Scribal Terror

Spicy eggplant soup

This is a real mood-elevator. Laura says it's Thai-Indian fusion soup, which  describes it pretty well, maybe with a touch of Japanese or Korean:

Ingredients:

2 thin “Thai” eggplants, salted, drained and cubed
1 medium sized yellow onion, chopped
1 clove of garlic, mashed
1 ½ inch thick slice of fresh ginger, mashed (comes to about a tablespoon)
1 ½ quarts of chicken stock (more if needed)
10  cooked fish balls, disks should work fine as well -- you can find these at any asian food store with a freezer section. Squid rings would work too.
salt to taste
handful of chopped cilantro
½ tsp coriander
2 ground cloves
T ground cumin
1 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tsp turmeric

Directions:

Sauté garlic and onion until translucent
Add spices, sauté until covered uniformly
Add chicken stock, simmer for ½ hour
Add eggplant, cooked fish balls, and cilantro
Cook until hot, about 15 minutes
Serve over rice noodles

This is heavenly the next day, but don't try to save it with the noodles -- they'll dissolve.

Busy beavers

They've been working at Meadowbrook Park (Urbana IL). That stream was just a little trickle not so long ago.

Deeply chocolate bourbon cake

Recipe (adapted from NYT):

Ingredients

2 sticks (8 oz.) unsalted butter, softened
2 cups all-purpose flour
5 oz. unsweetened chocolate
¼ cup cocoa
1/2 cup bourbon
2 T half and half
½ tsp. salt
2 cups granulated sugar
3 large eggs
1 T. vanilla extract
1 tsp. baking soda
Confectioners’ sugar, for garnish
Fresh raspberries and mint leaves, optional

Directions

Preheat oven to 325
1. Melt the chocolate in a double boiler
2. Put the cocoa in a 2-cup measuring cup. Add enough boiling water to come up to the 1 cup measuring line. Stir until the powder dissolves. Add the whiskey, salt, and half and half. Let cool.
3. Using an electric mixer, beat the butter until fluffy. Add the sugar, and beat until well combined. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in the vanilla extract, baking soda and melted chocolate.
4. With the mixer on low speed, beat in a third of the whiskey mixture. When liquid is absorbed, beat in 1 cup flour. Repeat additions, ending with the whiskey mixture. Scrape the batter into the prepared pan, and smooth the top.
5. Bake until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean, about 1 hour.
6. Transfer the cake, still in its pan, to a rack. Unmold when the pan is cool to the touch. and sprinkle warm cake with more whiskey (At this stage I had to do some reconstructive Cool completely before serving, garnished with confectioners’ sugar, raspberries and mint leaves.

Beautiful soup

Chicken noodle, made by my husband.

Eggplant and ground lamb in white wine sauce

I sauteed onions, garlic, eggplant, and lamb and then cooked them covered in white wine (Barefoot Sauvignon blanc), lemon juice, tomato sauce, oregano, salt, pepper, a few peas for color, and a dash of curry powder (to offset the bitterness of the eggplant -- you can't taste it.) It's delicious with the little red potatoes and I'm sure it would also work well with rice.

If you're cooking eggplant for something like this, be sure to peel it, cube it, salt it liberally, and let it drain for about a half hour in a colander, then rinse off the salt and dry it in a dish towel. This USUALLY gets rid of the bitterness. If there's just a little bitterness left, you can add a touch of curry or brown sugar, but if there's too much then you just have to throw away the damn eggplant and buy another. Our grocery stores have had a run of bad eggplants, so we were really happy when this one (grown by a local farmer) turned out perfect.

Summer haikus

Summer time is here
Girls half naked, guys speechless
I just want a book.

-- Shane

Summer in these peaks
Mean hairy armpits and legs
I don't want to look.

-- JWebb

Their pasty white thighs
Lobster red, they now blister
Some vacation, eh?

-- Scott P.

The pine beadle scourge
is ravishing our hilltops
Smokey Bear is scared.

--JWebb

Old men in speedos
flock to the beaches to play
such a ghastly sight.

--Shane

willowy tan one
unaware of Jabba's gaze
and mom grinds her teeth

--Ana

yellow jacket sting
distinct possibility
the figs are bursting

--Ana

Rain, rain, go away
Come again some other day
The effing roof leaks

--Gail

The everlasting pill

 
According to the Medico-Pharmaceutical Critic and Guide (1907), edited by William J. Robinson:

We have referred in the past to the economy which used to be practiced by our fore-fathers. Thus, for instance, it was customary to use leeches over and over again and there are instances of infection with syphilis by leeches that had been previously used on luetic patients. But we believe that the everlasting cathartic pill beats everything in the line of economy. This pill was a little bullet composed of metallic antimony which had or was believed to have the property of purging as often as it was swallowed. It is not conceivable that it might have had such property, for it is possible that a minute amount was dissolved by the gastro-intestinal juices and this amount, plus the suggestion, was sufficient to produce cathartic action. Then again the everlasting pill probably aided peristalsis by its mechanical weight and motion. The bullet was passed out, recovered from the feces and used over and over again. This, as Dr. J. A. Paris says, was economy in right earnest, for a single pill would serve a whole family during their lives and might be transmitted as an heirloom to posterity.

 The "everlasting antimony pill" is mentioned by Dr. Stephen Maturin in The Ionian Mission.

"Salt is not forgotten"

 

"It appears," writes B.C. Seeman (1860) "that human flesh is extremely difficult to digest, and that even the strongest and most healthy men suffer from confined bowels for two or three days after a cannibal feast." Here is Seeman's account of the vegetables which "in Fijian estimation" are properly eaten with human flesh (bokola),  from a collection of nineteenth and early twentieth century botanical writings called In Pursuit of Plants by Philip S. Short:

There are principally three kinds [of vegetables] which, in Fijian estimation, ought to accompany bokola [human flesh], -- the leaves of the malawaci (Trophis anthropophagorum Seem.), the tudauo (Omalanthus pedicellatus Benth.), and the boro-dina (Solanum anthropophagorum Seem.). The two former are middle-sized trees, growing wild in many parts of the group; but the boro-dina is cultivated, and there are generally several large bushes of it near every Bure-ni-sa (or strangers’ house), where the bodies of those slain in battle are always taken. The boro-dina is a bushy shrub, seldom higher than six feet, with a dark, glossy foliage, and berries of the shape, size, and colour of tomatoes. This fruit has a faint aromatic smell, and is occasionally prepared like tomato sauce. The leaves of these three plants are wrapped around the bokola, as those of the taro are around pork, and baked with it on heated stones. Salt is not forgotten.

The botanical illustration shows Solanum uporo or Solanum anthropophagi, AKA Cannibal's tomato.  Via Wikimedia.

Crow's Nest

 

If you've read Moby Dick, or seen the movie, you'll know what a crow's nest is . . . but did you know it originally had crows in it? According to the US Navy's Origin of Navy Terminology:

The crow . . . was an essential part of the early sailors' navigation equipment. These land-lubbing fowl were carried on board to help the navigator determine where the closest land lay when the weather prevented sighting the shore visually. In cases of poor visibility, a crow was released and the navigator plotted a course that corresponded with the bird's because it invariably headed toward land.

The crow's nest was situated high in the main mast where the look-out stood his watch. Often, he shared this lofty perch with a crow or two since the crows' cages were kept there: hence the "crow's nest."

 

Patty O'Toad

Enjoying a swarm of flying ants on the Patty-O.