They're Magically Delicious

Chocolate Lucky Charms were recently purchased because they were on sale. I'm not sure I could justify purchasing a cereal like this as a grown man if it wasn't on sale.

Mandy suggested I do a week-long series revealing what I discovered in my cereal. I think that would be a little overkill.

Instead, I present to you, my readers, pictures of all the different marshmallows in my cereal. Enjoy.


Pink Heart


Yellow Something (apparently an hourglass)


Red Balloon



Rainbow


Blue Moon



Green Clover

Red Beans and Rice

I'm not entirely sure what possessed me to make red beans and rice. Maybe I was thinking back to the time I spent in New Orleans with The Newtster and eating good meals. Later in the day I was looking through the topics of recent Good Eats episodes and...(drum roll)... Alton had made red beans and rice. It was a sign. I must make red beans and rice.

I used Alton Brown's recipe, mainly because it did not require me to pre-soak the beans. Before I could make the beans though, I required a trip to the store to pick up some sausage to replace the pickled pork (three days is entirely too much planning for a meal for me).

Luckily there are plenty of options in my neighborhood to buy cured meats. My first stop was at the Sunnyside Meat Market. Oh man. This place is something else. Its a pretty cramped operation, mainly because its wall-to-wall cured meats. I don't remember anything being labeled and the only thing I recognized was a smoked turkey leg. I was pretty frazzled when I was in there and the ladies behind the counter weren't terribly helpful (most likely because I could not articulate what I was looking for). I can't even remember what I asked for. I ended up with a hard smoked, slightly spicy sausage. Its good, so its a shame I don't know what its called. Maybe I'll bring in a picture if I try to buy it again.



I then went to Massis, which is an ethnic supermarket of sorts. Mandy and I had wandered through there one evening and I was fairly confident that I could get some Kielbasa. When I asked for some Kielbasa, I was first offered a log of the stuff the size of my leg. I eventually managed to buy a more reasonable sized sausage.



Finally I stopped at the Butcher Block looking for a ham hock to throw in the pot. Unfortunately they were all out. I bough a ham steak figuring that I could throw a portion in along with some of my other pick-ups. Had I really been thinking I would have wandered back over to the Sunnyside Meat Market and picked up a smoked turkey leg which would have added more flavor.

I returned home and prepared the beans. I used about 1/3 of a pound of each of the forementioned meats in place of the pickled pork.

The consistency was a little watery than I would find ideal, but I don't have a potato masher to go to work on the beans. They were pretty tasty, but in the future I think I'll just use a smoked turkey leg to add flavor instead of my sausage/ham mixture.

Salsa

I like making my own salsa mainly because I don't like jarred salsa. They all taste too much like tomato sauce or something.

I also like making salsa because I get to play with my knives.

Unfortunately, making fresh salsa in the middle of December probably isn't such a great idea. The tomatoes were definitely sub-par and didn't have a lot of flavor. I also forgot to leave the seeds and such in one of the jalapenos, so there wasn't much heat involved. At least I got my servings of vegetables.

The recipe is fairly straight forward and usually pretty good if you have quality ingredients. It makes enough for two people to snack on.

3 Plum Tomatoes (I used the vine-ripened instead of plum because the plum tomatoes looked terrible)
1/4 Red Onion
1/2 Red Bell Pepper
2 Cloves Garlic
3 Jalapenos
Juice from 1/2 a Lime
Salt/Pepper

Pear Pie

I do not bake often. In fact, the only baking I've ever done consists of chocolate chip cookies and out of the box brownies (the cookies are quite tasty though).

I've never baked pies because there has always been someone around who can actually do it a lot better than me (my grandmother, mother, sister and now Mandy).

A couple of weeks ago, refrigerated pie crust was on sale, so we bought a box just to have around.

So for some reason this week, I got it in my head that I wanted to make a pie with the ready-made crust (taking the hardest part of pie-making out of the equation). I somehow settled on making a pear pie. Pears are sorta in season. So yeah.

