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Posts from the ‘Breads’ Category

Apr 15

Muffin Monday: Out and Ab-oatmeal Bread

Every once in a while I remember that I’m a 24 year old single, attractive female and that I should try to enjoy that while I can because it’s not going to last forever.  It can be hard to break out of my cranky old British man persona but last Saturday night I did and oh it felt so nice to be young and dancing again.  I actually had a drink or two, went out, met new boys, met new girls, spent a little cash and most importantly I went dancing.  Oh how I’ve missed dancing.  I haven’t really been properly out dancing since Comic Con last year and I wasn’t even properly single then.  There’s something very wrong with that.  So since I wasn’t going to make another engagement on time and was looking at a night in doing nothing, once again, I hesitated for a beat when a friend from yoga let me know she was going out that evening.  Then I said “What the hell is wrong with you.  Act your age already!” and asked if there was room for one more.  So so glad.

What makes dancing so cathartic, so therapeutic and just so damn much fun?  It’s the release I think.  It’s physical, if not always sexual, and requires that you trust in your body rather than letting your mind do all the work.  Overthinking means you lose the beat.  If you have a partner you need to be able to really let your body win out and react to theirs.  If you let your brain worry about where his or her foot is going next, by the time you figure it out they are already two more steps ahead.  That’s not to say it involves totally turning off your mind because I certainly feel like mine is still racing but it’s in a reactive mode rather than predictive.  That’s a rare thing for me to be able to do and enjoy.  As such a Type-A(sshole) I find myself craving the ability to plan and control the majority of the time so finding a situation where I can be comfortable not doing that is rare and worth relishing.  In retrospect I wish I had taken ballet lessons when they had been offered as a child.

Now I don’t know as much about it as I do food but I do know that the concept of “Dance Therapy” is something that’s been around since the 60’s.  It’s distinguishable from just general physical activity but I will admit that even just getting your body moving whether it’s dancing or chopping wood is going to cause an endorphin release and improve mood.  How effective is it?  Well it can depend on what you’re treating.  I’m not sure that there’s as much of a verifiable success record that dance therapy can cure severe mental disorders like schizophrenia but it has shown significant impacts in the lives of the elderly, those recovering from brain injuries and in autistic children.  There aren’t any recorded negative effects (except maybe a sprained ankle or two) from what I’ve read on the topic.

Going on Saturday didn’t cure all my problems.  It didn’t end my celibate streak.  The fact that I haven’t even so much as kissed someone since July rather horrified one of my friends.  But it did reconnect me a little with the girl I’m supposed to be acting the age of.  Plus the nice part about being on the dance floor is that no one is talking.  No one is asking me what I do for a living and being impressed, or intimidated or suffering inferiority complex.  Instead it’s pretty simple: can you keep up?  For some reason people seem to be more up to that challenge on the dance floor than anywhere else with me.  Of course that might just be because I’m not a very good dancer….  White girl dancing isn’t exactly that poetic or challenging is it?  But I do it with gleeful abandon regardless of how good I am.

I remember being little at a dance party at my karate studio.  I chose the karate over the ballet lessons.  I don’t really regret that as much but I do wish I’d found a way to do ballet too.  Anyway I just remember that I was there with my first grade “boyfriend” who got tired and went home after only a short time.  I spent the entire party hopping around, throwing punches and dancing.  I remember hearing my Mom say to someone “Men are always going to struggle to keep up with her on the dance floor.”  Little did I know at that age that what she wasn’t just talking about the dancing.  Either way I need to get out a little more and act my age.  Even if I’m just dancing on my own—no wild oats need to be sown for me to enjoy myself.

For the mornings after this is a fantastic quick bread that comes together using the time trusted muffin method.  This means it’s simple and can be done even if that night before involved enough liquid courage for the dancefloor to leave you suffering some of the afterness of badness.  You can use the recipe to make muffins or a loaf for easy slicing.  It’s filling and delicious—yes even to someone like me who doesn’t really like oatmeal.

Dorie’s Oatmeal Loaf

From Dorie Greenspan’s “Baking from my home to yours”

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Mar 27

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Early baked bread, fails to rise, makes a Jew ask why matzo is prized?

So Olivia…why is it that during Passover you complain about not getting to eat any “Chametz”?  Why can’t you come out for pizza and beer?  And why in the world are you eating those crackers all the time that taste like cardboard?

You are not to eat any hametz with it; for seven days you are to eat with it matzah, the bread of affliction; for you came out of the land of Egypt in haste. Thus you will remember the day you left the land of Egypt as long as you live.    —Deuteronomy 16:3

Matzo Brittle!

Passover is a very holiday that is very strongly focused on the children of the family.  Much of the purpose of the retelling of the story, the ceremony itself, is about teaching the younger generation about their history.  Traditionally after the dipping of the Karpas (see yesterday’s post) the youngest child becomes a part of the ceremony.   The youngest will ask 4 questions of the person leading the seder and this guides the telling.  These are the same questions every year so it’s sort of like a recital.  I’m not sure that your five year-old is itching to participate in a religious ceremonial recital but it helps keep the kids engaged.  Which brings us to the next portion of the seder plate and the first question the child is supposed to ask:

Shebb’khol hallelot anu okh’lin ḥamets umatsa, vehallayla hazze kullo matsa.
Translated: Why is it that on all other nights during the year we eat either leavened bread or matza, but on this night we eat only matza?

