However, it seems I’m run into a slight snag. For some reason, the LJ importer at wordpress.com seems to be having issues with the way some entries are coded? So I went and downloaded LJArchive, figuring I’d download it all that way and convert into XML if I had to. Only LJArchive also told me something weird about converting old entries… which I’ve already done, as far as I can tell. So now I’m getting kinda desperate because having to do 8 years’ worth of posts by hand would really *really* suck.

This only seems to be a problem for this main LJ, which is a bit of a monster since I’ve had it since 2001. The other two smaller LJs I exported yesterday are only a year old and went without a problem. What could I possibly be messing up?

Anybody have ideas? *hopeful look*

UPDATE: Whee! After digging through several screens of LJ options, found the right thing to click. Can now import to wordpress.com account with the API importer, then transfer it to my home server from there. Threaded comments and everything! Am very happy

If you want 3 to 4 years of experience in loans from your paper pushers, you should really mention it in your ad before you start accepting applications, book applicants, and have them drive out to meet you at the height of traffic. Just a thought.

Ugh,

A.

So this past Sunday, we had our first cleaning binge of the month and I did 11 loads of laundry while T tackled the bathroom and vacuuming. The laundry room is right next to us, but I have to walk back and forth between our apartment and there several times to get all the clothes and keep the machines rotating. At some point, that load of socks and a couple of my lay-flat-to-dry wool sweaters got hijacked. The sweaters were designer, so I guess that was inevitable. The socks, though? That’s what really pissed me off, because those things had real sentimental value on top of being damn comfy.

I mean, really, who steals somebody’s load of socks?! Yet I remember explicitly going through each machine and checking afterward to make sure I’d collected everything. All my machines were empty. They were all empty. And the socks and sweaters are gone.

Speechless, man. Outraged speechlessness. What more can I say? Somebody stole our socks!

Considering that the original cioppino was a working man’s meal (created around the 1800s by the Italian fishermen of San Francisco), it’s suitable that it should be brought back up-to-date as a hearty-but-affordable dish for home cooking. With this in mind, I started putting together a cioppino with more realistic ingredients for the busy and budget-minded, who might not be within convenient range of a local fishmonger. I must say it was very tasty.

I took Allrecipes’ Southern California Cioppino as my base, with quite a few tweaks. There were many other more traditional recipes available, but being here in SoCal, it felt rather appropriate to start with a tribute to our local flavors. The consistently high reviews it got on the site didn’t hurt either.

The dry ingredients lineup. A very aromatic blend, as you can see. I substituted some of the dried stuff for their fresh counterparts to cut back on preparation time.

The wet ingredients lineup.

The canned ingredients, which take the place of a lot of the fresh ingredients that one would use if they were more readily available, in season, and/or affordable. These are all canned shellfish, so also have the added advantage of being pure meat instead of whole-in-shell, which ends up taking a lot less room in the pot and a lot less work to eat when served. Definitely worth it when you’re having one of your lazy days and don’t feel like dealing with a big mess of shells after you’ve had dinner. Using canned also let me incorporate a larger percentage of seafood in more different varieties than I otherwise would be able to.

The frozen lineup, once again chosen for convenience. I splurged a little on these because they would be the most obvious and chunky elements of the stew. Plus, we have a Trader Joe’s nearby that carries a good variety of interesting frozen seafoods.

Using a large stock pot (this recipe makes a LOT of stew), I started with 1/4 cup of olive oil. I then tossed in 6 tablespoons of dried minced onion and 1/2 cup of water, which equals 1 cup of minced fresh onion without the mess and tears. By heating these three up together, I hydrated the dried onion faster and kept the oil from crackling and spitting as much as it would if I’d added the water into already-heated oil. I could probably have soaked the onion in water beforehand, but I was doing this on a tight schedule.

4 chopped carrots and 4 chopped stalks of celery went in next.

Followed immediately by 4 peeled and cubed red potatoes and 1 tablespoon of garlic powder. I went for the powder over the minced garlic because I wanted the garlic taste without the random bits in the stew. Also, it was a lot less messy to deal with than fresh garlic. The vegetables were sauteed in the oil and juices for about 10 minutes, until they started to get tender.

