pseudonymity.

I just dreamed I met someone whose kids were named Absinthe and Persimmon. I think they may also have had tentacles.

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This is one of the first "fancy" dinners I ever tried to cook, in 1997 I think. I remember it being wonderful, but I'm trying it again tonight and we'll see what we think.

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You may have noticed that every other foodish blog in the InterWebz has done a Thanksgiving recipes post. We did not. Although we did participate in a medium-scale Thanksgiving meal (15 people or so?), I must say that the highlight of it was the absinthe (perhaps the source of the tentacle dreams?). Good carrot cake, too.

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salmon, maple, ginger, soy, lemon, scallions.

1/2 maple syrup

1-2 tbsp lemon juice, to taste

1 tbsp freshly grated ginger

1 garlic clove, pressed

2 tbsp soy sauce

10 grinds of black pepper

salt to taste

2 pieces of salmon

Combine first seven ingredients in saucepan and simmer for 30 minutes or so, your goal being to reduce to a glaze. Brush the salmon with half the glaze and bake/broil to doneness (possibly on a bed of scallions, I'll let you know). Use the other half of the glaze as a sauce.

Serves 2.

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hey asshole.

So, eh...we live in something like a housing co-op. We've just gone through an episode where it slowly became apparent to everyone that one of the newer tenants was, mmm, how should I say this...a big inconsiderate asshole dickface. Serieus, yo. Let's call him R.

I could go on for a good while about R. (who can totally go suck a bag of dicks), but I'll limit my scope in the interest of finishing this post. In his brief but memorable tenure here, R. accomplished many annoying and/or dangerous things, but one of my faves was the endless constrctionizing: R. loved power tools, and had no compunction at all about using them at all hours of the day.

Not inside his apartment. Out in the common hallway that five apartments share (so as to not get sawdust in his apartment). 8am, 10pm, all day from 8am to 10pm, whenever. I'm feeling whiny here, but trust me, after a couple weeks into a project it would begin to wear at one's composure, as in this actual re-enactment.

Me: "Hey honey? Have you seen the--"

R: "GHKGHGKHGKGHKGHKGKGHHKKGGHKGHKGK...."

Me: (waiting)

R: "...GKGHGGZGZGZZWERVGVGVKVKGVKGVKVKVK...."

Me: (waiting)

R: "GHKHKhkzkzkzkzzzkz. Wzzz. rrrr."

Me:

R:

Me: "Honey?"
R:

Mara: (can't hear me anyway b/c she's got her headphones on to block out the power tools)

Me: "Do you know where my--"

R: "GHKHKGHKZXZHKSSKHXKZCHHKZKCKZHCKZKCH..."

Me: (soils self in impotent rage)

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Over time, everyone who lived here developed their own personal pet peeve(s) about R.: his mistreatment of the bathroom he shared with his next-door neighbor (don't ask); his obsessive need for more and more storage space (no lie, he eventually took to furtively cramming his belongings up above the ceiling tiles in the common hallways, furtively b/c it's a fire hazard); hmmm, right, his shutting his screaming child out into the common hallway as some sort of punishment ("Papa, pleeeeeeeease let me in....puhleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeze", etc.); eh, his propping our security doors open for hours at a time, unattended, after everyone asked him a zillion times not to; his blah blah blah.

By the time he'd lived here for few years, he'd rather impressively managed to alienate everyone in the building, and after weathering a few public shitstorms of criticism, he moved out (in true form, he left behind a truckload of stuff he didn't want...although I can't complain too too much about this, that's how we ended up with a piano, which has almost made it worth having known R.).

My point is!!! After a lengthy interview/screening process, we selected a new neighbor from the 15 final candidates, and she happens to be the long, long, longtime girlfriend of one of the longest-term residents. A pretty good pedigree. She's very laid-back and sweet (so far), and she (with the help of her boyfriend) have been moving in for the past couple of weeks, painting, decorating, building, sawing (inside her apartment) etc. Normal shit.

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This morning my eyes open at 6:45am, even though I don't really have to be up until 9-something to go to Rotterdam, and I'm wondering why I'm awake. Then from the hallway I hear the distinctive whine of hi-speed metal-on-stationary metal. Someone is sawing through metal in my hallway at 6:45am. Am I dreaming? This can't be. Certainly, Long-Time Resident and Girlfriend are not out in the hallway with a saw???

