Is
Gelato!
There's a new(ish) gelato place in town, Mangiamo Gelato Caffe. I've been meaning to go for a while, and finally my brother and I walked down yesterday.
Mmmm.
They were nice & cheerful & let us try different flavors, and, even better, all the different sizes allow for different flavors--even the small (which is plenty large!) allows for three flavors. This is great for someone like me who always has to have pistachio(1), but still wants to try something else.
My brother had mango & nutella, both of which were delicious (I tasted some, of course). I had rum raisin, pistachio, and raspberry, all yummy, though I think the rum raisin was better as a taste than as a third-of-a-bowl-full, where it got too sweet.
The food was good, the place was nice, and the company was good as well. Lots of philosophy talk, given that Ethawyn is a philosophy major and all.
(1) With gelato, that is. Ice cream has to be chocolate, unless I'm somewhere where I can have black walnut ice cream. There's a lovely place in Florence, Oregon that serves homemade black walnut ice cream. I've never had any anywhere else. Mmmm.... *Starts dreaming happily & then realizes it's time to write.
Showing posts with label food. Show all posts
Showing posts with label food. Show all posts
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Happiness (1)
Is
A soft pretzel covered in salt, eaten with a cold Diet Coke while sitting on a low wall and watching the waves come in.
The company was good too. Pity it was my friend's first soft pretzel. It was happy-making, but it was also frozen and then thawed out in the microwave, not really the best way to first encounter a food.
I'll have to make some pretzels soon.
A soft pretzel covered in salt, eaten with a cold Diet Coke while sitting on a low wall and watching the waves come in.
The company was good too. Pity it was my friend's first soft pretzel. It was happy-making, but it was also frozen and then thawed out in the microwave, not really the best way to first encounter a food.
I'll have to make some pretzels soon.
Thursday, November 27, 2008
Mulled Mead
I mentioned earlier that I tried Turkish Delight because it showed up in books I loved.
I'm not the only member of the family who tries literary food. My brother turned 21 today and decided that for his coming-of-age drink, he'd like to try mulled mead because it shows up in so many books. Mead does, at least. I'm not too sure about the "mulled" bit.
So, he and Dad picked up some Chaucer's Mead at the store a week or so ago, and this afternoon he carefully brewed it.
The results:
Dad: "It's...sweet."
Pause.
"You know what it reminds me of? Cough syrup."
Mom: "No, it's better than cough syrup."
My brother: "I like it."
Pause.
"But I think I prefer sparkling cider."
I never really developed a taste for wine or its associated beverages, so my own contribution, that it's vaguely alcoholic in flavor and kind of sweet, doesn't really count, though I include it for completeness.
So, now you know.
Beowulf and various other heroic types of the past drank something sweetish and vaguely alcoholic in flavor that was kind of like cough syrup only better.
Mmmmm.
I'm not the only member of the family who tries literary food. My brother turned 21 today and decided that for his coming-of-age drink, he'd like to try mulled mead because it shows up in so many books. Mead does, at least. I'm not too sure about the "mulled" bit.
So, he and Dad picked up some Chaucer's Mead at the store a week or so ago, and this afternoon he carefully brewed it.
The results:
Dad: "It's...sweet."
Pause.
"You know what it reminds me of? Cough syrup."
Mom: "No, it's better than cough syrup."
My brother: "I like it."
Pause.
"But I think I prefer sparkling cider."
I never really developed a taste for wine or its associated beverages, so my own contribution, that it's vaguely alcoholic in flavor and kind of sweet, doesn't really count, though I include it for completeness.
So, now you know.
Beowulf and various other heroic types of the past drank something sweetish and vaguely alcoholic in flavor that was kind of like cough syrup only better.
Mmmmm.
Friday, September 26, 2008
Yum!
Cooking Light's Herbed Chicken and Dumplings is scrumptious.
And I need hardly add that the dish is even better if they are made with herbs from ones own garden and celery purchased at the farmer's market down town1.
A good green salad and Walnut Bread from 100 Great Breads2 are excellent side dishes, and cheesecake made from Dad's Secret Recipe3 is a fine finish.
1It's even tasty if you happen to run out of chicken broth and have to use beef as a substitute for part of it.
2 I don't unreservedly recommend Hollywood's book; I can't figure out quite why he uses so much salt, for one thing--the only time I tried using his salt amount and temperatures, I ended up with a brick rather than bread. But, using 1 teaspoon of salt instead of one tablespoon, and lowering the temperature by about 100 degrees usually works quite well for me, and I adore the Walnut Bread. Others seem to do fine with his temperatures, so I can't be too didactic. Oh, and if you don' t have 100 Great Breads, get it from the library. Or make some other bread, any other bread. No one should deprive themselves of the joy of making bread.
3 It's not so much secret, really, as constantly in flux. It started out being one recipe, morphed into a combination of two or three, and is perpetually being tweaked from one batch to the next. I think this one had more zest than the last, but I'm not sure.
