Letter to Susie

Well... I think (yes, it's ALL about ME at the moment!) I'd like to cater, plan events, you know, party stuff maybe... I don't know. Of course there is the photography. I'd like to do a line of art-cards, but that's no way to make a living... maybe I could make and sell hippie shit like anointed peacy lovey bath salts and witchy woman stuff like I used to do for a while. HOWEVER! Sebastopol seems to positively reek with that sort of thing, so back to the drawing board!

Something baby related, without being daycare--is that vague enough for you? Of course every new celebrity mom is doing "something baby-related" and having a much better chance of promoting whatever it may be, so that market is fairly well saturated as well.

Of course everyone wants a work from home job on the internet, and yes, I was making a decent living selling crap on eBay for a while, but they are such greedy thieves I have little desire to keep supporting them (but i will keep selling crap now and then, simply because they have the market for the most part) but I prefer CraigsList whenever possible. Still that's not really a dependable income the way i do it, I was just buying and selling random things here and there, not doing an actual wholesale-to-retail gig. Maybe I will revisit that idea.

Maybe I could do an imports thing, but again, so saturated, I would need to actually have something unique mass-produced in another country and sell it here. I do have another trip to India coming to me one day in the future. My ex-husband owes it to me. he promised me one trip for the honeymoon and one for the divorce! So if I can come up with some designs before I go that would be a good something something on the side.

I keep thinking I will just come up with the perfect chip-clip, post-it or pet rock idea one of these days, but so far nothing has manifested itself into a million dollar thneed.

Meanwhile I make food and dolls and other random things and photograph it all to release my pent up creative frustrations.






Now... I hope to hear what's going on in YOUR life soon! Maybe I'll go look at your blog. I think I will try again to post in mine. I've tried several times over the years, it never sticks. Not sure why, I used to write in a paper journal EVERY day for years. A lot of my journal back then was in the form of letters that I would photo copy and paste in. Maybe i should start doing that again, pasting my more verbose emails into a blog. I just started yet another blog recently, I think I'll post this letter in it, it's sort of journal like.

Love you and trust everything is going well on the tour. Still looking forward to those pics you promised!

Love Rupa

Migrate This!

So I started a blog and wrote one entry, then forgot I had created it! I just found it by mistake, logging in with the wrong email, so I figured I would migrate that ONE entry here and stick to it over here... or try to! So here it is:

Saturday, December 1, 2007
Flowerpot Chicken Geyserville

Instead of using the pressure cooker tonight, I tried something new and different. Here's the tale. I was in Geyserville with Julie (my sister) and Dominic (my one year old nephew) and we were letting him run around outside adventuring. We were on the side of the house near some huge solar panels and a pile of junk reminiscent of Sanford and Son, avoiding the aftermath of a rabbit bloodbath in the back yard (the backyard neighbor's dog caught and massacred an very large, floppy-eared grey bunny rabbit).

Dominic was feasting on a veritable smorgasbord of delectable stones and scrumptious dried leaves seasoned with bug exoskeletons and carcases while I was taking photos documenting his culinary explorations. Suddenly out of the corner of my eye (when what to my wondering eyes should appear) I spotted a large terracotta flower pot half buried in the dry dirt under the solar panels.

I got really excited, because I have been wanting to try baking in a flower pot ever since I saw Alton Brown--my favorite science teacher/television chef-- do it a while back on his show "Good Eats". I eagerly dug it out, dusted it off and determined it was a suitable size for my plan. I rushed to the utility sink in the back yard and proceeded to scrub it for half an hour, trying to get rid of as much of the brown staining as possible.

Oh yeah, I did pawn off baby-watch on Julie first. Next I brought it into the kitchen and confirmed it would fit in the oven, but still I needed to work out the base (the pot is the top of this cooking vessel). I looked for a large ceramic casserole or something similar, but struck out everywhere I looked. I was considering just putting the chicken in a dish on the floor of the oven and placing the pot over the whole thing, but ideally the food is supposed to be surrounded by unglazed terracotta. Finally I admitted that there was not much point in doing it that way.

Feeling a bit defeated, I decided to give up and use the pressure cooker after all. Just then I glanced out the window into the greenhouse and it was as if a higher power had directed my gaze there. A lone ray of golden sunlight streamed through the window, bathing a wrinkled white plastic bag of old socks (?) sitting in a shallow terracotta saucer just about the size I needed! I scrambled out the door and into the greenhouse, snatched up the dish and jumped for joy!

I didn't even bother to check it for size, I just went directly to the old sink, scrubbed it clean and then went to the kitchen to confirm what I already knew. It was the perfect size! I pulled the chicken out of the pot of brine I had it soaking in all day, dried it off and coated it with a generous spice rub consisting of salt, pepper, thyme, marjoram, cayenne, and nutmeg.

I chopped up an onion, a green bell pepper and several cloves of garlic. I opened a small jar of home-canned garden tomatoes and dumped it in the bottom of the saucer, along with a couple glugs of good red wine and placed the raw chicken on this slop, breast side up.

Next I smothered the chicken with my chopped onion, pepper and garlic, topping it off with a couple whole red chillies and a sprig of rosemary. I covered the chicken with the flower pot, placed it in the cold oven and turned the heat to 480* and left it for an hour. At that point I opened it up, sprinkled it with grated Parmesan cheese to create a crust, added some canned baby potatoes and put it back in the oven for ten minutes on 500*.

The chicken came out delightfully blackened on the outside, juicy and succulent on the inside with the exception of the breast in my opinion which seemed a bit dry, but then I am a dark meat lover so my tolerance for dry meat is close to nil. The others sharing it argued with me, but I still plan to do things slightly different next time (tomorrow?) All the vegetables were reduced to a delicious chunky salsa-textured sauce full of amazing flavor.

I served it with brown rice and steamed broccoli. Tonight's meal was fabulous, and I am already planning the next version, contemplating the slight improvements I will make on temp and timing since mine was based on modifying a recipe meant to be used with an actual clay pot cooker, not a flower pot.

Also, I think I'll try cooking the rice in the pot with the chicken next time, as well as reducing the heat to about 350* in hopes of a more tender and juicy breast. I will probably lightly coat it with olive oil before the spice rub too.

Please follow this link to view photos:

http://picasaweb.google.com/rupavangelder/FlowerpotChickenGeyserville
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There was one comment, which I also feel I need to migrate, in all fairness to Auntie Linda. So here that is:


Blogger worldhq101 said...

Well here I am having the honor of being the FIRST to comment on your new blog! How many times in one's life does that happen?

I really enjoyed it. Especially how you "re-purposed" an old, unused clay pot and saucer into a roasting pan . . . . .

A few years ago I actually had the "real deal". . . . . a clay roasting pan, (a gift), that came from one of those very pricey culinary stores. . . It was oval shaped, about 12 inches long w/ both top and bottom about 4 or 5 inches deep. It would have been perfect for you! I used it for potroast with potatoes, carrots, onions etc, (like your Grandma H. used to make), but only rarely because at the time I lived alone and didn't make Mom's potroast very often. Eventually, for lack of use, I gave the roaster to Dana and Kevin, who are both very good in the kitchen, thinking they would indeed put it to better use than I had. Here's the rub . . . A few monthe later, just like you, I was out in their yard playing with my grandson. We were playing catch. The ball landed in their little teeny garden and when I went to get it . . . . . there was my roasting pan! Both top and bottom! My son-in-law had re-purposed my roaster into a planter for herbs! Geez Louise!

I think, if it's still there, I'll go reclaim it and send it to you so you can re-re-purppose it back into a roaster.