Happy Birthday to You, Happy Birth...

... ein minuten bitte! It's supposed to be Happy Birthday to ME!

Yes, it's my birthday today, so I'm celebrating this morning with a breakfast of Huevos Benedict Parmessan, a recipe that I think I may have documented in a previous post. The major difference this morning is that I am having Denise assemble everything, so we'll see how she does. (OK for her first attempt as it turns out, although I had to make the roasted red pepper sauce.)

Interestingly, I harvested the eggplant from our garden this very morning. It's just weird; less than a week from Christmas and the garden is still prodigiously pumping out a plethora of produce. It's supposed to be winter.

For my birthday present to myself I think I will experiment with chili recipes in search of the ultimate chili for chili dogs, chili fries, chili burgers and the like. I've tried this in the past with limited success.

I decided to do a little research on Foodtv.com this morning, reviewing chili dog recipes to use as a sort of jumping off point. One of the first hits on the search was Tyler Florence's recipe for the Ultimate Chili Cheese Dog, which I have made once. "Hated It!" First of all, this is a misnomer; it could appropriately be called the Ultimate Ketchup Cheese Dog. The sauce is sickeningly sweet, the result of ratio of 1 teaspoon of chili powder to 2-1/2 cups of ketchup. Call me old fashioned, but I generally think chili should have a little chile in it. Of course, I should have known. Tyler Florence is, or at least was, the spokes-chef for Applebees, which is to dining what Thomas Kinkade is to fine art.

(I should accept at least a little of the blame here. As I read the recipe I thought, there is no way there can be enough spices in this recipe. I forged ahead anyway and suffered the consequences.)

Anyway, less than a week until Christmas and both of the boys are now home on their Christmas breaks. Nick actually arrived last Monday evening and has been hanging out at home (and drinking my beer) for most of the week. Jacob, having secured a ride from Arcata with a friend, arrived today in the wee wee hours of the morning. I haven't actually seen him yet as I was asleep when he arrived and he is still sleeping in.

Nick and I have been running our annual obscure Christmas film festival. We traditionally start the Christmas holiday observation with a viewing of the Muppets Christmas Carole on the weekend following Thanksgiving. After that any movie is fair game as long as there is the slightest reference to Christmas. Bull Durham for instance; Crash Davis' line "I believe in opening your presents Chrismas morning, not Christmas Eve." Or The World is Not Enough; Denise Richards as nuclear physicist Dr. Christmas Jones. This week it was Band of Brothers, because of the Christmas scene in Bastogne.

Denise has been working on getting the house fully decorated for Christmas and we spent the better part of an evening trying to get Leo into the holiday spirit by posing him in a Santa hat. Unfortunately, Leo thought of it more as a chew toy.

Quick jump to the future...

It's now Sunday, the 20th. Denise made me stop blogging to go shopping with her, so I didn't get this finished and posted yesterday.

We finished up my birthday with a trip to the Stone Brewing World Bistro and Gardens. We were joined by my Mom, sisters Terry (and husband Jon), Jean (with husband Joe), Kathy (who needs a husband like a fish needs a bicycle), Jack (and spousal unit Mike), niece Emily, and friend Mike Griffin. With Denise and the boys it worked out to 14 of us. Dinner was delicious. I had the Mac 'n Beer Cheese along with an assortment of fermented grain beverages. For dessert I received a complimentary Beer Float in which perfectly good beer was ruined with a scoop of vanilla ice cream.

So it is now Sunday, the boys have vacated the premises to do a little Christmas shopping. I am recording the Chargers game so that when the boys return we can do a little virtual tailgating. Watch the game, grill up some chili dogs, nachos or whatever. I'll be giving my experimental chili a try on the dogs, but I think the recipe will need a little tweaking. After bitching about the absence of chili in Tyler Florence's chili recipe I overcompensated with perhaps a wee bit too much Chipotle in mine. May not even be able to taste the dogs under that sauce. I believe it's a step in the right direction though.

