RatCreature's Journal

My meals recently have been somewhat odd because one of the major considerations has been that my food should also result in something tasty and fattening for sickly rats. So my lunch today has been cream of wheat pudding made with half milk and half cream and sugar (instead of just milk and no sugar like I normally make it) so Leo would get more calories with his lacking appetite. On the bright side, at least Leo was eager to eat some of it.

A few days ago I asked for advice how to fix the texture of my yeast plait, and got many helpful comments. I took the advice, got the more expensive bread flour higher in gluten, only softened not melted the butter, and kneaded a good deal longer, and it worked! The texture of the one I just baked is like it's supposed to turn out.

In the recent ep Diana claims that Neal's raw milk Pecorino cheese was illegal (Neal counters that it was a gift, not sold), which I found very strange. I know that there is more concern about risks of raw milk products in the US than elsewhere, but surely the US wouldn't outlaw all kinds of cheeses? What on earth would be sold as Parmesan cheese in the US for example (I mean if you want the non-ersatz kind, i.e. proper Parmigiano-Reggiano), if raw milk cheese was really illegal? Or Gruyère? Or any of the other common cheeses that need raw milk? It's not like raw milk is only used in obscure specialty cheeses foodie snobs seek out.

I've been wondering about carnivorous habits, and which animals people eat and which they avoid, thus a poll. (Vegetarians like me, feel free to answer for a period of your life when you ate animals. Obviously if you have never eaten any the poll is kind of moot.) For each you can pick a number from 0 to 3, where 0 = "I have never eaten this animal" (or an animal from a that group, as I bundled some), 1 = "I've tried it only once or twice", 2 = "I have been/am eating this every now and then" (e.g. animals you eat repeatedly but only on rare occasions, or as a treat), 3 = "this animal was/is a regular part of my diet".
( cut for length )

I'm wondering how many people are familiar with the situation that you are moderately hungry, but none of the food you have seems appealing in any way, and worse, you have no idea what you'd rather eat just now, even if the food of your choice could appear by magic.

I find this really frustrating. When this happens to me I either don't eat, and wait until I'm hungry enough that I don't actually care much about what I eat (but that sometimes leads to bad eating choices, also it is unpleasant to feel hungry for the time it takes for me to not be finicky anymore, usually about two skipped regular meals) or I just force myself to eat something that I have available. However that is unpleasant too, because I often start to feel sick of the taste of the food I have prepared way before I've consumed the usual amount of food I eat during a meal. Which maybe wouldn't be so bad, my weight being what it is, but then I actually go back to feeling hungry for that elusive unspecified thing not too long after. And it is the same thing all over again with the next meal.

This is really annoying. Also it takes any joy out of eating. :/ Besides, it seems messed up to feel appetite without it being either for something or just indiscriminate for somewhat tasty food. So do others have any strategies for this besides just waiting for the own wacky appetite to become normal again at some point?

I'm used to baking with butter (or in the rare cases that I've made vegan cake I got vegan margarine that on its label announced it as okay for baking). However butter prices being what they are (they are up to €1.05 as the cheapest for 250g again here -- food prices suck), I've been considering to substitute margarine, but the cheap non-vegan baking margarines have dubiously long ingredient lists, presumably to simulate butter taste and consistency. And of course there is the trans-fat prone hardening process issue that can come with margarines. (And the less scary vegan ones tend to cost about the same as butter or even more.)

So I've been wondering whether I could just use the neutral, no-frills vegetable fat you buy in cheap blocks as substitute for part of the butter, say half-half, and let some taste come from real butter, but cheaper as you'd only use half as much, and circumvent the whole margarine issue. That fat is just naturally hard fat with no other stuff in it, the kind you use for frying if you want hot temperatures. But then I wondered about the dough consistency and baking properties that would follow, as of course margarine is usually only about 80% fat with the rest water (same as butter I think) and softer at room temperature.

I mean, the problem of softening it enough could work through melting it at a low temperature, depending on the cake recipe I often do that with the butter anyway, but maybe you then would still need to add a bit less of the pure fat and more liquid to simulate the percentages.

Maybe I should just experiment and see whether the results are edible, but surely that kind of thing has been tried by many people, since it's not as if high butter prices are a new phenomenon?

