Mad treats!

I slept pretty horribly last night, but it was still better than the 4 hours or less I've been averaging for a few weeks. For some reason tho, I woke up this morning and I just felt like cooking. When you open yr eyes and you see yr son smiling at you and slapping yr face, and yr cat contemplating biting you, and yr husband happy to see you awake because he knows breakfast is coming...you kinda know it's gonna be a good day. I brushed my teeth, kissed my boys and off to the kitchen I went.

I'm still on a mission to make the perfect omelet. I'm pretty good. But I wanna make eggs like they make them at Dumont. How the fuck do they get them so light and fluffy and perfectly baby yellow and NO BROWN MARKS? HOW??? If you know, please share with me, because it's killing me. I made chipotle eggs with a chipotle butter sauce. Sounds fancy, but basically I just used the miracle chipotle seasoning that Becca gave me, and beat it in with my eggs, and when they were done, melted some butter and put more of the miracle chipotle in and lightly beat it before pouring it all over the eggs. Gerald declared these "best eggs ever." I don't believe him anymore because he seems to say that a lot lately. I think it's because for a few days I was treating him to chipotle fried eggs with soppy yolks. Blech. I hate soppy yokes, but he's into it, so I give the man what he likes. Whattayagonnado?

I had an idea of what I wanted to cook, but needed more supplies, and it's the fucking Fourth of July! Time to play! Gerald saw a cartoon hot dog on the telly before we left and he had that "must have hot dog" look on his face. So, off we went to hunt for hot dogs and fireworks. Luckily, whilst walking, I managed to convince him to go to Nita Nita because I saw a sandwich board stating that they had an outside bbq going on.

Can I just say that it was so good? I got scared that we were going to be eating grilled shit on a stick when I saw the prices, cos they were really cheap, but then again, for the price how could we not try it? So we ordered two $3 portobello burgers in herb aioli, 2 corns with honey butter and 1 coleslaw with mustard seeds. Oh, and two bloody marys. Everything was fanfuckingtastic, except the bloody marys. Gerald got another portoburger. But when it came to round deux of drinks, we thought it best to hit somewhere else because they weren't rocking my world. We did a quick drive by the park on the water on N 8th and then cut thru McCarren on our way to Lokal. We don't know why we like that place, but we do. It has a Florida feeling to it, and they play awful music, but we once had a fab cucumber soup there and the drinks are hella cheap. When we got there, they were out of BM mix, so G had a mimosa and I had a bad ass Cava. An excellent choice.

Feeling lovely, we hit Urban Rustic for dinner supplies. I bought: garlic scapes, basil, an Amy's baguette, 3 plums, an avocado, and a tomato. The guy behind the counter caught me looking up to the ceiling and muttering to myself, and then stopping, and then looking to the other side and muttering again. "Counting?" he asked. "No," I said, "trying to think of ingredients while slightly buzzing. It's not working out so well." He laughed and shook his head. What? It's true. I was building flavors in my brain and they were getting distracted.

The end result: garlic scape and basil pesto that I blended into some quinoa, garlic sauteed in my Rancho Gordo vaquero beans, chopped cukes and maters in salt, oil and lime, and cut pieces of baguette to sop it all around. But, my piece de resistance....dessert! I'm not one for making desserts usually, but when I saw the plums at Urban Rustic, I had to. I melted some butter and put in the chopped plums and bananas. I grated some cinammon and added a healthy splash of prosecco and let it cook down for a few moments. It literally took me about all of 10 minutes to make this, and the results were fucking awesome. Next time, I'll probably not put the bananas in with the plums immediately because they did disintegrate a little too quick, but they gave the sauce a nice flavor. Also, the garlic scape pesto in the quinoa was pretty rad, although I feel like it needed one extra thing in it that I couldn't quite put my finger on. I'll definitely make it again.

Happy 4th of July everyone! All 3 people that read this blog! :D

an tici pation

So, right now, I'm kinda feeling like that Sunday before the first day of school. You know what yr going to wear. You have yr new Trapper Keeper. You have assorted pens and pencils. A plethora of lined school paper. You vow that this year, yr gonna be organized, and it's going to be different and yr actually gonna do all yr homework and work ahead on yr papers that are due 3 months later and not procrastinate like you have every other time. There's that feeling that anything can happen. Are you still going to be a dork this year? Will so and so notice?

