Wisconsin is voting on a state microbe - one of the critters used to make CHEESE!

http://www.wkowtv.com/Global/story.asp?S=11613098

I went out to dinner with Mr S tonight since I was craving a fish fry. I grew up in Milwaukee in a Catholic neighborhood, so Fridays mean an innate craving for fishy goodness. We tried out the little family restaurant at Milwaukee and Stoughton Road (the one that used to be a Country Kitchen and hosted Social Practice for awhile years back). I had not yet been there since it looked like the sort of place that was mostly frequented little blue-haired grannies, but they advertised a fish fry and were close by the house.

It turns out I was right in my suspicions about the clientele - Mr S and I perceptibly dropped the average age of the location by walking through the door. However, the fish was really very tasty and reasonably priced. The hot buffet had a lot of fish and non-fish offerings, which included fried cod, baked cod, fried Alaskan pollack, fried chicken, fried shrimp, fried smelt, BBQ ribs, mashed potatoes, corn, and fries. We each had the Fish Buffet - soup, salad bar, the hot buffet, and a beer or wine for $10. All you can eat perch was $8 and the single servings of fish ran around $7 for the soup and salad bar, a potato, and four pieces of fish. And the fish was very, very good. Happiness.

Next time folks want to go for a fish fry, I now have a good recommendation. :)

Ooof. I've had a cheesy night. I made seven packages of manicotti - ten pounds of cheese! - plus some stuffed shells. I didn't eat it all - some was for dinner, some was for freezing, and some was for delivery to various folks.

Mr S helped with tube-filling and garlic-bread assembly which is good because.... day-am! That's a lotta cheese in the kitchen!

It was a glorious thing.

I caught the very end of this program on medieval foods, in particular the foods of the Ottoman Empire, on WPR this week so thought I'd share.

Here On Earth: Radio Without Borders  - 090724K
Have you ever wished you could experience an historical event first-hand? After three, on Here on Earth: Radio without Borders, join Jean Feraca and her guest to relive an ancient feast in the Ottoman Empire.

Guest: Channon Mondoux, professional chef and food historian.
http://wpr.org/webcasting/audioarchives_display.cfm?Code=hoe
Friday 7/24/2009 3:00 PM (repeated at 9PM)

Quest was a mostly good, mostly, successful adventure this year.

I left Madison Wednesday night, with the plan of stopping in Sioux Falls, spending the day sewing and working on other little projects, and then continuing out to site Thursday night after my companion got out of work... except it didn't work out that way. As I was leaving Madison, I found out that my formulary had bounced and I had until 5:00PM EDT on Monday to fix it. As in, a full day before I was going to get back to the office. >:/ Grrr... crabby Eithni. Even crabbier Eithni when it took almost 8.5 hours instead of the usual 6 to get to SF, thanks to construction and awful rain squalls. So, I arrived quite lat on Wednesday and spent Thursday working on the &*$% formulary instead of playing with toys. Happily, my boss was understanding and is not making me take Thursday as a vacation day and I got at least ONE of my projects finished. The formulary was not yet accepted when I left for site, but I had given enough directions to our Pharmacy Benefits Manager that they were able to fix it while I was incommunicado. For various reasons, including a really impressive game of camping-gear Tetris, we ended up leaving town later than we intended, but the ride out was pleasant enough - talking, sewing, and listening to an audiobook made the miles fly by... Arriving on site at 3AM was less than amusing, but we were reasonably efficient in setting up and soon were abed.

Friday was the Geek Food day - I came to site with a box full of Viking-period ingredients and a vague idea of how to mush them together ad decided I would just play with them and see what I got. Sadly, I was Full of Fail and utterly forgot to take pictures of any of the dishes. *sigh* I just am really bad at taking pictures at events. Anyway, I'll try to recall the "recipes" as best as I am able. I didn't use modern measuring implements, though, so this is all a little vague. A "measure" is about a cup, but that was just an estimate.

( Friday brunch )


( Friday dinner )

Oh, and FYI - eggs placed on a grate above coals and rotated will become "hard boiled". Eggs placed on a grate and not rotated will become cooked on one side and remain raw on the other (the soot patterns give you a good idea about whether you've turned it evenly). And an egg placed in the coals will explode with an impressive bang and leave apretty solid crater in the firepit. Hee! Too fun!

Friday night was coldcoldcold! I was worried I was just a whiner until A told me that she had seen on her alarm/thermometer that it had reached 20*F. Ooof. I so need a night cap - even with all my warm sheepies and decadent bedthings, I was still chilly... Another project for the list, I suppose... I needed a Pictish hood anyway... 

