Onions: The Daredevil Game

There is a comic book.

A comic book called Daredevil.

A comic book about a sweetass blind attorney who does cool shit by day, is like, a ninja or whatever by night. This is a worthwhile comic book.

Unfortunately, it was adapted into a movie that I fall asleep when I try to watch it. Do not watch the Ben Affleck movie. Watch a different Ben Affleck  movie instead. My phone's spell check knows how "Affleck" is spelled. Weird.

Better yet, instead of watching Daredevil, OR ANY OTHER BEN AFFLECK MOVIE, if you want to see a death-defying attorney walk around with sunglasses and a cane, watch the end of the third season of Battlestar Galactica. There's an attorney character who wears sunglasses and carries a cane, and while he's not blind, or a ninja, or any such Daredevil-themed things, he brings a cat to a job interview, and then says at the interview "If it's any consolation, I hate this cat as much as you hate having to hire me" BEFORE ANYBODY HAD HIRED HIM. 

Pretty sure that's the quote. I might be paraphrasing. I don't care. It was badass, is what I'm saying, and my favorite moment in television history. If I was even 15% as cool as that scene, this blog would...um...well...okay, so I'm not cool enough to know what this blog would be like if I was cooler, because I lack the perspective. But it would be pretty freakin' cool. 

But this was a digression. I'm here to talk about some goddamned onions.

Anyway!!!

I mention Daredevil because when I leave my nest of cat hair, weird jackets, shameless curiosity about human behavior, sketchy-looking found objects, and psychology textbooks (STOP TALKING ABOUT BATTLESTAR GALACTICA, WE'VE ALREADY CHANGED SUBJECTS) to chop onions...well?

As a ginger, I "have" to wear mascara. I really do. It ties my face together, dude.

As someone sensitive to onions, oh no I don't have to wear mascara. 

EVERY TIME, my eyes sting, then they melt and start to run down my face, then the paint on my eyelashes melts into my eyes, and then my eyes sting even more (holy fuck, it's awful), and then next thing you know, I have to find my way from the kitchen to the bathroom with my eyes squeezed shut to rinse my eyes and scrub them with a clean, wet washcloth. 

I made two meat pies yesterday, using only one onion (ONLY ONE GIGANTIC ONION!!!!!), and I walked to my bathroom sink three times (THREE TIMES!!!!!) with my eyes shut. I've gotten really pretty quite fairly good at this, I should say.

The first time, I tracked my location using the bottoms of my feet, because there are a series of rugs between the kitchen and the bathroom. I call it cheating to use my hands for data when I'm crossing the house sightlessly, like I call it cheating to use notes when doing sudoku. Shut up. That's not pretentious. I scrambled to the sink, I washed my hands, and then I washed my face furiously. Oh God, my eyes. My eyes!!!!!

I returned to the onion, and got through another third of it. Two thirds down!!!!! But again, holy fuck my eyes sting when I'm around raw, chopped onions. This time I paid attention to what little light I could see through my clamped-shut, horrorshow eyelids. I know where my lamps are, and could guess my location that way. It's cheating--Daredevil is a thousand times better at this--but it did the job, and it was actually pretty interesting to experience my house that way.

Triumphant from a truly epic eye washing session, I resumed chopping the onion and was able to finish the job before my third eye-washing. 

The third eye-washing sightless walk to the bathroom sink was the best. Not only did I finally get closure on the whole onion problem--not a small gain!--but Greg The Cat (one of my two cats) was standing on the living room table. When I walked by, Greg smashed his face in my hand, and followed me back to the bathroom sink/makeshift eyewash station. Thanks to this Greg intervention, I was able to avoid bonking my leg into the table.

And the onions...were completed!

(Fuck you onions, you tasty monsters.)

And the pies...were completed! This photo is only of one pie. There were two. I did not photograph one of the pies.

And now this story...is completed! Thank you and goodnight! Tip your waiter if you have one.

The Waffle Ratio--When toppings outlive their host

The waffles are almost gone. The raspberry jam (homemade by somebody else, thankyouverymuch) is still plentiful on the plate, and the whipped cream is, as always, nearly bottomless. (I like the sound that the whipped cream can makes. Shut up. No, you shut up!)

