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What I ate last week. Ranked #182 in food podcasts in Mexico according to an email I just got.
EPISODE 58
NEWS & UPDATES
Brian said I have to sit up right or it sounds like I’m asleep. We’re at war, what does it matter. Things are looking bad. Things are getting stupider by the second. I’m seeing reports and aerial shots of pistachio fields decimated. Iran has definitely lost the pistachio war against California amongst other things.
Wegman’s is selling cardoons which looks like a cross between corn husk and celery but taste like artichoke. They grow them at Colonial Williamsburg. Brian keeps saying he’s going to grow them and then never does.
Brian brought home a bag of Camelina meal from work and put it in my baking pantry. Apparently it’s a pet food ingredient. Commonly used in livestock and poultry feeds, particular pigs and horses. Also used as a fertilizer. So not sure what I should do with it. Brian said you can use it like wheat bran in baking applications but it might taste bad.
Irish report on camelina production economic potential: https://teagasc.ie/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Camelina-Food-and-crop-product-potential.pdf
My sister has never had Triscuits which is horrifying. I could eat multiple boxes of cracked pepper Triscuits in one sitting. The Back to Nature version is a let down and tastes like water because it isn’t flavor blasted. This same sister is now into wheat thins which I don’t love because they’re small and sweet but they pleasantly surprised me recently since my memory of them is so rotten. Not as bad as you think and they have a great salty glaze on them like they’ve lived by the sea. Their size doesn’t make sense and you can’t eat them with anything. Basically an oyster cracker. I need to stop talking about crackers.
Recipes from “Our Favorite Recipes” from Hester Baptist Church
Cheese Ball
2 (8oz) packages of cream cheese
1 package Good Seasons dry Italian dressing
Mix well and make into a ball. Roll in pecans. Refrigerate.
The BBQ sauce page is covered in actual BBQ sauce
Easy Salad
1 container Cool Whip
1 can crushed pineapple
1 cottage cheese
1 box dry orange jello
Mix well. Put in refrigerator for 2 or 3 hours to congeal.
Chicken Casserole
4 chicken breasts
2 cans cream of chicken soup
2 cups rice
1 cup chopped celery
1/3c chopped onion
3/4c mayonnaise
2 cups Rice Krispies
½ stick margarine
1/2c blanched almonds
Cook and chop chicken breasts. Mix first 7 ingredients with 3 cups of broth. Put in greased casserole dish. Mix 2 cups Rice Krispies with margarine and put on top of chicken mixture. Bake at 350 for 30 minutes. Makes 2 casseroles. Add grated cheese if desired. If you freeze, do not put Rice Krispies on until ready to cook.
Different Pecan Pie
3 egg whites
1 cup sugar
1 tsp baking powder
1 cup graham cracker crumbs
1 cup chopped pecans
1 tsp vanilla
Beat egg whites until stiff. Beat in sugar and baking powder. Stir in crumbs and pecans. Pour into greased 9-inch pie pan and bake at 350 for 30 minutes. Top with whipped cream when served.
3 recipes for “Japanese Fruit Pie” which is some combination of eggs, sugar, coconut, raisins, nuts, vinegar.
Favorite recipe titles: Fantasy Fudge, Pink Cloud Fruit Salad, Glamour Mushroom Rice
Brunswick Stew
8 hens
20 LB pork
20 LB beef
15 LB onions, cook whole (they will melt)
4 gallons butter beans
4 gallons corn
4 gallons crushed tomatoes
30 LBs potatoes, cook whole (they will melt)
4 to 5 LBs butter
2 QT tomato ketchup
Salt and sugar to taste
When you stop cooking, add tomato ketchup and salt and sugar to taste. This will make 30 gallons.
SCENTS
I’m wearing Le Labo Lys and it smells like the perfect beach day.
