*sigh*
...
*sigh*
Okay. My man and I have this freezer bag that we dutifully throw our potato/carrot/onion peels and chicken bones into. We do this so that one day, when there are enough scraps, I can boil them all and make real chicken broth from scratch.
Today was that day.
... and yet, the sighs. (I'll get there).
Chicken Noodle Soup
Ingredients
scraps (i.e. potato, carrots, celery, bones etc.)
Chicken (you can use a whole chicken, thighs, breasts, whatever)
real stuff (properly diced potatoes, carrots, celery, garlic, etc.)
noodles
I'm not kidding, the recipe is that simple.
You add water to your scraps and chicken and, as my good Australian mate would say: You boil the bjeezus out of it.
Then you let it all simmer for about an hour... or as I like to call it: the last chapter of my current book and two episodes of QI (oh Stephen Fry, you make life a happier existence).
Next, strain out all the scraps, set aside the chicken to cool and add the proper veggies to the simmering pot to cook.
Cut up your chicken meat and add that too.
Last but not least, add the noodles. (Yum). Let everything simmer until the noodles are soft, but not too soft and voila!
I was so happy with how my soup turned out. I honestly couldn't believe it. I felt worthy of my sparkly apron (which I was wearing over my bathrobe since it was 9 in the morning). I felt suitably domestic. I felt like had a delicious dinner to come home to.
Do you see where I'm going with any of this?
Flash forward to an hour ago when I walked in from one of the longest and most demoralizing shifts of my customer-service existence. Yes, today had sucked, but it was all going to be okay. My man had a 'pick-me-up' latte with my name on it and we were going to have homemade soup, right?
Wrong.
While I'd been out all day the noodles had come alive. Those twisty, twirly little slugs had gorged themselves on my broth! There they were, the guilty bastards, curled and tangled in the pot like satiated snakes, fat and lazy on their kill.
Where is the justice? How is someone supposed to plan meals ahead of time when the meals are literally working against us? Do we need to start planning an offensive? Do we need to keep certain foods away from one another lest we walk into a kitchen full of carnage and cookie crumbs?
What is this world coming to?
Outsmarted by noodles. This is a low point for me.
Saturday, October 22, 2011
Tuesday, October 18, 2011
mud masks, fried chicken and few facts about fairies
So, right now I am sitting at my kitchen table in pjs and a mud mask reflecting on the past week. Two things spring to mind.
The first is an adventure into fried chicken. You see my man and I saw The Help a little while ago - amazing film, I highly recommend it - and there was one dish that kept rearing it's head again and again. Fried Chicken. Would you believe me if I said that I have no memory of eating fried chicken in my life? Oh and I McNuggets when I was a kid... but let's be honest here. That's not chicken. That was probably squirrel and possum or something. But don't remember having fried chicken, not even KFC.
According to my paramour, everyone must try fried chicken at least once in their lives. So we went to work.
Typically for Fried Chicken you need:
chicken
egg and milk
bread crumbs/spices/flour
oil
However we barely have bread as it is and we were not about to use up said bread in crumb form. Trust my man to come up with a solution through.
Cornflakes.
That's right, Cornflakes.
So you have two bowls. One has the mix of egg and milk, the other has the mix of dry ingredients... whatever they may be. You dunk the chicken in the wet bowl the dry bowl then the plop it an oily pan to sizzle and crack. Mmmmm, best sound ever!
They actually turned out wonderfully... although a little crunchier than I think they're supposed to be. I blame the cereal. However, easy to do. Give it a try.
But just make sure that you don't piss off the fairies while you're at it.
Fairies?
I'm sure you're thinking it.
Yes, Fairies. My latest paper is all about the sub genre of Fairylore, looking at samples from the UK and Newfoundland (you know, that place that assaults you with its weather) and I have learned some valuable information.
