So… what is it you ask? Sounds exotic you say.

Well, I don’t know the English translation of Feijoada but I do know that it is DELICIOUS!!

Now, this is certainly not for the vegetarian.. not even someone who eats a little bit of meat once in a while. This is for someone who likes… no… LOVES meat. This aint no walk in the park let me tell you. It is meat upon meat upon meat. Throw in a few chopped onions and black beans for that little extra protein.

Start off frying up some thick sliced applewood smoked bacon. The recipe had me at BACON! Anything that has, smells, remotely looks like bacon chances are I will like. Bacon with eggs… eggcellent. Bacon as a sandwich… scrumptious! Bacon on a salad…solidifies it! Bacon on a potato… potential intoxication! Bacon Bacon Bacon! But I digress…

So I mentioned the bacon… fried… in skillet. Keep the drippings!! Yes…it gets used. “What?!” you say. Yep. The pound of pork shoulder cut into once inch pieces gets browned in the bacon drippings. Lord have mercy! Anything cooked in bacon grease makes it even better. The browned in bacon drippings pork goes into a crock pot. Oh yes, prior to browning the pork was sprinkled with salt and pepper (like I really noticed it after the bacon drippings). Then…browned about 1.5 pounds of beef short ribs. Again, sprinkled with salt and pepper first and then into the bacon and now pork shoulder drippings. This definitely is not kosher! Ribs browned…into the crock pot. Also toss in a ham hock…more pork! Throw in chopped garlic, onion, black beans, and chicken stock. Stir and cook. Throughout the day it was a lovely aroma of slow cooked porkiness. I think I was on a pork high from my pork crackpot.

Eight hours later with some cooked up crispy bacon tossed in at the end a delicious array of shredded meat was ready to be consumed. Cooked up some saffron rice…place it on a plate and then top with the porky pork pork. Delicious!!!

This one I will definitely make again.

In the meantime, homebrew Batch #1 is in short supply and Batch # 2 has matured nicely. Batch two is a slightly modified clone recipe that I found on-line of Founder’s Dirty Bastard Ale, a Scottish-style strong ale from the Founders brewery in Michigan.

My first attempt at liquid yeast and a yeast starter went well, thanks to the discovery of John Palmer’s bible on brewing. Bottling occurred about a month ago, and although Batch two doesn’t seem to have the complexity of Dirty Bastard, the flavors do seem to be aging nicely.

Tina did a nice job on the label for this one! We are calling it Eleven Twenty-niner, in reference to the eleven month, twenty-nine day sentence of bootleggers in the days of prohibition.

Harvest Ale 11-29er

After devoting an afternoon to brewing, the ale is now fermenting nicely in the tub. Should be ready to bottle in about 2 weeks. HOT DAMN!

Throughout the years…

Almost 2 weeks ago Dave and I had to make the extremely difficult decision to let our beloved cat, Alley, go. Since Alley’s diabetes diagnosis in August of 2004 she has encountered health issues periodically. All of which can probably be linked back to the diabetes. She had an eye issue that her regular vet could not treat. We had to take her to a veterinary eye specialist in Birmingham, Alabama. Apparently that was the only one in the state. After several visits down to Birmingham her eye eventually healed. She had her share of illnesses…upper respiratory infection…urinary tract infection. In February of 2009 she had thyroid surgery. This after a couple of months of dermal thyroid therapy. An ointment that was applied to her ear twice a day to help with her thyroid function. Although this seemed to work it did make her ear dirty and it was a costly ointment and we had to be careful not to get the ointment on our own skin due to it could affect our thyroid as well. She was treated for intestinal inflammation…diarrhea…dehydration…and lastly kidney infection. We took care of these illness without batting an eye. We paid for insulin needles and insulin knowing that this was keeping our beloved Honeybunny healthy. We bought the expensive food that was only available at the vet because it was what she needed for her diabetes. Money was no object when it came to the health and well being of Alley’s daily life.

