Cookbook Tuesday: Thxgvng Edition

You might be looking at me and thinking, "Dude, a grocery store pamphlet about Thanksgiving? That's not a cookbook!" Well, to me it is. It was my guide to my very first Thanksgiving. Well, the first Thanksgiving I didn't go home.  I was in Portland. I had a dog,  a cat and we shared this meal with friends and family.  It is one of my favorites to date. It was all ours.  We had so much fun making the food and setting up the apartment. We even had an appropriate fire going in the fire place.

This guide to building stuffing is the best. It is a Chose Your Own Adventure style recipe.  It has never failed me. 

I followed this recipe for the Turkey.  From the brining to to the temperature, at least what I thought the temperature was in my little electric stove oven combo could do. I also didn't use stuffing for my bird. I stuffed lemons,an apple, celery, onion, and some carrots in every oriface.  I also rubbed it down inside, outside and under the skin with herbs and butter.  It was perfect. 

  

This Week in SnackChat

Welcome to This Week in SnackChat! 

Stoner's wet dreams.

I wish my lunch looked like that.

Chicken butt

Inner fat kid is crying that this is not in my mouth.

This is my bar.

Classic

Rubbing salt in my wounds.

Classic mortician puns.  

Cookbook Tuesday: Le Pigeon

It's back! Cookbook Tuesday is back! The day I show off the books that are sitting on my shelves.  Today's book is Le Pigeon: Cooking at the Dirty Bird. Yes, another book from another restaurant from Portland. You should know me by now.

 

One of my earliest memories was being babysat by my God other's mother, my God grandmother.  I would play in the backyard all morning.  They had a sweet playhouse and a coup full of pigeons that I thought were pets.  I would feed them twice a day and run my fingers through the holes of the fence in hopes to try to pet one of the birds.  Most of the time I had to try to avoid them pecking me. It was fun.  As a child I didn't think much of it. My next door neighbors had pet chickens and I had a dog. People have weird pets.  I'm Filipino, so to me, this was kinda normal. 

Fast forward 20 years and I'm talking with my mom and I brought up the pigeons at my God mother's house. 

Me: Isn't it weird that Ninang (the Filipino word for God Mother) had pet pigeons?

Mom: Those weren't pets!

Me: What?

Mom: Have you ever eaten chicken at Ninang's house.

Me: Probably,

Mom: That wasn't chicken.

Well shit.  My friends turned out to be my meal.  

I guess you can say the same for many of the recipes in this book.  A whole section is devoted to rabbit.  I love how cute rabbits are, but they are pretty tasty.  They also make for warm, itchy sweaters. 


 While I haven't made anything from the book just yet, I have eaten here.  It was wonderful.

That Night I Made a Dinner for Two and Snacks for Eight

After about two weekends of not being home it was great to have a weekend to catch up on laundry and general apartment upkeep. It was amazing. We had a clean apartment, I had two little Cornish game hens ready to be roasted and I thought it would be a nice day to have people over for snacks and drinks at 7:45pm.  The original plan was to have two friends over for dinner only but that didn't work out.  So snacks it was.  

I originally wanted to make a roasted chicken but I thought it would be way fun to make Cornish game hens because they are fucking cute! I just want to hug them. I've never seen what Cornish game hen actually looks like so a quick Google search produced what looked like a small chicken.  They are also not game hens, they are boiler chickens. They are also not exclusively female. Mind exploded! 

 I cooked two according to the recipe according to Tosca's Roast Chicken recipe on Bon Appetit.  

I cooked both of them in my cast iron skillet and they were perfect! The juice soaked bread was amazing after a little time in the broiler. I have one more little guy siting in my fridge waiting to be hugged then consumed. The stuffing sounds odd but it is fucking delish! I heart you April Bloomfield! 

  After dinner it was snack time.  I made rainbow carrot fritters, a kale and heirloom spinach with ricotta, and a mushroom terrine made with homemade creme fraiche.  I also made hummus! Our friends are the best and they brought caramel pretzels assorted cookies, pies, mushroom turnovers and a Hormel party platter.  

Bring on the Holla Daze! 

Eating Out Portland

Portland holds a soft spot in my heart.  It is the first and only state I lived in other than California. I was 25 with my boyfriend at the time, now husband, and my best friend. Since moving back, we try to make it out there about two times a year.

This year it was Anissa's #30, so it was pretty special this time around. Unlike my #30, she didn't puke the bed, but like mine, I made food.  Brunch to be exact. 

