Demoralized by Oatmeal

So I made this breakfast instead. Extra large foached eggs on wholegrain toast, with mango and kiwi. YESsssssss. Kiwis at 3 for a $1 are not a bargain, being very...woody when eaten. However, I waited a week for the 2 for a $1 mangoes to ripen, and finally hit the jackpot with the second one. SUPER. I am craving protein. Time again for beef stew, I think.

Food Failure Leads to Discovery

Well, this morning I had a Fail. I have a container full of oversweetened sweet potato puree. It may not be too sweet for most people, but I'm on a low-refined-sugar kick, and also I'm sick of eating sweet food. I am so low on protein, dammit, I am CRAVING a big greasy turkey burger with cheese. RIGHT NOW. Omg. I am not even a burger person, mind you.

Anyway, the sweet 'tatoes are good, but I'm sick of sweet. Literally, I'm queasy. Trying to convert the taters into something more appetizing, I added milk and made them into a pudding/milkshake. That was fine for several spoonfuls. Then I was all, bleh. So this morning I turned the remainder into pancake batter, by adding an egg, flour, and baking soda. The pancakes were very beautiful to behold on the griddle, golden brown, but...I didn't quite add enough flour, and the insides were a little pasty. They were tasty enough, despite the texture problem.

After eating six palm-sized pancakes, I again felt queasy. Thought I might lose them, in fact - went on a walk around the pond to digest and stroll with Aster (still recovering from her near-mauling by a larger dog named - appropriately - Tigerlily). Digested the pancakes, but it took me about an hour of perambulation, fresh cold air, and a pleasantly distracting phone conversation with someone cute (!!).

So here I am, sick of sweetness. The sweet tater puree was so good for the first day, and it reminded me of a wonderful dinner I once had involving pork tenderloin, haricots verts, and some kind of demiglace...all over sweet potato puree. Maybe my mistake was over-sweetening, maybe they are plenty sweet enough on their own?! Damn you, American cuisine. With your marshmallows and your brown sugar bloating the sweet potatoes of my imagination.

Looking up sweet potato dessert manifestations - yes, I considered pie - I found a Cantonese "warm dessert soup" tangent. One possible soup is sweet potato and ginger and sugar, with pandan leaf.

I have only had one pandan-flavored confection, at Vosges in Soho: a Pandan leaf truffle! It was outrageously delicious, tasting something like hazelnuts and vanilla. So I feel very postively about Pandan leaf.

So I surfed around for it, and apparently there is a South-East Asian dessert specialty called Pandan Chiffon cake. And I really want a slice. Just one thick, moist, bright green slice of sublimity.

Except that I don't really, because I'm SICK OF SWEET. UGH.

Someone get me a medium-rare filet mignon with a side of fiddleheads and forest mushrooms in a red wine demiglace, stat. Multigrain breadsticks on the side, with bleu cheese dip. Yes.

Early American Hoe-Cake or Johnny Cake

Thought I'd try it out, even though I don't have a hoe blade to bake it on. Was reading about hoe-cake in this book called Massachusetts Curiosities...had an anecdote about johnny cake or shawnee cake being fundamental to the survival of the first colonists at Plymouth. Interesting. All that hard Indian corn they stole, what did they use it for? Basically unleavened cornmeal batter cooked on a greased griddle. I used spray Pam, which was not very Colonial of me.

Anyway, pretty good. I like the slight crunch of cornmeal anything, including pancakes. Blueberry johnny cakes would be super. I'll do that next time. Makes a novel breakfast with a glass of plain kefir and some maple syrup. But now I have this urge to go eat some fruits and vegetables. I'm sure the colonists would have preferred some raspberries or venison or sorrel, too. Ah well. Zucchini potato fritters next, since the weather is so shitty for running.

But not for weights. Hurrah.

Birthday Gift: Fabulous Built NY Lunchbag!!!

Lit from behind by the divine light of Super Giftdom. Insulating and attractive, with interior pocket for packets of tea, salt and pepper, and a small spoon/spork...hurray!

Glasslock Snapware, Hashbrowns with Kale and Spicy Chicken Sausage

Crunchy, tasty. Toothsome. In non-leaching tempered glass containers with brilliant leak-proof lids. Amaze.

This is deep.

From Jessica Hagy's awesome blog, www.thisisindexed.com - brilliant! Guffaws all around. Wish I were as smart and incisive as dat lady.

Final Thanks-eating Menu 2009

1. Butternut squash soup with cardamom, white wine, milk or cream, and maple syrup.

- Edit: adding quinoa and chicken pieces corrects minor flocculation problem created by astringent cardamom steeping in soup with a milk component. Superb flavor with the cardamom and wine and maple syrup.

2. Broth-poached lemon-rosemary chicken medallions. Possibly served with a very light gravy made of poaching liquid.

- Edit: I'll use the herbed poaching broth for the butternut soup and/or stuffing.

3. Hazelnut sage mushroom stuffing, lots of celery and fresh parsley.

4. Potatoes au gratin with bleu cheese topping, tarragon cream.

5. Brazilian collard greens OR sauteed Brussels sprouts with crispy bacon pieces and smoked almonds.

6. Corn nibbles with red pepper flakes (mainly an extra daub of color on my food palette).

7. Bourbon whipped cream and chocolate mousse...parfaits? With fresh blackberries or fresh pears, whichever I can find in better condition.

Edit: it's all a bit cream-heavy, isn't it?! ARGH.

Hot Mess In A Bowl

I have been hesitant to eat undercooked brussels sprouts, what with my history trying to eat onions and all. I like to avoid The Bloat whenever possible, because The Bloat is just not sexy. I enjoy feeling sexy.

So it was with tremulous hope that I made sauteed - and faintly poached - quartered brussel sprouts in my wok with baby portabella mushrooms and crushed smoked almonds. A little balsamic. Then an egg for scrambling and a sprinkle of feta cheese. I was looking for a variety of complementary textures for breakfast. Plus toast, and it turned into a hot mess in a bowl. Very tasty.

Last night, I made a very similar supper for myself - mostly out of desperation, since I was low on prepared food. But there were no bloating after effects, despite the tender-crispness of the sprouts. So I am optimistic about my breakfast not causing digestive upset! Now I can eat cruciferous vegetables with a little crunch left to them? Maybe it's just the onions, after all.

So begins Cooking Experiments in preparation for Thanks-eating. Much excitement!

Oat and honey bread is a little high on the flour for me, but I'm counting on the oat bran to keep things hearty. A nice balance between crunch and chewiness. Faint sweetness compliments my bitter tender-crisp mini cabbages and earthy mushrooms. Huzzah.

Beautiful Weather, Beautiful Breakfast

The low-grease version of a classic weekend breakie. Yes, now Tuesday counts as my weekend. Let's see if I go crazy-like-crack on another glass of Margaret's Hope Autumn Flush Darjeeling, shall we? Ladies and Gents, please start your engines.

More chicken soup tonight - I made the stock and picked the carcass for tiny chicken bits. Now I just need to procure some carrots, celery, and corn...delightful. Perhaps my meal at the library late tonight, instead of my usual pb&j. My teeth-shattering toast is becoming less than novel.

Carcass Soup

Am I being macabre lately? Not sure. Bought a small chicken from the Co-op and roasted it with lemon quarters and herbes de provence and some butter under the skin. Sick! But tasty in the end. A delicious little corpse. The lemons were an excellent addition. Sawed off the breast meat and thighs, then made a roux and added bouillion and carcass to the soup pot. Simmered for thirty minutes, with carrots and celery. How did it turn out?

Velvety smooth. Nourishing. Rich. Flavorful. Awesome? Carcass soup, who knew. Too gross for every day, but maybe okay for the winter time.

Roasted white meat is also just dandy.

Flank Steak Success

Finally seared some beautiful flank steak in my pan! 1 tablespoon of Canola oil, salt and pepper to taste. Three minutes at high heat one one side, four or five minutes at medium heat on the other side. Fifteen minutes of resting on a plate. Then slicing! I love slicing across the grain - somehow so much more appetizing to me. Great soft/chewy texture. Medium well, I'd guess.

Okay, the photo looks kind of gross. But that's because my camera phone has issues. It was a beautiful steak, and I felt grateful to the cow for sacrificing its flank in order to meet my b12, protein, and iron needs. Hurray!

A Seedy Part of the Fridge

Well, I'm still on my No Junk Food diet. Going well. I was in the market for some no-added-sugar blackberry jam, in fact. I picked some up at the Co-op and went happily home to try it on a piece of toast.

