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Wednesday, August 13th, 2008
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8:12 pm - triumphant comeback (?)
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inspired by the recent blogging of my (ever-so-famous) friend Wells, i feel like returning to this little internet-space that i've neglected for so very long. the cooking blog obviously didn't catch on, a tragedy i attribute to the fact that every time i cooked anything worth mentioning i was feeding other people and ended up drinking/distracted instead of posting a recipe. in my new place, roommates are rarely home and the kitchen is atrocious, so i expect i won't have all that much occasion to arrange feasts. maybe we can work on that once school starts up again.
i am, by the way, crushed to not be going back to school this fall. for reasons that i won't even go into, i'm not going to grad school this year. suffice to say the Kaplan company has earned my eternal hatred. i am, however, enjoying one of my extended periods of relative emotionlessness, so instead of telling you how i feel about my dreams being put on hold i will tell you about where i've been living for the last two weeks.
i am living on the edge of Cleveland Heights, with four darling boys who are all going to be seniors this year. being the oldest and the only girl, i expect i will end up feeling a bit like a house mother after a while. that's fine with me, so long as i don't end up the only one doing dishes. the kitchen really is a nightmare: almost no counter space, a big jumble of appliances on two tables taking up the only wall space where we might put something in, a fruit fly infestation that may well be bent on world domination. i've been funneling them into the dregs of empty wine bottles, but they keep returning.
i seem to be the only one who turns on lights in the house, which is actually half a house. i may die by falling down the stairs one day, but the whole place creaks charmingly enough that at least someone will hear. i come home daily to utter darkness and the scent of toast and ramen to journey through the sounds of four different stereos/televisions to my room, which is at the end of the third floor hallway. it's enormous, almost as big as my ridiculous room in the last apartment. mamma and i put a screen on one of the windows with pearlescent thumb tacks and Gorilla tape. i have a snap-together closet with an old ladyish plastic cover, because the real closet is an attic-space much too low to hang dresses in. i don't think i've ever made it out without bumping my head.
the furniture in my room is a combination of old apartment furnishings and the few nice bits from my room at mamma's house (the black chair, which i only really had for a year before college, is now enjoying its rightful glory). the latest pieces are the darling white dresser that held my clothes until i was nine years old and a television, discarded in my mother's effort to pare down her belongings, an item i've never had in my room before. i haven't used it, but only because i don't have a cord to hook up the dvd player yet.
due almost entirely to coincidence, the colors that pop out in the room are pink, purple, and green, my childhood favorites and three that i very rarely combine any more. one walks in to an expanse of sage green (a lovely soft rug my mother donated to cover the dusty hardwood) edged with the lavender of my bedsheets and the slightly-too-bright pink of the flowered rugs that followed me through college. the walls are currently half-bare, because most of the posters decided to slouch. the reason i'm not putting up photos right now is because i am waiting for the hangers i ordered for them to arrive.
so... here i live. most of my closest friends have left for more glorious places, but, truth be told, if i'm going to spend a year out of school, i'd rather be in cleveland than anywhere else. and i can't, of course, discount the friends who are here, whose tireless devotion to 'grabbing a drink' warms [the cockles of] my heart.
there you go, first posting in eons. hopefully i will keep this up, and, now that i have the 'my new awesome place' bit out of the way, wind up saying a few insightful or amusing things in the near future.
current music: Elvis Costello
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| Wednesday, May 7th, 2008
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11:10 pm - new era? okonomiyaki recipe!
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one of the lovely ladies i work with at the library suggested that i start a cooking blog, and, since i never really post here any more, i figured it would be nice to turn this into one. today's project is okonomiyaki, japanese pancakes or pizza. i've never had them before so even if they're delicious i won't know if they're right, but they sound delicious and elle and i both watched enough ranma 1/2 when we were younger to love the idea.
basic recipe (per okonomiyaki... multiply by the number of mouths):
1/4 cup flour (apparently there is such thing as okonomiyaki flour but they don't sell it here, mixing a few asian-type spices (or paprika, of course) and a pinch of salt into the batter makes it better)
1/4 cup water
1 big handful chopped/shredded cabbage
1 egg, lightly beaten
toppings (i have shrimp, crab meat (fake because i am poor), peas, corn, green onions, shredded carrots, mushroom, and chopped up green beans, but you can use whatever you like. apparently pork and beef are popular too.)
