Week Three: The Story

So it turns out...when I have a crazy week of work, coupled with the insane ticket price of crowns these days, my culinary concoctions tend to get pushed to the proverbial, though in no way ironic, back burner.

Cooking with some a new ingredient was, I'll admit, a bit of a wash this week. While I've never actually COOKED with radishes before (Suuuuure I'll have them in salad or as crudites but baking or cooking with them? Naaaah), I have eaten them at least a couple of handful of times in my life, making me feel as though I've only kinda sorta maybe a teeny tiny itty bitty cheated with the whole non-resolution deal.

It was a hell of a week last week -- which I'm so using as an excuse -- so sue me. Although don't really; you won't get much. Really, just hold me accountable enough to push me to make something really awesome with wicked strange and new ingredients this next month. Deal? Deal.

Eh, anyway. Where was I?

Right. Baked radishes. The first attempt turned out...candied, for sure, but not quite as baked as I would have liked. Sliced, cleaned and doused in a hearty coating of cinnamon-sugary goodness, the radish slices ended up caramelizing and hardening on the outside (Duh) but staying soft on the inside. While the flavor of the fresh root and sweet sugar created this heavenly aromatic earthy candy flavor, the texture of the hardened sugar didn't fly too well against the gooey inside. It's like one of those candies that has a great flavor but texture that kind of makes you wonder, by the time you swallowed it, why you let your tongue and mouth suffer that awkward texture metamorphosis.

Round two of radishes just happened (Pictures to be added soon). THIS time around I went without the sugary goodness (I had a weekend of baked good extravaganza-ness), instead baking the radishes THEN sifting them a shake of garlic salt, for a crunchy, tangy, earthy chip that's going to be hard pressed to see its way to Tuesday.

Culinary Concoctions Week Two: The Ingredient

Since I want to write more than just once or twice a week, I'm going to begin blogging three times a week during  this year-long cooking project of mine:

1. To introduce next week's ingredient (You know, for educational purposes)
2. To share the recipe (Also for educational and sharing purposes)
3. To lay out the play-by-play of cooking, with photos taken by Jason (For sharing and narrative purposes)

So next week's ingredient, as long as I'm able to find it at the farmer's market this weekend, is going to be black radishes.

Allow me to geek out:

Part of the brassicaceae or cruciferae family -- which takes its name from the New Latin word Cruciferae which, as my UP alumnus might have guessed, means cross-bearing for their criss-crossing leaves -- black radishes typically come in two varieties; the Black Spanish Long and the Noir Gros de Paris. Go figure I'm using a root plant native to Spain and France.  They grow best in winter, after sowing during June through September, because their white, firm and compact flesh will keep fresh most of the winter without entering a state of vegetation (Ha -- vegetables vegetating; seems like some kind of Buddhist practice, huh?) or becoming hollow.

I mean, who really likes a hollow radish, right?

Exactly.

The black radish is rich in vitamin c, which is why they're fantastic for winter time consumption, especially when you're living in the Pacific Northwest where the common head cold is just lurking around the corner of your favorite non-Starbucks coffee shop, waiting to latch onto you. They're also high in vitamin B and sulfur, which is the culprit for it's strong flavor. Furthermore, black radishes carry a serious punch of fiber and water which aids in digestion (Which, after three weeks of Vicodin and OTC cold head meds, could be of use).

To eat them,  you have to peel the skin because that's the most pungent part of it all; I'm assuming the strength of the sulfur would be akin to eating the skin of ginger root...not the same flavor profile but packing the same, "WOAH MAN!" reaction.

Not that I've eaten ginger root peel out of sheer curiosity or anything.

Okay fine. I'll give you a full Amie-palate review of black radish skin (By the way if that doesn't sound like a solid emo band name, I don't know what does.)

That said, let's hope Sunday's venture finds me buying black radish from the farmer's market.