You might be familiar with this funny looking cracker in the Kosher aisle of your grocery store.  Every year around easter time you might notice that boxes of it pile up in the aisles next to concord grape wine and a bunch of candles.  These giant crackers are called Matza or Matzah or Matzo…or plural Matzot.  There are a lot of spelling variations.  To keep it simple I’m just going to stick with Matzo.

Matzo is unleavened bread that Jews eat during Passover to remember the flight out of Egypt.  Remember how the Pharaoh suddenly changed his mind about freeing the slaves?  Well the Jews were savvy to this possibility, or maybe they were understandably in a hurry to just get away once freed, either way in the haste to get out of dodge the story goes that the Jews wanted to get out so badly they didn’t bother waiting for bread dough to rise.  They slapped it together, baked it, packed and left with flat loaves of bread for the journey to freedom.  This bread symbolizes both freedom and servitude for while it is part of the story of liberation, it also reminds us that we were slaves.  Thus it is known as “the bread of affliction” and also as a poor man’s bread.

Yeast, the microorganism which causes bread to rise, also is what breaks down wheat and gives bread flavor.  As such traditional Matzo is pretty damn flavorless.  Passover Matzo is made of only flour and water—nothing else.    The rest of the year you can buy some pretty damn delicious versions (sour cream and onion egg matzo is delicious) but for Passover the plain kind is all that is allowed.  Additionally no other leavened grain is to be eaten.  Grains include: wheat, barley, spelt, oats and rye.  These grains and anything produced with leavening are called “Chametz” and they are forbidden.  Thus no pizza and no beer.

In fact typically the more observant Ashkenazi Jewish households also remove foods considered “kitniyot” or “small things”.  These are any foods that resemble grain.  The idea being that even having them around mind lead someone to get confused/distracted and accidentally eat Chametz with them or someone might think you are eating Chametz.  Kitniyot includes: rice, beans, corn and lentils.  Sephardic Jews are less stringent on this matter….  (Olivia what is a Sephardic and Ashkenazi Jew?  — I’ll explain that in a few days)

There really is a lot more to the Matzo than I’m even getting into here.  It’s one of the oldest and most symbolic parts of the Passover Seder.  Still I know that this post has already gone on pretty long so now I will reward you with a tasty recipe for turning Matzo into a delicious dessert.  Which brings me to one last thing….

In order to keep the kidlets engaged and alert during Seder, there’s one last tradition I should mention about Matzo.  Matzo is considered the “Afikomen” or dessert for the Passover Seder.  Right before the youngest child asks the 4 questions, and after the eating of the Karpas, the matzo is uncovered on the table.  Typically there are three pieces and the middle one is broken in half.  The larger half is hidden by the family and the children go on a Matzo hunt after the meal to find it.    Now I’ve never found anything concrete proving this but the earliest recordings of egg hunts as part of a certain other religious holiday *cougheastercough* around this time of year didn’t pop up until the 18th century…so you’ve gotta wonder whether this played into that now mainstream practice we all know about.

Anyway plain matzo as dessert?  PAH.  Not in my house.  Nope I make this insanely delicious version of matzo – matzo brittle.  Mmmmmm.  The recipe is going to list butter OR shortening—use shortening if you want to keep the dessert parve.  Don’t know what that means?  Don’t worry about it, I’ll explain another day about Kosher laws.

 

Chocolate Honey-Almond Matzo Brittle Read more

Mar 11

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Monday Morning Loaf to Beholden

Persimmon Sesame Cake (7)

I vehemently dislike soliciting and accepting help from people—

This isn’t a perceived weakness issue like many people would assume it is for me.  I don’t think needing help is a sign of weakness.  We all come up against situations where you just can’t do it on your own.  Maybe a car breaks down.  Maybe a kid gets sick.  Life happens and that’s really just a more pleasant way for saying sometimes shit gets out of your control.  It took me a long time to learn to accept that I can’t reign over my day to day existence as an all-powerful, omniscient being.  Heck even when I AM that being the occasional satellite would fall out of the sky suddenly killing my Sim in front of my eyes and I may not have saved the game in the last hour.  Anyway the point is I know that we all need help sometimes.

Persimmon Sesame CakeThat being said, when I do ask for help I am always quick to define the parameters by which I intend to repay this person. See the reason I hate asking for help is that I hate the feeling of being in someone’s debt.  I hate that when you accept assistance from someone, especially for big ticket items, it comes with one or many strings attached.  Invisible and often undefined strings that will be insisted aren’t there but you know what?  They always are.  I think it’s a rule of acquisition in fact.  It might be a gift at the time but man oh man, when that person needs a favor in return that you initially can’t help with, you betcha they will bring up that “gift” again.  I once made the mistake of thinking that one of my ex’s made a grand gesture for me and accepting it as such.  He had just paid the cost of extending my plane ticket so I could stay an extra night since my classes were cancelled and joked that I had to clean his room in exchange.  I found out in a nasty telephone conversation that what I’d interpreted as a joke was actually in his mind a verbal contract.  It hurt on multiple levels—but mostly because it was a rare time that I actually took someone’s assistance/kindness without trying to give back.  Never again have I felt comfortable with a boyfriend offering to do something grand for me and quite often, with one rare exception but there were other issues in that relationship, I’ve found that instinct was correct.  There’s always some sort of expectation from men I date.  And people wonder why I’m happier being single.

So typically when I ask for help I will always include in my request some form of repayment.  I think I’ve asked for help from friends most often with the countless number of times I’ve had to move but I always, always send out that batsignal with a plate of cookies, pizza and/or beer attached.  As it stands I have one person who I still never managed to connect with and it’s driving me crazy to think that I haven’t repaid the debt yet.

