Homemaking

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A Full Half-Day

I’m trying to get into some better habits here, including not going straight to my office first thing in the morning, but rather going for a walk. I did that, came home, had coffee and a sincronizada, and started on work.

This is my neighbour literally right across from me. No windows, no doors, no running water, no power, but look at the pride of ownership with the neat front yard and vegetable garden. He's a nice guy!

This is my neighbour literally right across from me. No windows, no doors, no running water, no power, but look at the pride of ownership with the neat front yard and vegetable garden. He’s a nice guy!

Lots of pretty flowers blooming today.

Lots of pretty flowers blooming today.

This was my first view of Isla. You turn onto this road from The Road and it brings you to the RV park.

This was my first view of Isla. You turn onto this road from The Road and it brings you to the RV park.

Bottle wall.

Bottle wall.

This Quebec-plated vehicle was purchased in the city where my older sister lives.

This Quebec-plated vehicle was purchased in the city where my older sister lives.

On this dirt road next to busy stables sits this gorgeous modern construction.

On this dirt road next to busy stables sits this gorgeous modern construction.

And next to that modern house sits this family compound. I don't find the contrast that startling considering that I live on a street with proper houses and have an RV and two old sheds for outbuildings. :)

And next to that modern house sits this family compound. I don’t find the contrast that startling considering that I live on a street with proper houses and have an RV and two old sheds for outbuildings. 🙂

I'm seeing lots of Christmas decorations.

I’m seeing lots of Christmas decorations.

I would never have realised that this is a public alley if I hadn't come from the other direction.

I would never have realised that this is a public alley between those two houses if I hadn’t come from the other direction.

Janet and Grant came by at one point to pick up something I had for them, so I got to meet their super friendly and sweet pooch, Boo. We’ve already arranged that I’m Boo’s sitter if he ever needs one, so it was especially nice to get to meet him.

Grant left with the seat for my computer chair in the hopes of getting access to the necessary tools to make it work. I’ve asked for tools and received offers for them, but everyone is on Mexico time in terms of the tools materializing and I really wasn’t in the mood to wait any longer. My back is really sore and I’m having trouble focusing on work because I’m in so much pain.

I went back to work and Dale emailed to say that she’d come by around 11:00 to show me a new-to-her shop on Isla that I surely didn’t know about either. Great! I was peckish by this point, so I peeled a massive grapefruit and made my way through half of it by the time Grant returned.

Big bowl of toronja. I LOVE grapefruit. Please don't ruin it by adding sugar.

Big bowl of toronja. I LOVE grapefruit. Please don’t ruin it by adding sugar.

Between the two of us, we got the chair assembled! Yay!!! It is soooo comfortable. The only disappointment is that the arms are too low to be useful, but everything else is wonderful, especially since I only paid 1,200 pesos for it.

Yay for a comfy chair!

Yay for a comfy chair!

As Grant was leaving, he noticed the better veggie truck going by and I yelled out, “¡Verduras!” but the driver didn’t hear me. A guy walking down the street did and chased down the veggie truck for me!

I really didn’t need anything, but I still loaded up on things that have been elusive on Isla, like dark lettuce, green beans, and even a broccoli! I also bought a whole pineapple! I’m having salad for lunch to eat up some of those veggies.

Dale showed up as I was done shopping, so off we went. She took me to a part of Isla I hadn’t been to yet (I really need to explore more, I’m ashamed to admit) and found a whole street of shops to explore, including a bookstore, Telcel service store (!), and a tiny grocer that has a few things the City Deli didn’t, including rubber gloves. I picked up a pack of those, some baking soda for my fridge, chihuahua cheese, and crema for something like 83 pesos. Crazy!

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Paradigm Shifts

Paradigm: a theory or a group of ideas about how something should be done

Quick poll:

1) How many of you wash your dishes in cold water?
2) How many of you are absolute in your belief that water has to be scorching hot to clean dishes properly?

My answers were no to the first, yes to the second right up to this morning.

I asked my neighbour, who had this suite last year, if she had hot water in the kitchen last year. No. She said that the water heater for my shower (doesn’t reach hers!) is a Gringo luxury and that most of the residents of Isla make do with whatever temperature their water is as it comes out of their taps.

That didn’t shock me too much. I know that hot and cold running water is a luxury only a very small portion of the world has. But what did surprise me was being told that the dish detergent down here is meant to be just as good in cold water as hot.

Never taking anything at face value, I headed off to do some research. I use blue Dawn dish detergent exclusively. Every time I switch to save money, I regret it. So I Googled “dawn dish detergent cold water” and found a page on Dawn’s U.S. website that had the following paradigm shattering information:

You can wash your dishes in hot or cold water, as our products are formulated to perform in any water temperature. Try helping to save energy by washing in cold water. You’ll find you get a great clean, with less energy used.

