Category Archives: Play

Old Fashioned Frosting

August 29, 2015Family, Food, RecipesMush

In which there’s a recipe from my grandma.

I came across the image below from a few years ago, remembered how really delicious that frosting was, and realized that I have no idea how to make old fashioned frosting.

So I googled it. Weird results.

(I mean, I’m off carbs right now, but it’s unlikely that I’ll never eat another cupcake. A girl never knows when she might be called upon to produce, you know, delicious treats for some event or another. Best remedy this lack of knowledge!)

So I emailed my G’ma and asked her for the recipe. This is what she said:

Somewhere out there there is probably a recipe for that frosting with accurate measurments but this is my way.

You will need powdered sugar, butter, or if you want white frosting use shortening, and some liquid.

I melt about two tablespoons of butter, add about equal amount of cream, and slowly add powdered sugar. A little liquid absorbs a lot of sugar, so add slowly mix until spreadable.

Then the fun begins, add any flavoring you like or spice, food coloring for fun. Powdered cocoa if you want chocolate. A tiny touch of mint is good in choc. Orange juice or lemon juice can be used instead of cream. Top with whatever.

I have used molasses in place of cream when frosting a spice cake. The more sugar used and liquid the more frosting you get till finally you can frost dozens, so that is why you add sugar slowly. After a few times you will have it perfect for your project.

Basically a procedure for making delicious frosting in any flavor in any quantity! And much better than that crap in a tub from the grocery store, in my opinion, although I have been known to eat that stuff by the spoonful on occasion.

Stovetop macaroni and cheese recipe

July 16, 2015Food, RecipesMush

In which sometimes you just don’t want to turn on the damn oven.

I had intended to pop over to the grocery store this afternoon, but by the time I was ready it had started raining and has been raining ever since. So I had to make something with what I had, so macaroni and cheese for dinner it is!

It turned out quite well, actually.

8 ounces uncooked macaroni
1-1/2 cups whole milk
1 teaspoon prepared yellow mustard
1 teaspoon steak sauce (I used Heinz 57)
3/4 teaspoon salt, or to taste
3 or more generous dashes of hot pepper sauce (I used Crystal)
1-1/2 tablespoons butter
1-3/4 cups grated cheddar cheese
1-3/4 cups grated American cheese
2-3 oz crumbled feta cheese
1/2 teaspoon paprika

1 – Bring a pot of salted water to a boil. Add macaroni and cook for 8 to 10 minutes.

2 – While macaroni is cooking, heat milk in the microwave. Whisk in the mustard, steak sauce, salt, and hot sauce.

3 – When al dente, drain the macaroni and return to the pot. Stir in the butter and the three cheeses. When incorporated, pour the hot milk mixture over the macaroni.

4 – Simmer briefly over medium heat, stirring often. Then cook on very low heat until thickened. (No need to stir after turning the heat down, though, because it’ll just break the macaroni.)

—
This recipe is adapted from cafeteria macaroni and cheese, which I was going to make but didn’t have the ingredients for and I seriously didn’t want to run the oven.

Grateful

July 12, 2015Food, Gadgets, Life, Photography, ReadingMush

In which it’s a lazy Sunday.

It’s so shitty outside there’s a heat warning on! Stay inside, stay hydrated, check on your neighbors, that sort of thing! Temperature in the mid-90’s with a heat index of one hundred degrees! A big-ass line of storms tonight! Large hail possible!

So I’m staying inside with the A/C on. I’m so grateful to have access to air conditioning technology. And fans, too — we have two fans running, to circulate all that conditioned air (because otherwise it just pools by the door and does no one any good at all).

I stayed up super late last night devouring part three of Seveneves. Other than the agnostic science fiction writer’s silly dream that a catastrophe survived only by scientists would somehow end religion¹, it’s a really fantastic read. Being the jaded reader I am I’m loving being so absorbed in a story, since it happens so infrequently to me now.

I’d like to go look for curtains and wood glue and a few other needed household items, but I’m pretty sure leaving the apartment is a bad idea. Scott’s asleep anyway, taking a lazy Sunday afternoon nap.

I slept until two-thirty, then got up and made fried potatoes, Hollandaise, eggs, spinach, and toast for brunch. Not as good as the AMAZING Eggs Florentine at The Egg and I, but still edible. I also had a brilliant iced cardamom mocha breve with the last of the Radiance Dairy cream in it.