I am faced with a decision.

An old decision.

An ancient decision.

I am alone at the moment. By myself. In isolation. My husband is at work, we have no guests over, and my cats are sitting two feet away, feigning disinterest in my food. Nobody can witness my actions firsthand.

I must ask myself this:

Decorum or practicality?

Reality or illusion? 

Is it a better thing to make another waffle, so that these toppings will appear "dressed" when I eat them? Or should I throw propriety to the wind and make a scientific decision about the calories that a third waffle would, quite literally, bring to  the table? I certainly don't mind eating whipped cream and jam by themselves. Scraping my plate into the garbage is completely out of the question. As I said before, this jam is homemade.

High heels or comfortable flats?!?

Sports car or low-mileage, slow-acceleration...uh...car?!? (I totally forgot the slang for that.)

Space helmet or tiara...in space?!?

Update:

I ate the whipped cream and jam while typing this blog entry on my phone, before I even could have taken the time to get up and walk to the kitchen. Science wins!!!

Double Update:

Either waffles gave me a sore throat, which is impossible(?), or I've caught something and need to get extra sleep tonight. Or extra sleep right now, while I'm avoiding my graduate school homework. Or extra sleep tonight. Or right now. Or tonight. Aaargh, you see what I mean?!? Decision-making is such a grueling and punishing process sometimes.

D&D Delicacies, 2/1/2014

Today is the day before my hometown's Super Bowl face-off with the Denver Broncos. Snack foods are ON SALE, and while we plan to spend tomorrow in a sports pub, tonight we entertain guests in our home for Dungeons and Dragons.

If you are not familiar with D&D, well, go and fix that. You're already using the internet. You have to go online to read this, because these words are on a website.

In our house, D&D night has the intensity and snack-seriousness of a poker night, but with "fight the dragon!" heavy metal undertones. 

And so tonight, I am keeping things legit. I mean, you know who cares about food and dragons? How about Tyrion Lannister. That dude's culinary palate is, like, 1/8th of George R R Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire books. How about EVERY HOBBIT EVER?!?!?! Caring about food and caring about dragons are, like, two sides of the same gp. (Google "gp" too.)

What kind of food? OLD-TIMEY FOOD!!! What kind of food? LIKE BREADS AND CHEESE, I THINK!!!

Tonight, I did my best to keep this scenario both proper and legit:

Not Cheese:

We have small red grapes. They are sweet and amazing, except for the grapes on the one inexplicably wrinkly, old branch. Why does that always happen?!? I bought the grapes minutes before serving them. Huuuunhhhh graaaaaAAAAAAPESSSSSS!!!!!!!

We have Columbus dry Italian salame. (That is how they spell it on the packaging.) I added this to the spread after the cheeses, and after the grapes, but before the bread. It's greasy (good greasy), satisfying, barely spiced, and hearty. I served it at room temperature.

We have red pepper and cheddar cheese foicica, heated in the toaster oven until passable as oven-fresh. I was skeptical, but oh man, I cannot argue with the results I got. That bread is goooood.

Is Cheese:

We have goat Gouda, which has been complimented by a guest on being very mild, and "not goaty." It's the mildest cheese of the three, by far, and is wonderfully creamy and round-tasting. I do not know which creamery is responsible for the cheese, because I purchased it from the "discount, posh cheeses bin" in a QFC, and the only label I found was the sale price.

We have a rosemary and olive oil asiago. It's smooth, sweet, and surprisingly easy to slice. It's not any more crumbly than medium yellow cheddar, so, my guess is that it must be young. This cheese also tastes milder than other asiago cheeses I've had, which tend to be older, crumblier, saltier, and similar in flavor to typically-served Parmesan. In this cheese, the rosemary is subtle, but detectable. While its flavor is strongest on the rosemary-leaf-encrusted crust, the less-herbed areas are no less delicious. Thank you again, sale-priced cheese bin!

