I've Been Cooking You A Nice Hot Supper / And You Can't Even Eat It On Time

"My food ain't pretty, but it's good," says Dolly Parton.

Dolly's Dixie Fixin's: What. A. Cookbook.

Please preview this free recipe from the website (I'm curious as to how that much lard might effect the vocal cords?):

Hush puppies are to fried fish what pickin’ is to grinnin’. You just can’t have one without the other. The story goes that hush puppies is what camp cooks shouted to the yelping hounds when they tossed them the fried scraps form their skillets. Whatever the origin, they are easy as pie to make, just whip up the batter and drop it by the spoonful into piping hot fat.

Serves 6, makes 2 dozen

1 ½ cups cup self-rising white cornmeal
3/4 cup self-rising flour
½ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon sugar
1 egg
1 cup buttermilk
Lard or shortening for frying

Combine the cornmeal, flour, salt and sugar in a medium bowl. Add the egg and stir until combined. Gradually stir in the buttermilk, adding enough to make a thick batter that will easily drop from a spoon.

Meanwhile, heat enough lard in a deep skillet to reach 2 ½ to 3 inches. When the fat is hot enough (about 375°F), drop the batter by the teaspoonful into the skillet. Fry, turning occasionally, until the hush puppies are golden brown. Transfer to a paper-towel lined plate with a slotted spoon. Serve warm.

We Bout That Cake / Straight Up The Gate

Today is my roommate's birthday - and I am making a cake!

A "Mozart" is a type of cake, you know. It's pretty putzy, but doesn't it sound delicious: layers of almond-cinnamon pastry sandwiching chocolate mousse and apples. Yes, that does sound delicious.



Recipe and picture.

Yes, We Have No Bananas

I love to cook. That being said: there have been a couple of near-emergency-room-level cuts to my fingers over the past couple months, and I'm still wary of any recipe that calls for too much oil (the room getting hazy as I frantically open my high-rise apartment windows to their full inch-wide potential - what do I do?! what do I do?!). I thought for awhile I was going to have to stick with music, but then I found this:



The Ethnomusicologist's Cookbook, ed. Sean Williams

Très bien.
Each chapter is written by a different ethnomusicologist (including Tim Rice, Suzel Ana Reily, and a special poem by Bruno Nettl - big names!); recipes are paired with brief commentary and anecdotes about the experience of fieldwork, musical styles, and eating habits of particular cultures.
Fascinating AND delicious? I think so.

For you: a recipe from the chapter on Bali by Ni Wayan Murni and Jonathan Copeland.

Pisang Goreng (Banana Fritters)

1 c. plain white flour
1 egg
1/2 c. milk
1 t. vanilla
2 c. vegetable oil
6 large, ripe bananas
1/3 c. sugar
2 T cinnamon

In a bowl, mix flour, egg, milk, and vanilla to a smooth batter. Allow to stand for 1 hour. Heat oil gently in a frying pan until almost smoking. Cut each banana into thirds. Dip banana pieces in the batter and carefully drop into the hot fry oil; fry until golden brown. If desired, roll the cooked fritter in a mixture of sugar and cinnamon.

("Music and food are both deeply integrated into Balinese life. Gamelan rehearsals take place in village meeting halls all over the island. As you walk through the villages, you hear their wonderful percussive sounds and are welcome to sit down and listen. Never very far away are ladies selling food in small stalls. Music and offerings, which always contain food, are intended primarily to entertain the gods and ancestors during the hundreds of ceremonies staged throughout the Balinese calendar of 210 days." p 103)

(I love this book.)

Can't Find My Drink, Oh Man

A list of his preferred cigar brands, scans of his grocery lists, a graph of his debts and assets--this website's got everything you'd ever want to know about Jean Sibelius.
Also included: the composer's very own punch recipe:



1 l water + sugar + jam + brandy or spirit.
Add 2 bottles of wine when everything is completely cold.
Add a few drops of Bergamot oil in a lump of sugar, which
must be melted in the water.
(N.B. All mineral waters make the punch black.)

(Jean Sibelius--The Website)