The next step was to basically dump in all the wet ingredients, herbs and spices. 1 28-ounce can of crushed tomatoes, 2 cups of tomato juice, 2 8-ounce jars of clam juice, and 1/2 a cup of sweet cooking sake went in. The original recipe used white wine, but I usually have sake around and it makes a virtually indistinguishable substitute. I tossed in 2 tablespoons of dried parsley flakes and 2 tablespoons of dried cilantro instead of their fresh equivalents, using perhaps a bit more than I would have if they had been fresh. Both have such a nice, fresh smell that it’s hard to overdo them. 2 teaspoons of dried basil, 1.5 teaspoons of dried oregano, and 1 tablespoon dried thyme followed. I added 1 full teaspoon of California chili powder, which is a bit milder than normal chili powder, and 1/8 teaspoon of cayenne pepper. 1 teaspoon each of salt and ground black pepper.

The heat was reduced and this mixture left to simmer for 1.5 hours as our guild raided Naxxramas. About an hour in, I stopped by to stir the broth and have a quick taste. Sprinkled in a bit more salt, pepper, chili powder and a smattering of the Italian herbs. Although I’m known as something of a spicy food wimp, there’s lots of room to wiggle with the flavoring of this stew.

At about an hour into the simmering, I added the canned seafood comprised of 2 small tins of white crab meat, 1 small tin of chopped clams, 1 large can of whole oysters and 1 large can of boiled baby clams. I tossed all of these in with whatever juices were present in the cans, which wasn’t very much overall but added to the seafood flavor. I prefer to add these canned products in earlier than the fresh stuff to give them more of a chance to soak up the broth and mingle together with the vegetables. At the 1.5 hour simmer mark, in went a bag of defrosted Argentine red shrimp (sweeter and more lobster-like than normal farmed shrimp), two cubed fillets of mahi mahi, and a bag of defrosted bay scallops. Oh, and a few normal shrimp that I had leftover from a previous night’s dish. This was left to simmer for another half an hour.

Served! You can see how chunky yet hands-free it turned out, which is just the way we like it.

Since I made a pot big enough to serve a large dinner party, I ended up freezing 4 bags worth of the stuff for future meals. I’m a big fan of frozen soup — it’s so easy to heat up again and takes up minimal room in the freezer.

Taste analysis: While using fresh, intact seafood would have probably made for a fancier-looking stew, and might have added a different flavor on the whole, I was very happy with the results of my canned/frozen version. This is the second time I’ve made it this way and my guests are always impressed with the restaurant-quality of it. It’s warm, filling, mildly spicy and packed to the brim with seafoody goodness. I actually prefer it to some the other stews I’ve paid for, since a lot of restaurants seem to feel the need to go overboard with the hot spices. I like that herbs are given more emphasis in this recipe, giving your mouth a chance to deal with the other elements without being burned silly.

Convenience analysis: I don’t think I’ll ever chop another onion or garlic clove again if I can help it. While the texture of the fresh stuff might matter in some recipes, I don’t think it makes as much of a difference in something like this, where everything is stewed together for so long that it is falling apart anyway. Similarly, the canned and frozen seafoods were much easier to find at my local markets and could be stored for a much longer time than the fresh versions, giving me the option of stocking them for future recipes without fearing they’ll go off. Since the closest place with fresh seafood I trust is about a half hour drive, it also cuts back on gas and time.

Financial analysis: Obviously, if gas and time weren’t an issue already, the price of typical fresh seafood would be. We live in suburbia. As close as we might be to the beach, we’re still paying more than we would be if there was a local fish stall to buy from. By using what I did and splurging only on specific items, I make it possible to afford this dish more than one or twice a year. Given that a whole pot is about 8-10 servings’ worth, each serving has more variety and content than would be found in a restaurant’s bowl, and a typical bowl goes for anywhere from $20-40 at said restaurants? I see no wrong here at all.

At any rate, rich dairy products are especially hard to avoid when you have a fondness for cream-based desserts. Entirely soy-based ice creams tend to have a bit of a beany aftertaste and the only brand of Lactaid ice cream available in our area is plain vanilla. Born out of all this dietary adversity is my ongoing quest for the perfect lactose-free ice cream recipe. I don’t claim to have found it yet, but I have had quite a few trials that ended up as qualified successes. One of which I will talk about now.

The usual suspects. I decided to go for chocolate this time, since I didn’t have any handy fruit around and we had plenty of cocoa left over from my holiday baking bonanza. I’ve read through a lot of homemade ice cream recipes, but can’t say that this follows anything in particular. It’s in the same family, surely, but that’s about all I’m willing to commit to.

I started by scalding a cup of Lactaid milk and dissolving 1 packet of gelatin in it, to give the finished product some stability. I’ve made earlier batches without gelatin, which tended to melt much faster and turn liquid after being out of the fridge for a bit. I usually prefer agar because it’s what my mother always used in her cooking, but it’s not as readily available in most Western-style supermarkets. Next, half a cup of cocoa powder went in to be dissolved. I tend to prefer powder over solid chocolate because a lot of the solids have odd waxes that can give the boy a stomachache. I might try melting down a higher-end chocolate next time, though, for reasons I’ll expand upon later.

