A Standby

Liz got accepted into grad-school yesterday so we celebrated with one of her favorite meals and one of my most often used from Mark Bittman's "How to Cook Everything Vegetarian."

Pesto "Cheeseburger"

I actually serve this more like a steak than a cheeseburger topped with a balsamic tomato sauce. It's got walnuts, basil, fresh breadcrumbs, eggs, and parmesan making is a hearty and tasty dish. All that I added to the meal was some parmesean focaccia from the Depot Town Sourdough Bakery.

I've been on a real Rhone kick lately and I was pleased with this mostly Granache red from Chatau Pesquie. (And in a new decanter from Seth!)

It was nice and earthy with big luscious tannins. The decent amount of Syrah added a nice jammy mouthfeel with notes of pepper, dark cherry, tobacco, and a bit of black liquorish. It was a good food wine, but stood on it's own quite well.

In other news, I've been setting up some shows now to get myself back into playing Liz and I are playing on both June 6th in Ypsi and June 19th in Jackson. I've also been playing with the band Fields of Industry who have been one of my favorites for a while now. I am really exited to be playing music again.

Until next time.

Last Night's Dinner

Ok, so since James said it wouldn't be pretentious to make this a food and wine blog, here we go.

Last night I made an herbed risotto with a balsamic roasted eggplant/tomato topping.


I am getting more into risotto. It's so creamy and makes a great base or side to so many things like vegetables, fish, or poultry. I know the traditional gourmet herb is saffron, but let's be honest, I can't afford it. Here I used parsley, garlic, thyme, and anise. I also used anise in the eggplant and tomato topping. I've found anise works really well with eggplant. They both have really strong flavors but seem to cut each other when cooked together. And I garnished it with some basil from our new basil plant. It was a great entree.

The Wine was a Vidal Blanc from Sand Hill Crane Vineyards which is in Michigan, only about a half hour away. I was originally looking for a Sauvignon Blanc, but I was happy to see that this Michigan vineyard decided to use a lesser known and more suitible grape to the region rather than bank on a name that people recognize. I results were decent. I was expecting it to resemble Sauvignon Blanc, but tasted and went down much more like a Chardonnay. Smooth and almost buttery, not the crisp feel I expected. Definite American oak, and floral notes with a bit of vanilla. Overall the creamyness went well with the risotto. It was a fine table wine, but nothing too exiting going on.

I'm going to try and do this about once a week. Let me know if it gets annoying.

Let's give this one more try.

I am a terrible blogger.

So I got a new job a couple weeks ago. I'm now a "community integration coordinator" for homeless people in washtenaw county. It's going pretty well.

I really want to get back into music. It's been too long since I have played a show, and I'm really missing it. Lukcily I am starting to play with Fields of Industry who have been one of my favorite bands in the state for a long time. But I'm also trying to set up Segernomics again, maybe rename it, reorganize it, and reinvent it a bit, but I want to go back to acoustic. I think it's where I do my best stuff.

Would it be totally pretentious of me to turn this is into a food and wine blog? Because I have definitely thought about it. I think that would be pretentious.

btw, this is public now, so you can stick it in your rss/google reader if you feel so inclined.

The Man in the Diner

The other day I had an hour to kill before work. Being hungry, cold, and almost broke I went into the Fleetwood diner for refuge. It was there that I met this man.

His name is T. Casey Brennen and he is an accomplished comic book writer who's work includes some of the Vamirella comics. Bill Clinton named Janurary 1990 "T. Casey Brennen Month" for his anti-smoking campaigns (although he was smoking when I met him.)

He is homeless in Ann Arbor.

Oh yeah, and he made a statement claiming he was kidnapped and forced to assassinate JFK. He was #8 on the suspect list.

Аз Пътувам със Автобус!

So last week my grandma had surgery on her back. Her Parkinson's has been getting worse and she fell hard enough to break it. I'm not sure exactly what breaking your back entails, but it sounds horrible. She has not been recovering well and so I am driving down to Florida with my family on Saturday. It could very well be the last time I see her.
It's not going to be a fun Christmas.

In other news. I ride the Ypsilanti bus almost every day, and almost always something interesting happens. I thought the public transportation in Bulgaria was insane, and it was, but some of the stuff I have seen gives it a run for it's money.