Saturday was the Teach-Teach-Teach day. I got a sort of late start after a tasty-tasty steak lunch and associated cleanup, but then did a quick pass through the merchants and headed to Troll to teach my classes. The first one was a general fiber class wherein I taught whatever people were up for. I started with teaching fibergeek  Eithni's Magic Veil Stitch and then I taught all the attendees (and some fighters that wandered too close) how to whipcord.



Then, I taught an Elizabethan costuming class that was part library road show and part tutorial. That was followed by a short private costuming class and then it was almost time for court. I cleaned up my stuff and some of the A&S and went back to the tent... where I promptly faceplanted until I heard the herald cry for court. Court was quick and fun - and bonus! - one of my favorite blanks evah (the Pict from the Book of Kells) was used. I didn't see it finished, but HrRM told me which it was.

Saturday night was fajitas, s'mores, some wandering, some drinking, and some bardic. I slept in entirely too late on Sunday, but it was nice to wake up WARM, and to the call of free bacon. ;) Packing and getting offsite took about an hour longer than we'd planned, but with no firm plans for the day, there was little stressing about it, other than another game of quality Tetris to get everything back into the car. Hugs and goodbyes all around, and then we were off again...

You know how when you were a kid, your mom would pack that *extra* special treat in your lunch box just so you would know you were loved? Maybe it was your favorite sandwich, maybe a home baked cookie, maybe a special sugary treat she didn't usually buy...

Here's a treat to tuck into the armor bag for your favorite fighter, so they can have that special love-through-electrolytes feeling -



That's right! An individual serving (3.7 oz) of pickles that no one else has had their nasty sweaty fighter fingers in... and a little cup of pickle juice to finish! Love in a foil-topped cup! 



(Sorry for the multi-posting today - I had several items and wanted to make sure they all had searchable tags/titles for later when I'm trying to find the links!)

...at least in my house. Dinner tonight was wonderful from the company - corvusjoyous , ego_id_non_feci , kumakun , and fencingkitty  - to the menu - salad, corn, meatloaf, and garlic cheddar mashed potatoes. However, mashed potatoes in my house are made with milk, sour cream, butter, and cheese. Mmmmmm.... nummy! Food coma time!

Yay! Continuing the foodie theme of the week, I went to Border Skirmish and cooked and taught for most of the day.

I made some of my Pictish Bread as an active part of the A&S display and for my lunch. (OK, lunch for whoever I could convince to eat it. ;P) I had just gotten proficient at the baking over a fire or on hearthstones so today I trialled a new method, cooking on a propane stove with either one of Danr's pans or a cast iron skillet, since I wanted to bake in the NS pavilion but did not want to dig a fire pit in the middle of it. Cooking over the gas fire was a little challenging to start, especially because I wanted a very low flame and the wind kept blowing out my fire, but eventually I got better at it. Still need practice, mind you, but the bread was edible if occasionally "pre-toasted."



However, woman cannot live on bread alone, so I wanted something tasty to put on the bread... I made a "green cheese" - i.e. one made and eaten promptly, not aged. I went to a class on it at War and it really is very easy. You simmer milk, add vinegar/lemonjuice/acid and/or natural enzymes to curdle it, then strain it through some fabric and let it hang to drain. (The cheese is hanging just to the left of the tree trunk, like a particularly tasty linen-wrapped fruit.)



Once drained, you add salt and herbs, spices, or other mix-ins. I had brought some dill to add, but since Her Excellency CAM was there and teaching an herbal class, I asked her is there was anything on site that would be tasty in cheese. She brought me clover, so we had clover cheese, dill cheese and plain cheese (seen below). Sweet Clover, for those of you interested, has a sharp lemony- flavor that is really quite good and livened the cheese nicely.



The texture was interesting - crumbly but light. Since I had only about a quarter cup of cheese and no bread leftover, I'll consider the cooking a win. Round out the day with perfect weather, good folks to visit, two classes taught, pleasant travel companions, children to torture, and a houseguest and you have the makings of a very fine Saturday indeed.

Nummy!



Spinach leaves and fresh mozzarella with halved grape tomatoes, basil garnish and blackcurrant vinegar dressing.

Best of all, much of the vegetable matter was grown by my day care charges in the occupational rehabilitation garden. They had a little Farmer's Market to sell their produce and raise funds for next year's garden. The vinegar is, of course, from Vom Fass.

Last night I really let my inner foodie out and made turkey burgers with a homemade pineapple chutney, served with the above salad and three other side dishes in honor of dread_ex's birthday.

I wish that Culver's delivered.

Or that I had been clever enough to stop on the way home from an all-day sewing binge at goldfrog's.

