Six months, and still so happy!

For our six-month anniversary, Fred and I stayed in and dined on mussels, double-cream Camembert and a baguette, washed down with white wine. Perfection! Here's an estimation of the calories, etc. Leave out the butter for a much healthier meal!

Mussels are SO easy to prepare, and they're so delicious. Make sure you keep them cold (preferably on ice) when you get them home. Then give them a good scrub and remove the barb (the stringy part that might be sticking out). Do this just before you cook them because this will kill the mussel. (Yes, they're still alive.) Discard any cracked or damaged/open shells.

In your largest pasta pot, saute 1/2 white onion, chopped or 2 shallots, chopped in 1 T olive oil over medium heat. Add a pinch of red pepper flakes and a garlic clove, chopped. After two minutes, add a cup of white wine and let it come to a boil. Add the mussels, give them a stir and put on the lid. After abot 30 seconds, give them another stir. Within a minute, the mussels should be open. Drain the juices and put the mussels on a platter. (Throw out any closed mussels; they were dead and not safe to eat.) Strain the pan juices (there could be grit or sand from the mussels) and pour them back into the pot. Add 1 T butter and stir until it melts. Pour the sauce over the mussels and throw a handful of chopped flat-leaf parsley over the top. Serve with baguette. Eat with a loved one.

Inspiration, in the form of soup...

For my dear friend Kristin Demers' last night in Cincinnati, we wanted to try someplace new, special and cheap. Myra's in Clifton fit the bill.
It's in a house across the street from a new development and strip mall in the middle of campus. Myra's is an institution on the UC campus -- it's been there since 1977.
There are myriad vegetarian dishes, plenty of ethnic choices (some of which even I hadn't heard of, like pulao) and tons of soups.
The place is tiny, so Fred and I arrived early and guiltily took over the largest table in the restaurant. After pita and tzatziki and a glass of Chablis, people started drifting in, as did the food. I had the most delicious wheatloaf with mushroom gravy, cheesy mashed potatoes and steamed veggies ... for $6.75.
Everybody ordered at least an appetizer and an entree, plus alcohol, and no one spent more than $15!!!
Myra's menu lists more than a dozen soups, and a board above the doorway lists the ones made fresh that day. Fred and I shared a bowl of the Thai pumpkin, and I also tried the Spinach Coconut....heavenly!
It's a rainy, chilly night, perfect for soup and sandwiches!

A failure of sorts

So remember that post a couple of days ago when I said I was going to eat vegan for a week? Yeah, well, didn't happen. That night, I went to Green Papaya with my Freedom Porject group. I was tempted by sushi and quickly gave in. Delicious, succulent, sweet, oh so good.... mmm. We got some funky rolls, and while I'm usually a purist, I do love a good spider roll.

You see that, I heart fried things sometimes, too.
Other than that meal (I had tofu choochee curry again, but it was NOT very hot.), I have stuck to the cruelty-free diet.

Eating tofu/soy substitutes makes me feel like I'm indulging myself. I felt slightly guilty yesterday and today when I ate a bacon-egg-cream cheese breakfast sandwich... but no pigs, chickens or cows were harmed in the making of my breakfast! Morningstar Farms makes a fabulous -- yet funny-looking -- fakin bacon. I ate two of the marbled reddish-pink and white slices (just 50 calories, take that, Piggy!) between two slices of Ezekiel 49 bread slathered with Tofutti Better Than Cream Cheese. To this I added a slice of soft tofu. Looks and tastes just like egg whites. Fool your friends by adding turmeric.

Delicious!

I stole a Rachael Ray recipe for spicy chicken satay sauce (Holy yum, Batman! Here's a recipe that sidetracked me while looking for the above link: salmon dumplings with coconut curry sauce. Omit the pork fat, s'il vous plait!) I've got a mild peanut/cashew allergy, but I love spicy peanut sauce. (Loved, is the correct verb, je pense.) So I swapped soynut butter and added extra red pepper flakes to this sauce. I also added crystallized ginger instead of sugar. I've been eating it for lunch all week with mixed veggies and my new Trader Joe's find (thanks to Polly!): orzo-red quinoa-baby chickpeas. Fantastique!

