Uhhhhh, yeah: more food porn!

Anyone getting sick of all the food porn? My advice: get your own damn blog! Ha!

Here are some avocados in the Mercado de la Boqueria in Barcelona. The market really had some amazing visuals:

These funky mushrooms were all over the market. I have no idea what they are, or what they taste like, but am sad I didn't have the ability to do any cooking while I was in BCN: these would've been fascinating to try.

More funky mushrooms.

A wide variety of funky mushrooms.

Hot peppers!

A general fruit and veggie stall.


Okay, okay, OKAY ALREADY. I've heard the complaints, so here are some images that aren't food porn.

Some fun graffiti near the beach.

Buskers make these really elaborate sandcastles on the beach. Some are truly amazing. This was one of the few where I saw someone actively working on it.

"My first recollection is a day in December... 747 tracing lines through the sky"

More food porn!

Can't get enough of my food porn? Don't really have a choice, since it's all I feel like posting? READ ON!

Basically my start with photographing food porn was when I was cooking on the Sea Shepherd ship. (Scroll about halfway down for the food porn.) J mentioned that she'd seen a bunch more images that I hadn't blogged, so I dug some up:

tomato salad

soaking potatoes in saltwater overnight for breakfast

A local school came for a tour, and brought us massive amounts of fresh herbs from their school garden. It literally took me a week to process it all. Here is a bowl of sage leaves.

The aforementioned sage, a random avocado, and a jar that I'm making rosemary-infused olive oil in.

Self explanatory.

Yes, people really would just take stuff from the walk-in. Of course, this threat probably wouldn't be taken too seriously, since it involved a non-vegan dish.

The crew had this strange aversion to leftovers. So I usually didn't bother to tell them when something was a leftover: I either incorporated it into another dish, or just waited a week or so until they'd forgotten the dish. SUCKERS!

Here is the self-service area, with a broad selection. (Some of it is leftovers: don't tell!)

Fresh fruit for the juicer!

The results of peeling all that fresh fruit, other than my hands smelling good for a couple hours.

Fresh fruit with most of the juice removed in the juicer "waste" bin.
(Trust me: it didn't go to waste.)

And here is the result of some juicing!

Random veggie prep: I have no idea what this would have turned in to.

Food porn!

Since we're leaving for New England in a couple days, we realized we have a ton of fresh food we need to deal with. So we began a busy weekend of cooking with breakfast:

vegan pancakes with pink lady apples

boiling potatoes (yeah, I know: boring, right?)

but add some baked tofu,

and SHAZAM! it turns into something more exciting

pretty exciting: Thai tofu red curry with yellow, orange, and red peppers, onions, and zucchini

spicy Thai peanut noodles with tofu
(seeing a theme? it was actually accidental)

prepping brussels sprouts for Fresh Brussels Sprout Salad
from Earth Eats, a podcast I love.

adding green onions to the brussels sprouts

Unfortunately, the brussels sprout salad was kinda disappointing.
In fairness, I didn't have the toasted sunflower seeds or the red pepper flakes.
But I did have tofu and a hot skillet, which did wonders.

Another disappointment: Thai peanut cakes from an otherwise normally fantastic cookbook, The Gate Easy vegetarian Cooking , from The Gate vegetarian restaurant in London.

I know what you're thinking: what kinda lameass food porn blogging cooks are we that we need the "easy" version, rather than the full version ? Well, we also have the full version, and it has some amazing recipes, but the dishes can take hours, and the ingredient lists are often super complex and obscure. So many recipes might be feasible if you live in San Francisco or NYC and have hours to shop, but you'll have to trust me: it's much more difficult in Atlanta.

Why a disappointment? Well, they just didn't hold together in frying. At all. And since they're vegan, we couldn't cheat with a binder like egg. I mixed in a bunch of flour, which made them hold together better, but also took away the fluffy texture and made them taste a little more mild. I still have some of the mix, so I might try to work on them more tonight.

Three people, one dinner party: six wine glasses, five pint glasses, one small wine glass (the chef's share!), two digestif glasses.
Among other delicious libations, we enjoyed a 1.5 liter magnum of Anchor's Our Special Ale 2009 , their always delicious xmas ale. Yum.

And here's just a hint of what a three dish dinner party does to your kitchen. (It was well worth it.)

Play with your food

No, I actually wasn't bored in Barcelona. I just felt like playing with my food, okay?

The cast & crew.


Huh? Why are you anthropomorphizing me?

HEY! I'M TALKIN' TO YOU!

Fine: we're gonna make a run for it!

Hey! Wait for us!

This is what happens when your food tries to run away.

