Monday - January 31, 2011

afternoon dinner at the golden lion in front of a warm fire. nice change from everyday blahs.

Wife and I had a great pub dinner this afternoon since we had to be out and about anyway.
The portions they give you here are ENORMOUS!  Brits are always saying how surprised they are when visiting the states and how overly large our portions are. Well, based on this place we have nothing on them.

The Golden Lion is only about 15 minutes from our house.  We’ve been spending a bit too much time indoors and haven’t eaten out together in a year or so. That’s cos I’m lazy and addicted to this machine and if not here then I’m buried in a book. So anyway ... I thought I would share this very nice experience.

If you click the link, be sure to see the links on their site. Beer garden and Welcome page especially. Of course, the front didn’t look like this today, being Feb. 1st and not flower power weather. But it was still inviting.  We got a table near the fireplace. Very cozy it was.

Click on the photo and step inside for a look.

Posted by peiper     on 01/31/2011 at 11:11 AM   
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   Friday - January 21, 2011

Eye Will Drink To That!

With the proliferation of wines out there these days, vintners have gone to great lengths to come up with eye catching labels for their products. At least here in America. Most French wine labels are still going with that 19th century motif, trying to get on the elegant and classy bandwagon. As if. The American concept is that Wine Is Fun, especially for the cheaper stuff, so they go all out.  We saw this bottle in the store, and couldn’t resist, since my wife works for an ophthalmologist. And for $12 for a Columbia Valley Washington Cab, it isn’t bad glug at all.

Seeing Red is 82% Cabernet and 18% Merlot from the Columbia Valley. The nose on this wine is a clear highlight, with its oaky and dark floral notes making for a definite treat.  Seeing Red is aged in new American and neutral French barrels. The American Oak makes a real impression. On the palate the wine has notes of cherry, cola and light pepper. The wine is medium-bodied and the tannins are present but subtle on this Cabernet.

The Cartel Wine Group is making three wines, sourcing their grapes from some of the same locations in Washington where wines cost two or three times the price.  They have kept their overhead way down, and they bring you wine you can drink every day and not bat an eye at the price tag.

Not a bad idea. All the other wine makers buy this wine and that one to make their blends, and then these guys come around and take the extra off their hands, then make their own blends from it. You wind up with better quality vinos going into the blend, and with a bit of skill and luck you get a better wine coming out. This is the same approach that the infamous Two Buck Chuck wine, only with less ownership of the market and at a higher quality point.

From what I can find out, Surveyor, the third wine from the Cartel Group, is the best tasting stuff. It costs about $2 more. But it doesn’t have this label, which is sure to eventually find it’s way into the office of every eye doctor in the country. We bought an extra bottle for her to take to work just for laughs.

Yes, the graphic here is a bit blurry. I had to enlarge the picture since the only one I could find was tiny. Here, let’s try this lens. Is it better now? Or now?

“A Cabernet Sauvignon that plays with your perceptions, bringing fruit and structure into balanced focus.”
- from the bottle label

Posted by Drew458     on 01/21/2011 at 07:21 AM   
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   Monday - January 17, 2011

Keeping Away Winter’s Chill

This is an enhancement on the standard Mrs. Field’s chewy peanut butter cookie recipe. You still cook them low and slow, but this one has a stronger, deeper flavor. It also makes cookies which come out a bit thicker. Remember to dip the fork in water after pressing down each cookie. The extra tablespoon of flour and sugar compensates for the extra 1/4 cup of peanut butter. You could add a little more salt and perhaps an extra 1/8tsp of baking soda, but it isn’t really necessary. Try cooking them on parchment paper if you have it. I don’t, so I can’t say how that would change things. These cookies stay nice and chewy due to the fat in the butter, shortening, and the peanut butter.

Yum? Oh hella yeah.

2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour plus one rounded tablespoon
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt
1 1/4 generous cups dark brown sugar, firmly packed
1 level cup white sugar plus one rounded tablespoon
1/3 cup molasses
3/4 cup salted butter, softened ( a stick and a half )
1/4 cup Crisco vegetable shortening
3 large eggs
1 1/4 cup creamy peanut butter
2 tsp. pure vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 300 °F.