1. Fairies (aka the good folk, aka the fair ones, aka the fée, aka the little people etc.) will try to steal your baby and leave you with one of their own in its place. If this happens you have a few options. a)You can place the changeling on an a shovel you've heated up in the fire and leave them both outside, or b)you can hand the baby a set of wood pipes and wait for it to cave to its desperate love of music and leave your home.
2. If you don't want your baby stolen then leave some fresh baked bead in your baby's crib.
3. If you are passing a fairy tree (the great big tree all alone in the middle of a field) leave a shiny and the fairies will leave you (unharmed).
4. If you break a mirror, bring the broken pieces to the fairy tree and you won't get bad luck.
5. On the 11th of May one should seek our sprig of mountain ash with red berries and make a cross to hang over the door. This will keep the fairies from entering you house and keep away a bad luck.
Since October and May are the fairy months (the fairies are transitioning from one home to another) it's wise to have some fairylore in your back pocket. :)
The first is an adventure into fried chicken. You see my man and I saw The Help a little while ago - amazing film, I highly recommend it - and there was one dish that kept rearing it's head again and again. Fried Chicken. Would you believe me if I said that I have no memory of eating fried chicken in my life? Oh and I McNuggets when I was a kid... but let's be honest here. That's not chicken. That was probably squirrel and possum or something. But don't remember having fried chicken, not even KFC.
According to my paramour, everyone must try fried chicken at least once in their lives. So we went to work.
Typically for Fried Chicken you need:
chicken
egg and milk
bread crumbs/spices/flour
oil
However we barely have bread as it is and we were not about to use up said bread in crumb form. Trust my man to come up with a solution through.
Cornflakes.
That's right, Cornflakes.
So you have two bowls. One has the mix of egg and milk, the other has the mix of dry ingredients... whatever they may be. You dunk the chicken in the wet bowl the dry bowl then the plop it an oily pan to sizzle and crack. Mmmmm, best sound ever!
They actually turned out wonderfully... although a little crunchier than I think they're supposed to be. I blame the cereal. However, easy to do. Give it a try.
But just make sure that you don't piss off the fairies while you're at it.
Fairies?
I'm sure you're thinking it.
Yes, Fairies. My latest paper is all about the sub genre of Fairylore, looking at samples from the UK and Newfoundland (you know, that place that assaults you with its weather) and I have learned some valuable information.
1. Fairies (aka the good folk, aka the fair ones, aka the fée, aka the little people etc.) will try to steal your baby and leave you with one of their own in its place. If this happens you have a few options. a)You can place the changeling on an a shovel you've heated up in the fire and leave them both outside, or b)you can hand the baby a set of wood pipes and wait for it to cave to its desperate love of music and leave your home.
2. If you don't want your baby stolen then leave some fresh baked bead in your baby's crib.
3. If you are passing a fairy tree (the great big tree all alone in the middle of a field) leave a shiny and the fairies will leave you (unharmed).
4. If you break a mirror, bring the broken pieces to the fairy tree and you won't get bad luck.
5. On the 11th of May one should seek our sprig of mountain ash with red berries and make a cross to hang over the door. This will keep the fairies from entering you house and keep away a bad luck.
Since October and May are the fairy months (the fairies are transitioning from one home to another) it's wise to have some fairylore in your back pocket. :)
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
Mass Culture Hysteria
Oh October, you are my happy month of the fall harvest, full of reds and oranges, pumpkins and the crisp crunch of apples. How did you get here so quickly?
No, really? Last I checked it was September. You're early. October is the time that I turn to my recipes of pumpkin/squash soup and I try to add parsnips to just about everything. Sadly, that cannot be at the moment. I'm so tangled up in papers and readings that I don't have time to cook just yet. I've been relying on mushroom soup and omlettes for the most part these days. That and oatmeal. Pumpkin soup/pumpkin pie will just have to wait.