A side note: Quinoa is a phenomonal food. It's a whole grain, which keeps your insides happy, and is a nutritionally sound grain. It provides more protein than most grains (12-18%), and it has a wide range of amino acids! Throw some in with your rice, and you'll never know the difference.

Spicy, spicy, and some soy!

Work friend Kristin and I have had trouble getting our schedules aligned lately. First the cabin, then her mom's visit and wisdom-teeth surgery, then meetings at night for me and work for her. We've started a tradition of eating at a different (ethnic) restaurant each Wednesday, but we've skipped a few weeks. Green Papaya was her choice this week, and it was delicious!
I'm always on an unofficial quest to find my heat threshold, and in the U.S., Udipi's chana batura was the only dish to reach it -- and that was just one of a handful of times I ate it!
We arrived after 8:30, both famished: She'd had a couple of whiskey sours on a date, and I'd worked out beforehand. Sushi, curries, pad thai! Decisions, decisions.
I got choochee curry with tofu; Kristin got some basil noodles. We also got some sushi .(salmon skin roll and scallop nigiri for me. Yum!)
The heat scale was 1-4, so I got a 4. Heat aside, the curry was chock full of squash, eggplant, pineapple, tomatoes and red peppers, along with lightly fried tofu. The sauce was spectacular -- rich, coconuty... and spicy! It was perfectly balanced: sweet, sour, creamy, spicy, salty. An orgasm in the mouth.
My eyes welled up, my nose ran a bit, but I kept eating. Every bite made me feel better and better. Spicy food releases endorphins, so after a meal with a kick, it's like that post-sex feeling sometimes... although in a smaller dose. (The heat is pain, which tells your brain that to release the endorphins.) It causes a rush. This is why people like spicy food.
I ate it all.
I want more.
Sigh.
It was good for me.
Another great discovery this weekend: soybean butter.
I've got a little bit of a peanut allergy. (No anaphylactic shock, just gastrointesinal malaise and hives.) Growing up, my mom packed a PB-n-J sandwich in my lunch almost every day. Natural PB, even in the 80s, wheat bread and strawberry jam. By first grade, I'd decided I didn't like grape jam. My sister didn't like strawberry. This made for drama if the sandwiches were ever mixed up.

I haven't had a Reese's cup, a PB-n-J or a buckeye in more than three years. I've tried almond butter, but ce n'est pas pareil, as Colette was fond of saying. I'd given up on PB-n-Js, and then I noticed the soynut butter, which probably has been at Trader Joe's all along.
I fell in love with PB-n-Js once more.
I've eaten them for breakfast every day this week, on Ezekiel bread from TJ. It has no actual flour. It's all sprouted grains. I love it.

Soy and spice. I'm a happy girl!

Oh, and I've been experimenting with TVP. I'm sure everyone's anticipating an entry on the wonders of TVP. Wait for it. It's coming!

