Summer Fruit Crisps
If you haven’t cooked before, and are interested in beginning, Crisps are a good place to start. They are easy, don’t take a lot of time, and you get instant – and delicious! – gratification. Now, while fresh fruit is abundant in Kuwait (and elsewhere) is a great time to try a crisp.
These recipes are from Mary Cullen’s Northwest Cook Book, 1946. My aunt gave it to me before she died, and some of my best cooking efforts have been based on recipes from this book. They are simple, but . . . simply GOOD!
Apple Crisp
Crisps are wonderful when made with fresh fruit, and not so much trouble as a pie requiring crusts. Here, the topping is delicious, and easy.
5 cups apples
1/2 cup butter
1 cup sugar
3/4 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon cinnamon or nutmeg
Peel, core and slice apples and place in a greased baking dish or cassarole (a ceramic pie dish is perfect, but you can also use a ramekin, or something not too deep, not too shallow).
Using a pastry blender, or a metal whisk, or an electric mixer, work together the butter, sugar, salt, flour and spices.
Pack closely around apples.
Bake in 425 degree oven for 45 – 50 minutes. Serve with whipped cream or ice cream.
Berry Crisp or Peach / Apricot / Plum Crisp
Substitute berries (peaches or apricots or plums) for apples. If berries are very tart, sprinkle with 1/2 cup sugar mixed with 1/2 cup flour before covering with crumb mixture.
Rhubarb Crisp
Use diced rhubarb in place of apples. Mix 1/2 to 1 cup sugar and 1/2 cup flour with rhubarb before placing in baking dish.
Kuwait Fish Market Artistry
They’re in! The first of the season’s Kuwait shrimp! Did I buy any – you bet! Shrimp for dinner tonight. Yummmmmmm.
As I was having the shrimp cleaned, we noticed that someone had gone to a lot of trouble to put the fish out attractively. Doesn’t it make all the difference?
(Photos taken at the Sultan Center)
Shrimping Season Begins
Did you miss it? The Public Authority for Agricultural Affairs and Fish Resources announced the beginning of the shrimp fishing season August 15th, upon the expiry of the seven month ban, from January 15 – August 15.
I checked the fish markets yesterday, and didn’t see any Kuwaiti shrimp, only Saudi farmed shrimp (which is also good, but farmed); I expect we will be seeing the good Kuwaiti shrimp soon. Oh, I have been missing Kuwaiti shrimp!
The Avenues Mall in Kuwait
This if for my outside-Kuwait readers; most of the Kuwait readers have already been to The Avenues.
The Avenues is the newest mall in Kuwait, and has the greatest variety so far of shops with names familiar to most malls – Banana Republic, Starbucks, etc. But it has a couple stores with unusual things – one is a Moroccan design store, but everything I liked inside it said “this item not for sale!” Excuse me? What’s the point?
There is an IKEA attached, lots of coffee places, a few places to eat, mostly places you find in Malls – Paul’s, etc., but nothing outstanding. The coffee places are nice for sitting and waiting for friends who are shopping when you are bored or tired, but if you are interested in GOOD food, I think you can do better eating outside the mall.
The mall is vast. The good news is, there is lots of parking, so you only have to think about where you want to be. We were really lucky, as we pulled in, a car was just leaving a really nice spot. You know how you always THINK you are going to remember your spot? At The Avenues, you need to remember the letter, the number AND the color. Probably the S46a comes in handy, too. We took a photo, and it was a good thing, because we thought we remembered very clearly where the car was, and we were mistaken.
Going to a mall in Kuwait is one of the major summer pastimes. When the heat outside is 118 degrees F (48C), you look for places that are well air-conditioned. We found places in the mall where the air conditioning was working so hard it sounded like being in a wind tunnel!
As for shopping – the quality of the clothing is not the same as you find in the same stores elsewhere. Prices are high, and even when they mark them down, it is hard to think of most of this clothing as a good value for the money. There are no bookstores.
It IS full of light, and a great place for walking – groups meet up at the Avenues purely for walking, and then usually for a cup of coffee afterwards.
So, in conclusion – it’s huge. Positives: It’s light and airy. It’s great for fitness walking in Kuwait’s heat. It’s a good place to meet up with friends, great central location. Negatives: it’s just another mall, just bigger. Not a destination.
What would make a mall that interested me more? A Sephora that truly had the entire range of make-up products that European and USA Sephoras carry. A really good household department with high quality sheets and towels, and well made clothing in beautiful fabrics. An Eddie Bauer. A Clearwater Creek. A Barnes and Nobles. A couple Indian furniture shops. A L’escharpe. A jewelers/gold souk with ALL the major jewelers in Kuwait. A perfumers souk. Some really good local food places.
What about you? What would you like to see in a mall?
International Foods
My first trip to the Co-op to stock up on the basics – when I am gone, Adventure Man eats out or eats peanut butter and crackers, so the cupboard is bare! He very thoughtfully stocked up on skim milk for me, but beyond that, I am responsible.
I have a small, discreet camera but I wasn’t fast enough this time. One of the store people came over to me.
“Madam, why are you photographing this shelf?”
I told him I have a friend (well, aren’t you my friends?) and we were looking at ways the world is becoming more international.
“Look,” I pointed out to him, “here on this shelf you have Louisiana right next to India!”
I’m not sure he grasped the concept. I know he found it very weird that I was taking a photo of the shelves. Maybe he thought the Co-op had hired a mystery shopper (ho ho ho hohoho) and I was working for Quality Control?
By the way, now that I have started checking all my foods for country of origin, did you know that every can of tuna that we buy in Kuwait comes from Thailand? I have not heard anything about problems with quality control out of Thailand, not the same kinds of problems as with China, but they certainly are packing a LOT of tuna.
