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comiccurmudgeon_feedJudge Parker, 9/1/26
The best-case scenario when an attractive younger woman marries a rich, driven older man — well, I guess the best-case scenario is that they genuinely like one another, but the second-best-scenario is that the older man got to be so very rich because he’s so very driven, specifically career-driven, and therefore you as the younger woman can enjoy the financial and social benefits of being married to him without, you know, having to spend a ton of time hanging out with him. But because part of the whole deal is that you are younger than him, you run a greater than average risk that your husband will become a depressed old drunk who just kind of hangs around the house all day, cramping your style. Thus, Katherine is eagerly agreeing to Judge Parker Emeritus Senior’s suggestion that he go down to the courthouse and take care of whatever odd jobs they have for him down there. Is he completely with it these days, mentally? Enh, maybe, maybe not, but that’s the Cavelton court system’s problem now. They’re probably equipped to handle it, right?
Gil Thorp, 9/1/26
“Ahh, another school year begun. I’m virtuously setting the tone and putting student athletes first … tryout numbers are strong despite declines in enrollment … God I’m good. I’d make out with myself if it were possible. Wait, thanks to my uncannily clear reflection in this window, it is!” [vivid, unpleasant sounds of tongue wiping across glass]
merriamwebster_feedMerriam-Webster's Word of the Day for September 1, 2026 is:
conscientious • \kahn-shee-EN-shus\ • adjective
Conscientious describes someone who is concerned with doing things correctly. It can be used as a synonym for both meticulous and careful.
// She has always been a conscientious worker committed to painstaking research.
Examples:
“Earth-friendly, conscientious gardeners learn to slow down and pay attention not only to plants but to the many creatures that share the garden. ... The garden teaches us valuable lessons. It reminds us that balance is achieved not through sorting the natural world into neat categories, but by respecting nature and allowing it to reveal to us its own complicated, interdependent and beautiful gray areas.” — Rita Perwich, The San Diego Union-Tribune, 4 July 2026
Did you know?
As Mahatma Gandhi once wrote, “There is a higher court than courts of justice, and that is the court of conscience.” A person who is conscientious makes sure that they are judged well by such a court. This is true for someone who is “governed by their conscience” as the oldest sense of the word is defined—as in “a conscientious leader”—but it is also true for the conscientious person paying close, careful attention to the task at hand. Conscientious came to English from French, centuries after Middle English had adopted conscience from Anglo-French; both ultimately come from the Latin verb scire, meaning “to know.”
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xoverbingomondomolly_feed(Click here for information on the 206 edition of Molly’s Imaginary Summer Book Club Featuring Classics of Women’s Literature. This week, the second selection, Vanna Speaks By Vanna White.)
When I announced this title, it was because I was looking for the most lightweight summer read, candy-colored soap bubble that I could float away on. And while this book was certainly that, it was also a happy convergence of two of favorite preoccupations: “The Year of the Bimbo” and “That is a kind of actor you can be!”
“The Year of the Bimbo” was a term coined by the Wall Street Journal in 1987, following the public disgrace/scandals/reveals of bad behavior of televangelist Jim Bakker, Col. Oliver North and the Iran-Contra crew, and democratic presidential frontrunner Gary Hart, supposedly all at the hands three comely 20-something women, who had nothing in common except being wronged by terrible men and the media.
“That is a kind of actor you can be!” is what I like to declare every time I find out about yet another way people are making money as working actors: the weirdest local commercials, the warm-up act for a talk show audience, sinister union organizer for Wal-Mart training videos… or maybe even spending nearly 45 years turning letters on a game show.
Published in spring of 1987 at the height of “Vanna Mania”, this volume is definitely Year of the Bimbo-adjacent, starting with the title. Now, you have to think back to the “shopping” era of Wheel of Fortune, when hearing Vanna speak on camera was as rare and jarring as hearing Tom or Jerry speak in a cartoon. She was regarded as strictly decorative, there to turn the letters and tease the prizes.
Note from Future-Molly: in between the first draft of this essay and this post going live, I received a copy of The National Lampoon’s December 1987 issue, commemorating (what else?) The Year of the Bimbo. A different article in that issue celebrates and advises The Renaissance Man of the 1980s, and they instruct:
Renaissance Men don’t have an infatuation with Vanna White.