WHAT?!

HUH?!

Of course, I had to run an experiment and see if that was true. This was a good day for that because I had a lot of greasy plastic to deal with. I added my usual amount (less here than at Haven where the water is super hard) of Dawn to a bowl of cold water and proceeded to wash everything, rinsing again in cold water.

Guess what? My plastic got just as squeaky clean in the cold water as it does in the hot!

I find washing in hot water so much easier on the joints, but washing in cold is so much easier than heating pot after pot of water on the stove, like I’ve had to do at Haven in the past when I didn’t have running water! Imagine all the energy I could have saved, both personal and in terms of power and propane, if I had done that Google search then!

I came to Mexico hoping to gain a broader view of immense diversity of our world. Cold water dish washing is a small thing, but holds the promise of many even more shattering revelations.

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My Isla Kitchen, Revisited

I’m someone who needs to cogitate a problem before finding a solution. My Isla kitchen wasn’t working for me and I’d identified a lot of the issues in my post about it, but what to do about them? I thought long and hard about my kitchen in Miranda and what it’s taken to make it just about perfect for me. What lessons there could I apply to the kitchen here?

The first one was a huge duh: PURGE. There was tons of stuff in the cabinets that I don’t use. But I can’t throw anything away… No. But there’s a huge empty space under the sink and I have a couple of empty Rubbermaid totes…

After writing my last post about my day in Maz, I went back to the kitchen and emptied everything that I don’t use, right down to the toaster, into a single tote, which I tucked out of sight. I then arranged everything I do use into the cabinets and, low and behold, there was room for food!

I was able to clear off the top of the microwave and move my food processor to a more logical location. The end result is so much more functional for me and all it took was five minutes! I’m glad I didn’t throw money at the problem, although I will now spend a little to get an extra shelf for the far cabinet (to double the space in it) as well as a basket of some sort for the spices.

I know it's not ideal to store spices and such next to the stove, but this works. I will pick up a nice bucket at Waldo's at some point to store them in to make clean up easier.

I know it’s not ideal to store spices and such next to the stove, but this works. I will pick up a nice basket at Waldo’s at some point to store them in to make clean up easier.

Look at that!

Look at that! Middle bottom shelf, you can see on the far left my big box of powdered milk for the coffee and right next to it is my jar of yummy Isla honey. And then, lots o’ coffee. 🙂

The kitchen looks so much less crowded and cleaner now. I do need to get rid of the duck between the stove and crock (it holds matches).

The kitchen looks so much less crowded and cleaner now. I do need to get rid of the duck between the stove and utensil bucket (it holds matches).

My crock is full of not just the large cooking utensils, but also the eating ones, my can opener (glad I brought one!), and my BBQ lighter. During the purge, I found a large chopping knife that looks pretty sharp.

My utensil bucket is full of not just the large cooking utensils, but also the eating ones, my can opener (glad I brought one!), and my BBQ lighter. During the purge, I found a large chopping knife that looks pretty sharp that should be better than the steak knives for chopping veggies. One thing I forgot to pick up today is a couple of butter knives for spreading things like cream cheese. I can’t believe there isn’t a single one in this kitchen!

One thing I miss is my tiny strainer for collecting the pits from limes and lemons. This set was overkill, but at just 150 pesos, it was worth it just to never have to bit down into another lime pit again this winter! They should be good for jalapeño seeds, too!

One thing I miss from home is my tiny strainer for collecting the pits from limes and lemons. This set was overkill, but at just 15 pesos, it was worth it just to never have to bite down into another lime pit again this winter! They will be good for jalapeño seeds, too, as well as rinsing rice and lentils! I use both a colander and two sizes of strainers at Haven, so these will bring some sense of normalcy to my kitchen. 🙂

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Well, That Was Exciting

From The Money Pit:

Anna: Well, the turkey’s done.
Walter: So’s the kitchen. Actually, it’s a little overdone for my tastes. Let’s not go there again.

I decided to make a potato gratin for dinner. I’d tried that once, but couldn’t get the oven knob to turn. Janet managed to get it going and I have propane, so I thought I was good to go.

The stove here is very basic, running only on propane, same as my RV range, so I figured that lighting it would be easy. I couldn’t see the element, but there was an obvious opening for where I stuck in my lighter and, woosh, the oven lit.

I lit a burner to heat up the cast iron pan and went to the fridge to dig for potatoes, onions, and bacon when I heard a loud bang. I went back to the stove and saw that the whole rear of it was lit up! There were no flames, but the wall appeared to be glowing (reflection).