Even tuna branded “Americana” – wouldn’t you think a tuna branded Americana would come from America? Wrong! It is also canned in Thailand.
Halal Neighborhood Market
I have never seen this on a truck before. JD’s market is in an area near the local college, near the hub of the bus system, and near a lot of stores people can walk to. It is a neighborhood rich in immigrants, rich in opportunities for work, rich in transportation options – and it just tickles me to see a truck advertising “halal meat” on it.
You hear complaints in Kuwait and Qatar, and most of the Gulf countries, about the Americanization of the world – the supersize-me fast food outlets, the same western stores in every mall, the spread of western – and particularly American – culture.
Look closely. It’s not a one-way street. We are all influencing one another, more than we know.
Cost Cutter
The store I was going to wasn’t open, and I knew we needed a couple groceries, so I headed across the parking lot to the Cost Cutter (yep, it’s raining):
As soon as I got inside, I knew this was not just any old grocery store. The cashiers, the manager and the butchers all looked Mexican! And when I got to the deli section, the specialities were things like Dulce de Leche, all packaged up for people who eat a LOT of dulce de leche:
To my delight, there was an aisle labled Middle East foods, with tabbouleh, canned hummus and muttabel, foul, and Lebanese olive oil:
And a huge aisle with East European foods (I am not sure what East European foods are!)
And, while most stores hide their beer selection in some dark corner of the store, Cost Cutter has a huge aisle down the center of the store, with all kinds of neon signage – it looks very festive:
Stores like Cost Cutter, that serve the large and varied population of immigrants are one of the reasons I love Seattle.
The Lancome Lady
I can get better prices on Lancome products (yep, I am addicted) in Pensacola than I can in Kuwait, Seattle, or even the duty-free, so I stock up while I am here.
On my second trip to the store, not knowing if my stock will last until my next trip to what Mini-R calls PepsiCola, I again bought enough that the saleslady said I could have TWO free sets of the bags and make up samples and I just laughed – like really, how many do I need? How many can I use?
They are always shocked that I would turn down the “free” gift. But packing space and suitcase weight matters more to me than anything free, and also, I hate to waste.
I just laughed.
“What I really need,” I started off, “what would really help me is if you have any small samples I can take with me on the long plane rides, so I can put good cream on my face, not the airplane stuff.”
“Oh! We can do that!” she said, and started opening drawers, pulling things out.
“How about some of this – you bought some of this but here it is in sample form – and this – and you will want to try some of this!” she said triumphantly and handed me about a hundred sample packets.
But she was on a roll.
“And you will need a travel mascara! And how about some suncreen! And you can have some perfume samples, and share them with all your friends!” and a hundred more samples came out of the magical Lancome drawers.
Holy smokes! I can take care of my face, my eyes, and smell good too! Not that I wear perfume in the close confines of an airplane where it could offend the other passengers, but I have a lifetime worth of samples I can use at other times . . .
When I am in Seattle and ask the Lancome ladies for samples, they act very haughty (and I am thinking “excuse me? Who is the customer and who is behind the counter here?”) and usually tell me they don’t give out samples. No wonder I do my Lancome shopping in Pensacola! It’s not just the price, it’s the caring and generous customer service!
“Alien Babies!”
“Whaja think of the storm?” the young man asked me, as he dusted the magazines with a feather duster.
“Oh, wow!” I said. “I thought it would go on forever! How long did it last?”
“I don’t know,” he responded, “but it WAS a long time, and it was right overhead! Hey, this can’t be right. . . it says George Bush is involved in some kind of divorce!” He was dusting one of the tabloids.
“Naaahhh.” I said, waiting for my turn in line. “Sometimes they even write about alien babies being born. You know that can’t be right.”
He stood, transfixed.
“Alien babies?” he half whispered in astonishment. “No! Not really!”
“Yes! really!” I said, “and you know that can’t be true.”
“No!” he said. “No alien babies!” and then under his breath “alien babies!” half in wonder. He followed me around the store, from time to time saying in wonder “alien babies!”
Albertson’s supermarket hires mildly retarded adults to work as baggers and cleaners. These young people are trained to greet the customers, to accompany them to the cars if they have a basket, to unload groceries and generally to make the customer feel welcome.
I always feel welcome. These young people love their jobs, love being a part of the community, and they take great pride in doing their jobs well. God bless Albertsons for this enlightened hiring and training policy.
The Apple Market, Pensacola
The Apple Market isn’t a big chain. You can hardly maneuver in the aisles, they are so close together. They have their own deli, with Boar’s Head meats, they have a big section with deli-made food, made with fresh ingredients, that you can take home and heat – some are already hot! They have rotisseried chickens, they have fresh key lime pies, boutique breads, a whole huge refrigerator full of freshly made salads . . . the Apple Market is my kind of place.
I can’t imagine the odds against the family grocery stores staying in existence against the giants. But I can walk into one of the giants here – Winn Dixie – and walk out without buying a thing, the giant is so tired looking, so sterile, so packaged. What the Apple Market offers is personal service.
When I walk up to the counter with a container of “Mama’s Gumbo” they ask me if I have had it before, and when I say I have, and loved it, they recommend the Shrimp Loxlie, in the same brand, and recommend that I serve it over rice or noodles, to make it go further. I buy some, serve it over angel hair pasta, and it is a gourmet feast. They encourage you to bring your own re-usable bags, or buy one of theirs – they are earth friendly.
You pay a little more. I don’t mind. They buy locally, the produce is always first rate, and they have an amazing variety of goods in a relatively small space. I can always fine something to fix up for dinner there, and I always love the service. Give me The Apple Market over a big box store anyday!
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