Play With Your Food

Several years ago I packed all my possessions into my car and moved to Missouri. Once I'd arrived and somewhat settled in, I roasted a chicken. This chicken had oil-rubbed skin that became crispy, and juicy flesh, and lemon and herbs inside. Delicious.

In the spirit of adventure and friendship, I offered to share with one of my new roommates. She replied that she would be happy to partake of my proffered fare, provided I removed the meat from the bones and kept the offending carcass away from the dining room. She informed me that she was unable to eat chicken or any other animal product if she could see and thus "know" that there were bones associated with the meat. It "grossed her out" to think about that. She would eat it, but not if she had to think about where it came from.

I'm no foodie preacher, I try but consistently fail to grow something, anything, to eat, and I maintain few dietary restrictions. The reasons I cook are many, but I think the most important reason is this: When I cook my food, I know my food. I feel the vegetables and fruits, the fish and meats and fowl, I can reasonably judge a bread dough by its moisture, and I know exactly what I'm sustaining my body with.

My hope for you is that you are comfortable enough with what you eat that you can think about where it might have come from. I hope you have comfort foods you cook, and new dishes to stretch your skills. Spring is here today! Play with your food.

Gingersnaps

 

Have you ever had a go-to recipe that suddenly flopped?

These are my most famous cookies. I've had the recipe for years and they always came out great, and then suddenly a few years ago they just didn't. The greatness of this cookie is that they're not really snaps, or ginger, but more like chewy spice cookies. Not chewy like a certain Wookie, but 'crisp on the edges, firm in the middle like a proper cookie should be' chewy. Not that I have Opinions on cookies or anything, ahem.

Awesome!

So, my beloved cookies were weird. Flat, spread-y, weird. I tried a few more times, and they seemed to have gone loco. Then I abandoned the recipe. Last week, though, I decided to apply a little research to the problem. Preliminary findings seemed to indicate that the proportion of molasses was too high. I tweaked the recipe everysogently and tada! Back in the glory zone.

Weird.

Alberta Bound

My AB experience in 3 pictures.

Sadness

So yes, I spent time in Canada, which was wonderful and full of mixed emotions and so hard to leave in so many ways. My flight from Calgary was supposed to be Monday night, but then it was cancelled and I spent four! hours! in lines! waiting for some answers. I flew out the next morning, via Victoria. Victoria has a tiny little airport, and we flew in right at sunrise into a sunny day. The next day it snowed 24 cm there. Today, back home, it's been snowing for the past three days. Only a very compelling reason would send me north, not south, on a winter vacation. (For clarity's sake: The following is not that reason.)

She looks so lonely. Our other dog, Bella, was put to sleep yesterday. I've never been much of a dog person, and lord were they annoying sometimes, but she was our dog for six years. All the emotions and exhaustion of the weekend caught up with me, and I held her and cried. She is buried in our backyard under a tree.

Frozen

I spent the week in Alberta, and this is how I felt.

Sunny Day BLT's

First of all, I was unsure how to pluralize BLT. Thankfully the internet has the answer to many things, although this is an old-school actual dictionary page. (One recent question the internet could not answer for me: Who does the U.S. military's commission come from?)

Secondly, everyone and their mother feels really smart for knowing "botanically, the tomato is a fruit, NOT a vegetable". Come on. Everyone and their mother knows it. Let's move on.


EXCEPT!


The Supreme Court has an opinion on this! A Supreme Opinion! In Nix v. Hedden, 1893, it was decided that "the tomato should be classified under customs regulations as a vegetable rather than a fruit." (Quote and fascinating info via Wikipedia.) There are Dickens references! There's a cabbage! 


CONTEST: Find a more amusing Supreme Court ruling than this one. GO!


And now a Segway into the title meal... (but don't fall off a cliff):

On Thursday I really wanted a BLT, but a little different. I'm quite pleased with how this turned out.


You will need:


Corn tortillas, warmed (just throw them on a hot burner for about 40 seconds per side)
Pepper bacon, cooked to your liking (chewier is better)
Lettuce
Green tomato, cut into thin wedges
Avocado, cut in half and cut into thin wedges
Salsa verde


Assemble thusly:


Corn tortilla
  Lettuce
    Bacon
       Green tomato slices
          Avocado slices
            Salsa verde


Sit in the sunshine and enjoy.
       

(Sorry about the segue pun. RIP, James W. Heselden.)

Steak and Veggie Chili

Let's take a moment to talk about mise en place. Mise en place is a fancy-chef way of saying: Prep everything before you begin, and put in all in little bowls. There's a lot of positive things to be said about this method, my personal favorite being that you won't be stressing out as you create a dish or meal, frantically chopping things or discovering you're out of something you thought you had once you've begun. Everything is ready to go, right there in plain sight.

However, I don't always practice this very rigourously, and I'm here to tell you that's okay. Pete Wells of the New York Time's "Cooking with Dexter" column wrote a funny piece about the impracticality of rigid mise en place. And here's an interview with Mark Bittman that touches on the same subject. Both men mention television as a culprit. Many cooking shows show us the pretty picture (things in tiny bowls!) without much discussion about how necessary those tiny bowls are.