Empty
If you have a moment, I highly advise getting drunk in an international airport at around 2 in the morning. You can live out all your end of the world fantasies. It's just you and an odd collection of Asian families left in an enormous altar to mankind's desire to beat physics and cripple the environment.
mmmmm expired
Instead of going to the store Monday, I made a tofu + cheese quesadilla.
The tofu "expired" in July.
The tortilla seen here was in an unopened bag of ten that has been in the fridge for maybe six months?
The drink was a mixture of ginger ale a friend abandoned and a can off terrible off brand black cherry cola.
The salsa will not expire until 2009, but it was actually the nastiest part of the meal.
The cheese was not expired.
I call it "the refusal to go to the store quesadilla."
The whole concoction was surprisingly edible, though the texture of the tofu was a little weird. I am not a fan of extra firm.
Feeling all Japan-y
A few hours ago I decided that it would be a good idea to go and hike up mount Fuji in Japan. After viewing several funny Japanese style maps (http://www.city.fujiyoshida.yamanashi.jp/div/english/html/climbing_map.html) I came across something that is very, very, irksome:
Gorembaguchi Route
Disadvantages of this trail:
- Fewer mountain huts (one each at the 6th, 7th, and 8th station)
- During descent ash can make clothes and shoes very dirty, also shoes may fill with ash if gaiters or other covering are not worn.
- Transportation to the fifth station is limited- the last bus from JR Gotemba station to the 5th station leaves around 5 pm.
- No vending machines located on this trail after the fifth station.
NO VENDING MACHINES? Seriously, it's a mountain. Is it not possible to live 8 hours without getting food from a machine? I just don't understand. I thought North Americans were bad with their processed, high sugar diets, but when was the last time you've seen a vending machine even remotely close to any sort of outdoorsy trail? I think I might put Japan on hold (not that it was ever on) until my immunity to real food builds up.
kumara chips
are a delicious food.
Its 9:30pm and I'm just about to have dinner. also organising craft fair crap.... notice the lack of proper punctuation in this post cause I'm tired. So very tired. Its amazing how sleeping lots makes no difference to that fact.
I'm judging a band competition tomorrow night. Should be fun, free food, free beer
good times.
yum
After I went out in the outdoors for about a week, I've felt intense cravings for all sorts of foods, like I hadn't eaten for months. I'm starting to get annoyed with it, since I have to go shopping all the time. Tonight I plan for mojitos and stir-fry. And yesterday I had the ever so yummy Yves veggie dogs (all you haters don't know what you're missing!). I think I mostly decided to post this because veggie/tofu dogs are way awesome and I could go for a few more right now.
More than Nothing: Blackberries
Every summer I go on a blackberry bender; picking, cleaning and cooking up as much of the tasty morsels as I can. Usually I make jelly and syrup because I can't stand the seeds, but this year I found out I can also make jam after straining the seeds out.
It's still a lot of work, but WAY less than jelly. For a good jelly the fruit must be strained twice through like three layers of cheesecloth. It takes literally days, during which time the kitchen is taken up with various pots and collanders dripping berry juice ever so slowly.
Plus to make jelly you need pectin, which I don't like to use (because you have to add even more sugar). So I use either the quince from my tree, if it has any which it didn't this year, or under-ripe apples which I pick from a couple of trees down my street. I cook the apples separately, they also need to be properly strained, then - once the berry juice is ready to go - add the apple gunk as pectin and cross my fingers.
Often I get a couple of jars of jelly, then the rest comes out as syrup because it just doesn't set up (not enough sugar probably). That's OK though, the syrup is just as tasty and has many uses, even to slop all over some toast once the jelly runs out.
This year I checked a different cookbook and found I can indeed make jam, just put it through a strainer to get rid of the seeds. A three-day operation turned into one afternoon (not counting the berry picking which takes a few hours and a LOT of scratches plus some bug bites).
Gaze upon the loveliness:
you know you want it
freshly picked
the messy and unpleasant chore of straining
straining out the seeds
mmm, sweet delicious, ready for cooking
delicious ready to cook
gunk that was removed
yucky seeds
mmm, finished!
lovely jam finished
The jars are now in my fridge and after the second day set up quite well. Still a wee bit runny, because I use way less sugar than I'm supposed to, but I don't mind that. Yum yum, well worth the Sunday afternoon's effort!