food and drink yesterday (and covid-safe socializing)

[mellowtigger]

I don't "cook", not the way people usually mean that word. I make my own single-dish meals, but that's as fancy as it gets.  For most of my life, I never bought meat for use at home, because I never trusted myself to store and cook meat safely. That calculation has changed slightly with the air fryer, though. I can buy packages of 2 chicken breasts at the grocery store, then use it that day and the next. Easy and safe.

 
Yesterday, I ate what turned out to be an excellent combination. I've lived here for 7 years, but this week was the first time I finally visited the nearby "Good Deal Oriental Foods". Besides a wide range of fruits and vegetables that I've never seen at other stores, they also had a giant 4-pound bag of these Assi sweet potato noodles. The package said "gluten free" right there in big letters, so I had to buy some! It'll take me a month to eat all of it, but it makes a very nice change of pace from my usual bed of brown rice.

1. Start the chicken breast in the air fryer (use the preset "steak" icon), then set a pot of water to boil.
2. When it's boiling, add a handful of noodles for 3 minutes. It and the chicken finish at the same time.
3. Empty the hot water, drop the noodles into a giant bowl. Use a pizza cutter to roll across the noodles in crosshatch in that bowl to cut them up easily.
4. Add pre-cooked collard greens (I used half of a can) and a heaping tablespoon of Patak's Vindaloo Curry spice paste. Mix it all together well.
5. Drop the chicken breast on top.

With rice, it's easier to eat meals like this with a giant spoon. Those noodles, though, require a fork. It was surprisingly yummy. I will eat this mixture again, I'm sure.

Later in the afternoon, I joined the local Boys & Brews club at La Doña Cerveceria, my 3rd favorite brewery in Minneapolis from pre-pandemic days.  I went early, wore my Flo Mask elastomeric (with mask area shaved clean for good fit) when I went indoors to order, and I kept my Woody Knows nasal filter when I removed the mask to drink outdoors.  If you look closely at the large version of this picture, you can see the plastic band across the bottom of my nose where I can easily pull the filters back out again.

It was only 8C/46F outside, but the other dozen guys wimped out after 45 minutes outside then went indoors.  I'm still not doing indoor stuff, so I sat outside and read the local gay magazine on my own.  That magazine had this feature story which included a male couple who met a few years ago at one of these Boys & Brews events.  How's that for a fun coincidence?

Anyway, I took the photo of myself alone outside, just as proof that I do sometimes attend social events, even during pandemic.  As I learned dating for 1.5 years a guy with AIDS back in the 1990s (and I never seroconverted), I know that it is possible to safely enter high risk situations that you choose to be part of.  Staying negative is equal parts luck and effort, but you just can't skimp on the effort part.

Stay safe out there.  And, just for grins, wash your hands and face when you get back home.

Comments

[mtbc]

Last winter I sure had my wool coat on for some outdoor dining and put my gloves back on after I was done eating. Typically not worth the risk to eat/drink indoors.

[mellowtigger]

Yeah, I was disappointed that so very many people (not just this group) were there indoors and unmasked the whole time. I understand. They do it because they receive the messaging that if they survived 1 infection then they're fine from now on. Obviously, that's not how I understand what's happening. More on that issue on Monday, I think.

In more interesting news, no matter how many times it happens at these Boys & Brews events, it always surprises me that so many of the guys there came out very late in life, and some of them have children older than some of the gay men attending these social events. The social world in the USA really did change dramatically in some ways during the last 50 years. Straight bars (like this one) stock the local gay magazine at their front door, just like any other local community newsletters. Socially, the Twin Cities are very much like Austin Texas that way.

[mtbc]

Definitely plenty seem to think (a) a single negative nasal swab early into symptoms means not-COVID and (b) vaccinated people do just fine anyway. It's an attractive thing to want to believe and the government does little to suggest otherwise. It's great right now to be in a country that still has plenty of masking.

Yeah, I think in many places it's maybe only this millennium that it became at all comfortable to come out, and even then only in some cities, even now I assume it's one of the many things that throws the urban/rural divide into sharp relief. I mean, sure, I had friends who came out beforehand, but I suspect it was more a case of personal necessity than comfort.

[shimmerwine]

Air fryers are da bomb! Still can't believe I waited so long to get one! And an InstantPot. Don't use it enough, but it's worth it just for steaming potatoes for mashers. So damned good!

I refuse to eat in a restaurant or go to a bar, still. I wear a mask every time I walk out my front door due to my health. Taking the chance around others is just not worth the risk. I'm the loner, which sucks. I wear one outside when people are close, too.