Deb's Lunch … and dinner and breakfast too

So after the (disappointing to say the least) elections, I got up on Wednesday morning and went for a walk. To Union South, where I got a bunch of cash – for traveling and because I knew I was meeting the kids for dinner in Chicago at a restaurant that only takes cash. I got checked in for my Southwest flight and got in the As for both legs of the trip. I got a latte at Aldo’s and walked home to eat some breakfast, pack and work.

Megan & I agreed that I’d drive the car to my university lot and leave it there for her to drive home – I have the valet key, and left her the regular one. The car was only there a few minutes, and it’s $4 as soon as you drive in, but that’s still way cheaper than a cab, and I had time to go to the library and pick up my holds, for more to read on the trip.

Then it was just the long bus ride to Chicago. I had to change buses in Janesville, and the first bus had wifi, but no electrical outlets; the second no wifi but newer, cleaner, and outlets. So I arrived in Chicago with a charged laptop and 3 assignments left to grade.

I took the L up to Wicker Park, red to blue. Texting with the kids constantly to coordinate – Al put his name in for a table for 3, and John was on his way on the bus. Gotta love the CTA – Al told me the Damen stop, closest to the restaurant, was closed, but no mention of that fact on Google maps, on the platform, or even in the stop announcements on the train. I had to get off at Western, and walk back. The only place it said anything about Damen being closed was the sign on the stop, that I didn’t see until I walked past it on my way to the restaurant. I got turned around off the train, and I was in a hurry, and I fell and skinned my knee. But dinner was good, Big Star, a hipster join in Wicker Park, Al’s pic for his belated birthday dinner, and it was good to see the kids. We split a queso fundido – melted cheese with sausage & chiles and corn tortillas to dip. I had a fish taco, fried fish, and a veggie taco with potatoes and corn and chiptloe rajas, and two bottles of Flywheel Bright Lager.

Al’s newest tat, on the table at Big Star. I expect he’ll have this arm a full sleeve too, in a year or two.

After dinner, John figured out how to bus east and get the subway north, but Al rode the blue line all the way to the loop with me, and he caught the red north, and I waited to get it south.

I stopped at the Jewel and bought a sixpack, and headed back to Mark’s apartment. I got in, and ordered my taxi for 4:30, showered, and opened a beer, and tried to watch a Sopranos – I drank about 1/3 of the beer, watched the first 15 minutes, and then woke up for the credits – guess I’ll have to watch that one again. I set my iPhone alarm for 3:45, and went to sleep.

The cab was prompt and cost $30 and I was at Midway before 5:00. But I had trouble pulling up my boarding passes on my phone, and I didn’t get TSA precheck, and had to go thru regular security, and the gate was way off in a corner, and I had to change planes in Houston, where my coffee choices were Peets or Duncan Donuts. First world problems. Made up for by the fact that the flight was almost empty and I got a whole row. I ate the graham snacks they gave me and a pear I brought, and mostly slept.

#firstworldproblems gate 4AB at midway – a zillion miles away & no Starbucks. Even the jetway was long

— Debra Shapiro (@DebsLunch) November 6, 2014

On the second leg of the trip, Houston to Albuquerque, I bought the $8 not-so-great wifi and finished grading. I arrived in Albuquerque, and paid for another $30 cab ride, that got me to the hotel in time for the conference opening talk. I did spend most of the day suffering from the first day of conference, hadda get up at 3:45 to get here mush brain blues. We ate dinner at Church Street Café. More on the rest of the trip, next coupla posts.

On Thursday night, I carved my pumpkin, and went to bed a little early.

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On Friday morning, it snowed (just a little).

A dust of snow on Halloween morning

On Saturday, I had leftover twice-baked potatoes, refried with an egg on it,for breakfast. Then I baked my pie palooza pies. Cheese and onion, again. Thank you Rutles, for the inspiration. It seemed the schedule was charmed – I left home at about 11:20, and was at the community center with the salad greens & dressing ingredients and pie donation from the co-op by 12:30. I went home and finished baking the pies, and had time to bike back over to look at the checked in pies, and even though I didn’t get back until after dark, I had time to made chicken enchiladas for supper.