two spatulas/flippers (unless you are making very tiny ones)
- mix the flour and water into a thick, smooth batter. chill in refrigerator for ~one hour
- spoon up about half a cup of the batter, mix in the cabbage and the veggie-type ingredients (i left the mushrooms out because they are meaty and need to cook a little on their own)
- plop the mixture onto an appropriate amount of oil (i used veggie because little sister is allergic to nuts but peanut oil is probably great) in a big frying pan and smush it down with the flipper until it is more or less a round flat cake. put the meat-type ingredients next to it to cook a bit
- let it cook for three to six minutes (shuffling the meat things around a bit so they cook evenly), then press down on the middle so it hollows out a little and pour on the egg. try to get all of it to stay on top/flip whatever slides off back on top
- when the egg looks like it's just starting to cook, flip the whole thing over on top of the meat-type ingredients and cook it that way for another five minutes or so
- very carefully, so as not to lose the meat-type things stuck to the bottom, flip the okonomiyaki over again. both sides should be kind of crispy and quite brown
- brush okonomiyaki sauce (a mixture of soy sauce, worcestershire sauce, sugar, and tomato paste (ketchup works for the last two) which you can buy in asian groceries or find a recipe for elsewhere online) over the top side, cook for another minute or two so the sauce stiffens up
- authentic recipes say you should serve it with shredded nori (seaweed paper like you use for sushi) and shaved bonito sprinkled on top, but i didn't have either of these and it was fine
post-creation/editing of recipe: i cooked for three other people when i made this and, sadly, the last one i made (which was mine) was the only really good one. it's tricky to get the okonomiyaki to cook all the way through unless you make them very thin, at which point they tend to fall apart. the more cabbage/vegetables you use, the more the air circulates and the crispier and more thoroughly cooked the whole thing will be. i think it's one of those recipes that just takes some practice. it's pretty delicious, though, like a much more flavorful version of a latke, to the point where i was craving apple sauce. it is also traditionally served with pickled ginger (the stick-type kind, not the shaved sort that comes with sushi) and japanese mayonnaise, but all the asian grocers in cleveland are very far away. apparently the hiroshima version of okonomiyaki (this is the osaka one, which is more common) has crunchy noodles as one of the toppings.
i just ordered a rice cooker so keep an eye out for my first attempts at onigiri and sushi in the next few weeks. i'm not sure why i'm on a japanese kick except that it's one of my favorite kinds of food and i've never really cooked any of it before.
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| Thursday, April 24th, 2008
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12:54 am - the easiest thing i ever done was lovin' and drinkin' wine
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april is the cruelest month in that i am terribly allergic to most of it. i have been waking up very early lately, thanks to the ineffectiveness of my blinds. the up side is that i have been working out some mornings but the down side is that i am cranky and tired most of the time. graduation looms and i want to be cheerful but it's very difficult with all the uncertainty and lack of rest.
the fiery furnaces played at case tonight, and even hit my beloved 'straight street' halfway through the set. i was surrounded by some of my favorite boys in the world, three of whom will be my housemates in the coming year. life is pretty good. see? i can be happy.
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| Friday, April 4th, 2008
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1:11 pm - in our bedroom after the war
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i'm getting better at this... intense emotions no longer last only a minute or even only an hour... i'm up to a whole day. unfortunately it's been mostly bad ones of late, but it's nice to feel like i actually exist for once.
current music: Voxtrot
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| Tuesday, March 4th, 2008
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9:46 pm - juvenalia
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| Friday, December 21st, 2007
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4:42 pm - while avoiding packing or cleaning my room...
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| Thursday, December 6th, 2007
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8:32 pm - uncharacteristically emo & secretive
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my apartment is making scary noises and for a while i couldn't decide whom to call, then didn't call anyone. it's finals and i'm splitting myself every which way but there's one big split and i don't really know what to make of it. i know which way i want to go but it's the harder one and since everything else i love is hard i kind of wanted this one to be easy. grad school applications are killing me a little (i ran out of time and ended up not even applying to princeton) and i'm starting to be afraid of obligations again. it shouldn't take this much effort just to send an email.
