Wednesday, October 31, 2012

I Love Hurricane Hijinks.


Thanks, XKT.

Tuesday, October 30, 2012

Rosie Makes Tortilla Soup For The Hungry Hawthornes' Hurricane Meal.








The Hawthornes are still hunkered down
with little letup from Sandy.
Our hatches are still battened.
Still raining.
Still gusting.
So my thoughts naturally turn to food.
Quite logically so:
The winds are gusting.
Gusting leads me to Gustation.
Gustation prompts Food.
 Food => Tortilla Soup
Ole!

 



First, I'm making the seasoned tortilla triangles.
 
 Rosie's Seasoned Tortilla Triangles
3 TB butter
2 large tortillas, sliced into triangles
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp coriander
1 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tsp saffron
2 TB cilantro, lightly chopped

Place butter on large baking sheet,
place in oven, turn oven to 350 degrees.
When butter melts,
lightly coat both sides of tortilla triangles in the butter
and place the triangle on the baking dish.
Sprinkle the coriander, cumin,
cayenne, saffron, and cilantro over top.
Bake at 350 degrees for 12 minutes,
or until golden brown.


I find this saffron from the Asian market
in Virginia Beach suspect.

It was 79 cents for an ounce.

Mr. Hawthorne insisted it was saffron
"because it says so right there on the package."

Poor Mr. Hawthorne.

Speaking of cents,
why isn't there a cent key on the typewriter?

Or if you want to Semi-Ho your tortilla triangles
in honor of Hurricane Sandy,
 by all means do so.


Seasoned and ready for the oven.



 Bake at 350 until lightly browned.
Mine took about 12 minutes.

Rosie's Tortilla Soup
( Serves 2)
2 - 3 cups homemade chicken consomme
(Depending on how hungry you are.)
You can sub 2 cans chicken broth if you must.
1/2 cup cooked rice
tomato, diced
1 lime, thinly sliced
1 avocado, diced
1/2 red onion, chopped
1/2 small boneless pork loin, sliced extremely thin
seasoned tortillas
cilantro
scallions
To properly cut a pork chop,
 have the pork loin slightly frozen,
then you can shave the slices off.
Heat chicken consomme to a simmer.

Add in cooked rice, which I happened to have.
If you don't have leftover rice on hand,
you could certainly cook the rice in the consomme.
 Bring the consomme to a light simmer
and add the sliced pork.
The pork is ready in two seconds.
Turn off heat.

Ladle into bowls bought in Taos, New Mexico.
Top with chopped tomatoes, red onions, diced avocados,
sliced limes, cilantro, and scallions.
Serve with Seasoned Tortilla Triangles.

Having your meat slightly frozen
helps to cut very thin slices.

Then cut the slices into strips.
 
Lightly season the pork strips with cumin
and freshly ground salt and pepper.

Isn't my glistening chicken consomme beautiful?
The flavor of homemade
as opposed to canned
cannot be imparted to the uninitiated.
You must make this yourself.

Pour that golden goodness into your pan
and bring to a simmer.


Add the rice and heat through
.

 Slice the tomatoes.
Chop the avocado and slice
the noticeably absent red onion.

Thinly slice the lime
and chop the cilantro and scallions.

Drop the pork strips into the simmering consomme.


The pork cooks through immediately.



 Add the tomatoes, avocado, red onion,
scallions, and cilantro.

Squish the limes with your soup spoon
to get even more flavor.
Don't forget the red onions,
like I almost did.



This is one of those dishes 
in which the whole is more than the sum of its parts.
In every bite, there are myriads of flavors and textures.
It's one of the more sublime forms of synergy.


Monday, October 29, 2012

Coast Guard Rescue.

Please watch this video of Coast Guard heroes rescuing 14 of 16 crew members of the HMS Bounty.  The crew abandoned ship last night about 90 miles off the coast of Hatteras. The ship issued a distress call at 6:30 Sunday evening, at which time it had lost power and pumps. The Bounty Organization contacted the Coast Guard which sent out a C-130 to track the ship.  By 4:30 AM, the deterioration of the situation warranted the captain to issue orders to abandon ship. Two US Coast Guard helicopters were dispatched to the scene, rescuing 14 of the 16 crew members. No word yet on the other two crew members.



I'm wondering why this ship was even out there.


Edited to add:

After two hours,I came back and found this:
HMS Bounty Sinks Off Coast; Crew Member Found, Captain Still Missing
The fifteenth "unresponsive"  crew member was rescued; the search continues for the captain.


 This ship was built in 1960 for the movie Mutiny on the Bounty.


Update:
One dead, 14 saved, one missing, as tall ship HMS Bounty sinks off Hatteras.
The captain remains missing.


Hurricane Sandy - Day 2.


