January 28, 2007

Unvegetarianism

Recently I was excited to learn, via a recipe for Vietnamese Spare Ribs With Caramel Sauce, that Ayun Halliday had fallen back off the vegetable wagon. But I also feel kind of bad about feeling good about this. I'm not thrilled to report that I, too, lost the battle with pork resistance, and the weird thing is, my feelings about eating animals never really changed. I still know that I'm much too tenderhearted and cowardly to kill any kind of animal myself, which for 10 years I figured meant that I should avoid eating them. But then came that moment during the extra-bleak winter of 2001. At the time, Henry lived off the Kosciusko stop of the J train in Bushwick, in an apartment that lay within walking distance of only two restaurants: the bulletproof-glassed-in Carribean takeout place, and Dunkin Donuts. We were sitting in the latter when I made the fateful decision. It didn't even really feel like a decision at the time. I just put down the Dunkin Donuts "bagel" with "cream cheese" that I'd been eating and stabbed a plastic fork into Henry's jerk chicken platter. I've been happily (well, aside from the odd conscience-pang) eating meat ever since.

So I was excited that Ayun would be putting meaty recipes back on the menu over at DSC, because her recipes in the EV Inky had been a big help to me over the years as I slowly but surely figured out how to cook meat. I always especially liked her Chinese-y variations on the theme of "you've got a 1/4 lb of ground pork." Those recipes, in conjunction with a Cook's Illustrated recipe for Stir-Fried Pork, Green Beans, and Red Bell Pepper with Gingery Oyster Sauce, are the basis for the recipe I'm about to share with you, which I would consider one of my Jackpot Recipes. In my household it's simply known as Stir Fry. Unfortunately, I've made it about a bazillion times and am actually taking a hiatus from it for a while. (Also pastries. Seriously, if you see me with a pastry you need to be like "Emily, PUT DOWN THE PASTRY.") So, Stir Fry: it's not exactly health food, but it's totally soul food. I'm giving you the recipe in the hopes that you will one day be as sick of it as Henry is.

STIR FRY
Ingredients:
Peanut oil
sliced slower-cooking vegetable like bok choy (baby bok choy = yum) or green beans
bell pepper, cut into small squares
3 scallions, sliced thinly
1/2 lb of ground pork
a lot of garlic (like maybe 3 cloves)
a LOT of ginger (as much as you have or want)
(take these last two and mince 'em up together, using a food processor to save time if you have a dishwasher or a devil may care attitude towards doing the dishes, then stick the garlic-ginger mix in a little bowl with a tiny bit of peanut oil)
For the juice:
1/3 cup chicken broth
1 tsp cornstarch
1/4 tsp ground white pepper
1 tsp rice vinegar
1 tsp sesame oil
1 tablespoon sherry
2 1/2 tablespoons oyster sauce OR if you don't want to keep oyster sauce around just for this one recipe, a tablespoon of thai fish sauce plus a teaspoon of sugar is ok too.
Mix all these ingredients well together and set aside.

1) Take the pork and mix it with a few dribbles of soy sauce and sherry.

2)Heat up some peanut oil in your biggest frying pan or wok. Fry the pork til it's not even a little bit pink. Scrape the pork into a large bowl and set aside.

3) With a tiny bit more oil, stir-fry the slow-cooking vegetable on super high heat til it's done to your liking. Keep it crispy, is my thinking. When it's done, stick it in the bowl with the pork.

4) Do the same thing to the bell pepper. It's okay if the skin starts to darken in spots. When that starts happening, push the pepper to the side of the pan and add the garlic and ginger in a little pile. Wait like twenty seconds then move the pile around with the pepper. Then add everything -- pork, veggies, etc -- back in to the pan. Stir it around. Dump the juice on top and stir until it's thickened a little bit.

5) Put your stir-fry on an attractive platter and top with scallions. Serve over rice, which you probably should have started cooking around step 1. Live it up at the top of the food chain and try not to think about Charlotte's Web or Babe or whatnot.

Posted by emily at 08:35 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

January 21, 2007

Back Again

Hi, my blog got hacked. Ho-hum. Remember when hackers seemed cool? Turns out, hackers are so emphatically not cool. They are not Jonny Lee Miller at the peak of his hotness in a red vinyl dress. They're chickenshit dorks with nothing better to do than ruin someone they've never met's month by making her feel like the world is out to get her. Well, I vanquished you, dorks. Okay, actually, Dean Simakis (previously known to me only as outstandingly coherent Gawker commenter t.a.m.s.y.) vanquished you. Yaaaaay, Dean. I owe you one (hundred and fifty dollars) and a big debt of gratitude. I am also grateful to Lindsay, who I will restrain myself from showering with praise here lest this start to seem like a freshman signing a senior's high school yearbook. Okay, fuck it: lindsay u r my hero!! xoxo. Stay cool!

