Filed under: Food
So inspired by previous posts, I decided I’d have a go at cooking up some penne risotto style and the verdict is win. With the old style, you use crap tons of water and boil the living crap out of the pasta, if your water ain’t hot enough, chances are your noodles are gonna stick. The drawbacks to this of course, are the amount of energy wasted in transferring heat to a helluva lotta water. With the risotto style, you get away with using a lot less water and hence less energy. Also, this way, you could probably cook a pasta in a stock or whatever and let that absorb into the noodle. Hainanese Pasta anyone?
Whilst I don’t think pasta would go great with poached chicken, sesame and soy (call me traditionalist), I think it’d go great with say a light prawn + pork stock, garlic, parsley and tomatoes or whatever, just swop water for tasty stuff. The other significant difference between the risotto/absorption method versus the boil the living daylights out of stuff method is the gluey nature of the final product. This is due to the fact that the starch from the noodle has no escape. In you used a huge pot, you’d just strain the pasta and the starch would be gone with the water. With the risotto style, you just leave the starch in with the noodles. Which isn’t a bad thing. A lot of old school pasta advocates believe in using a bit of the cooking water to thicken sauces. Here, you’ve got all the thickening agent you need right in the pan plus, you don’t need to cook twice. You just cook once and finish everything in the pan.
My method included dry roasting the pasta in the oven at 180 degrees celsius for 20 minutes as Ideas in Food recommended. This was kinda interesting. There was definitely a warm, earthy/nutty aroma from the roasted pasta. Also, there were different colors cos my oven sucks. Some were real brown (inside versus outside) and other almost unchanged. Next step, I poured the pasta into a bowl and soaked it in water for 1.5 hours. I also drained it 2 or 3 times to a) cool down the pasta and b) remove excess starch. I knew it would be starchy so I sorta washed it out, like one would wash rice out. What was left would be sufficient to form a kind of sauce.
Next, I cut some batons of pancetta and cursed myself as I found no garlic/onions. This is what happens when you eat out too often. So anyway, I fried the bacon off in some duck fat I had leftover, then I put the pasta in, before pouring a layer of water over. Then I stirred. I coulda swirled it but my pan at home ain’t anything special plus the grooves on the stupid induction stove conspired to make things difficult. So I used a spoon instead. As the pasta got cooked, I noticed a few changes. One, the pasta got glossier. I was using the ridged penne and it was difficult to make out the ridges at the halfway point. This is due to the starch being released of course. The final remnants. I then chopped up some pretty purple basil I found in the supermarket, whilst I tossed some peas in for a bit of heat. Then in went the basil and seasoning. I then added some haloumi I’d fried earlier cos I wanted something more substantial inside. I wasn’t trying to be fancy schmancy with the purple basil. Ok so I was, but it cost the same as the regular and I wanted to know the difference! Which is um, not quite that much. It tastes pretty much the same and smells the same. However, because it’s so dark, it doesn’t look as oxidised/ugly like green basil can get. Also, I look forward to making a purple pesto.
Voila. Taste wise, I coulda had some garlic. However, it was seriously hearty. Roasting the pasta made it taste so much deeper and heavier. I think if I were to roast the pasta again, I’d use a deep rich beef based bolognese. If I don’t roast the pasta, I’ve basically got an easy thick saucing pasta without needing cream or long reduction times. It just takes a bit of prep is all, sticking some noodles in cold water. How hard is that?
Roast Penne w Pancetta, Peas, Haloumi & Purple Basil
Filed under: Film
John Huston directs what some consider one of the first noirs ever. The Asphalt Jungle is a crime caper involving a german mastermind called the Doctor, who’s just got out from behind the wall. He holes up with Cobby, a bookie with underworld connections. One of these connections is to a reputed lawyer, Emmerich. The Doc’s got a proposition you see but you needs money to bankroll it and he hopes Emmerich’s his man. They meet and thrash out a deal that involves robbing a jewelry store and then fencing off the goods.
