Legs even a pinup model would envy

I'm a leg man.

R U? 

Nothing extraordinary here, except extreme efficiency in getting dinner on the table in the midst of an activity spate  (I know that's not how you use the word, but I'm busy, don't bother me). Several chicken legs, rubbed with bottled Cajun seasoning and left to contemplate their lack of navels in the fridge for a couple of hours.  300 degree oven, covered, with a little broth for 2 hours while the spate is being dealt with. (If only the dealing had had to do with blackjack.)

Seafood dumplings

I met a nice fish in Hawaii,
An often farmed brand known as Swai.
Light, tender, and white;
Quite often at night
It's heard singing through "Bali Hai."

"A picture is worth a thousand words" is a wholly inadequate quote for this picture. It's worth a free blog site, which is, as we all know, what this is. Aided by my camera phone. Anyhow, I experimented today with an idea I will sell to a client for a dinner to be prepared for her for Monday. These are moist and delicate little pillows.


Contents:
6 oz shrimp
6 oz flounder
3 scallions
1/4 cup egg white
pinch each of salt, pepper, and cayenne

All gets buzzed in the food processor and results in a pretty wet pudding. It will hold together when molded with wet hands. To prepare for eating I boiled some broth, slipped the dumplings in and let them poach at a very low simmer for 3 minutes, flipped them and let them go for 3 more. They are served here over ramen noodles, but for my client it will be Jamaican rice and peas.

Bowl games and layered things

Ice cream










 


Cake

Do ice cream makers spin the other way if you're below the equator?

Do missing socks actually go to the Planet of the Sock Puppets, where they are ruled over by Shari Lewis?

Is a secret drone is being used by the US government to manipulate us? And it's Wolf Blitzer?



Pure ice cream may be just vanilla.
I dream of it when I'm on my pilla.
With berries of straw,
It puts me in awe.
Then morphs to nice screams at Godzilla.

When is this blog going to address the topic suggested by the title? RIGHT NOW!

I had a look at Michael Toa's blog this morning. It's about ice cream and the use of condensed milk. Fascinating fact: the condensed milk and other ingredients don't need the churn from an ice cream maker, good news for those of us who don't own one. I really want a sushi machine, but that's another topic all together.

I had occasion to make a pastel de tres leches (the traditional Latin American cake) recently. I was left with some of the three milks that I hadn't used. I threw them into the freezer where they became an exquisite ice cream with just a minimum of stirring over the 2-3 hours it took for it to firm up completely.

Google will help you find hundreds of recipes for the cake. The basics of the ice cream are these:

1 can fat free sweetened condensed milk
1 can fat free evaporated milk
1 cup heavy cream
1 tsp vanilla extract

Whisk together and freeze, stirring 2 or 3 times over 3 hours. You are done.

Medical Pot Roast That We Inhaled

The scene: a DC Safeway store
The motive: needed a protein for dinner
The catalyst: 30% discount on chuck roast
The result: done deal













Cast of characters:
That 3 lb. hunk o' meat
salt and pepper
garlic powder
1 1/2 onions - sliced into half moons
8 oz sliced mushrooms
2 cups beef broth
6 oz "manufactured" baby carrots
The pot (not prescribed by a doctor)
The oven (the heat which, if you can't stand it, keeps you out of the kitchen)

The wind howled as the sun groped it's way up from the horizon behind a dark and thick cloud cover (it was a sunny morning). The chef stumbled from the bed to the bathroom, down the stairs, and lurched into the kitchen (I got up, went down and turned on the coffee maker, visited the smallest room in the house, went to the front door to check for the NY Times). Unaware that there was a pot roast in his plans for the day, the chef groped around in the fridge and freezer for some darn thing to cook for dinner (I had no plans until I went grocery shopping later in the morning). He reached for the vodka bottle chilling in the freezer and made a Desperation Martini, booze in a glass with an ice cube (I waited patiently for the coffee to be ready). Hands shaking, the vodka splashed onto his wife-beater as he chugged a glug of it (I don't wear wife-beaters). The chef went back to bed (I read the paper, drank my coffee and prepared for my day).

Oh, the food. My apologies. Put onions and mushrooms in the bottom of a Dutch oven, lay the well-salted and peppered beef on them, top with more mushrooms and onions, garlic powder, and the broth. Place in a 325 oven. After one hour add the carrots. After another 1 1/2 hours, wake the chef and serve dinner.

Say "Cheese, Cheese, Cheese, Cheese, and Artichokes"

Recently I melted a few different cheeses in the microwave and then layered them in a small loaf pan. It made for a marvelous amuse bouche when chilled, sliced, and served up on a bit of bruschetta, or combined with some sliced meat in a tortilla wrap. Evolution being what it is I have moved forward and found different combinations of cheeses to use and then got the brilliant interesting idea to blend them with artichoke hearts. Normally I prefer frozen artichokes, but my snarky ethnic interesting neighborhood Giant doesn't carry them. I went with canned (not marinated).

Included: horseradish pepper jack, brie, gouda, Velveeta, one can artichoke hearts finely chopped.

Having recently published my eminently readable interesting "Velveeta Monologues," I had to throw some of the official cheese of the 1950's into the mix.

Soon to be published: "Noah's Nine Hundred and Fifty Years of Married Life (or how his sons Spam, Shemp and Curly Japheth kept him from offing himself)", the sequel to "Noah, I said make an arc, not an ark, you putz."