The vainest man you'll ever meet

But seriously, though, that is a sharp tie on me, right? A Rixon Groove purchase. If only the iPhone took photos of better resolution.







Sorry, though, Conrad has me all sewn up. Try to get over your disappointment.

;-)

celebration dinner: Topolobampo

Two nights ago we celebrated. Conrad and I took Bob, my former department head, to a restaurant we all rather like to celebrate my achievement of tenure this year and to give Bob special thanks for his good mentorship and guidance. Plus, he's just plain good company over food and wine.

Topolobampo was our choice. Bob has long been a regular in Frontera Grill with forays over to the fine dining room, so it's a nice kick to see him interact so well with so many of the folks there. Topolobampo is a handsome, warm room, and we had an great table tucked in a corner near the kitchen with views of all the other diners. Well, Bob had the views, as guest of honour. Conrad had some, too. Me? I got to look in at the remarkably small kitchen, something I enjoyed very greatly.

A caveat here: we decided we didn't want to photograph the meal (a decision we nullified by the end). We wanted to enjoy dinner. We did. Rest assured, we did.

We started out with a cocktail each while deliberating at length over the menu. Eventually we had another cocktail, which is unusual and ambitious for us. Mine were these seasonal apple cocktails - not at all sweet, in fact. The little twist was a hint of cinnamon salt to kick up the flavour. Really good.

Anyway, we talked over the food with our waitress and with Jill, the sommelier (we love her, I can't say it enough - we had a bottle of wine for her we brought back from BC because it's fun to share these things along). Ultimately, we decided we would each have an item from the raw bar (seafood), an appetizer, and an entree. I took control of the wine and ordered a half bottle of Champagne to start with, then a New Zealand red for after that. so, a half bottle of wine each, if you think of it. On top of the cocktails. Still with me?

Anyway, Conrad asked for a specific raw bar item, and a specific entree, and every other choice we left up to staff. Surprise us, make it go with the wine. And that was that. Fun to do - they liked the challenge of it.

Jill brought the Champagne. The food began.

Conrad had a trio of ceviche: Ceviche Fronterizo (lime-marinated Hawaiian blue marlin with tomatoes, olives, cilantro, jcama and green chile); Ceviche Yucateco (steamed organic shrimp and calamari tossed with lime, orange, habanero, avocado, jcama and cilantro); Ceviche de Atun "Chamoy" (sashimi-quality Hawaiian ahi tuna tossed with crunchy jicama and tangy, fruity, spicy red chile-apricot chamoy salsa; almond crunch).

Bob ended up with smoked trout (I wish I had a better description, sorry).

I had "Tostadas" de Atun y Erizo – Hawaiian ahi tuna carpaccio and fresh Maine sea urchin with crispy tortillas, fresh lime and roasted garlic mojo. Fried leeks, avocado, sungold tomato.

Next course was a surprise to us all. Jill gifted us with a glass of wine paired with each - a different wine for each of us. Lovely. So add to the tally of wine! The food:

I had Tacos de Huitlacoche, Caldo de Jitomate – Crispy rolled tacos filled with Three Sister's Garden huitlacoche (corn mushroom). Roasted tomato broth, crunchy pickled vegetables, avocado, Bayless Garden microgreens.

Bob had Atun de Mole Negro – seared Hawaiian ahi tuna in Oaxacan black mole with plantain-filled tamal, grilled nopal salad, roasted knob onions, three nut crunch.

Conrad had Mollejas de Ternera, Mole Verde – "Popcorn" sweetbreads with green pumpkinseed mole. Roasted local turnip, fried plantain, Bayless Garden microgreens.

For dinner we had the bottle of the Black Ridge Pinot Noir, a Central Otago wine (really super). The food:

Conrad had scallops, a dish I cannot find a full description of - my apologies again.

Bob had Mole de Olla – Rich, red chile-and-epazote broth with 72-hour-braised Tallgrass short rib. Corn masa dumplings (chochoyotes), xoconostle (sour prickly pear) green peas, chayote.

I had Cochinita Pibil – overnight-braised Maple Creek Farm suckling pig "pibil" with crispy pig's foot, sour orange jellies, habanero-pickled onions, sunchoke pudding.

