Tuesday, October 21, 2014
Beautiful Cars update!
Just a quick picture -- my Dad hasn't sold the car yet, so I got to drive it around the park last month when I visited home. It was quite a treat!
Tuesday, September 16, 2014
Beautiful Cars and Driving Lessons
Chatting with my parents on the phone today, I discovered that my dad is selling the gorgeous old convertible, that he inherited from his dad, on eBay. I think I last drove this car more than 10 years ago, the first time I learned to drive stick shift, right after getting my drivers license in high school. Now, I say the first time I learned stick because I re-learned how to drive manual and got a heck of a lot more comfortable with it about 3 years later, in college, on a different car -- still learning from my dad, but on a Honda from the late 90's(?), rather than on the gorgeous old Mercedes from the early 60's that he was rather (and rightfully) protective of. The second time, on the Honda, I got comfortable driving it every day to and from the girl scout camp where I was working all summer. The first time, on the Mercedes, it was just around a parking lot, around a cemetery, around a park -- not on any major roads -- after I had already gotten comfortable on an automatic. That time it was mainly so that I'd get the theory down and be ABLE TO DO IT rather than be comfortable with it, I think. I've written before (even just in my last entry) about my dad's insistence (and my subsequent gratitude) that everyone should know how to drive a manual transmission car.
I can't claim to be a car person in the sense of knowing tons about different cars or having a big mechanical aptitude -- I don't really know anything more technical than how to (and this is just in theory because I've never done it, only watched) change a tire or change oil. However, I *am* a car person in the fact that when I see a gorgeous car, I stop and look and drool a bit (usually figuratively, that, but only usually). I appreciate how beautiful they can be, and how lovely they are when they are running just as they should, and when a lovely car in the street, or on a television show to which I am semi-guiltily addicted, or on a website I'm browsing, or wherever, I can't help but stop and admire it. And I truly enjoy driving (though not in heavy traffic, no one likes driving in traffic). Give me a nice, hilly, up and down country road; or the twists and turns of CA-1 up the coast; or honestly just the car radio and a bit of lightly traffic'ed interstate through Pennsylvania to let loose my thoughts, and I'm content. I drove about 1400 miles from Cambridge to Manchester, to Edinburgh, to the Isle of Skye and back one over a period of a week this past summer. Parts of it were miserable, with stop and go traffic, and of course driving for LONG periods of time -- especially driving manual -- left me stiff and with a sore left leg. But the parts where I was flying through the Scottish countryside? Or driving around Skye's coast, occasionally stopping and admiring vistas? Those parts were utterly fantastic. Partly because of my love of travel and seeing new sites, but also partly because of that feeling of "WHEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!"
The number one purchase I think about if someone asks me what I'd do if I ever won the lotto (not that I actually ever play the lotto unless my grandfather gives me a scratch off ticket) is an increasingly detailed dream car. And the image of that dream car is based off of this one. This car -- the one that my grandparents used to drive up to our house when I was little; that's been sitting in my parent's garage since I was about 16 -- old enough to be thinking more seriously about learning to drive and getting my license and whatnot. This car has been around all my life and all my formulative years regarding car beauty. This dream car that I shall purchase first thing with my imaginary lotto winnings, in case anyone is interested, is a sporty little convertible with has a body shape that looks suspiciously like this car -- only with all the amenities that one wants in a car like air conditioning, a working radio, a clock, and an actual back seat. My dream car is is a lovely shade of silvery-blue; is one of those cars that can be driven either in manual or automatic -- because manual is FUN in the right situations, but you sure don't want to drive one uphill in a city with stop and go traffic; is a hybrid -- because the other car, the *automatic* car, that I learned to drive on was a Prius, and I like to be environmentally conscientious and gas prices are only going up and yes in this fantasy I've already won the lotto but still.
Anyway, I am kind of hoping my dad doesn't sell it before I visit home at the end of the month, since I'd love to take it out for one spin in the cemetery or something, just because DAMN. How often do you get to drive that kind of car? (Damn in the "ain't that fine" sense, not in the "cursing the world" sense). Like I said, I don't think I've been allowed to drive it in 10 years -- it rarely came out of the garage, for one thing, except for the occasional 'Fall leaf drive' and other quiet meanderings through the park. I certainly don't begrudge him of it if he sells it off before that, though -- I mean, I certainly could have asked before this to drive it again. I'm pretty sure I even have, a few times, but again, he's been protective of it and I'm not on the insurance or anything as a driver and I haven't had all that much stick practice in the past few years. But. It would be nice. And I *have* been practicing my stick shift lately, even if it was with the opposite hand and on the wrong side of the road. So maybe. We shall see. Either way, it will be sad when it goes. It's a lovely car. But hopefully it will go to someone who will appreciate it, who will fix it up and take it nice places, and who will keep it in good condition, and will be able to spend time enjoying it.
Friday, August 1, 2014
Travelogue: Scotland
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| Eilean Donan Castle |
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| Benson and I at Jodrell Bank |
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The next morning, we arose from our shipping containers, bright and shiny early, and drove to the Isle of Skye. Which was a lovely drive across the lowlands and highlands, going through a national park at one point. Now, you'll note that I was driving. Benson hasn't really driven since he got his license 10 years ago, and doesn't really trust himself behind the wheel. Whereas, I actively enjoy driving (assuming no traffic). This was my first experience driving in Britain, however, and it took some getting used to not only DRIVING on the wrong side of the road (and through endless roundabouts), but also shifting gears with my left hand. Manual cars are the norm in the UK, and much cheaper to rent, you see. My dad taught me how to drive stick shift when I was in college -- he kept a manual car around in part for this purpose, and had me drive said car to my camp job over the summer every day, so I'd get used to it. So it's a useful skill! I never finished writing up my last summer's activities (whoops) but this came in handy last year when we were in Italy, as well -- we stayed at a friend of Benson's house, and borrowed his grandfathers car. Which was stick. And I was the only one of the four of us that could drive -- which made me the designated driver throughout the Italian countryside, and enabled us to see much more of it than we would have been able to otherwise. So worth holding back a bit more on those italian wines....
Anyway, the Isle of Skye was GORGEOUS. We did a lot of hiking over the weekend, drove all around the island, had lots of delicious fresh seafood (and were even taught how to shuck oysters by the proprietor of the wonderful Oyster Shed), saw a TON of sheep (sheep EVERYWHERE), visited the Portree harbor, and, naturally, toured the Talisker Whisky Distillery. Talisker is one of Benson's favorite whiskies, so we got to sample a few very nice ones, too. We stayed at a lovely little B&B which overlooked the Eilean Donan Castle in the town of Dornie (not on the Isle of Skye itself, but within driving distance). After we spent a very nice 2 days in Skye, we headed back to Edinburgh, to explore the town a bit more in depth. We still mainly wandered -- I bought myself some plaid items as souvenirs, we had more delicious food, more whisky at Whiski, visited the main castle there, and climbed up Arthur's seat for a gorgeous view of the city. All in all, a good trip! Now, we're back in Cambridge again, which means... we should probably start thinking about buying tickets and planning our trip to Greece for the last week of August. Yeah... things to get on soon... |
| The view from Arthur's Seat |
Sunday, July 20, 2014
Cooking in Cambridge
So again, I'm spending the summer in Cambridge, visiting Benson. Both of us very much enjoy cooking, and I've been eating better here then I usually do at home, since usually at least *one* of us feels like cooking, and it's a lot more fun to cook for two then to cook for one. So, the result of this is that Benson and I have made breakfast (or brunch) at least once every weekend since I've arrived, which has been pretty awesome. I actually brought to England with me a small bottle of maple syrup which I bought in New Hampshire last week as a gift to Benson -- it's already over half gone!
We've done pancakes, omelets, Dutch Baby, the world's best scrambled eggs, Challah french toast (from scratch -- with my friend Zahava's amazing homemade Challah recipe), and this weekend we made Oeufs en Cocotte (eggs in a pot). I'd never heard of these before (and thus had never made them before), but while we were browsing in a kitchenware store (looking for a cheese grater, amongst other things) we stumbled across these little ceramic mini-casserole dishes which were just too cute for me to pass up (my one true weakness: kitchenware). So, while commenting to Benson, waiting in line, that I had no idea what we would make with them but I had to have them anyway, the lady in front of us suggested making Cocette - a french dish she knew, with eggs and ham all made in a tiny ramekin - perfect for the little crockery we were purchasing. So, with help from Google, we had this for brunch this morning.
Oeufs en Cocotte
4 eggs
150 grams (5.5 oz) créme fraiche
nutmeg (a pinch)
salt and pepper (to taste)
handful of fresh chopped dill
butter
Optional additions: chopped up ham, bacon bits, asparagus, smoked salmon, cheese, anything else that might go in a delicious eggy breakfast dish!