And nearly dented a filling on one of the multitudinous blackberry seeds. I mean, I do like blackberry preserves, but they've been lower in seeds in the past? I understand that a jelly is jelled juice, and a jam or preserve is made of crushed fruit. I understand that, and I enjoy eating crushed fruit - with some seeds - on my toast. But there is a limit to human endurance. There is a limit to what I can chew on the right side of my godforsaken dentition.

So I decided to perform an experiment using common sense and a small saucepan.

1. Spoon all the seedy jam into the saucepan, with one cup of water. Add a little maple syrup or honey - if you feel like cheating - and squeeze juice of one lemon slice. Add squeezed slice and boil gently until jam is a smooth liquid. About ten minutes.

2. Set sieve over a large measuring cup and pour hot liquid jam into the cup. Use the back of a spoon to crush fruit pulp from blackberry seeds through sieve. Discard seeds in sieve. Return strained juice to saucepan and heat for another 8 to ten minutes. Liquid should reduce and slightly thicken.

3. Cool five minutes and pour liquid jelly back into jam jar. Jam will set up and magically become a jar of blackberry jelly. Hurray, pectin!

And it's not bad, either. My teeth are saved, and I don't have to buy another jar of jam. SUPER.

Squash Size Queen

I just spent a few minutes picking at the remains of a roasted butternut squash. Like some people pick at the carcass of a roasted bird. Why is the squash so tasty? I roasted that sucker until I could peel the skin off with my fingers, until it was collapsing on the tray and smelling all caramelized. THE BEST. I have it for the rest of the week now. I chose a big fat one at the Co-op.

In other news, I attempted to make flank steak. I was stymied by my inability to find any flanks at the store, so I settled for a sirloin. My general problem with eating steak is that it's too gristly, and the sirloin was no exception. But I have restored some of my B12 and iron stores, after a particularly dam-breaking menstruation. Fine. You know, if I can refuse refined sugar and white flour, I can probably refuse industrial beef as well. I'll go for pasture-finished beef next time. Or bison or something "wild" like that. Beefalo, those leaner hybrids, cropping grass on some hippie rancher's pasture. That's what I'm talkin' 'bout.

Oh. Crap. I nearly set my tea kettle on fire. Forgot about it on the stove for about thirty minutes, I was engaged watching a documentary about gay muslims. It's called A Jihad For Love. A nice continuation of the dubious but very compelling film about a fleeing Iranian lesbian, Unveiled. The star of Unveiled is of German and Iranian heritage, and is a pop star and actress in Germany. Jasmin Tabatabai. She was quite delightful as the scruffy cross-dressing protag; her acting did not suck in the least.

Other victuals today included a pan of well-roasted brussels sprouts and mushrooms. I may be developing a craving for broccolini and balsamic butter. Must purchase more Irish oats.

Two Best Flavors of Dum-dums

So good, they're almost Japanese-worthy facsimiles of pleasurably acid fruit flavor.

Our Daily Bread

A documentary film by Nikolaus Geyrhalter. Yes, a German film - all incidental dialogue is in German, but that makes it even better. It's scenes from industrial food production, and I can only assume that Germany has a much cleaner slaughterhouse system than America. Really, they hose everything down with jet-powered suds at the end of the day1? Amazing. Slaughterhouses state-side would never allow a camera into the kill booth, would never allow a camera to film piglets being castrated, etc.

The film gains in gruesome technological power as it goes along, but it's beautifully shot and riveting to watch. Almost tranquil, alien scenes in the hydroponic greenhouses. And I love/hate the machine that distributes exactly the right number of live chicks into shipping boxes. Watch out for the salmon vacuum and the poultry vacuum. I highly recommend this movie. Our Daily Bread.

Yes, watching it did make me want to slide more to the vegetarian side of the spectrum. Glad I push for free-range organic eggs every time, even if they're not really clucking and scratching on lush pasture...at least they can walk around a little. Better than a cage. I hope.

Great movie. Everyone should see it. I like how no comment is made on the images delivered. It's just a slice of day-to-day industrial production, and it leaves the viewer to make his or her own comments. Extremely thought-provoking.

Collards and Omelets

A very good combination. The non-stick wok from my mom is rapidly becoming my favorite pan for most things. Fast, high heat! My omelet took two organic eggs, a splash of skim organic milk, a little canola oil, a good handful of steamed sliced collard greens, and a sprinkling of mozzarella cheese. Plus a little cayenne. Really nice. I even figured out how to fold it over and serve. Cooked through, with just enough gooey cheese. Very tasty. Toast was wheat, with a garlic-sage-balsamic white bean spread.

Now enjoying some Earl Grey with a splash of milk. A super breakfast.

Paleo vs. Meditteranean

Of course I can't remember what author recently wrote about the "diseases of civilization," and how those diseases can be related back to cereal grains and agriculture. Make a projection in your head, and we are dying of obesity-related diseases at an alarming rate due to our reliance on cereal grains as our major source of calories. CORN. WHEAT. And now soy, of course, but that is a whole other story of easy protein and phytoestrogens.

So in the era of Atkins and low-carb diets, the high-carbohydrate Mediterranean diet and the low-carb, high-protein Paleolithic diet clash with each other. New trend, new trend! But then, hunting and foraging are very relative to location, no? In the Arctic, there are no trees for fuel, so you are going to preserve those dried musk oxen patties until the last possible moment. Indigenous people of the Arctic ate meat raw, sliced right off the carcass. Seal sushi. Whale sushi. Plus fish and berries and eggs, of course - easier to gather and cook those in summer time. But then, you had American Indians on the New England coast fishing, eating oysters, growing strawberries, corn, and squash, and simmering venison stew with wild rice and herbs. And then you had plains Indians subsisting on the famed "buffalo" - they're bison! Bison! And then there are people whose diets revolve around breadfruit, or manioc, or plantains, or RICE, or SOY, or vegetables. It just depends on the geographic and climatic dice you roll.

So a paleolithic diet is impossible to define. It all goes back to eating whole foods, simple foods, and not too much food. We should eat food, as Michael Pollan wrote, that our great great grandmothers would recognize as food. Or was that our Indian great grandmothers?

Poke, anyone? Ramps? How about a paw-paw. Purslane? Lamb's quarters, otherwise known as goosefoot. Sorrel. Lots of things to eat that have fallen out of favor or simply out of common knowledge. If you can get any of these greens without a liberal application of weedkiller, consider yourself lucky. And well-fed? I'm personally still looking for purslane that hasn't been peed on by a thousand dogs. The search could take a while. Meanwhile, I can eat cattails and day lilies.

A fine article on NutritionData.com, weighing the pro's and con's of Paleo vs. Meditteranean.

My life is a long line of purees.

Tonight, I made more cream of tomato soup. With less salt! Stellar. Also, white bean dip with sage, otherwise known as Tuscan Hummus. Silky and delicious, featuring olive oil, lemon juice, balsamic, and a ridiculous amount of fresh garlic. Flu, stay away. Now I am making an acorn squash in the microwave. And then I may prepare some Brazilian-style collard greens with canola oil and garlic.

My steamed green beans were not so pretty this time, but still taste sweet. I guess they're a little bit tough and faded. Is this what happens to late summer beans? Still happy to have them, though.

Some very new and shiny Royal Gala apples at the Co-op. Excitement. Apples are my new dessert. Also, the wonderful and slightly expensive Packham pears. Looking forward to Clementines and better Navel oranges. I would enjoy some fresh figs right about now. Or papaya and lime and strawberries? Omg, FRUIT SALAD.

In the Lindsey Executive Suite, a seasonal fruit salad is currently being served with a fine cheese selection and multigrain toast triangles. Choose from a rotating selection of warm and cold savory salads. Sample tofu six ways at the hot buffet station! Add Greek yogurt with a drizzle of honey to finish your meal with style.

There is a luxurious dining area for up to six, a large screen television with video game consoles, leather armchairs with overstuffed ottomans, and a thick futon bed with deep pillow top. For when you're too tired - or amorous - to continue eating! Simulated flickering, crackling, warmth-exuding fireplace to keep Fido safe and content on the hearth. Enjoy the faux polar bear rug with a friend. Mini-bar inside the replica 19th Century world globe! When you're well-rested, access the private gym with weight machines and virtual reality treadmills, as well as free weights. Jillian Michaels with a flat-top and Roman Centurion outfit is complimentary.

Your VIP Pass also gets you time on the matching set of heated suede beanbags for tired people and weary pups. Follow that up with a dip in our canine-friendly jacuzzi. Bison and carrot dog biscuits gratis, of course. Estate lawns and Chihuahua Stables open to Rover 24/7.

The temperature on the ground is 52 degrees Farenheit. Looks like lovely weather, folks. Thanks for flying with us today, and we hope you fly Lindsey Airways again soon.

