Darth Libris

Just cause KRad did it

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 15:42:29 GMT

Where I've been in this country:

visited 34 states (68%)
Create your own visited map of The United States or determine the next president

and where else I've been:

visited 15 states (6.66%)
Create your own visited map of The World or determine the next president

It's still kind of pathetic that I grew up in Southern California but have still never been to Mexico.

Szechuan Peppercorn Ice Cream

Mon, 14 Jul 2008 03:03:20 GMT

Yes, you heard me right. Szechuan peppercorn ice cream. Fear my l33t ice cream skillz.

2 cups whipping cream
2 cups half-and-half
1/2 vanilla bean, split lengthwise
4 teaspoons Szechuan Peppercorns
9 egg yolks
3/4 cup sugar

Combine the cream, half-and-half, and vanilla bean. Grind up 2 teaspoons of the peppercorns in a mortar and pestle, and put the result in a loose wire sieve to separate the small, ground dark bits from the light husks; the husks will be caught in the sieve, while the dark bits should fall through. Add the ground dark bits to the cream mixture. Put the remaining peppercorns in a tea ball and place that in the milk mixture as well. Heat the whole mess in a double boiler until it reaches a simmer, and then turn off the heat. Set aside to infuse for 15 minutes. Whisk together the egg yolks and sugar in a separate bowl, large enough for you to add the cream mixture later without overflowing it.

Remove the tea ball from the cream mixture, and then pour the mixture through a wire sieve into a bowl to remove the vanilla bean and loose peppercorns. Scrape the remaining seeds from the inside of the vanilla bean and add back into the cream mixture. Then, whisking constantly, slowly pour the cream mixture into the egg yolk mixture. Put the combined mixture in a large saucepan and cook over low-medium heat, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon, until the mixture hits 180 degrees. Then remove it from the heat, and whisk until it drops back down to at least 155 degrees (you're releasing steam during this process). Then chill the mixture for 4 hours in your fridge, and then add it to your ice cream maker.

Yum. Double yum. As the Reduced Shakespeare Company once observed: "Damn -- I'm good!"

And a Grand Economy Sized Tip of the Toque to Prof. Jianhai Ruan, for bringing me the essential ingredient. And another tip to Lumiere Bistro and Wine Bar in Lake Placid, New York for giving me the idea in the first place.

The oobleck...is alive!!!!

Fri, 11 Jul 2008 17:17:39 GMT

I love science. :)

Another Episode of Darth Libris in the Kitchen

Mon, 30 Jun 2008 01:40:35 GMT

In my last post, I was enthusing about the menu at a restaurant I've yet to have a chance to try, Applewood in Brooklyn. Looking over their dinner menu, I noticed this entrée: "lemon-snap pea risotto
mascarpone, olive oil."

I'm watching Sis go pitterpat
said "I can do that. I can do that."

'Hmmm' thinks I to myself. Snap peas are currently in season in our farmers' market, the rest of the ingredients aren't too outré for me to acquire here in Champaign-Urbana, and risottos are probably my strong suit in the kitchen. That sounds like a dish ripe for recreation.

Knew every step right off the bat.
Said "I can do that! I can do that!"

A brief shopping expedition to pick up some mascarpone later, some time in the kitchen, et voilà! One lemon snap-pea risotto with mascarpone and olive oil, and if I do say so myself, it rocked. Followed up by some gluten-free angel food cake from the market (new vendor, and the angel food cake also rocked) with black raspberries, blackberries and cointreau, it made for a pretty darn good dinner. For those of you wanting to try the risotto at home, here's the basics:

2 cups arborio rice
2 quarts chicken stock
1/2 cup good parmigiano reggiano
1/2 cup white wine (recommend a New Zealand sauvignon blanc or an unoaked chardonnay)
1/3 to 1/2 cup mascarpone
2 1/2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons good olive oil
1 1/2 to 2 cups blanched snap peas
2 shallots, chopped fine
Zest of two large lemons (recommend breaking out a microplane grater for this)
1 tablespoon lemon juice

Bring all the stock to a light boil for adding to the risotto while you're cooking. Melt the butter in a large sauce pan over medium heat, and then add the shallots and cook, stirring, for 3 minutes. Don't let them get too brown. Add the rice and a pinch of salt, and turn down the heat a little. Cook the rice, stirring occasionally, for 3 minutes. Turn the heat back up to medium, and add the white wine. Cook until the wine is absorbed, then add enough of the stock to cover the rice, and add another pinch of salt and a few grindings from a pepper grinder. Keep cooking the rice, stirring frequently, for 25 minutes, adding more stock when the previous bunch of stock has been absorbed.

