Want fries with that?

My bestest birthday gift this year was something unusual - a cooking class. This was either a sign that my chateaubriand hasn't been up to par of late, or my family just wanted me to get some formal instruction and training to augment my love of cooking. I like to think it was the latter.

So there I was, tooling along in Hyde Park NY last Saturday looking for the world-renowned Culinary Institute. Apparently, there are no qualifications needed for the class, so the riff raff (me) can get right on campus. It's a beautiful place - picture a tree-lined, well-manicured, red bricked environment all designed around glorious food. I made a point of getting to the campus early, so I could wander around and check the place out. On the outside, it looks just like where I went to college, except for the semi-naked foreign exchange students that could usually be found sleeping in the shrubs on Saturday mornings. Inside, the kitchen classrooms have big windows so you can watch the students in tall white hats working away. In one room students were rolling pasties, in another sauces were being stirred. The smells that wafted around the place were amazing.

The class I was enrolled in was "Grilling". I know what you're thinking, a bunch of hairy, lumbering unibrows hunched over a gas grill all day making burgers. In actuality, it was a fairly refined group (well, except for moi) which included a few professional chefs there to learn a few things. The instructor (Master Chef) led us through an overview of the act of grilling, covered which meats and veggies grill best, and gave a general overview of how the day would go. Then it was off to our kitchen, where we donned our tall white hats and aprons. At least we would look like chefs.

We broke into four teams of four people were each, then took an assignment. My team, which I quickly named "Team RAMROD" was in change of a planked salmon with huckleberry sauce, fennel salad, fruit skewers and buttermilk ice cream. I was wondering how we were going to grill THAT (apparently, you don't!).

We huddled and divided the tasks to get the meal going, and (more importantly) assigned each other with nicknames. Mine was "Ginsu", and my other team members were "Bossy", "Lost" and "Weird Old Dude". I was in change of the nicknames.

I started chopping veggies for the sauce while Bossy and Lost started the skewers. Weird Old Dude excused himself to locate the rest-room. I browned the veggies and added red wine, then 8 quarts of stock to the sauce and let that simmer. The sauce was going to take 2 hours to reduce, so we needed to get that on first. Lost then joined me in cutting up the fennel while Bossy made the balsamic dressing that the fennel was going to marinate in prior to being grilled. Last we prepped the salmon, which didn't take long. The cedar planks had been presoaked, so all we had to do was cut up the salmon on the planks and salt and pepper. That was it.

During all the prepping and cooking we walked around and watched the other teams working on their meals. For the most part, they all seemed to get along as our unit did, but a few obviously did not. In one group that was working on lamb cakes, two well-dressed, immaculately gentlemen were arguing over stirring techniques on some mixed veggies cooking in a wok. "Slow it down!" hissed the gray-haired chef, his neatly folded shirt sleeve cuffs waving frantically. "Could you please restrain yourself? I'm doing the best I can!" shot back the moon-faced stirrer. The instructor hovered nearby, but avoided interceding in the discussion. Wisely so.

Another interesting team that caught my attention was a girlfriend/boyfriend combo working on the bbq chicken meal. He was a professional chef, and she was there I guess as a bonding activity. Being on the same team was a mistake though, for she deferred to his instructions to that team (he dominated, the kitchen being his bread and butter) so she stood around, not really doing much. Maybe she was having fun, but the look on her puss didn't indicate that. Why not go on another team and actually learn something? You can be away (across the room) from your boyfriend for a few hours. Really. You can.

The heat in the kitchen rose, and skirmishes over pots, pans and utensils flared occasionally. I was blown away by the sheer size of the kitchen, and the limitless resources. Every kind of pot, pan, tray, spoon, knife... and the food! The spice rack stood 7 feet tall, was 3 feet wide, and had four sides to it. It had every spice known to man, and then a few. The refrigerators that lined the walls contained foods of all descriptions. Fresh seafood (our salmon was Sockeye flown in from the Pacific Northwest - try finding THAT at Price Chopper!), meats of every cut, pork, poultry. Juices and oils and anything else you could find in a recipe was available to our mere asking. For a moment I got to feel like how an Iron Chef must feel. Except for the being a professional chef part.

