Massive Macaque

I Was Slicing Up An Avocado

2011-06-16T19:25:00.001-07:00

Possibly the best usage of our Swedish love, Jens Lekman's Your Arms Around Me, aside from that scene in Whip It, is this combination:

Swoon.

Cold/Flu-Kicking Soup

2011-06-16T19:10:00.000-07:00

GERMS
are evil.
But we all fall sick; be it due to the season, be it working in germ-prone environments, be it dorm life, be it otherwise.

The best way to clear your system? Take-No-Shizer-Soup!
Take any combination of dark leafy greens, a tasty veg stock, tomato paste/sauce, your body weight in garlic, a similar amount of ginger, some cayenne pepper, a little bit of lemon, any combination of vegetables, perhaps a grain or two, and consume liberally. You will feel better!

Vegan Pancakes!

2011-06-16T19:07:00.001-07:00

Simplest recipe ever! And delicious!

Prep Time: 5 minutes
Cook Time: 10 minutes
Total Time: 15 minutes

Ingredients:

* 1 cup flour
* 1 tbsp sugar
* 2 tbsp baking powder
* 1/8 tsp salt
* 1 cup soy milk
* 2 tbsp vegetable oil

Preparation:
Combine the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt in a large bowl until well mixed.

Mix in the soy milk and oil and beat together until batter is smooth.

Drop 1/4 cup of batter at a time onto a hot oiled griddle, or well greased frying pan over medium high heat. When bubbles appear on the surface of the pancake, approximately 3 minutes, flip, and cook the other side for another 2 minutes. Enjoy!

Nutrition Facts: One pancake provides approximately: Calories: 149, Calories from Fat: 50
Total Fat: 5.6g, 9% Saturated Fat: 1.0g, 5%
Cholesterol: 0mg, 0%
Sodium: 58mg, 2%
Total Carbohydrates: 22.2g, 7%
Dietary Fiber: 1.2g, 5%
Sugars: 2.4g
Protein: 3.7g
Vitamin A 0%, Vitamin C 0%, Calcium 22%, Iron 9%, based on a 2000 calorie diet

Free Stuff!

2011-04-21T18:49:00.000-07:00

I want to be able to do free Give Aways on this blog. So, if you read it, please follow it publicly via google (see link to the right), comment here, etc. Once i reach 30 followers I will do free Give Aways, and then if it grows to 50, 75, 100, i will do them more and more often. Also, tell me what kinds of things you want to see on this blog! I want to be motivated, creative, and positive in 2011!

This post is top-dated, so look below for new posts!

Little Joy

2011-03-27T22:32:00.000-07:00

I just cannot get enough of this band.
I:
A) (Unexpectedly) Miss Los Angeles
B) Wish I could have made it to Austin for SXSW and a million other reasons

"Honey" Mustard Tofu with Kale and Yams = Yum

2011-03-27T18:11:00.000-07:00

I've been slacking on cooking properly, especially in terms of making new things, and documenting them for your viewing and possibly also cooking pleasure.

My new friend and former neighbor David (<--- click that, he is quite the renowned artist) helped me to finally attempt this delicious recipe for Honey Mustard Tofu with Kale and Butternut Squash I've been meaning to try after spying it on Made Just Right, which is Earth Balance's blog of deliciousness. Earth Balance - you know, they're the ones who make the best vegan butter, and have recently started making other things too, like soymilk and peanut butter (it's the healthy kind but it tastes like JIF, sweet.)

Instead of butternut squash, we used sweet potatoes/yams. I substituted the honey with dark raw agave nectar, which worked nicely. Instead of 1/2 a TBSP of chili powder, I used 1/2 tsp of cayenne pepper. We used extra garlic. And be careful if you follow that recipe, it doesn't list vegetable stock as an ingredient until it mentions it in the directions.

I served it over quinoa, made simply with just a dash of Cajun seasoning, and later dressed a little bit with Braggs Aminos. Voila!

For dessert, we melted some chocolate chips and dipped these incredibly fresh, sweet strawberries in them. It was a success:

All photos courtesy of David Newman.

Lisa Hannigan

2011-03-16T22:42:00.000-07:00

I cannot stop listening to Ocean and a Rock, Lisa Hannigan's sweetly woven quilt of intricate lyrics and layered instruments. I would love to be able to cover this.

(Click here for lyrics)

Many of you have heard of Damien Rice, and if so, may remember that Lisa used to sing with him. She went solo a while ago and produced such mild yet moving music. She is a sweet addiction.

