Shopping for Leftovers

One of the many things my dad and I shared was a genuine love of food. We loved to cook, eat, buy, share, create, and eat some more food. One of his famous creations was what he called Enchilada stacks. he came up with the idea in the '70's. I have since seen variations but he was just playing around in the kitchen one day and came up with it. I walked into the kitchen and found him there, eyes closed, that familiar look of nirvana on his face. "Try THIS!" "What is it?" I didn't quite trust him. "TRY it! it's Lasagna, only it's made out of stuff for enchilada's! You LOVE enchiladas! TRRRRRYYYYYY IT!" "Does it have broccoli, cauliflower or zucchini in it?" (We lived in California. EVERYTHING had broccoli, cauliflower or zuchini it it.) "Hell NO! THIS is GOOD!" I tried it. Then we stood there together with that nirvana-esque look on our faces. It became one of his most requested dishes when we had or attended parties. He was also very adept at BBQ. And I don't mean the kind where they smoke the meat and then give you a generic ketchup bottle with brownish red liquid in it. I mean the honest to goodness, boiled, then baked, then braised BBQ that took all day, sometimes 2 to make. The kind that the meat falls off the bone and chews itself, travels all the way to your elbows BBQ. He would always set a pan aside and hide it so he and i could enjoy it together later with a couple of cobbs and some diet root beer. We drank DIET root beer so we could have an extra cobb of corn. (I know. That explains the repentent and exclusionary culinary abyss in which I find myself today.) The grocery store was always an adventure too. We came up with the some of the most wonderful ideas about all kinds of things, including food, while we strolled the produce, perused the spices. I have the curious habit of adding up my groceries in my head as I shop. Once we were going up and down every aisle at Kroger. We had a list but when we shopped together, we would each throw in an item or 3 from each aisle as we saw fit. So, our list of 20 items would end up being more like an entire basket and we'd wonder how that always happened. I was reading the labels comparing between two items and when I finally decided on the Raspberry Vinaigrette over the Balsamic, i mentioned we were up to about $64.00 Dad looked at me and made this face. "What?" "Nothing." "That face doesn't mean nothing. WHAT" "REALLY. Nothing." I contmeplated for a moment. "You don't count do you?" "no" He says. "Well, then how do you know where you're done?" (As a single parent, I was always on a tight budget. I had this horrible fear that one day I would be at the check out and not have enough money to pay.) "I'm done when you have what you need." I pointed out that we were, in fact, buying HIS groceries. "I know Sugar. But we're buying YOUR leftovers. " I loved that man.