Words’ End

I’ve put up the latest version of RolandHT. It can only be viewed with (freely available) Mozilla/Firefox, or another XSLT-aware browser. I don’t know of any besides Firefox, so if you do, please let me know the browser and the operating system(s) on which you’ve used it.

The site definitely needs a help section, and some more intuitive navigation. For now, a few usage notes:

– The links up top don’t do anything yet.

– Pick an excerpt from the list on the left. Mouseover themes/characters/imagery that show up over the sword, and see what happens. Then click on a theme or character or image, and see what happens now.

– Click on the red “reset” at top right to return to initial state.

– For three other nifty features, find the excerpt named “Missionary Work.” Click on the “i” beside the name of the work; click on the quill in the second stanza; mouseover any underlined word.

– Check out also the excerpt, near the very bottom, titled “Battle Near Saragossa.” Click on the image.

– If something seems aesthetically or functionally wrong, it would be lovely if you emailed me to let me know.

– This is a work in progress. If you see the word “check” where you expect information, I’m working on it.

In other news, a couple of questions for the internet. The first, in two parts, is Roland-related – I’d like to know more about two geographical locations. One is Terra Major:

“Could one achieve that Rollant’s life was lost,

Charle’s right arm were from his body torn;

Though there remained his marvellous great host,

He’ld not again assemble in such force;

Terra Major would languish in repose.”

Is TM a region? Is it in Europe? If not, what is it (another name for Charlemagne’s Holy Roman Empire?)?

The other place is a bit more mysterious, partly because it’s in Middle English:

Roulond rod furthe—he wold not rest, I wene—

he sawe wher a Sairsin seche hym wold,

kinge was of Criklond, croun[y]d with gold.

What, pray tell, is Criklond?

And finally, a non-Roland-related query: what’s your favorite slow-cooker recipe? Things I’m trying to stay away from: large chunks of boiled onions (I’ve disliked them since forever), and really heavy dishes like mac and cheese. Meat is great, veggies are great, seafood that’s sturdy enough to survive a slow cooker is great, wacky but tasty ingredients totally get bonus points. Non-desserts is what I’m after.

We spent Friday-to-Saturday night awake, Ethan and I and Jennafer the Awesome Housemate and friend Dave, celebrating Solstice. There was cribbage and Futurama and coffee with Bailey’s and whiskey and talking and cheese! Omigod the cheese. I’d bought clochette for the first time (not at that site, locally – but isn’t that a nice photo?), and it was all that with bells on. Other cheeses too, St Marcellin and a Portuguese semi-hard goat cheese marinated in olive oil and herbs.

There was so much cheese that, when we had crepes the next morning, I did not want any cheese with my crepes. I’ll wait for the gasps of horrified wonder to subside.

And then we had a really slow and sleepy day, at the end of which some friends from Virginia showed up and we had pumpkin risotto made by yours truly. I love making risotto. If your ingredients are good (and mine included homemade broth, thank you Mr. Chest Freezer), it’s dead easy and deeply satisfying.

Now, I’m taking a headache break while five people finish up dinner – dolmas (oh yes, hand-rolled) and chicken biryani.

To summarize: I LOVE FOODIES.

Happy Light’s return, everybody.

Toasted fennel seeds, left over from yesterday because what you actually meant to toast was cumin. By themselves, nothing else.

Big blog updates, what? So many things I keep meaning to write about, and they just never get written down. Have to start again somewhere.

Oh, all right. Here’s some content: Y: The Last Man is a great graphic-novel (you know, comic book) series. Well written, intriguing in its treatment of gender, beautifully drawn.

Was just talking to Cam Fraser, cool guy I met in Alberta at a graduate students’ humanities computing conference a few years ago. This is sort of a memo to self, but is also a great example of how THE INTERNET has changed the academic life. Multitask by chatting while writing a conference paper, get idea for a totally different thing, record it, go on. I *heart* these moments.

Cam: have you thought about bringing your cooking into your academic work?

me: Nnno. But it sounds like fun. How would you suggest I go about this?

Cam: boy, I have no idea.

me: drat.

Cam: Maybe something to do with bodies…

Cam: I’m thinking of the scene in “Woman on Top” where she’s smelling a chile and ends up cutting herself

me: hmmmm

me: Seriously, though: hm. Maybe I should take a look at how people (the *general populace*) procured and consumed food over the ages. It’s gone from a communal thing to a family thing and back so many times, I wonder if it’s correlated with the amount of cultural transmission that goes on.

Hmmm, indeed. Raw, but interesting.

Now that’s happiness.

Wonderful spinach, too: soft, moist and flavorful. Hard to believe it had been [flash-?]frozen. Another reason to *heart* Trader Joe’s, where we’ve started going for obscene amounts of food each time, since it’s all the way in Boston. The chest freezer was so, so worth it.

