Third Anniversary

My sister reminded me that last Saturday was the third anniversary of our kidney donation and transplant. Her last couple of exams have shown the kidney to be working excellently.

As I may have mentioned, I may traffic in my ownbody parts but only the best quality parts! Unfortunately, Wife has asked that I retire that particular business until further notice :(

If you know of anyone who is contemplating the organ donation path, my extensive reporting of my history is available to them in this blog under the tags "Living Organ Donation"

Weekend Round-up

Hike, Cook, Work

Pretty much the definition of the weekend.

Wild Bill and I are gearing up for a reprise of the epic South Crest Trail Hike on Memorial Day weekend. We have done this twice before in 2006 and 2008. The trail is 17 miles long and 4000 feet in climb though we have taken a steep short cut in years past that cuts off 3 miles. So far this year we've only done relatively shorter hikes and haven't gone that high so we needed to step up our training. So on Saturday we did the Pino trail which is 9 miles or about 50% longer than what we've been doing. We were both sucking wind. Naps in the afternoon were required.

Cooking was also done. We had Cabinet Lady and Dr. Debbie over for dinner...always a fun time. Wife did the bartender service making Kamikazes for the ladies and a Gimlet for me. I planned to take pictures but as usual I got too wrapped up in the cooking and entertaining. In short, I made a a special meat sauce for pasta the day before. This consists of a wide selection of meats cooked in tomatoes, onions, carrots and celery, herbs and spices. When the meat is done, you take if off the bone, blend the sauce and add the meat back in. I also roasted some veggies over the fire and marinated them overnight in fresh garlic chopped with salt, pepper and olive oil.

On Saturday, served the veggies with sprinkling of vinegar which resulted in a light vinegar flavor than if I had used vinegar in the marinade. I made home made and hand cut pasta for the sauce. And Wife did some fabulous hand made chocolate truffles sprinkled with sea salt for dessert. Wine of course and 10 year old Madeira with the truffles. Way good.

Sunday was a work day but fortunately a relatively mellow one.

Culinary Chicago

It is always such a treat when I go to Chicago for business because my partner (in spite of his protestations) is always happy to oblige my culinary cravings. I love living in Albuquerque but the food scene there just doesn't hold a candle to Chicago.

Lakeview blogged about the place we visited, Longman and Eagle. It's really just a bar, but a bar with great food. And old style food that I really love. Thanks and hats off to Ricardo who went out of his way to set this up for my benefit. So on to the details

This my friends is the elixir of the gods - Michters #1 Pure Rye Whiskey
OMG. It is so hard to find a spirit these days where they don't add some degree of sweetening to appease the modern palette. But this, this is pure distilled, aged goodness.

LL, fiance of Lakeview, has become a real fan of Belgian raspberry lambric since there recent trip to Europe.

I have no idea what this picture was supposed to be of. Lakeview was in great spirits so it really isn't representative.

On to food! Ricardo and I ordered a bunch of small plates.

Rillettes of pork (in the glass jar).
A classic French preparation of slow cooked pork shredded so it is like a pate, spread on bread.

These were Buffalo Frogs Legs.
The legs were very, very tender. It was actually hard to pick them up because the sort of fell right off the bone.
But the real star was the white stuff to the left - a foamed spread of blue cheese.
Imagine a can of cheese spread but made of super quality blue cheese.
LL wants to market the stuff.

Roasted Marrow Bones
These are all the rage in the complete animal movement.
You take the hot marrow which should be thought of us pure animal butter, spread it over bread and sprinkle salt on it.
Great.

Pastrami Cured Sweetbreads
Another excellent preparation.

Meantime Lakeview and LL were having more traditional main courses. While Ricardo and I were being given grief about the amount we were eating LL got...

...this bacon cheese burger and fries.
It was huge.
Fortunately for her, the three of us were more than happy to be the convenient pack of jackals that ate what she couldn't finish.

Lakeview had this slow roasted pork shoulder

Back to Ricardo and I

Tete de Veau
Literally, veal head. They actually took the meat that had been stewed and formed it into a patty and then put a duck egg on it.
Yum!

And I can't even remember what this was :(

Ricardo, thanks again!

