Gary's Third Pottery Blog

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Gary's third pottery blog

WRITE TO ME! garyrith@yahoo.com Come see me! Open studio HERE! November 25-26 (11-4 each day); Aurora Art and Design, daily until 12/24; Cooperstown Art Assoc. daily until 12/24; Ellis Hollow Community Fair, 12/10; December 10, Little Red Wagon at the Space at Greenstar. All material on this blog unless stated otherwise is copyright Gary Edward Rith 2016

Thursday, September 22, 2011

a hawt and spicy evening.....a reflection on men and women...

The wife and I picked apples from the neighbor's tree, and prepared to make apple pear chutney. I wish I could say we picked the pears, raisens, spice and onion too, but we picked them up at the store. You say "what is chutney?" and I answer "sort of a salsa-jam thing from India." You lay out all these tasty Indian foods on your plate with rice and bread, then add dollops of hot chutney here and there, like you would would with salsa or ketchup, but chutney is made with fruit and hot peppers :)

How do you make it, you ask? Similar to jam or apple sauce. Dice pears and apples, cup of raisens, sugar, vinegar, boatload of spice and hot peppers, boil for an hour, then put into sterilized jars, HUZZAH! Eat up the next day and for many days to come...

But here is the difference between men and women, or maybe, just this man and this woman. The wife is a detail obsessed type, good with accounting and the like, and I am a slob. SO, recipe in hand, the wife is captain of this chutney ship, reading directions, wearing her tidy apron, while her husband disregards the directions behind her back, randomly chopping and throwing things into the pot. At one point she was like
"stop that! measure those apples!" and I am like
"I don't need to, it looks about right" and she grabs things and measures, and, um, I had prepared enough for a double batch, not one, so I was like
"OH! I s'pose that is good to know, that we are, um, making a double batch now" and she is like, glaring at me...then we get to the spice, the cloves, cinnamon and whatnot, and I grab jars and start to shake
again "what are you doing! we need a 1/4 teaspoon!" (does such a measure exist??????) and I am like
"the more the better! its chutney!!!!" and she is like
"forget giving this to anybody!!!!" angrily trying to open and measure the cinnamon and I am like
"gimme!!!!" and grab and dump, seeing that there is, I dunno, not too many spoonfuls left in the jar, figuring, its time to start a new one, but at that point she is MAD and the apron comes off and she starts to huff away
"noooo! come back! I'll behave! you were right about the double batch part!" and she returns saying
"I am in charge, alright?" and the dutiful husband is like
"OH! Of course!" and I take a huge hunk of ginger and begin chopping and she is like
"what are you doing! I thought I was in charge?" and I smile guiltily and pass it over...about ten times the amount of ginger required...but she dices it and tosses it in saying
"we canNOT give this away, how do you explain that it is a ginger bomb?"

Stuff boiled a little more than an hour and we got a few STRONG cups of chutney, and a hawt and spicy smelling house. I give the wife credit for putting up with me, but I figured chutney is like salsa: take it easy and throw in a ton of stuff!

And the next day, eating it with rice? UNBELIEVEABLY yummy :)

12 comments:

Kimberly said...

Oh yum! We made it recently with some PA peaches and some cranberries we had frozen from last winter. Same thing....lotsa spice, raisins, some nuts for a little crunch...and its so great with potato pancakes, Indian dhals and rice which we love and just about any scrambled eggs.

Super yummy.

~ Sil in Corea said...

I wonder if I could do it with apples and grapes; someone just gave me a ginormous slew of Concord grapes! Whaddya think?

Hilary said...

That looks delicious... whatever you each did.. worked.

Unknown said...

It looks delicious.

Although you pulling that stuff on me with MY chutney recipe would not have gone down well...

I'd have joined your wife in that huff...and then some.

:-D

Knight said...

With my ex I used to get so ticked off at him for both being bossy and being a mess in the kitchen. When I was cooking he wasn't allowed in.

Janet said...

sounds like me and Dave :-)

Joyful Things said...

ha ha. I cook like that. When my husband is making something from a recipe he calls me and says "ok I put the stuff in that's in the recipe, what else do you put in....."
I love Chutney - good for you for making it. And as for give aways? I'll send you my address.

Unknown said...

Chutney sounds way yummy....can identify with you Gary, I am the one always in trouble. As a matter of fact I just stated today, "All these rules, who makes all these rules anyway"? hahhahahha! When we do pottery together, here comes George with the ruler, caliper, and me yelling, "NO, NO, NO"! Worry about your own stuff, leave mine alone....hahahahhaha! George cannot cook so that is a blessing to me.....

Reverend Awesome said...

I think I'm a better baker than cook. I'm good with the measuring and all that. Cooking? I never know what to add that's going to make something taste better. More of this, less of that? I dont know. I just want it to work out and be edible.

Jenn @ Juggling Life said...

I am sure the chutney is delicious.

I would not recommend the two of you hang wallpaper together--that's as close as divorce as we've ever come!

gz said...

just wait til that chutney matures!

kate et jim said...

I was beginning to hyperventilate just reading your post, Gary. I'd have walked off, too.

Good thing it's edible. ;)

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I am a full-time studio potter, sculptor, and dog walker, married to superhawt Missus Tastycake.