Once the rice is cooked, add the lemon zest, lemon juice snap-peas, mascarpone, parmigiano, olive oil and another few grindings from the pepper grinder. Add another few ladles of stock (you should have used up almost all of the stock at this point), mix, and let cook on medium-low heat for another 3-4 minutes. Serve with extra parmigiano for grating on top. If you want to get fancy on presentation, a few extra snap peas arranged on top of each bowl would be a good option.

Between the butter, olive oil, parmigiano and mascarpone, it's maybe not the lightest dish in the world. But darn tasty.

Attention NYC folks

Sat, 28 Jun 2008 22:24:06 GMT

Sour cherries have come into season in our farmers' market. parisgreen and I have been extracting sour cherry juice and making some truly excellent bourbon sours using the sour cherry juice. I wondered whether it would be possible to muddle some mint in there and basically do a sour cherry julep. I did a little web searching to see if someone else had done something similar, and hit the website for a restaurant in Brooklyn called Applewood.

Check out the cocktail menu and the dinner menu. I need someone to check this place out and give me a report. Whoever's running the bar end of things is obviously a person of distinction and character.

candygram....

Mon, 16 Jun 2008 18:19:15 GMT

On the continuing list of things you don't want to see outside your front door, add this:

Image courtesy of Ms. Lori Mehman of Orchard, Iowa, who took this photo from her front porch before running and hiding like a sensible person.

out go the lights

Mon, 16 Jun 2008 02:41:40 GMT

So, we had a line of severe thunderstorms roll across the state today. Our weather alert radio rang no less than 3 alarms about it, warning of possible quarter-size hail and 70 mph winds. It rolled over us, and while we did get a few wind gusts, it moved through so fast it did almost nothing.

Nothing, that is, except apparently bring a tree branch a wee too close to a power line, and took out our power, along with most of our neighborhood. Stupid storm. So, I got to take my first shot at cooking chicken tikka masala by the cheery glow of my laptop screen.

Fortunately, it came out extremely well, at least in part because the chicken was actual tandoori I had done up on the grill yesterday. Yum. Unfortunately, because the power was out, and we didn't really think that a dish consisting of large amounts of chicken and cream was something that would survive without refrigeration, we threw out what we didn't eat.

Thereby guaranteeing, of course, that the power would come back on in three minutes making us kick ourselves for throwing out all that spicy, creamy goodness. Oh well.

And for those wondering, no, we are not in the flooded part of Illinois. You would be hard pressed to name a direction we could driving in *without* hitting something that is flooding, but we are not. In fact, our sump pump has apparently gotten into its summer mode -- I haven't heard it doing anything in a couple of days, which is typical once we get into the summer season. All of the trees in our neighborhood are pretty effective straws keeping the water table lower than our basement in summer.

Memo to Daniel Boulud:

Fri, 30 May 2008 16:18:24 GMT

Your brasserie's food is indeed very tasty, but having a 20' animatronic tree frog appear over my shoulder and start singing "Lowrider" during dinner is not conducive to good digestion.

No Academic Should Be Without One!

Wed, 14 May 2008 03:24:52 GMT

Oh, I have so got to lay my hands on one of these.

"The muffins are rolling"

Tue, 13 May 2008 13:38:37 GMT

My muffin-manufacturing friends have made the cover of the NY Times Science section. I'm so proud. Photos of Digital Preservationist Extraordinaire Keith Johnson & daughter Karydis taking a ride in their muffin-mobile are available here.

NDL Digital Preservation Site

Mon, 12 May 2008 15:13:22 GMT

The National Diet Library in Japan has launched a new website on digital preservation, which includes summaries of their own research, as well as links to a variety of other standards, guidelines, research reports, etc.