And I need hardly add that the dish is even better if they are made with herbs from ones own garden and celery purchased at the farmer's market down town1.
A good green salad and Walnut Bread from 100 Great Breads2 are excellent side dishes, and cheesecake made from Dad's Secret Recipe3 is a fine finish.
1It's even tasty if you happen to run out of chicken broth and have to use beef as a substitute for part of it.
2 I don't unreservedly recommend Hollywood's book; I can't figure out quite why he uses so much salt, for one thing--the only time I tried using his salt amount and temperatures, I ended up with a brick rather than bread. But, using 1 teaspoon of salt instead of one tablespoon, and lowering the temperature by about 100 degrees usually works quite well for me, and I adore the Walnut Bread. Others seem to do fine with his temperatures, so I can't be too didactic. Oh, and if you don' t have 100 Great Breads, get it from the library. Or make some other bread, any other bread. No one should deprive themselves of the joy of making bread.
3 It's not so much secret, really, as constantly in flux. It started out being one recipe, morphed into a combination of two or three, and is perpetually being tweaked from one batch to the next. I think this one had more zest than the last, but I'm not sure.
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
A Few of My Favorite Things
Green olives stuffed with garlic
Peanut butter pretzels
Cheese
Dark chocolate.
Yum.
Peanut butter pretzels
Cheese
Dark chocolate.
Yum.
Sunday, June 22, 2008
Turkish Delight, a rambly little trivia post
I cannot remember a time without Narnia.
My parents started reading the books to me before I was five1 and read them pretty much yearly to me and my sisters2 throughout my growing up years.
One side effect of all this was a curiosity about British food3,but most especially about Turkish Delight. I wanted to know what fabulous sweet this was that Edmund loved so much.
I pictured a number of delicacies, finally settling on something more or less like baklava--something I also didn't taste until years later.
Finally, I decided to do the sensible thing and buy some. It turned out to be harder than I expected. Most stores hadn't even heard of it. This was before the movies, mind you. It may be easier to find now. A friend eventually bought some offline, and we tried it together.
It was gooey, a bit gelatinous, very sweet, and not much else.
My sister has recently decided to skip the whole hunting bit and just make some for her students. Consequently, I've now seen at least one recipe for it, and I can tell you why: This wonder consists primarily of cornstarch and sugar with only the smallest amount of rosewater, or maybe some other flavoring, to justify its existence.
My advice? Read the books, read them often, read them out loud to your kids if you have any, watch the movies, and eat baklava.
1.Likewise with The Lord of the Rings. A good many other books also made their way in and out of yearly rotation. Does anyone wonder any more how I ended up going to grad school?
2. My brother got to hear them a few times, but by the time he came along, the evening read aloud time had pretty much been taken over by other things. He does still love to read, but he missed out on a lot coming last.
3. Sardines on toast? C. S. Lewis makes this stuff sound so good when he writes about it that I'm almost tempted to try, on the other hand, look at what happened when I tried Turkish Delight. Or, for that matter, Yorkshire pudding (a sort of giant, un-popped popover), which I made once because James Herriot spoke of it so often and so fondly. It is possible some things are better left to the imagination.
My parents started reading the books to me before I was five1 and read them pretty much yearly to me and my sisters2 throughout my growing up years.
One side effect of all this was a curiosity about British food3,but most especially about Turkish Delight. I wanted to know what fabulous sweet this was that Edmund loved so much.
I pictured a number of delicacies, finally settling on something more or less like baklava--something I also didn't taste until years later.
Finally, I decided to do the sensible thing and buy some. It turned out to be harder than I expected. Most stores hadn't even heard of it. This was before the movies, mind you. It may be easier to find now. A friend eventually bought some offline, and we tried it together.
It was gooey, a bit gelatinous, very sweet, and not much else.
My sister has recently decided to skip the whole hunting bit and just make some for her students. Consequently, I've now seen at least one recipe for it, and I can tell you why: This wonder consists primarily of cornstarch and sugar with only the smallest amount of rosewater, or maybe some other flavoring, to justify its existence.
My advice? Read the books, read them often, read them out loud to your kids if you have any, watch the movies, and eat baklava.
1.Likewise with The Lord of the Rings. A good many other books also made their way in and out of yearly rotation. Does anyone wonder any more how I ended up going to grad school?
2. My brother got to hear them a few times, but by the time he came along, the evening read aloud time had pretty much been taken over by other things. He does still love to read, but he missed out on a lot coming last.
3. Sardines on toast? C. S. Lewis makes this stuff sound so good when he writes about it that I'm almost tempted to try, on the other hand, look at what happened when I tried Turkish Delight. Or, for that matter, Yorkshire pudding (a sort of giant, un-popped popover), which I made once because James Herriot spoke of it so often and so fondly. It is possible some things are better left to the imagination.
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