Monthly Archive for December, 2008

This is what we call pre-birthday weeks

Published
by
ashley
on December 29, 2008
in i am ridiculous
. 3 Comments

So Christmas is over.  For the record, I had a very nice Christmas.  Marques bought me the purse I wanted, and it’s beautiful and gray and sturdy and I am in love with it.  I got a Nintendo DS which is good because I got a little tired of carrying books on the metro, and now I can just play video games ALL THE TIME.  I also got a ice cream maker so I can try to replicate Dairy Godmother pecan pie ice cream.  And mixing bowls and Lego Batman for the Wii and all sorts of things.  Oh, and a GPS system, which is probably my favorite gift as we often do not know where we are going and then we have to call my friend Cara to look up our location on Google Maps.  It’s true.

But now Christmas is over and New Years is approaching which can only mean one thing.

BIRTHDAY SEASON.

Man I love my birthday.  I love birthdays in general.  But I love my birthday the most.  I generally have birthday weeks, at least two, where I get to pick what we eat for dinner and watch on television and what kind of ice cream to buy.  Marques has to be extra nice to me and do the dishes and clean the litterbox and take me to see kittens if I ask for it.  Yay birthday weeks!  I generally start birthday weeks on New Years Day, which gives me a week to ramp up the festivities for January 7th, my actual birthday.  After the 7th, I work my way back down for about another week.  I’m debating on the pros and cons of extending birthday weeks to Inauguration Day so I can say that Barack Obama’s inauguration was like a birthday present to me from the United States.  Fifty-two percent of them, anyway.

I’m hoping that even though there will be no friends or family around, Birthday Week will still be awesome.  Marques has promised to take me out to good dinners and he already has presents for me.  And I’ll be 26 years old, which is a daunting number.  I’m no longer in my early 20s, I have now officially crossed into late 20s.  And everybody is getting married and having children and I?  I am more concerned with getting all 140+ stars on Super Mario Galaxy.

I do expect birthday wishes and pieces of candy.  I would start preparing now.

This is definitely one yule log that should be burned… or eaten

Published
by
ashley
on December 29, 2008
in baking
. 11 Comments

Do you know what’s awesome about Christmas?  Getting presents from the people who know you the best, like your boyfriend and your family and your best friends.

Do you know what’s not awesome about Christmas?  Not having any time during the month of December to write about anything in your life.

It seemed like all of December just flew by this month - Marques and I really did a lot of work this Christmas to get the perfect presents for our families, and thus a lot of time was spent in malls (ick) and Amazon.com.  Also, we had to finish watching the third and fourth seasons of Doctor Who because, well, we’re nerds.  Add that into packing and work and liberal amounts of time lying around in bed moaning about not wanting to get out of bed (I did that a lot this month) and you’ve pretty much got our December.

And baking.  Of course.  For friends and family, I made three varieties of chocolate dipped pretzel sticks with crushed candy canes, white chocolate and crushed peanuts, as well as two kinds of popcorn (cinnamon bun glazed and honey butter crunch), oatmeal cinnamon chip cookies, cocoa snowflake cookies and coconut macaroons.  So much baking.

But it was not as much baking as this month’s Daring Bakers challenge, which I made earlier this month.  It did actually take me all day to make it, and while some parts were stressful (I may never make creme brulee again), it was pretty fun to make and it tasted pretty good too.

This month’s challenge is brought to us by the adventurous Hilda from Saffron and Blueberry and Marion from Il en Faut Peu Pour Etre Heureux.  They have chosen a French Yule Log by Flore from Florilege Gourmand.

It consisted of 6 elements - a creme brulee, an almond dacquoise, a chocolate ganache, a chocolate mousse, a praline insert and an icing.  We could choose what flavors we wanted, so my final yule log consisted of the following:

- almond dacquoise
- white chocolate ganache
- milk chocolate whipped cream (i don’t particularly care for mousse)
- milk chocolate praline insert (made with cornflakes instead of gavottes)
- dark chocolate creme brulee
- white chocolate icing

The most delicious thing, I think, was the praline insert.  You essentially melt a few tablespoons of butter and chocolate over a double boiler, then add praline cream (I used Nutella because I’m poor) and melt it all down and then mix in some kind of crunchiness.  I used cornflakes for two reasons - 1.  Because I didn’t want to buy a box of Rice Krispies and have them go to waste.  2.  I was hoping it would taste like a Ritter Sport Cornflake bar.  It DID.