I have been thinking, though. Much as I want to post about my baking/cooking exploits I have nothing to say so far, so I will instead wax philosophically about my studies and my opinions (isn't that what the great void of the blog-o-sphere is for?). On my mind at the moment is a swirl of thoughts about mass/commercial/popular culture. That which is made up of rom-coms, top 40s charts and marketing.
I have been doing many readings about mass culture, if only to be able to understand how folklore is different from mas culture - and what I have learned is this: academics can be dicks. Don't believe me? Look up the various essays on popular/mass culture from the past hundred years. They mostly seem to have this one thing in common, which is that the writer assumes that those who indulge in mass culture are slipping into hell fire. Perhaps not literally (although a few really do), but the sentiment is there. There's this notion that enjoying one blockbuster movie too many will lead to brain-numbing-escapist-societal-suicide!
And I'm sorry, but after reading pages and pages of all this moaning I have ask: wtf?
I genuinely cannot see the link between mass-societal-passivity and 'the romance novel'. Is that we're allegedly so wrapped up in enjoying the creations of others (specifically designed to suit the majority of pallets) that we'll somehow cease any personal efforts of creativity? Are 'bad pop songs' going to brainwash us into following a totalitarian regime? There seems to be this never-ending association between mass/commercial culture and stupidity.
Well thank you wise armchair academics for you lofty opinions, but I highly doubt that my indulgence in the occasional Britney Spears song will transform me into some sort.... I'm sorry but WHAT is that you theorist think is coming? You've all speculated that an un-named evil will arise from this passivity and these indulgences, but you don't go beyond that basic fear.
In my humble opinion, you theorist, you scoffers at mass culture are passing the same judgment as the xenophobic. "Oh no, it is new and different. I don't immediately connect or relate to it, therefore it must be EVIL."
Congratulations. You'll forgive me if I don't applaud.
No, really? Last I checked it was September. You're early. October is the time that I turn to my recipes of pumpkin/squash soup and I try to add parsnips to just about everything. Sadly, that cannot be at the moment. I'm so tangled up in papers and readings that I don't have time to cook just yet. I've been relying on mushroom soup and omlettes for the most part these days. That and oatmeal. Pumpkin soup/pumpkin pie will just have to wait.
I have been thinking, though. Much as I want to post about my baking/cooking exploits I have nothing to say so far, so I will instead wax philosophically about my studies and my opinions (isn't that what the great void of the blog-o-sphere is for?). On my mind at the moment is a swirl of thoughts about mass/commercial/popular culture. That which is made up of rom-coms, top 40s charts and marketing.
I have been doing many readings about mass culture, if only to be able to understand how folklore is different from mas culture - and what I have learned is this: academics can be dicks. Don't believe me? Look up the various essays on popular/mass culture from the past hundred years. They mostly seem to have this one thing in common, which is that the writer assumes that those who indulge in mass culture are slipping into hell fire. Perhaps not literally (although a few really do), but the sentiment is there. There's this notion that enjoying one blockbuster movie too many will lead to brain-numbing-escapist-societal-suicide!
And I'm sorry, but after reading pages and pages of all this moaning I have ask: wtf?
I genuinely cannot see the link between mass-societal-passivity and 'the romance novel'. Is that we're allegedly so wrapped up in enjoying the creations of others (specifically designed to suit the majority of pallets) that we'll somehow cease any personal efforts of creativity? Are 'bad pop songs' going to brainwash us into following a totalitarian regime? There seems to be this never-ending association between mass/commercial culture and stupidity.
Well thank you wise armchair academics for you lofty opinions, but I highly doubt that my indulgence in the occasional Britney Spears song will transform me into some sort.... I'm sorry but WHAT is that you theorist think is coming? You've all speculated that an un-named evil will arise from this passivity and these indulgences, but you don't go beyond that basic fear.
In my humble opinion, you theorist, you scoffers at mass culture are passing the same judgment as the xenophobic. "Oh no, it is new and different. I don't immediately connect or relate to it, therefore it must be EVIL."
Congratulations. You'll forgive me if I don't applaud.
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