Tea Time
First off, you know how sometimes you randomly create things in the kitchen that end up being pretty damn tasty? Well, on second thought, maybe you don't, but myself being a pretty big fan of all things edible in general, and having the knack for experimentation, I'm always thinking, "Hmm, I wonder how that would be if I added a little bit of this. . . ."
Granted, as you might have guessed, not everything turns out great.
I mean, I can recall dozens of times growing up when my brother and I used to make crazy things for each other to eat on a dare. It seems I was usually doing the daring, and he was doing the eating, now that I think back on it, but before you make me out to be some sort of childhood culinary beast, it wasn't that bad: creations ranged from the chocolate covered Cheeto, which was generally acknowledged to be pretty vile (though my brother pretended to like it just to trick me into eating one myself — clever, he), to the sliced olive sandwich on toast, which actually ended up being relatively tasty, especially with a little mustard thrown into the mix.
My more recent creations kind of walk the same line. I mean, you can't learn to cook if you don't try, right? And my self-avowed skill in the kitchen is not entirely without truth — it just took a lot of practice getting there.
Well, tonight was another success, albeit sort of a roundabout accidental one.
With my dinner of an instant Indian curry (long day at work — no more apologies offered — and those Tasty Bite meals are, like, way yummy) I'd poured myself a glass of iced tea. In this case it was some cinnamon plum tea I'd bought this past winter, a season for which cinnamonny plummy things are generally better suited, no doubt, though it's still decent iced in the summer. Anyway, per a habit which horrifies several of my friends, when at home, I tend to like milk in my iced tea. Say what you like. Try it in mango or peach flavored tea, and you'll never go back, I assure you. So, fishing for the milk, and finding it gone, I gave the soy milk a shot instead (I've been trying to cut back on dairy a bit).
Some time later, after I'd finished my meal but was still sipping the tea, I couldn't help thinking, "You know, this is not bad — kind of a different flavor than the tea with regular milk — but it needs something. Sweet. Honey maybe."
And that's how today's new tea creation was born. Iced tea (flavor optional) with soy milk and honey makes a damn fine drink. I had two more glasses. In fact I'm a little bloated from all the tea — probably not a great thing, but it made me happy.
No, I don't pretend to be the first person who's ever thought of this particular combination, but your parade's tomorrow, and I won't bring my umbrella to yours if you don't rain on mine. At least let me enjoy my self-designated glory for a few hours, right?
* * *
Speaking of other beverages (also in a roundabout way — I'll get to it), I met some friends at one of our favorite weekend dinner hangouts, Basha, on lower Greenville Ave. Well, or so we thought anyway.
As it was, Basha had already gone through a restaurant makeover of sorts about a year ago. Allegedly as a result of the faltering economy, the management had dropped the liquor license and re-engineered the menu toward a more uniformly less-than-$10 profile. I can't say whether it worked or not — if nothing else, the lack of wine list had thrown me for quite a shock the first time I'd met a friend there afterward (hard day at work + being deprived of the nice glass of wine I'd been looking forward to with my dinner made me a kind of cranky guy).
This time we discovered that the restaurant had been entirely sold to a new owner who has transformed it into a Turkish cafe. Figuring it was close enough to the Mediterranean cuisine we'd expected, we gave it a try (or my friends figured, rather, because I was last to arrive, and they were already well settled in).
The food was good, though the menu was a little homogeneous: basically variations of chicken, beef, or lamb, grilled in one of about 4 different ways, over rice or pita bread. If you do the math, you'll guess the "Entrees" section of the menu contained 24 or so dishes, and you'd be about right. At least the variation in the "Appetizer" section made up for it.
But, on the wine topic, I don't think, for all that's good and holy, I'll be buying an Alice White wine again anytime soon.
I mean, well, maybe I'm not being entirely fair, since at one point we were drinking our somewhat drinkable Alice White Cabernet/Shiraz, when the waiter sneaked up behind us, and, without checking the label with us, began pouring a truly frightful Alice White Merlot into our half empty glasses of Cab/Shiraz. If you've ever wondered why the big wine label, taste, and cork ritual, folks, it's for moments like this.
Anyway, yeah, that Merlot was atrocious. We assumed it wasn't just a problem with the bottle, because it wasn't vinegary, or corky, or moldy, or any of those other not-so-pleasant dark-side-of-the-wine-empire essences — it was just very strongly alcohol tasting ("hot", if you will), and otherwise sort of had a flavor like flat cola. I imagined somewhere in the world at the same instant some guy was sitting on a street corner drinking this stuff out of a little brown paper sack.
I have to admit, though, out of curiosity I checked out the Wine Spectator website to find a rating for the wine (mostly just to revel in their utterly trashing this wine in the review, it's true), and was shocked to see that in the entry they'd actually given it an 85 rating, which is not too bad:
Of course, now I'm resigned to have to admit that perhaps the bottle we'd had simply was a little off, but I'm still thinking it would have to have been a shaken-up-vigorously-then-left-in-the-sun-for-three-afternoons "little" bad. Who knows.
Anyway, I knew there was a reason I'd added a "personal rating" column to the little wine database thing in my palm pilot. That's all I have to say. . . .
