The Sinking, Soggy Hush Puppy

I really love hush puppies though I haven't had them often. The ones up north at fast food places are awful. We never could get them to work well at home. I only had the good ones when we went to Georgia in the summers to see the relatives. That was also the only place we had sweet tea, but that's another story. Anyway, since I've become a foodie, I've wanted to make my own hush puppies. I figured since the hubs loved fish and chips, I could get him to like catfish and hush puppies, right? My efforts were not successful at all. I never got to the point in the recipe where the dough would float on top of the oil just before it turned golden brown. My hush puppies always sank. They'd stay down there at the bottom of the dutch over not turning brown really. Just getting sad and soggy. I never even found out if I got the spices right. The hush puppies I made back then never really drained completely, so all I could taste was the oil.

Many years pass. I found myself watching a repeat of Paula's Home Cooking. One of the dishes was Crab Hush Puppies. I love crab in all forms. And my skills had improved markedly since my last attempt. I now have a thermometer to measure the temperature of cooking oil. And I take cooking with crab very seriously. Even if it's on sale, I am very careful in how I use it. I really studies the recipe and took my time. The oil was really hot...and they floated. The hush puppies puffed up and floated. They got a little darker than golden brown, but they were delicious! The only part of the recipe I failed to do was add the bacon crumbles to the finished batter with the crab. I cooked the crispy bacon to add to the hush puppies. I then ate the bacon. That was delicious as well. Thanks, Miss Paula!

Deb vs the Oysters

We were off on Friday, so I finally had made the purchases for the seafood extravaganza. Fortunately, Alton Brown had an episode of Good Eats on oysters the night before. I figured out that I needed to buy small oysters that were sweeter and easier to handle. That was good to know, because I knew nothing. I found myself really nervous about this whole situation. I am a self-professed Foodie, and my creds were on the line here. But as I looked at these things that seem to be exotic rocks, I couldn't help but wonder why anyone would ever get the idea of cracking that open and having a swallow. Primitive man probably saw primitive birds smashing these things on rocks and feasting on the innards. But what else did primitive man have to eat? I was dubious. With that in mind, I also bought some lovely lump crab meat along with the oysters at the fabulous Santa Monica Seafood and some shrimp and crab legs (they were on sale at my regular market). Since the oyster prep was very simple, I decided to finally tackle the elusive shrimp bisque recipe and make some crab cakes. If I hated the oysters, I could still enjoy some seafood. Next, came trying to opening the tightly closed rock. I am not the most graceful person I know. As far as I know, my father is still leery of me coming at him with hot food. You trip once going across a diningroom and no one forgets. Shucking these things involves holding the oyster in the palm of the hand while leveraging a sharp implement pointed toward my hand and shoving it into this rock. As I was doing that for the first time, I realized that we could be mere centimeters from a visit to the ER. However, that didn't happen. I opened them. It was inelegant, but I shucked a half dozen without losing any of the liquor. I had three on the half shell with a squirt of lemon and three with a Mignonette sauce. They are delicious. It was clean and sweet and a little salty. I got the attraction. I will definitely have them again. My Foodie creds remain in tact. The bisque and crab cakes were great as well.

Hot foot and other Kitchen Disasters

This week has had some really positive things happen. It's just been longer and stranger than usual. And the weather has been weird. It was 99 degrees at the Archive on Monday. By Wednesday the temperature had dropped more than 20 degrees. And my allergies are back to a level I hadn't experienced since leaving Philly 15 years ago. Thus, I'm a bit cranky, but not unhappy at all. Though as I take a break from cooking to write this, I realize that stoves and allergy meds may not mix. I just burned the top of my foot while making chili. And no, I don’t know how I pulled that off. I am backing away from the stove now.


Cooking Frenzy


A few weeks ago was the Easter holiday. My plans for making stocks were thwarted that weekend. Silly me thought that chain supermarkets would carry the same kinds of poultry at each store. Oh, no. Now, I’ll have to wait until Friday to get the turkey wings I like to use to make stock for various Easter related dishes. It’s not so bad though. Now, that we’re working the day shift, I have the whole evening on Friday to get a lot of the prep out of the way. I can do things like make pie dough a few days in advance of Friday, so there won’t be a lot of rushing around on Saturday. I’m not sure who, if anyone, is attending the dinner, but I always like to be prepared for surprises.

