Last post

I have not posted in a very long time, and don’t think I will again. Thanks for all the comments and best wishes. I will still leave this blog active for those who want to come back and read at their leasure.

Thsnks!

Gwyneth Paltrow Makes Chicken

This speaks for itself.

http://www.funnyordie.com/videos/f33f8c23ec/gwyneth-paltrow-makes-chicken-goop-com-with-abby-elliott?rel=player

The Unbearable Complication of Eating

Cannot get excited about eating.  For the first time in I think my whole life I am not craving anything, excited to try to cook anything…and know that it is because I am only feeding myself.  And who cares what I eat, frankly.  Upon returning home from work today, need to eat something.  Am so tired, down, crampy, sick still with a cold, I can hardly bear myself I am so miserable, and know that part of it is just that I need something good in my belly.

First off, a half hearted checking of the drawer of take-out menus.  It’s all crap, crap, and more crap.  Delivery Tacos?  When did this vile idea start, why would I ever order delivery burritos?  Sushi is too cold and uncaring on a night like this.  Thai seems too confrontational.  A quick check to the internet confirms my suspicions that ordering food will not be the solution to my hunger problem tonight.  I had better go to the grocery store.

I end up doing the equivalent of browsing in the grocery store.  I don’t know, is there anyone else who can go through all the aisles, decide what they actually want and then go back through all the aisles again?  On a night like this, this is exactly what I’m doing.  I am struck by the fact that in all this food, this beautiful, perfect food, I am having a hard time being seduced by any of it.  Motivation comes at rock bottom; the boil in the bag curry aisle.

I decide that the least taxing and most livable option is a lamb curry involving nothing but cooking some lamb and mixing in the packet and a cup or so of water.  This I can handle.  I better put some veg in it, I am eating so shamefully lately that if I don’t I may end up with scurvy soon.  Lamb curry and…mushrooms?  Lamb curry and…Eggplant?  Fuck it, who am I trying to impress, it’s just dinner.  I am putting in green peppers and zucchini.  As if authenticity is really going to materialize this evening, curry-in-a-packet-girl.

I get everything home, get myself an alcopop, and start chopping, searing, simmering…and everything seems a little bit happier already.  By the time the lamb in bubbling away in an erotically familiar sauce, I have decided to dry fry the veg and mix in at the end.  To preserve texture and flavor, I think to myself.  But perhaps also to prolong the act of cooking.  As long as I am here tending, browning, mixing, making it all work, everything is going to be alright, for a little while.

The curry was delicious.  And thank God, as I think that stupid bag of curry sauce saved me from topping myself this evening.  That, and the fact that I have cupcakes in the freezer.  No, will not do anything rash this evening…will maybe just have another cupcake…

You know, I’ve thought exactly the same thing

http://www.theonion.com/content/news_briefs/market_evidently_capable_of

After spending a good amount of time at home sick, watching my beloved Food Network, and the occasional Slice and TLC, I have also noticed that there are a strange and disproportionate amount of shows about cake.  Food Network Challenge (normally it’s a cake, really), Ace of Cakes, Cake Boss, and Last Cake Standing.  There are also a lot of shows specifically about chefs competing.  Top Chef, Chopped, Food Network Challenge (again), Hells Kitchen and Iron Chef America.  Has all creativity gone out the window? Or is this just fashion?

Still don’t feel like eating

Today I went “grocery shopping” and ended up with a pack of cigarettes, a toothbrush, and a tube of Pringles.  The name of this blog should officially be changed to Woman Eats Contents of Shoppers Drug Mart.  I could systematically work my way through only food items sold at Shoppers, and wait to see how long it takes for my teeth to get loose.  So depressed, am now watching Food Networks Sunny Anderson shout idiotically on the so badly named it has to be true “How’d THAT Get On My Plate!?”.   Is this woman for real?  She is so up, I’m sure when whatever she takes to make it through a day of shooting wears off and she goes home to her shabby chic condo in the town of whatever, she cuts herself to make sure she’s still real.

