Bacon & Banana, no anchovies.

homemade hummus, it's really good, very garlicy.
A store-roasted whole chicken (I bought the chicken whole. I won't eat the whole thing in this meal, it's two or three meals at least.
Corn chips, salsa.
Apple Ginger cider from Angry Orchard.

I keep telling myself that. :haha:

Today I decided the weather was right for braised beef short ribs. I had bought 4 lbs or so back on sale and frozen them so I let them thaw out in the fridge for a day or 2. I also had saved a bunch of beef scraps from when I had Frenched the ribs on a rib roast for a family get together, I had wrapped them up and frozen them so they got thawed out. Lots of nice bits of beef...

I've really taken a liking to my crock pot slow cooker. It was my mother in law's but was too big for her as she just can't lift heavy things and generally cooks smaller items for herself. I used to do braises in a Le Cruset cast iron pot on the stove but with the kitchen all torn up cooking on the stove isn't as easy and I think the crock pot actually cooks at a lower temp than on the stove on the lowest flame.

To fit it all in the pot I decided to trim off the bones, I know that they add flavor to the meat as it cooks but with all the beef I needed enough room. So I floured the beef a bit and tossed it into a skillet with some very hot grapeseed oil and let it all brown a bit. Then I rough cut an onion, 3 big garlic cloves, some celery and threw in a cup or so of those pre cut baby carrots that kind of needed to get used up and put all that in the bottom of the ceramic crock pot dish. After the meat browned I put it neatly on top of all the veg. and deglazed the pan with a cup of red wine and a 1/2 cup of orange juice. I don't know, it just sounded like a good liquid to add to the crock pot. Oh and I added some Herbes de Provence which is my all around go to spice mix for beef and lamb. Added some salt and fresh ground pepper, 2 bay leaves and put on the lid and set it for 10 hours on low. I didn't add any other liquid. I find some recipes call for more and with all the moisture that comes out of the meat and vegetables it cooks more like a soup and I have to reduce or dump some of it to serve.

Probably boil up some red skinned potatoes to serve it over or maybe make mashed potatoes. Pretty basic really.

Man, are those things handy as hell, or what? Price-Less/IGA's whole chickens absolutely rock.:yum:

Leek risotto. Chicken Marsala, made from scratch. Can't argue with that.

The price of each chicken, approximately the same size, a whole chicken, one roasted, one uncooked... the difference was about a quarter. WTF. I spend more than twenty-five cents cooking it and then cleaning the pan. For that matter, I don't even have to include the cost of a dirty dish for the first meal cause I start butchering it right in that clamshell bucket it get sold in. nom fucking nom.

Now.

It's not the BEST roasted chicken, I make a tastier, juicier chicken than one that's been mass produced and parked in hotplate purgatory. But. The convenience/grub factor is way, waaay higher.

Super Pollo Chicken is a local rotisserie chicken place two blocks from us, and when we don't know what we're having for dinner, I'll often walk there and pick up a whole chicken. They taste way better than the supermarket ones, but are a couple bucks more. Somehow they know how many to cook up, so they are taking them fresh off the spit just as you get there at dinner time.

I would not be able to resist calling that place "super chicken chicken" if I lived near one.

Yeah. We can't resist either.

Huh? Oh, pollo is chicken in Spanish... nevermind :smack:

And the La Brea Tar Pits translates to The "the tar" Tar Pits.

Anyone ever eaten at Pollos Hermanos?

Have I been putting my fish in La Brea Tar sauce?

Food today was a downer. I ate at a burger place I hadn't tried before, and their schtick is to try and sell fancied-up mini-burgers, not much bigger than a slider, for relatively obscene amounts of money. $10 for a two mini-burger, boring fries, and drink combo. It felt like an appetizer. It was technically executed well on the cookery side, but I left hungry. And they're doing that awful new west coast thing where they decorate with concrete and brushed metal everything, so it's ugly and the acoustics are terrible to boot. It was a weirdly depressing experience.

Food generally should not be depressing, with two notable and delicious exceptions, both sandwiches from Frisch's Big Boy. First and foremost, the Brawny Lad: a burger on a dark brown rye bun with a slab of onion. That's it. It's short, squat, and brown, like an old shoe, and it is a marvel to behold on a white plate. Stark but filling, and tastes surprisingly good. The other is the Swiss Miss, which is the Brawny Lad's slightly perkier cousin for those with a little pep still in their step. It trades the onion for a slice of swiss cheese and a little shredded lettuce and secret (tartar) sauce.

Even then, it's important to recognize that the Brawny Lad and Swiss Miss aren't sandwiches of despair, but meals of grim determination. When you order your Brawny Lad you know you're low in the world, but you set your teeth and you bear through it, and you come out a better person on the other side. You don't leave feeling hopeful, exactly, but you at least leave feeling tenacious and maybe even a little absolved, in a Protestant sort of way. They are exactly what you needed.

The mini-burgers tonight, though, just left me feeling hungry and a little dirty. Like I needed a Brawny Lad.