I don my ninja gear and prepare to terminate. Or, I put on pants and stumble into the hallway. There is no one. Que pasa? Then, from the back courtyard, I hear the power saw, 120 times louder now that I'm in the hallway. It is quickly joined by a jackhammer, twice as loud as the saw. Someone ten houses down is having their foundation rebuilt.

Ehh...sorry I doubted you, Long-Term Resident and Girlfriend. My next question is: how is this person with the jackhammer not being killed by his even-closer-than-me neighbors?

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dit is wat je niet mag doen.

Mara found this lying in a puddle on the street and was compelled to rescue it due to its awesome sad weirdness. At the top it says "Dit is wat je niet mag doen", or "This is what you mustn't do". And then there's the illustration of this thing that must not be done, which is mysterious in the extreme. Obviously a family, but where are they? In a tent? And what could possibly be inadvisable about their supplicating posture? I'd love to hear any ideas.

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Below, top: last night's unphotogenic but excellent bibimbap by Mara. Middle: current inhabitants of the kitchen island, also by Mara. Bottom: Surinamese snijbonen by me, easy and good.

tomatillo, overtoom.

Intuitively enough, the remedy for a repetitive stress injury is to stop repeating the stressful motion. So I'm taking the weekend off from playing, may my new callouses still be there on Monday please.

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On Friday night, instead of me hunching improperly over a torture device of a guitar, we hung out and cooked, and on Saturday night we spent some time in the old hood, revolving around a trip to the Filmmuseum to see Guy Maddin's My Winnipeg.

Afterwards, we pretty much had to pop into Vondelpark's new burrito joint, Tomatillo, to see what was what.

As you may know, we don't really do restaurant reviews here, and what follows here shouldn't be considered one. One of the main reasons we don't do reviews is that we are a biased motherfucker (one who obviously hasn't quite grasped the subtleties of the editorial "we"), and we are getting too old and tired to worry about trying to put ze bias aside, even for a couple of paragraphs.

And thusly we stumble forward, biased. The relevant bias in this particular case is minor but still I suspect that it held some sway over my assessment of Tomatillo: that I really wanted a shrimp burrito.

Like, for hours before the movie, I had a thought balloon over my head filled with a plump shrimp burrito (salsa verde, monterey jack, no rice). I knew Tomatillo had no shrimp burritos. And yet, my mind kept generating the thought balloons. People behind us in the theatre could barely see the screen through all the shrimp burritos.

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Once we were at Tomatillo, Plan B needed to be examined. We got two things to take away, a steak and black bean burrito with tomatillo salsa, and a chorizo taco with pico de gallo. When we got them home, this is what they looked like:

That's the chorizo taco, which I liked in spite of the abundant wilted lettuce (maybe shredded cabbage is a better idea for to-go orders?) and the lack of shrimp. They make their own chorizo, and it tastes almost exactly like the chorizo I used to make, so...yes. That's good. Also, their pico was exemplary.

The burrito? Also pleasant, though I can't say it was totally my style, I don't really love rice in my burritos. The steak was nicely seasoned, featuring a prominent cinnamon note (and maybe apple in the background?), which I like...but the tomatillo salsa was pretty undetectable (Mara said she had some in her half), which left the whole thing lacking a tiny bit of tartness.

But I'm nitpicking a bit, probably because neither item was a shrimp burrito: both the taco and steak burrito hit the spot and I'll probably be back to try the pork before long. Service was totally friendly, and the place seemed like an alright place to hang out and eat, with nice non-cheezy uptempo jazz standards on the stereo, etc.

Only other gripe would be the 9,50 price tag for the steak burrito...dass expensive, and it's not like it's because of the steak: the chorizo burrito is 7,50. The ingrained values of the American eater in me know that a burrito should not be more than twice the price of a falafel (the last carne asada burrito I had in Phoenix cost $4.45, which is just about 3 Euros). But the rest of me understands, really it does, and I'll be back to support them (as my local Tex-Mex establishment) before too long.

Tomatillo

Overtoom 261

Amsterdam

pom kroket?