Reconnected with an old friend after a decade’s worth of silence, more or less imposed by me. It’s strange to be in that phase of the email exchange when you’ve already established that you had the right email address, but no substantive conversation has yet happened. I felt strongly about him, back when we were on the same continent and for a long while after. There are some things that I couldn’t take, and so I stopped writing letters; but the memory of him has stayed with me, vivid and inextricable and compelling and good.

And now we’re suspended: how have we both changed in each other’s eyes?

And how will I deal if the answer to either is “no change at all”?

I like to ride my bicycle, I like to ride my bike…

Today I didn’t ride, but I’ve an excuse. Yesterday I did ride, seven miles instead of the five I’d been doing, and although the total is on the low side, it still feels good. Then, later last night, I went out to take a walk and ended up shoveling out a path from our porch to the road as well as the entire space around and on the car. It felt good! Aside from the fact that the people in whose driveway we parked (long story) were complete asses. But the actual physical work felt really good, and let me tell you, it doesn’t get much better than Peter Mulvey and Morphine on the iPod while shoveling metric %#@!tons of light fluffy snow.

Today, we shoveled again! The snow was much heavier by the time we got to it, and it was a different driveway, the one where we’ll be parking from now on (see above). But we also got to be genial with the neighbors, and although there was no iPod, there were two of us and thus bits of winded conversation were possible.

My back hurts like nobody’s business, and I don’t feel guilty at all for not biking. Will do it tomorrow. Oooh, I’m liking the physical activity gig. Really, really hope it lasts.

Here’s a gift from the green god on a white and sky-blue winter’s day:

Take come crushed coriander seeds, some garam masala and some black mustard seeds. No precise measurements, I went with about a tablespoon of each of the first two and 1.5 tbsp of the mustard seeds at first. Oh, and a dash of good chili powder. Heat up some fat-of-choice (olive oil and a bit of butter, here) and fry the spices until they smell amazing, and the mustard seeds are popping.

Add a large plastic package of frozen spinach, not the square-package kind but the kind that’s already broken up into clumps; dump in a bit of water; stir well; cover. Steam-fry, stirring occasionally, until the spinach looks unfrozen. Take off the cover and adjust seasonings (at this point I put in salt, garlic powder and more garam masala): you want the spinach to taste just a little bit overspiced. Fry some more at higher heat until it’s no longer watery. Let cool.

Open up a package of silken tofu and drain it as much as you can. Dump the cooled spinach and the tofu into the food processor and whirr until it’s all uniformly colored. Taste, adjust seasonings, refrigerate until tomorrow when you can dip carrots and anything else your heart desires into it.

Good night!

I’m afraid my entry into the distributed cookbook will be somewhat disappointing for George, since it’s…

well, it’s miso soup.

And I’ve never made it. But going to some Japanese place and ordering a bowl of that stuff when I’m feeling cold and miserable, mmmm. It cheers me right up.

The next thing I think of, when contemplating comfort food, is actually chicken soup. To wit:

a few large pieces of chicken
(I don’t much like white meat, so tend to get leg quarters)
1 onion
a couple of carrots
a couple of celery sticks
a couple of potatoes
fresh dill and parsley, the more the better
a tablespoon of Vegeta, more to taste
large pot

Throw the chicken in large pot, fill with water. Don’t ask me how much of either, because I don’t know. You know the largest pots in the cheapo sets they sell at Walmart? I’d probly put two leg quarters in that, and fill it almost-full of water, with just enough space to spare to put all the other stuff in.

Put that in, bring to a boil, reduce to simmer, wait until the foam floats up. Skim off the foam.

Put in everything else except for the herbs. I usually put in the onion whole, and at the end throw it out, but that’s because I don’t like boiled onions. If you’re using Vegeta, watch out: it contains salt already, so don’t add any more salt. Add other seasonings if you like, but I usually leave it at that. Cook until the vegetables are done, probably 15-20 minutes.

Throw in the herbs, taste and adjust the seasoning. I generally throw in a liiittle bit more Vegeta, or leave it be.

Let the herbs cook a couple of minutes. Turn off the heat, cover, let stand for as long as you can bear it. Ladle into bowls and grind some black pepper into that. Mmm.

It’s true.

Perhaps this weekend I’ll cook something out of her recipes.

Well, the photos get a resounding vote of “enh” from me. They’re just uninspiring. You had to be there, if nothing else then for the olfactory paradise of chopped herbs and ground spices.

N.B.: if you’re a staunch vegetarian who is nauseated by the discussion of preparing meat, you might want to skip the rest of this post.