Ffern Lunasa
Official description: Under the flaxen sun, people tread the ancient bounds. Remembering the pathway to other seasons. They plait ears of wheat into long-accustomed shapes, ready for burning - and for release. Lunasa is the first harvest, when the year's hard work reaps its reward. It celebrates the ripeness and warmth of this spoke on the wheel, poised between summer and autumn. A heady scent that sits close against the skin, lingering and sparkling like sunlight. Durange says: "I love how the kumquat brings energy to this batch, with its distinctive and beautiful natural texture. To me, Lunasa smells like foraging blossoms and fruit under a glowing sky, the first hint of change in the air." It opens with a burst of citrus, ripe and soft. Kumquat leads in the dance, both playful and refined. Lemon follows after with a touch of sugar, fading into neroli's golden nectar. A haze blows off the rolling hills and valleys, bending the light. We captured the dry, soft dust in an accord of nutmeg and brown-eyed rock rose, delicately spiced. Looking for florals at the heart, they chose jasmine grandiflorum, with its hint of apricot, to pair with powdery Rose de Mai. For the harvest itself, they imagined the heat rising from the sun-soaked earth, shimmering amid the stems and releasing the aroma of the grasses. Hay was blended with vetiver for its green-toned earthiness. This accord became yet more intense when woven into their great corn dolly, standing tall and ready for the evening's celebrations. The earth itself is baked like clay, with a scent all its own. Hardened by feet and the strong afternoon sun. Tonight the straw man will burn, sculpted into kindling - scorching the hay; a final release. The stars will light as the smoke rises, the embers cool and the ashes blow away. Lunasa features top notes of kumquat rind, nutmeg, white grapefruit rind, lemon rind, key lime rind, olibanum and green mandarin rind; middle notes of Rose de Mai, jasmine grandiflorum, bergamot rind, bay leaf, rose geranium, ho wood and neroli; and base notes of hay, Siam benzoin, red cedar, brown-eyed rock rose and vetiver root.
My review: “Oh”. Inky, bitter, dark, dirty, nasty. Vetiver, citrus pith, and soap. Cocktail bar. Put this on after my morning shower and almost wanted to take another shower to wash it off. Smells like my Neutrogena grapefruit-scented clarifying shampoo which runs about $10 a bottle so there’s an option.
INTERNET
Avocado pit orgeat syrup “what COULD that taste like” -Brian https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8g2uvGD/
Half baked harvest doesn’t taste her recipes, steals them, has two brothers named Oslo, www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8gFPonj/
Real Housewives of Rhode Island (RHORI) the ladies go to a vineyard and they wander out into the grapevines and one of the girls goes “omg these are tomatoes”. Brian started hootin and hollering when I told him I watched it because apparently he’s dying to watch it which is unusual for him. So I rewatched the first two episodes with him which was great because I can’t tell any of the women apart yet. It’s also insane that they included a woman that “isn’t from Rhode Island” yet looks exactly like all of them.
Remember when a dad was living in the Sarah Lawrence dorms and started a cult? Latest episode of Dial Dan podcast reminded me of this. Shout out to my sister who keeps recommending this podcast.
Cafeteria brownies; someone commented that this recipe is unhealthy https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8gMDoMf/
90 Day Fiance Forrest and Sheena, fully clothed, get tied up in banana leaves and bake themselves in the sun, like they are food. Then it starts to rain.
Speaking of 90 Day Elise the terror from Miami is asking the Australian man to introduce her to his son, who has flown away to live with his mother and her new husband. The Australian explains to Elise that he misses his son because he’s been there since he was born. Yep, that’s how biological sons work.
America’s Culinary Cup Season 1 Episode 6
The kitchen is decorated to be even uglier if that was possible; the theme seems to be haunted garden. There is a gold dome labeled “forbidden”. Padma’s hair is huge. She’s dressed in red and the male judges are dressed in white. The theme is desserts, the garden’s theme is “good and evil”. They have to make a good dessert and an evil dessert. Everyone is confused. Then they have to vote who is most likely or least likely to win the show. It’s getting too layered – like a dessert? Beverly gets voted most likely and she breaks down but it feels strange and fake? I’m scared. Least likely is Chris. This whole episode Padma is speaking like an evil witch voice like she’s reading a spooky story to a class of kindergarteners. It’s a tough watch.