Wish me luck in the Portland January rain! (Caveat: Even if my black radish pursuit IS a total wash, at least I get to A) Drag the boyfriend along with me after a two day hiatus and B) Savor my favorite treat at my favorite Portland bakery: The garden bread at Baker and Spice. As my mother would say, yum-a-dum-dum.)

PS -- On a side note, I never really thought I'd get to tag a blog with 'Vicodin' more than once. Shows how much I know.

Contributing to society one cupcake at a time

I'd like to point out that despite marking the near completion of week two on 24/7 pain meds that I haven't been totally worthless to society. Sure, I've loafed around, unable or unwilling to move more than three times within 10 hours, and have read, written and worked less since the start of the new year than I did in the past three months. Regardless of the fortnight's incredulously sedentary happenings, I'd like to take this blog post to highlight the one truely productive activity I completed: Baking cupcakes.

My friend Clara celebrated her 25th birthday on Thursday and I, despite loathing the celebration hooplah that accompanies some of society's most ridiculous "holidays" like Valentine's Day and disregarding anniversaries, love, love, LOVE birthdays. There are few things better in the world (free things, real mail and surprise flowers) than getting the one day to glow, shine and relish in glorious pomp and circumstance the fact that you came into this world, crying, slimy and naively ready to conquer anything. It's even better when others recognize that day, whether by today's standards of a simple text message or Facebook shout out or by good old fashioned baking.

In Clara's case, I chose all the above, inserting inside jokes about bad Van Morrison cover bands through Facebook and a quick "I'm happy you're my awesome friend who takes care of me when I'm in horrific amounts of pain and doesn't say anything when I get nervous because I'm about to show you my naked bum" Happy Birthday (About the naked bum: Clara took me to her home on Tuesday when I was in major pain crisis at work and helped me change into pajama pants. I was wearing a thong and my modesty, despite my Level 10 pain, came through. Clara didn't mind.). But neither digital message nears comparison to how much fun I had baking cupcakes for Clara and the rest of Friday's Pottery Barn gang.

I decided, while sitting in front of the computer at my new job  on Thursday afternoon thinking about how hungry I was, to make milk chocolate cupcakes with peanut butter frosting. After rushing home before my boyfriend met me, we headed to the store for supplies (A task not easily done after 10 hours of working on a continuous stream of vicodin) and set ourselves to baking. We painstakingly ripped open the Betty Crocker box of cake mix (Which we found out, thanks to Walker's iphone that you can buy it in bulk on Amazon for way, way cheaper) and transformed that mysterious brown powder into deliciously rich, yet light and airy, cupcakes by substituting buttermilk for the water (A trick I learned from the cupcake giftee herself).

The frosting really topped the cupcakes off (no pun intended). While I might cheat and use box mixes for the cake from time to time, I never go store-bought with my frosting. For my peanut butter frosting I trusted myself to my Joy of Cooking book that I got as a Christmas gift three years ago (When my knack for cooking and baking really began to flourish).  The recipe is as follows:

1/2 cup creamy peanut butter (Although I bet chunky peanut butter would be good too if you like a frosting with some texture)

3 oz. cream cheese at cold temperature

1 1/2 TBSP butter softened at room temperature

3 TBSP cream or milk

1 tspn vanilla

Mix above ingredients until smooth (I'm talking baby bottom smooth. If your butter is too cold you'll end up having little chunks of butter hiding in the frosting which is a bit rich unless you're Paula Deen).

Add in 2 2/3 cups powdered sugar, one-third at a time and beat just until smooth and desired consistency is reached.

Now, for all of the baking supplies I have (which pales in comparsion to Clara's. That girl puts me to shame, which is probaby why her blog is aptly named Bite Size Love), I learned -- with the peanut butter, cream cheese, butter and milk already in my yellow Kitchen Aid mixer I've appropriately named, "Happy," -- that I was missing vanilla.

