Fresh, Hot Wastes of Time

For those of you who are Iron Chef fans, I present this:

Iron Chef: Battle Long Pig

I think I peed myself.

What am I doing wrong!?!?

This is the second batch of cookies I’ve attempted in the past couple of days that has turned out spectacularly awful. The first time I used Alton Brown’s “Chewy” recipe, and they came out totally powdery, with a dry, cake-like crumb. This time I used the Tollhouse recipe (which is basically like AB’s recipe only with softened butter rather than melted) and added a little bit of milk, and subtracted some egg white because I am trying to get a nice flat chewy cookie.

They’re like freaking pecan sandies or something. Ugh. What the hell? Even my kids are asking what’s wrong with them.

This sucks.

It’s all Bill’s fault. He told me how easy it is to roast your own coffee. Now I’m obsessed with it. I bought a FreshRoast rather than went hard-core with a heatgun and a dog bowl, like some of the people on Coffee Geek.

The roaster came with a pound of green beans – Swiss water process decaf Sumatra Takengon. They sucked. Majorly. I had serious reservations about the whole thing. I ran down to Mozart’s Coffee Roasters which is just a couple of minutes away and picked up some of their green beans – $4/lb for any green bean, and they have quite a variety. They were better, but still not the coffee flavor explosion I was looking for. Then I placed an order from Sweet Maria’s. Wow. They’re pricier, but every green coffee they sell is accompanied by a detailed review saying what aromas it has, how dark to roast it for optimum flavor, if the beans need to de-gas for an extra long time, etc. My favorites from there so far are the WP Decaf Ethiopian Yirgacheffe, the Ethiopian Harar, and the Costa Rican La Minita Tarrazu. I’ve learned that African coffees generally have floral and fruity notes, while Central American coffees are more earthy and chocolatey. There’s one Ecuadorean coffee, the Escafe, which is insanely bright and tangy and not good by itself, but it’s great in a blend.

So I’ve got my little spreadsheet, figuring out what I like and don’t like, and in the meantime realizing that if I drink too much coffee I get heart palpitations. Hopefully that’s going to go away once I’m off all this ear infection medication. Cause, damn that’s annoying. But it’s ok, cause I get to mix myself a half-caf blend. Today it’s 2 scoops Harar (blueberry flavor), one scoop Escafe (brightness), and 2 scoops Kenya AA WP Decaf (not outstanding in and of itself but a good base for this blend).

I was so inspired with all the sourdough in Alaska that I decided to try to make my own starter. Unfortunately mine never took off and the loaf of bread I baked with it ended up being about an inch tall and denser than a brick. I called around to various different bakeries in Austin to try to find a starter that was proven, but had no luck until calling Texas French Bread, who was happy to give me some. My pancakes have never been fluffier. I’ve gone through about 15 pounds of flour in the past couple of weeks, feeding the monster.

This has got to be the coolest cake I have ever seen. It totally blows away the kitty litter cake (which yes, is actually a cake and is perfectly edible, see recipe here.

Damn, some people are just too creative. And have too much time.

Since the information is absolutely nowhere to be found regarding the calorie count on the Jack in the Box pannido sandwiches, allow me to break the story:

Zesty turkey – 750
Triple meat – 650
Ham and cheese – 675

Zoinks! I ate one of the zesty turkey ones the other day thinking “Hey, turkey can’t be all that bad, it’s turkey”. It was really, really, really tasty.

Last night Jo and I went grocery shopping.

“Mommy, which area is this?”
“This is the health food area.”
“Oh. So where’s the Oreo area?”

What a precocious little twerp.

I bought a Crenshaw melon, never having tried one before. It’s insanely tender and juicy. The knife slid through it like butter. Rivulets of sweet juice poured out while I cut it and dribbled off the counter onto the floor. Jo scolded me for letting all the juice out. I chopped half of the melon into bite-sized pieces and the kids followed me out of the kitchen like I was the Pied Piper. They each took two bites and split, and are now playing and refuse to come back to eat.

Those of you without children may wish to skip this next part, but I find it important to point out that Jo, who is three-and-a-half, pooped on the potty voluntarily for the very first time ever yesterday. Perhaps she will be potty trained before kindergarten, after all.

Still trying out Kung Log. I like the spell checker. I like being able to save drafts without connecting to the internet. That would come in handy when I’m away from home and without an always-on connection.

Hub and the three year old went on an excursion today, so I took the 1.5 year old to the Farmer’s Market around the corner. I got a bunch of good stuff even though we got there late: cucumbers, summer and acorn squash, tamales, tomatoes, and peaches. Only problem is that it was hot, and it was noon, and now the kid and I are sweaty and red-faced.

Next time I’ll go earlier so I can get more fruit and so that I don’t bake on the spot.