Various
I made the most amazing salad in the world two Thursdays ago, and want to post the recipe here. I already posted it to Omnomnom, which has some fabulous recipes. *tips hat to cofax7 for the recommendation*
Salad of Farro, Couscous, Asparagus, and Almonds with Meyer Lemon and Goat Cheese
I served this with grilled salmon and it was delicious. Serves 4 as a main dish or 6 as a side dish.
- 8 ounces farro
- 8 ounces Israeli (pearl) couscous
- 1 pound asparagus, woody ends snapped off, cut into 2" lengths
- 1 cup sliced almonds
- 5 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
- 1 tablespoon walnut oil
- 2 Meyer lemons, zested and juiced
- Salt and freshly ground black pepper
- 4 ounces goat cheese
Combine the farro with one cup of water in a wide-bottomed saucepan or saute pan and bring to a simmer over medium heat. When all of the water is absorbed, add another cup of water; repeat until the farro is al dente and all of the water is absorbed. (This should take a total of 3 cups of water.)
In the meantime, bring 1 3/4 cups of water to boil in a small saucepan and add the couscous. Reduce heat to low, stir, and cover. Simmer for 10 or so minutes, until all of the water is absorbed, and let rest.
Preheat oven to 250 degrees F. Spread the sliced almonds on a cookie sheet and toast until they're crisp and beginning to color, about 10 minutes.
Combine the lemon juice, 4 tablespoons of the olive oil, salt, and pepper in a large bowl. Add the couscous and farro as soon as they finish cooking and toss to coat; this will keep the grains from clumping.
When the farro is done, rinse the pan out and put it back on the heat to dry. Add the remaining tablespoon of olive oil and heat until fragrant. Saute the asparagus until it is bright green and just tender, then add to the salad. Combine the asparagus and almonds with the rest of the salad and toss well.
Serve at room temperature, sprinkled with crumbled goat cheese. It's even better the next day, after the flavors have had a chance to blend. I plan to try it with regular lemons once Meyer lemons are no longer in season.
* * * * *
Babylon 5 4.05 - "The Long Night
I remember, in Season 1, G'Kar speaking of beings out there in space for whom the Narns and Centauri and Minbari and humans were but ants. Giants in the playground indeed. Kosh was the first Vorlon we met, and made the Vorlons seem sympathetic, benevolent in a distant way; but Kosh was unusual, it turns out, and the Vorlons weren't so much benevolent as uninterested.
Sheridan's plan to get the Vorlons and the Shadows to fight each other directly involves ordering one of his captains to his death. It's open and unsentimental: smaller sacrifices for a bigger cause. It's exactly the kind of sacrifice that Londo has asked G'Kar to make--loss of his dignity, his eye, maybe his life. But Sheridan has already demonstrated that he was, first of all, ready to sacrifice himself to this cause; Londo is a more ambiguous case. So far, others have paid the price for his decisions--the heads of Cartagia's desk, the entire planet of Narn, G'Kar, and now Vir, who Londo chooses as his assassin because nobody suspects the bumbling sidekick. (Even though, as organizer of the Narn underground railroad, doesn't Vir deserve a little more credit for being able to be stealthy and devious?) The thing that gets me about Londo is that he never realizes what venal choices he's made until it's too late, but that once he does he actually tries to fix his mistakes; and that other people have to pay for those fixes, and that he realizes that too, but can't do anything about it by then.
At least Sheridan's captain knows that people understand his sacrifice. No one can ever know what Vir did; and G'Kar won't bother to tell his fellow Narn, when they question his suffering in comparison to theirs. He did it for them, but he didn't do it for them. And he certainly didn't do it to lead them into another cycle of violence. That's the one thing he and Londo agree on now, it seems, because Londo keeps his promise; even though G'Kar declines to become king and Londo agrees to become prime minister, they're both stepping back from the cycle of revenge.
