Books, food, etc.

Yesterday I stopped by the library to see if I could find The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy, which Alda had said was her favorite contemporary novel. With a recommendation like that, I definitely wanted to read it. But alas, the Uncle Remus Regional Library System* hath it not. I'll have to look for it elsewhere.

Of course, I didn't leave empty-handed. I brought home three cookbooks:

1. The oversimplistically named Madhur Jaffrey's Cookbook (what, like she never wrote any others?). This one's my favorite of the three. I read it pretty much cover to cover last night and took a lot of notes. She uses a lot of the same flavors and techniques over and over, but they're good sturdy techniques like popping mustard seeds in hot oil, etc., which she learned growing up in India.

2. Chinese Cooking for Dummies, which is better than it sounds because it was written by Martin Yan. I took this one out of the library before but made the mistake of not copying down the recipes I tried. This time the sweet and sour sauce and the basic chow mein are mine, dangit. I'm not the brightest bulb in the box when it comes to Chinese cooking, but the recipes in this book gave me excellent results when I used them before.

3. The Turkish Cookbook by Ozel Turkbas. I was excited, for obvious reasons, to see a Turkish cookbook in our teeny little rural library, but most of what I've found in this book looks underseasoned and Americanized. I would say the 1977 publication date is an excuse, but it's not; I have plenty of international cookbooks from the 1960s and 70s that are rigorously correct and adventurous. Still, there are a few things in this book that I can't wait to try. There's always something.

Two things I learned yesterday that have nothing to do with the above:

1. I've been rereading our copy of Amy Dacyczyn's The Tightwad Gazette (the book, not the newsletter). She has some good ideas that I use every day, but a lot of her economies are nitpicky and silly, and sometimes she's wildly inconsistent.** For years I've thought ill of her practice of substituting dry milk for fresh--that goes against everything I stand for as a foodie! But I'm willing to try almost anything once. Yesterday we ran out of milk, and instead of buying more I decided to make up a batch of the powdered milk I keep around for baking. After chilling it for a while, I bravely took a swig out of the jug. It tasted...fine. There was a malted-milk-powdery aftertaste, but it was not objectionable, just different. I'm thinking I should keep a batch of the stuff made up so I can use it in my coffee*** and in recipes, because that's an economically sound change that I won't feel a bit. When I'm making puddings (like last night's kheer), I can run through a half-gallon of milk pretty quickly.

2. On the other hand, Kellogg's Fruit Harvest cereal with strawberries and blueberries is cloyingly sweet and has a strange aftertaste. In no way is it an acceptable substitute for my beloved Kashi Strawberry Fields. I thought maybe it was the weird milk that was throwing me off, but I tasted a little cereal right out of the box and it was just as nasty. I won't be buying that again.

Oh, and...

I finished the first coat of paint on the fireplace mantel, but haven't gotten around to the second coat. It already brightens up the room a lot! I'll post a picture when I'm done.

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* Yes, really. Joel Chandler Harris grew up in the county on the other side of the lake. I show off my keychain-sized Uncle Remus barcode card at parties as an icebreaker.

** For example, she bakes her own bread but buys commercial hamburger buns. If you go to the trouble of baking your own bread, why on earth wouldn't you pinch off some dough and make a few buns? Also, she compares the prices of fresh vs. processed potatoes and shows that fresh is cheaper by an order of magnitude, but then admits to buying potato flakes sometimes. I don't understand. Surely a person who's obsessive enough to wash out plastic baggies and make potholders out of old jeans wouldn't think twice about boiling a pot of potatoes.

*** It is quite literally impossible to tell the difference between fresh and reconstituted milk in coffee.

Yay me!

I sanded the fireplace mantel yesterday. That was the evil part of the job--it involved moving furniture, rolling up the rug, and covering everything in the room with old bedsheets or plastic. Then I spent an hour or so employing power sanders and elbow grease, and another hour on the interminable cleanup of all the DUST. Ugh.

Today all I have to do is paint it. That doesn't seem so bad.

Despite our blustery weather (in the 40s this morning with frequent icy blasts of wind), roses and clematis are starting to bloom here in Greene County. I also noticed that my potted poblano pepper plant (try saying that ten times fast) has flower buds on it.

Baby tomatillos and lacinato kale in the garden. Apparent survival of a few cauliflowers. Excellent.

Le weekend

I thought this day would never come: I planted the sweet corn. Now we'll see if I got to it in time. I also started preparing the bean hills. The garden, whose appearance has so far been marred by the untamed beds in its middle, is starting to look as good as it actually is.

Last night we had a series of brief, energetic thunderstorms, which were just what we needed to re-saturate the ground and get my new crops going. Today it's bright and windy, with clouds that scuttle along quickly.

I have already been in the kitchen today, working on the beginning stages of tonight's cassoulet. Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall has a recipe for it in his Meat Book, and of course Julia Child included one in Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Vol. 1. For all intents and purposes, the recipes are the same: Cook white beans with herbs and garlic. Brown several kinds of meat. Make tomato sauce. Bake them all together with a bread-crumb crust on top. Both authors recommend lamb as one of the meats, but I'm saving my one and only meager little cut of lamb shoulder for a braise I'll be making tomorrow (with lots of escarole...mmm...). The cassoulet will survive, I expect, with "only" pork, sausage, and preserved goose leg.

This all sounds kind of over-the-top, but it's a thrifty way to use odds and ends from the freezer. A chunk of this, a scrap of that, and pretty soon you've got something completely new.

I made zabaglione a couple of nights ago, by way of using up some excess egg yolks. But then when I ate a serving of it, it gave me a headache--too much liquor and sugar at once, I suspect. (I wonder why it didn't it do that to me last time?) So today I'm once again finding a new use for an overly rich custard. I think I'm going to make little cups of crispy phyllo dough, then fill them with a layer of zabaglione, a layer of saucy sugared fruit, and a layer of whipped cream. That should distribute the marsala thinly enough so it doesn't knock me out.

My main task this weekend, though, is sanding and painting the living room fireplace. It's one of the last holdouts of non-doneness in the downstairs. Wish me luck. I'm dreading every moment of it.

Book meme

Rozanne tagged me with this, so here goes:

1. You're stuck inside Fahrenheit 451, which book do you want to be saved?

Charles Darwin’s The Origin of Species

2. Have you ever had a crush on a fictional character?

Many, many times. On everyone from Loyd-with-one-L in Animal Dreams to (as a preteen, so cut me some slack here) John Galt (who is he, anyway?). I develop crushes easily. Hell, I’ve had crushes on cartoon characters before.

3.The last book you purchased?

A 1915 translated edition of Virgil’s Aeneid at a flea market. And I have bought (but not yet received; it’s in the mail) the brand-new signed reprint of Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s A Cook on the Wild Side.

4.What are you currently reading?

Princess Alice: A Biography of Alice Roosevelt Longworth, by James Brough. I’ve only just started it, but it has promise.

5. Five books you would take to a deserted island?

(1) A Dashiell Hammett anthology

(2) The Time-Life Foods of the World series, 1975 ed., because they are just as much travelogues as cookbooks.

(3) Arts & Humanities Through the Eras: Medieval Europe 814-1450, which my mother and stepfather co-edited. I’ve really enjoyed the parts of it I’ve read, but I haven’t had time to dig into it the way I’ve wanted to--it is an encyclopedia volume, after all! Being trapped on a deserted island would be the perfect opportunity to read it cover to cover.

(4) Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie

(5) Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace, because no matter how many times you read it, you’re never really done reading it. ;-)

Okay, looking for victims...I tag Witho and her BF, Alda, and Kat.

Stupid garden management decisions and their inevitable results

This year I didn't label any of my plantings in the vegetable garden. My rationale was that (a) I didn't have any of the little signs I used last year and didn't want to bother getting more, and (b) I would know what everything was as soon as it came up.

That would have been really clever and thrifty of me IF some plants didn't take two weeks to germinate. A couple of the beds were still contaminated with weed roots and seeds when I planted, so in certain areas it quickly became impossible to tell what was a desirable plant and what wasn't. The task was made harder because I immediately forgot which row was which, so I didn't know what kind of seedling to look for.

Don't get me wrong--it's not a large-scale disaster we're looking at here, just a minor inconvenience. There are successes. I am proud to announce that this year I have a healthy, large crop of beets for the first time. I have been harvesting radishes, lettuce, and arugula for some time now. Turnips and kale are flourishing. Peas are starting to climb their trellis. The eggplants look healthy. And after the Big Washout that obliterated my tomatoes and peppers, the seedlings I planted to replace them are doing pretty well.

There are a couple of mounds of healthy squashlike vines that I think are cucumbers, but I can't be totally sure because I didn't label them and all squashlike vines look the same.

There are some rows I'm not as thrilled with. This morning I got out the hoe and utterly overturned the broccoli row. There was nothing there worth saving--just a tangle of invasive bermuda grass that I spent half an hour tugging out by the root. I was about to stick the hoe into the other side of the same bed when I noticed something that looked familiar. Was that...cilantro? Why yes, it was. And it turned out that on closer inspection (that is to say, me on my hands and knees with my face pressed close to the earth) there was more of it. So I spent another half an hour tugging bermuda grass roots out from between the sparse, delicate little cilantro seedlings. Then I sprinkled a few radish seeds in the sizable gaps in the row. That's my trick for gaps, because radishes don't take up much room, they're gone within a month, and you can never have too many of them.

I replanted the broccoli side with okra. I know for a fact it will grow and hold its own. Southerners don't grow vegetables because they are a platonic ideal of vegetable goodness; they grow them because they will GROW and you can feed a family on them. Turnips, collards, and okra being a case in point.

I threw in a couple rows of sunflowers before I came inside for lunch, just because I had room.

I still need to plant the beans, and I think it might be getting too late for the corn. Why do I always let this stuff get away from me? Spring goes so quickly...

A strangely intangible day

I look back on today and can't for the life of me figure out what I did. My back and feet hurt, which would seem to imply that I did something significant. But what it was, besides a little desk work and some garden-watering (with Miracle-Gro, I might add--the experimental cardoon plant was looking a little yellow), I can't say.

The s.o. and a friend are watching baseball and talking about baseball blogging. I am basking in the afterglow of American Idol. Two comments: (1) I called that*, and (2) Jo, your boy is back!

