I Should Just Start Numbering My Food Posts

This post should be called Summer Foods #2. This is a appealing to the same part of me that wouldn't mind wearing a uniform every day, but appalling to the part of me that can't eat a sweet potato and a tin of tuna for lunch day in and day out (yes, I knew someone with this diet). Coming up with the title for posts is the most tedious part of a blog.  I'm not sure what this says about me, and if I was sure, I probably wouldn't like it.

Steamed eggplant experiment

Eggplants are a tricky for me to cook without lots of oil. It's one of those vegetables that can be blissfully silky or disgusting and spongy depending on the preparation. My favorite Chinese braised eggplants involve deep frying eggplants in peanut oil, and then stir frying them with flavoring oils like chili and sesame. However, I like to use the slender Chinese and Japanese eggplants for that dish and the CSA keeps on sending me the globe eggplants. A Fuchsia Dunlop recipe for steamed eggplant had the potential to be a delicious and healthier way to cook the eggplant, so that was dinner last week. The dipping sauce, a combination of homemade chili oil, black vinegar, sugar, and light soy sauce, made me not miss the deep fried eggplant. However, it is questionable if this is actually healthier because I ended up mixing all of the dipping sauce with the steamed eggplant, which made a great room temperature salad.

Matcha mochi cupcakes are a win

This recipe for match mochi cupcakes was chewy and a good treat to bake up for someone who rarely bakes. I subbed out cashew milk for regular milk since I rarely have straight up milk around here.  Neither of us humans drink milk, although we are not technically dairy free because I usually have a tub of Strauss whole milk yogurt and the occasional pint of ice cream. If I make these again, I'd like them to be crispier on the outside with the aid of my convection oven. My oven, which I have had for almost 10 years now, has a convection setting, but I'm just now getting used to it. Crispy roasted potatoes in 15 minutes flat made me a convert.

Volunteer downspout mushrooms

I thought these mushrooms were porcinis, not that I'd dare eat them even after confirming that they have an olive brown spore print. They live in the backyard, a place where Mingus has free reign to do his bathroom business. Although I've never seen him pee on the downspout, I'm convinced everything back there is not fit for eating. Sure, now that I'm on the Bay Area Homesteader Hookup list, I've read about people much more extreme who use humanure from their compost toilets to grow food, but I admire that in a theoretical way and don't aspire to do that, not to mention that my backyard is small and the neighbors behind me can see into it.

My only productive zucchini plant

I still don't have zucchini coming out of my ears. One out of the three plants is producing one or two zucchinis a week although the plants take up quite a bit of valuable garden real estate. The other two plants are producing runty little 3-inch zucchinis that have blossom rot. Still, this is better than last year, and I know what now to do again next year. For example, no zucchini plant should grow in a pot. Although the raven zucchini seed package said it could be done, it is too hard to get the amount of water just right using our irrigation system.

Playing with my julienne tool yields zucchini noodles

I want zucchini coming out of my ears because I love cooking the nutty zucchini in my cast iron skillet with a bit of garlic and olive oil. Low and slow is how I prefer to cook this dish, although in time pinches I have only given it a quick shake in a hot pan. Both versions are good, and both versions take a boatload of zucchini for an adequate portion size (half our plate because we love it so).

Since I'm not crafting anything besides tiny hats and dishcloths, I've been catching up on Arrested Development (Season 4 was the best! Long live George Michael!) and reading. Since May, I've read Cooked: A Natural History of Transformation by Michael Pollan, Homeward Bound by Emily Matchar (interesting if you've ever pondered the questions of how the DIY revival and feminism can co-exist and if one cancels out the other), The Sweet Life in Paris by David Lebovitz (read this now!), and I'm almost done with Wild by Cheryl Strayed (a book I was reluctant to read due to its Oprah endorsement and my disdain for books about women overcoming obstacles, but so far I'm loving it). Most of these books came from my library's ebook lending program, which is the cat's meow. I'm almost done with Wild, so any recommendations on what I should read next? I have Lean In, Inferno (please don't give me crap for this one), Tiger Babies Strike Back, and Fairyland on my hold list.

