Thursday, December 31, 2009

My Christmas Gift

So for Christmas I got a 2010 Daily Calendar...

No wait...don't go.   I promise this will be interesting.  You can resume your google search for "cuddly kittens" or "hacksaw accident" in a few minutes. 

So for Christmas I got a 2010 Daily Calendar.  Only it's no ordinary daily calendar.  It's the Bon Appetit (sorry, I'm too lazy to put the fancy accent on the "e" in Appetit) Fast Easy Fresh Cookbook Calendar.  Now my first thought was "yikes..this is so going to stay in the box and I'll probably find it when I clean out my garage in 2012".   But then as I am looking at it, another thought occured.  "I could totaly do a rip-off of the whole Julie & Julia thing and cook my way through the entire year".   Yes..yes this could work.  I could make each of the recipes, take pictures of them, and blog about the results.  And I wouldn't be doing it to ultimatley write a book about the whole experience.  No, I would be doing it to battle sheer boredom!!   What an ingenious (and quite sad) plan.

And who knows... Maybe I'll learn a thing or two?  Or find some new recipes?  Or end up making myself sick?

So as I greedily rip the box open and extract the calendar, I already hit my first hurdle...the welcome page!

Here's what it says:

Welcome to 2010!  (Glad to be here).  Thanks to this calendar, it promises to be a delicious year. (Still to be determined).  Loaded with recipes featured in the best-selling Bon Appetit Fast, Easy, Fresh Cookbook (Hmm..suspiciously sounds like a plug).  This calendar is your gateway to ease in the kitchen, every day of the year.  On Tuesdays and Thursdays you will find simple and smashing main courses (Hmm...that could work); Wednesdays put the spotlight on easy side dishes (Okay..keep talking); Fridays deliver either a fun cocktail or stylish appetizer that's simple enough for after-work entertaining (Oh, Thank God for Fridays!); the weekend pages offers luscious desserts that are ready in a snap (Sat and Sun are together on one page, looks like I can procrastinate until Sunday); and Mondays provide helpful hints, tips, and techniques for the week's recipes (Mondays are Free Days!).  It all adds up to a year's worth of fast and fresh cooking.  Just turn the page and get a taste of what's to come...

And as I turn the page the first recipe is.... Guacamole with roasted tomatillos.  Shit, where the hell am I going to get tomatillos on New Years Day?  Are grocery stores even open?  I don't remember.  This is the first year I'm not working in a restaurant on New Years...I'm so out of touch with the normal world.  Guess this diversion will prove to be a little more work than I thought.  Thank you Bon Appetit for starting off the year with a recipe using ingredients I don't have in the house.    So much for easy...

Well this, my friends, begins my 2010 project.   Let the weight gain begin!



Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Julia Child is Awesome


Just re-read "My Life in France" by Julia Child. What an amazing woman. I read it a year ago and was amazed. Since I saw the movie Julie and Julia, I thought I would read it again. I am just fascinated with "Mastering the Art of French Cooking". Yeah, some critics will say its not the best cookbook and the recipes are so-so, but making the same recipes Julia spent years developing to me is a humbling experience as a chef.

For those of you who have not read "My Life in France" I highly recommend it. For those of you who are are like me and lazy, I recommend getting it on audio CD from your local library (although since the movie Julie and Julia it's almost impossible to get).

So I then picked up my copy of "Mastering the Art of French Cooking" and made the beef bourguignon recipe and the chocolate mousse recipe. The beef was okay...a bit putsy. The mousse, on the other hand, was SO GOOD!! I usually don't like chocolate or mousse, but this has to be my new favorite guilty pleasure.
God bless you Julia for such a wonderful, sinful chocolate mousse!