octopus flavored.

A rare visit to Toko Dun Yong today replenished some long-gone condiments (furikake, dochujang, kimchi) and of course the requisite impulse buy: takoyaki chips, featuring octopus flavor. Not exactly bad, something like prawn crisps, but yes it means something kind of special when one of the cats will eat a potato chip, which Macka did.

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MFWDxv.

Mayonnaise withdrawal in progress. I am attempting to distract myself from this and other input changes via tremendous doses of chile pepper. Specifically, the Surinamese X-Hot sambal, which I somehow used to find too hot.

So, back to carblessness, alcohollessness, sugarlessness, and dairylessness of MFSDxiv, but, you know, it's winter now. Tonight is kind of on the diet: chicken legs in Momofuku's octo vinaigrette. There's a little sugar in there.

Just invented a very tasty and also-nearly-diet-compliant hors d'oeuvre: pitted prune, hummus blob, harissa dot, cilantro leaf.

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sg 2.0.

It's not that nothing's happening, it's just the same shit every day. Grinding my poor little fingertips into gross, callused, falling-apart dust in preparation for the reboot of the Sleep Gunner franchise tomorrow.

However: in the kitchen this evening, the apartment is suffused/infused/confused with the massive goodness of a roasting chicken with garlic and rosemary...this is a smell that makes almost everything alright, or some combination of those words.

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bodacious.

Based on my current hangover level, I'd have to say it's a really good thing our two-hour party ran out of alcohol at around 4am (hour nine of the two-hour party). I think we could have kept going a while longer.

Food highlights: the buffalo chicken wings were the champ I think, I can think of no reason to not have some kind of wings at every party from now on, but people also got a bit giddy over the salpicón as well. The frittata experiment was not wholly successful: edible, but disorienting, in that they didn't taste like they looked.

Our ambitious baker provided more highlights via homemade peanut butter cups (somehow unpictured), orange-cardamom coconut macaroons (above, my personal favorite), a scone-like beast with currants? raisins?, and some Portugese pastel de nata, which I also bit the heck out of.

After the initial feeding frenzy, we went downstairs for a bit of Icelandic folk-jazz, and returned with a Dutch Icelandic folk-jazzist who hours later busted out some John Fahey via his recent birthday gift from his mom. Awwwwwwwwww!

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slapicon.

I can never find this when I need it, mostly because I don't own the cookbook. So here's Marcella's onion frittata recipe. There's going to be an adaptation that involves some southwestern elements. Haven't quite figured out the deets, but I think it will include rosemary, basil, bacon, Parmesan, caramelized onions, roasted red pepper, poblanos, and...somehow corn.

Let's give the ingredients a shot.

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bacon + green chile frittata bites.

4 cups onions
butter

3/4 cup cooked bacon
1 tsp roasted garlic
5 eggs
1/2 cup green chiles, chopped
2/3 cup cheese
rosemary
fresh basil

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We'll see. And this here's the new shrimpless version of our fvorite slpicon. One of my keys is not working properly. Salpicon.

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salpicón di panga.

4 panga filets
thyme
powdered bay leaf
1/4 cup olive oil
4 tsp capers
4 tbsp pickles
1/4 cup sherry vinegar
juice of a lemon
1 egg, hard-boiled
salt
pepper

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best banh mi, me.

Just wanted to say hi, as well as blandly gloat about the fact that, according to the NYTimes magazine's blog, it looks like I've eaten one of the best banh mi in America. And...yeah. It was just OK.

The blogger who did that list is getting hisself a new one torn in the Comments for nearly ignoring California's humongous (or should I say, wait for it, "Hmongous", godDAMN am I stupid) Vietnamese community, so ees looking like "Jordan" (come on) is not knowing shit about "American" banh mi, or even really "NYC" banh mi. The whole thing is a pretty "crappy" piece of dashed-off hack writing if you ask "me".

As is this! I mean, I would know hack writing, wouldn't I? Am I right??? Flurry of real activity soon.

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stolen moments.

bunnies!

This is the homemade stencil Mara used to ice the bunny cookies for Aitana's Year of The Rabbit party.

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