The Book and My Kitchen

I was listening to a podcast of the Splendid Table recently (the show for people who love to eat, as they always remind me) and Lynne was interviewing Ken Albala.  He was talking about how there is wild yeast everywhere, in the air, on our fruit, etc., and how you don't really need to use commercially produced yeast to make bread.  You can just set some food out for the yeast and they will come to you.  Mr. Albala is the co-author, with Rosanna Nafziger, of The Lost Art of Real Cooking.  I had recently decided that all cookbooks and such things are going to be previewed via the public library before purchase so I placed a hold and got the book pretty quickly.

This book is amazing.  And I just want to be clear that no one is asking me to promote this book, or paying me or any such other nonsense.  The book just blew my socks off.  The basic premise of the book is that we have gotten very far away from cooking (and subsequently eating) the way our not-too-distant ancestors did.  The authors advocate and delineate the pleasures and benefits of preparing food without small appliances and from super scratch.  Like growing your own yeast.  Which I am currently doing.  Here is an early picture of my flour and water (and now yeast) slurry:

It has since gotten much bigger.  I started it last Wednesday (3/23) and I'm going to try baking some bread with it this weekend.  You know I'll update you eventually on the results.  I also roasted a whole chicken while my mom and sister were visiting and made stock from the bones and skin and some previously collected vegetable peelings.  I've made stock before, but this book advocates cooking the stock (below a simmer: apparently simmering or boiling stock is what makes it cloudy) at least overnight.  So I took a leap of faith and left the stove on with a pot of soon-to-be-stock on it overnight.  And the house didn't burn down.  Woo hoo!  Here's a picture of it before I went to bed for the night:

To be clear, this book is not for the faint of heart or those of you who are looking for a quick weeknight meal (or, realistically, those of you with small children, or maybe any children).  The yeast slurry (what is actually pretty much a sourdough starter) must be fed and watered every night.  Every night.  As a result, I think I have more than a gallon of the stuff.  And I need to find people to give it away to.  Would you like some?  I can bring it over, if you live within a 50 mile radius.  The chicken stock involved bones and skin and the sort of things that most people who still eat meat seem to try to avoid.  But I also feel really connected to the foods that I'm making.  I talk to my starter every night, and sometimes I hug the crock that it lives in.  Truly.  I know it sounds a little bit crazy, but it's true.

So if you have any interest in this very back to the basics approach to food, check out this book. It's definitely heavy on an omnivorous diet, there's a lot about meat and dairy (the glory of cultured butter, making your own yogurt and so on) but there are a few other gems, like making dill pickles the old way (no canning required), rumtopf and a few other surprises.  I loved it so much and talked about it so much, that my lovely girlfriend surprised me with it and a nylon whisk.  That girl really knows me.  And she likes the results, too.

So Many Updates!!!

Well folks, A LOT has happened in the last two weeks.  And I'm a little embarrassed that it's been so long since I posted an update.  My mom and my sister came to visit last weekend (3/18-3/21/11).  We had a great time going to thrift stores and estate sales and playing games.  They also helped me accomplish one of my goals:  Lining and hanging the new curtains!  I'm about to show you an after picture, but let me give you some context.  For the longest time, our living room was painted three different shades of brown (I realize now it was a warm, brown cave).  To go along with that and our former brown couch, we had two sets of curtains, one ivory and one brown.  They were perfectly lovely.  Then we got rid of the brown couch.  Then we painted the living room a pale gray.  Suddenly the ivory and brown curtains just looked really, really bad.  So six months ago we bought some new curtains.  And they sat in the packages until just a week and a half ago waiting for me to quickly sew on the extra lining that I've had for years.  But thanks to my mom and my sister, they're done and hanging in the living room:

It's not the best picture, but you get the ideas.  Now, however, it has become even more painfully clear that the old green couch is going to have to go.  Luckily we've got a plan, and it looks like this.  I just want to save up a little more money before we buy it.  And we also have to figure out a way to get rid of the current couch.  I'm thinking we'll probably post it in the free ads on Craiglist, but if you want it, come and get it.

We also had a major accomplishment this evening:  We bought a new dishwasher!  By happy accident, all EnergyStar appliances were 10% off at Sears this week, so we paid a little less than we might otherwise.  It's going to be installed and the old dishwasher hauled away on Saturday, just in time for my turn to do dishes!  Ironically, it was my #3 choice of 3 models after doing research and before seeing them in person.  The sales lady clearly wanted us to buy this one, but we also liked it the most of the three on our list.  We also bought their 3 year maintenance plan, and I'm honestly not interested in hearing if you think that was a bad decision.