Padma opens the forbidden dome to reveal blue cheese, pickles, dandelion greens, mustard seeds, anchovies, radish, cured black olives, and sriracha. Chris gets to distribute the items since he’s probably going home and gives himself anchovies for some reason, maybe he really wants to go home.
Also why do all of the microphones on Bravo shows, and now this shows, sound like they are located in people’s throats? Everyone sounds slightly muffled or like they have a bubble in their throat. First noticed in the most recent season of Vanderpump and it’s driving me crazy.
They have six hours to make two desserts which feels insane, especially since they have stagnated start times. Cara is making puff pastry from scratch which is also insane.
Guest judge is Nina Metayer, who is apparently the world’s best pastry chef. So no pressure.
Matt takes a tumble with a stack of plates in his arms and somehow didn’t break any of his bones or plates.
Diana didn’t plate her evil dessert. She has a time issue. “I don’t cook with condiments”. Like ok but I don’t think it’s so awful to use mustard as an ingredient.
Beverly wins and maintains her composure. Diana is obviously going home because she only plated one dessert because miss “I don’t use condiments in my cooking” cannot finish her dishes in time for the second episode in a row. Try using a condiment on an insane show like this so that you can finish your dishes on time. I admire her made from scratch methods but this is a television where the host is dressed up like the devil and $1 million dollars are on the line.
Top Chef Season 23 Episode 5
We’re back and Jennifer’s arm is still broken
Guest judge is Fortune Feimster, who I learned about from Jeff Lewis’s show short-lived show Celebrity House Lift where he renovated celebrity houses. Controversial figure but I find him entertaining.
Quickfire challenge: Make whatever a trio of children want you to make, which is a dish using the keywords puffified, Colorado, and Christmas. I feel like I’m having a stroke.
Jennifer sits out the quickfire challenge again to “rest up” for the main challenge. One of the child judges / child laborers falls off of their chair. One of the children described the pizza puff as “yuck”. So rude. Brandon won because he made ice cream.
Elimination challenge: create an elevated dish featuring dehydrated ingredients. I wonder if they’ll go grocery shopping at REI.
Ok so they get to pick ingredients in the kitchen, put them in a dehydrator and go white water rafting while their items dehydrate. I bet Jennifer and her broken arm are excited to go white water rafting.
The twin brothers are both doing pavlovas and freaking out about it. Just make the same thing every time, you’re already twins. Who cares.
They go white water rafting and rock climbing in a giant manmade river, which is so Charlotte, and then go home to their lego condos to eat apples and peanut butter in the dark while Christopher Nolan movie music plays.
One of the twins (Jonathan) is crusting swordfish with dehydrated strawberries and smoking it. Dehydrated strawberries are a strange texture for fish. Freezedried would have been better.
We’re at the judges’ dining table and the Josh wine is flowing. People are white water rafting in the background.
Some bad reviews: hammered lamb, wet salad, chicken soup that felt like it was made for someone on a very specific diet, spongy monkfish that is leeching water.
Anthony is our winner and wins immunity.
Lawrence, Oscar, and Rhoda are in the bottom.
They talk to Jennifer to ask her if she wants to saw off her arm or go home and come back another time. She decides to stay and they tell her she needs to start doing the Quickfire challenges again.
Rhoda goes home; there was nothing redeeming about her dish. She won the first two challenges though, so there’s a chance she’ll win Last Chance Kitchen.
Last Chance Kitchen episode 2: Rhoda v Nana
They have to cook a dish that honors she-crab soup. There are loose live crabs all over the place, one of which has fallen on the floor and is stuck on its back.