The bit of sky I can see under the blinds looks nice and blue, with fluffy clouds and a strong breeze ruffling the leaves, but it’s probably as damp as sweaty crotch out there. I’ve always maintained that the Midwest looks lovely all summer but feels awful.

Yesterday I installed Flickr on my phone and it worked. (It’s never worked on this phone before, and getting images off the phone and onto Flickr has been a pain in the ass since I got the phone last year.) It worked so well, in fact, it uploaded all 200 images in the phone’s gallery and now I have to delete them!

The credit union didn’t get ahold of me at the end of the week, but neither did they do so last time. I just don’t think they’re in a hurry about anything. Hopefully they’ll offer me a position next week! *fingers crossed* If they don’t, I’ll have to start looking for something else in earnest. I mean, I’ve applied for three jobs this week so as not to have too many eggs in one basket, but I’ll really need to buckle down before I run out of money.

Friday, I got my nails done because they looked awful. That evening, Scott went to a ball game (and watched Detroit lose to the Twins in the final inning) and I had the evening to myself. I drank some wine, then rode my bike down to Nicollet and ate at a Mexican restaurant.

Then I went home and took a nap, sprawled diagonally across the entire bed, with a fan blowing on me. It was a fucking glorious Friday night.

I just looked up to see that the blue sky is gone, and is now the gunmetal grey of a thick cloud deck. The last time I checked, storms weren’t due for five more hours. Maybe it’ll get interesting out there!

—
¹ We all want to end the bullshittery of organized religion, of course, but evolution and bureaucracy are part and parcel of human nature. Wherever there are human beings, there will be religion, because there will always be a need for jargon to describe the internal and the numinous, and there will always be weird little rule-following bureaucratic assholes making people miserable. Basically, every time a writer kills “religion” in a book, it just tells you that s/he has no idea what religion actually is beyond what it looks like on the surface.

Amma 2015

July 8, 2015Spiritual, TravelMush

In which there was a long-ass road trip for both of us, some hotel lounging for him, and some much-needed spiritual renewal for me.

Tuesday we slept in and then packed and drove to St. Charles, IL. It took forever, or about six hours. Checked into our hotel and slept. I was so excited to be with Amma again for the next few days, and so grateful my partner had agreed to take me again.

Wednesday was an all-day program. I got dropped off and meditated and ate Indian snacks and socialized and got darshan from Mother, who smeared my head with sandalwood paste and hugged me like crazy. It was a great darshan. (I mean, they’re all ideal by definition, but some are more enjoyable than others. The ones where you know you’re Mother’s own are the best.) I hung out with Cat for awhile; she gave me some Radiance Dairy heavy cream! I haven’t had any for, like, eight years!

I bought a few things from the bookstore; a tee, a mini altar, a rudraksha necklace. I watched Mother give darshan.

Cat caught a ride with me when Scott came to pick me up and we all three stopped at Los Burritos Mexicanos #3 for dinner. I still can’t figure out what’s in that second green salsa of theirs; Cat thinks cilantro is a main ingredient. Whatever it is, it’s amazing.

Thursday I got up fairly early and went to the morning program, mostly to meditate and get something to eat. Didn’t get darshan. In the afternoon Scott picked me up and we saw a matinee of Disney-Pixar’s Inside Out and did some shopping (he got some shirts and I got a dress and a long-sleeved dark blue tee from Goodwill). In the evening, I told Scott he had to get darshan for his own good, whether he liked it or not, because the spiritual health of the family is the woman’s duty, so he had to park at the ashram and come in to the hall to get a token with me. Then I let him leave; bless his heart he came back at one in the morning for our hugs. (His darshan this year was nothing like the love fest She lavished on him last year, though.) Then we went back to the hotel and went to bed.

Friday we slept through the morning program on purpose, because I’d decided to stay up all night for Devi Bhava (since I haven’t done so in a few years and really needed to). We ate at Corfu, saw another matinee, and I was back at the ashram by seven, just in time for the meditation and the puja.

When darshan began I hung out with Tahmi — she laid an awesome theory on me about Calvinism and why so many people actively hate the poor — and we ate dinner together before her next seva shift. Most of the night I sat right up front and stared at the Holy Mother of the Universe and sang along to the bhajans and in general just basked in the presence of an Avatar. I’m half-certain She gave me a few looks; I’m also half-certain She did no such thing because why ever would She be sharing looks with me.