The recipe was fairly straight forward. It had me just pour the sugar/flour mixture over top of the pears once they were in the pie crust instead of pre-mixing. I thought this was a little weird, but I followed the directions anyway.


We were pretty impatient and wanted to eat pie, so we only let it cool for about 45 minutes. The resulting pictures show that it hadn't really firmed up yet and was ridiculously wet. Subsequent pieces have been great.

I thought it was a little too sweet the first day also, but I actually don't think I'd change anything in the recipe.

Well, the first pie didn't kill anyone (yet), so maybe I'll attempt another with a greater degree of difficulty in the future. Ideally I'll try my hand at some pie crust, but no promises there.

Pie Filling:
5 Large Pears (I think I used Bartlett)
1 Cup Sugar
1/4 Cup Flour
1/2 Teaspoon Lemon Zest
1/2 Teaspoon Cinnamon
1/8 Teaspoon Salt
2 Tablespoons Lemon Juice (drizzled on top of the pears and sugar mixture)
2 Tablespoons Butter (cut up and thrown on top of the sugar mixture)

Penne and Chicken

Slow week for Joe Cooks Dinner and Stuff. I haven't actually been cooking all that much, instead opting for sake and sushi in some far off Brooklyn neighborhood as well as a nice little italian meal to celebrate some good news in Hobo Gary's life. However, fear not as I still have some food related musings.

I had actually forgotten that I made this until I found a picture while going through our camera today.

I've been pretty bored with jarred sauce for the past few months, so I was determined to try something new.

I made a sauce using some basic canned tomato sauce, garlic, basil, white wine and cream. Next time I make it (and if Mandy is not joining me at the dinner table), I'll probably throw some onions in there as well.

I sauteed some chicken with just salt and pepper, and mixed everything all together. It was pretty decent, and a definite nice change from jarred sauce.

Netflix Watch Instantly - Certifiably Stellar.

Hello to my four loyal readers. There hasn't been much cooking going on in the apartment for the past week for two reasons:
1) Thanksgiving - Mandy and I spent Thanksgiving with my parents. They proceeded to load us up with a ridiculous amount of leftovers to bring back to Sunnyside. This also does not include the fact that Gary gave me probably a pound of ham after I visited him at his parents. I ate a ridiculous amount of stuffing and sweet potato casserole this past week. No real cooking required.
2) Food Poisoning - I'll skip the messy details, but I'll tell you I blame it on the burger from Bar 43. The bad meal was on Wednesday night and I only feel 100% today. Ugh.

Cooking will most likely resume tomorrow.

So to fill this blog with some other Joe related rambling, I present you my thoughts on some recently watched films from my Netflix Watch Instantly Queue.


Toy Soldiers - Oh man. This cast. Sean Astin, Louis Gossett Jr, Wil Wheaton, R Lee Ermy, Denholm Elliot (brody from India Jones), Lenny Briscoe. I was having trouble placing the Colombian terrorist, Andrew Divoff. Turns out he played Mikhail on Lost. Also Russian Soldier #3 in the newest Indiana Jones movie. Such a wide acting range.

My plot synopsis: Sean Astin plays the rebellious rebel attending his 4th boarding school. Louis Gossett Jr. plays the no-nonsense dean. Terrorists take over the school in an attempt to... well, that doesn't really matter. Astin somehow manages to come up with a plan to rescue the students that the FBI/military find acceptable. Hilarity ensues.

I think the most shocking thing to me is that it came out in 1991. I thought it was filmed in the 80's. Then again, the entire cast is dressed like I was in middle school, so I guess this makes sense.

Favorite Scene: When Wil Wheaton storms down the stairs brandishing an uzi with an absurdly long barrel, how can you not get a ridiculous smile on your face?

3 stars

Lethal Weapon - An old TBS/TNT stand-by. An excellent way to waste 90 minutes of your life away. And there's no Joe Pesci in this one!! (I'm not sure if this is actually good or bad, I'll get back to you once I rewatch the rest of the trilogy +1).

