On life, and what matters in it.

Today marks a somber and regrettable moment in my life. The storage unit that has for the last half-decade house the various collected belongings culled from 25 years of life on this Earth, has lacked payment for the last time, and will soon be auctioned off to some dispassionate junk collector who will, in all likelihood, throw out the vast majority of it.

Old books, old computers, countless games, a complete collection of the writings of my early school-age years, and plenty of just plain old junk. The first computer I ever owned sits there, the first thing I ever wrote that was worth half a damn sits there, and a whole host of other nostalgic things, are all now but a short breadth of time away from finding their way into the hands of someone who will rummage through it, salvage what might serve as decent eBay or junk store fodder, and likely toss the rest into the nearest landfill.

But, strange as it may sound, there's an odd sort of liberated feel to the realization that almost everything you had gathered in life will soon be gone. In many ways, for good or ill, that storage unit has served as an anchor about my heels from the moment I acquired it. Very often miles away even when I still lived in the city that housed it, I still held on to it all, always with the apparently vain hope of finally getting a place of my own one day where I could get all of it back out again once and for all. It was a symbol of a hope for a better life, with a nice house and the money to afford it. I dreamed of a place with a nice big room where I could finally set up my own personal antique computer museum, and a dedicated gaming room, and all sorts of fancies of that nature.

Yet as I reflect upon that dream, I wonder if perhaps I've been looking at it the wrong way. I think of a world out there that I have largely never experienced, living my relatively sheltered life in the Pacific Northwest's least interesting cities. Places I have loved in spite of themselves, but still nonetheless lacking the vibrancy and culture of so many places in the world.

I watch Anthony Bourdain and Andrew Zimmern wander the world, experiencing exotic foods, while I can only look on in rapt jealousy, and I suddenly understand the term the food blogging community seems to have latched on to: food porn. It is inherently voyeuristic, gazing on at things we wish we had, a pale if occasionally satisfying substitute for the real thing.

But surely, like one might say about the more traditional variety of fleshy cinema, the real thing is so much better than simply watching it. It must be experienced, tasted.

And this is where I start thinking that I've had it all wrong. I may fancy the sedentary life quite often, but at the same time, I'm bloody miserable living like this, making do with my culinary experimentations with what I can manage to learn from recipes pulled from the internet. One of my greatest thrills in life is finding something new, whether it's a place or a food or a game or just the right group of new friends.

And here I've had, by twist of fate and my own bungled life management skills, removed the only physical anchor that still tied me down to a more stationary lifestyle. Could I not, now, with so few possessions to my name, be free to travel the world, experiencing all those things I have until now only dreamed about and drooled over on the television screen?

Certainly it would be a far more fascinating way of learning the arcane art of cuisine. Like the adventuring wizards of so many fantasy stories and role playing games, I could be searching the world not for new spells, but new foods and tastes and techniques. I've never been one for classroom learning, and I'm not likely to ever be able to afford the kind of tuition a top culinary school offers.

So this seed of an idea has formed, of becoming the wandering cook. Start here in my own backyard, save up enough cash for a passport and a ticket to who knows where, and start looking for a job opening in some restaurant where ever in the world it might be available. Work long enough in each place to save up for a ticket to the next, and work my way around the world, and just keep going, recording the sights and sounds and tastes of each new place, before moving on to the next.

That's the theory anyway. The practicalities, as is often the case in these sorts of fancies, remain to be seen. Can a person even live like that anymore? So many countries seem to have such exacting standards as to who they will allow to stay and work in a country, so many other countries might simply not present the opportunity for a foreigner like me to simply walk into the kitchen and start working. Most countries aren't exactly jumping at the chance to import more cooks, it's not even considered a "professional" field in the parlance of many immigration authorities. What about language and cultural barriers? Can I even manage to fund this kind of lifestyle on the salary of an ordinary cook? What if I find myself trapped in a place where I simply can't afford a ticket on to the next place?

Or, how much of this sudden onrush of questions is simply the scared, coddled little mama's boy in me trying to come up with excuses to continue with the same dead-end life I've lived for so long now? After all, this is an adventure we're talking about, the kind of thing that certainly requires some thought, but also relies intrinsically on some level of sheer impulsiveness.