Food News

But first, I added sharp cheddar cheese to my broccoli potato puree, accented with herbes de provence. Really, really good. Added a tangy richness to the soup. I know, broccoli and potatoes and cheese are practically a holy trinity. I was overwhelmed by the angelic cheddar choirs, I guess.

Now for the news: Gourmet Magazine has a clever online slideshow of Oscar-inspired cocktails. For instance, he Meryl Streep (Persecco, Benedictine, and Goldschlager - for all those Oscar statuettes), and the Angelina Jolie (single malt scotch, elderflower liqueur). Hot stuff. I also like the Kate Winslet, the Sean Penn, and the Mickey Rourke cocktails.


Next, do you know about the Big Gay Ice Cream Truck in NYC? A guy bought an ice cream truck, and decided to let it all hang out with a giant rainbow ice cream cone on top of the truck. Lots of exotic ice cream toppings, like sea salt, balsamic vinegar, cardamom, and cayenne. And tshirts, of course, that are selling out almost faster than the ice cream. Check out the blog, don't forget to check twitter for location updates. I haven't gotten Big Gay ice cream yet, but I plan on it.

I had another link about pasta and eggplant puree, but you know what? I closed the page already. Tough.

Verdant Mystery

This is some candy or "dessert" available at one of the Chinatown banh mi shops. I love the color. I must find out what it tastes like - or, does anyone already know?? I like to think of it as Grass-flavored Candy. But who can say.

Exciting Food For The Week

Okay, maybe it's not that exciting. It's variations on some of my favorite meal ingredients: spaghetti squash, eggplant sauteed with sesame oil, lacinato kale with garlic, frozen/squeezed out tofu, udon noodles and cukes in spicy rice vinegar dressing, and cream of tomato soup.

The soup was exciting. I wanted to make a more traditional tomato soup, but I couldn't find an old-fashioned recipe calling for tomatoes (in lieu of tomato paste or canned tomatoes), and dammit I wanted a low-sodium soup. So I went for cream of tomato soup, which involved a roux and several cups of skim milk, and five vine-ripened Co-op tomatoes, and a bay leaf. And baking soda, to keep the milk from curdling! So, with the salted butter and the baking soda and the pinch of salt, I'm not sure it's low-sodium anymore. But I had good intentions.

Anyway, I pureed the soup in my food processor instead of straining it, and I like the thicker texture this way. It's quite nice. I added two pureed roasted red peppers to intensify the color. And I find that it's very tasty with some chunks of the sesame eggplant thrown in.

How many species of the nightshade family can I eat altogether (without poisoning myself)? Hmm.

Yes, eggplant sauteed with sesame oil, and then steamed until completely tender, is one of my favorite things. Goes great on top of the spaghetti squash, or with my sauteed kale, or with my soup. Love the eggplant.

Kale - after not eating kale for a few weeks - is a revelation. Brisk, bitter, green, but also a little sweet and tender. Lacinato kale is the best, and IMHO should be subsidized by the government as a very nutritious and hardy food for The People. Honestly. Collards and kale are so tasty when steamed.

In other news, I'm thinking of doing an ice cream cake roll for my birthday. A maple walnut filling? With a sort of molasses/spice exterior? Still thinking.

Salt Lessons

I need to say something about salt. Because I'm bloated and parched and everything tastes too salty. I need to tell you what I've learned about salt since my beef stew affair.

But first, remember that salt is a preservative, and has been used as such for thousands of years. Also, it strengthens flavors when used in moderation. Okay, tips to avoid redundant salting and sodium overload:

1. Never add salt to a broth made of bouillion.

2. Never add salt to anything featuring cheese as a primary or secondary ingredient.

3. Never add salt or soy sauce to the water for boiling udon noodles. Do add a pinch of salt to water used for boiling Italian-style pasta.

4. Look for low-sodium soups, sauces, and broths (you can adjust the salt level to your liking).

5. In a soup emergency, you can add potatoes and carrots to an over-salted soup; they will absorb some of the salt.

6. Girls, avoid salt before and during your period to cut down on water retention and bloating.

7. Grocery store breads often have a lot of added sodium, for whatever mysterious reason. Beware.

8. Nutritional yeast, nori flakes, and sesame seeds can all be used to heighten flavor without adding too much salt to food.

9. Never add salt to a canned or boxed soup.

10. Do add a pinch of salt to water used for poaching chicken or fish. A pinch of salt also works well when pan-searing steaks or poultry. Just a pinch, though.

11. Taste you food before adding salt and pepper. Seriously. Seasoning your food before tasting it is an insult to the chef.

Considering Beef Stew

Yes, it's not usually my style. But I've had such poor experiences with packaged chicken of late. And the stew beef was looking very fresh and bright red and inexpensive at the co-op...so I decided to try it. Just this once. One package stretched out for the whole week is a fine investment of $4.00 and change.

Vegetable bouillion cubes are also a fine investment. I bought some for about three bucks, and two cubes went into my giant pot involving 4 cups of water, 3 large red potatoes (taters absorb salt when cooking, just like pasta), and several large carrots, chopped. I could have used less than two cubes of bouillion, but the stew is fine as is. In future, I could have used one and a half cubes.

I guess I'm shocked at the ease of making a stew. One and a half hours of simmering chunks of stew beef (previously browned in a tablespoon of oil, with a tablespoon of flour sifted over it, and a generous amount of crumbled rosemary), and then 30 more minutes simmering after one adds the potatoes and carrots. Root veggies are tender but not falling apart. Great flavors! I didn't have to stir or anything. It just simmered away, I added things, I kept the lid on, and I used a regular pot. Not a slow-cooker, not a pressure-cooker. Just a big pot with a snug lid.

So. Easy! Very comforting food, I'm pleased to report. A secret: my favorite part of beef stew is actually the tender savory carrots. Thus I am particularly delighted at the quality and doneness of my rabbit food. Perfection. I feel so...American.

edit: You're right, I forgot to add the barley!

Because A Rice Cooker Isn't Just For Rice

Having been well pleased with steamed wheat berries from my rice cooker, I decided to try some pearled barley. (In this case, "pearled" means that the grain has had its outer bran layer removed, so it's not quite a whole grain anymore. But close.) Plus, all they had at the co-op was bulk pearled barley. So I bought a little, thinking about adding it to a beef stew.

But of course I always buy too much bulk grain at the co-op. And since the mornings have become too chilly for cold cereal, I decided to make my pearled barley into a hot breakfast. So I steamed a cup in my rice cooker, with 1 cup of grain requiring between 1.5 and 2 cups of water. I like more texture to my grains, so I keep it at around 1.5 cups of water.

When it was cooked and cooled, I removed a little so I could add it to a stew. Then I added some brown sugar, cinnamon, and ginger powder to the remainder. Lots of ginger powder! Then I pulsed this in my food processor for a bit - I wanted to break the barley down into smaller pieces, more like a hot cereal.

And it came out beautifully, I must say. Cinnamon, ginger, brown sugar and barley is a great combination. Would be excellent with walnut pieces, too. I'm eating a little bowl of it with some milk added. Has a good mouth-feel to it, still a little chewy.

Incidentally, barley is the grain ingredient in beer and many kinds of whiskey. Also a large part of farm animal feed. It's like barley goes hand in hand with civilization or something.

Spaghetti Squash

Okay, it's a great substitute for angel hair pasta. And it's tasty - nutty, faintly sweet, with pleasing mouth-feel. So far I've halved the squash crosswise and then microwaved each half for 15 minutes. Then I lift out the seeds and scrape the pasta-like flesh into a container. I wok up some items to mix into the squash: steamed broccoli, steamed green beans, crispy tofu, poached chicken, stir-fry beef cubes, steamed eggplant, portabella mushrooms, steamed wheat berries, etc. Broccoli seems to the overall winner with the squash. Plus stir-fry beef and mushrooms, and it's pretty hearty. Wheat berries also taste very pleasing with the squash.

One $4.00 package of stir-fry beef can last the entire week if you dice it, cook it with mushrooms and garlic, and add it to a vat of squash and broccoli. Toothsome, but not pretty. Thus, no camera pics.

I am obsessed with spaghetti squash. My roommate watched incredulously as I scraped "spaghetti" from a halved squash still steaming from the microwave. She just can't get over it. I'm just happy to share the joys of eating obscure and very tasty vegetables for cheap.

Savory French Toast

When breakfast needs to be more like dinner, or vice versa. In this case, I wanted some cheap supper. French toast with garlic instead of cinnamon and sugar. Plus layers of roasted red pepper and creamy goat cheese. A drizzle of balsamic vinegar to finish. Extremely tasty. In fact, that's what I'll have for lunch! An extra egg in the mixture meant a more rib-sticking meal. Made 5 small pieces of French toast using two eggs and a little bit of milk. Pretty damn good. Good mouth-feel, too.