So, I am feeling vindicated about putting these two subjects together [AT LENGTH -Ed.]
I don’t want to oversell the book. For the most part it is a very breezy and superficial story of a young woman who is ambitious to make it in Show Business, briefly suffers for her art, and then achieves that goal. And I do not mean that in a disparaging way at all: I have tremendous respect for anyone who gains fame doing a weird job for 45 years!
This book reminded me of Brooke Shields’s On Your Own, in that (after a completely irrelevant forward by Pat Sajak, who basically takes two pages to explain that he is writing the forward to this book you are reading) it immediately swerves into the beauty-and-diet-culture of the day:
If you aren’t that hungry, just have a nutritious snack, maybe a salad, a baked potato (but no sour cream, butter or other fattening toppings), or some fresh fruit and perhaps a small piece of cheese.
This passage appears on page 4, which seems pretty early to be prescribing me a plain dry potato, Vanna! Sheesh, we barely know each other!
After the unsolicited diet advice, Vanna and her ghostwriter (Patty Romanowski, “recognized as a leading author in the field of paranormal communication” per her Penguin Random House bio) then delve into eight of the most-asked questions Vanna receives by mail, all having to do with her fashions, including if she gets to keep them, how much they cost, does she ever wear the same outfit twice and which designers are featured. Answers: No (they either are on loan or get auctioned off for charity); surprisingly affordable (most ensembles retail for $60 to $150); occasionally on the daytime show, never on the evening version; and the three Gs of the 1980s: Gucci, Gitano and Giorgio of Beverly Hills.
This is followed by a pattern for an afghan! Vanna is a big crochet-er, and has subsequently published several books on the subject.
Next is her GRWM, in which she talks about the importance of brushing your teeth and pushing back your cuticles (fingers and toes!), her cats Rhett and Ashley, and her favorite magazine, Architectural Digest.
With that out of the way, it is time for the early childhood and dawn of ambition chapters, in which we learn about her… complicated family history: her mother was born out of wedlock in Syracuse, NY and “unofficially” adopted by distant relatives, who fled the state to avoid making it official; Vanna was born shortly before her parents divorced and was raised believing her stepfather was her biological father. Fast forward to high school, local beauty pageants, and ambitions to become a fashion model; after high school she moves from North Myrtle Beach to Atlanta to attend one of those back-of-the-magazine fashion schools, enters the Miss Georgia pageant and moves in with a much older boyfriend. Only 5’ 6”, she’s told that she’s too short for high fashion gigs in New York but makes a living doing local TV and catalogs.
At 22 she decides to go with a girlfriend and shoot her shot in Hollywood, where she waitresses, works as a hand model, and has a few small roles in horror movies, including one directed by Michael Crichton, and a TV movie in which she co-stars with Melissa Sue “Mary Ingalls” Anderson that finally gets her a SAG card. She appears as a contestant on The Price is Right. Tragedy strikes when her mother dies of ovarian cancer just as she’s on the cusp of making it big.
A year after Pat Sajak becomes the host of Wheel, co-host Susan Stafford decided to leave the show and a talent search is launched for her replacement; Vanna gets the job, despite flubbing her audition due to nerves, because producer Merv Griffin still thought she “turned the letters the best” and the director thought she had good chemistry with Sajak:
[She] thought Pat and I made a “cute couple” with sort of a brother and sister look. Whatever. I was just glad I was chosen.
They do sort of look like a blonde Donny and Marie, and I love the “whatever”: the book is at its best when it showcases Vanna’s sense of humor about the show and her job.
Which is on full display on the best chapter of the book, which goes into minute detail about how the Wheel of Fortune sausage is made, circa 1987, when it was still a charmingly analog process: the old manual board has to be changed by hand between rounds, and there is extreme secrecy surrounding the puzzle (Vanna is only one of three people on the set who know what the answer is); contestants have to turn their back to the board and stare into the eyes of their assigned contestant coordinator while it is reset; letters that have been guessed and vowels that have been bought are kept track of on a chalkboard just of camera; and the whole thing is supervised by a member of the Compliances and Practices department, who keeps an eye (and an ear) on the studio audience, bringing the game halt and restarting it from scratch if anyone in the audience calls out the solution to the puzzle.
