aetercrow

As promised, I made some modifications to my dish ‘ fish from last night. Here is goes:

Fish with Lime and Green Onion over Brocolli.

From My Menu 2

Ingredients:

• 1 Small Head of Broccoli
• 2 TBs Butter
• 2 TBs Olive Oil
• 1 Egg, beaten
• Bread, crumbed (not old yet!)
• 1 filet of fish (red snapper tonight, .5 lbs)
• 1 Bunch Green Onion, chopped
• 3 Eyes Garlic, minced
• 2 Limes, rolled and halved

Directions:

1. Cut broccoli crowns from head and place in steamer over tap water, stove on high. (You want the broccoli to be steamed until just tender by serving time so adjust accordingly).
2. Heat oil and butter over medium to medium high heat on stove.
3. Coat fish in egg and dust with bread crumbs.
4. Place fish in pan, cover.
5. Chop onions and mince garlic.
6. Flip fish after brown and add Onions and Garlic around the sides.
7. Saute for a minute or so.
8. Cut limes and squeeze around and over fish.
9. Reduce for a minute.
10. Flip the fish one last time.
11. Check broccoli, it should be just tender. Place on plate in a pile.
12. Place Fish on top of broccoli.
13. Pour Butter and Onions on top of fish.
14. Eat.

There you have it. Tonight the onions were perfectly sauteed, soft and flavorful. I definitely like it better than the browned crispy attempt last night.

bon appetit!

I’ve been meaning to post up some recipes here for a while. Not good recipes mind you, just what I’ve been trying for dinner, and then my thoughts on how I might try it next time. Because I’m still cooking and also slow to post, I have quite a backlog of dishes; and, like a pile of dishes, the best way to get it done is just fill the sink and start.

Fried Catfish with Green Onion, Garlic and Lime, over Broccoli

Ingredients:

• 2 Tbs butter
• 2 Tbs olive oil
• 1 bunch green onions, chopped
• 3 eyes of garlic, minced
• 1 fillet of catfish (approx. 1/2 lbs), whole
• 1 egg, beaten
• bread, crumbed (haha)
• 1 lime, rolled and halved
• 1 small head broccoli, cut and steamed

Directions:

1. Add butter and oil to a pan over medium heat. While melting, take the knife to the onion and garlic and broccoli. Start the broccoli steaming
2. Add onion to the pan when butter is sizzling, begin to saute.
3. Add garlic, stir a bit.
4. Coat the fish in beaten egg and dust with bread crumbs.
5. Add fish to pan and cover.
6. Flip after a few minutes, when the pan side of the fish is brown.
7. Squeeze the lime halves into the bottom of the pan.
8. After a few minutes, when the other side is browned, turn fish again and turn off heat.
9. Quickly place broccoli in a pile on a plate and place the fish on top.
10. Spoon the sauce, onions and garlic from the pan over the fish.
11. Enjoy!

Now, I did this and by the time the fish was done the onions were browned and slightly crisp from the butter. I thought it made a great crumble topping for the fish, but if you’re not into that I’d probably add the onions and the garlic after the fish. In fact, I have a piece of Red Snapper that I will try the same thing with those modifications tomorrow night!

bon appetit

After work yesterday, Paul and I cruised the crowded bike path back home with the intention of buying a mini keg for the night’s festivities, which included The Blazers game, tart baking (not torte, Sam!), and several runs to the school down the street for half court basketball. Ideal conditions for a mini keg. The rest is history, or this story anyway.

For our part, the mini keg tentatively started last summer when we brought a Heinekeg over to Jhomer’s to accompany a Miyazake film and some Nintendo Wii. More recently, however, we’ve been considering them as a solution for the problem of  the cost of tasty beer versus our desire to drink tasty beer. Measured against our original standard (a 12 pack of Henry’s), the mini keg can be a pretty good deal depending on price and overall tastiness. PC Market has a reasonable selection of these kegs and this selection has been the real genesis of our research.

Variety aside, most of these kegs share the same physical attributes, namely they are 5 liters of beer in a pressurised aluminum can. Next to these in the cooler, there is also a selection of less-mini kegs. These bad boys contain beer brewed here in state, and are housed in 8 liter containers that are returnable upon a 20 dollar deposit. We’ve tried several of the 5 liter kegs, and have been pleased with the results for the most part but until yesterday we hadn’t made a move on the larger ones despite our curiosity.