Maybe I should eat something.  MMM Pringles.

Warhammer cake!

http://www.joystiq.com/2009/08/26/warhammer-cake-bites-into-food-network/

Julie & Julia & Marlena

When I was a very little girl, my family had a rating system for movies based on how may times I cried during them.  I believe the record holder was E.T. with three times.  By now though I think that is long past that with Moulon Rouge I think racking up closer to 5 or six, because as soon as it starts, I start crying.  Today, I took myself out to see Julie & Julia and cried three times.  Maybe it’s Meryl Streep’s sincerity or Amy Adams cuteness.  But maybe it’s how many things we all seems to have in common.  I too, am a little lost and don’t know what to do with myself.  I like Julia Child could not have children with my husband.  I too love to eat and cook.  I have a blog.  But I don’t have a movie happy marriage anymore.  And my mother is not an over criticizing woman from Texas.  She is very sweet, and she is from Alberta.  Which is kind of the Texas of Canada, but I digress.

I suppose if nothing else watching this movie has made me reflect on what this whole food writing and obsessing thing is all about.  I know this is what I love, I’ve just been too depressed and lazy to do anything about it.  In fact most of my meals as of late have been made by the late, great Chef Boyardee.  If that isn’t losing ones way in regards to cuisine, I don’t know what is.  But I know I need to get something back.  It’s almost there, I can almost touch it.

I am also very sorry I have been so neglectful of those who have been kind enough to read this blog from time to time.  I promise, I will be a better blogger!  I will get it back, whatever it is.  I will keep eating you.

What would Brian Boitano do? make food t.v.

Brian Boitano, yes THAT Brian Boitano, Olympic figure skater Brian Boitano, and his new Food Network series What Would Brian Boitano Make?. I can’t help but think, really? He’s a figure skater.  I’m sure he loves to whip up a bowl of pasta after a long hard day at the rink.  Does this qualify him for a show on Food Network?  Do I qualify for a show on Food Network?  Does my dog qualify for a show on Food Network?  I’m concerned.

The types of people who used to teach us cooking on t.v. were at least in some way qualified.  They were actual visionaries, chefs, and scientists.  You had to at least run a cooking school, have a restaurant, write cookbooks, something in the food industry.  Now it seems all you need is a tenuous link to celebrity first, chef distant second.

Think of the train wreck that is The Next Food Network Star.  These people don’t know anything about food and really don’t care.  They have the sincerity of Big Brother contestants.  They don’t really want to wear whites and stand on their feet for 14 hours a day cranking out food.  They want to tour the food show circuit.

I can understand where they are coming from, the food celebrity gig sounds like heaps of fun.  The problem is that those most compelling to watch on Food TV have a bit of grit to them.  You can tell that their confidence with their subject comes from many, many hours doing what they do until their hands are numb and their feet hurt and mental breakdown is impending.

Made for t.v. hosts such as Roger Mooking of Everyday Exotic, Rob Rainford of License to Grill, and dullest of all David Rocco of David Rocco Dolce Vita have about as much edge as a member of a boy band.  And are they really much different?  They have been put through so many auditions, focus groups, filters, committees, and stylists.  What’s left but a big peroxide smile and some recipes ripped off from Martha Stewart?

While What Would Brian Boytano Make? Probably won’t ever even make it to Canadian food t.v., if it does, I will still be very interested to see how it all goes down.  Will food t.v. fans be interested in watching someone with admittedly no culinary background at all?  And will they be able to stop thinking about him in tights with fluttery sleeves?

Just a Quick One

Has anyone else noticed that when Guy Fieri (from Diners, Drive ins and Dives) eats stuff on his show he makes a face like he is making love to a a beautiful woman? He’s not really eating a burger sometimes, he’s preforming oral sex on it. There is something pretty sexy about someone who enjoys food that much. It almost makes up for that goatee.