Summer Foods

The boy has been brewing again, and that means that the freezers (yes, plural) are full of spent grain. A few times, by the end of the brewing process, we were too tired to bag and freeze the grains, so we dumped the whole pile into the compost bin. Since we have a slow compost bin that is open, this was not the best idea because it was a critter free for all and I was sure that I was going to get hantavirus. On the bright side, the "compostable" plates we used for a party finally broke down thanks to the molds that the grains introduced to the bin. 

Last weekend, I wanted the grains out of our freezer pronto, so I posted on the Bay Area Homestead Hook-Up* on a lazy Sunday morning asking to swap our grain surplus for some eggs. I got loads of replies from people who live 10 miles away or less, so that was a bonus! Within two hours, I had space for my ice cream maker, a dozen of mixed chicken and duck eggs, and I got to see pictures of a frizzle chicken and duck who are co-parenting a batch of eggs.

One chicken egg yolk was immediately transformed into aioli. I used David Lebovitz's recipe, using my mortar and pestle to both crush the garlic with the salt and to whip up the aioli. It was a breeze! In the past, I've used my immersion blender to make mayo because I was convinced it was the only way I couldn't mess it up, but the clean-up and the power cord bugged me. That aioli didn't last long because although its intended destination was a flop (oven roasted potatoes akin to patatas bravas) due to my inexperience with the convention oven, we found plenty of other things to dip into the silky, garlicy sauce. I have another chicken egg resting on the counter destined to become aioli.

Two other eggs became one of my favorite breakfasts: ginger and tomato eggs. Since we have a surplus of yellow snow peas, I chopped some of those into the mix as well.

The key to good ginger and tomato eggs is to use plenty of oil and to blister the tomatoes and vegetables. That little bit of char from the breath of the wok (wok hay) is why I will never part with my wok. Ever. I've worked diligently to get a good seal on it, and now my wok can transform anything that enters it into some damn fine food.

After you char the sauté the tomatoes and peas with ginger, take them out, add more oil to the wok, and  pour in a few softly scrambled eggs. When the eggs are almost set, put the tomato mix back into the wok, turn off the heat, add some roasted sesame oil and salt, and gently mix everything together. It's my idea of a perfect meal anytime, but it is especially delicious with homegrown tomatoes.

Oh, I've also knit another carboy sweater. This time, it's more dapper with the stripes. My next carboy sweater will be crocheted. We have a few sour beers that sit around the house for up to a year, and I am tired of the looking at the cardboard boxes in which they are housed, so I need to sketch up something cool that I can stand to look at for that long.

All my little lovelies

Have I talked about my love affair with Hida Tool in Berkeley? They carry, among other goodies, Japanese knives and ceramic sharpening stones. I bought a 10-inch sword knife there, and it brings me great joy to sharpen it and my other knives. Until recently, I was outsourcing my knife sharpening, but since I only had one chef's knife, I was left in a lurch when it was gone. I solved that issue by two things: buying a longer, sharper chef's knife from Hida Tool and learning how to sharpen my own knife. When you buy a knife in person from Hida Tool, you get a free knife sharpening lesson in a their dimly-lit back room. At first, I was pretty nervous about sharpening a knife on my own, but my teacher was patient and reassuring. It helped my nerve to read on an online knife forum (there are forums for everything!) that anything I could do to screw it up I could undo later as my skills progressed. Plus, ceramic takes very little material off versus those scary mechanized sharpening wheels. Sure, it takes longer, but it is deeply satisfying. Plus, no one f*cks with you while you are sharpening a knife. You get instant respect. In addition to the ceramic block, I have a ceramic honer coming in from Edge Pro.

