Pancakes are dinner too

Today's market in Copley yielded a great take of fresh, local vegetables for not a lot of money, and as I rode the train home and thought about food, as I very frequently do, a plan came together. Informed by last summer's fritter experiments and a savory spinach pancake recipe from the NYT last March, I raided the fridge in my trademark style and really knocked it out of the park. Culinarily speaking. I must say.

Chard and Sweet Corn Buttermilk (Dinner) Pancakes
serves two with a salad for dinner or one as dinner, then lunch
Prepare, combine, and set aside:
~one shallot (or two scallions, or some onion, whatever), fine dice
~kernels cut off one medium-large ear of fresh sweet corn
~about 1 1/2 c. loosely packed chopped fresh tender chard
~about 1 tsp minced lemon zest
Thoroughly mix together dry ingredients in a large bowl and set aside:
~1 c. flour
~1/4 tsp baking soda
~1/4 tsp + a dash of salt
~1/8 tsp nutmeg
~1/8 tsp cayenne (to taste)
~dash black pepper
Prep wet ingredients:
~3/4 c. buttermilk
~1 egg, beaten in to buttermilk
~2 tsp olive oil, beaten in to liquids

Heat your skillet or griddle of choice in your standard pancaking procedure. (For me, this means heating my trusty one-burner round cast iron flat griddle, which is cured as black as a spade and as nonstick as...a teflon...spade.) Add wet ingredients to dry and mix just to combine and break up lumps. Dump vegetable ingredients into batter and fold in, coating evenly. If it seems too thick, mix in a splash of buttermilk at a time until it has a bit of flow--but keep it tight. Drop onto the medium-hot pan by the 1/4 cup or so, spreading the pancake evenly out to about 1/2 to 3/4 inch thick to ensure that it cooks through. Cook on one side until golden; flip and attain goldenness on side two. You're aiming to give the vegetables a slight cooking before you've overdone the 'cake. Keep completed 'cakes warm in a heated oven (unless it's summer and that's just a stupid idea) and eat promptly with ad hoc sauce detailed below.

Impromptu tomato chutney for pancakes
~1 c. quartered grape tomatoes
~8 basil leaves, chopped fine
~juice of 1/2 lemon
~salsa to taste
Mix all together to desired taste and consistency. Eat with pancakes.

+ + +

Get to know the "planover," friend: it's more intentional than the leftover and telegraphs a certain agency and kitchen foresight to those looking at your lunch in the office, leading often to lunch envy and "oooo, are those planovers?" Yes; yes they are.

Note also that the above is a half recipe from its original jumping off point of the NYT 'cake formula, which leads me to believe that you can double it with ease and without fear.

My own advice

As you may know, I am a proponent of shopping your local businesses before shopping the chains or the internet. When I'm lucky enough to have more than one local to choose from, I try to buy from all pretty equally, unless there is a clearly superior vendor (as with Laurie's Planet of Sound in Chicago, a far, far better record store in my experience than Reckless Records).

For comic books in Boston, this has meant that I've gone to three different shops.

I absolutely love New England Comics, specifically their Malden location. The store is huge, open, and clearly organized, and the staff there has been really friendly, helpful, and engaged--they even took the time to talk shop with me on a Saturday before NY ComicCon. But it takes me a bus and a train, or two train lines, to get there, so it's not my monthly stop.

My more regular monthly comics purveyor has been Newbury Comics, because I can get records there as well, they have a couple of locations I can hit without too much trouble, and they send a weekly email of what's out that week, reminding me to go get my fixes in a timely manner. But with offerings ranging from dumb T-shirts ("Moustache Rides, $0.25!") to DVDs to "punk" belt buckles, Sox caps, and vinyl figurines, the store pulls in a customer and employee base that isn't specifically made up of the kind of fanboy (gender inclusive) that I aspire to be. But it's been a perfectly serviceable experience.

