Balls and Walnuts
more than you ever wanted to know
Category Archives: Food
Nine scary (and clueless) old (and not so old) men (and women)
Our Supreme Court Justices are living in the 1950s.
“What’s the difference between email and a pager?”
Read the article — this was not the only question indicating a mind-vacuum. Scalia and Kennedy tripped over each other’s boners*, and of course Thomas never asks questions.
I could understand if it was one or two of the older Justices who were ignorant, but no — Chief Justice Roberts asked the email v. pager question. And he’s only 55!
It’s frightening that the highest court in the land is making decisions on matters they understand as well as I understand quantum chromodynamics. I told Karen they should recuse themselves from the case; Karen thinks they should recuse themselves from the human race.
D.
*Obligatory apology for that image.
I love this guy
Huston makes me wish I were writing again. He’s that good. In his words I can sense the joy of creation, the satisfaction of craft well executed. I wish I were at it again.
Sleepless tells the story of undercover cop Parker Haas. It’s 2010, and the world is afflicted with a communicable prion disease (you know — like scrapie, CJD, mad cow . . .) that makes its victims sleepless, while slowly turning their brains into Swiss cheese. It’s invariably fatal, but takes its sweet time in killing; patients become confused and agitated, lose track of the past versus the present, and eventually descend into a terminal mode known as “the suffering.” The only thing that gives relief is DR33M3R, a drug that is in short supply. Haas has been tasked with uncovering the black market in DR33M3R.
The sleepless plague has warped the world, which is now descending into anarchic hell as a result. The Los Angeles of Sleepless is a minutely detailed war zone populated with gangs and militias, Blackwater-style hired guns, neo-Christian suicide bombers, the desperate and the rich and the desperate rich. Not too far from the real thing, in other words.
Haas’s wife is sleepless, and his infant daughter might be as well. And Haas — has he gone without sleep because he takes amphetamines to keep moving, or is he, like many sleepless victims, taking amphetamines to stave off the illness’s hallmark confusion?
Multiple murders at an MMORPG gold farm guide Haas towards the top of the DR33M3R food chain, but he’s not alone in his pursuit. He’s on a collision course with Jasper (no last name), one of the most cleverly drawn hit man characters I’ve read or seen in many years. Think of Arthur Bishop (Charles Bronson’s hit man from The Mechanic) with even more sophistication and cynicism. Like Haas, Jasper is terribly likable, even if you might not want him anywhere near your family. A great deal of the novel’s appeal comes from the suspense of not knowing what will happen when the two finally meet.
There’s very little not to like here: the depth of Huston’s world-building and character development are impressive, the plotting is tight, the action sequences are well choreographed and compelling. Huston’s good guy isn’t squeaky-clean good, and his bad guys are anything but cartoonishly evil. In fact, they’re likable folks, and their self justifications seem oh-so reasonable. Huston delights in gray areas.
I’ll have to admit that I can quibble with Huston’s understanding of protein chemistry, but hard SF geeks drive me nuts, so I had better not become one of them.
Ultimately, my measure of a good book is whether I cared about the characters and whether I enjoyed the experience. Moreso the latter, of course (I mean, think of a Piers Anthony Xanth book: it’s hard to feel anything for his characters, but that’s not the point. He still provides a fun ride). Sleepless scores on both points.
So how many times do I have to keep hawking Huston to get you guys to try his stuff? This guy is good, people. He needs to be read.
And so I’m about to start another one of his books.
D.
Better fried chicken
Start with this:
You don’t have to use this mix, but it was mighty tasty. Below, I’ll make a few suggestions for alternative spices mixes in case you can’t find the Shan mix (or don’t want to get it mail order).
It also helps to have one of these,
one of these,
and of course a bunch of these.
I used six thighs, but leg-thigh combos, a whole cut-up fryer, or even a whole (small) chicken would work. For that matter, there’s no reason you couldn’t use this approach with a whole fish. You would have to play with cooking times, but the results would be spectacular.
So what’s the trick? Marinate, steam, and fry. Simple, really.
News to me.
At our local Italian deli, they’re selling black garlic.
From blackgarlic.com,
Imagine garlic without all of the annoying stuff. Bad breath? Nope. Pungent odor? Nope. Acrid bite? No sir. You know how a great wine gets better with age? That’s what we’re dealing with here.