Or that the Chocolate Pixies would make something nummy appear in my pantry.

That is all.

Work sucked beyond all telling, but since then, things have been looking up:

The weather is beautiful, as if we might actually have Spring. (Good job, May Queen!)

Chucky has asparagus that did not get used in the feast that he will be dropping off later tonight. Tasty dinner for me!

I got a phone call from SR Harris - I won a $100 shopping "spree". The lady was knowing when I laughed. "OK, dent in the bill," she said. :) Fabric joy!

Last night ego_id_non_feci came over after work. I knew she was going to have a stressful day, so I had prepared some de-stressing materials for her. First, I have been educating her about Scotch, so we each had a Scotch monkey of Glenlivet 12. Yum! Then I also had a tasty, tasty new book to share - Moda a Firenze. I splurged and bought it and cannot say I regret it in the least. All y'all late period folks need to appreciate how lucky you are to have such wonderful portraits and freaking EXTANT GARMENTS to work from when doing research. It is so easy it is almost cheating. Fun cheating, pretty cheating, but cheating. :P

Speaking of  ego_id_non_feci , last night she had pictures for me of my last torturing the kids day. I went and taught them about microorganisms. Many of them have been sick, so they were interested in germs and such. We talked about bad germs and good bacteria, and yeast-y beasites and then made bread. For the explosion part of the experiments, we had a yeast volcano. *grin* D, my little buddy, just could not contain himself - he had to be touching my table, the experiments or me, pretty much all afternoon.


Showing the yeast bubbles in bread, with D sticking his head into the photo. :)


Kids consuming their little loaves.

Heh. After the little monsters made the bread I had SO many little floury handprints on my pants from around-the-knees hugs. Happily, the little loaves apparently turned out OK, even with the rough and probable over-kneading they received.

Now... just to come up with not-too-dangerous things to do with fire, the next topic that has been requested...

Monday was a Good Day.

* Just past midnight, I got the notice that some friends had welcomed their son into the world. Happiness and extreme cuteness!

* First thing this morning, I got an email that the wonderful and talented Edwin finished a cart for me and I may get it as soon as this weekend. (Minions, take note, this cart will be a factor in your education, I am certain. ;P)



* Then, I got positive confirmation that I will be getting the help I need in the Pharmacy department at work. I may need to cut my hours a but to make it work, but it is really going to happen!

*Oddly enough, my body is still not hating me. I need a prescription for twice a week hot tub and mudslide days, I guess. *grin*

* With a bit of a lead from damej, All Things Considered and Newsweek, I got the placebo article (see previous post).

* I made tasty dinner - a chicken dish that even kumakun would eat, despite its being covered in suspicious Greek seasoning. Yum! ;)

* I got some happy email and birdie time - one of the few (and minor) failures of the day was delaying the linen order AGAIN - the online shipping calculator won't work for the volume of linen I am ordering and then I got a last minute request from Toshikage and some CAM folks. Tomorrow, tomorrow we will have success and tasty linen, however!

* Then I had tea and talkies with a friend. It is nice to be useful and loved. :)

* And finally, I had a Shamrock Shake and Fries for a bedtime snack.

Life rarely gets better. :)

I was playing with Google, working on a different name research question for someone, and idly wondered, if I googled "Eithni" how high would references to me personally (without any modifiers like SCA, Jara, Jean, etc,) pop up? 23 of the first 25 entries is the current answer. I was, however, very deeply amused by the 26th entry, the first hit on an actual medieval woman's name. The web page provides this translation of a story, apparently from a medieval Irish source:

"The Violent Death of Medb

What is the cause of the violent death of Medb, the daughter of Eochaid Feidlig from Temair?

The three sons of Find[gail] [were] Conall Anglonnach and Eocahid Find and Eochaid Feidlig. Now Eochaid Feidlig had three sons and three daughters. The three sons [were] Bres and N�r and Lothur, that is, the three Finds of Emain. The three daughters [were] Eithni Uathach [For this reason she was called Eithni Uathac (Eithni the Terrible), namely, she used to eat the flesh of infants so that the children always disliked her to be mentioned] and Medb of Cruachu and Clothru of Cruachu...

"Aided Meidbe: The Violent Death of Medb" ed. and trans. by Vernam Hull. Speculum. v.13 issue 1. (Jan. 1938), 52-61."
from: http://www.maryjones.us/ctexts/medb.html



Bwhahahahaha!


If that were not funny enough, the story goes on to explain that the death of Medb was actually a case of murder by cheese. *grin*

Thing 6 - Sekanjabin!

