Omelets (food)
I finally made an omelet for the first time since I saw that particular episode, and it is, without a doubt, the best omelet I've ever had.
The particular steps I took were:
- Put three eggs in a warm water bath to bring them up to room temperature
- Finely chop some green bell pepper, scallions, and pepperoni (the real stuff which comes in the casing and everything, not the crap they put on pizza) and sauteé for a few minutes
- Whisk the eggs (I actually used a fork, not a whisk — please don't tell Alton, because he spent like 10 minutes of the episode showing exactly why to use a whisk and exactly which kind to use!) along with 1/4 tsp of kosher salt (Alton always uses kosher salt and so I haven't even bought the regular kind yet!) until they're light and slightly fluffy
- Heat a clean, stainless steel pan with a very light coating of oil (I used canola spray), and pour the egg mixture into it
- Swirl the egg with a fork until it begins to set
- Have Alton's voice pop into your head reminding you that at this point you just need to let it be and wait while it sets, because anything you do to the omelet will ruin it (a step I almost forgot!)
- When the topmost bit of egg is nearly set, use your spatula (which he spent another 10 minutes selecting) to scrape around the edges, then very carefully lift underneath the omelet, sliding it out onto a plate
- Fill with the filling, and fold the sides over in thirds
- Very lightly sprinkle black pepper and freshly-grated cheddar cheese on top
On another culinary orgasm note, earlier today I went, for the first time in my life, to Fürni IKEA, which runs a free shuttle bus from the Port Authority bus terminal. The first thing I did there was went to the restaurant, because I was hungry, and was amazed by the selection of food — it was mostly gourmet-quality high-end cuisine for prices way lower than what I normally pay for lunch around here. It makes me wish I worked near IKEA so I could eat lunch there every day. I had some amazingly good basil pesto pasta with crawfish (I'd never had crawfish before either), and it was only like $4 for the plate. I rounded it out with a small side salad (75 cents!) and a drink. Though, those crazy Swedes sure love themselves some lingenberries. The lingenberry sauce on the crayfish was pretty good, and the lingenberry vinaigrette on the salad was okay, but the lingenberry juice just seemed kind of excessive.
(I didn't end up buying anything else there, but I was there to browse and am probably going to order things from the catalog now that I know what their stuff looks like, and also how much they charge for shipping directly from the store... Also, the walkthrough was very helpful; I didn't realize how true it was without having been to an IKEA before. Now I know, and knowing's half the battle.)
Comments
Well, that mental image certainlly killed any blowjob fantasies I may have had today.. Or this month for that matter. ;p
I wonder how a blowjob-by-mail service would work. Maybe it'd be like a singing telegram, only their mouth would be full.
I don't know why I didn't comment on this earlier, but Ikea is definitely a great place to shop. I'm surprised you haven't been there before. It's the kind of place where everyday useful items(kitchen utensils, pots, dinnerware sets, etc..) are really low prices, yet a simple looking couch costs about a grand. There are no shades of gray. Everything either costs too little or too much. Yet everything there has enough utility to be very practical. The restaurant alone is worth the trip for me. I go there once every four or five months just to restock candles and tea lites. So it's more of a treat for me than a ritual. {=)
The problem I'm running into with Ikea stuff is that all the stuff I want is only available in-store, which means paying like $100+ for shipping (catalog shipping is much less). So a lot of these things I'm just going to order from Target, because these days Target has some pretty nice stuff with free shipping which is actually better than the equivalent Ikea stuff.
The main thing, though, is just that I can't find any pieces of furniture which handle my needs for my electronics just yet. Specifically, I want something which doubles both as an entertainment center and a computer workstation, which probably means getting a low desk-like thing and a separate rack-style audio shelf. But then there's the issues of component width (my stereo is quite wide and deep, and most of the vertical shelving I've seen doesn't look like it's wide enough for the PS2 even though that's standard audio component width, and of course most video game systems are top-loaders and so on), and other similar nonsense. Also the issue of chairs, and how to deal with the various wires between the monitor, my laptop, the external firewire drive, the Wacom, and so on.
Ikea's "Journalist" line is nearly perfect for what I want, but it's still not quite right, and many of the parts seem to be in-store-only. Which is retarded.
I need a new omelet pan...the one we have is trashed.
Also, I think that his closed-mindedness is part of the 'charm,' like it's supposed to be obvious that you really don't have to be that totally neurotic about everything. And he does provide alternatives in many cases. He's just very pragmatic and anal, but he also gives some very good advice.