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On Sunday, the charmed-ness lasted until about 8:00 AM. I had lots of help in the kitchen, but something  went wrong with the coffee order – when the volunteer arrived at the café to pick it up, an employee had failed to show up and there was no coffee – until she waited about 30 minutes for it to get brewed. I think it was a record turnout. We had just enough pie. By the later seatings, the selection of savory, especially vegetarian, was not the best. Two of the restaurants chose to donate organ meat pies – but they were in fact all eaten. By my lights, there was just not enough bacon. Only one pie kind – Peter Robertson of RP’s Pasta spaghetti carbonara pies had bacon. There was a quiche with chorizo, and a deep dish pie with veal sausage, the two kinds with organ meats, and chicken pot pie.

And, in an unrelated, but simultaneous disaster, Mark washed his iPhone in the pocket of his jeans.

Leek tart

I made leek tart for brunch today – more or less this Molly Wizenberg recipe; I, as always, used my own pie dough recipe:

For single crust:

• 1 1/2 cups flour
• pinch salt (or use salted butter)
• scant TBLS sugar
• 8 TBLS (1 stick) unsalted butter
• 1 TBLS vegetable shortening
• 3 – 4 TBLS cold water

Measure the flour, salt and sugar into the bowl of a stand mixer or food processor, or large mixing bowl. Slice the butter and shortening in on top. Cut the fats into the flour mixture, either with the paddle attachment for the mixer, short spurts of the food processor, or with a pastry blender, 2 knives, and your fingers, until you have a meal-y consistency. (In the food processor, it will look like coarse meal; other methods you should have some small lumps, none bigger than a pea.) If you are using a machine, with it running, drizzle in the water – if by hand stir with a fork. Mix (again short spurts in the food processor) until the dough clumps – stop before you have a solid ball. With your hands, gather the dough together, flatten into a disk, and wrap in plastic wrap or a clean towel, and chill for at least 30 minutes, or up to 3 days. Use plastic wrap for longer storage.

I rolled out the dough and fit it into my 9-inch flan ring. I froze the crust for a few minutes, then sprinkled in crumbles from a hunk of soft goat cheese that had been kicking around in the fridge for a long time, a few TBLS of grated parmesan, and a little bit of smoked gouda, also grated. I spread the leek confit over, and then used the same amounts of custard as Molly’s recipe.

I forgot the salt in the dough, and didn’t use salted butter, so I salted the pie crust cookies with fleur de sel. Which made Mark come running down to tell me that I had salted the cookies, after he took his upstairs to eat as a post-brunch snack – he was afraid I got my shakers mixed up or something.

Salted pie crust cookies

But no, done on purpose.

I also made Hell’s Kitchen style hash browns – with bacon bits, garlic, and green onions. We ate them before I could take a picture

So because the metadata conference I came to Texas for was scheduled the same time as Austin City Limits, I’m staying way the F out in the suburbs at an Aloft hotel. It’s right on a bus line, this rapid bus with limited stops, but still 40 – 50 minutes to get downtown. It’s also in a “lifestyle” mall – kind of like Greenway Station or Hilldale in Madison, but because it’s Texas, bigger. Instead of a Sundance cinema, it’s got an iPic Cimema. Bigger menu, more drinks. Full bar & pool tables & other games in the lobby. Leather seats with TV trays attached. Doesn’t reek of popcorn. In the previews just watched their chef (or a movie of their chef) preparing spicy fried chicken fingers with brioche toast, and now it’s their mixologist making a maple Margarita. And, oh, garnished with an orange twist & bacon. And you have time to order one before your movie. I’m closer than I like but it’s what was left.

I saw The Judge – kind of sappy, and a little too long, but the Roberts, Downy Jr. and Duvall, were good. And I just did one of those buzzfeed quizzes on what role were you born to play, and it came out Iron man, so I guess I was meant to go see Robert Downy Jr. I think everyone was playing a bit younger than they are, but maybe only 5ish years for Downy, instead of 10+ like Duvall.

I haven’t been doing so well at documenting the food this trip – I really haven’t taken any pics*. The rubber-chicken-conference dinner was actually the university dining hall version of Texas BBQ – there was chicken (that I didn’t have) and brisket in BBQ sauce – OK, but not really flavorful; corn muffins with a bit of red pepper in them – similar – a little dry, not bad but not terrific; veleveeta-y mac & cheese; potato salad (probably the best tasting). Good potatoes turned out to be a theme. The lunches were notable for the amount of vegetables – salad bar with kidney and garbanzo beans, potato salad made with good fingerling potatoes, roasted green beans, roasted fingerling potatoes, roasted cauliflower, broccoli, cabbage cooked with apples – and the Swedish fish in the snacks. Oh, yeah and whole fruits and peanut butter – so on Friday I had a banana with peanut butter for breakfast and on Saturday, I had an apple, also with.

