An ongoing discussion we have at our house, is the American vs Japanese attitude in regards to technology. The Japanese have a particulary voluble relationship to robots -  59 metre mecha angels of soulless kickass vs pneumatic strawberry packing robots for the tedious household chore of moving sushi from the to-go box onto the dinner plate.  Part of the love/hate, I'm sure, is that Japan is the foremost leader of robot technology in the world and hyping the industry is surely a civic duty, yet Japan also boasts an indivisible labor union that unites all workers against non-human job outsourcing.  On the other hand, America tends to vilify aliens over monsters, outerspace over inner ghosts, Mexicans over machines.  What that means, I have no idea.  But while the Japanese unkink cars that provide aerial views of rush hour traffic and mechanize kindergarten teacher efficiency factors, American hobbyists exercise their brain muscle masterminding mini mass destruction sumo warriors and nuclear waste cleanup modules.  Meanwhile, orders for robot arms are down in Detroit, and the housewife gizmo sector in Japan fares poorly.  All this! Tying vaguely into...

 "... Tuna was a subject where the national pride at the small country's technological strides was tempered with reactionary concerns about tradition and natural simplicity.  Nothing short of full human cloning could trigger as devastating a crisis of Japanese conscience about the value of science as the sight of a bluefin tuna artificially birthed in a lab." -- The Sushi Economy: Globalization and the Making of a Modern Delicacy (Sasha Issenberg)

I'm barely into 20% of the content according to ingame stats, but already Dragon Age feels epic.  The scope of this strategy rpg is massive, with a well devised story and game structure.  The two interact with each other quite well, interspersing game travel, combat, puzzles and cutscenes to move plot yet still allowing the freedom to travel willy nilly.  While the game uses a lot of rpg/tactical tropes familiar to Neverwinter, Baldur's Gate, Diablo etc, they've never been executed quite this cinematically or paced as well. At times the controls are finicky but certainly not worse than what came before and sometimes my load times suck.  As a whole however, Dragon Age is a really well crafted and worth the time finding all the Easter eggs. Here I am with my assembled crew. I'm so done with WoW collection quests. 


Machinarium is a great game to play for solving little puzzles and traversing a twee landsape of tinky tonk mechanical creatures. Sometimes the tasks get repetitive or drag a bit , but they are for the most part arranged very cleverly within the plotline. The music and atmosphere of this fairly modest game are the real treat, however.

Milkpail is something of a cheese mecca for me in the two states region (Northern and Southern Californias...)  They have walls of cold cases divided up by region and type, with an un-exaggeratedly vast, as well as deep, international selection of unusual and hard to find cheeses.  (Milkpail tops Whole Foods, Bi-rite, and dare I say it, the Cheeseboard Collective in Berkley in both variety and price, though the crowd in this tiny shop can be somewhat bumper to bumper.) You can find great wine, nuts, fruit, olives, salumi, pickles etc. to complete the ultimate cheese course.  Furthermore, the croissants in the freezer section are convenient confections, flaky, buttery and so light they're interstellar.

Clockwise from top left:  Jean Grogne, St. Agur, Boorenkaas Gouda, Mimolette demi Vieille

Fork and Bottle describes the Jean Grogne as, "Creamy and rich. Bloomy rind. Mushroomy but delicate  with a sight bitterness on the finish." A cow's milk triple crème by French cheesemaker and affineur, Robert Rouzaire.

The French St. Agur Blue is not as sharp or salty as an English blue and meets halfway with a washed rind's creamy soft texture. I like the funkiness, gentler blue kick, and lack of salt of this double creme from Monts du Velay cow's milk.

Our Boerenkaas Dutch Gouda is 3 year aged, cow's milk, farmer's cheese.  A hard hunk of lightly caramelized, grassy raw milk flavor with a complex yet mild taste.  From Slashfood: "The paste color is a deep yellowish-brown, and its aroma has notes of hazelnut and caramel with some meaty and cellar notes."

Mimolette demi Vieille just means Mimolette of 6 months age.  The orange comes from annato or achiote, which farmers of Lille, France add to cow's milk to make this goldeny cheese with a cantaloup exterior.  The hard texture and fruity-sweet, salty flavor isn't my favorite, but we got some so the SO could taste it because he found the color so mesmerizing. 

Kin Dza Dza takes a Russian bent on the dark comedic satire, making the most of post-war Soviet social oppression and dissent in a really surprising way, by turning it into great science fiction.  Released a year after Terry Gilliam's Brazil, which is gleefully grotesque and whimsical by turn, Kin Dza Dza maintains a bleak and creaky attitude, the stoic characters slowly unpacking a cultural farce that may not be as foreign as it seems, while journeying into a scoured landscape of industrial ghost towns.  The production is at times budget, yet the directing rationale is always endearing, and the mood recalls some of the resigned spareness and ingenuity  of the sci-fi russian greats if not the elegance. Directed by Georgi Daneliya and scored by Giya Kancheli.

See Kin Dza Dza for sure! Koo!

While not entirely essential, it is helpful to know the origins of this clip below, which comes from the film, Kotovsky (Котовский), made in 1942-1943 by Alexander Fainzimmer and scored by Sergei Prokofiev.  Kotovsky, the man 1881-1925, was a Russian revolutionary, a kind of militaristic Robin Hood who deserted the army, stole from the coffers of the Tsars and became a Bolshevik hero.  The song reminds me of something from my early piano books but I can't pin down the provenance.  I wouldn't be surprised if it was a folk classic, but that's all just conjecture.  Apparently, the early propaganda film, the song, and the Georgian title are familiar to a Russian audience, so the irony of Kin Dza Dza has made the film a beloved cult classic, and it's really easy to see why.