Nana makes crab mac and cheese, Rhoda made Singaporean chili crab (winner)
April 6, 2026 (Monday)
8:30am: Little Waves coffee with half & half, made at home.
10am: Leftover sausage and tortellini soup with parmesan.
2pm: Garlic and herb water crackers.
3pm: A pour of GT’s Trilogy kombucha.
6pm: Thai green curry with pork, green peppers, green beans, potatoes, and kaffir lime leaves over basmati rice, made at home.
7pm: Blue Bell Moollenium Crunch ice cream.
I used sweet Italian sausage which is kind of weird but you probably wouldn’t know unless I told you
Brian said “what is this ice cream, it’s amazing” it’s the ice cream we’ve been eating for weeks now. Hello.
April 7, 2026 (Tuesday)
8am: Little Waves coffee with half & half, made at home, and leftover curry and rice.
10:30am: Garlic and herb water crackers.
1:30pm: Leftover soup with parmesan.
3:30pm: A pour of GT’s Trilogy kombucha.
7pm: Chicken parmesan with marinara from Ideal’s and romaine lettuce with Brianna’s creamy caesar dressing, black pepper, and parmesan, made at home.
After watching two episodes of RHORI I woke up with a french manicure screaming “I need to make cutlets for my huge Italian family”. Double parm meal: chicken and Caesar.
Sizzler plates
Brian said “don’t ever make this for my parents or they will be over here every weekend and at that point we might as well open up a restaurant” so I guess they were good. Or maybe not because his parents eat pretty much prepared, canned, and packaged foods from Food Lion. They also will eat dinner while watching the surgery channel. And by surgery channel I mean TLC or whoever played that show The Operation for hours on end. If they were coming over every weekend it really would be like we were in an episode of RHORI with six of our aunts packing themselves into an escalade with a flask and coming over for cutlets and marinara. Restaurant that only serves cutlets.
Chicken cutlets from Whole Foods were already sliced thinly; salted both sides, then flour, then wet (Duke’s mayonnaise, pickled banana pepper vinegar, and mustard), then panko; topped with mozzarella and reduced Ideal’s marinara
April 8, 2026 (Wednesday)
7am: Little Waves coffee with half & half, made at home.
9:30am: A cup of coffee with half & half at the office.
Cake room: NYT Cooking Page-a-Day calendar recipes for Slow Cooker Picadillo, Matzo Lasagna, Curried Swordfish With Tomatoes, Greens, and Garlic Toast, Easter Egg Nest Cake, Air-Fryer Grilled Cheese, Easiest Chicken Noodle Soup, Turmeric-Black Pepper Chicken With Asparagus, Sheet-Pan Chicken With Shallots and Grapes, Skillet Chicken With Orzo, Dill and Feta, and Sheet-Pan Roasted Salmon With Pea Pesto, two Easter Baskets filled with Smarties, Bazooka bubblegum, and Peanuts-branded candy eggs, and part of a Mike and Ike flavored Peeps pop.
11am: Leftover curry and rice.
6pm: Leftover chicken parmesan and romaine lettuce with Marzetti creamy caesar dressing, black pepper, and parmesan, made at home
Google reviews for the Mike and Ike flavored Peeps pop are horrendous. 1.3 stars; has a horrible sour flavor that tastes like citrus cleaner
Leftover curry is the best breakfast because it is the perfect compliment to coffee: fat, heat, sweet
In case you can’t get past the paywall on Bon Appetit’s caesar salad dressing review article, I’ll let you know that Marzetti is their #1 pick, which I disagree with. Brianna’s has better, bolder flavor.
I’ve seen about 10 movies, Inception unfortunately being one of them. Brian has seen every movie so when we were scrolling on HBO Max inception before I started screaming and made him watch it I hadn’t seen it since it came out in theaters. I kept telling him that Bradley Cooper was in it and I waited for Bradley Cooper the whole movie; turns out he’s not in it. I understand the movie now I’m older and still think it’s stupid. Leonardo DiCaprio goes to an architecture department at a university to find an architect genius when he really should be finding someone who’s really good at Sims. They should remake it with Kylie Kardashian. Also there are only two women in the entirety of the film, one of which is dead.