After my darshan I sat on stage for a bit, and when I was asked to move for other devotees I mentally asked if I could sit behind the kalari. The response I got was a clear “no, you should go” and I briefly felt sorry for myself until I saw that the next act up was the folky Michigan satsang duo I’ve always complained about! So I walked out to the back 40 and had a cigarette and realized from the singing of the birds that it was almost dawn already.

After a cup of chai, I went back to my spot (on the floor under a monitor next to the band) and watched Devi give darshan and sang along to the bhajans. I’d somehow ended up in exactly the right spot. Well after sunrise, other devotees began to crowd around me, so much so that I ended up with my shoes and my purse in my lap, smushed up against the velvet rope marking the edge of the musicians’ area.

There were a few first feedings, a first letters, and then a sacred thread ceremony for a young Brahmin boy. Then I sat and watched most of the devotees parade past Mother while she showered them with petals. I had an absolutely perfect position for the very end of the program’s chants, with an ideal view of Her. I did a lot of crying. She made a face at me.

Scott picked me up from the ashram at 8:30, the time we’d pre-arranged and which turned out to be exactly the right time (he’d come into the hall to find me just as Mother was emerging from the kalari to leave). We napped at the hotel until 11, then loaded out and headed for home. I finished my leftovers from Corfu (spinach and feta omelet on rye with a slice of tomato and leftover coleslaw from Scott’s plate) and dozed a bit in the back of the truck. At a gas stop I got back in front; eventually we ate in Hixton, WI; we finally arrived home at a little past six.

The apartment smelled like ass, even though I’d left two windows cracked specifically to avoid it. (Old buildings: what can you do? There’s funk in the walls.) A quarter of an hour of wide-open windows, a fan, and a stick of incense and everything was back to normal.

The place wasn’t nearly as bad as I’d remembered; most everything is unpacked and it’s really close to totally-moved-in and comfortable. I took an afternoon nap but woke up fairly refreshed at dusk. Scott reiterated his affection for the new place (he likes the open plan and the paint colors the most) and then proceeded to use a tape measure to prove that the dresser actually would, in fact, fit in the bedroom! (We moved it in there today.) With the dresser out of the living room, maybe we can keep the recliner after all!

Our first night home, I laid in bed and felt like my head was full of noise and agitation and, well, bullshit. Many years ago I felt the compulsion to say my mantra at the anahatachakra (heart) chakra. Later, this compulsion moved to the ajna (forehead) chakra and it’s been there off and on for years. That night, it became the sahasrara (crown) chakra, a compulsion I’ve literally never felt before. Not only the noise of my mind, but also a brilliant light, was blowing out of it as I laid there and said my mantra while drifting off to sleep. I find it impossible to believe that my awareness has traveled so far; if it really has, then all that so-called advanced chakra stuff must literally be the absolute beginning of spiritual life and not the esoteric knowledge I’d always thought it to be. Well, and also, it says a lot for being the devotee of an Avatar because you basically don’t do anything at all but make the slightest effort and yet you move along the path anyway, basically in spite of yourself.

Had some gut distress during the days of programs; woke up the second night with pain. Was able to eat just fine, though. Last soreness was the first night home, then everything back to normal. One always feels like these things are associated with something Amma is doing, because the symptoms of whatever it is occur only on the days you’re with Her; they never extend to time before or after. On the other hand, if they are, there’s no way to understand how a fussy lower GI tract has anything to do with anything, or a cold, or a fever, or a headache, or any of the things one experiences while around Amma over the years.

I can’t remember when I first met Her, but I think it’s coming up on twenty years. Could I have met Her as early as 1995? I was living in Walla Walla and went to see Her on Fort Flagler for a retreat. Devi Bhava was in Seattle at the Scottish Rite Temple; I remember that the people I was with all pretty much wanted to go, but I knew the most important thing in my life was happening and I refused. I felt like She was somehow whirling everything together, and that She was communicating with entities that were neither embodied nor visible who had also come to get her darshan. I didn’t give a shit that my boyfriend was distressed about my rudeness nor that the people representing our ride were bored and not digging it. It didn’t matter if a few people were bored for a few hours. I had to get one more darshan from Her.

