The Man

I had a really fun weekend. On Saturday I headed downtown to St. Lawrence Market with some friends, and we walked around a bit. I managed to get my hands on super inexpensive passionfruit (I'll be attempting that tart again soon), and some truffle oil. Can't wait to put both to use. I also ran into an old high school friend not one minute after setting foot in the building. I hadn't seen her in about 6 years, so hopefully we can catch up soon.

THEN, my friend and I crossed downtown towards Healy's, where Jeff Healy plays for free every Saturday afternoon. On our way there, we chanced upon a movie set, for the movie The Man. There isn't much info on it on imdb, but given Eugene Levy's presence, and the scene we watched being filmed, I can only assume it's a comedy.

The scene went something like this:

Detroit Free Press

USA Today - note bystander with Canadian flag on his bike

The intersection (Bay and Richmond in Toronto, but supposedly Detroit) is filled with police cars, and they scream at the people in the black car to get out of the car with their hands up.

Eugene Levy comes running out (with his pants undone), and tells the cops that it's not what it looks like, and he's not with him (the man in the car) and it's not what it looks like.

Pants mid-fall

Meanwhile, his pants fall off completely.

Eugene's skivvies

Then, Samuel L. Jackson comes out of the car (I didn't get a shot, unfortunately, and he was looking MOIGHTY fine, with cornrows) and screams at the cops to run his plates, because he's FBI, and they're interfering with an FBI investigation. He flashes his badge, waits for them to run the plates, which they apparently do, and at that the scene ends.

DUDE! It was so cool. I can't wait to see this movie when it comes out. And I'll squeal like a little girl when I see that scene!

What the good lord giveth...

...Rogers taketh away.

I came home yesterday, and automatically reached for the remote and hit channel 52, only to be greeted by snow. I tried channel 51, and it was still snowing. Aghast at the thought of no food tv, I began testing all the other channels, and found them to be in tact.

I suppose it's a small consolation that it's taken Rogers Cable seven years to clue into the fact that we've been getting all the extra channels without paying. The question now is whether they'll present us a seven-year bill if we call to actually subscribe. I'm afeared of trying.

And in another case of Real Simple magazine reading my mind, there was a story about ethics in there, and it's true: I'm a cable thief, and even though the mistake was the cable company's, I should still volunteer to pay them for all the money I owe them. Well, that's not going to happen, but I consider myself properly chastized.

Speaking of Real Simple, you really should subscribe to it. It's a fantastic magazine.

Damned Australians

They just HAD to put out another fantastic food magazine, those bastards. One which I will be forced to purchase at $10.00 a month from herein. Because the $8.95 I've been dropping on Donna Hay just isn't enough. Oy.

Hop, skip, and a Passover

Passover is almost over, but I made sure to document the many preparations which spun this household into a holiday tizzy.

We start of with the gefilte fish. Made from my late grandmother's amazing recipe. They get better each and every year. I really ought to learn how to make them.

There were some seriously magnificent tasting matzah balls, but I forgot to take pictures of them. I'm told that the soup was really good, but I was too busy eating the matzah balls, which are the worst (and obviously best) kind of crack. I'll make some and post the recipe later on.

Then it was on to the chicken. I've included a picture of the recipe, even though it's in Hebrew and very few of you are able to decipher it. I was very amused by the fact that all the cooking instructions were written in feminine form. Because men don't cook, of course. This course was DELICIOUS.

There were a whole bunch of side dishes, but I didn't really document those. I did, however, take careful notes of dessert...

I wasn't so snap happy during dinner, but I did get a few shots of the table.
And no big meal would be complete without some coffee in my fisty mug. Unless you were kosher and couldn't have milk at the end of a meaty meal :).

Mirror Project

I don't generally like to be in pictures, or even much care for pictures OF people, but I took this picture yesterday, and thought it would make a great submission to the Mirror Project. Mostely because I'm really obscured.

The link to my photo is here.

Photo Friday: Discovery

It's been ages since I've submitted anything to photo friday, but I'm rediscovering my camera, and spring is definitely a time for discovery...

A flower discovering the appearance of a springtime sun, Mt. Pleasant Cemetery, Toronto

Passiflora, Part II

A while back I wrote about the passionfruit I got at Whole Foods.

Well. The results were not even remotely close to the tart I love from Israel, but I am not above documenting my absolute failures. I used Donna Hay's recipe from Donna Hay's The New Cook

It started off well...

The crust looked beautiful right before I put it in for the blind bake, but I suspect I hadn't rolled it out thinly enough.

My big mistake with the blind bake was using foil, instead of baking paper.

The foil prevented the crust from actually baking, and I didn't quite realize by how little it had baked until I cut into the finished product. The combination of a too thick crust and the foil covering was more than could be overcome.

Things I'd do differently with the batter...

Firstly, I didn't have enough passionfruit pulp, so I mixed the passionfruit with some mango (as per Jenny's suggestion). It tasted yummy, and in a pinch, I'd do that again. I did find the batter a bit too liquid, and the final result suffered as a result. In retrospect, I would have separated the eggs, and whipped the eggs to soft peaks, and then incorporated them into the fruit mix. Also, with the sweetness of the mango, I could have cut the sugar in the batter by half, easily.

The final product...

You might be able to notice the white dots that came up when the tart baked. I wasn't too thrilled about them. I'm not sure if they were condensation from baking, or parts of the egg white that hadn't mixed properly when I made the batter (ew). I'd rather think it was the former. Overall, it was edible, but most of it found its way to the garbage.

Oh well, lessons learned, and I'll definitely be trying this again, if I ever find passionfruit at a more reasonable price. I loved the tartness of the batter, but the whole package just wasn't good enough.

Farewell

My brother and sister said their final goodbyes to our kitty Glida today. I'd only spent two weeks with her while I was in Israel last, but I fell in love with her immediately.

She wasn't well for a very long time. Probably for the entire time that they had her, but we didn't know how old she was, and how bad her condition was, until very recently.

Sleep well with the angels, little one.