My plot synopsis: Mel Gibson and Danny Glover team up in this cop buddy movie. Gibson plays a cop who is wacky (possibly auto-biographical). Glover plays an old detective whose catch phrase is "I'm too old for this." Hijinks ensue.

Eric Clapton did some of the music for this movie? Amazing. Doesn't explain all the sax solos though. Unless they had a guitar effects board in the 80's that modeled a saxophone.

Scene of the film: The entire ridiculous climax. Gary Busey and Mel Gibson in a fist fight to end the movie? Terrific stuff here. Also the fact that they (Gibson and Glover) drove a police car through Glover's living room when they could have just dealt with Busey outside if they knew he was coming.

3 stars

Five Whiskeys

On a recent trip through DC, I stopped by to visit Jeff, of Jeff Drinks and Stuff fame.

We decide to partake in one of our favorite activities not involving video games, whiskey. I'm not quite sure how we ended up with so much to drink, but there was probably some peer pressure involved.

Jeff already had the Jim Beam and Elijah Craig 18 Year (well, that was technically Laura's). He purchased the 1792 and Jameson. The Jameson purchase took a little prodding from me, which most likely consisted of me saying, "hey Jeff, this is on sale!"

I purchased some Knob Creek which was destined for a Wake Forest tailgate.

I actually took notes on each of the drinks, but in typical fashion managed to misplace them.

The one surprise of all the night was how drinkable Jim Beam was neat. I'm not sure I'd ever just sipped it before, instead of just throwing it back, but it wasn't as harsh as I thought it would be.

The one thing that wasn't surprising at all was the awesomeness of the Jameson 12 year. It was, bye far, the best whiskey of the evening.

The middle three are all pretty good, but I thought the Elijah Craig was a little too peppery for my tastes.

I gotta say it was a good day.

A Sandwich Haiku

Two eggs, bacon, roll
Only five minutes to make
One tasty sandwich

Sausage, Cannelloni Beans, Broccoli Rabe

This was a Jacques Pepin recipe that I had found and wanted to try out. He made his with some canned clams and broccolini (its from his "Fast Food" book).

Once again my local grocery store failed me. They had did not have broccolini (also goes by baby broccoli). The regular broccoli didn't look that great, so I bought the broccoli rabe which looked pretty decent.

I thought the rapini (easier to type than broccoli rabe) would be slightly bitter, but it really just overpowered the dish. Next time I'll probably stick to broccoli.

He also had you use the liquid from the can of beans. I used this along with some chicken stock and let it all reduce, but I think in the future I'd just use the stock.

I topped it off with some olive oil and parmesan cheese.

Highlight of making this was squeezing the hot italian sausage out of its casing. Not quite sure what it reminded me of. I'm also fairly certain this would've grossed Mandy out.


General List of Ingredients
Hot Italian Sausage
Rapini
Cannelloni Beans
Garlic
Chicken Stock
Red Pepper Flakes
Salt

Blue Moon - Full Moon Winter Ale

I have two problems with this beer.

We'll start out with the brewer - Coors. They like to do everything they can to not acknowledge that this is their beer. Now, I suppose the other large brewers do this also, but Blue Moon is consistently positioned as a micro-brew. This bothers me for some reason. I won't even mention the Coors family political leaning.

The second is that it is described as an abbey ale. It does not come close to tasting like an abbey ale. In fact, it does not come close to tasting like anything at all. Maybe I'm being too harsh. It has a slightly metallic taste with no aftertaste. It has more maltyness (is that a word?) than a Coors Light. (Mandy also pointed out that the label touts a "balanced taste" which could be accurate if "no taste" and "balanced taste" are one in the same.)

It is probably easier to drink with a meal than a Sam Adam's Winter Lager, but that's about the only positive thing I can say for this offering.