I quickly cut the gas to the oven and saw that the flame had gone off on the burner, too.

After waiting five minutes, I lit the burner again. Since I got propane the other day, I’ve noticed that the burners haven’t been very hot and it’s taken ages to cook stuff. Well, this time around, the burner lit up properly and quickly heated up my pan!

I wonder if maybe there was some sort of obstruction in the gas pipe that got cleared when I lit the oven… I’m not keen to try to light it again, that’s for sure! And I need a fire extinguisher!

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My Kitchen On Isla

My kitchen on Isla is proving to be just adequate. I know that I’m spoiled by my just about perfect for me kitchen in Miranda so my standards are high, but there are serious issues with this kitchen. I’m not a fussy cook who needs a ton of equipment, but if I’m going to be living somewhere for a few months, I’m a little more particular.

First, the good stuff about this kitchen. The fridge is huge, newish, and runs cold. The stove has four burners and an oven and, most importantly, runs on gas. The microwave is super powerful and may actually get me hooked on making some things in the microwave. There’s more counter space than I’m used to having. There are some nice pots and pans and all the absolute basics, like plates, cups, utensils, and serving bowls.

But… considering the size of this house, the amount of storage in the kitchen is absolutely ridiculous and inadequate (and, yes, I know that it apparently has more storage than the average Mexican home). Unfortunately, the unit between the fridge and stove was left out in the damp and smells absolutely mildewy. I would not feel comfortable storing anything in it.

So much potential for storage, but the smell is terrible. :(

So much potential for storage, but the smell is terrible. 🙁

Same thing with the cavernous under sink storage area. I’m fine with storing empty totes and my water bottle there, but forget using it for food storage.

The cabinet above the counter is adequate for storing food prep items, but there’s a serious lack of pantry space.

I've filled this cabinet to the brim!

I’ve filled this cabinet to the brim!

The pots and pans are nice (I LOVE the wok-type pan), but there’s no lids for the smaller pots. The plates and bowls are plastic, which is already staining. I am going to pick up a single setting in china because there’s no way I’m going to make it through the winter without ruining those plates. I also need a decent sized mixing bowl and I’d like something other than my cast iron pan as ovenware.

I also dislike that there’s only a single bowl sink, but at least it’s big and deep.

But my biggest complaint is that the kitchen is so far from the water heater that I can let the water run for a half hour and it never gets hotter than tepid. I’ve been heating a bowl of water in the microwave to do my dishes. It’s a pain when I’m washing up a lot of things, like I did tonight.

When I was packing back home, I made the decision to bring quite a bit of kitchen stuff, including my beloved cast iron pan, a lot of my cooking utensils like tongs and serving spoons (the ones here are plastic, which I dislike, so good call!), and my food processor.

I wish I had known to bring a colander (bought one), a cheese grater (for shredding veggies), a chopping knife, china place settings, a mixing bowl, a Pyrex dish for oven cooking, and my pots.

A pantry would make the single biggest difference to this kitchen. I am thinking of suggesting to the landlady that I could pick up a pantry cabinet at Walmart or Home Depot and seeing if she’d be willing to take that off my rent. There’s plenty of room for one.

Even though this kitchen is far from ideal, I’m making it work! I took advantage of being able to cook again by making quite a spread for dinner.

Haven't had to use the four burners yet. I rarely use all three burners at home; not enough space on my stove! :)

Haven’t had to use the four burners at the same time yet. I rarely use three burners at home; not enough space on my stove for that many pots and pans! 🙂

The veggies are carrots, chayote, and white onion, with some spices. There’s also rice cooked in chicken broth. Finally, there’s the chicken that I purchased today. I cubed it with my kitchen shears (which I brought!) and marinated it in soy sauce, lime juice, a bit of sugar, and a roughly chopped red onion, adding a bit more soy sauce at the end.

Fun fact about chicken in Mexico: it’s corn fed, so the meat is kind of pale orangey and the fat is bright yellow! I’m glad I knew that or I would have been quite concerned about my chicken today! At any rate, it was very flavourful and moist!

Yummy dinner. I was getting a little tired of 'Mexicany' flavours.

Yummy dinner. I was getting a little tired of ‘Mexicany’ flavours.

All whining aside, I’m really glad to have a kitchen I can use here, remembering all too clearly the dingy kitchen in the apartment I rented in Lethbridge for the ’11 to ’12 winter. I can tell that this place wasn’t designed or set up for someone who does a lot of cooking. I’ll make do this year and if I come back, I’ll know what to pack!