A decision…

Those of us who have pets love them like they are family. We treat them like they are our own babies. Nothing but the best for them. Treats and love galore. Sometimes the time comes when we have to make the choice of what is in the best interest of our beloved pet. That time came for Dave and I. We watched Alley go from a maximum of 16 pounds down the a meager weight of 5.8 pounds.  She continued to eat normally, sometimes more so, but the weight continued to drop. She didn’t have much muscle mass and when your hand ran down her back you could feel every vertebrate. We were at a loss. We didn’t know what to do. Her weight loss was unexplainable. In the back of my mind I kept thinking about how hard the decision will be to make when the time came to make it. I hated thinking about it. I hated having to think that I would have to make the decision. But the day came.

We woke up on Tuesday, September 28 morning ready for another normal day. We opened a can of moist cat food for Alley, she began to eat… she laid down by her bowl… she wasn’t eating. Her head was resting on her bowl. She was so weak she could barely hold up her own head. I carried her to her favorite pillow in front of the fireplace, placed her there where she laid down on her side. I laid down on the floor beside her, stroked her soft fur, watched her chest rise and fall as she breathed, looked into her eyes and I knew. I told Dave that it was time.

Healing…

Since that day, I question our decision, whether or not it was the right decision. Every time I cry or at bare minimum get teary-eyed. I think about that day, the last day… it makes me sad. I think about what Oscar is thinking. I know he realizes Alley is not around. He doesn’t wait behind the wall for Alley to come out of the laundry room so that he can pounce on her and put her in a headlock. He sometimes sits in the bedroom staring at the bottom of the bed to see if Alley will come out. He seems to know that I have been sad. Maybe he has been sad too. We keep each other company and comfort each other. Pets are companions, sympathizers, therapists, and healers. What would we do without them.

A part of healing is opening up your heart and allowing another pet to fill the void that was left. The time to fill the void will come. When Alley has returned home and enough time as passed then I will feel it is ok to allow another pet to come into our lives. No other pet will ever replace Alley but they will surely bring more love and smiles to our home.

Forgetting that I regularly run and mountain bike enough to at least confidently tell people that “I bike,” Tina insists I need a hobby. Since “the wife” is always right (or at least wants me out of her hair), I’ve decided to take up the family hobby — so called because my Dad did it for years, my brother has done it successfully on at least one occasion, and my brother-in-law has done it with disastrous results (don’t stick your arm in the fermentation bucket). That hobby would be homebrewing. Never mind that it is still officially illegal in Alabama.

After some reflection on whether I should contribute to the moral degradation of northern Alabama, I decided, “Why not?” So Tina and I went to Nashville (which is decidedly more decadent) this past weekend and bought a good bit of homebrewing paraphernalia, and now I’m pretty much set to head down the road of drunken corruption.

The biggest challenge thus far has been deciding what type of beer to make. On the one hand, I typically like Pale Ales with a hoppy note, but not extremely bitter. On the other hand, I want to brew something a bit different from what I typically drink. So rather than brewing a pale ale, I finally decided on an American Brown Ale recipe. But I am still having second thoughts. Why an American brown ale?? First, I don’t especially like Turbodog. Second, I tried Avery’s Ellie’s Brown Ale yesterday; it was really good with a dinner, but I thought it had a little too much of a burnt quality on its own. But I’ve bought the ingredients, so I feel committed. I hate commitment.

The recipe I got is from Papazian’s second book, “The Homebrewer’s Companion.” I think I might tweak it just a tad – reason being is that when I put the ingredients into ProMash, the SRB color rating is a bit higher than a typical American Brown Ale, due to a combination of amber malt extract with crystal (80L) and chocolate grains. So I’ll replace half the amber malt extract with a light. I’ve noticed a lot of Brown Ale recipes using a light extract, despite their final color, so I imagine this will be fine.

I talk like I know something about brewing. But really, I have no clue. When I bought the specialty grains (that’s the crystal and chocolate malts for the non-brewers), the guy asked me if I wanted it milled. I asked, “Oh, is that something that you have to do?” He said, “Yeah, if you want the flavors.” I guess I do want flavors… Later, when cutting some siphoning tube, I asked him what a good length was. He said it depended on your “setup.” I had to admit, “I have no setup.” He gave me 5 feet, reasoning that there is no setup that needs more than 5 feet, I suppose.

Tina will be designing a logo for the bottle. So at least the stuff will look good before you pour it into a glass. I’ve told her that this is what she should give me for my birthday. Sounds like a reasonable request. Since the beer will be using Harvest-Monrovia water and it will be brewed around harvest time, we figure “Harvest Ale, American Brown” is a good moniker.