I came back from the bathroom after dinner and saw that we had three glasses of a dessert wine at the table, followed by a special dessert platter. These were compliments of Jill as well. She later came and sat and chatted a bit with us while Bob had a liqueur and I had a decaf cafe de olla.

4 hours all told. Lots of wine and food. We were treated so very well, is it any wonder we love going there? The surprises were surprising - really, so many things on that menu appealed to me, but it was good that I got things I might not have thought to order (the tuna to start, the tacos). The others agreed.

Favourites? I liked my cocktails a lot. I loved my tuna carpaccio - it left a real burn in my mouth in a good way. I liked my tacos, definitely, but thought Bob's black mole was even better and thought that Conrad's sweetbreads were swoon-worthy. Loved them immensely. My pork was awesome. The pork and the sauce went soooooo well with the wine, and the serving was a good size.

I wish I could remember the dessert details exactly - there were three on the platter, and I had had a comfortable amount to drink by that point. What sticks with me was the coconut sorbet - I think it was coconut. It tasted (and I mean this in a very good way, bizarre as it sounds) like white jelly beans.

So, a great night, and small wonder I didn't have breakfast the next morning!

Thanks, then, to Bob for his good mentorship, and to Jill and Jessica and everyone at Topolobampo who created yet another very fine evening for us.

easy, satisfying day in the kitchen

I'm at the tail end of a good Saturday with some nice work in the kitchen.

No, work is too much. This wasn't a hard day, a difficult day, in any way. I made some things, I was pleased with them, and all of them took relatively little effort.

(and once again excuse the rather poor quality of iPhone photos if you view them in larger size)

First "project": scones. Part of my joking Scones for Smelts program. Just a nice treat for various friends on the team when I see them at Saturday AM practice. Two batches, with a few kept for me and Conrad.
The first ones were simply currant scones. The second batch were dried sour cherry (from the awesome Lily's of Traunik store) and chopped walnuts. I think they turned out well.

After practice, before I did some housecleaning, I made some mixed spiced nuts. A simple and very good, reliable recipe from the Union Square Cafe cookbook - rosemary is the twist that makes them so appealing, I think. We'll have these to snack on, including when Conrad heads out of town in a handful of days.

Dinner tonight? I'm rather pleased with it. Two Saturdays in a row of producing nice meals. A little thought works. Here's what I did:

• Marinated two pieces of halibut in fino sherry with olive oil, lemon zest, pepper, fennel seed, coarse salt, and saffron. Baked it at 450 degrees.
• Lightly caramelized parsnip with some shallot, seasoned it with salt, pepper, and thyme, then cooked it tender-soft in chicken broth. Pureed it and strained it.
• Blanched Brussels sprouts. Sauteed chopped thick-slab bacon, removed most of the rendered fat, added chopped onion. Mixed in the Brussels sprouts and set it all to bake in a small tin at 450 degrees as well.

All of this plated up nicely. We dined at the kitchen table,
and sipped some Conundrum white wine, a favourite.

And now Conrad has gone back to do some work he must get done in the days ahead. A lovely dinner, and a fine day all around in the kitchen for me, however. I feel a little inspired to perhaps tackle cookies tomorrow!

family celebration

Another overdue post from the UP trip of earlier this month, this one to show off the family a little and spread some good cheer. You see, Conrad's birthday fell a few days after our trip up there, and so we had a get together with pizza, salad, and Conrad's cake.

Yes, Conrad's cake. I love this: Conrad, like me, had a special birthday cake while growing up. In my case, it was a chocolate-flavoured mayonnaise cake with green, mint-flavoured frosting. For Conrad, his Mom makes a white layer cake generous frosted with a chocolate fudge frosting.
And, because Hallowe'en is near, some seasonal candies for decoration.

Really, how can you not love it? And love it we did. We shared dinner in Conrad's Mom's kitchen. Karen was there (Terry was laid up with a dreadful cold). Justin and Tonna, too. Dan, Conrad's other nephew, was at a wedding that evening with his girlfriend, so no cake for him. Happily, he recently had a birthday and got his own special cake from Conrad's Mom.