We chose the wit, which is a Belgian wheat style appropriately named (my wit certainly increases upon a pint or two) and with a light fresh taste. I was pleased that the keg fit in my pack, and that it rode home well on my bike. I was also pleased that the beer went as far as it did. Yes, it only lasted an evening but with several other people drinking on it, it served well. I think that it was a great deal overall, but I won’t be entirely convinced until we exchange it for another. I want to know if the other varieties are tasty, and just how long one will last under a slower paced consumption through a week or two.

I’m pretty sure at some point the best course will be to just visit the homebrew store.

It’s official, I am now a member of the mountain biking community. No really, I have a bike and everything. I’m still waiting for the credentials and decoder ring to come in the mail however. Luckily, the community I’m referring is only 4 or 5 people strong; I don’t think they’ll be busting me for riding without the badge anytime soon. Except if they were I wouldn’t know it yet because they communicate in cipher, but I digress. Let me start from the beginning.

I bought a mountain bike frame off of Craigslist last Friday night (13th). It’s claim to fame seemed to be that it was:

1. A very nice bike.
2. A bike that many people looked at but declined to buy.
3. A very good deal.

Taking advantage of all three of those facts, I claimed it and brought it home. I immediately set about ordering parts for it, and scavenging or borrowing others to make due until such a time that I had the resources to complete it to match the picture in my mind’s eye. I had plans aplenty for finishing, but priority one was to get her rolling out on the trails. I was but an arrow to the target in that respect. By Wednesday I had most all of the parts I needed gathered and I begin tinkering on it with the help of Paul and Jev in the evenings. There were obstacles, but honestly, what fun would it be without at least one exploding tire? (I’ll let Jev answer that definitively).

The tires really were an obstacle to completion, and by Friday night I had begin to think that I would not be riding on Saturday as planned. I kept my head and tried to remember my own advice: there is a difference between excitement and impatience. With that in mind, I woke up Saturday and, on the advice of Paul, went looking for an open bike shop to get the tires mounted. I found success at Hutch’s and returned home just in time to head out to the trails for the title ride.

The christening scene was the North Shore trail at Dexter. Honestly, the events of that trip would constitute a blog in themselves, so I’ll leave you with a list of the highlights and some cool pictures:

1. Jev crashed my bike.
2. Jev crashed Paul’s bike, bending the wheel.
3. Jev caused Joe to crash and fall over a steep ledge into some brambles.
4. I actually popped my front tire up and over obstacles!
5. I managed a pretty good injury, albeit on a less exciting crash than Joe’s.
6. As good as milkshakes are, they are better after a few hours on the trails.

Now for some Pictures:

From Maiden Mountian Bike Voyage

So there you have it, My first MTB ride and how I got there. I joked with the staff at Hutch’s that I need to christen the bike in the style of ships, breaking a bottle of booze across the bow.  Instead, I spilled a little blood, which beats booze as a sacrifice anyday. Sure it caused me some pain, but at least I didn’t have to chip up the head tube breaking a bottle of Red Stripe on it!

It’s not uncommon to see the trails of earthworms on sidewalks around here; the moisture draws them out. Earthworms breath through their skin, which must be moist in order for the function to occur. They are able to breathe underground by air stored in between the dirt particles, but if the soil becomes water saturated they must come up to breathe. I find this fascinating but it doesn’t really explain why they head for the sidewalk. I have my suspicions.

When they do head for the sidewalk, a typical routine ensues. Get up a head of steam, make for the middle of the sidewalk in a straight line (perpendicular-ish to the edge) and then keep going until dried out and/or stepped on. It’s pretty simple and probably helps weed out the weaker and dumber portion of earthworm society. For every good routine, there’s always an exception; and, I guess this guy didn’t get the memo:

First of all, it didn’t exactly start out perpendicular; it looks like it tried to hug the coast instead. Then, either giddy or drunk on all the fresh atmosphere, things start to get a little crazy. It successfully maneuvers a small barrel roll and immediately spirals it up into a big one. I can only assume it’s still there, executing some weird sidewalk holding pattern.

No matter what, I’m rooting for the little guy. It’s larger than your normal, errant foot squished worm, so nature might be on his side during these kinds of maneuvers. With any luck he’ll grow up to be nice and healthy.

Sipping a beer and getting ready for a night of whiskey, High Life and 80’s music, is the perfect time to share a recent discovery. It comes in the form of a new energy supplement.

Are you in need of a new fix? Are you tired of the boring energy drink routine, sipping swallowing and repeating? Maybe you need of a new kind of kick, something with bite that takes bite:

Butterfinger BUZZ!

