We love watching The League on FX and are eagerly awaiting the second season, premiering September 16, 2010, the same night as the newest season of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. We found the official YouTube page from a cast member of The League, Jon Lajoie.
It's called "High As Fuck." Enjoy.
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Thursday, July 22, 2010
Sous chef comments!
Even though I was just the sous chef for the stuffed shells and the burger experiment, I have a few quick notes of my own.
Even though our stuffed shells didn't come out too well, I do think that there is something to be said for blending recipes. I know that my co-author and head chef XY doesn't like that, but some of my best dishes have come from blending recipes. It won't work for baking (baking is all about chemistry and reactions and stuff), cooking is meant to be fun and experimental. Remember the line from Ratatouille - "Anyone can cook!"
Now on to the burgers. I made mine on the stove top and it was really good. I wouldn't recommend mixing the meats and seasonings well myself because if you handle ground meat too much it becomes tough. I would suggest just mixing them together so that it's blended just enough. We also let our patties rest at room temp for about 10-15 minutes before cooking them. Not sure if it's necessary, but my dad always does that and he makes GREAT burgers.
I cooked my burger medium/medium rare even though XY likes his medium/medium well. I think I get a better flavor that way but it really is personal preference. My toppings were fresh grated Asiago cheese and some chopped red onion and it was delicious. Asiago isn't quite as pungent as some other cheeses but the flavor compliments the beef nicely. The red onions added a nice crunch and the flavor cut through the grease well, but I wouldn't slice an onion just for this burger.
Moving on to the cheese crisps...
At a restaurant near my parents' house they top their caesar salad with these parmesan crisps that are really good and add a beautiful crunch to the texture of the dish. I saw Giada de Laurentiis made them on the Food Network once but I sort of forgot about it until last night.
This is a good example of blending recipes successfully. I went to the Food Network website to find her recipe (here it is), but I also liked Alton Brown's version (can't find the link - sorry!) and some others that I saw on ChowHound (a favorite foodie forum of mine). I ended up using Giada's basic formula but I went with Asiago cheese (we had it on hand already) and instead of lining a sheet with parchment paper I just greased it liberally with olive oil (or, as they say on TV, EVOO). I spread the cheese thinly and evenly into 6 circles and popped it in a preheated 350 degree oven for 5-7 minutes (if you try this watch closely - you want the cheese to become golden brown but not burn!). After they were the proper color I removed the crisps from the oven and used a spatula to transfer them from the cookie sheet to paper towels immediately. Be careful when you pull them from the oven - after they cool they get really, really crispy and brittle so you want to do this ASAP.
I know that's a big block with a lot of info, so I'm going to post a clearer, step by step recipe with pictures and variations the next time I make them (possibly tonight!).
-XX
Even though our stuffed shells didn't come out too well, I do think that there is something to be said for blending recipes. I know that my co-author and head chef XY doesn't like that, but some of my best dishes have come from blending recipes. It won't work for baking (baking is all about chemistry and reactions and stuff), cooking is meant to be fun and experimental. Remember the line from Ratatouille - "Anyone can cook!"
Now on to the burgers. I made mine on the stove top and it was really good. I wouldn't recommend mixing the meats and seasonings well myself because if you handle ground meat too much it becomes tough. I would suggest just mixing them together so that it's blended just enough. We also let our patties rest at room temp for about 10-15 minutes before cooking them. Not sure if it's necessary, but my dad always does that and he makes GREAT burgers.
I cooked my burger medium/medium rare even though XY likes his medium/medium well. I think I get a better flavor that way but it really is personal preference. My toppings were fresh grated Asiago cheese and some chopped red onion and it was delicious. Asiago isn't quite as pungent as some other cheeses but the flavor compliments the beef nicely. The red onions added a nice crunch and the flavor cut through the grease well, but I wouldn't slice an onion just for this burger.
Moving on to the cheese crisps...
At a restaurant near my parents' house they top their caesar salad with these parmesan crisps that are really good and add a beautiful crunch to the texture of the dish. I saw Giada de Laurentiis made them on the Food Network once but I sort of forgot about it until last night.
This is a good example of blending recipes successfully. I went to the Food Network website to find her recipe (here it is), but I also liked Alton Brown's version (can't find the link - sorry!) and some others that I saw on ChowHound (a favorite foodie forum of mine). I ended up using Giada's basic formula but I went with Asiago cheese (we had it on hand already) and instead of lining a sheet with parchment paper I just greased it liberally with olive oil (or, as they say on TV, EVOO). I spread the cheese thinly and evenly into 6 circles and popped it in a preheated 350 degree oven for 5-7 minutes (if you try this watch closely - you want the cheese to become golden brown but not burn!). After they were the proper color I removed the crisps from the oven and used a spatula to transfer them from the cookie sheet to paper towels immediately. Be careful when you pull them from the oven - after they cool they get really, really crispy and brittle so you want to do this ASAP.