Overall, I can't recommend that anyone spend their money on this beer. Go buy yourself any other winter ale/seasonal offering that you can find (I recommend either this or this).

Official Joe Cooks Dinner and Stuff Beer Rating:
Blue Moon - Full Moon Winter Ale
1/5

Sausage and Peppers

Fairly straightforward dinner here.

Sausage, onion and peppers on a roll.

Done.

Smuttynose Pumpkin Ale

Ah. Now this is more like it.

I was a little afraid that I wouldn't be able to find more than one pumpkin ale in our neighborhood, but a few of the stores were actually carrying the Smuttynose Pumpkin Ale.

Now, I've definitely had this in the past, but once again, I could not remember if it was good or not.

Thankfully, this beer was not terrible. It may have been a tad sweeter than the Post Road offering, but this wasn't necessarily a bad thing.

The balance of pumpkin and spices was good. Even though its sweeter than the other I tried, there is some nice bitterness from hops still present.

I'd recommend it for anyone who wants a pumpkin ale and can still find it in stores (or just wait until next Fall...)

Official Joe Cooks Dinner and Stuff Beer Rating:
Smuttynose - Pumpkin Ale
3/5

Mac'n'Cheese

Mandy may have already blogged about this meal, but I'm here to do it right (i.e. better).

This dinner was inspired by our recent trip to Quaint.

I think the recipe is mainly derived from Alton Brown (also a man-crush of mine, along with Josh Howard, Doug Martsch and others). However, my recipe is far superior due to the addition of two ingredients: Bacon and Cayenne Pepper.

Unfortunately, it was not as bacony as it should have been, as I dropped a piece of bacon transferring it from the frying pan to a plate to cool. Being incredibly lazy/hungry, I decided to not fry up more slices. (Note to self: make at least twice as much bacon, if you do not use it in the mac'n'cheese, you can just eat it.)

The resulting mac'n'cheese was slightly spicy/hot, slightly bacony and deliciously cheesy.

Doug Martsch vs. The Smiths

Inspired by Nuclear Trout's Smiths' compilation, I present Doug Martsch and friends doing their best Morrissey/Johnny Marr impression:

1. Still Ill - Doug Martsch - 2002-06-11
2. This Night Has Opened My Eyes - Doug Martsch - 2002-02-13
3. Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want - Halo Benders - Don't Touch My Bikini EP
4. Bigmouth Strikes Again - Treepeople - Something Vicious for Tomorrow

Download

Hot Taco Action

When we first moved into our apartment here in Sunnyside, we had a little pest problem (OMG ROACHES!!!). Accordingly, we didn't do too much cooking for the first few weeks until we could get an exterminator. So while the roach situation was still in full crisis mode, I ate at the local taco truck probably about three times a week. Thankfully, the exterminator came in and solved our little problem and I was able to start my own kitchen nightmares. But as a result of my taco truck binge, I hadn't been much in the mood for tacos, salsa, guacamole, fajitas, etc.

This weekend as I was struggling to figure something out to cook, Mandy suggested I make myself some tacos. This sounded like a good idea as months have now passed since my affair with the taco truck.

The tacos were pretty straight forward. I came up with a spice mix with some references online (cayenne, cumin, chili/onion/garlic powder, oregano) and simmered the ground beef in it for a little while. I heated up the corn tortillas and chopped some vegetables. Quick and easy. Like your mom.

Mandy amused herself while I ate by trying to take action shots of me eating the tacos. I'm pleased to present below some of the highlights for your enjoyment.

Pork Scarpariello

This meal did not go exactly according to plan. I wanted to cook a version of the chicken scarpariello that I had eaten a few weeks ago. It was thin chicken cutlets with red and cherry peppers in a light sauce. It was slightly spicy and quite awesome.

I decided I didn't really want to eat chicken, so I was going to substitute in some pork. Hopefully the chef would be able to accommodate me.

I scanned some recipes online and came up with a rough ingredient list and recipe.

