Monday, August 16, 2010

Friday Night is Pizza Night (but of course)



Opening rant:
This crazy blog just lost my entire post and I have spent the last 5 minutes staring crazily at the screen debating whether I should retype it. At the same time cursing myself for not typing it in text beforehand and pasting it here like I and any intelligent person always do. If that's corrrect grammar but it sounds good. SAVE. I recall the time of internet dialup with AOL when you always typed your emails in word or a text file and then pasted them into the email to save dialup time. But this was a long time ago. Ten years of interent time is like 50 years used to be I find. Technology is simply speeding everything up. In the rush to eat well I find that I'm missing the good old days! And we do eat well. The entire family is in good shape, we walk, we go to the gym, and only hubby and I can pinch an inch. We both think the other is beautiful and ourselves fat pigs, but still. Can't have everything.

The Problem:
I remember a day when the fridge was where you kept leftovers, which could be lovelingly perused at leisure and interesting snacks enjoyed like having your own private buffet. That was yesterday. Now any time I open the fridge all I find is white wine, yoghurt, the odd chocolate bar, milk rice, jello, cold cuts and cheeses (but never any bread in the basket), berries and juice, kefir and quark. Not a single slice of leftover quiche, never a half chicken or a slice of roast. Not a pickle! Well, yes there are pickles but it's just an expression ... :o) I stalk into the living room and knock on the wall. "Family! The fridge is empty. Why don't we have any leftovers? We must be eating wierd. We need to get organised. NO more cooking on the fly." Everyone looks at me. "But I thought we had decided to cook light, eat light, leftovers were the work of the devil?" "True, but if I have to eat just one more yoghurt at 2 AM instead of the chicken leg I crave I might just pop." Everyone turns back to the television. See, we are prety normal after all. I fetch a block of paper and a pen. "We'll vote." I look at the clock. "Just as soon as we finish dinner."

The solution:
After a dinner of couscous with salmon, tuna and cod served wtih a fresh tomato compote and white wine, I push my plate to the side and put pen to paper. There is some couscous on my finger and I draw it to everyone's attention. "What am I to do with couscous leftovers? Why don't we have potatoes more often? What is this family's fascination with grains?" No one mentions the fact that I cooked dinner and also forgot to buy potatoes from the market. Hubby pours me another glass of wine. After only three rounds of voting we manage to create our family's first weekly dinner menu. Every other day should offer precious opportunites for leftovers too. Does anyone else do this or is it just me?? :o) katrin

Monday: schnitzel (turkey or pork)
Tuesday: pasta and two sauces
Wednesday: chicken (preferably whole and roasted)
Thursday: fish
Friday: pizza night (3-2 vote by the girls) with salad (mum and dad amendment)
Saturday: a roasted meat with all the trimming and dessert
Sunday: quiche or blini/crepes

Wednesday, August 4, 2010

Taking the Plunge

I've been working so much lately and everything, including my blog, has completely fallen to the wayside. I will be in Munich the second week of August to meet with three of my favourite catering clients to help them plan upcoming Fall events. While I'm there I am going to take the plunge and indulge in a very expensive treat. Something I have always wanted to put my mouth around and simply let it fill me up. I'm always producing the goods and for the last ten years I have been wanting to let myself be REALLY treated. Money is no object this time. Once we move back across the pond it will be a very long time before I can enjoy this Munich treasure. So it's salads and white wine until then! More about this paradise for my senses when I return. :o) poka! katrin

Friday, June 4, 2010

Cajun Fish Fry Up



Luuuuuuuuuuuuurve fish. Sadly also love fried food, to which my widening hips attest. But I love my hips. What a mess I am! :o) Breading. I like to bread in all sorts of things, and why not. Keep it moist and flavourful - and so polenta is one of my favourite ways to bread.

Salt and pepper on the salmon, then in flour, then egg, then in the polenta. I added fine chopped green pepper and red onion to the polenta and pressed that in. Gently but firmly fry. It was crispy and moist and wonderful! The sole is pressed on one side into chili pepper, and after it has been turned topped with tomatoe concasse with mint.

