Brussells, Turkeys, Flutes, and Tuxes
It's interesting how different foods can taste really good or really bad depending on how well you prepare them. Take brussel sprouts, for instance. I used to hate brussels. They were soggy, they didn't taste good, I didn't want them. So Lissa (the chef at my restaurant) puts them on the menu. And she tells me that I need to try them. I did, and it turned out that the way she made them, they weren't all that bad. Now that I've had them quite a few times, I've actually grown to enjoy them, and I tend to make an order to put on top of my salad for dinner about once a week. Turns out I just wasn't having them the right way before. The secret (at least for me) is to get small, young, fresh brussel sprouts from a local farmer (we get them still on the stalk - Did you know that brussel sprouts grow on stalks?), cut them in half, blanch them briefly, and then par-cook some house made bacon with a touch of olive oil(or pancetta if you don't have good, thick bacon - and I don't mean that sliced stuff you get in the store), add the brussels, salt, and pepper, toss and flip them face down in order to caramelize them a little and bring out a bit of sweetness (which means you can't overcrowd the pan or you cool it down to much to do this well), and finish with some fresh sage leaves and a good chunk of butter (to make a nice sage brown butter). We also garnish them with chopped, medium boiled egg and pickled red onion, but that's optional. I now like brussel sprouts (at least when it brussels, bacon, and butter in this fashion) enough that I'm actually going to cook them for my family on Thanksgiving (at which point I find out if they also will start to like them or if there will just be more for me...)
And speaking of Thanksgiving, it turns out that we're going to have it at my house this year instead of over at my parents. I don't have any extra time off next week, so Monday and Thursday are my normal days off. I don't want to spend my entire day off over at my parents' house, so they suggested we do it over at my house. Should be interesting. Also, we're not going to bother with turkey this year. We all like it, but we could take it or leave it, so we're going to go with some game hens instead. I'm going to go ahead and make some oatmeal raisin cookies and a couple of pumpkin pies on Monday (so I don't have to try and do it all on Thursday). I'm going to make one of the pies with rum. I'm still figuring out how I want to go about doing that (I don't want to pour it all in the pie mix as it would make it too loose and because most of the alcohol would cook off in the oven), but it should be interesting, and possibly really tasty. Of course, I will have to have a glass of it while I cook, since you are supposed to cook with whatever you are drinking (a good rule of thumb when cooking with wines and liquor, as it helps match flavors).
Random bit of information: It turns out that Jethro Tull songs seem to work pretty well for me as biking music, since they tend to have a good solid beat to pedal to, as I discovered on the way home tonight. It was foggy tonight, as well, which was a bit of a shock when I left the restaurant to go unlock my bike. I could only see the road clearly for about two or three blocks, though I could see headlights much further than that.
I need to pull out the sewing machine again this week, as I need to hem the tux pants and jacket I bought last month because I need them for the wind ensemble concert on the 4th. Said concert which has managed to sneak up on me quite rapidly. We only have one more practice before the day of the concert (though there is a practice run through in the afternoon on the day of the concert), which means I definitely need to spend some quality time down in the basement working on cleaning up a few trouble areas on my horn in the next two weeks. Pictures of Jeff and I in our snazzy tuxes should make it up onto my Facebook and Photobucket pages the week after (and we clean up nice, lol).
And now, as it is a quarter to midnight, I need to go grab some dinner. =D