Posts filed under 'Food follies!'
I know this is old news, but I’m a little bit peeved with HBO over their decision to move Big Love to the fall. I realize it was the writer’s strike and everything, but COME ON. Big Love is not a fall show. It is a steamy summer show with multiple wives and creepy old men and lots of sex that is anything but sexy, and yet somehow it remains completely appealing, but again, not in a sexy way. It’s horribly unsexy in the way that ’70s-style pubic hair is unsexy. Which is to say, vaguely familiar and yet slightly parental and no one knows why. Does that make sense? It doesn’t. But it does remind me of a the classic 1970s female sexuality self-help book by Lonnie Barbach, “For Yourself: The Fulfillment of Female Sexuality” in which she recommends GETTING HIGH AND/OR DRUNK as a means to sexual fulfillment. And she’s so EARNEST about it, too.
“Some couples find a joint puts them in the mood!” Yes, Lonnie, I’ll bet they do. She goes on to say that booze (and she calls it booze) is also useful. No word on whether these two recommendations are in the most current edition.
By way of explanation, not that anyone asked: I collect social hygiene, self-help and cook books from the ’50s, ’60s and ’70s, hence the Lonnie Barbach. Am desperately seeking a first edition of Hints from Heloise — not the Heloise you all know, but her MOTHER. The one who explains the best way to clean a crinoline skirt and mentions that you should clean the ashtrays before your husband comes home. And for the love of God, don’t forget to put on lipstick.
Now I have to wait until AT LEAST September, which means I won’t even bother with Entourage, because, my friends, I AM OVER IT. Over Vince Chase, over Turtle, over E. Over Drama, even. I never thought this would happen, but last season sort of did it for me. Medellin indeed.
Speaking vaguely of cookbooks, I remain confused by the never-ending “summer recipe” lists that say that they don’t use the oven and keep you COOL, and yet advocate standing over a white-hot skillet sweating into your potatoes for 25 minutes. Yes, yes, an oven heats a house, but a skillet heats your FOREHEAD. That being said, might I recommend roasting carrots in the oven at 425 for 25 minutes with salt, pepper and olive oil? Doing tomato slices in similar fashion at 350 for 15 minutes is also delightful, and if you do them both in the cool of the nighttime, you can have a lovely, filling salad the next day for dinner without breaking a sweat.
Not that I’m usually one to dispense advice about sensitive matters, but if you’re infertile or a suspected infertile, not only do I recommend avoiding TTC message boards (Babydust! ~~*~~~*~~~*~~~*) (GDIAF, Babyduster!), but holy lord, the dark underbelly of infertile blogs — not most of them, mind you, but SOME — is also a minefield that you should run, not walk, away from. In some of them, you’ll find people’s lives who have been utterly destroyed by their infertility, which is sort of understandable, but not something I’m aiming to aspire to, and worse, there are too many spouses whose lack of support will do nothing but break your heart. And while I generally stray from judging others, I will say that there is a special place in hell for husbands who leave their wives for no other reason other than that they can’t produce a biological heir. Dude, I’m sorry, get over yourself. If you’re that massive of a douchebag, it’s unlikely that your legacy was worth preserving in the first place.
Mercy me, this day is over! Almost over! I had a cup of coffee last evening at 6:30 p.m. and as a result stayed AWAKE! and also ALERT! until 4 a.m., which was the last time I checked the clock, no shit. Aaand, I rose at 7:30. This, when combined with a spot of hormones, had me actually warning Adam at 3:30 this afternoon that coming home was entirely optional, and that staying at work late may be recommended. Or hey, had he considered staying at a hotel for fun? The Marriott has rooms! Yes, yes, GO TO THE MARRIOTT! Instead, I opted for creme brulee, which is available in delightful single servings at our local health food store (ha ha HAAA) and waited until 8 for the wine. And while it was too late for the obligatory whimper of “I TOLD YOU I WAS NOT RIGHT TODAY,” both salvaged the evening quite nicely. No matter the order, I’m feeling nothing short of awesome, but I’m having a hard time imagining who wouldn’t after a hefty serving of wine and heavy cream.
And suddenly, I’m craving fish sticks. Crispy ones, from the freezer section, possibly made by Mrs. Paul. With TARTAR SAUCE.
I told you I was not right today.
Hey, happy Thursday! And thank you — THANK YOU — for all of the book recommendations. Am overwhelmed, but also madly in love with you. Our vacation, PS, is now the first week of August, rather than July, which is both disappointing and thrilling, as I love looking forward to things and PLANNING things. And I now have a wonderful reading list of fluff.
