Greetings to one and all and a mighty thank you for tuning in after such a long absence.  We hadn’t intended to take this long of a break but the GV requires 敏锐的头脑, a clear mind in order to even consider putting pen to paper, or fingers to keyboard as is the case.

The holidays were nice and heartwarming with visits from friends and family and a couple of trips out to the always-idyllic Toad Hall around New Years, but we  should add some other adjectives for good measure:  stressful, frantic, expensive and too-short.  Of the good things that the holidays bring, much cooking was had over the season, the pinnacle being our veggie Christmas dinner.  (Our new gas stove couldn’t have been appreciated!) In past years we’ve given a nod to the carnivores amongst us and barbequed a turkey out on the back porch (guilt!).  Since we’re returning to our proper vegetarian sensibilities we decided to hell with the meatsters, we’re not cooking any birds this year.  Uh-uh, no way.

No turkey was missed at our table.  T meticulously planned out a great menu and managed to pull off cooking the whole shot all by himself.  My suspicions are that he enjoys taking on this type of challenge so that he can turn all attention and praise onto himself and doesn’t have to share, but that’s another story which will be posted in my upcoming The Passive-Aggressive Chef blog which I hope to publish sometime soon.  Nevertheless, T cooked a scrumptious veggie spread:  vegetable pot pie, chana masala, artichoke struedel, mashed potatoes, beets, roasted carrots, green beans, topped off with a freshly made apple-pie.  Aside from not growing the vegetables and buying pre-bought pastry and phylo dough, it was all fresh and cooked from scratch.  Mahvelous, we chanted in unison, and raised our glasses to another fine meal.

We raised our glasses all-too-often over the holidays, which led to fist-fights amongst the entrepreneurial types who roam the streets on recycle day, vying for the contents of our bin.  Yes, OUR bin.  They’re usually careful in dislodging the wine bottles from the rest of the flotsam and jetsam but any nod to civility is thrown out the window over the holidays (Christmas season is not just a boon to retailers).  Even still, since the early days of the 20 cent return they’ve changed tack.  Where they used to roam and pick on recycle day, now they strategically slip into lanes and backyards, stealthily removing the bottles from the bins DAYS before recycle day. They still heed the “Beware of Dog” signs and make sure the gates are closed when they leave; indeed they are as respectful as they are persistent.  In fact, once we were sitting down at our dinner table enjoying a bottle of chablis après le dîner on a Saturday night when there was a knock on the door.  When we answered it a little old lady asked us if we were still using that bottle on the table.  We politely said yes.  She said, OK, I’ll wait, and proceeded to sit on our porch until we were obliged to take out the shot glasses to finish off the bottle in a timely fashion, just so she would go away.  Not entirely true I dare say, but who knows what the future holds?

UPDATE:

For those of you who might be interested in how we managed our beans, we didn’t get around to baking any but we were pleasantly surprised at the ease with which we achieved the tenderest chick peas around.  We soaked those babies for 8 hours (1 cup chick peas to 6 cups water).  We dumped the water and then added the chick peas to roughly 3 cups of water, brought to a boil and them simmered for about 1 1/2 hours.  They were tender, tender, tender and made a delicious hummous, to which I only needed to add about a half-teaspoon of sea salt to bring it to its usual beany goodness.  I don’t usually add salt to food if I don’t need to but when we gave up on our regular Bisphenol-A lined can brands (which is all brands except for Eden), I didn’t realize how much salt was added.  Most brands soak their beans in a veritable brine.  (As mentioned in an early entry we used Eden brand because they’re the only brand whose cans are BPA-free, but our hummous had virtually no flavour.  We usually sprinkle a little salt or pepper but I think I may have added 3 or 4 teaspoons to that batch, just to bring the hummous up to par.  Clearly Eden not only doesn’t provide us unnecessary BPA, they also hold the salt). So, when we decided to try the soak method, we expected to need to do the same, but it wasn’t necessary – no big salt required.  Not sure why that turned out the way it did, but we were pleased nevertheless that with a bit of prep work it’s easy enough to eat the beans without the chemicals attached, and very little salt required.

Both kids have something funny going on with their mouths in this pic:  K with Candy-Cane lips; J with a bout of impetigo, just in time for the holidays.

To all friends, family and readers, here’s wishing you Health, Happiness and Peace in 2012!