lady eats austin

this was an email i sent my dad tonight

You know how you've been trying to find the perfect
peanut soup recipe?

I have discovered the secret to achieving perfect
peanut soup. I'm amazed this even happened at all; it
was a total whim, spawned by desperation and the fact
that we've been making a lot of hummus lately.

You make a decent, minimalist peanut soup from a
recipe like this one:
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/233786

And then you add about a quarter cup of tahini paste.
For some reason you won't taste the tahini at all, but
it will make the peanut element taste much peanuttier
without tasting like peanut butter.

I was really amazed. Also, if you're making that soup
you should probably puree it, return it to the pot,
bring it to a simmer and then add about a cup each of
cubed sweet potatoes, cleaned okra slices and cooked
chickpeas. Simmer till veg are done, natch.
It will be incredibly delicious. 

Anyway, I always feel compelled to share scientific
breakthroughs.

cheers 
k8

ps, not originally sent: I love my dad. He and I are a huge pain in the ass 
in exactly the same way. 

the wine issue

I been thinking about box wine lately. My cousin, who is now on his way to becoming a doctor, once performed some revolutionary calculations which revealed a surprising truth: box wine, specifically Franzia box wine, is the most cost-effective drunk in the world. It turns out to be true; you can't really beat sixteen bucks (fourteen on sale) for five liters of a substance that actually tastes pretty good -- MD 2020 it ain't -- and will get you fucked up with a quickness. When Ceej and I first moved here and were shiftless and dead broke, we went through an unfortunate Franzia Table White phase, which resulted in the worst -- and I mean the worst; I know what I'm talking about -- hangovers in recorded history. The kind of hangovers where, and I'm stealing this but it's apt, your significant other creeps into your bedroom and asks if there's anything they can get you, and all you can say is "Gun".

Which brings me to the following, which first appeared here; it remains the funniest example of wine writing (after a fashion) that I know of. I still laugh and laugh every time I read it. I know, you see; in Franzia veritas.

Box of wine fair-weather friend, says Chuck

That's right. Box of wine screwed me. Oh, it sounded like a good idea when my buddy calls up at 1:30 a.m. saying "Hey, I wanna go out again, but everything's closed." We decide to go to the grocery store (and fast, because they stop selling beer and wine at 2 a.m. here), and grab a little something for domestic consumption.

Since they don't sell liquor, I was going to get some wine and he was going to have some beer. Until we stumbled there 'pon the grail. "Box of wine," I said. "Box of wine," he repeated. I hoisted the 5 liter spigoted-bag-in-a-box to the self-checkout and we were on our way. And I felt like I was 18 again. I thought back to the time that 5 of us in a movie theater - for the second Matrix movie, I believe - smuggled in a 5l bag on someone's chest, and each kept his own 20 oz soda bottle, for clandestine refills whenever necessary.

Now, some people will say that 5 liters of wine, at 12% alcohol, is a lot for two people to drink. Those people are absolutely right. I don't know how long it took or what, but we got really, really hammered. Totally blitzed. It was great.

In the still of the night it loves and cradles you in its warm, baggy embrace with a spigot at one corner. It is your companion of gentle spirit and élan, urging you to jump that fence, go for that swim dammit, if that's what you want! It said unto me "I am box of wine, and upon this rock shall thee do precisely what you please, and no laws of man shall prevail against it."

But box of wine has a dark side. It does nothing to help you in the morning as you lie there, unwilling or unable to move from some demonly compound ere consumed. It does not rub healing salve and ointment into your mysterious bruises, nor does it soothe your mysteriously aching knee. It just sits there, in its cardboard mansion, mocking you, its small red-buttoned tongue occasionally drooling a drop, heretofore inaccessible due to the engineering constraints of a plastic bag. Who knew that a 5 liter bag of wine in a cardboard box, purchased as the awesome price of $13.99, could be so obstinate?

In closing, I find that one must not only appreciate, but embrace the duality of the box of wine. It is sweet and tasty and alcoholic, but it is also a cruel cruel master.

Right now I am drinking Black Box Chardonnay, which is much more upscale owing to being $21.99 for three liters instead of $13.99 for five, and also not tasting like pineapple Kool-Aid that has been left in the sun and then enhanced with one thousand pounds of added sugar. I don't think I'll be asking Ceej where the twelve-gauge is come morning, but I wouldn't make any bets.

good idea/bad idea

I was at work, flipping through Martha Stewart Living (like you do), and came across a pornographic image of a bowl of buckwheat noodle soup with shredded duck in it, and a poached egg on top, and some scallions. I think there was probably some microgreen or other in there too. I was immediately entranced by this, because it reminded me so extremely of one of the truly great meals of my life. It was a late lunch, taken at Momofuku in New York, on a sweltering, stinky, gritty day which had already involved a long airplane ride and my total inability to get in touch with Will, with whom I was ostensibly in the city to visit. There was nothing to do but go to this wonderful chic, dim, icy noodle bar, and sit at the long communal dining table next to a nice lawyer from DC who was noshing on BBQ pig's tail (delicious), and drink an overpriced Stella and eat a divine, slithery little bowl of cold soba with shredded pork and a poached egg on top, and probably also some microgreens.