Griddle!

An August Breakfast

A little self-care in the form of breakfast: pureed sweet potatoes with a little pool of balsamic vinegar, yum! Cold steamed broccoli. Two pieces of toasted wheat-sourdough, one slice holding a foached egg, one slice spread with organic blackberry jam. And some milky iced tea on the side, sweetened a little with lemon syrup.

I'm awesome. I wonder if I would date myself.

Maybe I would just have a fling with myself, involving dinner out, then half a movie with the accompanying Best Foot Rub in the World, and then hot sex (after some germphobic hand-washing OF COURSE), and then maybe some reading or passing out...with a super breakfast in the morning! Then more sex? Dog walk?

Bizarre thought of the day. At any rate, breakfast would be good.

Dinner at Aquitaine, South End

Finally got my act together for Boston's Summer Restaurant Week: the price of a prix fixe lunch at most fancy restaurants is $20, and the prix fixe dinner is $30. Great deal! Stellar way to try a new fancy restaurant one could not normally afford, or would not want to risk due to price. After some reservation shuffling, I finally chose Aquitaine due to its sky-high Zagat ratings. They required a credit card number just to reserve a table (and would have charged me $25 if I hadn't shown up), so they mean serious business.

Well, I forgot to take any pictures. I was dazzled by my food as it appeared, and by the good music in the restaurant, and by the courteous attention of the waiter. And by the phalanx of graceful people keeping my water glass full of icy drink, bringing hot rolls and butter to the table, and delighting me with two warm, tender cheese gougeres on a tiny doily.

My choices on the menu were chilled corn soup with "leek and corn mignonette"; the Frenchified "Herbes Marinated Hanger Steakwith Pommes Lyonnaise and Garlic-Dijon Jus Lie", and "Lemon Ice Box Cake with Muscat Poached Peaches and Vanilla Crème Chantilly".

And I realize that, at a less fancy restaurant, that same menu would be Corn Chowder, Steak with potatoes, and Pound Cake with canned peaches and Whipped Delight.

The corn soup was sweet, chilled, silky smooth going down. I wanted to keep sipping it up forever. The toppings had a piquant, spicy, salty element which contrasted with the sweetness of the soup.

The Hangar steak was lean (thank goodness), cooked perfectly (Medium), and beautifully seared on the outside. The jus was a rose pink surrounding the meat, and the tender, buttery potatoes created a little nest for the steak. I could have licked my plate. Instead, I used my most dextrous two-handed knife and fork technique to create a succession of perfect bites. A little potato, a little bite of steak, a little dab of jus...chew slowly and savor. Sip cabernet suggested with the Hangar steak. Repeat!

Dessert was delightful. There was also a chocolate tart on the menu, but I wanted something light. Especially after steak, c'mon. I didn't realize the cake in question would be a slice of pound cake lightly brushed with some kind of herbed honey...there was the vanilla whipped cream on top, and the muscat-poached peaches were juicy and sweet and tender. Again, I used my cutlery to create perfect bites; speared a piece of cake and peach with the fork in my left hand, then used the knife in my right hand to finish my bite with some whipped cream and muscat-peach juice from my plate. It was like art, dammit. Like art.

My only complaint was that I wished I could have eaten slower, enjoyed the meal at a more leisurely pace. Aquitaine was serving a high volume that night, and that's an understatement. They were perfectly courteous and very polite - I felt cared for - but the courses came out bam! bam! bam! no waiting time. Perhaps on a regular night, there is some rest in between courses. I would have enjoyed thinking about my food, brain-savoring it before continuing on to the next thing.

Delightful. Good place for birthday dinner. Just like all the fancy Zagat-stars of the South End, I imagine.

Calorie Math: Booze

The booze math! I did it. It was me. Courtesy of www.nutritiondata.com and my desk calculator.

So, 12 ounces of regular beer is about 150 calories (13 calories per ounce).

Likewise, 6 ounces of cabernet sauvignon is about 140 calories (23 calories per ounce).

And 2 ounces of spirits - for instance, 86 proof anything - is also about 140 calories. That's 70 calories per ounce.

A single serving of spirits is generally 2 ounces. Mixing the spirit with juice or soda will, of course, increase the calories. A cocktail with ice, bitters, and lemon juice totally beats out a rum and Coke. Unless it's a Diet Coke.

Alas, 3 of my cocktails pack a 420 calorie punch - approximately the caloric load of a good lunch. Perhaps I can substitute steamed green beans as snack food and carrot juice for a "cocktail".

Cheer for the Poor

Despite the heat, my Saturday brunch required some fancy griddling. Started with slices of whole-wheat ciabatta, one organic cage-free egg, some organic skim milk, and some cinnamon and brown sugar. Made up some egg solution with a touch of sweetness and salt to accompany the cinnamon. Dredged bread ("don't be such a bread-dredge, don't be such an egg-sponge!") and griddled the soaked slices in butter and a little non-stick spray. Golden brown and crispy on both sides, still tender in the middle. Ran out of egg solution so toasted the remaining slice in some of the butter, then spread with blackberry jam.

My beverage is milk with a little tea, ice cubes, and some lavender syrup. I am all about the lavender syrup right now. Great in everything?

I splurged a little, buying $3 ciabatta, but I love it. It makes superior toast.

I am becoming adept at surviving on $20 a week with Co-op groceries. I could probably buy double the stuff at a regular grocery store, but the Co-op is close and on my bus route. Plus, it makes me happy to buy my organic milk and cage-free eggs. And I'm not sick of eating short-grain brown rice. (Yet.)

Perfect French toast. I rock. Awesome, though somewhat lonely breakfast. Perhaps some skating later, though mostly I just want to lay on an ice pack and read.

Yesterday, I recycled some Chinese fast food: dubious chicken teriyaki kabobs with some sort of sweet glaze were sliced and sauteed with some fresh broccoli, fresh garlic, and a little soy sauce. A sprinkle of water rinsed some of the glaze from the chicken and allowed it to coat the broccoli. This whole process made the chicken sticks much more palatable, and resulted in two servings of chicken and broccoli.

What covers up the taste of bottom-shelf gin?

Why, watermelon-cucumber pureé, of course. Strained and slightly sweetened with lemon-basil syrup. (It was a shame to pureé the pickling size cuke, though. Delicious little Kirby cucumbers.) The gin actually improves the taste of watermelon sliced too close to the rind. Delightful with some ice cubes and a tall glass.

Remember, a true olde tyme cocktail involves a spirit, a sugar, a bitter, and a sour aspect. Gin + Cointreau + bitters + lemon juice works! Also, Scotch + lemon + bitters + Benedictine = super, and I might have to call it Scottish Monastery. As in, may I have another Scottish Monastery please.

Or else, Lindsey at the Monastery on the heath. I have Welsh heritage, and they love long place names in Wales. With as few vowels as possible. True fact.

I heart Benedictine, very much. I'd be interested in experimenting with limoncello as the sour-sweet aspect, though. Perhaps limoncello with extra lemon juice.

Pasta Conflict

So, I've historically felt conflicted about whole-wheat pasta. Like, I assumed it was mushy and/or unpleasant to eat. But just the other day, I took a chance on some whole-wheat penne at the store. Considering I've been eating lots of pasta, and like everyone else in the world, I could use more fiber.

I had a simple dish in mind: Diced stewed tomatoes from a can (with a nice salty punch to them), plus tofu that had been browned in sesame oil with garlic slices. Ideally, I would have had some extra eggplant cubes and some fresh basil, but I can do that next time. So, once the tofu is nicely browned and looking chewy, I mix it with the tomatoes and some of their juice. Continue cooking some of the juices off. And then spoon over al dente pasta.

And I was so wrong about the pasta being mushy or unpleasant. In fact, it was delicious. Slightly tastier than regular pasta. And the tomato and tofu simmer that Hannah cooked me a long time ago is still just as good as it was then. Tasty!

Herbal Liqueurs

Very pleased with B&B (Benedictine and Brandy) on ice. Am excited to try more herbal liqueurs. Have already tried Drambuie in a Rusty Nail, but am curious as to how it tastes by itself. Other liqueurs to sample: green Chartreuse and yellow Chartreuse, Galliano, straight Benedictine, perhaps Chambord, Grand Marnier...I'm more interested in herbal flavors than fruity, I must admit.

This quick review of major liqueurs is quite mouth-watering and enticing.