We miss you Alley.
1994-2010

Just this side of heaven is a place called Rainbow Bridge.

When an animal dies that has been especially close to someone here, that pet goes to Rainbow Bridge.
There are meadows and hills for all of our special friends so they can run and play together. There is plenty of food, water and sunshine, and our friends are warm and comfortable.

Author unknown…

Crazy Chicken

Crazy chicken… whatcha pickin?
You have no nose
Only three toes
We fry you up
Cluck Cluck Cluck
Crazy chicken…finger lickin’!

Crazy chicken… are you pickin?
Always going to poop
In your little chicken coup
Sitting on your bed of hay
Here is where you eggs will lay
Crazy chicken… are you kickin?

Crazy chicken… are you wishin?
That you can be a cow
They’re no good anyhow
We all know you can’t be beat
You have tastey whiter meat
Crazy chicken… finger lickin’!

Crazy chicken… you be chillin’!
Walking and strutting around
Making your little chicken sound
We all know who’s the boss
All is not a total loss
Crazy chicken… are you sittin?

Crazy chicken… whatcha pickin?
I’m not sure where you’re goin
But here we have a hunger growin
Now I see you in a rut
You’ve been pickin your butt
Crazy chicken… you’re livin!

Yes, I received my pink slip. On Thursday, June 24 I was called to the office of my supervisor. Now, I knew, I knew what it was about. I just didn’t want to acknowledge it. Since the fall of 2009 I had been preparing myself. Since President Obama released the proposed 2011 budget stating that Constellation project should be cancelled, I had been preparing myself. You think you’re prepared. You think you’ve got it all together. No problem…I can handle it. You think you are a cool cookie. You think that the third time is a charm.. piece of cake. And then….”I’m sorry to inform you, but…”. The inevitable ‘but’ rears its ugly head. And we all know what happens after the ‘but’. There’s no denying it…the ‘but’ is an ugly thing. No one wants to hear or see the ‘but’. Usually no good comes from the ‘but’.

The drive…

So, here I am…at work. BUT (there’s that word again) not for much longer. Soon, I will no longer be employed. Wednesday, June 30 will be my last day driving to NASA. Driving on to the army arsenal known as Redstone Arsenal. I think my mom will be glad that I won’t be working on the army arsenal anymore. It is after all a terrorist target because it is an army arsenal. So, there’s that. No more having to sit in the line of cars waiting to drive through the arsenal gate. Lord I hated that!! It was such a pain. Sometimes taking 20-30 minutes just to get through. No more taking 50-60 minutes to drive 15 miles to work. Why did it take that long?! I have no idea. It was ridiculous. I had my share of road-rage on several occasions.

And beyond…

I guess you could say that working at NASA was my going to the moon. My big journey if you will. I hopped on to this ship called NASA and made my dad jealous because I had an email address of @nasa.gov. I explored the world of space. Learned new things and taught some people a thing or two. Now, I have made my impression, placed my footprint in NASA and it’s time for me to move on. Towards my dream and not NASA’s dream. To go beyond being an employee. To become my own boss. It’s time for me to concentrate on me and begin my independent career. Freelancing my talents to those who are willing to take a chance on me. Full throttle…God speed.

So, this poor guy was running around with the help of only one other person and she seemed like she didn’t know much about Indian cuisine. She was definitely southern, had the accent and all. Maybe she was just there helping out because she also seemed to be in street clothing. By the end of our meal a customer, who was pregnant, volunteered to help him out by waitressing. I think every customer could see how stressed he was. One or two tables of customer eventually left because of the left of time it took to get food. So it seems as though there is still work that needs to be done to the restaurant but they certainly did not neglect the quality of the food!

We ordered paneer saag and lamb biriyani. Appetizer was mulligatawny soup. All of which were ordered at medium degree of spiciness. Well, actually Dave ordered his soup hot.

Soup…

Soup comes… nice brown color. Can see the various spices in the soup. I take a bite… spicy hot, but not too spicy that I can’t enjoy it. Although I did add a little yogurt to it mid-way through eating.

