Deflation

Forgive this break from our regularly scheduled programming, but I just had to bring you this:

From my horoscope today, courtesy (or dis-courtesy, as you will shortly see) of Google -

"Everything isn't as rosy as it appears, so don't be fooled just because others seem to support you. It's not a good idea to relax and let down your guard, for it's likely that you don't have the whole picture. Building a relationship on promises won't work now, so get to the bottom of what's going on before a little problem grows into a much larger one."

What. The. Crap.

I want to go back to bed now. What is the purpose of deflating people so throughly?? I read my horoscope about once every 6 months. When I do read it, I like be told that I am wonderful, smart, irreplaceable, and am about to have the bestest day ever. Honesty, if honesty it be, has no place in horoscopes! Gah.

Choose Your Own Adventure: A Photoessay

'Tis time for another photoessay. I am totally short on time and cannot write a proper post at the moment. I also have a massive backlog of photos of the things I eat (I take pictures of close to everything that passes my lips, much to my very patient friends' chagrin) that never sees the light of day. That's just not right. And while my cooking has slowed down as of late, it has not stopped entirely.

So here is the theme for the current photoessay: Homemade Adventure. You tell me which picture speaks to you the most. Not necessarily the prettiest picture or the best composed plating, but what you would want to eat most. Tell me what makes your stomach grumble and that shall be the subject of my next post, provided I don't blow an aneurysm in the next week from dissertation stress. Stranger things have happened.

Help me out. Make the decision for me - tell me what to post about! Please vote by leaving a comment with the name of the dish/picture. Vote with your stomach, less with your eyes (I really do suck at taking good pictures).




Mark Bittman's short ribs, braised with red wine and coffee; lemon risotto, and the supervisor's honey and vinegar glazed carrots.

Breakfast tacos: scrambled eggs with chorizo and avocado, in home made tortillas (a Battling Brunches entry).

Baked cod, breaded with homemade buttered bread crumbs and smoked paprika, with balsamic drizzled avocado (an American Test Kitchens test recipe! They send you a recipe, you test it and tell them what you think. It's neat to be a part of the "test" in Test Kitchens, even if in a small part).

Yellow tomatoes with fresh basil, balsamic, and good olive oil. Simple and summery. (Guess now you know how long that picture has been the depths of my hard drive).

Blini - this one is a bit of a cheat. My grandmother actually made these Russian-style crepes, stuffed with ground beef, onions, and other secret grandmother ingredients that make this wonderful, delicious, and near impossible to replicate. If the blini are selected for the next post, I will beg her for the recipe and try to write it up, although please don't expect the product to taste nearly as good as these did. It's not possible, because you are not my grandmother. (Hi Lina!)

No-knead bread - no work, all the pay-off. It really does taste like it's straight from a bakery. Spread with pepper-blueberry preserves.

Breakfast the morning after - samosa insides fried as potato cakes and fried eggs. Part of the post New Years recovery program. I highly recommend it.

Irish soda bread with pecans and raisins. No kneading, no waiting, slightly sweet and super dense.

Quinoa salad, courtesy of Amanda at What We're Eating, with a thyme and lime vinaigrette.

Living Vicariously

If I didn't have my dissertation lodged half way up my, ahem, yea... If that wasn't the case, I would likely be attending this festival at Northeastern University. The good causes are mutilayered and all rewarding. The official cause and the reason for the fundraiser is ALS Therapy Development Institute, an organization right here, in Cambridge, MA.

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From the organizer:

One week from today (oops, I was slow in posting this), on March 14, from 6-10pm, we will be hosting an International Food Festival at Northeastern University's Alumni Center in Boston to raise money to support the ALS Therapy Development Institutea Cambridge MA based organization that is dedicated to developing treatments and ultimately, a cure, for ALS (also known as Lou Gehrig's Disease). The event is a "Running a Business" component of our full time MBA program at Northeastern, and we will feature a live jazz band, food donations from many restaurants in the community, a cash bar, and a silent auction with items that include a $1300 brand new treadmill donated by Reebok and delivered to the winner's home, $500 Red Sox tickets, a chartered boat for the day, ski gear, hundreds of dollars in gift certificates to local restaurants, and more! 100% of the profits will be donated to the ALS TDI, and as many of you know, it is a research group that I have supported since a good friend of mine, Steve Saling, was diagnosed with ALS in the past few years.

