In which I enjoy a lovely, relaxing weekend at home.
Saturday I carried boxes down from the attic and Gramma and I spent the day redecorating for the holiday. All the framed photos from the corner cabinet were boxed up, all the Santas were unpacked, and things were dusted and arranged and displayed. We had fun.
Sunday I drove the car to the store; I get to drive the car this week since Gramma’s ankle is wrapped up and she can’t fit her foot into any of her shoes. When we got home, Gramma baked butterscotch oatmeal cookies.
Sunday night I cooked. I made Indian food: channa masala, cumin rice, and cucumber raita. Gramma had seconds. Then we had tea and cookies for dessert and discussed cake-baking.
I learned that when margarine first hit the market, the dairy farmers lobbied and made it illegal for margarine to be sold butter-colored. It used to come white with a small capsule of yellow food coloring it, and you’d pour the coloring in and mix it up yourself. If you got lazy, your margarine would end up with bright-yellow and white streaks in it. Weird little historical details such as these fascinate me.
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so far as i know, margarine still comes that way in quebec. though i could be wrong.
I’ve been eating margarine on my toast since I moved in with Gramma, but before that I hadn’t eaten it – except in restaurants, probably – for YEARS. -m
I don’t recall you ever ‘decorating’ at your grammy’s so ‘redecorating’ would be incorrect. You spent the day ‘decorating’ for the holiday. Geese. I take no pleasure in correcting you, dufus.
Are you ever pleasant? *lol* -m
And Ma Ingalls used to color her butter with carrot juice. But colored or not, I’ll take butter over margarine any day. I’m told you can set margarine out for weeks and it won’t rot or get eaten by bugs–nasty little non-food substance, that margarine is.
I much prefer butter. Margarine is weird. -m
I prefer butter as well but I greatly enjoyed the quick history lesson. Although Earth Balance is pretty dern good.
Butter IS better. -m