I had noted awhile ago that my sekanjabin stores were running a little low but did not have time or motivation to make any more at that time. Today,  ego_id_non_feci   came over and we had salads for dinner, including tasty vinegars, which reminded me of the lack, so I made a half-batch of Blackcurrant Balsamic sekanjabin. (Besides, I needed to do something tasty with my goodies from Vom Fass!) I had to dig a little to find the sugar, which made me notice that the staples cabinet was a mess - so I cleaned/organized it as the sekanjabin reduced. Which made me notice that we have A LOT of flour and sugar. Which made me make A LOT more sekanjabin... and may mean that tomorrow's thing is bread. ;)


Left to right: 3 jars Blackcurrant Balsamic, 3 jars and one bottle aged Balsamic, 2 jars Apple Cider Vinegar without mint, 4 jars and 7 Bottles Apple Cider Vinegar with Mint. Yum! 

It has been a pretty good weekend...

Friday I cleaned like crazy and did some decorating for the Mad Scientist party and then valkyr8 arrived on time and safe, despite the nasty weather.

Saturday I slept in a bit and then went to It's Only a Flesh Wound. That was a pleasant event with enough fighting to satisfy even most of the die-hard fighters. Even better, I think it might be just the site to hold a Golden Seamstress- type event! I will be traveling to the original in a few weeks and have permission to steal the concept, so look for a Golden Seamstresses Northshield in the not-too-distant future!

After the event,goldfrog and her man hosted dinner at their place, which allowed me to eat and then quickly run back to my place to do final prep for the party. The party itself was a reasonable success, although I found out belatedly that not all the invites got delivered. *pout* If you didn't get an invite, my apologies - I was trying to avoid inviting the whole world and so didn't do the general post here or on the Jara list, but apparently even some of the personal invites went astray. *sigh*

Anyway, there was weird and gross food to be sampled and many people played along and came in lab gear. Thanks to my co-birthday girlvalkyr8 for sharing her day with me and bringing a lot of props. Thanks to fencert for bringing other essential props that I thought I'd have to do without. Another happy birthday to aaron_pike who shares a birthday with me and didn't kill me for ratting him out to Their Highnesses and still came to the party with his lovely lady. Thanks to everyone who came and especially those who brought weird food - arebekah's red velvet-pumpkin-bacon eye was particularly... spectacular. And, of course, thanks to the wonderful inhabitants of Eithni's Home for Wayward Girls for putting up with my silly theme party and the sticky juice "blood," suspiciously colored drinks, and miscellaneous party detritus that accompanies these things...

Today, I had planned to go to Cocoliquot for lunch with a bunch of folks, which ended up beingvalkyr8, goldfrog, goldfrog's guy, and damej, but they were closed due to a water main break. Sadness, particularly since they were running the restaurant week special ad will soon be closing. However, Brocach was a sufficiently satisfactory replacement. Besides,gflower and I will probably go there on Tuesday night anyway. :) Then our little group, minus damej went to Vom Fass to sample oils, vinegars, and fine spirits. What fun for foodies! valkyr8 and I rounded out the afternoon with a visit to Gayfeather Fabrics where I acquired some lovely blue wool - some for a project for gwyneth1362 and some for a Jara-themed gown... arebekah - I think G talked me into making a cotehardie, so I may be seeking your services soon....

The rest of today was spent cleaning and otherwise recovering from the weekend. The house has mostly been put to rights and I'll finish the last of the dishes and putting stuff away process tomorrow. :) Thank you to everyone who made this a special weekend! The flowers, gifts, books, and well-wishes were most appreciated!

With this cold, we all clearly need some extra insulation... Madison restaurant week to the rescue!

About two dozen of the local nicer restaurants host special lunches and dinners where you get three courses for $15-25. The menus are somewhat fixed, but I went to a few places last year and it was worthwhile. Besides, I got to sample dishes I may not have otherwise picked at places I certainly don't frequent.

I at least have the convenient excuse that it's my birthday week, so some celebration is in order... ;) However, I would encourage other folk too - Get dressed up and go try out some new fancy places, just for fun!

Note: for some of you, this is just odd or confusing... Some of you, however, will find this freaking hilarious. 

After years of resisting temptation, I finally could not take it any more! I was shopping and was seized with an uncontrollable, undeniable desire for a crayon! A pink one! I had to do it! Observe as I finally give in...

 http://www.crayonsinc.com/

Lupper at Michael's was wonderful - the food was great, we had nice dinner conversation, and then returned to Madison, where we braved retail stupidity for external harddrives. Mmmm... 500 GB!

Tomorrow I am running some errands, tidying up a bit, and then off to pick up a guest from the airport!