Work is still hectic, but I'm really loving it.  There's something really awesome about caring for people who are at their most acute.  I'm learning so much more than I anticipated.  I also had the weirdest, funniest dream about my boss last week.  I dreamed that he had put my on an experimental weight loss program that he developed (he's an MD and an MPH) and by the end of it I had gained 115 pounds.  He told me that it means I think he's a terrible doctor.  I actually think he's a brilliant doctor, but I didn't tell him that.  I just told him I think it means that this job is harder and heavier than I thought it was going to be.  I really think that's what the dream meant.  But I'm really happy I made the change.  The challenge is exactly what I needed.

Coming soon: a post on the book that has revolutionized my kitchen.  And an update on all of my recent thrift/antiquing finds (Margo and I went antiquing this weekend.  I love to go to antique malls.  We spent three hours in one of them yesterday.  It made my weekend.).  Maybe tomorrow....

Naked Ladies and Pie

Well, as I suggested I would back on January 11, I went to a strip show over the weekend with my lady and a couple of our (straightish) friends.  This was a women-only event, and a fundraiser for an AIDS organization in California (although the show was here in Seattle).  One of the most interesting aspects of this event was that every single woman who stripped was an audience member.  They called it a Strip-O-Rama and had a one hour strip tease class before the show actually started that was taught by the beguiling and ever-so-lovely Miss Indigo Blue.  (Miss Indigo Blue was also the hilarious and delightful host of the show with more costume changes than Anne Hathaway at the Oscars).  After the class, anyone who wanted to could sign up for a two-minute slot (no pun intended.  or maybe pun very much intended).  This is not the first time they've had this event in Seattle, and some of these ladies had very clearly attended and performed before.  Each act (some acts were multiple women at once) was judged by the amount of tips that they received (although all tips went to the charity).  At the end of the evening, the top three acts were then auctioned off for a lap dance.  One thing that I very much appreciated was the variety of body types and gender expressions that we saw in the performers, and every one of them received an adoring and appreciative response from the audience.

All in all, it was a seriously good time.  It was funny, it was touching, it was hot, and at times it was down-right disturbing.  As the event did not take place at a Washington State-licensed strip club and was a charity event, none of the rules that generally apply to strip clubs applied to this show.  Some people ran with the lack of restrictions.  And, as a lady who appreciates a certain type of lady, there was plenty of eye candy to behold.  So, if you're a lady who loves the ladies and you appreciate a certain degree and variety of sexual expression, I highly recommend attending this in the future.  I'm also feeling like I might almost be brave enough to consider thinking about taking a burlesque class.  There were also raffle prizes.  And so many of them that nearly everyone won something.  I'm not telling you what I won...

Moving on to Pi(e) day and the food I'm cooking as I type.  Because it is Pi(e) Day (3.14), I decided to make (with some assistance from Margo), apple hand pies.  I haven't tasted them yet, but they look delicious:

Also in the works is Costillitas en Naranja (Mexican Ribs In Orange & Chili Sauce).  It's not completely done yet, but we are hungry so we each had one not quite totally tender rib with a drizzle of sauce to tide us over until it's completely done and the barley is ready to go under it.  Here's a picture near the beginning of the cooking process:

So far, the verdict is: very tasty but very time-consuming.  A better recipe for a leisurely Sunday afternoon than for a Monday night.

And finally, here's what happens around here when you get up off the couch to go tend to your cooking:

While this one looks on in disdain:

That's all she wrote, folks.  Happy Pi(e) Day!

A Cooking Update

It's been way to long since my last post, again.  I have so much to catch up on. 

