Saturday, June 30, 2007

Putting a life together

This weekend the agenda is to study for Spanish final on Tuesday and prepare for Thursday, when I will be going to Ireland for about 5 weeks for a little quality time. The Spanish thing, it's boring. I don't wanna. But preparing for a trip is always a little exciting and a little nerve-wracking at the same time. Making sure all your clothes are washed, that you haven't lost your passport, that you pack plenty of Cetaphil because you can't get superior face wash like that in Irish drugstores. I guess you could buy yourself some Clinique or Dior or Clarins or something, if you're not picky about quality.
And that's the trick: stocking up on the things you can't live without first, then making sure you are supplied with the things that make your life happy and homey, things you won't be able to get once you've arrived at your destination. Passport and cell phone? Essential to survival. Cetaphil and Twinkies? Essential to maintaining sanity.
I have been worried about this for some time, that when the time comes in the not too distant future for me to spend very extended periods of time in Eireann (and I know I have expressed some concern about this before) that I will not be able to manage my usual intake of Tex-Mex and fried things. In anticipation of this, I took up cooking with delusional enthusiasm. After sitting in front of the Food Network for an embarrassing amount of time and making multiple attempts to recreate the biscuits they serve at Cracker Barrel, I had a breakthrough. Wednesday I ran across Homesick Texan totally by accident. Homesick Texan is a blog managed by a Lone Star native living in New York that appeared magically out of the ether specifically for my benefit. For the first couple of days I thought I was the only one who could see it, but it eventually dawned on me that there must be lots of displaced brothers and sisters looking for a decent biscuit recipe. It is more than a blog, it is a love letter to Texas and the culinary wonders that call it home. She has recipes for all the classics like sopapillas, tamales, and chicken fried steak as well as ways to ship cases of Blue Bell ice cream and Big Red (the soda, not the gum) to someone you love.
I will take this miracle and put it in my pocket, because now I am armed with the tools I need. I now have a recipe in my possession for buttermilk biscuits that rivals Cracker Barrel's, and I will let nothing bring me down and I will bring buttermilk biscuits to the Irish and I will tell them FOR THE LAST TIME DANGIT THEY ARE NOT CALLED SCONES!

1 comment:

Lisa Fain (Homesick Texan) said...

Thank you so much for your lovely words--I'm glad you're enjoying the blog!