"The most famous of the herbals are the French "monastery liqueurs" Benedictine and Chartreuse. Benedictine, a proprietary blend of 27 ingredients, is the oldest of the herbal liqueurs. In 1510, Benedictine monks first made the elixir that we now know as Benedictine, reputedly to fight malaria. In 1873, production of Benedictine was placed in secular hands. Benedictine DOM is a wonderful, complex honeyed liqueur with a bouquet of spice and citrus blossoms. In 1938, a recipe from Manhattan's 21 Club was adapted to create B&B (Benedictine & Brandy), a spicy, slightly caramelized blend of the original liqueur and aged Cognac..."

Results: I am not crazy about sweet orange-flavored liqueurs. Cointreau/Triple Sec is alright with a bitter and sour aspect, i.e. added in small amounts to classic cocktails. I love Benedictine and B&B for it's herbaceous honeyed complexity - it does not hit me over the head with citrus, in other words. Galliano was a disappointment, with an overwhelming note of vanilla. (A Harvey Wallbanger tastes a bit like an alcoholic Orange Julius-type drink.) Still looking to try the Chartreuses. An absinthe imposter called Absente has an unpleasant tongue-numbing aspect, but is alright when used as a flavoring by the drop.

I look forward to being able to try different kinds of bitters - orange bitters, Peychaud's bitters, rhubarb bitters, artichoke bitters, etc - and I think it may happen eventually since they are usually around $9 for a 10 oz bottle or $4 for a 5 oz bottle. And they last a long time. Bitters add much depth and balance to my cocktails. Spirit + bitters + sour + sweet is a successful formula.

Portrait of a Breakfast as a Big Deal

A giant mug of hot "cream" of potato and corn, pureed and diluted with skim milk. Crumbles of salty feta hiding at the bottom of the mug, yum. Also, a poached egg sitting on top of some toasted challah. What could be more comforting on a cold, damp day! It took so long to assemble, and particularly to poach an egg in pyrex, but it was worth it. Sooo photogenic. So tasty.

One regret: monochrome! Ate all my beautiful beet greens yesterday, alas.

Breakfast Soup

Like so many other gastronomical wonders, the creation of Breakfast Soup was a happy accident. I had intended to make a puree/chowder of sorts with beautiful newly-dug potatoes from the farmer's market. There was some frozen broccoli in the freezer... I know, the travesty of combining the frozen with the fresh! In the end, the broccoli was so withered and freezer burnt, I couldn't use it. Who knows how long it had been in there.

But there was some frozen organic corn that I recalled buying. Into the steaming pot of boiled new potatoes went the corn niblets. Later, I added sage and white pepper and salt and milk. And pureed.

At first, it was glue. More milk. Still gluey. So I put it aside to cool, then slid it into the fridge, thinking of it as "potato corn pudding".

But this morning, I added several spoonful of pudding to a mug, added more skim milk, then microwaved - voila! Palatable and faintly sweet, faintly saged Breakfast Soup. Warming and easy to sip. I approve.

Also from the Copley Farmer's Market: red chard so beautiful, it breaks my heart. A little of that mixed into scrambled eggs with garlic, and it will handsomely top off my brown rice lunch.

More chard to cook up tonight. All the greens at Copley are organic, though lower priced than organic supermarket produce. And in fair temperatures, all the greens are ethereally beautiful. There was red Russian kale, which I had never seen before. They had Caribbean callaloo, Tuscan Kale, spring onions, fresh basil, broccoli so fresh I almost didn't recognize it.

Oo, wikipedia tells me that chard is another name for beet greens. A rose by any other name...

The Bitter Truth

I know, I'm punny. But this is a link to a great article about cocktail bitters - all kinds! Artichoke bitters, celery bitters, Peychaud's bitters, and the usual orange Angostura bitters. Also with several intriguing recipes. Article is called When Bitter Is Good, by Jen Karetnick.

Is it pretentious and old-fashioned, or is it interesting and old-fashioned? I'm still deciding, but I do like bitters and bitters-heavy cocktails. Below is an example of a cocktail that would go well with either Steam Punk or the American West. I can't decide.

The Ninth Ward
Serves 1

Created by Brother Cleve

Ingredients:
1-1/2 ounces Bulleit Bourbon
1/2 ounce St. Germain Elderflower Liqueur
3/4 ounce Fee Brothers Falernum Syrup (substitute Orgeat Syrup)
3/4 ounce lime juice
2 dashes Peychaud’s Bitters

Directions:
Shake all ingredients with cracked ice and strain into a 5-ounce martini glass.
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Also, there's an orange-infused Scotch whisky called Orangerie. Made from single-malt and the hand-zested peel of Navalino oranges. For drinking in cold weather, they say. Sounds like dessert.

Trash Day

What happens when you have some day-old bread in the fridge, some cans of dubious light tuna in the cupboard, a little shredded cheese, and some ancient corn niblets and asparagus tips in the freezer?

You make Trash Sandwiches. In this case, I made Trash Melts.

Found some mayonnaise in the fridge, steeled myself and mixed the disgusting tuna with the disgusting mayonnaise. GROSS, I hate the smell! Mixed in some pepper, cayenne, and Cajun seasoning to make the tuna taste at least tolerable. Then I grilled some bread with sprinkles of cheese on it. Heated up some of the veggies and pressed them into the melting cheese. Then topped with some tuna and slapped those sandwiches on a plate. Ugly food.

Trash Sandwiches. But now there's more cupboard and freezer space for things I actually want to eat.

Food Bucket, Ginger Punch

I made a giant container of bowtie pasta, spinach-feta chicken sausage, broccolini, green beans, and arugula. With garlic and olive oil and pepper. Tomato sauce optional. Not bad, and certainly nutritious. Would be even better with some nutritional yeast, in fact. But it's not terribly photogenic - could've used some red peppers for color, but those bastards are expensive.

One mini bottle of Cointreau later, I've created a cocktail for the summer (or the holidays?). I'm calling it Lindsey's Ginger Punch until a better name occurs to me.

1 oz ginger simple syrup
1.5 oz bourbon
0.5 oz Cointreau
1 big wedge of orange, squeezed
1 optional wedge of lime, squeezed
Topped off with a few ounces of club soda
Optional dash of bitters

Over ice in a Collins glass, maybe with a cherry. Would be lovely as a hard lemonade, too. Doesn't taste like it contains alcohol, which weirds me out. I enjoy the taste of whiskey/bourbon/scotch, so it seems odd to cover up the taste. But convenient for cheaper alcohol? It could be a fine party drink.

For the record, "Ginger Punch" is the name of a race horse (thanks, Wikipedia!). Which is even better!!! Derby cocktail, or Ginger Punch, anyone? We need a cocktail named after Barbaro, poor guy.

Maybe a Sazerac

In a bizarre turn of events, I have decided that rye whiskey with bitters, on ice, is possibly my favorite drink of the moment. This is like the minimalist version of a Sazerac cocktail; the recipe from cocktailmixer.com follows.

1 tsp sugar
1 1/2 oz rye whiskey
1 dash Deva® absinthe
2 dashes Peychaud® bitters
2 dashes Angostura® bitters
1 twist lemon peel
ice

Chill an old-fashioned glass by filling with crushed ice. In another glass mix the sugar with the bitters dissolving the sugar. Add some ice, stirring to chill. In the old-fashioned glass remove the ice and pour in the absinthe coating the entire glass. Remove the excess absinthe. Add the rye whiskey and bitters/sugar mixture. Add the lemon twist.

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Sounds grand. That'll be my next experimental bar order, I think. That, or a Negroni. Which will get me the weirdest look? Also, I was thinking that combining a Manhattan with an Old-Fashioned would make...an Old Man. Surely this cocktail pun has occurred to others.

I enjoy my rye with bitters, on ice.

After the BBQ

All the chicken sausages and veggie sausages have been eaten, all the peppers and potato salad consumed. What I had left: a 1/2 package of regular, convenience-store hot dog buns.

So I made my Saturday breakfast on griddle-grilled hot dog buns, yeah! Scrambled eggs and kale with a little cheese on top of toasted buns. How many times can I type "buns" here? Buns buns buns.

It was a tasty breakfast, alongside some blueberries and nectarines. Downright summery.

Rob Roy

It's a Manhattan made with Scotch, and it's a Scottish folk hero! It's pretty tasty. The inclusion of the maraschino cherries is really growing on me - for better or worse. My recipe so far is:

1.5 ounces Scotch
1 tablespoon sweet vermouth
2 cherries
2 ice cubes

It's a party in a rocks glass.

Today is also a historic day, because I finally broke down and bought a quarter of a Boston Cream Pie from the Co-op. Three bucks for a giant slice of cake/pie is not a bad deal. And it turned out to be way tastier than I expected; the custard is whipped so it's not gloppy and gross as I anticipated. It was more like...dense whipped cream, I suppose. Spongy, moist yellow cake. And a nice chocolate glaze. I have the rest of the slice to eat tomorrow. It only took me three years to sample Boston Cream Pie, and it was just right! I am pleased. I'll put a picture up when/if I find a prettier slice that hasn't smudged its chocolate glaze inside a plastic container.