All was going smoothly until Gary showed up to play some Portal, or as he likes to call it, Holes.

I seared the pork on both sides with just a little salt & pepper. Then I started doing things in the wrong order (ugh). I poured some chicken stock into the pan to start the sauce. While this is one of the steps, I should have sauted the garlic and cherry/red peppers first in the pan. This is what I get for not writing down what I'm going to do ahead of time.

I dumped the stock out into a bowl and tossed the peppers & garlic into the pan with some olive oil. I then went and watched Gary play some Holes for about two minutes. When I came back in to the kitchen, there was a rather pungent pepper smell in the air. Woops. Combination of not enough oil, not enough movement in the pan and too much heat. The red peppers were a little charred (as you can see in the picture). I added a little more olive oil and watched them for a few minutes until the peppers were mostly soft.

I poured the stock back in along with some of the liquid from the cherry peppers (i also should have included white wine, but I didn't have any around) and put the pork in. I let it all cook for a while to let the liquid reduce.

Total cooking time was probably around 15 minutes.

It actually tasted pretty good, but I'd like to have the sauce be thicker next time. Maybe some cream and a little roux in there and it would probably be closer to what I was aiming for. I also forgot to put some of the parsley in the sauce that I had around the apartment.

The one major drawback to this operation was the apartment smelled like peppers for the rest of the evening. It may or may not have caused Gary to cough up a lung while attempting to solve 3D puzzles.

Chickpea Ragout

This is one of my favorite dishes to make for several reasons:
1) I get to chop up a lot of stuff with my knife
2) Not too many dishes/clean up (one pot, one cutting board, one bowl)
3) You can't really mess it up

However, even as easy as it is, its still possible to forget important things. For example, the layout picture is missing one key ingredient: an onion. I had to take a stroll down the street for a yellow onion after getting everything together. I'm thankful I don't have to get in a car for situations like this.

So lets get to the easy to make part:
Chop a medium yellow onion and an equal amount of green onions.
Saute the onions in some olive oil along with some salt and pepper.
Mince (or slice depending on how garlicy you want it) 2 cloves of garlic.
Throw the garlic in!!
Roughly chop the2 medium tomatoes (I usually just quarter them but I chopped them up today), throw them in!!
Drain the chickpeas, toss them in!!
Put in some chicken stock/broth or water; somewhere between 1/4 and 1/2 cup depending on how thick you want it to be; consider adding some more salt & pepper.

Bring it to a boil, cover and reduce to a simmer for 15 minutes or so. Uncover and cook for another 5-10 minutes until it gets to the consistency you want. If your a pimp with a kitchen knife you can probably cook the whole meal in 30 minutes (I'm looking at you Rachel R.).

I put some parsley and hot sauce in and ate it as my main course, but it also makes a nice side dish. It would probably go well over rice or pasta, but I'm typically too lazy to do more dishes when I make this.

Wild Animal Crunch

I like cereal. A lot. So, I'll occasionally post some cereal reviews here if I'm eating anything interesting. You, my three loyal readers, will not see a review of Cheerios, which also happens to be in our cupboard now.

At the grocery store I shop at there is not a wide variety of cereal. They did not stock Count Chocula, Franken Berry or Boo Berry this fall season. You cannot buy Golden Grahams. And of course, the cereal prices are outrageous. Everything is around $5.00 a box unless it is on sale.

While shopping yesterday, I saw that Wild Animal Crunch was on sale for $2.99. The description of "vanilla-chocolate" flavor intrigued me. The box was pretty interesting. It was really glossy and had animal trading cards that you can cut out (Sloth FTW!!!!!11!juan). Since I will purchase any cereal that looks like it might have some sugar in it if it is on sale, Wild Animal Crunch made its way into my shopping basket.

Upon waking up this morning, I poured myself a bowl of cereal along with some organic milk (thanks for the tip Gary).

The texture was pretty interesting. I don't mean that in a positive way. I thought it might have been stale, but the "good by" date is in December.

