Scenes From a Country Weekend

I worked from the country for the Thursday and Friday, which went off without a hitch. At some point Yma decided that this remote contral was the perfect pillow. I questioned her on this, but she was really committed.

This was a breakfast I had one of the days - two fried eggs and turkey bacon on a toasted English Muffin with a smear of cream cheese. Because if it's one thing I know how to do, it's clog my arteries.

I think I've watched these dogs/spent time in this house going on three or four years, and each time I sueually end up making some kind of 'welcome back' dish for the family. In years past it was some variation of a chicken noodle soup - though I think perhaps one year it was a lentil/artichoke soup of some kind. This time around I had my own hankering and figured I could combine my own gourmet want with the need to also leave them something to enjoy. The result was two batches of curry, one with chicken and shrimp and decidedly not vegetarian, and the other very much the opposite. Pictured is the meat version, which I think turned out quite well. Had a little spice to it through quite a number of chopped peppers and a little extra help from a curry paste. Other ingredients included fish sauce, okra, snap peas, portobello mushrooms, basic, lemongrass, ginger, garlic. Quite satisfying on what turned out to be some relatively cold and snowy days.

I had grand plans of taking a really good photo of my tattoo with my tripod in a pretty lighting set up. And I sure did take a lot of photos, but pretty much failed on the 'good photo' part of my quest. I'll need eventually to just have someone else do it for me. Help stop the guesswork.

It did eventually snow (this was the day that Gronkowski and Reggie Bush messed up my FF plans). Not only were my FF plans torn asunder, so too were the traveling plans of Mr. Ass and his parents. Their flight was eventually canceled and so I ended up spending an extra day and evening with the dogs, which was quite a bit more relaxing, I would imagine, than being stuck in Florida when all you want to do is get home. In any case I was on the look out for interesting birds by the bird feeder, but didn't see anything so totally interesting.

These six deer were only one small part of a much larger herd that ran by at one point. I think I counted close to, if not more than, 20.

Football Sliders and Work Lunches

I'm not sure whether I've really mentioned it on the blog, but I did join a fantasy football league this year, though I wouldn't say that anyone would usually describe me as a particularly die-hard sports fan. It just seemed like an interesting new thing to do. Turns out that football is far more interesting when you feel like you have something on the line. Though, really, I'm pretty sure nothing is actually on the line as this is a league without prizes. In any case, I went to Rembrandts a few weeks back so I could see the Redskins and Eagles play against each other. One of my three quarterbacks is RGIII so I quickly realized that going to a bar to root for the opposing team of the city you're in can be a little awkward. I also realized that RGIII is simply not as awesome as I thought he was. While surreptitiously being pleased while the rest of the bar groaned, I also enjoyed their $1 sliders. Pretty good stuff.

And then more work lunches. Baked ziti is my downfall and my savior. Maybe I will make myself baked ziti tonight. That, actually, seems like a very good idea. That or artichoke red onion soup.

Another day, chicken curry.

I think on this particular day it was coconut chicken curry .

And then, to lighten the mood, a spinach salad with far too many roasted red peppers.

Chicken, Okra and Pea Curry

Another country day found me making green chicken curry. I consulted a few different recipes before ultimately going my own way a bit. Started with freshly grated ginger, chopped lemongrass, three hot peppers and plenty of garlic. Added to that mixture chicken, then chicken broth. Cooked and simmered before adding additional spices, coconut milk, peas and okra.

I was quite pleased with the result. I should have used far more peppers if I wanted the dish to have any heat, but as it was it had a great lemongrass/ginger overtone and the chicken didn't dry out.

The one drawback was the lemongrass bits, which were many and yet not good to actually chew on and eat.

Soup, Curry and More c/o Thai Tida

Once Mr. Ass was finished with his responsibilities we gathered ourselves together and began to play a game of Scrabble. Unfortunately I may have gotten us a bit off the topic of Scrabble and the game was never completed. Actually, that may have actually worked out for Mr. Ass's pride in the long run since I had a pretty good chance of getting a bingo. Heh. L. met up with us and then we all went to Thai Tida in Lambertville. While the man at the front was, to put it mildly, a bit less than cordial to us upon our entrance, our servers were quite friendly. I wanted the Tom Yum soup, so I ordered it.
Mr. Ass wanted the sweater shrimp. So he ordered them.
I made a game time decision and went with the green curry with chicken. This dish started at 'medium' and then you could add 'one pepper' 'two peppers' or 'three' for additional spice. I assume these were figurative peppers not literal ones, though I guess it could work either way. I went with one pepper over medium.
L. ordered the duck with three peppers, or maybe two? And Mr. Ass ordered the Drunken Noodles. My dish was definitely spicy, and L.'s spicier than that. I really couldn't take L.'s dish. Yes, there was flavor there and I knew it, but my mouth burned and burned. The drunken noodles were more my style. I guess this is my foodie weakness: an inability to really appreciate food that makes my mouth burn. I mean, I love wasabi, but that's more of a head rush than a slow, neverending burn.
Spiciness aside, it was a good dinner and continued my weekend's eating tour of Asia, you'll see that it continued.

