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?