The Forest and the Outlaw

What has two thumbs and is incapable of completing New Year’s Resolutions? This guy.

Here are some things I remember doing:

Tomato and Tomatillo Gazpacho
I posted this on facebook and observed that it is, in fact, salsa soup, not gazpacho. I thought the tomatillos didn’t add much to it, but when I made it without them it was not as good. I think the lesson is that I should just make salsa.

It’s tasty, though.

Full of Beans Salad

You know what’s worse than having a really boring salad for lunch? Having a really boring salad for lunch when it’s chicken nugget day in the cafeteria.

Harry Truman’s Excellent Adventure: The True Story of a Great American Road Trip by Matthew Algeo

Harry Truman is a class act. Also, it is neat to read about the last president to avoid the celebrity of the presidency.

When Everything Changed: The Amazing Journey of American Women from 1960 to the Present by Gail Collins

This book is totally exciting and inspiring until you realize it’s all a lead up to Sarah Palin.

Now I’m reading Collins’s previous book America’s Women, about the 400 years prior to 1960, but since I’m in law school and have no time I anticipate it will take me the rest of the year to read it.

Perhaps you noticed that we are well past week 7! I’m actually more behind in blogging about resolutions than I am on completing resolutions. Which is why these are quick and dirty summaries.

Recipe 5: Veselka’s Cabbage Soup

I made this twice. It is tasty. It also freezes better than I expected.

Recipe 6: Sour Cream, Cheddar, and Green Onion Drop Biscuits

I burned these and so only ate the insides, but I think they need more cheese and less onion.

Recipe 7: Cooks Illustrated Roast Chicken

My coworker Charles told me about this recipe years ago, but I could never make it because I didn’t have a dutch oven. But now I do! It’s very moist and delicious but is an ugly damn chicken, since it doesn’t brown at all. This is not a problem since I’m not cooking for anyone else.

I will not post the recipe because I don’t want to incur the wrath of Cooks Illustrated.

Book 5: Look at the Birdie by Kurt Vonnegut

I got this for my mom for Christmas and borrowed it. It’s basically what you’d expect from a collection of stories that previously weren’t considered good enough for publication. That said, mediocre Vonnegut is better than 90% of the books out there.

Book 6: Cart and Cwidder by Diana Wynne Jones
Book 7: Drowned Ammet by Diana Wynne Jones

I had big plans to read David McCullough’s thousand page biography of Harry Truman, but I started watching Bones and discovered that a romantic comedy procedural is basically tv made especially for me, so I was binging on that instead of reading. But I still wanted to keep up with the resolutions, so I went with quick read fantasy novels I bought months ago and never read. They were okay.

Week 4 Recipe: Flour tortillas (Texas-style)
Recipe here

Not being Texan, I’m not sure if these came out right. It does say they should be thick and chewy… but mine are really thick and chewy. Possibly they weren’t rolled flat enough. Possibly this is because I don’t have a rolling pin, or even a bottle of wine, and was using the flour jar, which is large and bulky. They taste okay, though!

Please note I cooked something with more than three ingredients, but just barely.

Week 4 Book: New Moon by Stephenie Meyer

I’m reading these books for cultural awareness. They are dreadful. Anyone thinking I am a secret Twihard, keep in mind that I am never ashamed to admit that I like terrible things. For example: I like Chasing Liberty, the Mandy Moore remake of Roman Holiday. I liked She’s the Man, the Amanda Bynes modernization of Twelfth Night. I like the music of Kelly Clarkson. I genuinely and unironically enjoy these things. The best I can say for the Twilight books, on the other hand, is that they are sometimes amusingly bad.