The new house and food

Army daughter and son-in-law just opened escrow on their first house.  Hopefully this will go through because they had an offer accepted on another house and then someone came along and offered more so their offer was cancelled by the seller.  It's a great first home.  It has three bedrooms, two bathrooms, and a swimming pool.  Not much room for growing anything...not like they will garden or anything.  They are supposed to be closing escrow and moving in the first week of October.  I can't wait. 

I will miss them and I will miss the ridiculousness of my daughter's shopping habits.  Today she went to the grocery store.  She asked me to pick up cheese from Costco but everything else she planned on buying.  When she came home I helped put the food away.  She bought asparagus.  What about the asparagus plants in the garden?  But these are ready.  If you wanted asparagus you just let me know and I'd cut back one of the plants and in a week we'd have asparagus.  For free!  Then my jaw dropped to see her next purchase.  Actually I've never seen it in the store, although I heard that it existed.  She bought a quart sized carton of....egg whites!  Yes, we have about 30 chickens that like to lay eggs and she bought egg whites.  Why?  So she could just open the carton and pour out the whites in the morning to make an omelet.  This way she didn't have to separate out the egg whites from the yolks AND she wouldn't have to use our supply.  I think she failed her logic class because I got an A in mine and even though it's been a million years since I took that class in college I think my logic is still pretty good.  This is illogical.  Yes, it may take an extra fifteen seconds to separate the whites from the yolks.  If her life is that rushed that she can't take the extra 15 minutes then I feel sorry for her. 

Our dinner was delicious.  I took six eggplants and sliced them into 1/2 inch thick slices.  I dipped them in egg (from our freshly laid eggs) then in breadcrumbs (that I make from leftover pieces of bread, toast, or any other baked goods).  The breadcrumbs were seasoned with Italian seasoning, garlic powder, and onion powder.  I greased four baking sheets and laid the eggplant slices on the baking sheets.  I baked them for an hour at 350.  I took them out, poured on some homemade spaghetti sauce, sprinkled on some Parmesan cheese then some mozzarella cheese.  I put them back in the oven and turned the oven off.  When everyone got home about 45 minutes later I took them out of the oven and we had a delicious dinner.  Even the baby ate eggplant.  We cut up a cabbage (homegrown, of course) and sprinkled it with Italian seasoning.  For dessert we had watermelon that grew in the front pasture.  Dinner for five plus the baby cost less than two dollars. 

Of the food we ate tonight, the only thing that wasn't home grown or out of the food storage was the mozzarella cheese.  Mozzarella cheese can be purchased freeze dried.  It is pretty expensive when compared to under three dollars per pound for the shredded mozzarella from Costco but it sure made the dinner more tasty having it on the eggplant than not.  I'll think about purchasing some cans.  I wonder if you can dry the cheese just by leaving it out on the counter to air dry?