Buffet Dinner

Our first evening we went to the big buffet place and took a look around. I ended up with one plate that consisted of 'escoveitched fish,' corn salad, Jamaican beef stew, shrimp fritters, curried chicken and a tiny bit of salmon. The escoveitched fish was nothing like the dish that I love-love-loved in Greensboro so many years back, so I didn't bother eating all of it. The shrimp fritters were freshly fried, but also not all that great. I think I ate most of the stew and liked my bite of salmon and curry. I then tried the paella they were serving in the main outdoor dining concourse. Eh. I wish I could say more. But just because there were a lot of options doesn't mean that any of them were all that great.

Thai Food, High School Folks and Sing-Alongs in Bucks County

After work on the Tuesday after Memorial Day I drove up to Bucks County to hang with Mr. Ass and JDF and, later, L. We met up in Newtown and picked up the grub before heading back to Mr. Ass's.
We shared Pad Thai, Drunken Noodles, crispy Spring Rolls and some sort of curry.
It was all very good. Mr. Ass will have to remind me of the restaurant's name.
It was a beautiful evening, with properly impressive sunset clouds and swarms of lightning bugs that lit up the grass like some sort of neon carpet LED system.
We climbed up and onto Mr. Ass's garage roof for a better view of the pretty and watched as it flared and flickered into night.
L. arrived and we tried to surprise her by becoming just heads, but she didn't seem very surprised.
Mr. Ass took this photograph.
I took this one.
Later we ate chocolate pot de creme and participated in a short sing-along that warmed my heart. I am not a good singer, but I like to sing nonetheless and sometimes I gain confidence by singing with others...my missed notes perhaps softened by others' abilities to reach them. JDF led us in a song about a prison dog and its love. I think that's what it was about anyways. I sang a few bars of the Red Hot Chili Peppers' Under the Bridge and it was all very good.
It was nice to see JDF in person. I think the last time we saw each other was, hmm, Tennessee last year? Since then we have made big, magic plans for some alternate reality in which we buy land in North Carolina and encourage all our nearest and dearest to live on it with us...but the only way to get that sort of plan off the ground is to sing together from time to time...get the magic flowing. I'm not sure we convinced either Mr. Ass or L. to join us, but we sowed the seeds. A lovely evening.

I'll Curry All Week Long

On Sunday I decided to make myself some meals for the week. Basically I made two big batches of things, the first of which was a curry. It consisted of: roasted garlic (that I roasted myself, thank you very much), okra, mushrooms, ginger, cumin, coriander, tomatoes, coconut milk and vegetable stock. It was, actually, entirely vegetarian. I feel like I'm forgetting an ingredient, but I can't tell you what it might have been. I served it with steamed asparagus and it really tasted like curry...which I was reasonably impressed by, since I didn't use one dash of 'curry powder'.
B. came over and had some and seemed quite pleased.

For NC Catherine I will try to make some semblance of a recipe but, honestly, I was flying by the seat of my pants:

Ingredients:
1 head garlic
1 bag frozen chopped okra
4-6 ripe tomatoes, chopped
1 shrink wrapped package of baby bella mushrooms (though any hearty button type mushroom would do as well), chopped in half...you want them to be succulent and cut no more than in half
1/2-3/4 cup tomato puree
2 cups vegetable stock
1 yellow onion, chopped
olive oil
cumin powder
coriander powder
fresh ginger root (about one tablespoon or so)
1 can coconut milk
olive oil
sea salt
fresh ground pepper
red pepper flakes

What You Do:
1. Roast your garlic in your oven.
2. In Dutch oven, sautee onion, ginger (peeled and shredded) and roasted garlic (I think I put about half the head in) until onion is soft.
3. Add the mushrooms, vegetable stock, tomato puree and spices in some kind of order. I totally forget which order. Let simmer for 5-10 minutes.
4. Add the okra and tomatoes. Simmer additional 10-15 minutes.
5. Taste it. Adjust spices as you see fit and simmer a little more.
6. Add whole can of coconut milk, stir to combine it with existing liquid and veggies.
7. Simmer on low, adjust spices as you see fit.
8. Serve over rice.

