A few winters ago, my father was helping me do some work around the house, and he suggested, after slipping on what were at the time slippery, snowy stairs, that I re-paint the back stairs and put some cutting-edge anti-slip technology to good use.  Years later, I did it.   PRETTY COOL!!!  They used to be painted this awesome (not actually awesome) teal color, so while I’ve lost the Miami party atmosphere that made my back stairs such a cool party hang out, I’ve gained…  well, very little, now that I think of it.  BUT I DID TAKE PICTURES.

OH MAN!

I’ve eaten like a king recently, but this week I don’t plan on doing anything interesting on account of being lazy and whatnot.

Anyhow, last week was left over week, but the week before that was pretty good.  The roasted vegetables definitely smelled the best, though I couldn’t come up with a satisfactory side dish, so I just stuck with  the koala sauce.  This had butternut squash, potatoes, sweet potatoes, onions, red peppers, and..  some other stuff.  It took a long time to cook, which was actually kinda cool cause it made the whole building  smell pretty good.  Well, that was good for me, hopefully the other folks in the house weren’t annoyed.

I also made a garlic-garbanzo bean-spinach soup that I thought was fantastic.  I still have one container left in the freezer, and I can’t wait to eat it.  I was so pumped on it I even made it again last night at my brother’s house, though I somewhat irrationally doubled the recipe, so there is a LOT of soup left.  Hopefully they saved it!

Saturday I spent forever cooking Potato Rostis with gingery baked tofu and a sweet tomato sauce.  This was gross.  The picture in the cookbook I was using looked awesome, but what I ended up with looked gross.  The worst part was the tomato sauce, which in the picture was dark purply red and delicious-looking, whereas mine was a kind of pasty pink/red and not good.  Tomato sauce.  Yuck.  At least the tofu turned out great, so though I will never attempt to make the whole dish again, I will keep in mind the tofu preparation.

Sunday evening I made a broccoli/chestnut terrine, which was good, but not so good that it justified going to three different stores to track down the chestnuts.  The recipe didn’t ask for very much salt or other seasoning, so it was a little bland, but I think I could try it again and spice it a little more extravagantly!  It was fun to make though, and it’s kinda neat looking.  Plus, it was pretty tasty with breakfast the next day!

So, that was that.  I’ve still got some frozen soup, like I said, and my mom’s in town, so I’ll probably be eating with the fam the rest of the week, but I’ll hopefully get back into my cookstravaganza mode soon enough.  OH!  I also made some Jamaican black bean something or other that was AWESOME.  If i find a similar recipe online, I will post it, cause it was awesome!

Monday: Roasted Vegetables, simple mixed green salad, boring.  I can’t do my shopping until later tonight, so I didn’t want to make anything too complicated tonight.

Tuesday: Garlic, Garbanzo, Spinach Soup, with some sweet koala sauce.

Wednesday: Jamaican Black Bean Pot, Spinach/Mandarin Orange salad, rice.

Thursday:  Broccoli Terrine with new potatoes, mixed greens.

Friday: Potato Rosti with Tofu.  (This might actually happen on Saturday, depending on whether I actually feel like cooking still.  This is a much more ambitious week.)

So I’ve got a new plan!!!

Every week, I’m gonna cook something awesome and new every night!  Five full days of awesomeness!!!  WEEKENDS ARE FOR PIZZA AND BEER!  THEN AFTER THAT I’m gonna save the hell out of my leftovers, and the NEXT WEEK I am going to eat leftovers EVERY night!!!  AND THEN the third week I will cook again!!

Whew.  Now that I’ve got the exclamation marks out of the way, I can get on with…  it. (more…)

I got into grad school, so I drank champagne. That’s what you do when you celebrate… Or go to a Bulls game.

1999 Dom Perignon

In its fancy case

Outside its fancy case

Properly dressed glass

Enjoy!

Some people think they’re overrated. That person is wrong.

The last time I ate at McDonald’s was January 2nd, 2008 somewhere between Ft. Collins and Denver.   My crew stopped at the McD’s en route to the airport.  I eat at Dunkin’ Donuts on occasion, so I figured that McDonald’s breakfast sandwiches couldn’t be all that different, and it was the first time in ages I was at a McDonald’s while breakfast was still being served.  So I got an Egg McMuffin with cheese.  Within twenty minutes, I realized what a mistake that was.  I don’t intend on ever eating at a McDonald’s again.

Generally speaking, I don’t like eating at big chain restaurants, but there are a few that I eat at, and I’m not ashamed to admit it.

