Is You Tweaking?

The Keegan (Mr. Boston, page 185) is four parts bourbon, three parts Aperol, two parts Yellow Chartreuse and three parts lime juice. We made it with Strega and lemon juice and it tasted good anyway.

Eat Me, World: Japan

We did this Japanese-themed meal for book club. Yakisoba was somewhere between this and this. I wanted it to taste really fried and griddled but I’m assuming it was an operator error; still I think it tasted pretty OK. Bought Aonori (seaweed flakes) and Benishoga (pickled red-colored ginger) at the local Japanese food mart and that was a great addition. Made okonomiyaki for the second time using a cross between this and this; I cannot get it to flip correctly; assume it’s an operator error. Then had tonkatsu — or pork katsu — except I used pork shoulder meat (butcher’s recommendation). It was only $13.15 for like 20 cutlets and it totally worked.

Strega Anagram: “Greats”

I avoided getting a bottle of Strega because it looked expensive, but if you only use a 1/4 ounce or a 1/2 ounce at a time, it’s not that big a deal, right? Anyway, so the other day I just got a bottle and tried hard not to do the math (it wasn’t bad, actually: $35 or something). [Edit: this was from March 25 at 12:47 a.m.; meaningless gibberish deleted.]

Been using it a lot lately [writing this as of 5/12/16] and I can’t remember a whole lot about it other than someone someplace suggested substituting it for Yellow Chartreuse, which I definitely did because Yellow Chartreuse is definitely more expensive.

Tonight I happened upon this cocktail in the course of trying to figure out what we were served at Flatbush Farm last Monday; I’m pretty sure it was sort of like a The Last Word but with mezcal instead of gin or whatever they normally use (a recipe is here but we didn’t have a pepper in it).

Anyway, this cocktail has two parts mezcal, one part Yellow Chartreuse, one part dry vermouth and two dashes grapefruit bitters. I replaced the chartreuse with Strega. This was a good drink. I also want to try the The Last Word soon, too.

On Falernum

I came across Falernum a few times in the PDT book, I think; it was one of those things I never saw/looked for/assumed it was expensive (it’s totally not; under $20). So anyway, I finally got a bottle. Jen immediately tried something called a “Doctor Funk #2” in Mr. Boston: six parts dark rum, two parts Falernum, two parts grenadine, three parts lime juice, one dash absinthe, one dash Angostura bitters and club soda (we didn’t use the club soda). She made another round, then some more the next day.

I don’t really like rum, though I’m not really sure why; I just avoid rum drinks, in general. Maybe it’s the goofy names. Jen, on the other hand, very much likes rum, so this was in her wheelhouse/right up her alley/whatever.

A few weeks later I was searching for more Falernum drinks and found the ridiculously named “Satin Sheets” in Mr. Boston: six parts blanco tequila, two parts Falernum, two parts simple syrup and three parts lime juice. Now this was a cocktail; and it passed the guest test a week or so later. The other day I tried it with Mezcal and it was still good.

Falafel Chicken

Michael Ruhlman’s brilliant pan-fried chicken recipe has single-handedly helped reincorporate protein into the diets of at least one carb-fascinated kiddo; for that I am eternally grateful.

The recipe uses a buttermilk-like glop to soak the chicken in which isn’t buttermilk but rather milk and yogurt; obviously useful because those two ingredients are usually on hand. But actually we don’t usually have yogurt on hand. What seems always to be around is hummus.

I can’t get into a thing right now about how people want to believe they eat more hummus than they actually do, but suffice it to say I think people entertaining people assume people eat a lot more hummus than they actually do. Which is how we ended up with a shit-ton of hummus. And when I learned that you can freeze hummus without it harming anything, I learned to accept all the hummus which we were in custody of.

Which is to say, I took out a single serving of hummus, the kind you get in bulk at Costco, let it come to room temperature and then mixed it into a bowl with milk — thus your fried chicken wash.

Alright, so then, instead of just white flour, mix a little chickpea flour (or garbanzo bean flour). The thing, honest-to-god has this great falafel flavor in there.