April 9, 2026 (Thursday)
9:30am: Little Waves coffee with half & half, made at home.
10:30am: Two sunny eggs with Texas Pete garlic hot sauce over olive oil toasted Whole Foods San Francisco sourdough, made at home.
2pm: Whole Foods queso with Late July tortilla chips.
3:30pm: A pour of GT’s Trilogy kombucha.
6pm: Screamin’ Sicilian frozen pepperoni pizza.
7pm: Half of a slice of cinnamon coconut cake, made at home.
Sourdough in quotations - dense crumb structure; no sour taste
Whole Foods queso was mid; added some local cream top milk (Ran-Lew) that tastes too much like a farm - is that good - and leaves a streak of gaminess down your throat and some Texas Pete garlic hot sauce and tasted like water; Sometime in July chips were fantastic, fresh, restaurant-style tasting with great crunch
Screamin’ Sicilian pepperoni pizza has more cheese on it than the cheese pizza. It’s a cheese pizza. Put cheese on it.
Coconut cake recipes: Sally’s Baking Addiction (canned coconut milk, coconut extract, shredded coconut; cream cheese frosting), Ina Garten (shredded coconut in cake and frosting, cream cheese frosting), Pancake Princess (Sally’s won overall, but King Arthur won for frosting which uses a coconut milk powder, Thomas Keller came in last for his mayonnaise-based cake); mostly butter-based cakes which I do not prefer, Alison Roman (uses buttermilk, coconut oil, but also butter), Serious Eats (coconut flour, coconut oil, coconut milk)
Whole Foods only had unsweetened coconut in the texture of what is on the chocolate coconut cake donut at Dunkin Donuts. Not as nice as the sweetened, wavy and soft generic shredded coconut for baking. Debating whether or not adding coconut to cake batter would ruin texture. Since this was a slightly runnier batter than the chocolate version I tried the spin method to prevent doming, which I saw on a TikTok video from the pastry person at a restaurant owned by a Top Chef person whose name is escaping me. Better in a round pan. The concept is that the force of the spin makes the batter stick on the sides to compensate for a rising middle, creating a flat surface. Also, I forgot to buy cream cheese, but both Vermont Creamery creme fraiche and mascarpone were on sale so I got those instead so everything worked out in the end. Baked at 325 for about 35 minutes or until it registered as 200 on a thermometer and smelled done; took it out at 190 and it smelled raw. All of this cake talk is reminding me of when I worked at Milk Bar and Christina Tosi wanted to do a cake walk for children while blasting “Birthday Cake” by Rihanna on loop and I had to tell her what cake meant.
COCONUT CINNAMON CAKE (coconut made me think of tiki / velvet falernum)
187g all-purpose flour
175g granulated sugar
1 teaspoon Diamond Crystal kosher salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
⅓ cup vegetable oil
1 cup buttermilk
¼ cup water
FROSTING
4 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
3 tablespoons mascarpone
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
125g confectioners' sugar
2 tablespoons heavy cream
1 tablespoon buttermilk
¼ teaspoon Diamond Crystal kosher salt
½ cup of toasted shredded coconut
This was…ok but it wasn’t chocolate cake. Icing was too dense. For vanilla cake I like a sickly sweet, soft frosting. I don’t think I will eat it. This is why wedding cakes are bad. Dense, structurally sound buttercream that tastes like you’re eating a stick of butter. In the early 2000s my mom started making a seven minute frosting with a ton of egg whites that tasted like nothing and it made me so mad. What’s the point? Might as well drink a glass of water. I threw the cake away. Unless I love it, not worth eating garbage that doesn’t even delight. Brian has informed me that he likes rum cake and can’t believe that I haven’t made it now that I have knowledge of what his favorite cake it, but I don’t keep rum on hand. I’m not a pirate. Brian is also mad that I don’t “stock little peps”. He thinks I’m his stockist and that I should have small peppers in the fridge at all times.
