Eric’s Neighbors

Vegetarian Taco Burger

nobody@vox.com(julie) — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 18:11:23 -0700

This is by no means haute cuisine, but boy oh boy, is it delicious. I give all the credit of this ingenius creation to B. If he ever decides to change careers, Taco Bell would be foolish not to bring him aboard as a food conceptor. That boy comes up with some excellent gourmet junkfood. A taco and a burger in one. What's not to love right? Here's how it works... spread some refried beans on both ends of a toasted hamburger bun. My taco "meat" was chopped baby bellas, onions and corn seasoned with cumin and chile powder. Now layer "meat", cheddar cheese, tomatoes, avocado slivers and a fried corn tortilla. Top with your bean slathered bun and serve with plenty of salsa and Tapatio. Spicy, crunchy, creamy, cheesy flavor explosion!

salsa

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Rancho Gordo Haul

nobody@vox.com(julie) — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 23:51:23 -0700

Hi guys! We all love Mad Libs, so let's play a little game. Finish this sentence for me:

You know you're a food nerd when ___________________________________!

Rancho Gordo Haul

Here is my answer:

You know you're a food nerd when... you get really, really excited about your order of heirloom beans coming in the mail (insert sheepish grin)!

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Space Twits

nobody@vox.com(Garth) — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 14:56:09 -0700

MarsPhoenix

CassiniSaturn

I'm really impressed by the recent addition of twitter accounts from NASA made to be in the perspective of their space craft/exporers. There's the CassiniSaturn twitter account I just posted about, as well as the MarsPhoenix account.

Both post interesting updates and respond to replies people make to their twits. Rather than seeming like a cheesy PR ploy by NASA, they seem to understand why twitter is a good forum for these types of updates and how to use it effectively. Having these penned from the point of view from the spacecraft makes it personal in a way that makes you care more about the little milestones than a straight log of events would.

Well done NASA!

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Video from Saturn

nobody@vox.com(Garth) — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 14:41:21 -0700

Here's a cool video that the Cassini spacecraft just twittered:

Cassini-Huygens: Multimedia-Videos

http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/multimedia...

The movie consists of 34 images taken over the course of 12 hours as Cassini pierced the ring plane. Additional frames were inserted between the original images in order to smooth the motion in the sequence -- a scheme called interpolation.

Its really amazing how good this looks compared with some of the prior still shots from the middle/outer planets.

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Bloody Mary Bison Sliders

nobody@vox.com(julie) — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 21:13:25 -0700

Bloody Mary Bison Burgers

Originally, I had bought a pound of ground bison to make something called Kill 'em Quick! This is a recipe created by my co-worker Helene that is simply a scramble of portobellos, jalapenos and ground bison. I'm not sure why or how the catchy name came about, but the ingredients all sounded delicious and I was definitely into incorporating more lean protein into my diet. This was the original plan of execution, but things quickly changed once I surveyed all the bloody mary ingredients in my refrigerator. This past Sunday, my friend - and ex-bartender - Shilpa had treated us to some of her "secret" recipe bloody marys. I'm sorry that I wasn't able to weasel the secret out of her, but they were the perfect Sunday afternoon cocktails. So perfect in fact that they were my inspiration for dinner tonight. Instead of just scrambling the bison, as originally planned, I formed patties seasoned with horseradish, worschester sauce, jalapenos and shallots. My cast iron skillet cooked these puppies to medium rare (bison is so lean that it should never be cooked to well) and onto a sprouted grain bun they went. How healthy of me, right? As for garnishes, tomato was a no brainer. You can't have a bloody mary without tomatoes. In popular slider fashion, I inserted the obligatory tangy cheddar cheese and sliver of fresh, crisp lettuce. I topped it with a jalapeno stuffed olive. For next time, I'm thinking a horseradish aioli would be a great addition. Bon appetit... or should I say cheers?!

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Scallop Curry with Long Beans, Zucchini & Mushrooms

nobody@vox.com(julie) — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 15:58:49 -0700

Scallop Curry with Long Beans, Zucchini & Mushrooms

From my adventures in Indian cooking not too long ago, I have jars upon jars of Indian spices. Good thing for me, I love Indian food. Not too sure how my neighbors feel about all the pungent spices wafting in the air. They tell me that they can smell everything I cook in their bathroom. Bizarre, right? I always tell them that I'm glad that it's not the other way around. :)

For this dish, I ground a spice mix of coriander, ginger, garam masala and mustard seed in my mortar and pestle. After cooking the spices in a little olive oil, I sauteed some mushrooms, zucchini, long beans and red bell pepper. I added a little bit of vegetable stock just to moisten my curry. As always, I was trying to support local farms, so everything except for the mushrooms were from the farmers market. I also found some lovely, large sea scallops to add protein to the meal. These were from Bristol, but I have been seeing small bay scallops in the shell at the FM that I've been meaning to try. I cooked the scallops in the curry for a few minutes just before serving it all along side a steaming bowl of brown jasmine rice. This is definitely my kind of meal. Flavorful, spicy and so satisfying to scarf down.