That meal was a jewel, a clean, shining example of the power of food to Soothe and Fortify, and I emerged with my coping skills much enhanced. So Martha's soup, though not identical -- there was the different protein for one, and also Martha's was hot, not cold -- just seemed like a really good idea.

Until I read the recipe. The recipe was stupid in a number of ways that contrived to make me kind of irritated at the usually peerless Ms. Stewart. Like how she wants us to make this soup "for party". At least I assume as much, because the recipe is supposed to feed 8-10 as an appetizer. Read that again: slithery, splattery, slurpy noodle soup. At a dinner party. Martha! You are supposed to be the mistress of Entertaining! Do you actually hate your guests so much that you enjoy watching them dribble duck stock all over their Jil Sander? Trying to converse at the same time? I ask you! Noodles like this are street food. They are late-afternoon food at least, and breakfast/brunch food at best. They are meant to be eaten in silence with strangers, or maybe one select fellow-traveler, not a bunch of people who want to talk about real estate and Geraldine Ferraro and how well the daffodils are doing.

Also, I was confronted by a bit of moral queasiness, rare in my usually cheerfully omnivorous life, about the fact that the recipe called for two ducks. You are supposed to buy these ducks and roast them, then tear their flesh off and turn the carcasses into stock. Two waddling, quacking little lives, sacrificed for something that is a Bad Idea in the first place. "For party", you must honor the duck; you must harness its ultimate ducky self, the quiddity of duckness, and lay it to rest with mindfulness and reverence. I think roasted simply with some dried cherries stuffed into it, and a little port sauce, and potatoes done in the duck fat, and a simple salad involving oranges afterwards. That's what people really want to eat at your party, not duck as placeholder protein; besides, the soup would probably be fine with no meat at all.

But that soup sounds good, doesn't it? So here's what I'm going to do. Next time I am at the meat counter, I will buy a couple of little duck breasts, and I'll beg some duck bones and other random parts off the meat guys for my stock. I will get home, and I will not go through that whole roasting/scratch stock/blah blah blah rigamarole; I'll simmer the scavenged parts with some plain old regular chicken stock, while I am getting that night's dinner together (probably burritos, we've been having them a lot lately). Also a couple coins of ginger and some garlic, nothing fancy. When the stock is sufficiently duckified, I'll strain it and set it to chill, and forget about it until I want my soup.

It'll have to be a hot, fetid afternoon. I'll get home, and I'll start the noodles so they have a chance to cool off after they're finished. I'll panfry the duck breasts slowly, skin side down, so all the fat renders out and the skin gets golden and crispy. I will then allow the duck to get lukewarm on the counter, and the noodles to get cold in the fridge. Then I'll take out the stock and distribute it in bowls, with scallions and a handful of enoki mushrooms, and probably some microgreens... and a splash of sake, maybe, and the noodles and duck slices. Then I'll poach the eggs and perch them on top, and that will be a wordless late lunch, for just Ceej and me. And it will be so, so good.

Suck it, Martha.

---

dinner party

So the other night, Ceej and I were going to have Provençal Cornish game hens for dinner. It would have been chicken from the get-go, but my oven tends to make whole roasted chicken into a horrible, bloody, dry-on-top, raw-on-the-bottom mess. Cornish game hens are more our speed. So I called Ceej and told him to pick up the following, which you will also need for your impromptu dinner party:

Poultry (details in a minute)
A pound of plum tomatoes; it's OK if they're pink and sad, because they will be roasted, and roasting tends to bring out the best in all tomatoes, pink or not
Leeks, a couple
Herbes de Provence (a blend of dried rosemary, marjoram, basil, bay leaf, thyme, and sometimes lavender; available in bulk at your local gourmet grocery)
Olives -- I told Ceej that Niçoise olives were preferable, but Kalamatas were cheaper. He bought the Niçoise anyway. I love that guy.)
Bread, preferably a rustic French loaf
White wine

We already had, as should you:
Garlic
Canned tomatoes
Olive oil
Parsley
Salt and pepper

Anyway, that afternoon my friend Christian was supposed to come over to hang out and ponder the imponderables, preferably with beer. Shortly after I got off the phone with Ceej, Christian called and asked if he could bring his friend Callie, who I like a lot. They showed up with two six-packs of Blue Moon Belgian white. I wasn't too stressed about dinner yet, thinking that they'd just be around long enough for a beer and a jaw. But the afternoon wore on, my guests were looking hungry, and I began worrying about having enough food for everyone -- Cornish hens, the previously-specified poultry, are kind of meager.

Afternoon bled into evening. Much beer was consumed. Callie called her boyfriend Jason, and we accidentally left a message on Jason's iPhone, featuring all of us talking about how awesome Jason is, and what a sexy beast he is (and it's true), and how Callie is very lucky because Jason was only supposed to be a rebound. It isn't often that I get to witness a moment in someone's life that they will spontaneously remember forty years from now and want to sink straight through the floor, but I did then, let me tell you. We wondered what the fuck we should do, and the idea that Jason should be invited to dinner to make up for the excruciating accidental message was floated.