It occurs to me that this is one of the most blissfully beautiful times of year here. Every morning lately we have been waking up to a subtle, haunting perfume we can't identify. We go outside and search for it and it's nowhere, but still it's everywhere. The azaleas are vibrant right now, and so are the wild roses, but it is neither of those. The honeysuckle hasn't bloomed yet, so what in the world is it?

The blueberry bushes are in between flower and berry--they have tiny blue-purple buds all over them. The chimney swifts are thundering in the chimney.

Ah, now I remember something important that I did today. Today I found two roommates to share my hotel room at Twangfest. Now I can afford it for sure! Both ladies are in need of a car while they're there, too, which is something I can help with (I'm driving, they're flying). I'm starting to get excited about it now, and to wonder exactly who will be there.

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* I predicted the dream sequence on House last night, too, for what it's worth. Best. Episode. Ever.

Just do it

Try this recipe. Just go ahead and try it and you'll thank me later.

It's a recipe for something called a Far Breton, which is more or less a member of the clafoutis family*. I made it first thing this morning and groggily did everything possible to screw it up, including trying to make it in a springform pan (don't--the batter is too thin and it will run out!). Eventually I poured what was left into a souffle dish and stuck it back into the (by-then-smoldering) oven. It resisted all my attempts to kill it and turned out delicious.

I can't believe one of the reviewers on Epicurious called it "bland." Nothing could be farther from the truth. I suspect that person skipped the flaming-the-fruit-in-brandy step, or maybe forgot the vanilla. I can't imagine that their taste buds could really be that lame.

Here is today's brunch menu:

Far Breton
Canadian bacon
Buttered homemade bread
Sliced pears
Hobnobs with Brie (try it!)
Coffee

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* I know, they keep cropping up here. I can't help it--I love anything that resembles a crepe with fruit in it. Especially a GIANT crepe with fruit in it.

Cows 50, cowboys 0

The signs had been up on telephone poles all over the county for a week or two. The s.o. was excited and kept reminding me not to make plans for Saturday night. We were going to the rodeo!

It turns out there is a livestock arena in Union Point that I had no idea existed. At dusk that day, the s.o. navigated as my car bumped along the Crawfordsville road, past a hand-lettered sign that read "CONTESTANT PARKING," to a steep driveway where cowboy-hatted volunteers were directing traffic into the public parking lot.

The red dirt arena had the air of a high-school football game, with gaggles of teenagers wandering around, giggling and eating nachos. A lot of them were wearing 4-H tee shirts and/or cowboy hats. Many of the girls' cowboy hats were cotton-candy pink. We found seats in the bleachers just as the last notes of the national anthem faded away.

I should mention that this wasn't my first live rodeo. About 14 years ago, I attended a pro-circuit rodeo at a Boys' Town in western North Dakota. Some of the best cowboys and cowgirls on the continent* were there. Because of this, my impressions of Saturday evening are probably a little skewed. Let's just say I'm not wowed by the cattle- and horse-wrangling skills of Georgians and Alabamans. In event after event, almost no one qualified. It wasn't what I had learned to expect from the time I spent on the Great Plains, but it was still well worth the $10 admission.

Calf roping was unintentionally hilarious. A chute would open ("sponsored by Bug House Pest Control, ladies and gentlemen!") and a calf would jet out into the arena, followed by a horse-riding cowboy who would either utterly fail to rope the calf, or fail to tie it down for more than a few seconds. Steer wrestling followed a similar pattern. The steer was almost always eventually subdued, but oh-so-slowly. Feeling a little uncomfortable for the benighted contestants, we watched as they tried to wrest the legs out from under the unwilling animals. There was a lot of flailing. Times were in the neighborhood of 20 seconds.

Bronc riding and bull riding were unnerving, especially the latter. As I watched animals that weighed well over a ton writhe and kick and stomp, nearly mangling and crushing the local cowboys, the geekiest thought in history crossed my mind: This must be what the computer animators who worked on Lord of the Rings modeled the Balrog on. Watch The Two Towers and then a little off-peak-hours ESPN2, and tell me if you don't agree.

One cowboy hastily limped away from his run-in with the Balrog, raising his arms in nervous triumph (e.g., "I wasn't killed!). Another walked off, shaken, flexing his trampled hand to see if it still worked.

The head rodeo clown made predictable jokes (fat wife, soiled trousers, cops with doughnuts, etc.) to occupy the time in between events. At one point he asked the crowd if they were fans of Larry the Cable Guy**. To my astonishment, the audience bellowed, in unison, "Git 'er done!" One guy in a NASCAR jacket nearly knocked himself out cheering. Later I discovered that one of the merchandise trailers parked out back was selling GIT R DONE tee shirts. Oooooookay.

My favorite parts of the evening were the children's activities. That's a bizarre thing for me to say, since I'm wildly uncomfortable around kids. It's not that I don't like them or that they don't like me--in fact, for some reason I've never been able to pin down, four- and five-year-old girls always decide I'm their New Best Friend, and I find it kind of sweet. It's just that even when I was a child, I related better to adults. I think I've heard Fran Lebowitz say much the same thing, which gives me a little pause, but that's the way I am.

Anyway, the littlest kids were given hobbyhorses (on loan; the s.o. noticed that these same hobbyhorses were for sale for $15 out back, and doubtless many parents were persuaded to buy them afterward) and competed in horsey races across the arena. But the seven- to 11-year-olds were too big for that. They were allowed to participate in the Calf Scramble.

The Calf Scramble went like this: Ribbons were tied on the tails of two calves. Then the calves were let loose into the arena and the horde of children chased them, vying for the ribbons. To say I was nonplused by this is an understatement. Even baby calves weigh 250 pounds. That's the size of two mastiffs! Think of the liability! But I guess I was just being a fearful city slicker. When calves see that many children running toward them, it turns out they have a very predictable reaction: They run like hell in the other direction.

Soon a towheaded boy was barging his way through the bleachers near us, shouting, "I GOT DA RIBBON! I GOT DA RIBBON!"

I wish I could tell you about the cowgirl barrel races and the other events, but we weren't there to see them. We've been having unusually clear, cold nighttime weather lately (I am pretty sure it was in the upper 40s Saturday night) and we left for a while in the middle so we could go home and get our hats and mittens. It was worth it. Newly warmed, we were able to stay till the very end, when the announcers bade everyone farewell and turned on the recording of "Happy Trails."

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* I say "on the continent" instead of "in the country" because it turns out that the Canadian west is a hotbed of cowboy skills. Some of the best riders and ropers are from Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba. It makes sense when you think about it.

** For the uninitiated, Larry the Cable Guy is the least talented of Jeff Foxworthy's redneck comedy power quartet. I actually think the other three comedians are fairly good (although uneven to say the least--for the love of God, don't waste a half hour of your life watching the television series), but I've never been able to account for Larry's appeal.

Je ne regrette rien, part deux

A tarte normande aux poires, or pear custard tart, in my new tart pan. I'm pleased as punch.

I wish I'd written this, and so many of his other sentences too

"He was from the Bay Area and let me listen a bit to his Windham Hill tape, Colors or Songs for the Road Within or something. Music that, if you're not buying a futon at that very moment, is essentially aural torture."

--David Rakoff, "I'll Take the Low Road," from the collection Fraud

Je ne regrette rien

We have coined a new slang phrase. You know how when people want to say "information" they say "411" instead? Well, in the same spirit, the s.o. and I have decided that "filing a 4868" will henceforth mean "procrastinating." We are sure this new phrase will get a lot of use.

So yesterday morning I was filing a 4868 (yes, figuratively--I printed out the real one later in the day) and decided to bake a couple loaves of bread. I'm not too talented at baking bread. It requires a completely separate skill set from pastry-making or cooking, and I've never really gotten the hang of it. But we were almost out of wheat bread, so I cracked open Deborah Madison's Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone and embarked on a recipe entitled "Molasses Bread with Cooked Grains." I used oatmeal as the cooked grain. And guess what? It was easy. A few hours later I had two beautiful, nicely-risen loaves of delicious oaty, wheaty bread. It turned out better than anything I could buy at the store, which, believe you me, is a new experience for me when it comes to bread-baking.*

This unexpected victory put me in a good mood for the whole work day, and much to my own surprise, I got quite a bit done. I interviewed four key people for my next article and wrote several hundred words on my current one. Then I had to drive into town to run some errands.

Errands, schmerrands. Yeah, sure, I went to the bank and put up a bunch of dog posters and picked up a case of beer and some pistachios**, but it didn't take me long to find my way to the expensive snobby cookware shop. Emboldened by my earlier success, I picked up the baguette pan I'd been wanting forever. After all, I reasoned, the only thing wrong with the baguettes I'd made a couple weeks ago was that they'd spread out funny. Obviously it was an equipment issue.

And then I saw it: a nine-inch red ceramic tart pan from the Emile Henry "Couleurs" series. I had never seen this particular piece before, but I knew it was exactly what I wanted. I already have the gorgeous blue pie plate from the same series--it was a gift from a very considerate chef friend--and I'd been thinking about collecting a few more pieces in different colors, but I hadn't known where to begin. Now, suddenly, I knew.

So I own it. I guess I'll be adding the large green souffle dish and the yellow rectangular baker to my Amazon wish list. As if my list weren't long enough! And did I mention that the "Provençal" series is unbelievably lovely in person? Sigh.

You know what? I don't usually buy things on impulse. It's not in my nature or my budget. But I keep walking into the kitchen and thinking, "I don't regret that at all."

Now the only question in my mind is, what shall I put in it for Saturday night's dessert?

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* I am not alone in my bread-making woes, I know. When I was growing up, I remember visiting my dad and my stepmother during their extreme hippie phase. My stepmother is a wonderful, delightful person, but back then she baked a lot of whole-wheat hockey pucks in the name of natural foods.

** Guess which errands were undertaken at the s.o.'s request?

Results

I heard a chuckle from the vicinity of the s.o.'s desk. I slugged down the rest of my coffee and walked over. He looked at me and furrowed his brow.

"I like all of these," he said. "Are you sure you can't send them all a jar?"

I considered it for one brief moment, and then pictured myself bubble-wrapping, styrofoam-peanutting, and shipping four separate packages. And then I considered the prospect of having three fewer jars of relish for myself. "Um, yeah, I'm sure," I said.

He scrolled up and down and finally pointed a finger at the screen. "This one, then."

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Congratulations to Diana, who has won a jar of homemade radish relish. Diana, please e-mail me your street address and we'll go from there. And a huge thank you to everyone who entered. You really made us smile!