After such a lovely evening, then, you'd think I'd let the birthday boy have a good night of rest. Sure. Mostly. Until around 7ish when I stuck the phone camera in his face and caught a little smile crossing his face. Poor guy, stuck with a morning person like me. Ah well. More cake makes everything better!

antiques/junk?

It's a gay stereotype, isn't it, that we all like antiques? That we comb the shops of smalltown America (and Canada) looking for exquisite pieces at bargain prices.

I must be a bad gay.

I mean, add in that I really couldn't care less about all the diva icons I'm supposed to care about as a gay man, and toss in a whole slew of other "gay" things that have as little relevance to me imaginable, and I'm not doing too well. Heck, I even read Sports Illustrated.

So how is it that I find myself a few times a year up in the UP, browsing through antique shops in small towns there?

Well, credit the Conrad and the family with this one. Conrad - I think this may be well known by now - has long collected vintage Fiestaware,
and his sister is an extremely knowledgeable estate sales manager and dealer in antiques. So I go along, and I actually enjoy the hunt for the Fiestaware (and American Modern pieces by Russel Wright - perfect for the Vancouver condo). The thrill of the chase. That's what I go for.

Once in a while, though, I just have to shake my head at some of the things in these stores. Some examples from out recent trip up to the UP, browsing in Ishpeming
and Negaunee:

Snowshoes! Of course! It's the UP - far far north. They need these for going out and shooting things, right? ;-)

Piggy banks. I'd never buy this, but it gave me a great laugh when I entered a room of the store and came face to face with it.

Ties. Antique ties? Seriously? Oh my. If there's one thing I would be very disinclined to purchase at an antique shop, it's clothing. And you know, for all that I said I'm not gay enough, I can tell that most of the ones here are not as fabulous as they should be!

Chairs. Piled up all higgledy-piggledy in a basement, or so it felt. At this point, I start thinking "junk" instead of "antique". Happily, there's always more fun discoveries in another shop.

Autumn vegetarian dinner

You know, a challenge in the kitchen can be fun. No, really. I don't mean some sort of horrid, demeaning Quickfire Challenge thrown at me, no. Instead, I like the notion of having some sort of restrictions or parameters tossed my way and going ahead in respect to them.

This time, it was vegetarian cooking.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, you say. Big whoop. Lots of vegetarians out there. And I agree. But Conrad and I are not vegetarian, and it's second nature for me to reach for chicken stock (to name one thing) to get some good food going. A little bacon to enhance that? You get the idea. Worse: given Conrad's need to regulate his starches, I couldn't do a pasta or risotto and thereby take an easy way out. I didn't eliminate carbs, but they were in check.

Deborah and Harry came for dinner, and a nice dinner it was. Conrad and I had all the clean up/set up well in hand by the time they arrived, so that started the night off for us on a good note. Table set, flowers out.

All was ready.

First up, with a bottle of a New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc, was a bowl of a white bean puree, plus some nuts, caperberries, and buttered toasted bread slices. Simple.

First course: empanadas.

Or quesadillas, I guess - perhaps I need to re-consult the Rick Bayless cookbook I took the dough recipe from. I filled the little turnovers with roasted trumpet mushrooms, sauteed with white onion, thyme, and chopped reconstituted New Mexico red chile, and mixed with grated chihuahua cheese. Fried them up, set them atop a roasted tomatillo sauce and some sour cream atop. Despite my normal aversion to mushrooms, these were rather good.

Round two (three?): salad. Water cress with roasted grapes glazed with sherry vinegar, toasted pistachios, and manchego cheese. Once again, a simple course, but decent. The grapes are my new obsession.


The "main course": savoury pumpkin souffle.
I fried sage leaves and used them for garnish along with some thin slices of Parmesan.

All in all, I'm quite pleased with the meal. Some new recipes, for starters. Tasty food. Decent plating. Easy clean up. Can't ask for more than those, not for a dinner party, and not with such enjoyable guests. Bonus: having guests means we cleaned up the place a bit. Always nice.

Also, it must be said, little is hotter than a husband who does my dishes on the rare occasion I ask him to. ROWR!

Autumn foliage

We had feared that by the time we got up to the UP last weekend, the early snow (no trace of it by the time we got there save for some oh-so-light flurries on the late Friday night drive) and the late date would mean that we'd have missed the lovely fall colours of the Upper Peninsula.