Half a year later, broken hearted and living in California, I was sitting in a cubical farm and thinking about Her endlessly and I smelled Her perfume and felt Her presence and felt incredibly soothed. Weirdly enough, I never made it around the bay to the San Ramon Ashram — I never visited there until just a few years ago…

Excitement! So much of it! Also: packing.

June 16, 2015Family, Holiday, Moving, Spiritual, TravelMush

In which many exciting changes — a move, a job change, and not one but two opportunities for travel — are afoot!

The lease is up here, and while this apartment has some incredible amenities — such as southern exposure, a gas range, amazing cross-ventilation, and a wonderful view of a park with a pond in it — it also happens to be located in a rather industrial-sized, non-walkable bedroom suburb, so we’ve recently signed a new lease for an apartment in or very near Uptown.

“Uptown” is the neighborhood directly south of downtown Minneapolis, and it’s eminently walkable as well as featuring access to Eat Street, the Midtown greenway, and lots of groceries and bars and venues.

The new place has off-street parking for Scott and a storage locker for my bike (I’m hoping), wood floors, a larger kitchen, a bathroom practically identical to the one we have here, A GAS RANGE, a residential neighborhood that will probably be quiet, and a killer location for walking and biking to stores and bars and restaurants. (Well, during the nice months of the year, anyway.)

We’re still waiting on a move-in date from the new landlord (the current tenant hasn’t moved out yet), but it should be within the next few weeks.

I gave notice at Home Depot a couple of days ago. It’s been… interesting employment for me, and required a lot of comfort zone-stretching (sharing a desk, never sitting down, limited online access, steady physical exertion, etc). I can’t say I haven’t enjoyed any of it nor that the physical component hasn’t been good for me, but I’m incredibly happy to have a concrete end date in sight (since knowing it was temporary was sometimes the only thing that kept me sane).

The very day after giving notice I got a call back from a credit union two blocks — 600 feet from door to door, as the crow flies — from the new apartment! After signing the lease I’d used Google Maps to reconnoiter the area looking for work, and lo and behold there was a job posting for a part-time teller! In the neighborhood!

How great would that be? A two-block commute to a part-time job in a quiet environment? No nights or weekends or holidays? To work when Scott’s at work? (They’re open 9-6 on weekdays and 9-12 on Saturdays. I’d never have to work two solid months of 8-hour weekend shifts again! Even if I have to work every Saturday morning forever, it would still be a thousand thousand times better than the insanity that is the home improvement warehouse retail schedule.) Had a lovely pre-interview by phone today with the credit union’s HR; I have an in-person interview at the branch next Tuesday. So excited!

If it doesn’t work out — which it might not, of course, because they don’t post the pay range even in the job description and it might be minimum wage, which I’d probably pass on even with the ideal location and nearly-ideal schedule — I think I’ll just take a couple months off and get back into some semblance of a routine.

After a year of being scheduled anywhere from 6 AM to 10 PM, seven days a week, 363 days a year, I now have nothing like regular mealtimes and am usually not hungry when I have to eat or am starving when I can’t. Sleep schedules are utterly blown, and I’ve nearly lost my ability to sleep when I have to because I’m either inappropriately not tired or totally exhausted for whatever my schedule requires of me. I’ve never really considered myself a routine-oriented person, but that might be because I always had much more of one than I’ve had this past year. Random scheduling fucking blows and I feel deep sympathy for all those who are trapped in it.

Anecdotally, the new place is two blocks — normal city blocks, not the monstrosities here in the old apartment’s neighborhood — from a 30-year old breakfast joint called The Egg and I. HOW COOL IS THAT. There is nothing that close to this apartment but grass, trees, other apartments, roads, and weeds. Oh, and a pond.

So, the Employment Of Misery is basically over, a new lease is signed, I’ve started packing, and I already have an interview for a highly desirable position in the new neighborhood. On top of that, we’re going to see Amma in Chicago in a couple of weeks, and we have plans to visit Walla Walla in mid-August for a Morgan family reunion/get-together!

Totally stoked. Now I just need to put more stuff in boxes and find something nice to wear to next week’s interview!

How to make pudlas

April 19, 2015Food, RecipesMush

In which there’s a process more than a recipe.

A pudla [ pooda, poodla, puda, chila, cheela, chilla ] is a savory pancake made from lentils, rice, and/or flour. They’re cheap, easy, delicious, and I think it’s weird that I’d never even heard of them until last year. (Apparently they’re a breakfast food in India, sometimes served as snacks, or for lunch with side dishes. I don’t know why they don’t exist in every cuisine that uses lentils, because you can make them with any kind.)