Pollyannaism, a contest, etc.

Well, no word yet from the real estate agent. Maybe those people will come look at the house. Maybe not. I keep telling myself that at least I have already scrubbed the front porch! It looks quite nice, if I do say so myself.

I have no way of knowing (thanks to my realtor!) how the next few months of my life will take shape, but I'm strongly considering going to Thursday and Saturday nights of Twangfest this year. I attended Twangfests 1, 2, 3, and 5 (I had tickets for #4 but missed it because my dad died, which is ironic because he was a massive Commander Cody fan and would have been pleased as punch if I'd gone to see Bill Kirchen live), and I think it's time I showed my face there again. Good friends, good music. I've known a lot of the organizers and attendees for years, and I miss them. Hard to believe this thing has been in existence for NINE YEARS.

Cairo and I are playing ball as I write this. Nature is amazing. One drop of retriever blood in a dog and the instinct kicks in--the prospect of cavorting with an old tennis ball is almost too good to be true. Hours of amusement. It sure brings a smile to my face to see him that happy.

Another amazing thing about nature is how quickly plants begin to thrive when they're given a couple of really perfect days (warmish sun mixed with sprinkles of rain). The trees I transplanted look pretty good--even the hawthorn, which was touch-and-go for a while because I managed to snap off the tip of its taproot when I dug it up. It could still die, but I don't think it will. The crabapples, meanwhile, look as though they've been growing in situ all their lives.

Out in the garden, the turnips have doubled in size, the kale is sprinting upward, the eggplants are putting out a new whorl of leaves, and the first round of lettuce has reached a stature where it's finally worthwhile to pick it. Most notably, the radishes are ready to harvest--red, cheery, round, and poking up out of the soil. That means I'll be making radish relish in the very near future.

Radish relish is a recipe I got from A Midwest Gardener's Cookbook, a very useful tome by a Mennonite woman named Marian K. Towne. It's organized by season and then by vegetable or fruit (in the approximate order of harvest time), and it has lots of recipes for quick salads, casseroles, and preserves. So last spring when I was deluged with radishes all at once, I consulted it. Lo and behold, it gave me radish relish, an alarmingly fuchsia-colored concoction that tastes amazing on bratwursts and hotdogs. It's one of the easiest and most satisfying canning projects a person can take on, in my opinion. Now I grow extra radishes just to make sure I'll have enough relish.

Who would like to try radish relish? If your answer to that question is "Me! Me!" you'll need to work for it. Write a 25- to 50-word essay in the comments box on why you deserve to have a jar mailed to you. Time limit is 10 AM EST tomorrow. Most compelling and amusing essay wins the prize. The s.o. will be the judge since he's very clever, yet impartial, and doesn't know any of you.

I suspect Greavsie will be irked by my timing because he is traveling today and can't possibly write an essay while he's on an intercontinental flight, but again I promise: This will not be the last contest offered here.

And now I have to keep working on some writing of my own...

Psych!

Our real estate agent called us at lunchtime today and told us a couple wanted to see the house. I had spoken to these folks a couple months ago and then they'd disappeared. I thought they had long since found a property. But apparently they're still looking. We set up an appointment for 9 am tomorrow...or so I thought. Tonight during American Idol our agent called back and said they couldn't make it at that time after all. We're not sure when they can make it.

They would need us to move out REALLY soon. Which is well and good, except the longer they take to see the house and potentially make an offer, the more of a hardship it would be for us to get out as quickly as they'd want us to.

Can someone please, please do what they say they're going to do, when they say they're going to do it? This seems like a pattern with our real estate agent. Everything is a freaking surprise. HEADS UP! HOUSE SHOWING! OH WAIT! NO HOUSE SHOWING AFTER ALL!

Even American Idol was disturbingly unpredictable. Maroulis safe. Bice not so much--a narrow escape. Who knew singing "Freebird" doesn't get you very far anymore?

Mercurial

What on earth has gotten into Constantine Maroulis? The past two weeks he has been killing the competition on American Idol. He's been performing so well that I've been leaping out of my seat, yelling "YEAH!"

This guy is the one to beat. And I hope nobody can do it.

I spent part of the day at my desk and part of the day outside. I dug a bunch of holes so that we could transplant some trees (my! how our free seedlings have grown since they first arrived!) and turned over a lot of dirt in the garden. Gorgeous weather--a balmy partly-sunny day with occasional sprinkles of fresh-smelling rain.

I'm exhausted. I ache.

A full day

I hurried through my office work this morning so I could drive into town. First and foremost, I sped directly to the restaurant supply! But...they didn't have anything I wanted. They're not a very fancy restaurant supply. Still, I emerged with a kickass set of every possible size of biscuit cutters, which faithful readers will recall that I needed very much. (I can probably use a medium-sized one as an English muffin ring if I have to. Still, I don't relish the idea of making one muffin at a time! I guess I might have to order the rings from Amazon after all. Either that, or make all different sizes of English muffins. That might be funny in a way.)

My Spidey sense was tingling when I got to town, so I drove over to the Goodwill store. Sure enough, I ended up with four pairs of beautiful nearly-new shoes--exactly the sorts of things I'd been looking for but hadn't been able to find new--for $5 apiece. Oddly, I didn't find anything else at Goodwill. Just shoes.

I was on my way to my friend J.'s place (to drop off the leftovers of what I'd made for contest winner Jo) when I spotted a sign for a Red Cross blood drive. Since I'm an obsessive nutrition-tracker, it occurred to me that giving blood was a free, benevolent way to get my iron level and blood pressure checked. I marched in the door and signed my name before I had a chance to chicken out. Nearly an hour later, I was still there, because it turns out I have been to Africa within the last three years and, while that didn't disqualify me, it was a piece of information that they wanted to enter into their new software, which they were having trouble figuring out.

Anyhow: Iron level 38 (lowish but absolutely fine). Blood pressure 90 over 70. Heart rate 60 (fine, but probably artificially high because I was starting to panic by then).

I didn't faint. And bonus: I got a Nutter Butter cookie! I haven't had one of those in years.

Once I was safe to drive, I went to J.'s place and gave her the pastries. She had just been to a big international grocery in Atlanta and rewarded me with a packet of Hobnobs! She knows the way to my heart.

My last stops were the copy shop (to print out "free dog" posters) and two locations of the Taco Stand (to put the posters up on the bulletin boards). Then it was time to go home. Way past time, really.

Dinner: Rice-paper spring rolls with noodles, shrimp, cilantro, bean sprouts, and cucumbers. Side of peanut sauce. Dessert: Pears poached in red wine, served over plain yogurt. It's nice to have something so simple and light after all the ridiculousness that's been going on around here.

Half, baked

In job interviews, I am in the habit of describing myself as a "quick study," partly because I can learn new software and processes and such fairly fast, but mostly because I've found it's a phrase that prospective bosses respond positively to.

In reality, though, sometimes it takes a long time for information to sink into my head to the point where I can actually use it on a day-to-day basis. For example, despite a lifetime of cooking for a maximum of two people*, it has taken me until now to figure out that I should cut most recipes in half.

Cutting recipes in half works really well most of the time, but occasionally I'll run into recipes that don't divide (or, for that matter, multiply) well. My family pie crust recipe, for example, is a hot-water crust that derives its tender flakiness from the fact that the dough's warmth lets you roll it out in just a few strokes, without overworking it. It is completely possible to make a half-batch, but you have to work with a certain degree of alacrity because the smaller mixture loses its heat more quickly. With a full batch, you can laze around all you like.

It would be helpful if cookbooks included information about sizing--how to tweak the baking time, for example, or what kind of pan to use for a different-sized batch. When and if I ever write a cookbook, I'm going to do that.

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* Except when I invite people over for dinner or cook for an event, in which case all bets are off and I make enough food for an army.

Two out of three ain't bad

I love, love, love my new haircut. Mid-career Jennifer Aniston is gone. Elisabeth Rohm's coif has replaced it. Not blonde, though; just my usual brown with a few shiny new strawberry-blonde highlights. I wish I could freeze the way my hair looks today for future use.

The weather was perfect for the Braves game. Our seats were not behind the Braves' dugout, as advertised. They were behind home plate! The home team tromped the Mets and there was, as usual, an entertaining drunk shouting guy behind us. "Swing batter MIIIIIIIISSSSSSSS!" The only down side was that they didn't put me and my temporarily perfect hair on the new humongous video screen.

The restaurant supply was closed. In retrospect, it makes sense that they're closed on weekends. Ah, well. I suppose I can wait a few days to buy my English muffin rings and baguette pans. In the meantime, I probably just dodged a financial bullet, didn't I?

A week ends, a season begins

There's something really special about the first time you eat something from your garden in the spring. That's what I experienced today. Sure, I had eaten a few of last year's carrots, plucked after overwintering--but that doesn't count. And sure, I'd had some of our asparagus--but the asparagus bed came with the house; it's not as though I had anything to do with growing it. And yes, I've been cutting sorrel all winter--but...well, I've been doing it all winter.

So maybe this isn't the first produce from the garden. It just feels like it.

Anyhow, the arugula needed thinning, and I came away with two heaping cups of baby leaves. I washed them three times to get the sand and mud off, then tossed them with sopressata, hard-boiled eggs, a few leaves of Boston lettuce, olive oil, red wine vinegar, salt, and pepper, and it was about as close to perfect as a salad can get.

This was the starter for a meal of foil-baked river trout in white wine, paired with steamed broccoli. I love trout. It seems to be one of the few fresh fish that live up to the word "fresh" around here, and quite honestly, I like it even better than salmon (which it resembles for reasons I've never been able to figure out).

A little part of me wants to drive into town and celebrate the ending of the work week. This has been a hell of a week, and I'm sleep deprived and ready to taste a little freedom. But I am going to stay in and watch TV because tomorrow has the promise of greatness. I'm getting my hair done (after a couple weeks of looking like a fashion "don't"--I swear my roots must be two inches long) and going shopping at Manning Bros. Restaurant Supply (WOOOOOO! HOG WILD!), then joining the s.o. and his dad for a Braves game at Turner Field...with enviably good seats right behind the Braves' dugout. Gloat gloat gloat.

Yes, I like the look of Saturday.

N-V-T-S, nuts

Baked goods in the mail for the first person to tell me where the title comes from.

Cairo has been lying at the s.o.'s feet, staring intently up at him, for about 15 minutes straight. It must be hard to type when those shiny, worshipful canine eyes are burning into the side of your head.