I know that's a big block with a lot of info, so I'm going to post a clearer, step by step recipe with pictures and variations the next time I make them (possibly tonight!).
-XX
Eat This: Burgers
Overall Rating: 8/10, Fast cook time, messy/greasy, easy to make
I can't say enough about Burgers. I fuckin' love them. Homemade, store bought, or from a restaurant, they are always good. Last night we made some delicious burgers, each one built from scratch and unique. Making burgers is simple and fun. You get to combine whatever you want with the meat, then just cook it.
For this recipe we bought about 1.3 pounds of 80/20 ground beef. The percent of fat doesn't matter so much if you are going to use a George Foreman type grill, but I typically get either 10% or 20% fat. For this batch of burgers we decided to flavor the beef with Worcestershire sauce and salt and pepper. Once the beef is mixed well with the flavorings, I like to use my hands to cut an 'X' into the beef, so I get about 4 equally sized portions.
The first burger was made in a sauce pan. Don't use any oil or grease, let the burger cook in its own fat. It takes a little bit longer to cook this way because there is not an equal amount of heat on all sides of the burger, but it is worth the wait. Burgers cooked in this way have so much more natural flavor and don't need any extra sauces.
I cooked Burger 2 on the stove, in the grease leftover from the first one. I stuffed this burger with a mix of shredded Asiago cheese and Yellow Hungarian Wax Peppers. I tasted the pepper as a slice before cooking and it was crazy hot. Diced into the burger, the spicy pepper taste was lost. I recommend keeping the pieces bigger or just using them as a topping. I topped this burger with red onions and American cheese. I used a Vienna roll with a spread of a spicy Chipolte sauce. This burger cooked in less than 10 minutes and was SO juicy! I didn't need to use any extra sauces or anything. This was the best burger of the night.
Burgers two and three cooked on the George Foreman. Be careful when using a George Foreman! They cook fast and you can't see food while it cooks. It is useful though because you can fit 2 burgers on at once. One of these was stuffed with cheese and peppers, the other had a bit of cheese and a secret ingredient: a few drops of Liquid Smoke. It added a great smokey flavor to the burger that reminded me of pulled pork. Both of these burgers got American cheese and were served on normal hamburger buns. While neither burger needed extra sauce, I did add an 'X' of Sriracha for an intense flavor. This hot sauce is also good to marinate the beef with.
My sous chef made an extra ingredient that went great on Burger 2, the mega burger. She greased a cookie sheet with oil, then put patties of Asiago cheese. Cooked at 350 for about 5 minutes, these were great crispy toppers to the burgers. I would even eat these on their own.
Tips and Tricks:
-Wear a shirt or apron when cooking burgers on the stove. The splattering oil is hot.
-Stuff your burgers carefully. I have two techniques for stuffing meat. Sometimes I make 2 smalls patties and combine them with my extras in the middle. For this recipe I chose to mix in the stuffing with the meat. Ensure that cheese is not on the outside of the meat, keep it in on the inside.
-When in doubt, go light on the seasonings prior to cooking. It's easy to add more flavor later, but tough to get rid of what is not wanted.
-Taste stuffing or toppings prior to inclusion to ensure you like their flavors.
-When doing the clean up, let grease cool then pour it in the trash. Dumping down the drain will give you a bad smell and plumbing problems. I like waiting until the grease is dry and easy to spot.
-For a different taste, use ground turkey instead of beef.
-XY
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Right Now
-XY
Don't Eat This: Stuffed Shells
Overall Rating: 4/10 Edible, but not memorable or exciting.
Problem #1: We couldn’t find a recipe we agreed on for making this dish, so we decided to combine Internet recipes and the one from the back of the Shell box. Sticking to an entirely scripted menu or to an entirley improvised one works best. Mixing and matching is not easy and some essential elements of one or the other end up being sacrificed.
Problem #2: Despite writing it on TWO separate shopping lists, we forgot (whoops) to get the Mozzarella Cheese. We used fresh Parmigiano Reggiano and Ricotta Cheese. I think that the cheese stuffing we used would have been thicker and easier to manipulate with the additional cheese.----- Sub-complaint: Typing these Italian words into my browser changed my default language to Italian. Be warned
Problem #3: Messy. Getting the stuffing into the shells was messy. All I did was place the shells into the dish/sauce and my hands were covered in sauce. Putting the stuffing into the shells required patience and precision with a spoon. I can’t imagine how difficult this would have been to do on my own.