I know I haven't shared exact amounts of spices. It's because I was using the 'a dash here a dash there' method.

Chicken Curry Lunch Box c/o King of Tandoor

For lunch, at work, chicken curry lunch box. It was very tasty.

I Think I'm Turning Indian

A good number of my clients are Indian. A good number of meals I have while at work are Indian. I feel that I may be turning Indian. Not really. Some time last week, Monday probably, the office ordered Indian for lunch. I believe I ordered the lamb curry lunch special. It came with a very tasty chickpea veggie curry kind of dish and rice.
It has gotten to the point where (it's funny how I continue to write how I like to write even though I tell people all day to write some other way) the Indian restaurant will call us and ask us how our meals were...if we missed a day. They're eager to keep our business, you see, because we've become ridiculous regulars. One meal, sometimes two, a day. It's obscene. The dragon continues not to give an ef.

Faux Curry

Last weekend I made myself a little curry-like dinner that lasted me most of the week. A mix of corn, shelled edamame, onion and potatoes in a little chicken broth/coconut milk mixture, and seasoned with cumin, garlic, garam masala (spelling, I know), ginger, turmeric, salt and pepper.
Served over rice. It could have been spicier. Maybe next time.

Appetizers and Curry c/o Beet

On Tuesday night L. and I went to Beet Restaurant for dinner. The decor was an odd mixture of colors and textures. Along the booths, that ran along one whole wall of the narrow space, were small mosaic tiles in varying shades of brown. Then wall painted pink with white swirls further down exposed brick was the backing for the booths. Benches? L. and I both ordered cocktails. I wanted the Limoncello Cooler but our waitress, a less than savvy server, looked blankly when I ordered it then returned shortly thereafter with the news that they didn't have it. I ordered something else instead. It had puree and sake and vodka and lychee...I didn't like it. For all the sweet ingredients in its description the overall taste I had in my mouth was sharp and alcoholly. The bite of vodka mixed with something wrong. We ordered two appetizers. The Jeep Thai Dumplings (I think that's what they were called) and the spring rolls. The dumplings were a bit like shiu mai (or however you spell it...the dumplings at dim sum) with chicken and pork and maybe shrimp. They weren't quite it. The spring rolls were satisfying, crunchy and hot and with real taste to their filling. And how I love me some dipping sauce.
I ordered the green curry with chicken. L. ordered shrimp crusted turbot with a lobster curry sauce. Both of our dishes were spicy. Not too spicy, just spicy so you felt it. We both commented on how refreshing it was to see a hot pepper by a dish's menu description and to have the food truly reflect the pepper...if you know what I mean. There were the most tender lovely little eggplant chunks in my curry that I liked very much. L. let me have a taste of her turbot and it was excellent.
The pink lights and the reflection of the pink wall made it difficult to take photographs without a pink cast to it...so the flash was utilized. I'm thinking this camera may soon be making its way to its end. Thank you to L. for the meal and the company. After not seeing her all that often in the last five years it has been so awesome to see her twice in less than 2 months.

Curry Take Two

On Wednesday night I took the remaining left over chicken and turned it into curry. The main difference between mom's and my own was coconut milk and not so much flour. It was definitely soupier.

Chicken Curry

Some of the left over chicken was turned into curry by my mother. I sort of want to make my own chicken curry and have some kind of curry show down. Though I'm not actually saying anything negative about this curry...I liked it very much and had more than one helping.

Spicy Defeat, Kind Of

Last Tuesday I went to trivia night again. The team (Caroline's Fierce Foursome O' Fun) did not fare half as well as we had the week before. I did, however, run into a Chicagoist writer or two. Their team did better than us...but whatever, I don't even care. M. Lady and I arrived early enough to grab the table area I like. We both ate a little food and had a Unibroue Apple. I had the chips and curry (fryer was back up). The fries were good, the curry was a nice change of pace with chips but if compared to other curry I've had in my life time, well, it wasn't spectacular...a little salty...and little bland...but also, to be fair, with a little more nuance of flavor than if they used only curry powder from Jewel.

Curry

The boyfriend made a lovely coconut curry with stir fried tofu. Oh my, what a treat, what a nice thing to come home to. I have so much homework to do and I'm not sure I can do it all but, but, like I should and I will and I have to and gosh.