FOOOOOOD!

So, one great thing about being a BIG city for a while is the variety of foods.

Except for breakfast, which comes with the hotel stay, I've only eaten food that I can't get at home. (Things in the cold case at the supermarket don't count.)

I don't often eat out and the variety is so much fun.

One more full day surrounded by too much humanity.

Here's to delicious survival.

Pie

I don't often try to make food look fancy, but chocolate curls are an easy way to do it, even if several three to six year-olds pick them off the top.

On Chocolate Chips

A few months ago I bought an ice cream maker. One that has a tub you freeze overnight before you churn. It's a good ice cream maker that's dangerous, but creates much deliciousness.

I tackled the big three right away -- vanilla, chocolate, and strawberry -- with no problems. The next on the top five list seemed easy. Make vanilla and add mini chocolate chips because big ones get too tough to chew.

Pow.

Except not really.

The mini chocolate chips are easier to chew, but not by that much. Also, because the chips are frozen I couldn't really taste the chocolate.

One of the joys of chocolate is that it melts at body temperature. When it melts in your mouth is when you taste that singular flavor. Shoveling it in with frozen cream does not allow for much melt and therefore not much flavor.

Store bought chocolate chip ice cream doesn't have that problem, though. The chips melt fine and every bite is nicely balanced between the vanilla of the cream and the chocolate of the chip. What makes them chips so special?

The last time I was at the store, I looked at the ingredients of a chocolate chip ice cream: cream, sugar, blah, blah, blah, chocolate flavored chips.

Chocolate flavored chips?

Fortunately, modern ingredient lists also list the ingredients for the ingredients and I learned that chocolate flavored chips are made with bittersweet chocolate (like standard cookie chips) and coconut oil, non-hydrogenated. (In other brands it may be some other kind of oil.)

My brain went DING.

Coconut oil is solid until about 75 degrees Fahrenheit and then starts melting. Mixing the coconut oil with the chocolate brings the melting point of the chocolate down and, if you don't buy the super organic oil (oops), it doesn't taste too different. Not as strong as bittersweet chips, but more chocolaty than milk chocolate.

I felt stupid. I've been making homemade Magic Shell for over a year now. It's mostly chocolate and coconut oil. This keeps the concoction liquid at, relatively, cool temperatures and then it freezes on the scoop of ice cream (or frozen strawberry or ice cube or frozen spoon, however you take your chocolate).

The chips work, too. Now the question is what's the perfect ratio of oil to chocolate?

Dear Gramma,

Thank you for the casserole dish.

Strawberry Jam

Made strawberry jam this afternoon. One just popped. Hurray!

Finished Yogurt

With peach jam.

Yogurt: Successful!

Currently, three of the quarts are draining for the Greek style.

Today I Make Yogurt

I hope it turns out.

On Making Apple Pie

I saw giant piles of apples at the grocery store the other day and I decided that what I wanted more than almost anything was apple pie. Not just a regular pie, but a mile high apple pie.

When I make apple pie, I like to get the apples ready first so they can sit for at least 90 minutes gaining flavor.

Here's what I used:

Sugar
Flour
Lemon Juice (I forgot to buy a lemon. The bottle works well, though.)
Nutmeg
Ground Cloves
Cinnamon
 Apples

I used three Lady Alice, three Honeycrisp, and  nine Granny Smiths. The variety of apples was to help vary the texture and sweetness within the pie when it finished cookin.

The contraption is an apple peeler/slicer:

Nothing gets apples prepped for pies faster. Setup, peeling/slicing, and cleanup took about twenty minutes. (You can choose if you want the apple peeled, too. Oh, it's perfect if you're going to dehydrate apples because it takes out the core and all the slices are uniform.)

I like to use a bowl with a lid so I can shake the bejesus out of it.

I used a teaspoon of the nutmeg, a teaspoon of ground cloves, a tablespoon of cinnamon (I like cinnamon in my apples, most recipes don't call for this much.), two tablespoons of flour (this helps thicken the juices the apples are going to let go), two tablespoons of lemon juice (which was too much; one would have been better), and one cup of sugar.