And this is what happens when you let someone else play with your food for you (at the Sal Cafe.)

Spain's favorite pastimes

Top Three, of which I share none:

1) Smoking. Everywhere possible. I regularly came back to my room without having patronized a smoking bar or restaurant, and still smelled like I'd been bar-hopping in the mid 90s.

2) Ham. It's everywhere. On a rather silly wine show on the plane on the way back, Andrea Robinson mentioned in her Madrid visit that there are apparently over 400 varieities of ham in Spain. Yuck. Tapas in bars often seemed to be a slice of ham with some cheese on top of ham, garnished with ham.

2a) Footnote to my badmouthing Andrea Robinson: she *is* a Master Sommelier, and she was the first female master sommelier in the US. Oh, and her newly developed "you only need one wine glass" glasses, called "The One" , bear a very strong resemblance to the red wine glasses we have. From Costco. That cost $14 for eight, not $49.95 for four. But to continue my random digression, her show is amusing, except that it's really more about travel and eating and being lovey-dovey with her somewhat oafish husband John, and kind of not about wine. And she ooohhhs and aaahhhhs about every dish that is brought out to her, and loves every one, as well as every wine. Apparently she never gets even an average dish or bottle, or they just edit that crap out. In any case, she never really gives details about any of the wine she's drinking, beyond a couple adjectives, and some moaning.

3) Public nose-picking. Aggressive public nose picking. Like, not trying to just subtly clear up one that is really bothering you, but sticking your index finger way up your nostril and tunneling. Diggin' for gold. I'm not alone in this observation. Just google it, and check out quotes like this:

Though marvelously dressed, Spanish men often accompany their wardrobe with a finger in their nose. There is something about the climate or allergens in Spain that makes mucous glands run on overdrive. After about a week of being here, I understand the need for Madrileños to probe their nostrils in search of a green gooey reward. I take a more refined approach to my menacing mucus and blow my nose often, yet the snot never seems to stop. Even mucous glands cannot resist the vigor and vitality of Spain.

"The nose picking here is continuous," said 22-year-old Palo Alto student Cristina Mireles."I suppose the people here must have really dry boogers or enjoy it (nose picking) as a hobby."

Okay, now I really have to get some other stuff done, like send in my passport for renewal.

Back from Spain, and better living through pharmeceuticals

After an 11 hour* plane trip yesterday, got back and had delicious spicy peanut noodles with tofu, green onions and cilantro with J, and soon went to sleep. Well, after a week of being jet-lagged and generally sleeping poorly in Barcelona (which might also have had something to do with other guests in the hostal coming in from clubs through the wee hours of the morning) I took 2/3 of a melatonin before going to sleep, and got a good night's sleep for the first time since I left North America.

*11 hour plane trip? That sounds really long, right? Well, a bozo in business class (essentially first class since it was a two-class 767 ) decided as we began to taxi for takeoff that his tum-tum hurt. So the flight attendants called for doctors, and and Totally Inappropriately, announced the reason why they needed a doctor ("really bad stomach cramps.") Two guys, ostensibly doctors, wandered up from coach to business class, and after about ten minutes, the decision was made to go back to the gate. And get the idiot off. And then wait for his checked baggage to found and pulled off. And then wait for "1300 pounds" of fuel to top us off (which seems like an immense amount of fuel for taxi, but whatever.) (And here is what going down the google rabbithole can do: a cautionary tale about switching between the imperial and metric systems.)

So we finally got back into queue for takeoff about an hour late, and got up into the air. In the air:

* Four Christmases was surprisingly funny for much of it, until it turned into a stupid, formulaic romcom in the last 15 minutes.

* Four returning LDS missionaries were on the flight. First amusing thing was when one of the flights attendants (cue up Total Inappropriateness, Round 2!) just assumed that they were continuing on to Salt Lake City (they weren't, but the hyper-aggressive niceness of the LDS missionary caused them to be, well, really nice about it.) Then as Four Christmases cranked up, you could visibly see one of the two male missionaries get quite wide-eyed at the somewhat edgy pickup and sex scene in the very beginning, and the other look totally mystified.

* The plane was only about 1/3 full in coach, so people were playing musical seats most of the flight, which got surprisingly irritating. But I had a two-seat wide exit row to myself, so I can't really complain about the people who were stuffed into prison cells of Delta's 767 coach configuration needing to move. J and I flew to Belgium a couple years ago on a Delta 767 in coach, and I swore never again. I apparently forgot this when I booked the Barcelona trip, but the exit row made it totally tolerable.

More observations and some images to come: this post is already getting really long.

