Super boredom usually leads me to one of two things. The one I generally lean toward is going to the kitchen and cooking something up. But since I didn’t feel like being a fatty today I decided to settle on my second option: pondering. And no it’s not “if the plural of mouse is mice, wouldn’t the plural of spouse be spice?” and other fun Pinky and the Brain quotes. It’s more processing what I want to do with my life. Going over what I’ve done and how I want my future to unfold. A sort of defragmentation of my brain if you will; a nice way of keeping myself sane.

One of the main topics of my think session today was what I’m going to do after school. Sure I may have 2 more years to go, but those years turn into months and months turn into days pretty fast. With just a few more GECs before I get into the nitty gritty world of Food Science, the next two years will fly by. So I’ve got to start thinking about my future. My first priority is to get away from my parents. I don’t mean that in the unloving son sort of way. I just don’t want to rely on them like I do now. I’ll always be a momma’s boy. I just want to be self-sufficient. That means getting a nice stable career. No jumping around from hot bar to cafe to restaurant. I’m hoping my 2 degrees will be extremely helpful in that regard. I was told by my advisor that I’d be a great candidate for heading research and development with big food companies thanks to my culinary degree. But I can’t just rely on that alone. Hard work, perseverance, and all that jazz will play a role too.

My second priority is to get out of the country. Not permanently, mind you. Just for a couple years. Now I’m not talking about backpacking through Europe or volunteering in some third-world country. I’m caring and all, but good luck trying to get me away from civilization for an extended period of time. I’m talking about getting a job in a nice, developed country. The good thing about the food industry is that everyone needs to eat, so it won’t be hard to find work. My primary choices would be Spain, Australia, and Japan; Spain for the food, Australia for the beauty, and Japan for being fucking Japan. Hell if possible I’d like to a few years in all three places.

Lastly there’s the fact of settling down and starting a family. But that one is a little bit more personal so I probably won’t delve into that one here. Plus it’s still filled with way too many uncertainties it’s impossible for me to say exactly what’s going to happen. Even the things I’ve said above can be thrown for a loop by some unforeseen events. Still though, it’s nice to have a vague plan of what’s going on.

Been tired of looking at the same dull site for a while, so decided to do a layout change. Was also too lazy to create a new layout for scratch again so instead went the “free theme” route and after three or so tries, decided upon SubtlyMade by the folks at Everyone Knows. Will be making a few additional tweaks over the course of the week to align it more to what I like.

In other website kind of news, still really want to make a food blog. Thinking of diverting my new TV money fund toward a nice camera instead. Wondering if I should go the full on DSLR route, micro four thirds route, or just a fairly decent point and shoot. Either way still deciding if I should just incorporate the food blog into this site or maybe open up sushiplane.com again and use that instead. Regardless it’s still a ways off so I’ve got time to decide what exactly to do. It’s always helpful though to get it down on paper though. Or I guess in this case, published online.

So I made dirty risotto yesterday and had quite a bit leftover. Now we all know that leftover risotto is horrible. Gummy, mushy nastiness. Pondered a bit and came up with the idea of risotto cakes! Thought up a decent procedure and was excited to try it out the next day. First began by adding extra sausage to it cause, c’mon, who doesn’t like sausage? Then some flour, an egg, and chives. Mixed it together by hand and thought it was still a little too loose so added some more. Then it was too sticky so I was all oh crap. Added a little bit more flour then tried my best to form it into a patty shape. Made two this was then coated them with panko and fried them up! The leftovers I added some broken up crackers then did the same.

Oh my god. They were amazing. Still a little gummy but you might actually mistake that for cheesiness. Wolfed down three and gave the last to my roommate. Man it feels great to make something good without following a recipe even if it was fairly simple. Though the next time I make them I may do a different procedure. Possibly just a simple breading station since the risotto is already thick. Sadly though I was only able to get one picture. Didn’t even think about snapping one while making it and I ate them way too fast to get anything better. Once I get a better camera I’ll be more responsible about that. Right now I’m just feeling things out anyway.

Man I want more..

Possibly just made one of the best sandwiches ever. Was trying to figure out something different I could do with my extra chili yesterday and went through several iterations of possibilities. On noodles, with eggs, on toast. The last one stuck with me a bit so I pondered it over a little more. My thoughts led me to the wondrous grilled cheese and eureka! I’m a fairly good expert at making grilled cheeses so adding a little chili to the mix shouldn’t be too difficult. While I’m sure a grilled chili cheese sandwich isn’t a culinary breakthrough it was still fun thinking it up on my own.

So today I set upon making this chili cheese sandwich. Started off normally with two 3/4” slices of bread, melted a tbsp of butter in a nonstick pan, then stuck one side of one slice into the melt butter and set it aside. Put the other slice into the butter which will become the base of the sandwich. Spooned some already warmed up leftover chili onto the bread and topped that with some fresh cut onions. Then topped with two 1/4” slices of colby jack cheese and placed the other slice butter side up on top. Added a tsp. of water to the pan to help the cheese melt faster then covered with a lid. After the bottom side got nice and crispy but not burnt, I had to flip the sandwich over. Ended up using a spatula to lift the sandwich out of the pan, inverted the pan onto the sandwich, then in one motion flipped the sandwich and pan at the same time. Nothing spilled out so it worked pretty well. Added another dash of water then covered again. Once the cheese was melted and the bread properly toasted it was done! Wish I had some awesome pictures to show it off, but sadly I do not. It was definitely very, very tasty even taking into account that the chili wasn’t my best. Will make again for sure.
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