I spent Thursday morning cooking a pan of green beans. It's not like I went out and picked them out of a garden I had lovingly tended all summer. I just opened two cans. But before that, I cut up some thick bacon and simmered it in the bottom of the pan. Then I added a diced onion. And the green beans. Ground some black pepper in it. They had to cook for an hour and a half, with me checking on them. I figured we could have them for a couple of days, at least.
Thursday evening we had country-fried steak sandwiches. They were frozen, without the gravy, but still pretty good on a bun with pickles and onions. Nice and crispy. For once, I didn't set out a plate for Farmer H, because I was busy slicing the onion when I called him to the kitchen. But I already had a slotted spoon laid out, since we know Farmer H does not like juice. His dill pickle slices were draining on a paper towel on the cutting block. Two slices of pepper jack cheese next to them. I set the plate of onion slices beside them. I even put out his buns, balancing them on the side of the onion-slice plate.
When I had called Farmer H to the kitchen, I asked if he was having his green beans on the plate, or in a bowl. He said "Probably a bowl." So I didn't set one out...
SWEET GUMMI MARY! When I turned around, I saw that Farmer H had taken a LARGE styrofoam bowl, and filled it with green beans and bacon. While I was looking into the pan to see if any green beans were left, Farmer H busied himself building his sandwich. ON THE ONION PLATE! I suppose he was just going to walk off with the entire onion.
"Hey! Why didn't you get a plate?"
"I thought this one would work. But I'll get a fancy one if you want."
"You ALWAYS get one of the thick paper plates. You never use the plain white ones that I use for slicing."
"Whatever."
I took half a small styrofoam bowl of green beans. That left almost as much as Farmer H had in his large bowl. So it looks like Farmer H will be having green beans the second night, and I won't.
It's not that I begrudge Farmer H an extra-large portion of green beans because I want them. It's the fact that I plan a certain amount of meals out of the food I prepare, so I don't have to cook something entirely different. When he takes over half the first night (even worse than Mr. Grant taking half the Veal Prince Orloff at Mary's dinner party!), I have to come up with a new dish sooner than I had anticipated.
Next time, I might be smart enough to put everything on the plate and in the bowl for him. Unless that has been his evil plan all along...
That is DEFINITELY his evil plan and maybe you should do it so that you get the required number of meals. Unless he goes back for seconds and then you're screwed.
ReplyDeleteRiver,
ReplyDeleteWhen we have something with extra servings, like a pot of beans, or soup... I encourage Farmer H to come back for seconds. But he won't! So I end up freezing part of it after we get three suppers from it.
Tonight he didn't take the rest of the green beans! Got a big bowl again, and only put less than half in it. I kept telling him to take more and finish them, but he wouldn't. So why did he get the BIG BOWL??? I think he saw how little was left, and played that "I didn't take the last of it" game. So I got half a small bowl from what he left.
This why I put HeWho's food on his plate. He has a bad habit of putting more food on his plate than he can actually eat. We all know I hate waste! He can have more if he wants, but it is a royal pain to put the food he leaves on his plate in containers to serve to him at another meal. We do give our dogs some things that we eat. They love green beans, but some things we don't. We shouldn't, Eddie is getting quite fat!
ReplyDeleteKathy,
ReplyDeleteThe only difference is, Farmer H CAN actually eat all he takes! Our poor dogs only get the not-so-tasty items that we don't scarf down. For instance, Farmer H said if I didn't want the beets he brought home from the Senior Center, we could give them to the dogs. I imagine the dogs would want them less than I did.