In a medium bowl combine flour, soda and salt.  Mix well with a wire whisk. Set aside.

In a large bowl blend sugars using an electric mixer set at medium speed.
Add molasses and butter and mix to form a grainy paste, scraping the sides of the bowl.
Add eggs, peanut butter and vanilla, and mix at medium speed until light and fluffy.
Add the flour mixture and mix at low speed until just mixed. DO NOT OVERMIX! Use a wooden spoon instead.

Drop by rounded tablespoons onto an ungreased cookie sheet, 1 1/2-inches apart.

With a wet fork gently press a crisscross pattern on top of cookies. In order to keep dough from sticking to the fork as you proceed, dip the fork in water after each cookie is flattened.

Bake for 19-22 minutes until just brown at edges.

Makes 4 dozen. If you add 2 cups chocolate chips or nuts or raisins it will make 5-6 dozen, and cooking time will increase about 3 minutes per sheet. After making the first sheet as plain peanut butter cookies, I added 1c chocolate chips, 1c roughly chopped walnuts, and 1c of raisins. Worked fine. A non-stick cookie sheet is a good idea. Next batch I’ll try chopped 2c dry roast peanuts for a killer power peanut flavor.

Posted by Drew458     on 01/17/2011 at 11:08 PM   
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   Saturday - January 08, 2011

K-Cup Koffee?

I likes me my coffee. My usual brand is the Caribe blend, a latino style espresso that comes in a 10oz brick. Cheapest coffee on the market, but makes a nice robust, low acid cuppa when made at regular strength. I don’t make it as espresso, merely as good strong coffee. It doesn’t seem to have much longevity in the pot - it goes stale quickly - so I make up just enough for 2 mugs for me and 1 cup for her. So I don’t care too much about longevity either - those 2 mugs are gone in half an hour.

My wife’s office has one of those fancy Keurig coffee machines that take the little “k-cup” cartridge “pods” of pre-packaged coffee portions, so it makes every cup fresh and exactly the same. They had it out in the waiting room for the patients. She’s always going on about how wonderful it is, mainly because it only takes a minute to brew a mug’s worth, and because the little k-cups come in so darn many varieties, and she loves all the fancy-nancy flavors.

So anyway, the folks at the office used their machine daily for 2 years and then it stopped working. Turns out they never once cleaned out the machine, or ran some white vinegar through it to de-scale the pot. She brings it home Friday and wonders if I can do anything with it. Um, thanks. I’ll look at it Saturday.

So today I went and got a gallon of cheap white vinegar and filled up the tank, wiped down the little gizmo that holds the k-cups in place, cleaned out the needles, and went over the whole pot with some detergent in a sponge, followed by a rinse and then a wipe down with rubbing alcohol. Used a toothpick and a Q-tips for all the nooks and crannies. That got every last bit of dirt, grease, and old coffee grime off the pot. I then stood there in front of the machine and ran a gallon of vinegar through this machine one mug at a time ... and then, WTH, ran it through my old Mr. Coffee pot as well, with a filter to catch any bits. 13 mugs worth. Put the hot vinegar outside for 10 minutes to cool, then ran it through both machines again. The Keurig’s instructions say to leave the machine in standby mode for 4 hours, then to run several tanks of fresh water through it. That gives the vinegar plenty of time to clean out the inner water holding tank, and then get everything rinsed clean.

While I was waiting, I looked up any issues with the machine online, and found out 2 ways to reboot the unit when things go wrong: one complex method that is the coffeepot version of the old “Ctrl-Alt_Del”, the other method tells you where to smack the machine to make it go. I like that one the best!

So I do all that cleaning and rinsing, and now the pot works perfectly, no whacking or rebooting necessary. Here you are honey, take it back to work. “Oh, no, I don’t have to. They said they’re ordering a new pot anyway since this one was broken, so if you could make this work we could keep it.”

  Great! Hey, if they can afford to throw away money that easily, maybe they can afford to give you a raise!

So now I have a fancy-do $150 coffee pot, that works just as well as my $15 coffee pot.

These things are kind of popular, so I’m sure several of my readers have them. Can you tell me if they make economic sense? Or if the taste is so superior that the extra cost is justified? Or they even save time? I’m not going to leave this thing in 1500 watt power eating “standby” mode all day; I’ll turn it on in the AM, give it 3 minutes to warm up, crank out 3 or 4 cups of coffee, then turn it off. That’s about how long it takes my regular pot to brew things up.