I also really enjoyed the almond dacquoise, which is a very light and spongy cake made with almond meal and egg whites.  I thought it was pretty delicious though I wouldn’t eat it on its own.

I had a bit of trouble with my creme brulee - it wouldn’t set up.  Finally after it had baked for 90 minutes, it looked a lot less jiggly so I put it out to cool and then stuck it in the freezer.  Unfortunately, it got a bit icy.

Because I used whipped cream instead of mousse, my log was a giant mess.  It essentially collapsed into itself, much like a supernova.  Layers?  Not so much.  Try just big puddle of deliciousness.  Here’s what it looked like:

Would I make it again?  Sure, if I had a bit more experience.  I did actually think it tasted good (except for the icing) but really, it had 5 different kinds of chocolate in it.  I could have probably spit in it and it would’ve tasted good.  I contemplated doing another one but decided if it didn’t work out, I wouldn’t want to punish the recipient with a bowl full of chocolate mush.

You can grab this 17 page recipe from one of the host’s sites. You will also probably see a multitude of perfectly formed logs.  If I was you, I would ignore those and focus on my pile of chocolate mush, as it is a masterpiece of baking.  And if you decide to make a yule log, even if you hate mousse, you should use it because whipped cream doesn’t really provide any sort of structural support for your ingredients.  FOR THE RECORD.

So.  Daring Bakers December challenge is completed.  Looking forward to January.

The turkey has landed - in my stomach

Published
by
ashley
on December 6, 2008
in cooking
. 3 Comments

So.  The turkey is out of the oven.  I couldn’t figure out exactly how long I was supposed to leave this bird in the oven.  Butterball said 3 and a half to 4 hours.  The package said 5 to 6 hours.  I figured I would leave it in for 5 hours and then see if the little pop-up thing popped up.

It did.

So I took it out.  And I know you’re supposed to let it rest for a half hour, but I was too concerned that it wasn’t cooked, so I started dissecting parts of it to check for pink juices.  Luckily, all juices are clear.  I also took some bites of it, and am pleased to report that my first attempt at cooking a turkey is a success!  My turkey is not that dry (though, to be honest, a little drier than I would’ve liked), the skin is crispy and delicious and even the dark meat is good.

I know I said there would be pictures, but I can’t find my USB cord, so you may have to wait until Monday.  Regardless, I will now eat myself into a turkey coma and then fall asleep in a turkey haze while watching Slumdog Millionaire.

Tomorrow will be spent making turkey stock!  Yum.

Pats on the back to me!

The turkey has landed - in the oven

Published
by
ashley
on December 6, 2008
in cooking
. 0 Comments

So.  Today is turkey day.

I woke up at a healthy noon (siiiiigh) and immediately set to work preparing my monstrous bird.

First, I had a bit of trouble removing it from the refrigerator.  Note to self - stop using treadmill and maybe pick up a set of weights every once in awhile. I took it out from the plastic bag and made grimacey faces at the amount of red juice (yes, I know it’s blood, humor me please) that had collected.  Gross.  This is why I don’t make a lot of things with meat in them.

So I rinsed off the red juice and spent about 5 minutes contemplating the metal clamp that was holding the legs together.  This is a very demure turkey.  I tried pulling the legs out but they wouldn’t budge.  Finally, I thought about going to wake up Marques, but then in a rush of adrenaline, my “lift a car off my child” power surge kicked in and I totally got those legs separated.  And then I immediately wished I hadn’t.

Turkey neck!

This was almost gagging.  But I bravely picked it up and out and placed it gingerly on the edge of my sink.  Then I saw some other weird looking piece of meat in there that I couldn’t figure out if it was supposed to be in there or not, so I just took it out.  I hope I didn’t remove like, flavor central from my turkey.  I also got a bit panicked when I couldn’t find the gizzard bag, as my mom told me that one time when she cooked a turkey, she left the bag in and the turkey was ruined.  Marques and I were at the grocery store last night picking up things for turkey leftover dinners and he said, “What happens if you ruin the turkey?” which I thought was pretty mean but it has been hanging over my head since.