And the winner is....

Wed, 07 May 2008 01:40:46 GMT

YYYYYYyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy Parisgreen!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

cinco de mayo menu

Tue, 06 May 2008 03:17:10 GMT

So, the small but tasty menu for Cinco de Mayo here at Strange Manor:

Callos con Calabaza (seared scallops in a butternut squash, serrano chile, shallot and brandy sauce, recipe courtesy of Dona Tomas restaurant in Oakland)
Escarola con Ajo y Limón (braised escarole with garlic and lemon, seasoned with red pepper flakes and bay leaf)

Tasty. Unfortunately, I'm still sort of fighting off the cold/eye infection, so I resisted the urge to have a margarita along with it. Despite the fact that I am itching to try doing a margarita using the Qi white and black tea liqueurs to substitute for my usual Cointreau.

Yay Apple Gear!

Wed, 30 Apr 2008 21:19:30 GMT

This post brought to you courtesy of our new Aiport Extreme base station, which has finally enabled the wireless access to print and high capacity backup disk I should have had running a while ago. Plugging in the equipment literally took more time than the configuration. Apple gear rocks.

ruddy earthquakes

Mon, 21 Apr 2008 17:18:38 GMT

Another quake last night, smaller than the previous one. USGS says a 4.0. Why do these damned things have to keep hitting right when I'm dropping off to sleep?

To shout, to sob, to weep steam

Mon, 21 Apr 2008 01:08:17 GMT

We had our good friends J__ and M__ over to dinner last night, and J__ noted a bottle of Qi black tea liqueur we had sitting on the bar and had to sample it. We mentioned that while we quite liked it (it's actually a pretty darn good lapsang souchang liqueur, not too sweet), we hadn't quite figured out a way to use it in a cocktail that worked. You can't mix it with Scotch, or indeed any of the standard brown liquors. The smokiness is overpowering. I thought I was on to something when I tried creating a variation on a theme of a drink I used to get in Berkeley. Le Bateau Ivre restaurant did a Navy Grog that was just strong black tea with a vial of Stroh Inlander 160 proof rum on the side to mix in. The butterscotch flavor of the Stroh went very nicely with the tea. So, I tried a mix of the Qi and Stroh -- no good. 160 proof rum does not make a good *base* for a cocktail. I tried cutting the proof of the resulting drink down by watering it with vodka (not often you use vodka to water a drink down), and while getting there, it wasn't perfect.

J__ suggested that the rum idea seemed reasonable, but maybe I should try white rum instead of the Stroh. That sounded like a good base, but we decided it needed something else in there, otherwise we're back to drinking liquid smoke. M__ said "citrus goes with tea," and after everyone looked at me like I was from Mars after suggesting maybe lime juice, the concerted opinion of the table was that Cointreau was the way to go.

After some playing about with proportions, here's what we came up with:

1/2 oz Qi black tea liqueur
1 oz Cointreau
3 oz white rum of choice.

Shake. Strain. Garnish with twist of orange peel.

Now it just needed a name. J__, inspired by the name of the liqueur (Qi, pronounced 'chee'), suggested we name it the Hoo Qi Koo Qi. A little exploration with a pinyin-to-ideograph translator today reveals that actually Hu and Ku are valid pinyin expressions. So, we have our official name for the drink. Ladies and gentlemen, we give you the Hu Qi Ku Qi.

Unfortunately, we're now stuck trying to work out the most appropriate translation. I think the "Hu" and "Ku" should be first tone (high), and the Qi should be fourth tone (falling), but while that narrows the range of possible meanings for each syllable, it still leaves a lot of room for interpretation. They could each still map to many different Chinese characters. The subject line for this post is about as close as I've gotten to something sensible for a translation. Here are some possible meanings/ideographs for the three syllables used in the name. Feel free to suggest your own preferred translation in comments (translations courtesy of Mandarin Tools:

Hu:

呼 to call; to cry; to shout; to breath out; to exhale
幠 arrogant; rude; to cover
忽 suddenly
惚 indistinct
欻 suddenly
滹 (surname); name of a river
膴 big piece of meat; dried meat
虍 stripes of tiger
虖 exhale; scream of tiger; to call
謼 to shout; to mourn; to invoke