Babylon 5 4.06 - "Into the Fire"
Hey, this is also the title of an SG-1 episode! As are, probably, most words in the English language. They had a long run.
Londo's bad judgment is still coming back to haunt him. It was so easy for Morden to manipulate him all along; Refa was just the last piece; and as usual, he realized it too late. He got rid of the Shadow ships on Centauri Prime, but the Vorlons were still going to come for him; he was the one thing that still reeked of their presence. And, finally, he offers to pay the price for his mistakes; I think it's the first time in the entire series. He's always seen his own aggrandizement and the good of his people as a single entity; here he realizes that they're not. It's an amazing moment, made more touching by the fact that his intermittent kindnesses to Vir have made Vir unwilling to obey his order to kill him. (And hey, Vir got to keep his promise to Morden! What a satisfying moment.)
I was sort of hoping Lorien was the embodiment of the original concept of universal darkness that gave rise to the idea of the devil; it fit so well with the way he and Sheridan met. However, it seems he's the last survivor of the First Ones instead. Ah well. In any case, I like the way the choice between the Vorlons and the Shadows--between stultifying order and brutal chaos--ends up being a false one, and that Sheridan and Delenn reject it; that they've been using other people to fight the battles between them for so long because they can't fight each other, because they've forgotten what it was about. It's another case of stepping away from the cycle, and another instance where the people on the station can't depend on the support of older, more powerful institutions, but must craft their own solutions. And it makes sense that without that cyle, there's nothing left for the ancient races here, and they leave, but at the same time I'm rather shocked that the war that has been the central arc of the show from the beginning is suddenly over, like that.
Babylon 5 4.07 - "Epiphanies"
I love all of the parallels in this episode between G'Kar and Londo and between Lyta and Bester. G'Kar and Londo have both returned to the station; G'Kar refused to lead the Narn because power corrupts, and Londo maneuvered himself out of the palace because power is dangerous, and they're both, weirdly, back in the same positions. Some things have changed, though; although I might have been pleasantly surprised that Londo kept his word, G'Kar would have expected no less, and isn't going to thank him for basic honor; that was one of the ouchiest cuts I've ever seen. He's getting a new eye, and it will let him see, but it's not the same.
G'Kar places the blame where he feels it's due, with Londo; Garibaldi might feel responsible for G'Kar's capture and torture, but G'Kar is only grateful to have had the opportunity to free his planet. He was being a friend, as Garibaldi has been a friend to him. I love those two, and wish G'Kar had any hint of how much trouble Garibaldi is in now. That transmission was remarkably like the one that set the assassin and Talia off on their programmed trajectories, wasn't it?
Garibaldi tells Zack he quit because he's made mistakes; he wants a second chance, and people throughout the episode are driven by their willingness to give others second chances. G'Kar won't give one to Londo: he does not exist in his universe anymore. Bester wants a second chance to save his lover. Lyta triggers the evacuation and self-destruction of Z'ha'dum, and it's telling that Sheridan agrees with her that the technology should not fall into the hands of PsiCorps, but that the way she frames her motivation is much more personal: she doesn't want to give Bester a chance to hurt anyone else. And, finally, Bester threatens payback for the failed mission, convinced that everyone is laughing behind his back; he won't give them a second chance.
In other news, there's SOMETHING ON THE REGENT'S SHOULDER AAAAAAAAH!
Babylon 5 4.08 - "The Illusion of Truth"
Oh dear, another reporter. Given how very in the bag ISN is for Clark, this is not going to end well. On the one hand, I can see why Sheridan would take the chance: it's his only conceivable opportunity to influence the story. On the other hand, SHERIDAN YOU MORON. Of course the guy's going to do a slanted hit piece. Do not underestimate the power of selective editing! On the third hand, he couldn't have anticipated that Garibaldi would turn against him; something is very, very wrong with Michael, but it's subtle enough to keep his former friends questioning him rather than what has happened to him, and that makes me very afraid for him.
