Pretentious Pasta Primavera

Dear Reader,

I know it has been quite sometime since I have posted anything, and I promise you, if I had remembered that the last thing I put on here were those DORKY photos of myself, I would have updated a lot sooner.  So here is something new to eat. 

Pretentious Pasta Primavera

You will need:

New Yorker tote bag
locally brewed beer
sustainably made shoes
nerd glasses
pasta
wine
garlic
fiddleheads
purple carrots
romanesco
ramps
morel mushrooms
habanero peppers


Good morning Brooklyn!  Drink a Kombucha, throw on those Toms shoes, hop on your skateboard and scoot over to the food co-op, but not before telling everyone about your do-gooding on Twitter.  Try to make friends with Adrian Grenier during your shift.  Decide that he is a stuck-up poser when your advances are rejected.  After work, fill your tote bag with fiddleheads, ramps, romanesco, morel mushrooms and a super spicy habanero.

Once home, chop and saute all veggies in white wine and garlic while listening to Radiohead.  Invite friends to whom you feel superior over for dinner and a lesson on the rare vegetables you have foraged from the market.  They will appreciate it, and at the same time be forced to recognize your intelligence and superiority in all things.  Play for them new music that they may not have heard, being less clued in than you are.  Toss with pasta with veggies, sprinkle with cheese - not the cheese made from that lady's breast milk.  That was a disaster.  Chop habanero and mix with guest's pasta for chance to belittle their intolerance to spicy foods.  Serve with local beer while discussing Art, Artaud, Proust, Globalization, and whether or not the piano is a percussion instrument.  When guests are gone, remove needless nerd glasses and catch up on back episodes of Gossip Girl while drinking your secret stash of Zima.

Eclipse is only 21 days away...

In honor of the upcoming release of Eclipse, I wanted to share with you the latest results from my favorite time waster, seeing what I look like with other people's hair, which is what I did while watching The Today Show this morning.

Hello Bella, I love your hoodie. Do you like my fitted sport coat?

I don't know, Edward.  I just want you inside me. This is torture. Don't make me wait for the next movie.  It's too long!

Don't even think about it, bloodsuker. 

Who let the dogs out?

If you even imagine making her one of you, I will eat you alive.  Right after I tie my pants to my leg with a little strap. Aarrrrrrrrrf.

Would you guys cut it out already? I'm going home to stare out my window and listen to Muse.

Hi there guyth! I'm Drew. I'll hang out with you while the's gone. Letth party!

It is a pleasure to meet you, Drew.  However, you don't smell very good to me.

She smells pretty good to me. Perhaps she would like to accompany me on a peace keeping mission to Africa. I would only require that she takes my six children out for fast food and ice cream three times per day, and to alert the media when I am going to be with my children, so they can take photos.

OMG Africa? Like, I totally love everybody, but I'm not sure I want to go to Africa! Will they appreciate my new 1950'th look? I'm like a bombthell!

I was alive in the 1950's and you, ma'am, are not 1950s.

Can we just keep focused on me? God!

Sorry, Bella.

Yes, I'm so very sorry.

Whatever. Where's Renesmee?

Who?

Renesmee. Our daughter.

That's not until the next book.  I read them on the plane to Somalia.

Wait. We have a daughter and you name her... Renesmee?

Yeah. So what?

Seriously?  And I'm cool with that?

Yeah. Whatever Edward. I don't have time for this.

Renethmee ith like a really lame-o name!

I agree with Drew.  I'm sorry Bella. I'm just not that into you anymore.

Renesmee sounds HOT.

Lovely Day Strawberry Tart

Dear Reader,


Today was gorgeous.  I realize I have been remiss in creating recipes for you to enjoy on lovely days such as this, so I offer you a delicious and super easy tart that I made for dessert tonight.  Enjoy!

