that's the way.

That’s the way the cookie crumbles
That's the way the feeble fumble
That’s the way the pie humbles
That's the way the needle pricks
That’s the way the latch clicks
That’s the way the door bricks
That’s the way the Stevie Nicks

That's the way the pan flashes 

That's the way the market crashes 


That’s the way the piñata smashes
That’s the way the ash to ashes
That's the way the moon wanes
That’s the way the chest pains
That’s the way the box contains
That’s the way the mortal remains

--Tom Waits + HBF + MEM

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intrepid.

I don't even think she's on a bike, just wearing the helmet for protection.

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OK so I should really be working right now? But I just made something that literally took 5 minutes of effort and left me wondering, "Why don't you just cook like this more often?".

Here's how it went tonight, but I'm sure this could be streamlined: take a bag of Cheap Dirk Fish (mine was Alaskan salmon). For each filet, sprinkle/rub unto/onto it: about a tbsp of Surinamese masala + a tsp of Surinamese X-Hot sambal. Broil for 12-15 minutes (probably 5 minutes too long, but I don't like to undercook Cheap Dirk Fish). Remove from oven and slather/drizzle each filet with 1 tbsp pumpkin chutney from De Avondmarkt and 1 tbsp of ketjap manis (this is why you didn't salt anything earlier). Broil for another 5 minutes without burning the sugars in the ketjap and chutney. Zero effort, big happy mouth time.

A banana-cardamom milkshake would've been the perfect sleeping pill afterwards but there is work to be done.

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There'll be more to this post when procrastination comes a-callin' again, but for now, I don't want to forget that The Girl Who Ate Everything was just on a terribly well-researched trip to Sweden and has lots of good info here on her blog, but also here on Serious Eats.

And, uh....here's this. Don't watch the original until after you see their version, but do watch it to appreciate the effort that went into the tribute. I didn't really laugh until he made the vinaigrette and then I had to watch it again.



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more_recon.

Above: Tjon's stall at the Dappermarkt, selling their standard stuff.

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Could one do a vegetarian version of this that would rock? I think so. Some kind of eggplant or chickpea filling?

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My first Surinamese venture this week will be a slightly weird one: sjoerkoro, a Surinamization of the Dutch word zuurkool, which is, yes, what we Americanos know as sauerkraut. I'm doing this because the weather here has been decidedly unsummery, and also I'm, as always, trying to do one healthy thing here or there.

I've never made this before b/c it just sounds wrong: the primary ingredients are sauerkraut, tomato, habanero, and salted beef. OK, maybe I can imagine it being OK. I report back later.

REPORTING BACK LATER: Totally good. I did a vegetarian version that was basically like this:

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sjoerkoro.

500 gr sauerkraut, drained and rinsed
50gr butter
1 onion, chopped
2 canned tomatoes, chopped
1/2 cup water
1 madame jeanette/habanero, whole
black pepper

Yes, saute onion in butter, add everything else, stir, cover, simmer for 20 minutes. There are slightly fancier recipes out there, but this was mindless and a nicely different way to eat sauerkraut. Don't really understand how leaving the chile whole works, but...it does. Poke a couple holes in it with a pin if you want more heat.

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summer's kiss.

Procrastination afoot. And thus, blogging afoot. But we are fighting valiantly against our baser instincts, mostly b/c we really do have things to be doing.

So, may I present some efficiently-delivered brief notes from the last week of eating:

1) Went to La Perla again, ordered the same food, it was just as good as the first time, kind of unsurprisingly, which was, yes, a surprise.

2) Went to the beach for the first time this year: it was pretty good except for the sunburn, a beach tradition in which I do not normally participate.

3) Surinamese food makes me so consistently happy that I'm forced to wonder why I don't make it more often. It's so reliable in terms of dopamine delivery.

The latest reminder was: a full take-out meal from Riaz on Bilderdijkstraat for the first time in years, and it was...above average. We didn't order a ton of food, but what we did order was interesting and distinctive. Service was friendly if a bit slow and exhausted-seeming, and the prices were pretty reasonable.

Pictured below is my herheri with bakkeljauw, herheri being a mild stew of ripe and unripe plantains, sweet potato, and cassava, enlivened by the presence of spicy salt cod, homemade pickles, and a sambal or two. Unique flavors, and the whole thing felt more healthy than not. We also tried the jarabaka, a kind of dryish catfish masala with rice (jarabaka = pangasius), also good if carefully straddling the too-salty line. Baras were fine but not as good as Hangalampoe, IMHO.