This dish was quite easy to make - first, preheat the oven to 180C/350F (switching units of measurements for temperature and cooking in England has been a tad aggravating, I admit, but I'm getting used to it). Mix the créme fraiche with dill, salt and pepper, and a dash of nutmeg in a small bowl. Then, butter 4 ramekins (we just did this in the 2 little dishes, but ramekins are usually smaller) completely, and put a generous spoonful of the creamy mix in the bottom of each one. If you are adding ham, cheese, or other things, put those in next (we just used ham, which was a nice addition), and crack an egg on top of that (in our crockeries we put 2 eggs, since they were large enough). Finally, put a dallop of the créme fraiche mix on top of all of this, and put another sprinkle of salt and pepper and a dash of dill to garnish. Put your ramekins in a baking pan, and fill the pan with warm to hot water until it comes halfway up the side of the ramekins. Bake for 15-20 minutes, until the eggs have set nicely.
These are great. I particularly like the taste that the dill gives to the recipe - dill is something I really like but don't actually go out and get very often (it doesn't dry well in my opinion, fresh is the way to go, and I usually don't buy a lot fresh herbs because they only come in huge packs at the store and they go bad before I can use them all). I also associate the taste and smell of dill with my grandmother (on my dad's side) -- she was a fantastic cook, and I don't think I encountered dill very often anywhere other than her house when I was little, so it's a pretty strong sensory memory associated with her. Can't have it without thinking about her. Anyway, so yes, a delicious brunch, and pretty easy to do, if you have ramekins.
Dinner is also a thing Benson and I have been making, obviously. So we also recently made the *best* chicken wings I've ever made in my life. We combined two recipes for the task -- first, Korean chicken wings are amazing, so we found a recipe for the sauce used in San Tung Fried chicken wings (here). We lack a deep fryer, however, so instead we decided to bake our chicken wings. However, the best thing about Korean chicken wings is how deliciously crispy they are. Which means we managed to discover a recipe which crispifies chicken wings in the oven extremely well instead (here)! We modified the crispy bit a little.
Crispy, Oven-baked San Tung Chicken Wings
Wings:
4 lbs chicken wings
2 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup flour
Sauce:
2-3 scallions
10-15 cilantro sprigs
2-3 tbs soy sauce
1/2 cup honey
1/4 cup water
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 tbs rice vinegar (we substituted apple cider vinegar mixed with white wine)
1 tsp chili garlic sauce or red peppers (AKA - Sriracha sauce!)
Preheat the oven to 250F (yes, two hundred fifty, not a typo). Pat the chicken wings dry. Mix baking powder, flour, and salt and sprinkle/coat the chicken wings with the mix -- you don't want to heavily coat your wings, because then they taste like baking powder, but you want to cover them well. This is the agent which is going to make your chicken wings crispy! You can add the flour mix through a sifter or a mesh strainer to sprinkle it lightly over the wings if you would like, rather than rolling it in the flour mix to coat it.
You are going to bake the wings on a wire rack -- so you want to put the rack on a cookie sheet, with aluminum foil covering the sheet (for easier cleaning). Then evenly arrange the wings, skin side up, in a single layer on the rack and bake at 250F for 30 minutes (this dries out the skin). Then, increase the temperature of the wings to 425F for 40-50 minutes more, rotating the sheet halfway through. The wings should be lovely and crispy and brown at this point, so take them out and let sit for 5 minutes. Then, simply toss in the sauce until they're all coated and delicious.
Ah yes, the sauce. Also an important thing you should make. The sauce is quite easy though -- just mix all the ingredients in a sauce pan, put on low-medium heat, and simmer (stirring frequently) for 5-10 minutes until it has thickened. We found that starting the sauce right after you rotate the chicken wings is about the right amount of time, giving you 20 minutes or so.
These are AMAZING. We served them over rice -- we actually made a half recipe, which was plenty for two with the rice. But for a larger group, make more!
So, all in all, having a lovely time in Cambridge. I've also gone into London 3 times now -- once as described in the last post, once for a live show of a comedy radio program I really like, and once to go to the Victoria and Albert museum as well as to track down the *best scotch egg* in London. We succeeded in this second task, finding ourselves in a really great Michelin star pub for lunch which served game and had *perfect* venison sausage covered scotch eggs. That was a good day!
Until next time!
We've done pancakes, omelets, Dutch Baby, the world's best scrambled eggs, Challah french toast (from scratch -- with my friend Zahava's amazing homemade Challah recipe), and this weekend we made Oeufs en Cocotte (eggs in a pot). I'd never heard of these before (and thus had never made them before), but while we were browsing in a kitchenware store (looking for a cheese grater, amongst other things) we stumbled across these little ceramic mini-casserole dishes which were just too cute for me to pass up (my one true weakness: kitchenware). So, while commenting to Benson, waiting in line, that I had no idea what we would make with them but I had to have them anyway, the lady in front of us suggested making Cocette - a french dish she knew, with eggs and ham all made in a tiny ramekin - perfect for the little crockery we were purchasing. So, with help from Google, we had this for brunch this morning.
Oeufs en Cocotte
4 eggs
150 grams (5.5 oz) créme fraiche
nutmeg (a pinch)
salt and pepper (to taste)
handful of fresh chopped dill
butter
Optional additions: chopped up ham, bacon bits, asparagus, smoked salmon, cheese, anything else that might go in a delicious eggy breakfast dish!
This dish was quite easy to make - first, preheat the oven to 180C/350F (switching units of measurements for temperature and cooking in England has been a tad aggravating, I admit, but I'm getting used to it). Mix the créme fraiche with dill, salt and pepper, and a dash of nutmeg in a small bowl. Then, butter 4 ramekins (we just did this in the 2 little dishes, but ramekins are usually smaller) completely, and put a generous spoonful of the creamy mix in the bottom of each one. If you are adding ham, cheese, or other things, put those in next (we just used ham, which was a nice addition), and crack an egg on top of that (in our crockeries we put 2 eggs, since they were large enough). Finally, put a dallop of the créme fraiche mix on top of all of this, and put another sprinkle of salt and pepper and a dash of dill to garnish. Put your ramekins in a baking pan, and fill the pan with warm to hot water until it comes halfway up the side of the ramekins. Bake for 15-20 minutes, until the eggs have set nicely.
These are great. I particularly like the taste that the dill gives to the recipe - dill is something I really like but don't actually go out and get very often (it doesn't dry well in my opinion, fresh is the way to go, and I usually don't buy a lot fresh herbs because they only come in huge packs at the store and they go bad before I can use them all). I also associate the taste and smell of dill with my grandmother (on my dad's side) -- she was a fantastic cook, and I don't think I encountered dill very often anywhere other than her house when I was little, so it's a pretty strong sensory memory associated with her. Can't have it without thinking about her. Anyway, so yes, a delicious brunch, and pretty easy to do, if you have ramekins.
Dinner is also a thing Benson and I have been making, obviously. So we also recently made the *best* chicken wings I've ever made in my life. We combined two recipes for the task -- first, Korean chicken wings are amazing, so we found a recipe for the sauce used in San Tung Fried chicken wings (here). We lack a deep fryer, however, so instead we decided to bake our chicken wings. However, the best thing about Korean chicken wings is how deliciously crispy they are. Which means we managed to discover a recipe which crispifies chicken wings in the oven extremely well instead (here)! We modified the crispy bit a little.
Crispy, Oven-baked San Tung Chicken WingsWings:
4 lbs chicken wings
2 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup flour
Sauce:
2-3 scallions
10-15 cilantro sprigs
2-3 tbs soy sauce
1/2 cup honey
1/4 cup water
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 tbs rice vinegar (we substituted apple cider vinegar mixed with white wine)
1 tsp chili garlic sauce or red peppers (AKA - Sriracha sauce!)
You are going to bake the wings on a wire rack -- so you want to put the rack on a cookie sheet, with aluminum foil covering the sheet (for easier cleaning). Then evenly arrange the wings, skin side up, in a single layer on the rack and bake at 250F for 30 minutes (this dries out the skin). Then, increase the temperature of the wings to 425F for 40-50 minutes more, rotating the sheet halfway through. The wings should be lovely and crispy and brown at this point, so take them out and let sit for 5 minutes. Then, simply toss in the sauce until they're all coated and delicious.
These are AMAZING. We served them over rice -- we actually made a half recipe, which was plenty for two with the rice. But for a larger group, make more!
So, all in all, having a lovely time in Cambridge. I've also gone into London 3 times now -- once as described in the last post, once for a live show of a comedy radio program I really like, and once to go to the Victoria and Albert museum as well as to track down the *best scotch egg* in London. We succeeded in this second task, finding ourselves in a really great Michelin star pub for lunch which served game and had *perfect* venison sausage covered scotch eggs. That was a good day!
Until next time!
Thursday, July 3, 2014
An American Abroad
So, as I may or may not have mentioned, I'm spending this summer in Cambridge, England, where Benson works as a postdoc. I've been here almost three weeks now, and overall, I'm just very content and happy. I've settled in here pretty well.
