Text 11268, 143 rader
Skriven 2007-02-03 08:19:00 av MICHAEL LOO (1:123/140)
     Kommentar till en text av HAP NEWSOM
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 -> A fairly nifty travel planner is at www.511.org (which once
 -> told me it took 14 hours to get from the airport to the
 -> financial district by bus, so the algorithm isn't perfect).
 HN> I'll be sure to have a look at it.

If you have friends there, it seems a pity not to visit them
now and again.

 HN> Right now I'm in the midst of planning my road 
 HN> trip part of our vacation to New Mexico...I'll leave early and drive
 HN> down with  all the extra gear and Anne will fly down a few days later.

That sounds like a fun trip. Hope you have a great time
communing with the icebound cacti and stuff.

=

 HN> In any case fry them is what I did (not deep fried mind
 HN> you) and  they were'nt really bad...just not a lot of meat on them.

You could have gotten the taste for bushmeat and become a forager,
you know, like the guy in the story.

  So there's this guy living in the hills east of you, and
  for some unknown reason it is discovered that he has the
  remains of a spotted owl (roasted, probably) in his
  rubbish bin. So he's hauled up before the magistrate,
  who's prepared to throw the book at him but in fairness
  asks if there's anything the defendant would like to say
  to mitigate his circumstances. So the guy tells about how
  he's out of a job, and his wife has left him, and he has
  to hunt twelve hours a day to feed his five scrawny children,
  and his hunger was getting to him, and he saw this bird and
  shot it, not realizing that it was a protected species.

  The judge, moved by this sad story, dismisses the case with
  a stern admonition not to do it again.

  As the courtroom clears and the guy is about to leave, the
  judge takes him aside, and in a low voice asks, "just out
  of curiosity, what did the bird taste like?" "Sort of like
  bald eagle, but not as tough."

=

 HN> our temps were in the 30's....but the wind was a steady 15-20 with
 HN> very few  gusts, just an unremitting cold pressure that kept blowing my
 HN> hood back.

I recently discovered that my windbreaker has ties to keep
the hood up.

 HN> At least you could  have called a cab...or ducked into
 HN> the nearest shop along the avenue for a  bit of warmth and rest.

You've not seen my neighborhood, have you. The nearest shop?
[sniggers evilly, not unlike Glen]

 -> To give the man his due, he does find good ones and cooks them well.
 HN> I consider that high praise indeed!

If the truth is high praise, "so be it" (a phrase my
brother often uses, and it drives people up the wall).

Dungeness crab puffs
cat: starter, seafood
Yield: 48

h - Pastry dough from Madeleine Kamman
1/4 c butter, diced
1/4 ts salt
1 pn sugar
1 pn white pepper
1/2 c sifted flour
3 eggs, lightly beaten
Butter
h - Dungeness crab salad
6 radishes
1/2 lb Dungeness crab meat
1/4 c mayonnaise
1 Tb snipped chives
1 1/2 ts minced tarragon
1/2 ts tarragon vinegar
Salt

For the puffs:
Position a rack in the upper third of the oven and heat
the oven to 400 F. In a small saucepan, bring 1/2 c water,
butter, salt, sugar and white pepper to a boil, and simmer
until the butter is completely melted and the mixture looks
milky, 2 to 3 min. Remove the pan from the heat and all at
once dump in the flour. Stir until a rather firm ball forms.

Dry the dough by returning the pan to medium-low heat and
cook the dough, stirring constantly, flattening the ball to
expose as much of the surface as possible to the heat. Cook
until you see little bubbles of butter oozing from the paste
and a sandy film of paste appears on the bottom of the pan,
5 or 6 min. Remove from the heat and beat in the eggs, about
a third at a time, stirring briskly to incorporate the egg
into the dough as quickly and thoroughly as possible before
adding another portion of egg. Stir vigorously. At first,
the mixture will loosen and separate, but as you continue
beating, it will come back together, thicken and become
shiny and sticky.

Butter a cookie sheet generously and rinse it under cold
water. (The water will evaporate while the puffs bake and
prevent the bottoms from scorching.) Fit a plain nozzle into
a pastry bag and fill the bag with the dough. Pipe balls
about 1" in diameter onto the cookie sheet, leaving about
2" in between for expansion during cooking. You can also
use two spoons to scoop out the dough and form it into balls.

Bake the puffs until they are dry and brown, about 30 min.
Use a paring knife to cut a slit in each puff, then return
them to the oven for 5 to 10 min to finish browning and
drying. Do not let them scorch. Remove the puffs to a wire
rack and let them cool. The puffs can be prepared 8 hr in
advance and stored on the wire rack at room temperature.

For the salad:
Cut the radishes in half and then cut them crosswise in
moderately thin slices. They should be thick enough that
they crunch, but not so thick they dominate the crab.
Combine the radishes, crab, mayonnaise, chives, tarragon,
and vinegar. Correct salt. The recipe can be made to this
point and refrigerated, tightly covered, up to 8 hr.

Assembly:
Slice the top third off of each cream puff shell using a
serrated knife. Pull out any moist dough from the center
and discard (the better you dry the dough after you've
added the flour, the less you'll have to throw away).

Spoon a heaping teaspoon of crab salad into the center of
each shell and replace the lid. It should sit jauntily on
top. Serve within an hour.

L.A. Times, December 20, 2006
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