Lovely Day Strawberry Tart

You will need


1 Day
Lots of sleep
Perfect Weather
A nice place in which to live - can be a vibrant city or the fruited plain
Farm or farmer's market
9 Graham crackers
10 almonds
1/2 cup oats
3 Tbs. light brown sugar
Guitar
5 Tbs. melted butter
1 tsp. vanilla
Porn
1 cup Mascarpone
1/3 cup whipping cream
1/4 cup sugar
1 quart strawberries
2 Tbs. Sherry
2 Tbs. Jam
Television
Comfy pants
Cocktail


Begin your lovely day by waking to birds chirping on a clear, crisp morning.  Go for a run along a river.  Head to the farmer's market and pick yourself up a quart of strawberries.  At home, put graham crackers, almonds, oats and brown sugar into a food processor and turn it on while you strum songs by John Denver on the guitar.  Pick the songs that don't use any B chords, cause those are too dang hard for this lovely day!  Pour in the butter and vanilla and whiz it all up, making silly whizzing sounds as you do.


Heat your oven to 350 degrees, and press the crust into a tart shell.  Bake for ten minutes or until as golden brown as your tanned shoulders.  Meanwhile, clean strawberries and place them in a bowl.  In an adorable little saucepan simmer the Sherry and the jam (I used strawberry cause that was all I had, and it's all good) until it is syrupy.  Pour it over the berries.


Take a little time out to enjoy some porn with someone you like.  Or, if you'd rather, someone you just met online, in the elevator, or at the farmer's market.

Whip up the Mascarpone, cream, and sugar and spread it into the tart shell.  Top with berries and place in the fridge.


Put on your comfiest pants, sit on the couch in front of the television - I am enjoying Antiques Roadshow.  Pour a cocktail, such as a Greyhound, into a gigantic glass, and dig in.

Ben's Jury Duty Jambalaya

Dear Reader,

I have had a special request for a recipe from my friend Ben, who writes the very informative and hilarious B-Side Blog.  He's a wonderful cook and all around great guy who is currently doing time.  He writes:

I'm too lazy to actually get out of my chair and open your cook book, but do you have a recipe for jury duty?


Poor Ben is in municipal court.  If you're going to be on a jury, you should hope for a nice juicy murder trial, or an assault case like the one I adjudicated last year which inspired this recipe.  Shout out to my fellow jurors!  Woot woot!  NOT GUILTY!


I digress... So Ben, here it is, just for you and those also doing their civic duty.  Enjoy!

Ben's Jury Duty Jambalaya

You will need:


I.D.
12 medium shrimp, peeled and deveined
2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cubed
2 Tbs. olive oil
1 Tbs. Creole seasoning
1/2 onion, chopped
1 green pepper, chopped
2 ribs celery, diced
3 cloves garlic, minced
Magazines
2 tomatoes, chopped
3 bay leaves
1 Tbs. red chille, minced
Dash Worcestershire sauce
3/4 cup rice
Money for lunch
3 cups chicken stock
1 cup sliced Andouille sausage


The night before reporting for jury duty, put the shrimp and chicken in a large bowl and massage the seasoning into the meat.  Also massage your butt muscles because they are going to get a good workout sitting around all day tomorrow.  Heat the oil in large pan and saute the onion, pepper and celery until as soft as the pillow you are going to be wishing for tomorrow when the extreme fatigue sets in around two o'clock.  Add the tomatoes, chillies and Worcestershire sauce.  Add an extra few glugs of oil in honor of the Gulf Coast.  Now stir in your rice and add the broth a little at a time.  Turn the heat down and let it simmer until the liquid has been absorbed.  This should take about fifteen minutes, which is the exact amount of time you are permitted to use for bathroom breaks, if you employ the chronic diarrhea defense.  When cooked, add in the chicken and shrimp.  While this cooks practice saying the following:


"I don't have a prejudice against the Portuguese, but I do have one against LAWYERS.  Especially mealy mouthed DEFENSE ATTORNEYS.  I HATE THEM!!!  Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.  Woof woof."


"Sorry, I'm so hungover, was out all night doing meth with my mom.  Could you repeat the question?"


"What is she accused of?  OMG  That totally happened to me, too!"


"What do I do for my job?  I write a blog, and hence feel compelled to relate to the world the events of each and every day as they occur to me.  I write it all down.  Sometimes as funny recipes.  And I always use real names."


