Today's Gripe: Not-So Miraculous Gadgets

Ok, I'm sure you're already nodding your head and have your own tales of appliance-related woe, but I'm in the dumps. I tried to chop an onion with my beloved immersion blender, using the miniature food processing attachment. It looks just like a mini food processor. It should work just like a mini food processor.

It does not.

I ended up with some slushy onion mush and several slices of unchopped onion that were the same size as when I put them into the machine.

Damn!

Today's Gripe: New Year's Resolution

After two weeks of indulging in lots of creamy, cheesy, heavy, rich foods, I'm feeling logy. I'm not getting on the scale because I'm sure I won't like the result. My resolution for 2009 is to eat less cheese -- in fact, to eat less dairy altogether, and to eat more vegetables. So in the coming posts, you'll be seeing more vegetable dishes and far fewer recipes calling for cream, parmesan, or other cheese. Boo hoo.

Gripe of the Day: Stomach Viruses

It started with my daughter. Soon after we put her to bed on Wednesday night, she began throwing up. She continued being sick just about every 90 minutes until about 4am. I did four loads of laundry that night and got about 2 hours of sleep. My husband stayed home with her the next day while I went to work (and barely made it through the day, even with 5 large cups of coffee). That night I started barfing, my husband took care of the baby, who was also barfing, and we all were exhausted and miserable. Finally, on Friday morning, my husband succumbed to this virus also and now we're ALL sick.

On the bright side, I might lose a couple of pounds from not eating.

Today's Gripe: Fat

My mother always said, "never trust a skinny cook."

Unfortunately, she never said anything about cooking and tasting and eating so much you feel all your favorite jeans getting tighter!

Damn. Maybe I will start investigating portion sizing, and include some info about that in future recipes. I'm sure I'm not the only person who eats a bit more than she should while cooking something yummy.

Today's Gripe: Salmonella

As I write this, my husband is lying in bed half-convinced that he's dying. It's 2:25 AM and he's been extremely sick to his stomach for the past 4 hours. I've been awake too, helping him to and from the bathroom, bringing him ice chips, water, cleaning up a broken glass, bringing more water in a plastic cup, and now covering him in blankets to ease the chill he's feeling. I, on the other hand, am still feeling summer's last heat, and am a bit sweaty.

All this thanks to a lovely brunch this morning consisting of eggs Benedict. We went to a French bistro in Carroll Gardens this morning, a place that is usually so packed there's no point in trying to get a table unless you've got an hour to kill on the sidewalk. Matt had been wanting to go to this place for a while, and as we had secured a babysitter, he took me on a daytime date. Trying to watch my waist (although my mother always said never to trust a skinny cook), I ordered a Salade Nicoise. The salad was quite good and I'm sure a version of it will appear on this blog soon. But Matt ordered eggs Benedict, usually my favorite breakfast dish.

It was one of the more awe-inspiring and delicious plates of eggs Benedict I've ever tasted -- and perhaps I'm not sick because I had only one small bite. The eggs were just perfectly poached: soft, yielding whites and a hot, runny yolk that broke over the underlying ham and English muffin like spilled sunshine. The Hollandaise sauce was clearly homemade; it was tangy, creamy, and rich, the perfect foil for the yeasty muffin and delicate egg white. Delightful. Heaven on a plate.

But now I find myself Googling salmonella symptoms and pasteurized eggs. Ugh. But I guess de-germed eggs are the only solution to this awful affliction, unless we want to avoid Hollandaise and soft eggs for the rest of our lives. The horror!