Everyone takes that possibility very seriously: not only do the contestants forfeit any winnings when they restart from the beginning with a new puzzle, but the show is also on a grueling schedule of taping five episodes a day.
Vanna points out that because of the tight schedule and that in television “time is money” (and TBH, Merv seems kind of cheap) they tend to keep the cameras rolling at all costs, making her job both very physical and sometimes dangerous: in the Prize Showcase era, the different room displays were all on moving sets, and she was constantly in motion, jumping from set to set to be in place as Jack Clark announces. Also, you can’t really tell watching at home, but the puzzle board is on an elevated platform, which she describes riding as it’s wheeled into the studio “like a parade float”; she also has taken a few spills on-camera stepping down from the board. Show biz is dangerous!
So that covers the “That is a kind of actor you can be!” aspect.
And now on to the how we need to be treating our nation’s bimbos better aspect, which I think makes this book even more interesting 40 years after its publication. Shortly after her arrival in Hollywood, she needs to make rent and takes what sounds like a legit modeling gig for a mail-order lingerie company, despite that fact that the underwear it much racier than what she had been modeling back in Atlanta and she goes on for a bit about how “from the moment I accepted the job and every day since, I’ve regretted it.” FORESHADOWING.
It is extra weird that we as a people were ready to slut-shame our nation’s gameshow hostesses, but Vanna gets involved with her first serious L.A. boyfriend John Gibson, soap star by day, Chippendales dancer by night, and nude Playgirl centerfold in-between times, and it doesn’t seem to hurt his career at all.
A year before the publication of Vanna Speaks, Gibson was killed in a plane crash, and while her Wheel colleagues all have Vanna’s back (Sajak is one of the first people she calls upon learning the news; Susan Stafford returns to substitute for her in the immediate aftermath), the same can not be said of our nation’s Sleazebag in Chief, Hugh Heffner.
Shortly after her Boyfriend is KILLED IN A PLANE CRASH, the lingerie photos resurface and are offered for sale to Playboy. Both Vanna and John considered Hef a friend, and she extracts a promise to not buy and print the photos, which he immediately does anyway.
Also not coming off great? David Letterman (she describes him “goosing” her backstage) and Johnny Carson (who goes out of his way to embarrass her in front of Luciano Pavarotti) (WHY?) as well as People magazine, which seems determined to gin up a feud between Vanna and the Price Is Right models. Again, can we just let our nation’s bimbos exist in peace?
I would absolutely buy an updated edition or sequel and would love to hear from Vanna 45 years older/further into her career.
About a year after the publication of Vanna Speaks, she made her starring debut in the made-for-TV movie Goddess of Love, a remake of the 1948 Ava Gardner vehicle One Touch of Venus, co-starring with David Naughton (the “I’m a Pepper” guy!), David Leisure (Joe Isuzu!), Amanda Bearse (Marcy D’Arcy!) Special guest star Little Richard as a gay hairdresser! John Rhys-Davies as Zeus! Game show panelist/Jason Voorhees mom Betsey Palmer as Hera! How could this cast fail?????
Well, I am greatly disappointed to report that this movie is a snooze. Seriously, I could barely stay awake. I would also like to report that Vanna’s performance is a forgotten gem… but it is pretty bad. Although I did get a kick out of her threats to “crush” her romantic rivals with a wrath that rivals Arnold Schwarzenegger in the Conan movies.
Availability: Out of print, plentiful used, along with her numerous books of crochet patterns.
Goddess of Love is available on YouTube.
ysabetwordsmith posting in dw_community_promobirdfeeding is a community started on January 1, 2023. It's all about birdfeeding, birdwatching, and other topics relating to birds. It also touches on nature in general, and observations that may effect bird activity such as local weather. Both text and image posts are welcome. Now is a great time to join as hungry birds are easy to attract with a feeder.
budgetbytes_feedThis Taco Casserole stacks three cheesy layers of soft flour tortillas with a well-seasoned beef and black bean filling to make the easiest taco dinner ever! I brown the beef with onion and green pepper, then stir in thick, chunky salsa for a rich, saucy filling with loads of Tex-Mex flavor. Adding beans and fresh veggies also helps me stretch one pound of ground beef into eight servings for only $1.70 each, and the whole thing is ready in 45 minutes. Set out your favorite toppings at the table and let everyone finish their own slice. This casserole is a huge people pleaser and the kind of simple meal that turns an ordinary night into a mini fiesta!