The s.o. has been eating a lot of pistachios lately. The dogs congregate around him when he starts cracking open the shells, knowing that eventually they'll get one. I've heard of dogs loving popcorn (and ours are no exception), but pistachios? Now we've done it--our dogs have acquired gourmet tastes!

I turn to look at the s.o. "Do you have pistachio dust under your fingernails or something?"

He looks down at his furry admirer.

"Maybe."

(Not) just desserts

I had some tart pie cherries and their juice left over from making a clafoutis this weekend, so I decided to make cherry ice cream. Besides being spectacularly pink, it is perhaps the best ice cream yet. Here's what you do. But first, a caveat:

I get my cherries fresh from a fruit farm and freeze them in pie-sized amounts (5 cups of cherries to 1 cup of sugar). The sugar helps them keep their bright-red color and their fresh texture while they're in the deep freeze. So the "juice" that comes with my cherries is actually more of a light syrup. If you use canned pie cherries, you'll want to add a little bit of sugar.

CHERRY ICE CREAM
2/3 c. sweetened condensed milk
1 c. sweetened pie cherry juice
1/2 c. pie cherries, chopped
1 tsp. fresh lemon juice
1 c. heavy cream

Whisk together the condensed milk, cherry juice, cherries, and lemon juice. Freeze in a shallow container until the outermost half-inch of the mixture is frozen.
Whip the cream until it holds soft peaks. Scrape the frozen parts away from the edges of the cherry mixture, then carefully fold in the cream, retaining as much fluffiness as possible, until the mixture is no longer streaky.
Continue to freeze until firm. While it is freezing, take it out every hour or so and carefully fold the frozen edges toward the middle. The goal is to break up the ice crystals but, again, retain the fluffiness.

*****

Now, I should hasten to add that we do eat healthy entrees and don't subsist wholly on ice cream. I made a perfectly good quasi-Indian meal today! I keep trying to make myself into Iron Chef Indian, and someday I swear I'll get there. It definitely comes a lot more naturally to me than it used to. Once upon a time I used to go out for Indian food, but now that I live in a place with exactly zero Punjabi-run* restaurants, I have been forced to take matters into my own hands. I think it's for the best.**

The veg was something called "Carrots with Fresh Spinach Ribbons" from Neelam Batra's 1,000 Indian Recipes. It was really interesting and different; it called for whole cumin seeds that were toasted in oil, which gave the whole dish a nice nutty flavor.

We had some leftover unsauced tubini pasta, so for the main dish, I immediately thought of something called Keema Macaroni that Bakerina reprinted on her blog many months ago. I had tried and liked her version, but I craved a soupier sauce. Plus, in my mind, keema = lamb. So I took Neelam Batra's recipe for Moist Ground Lamb Pilaf, cut down the yogurt a bit, left out the almond slivers, and substituted pasta for the steamed basmati rice. Perfection! Bakerina, you are an inspiration as usual. I never would have thought of doing such a "fusion-y" thing as putting pasta in Indian food if it weren't for you, but it works big time.

And now I am approaching another writing deadline, but I refuse to think about it. My brain is focused on vegetable gardening, laundry, and the imminent American Idol results show***.

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* Northern Indian is my hands-down favorite unless the chef is really out of this world. There's a vegetarian south Indian restaurant in Athens and it's not bad, but it doesn't scratch that itch.

** I can still utterly destroy an Indian restaurant's lunch buffet, though. "Destroy the Buffet" was a phrase coined by an ex-co-worker to describe his lunchtime activities at India Palace, and I think it fits. The image we're going for is sort of like Godzilla in Tokyo.

*** Addendum: I was wrong about the results. Unfortunately, that horrible Anthony kid is still on the show, and we've lost Nikko Smith just when I was really beginning to enjoy his voice and arrangements. Miraculously, baby-mama-beating Scott Savol hangs by a thread.

A few short commentaries

1. April in Georgia means a thick coating of chartreuse dust--otherwise known as pollen--on every horizontal surface. It's on the car, the front porch, you. People who think they don't have allergies are suddenly forced to admit that, yes, come to think of it, they do feel a little itchy and congested. It's kind of cool-looking, though.

2. The wisteria is blooming. Invasive or not, it looks gorgeous when it takes over a woods.

3. The thing about losing all the weight you ever wanted to lose--living the dream, so to speak--is that if your competitive nature is one of the things that helped you lose the weight in the first place, you're suddenly left in a tricky spot, motivationally speaking. Now there's no more woo-hooing "I LOST A POUND!" While your friend or mate who hasn't reached his/her goal is still cheering incremental victories, the best you can do* is say, "Hey, look, I still weigh the same!" Which in reality is even more challenging and cheer-worthy, but it's hard to feel that way. And then if you gain a pound, even though it's almost certainly a normal water fluctuation, suddenly you wonder if you're screwing up and if this one pound is a harbinger of thirty more. "Oh, God, I'm doing something wrong," you fret. "Is this how it all ends?" It turns out that the hardest thing on earth is to achieve stability and just RELAX AND ENJOY IT.

*Barring an Olsen-twin-style corporeal disappearing act, which is not only potentially deadly but disgusting to look at. I like to have a little "back" on me, y'know?

4. This week was a gimme for Constantine on American Idol. The theme was show tunes, and he's an experienced musical actor. So while almost all the other contestants floundered through boring renditions of boring songs, he got the ladies all hot and bothered with a sexy, tuxedoed version of "My Funny Valentine." Our prediction is that we lose pernicious little Anthony Federov this week, because surely his performance of "Climb Ev'ry Mountain" was not what Rogers & Hammerstein had in mind. Ugh--I wanted to punch out my eardrums with an ice pick.

Farm facts

1. People in the U.S. spend only about 10 percent of their disposable income on food. That's lower than any other country in the world.

2. For every $1 spent on groceries in this country, only 19 cents goes back to the farm.

I don't want to get all John Mellencamp about this, but obviously it is wrong on so many levels! How is it that so many of the most essential jobs pay the worst? But there are a couple of things we can do, off the top of my head:

1. Join a CSA (community-supported agriculture) program. You give a farmer--usually an organic one--a chunk of money up front before the yearly planting starts, which keeps them from having to take out a loan at interest. Then, every week, you get a share of everything that grows. Often the farm will have recipes and food tastings and value-added products, too. It's one of the best and most fascinating ways to become connected to your food. Props to Red Cardinal Farm in Minnesota for teaching me to love edamame, garlic scapes, and lacinato kale.

2. Buy at the farmer's market, direct from the source. If you don't know what something is, ask.

3. Buy local produce on those rare occasions when you see it at the grocery store.

4. When you shop at the grocery store, buy more "whole" foods as opposed to prepared ones. Stick to the outer aisles and tread not in the center ones full of boxes and packets.

Anyone have any more ideas?

Bleah

Steer clear if you know what's good for you; I've got my period. The Midol has kind of kicked in, but I still feel pretty lackluster and it's not worth testing my temper.

Stereotypically enough, I can't seem to keep away from the leftover chocolate brownie pie today. It's a good thing yesterday's dinner guests (our beloved J. and F.) helped us polish off the ice cream already, or I'd have a spoon in that, too.

But I also have a new passion with much better vitamin content: Today I tried celeriac (a.k.a. celery root) for the first time ever. I followed a Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall recipe and made it into a gratin with light cream, garlic, and red pepper flakes. I love it, I love it, I love it. Did I mention I love it? It's the best root vegetable ever. Such depth of flavor. I'm going to want it all the time now.

Let's see, what else? Oh, yeah. I'm on a deadline. I really ought to get back to work, but nothing sounds less appealing right now.

Cold feet, literally

I had a great night at J.'s place. She didn't have to work, so she had a few of the girls over. There was lots of wine drinking, lots of talking, lots of laughs, a little Belgian chocolate, and some teeny strawberry and brie tarts of G.'s that were really awesome.

But I had the worst drive home. First I stopped at the grocery store (where I bought the last $10 goose in Athens, thankyouverymuch) and while I was in the produce section picking out portobello mushrooms, I started to have an unusually bad Raynaud's attack. I watched as the first two fingers of my right hand turned white and dead-looking. It hurt. I swore, flapped my arms like a moron, and breathed hot air on my fingers to no avail.

The fingers stayed fishy and numb the whole way through the grocery store. I didn't figure they'd improve. If there's one thing I've learned in five years of dealing with this condition, it's that I lose my ability to regulate my body heat when I'm overtired. And guess what? It was super late and I was exhausted. I just needed to get home and go to bed.

By the time I made it through the excruciating, pointless self-checkout (is it really a self-checkout if the clerk has to override the machine twelve times?), four toes were numb as well. Two of them were the toes that have been frostbitten again and again because of the Raynaud Syndrome. Not good.

I got in the car, started the engine, cranked up the heat in the footwell, then sped away. A few miles later, near the edge of town, I noticed that the gas gauge was dangerously low--like, way below "E." It has a habit of dropping off like that; first you think you're fine and you have a quarter-tank, and next thing you know you're running on fumes. I started looking for a gas station, and lo and behold, none were open because it was 3:30 in the morning...or was it 4:30 in the morning because of Daylight Savings? I kept thinking that the next station would be open, but again and again I was dismayed to find them closed.

Here's where it gets scary: The last 18 minutes of my drive home is through really, really rural territory with absolutely no gas stations. And I don't carry a cell phone, because they don't work out in the country. Still, at this point I had no choice but to forge onward.

It was a windy, chilly night. I envisioned having to walk for miles to find a telephone, alone and scared, with my extremities beginning to blister.

It was the longest 18 miles I have ever driven.

But obviously, since I'm here writing this, I made it. I guess that's kind of anticlimactic, but it doesn't feel that way. I'm still so wired that I haven't gone to bed, even though it's almost 6 am. On the bright side, I got all the dishes washed. The dishwater was nice and warm, and I have feeling in my hands again.

I'll be sleeping in my wool socks tonight.

Vanilla with toasted almonds

Because nobody makes homemade ice cream just once.

New adventures in thriftiness

You'd never know I was a vegetarian for half my life.

Here's how the chain of events goes: I am thawing the $10 goose for the weekend. I plan to roast the breast, and then I will bake a delicious terrine with the neck and giblets. But I remember that due to the relative youth and smallness of American geese, I came up a little short on pieces-parts last time I made that terrine. So I think, all right, what can I do to pad this thing out a little, other than adding extra sausage and breadcrumbs?

