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eanja
Five people I love who aren't family: See the list of people tagged below and addeanja,moria923, my former housemates bryt, jerminating, Lucy, the Professor, and Snow. Also, the Pages, Ki-Lin, and too many more to try to list. I've been very lucky.
Five things I can't live without:
Moisturizer
Dental floss (I ran out last week and acted like a mad woman until I had more. If this had come up earlier, I wouldn't have included it.)
Blistex
Books
Conversation. (This was the thing that I found myself missing when I was in L.A. I had a couple of long, lovely conversations with my father, but my mother and sister just talk a lot.)
Five foods/drinks I love:
Only five? Dammit!
Drinks:
Evian water. -- I don't know why it tastes so much better to me than any other filtered or bottled water out there, but it does. Evian has a sensuous feel to it that I have never managed to duplicate elsewhere.
Grand Cru Meersault -- Don't faint at the price. Buy some. Drink it with a good meal preferably one that involves a rich seafood and hollandaise sauce. You'll see.
Eau de Vie Mirabelle -- I don't know if we don't grow mirabelle plums in this country or if we don't let them get ripe. The plums themselves are sweet and musky with a rich texture more reminiscent of a white peach than most plums. This is macerated in good white brandy until it produces an after dinner drink that's like a soft kiss.
Schweppes menthe -- The French tend to mix sirops with water. The Italians use fizzy water and, sometimes, milk. With sirop de menthe either of these methods is just too cloying. The first man I fell in love with introduced me to this variation: Tonic water with all it's bitter quinine and sirop de menthe. It's a wonderful summer interlude, and the only fizzy thing I miss. (No more fizz permitted thanks to burgeoning osteoporosis.)
Caffe fredo -- I've described it elsewhere in my LJ, but this is the single most refreshing thing I've ever drunk. I had it in Venice in the middle of a hot summer. It was served in a shot glass. As best I can tell it was double strong espresso with nearly enough sugar in it to make a syrup. It was kept on ice until it was poured and handed to me. The best $.50 I ever spent. I've tried, but never quite succeeding in duplicating it. I don't think I can find a dark enough roast coffee.
Foods:
Asparagus -- I've loved it all my life in many different preparations. The very first medieval recipe I redacted was for grilled asparagus with bitter orange. It's simply heavenly. But boiled asparagus a la Nettie, or Asperge flamandes, or Schwetzinger spargel: I've never had bad asparagus.
Tortellini in brodo -- My sister prefers it in cream sauce, but on our first trip through Italy, she's the one who first tried tortellini. I've still never found a U.S. restaurant that makes it the way I had it a little Osteria in Rome. The broth was excellent, and the tortellini had the perfect texture. I've tried to make it, and never quite succeeded. But every time I go to Italy, it's one of the first things I order.
Artichoke -- Like asparagus, this was an early love. It's a great vegetable to get kids to eat because they can pluck the leaves and get them to their mouths so easily. Boiled, steamed, grilled, it doesn't matter. The subtle sweetness and delicate aftertaste are it for me.
Cavaillon melons -- served with prosciutto or other air dryed ham this melon has a pink fleshed sweetness that melts on the tongue. The salt of the ham accentuates it. Some people serve it with port wine in the middle, but that's never burst into my senses the way it does with jambon cru. It's one of early summer's little perfections.
There are so many things I want to pick for my fifth, but I have to go with truffles. Not the chocolate kind, the fungus. I'd heard so many things about truffles, every gourmand tries at some point to describe them. But one evening I was travelling with my parents and we stopped at a hotel in Luxembourg. The restaurant was simple and elegant, the decor was nothing to write home about. The food, though, was extraordinary. I had a dish of lotte (monkfish) in a truffled sauce. The slices of truffle weren't trivial either. It was good, really good. And then I picked up a bite of truffle. It's indescribable. The closest I've been able to come is that it tastes like the best sex you've ever had. That meal was also the first time I had meersault, mirabelle plums (in a simple dessert crepe), and, later that evening on the porch watching the late sunset, eau de vie mirabelle.
Five things I always have with me:
Lip gloss (I usually have multiples in different tints and textures.)
A book (or twenty)
ID
tweezers
loose change
Five things I will forever hate:
Willful Ignorance.
Deliberate Cruelty.
The Death Penalty.
Abuses of Power.
And, frivolously:
Shoes that rub blisters.