I recommend listening to the studio version of Ocean and a Rock as well:

More gems from Lisa's album Sea Sew:

Sea Song, Pistachio, Lille.

Thomas Fersen: The Tom Waits of France

2011-02-20T09:56:00.000-08:00

I recently discovered Thomas Fersen, a Parisian who began in a punk band, continued as a 'café-theatres' piano player, and ended up a multi-genre artist drawing from Jazz, Folk, Blues, and so on. His smoker's voice immediately made me think of Tom Waits, though his music certainly has its own originality to it. He is a great poet and story teller, and in turn a great singer-songwriter. Give him a listen, below:

Fort Funston

2010-12-27T21:09:00.001-08:00

I rode on the back of a Harley and I liked it.

Vegan Chocolate Peach Cobbler

2010-12-19T00:24:00.001-08:00

In addition to veganizing, there seems to be a theme here of chocolatizing everything.

*This photo was made with a free polaroid maker, let me know if you want the download information*

Vegan Chocolate Peach Cobbler
I Adapted/modified this from a couple different cobbler recipes

Ingredients:

- 4 TBS Vegan Butter (i.e. Earth Balance)
- 6-8 sliced Peaches
- 1/2 Cup Flour
- 1/2 Cup Sugar
- 1/4 Cup Cocoa Powder
- 1 tsp Baking Powder
- 1/2 Cup plain rice/almond/soy/etc milk
- 1/4 tsp Vanilla (optional)

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.
Melt the butter in a baking dish. Mix in the peaches until coated.
Sift dry ingredients in a separate mixing bowl, and mix with wet ingredients. Pour onto peaches and mix. Bake at 375°F for 40 minutes. Remove from oven, sprinkle with sugar, and allow to cool. Serves 4-6.

Vegan Scones

2010-12-16T05:50:00.001-08:00

This was my first time making scones. Despite following the same recipe, the two batches somehow looked drastically different. Both were a success.
I added some extras to it, like vanilla extract and cocoa powder, to make it interesting.

The Courtney Janes

2010-12-12T21:26:00.000-08:00

New favorite music: The Courtney Janes!

Since I had The Be Good Tanyas/Jolie Holland ruined for me by association recently, I was worried about it possibly leading to falling out of love with Alternative Country/Indie Folk, which would be tragic indeed. But last night at KC Turner's birthday bash, my faith was restored.

The Courtney Janes. There is something about Ben Hulan's demeanor that was absolutely enchanting. The beautiful Southern tinge in his voice, his sincere smile, the eloquently yet simply crafted lyrics, some sort of magical energy...

Learning To Love You More Assignment #69: Climb to the top of a tree and take a picture of the view.

2010-11-21T19:57:00.001-08:00

Learning To Love You More Assignment #69:
Climb to the top of a tree and take a picture of the view.

I climbed this tree at the Treasure Island Music Festival in October.

Opéra national de Paris

2010-10-21T22:22:00.001-07:00

‘Your wife is dead’: Lost Ted Hughes poem about Sylvia Plath’s suicide published

2010-10-09T14:27:00.000-07:00

From Dangerous Minds:

A poem by Ted Hughes, considered lost, was published today in The New Statesman magazine after being discovered in the British Museum among his papers. In it, Hughes addresses the painful suicide of his wife, Sylvia Plath. The poem, written in the 70s, would seem to be the “missing link” from Hughes’ 1998 book about his marriage to Plath, Birthday Letters, as none of the poems in that book discuss the circumstances of her death.

Carolyn Kellog, writing at the Los Angeles Times, Jacket Copy blog:

Actor Jonathan Pryce read part of the poem for the [BBC4 Radio] broadcast, reading:

Late afternoon Friday
my last sight of you alive
burning your letter to me
in the ashtray
with that strange smile

Sylvia Plath, who today is best-known as the author of the autobiographical novel “The Bell Jar,” was a young poet living in England when she met Ted Hughes, then also a young poet. The two married in 1956, moved to the U.S. for three years, and then returned to England. They had two children together.

Plath was 30 when she killed herself by inhaling the fumes from an unlit oven. Hughes went on to become one of the significant British poets of the 20th century, serving as British poet laureate from 1984 until his death in 1998.

The poem includes how Hughes learned of Plath’s death, in its final lines.

And I had started to write when the telephone
Jerked awake, in a jabbering alarm,
Remembering everything. It recovered in my hand.
Then a voice like a selected weapon
Or a measured injection,
Coolly delivered its four words
Deep into my ear: ‘Your wife is dead.

There is also a video on the website above.

I will skip opinions about Hughes for now. I recommend you read the Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath, as he censored the original publishing thereof.