1. College age girl talking on cellphone at station:
"I don't eat hamburger meat unless I have a hamburger, and I only eat hamburgers if I have a George Forman grill because I don't like greasy food... And I only like chicken if it's fried... And I don't like fresh vegetables except corn on the cob." I can't even count the contradictory statements here. I mean does she really eat corn on the cob fresh? Like straight off stalk?

2. A grown man an woman were having a quite argument behind me, when out of nowhere the man grabs her, hits her, and push/throws her over the seat. She gets up, says she will press charges and leaves. He leaves too. I assume to call his lawyer, or his babymomma.

3. I thought that only in Bulgaria did people carry around ridiculous shit in plastic bags, but no. There is usually at least one person who takes up the isle with a few giant garbage bags full of god knows what. And the crazy part is that they always get off the bus, jump on their bikes with the bags and take off. This is a feat I cannot figure out how to manage, but somehow they make it work.

4. At the complete opposite end of the socioeconomic spectrum: There was a man sitting across from me, wearing a really expensive looking coat and hat, with his iphone in one hand and in the other, a giant wad of cash. I mean really. Come on

Говорите Български? Или Рускии? Nevermind.

The other night on the bus to work I definitely heard a woman speaking either Russian or Bulgarian/Macedonian on her cell phone. I assumed it to be Russian, because the odds of the other are pretty slim. There were plenty of "Къде Си?" A a whole lot of "Кажа Ми" along with the few other things I could pick up from across the bus.

I felt really compelled to go speak to this woman, but what would I say? "Excuse me, but that language you are speaking... I know some of those words. Lets be friends." Somehow I don't think it would have worked out. I used to be so good at talking to strangers in a different language, and by good I mean moderately bad. But still, I feel like I missed an opportunity for something. What? I don't know.

Then today I was in Boarders with a friend who was looking for something, and I felt myself oddly drawn to the travel section, and of course to the Eastern Europe shelves. I found the two books about Bulgaria and almost broke down when I saw a picture of the Virhin mountain. I used to look at it outside my window, and it somehow seemed reduced to that picture. In a guidebook. That no one ever looks at. It was all a bit too much.

Brother, can you spare an alternator?

Our car has been sitting in the parking lot of Auto-Zone for a couple days now.
It's cold and pouring outside.
I have never fixed a car before.
But here we go.

In other news, our landlord is completely obsessed with us. Well not us, and not our apartment. But with us getting a giant Christmas tree in the apartment. Literally every single time he see's us he asks "You got a Christmas tree in there yet? It would look great in there, one over seven feet." This has long ago moved past the point of slightly annoying to downright pushy. Yesterday some friends came to visit and he happened to be around, and the first thing he says to them is about our lack of Christmas tree. I'm thinking about telling him we're Jewish.

Maybe if he pays for my car to be fixed I can afford a giant tree. As it currently stands, I have other things on my mind.

edit:
luckily it was just the battery.

Moving On

When first arriving back to the states, I had two major feelings going on. The first was that I really missed Bulgaria. The second was that I hated living in America. And while I still strongly feel the former, luckily, the later has subsided.

It helps that I love our new town and apartment. (I'll post either a video or some pictures of it soon.) I am withing walking distance of almost ten of my best friends from college, an amazing coffee shop with the best espresso I have ever had, a really great food co-op that ensures I rarely have to go to a large supermarket, several great bars, and a park by the river where Wes can run around.

This is the first time I have ever lived anywhere indefinitely. At home, college was in the future, during college I knew I would leave after my four years, then in Jackson, we knew we would leave the country in eight months, and PC had a time frame as well. It's a strange feeling to not know that I will leave. It also helps that I can actually see my future beyond this week or month. Now that jobs are settling in, Liz and I are looking at grad school options and long term plans.

I promise to try and update this more often. Things happen to me, I should write about them. I don't. I apologize.

Orientation at new job today. I'll be a Server Assistant at the Chop House in downtown Ann Arbor. The job is more or less glorified bus boy, but the shifts are 5pm-10pm, and I will usually pull in $80-$100 a shift. And I can move up to server pretty quickly, which means even more money per shift.

We also found an apartment in downtown Ypsilanti. We will be moving in this week. It's a great location, beautiful space, and really cheap. It's going to be nice to have our own place, and get back in to the flow of things. Transitioning always kind of sucks.