un weekend plein de bons repas et amis

It's noon on Sunday, and my weekend has been fabulous, despite the substantial apartment cleaning that awaits me today. (I have an in-home interview/inspection for Big Brothers/Big Sisters tomorrow night. It was rescheduled twice because of illness and a massive ice storm.)
Friday afternoon, I sat at my desk, anxiously awaiting news about that night's date with the international banker. Ever the diligent editrice, I left my phone on silent and forgot to check it. At 5, I noticed I had a message... oops. So plans had changed, and he invited me to the Ladysmith Black Mambazo concert at the Aronoff, then drinks.
The concert was great: The group's singing is mesmerizing, and their voices are so smooth that it makes their singing seem deceptively effortless. And... we had box seats! I felt so important!)
It didn't let out until 10, so by then the sushi place he'd chosen for drinks/nibbles (Miyoshi in Florence) was closed. So we went to the Celestial Steakhouse in Mount Adams. We were in the Incline Lounge, with its fantastic view of Cincinnati and NKy. We had a few rich bites and a bottle of wine and danced to an old-school jazz quartet. He kept raving about the lobster bisque, but I wasn't very impressed. But the rest of the night was great.
The next day I woke up early to retrieve my car from a downtown garage (I couldn't drive after half a bottle of wine!) and spent the day being productive. I tried to go to the new coffee shop in Covington, but it didn't open until 10, so I settled on the next-newest coffee house there. The Bean Haus' coffee is pretty good, and the employees were perky and kind. After a morning and afternoon full of errands, I returned to Pike Street for lunch. In the mood for a sandwich and having had nothing in my belly for more than 12 hours, I got the Washington Post panini with turkey, bacon, tomatoes, avocado and asiago mayo. It came with kettle chips for $6.50. Next time, I'd hold the mayo and perhaps the bacon. I secretly love bacon, despite its lack of nutritional value, but this was chewy not crispy. The sandwich was excellent, and the "artisan ciabatta bread" is fresh and crispy. The atmosphere is good, the location is convenient for me, and the food/drinks were good. They have fancy to-go lids that open and close. I still managed to dump tea on the floor of my car when I left. Typical Stepf.
Last night for dinner, I went to Honey in Northside with my old friend Bethany. After MapQuest betrayed me and sent me on a wild goose chase around the West Side, we finally arrived, despite freezing rain and numerous detours. The wait for a table was more than 30 minutes (9 p.m. on Saturday), but we were seated quickly at the bar. We intended to get appetizers and wine, then move to a table, but we soon filled up on our starters. We went with honey fries because I'd heard that they were good, along with some polenta. I wasn't too impressed with either, but the atmosphere was nice and I'd be willing to try again. The polenta was good but not outstanding, with a smokey, caramelized onion flavor, topped with smoked mozzerella and dried tomatoes. It just needed something else, but it was good. We should have gotten the salmon, our first choice. Not sure why we chose the polenta. The fries, a mix of sweet and Yukon gold, were cut too thinly and were pretty limp. The chili-lime-honey dipping sauce was great, but the fries were just too wimpy.
After those rich meals, I am back to my healthful eating. I've got a pot of brown rice on the stove and a tofu-spinach-roasted pepper lasagna in the oven.
I cook on Sundays so I have meals for lunch at the beginning of the week. I separate them immediately into single-serve containers so I'm not as tempted to overeat.

Mmm, Korean food

On a cold, slushy night like this one, Korean food is perfect. Kristin, her man friend and I headed to Riverside tonight after I got done at the Big E. He's going to Korea in a month, so he wanted the low-down on life as an ESL teacher and he'd never had Korean food.
Kristin, who's newer to Cinci that I am, had been there. Surprisingly, she stopped there once when she didn't want to go home for her dinner break.
I had dolsot bibimbap, like a Korean salad in a giant stone pot. They put a sunny-side up egg on top, and you mix in kochu jang (hot pepper paste) and stir the whole thing up. The rice on the bottom gets crispy and delicious! Yum!
Riverside serves traditional ban-chan (side dishes) with each meal -- nine of them. Tonight: kimchi, spicy spinach, sesame spinach, spicy radish, mushrooms, cucumber-crab salad, spicy cucumbers, sweet potatoes and something else. I can cook Korean fairly well, but the side dishes are tough. I never make more than one or two... it's such a treat to get so many at once.
Greg, Kristin's boy toy, wanted to try soju, the traditional Korean liquor. At $16 (instead of $2 or less at restaurants in Korea), we opted against a bottle of it.
We used to buy bottles and bottles of the stuff (at 88 cents each in the store), along with random juices and sodas and mix it all up in a five-gallon bucket at Monique's house. We'd usually party till well past dawn, and Shan and I'd spend the entire next day recovering at Monique and Jen's apartment. Soju is wicked, wicked stuff. Even a sip of it makes me sick now.
When I dated Joon-Hui, I learned to drink it like Korean men did: at room temperature and in shots, bottle after bottle. One night we went out for sushi and had three bottles. Ugh. That's when I stopped trying to keep up with locals. (After, I just tried to keep up with the expats, which proved dangerous enough to my liver!)
So, kids, beware the soju. It's potent stuff.
Sunday I went to Wild Oats to get some spices and soymilk. Random, but c'est moi. I bought turmeric, curry and garam masala. I mixed a teaspoon each of those, along with two cloves of garlic and some cumin and added it to the inside of a spaghetti squash. Yum. A quick, easy lunch for a few days.
My diet right now, if not my life and this entry, is spicy.

