Trattoria Scorpacciata

Sunday, November 10, 2013

Quasi-Ethiopian

We had real Ethiopian food in LA a couple of months ago. Pretty good stuff. This is similar-ish. Yeasted pancakes as the base, some leftover roasted chicken, and some chile pickle. Good.

Thursday, October 17, 2013

This is freaking sweet, watch it all the way to the end. On a sidenote, Frank from the garden has rigged up a Nikon such that it moves on a track and fires pics every however you want seconds, DIY-style. So while Goleta lacks northern lights maybe I'll link to his stuff some day.

Wednesday, October 16, 2013

Qupe / Au Bon Climat Open House

We're in the Qupe (Chumash for Poppy) wine club. One of the perks are the biannual open houses at the winery/vineyard that Qupe shares with Au Bon Climat. We went in the spring, but I didn't take a camera, this time I was prepared. Full album here. I had a great time with the camera, interesting shapes a plenty. Food was good, wine was good.

silhouette

rack focus action

we had lunch in the vineyard

winery mascot, he covered alot of ground

Sam Elliott / Random Roles

could have been a little better considering he's in Roadhouse and Lebowski, but entirely respectable.

Home Decor

Sara's dad made the mug rack. All pottery by Sara

we got the vase at the Ventura County Potters Guild; shells and whatnot from Baja and SB

summer bounty. loon with baby NWC art in the back right

Roasted Salsa 2013

My second year making this. So damn good. We're doing 1.5x the proportions cause lime juice comes in a 1.5 cup bottle, so 12 lbs romas, 3 lbs of mixed peppers, etc, etc. Takes a while to roast everything when the batch is that big. Anchos, anaheims, jalapenos, hot orange chilies all from the garden. Pimientos from Givens Farm.

Update: I ended up making 5 batches of this. Canned alot, maybe 6 quarts? The later batches I used up some canned tomato puree from the pantry from last year's efforts.

looks boring but so tasty

Red Sauce 2013

couple of pics. 5 gallon pot for halved tomatoes, other pot for boiling down juicy seeds.

Fermented Chile Pickle

Chilies in salt. Specifically 1/2 lb chilies in each jar mixed with 1T salt in each jar and a brine of 1T salt + 1 pint water in a ziploc bag in each jar. It goes for 3 weeks. Green jar = jalapeno, serrano, green cayenne, underripe orange chile (i forget). Red jar = pimiento, anaheim, cayenne, fresno, cherry bomb, orange.

purty-ish pimientos

final product

Recipe from the Joy of Pickling by Linda Ziedrich

ferment chilies for 3 weeks

1/4 c brown mustard seeds, ground

1" piece ginger, minced

1t turmeric

3T lime juice

2T mustard oil

drain chilies, mix in the rest. simple. pretty good.

keeps atleast a year in the fridge

Visit From Snoopy

This dude showed up meowing one night and checked us out. About a month later I saw him with a collar on about 3 blocks from our place... Sara thought he looked like Snoopy with his color patterning. I thought he had a rat face; it takes all kinds.

Random Food Pics

watermelon from Gathering Together Farm in Philomath, from the late summer Oregon trip. super good

chinook salmon, stewed leeks, tabbouleh, tzatziki. colors not great but flavor was

Sara's plate was nicer looking than mine

barley, red rice, white rice mix. cooking barley and rice together is super good

sushi action, jade pearl rice, tuna from Nikka market

Tuesday, September 10, 2013

Agave at the SB Mission Rose Garden

Fun with the 105mm macro...

Titan arum

The UCSB greenhouse had a Titan arum plant bloom this summer. Pretty cool.

the central stalk heats up so that the odors are more easily released

they moved it outside when it opened to make viewing easier

the circus. something like 2,000 people came

Monday, September 2, 2013

A bit of a placeholder link... new writing from Shuna

I discovered the writing of Shuna Lydon early on in the blog, she's a pastry chef, and a great writer. She's got a new writing gig on the side, gotta check it out.