It tasted like nothing. Cardboard probably tastes better in milk than this stuff. I'd rather eat some shredded wheat, at least that has some good texture to it.

While the cereal itself showed no signs of its "vanilla-chocolate" flavor, the remaining milk had a hint of vanilla flavor. While this was great, it by no means mad up for the rest of the experience.

Overall, a pretty terrible cereal. Not worth the $2.99 I spent on it.

Castle Rock 2007 Pinot Noir

This past weekend Mandy and I went out for some drinks and a snack at Quaint and Bar 43. We ordered the bacon macaroni and cheese at Quaint, which I enjoyed. Mandy said she enjoyed my macaroni and cheese better (not Kraft). This may or may not have been a hint that I need to make mine soon.

Before returning to the apartment, we picked up this fine bottle of wine. Now, because of the drinks I already had (an old fashion and a Brooklyn Lager), many of the details about the wine are foggy (much like the picture below). In fact, this entire review basically comes from Mandy. "There was no aftertaste/finish" and "This $5 bottle tastes just as good" were the two comments that stuck with me.

However, it was still drinkable, which qualifies it for the highest score on the Joe Cooks Dinner and Stuff Binary Wine Grading Scale.

Joe Cooks Dinner and Stuff Binary Wine Grading Scale:
Castle Rock 2007 Pinot Noir
$10? (this is what happens when you drink and don't write things down ahead of time)
1/1

Tortellini and Sausage

Ah. The perks of living in New York.

Two of the things I missed the most not living near New York were tortellini and thin italian sausage (also known as cheese and parsley sausage).

After three years in DC, I moved to Cleveland Park. There is an italian deli (Vace) on the main stretch of Connecticut Avenue that has a good selection of frozen pastas that are locally made. Their tortellini (both cheese and meat) were actually really good, and I was glad that I didn't have to bring tortellini back in a cooler from visiting my parents in New York. Unfortunately, they only made sweet and hot sausage.

So I'm glad to be back in NY. This tortellini is from Riviera Ravioli on Morris Park in the Bronx. I think the sausage was from a deli in Carmel, NY (not sure of the name of it, its in Putnam Plaza, but used to be on the corner of 52 and Fair Street).

Both were totally awesome.

The last time I was in Butcher Block (an awesome Irish deli around the corner from my apartment) I noticed they had some in the case in back, so I'll try that soon too.

Zaro's Chocolate Babka

Mandy has wanted to get a chocolate babka for a while now. Last week after trying to go to the Rachel Ray Show, we stopped into Zaro's in Grand Central but they had no babka and Mandy was less than pleased with the store layout. I'm pretty sure she muttered "I will never ever ever step foot in NYC ever again" or something to that effect.

Much to my surprise, one day this week after class she stopped into the Zaro's and brought one home.

Now, while Zaro's website insists that they have been making their babka the same way as "the old days" I'm not sure I believe that. The top is heavily coated with powered sugar and chocolate drizzle. Mandy referred to it as "novelty" babka.

The bread portion was a little on the dry side for my tastes. Mandy thought that the chocolate wasn't distributed well throughout the babka.

I don't think we will be purchasing another one from Zaro's, but I'm sure this won't be the last babka review.

Pork

I haven't cooked pork in a few years. Mandy doesn't eat it (yet) and so I'm pretty much too lazy to cook it just for myself.

However, my parents gave me a package of thin sliced pork tenderloin so I had to do something with them.

I seared them, then made a sauce with a tomato, white wine, chicken stock, garlic and parsley. I cooked the pork for a few minutes more in the sauce.

It was pretty darn good. I still have four more pieces of pork in the freezer so I'll probably cook some more like this.

I also made some roasted potatoes to go along with the pork. They did not turn out too wonderful. I should have roasted them at a lower temperature as they were pretty crusty (i.e. burned) on the bottom. Oh well.

