Sunday, April 29, 2007
Birthday Goodness plus pizza pies
Let’s continue with a theme and get back to run-of-the-mill posts once I put down this blasted centrifuge and write some. Meantime I’ve had a nice “rolling” birthday and wanted to make special notice of the following birthday goodies:
* Gifties and remembrances from many very thoughtful people - those of you who visit here, thanks! It’s never a party without you!
* Tani Sushi: Yes, they managed to get another exceptional place to eat - not just in my neighborhood, but actually closer than any other option to date, just directly across Geary. The sushi is so over-loaded that it’s effectively a big slab of sushi followed by a big slab of sashami - double your fun. The fish was flawless (though I did have some problems with my nigiri falling apart); standouts include the smoked salmon, succulent and tongue-pungent, and the delightfully hamish Richmond Roll - crab, eel and avocado with four colors (!) of tomiko. Tani sushi: Not cheap, but a bargain. A fitting sentiment for my birthday, I think.
* Schubert’s Mango Mousse cake: with the requisite chocolate flowers, white chocolate “happy birthday” plaque, white and milk chocolate zebra sticks, leopared-skin milk chocolate ribbon, and of course two lucky raspberries, atop a layer of mango jelly that floats above a thick bed of creamy, almost fluffy mango mousse that rests on a think layer of delicate white cake. I held myself to about one-third of it that night, but only because I’d actually overeaten to the point of physical discomfort. And it gave me certain ideas about breakfast.
Plus, of course, we were partying with bananamonkey. It’s always good to party with bananamonkey.
And that’s a solid birthday celebration right there for ya. Maybe a little too solid, but not really. Moral: Sometimes too much of a good thing is a-okay. Which is probably why I decided not to memorialize my actual dining-out-with-babysitter whoo-hoo birthday feast, up at the Buckeye. I will admit that it included maker’s mark and a Marin Manhattan with vanilla-infused bourbon and kirschcherries, and of course we had some of those killer roasted artichokes, and some excellent brussel sprouts and bacon gratin that paired well with mac-n-ham-n-cheese, and an astonishing seared scallop rissotto, and a nice big slab of ribeye, saison farmhouse on tap, madiera (m’dear), something like an ice cream sundae, and something else very much like pineapple upside-down cake with house-made vanillabean ice cream and caramel sauce. Or something like that. No, I left the camera behind for all of that so you’re spared the indignity of my crapulence.
However, I did also recently very very much enjoy some pizza that was sent to me by a pair of evil geniuses who will remain nameless lest they be pestered with requests to do for others what they recently did for me: sent me pizza. And not any pizza - special super-good pizza from Danny Boy’s in Cleveland. I did, however, promise them photographic evidence of the enjoyment of said pizza, so here it is. The box, for starters, was freaking huge - I had to put it in the fridge at work and carry it home with me on the bus, so everybody got to wonder what dangers lurked in my plain cardboard wrapper. Well soon enough the mysteries were revealed: boxes! No, that doesn’t seem intense enough. Let’s try again: boxes! Yeah, that’s more what it was like. And here’s a whirlwind tour of my pizza odyssey: here is what they looked like out of the box (foil’s alien-repelling powers are accentuated in this photograph; antique bottleopener added for scale). Here, on the other hand, is what the pizzas looked like out of the foil. Now, for the first one, I must admit, we ate it rather quickly. I only remembered to take a photo of it when this was all that was left of it. But believe me, it was tasty. The second one, it was a bit more to handle. After we baked it at 325 for about 25 minutes, it came out of the oven looking like this, and a couple of slices on my plate looked like this. You might ask me if I shared it with zach, but honestly, no, we didn’t. That first chicken parm pizza didn’t last long enough, and the bridgeport buffalo with the yellow peppers and ranch dressing and taco chips and breaded chicken fingers… friends, that’s no pizza for a child. I could barely handle it myself. My friends - you know who you are - thank you, from the bottom of my cholesterol-clogged heart. That was a really momentous couple of pizzas.
And I think that’s about all we need to say about this for now. Enjoy monday. I’ll see if I can come up with something diverting for midweek. We’ve just finished allocations, which means the world to me, but to you it’s mostly about how I might get a bit of writing done again - instead of just slorping down the calories and taking photos of it, god knows we’ve had enough of that for a while now....
