Wednesday, April 30, 2003

Gosh.  I’m trying to think of something funny to say about dinner last night, but really, there wasn’t anything too humorous, or disastrous either.  I’d gone to get the veal roast for the Veau Poele a la Matignon (Casserole-Roasted Veal with Diced Vegetables) on my lunch break.  Getting from lower Manhattan to the Fairway at 75th Street and back again takes a bit longer than an hour-long lunch break, though actually not as much longer as you’d think.  As Eric always says, living in Manhattan must be like living in some blessed alternate universe.  John from my work, for instance, walks home from work.  He also walked home from work at his last job, in Soho.  This is because he lives in Tribeca.  I try really, really hard not to hate him, he being one of the few non-wonks out there, but the Tribeca thing makes it hard. Anyone who knows of a roomy one-bedroom in NoLita that takes dogs and cats for under $1500, please let me know.  Thanks! So anyway, get the roast, go back to work, do the work thing.  Come home, after one of my glamour treatments.  I was reading through the brochure for the spa while waiting for my mundane appointment to help make me not look like a freak of nature, and I saw that a Brazilian bikini wax was only twenty five bucks!  I find it a little disturbing that you have to pay so little for the privilege of having hot wax poured on your genitals and getting your pubic hair ripped out.  But Jesus, for 25 bucks, I could learn to like excruciating pain. So, where was I?  Oh yes.  Going home.  So, yeah.  I get there, and the TV’s home, having been delivered, which means I can indulge my increasingly sick addiction to la Buffe.  I diced up some carrots and onions.  I browned the veal, which was all nicely wrapped up with twine into this nice little package, in oil and butter heated up good and hot.  This I could do while watching Buffy.  Buffy is such an insufferable little bitch.  But it’s nice having Faith around, and they lost no time getting the Faith/Wood chemistry going.  And it would have been a shame to waste Wood.  (Oooh.  I’m punny.) Sorry, non-Buffy folks.  On with the veal. So, browned the veal, took it out of the pan, poured out the butter which had gotten a little too brown.  Melted some more butter, threw the vegetables in with some parsley and a bay leaf.  Let them cook slowly for five minutes.  Added a third cup of Madeira and let that cook down to syrup over high heat.  Salted and peppered the veal and stuck it back in the casserole, scooping some of the vegetables over.  Laid two pieces of bacon over the meat – didn’t boil it as Julia wanted me to, because I haven’t got time for the pain – covered it with the foil and the cover to the casserole, and stuck it in the oven. Forgot to put the meat thermometer in – opened the casserole back up again and stuck it in. Watched Buffy. (Non-Buffy-philes can skip to the next paragraph:) So, yes, the scene on the bike was Spike’s best bit in eons, and yes, it is certainly a relief to have everybody turn on Buffy, and yes, we can all see now that Joss et al have had a master plan all this while, but I continue to maintain that it’s a crappy master plan that disregards pretty much everything we’ve ever loved about any of these characters, and I hate them for ruining something I held so dear.  Plus 24 sucks the big one, too, and I just don’t know where to turn anymore?  What’s left for me in TV Land? Okay, so I still don’t trust meat thermometers.  The temperature rose steadily in the roast to 160°, then got lodged there immoveably.  Eventually I took it out, figuring, come on.  I’d probably eat my arm at 160°.  So I took it out of the casserole, poured in some of my handy dan meat glaze, of which I have more than a quart, mixed up with water to dilute, and let that simmer five minutes.  Took out the bacon and parsley and bay leaf.  I was supposed to degrease the sauce, but fuck it.  I poured in a tablespoon of cornstarch that I’d mixed with two tablespoons of Madeira.  Since the recipe called for an (optional) truffle, I stirred some truffle flour into the Madeira/cornstarch mix.  Let that simmer another five minutes until the sauce was nice and thick.  Stirred in some butter, and that was that.  I’d made rice in there somewhere, and Eric had made salad.  It was a pretty meal, and the veal was still nice and slightly pink in the middle.  The sauce was really good – meat glaze makes yummy sauce – but I put in way too much truffle flour, it was a little overwhelming.  Other than that, though, plenty good. So – a good meal, solidly prepared.  So boring to write about, so nice to eat. 7:57:19 AM    comment []