I've got official visitor status at the IOA now, and am moving from desk to desk as various astro grad students are on vacation, or working in the library when no desks are available. The people here are friendly and interesting to talk to, I've been having good conversations about science and about non-science things, too. I'm chatting with the grad students at lunch and during coffee and afternoon tea (both of which are daily here... which is good except it makes it overly easy to take breaks and not be working!). My paper is coming along, not as far as I would have liked, but I feel like I'm making progress. After work, Benson and I cook nice dinners together on almost a daily basis, then hang out, watch TV, play games, or even work a bit at home. Or we bike into Cambridge and watch 'football' (aka soccer) at a pub with some of his friends, or go to the market (there is a very nice market in the town square), or watch movies at his department. Watching the world cup has been a lot of fun here -- even if the USA is now out. We watched the USA/Belgium game at the "Isaac Newton Pub," where apparently a bunch of Americans had gathered to watch the game. (Our keen senses picked up on this when people on the other side of the pub started belting out the National Anthem at the beginning of the game -- of course, the Americans at OUR table then joined in as well.) Quite a gripping game, even if we got out at the end. Tomorrow for the 4th, we're going to a pub with a German friend of Benson's to watch the Germany/France game, then are going to wander the town and do *something* vaguely patriotic or celebratory, I suppose -- perhaps we can find other Americans out and about.
Benson's flat has the most gorgeous view out the back of a huge field and trees and whatnot in the distance. I'm biking to work every morning past horses (well, one field of them, anyway), but the town center is like 10 minutes by bike, extremely easy to get to, we go in pretty regularly. And honestly, the IOA couldn't be closer to the department, it's like an 8 minute walk, which means it is barely even a bike ride. EVERYBODY bikes here, the town is *quite* bike friendly. It's also easy to get into London by train. We've only gone in once so far -- we went to the British Museum and attempted to do the entire thing in a day -- an exhausting and somewhat hopeless task, but we did walk through every room at least, even if we didn't look at most things closely. We then went around town to see all the big landmarks: Big Ben, the Houses of Parliament, westminster abbey, the Eye of London, the Tower of London, the famed London Bridge (aka the Tower Bridge). A fun day! And of course I've been trying to eat all 'typical' English foods -- bangers and mash, meat pies, fish and chips, tikka masala (which is as English as the fortune cookie is American, plus there is a LOT of good Indian food here).
As I mentioned, there is a market in town, so we've been cooking a lot. Mostly simple things -- stir-fry with rice, oven baked chicken, sloppy joes, the most gorgeous and huge artichokes from the market that I have ever seen, a homemade omelet and bacon (the bacon here tastes different, and is a lot leaner, which is fine, I guess, but leaves us without extra bacon grease with which to cook other things... and the bacon doesn't feel quite as *decedent*) -- but we've also done stuff like homemade wonton. And this weekend we're thinking of doing another French Laundry project, we haven't decided quite what to do. In general, I find it's a LOT nicer to cook for two than to cook for one, so I've been eating and cooking more here than I usually do back in NYC, with more variety and fewer leftovers. We're also planning on going back into London next Monday, do another museum (we're deciding between the Tate Modern and the Victoria Albert museum, we'll do them both eventually, it's just a matter of priority), get a nice dinner, and then I managed to get us free tickets to a recording of a radio show I like: John Finnemore's Souvenir Programme (basically, a radio sketch comedy show). So that should be fun!
That's all for now, I'll be sure to post a few more status updates while I'm here.
Benson's flat has the most gorgeous view out the back of a huge field and trees and whatnot in the distance. I'm biking to work every morning past horses (well, one field of them, anyway), but the town center is like 10 minutes by bike, extremely easy to get to, we go in pretty regularly. And honestly, the IOA couldn't be closer to the department, it's like an 8 minute walk, which means it is barely even a bike ride. EVERYBODY bikes here, the town is *quite* bike friendly. It's also easy to get into London by train. We've only gone in once so far -- we went to the British Museum and attempted to do the entire thing in a day -- an exhausting and somewhat hopeless task, but we did walk through every room at least, even if we didn't look at most things closely. We then went around town to see all the big landmarks: Big Ben, the Houses of Parliament, westminster abbey, the Eye of London, the Tower of London, the famed London Bridge (aka the Tower Bridge). A fun day! And of course I've been trying to eat all 'typical' English foods -- bangers and mash, meat pies, fish and chips, tikka masala (which is as English as the fortune cookie is American, plus there is a LOT of good Indian food here).As I mentioned, there is a market in town, so we've been cooking a lot. Mostly simple things -- stir-fry with rice, oven baked chicken, sloppy joes, the most gorgeous and huge artichokes from the market that I have ever seen, a homemade omelet and bacon (the bacon here tastes different, and is a lot leaner, which is fine, I guess, but leaves us without extra bacon grease with which to cook other things... and the bacon doesn't feel quite as *decedent*) -- but we've also done stuff like homemade wonton. And this weekend we're thinking of doing another French Laundry project, we haven't decided quite what to do. In general, I find it's a LOT nicer to cook for two than to cook for one, so I've been eating and cooking more here than I usually do back in NYC, with more variety and fewer leftovers. We're also planning on going back into London next Monday, do another museum (we're deciding between the Tate Modern and the Victoria Albert museum, we'll do them both eventually, it's just a matter of priority), get a nice dinner, and then I managed to get us free tickets to a recording of a radio show I like: John Finnemore's Souvenir Programme (basically, a radio sketch comedy show). So that should be fun!
That's all for now, I'll be sure to post a few more status updates while I'm here.
Wednesday, June 4, 2014
Movie Review: Maleficent
Or: How did you fail me? Let me count the ways.
Before I start, I should state I'm going to be spoiling pretty much the entire movie in this review. Because when I'm frustrated with a movie (or excited with one, let's be honest) I can get a bit carried away in my discussion of the topic. (Indeed, after this movie, I actually went and spoiled an old Hitchcock movie for a friend because I got caught up in my rant on disappointing movies. Hint: if you ever want to watch the movie "Suspicion", don't get me started on how I feel about that movie and how of all the movies I've seen, it was the one that let me down the most because it was *GREAT* until about the last 5 minutes and then it RUINED EVERYTHING because of STUPID STUDIO EXECS and wasn't Hitchcock's fault at all, he had a brilliant ending planned but nooooooooo. Can't have THAT. Mumble mumble spoilers mumble mumble.)
So. Don't read on if you haven't seen the movie unless you don't mind spoilers.
Now. Maleficent.
I was extremely excited by this movie (which is part of the reason I feel so let down now). The trailer looked great; I *adored* the single "Once Upon a Dream" that was released from the teaser; I have a strong partiality towards fairy tales redone, and those retold from the villains point of view are usually a lot of fun (Wicked, for example, is great fun. And things like the 100 Kingdoms books. Or Ella Enchanted.) So I went in with high expectations. Indeed, prior to seeing the movie, I made a point of re-watching the original Sleeping Beauty (which I also love, but hadn't seen in ages -- it's a gorgeous movie! They don't do animation like that anymore - hand painted backgrounds with incredible detail, drawn stills based on live models....) and listening to Tchaikovsky's original Sleeping Beauty ballet (on which the original movies score is based -- "Once Upon a Dream" is based on a waltz in it, for example.)
First off: technical stuff. The score was disappointing, especially as the first thing that drew me to the movie was the gorgeous creepy take on "Once Upon A Dream." Alas, that song appeared only in the final credits. I didn't notice any other references to the original scoring during the movie, and the scoring that was there was just... I want to say standard modernish fantasy music with heavy inspiration from Harry Potter that was neither creepy, moving, or in any way special or memorable. And while we're going with look and feel, the CG was not great. The moors were supposed to be a realm of magic and wonder, they certainly could have tried to make them a bit more impressive. The original art from the 1959 movie is so beautiful -- this was... not so much.
Now for the main issue: the plot. The plot did not know what it was doing. It starts off decently enough: there is a kingdom where all the humans live, and a separate realm for all the fae creatures. A young Maleficent falls for a young Stefan (an ambitious and curious child) but they grow apart as they age. However, when Stefan finds out he could succeed as king if he kills Maleficent, he uses their former connection to establish trust, drugs her, and -- while he can't bring himself to kill her -- cuts off her wings to bring home as a trophy, to prove he has what it takes to rule and as a promise that he'll try and take over the fairy realm, like the current king wants. Which is a *terrible* and *horrifying* thing, but completely reasonable as a premise (and as the review here states, is a thing that while children might be shocked by this betrayal, adults, unfortunately, won't be.) So far, so good. However, this is where things start going wrong.
This movie *could* have gone the "she's protecting her realm from invaders" route. Or the "misunderstood and not actually doing anything that evil" route. Or even the "gradually starts making choices that lead her down a darker and darker path until she's completely corrupted" route. But no. Instead, rejected, mutilated, and heartbroken, she does a complete 180, takes over the fairy realm and instantly establishes herself as an evil and terrifying queen (modifying and darkening the landscape around her), and, of course, curses Stefan's firstborn child to die. [Now, a minor note here: in the first scene of the movie, it establishes that the moor where the fae live does not need a ruler and everyone lives in harmony! As she grows, Maleficent graduates to a protector of that realm (being the strongest fairy) but as soon as she gets betrayed, she immediately seizes power and none of the others put up any fuss about this. And at the end, when things are supposedly back to their happy state at the end, she randomly declares that Aurora is going to be joint queen of that realm and the human kingdom! Huzzah! Yeah... does not compute.]
