Corn Chowder

I love chowders. They're warm, satisfying and fill a spot inside like nothing else. It takes something special so make a true chowder. Unfortunately, what I made in the crockpot was not that special. Crockpot recipe out of Mabel Hoffman's Crockery Cookery (pg. 74). Corn, potatoes, onions and broth cooked overnight and then I pureed the mix this morning (got to try out the imersion blender for the first time - very cool). Refrigerated it during the day and then added milk and butter and cooked it for another hour. Spooned it out and dusted it with ground mace. Didn't really care for it much. Since it was pureed, there wasn't anything to make one stop and savor. It was like really really soupy grits. In eating it, it didn't feel satsifying or filling. It felt like a good base just waiting for the chowder parts to be added. Zeb and I were thinking about shredded chicken and some additional vegetables, perhaps another can of corn. Oh, and I put too much ground mace on mine. FYI - ground mace should be used sparingly - it's a very strong flavor.

Spicy!

Last night, Zeb made Thai-Phoun Ribs and Jalapeno Poppers (Smoke & Spice, pp. 74, 386). The ribs were so tender but the star of the meal was the sauce. All sorts of Thai flavors reduced down into syrupy goodness. The poppers were way too spicy for me and even Zeb couldn't handle them for long. Too bad too because they were stuffed with cheddar and cream cheese and looked so yummy. Alas, it was not to be.

For dessert, I made strawberry empanadas (Intercourses). It's one of Zeb's favorite desserts and I've memorized the recipe. It works the best with fresh ripe strawberries so it's a seasonal dessert for us. I've put together more filling than the recipe calls for and add WAY more strawberries. It's so easy! Blend together half a block of cream cheese and 1/4 cup of brown sugar (I sometimes add more brown sugar but it's a sweetness preference). Mix in 1/4 cup chopped strawberries. Using refrigerated cresant roll dough, place 4 rectangles on a greased cookie sheet. Place about 1/4 cup of the filling on one half of each cresant roll square, fold over the other side and crimp the edges. Crumble additional brown sugar on top (brush with melted butter first if you like). Bake according to cresant roll instructions.

Strawberry Pasta

If you're looking for a romantic and (relatively) easy cookbook, I highly recommend Intercourses. Each section is devoted to a different aphrodisiac food. The pictures are sumptuous and the recipes are simple and easy to follow. Even if such foods create only a placebo effect, cooking out of a book devoted to them can still get the blood hot. Plus, the book has little stories and quote dispersed throughout. I've tried about 15 recipes out of the book (all good) and have about 5 more on my radar to try out soon. (Note: I had actually typed out a list of recipes but then the site screwed up when I tried to spellcheck. I'm not doing it again. Sorry!)

Last night, we had Strawberry Pasta (pg. 57). It's basically fettuicine alfredo with pureed strawberries. Very rich and very satisfying.

Country Captain in Cast Iron

Last night I made Country Captain (Cooking in Cast Iron, pg. 72). It was a mix of tomatoes, pepper, onions, garlic, curry and thyme with chicken tossed in for good measure. I served it over rice and topped it with toasted almonds and mango chutney. Sound good? Well, it was too spicy for me. And it didn't help that I didn't finish cooking it until about 10:45. I started to eat and realized that I just wasn't that hungry. Zeb liked it though.

On another note, we've figured out the trick to cast iron - you HAVE to clean it after dinner. There's no letting it sit overnight. If you clean it right away, it's a snap (or so Zeb tells me).

Fish soup

Last night, I made Lingcod Chowder from Dan's recipe. I didn't realize how much soup the recipe made and so I didn't get enough lingcod. It had more potatoes in it than fish. Quite good though - spicy milky broth with different chunks of vegetables in it. I had never worked with lingcod before. I wasn't expecting to find bones and couldn't get them out so I didn't even get to use all of the fillet I brought home. Oh well...

Lack of posts

I have received complaints from all of my (two) readers that I haven't been posting. The thing is...my blog is about home cooking and in the last few weeks, I haven't had the time. Should be getting back in to it soon though.

Tonight's going to be an adventure...

Dan and Renee brought by live fresh mussels they gathered on the coast this weekend. I never worked with mussels before. Dan kindly sent me directions. We'll see how it goes!

