Juleps and Gardening

So, Gropius and I used the gift certificate that Kristin and Cory gave us as a house-warming present today. Thank you, Kristin & Cory! I was certain that we had gone over the gift certificate amount when we got up to the register, but turns out, we had $2 left to spare. We bought a various mish-mash of stuff--soil, rocks, plants. They had a TON of their vegetable plants on sale, so we scooped up more peppers and tomatoes and some squash to put in our garden, plus some flowers.

Our primary purpose though was to finally re-plant the poor "dwarf asian pear" tree that was left in a bucket in the backyard and remained there this winter when we were certain that it hadn't survived. Imagine our surprise when it started sprouting leaves! It was also absolutely INFESTED with tiny brown ants.

So, before we re-planted it, we had to rinse the ants off. Gropius used his root-rinsing bonsai technique on the tree (we found the queen and the eggs, so we think we eliminated the colony).



Then, we put it in a pot that we bought at IKEA earlier in the week and put some geraniums around the base. We thought the geraniums were really pretty and unusually colored. I'm glad Gropius insisted we needed something around the base of the tree because it would've looked pretty bare otherwise.



Gropius giving the tree and flowers a good watering in their new home:



Here are the geraniums close-up--pretty, huh?



After we were done with the tree, planting various tomatoes/squash/peppers, and spreading rocks, we celebrated our gardening efforts with mint juleps. Gropius has been wanting to make the recipe he found in Saveur for a while and we finally had the bourbon and the mint!



He did "lighten" the recipe though--it called for 1/2 c of bourbon and he only used 1/3 c instead. I've got various pictures to post--they're all me trying to be artistic.



I like this close-up picture better...



...but Gropius likes this one (I think the sky is too washed out, but it's pretty washed out in mine, too--a filter might've helped?).



Here's a pic of Gropius reading Saveur.

You scream, I scream....

Dido and I had pretty harrowing days today. Given that our backyard is Grand Central Station for neighborhood cats, I took her to the vet this afternoon to have a yearly check-up and to get her immunizations up to date as well. We never bothered to get her vaccinated for feline leukemia in Colorado or Iowa. I had her vaccinated once for it in Ohio because the vet said that it was rampant there (yet another reason to hate Ohio). But, given her dust-ups with at least three different cats, I figured it was a good idea in California.

It should be noted that this is the same cat hospital/vet clinic where Derellek took Lucy so I was a little wierded out about being there anyway. Dido yowled in her carrier the whole ride over there (it's over near Land Park) which is normal. The clinic had a mascot cat who was a larger, male version of Dido (with some British shorthair mixed in, I think). He sniffed her carrier on the floor while we were checking in at the front desk and Dido growled at him. Then, she was pretty quiet....

....until I dumped her out of her carrier (had to up-end it to get her out). The vet wanted to test her for feline leukemia and feline AIDS (I thought they were the same thing??) before vaccinating her since it doesn't make sense to protect her from a disease she's already got. Luckily, the test came back negative, so we're in the clear.

But, the test itself was an ordeal. Apparently, it was a simple blood test, but I had to wrap Dido up in a towel so the vet assistant could carry her out of the exam room and back to the lab to run the test. I heard the most God-awful shrieks of terror for 5 loooong minutes. Seriously, shrieks of terror. These are the same shrieks that she does to Walter which usually end in a low growl, but they weren't ending in a growl today. When she came back to the exam room, Dido had gained another vet assistant and BOTH of them were wearing leather BBQ-grill style gloves and holding her down, still wrapped in the towel. Apparently, my girl is a FIGHTER.

I always thought those women who described not being to bear the sound of their babies crying as over-reacting, hovering types until this afternoon. The vet assistant who ran the front desk had to talk to me to keep me from shrieking myself. Seriously, I was tearing up like *I* was the one being wrapped in a towel, held down by two strangers while a third poked me with a needle.

