Rabid & Ready Swarofski Encrusted Dobermen

During a recent visit to Scottsdale, Arizona I found myself crushed under the wet, sloggy heaviness of a brief but intense depression. I attribute this to recently developing happy facts in my life; Daisy's health is on the mend, JP is out of the hospital, the DH's retina is refraining from detachment, and so on. Why, one might ask, would the mending of my loved ones cause me to BE depressed instead of happy? I think during the visit to Scottsdale I finally allowed myself to breathe. I felt safe amongst some of the people who love and care for me the most. And in the for some reason unforgettable lyrics of the completely insipid Faith Hill, I could finally, "just breathe". So I had a good cry and went on a rampage at Target. As I threw away the disgusting amount of environment ruining packaging that comes home with you after a spree at Target, I felt a little better. I dried my tears and went down to the pool at the Scottsdale Resort and Athletic Club.



A little later in the day, to further cheer me up, D took me to have a gander and a medicinal beverage at the Scottsdale Mondrian. Just like every other Mondrian and/or Ian Schrager property, this one is whimsical, fun, and filled to the brim with good looking young people partying their asses off. Both of the following are pictures of the Skybar, which I like much better than the Skybar in West Hollywood.





While it might not show much imagination on my part, I had a major craving for Mastro's. There are three unidentical branches of the small Mastro's chain in Scottsdale. The one we chose is called Mastro's City Hall Steakhouse: The first of a new hybrid steakhouse and sophisticated nightspot offering elegant, timeless dining experiences for the new millenia. You can find descriptions and locations for all Mastro's restaurants at the link below. (Psst: TomKat has been photographed leaving the one in Beverly Hills several times, which makes me hope they bring their own cutlery.)

http://www.azeats.com/Mastros/

As always I ordered the petit filet on the bone. With consistency, the Mastro's filet on the bone is the best steak I have ever and will ever eat. Period. The end.



All sides are served family style, and by family style they mean for the family portrayed in the 1970's drama, Eight is Enough. We finished none of our sides between the five people and there is not a dainty eater among us. Here are the delicious snap peas.



As a self-identified truffle whore, I was unable to take a pass on the truffled gnocci. This was a serving of monstrous proportions...did you hear me? MONSTROUS! I am sad we didn't finish this either. Tears fill my eyes at the thought that some portion of a beautiful truffle was used and did not pass through my digestive system.



We ended Saturday evening at a winebar modeled like a speakeasy. With a sign above the door stating simply, "The Truth Is Within", Kazimierz World Wine Bar has plush if not ample seating, friendly staff, a stunning interior that I will christen SouthWestoroccan, and a 136 page wine list that I did not even begin to delve into. I will do so at a later date. Do you hear me Scottsdale? I will return to conquer that wine list! Lock up the children and batten down the hatches!

http://www.kazbar.net/index.php




The following day, after attempting comic tennis in the swirling desert winds, DF gave us the tour of old town Scottsdale and some of his favorite and notable spots. Eating lunch at the Italian Grotto was a treat. Aside from the open walls looking out onto the desert landscape, it feels just like any New York/Long Island brick walled, black leather boothed Italian restaurant owned by a made man with a bar tender so lovingly snarky you have to smile. The clams portofino were outrageously delicious. Frank Sinatra singing in the background was so cliche it was classic.

http://www.italiangrotto.com/

D being D meant that he ended up with tomato sauce spilled all the way down the front of his tee shirt and we spent the better part of the afternoon shopping for a replacement. When in the wild west, one wants to look like a wild western cowboy, therefore we shopped here.





And wonders may never cease, since we shopped for quite some time in a store with very expensive shoes and I found nothing of interest. It may have been a first.





We ended our afternoon walk at a random overly contemporary restaurant bar with the notable and noted Swarofski encrusted doberman pinscher statues encased in plexiglass. These are randomly cool.





We ended our evening and our trip with C at a Mexican restaurant so lovely I cannot remember its name. Delivering strong well constructed margaritas and light fare with lots of vegetables and freshly made tortillas, I will gladly eat there again anytime. Adios, Scottsdale.

Eggs in Aspic, o Ouefs en Gelees

Audiobooks are a recent joy in my life. Right now I am listening to Julie on Julia, the journey of one woman experiencing a third life crisis who cooks her way through the classic American tome of French cooking, Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking. The most recent chapter, which I listened to Thursday, describes Julie's adventures cooking oeufs en gelee, or poached eggs in aspic.

http://blogs.salon.com/0001399/2002/11/29.html

Julie did not measure this a successful recipe. However I, for some reason, find my psyche obsessed with the idea of making aspic from bones. Next, softly poaching an egg and layering it with various herbs, al dente poached veg & maybe some salmon or lardon inside the confines of a transparent aspic encasement. Upon further research, I am pleased to find out that there are many renditions of ouefs en gelee.

http://chocolateandzucchini.com/archives/2006/02/egg_in_aspic.php

The author of Chocolate & Zucchini, Clotilde Dusoulier, writes about the both the joy of gently breaking apart the aspic to free the beauty of the ingredients inside and the omniprescence of this dish in the non-touristy outer arrondissements of Paris.



Below is the close up she posted. I like how this one is wrapped in what looks like a thin slice of ham or proscuitto:




I have not attempted to make this yet, but I can feel it coming. I made a horrific dinner the other night for John and David, as usual winging it completely. I will blog about the horror of that meal at another time. Now however, I will treat you, dear reader, to the joy of a variety of examples of oeufs en gelee from various places about the interwebs.

Here is a simple version, still in its ramikan.



