Random Violence

The thing about random violence is that it is random, and it is violent. It is also devastating and unbelievably unsettling. And because it is about being in the wrong place at the wrong time, you can't do much about preventing it. You just have to deal with the consequences after the fact.

My family learned this horrid lesson this week an awful way when my aunt was brutally assaulted, although in her case, it turned out the wrong place was her own front yard and the wrong time was late afternoon.

I am having a hard time wrapping my brain around the type of person who could commit such a senseless and inhumane act. I can comprehend the carjacking and the purse-stealing, but I just can't process the brutality of such a severe beating and assault of a nearly 70 year old woman. I just can't imagine the depravity of someone who could do that to someone's grandmother.

That is the terror of random violence.

Buying "right" and the best banana bread

One of the things I've figured out over the last few years is how to better approximate how much food we'll eat and use. I stopped going to Costco; I stopped buying so much food at once. Instead, I now grocery shop twice a week and concentrate on what we actually need for those days. I used to buy large quantities of food and I'd end up throwing too much of it away. I admit to having to throw away leftovers, but rarely now do I toss uncooked meat and vegetables. I still overbuy on fruit, but I'm getting better. I actually found that by shopping my local grocery and buying the correct amounts, I spend less than if I'd bought more food with a discount at the bigger stores.

So that brings me to banana bread. My younger son and I are the big banana consumers in our house. My husband will occasionally eat one smashed with honey on toast, but the little guy and I normally each eat one banana/day. So, I buy accordingly. But, it turns out that some days one of us doesn't really want a banana. So I always have leftover bananas.

As a result, I went on a massive hunt for the best banana bread recipe to use up the leftover bananas. The recipe I'd used for years (I think this was the first banana bread I'd ever made, at the age of 12) was a fairly complicated, multi-step process. It had a lot of ingredients, and although delicious, wasn't something I was eager to make every week. (I can't find a link to the recipe, but sometime I'll post that recipe as I made my mom turn over the Elsah Landing cookbook where I'd found it this Christmas).

Instead, I've subsituted this great recipe from Elise. Her site is fabulous, with lots of delicious recipes. Since I use it as is, rather than reproduce it, I've linked to it, with the added bonus that you can go exploring her great recipes.

Just a couple of notes:

1. I have never tried not to use a wooden spoon.
2. I find that it takes about 50 minutes in my oven.
3. It works best with 3 - 3.5 bananas. You go the full four and you need to make mini muffins out of some, as it overfills the cake pan.
4. I love my silicon loaf pan.
5. Elise says you can reduce the sugar and you definitely can.
6. A couple of times, I haven't stirred it enough after adding the baking soda. Make sure the baking soda is evenly dispersed through the batter, but try not to overwork the batter.
7. Feel free to add in nuts or mini chocolate chips. They make a delicious add-in.

That's all. I have some banana bread in the oven as we speak. Can't wait....

Green Dilemmas

So, like a lot of people, we're trying to lead a greener life. That means many things, but primarily making changes, big and small, in how we live. We try to be more thoughtful consumers; we try to drive less and use less.

Some choices are pretty obvious. I bring my own bags to the store (they're in the car, so even for quick trips to Walgreens I have them available). I look for products with less packaging. I try to cook as much from scratch as possible. We joined a CSA so that we could get produce grown within 70 miles of our home (we have yet to get our first basket, so I can't report on that yet). I combine errands and try to think about how much I drive.

But other choices aren't so obvious.

• Is it using less carbon if I drive the 20 miles to and from the store where I can get locally sourced produce? Or, is it better if I stop at the store a couple blocks away (and where I don't drive out of my way) where the produce has been trucked in from goodness knows where?
• Is it better to support the small local hardware store, even though they probably get their products from the same Chinese manufacturers as a big box store?
• Is organic produce always more green, even if it's been shipped from Mexico?

I just read this book called Farewell My Subaru, where the author moves to a small ranch in Southwest New Mexico and tries to take himself off the grid and make his carbon footprint as small as possible. He talks about some of the conundrums he faces in trying to accomplish his goals of a carbonless lifestyle. If you start to think about it, many of those choices and decisions aren't that clear.

Seriously...it makes my head hurt to think of these things.