They hire a pro safecracker, Louis Ciavelli, a driver in Gus and the thug in Dix. Each guy comes with their own little story. Doc has been doing big heists for years but he’s a perv. First thing he does when he gets to Cobby’s is stare at this calendar with 50s poster girls on it. Cobby’s a nervous wreck all the time and he’s been running an illegal bookmaking racket. Louis Ciavelli’s got a family to take care of and needs the dough. Dix left his farmland in search of a better life but ended up as a hoodlum. Emmerich’s front is a rich, respectable lawyer but in truth he’s broke as and therein lies the problem. The poncey old man keeps a mistress on the side, played by Marilyn Monroe in a minor role, which helps to suck his finances dry. He reckons he can get away with double crossing the crew with a little help from a PI. Good thing Doc’s wise to this and enlists the help of Dix. Can they get the money or will the cops get em first?
Crime doesn’t pay. I don’t really think urbanity breeds crime or that rural = simple though. You get that in the film with the contrast between the various people with various statuses, from high rolling white collar to blue collar types and pro crims and finally the peasant. The film is shot beautifully and I dug the cinematography. But hey, it’s a film noir so it’s already full of win.
Also, the first scene has to have inspired Le Samourai’s line up with Jef Costello when Dix gets pulled in for a robbery. Great quote from the film comes via Alonzo D. Emmerich, “Crime is only a left-handed form of human endeavour”.
I love Woody Allen’s glasses. Watching Annie Hall and I’m actually not quite done, I’m at the ending but I don’t really wanna find out what happens cos its kinda sad and all that and so I thought I’d just spew some nonsense here instead. I guess I emphathize with Alvy, the lead character in the film, who is cynic central basically. “Neurotic comedian” is his official description and as he puts it, he has a very depressing view on life. People are sorted into 2 categories. The horrible, like the cripples and the blind etc and the miserable, which is everybody else, so be thankful you’re only miserable.
God, I only wish I had half an intellect like Alvy’s. The entire film is smacked with the most caustic lines ever and Alvy can say the meanest shit ever and I wish I’d said all that. The flipside is I also realise I don’t really wanna be Alvy and live on an island (or as my friends call it, a castle) and be neurotic and mean and cynical and hate the world but still live in it and rattle on and on and on without proper punctuation or whatever. Not even gonna comment on the love interest bit of the film. That bit’s just sad. Cos at least Alvy went around and did his thing with a buncha floozies. Me, I’m stuck at home Sunday night typing shit in a computer trying to relate myself to a character which is something my ex-girlfriend used to always chide me about for being predictable and of course it seems pathetic and useless and amateurish but hey, the movie was great.
The film’s really brilliant I have to say. It’s probably the best comedy I’ve ever seen in my life. Not because I idolize neurotic, cynical, self-absorbed, egocentric, pseudo intellectual personalities. That’s besides the point. It’s a triumph in comedy and film. Not least because it feels intensely personal, regardless of whether or not the film is semi-autobiographical or otherwise. Alvy constantly breaks the fourth wall, asking random people on the street about love whilst addressing the audience. This helps the viewer digest all that the character’s struggling with and how we sometimes wish we could just take people aside in a time freeze and resolve issues that would otherwise be left dormant. Or in another scene, we’re transplanted into an animated fantasy where Alvy is having a lover’s tiff with the evil witch from Snow White cos everyone fell for Snow White, but he fell for the evil witch first. It’s hella cerebral on the one hand but just damn funny and it removes every and any inch of cheesiness from romance.
One particular I scene I remember is when Alvy meets Annie and they go out and Alvy stops on the street and asks “Hey listen, gimme a kiss.” Annie asks back, “Really?”. To which Alvy’s reply is, “Yeah, why not, because we’re just gonna go home later, right, and then there’s gonna be all that tension, we’ve never kissed before and I’ll never know when to make the right move or anything. So we’ll kiss now and get it over with, and then we’ll go eat. We’ll digest our food better.”
The lines make the film. From trash talking about LA being clean cos the garbage gets turned into telly or that masturbation is sex with someone you love, it is god mode incisive.
