"Tokonoma" with African Art

I didn't really do a lot today other than herd cats, look up news on the Internet, read the ★ SPECIAL ★ HOLIDAY ★ DOUBLE ★ ISSUE ★ of "The Economist", and do some cooking.  

I got especially excited about the article "Nollywood: Lights, Action, Africa" on the Nigerian film industry that has become the second most prolific producer of films behind India's Bollywood. I was fascinated by the ingenuity the film makers, promoters and distributers use to make the best of a disparate free market system where they know their films will be pirated within weeks of their release, but realize that the pirates create distribution networks that reach audiences that they would have no access to by normal, legal distribution networks. It's an awkward symbiosis that works for the benefit of the film industry, the pirates and the consumers.

Laurie cooked a simply divine swine and bovine loaf with stout beer and cheddar cheese from one of the eight meat loaf recipes in the latest Fine Cooking Magazine. It had all kinds of vegetables and spices, and we used premium ground sirloin, pork and bacon from Keller's Farm Store. Laurie got wild chopping up a piece of hard, sourdough French bread with a Chinese meat cleaver. The bread was so hard that half the time the cleaver would only cut halfway into the baguette. When she got the cleaver to chop through the bread, pieces flew across the kitchen. Laurie had a great time laughing with every chop! 

I peeled boiled potatoes and mashed them together with buttermilk and fresh grated horseradish. I ate some of the mashed potatoes with green chile and cheddar cheese, which made a marvelous combination of flavors. Laurie sprinkled Parmigiano Reggiano Stravecchio on her mashed potatoes, which she said was excellent.

The kitties were out and in all day. Mama Manx got up on the roof and acted pitiful, coming down to a railing where I could reach her, making me pick her up and bring her inside. She will eventually get down on her own; but then she tells me off for not rescuing her and making her get down by herself when I let her in. Kitties are a lot like kids in the games they like to play and the rituals they like to follow.

I suspect that my immune system has gone south again. I've been very sniffly, have a slight sore throat, mild headache and low energy. I am trying very hard not to get sick, as I don't want to end up in the hospital or spend another week getting infusions of antibiotics. The side effects of chemo seem to go on and on!

Stout & Cheddar Meat Loaf

Puck