Arlo and Janis by Jimmy Johnson for June 17, 2022

You’re supposed to complement her veggie garden.

Meat and potatoes vs salad and croutons with a little chicken, of course they could just grill them all and choose what they like.

Only her interests count in her mind

It may be summer next week. but I felt a sudden chill in the air. Better check to see if I have a fever.

I love fresh vegetables this time of year. Especially grilled with a side of steak.

The item that both of them would like is Shish Kebabs. Meat and Veggies. Everybody gets a little something that they like.

If she’s the one growing the vegetables—and I think she is—I can certainly relate. My husband’s the grocery-buyer and cook now (19 years ago he said that because I’d done that our first 30 years, he’d do it for the next 30 years).

It can be very frustrating when he’s found a “great bargain” on one or another meat and drops salad from the menu while lettuce is plentiful. When it starts to bolt, he suddenly remembers it exists (existed).

Or when he declines to use what I consider to be “enough” potatoes, though they don’t store well and we’ll both get tired of lunches of frozen onion-and-potato soup all winter. (I won’t be growing potatoes next summer, though we do love banana fingerlings. I’ll grow scallions in that raised bed.)

Or he doesn’t bother to work asparagus into more than one menu during the only two weeks it can be cut (that won’t be a problem next year, when the crowns will be established and I can cut it myself and freeze whatever he doesn’t immediately use).

The whole vegetables vs meat thing worked a lot better, IMHO, back when I was both gardener and chef!

A line I remember from the tv show Coach, “My favorite, meat and potatoes and no vegetables!”

(Warning: This joke might be a trigger for some.)

Perhaps Arlo belongs to the alternative PETA: People Eating Tasty Animals.

Around this time of year when I am in the produce section of the supermarket, I marvel that only a few centuries ago heads of state could not get this variety of fresh food.

That’s because veggies taste like wallpaper paste* the rest of the year

Quite a bit left in the pan. Wonder if it is a meat casserole or a vegetable casserole?

All three balloons are correct……

If there is more than 10 minutes between picking & preparing, they’re not really vegetables; I miss my Grandma – but I miss her garden, too! (and her henhouse, for that matter; the same rule holds for eggs.

Myself, I was raised on the rule that “dinner” meant the classic “meat and 3”; a chunk’o’beast, a spud, a green vegetable, and a yellow one.

But salad isn’t food; it’s what food eats.

Why take umbrage at that?

My husband eats a lot of meat and very few vegetables. His doctor wants him to get a colonoscopy every 2 years. I eat a little meat and a lot more vegetables and I’m much healthier than him.

Janis is correct of course, in that the fresh (and local) veggies are really nice to have this time of year. I don’t think she was criticizing eating meat, but Arlo responded as if she was (better he had kept his mouth shut). But personally, I would much rather have both than one or the other – I can’t imagine eating a “steak and potatoes” diet like so many of us were raised on the 1950’s. Actually, anymore I really prefer having the various veggies than very much meat (might be an age thing). By the way, I think the frozen veggies available today are way better than the frozen “stuff” we had 40 or 50 years ago!

The world has many wonderful aspects and treats.

My husband raises cow…guess what I eat ?

I have developed the bad habit of not eating as many vegetables as I did about 10 years ago but I love salad and will eat one anytime it is put in front of me or I will order a salad from a restaurant quite often. Growing up we ate a lot of canned and frozen vegetables but in my teens my Mom started having a garden and I found that fresh vegetables are way better tasting and better health wise. Where I live now there is no place to have a garden but I have two big planters and Dad buys me tomato plants and I love fresh off the vine tomatoes, He doesn’t eat them but he always buys the plants and tells me afterward that he got them before I get the chance to buy them and he is the one who waters them and takes care of them. My only problem is they take so long to grow that it makes me want them even more. If I want tomatoes off season I will buy them at the store but only the “off the vine” kind, they may cost more but they are better than the cardboard tasting regular ones stores sell off season.

??

Lamb is a seasonal meat because lambing season is in the spring. Tastes better and is cheaper at certain times of the year.