You might think “Olivia you don’t owe someone just because they carry a bag for you.” No, maybe not that one time, but there’s the risk of accumulated performance of this task and that DOES eventually add up.  Trust me I know.  After a while that friend who always takes a ride home is less attractive to hang out with because you get tired of always taking them home.  Then you get invited out less and…yes it adds up.  I dislike the idea of wearing out my welcome with requests for help so I try to minimize asking for unless it’s quite literally impossible for me to do on my own.  That way when I have a genuine emergency, I haven’t cried wolf too many times.Persimmon Sesame Cake (3)

I get extremely frustrated too when it’s a persistent unsolicited offer.  I hate being asked repeatedly to allow someone to help me.  When it comes to very simple things like luggage, and I am struggling under the weight of my decision to pack too many shoes, I will actually ask for help should I need it but I much prefer to ask than have it offered over and over again after I refuse over and over again.  That repeated offer just ends up frustrating me and making me cranky.  I don’t play those social contract games where you refuse out of politeness.  I think that’s why I get so frustrated when someone will persist in offering—I feel like I’m not being taken at my word.  I’ve always been someone who feels that my word really matters. If I say I’m going to do something I do my damndest to make sure that happens.  This stems from my fear of ever letting someone down.  Plus I have that impatience issue where I really, really hate taking the time to repeat myself when it’s not needed.  I suffer from that pesky “I want to do it all”mania so for me time is extremely precious.  Yes even those extra few minutes.    Anyone who has had to use public transit should know that even the space of a minute can make a HUGE difference in the timing of your day.

Plus when it comes to things like rides or carrying heavy stuff—I like the exercise.  I like the excuse to get an extra walk in.  I want to do it.   If I had my way I’d live in a city within a 1 mile of radius of everything I needed because then I could always just walk where I want to go.  Heck 2 miles even.  I’m an endorphin junkie and I get them from moving my body.    Persimmon Sesame Cake (5)

What I don’t like is the feeling of invisible strings hanging off my body, ready to be tugged upon at a moment’s notice.  I really relish my freedom and I’m the sort of person who gets very uncomfortable when held too tightly.  That concept of keeping your palm open and letting a butterfly choose to land, stay or leave has always been an exceptionally apt analogy of how I am.  I just get squirmish otherwise.  OF course the problem is that I’ll also run away if I feel like no one wants me around.  But that’s another topic altogether and right now I’m getting hungry so without much further ado here’s a recipe I love to bake as a thank-you gift for friends.  Quick morning loaves and muffins are often characterized as the homemaker’s choice and there’s a reason for that.  A simple reason.  They are incredibly simple and fast to make but still extremely delicious.  This persimmon bread is actually a modified mango bread recipe that I updated for winter produce and played around with the flavors a bit.  It’s also incredibly, delectably moist and delightful to bite into with some nice complex flavor from the persimmon.  If you ever do get the rare opportunity to do me a big favor and I offer to bake for you, I highly recommend you ask for this.

Persimmon Sesame Bread

an Olivia Original Read more

Feb 21

I’m hot, sticky sweet…

from my head to my BUNS..er, feet

A lot of my friends, and social media acquaintances, are presumably quite sick of hearing me go on and on about my love for Bikram yoga.  I am sure I mention it in at least a third of my blog posts here but if you’ll forgive me this time I have an “I’m kind of a big deal” announcement to make.  I just completed my first 30 day Bikram yoga challenge.  Actually when I say “just” I really mean I completed it over the weekend and as of this posting I will have gone 33 days in a row.  It’s a huge accomplishment.  But even more awesome was that day 30 I was joined by two lovely ladies who I’m friends with and may have infected them with the Bikram yoga bug.  And they aren’t the only ones.  It seems I’m a walking advertisement for the yoga and since I posted a photo from a recent photo shoot I did (more on that another day) I’ve had quite a few people come to me to say they were inspired to try Bikram for the first time and/or go back to it.

FL_Style_Lounge-0362b

I lost a lot of weight and toned a ton of muscle doing this yoga.  No joke, no gimmicks, no weight lifting required.  I very rarely go to the gym and when I do it’s to use a treadmill.  I will not say I **never** touch weights but I do it usually on a whim—usually because I just feel too good to want to stop working out.  The last time I touched a dumbbell was two weeks ago.  Just to provide a source of reference.  The reason no one ever believes that yoga can build muscle is because most Americans are more familiar with a fairly passive, meditative yoga.  Bikram is nothing like that.  It is 90 minutes of stretching and compression postures utilizing isometrics in a room heated to 105 degrees with 40% humidity.  You ever try doing squats, holding your arms out in front of you, and holding it for 3 minutes?  Now do that in a HOT room.  It will kick your yoga mocking butt.  There’s no staring into crystals and sighing “Ommmmm” in that room.

Why is it so hot?  The heat relaxes your muscles and lets you get a deeper stretch than you could in the cold.  It also decreases the risk of pulling a muscle that is not properly warmed up like you more often would in a gym.  The heat also creates more of a cardiovascular strain on your system as your body works harder to cool itself down while doing the poses.  This obviously means you sweat a ton.  Now I’m not sure how much of the concept of “sweating out toxins” is valid but the increased cardiovascular energy is certainly a good thing.  Interspersed with the stretching poses there are compression postures designed to cut off blood flow to different points of your body for short periods of time.  After releasing your heart works fast to deliver blood to these areas—the theory being that the rush of blood flow helps clean out arterial walls.  It also gets your heart rate up so that adds the cardio/weight loss element of the class.  I’ve always been a fan of coiling up in small spaces.  As a little girl I used to curl up into my cubby hole in kindergarten whenever I felt sad or upset.  The compression postures are very psychologically comforting for me as a result.

