Miss me?

I've been rather busy the past few weeks. I have started taking classes in American Sign Language at the local library, and I love it. It turns out a number of people I know have some knowledge of it, and almost eveyrone I know thinks it's pretty cool that I'm learning it. One of the women in the class pointed me to a website that has video of the signed word, which helps, but I would really love a site that not only had a person doing the signing, but an indication of what handshape, where you start, and the motion you use to make the sign. Sometimes the signer goes too fast, and I have to play the thing over and over. I keep a dictionary with me at all times and will look up random words while riding Metro. I don't know that I'll ever be good enough to be an interpreter, but if I can communicate with other deaf people--and there are a number of deaf and hard of hearing in DC--that will be a plus. I just wish I could get my boyfriend to learn, but oh, well.

This means I haven't had much time to cook, as the class is twice a week, and while it's supposed to be an hour, it frequently runs over. Not that I mind. I seriously want to learn. I will also be attending ASL Meetups if I can and trying to find fellow ASL newbies to practice with me to keep our knowledge and skills.

But never mind that--you probably miss my cooking, right? I recently discovered that there is a little farmer's market near my office building every Thursday. One day I saw a vendor with green tomatoes, and I knew I had to get some. However, I had plans for that evening and didn't think it would be practical, so I decided to wait. Last week, even though I had plans, I bought a bag of green tomatoes. I wanted to cook fried green tomatoes at some point! Warning: if you do buy green tomatoes, cook them the very same day. Even three days later, they've ripened quite a bit, much to my dismay. But I dipped them in soy milk, dredged them in a mix of flour, paprika, salt, and pepper, and then fried them up. I made a simple gravy from The Dirty South (which has another Southern-style vegan cookbook, Hot Damn and Hell Yeah on the other side), and then dredged some tofu in a mixture of flour, sage, pepper and powdered garlic. Mmmmm, gravy. The tomatoes were juicy, tart, and crisp, although I suspect a real Southern cook would disapprove of my cooking them in canola oil. Some recipes I looked up suggested using bacon drippings--ewwww. But mostly, you take some flour, toss in some seasonings, dip, dredge, fry. If you have ample space in your kitchen--which I certainly do not--it's easy, easy, easy. If you don't have ample space in your kitchen, trying to work around it can be challenging. But it was so worth it. The tomatoes really didn't need the gravy, but the tofu surely did. I've got a lot left over to try to use in a week (maybe I should halve the recipe next time), so I'm going to have to get creative here.