Mousse Fail

In preparation of B's poppa and bro coming over for brunch, we were a whirl of bouncing Edie, doing the laundry, cleaning the house, running out to get groceries. At one point, B was in the bathroom and Edie was howling in the swing while I made the bed. So I turned on the stereo with whatever disc was in the player, and blasted at full volume "One Fine Day" from Byrne & Eno's new record. Edie immediately calmed down in my arms while I sang to her, and she remained calm after. I think that was the first piece of music I played for her, and she liked it!

BREAKFAST: 8:30am, small amount of sesame noodles, .25 bowl, hunger 4/5

AM SNACK: 10am, 2 wholefoods cookies, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5

AM SNACK: 11:15am, a pickle, a snippet of smoked sable

AM SNACK: 11:45am, apple cinnamon muffin, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5
Made this recipe with the following changes: doubled salt, exchanged milk for cream, doubled eggs. Baked for 20 minutes. Came out super rich and moist. The recipe says serves 6, but I got a yield of 12. The diced apples make up about 50% of the batter, which is kinda neat.

BRUNCH: 1pm, bagel with cream cheese, smoked sable, onion and tomato, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5

PM SNACK: 4pm, spoonful of chocolate mousse
B's dad brought me about 8 LARGE boxes of cook and food-related books (don't ask, long story). While browsing, saw a recipe for chocolate mousse that looked horrible, but realized I had left over ingredients from the morning muffins that needed to be put use. So I versioned this recipe while hanging with the inlaws. Had 2/3 of a cup of cream, and only baking chocolate, so I sugared the chocolate/butter/Kahlua mix with caster sugar. Funny, I have a bottle of Kahlua in my liquor cabinet which I inherited from my parents....they never opened it, and neither did I. Coffee cough syrup, yick, but added an interesting depth to the mousse. The spoonful I had was still warm, tasted sweet enough, but too much of an alchy kick.

(I tried a spoonful later, after dinner, it set up nicely but caster sugar left lump -- I should of sifted it -- and still tasted way too boozy. Gonna trash it and try a mousse later.)

DINNER: 6:30pm, lame pizza, 1 beer, 1.25 bowl, hunger 4/5
We went to San Marzano in my hood, hoping for something better than the last time we ate there, was disappointed. Individual Neapolitan pies, wood burning oven. They still have retarded buffalo chicken pizza on the menu. I ordered a new entry, which was basically a marg with sausage, onion and mushroom. The onion was raw diced white which brought nothing to the party -- B's vegetable pizza had caramelized onions, which were sweet & packed a big flavor, why couldn't they have used those onions on my pie? The mushrooms were shitake, which gave a discordant woody flavor against the sauce and cheese -- I like shitakes, but not on pizza. And finally, the sausage -- what the hell? At first I thought they goofed and put prosciutto on my pie, but after close looking seems they thinly sliced some sort of very mild sausage, which ended up tasting like barely anything. On top of all that (or more correctly, beneath it), the pie was flibbidyflobbidy in the middle, too much sauce and DEFINITELY too much cheese. I don't care if the cheese is a fresh moz, if you add too much, it's still gross. On the (only) positive side, the crust had a nice char and I could really taste the wood in it.

EVENING SNACK: 10pm, watermelon, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5