Meat Theft

A long chain of events landed me at the Waldbaums on the corner of Horace Harding Expressway and Francis Lewis Boulevard early Sunday morning, March 25th, picking up baking supplies for a date to make Red Velvet Thumbprints with Edna Liu later that afternoon. I had given myself only 10 minutes to pick up the supplies, and quickly realized that was creating a horrible dilemma because of all the wonderful suburban supermarket sales with which I was now standing face to face. As I was trying to stuff 4 boxes of reduced fat wheat thins priced at $2.50 a box instead of the usual $4.99 (which keeps me from ever buying them and to resorting to getting the jumbo regular wheat thins from Costco) into my already full of flour- sugar-baking-soda-milk-eggs-and-red-food-coloring-filled hands, I finally decided that I would JUST come back later that afternoon. Besides, Jesse was preaching at Faith Bible Church of Flushing, and I had to drive back to the area to retrieve him later that day anyway. Upon returning, I'd make him take me suburban supermarket shopping for reduced fat wheat thins and 100 calorie snack packs. With that, I took (rather hobbled and lugged) my load to the register, checked out, and left, in just under 10 minutes. 


Fast forward around 10 hours later, and I managed to make it back to Waldbaums where I scored many wonderful deals, including a good deal on some of my favorite southern meat, cube steak. I rarely find cube steak up here in the North. It's like the Northern people don't eat it. It's never in the meat section, but in the South, we eat it a lot. I guess cause it's a poor man's steak? I donno. AND, it's so easy to cook? Anyhow- I had actually complained to Jesse a few weeks before that our local grocer never had cube steak, and now here at the suburban market, I'D FOUND SOME. We picked up 6 slices, and a lot of other goodies, and headed home.


So yesterday was our day off, and after a long leisurely day of rest, I decided to cook our dinner. I had just gotten back from a 6.5 mile run, so I wanted to shower, but I figured I'd tenderize the cube steak (which is notorious for being tough) before I showered, so I laid it out in the pan and doused it with a lot of tenderizer, just like my mama taught me. 


After my long shower and soak for my muscles, I went back to marinate it. I put some Worcestershire Sauce and A1 Sauce with a little Teriyaki Sauce on it, with a bit of lemon pepper. (I pretend to have skill. In actuality, I do not have skill. Mom uses Dale sauce. I like that best. The store didn't have any. Sadness).  Then I went to dry my hair. After about 20 minutes of letting the meat soak, Jesse and I headed to the kitchen to cook our nice dinner, and THAT'S when the juice of the story began..


I noticed that there was a large spill of Teriyaki Sauce on the stove and counter, and I wondered to myself "How did that happen? I don't remember spilling? I would have cleaned it up immediately!" And then as I looked, I saw it was all over the edge of the pan. I was so confused. My eyes traveled over, and then...TO MY DISMAY....CAN YOU GUESS WHAT I SAW NEXT?? HAVE YOU ANY IDEA?????????

.........i'll give you a  moment to think..........

.......ready yet???.......

THERE WERE ONLY 5 PIECES OF MEAT IN THE PAN!!!!! 

THE LARGEST PIECE WAS GONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

GONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I gasped and screamed "STUPID CAT!" Jesse immediately said "What?" I said "THEY ATE THE MEAT!" He laughed, confused...surprised..I actually forget what he said...we were...in...shock. We looked around, and there was proof. To our right, in the next room near the litter box, was another large stain of Teriyaki sauce....and a rather plump black cat perched, smiling at us. I yelled at him. He licked his lips. I glared. 


I knew it was him. It was stupid of me to leave the meat unattended I suppose. I recall that in the past, when Mom would make sandwiches, Abraham would try to eat the ham. And Abraham would try to steal the turkey from my sandwich when I was in seminary. I didn't recall these things, however, until AFTER he stole my cubesteak. His theft jogged my memory. It also reminded Jesse and I that we have seen him jump on the table when we weren't looking and try to steal a piece of chicken from our dinner plates. Sigh. 


Jesse told him he'd get no dinner that last night, that we'd feed Gracie on her on, and I immediately told Jesse to go and google, "will eating raw meat kill my cat?" He did, because we were both a bit concerned, but then after we did, he kind of mocked me as we discovered posts that said, pretty much, "No stupid. In the wild, cats don't cook the animals after they kill them. They don't grill the squirrels they catch. Idiot. Raw meat is FINE for your cat to eat. Duh." 

Culprit's innocent face...similar to how he appeared when originally questioned.

Culprit's actual face, thinking (in his learned Boston accent) 'Yeah, I ate your steak. What you gonna do about it? That's what I thought. NOTHIN!'

So yeah. That's my story. About my cat...who ate my cubesteak, my poor man's steak, and loved it. Jesse also loved it, but he let me finish cooking the meat before he dug in, and he also ate his meat with utensils. Sigh. So in the end, the tally for meat consumption at the Williams-Eng household last night was as follows:

Abraham: 1 large piece

Ms. Megin: 1 moderately sized piece

Mr. Jesse: 1 large piece, 2 small pieces, a portion of a large piece (which is now leftover in the frige)