Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Innocent people do not delay justice.

Today’s gop: why go just far enough when too far is right there?

The revolution will be supervised.

There are consequences to being an arrogant, sullen prick.

Quote tweet friends, screenshot enemies.

Republicans: The threats are dire, but my tickets are non-refundable!

It’s all just conspiracy shit beamed down from the mothership.

Conservatism: there are people the law protects but does not bind and others who the law binds but does not protect.

Human rights are not a matter of opinion!

They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!

You know it’s bad when the Project 2025 people have to create training videos on “How To Be Normal”.

But frankly mr. cole, I’ll be happier when you get back to telling us to go fuck ourselves.

Giving in to doom is how authoritarians win.

In my day, never was longer.

Compromise? There is no middle ground between a firefighter and an arsonist.

Also, are you sure you want people to rate your comments?

Museums are not America’s attic for its racist shit.

The worst democrat is better than the best republican.

Every reporter and pundit should have to declare if they ever vacationed with a billionaire.

Let the trolls come, and then ignore them. that’s the worst thing you can do to a troll.

They spent the last eight months firing professionals and replacing them with ideologues.

She burned that motherfucker down, and I am so here for it. Thank you, Caroline Kennedy.

You cannot shame the shameless.

Prediction: the gop will rethink its strategy of boycotting future committees.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / It Amuses Me To Feed You Beautiful Things

It Amuses Me To Feed You Beautiful Things

by | 78 Comments

This post is in: 

Except when there is no recipe exchange. But I do have a few photos:

Who's a good kitty

He blends in so well with his surroundings, doesn’t he?

Evening Harvest

This is my third harvest of grapes. I’m going to start the jelly this weekend. I’m hoping for anything north of disaster and I’ll call it a success.

I do have a recipe question. I am going to have dinner guests next week and I want to do something fresh with zucchini, eggplant, tomatoes, peppers…anyone have suggestions? I was going to lightly saute in olive oil and toss with pasta, but I’m open to any other ideas or herbs, spice ideas to add. I just want to make sure it retains its fresh from the garden flavors.

I will be making homemade baguettes, too, which will finally prompt me to post the recipe and technique for this foolproof easy-peasy bread dough.

What’s on your plate this evening? Big plans for the weekend? I bought a beautiful leaded glass front door today (at our local recycled building supply center), you can see it here, along with your weekly dose of Bixby and some garden photos.  So along with everything else on my menu this weekend, I will be touching it up and picking out paint colors.

Open thread!

 

Reader Interactions

78Comments

  3. 3.

    JPL

    Thank you for the recipe for the convection oven roast chicken. I made it last weekend and it was delicious.

  7. 7.

    Mnemosyne

    I actually got some writing done after getting home from work, and ordered a metric shit-ton of research books. I really need to find a critique group, but I’m waiting for my writer’s group to get theirs re-started.

  8. 8.

    Ian

    fresh with zucchini, eggplant, tomatoes, peppers…anyone have suggestions?

    You seem to have the pasta angle covered, though may I suggest a parmesan creme sauce?
    In terms of the veggies you have, I suggest Baba-ganoush spread.

  10. 10.

    Ruckus

    That veg dish sounds fine. But. I’d put all that veg over wild rice. More texture than the pasta, adds a distinct flavor and more body to the dish. And of course I’m lazy so I’d just add the cooked rice to the pan of veg, mix and serve.

  12. 12.

    patroclus

    Throw in some coriander and give it a little Thai flavor! And, like ruckus, I’d recommend over rice rather than pasta. With a long weekend ahead, I’m gonna do college football, biking and swimming.

  17. 17.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @patroclus:

    Throw in some coriander

    What’s my secret? Frankly, dear, forgive my candor.
    Family Secret,
    All to do with herbs.
    Things like being careful with your coriander.
    That’s what makes the gravy grander.

    [Customers]
    More hot pies! more hot! more pies!

  22. 22.

    Currants

    Oven Roasted Ratatouille! (I tend to cook it longer than called for because I think it’s delicious somewhat caramelized.)

