Woonsocktoberfest

Today, as I worked Jen worked twice as hard on enriching activities for the Wombats. Partly this was to give them lots of stimulation and entertainment. Partly it was to make me look like a jerk when I take over Mr. Mom responsibilities in a couple of weeks.


Before I left for work she even picked out some different fabrics to drape them in to give them exciting sensations. I would never think to do something like that. The best I would be able to come up with would probably be something like having a detailed discussion about Cobra Commander's role in G.I. Joe: The Movie.


Since we already had the "authentic" German style Oktoberfest dinner on Saturday night I opted to go for a meal from my hometown of Woonsocket, Rhode Island. My mother had brought over some dynamites on a previous visit. This is a traditional Woonsocket meal consisting of a grinder or dynamite role filled with a mixture of cooked onion, pepper, celery, ground beef, and tomato.


To go along with the dynamites I served up Rhode Island's own beer Narragansett Brewing Company. While probably not an original variety we enjoyed their Fest lager. This was a very nice Marzen, far better than I'd expected. While it would have been more authentic to enjoy it with regular Narragansett lager it was nice to try one of their different offerings and I have to say that this was probably my favorite Narragansett beer to date.

After a night of enjoying my hometown favorites I was sadly unable to come up with a traditional Woonsocket dessert. I'm not really sure what that would be. There's that ice cream dish our family friend (and my first grade teacher) made that looks like watermelon. Then there's just a brick of Neapolitan ice cream. Or I could have made a doughboy but that is pretty much just fried dough and has a different name any place on earth that you go.

Instead we enjoyed some quiet time with the babies and watched Northern Exposure episodes to relive our high school years, and the years when we first moved to New York. This was a nice reminder of a time when I first left the fertile crescent of the Blackstone Valley and moved nearby another river on the tiny island of Manhattan. Things had changed a lot at that point and they've changed even more since then.

Vani tass, vani tatum, et omni i vani tass
Only when we understand all is vanity, only then, it isn't.

Sorry. We've been watching an awful lot of Norther Exposure these days.

Cincinnati Weekend (Part One)

Ah, Cincinnati. Glorious were the days of my youth mucking about downtown, getting up to no good with the rap scallions down on Court Street, giving a piece of gingham to Emmy Lou, late nights at the cranberry bog.

Okay, so I've never actually been to Cincinnati. However, I did see an episode of No Reservations where Anthony Bourdain went there so I'm pretty much an expert. When I heard a friend was going to visit family there recently I asked him about Cincinnati chili and, much to my delight, he returned with a gift!



Cincinnati chili! Two cans from the top two rival Cincinnati chili makers: Skyline Chili and Gold Star Chili!



The Skyline Chili can had a recipe on the back of the can. And any recipe that begins with the words 'Place a cooked hot dog in a bun' has just got to end with happiness.



I added some mustard (though I had trouble splashing it), some of the chili, and shredded some cheddar cheese for the top. I feel like I lose points by using an organic hot dog bun and an organic beef hot dog. Also I probably lose a lot of points for using a cheddar cheese that was not from Skyline and even more points by shredding it myself.

I have to say that it was pretty tasty. The chili itself was a little sweet from the spices used. It reminded me a little bit of a New York System wiener which, curiously, isn't actually available in New York but is very popular in northern Rhode Island. Remove the cheese and take out the spices from the meat sauce and the two 'recipes' are nearly identical.



It is really hard to find beer from Ohio in New York. I looked and looked and the best I could find was this Little Kings Original Cream Ale from Hudepohl-Schoenling Brewing Company in Cincinnati, Ohio. I'd imagine that a few of these beers have been consumed with many a cheese coney in the past. Cheese coney is, by the way, what they inexplicably call these hot dogs in Cincinnati.

I was expecting this beer to be terrible but I was actually very surprised by it. It had a very soft and sweet taste to it with a strong flavor and scent of apple juice, something I've never really picked up in a beer before.

This was, indeed, the perfect accompaniment to the cheese coney.

Drinking this beer has renewed my faith in the entire class of beer known as cream ale. I'm actually eager to try a few more. This could be the beginning of something beautiful!

Or, I could be disappointed to find out that the rest of cream ales are foul, flavorless, abominations.

Ah, Cincinnati. I feel like I've experienced a sterilized version of your majesty this evening.

Now . . . what would Cincinnati be like if I were in charge? I guess you'll have to tune in tomorrow night to find out!

Prelude to Giving Canadian Thanks

I spent the last few days traipsing through Maine, visiting farms, and sampling some local treats. Strangely, I had a minimal amount of lobster in my time there. I did, however, sample the following beers:

Allagash Hugh Malone, Allagash Mattina Rossa, Allagash Black, Geary's Autumn Ale, Atlantic Brewing Porter, Sea Dog Blueberry, Maine Mead Works HoneyMaker, Shipyard Pumpkinhead, Shipyard Blue Fin Stout, Shipyard Old Thumper E.S.B., and Shipyard XXXX IPA (Pugsley's Signature Series).

