Pea Risotto

Pea Risotto was for dinner tonight for Meatless Monday, with a some sauteed mushrooms.

This was good, really good. I didn't follow a recipe, but it is similar to this one, but I like shallots more than green onion.

If you didn't want to do it meatless, it would be really good with bacon or with seafood.

White Food

White Food: Ugly, impossible to photograph, boring.

Last night I made a very simple fish dish that tasted very good, but was totally not photo compatible.

White fish, with a colorless sauce, with white rice. Dear, dear, dear, how boring.

But it was good. I saw Bittman do it on PBS, so I replicated it without having any measurements.

Take a nice mild white fish and pan fry it quickly in olive oil making sure not to over cook it. We used wild caught Dover Sole (you should always use wild caught fish. Farmed fish has none of the nutritional benefits associated with fish like Omega-3s and is generally bad for the environment.) Make sure to season it generously with salt and pepper.

Meanwhile, make the sauce, I used a couple tablespoons of butter melted. Add a tablespoon or so of capers, a tablespoon or so of red wine vinegar and two tablespoons of honey.

The sauce is very runny, which was perfect with the rice. The whole meal (we had rice already made) took about 7 minutes.

Learn the Music of a Composer I Like

Learning the music of a composer I like is proving to be the most rewarding and interesting of all my goals. I started off by putting a call out to my twitter friends asking for composer recommendations. I got quite a few and started going to the library to get music from them.

I don't steal music. That means, I don't get things from the library, put them on iTunes and keep them. I delete the music when the CD goes back to the library. If I don't pay for it, I don't keep it. That said, I found music I liked and wanted to go out and buy it. But CJ told me he has a big box of Classical Music somewhere in the house. I shouldn't buy anything until he finds it.

Well, I've been waiting for over a month for that.

Meanwhile, knowing he did not have any opera, I started listening to it. And I LOVE IT. It is dynamic, beautiful, heart wrenching and amazing. While I like all classical music, opera is my favorite for sure.

So far, I've bought 5 operas. Between them and the new Decemberists, that's all I listen to. I've done research about opera and find it fascinating.

So, I think, in the end, I'll be choosing a composer who did Opera also for this goal. But I have a lot of exploring left to do.

4 Books a Month FAIL

March was to be my first month of reading 4 books each month for 6 months. I failed.

But things started out really good. I read Kurtis's great book Mudville within the first 3 days of the month.

But things went downhill from there. But not from lack of trying.

The first book I tried to read was What is the What by Dave Eggers. It is an interesting story, I guess, but I just couldn't get through it. I would read one or two pages and put it down. I'd bring it on the bus, but just stare out the window. I just didn't get into it.

But, I didn't just give up on it and move on. It took me two weeks to finally give in, all the while I could have been reading something I liked.

Second was Watchmen by Alan Moore. Same thing. It just wasn't interesting to me. It was actually super boring and I didn't care what happened.

So, next month I try again. I just picked up The House at Sugar Beach by Helene Cooper for the MNSpeak Book Club. I've read the first couple chapters and it is great. I'm ready to head to bed right now to read more. I will likely make sure the book gets finished in April so I can count it for them (they are my goals, I can cheat if I want.)

Nerstrand-Big Woods State Park

Awesomely both of our wireless routers died today, so I had to quit work early due to it. Since sitting at home without Internet wasn't an option, I decided to head to Nerstrand-Big Woods State Park.

Jeff and I hiked around for an hour and a half. It wasn't that great. The trails were very icy, covered with snow. That made it very slippery and difficult to hike on. But, the trails themselves are nice. It is a very wooded area near a river. We found the "hidden falls" which were frozen and very pretty. There is a bit of elevation change, which would be nice if it wasn't all icy. Jeff enjoyed himself quite a bit.

So, 1 of 20 new State Parks down and another 2.5 miles covered.

Mmmm, Dinner for real

On the recommendation of CJ's parents, we went to 98 Pounds Buffet tonight. The buffet is, I thought, your standard Chinese buffet in Bloomington. But I had heard they had crab legs, and I love crab legs, so we went. We tried to go on Valentine's Day, but the line was out the door, so this was attempt two.

The first surprise was the number of Asian families dining. Awesome, right? It is always a good sign when Asian people are eating at an Asian restaurant you are about to try.

