Category: Food

Double Chicken

Recently, I’ve detected a frequency in the amount of comments directed at me regarding my talents in the kitchen.

Since these have been – obviously – universally positive, I believe it is time again to share my skills in the form of another recipe.

So today I will teach you all how to make what I just ate for lunch: Rotisserie chicken panini with homemade chicken soup.

As we all know, good food requires good ingredients. You can use any old bread to make a panini, but I recommend something premium:

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Place the bread on your cooker of choice, then carefully slice a rotisserie chicken and some provolone cheese and add it to the sandwich:

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Put the other slice on and start cooking. Now there are varying opinions as to how long one should cook a panini, but I subscribe to the ‘when the light is green’ technique:

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Assuming you have followed these instructions without error, you should end up with a delicious chicken panini:

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Now as Jesus Christ never actually said ‘Man can’t live on bread alone’. The second half of your meal is homemade soup. Start by bringing about half of a small saucepan of water to a boil:

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Carefully add the water to a mixture of noodles, vegetables and chicken stock flavoring (I use the powdered version):

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And here’s the step that separates the chefs from the home cooks: seal the top for a while, allowing the newly added ingredients to cook in the water. If you master this technique, you’ll enter into a new world of taste:

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And that’s it. Serve the panini and soup together with an appropriate beverage (I recommend something citrusy) and enjoy πŸ™‚

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Twenty Things We Saw At Another Fair

After the fair last week, one of KLS’s workmates suggest we visit another fair, about 90 minutes south of here. Everything about it was supposed to be bigger and better than Altamont, including the rides.

We had to go!

So go we did, to the Duchess County Fair in Rhinebeck, NY. We got there shortly after it opened and stayed for more than six hours. Quite simply, this fair had more to see than could ever be seen and more to do than could ever be done.

We tried though, and here is some of what we saw:

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1) County fairs celebrate agriculture and farming, so is it a surprise to see something like the above? What about…

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2) The JCB ‘dancing diggers’ performance. Such hydraulic power! Such structural integrity! I have never seen such a beautiful performance of choreographed excavators before!

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3) We saw a robot named Oscar…

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4) And an old master painting a masterpiece onto a mirror!

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5) The food selections were mind boggling. KLS had a crab cake platter, and I…

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6) had a lamb gyro. I was planning on getting a corn dog later but… I’ll get to that…

Lets talk about the animals! There were a bazillion of them there, representing countless different species, for example:

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7) Porkers…

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8) A tiny horse…

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9) An evil giant bird…

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10) An insane, metal-eating armor-clad sheep…

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11) A lazy bugger…

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666) And Satan!

We also saw camels, long-jumping hounds, rabbits, fowl, monkeys and even two coatimundi!

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13) Here we see KLS next to the prize-winning Christmas tree. Every type of plant you could imagine was being shown and judged including…

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14) A room full of flowers!

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15) That’s the prize-winning Dahlia. Can you grow them this well?

16) Speaking of prize-winning, here’s a remarkable piece of art we assume is The Greatest American Hero:

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And of course, we saw the rides! Unlike Altamont, rides were not included in the entry price and cost about $5 each. There were dozens of them in all shapes and sizes, three of which I was very interested in riding. They were:

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17) ‘The Claw’, a contraption with so many axis of rotation it may outdo The Zipper! Looking at it, I knew it would ruin me πŸ™

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18) The ‘Sky Diver’, a sort of leveled-up Ferris Wheel in which you’d spend half your time upside down!

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19) The ‘Fire Ball’, known to aficionados like myself as the ‘Superlooper’. I hadn’t ridden one in 30 years and even though I feared it would ruin me the pull of nostalgia was strong. I sat KLS on a shady seat, shuffled off and before I could change my mind purchased a ticket from a grizzled felon, hopped on the ride and buckled myself into the front seat. Here’s what I looked like immediately afterwards:

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20) Yes my friends, I was ruined. Even now, almost a day later I can remember the dizziness. I curse the god that makes me sick on all these wonderful rides I love :< After, I noted that I was significantly older than almost every person riding any ride. Have I outgrown these things? I hope not. Post-fireball illness aside, the fair was spectacular. We will certainly be back next year :)

Twenty Things We Saw At The Fair

It was time once again to visit the annual Altamont fair! It doesn’t change much from year to year, but I can’t resist the lure of the rides! Here’s twenty things we saw today:

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1) A new ride, called ‘Pharoah’s Fury’. Basically a version of the Pirate Ship, this was notable for the 90 degree maximum incline that created sustained zero-g. KLS was screaming almost non-stop. A very fun ride πŸ™‚

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2) Another new ride, called ‘Vertigo’. I was impressed with how high it was! Unfortunately, since it’s a rotator, I didn’t ride it due to motion sickness.

3) All the old favourite rides returned, staffed by the usual gang of creepy murderous ex-felons carnies. We saw a guy ‘fixing’ The Zipper using a piece of string (not a joke!)

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4) I saw KLS eat delicious fries with me, shortly after I had eaten a hamburger myself.

5) We saw this device, but for the life of us couldn’t work out what it was called or what it was supposed to do:

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6) We saw a tiny, tiny goat:

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7) And a kangaroo with a joey in it’s pouch. She bent down to eat some grass and the joey ate as well!

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8) We saw a very special duck…

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9) And an evil looking chicken…

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10) And a happy sheep… in a barn full of happy sheep πŸ™‚

11) Over in the art contest displays, we even saw Doctor Who!

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12) Nearby, the first prize winning scarecrow wasn’t perhaps as scary as you’d imagine:

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13) Here is a princess being defended by a dragon:

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14) Heading back to the midway, past the vendors selling spa’s, blenders and insurance, I found an unusual sight!

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15) We didn’t go on that many rides, mostly because they almost all go in circles. The Ferris Wheel is always fun though. Right next to it this year was a ‘cryptozoology museum’ with some extraordinary art hanging out the front:

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16) Oh, I almost forgot! The giraffe was back:

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17) As was the circus we saw last year. We didn’t go since we were a bit tired and it was very, very hot.

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18) The games on the midway are as dubious as ever. Surprising prizes this time around included live goldfish and knives!

19) The animals are fun, but for me the fair is always about the garbage food…

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20) And the big, noisy, scary and quite possibly life-threateningly dangerous rides:

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I just wish I was 12 again, so I could ride them all without getting sick πŸ™‚