I haven’t been talking about it very much lately, but I’m still doing a lot of cooking that is getting more and more involved each year. I diligently record cooking shows on The Food Network and PBS every weekend. I watch them for new ideas and re-watch them to make sure I understand the techniques. One thing that has been a challenge for me is that most of the shows have recipes that must be served immediately after they are finished. That’s not an option for a person who tries to make most of the meals for the week during the weekend. Sometimes, I don’t even have the energy to make 30 Minute Meals when I get home. I need something I can throw in the oven or on the stovetop and is on the plate in fifteen minutes. So, my big food project, aside from sneaking more veggies into Jon’s diet, has been figuring out where I can stop a recipe to freeze it so that it tastes the same when I make it later in the week. Generally, I’ve found that blanching the veggies and freezing them separate from the meat an sauce in stews keeps them from being mushy when I put it all together. I actually make all my sauces and freeze them separately. Each night, I defrost the meal in the fridge and put it together when I get home. I’m also getting more confident with complicated dishes. But I find cooking very peaceful. That’s probably because I can control most aspects of it. And, as Jon says, there is much yumminess at the end.

Time to get back to cooking. Don't worry. I've put on some slippers!

Books, Books and a Jug Band

Surprise in a jug

I was surprised last week at the archive. That’s an extremely hard thing to do these days, especially while I’m in Los Angeles. I mean, the day we moved into our first place in Venice, a guy on a unicycle wearing a pink Spandex unitard and a little cape rode by yelling ‘I’m Pink Man.’ Turns out he wasn’t the actual Pink Man who operates out of San Francisco. This specimen was a local Venice denizen trying to horn in on the franchise. But you get the point. It’s not that I thought that the librarians where I work wouldn’t or couldn’t sing. They struck me as either the Peter, Paul and Mary type singers or closeted Headbangers. I really wasn’t expecting a jug band. They didn’t have washboards, but they did have mandolins and a slide whistle. There was much in the way of knee slapping. I was very surprised as the Librarian at the center of it all (he’s a cross between Grizzly Adams and Santa Claus) hardly every speaks. See him belting out a jaunty tune was quite a surprise. As were the jugs.



There isn’t much noise at work. Loud conversations are rare. But work at the Archive has been, for the most part, very interesting and satisfying. Right now, I’m digitzing a special collection of very old (we’re talking pre-Mayflower voyage old) books on trade from the big players of those days (England, France, Spain, Italy and the Netherlands). I believe I can read the term Table of Contents in 8 languages. What good is that? Who knows? The fate of the world may turn on my finding a table of contents in Sanskrit. I haven’t scanned the oldest documents at the Archive. We have a center working on the Dead Sea Scrolls. I know the London Center scanned the Book of the Dead. I don’t think anything other-worldly happened to them afterward. During last week’s conference call, no one from that center was chanting about Imhotep. Jon thinks it’s because no one READ the Book of the Dead when it was scanned. That must be it. Horror movies are never wrong about these things. Where was I? Oh yes, old tomes. I think the funniest thing I discovered were civil codes from the 1600s carefully laying out when it was permissible for passengers on a ship to sue the shipping line if they fall victim to pirates. Since I have found evidence that these laws were still in international law books as late as the 1920s, I doubt they were ever repealed. Thus, survivors of the Somali pirate attacks could hire one of attorneys who appear on daytime TV ads, to go after the careless ship owners who were in dangerous waters and not in a convoy. This is the stuff that goes through my head while at work.

Passages
Borders Book Store #93, 3rd Street Promenade closed its doors for good in January. Those of us who worked there have decidedly mixed feelings. There was a lot of evil cackling, to be sure. Some bitterness remains at the customers, the management, the corporate structure and even the fixtures. But, there is some sadness at the loss of yet another brick and mortar bookstore. Jon argues that it wasn’t really a bookstore at this point. It was more like a gift shop that sold some books. The depth of the inventory had changed considerably. The last time I was there, I couldn’t find a copy of The Great Gatsby. ‘Nuff said. I mourned the store’s demise back then. The company should have never abandoned its original mandate – a community bookstore with the prices of a chain. Borders expanded way too quickly (during my time there, a new store was opening every month). The Amazon.com completely panicked Borders. After they came along, it was one hair-brained scheme after another to try to keep its market share. They diminished the number and types of books they carried and abandoned the idea of full-time, knowledgeable staffers there for the long term. I’m saddened because it was a really great bookseller at one time. I have some wonderful memories of that store. I met some of the best people I know there (like Marie and Craig and Phil who were at our wedding). Marie and I learned about independent publishing working for Borders. My fondest memory of book signing was at a Borders. This one was in Philly while I worked for the Center City District. Peter O’Toole was signing a memoir at the Rittenhouse Square Borders. I just had to see him in person. He did not disappoint. Mr. O’Toole was there with a fine glass of booze and a cigarette awaiting the throngs when I arrived. The timid staff was trying to gently get him to not smoke and drink. He dismissed them with a very cultured ‘Oh, do go away.’ Then, he winked at me. It was fabulous. We would have never tried to take his stash at store #93 -- as long as he shared with us -- just kidding.