In case anyone is interested here's what I tried...

4 dried New Mexico chiles (stems and seeds removed)

4 dried California chiles (stems and seeds removed)

4 dried Chipotle chilies (I think I'll cut this to 1 or 2 next time I try this)

1-1/2 cups chicken stock

1/2 pound ground beef

1/2 pound habanero pork sausage (homemade) or ground pork

medium onion finely diced

4 garlic cloves, crushed

1 Tbsp ancho chili powder

2 tsp cumin

1/2 tsp salt

3 bay leaves

fresh ground pepper

olive oil

12oz canned Pabst Blue Ribbon

Place chiles in chicken stock, bring to boil and simmer 30 minutes. Puree cooked chiles and stock and PBR beer in blender, then force through a fine wire sieve to create chile sauce.

While chiles cook, brown ground beef and pork in olive oil. Remove browned meat and saute onions until soft. Add garlic, spices, bay leaves and saute a few more minutes. Add meat and chili sauce to the onion and spices. Simmer until chili reaches desired thickness. Eat.

Remember that this is a work in progress, so plan accordinginly. I am open to suggestions for improvement, as long as no one suggests ketchup.

Overdue Post, Thanksgiving Update, Pearl Harbor

I apologize. I was trying to be more proactive about posting updates to this blog, but the calendar tells me that it's now been two weeks since my last update.

I've been in a post-Thanksgiving funk for the last week and half or so, partly because I picked up a cold on the Friday of Thanksgiving week (the remnants of which are still with me), probably in part because my boys had to leave and head back up to school so I have no one to play with and partly because I experienced one of those falling incidents that start to affect you when you are old and infirm.

Actually, this happened a couple weeks ago. I had gotten home early and was trying to take care of a bunch of projects in the yard while there was still a little daylight. Taking a short cut across Leo's bed on the garage floor, his blanket completely wrapped itself around both my legs and I went nearly face first into my roll-away tool cabinet. I broke my fall, mostly with my right thumb, and managed to avoid the toolbox, but I very nearly ended up replicating Jake's little incident. I am fairly certain that I broke my thumb, but the thought of spending an evening in a Temecula Urgent Care center was too much to bear, so I administered an ice pack (frozen peas) and alcohol (bourbon, I think) and finished what chores I could.

I had fallen, but for the time being at least I was able to get up. But the inevitable, "I've fallen and I can't get up!" can't be too far away. What's in store for me now; LifeAlert? The Clapper?Stepping on the accelerator instead of the brake and crashing through the DMV?

On top of that I've been going through a lot of old photographs and have started to realize how little I've accomplished. My Dad survived the depression, served in WWII, including servicing B25s aboard the Hornet in support of the Doolittle Raid, worked on Craig Breedlove's Spirit of America world speed record attempts on the Bonneville Salt Flats, raised six children, took his wife on occasional trips to Hawaii, the Caribbean, etc. I cook a pretty good Thanksgiving dinner and that's about the end of my resume.

Anyway, I have been depressed, that is until tonight when I received this email...

Hi Hanten.....

I'm not 100% guaranteed if Im still going to send this e mail, but I should write it or Ill go crazy....I dont know how else to say it..... I have a crush on you. been dreaming about you non stop and I'm shy to let out my feelings to you...youll understand why if you knew who this was. I might regret this another time, though I think I want to tell you now. I wrote a hidden blog post for you ...here it is
secret blog for Hanten
I hope I'm not making a stupid decision although after writing this I know I have to click Send

I have omitted the link, because it is, after all, a secret blog for me. Imagine how happy I am now to know that someone, somewhere has a secret crush on me. And imagine how much happier I'd be if the person actually knew my name.

Anyway, now I'm in a good mood, so I can try to catch up on all the info I should have posted long ago.