Now this is worrisome. 
It's around 1:30.
The wind is gusting more.
It's raining harder.
The water is rising.

And here's the disturbing part:
This is low tide.
High tide is around 8 tonight.


Tail-end Of Sandy.


Sandy is still with us.
Still blowing and raining,
although not as hard.
Still getting the occasional gusts.

High tide was around eight this morning,
and, as you can see,
the water level is pretty much normal.

Hopefully, the worst is over,
but we don't know until the next high tide.
The west wind and a high tide
do not a good mix make.

Off to make tortilla soup.
Ole!
Arriba!

Sunday, October 28, 2012

Later On During The Hurricane.

I just found this on Facebook, and I had to stop and laugh.

‎"Maintaining proper gastronomy is key during hurricanes." - Rosie Hawthorne
 
Did I just have an Algonquin moment?

Hurricane Sandy. The Hawthornes Persevere. Sunday Evening. October 28, 2012.

Our dinner tonight,
on the cusp of Hurricane Sandy's shenanigans,
is provided by the ones with Pioneer Spirit
on this Blessed Island upon which we live.
Thank you, Zippy.


 Good neighbor, Zippy,
brought a bushel of crabs over the other night.

 Mr. Hawthorne did his magic on the crabs.
He cooked and picked the crabs all by himself.

At the time,
I was on the ground level,
cleaning and moving stuff to higher levels,
in preparation for this BitchSandy.

 Tonight, Sunday, October 28, 2012,
we finally settled down to eat.
Dinner ENTIRELY by Mr Hawthorne.

 The green topping in the back 
tastes like parsley and garlic.
We found it in the fridge.
It was still good!

 The pink topping is something I really like.
It's roasted red pepper in tartar sauce.

A most excellent crab cake, Mr. Hawthorne.
I genuflect.

Rosie Is Getting Tired.

Poor Mr. Hawthorne,
leaving to take his truck to higher ground.
Mine is on way high ground
since yesterday.

My utility room.





Oh, Sandy. I Like Thee Not.

Sandy is working on my nerves now.

Still blowing and raining.

We've elevated all important stuff which one 
would keep in a utility room or garage.

We have moved our vehicles
to higher elevations.

And now ...
we wait some more.



More Of Sandy.



I'm sure many of you are wondering,
"What does Rosie eat during a hurricane?"

Well, Imonna tell you.
Rosie eats comfort food
and Rosie's comfort is meatloaf on white bread with butter.
A nice whole wheat heel is really good too.

Mr. Hawthorne and I (Read: mostly me.)
have spent the past few days preparing for Sandy.
We learned from ThatBitch Irene.
We'd never had flooding to that extent before.

Our homes are on pilings,
so we don't worry about that.
We worry about all the equipment and debris of our lives
one normally stores in a
 ground-level utility room and garage.

After ThatBitchIrene,
the cleanup entailed taking EVERYTHING
out of the garage and setting it in the driveway
and cleaning the garage completely.
Bleach was involved.
We went to Home Depot and
bought sturdy storage/shelving units,
installed them throughout,
let everything dry out in the sun
in the driveway for about 2-3 weeks,
then organized everything and put it back together.
I never want to have to do that again.
To make a short story long,
we had to lift several rather heavy items
to put up on planks atop saw horse.
There was a power washer,
a compressor, and a generator,
which I hope we won't have to use.
Then I had to figure out what to do
with the additional items Middle Hawthorne
left in the garage 3 weeks ago
when he was moving from Point A to Point L
and stopped at Casa Hawthorne along the way
 to "drop off some stuff."

Everything is ready.

And now ...
we wait.




Sandy Update.




My castor bean plants are taking a beating.



Sandy Update.

As of Sunday morning, the center of Hurricane Sandy
is over 200 miles away from Cape Hatteras,
with tropical force winds extending 520 miles
from its center.

We've been experiencing rain and winds since
Saturday morning,
with conditions increasing overnight.
The forecast calls for Sandy to pass
around 150 miles offshore
sometime between Sunday night and Monday morning.

I hate that.
I hate it when a storm hits at night
and I can't see what's happening.

It is expected late tonight
the winds will shift from northeast to west-southwest
as the storm passes by the Outer Banks,
creating a very good possibility of sound-side flooding.
A 3-5 feet of storm surge is expected.
This is not good.

For more information on Sandy,
check out the Outer Banks Voice.

And stay tuned for more Sandy Updates.

Rosie's Roses. October 27, 2012.


I know you've seen my moonflowers opening before,
but this video is particularly telling.
I have time lapse video on my camera
and it has several settings.
This video is on the shortest interval
which is every 30 seconds.

I told you you can watch the moonflowers as they open.
This moonflower opened up in that thirty-second interval.


I'm headed out to pick a bouquet
because all this will be gone
when Sandy blows through.