After the shake-up, it's time for the dough for the pie crust:

Flour
Sugar
Salt
Shortening
Butter
Vodka
Water

I use the America's Test Kitchen Foolproof Pie Dough, because I need the foolproof part and it's delicious. I'm not going to write the recipe out because they don't give it away for free. It's worth the price, though,

Also, I forgot to take pictures of the mixing process (I'm new to trying to blog cooking), but here are pictures of the only dishes I dirtied and the dough in balls ready to be put in the fridge for at least an hour:

After at least an hour, I pulled out the larger of the two balls, rolled it out, then put it in a 9-inch pie pan, mine is Pyrex.

After filling the bottom, I rolled out the top, laid it over the pie, trimmed and pinched the edges, and cut some slits in the top to let the steam out.

The pie went into a preheated 425 degree (F) oven on a half-sheet on the bottom rack of the oven. The half-sheet went into the oven as it preheated so it was nice and hot. This is to help the bottom of the pie cook a little bit faster so it won't be soggy when the pie is finished.

It cooked for 45 minutes and came out like this:

Usually, I use some melted butter on the top then sprinkle cinnamon/sugar. This time I used an egg wash and then cinnamon/sugar. It's pretty obvious where the wash was too thick and the cinnamon/sugar was too thin.

Here's the first slice, after it rested for an hour:

The dough was amazing. In the past I've rolled this recipe out several times and it's always come out flaky and tender and delicious. The apple had a great texture, but was a little tart; too much lemon juice added to the apples. I like tart, Granny Smiths are my favorite apples, but others would have liked it to be a more sweet.

Still, it was devoured pretty quickly.

After I put the pie into the oven, I collected the scraps of dough, formed them into a new ball, and put it in the fridge for 30 minutes. Then I rolled the dough out, smeared melted butter all over it, and sprinkled cinnamon/sugar everywhere.

Then I rolled it up into a log and sliced that log into half inch pieces. After the pie came out, the mini-cinnamon rolls went into the oven for 13 minutes. Which was probably two minutes too long. Some got a little too browned, but they all tasted great.

YOGURT!

Along with that cake yesterday, I decided to make yogurt in the slow cooker. I did it over night.

 

This is what the cooker looked like this morning after a couple little taster scoops. I'm not a fan of plain yogurt. I wanted to add canned peaches, but this yogurt was too runny to add anything juicy to it.

I put a clean dishtowel in a colander and put that over a bowl and let it drain in the fridge all day.

 That's what it looked like when I pulled it out of the fridge tonight. You can see the rings where the yogurt started.

It's the consistency of sour cream and sort of tastes like it, too.

 There were at least four cups of water in that bowl.

On the left is starter for next time. On the right I will mix in my can of peaches.

Like the recipe says, I used a half gallon of milk and it gave a half gallon of yogurt. After draining I have a lot less yogurt, but it's at a consistency I really like. I think that on the weekends I could do two batches a day and get a lot made. Plenty for the whole week.

Of course, since this isn't my house I don't think I should go this crazy, but in the future...

Hooray for cooking!

Because I Wanted To

I made cake.

 

It's devil's food with a butter cream frosting and I made it without a package mix. The cake is chocolaty and moist and so dark it's nearly black and quite wonderful. The frosting okay, but next time I think I'll use a bitter-sweet chocolate chip so it's not quite so sweet. (I used Alton Brown's recipe. He's my cooking hero. I hope he makes some Good Eats specials soon, since he stopped making the show.)

I really like baking things and cooking things. I'd do it all the time if I had the time an the money. The problem is that I don't really want to eat much of what I make (especially full cakes), so that sort of stops me from going crazy. I guess.

Still, I'm bought most of the the ingredients for a red velvet cake. I'll save that one for Christmas. Maybe a little green coloring in the frosting for the holiday?

There'll be pictures.

I've always been yucky!

I made sure to have dinner well and on the way to being completed by the time The Mother got back from work tonight: chicken was salted and sitting; rice and water was ready and waiting; and the macaroni (noodle? pasta?) salad was in the fridge so flavors could mingle. Today was her first day of school with students. It was rough.

Going to work every day to a job you hate, or are just tired of, or burnt out on is tough. I know because I do that, but the longest I've ever been away from my work was 16 days and it was painful to go back to my job. I don't want to imagine how hard it is for someone to go back after sixty days.