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la perla.

Last night at La Perla, I said something like, "I haven't experienced this kind of unqualified pleasure at an Amsterdam restaurant since...", and then I couldn't think of when the last time was.

Now I think I know: Marius is the only other Amsterdam restaurant I can think of that is such an obviously great place to be that (paradoxically, I guess) you kind of forget where you are when you're there. Very nice.

Pictured above and below are the calabrese di spilinga and the finocchiona, both of which I would order again together in a second, they were completely complementary: the calabrese di spilinga features these little dark red hills of pungent and assertive 'nduja (which I would never have identified as sausage if the menu hadn't told me it was); the finocchiona's sweetish fennel sausage provided a nice counterbalance.

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Another element that worked in La Perla's favor last night was that we tried some of the food at Hanneke's Boom first. It's a great location and the vibe outside is nice and relaxed in a way that feels far from Amsterdam's normal non-beach terrace culture. The food, however, immediately reminds you that you are actually still in Amsterdam: careless, careless cooking.

And by that I mean whoever cooked this stuff couldn't actually care about how food tastes, or at least didn't taste this food: the hummous was decidedly moldy-tasting, the carpaccio had some kind of cheap and shitty long-ago-grated Parmesan emulator all over it; the scallops and chorizo with orange was a nice idea but didn't taste like anything (how do you make chorizo not taste like anything?) and was kind of definitively ruined by these bitter greens that were scattered over all of the appetizers....etc.

But yes, La Perla made everything OK again. As Dennis said, this is one of the only places in Amsterdam that makes you feel like you could eat there again the next day, or at least very very often, which is exactly my plan.

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eastern daylight time.

Above: Hilly and Anat at Paradiso.

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So, yeah, hi there. It looks like I will be going to Sweden for ten days in August, which will be my first time in Scandinavia. In the manner of past adventures, I will be using this here post as Planning Central.

Which, much like last year's Sardinia trip, is proving difficult to research. Sweden is apparently not the biggest tourist destination of all time, and the people who do visit are focusing their efforts on Stockholm and areas south.

I, on the other hand, am just landing in Stockholm and then heading north. Far north, first to Umeå, and then up north of the Arctic Circle towards Gällivare and the land of the midnight sun...looking forward to the outcome of my insomnia vs. no darkness. Will it be easier to sleep if I can't worry about the sun rising?


View Sweden in a larger map

rainy days and mondays.

And beer, and cheese, and sausage. This is some of the best osseworst I've had, handmade and smoked by some dude who  lives/works/smokes sausage around the corner from the bar. The bar being In de Wildeman.

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euphemistically.

It's fish taco season again. This, however, isn't one: there's an over-easy egg inside this one, alongside guac, homemade pickled jalapenos, two salsas, chipotle slaw, black beans, and fresh cilantro..with a little feta on top. Chomp.

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best, laid, plans.

Just checking in. Everything's fine, about to begin some kind of detoxification from weeks/months of abuse, let's see what happens.

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sweet.

While I was licking my plate at breakfast this morning, I realized that chutney and crème fraîche should really end up in my mouth together more often.

Why was I licking my plate. A better question might be: why was I even using a plate. This is not standard breakfast procedure around here. Well, this protocol breach occurred because I made those smoked sweet potato pancakes (actually much more like latkes than pancakes) I mentioned a few weeks ago, and the platelicking occurred b/c, all respect to the Hilly, I think mine were even better. Like crazily good.

I didn't really change the recipe, just some quantity adjustments, so it must've been the ingredients. It did not hurt one bit that these were served with not only crème fraîche but a spicy plum chutney from De Avondmarkt that added some complex cumin-related support. Both condiments were essential to the awesomeness, but, wow, yes: these are Thoroughly Repeatable, and should probably definitely be deployed at your or my next vegetarian meal, and also as soon as possible.

UPDATE: One time, in the absence of creme fraiche and pimenton, I used lime-spiked Greek yogurt and smoky Jack Daniels BBQ sauce, respectively...worked pretty fine.

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sweet potato latkes with pimentón.

2 medium sweet potatoes, peeled and grated
4 scallions, finely chopped
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
1 tsp smoked paprika (I used pimentón agridulce, moderately hot)
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp freshly ground black pepper
1/4 cup peanut oil, for frying

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Basically fry for 2 minutes per side. This probably serves 4.

easy prey.