The Instructor called us together for demonstrations on certain techniques, and kept us aware of the time. It amazed me how fast 3 hours passed. A meal I thought would take 30 minutes actually took the full time, and the other teams were racing to keep up as well. Another similarity to the Iron Chef - the race against the clock. You think you have so much time, but getting it all to come together at the exact same time (and have it be hot) is a real major skill. Nobody wants cold food. Our salmon and fennel was one of the last to hit the grill, being the quickest to cook. Then a few minutes to finish in the oven while the salads and sauce is plated, and done.

When we all stood back at the end of our grill fest, a huge table was set containing all our dishes. I have to admit, reading the menu on paper had not excited me near as much as seeing and smelling it all laid out before us. We attacked it buffet style, having some of everything. I went back for seconds on the salmon, which I have to say was the best dish. Especially that sauce. And the buttermilk ice cream. Oh man.

Once the meal was devoured, we returned to the classroom for closing comments. It was then Weird Old Dude reappeared, and I realized I hadn't seen him all day. I smiled quietly to myself at my stellar nick-naming talents.

Immigrant Song

This was a report my son Dan did on the experience of an immigrant coming to America in the 1900's. His persona is an Irish kid named "James McHale", and you'll know he's Irish because he writes WITH the accent.

I made the mistake of reading this at the tail end of dinner last night. I laughed so hard I got the hiccups.




Ok, that's the premise. Let's continue! (click the pics to see full size)



So this is a list of the stuff he's packing. Notice item #2 "Me wee stuffed lion."

He's spelling challenged (taking after his dad) so item 3 is actually "Clothing". He ends the page worrying "what if sea sickness does me in?"

Sounds like they spent a lot of time in class talking about the horrors of sea sickness, for as you'll see, it figures prominently in his story.




More worries, this time about the destination, Ellis Island. I love how he announces he has finished packing.

"I have barfed many a time." Holy crap did that make me laugh.

The next line was just as good: "The grub is terrible here, the bathrooms are always full, and people are spewing barf everywhere."

That single sentence alone captures the nightmare of the immigrant ship experience.

He ends the journal entry with "Wait, I must stop writing because I feel my lunch coming up. Bucket, here I come!"

Where did he get the idea of the bucket? Is that one of the things they teach, that the immigrant ships contained barf buckets?

Now we're getting to the tedious nature of the trip. "People are either sick, in bed, or dying." Sounds like a modern-day Carnival cruise vacation.

It seems like the barfing, at least, has subsided.

After reading the journal I wiped my eyes and gave Dan a hug later and told him how funny his report was, to which he replied "It wasn't supposed to be funny. It was about immigrants."

It was. And it was.

Rant About Meetings, And Being A Moron

Being a parent means having to attend meetings at your kid's school. The parent-teacher meetings are fine, since they are one on one and focused and deal with your child directly. The group meetings, however are hell.

Why?

They are run by people who love to hear themselves talk. The actual content is usually 5 minutes stretched over an hour. To a nerd like me, who gets paid to solve workflow issues these cluster fucks are particularly frustrating. In the age of electronic communication, there is no reason why the material cannot be presented online, through documents, or a recorded presentation. If you have questions, post them and respond to them online. Anything to streamline our already busy lives.

I'm on fire, right? Yeah, well I'm getting old, and like sands through the hour glass, so are the hours of my life. I don't have time sitting in a stuffy room, in a desk designed for a 10 year old, listening to someone "um" and "uh" their way through mundane information.

Like last night. It was a meeting for parents who's children are going to be moving up to Middle School next year. (For my Canadian readers, Middle School is grades 6, 7 & 8.) The content of the event was to go over what our kids need to know about how the schedule works, where rooms are, etc.

Little Shamus gets comfortable at his new desk

Speaking of where rooms are, I got lost getting to the meeting. My instructions on where the meeting was being held was incomplete, so the advice I was given was "just follow the other parents to the room". So I drove to the school and followed a few people inside. The cafeteria was bustling with a group of people, and I recognized some teachers among the throng, so I went in.