April 10, 2026 (Friday)
9am: Leftover coffee with half & half.
10:30am: Leftover frozen pizza.
2:30pm: Whole Foods queso with sriracha and Late July tortilla chips.
6pm: Marinated gigante beans on olive oil toasted sourdough topped with chives, lemon zest, arugula and a ricotta, mascarpone, and lemon spread, made at home, and a small pour of Broomtail Brewing brown ale.
7pm: Blue Bell Cookie Two Step ice cream.
Added sriracha to the queso which was great
My dream came true: Whole Foods gigante beans were on sale for $5.56 or so; using the bulk bins with unstructured plastic produce bags that blow away if you breath around them at the wrong angle is diabolical; also there aren’t any scales. Ended up getting 2LBs.
Gigante beans - 4 hour soak. No skimming necessary. Brought to boil and simmered for about three hours.
https://www.alisoneroman.com/recipes/vinegar-marinated-butter-beans/
American Vinegar Works red wine vinegar and leftover pickling liquid flavored with garlic and black peppercorn, La Tourangelle olive oil, Gustiamo oregano, salt and pepper
Playa Provisions Crispy marinated gigante beans: YUZU AIOLI, LEMON CHIPS, TROPICAL CHILI CRUNCH, HERB AIOLI
This toast meal is peak new restaurant in your neighborhood whose name is in a nouveau 70s font because when they hired a designer the only inspiration or reference photo they had was the Graza olive oil bottle and the restaurant doesn’t really belong there yet but has a fat slice of toast on the menu that is perfectly golden and topped with an assortment of pantry staples that don’t go together and most of the local community sees it and doesn’t bother looking at the menu but if they did they would be like oh ok I guess we can’t afford toast anymore
April 11, 2026 (Saturday)
8:30am: Little Waves coffee with half & half, made at home.
11am: A slice of toasted sourdough with Isigny butter, made at home.
3pm: Two Miller High Life ponies, Eastern NC asparagus, spring onion & arugula salad with garlicky breadcrumbs & pecorino dressing, Tempesta "porchetta" pizza with castelvetrano olives and crucola cheese, Buffalo stracciatella pizza with oil-cured anchovies, pink peppercorns, and pecorino, chili oil, and an espresso at Pizzeria Toro in Durham, North Carolina, and a Stony Creek neon sour ring.
6pm: A slice of chocolate cake with vanilla mascarpone buttercream, made at home.
It is soft shell crab season so we went to Saltbox to get soft shell crab and they sold out as soon as it was our turn to order so we walked out.
Line culture is spreading to smaller cities and kills spontaneity; whoever has the luxury of time wins; I guess now that we are a society of convenience and consumption people need something to do with their extra time so it might as well be standing in a line; standing in line for expensive food ultimately makes me feel like an idiot; Hannah Horvath https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8grye63/
Conspicuous leisure is the public display of non-productive time—such as lavish vacations, hobbies, or idle manners—to signal high social status and wealth, as coined by Thorstein Veblen in The Theory of the Leisure Class
Adam Rotstein https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8gr4QQn/
@caroline: The regulars probably HAVE to do their grocery shopping there because they don’t have time for anything else after waiting in that line
Loudest restaurant I’ve ever been to. Not sure why they were bothering to play music. It was mostly one table that was screaming at the top of their lungs the whole time. Not a cushion or wall hanging or pillow to absorb any of the sound. Felt bad for everyone working. Inconsiderate people make me angry. Harpo’s Bakery incident origin story. Nobody else can have a conversation because one table is screaming. This is why Beverly on ACC jumping up and down and clapping when she won while ignoring her opponent who was being sent home was so abrasive for me. Then it’s exhausting for me to socialize because I’m hyper vigilant because i’m trying to prevent anybody from feeling the way that I felt at the cinnamon roll sleep over incident.