I also gave away most of my other knives that I rarely used and the accompanying knife block, and I have plans on replacing the cleaver and the bread knife. I'm ready to graduate to a real Chinese cleaver that I sharpen myself, and that bread knife is a mere 7-inches, so it's a little too short for my round loaves. Since I'm knife obsessed, I'm going to stop writing about them now because I can go on and on. The boy is genuinely terrified of my Japanese knife, and he refuses to use it. That's fine. All mine.

* You can subscribe to the BAHH by sending an email to bahh-subscribe@lists.riseup.net.

Dog Meets Boy

Mingus has decided that kids are cool because they feed him animal crackers and they give him lots of pets. He even liked playing with the talking puzzle, although the talking part of the puzzle ended up frustrating him and I had to stop him from repeatedly pouncing on it. V is for violin! Y is for yak!

Kids even give him hugs and kisses (followed by some spitting out of fur). At first, Mingus was confused and a little alarmed.

Then, Mingus eased into the hug. He focused on the good things, like an endless supply of animal crackers.

The thought of animal crackers really warmed his heart, and he begin to enjoy the toddler version of a hug, which is more like a lean.

Mingus was showered with many more hugs that day, sometimes when he wasn't expecting them.  This visit is going into the books as a successful playdate!

Knitted Carboy Sweater

Click here for my Knitted Carboy Sweater Pattern!

For the boy's birthday, I wanted to make his 6.5-gallon carboy a sweater of its very own. Since light exposure can lead to skunky beer, he had been wrapping his carboys in dog towels. While this practice wouldn't bother me that much if his beers were brewing in the back room, the fact that he insists on fermenting on our kitchen counter, where it was the first thing I'd see upon entering the house, started to wear me down. So, I guess you could say that I also knit this for myself.

See that blowdown tube in the above picture? That tube saves marriages. Seriously. It still makes me livid to repeat the stories (yes, plural), so just trust me on this one.

I decided to knit the sweater in 4x4 ribbing in a tight gauge, and I did want something that looked, well, classic. More Pottery Barn than CB2. It's hard to not think of yourself as a little odd when you're designing a classic sweater for a carboy, but I am pleased with the final result!

In the end, it was all knit out of leftover Wool-Ease I had purchased for a blanket (almost done, although I keep saying that!). There were several times during this process where I resented the carboy sweater because it was more knitting than I would have to do for a sweater for myself. Yet, it was the perfect project for that time because it was fairly mindless after a few easy calculations and gauge swatches. I knit it bottom up, but the next one I do will be top down. Although this is a ribbed sweater and it can fit both the 6.5- and the 5-gallon carboy, I do want to knit another one since the other carboy we have in the house is sitting in a cardboard box. Sour beers age for about a year, and I've been staring at that box in the corner of our living room way too long. If I don't knit it a sweater, I'm going to insist that the boy makes it into some sort of coffee table so that space isn't wasted.

A Small Amount of Kale Kimchi

One bunch of kale and 3 carrots yields about 2 cups of kimchi

Carrots and kale abound in our garden, although for this experimental round of kale kimchi, I used the kale and carrots that came in my weekly CSA box. The idea is that in the near future, I can make kimchi from all the things growing in my garden, sans ginger and garlic. Oh, I know I can grow garlic here because other people do, but my garlic turns out wormy. Two seasons of wormy garlic and my drive to continue growing it is in the gutter. 

Carrots and Russian red kale

Loosely, I followed this recipe. I salted my kale and carrots instead of drizzling them with fish sauce, and I added 1 T of hot Korean chili powder and 2 T of Korean chili flakes. I also added minced ginger and reduced the sugar.

Reducing sugar intake has been a thing around here thanks to reading Fat Chance: Beating the Odds Against Sugar and Salt, Fat, Sugar: How the Food Giants Hooked Us. Admittedly, I am one bummer of a dining companion right now because I'll tell you how putting that sugar- and carb-laden dessert in your mouth will mess up your liver. Oddly, people don't want to talk about it, although I find it fascinating and I just bring it up because I think my companion will think it's fascinating as well and not because I am admonishing that person's choice of food. Apparently, I am out of control because the boy will come home, grab a beer, and go into another room as fast as he can so I won't talk to him about liver damage and visceral fat. He's glad that I'll be reading Cooked: A Natural History of Transformation next.