In these situations, I always feel like everyone knows each other. There was not a single person standing alone, except for me. The second uncomfortable thing was I quickly became aware of was I appeared to be slightly under-dressed. My comfortable ensemble of cargo shorts and t-shirt clashed with the sea of professional attire around me. Am I the only person who prefers to dump the work clothes as soon as they can? This was an informational meeting, right? No need to impress anyone with my big boy suit and shiny shoes. Right?

So I'm really uncomfortable, and really feeling like an outsider, as everyone seems to know someone. No other poorly dressed loners on the fringe. It's now 10 minutes past the meeting start time, and no-one is moving to get seated or start the meeting. So I sit down, try to look comfortable. A guy in a suit wanders over, and says, "How ya doin?" But what he's really asking is "Who the eff are you?" I say "Is this the Middle School information meeting?" He says "No, this is the tenure celebration."

I saunter out, trying to look casual.

Once in the hall I frantically look for the meeting room. I see another person wandering the halls, and throwing caution to the wind, I follow them. This time I get the right room, although I have missed the first part of the meeting. Even after I am safely in my meeting my mind is still chewing on the fuck up, still feeling embarrassed for being in the wrong place and for being here late. I hate being late. And me sitting there among all the well-dressed tenured teachers in my cargo shorts, like an unwashed interloper. How they must have talked about me when I left.

All this to find out that the information covered in the meeting was all available in handouts, and on their website. Wouldn't that have been nice information to have an hour ago. The meeting adjourns and headache screaming, I make for my car. Bad week to not be drinking caffeine, but I haven't turned my back on wine. I foresee a tall glass, and comforting looks from my dog, who loves me no matter how shabby I dress.

Doggie Style

So here's my idea.

There's a place up for sale in the area, a pet boarding business. I have been mulling in my diminutive cranium a few ideas for alternate methods for generating income. Something I can do in my older years, because I can't wrestle midgets forever. At some point I have to find something a bit more stable. The idea was born in of all places "I Love NY Pizza", which for those of you outside of the Albany area, I'm sorry, for it is the best pizza in this world. You'll have to take my word for it.

Anyhoo. Sitting there munching on delicious pizza, relating to some people my various ideas for other jobs. Most are un-researched, far-flung exercises in futility, but it's good to talk things out with smart people, which I was in the presence of. I mentioned that I was thinking of setting up a pet boarding business, maybe take in a few cats or dogs a week to generate some extra income. Pausing from his chicken parm pizza slice, My friend Jim (another Jim) suggested that there was a local place up for sale. Turnkey, baby!

So now I'm thinking about it. In the back of my head, mulling mulling. It's nice to have new possibilities to mull when other things churn in the brain. Good to have something else keeping me up at night, or greeting my mind when consciousness arrives at morning light.

I try to look at it from all sides. As one friend put it, "Dude, one word - poop." Yes, the waste issue is a concern. I would have to figure out something to deal with the "by product" as it were. Can't I hire a high school kid to scoop it and do the other cleaning duties while I supervise? Isn't that how it works? Then there are my kids, who would love to make some money on the side to augment the zero dollars they get as an allowance. In my defense, they don't do anything to earn the zero dollars, hence they get zero dollars. I'm kidding, they do some chores, but I consider them basic "room and board" activities which deserve no recuperation.

Besides poop, there's barking/whining/crying. The place would have to be soundproof, or I would need a really good stereo system. Or bring my ear protection I use when mowing the lawn. I've heard the cacophony at the dog shelter in town, and it can be mighty. I might need to keep a supply of muzzles on hand, in case I need to impose "quiet time".

Another issue - pet expiration. Not sure how good I would be at greeting customers with a dead pet. "How was your vacation? Oh, yeah, Fluffy kind of died while you were gone. Thank you, come again!" Awkward! Do you make them pay for the full stay, or just the days the pet was still alive? Is it insult to injury to hand back a limp feline and demand cash?

