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I'm sure this post will go over like a stale fart in packed movie theater, but there's no way around it: I find soccer boring.
I'm trying to enjoy the World Cup. I really am. I even convinced myself that I was excited about it. What I've found, though, is that while I'm excited about the event, I really don't need to watch any of the actual games. In that way, it's kind of like the Olympics. Outside of a few events, I'm perfectly satisfied just watching highlights and reading the results.
I KNOW this boredom with watching soccer primarily stems from the fact that I don't understand the intricate details of the sport. But, the more I watch it, the less I actually like it. I'd much rather watch two hours and 20 minutes of a random women's marathon than 90 minutes of soccer.
Here's what I like about the game: the players are great athletes. You don't see a Carlos Silva rolling around out there. Those guys play as hard as they can for as long as they can. I love that. The sport is competitive as Hell. It seems that even the most mediocre of teams can stay close to the superpowers (I just tweaked this post a bit after Germany's thrashing of Australia).
My final knock on soccer though, is this... play the damn game until someone wins. People are celebrating a TIE vs. England. It was a TIE. Why even play the game? What's the difference between 1-1 and 0-0? Though, that said, I'd rather have dual champions than have the World Cup champion to be decided by a shoot out. Can you imagine if the NBA Finals were decided by a free throw shooting contest or the World Series decided by home run derby?
I'm sure I'll end up watching the Championship match. I'll probably even enjoy it. But, that's sort of the point of this post. As great as the sport is purported to be, I still only want to watch a match once every four years.
Ah, ice cream. Who knew the stuff was so easy to make? I mean, about three minutes prep time, stick stuff in the ice cream maker, transfer to a container, put in freezer, and two hours later, fresh, all natural ice cream.
Memorial Day weekend, Sur La Table (the greatest store known to man) had $89 Cuisinart Ice Cream makers on sale for $49, plus you got a $15 gift card for a later purchase. I had been looking at a higher end ice cream maker, but questioned whether I would ever actually use it. So, when I saw the Cuisinart on sale, I snatched it up, figuring, if I never used it, it would only be $35 down the drain, rather than $200.
As for the ice cream, it was a simple concoction of 2 cups heavy cream, 2 cups whole milk, one cup sugar, some vanilla extract, some peppermint extract and mini-semi-sweet chocolate chips. That's it. So, it's not fatty at all! I found the recipe here.
The taste? Excellent! Creamy and not overly sweet. Should summer ever come to Seattle, I can see making lots of ice cream. In fact, when my niece is here next week, I think it will be a fun project for her.
No, this has nothing to do with Colt McCoy. This recipe comes from Dave McCoy, a buddy of mine who lives down in LA.
After work on Friday, I stopped by Safeway to get the ingredients for the chili. $70 later, I walked out of there with two pounds ground beef, two pounds of London Broil, two pounds of pork chorizo, eight jalapenos, five red bell peppers, two heads of garlic, two onions, bay leaves, cilantro, basil and assorted spices.
Yes, this is enough chili to feed the Seahawks offensive line... with leftovers for the kickers.
The only difficulties I had were purely mechanical. I don't eat canned food, well, ever. So opening the can of whole tomatoes took about 10 minutes due to the crappiness of my can opener. I wasn't sure the damn thing was ever going to open. The other issue is that my disposal got stuck and I had sink full water that I needed to drain. It's always perilous sticking your hand down a machine that wants to eat it, but I eventually got it to work.
From a cooking standpoint, the hardest part for me was roasting the peppers, something I had never done. I took the five bell peppers, coated them with olive oil, then stuck them under the broiler. I flipped them three times until they were nearly completed blackened. I let them sit for a bit, then I was supposed to put them in a plastic bad. Unfortunately, I didn't let them cool long enough, and they ended up melting the bag.
Once cooled, I peeled off the blackened skin, leaving pure, juicy roasted peppers. You know how after you suck off the burned part of your roasted marshmallow and you have that hot, soft marshmallow goodness? These peppers are like that.
Eventually, everything ended up in a pot. A giant pot. I simmered it for four hours before going to bed. Then, following direction, I turned off the heat and let the pot sit overnight. This was to develop "the funk." The next morning, I simmered it for another two hours, then stuck it in the fridge. An hour before eating it, I poured in a beer, and let simmer for another hour.
The end result is the best chili I've ever eaten. In fact, nothing else even close. It's spicy and meaty, but the bell peppers and cinnamon give it a bit of sweetness. The cilantro and basil also help off-set the fire. I would invite to eat some, but I'm doing miraculously well at eating it all myself!
Today, the greatest player in Mariners history retired. Ken Griffey, Jr., just Junior to most of us raised here in Seattle, stepped away from the game of baseball.
He and his mates in the mid-90's made baseball relevant in Seattle. I will never forget crying, bawling really, for 15 minutes after we dispatched the Yankees in game 5 of the 1995 playoffs. It was truly one of the happiest days of my life.