My third comic shop is Comicazi, in my neighbourhood. A tighter space, but still a comprehensive selection. Things with Comicazi had been just fine--until yesterday. Yesterday I'd been to Newbury to get some issues of Buffy Season 8, but because I was behind a few months (for shame!) I needed multiple issues: 14 through 16, inclusive. Newbury did not have 14. Now, it is my own fault that I am short an ish and I really should keep up better, but damn if I did not want 14. This story arc ("Wolves at the Gate") has had at least one MAJOR BOMBSHELL and I neeeeeed every ish. I went to Comicazi after Newbury and scanned the shelves for 14, but it wasn't there. So I asked the guy at the counter, mostly for confirmation, "if a back issue of a comic isn't up on the shelf, you totally do not have it, huh?" He asked which one, and when I said "Buffy 14" something wonderful happened. He went to a stack behind the counter of every Buffy single issue, every Buffy trade, every omnibus. "This guy asked me to hold these for him, and I've held every one, but he's never shown up to buy them and I never see him. I'm going to sell 'his' 14 to you, because he never came through and I am a business owner. If he were a True Believer, he would have come in for them, and you should have this."

I felt both awesome and awful, because in two ways I'd been a bad fangirl: I'd dallied in getting the ish in the first place, and I'd bought the other issues somewhere else. This guy didn't know me from nobody. I'd only been in a couple of times, but he dipped into a delinquent customer's stash for me. So the question of where I will get all comics henceforth is certainly answered. These guys should get all of my local money. I did not deserve that ish, but I will work to deserve it. I've been a fool, Comicazi! Forgive me! I'll be back!

Quick hits

Delivery methods for Coca-Cola Classic in the order of their relative deliciousness to me, EDITED (1 being most, 5 being least):

1. glass bottle coke from Mexico (thanks for the reminders, Daisy and Vivek...)
2. from the fountain at McDonald's
3. from any fountain
4. out of a can
5. out of a 2-liter bottle
6. out of any plastic bottle

Finest of the Magnum ice cream bars (available in Australia and other UK-type locales), in order of fineness (1 being most, 5 being least):

1. Magnum EGO
2. the one that was the multi-chocolate coated with chocolate and a layer of fudge
3. Magnum Crunch
4. plain
5. the one with almonds

Subjective personal ranking of the 7 Dark Tower novels, "best" (1) to "less best" (7):

1. 7
2. 5
3. 4
4. 3
5. 1
6. 2
7. 6

When presented with a plate of nigiri-sushi and maki, the order in which I will eat it:

1. hamachi
2. cucumber roll
3. maguro
4. shrimp
5. octopus
6. eel
7. eel roll
8. hamachi again
9. oshinko roll

When presented with a long list of email addresses to send a message to, the order in which I will list them:

1. alphabetically

M&Ms varieties, from personal best to worst:

1. peanut
2. peanut butter
3. "crunch"
4. almond
5. rolled under the couch by accident
6. plain

Yes, I baked

It's well known around the House of the Rising Somerville that I am the cook, not the baker. I am more comfortable when I can add, fix, doctor as I go; the pot's on the stove and it could all change moment to moment. Baking requires faith on two levels: that the recipe will prove worth it and that I've done it right, because once I close the door it's all over. I lack this faith. It's also almost certainly a control issue--the same reason I feel safer in a car than in a plane. I need to be in charge of the stew.

All the same, I baked this past weekend. My first run at biscotti was a total success. I owe most of this to the stupid-proof nature of biscotti: sugar, flour, whole eggs, baking powder, pinch salt, butter (or not), spices, flavours, fruit (or not). The other part I owe to the best baking book I own: Cook's Illustrated's Baking Illustrated. I just like reading the dang thing, too, but every recipe we've tried has worked out. The lemon-anise biscotti was no exception, and thanks to their detailed description of how they arrived at the perfect recipe, I know why the other recipe, from a very flash looking but sadly disappointing other baking book, was good, but not The Best Recipe.

So now I have about 30 lemon-anise and about 30 cherry-almond biscotti up in my kitchen. I foresee a lot of dunking in my near future.

+ + +

The family Rocket is coming to town. Ma and Pa roll into the airport tomorrow evening, and the first thing we'll do is dunk biscotti into warm milk, before bed. The next day, I'll enlist their help in hanging the new art before we go on a rangy walk around town, hitting my high spots: brunch, museums, dinner in my favorite spot. Friday is the Canada Day of the U.S., also known as the Fourth of July, also known as the Rocket parental wedding anniversary. We'll probably make a pizza and try to overhear the Pops. Pops. I just like saying Pops. Pops. Anyway, I've shored up milk, eggs, coffee, tea, and all those things you'd need to either hit the Oregon Trail or have your folks over. Popsicles and sorbet in the freezer, white wine and sherry and beer in the fridge.