Although, now that I think about it, I do recall a similar experience when I was 9 and had stitches on my right cheek from falling face-first onto a water sprinkler. My parents had to drive me up to San Angelo to a doc-in-the-box walk-in clinic. My dad and brother went somewhere and left Mom and me there. The relatively youngish doctor insisted that he had to drape my face, to "protect the field," while he did the stitches but I wouldn't let them put anything over my face. According to my father, you could hear my screams from the parking lot when they came back and he walked into the exam room in time to see me kick the doctor as hard as I could in the crotch while my mother held my arm(s) down. Needless to say, I'm really surprised I didn't have more of a scar on my cheek from that episode!

I was too upset to take any pictures during the screaming, but here's a picture of the cat clinic's resident mascot, Boz:



And here's the African Queen herself, plotting revenge against me, I'm sure:



I think a day like today deserves a little ice cream salve....more on that later though:

Sachertorte

So, in honor of Franz Sacher's creation of the Sacher Torte 175 years ago, Gropius and I made a sachertorte (note the small "s" since this is NOT the official one from the Hotel Sacher in Wien/Vienna). I had never made one before, but I think the end result will be VERY tasty and looks pretty good (there is a bit of a learning curve involved with that chocolate glaze!).

First off, when you approach the cashier at Whole Foods with these:



you're bound to be asked, "What are you making?" You just can't go wrong with cream, butter, and chocolate, can you?? ;)

The Sachertorte is a chocolate layer cake with an apricot glaze that's then covered with a shiny chocolate glaze. The recipe I followed is from my trusty Rick Roger's Kaffeehaus cookbook and is Walter Leschanz's version of a Sacher Torte (I figure the head baker from Demel and Sacher can't be wrong, right?). So, I whipped butter, melted chocolate, added 7 egg yolks:






Then, I whipped 7 egg whites into soft peaks, folded those into the batter, sifted flour, folded that in, and then put the thing in a springform pan and into the oven:







And the end result looked like this:





After that was done, Gropius and I went to the movies (saw "Knocked Up" and wow. GREAT movie).

This morning, we made the apricot glaze which involved an entire jar of Bonne Maman (sp?) apricot preserves and a couple of Tb of rum:



Then, Gropius cut the cake into three (!!) layers.



This is different from the "official" Sacher Torte rezept and was the ultimate determinant of the court case between Demel and Hotel Sacher about whose recipe was the "official" one. (Hotel Sacher won). Leschanz argues that the three layers helps to keep the cake moist which is a common problem with sachertortes (torten?)--the cake itself can be very dry. We glazed each layer with the apricot glaze and then the top and sides of the entire thing and let it cool.



Then, it was making the chocolate glaze! Melting 6 oz bittersweet chocolate, 1 1/2 c sugar, and 3/4 c water over med-high heat until it reaches 234 degrees then pouring the stuff over the top of the cake. Wow.





Here is the learning curve though--I should've pour some over the top, let it cool, and then poured more to more fully cover the sides of the cake. Oh, well. Guess that means I have to make it again??



I think the reflection of the fireplace and wall from across the room on the top of the cake is pretty awesome.

Next up: Dobos Torte!

Pork & Cabbage

For dinner last night, Gropius and I had grilled pork chops, wirsing (wirsching?), baby Russian fingerling potatoes, and balsamic-glazed carrots.



I was quite impressed with the carrots since I was improvising and not following a recipe.







We enjoyed it with a Goats Do Roam rose that we bought at Cost Plus for $4.50. (I love CA!)

YUM!



That's me trying to be artistic, but Gropius looked over to see what I was doing.

Retro Dinner Par-tay.

So, we had our friends, Hellen & Derek, over for dinner on Sunday. Derellek, as they're known, contributed to the retro theme by bringing their "astro ball" as an appetizer.



Yes, it is cheese, meat, and olives on toothpicks! And, even better, the dipping bowl fits into the top of the cabbage. Personally, I think you can't go wrong with meat and cheese. Mmmmm, meat....or as my friends Bob and Mike put it, "eyeball eating."

The astro ball was followed by a dinner of chicken tetrazzini with bundles of beans, my father's trademark recipe. I was inspired to try my hand at cooking tetrazzini from a Martha Stewart Everyday Food recipe newsletter, but I didn't like the shortcuts that MS-EF advises. (Rant: MS used to mean something--if you cooked something and said you got the recipe from MS, people were shocked and awed. Now, it's almost equivalent to Sandra Lee's semi-homemade cr*p). So, I found a recipe on epicurious.com that didn't cut corners.