I do love a good beef taco, but filling and folding tortillas one by one isn’t always realistic on a busy night. So I skip the taco assembly line and layer everything into one baking dish instead! The filling stays simple with ground beef, canned black beans, jarred salsa, and a couple of fresh veggies. Instead of reaching for a packet, I use chili powder, cumin, paprika, oregano, cayenne, salt, and pepper straight from my spice cabinet to make a homemade taco seasoning. There’s no added water, so the filling stays concentrated and easy to layer.
Once the salsa and beans are stirred in, I cook the filling until it looks thick and no loose liquid pools in the skillet. Then it gets layered up between soft flour tortillas with plenty of cheddar. Since everything in the filling is already cooked, this beauty only needs about 20 minutes in the oven to heat the layers and melt the cheese!
See how we calculate recipe costs here.
Gather all of your ingredients. Preheat the oven to 350°F and lightly coat a 9×13-inch oven-safe baking dish with nonstick cooking spray.
Cook the beef: Heat a medium skillet over medium heat. Add 1 lb. ground beef, ½ a diced onion, and 1 diced green bell pepper. Cook for about 5 minutes, breaking the beef into small crumbles, until no pink remains and the beef reaches 160°F. The vegetables should be tender but still hold their shape. Keep cooking for another minute or two if needed.
Remove the excess fat: Carefully drain away the rendered fat, or blot it with paper towels held securely with tongs. If you’re using lean ground beef and there’s little or nothing to remove, you can skip this step.
Toast the spices until fragrant: Now add 1 Tbsp chili powder, 1 tsp ground cumin, 1 tsp paprika, ½ tsp dried oregano, ¼ tsp cayenne, ¼ tsp salt, and ¼ tsp freshly cracked black pepper. Stir constantly for 1 minute, until the spices smell warm and fragrant. This brief toasting helps bring out the flavor of the spices.
Finish the filling: Stir in 1 (16 oz.) jar of mild thick and chunky salsa and a 15 oz. can of drained black beans. Cook for 4 minutes, stirring occasionally, until everything is hot and the filling looks cohesive. When you drag a spatula across the skillet, no watery liquid should pool in the space. If it does, cook for another minute or two before layering.
Build the layers: Overlap 2 burrito-size flour tortillas across the bottom of the prepared baking dish, allowing the edges to fold slightly up the sides. Spread one-third of the beef filling evenly over the tortillas, all the way to the edges.
Then sprinkle with a ⅓ of the cheddar cheese.
Repeat twice more with the remaining 4 tortillas, filling, and cheese to create three layers total.
Bake the taco casserole: Bake uncovered for 20 minutes, or until the cheese is completely melted, the filling is bubbling around the edges, and the exposed tortilla edges are lightly browned and crisp. Let the casserole rest for about 5 minutes to help the layers settle, then slice into 8 servings and add your favorite fresh toppings. Enjoy!
Add whatever fresh toppings you like or already have to each slice of taco casserole before serving. I love black olives, juicy tomatoes, and cilantro on mine, but use whatever sounds good! Those cool, crunchy salad toppings are so good alongside the hot, cheesy beef casserole. For sides, a batch of Spanish rice also serves eight, so it’s an easy way to round out the meal when you’re feeding a crowd!
I also think our cumin lime coleslaw with crisp cabbage and carrots tossed in a tangy lime-cumin dressing would be delicious, or guacamole for a classic taco pairing. The guacamole would also be delicious served with tortilla chips before dinner, then left on the table for spooning over each slice! And if friends or family are coming over, avocado margaritas make the meal feel fun and a little extra special for the adults. The recipe makes two drinks, so scale it up to suit your group.
Store leftovers in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 3-4 days. The tortillas do absorb moisture from the filling and become softer over time, particularly along the bottom, but the casserole is still delicious!
Leftovers reheat well, but I much prefer this taco casserole fresh. If I want to get ahead on dinner, I’ll prepare the components separately instead of assembling the whole casserole in advance. Make the taco meat and shred the cheese, then store them in separate airtight containers in the refrigerator for up to 3 days. Layer everything just before baking and add a few extra minutes to the cooking time since the filling will be starting cold.