Barcelona

The city, in many parts, is teeming with people. Then it will feel oddly empty on some sidestreets.

Yesterday included putting my feet into the surprisingly pleasant Medeterranean, and lots of walking, and some mediocre tapas, and some decent wine.

Not sure what today's plan is. Still sleeping poorly, waking up every couple hours feeling wide awake, so I don´t have a ton of energy. Un cafe solo is definitely in my immediate future.

Taking a fair amount of pictures, but not sure how many are worthwhile. I´m starting to think about the literally hundreds of gigs of images I have on the computer at home that I mostly haven´t sorted.

Okay: time to do something not involving a computer!

How to get cheap green onions in Barcelona

1) Go to the market, and ask nicely for them.
2) Be mystified when the woman cuts off the top parts, but the green onions are enormous, so there is still plenty of stuff left.
3) Ignore the sign on top of them: it's wrong.
4) Don't speak or comprehend adequate Spanish, so when the woman rattles off the price too quickly and you give her forty euro cents too little, she is too frustrated with your crappy Spanish to bother, and just tells you it's okay.
5) Proceed to the ripe avocado table, and buy one for 27 euro cents.

A nice flight, lovely hostal: Hostal Campi, a nice three hour nap, some good walking around, an amazing museum: Museu d'Història de la Ciutat de Barcelona (MHCB). More of same for tomorrow (well, probably not another flight.)

Barcelona: Absurdly cheap wine. Amazing crowds. Lots of energy.

It's nice to be challenged to use my Spanish. I really wish I spoke more.

Okay: time for picnic dinner in the room.

Confidential to NPR: SERIOUSLY?

Driving back from Death Valley to Beatty, Nevada, NPR gave about ten seconds to reporting that Iran is threatening to pull out of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, and about four minutes to whether sandwiches are better cut diagonally or crosswise.

Vigiling

I was up the ass crack of dawn to help at the vigil, only to find out it was a false alarm. Now preparing for other (real) stuff.

99 miles of road under the bike, 99 miles of road

Rode from atlanta to columbus. On balance a good ride. Scenic, lots of small town and rural Georgia, nice to have the time to breathe and think. Definite down sides: aggressive dogs (especially in the dark) and the stomach upset and runs that made much of the second half, ummmm, complicated.

Tomorrow I go into high gear. As if a century ride isn't high enough. (Yes, I'm calling it a century, notwithstanding the missing 0.8 miles.)

AZ

A lovely weekend in arizona with great people. Busy and tiring, sure, but well worth it. I'll try to get up some images soon.

With one exception, the Sierra Vista police department was uniquely professional. One insecure, chest puffing turd with two little stars on his lapel was an ass, but every other officer I dealt with was just doing their job, calmly and dispassionately.

If only I could say the same for the obnoxious rude bigoted ignorant trash who made up the vast majority of the counterprotesters. From the scumbags on motorcycles who intentionatally tried to make their flapping flags hit us as they drove by (nice job swatting that ocotillo tree, dumbass) to the screeching troglodyte with the megaphone who was out again spewing venom, to the hateful trash with the bizarre anti-priest signs, it was an appallingly ugly display of poisonous human nature.

Sitting on a tiny plane from TUS to SLC, so over halfway done with trip #4 of 6 in three months, with one more to book (might be Barcelona!) Listening to the fantastic tribute album to Springsteen's Nebraska, Badlands.

Now if only there was any good food in the SLC airport. At least the local brews in the Sky Club will ease the pain: last time through, it was Park City Steamer (surprisingly excellent) and Uinta Golden Spike Hefeweizen (mediocre but drinkable.)

Big dudes

The two guys sitting in 7C and 7D on this tiny little regional jet are about 300 and 350 pounds. Have fun, guys!

Hippy?

At the end of today's protest, some kids were riding bmx bikes in a parking lot. I went to put something in the car, and one asked me, "Are you guys hippies?" I said "some of us would probably say yes, but I just like protests. I'm a lawyer, I help with the legal stuff." The kid said "Ohhhh." I think maybe I didn't explain it all that well.

My first mobile blog. Woo.

Sitting in a hotel room in Tucson, testing out mobile blogging, since I've recently joined the mobile generation. Yes, friends, that's right: I no longer have a cell phone that is six years old and reminiscent of a coffin, I have a Droid.

So far, as I told A who waxed enthusiastic about the Droid, I like most everything about it, and love a couple things. I LOVE the GPS navigation. It works vastly better than either of the two standalone GPS units I've owned. Being able to drag the google map around along your route is huge, and the street view photos provide a much better context when you're unclear on something than just a map with streets.