This brings us to the three 'good' fairies. I do not know WHAT was up with them. I think they were supposed to be comic relief? The fact that they showed up at all to the christening was a little odd, considering the fact humans tried to invade the moor and Stefan mutilated their realms protector. Are they just traitors to their species? I was prepared to snicker despairingly that the gifts from the fairies were beauty and a lovely voice -- clearly the most important things for a young lady to have! However, they swapped the second fairy's gift to "She'll NEVER be UNHAPPY or BLUE." What the hell??? That's a TERRIBLE GIFT. You will never be able to feel unhappiness. You have no control over your emotions! Plus, it didn't even WORK - I was wondering if Aurora was going to go through the movie in a state of clueless bliss because of it, but, while certainly clueless, she definitely had some moments where she was less than thrilled. And then the three fairies take charge of the baby and decide to do so without magic and are hopelessly terrible at it and it's a wonder the poor kid doesn't die.
Except it's not a wonder, apparently. After Maleficent curses the baby, she finds it right away, and instead of letting the three neglectful fairies do her work for her, or just taking care of things there and then, she decides to protect the child and follow her around as she grows up. She naturally grows to care for her (though I can't say I grew overly fond of Aurora) and eventually even tries to lift the curse (but fails). Aurora mistakes her for her fairy godmother and decides she wants to live in the fairy realm with her as they grow to care for each other. However, once Aurora finds out that Maleficent cursed her, she doesn't even give the woman she had JUST said she loved and wanted to live with forever and take care of her and be happy with a chance to explain, or ANYTHING. Nope, she just runs off, straight into the arms of her father. Her father, who has just been growing more obsessed about finding and killing off Maleficent as the years go by, even ignoring the death of his wife, the Queen who did not even merit a name (though according to IMDB she had one - Leila. It didn't ever came up in the actual movie, though.) He barely looks at her, and just sends her off to a tower while he prepares to try and kill Maleficent when she approaches.
I won't go through the entire climax. Maleficent decides to make sure that Aurora gets cured on her own, gets into the castle, Aurora awakens (see my positive notes, below) and as they go downstairs, Stefan attacks and there is a big fight. Stefan gets what is coming to him, dying a predictably Disney death by falling to his doom after Maleficent spares him, thus negating all responsibility on anybodies part. The ending is abrupt and saccharine and doesn't really track very well at all. In general people's motivations aren't well explored or understandable, and while I understand if you want to make this movie about Maleficent and make her the 'good guy' you have to make changes to the story, you can still make the other side more complex and interesting, and you can still try and make people behave in ways that make sense for *them* instead of doing things all over the map.
On the plus side: Angelina Jolie was magnificent. She was working with poor source material, but she *worked* it, and looked dead on as Maleficent. When she was on screen, my eyes were glued to her. Definitely the highlight - she was creepy, wounded, and lovely, even when I was let down her actions, she was still brilliant doing them. Whoever designed her look also deserves props - she could alternate between beautiful and terrifying while keeping all the same features - her horns made her look gorgeous in the right context! I also liked that it was Maleficent that added the "true loves kiss" thing to the curse as a mocking note to Stefan, who supposedly give her a 'true loves kiss' when they were younger. She also got to use her awesome opening lines from the 1959 movie, and delivered them perfectly.
Additionally, I was quite pleased by the fact that Prince Phillip was understandably -- but considering how things usually go in movies, unusually -- reticent about kissing a girl he'd just met the once while she was sound asleep and thus completely out of it. And then it didn't WORK because you don't get true love after one conversation with a person. Seriously. Thank goodness for smashing THAT sort of trope. They handled the manifestation of the dragon well (though I wish it was closer to the original movie design) and they didn't suddenly hand Maleficent shapeshifting powers, they did it in a logical manner by giving that to the shapeshifting crow. The fact that they made the thicket around the castle a nest of cold-iron thorns was pretty cute, though easily circumvented. Indeed, I really appreciated that they made it clear that, like in the lore, fairies are weak against cold iron. I also appreciated some of the small touches referencing the original movie: the cottage design looked like the cottage; the castle looked like the castle; the abandoned ruin which makes her headquarters in the original looked spot on.
So. To sum up. Disappointing CG, design, and score. Plot is patchy, doesn't track well, and doesn't create a new and interesting story from the original. The reason why people do certain things and make various choices is completely incomprehensible at times, inconsistent at others. It really doesn't say anything new. I would say that the ads were quite misleading, in fact - don't go in expecting Wicked. Nothing is all bad, there are some highlights, but overall, not worth it.
(Huh. Both my movie reviews in this blog were movies I felt strongly disappointed by (the other being the Hobbit). I should try and remember to review a movie I actually like at some point.)
Before I start, I should state I'm going to be spoiling pretty much the entire movie in this review. Because when I'm frustrated with a movie (or excited with one, let's be honest) I can get a bit carried away in my discussion of the topic. (Indeed, after this movie, I actually went and spoiled an old Hitchcock movie for a friend because I got caught up in my rant on disappointing movies. Hint: if you ever want to watch the movie "Suspicion", don't get me started on how I feel about that movie and how of all the movies I've seen, it was the one that let me down the most because it was *GREAT* until about the last 5 minutes and then it RUINED EVERYTHING because of STUPID STUDIO EXECS and wasn't Hitchcock's fault at all, he had a brilliant ending planned but nooooooooo. Can't have THAT. Mumble mumble spoilers mumble mumble.)
So. Don't read on if you haven't seen the movie unless you don't mind spoilers.
Now. Maleficent.
I was extremely excited by this movie (which is part of the reason I feel so let down now). The trailer looked great; I *adored* the single "Once Upon a Dream" that was released from the teaser; I have a strong partiality towards fairy tales redone, and those retold from the villains point of view are usually a lot of fun (Wicked, for example, is great fun. And things like the 100 Kingdoms books. Or Ella Enchanted.) So I went in with high expectations. Indeed, prior to seeing the movie, I made a point of re-watching the original Sleeping Beauty (which I also love, but hadn't seen in ages -- it's a gorgeous movie! They don't do animation like that anymore - hand painted backgrounds with incredible detail, drawn stills based on live models....) and listening to Tchaikovsky's original Sleeping Beauty ballet (on which the original movies score is based -- "Once Upon a Dream" is based on a waltz in it, for example.)
First off: technical stuff. The score was disappointing, especially as the first thing that drew me to the movie was the gorgeous creepy take on "Once Upon A Dream." Alas, that song appeared only in the final credits. I didn't notice any other references to the original scoring during the movie, and the scoring that was there was just... I want to say standard modernish fantasy music with heavy inspiration from Harry Potter that was neither creepy, moving, or in any way special or memorable. And while we're going with look and feel, the CG was not great. The moors were supposed to be a realm of magic and wonder, they certainly could have tried to make them a bit more impressive. The original art from the 1959 movie is so beautiful -- this was... not so much.
Now for the main issue: the plot. The plot did not know what it was doing. It starts off decently enough: there is a kingdom where all the humans live, and a separate realm for all the fae creatures. A young Maleficent falls for a young Stefan (an ambitious and curious child) but they grow apart as they age. However, when Stefan finds out he could succeed as king if he kills Maleficent, he uses their former connection to establish trust, drugs her, and -- while he can't bring himself to kill her -- cuts off her wings to bring home as a trophy, to prove he has what it takes to rule and as a promise that he'll try and take over the fairy realm, like the current king wants. Which is a *terrible* and *horrifying* thing, but completely reasonable as a premise (and as the review here states, is a thing that while children might be shocked by this betrayal, adults, unfortunately, won't be.) So far, so good. However, this is where things start going wrong.
This movie *could* have gone the "she's protecting her realm from invaders" route. Or the "misunderstood and not actually doing anything that evil" route. Or even the "gradually starts making choices that lead her down a darker and darker path until she's completely corrupted" route. But no. Instead, rejected, mutilated, and heartbroken, she does a complete 180, takes over the fairy realm and instantly establishes herself as an evil and terrifying queen (modifying and darkening the landscape around her), and, of course, curses Stefan's firstborn child to die. [Now, a minor note here: in the first scene of the movie, it establishes that the moor where the fae live does not need a ruler and everyone lives in harmony! As she grows, Maleficent graduates to a protector of that realm (being the strongest fairy) but as soon as she gets betrayed, she immediately seizes power and none of the others put up any fuss about this. And at the end, when things are supposedly back to their happy state at the end, she randomly declares that Aurora is going to be joint queen of that realm and the human kingdom! Huzzah! Yeah... does not compute.]