Finally, I exchanged the bag of rejected food at the fancy pet store. Found some lighter food, which Aster is excited about eating. She seems much perkier now. I'm SO RELIEVED. Perhaps we can try something like a regular dog-breakfast tomorrow.

Cocktail Party Fun

On Sunday, I decided to try throwing a mini-cocktail party: small glasses and only 3 guests, plus a greyhound. The dog, not the drink. Hah.

Possibly my first solo cocktail party ever. Excitement! The thrift store afforded me assorted cocktail glasses and bar utensils for about $1 per item, on average. I bought a less expensive bottle of rye, a bottle of dry gin, St. Germaine in mini, a variety of citrus fruits, and a quartet of fancy flavored sodas: grapefruit, tangerine, vanilla creme, and ginger.

I cleaned up around the house, shined glass surfaces and drinking vessels, and wrote out a "cocktail menu" for my guests. I prepared my "bar" on the kitchen counter, and pre-sliced all my citrus garnishes. In a fog of Let's Play Pretend delight, I refilled my ice trays.

If I had really thought ahead, I would have worn my white bow-tie, too.

Guests arrived bearing hot pizza, a jar of maraschino cherry garnishes, and boardgames, plus a giant ecstatic greyhound. Dog treats were exchanged. Then I took my first cocktail orders: an Old-Fashioned, a Manhattan, and an Elder Collins. Chop-chop.

Lacking a jigger measure, I made all my drinks quite strong. But tasty! The cherries were not as unpleasant as I had imagined. I was pleased to put the Collins in a Collins glass, the Manhattan in a cute cocktail glass, and the Old-Fashioned in...yes, you get it.

My decanting strainer thingie performed very well. I got it for a dollar! As a matched set of utensils! How I enjoy that.

Running out of fizzy Jamaican Lemonade, I improvised the next Collins: fancy tangerine soda, lime juice, elderflower, and gin. A hit. Hilarity and boardgames followed.

I see fancifully flavored sugar syrup, bison-grass vodka, and sparkling apple cider in my future.

Without Rice-cooker, Panic Ensues

Well, not really. I didn't want to risk miscalculating the water needed for beans and rice on the stove. So instead of rice this week, I decided to try some other starch. I have bread, of course. Cornmeal mush. I could also make some kind of Vermont-inspired homemade cracker, or some approximation of Civil War hardtack biscuits.

I decided to go with my chewy Italian bread. Recalling that I enjoy the idea of strada, if not the actual execution, I created a meal - it's what I want strada to be in Lindseyland.

Lindsey's Pillowy Strada-in-a-Pan

2 or 3 slices of crusty Italian bread, cubed

2 large fresh eggs

Approximately 1/3 cup of PLAIN kefir or unsweetened yogurt

Approximately 1 cup of chopped fresh broccoli, spinach, or kale

Shredded mozzarella cheese (or whatever kind of cheese you prefer)

Salt, pepper, cayenne, sliced garlic to taste


Melt a little butter in a pan and dump the garlic in with it. Don't let it get too brown. Meanwhile, mix the eggs and yogurt together in a bowl until well blended and golden. Add the cubed bread to the bowl of egg mixture and stir gently - you want the bread to soak up the egg mixture until there's almost no liquid element at the bottom of the bowl.

Add some cayenne or whatever you like to the bread/egg mixture, and mix lightly. Pour into pan with hot butter and garlic. Add your fresh vegetables and sprinkle with cheese. Lower heat and cover. After at least five minutes, check the underside of the egg mixture with a spatula. Shouldn't be too burnt, just crispy and brown! Flip or mix up the strada and continue cooking, covered. By now your greens should be brightening up and looking tender.

When strada is just cooked through, serve and eat! The bread cubes will be savory, and fluffy, moist in some places and crispy in others. Soft, but resilient to the bite. Perfect.

This is not a photogenic meal, but it is a tasty and quick after-work nosh. Obvy good for messy brunch, too.

I followed it with my Recession Dessert: cornmeal mush topped with brown sugar, bananas, cinnamon, and a little more plain kefir. The sourness adds complexity, and is especially good with the sweetness of the ripe banana.

Pancakes and Cocktails (sounds trashy)

So far, I've created miniature versions of an Old-Fashioned and a Manhattan. A tiny bottle of bitters is not expensive and will probably last for a year or two a good while. For the Manhattan, I consulted the inherited booze cache in my kitchen cabinet: a bottle of dry vermouth and a bottle of sweet vermouth behind bottles of coconut rum. Exciting! Thus, I made a Manhattan sans disgusting cherry. AND it was tasty!

The Old-Fashioned is still my favorite: 2 oz of bourbon or rye, 2-3 dashes of bitters, two orange slices squeezed and tossed in (or not), maybe a little sugar, and ice cubes for chilling/dilution. Clink clink!

Tom Collins should be fine with some Jamaican sparkling lemonade. I've also recently read about an Elder Collins (as I'm calling it), which is a Tom Collins (gin and fizzy lemonade) with elderflower liqueur added. They've got tiny $3 bottles of St. Germaine at Blanchards, so I'm all set for Elder Collins.

Now all I need is some cocktail drinkers in the mood for mini cocktails, and perhaps a freshly delivered pizza (or a stir-fry, if I wanted to be labor-intensive). Oh, and a board game.

This morning, I made blueberry cornmeal pancakes for myself and my lady friend. The blueberries were big, fat, and sweet = a little surreal. I went with it this time. Lots of blueberries per pancake, lots of butter and wildflower honey involved in the batter, with grade B maple syrup for topping...AMAZING. Extremely pleasurable - particularly after a sweaty run - and the only pancakes I'll eat with gusto. Photos forthcoming. I halved the recipe from Bon Appetit, and it worked out perfect for two.



Now I sip a gin and tonic with lime; my reward after cleaning the fridge with soap and hot water, and then mopping the floor. SUCCESS.

The Golden Beet

So I bought some bright, carmine-colored beets at the Copley farmer's market the other day. Looking forward to beet greens and to the beets themselves, of course. Tonight I sauteed the greens and boiled the bastards. Didn't knick the beets even a little bit, just washed them, left generous stems on them, left the roots alone...and plunked 'em in boiling water for 55 minutes.

When I checked back, they were no longer carmine. They were golden yellow.

My first thought = Omg, BUNNICULA WAS HERE.

Okay, so I guess these must be golden beets. The unicorn of root vegetables! Who knew. Taking the skins off was fine; each beet is smooth and golden, with a blush of almon pink at both the stem end and the root end. Speaking of salmon, slicing the beets really looked a lot like slicing salmon sashimi. Or some kind of raw, beautiful fish. The layers of the beet - like the layers of an onion - look like the fat layers in a cold-water fish like salmon. So...yeah, my mind was freaking out. Hoping for sashimi, but tasting a mildly sweet beet.

Sweet beet.

I'm too sleepy to pep them up with vinegar, and I don't have any blue cheese. Drat! Perhaps they'll take a low-key vinaigrette tomorrow.

Don't the pictures remind you of peaches? Golden and kissed with reddish pink...I need a better camera phone.

Drinks To Sample: a list in progress

Harvey Wallbanger (orange juice, vodka, galliano)

Manhattan (bourbon or rye, lemon juice, bitters, sweet vermouth, a non-disgusting variant of a maraschino cherry garnish)

Tom Collins (gin, lemon juice, sugar or syrup, soda water)

Old-Fashioned (bourbon or rye, bitters, sugar, soda water, orange slice garnish)

Alabama Slammer (vodka, amaretto, sloe gin, southern comfort, orange juice, holy shit)

Then, there's this super froofy, delicious-sounding Cucumber Lavender Sour made with Hendrick's gin and lavender bitters and all kinds of other things difficult to find. Like sugared vanilla beans. And lavender-infused simple syrup.

Or! An Earl Grey Fizz! (Zubrowka Bison Grass vodka, Earl Grey tea syrup, lemon juice, vodka, champagne, a dash of the good life.)

I would also like to try more drinks with delicious elderflower liqueur. The French 77 (St. Germain, lemon juice, champagne, lemon twist) was super.

And posh. Super and posh. Okay, it was mostly super.

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Note: I tried an Old-Fashioned and a Tom Collins! The OF was delish - the bitters really balanced out the sweetness. Definitely something to order again; I feel like different bartenders will make wildly different versions of the drink. This most recent cocktail had orange slices squeezed into it, and a cherry (meh), and bitters and bourbon and possibly sugar and definitely soda water. Exciting.

