When the Romans saw something they wanted, they just whipped out their spears and made it their own. It is the ease with which the Romans could simply lift a leg and march on a city that ranked the Romans as number one amongst their peers.
Asparagus was once free and wild as the breeze it swung in, but when the Romans got a taste for this wee wild grass, they captured and cultivated it for their pleasure. As Roman soldiers continued to assertively mark their territory throughout the known world, so did asparagus following in the soldiers’ tracks.
However, long after the last Roman legions trickled out, asparagus continued to flow steadily throughout the Middle East, modern Europe and eventually made its course across the ocean to the Americas.
Today we can commemorate another asparagus season with this recipe for toast soldiers, asparagus spears and soft-boiled eggs.
INGREDIENTS
Asparagus spears
12 asparagus spears
juice and zest of one lemon
drizzle of olive oil
salt and pepper to taste
Soft-boiled eggs
4 eggs
salt and pepper
Toast soldiers
2 pieces of bread
butter
PROCEDURE
To cook the asparagus
Preheat the oven to 425˚F.
Hold an asparagus by each end in your fingertips. Bend the asparagus, applying slightly more pressure to the fat end until the asparagus snaps. Wherever it snaps is the perfect spot. You can chuck the fat ends and toss all the spears in a single layer in an ovenproof dish. Dirzzle on some olive oil, the zest and juice of one lemon and season with salt and pepper. Toss them with your hands to coat and get them in the oven for 20 minutes. Flip them half way through the cooking.
To soft boil eggs
Get all four eggs in a small pot and submerge by ½-inch in cold water. Get the pot on the stove over high heat. When the little bubbles begin to break the surface 6 at a time, turn on your timer to exactly 4.5 minutes. If the water starts to boil really vigorously, you can turn it down a bit so the eggs don’t get too rattled.
When 4.5 minutes is up, drain the eggs immediately and use a sharp knife to crack them open. Start with a little tap to break the shell, then a quick hard cut to go all the way through. Season the runny yolk generously with salt and pepper.
To make the toast soldiers
Place the bread in a toaster and hit the magic toast button. Pretty soon the toaster will spit out some toast. Apply butter to the toast, then cut it into 4 long strips, or toast soldiers.
Serve eggs in an egg cup along with 3 toast soldiers and 6 asparagus spears.
Four number ones
Modern scientists do not have any conclusive evidence regarding the effects of asparagus on urine. No one has quite been able to narrow down the compound responsible for causing malodorous urine after consuming asparagus. It could be dimethyl sulfide or S-methylthioacrylate… personally I think it’s the methanethiol.
The greater mystery is how and why it affects people in different ways. Only some people produce the sulfurous smelling urine after consuming asparagus but, to complicate things, not every one who produces the odour is able to smell it.
Resulting in 4 categories
Those who produce the odour but cannot smell it
Those who do not produce the odour and cannot smell it
Those who produce the odour and can smell it
Those who do not produce the odour but can smell it in other peoples’ urine
More research is clearly needed on this subject …
Curling offers up plenty of thrills and chills, but don’t expect many spills. If there is one thing curling fans hold onto harder than their lucky tams, it’s a cup of hot coffee. It’s not that the cold bothers them, it’s because curling fans just love coffee… and doughnuts.
Here is a rock-solid recipe for all those hot-blooded fans who love curling, coffee and doughnuts. Make your own Tim-Horton-doughnut-and-coffee-ice-cream-sandwich (aka; Cold Curling Rocks) to enjoy at the rink or anytime you just need to cross that hog line. These bad boys rock!
The 2009 Tim Hortons Brier Curling Championship is throwing down at the Saddledome from March 7-15. It’s impossible to know who will own the house, but you can bet you’ll spot a few Kenora dinner jackets, some painted screaming faces and plenty of coffee and doughnuts.
