Self-Inspired

I am happy with what I ate so far today so I thought I'd blog about it. I miss this thing!

Breakfast: Fried egg, sunny-side down. Small hunk of orange Cabot cheddar (why's it orange, by the way?). Slice of delicious Boule bread from Brooklyn Larder, spread with Trader Joe's blackberry jam. English breakfast tea, no milk. Water, vitamin, fish oil.

Lunch: Leftover Szechuan: chicken with celery and mushrooms in a spicy garlicky sauce. It needed peanuts. Homemade Jasmine rice.

Mid-afternoon snack: Handful of yogurt-covered pretzels. One of the last Macouns of the season.

Dinner at franny's or the W?

Pancake Man

Its been awhile since we've seen one of these and not everyone is completely crazy about subliminal implications but I know at least one person reading this from art history has a smile growing across her face.

The run down:
Pancakes a la buckwheat, choc chips, kasha, ground sunflower seeds & banana chips
Maple s-y-"up"
a fresh batch of yoghurt
almonds
granola clumps
fried egg, chedah cheese & slice of tomato

Cold Hot Pasta

Is hott in herre & I've got the remedy...



Arrabiata is one of the few un-swear related words i brought back from sweet Italia. Often inexpensive, tasty and unique due to it's hott character Arrabiata is not a sexually transmitted disease but rather a popular red sauce found all over Roma.

I was told by Gabriele that Arrabiata means "of the Arabs", presumably an Ancient Roman pick up from the crusades but Wikipedia suggests the following: All'arrabbiata means "angry style", named as such due to the heat of the peppers.

Either origin this sauce makes for a great overlay, both fresh off the stove on evening over penne or the following afternoon, outta the fridge. In fact, the heat (& in case you missed it, even Santa thinks this iz some heat) when combined with cool, is one of the great universal combos. Jason Alexander certainly nailed the thought with this dance number, in probably my all-time favorite commercial.

Thats the stuff!

After Putney let out, I spent some days va-couching: pushing off responsibilities at home in favor of moving through various friend's domiciles, drawing and decompressing. This is really a terrific way of traveling because on short notice you get to witness people in their native habitat and often they feed you just because your around and playing with their cat or three year old.

On one such visit, with this drawer and his significant paintess, I was treated to the breakout surprise of the summer: yogurt. Not just any yogurt, but thick, creamy, cool in the summer heat and best taken out to the porch, made-at-home yogurt.

Made-at-home yogurt... you're kidding me. No, I am not. And I was told the only instrument you'd need is a thermometer. From that moment I vowed to bring the concept, made at home yogurt, to New Haven.

It took about 2 hours upon arrival, 1 for unpacking and another to get hungry before I found myself at the grocery store frantically phone calling any one I knew who might know something about yogurt or had access to the Internet.

The ingredients are simple:
1/2 gallon of milk
1 container of yogurt
1 thermometer
Several bags of Chocolate Chips, some cheddar and Ben & Jerry's



For a recipe source I improvised, using these guys, who are especially cool because they're also into illustrating.

So this is what I came up with: (you can call it the 9:45pm yogurt recipe & you'll soon see why)


1.Construct a double boiler and heat 1/2 gallon of milk up to 190 degrees F

2.Cover pot & place in cool water watching the temp to sink to 107 degrees F

3.Add 1 cup of yogurt, well 16 ounces if your not careful and stir lightly.

4.Meanwhile, heat oven to 350 degrees F then turn it off once it's nice and hot.

5.Cover the alleged yogurt, stick it in the oven, close it, go to bed & let sit over night.

6.In the morning, pull the pot outta the oven, pour off the residual liquid



and if you're lucky, voila!


One day... a boy can dream

Can't beat the stand-by

Just made it thru summer camp and these were the digs that got me thru...

A layer of kale, chard & beat greens occasionally accompanied and occasionally pirated from the staff garden from behind the cow barn. Steam till relaxed then add several poached eggs from Trish's chickens with a few hunks of Cheddar. Top it with a combination of lil' beats stewed with cherry tomatoes and a nip of honey. Smatter with pepper and salt.

Doesn't matter who you are, a few bites of this will have you maneuvering like a teenager, running barefoot and settin' fancy free.

Cinco De Mom-0h

To go in reverse, for dinner: I picked up several slices at Bella Haven on College Street in New Haven. Although it was a prelude to a baseball game with liquid accompaniment up the block at the Anchor, Bella's pizza tasted just as good this time at 730pm as it more often does at 1 or 2am.

Not to step on the far more sophisticated New Haven Pizza reviews about to come out by Val Taleggio but I think Bella achieves it’s success by hitting on all three sides of the pizza golden triangle: sauce (which is clean, vibrant and fresh), crust (which is crisp, thin, yet pliant and acting as a perfect backboard for the sauce) and cheese (which is absorbent, piping hot and in an appetizing ratio relative to the thickness of the crust).

If there be one draw-back to this pizza, and it may be a matter of personal taste, because others have called this an attribute: the amount of oil which pools on your plate and is left on your hands between bites. Either way, you can’t beat the vicinity to the Anchor, where the food is horrible and the atmosphere divine. Especially the drawing angles from the booths and the steady stream of personality that flows in and outta there. On yester evening I had the pleasure of watching the hapless Yanks drop another against the pizza-sauced-colored Sox to the glee of a very independent Melissa and the woe of a carless, jobless Kiki.

Not to go off topic anymore than usual but I’m very impressed with the coaching going on in the ultimate sports program at this middle school.

For lunch, Chico & I heated up some split pea soup*(1) with a side of steamed brown rice and rainbow chard. These leftovers were well timed as we’d spent all yesterday morning into afternoon cleaning the apartment for Artwalk. After reorganizing the studio (we’re talking no brush left unturned), repairing hockey sticks, vacuuming and hanging paintings... lunch, in strong contrast to the rain outside, brought a glorious warmth to the living room and a temporary finishing still-life to the exhibit on the walls.

Although the original feeling earlier that morning was discontent with the timing of the event/relative to the state of finish with the paintings I’ve been working on.. after some pinhead oatmeal dashed upon with some simply bumpin jive-with-the-tastebuds, teamwork’d granola*(2), plus the addition of yoguhrt, ba-nenes, peanut butter, raw milk and honey, I felt fit for baptism.

Shout out to all the moms, grandmoms, future moms and potential moms this weekend...

Yours in culinary endeavors, J

*(1) Whole nother story, as that Split pea was the legend of last week never written but duly noted by all bards who put down their harps and pulled up a chair to sample its splendor.

*(2) Granola recipe and team-workmanship courtesy of the San Francisco Chef… Todah Rabah Beckolina

Leggums

Legumes, people. Grains and legumes, that's what I'm eating these days... well, that's what I should be eating anyway. I eat mostly bread. And dessert. Honestly, I can't even remember what I ate yesterday but so far today, it's been cereal with banana, coffee, a biscuit, some lentils with roti and some water. I'm actually pretty full or I would polish off some samosas and a couple of cookies. Hah.