Pizza problems pissing me off

(Alright, alliteration overload night)
Recipe for great gourmet pizza (at least has been so far??):
Get cheap cheese pizza - 2 bucks a pie
Is perfect base for a perfect pie, wonder why?
One, it's low and cheap on cheese, skimpy on sauce;
Cripsy crust that's not flowing with fat;
Offers one ready-to-craft pizza pie
Without the time or hassle to do the dough from scratch
So, I (used to??) take the fine frozen pie,
Add some siracha saucem spice it up
Thin tomato slices, slender onion longs,
Green peppers, pineapple pieces,
Parmesan cheese, crushed pepper flakes,
Good quality shredded cheese: - cheddar, mozzarella, monterrey jack
In the oven, 400 Fahrenheit, fifteen minutes
Out and on the cooling rack for four-five minutes
Six slices serves three or two if you are too hungry
But Walmart wants me to staaaaaaahp!
The cheap cheese pizza - 2 bucks a pie was gone...
Yanked off their freezer (forever??) Or short term stock shortage???
Pizza, pray please come back,
Hope to see you stocked sometime soon.

The F Word...

One of the kids asked yesterday, "What's for Dinner??"

My smart-ass brain said, "The F Word"

I was smart enough to not let what my brain said convert to what came out of my mouth. I just kept quite and chuckled on the inside. My right brain, however, continued to brag to my left brain about the smartassedness of that unsaid comment.

Fast forward to today, I was browsing Reddit when I bumped into Gordon Ramsay's AMA. It was quite an interesting read. I admire that guy and reading his AMA managed to bump up my admiration for him by a few notches. (AMA = Ask Me Anything = Reddit's way of having folks come and answer questions asked live by fellow redditors)

It was while reading his AMA, that I found that The F Word is a cooking show in UK hosted by Gordon Ramsay and has been going on for almost 10 years now. My right brain was hurt and my left made fun of the right for rest of the day for yesterday's unoriginal comment.

Edit: (removed link...search it yourself if you wanna watch!) PG13 Youtube video of "Gordon talking dirty" (bumped into it while reading his AMA). Hahaha...some people put their editing skills to good use!

A knife for everything, everything for a knife...

I love my knives...but I feel knives are some of the most underrated and unappreciated tools in most households. Figured I'll share my thoughts on what might be some good set of knives to get.

My most favorite of knives by far has been the Victorinox 8" Chef's Knife. I bought this knife over 6 years back and I still continue to use it multiple times a day. It's still priced very reasonably on Amazon - Around $35. I checked my order from Sept 2012 and I paid around $23 for it (whoa - 50% inflation!).

One might say - "$35??? I can buy a 12 piece knife set with wooden block to store them for that money!!!"

While someone else might say - "$35 for a chef's knife??? That's nothing compared to my $219 Shun Ken Onion chef's knife!!"

Some day when I have enough money to burn, I want to buy the Shun Ken Onion. But before that I have quite a few things to burn money on - camera, lens, speakers, you get the drift.

Back to knives, this Victorinox 8" Chef's Knife is really good for your everyday slicing, chopping, etc. It is very well balanced and has a solid feel to it. It's heavy but not too heavy. It was kinda big for the wifey, so I had bought her a smaller version of it - the 6 inch chef's knife but I was not at all happy with it. It  is too light and not nearly as sturdy as the 8" version.

I also bought the Victorinox 7" Santoku knife in 2011 - around 4 years ago. This is my second most frequently used knife and it's light enough for wifey to use as well. She uses it regularly but it's too light for my preference. It's still a good knife though - sharp, shaped well for day-to-day cuts and the granton edge helps prevent the veggies from sticking to the knife while slicing.

These are not serrated knives that most of us in India are used to. Serrated knives don't need sharpening and cannot be sharpened properly. If you have seen those Informercials of "NEVER NEEDS SHARPENING" knives - those are your serrated knives. They may be good for slicing 0.0004mm thick tomato slices but they are not fast enough or smooth enough for your day-to-day chopping and slicing (how often do you need to have a 0.0004mm thin tomato slice, eh?)