Problem #4: Taste. My sous chef really likes adding onion and bacon to most pasta dishes, so we did it this time. They took away from the cheesiness but helped make up for our missing ingredient in size. The onion was mild and so were the cheeses. The bacon came through well but it was a very mild dish. It wasn’t even sweet or salty.
Problem #5: It was better the next day. On Day 2 of Stuffed Shells they held together better. I don’t know how much of this came from the new consistency, but there was a more evident pepper flavor. When I put in almost an hour of cooking and prep time, I want a dish that will be excellent as soon as it comes out of the oven/microwave/pot as it is on Day 2 or Day 3.
If you decide to make this recipe anyway:
Get all your cheeses.
Be ready for a mess (or get help).
Use a chunky sauce to add texture.
Frozen stuff has about as much taste as this did fresh.
Add broccoli to the mix. This could have really used some fresh veggies.
Always use potholders.
-XY
Problem #1: We couldn’t find a recipe we agreed on for making this dish, so we decided to combine Internet recipes and the one from the back of the Shell box. Sticking to an entirely scripted menu or to an entirley improvised one works best. Mixing and matching is not easy and some essential elements of one or the other end up being sacrificed.
Problem #2: Despite writing it on TWO separate shopping lists, we forgot (whoops) to get the Mozzarella Cheese. We used fresh Parmigiano Reggiano and Ricotta Cheese. I think that the cheese stuffing we used would have been thicker and easier to manipulate with the additional cheese.----- Sub-complaint: Typing these Italian words into my browser changed my default language to Italian. Be warned
Problem #3: Messy. Getting the stuffing into the shells was messy. All I did was place the shells into the dish/sauce and my hands were covered in sauce. Putting the stuffing into the shells required patience and precision with a spoon. I can’t imagine how difficult this would have been to do on my own.
Problem #4: Taste. My sous chef really likes adding onion and bacon to most pasta dishes, so we did it this time. They took away from the cheesiness but helped make up for our missing ingredient in size. The onion was mild and so were the cheeses. The bacon came through well but it was a very mild dish. It wasn’t even sweet or salty.
Problem #5: It was better the next day. On Day 2 of Stuffed Shells they held together better. I don’t know how much of this came from the new consistency, but there was a more evident pepper flavor. When I put in almost an hour of cooking and prep time, I want a dish that will be excellent as soon as it comes out of the oven/microwave/pot as it is on Day 2 or Day 3.
If you decide to make this recipe anyway:
Get all your cheeses.
Be ready for a mess (or get help).
Use a chunky sauce to add texture.
Frozen stuff has about as much taste as this did fresh.
Add broccoli to the mix. This could have really used some fresh veggies.
Always use potholders.
-XY
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Dumb pothead or super genius? Part I
Well, maybe "super genius" is taking it a little far, but my dearest co-author of this blog and myself had a brief conversation the other day about something that I've thought about a lot over the last few weeks - am I actually smarter because I indulge in an alternative lifestyle?
Alright, "smarter" might not be the right word. I've always done well in school (just graduated college magna cum laude, with honors, and finished out my last semester with 3 A's and an A+ BITCHES), but I think that weed has helped me along with my time management skills (for organized intellectual activity) and a great sense of curiosity. Let's begin by taking a look at time management so that we can throw one of the largest pothead stereotypes out the window first - laziness.
Admittedly, I was not an average college student. When I got to campus in Fall 2006 I was eager to get involved, I made sure that I had good relationships with the Deans, and somehow the President of the college learned my name, where I was from, major, research interests, etc. Although I did well (B's and B+'s across the board), I wasn't very good at time management which is something that the academic Dean had stressed during orientation. I did my work in time for class and I made sure that all of my assignments were on time, but I always had something going on and I had very little time to relax.
I had smoked a good amount in high school but I didn't keep up the habit after my junior year. I'm going to go as far as to say right here, right now, that picking up smoking again in college was one of the best things I could have done for my time management skills.
Just let that one sink in for a minute.
Okay, now let me explain to those of you who might be a little skeptical. It's really not that hard once you can wrap your head around the sheer simplicity of it. Here we go:
I picked up smoking again at the beginning of my sophomore year of college. I really enjoyed it and I had missed some things that came along with getting high - the social experience, anxiety reduction, having those deep thoughts, etc. I decided that it was something that I wanted to bring back into my daily life, but I didn't want any overlap with the other things I did. I wouldn't have dreamed of going to class, sitting on my committees, or doing any of that while high. This meant that I was going to have to work extra hard to bring this into my schedule, but the solution was pretty easy - time management.