I’ve got to say, thinking that I could easily cut up a whole duck, just because I know fairly well how to do the same thing with chicken, was erroneous. Duck skin is rather more strongly attached than chicken skin is; plus, I couldn’t figure out how to partition it. Ethan’s googling powers saved me, of course; what I’d failed to understand is that the duck is both more fatty *and* more bony on its back than chicken. So I decided to save some of the bonier parts for a soup (to be made tomorrow) and soon I had three containers. The contents of one of them will be rendered, and will make for a good cooking medium for potatoes, fish, what have you.

I’ve got to say, I’m pretty proud of myself for not throwing away any part of the bird, which had admittedly been cleaned before they sold it to me. Its meat is providing us with two meals each, and we’ll have soup and cooking fat besides. Not bad, for a generally wasteful world.

So, here’s the recipe I made. It comes from Alexandra Greeley’s Asian Soups, Stews, & Curries, which I really must return to Mrs. Zogathon someday soon. Next time I make this, I’ll use more ginger, galangal and lemongrass, and will add some fresh chili peppers. This was surprisingly mild.

If you don’t know where to get certain ingredients, check to see if you have an Indian and/or Southeast Asian grocery store nearby. You can always resort to places like Whole Foods, but their herbs are both expensive and not as good. Also, for the love of all that’s holy, don’t use the Thai Kitchen brand of coconut milk. Use Chaokoh instead. Have four cups of it on hand.

Get a 4- to 5-pound duck, clean it and cut into serving pieces (or you could just get duck legs, I guess).

Prepare your herbs and spices. Throw all of the following in one bowl:

     1 stalk lemon grass, trimmed and thinly sliced;

     shred 3 kaffir lime leaves;

     one 1″ piece fresh ginger, peeled and chopped;

     two Indonesian bay leaves, crumbled (I used regular Western bay leaves);

     1 tsp’s worth of galangal root, minced;

     1 tsp ground coriander;

     1 tsp freshly ground black pepper;

     1/2 tsp ground cumin;

     1/4 tsp ground turmeric;

     salt and sugar to taste.

Take 8 shallots and 4 garlic cloves, peeled and rouhly chopped. Put them in a blender or small chopper, add just enough water to process, and blend until smooth. This she calls “curry paste,” why, I don’t know.

Heat 1/3 cup of vegetable oil over medium-high heat. Add the onion-and-garlic paste and stir around for 2-3 minutes, until it’s fragrant. Add all the other spices, stir well and cook for about 5 minutes. That’s what she says, anyway; I cooked for about 7-8. Add a bit more oil if the mixture is too dry.

Add in the duck pieces, and make sure they’re thoroughly coated in the spices. Pour in the coconut milk (mix it up first if it’s separated; it’ll be hard to mix with all that meat in the pan). Reduce heat and simmer, stirring occasionally, for 1.5-2 hours. If the sauce gets too thick and/or shallow, add some water. For garnish, fry up some shallots and/or garlic until crunchy. Honestly, I skipped that last part.

Mmm, tasty. Do make some sticky rice to sop up all the saucy goodness. Make sure you stir the sauce before spooning it onto the rice; some of the herbs and roots stay crunchy, and in every tender bite there’s a little explosion of flavor.

In other news, my Italian class did marvelously well on their exam, all things considered. (They are a good and genial group, but this class is their very lowest priority. We do what we can!) The average grade was 7.5 percentage points higher than the average quiz grade! I’m duly impressed, and they seemed pleased too. We did the simple past today, their first Really Tough Topic, and they did well. I dare say I’m proud! And to think that I’ll have children someday. If that’s how it’s gonna be, at least sometimes, then I’m all for having children. Because, you know, I need convincing to have children.

G’night. Let me know if you make the duck; I’d be curious to find subtle but tasty variations.

We arose rather atrociously late today – 11am; not bad, though, for a Saturday, especially considering we didn’t go to sleep until 3:30 last night. After extremely minimal puttering, a bank errand was run, and then we went food shopping. Since it’s now rather late in the day, the cooking-for-the-week extravaganza has been deferred until tomorrow; but I’m already excited. Besides our usual (already rather eclectic) array of food, we got the following, which I’ve never cooked with before:

duck
galangal root
fresh lemongrass
kaffir lime leaves
some other sort of leaves that should be good fresh, don’t know the name
an array of curry pastes:
     red (a laaaarge tub!)
     masaman and leang (small tins)
thai peanut noodle sauce
msg (to be used as a seasoning in judicious amounts)
fresh young coconut to shred

Artichokes are coming into season, too. They had gorgeous, huge ones at Whole Foods. So we got two, and they’re enough for a lunch, steamed and with a dipping sauce.

Photos, I hope, tomorrow. It is spring outside.