I also had a Stella Artois just for a little retro fun.



Today, however, I got home and I put on my cooking shoes. Jen's always trying to get me to wear these silly shoes and I found them to really get me back into the cooking game.

Mostly all I did today was spend the day peeling, chopping, and roasting vegetables in preparation for tomorrow's Canadian Thanksgiving celebration. I took advantage of this idle time sitting on the couch to watch a double feature of Animalympics and The Matrix, two Canadian Thanksgiving themed movies.



I took a quick break to make a Maine-inspired seafood dinner based on some awesome mussels I had in Portland. I rendered a little bacon with olive oil then tossed in some crushed garlic and sliced shallots. After they'd cooked down a bit I seared a piece of cod, some sea scallops, and tossed int some littlenecks. I seasoned them with only salt and pepper but sprinkled some Old Bay over the top when it was all done.

I also baked a potato, sliced it, and tossed it into the pan. Then I grilled some slices of bread and rubbed them with a garlic clove.

I would have liked to add a little white wine and some seafood broth to this but we didn't have either ingredient handy. This dish is super easy to make (took about ten minutes from start to finish) and I would highly recommend doing this with the two missing ingredients mentioned above. It couldn't hurt to also add some fresh herbs.



To pair with this I poured an Arabier from Brouwerij De Dolle Brouwers. This was the headiest beer I've ever had and I really wasn't able to start drinking it until after dinner. It was much more hoppy than the parrot on the label would have lead me to believe.



After dinner we heard a knocking at the door. My favorite UPS driver was there holding a box. He said, "I think this is grape juice." Then he looked at the label and nodded. "Yup. Grape juice."

It turned out to be the wine we'd ordered on our expensive stop in Beaune, France this summer. As expected it was like someone had delivered a present! After all, we'd paid for this months ago and now it was like it was being delivered for free, as if we hadn't foolishly squandered hundreds of Euros on it.

I'm not quite sure why the UPS driver was so coy about the contents of the box. Is it illegal to ship wine via UPS? Is my favorite UPS driver in cahoots with the fast-talking wine salespeople in Beaune, France? Will we be able to fit 30 people in our tiny apartment for Canadian Thanksgiving?

Answers to these questions and more on the next exciting installment of Jen and Nate Buy the Farm . . . Share!

The Po' Man's Po' Boy

Regardless of which story you believe the po' boy sandwich is short for poor boy. Some posit that this is because a restaurant served these sandwiches for free to striking workers in the late 1920s. Others think it is because a certain sandwich shop in New Orleans used to throw one of these in for three if you bought a nickel beer. A controversial new theory (proposed by me) suggests that robber barons hated fried fish and shellfish before it was considered a delicacy and used to force their underpaid workers to eat it in between slices of stale bread as their only meal during their eighteen hour workday.

Sadly, this new theory hasn't gotten a lot of traction. Yet!



My po' boy really had a lot less to do with being poor than it did with being lazy. It should be called a la' boy. Being poor would be a great justification for not having all the ingredients necessary to make a proper po' boy. Being lazy just happens to result in the same lack of ingredients.

I grilled two sliced of leftover ciabatta while the zucchini-crusted catfish from the other night warmed in the oven. After it was done I placed it inside the grilled ciabatta bread along with a quick sauce I made with mayonnaise, Dijon, relish, and Sir Kensington's spicy ketchup -- a sort of poor man's remoulade. I also sliced up some of the farm tomatoes and served it all with pickles and chips.

One of Jen's least favorite thing is a sandwich for dinner. I was kind enough to save this dish up for when she was out of town.



The other day I realized that I had about $350 backed up in Amazon points so I decided to finally use some of it up on these awesome beer-tasting glasses. I also purchased a new tripod for my camera (not pictured) as my old one was beginning to fall apart. These are specialized glasses for enjoying the aromas and flavors of specific beers. You know, if you believe in that sort of thing. I don't, but I do like pretending that you need to serve drinks in the proper glassware. Something about it makes me feel at peace.



I recently learned of a German beer called kristallweizen. It was a little tricky to find so that heightened my interest in this type of beer. Quite simply it's just a hefeweizen that has had the suspended yeast and wheat particles filtered out so that it has a perfectly clear appearance. I thought if I found this I could mark off another beer I've tried and I could even serve it in the appropriate glass!

A store nearby sold kristallweizen from three different breweries: Erdinger, Tucher, and Weihenstephaner. I chose the Weihenstephaner for a couple of reasons. Firstly, it had the longest name and when it comes to German things that's an important point for me. Secondly, it had the claim on the label that it was the "world's oldest brewer." I found this hard to believe but I admired them for putting this on their label.

After doing a little research it turns out that this brewery is largely considered to be the world's oldest brewery established in approximately 1040 A.D. Only one other brewery has any evidence of possibly being older but, hey, good for those Weihenstephaner folks!