I’m going through about 8 “8-cup” pots (ie 4 mugs worth per pot) of coffee a week, which uses no more than 1 10 ounce $1.99 brick of Caribe. I think that works out to 6.2¢ per mug. Once in a while I’ll have some of the flavored decaf the wife sometimes makes in the evening, but most of the time I avoid both decaf and flavored coffees. Are these k-cup things sold in real bulk (500) so that the price comes down?

PS: old guy rant: It sucks arabica beans that we’ve been downsized so damn many times that a “pound” of coffee now only weighs 10 or 11 ounces. And a “cup” is now somewhere between 4 and 6 ounces. GTFOH. No. NO! Sorry, a pound is 16 ounces, and it fits in exactly the same size can as the 11 ounces they sell today. And a cup is 8 ounces, even though almost everyone in America drinks coffee by the mugful, and that’s a 12 ounce pour. Sure, we’re using more coffee than ever before, and drinking better coffee than ever before: today’s Mr. Coffee style drip pots use more grinds per cup than the old school percolators. They also make a better tasting cup because the water isn’t boiled through the grinds endlessly. But there is no coffee shortage. We’re just getting screwed over by the industry, and they’re trying to hide that by downsizing the packaging and by downsizing the serving size. That way we “won’t” notice that the stuff that used to cost 85¢ per pound now costs $8 per pound.

PPS - one thing that I do like about this Keurig machine is that it has adjustable water temperature. You can set it for a maximum of 192°F, and actually get a hot cup of coffee. Neither McDonald’s nor Mr. Coffee will do that for you these days.

Posted by Drew458     on 01/08/2011 at 01:21 PM   
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   Friday - January 07, 2011

GUY EATS 20,000 CALORIES A DAY. GUY GETS GROSS.  GUY SUES NATIONAL HEALTH. FIGURES.

I guess this is just one result of growing up, (and boy did this fat ass grow) believing the state should be responsible rather then the individual. The state in this case being the NHS. National Health Service.

I need to warn you about the photo on line of this slob.
I will never post a photo like this here. You can go to the link but have a bucket handy.

btw ... 1 Stone is equal to 14lbs.

It’s not my fault, the NHS should have helped: The former world’s fattest man to sue health service for his weight gain

By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 9:08 AM on 7th January 2011

A man who once weighed nearly 70 stone is to launch legal action against the NHS, claiming they failed to help him as his size soared.

Former postman Paul Mason received life-saving gastric surgery last year binge-eating his way to gargantuan size.

But the 50-year-old, who now weighs in at a comparatively small 37 stone, said he should have been helped years ago.

Mr Mason, who was eating 20,000 calories a day at his heaviest, claims he sought help from his GP after ballooning to 30 stone.

Instead of receiving a treatment programme to manage his weight, he has complained he was told in 1996: ‘Ride your bike more’.

He has pledged to put any compensation he receives if successful towards helping other obese people lose weight.

An NHS spokesman said of the purported lawsuit: ‘As we have not heard from Mr Mason, it would be inappropriate to speculate.’

Mr Mason’s care bill costs taxpayers an estimated £100,000 a year and is believed to have topped £1million over the last 15 years.

At the height of his binge eating, he was consuming 20,000 calories every day - ten times the recommended daily intake for a man.

FAT PERSON LINK SICK!

Posted by peiper     on 01/07/2011 at 08:42 AM   
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   Wednesday - January 05, 2011

Catch a fish, buy a house

Wow, I think I need to get a bigger fishing rod!

Tokyo - A huge bluefin tuna fetched the highest price ever at 32.5 million yen (396,000 dollars) at the year’s first auction at Tokyo’s Tsukiji fish market, amid mounting criticism of Japan’s overfishing of the threatened species.

The tuna weighed 342 kilograms, more than twice as much as the average Japanese sumo wrestler. It was caught off Hokkaido, Japan’s northern island.

The fish valued at 95,000 yen per kilogram will be sold to upscale sushi restaurants in Tokyo and Hong Kong through a wholesaler, news reports said.