When he demanded out of Seattle, he broke my heart. I hated him for it. His first few seasons in Cincinnati I rooted against him and wished him bad luck. As fate would have it, I didn't need to root for bad luck, because it zeroed in on him. In Japan, they call that Bachi.
In the end, though, when he came back to Seattle, I welcomed him with open arms and open heart. I'm glad he retired a Seattle Mariner.
Thank you Junior for bringing joy to Seattle's baseball fans. We're going to miss you!
Yow. I nailed this one. Making risotto isn't really hard. It's just time consuming because you have you have actively cook for about an hour, if you include prep and reduction time.
A couple of weeks ago, I was in New York for my friend's 40th birthday party. The dinner, at Spina, was wonderful. It was three courses, and each course was excellent. My favorite dish, though, was Beet Risotto. It was then that I realized that I just loved Risotto and hadn't made it in about five years.
So, fast forward to the past weekend. I went to Pike Place Market on Saturday and picked up the shrimp, scallops, and truffle oil. The rest of the ingredients, I grabbed from the supermarket.
Making risotto is quite simple, but again, it's just very time consuming. Basically, you have two pans going... one with the rice/veggie/meat mixture, the other with the liquid base. In this case, the rice was simmering with onions and garlic. The shrimp is added at the very end. The liquid base consisted of three 8-oz bottles of clam juice and chicken stock. As the rice is cooking, you add one cup of the liquid until it's totally absorbed by the rice, then you add another cup, and so on until the rice is cooked.
It took about 35 minutes to reduce the risotto mixture. Then I just topped the risotto with the seared scallop, the yummy (and stupidly expensive) truffle oil and chopped chives.
All in all, I felt like a rock star when I tasted it. It was so good! If I can ever get another woman into my apartment, I'm going to make some form of risotto. It would actually be fun to make with someone else because it's very hands on.
On Saturday, I met a couple of friends visiting from New York for brunch at Etta's, located down near Pike Place Market. Etta's is a Tom Douglas joint, so of course, it's really good. I'm not much of a breakfast guy, but having just come off of a run, I was actually hungry.
I started with a wonderful, spicy Bloody Mary. It was one of the better Bloody Mary's I've had in quite some time. For my breakfast, I had a really good corned beef hash. It was more corned beed than "hash," but it was delicious. It was topped with two poached eggs and served with home fries. I was pleased with my meal.
Sunday, I met a friend at noon at Mike's Noodle House for some Chinese noodles. Now, let me say this, I'm a big fan of Japanese noodles... I visit Samurai Noodle for ramen at least once every two weeks. And I'm a big fan of Vietnamese noodles... I eat Pho at least once a week (for some reason it seems healthier, I have no idea if it is). But, Chinese noodles, I wasn't so sure of.
Guess what? I can add more noodles to my mix. At Mike's I had the noodles served with Won Tons and Beef Brisket. Excellent. I would rank it below ramen and pho, but the soup was quite satisfying.
After lunch, we went to the Panama Hotel for coffee. Or, rather, Tim had coffee, I had water. But, it was great catching up, talking running, baseball and food. Pretty much my three favorite topics. Tim said he'd do a post about his dinner at Alinea... it was a five hour dinner! Crazy stuff. Can't wait to read about it. I'll share the post once it's up.
As some of you know, I've been working on making really good peanut butter cookies. It took three tries, but I'm pretty comfortable with that, using this recipe from David Lebovitz. So, today I tried something new: Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookies.
These are my favorite kind of cookies to purchase, but they're not always that easy to find. So, I decided I should just make them myself. Using a recipe found on Food Network's site, I was able to whip out two batches pretty quickly this morning between a run and meeting a friend for lunch in the ID.
The cookies turned out quite good, though, because I couldn't find unsweetened cocoa, they're a little sweet, They should definitely be eaten with milk. Besides the sweetened cocoa, the only other modification I made to the recipe was to use both semi-sweet and milk chocolate chips.
I like the crisp edges and and the soft middle. Actually, I like everything about the cookies. I couldn't be happier. Unlike the peanut butter cookies, I don't need to practice this one. I have a feeling I'll be returning this recipe quite often.
I've been working in Bellevue for about a year. Mediterranean Kitchen is a restaurant near a bus stop I use if I wander after work.
While waiting for the bus, I'd often read the reviews they have posted on their window. All of them, including a bit from the New York Times, rave about their "Farmer's Plate," barbecued chicken wings with garlic sauce. The wings are marinated overnight, then charbroiled and covered in a thick garlic sauce. The wings are served over a huge portion of saffron rice. Honestly, there's too much food. I left most of the rice and should've left a wing... but of course, I ate all of them.
My friend Adam, who runs the Blue State Barbecue blog, needs to give these wings a shot. He's the real authority on barbecue. But in my opinion, they're the best barbecued wings I've ever eaten. The caveat being, I haven't eaten many barbecued wings. So, a better recommendation would be: I loved Mediterranean Kitchen, and I will definitely return.
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