I go to the grocery store. I wander past the meat counter and spot what may be my favorite food label ever:

HORMEL CHICKEN GIZZARDS AND HEARTS
mostly gizzards

(Which maybe works as a metaphor for life, if you ask some people. But I digress.)

Aha! I purchase a package.

At home, I separate out all the hearts (there are actually at least ten or fifteen of them, despite the small print) and put them in a baggie in the fridge to use later in the terrine. They'll be a welcome addition to the goose parts. Then I put the gizzards in a pot with onions, garlic, carrots, celery leaves, parsley, peppercorns, tarragon, etc., cover it all with water, and simmer. An hour or two later, I strain it and I have a lovely chicken stock, which I freeze for a future soup.

I have just tossed a boiled gizzard to each of the awaiting dogs when, out of curiosity, I google "chicken gizzard recipe" and find out that people really do eat these things. Huh. I thought they were dog treats. I shrug, then clean the mushy stock vegetables off the gizzards, chop them roughly, and stick them in the fridge.

Today at lunch I saute the gizzards in butter with some onion, mushrooms, black pepper, and a dash of sherry. I serve them for lunch alongside scrambled eggs. And you know what? The texture is oddly clamlike and chewy, but they're quite good.

When life hands you "mostly gizzards"...

Oh, dear

This isn't going to do Scott Savol any good at all in the Top 9.

The perfect brunch

Five eggy, tender crepes, hot and crisp-edged from the pan.
A jar of apricot preserves.
A banana, sliced.
A jar of Nutella.
Hot coffee with milk.

Decorate and eat in this order:

Banana/Nutella
Apricot
Banana/Nutella
Apricot
Banana/Nutella

Nothing further.

The Church of Dog

When the s.o. builds a doghouse, he builds it for keeps. My favorite part is the ventilation slats in the eaves; for those keeping track, they represent incarnation #3 of the leftover shutters on our property.

Note to self

I'm blogging yesterday's rib marinade and sauce just so I don't forget how to do it next time (I made it up on the fly). But if anyone else wants to try it, here's how: Marinate the ribs for a couple of hours, add the sauce, flash in a hot oven for half an hour, then reduce to 225 or 250 F and go "slow and low," turning and basting occasionally for several hours until all the sauce has glommed onto the ribs and the meat is fork-tender.

MARINADE
2 Tbs. Dijon mustard
3 Tbs. red wine vinegar
1 Tbs. honey
1 tsp. sriracha chili sauce
freshly ground black pepper

SAUCE
2 or 3 chipotle peppers with adobo sauce, chopped (about 1/3 small can)
8-oz. can tomato sauce
half an onion, chopped
2 to 3 cloves garlic, minced
half a stick of cinnamon

So now that I have a record of that, on to more pressing matters: American Idol! I thought Constantine did especially well yesterday--he moved me, to be honest, and I think the judges felt the same way--and that Vonzell was fabulous and Nadia redeemed herself. Meanwhile, Scott, Anwar, Jessica, and Anthony should watch their backs tonight.

Breakfast from a packet

Now that I have made my feelings known about prepackaged foods, I suppose I ought to confess the one major exception to the rule: breakfast cereal. I guess it's my upbringing: My grandfather, now very elderly, was the head cereal chemist for Quaker Oats*. So I grew up eating a lot of Life and instant oatmeal. To me it's extreme comfort food, even though I know perfectly well how to make oatmeal from rolled oats (and sometimes do exactly that).

Sure, sometimes I'll get up and eat a little serving of yogurt and some fruit. Sometimes I'll boil a couple of eggs and make toast. Sometimes I'll even embark on something more ambitious, like a batch of muffins or a plate of huevos rancheros. But on those mornings when the coffee cannot possibly be ready soon enough, it's commercial cereal** for me.

Lately I have been experimenting with "add-ins" to my instant oatmeal. Not long ago, I discovered that if you dice up an apple and throw it in the microwave for a couple of minutes with dry Maple & Brown Sugar oatmeal and a little more than the usual amount of water, it creates a delicious melange of oaty baked apple. It's also very filling. It's a rare and beautiful thing when such a small, simple breakfast can hold me until lunchtime.

This morning I branched out. I used the Apples & Cinnamon flavor and threw in three prunes, snipped in half. Sure enough, they rehydrated nicely and filled the oatmeal with raisiny goodness.

Now what, I wonder, will I do with the Cinnamon & Spice flavor?

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* He tried out several prototypes of Cap'n Crunch on my dad and my uncles, and interestingly, none of the ones they liked were chosen as the final product. I was never allowed to eat Cap'n Crunch for breakfast, ever. My grandfather had a deep-seated objection to the stuff.

** By the way, here's an interesting factoid about my mother. For years, she has had a bowl of Wheaties with skim milk for breakfast every day. She just...likes it. I find this a bit odd, since I crave variety, but I must admit it's a good cereal.

Food fashion

You know those lists that Vogue-type magazines print, telling you what foods are "in" this year? The ones that declare that, for example, balsamic vinegar is Out, thanks to ever so many Dreadul Imitations and Salad Saturations Ad Nauseam, and that this year everyone will be singing the praises of hominy? Well, I'm not much of a follower. This is not the Year of Infused Sake for me (although if you pour me a shot, I'll be glad to drink it), and I couldn't care less what chefs in Manhattan are purchasing for their overpriced restaurants.

I do, however, go through periods of heavy consumption of particular foods because I can't seem to get enough of them. (I think everybody does this. The year the first Bruegger's Bagel Bakery came to North Canton, Ohio, my stepdad ate his weight in cinnamon-raisin bagels, and as a onetime employee of that company, I can't say I blame him.) Here's what's big for me this spring:

1. Fennel - Hit the charts last fall and hasn't let up, not even a little bit.

2. Canned tuna fillet packed in olive oil - Because it's a whole different thing from chunk tuna in water, and it makes a salad a meal. Also, fresh tuna is pretty patchy around here and I've been disappointed too many times. This never disappoints.

3. Escarole - I didn't even know what it was before a couple of months ago. Now I must have it.

4. Broccolini - Steamed and dipped in rarebit sauce.

5. French pastries - Especially eggy, fruity ones. As if you didn't know that already.

6. Nuts - Almonds, pecans, hazelnuts, walnuts, cashews, pistachios. I have gotten in the habit of putting nuts in my salads, baking them on fish, and integrating them into entrees and desserts. Not only do I enjoy the taste and texture, but I feel healthier for it. Also, this is the year we switched from regular peanut butter to the natural kind that doesn't have emulsifiers or added sugar. The s.o. refers to it as "peanut butter you can sip" and never wants to go back.

7. Kashi "Strawberry Fields" cereal - Best. Cereal. Ever.

8. Poached or medium-boiled eggs - A really nice change of pace from fried or scrambled ones.

9. Spring greens - I have been craving sorrel, watercress, baby arugula, mini lettuces, etc., probably because this is the time of year for them and I get excited about things like that.

10. Friendly-farmed meats - Not only the humanely raised chicken, beef, pork, and buffalo sold by Maverick Ranch, Spring Mountain Farms, et. al., but also meat from animals that refuse to thrive in tiny cages and pens, such as sheep and geese. They are more expensive, but sometimes I luck out and get a good deal.

What are you into lately?

The day after

I generally have leftovers for lunch. That's fine with me; if I like something well enough to eat it once, I usually want to have it again. Leftovers are a natural byproduct of an unstoppable desire to cook. There will always be more than two sane people should eat at one sitting.

Sometimes the postmortem on the food is glowing (i.e., "Damn, but I make good Chicken Marsala--even if it is just a recipe I clipped out of Real Simple, and even if I did nearly flame my eyebrows off while I was making it"). Other times, not so much. The cream custard I loved yesterday now seems way too over-the-top and heavy. Big surprise, there, since it is more than half cream.

So since I'm planning a French dinner today (cabbage soup plus a quiche made with Swiss cheese and one giant priapistic stalk of asparagus), I figured out a way to recast yesterday's hefty dessert. I baked a very airy, fluffy orange spongecake (the one in Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Vol. 1) that I glazed with apricot preserves (shades of yesterday's apricots) and filled with a healthy dollop of the orange- and nutmeg-scented custard.

Tangentially, I am kind of surprised that, to my knowledge, none of the low-carb fadsters have illuminated the difference between most American cakes and a certain type of French gateau. (Does anyone know how to make an "a" with a circumflex on an American Mac keyboard?) Sure, we have spongecake in our baking tradition, but do you know anyone who makes it? There's practically nothing in it but egg. It has more in common with a clafoutis or a crepe than it does with our usual birthday or wedding cake.

Save this post. Later I will be credited with igniting the Atkins gateau craze.

"Mornin', Sam." "Oh, good morning, Ralph."

The chimney swifts are back. The bats appear to be gone. They work the same territory in opposite shifts. I wonder if the former drove off the latter, or if we had already evicted all the bats before the swifts showed up?

I love the chimney swifts. Just thinking about them gives me warm fuzzies.

The bats can stay, too, just not in the house.

For your arteries' pleasure

Here's a really delightful recipe I came up with today. It's a substantial reworking of something I found in a Cookshelf book. The original had some serious editing problems (not uncommon in that series, unfortunately, because the recipes are otherwise very nice) that resulted in impossible caramelizations, noxious amounts of nutmeg (2 tsp.!), etc. There was also an apparently intentional garnish that, in the photo, looked like mouse droppings. So here is my much-changed version. There is, happily, nothing rodent-like about it.

ITALIAN CREAM CUSTARDS
Makes 5 1/2-cup servings

1 1/4 c. whipping cream
3/4 c. skim milk
3 Tbs. to 1/4 c. sugar, to taste
zest of 1/2 orange, minced
1/4 tsp. ground nutmeg
1/4 tsp. ground Ceylon cinnamon
1/2 tsp. good honey (orange blossom honey is a nice touch)
3 large eggs, beaten
2 dried apricots

Place the cream, milk, and sugar in a large saucepan and slowly bring to a boil, whisking often. Reduce to a simmer and add orange zest, nutmeg, cinnamon, and honey. Continue to simmer a few minutes more.
Add some of the hot cream mixture to the eggs and whisk briskly. Add the eggs to the cream mixture and whisk well. Cook over medium-low heat, whisking often, until the mixture thickens.
Pour into custard cups. Chill at least two hours.
While the custards are chilling, place the apricots in a Pyrex cup and cover with water. Heat in the microwave for 2 minutes. Let stand at room temperature to completely cool and rehydrate the apricots.
When ready to serve, drain and mince the apricots. Spoon a little minced apricot onto the center of each custard.

