FoodNerd!

Cut up about 3 summer squashes (yellow/zucchini/whatever) and an onion into large dice. Sweat the onion in a scant tablespoon of bacon fat (or butter or olive oil), then add 2 large cloves minced garlic and the squash. Sprinkle with Lawry’s seasoned salt, and let cook, stirring occasionally, till squash is almost tender. Dump in a bag of Trader Joe’s Soy-cutash, grind in some pepper, add a little more Lawry’s if needed, and cook till hot and squash is tender.

Eat over rice with grated cheddar. Yum.

Padma Lakshmi has a new line of jewelry, and all of it is pretty, but one item in particular stands out. She made a pair of earrings in the shape of clove buds, with square diamonds in the center. They’re pretty just as abstract organic shapes, but food nerds will almost certainly recognize them as cloves immediately, and that makes them so much more awesome. Why have plain diamond earrings when you can have FOOD-shaped diamond earrings?

I have now run 25 minutes straight 4 times in a row. That is mind-boggling.

Also, a fearsome necessity given the number of fully-loaded Chicago hot dogs and pieces of passionfruit layer cake I ate at our party this weekend. Heh heh.

I just ate a fresh lychee from the branch I bought for tallasiandude at the local Indian market, and maybe it is the heat but it took me straight back to Hawai’i and made me want a shave ice. With lychee and liliko’i and li hing syrups. Sigh.

actually quite insanely useful. video of a dude opening a bottle of wine with a shoe and a concrete wall

O how I love Ribena black currant syrup mixed with icy cold seltzer. Om nom nom.

I ran for 20 minutes straight last night. And didn’t die.

I mean, we always liked it. The steak tartare was tops and the cocktails were always well made, and you can’t beat the busy comfortable vintage atmosphere. But most things were drastically oversalted, and the cocktail attitude needed to be adjusted — when I read your cocktail menu, I’d at least like to know the general flavor and format of the drinks.

Notwithstanding, we’ve been going there a few times a year now for several years, and this last visit, we realized: all those problems have gone. There’s a new cocktail menu, still a little oblique but at least you know whether you’ll get gin or whisky or fruit or bitters. Nothing that arrived was oversalted, and the scallops in spicy roast corn was truly one of the best things I’ve ever eaten there, perfectly balanced, creamy, spicy, savory and light.

So yay — a place we liked a lot before has a lot more to like now.

I finally broke down and bought a fancy electric meat slicer in order to properly slice the salumi I often get from my brother. Now, this is not the slice-everything-in-sight wonder that the brochure claims it is, but hot damn if it doesn’t slice the paper-thin bejesus out of my cured meats. Worth every penny.

Last night I sliced up some mole, finocchiona, and tartufo salumi to eat with the pasta and red sauce that was the sole dinner option after a hectic week. Yes, and it was only Tuesday. Yeesh. And today I was able to enjoy the leftover sliced goodness with a few slices of bread and fresh cherries for lunch. Summer does not suck.

Ninegret oysters from Rhode Island are delightful. Little superbriny nuggets of shellfish flavor. We had some at The Oceanaire last night for Father’s Day.

Ripe mango from the Indian market + queso fresco from the Latin market = delicious breakfast.