I'm thinking some vegetable biryani for my next Indian dish. Purple, I bet you have a killer recipe. Are you dying to share it? Anybody?

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Best tool ever

nobody@vox.com(Garth) — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 09:53:47 -0700

I have been at battle with a small lug of metal not quite an inch in length for over two weeks now. It is a screw in the front hub of my motorcycle. It has been frozen in place despite blasts of screw loosening chemicals, large high torque screw drivers and a lot of swearing. The final battle left the phillips head screw completely torn up, from this shape, +, to this shape, o.

No human screw driver could budge that screw in that state, so I had to step it up to the next level. A screw extractor is typically just a piece of tapered metal that gets forcibly rammed into a fatigued screw head. Its slightly larger than the previous slot so that it bites into the metal around the outside. A wrench is then used to turn the screw and pull it out. The one I got does it a little better. Attached to a drill, one side reams out a circular hole in the screw head to make a clean starting point. The other side is threaded and tapered so that it can more easily embed itself in the hole and allow the screw to be removed.

Despite this awesome technology, the screw still put up a fight. The medium sized extractor couldn't turn the screw, the tapered end just digging out a bigger hole. I went to the larger size and applied slow deliberate force to keep from stripping out the hole. After a minute of careful pressure and torque the screw moved, almost imperceptibly, but it moved. From there it was easy and it was free from my bike within seconds. Huzzah! Best tool ever!

Screw Extractor

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Get 'em while its hot

nobody@vox.com(Garth) — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 08:55:40 -0700

Whole Foods has coconuts! With the husk hacked off down to the top, you can pop a straw into the top as easily (or easier) as a Capri Sun.

After enjoying my Capri Coconut I pried it open dangerously with a large but flimsy knife to reveal...not much flesh. Oh well. I guess the more coconut milk, the less solid coconut there is.

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Raviolis

nobody@vox.com(julie) — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 18:35:15 -0700

Last week I was in a ravioli-making frenzy. I ate raviolis five nights in a row. Five. Count them. I'm on what they call the anti-South Beach diet. :) This carb loving girl never says no to fresh pasta. What brought on this carb loading you ask? Well it all started with a simple tiny little unassuming bag of flour. 00 flour (super duper finely milled) to be exact. Most pasta recipes I've seen ask for 00 flour, but since it's not easily or readily available, I normally substitute with all purpose flour. Since I was all stocked up on the good stuff, now was time to see what all the hype was about.

It was love at first knead. The flour is baby powder soft and absorbs the liquid in a flash. I used the proportion of one cup of flour to one egg. A few teaspoons of water helped bring it all together. I gave the dough about 30 minutes for the glutens to relax and rolled it out as thin as possible. I cut out rounds using a large biscuit cutter and then I set everything up assembly line style.

The process of making raviolis

Wrappers, filling and egg wash to seal it all up. Hungry tummys want food fast.

Seal 'em Up

Now let's talk filling. Sky is the limit here. I love mine creamy with a punch of flavor, so the first night we did the classic spinach and ricotta. Even though it would have been perfectly delicious with just butter and Parmasen cheese, I added some sauteed Opo squash, red chili pepper flakes and flat leaf parsley.

Spinach & Ricotta Ravioli with Opo Squash

The next night we had raviolis filled with organic arugula and garlic quark from Spring Hill. I topped it with a quick heirloom tomato sauce. Raviolis are comfort food so I kept it rustic by garnishing it with hand torn basil and lots of Parmasen cheese.

Arugula & Garlic Quark Raviolis

00 flour is awesome. It yields the tenderest most delectably delicious dough.

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Positive News

nobody@vox.com(jfield) — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 09:19:21 -0700

I'm in the middle of driving around our big beautiful country this month, and appreciating its great beauty, diversity, and the ubiquitous civility of its people. It really is a wonderful place.

I happened across two articles of news today that seemed positive to me: First, it sounds like congress is going to get a little more involved in approving wars. I don't know how it will play out in practice, but I think the idea that war, something that requires such enormous sacrifice of the populous, should be checked by their representatives, and not the whim of a few. Those framers got it right again.

On the other side, I found it interesting that Iraq's new government wants us completely out eventually. Despite security concerns, if one believes in any notion of national sovereignty it makes sense down the road. I doubt the leadership there has got the power to keep things under control at this point, but I'm glad to see they have the guts to take a stand on the issue.

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