Our memories at store 93 are mostly ghastly. There were the various naked homeless people washing up in the bathrooms. They were never the OZ kind of naked or even the nudist camp kind of naked. It was gruesome kind of naked. Sometimes, they’d use the bathroom by going outside of the bathroom door next to the back office doors. My favorite of the homeless was not bathroom related. Mine was the one covered in gasoline and carrying an open cup of gas right in front of a group of VIPs from corporate headquarters. They no longer questioned our contention about having the weirdest clientele in the chain. We beat out the Manhattan stores for bizarre by a mile. We also cornered the market on privileged and often abusive customers who felt very entitled to everything. I won’t miss them at all. Though I met Star Trek's Patrick Stewart there (a co-worker nearly got injured over my wanting to wait on Captain Picard). Barbara Streisand had pretty good taste in book but made her husband pay for them. And Ted Danson looked for me long after I quit as he believed I was his personal shopper. Ah, memories. We tried to get a reunion group to go for one last visit, but I worried that Craig’s idea for a proper farewell would end in arrests. Thus, I said adieu from home.

Rainy Season and Soggy Tourists

Sorry to take so long to write. Work was left really unsettled as we broke for the holidays. And once back, we changed from night to day shift. It's been a real adjustment. Now, I'm back in the swing of things.

The thing I learned last week is that I’ve developed a capacity for eating huge amounts of Buffalo wings . I don’t really have them when I go out. They’re always too spicy or not tender. I didn’t typically make them for the Super Bowl. My friends preferred a Betty Crocker creation called Mahogany Wings (wings baked with a molasses, soy, ginger sauce). I supposed that I was feeling more traditional that night, so I made a pile of Buffalo wings thinking I’d snack on them all week. Maybe it was the thrilling game or something. All I know is that I had about seven wings left from a three pound bag. Just disgraceful. I’m making more today.

LA in Winter

We knew it was going to be bad when the sandbags were out in the breakroom. That the library has custom built sandbags tells you about the rainy season here. It was just as crazy as advertised. The downpours were so hard that visibility was only a few yards. Our bus on thursday took almost 20 minutes to travel two blocks. The drainage is terrible and Angelenos do not know how to drive in any kind of real weather. We left early on thursday and got home later than our normal time. It was much the same Friday save for the drenching we got just as we were left off the bus. A river ran through Culver Blvd., that was for sure. We didn't have to go anywhere on the weekend. I think our shoes will be dry by tomorrow. All told we had about three inches of rain in the region over the last few days. In snow that can be up to 30 inches. Still, that may not be enough to prevent water restrictions in the summer. What were people thinking building all this stuff in the desert? It won't affect us though. we don't have a lawn to water or a car to wash or a dishwasher...wait, is this a good thing? More rain is coming this week. The weather forecasters are very happy to have something to do. Maybe this week, everyone's driving will be better.

Tourist Season

Meanwhile, the tourists are suffering. I'm not sure what kind of travel guides they're reading, but most seem to think that our weather is completely opposite of the rest of the country. One of our more colorful bus drivers said to a German tourist who was shivering in shorts and a T-shirt during the rain storm, 'You seem to have LA confused with Brazil or Australia. It's still winter here.' The Big Blue Bus Drivers are very helpful with tourists. They even keep them from getting off at stops where it's likely they'll have a real LA adventure complete with gangs and rotweilers. Jon and I don't travel through those areas, but the bus connects within reach those destinations. Looking at a map, it seems that getting from our area to Venice Beach is an easy 20 minute walk. And it is, but that very direct route takes one through some ungentrified areas that are still in dispute among those who wear colors and use gang signs. The drivers give them helpful hints like, 'I could let you off here, but you'll proabably die.' After the local passengers agree with the driver, the tourists stay on board into downtown Santa Monica and take the very safe shuttle up the beach. Venice is quite safe on the beach. LAPD has a station there and lots of bike patrols (there was even a TV show about them called Pacific Blue - it was terrible). No one in city government will risk a world tourist destination. Jon and I haven't been there in a while. It's too much of a freak show. The beach near us is just off Marina del Rey. there is a mix of the very rich and regular locals. the beach has some nice, family owned restaurants. Tourists get there but not in as many numbers as Venice Beach.