Granted, as you might have guessed, not everything turns out great.
I mean, I can recall dozens of times growing up when my brother and I used to make crazy things for each other to eat on a dare. It seems I was usually doing the daring, and he was doing the eating, now that I think back on it, but before you make me out to be some sort of childhood culinary beast, it wasn't that bad: creations ranged from the chocolate covered Cheeto, which was generally acknowledged to be pretty vile (though my brother pretended to like it just to trick me into eating one myself — clever, he), to the sliced olive sandwich on toast, which actually ended up being relatively tasty, especially with a little mustard thrown into the mix.
My more recent creations kind of walk the same line. I mean, you can't learn to cook if you don't try, right? And my self-avowed skill in the kitchen is not entirely without truth — it just took a lot of practice getting there.
Well, tonight was another success, albeit sort of a roundabout accidental one.
With my dinner of an instant Indian curry (long day at work — no more apologies offered — and those Tasty Bite meals are, like, way yummy) I'd poured myself a glass of iced tea. In this case it was some cinnamon plum tea I'd bought this past winter, a season for which cinnamonny plummy things are generally better suited, no doubt, though it's still decent iced in the summer. Anyway, per a habit which horrifies several of my friends, when at home, I tend to like milk in my iced tea. Say what you like. Try it in mango or peach flavored tea, and you'll never go back, I assure you. So, fishing for the milk, and finding it gone, I gave the soy milk a shot instead (I've been trying to cut back on dairy a bit).
Some time later, after I'd finished my meal but was still sipping the tea, I couldn't help thinking, "You know, this is not bad — kind of a different flavor than the tea with regular milk — but it needs something. Sweet. Honey maybe."
And that's how today's new tea creation was born. Iced tea (flavor optional) with soy milk and honey makes a damn fine drink. I had two more glasses. In fact I'm a little bloated from all the tea — probably not a great thing, but it made me happy.
No, I don't pretend to be the first person who's ever thought of this particular combination, but your parade's tomorrow, and I won't bring my umbrella to yours if you don't rain on mine. At least let me enjoy my self-designated glory for a few hours, right?
* * *
Speaking of other beverages (also in a roundabout way — I'll get to it), I met some friends at one of our favorite weekend dinner hangouts, Basha, on lower Greenville Ave. Well, or so we thought anyway.
As it was, Basha had already gone through a restaurant makeover of sorts about a year ago. Allegedly as a result of the faltering economy, the management had dropped the liquor license and re-engineered the menu toward a more uniformly less-than-$10 profile. I can't say whether it worked or not — if nothing else, the lack of wine list had thrown me for quite a shock the first time I'd met a friend there afterward (hard day at work + being deprived of the nice glass of wine I'd been looking forward to with my dinner made me a kind of cranky guy).
This time we discovered that the restaurant had been entirely sold to a new owner who has transformed it into a Turkish cafe. Figuring it was close enough to the Mediterranean cuisine we'd expected, we gave it a try (or my friends figured, rather, because I was last to arrive, and they were already well settled in).
The food was good, though the menu was a little homogeneous: basically variations of chicken, beef, or lamb, grilled in one of about 4 different ways, over rice or pita bread. If you do the math, you'll guess the "Entrees" section of the menu contained 24 or so dishes, and you'd be about right. At least the variation in the "Appetizer" section made up for it.
But, on the wine topic, I don't think, for all that's good and holy, I'll be buying an Alice White wine again anytime soon.
I mean, well, maybe I'm not being entirely fair, since at one point we were drinking our somewhat drinkable Alice White Cabernet/Shiraz, when the waiter sneaked up behind us, and, without checking the label with us, began pouring a truly frightful Alice White Merlot into our half empty glasses of Cab/Shiraz. If you've ever wondered why the big wine label, taste, and cork ritual, folks, it's for moments like this.
Anyway, yeah, that Merlot was atrocious. We assumed it wasn't just a problem with the bottle, because it wasn't vinegary, or corky, or moldy, or any of those other not-so-pleasant dark-side-of-the-wine-empire essences — it was just very strongly alcohol tasting ("hot", if you will), and otherwise sort of had a flavor like flat cola. I imagined somewhere in the world at the same instant some guy was sitting on a street corner drinking this stuff out of a little brown paper sack.
I have to admit, though, out of curiosity I checked out the Wine Spectator website to find a rating for the wine (mostly just to revel in their utterly trashing this wine in the review, it's true), and was shocked to see that in the entry they'd actually given it an 85 rating, which is not too bad:
Winery: Alice White
Wine: Merlot South Eastern Australia 2002
Score: 85
Price: $8
Country: Australia
Region: Australia
Light and refreshing, with pretty blackberry and currant flavors and crisp tannins. Drink now through 2004. 32,000 cases made. (HS)
Of course, now I'm resigned to have to admit that perhaps the bottle we'd had simply was a little off, but I'm still thinking it would have to have been a shaken-up-vigorously-then-left-in-the-sun-for-three-afternoons "little" bad. Who knows.
Anyway, I knew there was a reason I'd added a "personal rating" column to the little wine database thing in my palm pilot. That's all I have to say. . . .