You'll understand if I'm not around for a few days. First, the walkies; then, the deeply overindulgent eating; then, the POPS; then, the recovery.

Thensday

When I related the story of how I am granted every other Friday off in the summer, my friend C remarked at my great skill at having manipulated space-time to get and hold on to a regularly occurring Thensday. You know: a day suspended off of the calendar, not planned, frequently unexpected, and wholly welcome. Snow days. Days when a rolling brown-out shuts down your parent company's server in Jersey and you all get to go home, or when the transformer on your building makes with the big boom and all the computer screens go blank. Every other Friday all summer for me. What better way to spend it than with flagrant idleness, unapologetic consumption, early drinking, and an action movie?

That's what I thought you'd say.

C and S and I arrived at a new-to-me hole-in-the-wall pub in Cambridge at around 11:30 and began to consume mass quantities. And nachos. When the rains came, we retreated from the patio into the bar and said "well, that settles it" and had another round. By the time we began to be a little sensitive about having outlasted multiple rounds of other patrons, the idea came up to go see the 4:15 of the new Angie Jolie shoot 'em up, Wanted.

This is the kind of movie that, upon seeing previews, prompts my ladyfriend and I to turn to each other and start a low, slowly accelerating chant of "brew and view, Brew and View, BREW and VIEW! BREW AND VIEW!!!" The Brew and View runs nights at the Vic in Chicago when they're not hosting a show; for a solid fiver, they play you two (three on Fridays and Saturdays) movies and the bar serves a high-value double (more like triple) well drink for not a ton of cashola. There are certain movies that lend themselves so well to this concept that I want to view them at the Brew and View, even though I wouldn't see them in any other circumstance (in a regular theater, at home, on a plane, at a friend's house...). Summer dreck fares especially well paired with beers, G&Ts, and cheap popcorn swiped off the abandoned table of the couple who are not staying for the second feature.

Wanted is most certainly summer dreck. Only two (almost three) things allowed me to endure it: I love the director Timur somethingsomething (Night Watch, Day Watch), I was drunk, and I have a shameful attraction to Angelina Jolie. That last one is only about 1/2 of a thing, though, as I find her less and less enrapturing as she acquires a colonialist's menagerie of global children. A far cry from "Hack the Planet," which is how I like to remember her. Oh, pixie cut Angie Jolie, you can make it all the way into my wireless network any weekend evening. *ahem* Where was I...ah yes, "dreck." It wasn't the alco-mo-hol that killed my brain cells, it was this movie. It was the un-twist ultimate twist near the end, the non-evocative evocation to action as the final line, the deeply uncompelling characters (how in the bright hell do you make a fraternity of weaver-assassins THIS boring?), and, on top of it all, an overqualified Morgan Freeman phoning--nay, texting--it in. I wanted to say, "This is Jack's disappointment at this worst realization of what Fight Club could be said to have given us as a film legacy." At least the chase scenes were filled with chases, and the film entire had that little Russian "I don't know what" (how do they say je ne sais quoi in Russian? Maybe they don't ever not know what...) that I love from Timur what'shisname.

I feel badly that C and S suffered through it with me, but they were also real tight by this time, and we'd had some ice cream, so the synapses that weren't languid with Newcastle were hopped up on sugar and butterfat.

If that's not a recipe for a summer movie experience, I just don't know what is.

Shouts out

I want to take a quick moment to holla for some new additions to my blog roll over there, on the right. No, your right. Stage left. Yeah. Awesome.

The Wilhelm Scream - Helmed by an able gent indeed, the Wilhelm Scream is a GIFT to the blog world and we welcome it and Kumail with open damned arms. Saying it contains movie reviews is like saying that little Reagan had a behavioral disorder. Read it, live it, write a little song for it. I did, and it goes a little someth...hey, where're you going?

Eat Food - It's Sarah's food blog and maybe if we're lucky she'll update it from her summer in Florida. In a string bikini. And an apron, because burning yourself is not funny, y'all.