We enjoyed this with a cold Fielding wineries Gewürtztraminer (2008 from our last trip across the pond) and ceasar salad - and yes! you must make your own ceasar dressing! :O) poka! katrin

Monday, May 17, 2010

"Uncorked" the new wine/foodie tv series

Hubby commented on http://www.facebook.com/#!/sarahjgim Sarah J Gim's facebook post this morning. Her suggestion to come up with a tv series or book based on Ben Anderson's pic "Wine Tasting" http://www.facebook.com/#!/photo.php?pid=31216014&id=1291378334. It's a great set of images! Makes me wish it weren't 7 in the morning ... I don't think the 2009 tv movie did that well, so what about a remake?!

"Uncorked". Season 2 - Ben and Alex's wine making classes are suddenly placed in jeopardy when Sarah arrives in town to open an upscale wine chic tasty bar with her old room mate Suzanne. Wil sparks fly between these four or just tasting glasses? Meanwhile Pilar's catering company has received an offer from Jacques Torres to open multiple floating pastry bars in Manhattan, which leaves her mulling a move to the East Coast and leaving her friends ...

But Darling you didn't do it right ... here is my take:

"Uncorked". Premiere! - Gardenville's Ben and Alex's wine making classes are suddenly placed in jeopardy when big citty LA hotties Sarah and Suzanne arrive in town to open a swanky wine chic tasty bar, and the office crowd flock like pigeons to a popcorn bag. Will sparks fly between these four or just tasting glasses? Meanwhile Pilar's catering company has received an offer from Jacques Torres to open multiple floating pastry bars in Manhattan, which leaves her mulling a move to the East Coast and leaving her friends ...

poka! :o) katrin

Tuesday, May 4, 2010

Missing Old Friends


I love the movie Sideways - and I love wine. Virginia Madsen (Maya) has the best line in this movie and I agree with her 100% ... you open a bottle of wine and you wonder what was the weather like on the day it was bottled, who bottled it, what are all those stories you are unleashing when you uncork that bottle - and once uncorked, its done. you can't go back. the anticipation is like the first time you sleep with someone ... forget food porn - wine erotica is even better. it is a physical tingling .... Virgina Madseon always has great lines - Gotham (1988) she plays Rachel, a ghost who haunts her husband, and meets the man who is hired to track her down (Tommy Lee Jones). They meet on a darkened street and she says ... you ask the girl for her number but you won't call - becasue it's not about that - it's about how she looked when you saw her, how she made you feel - and you had the best of her - the very best of her. And wine is the same way.

I'm looking back over my cellar notes - yes, hubby bought me a cellar book in the 90's when we were both so into wine - we were buying 12 bottles a month to lay down. Before we moved we had .. 176 bottles in the cellar according to my records. :o) Now we have 2 cases and we're drinking them up before our next big move. Every time I get a bottle it's a horrible experience. I know that once it is open it will be gone for ever. It's almost like I'm killing the poor darlings. They have been with me for over a decade now ... like favourite pets.

Last weekend we opened a 98 Pessac Leognan which was brilliant the second day. The first day the nose was full of tobacco and raspberries but the mouth was nothing to get excited about, but the second day it had settled down and the initial nose was gentler but the taste fuller. and now, it is gone. :o(

some of my favourite lost friends?

fitou '99 "very berry then dryyyyyyyyyyyy..."
corbiere '97 "speechless"
los vascos '98 " very disappointing after the '86! why did we buy a case?"
bailey's block shiraz '97 "like a mouth full of curant jam ..."
equisheim muscat '98 "what a souvenir! goosberries and honey"
tocornal cab sauv '86 and a BC okanagan ehrenfelser '87 both of which we were drinking almost daily ... oh my ...

I love wine. I miss many of them dearly. They bring you back, not only to the possibilities of what you will encounter when the cork is removed and the wine hits your lips, but it seals the memories of those moments - like you are corking them back inside yourself. Blackberry Wine by Joanne Harris -- READ IT!

:o) poka katrin