Whisked mixture until smooth. Took a quick taste-test and found that it was on the bitter side. Added 2/3 cup of sugar to sweeten it up, and let it all melt together completely.

The chocolate mix then got tossed in the blender along with 6 oz. (1 small tub) of plain greek yogurt, for its live cultures, dairy creaminess and an extra bit of tanginess. 2 squirts of chocolate syrup were added, mostly because I had it around and don’t believe one can ever have enough chocolate. It all got blended on a fairly low setting.

Finally, 8 oz. (one tub) of Cool Whip went in to lend its unique creaminess to the mix. This would be the space normally reserved for heavy cream of some sort. Despite the scorn heaped upon Cool Whip by would-be food snobs, it’s remarkably low in calories (25 cal per 9 grams) and delightfully lactose-free. It wouldn’t be such a popular and enduring artificial topping if it didn’t have some appeal, eh? I made the mistake this time of just popping it in the blender and mixing up the whole thing like a giant smoothie. In retrospect, I probably should have folded chocolate mixture into the Cool Whip in a large mixing bowl, to preserve the airy texture. I’ll be doing this next time.

Resulting mixture went into the freezer for a few hours to harden. Yes, I might have poked at it a few times to see how it was coming along

When solid enough, it scoops like a gelato, rather dense but still very creamy. I shaved a few curls of chocolate over the serving for garnish. If allowed to thaw, it becomes a very decent chocolate pudding.

Taste analysis: I mentioned earlier that this was a qualified success. The reason for the qualification is because I believe it would have turned out better if I had used better ingredients. I happened to have Hershey’s products on hand, so I used them, but I would have probably been happier with a richer chocolate powder (possibly Ghirardelli or the like). A melted-down bar of good wax-free chocolate — a hunk of Belgian, or one of the many bars we brought back from Finland — would probably have worked, too. It would have probably also eliminated or lessened the need for additional sugar and syrup, which led to a strangely high-pitched sweetness in this particular end product. It wasn’t unpleasant, but it did rather taste like some of the cheaper ice creams that I’ve had as a child. It hits your palate at the wrong level for chocolate, and you can’t help noticing that artificiality. I’m certain this is more the fault of the chocolate than the Cool Whip because I’ve used the whip before to make a wonderful strawberry sorbetto that had no cloying taste whatsoever. The strange part? It only feels weirdly sweet in ice cream form. When thawed into pudding, it tastes amazingly similar to the very rich Belgian chocolate pudding that I’ve bought at Trader Joes… pretty impressive considering its low dairy content.

Texture analysis: I don’t have an ice cream machine, nor do I particularly feel the need to get one since my kitchen is already pretty cluttered. I also enjoy the denser iced creams, like gelatos and sorbettos, so the freeze-and-scoop method suits me pretty well. Those wanting a lighter product might do well to invest in an ice cream machine to inject more fluff into the finished product. As I mentioned earlier, though, I also suspect that if I had folded in the chocolate rather than blending the whip, I would have ended up with a fluffier product since the whip is very light to begin with. Future testing will probably confirm this.

Convenience analysis: Using mostly stuff that’s already in the kitchen or easily picked up at the grocer’s freezer. Minimal kitchen work involved, and a tasty result in hours which would have fooled most of my dinner guests. Not bad, not bad.

Financial analysis: This is iffy, since there’s nothing really similar on the market. Well, there’s the soy ice creams, which come in tiny tubs and are priced like the gourmet ice creams. So to that extent, this is a great success. As you can see I have a whole pan of the stuff, which would probably make two tubs worth at least. The ingredients are relatively cheap, even if I end up using the “good” chocolate. Doing a version out of fruit would also be a very nice alternative. Thumbs up all the way on this category.

PS. Why am I doing these food columns all of a sudden, you might be asking? A few reasons — 1) I’ve been cooking a lot more in the past year since I’ve moved into my own full-stocked kitchen. 2) I have a few friends (I’m looking at you, sassygurl) that I’ve been promising to help along in the culinary department for a while. 3) I need some blog entries and some “how-to” articles to put into my writing samples for some future employment. 4) I’ve missed writing

I went off of the Cooking For Engineers Gravlax recipe, since it seemed to be one of the simplest available while being close enough to traditional technique without required wooden weights and large drifts of snow. The cook for that page put up great pictures, but I wanted to take my own because I’m contrary that way

I started with some frozen Atlantic salmon filets from Costco, because I didn’t want to deal with the pre-freezing process of using fresh fish. I ended up going with farmed Atlantic for its higher fat content.Ideally, I should have looked for a nice slab of salmon belly, but I wasn’t going to find that outside of a genuine downtown fish market. Besides, my goal here was accessibility — I want to be able to reproduce the results on short notice, without having to drive across county lines.