Qi:

亟 repeatedly; frequently
咠 to whisper; to blame, to slander
器 device; tool; utensil
契 contract
妻 to marry off (a daughter)
憩 to rest
栔 carve; cut
棄 or 弃 abandon; relinquish; to discard; to throw away
气 air; anger; gas
氣 or 气 gas; air; smell; weather; vital breath; to make sb. angry; to get angry; to be enraged
汔 near
汽 steam; vapor
泣 to sob
犵 name of a tribe
盵 (surname)
砌 to build by laying bricks or stones
磧 or 碛 moraine; rocks in shallow water
葺 to repair
蟿 (insect); Tryxalis masuta
訖 or 讫 finished
迄 as yet; until
鏚 battle-axe

Ku:

刳 to cut open; rip up; scoop out
哭 to cry; to weep
堀 cave; hole
枯 dried up
骷 skeleton

Actually, now that I think about it, "arrogant insect" isn't a bad start for the name, but I'm not sure what to do with the 'ku qi' that follows that. "dried up battle axe"?

In other news, I am tired of coughing my lungs out every night from this cold. That is all.

Succumbing to peer pressure

Sun, 20 Apr 2008 22:20:43 GMT

OK, ok, if everyone else is doing this meme, I guess I have to.

Music meme: List seven songs you are into right now. No matter what the genre, whether they have words, or even if they're not any good, but they must be songs you're really enjoying now, shaping your spring. Post these instructions in your LJ along with your 7 songs.

The Touch of Your Lips, Ben Webster & Oscar Peterson -- Probably the best jazz duo I know. I never get tired of listening to their stuff.

Ford Econoline, Nanci Griffith -- Definitely a must-have for anybody's road trip playlist.

Outbound Plane, Nanci Griffith -- Yes, I'm listening to a lot of Nanci Griffith.

No Hawaiians, No Aloha, Sean Na'auao -- One of the great Hawaiian guitarists/singers.

Hard Time Killing Floor Blues, Chris Thomas King -- Off of King's The Roots album, which you should be running to buy if you don't have it already.

I'll Never get Out of this World Alive, The Little Willies -- The Hank Williams' classic, done by the C&W band that Norah Jones sings with in New York. Yes, that Norah Jones. Yes, it's good. How often can you get a C&W album with a song about Lou Reed tipping cows on it?

Was I Wazir?, Henry Calvin -- One of my favorite, comic Broadway songs, from the original cast recording of Kismet. I'm waiting for someone to do a YouTube video of clips of Dick Cheney with this song as the background music.

In other news, still sick as a dog.

Little Hottub on the Prairie

Fri, 18 Apr 2008 16:30:59 GMT

How do you make a hot tub out here on the prairie? Well, take a stock tank, fill it up with water, take a few big ol' aluminum tubs, fill them with a few hundred pounds of quicklime, float the tubs in the stock tank and add some water to them, and then stand back while the exothermic reaction takes place and the aluminum tubs transfer all that nice heat into the water in your stock tank. See PopSci for details and video of Champaign-Urbana's very own Theodore Gray of Wolfram Research cranking up the ol' hot tub in winter, local style.

And that's how we pass the day away in the merry ol' land of Oz.

Shaken all over....

Fri, 18 Apr 2008 14:22:07 GMT

I had a few qualms when we purchased a brick house. Having grown up in California, I associate brick houses with major structural failure in the event of an earthquake. "How likely is it you'll get an earthquake in central Illinois?" paople said.

Likely enough, apparently:

Magnitude: 5.2
Date-Time: Friday, April 18, 2008 at 04:37:00 AM at epicenter
Location: 38.450°N, 87.890°W
Depth: 11.6 km (7.2 miles) set by location program
Region: ILLINOIS

Data from the USGS.

We're fine. The house is fine. And the National Weather Service is predicting the thunderstorms this afternoon won't be severe, so we're unlikely to get a tornado on the same day as the earthquake.

