Apologies for the not-being-around business. My dissertation is interesting to me these days, and a main project is gaining some of the weight I lost over the last year — the result of my illness du global south.

On my doctor’s orders, I am drinking, in bulk, a not-so-delicious shake called “Ensure”* and supplementing with meals. Cases of Ensure are not only heavy (how do the oldsters get these mineral laden liquid bricks home I wonder?), but a bottle is nearly equivalent in price to two pieces of Popeye’s chicken (or one third a piece of nigiri), either of which I would rather be eating.

Here are photos of the meals I’m taking to supplement my Ensure.

Above: last Friday we made Mexican tortilla soup, made with dried pasilla and guajillo peppers, roasted tomatoes and our own chicken stock.

Garnished with roasted ancho chiles, avocado, Salvadorean-style tortillas, and crumbled guajillo peppers.

*a bit ominous, this name, no? Ensure what? That I don’t die?