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| Friday, October 5th, 2007
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12:43 am - revival
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| Tuesday, October 2nd, 2007
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10:23 pm - i miss my bookshelves
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pop quiz:
1) there are two middle-aged indian men from my building who take their weekly exercise by walking around and around the parking lot, often in running shoes, sweat pants, and oxford shirts. are they afraid of cleveland or do they just like to be ridiculous?
2) is there a decorous way to drink one of the pint-sized (odd use of that phrase, i think) red stripe bottles without resorting to a glass? the neck is too short to play it like a wine bottle, but the body is too big to grip the same way as a normal beer.
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| Wednesday, September 19th, 2007
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11:18 pm - there ain't no devil, there ain't no lord
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i can't get enough of Orenda Fink's solo album, which has been a periodical obsession of mine ever since it came out. i believe Maria Taylor's was the better reviewed of the Azure Ray side projects, but this lady can make you feel both utterly sensuous and completely innocent without even raising her voice.
i started working at the library today. if they'd give me more than ten hours, i'd quit la dolce vita all together... this job is so beautifully relaxing, despite the noisy clang of the book carts on the slate floors. the stacked characters of the library of congress cataloguing system are remarkably soothing.
i believe that my classes this semester, particularly the one on evolution, are making me into an even more confirmed atheist than i used to be, due to frustration with people who feel the misguided need to attribute the beauty of life or even their own personal strength to god or anything else of the sort. i am very calm lately, and good humoured, but i feel like at any moment i may do something rash. i have a feeling, however, that it wouldn't seem particularly wild to the outside observer. the other day i wrote something entitled "a fantasy of cleaning out my life with many sounds of breaking glass". you can imagine how that went.
current music: Orenda Fink :: Invisible Ones Guard the Gate
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| Wednesday, August 15th, 2007
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2:44 pm - bye bye baby bye bye
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i've neglected both this journal and the corporeal one so long that i'm a bit embarrassed to start up again. i've spent the better part of the last three weeks hostessing at la dolce vita on murray hill. the boss likes to yell and make irrational demands, but everyone else is lovely. i'm still hoping for a library job, and will probably have to quit this one anyway once i start working on grad school applications and have no time to sleep.
this week is the feast of the assumption, which, as i'm sure all clevelanders know, means the hill turns into a sardine can reeking of pesto and booze. in two hours i'll be on the other side of the counter, hating everyone who shows up. i will make exceptions for friends, though, so if you don't hate crowds as much as i do you should definitely come up and have a cannoli. the place across the street is, for some bizarre reason, selling gyros, so you can get your greek fix as well (though i'm holding out for the mayfield greek festival next week).
sunday i'm moving my sister in and sleeping in my old bed, which is now kyle's, due to the prescience of the random housing lottery. there may even be more pierogies, since there are a dozen (handmade by myself and the lovely meredith) sleeping in my freezer, waiting for more visitors.
current music: Leonard Cohen
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| Tuesday, July 10th, 2007
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4:21 pm
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( apartment photos )
i love setting up house, but i'm starting to understand the desperation of fifties housewives due to having no internet, no job, and no energy for going anywhere in the heat. i've been baking, cleaning, and reorganizing the wine while talking myself out of opening a bottle at ten in the morning.
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| Thursday, June 14th, 2007
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3:32 pm - true love
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"Here's the first of the day, fellas. To ol' D.H. Lawrence!"
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| Tuesday, June 5th, 2007
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11:47 am - friends only
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for reasons of possibly unfounded but exceedingly convincing paranoia, i've switched my journal to friends only. comment to be added... whoever you are. i like having friends.
* 5/7/08- clearly this didn't stick. from now on this is more or less going to be a cooking blog, so i don't really care who reads it, but if you want to be friends just add me!
** 8/13/08- i failed at the cooking blog. friend me if you want to read the back-issues of my adolescence, but everything from here on out will probably be public. not that you shouldn't friend me anyway.
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