If you say so...

I asked Kara what I should make for dinner, and she said, "Alfredo". So I cooked up some angel hair pasta, poured in some half&half, black pepper, and butter, topped it with a chopped up tomato from my garden, and done.

Fresh pesto for lunch?

Why not?

Step 1. Go out to the garden and pick a bunch of fresh basil leaves.
Step 2. Throw washed basil, sunflower seeds, and parmesan cheese into the food processor.
Step 3. Cut a hole in the box.
Step 3. ????
Step 4. Profit!

Dump it all in! No measuring required.

Blend together with a bunch of olive oil.

Mix together with whatever pasta you have sitting around, throw in <meat of choice>. In this case, bacon and sausage.

Pack it up and eat it for lunch! yum.

What did you have for lunch today?

Grilled Beef Ribs

Ribs grilled for almost two hours, a baked potato (with bacon), and some spinach (wife's addition)

More pizza :)

I know I post a lot of pizza photos. I'm like a proud dad.

Ricotta, home-grown tomatoes, home grown basil, jimmy dean sausage.

What's your "Go-To" meal?

Garden Dinner

Tonight's meal brought to you via MY GARDEN. That's right, fresh basil for the pesto, plucked from my basil plants. Garnished with fresh tomatoes, ripe from my tomato plant.

Next time, I'll have to make my own pasta too. I was too lazy for that this time. I probably won't be able to get fresh chicken for a couple years, when my friend's chickens get too old to lay eggs. This will do for now.

Check out my garden!

I started a garden about a month ago, and it's doing great, for the most part. The big winner so far is my Roma tomato plant, which seems to be taking up more than its fair share of space.

I originally started it out based on the Square Foot Gardening technique, but I was not terribly precise when I did the actual planting, so it looks more "organic" now. Yeah, it's not "messy", it's "organic".

The fence is to keep out the bunnies. We have a whole bunch of them that live under the deck. Since they can't eat my plants, they eat the strawberries in my neighbor's garden. :)

Look at all these tomatoes!

I don't even like tomatoes.

I plan to use these for pizza sauce when they get ripe. I figure that's the next step in pizza making, now that I have the dough and cooking process going fairly well.

I'm growing strawberries too, but I only have 2 growing so far.

that tiny white thing in the center = potential yum.

Next year will be even bigger and better, now that I know I can grow stuff without killing it, and what works and doesn't.

I have an automatic watering system going on, using a drip hose on a timer. Laziness is awesome.

Better, but not perfect!

Not that there is a "perfect" when it comes to my pizza, but I'm getting better.

It's definitely better on the grill than in the oven. I can get the stone a lot hotter, which makes for a better crust underneath. I might have to get another stone above the pizza to keep the air temperature as hot as I'd like. This is the beginning of craziness though.

Yes, my stone is cracked. No, I don't give a crap.

Pizza nerds call this the "upskirt" shot. 

I'm pretty happy with the amount that the bottom is getting cooked. I just need to get the temp above the pizza hotter to match.

The crust is nice and moist and fluffy. Not bad.

Plus Running, Minus Running.

This evening I went for a long run (well, long for me). Kara would consider it a warmup, but 5 miles is pretty good for me. I didn't even stop to walk, so that's new!

But then I pretty much cancelled out any health benefit the running may have gained me with my dinner.

I started with some yummy soft potato rolls, slider-sized. Browned to a gorgeous golden brown, in butter of course.

Oh yes, soon you will be mine. Mine, I say!

Then I stuffed those yummy yellow buns with some ground beef (seasoned simply with salt and pepper, not the 80's hip-hop duo), some applewood smoked bacon, and a fried egg.

An extra piece for good luck.

I stay healthy by not eating dessert after meals like this.

So yummy and juicy.

A better grilled pizza!

This time when I made the pizza on the grill, I didn't screw it up! Not too badly, at least.

The slight charring on the bottom means that I actually got the pizza stone hot enough - something I have been unable to do in my oven. The top of the crust was less cooked than I'd like, but it tasted great! It was still moist inside and crispy on the outside, just about perfect!

The grill temperature was around 600 when I put the pizza in. I left the grill open longer than I wanted though, so a lot of the hot air escaped. This is a problem with grilled pizza that I will have to work on. I do not yet have an IR thermometer, so I'm not sure exactly how hot the stone itself was, but since it's right over the propane burners that were all set to HIGH, I'd guess it was pretty hot.