The hit piece is a nice window into what Clark's doing on Earth, though: the ratcheting up of paranoia about Babylon 5's ties to aliens, the picking at the psychological scabs of the Earth-Minbari war, the ersatz sympathy for poor, deranged Sheridan. We also get a reminder that Sheridan has family on Earth, and is therefore potentially vulnerable.
Babylon 5 4.09 - "Atonement"
G'Kar's delight when he discovers that his new eye will work when it's not in his socket is hilarious; it's a small compensation for the loss, but it's there. And it reminds me very much of the Farscape episode "Scratch 'n Sniff," which took that idea to the wall and then through the wall into the alley out back, as it does. (Yes, I am experiencing a resurgence of Farscape love thanks to farscaperewatch.)
But what's really impressive is the way the show does its own foreshadowing, and when we get a meaty backstory episode like this, all of the pieces are already there and fit together seamlessly. Oh Delenn! No wonder she counsels calm; when she lost hers, she started a war. And it's all so circular: her presence on the Gray Council a result of her genetic inheritance from Sinclair, who traveled back in time to mimic her transformation and introduce human elements to Minbari heritage that become, in the future, the reason for that transformation. I'm glad she had Lennier there with her, because of all people, his regard for her will survive this as it has survived everything else.
Babylon 5 4.10 - "Racing Mars"
I am weirdly--disturbingly, even--charmed by Stephen and Marcus's cranky buddy-cop road trip dynamic. And points to the show for giving them a fake honeymooning cover identity and not having either of them get grossed out or otherwise reacting poorly; the jokes are funny, not insulting. I'm also super-excited to see more of Mars, since I've always had the feeling that it was important. But I expected it to be important for political reasons, because of the rebellion and the secret PsyCorps base. The last thing I expected to see there was another one of those creepy shoulder-things. In retrospect, Captain Jack's lack of freedom was very well hinted at, and as creepy as Londo getting the thing drunk in order to be able to talk unmonitored for a few minutes. So whatever those things are, they are getting their tentacles--literally!--into both the Centauri government and the Mars underground resistance. Hmmmmmmmm.....
I know that Garibaldi's rationale for breaking with Sheridan is being layed out for us step by step. He reacts poorly to what he sees as a cult of personality around Sheridan, rather than a movement of equals. And Sheridan, in turn, has been more impatient and high-handed than anything with him, which tends to reinforce that impression. Still, there's something very wrong about Garibaldi's decisionmaking process at this point; it's skewed. The first thing he did when he got back was pull away from all of his old friends; and his friends, preoccupied with the war and their other problems, haven't noticed until he was already isolated; and now it's become a self-perpetuating cycle of misunderstandings and hurt feelings, and Garibaldi is making even worse choices. This cannot end well.
* * * * *
The upside of Amazonfail was that it got me in the habit of stopping into Borderlands and Modern Times. (Before Borderlands moved to its current location from Hayes Valley, I lived right around the corner, and Modern Times was my home away from home.) My to-read pile is pretty tall right now, and that's the way I like it. However, I picked up what was billed as the first of Terry Pratchett's Discworld Series without realizing it's less a series than a flowchart. We'll see how that goes.
* * * * *
Dreamwidth administrivia:
* * * * *
It is Saturday and it is sunny and gorgeous and I am about to go out for brunch with friends. And I have been up since 5:00 am. Stupid time zones!
Salad of Farro, Couscous, Asparagus, and Almonds with Meyer Lemon and Goat Cheese
I served this with grilled salmon and it was delicious. Serves 4 as a main dish or 6 as a side dish.
- 8 ounces farro
- 8 ounces Israeli (pearl) couscous
- 1 pound asparagus, woody ends snapped off, cut into 2" lengths
- 1 cup sliced almonds
- 5 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
- 1 tablespoon walnut oil
- 2 Meyer lemons, zested and juiced
- Salt and freshly ground black pepper
- 4 ounces goat cheese
Combine the farro with one cup of water in a wide-bottomed saucepan or saute pan and bring to a simmer over medium heat. When all of the water is absorbed, add another cup of water; repeat until the farro is al dente and all of the water is absorbed. (This should take a total of 3 cups of water.)