Here are Dan-and-Dan's-Mom-tested cleaning and cooking methods from Allrecipes.com:

Cleaning Mussels If you want to avoid serving a bowl of full salty, sandy mussels it's a good idea to become familiar with the simple process of cleaning and debearding mussels.

1. When selecting your mussels, NEVER choose a mussel that is chipped, broken, or damaged in any way. Also, never choose a mussel that is open. The mussels should be tightly closed and stored in a cool area where they can breath. When you purchase your mussels, make sure to immediately unwrap them at home so they can breathe, otherwise they may die before you cook with them.

2. Just before cooking, soak your mussels in fresh water. Soak them for about 20 minutes. As the mussels breathe, they filter water and expel sand. After about 20 minutes, the mussels will have less salt and sand stored inside of their shells.

3. Most mussels have what is commonly called "The Beard ", also known as byssal threads. The beard is comprised of many fibers which emerge from the mussel's shell.

4. To remove the beard, using a dry towel, grasp the beard and give a sharp yank out and toward the hinge end of the mussel. This method will not kill the mussel. If you were to pull the beard out towards the opening end of the mussel you can tear the mussel on the inside of the shell, killing it. Discard the byssal threads.

5. Remove the mussels from the water. Do not pour the mussels and water into a straining device because the sand has sunk to the bottom of the bowl. Pouring the mussels and water into a straining device would cause you to pour the sand back on top of the mussels. Place these mussels into another bowl full of clean cold water.

6. Once the mussels have been soaked, use a firm brush to brush off any additional sand, barnacles , or other oceanic attachments. Rinse the mussels under cool tap water, and set aside. Dry with a towel before cooking .

Cooking Mussels There are many ways to cook mussels . The method we have chosen (steaming) is applicable for use with every different type of mussels and is an especially simple way to make delicious mussels quickly.

1. We used 1 pound fresh cleaned mussels , 1/4 cup white wine, 1 teaspoon minced garlic, and 1 tablespoon butter. This preparation begins once the mussels have already been cleaned and takes about 3 to 4 minutes to cook completely.

2. Preheat a pan over medium heat. Once you have chopped your garlic, place a small amount of butter into your preheated pan. Stir the garlic into the butter. A light olive oil could be substituted for butter.

3. Cook the garlic in the pan until it becomes a tan color. Do not burn the garlic, as burned garlic is very bitter. If you do wind up overcooking the garlic, throw out both the butter and the garlic, then wipe out the pan and start over.

4. Once the garlic is tan, add the mussels. Do not add too many mussels to the pan at once. If the mussels are stacked on top of each other, the weight of the other mussels will make it more difficult for the mussels on the bottom to open. Using this method, you should only cook enough mussels to cover the bottom of the pan at one time. Toss the mussels around in the garlic butter and coat the shells with the fat. Be careful not to be too rough when tossing the mussels in the butter, as the shells are somewhat fragile and will crack and chip.

5. Once the mussels have been coated, add about 1/4 cup of wine per dozen mussels. This creates the necessary steam required to open the shells. It will also decrease the overall heat within the pan. Cover the mussels with a lid to finish cooking.

6. After about 4 minutes, remove the lid. At this point, most if not all of the mussels will be open. Mussels, unlike clams, will open before they are cooked all of the way through. If some of your mussels have not opened, then it is possible that either they were not cooked long enough, or they are bad and should be discarded. If most of them have not yet opened, place the cover back on the pan and wait another minute or two. Be careful not to cook the mussels for too long, as they will become tough and grainy if overcooked.

7. Remove the mussels from the pan. Pour the juices left in the saucepan into your serving plate or bowl with the mussels. The juice is delicious when sopped up with slices of fresh bread.

Soup...mmm.mmm..good

Crappy weekend. Zeb was out of town which meant I slept terribly. The animals were going nuts and, to top it all off, I got a migrane. When Zeb's gone, I eat crap. While he was gone, I had a box of Kraft mac & cheese, way too many Nugget chocolate chip cookies and a ball of fresh mozzarella. It's embarrassing how little I care about what I eat when I'm by myself. Bless his heart, Zeb is always on my case about this. He's going to be heading to DC for a week next month and I'm going to have to really think if Kraft and Nugget cookies can sustain me for that long.