I think I'm a little obsessed.

Memorial Day Meals

Ok, so there's no pictures from the actual Memorial Day meals, because they were fairly unexciting basic grilled burgers from frozen patties. Sunday though, was pretty great. The weather was amazing, so we ate a very nice casual meal out on the deck.

complete with lovely beverages and citronella candle

Angie made some delicious guacamole to go with the tortilla chips, along with some salsa and fake sour cream (It's some sort of yogurt, so it's healthy!).

Then we chowed down. It was good.

I have a hard time making a normal face to the camera. Check out my cleavage.

After relaxing a bit and enjoying the views, I made some burgers. Healthy burgers, made with ground turkey, and stuffed with blue cheese. I seasoned the meat with some black pepper and salt. Yum!

Yummy oozy cheese, on amazingly soft buttery potato rolls.

Actually, I lied about not having any Memorial Day photos, because this one was the breakfast I made this morning. Sausage patty, and a runny egg, also on those awesome potato rolls.

I toasted the roll in butter, because, well, why the hell not?

How was your Memorial Day weekend?

Saturday Breakfast

Banana Pancakes. Yes indeed. 

Pizza FAIL

No, I'm not perfect, as some of my loyal readers might believe. Sometimes it takes me a couple tries to get things the way I want them. (ok, sometimes more than a couple.)

Tonight was one of those nights. I needed to prepare for the summer, for when it's too warm to run the oven at full blast in the house. But I obviously couldn't go the entire summer without making pizza, so it was time to practice pizza on the grill. This can get a little tricky, because I am just not a pizza master yet. A regular oven has its advantages and disadvantages. On the plus side, it's highly controllable and convenient. On the negative side, it can only get up to about 500 degrees maximum, and then the kitchen gets really hot. The grill has its own pluses and minuses. It is able to get much hotter, which is a plus, but it's not very well insulated, so once you open the lid, all the heat escapes pretty quickly.

Tonight I decided to build my pizza on this new aluminum screen, which I figured would allow me to get the pizza deployed much quicker. I turned on the grill on full blast with my baking stone in the center, and let it get as hot as possible. (my main issue with the oven is that I can't get the stone as hot as I'd like, so the bottom of the pizza doesn't get fully cooked.)

I took the pizza outside, ready to be cooked.

This pizza has thinly sliced roma tomatoes, ground sausage, mushrooms, shallots, and ricotta cheese.

When I put it on the grill, I made sure to only open the lid a little bit, so the heat wouldn't escape. I was pretty successful in this, but I soon saw a problem. There was tons of smoke that started coming out from the grill. I didn't get any photos, because I was freaking out a little trying to figure out what the hell was going on. Turns out that I forgot to clean the drip tray under the burners, and the crap that was in there ignited from the high heat. 

It started covering my beautiful pizza with black smoke (not the good kind of smokiness that bbq-ers covet). I took the pizza out as soon as I could, and turned off the grill.

I was hungry though, so I didn't want to start over, so I turned on the oven and figured What the hell, I'll try to salvage it. It came out ok, it was nice and crispy, but the color left something to be desired. Grey pizza crust is not an attractive trait.

The grill experiment did confirm one thing that I was wondering about though. It was able to retain a high enough air temperature to produce decent spring in the dough. (This is caused by the rapid heating of the dough, which causes the small bubbles from the yeast to expand, leaving bubbles in the fluffy risen crust.)

I was also pretty happy with the crispiness of the crust, but that doesn't have anything to do with the grill or the oven. I think it just dried out too much because of the fact that I cooked it twice. Oh well. Next time will be better. At least it tasted ok! (I'll probably die sooner though, because of the carcinogens in the smoke)

What meals have you fucked up? Were the results edible?

A Topological and Tasty Treat

Inspired by a photo I saw on Flickr today, I decided to make this incredibly nerdy meal. In mathematics, "topology" refers to the study of surfaces and the properties they possess. One of the most famous of these is the Möbius strip. This is a surface that has only one edge and one side. If you put a pencil on one spot, and draw a line along the surface, you'll have a line with a line on both "sides" of the surface, meeting right back where you started, without lifting the pencil.

I decided to apply this to my dinner tonight.