In the meantime, bring 1 3/4 cups of water to boil in a small saucepan and add the couscous. Reduce heat to low, stir, and cover. Simmer for 10 or so minutes, until all of the water is absorbed, and let rest.
Preheat oven to 250 degrees F. Spread the sliced almonds on a cookie sheet and toast until they're crisp and beginning to color, about 10 minutes.
Combine the lemon juice, 4 tablespoons of the olive oil, salt, and pepper in a large bowl. Add the couscous and farro as soon as they finish cooking and toss to coat; this will keep the grains from clumping.
When the farro is done, rinse the pan out and put it back on the heat to dry. Add the remaining tablespoon of olive oil and heat until fragrant. Saute the asparagus until it is bright green and just tender, then add to the salad. Combine the asparagus and almonds with the rest of the salad and toss well.
Serve at room temperature, sprinkled with crumbled goat cheese. It's even better the next day, after the flavors have had a chance to blend. I plan to try it with regular lemons once Meyer lemons are no longer in season.
* * * * *
Babylon 5 4.05 - "The Long Night
I remember, in Season 1, G'Kar speaking of beings out there in space for whom the Narns and Centauri and Minbari and humans were but ants. Giants in the playground indeed. Kosh was the first Vorlon we met, and made the Vorlons seem sympathetic, benevolent in a distant way; but Kosh was unusual, it turns out, and the Vorlons weren't so much benevolent as uninterested.
Sheridan's plan to get the Vorlons and the Shadows to fight each other directly involves ordering one of his captains to his death. It's open and unsentimental: smaller sacrifices for a bigger cause. It's exactly the kind of sacrifice that Londo has asked G'Kar to make--loss of his dignity, his eye, maybe his life. But Sheridan has already demonstrated that he was, first of all, ready to sacrifice himself to this cause; Londo is a more ambiguous case. So far, others have paid the price for his decisions--the heads of Cartagia's desk, the entire planet of Narn, G'Kar, and now Vir, who Londo chooses as his assassin because nobody suspects the bumbling sidekick. (Even though, as organizer of the Narn underground railroad, doesn't Vir deserve a little more credit for being able to be stealthy and devious?) The thing that gets me about Londo is that he never realizes what venal choices he's made until it's too late, but that once he does he actually tries to fix his mistakes; and that other people have to pay for those fixes, and that he realizes that too, but can't do anything about it by then.
At least Sheridan's captain knows that people understand his sacrifice. No one can ever know what Vir did; and G'Kar won't bother to tell his fellow Narn, when they question his suffering in comparison to theirs. He did it for them, but he didn't do it for them. And he certainly didn't do it to lead them into another cycle of violence. That's the one thing he and Londo agree on now, it seems, because Londo keeps his promise; even though G'Kar declines to become king and Londo agrees to become prime minister, they're both stepping back from the cycle of revenge.
Babylon 5 4.06 - "Into the Fire"
Hey, this is also the title of an SG-1 episode! As are, probably, most words in the English language. They had a long run.
Londo's bad judgment is still coming back to haunt him. It was so easy for Morden to manipulate him all along; Refa was just the last piece; and as usual, he realized it too late. He got rid of the Shadow ships on Centauri Prime, but the Vorlons were still going to come for him; he was the one thing that still reeked of their presence. And, finally, he offers to pay the price for his mistakes; I think it's the first time in the entire series. He's always seen his own aggrandizement and the good of his people as a single entity; here he realizes that they're not. It's an amazing moment, made more touching by the fact that his intermittent kindnesses to Vir have made Vir unwilling to obey his order to kill him. (And hey, Vir got to keep his promise to Morden! What a satisfying moment.)
