Weekend Rewind

     This weekend was jam packed with all sorts of fun activities. And it doesn't look like i'm going to be slowing down any time soon.  

     

     The weekend chaos started on Friday when i finally managed to get my mother to teach me her meatballs recipe. If you thought i was kidding about the "only cooking for a lot of people" in my previous post, here's a prime example. The meatball recipe called for over 6 pounds of meat. i made at least five dozen meatballs out of that. Thankfully they freeze really well, and my sister who's kitchen is still being remodeled, is very thankful for the re-heatable meatballs to have on hand.  

     

     STILL! I turned, and cooked meatballs from just before 7pm till practically midnight. That was way way way too much. I will be actively working on cutting down the recipe to a much more manageable portion.


     Next time i make them though, I'm going to tweak some of the ingredients and how they're prepared. For instance, i don't like getting a huge chunk of onion when biting into the meatballs. So i'm going to mince them up instead of just dicing. Celery will all be food processed. My sister suggested i mix in sausage meat with the ground meat. And the meat definitely needs more garlic and more spices. They're good, but they're more bland than i would prefer.   

     

     This also reminded me that i really need a better way to store my spices. The few that i have are currently sitting on a turn table that they fall off of every time i turn it. So, in other words not ideal.  

     

     I'm already short on counter space, so a while ago, i put my microwave up on a riser so when i opened the door to the microwave, it wouldn't knock over any food i had waiting to go in. This worked great except it became a catch all for random things like my bike water bottle and my cake icing technique book.  

     

     But, armed with a 20% off coupon i snagged from my parent's place, i went and purchased a spice rack from Bed Bath and Beyond. I then placed new spice rack underneath the my microwave and it FIT....just barely. Check out how awesomely close this fit is!!!

     How's that for eyeballing? Note: This rack is designed to stand upright but the hook on the top just looked like a drawer pull to me which gave me the idea. It's also pulled forward to show how small of a gap there is so i'm not loosing any of my food prep area. It pushes back about six inches.  

     

     I'll just be replacing some of the more off-beat ones like Curry and Cumin, and Celery seed (not getting rid of them, just replacing the contents of the jars) for things like Lemon Pepper, Garlic Salt, Onion Powder, and Hungarian Paprika which i use on a much more regular basis.  
     
     Also this weekend was a slew of video game playing, cleaning, helping Lindsey move and playing cat and mouse with the property manager at my complex.  

     

     One thing: Am i crazy for expecting a manager to reply to an email within a day or two? Not a WEEK without a word in response to three emails and then i get a call saying "we haven't heard from you...are you staying or moving out?". I wonder if the girl in the office wrote his email down wrong, cause i checked it several times. And then, once i talk to him, and he says "I'll call you back within a couple hours" and not hear from him until I CALL HIM five hours later.  

     

     This company's office staff is painfully bad at keeping their promises. After a year, i'm not surprised. But it still grates on my nerves to no end.   

     

     Right now, I've turned in my notice to vacate with his promise that he'll see if he can do better than raising my rent 75$. Theoretically, i should be hearing from him before the end of today. *eye roll* 


We'll see what happens.