Fish and Vegetables.

The globe artichoke, Cynara scolymus--I only ever call it an artichoke, myself--is a species of thistle.  The Italians brought it to the New World, perhaps in recompense for their discovery of tomatoes.  It's one of my favorite vegetables, but I rarely eat it because it seems difficult to prepare.

On the way home from today's round of auditions, I ducked into Union Market and bought artichokes (six babies and one full-sized) and a half a pound of wild arctic char, which is a distant cousin of salmon, but with lighter flesh.  When I got home, I turned and simmered the artichokes according to James Peterson's Vegetables, and then dressed them with olive oil, lemon juice, and salt.  The fish I baked in a 400F oven, putting it on a square of parchment paper with a bit of butter, salt, and pepper; I pulled it out right when it began to flake, which couldn't have been more than ten minutes, squeezed some lemon on it, and sprinkled it with more salt.

The fish was perhaps the best I've had; the flesh was tender, fatty, and remarkably sweet. 

And artichokes are always lovely, but these tasted even better because of the novelty of their presentation.  I've eaten those vinegary artichoke hearts from a jar, and Miriam, a restaurant in my neighborhood, serves grilled haloumi cheese on a bed of vegetables that include chopped artichokes (very good), but until following Peterson's directions I'd never had an artichoke that was so easy to eat.  (You remove the choke from the full-sized thistle before it gets to the table, and baby artichokes are so tender that you can eat them whole--although dainty folks might want to quarter them with a knife and fork first.)

I had never thought to serve artichokes with fish.  It's what ended up in my shopping basket, and then I discovered that Peterson recommended putting the two together.  I think he's right.  At any rate, this particular combination turned out a stunner.  The clean, earthy, slightly astringent, green taste of the artichokes emphasized the natural sweetness of the char.

It was also, I think, an outstanding piece of fish.  The more I cook, the more I appreciate good ingredients, especially when I'm preparing something simply.  No amount of marinating or careful cooking fix a mediocre piece of lamb or steak when you're grilling.  The same is true of fish when you're baking it.

Sadly, I never expect to have anything this good in a restaurant.  Certainly not in an American restaurant.  In my experience, no kitchen technically capable of putting out plate after plate of properly cooked fish will be allowed to present anything so simple.  Oh, maybe it could happen in a Japanese restaurant.  Maybe if I came up with the $300 to eat at Masa, I'd change my mind.

But then, I wouldn't have made it myself.

Globe artichoke - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Union Market

Amazon.com: Vegetables: Books: James Peterson

Miriam Restaurant & Wine Bar

MASA

Overstaying my welcome.

We got pelted with tiny daggers of ice yesterday. Snow fell from a great height, melted on the way down, and then re-froze. I took the subway several times on my round of errands. Each time I emerged from a station, I thought snow had given way to rain because those sharp little crystals sounded just like rain.

I'm struggling to finish the Ample Catnap 10 Films DVD.  It's the outtakes, which should be long enough to be amusing, but not overstay their welcome.  Without the hard deadline of releasing a film each week, I've allowed myself to linger over the edit, imagining that by taking longer, I'll make a more perfect cut.

Actually, it's kind of boring.

When bored, we have three options, right?  We can

1. accept the boredom, and try to live with it,
2. abandon what bores us, and try something else, or
3. raise the stakes.

I think most of us choose some combination of the three.  And the third one is the hardest to faithfully execute.

My answer has been to set tiny artificial deadlines.  I'll make a list of edits, and complete them in a half an hour.  Then I'll walk away for a day or two, watch it again, and make another list of edits.

Today is St. Patrick's Day.  Over sized green hats abound.  I wish I'd had my camera with me, but I had left it sitting on top of the computer, having uploaded yesterday's pictures of the storm.

More Monsters

I can't help myself, so filled am I with delight at some of these pictures.  It being just before I'm really, really supposed to be in bed doesn't help; I get punchy and easily excited.  Anyhow:

DAILY MONSTER : OPEN SOURCE BLOT 01

Is a tribute to Stefan G. Bucher's monster-drawing performance art project, which may be found here, and which I first blogged about some time ago.

Amongst the tributes I was particularly taken with was Jonas Forslund's monster bug.  It's the fourth one down.

The name is funny

Coming home from the gym, I ordered a fish taco with rice and beans at Rachel's Taqueria.  I ate with ravenous gusto, even though my meal had a ridiculous name.  I mean, really: fish taco?

This afternoon I finally was able to watch a movie I helped make back in early February.  Check it out at On The Lot: Out of Darkness.  I like the graphics, but all the movies at On The Lot look muddy, which makes me sad.  Why do we put up with such crappy video?  Some of the stories are really clever, and the presentation does them no favors.

Recently I got back on track producing the final DVD for the 10 Films, which should have been done ages ago.  Progress is slow, what with audition season ramping up and spring fever creeping into my brain.  That trip to Puerto Rico didn't help one bit.  (Plus, I never got to try the pinchos.)

Fish for pixels.

We haven't had much truly cold weather this winter, but today was bitter and cruel.  I'm ready for it to end.

I had a lovely bit of sushi for lunch.  My friend Jeff bought it for me.  Before we ordered, I handed over some raw, badly-shot video from the most recent gig by The One Eyed Bishops.  Jeff's the bassist for the band, and an old friend of mine, so he really didn't have to buy me the raw fish.  Then again, once he sees the footage, he may wish he hadn't.

Once again I'm fighting with software.  Microsoft issued some patches for Windows XP, and ever since then Avid Free DV crashes in the middle of the file selection dialog.  Nero 7 Recode refuses to output video in anything other than MP4, which Avid Free DV can't digest.  I tried to download Quicktime Pro, but Apple makes the ordering process both too complicated and too unreliable.  Nero 7 Vision can generate titles in HD, which look snazzy, but the title tool is ridiculously simple-minded. 

And I have a folded-up contact lens lodged on top of my eye.  I can see fine (with another lens in the proper alignment) and my eye itches only a little bit.  But still.

I've started to audition again, in a most desultory fashion.  Some of my old scripts emerged during office cleaning.  I'm looking for that fire, haven't found it yet.

Maybe I just need to see the ophthalmologist.