I still haven't had any dinner, because it's clear that the Spanish custom to have dinner really late around ten or so in the evening, is the only sensible one in this this kind of heat. Any earlier is simply too hot to have any substantial appetite.

And this awful weather sucks for my food budget. In reaction to the intolerable temperatures I'm mostly subsisting on chilled yogurt and fruit and the like, which I'm sure is healthy and everything, but even in season fruits are expensive. Also, ultimately while tasty not all that satisfying.

I'm hungry, I have plenty of food at home, but I'm too sticky and lethargic to cook myself anything.

I am curious: When you are cooking, and tasting things, how careful are you not to get any of your saliva into the food? I.e. do you always meticulously use two spoons, or are there circumstances when you don't bother and put the same spoon you had in your mouth in contact with the food again?

So unlike last year, this year I've managed to get my homegrown tomato plants to actually produce some tomatoes. Not that many so far, probably because growing indoor in a flowerpot is less than ideal, but at least they do produce fruit. However the tomatoes don't actually taste significantly different or better to me than supermarket tomatoes. Well, they are somewhat smaller and their skin is a bit tougher, but they pretty much taste like a regular mass-produced tomato. OTOH at least I'm sure they have 100% less pesticides on them.

I finished assembling the rat cage, and while I don't have all the things for its interior yet, it's already obvious that it'll be much nicer for rats than the old one. For me too, because it'll be much easier to clean than my current cage, which I have to take apart for that.

I'm really pleased with the cage, even though at the moment it takes up all the space in the middle of the room where I assembled it, as the place where it's supposed to go in the other room is still occupied by my current cage. Unfortunately that will be the case for a while longer because the breeder advised that Ben and the eventual newcomers would have an easier time with each other if their home was new for all of them, if that was an option. I considered not assembling it yet, but the parts took up room too (if slightly less) and I also wanted to see whether all the parts were alright and fit together okay. I assembled it on a board with wheels so I can move it without problems at least, if I want to do anything in that room, like getting to the comics, watering the plant and the like.

So, first a "before picture" showing the ca. 65kg of metal parts I schlepped up five flights of stairs on Friday:
( a rat cage in parts )

After figuring out the instructions -- which thankfully weren't more complicated than for a piece of IKEA furniture, though unfortunately the pictures didn't show the screws, nuts and bolts and I had to figure out which parts were meant by the instruction sheet when it talked about things like "Ringnutbolzen", but mostly any part fit only in one kind of place so it was easier than expected -- and a couple of hours work I finally ended up with a cage that even looked like advertised:
( the picture is somewhat crappy, because I didn't have any room to get far enough away from it at a good angle to take a picture )

The lower two modules both have an inserted floor like this:
( a closer look a a module )

The openings between the modules (you can see the holes on the picture above) can be closed with either a solid barrier, a barrier with wire mesh if you want different groups of rats to be able to see and smell each other through them to get them used to each other or left open. So if I should have bad luck and Ben won't get along with the future new rats I could let them get used to each other slowly, or even keep them apart permanently without any problems or having to accommodate more than one cage in the room.

I chose the upper module without an inserted floor to turn it into a more free-style play area with room to put a larger climbing branch somewhere in the cage and maybe some longer winding plastic tubes, since my rats so far all have loved tubes a lot:
( right now the upper area looks very empty )

And because Ben looked ridiculously cute when he fell asleep next to me on my pillow:
( click for a cute sleeping rat )

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Finally, for the last day of that food log meme, today I ate:

• a latte, two slices of pumpkin seed bread, one with plum jam, the other with cream cheese and strawberry jam, for breakfast
• a satsuma, a banana and another latte during the morning
• three pancakes (one with strawberry jam, one with plum jam, and one with banana slices and cinnamon as toppings) for lunch
• a bowl of leftover butternut squash risotto with a piece of garlic bread for dinner

P.S.: Does anybody else get weird errors on all LJ scrapbook pages, i.e. specifically for me the page only partially loads and says "[Error: Can't locate object method "can_use_sms" via package "FB::User" at /home/lj/cgi-bin/LJ/Nav.pm line 114. ]"? I mean, I can upload and edit pictures, mostly what doesn't load is the navigation, but it's still annoying.