I worked harder when I was in the library, I scheduled my meetings in blocks, I went to professor's office hours when I needed help (instead of trying to spend hours figuring shit out on my own), and I began waking up a little earlier each day to get some reading done in the morning. It was fantastic - I was getting most of my work done and papers written days (weeks sometimes!) in advance which left we with my evenings and sometimes whole days free to do what I wanted. I was often the butt of my friends' jokes about how much time I spent in the library, but boy did it ever pay off. I know that that work style isn't for everyone, but you have to admit that it did wonders for my schedule. What's even better is that my grades skyrocketed. It killed me that I missed the Dean's List in Fall 2006 by so little (I got a 3.49 but you need a 3.5), but I never missed it again. I was raking in A's, A+'s, and the occasional A- or B+ for some of the tougher courses.
I know that a lot of people are good time managers on their own and I know that a lot more people time manage like I do for other activities (athletics is a good example here). All I'm saying is that I time managed around when I wanted to hang out and smoke on the weekends and my productivity and GPA floated. This is exactly the opposite of what people might expect from a stoner who is often times written off as being lazy and stupid, but marijuana actually motivated me to work harder.
If we ever get some readers on here I'd love to know if anyone has had any similar experiences. In the meantime, stay tuned for Part II of this post in which I try to explain a pothead's love of trivia, facts, and general knowledge.
-XX
Alright, "smarter" might not be the right word. I've always done well in school (just graduated college magna cum laude, with honors, and finished out my last semester with 3 A's and an A+ BITCHES), but I think that weed has helped me along with my time management skills (for organized intellectual activity) and a great sense of curiosity. Let's begin by taking a look at time management so that we can throw one of the largest pothead stereotypes out the window first - laziness.
Admittedly, I was not an average college student. When I got to campus in Fall 2006 I was eager to get involved, I made sure that I had good relationships with the Deans, and somehow the President of the college learned my name, where I was from, major, research interests, etc. Although I did well (B's and B+'s across the board), I wasn't very good at time management which is something that the academic Dean had stressed during orientation. I did my work in time for class and I made sure that all of my assignments were on time, but I always had something going on and I had very little time to relax.
I had smoked a good amount in high school but I didn't keep up the habit after my junior year. I'm going to go as far as to say right here, right now, that picking up smoking again in college was one of the best things I could have done for my time management skills.
Just let that one sink in for a minute.
Okay, now let me explain to those of you who might be a little skeptical. It's really not that hard once you can wrap your head around the sheer simplicity of it. Here we go:
I picked up smoking again at the beginning of my sophomore year of college. I really enjoyed it and I had missed some things that came along with getting high - the social experience, anxiety reduction, having those deep thoughts, etc. I decided that it was something that I wanted to bring back into my daily life, but I didn't want any overlap with the other things I did. I wouldn't have dreamed of going to class, sitting on my committees, or doing any of that while high. This meant that I was going to have to work extra hard to bring this into my schedule, but the solution was pretty easy - time management.
I worked harder when I was in the library, I scheduled my meetings in blocks, I went to professor's office hours when I needed help (instead of trying to spend hours figuring shit out on my own), and I began waking up a little earlier each day to get some reading done in the morning. It was fantastic - I was getting most of my work done and papers written days (weeks sometimes!) in advance which left we with my evenings and sometimes whole days free to do what I wanted. I was often the butt of my friends' jokes about how much time I spent in the library, but boy did it ever pay off. I know that that work style isn't for everyone, but you have to admit that it did wonders for my schedule. What's even better is that my grades skyrocketed. It killed me that I missed the Dean's List in Fall 2006 by so little (I got a 3.49 but you need a 3.5), but I never missed it again. I was raking in A's, A+'s, and the occasional A- or B+ for some of the tougher courses.
I know that a lot of people are good time managers on their own and I know that a lot more people time manage like I do for other activities (athletics is a good example here). All I'm saying is that I time managed around when I wanted to hang out and smoke on the weekends and my productivity and GPA floated. This is exactly the opposite of what people might expect from a stoner who is often times written off as being lazy and stupid, but marijuana actually motivated me to work harder.
If we ever get some readers on here I'd love to know if anyone has had any similar experiences. In the meantime, stay tuned for Part II of this post in which I try to explain a pothead's love of trivia, facts, and general knowledge.
-XX
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