We poached three chicken breasts in water with aromatics (carrots, onion, celery, bay, cloves, peppercorns, etc), then boiled down the liquid to make a quick chicken stock. Then, I cooked some sliced white button mushrooms in butter until they released all their water. Then, I made a quick roux with some flour and additional butter, added the cream and sherry, added the chicken stock and let it thicken into a sauce. Basically, making cream-of-mushroom soup (the hard way). Meanwhile, I cooked the pasta (linguine fini for those keeping up at home) and Gropius cut the chicken into 2-3" chunks.

Put it all together in a casserole dish (or my trusty 9x13" cake pan), top with some breadcrumbs and parmesan, and bake for approximately 30 minutes. That's it. Took about an hour or so to prepare, assemble, and cook.

I also made my Dad's signature Bundles of Beans (although I didn't follow the recipe exactly because I used fresh green beans, not canned). Basically, wrap a bundle of beans with bacon, holding the bacon in place with a toothpick. Melt equal parts brown sugar and butter, pour over beans, and bake for 30 minutes. I got a little fancier by using sliced garlic (since the original recipe called for garlic salt which we didn't have) and some thinly sliced almonds (because nothing tastes better with green beans than almonds!).

Gropius poured a nice cremant and here's the finished product:



Tasty, no?

Derellek was REALLY excited because Derek's new CD was reviewed in the Sac Bee that day and Hellen had to read the review to us:



You can read the article for yourself here (still don't know how to post links yet):

http://www.sacbee.com/music/story/184477.html

Is an aural carnival ride like a magic carpet ride? Is Derek getting carried away with his Moroccan fanbase??

Gropius and Derek were enjoying Hellen's reading of the review and celebrated with spontaneous dance:



Dido, however, was NOT so amused. Apparently, Derek's harshest critic has yet to be pleased...

Kung Pao!!!

My friend, Dandan, makes the BEST Kung Pao Chicken you've ever tasted! She and her husband invited Gropius and me over for dinner last summer before we moved and I'm still haunted by how tasty her kung pao chicken was. The spices were amazing--you could literally feel the heat hitting different parts of your tongue as you ate. Seriously, I've never had Chinese food that tasted so good.

She was kind enough to give us some tips and pointers about cooking Kung Pao Chicken and we've been experimenting to try to re-capture the deliciousness of that meal. (I don't think we'll be successful though since the companionship made the meal)

Last night was our latest attempt/interpretation: Kung Pao Pork. We followed Dandan's recipe with a few modifications: we substituted pork instead of chicken and cashews for peanuts (because that's what we had on hand) and we added sugar snap peas into the mix.




Dandan recommended finding a sauce called "old step-mother" and two of my colleagues, Joni and Ta-Chen, have helped me locate what we think is the sauce Dandan recommended. (if it's not the same one, it's still tasty!) We also added some dried Thai peppers to try to liven things up a bit.



Gropius got some pretty good "wok hay" going.



Raley's had "european-style" (i.e., fat) asparagus on sale, so we had some of that on the side (simply steamed with a little salt to finish). Dandan, I wish you could've been there to share it with us!

Mmmmmmmm, chocolate cake.

For the ODE (Omicron Delta Epsilon) reception tomorrow, I made a chocolate cake in honor of the occasion. It's a sour cream fudge layer cake with butter chocolate frosting from The Best Recipes cookbook. It was pretty easy to throw together--combine cocoa, instant espresso powder, sour cream, and vanilla.



Cream butter, sugar, and eggs.



Alternate dry ingredients with the cocoa mixture until well mixed.





Bake in the oven until done.

Assemble the icing by melting butter and chocolate together over a bain marie then stir in some Karo. Easy.



Let it cool in an ice bath until the right consistency to assemble the cake.



When you're all done, you've got (in the words of my friend Derek) "a thing of beauty."



Mmmmmmm, cake!