Well, as Karen points out, cooking garlic accomplishes much the same thing. The Wikipedia entry provides a better explanation of the appeal: “It is made by fermenting whole bulbs of garlic at high temperature, a process that results in black cloves. The taste is sweet and syrupy with hints of balsamic or even tamarind.” The Wiki further explains that
black garlic entered the mainstream in 2008 when Le Sanctuaire in San Francisco began selling its own black garlic. It was written up in the Spring 2008 “Design and Living” special section of the New York Times as a “new staple” of modern cuisine (and incorporated into a recipe, “Black Garlic Roast Chicken”); the NYT author, Merrill Stubbs, noted it was being used by chef Bruce Hill of Bix Restaurant, San Francisco. Hill soon found his way to the entrepreneur Scott Kim, who in 2005 had started to import garlic from Jeju Island, Korea, to process in the United States. He ferments them for a month, at high temperature, and sells them online. Black garlic’s fame grew from there. Soon, Matthias Merges, executive chef at Charlie Trotter’s in Chicago, listed black garlic as one of his top five food finds in Restaurant News, December 2008. The rise of black garlic in the US was called “sensational,” and other trade publications besides Restaurant News have noticed the trend.
It garnered television attention when it was used in battle redfish on Iron Chef America, episode 11 of season 7 (on Food Network), and in an episode of Top Chef New York (on Bravo), where it was added to a sauce accompanying monkfish.
Sounds intriguing, especially the part about black garlic conferring immortality (or at least longevity) upon its consumer.
There can be only one!
D.
On the theory that you can find anything on the Internet . . .
I googled “Random Recipe Generator”.
No, you won’t find inspiration for dinner at this site, but you will find recipes for Anchovies Creme Brulee, Pizza Style Mangoes, and this beauty — Horseradish Sauce Bake:
Horseradish Sauce Bake
Serves 2
You will need: 80ml horseradish sauce 4 spring onions 2 bananas
Instructions:
eat the spring onions
eat the bananas
whisk the horseradish sauce
go down to the pub
My random recipe was something called “Raisins Salad.” I must admit, I never would have thought to combine raisins, asparagus, self-rising flour, and Greek yogurt.
I’m just a little confused on the direction, “Barbecue the flour.”
D.
Extreme cuisine
Today, a patient recommended Lengthwise Brewing Company here in Bako. I asked him, “Where’s your favorite place to eat in town?” and that’s what he came up with.
Interesting place. From the dessert menu,
Crude Beer Float
A pint of Kern County Crude Porter sharing space with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. (Sorry kids, adults only!) $5.95Deep Fried Twinkies with Ice Cream
We had to do it! Three Twinkies lightly fried and topped with our maple and cinnamon syrup, served with a cold scoop of vanilla. $7.95
I’m not sure which is more extreme. Perhaps the deep fried Twinkies? Right up there with Deep Fried Snickers Bars. Of course, we could all visit Thailand and eat bugs.
The most extreme thing I thought I had eaten: jook, which turns out to be rice porridge and not fish stomach, which is what my old gf’s mom told me it was when she served it to me. Witch. Ignoring jook, I guess it would be a tie among jellyfish, blood sausage, and snails, all of which I still eat when the occasion arises.
What’s the most extreme thing you’ve ever eaten?
D.
Chicken shawarma
Today, for a lark, I googled “Tongan recipes” and discovered pani keke, which are donuts, more or less. Can’t have donuts for dinner, so I googled “Lebanese recipes” and eventually found this recipe for chicken shawarma.
This was good. I followed the recipe almost to a tee, but did add about 1/2 teaspoon of cumin, 1/2 teaspoon of turmeric, and 1/4 teaspoon ground clove to the marinade. I chopped the chicken thigh meat into 3/4 inch cubes and marinated for about 4 hours. Instead of cooking on the range, I put the chicken with its marinade into a casserole dish, covered it with foil, and baked it for 45 min at 350 F. Then I fished out all the chicken, put it on foil, and broiled it until brown. Probably not a necessary step, although I suspect it added some flavor at the cost of dryness. But if you’re going to make a nice salad of plain yogurt, cucumber, and tomato, then it doesn’t matter how dry the meat is.