Lastly but not leastly, we have whatever this label says:

It has fuzzy grey-green caves in it that you're not supposed to let your eyes focus on, because cheese mold is as horrifying as it is nutritious. I assume. Depending on who you are. This cheese is creamy, pungent, salty, and a liiiiittle bit spicy. Spicy, of all things! It is the strongest-tasting of the three cheeses I've served for this D&D group. It is very good. Still gentler on the tongue than most veined cheeses I've had, without losing its meaning of purpose. I took off my glasses to improve the blurriness of my eyesight, and then I ate a lot of this cheese.

D&D NIIIIGHT RULES!!!!!!!!!!

Also, please click on this link. It is for a YouTube:

http://youtu.be/VufilzHKTqk

I didn't make it, and am in no way affiliated with it, beyond being a music fan. However, Red Fang's video for their song "Prehistoric Dog," while technically not being about D&D, fits the D&D "for not kids, or teenagers, guys" mood.

Guest Writer Decker Fantastic: I HAVE A MOUTH: AND I DRINK COCONUT WATER WITH IT

An argument for the sake of coconut water

by Decker Fantastic

First of all, let it be known that I am not a smart man, I am not trained in the culinary arts, nor am I a paid food critic. [Editor's Note: Nobody here is.] I do however own a mouth. And occasionally I enjoy placing things into said mouth. This includes, but is not limited to, tasty foods and pleasing beverages. Now, coconut water can be one of those pleasing beverages. BUT! BUT! It can be awful. 

For a delicious coconut beverage, I have a few recommendations. Harmless Harvest is by far the most coconut-ish coconut water i have tried. It is very, very flavorful, and could almost be considered syrupy. It has some kind of natural processing, or some shit, that means that it doesn't ever get frozen or reconstituted or whatever, but the end result is like when you bust open a coconut and drink from the source itself. Or maybe not. I honestly don't do that very often. Either way, it's hella good, but maybe too much flavor for some people. PLUUSSS it's crazy expensive. Like fuckin 4 bucks for 8 oz, which is absolutely mind blowing. But like I said, they do a thing that doesn't hurt the coconuts, and the coconuts are picked by the supple, well lotioned hands of devout and celebate priests. So I guess it makes sense. OOOH yeah! Added bonus, sometimes the water itself is pink. At first I was like, "WHAT," but then I tasted it, and I was like "Yeaaaah." I think it's probably like that, because they scored a super coconut or something.

The one I drink the most is Taste Nirvana. It's just the green can that says coconut water. Some have pulp and some don't. My mouth doesn't like the pulp ones, but maybe it's your favorite. This one isn't as intense as the first one, but it's definitely better than most. Idon't  believe that it goes through the same enchantments and blessings as the previously mentioned one. But it doesn't taste like its been stuck in a large metal vat for a few months, either. It comes in a 16 oz can, and that's good because you can wrap a paper bag around the outside of it and still maintain some street cred.  Plus 16 oz for like $2.50 is way more cost effective than the previous applicant. 

I dunno man, if you really don't like coconut water, I doubt these two samples are going to change your mind. BUT it's worth a shot because, like, what if it turns out that you reeeeaally like it? I mean, like when I first discovered the hot sauce at the gyro place, I was mad at myself not trying it sooner. All those poor (but still delicious) gyros I had consumed could have been soo much better with the addition of that wonderful sauce. I went into mourning over the lost experience.

So basically, just drink the green can stuff, unless it's like your daily present to yourself or something, in which case go for the other stuff. And if you don't like either of those, then, well don't drink them. Give em to hobos. Hobos love coconut water.

The least-gross coconut water that I've found so far!

I've held a reputation for having a questionable culinary palate for a very long time, in my family.

One of my first real decisions in life was to start saving my broccoli from dinner, to go with vanilla ice cream, which my parents--especially my chef father--will never stop periodically bringing up in conversation. I'm pretty proud of it, really, because it shows a willingness to take risks and openly embrace unpopular aesthetic likes from a very early age. When the 11th Doctor (look it up) discovered that he wanted "fish fingers and custard" as his first meal, everybody said, "Hey Lindsay! He's you!" and I felt pretty proud of myself.

The second family anecdote about my having a questionable palate is less-flattering.