Note the light color — while it gets a bit pinker after being thawed, it’s not by much. The fat veins in this piece are also nicely visible. It should be noted that this was my third try, and the first successful one. Earlier, I had a not-so great run using leaner wild sockeye filets which ended up being hard as salmon jerky after a day. This is what prompted me to go for a fattier fish and to cure it for a shorter period than recommended in the recipe.

I based my brine mix off of the site, with a few minor tweaks, making enough for a pound of fish. Two tablespoons kosher salt — I had tried regular iodized table salt on earlier runs and felt it left a weird chemical aftertaste, which is probably the main reason the page suggests kosher, despite almost nobody in the Nordic countries being Jewish. Two heaping tablespoons of white sugar — not brown, since it turns molasses-y, and outweighing the salt by a bit because I found this recipe a bit on the salty side during my last try. Too much salt also sucks the moisture out of the fish that much faster, leaving you with the rock-hard wedge I mentioned earlier. Two teaspons of freshly ground black pepper. Two heaping tablespoons of dried dill — the site calls for sprigs of fresh dill, but it never seems to be available in the markets I frequent. Not much of a SoCal thing, I guess — maybe I should try cilantro next time, for kicks? Anyway, two tablespoons of dried dill would equal a pretty big mound of fresh dill and it’d have enough of a chance to marinate in the juices leaking from the fish to leave its mark. The only downside I could see was that I’d have to wash off a lot more extraneous matter, but that’s a small price to pay for the convenience and accessibility factor.

I sprinkled about 1/3 of the brine on the plastic wrap, then lay down the first filet, following with another layer of brine, then the second filet. Topped with the rest of the mixture. Since I was using skinless filets, I figured it’d be nice to coat everything thoroughly. The site only has it on one side since it’s a piece with skin still attached.

The filet sandwich was securely wrapped in plastic, then rewrapped in a second layer to keep things tightly held inside.

I then took the step of tossing it into a freezer bag, for protection against the inevitable juice leakage. The picture on the left is before, the picture on the right is 6.5 hours later. With this rapid rate of fluid loss, you can see why my last experiment (where I left it in the fridge for two days) ended up in a very hard chunk of fish. Wanting a softer texture, I took it out relatively early. I might try it again for 12 hours and see the difference, but I will probably never go the full three days recommended on the page.

The finished filet, rinsed off in cold water and patted dry with paper towels. Notice how much darker the flesh is, after just a bit of curing.

A few initial slices, which were approved by the boy as being “pretty much like the stuff at home”. Score!

Taste analysis: Buttery, leaning definitely towards the sashimi spectrum in softness, but still with that unmistakably cured bit of resilience. The fresh dill flavor did manage to infuse the whole cut, and adding the extra sugar helped balance out the crazy saltiness of before. You can actually taste the fish. I could definitely eat this stuff plain and be happy.

Convenience analysis: I did have to go out and buy a box of kosher salt, but that will probably last me for a year. Sugar and dried dill were already in the pantry. Grinding the pepper myself to get the full measure I needed took some time, but it smells so much better than the pre-ground sort that I don’t mind. The big bag of filets I got will give us at least another month’s worth if I don’t use it in other recipes. Altogether, a very easy recipe with simple, attainable ingredients.

Financial anaylsis: I now have two full filets of this stuff, which ends up being about two large packets worth at the store. Around $25-30 retail, for a fraction of the cost. Easy on the pocketbook, too

PS. On a completely different but still Nordic fish-related note… Yes, for those of you that wondered, I have tried lutfisk (lipeäkala in Finnish). And no, I don’t think it deserves all the disgust people seem to heap on it. A bit bland, yes, but the consistency was rather enjoyable. Reminded me of scallops. Might try to make some on my own one day for the heck of it. Then again, remember that the only people to beat East Asians in willingness to eat anything are possibly the French…

A new Fresh and Easy just opened across the street and I might be slightly excited about the convenience with which I can now run out to pick up random ingredients for my culinary experiments. Which, granted, don’t always turn out quite the way I’d expect, but luckily the boy has a strong stomach. Hee.

Our cat. Wants to be a model.

I have no other words. Just.