In short you can get some nice tight, hot little buns with Bikram yoga.  And speaking of hot, sticky buns….  Since today is National Sticky Bun Day and the process to make these involves heat, stretching and compression, it only seems appropriate to bake and blog about them as part of my 30-day challenge celebration!

Personally I always see these and immediately think of Princess Leia.  I think I probably saw Star Wars before I ever ate my first honey bun so that image is thoroughly burned into my brain.  Unfortunately the history of the sticky bun didn’t start on the planet of Alderaan but rather with the Pennsylvania Dutch.  Well okay actually just the Germans in general who brought the pastry over with them to the new world where it took off like (ha) hot cakes. The germans called these yeast raised dough treats “schnecken” which translates into snail.  Obviously a reference to their coiled shape.  Not nearly as cool as if it meant “kick ass space princess” but I guess we can’t win it all.  Traditional schnecken dough is made with sour cream and they often get mixed up with a similar Jewish treat called Rugelach which is made with cream cheese.  You’ll find both treats in some of the older, east coast Jewish communities.  It’s also a sweet served at every Sunday breakfast at the Walden Summer Camp for Girl’s in Maine—why is this at all an interesting piece of information?  Well back when Lindsey Lohan actually had a career this was the camp setting for a certain Parent Trap remake….  Just your random bursts of pop-culture knowledge to make up for a few days of non-posting.

Pecan Honey Buns

From Dorie Greenspan’s Baking from my home to yours

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Jan 29

Twofer Tuesday: Duck, Duck…Soup

Introducing Twofer Tuesdays – Two recipes for the price of one!  This week is also a Think Thin post but I’m retiring that title for more general use so you might get think thin thursdays or random healthy recipes as I kickstart back up my own diet.

Something my friends have learned from my instagram and photo streams:  I share photos that will either whet your appetite or turn your stomach.  Case in point—I’ll switch between taking snapshots of doughnuts and cookies to images of post-surgery body parts oozing and gushing.  Yum yum!  I recently had to have another ingrown toenail removed (why am I posting about this on my food blog?) and put up a picture that got an array of disgusted responses.  Don’t worry I won’t be sharing that here now.  Suffice to say it hurt, it still hurts and is in fact in such a bad way that I’m on antibiotics – read between the lines ewwww she’s infected.  Who said pretty girls can’t be gross?  We fart and burp too.  Yup yup yup!  Some hot girls even do it on microphones—I’m looking at you Adrienne Curry.  That woman is insanely hot, insanely geeky and insanely disgusting and I love her for all three.

But on the topic of grossness, I feel awful.  Not sure if it’s because I was in so much pain from my wee toe that I could sleep last night or these antibiotics I’m on—4 times a day!  What?!  I’ve never had antibiotics I had to remember to take so often and I was even on Bactrim years ago which is a huge honkin’ horse pill of a triple-acting antibiotic regimen.  Yuck.  I’m not usually sensitive to medications though I can’t stomach Tamiflu.  Literally can’t stomach it which kind of sucks since it’s the only real anti-viral that exists on the market.  Thankfully I seem to avoid getting the flu year after year in favor of my standing appointment with bronchial infections that have plagued me since childhood.  Or at least I used to.  January has almost come to a close and I have officially made it over a year—a year—without a sinus infection.  Is it a bird, a plane, a miracle?  Nope.  It’s Bikram yoga but I’ll wax and wane poetical about that another day because while I’m grateful to be healthy in a way I’ve never before experienced, I’m in a piss poor mood right now about this stupid toe thing.

I think I’ve been indulging too much as well.  I feel bloated and disgusting and know I’ve gained back a pound or two in the last few weeks.  It’s hard to balance the desire to hunker down in the winter with warm fatty comfort food and efforts to lose or maintain weight loss plans, isn’t it?  We instinctively want to eat more in order to put on that heat insulating blubber that our bodies needed before the modern first world marvel that is the indoor heater.  Part of the problem is that I’ve been on a mad woman quest to develop the PERFECT chocolate chip cookie and as such I have made and eaten way too much cookie dough and finished products.  I’m giving em away as much as I can but really how is a girl to resist warm, gooey cookies fresh from the oven?  I’m happy to say that I’ve finally gotten the recipe tweaked to my liking, as my hips clearly show, and as of today I am officially back on a rigid diet until my weight is back to where I want to maintain it.  But how do you balance that still with cold, overcast weather?

Soup.

Soup is a great meal for dieting in the winter so long as you are making the right choices i.e. avoiding those bacon, cheese, cream and potato laden bowls of deliciousness.  I know baked potato soup is amazing but it’s also NOT a diet friendly option.  Good news though: you don’t have to sacrifice rich, decadent flavorful soups for skinny jeans.  I’ve got a recipe for a Duck broth vegetable soup that will warm you up from the inside out.  The flavors always summon up for me the feeling that I’m in a French countryside cottage with a fire roaring, keeping my toes toasty despite snow on the ground outside.  It’s got all the indulgence of French cuisine without the guilt.  I’ve paired it with a great recipe for some sweet potato biscuits and while the carb load isn’t exactly on diet, if you can constrain yourself to JUST ONE, then you can still have a delicious rustic dinner for under 500 calories—and you never knew that a bit of soup and crust of bread could taste so good.