(Served with: Chicken Marsala, spaghetti tossed with roasted red pepper and anchovy sauce, and steamed broccoli.)

Turning the corner

Last night was magical. The moon was so full and bright that it was like daylight outside when I took the dogs for their last walk of the night. An airplane, lights blipping, traced a long vapor trail between the moon and Saturn. The air was warm and moist. A whippoorwill called out.

Today is the very first day (Florida trip included) that I have worn shorts and a tank top this year. 79 and sunny, light breeze. The pear tree next to the house is starting to bloom now, and I saw a few violets in the lawn--the pale-purple kind with dark "whiskers."

It's supposed to rain for a couple of days starting tomorrow, so I'm out there planting the hot-weather crops in the garden. Squash, cucumbers, tomatoes, tomatilloes, and also peppers and okra if I have the time and energy.

I love this time of year. I can see all the work and weeds and bugs and sweltering weather in the future, but it's not quite real yet. Right now it's just a fantasyland where everything is full of potential.

P.S. Gracie has learned to sit! By the time she is adopted, she will be a real treasure.

Jackpot!

I just got a ten-pound young goose for $10 at the eastside Kroger in Athens. I think it was a mistake on their part, since the geese weren't even on sale, and by all rights it should have cost at least three times that amount.

I love it when people hire the incompetent. "$35? That can't be right. I'll fix it so it's the same price as the chicken."

TMI, I'm sure

I am pretty sure I think about food too much. I read cookbooks for pleasure on a daily basis. I dream about food. I linger in grocery stores.

Probably the scariest part, for the outside observer, is that I track everything I eat every day on Fitday. Some people think it's psycho of me to do it, but there's a good reason. You see, I have an eating disorder. I was a full-blown compulsive eater for years, with all the scary behaviors that conjures up (bingeing in secret, skipping lunch every day out of guilt but then devouring half the pantry when I got home, etc.). Counseling didn't help. Diets didn't help. The only thing that helped, in the end, was to be conscious of what I was doing--to bring it out into a realm where I could look at it and analyze it.

It turned out my big problem was portion control. I don't have that mechanism you're supposed to have where, when you have had enough to eat, the meter registers "full" and you stop eating. So if I don't measure and tabulate everything, I tend to eat like a 16-year-old boy, which is to say a LOT. And I never stop.

(My grandmother once complained to me that she's always ravenously hungry, no matter what she eats. A light went on in my head. Isn't genetics fascinating?)

Once my best friend in high school said I ate as though my food was going to get up and run away from me.

So now I keep track of everything. And yes, I think about food more often than is probably healthy. I don't think I will ever evolve to the point where I don't fantasize about it constantly. But then again, as long as I measure and keep track, I can eat whatever foods I want and my weight stays where I want it. It makes me happy. So sue me.

For me, it has been about learning to eat a single square of chocolate rather than an entire Ritter Sport bar.

It has been a matter of redefining pasta in a two-ounce portion. It has been learning to eat only one piece of lasagna rather than half the pan--and then freezing the rest so I can't pick at it mindlessly.

It has been about splitting gigantic restaurant meals or hunks of coffeecake in two, and then saving half for another meal.

I don't just watch calories; I watch my nutrient intake. It's a great reminder for me to have some fresh greens or to munch on an apple instead of, say, raiding the breadbox for leftover coffeecake. I think I enjoy my food more in the long run when I get a lot of healthy variety. I love vegetables, fruits, legumes. I love it all.

Diet programs like the Zone and South Beach and Atkins and Jenny Craig are--please forgive the vulgarity--total horseshit. Even if they work (which is debatable), there is something fundamentally wrong about denying yourself the things you love. It is wrong to have to eat unsatisfying, tasteless, low-fat versions of full-flavored real foods. And most sinister of all is the idea of eating nutrition bars and drinking foul chemical shakes in the name of losing weight. My feeling is, I can only eat a certain number of calories in a given day. Why would I want to waste even a single one on something substandard? There are hundreds of recipes I'm dying to try. It's everything I can do to fit in all the real food I want. I have no room for fakes.

Everybody needs a hobby, I guess. This is mine. I don't eat imitations because I am too busy trying to find or make the real thing. I don't eat Nutrigrain bars; I eat apple crisp. I don't eat Twinkies; I eat sponge cake. I don't eat Quarter Pounders; I eat buffalo burgers on crusty bread.

I tend to get a little dogmatic when I talk about food, so please forgive me. I'm sure it's like listening to a Trekkie talk about why (in their humble opinion) Klingon is an especially expressive language.

But I really do feel that way (about the food, not the Klingon).

Idolatry

Tonight's American Idol results show has been postponed until tomorrow, and last night's performances are being replayed for our voting pleasure because human error invalidated last night's votes. What-ever. So I guess I'm going to take this opportunity to express my opinions on the top 11.

(1) Anthony Federov. I hate this little prick. He has a soulless choirboy voice and a prepubescent prettyboy appearance, both of which would be forgivable except that he also has the worst musical taste of all time. His song choices have ranged from Foreigner to George Michael. I wish we could get rid of him ASAP, but I am pretty sure all of America's 10- to 13-year-old girls are voting for him.

(2) Carrie Underwood. She's a squeaky-clean, pretty girl from a farm in Oklahoma. She has a lovely country-style voice. I find her a little bland, and I don't hear any evidence that she knows anything about music history, but I think she has a decent chance of winning.

(3) Scott Savol. When I first saw him, I wondered if he was, y'know, all there. He's a bona fide weirdo and he comes across pretty badly onscreen whenever he's not singing. Looks like Bubba Sparxxx but he has gorgeous soul pipes. I like him. Don't think he'll win, but I could be wrong.

(4) Bo Bice. Stunning. A sexy Southern man with a great, versatile rock 'n' roll voice. He took a big risk by singing Jim Croce this week...zzzzzzz. But I love him all the same. In a perfect world, he would win.

(5) Nikko Smith. Eh. He doesn't make much of an impression on me. He was already eliminated once but got reinstated when Mario left for personal reasons. I suspect he'll leave again soon, but who knows? The judges were complimentary this week, so he could sneak through.

(6) Vonzell Solomon. She has a great disco diva voice, but she occasionally has trouble controlling her pitch. She was great this week and the judges hyped her a lot. I like her pretty well and I hope she doesn't have to go back to being a U.S. Mail carrier.

(7) Constantine Maroulis. Hot! He was looking weak for a while, but he has shown more resilience than anyone expected. This week he rocked the audience with--wait for it--The Partridge Family's "I Think I Love You." It was weird, it was theatrical, it was gutsy, and I think it worked. He isn't the best singer in the group, but he does have the best stage presence. And did I mention he's tasty?

(8) Nadia Turner. She was a favorite of mine until this week, when she did a horrific rendition of "Time After Time" in a ridiculous fauxhawk. She even forgot the words, twice. It was just stupid, and now that I think of it, it's not the first time she's made a bad song choice. She deserves to get cut.

(9) Mikalah Gordon. Have you ever noticed that when people are called "irrepressible," they are usually the people you would like to repress the most? That's how I feel about this overplucked Streisand-loving teenager. I should cut her some slack because she's young and immature, but still she annoys me. Puh-lease, send her home before she says "FABULOUS!" again.

(10) Anwar Robinson. Great singer, questionable style (he seems to think he's Wyclef Jean). He was amateurish and boring this week, but he hit his final "wow" note as usual, and that may pull him through.

(11) Jessica Sierra. She has an excellent voice, but she just doesn't look like a star to me. I gather she barely squeaked by last week. I think it's because she's a little unmemorable. Too bad, because she does have talent.

Like magic

One of the benefits of being a lazy, non-detail-oriented gardener is that sometimes my plants go to seed or are unwittingly buried in compost at the end of the season. That's how I got a little crop of carrots this spring; they were the ones that had been forgotten under the weeds last year and had wintered over.

Today I was cleaning up some beds and installing new weed-blocking fabric (a new experiment, this--the very concept of not having weeds everywhere) when I found something that looked familiar. It was mache! There were several clumps of it. The very plant that had failed me so disappointingly last year was volunteering this spring. And it was pretty large, too, since it had gotten started early before the hot weather came.

I also noticed a couple of dandelionish plants nearby that turned out to be arugula, big enough to harvest and eat. This isn't as big of a deal--I have an entire bed of thriving arugula nearby, which will be edible-sized within a week or so--but it's satisfying nonetheless. Gardeners of the world, plant arugula! It is the most enthusiastic seedling around. It'll outcompete any weed Mother Nature throws at it.

I noted with satisfaction that my beets--notoriously tricky in this climate--have sprouted and are doing pretty well. I can take full credit for this, since I had the presence of mind to plant them in February (they're another plant that likes cool weather).

The turnips are preparing for their yearly onslaught abundance. Nothing can stop a turnip.

There are a couple of cute little pea plants, but most will have to be reseeded because they got drowned by a storm just after planting and started to rot.

All in all, very successful so far.

Further developments

The lawn is unkempt with wild onion.
The first white irises have popped open.
The honeysuckle is leafing out.
The Bradford pears are a riot of white petals--but not yet the real pear tree beside the house, which blooms a little later.
And in the asparagus bed, one pioneering spear has poked up through the mulch.

Because one cannot live by ice cream alone

We are exhausted. We've been making a wire-fence pen and a very swanky doghouse for Gracie (after we find her a permanent home, the pen and house will be used to put up any dog that needs to be fostered; I suspect we will take them with us when we move). That has meant a lot of digging on my part--eight two-foot-deep holes in stiff silt and clay--and a trip to Home Depot for a lot of bulky materials. And for the s.o., it has meant a lot of hammering and sawing of wood, and a lot of tamping of dirt with a heavy sledge.

Also, the other day at dusk, the s.o. was outside using the table saw for an unrelated project when he started noticing small swooping creatures launching themselves from the eaves of the house. It turns out that what we had thought was a nest of peeping baby birds in the wall was actually a massive colony of bats. "Well, that explains why we don't have a mosquito problem," the s.o. observed. Bats are useful and good creatures, certainly. But the thing is, we can't sit idly and let our walls fill with guano (there's a lovely image). So the s.o. is spending a lot of time on the extension ladder, sealing chinks in the siding (the trick is to try to do it while the bats are outside), and meanwhile he has built a largeish bat house from plans he found on the internet. I think he is making some progress on the bat-exclusion front, if displaced bats are any indication. A couple have blundered into the chimneys and down into the house, leading to a lot of barking, meowing, and shrieking on the part of the house's occupants.