*The Raconteurs
June 25th, 2008
My skin doesn’t like Vermont very much. Since we moved here, it’s been … well, a mess, really, and not a day hasn’t gone by when I haven’t been rocking what can only be described as pizza face. It did the same thing when we first moved to Florida, and eventually I got into a good groove by finally acquiescing to a decent moisturizing regimen, including a night moisturizer that I really loved (Boscia, if you’re wondering) and the clouds parted, and I had great skin until we got here and it all went to hell in a handbasket. I changed it up last night in an effort to reclaim great skin, and truly, I didn’t think it could get any worse, but hey, um, WOW. IT DID.
I used Burt’s Bee’s Radiance Night Cream with royal jelly, which sounds so absolutely gross, does it not? Like, it sounds like sexytime lube for bees, which I just don’t want to smear on my face. I know that’s not what it is, but dude, it’s called ROYAL JELLY. And it’s a SECRETION. BAHRGH.
No matter. I woke up this morning with FIVE BRAND-NEW ZITS of the extra-ooky variety, if you know what I’m saying. So no jelly for me. And perhaps none for you, for if you have oily skin, dude, RUN. RUN AWAY FROM THE BEE LUBE. Which brings me to the fact that I am now in the market for a new night cream, and because I don’t even live near a department store, I’d like something I can get at Rite-Aid. Call me cheap, but it’s mostly laziness and a hatred for mail-order. Do you have any recommendations?
Speaking of cheap, I got a library card at lunch today, when I realized that I’ve been spending an ungodly amount of money on books for an ungodly amount of time. I don’t even think I THOUGHT about the amount of trips I took to the bookstore, because I told myself, “It’s for books! Books are good for you!” I had a backlog of reading material that carried me through since we moved here, but in the last three weeks, I’ve spent upwards of $50 PER WEEK OR MORE on books. I’m sorry to say as well, that it’s because we only have a locally-owned bookstore here and NOTHING is discounted, ever — I mean, I’m all for buying local, but there’s something to be said for Barnes & Noble’s prices, I’m shamed to admit. Especially when my lifelong voracious reading habits suddenly mean I won’t buy any books at all. (I’m sorry authors! I’m sorry! Local is EXPENSIVE! Like, uh, more than $200-per-month expensive! Reading is supposed to be a cheap, at-home entertainment-type activity!)
Anyway, for some reason, the library card makes me feel virtuous, like the Elizabeth Berg novel I nabbed today helps me to contribute to society. It doesn’t. But I still feel SPECIAL. I have a LIBRARY CARD and am saving MONEY. Someone give me a cookie.
(Also, can I tell you again how much I love Goodreads, as it totally appeals to the listmaker in me and I’m embarrassed at the amount of procrastination I do there by browsing reviews and books and MAKING MORE LISTS.)
And finally, in the land of biting off more than you can chew, I — who have until this point only attempted culinary challenges to the level of SHAKE ‘N BAKE — thought that since we have no Thai restaurants near us, that I would attempt homemade pad thai. And folks, there is a reason that kids don’t grow up eating pad thai as a familiar comfort food, along with meatloaf and mashed potatoes. This is because it’s HARD. AND AWFUL. AND VERY, VERY DISGUSTING. AND NOT LIKE IT IS IN RESTAURANTS. I finished working at 5:30 and started dinner, thinking that it would be easy! The Web site said it was easy! We’d be eating by 6:15!
HA. We ate at 7:30, if by “ate” you mean took one bite each and nearly threw up in our mouths, because again, oh my sweet God.
“It tastes like soap! But it’s … it’s sort of okay.” Adam was horrified, but trying to be a good sport.
“No! NO! It tastes like PASTE in elementary school — no no, PASTE IS BETTER! THIS TASTES LIKE ROTTING PASTE! WITH SOUR FRUIT.” And it was. It was awful. So awful. So, so awfully awful.
I was almost in angry pad-thai’d tears, because dude, it was HARD. There were MANY INGREDIENTS. They were CHOPPED and for chrissake, I used MISE EN PLACE. WITH RAMEKINS. The kitchen was trashed like it has never been trashed before. Scallions littered the floor like confetti, while the refrigerator door was smeared with a slash of tamarind paste that resembled a bloodstain. Splashes of oily garlic were caked to the walls above the stove, and I used every pot we owned, along with the wok, which lay haphazardly askew in the sink, the sticky noodles permanently etched onto its surface, never to be removed again. I was sweating, despite the fact that it SNOWED TODAY. (Did I not mention it fucking SNOWED TODAY? WELL, IT DID.)
