Stick your finger…in the…..stew

Got to Penzeys a couple weeks ago. Spent what seems like an obscene amount of money on herbs and spices and…stuff. I was a tad surprised at how much it cost but when you factor in how long it has been (many years) and all the things that I am just getting for restocking the kitchen and how long it will last us, it’s not so bad.
Also, you don’t realize just how much smoked spanish paprika you use until it is gone.
I am suddenly hit with the urge to make those things that are not stuff you eat but the stuff that goes into what you eat. Chicken stock, both regular and asian, italian sausage, sage sausage, 3 chili sprinkle, chili powder, spiced clarified butter (niter kibbeh but also other sets of flavors like a curry-ish one and an herb-y one), because they are delicious for cooking and so so so terribly awesome for popcorn. When you cook off all the water in the butter it then doesn’t shrivel your popcorn when you drizzle it on. The problem is that I want to make so many things and so many things are not a good idea when we are trying to minimize the volume of things being transported across the country.
I imagine it will be easy enough to offload that stuff to people here.
Today marks the end of the last full week at David’s job. Just a handful of days and he is done. It will be the relief of an ugly burden.
You know what? Today is a day for grilling steaks! We will celebrate! Steak and beer and corn with chili butter, that is what today says to me.