To make some, you don’t really need a recipe so much as a procedure, maybe like this:

1. Soak 1 c. dal in 2 c. warm water for 2 to 4 hours

Get out your ugly pink bowl and put a cup of dal and two cups of warm water in it. (I used the last of the chora dal*, about 3/4 cup, and some toor dal to make a whole cup of dal. You can use any dal at all except maybe urad, and any combination of dals including urad.

Put your ugly pink bowl in the microwave to keep the heat in because it’s kinda chilly today and let the lentils soak for 2 to 4 hours. Check on it every so often; if the water gets cold just run the microwave for a minute.

The dal will have absorbed at least half the water and gotten larger. If there’s a lot of water remaining, drain some off, but this recipe isn’t picky. If the batter is too wet, the extra water just steams off during cooking.

2. Add desired flavorings and grind into a pancake batter consistency

I grabbed these things: turmeric, cumin, asafoetida, methi powder, garlic, jalapeno, onion, and ginger. You can use any, all, or none of these.

Add some spices to your soaked lentils: perhaps 1/3 tsp. methi powder, a dash of asafoetida, 1/4 tsp. whole or ground cumin, and 1/4 tsp. turmeric. Mince onion, jalapeno, garlic, and/or ginger in whatever proportions appeal to you and add them to the bowl.

Grind the whole mess until you’ve got yourself a pancake batter-like consistency. Add water if needed. You can use a blender or a food processor or an immersion blender.

Stir in up to a teaspoon of salt, depending on your taste.

3. Fry

Heat a griddle or a Teflon pan to medium-high heat. Add a little neutral vegetable oil.

Fry your savory pancakes. Remove to a plate (lined with a paper towel, if your pudlas are a little greasy).

Pudlas need to be cooked longer than regular pancakes because the dal is raw and needs time to steam fry, but the process is similar and will seem familiar: pour batter onto the griddle, smooth with the back of a spoon as you would with thick pancake batter, cook. Lift an edge to check for doneness, and flip when golden.

4. Eat

Eat a couple-three pudlas hot, with whatever condiment appeals to you. Green chutneys are often recommended — I like mint, myself — and coconut chutney is awesome with them.

Fry up however many pudlas you’re going to eat — they’re remarkably filling, so you’ll only need a couple — and put the rest of the batter in the fridge in a closed container. It’ll keep at least a week, so you can fry up a snack whenever you want.

More recipes:
Chora daal na pooda – http://enjoyindianfood.blogspot.com/2008/03/chora-daal-na-pooda.html
Chola dal poodla – http://www.tarladalal.com/Chola-Dal-Pudla-569r
Moong dal pudla – http://mayurisjikoni.blogspot.com/2012/09/healthy-snack.html
Stuffed moong dal chilla – http://www.archanaskitchen.com/recipes/indian/snacks-and-sweets/indian-party-appetizer-recipes/935-moong-dal-chilla-cheela-stuffed-with-paneer
Panchratna poodas – http://enjoyindianfood.blogspot.com/2009/04/panchratna-pooda.html

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* ‘Chora dal’ is split cow peas, otherwise known as blackeyed peas, so it has a very low glycemic index which is what makes pudlas such an excellent bread substitute.

Basically the only hobby I indulge in anymore is cooking

January 7, 2015Food, WorkMush

In which I watch TV, cook, and hang out online. (WHAT IS NOT TO LOVE ABOUT THIS RIVETING CONTENT, I ASK YOU.)

Hi. Welcome to my day off. It’s pleasantly sunny outside, although the high is still ONLY ZERO DEGREES FAHRENHEIT. I am wearing sweats. They’re grey. The hoodie sports the logo of Scott’s alma mater. Because college sportsball or something. He gave it to me. I have no idea, to be honest, why anybody would have a college hoodie years after graduating, but that’s just me.

OTOH, maybe I should locate and buy an MIU (er, MUM now, I guess) hoodie. Because LOL MAHARISHI UNIVERSITY OF MANAGEMENT. I had a navy MIU hoodie with the logo on in gold foil; I wore the shit out of that thing. WHEN I WAS A STUDENT THERE.

