I have been cooking up a storm since I've been back.
Dinner last night:
Fish stew (tilapia, red snapper, clams, squid, veggies in a clam chowder, sauvignon blanc and creme fraiche base)
Butter and garlic pan seared giant scallops
Sourdough for dipping
Dinner tonight:
Tagliatelle bake with sweet italian sausage and ground turkey and four cheeses
Roasted fennel and carrots in herbs and shaved parmesan
Polenta, pan fried in garlic and then topped with shredded parmesan and baked until parmesan is crispy
Butternut squash soup, made from scratch (my friend Mat made this and it was delicious)!
Balsamic glazed raosted brussels sprouts
Columbia Crest Two Vines Shiraz
Here is the recipe for the Butternut squash soup, which is absolutely scrumptious.
BUTTERNUT SQUASH SOUP
1 Butternut Squash
1 whole head of garlic
Chicken stock
Olive Oil
Salt
Pepper
Nutmeg
Curry Powder
Cut squash into quarters, remove seeds and membrane. Rub with oil, salt, pepper, and a little curry powder and nutmeg. Wrap in foil. Cut top off of head of garlic, drizzle with oil, wrap in foil. Place squash and garlic on BBQ grill, close lid, and grill for about 40 minutes, or until squash is roasted and soft. Let cool a little. Remove from foil, scoop out squash and squeeze out garlic from casing. Puree in small batches in blender with chicken stock. Transfer to pot, re-heat, sprinkle some more nutmeg if desired. YUM!
Monday, October 16, 2006
Tuesday, October 10, 2006
Monday, October 09, 2006
The List, updated
Places I’ve been in the past five years, in no particular order (times in parenthesis if visited more than once):
Guatemala City
Antigua, Guatemala
Amatitlan
Jocotenango
San Jose, Costa Rica
Alajuela
Tortuguero
La Fortuna (Volcan Arenal)
Bocas Del Toro
Tikal
San Salvador
Granada, Nicaragua
Paris (3)
Lyon
Marseilles
Iles du Frioul
Cassis
Barcelona (2)
Mallorca
Cinque Terre (2)
Amsterdam (4)
Lisse
Siena
Prague (2)
Vienna (2)
Rome (2)
Venice (2)
Florence
Shanghai
Guangzhou
Hangzhou
Suzhou
Taipei
Kaoshuing
Hong Kong (3)
Macau
Bangkok
Phuket
Phi Phi
Ko Chang
Siem Reap (Angkor Wat)
Oahu
Vegas (10+)
Puerto Nuevo (6)
New York City
Guatemala City
Antigua, Guatemala
Amatitlan
Jocotenango
San Jose, Costa Rica
Alajuela
Tortuguero
La Fortuna (Volcan Arenal)
Bocas Del Toro
Tikal
San Salvador
Granada, Nicaragua
Paris (3)
Lyon
Marseilles
Iles du Frioul
Cassis
Barcelona (2)
Mallorca
Cinque Terre (2)
Amsterdam (4)
Lisse
Siena
Prague (2)
Vienna (2)
Rome (2)
Venice (2)
Florence
Shanghai
Guangzhou
Hangzhou
Suzhou
Taipei
Kaoshuing
Hong Kong (3)
Macau
Bangkok
Phuket
Phi Phi
Ko Chang
Siem Reap (Angkor Wat)
Oahu
Vegas (10+)
Puerto Nuevo (6)
New York City
back
i'm back! the flight was quite arduous (guatemala city to san jose, costa rica, overnight in san jose, san jose to miami, overnight in miami, miami to LAX). my body reacted by developing a large cold sore. i'm not leaving the house until it disappears.
Mouse has forgotten about me, and I am heartbroken. She seems to view me as an unwelcome extra presence in the house, a disruption to her blissful coexistence with my boyfriend. They curl up in bed together and cast hostile stares me way.
Mouse has forgotten about me, and I am heartbroken. She seems to view me as an unwelcome extra presence in the house, a disruption to her blissful coexistence with my boyfriend. They curl up in bed together and cast hostile stares me way.
Sunday, October 01, 2006
tal vez: perhaps
VIII. TAL VEZ...
Tal vez ya no le importa mi gemido
en el indiferente edén callado
en que el espíritu desencarnado
vive como dormido...
Tal vez ni sabe ya cómo he llorado
ni cómo he padecido.
En profundo quietismo,
su alma, que antes me amara de tal modo,
se desliza glacial por ese abismo
del eterno mutismo,
olvidada de sí, de mí, de todo...
- Amado Nervo (Chilean poet, 1870-1919)
Tal vez ya no le importa mi gemido
en el indiferente edén callado
en que el espíritu desencarnado
vive como dormido...
Tal vez ni sabe ya cómo he llorado
ni cómo he padecido.
En profundo quietismo,
su alma, que antes me amara de tal modo,
se desliza glacial por ese abismo
del eterno mutismo,
olvidada de sí, de mí, de todo...
- Amado Nervo (Chilean poet, 1870-1919)
mariposa negra
Last night while we were eating dinner, the duena (landlady) came to talk to my host mom. The corner convenience store had just been robbed. My roomates and I stared around the table at one another, frozen to our seats. The store is not 75 feet from where we were sitting, and we had heard nothing.
I thought about the night before, when I had walked there alone at 10:30pm, to buy apple juice. I remembered the bored-looking clerks, two of them, young men, who explained to me that one of the refrigerators was broken so if I wanted cold juice, I would have to buy apple, and not grape, as I had originally asked for. I thought about what could have happened if I had chosen to go a day later.
We briefly considered not going out that night, but decided to go dancing anyway. Spent the night dancing (or in my case, trying to dance) to salsa at a club called Casbah under the arch.
Today at lunch, Dona marta told us that there is a black trash bag tied to the door of hte store in the shape of a bow or butterfly. The clerk had not just been robbed--he had been shot dead.
It seems to wrong that at the exact moment I was sitting down at dinner, discussing where to go dancing that night, less than half a black away someones life was slipping away.
There are 200 violent attacks, mostly robberies and mostly in the capital, on the camionetas (chicken buses) every day. Every other day or two the newspapers fill up with the count of people who had been shot dead on the buses that day. Last friday, there were 12. Yet every afternoon, the buses roll by, packed to the gills with passengers and laden with luggage tied to the roof.
I thought about the night before, when I had walked there alone at 10:30pm, to buy apple juice. I remembered the bored-looking clerks, two of them, young men, who explained to me that one of the refrigerators was broken so if I wanted cold juice, I would have to buy apple, and not grape, as I had originally asked for. I thought about what could have happened if I had chosen to go a day later.
We briefly considered not going out that night, but decided to go dancing anyway. Spent the night dancing (or in my case, trying to dance) to salsa at a club called Casbah under the arch.
Today at lunch, Dona marta told us that there is a black trash bag tied to the door of hte store in the shape of a bow or butterfly. The clerk had not just been robbed--he had been shot dead.
It seems to wrong that at the exact moment I was sitting down at dinner, discussing where to go dancing that night, less than half a black away someones life was slipping away.
There are 200 violent attacks, mostly robberies and mostly in the capital, on the camionetas (chicken buses) every day. Every other day or two the newspapers fill up with the count of people who had been shot dead on the buses that day. Last friday, there were 12. Yet every afternoon, the buses roll by, packed to the gills with passengers and laden with luggage tied to the roof.
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