I was approximately eight years old at the time, and I REALLY, REALLY wanted to do that thing with a coconut that you sometimes see on television, in which a straw is stuck directly into a whole, otherwise unopened coconut, and the straw is then sipped from. Cartoons did it. People on Gilligan's Island did it. It seemed like the way to go, really.

Eventually, despite repeatedly declaring the whole exercise an unnecessary waste of time and money for a good long while, my eventually father relented, and picked up a whole coconut from the grocery store. Fidalgo Island, where we lived, is nearly the most northwestern point in all of the continental United States. The weather there is virtually identical to the weather in Vancouver, BC, the place in Canada where most of my favorite American television is/was filmed. So, in our shadowless, silvery-gray lit corner of the looks-like-The-X-Files world, coconuts were pretty far from local, and were neither fresh nor cheap. So I can almost empathize with my father's protests about cost and quality, except ARE YOU KIDDING?!? WHO DOESN'T REALLY NEED TO KNOW WHAT THE THINGS ON TELEVISION ACTUALLY TASTE LIKE?!?!?! Pfft.

Anyway.

In our tiny kitchen, my father took out a hammer and a nail. He took the intact coconut, drove a single nail into it, pulled the nail back out, stuck a straw into the hole where the nail had been, and handed it to me.

I took a sip, made a face, and reported that I didn't particularly like coconut water. My father told me that this was because I was a child with an unrefined palate, and that I hadn't developed a taste for coconut water yet. Moreover, he'd spent the money to buy it, so I had an obligation to keep trying.

I kept sipping from the coconut, and I kept trying my very best to force-mature my taste buds into liking the flavor. But I didn't. I couldn't. The effort just wasn't working!

After some significant begging, I was able to fiiiiiiinally convince my younger, but more credible, sister to try it. She made a sour expression similar to mine, and verbally confirmed to our dad and me that there was indeed something singularly unpleasant about the coconut. While my father could dismiss my flavor reports easily (I liked broccoli ice cream as a little kid, after all), my sister's reaction was enough to make him finally take the straw, and try it himself.

My father's reaction was huge!!! 

He spit the coconut water into the sink the moment that he tasted it, shouted "It tastes like jet fuel!!!!!" and cracked the coconut open to figure out what was wrong. On the inside, the coconut was completely lined with black and green mold, where white coconut flesh should have been.

As his mind reeled in humor and disgust, my father (and following his lead, my sister) started to make fun of me for sipping from the coconut more than once. They have continued to make fun of me for this, whenever either one of them remembers to do so, even though over twenty years have passed since this incident took place.

Luckily, this unpleasant, formative, childhood experience has given me an intensified understanding of the contemporary hipster take on coconut water:

Coconut water is gross, but it's not as gross as it could be. 

I KNOW THIS TO BE TRUE, FOR I HAVE TASTED AND SURVIVED ACOCONUT WATER HELL, AND ITS SPECTRE HAUNTS ME TO THIS DAAAAAYYYYYYYYY

And that brings us to today's food blog challenge!

On the left, we have O.N.E. brand coconut water, and on the right we have Vita Coco brand coconut water.

I...I don't actually have an eloquent description of the flavors handy. Sorry about that.

I can report that I'll definitely drink the Vita Coco stuff, and it's not THAT gross. It's really not. It's pretty alright. In a pinch, I will straight-up chug several consecutive cups of it, and be grateful for the opportunity to do so. Just, take my advice, and don't buy it when it's been cut with something like pineapple juice. Just...just don't do that to yourself. (Unless your palate is different enough than mine that that's what you're into. In which case, just do your thing.)

However, the O.N.E. brand coconut water actually tastes pretty good. Like, "good" good. Like, the flavor is literally pleasing. Literally. Literally.

Instead of enduring it's ingestion, primarily for the health benefits (*cough* "hangover/puffiness cure" *cough*), I actually pay attention to the flavor, and drink it at a slow, mindful, even meditative pace. I don't use this particular brand of coconut water to wash foods down with, because the flavor is delicate, worth paying attention to, and it gets masked too easily.