My wife got me a hand-crank pasta roller a while ago, and I've only used it a couple of times. Making pasta is really easy, but it just takes a long time, so I don't do it very often. This Möbius pasta was too cool not to try, so I set to it.

I used the very simple pasta recipe from the Pioneer Woman (1 egg, half a cup of flour, per serving. Mix.)

So I did that. Then I started to roll it out into thin sheets using my awesome pasta roller. I started at the widest setting ("7" on this unit), and gradually worked it thinner and thinner. I stopped at "3", because it was good enough.

Make sure you keep them floured, or else they'll stick to everything.

Then use a pizza cutter to slice them into little strips. They ended up approximately 0.5" by 4". But as you can see, it's not an exact science.

I'm obviously not an expert with a pizza cutting wheel. 

To create the Möbius strip, simply put a half-twist in the pasta before squeezing the ends together to form a loop.

taking a picture of one hand with a huge SLR is tough.

One of the interesting properties of a Möbius strip is that if you cut one down the entire length, you don't get two loops, you get a single larger loop, but with a full twist in it!

amazing, right? I know you're just flabbergasted.

Also, since I didn't have a legit pasta drying rack (like one of these bad boys), I had to kluge one from what I had lying around the house. I used the clamp from the pasta roller, and a dowel. That'll do, donkey.

I took the picture from this angle so you wouldn't see my messy floor.

lots of mini topological wonders

Then, dump the pasta into a big pot of salted boiling water. They only take a couple minutes to cook though, so make sure everything else will be ready at the same time. I just cooked up some ground sausage, some leftover chicken, and a head of broccoli.

Yes, I eat late. 

Let the pasta boil until they all float to the top. Probably 3 or 4 minutes.

mmmm. non-orientable dinner.......

Toss it all with some chopped garlic, olive oil, and freshly ground pepper, and enjoy!

What's the nerdiest thing you've ever eaten?

Pizza Night

Those of you who know me would find it pretty odd that I posted a picture of a pizza with zucchini and tomatoes and no meat at all. But don't fret, my friends, because the meat pizza is in the background of the photo. I just thought the veggie one was pretty. 

We had Dawn and Justin over for pizza last night, and Justin likes to make crazy pizzas. In the past, he's made a pizza with canned tuna and corn. The veggie pizza was his creation (I sliced the veggies though). 

The one in the background has chicken and olives on one half, and sausage and ricotta on the other side. And a crapload of mozzarella. 

Dessert was homemade cookies and french vanilla ice cream.

More Man Food

Fending for myself again, I decided to go a little crazy. I had bought some ground beef the other day (wife doesn't eat red meat all that often), so I figured I'd make a burger.

The asparagus is there to be healthy. The beer is for carbs.

But a regular burger isn't interesting enough, of course. First, I made my own bread for the bun. I also decided to mix in a little ground sausage for flavor. About 20% ground sausage, all mixed up with the 80/20 ground beef. YUM.

But wait, there's more.

I also stuffed it with blue cheese. When it cooked, it got all melty and awesome. Then I threw a slice of cheddar on top (but really, it didn't need it). The bun was delicious right out of the oven, but a little too crusty. The burger was pretty soft, so it fell apart when I bit into it. In a delicious way.

Here are some bonus pictures from the past few nights:

chicken wings with hot sauce and blue cheese

I made the hot wings the day after the corn dogs. This was another "fend for yourself" meal. Hence the beer. And the spicy. And the no-vegetables. Does the green/blue stuff in the blue cheese count as a vegetable? It grows! And yes, I know the placemat is dirty. Must be crumbs from the corndog. Yeah, definitely not crumbs from a week ago.

Anchovy pizza

We had never had anchovy pizza before, so I decided to give it a try. I did overcook it a little, but overall it wasn't horrible. The anchovies were a lot saltier and fishier tasting than we expected though, and Angie pulled them off her slice. If we do this again, I will try rinsing the anchovies a little to remove some of the salt.

I also made some awesome French Vanilla Ice cream. 1 cup heavy cream, 2 cups half & half, some sugar, and 3 egg yolks. Oh, and the most important part, 1 whole vanilla bean, split and scraped. I think this may be the best ice cream I've made yet. Maybe next time I'll let it churn a little longer though, to get a tiny bit more air into it.

YUM!