Wheee! Santa shopping!

Lovely day today. Got to spend my Santa money! Well some of it anyway. I had to deposit part of it in my checking account to cover some holiday indulgences....

But I digress. I went to Costco bright and early, with every intention of joining. I had eaten some of the food from there that my parents gave me last week. I gave the store a good going over, and some of the products they had looked really good. The produce section was very nice, but they didn't have many of the items I consistently buy from BJ's, my old discount club. BJ's has their own brand of multi-vitamins for men which is excellent. I saw only brand name vitamins at Costco. They didn't have frozen broccoli spears (which I eat a LOT of), only florets, which don't work for Decadent Baked Broccoli. They also didn't have the mini-quiches that Justin and I love. They had another kind done in phyllo dough. The spinach ones were very good, but the others had salami in them - ugh. Overall, they had a really good selection of prepared food, but they didn't have as good a selection of ingredients, I thought, which I mainly what I buy in bulk.

So I went down to BJ's and got a membership there. Then I went shopping! I bought stuff for the freezer, and new Fat Pants (thanks to the holiday eating). It was wonderful. They also had a beautiful salmon fillet on sale for half price, which I took home and promptly Teriyakied for lunch. Delicious! The only disappointment was the little quiches. Some idiot decided to change the recipe, and put fucking bacon in all of them! DAMMIT!! They've only sold about a blue million of them, so I guess the recipe needed to be changed. Git.

Tonight was Paul's (my brother-in-law) birthday dinner at his parents house. It was very nice. His poor mother had cooked all day, and then was so tired and sick from the heat in the kitchen, she couldn't even enjoy the meal. That woman makes a macaroni pie so good that angels would weep. She told me her secret, and I am sure going to try it the next time I make one. She says the secret is to make the pie ahead of time, and let it sit before you bake it, which I never do. Easy enough to try. She also gave me both of her pound cake recipes I have been wanting, both of which are shortening free. I have been looking for a shortening free pound cake recipe for some time, and now I have a chocolate one too! Bonus! Can't wait to try them. Her chocolate pound cake is supposed to be delicious. Oddly enough, you start both recipes in a cold oven, which I have never heard of. Interesting. They are RICH cakes though. Like 5 eggs each, whipping cream, the whole 9 yards.

So I have new pants that don't impede blood flow, and new recipes to try. Yay!