Icarus's blog: "Augurs, Martyrs, and Agnostics"

So... after 3 hours of stacking boxes, I came home, cleaned house a bit, and started prep for my five course dinner.

Plans changed a bit, but it wasn't anything I couldn't/hadn't dealt with in living in an area with scarce produce.

I spent about 2.5 hours cutting vegetables, baking/prebaking, stacking up, precooking noodles and cleaning.

No big deal right?

At one point my neck/beck went out but ...
let's take you on this little trip.

1. For my appetizer course (and this made my Brother crack up, because I said "and that was one course" very casually when explaining it)

Antipasto ala Ick:
Thin sliced italian bread with alternating pestos arranged around 3 stuffed tomatoes with mozeralla balls between bruschetta.
...

That's pretty self explanatory right?

I made my pistachio-arugala-spinach-oliveoil-basil-salt/pepper pesto (extra chunky version).
Punched up classic.

And my artichoke-walnut-oliveoil-greens(mainly basil and parsley) pesto.
Smooth/mellow.

around plum tomatoes stuffed with
breadcrumbs, olive oil, capers and parsley

with well placed mozerella balls.

Comments:
I've never ate anything like this!
Oh my god!
Wow.
It's so pretty!
You made this yourself!?

(cleaned plates)


2. For my salad (with chilled plate and fork)
I made a "citrus assault"

Intro: Usually salads are mellow and crisp, and a pallette cleanse, kinda neutral and timid, I decided to make a culinary assault with bold and unfamiliar flavors.

So I arranged orange/lemon sections (with that fancy cut that takes out all the white stuff and takes forever to do)

over a bed of arugala/spinach

drizzled with a heavilly salted citrus infused olive oil (I like my salad with flake salt >>)

with centrally placed chive blossoms and minced shallot, and a sprinkling of pistachios. (because one of my guests said her favorite nuts were pistachios and cashews)


No fennel, no decent olives. Had to adapt.

Comments:
Is he every woman's fantasy!?
How do you know so much about food?


(cleaned plates)


3. Soup was... a catastrophe. "Spring minestrone"
... but I think it still worked.

It had
Cubed/diced: carrots, celery, onion, zuccini, garlic, potato
Whole green beans, whole grape tomatoes
small pasta shapes
split peas

and would've benefited greatly from a ham bone, meatballs, and a pound of cheese...

but I was cooking for vegetarians.

And I used store vegetable stock (there were 4 boxes of low sodium vegetable stock on a WALL of beef/chicken stock... that was it. Obviously not a vegetarian friendly store)

Low sodium stock has its place... but I was constantly adding salt to this damn soup.
I think I eventually bumped it up, but I started it 3 hours too early, overcooked the green beans a scooch

and I only used split peas as a substitute for missing ingredients.
Worked
but for the first couple of hours they were... crunchy.




Comments:
Ah! Its hot!
Like burn my mouth hot!
But it's good.



... so I came back in from the kitchen and conversed for 10-20 minutes until the soup cooled. My service was going too fast anyway.
Served some wine. Chatted. Got a couple origin/background stories.

(over half gone, and some "I'm getting full" comments)





At about this time I dropped my dry pasta for my main dish, and ... didn't time my main dish correctly at all XD







4. Main course was cubed, peeled,partially seeded eggplant, cubed zucchini, bell peppers and garlic in a basil-tomato sauce with linguine.


And I said
more than once, that I have NO IDEA what "done eggplant" looks/tastes like.
I was informed I did a good job. I just poured the sauce and lifted it once the eggplant tasted kinda like weak apples/celery. Plated and served.


My pasta clumped a bit because I didn't stir it enough, and I left it out of water too long... but it wasn't overcooked at least.


Comments:
And you say you've never cooked eggplant before? I haven't either and this is great!
Gah this is like restaurant food, you should start a business!
I want to eat more, but I want to save room for dessert too!

(around half cleared plates and comments like "man I'm glad I didn't eat lunch" and "I've never ate so much good food")







5. "Dessert as my father advised"
was "something with dark chocolate, women love chocolate"

So I picked up some 86% ghirardeli chocolate... this is make your mouth numb chocolate. I shaved it fine, and broke off big chunks of it and piled it over some hagen das chocolate ice cream.

I couldn't get it out of the bucket... because I forgot to soften it on the counter... but my guests suggested I put it in the nuker for 15 seconds, and that worked.

So we had gooey
rich chocolate icecream with chunks, shavings and whole bars of super dark chocolate.

... and then I remembered to pair it with wine, and serve some pistachios

Comments:
I was waiting for this moment.
I LOVE salt with chocolate.
I LOVE chocolate.
























The evening itself-
I was elbow deep in antipasto, and I was honestly expecting these girls to be 20 minutes late.
They arrived right on time at 8:00 P.M.
I heard giggling... and two figures darting around my back yard to my grand front entrance (giant door on a giant porch)
I answered the doorbell to two
young
thin
made up
women
...
in flapper dresses/costume
and hosiery.
Complete with the lil flapper feathered headband
ruffles
My friend was in combat boots
her girlfriend was in high heels.

"Awesome... I am way underdressed"

giggles.

I put my dog in a safe place, changed into my best black polo about two sizes too small to make me look more cubed. Ran a comb through my hair
Served drinks in the living room and finished antipasto.

Pulled their chairs out.
Poured wine with a towel over my arm.
Served dainty lil plates on a precisely laid out setting.
Gave my course spiels.
Made chitchat.
Complimented them on their lovely outfits.
Answered questions.
Asked if I could get them anything.

... mostly in a british butler voice XD







And after dinner they had a cigarette on my huge front porch, talked, came back in for a bit, looked at my photographyish recipe books, talked more about food and what I like to cook.
Talked about documentaries to watch.

Distributed antacids.
And bid farewell.

I had to take my dog to the vet at the asscrack of dawn
and my friend's girlfriend had her sister in town (a rare occasion)

During the night I got a poutey text from another lady friend about not being invited to dinner
not only is she ALSO a vegetarian, but she's also gluten intollerant...
I think I made ONE dish gluten free that night :b

And I didn't invite ANYONE to dinner.
They invited themselve XD




Got a nice hug from the bisexual freespirit freelove type in the group.

And my old-friend says "I've never hugged you before, have I?"
And she hugged me.

I ... didn't really hug back.
"What you don't use your hands?"
"I didn't know how comfortable you'd be with that"
and put my hands on her back and a gentle rub.

I'm a pretty good hugger- I'm better at hugging people with intent.

I think my friend's heckles were up a bit because her girlfriend had her arms around me...

Understandable.


She does kinda hug... and touch a lot.


And I'm pretty bad ass.

It didn't take long for tale of my five course dinner to get out.
The general consensus in the amoeba of friends is that I'm
"pretty bad ass".

In an Iron Chef kinda way I'm guessing...
which is about the most bad assed a person can really be.

But not that pansy Iron Chef America crap...