how to induce nightmares culinary-stylee
Jan. 8th, 2008 10:10 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dubdobdeeok so i planned to poach a chicken for supper last night (and for cold lunch and supper today), and as i had a lot of boxwine left over from my party ("VERY rough" -- dr vick, who gave it to me for use in mulling), i thought i wd experiment poaching the chicken in red wine
i. this WORKED WELL (proportions = abt 3 glasses worth of red wine to two kettles-full of water, plus 2xchicken stock cube, peppercorns and bayleaves, splash of soysauce, splash of lea and lovely perrins) (i meant to put an onion a carrot and a celery in, but i didn't have a celery at all, the carrot was mummified, and i chooped the onion then forgot to put it in)
ii. then leave to poach for two hours (this was a bit long actually but i was busy)
iii. remove (skin nicely wine-darkened) and leave to stand while reduce liquor
iv. which took ages as there was a lot of it
v. meanwhile dismember chicken and discarded bones and string and other unwanted stuff (it fell completely to pieces very easily as it was a bit overcooked)
vi. after about AN HOUR the liquor was reduced enough to transfer it to a saucepan for sauces -- seive out the detritus (bayleaves, a LOT of perppercorns, far more than i remember puttigg in), and reduce some more
RESULT 1: the best chicken gravy i have ever made, piping hot; cold poached chicken; plus leftover roast leeks and courgettes from sunday -- now actually this DOESN'T QUITE WORK AS COMBO (i should have kept the chicken warmer -- tho i find it hard to debone when it's too hot, and reheated the vegetables i think, but they seemed too mushy to fry): however the entire point was a meal painless to prep while i did other things
RESULT 2: the gravy was really impossibly rich and lovely -- also i suspect a bit dubious on the agatston scale -- and made me eat more than i meant to (i'll have cold for lunch OR supper but not both)
RESULT 3: i dremt i was sitting up high in a high chair, bound intop it, in fact, in an empty marianne-dreamsish room, listening to the sounds iof something scrabbling around that i couldn't see and TALKING TO ITSELF: "i am chopped-up HU MANCHU," it said, "and soon i shall be FREE!", as the room darkened menacingly -- i was a bit alarmed by this development and started yelling HELP ME HELP ME HELP ME but no one heard and no one came! After a while I woke myself up -- OK, this is a fairly standard sleep-paralysis type dream, but i've been made repeatedly aware that when i call out in such dreams, i am quite likely ACTUALLY CALLING OUT, out loud!
so apologies to neighbours and that -- all i can say is, chopped-up hu manchu was less of a danger than i believed at the time
i. this WORKED WELL (proportions = abt 3 glasses worth of red wine to two kettles-full of water, plus 2xchicken stock cube, peppercorns and bayleaves, splash of soysauce, splash of lea and lovely perrins) (i meant to put an onion a carrot and a celery in, but i didn't have a celery at all, the carrot was mummified, and i chooped the onion then forgot to put it in)
ii. then leave to poach for two hours (this was a bit long actually but i was busy)
iii. remove (skin nicely wine-darkened) and leave to stand while reduce liquor
iv. which took ages as there was a lot of it
v. meanwhile dismember chicken and discarded bones and string and other unwanted stuff (it fell completely to pieces very easily as it was a bit overcooked)
vi. after about AN HOUR the liquor was reduced enough to transfer it to a saucepan for sauces -- seive out the detritus (bayleaves, a LOT of perppercorns, far more than i remember puttigg in), and reduce some more
RESULT 1: the best chicken gravy i have ever made, piping hot; cold poached chicken; plus leftover roast leeks and courgettes from sunday -- now actually this DOESN'T QUITE WORK AS COMBO (i should have kept the chicken warmer -- tho i find it hard to debone when it's too hot, and reheated the vegetables i think, but they seemed too mushy to fry): however the entire point was a meal painless to prep while i did other things
RESULT 2: the gravy was really impossibly rich and lovely -- also i suspect a bit dubious on the agatston scale -- and made me eat more than i meant to (i'll have cold for lunch OR supper but not both)
RESULT 3: i dremt i was sitting up high in a high chair, bound intop it, in fact, in an empty marianne-dreamsish room, listening to the sounds iof something scrabbling around that i couldn't see and TALKING TO ITSELF: "i am chopped-up HU MANCHU," it said, "and soon i shall be FREE!", as the room darkened menacingly -- i was a bit alarmed by this development and started yelling HELP ME HELP ME HELP ME but no one heard and no one came! After a while I woke myself up -- OK, this is a fairly standard sleep-paralysis type dream, but i've been made repeatedly aware that when i call out in such dreams, i am quite likely ACTUALLY CALLING OUT, out loud!
so apologies to neighbours and that -- all i can say is, chopped-up hu manchu was less of a danger than i believed at the time