Anyway, tonight I made Southwestern chicken soup in the crockpot. This is one chunky soup! Corn, chicken slices, bell pepper, onion, tomatoes... I was a bit worried because the picture in the article makes the soup look quite tomatoey and red but, with only one can of diced tomatoes, there's not much in the way of red. The broth is more milky in color. I think that's from the corn and chicken. It's very mild until you add the cumin. I just love cumin. It's smoky without being spicy. We actually ran out of ground cumin a few days ago but luckily, I had some cumin seed left so I gave it a whirl in the spice grinder (formerly Zeb's coffee grinder). Oh, the smell is just divine! In eating the soup, it felt like there were too separate dishes: chunky bits and broth. The broth was too thin to really cling to the bits. Not that it didn't taste good but it was different. The taste was fantastic. I think next time, I might add a can of tomato paste to see about intensifying the tomato flavor. Also, I might add rice as well. I liked this one alot! (oh, I didn't put in the green bell pepper, I'm just not a fan.).

One thing I did accomplish this weekend was to finally go through my new crockpot cookbook, Mabel Hoffman's Crockery Cookery. I have high hopes for this one! This is where the Flank Steak in Currant Wine Sauce came from. I pulled out about 50 recipes so we'll be trying new crockpot recipes for at least a year!

Back to an old standard

After several disasters in a row, last night I went for something I knew would be good, Tuna Tatties (Ainsley Harriott's Meals in Minutes, pg. 22). It's a baked potato topped with carmelized onions, tuna, feta cheese and roasted cherry tomatoes. I know the recipe by heart by now. Super simple and very filling. So, yes, dinner was good last night. Finally!

The mystery of the traveling cutting board

For the longest time, we had two cutting boards: a big wooden one and a smaller plastic one. The wooden one is from Crate and Barrel and has been splitting and warping (and no, we don't put it through the dishwasher) - I don't recommend this brand. The smaller plastic one has been the workhorse - I think I bought it years ago back in DC (YAY Target!). So, a while back, Zeb and I realized that the plastic cutting board was missing. We searched everywhere - it was not to be found. So, I used the warping, splitting wooden one and was annoyed. Finally, about a week ago, I broke down and bought a new big plastic cutting board. Two days later, before I had even had the chance to use the new cutting board, the smaller plastic one appears in my office. Spooky...Zeb and I had no idea where it came from. We thought it might be possessed. No one in the office knew how it got there and thought it was weird that I had a cutting board in my office, regardless of size or material.

Turns out, Dan and Renee had it. Any time something goes missing and I can't figure out where it could have gone, they have it. There was another mystery involving a bucket that I won't go into.

The moral of the story is that, while I'm glad to have the smaller cutting board back, its absence finally pushed me to get a better one.

Salty Shrimp

Last night, I made Stir Fry Shrimp with Crispy Lemongrass (From Bangkok to Bali in 30 Minutes, pg 213). Note to self, when recipe calls for both soy sauce and salt, leave one out. This dish was painfully salty which is too bad because it smelled divine. Frying lemongrass gives off a wonderful aroma. Unfortunately, the fried lemongrass wasn't the type of crispy I was expecting - it was more like chewing on fingernail clippings.

Now I love shrimp, could just eat shrimp for days but last night I was having to choke down the shrimp because they were so salty. I guess I'll chalk this dish up to disaster. Now I wonder how much is my fault and how much is the recipe's?

Legumes....

I really don't like working with dried beans. They take forever to prepare and they never seem to truly soften up. Last night I tried to make Middle Eastern Lentil Salad. Very healthy and all. The recipe called for simmering the lentils for 30 minutes or until soft. An hour later, the stupid things were still slightly crunchy. In the end, we drained them when there seemed to be more that were soft than crunchy. I made this recipe as a main dish and I think it wasn't meant for that. The dressing had olive oil, lemon juice, garlic, parsley and cumin. It was quite tart and QUITE garlicky. Maybe as a side but it was a bit overwhelming (and not in a good way) as a main dish.

Crockpot recipes as requested by Lisa

Lisa just got a new crockpot and wanted some recipes. Here's the stuffed flank steak recipe which I tried a few weeks ago (delicious!) and a southwestern chicken soup which I'll be trying soon. I got these recipes out of the Sacramento Bee.