    It’s do-ahead if you want (pre-cook all the way, or just do the first half and have it ready to go into the oven the next day), you can serve it room temp or warm, you can serve it for breakfast with a poached egg on top, and you can freeze leftovers (not the egg…). WIN.

    I plant a ratatouille patch every year in my garden. (This was a tough garden year in eastern MA: driest summer since record-keeping began, so my rata-patch wasn’t very prolific. To say the least.)

  24. 24.

    rikyrah

    This 43-tweet story explains how black kids are treated by America’s criminal justice system

    T. Greg Doucette is a criminal defense lawyer in North Carolina who also writes a legal blog. And he’s got some things to say:

    In a 43-part tweetstorm on Tuesday, Doucette recounted a recent experience defending a 17-year-old black teen from claims by a police officer that the teen was doing 360s in the middle of the street. Over the course of the story, Doucette demonstrates many of the problems black people face in the U.S. court system and why changes never seem to stick.

    We’ll let him take it from here.

  33. 33.

    SenyorDave

    I just came back from Friday evening services at our Synagogue and was thinking about the state of our nation. We have a presidential candidate whose campaign CEO runs a “news site” that is, quite simply, a white supremacist website. I have poked a round Breitbart a few times and I think it is accurate to describe it as white supremacist in its leanings. And what was the media reaction to Clinton’s speech last week pointing out these connections – a collective yawn ,let’s move on to more important things like the NYT’s surreal article implying that a fairly ordinary State Department series of events was a pay for play transaction (ignoring Trump’s actual pay for play donation to the FL AG to help persuade her to drop the investigation into Trump U).

    Trump’s speech this week was a hate speech, pure and simple. I must have missed the mention of that part amidst the media talking about presidential Trump was. I am convinced the media would have covered Hitler’s rise in a fair, even’handed manner, saying “both sides do it” as they were rounded up into camps.

  34. 34.

    Currants

    @Currants: Should add that it’s really easy: slice all the veg, toss them into a roasting pan w/herbs and olive oil, and then into the oven.

  37. 37.

    geg6

    Steve Kornacki is, hands down, the worst spokesmodel on MSNBC. He makes Tweety look sober and thoughtful. Jesus, what a hack.

  38. 38.

    Feathers

    I bought an InstantPot electric pressure cooker a while back on the recommendation of several friends. I just got it out to cook with this week. I think I was somewhat afraid. I’ve been doing the lessons at Hip Pressure Cooking. The mashed potatoes, carrots, and spaghetti sauce all went well. Tonight I used it for the real reason I bought it – cooking chicken breasts from frozen without defrosting. You end up with shredded meat, but that is fine because that is what I use for rice and grain bowls (omelettes and quesadillas are looking tempting as well). My next big step is yogurt.

    Does anyone else have an InstantPot? Are there any suggestions for cooking for one (or two) with a pressure cooker?

  41. 41.

    Mike J

    The produce stand near me had a sign out front that they have fresh huckleberries. I’ve got a spot on Snoqualmie pass that I usually go to for picking, but I haven’t had a chance yet this year, and actually I would have thought it a bit early. It’s hard to find good huckleberries, as Nelson can tell you.

  44. 44.

    stinger

    I do a seven-vegetable saute (number of veg may vary): onions, carrots, zucchini, yellow squash, red bell pepper–very colorful. Toss in some broccoli and cherry tomatoes just long enough to heat them through and bring up the color of the broccoli. Season with white wine vinegar, tarragon, garlic, black pepper, just enough salt to balance the vinegar and tomatoes, and the EVOO it was sauteed in. Very last thing is a paper-thin sliver of butter, to smooth things out.

    I add leftover chicken if I have it and want meat, then serve over any kind of rice, pasta, or, especially with chicken, mashed potatoes.

  45. 45.

    NotMax

    Posted previously, but curried eggplant over rice is great, super easy, and uses only one pot to prepare.

    Suppose one could toss in the zucchini* with it as well.

    *The single food which will never, ever again cross the lips. Repugnant, vile, tastes and smells like spoiled mucilage; fit only for the trash can. YMMV.

  46. 46.

    amk

    Mark Cuban @mcuban

    Read the entire fbi release. No wonder they released Friday of a holiday weekend. It clears @HillaryClinton 100pct

    3:01 AM – 3 Sep 2016

    comey must rank as obama’s worst appointee.