These are straight edged knives and these need to be sharpened quite frequently. I sharpen my Chef's knife almost every day before I start using it. I am made fun of at times when I do it - "Do you really need to sharpen it everyday???" - but I still do...and I think it's important to do so.

I don't use a sharpening/honing steel for my sharpening but a simple AccuSharp 001 Knife Sharpener (again from Amazon). Have had for 5 years now, had paid 5 bucks for it but is still going strong. I just ordered a new sharpener earlier today - KitchenIQ 2 stage knife sharpener - $6 on Amazon.com and it should be arriving on Sunday (Yeah Sunday! Amazon delivers on Sunday now - Ordered Friday night, should be in my hands Sunday night - how cool is that!!!).

Happy knifing. May your edge be true and your blade sharp, forever!

(By the way, new series - Gyaan)

Dusk...

Dusk
Driving Home
From the Park
One hand on the Wheel
Other on the Phone
One click Pic
Illegal in some States
Illegal in Mine
Whatever

Friday night dinner...

Friday nights are usually pizza nights. Sometimes, do get a bit adventurous.

It was half a pizza (cheap frozen + spinach, onion, green peppers and crushed red peppers), baked fingerling potatoes (not pictured - sliced in 4, Parmesan cheese, red pepper flakes, Italian seasoning, olive oil, salt - in oven for 20 mins at 425 F) and asparagus (minced garlic, crushed black pepper, olive oil, salt, lemon - in the oven for 8-10 mins at 425 F).

Yummmm...

Boston Snow

Had an opportunity to visit Boston a couple of months back. Among other memories, also had a fond encounter with beautiful fresh snow after a long time, as I wandered through downtown Boston in the middle of the night...

(Yep...I made my own snowman!)

I love my iPhone and it has been my primary camera for a while now. 90% of the pics I click these days are with my dear beloved iPhone. Thank you Mr. Jobs. RIP.

Panoramic Boston snow, just for grins..

The lady in red...

Been wanting to write about this for a few days but never got to it...but better now than never.

So, the other day, I was at Publix on my way home from work to pick up a few things. Publix is one of my favorite places to shop. I love their customer service, the cleanliness, the short line and oh yeah their bakery - they make some of the best cakes and breads around....but I digress.

So, I was at Publix to pickup a few things we had run out of. It was supposed to be a quick pit-stop - thing 1, thing 2, thing 3, ring, ring, out. While I was zipping through the aisles, I couldn't help but notice this lady - short, athletic, fair, dark dress and had a bright red lipstick on. For some reason, that red lipstick stood out but at the same time blended perfectly with the rest of her features.

I passed her once in aisle one as I picked up thing 1, when I noticed her for the first time. Then, couple of aisle down, we crossed again. But something weird happened....

"That red lipstick looks really good on you..." (+/- a couple more mumbles")

"Why, thank you very much!" (With a nice big smile)

I then proceeded to pick up my thing2, thing3, ring, ring, and continued on my home and never saw her again.

Was pretty surprised at the spontaneity though. Made me think:

- Liked something, complimented someone, with no strings attached.
- Went off-pattern from my day-to-day introverted lifestyle
- Probably made her day a few points better with my compliment
- Didn't come off as flirting, or getting slapped, or banned from Publix forever (Cakes!!!)

Also made me wonder:
- Do we compliment each other enough? Folks around us? Folks we know? Folks we don't?
- Why don't we?
- Would I like to get a compliment out of the blue from someone I know? from someone I don't?
- Why is it always: "GM, How are you", "I'm good, how are you?". Do we ever expect to hear how someone's actually doing? Do we ever share anything other than "I'm good" when anyone asks us how we are?

While I was wondering all this, I also wondered, Why did I stop posting on my blog? Thought of resurrecting it. It's been around a couple of weeks since this incident and the wonderings, and here I am today, posting on my blog after many months.

Do I really need another lady in red for my next post is yet to be seen!