The opportunity here to learn about the many foods across the world is just too tempting. There's so many places in the world I want to go simply for the food, and likely so many other places that I'd never even think about for food, that could have a host of surprises in store.

There's a feeling I get sometimes, with food, where I just sit and think of all the things out there that I just haven't tried yet, and it drives me absolutely batty that I haven't tried hardly any of them, and I want to try them all. I can easily see making a life's work out of doing nothing but going out, and doing my best to reach that unattainable goal.

Step one of course, is to go down to the local saloon, whom I've just learned is hiring, and do my best to talk my way into the kitchen. As with so many journeys, this one really starts at home, and in the preparations that will have to made for this adventure to truly begin, and I truly hope that this most recent dream, unlike so many in the past, I can will into reality.

And maybe get a nice fat book deal out of it.

Holy crap, I baked something.

Last night, for the first time, I actually baked something that did not come in the form of a mix in a box. This may come as a shock to the reader, but by and large the oven has always been for me, a place to which I did not go.

The art of baking has never been something I really got into, I think perhaps due to the exactitude involved in it's practice. I'm a very "eyeball it" kind of cook, I just throw what seems right into the pot, and see what happens. Generally all the measurements for my recipes come afterwards, during an introspective phase in which I think back on it and try and remember just how much of any given ingredient I put in it.

The preheating process is a sublime agitation to me, this idea of having to wait for the device to finally getting around to producing the requested temperature. I tend to have a similar complaint with electric ranges too, though to a far lesser extent.

I don't even use the oven for any non-baking/pastry type recipes. Basically, if it can't be made on a grill or a stovetop, I don't cook it. The general exception has been frozen pizzas, boxed cake or brownie mixes, and Bisquick biscuits.

However, I think my attitude on this is starting to shift, as I continue my desire to search out new avenues of experimentation.

A few nights ago, I made biscuits and gravy for the household. Now generally, when I make biscuits, I buy a box of Bisquick, add milk, and spoon onto cookie sheets as per the recipe on the box for drop biscuits. But this time, I was feeling a desire to actually try to make them from scratch for once. In the end, I sort of wussed out on the scratch-built way to go and bought another box of Bisquick. But this time, I decided to improvise and buy some buttermilk to use instead of the normal milk. I also decided to actually put in the effort of properly kneading the dough and cutting it into rounds, rather than half-assedly spooning them onto a cookie sheet and calling it good.

And to my surprise, I found I rather enjoyed it. Something about just digging in and getting my hands dirty and working the dough appealed to me.

So last night, when I found myself craving something sweet, I wound up deciding to just bake something. I expressed a desire to try my hand at baking in my IRC haunt, and someone mentioned making shortbread, which then led my thoughts to shortcake.

So I did some digging on the Food Network site, and started pulling up recipes, and found one for sour-cream shortcakes. This would be perfect I figured, because I didn't have any heavy cream, as was called for for most of the recipes I'd found, while this one only wanted the sour cream.

I ran into a few snags as I prepared my ingredients. Right after I'd just got done mixing the dry ingredients, I discovered to my dismay that we were out of butter. but I soon discovered that apparently the butter-flavored Crisco can be used as an even substitute. I also found that the recipe was actually missing an ingredient in it's list, as the directions mentioned combining egg with sour cream, yet made no mention of how many, which lead to a frantic googling for similar recipes, which eventually revealed that the standard amount seemed to be a single egg.

However, I am pleased to report that, despite these setbacks, I successfully produced some pretty damn tasty little treats, which I have been slowly consuming, split in half, with a bit of jam on each side. They are rather like an odd mid-point between a yellow cake and a scone, and the combination is very, very pleasant, and may indeed become a regular staple.

I will I think do some experimenting further. For one, I'd like to see how it comes out with real butter instead of shortening. Butter has a certain percentage of moisture to it that shortening doesn't have, and I think it might make the different in making a moister cake. I'd also like to try actually kneading and rolling it out, and cutting it into rounds like biscuits, to get a more regular shape than the rough balls as per the written recipe. I'd also of course like to try some more elaborate toppings than just simple raspberry jam, maybe even that old standby, the strawberry shortcake.

But even as they stand, they're wonderful little cakes, and serve well both as a dessert base, and actually do well as a breakfast pastry, thanks to their similarity to scones. I will be making them again.

Barbecue without the barbecue.

