I am a good cook. Which makes sense, since I spend the majority of my waking hours doing it. It is, and honestly, always really has been, my hobby and more recently; my profession. Today, in a kitchen bare of a lot of ingredients (payday is Monday, and money is tight lately) - I made a fantastic tortilla soup, which I just upgraded to black bean & tortilla. Made the stock from scratch, which I do regularly now, accumulating carcasses from the inevitable rotisserie chickens I buy (back to spending money on them, but the emotional cost of getting them for free made everything I made from those Roti chickens taste like doom) every week. I've got the method locked in, and I think HRH Keller would smile on the fact that I literally cook this stock for 48hours - at a bare simmer, adding water when the pot cooks off to half way - typically three times. Carcasses (including wing tips, pope's nose & neck) go in first alone for the first round of cooking down 50%. Then I add water back to the top, add carrots, celery & onion (though not mirpoix, just rough cut of all of them) and back it goes to the low, no bubble, just steam rising and movement below surface simmer. Overnight usually. My landlord would probably freak if she knew, and I often wonder if she notices any difference in the gas bill...at any rate. I always do it on my weekend, starting on my "friday evening" day and cooking through to my "sunday". I use the stocks for lots of stuff, but mostly soups, and usually I buy produce specifically for them, but this week, I was a little short of cash (yes, even for produce) and it was raining like crazy, so I did a cupboard dump. Cumin (no cilantro or coriander in the house, need to fix that last issue, also no oils, either olive or canola, though I did have duck fat, so I sweated the onions in that), paprika, garlic, cayanne, a little tapatio, some oregano (italian seasoning, but just a pinch) salt and pepper. Fresh toms that were about to turn, and an onion. can of tomato sauce, and then patience. I will never stop loving the delight when I taste something that I scrape together like that. Didn't do any baking this weekend, but brought a lot of the stuff I did at work home, so no reason to heap piles more sugary shit onto my shelves.
Just wanted to get that down. Nothing earth shattering, just a note to self about how I'm getting through the Arsenal off season. Watched horrible USMNT vs ESP, ouch. But, on the other hand: Iker!! in the US, but he only played a bit of the last half so that was unfortunate. Though at least the tv cameras knew to keep him on camera as much as possible :)
Monday, May 30, 2011
Apartheid
It's amazing sometimes, to stop and think about how much the world has changed in the last 20 years. I guess this happens to everyone once they pass the old #40 in the rear-view mirror, and more and more I find myself thinking about how different "the kids today" are. Not just in that they don't know the power and excitement of receiving a letter - I just recently started a pen-pal exchange with my 10-year old nephew, and he had no idea what a post card was. Today though, it was an exchange with my 25-year-old coworker. She's a firecracker, and loves the punk rock (as she knows it, though she continues to blaspheme my generation's leaders, but whatever) and considers herself political: vegan, environmentally conscious, female-powered ("i spell woman with a Y" etc)...however there's this thing about history. In passing we were talking about our banks, and I mentioned that I was with Chase currently because they had bought out my previous WaMu, and was headed to Bank of the West because I wanted a smaller entity, and she told me she left WaMu and went to BofA, and I, as a reflex said "Oh, I left them when they refused to divest." Because I had. 20 years ago. Of course I changed a lot of stuff, stopped drinking Coke, protested our campus into not buying IBM computers, etc. But it was her blank stare and her question: "What do you mean, DI-vest?" And I replied, "From South Africa."
Still nothing. "Because of Apartheid, you know?" She did not, and seemed sort of perplexed. I haven't really talked much about this, about my politics, in a long time (when I talk politics, I generally do it to an audience who already knows where I sit, unless it's on the internet, and that I gave up a while ago, though I think I've tossed a few rants in here from time to time). I didn't want to rant so I just gave her the cliff notes. "So back in the late 80's when South Africa was having a financial crisis and trying to sell off their gold and get countries to invest in their country, back when Nelson Mandela was still in jail, there was, and had been in place for a long time a..." I genuinely hesitated, though why I don't know; "a policy called apartheid, separating the races systematically...and we, we protested it. We took the view that if we refused to participate in helping South Africa succeed financially, that would affect the people who were benifiting the most from apartheid, and ultimately, couldn't affect the victims as their lives were already desperate and horrible. We refused to buy things from companies who did business in that country...we protested to keep our campus from spending our student monies with those companies."