Backtracking to Friday night, I went on a quest for cheap Mexican with another librarian from LoC, and got to eat at Taco Joint (their website sucks, you can’t read the menu, obviously not done, lorem ipsum text, but at least they’re using Word Press). I had tried to go there the last time I was in Austin, but it was closed – it closes at 8:00PM. Between us we tried 3 tacos – the Wholey Mole – chicken with mole; El 4/20 (haha) beef carnitas with shoestring pepitas – no, I still don’t know what those are – little crunchy strip something’s; and the street taco – grilled sirloin (garlic & lime) with avocado. I rode the bus back to the Aloft, finished grading my information architecture students’ websites, watched a Sopranos, and I think I slept straight thru until 6:30AM Saturday. That never happens. I mighta got up, but I don’t remember.

Speaking of sleep, the Super Shuttle is getting me at 5:30AM Sunday, so I better head for bed.

Here’s how bad I really was at taking pictures – I took little camera, my Canon point & shoot, and when I got home, its memory card was still in my computer. <grin>

I started writing down a bunch of random impressions on Tuesday, and now it’s Friday and I’m in Texas. At the metadata conference, that was in Pittsburgh the last time I went.

On Monday, Rach and I went for a nice long walk in the morning. I felt like I was getting stuff done, but I recorded a lecture with the sound off, and had to re-do. I did finally get three people together for a phone meeting that had been rescheduled and rescheduled, to talk about a program for the librarians’ conference next summer. I drove out to Evansville to get my U-Pick pumpkins from my CSA farm.

Tipi Produce pumpkins

And came home and roasted vegetables – delicata squash & Romanesco broccoli, that Megan and I ate on lettuce, with pears with Brie melted over. Before I went to bed, I marinated tofu, like this.

On Tuesday, I had a bunch of meetings, starting at 8:15. I left my bike parked in an UN-covered spot and it got parked in and rained on. I got my computer configured for a workshop on Saturday. Which meant that I didn’t get home until after 6:00, and then I roasted vegetables again – this time carrots, that I tossed with wine vinegar & cilantro, and broccoli, that I tossed with the last of the Romanesco (because it never seemed quite done). And roasted the tofu. And put on a big pot of brown rice with veggie broth (that I had thawed for two things I’ve never got around to making: this soup, and braised red cabbage with apples.)

Megan had had a sandwich, but Rach and I needed to eat before the rice got done. We ate big bowls of veggies & tofu – naturally the rice was perfect just as we finished. I puttered and clean up the kitchen, and paid bills, and did laundry. Since we’d had such a healthy dinner we both craved a little something sweet, so we split a microwave s’more and watched the Sopranos pilot. And paused it for a few minutes to make Nutella grahams.

I can’t remember which day is which, but I know I had a couple of satisfying packed lunches involving Greek yogurt – with some kind of chunky and maybe a little sweet pear apple sauce I made; with raspberries and honey. One day I had a cheese sandwich with cheddar & the last dab of some coleslaw.

On Wednesday, I decided that I wouldn’t leave until about 2:00 for Chicago. So I got up and walked Rachael to work, then folded laundry and packed and remade beds and went to Whole Foods for a toothbrush, and put air in the car’s tires because the low tire pressure warning light was on. It came back on when I turned the car back off after getting the air, but went off for good about 12 miles away from Madison. I tried to eat up fruit that might spoil while I was gone, raspberries and pears and bananas and plums. I was pretty uninspired to be packing for a place where it was going to be 93 degrees everyday, when we’re having great, crisp, fall weather in the Midwest – but in the end it made packing easier, because I had lighter clothes that packed smaller.

Breakfast on Wednesday

Mark and I had dinner at Gioco in Chicago on Wednesday night – we split a roasted Portobello mushroom appetizer, and I had paccheri with tomato sauce & burata, and he had fettuccine Bolognese. All quite good, especially the mushroom – I inadvertently ate a slice of raw garlic that came with it. And I got a 2nd glass of wine, while Mark had a coffee – probably shouldn’t have done that either. Went back to the apartment and watched the 2nd episode of the Sopranos.

I woke up at 5:15 and remembered that I never checked in for my Southwest flight – but I still got B58 – so not too bad. And, if Mark’s new MacBook Air hadn’t been right next to the bed, I probably wouldn’t have checked in till it got light.

We had breakfast at Yolk, and I took the Orange Line to Midway.

Vat of oatmeal, Mark’s cimmy bun French toast, potatoes & bacon