The microwave is the quickest option for individual slices. Cover and heat until steaming throughout, using short intervals so the edges don’t dry out. To reheat several portions, place them in a baking dish, cover with foil, and warm at 350°F until the center reaches 165°F. Remove the foil for the last few minutes to help firm up the tortilla edges.
Freeze cooled portions in airtight freezer-safe containers for up to 3 months. Individual slices are easier to thaw and reheat than the entire casserole. Thaw them overnight in the refrigerator before reheating. Just note the tortillas will be noticeably softer after freezing and thawing.
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comiccurmudgeon_feedMary Worth, 8/31/26
Hey, everyone, here’s a fun fact, if by “fun” you mean guaranteed to deliver the epiphany that oh my god I’m so old, how did I get to be so old: we are mere weeks away from the 20th anniversary of the death of Aldo Kelrast. Can contemporary Mary Worth come up with a storyline that could come close to that magic? Well, today we’re launching a new one, and I’m mildly hopeful, as it introduces two intriguing things: Mary and Ian spending time together socially and, apparently, enjoying themselves in a quite manic fashion; and some anhedonic old lady sitting in her Charterstone kitchen fuming about how nothing is as good as it used to be when she was young and had her whole life ahead of her. Not even putting oat milk on oat-based cereal (or “oatmaxxing,” as the kids call it) can bring her a frission of pleasure anymore! Looking forward to learning how she’s about to make this everybody else’s problem and nip Mary and Ian’s ha ha!ing in the bud.
Rex Morgan, M.D., 8/31/26
OK, fine, I guess we’re not going to get to see the scam twins try and fail to pull off a child kidnapping, but at least we’re going to be treated to a Socratic dialogue between Rene and his elaborately coiffed and mustachio’d jail buddy, in which the former attempts to explain how rating on a criminal associate entails turning them in to the authorities, usually in exchange for reducing one’s own looming criminal penalties, and is quite different from activating family networks to dissuade a loved one from a course of action that you don’t believe they’re equipped to handle.
Pluggers, 8/31/26
You could definitely have done a panel with this caption where the plugger is cheerfully strolling ahead with a measured pace, just like many older heavyset adults I see every day do. But we’re in the late Pluggers era, so instead we have to look at this, a “fun” comic in which a plugger is clearly in genuine distress.
sovaya_reasonable_man just sent me an article by Hilfinger about its creation. "For those who might ask how we matched the lip movements to the sound track during editing, we can say it was just a matter of reading lip movements on a Moviola film editor and positioning the sound track accordingly. Each scene had to be synced separately, of course. It was not possible to use the professional clap boards for a picture of this sort."merriamwebster_feedMerriam-Webster's Word of the Day for August 31, 2026 is:
gumption • \GUMP-shun\ • noun
Gumption refers to courage and confidence.
// It took a lot of gumption to speak up for yourself like that.
Examples:
"Fourth graders devise machines powered by rubber bands and 10-year-old ingenuity, some of the most creative thinking you'll ever witness. Wonders of nature and humanity coexist in these spaces. Behind all this is the gumption and bravery of teachers who set this up." — Adam Johnston, The Daily Herald (Provo, Utah), 13 May 2026
Did you know?
English speakers have had gumption (the word, that is) since the early 1700s. The term's source isn't known, but early examples of it are found in Scottish (the related terms rumblegumption and rumgumption can be found there too). Gumption originally referred to common sense, but it is now more commonly used to refer to the kind of courage and get-up-and-go that makes undertaking difficult things possible. Art historians may know a couple additional applications for the word: gumption was historically used both to refer to the art of preparing painters' colors, and as a synonym of megilp, which refers to a mixture of linseed oil and mastic varnish that is used as a vehicle for oil paints.
comiccurmudgeon_feedDick Tracy, 8/30/26
I had kind of lost interest in this Dick Tracy computer hacker storyline, mostly because both the ways in which it got computer stuff right and the ways in which it got it wrong were fundamentally boring. But today? When one of Widescreen’s gang members tries to quit and demands to get what he’s owed, and Widescreen gives him a USB drive shaped like the Space Shuttle, which I guess we’re supposed to understand the implication is that it has crypto on it or something, so the henchman goes online via a coffee shop’s public Wi-Fi network and plugs that USB drive into his laptop like any savvy hacker would, and then the laptop explodes in such a way that henchman himself is immediately engulfed in flames and dies in agony? Well, that’s extremely not how computers work, but it’s also pretty exciting, so I’ll allow it.