Stuffed flank steak
Prep time: 10 minutes * Cook time: 8 to 10 hours * Serves 4

This recipe is simple but impressive. It's a great one to make when you expect company for dinner, but won't be home in time to do a lot of prep work. It is based on one from an old cookbook called "Crockery Cookery" by Mable Hoffmann.

Ingredients
1 1/2 cups packaged bread stuffing
1 cup diced, fresh mushrooms
1/4 cup beef broth
2 tablespoons butter, melted
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1 flank steak, 1 to 1 1/2 pounds
2 tablespoons salad oil
1 package brown gravy mix (to make 1 cup gravy)
1/4 cup dry red wine
2 tablespoons minced green onions
1/4 cup currant jelly

Instructions
1. Combine bread stuffing, mushrooms, broth, butter and cheese.
2. Unfold the flank steak and with a sharp knife, lightly score the steak on both sides, cutting diagonally across the grain. Spread the stuffing mixture over one side of the steak and roll it up like a jelly roll. Tie the steak closed with kitchen string or fasten it closed with skewers. Pour the oil into the slow cooker. Place the steak in the cooker and roll so that all sides are coated in the oil.
3. Prepare the gravy mix according to the package directions. Add the wine, onions and jelly to the gravy and whisk until the jelly is dissolved. Pour the gravy mixture over the flank steak.
4. Cover and cook on low 8 to 10 hours. To serve, remove the steak from the pot and slice it. Pour sauce over the meat before serving.

Per serving: 456 cal.; 25 g pro.; 32 g carb.; 23 g fat (10 sat., 8 monounsat., 5 polyunsat.); 67 mg chol.; 735 mg sod.; 1 g fiber; 15 g sugar; 48 percent calories from fat.

Southwestern chicken soup
Prep time: 5 minutes * Cook time: 5 hours * Serves 10

This delicious main-course soup flavored with corn, tomatoes, red and green peppers and chicken breast strips is simple to make, thanks to several convenient canned items. Cumin, added at the end of the cooking time, gives the soup extra zip. The recipe is from "The Best Slow Cooker Cookbook Ever" by Natalie Haughton.

Ingredients
2 14 1/2-ounce cans chicken broth
1 14 1/2-ounce can diced peeled tomatoes
1 4-ounce can diced green chilies
1 16-ounce package frozen corn kernels, partially thawed
1 red bell pepper, chopped
1 green bell pepper, chopped
1 onion, chopped
4 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves, cut into thin strips
1/2 teaspoon garlic pepper
1 teaspoon ground cumin
Seasoned salt

Instructions
1. In a 5-quart electric slow cooker, mix together the broth, tomatoes with their liquid, green chilies, corn, red and green peppers, onion, chicken strips and garlic pepper.
2. Cover and cook on the high setting 1 hour. Reduce the heat to the low setting and continue cooking 3 to 4 hours, or until the chicken is cooked through and tender. Stir in the ground cumin and season with seasoned salt to taste. Serve immediately.

Per serving: 132 cal.; 14 g pro.; 15 g carb.; 3 g fat (1 sat., 1 monounsat., 1 polyunsat.); 29 mg chol.; 531 mg sod.; 2 g fiber; 4 g sugar.

Delicious crockpot recipe - Finally!

My crockpot and I have a tempestuous relationship. It has such potential to be a great kitchen tool. The idea of dumping stuff in in the morning and having a yummy meal at night is so tempting. The problem is that it is so hard to find any good crockpot recipes.

I have several crockpot cookbooks but they each have their own problems. The first is Slow Cookers for Dummies. It does a good job of explaining how slow cookers work but there aren't that many recipes in it. I think I've only gotten one or two recipes out of it that I like. Its big things are these Master recipes that you make up and then use in several different recipes. To me, that's just too close to using leftovers in a dish. I HATE leftovers. Zeb has them for lunch but I just can't stand them.

The second is Williams-Sonoma Gourmet Slow Cooker. We've had great success with this cookbook. The problem though is that this is not a dump-and-go slow cooker cookbook. Each recipe calls for sauteeing or grinding or mixing before you can turn the crockpot on. Sort of defeats the purpose. I don't often have 45 minutes in the morning to prepare a crockpot recipe before heading out which means Zeb often does these. Another annoyance with this cookbook is it will call for the crockpot to be on high for a period and then reduced to low. Unless you've got a fancy programmable crockpot, this also throws a wrench into to concept of turn it on in the morning and forget about it until the evening. But the best tasting crockpot meals have come from this cookbook so it's a give and take.