Wild Day

The other weekend I spent the whole day pretty much with the Wild Family. That would be hiking buddy Wild Bill and his Wife, Wild Jill. Jill enjoys cooking as much as I do and is no shrinking violet. So we actually do well in the kitchen together.

I had set up a date with Jill for us to cook together. But first in the morning Bill and I went for hike up a trail that we normally don't do.



After showering and a little rest, Wife dropped me off at the Wild Home. Wild Jill and I did a bunch of research and came up with a menu.


Then we headed off to Whole Foods. Of course when we got there we didn't like what we found (we had been thinking fish) and ended up buying chicken and mushrooms and going in an entirely different direction.

I spent a lot of the time when we weren't cooking and drinking trying to get shot of Jill where you could see her face but she wasn't very cooperative.

The main course was a roast chicken that had been flavored with a special butter. Jill did the chicken and I did the flavor butter. The flavor butter was red wine, pancetta (Italian salt cured bacon), and thyme. It was supposed to replicate the flavors of coq au vin. I cooked all those down until they became like a syrup then drained the solids out. We mixed that into softened butter. Jill then put the butter under the skin of the chicken, in the cavity, and on the chicken.

Hah! an unguarded moment when she took out the chicken from the oven.

The chicken came out extremely moist and flavorful

Travel of a Different Kind

Normally my travel involves some sort of airline endeavor going to one major metropolis or another . This week however, I am doing something completely different...the long drive into no where. Well maybe not no where but way off the beaten path.

If you will go to Google Maps and look at the southeastern corner of New Mexico you will find the towns of Roswell, Artesia, Carlsbad, and Hobbs. This area sort of by itself has around 250 thousand in total population. And more importantly it has LOTS of oil and ergo lots of oil money funneling into its economy.

Hence we have lots of businesses that are doing very well. They also have a real shortage of business knowledge so it is fertile ground for consultants like moi. The only problem is that is is a long drive and driving is the only practical way of getting there. It's 271 miles from Albuquerque to Carlsbad where I am tonight. That's a good 4.5 hour drive. And unlike the airplane, I can't do anything productive.

But I think there could be real good opportunities for us in the future here.

Addicted!

I have managed to live almost my entire adult life without once having played any kind of computer based game. Now I am sad to report that has ended.

Last weekend when I was with the Pulisha #2 daughter clan, she is on her cell phone all the time playing games. I commented that I didn't even think there were any games on my phone. But a brief perusal found that indeed there were two - solitaire and bubble blaster. Solitaire and cards in general hold no interest to me. But I decided to try bubble blaster. BIG MISTAKE!

I played the first couple of games not quite knowing what I was doing. Then #2 gave me a couple of hints. Soon I was really at it. #2 gave me another very valuable hint. Don't express your emotions while playing! Look like your texting, emailing or doing some kind of work. Ah yes, thank you Master (deep bow)

Yesterday driving around Chicago with Lakeview Joe, I went about 20 minutes playing before forgetting and making a comment (I had just posted my high score). He thought I'd been working. Ha!

Of course now I have committed the original sin and I'm condemned to the same horrible after life as everyone else :(

Only a few Florida Photos

Wasn't in a very inspired photo journalism mood while visiting the #2's. We did our usual round of good eating. 2B grilled a fantastic steak using a proprietary method where he incinerates a gas grill. I wouldn't have believed it would have been so successful if I hadn't tasted the results myself. Also his wine inventory has improved big time. Lots of real good and interesting selections.

Now that 2.1 is old enough to babysit the younger kids, we can go out just the adults which we did twice. Went to this seafood place that was pretty good, somewhat erratic, but the oysters and the deep fried spinach were excellent. Then we went to this tapas place in downtown St. Pete. We really enjoyed that. They had some excellent and different selections. Only a couple disappointed.

We're certainly going to miss being able to visit them in their very idyllic setting but we could very well be visiting them soon in China and that will be very cool as well.

Another place we ate at is a place that smokes its own fish.
We'd been there before and it is totally top notch

While we were eating, this crane came walking up to us!

Poor #2 is still waiting for all her orders and confirmations before she can actually start arranging to make her move to Washington, D.C. She was very stressed.

And 2.1 soaked up a lot of serious snuggle time with the Grandpa :) ...
...when she wasn't beating the crap out of him in the pool :(