So, I was a good son and made dinner. I also cleaned up dinner. I also choose what we watched while eating dinner, but that was purely selfish. (Apollo from the new Battlestar Galactica co-starred in it.) I didn't mind doing it and I'm always willing to help make dinner, lunch, whatever (I like to cook), I hate being the decider for everyone. I hate it so much. I know it won't be expected of me, but I live in irrational fear.

Oh, "great" and "powerful" "mystical" forces of the "universe," help me to settle my job bullshit once and for all so I'm comfortable enough that I can sign a year long lease. I would appreciate it.

Also, to swing this post in a startlingly different direction, I'm trying to plan a trip to Oregon. At this moment I think a flight up there and a car rental for a weekish and extra stuffs would cost me about $1000. But I'd get to spend some time with those who moved to the hipster place and then head out to see sister-in-law and brother and their baby at there new place. And I could drag brother and niece, since SIL would probably be in school, to the cheese factory and the plane exhibit and generally goof around. I also want to visit other brother and other sister-in-law and use their proximity to go to the Paley Festival. Which to choose? Could I do both? Unfortunately, any plans have to be based around the job bullshit, so like February or March, if I'm lucky.

I've never been lucky, though.

I've been in a pissy mood lately. And I can't tell if it's getting better.

On the plus side, I cooked a salmon last night (stuffed it with lemon and dill and parsley and green onion) and it turned out really good.

Mah Little Dumplin'

Yesterday, I roasted a chicken, which I bought on Saturday, for dinner. Didn't do anything special, except actually take the time to baste it every thirty minutes, instead of wrapping it in foil and hoping that it'll get some color during the last bit of cooking when the foil is bravely removed.

I learned, though, that I really need a smaller roasting pan thing. Mine's huge. Like turkey sized, huge. To be, sort of, fair to myself, it was the only roasting pan they had when I bought it and I did, silly me, imagine serving turkey dinners. Still, I need to find one that's chicken sized. And I'd like it to be more rounded than square.

See the problem with having a large pan for a small, in comparison to the pan, bird is that all the juice that drips quickly dries. To have anything with which to baste, I have to continually add water to the pan and hope that it'll still be there the next time I pull the bird out of the oven. It's not that I can't do it; it's just an extra step that I'd like to avoid. Plus, a smaller roasting pan would actually fit into the sink comfortably while washing dishes.

Still, when all was over the chicken came out well. I sprinkled it with my favorite pre-mixed herb, lemon pepper, and shoved some lemons up its butt. I also did lemon pepper rice. It was all very nice.

Tonight, as is the next day tradition when there's a chicken carcass around, comes soup. Already the bones were boiled and picked clean of flesh. Soon the fat will be skimmed and the veggies added. But tonight, instead of noodles in my soup, I am going to attempt the dumpling.

After checking my two cookbook and some places on the 'net, I have found that there are two ways people cook the dumpling. Many drop the dough into the broth then cover and allow to cook. Others say to rest the dumpling dough on the chicken out of the broth so it gets more of a schvitz than a bath. I shall, of course, be dropping.

Into the Red

Do any of you out there have a good recipe for pizza sauce your willing to share with me?

I'd like one that's not too sweet and is on the thicker side, if you have it.

Sausage Things Wrapped in Pancake

I've been thinking about those little sausage things that are wrapped in pancake that are deep fried and on a stick. (Which is another way of saying, I haven't really though about what to write her today.) Those things are so good. I see boxes of them in the freezer at the grocery store every time I go. I don't buy them, though. If I buy them, I'll eat them. If I eat them, I'll want more. If I want more, I'll buy more. And the cycle will continue until I have eaten all the little sausage things that are wrapped in pancake that are deep fried and on a stick in the world. And I don't think we can have that.

In other links:
Who Is Your Savior?
and
Who Is Your Savior? (Regeneration Remix)
also
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
again.

Blizzard

I really want a Blizzard. I actually have money with me and even though the Mall isn't on my normal route away from work, it's also not out of the way. I think I'll stick with my usual peanut butter cup Blizzard. That seems like a good idea that's also bad.