The clip above has Alvy in line with Annie with one helluva dickhead behind him trash talking Fellini, talking about Weltanschauung and shit and just watch how Alvy resolves this in fantasy phase. Just brilliant on so many levels.
At the request of some friends, I downloaded the Detroit Metal City live action movie so we could all watch it together. I still haven’t. But I’ve been itching to find out more after they keep talking about it. So I went and downloaded the OVA that spawned it.
DMC is about a nice kid from the countryside, Negishi, who dreams of playing lovely pop music inspired by acts like Kahimi Karie or Fishmans. So he leaves the country for big city Tokyo. However, he ends up in a band that’s pretty much the opposite of his ideal, a death metal band called Detroit Metal City. In it, he puts on makeup and changes from his nerdy self into Krauser II. His rabid fans shower him with made up adulation, like the fact that he raped and killed his parents when he was a kid or that he’s the demon king from hell. Poor Negi-kun just wants to be a folksy, bowl haired, BEAMS wearing dude who goes to trend cafes. But he’s got a job to do and he’s good at it. When Negi gets in character, there’s no stopping him and Krauser II takes over, ordering people around and generally behaving like the demon lead singer for a death metal outfit should.
Conflicts with his own personal desires, be they material or romantic, arise. Negi never wanted to be singing about killing babies or raping bitches. Yet, you can’t deny there’s a certain attraction to being in the limelight, whether as some wanky indie-pop scenesters or axe wielding goths and Negi pretty much goes with what opportunities present themselves.
I love how the Japanese can take any piece of pop culture, extract the vital elements and re-present them in a way that’s absurd and silly. The parody on both indie pop and death metal is hilarious. On stage, Negi performs with 2 friends. Jagi is the bassist, who’s determined to make DMC big. Camus is the drummer, a fat dude that’s always muttering pervy shiz. They’re joined by a prop actor, the Capitalist Pig, who’s a masochistic, middle-aged convenience store clerk in real life. Behind them is Death Records’ president, one hella crazy bitch who goes on about her cunt getting wet when she hears metal. The songs involve ridiculous lyrics about killing parents, rape and more rape. One of Krauser’s most famous lines is his 10 rapes in 1 second. His outrageous performances coupled with his bumbling self somehow result in hilarious events perpetuating the myth that a simple guy is a blood obsessed serial rapist/murderer.
On the flipside, Negi’s constant penchant for cheesy as hell pop songs (the lyric has even got cheese tart in it) is annoying. I like Kahimi Karie as much as the next person but he’s like the ultimate in empty indie trend following. It’s real cutesy stuff though, from talking about Daikanyama or going to trend cafes and living the ultimate indie lifestyle. Which is hella materialistic if you ask me! He dreams that he’ll make it big and he tries but nobody really cares. Yet, once he puts the makeup on and becomes Krauser II, everything seems to work. He doesn’t want to be the king of death metal but it seems he will anyway!
DMC’s a real funny anime that looks at the multiplicity of people. How we behave one way in public but wish we could be something else in real life. It also removes any and all seriousness whichever music genre you subscribe to and just how camp it is to be “following” a trend, be it punk/gansta rap/metal/indie. I guess, we can’t always choose what we want and we’ve got to take what’s in front of us sometimes and in the end, maybe what we do end up with is even better than what we wished for. It’s like Kiss reborn in parody. Which is better in my books! I bet Ozzy didn’t rape or kill his parents! Krauser rocks! \m/
The intro offers a peek. Rape rape rape rape rape rape rape rape rape rape!
I have a newfound love for death metal now lol.
One thing I love about food is all the awesome gadgets and stuff you get to use. Whilst I am still dreaming of working in a commercial kitchen that uses thermomixes, immersion circulators and centrifuges, I also love the old world stuff, like the slicer below by Berkel. It’s a vintage one you operate by hand that’s been restored by some dude in Italy. The company was the one that made the first ever meat slicer back at the turn of the century, which revolutionised the way butchers worked. It also gave rise to the popularity of fine sliced dry cured meats like prosciutto and jamon.
