Thursday, December 29, 2011

The Last Thursday Of 2011 Hiking The Wilderness Area Where I Live With Homeless People & Beef Stroganoff

Fort Worth Water Tank
Today I decided to do something radically different.

The radical difference consisted of going on a walk without going on a drive to get to a place to walk.

This turned out to be much more adventurous than I anticipated it would be.

I left my abode, headed east and then south through the Albertsons parking lot. Then walked west on Bridge Street past some fast food joints.

Crossed the street to Krogers where I got sour cream for the Beef Stroganoff I'm making for lunch.

Left Krogers, heading south, up a hill, back to Bridge Street, then headed west towards Fort Worth's East Regional Library.

My plan was to walk the trail that I've noticed, for years, that is under a power line/utility right of way that a road leads to just to the west of the big Fort Worth water tank you see in the picture.

All was going well, walking under the power lines, til I came to an area where water was leaking in amounts copious enough to make for a muddy passage.

A lot of heavy equipment work had rutted up the area under the power lines. I saw drilling equipment. I could not figure out what the nature of the heavy equipment's project was.

The trail grew continually more difficult. Soon I was going cross country. No trail. At one point I had to jump a ditch that was running water. That wrenched my shoulder, somehow. The pain was bad, but quickly abated.

Eventually I came to a spot where heavy equipment had run over the land, making a sort of a trail, which, ironically. took me back to Krogers.

In the open field due north of Krogers I saw a big pile of garbage which caused me to mutter to myself about some Texans and their garbage disposal methods.

I was in mid-mutter when a guy popped out of the garbage and headed towards me. It was a young guy, looked to be in his 20s, maybe older. The garbage was his shelter. It'd been awhile since I'd seen a homeless person. I had no idea there were homeless people living so close to the place I call home.

If I was a nicer guy than I am I'd probably bring the homeless guy some Beef Stroganoff.

It was really good.

Beef Stroganoff is my favorite thing I learned to make during my stay in Moscow.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yeah Moscow, Idaho I'm assuming.

I hope Washington loses to Baylor in the Alamo Bowl tonight. I think the game is tonight.

cd0103 said...

Please share recipe. I need a good Beef Stroganoff recipe.

Durango said...

Anonymous, I did not know Washington was playing Baylor in the Alamo Bowl tonight. So, I have no opinion regarding this serious matter.

cd0103---After watching Heather get sent home from Top Chef last week for her Beef Stroganoff, I Googled for info about it, because Heather's looked like no Stroganoff I'd ever seen. Apparently all over the world there are variations.

For today's I cooked a couple pounds of beef stew meat in Worcestershire Sauce, slow cooking with a lid over the pan. Added 2 diced up sweet onions, a pound of fresh sliced mushrooms. When the mushrooms were cooked enough I added a large can of crushed tomatoes, a lot of granulated garlic, one can of fat-free condensed mushroom soup, pepper and salt. Then let it all simmer. Then tweaked the taste with salt, pepper, garlic and Worcestershire Sauce. Boiled a pound of wide egg noodles. Then when the noodles are done, drain and pour the whole mess together and mix it all up.

It was too tasty. So I ate too much at lunch. Which is being compounded by the arrival this afternoon of my mom and dad's Christmas cookies.

Anonymous said...

You made, no doubt a tasty dish but not Beef Stroganoff--sour cream (or Greek yogurt for calorie conscious) is the defining ingredient and always mushrooms, sour cream & butter.
Get a lean cut of beef. Stick in freezer for about an hour to stiffen for cutting ease. Cut paper thin slices, flash butter saute. Remove. Keep juices, add more butter, and saute onions/garlic, worcestershire, dry mustard and whatever you like spice wise. Add sliced mushrooms until they weep. Add sour cream, sea salt and plentiful cracked pepper. Put in cooked almost rare slices. Serve ASAP over egg noodles and don't forget fresh parsley. Freezes well. Have heart attack at 3:00 a.m.

Durango said...

I am in a state of shock. I forgot to add sour cream to my directions as to how to make Beef Stroganoff. Anonymous is totally right. It ain't Beef Stroganoff without the sour cream. I did mention I'd bought sour cream at Krogers for the Stroganoff. I hope cd0103 realized my omission.

And I just this minute read an email from Betty Jo Bouvier telling me she is making my version of Beef Stroganoff, tonight, for New Year's Eve. I can only hope Betty Jo remembered the sour cream.

What we can all learn from this is we can not trust me for accurate directions for cooking anything.

cd0103 said...

Thanks! Bookmarking the page now. Sounds yummy.

Durango said...

Anonymous commenter #1 had it right, Anonymous commenter #2. It was the Moscow in Idaho, not the one in Russia. I probably should have been more precise. Then again, I can't even remember to put sour cream in a Beef Stroganoff recipe.