Maguro (mah-goo-roh) is the Japanese term for bluefin tuna, perhaps the best known and most commonly eaten fish in all of sushi dining. Used in many rolls, but often seen by itself, what is now the old stand-by was not always the most popular item on the menu. While currently suffering from incredible demand, tuna was, until the 1970’s, a sport fish commonly known as “horse mackerel” and sold to companies for cat food or thrown away. Now, its fatty belly meat, known as ‘toro’ is one of the more expensive items on the menu, prized for its taste, texture, and scarcity. Tuna has come a long way from being a fish the samurai considered unclean and would not eat, to one of the most popular fish in Japan, and the world around.

Tuna served in restaurants is generally one of two different species, the bluefin tuna (Thunnus thynnus), traditionally known as ‘maguro,’ which is usually fairly lean, and the yellowfin tuna (Thunnus albacares), known as ‘ahi’ (ah-hee), which is a fattier species. Yellowfin tuna may also be labeled ‘maguro’ but more often than not, if you see maguro it will be bluefin tuna. Tuna sushi is further broken up into subtypes, based on the fat content.

For more about sushi, see here, which might confuse you a bit: do I ride my Suzuki, or eat it?

Posted by Drew458     on 01/05/2011 at 01:57 PM   
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   Thursday - December 23, 2010

Export Opportunity?

India has banned the export of onions after a blighted crop sent prices soaring, leaving many poor families unable to afford a staple curry ingredient.

Prices have doubled in recent days to £1.14 per kilogram – more than the daily income of almost 500 million Indians. The sharp rise has led to hoarding and fears that the price will climb higher still. Some traders predict prices could hit £1.40 per kilogram before they stabilise.

The shortage was caused by heavy late monsoon rains in Maharashtra, Gujarat and Rajasthan states. Officials had expected crop yields to fall by just under a quarter but instead discovered entire crops had been devastated in some areas. The country is currently relying on warehouse stocks to cook the Indian staple of dal (lentils and onions) and sabzi (curried vegetables).

To head of a growing domestic crisis, ministers ordered a ban on exports to the Gulf states, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka until Jan. 15.

A member of Delhi’s Agriculture Board said: “The monsoon had completely ruined the Maharashtra crop while in Rajasthan it was affected by both extreme summer heat and then heavy rain. Prices were quite high even in October and November but we were expecting things to stabilise as the backup crop had started coming in. Now even that has been exhausted,” he said.

One Delhi restaurateur said onions were now so expensive he would no longer give them away as side dish accompaniment with kebabs.

The onion shortage isn’t just in India. It’s all over central southern Asia.

Sri Lanka experience severe shortage of onion , prices soars to record levels

Minister of Co-operatives & Internal Trade Johnston Fernando, who is keen to curtail the rising prices, plans to import new stocks from Pakistan for the festival season.

However, Pakistan is reported to have received more orders for onions from the region, which has moved the prices artificially with India temporally suspending the exports. “As a government, we will take all necessary measures to control the onion prices by importing from other sources,” said Minister Fernando.

According to Dambulla Economic Center, Sri Lanka produces less than what is required to meet its annual onion requirement and imports 90% or at least 5,000 metric tons from India on a monthly basis. However, Pettah Wholesale Traders’ Association Vice Chairman Nihal Seneviratne stated that Pakistan grown onions are inferior in quality and taste, when compared with India. With onions playing an important part as a vital ingredient in the Sri Lankan food menus, government is expected to import from other sources such as, Thailand, China, Egypt and Netherlands.

Onion prices in the UAE continue to remain high as the supply of one of the most used vegetable from India has dried up following Indian government’s blanket ban on the commodity’s export, as well as a drastic cut down on the arrival of onion containers from Iran, Egypt and Pakistan.

The retail price of onion in the UAE market has touched Dh5 per kilogram, up from Dh1.5/kg earlier. “We used to get 10 to 12 containers of onion regularly. Yesterday, not even one container came from India,” said Sidharth Chomal Kamal, Managing Director, Sun Floritech International, fruits and vegetables wholesale dealer in Al Awir Vegetable market.
...
Wholesale price of a kilogram of onion in the UAE market is Dh2.80 and the Indian onion is Dh2.50/kg. Iranian onion commands Dh2.2 per kg and Egyptian onion costs Dh1.8 per kg.

