La Quinta, California: I was up with the chickens this morning to be at the house by 7a, to greet the technician who would install two reverse-osmosis water systems in our new house. Steve arrived at 7:30, but remained outside in his work truck for thirty minutes. Seems he was waiting for his boss to show-up.
Odd, but no business of mine what people do in their vans parked in front of houses. I started washing the bedding for the master bedroom. I started with the mattress pad, and just kept working my way up... all dang day.
I am convinced the washer/dryer unit in this house is the original from the 2004 build-out. It is the Kenmore George Bush Edition, and uses about 350 gallons of water to wash a load of clothes. Next thing of my list, as soon as I win the lottery, is to order a new washer/dryer. I have environment-guilt using these dinosaurs.
At our last house in Oregon, we had one RO (reverse osmosis water system) unit housed under the kitchen sink. This 3+gallon tank provided purified drinking water to the kitchen refrigerator ice maker, a tap for purified water at the kitchen sink, plus... it provided purified drinking water to the cold-water faucet at the bar fridge and ice maker in the family room. One system; four outputs. We lived in this house for 26 years and never had to deal with stinky or clouded ice. Ever. Filters changed once a year.
Sadly, our new house isn't plumbed to accommodate our purified water needs as simply as our old house. Understandable though, as houses down here built within a few miles of the San Andres Fault are built on a cement slab. Some plumbing goes through the attic (so very odd for a Pacific Northwesterner to understand). The kitchen fridge ice maker and in-door water dispenser are plumbed on a separate spigot in the attic, so the kitchen ice maker and indoor water dispenser cannot be tapped-into from a reverse osmosis tank under the kitchen sink. This blows.
Happily, we have ordered a Subzero Beverage Center for the bar of our new house. (We had one in our bar in Oregon, and have one in the casita in Indio.) This marvelous under-counter fridge/ice-maker is the best thing ever. It makes tons of ice, keeps cans, and bottles of wine (upper wine rack) cold - and has plenty of "tall" in-door storage). The tech installed a RO system for our new bar fridge today. The best thing about the lower freezer compartment of the Beverage Center? On the side of the freezer ice bin, is enough room to hold two martini glasses! Frozen martini glasses ready! In the installation today, we had the purified water plumbed to the cold-water faucet in the bar sink. Perfect. No need in the bar for a separate faucet for purified drinking water.
So let me explain this kitchen sink situation. (Follow along!) The photo above is the "after" version. Four openings above the sink.
First opening, on the left is the faucet. I know this faucet well, because I purchased the same faucet at Costco in Portland (probably on the same day the last owners of our new house purchased this one). It is a great faucet and we really loved using it the bit of time we had it in Portland.
The next opening, that is now only covered with a metal disk, was once an under-counter soap dispenser. When we purchased this house, it took me .15 seconds to realize the new faucet was purchased without any concern to the soap dispenser. The soap dispenser pump handle was now completely useless as it was under the handle of the new faucet! (Not to mention it had a cracked white handle, and was kinda grossly encrusted with blue soap residue. Goodbye.
The third opening now houses our beautiful new purified drinking water tap. It previously was unused, and was covered with the disk that now sits to the left... I asked the tech to move the metal cap to the opening once used for the under-counter soap dispenser. Done.
The fourth opening, on the far right, is some-sort of California-required (though we do not have this on our sink in our MCC casita?) dishwasher over-flow valve. It is still ugly, but was in nearly every house we visited during our Pandemic House Search.
Guess I will be using a counter-top soap dispenser from now on. Happily. The house has fantastic water pressure, by the way.
After the tech finished, before noon, I went back to the RV to fetch DT. He had finished working out and had cleaned the entire bus! We returned to the house, continuing our organizing and situating. It seems there are so many tasks and we keep getting side-tracked.
By the time we left this afternoon, the master bedroom quilt was nearly dry! Maybe tomorrow we will be able to make the bed?
Perfect night to try a so-not-fancy fancy dinner! The other day I watched Jacques Pepin make two small souffles with nothing other than Kraft Whipped Cream Cheese, one egg, a bit of pepper and a tablespoon of fresh herbs. What?
During the lock-down Mr. Pepin has been preparing luncheon for his wife (of over 50 years) every day and often posting the recipes on Instagram. I have been really enjoying these videos.
When Chef Pepin prepared a souffle in 20 minutes using Kraft Whipped Cream Cheese and grated cheese from a deli bin, I nearly choked on my Beaujolais. Had to try this!
Seriously? So delicious! I did use chopped fresh tarragon instead of chives, (because I had tarragon and did not have chives). Except for the fact we each just consumed half a tub of cream cheese, it was pretty dang delicious.
Still in shock that a French chef would go so rogue. Love it! (And I also love purchasing already-grated Parmesan and now feel free to shout it out loud.)
Until my next update - which will entail going to fetch our CSA box instead of hanging-around to wait for a delivery - I remain, your purified correspondent.
I’ve always wondered what those ugly dishwasher valve things were – Cory had one in her LV house. They do nothing but get dirty. Glad we don’t have to have them here in OR!
I have watched Jacques Pepin on PBS for years and bought his cookbook Fast Food My Way because of that. Love him and his meals during lockdown but I missed this one. Looks so good so I’ll look it up. Thanks for keeping me inspired with your dinner ideas. I’m so over trying to come up with meals every day!
BTW, I found your blog a few years ago when we bought our RV and I googled ideas for food, planning, stocking, etc for travel. I used your lists and tailored them to our needs, which worked out perfectly. The food inventory list comes in handy before we hit the road. Hope we can go again soon 😔 Thank you!