  48. 48.

    SenyorDave

    @amk: And the damage has been done. Trump and Clinton are considered equally untrustworthy. Trump is a lifelong con man, and can barely get through a paragraph without lying. He’s normalized lying with the help of the media.

  49. 49.

    SenyorDave

    @amk: I think Cuban is legitimately horrified at the though of Trump as POTUS. He does seem to care about the country, plus he knows how bad Trump would be for the economy and the stock market. One thing the market hates is uncertainty.

  54. 54.

    WaterGirl

    @TaMara (HFG): I am really touched by that picture of Harley. I felt in love and it broke my heart all in the same instant. I’m glad you had him, so sorry you lost him.

  55. 55.

    TaMara (HFG)

    @WaterGirl: Thank you, it will be three years in November and I’m still not over it. I even lost my sweet Missy since then, but it didn’t hit me as hard as Harley – for a cat, he saw himself as my protector and behaved accordingly.

    He would have loved Bixby.

  56. 56.

    SenyorDave

    @Mike in NC: They’re working on bringing Hannity onboard for the right price.

    I’m assuming this is a joke, but with the way things are it just might be possible.

  58. 58.

    WaterGirl

    @TaMara (HFG): So unbelievably gorgeous, and those eyes! They remind me of Reverend Barber’s eyes when he spoke at the convention. Both of them wouldn’t let me look away.

    We love them all, but some hold our hearts in a different way than others. :: big hugs ::

  63. 63.

    Misterpuff

    Trump is Borg. You will be assimilated. Unless you are unable to assimilate (are too Mexican or Muslim), then you are out.

  64. 64.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Major Major Major Major: Umm. I was hoping for a bit more analysis. You are under no obligation to provide more, but “okay” conveys very little info. Just saying.

    ETA: If you found your truck, it’s all good. You weren’t there for the art anyway.

  65. 65.

    Major Major Major Major

    @Omnes Omnibus: The center of the room had a realistic bear 1/2-size statue with angel wings riding a tricycle. And some pictures of ruralia. Paintings of street scenes. It was okay. A bunch of bricks, each silkscreened with a nude picture of the artist, in a man-shaped pile on the floor.

    Nothing really popped for me. You could buy a brick though.

  68. 68.

    Peale

    @amk: Arnie Calson is the worst, but seriously. I like how the right is all up in arms about her handling of state secrets and upset that anything might be redacted. Oh and waiting for Assange to release that stuff his boys stole. Yeah. He should be a hero for all citizens concerned with the importance of state secrets. Always “our state secrets” too. Like the public owns them. Those are our secrets.

  73. 73.

    Steeplejack

    @Feathers:

    Glad I caught this, and thanks for the link to the HP site.

    I bought an Instant Pot a few weeks ago. I was looking for a new slow cooker and was curious about the various “multi-cookers” out there, and then Amazon snaked me in with an unexpected (and huge) sale on the Instant Pot model I had been considering.

    I haven’t done anything with it yet. What I hope it will do is (a) replace my aging slow cooker, with better and more precise control; (b) do things like you’re talking about, e.g., quickly cook chicken breasts (and other meats) for multiple meals; and (c) let me explore the “pressure cooker space” and just check out what all can be done. Technology is changing the way we do a lot of things, and that’s as true in the kitchen as elsewhere.

  74. 74.

    Tissue Thin Pseudonym

    @TaMara (HFG): I feel the same way about Eddie, who’s been gone more than five years. He wasn’t my protector, but he was the sweetest, most empathetic cat I’ve ever known. When it came to health, he lost pretty much all of life’s lotteries, but I miss the sound of him coming, on his three legs, to join me in bed.

  75. 75.

    Pete Mack

    Grill the vegetables in charcoal. Make the charred tomato and anchovies recipe from the NYT. It is superb, really.

  76. 76.

    SlothropRedux

    You have the ingredients for ratatouille OR, if you are feeling ambitious, confit biyaldi, the ratatouille that is the pivotal recipe in the Pixar movie Ratatouille! Here’s the recipe the movie used (yes, they had a real food consultant)

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