Breakfast

Bankruptcy Hash, eggs, tea, and seltzer.

How did your day begin?

Chicken Ala Nancy

chicken recipes

I watched the the other night and realized that removing the bones would allow one or another of my siblings to enjoy roast chicken without the liver-taste, that she insists, accompanies chicken on the bone.

So:

First debone then stuff and then cook.

With Sausage:

With rice, mushrooms, and sausage:

And yes I deboned the legs as well.

All in all a tasty treat and not all that difficult to do really.

You Tart

Tomato and cheese tart fresh from the garden:

The crust needs some work yet as it is not quite crispy enough but on the whole a nice hot weather dish.

Supper

Too busy, couldn't come, or weren't invite? Well here is what you missed:'

Some odd pounds of smoked porkly goodness replete with fat,  violations of dietary laws, and general loveliness. There were vegetables but who is counting?

Supper

The Lamb began as a whole rack that I trimmed and Frenched, the spuds are Parmesian, and the Corn lime cilantro. I fear that the Lamb is over.

Supper

This from a couple of days ago, Cornish Game Hens, thick pork chops, and ring sausage:

Very good.

Supper

Tonight it was ribs and suds. After  braising:

After Smoking:

Sauced with spuds

2.5 hrs braise, 30 mins hot smoke,shredded spuds with parmesian, butter, and milk for 1hr. Needs a green; therefore coleslaw.

Just Dessert

The other day I made a dessert that was so bad the squirrels wouldn't eat it:

I got a different recipe and tweaked it:

Name That Pie

Here we see the Wisconsin Republican Party pushing an ALEC inspired mining bill:




Here we see my latest attempt at pie:

 It's called frog or jagger pie, anyone have a better name?

I Do Not Want

to eat a picaken, but you might:

Image
Directions on how to make.

Bread

I've gone back to trying to bake some bread. I am closing in on a nice loaf:

It needed five or so more mins in the oven and maybe the odd spray of water but this is just about the loaf I want. Huzzah bread. Oh yeah, as by the way, Scott Walker broke a bunch of contribution reporting rules, it looks like; also he hired an alleged kiddie porn aficionado, who used the clever nom de porn of Walker04 while working for Walker in, I assume, 2004.

Zola

I've been reading Zola's The Belly of Paris and, although I suspect this is not his purpose, am nearly crazed with desire for the various foods he mentions. I guess that his larger point has to do with materialism and how wrong it is to be trapped by the good things of the world while suffering abounds, or some such. None the less, I found that I had to have an onion tart:

What's for dinner by you?

In addition, neither the Falcons nor the Giants knows how to win.

Taco Thursday

I have on at least three occasions tried to make a tritip roast on the grill and, as at least one sibling can attest, produced an undercooked and tasteless meal. Last night, however, I think I got it right. So at Ish Kabbibile's Smoke Shack and Grill, Thursday will be taco night:

What I did was to season it and then poke a bunch of holes in it with a meat fork. I grilled two yellow peppers, a couple of whole onions and some portabellas with lemon until they were done. I made rice with garlic, jalepeno and cherry tomatoes. Then I grilled the tritip for ten mins a side and then put it off the heat for another 15 mins and then rested it for 5-10 mins. The meat eaters like the meaty tacos while the Vegitarian claimed that the rice etc, at least I think it was the etc as well, was very good.

Bug Me Not

Last night's supper, or plate #3 at Ish Kabbible's Smoke Shack and Grill, wood roasted pork tenderloin and potatoes, tomato and motz with fresh basil and lemon, side of butter poached pearl onions with rocket.

Had I but known, however, that I should be economizing for the return to the the 19th century, I would have eaten:

Menu
Slug soup.
Boiled Cod with Snail Sauce.

Wasp Grubs fried in the Comb.
Moths sautéed in Butter.
Braized Beef with Caterpillars.
New Carrots with Wireworm Sauce.

Gooseberry Cream with Sawflies.
Devilled Chafer Grubs.
Stag Beetle Larvae on Toast.

Retirement Planing

As it seems that even should the political class avoid destroying the economy for at least 5 years or so, they are bound and determined to see to that those freeloaders and parasites, i.e., the elderly and the poor, no longer freeload or blood suck, neatly avoiding the fact that there are somewhere in the area of 10 to 20 million jobs missing, I remain in the market for a wealthy widow woman to defraud love and cherish, and together we will travel the world on a food food truck called Ish Kabbile's Smoke Shack and Grill. In addition to the brisket, chicken smoked.

and pork chops:

With more to come

Smoke Signals

The other day a pal and I were at the grocery and we ended up in a discussion with two other cyclists about hand signals. Neither of the other two knew what they were. I ran through them and mentioned that the use of the left hand has to do with how easy it is for other vehicles, particularly motorists, to see the signals.  As it happens for some time now I have used the point with the left hand for going left, point with the right hand for going right. About a block after the conversation, Ian pointed out that I had just said that motorists are unlikely to see my right hand and shouldn't I use the bent left arm instead? Um, er, ah, I argued. The fact is I hate the bent left arm signal, no real idea why but it's aesthetically unpleasing to me. However, having realized that I was wrong and condemned out of my own mouth, I have gone back to the bent left arm.

As the economy  continues to morph into some kind of hellish neo-liberal dystoptia, I have become increasingly convinced that the proper response is to marry a rich widow, defraud her of a portion, but not all not even the majority, of her wealth and use to buy a food truck. I would then change my name, I am leaning toward Ish Kabbile and a bbq.  In the service of this future easy street, I decided to make a smoked beef brisket. According to all and sundry smoking blogs and webpages it is the sine qua non of bbq. Indeed, according to all and sundry making bbqed beef brisket is slightly, but only slightly, less complicated that than the logistics of the Berlin Airlift. Not true. I went to the store bought a half pre-trimed brisket and seasoned it:

The next day I set up the grill for smoking:

I used two thirds of a chimney of lump charcoal in a little metal container, an aluminum pie tin filled with water and, in total, 1/2 bag of soaked apple wood chips added every half hour or so.  And cooked it for about 5 hrs turning it over about half way. It looked like this  when I flipped it:

And then, because everybody said to, I took it off the grill wrapped it twice in aluminum and stuffed it in oven at 220 until it was done, about 2 hrs more. After 1/2 hr of resting, it looked like this:

When I sliced it, it looked like this:

It was very, very, good and a lot less work then it sounds.

Reviews:

Who doesn't like a nice refreshing beverage, particularly when the day has been hot and sticky?  No one, that's who. Indeed, you judge a human society's generosity and all around greatness by the kind, quality, and quantity of its beverages. I like a nice seltzer or bubbly mineral water prior to the beer and/wine part of the evening. So when  I saw this:





I had to buy some. It's great. Sweetly, tart and very refreshing.