She seemed astounded that it would make a difference, though she didn't say so. She did say, how's that work? And I responded, Imagine if the Chinese decided to pull their money from America because they thought the US policy of allowing states to outlaw female reproductive services, was a civil injustice (not that the Chinese government would ever do anything even remotely like that, but I needed a broad example)? All that money just gone, Poof! Like that, sorta. The subject died off quick, and I didn't get a chance to say my favorite sentence in the whole world: I never ever expected to see Nelson Mandela walk out of prison, Certainly not become the president of the country that jailed him for 33 years, and yet, he did.
I know Leonard Peltier will not get that chance in THIS country. I didn't expect to see the Berlin Wall come down (didn't really expect it to be an issue at all, really). Some stuff you just do because you believe in it. I didn't believe I'd ever vote for a candidate for president of the US who would win. Even that has happened. What comes next? As crazy and depressing as things get, there are these, focused, blazing moments that make you feel like it's worth hanging around...so I do.
But the kids, what the hell are we gonna do about the kids? 20 years and apartheid is forgotten? Even last year as I watched the World Cup I was kind of awed by how distant it all seemed, was it really not a victory for humanity that they don't teach it in History? Or is it because historically it's linked to our own racial segregation and so we bury it?
Ok, that's enough for now. Sleep tight.
Still nothing. "Because of Apartheid, you know?" She did not, and seemed sort of perplexed. I haven't really talked much about this, about my politics, in a long time (when I talk politics, I generally do it to an audience who already knows where I sit, unless it's on the internet, and that I gave up a while ago, though I think I've tossed a few rants in here from time to time). I didn't want to rant so I just gave her the cliff notes. "So back in the late 80's when South Africa was having a financial crisis and trying to sell off their gold and get countries to invest in their country, back when Nelson Mandela was still in jail, there was, and had been in place for a long time a..." I genuinely hesitated, though why I don't know; "a policy called apartheid, separating the races systematically...and we, we protested it. We took the view that if we refused to participate in helping South Africa succeed financially, that would affect the people who were benifiting the most from apartheid, and ultimately, couldn't affect the victims as their lives were already desperate and horrible. We refused to buy things from companies who did business in that country...we protested to keep our campus from spending our student monies with those companies."
She seemed astounded that it would make a difference, though she didn't say so. She did say, how's that work? And I responded, Imagine if the Chinese decided to pull their money from America because they thought the US policy of allowing states to outlaw female reproductive services, was a civil injustice (not that the Chinese government would ever do anything even remotely like that, but I needed a broad example)? All that money just gone, Poof! Like that, sorta. The subject died off quick, and I didn't get a chance to say my favorite sentence in the whole world: I never ever expected to see Nelson Mandela walk out of prison, Certainly not become the president of the country that jailed him for 33 years, and yet, he did.
I know Leonard Peltier will not get that chance in THIS country. I didn't expect to see the Berlin Wall come down (didn't really expect it to be an issue at all, really). Some stuff you just do because you believe in it. I didn't believe I'd ever vote for a candidate for president of the US who would win. Even that has happened. What comes next? As crazy and depressing as things get, there are these, focused, blazing moments that make you feel like it's worth hanging around...so I do.
But the kids, what the hell are we gonna do about the kids? 20 years and apartheid is forgotten? Even last year as I watched the World Cup I was kind of awed by how distant it all seemed, was it really not a victory for humanity that they don't teach it in History? Or is it because historically it's linked to our own racial segregation and so we bury it?
Ok, that's enough for now. Sleep tight.
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