Homebound – Dining Options

With Covid-19 and self-isolation, we do miss being able to go out and actually eat in a restaurant.  However, even if we could, the risk would be far too great!  All of our meals are at home now but we have used take out and we’ll continue to do so in our support of local restaurants.

So what kinds of basic foods have we been enjoying?

As I mentioned in a previous post, our neighbor Sherry brought us some blueberry muffins.  I took the ‘responsibility’ of consuming the last one after heating in the microwave with butter…and then drizzling it with a little honey!

One of the best (or favorite) purchases in recent years was our Waring Pro Waffle Maker!  The other morning, Laurie whipped up some luscious waffles for breakfast.  Add Amish butter and genuine pure maple syrup and we were happy campers…

We love waffles…but not just any waffles!  We almost never order them in restaurants.  We’ve been ‘spoiled’ by the Carbon’s Golden Malted Pancake and Waffle Mix that we buy at our local World Market.  That malt flavor really kicks the waffles up a notch.  Carbon’s must be doing something right as they’ve been around since 1937!

Then of course, there is the old classic…Kraft’s Mac ‘n Cheese.  We dressed it up a bit, adding a lot more shredded sharp cheddar cheese, a small can of peas and sliced up hot dogs.  Ultimate comfort food!  Laurie likes hers with paprika and I like mine with a bit of Tabasco… We got 2 meals out of the big family size box.

We love a good pot roast so a few days ago Laurie put one together for us.  It was excellent!  The best part is that this is one of those meals that just keeps on giving.  We had open face hot roast beef sandwiches one night and we used the leftover potatoes with eggs and bacon for breakfast one morning.  Even then there was enough pot roast and gravy left over for me to have one more open face sandwich!

We like tuna salad and chicken salad… This is my version of tuna salad!  A can of prime tuna is mixed with mayonnaise, shredded sharp cheddar cheese, slices of celery, pepper, a hot spice mix, onion powder and garlic.  Laurie made 3 lunches from it and the crackers and tuna salad shown above was my lunch one day…

The last time we were at Costco, I picked up a package of sliced Kirkland Oven Roasted Turkey Breast.  So, one night for dinner we had celery and carrot sticks and some very tasty turkey and cheese sandwiches.  It was another satisfying meal.  Also I like having this in the fridge because if I get a ‘hunger pang’, it’s much better if I grab a slice of turkey than some kind of carb loaded snack food.

We did get out to the Ingles Grocery Store in Lenoir City the other day to pick up a few things to complement our on-hand food supplies.  While we were there, we picked up some fried chicken.  They make good fried chicken and we bought enough for dinner as well as the leftovers shown above.

OK…I messed up yet again!  Laurie breaded, seasoned and baked a couple of beautiful thick boneless pork chops that we’d purchased at Costco.  They were amazing and, prepared like this, they are among my favorite entrees.  Unfortunately, I forgot to take a photo when they were served.  This little 5 oz. hunk of leftover pork chop served me well for lunch on Sunday.

I am not much of a TV watcher.  I do like HGTV, Live PD, national news, Sunday Morning on CBS, nature, animal shows and the like.  If there was any golf or football I would watch some of those matches.  My big problem is boredom!  If I sit in front of the TV for long, the inaction ‘merits’ a snack! 

Still, given the times we are all going through, I have begun to watch the occasional movie…which leads to a snack.  Hence Orville Redenbacher’s Ultimate Butter Gourmet Popping Corn the other night when we watched 2014’s “The Equalizer” starring Denzel Washington.  We both like action movies, especially when ‘wrongs’ are ‘righted’!  Now we’ll have to indulge in 2018’s “The Equalizer 2’… 

FYI, we did add some Amish butter to the mix!  Would it surprise you if I mentioned that I sprinkled Tabasco on my popcorn?

…and finally, how about some cookies.  Who can live without an occasional taste of something sweet and satisfying?  As they say, older folks do crave sweets more than younger folks.  We do limit ourselves in this regard but Laurie did make up a couple of batches of cookies lately.  The first batch was Nestlé’s Chocolate Chips…and all but 2 of those cookies were delivered to our neighbors Sherry and Mike.  This is what remains of a batch of Nestlé’s White Chocolate Chip Macadamia Nut cookies.  Yum!

Just click on any of the photos to enlarge them…

Thanks for stopping by for a visit!

Stay Well and Take Care, Big Daddy Dave