Ok, I’m cheating a little. I was actually “assigned” to read Amateur Gourmet last week for Blog Class. I didn’t discover it, but I didn’t discover Cake Wrecks on my own, either. I rely on people better than me to do that for me. You see, I’m a little bit A.D.D. and better at oral and visual learning. This is really a pretty fabulous combination of attributes if you’re looking to get nowhere in life. Luckily, I’m too busy focusing on something else every few seconds to be “looking” to go anywhere. Continue reading
Definitely not a Stepford wife…
Here’s a quick post to satisfy my now 2 readers (I think Chef Hayley’s mom saw my post on Cake Wrecks and no longer has time for me). Every Wednesday night, I intern in FCI’s Wine Fundamentals class. Class is great. I know nothing so every word out of the instructor’s mouth is enlightening… Very similar to my everyday life, actually. I eagerly swirl, sniff, taste, spit and jot down notes for 2 hours. And at the end of class, I earn my keep by dumping peoples’ spit cups down the drain, fighting back the dry-heaving, and wondering whether those financial spreadsheets were really that bad.
But… After I’m done, I return to my wine glasses that I have purposefully saved from the dump bucket. I sit back, eat a couple of slices of impossibly crusty with just the right amount of inner chewiness baguette, and go about finishing my tasting… Without the spit cup.
When I’m done, I usually meet my husband at his office so we can commute home together – basically the bulk of our Monday-Friday quality time. Unfortunately, I now show up every Wednesday night with purple lips that barely conceal a mouthful of large, purple teeth, and after so much wine, I’m also a little emotional. Yeah, that’s right, I hang out in his lobby swaying from side-to-side, smelling like a vineyard, looking like I’ve been drinking grape cool-aid, and sometimes even weeping. Every Wednesday. I will say this, I used to have to wait for several minutes in the lobby for him to come down, but now he’s usually waiting for me outside…
Filed under Living the disaster
2 Things: 1) Damn that kamikaze mango and 2) I smell like toast…
Wow, I just found out that today is the 13th and laughed… you know, one of those, “if I don’t keep laughing, the pain and tears will overtake me” crazy fits of laughter that make everyone around you start backing away slowly. You know what they’re thinking, “that’s it, she’s finally lost it, move away slowly and don’t break eye contact or she’ll attack.” Continue reading
Filed under Living the disaster, Randomness
Screw the miracles, give into the pain.
Yeah, I didn’t post yesterday because I thinks I gots the Swine. Ok, obviously I don’t have Swine Flu. Actually, my husband, Chris, wants to refer to it by its proper name as Swine Flue is a misnomer. So I don’t have H1N1 Influenza (Really, Chris? That makes you happy? Really?), but I’m rocking a sore throat that’s enough to make me miserable… and miserable to be around. So apologies to my 3 readers (shout out to my mom, Chef Hayley’s mom, and Chris) for slacking off yesterday.
This week is going to be beyond bad, so by force, all my posts will be ridiculously short. That means they’re going to be normal post length vs. my ongoing diatribes about nothing. I know, everyone’s thrilled. So here’s what I want when I’m sick. Tea. Green Tea. Japanese brown rice green tea. And I want it in my favorite Car Talk mug, which has “unencumbered by the thought process” written on it. A phrase to live by… truly. I also want lots of lemons and limes that I will slice up into wedges, sprinkle with Maldon’s salt, and eat like oranges until my teeth hurt. I want to curl up on my couch, wrap myself in 8 layers of blankets, and watch chick flicks like “Becoming Jane” all day until I nod off. Unfortunately, I will be leaving here in about 2 hours to spread my joy (and germs) to all the lucky visitors to the FCI library. Wonder where I can buy one of those face masks…
Filed under Living the disaster
Passion fruit pain…
Ok, I’m exhausted and don’t have a lot of motivation to do anything other than sleep right now. But… I have one, great little story to share with you. Forgive me if this gets a little “techy” with mentions of the vacuum machine, but the end is pure and simple Mindy disaster.
I was pulled from brunch service today to help the head of my school prep for an event tomorrow night. My last task of the day, after a full day of work, was to place these little passion fruit meringues (made with a hydrocolloid that eliminates the need for and taste of egg whites) into a glass vacuum jar and vacuum seal them. They take hours to dry in a food dehydrator and are light, crunchy, and full of passion fruit flavor, but quickly become soggy if left to sit too long in the open, sucking in moisture. All I had to do was place them in a jar and vacuum them, and then I could finally go home after being there since 7:30 AM.
