Monday, February 04, 2008

LOL

Despite the fact that I am kinda paralyzed with embarrassment because of this stupid joke I forgot to edit out of my food article, I am very psyched on the new issue of Midtown Monthly. The cover looks great, and all the articles are really interesting. Best issue yet. Rachel G. really harshed on the True Love, but I agree with her assessment of all the coffee houses I've been to. I loved OMF's thing on Little Joes. It almost made me want to try it again sometime. Almost. Pay close attention to MH's wine picks. I've had both of them and they are both good enough to make baby angels cry. No Soriano thing, though? I miss that. I want to know what the recession is going to do to all the development plans, and I want Soriano to explain it to me.

I finally got to do some cooking this weekend, which made me really happy. I cooked a LOL (leg of lamb) from a recipe by Simon Hopkinson (not sure if this book lives up to the hype but I really like it). The recipe called for me to stab the leg with a small sharp knife, stuff in half a garlic clove, half and anchovy, and a sprig of rosemary, and repeat twelve times. Then I rubbed the leg with a butter, anchovy mixture, poured half a bottle of white wine into a roasting pan, and put the whole thing in the oven. Unfortunately, the timing on the recipe was completely wrong, so the first time I pulled the leg out it was raw, and I ate a bite and got a bite of total lukewarm raw bloody meat in my mouth. I'm still kind of recovering from that. The real revelation was the brussel sprouts recipe. Corti brothers had some beautiful brussel sprouts with small, tight heads (sounds dirty). Here's what I did:

saute yellow onion of shallot in some olive oil for two minutes on medium heat
throw in brussel sprouts (halved), salt and pepper and saute for four minutes, until browned
throw some water in the pan, enough to just cover the bottom
put on lid and cook for about 6 minutes, still on medium, keep checking to see if the water has evaporated, if so add a teeny bit more
when done, squeeze a half lemon over the top. I picked a meyer lemon from my neighbor's tree and used that.
the recipe called for apple cider vinegar, but mine had some disgusting huge clot of mold in it. does anyone else have this problem with vinegar? do you keep it in the fridge? mine always goes bad before I can use it more than once.

14 comments:

Anonymous said...

I am a big fan of the apple cider vinegar (mainly as a hippy face wash), do you have the braggs kind? It has something called the "mother" in it, I actually can't tell you what it is but it's cloudy nd chunky it doesn't mean that the vinegar is bad though.

Anonymous said...

Eating raw little lambs makes baby angels cry.

beckler said...

this thing in the vinegar actually looked like i was growing a kombucha in there. i know this from back in the early 90s when my parents were into the life-giving aspects of kombucha and were always growing one in our fridge. they jumped on many new age trends before they were cool, such as st. john's wort.

Anonymous said...

Given the fact I am washing my face with vinegar, obviously I like a new age trend, should I be looking into kombucha?

p.s. I don't keep mine in the fridge.

Liv Moe said...

it may have been the mother in which case you can pull it out and add it to various things and make your own vinegars. PM used to make vinegar with watermelon juice which i didn't even know was possible.

i'm always looking for a mother but rarely find one. i used a mother to make some wine vinegars last year that are super good in salad dressing.

wburg said...

While I'm no Soriano, I'm working on an article covering that particular subject (recession and development.) What I'm finding is actually kinda good news, at least from where I'm sitting. Recessions generally mean people retrench, and actually start fixing up the properties (capital reinvestment) they own instead of speculating on properties they don't own yet.

beckler said...

wburg-i knew i should have added you in as a possible source of that article. i'm glad you're on it.

wtf is the mother? if that's what it is i quickly put it in the garbage disposal. it looked like it was about to spring to life.

Liv Moe said...

that was probably the mom. it sorta looks like a big loogie. i could see how one would confuse it with mold. next time you have one hold onto it for dear life. making vinegar is about the easiest thing ever.


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Anonymous said...

Mother of vinegar is a slime composed of a form of cellulose and acetic acid bacteria that develops on fermenting alcoholic liquids, which turns alcohol into acetic acid with the help of oxygen from the air. It is added to wine, cider, or other alcoholic liquids to produce vinegar.

Mother of vinegar can also form in store-bought vinegar if there is some non-fermented sugar and/or alcohol contained in the vinegar. While not appetizing in appearance, mother of vinegar is completely harmless and vinegar does not have to be discarded because of it. It can be filtered out using a coffee filter, or simply left in and ignored.


thanks wikipedia.

beckler said...

damn. mother, i'm sorry i chopped you to bits in the garbage disposal.

Anonymous said...

I hope your not referring to the "blown dome" in your article. Any mention of a dome getting blown is high comedy in my book.

heckamax

Anonymous said...

I thought the True Love review was a bit harsh, even if the complaints were valid. It's kind of like reviewing Little Joe's with the same standards you'd use to review The Water Boy. True Love is a place for bad, sugar sweet coffee and loud mouth kids yes? I think it serves it's purpose well and I'm glad its there, even if I choose to get my coffee elsewhere.
Remember when New Helvetia was the ultimate gay teenager hang out? Where do them gay teenagers go now? Poor gay teenagers. Lets not let it happen to loud mouthed punky teenagers next.

Anonymous said...

Kombucha mother and apple cider vinegar mother have a lot in common, actually.

It shouldn't hurt you to use it, a lot of people strain the vinegar out. I didn't know you could use the vinegar mother the way Moe says, & since PF won't let me make my own kombucha anymore, I probably won't even try it...but I want to go on record as thinking that it is awesome.

I did recently make my first batch of st. benoit yogurt, and that was hilarious fun.
-wingnut a.

Anonymous said...

I wish you would all stop pretending like anyone actually consumes Kombucha. They don't because that's disgusting. I was handed a bottle this summer and thought it was apple cider. But it's not. It's alive and it's going to get inside you and grow. Did anyone else see that TLC show recently about the guy in Indonesia who had a rare warts condition that made him look like he was turning into a tree? That's what will happen to people who drink Kombucha. I'm convinced of it.
jamattack!