Beautiful red pepper paste made with fish sauce, rice flour, ginger, and garlic

More cooking thank knitting has been happening in these parts. I thought I'd be sick of cooking since we pulled off a party for 30 people with only 1 day of preparation and lovely friends who all pitched in, but it actually fired me up again. (You must make a Green Glove cocktail!) Well, that and the longer days. Staying inside and cooking when it is sunny outside is more appealing than staying inside and cooking when it is cloudy outside, although it makes no sense to me since I'm indoors in both scenarios. I guess I like the view best when it's sunny.

Tonight's dinner is pork belly braised with soy sauce, Chinese rice wine, star anise, cinnamon, dried chills, and plenty of ginger and garlic. The two pound pork belly from our meat CSA was beautiful, and I used half of it for a kimchi stew and the other half for this Chinese stew.

Time to eat! I hope you all have a wonderful summer!

Radish Pods

Last winter, I planted Munchen bier radishes in the hopes of reaping some lovely, mild white radishes that I could spiral cut and eat with salt, just like I did in Munich. Alas, since I was lazy and didn't prep the soil very well, our radishes were knotty, woody things that tasted too peppery to consume. But, these radishes give you a second chance! In addition to their root, they are known for their delicious pods! Spring has brought us an abundance of radish pods, and these are delicious on their own or pickled. I'm going to plant some more just for the pods.

Freak Show Carrots

Yesterday's long overdue chore was to pull up the remaining carrots so we could plant raven zucchini (it is supposed to grow upwards!), yellow snap peas, green snap peas, and even more carrots. I had to stop pulling carrots after the first few because they were scaring me. "Unspeakable horror of a carrot" is what we called the freaky ones.

We did determine that the Nantes carrots were the ones subject to mutation. One person thinks that a nematode is the culprit. Another thinks our proximity to the Lawrence Berkeley Labs produces suspect carrots. I just call them organic and leave it at that.

Not every carrot we grow is a freak show. The chubby carrots are the ones we replanted: red core Royal Chantenay.  You've never tasted a carrot so sweet!

The mutant carrots will be diced and added to some tomato sauce. All chopped up, they pretty and the ugly carrots look and taste the same. The boy also wants me to make him some carrot pickles, and I have the twisted idea of putting a whole mutant carrot into a jar, covering it with brine, and using it as a centerpiece. I could line up a row of mutant carrot pickles like the specimen jars we saw at a sketchy science museum in Vietnam! Yeah, maybe I'll do that.

Big and Littles

Even though he was freshly bathed and conditioned, the Littles did not want to be near him. However, enough bacon can make all three sit close enough for me to take a picture.

Mingus smells spiffy because I took him for a bath. It was a full service bath, so I was hoping to sit outside in the sun and knit while Mingus got pampered. We walked in, and the groomer greeted us by saying, "Welcome to the lap of luxury!" So far, so good. Before I left, I had to assist Mingus up the stairs into the tub. This posed a challenge since Mingus, my normally confident dog, refused to move. Then, he let out a WOO! And another one. And another one. And then he would shake his body so we would all get wet. Then, another WOO! I couldn't just walk away and let the groomer deal with my dog, so I stayed there and proceeded to get soaked. 

Still, as awful as that was for us, I'll probably do it again because he feels like the softest bearskin rug. It's not like he was filthy before, but this ridiculous - he is softer than our cats. Plus, our one and only bathroom doesn't have wet dog fur on the ceiling. That, my friends, is the lap of luxury.

Avocado Toast is the New Kale Salad

To pamper myself on an early weekday or weekend, I've started going to brunch on my own. Sure, I could wake up the boy before 8 to come with me, but food isn't a huge motivator for him in comparison to sleep, and I enjoy navigating places and experiences on my own. During one of my brunch voyages, I checked out Bartavelle Coffee and Wine Bar, located in the old Cafe Fanny space and conveniently located next to Acme Bread.