A Victory Over Flour and Water

I baked by own bread on Saturday. Now from my many other postings I have done on my absolute screwing of the pooch on many, many simple food items that should not have been screwed up, I was taking a big step here with bread. No bread mix, no bread machine, just yeast, flour, water, a dough hook on a Kitchenaid, and my own brute frustration. And let me tell you, it turned out really well.

I really have no excuse to not be making my own bread, I did work at a proper bakery for 6 months. I know what I’m looking for, I know what it’s supposed to look like and feel like. The thing is you really need a day or at least the better part of a morning to bake bread. A good recipe is nice as well. A day that is cool enough that you don’t mind having the oven on is awfully nice as well. But there also seems to be some general rules and mysterious things that happen that makes good bread.

1. Start with bread flour and real yeast – You cannot make decent bread with all purpose flour, the protein content is not high enough to build the gluten required for bread. You need bread flour, preferably a decent one. There is also no point in fast rise or easy blend yeast. It tastes, for lack of a better word, yeasty, even after being baked. Use standard rise or fresh yeast (fresh you can buy from any bakery and sometimes the bakery counter of a grocery store, it looks like a pound of butter, but grey. Don’t make that face). Standard rise dried yeast you will have to dissolve in water with a bit of sugar for 10 minutes or so before you can get down to making dough. This is hardly a bother though as you get to then watch it bubble like a science experiment on your counter top for a few moments before you viciously mix it into your flour.

2. Bread makers are false hope – Don’t buy them. There are too many variables when you are trying to get the dough right; the weather, the ingredients, humidity in the air, etc. There is a certain amount of judgment that needs to be used to know whether it’s had enough flour, water, and kneading. A bread maker cannot see or feel the dough in order to gauge if it really ready, it just uses a timer. This leads to almost universally under mixed dough resulting in tough, dry bread. A better option is a dough hook on a mixer, but this will still only get the bulk of the ingredients mixed. You still have to get it all out of the mixer and give it a good thrashing on the counter top.

3. You will know it’s ready when it gives up – When you are kneading the dough by hand, at first it will seem very tough and will not want to behave. You will really have to fight with it for about 10 minutes (depending on how long it was mixing in the stand mixer). You will know that you can stop when the feel of it changes and it just seems to give up in your hands. There will be less resistance and it’s easier, almost suddenly, to knead. Another indicator will be that you are completely sick of kneading, but maybe that’s just my experience. You can also tell it’s ready when a small bit of of dough stretched very carefully makes something like a bubble of dough which is kinda see-through. This is called a window test, if you want to impress people.

4. Don’t try to make crusty loaves at home – It’s just an exercise in frustration and disappointment. You can’t make French bread by sticking a pan of water in the oven or any other nonsense. You will burn yourself and it will not be right anyway. Regular load bread, cinnamon buns, rolls, anything with a soft crust, these can be done beautifully at home. Leave the specialty breads to people with $30,000.00 invested in steam injection ovens.

4. Give it lots of time to rise – Rising develops flavor, so it’s really important to give it it’s full hour or so to proof and another hour or so after forming to proof again. Yes this is a lot of time, but if you don’t have at least 4 hours to kill, don’t bother baking bread.

5. The oven has to be pretty hot – Hotter that you may be comfortable with actually. You know whether or not your own oven runs too high and burns things (like mine), but you still need it to be pretty damn hot in there. It needs the initial burst of heat to get the remaining yeast to give a final push to rise everything to it’s full potential. You also don’t want to under bake, so give it a good amount of time in the oven but check the bottom to make sure it’s not burning. Tap it when you think it may be done, it will sound hollow.

6. Anything not eaten that day must do into the freezer – Commercially produced breads are full of chemicals to keep it from going bad, and even scented with fresh baked bread scent to convince you that it hasn’t gone bad even after it has. What you produce at home will be not the same tomorrow. Anything not eaten in 24 hours must go in the freezer.

I hope you give home bread making a stab. Even though it’s time consuming, it’s enormously satisfying when it all comes together. Just keep your first few attempts something simple like rolls or pizza. Don’t be surprised when you start casually throwing together a focaccia over the weekend and bringing it into work to impress people.