 Duck Duck Soup

an Olivia Original Read more

Jan 25

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Scifriday: Farewell Fringe

Dr. Walter Bishop: Peter, hold on to these tight. Anti-gravity osmium bullets. Shoot Observers with these and watch them float away like balloons.
Peter Bishop: If we shoot ‘em they’re dead. Why’d we want ‘em to float away?

I love this show so much, I wear it on my head!

I love this show so much, I wear it on my head!

Dr. Walter Bishop: …Because it’s cool.
Peter Bishop: That makes sense Walter.

Fringe has ended and my heart has broken into a million, red-viney pieces knowing that the last bastion of good scifi tv goes with it.  Especially because this show was so damn good and not just because I got to hear Joshua Jackson lovingly say “Olivia” on a weekly basis.  (I’ve had a crush on him since the days of the Flying V) It really was an excellently written, shot and acted show—while there were rough spots and bad episodes, it was an original and fun series to watch.  Not familiar with this show?  Where have you been for the last 5 years!

Okay so Fringe is a show with a simple scifi premise: a specialized FBI team examines a series of events, ranging from the fantastical to the grotesque, and discovers that these events are linked to the existence of a parallel universe with which “our side” is unknowingly at war.   Intriguing no?  I was hesitant at first when the series began and like any show that is more storyline based, the first season ran slowly.  The initial few episodes were weaker because the show was laying foundations for a spectacular underlying storyline that played out over several seasons and 100 episodes.  What begins with the standard “freak of the week” rapidly becomes far more complicated as the story starts to craft connections between bizarre events and develop the real backstory to our main characters.

This show was essentially like an X-files for the 21st century—and in my humble opinion, had many one-ups that came from learning what worked and what didn’t work on the previous paranormal series.  Where the X-files underlying theme was the existence of extra-terrestrial life, Fringe followed the concept of the multi-verse i.e. alternate realities.  While simultaneously embracing some of the harder elements of sci-fi it also was a show about a much simpler concept: love.   While there is a romantic relationship between the pretty people on the show (Joshua Jackon’s Peter Bishop and Anna Torv’s Olivia Dunham) the real examination of love is actually that of a Father and Son.  It’s a beautiful story that begins with the estranged Dr. Walter Bishop and his son Peter Bishop…and it resolved in a serious tear jerker end.

The skills of the actors were especially highlighted through the use of the multiverse concept.  Anna Torv and John Noble played not one, not two but 4 different versions of the same character.  These two managed to capture both the big and subtle changes caused by altered timeline events with real aplomb.  John Noble as Dr. Walter Bishop is easily the fan favorite—he is a villain, a hero, comedic relief and the heart of the show all rolled into one.  Still I think the most beautiful character manipulation was in the version of “our side” Olivia Dunham in a world where Peter Bishop remained dead as a child.  Yes remained dead—take that as you will.  I will never forget the scene where this very quietly harder version of Olivia reveals what the driving distinction is: in this universe she killed her abusive father.  It was a quiet but jaw dropping moment in understanding this version of her character and Anna Torv played it beautifully.

Walter Bishop’s character also explores a concept in science fiction that I find particularly of interest: the question of what can and should be done in the name of science.  Dr. Bishop has a dark past—he has done many questionable things in the name of science with a variety of motivations behind them.  As you explore his character over the series, you still can’t help but love him and fear him and then love him again in spite of some of the awful things he’d done—including using children as subjects in some seriously damaging experiments.

Dr. Walter Bishop : It’s one of the inherent pitfalls of being a scientist – trying to maintain that distinction… between God’s domain and our own. Sometimes, I forget myself.

I hesitate to give much a way in this farewell fringe blog post because I really want to encourage those of you who haven’t seen the show, or who maybe only just discovered it, to watch and love all 100 episodes like I did.  I’ve noticed in general that a lot of shows seem to get picked up by viewers at the end.  It must be something about series end hype.  I know that I only just picked up Breaking Bad in its last season and wow, talk about juxtaposition to Fringe.  Fringe exposes the weaknesses and flaws of its characters but resolves ultimately leaving you loving almost all of them.  B.B. has done the exact opposite—I hate or pity pretty much everyone, but that’s a post for another day.

As if I need another reason to explain why I love Fringe so much there is a foodie element to the series as well.  Dr. Bishop’s many idiosyncrasies extend well into his stomach and we are treated to a reference to some craving of his in every episode of the series.  They range from the everyday, like rootbeer floats and blueberry pancakes, to the highly imaginative like bacon berry frosting and parmesan ice cream.  One food item is mentioned and shown with such frequency that I’m surprised it didn’t get a line in the credits: RED VINES.  Have I ever told you how much I freaking love red vines?  Have I ever told you that during finals weeks when I’d be cramming for microbiology and trying to memorize my amino acid structures for Orgo (organic chemistry) my diet would subsist mainly of diet redbulls, pizza and red vines?  It’s little wonder that I would wind up sick as a dog after finals…I wasn’t exactly taking care of my diet during those high stress times.  Still it thrills me that my favorite scientist was weekly eating the same “brain food” I devoured in college.  So of course when I said goodbye to the show this past week I had to make something featuring this uncredited cast member.  This season one of Walter’s food choices was a 25 year old jelly doughnut he made that he consumed with an almost crazed glee.  And so from there my abominable recipe was born: Red Vine Jelly Doughnuts.

Red Vine Jelly Doughnuts

An Olivia Original inspired by Walter Bishop on “Fringe” Read more

Dec 6

2 Comments

Bread always falls on the buttered side….