INGREDIENTS
A 1-pint container of vanilla icecream
1/3 cup cold Tim Hortons black coffee
6 honey glazed Tim Hortons doughnuts
PROCEDURE
Pop the ice cream into the micro for 30 seconds to soften it slightly.
In a big bowl use a fork to mix one scoop of ice cream with the coffee until they are smooth. Add half the remaining ice cream and stir it to incorporate. Add the rest of the ice cream and stir until the whole mess is pretty smooth, but a few little lumps is fine.
Pour the coffee ice cream back into the ice cream container. You’ll have a little extra that won’t fit in the container, feel free to slurp that back right away. Put the ice cream back in the freezer to firm up for at least 2 hours.
Place the half-dozen box of doughnuts in the freezer so they can firm up too.
When the doughnuts are frozen solid, use a serrated knife to cut them in half like a bagel. Go slowly as they are brittle, but it’s easier than squishing them when they are soft.
After the ice cream is firm, run warm water on the outside of the container until the whole thing can slide out easily. Lay it flat and slice the ice cream cylinder it into 6 disks. I like to make the first cut in the middle and cut each half into threes.
Place one icecream puck in each doughnut like a sandwich and place them all back in the box and into the freezer get rock solid.
If you are eating them directly from the freezer, they might benefit from a quick 10 seconds in the micro. If you are taking them to the rink keep them on ice and let them warm up and soften slightly before you chow down.
Goes great with hot coffee for dunking.
Makes 6 Cold Curling Rocks… enough to feed the Lead, Second, Vice, Skip, Coach and Coffee-Runner.
Filed under: hand
Run, run as fast as you can, you’re going to be eaten little Gingerbread man.
The buzzing metropolis of Gingerbread is always in full gear during the holidays. Busy Gingerbread citizens coming and going are blissfully oblivious to their horrifying fate. Put a little terror and mayhem in your holiday, attack and devour these delicious little unsuspecting Gingerbread folks down to every last Gingerbread man, woman and child.
INGREDIENTS
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1/2 cup fancy molasses
2 ½ cups all purpose flour
2 tsp ground ginger
pinch cinnamon, allspice, salt
½ tsp baking powder
PROCEDURE
In your standup mixer, beat the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in the egg and the molasses.
Sift together flour, baking soda, salt and spices.
Add the dry stuff to the mucky mix in thirds, stirring to incorporate thoroughly. At the third addition, you may have to use your hands to combine the stiff dough. Form the pile into a smooth dough ball and divide into 2 even balls. Wrap the balls and blap em in the fridge for an hour to firm up.
Preheat oven to 350˚F.
Place one ball in the center of a large piece of parchment paper or silpat. Dust the top with flour and use your rolling pin to roll out from the center until you have a flat whack of dough about 1/3 inch thick. Place the parchment with the dough on a baking sheet and cut out your little gingerbread people. Remove the scraps and ball them up and blap back in the fridge for more cookies later.
Bake that batch while you roll out the next ball. Combine all the scraps to make more gingerbread folks.
Obviously the dough is already dark and gorgeous, so when you bake then the colour change will be subtle. Bake each round for 10-13 minutes until they get goldener-browner, but not burnt and firm to the touch. Remove, slide the parchment onto a cooling rack and let them cool. They will become crispy as they cool.
While the cookies are cooling, create a small metropolis diorama out of shoeboxes and other crafty material on your kitchen table. Set up the gingerbread people around the make-shift city and let them go out about their daily business before you attack and devour them with reckless fury.
Icing…
Cut yourself some slack and go buy a little tub of premade vanilla icing. Add a tablespoon of powdered ginger and a splash of the liquid from your jar of pickled sushi ginger. Stir it all up and load it into a pastry bag and decorate as your talents allow. Just remember, it’s not how your gingerbread person looks, it’s what’s on the inside that counts… and the inside is delicious.
Manwich…
Alternately you can just smoosh two gingerbread men back to back with a good smothering of icing in between to make a gingerbread manwich.
