Cooking; The Walkmen; Recruiting, Baker St.; Poker; Band of Horses
6/19
Back from Austin, I turn my attention to a little cooking. Dad has, since I've been in Houston, made a habit of bringing me packages of pork sausage and andouille made by Richard's. The andouille usually goes into red beans and rice, and the pork I either serve as barbecue, or...
This one I've done several times. Slice the sausage (going at an angle makes it look nifty) and throw it into a largish skillet and start cooking. Add in some veggies—this time I went with zucchini, asparagus (new this time) and halved grape tomatoes (also new) and a poblano pepper (usually use jalapeños) to start. Then, of course, some garlic, jalapeño seasoning, jalapeño tabasco for some seasoning. Cook it up, and then throw in some fresh spinach and let it cook. Optionally, add some proscuitto for a little
Then, the hat trick: a pint of half and half. This will combine with the sausage grease and cook down to create an incredibly tasty cream sauce. Toss it all with a pasta with plenty of surface area (I used cresti di gallo), and, preferably, colorful. Top with parmesan (or asiago or romano) and red pepper flakes.
Great. And I can claim this one as an original. Cindy loved it, too.
6/20
Finally, a chance to do the Walkmen up right. My first chance to see them was at ACL last year, but it was too loud, too hot, too dirty. Then there was the Camel promotional show at the Meridian, where they just couldn't overcome an indifferent crowd.
But this show had, in a wonderful twist of fate, been moved from Numbers (blah) to Walter's (yay!). Char had some time ago expressed an interest in checking out some shows, and the Wlakmen seemed like they would be something he'd like.
And the verdict? On their best songs, a huge amount of energy and great performances. On their not-quite-so-great songs, well, they produced a somewhat uneven show. But, overall, fun.
No matter what, though, they had their nifty little antique piano:
6/22
School usually brings some undergrads in during the summer as cheap labor, and the graduate school usually takes the opportunity to do some recruiting. Wanda lined up Oliver, Anup and I to man the booth. She was smart enough to order some fajita wraps, which were quite popular given that they were the most substantial food available. Lots of cute girls around too. Who knows where they all run off to before grad school time comes around? Probably med school... Being the fine gentleman we are, we were tasked by BCM Lauren with finding a good place to dump the sand from the little sand box their program had set up. Anyway, it was an enjoyable experience, and I managed to score an extra water bottle.
Anup and Oliver suggested that it was a good time to go for beer, so we made our way over to Baker Street and made our way through a couple pitchers, some gossip, and a game of darts. Good times...
I was a little drunk by the time I got home, but sobered up pretty quickly in time to go out with Cindy for more beer.
6/23
Oliver threw another one of his trademarked poker nights, accompanied by beer and homemade pizza. Thankfully the number of people playing was relatively small, and rotating, so we didn't play tournament style, which works well with my short attention span. We did play Texas Hold 'Em, which is not my favorite, but you can't win 'em all. Or can you?
From a ten dollar buy-in, I managed to reach a balance of $25, netting myself a nice profit. My interest was waning, and it was a good time to cash out. Beer was on me the next night.
6/24
Band of Horses came out of nowhere with a shockingly good album earlier in the year, and I'd been looking forward to their show for months. They were playing Walter's, which was a nice, intimate choice. I ran into Molly and got to catch up with her for a few minutes, which was good.
The show wasn't... spectacular or anything. They pretty much duplicated their atmospheric, slightly country-tinged rock from the album, but the live setting didn't add that much. Still, good music, good beer, good friends. Nothing at all to complain about.
Back from Austin, I turn my attention to a little cooking. Dad has, since I've been in Houston, made a habit of bringing me packages of pork sausage and andouille made by Richard's. The andouille usually goes into red beans and rice, and the pork I either serve as barbecue, or...
This one I've done several times. Slice the sausage (going at an angle makes it look nifty) and throw it into a largish skillet and start cooking. Add in some veggies—this time I went with zucchini, asparagus (new this time) and halved grape tomatoes (also new) and a poblano pepper (usually use jalapeños) to start. Then, of course, some garlic, jalapeño seasoning, jalapeño tabasco for some seasoning. Cook it up, and then throw in some fresh spinach and let it cook. Optionally, add some proscuitto for a little
Then, the hat trick: a pint of half and half. This will combine with the sausage grease and cook down to create an incredibly tasty cream sauce. Toss it all with a pasta with plenty of surface area (I used cresti di gallo), and, preferably, colorful. Top with parmesan (or asiago or romano) and red pepper flakes.
Great. And I can claim this one as an original. Cindy loved it, too.
6/20
Finally, a chance to do the Walkmen up right. My first chance to see them was at ACL last year, but it was too loud, too hot, too dirty. Then there was the Camel promotional show at the Meridian, where they just couldn't overcome an indifferent crowd.
But this show had, in a wonderful twist of fate, been moved from Numbers (blah) to Walter's (yay!). Char had some time ago expressed an interest in checking out some shows, and the Wlakmen seemed like they would be something he'd like.
And the verdict? On their best songs, a huge amount of energy and great performances. On their not-quite-so-great songs, well, they produced a somewhat uneven show. But, overall, fun.
No matter what, though, they had their nifty little antique piano:
6/22
School usually brings some undergrads in during the summer as cheap labor, and the graduate school usually takes the opportunity to do some recruiting. Wanda lined up Oliver, Anup and I to man the booth. She was smart enough to order some fajita wraps, which were quite popular given that they were the most substantial food available. Lots of cute girls around too. Who knows where they all run off to before grad school time comes around? Probably med school... Being the fine gentleman we are, we were tasked by BCM Lauren with finding a good place to dump the sand from the little sand box their program had set up. Anyway, it was an enjoyable experience, and I managed to score an extra water bottle.
Anup and Oliver suggested that it was a good time to go for beer, so we made our way over to Baker Street and made our way through a couple pitchers, some gossip, and a game of darts. Good times...
I was a little drunk by the time I got home, but sobered up pretty quickly in time to go out with Cindy for more beer.
6/23
Oliver threw another one of his trademarked poker nights, accompanied by beer and homemade pizza. Thankfully the number of people playing was relatively small, and rotating, so we didn't play tournament style, which works well with my short attention span. We did play Texas Hold 'Em, which is not my favorite, but you can't win 'em all. Or can you?
From a ten dollar buy-in, I managed to reach a balance of $25, netting myself a nice profit. My interest was waning, and it was a good time to cash out. Beer was on me the next night.
6/24
Band of Horses came out of nowhere with a shockingly good album earlier in the year, and I'd been looking forward to their show for months. They were playing Walter's, which was a nice, intimate choice. I ran into Molly and got to catch up with her for a few minutes, which was good.
The show wasn't... spectacular or anything. They pretty much duplicated their atmospheric, slightly country-tinged rock from the album, but the live setting didn't add that much. Still, good music, good beer, good friends. Nothing at all to complain about.
posted by L. Maxwell Ward at 10:49 PM