For posterity (just in case that link disappears some day — and also because I changed things a bit), here’s the marinade:
1 cup plain yogurt
1/4 cup malt vinegar
4 cloves garlic, crushed
1 teaspoon pepper
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground cardamom
1 teaspoon allspice
1/2 teaspoon of cumin
1/2 teaspoon of turmeric
1/4 teaspoon ground clove
juice from 1 lemon
The tahini sauce in that recipe is ridiculous. If you start with one cup of tahini, trust me, you won’t use even one-quarter of the end result. Here’s a nice tahini sauce:
1/3 cup tahini
juice of one large lemon
One large clove of garlic, crushed
salt to taste
water
In a can of tahini, the oil will typically separate from the solids. Carefully stir the can (the oil tends to splash, if you’re a slob like me) until homogeneous. Mix 1/3 cup tahini with the lemon juice. As you stir, you’ll notice that the tahini thickens to a remarkable degree. Add garlic, thin out the sauce with water, and then taste for salt.
For the yogurt, cucumber, and tomato salad, simply be careful to use plain yogurt and not vanilla yogurt. Yes, I did this once. We usually have plain AND vanilla in our fridge, so it’s an easy mistake. Cut the cucumber and tomatoes into small cubes and add enough yogurt, however much you like.
Then it’s just a matter of salting the chicken shawarma and putting it all together into pita pockets, along with some red chili sauce. We always have a jar of the red chili garlic sauce you can get at Chinese markets. Harissa would be nice, but oddly enough, the Chinese red chili garlic sauce makes an awfully good harissa.
Enjoy!
D.
CLAMS!
Dean is back from his brother’s funeral and all I can think about is New England fried clams. Which means, I suppose, that my sensitivity is in my stomach. Or something. But clams. Fried clams. New England Ispwich whole belly clams.
Used to be a place on the Ventura pier which flew in Ipswich clams. All manner of New England seafood, in fact — the lobster there was fine, not like that gamy crap you pay $40 for in a restaurant and then choke down. But then the pier washed out some time in the 90s, and our one west coast connection for fried clams closed for good. Sigh.
So, what’s so great about these clams? If all you’ve ever tasted are the frozen, store-bought clams that you toss in the oven, bake, then chew like bubble gum: you have no idea. The flavor of the real thing is intense. The big deal about “bellies” is, they’re soft and tasty, not chewy like the rest of the clam.
Over at Chowhound, someone asked if there was any place in LA where you could get Ipswich clams. I’m sure my sis would be up for a clam run, eh Sis? And yes, there’s a place called The Jar, which has Ipswich clams for $17. Hell of an appetizer.
But they’re not alone, and apparently not the best. Here is the Holy Grail Post for fried clam seekers in Southern California.
I am so there.
Except I’m not. I am so on call.
D.
And now for something completely different
Doro wat . . .
This looks nothing like MY doro wat. But you get the idea.
I had a yen for a nice doro wat tonight. Ethiopian curries are like none other; I think it’s the combo of heat, spice, and sweetness from the berbere**. But man, is this a bit of work. Would have been easy on the weekend, but more than I really wanted to do on a week night. Anyway, here’s what you do:
Sprinkle salt on your chicken and throw it into a gallon bag. Add about a half cup of lemon juice, and let it sit for a while, turning the bag over and over every 10-15 minutes. You’ll be doing this while you work on the rest of the dinner. What kind of chicken? I used thigh/leg combos, three of them, but in the future I think I will use boneless meat cut into large chunks. Only trouble with that idea is, it’ll cook much faster, so I’m not sure whether the chicken will cook too quickly, well before the stew has a chance to develop its flavor.
Second, the berbere*:
Dates
Oy. I keep forgetting that WordPress, like Blogger, doesn’t save stuff in this little entry box. If I’m writing stuff and I navigate away, it’s lost forever. And that’s what happens to me. I’m writing about the date, let’s say today (since 1/11/10 is so delightfully binary, though not as wonderful as 1/11/11), and then I say, “Ooh, something sparkly!” and I click on a link and poof. But that’s my problem, not yours.
This tickles me. This is what you get if you google “tentacle sex papacy” with safe search off.
So where were you on 9/9/99? Or 8/8/88? Or 7/7/77? Or 6/6/66?
Of these, I remember clearly only 7/7/77. Summer school: I was in George May’s art class at Roosevelt High School in East Los Angeles, where my dad taught math. Like my father, I can’t handle long periods of inactivity, so summer school was a must. Mr. May was this animated fellow who reminded me of Red Buttons. And for those of you too young to remember Red Buttons, well,
Fine teacher, George May. Taught me how to draw.
6/6/66, I would have been four, looking forward to kindergarten, not realizing that kindergarten was ruled by a witch who would forever be locking me up in “the kitchen” all because I wouldn’t stop harassing this one girl (with whom I’m friended on Facebook).
Where were you?
D.