"Just put in peppermint. Nobody will notice," Walker suggested after peering into my pitiful baking drawer that I was crazily rifling through, wishing that vanilla would secretly appear.

I stared deftly at my grinning boyfriend whose sarcastic suggestion reminds me that there's always room for improvising. I thought of my Royal Icing which I use for sugar cookies, recalling that I substitute lemon zest for vanilla, simply because I like a less-sweet frosting and that the three cups of powdered sugar that recipe calls for is sweet enough for Willy Wonka.

"Uhm, I'll just use lemon zest," I said with wavering confidence.

It turns out, zesting about 1/2 of a large-sized lemon and adding that into my frosting was an awesome idea. And of course, I should have known the tart and nutty combination of lemon and peanut butter was going to be a winner from the get go: Three summers ago while on a rainy July day-trip to the coast, my now-ex and I traveled through Seaside, picking up salt water taffy at a Tazmanian Devil rate (I love the stuff, what can I say?) before locking ourselves in his Subaru to read Harry Potter for the day (It was raining and there was nothing else to do and the 7th book had just come out that day).

One of the salt water taffy stores sold peanut butter-lemon salt water taffy, a combination that made us both simultaneously skeptical and interested (It happens when you're both foodies). The taffy was phenomenal; the richness of the peanut butter is warm to the palate, a definite comfort food treat that makes you close your eyes and think of curling up with your sweety under a blanket next to a fire while its snowing outside (hey, I can do cliche fantasies, too). But the tangy pop of lemon adds a kick of tango fun, morphing that romantic fireside snugglefest into something a bit -- Yes, I'm going to go there -- sexier.

The sexy snugglefest session was indeed the perfect topping for the richly light buttermilk milk chocolate cupcakes. The milk chocolate added the third cornerstone of taste perfection, the sweetness, to the unexpected harmonious duo of salty and sour.

But the best part of the cupcakes? The sprinkles of course. As Clara and I firmly believe, you can't have a cupcake without sprinkles. Okay, okay, you can; but why would you want to?

And so, while I might not have been the friendliest of neighbors (I've been rude to the nympho above who recently got a TV and in her typical loud fashion, has to have it on at an ungodly high level), the best family member (I've barked at my mom and ignored calls from my sister because I've been in so much pain and pathetic agony) and especially the best employee (I haven't helped a guest decorate with Pottery Barn accessories or furniture in weeks!), I was at least able to make my friends and coworkers a little happier, one delicious cupcake at a time.

Hello? Are there any aminals in here?

Well, I'm not entirely sure why I titled my post after a line from Lilo and Stitch -- perhaps I felt so inclined to because I watched the movie less than a week ago, loopy on Vicodin and Benadryl, on the denouement of one of my Shingles nerve pain attacks -- but I did, so just accept the quoted title.

More likely than not, we can assume that my quoted question (In case you don't know the movie or can't recall the scene, the quotation is Lilo's, when she goes into the humane society looking to adopt a dog; however, they're all hiding on the ceiling -- you have to love the lack of gravity and logic in Disney cartoon movies -- because they're afraid of the freak blue creature that we come to love as Stitch) is an out-reach to anyone who usually reads my blog since, let's face it, I've been totally MIA (Not to be confused with MIA) for the entirety of the new year and I'm sure you've all been terribly worried about me (Or at least my imaginative thoughts assume you've been).

Rest easy; I've been doing well. The Shingles (If that's not the name of a solid, one-hit-wonder emo band, I don't know what is)pain is nearly gone, thank goodness. Although I had a major pain attack on Tuesday morning while at Pottery Barn (Yes, there's nothing less humiliating than crying...no, bawling...in complete agony in front of all of your coworkers and being so writhed in pain that you can't even undress yourself to put on comfortable pajamas), I've been able to manage the pain, through a combination of vicodin, tyenol, ibuprofen and a decent amount of sleep, and begin to join the ranks of everyday society, yet again.