Dh1.5/kg is 41¢ per KILO, which means onions cost 18¢ per pound in the United Arab Emirates.  At the peak of the Onion Panic before India curtailed exports, onions in India were retailing for just over 80¢ per pound. That’s the panic market price. A 3lb bag of plain old yellow onions costs $2.49 in my local grocery store. That’s 83¢/lb, a normal everyday price.

Silly foreigners! Screw your local markets, export your onions to the USA!

But in the mean time, here’s a recipe for a very nice Dal Makhani that uses no onions at all, and another that only uses one onion. Dal Makhani is the yummiest stuff ever to dip a fat hot chunk of naan bread (pita) into. It’s just kidney beans and lentils with spices, butter, and cream. So good!

Posted by Drew458     on 12/23/2010 at 01:24 PM   
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   Saturday - December 18, 2010

Now That’s Hot

Vindaloo, Baby!

Remember that Vindaloo recipe video I posted a while back? This one?

4 bay leaves
1 tsp black mustard seed
1 tsp fenugreek seed
1 tsp black peppercorns
1 tsp green cardomom seed

grind these together into a fine powder

4 chopped green chilis
2 tsp salt
2 tsp coriander pwdr
1 tsp cumin pwder
1/2 tsp ground clove
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp tumeric
1 tsp hot chili powder

mix it all up, then add the other powdered spices

add 4 tbs white vinegar to moisten the mixture

4 breasts o chicken, cut up in 1/2” cubes. Or 1.5lb pork
spread paste on meat, cover and marinate

2 onions rough diced
3 chopped tomatoes or 1 big can?
boil 3 chopped potatoes until tender

fry onions in 2tbs ghee or sweet butter for 5 minutes until golden

more ghee in pan. Stir fry meat for 5 minutes. Add tomatoes and onions. Add 150ml water, stir, boil, cover and simmer for 20 minutes.

I made the recipe again, only this time with fresh spices from Penzey’s.  It was fine when I made it last time, but it seemed a little thin, and a little mild. So I made a double recipe, except that instead of 4x2=8 green chilis, I used 2 rather large jalapenos, seeded and mashed. And instead of 1x2=2 tsp hot chili powder, I used 4 generous teaspoons of freshly ground cayenne. This is not the lame weak kneed stuff McCormack’s sells in the grocery store. It’s the real deal.

And the spice mix was too damn hot. So I added in another generous teaspoon of tumeric, coriander, fenugreek, cardamom, and mustard seed to balance it out. And just a little more salt. And then a little more fenugreek. Then a little more tumeric. That seemed right. The spice paste was looking a bit dry at that point, so I wet it down with about a few tablespoons of apple cider vinegar. And I used olive oil instead of ghee for browning the onions.

I used 2 typically gigantic American skinless whole chicken breasts with back meat, so I’m guessing that was at least 2 pounds of meat. Maybe more like 3. Guess they smaller chickens in the UK. The meat got 4 hours marinading along with 1/2 chopped onion, then into the pan with the leftover onion juices and oil. While that was warming up and starting to sizzle, I quickly parboiled most of a bag of frozen okra slices, 2 sliced zucchinis, half a pound of halved carrot medallions, a rough diced yellow onion, and a julienned red pepper, green pepper, and a yellow pepper. Add a can of drained chick peas and a whole bag of frozen stir fry vegetables. Throw it all together, get it simmering, and add a large can of diced tomatoes with their liquid. Then 2 cans of coconut milk along with 1 1/2 cups of water.

This makes a really large pot of curry; my biggest chicken 12” frying skillet was filled right to the brim. For once, it’s a Drew dish that isn’t just meat and spices. There is plenty of veg going on. I should have used my giant pasta/lobster boiling pot. Simmer for about 45 minutes until it reduces somewhat, then serve over rice. Spice gruel will stick to the bottom of the pot, so stir often and scrape it up.