To further enhance my mood I decided to observe the anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor by watching a movie that truly recreates the trauma of the event; Pearl Harbor. A two-DVD extravaganza of pain and suffering, for the audience at least. Jeez, what a horrible flick. This is a movie that had to have been made to go straight to Mystery Science Theater 3000. I feel much, much better having spent the entire first disc bagging on the copious flaws in the film. I may even watch disc two.

Actually, the movie Pearl Harbor spends a considerable amount of time (the entire second DVD) on the Doolittle Raid. So, I've decided to watch the disc in hopes of seeing an actor playing my Dad, but the film makers don't seem to think there was anyone actually aboard the Hornet to service the bombers. Oh well, they also seem to think that Jack Daniels bottles had bar code labels in 1941.

So, now that I've dramatically improved my mood I can provide a brief update on T-day and subsequent activities.

I spent most of Wednesday cooking anything that could be prepared in advance, killing time waiting for Nicholas, who arrived safely at our happy home later in the day. Having done a lot of cooking in advance, I thought that Thursday would actually be pretty simple, but for some reason the kitchen was busy all day again.

The boys, Denise, Leo and I were joined for Thanksgiving dinner by sisters Kathy, Jackie and Jackie's husband, Mike.

(Sorry, a short aside, Pearl is playing in the background and Ben Affleck and the rest of his B25 crew seem to be winning the war in the Pacific single-handedly. Apparently we needn't have sent all those Marines to Iwo Jima, etc. It's over now, thank God...the second disc is mercifully short at 45 minutes.)

Dinner was ultimately quite enjoyable; BBQ Mesquite Smoked Turkey with roast garlic mashed potatoes, chipotle smashed sweet potatoes, spinach-chorizo stuffed poblano peppers, traditional dressing, cranberry sauce and jalapeno-cranberry relish, a delightful salad care of Jackie and pumpkin pie a la Kathy. Oh, and home-brewed Imperial Blonde Ale, which seemed to be pretty well received, even though I was a little dissatisfied with it.

For after dinner entertainment I introduced my sisters to Mav TV and the program Body Shots, in which cocktail recipes are prepared by a bartender between a pair of blonde-bikinied-bimbos who occasionally venture opinions along the lines of "Wow, these look great. I sure can't wait to suck one down!" It is one of the single most stupid things I've ever seen on TV and I've seen the Sham-WOW, so that's going some. Mav TV also features a show called Fitness Beauties which consists of nothing but video of some woman, OK fairly attractive woman, working out on fitness equipment. No narration, just an instrumental soundtrack. Apparently it's for guys who are too big of losers to actually join a gym to ogle women. With this show they can ogle within the privacy of their own homes. Mav TV is seriously bizarre. It's like programming for the perennially juvenile. I fit right in.

Anyway, on Friday Nick and Jake helped me launch another batch of beer, this time cooking up a holiday ale, which I hope will be decent and ready to serve by Christmas. Keep your fingers crossed. I'll be bottling it some evening this week barring some sort of crisis.

Accomplished very little beyond that over the holiday as by Saturday I was starting to feel pretty crappy with this cold. Stayed in, watched some football and played a few Pinochle games with the boys and that was about it. Unfortunately, they had to leave at 0'dark-thirty Sunday morning to get Jake back up to Davis for his 2:30PM Amtrak connection back to Humboldt. Got up to see them off around 5:00AM and then went back to bed.

In addition to the normal sort of care package that Denise trys to send off with the boys I sent the remaining stock of Imperial Blonde off to Davis with Nick. He seemed to like it and with him having little in the way of beer budget I figured it was going to as good a final resting place as any.

So the boys are back at school and I am sinking further into decrepitude, but at least we will be seeing them again soon for the Christmas holiday.

Oh, BTW my ESB was pretty much DOA. I don't know for sure how I screwed it up, but Extra Special Bitter is not my forte. It's pretty much undrinkable, but mixed half-and-half with soy sauce made a pretty serviceable Tri-tip marinade. So, that got rid of one bottle. Now what to do with couple of cases. Maybe a little beer-battered fish and chips? I'll have to work something out.