And this is a good thing. Because we need to move closer to Mom before I can get my surgery because after the week in the hospital there's going to be like three months when I can't really get up and make my own sammiches. So this is a good thing because selling the house gets us closer to surgery time.
And, guess what, oh you will never guess! I got asked back to be an ABNA judge this year. And while I could not be happier about that, it does mean that there's a two-and-a-half week period over February/March where I will have 40 excerpts to read and review at a thoroughly breakneck pace.
Go, Sea Biscuit, go!
Ahem. I am totally, 100% committed to this affecting none of ya'll in any way whatsoever, but that may be unrealistic. So! Random thoughts:
- I'm going to go ahead and let Claymore finish out on Tuesdays before starting Narnia (or whatever we vote on) up again. Sorry about that, but it should be finished by April.
- If I miss a Sunday Recommends, I can assure you all that it's NOT because you all didn't write awesome things this week. It's just because I wasn't able to READ anything that week.
- If I fail to respond to an awesome comment or kick-butt email in a speedy fashion, it's because my phone is plastered to my ear dealing with apartments, movers, and doctors.
- Come hell or high water, Saturday Twilight will continue! Damn the torpedoes and full speed ahead!
10 comments:
I honestly can't remember if I told you guys that we're selling our house. Did I tell you guys we've been trying to sell our house? Anyway, that's totally been a thing for, like, 6 months now.
I don't think you did, but possibly it just failed to integrate into my mental filing system. That happens sometimes.
On a completely unrelated note, this conversation happened at dinner today:
Mom (discussing plans for tomorrow's dinner): So were you planning to cook the banana with the bacon, or wait until the bacon is mostly done but still flexible and wrap it then? How about both, plus one version with chocolate syrup and one with melting chocolate, to see which one's best?
Me: Sounds good.
Dad: Well, what does the recipe say?
Me: It doesn't*. It's a hypothetical metaphor I'm trying to make a reality.
Dad: Ah. Are you going to take pictures?
I had a similar conversation with just Mom in the grocery store a couple days ago, explaining why I wanted to buy a banana. Both my parents have taken it in stride: I was expecting the explanation to be significantly more awkward.
(I might well take pictures, but I'm not entirely sure yet.)
(I said I was going to try it, and I am damn well going to try it.)
*Though looking at it again, I see you did specify the bacon be wrapped first, then cooked. I think I'll try it both ways anyway.
Good luck on the move and surgery and all. We all know real life has to come first.
Good luck with everything!
Also, not gonna lie, I'm soooo happy about Claymore cuz I LOVE it and I love your posts on it.
@Ana,
The best of luck to you.
@Brin,
Pictures would be nice, but the most important thing is to report back to us on the results.
@Brin, I'm sure they have their off-moments because which of us don't, but your parents sound so freaking awesome. And *do* take pictures -- I'm so curious now. (I also want to make this, which was on TV the other day: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/the-elvis-presley-recipe/index.html )
@Depizan, thank you. :)
@Dezster, w00t!! :D
Operation Banana is complete!
Mom started cooking early and without me, entirely forgetting about Operation Banana. Luckily I noticed the suspiciously meaty smell and she happened to have just enough bacon that wouldn't fit into the first batch left for my purposes.
I spent much of the cooking process giggling from the sheer strangeness of the fact that I was actually attempting this.
Ingredients used:
One banana, cut into four roughly-equal chunks
Four half-strips of beef bacon
(I, who have eaten pork bacon twice, think beef is the same only better. Mom, who was not even slightly raised kosher and has far more experience with pork, says it's pretty much the same and the pork bacon I had was cooked wrong.)
(Brand doesn't matter much with bacon.)
Some Nesquik chocolate syrup
(Would have used Hershey, but couldn't find it anywhere. Might not be sold in Canada at all.)
Some Ghiradelli 60% cocoa chocolate chips, melted in microwave
Toothpicks to help hold the bacon onto the banana
Results:
Uncooked banana/chocolate syrup: meh. Not good, not bad, not worthy of being compared to the Universal Prayer.
Cooked banana/chocolate syrup: good, but more in a novelty way than a I'd-like-to-have-this-again way. Banana was somewhat mushy and infused with bacon flavour.
Uncooked banana/melting chocolate: I'm glad I had the syrup ones first so I wouldn't be disappointed by them after. The chocolate shell (I put them in the fridge for a couple hours) is much better than the syrup. Oddly, the bacon doesn't add much, but bananas dipped in chocolate are delicious. I'll probably make more in the future.
Cooked banana/melting chocolate: The bacon infusion makes the baconiness much more noticeable, while keeping the good parts of the previous version. It is indeed many layers of awesome. *thumbs up*
Pictures to come later, because Mom's busy and she doesn't want me messing around with her camera without her supervision. They do exist; I just have to get a hold of them.
Ana, I K.N.O.W. I'm most likely being cranky after about 5 hours of homework...
But if those doctors mess up your back again, I AM contemplating violence. I'm just letting you know that up front.
Otherwise, Brin, thanks for the recipe/description!! I'm already smacking my lips in an unladylike fashion at the very thought of the taste! YUMMY!! :D
@Amarie, thank you. *hugs*
@Brin, I am so very very interested in any actual recipe you end up writing up. Who'd have thought this would be a real thing!
I'm leery of that Elvis thing, but I do want to make a savory version of this chocolate-bacon-banana thing now - bacon-wrapped plantains with mole sauce. Not sure how the butter fits in, I might just have to include it in the sauce. Will take pictures and post recipe if it turns out at all well.
So, mole sauce turns out to be weird, but good. I went with an easy version that just involves frying onions, garlic, and ginger until cooked, then adding spices and chicken broth and simmering for a while. And I toasted and pulverized some walnuts to act as a thickener. Also decided that baking the bacon-wrapped plantain chunks would be more convenient than frying them, which was true, but they came out kinda hard. Either I didn't bake them long enough, or green plantains just turn hard when cooked like that. The combination was still edible, at least.
I have a fair bit of mole sauce left, so I'll probably get more plantains for another try - boiling plantain chunks, mashing them, and mixing in mole sauce and pieces of bacon seems like a promising venue, as does frying plantain slices in bacon grease and using the mole as a dipping sauce.
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