I said fine, of course; after all it was I who was clearly audible on the message, drunkenly shouting "AND TO THINK, HE WAS SUPPOSED TO BE A REBOUND! HA HA!" But now I was REALLY stressing out about having enough food for everyone, because not only did we suddenly have five for dinner instead of two, but three of the pertinent parties were giant, strapping men who like to eat Brazil.

THANK GOD Ceej called right then. The grocery store only had sad, watery, hormone-y Tyson Cornish hens. I said "Oh good. Look. Scrap the Cornish hens. Go to the meat counter and buy the biggest organic bird they've got. Have the guy at the butcher counter French it into eight pieces. We've never tried to roast a cut-up chicken in our oven before, but there's a first time for everything."

Ceej said OK.

"And we need more wine," I said.

Ceej came home, bearing groceries. I started a prophylactic batch of brown rice, poured Chardonnay all around, and made the marinade, as follows:

Microscopically mince a clove of garlic and mix with a tablespoon of herbes de Provence, some S&P and a healthy amount of extra-virgin
Allow to macerate for as long as it takes you to get through another beer and several ribald anecdotes about all the parties present
Smear marinade all over cut-up bird and let sit until Jason shows up

Upon Jason's arrival, we had many pairs of hands at the ready. We all sprang into action, a well-oiled (and well-lubricated) machine, and here's how you and your guests would do it:

Preheat oven to 425
Core, seed and slice the tomatoes
Supplement them with some canned tomatoes, squooshed up
Chop up the white and light green parts of the leeks, and rinse them very well in a bowl of water (a good task for the entertainingly loquacious but not culinarily inclined)
Bash the pits out of the olives
Peel and slice about four, five more cloves of garlic
Toss all of the above together with some more olive oil and S&P
Spread mixture in a roasting pan; if your roasting pan is not big enough to accommodate both veg and chicken (likely) distribute veg between two pans
Douse mixture with a couple glugs of white wine
Arrange marinated chicken pieces on top
Put in oven
Pray that this will turn out OK, because what you have on your hands is a genuine Dinner Party, and you never make anything for Dinner Parties except food you can crank out under general anesthesia, and this chicken is a total, total experiment.

I drowned my anxiety in more wine. My starving guests (and husband) did the same. We talked about pretty much everything: Christian's crisis of spirit that came with turning thirty, Callie and Jason's plans to move in together and whether that was a good idea, Ceej's and my marriage and how it seems to be working out for us, the emotionally wrenching nature of the race for the Democratic Party nomination, and oh yeah, our fire-breathing armadillo art car project. And presently the most heavenly aroma began to waft from the kitchen -- chicken fat and olives, lavender and thyme. It smelled like summertime in Nice in there. I began to think that it would be OK after all.

You:

Roast chicken until internal temperature reaches 160 on an instant-read thermometer. In our oven this took exactly 45 minutes.
Have someone cut up the bread.
Have someone else plate the food: emergency brown rice on the bottom, roasted vegetable goosh on top, chicken pieces on top of that (the eight-piece French cut you had the meat-counter guy do means that everyone gets light or dark, whatever they like).
Strew everything with chopped parsley.

We ate this in near-total silence, punctuated only with occasional slurping of wine and faint moaning. All the vegetable goosh disappeared, as did the rice, as did the delicious artisan levain Ceej bought, as did the chicken, with the exception of one sad, bristly wing joint which we gave to the grateful cats. Then we all sat around, grinning to ourselves and basking in the joy of Unexpected Dinner Party, and discreetly wiping our greasy fingers on the sofa. Then Ceej played guitar and sang some songs, to thunderous applause, and everyone reluctantly dispersed, a little wobbly but none the worse for wear, warm with friends and Chardonnay and good old-fashioned schmaltz.

It would probably be delicious with some fennel too.

it's called "pesto" for a reason

I've never had real pesto before tonight. I make it in the food processor all the time, and I buy ready-made pesto (doubtless made in a giant version of a food processor) sometimes, but I'd never had it the way it's supposed to be done. "Pesto" means "item made with a pestle". After many years of living pestle-bereft, I finally own one; it's black marble, purchased at Ikea for a pittance. And tonight I made real pesto -- walnut pesto, to go on top of whole-wheat pasta with wilted red radicchio and grilled mushrooms -- for the first time.

Actually Ceej and I collaborated on it. We took turns pounding away while sitting in front of the television, taking in the thrillingly squeakeriffic Lakers/Mavericks game and about a billion and a half political ads (hello, Hillary? Girl, I love you, but your shit is weak), and feeding basil to the mortar leaf by leaf, and walnuts when the mixture needed more grist, and olive oil drop by drop or else it splatters, for a long, percussive, strangely satisfying time.

Pestled pesto is alive, somehow. Its springy, claylike consistently is something else entirely, and it tastes warmly, strongly, but softly of basil -- sometimes I think basil is my favorite olfactory experience in the world. The whole house smells like basil now, and our alive, but dormant pesto will surely spring to life when mixed with warm pasta and warmer Mostly Plants. Totally, totally worth the effort.