The Tom Collins was okay. Basically hard fizzy lemonade with a slight evergreen/gin aftertaste. Nice. Not as exciting as the OF, but nice.

Fresh Corn and Blueberry Cornmeal Pancakes

So I have been thinking of blueberry corn pancakes for a while. And the other day, I bought blueberries and fresh corn, and also found a recipe on epicurious.com. The recipe is from Bon Appetit, and involves the whipping and folding in of egg whites. Exciting!

Despite forgetting to add the egg whites for the first patch of cakes, my pancakes ROCKED HARD. Fresh corn I cut off the cob myself, very sweet and crisp. Blueberries from the pint container. Kept them warm in the oven while I finished the last batch. Drizzled them with molasses - since I'm out of maple syrup - and they're fucking fantastic. God, I love breakfast for dinner! And I don't even like pancakes generally, but I like these pancakes; they have texture, a vegetable element, a fruit element, a little bit of crunch... It's the perfect pancake, as far as I'm concerned. A glass of peach kefir cut with skim milk completes my dinner. I think I might have seconds.

The photo I took is so bad. I wait for a better camera phone from Craigslist!

Wooden Sushi Playset

Realistic chopping sound. I like the little green lump of wasabi. Is that the pink pickled ginger underneath it? Is this set really meant for yuppie toddlers who love sushi?

Whiskey Cocktails, Hangover Breakfasts

In my search for new and not-too-sweet whiskey cocktails to sample, I came across a drink called a Rusty Nail. It's Scotch whisky, Drambuie (a Scotch whisky liquer made with herbs and honey), and a lemon twist. On ice. I ordered it from the very friendly bartender in the Midway, and I enjoyed it very much. Slightly medicinal, but indeed, not too sweet. Next, perhaps I will try ordering a Manhattan. I also ordered a whiskey and ginger ale, which was just fine; there's a camera phone pic to prove that I was still walking around after the whiskey and ginger, but my memory is not bringing back a lot of information. Other than bobbing along in a small crowd, like a cork in a stream! Nice - a high level of debauchery (for me), in a low-key environment. It's practice for the larger clubs, I say.

Normally my post-alcohol breakfast would be something very savory, with a salty and spicy element. Like maybe poached egg over toast with greens and sriracha. Mmm. But today I'm trying something sweet: shredded oats, sliced organic strawberries, sliced banana, a little peach kefir, and skim milk. Accompanied by hot cranberry juice doctored up with licorice-mint tea and sugar.

The verdict is Super Tasty.

My Pride Day Breakfast

Happy Gay Pride!!! Yesterday at the March, I bought a rainbow wrist cuff. I was pleased by the Bostonian bystanders clapping and cheering as we marched through. Go, Boston.

This morning I prepared zucchini ribbons with garlic and pepper, a foached egg, and some multi-grain toast. Also a cup of blueberries, a lemon tea cookie, and oolong tea.

If the blueberries had been organic and the toast hadn't been freezer-burnt, my breakfast totally would have substituted for a good girlfriend.

Maybe I could barter!

Scavenger Score at the Workplace!

After a meeting of the Higher-Ups, what leavings! A fine Cafeteria-style Lunch Score:

My first course involved a tortilla filled with slightly pink real roast beef (as opposed to deli roast beef), iceberg lettuce leaves, pale tomato slices, and pale mystery cheese.

My second course involved a reasonably nice and crusty half-baguette with cucumber slices, a different kind of mystery cheese, and the unwanted "butts" of the roast chicken fillets.

My dessert involved a wedge of 7-layer bar about the size of a make-up sponge; one normal-sized M&Ms cookie; one Krackel mini, one Special Dark mini, and one Mr. Goodbar Mini.

Desserts redolent with palm oil and corn syrup. I suspect the 7-layer bars involved lemon as well as coconut, plus walnuts and...who can say. The meats and the baguette were the best parts, and if I hadn't been over-excited with the apparent bounty, I would have made wiser choices. For example, two baguette sections, heavy on cucumber, with a selection of the higher-quality chicken and beef (avoiding cold-cuts), the reddest tomato slices available, some romaine, and one mini candy bar for dessert.

Ah, but it was lovely to a have free lunch with so many options! I am pleased. Ravenous Workplace Vulture Points: +5

Zucchini Tomato Madness

So summer doesn't begin officially until the 21st of June. But I'm feelin' it. The weather is absurdly perfect and temperate, meanwhile there's fresh zucchini and good-looking tomatoes at the Co-op. So I've been eating the beans, the brown rice, and tomatoes, zukes, garlic, and cheese. This is either a one-bowl meal (or work lunch), or it's a super quesadilla.

Also, it's cheap. Salsa, too. I recently tried some new tortilla chips with embedded, flattened peppercorns. Pretty tasty, gave the chips extra zip.

My brain is all cottony due to my cold, so I think I'll stop blathering.

O, there's tofu chocolate pudding, too. Choosing a milk chocolate hazelnut bar seems to cover up the "bean-y" taste of the silken tofu. Really fine, smooth, almost whipped texture after a bout in the food processor. Also makes a damn good tofudgesicle.

It will be exciting to exercise again, but for now, I must return to my sniffling and prone reading.

Beans and Rice, continued

Summer is starting to kick in; May was a gorgeous, perfect, wondrous month (aside from that week of rain, fine). Having recently come back to Mexican food, my staple diet continues to be salsa, tortilla chips, tortillas, beans and rice, tomatoes, and some kind of cooked green. Last night I made my usual lunch-in-a-box, but added diced and very good-looking zucchini: zuke, black beans, butter beans, brown rice, tomatoes, salsa, cheese. I could use more vegetable items in my diet, but the salsa is so flavorful. Beans and rice seems to go down real easy, too. For cheap.

But, adding the minced raw zucchini was great, because it cooked perfectly in the microwave at work. I'm awesome.

This morning I needed something especially substansive, so I made a quesadilla with more diced zucchini, tomato slices, salsa and cheese. The zuke cooked very nicely in the 'dilla. Good to know, good to know.

Chemistry of Cream

So, there was a Tasting Table recipe for making butter out of whipping cream, some salt, and a jar with a tight lid. I had to try it.

Though I didn't have an odor-free jar. But I do have an oversize glass cocktail shaker. And some packing tape. Shake it, shake it!

Shake it for half an hour, until your arms burn. Respect those farm women, churning butter much better than my butter.

I turned into whipped cream almost instantly, then gradually into butter. I poured off some butter milk, rinsed with clean water, then shook more. Forgot about the perforations in the top of the cocktail shaker; removed the little metal cup to find a blob of perfectly formed butter.

Transferred butter to a shallow container and chilled. Voila, white sweet butter of the sort you might find in a fancy restaurant. Hard to spread, very light. I'm going to use it in some chocolate butter cream frosting, I've decided. On top of lemon cupcakes. Should be delightful.

Using a smaller portion of the remaining cream, I whisked up some sweet whipped cream to spoon over some organic strawberries. I needed a pick-me-up after reading Water: A Natural History. (It goes into my Top 50 Books Of All Time category, and it was extremely well-written, but also simply devastating.) Thus, organic fruit and cream.

DELICIOUS. Holy shit.

I also made some brown rice and black beans, some spinach and garlic, and more ass-kicking salsa. This time I used:

4 scotch bonnets
4 jalapenos
8 cherry tomatoes
2 cloves of garlic
1 lime

I was sadly out of poblanos. I didn't want to buy more - it was exciting to use leftovers from last week. So my salsa is the hottest I've ever made, but it's very tasty on chips. I am acclimating to the heat. Go, capsaicin!

If I get that job at Pine Manor, I'm going out for a fancy dinner and champagne. Seriously.

Edit: The butter went into a chocolate buttercream frosting, which was itself the filling for Southern Tea Cake sammiches. INSANE. My eyes bulged with pleasure.

Oliveira's Brazilian BBQ - Eastie

Why is East Boston full of inexpensive, delicious restaurants? I am not sure, but I am enjoying my Eastie restaurant crawl. Yesterday, after a 3-hour hike in the Fells, I got a taste of Brazilian BBQ/Churrascaria.

So, like, you walk into the place. Put your stuff down at a table; it's bustling, there's a soccer game on the flat-screen tv, there's a glass case full of coconout-dipped sweets and cookies. So then you pick a plate from the stack of clean plates, then serve yourself from a hot and cold buffet of pinto beans, black beans, rice, broccoli and cauli, thinly-sliced sauteed collard greens, chicken or shrimp salad, chicken stew, beef stew, fried fish, green salad, watermelon chunks, hearts of palm and sliced tomatoes...THEN you visit the rotisserie section for slices of steak, chicken, sausage, or pork.