Remember this pic of Al Gore breathing fire? (I can’t find the animated one with the puppy) I know what he had for lunch! This is very potent curry, about as hot as I want to go. And I’m a Thai food junkie. But it isn’t just hot. There is a significant depth of flavor here because of the larger quantity of fresh spices. The coconut milk adds a note of sweetness too. It makes curry for 10 or 12, so I guess I know what I’ll be eating for most of the coming week!

Woo doggies, it’s hot though. Makes my cheeks sweat! And goes great with a couple bottles of Blue Moon white ale. Yumm! I gotcha Globull Warmin right here Al: say Ah!

PS - once again, the entire house smells like an Indian restaurant. Wow. Nearly 24 hours later, just walking in the front door is almost like a physical assault. Love it!!

Yes, I guess shy, retiring, sensitive tastebud types could go with less cayenne. 1 spoonful maybe. And only 1 jalapeno. And you’ll get a really rich Vindaloo without killer heat, which most people will find more enjoyable. But I like the fire along with the flavor.

Posted by Drew458     on 12/18/2010 at 03:28 PM   
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   Thursday - December 09, 2010

they care this much about school meals? when you care enuff to fight your very best. captions?

And here I thought the student protesters were over the top.

Captions anyone?

Can you imagine this in our senate or house over immigration? Or anything else. 
I’m not sure this solves things but on the other hand ... might feel good to whack some bleeding heart supporter of the aclu and that ilk.

Drew’s Wed. post on immigrant bill and Wardmom’s comment as well of intense interest. I see here what immigration has become as well as something America hasn’t had to face yet on the same scale. And that’s ASYLUM!  You may want to remember that word because my huge worry is that the USA may well end up with the same thing in time. So I can’t help but look at this photo and wonder if in some future time, this could be the USA over immigration but in the streets instead of a room full of senators.

Fight erupts in South Korean parliament over free school meals

A brawl has erupted in the South Korean parliament after an argument over the provision of free meals for students in public schools turned physical.

WHEN YOU CARE ENOUGH TO THROW YOUR BEST PUNCH

VIDEO IS HERE

Posted by peiper     on 12/09/2010 at 10:06 AM   
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   Thursday - November 04, 2010

I think she is one of us

Personally, unless her chili powder is part of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal, I’d add 4 tsp worth. But I am so tempted to make this that I think I’ll go see what bits are in the spice box.

Make your own ghee. It’s just clarified butter. Melt some sweet butter in the microwave or a pan, then let it cool a bit. Skim the foam off the top and discard. Pour the liquid off, leaving the solids in the bottom of the cup. That’s it, done. You’ve got ghee!

And before you make all those snide remarks, know that “titli” is the Hindi word for butterfly, and is a very common pet name for women. So there.

Posted by Drew458     on 11/04/2010 at 03:02 PM   
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   Thursday - September 16, 2010

fine dining?  don’t think so. near death experience for young girl and death cap mushrooms.

How old does this girl look to you?

In the paper, she looked a bit older then on line pix.  Anyway ...  I wonder if people are now gonna say that it’s a bit of a miracle because the Pope is visiting the UK.  One of these things can kill and she downs two.  And lives to tell. 

Sometimes friendly folks, like to bring things from their veggie patch. Like one of our neighbors.  Brought over this huge cabbage last week.  He probably grows too much and doesn’t want to waste.  Yeah. I’m that cynical. Anyway, I politely refused the offer.  First, I don’t want to encourage any further acts of garden generosity.  Second, it has to come from a proper super market like Tesco, wrapped in plastic.  That’s how food comes. It doesn’t grow on trees and especially doesn’t come from the ground.  Can’t fool me.  Places like Tesco and Sainsbury and Iceland have this magic place where all this nice stuff comes from, already safely wrapped.  And they kindly hold the stuff for all the ppl that require the sustenance thus wrapped, untill we come by to pick it all up.  Ain’t that nice of em?  Would your MIL do that for you? And for a small but worth it fee, they will even deliver it right to your door.  Heck, they didn’t even have that service in Palm Desert, CA.  Where was I?  Oh yeah.

The young lady is damn lucky to be alive.  Really she is. 

Honey, next time you want a snack, go to Tesco. Waitrose isn’t bad either.

Girl wolfs down TWO death cap mushrooms and survives to tell the tale

By Andrew Levy

A 12-year-old girl has survived after accidentally eating two mushrooms which were poisonous enough to kill an adult twice over.