Okay. So maybe it's not exactly that. I'm just starting a new job. A new fabulous job. And I'm not quite sure what I'm going to wear, but I've got a good idea. I do know what make up I'll be wearing. (For Bex: the brown Chanel eyeliner, the MAC Patina, Mascara, foundation, powder, blush and that peach Clinique gloss you gave me...I know that's yr fave on me.) But, I do have that little butterfly in my stomach flittering...wondering if they'll like me...if they'll reaaaally like me. I am not going to have coffee because I'll get too hyper and frighten them all off.

In other news, I'm making TWO, count em TWO, different beans at the mo. I'm making a chili with my Rancho Gordo Scarlett Runner beans. They're simmering in half of a Spanish onion, about 37 cloves of garlic, a green pepper and some cumin and crushed red peppers. The Rancho Gordo Flageolet's are simmering in Spanish onion and garlic. I'm going to make a salad with some fennel, parsley, mixed greens, cukes and some feta for tonight. The chili is for tomorrow. I was smart this time and started soaking the beans last night, so hopefully this shit isn't going to take ten years. I'm also experimenting with the Flageolets and hoping that my onion and garlic mire poix is sufficient compared to the shallot, celery, carrot and garlic one I'd made before. Don't get me wrong, they tasted fantastic...but there was something not quite perfect. Someone commented about cooking beans in a pressure cooker in like 30 minutes. I'm effing jealous. I want one.

Here's the new kitchen wishlist:
-Le Creuset cookware
-a new stovetop espresso maker (Darling Husband killed the last one.)
-a whisk
-prep bowls
-a Peugeot pepper grinder in the piano finish (shut up, it's effing beautiful)
-a test tube spice set

Note to husband: almost all of these items are available at the Brooklyn Kitchen, as you might have noticed, because I LINKED THEM. You know, that place that's one block away from our house that I love? Just so you don't ever say, "I didn't know what to get you" ever again.

Anywho, wish me a good first day of work tomorrow. I hate being the new kid. (The one that's too old to be a kid anymore.)

Beans, beans the magical food...

So, I was reading this food blog a few weeks ago...one of the many that I subscribe to, since I am a food fag...and got inspired. I had read a Domino article a few months before about Rancho Gordo's heirloom beans, and this bloggy chef had made a warm heirloom bean salad using the Rancho Gordo variety. I had to have them. I ordered the European variety pack, and within days I had RG beans of my very own. Now, ordinarily, beans aren't something that you would call beautiful, or even cute...but these are *gorgeous*. These are seriously some damn sexy beans.

After showing off my beans for a few weeks, and forcing friends to ogle them and swear that they were the most beautiful things they'd ever seen, I decided that perhaps it was time to eat the damn things. Now, I'm all about doing things from scratch, being organic and all that jazzy jazz, but buying a can has always sounded a lot easier and less headachey than DIY beans. Seeing as this was my first foray into this world, I did a little research and went on my merry little way. In between changing midget diapers, and naps, and being run over by a walker, I was soaking and prepping and organizing dinner.

I've always prided myself on my 30 minute meals (NOT the Rachael effing Ray variety which involve CRAP food and actually listening to that voice of hell), but there is no getting out of doing beans in 30 minutes or less. Soak time: 1 hour. Mire poix prep and cooking: 20 minutes. Cooking beans and mire poix: 2 effing hours almost. Chopping salad and making dressing: 20 minutes. This is a salad, people! I could have made a rack of lamb and mint chutney and maybe some grilled baby veggies in the same amount of time it took me to make this beast. (Not that I would, because carcass is gross, but still, you get my drift.)

Auden had had dinner, napped, played, bathed and had his last bottle of the night, and FINALLY my SALAD was complete. We dug in. It was brilliant. Now, I'm my own worst critic. I rip my dishes apart. I sit there and bitch about a lack of salt, or a heavy hand with the sherry vinegar or the truffle oil not being necessary. Although I probably would have added a little more salt, and maybe some grilled garlic cloves to make it super perfect...this salad was the mother effing jam. Gerald declared my beans the best ones he's ever had in his life. He mentioned it several times. He's still talking about it. (Shut up, I have more, I'll make them. Garsh.)

In conclusion, buy these beans. They will make you happy.

I'll give the gas update tomorrow...so far..so good. X gas free X Pics tomorrow too.

xoxo