Pickles!

This is an adaptation of Alton Brown's bread-and-butter pickles recipe which Sylvia and I made last week. After not even 24 hours, they were delicious -- and have only been getting better. Note: these are refrigerator pickles, meaning not the kind that you can store at room temperature forever.

• 2 medium-large cucumbers
• 1 1/2 cup water
• 1 1/2 cup red wine vinegar
• 1 1/2 cup sugar (I used white sugar, but will try light brown next time)
• 1/2 tsp turmeric
• 1/2 tsp celery seed
• 1/2 tsp mustard seed
• 1/2 tsp pickling spice (I got mine at the hardware store, of all places)
• Pinch of Kosher salt
  

This will make two quart-jars worth.

Slice up the cucumbers into very thin rounds, and pack into the jars. Boil all of the other ingredients for about five minutes, and then pour over the cucumbers. Cap them with the screw-on lids, let cool slightly and put in the fridge.

This was incredibly easy, and resulted in some of the best pickles I've had in ages. Total cost per batch is probably about a dollar a jar, and I don't think I'll ever buy store-bought pickles again.

This will make no sense, best to ignore it

This will make no sense unless you are a fan of both Fallout 3 and The Hold Steady.

well holly came from megaton
when her dad stepped out, it was the smoking gun
the smoking gun that echoed as she stepped out onto
the banks of the potomac river

[insert chorus, something that rhymes 'smoked those raiders' and 'she said laters' ]

and she came to ground and she staggered around
she did some jet and some stimpaks
and she had to kill some tunnel rats
on the banks of the potomac river

[something that rhymes 'young turk' and 'mirelurk']

I was bored while getting a haircut, and had been listening to The Hold Steady right beforehand, give me a break, huh jeez

That damned Firefox cursor

Have you ever noticed that in Firefox, on some sites the cursor will look weird, like it has a couple of extra pixels jutting out to the right? I think I have finally figured out why. Here's an example, if you've never noticed. I can't believe that this has been bothering me for so long. Years, I mean.

Vermicomposting

This isn't a post about food, but rather about a potential project that I'm considering after I do some more research. A project that could, in theory, lead to delicious food! Vermicomposting is a method of composting kitchen scraps (vegetable trimmings, potato peels, coffee grounds, etc.) indoors, with the aid of our friend the humble worm.

You take a smallish bin (think Tupperware storage, the opaque kind), and after drilling small holes in it, fill it with 'bedding' such as cut up newspaper and corrugated cardboard, the aforementioned kitchen scraps, and worms. Cover with more food and more bedding, add some water, and cover it with a tight-fitting lid.

The worms eat the vegetable material as well as the bedding, and you just keep adding both and occasionally stirring the whole thing around to fluff it up. You have to make sure the worms get enough food, and that there isn't too much or too little water in it, but after a few months, you get a ton of insanely high-quality compost/fertilizer. You separate the worms from the compost, and start all over again.

I grew up in a family who grew a ton of vegetables every spring and summer and composted religiously, but for all of my adult life I have lived in apartments in the city and have felt vaguely guilty every time I throw a piece of celery trimming or potato peel in the garbage. I do have a small area I can grow tomatoes and herbs in, so why not try this to feed my beloved vegetables? I will be looking into it further, and will certainly post about the experience, accompanied by photos if it turns out to be something I can actually do in a bin under my kitchen sink.

Here's what the EPA has to say about it, and here's somebody who is selling a pre-made 'Worm Inn' to do it with.

Quick, spicy, BBQ flavored chicken

One of my favorite quick meals (with a little bit of prep beforehand for marinading) is a dish of roasted chicken thighs and drumsticks, with carrots and onion. I do this differently every time, it seems. Here's what I did tonight. I used four thighs and four drumsticks.

For the marinade:

• 1 lime, juiced
• 1 tablespoon salt
• Lots of pepper
• A couple of tablespoons of vegetable oil
• A couple of tablespoons of ketchup
• A teaspoon of prepared mustard
• A half teaspoon of dry English mustard
• A few drops of one of the really hot novelty hot-sauces (anything that says something like "XXX" or "Do Not Want" or "This will make you Butt Hurt" on it)
• About 10 oz of Coca-Cola (no kidding, Coca-Cola).

Whisk that all together and put it over the chicken parts, in a big bowl. Cover and stick in the fridge for at least three hours.

Once that three hours is about up, preheat your oven to about 400, and cut up a big onion into thick slices, and place that at the bottom of a largish roasting pan. Peel and thickly slice three medium carrots on the bias and add them as well. Drizzle with olive oil and kosher salt.

Heat up your biggest cast iron pan, and add olive oil once hot. Brown both sides of all of the chicken parts (you'll have to do it in shifts), and as they finish, put them on top of the vegetables, skin side up. Once they're all added, throw it in the oven uncovered for about 40 minutes.

After the 40 minutes are up, take out the pan and turn the oven to 'broil'. While it's heating up, drizzle a tablespoon or so of the reserved marinade over each chicken part (which should at this point have nice and crispy looking skin) and then stick back under the broiler for about 5-10 minutes.

Remove. Eat. Enjoy.

Happy Independence Day

Watched the fireworks from 902 Hart last night with Hemen, Anna, Sylvia and Tim. Hemen took some fantastic photos.

Quasi-Mediterranean Pasta

Defrosting my fridge tonight (every 3 or 4 months, it starts sounding like there's an idling moped in my kitchen) so wanted to use up some of the spoilables inside -- namely a tub of ricotta that I ordered from Peapod this weekend.

I wasn't in the mood for anything super fancy, so while I was boiling water for pasta, I threw into a small bowl:

• A small handful of Kalamata olives (pitted)
• A clove of garlic
• A tablespoon of olive oil
• A few shakes of lemon pepper
• About a quarter cup plus of the ricotta

I turned it all into a paste with a hand-held stick blender, and tossed it with some linguini, and topped it with some of the cherry tomatoes from my front yard. All in all, it took about 5 minutes of effort (not including the time to make the pasta). I'm pretty sure I'll be trying this again -- nice, simple and tasty.