Lucy Adcock fought for her life in hospital after she ate two death caps while on a bike ride, having mistaken them for ordinary field mushrooms.

The schoolgirl, who suffered liver failure, yesterday told how she felt ‘lucky’ to be alive. Doctors were astonished that she not only pulled through but may have escaped without any lasting problems.

One death cap mushroom is normally enough to kill an adult. Those who survive often need liver or kidney transplants.

Of her ordeal Lucy said: ‘I realise I am lucky because they are so poisonous. I was really ill. It was horrible.’

Her mother, Tania Smith, 42, said: ‘It is hideous to be told by doctors that your daughter may not make it. When I realised what she had eaten, my heart sank.

read more

Posted by peiper     on 09/16/2010 at 12:05 PM   
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   Wednesday - September 01, 2010

Sort of Thai

I am really creating some aromas in the kitchen tonight

Take 1 3/4 lb pork loin, cut into 3/8” thick slices and then into cubes. Put it in a medium mixing bowl.
Add 3 cloves garlic
1 - 2 Tsp Thai red curry base
about 3 Tbl freshly ground ginger (call it 3/4” inch ground off of a golf ball sized ginger node)
1/4 Spanish onion minced
splash of olive oil
plenty of ground black pepper

Mix it around by hand, cover, set aside. After having marinaded about an hour on the counter, stir fry the pork in a medium pan with a generous splash of olive oil. Brown it nicely but don’t cook it to death.

Start some rice. If using jasmine rice, rinse it several times first. Boil up the right amount of water, throw in 1 tsp salt, stir. Add the rice to the boiling water, stir it around 1 minute, turn off the heat and cover it. The rice is done when you can hold the sides of the pot with your bare hands, about 40 minutes.

5 fist sized new potatoes, quartered. Yukon Jacks or Easterns work well here. Wash them and boil them for about half an hour, until not quite done. Drain and allow to cool. When cool, squeeze the skins off, then cut them into smaller chunks.

1 medium head of bok choy, cleaned. About a pound. Cut off the base and chop it up. Use the greens, but discard the tips if they’re wilted. Throw it in a wok or a big frying pan and soften it for a few minutes under high heat.

2 big handfuls of fresh green beans. Wash, trim the ends off, and cut into thirds.

chunk up the rest of the big Spanish onion.

Chop up a full bunch of green onions after discarding the very bottom of the bulbs and the roots.

About 2 carrots, peeled and sliced into medallions. Or one generous handful from the pre-washed little bag of carrot “coins”.

Half a little jar of red curry base. Put this in the big frying pan along with 2 14oz cans of coconut milk. Start it heating slowly, mix it together. Add 3 Tsp fish sauce, stir. Add in 1/4 cup of Sriracha chili sauce for some heat. Add 3 Tsp palm sugar, or 2 Tsb of white sugar. Stir. Taste. Add more curry base and another splash of fish sauce. You don’t want it too thin, about like American heavy cream, and you don’t want it too salty. Add a cup of water or chicken stock. Keep heating it. If you want it a little sweeter add some Tabasco Asian sauce, which is the same as Thai table sauce, or any of those sweet & hot chili sauces in the international section of your grocery store. When it just starts to bubble, add the potatoes, the onions, the carrots, the pork. Simmer over low heat for about 15 minutes, stirring every few minutes, then add the green onions. Cook them for about 5 minutes then add in a great big handful of freshly chopped basil. Stir, then ladle out the rice and serve it up.
The carrots should still be a bit crisp, and the bok choy just softened.

Feeds 5 easily. Or 3 really hungry Thai food lovers.

Yum. It’s got some spark, but it isn’t close to lethally hot. If you like your green beans squeaky, add them a few minutes later instead. Looks like Tami only threw in half the green onions at the last minute. It still came out just fine. I would recommend adding 2 tsp of fish sauce to the marinading pork next time.

Posted by Drew458     on 09/01/2010 at 06:04 PM   
Filed Under: • Fine-Dining •  
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   Saturday - August 07, 2010

Cooking for Men

I was single until I was 30. Which means I had to cook for myself. Worse, while growing up, Mom was a lousy cook. Oh, she had a dish or two, but I later found that she’d gotten them off of a can of green beans. Haute cuisine was Salisbury steaks and Minute Rice. Or Hamburger Helper. I started trying to cook while in the Cub Scouts in self-defense. By the time I was a Webelo and had earned the Arrow of Light, I was a better cook on an open fire than Mom was at home.