I have absolutely NO IDEA AT ALL why these two brands of coconut water differ in any way. I can speculate, but speculation makes for very sloppy writing, by itself.

While I'm at it, why not ask why I typically like the flavor of standard, grocery store brand jugs of bottled distilled or drinking water, or Seattle's badass tap water, significantly more than I like the Arrowhead brand of bottled water, or (less-bafflingly) more than the nasty/gross tap water in Southern California? These questions would require at least a modicum of journalistic effort to execute, and journalistic effort is not what you're getting out of this blog post, at this time, Dear Reader.

It just is what it is.

It is what it is.

French Onion Soup...For BREAKFAST?!?!

That's right!

This meal incorporates my own two personal food groups: cheese, and things to put cheese on. 

Plus, the bonus food group: bread things.

I made a big pot of onion soup yesterday, and prepared a little reserve of thick-sliced Tilamook medium cheddar for easy soup assembly later on.

To make the soup, I minced 1.5 yellow onions and sautéed them in maybe 2-3tbs of canola oil on lowish heat for a very long time, stirring frequently, until mushy and a little browned. 

I then added a bottle of Session lager, half of a can of Rainer beer, and about four cups of the leftover cooking water from a pot roast. 

I then used a bunch of stuff to adjust the flavor of the soup. I threw in a tiny amount of curry, a little basalmic vinegar, a fair amount of Worcestershire sauce, some of this mystery seasoning stuff with a vague label that tastes like it's probably soy sauce and MSG, some salt, and a lot of dried thyme, because it's my favorite herb in this soup. I considered hot sauce but changed my mind. (The beef broth already had hot sauce and yellow mustard in it, among other things.)

I let the whole thing simmer, stirring pretty frequently, until the beers in it stopped fizzing and the soup really looked like a proper soup.

The soup spent the night covered, in the fridge, letting the flavors "marry." 

Then in the morning? Because I like dinner for breakfast just as much as I like breakfast for dinner? I heated up a mug of soup in the microwave while toasting 1/4 of two conjoined hot dog buns in the toaster oven, before melting the cheese onto the hot dog buns. 

I put the cheese bread on top of the soup, getting the cheese bread totally damp, while simultaneously infusing the soup with essential cheeses and breads, and presto! I have an economically constructed, greasy-yet-lowish-calorie meal to help me get my body back to normal after winter holiday eating, without having to compromise my need (need) to mostly eat melted cheese, nutritionists be disregarded.

Bla-dow.

Baked Potato in a Mug

BAKED POTATO IN A MUG! 

BAKED POTATO IN A MUG! 

BAKED POTATO IN A MUG! 

BAKED POTATO IN A MUG! 

BAKED POTATO IN A MUG! 

BAKED POTATO IN A MUG! 

Because I've been making food nonstop all day, and all of my potato-sized plastic storage thingies are already full of French Onion soup (beer + beef broth + onions + stuff), or wheat berries, or roasted sweet potato, or apple slices, or greasy (with "awesome") breaded firm tofu in Old Bay seasoning, or other baked potatoes, or pre-buttered blueberry streusel bread separated by sheets of parchment paper, or whatever!

Well...not literally "whatever." That's too open-ended. The list I just wrote pretty much covers everything.

I also pan-fried a pork chop for my husband to eat for lunch tomorrow, and whipped up a 9" x 13" pan full of pasta in (semi-)homemade tomato/sausage sauce for, like, whatever meals we don't want to cook new things for, for the next few days.

Because nothing says "thanks for cooking most of our dinners, and for being a good sport while I was away helping a family member with a dilemma" quite like presenting my honey with a fridge full of food and a sink overflowing with dirty dishes. Ahhh, love.

IT IS ALSO MY FIRST DAY BACK TO SCHOOL AFTER WINTER BREAK!!!!! 

FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL!!!!! FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL!!!!! FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL!!!!! Graduate school, 'natch. Kabam. 

UPDATE:

I did not bake the potato in this mug. The mug depicted is not oven safe. Do not bake a potato while it is in a mug. I followed <a href="http://whatscookingamerica.net/Q-A/PotatoBaking.htm">these</a> potato-baking instructions, instead.