Mmmm, potato kugel
After reading about this “potato, egg, salt, grease” concoction, I obviously needed to make some. I used the recipe at the end of this piece, and it worked quite well. Grating all those potatos took forever, mind you. And can someone tell me a good way to grate onion that won’t make my eyes burn? At the suggestion of another cookbook, I added some grated cheese to the mix. I also heated some oil in the baking dish for a few minutes and then added the mixture (similar to when making yorkshire pudding). It adds more crunch to the edges, while the inside stays soft and savory. It took me only two meals to eat it all.
The perfect cheese sandwich, proven by science
And it’s 0.225b+0.196f+0.181e + 0.136p +0.134c + 0.127s.
But margarine on a cheese sandwich? Ew.
Check out the recent issue of Stay Free!, subtitled the Psychology Issue. There are interviews with Edward Valenstein on the history of lobotomies (why does my library not carry his books? I want to read more!), Laurence Kirmayer on mental illness across cultures, and Edward Shorter on hysteria and psychosomatic illnesses. There’s a reader write-in column is on this last topic. (My only experience with that was bizarre; after my first kiss I was unable to eat for three days. And I can eat a full meal when sick with the flu!). But the magazine is worth the $4 for the anecdote of the suicidal circus octopus.
I can’t stop thinking about my dinner at Lomzynianka. My meal was cheap, tasty, satisfying Polish food. After rejecting two restaurants in Williamsburg (Brunch only? Four dollars for borscht? Screw that!), my dining companion and I finally made it to Manhattan Avenue in Greenpoint. The restaurant’s decor is reminiscent of your neighbours’ rec room, and the food has an equally homey flavor. Nothing is under $5.50, and I splurged on the Polish platter: stuffed cabbage, kielbasa, bigos, pierogis and potatoes. Mmm meat and starch! The pierogis can be had fried or boiled; mine came fried. There were three different fillings. I am partial to the potato and cheese. Farmer’s cheese is a bit sweet but still tasty, as is the sauerkraut and mushroom. Bigos was new to me, but contains familar ingredients like sauerkraut, mushrooms, and meat. Yum. Who’s up for a return visit?
This time it’s challah! (But on a Thursday?) I have three different recipes but which one to use? Not the one requiring six eggs, thanks. (I only have four in the house.) I combine the Mark Bittman (How to Cook Everything) and the most recent edition of Joy of Cooking, using Bittman’s recipe and Joy’s rising times. So. I combine part of the water and yeast, and then eggs, sugar, salt and flour and start thinking ‘uggh, why is this so dry? Please don’t let this turn into the hamantashen disaster of 2003′ but then a-ha, oh right, I forgot the rest of the water. I knead and cover and wait, then beat the now puffy dough down and stick it in the fridge for three or four hours.
By now I am SO BEAT, it is time to try a Girl Drink Drunk cocktail recipe, taken from the the Fog City Diner Cookbook. It’s the Pterodactyl! Oh shit, I forgot to buy limes. Maybe I’ll just add more pineapple juice. I fiddle with the proportion of the juice, the simple syrup, and the Stolichnaya Limonnaya (ok, fine, it’s Smirnoff Citrus Twist, ’cause I’m cheap.) Shake in my $2 cocktail shaker, and well. It’s sticky and strong. Maybe it does need lime juice.
Back to the bread! Knead, rest, roll into three pieces, (WAIT, I have no rolling pin!) braid. Cover and rest and then brush with a pastry brush. (Surprisingly, I actually do have one of those. Thanks Williams-Sonoma store!) BAKE.
It’s yummy. The crust is crunchier than I remember it being on store bought loaves, and maybe next time I will add more eggs to the dough to get a lovely yellow look. It’s nice with butter. And maybe another Pterodactyl.
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