Real Media Ethics - From the moment Anne launched the good ship OH NO THE MEDIA DI'INT, I've been hanging on her every word. Smart, incisive, and well written, it's everything I didn't even know I needed from a media blog.

The Blog of Diminishing Returns - Econ prof Seth is wicked smart, and consistently pulls the curtain back from those little things that I always think must be fascinating from an economist's point of view. I do not have this point of view: I spent two semesters in econ classes and all I remember is cutting class with DS and, bizarrely, having a strong craving for Diet Coke...

The Highfield Bread Oven - Mark the trucker gets home to Maryland every couple of weekends, at which points he works on his bread oven. Progress is gradual but steady, and I always wish I were there.

They join the ladies at Puffery and the astoundingly thorough and worth it Less Than a Shoestring as topical (rather than strictly personal) reads that I hit.

Surf away, my minions. Can I call you that? Minions? I love you.

Getting things done

I did a large load of dishes tonight. First, I was astounded that I used so few bowls and so many spoons. Does not compute. Second, I take a great deal of pleasure in doing as many dishes as possible with as little water and the most appropriate amount of soap possible. Some people get virtuously off when they buy organic food; I enjoy aggressively conserving water. Other aggressive acts of conservation/cheapskatery: we've been using and washing and reusing the same 20 or so gallon storage bags for about three years.

In other news, June's going by very quickly. I'd worked out a complex explanation of why it feels this way, involving the long duration of the first week of June--which was a full week long--and also the pocket of business travel that interfered with my use of the Big Corporate Employer-granted summer hours (every other Friday off). I really thought I'd have a little more summer in my summer, but looking down the barrel of my remaining weeks I see a lot of plans and a little less time than I'd imagined back in May.

Anyway, with my girl in Peru I'd made myself a list of home improvements and crafty-type projects to tackle while I have lots of self time. The first was, ah, to blog regularly. So. Cross that one off. The balance:

* frame comic book (Buffy #1, signed; thanks KP!)
* have framed handpainted fabric from India (two years after acquisition!)
* reupholster chair (found it in the alley!)
* design & sew arm covers for sofa (bad kitty! no shreddy!)
* get all up under the range top on my old stove and clean all the crap left there by the previous tenants (and us...)
* clean and oil dining room table
* top the craft desk with cork
* set up sewing machine/craft table on newly corked desk
* make requested aprons (3x! Late Mother's Day, Christmas, and birthdays! Bad Nora!)
* find killer sundress pattern
* make same
* purge shoes
* organize closet
* organize storage room on back of apartment
* conduct a modest book purge; sell as many as possible via Half.com
* seal tub edge with caulked tape
* get made when this method fails epically
* buy TV from that one kid
* sell TV when it turns out to be completely not what we thought it was
* clean fridge interior
* turn moderately ratty cashmere sweater into cardigan
* turn very ratty cashmere into pillows
* turn super ratty duvet into pillows

I feel like my progress has been adequate, and if I remembered how to write the strikethrough tag in HTML, you'd also feel that way, on my behalf, as you view the many things crossed off. It's a shame I don't remember all that self-taught coding. That's for next year.

+ + +

Another thing on my list: eating breakfast. I was totally inspired by Sarah at Brood. This might not seem so big, but it is for me, for despite my firm belief that breakfast is The Most Important Meal of the Day, I cannot seem to haul my ass out of bed the sufficient five to seven minutes that a brief morning meal would require. I like to think that my first and second cups of coffee at the office are almost a meal, but that's completely delusional. So I've been making breakfast happen, and I've been successful for almost three weeks. I try for protein and speed, and I try not to, oh, slice my finger open or choke or spill on myself or anything. English muffins have been buy-one-get-one lately, so this morning I had one with goat cheese and honey and tomorrow I will eat one with peanut butter. Some mornings I have a hard boiled egg and a ton of fruit.

And what's the freaking deal with fruit salad? I would never sit down and eat a banana, 12 strawberries, a handful of frozen raspberries, and two kiwi fruit - that's a ton of fruit at once, and, having grown up lower middle class, I find eating that much fruit a little decadent. But I will readily scarf that amount of fruit in a fruit salad.

My breakfast has a first name, it's NOM NOM NOM NOM NOM.