Five people to be tagged:
rhiannonhero
thorbol
siderea
jdulac
pamelina
eanjaFive people I love who aren't family: See the list of people tagged below and add
eanja,moria923, my former housemates bryt, jerminating, Lucy, the Professor, and Snow. Also, the Pages, Ki-Lin, and too many more to try to list. I've been very lucky.Five things I can't live without:
Moisturizer
Dental floss (I ran out last week and acted like a mad woman until I had more. If this had come up earlier, I wouldn't have included it.)
Blistex
Books
Conversation. (This was the thing that I found myself missing when I was in L.A. I had a couple of long, lovely conversations with my father, but my mother and sister just talk a lot.)
Five foods/drinks I love:
Only five? Dammit!
Drinks:
Evian water. -- I don't know why it tastes so much better to me than any other filtered or bottled water out there, but it does. Evian has a sensuous feel to it that I have never managed to duplicate elsewhere.
Grand Cru Meersault -- Don't faint at the price. Buy some. Drink it with a good meal preferably one that involves a rich seafood and hollandaise sauce. You'll see.
Eau de Vie Mirabelle -- I don't know if we don't grow mirabelle plums in this country or if we don't let them get ripe. The plums themselves are sweet and musky with a rich texture more reminiscent of a white peach than most plums. This is macerated in good white brandy until it produces an after dinner drink that's like a soft kiss.
Schweppes menthe -- The French tend to mix sirops with water. The Italians use fizzy water and, sometimes, milk. With sirop de menthe either of these methods is just too cloying. The first man I fell in love with introduced me to this variation: Tonic water with all it's bitter quinine and sirop de menthe. It's a wonderful summer interlude, and the only fizzy thing I miss. (No more fizz permitted thanks to burgeoning osteoporosis.)
Caffe fredo -- I've described it elsewhere in my LJ, but this is the single most refreshing thing I've ever drunk. I had it in Venice in the middle of a hot summer. It was served in a shot glass. As best I can tell it was double strong espresso with nearly enough sugar in it to make a syrup. It was kept on ice until it was poured and handed to me. The best $.50 I ever spent. I've tried, but never quite succeeding in duplicating it. I don't think I can find a dark enough roast coffee.
Foods:
Asparagus -- I've loved it all my life in many different preparations. The very first medieval recipe I redacted was for grilled asparagus with bitter orange. It's simply heavenly. But boiled asparagus a la Nettie, or Asperge flamandes, or Schwetzinger spargel: I've never had bad asparagus.
Tortellini in brodo -- My sister prefers it in cream sauce, but on our first trip through Italy, she's the one who first tried tortellini. I've still never found a U.S. restaurant that makes it the way I had it a little Osteria in Rome. The broth was excellent, and the tortellini had the perfect texture. I've tried to make it, and never quite succeeded. But every time I go to Italy, it's one of the first things I order.
Artichoke -- Like asparagus, this was an early love. It's a great vegetable to get kids to eat because they can pluck the leaves and get them to their mouths so easily. Boiled, steamed, grilled, it doesn't matter. The subtle sweetness and delicate aftertaste are it for me.
Cavaillon melons -- served with prosciutto or other air dryed ham this melon has a pink fleshed sweetness that melts on the tongue. The salt of the ham accentuates it. Some people serve it with port wine in the middle, but that's never burst into my senses the way it does with jambon cru. It's one of early summer's little perfections.
There are so many things I want to pick for my fifth, but I have to go with truffles. Not the chocolate kind, the fungus. I'd heard so many things about truffles, every gourmand tries at some point to describe them. But one evening I was travelling with my parents and we stopped at a hotel in Luxembourg. The restaurant was simple and elegant, the decor was nothing to write home about. The food, though, was extraordinary. I had a dish of lotte (monkfish) in a truffled sauce. The slices of truffle weren't trivial either. It was good, really good. And then I picked up a bite of truffle. It's indescribable. The closest I've been able to come is that it tastes like the best sex you've ever had. That meal was also the first time I had meersault, mirabelle plums (in a simple dessert crepe), and, later that evening on the porch watching the late sunset, eau de vie mirabelle.
Five things I always have with me:
Lip gloss (I usually have multiples in different tints and textures.)
A book (or twenty)
ID
tweezers
loose change
Five things I will forever hate:
Willful Ignorance.
Deliberate Cruelty.
The Death Penalty.
Abuses of Power.
And, frivolously:
Shoes that rub blisters.
Five people to be tagged:
rhiannonherothorbolsidereajdulacpamelina