So, we're working on this piece in Rotterdam, which I think is going pretty well except for the RSI troubles that J-Kim and I are experiencing. J-Kim's been having them for months, mine just began about two weeks ago, but somehow neither of us immediately associated the relentless and nearly-incapacitating neck and right shoulder pain with our recent adoption of new (for us) right-hand fingerpicking techniques. Turns out that your fingerbones are connected to your neck bones after all.

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When I get to Rotterdam on rehearsal days, I take the tram to Tiendplein, which plunks me down right in the middle of like 12 Surinamese/Chinese tokos. I also arrive right at noon, so it would seem natural to do some lunchtime snacking over the next couple of weeks. I think I'll start with Kiem Foei on Monday. Rotiland also has some great reviews, and Sangam might be nice for a post-rehearsal curry if that ever happens.

very good friends in the city.

We somehow have a piano now. A free piano.

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mara's nuoc cham.

2 cloves garlic, pressed
2 tsp sriracha
2 tbsp raw sugar
juice of 1 lime (or roughly 1/4 cup)
slightly less than 1/4 cup fish sauce
1/4 cup rice vinegar
some chopped coriander (optional)

Makes a cup or so.

pom nom nom nom nom.

Mara made her first pom today. I know that looks like "porn" if you are reading quickly, but naw, man...she made her first porn years ago.

This was the same old pangapom recipe, and it worked pretty perfectly. In fact, it's been getting better since it came out of the oven, and if it weren't about to be all gone, there's no telling just how good it would get.

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superfreaky, yow.

Wednesday, 1:12AM. After an unusually satisfying evening of Available Jelly, I necessarily stepped into the role of post-drinking, pre-bedtime cook for J-Kim and the Mara (pasta with tomato, butter, garlic, pecorino). I myself? Still not drinking.

After we put J-Kim on a bike pointed in the general direction of his house, Mara fired up Rick James' legendary ode to adventurous women for a brief Dance Moment, and I realized that I had no idea what Mr. James was saying during my favorite vocal portion of the song, so I Googled it, and what it is, is: "Three's not a crowd to her she says." Kind of disappointing, considering the rest of the song's quotability quotient.

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Mara assembled something very collegiate yet very delicious just now (and by collegiate I mean something munchies-derived made from existing pantry items), something for which I wish we could keep the supplies around all the time. But it's so good and so easily made on the barest of impulses that I don't think it's safe for us to have the raw materials within grabbing distance. Maybe everyone else already knows about this kind of thing, but Mara's such a dessertmaking fool that we very rarely resort to quick and dirty solutions like this. You can get all of ze supplies at the Dirk.

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cherry, cream cheese, biscuit.

Take 1 Pally Country Biscuit (for you Europeans, this is a sweeter-than-average digestive biscuit; for Yanks this is something Nilla wafer- or graham crackerish but considerably less sweet).

Spread a reasonable layer of Philadelphia Cream Cheese on it.

Finish with a tablespoon of Jonker Fris cherry pie filling on top (I bet guava jelly would be awesome as well)

This is essentially a cheesecake, made in less than 30 seconds.

Repeat as necessary.

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smoked kale.

Just so I could stop talking about it, I made it for lunch today. And it's delicious, a really good side dish. Ze problem is...it's going to be a bitch to translate the recipe for repeatable home cooking.

Cue whiny verbiage that no one cares about: the biggest issue is that the original recipe says "salt and sugar to taste", and the only way I could get mine to taste right (and by "right", I mean like Southern-cooked greens) was to salt and sugar my individual portions after I'd filled my bowl via a slotted spoon: otherwise the salt and sugar all got lost in the pot liquid. I'm thinking I'll use less water and more butter next time, and just go for broke on salting and sugaring the cooking liquid.

Also: We have no smoker, so the dreaded Liquid Smoke was called off the bench. If you have a smoker, cold-smoking the kale for 5 minutes is the thing to do. For me, Liquid Smoke was just fine. I think it's no longer the embarrassing cheat it used to be. Unless you're a real BBQ person, and then of course you're right, it's evil.

All that said, it really was good, and so I'm going to work on it a bit. This is just a placeholder recipe until I can buy some unprocessed heads of kale this week and try it again.

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smoked kale.

50gr butter

1 onion, brunoised

5 drops liquid smoke

1 clove garlic

250gr kale (mine was pre chopped, that's how I know how much I had)

1 liter water

2 tbsp cider vinegar

lots of salt and sugar to taste

Serves, eh...4 probably.

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