For some reason, I have a fondness for those shrink wrapped crumb cakes you sometimes find while in line at the gas station, the kind with super sweet topping that looks just like rabbit pellets.  Appetizing, I know....

I've plugged away, baking coffee cakes with various streusel, but I could never quite reproduce what I was searching for.  Then, the Cook's Illustrated folk struck again.  I was making the wrong thing all along.  Today, I followed the America's Test Kitchen dvd instructions and made a New York/German style kuchen, a real crumb-y cake.  The secret is to make a substantial "dough" topping, streusel-like but with a high flour content, and roll each crumb into individual balls.

I slipped half a thinly sliced apple at the 2/3 mark and baked the batter in a lightly oiled springform pan.  I had no trouble turning the cake out, although I am still second guessing my oven temps and the cake is slightly overbaked at the bottom.  I really need an oven thermometer! With a soft and fine moist cake and a crumb like the lunar terrain, I am finally a happy gal.  Best of all, the sugar doesn't overpower like a gas station dandy.

Cabbage, carrots and onions go in while the meat gets a rest.   From the leftover beef broth, I flip a hearty barley vegetable soup with fennel, greens, carrots and mushrooms.  Below is the second attempt with a longer 7 day corning and afternoon soak.



While it looks pretty good, the original 2.5 lb piece of point meat was from Schaub's and the quality of the dry aged beef really stood out in terms of texture and fork tenderness. Definitely spring for better meat.  Also, the larger hunk seemed to benefit from twice the simmering time (just make sure not to boil the roast to death in the process).  I found that 7 days of corning requires a much longer soak or else the meat is just overwhelmingly salt flavored rather than spiced.  I also like the meat cooked without much rinsing so that the excess spices give the soup a little love too.

Current rub recipe, adapted from the book:

1/4 cup fine grained kosher salt
1 tbsp black peppercorn, cracked
3/4 tsp coriander seed, whole

1/2 tsp brown mustard seed, whole 
3 bay leaves
3/4 tbsp thyme

1/2 tsp allspice
1/2 tsp California chili, or paprika

** optional

1 clove
2 juniper berries
1/2 tsp pink curing salt, for that candy color

Posole is great comfort food for cooling nights and gets better with age.

However... Big Surprise... The Cook's Illustrated version is a dud for me, crowded with surfeit of pork, as well as burdened with one-note flavor from a soup lacking any chili piquancy or smokiness. I followed the recipe to a T but 6 cups of water really doesn't seem to be enough for the quantity of meat when oven braising (and gets even worse when the hominy goes in).  While the meat was tender and the texture of the soup robust due to the long braised pork butt bone, the whole dish was just off.   I didn't end up returning quite a lot of meat to the pot and we used the excess for a very fine meal of tacos the next day.  We added the zucchini to alleviate some of the portliness of this dish and believe me it was still a bear to return to.



I may very well try the below recipe from Epicurious the next time around, which includes more herbs, garlic and water, less meat, less cooking time for the canned hominy, plus two kinds (I've seen other recipes also include arbol, puya or jalapeno) of whole chillies (and more of them!) made into a paste and pan sauteed to bring out the aroma. The Epicurious recipe is more fussy, but I have reason to believe the results will be better.  Throw in a couple chicken wings to leaven the pork broth or add several pork neck bones for a thicker soup. I don't think the recipe needs the sweetness of the tomato paste or tomato puree etc., but perhaps someone else will like a fresh plum tomato tossed in for good measure. 


Tie together mint and cilantro with kitchen string. Bring pork and water to a boil in a large pot, skimming froth, then reduce heat to a simmer. Add tied herbs, 20 garlic cloves, quartered onion, oregano, peppercorns, and 2 teaspoons salt and gently simmer, uncovered, until pork is very tender, about 2 hours. 

Strain broth through a large sieve into a large heatproof bowl. Return broth to pot. Discard mint and cilantro. Transfer cooked onion and garlic to a blender with 1 1/2 cups broth and purée until smooth. Add purée to broth. 

Meanwhile, slit chiles lengthwise, then stem and seed. Heat a large cast-iron skillet over medium heat until hot, then toast chiles in batches, opened flat, turning and pressing with tongs, until more pliable and slightly changed in color, about 30 seconds per batch. Transfer to a bowl and pour 2 1/2 cups boiling water over chiles. Soak, covered, until softened, about 30 minutes. Purée chiles with 1 1/2 cups soaking liquid, chopped onion, remaining 6 garlic cloves, clove, and 3/4 teaspoon salt in cleaned blender until a smooth paste forms, about 2 minutes. 


Heat oil in cast-iron skillet over medium heat until it shimmers, then add chile paste (it will spatter) and cook, stirring occasionally, until slightly thickened, 5 minutes. 

Discard bones and coarsely shred pork into broth. Add chile paste and hominy and simmer 5 minutes. Season with salt. 

Accompaniments: diced avocado; crema; queso fresco; thinly sliced iceberg or romaine lettuce; chopped white onion; sliced radishes; fried tortilla strips or chips; lime wedges; dried oregano; dried hot red-pepper flakes