Making Love to Mushrooms and Stripping

First things first!  I wrote a recipe post for the blog I share with Friend Sarah.  It contains an easy, wholesome pasta recipe and includes an illustrated explanation of how to make mushrooms taste really good.  Perhaps you already know how to do this; if you don't, read the blog and then you will.  I guarantee that anyone who says they don't like mushrooms only says that because they have been subjected to rubbery, slippery, undercooked, overcrowded mushrooms.  Well no more!  You can change any mind about mushrooms, and all it takes is a really big skillet and patience.  Read that blog here.  (Please!)

Really good mushrooms. And a happy spoon.

Yesterday I mentioned my successful farmers' market run. Point #1: I didn't buy enough leafs for the whole week -- from now on I'll know better.  Point #2: I was a little brain dead last night, so I just threw some dinner together in a stew pot.  Red kale, beet greens, onion, garlic, chicken thighs, salt, pepper, cider vinegar, Red Hot -- stew stew stew for an hour.  I served it with bread and butter.  I accidentally oversalted it a bit, but Ted liked it enough to get seconds.  This was actually my first time using beet greens, and I really liked them, so now I know.  Now, of course, I've got beets in my vegetable drawer, but they'll get used, don't worry.

Still, man cannot live by leafs alone, so today I headed down to the Strip.  My first order of business was lunch, since it was already almost 1:00 and I hadn't eaten yet.  I ducked into Reyna's to buy some tortillas, and the taco stand tacos smelled so good I went with those, one pollo and one carnitas on fresh corn tortillas with queso fresco, sour cream, lettuce, tomato, onion, salsa, fresh squeezed lime, and a few dashes of Cholulu hot sauce for $5.35 (with tax).  The carnitas won the day.

"Buy some food that's prepared near the stre-eet, who knows you might even see this guy ..."

Really nice and fresh.

From there I headed over to the Pennsylvania Macaroni Company, where I availed myself of their cheese counter for some delicious Cypress Grove Humboldt Fog goats' milk cheese and a pound of fresh ricotta.  I also picked up some sour cream, some dried pasta, and some fresh linguini.  Onwards, I went to Stan's Market and got three orange bell peppers for only $2.50(!), some savoy cabbage, some fresh basil, and some limes, since Friend George was good enough to bring me a giant bottle of my favorite gin (Bombay Sapphire) for my birthday, and we're definitely getting into gin 'n' tonic season.  After that: delicious delicious pork.  I hit Parma Sausage for hot Italian and Sicillian sausages, some pepperoni, and some prosciutto.  It's all made fresh by Parma and it's the best fucking stuff around.  Seriously.  Get thee to the sausage men.

They look humble, but do not be deceived.

Oh, and I also picked up some chocolate truffles for Ted and I from Mon Aimee Chocolat.  Cause, yum.

It is taking all of my willpower to not eat my little packet right now.

So that's that, and I've got dinners planned for the rest of the week: tonight is going to be swiss chard whole wheat linguini and Sicillian sausage; then chicken tacos, stuffed shells and Italian sausage, and I'm going to take a crack at Ethiopian food on Friday.  Saturday we're going out, and Sunday is going to be curry.  I just have to pick up a few more leafs tomorrow.