Snails with chorizo and serrano ham, from Penelope Casas. Even better than the Wolfert recipe if you double the garlic and the chili pepper, and again, this sauce would make anything you placed it on taste good or better.

enstrangement.

Not an English word, but it should be, describing the process of beginning to feel strange. More on this later.

For now, somehow I forgot to document the best pho recipe I've ever made. It's right here, and I'll post my modifications to it eventually. But it was perfect.

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and taketh away.

A knowledgeable and open-hearted friend just told me that they missed my blog, and when they said that I realized I hadn't even thought about "my blog" in a while. But then I also thought, yeah, I miss it a little too.

Time management issues aside, the biggest current obstacle to really blogging the way we used to is that a few months ago shit got even more complicated and, yes, well, please refer to this discussion for my position on publicly casting our feelings into words, and then add another whole dimension of necessary restraint having to do with being considerate to people you care about, and ect ect ect.

There's no ignoring the...unusual unprecedented time constraints of the last two months, and the resulting fact that often there was not one free second in which to blog, seriously. But I guess right now there is some time, and yet I seem to be mostly not blogging because: yyiisssssss, I thought this blog was about one unspoken but obvious thing, and the prospect of, ehh....expanding the scope is just too much of a shift in the original design. My own scope is a painfully overexpanded as it is. Like I said, shit is complex. But I'd like to try to find a way to write about things a little more...I guess we'll see won't we.

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At the top of the post: dinner on a swiftly-becoming-cloudy evening at Mano a Mano on Hugo de Grootplein. Left to right: San Miguel; pan tomate; grilled sardines; octopus salad; chorizo in red wine; paella; aioli; Swedish person; agreeable white wine. All good stuff.

Mostly decent food (chorizo and sardines best by far, octopus good with bread and aioli), elevated by very pleasant service, kind of just like every other Spanish or Turkish place I've been to recently in my hood. Admittedly, the food was better at, say, Orontes West right next door (mussel salad good) or even Pasodoble, surprisingly. But I'd go back here for the chorizo and the terrace for sure.

Below: one of the best things I've done in the kitchen lately, recipe in progress. The sauce would be a weener on any kind of shellfish I think.

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snails with country ham and garlic (via Paula Wolfert).

"1 can (7½ ounces) snails (24 large snails)"

is what the original recipe called for. I used two cans from De Avondmarkt, have to check quantities. I may have ended up doubling everything.

2 tsp butter
2 tbsp finely chopped prosciutto or serrano ham
2 tbsp finely chopped shallots
½ cup dry white wine
½ cup well-reduced (thick) meat or poultry stock
1 tsp fresh thyme leaves
1 tbsp finely chopped garlic
1 tbsp chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley
1 large plum tomato, peeled, seeded, and finely diced
2 tsp Pernod
6 tbsp unsalted butter, at room temperature
Salt and freshly ground pepper

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the moleman cometh.

A recent new reader pointed out that I maybe shouldn't begin every post with an apology about not posting. That maybe the monotony of my apologies is as boring as not posting at all.

I'm inclined to agree, which is why I just haven't been posting. Also, I have been eating zero interesting things. Unlike some people.

That's not totally true, actually: these sweet potato pancakes were deeeeelicious, made by Hilly from a recipe by the Neely's.

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waftug.

shooting out sparks.

From an open mic performance at Schijnheilig Thursday night. I'm pretty sure he didn't even use a mic, a fact for which he compensated by having his penis visible throughout his "set".

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what i'm missing.

Beautiful weather + Me inside all day every day = frown city.

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eyexes.

Above is where I am every day at 11am. Then I go upstairs for nine hours and stuff like this happens:

spring can really hang you up the most.

Camembert and honey on toast. A break from the studio, 30 mintues of lunch at Cafe Wilhelmina (my smoked salmon sandwich with wasabi mayo, soy sauce, and scallions was good...Hilly's hummus + roasted veggie sandwich was not good because of superdry homemade hummus and a weirdly pitched spice mix, Anat's carpaccio/truffelmayo was the best of the lot I think). Back in the studio while the sun continues to laugh in our face.

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uitvaartbeurs.

Saturday morning, 8:18am. Where am I going? To a funeral services industry trade fair in Alkmaar. For research.

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