Well, I put the meringues in a vacuum jar and put on the lid. Unfortunately, my boss, Dave, had drilled holes in all of the glass vacuum jar lids for another application a while back (typical). So, we had been placing the jar and lid in a vacuum bag and sealing them that way. I asked the head of the school whether the lid was even necessary then. He replied that he didn’t know, but he didn’t think so and then left, leaving me on my own to finish up. I put about 100 little puffs into a large vacuum jar, sans lid, into a plastic bag and then placed it in the chamber of the vacuum machine. I hit start and watched all the air being sucked out of the chamber. Right about then, I started to think that maybe this wasn’t a good idea… Continue reading
Filed under Living the disaster
Friday Disaster-Free Recap
1) Holy cheez its, the NY Times Diner’s Journal picked up my Cooking Issues Post about the Red Hot Poker AND used my photo!!!
2) Believe it or not, this is part of my job: Check out the new SKOAL page on Cooking Issues
3) I’m headed to Sakagura tonight with friends for one more birthday celebration before I officially accept being 29. Afterwards… karaoke. Manhattan, Queens, Brooklyn, and parts of Long Island residents: please cover your ears between 10PM – 3AM.
Filed under Randomness
Quail eggs… why?
Quail eggs have been haunting me. The first time I actually saw a quail egg was just south of Moscow, Russia at my husband’s family reunion. What a trip. Some true-to-form Mindy highlights: being held at customs until we paid a $300 visa-revision fee (that’s right, US dollars, meaning my husband had to go to an ATM, withdraw rubles, exchange them into US dollars, just to go back to withdraw $3 more dollars to cover the transactin fee); showing up at a giant, empty hotel with 4, separate entrances, each with its own reservation desk & staff, none of which would acknowledge that we had a reservation; and basically just not remembering how to say “yes” in Russian for days because every time we asked a question, we heard, “nyet.” Anyway, at one outdoor picnic (infested with yellow-jackets that I actually saw eating chunks of cured meat), out came the quail eggs. They proceeded to drop them into shot glasses, top them off with vodka, and down the entire thing. Continue reading
Filed under Living the disaster
Birthdays still blow…
Last night, I had a late dinner and cocktail at l’école’s bar. What started as a simple and quick bite quickly became a late birthday surprise. Michelle Kwak, FCI Culinary student, but Pastry all-star baked a special chocolate chip cookie that made Jacques Pepin remark on its deliciousness. In fact, he gently touched her on the cheek and told her how good it was… that’s like being blessed by the cooking pope. As if that weren’t enough, when we ordered dessert of Chocolate Bread Pudding, Caramelized Bananas, and Coconut-Ginger sorbet, it came with yet another birthday candle and “Happy Birthday” written in chocolate sauce.
But… that wasn’t the best “birthday candle” of the night. Matt, one of FCI’s fabulous bartenders, fired up the Red Hot Poker and made me a Red Hot Manhattan. He made it extra-special by flaming it so long that when he stopped, his protective mitt smelled like it had been cooked “well-done.” I definitely needed it since every time I celebrate my birthday, it MONSOONS outside. And I was so happy that I’d had it when I got into a cab and sat in a puddle of what I hope was rainwater. Good thing I was wearing light-gray pants that thirstily soaked up the water and left a giant dark water stain on my butt when I walked into my husband’s office building to pick him up. Good news is that I think the rain water washed away the wine splatter that I hit myself with while opening bottles for wine class a few hours earlier.
Oh, and deep apologies to Angela for hitting her with my bag, stepping on her, and elbowing her during dinner… Listen, dining with me is “at your own risk,” people.
Try blowing out this birthday candle:
Filed under Eating my feelings and paying for it
Omelette my people go!
Omelette-related injuries to date: 3 including 1 bruised ego
I knew this was coming; you knew this was coming; so let’s do this. Let’s shake n’ bake some freaking omelettes! I missed the kitchen so last month, I asked to get staffed on Sunday brunch, which was just getting started at l’École. I remind myself of this every time I want to beat myself with an omelette when a 5-top sits down, all wanting omelettes at the same time. I’m exaggerating of course (what? me? noooo…), things aren’t that bad on the omelette station… anymore. Luckily, volunteer cooks are literally pushing each other out of the way for the opportunity to sling omelettes for Sunday patrons. Nooo problem, I will gladly step aside! But before people were forming a queue to make colorless, glossy omelettes, I suffered through a lot of omelette rolling. Just self-deprecating? Nope. After my first day, the Exec Chef on duty told me the following: “When I worked at a 3 Michelin star restaurant and we were in the weeds, we’d draw 3 stars and then cross them off every time we put out a bad plate. You have no stars.”
Mindy's Recipe For Disaster 