Note to selves

It's Will's birthday.

Happy birthday, Will.

Monopoly Monarch

After a nail-biter of a game (well, at least for a round or two) I have emerged as the new Monopoly King, dethroning King Richard. I am sure my reign will not last, as I expect to be swiftly usurped in an unimpressive effort, where I will only be able to get my hands on a railroad, a utility, and a green territory.

So for now, it's good to be king =D

Le cassoulet de Dr. Dickolas

Lately I've been really into cooking beans. They're such a wonder food: earthy, hearty, satisfying, healthy, and packed with protein and fibre. Instead of just boiling them up and eating them with rice Silver Age Jowen-style, I've been trying to learn real bean recipes. There's something very food-therapy, if I may be so hipster, about slow-cooking a big pot of beans for hours until you end up with a piping-hot bowl of stew. So far I've done plain black beans and ham, cajun red beans, baked beans, and this time...

... cassoulet, the classic French dish. I always thought it was just some kind of fancy white bean soup, but it turns out it's a peasant's stew of duck (fat) and pork (fat) with beans there to soak up all of the flavours (fats). Guided largely by this recipe, we begin.

Instead of cannelini beans, I go with Great Northerns, just because I had them on hand. Instead of fresh duck legs, I go with two fresh legs and two confited. Bacon was replaced by a ham hock, because Wikipedia told me that both pork and pork rind are traditional. For sausages, two garlic pork sausages. I browned the fresh duck and sausage and reserved about half the fat. I put the mirepoix in and sweated it, then dropped the confit and the ham shank in along with a litre of water. On top of this went three roma tomatoes (which I should have peeled, but oh well). This was boiled for 15 minutes to get some broth going. I also dropped in some fresh thyme and a bay leaf. I should have made a bouquet garni, but I don't have any kitchen string. Later I decide to throw in my leftover tomato paste after all.

At this stage I added the browned meats back in along with all the beans. Here we are, pre-slow-cook:



Note the fat already collecting at the top of the broth. The fresh duck is the one with the pepper on it; the confit is the pallid grey one in the middle. The garlic sausages are looking a little bit too hot dog-gy for me at this point.

Sometime in the next 45 minutes, I realize I forgot to add parsley, so I drop in about two teaspoons of dried parsley. I took it out at 45 minutes to see if it needs more liquid:



It does not. Notice the ham hock on the right, peeking out. The duck looks positively marvellous at this point, but we soldier on. Some salt, some pepper, everyone back in the pool...

... and back out after about two hours. The meat has all basically disintegrated at this point; I'm not sure it was supposed to do that, but let's just run with it.



No need for the bones anymore, or the bay leaf:



I would have taken out the thyme but I forgot to pick it off the top before I gave the whole thing a stir. I take out what I can; I'm sure the eater won't mind a little fresh thyme here and there. A good dose of salt and paprika, and a bit of cayenne, follow. On goes a layer of panko, followed by the reserved duck fat, followed by a bit more panko, and back into the oven at 350. This didn't brown, so I cranked it up to 425, drizzled a bit of olive oil on, and gave it about 15 minutes:



Overall it's pretty good. The duck and pork flavours have basically melded into one overall meat funk, which is alright if perhaps a bit too heavy on the pork side and not heavy enough on the duck. The breadcrumb topping gives a nice crunch where you can get some; in the future I should really make this in a proper roasting pan so that I can get a nice toasty layer on top. Maybe -- maybe -- some white wine to brighten things up a tad, but I'm not sure you're really going for "bright" with cassoulet.

Spot Prawns

It's spot prawn season again, or rather it has been spot prawn season for the last few weeks already.

$8.99/lb at Chinatown

Life is hard for tasty animals. I'll use the
heads to make a soup later.

Mixed with yum

Shrimp on the BBQ

An experiment with prawn ceviche.
It was OK.

Moving to a bigger place

My vegetable plants are now enjoying their new home. They each have a 2 gallon pot to grow in with fresh top soil. Their roots were all squished up in that tiny little rectangular pot so I'm sure they are much happier now.

I checked out the new Whole Foods today on Cambie and Broadway. They had whole chickens on sale for $3.99/lb which still isn't very cheap, but I spotted one that was mislabeled and had a price of $2.99/lb! Well I grabbed that bird and ran to the cashier. Cha-ching!

Growing Vegetables

In another unintentional step to becoming a survivalist, I bought these three little plants:

Aren't they cute?

I was walking past a local grocery store and saw them outside - 3 for $2, how could I not buy them? So in 60-70 more days I will hopefully have a bounty of Roma tomatoes, sweet 100 tomatoes (I've never heard of them either), and sweet peppers.

Edit: After some research I have discovered that some tomatoes grow best in a large container, like 15 gallons large. And they like direct sunlight. I have neither a 15 gallon container nor an apartment that receives direct sunlight. Well at least the plants were cheap.

Did someone say clambake?

Stainless steel, 24 quarts, with a 6mm aluminum sandwich bottom, bitches. Aww yeah!