Cat-ch up!

Monday, August 3rd, 2009

Pardon the pun... I'm catching up!

Here's more prettiness from the Woodlands area in Texas, where Anthony and his family live. This is the canal.

This is Maren telling me all about stuff an' junk.

She likes to play near the water features, by the canal.

In the canal tunnel - neat mosaics!

And there are fish in the water, too!

This is the pavilion where NEW KIDS played!!!!!!

Near the pavilion.

Once again, thanks to Anthony, Crissy, Maren and Blake for a fun weekend!

I made some Luzianne sun tea when I got home, since Anthony had such success with it.

Also while there, we chatted about the foods we used to love as kids. Steak Uums, Chick-Fil-A, etc. It was then that he mentioned hearing that the secret to Chick-Fil-A's delicious chicken was the fact they soaked their chicken in pickle brine before cooking! "Surely that's bullshit" I thought to myself... but being the adventurous/foolhardy type, and since we had two jars of almost-empty pickles, Lisa and I decided to give it a go. Here's what we did.

• 4 Chicken breasts, frozen, from your standard ziplock bag frozen chicken package as seen at Costo, Sam's Club, BJ's, etc.
• Placed two frozen breasts into two separate tupperware containers.
• Dumped pickle brine from Mt. Olive Kosher Dill Pickles into one container, and the brine from Claussen's Dill Pickles into the other.

They sat in the fridge for 24 hours (I dumped the brines after work, and the next day, pulled them out of the fridge).

The brine turned milky and gross. Surely I have ruined 4 chicken bits.

Mt' Olive was the darker yellow brine (the Tumeric in the brine stained the chicken a darker yellow, too!)

Claussens just lookedwrong.

But goddammit guess what? Both batches were out-of-control AMAZING! All I did was slap them on the grill and cook them like I would any other chicken breast. They were succulent, amazingly juicy, flavorful, and just salty enough to not need any modification. The darker yellow breasts (Mt. Olive) had a pickle flavor to them, but here's the trippy thing - the regular looking ones on the left, below? They tasted like Chick-Fil-A chicken! (Discounting the breading and pressure cooking in oil)

We fucking love Pickle Chicken™. Spread the word.

So lately, Lisa has become the neighborhood cat whisperer. Here she is with "PeaChee", the cat we suspect of having a hidden brood of kittens. She's amazingly easy going and comfortable around us.

Maybe it's the food?

Maybe it's the fresh paint.

Maybe she's friends with Beverly the Beaver.

She certainly liked my camera lens cap, when it dangled from the camera!

Simon either likes her ass, or is defending his territory.

Poorly. Good job, Simon!

We also have another local cat who showed up and ate some food - we named him Archimedes.

What's that you say about food?

Grilled pineapple, teriyaki chicken, and more of my asparagus "recipe"!

I need to lighten up on the olive oil, but I'm getting there!

Caturday

Saturday, August 8th, 2009

Ohhh Caturday, you are so lazy.

So for lunch I made some Middle Eastern pita deelies - hand made some hummus, even! (Partially cheated with Tahini Hummus, apparently)

Kalamata olives, mint from our garden, spring onions, tomato, cucumber, feta cheese, lemon juice, chicken...

And extra grilled chicken from the night before! Another culinary triumph!

Crostini

Monday, August 10th, 2009

So this evening was the night I replicated the "Caprini Crostini" from The Golden West Café in Hampden. I changed it up a little... let me backtrack a little. Two weekends ago, John, Libby, Lisa, and I went to the House of Kabob and had a lovely delicious dinner. The appetizer featured a feta cheese that I fell in love with - it was creamier and not as crumbly as "regular" feta, and seemed to be spiced. So I spent a week Googling "Persian feta" getting nowhere, so we decided to return to the restaurant this past weekend, where I could ask them directly. Turns out I didn't need to! Unlike their online menu (which just says "feta"), the printed menu specifically says "The finest Bulgarian Feta" - score!

Armed with this knowledge, I decided to visit Prima Foods, right near work, as they had a retail store and advertised exotic feta cheeses. So at lunch today, Aaron and I ran to what I thought was Prima Foods, right near work. We pulled up to the warehouse, and asked the receptionist about their retail store, which she pleasantly informed me did not exist. "That's strange, because your website says..." blah blah blah. To make a long story short, she let us enter the warehouse area (as this particular company is a restaurant supplier and trades only in bulk) where they informed us that they only sell one kind of feta - the Greek kind. But I didn't walk away empty handed - I got a bottle of Sun of Italy Italian Spice Mix! Puzzled over this weirdness at not having what the website clearly states, we went back to work... where I discovered my error. We had stopped off at Pastore's building, not Prima. Fuck a duck.

I'll hit Prima tomorrow.So yeah... to make the best of it, I incorporated the Italian Spice Mix into the dinner this evening.

Cannellini beans sitting in a solution of balsamic red wine vinegar and a Balsamic/Olive Oil Safeway salad dressing, oilve oil in a ramekin filled with the aforementioned spice mix, and sliced french bread. Basted the bread with the dipping sauce (and ate a couple as it basically tastes like the stuff they mix up at Bertucci's), set aside.

Mixed field greens, spring onions, sundried tomato paste, walnuts, Greek feta, and the Cannellini beans.

Toasted the bread on the grill because I am fucking ridiculous.

Drizzled balsamic vinegarette/olive oil dressing on the greens, served! Combine the stuff on the plate with the bread, eat, smile!

Surprisingly filling, and it was delicious enough that we're having it again tomorrow night!