The second surprise was what was on their plates. What was on their plates? I wasn't quite sure, but I could tell it was seafood.

While the buffet has standard lo mein, fried chicken dishes with sauce, and ice cream, it also had some items I have never seen at a buffet. Luckily I'm a very adventurous eater. Too bad I didn't bring my camera.

The first new to me dish I had was crayfish. People were eating crayfish by the plateful. It was cooked in hot peppers, but no real sauce to speak of. They were really tasty, once I figured out how to eat them. Here's a picture from their website:
A second awesome item that I had never had before was crab stuffed oyster. It was really good, almost like a casserole on an oyster (which is good IMHO). Here's another pic from their website:
I also had some of these, but I have no idea what they were:
Some sort of dumpling I guess. I also had a whole crab. It was very interesting trying to get that open. I have had crab legs before, and soft shelled crab, but never a whole hard shell crab.

The interesting thing I had though, was chicken feet. Yep CHICKEN FEET. For some reason they don't advertise their chicken feet dish on their site. Here's a pic I took from Palace Chinese Restaurant's page (http://www.palacechinese.com.au/?action=YumChaGallery)
It was, um, interesting.
If you like the fat on beef or pork, you will love these. That is, if you can get past the fact they look like feet and you have to eat the meat off the fingers, which totally bend like fingers in your mouth. It is a very fatty texture, I think it is all cartilage. It was real tasty, but I don't like eating fat, and that's what it was like. And the fingers were a little bizarre. It was a very rich taste and was very good, I just didn't dig the texture and only ate one.

Overall, I would highly suggest 98 Pound Buffet on a Friday night. Bring your best appetite.

(p.s. there is also sushi, which was pretty good. Like Lund's quality and a good variety.)

Breezer Uptown 8

Today, I bought a bike. Specifically, this bike:
Pretty sweet, huh?

It has everything: internal gear shifting hub thing, kickstand, fenders, bell, lights that run on people power, the back rack and comfort. I also picked up a lock, a computer for it, and a net for the back rack.

Pete and I went on a bike ride today too. I'm incredibly out of shape, but made it 4.5 miles. This is my first of 1000 miles that I will be walking/biking/snowshoeing etc.

Meeting a "Celebrity"

On Saturday, I met the goal of meeting a "celebrity." I met Kurtis Scaletta author of Mudville at the Red Balloon Bookshop in St. Paul.

Here's a pic, stolen from Kurtis's site, photographer unknown:
You can see CJ, David and me sitting on the steps.

Mudville is Kurtis's first published book. The book is targeted to Middle School kids. You can read all about it on Kurtis's site.

I read the book in a handful of hours and really liked it. Besides being about baseball and brothers, there are themes on race, alcoholism, and absent parents. The main characters have real world flaws and troubles, which I really liked. Kurtis does a good job giving the characters depth and their troubles relevant and real.

I feel honored to meet Kurtis and read his great book (my first of four this month and each month for the next six.)

Some Updates

First, I finished my Community Ed class. Mollie and I took Crochet and it was a lot of fun. I learned a lot, but I didn't complete any projects. So, that's one off the list.

I also learned the "bubble stitch" in the class, though it is actually called a "bauble" or "bubble" stitch. It was much easier than I thought it would be, so it wasn't much of a goal. But that is another off the list.

I have been plugging away on the both the wine list and the documentaries. Since I love both, they aren't really challenges, but a fun way to pass the time. I keep forgetting to write down the wines I try when I'm out, so I'll keep adding the ones I remember to the previous post. I also have made a meatless dinner each week, but they are too boring to write about.

I am starting the first month of my read 4 books a month for six months. I read a large chunk of "Mudville" today, so that counts as one. More on that later.

I didn't save $25 in February, but I'll save $50 in March.

I'm going to change a couple goals. I'm eliminating the "run 3 miles" since I also have "run a 5k" on the list. Those are the same things. I am adding something, but I'm not quite sure yet what it will be. Additionally, I changed the walking 500 miles to include biking and upped the amount to 1000 miles. I was counting miles on a treadmill, but I won't anymore count anything but outside miles now. I made this change because I will be getting a bike soon and it is more about being outside than straight up exercise.

Any ideas on a new goal to add? I'm not sure where to go with that one.