Meatloaf!

Campbell's Best Ever Meatloaf recipe, modified 

This is the first meatloaf I officially can declare a success. Next time, though, I shall use real breadcrumbs instead of canned.

Features potluck

My plate. Oy.

Thank goodness Holiday Potluck Week is over. Last Tuesday was the features department potluck, and Wednesday was the newsroom potluck. There was so much tasty food, which made me want to nap at my desk.

Tuesday, I contributed a delicious mushroom bread pudding (the brownish pile at the bottom); Wednesday I just ate.

What's for dinner?

Semi-homemade.

Tonight, I made fettuccine with shrimp and pesto-cream sauce. Cheese-filled breadsticks by Market Pantry. Neighbor Betsey stopped by and mocked me for photographing it.

Like, a food emergency?

Food-court emergency

I don't understand how Crestwood Court stays afloat. I only go for its Gap, which is always dead but with many discounts.

I'm obsessed with the taco truck

The Cha Cha Chow truck at Market and 10th streets

Beef short-rib taco: hamazing.

The arrival of the Cha Cha Chow truck (twitter.com/whereschacha) has been life changing. My favorite item on the menu: the beef short-rib taco.

Fried things!

Maybe it's just my Southeast Missouri roots showing, but I love fried foods. Fried chicken, fried potatoes, fried okra, fried squash, fried onions and — the best fried things of them all — fried pickles.

I bought some sliced dill pickles a few weeks ago with big plans to fry them, and tonight I decided to go for it. It's really not hard; it's just messy.

The results were amazing. Just for fun, I tossed in some onion rings. The recipe I used was from a 2004 Recipe Swap column by Susan McClanahan (the first one) in the Southeast Missourian, where I once worked.

Homemade fries, y'all

Here's another of my recent culinary accomplishments: homemade fries. They actually were quite simple, and no one was injured in a horrible grease fire.

The spinach wrap contains marinated buffalo chicken. Also delicious.