The Haven, Visit No. 2

No, it hasn't happened yet. But I've already decided what I'm going to order. It's Cullen Skink, a potato-thickened chowdery soup. In this incarnation, it will feature sunchokes and finnan haddie. What is finnan haddie, you ask?

Finnan Haddie is "smooked fesh," or cold-smoked Haddock fillets from the town of Findown. It's lightly salted, and soaking can remove even more salt. To watch a Scottish shaafe demonstrate a chitterin ressepeh fur Finnan Haddie, cleck heeyer.

And then I'll have a Belhaven stout, which is my new lover. And then I'll have an Alba Scots Pine ale for dessert. That's right. You heard me.

Slàinte mhath, to your health!

Dinner and drinks at the only Scottish bar in JP - possibly in Boston - The Haven. They've reconfigured a bit since the first time I was there. I <3 The Haven, and their giant thistle logo, and those stag-antler light fixtures, and the brogue-y kilted bartender! Maybe he's even the owner?

Beers:

- Belhaven draft - Okay, very plain jane.

- Belhaven stout - Chocolatey and smooth, thick creamy head, super sexy. I drank two!

- Alba Scots Pine ale - almost like a fruity wheat beer, but neither cloying in a pine way, nor in a fruity sweet way. Very refreshing, easy to drink, unique. Love!

- Fraoch Gruit beer - Refreshing and fascinating, floral-honey taste. I'm basically Scottish now.

I want to live in this bar. It's making me love Scotland, which is one place in Europe I've never been! Obviously I must go on a beer and scotch tour, with plenty of hiking and running and birding in between hangover breakfasts.

Speaking of Scottish meals! We ordered some tasty appetizers.

- Cheese on Toast = Stilton and melted leeks on country bread with Gala apples. A pleasure.

- Scotch Broth = a shallow bowl of barley and tender lamb chunks with parsley and a rich broth. In the middle of the bowl stood a white shank bone into which a bendable plastic drinking straw had been stuck. Yes, hot marrow for sipping in between soup bites. Strangely pleasurable. (I would also like to add that most lamb is pasture-raised by default, with small amounts of grain here and there in emergencies.)

So that hot liquid marrow I sipped had some omega-3's for me after all. Yes!

By dessert, I was quite tipsy and joking with the enormous kilted Scotsman next to me at the bar. The bartender so thoughtfully kept carafes of cold water and tumblers at arm's reach at all times. We served ourselves. It was delightful. We ordered a butterscotch trifle and it was fluffy, cold, and butterscotchy, with some crunchy sweet topping - maybe oats? And I was so, so giddy with drink and Scottish everything and OMG, CAKE?!

Fucking awesome bar. Crisp-chewy oatcakes and pickled fennel and carrots with your beers. I want to drink there all the time and listen to the bartender talk to other Scottish people and then have him give me more oatcakes along with some joke in heavily-accented English that I can barely understand. SO FRIENDLY. SUCH good beers, and pleasing food. Here's the current menu: "chitterins" are Scottish comfort foods, and of course they have their separate menu.

Next on my list to try? Cabbage salad, Cullen skink. Pheasant and squash curry? Cherry and sage "sassitch and mash"? Maybe, on that last one - so salty, I'm sure, but tasty. I'd get the lamb broth again, great comfort food in a just-right portion for drinking.

And obviously I need more Scots Pine ale and Belhaven Stout. YES.

Cupcakes are Dead, Long Live the Pie!

"And vegetables are the new meat." An NPR article by Bonny Wolf.

This is great because I've seen and tasted way too many disgusting takes on Red Velvet cupcakes. Everybody, time to get over it. Pie sounds great. Savory, sweet, experimental. Let's do it.

For instance, a new take on "blackbird" pie could be blackberries and bird - or cayenne - pepper, eh? Plus lots of chocolate, who am I even kidding. And probably whipped cream, too. With bourbon in it.

Dairy-free Quiche

Laughing Cow. La vache qui rit? La valkyrie. Brand name origins via Mental Floss, right there.

Well, now we've got la quiche sans vache. My brand name will be? Lucky Sandwich. If you say it like you're drunk, or maybe like your face is really cold. Luh-kee sahn-vash.

It's 8° right now.

This is all a preamble to one of the most beautiful - and delicious - quiches I've ever made. Instead of heavy cream, I used regular coconut milk from Thai Kitchen. It's a crustless quiche, based on Martha Stewart's recipe, Crustless Broccoli-Cheddar Quiche.

I just decided to make it spinach, tomato, and mushroom. Organic chopped frozen spinach, about two cups. Two nice organic - hydroponic because it's fucking winter - tomatoes. Ten lovely crimini mushrooms, sliced. Sauteed until tender, tossed with three tablespoons of nutritional yeast. Flakes of pure umami, the yeast stands in for the absent cheddar.

Still with the pepper and frrrresh nutmeg, though. (LOVE my microplane!) Still with the 6 large eggs, 1/2 cup of "cream". Still with the oven at 350°, for 35 - 40 minutes. In four 8 ounce ramekins, or a 9 inch pie plate. I went pie-style.

Gorgeous. Delicious. Moist, and the slight coconut taste made the nutmeg pop. And we all know that nutmeg and spinach is a weirdly fantastic combination. And I love tomatoes in quiche, so. The mushrooms were fab as well. It's my lunch tomorrow. Makes four big tasty wedges. Comes out puffy, and golden. Love.

Lately, My Response to Everything.

Ah, Now I See!

Taza discs make excellent, fantastic hot chocolate. I made this cup with some vanilla coconut milk and my trusty whisk. The twirled-whisk-cum-molinillo is important! A Mexican chocolate whisk is hard to find in New England, and a wire whisk provides a delicious amount of chocolate foam besides.

OMG, the Taza website has this recipe for tahini and cacao nib cookies! WHAT. It's probably like a halvah cookie. YUM.

O, halvah. I love it when you put on that sexy little bittersweet chocolate tux.

I've rediscovered the pleasing taste and excellent mouth-feel of Sunshine burgers - basically brown rice, carrots, and sunflower seeds ground and pressed into a patty. Strangely delicious. Especially with peas.

New Year's Dinner and Drinks

It's a stay-cation with Rihanna off MySpace, and some Jeff Bridges courtesy of the BPL dvd collection. Good stuff.

Pasture-raised organic sirloin steak tips, grilled to Medium (pink inside and hot, slightly beyond tepid and bloody). Spaghetti squash, fresh broccoli, garlic, herbes de provence. A fourth cup of turkey carrot bolognese. A half liter of Schneider Aventinus, a delicious German eisbock with a hearty alcohol content. Yummy.


Now for a mug of my own eggnog, featuring a fresh organic cage-free egg - sad I don't have easy access to free-range eggs - coconut milk, fresh grated nutmeg, ginger, vanilla...oh, and Knob Creek bourbon. YES.

Currently I have resolved to pursue a doctorate in biology. Aquiver with excitement, fear, hope. Hoping I can make prerequisites happen without too much financial impact on me. Oh god. (Edit: Just the 'nog talking. I can't do calculus or organic chemistry to save my life.)

Taza chocolate discs with guajillo chili. Fine, I'll accept the roughhewn granularity as historically interesting and oddly compelling. Maybe comparing it to beautifully conched and cocoa-buttered Porcelana is the wrong thing to do. Taza is its own kind of cacao product. Not a smooth-melting chocolate on the tongue, but something crunchy and tasty to chomp up, with a strong chocolate flavor. In fact, it's only got three ingredients. It's more chocolate than Domori chocolate, in a way. But still, only appropriate for certain moments in sore need of spice and that Taza-esque stone-ground granular crunch.