status report 2

The spaghetti sauce is done and quite kick-ass. The beef burgundy... well, it's 2:20AM as I type this, and the beef's got to simmer until about 3:15AM. I'm thinking of simply pulling an all-nighter. And why not? I still need to finish grading those final exams. I have only five left, but grading takes me a while because it's one of my least favorite activities (surprise, surprise).

Back to the food. The beef burgundy looks and smells the way it should; I followed online recipe suggestions to stick with a dry wine like a Cabernet Sauvignon, and the result is something that looks and smells remarkably like, well, beef burgundy. Being the onion hater that I am, I did engage in some sacrilege: I used onion powder in lieu of actual onions. Another reason for this, however, is that I want my buddy Tom to be able to sample some of the food. Tom refuses to eat vegetables, you see, and for whatever reason, his body seems to think this rather significant dietary omission is perfectly fine: Tom remains in perfect health despite decades of vegetable-avoidance. "It's not the taste; it's the texture," he tells me by way of explaining his longstanding hatred of all things plantlike. Actually, strike that: there are certain vegetabular entities Tom will eat, such as potatoes (which, according to Tom, only barely qualify as vegetables). Anyway, I'm hoping he'll sample some of the beef. I know for a fact that he'll avoid my spaghetti sauce like the plague: too many veggies. No big loss: I was hoping to save the spaghetti sauce for my students, anyway.


UPDATE: It's almost 4AM now. Time for a quick nap, then up at 6 to trek on over to class early and prep for four parties. Oy.


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