I've been there twice now, and my first order of avocado toast coupled with a cortado (1/2 espresso, 1/2 milk) was so good that I ordered the exact two items the second time I went there. And I was so enamored with avocado toast that I've made it several times for breakfast, snack, and dinner.

My first attempts at avocado toast were edible, but not blissful. Partially, this was because I had no patience and I didn't wait for one avocado to ripen, and the other avocado I bought was a bit past ripe. Since the avocado is the star of this dish, it has to be just right. The other reason it wasn't so great was logistical: so many dishes for one piece of toast. I had a bowl, a cast iron pan (for the toast - no toaster here), a cutting board, a knife, a plate, and a fork to wash afterwards.

Subsequent attempts reached the bliss point because, the second time I went to Bartavelle, I had a seat at the counter and watched my toast being made.  And now I will share it with you.

Start with a 3/4" piece of levain, Acme has the best, but any rustic loaf will do. If you have a toaster, throw it in on the "lightly toasted" setting. If you don't have a toaster, heat up a cast iron pan on medium and toast the bread on both sides. Once your toast is done, drizzle one side with olive oil, and mash 1/2 an avocado onto the toast using a fork.  Squeeze some lemon juice over the avocado, and mash a little bit more. Finish by sprinkling some crunchy salt (I used Maldon smoked salt flakes), chili flakes (I have a stash of Korean chili flakes that are fruity and hot, but Bartavelle uses marash peppers), and drizzle with more olive oil. Done!

A Break from Kale Salad Pictures

There's nothing like reviewing your last few blog posts and realizing that you've forced people to look at multiple pictures of kale salads. While I'm obsessed with them, kale salad obsession is not as common as cat and dog obsession, and since most of you were lured here first by cat hat pictures, I feel bad about the unintentional bait and switch. So, while these are still not cat hat pictures, they're a step up from kale salad, right?

The boy is racing in 24 Hours of Lemons, and since the car name is Balto, they thought that it would be funny to also refer to themselves as Team Idiotarod (iditarod, get it?), and who better to lead the Idiotarod than our boy Mingus? So, although Mingus is no Balto in appearance or demeanor, as a Nordic dog he is close enough. We put his harness on and let him pull the car into BS, the first judging station where the teams convince (and bribe) the judges that the car is indeed worth no more than $500.

Mingus was a crowd pleaser, and as you can see, he is also quite pleased with himself. The funny thing about walking him around is that everyone wants to tell you about your dog.

"Is that a husky? A malamute? No, can't be, he's too small for a malamute!" Followed by, "he's too big for a malamute!" by another person. Followed by, "Is your dog a tervuren wolf?"

That last question really puzzled me because I've never seen a tervuren wolf before, and further Google research shows that Mingus looks nothing like a tervuren wolf.

I just told people that he looks close to a malamute, so that's why we call him one, and that we got him at the pound so he could be a mixture. That answer seemed to satisfy those who really wanted to be right about Mingus's genetic makeup. People are strange.

The other common question was how he got the name Mingus. No, not Charles Mingus. No, not Mingus Among Us. Yes, a GSD that I loved in East Oakland named Mingus. So, you see, my love of GSDs runs deep, and even Mingus has a touch of GSD in him. If I would have known that Mingus was a jazz musician, I would have never named him that because people are constantly singing bits of Mingus songs to me and I become really embarrassed, both for them and for me. Sometimes, I feel like an Idiotarod myself when I have to give the real answer for why he is named Mingus, so oftentimes, I let people draw their own conclusions on why he is named what he is named.

The jury is still out if we'll go back tomorrow to watch more racing. Mingus was tuckered out because he's such a social butterfly that he did not have nearly enough napping time, and I'm unsure if I want to be out in the sun, sans shade, for most of the day again. We'll see how we feel tomorrow.