It looks disgusting to me, but maybe they’re on to something. I’m betting there’s more sugar in those than the average Amp or Rockstar, and it’s cheaper to boot. I’m not sold however; after eating a carton of Butterfinger ice cream last summer in an ice cream challenge, this flavor still makes me gag a bit sometimes extra caffeine notwithstanding.

Axiom 1: Coffee can cause hallucinations.

Axiom 2: Coffee can reduce dementia and Alzheimer’s.

Ergo we should all be taking more hallucinogens, logical fallacy be damned!

Quick, without looking it up, do you know what the numeronyms “i18n” and “L10n” stand for?

The first represents the word internationalization and the second stands in for  localization. Who used these words so much that listing the first and last letter separated by the number of letters left out in the middle seemed like a good idea?! To their credit, in a specific context, these terms are used a lot so some shortening should be expected. I think n14n (numeronymization?) is probably the geekiest option possible to do that however.

When I encountered them in a bit of reading today, I was amused at the memory they sparked of a joke book I had growing up. It had pages of verbal complete with illustrations emphasizing the punchlines. One of my favorite of these was play on words, or a single word in this case. Here it is in original form:

What’s the longest word in the world?

Smiles, because there is a mile between the first and last letter!

The accompanying picture showed a man standing next to a large S, while peering into a telescope at a distant S down the road. That’s some funny stuff there!

There’s nothing like a pb and j and a cold glass of milk. This simple sandwich is one of my favorite foods, and eating it always satisfies. When eating, I always take a slow pleasure in mixing every bite. There’s something about how the milk interacts with sweetness of the jelly that makes the combo taste so good. For the full effect, I prefer to cut the sandwich on a diagonal, as every sandwich should be cut, and dip the sandwich into my milk before each bite. This method works well at home, but you get a few stares at the lunch table when you’ve fully opened the top of the milk carton, the one you traded chips or a handy snack for perhaps, to dip your sandwich into. If dipping isn’t an option a more socially acceptable “bite, hold in mouth, sip, chew” comes a close second.

While I was biting, holding in mouth, sipping and chewing my pb and j on focaccia with milk today, I had a craving for a sandwich that I might possible like better than pb and j; and, that sandwich is pb and pickle. Much like the milk and the jelly, there is a interaction between the tangy acidity of the pickles and the peanut butter that is out of this world tasty.

In the spirit of the pb and x sandwich, I’m proposing that we have a potluck night where everyone brings their favorite pb an x sandwiches, cut in finger sandwich size portions to sample and share. Even better, we can construct a bunch of sandwiches using standardized bread and pb, paired with a list of common x ingredients for us to judge and rank. Pairings might include pb and pickle, pb and bacon (Elvis, right?), pb and banana, and etc. In any case, I’m betting some good and tasty times will be had by all.

Hi all, and Happy new year. I’ve spent the last couple of weeks on a nice and lazy vacation; and, I spent the week before that in a mad rush to finish all my break work tasks to enable me to take said vacation. In that block of time a lot of cool things happened, let me catch you up.

At work, I manged to push out several new software packages to our Mac instructional labs, on top of my more run of the mill EMU updating and scheduling. I was worried about this a bit at first, because beneath my exterior of  bravado, I had no idea if the tools I had would work as advertised. As it turned out, it was a struggle to get the tools in the first place, but I kept my head and it all worked out. I even managed to get in at my normal time (7:00-7:30am) despite the snow delays the campus enacted. It felt good to be so productive.

Moving on to the fun stuff, my vacation was satisfying as well. I spent the first couple of days researching and shopping for cars. I ended up with a 2006 Subaru Forester FXT, at which I stole from the dealership for the value of a trade in. Why the purchase? Lots of reasons, mostly that I wanted to have a car purchased before I bought a house, or anything else major I’m assuming will happen in the next five years.

Regarding the Holidays, I spent them with friends and family. Rachel had an early flight out of PDX on the 24th, so we decided to take an impromptu night in The Pearl on the 23rd. We stayed at the Hotel Lucia (highly recommended), and spent that evening wandering the snow filled streets, to Powell’s, pioneer square and etc. After she left Oregon for Hawaiian climes I shacked up at my parents house, sleeping on the couch, eating home meals and sharing good times with my family. The year itself ended with a party here, where fun was had by all and some idiots streaked around the culdesac screaming “happy new year”.

Here’s to many sacks in your culdesacs, Happy New Year.