Weekend update, March 11, 2013

“Life is what happens to you 
 

while you're busy making other plans.” 

Allen Saunders

When I hear this phrase

my mind picks it up and flips it like a shiny quarter. The phrase lands in my imagination heads up and it's an imperative command to make a plan and prepare for the future. The phrase lands heads down and it becomes a warning: there's a plan ahead,  like a collapsed bridge ahead or a landslide ahead- only the nature of time means that the plan ahead is actually traveling toward you at breakneck speed and if you don't watch out, if you stand too still, that plan may just.....

well, you get the idea

I wonder if perhaps some of history's most interesting moments occurred when a well-laid plan went sideways:

"this was not the plan!
those cleaners swore they'd deliver!"

"Awesome! I thought they were planning on a
simple 'congratulations on your victory' type
floral arrangement."

"Uhhh...Houston? We seem to have taken 

a wrong turn. We may have to scrap that

Mars  plan. I think we've landed

on the moon"

This week, I did NOT get on the planned plane headed westbound; it was a last-hour change in plans that gave me a few more days in lovely Charlotte NC.

Days which we've managed to fill with fun and exploring and experimenting- and the food fun has been some of the best fun of all.

Here's some news- this all day pulled pork? Wow. Just....oh wow. The addition of coffee to the dry rub really does add a deep color and a sweet smokey flavor and wow, and oh my, and... well. One can only say "really really good" so many times before one becomes tiresome. We had the firstovers for a weeknight dinner with a carrot salad, and the first round of leftovers in lunchtime soft tacos the next day.

The change in plans made possible another blissey Saturday morning at the farmer's market in nearby Matthews, where we received inspiration for the entire weekend's meals. First up, the second round of pulled pork leftovers were topped with plain yogurt, fresh lettuce and tomatoes and wrapped up in the softest, puffiest flatbread that ever floated into your mouth:

so yummy. In case you're counting, that's
one great dinner and 2 lunches from one pork roast.
This makes my frugal heart happy.

I was introduced on Saturday night to a new favorite comfort food (thanks Andrew): this fantastic lamb ragu. 

And those things next to the ragu that look like cute little turnips are indeed cute little turnips. Tokyo cross turnips, to be precise:

We tossed them in olive oil, sprinkled them with salt, and roasted them whole at about 350 for about 20 minutes. Delicious, nutritious and (squeee!) adorable.  

And for breakfast Sunday morning, credit and respect are due to the same brilliant baker responsible for the aforementioned pillowy flatbread. One of Matthews Market's Queens of Carb:

Maigualida Rowe, of Baker's Blessing.
Long may she reign.

That's her brioche loaf she's holding (we scored the last one!) and she's smiling because she'd just told me how to turn it into the best bread pudding ever, and I'd listened.

Boy, did I listen.

Half of the brioche loaf and half a loaf of Maigualida's sweet potato bread were sliced, then cubed, tossed in Alton Brown's french toast mixture, and tipped into a greased baking dish. Per Maigualida's instructions, broken bits of half of a ghiradelli semisweet chocolate bar were tucked in among the cubes of soaking bread. The pudding slept in the fridge overnight and in the morning it was sprinkled with sugar and popped in in the oven at 350 for about an hour.

(The bottom and sides of the pudding were kept from getting hard with an improvised bain marie: I put the glass dish of pudding in a larger dish, poured in water till it was about half-way up the sides of the pan, and put that whole assemblage in the oven. Tomorrow I'm building a jetpack out of hairpins and paper clips.)

We munched on it warm for breakfast, and then for a mid afternoon treat, well....

we nibbled away an entire pan of this eggy
chocolatey wonder bread in less than 24 hours.

Do you know what I realized when plane plans changed this week?

That there was a plan under the plan.

That the immediate plan was all about accomplishing a deeper plan- a plan about loving people and being loved and have lots of fun in the loving.

And though one plan went awry, the loving and the fun still somehow happened.

 I hope that this week, if (and almost certainly when) you find yourself standing in the rubble of another carefully constructed plan, you realize the same thing.

I hope you see, through the dust of one fractured plan, the gleam of your bigger plans.

Your big plans to love people, to help the people you love love each other, and to have lots of fun in the loving.

I hope this week, if (and almost certainly when) that sort of love and fun happen, you maybe, just maybe, can step back, take a deep breath and a sip of coffee, and whisper to yourself

"Mission Accomplished"