Egg on Our Face

Boy, the U.S. just can't seem to get it right. You'd think after Abu Ghraib, the military would be more careful about what cheesy photos they take of prisoners, let alone leaking them to the world.
Now, instead of Saddam's WMDs, we've got pix of Saddam in his BVDs. Put something on, dude!
So, with spring winding down to a glorious close (four weeks to go until summer), I decided to undress and briefly simmer a bagful of wonderful English peas from the farmers' market -- the guys who sell them already packed in brown bags have the tenderest ones there; worth the extra few cents.
Oh, but so as not to parade these luscious mini-mouth-bombs around in their altogether, I clothed them in an ad-hoc "sauce" made simply by stirring in chopped gently hard-cooked eggs -- still warm -- and copious scoops of butter. Salt and pepper, natch.
Prison fare this is not. So I guess it's all right if I take a picture.

What a Relief

What a Relief
Posted by: horsecow.

I'm so glad Roxanne's closed.
You may know of the celebrated raw-food restaurant in Larkspur with its beautiful, blonde, yoga-practicing chef and her zillionaire eco-freak, electric car driving husband. He was her benefactor -- in fact, he admitted to keeping menu prices artificially low for the first few months in order to build up a fan base. Over time, the place got expensive, as you might expect.
It was a very labor-intensive restaurant. Imagine all the planning that goes into soaking nuts days in advance to make "cheese," the dehydrating of pretend crackers and miniature tortillas, the insane amount of extracting and sculpting and coaxing unusual ingredients into semi-realistic-looking replicas of sushi and lasagna (no fish! no cooked rice! no noodles!).
Come to think of it, imagine all the fingers touching your food -- stacking, squeezing, drizzling, twisting. The presentations were always fabulous, no question. And the food was actually quite delicious, even if everything on the plate was the same temperature. (Just how did they manage to get the dining room to smell so delicious? Was there somebody in the kitchen illicitly boiling a pot of broth and wafting aromas into the room?)
I couldn't afford to patronize the place, and yet it was such a mesmerizing concept, I thought about it often.
Then Mr. Roxanne pulled the plug. The scuttlebutt at one Mill Valley coffeehouse was that Mrs. Roxanne was having a dalliance with a busboy.
I'm so glad I don't have to think about Roxanne's anymore.

Rats, no more crackers

Posted by: horsecow

Rats, no more crackers
They would have been good with this soup I made for lunch today: Steamed asparagus, sauteed onions, some veggie broth, herbs from the garden, and a ripe avocado -- pureed and topped with a drizzle of sour cream and the reserved asparagus tips.
We ate the soup at lukewarm temperature, and it was velvety goodness. Might have made a good picnic item if we were, I don't know, obliviously *bicycling* in a Maryland park while the Capitol was being evacuated! Hello, anybody in charge here?
My husband thinks the reason the bicycler-in-chief was not notified of the red alert was maybe because he was in the bushes getting a BJ and his handlers didn't know how to interrupt.
Still, the soup was yummy. I think I just wrecked my appetite.

It's crackers to slip a rozzer the dropsy in snide

OK, these are the flaxseed crackers. We added some chopped herbs from the garden (yow!). The convection oven seemed to work out fine -- our first trial. The crackers cooked in a shorter time than specified in the recipe we cannibalized, but no problem if you're constantly watching. And our lovely new oven has a window and interior light, so it's easy to monitor.
At first we thought the crackers were a bit bland. I would have added more salt, for instance. But when we enjoyed them with Rouge et Noir brie, all was copacetic, even if we thought the crackers themselves were a tad tough.
Surprise! The next day, the crackers were tons more tasty and tender. We stored them overnight in a plastic container with snap-on lid -- oh, my.

Steam Me Up, Scotty

Well, it's finally installed. Took several teams of willing craftsmen (pipefitter, sheetrock guy, electrician), tons of patience, sheer brawn and a lot of money. But we now have the dual-fuel convection oven in place. Watch out for that Power Boil high-BTU burner, though. I managed to scorch a couple of eggs the other day, and I *never* do that. It does a dandy job on the teakettle, though.
Still haven't tried out the convection oven, but I'm dreaming up a flaxseed cracker recipe to bake in a day or so. I'll let you know.
Here it is. We call it the Starship Enterprise.