Ah! The country life.

So in those moments when we are not playing with dogs, shoveling dirt, or chasing bats with brooms, we are hungry. Here's what we had for dinner today, which I thought turned out really well:

TURKEY GUMBO
2 turkey thighs, skinned, deboned, and halved
2 to 4 Tbs. flour
1 medium onion, chopped
2 Tbs. vegetable oil
14-oz. can diced tomatoes with juice
8-oz. can tomato sauce
3 c. fresh or frozen okra, chopped into bite-size pieces
1/2 c. chopped celery
1/2 c. fresh or frozen corn kernels
1/2 c. diced cooked ham
several sprigs fresh parsley, chopped
a bay leaf
3 c. water
salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

Dredge the turkey pieces in flour and fry them, with the onion, in the oil in a large pot. When the turkey is slightly browned, add the remaining ingredients. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer 1 1/2 to 2 hours. Reach into the pot with two forks and pull the turkey into large shreds for easier eating.

Somebody stop me

We picked up a copy of The Culinary Arts Institute Encyclopedic Cookbook at a thrift store while we were traveling, and I noticed it contains a bunch of ice cream recipes that don't require an ice cream freezer contraption. Well, let me tell you, there is no way I'm going to read a recipe for Coffee Malted Ice Cream without giving it a try.

Here's my adaptation. It's currently half frozen and is completely decadent-tasting. If the texture is anything even approaching proper ice cream when it's done, it'll be a runaway success.

COFFEE MALTED ICE CREAM
2/3 c. sweetened condensed milk
3 1/2 Tbs. malted milk powder
1/2 c. strong cold coffee
scrapings of half a bourbon vanilla bean
1/2 tsp. cognac
1 c. heavy cream, whipped until it holds stiff peaks

Mix everything but the cream together until smooth. Freeze in a shallow glass or plastic container until edges and bottom are frozen, then scrape into a bowl and beat until smooth but not melted. Carefully fold in the whipped cream, return to container, and freeze until firm. Stir a couple of times during the freezing process.

Florida photos...

...can be found here. If you open the first one up and then use the "next" button to view them, you'll see the captions and comments.

Moral: Ask Icelandic people what to do with fish

Alda's recipe for salmon (see her March 18 entry and its comments) is soooo good! The s.o. and I both think its marriage of spicy/cool/tangy/mild is awesome. I'll make it again, for sure.

It went really well with my beloved watercress salad. That's a nice bonus.

What do you get if you pour boiling water down a rabbit hole?*

Here's a little seasonal flavor for you--in my not-so-humble opinion, the very best hot cross buns recipe on earth. I came up with it by crossing a Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall recipe** with a Sunset magazine one, then adding a little bit of Florida inspiration in the form of orange flower water. If there is any smell headier and more magical than the scent of an orange grove, I don't know what it is. And orange flower water, though a pale imitation, helps me remember what it was like to stand in a grove and draw that sweet air into my lungs.

HOT CROSS BUNS
1/2 c. golden raisins
2 Tbs. brandy
125 ml cold skim milk
125 ml boiling water
pinch of sugar
1 1/2 packets yeast
500g all-purpose flour, divided into two bowls of 250g each
50g sugar
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
1/4 tsp. powdered ginger
1 tsp. grated lemon zest
1 tsp. grated orange zest
50g melted butter
1 egg, lightly beaten and divided in half
1 Tbs. skim milk
a few drops orange flower water
3/4 c. powdered sugar

Soak the raisins in the brandy for 30 minutes or until all the liquor is absorbed.
Mix 125 ml of cold milk with the boiling water. The resulting liquid should be about 105 degrees F. Toss in the pinch of sugar and then mix in the yeast. Let the mixture sit until foamy. Add the activated yeasty liquid to one of the bowls of flour and mix well to get a sticky batter. Let rise, covered, in a warm place for 45 minutes or until doubled.
To the other bowl of flour, mix in the remaining sugar, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, lemon and orange zests, and brandied raisins. Add this mix to the risen batter, along with the melted butter and half the beaten egg. Knead for a few minutes with floured hands. Cover the dough and let it rise for one hour in a warm place, until doubled.
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
Turn the risen dough out onto a lightly floured surface and gently pull it into a log shape. Without kneading or punching down, cut the dough into 16 equal pieces. Gently shape each into a ball. Space them evenly on an oiled, floured baking sheet. Let rise 15 minutes, covered with a damp towel. Brush lightly with remaining egg and bake 15 minutes. Remove and let cool slightly.
Put the 1 Tbs. milk into a medium bowl and add just two or three drops of orange flower water. (Don't overdo it--a little goes a long way!) Gradually whisk in the powdered sugar until you have a thick icing. With a rubber spatula, transfer the icing into a plastic sandwich bag. Snip off the corner and pipe crosses onto the buns.
The buns are best when warm, but they'll keep for a couple of days.

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* Hot cross bunnies, of course. This is quite possibly the worst joke ever told, but it's the only one I can ever seem to remember.

** It's because of the HFW ancestry that some of the measurements are by weight and/or in metric measurements. I like the British weighing method better than cup measures anyway when it comes to baking, since it's more accurate.

Back

We have returned from Florida, happy and tired. I will post photos and details of our vacation soon. Right now I'm too scattered. But I can tell you it was about as close to perfect as a vacation could be. Muy bueno.

Taxi the cat spent the week patrolling the house and was visited twice by a friend of ours. You're a good egg, Jon--thank you. She was very glad to have your company. She is a little miffed at us, but she'll get over it.

Silver and Cairo spent the week at the Winterville location of Four Seasons Pet Resort. They were the new location's very first customers! They had a fun week at "camp" (lots of romping in the play area, ample Bil-Jac, etc.) and were sent home with Hawaiian-print bandanas around their neck. The manager of the kennel even took a photo of them for us and printed it out on a little postcard.

Gracie the new kid spent a week luxuriating at Athens Animal Hospital. She got all her shots and was dewormed (luckily, she was heartworm-negative, but she did have a pesky case of hookworm that needed attention). She gained a little weight and won everyone over with her friendly personality. When I picked her up, I took her directly to Pawtropolis to use the self-service dog wash. I managed to get rid of most of her hobo smell. You should have seen the dirty water that poured off of her. Who knew she had white feet? She looks so pretty now.

Special thanks go out to my veterinary-student friend Becky, who interned at Athens Animal Hospital and was able to give me good advice on what to do with a bedraggled wandering dog on a moment's notice! Becky, you rule.

The s.o. is building an outdoor run and doghouse for Gracie, since she's not too keen on other dogs.* I have already become very fond of her. She's such a playful, curious little monkey. Sweet as can be. When she rides in the car, she climbs up into the back window and makes all the other drivers crack up. If anyone knows of someone near us who'd be a good parent for her, please let me know.

Other than taking care of all these doggie details and catching up on my e-mail, the only thing I've done since we got home is cook an elaborate Indian meal. I did it because I was inspired by new purchases. We shopped at, like, a thousand thrift stores while we were traveling. At one of them the s.o. found a couple of those stainless-steel covered dishes that they serve entrees on at Indian restaurants. At another, he found a stainless steel three-cup condiment caddy. At yet another, he picked up two volumes of the Time-Life Books Foods of the World series: Chinese and Indian. They are copyrighted 1969, and they're fantastic--super authentic and informative, with as much cultural information as cooking instructions. So I took the Indian volume and set to work filling our new serving dishes. I made:

Roghan Josh (Curried Lamb)
Same ki Bhaji (Fried Fresh Green Beans with Coconut)
Puris (Deep-Fried Unleavened Whole-Wheat Bread)
Dhanya Chatni (Fresh Coriander Chutney)
Kela ka Rayta (Yogurt with Banana and Grated Coconut)

All of the recipes were spot-on. Delicious. I felt such a sense of accomplishment; I had been trying for quite some time to make a decent roghan josh, and this recipe--the simplest I've tried--was the best. Also, I had always assumed there was some trick to making puris, but there isn't. You roll them out and drop them in hot oil, and they puff up like balloons. Cool.

I think it's time to sit around and read some magazines. All that unpacking and dog-collecting has worn me out.

One more thing: DOES ANYONE KNOW WHAT HAPPENED ON AMERICAN IDOL THIS WEEK?!

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* There was a snarling, lungeing incident when she encountered another dog at Pawtropolis, although I was able to contain her. Gracie trusts people, but seems to have a strong instinct to protect me against other dogs. We will try to socialize her, but I suspect she would probably do best in a situation where she would be an "only dog."

Gah!

OK, I lied again. One more post. Does anyone want a puppy?

A stray wandered up on our front porch. A 4- to 6-month-old female mutt who is definitely part pit bull (judging by her square head and small flop ears), maybe mixed with something small. SUPER friendly. Likes to give kisses and receive hugs. No aggression whatsoever. Strong guard dog instinct--barks at scary stuff. We have named her Gracie because we needed something to call her. It seemed right.

She is skinny but not emaciated. Her collar was too tight. She has the remains of a chewed-off lead on her collar.

As you know, we're trying oh-so-hard to leave for vacation. I called my friend who's a veterinary student, and she gave me the number of an animal hospital in Athens that can vaccinate and board on short notice. I'm calling first thing in the morning. And then we are outta here...and will deal with this when we get back!

In case anyone is wondering, we are fostering this dog, not adopting her. We don't want another dog, and indeed don't have the time for one. But we can't just cut her loose. She has proved already that she hasn't got the sense to stay out of the road. And if someone else around here found her, they might try to dogfight her, or worse. Gotta find her a real home where she'll be loved.

LATER. In a week.

Why does everything always have to happen when you're busiest????

One more before I go

This is what happened to the sweet potatoes and cauliflower (not the radicchio; it went into a salad, and there was an accident when the bottom of the salad dressing cruet blew out in mid-shake, but I think you can imagine the scene as well as I could describe it in words, so I'll leave it at that). It is delicious and we're freezing the rest of it so we can enjoy it again when we get home. Please forgive the lack of exact measurements and instructions; I did it by taste and added things as I thought of them. If you do this, you'll want to start by sauteing the onions in the oil, then throw in the sweet potato, garlic, and spices, and keep sauteing. Then add most of the rest of the ingredients, simmer until tender, and stir in the cilantro near the end.

