I was tagged by Cathy at one of my new favorite food blogs, not eating out in New York, to tell you five things you may already know about me. I can’t resist her site and those pickles.
Two oil paintings are hanging in my parent’s living room. They were painted while I took a course on the Greek Island of Corfu between semesters. Back then, I thought I would be a professional painter one day. I hardly touch paints anymore, but I still get a turpentine smell when I open one of the boxes under my bed. Later I became more interested in ceramic sculpture and missed it a lot. If I ever end up in a house outside the city, and hell freezes over, I’d like a kiln. Just thought I would put it out there.
You may not know that I work as a journalist for my day job, and I write about technology. This means that I would probably bore you with a long discussion about the UAC features in Vista but promise not to do so. Alex, unfortunately, does not receive such an assurance. This does not mean I’ve ever successfully programmed a VCR. Could I sound older? Out of my immediate ten coworkers, only one is a girl. I’m the only girl who brings freshly baked bread to work, but that should be obvious.
I often design blogs for friends for free. I love to play around with code and stylesheets. I haven’t quite mastered the creation of graphic elements in Illustrator, despite being number one. I have it on my list of things to do, but item 3,042 is correct.
Our second anniversary is now closer than our first. We haven’t even finished putting together our wedding album. What? What?
We are a bit obsessed with babies. But mostly the ones that belong to “other people.”
Today, I brought gem-colored cookies to work, and only one person was there. I work in media! In New York City, someone said, “Ooh! hamantaschen!” For everyone else, hamantasch is a three-cornered cookie, traditionally filled with prunes, jellies, or poppy seed paste and served at the Jewish festival of Purim. Purim is more or less the Jewish Mardi Gras/Halloween and lasts until next Tuesday. These cookies are named for Haman, the “bad guy” of ancient legend because he wears a three-cornered cap. I had to check this out on Wikipedia, just in case I wasn’t already an evil Jew. Shanda fer de goyim, indeed.
After reading the recipe, I remembered exactly how to make them. It was as if I had baked them just two days ago and not a decade earlier. After reading Rachel’s Yesterday, NPR published a lovely article. Last night, I could not resist making these cream cheese cookies. They are delicious. My only complaint, and probably something stupid that I did, is that they didn’t stay sealed after they expanded in the oven. I tried pressing them firmly and brushing them with water before pinching and moaning at my husband. Oh, well–that didn’t work. The only thing I changed was adding half a teaspoon of salt to the dough and an additional tablespoon of flour. I filled half the cookies with raspberry jam and the other half with an orange fig. Date Jam ( Dalmatia Brand I fell in love instantly with this product when I saw it in the store yesterday night. I wanted to use it because orange is a classic hamantaschen flavor.
And lastly: I didn’t intend for this to become my final post for the week, as I have so many new recipes to share! –but that may be the case since we are about to leave town for a couple of days. I appreciate your many suggestions on where to eat and go. I have painstakingly copied all of them and our comments and am ready to go.