Ooo I forgot I made a bacon scallion ricotta too! 

The finished plate! 

The brunch spread. Can't forget the booze!  

Because Revolutionary War themed bars are the new hunter's lodge theme bar.  The food here is pretty legit and they have free pool! Oh and a flat screen Big Buck Hunter! Oh and  a photo booth! Oh and a World Cup pinball machine!  Legit cocktails and bartenders but they did't know how to make Washington apple shots. This bar used to be called Madison.  Bus simply remove a vowel and you have Mad Sons. 

Portland Airport started featuring carts and one of them is Pok Pok wing.  We ordered the wings and one of each buns. I really wanted the drinking vinegar but it was outside of security so getting some of those back home is a no go. 

Snaps on the packaging!  The best airport meal ever!  

This Week in SnackChat

Ahhh...it feels good to get over that hump of Wednesday and to slide into This Week in SnackChat.  I start with a SnackChat I Snapped out to my friends.  After a long week of eating out, I needed something homemade and fresh.

To me Halloween is candy, it's a little messy throwing these things into candy bags.  You can say it is a trick and treat all in one.

This is Halloween! Look at that squirrel, it's all like, "Hey, Mr. Goodbar, give me yo nuts?"

From healthy to unhealthy. Sometimes you gotta do the Dew.  So I love the Mountain Dew Twitter. It's like they know their customer and they are gently whispering in their ears, "Hey, I know you game/skate/love Hot Pockets bro, you need to fuel up with the Dew. "

It's a take over. @CallofDuty:#AdvancedWarfare is occupying our YouTube page. Get ready to Fuel up for Battle. https://t.co/Ha1BAY7PjP
— Mountain Dew® (@mtn_dew) November 4, 2014

I miss you Linda!

Dang indeed.  Is that a chicken fried steak?

Heaven indeed. It's not heaven when you think you've washed your hands thoroughly and then you take your contacts out and your eyes burn.

 I'm a sucker for homemade SnackChats. 

The beginning of the week was feeling like Fall.  The air is crisp, when the sun is not out. It makes me sad that I was in Portland the it rained in Long Beach. I mean, I wasn't sad because I was in Portland and I cry every time I leave. But rain in Southern California is like a unicorn. I missed the unicorn and hopefully I can see it soon. 

Gotta SnackChat you wanna share? Send them to me via SnapChat! Username: log.lady

Eating Out NYC

The best part about being in New York by myself was I got to eat where I wanted to.  I felt like Madeline, a little person in a big city.  I didn't have anyone telling me, "Really, that ramen place? This ramen place is better" or "I really feel like eating pizza."  I made all the executive decisions and I loved it! It did get old second guessing myself on what to order and the benefits of tasting your dining companions meal is out of question.  Also conversations with yourself do not fully drown out the other conversations of others around you. Nonetheless, I had a good time entertaining for one.


My goal was to eat at places that I owned the cookbooks.  For the most part I was quite successful. I didn't eat in the hotel where I was staying and I sure as fuck didn't get my coffee from Starbucks.  I walked everywhere within thirty minutes of where ever I was. My souvenirs from this trip were menus, coasters and cookies that I bubble wrapped before they went into my luggage.

Ivan Ramen Slurp Shop located in the Gotham West Market. I can daydream about that egg all day.  It was perfect. 

Baohaus. Eddie Huang doesn't have a cookbook, however, I do own an advanced copy of Fresh Off the Boat, his memoir. 

Momofuku Milk Bar.  I ate at the Midtown location every morning. After I ate at Baohaus, I took a cab back to Midtown and a quick right turn revealed there was another Milk Bar in SoHo.  I gasped in and was quickly sad because I could have gotten dessert.  

Totto Ramen: It was like I was in Japan.

The Breslin. Where your cocktail cost more than your meal at least that was my story. Ever since I saw April Bloomfield make a Scotch Egg on Mind of a Chef, I decided that I was going to have try it. I sat at the bar because I was too embarrassed to sit at a table for one and I probably looked cooler sitting at the bar with a $14 cocktail and an $8 meal. The person sitting next to to me was fucking disrespectful. First off he blew the smoke from his vape pen right in my face. Second, he ordered a Sauv Blanc, a grown ass man at a cocktail bar.  Then he asks me if the sausage in the scotch egg was made of bacon.  He ordered the boiled peanuts.