(Meta)data beats algorithms

Wed, 02 Apr 2008 14:48:25 GMT

An interesting post from Anand Rajaraman, who teaches data mining at Stanford. He had students in his data mining class try to beat the Netflix Challenge, developing a movie recommendation algorithm superior to the one Netflix uses. One student team tried to use an extremely sophisticated algorithmic approach. Another team used a relatively simple algorithm, but supplemented the data pool with genre information from IMDB. The team with the simple algorithm/additional metadata outperformed the fancy algorithm team, and in fact made it on to the Netflix leaderboard. Yehuda Koren (from the top-ranked BellKor team) disagrees that adding metadata to the equation is a good approach. Interesting to see this debate carried out. Count me on the side that says metadata is actually useful.

"I'm alright...don't have to worry about me...."

Tue, 25 Mar 2008 21:24:12 GMT

Our neighbors to the North apparently didn't learn their lesson watching Caddyshack.

"Humans eight, gophers one" indeed.

Life among the Illini

Sun, 23 Mar 2008 16:34:47 GMT

parisgreen and I dropped by Friar Tucks, a local big box liquor store, since they are the only place in town that sells San Pellegrino Chinotto. This is what we saw in the parking lot outside the store:

1. Kids, NEVER drink and mow.

2. I'm almost certain this isn't street-legal, but maybe there's a special "John Deere" exception in the laws around here.

3. Friar Tucks is located south of Champaign on a road with a 45 mph speed limit. Apparently John Deere mowing machines are a wee bit peppier than I thought they were.

Methinks he doth protest too much

Fri, 21 Mar 2008 15:31:37 GMT

According to Editor & Publisher, the New York Times will have an interview with Rev. John Hagee this Sunday talking about his endorsement of John McCain and his controversial statements regarding Hurricane Katrina being God's vengeance against New Orleans for tolerating a gay rights parade. Apparently the interview contains this quote:

"Our church is not hard against the gay people."

Interesting choice of words, Reverend.

Official St. Paddy's Day Quiz Answers

Tue, 18 Mar 2008 23:07:56 GMT

If you got all ten right, you're officially permitted to die your skin green next St. Paddy's Day.

1. Name the four historic provinces of Ireland.

Ulster, Munster, Leinster, and Connaught

2. Paddy Old Irish Whiskey has a map of Ireland on the label, with each of the historic provinces in a different color. Name the colors assigned to each province on the label. (half credit if you can name the colors.)

Ulster = Green
Munster = Blue
Connaught = Red
Leinster = Yellow

3. Fill in the blank: "To Hell with your English permit, boy, we need your ____________."

"Motor Car" from the Tommy Makem & the Clancy Brothers famous song "Johnson's Motor Car."

4. "Sinn Féin" translates as ____________.

We Ourselves

5. The Irish language was outlawed while Ireland was under British rule. Which king (and yes, it was a king) outlawed the use of Irish?

Henry VIII. Sometimes Elizabeth I gets falsely blamed for this, not that she was any great friend to
the Irish.

6. One of Darth Libris's kinsmen signed the Proclamation of the Republic during the Easter Uprising in 1916 (and was executed for his trouble). Being a Tipperary man, he spelled his last name a bit differently than we McDonough's up in Sligo. What was his full name (full credit for either Irish or English spellings)?

Tomás Mac Donnchadha, aka Thomas MacDonagh

7. There is a passage grave above the hills in Sligo, Ireland reputed to belong to a famous Irish Queen. Her name?

Maeve. The passage grave dates to 3000 BC, though, a wee bit before Maeve's time.

8. Anne Bonny, the pirate, was from Ireland. Which county was she from?

County Cork

9. Name any three members of The Chieftans, living or dead.

Members over the years have included Paddy Moloney, Sean Keane, Kevin Conneff, Matt Molloy,
Derek Bell, Martin Fay, Michael Tubridy, Sean Potts, Peadar Mercier, and David Fallon.

10. The Claddagh ring, with its heart, hands and crown, has become an international symbol of friendship and love. The ring is actually named after the Claddagh, a fishing village formerly located outside of the city center of Galway. Is the Claddagh on the north of the south of the River Corrib as it flows into Galway Bay?

Trick question -- it's actually on the west, near the Spanish Gate.

Arthur C. Clarke passes away

Tue, 18 Mar 2008 22:31:03 GMT

Details from BBC.