Mother Goose and Grimm, 8/30/26
So, yes, Grimm’s liminal position between human and animal is extremely discomfiting to think about. But on the other hand, it allows him to talk to cars and know their True Names, so who’s to say if it’s good or bad?
Mary Worth, 8/30/26
Extremely sinister that the inspirational quote about self-respect and being a role model in today’s strip comes from notorious steroid abuser Barry Bonds. Are we meant to understand that Mary is, in some way, juicing? Is she using performance-enhancing drugs to improve her level of meddle? Truly disturbing.
sovayrushthatspeaks' birthday at Kowloon Tiki. A motorcycle had parked very badly and I parked very carefully behind it. We walked a block at most to our quarry, conspicuous by the neon grimace of its cocktail logo and its profusion of beachcombing exotica down to the green-painted wooden macaw perched beneath the grass-hut overhang of a red-lacquered high-top table. Netted glass floats and tiki masks predominated inside the bar which had rolled up its shutters to the late summer salt, lifebuoys and dried shells around the patio where at three in the afternoon we had no difficulty getting a seat. I hadn't ordered a tiki drink since before the last glaciation and our round arrived in mugs of superlative kitsch. Rush-That-Speaks had the Dr. Octopus whose Kraken and Dr Pepper had been poured into a sort of manically grinning pineapple. My Painkiller which was built around a Victorian-style pineapple-infused rum showed off a dolphin motif on one side and surfer cheesecake on the other. We apologetically had to ask the server to extinguish the hibachi at the center of the pu pu platter because it kept blowing sparks off onto me, but the chicken wings were juicily crisp-skinned and the crab rangoons plump with surimi and the char siu of the glistening boneless ribs only lightly, addictively sweet. The Polynesian Chinese of the original Kowloon out on Route 1 was a part of my childhood I hadn't thought about since my grandparents stopped driving down from Portland. Next time spatch will help us dispatch a scorpion bowl. We walked down to the nearest pavilion afterward and basked on a partly shaded bench, listening to the volleyball game by the bath house taking itself as seriously as the World Cup. Seagulls strutted and screamed; a clam had been successfully cracked on the murrey-colored paving and scoured. We said yes to the photographer who asked to take our pictures because of the light which was flooding like autumn over the stiff dark blue of the just-turned tide. I walked down to it to wash off a ring of periwinkle shell I had found in the litter of high tide and it was strewn with the tattered rust-ribbons of kelp and olive-bubbled bladderwrack. The sandcastle we passed had been plated with white clam shells and bannered with gull feathers at the towers. A line had formed for the tiki bar by the time we got back to the car. We were watching anime on the couch when Rob came home with strawberry and blueberry mochi. As of this afternoon, seven monarchs have metamorphosed and flown.
merriamwebster_feedMerriam-Webster's Word of the Day for August 30, 2026 is:
illustrious • \ih-LUSS-tree-us\ • adjective
Illustrious describes a person or deed that is highly admired and respected.
// During the ceremony, the illustrious star of stage and screen was presented with a lifetime achievement award.
Examples:
“Two of the most respected professors—an academic power couple—invited me to their home for dinner. I was flattered and excited. When we sat down at the table, my heart sank. The first dish they served was steak tartare. Raw beef, no matter how well seasoned, no matter how swanky the cut, is not my jam. ... And in the home of these illustrious professors, I was ashamed about that. I feared they would consider me unsophisticated for not liking the dish.” — Leslie John, Revealing: The Underrated Power of Oversharing, 2026
Did you know?
Today’s spotlight is on illustrious, from the Latin adjective illustris, meaning “shining brightly with light.” Illustris itself was probably a back-formation of the Latin verb illustrare, a word with varied meanings, among them “to light up,” “to make clear,” and “to embellish.” (Our word illustrate also comes from illustrare, of course; its original meaning was “to enlighten intellectually, culturally, or spiritually.”) At one time, illustrious could be used synonymously with its immediate Latin forbear to describe things that glow brightly, but that meaning is now considered archaic. The word today is almost exclusively used to describe something—such as a career or achievement—that stands out figuratively, shining brilliantly in the mind’s eye.