This brings us to the three 'good' fairies. I do not know WHAT was up with them. I think they were supposed to be comic relief? The fact that they showed up at all to the christening was a little odd, considering the fact humans tried to invade the moor and Stefan mutilated their realms protector. Are they just traitors to their species? I was prepared to snicker despairingly that the gifts from the fairies were beauty and a lovely voice -- clearly the most important things for a young lady to have! However, they swapped the second fairy's gift to "She'll NEVER be UNHAPPY or BLUE." What the hell??? That's a TERRIBLE GIFT. You will never be able to feel unhappiness. You have no control over your emotions! Plus, it didn't even WORK - I was wondering if Aurora was going to go through the movie in a state of clueless bliss because of it, but, while certainly clueless, she definitely had some moments where she was less than thrilled. And then the three fairies take charge of the baby and decide to do so without magic and are hopelessly terrible at it and it's a wonder the poor kid doesn't die.
Except it's not a wonder, apparently. After Maleficent curses the baby, she finds it right away, and instead of letting the three neglectful fairies do her work for her, or just taking care of things there and then, she decides to protect the child and follow her around as she grows up. She naturally grows to care for her (though I can't say I grew overly fond of Aurora) and eventually even tries to lift the curse (but fails). Aurora mistakes her for her fairy godmother and decides she wants to live in the fairy realm with her as they grow to care for each other. However, once Aurora finds out that Maleficent cursed her, she doesn't even give the woman she had JUST said she loved and wanted to live with forever and take care of her and be happy with a chance to explain, or ANYTHING. Nope, she just runs off, straight into the arms of her father. Her father, who has just been growing more obsessed about finding and killing off Maleficent as the years go by, even ignoring the death of his wife, the Queen who did not even merit a name (though according to IMDB she had one - Leila. It didn't ever came up in the actual movie, though.) He barely looks at her, and just sends her off to a tower while he prepares to try and kill Maleficent when she approaches.
I won't go through the entire climax. Maleficent decides to make sure that Aurora gets cured on her own, gets into the castle, Aurora awakens (see my positive notes, below) and as they go downstairs, Stefan attacks and there is a big fight. Stefan gets what is coming to him, dying a predictably Disney death by falling to his doom after Maleficent spares him, thus negating all responsibility on anybodies part. The ending is abrupt and saccharine and doesn't really track very well at all. In general people's motivations aren't well explored or understandable, and while I understand if you want to make this movie about Maleficent and make her the 'good guy' you have to make changes to the story, you can still make the other side more complex and interesting, and you can still try and make people behave in ways that make sense for *them* instead of doing things all over the map.
On the plus side: Angelina Jolie was magnificent. She was working with poor source material, but she *worked* it, and looked dead on as Maleficent. When she was on screen, my eyes were glued to her. Definitely the highlight - she was creepy, wounded, and lovely, even when I was let down her actions, she was still brilliant doing them. Whoever designed her look also deserves props - she could alternate between beautiful and terrifying while keeping all the same features - her horns made her look gorgeous in the right context! I also liked that it was Maleficent that added the "true loves kiss" thing to the curse as a mocking note to Stefan, who supposedly give her a 'true loves kiss' when they were younger. She also got to use her awesome opening lines from the 1959 movie, and delivered them perfectly.
Additionally, I was quite pleased by the fact that Prince Phillip was understandably -- but considering how things usually go in movies, unusually -- reticent about kissing a girl he'd just met the once while she was sound asleep and thus completely out of it. And then it didn't WORK because you don't get true love after one conversation with a person. Seriously. Thank goodness for smashing THAT sort of trope. They handled the manifestation of the dragon well (though I wish it was closer to the original movie design) and they didn't suddenly hand Maleficent shapeshifting powers, they did it in a logical manner by giving that to the shapeshifting crow. The fact that they made the thicket around the castle a nest of cold-iron thorns was pretty cute, though easily circumvented. Indeed, I really appreciated that they made it clear that, like in the lore, fairies are weak against cold iron. I also appreciated some of the small touches referencing the original movie: the cottage design looked like the cottage; the castle looked like the castle; the abandoned ruin which makes her headquarters in the original looked spot on.
So. To sum up. Disappointing CG, design, and score. Plot is patchy, doesn't track well, and doesn't create a new and interesting story from the original. The reason why people do certain things and make various choices is completely incomprehensible at times, inconsistent at others. It really doesn't say anything new. I would say that the ads were quite misleading, in fact - don't go in expecting Wicked. Nothing is all bad, there are some highlights, but overall, not worth it.
(Huh. Both my movie reviews in this blog were movies I felt strongly disappointed by (the other being the Hobbit). I should try and remember to review a movie I actually like at some point.)
Saturday, May 31, 2014
Cleaning out the Freezer
This summer I'm going to be spending three months in the UK, where my boyfriend, Benson, is working his post-doc position. So prior to leaving (in two weeks!), I've been trying to eat all the consumables in my apartment that are sitting in my pantry, my fridge, my freezer. This has resulted in me eating and making some interesting dishes lately, just to get rid of various ingredients. This past week, this resulted in me making Matzah Ball soup (getting rid of a bunch of soup stock), pan-fried chicken hearts (getting rid of chicken hearts), and dark chocolate beet brownies (getting rid of both some frozen leftover beets AND my chocolate chips). I got the recipe for the beets from here, altering the recipe slightly by removing an egg, adding a bit of extra salt, and swapping butter in for oil, so if you compare to the website I got the recipe from, you'll see a few changes. The chicken hearts, I improvised after looking at a bunch of different recipes, none of which I liked completely. (And I'll leave the Matzah Ball recipe, recipe from my friend Abe but with bacon fat substituted in for chicken fat because I didn't have any chicken fat -- the most unkosher matzah ball soup ever -- for another time.)
Dark Chocolate Beet Brownies
2 large beets, peeled (~1 lb)
2 large eggs
2/3 c. brown sugar
2/3 c. white sugar
1/2 c. butter, melted
2 tsp vanilla extract
1.25 c. cocoa powder
3/4 c. flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp kosher or sea salt
1 c. chocolate chips
So as I said, I had some beets in my freezer (see "Death of a Lobster" - yes they were a year old - but you can freeze that kind of thing for ages and they're still just fine) -- basically extremely finely chopped beets, which had been through a blender, and which came from roughly 1lb of beets. Now, if you have your own beets not yet pureed, chop them up into a smallish dice, boil them in water until they're soft, drain well, then puree in a blender. If it doesn't blend well, add some melted butter from your butter reserve (as the butter is going to go in your brownies anyway!) so that it purees! You want the puree NOT to be hot (warm is ok, but NOT hot) so let that sit and cool a bit. In a separate bowl, mix flour, any remaining butter (melted), vanilla and sugars. Then add the beets and blend until homogenous. Next add the dry ingredients, mix again, then finally stir in the chocolate chips. Pour everything into a WELL GREASED, 9x13 baking pan, and bake in a pre-heated 350 degree oven for 30 minutes until a toothpick comes out clean. Let cool, then consume these delicious, rich and uniquely flavorful brownies at your will!
Pan-fried chicken hearts with garlic and rosemary
chicken hearts
a few cloves garlic, minced
olive oil
rosemary
salt
pepper
cayenne pepper
chili powder (for an optional KICK)
flour
bacon fat (or other oil/fat to cook them in! Butter, chicken grease, or even more oil would work fine)
2 large beets, peeled (~1 lb)
2 large eggs
2/3 c. brown sugar
2/3 c. white sugar
1/2 c. butter, melted
2 tsp vanilla extract
1.25 c. cocoa powder
3/4 c. flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp kosher or sea salt
1 c. chocolate chips
So as I said, I had some beets in my freezer (see "Death of a Lobster" - yes they were a year old - but you can freeze that kind of thing for ages and they're still just fine) -- basically extremely finely chopped beets, which had been through a blender, and which came from roughly 1lb of beets. Now, if you have your own beets not yet pureed, chop them up into a smallish dice, boil them in water until they're soft, drain well, then puree in a blender. If it doesn't blend well, add some melted butter from your butter reserve (as the butter is going to go in your brownies anyway!) so that it purees! You want the puree NOT to be hot (warm is ok, but NOT hot) so let that sit and cool a bit. In a separate bowl, mix flour, any remaining butter (melted), vanilla and sugars. Then add the beets and blend until homogenous. Next add the dry ingredients, mix again, then finally stir in the chocolate chips. Pour everything into a WELL GREASED, 9x13 baking pan, and bake in a pre-heated 350 degree oven for 30 minutes until a toothpick comes out clean. Let cool, then consume these delicious, rich and uniquely flavorful brownies at your will!