Our soups arrived at the same and it was obvious whose was whose. Dave’s soup had a darker brown color. Same soup… more spice! I think after taking two bites he regretted getting it hot. Even the yogurt he added to his did not tame the spiciness. Thank god the rest of the food wasn’t ordered as hot. Usually I even order my Indian food mild spiciness because I am one who likes to taste the different flavors in my food, not drown it out by a single spice. Too hot and you can’t even taste anything else because your taste buds become numb!

Saag…

The saag was different than saag I have had before. Not so much in the ingredients but more so in the fact that you could taste the ingredients and they were not drowned out by a lot of cream which I believe is in a lot of other saag dishes I have had. There were chopped onions, spinach, and spices all surrounding cubes of Indian cheese.. paneer! Yum. You could even still taste the flavor of the paneer. It was not overwhelmed by the saag mixture.

Biriyani…

The lamb biriyani was something we ordered the first time we went to this restaurant. Oh man was it good!! So good we had to order it again. Something about it is so full of flavor and textures. The crunchiness of the cashews. The grains of rice full of flavorful spice. The tenderness of the lamb.. melt in your mouth and not gamey at all. Top it off with a yogurt mixture that adds the best tanginess to every bite. I think that this is my favorite dish at this restaurant.

So I have decided after ordering these items as medium spiciness that mild is the way to go for me. After eating this two days in a row (leftovers were dinner the next night) it does not work with me. Plus, like I said, I like to taste all of the flavors not just the overwhelming mouthful of spice.

Our anticipation of eating delicious Italian foods was high. Fresh seafood from the Mediterranean. Homemade tomato sauces. Pastas made from scratch by hand. And maybe even some carpaccio. We booked the tour and our meals were included. Great we thought. No worries about where to find a place to eat everyday. Now, I, for one, am not a vegetarian and at that time neither was my travel companion, so to have no meat for some time is was difficult. We soon discovered that the included meals in our tour did not necessarily include meat. Oh, we got our share of pasta all right!! Not to say it wasn’t good pasta.. it was delicious pasta. But sometimes a little sausage in that pasta would have been nice. Breakfast consisted of various kinds of bread. Bread. Bread. And more bread. Load up on the carbs. The first few days it was fine. Between the bread for breakfast and lunch and then pasta for dinner we certainly had our fill of carbs. But, as most people know, those kinds of carbs burn up fast. You have energy for a little while then you feel drained.

Pizza…

We had our first official Italian Neapolitan pizza… pizza Margherita. This was our lunch when we were in

Pompeii. Fresh made marinara sauce. Whole, fresh basil leaves. Melted mozzarella cheese in just the right places. Brick oven baked crust that causes big bubbles in the crust that you can’t resist popping with your finger. And top if off with an American favorite… Coke Cola. Ahhhh. It was great!

Maybe I should say the first time was great. The fourth or fifth time you really craved something more.

We were really feeling the results of the lack of protein. We didn’t even have an beans or such to compensate for the lack of protein found in meat. We were becoming desperate!

Our tour continued to other cities in Italy where we encountered more bread and pasta. But alas, we could take no more. Rather than go to Pisa with the rest of the tour group, we chose to stay in Florence for the day. We were on our own. That meant we could get our own food!! We searched for a place where we could fulfill our need for protein. At last, in a piazza we found a restaurant. Did we order pasta… hell no! We all (6 of us in our small group) big, juicy steaks!! Yes, we were about to be reborn! Hallelujah.

You ate what?…

Moving on from Florence overnight on a train headed straight to Paris. From that point on we decided that we were going out on our own. We told our tour guide “see ya, we’ll meet you when it’s time to move on to England.” And that we did. Went to places we would not have like the catacombs of Paris, eery! Ate whatever we wanted which included French crépes.. delicious!!

Had quiché Lorraine with a glass of red wine in a cafe on Ave des Champs-Elysées.

This is how hungry for protein we were… we even ate escargot. Yep… snails.

Cheerio…

No, not the cereal, although even that would have been really good at this point. We arrive in London, England. Again, we set off on our own. In search of scenery and food! But what’s a stop in London without a good pint and some fish-n-chips.

I had no idea peas would come with the fish-n-chips that was ordered. It was pleasant, but who would have thought it.

So, we ended the tour on a good note… a pint and our bellies full. Although we nicknamed this tour the “Sleep Deprived, Protein Deficient, Catholic Conversion” tour, one thing we will always remember is the food.