I have a pot of quick-soaked kidney beans simmering on the stove. Eventually they’ll become rajma masala. I have a cabbage in the fridge and that’ll become cabbage thoran. I’m also intending to make tomato-onion raita, but we’ll see. I’m out of fresh ginger so I don’t know if it would be worth the effort without it.

I’ll probably serve Scott a steak and a potato. He eats Indian food but there’s a steak in the fridge that shouldn’t be allowed to go bad.

I slept until nearly eleven, then got up and rearranged some flowers. As you do when you’re living in a Victorian novel, or, apparently, my life. Had coffee. (I get Turkish-ground espresso at Big Lots, a used food/dollar store, for super, super cheap. Which means I drink fantastic coffee; much better than any of the crap you’ve had at a coffee shop in the past decade.) I ate some leftover homemade kichdi I’d pulled from the freezer the day before.

Then I got my laptop, put it on the lapboard, and settled my fat ass into the couch. HELL YES, DAY OFF. I’m not even going to make the bed or do that load of laundry I should do. I’m going to cook a little, but that’s it. Swear to God. I don’t even care that the garbage needs to go out, because it’s so fucking cold I’d have to get fully dressed to avoid death between my apartment and the dumpster. Fuck that. Been watching old movies on GetTV all day and surfing social media like an asshole. It’s what you do when you have no actual social life.

Wrote a long response to a Facebook post… a girl I knew in college is now a grown-up mom who writes for The Atlantic, and she asked, without irony (I paraphrase), “Why the phrase ‘making their kids organic baby food’ is used to indicate privilege or elitism.” I laughed, because I thought it was a joke, but then I read the responses from other moms she knows and realized that it wasn’t a joke. They were all genuinely miffed that people make fun of them and, even worse, consider them entitled and/or wealthy, when they know how hard they work and how little their portfolios are worth. They’re not privileged! Those blenders don’t wash themselves, nor do those organic bananas buy themselves!

I wrote and re-wrote and re-wrote my response for nearly an hour, because I wanted to get the point across (“only an elitist — someone with money to waste, in other words, who wastes it mainly to maintain an identity — would ask something like that, dear”) without sounding like a complete dick. I hope she doesn’t get mad, but seriously: popping an organic banana into a blender because you just KNOW it’s SO MUCH HEALTHIER than, say, a jar of Gerber’s? Really? Do you have any evidence for this at all?

Um, no. No, you don’t. And poor people know this, because they’re not stupid, just poor.

And how can you not understand how wealthy you are? You have: a house, electricity, the money to buy organic bananas, and the time to make your own organic baby food. Fuck yes you’re lucky. One might say elite, even. I personally know moms just as educated who work two jobs and just don’t have the money to shop organic produce or the time to prepare and feed it to their kids.

Eh. I’m paraphrasing a Facebook interaction on my blog. Holy shit. Apparently I don’t have a life.

One of the people in my department at work is transferring to another store, so guess what? I’m working 33 fucking hours a week again. It had gotten as low as 24 and I was really stoked, but apparently that’s over. Again.

I like the people. The work is okay. I FUCKING HATE THE HOURS. WITH A BURNING PASSION. I’m expected to blithely be available from 6AM to 9PM every single fucking day, and to not care when I have only nine hours off between shifts? Are you fucking retarded as well as greedy, corporate America?

I’m hoping my Comcast friend will give me tele-work, because I really don’t want to stay where I am until May even if I am beginning to make friends with my co-workers and they’re all pretty awesome people.

Anyway, I’m cooking stuff now so off I go. I’d write more interesting posts, but I’m just not that interesting these days. You know how it is, first year with a new man, you just hole up and snuggle and coo at each other, and literally no one wants blog posts about THAT.

Full English

December 6, 2014FoodMush

In which I LOVE THIS WEIRD BREAKFAST.

This meal makes no sense.

I mean, it’s basically bacon and eggs and toast, which is pretty normal, but then there’s tomato, mushrooms, and… beans? And the toast isn’t toasted, it’s fried.

It makes no sense, at least, until you read some very, very old cookbooks and discover “sops,” which are pieces of (one assumes) stale bread, revitalized by frying in fat, and over which is poured broth or stew or whatever. After you learn about that, the British whatever-over-toast thing begins to make more sense. And so somehow the inclusion of beans begins to almost make sense, too.