Pan-fried chicken hearts with garlic and rosemary
chicken hearts
a few cloves garlic, minced
olive oil
rosemary
salt
pepper
cayenne pepper
chili powder (for an optional KICK)
flour
bacon fat (or other oil/fat to cook them in! Butter, chicken grease, or even more oil would work fine)
So as you can see, this recipe doesn't really have... proportions. I had a container of chicken hearts, and just kind of scaled accordingly. I sliced them up into strips (like 4 slices/heart - not quartered, but flattened slivers) rinsed and drained them thoroughly, then tossed with olive oil and the various spices to taste until they were well covered, then let them sit in the fridge for a couple hours (though honestly, 30 minutes would probably be fine). After that, I simply tossed the heart slices in flour and pan fried them in bacon fat (because everything improves with bacon fat!) for maybe 10 minutes, until they were cooked through. Then I popped them in a bowl and ate them as is. These turned out REALLY well - I tend to be ...non-discriminating when it comes to what types of food I'm willing to consume, so eating hearts doesn't bother me. Especially considering that my family always eats the chicken innards when we roast a chicken (or turkey, or other fowl beast) anyway. My dad's even made chicken heart soup. So eating chicken hearts is nothing new. However, when cooked this way, rather than baked to death inside a roasting chicken, they turn out extremely tender and juicy, much better than I've had them before (again, boiled or roasted to death). 10/10 would recommend for the more adventurous eater!
Sunday, March 30, 2014
Homestyle Cooking: Meatloaf!
Everybody has their own recipe for meatloaf, and each one is just the way you had it growing up, and no other recipe for meatloaf can compare. What good is meatloaf if it's not just the way that mom/dad/grandma used to make? In college, my biggest almost-fights - recurrent arguments? Joking arguments that almost weren't jokes? - with my friend Abe were over our respective meatloaf recipes. His recipe involves lots of ketchup, with more ketchup served on top - meatloaf, to his family, is a mechanism for getting rid of ketchup in a tasty fashion. Whereas I would never let ketchup within a MILE of my meatloaf - who eats meatloaf with ketchup??? Meatloaf is nostalgia, personified (food-onified?). As such, visiting my folks last week over Spring break, and having my grandfather over, I happily use my mothers - or rather, her Aunt Grace's - meatloaf recipe for some good home cooking. I don't tend to make it for myself very often, as it's rather a lot of food for one person. On the other hand, it does freeze well. But when I make it for family, well, there is never enough left to freeze!
Meatloaf
Preheat oven 400F. Mix all
ingredients thoroughly - I usually just do this by hand, as I find that gets the whole mixture a bit more homogenous. Now, this recipe is a bit flexible, and usually when I make it it's with a little more (or less) meat. As such, I usually give it a good mix, then add more tomato sauce or breadcrumbs as necessary. You want the meat to be firm and moist - holding it's shape well - you don't want it to be overly crumbly from too many breadcrumbs or overly moist or slimy from too much tomato sauce or too many eggs. When cooking in Baltimore, I actually usually make a 2+ lb batch, which I split into two smaller loafs, saving one for a second meal with my folks.
Now, once everything is nicely mixed, and (for larger batches) split into equal loaf sized parts, you shape your meatloaf. This is the ... trademark? ... of my meatloafs. Ever since I was very small and helping my parents make meatloaf, I've always always always made my meatloaf into shapes. A cat, a Christmas tree or snowman, something seasonal. I've found that rabbits
are particularly nice. Bake for 1.5 hours (more or less - obviously for more meat, cook longer, for less, cook shorter). Serve without ketchup.
Meatloaf
1.5 lbs ground
beef
1 c. seasoned
bread crumbs
1 c. tomato sauce
2 eggs
1 medium onion,
chopped (optional)
1/2 tsp salt
dash of pepper
Preheat oven 400F. Mix all
ingredients thoroughly - I usually just do this by hand, as I find that gets the whole mixture a bit more homogenous. Now, this recipe is a bit flexible, and usually when I make it it's with a little more (or less) meat. As such, I usually give it a good mix, then add more tomato sauce or breadcrumbs as necessary. You want the meat to be firm and moist - holding it's shape well - you don't want it to be overly crumbly from too many breadcrumbs or overly moist or slimy from too much tomato sauce or too many eggs. When cooking in Baltimore, I actually usually make a 2+ lb batch, which I split into two smaller loafs, saving one for a second meal with my folks.Now, once everything is nicely mixed, and (for larger batches) split into equal loaf sized parts, you shape your meatloaf. This is the ... trademark? ... of my meatloafs. Ever since I was very small and helping my parents make meatloaf, I've always always always made my meatloaf into shapes. A cat, a Christmas tree or snowman, something seasonal. I've found that rabbits
are particularly nice. Bake for 1.5 hours (more or less - obviously for more meat, cook longer, for less, cook shorter). Serve without ketchup.Thursday, March 13, 2014
Fun with Soup Stock
As I've mentioned in a few previous posts, I save chicken (and duck, and turkey, and lamb) bones in order to make my own soup stock. This results in me having, first, random bags of bones sitting in the back of my freezer, and second, large amounts of soup stock sitting in my freezer. Which means even when I'm busy, I have easy access to quality soup. It's easy enough to make soup stock: fill your pot 2/3 or 3/4 up the way with bones. You can add in some veggie scraps if you have them - or some garlic, or onion, or celery - for a bit rounder a flavor. I usually toss things like corn cobs in a plastic bag and save those in my freezer as well. Cover entirely with water, with a couple inches above the bone line to spare. Add in a bay leaf if you have one, and possibly a bouillon cube as a bit of a starter, and salt generously. Cover and cook. In a regular pot you have to cook for HOURS (and you probably want to smash up the bones with a hammer or something so they release their flavor a bit easier). However, I have a pressure cooker. Hence, I can just pressure cook the pot for about 45 minutes to an hour, and it's gonna be as good as it's gonna get! Once that's done, simply strain the soup thoroughly - first to get rid of the bones, then through a finer strainer to get rid of any small particulates which may have slipped through. Apparently fine restaurants strain their stocks up to 5 times to get them extra smooth, through increasingly finer strainers, but I generally don't go that far. Any sort of bones work here - as I've said, I've made turkey soup, duck soup, chicken stock, lamb stock, shrimp stock, and even veggie stock once (I didn't find that veggie stock was worth it, though - I'd have rather just eaten all the veggies and bought veggie stock - the difference from store bought didn't seem significant, except for a bit of a stronger dill flavor, but I digress). You can also make soup out of actual meat - buy a whole chicken and work from there - and that will end up with a delicious pot of soup as well - with actual meat in it to boot. But I rather favor this bone based method, as it's nice not to waste the bones from your lovely chicken roast and to reuse them for new, delicious purposes. It feels thrifty, and it turns out very well.
So in the past few weeks, I've made a couple different soups using my stock base (and yet, still have some remaining in the freezer). First, I made a sort of 'leftover' soup using a bunch of items that I had in my fridge I wanted to get rid of. This ended up consisting of onion/garlic/celery/cream cheese/parmesan cheese/heavy cream/chicken soup/cumin/bay leaf/chili powder/pepper/cayenne pepper/chives/corn starch/MSG/salt/anchovy paste/hot sauce! I don't have a picture, or even a recipe really other than my list of ingredients, because I just kind of kept adding things to the soup, tasting it, and whisking vigorously. So I guess this bit of the post is just a self-reminder and PSA that making soup once you have a good base is pretty easy and flexible. And there aren't any rules about it. Just stick things in that will taste good, and there you have it.
More recently, I decided to make some congee. This is also a relatively recipe-less dish. At it's most basic, it is rice in soup broth, cooked for long enough that the rice breaks down and becomes mush. So it is mainly a question of what you want IN your mush. However, I scandalized Benson by putting onions instead of scallions in my congee (one of these items I had, the other I didn't. The onions taste FINE, but admittedly the scallions are a BIT more traditional...). "Why would you put onions in congee? Nobody does that." I don't recall his EXACT phrasing, but the upshot was I was corrupting one of his favorite dishes, apparently. He also gets on me for putting sugar in my tea. Which is why I don't put sugar in green tea any more (but still keep to my sugared black). Anyway, this is an example of when I like to take full advantage of my slow cooker to just let the soup sit on my counter as everything cooks. So here are the ingredients I put into my most recent batch of congee - again, the only real things you need to put in are rice and broth. And scallions. And perhaps some ginger. And salt.
Congee
1 quart chicken stock+ 4 cups water (aka, 2 quarts soup)
1.5 c. uncooked rice
2 chicken thighs
1/2 diced onion (or, fine, SCALLIONS - ok? I had to promise Benson that if I ever made this for him, I'd only put scallions in.)
Ginger (alas, I only had the ground stuff this time, but I prefer to chop up a few actual chunks/slivers - that's what I tend to do. I usually have it around, but I recently finished off my last hunk.)
Salt
Pepper
MSG (see my post, Cooking For One, if you want to hear my mini-rant on MSG having a bad rep)
Soy Sauce
Maggie sauce
Sesame oil
Jyok3 sung1 - which is shredded... dried... pork stuff? From Chinatown. Added at the end as a kind of garnish, on top of the soup, not cooked with it. Also delicious over straight up rice. Or over other stuff with rice. Or on it's own. Just look at the picture, not really sure how to describe it other than kind of sweetish dried shredded pork.