For starters, I made so very many new recipes in the last couple of weeks.  Some of them were great and some of them were iffy.  My new favorite recipe, however, is this recipe which is for cookies that are healthy, with no sugar (except what's in the chocolate chips) and no flour.  I know you're probably skeptical, but they are totally delicious and feel like a total treat.  Here's a picture of the dough below:

I also made spinach and chickpeas Jamie Oliver style.  I think I used too much vegetable broth powder, so it tasted a little to salty and vegetable brothy.  I also had about a quarter of the spinach called for in the recipe.  I think that the sauteed spinach in combination with the sauteed onions (which were sliced rather than diced) was just altogether too much sliminess for me as well.  I am typically a fan of both spinach and onions, but the slime factor here was more than I could handle.  But here is a really nice (if I do say so myself) picture of the end product:

I also made the first bread I've made in years, and the first entirely whole wheat bread I've ever made.  I used this recipe, substituting agave nectar for the honey.  I found the end product to be quite heavy and very dry.  I'm not sure why, either.  I was hoping for something a little chewy and crusty, and found neither of those in this recipe.  I don't think that it was due to the agave nectar substitution, but I don't honestly know enough about the science of baking to know that for sure.    I've also learned that there are surprisingly few recipes for whole wheat bread that call for only whole wheat flour.  Some of the recipes call for the addition of wheat gluten if you're only using whole wheat flour, and most just call for some white flour or bread flour.  This is clearly something I'm going to have to investigate/learn more about if I'm going to be making more bread anytime soon.  I will say, however, that the dough was delicious.  I also learned that if you eat a lot of bread dough, it does some strange things in your stomach and you wind up having burps that feel carbonated.  Here are a couple of pictures of the end product.  You can see how the loaf of bread just collapsed at some point in the process.

Finally, I also tried a recipe for Double Coconut Chicken.  I simultaneously cooked brown rice with some shredded, unsweetened coconut and then served the whole thing over the rice along with some steamed broccoli.  I think this would have been much better had I salted and peppered the food as directed in the recipe.  I also didn't brown the chicken as well as I would have liked.  As it was, it turned out a little bland.  The recipe was pretty easy to execute, though.  And here are the results of that endeavor:

It even looks a little bland, doesn't it?  I also question the quality of my saffron.  I purchased it some time ago for a ridiculously small amount of money at World Market.  I think it's worth another shot, although I might go an entirely different route next time and use some Thai seasonings instead.

So there's your cooking update.  If you have recipes you love, I would love for you to share them.  I'm always looking for new recipes to try.  Especially recipes that real live people cook in their real life kitchens with reasonable ingredients.  I've recently been checking cookbooks out of the library in droves as well, so if you have any cookbook recommendations, I'm all ears.  I recently purchased Urban Pantry: Tips & Recipes for a Thrifty, Sustainable & Seasonable Kitchen after checking it out of the library and loving it.  You might want to check it out as well.

My Oscar Opinions

With the Oscars coming up tomorrow evening, I had to do a quick post about my thoughts on the nominees for Best Picture.  Especially since I busted my ass to make sure I saw all of them before the show.  To give you a little context, the Oscars are sort of the highlight of my year, television-wise.  They have been for a long time.  So here are my thoughts, and a prediction.

I am fairly certain, as are many other people, that The King's Speech will likely take home the Oscar for Best Picture.  It was, to be honest, a really great film.  Margo and I thoroughly enjoyed it.  If I got to pick, however, I would choose 127 Hours.  I really did not want to see this movie, and I cannot say that I enjoyed the experience of watching this movie, at least not all of it.  I was, however, amazed by how engaged and interested I was and by how much I enjoyed all but five minutes of the movie.  Now I'll give you my brief response to each of the nominated films.

127 Hours:  See above.  I really did not want to see this movie.  If it had not been nominated, and had not seen James Franco on The Daily Show, I probably would not have seen this movie.  That being said, I enjoyed the vast majority of the movie.  I was unable to watch the five minutes of the movie where the man was removing his arm.  It was far more gruesome and horrific than I was prepared for.  I also found it surprisingly inspiring.  And it gave me cause to spend some time thinking about whether I would be capable of enduring what he endured and of removing my own arm.  I think I probably would have just killed myself.

Black Swan:  I thought this movie was pretty well done.  It was disturbing, and there were a lot of elements (physical injuries) that totally grossed me out.  The sex scene was hot, and probably the main reason any straight men saw the movie.  I also thought it was a remarkable demonstration of the stress-vulnerability model.

The Fighter:  Another movie I wasn't particularly interested in seeing.  I'm not really into boxing and had been generally irritated by the fact that Christian Bale, Amy Adams and Melissa Leo had all been nominated for Oscars but Mark Wahlberg hadn't.  I'm a pretty big Mark Wahlberg fan, and have been sitting in judgment of Christian Bale, especially after seeing his hair and beard at the Golden Globes.  But we finally saw this movie last night, and it was really quite good.  And Christian Bale deserves his Golden Globe and I hope he wins the Oscar.  He was unbelievable.  Regardless of what I think of him as a person, that man is an INCREDIBLE actor.  The movie was inspiring and heartwarming and turned out to be about so much more than boxing.

