Text 8256, 85 rader
Skriven 2013-12-26 14:14:00 av MICHAEL LOO (1:123/140)
Ärende: trip 651
================
The last chub of Habbersett's met its maker this day. Annie
did this batch my way, i.e., thinner and crispier than the
normal. This has pluses and minuses: the pluses, it tastes
better this way, and the crunchy texture has its adherents.
The main minus is that the lovely puddingy texture of the
traditional version is sacrificed for that crispness. I
like both ways but this way better.

Also. My first day, Annie had set out the fixings for chili
on the counter: an onion, four jalapenos (I used three), two
packs of ground beef, 1 1/2 lb each, a couple cans of diced
tomatoes (I used one), plus herbs and spices. I made a batch
of extremely spicy chili: the heat level was about right,
a bit hotter than the Firebrand that Uncle Dave speaks of,
but I went overboard with the cumin, to the degree that I
could detect it on my breath and in my burps a full day
afterward. Anyhow, I'd been eating of this pot of chili
all along, and it was mellowing nicely. I figure all in all
I've eaten this for a week during my nonmealtimes, and there
are still 3 servings left. The stuff is still pretty good,
but by this time the green jalapeno taste was mature and
coming to the fore. As of this writing, some days later, the
green taste is receding again, a good thing, but the cumin
is reintensifying.

=

Anne, the old lady down the way, parent to Dan and Charlie
and aunt to Mike, invited us to dinner. I am told that this
is a major honor. After coming back from Radcliffe and
marrying one of the wealthiest boys in town, she devoted her
life to teaching and cooking. One aim in life was to make
every worthwhile recipe in her several thousand cookbooks -
this of course is impossible, but it is said that Dan and
Charlie and the other Mike (now living elsewhere) never ate
the same dish twice growing up. I think this is a bit of an
exaggeration, but you get the idea.

The atmosphere was muted because her namesake downtown, a
cousin-in-law of some sort, died this day, about the same age.

Anne uses a walker and a cane that had belonged to Billy but
still seems to do okay in the kitchen. Actually, Dan does much
of the cooking, but Anne is still definitely chef.

Dan brought his wife and two sons; Charlie showed up a little
late from the operating room; he told a lurid tale of having
been knee-deep in hemorrhage or something like that.

Appetizers:

salmon and cream cheese on baguette - all top-notch ingredients;
well balanced, each canape sporting a single small caper;

brie on baguette - I didn't try;

pate, which after one taste I stopped, as it consisted largely
of liver whizzed with cream cheese. Annie, who should know
better than to doubt me on such matters, disputed this but was
quickly corrected by the chef and by my backside.

Beaujolais Nouveau (Duboeuf) 13 was a respectable accompaniment.
It had some of that gamay (not gamy) taste, a bit of pepper and
plumminess, and a lot of essentially raw grape juice flavor. It
is not my favorite thing, but it's okay with appetizers.

Anne had a bee in her bonnet to make country captain, a chicken
and fruit curry of uncertain but possibly actually Indian
origin. It was fine, though with too many or too few cooks,
the main dishes were rather overcooked, and to me there's little
worse than overdone chicken. I managed to snag me a thigh, which
was decent except for the strip that had been next to the side
of the glass baking dish and thus jerkified.

Baked farfalle with shrimp and scallops in tomato sauce was the
alternative choice for nonmeat eaters. The shellfish were big
but also suffered from having been forgotten in the oven. The
pasta was kind of mushy.

Peju Sauvignon Blanc 12, a rather likeable wine with not so
much pee in it, went well with the main courses.

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