The space is claustrophobic and u would only go back if outdoor seating was an option. Pizza and salad can stand to be eaten outside without risk of cooking off too much in the breeze. Pink peppercorns like the chicken liver mousse at Rootstock. Tasted like natural white cheddar Cheetos. Tempesta porchetta was great (basically ham) and from Tempesta in Chicago, who does a great muffaletta and ‘nduja spread. Fantastic chili oil. Salad was good. https://www.tempestaartisansalumi.com/
Was just talking about how a pony is the perfect beer size because it never goes warm or flat. Apparently two is perfect. Brian switched to a Peroni which came in a perfect glass. Great glassware selection. Then he got a Cynar which I consider too sweet. Another place with a lengthy amaro list yet no Santa maria al monte, which is the perfect amaro. I love a large meal in the daytime. Home by 5 to laze the evening away and have a slice of cake or something small as the sun goes down. Anyway they did not charge us for our digestifs which was nice. I think our server thought we worked in a restaurant based on hints he was dropping but I think the Durham restaurant scene is small enough that he would have known if we were fellow restaurant employees. Brian did work in Durham restaurants and deliver farm produce to restaurants for the first 3-4 years we lived here so maybe he recognized Brian.
Brian stopped at a gas station to get two Diet Coke tall boys and a pack of Stone Creek brand neon sour rings that smelled like a carpeted house where a bunch of small children lived or diabetes. tasted like sweet tarts. Stone Creek is from Massachusetts apparently. Never heard of them. Looks like a generic gas station snack brand that would also produce a line of flavored sunflower seeds.
Picked up Fire house steak house fundraiser meals from Brian’s cousin. It’s good that he’s giving the fire house money because he sets a lot of fires.
This feels like a good time to mention that the Firehouse Subs in my hometown caught on fire and burnt down.
Steak dinner: imagine the worst steak possible. It’s in a styrofoam container. Well done yet unseared and unseasoned. Floppy. Wet. There’s a plain baked potato in foil. Salad is iceberg lettuce, two slices of cucumber, a cherry tomato, mixed shredded cheese, and then a fat slice of square toast. I just dumped the salads into my compost because they were already gray and the smell reminded me of my elementary school friend, who actually hosted the Harpos Bakery incident sleep over, used to bring an iceberg lettuce and butter sandwich to lunch everyday.
And yes I made another cake. I’ve memorized the cake recipe at this point. Made the buttermilk chocolate cake base with a vanilla mascarpone buttercream frosting. It look a long time to get the buttercream completely smooth; switched to the paddle and it eventually worked and was nice and soft and tasted like a Dunkaroos style frosting, but got a little too hard in the fridge. Was broken for a long time because of temperature issues. I don’t want to start any feuds but my favorite cake flavor combo is chocolate cake, vanilla frosting, followed by double chocolate, followed by double vanilla, and concluding with vanilla cake, chocolate frosting. If we’re being honest chocolate chocolate and vanilla vanilla are tied because vanilla and chocolate are tied in the cake industry but not in ice cream industry. But for cold cake chocolate chocolate is the best combination. The cocoa powder covers up the cold butter flavor. Cold vanilla frosting is best when made with an oil-based shortening like a cheap grocery store cake. That’s the problem with vanilla frosting; without a powerful flavor of something like cocoa you need a lot of sugar to counter the taste of cold fat.
April 12, 2026 (Sunday)
9am: Little Waves coffee with half & half, made at home.
10am: Fried rice with scrambled eggs, onions, and peas, made at home.
12:30pm: Whole Foods queso with sriracha and Late July tortilla chips.
3:30pm: A slice of chocolate cake with vanilla mascarpone buttercream.
6:30pm: Marinated gigante beans.
8pm: A slice of toasted sourdough with Isigny butter, made at home.