I finally found the gizzard bag in the BUTT of the turkey, which also had this weird popup thermometer looking thing.  I was initially concerned that my popup thermometer had broken but luckily, it was on the breast.  I still have no idea what the other one was.

Then I rubbed the turkey down with olive oil, kosher salt and cracked black pepper.  I threw some chopped celery, a cut up orange and about 10 cloves of smashed garlic in the cavity.  And then I put it in the oven.  I hope I didn’t forget anything.  I will probably do that basting thing that people talk about and I also plan to rub the turkey down with butter about 45 minutes before being done.  Yum!

Pictures to come when my turkey is done!  It’s in the oven now and, at the time of this post, has 5 hours and 36 minutes to go.

I think I have kitten fever

Published
by
ashley
on December 6, 2008
in i am ridiculous and waylon
. 2 Comments

Last night, during a midnight library book dropoff, I saw a tiny black and white kitten on the sidewalk.

Immediately, my heart expanded three times its size.  I love kittens.  I love them so much.  I love their little wobbly heads and the way their whole body vibrates when they purr.  Aside from a tidal wave of zombies, all I want for Christmas is a tiny, baby kitten.

I’ve been thinking a lot about getting another cat to share our tiny apartment with.  Waylon is still number one in my heart, but he’s a very needy and playful cat.  When we go home for the holidays, I hate leaving him by himself, to wander from room to room for days and nights.  I think if he had a little brother, they could play together and talk to each other with meows.

It’s not feasible, really, for me to get another cat.  I think finding an apartment that allows two cats will be nearly impossible should we decide to move next summer.  If we decide to stay in DC, I’m not looking forward to paying 7 bajillion dollars as a cat deposit for our two cats.  Also, when you tell landlords that you have one cat, they think, “Oh, well, this person is obviously a caring individual who loves animals” but when you tell them you have two cats, they immediately think “Cat lady.”

It didn’t stop me from chasing this baby kitten all around the parking lot.  After I had walked up a hill and forced my way through some decorative hedges, I saw that this kitten joined up with another kitten, this one solid gray, and then I saw a giant black cat skulking around the edges of a dumpster.  At this point, part of me thought, “Aw, it’s a family, better not split them up” but the other part of me was like, “Must. Get. Kitten.” so I continued the merry chase, leading me to a very creepy sidewalk behind a day care center, where the kittens jumped into a forest-type area and they were gone forever.  I’ll push my way through a hedge, but I’ve never been able to climb a fence.

I was initially quite sad about the loss of my potential new kitten acquisition.  But I suppose it’s for the best.  Waylon can still roam our hearts knowing he’s our favorite cat (and he can eat all the food) and those kittens can stay with their mom and be a family.

Weekend plans include:

- Driving past library area during the evening with bowls of cat food in case the kittens are hungry.

- Resisting urge to steal kittens.

- Cooking a 20 pound turkey (am most excited about this)

- Hopefully going to see “Slumdog Millionaire”

- About 5 episodes of Doctor Who (shameful how much tv we watch)

- Visiting the Alexandria shelter website and mooning over pictures of kittens

(will post a “Things I Learned” this weekend, as I was amazingly quite busy at work today and thus was not able to spend any time using the internet for fun!)

All I want for Christmas is a tidal wave of zombies

Published
by
ashley
on December 4, 2008
in i am ridiculous
. 2 Comments

I’ve said before how excited I am that they’re finally making World War Z into a movie.  On one hand, I would like to see World War Z be a miniseries of sorts, one where they can stretch out each story into an half hour or an hour even (the Battle of Yonkers = win).  But if I have to settle for a movie, at least they’re putting a tidal wave of zombies in it.

For serious.

“Most zombie movies to this point have been small, focusing on a few people in a house. And this has got real scare. You’re in India with hundreds of boats trying to get out of there with a tidal wave of zombies. The scale of what we’re doing here is phenomenal.” - J. Michael Straczynski, the screenplay adapter.  “The fictional concept of the book is that its written by someone with the UN, so let’s tell that story,” he explained. “Let’s show the book being written. We follow this guy all over the world as he goes on these interviews, and he has his own personal story as well. You’re cutting between the past and the present, how he got to this point.”