It turns out this tasted exactly like a hefeweizen but appeared perfectly clear. Who could have predicted that? I suppose the same thing could have been achieved with a bottle of hefeweizen and a coffee filter.

But it wouldn't have been as fun!

Buttered Noodles, Roman Style!

The other night Jen and I went to a really nice restaurant and had a fantastic meal. We both felt compelled to order what they were calling Spaghetti, Roman-Style. It was simple: spaghetti cooked with butter, garlic, and Parmigiano. Sometimes that just hits the spot. However, we couldn't bring ourselves to order it much for the same reason I never order the chicken entree at a restaurant. I don't think I'd forgive myself if I used up this experience to order what essentially amounted to buttered noodles.

Besides the price tag was $25. For an extra $5 you could get the seared ahi tuna entree. The owner of that restaurant must get text alerts on his phone sent to him whenever anyone orders the Spaghetti, Roman-Style. I can imagine him smiling as receives the text, lighting a cigar with a $100 bill and telling his mistress, "One entree closer to getting that new gold-plated helicopter."





Jen always refers to this dish as "buttered noodles." This is why she is not a successful restaurateur. She could only get $12 at the most with a dish of that name. This also happens to be one of Jen's favorite meals in the entire world. Since we weren't able to have it at the restaurant we had been craving this dish ever since Friday night.



Tonight I decided to give in to that craving. I had also given into this craving last night by making cappelini with olive oil, butter, crushed garlic, fried parsley, cappelini, salt, and pepper. It was such a hit I decided to do the same tonight replacing the cappelini with this spaghettine.

While the pasta was cooking I crushed the garlic, cooked it in butter and olive oil, threw in the parsley to fry it. I really kicked this dish up a notch by adding some tomatoes that I'd peeled and seeded. This is just another example of my culinary ingenuity. Tomatoes with pasta! How do I come up with this stuff?



Given the fake Roman nature of our meal I decided to start us off with a refreshing Campari and soda. Having never been to Rome I just assume this is the kind of thing they drink before they have their Roman style spaghetti.

When in Rome! Maybe! I imagine!



For wine I really killed the mood by introducing a wine from Napa Valley. I'm sure I should have served a nice Montepulciano or Sangiovese but that is so trite. Besides I didn't have any of either of those. I did have this lovely cabernet sauvignon from Decoy Wines that some lovely soul had given me for Christmas this past year. It may not have been Italian but it did have a handsome mallard on it and it was was fantastic.

Truth be told I would have liked the wine even if it wasn't very good just for the mallard. It reminds me of a painted wooden mallard my mother had when I was a young child. The mallard has always been a favorite duck of mine for that reason. It always reminds me of home and of youth.

Although I may just be imagining the part about the wooden mallard.

Puttin' on the Ritz (or Equivalent Crackers)

In Rhode Island there is something that restaurants like to do and that is to put a Ritz Cracker crust on some seafood and bake it. Growing up in Rhode Island I didn't realize that this was not as pervasive outside of the smallest state. To me this is about as ordinary as spaghetti and meatballs or a hamburger. It wasn't until Jen visited me in Rhode Island and ordered it from a restaurant and remarked about the dish that I realized it was something of a local specialty.



In Rhode Island when you order scrod -- which is a fish that does not actually exist -- they often serve it with a wedge of lemon in a little pocket of kale. We used to get cases and cases of kale into restaurants and it would all leave the kitchen exactly like this. The dish the cod was baked in would be placed onto an oval plate with a little lemon-kale garnish nestled along the side.



I call this salad "Scrod Garnish Salad." I started off with kale and lemon then added salt, pepper, Old Bay seasoning, olive oil, and diced avocado.



For the actual dinner I decided to mix it up a little from its traditional form. I rendered some bacon in a pan with sliced shallot and fennel, lightly cooked some fresh English peas, then tossed it all together with some scallops and a little butter and olive oil.



I put the whole mixture together in a baking dish with lemon juice, salt, pepper, and olive oil. Then I crumbled up some Ritz crackers on top. I didn't actually use Ritz crackers. I used a knock-off brand that doesn't have high fructose corn syrup in it because. Somehow the boffins at this company have figured out the ancient secret of how to make a cracker without the use of high fructose corn syrup. What will they think of next?



I got this sampler pack from Lakefront Brewery. Doesn't it look all majestic there on my table with some fresh daffodils? My life is so beautiful.



Since cracker-crusted seafood is something I learned how to make (and eat) in a French town in Rhode Island I figured I'd accompany it with a French beer from another key French area in America: Wisconsin.

This beer was probably a little too heavy and malty to be paired with this dish but I don't really care about that. The French thing fit into the narrative nicely.

The end result of this variation on a standard recipe was fantastic. While a nice sauvignon blanc would have went better with it that would have been boring.

Unless it had a funny name. Then it would have been perfect.