Brioche 1I’m too tired to come up with a clever pun and so instead I’m afraid today’s title will have to be an idiom that is always too true.  When things go wrong they go really, really wrong…like my commute Wednesday morning.

Dear sweet yeasty lords what did I do to offend you so?  Why did my commute, already somewhat hellish at 70 minutes, have to take 3 hours in pouring rain, on flooding roads littered with assholes driving like they intended to leave another bloody smear of twisted metal on the highways?  Appetizing imagery I’m sure.  I really need to start remembering that as this blog features food, I may want to stay away from things that turn the stomach.

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The weather and several accidents tied up my commute more than it ever has before.  I rolled into work at 8:20AM which sounds respectable enough, but I normally arrive at 7 and keep in mind that I left the house at 5AM.  I don’t normally leave that early but when I woke and heard the rain I knew traffic would get bad so I departed early, thinking how clever I was to skip the whole mess.  I had no idea that accidents had already clogged down the highway of hell by the time I came out of my slumber.  Oh what a mess.

IMG_3045I dreaded the drive home that day as well because I could only anticipate another 2-3 hours on the road going back.  It’s always about 2 to get home because I can’t avoid rush hour on the way back.  That meant at least 5 hours of driving yesterday—almost a full workday in my car.  Heck I could have driven to LA instead.  I could have seen a double feature.  I could not help but sit there on my ass, hating the inactivity of it and the heightened mental awareness needed to avoid erratic lane jumpers, thinking of all the things I could be doing with those precious minutes dripping away with each rain drop that splattered on my window.

Drop – there’s another second you could be doing something else.  Drop – did you know someone dies of *insert disease here* every five seconds?  Drop Drop Drop Drop Dead.  Drop Drop Drop Drop Bread.  Oh bread.  I sat there for a good long time thinking of how I’d rather do anything, including the agonizing torture of watching bread rise, than this.

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So I’m rewarding myself and you dear reader with a recipe for the most decadent, sinful and soul lifting bread in existence.  Brioche.  Buttery, eggy and better than chocolate.  YES I said it.  Better than chocolate.  Why?  Maybe it’s the three sticks of butter that go into it.  It’s like a croissant but as sandwich bread.  How the French aren’t the most obese people on the planet I will never understand….I made a batch of this to use in my stuffing at Thanksgiving and thankfully a batch is really a double, so you can freeze half to save for a day.  A rainy, horrible, awful no good day when you need something to delight your tastebuds and melt away all those horrible stresses.  Toast it, butter it or just pull it apart and eat it like a caveman.  I don’t care how you eat it because I’ll be too busy fighting for another piece myself.

Brioche 3This recipe isn’t my favorite to be honest.  I think Peter Reinhart produces a much better Brioche dough but I have had Dorie Greenspan’s fail on me twice and I was determined recently to make the third time the charm.  After all I know her brioche is good, since I used the recipe for my plum tart a while back.  I just seemed to have lost the magic in my touch the first few times I made it.  Well third time was the charm indeed and this batch came out just like it ought to.  Brown, buttery and beyond heaven.

I’d write more but I need to go eat a big slab of this, toasted with butter and unwind.  It’s time to start searching craigslist with a wanton abandon and move closer to work because this cannot happen again.

Buttery Brioche Dough
Dorie Greenspan’s “Baking from my home to yours” Read more

Nov 30

2 Comments

SciFriday: Commander Adama pullapart my heart bread

Shorter post today or at least one with a little less cohesion.  Just my ranting again about BattleStar Galactica but I do have a valid question: is blood and chrome worth investing in for this little broken heart of mine?  I’d favor answers from other fans who were as disappointed as I was (see below) about the finale of the main series…..

Adama 7Recipe Rewind!  I posted this a few years back but since that was when the only person who read this thing was my mom, and because the photos have disappeared,Adama 2 I thought it was high time to share this recipe again.  It’s one of my absolute favorites and after my step-brother ate 6, yes SIX, rolls of this bread at Thanksgiving dinner I’m pretty confident in saying it’s popular with the family too.  It was a New England style feast this year and this bread is the very epitome of New England flavors.  Almost no one outside of the frigid Northeast has probably ever heard of it which is a real shame.  It’s fermented with cornmeal that provides a very satisfying textural contrast to the soft, flakey bread and the flavor is accented by a small addition of molasses.  This gives the bread just the slightest sweetness and when baked like pull apart rolls, it’s like the New England, less sweet version of the insanely popular Hawaiian bread roll.  I definitely prefer Anadama over the Hawaiian variety—less sweet and a perfect accompaniment to my style of cooking.

The only problem with this bread is that I inevitably wind up referring to it as Commander Adama bread.  Why is this a problem?  Every time I think of Battlestar Galactica I get all worked up into a lather over how miserable I was about the ending.  I mean it stunk.  It really, really stunk.  So much so that I could not bring myself to watch Caprica, not even knowing that in the first episode there is an Easter egg where a Firefly class ship flies across the sky in the background.  (Wait that was in Caprica right?  I don’t remember where actually I just know that it was a BSGverse / Firefly crossovergasm at some point)

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Right now the Blood & Chrome miniseries is out and I haven’t been able to bring myself to watch that either.  I’ve been hearing good things about it from both sources I trust and sources I trust less but I just can’t get over how utterly disappointing the wrap up to the original series was.  Okay yes I mean the reboot of the original series.  JEEZE.

