Thank you Thursday: ice cream appreciation. 11 September 2009 4:04 pm
Posted by Tracy in : consumerism,dessert,eating,fangirl,food snobbery,good news,milk,news,pictures,politics,school,video , add a commentSo this belated Thank you Thursday is going up Friday, just like Monday’s monkeys were a bit off-schedule. Speaking of off-schedule, it turns out I can’t crash tonight’s Contemporary Issues class, because Professor Ray’s out of town. So much for my cunning plan. On the upside, I’m back to digging the syllabus for Advanced Topics: Food Sociology, and I have written permission to skip the class which overlaps so strongly with the sustainable agriculture course I took at the University of Oregon. Victory dance! Clearly, this calls for ice cream, or at least the idea thereof (it’s kind of cold and wet out for the real thing).
First of all, a little bit of classic Sesame Street:
Yay! Thanks, YouTube! And thank you, ice cream, for being delicious and making me happy. (more…)
Monkey Monday: things I’m looking forward to 10 November 2008 7:35 am
Posted by Tracy in : baking,books,dessert,garden,geekery,good news,history,milk,monkeys,school,seasonality , 2 commentsIt’s wonderful, having stuff to look forward to. Which might be why I so love food — there’s always another meal in my not-too-distant future, another chance to pursue my goal of always eating the most awesome option at any given opportunity. Cooking’s great for anticipatory goodness, too — the smells, the feelings, sneaking the occasional taste — and the knowledge that I’m making it happen is an added bonus. Gardening has similar joys — albeit with more surprises, since things will happen in a garden whether I make them or not, but that’s part of the fun. As I wrote in my extended review of Michael Pollan’s Second Nature,
What I love most about gardening (besides the delicious food, anyway) is the hope. Seeds always seem to put up sprouts the day after I’ve started to think they were eaten by birds, or worms, or that maybe they were just plain dead and I should have known better than to plant them to begin with. Every time I prune my rose bushes, I think maybe this time I’ve killed them, and instead they reward me with an abundance of flowers that still feels inexplicable (which just might have something to do with why I don’t prune as often or as ruthlessly as I should). Every time I eat something that grew in my garden with little help from me beyond my own hands, tools, and attitude, I think, “This is as real as magic gets.”
And on that note, I am happy to report that I’ve found my first garden in New York City! (more…)
Monkey Monday: food irradiation, breakfast cereal, and more! 8 September 2008 1:46 pm
Posted by Tracy in : books,breakfast,food safety,geekery,good news,Marion Nestle,milk,monkeys,news,nyc,politics,random,restaurants,school , add a commentUm, not necessarily in that order. Breakfast first, right? Right. Here goes. I had cereal for breakfast for the first time in a very long time today. Not oatmeal (it’s still way too hot for that), Tracy granola with yogurt, like I love, but something more in the muesli genre (hand-me-down free food from my parents) with milk. Turns out this was a bad idea, one which reminded me why I quit eating cold breakfast cereal. I’m just not a big fan of milk, unless it’s transformed in combination with something delicious, like tea or ice cream ingredients. (I’ll make an exception in the case of hot and fresh chocolatey baked goods, and tomato soup. For some reason I really love the contrast between a glass of cold milk and the savory acidity of hot tomato soup. But I digress.) If grains are going to be soggy, I want them warm, and soaked in delicious stir-fry sauce or something — old milk doesn’t count. So I was still hungry after forcing myself to finish the sad little bowl of milk-soaked oats and whatever. All told, cold breakfast cereal is still not my favorite: anything besides granola leaves much to be desired.
In other news of the disappointing, today the Ethicurean reminded me that the FDA now allows irradiation of spinach and lettuce. (more…)
Monkey Monday: mac ‘n cheese challenge edition 3 September 2007 8:15 am
Posted by Tracy in : books,cheese,cooking,eating,friends,milk,monkeys,Morning Glory,news,people,travel , add a commentGood morning, sports racers! (Some of you are sports racers; the rest of you really must check out The Show with Ze Frank.) Peter’s on trail in the high Sierras with his dad and brother this week, so I hitched a ride down to Davis, CA with him on Thursday, to hang out with our friends Chris and Kevin and Tessie and my new friend Ella, all of Everything2 fame. The plan was for me to hang out until Sunday night, then ride Amtrak back up north to Eugene and arrive on Monday. Only when I called Morning Glory earlyish on Saturday to make sure I was covered for Labor Day morning, I found out that my would-be substitute had been fired and there was no one left to cover that shift, which in turn meant lots of angsty phone calls and changes in travel plans. Oops. That’s what I get for not making sure my shift coverage arrangements are confirmed in writing, and maybe notarized to be on the safe side. But oh well. By now, you are wondering what any of this has to do with macaroni and cheese, and rightly so; I have digressed. But read on, and I will explain everything. (more…)
Monkey Monday: Zuiderzeeroute edition 25 June 2007 12:43 am
Posted by Tracy in : cheese,local food,milk,seasonality,sundance,travel , 2 commentsHello readers! Automatic posting turned out so well last week that I’m giving it another shot with today’s post, which I am actually writing late on Saturday night/early Sunday morning in Volendam, the Netherlands, on the second night of an epic bike trip around the IJsselmeer, a body of water formerly known as the Zuiderzee, for which the bike route around it is named. Biking burns a lot of calories, and Peter and I have been eating all kinds of crazy delicious food, and lots of it, to keep fueled on this adventure, and I have been taking notes whenever possible. However, it is very late, and I must sleep, so just a few quick monkey-style thoughts for you to ponder: (more…)