More adventures in Deliciousness

2010-10-09T13:53:00.000-07:00

Signature dishes round two: Ben approves of Chickpea Quinoa Pilaf. Added are a stir fry of greens in nutritional yeast to make it cheesy, grilled asparagus, and boiled corn.

This Coconut Red Lentil Soup (click for recipe) from 101 Cookbooks was incredible! Flavorful, aromatic, filling, and even photogenic. I absolutely recommend making it.

I paired it with:

Pasta Della California from the sassy favorite Post Punk Kitchen.
While a great idea, I feel that this would work better with couscous, quinoa, or anything otherwise that absorbs flavor better than pasta does. It was still delicious though.

All in all, good feasts.

Signature Dishes, Part 1

2010-09-20T20:53:00.000-07:00

This post is very much overdue, but, better late than not ever?

I find myself making some of the same dishes over and over again, mainly because they are:
(A) Tried and True
(B) DELICIOUS
(C) A hit with both my vegan and carnivorous friends.
And so forth.

Kali and Christy, two fabulous individuals who happen to be RVing across the country at this moment, an account of which you can follow here (and should, this blog is complete with pretty pictures!), came over in July to try some of these signatures for Kali's birthday.

Behold, Chickpea Quinoa Pilaf from Veganomicon (which is apparently available in its entirety on Google Books, holler! ...wait a minute, I do not use expressions like "holler!") and the simplest and yummiest Vegan Chocolate Cake! Let me know if you would like the recipe to the latter as well. I tend to change up what I add to it, such as fruit, berries, and so forth.
Click on the photos to enlarge.

The birthday dinner, assembled and complete. So I have a little too much fun with presentation.

Closeup: In addition, we have veggie dumplings (not homemade, sorry! but something to try and make another time!), a simple salad, and fruit for garnish/decoration.

Hmmm.

I seem to be missing my cake pan, so lately the chocolate cake has come in the form of cupcakes/muffins. Christy helped - notice her flawless distribution of the batter. You're hired!

Birthday Kali approves!

And how can you get a cameo in the culinary adventures section of this blog, you asked? It's simple, cook with me! Or, be cooked for by me.

Musée de l'érotisme de Paris

2010-08-27T20:19:00.000-07:00

Välkommen till Stockholm

2010-08-18T01:12:00.001-07:00

Willkommen in Berlin

2010-08-10T15:48:00.000-07:00

Bienvenue à Paris

2010-08-05T18:47:00.000-07:00

Here, have an amazing music mix while I go off for three weeks

2010-08-02T08:35:00.000-07:00

I compiled this for your and my listening pleasure, a combination of recent discoveries and old time favorites. There is a lot of dreamwave on here, and it may be a little bit of sensory overload. I can't organize the files for you in mediafire, so the track list is below if you would like to listen to them in the order that I compiled this. I'll also include videos for some. Enjoy! (Comment with thoughts so I know what to keep coming. So far said about this mix: "You listen to feel good music.")

Bye Bye Bean Mix (click)

[Song Title - Artist]
1. 1, 2, 3 - Camille Video
2. To The Lighthouse - Memoryhouse Video (I actually got to see Memoryhouse live the other night, they were lovely!)
3. Black Flowers - Yo La Tengo Video
4. Safe and Sound - Electric President
5. When I Grow Up - Fever Ray Video (The video seems simple, but something about Olivia Chachi Gonzales is hypnotizing here. Plus you can't go wrong with Karin Dreijer's genius.)
6. When The Day Is Done - Legends Video
7. The Day The Aliens Came (Hawaiian Feeling) - The Mountain Goats Video "This is a song about how sometimes you find yourself living in a house where you think, I have to get out of here! But maybe you're too young to get out of there, or you don't have any money, or you don't have any means or anywhere to go; and yet, you cling firmly to the idea that someday you will escape, through some means. Maybe Batman will show up in his car outside or something, and other people might laugh and say, man, John, Batman's not coming to save you! And you say, look man, between me and Batman and you, i'll take Batman!"
8. Animal - Miike Snow Video
9. Pass This On - The Knife Video Rickard Engfors!!! And again, the Dreijers' ridiculous genius at work.
10. Marble House - The Knife (with Jay-Jay Johanson!) Video
11. Our Own Pretty Ways - First Aid Kit Video
12. My Party - Wisdom Tooth (From my good friend Mikey's latest mix! No one makes cover art quite like he does.)
13. Happy High - Bye Bye Blackbird / Blackbird Blackbird (The band name seems to be undecided)
14. So Sorry, Girl - Bye Bye Blackbird / Blackbird Blackbird Video
15. Hammock - Millionyoung
16. Swimming Field - Memory Tapes
17. I Just Had To Die - The Knife

à bientôt!
Bis bald!
Se dig snart!

