Sunday, February 14, 2010

Late Jan/Early Feb


The number one rule of blogging is, or should be, never start a post with an apology for not blogging. So I'm not going to apologize. But I am going to say that this post is mostly a photo essay of my last few weeks not blogging, because life has just been that busy.

We begin with an amuse bouche of Korean chicken wings, prepared the week after the Golden Globes, when I was not quite done with the exploration of bar-food-cuisine, as per the last post for taco salad. These particular wings marinated in garlic, ginger, rice syrup, soy and gochujang, pan fried then broiled in the marinade. Finger lickin' good:


The following weekend I went out to Goldendale, WA with my friends Laura, Piper and David to Piper's family farm. The weekend was worthy of several blog posts covering the topics of roasted organic chicken with seasonal root vegetables and panade, the incalculable value of real friendships , incorporating vibrantly fresh eggs into every meal, what to (or not to) eat and drink before and after an 8 mile run, dog-pack order and why Victor isn't a 'real' dog, pizza making in an outdoor wood-fired oven and the 14" lemon tart that sustained us for days and kept getting better:








The following week I volunteered to make a spaghetti and meatball feed for my newly former roommate David's birthday:


There was also a Super Bowl party involving freshly shucked oysters, po-boys, gumbo, red beans and rice, pork tenderloin sliders, broccoli cheese casserole and Indiana sugar cream pie. Sadly, my hostessing duties prevented me from taking any pictures or even having fun. Sigh. Let's move on.

Finally, in honor of Valentines Day, which is today, I made a meager but meaningful batch of my Valentine's heart cookies. As indifferent as I am to this holiday, I really do enjoy making these cookies and wish Valentines Day didn't follow so closely on the heels of the Super Bowl. It would make life so much more manageable:


Today also marks the Chinese New Year. Having failed at commemorating it by wearing new clothes, or purchasing flowers or getting my house clean or doing anything remotely symbolic, I am still hopeful that today marks the beginning of a prosperous new year. With a few too many competing irons in the fire, I'm trying to both simplify and enrich; let's say that I'm looking forward to turning life into a beautiful, clear consommé.