The third cookbook is Fix-It and Forget-It Cookbook:Feasting With Your Slow Cooker. It's a compilation of recipes sent in by home cooks. Most of the recipes are from the Midwest - not a region known for its cuisine. This one has the most recipes but most of them are terrible. Canned everything (usually cream of mushroom soup) and too much salt (from the packets of Lipton's onion soup mix). There are some diamonds in the rough including a fantastic Moroccan chicken dish but the majority of the ones Zeb and I tried were horrendous. I'm talking about having trouble choking it down sort of bad. The upside is that all of the recipes are dump-and-go.

The Sacramento Bee Food Section recently did several stories about the re-emergence of crockpots and included several recipes. Last night we tried one - Stuffed Flank Steak with Currant Wine Sauce. It was quite good. The steak was fall apart tender and the stuffing and sauce were delicious. Not to mention that it was a hit presentation wise what with the spiral stuffing. I served it with a side of orzo and the sauce on top of the orzo was quite a hit. As for prep - I spent about 20 minutes getting everything together so it wasn't as much of a pain as the Williams-Sonoma recipes. I think I'm going to have to get this cookbook.

A friendly reminder to back up your documents

Friday night, I settled in for a bit of television watching while I compiled the week's menus and grocery list. My laptop, which got me through law school and the Bar, made some funny clicking sounds and then said that it didn't have a hard drive. Now, when I was in law school, I backed up all of my documents pretty regularly. However, since graduating and starting work, I haven't done that. It didn't really occur to me that I had anything important saved just on my laptop...until my laptop said it didn't have a hard drive. That's when I realized that the ONLY copies of my menu spreadsheet and grocery list document were on my laptop. I nearly had a panic attack. I have probably spent close to 30 hours compiling all of that stuff. To give you an idea, I had menus planned out for almost a year's worth of dinners and my shopping list, which lists every ingredient of every menu, was 91 pages long. I've been doing this for a good 8 months. I didn't know what to do. I didn't know what was planned. I didn't know how I was going to put together a grocery list. All that hard work just lost...

Thankfully, the computer gods smiled on me and I was finally about to get my laptop running again. Everything is now backed up on several computers. And I made it to the grocery store.

So much food...

Our Super Bowl party went very well. I was worried we weren't going to have enough food but people outdid themselves. I was running out of places to put everything! I made three different kinds of chili. The chorizo and ground beef with beans was the biggest hit. We didn't seem to have any vegetarians this year so my vegetarian chili was a waste. Too bad because it looked pretty good.

My first dinner party

Last night, I got to throw my first dinner party. Now, I've had tons of people over before but never have I provided seats for them all to sit on. It was Dan's birthday and his wife Renee wanted to throw him a party. Zeb and I offered to host since their apartment is a bit on the small side. Renee and I set up two long card tables together and then decorated them in a fishing theme. There were candles everywhere and I got to use all of my new wine glasses. We had Grilled Tilapia with Mango Salsa and Curry Couscous (Rachel Ray's 30 Minute Meals 2, pg. 221). The incredible thing about this recipe is that it is so colorful and delicious but there's very little fat. I think I used only a couple tablespoons of olive oil total and I tripled the recipes. Definitely different from what we're having tomorrow on Super Bowl Sunday. Renee and I made the salsa the night before and managed to have everything ready when people showed up. Now that's a first for me. Usually, when I invite people over for dinner at 7, we're not eating until 9 at the earliest. And we made food for 10! It was a great party. For dessert, Renee and I made Dan's favorite, strawberry shortcake. The strawberries were huge but they weren't that sweet so we sliced them up thin and marinated them in sugar and a bit of lemon juice overnight. We used the Bisquick recipe for the biscuits and then topped them with vanilla ice cream, strawberries and fresh whipped cream sweetened with sugar and vanilla. And with Dan and Renee's help, Zeb and I got the house back into shape in no time.