Next Time

I'm going to try another video next week. I'll be doing a lot of cooking to cover the next couple of week. We're almost out of everything I made during the Christmas break. Jon's face was priceless during those shopping trips. I believe he thought I had lost my mind or invited a hundred people for the holidays. But no, I just did a lot of cooking and freezing. It almost lasted two months, and everything still tastes good. I've come a longway from watching the Galloping Gourmet. I'd never want cooking as a career, but I'd really like to take some courses on things like

A Message for Dad

Mind you, I'm at least ten pounds thinner in person. Make that twenty. Enjoy!

Ghost of Cookies Past

Ready for My Close-up

I’ve been meaning to do a cooking video for everyone this year. I thought it would be fun to see Jon and I in action during the baking frenzy. I was going to do it this week as we made the first wave of cookie dough, and I made the fruitcakes. But, our apartment is a bit cluttered with piles of papers, reports and forms related the writing stuff. It wasn’t as noticeable in our place in Playa de Rey. It’s hard to miss here. And then neither Jon nor I was exactly camera ready. Thus, I could hear the commentary. You know what you’d be saying. Couldn’t she pick up the place? Why didn’t she do something with those edges? Why doesn’t Jon have a shirt on? That’s just nasty. (Jon does the dishes for me between batches of dough. He prefers doing them topless). How did she get flour on her back? You get the idea, and you know it’s true. I’ll make a video during the second wave, and have my act together. Though that one will include the marshmallows that sometimes run up the paddle to the mixer to escape. That’s always a lot of curse filled fun. Marshmallows are kind of hot when you’re making them. Meanwhile, enjoy the tales of cooking making past.

From 2007
Dough is Me

But there are things on my mind and all over our apartment. It’s the cookies. They’re everywhere. I chortle at my favorite Food Network chefs baking two dozen cookies and acting like they’ve done a lot for gifts. Somehow, my little college aged efforts have exploded into a two week production involving nine pounds of butter, so far, four five pound bags of flour and sugar, and a lot of other stuff. And we aren’t done yet. We have to ship to six cities in the US and two in Canada. The LA deliveries are mostly in person. It’s a lot of work, but we enjoy the process for the most part. It’s just a trifle cluttered in here at the moment. I’m making the marshmallows and hot cocoa mix this year, but I’m hoping to avoid the attack of the hot stickiness by using the wonderfully stable Kitchenmaid mixer that the lovely Marie kindly loaned us. We need to get all this stuff out of here, or the tree won’t fit.

It’s been a busy week. I apologize to everyone that may still be waiting to hear from me. It’s been hard keeping up with even routine e-mail. The cookie insanity has entered phase two – local deliveries. The first batches turned out well and had a lot of variety this year. The marshmallows stayed in the bowls and turned out light and fluffy. And the menorah didn't catch the apartment on fire. But the baking was the easy part. Over the past week, I’ve packaged and shipped 35 boxes with an average of three bags of cookies or cookies and hot cocoa mix. Thank goodness for flat rate boxes and labels with postage that can be printed at home. Everything was ready when we got to the Post Office. Today I will try my hand at making chocolate truffles and mini baklava. The ladies on The Food Network make it all look easy. We shall soon see.Right now, I’m enjoying a surprisingly good glass of wine in preparation for the Eagles/Dallas game. It’s surprising because I bought it at the 99 Cents Only Store for only 99 cents. I’ve had really good wine in France for under $2.00. It was 1€ 20, I believe, for a lovely red wine. I always enjoy a glass of two buck Chuck but this is my first under a dollar vintage. I must say that Foggy Bay white Table Wine is quite nice. I don’t think it will help with this Eagles game, but maybe I won’t care by the time I finish drinking it.