settled down a bit

I survived June’s insanity. Now I get a nice calm three weeks or so before I head off to Japan, unless of course something changes. Poor Ted doesn’t even get a weekend to recover; he’s leaving for Taiwan this weekend, though at least this time he only stays a week.

You can see my trip report from Budapest here; I don’t have the Paris Airshow written up yet, maybe later tonight. The short version is that it’s not all it’s cracked up to be, because it’s primarily designed for industry and the period when it’s open for the public feels like sort of an afterthought.

My current annoyances are two: for one, my baby present for my friend C has been stuck in US Customs since May 26. I have just called TNT (who handle the post for the Netherlands) to initiate an investigation, but now they have to send me a form which I have to fill in and mail back. Hello, they have this new Internet thingy? Also, in the usual manner of Dutch “customer service” they charged me €.45 per minute for the call and kept me on hold for a while.

Also, as you may gather from the first paragraph of this entry, Ted and I have not managed to sync our busienss trips this time around. We thought mine would be sooner but I said I’d only leave on July 5 (the 4th being our eighteenth anniversary), but then he moved his trip up and we figured we could both travel that week and celebrate later. Then mine got pushed out to mid-July. We have a week together at home between trips, but it doesn’t include a weekend

We still haven’t figured out our non-business travel for the rest of the year, though after a conversation with my brother it looks like we should plan to be in Philadelphia in the last half of October. We might factor in a couple of days in NYC; Ted’s never been there, and it’s been a long time for me.

Nothing else major is going onright now. Ysterday I decided not to row because I got out of work late due to attending a retirement party for my department VP. That might have been better if I’d known I’d be one of the most junior people there – the CEO, the whole board, all the VPs, and the rest of senior management were all there and the majority of people in the room were wearing suits. And then there was me, in my fitted black T and cotton printed skirt. Oops. At least I went with dressy heeled sandals with a lot of foot coverage, instead of the more casual ones I’d considered. By the time I stood in line to speak to and congratulate the man who’s retiring and taken the bus home (because Ted had to leave early) it was getting late to leave for rowing. Good thing I decided not to go anyway; the weather looked OK despite predicted thunderstorms, but they came in with full force just as I’d have been on my way back to the boathouse. Ted had left a bit early, so managed to get in a short row and get home just as the first lightning struck. It was a violent storm; this morning I bicycled to work and the bikepath was covered with everything from leaves and twigs on up to entire branches.

ETA: LA has reminded me that I wanted to mention cooking. I think I’ve got my jambalaya more or less down pat now. The version I made Sunday was perfectly seasoned. It wasn’t perfect overall, because I didn’t have any bell pepper (used extra celery) and the only sausage I had was some vegetarian stuff we bought by mistake. It was actually a pretty reasonable substitute, but a bit less strongly flavored and a lot softer than the real thing. And I’d like a bit less chicken and sausage and more shrmp, but it’s hard to add a chicken filet and a half (in the US I might buy chicken tenders) and I wanted to use up the sausage. Otherwise, it was just right – the thing I’d been missing was to add part but not all of a can of tomato sauce. (Also a couple of hot peppers, a fair bit of Worcestershire sauce, a generous shake of Cajun seasoning, a bit of paprika, cayenne, and oregano, and what was left in the bottle of Provence herbs. I didn’t add salt because there was plenty in the chicken broth and the Cajun seasoning.

I’d like to work on a recipe for Hungarian goulash next, but I think I’ll save that until it gets cold again. Still, if anyone knows of a great recipe, please point me to it!

Mirrored from Dichroic Reflections.

Jambalaya

LA asked for my jambalaya recipe; as long as I was writing it out, I figured other people might want it too. Like lots of traditional forms of cooking, I think jambalaya evolved as a way to use up every bit of your leftovers, and to make a bit of meat go a long way, so it’s a very flexible recipe. Here is is, with what I used last night and the things I’d have added if I’d had them on hand.

Jambalaya

1 – 2 breasts of chicken, raw and diced
1/2 – 1 lb of raw peeled shrimp (I like shrimp, so I prefer to go toward the generous end of that – if they’re large, cut them in pieces)
sausage, sliced (In the US we used to make jambalaya from a box, and we’d use smoked turkey sausage – 1/2-1 pack of that is about right, again depending on your preferences. Here I use rookworst – smoked sausage – and I assume it’s pork. Kielbasa works OK, too. Don’t forget to peel it if yours came with a skin.)
1 bell pepper, diced
1-2 onions, diced
1-2 sticks celery, sliced (this time I had no peppers and only one onion, so I used 3 big stalks of celery)
2-4 cloves garlic, minced
1-2 chile peppers, diced (optional – I remove the seeds so it’s not painfully hot)
2 cups chicken broth (I’ve used bouillon cubes + water, these last couple times – works fine but if you have real broth use that)
1-2 cups rice (I used 2 c on this last batch)
2 medium tomatoes or a bunch of cherry tomatoes, diced
about a half can of tomato sauce
1 Tbsp Worcestershire sauce
Cajun seasoning
Tabasco (optional, and I didn’t use it this time because I had chile peppers and cayenne)
salt (optional, and not needed if you use commercial bouillon and Cajun seasoning)
black pepper, cayenne pepper, paprika, oregano, herbes de Provence, thyme, whatever herbs you like
olive oil (if you have it; if not use vegetable oil)

All that chopping is the longest part of this recipe! Saute the chicken in oil until cooked through; saute the onions, green pepper, celery and garlic in oil until soft. If you don’t feel like dirtying two pans, you can do one batch after the other; it won’t matter. Add water to the broth until you have a bit more than twice the volume of your rice. Dump the chicken, the veggies and everything else into a big soup pot or Dutch oven – you don’t have to precook the shrimp and of course the sausage pretty much comes already cooked. Use the amounts of herbs and spice that seem right to you, but be reasonably generous – and figure the Cajun seasoning and cayenne depending on how much spice your household likes. Stir it all together and cover. Cook on medium-low heat until the rice has absorbed all the liquid, stirring occasionally. Add more water if it seems to need it. Stir and serve with crusty bread or garlic bread.

The vegetarian sausage we had this time (I think the brand is VEGA) really wasn’t bad aside from being softer than I’d prefer. If I wanted to make a vegetarian version I’d use that and up the quantities of vegetables. I don’t know what other veggies would work well in this: scallions for sure (I use those if I have them) and probably shallots; not sure if diced leeks or eggplant would work but they might.

Mirrored from Dichroic Reflections.