Happily, it was far from that case.

Saturday the weather wasn't as cooperative as we'd like, but in the patches of sun that hit Escanaba and the UP, we could see some fiery hues. Quite spectacular, often in the sudden appearance of a flame-red tree here or there.

I didn't get that sort of autumn colour, growing up. Evergreens and yellow-leaved trees like birch and cottonwood predominate. Seldom was there a glowing orange or red.

I took this first photo on Conrad's Mom's block. Not a spectacular tree, but I feared I would see few that day. In fact, we really didn't take many photos that day - the weather didn't help, of course.

The drive back home through Wisconsin, however, is another thing. A lot of sunshine, and some patches and swathes of yellows, oranges, and reds. Gorgeous. Given an easy schedule, we took a leisurely detour by way of Plymouth, and just outside that pretty town we stopped and took a few shots.




Ah, Plymouth. Also looking autumnal, but I'm mighty curious if Antoinette here gets garlands of lights and holly at Christmas.

big ass radish

There is no other way to describe this beast of a root vegetable. Big. Ass. Radish. Grown by Conrad's niece, Tonna.



The family is a little daunted at the prospect of cutting into it and trying it out, I think...

Dutch treat

Ah, the fun of sleepless nights. Occasionally it happens, and I don't think the horribly mild, even warm, weather helps. I was in bed for about a half hour before giving up. No worries. I've been getting a lot of work done tonight.

Over 2.5 hours in, though, I realized, "Hey, I should catch up on blogging." Just me, I guess, putting the needs of the Library and its users first.

;-)

So let me launch a puffy, soft little entry out there. I actually feel a little drowsy now, and I may attempt going to bed soon. Before that, though, I present to you a treat, potato chips.

For most of my life, until perhaps 5-6 years or so ago, I thought that Old Dutch was a Canadian brand (and western Canadian at that!). Imagine my thrill, finding the brand on a UP trip, and imagine my chagrin at discovering they were USian. Darn it!

A late lunch in Negaunee last Saturday had us at the Midtown Bakery. Inside, I was delighted to see a display of chips that included my favourite flavour: dill pickle. Apparently, it's not a well-known flavour in the US, nor is another flavour I recall less fondly from childhood: ketchup. No sign of salt-and-vinegar - I guess some things remain resolutely Canadian.

Even before lunch arrived at the table, though, I'd opened up that bag and started on the salty, tangy chips. Heaven. Bliss. My own little Canadian treat in a part of the world that is pretty darn close, geographically, to the homeland anyway...

dinner at Hinterland

At the risk of sounding like a horrid snob (which, I'm aware, I frequently do anyway), we've found a really super restaurant in Green Bay, of all places.

Now then, before any Green Bayites flood my comments, let me state that my experience of the city has overwhelmingly been fleeting, stopping for coffee, barely seeing anything, passing through downtown to and from The UP and usually at times when the downtown is utterly dead. Hardly fair. But, that's what has shaped my impressions, and I'm happy that there is dining like at Hinterland Brewery to totally knock my notions down.

It's likely somewhere farther back on my blog, our first visit to Hinterland. A chance encounter, thanks in part to Opentable.com (are you using it yet? no? why not???). We liked it. We liked it again for a proper meal earlier this year. And a week ago we stopped in again.

I've said this elsewhere and before, but I love to see a menu where I am so torn because so many things jump out at me. I prevailed on Conrad to share small plates, and as a result, we had a good sampling of things.

Alas, it was a very dim room, and we had only the flashless iPhone for photos. As a result, you will never see how lovely and delicious our salads were, or how impressively crammed with crabmeat the crab cake was (and we loved the habanero aioli - ZING!). I did get a shot of the beef and mushroom meatballs,
though, as well as the plate of (mostly, I think) local cheeses.

Conrad was driving the rest of the way, so he had water. I had a glass of a richly fragrant wine whose name now escapes me. A Spanish Garnacha, though.

A good place. It's in a perfect spot to break up the drive up north, and we think that when we next head up there, on a likely snowy December weekend, we will stay in town so we can have a proper meal without driving the next day.