In fact, I was even able to actually, finally start my new job full time on Thursday. The job -- I'm a receptionist at a small naturopathic and acupuncture clinic in Southwest Portland -- is wonderful. It's relaxing, sitting on a comfortable office chair, greeting patients while zenning out (yes, I added a gerund to zen; what now?) to the hums of the noise maker and soft music. After a half day of organizing stock rooms and unwrapping pre-wrapped gifts at Pottery Barn, it's nice to just chill (especially while getting paid for it). While I've only completed two 10 hour days (Many, many more to follow), I think that I'm going to be able to handle it just fine. Of course, last night I was so exhausted that I spent the night watching Friends while my friends whipped themselves into a baking frenzy, producing lemon bars (complete with a pinch of orange zest) and chocolate chip cookies, so we'll see how long it takes for my energy levels to plateau.

Just as long as I don't come down with the damn Shingles again, I think I'll be able to manage anything that's tossed my way.

Man, I hope I didn't just jinx myself.

Anyway...thanks for bearing with the "I'm Back" update. Expect more blogs to come more frequently.

Shingles

Disclaimer: This blog was written while under the influence of vicodin and benadryl. That is all.

It's been far too long since my last post and for that, I apologize (To who am I apologizing, I'm not entirely sure, perhaps the two followers I have). However, this little blog of mine, which I began less than two months ago as a way to rant and, perhaps reduce, stress in my life, had to take a back seat because I have been dealing with stuff much larger than online writing.

That stuff would be Shingles. Yes, on Christmas Eve I noticed, after taking my bra off and changing into pajama pants to watch Knowing (The latest Nicolas Cage movie that, big surprise, lacks acting talent and a plausible plot line), a few small red bumps on the right side of my back. I showed my mom who insisted, for the sake of my sanity, that I need not worry.

She also said she thought it was Shingles.

Like any good American who thinks he or she is a doctor, I looked up shingles on the Internet to confirm my mother's diagnosis. Shingles are (or should I use 'is?' After reading through pages upon pages of online Shingles literature, I have yet to come to a consensus on whether I should use 'is' or 'are' but, considering that Shingles ends with 's,' thus making it plural, my grammatical instincts tell me to use 'are.') caused by the same virus as the chicken pox. Little red blisters pop up in clusters on one side of the body, usually the back, trunk, chest and stomach, and last for weeks, morphing from red hot bands of hellatiously painful blisters to oozing pustuals of pain and disgustingness to flaking and scabbing sheets of grossness. Shingles are further accompanied by sharp lightning-bolt like nerve pain.

In my case, the actual shingles aren't that bad. Sure, I've got no fewer than six major bands of shingles, all in varying stages of pain and ooziness. The worst part of my case of Shingles is the nerve pain. Blinding pain shoots across my right rib cage, crushing me and making me unable to breathe. I'm pretty certain that J.K. Rowling had Shingles pain in mind when she wrote of the searing scar pain that Harry Potter experiences whenever he is near Lord Voldemort.

Shingles are my Lord Voldemort, that's for sure. They're ugly, they're useless and stare at me with such blatant irony that I can't stand it (Lord Voldemort, much like Hitler, was ironic and hypocritical in the fact that neither were 'pure bloods.' Yes, I've just likened my Shingles to Hitler. Again, I've got a cocktail of medicines floating around my blood stream). The irony in my Shingles is the fact that 20-somethings don't often get Shingles...

...unless they're stressed out. So my stress -- over finances, family, work, boys, you name it -- has not only caused me emotional pain; it's now causing me actual physical pain. Of course (Which is actually the exact reaction my friend Jacob had when I told him about my Shingles). And now I'm in so much pain (Okay, currently I'm floating on cloud nine with just a few itchies) that I can't work. If I can't work, I can't bring in money and if I don't bring in money...well, then the entire vicious circle of stress begins all over again.

Sigh. I'm just glad I have vicodin so I can stay relaxed, even if it is artificial.