Adama 6Anyone out there watching the show who was as frakking pissed about the finale of BSG as me?  I’d like to get an idea from one of you about whether or not it would be worth getting into a renewed relationship with the series.  I don’t want my heart broken all over again.  Then again it might be time for the healing process to start.  I’d love to put together my Kara Thrace cosplay and not be bitter still about her big reveal as an **SPOILERS SPOILERS** frakking angel.  Are you kidding me?  I had such a better theory about where this was going.  Why make such a big fuss about her father if he WASN’T going to turn out to be the Daniel cylon that they mentioned for all of five seconds and was apparently totally unimportant to the plot????  They could have made her a hybrid along with Baltar.  Yes both from Daniel and therefore arguably siblings which makes their hookup gross but hey if Luke and Leia can kiss in the 70’s they can frak mistakenly one time in 2000.  Adama 4Plus it would explain why both she and Blatar can project, which again, why go into all the detail about cylons being able to do that if Baltar and Starbuck are angels rather than hybrids who have this ability?  YOU MAKE NO SENSE!  Why establish these plot points if they lead NOWHERE?????    To quote my favorite song by the geeky duo the Double Clicks:

You and I are kinda like
Starbuck and Apollo
In that after all this
unresolved sexual tension
and emotional investment
and time and money
this going to end in an anticlimactic way

Anyway while Starbuck might be my cosplay choice, Commander Adama I think was definitely my favorite character with Colonel Tigh being the most interesting to study and Gaeta being the most pity inducing, oh god when will he ever catch a break, role.  And speaking of rolls….back to the recipe!  Happy SciFriday folks!  I’ll be baking this bread a lot in the future and I have some ideas and twists to try out (hint hint: barley malt) so you’ll probably even get a threepeat one day!

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Anadama Bread

From “The Bread Baker’s Apprentice” by Peter Reinhart

Makes one 1 1/2-pound loaf and about 15 pull apart rolls Read more

Nov 8

3 Comments

Grape Expectations

I’m not really asking for much I think.  I just want to date someone who can keep up with me intellectually.  Someone who isn’t overweight or slovenly in their appearance…ya know, a guy who cares about his body and avoiding diabetes and heart disease.  Someone who has a little bit of culture and doesn’t use the “words” hella, gangsta or bro.  Someone who has read at least one poem in their lifetime because it was interesting.  Someone who isn’t clingy, or needy or bogged down by baggage he expects me to carry.  Someone whose masculinity isn’t threatened by men who kiss each other or wear tights.  Someone who manages to be strong without being cruel.  Someone who has an artistic side but isn’t a complete layabout “artist type” aka useless.  Someone who can pull their own weight financially.  Someone with focus and drive.  Someone with goals and hopes and dreams.  Someone without weird social disorders.  Someone who enjoys geeky things and can share in them with me rather than need me to navigate them through scifi 101.  Someone who gets my anarchist streak and doesn’t suck on the teat of either major political party like a zombie pundit.  Someone who could be thoughtful on the day to day and manage a grand gesture once in a while.  Someone who pays attention to me but gives me space when I need it without feeling threatened.

Ya know.  The simple things.  Not much.

Okay I realize I’m asking for a lot.  I have some really high expectations and I guess that is a reflection of how I view myself.  Maybe a bit too lofty in my opinion of me after all despite all my insistence that I don’t really think I’m that special or unique?  I wonder in how picky I seem to be, if that’s an indicator that deep down I do have a superiority complex of some sort and really don’t have a humble bone in my body.  I’m asking for a lot but am I asking for too much?

Can we at least agree that getting hit on with lines like these is ridiculous and a total waste of my time:

  • Damn, you know I could look at that mug of yours all day. {Impression: thanks I am rather enjoying my coffee…oh, wait}
  • Hello there!  Wanna get married and make some little mixed kids? {Impression: wtf? Does that ever work?}
  • I would get on my knees in front of a guy and obey you cause you are so delicious looking {Impression: ew2}
  • Wanna cuddle? {Impression: ew}
  • Message from 9inchDIK4U:  {Impression: need I go on?}
  • I have a 1968 Camaro SS.  Custom paint bike and an Acura type s.  I make more than 80,000 after tax’s (tax’s?  you mean TAXES?) a yea.  And I don’t even work.  I am going to school for construction management.  I travel when I can, and enjoy the finer things in life and am, into body building.  {Impression: shallow mother effer}
  • So judging by your photos and profile you’d be married by now.  Clearly you must have baggage so why not just tell me up front what it is, be honest I’ll find out eventually {Impression: Is this supposed to be a neg of some sort?}
  • You down to fuck? {Impression: well at least he’s honest, also, ew.  Also I’ve gotten this message from at least 5 different guys.}

I know, I know if I were really looking seriously for someone I’d be using a pay site for online dating.  I’d also be at all available for dating.  A few semi-decent guys (though still usually far from my grape expectations) have messaged me but I can’t really be bothered to try to make time to meet them for coffee.  Partly because they just don’t pass the first visual/written evaluation I can make.  I guess I’m judging too harshly or maybe I’m still not in the “dating space.”  Actually I’m sure I’m not really in “dating space” yet.  I think I’m lightyears away.  I have too many selfish things I’m trying to accomplish like getting my own place, getting a car, finishing off these last 2-3 pounds to lose 20lb before the year is out, filming on the weekends, writing consistently and various projects I want to start.  I have two cookbook ideas I’d love to develop, podcasts, videos…..

Honestly who has time for a guy?  Maybe that’s why my expectations and needs are so high.  Self-imposed dating exile in favor of getting shit done.