• Chipotle.  All sorts of good and okay stuff about Chipotle.  First off, people constantly mispronounce the name, which I think is awesome.  Second, one burrito is all you need for an entire day, and the veggie option seems less like an after thought than it does at most similar places.  Third- all the cups are covered with left-wing hippie propaganda.
• Dunkin’ Donuts.  Breakfast all the time!  Bagels!  Consistency!  I’ll eat at a DD without too much worrying, and the fact that so many are paired with a Baskin Robbins is another plus.  However, despite what the ads say, DD coffee isn’t nearly as good as *bz, which is still not actually very good coffee!  (When I was in Peru, DD was the only place where I could get a giant, American style drip coffee.  I felt kind of like a tool for going there, but I’m just not an espresso kind of a guy.)
• Starbucks, aka *bz.  Wide selection of pretty okay baked goods (though their scones totally suck!), plus it’s a guaranteed okay cup of coffee wherever you might find yourself.  Also, in the summertime you can’t beat a grande unsweetened iced soy green tea latte!
• Wendy’s.  Though the food is as bad as any other fast food place and there’s no legit vegetarian entree, they do have baked potatoes.  Plus Dave Thomas was so likable in his ads, the whole chain gets a lifetime pass from me.  That said, I think I’ve probably only eaten at a Wendy’s once in the past ten years.
• Quizno’s.  Passable guacamole on their veggie sandwiches, bread that doesn’t taste like paste, and that cute little cooker thing, not a microwave like some sandwicherías.

There’s one more chain-type place I eat at on a regular basis, though I am fully embarrassed to admit it.  I get the egg salad sandwiches from 7-11 at least once a month, sometimes once a week when I’m feeling particularly low-standardy.  (7-11 is barely a block from my house!)   The bread is gross, the eggs are questionable, and food should probably not come in a cellophane wrapper.  Yuck.  But it’s the only thing I can get at 7-11, and I have to support it if only to ensure 7-11s continue stocking them for when I’m reeeeaaaallly hungry and it’s the only option.

Am I forgetting anything?  I don’t think so.  I like the lettuce taco things at PF Chang’s, and it’s probably the best of the suburbotron maximostraunts., but I can’t say I’d ever suggest eating there.  Also, any place where there are no rules and just right is totally sweet and awesome.

In case it’s not obvious, I am really hungry right now.  There might could be a 7-11 ESS on my horizon.

Since I’m just about done upstairs, I’m soon going to be sticking a FOR RENT sign in the front yard and trying to get strangers to move into my home.  Though obviously cool stuff like stainless steel appliances and nice back porches go a long way, the neighborhood really does most of the work.  When I first moved to Logan Square just three years ago, people were still talking about it as if it were the place to go if you wanted to get mugged or, even worse, be bored.  Fortunately, the last several years have seen both the mugging and boredom rate go down.

Since muggings fall nicely into the “It can’t happen to me” category of things that may in fact happen to you, I like to talk to potential tenants more about the decline in the average per capita boredom rate in the area.  Unlike muggings, boredom falls quite squarely into the “It will most likely happen to me” category of things that may in fact happen to you.  Assuring would-be renters of this goes a long way in getting them to call the Square their new home rather than Wicker Park or Ukrainian Village or wherever else.  It also helps ensure I successfully get the exorbitant rent I’m hoping for.

So, I claim that boredoms going down, but why?  Answer:  new bars, new restaurants.  In the past year or so, 7 new places will have opened up within 4 blocks of the house, two in just the last month, plus another two scheduled to open in the coming months.   The best part: they range from awesome to still pretty okay- not a single real bummer of a place.  Add to that total the three new tattoo parlors that have opened in the last year…  well, you still have  a lot of good restaurants and bars. Some of them are better than others, and the sad(?) truth is that every new, fun place to eat or drink or do whatever at is just a step closer to making Logan Square more like Wicker Park.  As a cool, hip dude, that sort of bums me out.  As a property owner and tenant-looking-for-er, however, I’m stoked.   When an Urban Outfitters opened up around the corner from my last apartment, I was bummed.  If another one opens up near here, I’m throwing a welcome party.

After yesterday’s trip to Mitsuwa, I was stoked to be able to have natto for breakfast.  I haven’t had natto nearly as much  as I’d like in the past few months, so I bought three packs at the store.  I’ve already eaten 2/3 of the first pack; I wish I had bought a ton more, though I’m not totally confident about how long it lasts.  It comes frozen, so presumably awhile, but I guess a part of me is still a little sketched out by the fermented nature of it.  It was as awesome as I’d remembered it, though I wish I had some wasabi paste to spice it up.  The container comes with a tiny little bit of spicy mustard and a tiny litle bit of soy sauce, so that was welcomed, but it needed a little more.

This afternoon, after my second helping, I searched Twitter to see what else folks had to say about natto today, and I came across a video with a few different serving sugestions.  (I decided not to embed the video for fear of offending those nattophobes out there.)  This is the dude that made it.

The three recipes: sauteed garlic+cumin+red pepper; avocado+wasabi+soy sauce;cheddar cheese.  I’m pretty interested in trying out the first one, cause nothing is worse with the addition of garlic (except maybe raspberries).   I like avocado, though I kinda worry that the mush texture would be a less than stellar compliment to the mushy texture of the natto.  As for mixing it with cheddar cheese?  Probably not, though one of the commenters suggests natto on cheese+toast, which I could probably see happening.  I think I’ll probably try the first one tonight as an appetizer before my real dinner.  With any luck, I’ll be inspired to try something out myself.  (As noted, it’s kinda weird to eat it with a fork, but I’m chopstickless.  I’ll have to go through my boxes from my move to see if I can find my old ones.)