Filed under: Food
OMG! Harold McGee has a blog? He writes a column in the NYT, called The Curious Cook, which is also the name for a blog. He doesn’t transcribe entire articles and you’re still gonna need an NYT subscription to read them but his blogsite offers a slightly different glimpse into things. Like him mentioning the cooking of pasta risotto style and using less water rather than the primitive giant boiling pot. Cue Ideas in Food which argues for roasting the pasta before cooking to intensify flavor.
Imma get me sum tomatoes.
When I was young, we used to go to this place in Holland Village in Singapore for some zi char. It wasn’t that the place was super special or anything but we typically had the same dishes and were used to it. It’s now taken over by a food court-ish type place but we used to always get some venison and tofu with egg on a hot plate and some misc veg. Anyway, long story short, it was situated along Lorong Liput. However, I had or perhaps my parents had some obsessive desire to call it Lorliput in reference to Gulliver’s Travels. A Singaporeanization for little rhyme or reason.
But the real story has got scant anything to do with some obscure and pointless childhood memory other than the name. The title of my post is the name of a cafe in Bondi, owned in part by a Japanese friend of mine.
The cafe is a small place, located in a residential zone in Bondi and quite a ways from the beach. There’s plenty other cafes about 100m away on a busier part of the street but Liliputien still manages to stand out. Whether its in the slightly mangled Janglish spelling for Phun Jabi Chai or that they claim to make things with <3 or in the awesome pieces of pottery used as serving dishes. The coffee is a mean brew and they offer a small selection of pastries. The main draw is my friend’s “baby” as he puts it, the croissant. On first inspection, it seems a tad overbaked, sitting in a cutesy wooden edged, glass cabinet. Yet when I bite into it, my unease was swept away. It’s so crispy on the outside, you’d be forgiven for thinking it was deep fried. Yet the very centre remains delightfully moist and fluffy. It’s a damn good croissant and I don’t really care if there are that much better in France or wherever. The same could be said of his sweet sourdough toast. Superbly moist inside and it’s all because everything’s baked on the day itself, right before my mate heads down to school. When he finishes up, he’s right back in the cafe as well so that’s dedication for you.
The interior of the shop shows off his kookier side, with an LP of The Sound of Music sitting on a shelf and the burlap coffee sacks adorning the walls. It feels very cosy and easy to relax in. I must say, I know the guy and all but not all that well. His cafe though, is a wonderful little place that has a guy running it that will probably go onto bigger and better things. I honestly rate the stuff on offer really well and I’d go as far as to say that most other cafes in Sydney suck in comparison.
Lilliputien 112 O’Brien Street Bondi NSW 2026Directions: From Bondi Beach itself, look for the Platypus store. It’s on the corner of Roscoe Street and Campbell Parade. Walk up Roscoe Street, which filters onto O’Brien Street and keep walking up for another 5 minutes till you see this green leaf thingamajig on the front of a shop.
Filed under: Food
The label read $9.99 but something didn’t compute. It said Rouzaire on the label. Camembert. From France. For $10 buckeroos. Half price. Let’s just forget that I’m indulging in a poncified gastronomic exercise for once and just eat the damn thing. Mmm. Tasty. It’s not melted like the last cheese I had but still delightfully mature and soft, creamy in the middle. The rind crusty and brittle, biscuity and fades into a kind of mash. The cheese is deep, earthy and greige, if it was a flavor. It’s similar to the pasteurized Brie I had before from them but stronger, more intense. Pretty damn good.
Now if only the good brie and the brillat savarin or some of the roquefort/gorgonz/stilty went on sale too.
Filed under: Gaming
The current expansion of World of Warcraft still isn’t complete yet but Blizzard have just officially announced plans for the next one. WoW Cataclysm will feature a lot of new features and a lot of revising old things. The general storyline is that Deathwing, the evil dragon has broken out from hiding and as a result torn Azeroth asunder. Whole regions will be changed entirely and the old classic maps will be revised along with the quests and stuff that is now considered old school.
