"Uh-hmm!. That is a tasty burger. Vincent, ever had a Big Kahuna Burger?"

I always add some grated onion to the meat mixture, but this time I added far too much, and the patties suffered from a lack of internal integrity because of it. Oh well, you live and learn. 'Twas a bummer, because I got some great grill marks on the patties, as well as the buns.

But the fries look great, though. And they were great. Not perfect. Nothing is. But they were very nice. I do my fries in the oven, because I generally tend to avoid deep frying (I deep fry certain things, but well, if I can get a reasonable result without deep frying, I tend to go that way). I toss them in some peanut oil, flour, and various flavorings like garlic salt and cayenne pepper, or chili powder, or whatever I feel like; this isn't a fixed recipe. It' is a variation of something I saw Heston Blumenthal describe on egullet. Heston's recipe was far more refined and elegant, but dagnabbit, my spicy baked fries are tasty.

"Wish I had time for just one more bowl of chili" — Kit Carson's alleged last words.

Chili is one of those standard, classic American dishes that I want to learn; to comprehend; to understand; to be able to cook reasonably well, and if possible, well — even to perfect (as best I can, with my abilities). Well, screw that. You gotta pick your battles.

Chili is overblown.

Yeah, I said it. Seriously, I see no difference between cooking a good chili at home, and simply heating up a can of supermarket chili. It takes a lot of work to create a decent chili. And it takes a lot of work, and a lot of experience and knowledge, to create a good chili. And you need a helluva lot of experience (ie., a lot of bad chilis) to create a really great chili.

Chili is hard work, and trying to create one, has given me renewed respect for those that are capable of doing it. But as far as I'm concerned, the law of diminishing returns comes into play at this point. I think this was an okay chili — or if you're very generous — perhaps even a halfway decent chili. But I'd stretch the truth if I were to say that it was a good chili. It certainly wasn't a great chili. And I'm realizing that while I might technically be capable of creating a truly great chili, it would take far too much effort and time.

I mean, chili isn't a food. It's a religion. It reminds me of the whole "PC vs. Mac" thing, to be honest. It's all very angry, deranged, and generally crazy. People say things like "If it has beans in it, it isn't a chili — it's a damn bean stew!" and "If it doesn't have beans in it, it isn't chili — it's a damn meat sauce!" It's all far too fanatical for me; it's really put me off the whole thing to be honest. As far as I can tell, chili can be a stew, and chili can be a sauce — and whatever else you want it to be.


Yeah, a couple of pictures of the accouterments for the chili, both completely out of focus. Oh well.

I overcooked the garlic bread. It's so simple to create this — just use a garlic press on a couple of cloves, mash it into some room-temperature butter and spread it on a slice of bread, and toast it and Bob's yer mother's brother. But I overcooked it. D'oh. Oh yeah, and I didn't get the camera focused either. D'oooooh.

It's not proper Christmas unless you have cookies. I had some problems (big surprise) with these suckers — they ended up without much of a peanut butter taste to them. But then I came across an odd recipe that used no flour at all — just one cup of creamy peanut butter, one cup of white sugar, one egg, one teaspoon of baking soda, and half a teaspoon of vanilla extract. I added a touch of pre-ground cinnamon this time around, and that seemed to work very nicely. Not enough to really be noticable (just like the vanilla extract — it seems to just enhance the overall flavor of the cookie, even though you can't actually taste the vanilla itself.)

Aw, damn, I forgot to add a pinch of salt! Argh. That's the problem when I think I've mastered a recipe, I sometimes get careless. Oh well, they still taste good.

This was a much, much thinner pizza than the last. I didn't use a sauce on this one, but there was plenty of liquid from the tomatoes and the anchovies. Also, I added scallions and mushrooms, in addition to the mozz and parm cheese. Very simple, and very nice — if you like salty things like anchovies, that is.

I did make a mistake on this occasion though: I didn't let the oven heat up enough, so the pizza stone didn't get hot enough to brown the crust on the bottom. Also, I didn't brush the crust with any oil at all, since the last pizza I made ended up a little too wet — which I still think is a good idea, but I figure I might brush the edge of the crust with a little oil next time around, because it ends up a little dry otherwise.

This was a long, slow, lazy — and excellent Saturday meal. 'Tis the season of frantic, procrastinated, neurotic Christmas shopping, and hand-to-hand combat over the potential ownership of Pokemon, Tickle-Me-Elmo dolls and whatever Japanese tentacle rape porn entertainment that has been currently been presented to us as the most desirable thing to obtain for your loved ones, for this oh-so very merry season. (Sorry, I always wanted to incorporate Japanese tentacle rape in this blog. I think it should be every bit as much a part of the English language as "bunny boiler" and other phrases).

Tentacle rape? WTF. What fresh hell is this?