Finally, the name of the place. If you don't have a good name for your business, you'll never make it. I am inspired by a local guy who has the most perfect name for his business, which just so happens to be pet related. The guy has a mobile dog grooming business, a large white van and the name on the side? "Doggie Style". I shit you not. So I need a name like that, one that will crack up half the population, and go over the heads of the others, but still be effective. I'm not that creative, so all I can shoot for is something accurate. "Chez Pets" was one idea. "Drop 'Em And Run" was another, but that is kind of vague as to what the business is. People may try to leave kids with us, and we wouldn't be properly certified for that.

These are some the things I would need to work through. Sounds like I need another business meeting at I Love NY.

Totally off subject, I hate you , AT&T. You guys are effin crooks.

The Call of the Loon in the Night

We took it out of doors this weekend, packing the car and heading North into the wilderness of the Adirondack Park. We met up with friends outside Saranac, at Fish Creek Pond, which looked more like a lake to me. The shore was ringed by camp sites, so it's easy to get waterfront property, which is cool if you have boats, you can pull right up to your site.

You would think that camping attracts a certain mindset - people who enjoy communing with nature. People who maybe need to live in urban areas because of jobs or whatever, but when they can, they want to escape to the woods, to be on the water, to smell the burning wood of a campfire and hear the call of a loon in the night.

Well, sorry. You'd be wrong, because a-holes camp too.

Take for example the family with a fifth-wheel as large as the Queen Mary, powered by two ill-maintained generators banging like the cast of Stomp. They thoughtfully position those beasts on the OTHER side of his trailer from where he and his brood hang out, so the neighbors get to hear/breath the excrement from those devices. I can only imagine that the same guy practices his electric guitar on his back porch so the neighbors can enjoy his scatty version of "Smoke On The Water". When you yell at hit to shut up, he no doubt turns it up and shouts back "YOU shut up!". Yeah, he's that guy.

In my mind, camping is at it's essence a stripping away of modern conveniences, and by an extension of that, a removal of things in our daily life that cause stress. Some people think of camping as moving their comfy indoor life outside for everyone to see. Like barcaloungers. I have to say I've never even contemplated bringing mine along for a camping trip. The site a few over from ours had 2, his and hers. I can only imagine the conversation leading up their trip. "Honey? Have you water-proofed the lazy-boys? We got the big camping weekend coming up...". In the defense of this dubious outdoorsman, the normal camp chair may not be up the heftiness of his stature, so the extra support may be warranted. I just found the presence of indoor furniture unusual.

On the first evening at the site, sitting by the smoking fire watching the sun dip below the trees, a lone loon gave it's winsome cry. It was immediately echoed by yells from around the lake of "Yoooohooooo!" Then I realized the initial call was not a loon, but some yahoo across the way yelling "YOOHOOO!" It was like a sporting event, when someone starts a wave, and it rolls around the arena, the yells of "YOOOHOOO" rebounded around and around. My friend anticipated my initial question and said "Yeah, they do that. We heard it last night." The cries of "Yoohoo" alternated with "Marco!" and sometimes "Polo!". This went on for 30 minutes of almost constant wailing around the large lake. So here they were, away from all the urban noise and chaos - causing noise and chaos. i wanted to stand up and yell "SHUT THE FUCK UP!" but that would have just been playing into their plan. We just waited them out, and soon they calmed down and went back to watching their tv's. Yeah, they brought their tv's with them.

After dusk, my daughter and I pushed the canoe out into the water and glided across the glassy surface, paddling slowly. We listened to the conversations that carried out from shore, the people huddled around fires laughing and talking. After making a circuit around we realized that the yoohooers were the minority, the majority were like us, just there to relax in the woods by the water in relative quiet. Then there are some that enjoy the idea of bringing their indoor urban life outdoors. Like being able to watch "Biggest Loser" while reclined in your Lazy-Boy, yoohooing at your neighbors under a blanket of stars.

Sweet.

Take us out, Giada!

You're Number 1!

Hey Bitches. Wassup?

I can't stop laughing at this one.