finally reaching my heat threshold, and a review of heat

It's freakishly cold in Cincinnati this weekend, so I decided to heat up with a review of hot food around town.
I love hot food, the spicier the better. After a year of Korean food, I have a pretty strong gut when it comes to spice, so I tend to be a bit ballsy when eating out. On a scale of 1-10, I usually go with 10 at Thai, Korean and Chinese places and an 8 at Indian restaurants.
I met my match at my favorite restaurant, Udipi. I ordered chana batura, which is a light, fried balloonlike bread with spiced chickpeas on the side. I had ordered this a couple of times before, but this time I asked for "extra spicy."
PJ laughed as tears ran down my face and I greedily slurped raita in between long, exaggerated inhales through pursed lips. My nose ran incessantly, but I kept eating. My stomach would be fine and my fiery lips would cool. The chickpeas were so rich, so spicy, so delicious! I couldn't stop.
Oh, and a meal at Udipi for two with appetizers, never goes above $20! More reason to love it!
Here are my observations on other spicy dishes I've eaten recently.
Riverside, in Covington: Tofu soup with clams. 2, perhaps. As far as Korean food goes, it was tame. (But the food there is delicious and quite authentic!)
Teak, in Mount Adams: Seafood Choochee curry. Oh, the squid was divine. So tender, as it should be! I ordered an 8 the first time and felt nothing. The second time there I went for a 9, which was a nice 4 or so at dinner. The next day, the leftovers were definitely a 9. Their curries are the best I've found in town.
Wild Ginger, in Mount Adams, also makes good curries. I ordered salmon choochee there a couple of weeks ago, and an 8 was nicely flavored but not hot enough. Not even the leftovers were fiery. Oh, and the salmon -- a nice-size fillet -- was buried beneath the vegetables and sauce. Perhaps this was to conceal that it had been dreadfully overcooked. I love a crispy piece of salmon, but this piece was crunchy most of the way through. The thinner end of the fillet was nearly inedible. The last time I'd been there I ordered a green curry with chicken. I think I ordered a 6, because my friend and I were planning to share. It was bland.
My "book club" went to Aqua in Mount Lookout for half-price sushi night two Wednesdays ago. The sushi was fabulous, as were the scene and the wine, but the spicy scallop rolls were what really stole my heart. The scallops were fresh, sweet and succulently tender. The spice almost detracted from them, but the heat was so serendipitous that I didn't mind.
I'm always looking for good ethnic food, so share!

Where I've eaten. (updated frequently)

(Mostly for me)
Vinyl
Mesh
Udipi
aoi
Wild Ginger
Teak
Riverside
Moon Garden
Molly Malone's
Hideaway
Greenup Cafe
Chez Nora
Zola's

Sweetbreads and other new treats

Life, sometimes, is funny. Last night I worked the election desk in the Kentucky bureau, taking results from a reporter in Campbell County. It was a bit of an ass-backwards setup because Kentucky has no direct feed unlike Ohio. I was there until 11:30, then came home and passed out.
I went to work an hour late today and just wanted to come home and sleep. But for reasons I shouldn't blog about, I was offered a great dinner... at a great, five-star restaurant downtown.
The menu:
Côtes du Rhône rosé
amuse bouche: tuna tartare with a yummy sauce and micro cilantro
oyster velouté with seared sweetbreads and a poached oyster with purple peruvian potato chips
bonus course: skate in a fabulous sauce with grilled baby fennel
duck with curry sauce and a cabbage roll stuffed with basmati rice
with a great pinot noir
cheese course...
mmm.... very happy I am.
Sweetbreads are something I've always wanted to try. I was afraid of them at first, but the texture is velvety inside and crisp outside. They were perfect. Heavenly.
The skate has a crablike texture. Yum!!!
And the cheeses: a sheep's milk cheese from France, firm and a bit pungent, served with honey and honeycomb. A weeping, soft sheep's cheese from Portugal, with a kumquat. The grapefruit flavor, slightly bitter and acidic, mellowed the cheese. And a fine blue from Spain, with a fig jelly. Divine!
Et puis, je ferai dodo!