I normally make pizza on Friday, but I wasn't feeling too sharp, so it got pushed a day. And that proved to me that leaving the dough in the fridge for two days is better than leaving it in the fridge overnight. The dough really takes on a character, if the yeast is allowed to do its magic — but it needs time. So I'm thinking a minimum of two days, from now on — but I'd happily do three, four, hell, five days from now on. It really gives the bread some serious character.

One mistake I made here though, was that I didn't use enough salt in the dough. That is a very bad mistake. Salt heightens the taste of whatever it is mixed with, but it has been linked to high blood pressure and such, and some people are also more sensitive to salt, so I've been trying to be careful about salt use. But this dough should not be undersalted. And of course, equally obvious, this dough should not be oversalted. All things in moderation.

This pizza was very thick — I mean, I intentionally made it so. I prefer thin crust pizzas, but a friend of mine likes thick, chewy pizza crusts, so I tried to accommodate: You Cook for the Audience.

I was quite worried about the cooking time, since this pizza was so much thicker than what I normally do. So I brushed it with peanut oil (a mistake; I should have used olive oil, since it has a taste. Peanut oil has very little taste, which makes it a great oil to use if you really want to control the flavors (and of course, it has a higher smoking point than olive oil, which quite frankly is the reason why I default to peanut oil for most of my needs)). Then, I smeared on a very thick garlic cream sauce, along with the toppings: mushrooms, red onions, scallions, tomatoes and garlic chicken. And finally, the cheese: a modest amount of grated mozzarella and Parmesan. I know the groovy and cool and authentic pizzas use big blobs of sliced mozz, and I readily admit that I occasionally feel seriously inclined to try that myself, but I still grate it. It's an obsessive thing, I guess.

But the real question I have after all this is, should the cheese go on top of the toppings, or should the cheese go on, and then the toppings? I tried to mix it up a little, as I always do, when I'm uncertain.

If anyone reads this, I've got a question: Is it "American style" for pizza to have the toppings on top of the cheese, and "English/British style" to have the cheese on top of the toppings?

The reason I ask, is that I've had problems with how certain toppings react to the heat of the oven. Scallions are very fragile, and will lose all of their texture — as well as their distinctive taste — if cooked alongside even the thinnest sliced onions, so getting this symphonic orchestra to play in tune, honestly, it's actually pretty damn tricky.

Well, damn good meal. I'm making some seriously good pizza these days. Hell, I'm proud of it. And listening to Creedence.

What I'm saying is, fuck it dude, lets go... Oh nevermind, you folks who knows where your towels are, do.

Shrimp, mushrooms and pasta cooked in a stock of coconut milk and chicken broth, flavored with jalapeños and kaffir lime leaves, and a paste of onions, almonds, garlic, ginger, galangal, tamarin juice and coriander seeds. Decorated with cilantro and freshly ground, black pepper. I should have added some thinly sliced, red chili peppers, though. The growing season is over, so the jalapeños bush was pretty much kaput, and only had two very small, green ones, but the cayenne bush, and the plain "red" chili bush still had a few stragglers. I can't believe I didn't grab some for this dish.

This was a very simple dish: garlic mashed potatoes (exquisitely decorated with some home-grown parsley, as well as their own skin (uh, that sounds sort of tortuous and cannibalistic, that)), silly fingerling carrots and peas, and a salmon fillet, sautéed with some salt, pepper, and a gentle dash of soy sauce.

I had planned to use a mixture of soy sauce and toasted sesame seed oil, but I ran a little short on time. This is, of course, a completely moronic excuse, but dammit, that's the way it happened. This ain't FoodTV; it's reality. A diary, I guess.

Omelette with cheddar cheese, parsley and freshly ground pepper. Very happy with the colors.

Chili is such a simple dish — yet it is insanely complicated. The hotness must be balanced against the (utterly required) sweetness. In this case, I tried the Food Network's Tyler Florence's "Ultimate" thingie. And it wasn't ultimate, or generally fantastic, but well, it was better than whatever I did previously, in an attempt to create a chili.

I can, and should make a better chili, definitely. But this one didn't make it.

I'm seriously starting to enjoy this dish. Enjoying eating it, as well as cooking it. It's so damn simple, and so damn tasty. And I'm thinking sugar snap peas are just about the perfect veggies to add to this dish. I tried carrots, but the sweetness didn't really seem to work. I'm wondering about adding celery, next time around. That crisp, crunchy texture, as well as the flavor should work really nicely here.

And I'm never using peanuts for this dish, ever again. Cashews are definitely the way to go: raw, uncooked cashews.

This time, I served it over pasta. If I were strict about such things as authenticity, I might have gotten some noodles, but seriously, it's pretty much the same stuff, you know? I enjoy my biryanis and risottos and all that, but rice can get a little boring. So I grabbed some spaghetti. The end result was very nice.