And because by the time this all wrapped up, it was 8 p.m., and because we live in a town where NOTHING IS AVAILABLE AFTER SEVEN WITHOUT A BIG PRODUCTION, and I … I had no back-up plan at all … I had a McDonald’s cheeseburger for dinner, while Adam had a Quarter Pounder. Thai food is awesome.
(Seriously? My last meal was SHAKE ‘N BAKE. What was I THINKING? I AM NOT SMITTEN KITCHEN. Also? Tamarind tastes like absolute shit, as does fish sauce, I’m sorry. And as a sauce, together? Over NOODLES? WITH VERY LITTLE BLUNTING INGREDIENTS? NO NO NO.)
Have a great Thursday!
*Travis
April 30th, 2008
I have a thing for high-end cooking magazines, like I have absolutely any idea what I’m doing in the kitchen, and for some reason, I like to read them in bed, which is quite possibly the least appetizing spot in the house. Although that’s not really true, because tonight, we had dinner in bed, does that gross you out? Grilled cheese and tomato soup from a can (Campbell’s!), because Adam is sick, we don’t have a dining room table (the second we knew we weren’t going to stay in this house, we nixed the very idea of buying one, because why? So we can pay to move it?) and our usual spot where we eat in front of the television was unappealing.
Does anyone else do this, or are we the only piggish couple who shovels our food in our mouths in odd locations? I mean, certainly if we had a child, I might feel differently, as really, a high chair has no place in the bedroom or living room, but … well, for now, it’s fine.
The point I started to make is that my bedtime reading leaves me subject to illusions of culinary grandeur, particularly Bon Appetit, and in the last five minutes tonight, I had to be talked off the ledge of making my own handmade spice rubs in pretty jars to give out as Christmas gifts this season. I mean, really, I made Campbell’s soup from a can for dinner … do I really think I’m going to roast a supersize batch of cardamom pods and toasted cumin seeds, grind them with a mortar and pestle, throw in a little gourmet sea salt and then (oh my God) put it all in a hand-decorated tin with a personalized label? Seriously?
I have a mammogram at 8 a.m. tomorrow morning, and while yay, breast health and all, I’m dreading it, because again, I have these dense fibrocystic breasts that take hours to sift through with the assistance of four radiologists and a special decoder ring. I don’t mind these things generally, but all, and oh I mean ALL, dignity is lost when you have four doctors and a nurse repositioning your breast on a set of slides while one says things like, “No, put the nipple THAT way. No, no — THE OTHER WAY. Facing me. Yes, I want the nipple facing ME. Really jam it in there so I can see the top part of it. That’s good. Like that.”
Yes, the last doctor I had said “jam it in there,” like he was packing the trunk of a car for a road trip and my boob was that last pesky duffel bag that refused to cooperate.
And finally, since we’re on the path to dangerously disjointed anyway, vanity sizing is really on my nerves. I initially thought, stupidly, that even though I lost a rather sizable amount of weight, that I could still get away with wearing some of my fat pants, because so what? They’d be a little big! How exciting! Not so much. Perils of bearing your thong at the post office aside, my God, too-big pants are astonishingly unflattering. Most days I alternated between looking like I had a giant load of corn poop in my pants to simply appearing … deflated, like someone had let the air out of my legs. In both instances, I actually looked fatter than I had before, which was certainly not the goal, and I did not give up copious amounts of pizza so that I could look like a half-empty Michelin man.
Enter the new pants I finally bought, which were in a size eight, which, I might add, is a perfectly reasonable size for someone of my … size, hey, can we say SIZE again? Also, I already had two pairs of these pants (Gap jeans, boot cut, if you were wondering) and loved them in my size eight. Except that it appears that what was once a size eight is no longer a size eight, and the current size eight is more like a ten or a twelve. And although I bought them anyway, because they fit in the dressing room, after about an hour on my body, my crotch was starting to seep to my knees and I’m pretty sure I could pull them off without unbuttoning them, and this is WRONG, people, it’s SO WRONG.
I am not a size six. I’m not saying that because I want you to say, “yes you are!” I’m saying that because frankly, I don’t want to be a size six. I’m certainly a lot thicker than that — by choice — and if sizes keep shrinking at this rate, in a few years, I’m going to be the first five-foot-seven woman in history to weigh 140 pounds and wear a size 0.
