Wednesday, December 05, 2007

kitchen noir

Dark, mysterious things have been happening in my kitchen. Like the case of the missing toast:

In the busy life I lead, I am often not able to fully ingest something before my attention is diverted away. In this case, I was about to sit down to a nice slice of toasted baguette when the wee one woke up from a morning nap. I ran upstairs to attend to him, and returned just a few moments later to find these remains. Hmmmmm, in black and white, to make it all the more mysterious......

Well now. If my breakfast is going to disappear I'll just have to do something about it. Sticking with the theme, I pulled out a boudin noir (my new favorite sausage) from the fridge and plopped it in a frying pan. I went to the remains of the baguette and discovered there was enough for a breakfast sandwich. So after frying the sausage, with the pan still blistering hot, in went two eggs. Slice the bread and pop it in the toaster. Spicey mustard in hand, the fixin's were coming together.

Now that is one good looking breakfast sandwich.

Wait.

What the hell? Black and white still? What the f*%@ is going on here?

Can't a guy enjoy his morning sandwich in peace AND color?

Well, it tasted great. Them folks over at the Fatted Calf really know a thing or two about charcuterie. Topped off with local eggs and handmade mustard on a sourdough baguette and I nearly fainted. I could eat this all the time for breakfast. And lunch. Okay, and dinner too, who am I kidding. But I'll still need something to wash it down with. Something black I suppose.

Like a homebrewed black death stout. Who cares if the picture is black and white or not, the beer is black. That's all that matters. Oh, and super yummy tasty. I guess that matters too. There is another gallon or two in the garage, that should in theory, peak in flavor somewhere near the winter solstice. Pffftt! Like it will last that long. (I've really gotta get to making another batch of that stuff, damn it's good!)

Then, with the holidays just around the corner and the prospect of cooking very large sized meals for lots of family and friends, you start looking at all the kitchen implements at your disposal and wonder: do I have a big enough pot to cook that 15-20 pound roast in? I rifle through the pots and pans in the kitchen and none look up for the task. Besides, it's hard to gauge how big such a roast would be in theory. Unless you have such an ample sized "roast" at your disposal.

Looks like an eight-gallon stock pot will work!

Thanks little buddy. Good thing 6 month olds are entertained by such simple things. Like being momentarily sequestered in a large pot while your father day-dreams of enormous quantities of chile verde............

And for the folks worried about child endangerment: calm down. I'm a professional Monkey Wrangler here. I've been on the job for four years and haven't killed anyone yet. There was no active flame under that pot, nor was there one for the previous couple of hours. And just so you know, he loved it. So much in fact that the elder monkey requested she try it out as well.

See you all later. On the dark side of things.

Got any kitchen noir to share?

9 comments:

Chilebrown said...

Black Death Stout does not sound like a Christmas Beer. It does sound pretty good.

K and S said...

that stout looks really good! and that last shot of your monkey in the pot reminded me of when we got new trash cans, we would fill them with water and go for a "swim".

Anonymous said...

I have to stop sneaking over to your blog while I'm at work. People are going to start to wondering why so much laughing is coming out of my cubicle.
I have to say... you are quite a manly man. Boudin Noir for breakfast?!?

Anonymous said...

OH LORD!!! Now I want Boudin Noir...I really really want some now! I fell in love with that stuff when I was living in Europe...I might have to go do something about this.
Come to think of it...that would taste mighty fine on one of your EMs.

Monkey Wrangler said...

Chile: I didn't name the stout. It's the name of the recipe for it. But damn........you could call it doggie doo stout and if it tasted like this I'd still drink it.

Kat: I seem to remember a neighbor doing something like that as a kid. Maybe they were relatives of your's?

Mimi: Yeah, hunker down so no one can see you and then let out a diabolical laugh. Then jump up suddenly and say something like: "ooooooo, I'll have to try that recipe out sometime!"

Manly breakfast huh? Thanks, I needed that, especially after all that pink recently.

Aaron: I wanted the boudin on an em, but none were hanging around. I was bummin'.

Anonymous said...

The baby in the pot totally reminded me of "A Modest Proposal". Now there is some Kitchen Noir for you!

meathenge said...

Hmm, that's where my two boys ended up. Keeps 'em all safe.

Biggles

Monkey Wrangler said...

Leena: Really now? Hmmmmmm........

Biggles: Hmmmmmm...........now really?

Tea said...

That last photo is priceless!