I believe it was my cooking that ultimately won my now-wife over. Once while we were dating, she was sick at home, with a couple of teen-aged boys. I brought over a big pot of my Chicken Cider Stew. That not only fed all three, but my stew isn’t so different from basic chicken soup, which we all know is good for what ails you.

Anyway, cooking is a hobby of mine. I just have to share this recipe I found last year at food.com (formerly Recipezaar.com)

Rice With Garlic and Pasta

1 cup jasmine rice
1/2 cup orzo pasta
2 tablespoons olive oil
3 garlic cloves, minced
salt
2 1/4 cups chicken broth

(I’m not sure why it specifies salt. I’ve occasionally salted the dish after cooking, but you don’t need it, unless it’s to help the water boil.)

1. in a medium sauce pan brown the pasta in the oil until golden brown.
2. add chicken broth bring to a boil.
3. add rice and garlic.
4. cover and cook over low heat 20 minutes.
5. remove from heat and let rest for ten minutes.
6. stir and enjoy.

Source: Rice with Garlic and Pasta

Orzo pasta is a rice-shaped pasta. I buy it a my local Meijer’s store. A Meijer’s-brand box runs about $1. Since I usually double the recipe, I can get three pots from one box.

Jasmine rice is a short-grain aromatic rice from Thailand. I highly recommend washing it before cooking. Just rinse it off 4 or 5 times to remove the excess gluten (and possible talc that Thailand sometimes uses to keep it from clumping). I find 4 or 5 rinses is enough; the rice will still be ‘sticky’ without being a soggy mass.

I’ve been experimenting with this recipe for over a year now. I double the garlic (personal preference, we love garlic). Served hot I recommend some Parmesan cheese. Fresh-grated if you keep such on hand, but the usual pre-grated stuff works also, I just find more is needed for the same taste.

Served cold, I like a few dashes of Balsamic vinegar on it. I pack it cold w/Balsamic vinegar for my lunches at work.

Hope you’ll try it. Let me know what you think. And let the chef know at the link above.

Posted by Christopher     on 08/07/2010 at 10:33 PM   
Filed Under: • Fine-Dining • Miscellaneous • Personal •  
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   Saturday - June 12, 2010

Happy Tummy

Happy me, I sold the Natuzzi sofa to a neighbor today. It was a beautiful thing, a great black leather fancy Italian design sectional. Seriously swank. Softest leather I’ve ever seen, but thick, and very well made. I got it for a huge discount because the store had marked down the cream colored ones, but had put the label on the black ones by mistake. Still, even with 40% off it set me back a couple grand, 12 years ago. I got a lot of use out of it, though the corner piece never fit in this condo. It lived out in the garage under a tarp. When we almost moved last summer, the whole thing came out, and a few days later when we moved back under emergency circumstances, it all went into the garage. So we haven’t used it in nearly a year. And to be fair, it needed a bit of restuffing on one or two of the seats, though the leather is all perfect. So I got rid of it for a really low price, 1/6 of what it cost me. I’m glad to be rid of it, and she’s happy to get some quality furniture. Her boys are both in high school now, so she can look for more in furniture than stain resistance and raw durability.

But with cash in hand, we decided that we ought to go out to dinner. So we went down to the local ribs joint and I had a big plate of St. Louis style ribs. Well smoked and mildly seasoned, they were great. All sorts of sauces and spices on the side for the adventurous. Leftovers? Not a darn thing.

The side dish was mashed sweet potatoes. But they were better than any I’d ever had before. We figured out their recipe: cook the sweet potatoes, mash them up, add butter, a bit of brown sugar, and a good dash of bourbon. I’m not epicurean enough to be able to tell if it was Jack Daniels or Jim Beam, but the next time I make some, that’s what I’m doing. Fan. Tastic. Beats the daylights out of adding stupid mini-marshmallows.

Posted by Drew458     on 06/12/2010 at 08:48 PM   
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