CafePress can read my mind

I just got an email from CafePress with a link to cooking designs. How did they know I was in the market for an apron?

The "Your misenplace or mine?" design made me laugh pretty hard... is that sad?

Anna, How I've Missed You

Anna's has been my favorite Boston-area taqueria since Day One. When I was in college, we would eat at the Davis Square branch at least once a week. Nowadays, though, I don't get there often enough... it's just don't get off at that T stop. I finally stopped by today to assuage my craving for veggies and cheese.

After years of experimentation, I have come to the decision that the Veggie Quesadilla is an amazing food. The tortilla is oiled and grilled to crispy perfection. The cheesy is creamy and not too bold. The myriad of veggies are fresh and delicious. In the production line of various fillings, there is a bin filled with cooked veggies of all sorts - zucchini, summer squash, broccoli, red onion, sweet potato and corn on the cob. You just let the guy behind the counter know which ones you specifically want or don't want, and he'll chop them up and wrap them in the crispy shell (be sure to get some of the sweet potato, though, because it really elevates the dish). The fresh salsa is a perfect accompaniment to the cooked veggies (although if the salsa is too cold, it can be a bit jarring against the warm veggies and cheese). And can you see all the cilantro in the salsa? Delicious!

And don't forget the chips and guacamole! The chips aren't stellar, just good. The guac, though, is great. The avocado is creamy and smooth, while small chunks of tomato, white onion and cilantro give some texture. It's not uniformly mixed, allowing for each bite to have a different nuance - a crunch of sweet onion, the coolness of the avocado, a hint of black pepper.

I've been hearing a lot of grumbles from various sources, especially on Chowhound, about how awful Anna's is. This visit only strengthened my view that my standard quesadilla order is far superior at Anna's than at the Boca Grande near my office. If only that Boca Grande, which opened just a few months ago, could have been an Anna's...

I Have a New Love

The rain was beating down last week when I finally made it to the farmers market. I made my choices quickly, moving from booth to booth and picking what looked best. I really had my hopes up for some zucchini flowers, but there were none in sight. One booth had bunches of pea tendrils, something I've heard a lot about, but never tried.

The first time I heard that people ate pea tendrils, I was amazed. I would never think to eat the part of the plant that helps the peas climb. I thought they would be too tough, despite the thin curls, because the plant would need strength to climb. I was all wrong. The leaves and the vines were very tender with just a little bit of bite.

I didn't get around to cooking these until tonight, and I was afraid they wouldn't be any good after 4 days in the fridge. There were a few bad pieces, but there was more than enough left after I culled them from the bunch. I heated some oil in a wok on high, then added the tendrils for about 10 seconds. They wilted immediately, and with that, they were ready to eat.

My first bite made me smile. The flavor was still bright and fresh, even after so many days. It tasted like a wonderful combination of fresh peas and asparagus - not quite as sweet as good peas, with a little of the woodsy quality of asparagus. Just cooking it in oil let the real flavors shine through, but now I'm looking forward to trying new flavors with it. My Chinese five-spice peeked its head out of the cabinet as I reached for the oil, so I may had to give it a try next time. I'm so pleased that I finally tried these, and I can't wait to pick some more up at the farmers market this week.

A Sign That I'm Becoming My Mother

I've seen it coming for years. It's in my words, my gestures, my tastes, my hobbies, even my face (at least, the skinnier version of my face that I had in college). I am becoming my mother.

This isn't a bad thing, or something that I fear. My mom's a great woman (and I'm not just saying that because I know she'll read this - hi Mom!). She's taught me a lot of things, including how to find my way around the kitchen (although she's quick to point out that I still don't know how to make pilaf, which is a travesty for any good Armenian girl).

My point here - and I do realize that I'm rambling - is that I've picked up some of her bad traits as well. In our family, we joke that we can't take her anywhere because she will inevitably get food on her shirt. For a while when I was younger, we were trying to invent disposable napkins with velcro attachments, to make them stick to your clothes... but that venture never panned out. More than once, we've mentioned the need to keep lobster bibs on hand, just in case.

Where am I going with this, you ask? Well, I was sitting at work the other day, enjoying some cherries for my mid-morning snack. Huge, dark, juicy cherries. I had already eaten about half the bag when I bit into a particularly plump specimen... and before I could even look down, I knew that some of the juice had landed on my shirt. On assessment, it was not just my shirt, but my jeans AND my keyboard as well. And not just a dot on my shirt. No - a huge line of juice, dead center of my chest. When I went out to get coffee later in the day, the guy behind the counter didn't even look at my face.

And today? I ended up eating a nectarine over the kitchen sink, right out in the middle of the office. I need to remember to bring in foods that are easier to eat...

Pie-tastic!

So I made my first attempt - ever! - at a pie last night, and I'm pleased to say that it didn't turn out horribly. I made a very free-form galette, since A) I wasn't sure if we even have a pie plate in my apartment and B) I was too lazy to actually roll the dough out nicely. I'm going to play with the recipe some more to see how I can improve it, but for the time being, you get this tease:



It's lime and cherry, sweet and tart. I could have just eaten a bowl of the filling and been perfectly happy.

I pitted all the cherries using a cider bottle and a chopstick, on recommendation from this Chowhound discussion. It wasn't particularly clean, and some of the flesh got stuck on in the bottle, but it was fun ;)

I Wish This Were the Standard

Eastern Standard Kitchen is one of the nicer options in Kenmore Square. It's my office's go-to spot for going-away lunches. My coworker Tracy is headed off to grad school in Toronto (good luck, Tracy!), so we had a nice two-hour lunch at ES to send her off in style.



About half the table ordered the baked macaroni and cheese, rich with bechamel and with just enough breadcrumbs on top. I thought I was ordering slightly more healthy with the glazed salmon... There was a lot of butter on the dish when it arrived, negating the healthy qualities. It tasted great, however; that much butter will do that ;) The salmon had a mustard glaze that was tangy and spicy, a nice compliment to the sweet butter. The kitchen boasts great fries - thin, salty and ultra crispy, just the way I like them. Overall, the meal was probably a little too salty (which is not something you'll hear me say very often). It didn't bother me at the time, but I was wicked thirsty for the rest of the day.



I was fairly full, but I'm not one to pass up free dessert. I ordered the creme brulee, which was presented with a lemon shortbread cookie. The dish was long and shallow, the optimum shape for a good custard/crust ratio. The sugar was perhaps caramelized a little too much in places; it was very dark, a bit overdone. The custard had a perfect consistancy, rich and creamy but with some stiffness. The lemon cookie might have been my favorite part of the dish, though. The flavor wasn't too bright or tart, and it was soft and buttery without crumbling.

I've eaten at ES a few times now, and everything I've tasted has been fantastic (on other visits, the calamari, the green salad with feta, and the steak frites were great). Oh, and the drinks! The bartenders know what they're doing, and you're guaranteed something delicious.

Me, A Freak?

I'm a big fan of corn on the cob. It's another trait I've picked up from my father, who will routinely eat 3 ears in a sitting. Next time I eat with him, I'll have to remember to look at how he eats his...

Why? Because my friends have noticed how I eat mine, and they think I'm a little bit of a freak for it.



Apparently there's something strange about the ear being this clean. The weirdest part is that this is totally out of character for me; I mean, I'm clean, but not anal retentive!

I think I learned this trick when I had braces; only my bottom teeth were in a metal hell, so my uppers learned to scrape off each row of kernals without producing too much fibrous wreckage. Since then, I've kept up the habit for a different reason... good corn can be hard to come by, and I don't want to waste any of it!

Does anyone else eat their corn like this?