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Saturday, September 11, 2010

Talking About the Weather and Food


When I write about the weather I don’t mean to brag; I just like to have a record of things. This has been the best September in my almost four years here and all I see I the forecast is more sun and warm temperatures. I still sleep on top of the covers and with the fan on all night although once or twice in the past week I felt a bit cold (but I was too lazy to cover up).  I took the windows out of the window next to the kitchen so the back wall is completely open. One of these days I’ll have to put them back. The room looks so big and open without the windows so it will be a little sad when I have to put them back.

How bad could your life be if you are still able to ride your bicycle shirtless to the beach on the 11th of September?  Not that any other aspects of my life are at all bad but I have absolutely nothing to complain about as far as the weather goes. It’s not even like I really want to go to the beach but with the beautiful days we are having you don’t want to miss a single opportunity. 

I went to the market and ended up buying a bunch of pork. Big surprise! I was in line at my butcher when I accidentally jumped the queue. I started to order when the man next to me said it was his turn. I apologized and said that I thought that he was with the woman who had just purchased about 80 kilos of meat. Then the man proceeded to order another ton of meat. My butcher heard the first part of my order and saved me a big rack of pork ribs. I also had him special grid some hamburger meat for me that is a lot fattier than the burgers he usually grinds. I like to have between 20-25% fat in my burgers. I bought a bunch of olives, just because, and some vegetables. The tomatoes are still incredible these days and I buy them compulsively. I usually buy the Valenciano tomatoes and another variety called raf.

I made homemade barbeque sauce for the first time in my life with tomatoes, onions, garlic, hot peppers, cider vinegar, brown sugar, olive oil, salt, pepper, pimentón, cumin, and red pepper flakes. I couldn’t find molasses (melaza) so I used a couple table spoons of this great cherry jam someone made for me. I cooked the beautiful ribs in my pressure cooker—the world’s most kickass kitchen device. I browned them well first then removed them from the pot. I sautéed onions, garlic, hot peppers, and some red pepper I had leftover. I added a cup of wine to this and simmered it for a bit before I added a couple cups of water along with the ribs and about a cup of the barbeque sauce. I cooked this under pressure for 22 minutes.  I’ll make a video the next time I make this dish that I totally adlibbed.

2 comments:

  1. Yes!! Video please!

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  2. I don't know if my heart will be able to withstand that much pork for a while but when I decide to make these pressure cooker ribs again I will make a video. The pressure cooker really makes a mockery of the tough connective tissue in this meat. It's either about 5 hours in the oven or 22 minutes in the pressure cooker.

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