Time Waster, the series continues

I have two goals for this weekend:

The first is to see For Your Consideration. I think that any movie that has people celebrating (sort or) Purim in the deep south has to be worth watching.

The second is to eat at the barbecue place that's right by the theater. I think I've been to the theater at least once a month since I moved here, but I still haven't tried the Q. It sure smells good, though.

I've been trying to go to lunch, since I hate going out when actual people are out, at places I haven't tried yet. I did the sushi place last week. It was good, but expensive, very expensive. The biggest problem I have with sushi places is they keep wanting me to order things with shrimp or octopus or squid in it. I can't handle those foods. I don't like the way they taste. And they make me vomit (or maybe there's just something out there that's totally unrelated to ingesting those creatures that makes me vomit after I eat them, I just don't know). So far my favorite place is the Mexican food place my mom and brother and I went to when I we came here to look for an apartment.

For next weeks place, I need some help. I want to try the Indian food place, but I've never had Indian food before. The one time I asked my brother about it, he told me it was good, but I might want to eat it on a night when I don't have anything to do the next day because I wouldn't want to be too far from the toilet. I also know about the Gilmore Girls suggestion of, when you order Indian take-out, burning down the house is the only way to get out the smell. So, I want to know, what should I order? Please remember that creatures with shells, creatures with shells and tails that swim or scuttle, and creatures with tentacles make me vomit, and not in the figurative sense.

And, just for the hell of it, here's a comic about cereal characters.

Weekend

Friday, after work, I went to see the final show in the Josh Kornbluth's Red Diaper Trilogy, three one man shows. Here's a quick rundown:
Red Diaper Baby: Both of Josh's parents are communists. His dad wants him to lead the American communist revolution.
The Mathematics of Change: Josh goes to college as a math major and gets run over by calculus.
And Ben Franklin: Unplugged: Josh discovers he looks like Ben Franklin and is told he can make money at it.

My thoughts:
Red Diaper Baby: Really, really funny. Too bad it ends on a tone that's nothing like the tone of the rest of the piece; the theme is totally different, too. That sort of ruined it for me.
The Mathematics of Change: My favorite. It's funny. I suppose anything that has a human get mouse cancer is funny though. It ends on a different tone than it started with, but the theme is still there.
And Ben Franklin: Unplugged: Not as funny as the first. Not as meaningful, to me, as the second. I enjoyed it.

* * *

When I got back from the show, I pulled my mail from its cubby thing and found a check in it for me from my car insurance company. It seems that Proposition 103 has actually been put into effect. (Well, not into effect, exactly, but a lawsuit has been filed against some companies.) Now, I'm richer than I was a week ago. (You may applaud, if you wish.) Before Friday, I had never considered that a law passed in 1988 would earn me some extra cash today. I was only nine when the law passed. I didn't have my license for another ten years.

Thank you, weird universe, for punishing my insurance company.

* * *

Saturday, I did something, but I can't remember what.

* * *

Sunday, I made some kick ass ribs, drove around this city here, got some new comics, and watched the last disc of the first season of Bewitched.

* * *

Yesterday, I went to Cowcity to a union rally. It was interesting, but I don't think anything was accomplished. I've got to get going, so I may write more about this tomorrow.

Good Eatin'

I go out to lunch about once a month.

It gets me away from the office and I get to eat something that’s not between two slices of bread.

Today, I went to the Mongolian BBQ place in the mall. They have an okay selection of stuff. I freaked the lady behind me out when I kept piling the cilantro on. I like that herb quite a bit.

After lunch I walked across the food court for a Blizzard(TM) because even when the temperature outside is below 50F, you can’t keep a fat man away from his ice cream. I added Reese’s to it. It was good and made my hands very cold on the walk back to work.

Right now, I should be doing my work. Going and pulling files. Looking up information on the computer. Dancing for my pennies. I don’t want to though. My supervisor has handed me a pile of work from the desk of a woman who isn’t here today. The work is over a week old. Is it my fault that she didn’t finish her work? Am I the one that causes her to be away from her desk for four hours a day speaking with the secretaries and court reporters? This woman has been gone for two days and hasn’t gotten an equal share of the work since last Friday.

*sigh*

Thank goodness I don’t have to be back here for 62 hours, in about 25 minutes that is.