. . . in the distant, early morning . . .

Vacation Cooking

Tomorrow is the last day of vacation.  I’ve been on vacation now since December 23rd..

This was a much needed rest.  It let me turn my brain away from work (albeit with limited success).  The part that did think about work made some positive strides in areas that I hadn’t had the time to sit back and think through some intriguing puzzles.

Over this holiday Chris & I cooked with a fair amount of frequency, with some fun cooking experiments.  It started on Christmas with roast chicken, carrots, and potatoes.  The potatoes and carrots would have been cooked longer - they went in 30 minutes before the chicken, in chicken stock.  But still, at least an hour before the chicken next time.  Chris made what may have been the worst mashed potatoes I ever tasted, and I believe he agreed.  The consistency was very off.  The rest of the dinner was a huge success, and quite yummilicious.

We made spaghetti bolognaise twice, with the world’s best cheese garlic bread on the planet - made with Provel cheese. 

For New Year’s eve, we made fresh pizza with Chris & and Wendy, along with Provel cheese.  The provel was a bit strong on the pizza.  No pictures of that, regrettably.  However, Chris & Wendy are now addicted (along with myself) to Provel cheese, so much so that one of Chris’ first missions upon his arrive home is to ship out 4lbs of Provel to us.  2lbs for me, 2lbs for Chris & Wendy.

I also satisfied my desire for a real blender, which turned into several delicious, fresh strawberry daiquiris.  I tried with a daiquiri mix as well, but it’s much better with fresh strawberries.  Chris made those for me, really.  And having my own personal bartender is excellent.

My last experiment was roasting pineapple in cinnamon sugar.  More like griilling.  I really went to town playing with this one.

• Cinnamon sugar
• Blackberry wine & cinnamon sugar
• Coke & cinnamon sugar
• Butter and cinnamon sugar (GROSS)
• Rum & cinnamon sugar
• Kahlua & cinnamon sugar
• Lime Juice & cinnamon sugar

The rum & cinnamon sugar, as well as the coke & cinnamon sugar had some real potential.  I think the main thing that is making this not as good as I’ve had in restaurants is that I do not own a rotisserie and can’t slow-roast this over a few hours.  This summer, on the barbie maybe.  All in all, after the experimentation was done, I made a batch of just pineapple & cinnamon sugar to eat and it was pretty damn delicious.  I need to try with coconut juice as that is quite popular and I think might help out a bit.  Also, tequila and orange peels apparently work well, or something.  I’ve got a bunch of recipes to try out on that one.

In any case, I spent more time in the kitchen this last 2 weeks than ... well for a long time, and I had an absolute ton of fun doing so.  I invested in a whisk, meat thermometer, two pizza stones (AWESOME!), blender.  My desire to learn to cook is growing, along with the gadgets and gizmos to make that easier.

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In other “stuff”, Chris & I ventured to Sky High Views to trampoline some.  We jumped into the foam first - big freaking mistake.  I almost couldn’t get out!  I could only trampoline about 20 minutes, to be honest.  My fitness level is pathetic, and that gets fixed starting as soon as my toe is no longer black and swollen.  I shouldn’t have jumped today but dammit, I wanted to!

Mali is doing great, so are Elka & Milton.  My house is wonderfully clean, and life is going well.  I can not wait to go back to work on Monday.  2011 is promising to be a stupendous year, both with work and personal matters.  Good times ahead!

-Lisa, on January 7, 2011 at 12:00 am

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