Memoryhouse

2010-07-22T23:20:00.000-07:00

I have had an onslaught of new music discoveries, (and some rediscoveries, which are the best), in a short span of time, and they continue to grow; thus, you get to benefit from it!

http://www.myspace.com/wearememoryhouse
http://www.last.fm/music/Memoryhouse

I am not sure how I came across Memoryhouse, perhaps listening to a dreamwave radio thread on last.fm, but I do know that I cannot stop listening to To The Lighthouse for the life of me. I recommend not watching the video at first, but turning off all the lights around you, lighting some candles, and immersing yourself in this dreamy sound (the genre could not be better named here).

I didn't even have to do any uploading work: last.fm says that their EP The Years is available as a free download at the Arcade Sound Ltd website, http://www.arcadesoundltd.com/downloads.html. So, enjoy!
I would like to particularly draw your attention to the fact that THEY ARE ON TOUR, and I enthusiastically encourage you to go and have yourself a nice dreamwave experience for the few bucks it will cost to see them. I am going to try to go to my local show, so if anyone would like to join me, please do.

What does this remind you of?

2010-07-15T16:32:00.000-07:00

I found these Tree Faces on some side streets in the neighborhood where I work. My camera is functioning again so today I tried to be stealthy while taking some photographs early in the morning. What do they remind you of?

Those of you who follow me on LiveJournal get an "exclusive uncensored outtake" of the rest of this Field Guide to said neighborhood.

This is what I want my Food Porn to look like

2010-07-13T17:41:00.000-07:00

Now that I am down to one job instead of four, I really need to kick all excuses to the curb for why I haven't been putting more time and effort into food preparation and attention to its content, and trying to eat more raw.
I have: Veganomicon; some raw books thanks to a very lovely and knowledgeable Ukulele playing friend (including Juliano's RAW! where I found that amazing Pomegranate Guacamole idea) ; and The Post Punk Kitchen online; among others. I am surrounded by farmer's markets. Aside from salary woes and lethargy, no excuses.

This is a recent post in a Raw Veganism community that I follow on LiveJournal.
Don't be afraid to click. It's food porn silly, not the other kind, of course it's safe for work. But I assure you it is orgasmic nonetheless.
These pictures are amazing. I do not have such a high quality camera. Mine is a really old digital Canon I got off CraigsList some years ago, and had to ride the commuter rail to a mill town to obtain. The train ticket cost more than the thing itself. It functions of its own accord and mood. Any stunning photos taken with it have been accidental and subject to lots of my amateur editing.
My signatures include various versions of vegan chocolate cake and vegan cheesecake, Veganomicon's Chickpea Quinoa Pilaf, Vegan Latkes; and yes, I have made these amazing Potato Kale Enchiladas once from the glorious PPK! (I substituted all the hot peppers with poblanos though).
So if anyone with jaw dropping photography equipment and talents, such as in the above, wishes to team up with me to take pictures of my culinary adventures when they finally take flight again, do tell.

Especially when I hunt down that Cafe Gratitude raw vegan Tiramisu recipe I have been lusting after and finally manifest that amazing creation myself. At which point we will have to have a Prince/ss Tea Party as well.

The Homeless People

2010-07-12T20:55:00.000-07:00

First music post! This reminds me of way back when I had the privilege of being one of the regular posters over at the, now sadly defunct, music blog community ____rhapsodical.

The Homeless People (click for their MySpace) are a Gypsy Jazz duo/trio that I had the pleasant surprise of witnessing live when they came to play a local show a few months back. They are buddies with some acquaintances I made during my brief stint in a band (which hopefully will resume sooner than later). I searched all over for them online to no avail until today, when a friend of mine happened to link to them. Sometimes I love how small a world it is.

I am trying to obtain their album, so for now the tracks and videos on their MySpace will have to do for sharing. Really I suggest you follow their tour schedule and go experience them in person if they are coming to town in your area. The voice that booms out of Christa is truly something to behold, and her musical chemistry with Robbie is undeniable. Violins, Accordions, Foot taps, Gypsy covers of "gangsta rap," and a fabulous rendition of Tom Waits' Tango Till They're Sore, how can you say no?

Nous sommes prêts pour le monde!

2010-07-12T15:48:00.000-07:00

Chillin' with my gnomies.