So tonight's bit of culinary magic is basically a page pulled from a restaurant I once worked it, only done right.

We had what the menu called a "BBQ Chicken salad", which of course, had no barbecued chicken at all. It was basically boiled chicken, shredded, and tossed with a healthy amount of cheap BBQ sauce. To be flatly honest, it wasn't the best. The chicken was usually over done, and when combined with the cold temperature the meat and sauce mixture was held at, made sort of a stringy paste that was largely unpleasant.

There was however, one magic method by which to turn it into something more palatable, which was to take the "BBQ chicken", put it between two pieces of bread with some cheddar cheese and just a bit of ranch dressing, then slapped in between the two hot slabs of metal that make up a panini press. After thoroughly warmed through, it actually approached something rather like tasty.

But, recently primed by Yet Another Good Eats Episode on the subject of poaching, it occured to me that with a more proper poaching job in a good stock, this recipe might still have some hope for it.

A small scale experiment a few days ago served to prove the principle, as using the simple technique of boil, drop, and hold discussed in the episode, combined with a flavorful dashi broth seasoned with garlic, onion, chives, and curry and chili pastes, produced what was actually quite a tasty sandwich.

But I was not done with it yet. While on a trip into town to deliver a package, my stepdad and erstwhile transportation dropped me that bombshell of a question, "So, since we're in town, you got any ideas for dinner?" My mind blanked for a solid 5 minutes, as it often does in those situations, and somehow my mind seized upon the experiment of a few day's past, and suggested I could make that, I just needed some stock and perhaps some fries for a side.

So, I started with a big 40 oz can of chicken broth, to which I added a sliced onion, a chopped stalk of celery, about 4 cloves of garlic, a tablespoon of curry paste, some chives, dried rosemary, parsley, paprika, and salt and pepper, into which went 6 chicken thighs. Brought it up to a boil, then dropped it down to the next to lowest setting on the burner and cooked for 20 minutes, then pulled off the heat for ten minutes.

Once the thighs had pulled from the broth and cooled, I set about the laborious process of shredding the chicken. Once properly shredded, I tossed this with about equal parts barbecue sauce and tonkatsu sauce, topped off with some sriracha sauce. This got tossed together, and then put into a bare frypan over medium-low heat for about 20 minutes, while the fries baked in the oven.

Put a helping of that on a bun with some ranch and mayo, and a slice of colby jack cheese. To speed up the cheese melting, I popped it in the microwave for 45 secs.

The result was perfect. The chicken was moist and tender, the combination of flavors from the three sauce was perfect, tangy, sweet, and just a hint of spice. Frankly, unlike my former employer's recipe, I think this one could actually get someone believing it was really barbecue.
The only think it lacks is the flavor of smoke.

Where to begin?

Today's menu was all about the Bechamel sauces. I'm not sure what prompted it exactly, I think it might have been the rice with bacon gravy I made the other day.

So for my first meal of the day, I decided to go with rice and cheese sauce. I grated up some sharp yellow cheddar, and made a typical cheese sauce, but with one extra twist: I sauteed about a tablespoon of chili garlic paste in the butter, before adding the flour to the roux. It came out delicious. The texture and thickness was dead right for once, and strangely stable. I guess I just got the amount of milk plus roux plus cheese just right, as it just hit a point where the thickness just wasn't gonna change. Usually I have a problem with my Bechamel sauces, in that they don't stay the same texture for very long, but this was dead perfect. And something about the whole combination actually made the chili sauces' contribution more mild and almost sweet, as opposed to the heat I would normally expect from what was actually a bit more than I use for, say, my spicier ramen soups.

For dinner, I went with a mock Alfredo with tuna and spaghetti. I say mock, because, lacking heavy cream, I instead made do with a Bechamel base. A more traditional Alfredo derives it's sole thickness from the heaviness of the cream and the melting cheese, as well as the starch given off by the pasta, and this is generally how I prefer to make it these days. But, in a pinch, if you're sure to cook the roux just right, it works well enough to fool most anyone, and probably bears more resemblance to that jarred stuff in the store that most Americans are familiar with than the authentic recipe does.

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My most recent big experiment was crepes jambalaya. I'd been feeling the urge to try a more savory crepe dish, after the semi-success of my previous experiment with sweet crepes had gone relatively well.