When the shrimp and chicken are cooked, take one shrimp and wrap it neatly in its very own tin foil FEMA house.  Put it all into a thermos, with the special shrimp on top.  Once at jury duty, open the thermos and let the heady aroma waft throughout the room, handily keeping people from sitting too near. Vow that in five years time, you will simply toss the jury summons in the garbage like everyone else does. 

Bright Star, oh, whatever.

Dear Reader,

I apologize for my extended absence.  Blame it on Keats.  Recently I watched Jane Campion's amazing film Bright Star.  I like Jane Campion because she reminds me of my grandmother.  Years ago, when I saw Shindler's List, I called my grandmother afterward, because her family was from very near Krakow.  She called the following evening to tell me she had been to see Jane's Campion's The Piano.  I asked how she liked it.  "Well, I'll tell you something," she began, "I've seen two naked men in my life.  Your grandfather, and Harvey Keitel."

Bright Star was really good - kind of like a tubercular Twilight.  I don't know if actor Ben Whishaw looks much like Keats, but that's probably a good thing.  See?

Nice curls, John.

Honestly, who cares if you are coughing up jellyfish from your lungs when you look like this?

My problem is, you see, that John Keats died when he was twenty-five.  It got me thinking, if Keats had access to Facebook, and Twitter, and had busied himself trying to write silly recipes, would he ever have written Ode on a Grecian Urn?  And if he hadn't done that, my freshman English professor wouldn't have written a whole book on Keats that he could quote from day after day (after day) in a drunken snarl.  So I thought, as I am trying to work on What Comes Next, that I would put aside these distractions.  After all, I am almost twenty-five myself.  But alas, no odes have I written.  So there you have it.

Someone sent me something AWESOME.

Dear Reader,

My friend Jon sent me a link to the most excellent site.  I have a collection of obscure and vintage cookery books, but this takes the cake.  Enjoy with an ice cold Jellied Tomato Refresher.

Voila.

FIELD TRIP SURVIVAL GUIDE FOR EAGER PARENTS

Dear Reader,

As spring approaches so does the season for FIELD TRIPS.  If you are the type who volunteers for these excursions, or if you, like me, have a husband who volunteers you for them, there are some things you need to prepare yourself for the day.  Here is a handy little FIELD TRIP SURVIVAL GUIDE FOR EAGER PARENTS

1.  Bring hand sanitizer.  Two of them, preferably the kind you can spritz on someone's hands or face without touching them.  One should be used when ever another child is going to touch your child, the other  is for your child after the aforementioned other child has touched them.  And always for yourself, before and after touching anything.

2.  Wear cheap gloves that you don't mind tossing at the end of the trip.  Inevitably some kid will be picking their nose, digging away in there like Yosemite Sam, and then want to hold your hand.

3.  Bring a snack for yourself.  It doesn't matter that the kids will be having a decidedly boring snack of pretzels or cheese crackers, it will make you ravenous.  Bring something yummy that you can duck into the bathroom to eat, out of sight of anyone who might want you to share.

4.  Bring a camera.  Even if you never develop the photos, other parents will have theirs and you will seem uncaring if you don't have one.  A photo album from your child's class is a nice end of year gift for them.

5.  Buddy up to the teacher.  Befriending the teacher is a good idea for obvious reasons, but is not without pitfalls as you will be the first person they turn to when a class project needs organizing.  See this post about my quilting debacle.

6.  Keep track of the kids.  This may seem obvious, but my first field trip, to a farmer's market, included a harrowing moment where I really believed I was going to have to tell another parent that I lost their kid.  In fairness, the kid in question DID get lost on another trip, so I am inclined to think it was his fault.

7.  Dress comfortably.  This is my number one rule regarding all unpleasant situations.  Comfy socks go a long way to soothing frazzled nerves.

8.  Do not yell at other people's children.  Mocking them is a far better technique, especially for whiners.

9.  Don't miss the opportunity to get nosy about what the other parents do.  Ask questions.  Most kids love to give you the dirt on what goes on at home.

10.  If the trip involves a bus ride, sit near the front and make sure to ask any nearby children if they get car sick.  If so, find another seat.

There you have it.  Have fun on your field trips and try not to lose anyone.