You can’t hear me, but I’m squealing, quite loudly.  If you throw in the part where they’re underwater in the submarine and they turn the lights on and see zombies on the ocean floor, I will marry you.  I will marry you twice if you talk about the deep sea divers who kill zombies on the ocean floor.  For some reason, the ocean zombies scared me the most in that book, how zombies are still walking up onto beaches after wandering aimlessly on the ocean floor.  Just another reason for me never to go swimming in water you can’t see the bottom on.

Also required for me:  the Battle of Yonkers, the part where the people rush the celebrity compound, and the Japanese computer-obsessed kid who has to make his way down to the street by jumping on balconies with apartments full of zombies.

WIN.

A list of things that happened to me while I was gone

Published
by
ashley
on December 2, 2008
in baking, family, friends and i am ridiculous
. 3 Comments

1. I fully expected to gain a bit of weight by going home, considering the fact that I ate gravy a lot and my left arm’s weight of mashed potatoes.  Also, for dessert, I baked a Paula Deen gooey pumpkin cake that called for not one, but two sticks of butter.  And I ate like three pieces of that.

So I get home on Sunday night after hours of being stuck in traffic and weigh myself and lo and behold, I’m up SEVEN POUNDS (no, this is not a shameless plug for the new Will Smith movie).  Seven. Pounds.  I died inside.  Is that even physically possible to gain seven pounds in two days?  I know I ate a lot of Little Debbie snack cakes (my weakness for oatmeal cream pies, it is astounding) but I don’t recall eating seven pounds worth.

Thankfully, the next morning, I weighed myself and my weight was back to normal.  Either I had a baby overnight that I didn’t remember or I was hoarding a lot of water in my system.  Either way, I’m thankful that my weakness for gas station food and drinks did not contribute.

2.  I got to see my friends on Saturday night, which was great fun.  We played Monopoly, which is Lorrie’s favorite game to play.  She is all the time trying to get us to play Monopoly and Taboo.  Marques dominated, which was pure luck.  I was out of the game second.  My Monopoly strategy is to buy up the orange and red corner and build it up, and I have a strong fondness for Reading Railroad because I like to read.  Jasmine likes to buy the ghetto purples and build hotels on them.  Lorrie’s fiancee Josh… I don’t know what his strategy was.  Possibly to just buy everything he can.  At one point, Josh and I were down to $35.  We suck.

3.  Last night, while grocery shopping, I came upon a giant stack of marked-down frozen turkeys.  I looked at the price ($5.50) and the former price ($45).  Good Deal Syndrome immediately kicked in.  I have this problem where I cannot resist buying something if I feel like I’m getting a Good Deal out of it.  Buying a twenty-pound turkey for 1/9th of the price is a Good Deal.  I’ve never cooked a turkey in my life, but by goodness, I have a twenty-pound turkey sitting at the bottom of my refrigerator thawing out right now.  I have plans to cook my very first turkey ever on Saturday.  Marques is apprehensive, but if I screw it up, I mean, I’m only out 5 dollars.  You can’t even go see a movie for 5 bucks anymore, but I can damn well buy a twenty-pound turkey.  Pictures and leftovers forthcoming.

4.  I’ve not yet quite gotten into the Christmas spirit yet, but I did buy my first Christmas presents last night - both for my mom.  My mom has gotten it into her head that she needs, wants, has-to-have an iPod Touch this year, even though we had all agreed this Christmas was going to be a low-key, non-expensive Christmas.  This always happens, too - every year we say, “Oh, don’t buy a lot of presents, let’s save money, blah blah” and then what happens on Christmas morning?  We have so many presents under the tree that it’s obscene.  I’m going to make a lot of my gifts this year, especially for my friends.  And for the record, I did NOT buy my mom the ipod touch she wants so much, which makes me feel a little bit like a very bad daughter.

5.  And I did not participate in this month’s Daring Bakers challenge, although I’m sure you’ve seen them all over the internet (it was a caramel cake with caramelized butter frosting).  I had every intention of participating, but when I got to my grandma’s on Thanksgiving day, I just didn’t have it in me to cook in front of my family.  There are certain things I feel weird about doing in front of my family - most grown-up things like cooking and baking and paying bills and cleaning.  Everytime I do something of that nature, it’s like I get a pat on the head.  Like “Good job, Ashley, look at you all grown up” and it just drives me crazy.  For that reason, when I’m home, I regress to the age of 18 and tend to look surly and play video games for much of the time.

Wish me luck on my turkey-cooking.