Elegant Simplicity

Morning earworm: The Sound of Muzak, Porcupine Tree - a great song, though painfully true.



Much time both yesterday and this morning pondering further gear issues; I'll spare you the details, as your heads are probably still spinning from yesterday's post - lol. Let's just say that a potential trainwreck had appeared, and during the wee hours a simple and elegant solution presented itself, which means yet another week spent rewiring my looping rig. So it goes. I'm sure I've mentioned elsewhere that I secretly have as much fun doing this as I do playing.

Equally elegant and simple: last night's dinner. Specifically, I think I have finally mastered gravy. I have also mentioned elsewhere my curious history, in that I mostly learned to cook from watching tv, which has produced somewhat lopsided results - I can do tea-smoked duck legs and mushroom-orzo ragout in my sleep, but simple stuff like salads are a complete mystery to me. Up until now, gravies have fallen into the latter category. I have a functional knowledge of the process, but have only just now gotten the ratio / recipe right - 2 Tbsp each butter and flour for the roux to 1½ cups of stock, beef in this case. And seasoning, of course; something of a secret weapon there is that I have gotten wonderful results using my garlicky ancho chile spice rub, of all things. Combined with the steamed-and-riced method for mashed potatoes, I had a side dish that nearly overshadowed the venison meatloaf, it was so good.

Now, I am faced with what to do tonight. After some consideration, I am leaning toward buffalo shrimp, though it may involve making a fresh batch of mojo de ajo. It doesn't necessarily, but I need to anyway, and it does make it even better :D

Discard the superfluous.