I was sort of hoping Lorien was the embodiment of the original concept of universal darkness that gave rise to the idea of the devil; it fit so well with the way he and Sheridan met. However, it seems he's the last survivor of the First Ones instead. Ah well. In any case, I like the way the choice between the Vorlons and the Shadows--between stultifying order and brutal chaos--ends up being a false one, and that Sheridan and Delenn reject it; that they've been using other people to fight the battles between them for so long because they can't fight each other, because they've forgotten what it was about. It's another case of stepping away from the cycle, and another instance where the people on the station can't depend on the support of older, more powerful institutions, but must craft their own solutions. And it makes sense that without that cyle, there's nothing left for the ancient races here, and they leave, but at the same time I'm rather shocked that the war that has been the central arc of the show from the beginning is suddenly over, like that.
Babylon 5 4.07 - "Epiphanies"
I love all of the parallels in this episode between G'Kar and Londo and between Lyta and Bester. G'Kar and Londo have both returned to the station; G'Kar refused to lead the Narn because power corrupts, and Londo maneuvered himself out of the palace because power is dangerous, and they're both, weirdly, back in the same positions. Some things have changed, though; although I might have been pleasantly surprised that Londo kept his word, G'Kar would have expected no less, and isn't going to thank him for basic honor; that was one of the ouchiest cuts I've ever seen. He's getting a new eye, and it will let him see, but it's not the same.
G'Kar places the blame where he feels it's due, with Londo; Garibaldi might feel responsible for G'Kar's capture and torture, but G'Kar is only grateful to have had the opportunity to free his planet. He was being a friend, as Garibaldi has been a friend to him. I love those two, and wish G'Kar had any hint of how much trouble Garibaldi is in now. That transmission was remarkably like the one that set the assassin and Talia off on their programmed trajectories, wasn't it?
Garibaldi tells Zack he quit because he's made mistakes; he wants a second chance, and people throughout the episode are driven by their willingness to give others second chances. G'Kar won't give one to Londo: he does not exist in his universe anymore. Bester wants a second chance to save his lover. Lyta triggers the evacuation and self-destruction of Z'ha'dum, and it's telling that Sheridan agrees with her that the technology should not fall into the hands of PsiCorps, but that the way she frames her motivation is much more personal: she doesn't want to give Bester a chance to hurt anyone else. And, finally, Bester threatens payback for the failed mission, convinced that everyone is laughing behind his back; he won't give them a second chance.
In other news, there's SOMETHING ON THE REGENT'S SHOULDER AAAAAAAAH!
Babylon 5 4.08 - "The Illusion of Truth"
Oh dear, another reporter. Given how very in the bag ISN is for Clark, this is not going to end well. On the one hand, I can see why Sheridan would take the chance: it's his only conceivable opportunity to influence the story. On the other hand, SHERIDAN YOU MORON. Of course the guy's going to do a slanted hit piece. Do not underestimate the power of selective editing! On the third hand, he couldn't have anticipated that Garibaldi would turn against him; something is very, very wrong with Michael, but it's subtle enough to keep his former friends questioning him rather than what has happened to him, and that makes me very afraid for him.
The hit piece is a nice window into what Clark's doing on Earth, though: the ratcheting up of paranoia about Babylon 5's ties to aliens, the picking at the psychological scabs of the Earth-Minbari war, the ersatz sympathy for poor, deranged Sheridan. We also get a reminder that Sheridan has family on Earth, and is therefore potentially vulnerable.
Babylon 5 4.09 - "Atonement"
G'Kar's delight when he discovers that his new eye will work when it's not in his socket is hilarious; it's a small compensation for the loss, but it's there. And it reminds me very much of the Farscape episode "Scratch 'n Sniff," which took that idea to the wall and then through the wall into the alley out back, as it does. (Yes, I am experiencing a resurgence of Farscape love thanks to farscaperewatch.)