This one, served on a bed of greens, illustrates the beauty of digging through the aspic and cracking the softly poached egg...I am imagining sopping up the yolk with a warm grilled hunk of kalamata olve bread.



And this version (apologies for the tiny pic) shows one housed with slices of salmon, my mouth is watering anticipating that those are slices of smoked salmon, the combination of the lightly flavored aspic, the egg and the soft fleshy salmon...




In the recesses of someone's dark and twisted mind, labeling this photo of a streaker at Wimbledon as "oeufs en gelee" must have seemed amusing.



I am officially amused.

"They're not CUPCAKES!",

I said adamantly for the third time. Inspired by a recent obsession with cupcake blogs and the little cakes made at http://www.cakemonkey.com/, I decided to make Tracy's birthday dessert my damn self.




I had been dying to try silicon baking pans. They are supposedly easy to clean and foolproof with regard to depanning your baking. I bought these online at http://www.kitchenkrafts.com/product.asp?pn=BP1037.






The recipes that inspired these cakes were found at http://cupcakeblog.com/index.php and altered according to my whim and circumstance. I wanted to make starkly contrasting flavors so I chose ancho-chili chocolate and grapefruit-pomegranite.




The chocolate cakes were iced with ancho-chili chocolate ganache and topped with shavings of Scharffenberger chocolate.






When shopping for ingredients, my local yup-mart was *gasp* out of pomegranite seeds. So to give a little extra kick I trebled the amount of grapefruit zest in the recipe. Amd because buttercream frosting should be banished from existence (nods to Karla) I frosted these with cream cheese frosting. Teh nom!



CJ's lamb. This guy can cook!



Before and after:





My all time favorite lewd gesture.



The more or less unused cocktail table.

Pancakes & Hope

The last nine months illness has been circling my life like angry frustrated bees circling their hive on a sweltering summer day. What do I do with my hands and myself when I feel this helpless on so many fronts? I make special dog meals, meting out a bewildering and ever changing array of meds.



I buy magazines and don't read them.



I visit hospitals, doctor's and veterinarian's offices. I attend and mark every special day as though it might be Sue's last.



I drive in silence. I take pictures of the beautiful northern California sunset.



I try to live simultaneously with hope and without denial. And I make pancakes for this guy.

Phantom Sightings: Art After the Chicano Movement (and snacks)

Last Wednesday evening we headed over to LACMA for the opening of the new exhibit, "Phantom Sightings: Art After the Chicano Movement". It runs for the public April 6th through September 8, 2008. I certainly cannot describe the show better than the writers at LACMA, so here is their blurb.

Phantom Sightings: Art after the Chicano Movement is the largest exhibition of cutting-edge Chicano art ever presented at LACMA. Chicano art, traditionally described as work created by Americans of Mexican descent, was established as a politically and culturally inspired movement during the counterculture revolutions of the late 1960s and early 1970s. This exhibition explores the more experimental tendencies within the Chicano art movement—ones oriented less toward painting and declarative polemical assertion than toward conceptual art, performance, film, photo-and media-based art, and "stealthy" artistic interventions in urban spaces. The exhibition includes approximately 125 works in all media, including painting and sculpture as well as installation, conceptual, video, performance art, and intermedia works that incorporate film, digital, and sound art. Artists featured are photographer Christina Fernandez, who documents the poetic and “phantom” in the urban landscape; Mario Ybarra Jr., who creates performances, site-specific installations and intermedia works; the “intermedia synaesthesia” of the seminal conceptual art group Asco; and the New York-based artist Nicola Lopez, who creates dramatic installations with drawings that extend from the wall into the gallery.

http://www.lacma.org/art/ExhibPhantom.aspx

I may not know much about how to characterize Chicano-Latino art late into the 20th century and on into the 21st, but I know what I....



Above is an example of the first set of pieces that moved me. Taken in the mid 1970's, these are richly saturated and color drenched photographs of the vogue-ings of individual and small groups of Latinos in parks and urban environs. The eternal return dictates that the clothing in these photos are definitely having a second 15 minutes.




The above is particularly striking, but as an installation it needs to be seen in person and from the ground looking up into an antechamber of the main gallery. The effect is that of looking up into the underside of a twisted and torn bridge. There is another half to the bridge, and the two almost meet in the middle of the ceiling. Is the artist saying something about time spent as an under-the-bridge hanging subculture, or is this a statement about the imminent decay of urban infrastructure?



The above piece interested me due to the accompanying text that follows:



The 45 indigenous people that the Spanish settlers "discovered" were living, I assume, between what is now Olvera Street and the LA River, just a few hundred yards from my front porch. I like thinking that I walkon the same earth as they walked, and wondered last night what their lives were like prior to their discovery.



The above series is called "Breaking".



This witty piece is titled, "El Rey y Corona".



Above is an example of my favorite group, color and composition wise. I love the passionate lines and vivid shapes...



This last piece is from a group of photgraphs that are my favorite conceptually. To create these portraits, the artist pairs people with a life size photograph of someone else. These are intriguing to look at and leave some ambiguity with regard to statement, which is something I love in art. This particular piece is a portrait of the artist with Charles Bukowski.



Immediately afterward, we headed over to Jar, one of our all time favorites. We love to hang out with Margo at the bar. She brought over the obligatorily delicious handmade potato chips and horseradish-chive dip. The perfect nibble for starving yuppies posing as art afficionados.



I made the wise choice of ordering a Jar favorite, pureed English peas with fennel, roasted garlic and olive oil. Apparently this one time special was so frequently requested that Tracht added it to the spring menu. It is astoundingly delicious. Served warm, and not overly pureed so you still have a slightly al dente texture, with the tiniest sprinkling of feta cheese for hint of goat and radish shavings for some bite.