I add the bit of water to my soup stock because stock is STRONG, and I added other stuff into it for flavoring, so I can get away with diluting it a bit. It goes further that way. But yes, toss everything in your crockpot, give it a stir, and let it cook for 4-6 hours until the rice has broken down and it's nice and porridge-y. That's when you taste and adjust the seasonings. Obviously, since I tossed in raw chicken, one can't taste until after it's cooked through. But I don't even bother taking the chicken off the bone - just tossing the whole thing on is fine, because after a few hours it falls OFF the bone. So yes, all of the ingredients, save the jyok3 sung1, into the crockpot for 4-6 hours. Stir occasionally. Or in an actual pot, but then you have to keep an eye on it and stir a heck of a lot more often. I mean, I put it in the pot and then watched a movie with Benson. Can't do that with a pot sitting on top of your stove. (We watched Hot Fuzz, which was great. And in case you are wondering how I watched a movie with Benson when he's in England and I'm in New York, we do this by getting the same copy of the movie, shared via Dropbox, getting on Skype, setting up the movie, and counting backwards to hit play at the same time. Then we keep Skype going, and usually IM comments back and forth throughout. It's nice. We do TV shows the same way.)
So, that's it for now. Hope that this encourages folks to stop and enjoy some delicious, delicious soup. After all, when I was little, soup was my absolute favorite meal of all. I'd eat it almost every day. Nothing wrong with that - it's extremely versatile and a wonderful comfort food.
So in the past few weeks, I've made a couple different soups using my stock base (and yet, still have some remaining in the freezer). First, I made a sort of 'leftover' soup using a bunch of items that I had in my fridge I wanted to get rid of. This ended up consisting of onion/garlic/celery/cream cheese/parmesan cheese/heavy cream/chicken soup/cumin/bay leaf/chili powder/pepper/cayenne pepper/chives/corn starch/MSG/salt/anchovy paste/hot sauce! I don't have a picture, or even a recipe really other than my list of ingredients, because I just kind of kept adding things to the soup, tasting it, and whisking vigorously. So I guess this bit of the post is just a self-reminder and PSA that making soup once you have a good base is pretty easy and flexible. And there aren't any rules about it. Just stick things in that will taste good, and there you have it.
More recently, I decided to make some congee. This is also a relatively recipe-less dish. At it's most basic, it is rice in soup broth, cooked for long enough that the rice breaks down and becomes mush. So it is mainly a question of what you want IN your mush. However, I scandalized Benson by putting onions instead of scallions in my congee (one of these items I had, the other I didn't. The onions taste FINE, but admittedly the scallions are a BIT more traditional...). "Why would you put onions in congee? Nobody does that." I don't recall his EXACT phrasing, but the upshot was I was corrupting one of his favorite dishes, apparently. He also gets on me for putting sugar in my tea. Which is why I don't put sugar in green tea any more (but still keep to my sugared black). Anyway, this is an example of when I like to take full advantage of my slow cooker to just let the soup sit on my counter as everything cooks. So here are the ingredients I put into my most recent batch of congee - again, the only real things you need to put in are rice and broth. And scallions. And perhaps some ginger. And salt.
Congee
1 quart chicken stock+ 4 cups water (aka, 2 quarts soup)
1.5 c. uncooked rice
2 chicken thighs
1/2 diced onion (or, fine, SCALLIONS - ok? I had to promise Benson that if I ever made this for him, I'd only put scallions in.)
Ginger (alas, I only had the ground stuff this time, but I prefer to chop up a few actual chunks/slivers - that's what I tend to do. I usually have it around, but I recently finished off my last hunk.)
Salt
Pepper
MSG (see my post, Cooking For One, if you want to hear my mini-rant on MSG having a bad rep)
Soy Sauce
Maggie sauce
Sesame oil
Jyok3 sung1 - which is shredded... dried... pork stuff? From Chinatown. Added at the end as a kind of garnish, on top of the soup, not cooked with it. Also delicious over straight up rice. Or over other stuff with rice. Or on it's own. Just look at the picture, not really sure how to describe it other than kind of sweetish dried shredded pork.
 |
| Shredded dried pork product |
So, that's it for now. Hope that this encourages folks to stop and enjoy some delicious, delicious soup. After all, when I was little, soup was my absolute favorite meal of all. I'd eat it almost every day. Nothing wrong with that - it's extremely versatile and a wonderful comfort food.
Thursday, March 6, 2014
Catching up, plus Deviled Eggs
Hey all!
It's been much, much too long since my last blog update. Very sorry about that, I genuinely WILL TRY to go back to an update schedule of every other week at a minimum. So. What have I been up to since... gosh, has it really been since last summer, basically? I've had many blog posts I meant to write. My dining experience at Per Se. The rest of my trip to Italy. The many various things I've cooked over the last 6 months or so. Well, I've been up to a lot in that time. Benson has visited twice. I've gone to Baltimore more than one might expect, including a week of housesitting plus keeping an eye on my grandfather who recently moved down to an assisted living place in Baltimore. A dear friend of mine got married and had a lovely wedding. I gave a public outreach talk on some interesting debates in the history of astronomy, plus have participated in other outreach activities with the astro department. I've been running/attending a movie night with friends in the department, too, so lots of good movies, there. My research has been going well, and I've been working on some papers and gotten several proposals in, and even accepted (well, my research group has, and I've helped). I went to the AAS meeting in National Harbour, MD, to present a poster on my research. I got glasses, and want to get a monocle (but these are a bit hard to find prescription). I bought some single malt scotch with some of my Christmas money. Benson went to Cambridge, so we've been adjusting to an all-new 5 hour time difference. I went to the beach in Ocean City, MD. I wrote a couple pieces of fanfiction (you saw the piece for the WTNV election, my last blog post!). I've been spending too much time on the internet, particularly Tumblr, AO3, Facebook, etc. I've been going to Chinatown semi-regularly with a group in my department, mostly for dim sum though recently for the Chinese New Year and peking duck (amazingness!). I went to my 5 year Brandeis reunion. There was Christmas. Iceskating and sledding with Benson. Watching too much TV, including a new season of Sherlock, starting Supernatural, the Sopranos, and the usual Doctor Who, Homeland, HIMYM, and other shows. Played a few good computer games - particularly Fez and the Stanley Parable. Movies: Godfather Trilogy, Hunger games, Desolation of Smaug, Pulp Fiction and Resevoir dogs (in a one night Quintin Terintino marathon). Hung out with my friend Lloyd and cooked with them a bit as well. Went to a Doo-Wop festival in Wild Wood, NJ, dressing all 50s in a poodle-skirt both for that AND Halloween. I may do some mini-blog entries on some of these things, we'll see how it goes.
Anyway, with this "sort of" entry, I figure I'll post a "sort of" kind of recipe. I made some deviled eggs last weekend for an Oscar party I attended Sunday night, so there we go!
I've always loved deviled eggs. It's probably one of the first dishes I made on my own without help or recipe from my parents. I'm not counting sandwiches or scrambled eggs or cake mix here, or a recipe I made 100x with my mom before doing it again by myself - I mean a recipe I sought out on my own. This is also not counting the numerous instances when I was really young when I would mix spices, water, and food coloring to make 'magic potions' - those were pretty inedible, considering they were made entirely of edible substances. Anyway, deviled eggs. I ate them for the first time... probably at my aunts New Years Eve party or something similar... and really loved them, so resolved to make them on my own. I don't know the age when I started making them, but it was probably sometime in elementary school.
Now, my recipe is a bit different than most deviled egg recipes because of this. When I was younger, I HATED mustard. Would not eat it. Could not stand it. So that very classic ingredient in deviled eggs has been substituted by thousand islands dressing, which apparently my childhood self decided was the obvious substitute for that much-hated condiment. And I think it works very well.
The other thing about this recipe is that it doesn't have 'proportions', per se. I just tend to add each thing until it looks/tastes right. My usually 'stopping' point for adding ingredients is and always has been that when I can't stop myself from tasting it because of deliciousness, that's when I can stop.
This recipe has also evolved to be spicier over the years. The hot sauce is a relatively recent (ie, college-aged me) addition. This is because, in addition to my spice-tolerance growing, my mother dislikes spicy food. In fact, I'd always fill a couple eggs early for my mother prior to adding some of the spices (like the old bay and chili powder) before making the rest of the egg fill more spicy for my dad and me. I contained this trend of a separate early non-spicy batch in college for my dear friend Kaila, who has an even more extreme spice intolerance.
So my point is, this is not so much a recipe as much as a flexible set of guidelines for how to my style of (awesome) deviled eggs. Modify and taste throughout for your best personal results. Feel free to experiment until you find the combination that's best for YOU. But DO include the Old Bay - it is my not-so-secret key ingredient.
Obviously, the first step is to boil and shell however many eggs you are planning on making. I usually make a minimum of 6 at a time. I have a very nice egg transport container, with little divots for the eggs so they'll be stable, and that will hold 20 half-eggs, so when making them for large groups I'll make a dozen, eat 2 of them, and put the rest into the container for transport! So. Once you have your eggs boiled and shelled, slice them all lengthwise (as shown) and remove the egg yolk and put it into a small mixing bowl. The egg whites go into your egg container to be filled later.