Ok, after being back a while I have a list of things that I definitely notice more after living abroad.

1. Parking Lots - I saw one parking lot in all of Bulgaria, and it was tiny. Every time I see one here I'm always thrown.
2. The space between things. -From houses to grocery store isles, I can't get over how much space there is in between things.
3. The size of cars - I saw maybe 2 pickup trucks in Bulgaria, and even small/midsized cars here seem huge to me right now.
4. Warning signs - I saw a warning sign on a window letting you know that children can fall out of them. Compare that to the doors of death (a.k.a. the people's doors) on the Sofia pubic trams.

and last...
5. The meaninglessness of life - OK, lemme explain. I'm having a hard time putting meaning and value to things here. I think that because in Bulgaria, nothing came easy, everything was more meaningful. It was a huge deal when we bought a blender. A giant accomplishment when we properly communicated to the lady at the post office. And visiting friends seemed so much more urgent and necessary, and it took so much effort, that it was always incredibly meaningful. I think that because things here take so much less effort, they feel a bit cheapened.

I can feel myself starting to slide back into things, and I think overall this is a good thing. I gotta look ahead, gotta stay positive.

The future is food.

With all the changes in my life over the past few weeks you would think I would have something to write about other than cooking.

but.

well.

I'd rather not talk about the other stuff right now.

Tonight I made probably the best pizza of my life. A lavender dough topped with fresh mozzarella, goat cheese, parmesan, tomatoes, garlic-stuff olives, chicken, arugala, and a tomato-pesto sauce. And a salad with arugala, spinach, honeycrisp apples, pecans, strawberries, avocado, and gorgonzola, with a honey-lime vinaigrette.

Good food and drink are about the only things keeping me sane in America. I love having access to this stuff, I just hate how much it costs. I'm probably either going to be working as a cook at whole foods, or serving at a really nice restaurant in Ann Arbor. Either way food is in my future. Hooray.

Closing Time

I would say that I hate goodbyes, but let's be honest, everyone hates goodbyes. I've never met someone who has said "Man, I love saying goodbye." If that guy exists, he is either a liar or an asshole.

That being said, there is no way for me to put into words how difficult these past few days have been. It's been harder to let go here than it was at home. And even though I know it's for the best, I really don't want to go. I'm not ready to go. I have too many people I want to spend the next few years with, too many experience I want to have, too much everything. And while there are so many people and things I am looking forward to seeing and doing, it's hard to focus on that when everything I will miss is still staring me right in the face.

Life will go on. I will readjust. I will be OK. I will feel much better in a week or two.

To everyone who came or wanted to come see us off, I appreciate it more than you can imagine. I needed that closure.

To everyone back home. The one thing keeping me sane is knowing that I will see you soon. I'll be at the Town Bar in Jackson this Thursday, Spring Arbor for the weekend, and in Ann Arbor next week. Liz and I will probably settle in the AA/Ypsi region.

In the prophetic words of Semisonic, every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end. I'll try to remember that as I drink this last bottle of Rakia.

Will it blend?

I never wanted to be one of those teachers who slams textbooks on desks in front of kids and makes them copy dictations for entire classes, but here we are. I have run out of ways to get these kids to shut up for two seconds and care about the present perfect tense.

When I signed up for Peace Corps I didn't exactly envision myself in a room full of 11th grade boys at an auto mechanic school, listening to their mp3 players and yelling at each other while I was teaching. Hell, I didn't even envision teaching. And I'm not sure how to make them care, when quite frankly, I don't care.

It's not that I don't care about them, I just don't care wither or not they learn English. Honestly, these kids can have a fine, productive, and meaningful life in Bulgaria without it. Most of my students want to be bus drivers, mechanics, ect. which are not things you need English for, and in lots of ways knowing English hinders that "sustainable development" we heard so much about. When someone here can speak English, they usually do one of two things, they leave their town for a big city, or they leave their country all together. It's hard to feel like I'm not encouraging the brain drain. But then again, it's not like these kids are learning anything from me anyway.

But we got a blender.
It's making everything ok.

The other night, because I actually found lettuce, and the heirloom tomatoes are still in season. I made some golden sandwich bread and my own mayonnaise to go along with some creamy cauliflower soup.

Blender

Making Mayo

Soup and Sandwich

I forgot just how much I love sandwiches. This is going to be a regular occurrence from here on out.