I know this isn’t new, but God, it’s annoying, and so completely deceptive and it’s cruel, it’s actually cruel. Not to mention the fact that it encourages us to be porkier all the time, because why not? You can eat nachos every day and still be a size two! I’ll roll down the aisles of the supermarket like a blueberried Violet Beauregard, but by gum, I’ll be wearing my size zero pants!
But for now, it’s a minor irritation, because I have to buy new pants again, despite already having gone through the miserable self-ass-checking in the mirror. Thank you, Gap. It is small consolation that you are not Ann Taylor, who designs pants for … well, I don’t know who. Can anyone wear Ann Taylor pants? I might as well throw on the slipcovers for our couches and pair them with a nice cardigan, because geez, are they boxy on me.
Happy Wednesday!
*Shocking Pinks
November 13th, 2007
So I was wrong, so very wrong, about a few shows this fall season, as I discovered throughout the weekend, as both days can be summed up thusly: Caught up on TiVo. The End.
Well, not really, of course, but it would be disingenuous to deny that a significant chunk of the evenings were spent lying supine on the bed beneath the pleasing glow of Top Chef (go Casey!) Dirty Sexy Money (Donald Sutherland? Love!), Life (House, but in cop form!), Bionic Woman (So bad. Run for your lives!) and, um, Back to You (ummm … will it do to say that I like Patricia Heaton and can’t help myself?).
This all points to the fact that I’m afraid I may be overextending myself this television season, because Friday Night Lights is coming back, and Pushing Daisies and … well, I’m overwhelmed, and I may have to quit my job to become a full-time television watcher. And after the week I had last week, it’s a bit tempting.
Honestly, we had a great weekend, and I’m crushed to see it end, as usual. We took Sunny out for breakfast on Saturday morning, and to a local park for some fetch, which actually means “lying in the grass and falling asleep while staring at a ball.” While it was lovely, it knocked her on her sad little puggy ass, and she’s done little but sleep ever since — in fact, she’s asleep right now, at 8:30, after sleeping until 11:30 this morning. Oh, to be a pug.
Completely unrelated, but you know, I got an e-mail last week from Saks touting the excitement of new! high-waisted! DENIM! And honestly, I know it’s coming back, but I have to ask: why? Why the hell? It’s not flattering on anybody, I don’t care who you are. I’ll grant you, the low-rise revolution created some issues in the ass-crack department, but the high waist creates a bit of a … well, it creates a gunt. I don’t know how more delicately to put it.
And with that, I’ll leave you with a recipe for my very favorite snack in the universe. We had a bit of a culinary disaster this evening (Adam this time, not me, and it involved a recipe for chicken rollatini gone horribly, horribly awry), and I’m currently holed up in our bedroom with a big bowl of Smitten Kitchen’s roasted tomatoes and onions over white beans (again, I add an entire head of garlic and roast it, too) and my snack is marinating downstairs. HOO BOY AM I EXCITED.
I am nothing if not enchanted by exceedingly stinky brined foods — pickled brussels sprouts are a favorite, and I even like pickled eggs, and if I wasn’t allergic to them, would be unafraid to order them in bars, or is that only a rural Pennsylvania thing, with the pig’s feet and pickled eggs behind the bar? Anyway, these radishes, I must admit, smell a bit like … well, they smell like toe jam. But oh, they are delicious! Peppery and sweet and slightly acidic, with the perfect nutty accord of sesame oil. I implore you, move beyond the stench and enjoy! I usually triple the liquid and use it with about two bunches of radishes, or one medium-ish bag of them, cleaned.
A few hours before you make this, clean the radishes and smash them with a mallet or rolling pin. Salt them heavily (HEAVILY) and place them in a colander or strainer over a bowl to draw out the water. Let them rest for at least two hours, so that they can soak up enough of the marinade.
- 1 tsp. salt
- 2 tsp. soy sauce
- 2 T rice vinegar
- 2 T dark sesame oil (I like to add a drop or two of the superhot variety, for spice, too)
- 1 tsp. sugar
Whisk together all ingredients and pour over radishes. Refrigerate and, most importantly, DO NOT EAT RIGHT AWAY. Oh my goodness, these are much, much better the next day and the day after that and after that and OH MY GOD THEY ARE SO STINKY AND GOOD.
Enjoy, and happy Monday!
*Wilco
September 30th, 2007
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