Except it doesn’t, really, because what the hell do beans have to do with toast? I mean, why on Earth do the English eat beans on toast? But then you eat a Full English breakfast and realize that HOLY SHIT BEANS ARE GREAT WITH EGGS AND BACON AND FRIED BREAD AND A GRILLED TOMATO AND SOME MUSHROOMS and that THESE BRIT NERDS ARE BRILLIANT.

Now, as a vegetarian, there’s no hope in hell of my ever getting a Full English at a restaurant, because even with the general acceptance of vegetarianism there’s never any fake bacon on menus. (Except maybe in some funky little diner in Eugene, OR, but they’d probably be fucking vegan or some shit and butter is essential for basting the eggs.) So I have to make my own.

This morning we slept right through noon and nearly until two o’clock in the afternoon. I got up and started doing dishes and sent my beloved off to the store for eggs. When he got back we had breakfast and it was GLORIOUS!

And then a couple hours later it was dark already. Which is kind of depressing, but the sleep felt great.

I found instructions for making a Full English somewhere on the internet. Basically, you cook the meat first and then remove it to a plate. (Which is what I do for Ader. In my own pan, I use butter and oil to fry my fake meats.) Next you fry the veggies in the fat with liberal applications of salt and pepper. Then you pull them out and fry the eggs “with a knob of butter,” which you spoon over the eggs to set the yolks. After the eggs are on the plate, you fry your bread in the remaining fat, plate it, add a scoop of simmering beans, and serve.

Truly the ugliest, heartiest, greasiest, most delicious breakfast EVER. Of course, the Brits use baked beans, but I just use whatever I have. Because I’m American. And vegetarian. And I use Ezekiel bread instead of white. And I’ve already bastardized the meal so much that the wrong beans hardly matters.

Point is, the eggs are amazing, basted in fat and butter as they are, and the beans are better than potatoes, somehow, and the fried bread is fucking glorious, and the tomato and mushroom is the most amazing accompaniment, what with being all juicy and tasty, and like I told Scott I could probably eat this meal twice a day for a week before getting bored of it.

It’s still pretty awesome with potatoes, but not quite as good. You really want some white or chili beans to make this bitch sing.

Things to be thankful for.

November 27, 2014Holiday, Love & MarriageMush

In which there is no irony in this post.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Last night we stayed up late enjoying Christmas movies and adult beverages and this amazing hot spinach-artichoke dip we made somewhere around midnight. It was AMAZEBALLS. (Click the pic for a link to the recipe.)

Then we slept and snuggled until well past noon and had more of the dip, along with a relish tray, for ‘breakfast.’

(The Thanksgiving greeting cards on the table are from our moms. Because family.)

Then we lounged about and enjoyed sportsball (excuse me, that’s SPORTSBALL!!1!, I believe) and classic Christmas cartoons (Donald Duck and Chip ‘n’ Dale in the snow!), then we started on making dinner with some potato scrubbin’. We get along great in the kitchen. Here’s the whole day’s menu:

Our Official 2014 Thanksgiving Menu

Starters:
Stuffed celery, radishes, olives, deviled eggs, crackers, cheeses
Spinach-artichoke dip with baguette

Main:
Tofu ‘steak’ for me
Beef steak for Scott

Sides:
Gravy (meatless)
Dressing
Mashed potatoes and parsnips
Lemon-garlic Brussels sprouts

Dessert:
Apple crisp with oatmeal streusel
Vanilla gelato

Afters:
Cranberry vodka and sodas
Tater skins

And since this holiday is about not just gratitude, but food, here’s more food porn:

Scott’s plate:

Gravy (turned out weird but edible) and the mashed potatoes and parsnips, also weird:

Tater skins! OMG so good!

Cranberry-vanilla vodka and soda (again, click the pic for the recipe):

And now, right now, as I write, the apartment smells like heaven because there’s an apple crisp with oatmeal streusel in the oven!

We’ve had a wonderful day, the two of us, enjoying cooking and eating and companionship and so much to be thankful for today. We’re warm and safe and blessed, and have had a really quiet and comfortable day of abundance and each other. Not to mention the polar vortex and that having had the oven on so much has kept the furnace from even kicking on once.

Now we’re watching an old Danny Kaye Christmas Special (Dinah Shore! Lena Horne! Bing! Bob Hope! Jimmy Stewart! Satchmo!) and waiting for the apple crisp to cool.

And so, with full hearts and from a warm apartment, Happy Thanksgiving from us to you!