Obligatory flight/airport snark: woman boards the obnoxiously small plane; and I smell her from an aisle away. I immediately think ohhh, I hope the smoker isn't my immediate seatmate. She is. She sits down, drops her stuff on the floor, and starts fishing in her purse. She immediately offers me a mint. I politely decline, and she says okay, and puts them back without taking one herself. She says "Are you the one with the onions?" A little confused, I say, "uhhh, no." She responds "Good, 'cause someone just ate a ton of onions. if you figure out who it is, let me know, so i can offer them a mint." Her cigarettes are visible in her purse, and she smells like the smoking room at SLC. (When will the geniuses that run public health programs realize that if you make it easy for people to kill themselves and the people around them, they will, and it you make it more difficult, they'll be less inclined? Or at least not smell so freshly bad when they sit down next to me?)

That would be the whole story, except for this brief epilogue: she dunked her nasty little biscotti cookies in her diet coke to eat them.

Fortunately, it was a relatively short flight.

Now running around in Arizona, but apparently with plenty of time to blog.

Various & random airport observations

Sitting in a lovely Delta sky club in A: it's the secret one in the center (find the Chili's Too), not the consistently crowded one near A17. Great views but limited electricity in the northernmost part.

Well, this little room was great, if you can ignore the CNN Headline Noise in the adjacent room. Then Team Idiot rolled in and began babbling. Two women, one prattling away into her cell phone, another texting while shoveling in a bagel with cream cheese and trying to ignore guy in his 20s. Guy in his ~60s is visibly and audibly drunk at 8:36am, and working on a(nother) bloody mary and his cell phone.

Just watched a pretty shabby looking MD88 roll out of the nearest gate: from up here on the 2nd/2rd floor, you could see that it's been a while since they re-painted it.

Waiting on a flight to JFK en route to BOS for a some G time. Big times to come!

Delta baggage truck (one of those bizarrely cute Tug vehicles) just ran the baggage trailer over an orange cone and looked back, obviously surprised. (UPDATE: about 10 minutes later: a delta trash truck nailed one of the orange cones that a Delta poop truck (aka "lavatory waste") had just put down, about 50 feet from the first sad cone.)

On the MARTA train coming down here, there were at least three sets of identical twins, two of sets apparently going to the same expensive private school. One girl had both a iPhone/iTouch, and an iPod, and was working both of them while doing some sort of homework balanced on a Chinese language textbook. Her sister was going over some fairly complicated math homework that she had gotten a 34/45 (i.e., a C, at 75%) on. The twin brothers seemed to be mostly concerned with laying all the way out on the benches, shoes up and all, though brother #2 was also interested in repeatedly blowing bubbles and getting them stuck all over his upper lip, the pulling it off with some significant effort and starting the process over again.

Okay, about time to begin packing up for some good times on the plane. Woo!

Dinner party!

Briefly alluded to in the last post: a dinner party for seven people, with six courses, and 2.5 hours to cook = eek! I can only blame myself. What J and I started discussing as having soup and bread for three out of town friends, I turned in to a monster while reading cookbooks and shopping.

The menu:

• vegetarian chili: black beans, kidney beans, pinto beans, tomatoes, sauteed onions, garlic, sauteed zucchini, red wine (all organic except the wine!)
  
• pumpkin soup pureed
  
• spicy Thai peanut noodles: whole wheat spaghetti noodles, peanut butter, carrots, scallions, pan-seared tofu (all organic)
  
• sourdough bread, with dipping options: apple balsamic vinegar, fig balsamic, cherry balsamic, extra virgin olive oil, chili pepper oil
  
• stuffed baby bella mushrooms, with garlic, sauteed in a balsamic reduction and then baked
  
• spinach salad roasted red and yellow peppers, grapefruit, tomatoes, avocado (all organic)
  
• wine: three reds, a white, and a rose
  
• beer: Sweetwater IPA
  

All in all, despite my frantic cooking, it was a success. I didn't have time or mental energy to take pictures of everything, but here are a few images:

Onions. (Duh.)



Onions and carrots. (Duh.)




Zucchini, post-slicing, for the chili.




Onions, carrots, and zucchini being sauteed for the chili.




Vegetarian chili, early in the process.




Mushrooms after being wiped clean.




Mushrooms being prepped. (Stems in the bowl form a lot of the stuffing material.)




The mushroom stem and garlic mix for the stuffed mushrooms.




Post glazing, pre-stuffing, pre-baking baby bellas.




Sauteed tofu, before being pitched into the spicy Thai peanut noodles.




The balsamic assortment and some freshly polished wine glasses.




The stove isn't tilted toward the back, no matter how it looks.