cutting up my diner's card

I am moving.

Well, I may as well after my brother reads this post.  He will be on an airplane down here to cut up my charter member card in the Cercle de la Famille Cotton Gourmand.

I have had a craving for pasta with clams in white sauce for the past couple months.  When I was up north, I planned to go to one of my favorite Italian restaurants.  But I flew back to Mexico before I could scratch that itch.

The craving returned while I was shopping in my favorite Melaque grocery store.  I noticed a jar of Paul Newman alfredo sauce.

Now, I have never eaten any of those canned or jarred pasta sauces.  They all looked as if they would taste just as they are -- processed.

It had one advantage, though. It would be fast.  But where would I find fresh butter clams?  A can of baby clams answered that question.

Because neither ingredient offered scant hope of a good dinner, I bought a packet of Italian pasta.  Apparently, I failed to notice that the pasta was gluten-free.  So much for premium semolina flour.

The cost for those three items?  $175 (Mx) -- or about $13.40 -- for what should have been three or so servings of dinner.  After all, they were all imported goods.

Having acquired enough guilty pleasures for the day, I skulked home and started putting my treat together.  Rather, I opened the can of clams and the sauce jar, and tested the contents.

The sauce tasted like something that had seeped out of a New Jersey toxic dump site.  And the clams?  As tender as pencil erasers with a subtle note of aluminum.

My last hope was that the pasta would be good enough to make up for the sauce.  I was wrong.  "Gluten-free" must be a euphemism for gummy and tasteless.

Combined, there was no descriptor other than inedible.  It was so dreadful that a heavy dose of Valentina sauce didn't improve it.

With one bite, I was done with the lot.  It now sleeps in the garbage pail.

I had hoped to have some for dinner last night.  Instead, I bought two charcoal-grilled chickens and a bag filled with vegetables.  Stir fry never fails to boost both my mood and my palate.

And, who knows, it may be enough for my brother to put his shears back in his desk drawer.