Much Ado About Rosemary
In an unprecedented event, today saw Mel working at the store and me staying home. (And even then, I was still up and showered before her. Go figure.) I was already pleasantly buzzed from Saturday evening's shindig in Stratford with Kevin & Dana and Dana's parents, wherein I learned that ground beef made into sausage-like shapes whose names I now completely forget are frighteningly tasty and addictive.
And so while Mel was away, the baka...spent most of the day cleaning and cooking, funny enough. There was a brief blitz cleaning on the front hall and living room, and from thereon in I was joined by my "old friend and zombie shooter-in-arms" John for an afternoon of simple relaxation.
Food ensued.
With the full intent on surprising Mel with a fancy dinner when she came back (because with the way work's been lately, such dinners have been few and far between), John & I set out with a menu and grocery list. By the time Mel returned, we had prepared two different breads--an Irish wheat bread John made from scratch and cooked in the stove, and a generic white bread I cheated & used our swanky breadmaker for.
(Sidenote: I very much heart homemade bread. The smell alone remains in my top food three scents, and reminds me of easy-going summer spent at my aunt & uncle's cottage where every morning began with a fresh, homemade loaf of bread for breakfast.)
The meal itself was a pork tenderloin grilled briefly in a saucepan and then broiled in our crockpot for a few hours. The original plan had been for it to be a Carribean Jerk flavouring...but then we managed to utterly forget to buy the jerk sauce despite going to 2 different places for ingredients. Oops. But we switched to a Mediterranean flavouring, with the pork loins being marinated in a Greek lemon sauce and some rosemary sprigs, and some small white potatoes fried up with olive oil, red onion, garlic and some sort of spice that starts with "f" and tasted a little like licorice.
I think it was fennel seed. I have vague recollections of my Dad serving the fennel vegetable a while back, and the distinct licorice-ish aftertaste. I could be wrong, and for all I know it was cumin.
We had also been hoping to make a chocolate mousse, but all the counterspace had already been used up by the crockpot and the bread machine. That, and I feared plugging the mixer into one of the already-used outlets and blowing a fuse.
Oh well.
I may not be the grandest of chefs, or even the most ambitious of amateur cooks (refer to Gary for the infamous "electric kettle" incident, or to Mel for the "chocolate milkshake in the blender" mishap), but I can't help but sit back with a quiet sense of pride in having helped out with a rather delicious meal.
Don't worry--I'm not going to make countless posts from here on in about what I made for breakfast every day. (I usually can't even remember what I had for breakfast by the end of the same day anyways, so we're all safe.) But today remains one of the best days off I've had that was spent just lounging around the apartment. And even if you've skipped everything just to get to today's lesson, this is a good way for me to bookmark the memory.
But in the wide world of random tangents:
http://www.howstuffworks.com/swearing.htm - an intriguing if not technical look into swearing, best viewed in conjunction with the
Penn & Teller's Bullshit episode on profanity.
http://obakemono.com/ - gacked from Jen's LJ originally, I think. The Obakemono project is a samll but still very informative database of common Japanese spirits & beasts found in folklore and mythology. (Great if you need to find something to viciously devour your Mary Sue.)
http://cabinet-of-wonders.blogspot.com/ - I first discovered this site courtesy of Gaiman's blog. It's in essence a very cool, Internet version of the old "Cabinet of Curiosities": private collections of strange artifacts, a concept which in turn evolved into museums as time went on. The best part about this site is that nothing is a simple "this subject only" post. A single entry will flow from one topic into another, and by the end you'll be still be educated and entertained. Highly recommended reading.
...and I think that's everything. If you need me, I'll be curling up with Neil Gaiman's
Fragile Things short story anthology.
Today's Lesson: fennel seed is much cheaper at a Bulk Barn, than if you bought a prefab jar of it at any standard grocery store.
Labels: Cabinet of Wonders, How Swearing Works, I can't believe it's not fennel seed, Obakamono Project, you blog what you eat
posted by Phillip at 8:32 PM