Or I’m just really stuck up like many other messages have informed me I am.  But that will be a post for another day.

 Well even if I can’t sum up a recipe for simple relationship or a simple guy, I can share with you my attempt at this ridiculously easy and delicious grape flatbread.  In fact if it weren’t for the need to let the dough rise I’d say this is an “afterthought” kind of recipe.  It comes together beautifully…and my family devoured it the same day I made it despite the fact that the dough is a one day fermentation (meaning it doesn’t develop that ridiculously sinful yeasty flavor) but it certainly looks and tastes impressive.  All you really need to do is have a little bit of patience for a simple bread to come together, shove down some grapes into it and bake.  Yet it transforms into this beautiful table addition that will have your diners coming back for just one more piece….

 Red Grape Focaccia

From “Wine Bar Food”  Read more

Oct 10

Plum kind of wonderful

By the time Friday rolls around I’m usually pretty wiped.  My new job is extremely satisfying in that I’m getting to do more clinical trial work, but the commute and constant learning of new things does tend to get a little wearisome.  The upside to working hard is that I feel like I’ve earned myself a little fun and that makes the reward of getting to spend time with friends that much better.   Last Friday night not only did I get to treat myself to some much needed socialization, I had the wonderful privilege of getting to visit my friend Doug where he works—Lucasfilm Studios in San Francisco.  I genuinely enjoy spending time with Doug…he’s one of the few friends I think I can talk about politics with totally openly without having people look at me like I’ve got two heads or without my wanting to stab things with pointy objects.  The studio tour was just a cherry…okay a bunch of big fat cherries, on top of that treat.

This place is like paradise for nerds and movie buffs alike.  It’s basically a historical museum of film (and a fair number of geeky classics obviously) but it’s a museum where they are also making movies of the future.  Outside the building there’s a fountain with a beautiful statue of Yoda and once you walk in the front door there is movie memorabilia everywhere.  Unfortunately to get past the main lobby there’s a non-disclosure agreement which basically says “take pictures, you shall not” and so aside from the obligatory awkward family pose with a life size Boba Fett, there’s not much for me to show you from inside the compound.  Suffice to say, it was very, very cool.

At one point Doug showed me a model from the Jurassic Park films of the T-Rex.  I think he must have considered me a little nuts because I commented that I feel as though I can recognize the specific T-Rex model as the Jurassic Park dinosaur (as opposed to say just any old T-Rex) and that probably does sound a little silly.  Then again what other iconic dinosaur movies are there?  Land Before Time is the only one I can think of but that’s animated…maybe Fantasia, but again, the dinosaur scenes are animated so no models included.  By the way has anyone else noticed that the consistent hero and star of all the Jurassic Park films is the t-rex?  No really!  Think about it.  In the first movie it bursts in at the final moment, saving the humans from a horrifying raptor death…plus it eats the lawyer.  I applauded both moments as a child when I saw the film.  Then in the second movie you’re rooting for the Mama Rex, even forgiving the scene where she eats that dog, because really you want to see her reunited with the baby and defeat the evil poachers.   Besides that dog was probably an asshole right? Then again in the third film when the Spinosaurus is chasing down the humans, who saves the day?  T-Rex.   I think he dies in the process but everyone loves a martyr.

Anyway…Doug.  Right.  So occasionally he gets to invite a friend to join him at George Lucas Theatre (!) on site to watch a movie screening/premiere.  Last Friday I was lucky enough to join him for the screening of Seven Psychopaths and after we were treated to a Q&A session with director Martin McDonagh and actor Sam Rockwell.  Frakking fantastic.  The film, the theatre, the comic con-esque panel after without any of the associated lines…just plum kind of wonderful.  The movie was brilliant by the way.  I always forget that Collin Ferrell is actually a pretty talented actor.  Rockwell is easily the star—his portrayal of the character was amazing, right down to dozens of ticks in body language.  Christopher Walken was his usual amazing self.  The critics who are comparing the style to Tarantino aren’t far off.  It manages to somehow be humorous, violent and thought provoking without coming off too heavy handed on any account.  I wavered between laughing at the simple gags, laughing at the smarter bits of dialogue, cringing from some particularly over the top gore (which still carried humor to it) to actually tearing up at a particularly poignant moment at the end commenting on the Vietnam War and hope for a future.  I love films like this where you get the fun aspect of a stupid shoot-em up but so much intelligent writing to chew on that you walk away feeling like you fed your brain AND your inner base desire for “guns and coffee”.  But here’s my advice: if the first five minutes don’t make you laugh, odds are you should leave and get your money back.

I know that not everyone gets to reward themselves for a hard week with this kind of amazing opportunity so I offer up to you a delicious alternative instead: a brioche plum tart.  MMMM oh god.  Unlike a traditional tart you use a rich, buttery, eggy Brioche as the basis for the tart.  This is such a beautiful, Parisian way to usher in a Sunday morning brunch.  The dough gets made the night before and comes together pretty easily.  You store it in the fridge overnight so the yeast take a long, slow time to break down all those starches into delicious flavor and then in the morning you just fill it with a simple blend of stone fruit, jam and sugar.  It could just as easily be a dessert but something about simple baked goods of rich, buttery dough and fruit seem particularly satisfying to me in the morning with a hot latte and pajama bottoms.  The recipe is for plums but peaches, apricots and cherries would all be delicious too.

 Plum Brioche Tart

From Dorie Greenspan’s “Baking from my home to yours” Read more

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