Lucky for all of us it has been a sort of slow month and not much has happened that I yearned to report to you, my internet friends. I read some books and saw some movies, as did we all. However, I will probably be forced to poop out TODOs about them, meaning that recipes and cat pictures will continue to dominate the post-Gawker incarnation of Emily Mag until TODO finally TODIES. There is this one thing that I would never tell them about over there, though: I did develop a worrisome obsession with a band that gets absolutely no repect, and I'd like to share that with you. As the unfortunates who are forced to listen to my iTunes in the office already know, I have been listening to a lot of the band that Henry affectionately refers to as "F. Mac," especially Tusk and the eponymous Buckingham Nicks album featuring naked Stevie and Lindsay on the cover. What can I say? Sometimes only cheese will satisfy my appetite. If you have absolutely no idea why I would ever listen to a soft rock staple like F. Mac, perhaps this video will enlighten you. "And to those that I've loved like a ghost through a fog, like a charmed hour and a haunted song . . . "

Posted by emily at 07:32 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0)

December 24, 2006

Riffles

I got a digital camera for Hanukah/Christmas. This means: finally, the catblogging can begin! Meet Riffles. He belongs to my parents (I have his brother, Raffles. Btw, I didn't name these cats.) Riffles weighs more than many toddlers. AWESOME. In the future, look forward to: me learning how to hold the camera still and Riffles getting even fatter.

Posted by emily at 10:00 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

December 17, 2006

Fame

Ok, I'm fully aware that hearing about someone's dream that they had is the only thing less interesting than hearing about the cute thing someone's cat did, but: sorry!
Last night I dreamt that I ran into an ex boyfriend at a basketball game (it was unclear why either of us was at a basketball game, but I guess that's why they call it a 'dream'). I don't remember much about the dream except that my ex boyfriend was really, really impressed by my fancy new job at Gawker. What a fun dream!
Then today I was Christmas shopping and I ran into a bunch of people I knew in high school. They had never heard of Gawker.

Posted by emily at 04:41 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

December 06, 2006

Take that, Psoriasis!!

Thaaaaaaaaaaank GOD. SERIOUSLY. Ok, so as you may recall, I fucking hate Melrose. To me, Melrose is so much more than a shrill, bitchy, overachievy, conniving, fakety-fake reality show contestant. To me, Melrose represents EVERYTHING THAT IS WRONG WITH WOMEN. So I was incredibly worried when, for the first half of tonight's finale episode, it genuinely seemed like she might do more than continue on to becoming America's Next Top Model. In fact, when Eugenia was ousted (for, apparently, being too much of a natural on camera and not giving canned responses to the judges at 'panel'), I feared that the tragic prophesy of Wikipedia would indeed come to pass.

But it didn't. YAY! Caridee represents . . . well, nothing much. But she seems nice, and she's kind of a ho, and she's not Melrose. Way to not be Melrose, Caridee! Also unlike Melrose, Caridee is actually hot.

Amazing moments of this episode that will be better when someone with DVR recaps them:
*when Tyra contradicted Jay Manuel's assertion that all of the judges got to where they were by being "unpredictable," and Tyra said something like "I'm not unpredictable, I've always got a buttload of makeup on my face, a big old weave, and a dress on that nips in my waist!" I think this kind of thing is why this season has been so awesome, actually -- the constant tension, the mystery, of whether Tyra knows. Moments like these -- and moments like when she wonders aloud whether the other contestants hated Melrose because they were jealous or because Melrose is unlikeable (so that you're forced to scream "UNLIKEABLE!!" at the screen) -- make me think that she does. And then the other 98% of the show makes me think that she is dumb. It is a riddle for the ages, for sure.
*At the end when Melrose was crying and bemoaning the fact that the whole time, people had called her a bitch. MELROSE, THEY CALLED YOU A BITCH BECAUSE YOU ARE A HUUUUUGE FUCKING BITCH! HA! CRY ABOUT IT SOME MORE!

To conclude: yay. Fuck, I'm so tired.

Posted by emily at 09:17 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)