(no subject)
Today was a vast improvement over yesterday. After a good cry, a great e-mail from my Papa, and a night of sleep, I was ready to Put My Shit In Order, and put it in order I did. By noon the car debacle was sorted out. I'm paying out the nose to keep it at the towing agency over the weekend, but then a charity is coming to pick it up on Monday and then I will not have a car anymore and Habitat for Cats will get the proceeds from Ziggy (scrap or sale, I don't know; we don't even know if he runs). Work passed quickly and I even got to scoot home a bit early, which meant I got to start on my Good Stuff. (First I ran into Kirk on the subway; he was easy to spot because there are only a few men I know who have a limited-edition GGRD tote bag from 2008. Hi Kirk!)
I've been craving parsnip soup a lot lately. It's winter, parsnip soup is very wintry, but I think it's also because I've been thinking and talking a lot about English cooking, and England ALWAYS makes me think of parsnip soup. Zach and I took a trip there just after Christmas in 2001 and we ate creamy parsnip soup at Leeds Castle, where it was the only vegetarian item on the menu. It was AWESOME. I had no idea parsnips were so amazing. They're sweet and earthy but not in the gross way beets are. They get better and better with roasting, but they're so wonderful pureed and added to soups. I love a good parsnip. I eventually found a recipe that I made a couple of times, but no parsnip soup will be as good as the one I had in Leeds. I think it tasted better because I could see black swans swimming in the moat while I ate it. Mike's parents got me a cookbook for Christmas that had an appealing recipe so I figured I'd give it a spin. It contained green apples, which sounded like a delicious complement (please note: it was), so I got to chopping, listening to the Grosse Pointe Blank soundtrack. By 8pm we'd inhaled bowls of the soup (which I topped with fried leeks and which we scooped up with pieces of hot, fresh bread) and Mike went off to the bedroom to work on web stuff while I...cooked some more. AAAAAHHHHHH.
Our friends Luke and Lisa are coming over tomorrow to watch Inglourious Basterds and I wanted to make lentil soup (another wintertime craving -- did I mention I really love soups?). Since lentil soup improves upon sitting in the fridge, I just made the whole cauldron of it tonight. OH MY GOD you guys. I combined two recipes, kind of winging it, but I put crushed up grains of paradise in like I did last time, and that spice is just so much fun. I hadn't given thought to dessert until tonight, but as I was cooking I decided that gingerbread (cake, not cookies) would be appropriate -- earthy, rich, heady -- and I had the ingredients handy, so in the oven it went. I can't tell you how amazing my house smells right now. There's still a tinge of leek high on the air, there's lots of sweetness thanks to the cake and the apples and parsnips, but there's also a basenote of bacon and mirepoix and oh man, I never want to leave here. I just want to keep smelling this stuff all night. I put a bunch of CDs on and, though I didn't plan it, I ended up listening to a sort of Heather in 1999 mix -- Rushmore, Black 47, Great Big Sea, and Frank Black and the Catholics.
Words cannot express how peaceful I find it in the kitchen. I like cooking with other people, but it's a treat to be by myself, singing at the top of my lungs to old, familiar songs I haven't heard in ages. If I clean up my mess, no one will notice that I dripped cake batter down my arm, no one will see me steal tastes out of the soup pot (I'm very bad about blowing on it enough because I'm always too eager). One of the best parts of cooking, if you ask me, is presenting the food you've made to someone you like. I express love through food, and making a good meal for someone makes me feel good in my bones.
I've got happy bones tonight. There's just enough time to finish Hungry Monkey before bed... Is it bad form to reread a book immediately upon finishing it?
Big ups to Brother Choo who gave me this awesome apron for Christmas.
I've been craving parsnip soup a lot lately. It's winter, parsnip soup is very wintry, but I think it's also because I've been thinking and talking a lot about English cooking, and England ALWAYS makes me think of parsnip soup. Zach and I took a trip there just after Christmas in 2001 and we ate creamy parsnip soup at Leeds Castle, where it was the only vegetarian item on the menu. It was AWESOME. I had no idea parsnips were so amazing. They're sweet and earthy but not in the gross way beets are. They get better and better with roasting, but they're so wonderful pureed and added to soups. I love a good parsnip. I eventually found a recipe that I made a couple of times, but no parsnip soup will be as good as the one I had in Leeds. I think it tasted better because I could see black swans swimming in the moat while I ate it. Mike's parents got me a cookbook for Christmas that had an appealing recipe so I figured I'd give it a spin. It contained green apples, which sounded like a delicious complement (please note: it was), so I got to chopping, listening to the Grosse Pointe Blank soundtrack. By 8pm we'd inhaled bowls of the soup (which I topped with fried leeks and which we scooped up with pieces of hot, fresh bread) and Mike went off to the bedroom to work on web stuff while I...cooked some more. AAAAAHHHHHH.
Our friends Luke and Lisa are coming over tomorrow to watch Inglourious Basterds and I wanted to make lentil soup (another wintertime craving -- did I mention I really love soups?). Since lentil soup improves upon sitting in the fridge, I just made the whole cauldron of it tonight. OH MY GOD you guys. I combined two recipes, kind of winging it, but I put crushed up grains of paradise in like I did last time, and that spice is just so much fun. I hadn't given thought to dessert until tonight, but as I was cooking I decided that gingerbread (cake, not cookies) would be appropriate -- earthy, rich, heady -- and I had the ingredients handy, so in the oven it went. I can't tell you how amazing my house smells right now. There's still a tinge of leek high on the air, there's lots of sweetness thanks to the cake and the apples and parsnips, but there's also a basenote of bacon and mirepoix and oh man, I never want to leave here. I just want to keep smelling this stuff all night. I put a bunch of CDs on and, though I didn't plan it, I ended up listening to a sort of Heather in 1999 mix -- Rushmore, Black 47, Great Big Sea, and Frank Black and the Catholics.
Words cannot express how peaceful I find it in the kitchen. I like cooking with other people, but it's a treat to be by myself, singing at the top of my lungs to old, familiar songs I haven't heard in ages. If I clean up my mess, no one will notice that I dripped cake batter down my arm, no one will see me steal tastes out of the soup pot (I'm very bad about blowing on it enough because I'm always too eager). One of the best parts of cooking, if you ask me, is presenting the food you've made to someone you like. I express love through food, and making a good meal for someone makes me feel good in my bones.
I've got happy bones tonight. There's just enough time to finish Hungry Monkey before bed... Is it bad form to reread a book immediately upon finishing it?
Big ups to Brother Choo who gave me this awesome apron for Christmas.