Power Outage, Snow, Those Expensive Bananas, Hair Cut, Jonathan Antoine,

I started a  blog this morning (Friday) and the power went out. I therefore lost what I had written which hadn't yet been saved. Grrrr. Power went off during the night too so I had to reset clocks and radio station twice this morning, more growls. Dunno if it's our building or outside.

When I awoke this morning, somewhat late, I thought it was foggy, I had thought the same once during the night. I looked out of the window and damn me, snow, lots of it, the trees look wonderful and the park is all freshly covered. Of course ladydog was due to visit, said she might still make it but don't want her to put herself at risk. Snowed up country roads between her home and ours. She, sensibly, decided not to come.

After lunch we went to get our hair cut, mine is, once again very short, bit shorter than I like but everybody but me liked it last time she cut it this short. She really is the most amazing person, when she sees us (if she isn't busy) she comes out and helps Matt into the salon. Then into the chair and once finished, out of the chair once more and later into the car again. Makes it easy on me. I really am very grateful to her.

We also went to Victoria St. Market for bananas, I actually wanted three things there, bananas, sausages and a sauce they make which I have been using on my burritos. Unfortunately my hands couldn't stop picking things up. What an idiot I am.

This evening, we more or less accidentally turned on a programme called Going the Distance with Jonathan Antoine. Never heard of him. My first reaction was, what a size, but then we heard him sing and Matt went absolutely nutty about his voice. Well so did I. Turns out he won Britain Has Talent when he was 17 (in 2012) and has been doing pretty well since. He is giving a concert in Toronto in October. Oh if only, we would both love to go. Although, don't know how Matt would be by then. I guess it won't happen. I tried to buy the DVD away from the PBS show, but it isn't available and I sure can't afford to contribute to PBS in order to get it. Checking him out online, it turns out he was in Toronto before but we have never heard of him. I hope you enjoy this as much as we did. He sings popular songs as well as classical. Wonderful voice.


I have never eaten fried pickles and when I saw this picture I could have grabbed them off the plate. I now have to consider whether I can make them in the air fryer. If I did fry them in oil I would haul out my Fry Granddaddy which I haven't used in a looooong time.

Fried Pickles

vegetable oil for frying
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp salt or to taste
1/2 tsp pepper or to taste
1 tsp paprika
1/2 tsp Italian seasoning
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 large egg
2 cups dill pickles sliced, drained

1. Fill a Dutch oven with 2 to 3 inches of vegetable oil for frying and heat to 375 F degrees. Should take about 10 minutes.

2. In a bowl, combine the flour, salt, pepper, paprika, Italian seasoning and cayenne pepper. In another bowl whisk together the buttermilk and egg.

3. Dredge pickle slices through the flour mixture, then buttermilk mixture and finally flour mixture again. Carefully transfer to the hot oil. Fry about 5 pickle slices at a time until golden brown. Repeat with remaining ingredients.

4. Serve warm fried pickles with ranch dressing.

Servings: 4

Author: Joanna Cismaru

Author Notes: Leftovers will keep for 2-3 days stored in the fridge in an airtight container.

Have a great weekend.