So Easy to Make

I wasn't interesting in cooking tonight. I had just gotten back from the laundromat and just wanted to not be hungry. Kraft Mac'n'Cheese it is.

Now, its not easy to mess up Kraft Macaroni and Cheese. This uber-difficult recipe contains only four steps: boil the macaroni; add some butter, milk and cheese packet; stir together; eat.

Unfortunately it is possible to mess up it somewhere in there. Are you a six year old and do not know how to boil water? Are you incapable of tearing open a cheese packet? Is your name "Joe Cooks Dinner and Stuff?"

I cooked the macaroni, no problems there. I added some butter and the cheese packet. Things are going smoothly at this point. I then pour in some milk. Uh oh. The milk looked rather "chunky" while pouring. I check the label "Good Until October 27." That's what I thought.

Wait a second, what does it say direct under that? "NYC Good Until October 25."

What the fuck. Seriously. The milk decides it is going to spoil two days earlier just because of where I live?

I toss the milk and "mac'n'cheese" and instead go to the taco truck.

Post Road Pumpkin Ale

I drink a lot of beer.

Not as much as I once did during my younger years (I still miss you, my dearest kegerator).

Anyway, I suppose I will occassionally review beers that I'm drinking, mainly so I remember to buy the good ones again (not that hard) and to not buy the bad ones again (this happens on occassion).

Unfortunately, this was one that I had bought in the past and couldn't quite remember how much I liked it (or didn't).

It's brewed by the folks at Brooklyn Brewery. The head quickly disappated. It had a good aroma of spices and such, as a pumpkin beer should. The taste was a little off for me though. I'm just not sure what its missing. I thought it had a little soapy (or metallic?) aftertaste. It's not as sweet as other pumpkin ales (Mandy liked this about this beer) so its drinkable with a meal.

I will not be purchasing again in the future. I'd stick to the Dogfish Head pumpkin ale if I could find it up here.

Official Joe Cooks Dinner and Stuff Beer Rating:
2.5/5

Beer Bread

Mandy was a little bored the other night, so she decided she was going to bake some bread. She found a "beer bread" recipe online and wanted to give it a shot. I'm not sure what exactly was in it besides a bottle of Sam Adams lager.

It came out pretty dense (I guess that's what happens when there's no yeast involved). The bread smelled like beer. It also had this weird bitter aftertaste which is attributable to the hops in the beer. I'm guessing something lighter, like a hefeweizen or fruit beer or something would work better and not impart the same bitterness. It really just made me want some irish soda bread.

After two days on the counter, we still haven't had any more slices since that first night. So yeah. You be the judge.

Pig Parts or Potpourri

Since I haven't been a particularly prolific blogger in the first two weeks or so here, I have some random photos that I need to unload.

My mother and father brought some great cherry tomatoes from their home garden when they visited for my birthday. We had some mozzarella around from when we made pizza so I tossed it all together with some olive oil, salt and pepper for a nice little snack. It was scrum-didly-decious.
Also courtesy of my mother and father were some sorta prepared meals that they bought at various stores. The chicken scarpariello that they brought from the italian place in their town was amazing for being frozen. My dad asked if I split it with Mandy because there was a lot to eat. I just devoured the whole thing in about 5 minutes. I'll have to try making some on my own soon.

They also brought some meals/meats from Stew Leonard's. The flank steak stuffed with cheddar cheese and bacon looked phenomenal while uncooked, but looked pretty average after I seared it and threw it in the oven for a bit. It tasted pretty decent, but I wouldn't go out of my way to make it or even buy it again.
And finally some more stuff courtesy of dear mom and dad. They brought some Hatfield ham along with the bacon from the previous breakfast post. They'd been sitting in the fridge a bit longer than they probably should've, so I fried them up along with some eggs and had a quite good breakfast at 3pm the other day. The bacon was still phenomenal even though one piece didn't really want to stay together anymore. Also making guest appearances are some cheddar cheese and a plum tomato.