AFRICAN-STYLE LEFTOVERS SOUP
1/2 c. chopped onion and/or shallot
1 Tbs. peanut oil
1 large sweet potato, peeled and chopped
a few cloves garlic, minced
ginger (fresh or powdered)
berbere*
peri peri**
cumin
a 14-oz. can of diced tomatoes, with juice
half a head of cauliflower, in florets
a couple handfuls of shredded cabbage
a handful of unsalted roasted peanuts, chopped
a teaspoon or two of peanut butter
salt and pepper to taste
a little water if needed
1/4 c. chopped cilantro

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* I was going to call this a West African soup, which it more or less resembled, what with the peanuts and sweet potatoes and all. But then I went and threw an Ethiopian spice mixture into it and mangled my geography. Ah, well.

** And then I threw in a South African red pepper powder to further confound matters.

The bikini is in the bag

There is no milk in the house. We're leaving on our trip to Florida tomorrow morning, and we are trying to "run down" the food in the fridge.

This morning: Oatmeal with brown sugar and diced apple. Coffee with no milk. Things are getting lean and hungry around here. I usually have about a quarter-cup of skim milk in each of my two cups of coffee (not that I'm a creature of habit or anything), and I miss it a lot. Not enough to use powdered milk or to open a whole can of evaporated/condensed milk, though.

Last night I made EmptyTheFridge Lo Mein. Leftover chicken, tofu, the last green and white onions, the last half of a bunch of cilantro, the dregs of a bag of frozen peas, the remainder of an already-opened can of commercial chicken broth. By the time I piled all the leftovers into it, it was huge, so now we have leftovers of lo mein. Oops.

For tonight's dinner, I get to figure out what to do with two sweet potatoes, a carton of yogurt, and half a head of radicchio. (?!)

I don't expect to be blogging much, if at all, for the next week. We intend to find a library at some point and check in, but by then I will probably have 30,000 e-mails to deal with, and no doubt all of them will be RED HOT EMERGENCIES. So it's safe to assume you won't see much of me until the 17th or 18th.

We will be spending a couple of days in Kissimmee/Orlando, then moving to a beachfront campsite in St. Pete for the remainder of the week. There will be jai alai, manatees, museums, botanical gardens, sponge divers, thrift shopping, kitsch, seafood, Cuban food, Greek food, and of course a lot of spring training baseball. I'll post some photos when I get back.

Mistake? Or good fortune?

I accidentally bought white chocolate Toblerone today. The bars were 79 cents each and they were sitting on the checkout counter at Big Lots, and I grabbed three of them without looking too closely because I loooooove Toblerone.

When I got home with the groceries and looked closer, I was terribly disappointed because I don't like white chocolate. I dislike it to the point where I don't even want a hint of it in a cheesecake or a cookie. I've always seen it as pointless--chocolate without the chocolate. Give me my cocoa!

But then I broke off a little "mountain peak" from the bar and ate it. And you know what? If all white chocolate tasted like that, I wouldn't think so poorly of it. In fact, I might even like it a lot.

Let us raise a glass in honor of Swiss chocolatiers.

But let us not become hasty. If I am eating dinner at your restaurant and the waiter tells me the house dessert specialty is Raspberry White Chocolate Decadence Cake, I still won't order it, because most white chocolate is not worth the energy it takes to break off a chunk. White chocolate as a "fancy" extra in a dessert? That's hack.

I did it

I finished the living room ceiling! Woo! And now my neck hurts too much to look up at it. I think it's probably very pretty.

Fruits of my labors, part deux

The consensus here is that the bramley burnt creams from Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's The River Cottage Year are one of the best desserts ever to grace the earth. Of course, since I have no access to bramley apples here in the U.S., mine were macintosh burnt creams. I don't think much was lost in translation.

Let me try to describe the concept. You cook up a batch of homemade applesauce, keeping it nice and tart. You chill a layer of the applesauce in ovenproof ramekins. Then you whip some cream--unsweetened--and chill a layer of whipped cream on top of the applesauce. Then you sprinkle a layer of brown sugar over the whipped cream and put the cold ramekins under the broiler just long enough to caramelize the sugar, yet keep everything else cold. Chill once more, then crack the burnt sugar with your spoon and dig in. Stunning. I made a half recipe (three ramekins) for three people, but we all wish I'd made more.

Lately I've been really loving desserts that are heavy on fruit, eggs, nuts, etc. Wholesome, bright tastes, with less fat and flour than I've baked with in the past. I've been making these cookies from Jacques Pépin's Simple and Healthy Cooking that have nothing but ground pecans, powdered sugar, and egg white in them. I have nicknamed them pecanaretti. They're wafer-thin and crispy and toffeelike, and when they're crumbled they make a perfect topping for, say, key lime pie-flavored yogurt, or zabaglione.

Bring me your tired, your poor, your sweet-toothed...

Clever, clever s.o.

Like our new entertainment center? It's a 1920s electric stove that came with the house. We don't have the money to restore it right now, but we are managing to put it to good use nevertheless.

And look where the components go!

Janus-faced

Good Jamie:
While moving furniture and DIY supplies upstairs so that the s.o. could install baseboards, I found a partial can of semigloss paint in the living room/dining room trim color, which means I probably don't have to buy more paint for the living room ceiling after all. This means a potential savings of $25 (expensive, I know...it's Ralph Lauren paint) and a trip to Athens.

Bad Jamie:
Casting health concerns aside, I made batter-fried pollack, homemade onion rings, and baby broccoli with rarebit dip for dinner. Mmm...so greasy and fried...

Fruits of my labors

Julia Child was known for drinking wine while she cooked. Perhaps that's why she was in the habit of leaving things in the oven for about five minutes too long. Take a look at Julia Child & Company, which shows photos of actual food cooked on her show, and you'll see that most of her pastries are a little scorched.

With this in mind, I would like to amend the recipe for clafoutis that appears in Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Vol. 1. A clafoutis should remain in the oven for 55 minutes, not an hour.

Anyhow, I don't mind that my plum clafoutis turned out just a tad too brown. Redolent of cognac, bubbling with purple juice, eggy and slightly sweet...oh my, it takes all my strength to keep from eating the entire thing.

Busy bees

After I've been working on a particularly grubby and grueling DIY project, there's no feeling in the world like stepping into the shower and getting really clean. I deploy the sweetly-scented personal-care equivalent of 80 grit sandpaper. It's so wonderful to scrub off all the teeny paint chips and cobwebs and dirt, and to emerge smelling like mangoes or papayas or coconut.

All of that is a lead-in to the fact that I started painting the living room ceiling today. Yes, I know you're supposed to work from top to bottom when you remodel a room. But we had to live somewhere, didn't we? We couldn't stay at the Suburban Lodge motel forever--not at $180 a week. So we finished the walls and moved on in.

So now I am moving furniture wherever practical, and throwing dropcloths over the rest. I'm scraping peeling paint where I find it, painting what I've scraped, and basically spending hours on a ladder with one arm over my head. Then there's a long, drawn-out cleanup where I vacuum everything and use the brush attachment to get flyaway dust out of the papasan cushion.

The room is starting to look a lot better--lighter and brighter! and with a ceiling that matches rather than clashing with the walls!--but I suspect it's going to take me a while to finish.

Outdoors the weather is gradually improving after the lapse earlier this week. The arugula, radishes, and turnips are starting to look like real plants. The sorrel is sending up new shoots. The s.o. has been outdoors whenever he can, using the table saw to rip baseboards for the upstairs (and to make a couple of replacement boards for the exterior, with the goal of keeping a noisy squirrel out of our attic).

Suddenly it's afternoon, and I haven't even had my lunch!

AI results postmortem

I'll keep this brief for readers who couldn't care less. Heh.

Constantine survived despite what I thought was a really lame performance. I'll start rooting for him (as a number TWO favorite) again if he doesn't suck next Monday.

Aloha didn't make it...proving once again that the only thing more deadly than a terrible performance is a workmanlike but forgettable one, especially if you have to sing first. Really a pity. I did like her.

Have towel, will travel

Can't wait for this! Best casting ever. It looks so good. My only regret is that my dad (who introduced me to Douglas Adams' work and had a very similar sense of humor) isn't still around to see it with us.

One fish, two fish, bread fish, Hugh fish

The title is a reference to dinner, of course. I made the Foil-Baked Trout with Granary Bread Croutons from Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's The River Cottage Year cookbook. I did it completely "by the book," even to the point of following his suggestion to serve the fish with wilted spinach and new potatoes. Excellent.

Today it snowed. Let me say that again: It snowed. I was out running errands and I kept seeing these little flakes flying around. Because I am a northerner, my Spidey sense said "snow," but somehow I couldn't quite believe it. Sure, it was wool-sweater weather, but snow? The wind was howling, but snow?! We don't DO snow here. Maybe there was a fire somewhere and this flurrying stuff was ash.

It was snow. A piece of it fluttered onto my windshield and melted. Ash doesn't do that.

As soon as I saw that melting flake, I started cussing. FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK! I did not move to Georgia so that I could run my errands in the snow. On the bright side, the snow didn't stick around here (although it did in the northern mountains). On the not-so-bright side, a hard freeze is forecast for tonight. I am not impressed.

Snowflakes aren't the only things I've been seeing out of the corner of my eye. Lately I've noticed a lot of signs.

Outside a church: JESUS LOVES YOU MORE THAN ANYONE. (Do they mean "Jesus loves you more than he loves anyone else," or "Jesus loves you more than anyone else does"? It's kind of important to know which one. I favor "A.")

On a marquee in front of the Hardee's: MONSTER THINKBURGER. (Think twice about eating it.)

On a signboard with letters dropping off, in front of a gas station in Union Point: WIN 20 GALLONS OF GA. (I already carry 20 gallons of Georgia with me at all times. I think I always will.)

Change of heart

I'm over Constantine Maroulis.

There's a lot of stunning talent on American Idol this year, and he's just not performing at a high enough level to be a contender.

Meanwhile, Bo Bice is kicking everyone's ass. Chills, I tell you, he's giving me chills.

Might as well make a Top 5 prediction:

Bo Bice
Nadia Turner
Carrie Underwood
Mario Vazquez
Aloha Mischeaux