Homemade Chicken Noodle Soup, in three parts

October 5, 2014Domestic Goddess, RecipesMush

In which there’s a recipe for soup, because I want to know EXACTLY WHERE THIS IS and not have to read a dozen other recipes again the next time I decide to make soup for Scott.

I haven’t eaten chicken noodle soup for a few decades, probably, but I remember the Campbell’s and Lipton versions: bright yellow, thin, with itty bitty cubes of meat. Not really all that great. Certainly didn’t evoke feelings of wholesomeness or profound nutrition.

Then, a couple of months ago, Scott said he thought he was coming down with something and I told him I’d make chicken noodle soup if he brought home a chicken. I mean, wasn’t there that thing once where science supported old wives’ tales and determined that chicken noodle soup really is good for colds?

The resultant concoction, even though I didn’t eat any (because EEWH DEAD CHICKEN BODY), was rich, wholesome, and nourishing. In, like, some sort of profound way. Scott didn’t catch that cold, so the shit really works, and the rest of the pot went into the freezer to be pulled out when needed: the next time he felt under the weather, as something to take for lunch the next day, as something warm and homemade when he’d had a bad day.

Part One: The Stock

In a large stock pot, bring to a boil:

1 large carrot, roughly chopped
1 large celery rib, roughly chopped, with leaves
1 medium onion, peeled and cut in half or quarters
2 cloves garlic, crushed
Several sprigs of fresh parsley (or the equivalent dried)
1 tsp. dried thyme or to taste
A few black peppercorns, cracked
1-2 large bay leaves
1 chicken bouillon cube (optional)
1 whole chicken, rinsed, about 3-1/2 pounds, gizzards removed
10-12 c. water

Reduce to a lively simmer and allow to cook until the meat falls off the bone, a couple of hours or so. Add water as needed to keep the chicken submerged.

When the bird starts to fall apart, remove it from the pot and let it rest on a platter to cool. Strip the meat and dispose of the skin and bones. Skim the fat from the broth if you want, and strain out the remaining veggie solids and eat them or chuck them.

You can stick both the meat and the broth in the fridge at this point and go drink some wine and deal with the rest of this shit tomorrow or later or when you get back from running errands or whatever.

Part Two: The Egg Noodles

You can use store-bought noodles, of course, and a lot of recipes do call for them, but I don’t really see the point of laming out now when you’re already halfway through making full-on awesome homemade chicken noodle soup. Plus noodles are hella easy and don’t take any time at all. Plus you can say YOU MADE THEM AND THIS ENTIRE GODDAMNED SOUP IS LEGIT FUCKIN’ HOMEMADE, BITCHES.

So, since you’re gonna make your own noodles, you need:

Some clean counter space
1 cup all-purpose flour, plus more for rolling out
1/4 teaspoon salt
1-2 tablespoons milk
1/2 teaspoon oil
1 egg

Combine the flour and salt in and make a well in the center. Crack the egg into it. Use a fork to beat the egg and then gradually start incorporating the flour into the eggs. Sprinkle the milk and oil onto the dough. Keep stirring and pulling in more flour until a solid dough forms. The dough will be sticky.

With well-floured hands, knead the dough, incorporating more flour as necessary to keep it from sticking to the work surface or your hands, until it is smooth and firm and no longer sticky.

Cover the dough with plastic wrap and let it rest for half an hour or so while you do other things, like chop the vegetables and get the herbs and spices you’ll need for the soup.

Flour the counter and roll out the dough using a rolling pin or large bottle. Try to get it nice and thin, less than a quarter of an inch if possible. Slice into noodles and place on a paper towel. (Apparently you can, at this point, place them on a rack to dry and then store them in an air-tight bag in your pantry for several weeks.)

Or, make these (they’re the simplest — fewest ingredients). Or these.

Part Three: The Soup Itself

Re-heat the broth in a soup pot while adding:

1 carrot, diced
1 rib celery, diced
1 small onion, diced
1/2 tsp. dried thyme
1/4 tsp. dried parsley
2 cups diced or shredded chicken meat
salt & pepper to taste

Bring to a gentle simmer. Add your noodles and cook until they’re done, about half an hour depending on their size and thickness.

Adjust seasonings as needed and serve immediately, or cool and freeze to enjoy on a rainy day or the next time you think you’re catching cold.

Note: Apparently this soup is magic and makes people feel better.

goblinbox.com

blogging for no apparent reason since 2001