search for pleasure dome.

Well, your host is having some kind of pharmaceutical problem again that is only made marginally better by pushing a pleasure button, when he can manage to locate one. Believe you me we will be launching a Nostromo-like salvage mission to go in there and methodically detail the recovery process should there be one and maybe even learn something from it this time, but for now let's just thank our lucky lucky stars, shall we, for in a moment of true inspiration/desperation I have found/developed a super surprising, healthy-ass pleasure button. Check this shit out. I think it's "Southern food". Maybe it would need to be trout or catfish or catfish instead but you feel me.

+++

blackened salmon with kale and sauerkraut slaw + blue cheese and peanut.

4 x 125g salmon
2 1/2 tbsp paprika
3/4 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tsp dried thyme
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1 1/2 tsp kosher salt

2 cups of shredded kale
1 cup fresh sauerkraut
2 scallions, diced
1/2 cucumber, sliced
3 tbsp cider  vinegar
2 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp Dijon mustard or piccalilli
1 or 2 tbsp agave syrup
I guesss you should probably put some mayonnaise in here, but we'll try it without

the necessary amount of blue cheese, crumbled
a handful of dry roasted peanuts

+++

recipe break: bayrisches weißkraut.

I didn't eat anything like this in Germany last week, but I am striving for a week of very simple food and this is pretty much all I felt like eating last night, and, strangely enough, again tonight. You can also un-German-ly add a 1/2 cup of washed quinoa to this when you add the water/broth.....suuuuuuper health time.

+++

german braised cabbage.

2 tbsp lubricant of your choice, I used goat butter last night, tonight I probably use butter butter, but olive oil would also be juuuust dandy
1 onion, sliced
2 tbsp raw sugar
1 garlic clove, pummeled
1/2 large green cabbage, coarsely chopped
1 tsp caraway seeds
1 cup water or vegetable broth
optionally, 1 tbsp vinegar, I didn't feel like this last night
salt, or possibly smoked salt and pepper to taste

Melt lubricant. Add onions and brown slightly. Add sugar and let caramelize. Add cabbage, garlic, caraway seeds, and water or broth. Bring to boil and simmer, covered, about 1/2 hour or until cabbage is tender, stirring occasionally and adding extra water if needed. Season with more salt and pepper if necessary and add vinegar if desired.

Yeah I ripped this off from here, haven't felt like duckifying the whole thing yet.

+++

bánh phở.

Well, we were about due for a new Vietnamese thrust around here anyway, but a couple days' worth of inexplicable queasiness (or possibly explicable via changing mirtazapine brands again) made the demand for comforting rice products unpostponeable.

Bánh phở are the non-round rice noodles that go in phở, and like most noodles they come in various thicknesses. Somehow we'd never tried the thicker end of the spectrum, and that unfortunate tryinglessness came to an happy end last night, and yes the thicker ones are better, or at least to this noodle-deprived mother, more satisfying.

Last night we et them (Scrabble artifact) up with a homemade peanut sauce very close to this one, but with grated ginger and sugar instead of bakgember, no fish sauce or coconut, and a dash of tamarind at the end. Soon the other half of the noodle package will be et up with a recipe that will then appear somewhere in this post, or maybe just something based on this.

Noodle cooking method: soak for 45 minutes in cool water then boil until there is a chewiness level that is tolerable, that took about 5 minutes for us. If you let them go beyond chewy they'll end up gummed together in clots or they'll start falling apart when you try to pick them up.

And, as has been our custom lately, we finish with a totally unrelated recipe from another cuisine entirely: this is something I should try as a healthy-ish GF dessert. Apples are on sale at the moment, and we have a lot of them. This is a Saveur recipe at the moment, but I'll fix that, just you watch.

+++

bratäpfel mit walnusseis.

¾ cup raisins
¾ cup walnut halves, chopped
¾ cup packed light brown sugar
¼ cup dark rum
4 tsp. kosher salt
6 tart apples, such as Gala
1 cup dry white wine
6 tbsp. unsalted butter, cubed
⅓ cup honey
1½ tbsp. ground cinnamon
whipped cream, for serving

Heat oven to 350°F (150°C on our oven). Combine raisins, walnuts, sugar, rum, and salt in a bowl; set aside. Core apples, and place right-side up in a 9" x 13" baking dish. Fill each apple with ¼ cup walnut mixture, add wine and butter to baking dish, and drizzle each apple with honey; cover tightly with foil, and bake until apples are tender, about 1 hour and 15 minutes. Uncover, sprinkle with cinnamon and let cool slightly; serve in bowls with pan sauce and a dollop of whipped cream on the side.

+++