But what's really impressive is the way the show does its own foreshadowing, and when we get a meaty backstory episode like this, all of the pieces are already there and fit together seamlessly. Oh Delenn! No wonder she counsels calm; when she lost hers, she started a war. And it's all so circular: her presence on the Gray Council a result of her genetic inheritance from Sinclair, who traveled back in time to mimic her transformation and introduce human elements to Minbari heritage that become, in the future, the reason for that transformation. I'm glad she had Lennier there with her, because of all people, his regard for her will survive this as it has survived everything else.
Babylon 5 4.10 - "Racing Mars"
I am weirdly--disturbingly, even--charmed by Stephen and Marcus's cranky buddy-cop road trip dynamic. And points to the show for giving them a fake honeymooning cover identity and not having either of them get grossed out or otherwise reacting poorly; the jokes are funny, not insulting. I'm also super-excited to see more of Mars, since I've always had the feeling that it was important. But I expected it to be important for political reasons, because of the rebellion and the secret PsyCorps base. The last thing I expected to see there was another one of those creepy shoulder-things. In retrospect, Captain Jack's lack of freedom was very well hinted at, and as creepy as Londo getting the thing drunk in order to be able to talk unmonitored for a few minutes. So whatever those things are, they are getting their tentacles--literally!--into both the Centauri government and the Mars underground resistance. Hmmmmmmmm.....
I know that Garibaldi's rationale for breaking with Sheridan is being layed out for us step by step. He reacts poorly to what he sees as a cult of personality around Sheridan, rather than a movement of equals. And Sheridan, in turn, has been more impatient and high-handed than anything with him, which tends to reinforce that impression. Still, there's something very wrong about Garibaldi's decisionmaking process at this point; it's skewed. The first thing he did when he got back was pull away from all of his old friends; and his friends, preoccupied with the war and their other problems, haven't noticed until he was already isolated; and now it's become a self-perpetuating cycle of misunderstandings and hurt feelings, and Garibaldi is making even worse choices. This cannot end well.
* * * * *
The upside of Amazonfail was that it got me in the habit of stopping into Borderlands and Modern Times. (Before Borderlands moved to its current location from Hayes Valley, I lived right around the corner, and Modern Times was my home away from home.) My to-read pile is pretty tall right now, and that's the way I like it. However, I picked up what was billed as the first of Terry Pratchett's Discworld Series without realizing it's less a series than a flowchart. We'll see how that goes.
* * * * *
Dreamwidth administrivia:
- I have totally lost track of who's over there and who isn't, beyond the people I have already subscribed to and/or granted access to. Let me know if you're over there.
- I plan to maintain an active presence on both LJ and DW; DW makes it very easy to do so. I can also see that I'll be using the sites in somewhat different ways. It will be interesting to see how that works; I'm actually pretty excited about that prospect. I've been terrible about both posting and commenting for the past few months because I was dealing with a very complicated and problematic release, so I'm looking forward to getting back into it.
- I'm going to import my current LJ content to DW soon. It has come to my attention that some people object to having their comments imported to DW. I am not sure I understand the objection, but I do respect that it's the way some people feel. DW is apparently working on a feature that will allow anyone with an openID to mass screen their comments on imported journals. However, since some people's issues with having their comments imported to DW are rooted in their desire not to have anything to do with the site, I will screen all of the imported comments for anyone who asks myself. This offer is good in perpetuity, and I'll add it to my userinfo both places.
- I am not going to admit how much time I spent mucking around with styles trying to add a page summary, tag cloud, and syndication buttons to my DW layout without success. I feel I learned a lot about styles, but not enough to, you know, actually do anything with them. My thing with code has always been that I could read and understand it quite easily, but could never actually write it; that's been fine for my job, but isn't so useful for things like this. If anybody has pointers to how-tos, I'd appreciate it.
* * * * *
It is Saturday and it is sunny and gorgeous and I am about to go out for brunch with friends. And I have been up since 5:00 am. Stupid time zones!