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Shhh- the cover and name of the new PostSecret book are a secret but you can pre-order it now; CLICK HERE.
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budgetbytes_feedLate summer belongs to the eggplant! This warm-weather vegetable is at its seasonal best from midsummer into early fall, and is usually easier to find at a good price around this time, too! I know eggplant can feel a little tricky if you don’t cook with it often, but I’m a veggie gal through and through, and I never run out of ways to put it to work. Roast it until tender, mash it into a smoky curry, bread it until crisp, cover it with sauce and cheese, or arrange it in colorful layers. Not sure where to begin? These 12 eggplant recipes will help you make the most of every one you bring home!
Ratatouille might sound fancy, but at heart, it’s a practical way to turn a pile of summer vegetables into something delicious. This rustic dish comes from Provence in southern France and traditionally brings eggplant, zucchini, tomatoes, peppers, and other seasonal produce together until tender. These two recipes take that familiar vegetable medley in less traditional but very practical directions for everyday cooking!
Our homemade ratatouille takes a different route from the traditional chunky vegetable stew. Thin slices of eggplant, zucchini, yellow squash, and tomatoes are layered over marinara, similar to a vegetable tian, then baked until tender and topped with melted cheese. It looks impressive, but all you really need to do is slice, layer, and bake before serving it with bread, polenta, rice, or whatever else you fancy for dinner.
Ratatouille already brings together some of summer’s best vegetables, and this ratatouille frittata bundles eggplant, zucchini, onion, and tomatoes into one filling dish. Eggs are also one of the more affordable protein options again (thankfully!), and this recipe stretches six eggs into eight generous slices. I’ll happily serve this one for breakfast, brunch, lunch, OR dinner!
This is where eggplant really earns its place in my grocery cart. Its hearty texture makes it easy to build a filling dinner around inexpensive staples like rice, pasta sauce, cheese, and pantry spices. One recipe even pairs two whole eggplants with only ½ lb. ground beef to make four servings! Here are some of our favorite dinners using eggplant.
This eggplant Parmesan is comfort in a casserole dish for me! This recipe skips frying the eggplant, and bakes it instead…which means less oil, mess, and hands-on work! Once the breaded slices are golden and crisp, layer them with marinara and plenty of cheese, then bake again until everything is bubbly and gooey. YUM.
My eggplant curry is a budget-friendly take on the baingan bharta I order from my favorite Indian restaurant. Roasted eggplant and tomatoes are mashed into onion, garlic, ginger, red curry paste, and aromatic pantry spices for a thick, smoky curry that tastes even better the next day. You can roast the vegetables ahead, and the finished curry freezes beautifully! Top tip: If you need this dish to stay vegetarian or vegan, check that your curry paste doesn’t contain shrimp paste!
Our soy glazed eggplant turns one eggplant and a few pantry staples into a sweet, salty, garlicky stir-fry in only 20 minutes. We use fresh ginger because it gives the glaze a much brighter flavor than dried ginger (I recommend storing the remaining ginger in the freezer so none goes to waste!) Serve it over rice with peanuts and green onions, then add broccoli or snow peas if you want to make the meal go even further!
Two eggplants help a modest ½ lb. of ground beef go much further in our roasted eggplant with meat sauce. The eggplant halves roast cut-side down, which traps the steam and leaves the centers soft and creamy beneath all that rich tomato sauce. For a vegetarian version, finely chopped mushrooms make a great replacement (I’d cook them until the liquid evaporates and they begin to brown for the best flavor!).
Got a crowded crisper drawer? I’d call that the perfect excuse to make our summer vegetables in red sauce! We add the eggplant, bell pepper, and zucchini in stages so each one becomes tender without anything turning mushy. Spoon it over budget-friendly Parmesan polenta, pasta, mashed potatoes, or sturdy toast for an easy dinner starring eggplant!
Eggplant pastas can be rich and cozy or fresh and summery, and I’ve got one of each here. Choose between a savory tomato-based pasta for dinner and a pesto pasta salad that’s perfect for cookouts and meal prep!