I'm not sure what my big interest is in crepes exactly. Ever since I saw the crepe episode of Good Eats, they've sort of nagged at me, always begging me to try them, yet until recently, despite repeated recitations of the old standby, "I should really try that sometime", I hadn't yet had the courage to try them.

I think perhaps because they do have a reputation as a notoriously challenging dish to make, and in something of a surprise, Alton's presentation of the subject actually did much to reinforce that image in my mind. Perhaps this image fed into a conception of their crafting as a sort of right of passage for a cook. That by mastering the crepe, I would somehow be proving my worth as a cook.

In practice, they certainly did prove to be quite a thorough pain in the ass and, in all honesty, I'm not really convinced the effort is actually worth it. The sweet crepes I made during my first attempt were reasonably tasty, but the more neutral crepes I made for the crepes jambalaya just had an odd flavor that I'm not sure I cared for, and certainly didn't wow the way I would normally demand from a dish that took so much craft and effort.

The jambalaya itself on the other hand, has spiraled into a recipe all it's own, one which I'm actually quite proud of. For the crepe filling, it was really a simplification of the stuff. I chopped some bacon and got that rendering in a small saucepan, then added half a diced onion. While that sauteed I whipped up a quick broth/seasoning combination, using dashi for the base stock, and adding black pepper, a healthy dose of chili paste and even some sriracha, and oddest of all, Montreal steak seasoning.

The resulting flavor combination was superb, and rolled up with a tiny bit of grated cheese, really carried the whole dish.

I've since attempted a more complete version of the dish, made in a larger batch with a full compliment of vegetables, while still keeping the same base ingredients, and the recipe is excellent. The main thing it lacks is meat, I've yet to have the opportunity to try it with a decent compliment of meats. Perhaps soon I'll try adding some chicken to the mix, and it occurs to me I missed the boat on using some of the Italian sausage that we had bought in massive bulk from Costco, as all of it has since been consumed.

I basically ate nothing but jambalaya for a whole week, between the crepes, and the second, larger batch, which as well as eating on their own, I also rolled up into some tortillas with a bit of sour cream, sriracha, and grated cheese.

La pomme revolucion!

From Noisebot, comes what I shall brand the official T-Shirt of the Apple Juice Revolution.

Thanks to Dan Davenport for the linkage.

Viva la pomme!

It has occurred to me that thus far on this blog I have yet to sing the praises of Alton Brown's omelet recipe.

The Good Eats Fan Page has a wonderful transcript of the episode, which is the best way to get it, as the Food Network recipe card is a bit more vague on the process, and the process is really what makes the dish in this case.

This morning's simple breakfast was the Alton French omelet, filled with a four cheese Mexican blend, and sprinkled lightly with a bit of black pepper and paprika. To go along with, just two slices of buttered toast (no garlic toast this time, it's breakfast!), and a glass of apple juice.

Today's came out extra delicious, as a I actually managed to get the temperature just about right. Normally I tend to get impatient and wind up with the pan not sufficiently heated, and the omelet a little too runny. I like it a little bit liquid on the inside, gives a nice over-medium egg texture to the whole arrangement, but if the temp is too low, you wind up with too much liquid, and too thin.

Also, I love apple juice, and don't really understand the reputation it has in the US as being a child's drink at all. Where on Earth did this come from? And why do so many adults willingly deprive themselves of this simple yet delicious beverage? That crisp, refreshing flavor is just too wonderful to pass by simply because of some weird embedded cultural notions.

Even when you ferment the stuff and turn it into booze in the form of hard cider, it still bears a reputation as a sissy drink, despite the fact that a little homebrew cider can knock you on your ass faster than any beer, and can taste just as foul as the worst bargain "malt liquor".

So I suggest that we all do our part, and seek to rehabilitate this noble beverage. Order apple instead of orange with your next dine out meal. With Summer upon us here in the Northern Hemisphere, apple juice makes a fantastic refreshment on hot afternoons, and some hard cider makes an equally fantastic libation for the evening's festivities.

I needn't remind our American readers that the Fourth of July is upon us, and what better way to celebrate a bunch of rich, dead white men refusing to pay their taxes, than with an alcoholic beverage with a long and noble history as one of the great forms of moonshine.

Drink up, we will deprive ourselves of this delicious nectar no longer! Viva La Pomme!