I just opted for steak - haven't eaten it for a while. Medium-well. The Man With The Large Knife was ever so nice. My steak slices were beautifully pink on the inside, and smelled delicious.

So then I took my loaded plate to the cashier, who weighed my plastic plate on a scale. Then I got a tall glass of orange juice from the...circulating juice tanks? Behind her: cashew juice (?!), orange juice, and guava. All together, about $9.00 for some nice-looking food and drink! Seriously.

My intense hunger helped, I'm sure. But everything tasted mouth-watering. My collards, my pinto beans were tremendous. I ate slowly, to draw out my enjoyment. Then my steak wasn't just good, it was great. Like, I thoroughly enjoyed eating it. And was glad I hadn't got any other meat, because that single serving of steak was almost too much.

No indigestion afterward. My orange juice was weirdly good - pulp-free, but tasted fresh-squeezed or something like that. Overall, I am so excited to go back, or to find a similar Brazilian BBQ around Jamaica Plain. Seriously, awesome cheap eats.

Also, I would like to mention that I had this dining experience with someone who was previously almost vegan, omg. She had, I believe, four kinds of meat and fish on her plate. A parallel universe, I think. A delicious parallel universe.

Dear Sacrificed Cow - I am sorry that the beef came from you in particular. It was nice, though. I hope that your slaughter was humane and very fast. Thank you, Cow.

VeeVee in JP

Now serving lunch on Saturdays, with a more minimalist and affordable menu. I had been wanting to go to VeeVee and have some brunch or lunch or something. The other day, I finally went.

Fancy beers, fancy wines, seasonal and local ingredients when possible...named one of the Boston Globe's Best New Restaurants for 2008. Plus, a really excellent house-made veggie pickle that I recall fondly from my last visit.

I chose the morel mushroom and goat cheese frittata with balsamic-splashed pea shoot salad. Fried sage leaves on top, so crispy. Very good! I enjoyed my meal very much, and wished to draw it out by ordering more little tastes. Alas.

Veevee offers a prix fixe dinner menu on Tuesdays and Sundays: non-vegetarian menu for $24 and vegetarian menu for $19. How awesome is that?

Omg, I just looked at their current menu. Not only are they serving maitake ("Hen of the Woods") mushrooms, but they're also serving the elusive ramp - mysterious vegetable of spring!

I must go again, for dinner. After my stomach calms down. Yeah.

Upset Stomach

Um, maybe I tortured my stomach today? Oops. Lunch was half of a lamb burger (tasty!) and half of a turkey burger (meh), plus a beer. Followed by a disappointing dry chocolate cupcake with pleasing chocolate-stout frosting.

Then dinner was grilled tuna, homemade black bean patties, cheese dip with chips, grilled pineapple = BBQ! Plus another beer, and 4 ounces of whiskey. Oh, and vanilla ice cream with hot fudge sauce and Cool Whip (wtf), and chocolate-dipped bacon pieces.

Wow. Just, wow.

Yesterday I seem to have eaten the greasy meat off a fried chicken's neck bones, plus some over-salted Spanish rice with pigeon peas and maybe...carrots? And then I had some mint Oreo ice cream, to soften the discontent of my dinner.

So, little wonder that I have the runs today. Otherwise I feel quite perky. Tomorrow I'm eating cereal, maybe a pear. A salad? I'm okay with the extra protein (buildin' muscles oh yeah), but I'd like to avoid the chicken neck bones and anything exceptionally unctuous. Hopefully the grilled-in-advance tuna is not causing these problems, but I have had poor experiences with grilled-in-advance fish.

Oof, uncomfortable memories. Where's the Immodium.

Salsa Improvements

So what we've got here is:

3 poblanos (big, blackish-green and shiny)
3 jalapenos
3 habaneros scotch bonnets
1 lime
some good tomatoes
some salt

Blacken all the peppers on a grill or over a burner - i use forks and wooden skewers to do several at a time. Indoor BBQ! Smells good, too. Clean the seeds out of the peppers, but don't scrape away the veins (full of heat?). Throw the tomatoes and cleaned peppers and the juice of one lime into your food processor. Did you burn yourself handling those hot forks? Be careful. Don't touch yourself after touching the peppers, btw. Particularly the habanero element.

Pulse until you're satisfied with consistency, adding more lime, some salt, or more tomatoes to taste. This salsa has great sizzle to it, and the heat build-up after several chipfuls is tear-inducing. SO GOOD. I need to think of a suitable name for it.

Lemon Peel and Coffee Ice Cream

My English Breakfast tea was getting pretty boring. That is, before I added strips of fresh lemon peel to the steeping. Now my mornings are full of excitement. Word.

My last pander to my ice cream addiction was buying a 2-for-1 pair of Edy's containers. Whatever that large cylindrical size carton is...a gallon? No, a quart? Whatevs. I bought one regular and one low-fat carton. I ate the regular carton, of course. In a surprisingly short amount of time. But you see, I purchased coffee ice cream as my second flavor. I needed to inject a little negative feedback into my addiction!

Successful negative feedback: after twice trying to enjoy 1/4 cup of coffee ice cream at night - and then staying up until 2 am dancing around or lifting weights - I decided to try putting three spoonfuls of ice cream into my morning cereal. So I can finally be rid of the crack they call coffee. And I can be extra perky in the morning.

These are spoonfuls, not scoops, mind. A very small serving - more like the true serving size on the ingredients list.

Coffee ice cream and a sliced banana in my cereal reminds me of a milk shake. A milk shake before the blending. But it's very tasty, and I am thankful for that. And I feel like I'm tapering off the ice cream addiction - it's working! I'm out of the evening ice cream habit. That is huge progress. I feel thinner already.

No more purchased containers of ice cream. I may have small servings when I go out, but I cannot buy large containers of it. I wonder if they put heroin in ice cream. Seriously.

Pizzery

The results are in, ladies and gentleman. I have no innate talent for pizza making. Whatsoever.

My dough was baked through, as I had hoped, but it was also...tough. Not that tasty. The layering of thinly sliced tomatoes, spinach leaves, and fresh basil + white bean puree was not substantial enough. (I couldn't get the jar of pizza sauce open. This is why I need to date a really strapping butch lady. Who can make good pizza. A butch pizza-maker is all I want from life. Aside from, uh, Fame and Fortune.) The mushrooms and cheese were okay. Overall: Pizza fail.

Lame!

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Edit: The pizza wasn't really that bad. In fact, it improved with some time in the fridge. I ate it over two days, as my work entree. Dough was still tough, but the taste was fine. Perhaps the secret is making my own dough, treating it right (stretching it effectively), and assembling a thinner layer of ingredients. There's still hope for my pizza.

Goya Tortilla Chips

Well, I bought the Goya yellow-corn tortilla chips because they were cheaper than Tostito's. But you know what? These chips only have three ingredients: yellow corn, canola oil, and salt. WHAT. And they're really tasty: thin, so crispy, and so salty. There's a fine salt dust happening, and it coats all surfaces of the chip. Hypertensive people, beware. This is some pretty fabulous sodium intake.

And these chips are awesome with my salsa, and with cream cheese, and by themselves. I am a new convert.

Also, I had some tomato leftover from layering slices on a pizza. I diced up some nice fillets of tomato, and added them to my remaining salsa. Yes, yes, YES. I'll do this with every batch, fuck yeah. With cilantro. It'll be unstoppable.

Grass-flavored Vodka, Lemon Popovers

So I heard about this Polish vodka from a friend. The vodka is flavored with Bison Grass, and even comes with a blade of this grass floating in the bottle. It's called Zubrowka; Wikipedia tells me that "Zubr" is the root word in Polish, meaning the European bison, or wisent. As you may imagine, the wisent enjoys chowing down on this particular type of grass, etc, etc.

The vodka supposedly has flavor notes of "woodruff, vanilla, coconut, and almond". Sounds pretty delicious? Apparently this is the new rage in vodka cocktails? I've already seen a variation involving coconut and pineapple, and another involving unfiltered apple juice (this latter cocktail may count as a traditional mixture).

According to Wikipedia, bison grass vodka has been banned in the U.S. since 1978, because it contained a toxic compound called coumarin. New distillations of the vodka have somehow removed the coumarin element, and thus the bison grass vodka can now be drunk on this side of the pond. Interesting, no? Absinthe, bison grass vodka, what's next?

So this morning I baked 8 sweet lemon popovers, but did not preheat the pans first. I disregarded Ruth Reichl's advice! Oh my god. So my popovers were not quite popped, but they were pretty good. I realized too late that I have actual lemon extract, which would have tasted more lemony. Next time. I ate all the popovers with blackberry jam and a little butter, plus some tea. When they had digested somewhat, I went for a 6 mile run. Yee-haw!