We are asking for a $30 donation from non-students and a $15 donation from students to be a part of the event, and please take the chance to follow the link below to learn more about the event and purchase tickets online. We will also accept cash and checks at the door of the event if that is easier for you - please do let me know if you plan to attend and will be making your donation at the door so that we can get a good idea of the number of guests. *** Please note: this event is 21+. ***

INFORMATION AND TO PURCHASE TICKETS: http://geocities.com/food.festival/

To learn more about my friend Steve and perhaps understand how I have found his attitude to be very inspiring these past few years, I invite you to spend some time exploring his MySpace site - http://www.myspace.com/smoothsaling

I hope you choose to support our event, and even if you can not attend or might not be able to make it, purchasing a ticket (or a few tickets) to show your support would help us to make this event a success. Please don't hesitate to contact me with any questions you might have.


Best regards,

--
Chuck McNamee
Northeastern College of Business Administration
MBA Class of 2009
781.248.5834 (cell)
mcnamee.c@neu.edu

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The second reason to go to this event, and the one most relevant to the theme of this here food blog, is to celebrate the international restaurants of Boston (please don't call them "ethnic". That word makes me twitch). Cuban, Indian, Mexican, they will all be represented at the event.

Help ALS, help Boston area restaurant, it's a win-win. If you go, tell me about it so that I can live vicariously through you.

Now if I could just get rid of this stupid dissertation...

Round 2

I got tagged! Lovely Leena, who I would force to be my bestest friend ever if she lived on the same continent, tagged me for a meme. I sort of kind of have already done a meme like this, so consider this Round 2. Way waay more information than you needed to know about me.

Here are the rules:
1. Link to your tagger and post these rules.
2. Share 5 facts about yourself.
3. Tag 5 people at the end of your post and list their names, linking to them.
4. Let them know they've been tagged by leaving a comment at their blogs.

1. I love pickles in every form and shape. I have no fewer than three different jars of pickles in my fridge at any one time. I am still looking for my dream pickle brand. If you have any suggestions/preferences, please let me know. My parents tell me that when I was little I loved sweetened tea and pickles. Together. Don’t know how a five year old could have the food cravings of a preggers lady, but there you go.

2. I have only been in one physical fight in my life. And by that I mean that I got picked on hard core when I was in seventh grade. Picture a girls locker room. Scratch that. That’s wrong. Don’t picture a girls locker room. Picture me, with a soon to fade Russian accent, perm, glasses, and braces – oh yea – in a head lock by a girl who is not only smaller than me, but also has uglier hair (I didn’t even think it possible). It sucked. Courtney Wergely (don’t remember how to spell her name) - I hope your hair is still ugly. Mine rocks. It’s occasionally hot pink. So ha! I win.

3. I have a super duper fancy pants camera and absolutely no idea how to use it. I am all about excess.

4. I am now, and will forever remain, a brand label whore. I am unrepentant, I have no intention of weaning myself off, I don’t care if people think it’s bratty. You get what you paid for and I firmly believe this. If I have the choice between CVS brand toilet paper or no toilet paper at all, I will not buy toilet… Err, ok, I will buy CVS brand, but only if I really really have to.

5. I don’t watch TV, hardly ever. I used to be able to hold up normal conversations about pop culture – even if I had never seen the show, I would have usually heard of it and knew what it was about. No longer. I don’t even know what people are talking about most of the time! I have never seen Arrested Development (yea, I know, shut up), I am not entirely sure what Lost is about, I recently heard about the Wire. It’s terrible. I don’t know when I turned into one of those people that is completely isolated and out of the way of popular culture. Kids these days…


Ok, I am pretty sure that is way more than anyone wanted or needed to know about me. I am done now, and have to go to bed. Another fun filled day of vomit-inducing dissertation writing is ahead of me. Lord almighty, I want to be done already!

Now that I am done, I can pass the torturous torch on to other people so they can reveal their deepest and darkest to the world wide internets.

Scott, One Food Guy, soon to be fresh from India, full of great food no doubt.
JC
Allen (Green Armadillo)
Naveen (you have a blog outside of JoVE, right?)
Michelle, who knows the pain of dissertation writing all too well.

Under Ground

I am completely buried. I defend my dissertation (...I think I just threw up a little) on May 6. This means that my dissertation is due to my executioners, ahem, examiners, on April 22. That gives me about 6 weeks to write a 200 page document that technically, is supposed to make sense and make me sound all smart and PhD-like. I don't know how this is going to happen.

I just want to play, eat, and post on the blog! Alas, that is going to slow down for the next month. Suck. Wish me luck. Also wish for someone (you know who you are) to keep me from eating myself sick with Cheetos and other crappy studying food.