Mild but good

Tonight I made Chicken Breasts in Pumpkin Sauce. I'm a huge fan of pumpkin. I make a fabulous pumpkin dip that is a hit at parties and some really good pumpkin muffins. I haven't made the muffins in a few years though because one holiday season, I made muffins as gifts. Dozens and dozens of muffins...muffins everywhere. Zeb and I got to the point where the sight of them just made us gag. We're coming out of our pumpkin muffin aversion though. I considered making them this past Christmas but never got around to it. By next Christmas, I should be in a place where I actually look forward to them. Again they're great muffins...in moderation.

Anyway, tonight's dinner...very few ingredients...no chopping. In a way it's great to have a dish that doesn't require chopping because that means fewer dishes to clean up, but I don't have to do the dishes when I cook and I LOVE my knives. Zeb got me a killer set of knives for my birthday (okay, maybe "killer" is a bad choice of words). These knives are amazing - everything chops so perfectly. Zeb has several scars from them but I have yet to get anything more than a chipped nail (knock on wood). I used to dread mincing herbs because our old set, while functional, merely mascerated the leaves without actually getting through. I would even bring out the food processor just to get a fine mince. Now it's so fantastic! Mincing and fine dicing are a snap! I'll even mince garlic rather than put it through the press just to get to use my knives. Oh they're so fabulous.

But again, I didn't have to use them tonight...sigh. Nope, just chicken sauteed in garlic, olive oil and butter. The recipe said to pull the chicken out of the pan once it was done and then pour in 1/2 cup of whipping cream and get all the browned bits up. Well, I think there was a step missing, like remove pan from heat. The cream was bubbling like mad and I think got burned. I went ahead and added the pumpkin, white pepper, salt and nutmeg but it just tasted awful. I ended up tossing out the sauce and starting over. Didn't have any of the browned chicken and garlic bits but it also didn't taste like crap. I didn't think I was going to like the sauce, even remade, because it was so mild in flavor. I tend to go after very bold flavors and there is nothing bold about this dish. However, the sauteed chicken topped with the mild pumpkin sauce and almonds (which were supposed to be toasted but I was tired and a bit lazy) turned out to be quite good. Not New Year's in Vegas-more like your grandmother putting a warm fuzzy blanket she made herself on you after you've dozed off, a gentle ahhh flavor. Although the pumpkin was a main ingredient, it wasn't as strong a note as I was expecting. I will definitely try this recipe again - with my added directions for the sauce.

The one thing dinner was missing though was a side. I'm terrible about putting sides with a main dish. Usually, we just throw the main dish on top of couscous or rice but this dish didn't feel like it would mesh with either. The sauce wasn't the kind the runs down for the couscous or rice to sop up; it stayed with the chicken. I guess I could have done some sort of vegetable but I never think of that until I'm staring at the plate thinking: Gee there's a lot of empty space. Oh well, I'm working on it.

Sweet seafood

Tonight, dinner was a snap, Pasta with Scallops and Lemon (Sunset, May 2004). Just a few ingredients - scallops, penne pasta, lemon, onions, garlic, and basil. It was so simple and yet the flavors worked so well together. Either scallops live beneath lemon trees or lemons grow at the bottom of the sea. (Just kidding, it's the excellent Kendall Jackson chardonnay typing). The one issue I had was with the article. In introducing the recipe, Sunset said that one night when the cupboards were bare, Jane Doe (I can't remember her name) only had scallops and lemon on hand and, voila, a great weeknight meal was born. Who the hell has scallops just lying around? Seafood goes bad!!! It's something that you get when you have a plan!!! Either Jane Doe's lying about the origins of the recipe or she wastes a hell of a lot of seafood. Anyway, good recipe. Watched I, Robot with dinner. I was impressed - Will Smith wasn't as suave as he usually is and yet he still pulled it off.

Blackberries - not just for pie anymore

Friday night was the first night I scheduled a repeat recipe since mid-September. I've mentioned this before but, after several months of trying new things, I needed to know that what was for dinner was going to be good - not just look good on paper. Zeb made Blackberry-Barbecued Chicken with Couscous (Williams-Sonoma Pacific Northwest, pg. 48?). The baste is carmelized onions, blackberries, red wine and other things all cooked down and pureed. I could eat the stuff like soup it's so tasty. Zeb didn't grill it though. When he went out to light the grill, he noticed a bunch of feathers. It looked like a bird had exploded. I have my ideas of what happened but it's not really appropriate for a blog on food. Needless to say, we baked the chicken instead. It was missing that added flavor that grilling gives a dish but it was still delicious.