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Vinegar and Mousse
They go together, right? Half of you are thinking ick, and half are all, well, if it’s a strawberry balsamic reduction, maybe.
Doesn’t matter because they won’t be touching until they get in my belly.
This evening’s culinary treat consists of an asparagus salad over pasta…
(Thin slice a bunch of asparagus, finely dice a red onion, add a big handful (maybe two) of grated pecorino, some salt, a lot of fresh ground pepper, my favorite olive oil in the world, and about a half cup of vinegar (red wine).)
…and a chocolate mousse dessert which I totally shouldn’t be eating but oh well.
(I usually do this with egg whites, but tonight I did about a half cup semisweet chocolate, melted and added to two egg yolks whipped up with a quarter cup of sugar and then added to 3/4 of a pint of heavy cream (whip before combining, and combine a little at a time so you don’t unwhip the cream with all the subsequent spooning), and save the remaining 1/4 fresh whip for a topping. Chill for an hour.)
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83 and sunny
When you wake up on a day like this…
…all you want to do is make some pickles.
Not really, but that’s what I did, because I’m preparing for the summer of Consistently Awesome BBQ. And what do you need next to a gorgeous, dripping, cheese-globbed burger? A crispy delicious pickle!
Sterlize jars, boil vinegar and water mix (50/50 makes a tangy pickle; go with less vinegar if you’re more mild), add whole garlic cloves, pepper flakes, some fresh dill, a few bay leaves, and half a tomatillo pepper to each jar, along with the freshly washed and cut cucumbers, then pour the liquid mix in, seal up the jars and refrigerate. In as few as three days, they’re perfection.
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I am done.
When I was a kid and overheard adults groaning about the various dooms of Summer, I was all whaaa? How could they not love this gloriously blissful time of the year?
Twenty years, at least twenty heat strokes, and five thousand mosquito bites later, I am done with it. Please bring me Fall now.
(Hey, doesn’t my hand look a little like I’m trying to play the duck in the shadow puppet play? Also, these are just three of the seven gnarly crimes committed against my skin in my own home this weekend.)
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Betwixt
I could go for a Twix.
But this is the least convenient time of year to have one. Too hot and sticky and humid for the fatty, sugary delights I pine for. And I can’t believe this is the point I used to consider “halfway through summer”. Technically it was; school usually ended around June 18 and we’d be back behind our desks by September 15. But the heat, oh the heat, would continue on through October most years.
So I really had much more summer than I thought. And, despite the “unseasonably cool” temperatures this year, I will this year, too. Supposedly this is the coolest summer on record since 1869. People keep saying this, but folks, it feels hot to me. And I have this suspicion that the 90-plus weather is around the corner and will be crashing at our place through September.
I’m ready for fall. I’m ready for temperatures where I’m willing to walk all around the city, Harlem to the ferry, whereas right now I’m almost happy to be chained to my desk, so the sun’s poisonous rays never touch my fair, PLEified skin. And!, people keep reminding me, it’s not even hot. Thanks. Thank you. So much.
The weather is just a big fat bummer, because I am not built for the four words I always wanted to be: fun in the sun.
Which is why I’m feeling fortunate to have packed so much outdoorsy stuff into my summer already. We’ve been to Wildwood Crest and Cape May, at the southern tip of New Jersey (which isn’t as bad as it sounds).
It’s kind of a sucker punch that I should love the beach so much, but be so tortured by the sun, becase there is nothing better than relaxing in the sand.
Watch the tram car, please.
We just happened to catch this performance of something involving chairs, which I especially loved for its background. You may not be able to tell, but this stage is ON THE BEACH. That’s the ocean in the background behind the fake ocean background.
This guy was unimpressed.
James’ is very convenient.
The boardwalk is definitely the Jerseyest part of the Wildwood experience, but you can’t help but love what you grew up with. Not that I grew up with half-naked be-muffin-topped girls.
Meet the star of the show, Kohr’s ice cream.
There is much too much Wildwood left to show you. So much has changed, and of course that makes me really angry, but I will always go back and find something to enjoy.
A couple weekends later, we went to D.C. and wandered around with my sister- and father-in-law. (This was lovely, but perhaps my least successful summer fling, what with the sausage fingers, blood pressure rising, crappy breathing, and near falling down.)
These people were actually yelling for “President Obama” himself. “President Obama: do you want babies to die?” “President Obama: do you want our people to die?” I’m still sort of surprised how tiny their delegation was. And how repetitive and sing-songy they were. And then I’m always surprised that people think a protest is going to accomplish anything when it’s government-sanctioned and heavily regulated. You think that bullhorn is going to rearrange Obama’s priorities? Okay.
On a brighter note, if I didn’t love Eric so much, I might marry the Hay-Adams.
I could also stand to live at this place.
If it weren’t for all these people gawking at it every day.
Then I turned around, and it looked like Eric was leaving with this other family.
But I smiled and evidently that was enough to convince him to come with us.
Mr. Lincoln’s place isn’t bad either.
Pigeons wouldn’t leave these poor ladies alone. (They were all pooping in the pool. Not nice.)
The next day we squeezed in a walking food tour of Philly between our drive from D.C. and back to the city. Mostly good, but come on, Philadelphians – you proudly eat CHEESE WHIZ? (With the notable exception of the aforementioned Twix, I do like to avoid strange alphabet choices in my food.)
[Hey, Eric - hook me up with a photo. Please?]
After all the walking through town at a painfully slow tourist pace in the blazing hot sun, we hopped back into the rental car, thanked the lord of electricity for the full-blast a/c, got lost a little bit a few times (which is just another lesson learned: never let me navigate), and got home in time to order in Goodburger and call it a night.
Since then, I’ve visited J.Jill with my mother, where we saw… what looks like a woman trying to escape from hell (which is also a fair assessment of what it’s like to be in that store).
Then I almost bought some shoes. They’re too something, right?
And then on Saturday I attended a lovely little ICE class, Cooking in the moment: Greenmarket Cuisine, taught by this guy (who is such a happy, friendly genius), where we made this delicious stuff.
(Yeah, your plate would’ve been this big, too.)
And then yesterday was almost a vacation in itself – from the consistent 90 degree temps in our apartment. (Fuck thermal resistivity.) We decided to treat ourselves to eight hours of running our two dinosaur air-conditioners, and after three hours the house was livable. Luxury, baby.
I’m just not looking forward to that six hundred dollar Con-Ed bill.