Nuit Deb - pas de déconner

Greetings Hallie and other humans.  Tonight’s dinner is brought to you by Deb, and will consist of over the top mushroom quiche, apple-walnut cake, and a “kale dish” (optional).  Alex (blogging!) is going to opt in for that one, insofar as I have any say whatsoever in the situation.

Why, our very own Jim, in the orange!  He's so fancy!

Jim’s open studios is going on this weekend, which is pretty much the most exhausting days of standing around you’ve ever seen.  What?  You missed it?  Don't worry, you can buy his work on etsy!  Go do it now!

So, now we’re at one of these questions that characterizes cooking club:

“This apple cake isn’t very sweet.  And when are we supposed to add in the apples?”

Brian that makes that sound that’s like Scooby Doo saying “I dunno!”

Awesome.

Apple cake.  Now featuring 100% more apples!

Puritans.
Not fucking around!

Anyway, Brian is now regaling us with tales of his history club (nerds…) adventure to the graveyard, which is apparently so over-stuffed with corpses (like, 25,000 in that tiny little graveyard next to Park Street) that when they were building the T station, skeletons kept falling on the construction workers.  Damn, yo.

“The puritans did not fuck around.  They made scientologists look normal!”  Apparently, they used to hang teenagers for saying unkind things to their parents, and didn’t think that women had souls.  Ouch.

“Oh yeah, and the jungle gym is where the gallows used to be!”  Brian says this is the best history tour he’s ever been on – I find it hard to disagree based on his retelling!

Deb, also
not fucking around.

Deb, drinking her beer, asks us how hungry as we are.  And…do we want a pizza?  She’s really dying to get out of this recipe, which apparently requires 90 minutes in the oven.  Unfortunately, nothing has been prepared yet, so…we’re going to be eating at maybe 9:30 or so.  Ah, well!  The joys of cooking club.  We suspect that the reason it needs to cook so long is so that it cooks slowly, and gets custardy and not crusty and frittata-y.  You know, to be gentle with it.

Brian: “we’re going to be so fucking gentle, we’re going to punch this quiche in the crust…with love.”

Deb: “So say we all!”

Anyway, it’s political season here at the cooking club, and we (well, I) am enjoying the general shitshow that is American politics.  Case in point, Mitt Romney’s extremely evil looking son:

Watch out, world!  I'm not fucking around!

I have to say, I’d hate to be on television.  I’m sure that I’d be picking my nose while trying not to fart and would have this insane look on my face.  Man, I’d be a terrible politician.  I can’t even sell pottery to people for six hours, let alone kiss babies and shake hands and shit…for 18 months.

Assembling quiche!  Yes!  Apparently, the dough must be cold, which makes it much harder to work with.  It’s one of the great conundrums, like how the Shaggs ever managed to make an album and get it produced.  

Brian discovers The Shaggs.

To cleanse his palette, Brian has chosen to play “Take On Me” and dance like this baby:

Meanwhile, Deb has given up on the dough and put it in the freezer.  I’m not sure what impact this will have, but it…uh…quiche!  I love quiche!

So, Brian’s new favorite teacher brought him back a Green Tea Kit-Kat from Japan.  I’m quite interested in how this is going to turn out…much like the intensity of our quiche dough.

Deb: “In the future, we will all be wearing jump suits.  It’s obviously going to take over.”

Hoo boy.  We’re having quite a quiche adventure here.  “I don’t want to depress you guys…”, Deb begins, and I basically just stop paying attention then, because I've already been a bit jaded.

I'm not going into that pan!  I'm not fucking around!

At this point, we reflect on our cooking club successes and failures over time, and what we've learned.  How do you know if something is done?

Jim: “Our general cooking policy is to poke it with a stick, and if it moves, it’s not done yet.”

And how can you judge your progress as a cook?

Brian: “I made eggs this morning – without a recipe!”

Fear us, O Internet, for we are Not Fucking Around!  Anyway, I'm now being called off to make some kale, so...

The OED (not fucking around) suggests that you rename
your candy from "Wazoo" to anything that doesn't
mean "anus".  Fruity anus, sprinkled with crunchies. :-(

Jim here!  Deb comments that it’s all Hubway’s fault that their house is full of dessert.  Hubway is a system where you can take a bike from the rack, ride somewhere else and leave the bike in that rack.  I’m not sure how that relates to delicious sweet goodness, but I think it involves Trader Joe’s...and today is not the day to tell Deb that she’s wrong.

The great wazoo debate erupts.  Deb claims that wazoo is a river somewhere.  Bri insists it’s the tuchus, the heinie, the thing that the poop comes from.  After much discussion (read that as argument), cooler heads prevail and we consult the interwebs.  It turns out the OED has the answer.  Bri for the win!  Now that we’ve discussed the Poopchute, it’s time to get back to talking about food.

It’s now 10 PM and we haven’t eaten yet.  Hungry Jim is picturing all his friends like this:

Nom Nom Nom.  Did you know that Spam is actually not terrible if it’s fried and covered in mustard and ketchup.  That’s how hungry I am people!!!!  I want spam.  I’d even eat it raw.

libération de la quiche

The quiche is out of the oven.  Unfortunately, the lame vague website we got the recipe from says we have to wait till it’s warm.  “How long do we have to wait,” Deb asks, “It’s been 4 minutes already”  Deb has successfully removed the spring form ring so now it’s all I can do to not bury my face in the piping hot quiche.  GIVE.  GIVE GIVE GIVE!!! 

Fail quote of the night:  “It’ll be easier and faster”  Nope, too late for that.

The crust is like shortbread without butter.  It also all over the keyboard as it’s really crumbly.  I hope IT Deb isn't reading this right now!

Alex is back to the blog!  Hey-o!  So, in the time that Jim was fantasizing about spam, I was making Kale!  Delicious coconutty Thai kale with lime juice and soy sauce.  And how did it turn out?

Mushroom quiche, coconut-lime kale and apple cake.

	Deb	Alex	Jim	Brian
Kale	Too tart for Deb!  B+.	A-.  I like the tart and coconutty!	For kale, an A-.	B+.  But an A+ for any other vegetable.
Quiche	A-.  I’d make it again, it’s a little runny though.	B+.  The crust is a litte floury tasting, and it’s quite runny.  But so rich!	B+.  We should have prebaked the crust!  Not that we had time…and it needed more time to get less runny.	B.  It’s got potential, but it’s a runny crumbly mess.
Cake	I actually think it’s really good…for breakfast. B+…but I’d make it again.	C.  Too spiced, too dry, not sweet enough.  You could call it a bread.	B.  The cake part tastes a bit dry.	[After being guited into tasting it…] C-.  It is dry.  Except for the wet and uncooked part I just tried.  Not enough sugar…nuts on top…bland like a sara lee cake with no frosting or ice cream.
Cooking Club	Priceless.	Priceless.	Priceless.	Priceless.