Inception:  I saw this movie the first time at the IMAX.  It was a great way to watch the movie.  I enjoyed it.  It is a total mindf--k.  I've seen it again since, and enjoyed it the second time as well.  I don't know how I feel about Leonardo DiCaprio at this point (side note: I sent him an invitation to my high school graduation) but I enjoyed the movie.  And the visual effects are pretty awesome.

The Kids Are All Right:  This was a wonderful, although painful, movie.  I was appalled that it was nominated for a Golden Globe in the comedy category.  Occasional funny moments do not a comedy make.  The acting was superb and it was so real to life.  I could identify with both female characters and could imagine feeling the things they were feeling in their circumstances.  Excellent film.

The King's Speech:  Like I said, I think this one is going to win it.  This was a very enjoyable movie.  Colin Firth did an outstanding job of acting a speech impediment.  I've known a number of people with stutters, and he did it very realistically.  It was also heartwarming and inspiring, and I actually wound up doing a little reading up on King George VI when we got home, because I was more interested in the history than I had been previously.  I won't begrudge it it's Oscar.

The Social Network:  This was another movie I never would have seen if it had not been nominated and I did not have a secret love for Justin Timberlake.  I was pretty impressed at the way that they made what was essentially a deposition so engaging.  I left the movie feeling pretty sorry for the Facebook guy.  I also thought that the movie kind of made it seem like he has an autism spectrum disorder.  He reminded me of a guy I used to work with who had Asperger's.  I wouldn't have nominated this for a Best Picture.

Toy Story 3:  Another movie I definitely would not have seen without the nomination.  This nomination is one of the reasons I'm a little irritated that they increased the number of Best Picture nominees to 10.  It was cute, it made us a little faclempt, but it is not a Best Picture by any stretch.

True Grit:  I have to say that this is the movie that I enjoyed watching most out of all of them.  It was funny, it was compelling, I loved the actress who played the main character (Supporting Role, my ass!) and I always love Jeff Bridges.  In general, however, the Coen brothers are so hit and miss for me.  I find that I either really like their movies (The Big Lebowski is one of my all time favorite movies) or I am left feeling irritated, confused or feeling like I just wasted two hours of my life (A Serious Man, seriously?).  True Grit, however, is a big winner in my book.  I would watch that again, which is pretty unusual for me.

Winter's Bone:  This movie was depressing.  I did not enjoy watching it, although I thought it was good, if that makes sense.  It definitely confirmed for me that I do not want to cook meth, nor do I want to live out in BFE with all of my f--ked up relatives who cook meth.  There is no happy ending when that's your life.

So there you have it.  Hopefully I haven't given anything away.  I tried not to do that.  I'd love to hear what your pick is and what you thought of the movies.

Glass and Snow

A while back, I bought two passes to the Museum of Glass in Tacoma from Living Social.  The half price price was particularly attractive because we hadn't been particularly excited by it the one other time we visited.  This time was a very different story.  Two exhibits in particular, Glimmering Gone by Ingalena Klenell and Beth Lipman and Kids Design Glass really blew us away.  Unfortunately for all of us, we weren't allowed to take pictures in the galleries.  Glimmering Gone had this really amazing installation piece that was a forest made out of many many different pieces of clear glass hanging from the ceiling.  It's hard to describe in words and the pictures on the website don't do it justice.  If you live in the area, I recommend you go see it.  Kids Design Glass is this amazing project that the Museum does where children who visit the museum (or are receiving treatment at an area children's hospital) can draw pictures and write artist's statements that they submit to a monthly contest.  The Museum then chooses a drawing each month to be reproduced in glass by a glass artist.  The glass pieces are displayed with the original drawings and artist statements.  Totally amazing and inspiring and hilarious.

Here are a few pictures I took of the glass installations outside of the museum.

Before we headed out this morning, it occurred to me that I still needed to visit a new park this month.  I did a little searching on the interwebs and came up with Delong Park.  Margo was initially not enthused at all because it was COLD today.  When we pulled into the parking lot, her enthusiasm dropped even further when we saw what appeared to be a field with a track around it.  We soon found a trail leading into the woods with views of the wetlands.  We had been hoping to see some birds, but the snow and iced over water resulted in us seeing only a lone seagull.  But it was really beautiful in spite of all of that.  Here are some pictures as proof.