Now, first, add in *roughly* equal parts Miracle Whip and Thousand Islands dressing - not *quite* equal, though, I tend to put in a bit more of the Miracle Whip than the dressing, because I like the tang. How much of each of these, you ask? Well, that depends on the number of eggs, for one thing, so add a bit at a time and MASH everything with a fork. You want the yolks to form a thick paste - on the creamy side of crumbly, and as smooth as you can get it, like really thick icing. When the texture seems pretty good, take a taste to balance the Miracle Whip/dressing ratio, make sure that's good, and then you can start adding your hot sauce and spices. The amount of hot sauce, of course, depends on how spicy you like things and the spiciness of the sauce in question. I have a thing of "Dave's Insanity Sauce" which I've been very slowly working my way through for a while now, because a little goes a LONG way. As far as spices, I'm VERY generous with my Old Bay (being a Maryland Girl at heart). But the cajun spices are also a really good addition and I put those in with a fairly liberal hand as well. And of course, chili powder and pepper for a bit more kick, and you can't make deviled eggs without paprika. All I can say for this bit is just keep mixing and tasting. This time I also happened to have some chives in my fridge, so those turned out to be a really nice addition, but I don't usually have those around.
Once you're egg-paste is to your satisfaction, you can fill your egg yolks. I would be generous in how much you put in each egg - it's better to have nice fat eggs and just munch on an empty egg white or two than to be skimpy here, I feel. Plus, you've added mass to the egg whites by adding in the Miracle Whip and the dressing, so you should be able to fill most of them. Once that's done, for a dash of color (and a bit more spice) I toss a dash more of Old Bay and paprika (and sometimes the cajun seasoning, or in this batch, chives) over the top as a lovely decorative touch!
It's been much, much too long since my last blog update. Very sorry about that, I genuinely WILL TRY to go back to an update schedule of every other week at a minimum. So. What have I been up to since... gosh, has it really been since last summer, basically? I've had many blog posts I meant to write. My dining experience at Per Se. The rest of my trip to Italy. The many various things I've cooked over the last 6 months or so. Well, I've been up to a lot in that time. Benson has visited twice. I've gone to Baltimore more than one might expect, including a week of housesitting plus keeping an eye on my grandfather who recently moved down to an assisted living place in Baltimore. A dear friend of mine got married and had a lovely wedding. I gave a public outreach talk on some interesting debates in the history of astronomy, plus have participated in other outreach activities with the astro department. I've been running/attending a movie night with friends in the department, too, so lots of good movies, there. My research has been going well, and I've been working on some papers and gotten several proposals in, and even accepted (well, my research group has, and I've helped). I went to the AAS meeting in National Harbour, MD, to present a poster on my research. I got glasses, and want to get a monocle (but these are a bit hard to find prescription). I bought some single malt scotch with some of my Christmas money. Benson went to Cambridge, so we've been adjusting to an all-new 5 hour time difference. I went to the beach in Ocean City, MD. I wrote a couple pieces of fanfiction (you saw the piece for the WTNV election, my last blog post!). I've been spending too much time on the internet, particularly Tumblr, AO3, Facebook, etc. I've been going to Chinatown semi-regularly with a group in my department, mostly for dim sum though recently for the Chinese New Year and peking duck (amazingness!). I went to my 5 year Brandeis reunion. There was Christmas. Iceskating and sledding with Benson. Watching too much TV, including a new season of Sherlock, starting Supernatural, the Sopranos, and the usual Doctor Who, Homeland, HIMYM, and other shows. Played a few good computer games - particularly Fez and the Stanley Parable. Movies: Godfather Trilogy, Hunger games, Desolation of Smaug, Pulp Fiction and Resevoir dogs (in a one night Quintin Terintino marathon). Hung out with my friend Lloyd and cooked with them a bit as well. Went to a Doo-Wop festival in Wild Wood, NJ, dressing all 50s in a poodle-skirt both for that AND Halloween. I may do some mini-blog entries on some of these things, we'll see how it goes.
Anyway, with this "sort of" entry, I figure I'll post a "sort of" kind of recipe. I made some deviled eggs last weekend for an Oscar party I attended Sunday night, so there we go!
I've always loved deviled eggs. It's probably one of the first dishes I made on my own without help or recipe from my parents. I'm not counting sandwiches or scrambled eggs or cake mix here, or a recipe I made 100x with my mom before doing it again by myself - I mean a recipe I sought out on my own. This is also not counting the numerous instances when I was really young when I would mix spices, water, and food coloring to make 'magic potions' - those were pretty inedible, considering they were made entirely of edible substances. Anyway, deviled eggs. I ate them for the first time... probably at my aunts New Years Eve party or something similar... and really loved them, so resolved to make them on my own. I don't know the age when I started making them, but it was probably sometime in elementary school.
Now, my recipe is a bit different than most deviled egg recipes because of this. When I was younger, I HATED mustard. Would not eat it. Could not stand it. So that very classic ingredient in deviled eggs has been substituted by thousand islands dressing, which apparently my childhood self decided was the obvious substitute for that much-hated condiment. And I think it works very well.
The other thing about this recipe is that it doesn't have 'proportions', per se. I just tend to add each thing until it looks/tastes right. My usually 'stopping' point for adding ingredients is and always has been that when I can't stop myself from tasting it because of deliciousness, that's when I can stop.
This recipe has also evolved to be spicier over the years. The hot sauce is a relatively recent (ie, college-aged me) addition. This is because, in addition to my spice-tolerance growing, my mother dislikes spicy food. In fact, I'd always fill a couple eggs early for my mother prior to adding some of the spices (like the old bay and chili powder) before making the rest of the egg fill more spicy for my dad and me. I contained this trend of a separate early non-spicy batch in college for my dear friend Kaila, who has an even more extreme spice intolerance.
So my point is, this is not so much a recipe as much as a flexible set of guidelines for how to my style of (awesome) deviled eggs. Modify and taste throughout for your best personal results. Feel free to experiment until you find the combination that's best for YOU. But DO include the Old Bay - it is my not-so-secret key ingredient.
Deviled Eggs
Eggs (hard boiled and shelled)
Miracle Whip
Thousands Islands (French) dressing
Hot Sauce
Spices:
Old Bay
Cajun seasoning
Chili Powder
Paprika
Pepper
Anything else you think might be delicious, like chives, if you have them!
Obviously, the first step is to boil and shell however many eggs you are planning on making. I usually make a minimum of 6 at a time. I have a very nice egg transport container, with little divots for the eggs so they'll be stable, and that will hold 20 half-eggs, so when making them for large groups I'll make a dozen, eat 2 of them, and put the rest into the container for transport! So. Once you have your eggs boiled and shelled, slice them all lengthwise (as shown) and remove the egg yolk and put it into a small mixing bowl. The egg whites go into your egg container to be filled later.Now, first, add in *roughly* equal parts Miracle Whip and Thousand Islands dressing - not *quite* equal, though, I tend to put in a bit more of the Miracle Whip than the dressing, because I like the tang. How much of each of these, you ask? Well, that depends on the number of eggs, for one thing, so add a bit at a time and MASH everything with a fork. You want the yolks to form a thick paste - on the creamy side of crumbly, and as smooth as you can get it, like really thick icing. When the texture seems pretty good, take a taste to balance the Miracle Whip/dressing ratio, make sure that's good, and then you can start adding your hot sauce and spices. The amount of hot sauce, of course, depends on how spicy you like things and the spiciness of the sauce in question. I have a thing of "Dave's Insanity Sauce" which I've been very slowly working my way through for a while now, because a little goes a LONG way. As far as spices, I'm VERY generous with my Old Bay (being a Maryland Girl at heart). But the cajun spices are also a really good addition and I put those in with a fairly liberal hand as well. And of course, chili powder and pepper for a bit more kick, and you can't make deviled eggs without paprika. All I can say for this bit is just keep mixing and tasting. This time I also happened to have some chives in my fridge, so those turned out to be a really nice addition, but I don't usually have those around.Once you're egg-paste is to your satisfaction, you can fill your egg yolks. I would be generous in how much you put in each egg - it's better to have nice fat eggs and just munch on an empty egg white or two than to be skimpy here, I feel. Plus, you've added mass to the egg whites by adding in the Miracle Whip and the dressing, so you should be able to fill most of them. Once that's done, for a dash of color (and a bit more spice) I toss a dash more of Old Bay and paprika (and sometimes the cajun seasoning, or in this batch, chives) over the top as a lovely decorative touch!
Anyways, hopefully this is a useful set of guidelines for deviled eggs. Also hopefully it won't take me forever to update this blog again. I do like writing it, I just got busy and then out of the habit of posting. Ah, well! Such is life. Like I said, I may try to do a few mini-blog entries describing a few of the things that have gone on in my life in the past 6 months in a bit more detail in the future!
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