The new expansion will also include 2 new factions. The alliance get the werewolf like Worgen whilst the horde get the awesome sauce goblins. Imma make a goblin engineer/alchemist warlock dude fo shizzle. Hmm, I think imma call him dat. Forshizzle. (edit I just checked, on my server Argent Dawn, Foshizzle’s taken so I gots to add an R.)
You can watch the trailer and learn more about the new expansion on the webby link.
Jim Jarmusch’s Ghost Dog: The Way Of The Samurai features Forest Whitaker in the leading role. The pudgy dude who seemed the perfect fit for Idi Amin in The Last King Of Scotland seems a whole lot more bewildering as a dude who lives by the samurai code, working for a mob boss as a hired killer. The film itself is a sorta homage to Melville’s Le Samourai but it somehow also reminded me of Leon The Professional in some ways. Of course, it’s also set to a soundtrack built by RZA. Which is kinda awesome.
It is curious. There’s a whole lotta pop culture being mentioned, from Rashomon and Hagakure to Betty Boop and Felix the Cat. Or Wind In The Willows and Frankenstein. It’s a kind of cultural kaleidescope, with a black man pretending he’s a samurai working for the Italian mafioso. The titular character Ghost Dog’s best friend is Haitian and speaks only French which he doesn’t understand. Yet they seem to communicate and emote perfectly. There’s also 2 other people in Ghost Dog’s life, Pearline, a young girl which lends the Leon aspect and Louie, the mob boss. In the former, Ghost Dog seems to envision a sort of protege. In the latter, he is respectful towards, as if he really was a samurai working for a retainer in feudal Japan. Interestingly, the mob are also made up of old Italian dudes who are characters in their own right. One dude likes to rap in the bathroom. There’s a certain cultural stereotyping but also a certain non racism inherent in the characters. Also, Nobody from another Jarmusch film, Dead Man, makes an appearance, uttering his trademark, “Stupid fucking white man!”.
A lot of the stuff that gets mentioned, various books or the cartoons mob bosses watch before they get whacked, seem to relate strongly with what’s happening in the film or has something to do with the plot or characters. In the most Leon-esque scene, albeit with no trace of Lolita elements, Ghost Dog has a conversation with Pearline about books. Each one seems to emphasize him in relation to the story at large. On the flipside are the cartoons, usually pre emptive elements that foretell the mob bosses death, even going so far that the happenings in real life are pretty much mimicking the cartoons entirely. One scene has a cartoon character firing bullets up a drainpipe to attack another character. In the real world, Ghost Dog is in the basement, working his way to a pipe attached to the bathroom upstairs. He disassembles it and manoeuvres his pistol to kill the crim who’s wondering why a red light is coming out the plughole.
It’s kinda funny in bits, especially when Ghost Dog twirls his pistols as if they were swords. Or when Ghost Dog and his Haitian friend Raymond converse, pre empting each other despite the language barrier and then following up on what the other has guessed. Like when Raymond says in French, “I guess you have to go because it’s getting dark right?” or words to that effect and Ghost Dog replies, “I got to go, it’s getting dark soon”. They don’t get it but they feel it and maybe sometimes that’s more powerful than a film with standardized plot or character development with conceivable story arcs or a linear progressive idea. Ghost Dog follows a basic script as such, which is the lead character knocking off mob bosses after him because of a botched hit that wasn’t even really botched. Yet, it doesn’t feel like it maintains that structure but that the story itself allows us to get a sense of this imaginary, culturally mashed up reality. Zen calm amidst a cultural storm.
Check this scene for a sampling, which is itself, an offplot device. The samurai-esque Ghost Dog is seen walking and in the other direction, camo fatigue clad RZA. They meet and exchange the following. RZA: “Ghost Dog, power, equality” GD: “Always see everything my brother”. Which translates to Peace if you take the take the first letters of the middle text and swap see for C.