I was especially fascinated by the juxtaposition of snow and moss, as you can see from a couple of my pictures.  All in all, a pretty good outing, and a park that I may want to revisit in nicer weather.

We also did some thrift store shopping on the way home.  We scored some pretty good deals, including a bunch of picture frames, a cool green glass jar and a few other fun things.  Margo broke my heart when she wasn't impressed with the dining room table I fell in love with.  I've never been so upset about a piece of furniture before.  I literally almost started crying in the store.  But ultimately it's important that we're both on board with major furniture pieces.  So we'll keep looking.

A Day Late and a Dollar Short

So, I know that I promised a blog post yesterday.  And I also publicly shared my plans to go to the conservatory, among other things.  But here's what happened:  I blew my nose.  Now let me explain.  I've had a bit of a cold for about a week, truly the mildest cold I think I've ever had.  I've had a bit of mucus over-production in the head and that's about the extent of it.  So yesterday afternoon, after getting all my things in order, I blew my nose before heading out.  And seriously messed up something in my inner ear.  I was instantly on the floor, with the room spinning wildly out of control around me while I tried not to vomit.  It took about 15 minutes before I felt well enough to even move and my inner ear parts moved back into some sense of order.  It was pretty awful and I felt nauseous for the rest of the day.  So instead of going on an adventure and stocking the pantry, I laid quietly in a dark room, listening to nerdy podcasts (and eventually falling asleep).

But I promised you some other topics, so here they are.  My new recipe a couple of weeks ago was for a Toasted Barley Asparagus Risotto.  I started by toasting the barley:

I then chopped up some red onion and garlic:

Sauteed it in the pan:

Added the barley and some broth (which I made using the water I blanched the asparagus in: tasty and conservationist!):

And stirred.  And added broth.  And stirred some more.  And repeated, for way too long.  Then I added the parsley and the blanched asparagus and some tomatoes.  And it was good.  But man it took a long time.  I'd start it earlier in the day next time (I think I started it at around 5:30 or 6:00PM, not good planning).

We also ate dinner at BOKA a couple of weeks ago and it was delicious.  We started with drinks and truffle fries.  Now, maybe I just have an underdeveloped tongue, but I (so far) haven't really understand the big deal about truffles.  Maybe someday I will, but for now, I don't get it.  I did have a delicious White Peach Cosmo, however.  Then I had the Rabbit Schnitzel and Margo had the Brick Chicken.  I've never eaten rabbit or schnitzel before (sorry Beth), but it was quite delicious.  It was served with this amazing spaetzle that was rich and caramelized and had brussel sprout leaves in it.  Some of you may know that brussel sprouts are my favorite vegetable of all time.  I love those things.  Margo's chicken was also delicious and came with a tantalizing and creamy celery root mashed potato puree.  Yum yum yum.  We will definitely go back there.  We also had fantastic service, which didn't hurt matters at all.

My most recent new recipe was not a success, I'm afraid to say.  I made (or attempted to make) pita bread to go with my tabbouleh (which is always a success!).  I used the recipe in my Joy of Cooking but had to make a few changes as a result of my inadequate flour supply.  The recipe called for three cups of bread flour, but I had 2 1/4 cups of whole wheat pastry flour and some buckwheat flour to make up the difference.  I also declined to knead the dough for the suggested 10 minutes.  My best guess is that, somewhere along the line, between the flour substitution and the inadequate kneading, I failed to develop enough gluten.  I'm not sure why they didn't puff up like balloons as the cookbook indicated they would.

Here is the finished product on day one, piled high with delicious tabbouleh:

At that point, I was still able to wrap it around the tabbouleh with no ill effects.  Here is what happened when I attempted the same maneuver the following day:

An almost unmitigated disaster, I'm afraid.  So I promptly cut the remaining pitas into triangles and turned them into pita chips.  Which are solid and crispy and delicious.

That's enough for tonight.  And I just have to say that this blog post would never have happened tonight if Margo hadn't made me do it.  There are a lot of positive things I might not do in my life if I didn't have her there to nudge me along.  And I'm grateful for where her nudging pushes me, even if I hate it in the moment.