Marbella, Briefly

Marbella, Briefly

Cars Seen at Our Hotel:
A Bugatti Veyron
The Dutch "Gay TV" Audi sports car (it's pink)
A Ferrari
Two Porsche Cayennes (the silly crossover SUV)

Nearby in Puerto Banus, not yet seen but we probably have to check it
out:
The Plaza Antonio Banderas

El Circulo, the 4 euro bottle of rioja wine we got at a nearby
supermarket:
Not delicious

The Rioja at La Vanencia, the tapas place we were at last night:
Delicious

Ingredients of note in hotel bar sangria:
Sprite, triple sec, sugar

Fact that supermarket has draft beer in its coffeeshop:
Awesome, plus the coffee is good.

Unusual things The Pedant ate:
Black pudding with onions
Vanilla and strawberry ice cream in lasagna shape

Where we're going Friday:
Grenada

-Sent from my iPod because I am a pretentious futurist

Update

Married Sherbs. In Spain. Food terrific.

-Sent from my iPod because I am a pretentious futurist

Please, Folks

So, I hear from Australia that demand for upscale cat food is contributing to overfishing.

Overfishing is actually one of the environmental causes that I really care about (I've actually written to Congress on this issue); after seeing the Tsukiji fish market in Tokyo, I realized that we are pulling too much from the ocean and it's just not sustainable.

It's one thing if people eat good fish, but cats? Come on. This is like dog food that looks better than Dinty Moore. It's even packaged better (see Dinty Moore products here).

Dogs will eat anything. Cats will eat most meat products unless you make them picky. They do not need to eat our food, thus imperiling my chance to get sushi (or pickled herring in cream sauce) twenty years from now.

Stop the cat food madness.

Puccini, or Not

I said in my last blog post that we were going to dinner. It was a good dinner. As is our tradition, I'll blog my side.

Went to Tosca last night here in DC, and did not know that the waiters were refilling my glass with pinot noir as I focused on my food. I was a tad loopy on the Metro home (the Sherbs, as always, was very tolerant of my shenanigans).

My meal was as follows:
1) Red mullet and sardines with fava beans and tomatoes - did not taste like the sardines one's used to. Salty, tasty, and the beans were terrific.

2) Quail stuffed with shiitake mushroom. I love me some quail, and this was deliciously moist, on a bed of wilted swiss chard and grilled artichokes. I have never had chard so good, but I tend to stay away from chard and kale because they can be bitter as all get out (still, we're making a dish featuring kale at home in a couple nights - and may make more if kale stays at 99¢ per pound).

3) Gorgonzola ice cream with candied celery and rosemary - as soon as I saw this incredibly Iron Chef-y dish on the menu, I knew I had to have it. Verdict: I loved it. My father (for whom dessert is chocolate) would not.

I believe, in my drunken stupor, I told the Sherbs "it's like an appetizer, for dessert, but sweet." It's a little more than that, but the drunk summary suffices for rough work. The ice cream itself is not sweet; it's more neutral and gorgonzola-flavored. It's eaten with the candied celery, which is like a relish or a fruit topping, and also mixed with the honey syrup that the ice cream is placed in.

The sommelier's wine selection was excellent (we took advantage of his recommendations), and I loved the plum tomato foccacia in the bread basket.

Restaurant Redux

Recently I noticed, using Google's Webmaster Tools, that this blog is one of the top searches for the Quebec City restaurant Le Pain Beni. Which is good, because we really liked the food there; I have never had better sweetbreads in chocolate sauce, and the Sherbs had great stuff which does not automatically turn off the non-food-adventurous.

The breakfast there, while really only croissant, fruit, baked beans, and little meat tarts, was a great start to a day of trudging through the snow.

Tonight we'll be going to a fun restaurant here in DC with my boss. Hopefully it will be non-awkward.

Do You Drink the Muffin Drink?

Since the news today is filled with cows attacking bears and the McCain campaign's baseless slurs against Dungeons and Dragons, I thought it would be a good idea for a similarly frivolous post, based on a prior conversation I had with the Sherbs.

How do you make a mixed drink that tastes like a muffin?

We have some cheap blackberry wine (as mentioned before, purchased at a sale at the Teet), and I think with Cointreau, vodka, and a butterscotch schnapps in the right quantities, it can approach muffin-tasting (I think it would be better with blueberries, but the Sherbs doesn't like blueberries).

With bourbon and blackcurrant liquor, you might be able to approach "raisin bran." Or create something vomitrocious (a neologism that I find not as good, but more useful, than my new favorite non-word "baconostalgia"; furthermore, it turns out that I didn't invent it; "vomitrocious" has been used in such cultural touchstones as an episode of Arthur, the PBS cartoon about an aardvark that does not look at all like an aardvark).

"Chocolate muffins" are actually cupcakes, and so those suggesting Godiva liqueur recipes should take note. Vermeer is better for most mixed drinks, anyway; it's like the Cocio of chocolate booze.

Man, I wish I knew of a place that sold Cocio around here. It's not only better than Nesquick and Yoo-hoo (not hard, especially since Yoo-hoo is one step removed from the weird marsupial-equivalent-in-evolution beverage that is Ovaltine), but from the stuff you make at home with chocolate syrup. It is tasty-riffic.

Eating, Drinking, and Merriment

The Sherbs has already mostly dealt with Sette Bello; my only contribution is to add my meal there, which was a seafood medley on squid ink pasta (pretty good, although basically just stuff in a garlic-butter sauce; not exceptional) and the veal with saffron risotto entree (veal: slightly dry. Risotto: good).

At least as tasty was the pasta dish the Sherbs cooked up last night, which was spinach and garlic on whole wheat rigatoni, topped with parmesan and chopped walnuts. Really tasty.

We also made sangria yesterday to get rid of the half-bottles of cranberry wine and cheap red wine we had lying around (especially since they had a sale on fruit wines at the Teet, and we stocked up). The fruit part was contributed by a frozen fruit medley we were initially going to use in smoothies, but then we used the yogurt for something else...I can't remember what.

Tonight I am going to try to rock the wok with a paella. Wish me luck!