I’m all for getting every last bit of flavor out of what I’ve got, and smart flavor boosters are a great way to do it. In our pasta with eggplant sauce, that means adding a little anchovy paste. You only need 1 teaspoon to give the tomato sauce loads of savory depth, and don’t worry, it won’t make the pasta taste fishy! Cut the eggplant into small ½-inch cubes so it softens evenly and becomes silky in the sauce.
Those tiny pasta tubes make this ditalini pasta salad especially easy to scoop at cookouts! Roasted eggplant is tossed with zucchini, bell pepper, pesto, and salty feta for a colorful and incredibly delicious summer side. I always make this one ahead because the flavors only get better after a brief chill. Use store-bought pesto for convenience or homemade pesto to keep the cost down!
Eggplant isn’t only for casseroles, curries, and pasta sauce. I’ll blend it into a creamy dip, pile it onto a cheesy toasted roll, or roast it with lemon and garlic for filling pita pockets. These easy eggplant recipes cover everything from party snacks to simple lunches and dinners.
I’m usually the first to reach for hummus at the snack table, but when baba ganoush is in the mix, I can’t resist its creamy, garlicky, lemony flavor! Whole eggplants and garlic roast together before being blended with tahini, lemon, paprika, and salt. Let the eggplant roast until its skin is wrinkled and the center is completely soft as that’s how you know it’s ready to scoop!
When a cold veggie sandwich won’t do, these eggplant mozzarella sandwiches pile saucy sautéed eggplant and melty mozzarella onto garlic-butter toasted rolls. Fresh mozzarella gives you the dreamiest melt, but shredded full-fat mozzarella works when it’s the better buy. I’d only assemble what you plan to eat and refrigerate the remaining filling separately to avoid soggy sandwiches.
Most of the work for these oven roasted Greek stuffed pitas happens in the oven, where chicken, eggplant, tomatoes, peppers, and red onion roast in a lemon-garlic marinade. Finish the roasted filling with salty feta and fresh parsley, then stuff it into warm pita pockets. It also stores well for easy make-ahead lunches!
The post 12 Eggplant Recipes You Need to Try appeared first on Budget Bytes.
comiccurmudgeon_feedPluggers, 8/29/26
The key to unlocking this scene, to my mind, is the cobwebs. Pluggers now spend all their pooping time doomscrolling just like the rest of us, but unlike the rest of us are letting their long-abandoned late ’00s Reader’s Digests moulder, unread, untouched, and unloved, which really raises questions about when the last time anything in that bathroom was cleaned in general.
Rex Morgan, M.D., 8/29/26
Against all odds and the pressures of the very fabric of their reality, the scam twins were on the verge of talking themselves into doing something interesting like kidnapping Sarah. That’s why the strip had to call in the big guns, in the form of their grandpa Lyle Ollman, inventor of the Ollman Technique, the self-help/brainwashing process now being marketed as the Mirakle Method. I don’t know that we’ve ever actually seen the Technique/Method in action, but based on today’s strip it seems to mostly involve an old man berating you to get your life together and maybe go back to community college, which is frankly a little underwhelming.
Beetle Bailey, 8/29/26
I genuinely enjoy Beetle’s silent body language here. “I’m just gonna … I’m gonna go eat these chips in my bunk, I think.”
merriamwebster_feedMerriam-Webster's Word of the Day for August 29, 2026 is:
kith • \KITH\ • noun
Kith is an old-fashioned term that refers to familiar friends, neighbors, or relatives. It is often used in the phrase “kith and kin,” which means “friends and relatives.”
// Spending time with kith and kin at the end of the summer is the highlight of our year.
Examples:
“One thing that you could usually count on was the loyalty of your kith and kin, your friends and family. But now it seems that the closeness of family and relatives is more difficult to maintain in the modern world.” — James Morabito, The Buffalo (New York) News, 26 July 2026
Did you know?
If you’d used the word kith a thousand years ago, you might have been referring to knowledge, or to a homeland, or to your neighbors and acquaintances. While those first two meanings of kith have long since fallen out of use, the word endures with a meaning very close to that “neighbors and acquaintances” one. Today kith appears almost exclusively in the phrase kith and kin, meaning “friends and relatives.” (Kin, another ancient word, can also refer independently to relatives.) Occasionally you will see kith and kin used to refer only to family members, much to the chagrin of those who despise redundancy in language. If you wish to avoid redundancy charges you’ll be sure to include friends as well as family among your “kith and kin.”
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