Food Entry 5: French Dip

I want to start this post off with a statement. Angie makes the best marinated meat anywhere! The first time she attempted marinating some meat, I almost got sick trying to eat it all! It was sooooo good! The first time was fajita steak, which we ate with fajitas! This second attempt was for French Dip sandwiches. Last night, Angie asks if I feel like a beer. I explain we don't have any more, to wit, I drank it all. She explains we're having marinated meat for dinner, so I jumped in the car and drove to get some beer. After marinating the meat, Angie cooked it on the stovetop. The meat was paper thin cut flank steak. Angie made some Au Jus and some garlic toasted rolls. The French Dip was a success! I even brought one for lunch today!

For those foodies: Au Jus is a French style of cooking a meat with it's own juices and then utilizing the juice as a sauce or gravy for service the meat. In America, it is commonly a created sauce that does not use any juices from the meat, but instead replaces the juice with Worcestershire Sauce or any of a number of "flavor enhancers". Angie used the packaged kind, since the steak was so thin it barely had any juice in it except the marinade.

Food Entry 4: Borriello Brothers Pizza

This could also be titled: "Why we hate Borriello Brothers!"

Borriello Brothers Pizza is a local "New York" pizza place that has begun taking over everything that is good in the world. First, they took over Sebastiani's Deli on Oro Blanco and Barnes. This little shop was a wonderful haven for foodies. They imported all sorts of meats and cheeses from around the world, and Jim Sebastiani knew every single one of them by taste. The rest of his family also worked the shop with him, and it was a very friendly place to go. It was also my very first job, and I was eventually let go because I was a sixteen-year-old kid with no thoughts in my head or morals under my belt. It broke my heart, and I felt betrayed even to this day...more along the lines of me betraying them with my crappy work ethic today. That shop is now a Borriello Brothers Pizza, and we think it was the first. As soon as it opened, we went down and bought a large pizza, since my dad is from New York. I think I ate one piece that night, and it was more than anyone else ate. The pizza was terrible! The sauce was too sweet, the cheese was not salty enough, and the amount of grease dripping off the slices would give you a coronary just by looking at them! Since this place opened up across the street from a renowned pizza shop called Louie's, I assumed it would be gone faster than free diapers at the daycare. It's still there.

Let me regale you with another story. There was once a beautiful Italian Restaurant called Rotelli's. The first time I went there, I had Penne alla Vodka and it was fantastic! I went back time and time again, sometimes adding a slice of pizza to the meal. The pizza was everything Borriello Brothers is not. Yes, sadly, I use the word "was" here. Rotelli's is now a Borriello Brothers. I will not blame Borriello Brothers for this wholly, as the management of Rotelli's started hiring more and more incompetent workers and trimming the menu down to try and save money on specialized ingredients. The very first thing they cut was the Penne alla Vodka, but they still kept making it for me when I went in (before they sold out). I remember one time I met Angie for lunch and was late because I stopped to get a snack on the way. I told her to order drinks and then wait for me. I showed up twenty minutes later and she still had not been offered drinks. So, Rotelli's was doing badly anyway, but they didn't need to be replaced by Borriello Brothers!


I like giving people the benefit of the doubt. Yesterday, while I was travelling to Fountain for a Video Game Quest, I thought to myself, "I would like a snack of pizza". There was a great little pizza place right next to the GameSource down there, but it closed a week ago (probably because they spent all their money on huge TVs and not on soap...lots of people complained about getting sick there). Right across the street was Borriello Brothers and I decided to give them a try. Yes, my Video Game Quest went successfully. I walked in and asked for a single slice of pepperoni pizza. Price? $2.50...not bad. I waited about five minutes and they called my name. When I picked up the pizza, the lady working there told me they had given me two pieces instead of one, "because it was easier". I'm not sure what that meant, but I took the pizza home and shared it with Angie. We were instantly reminded why the pizza there is so terrible. The sauce was sweet (and sour in a few bites, which boggles the mind), the pizza was just dripping grease, and the flavors were very bland! Also, the crust was overcooked and possibly a little stale. Angie mentioned that the thinness of the crust was good, but that was it. This brings me to my final tirade, which is: why change something when it is working so well?


Il Vicino is a wood burning stove pizza place downtown Colorado Springs. A month ago, they changed their dough recipe. Last year, Angie and I went there probably a dozen times, and I found the thin crust Italian-style pizza was the best in the world. It reminded me of Pizza Express, which is a little pizza chain in England we used to frequent (I still miss them). Il Vicino's pizza was so thin and crispy and topped with the most luxurious toppings. We went there for lunch at the beginning of the New Year, and the dough was terrible. I called the manager over and covertly told him my pizza wasn't cooked. He quickly took it back and had them cook it another ten minutes. It came back undercooked, and I mentioned it to him. He realized I hadn't been in for a while and explained they changed the dough. I told him the dough and resulting crust was my favorite part. He told me to tell the waiter to cook it crisp next time. I took my parents and their friend from New York, Sam, to Il Vicino. We all told the waiter to make it crispy. The pizza was delicious. If they don't change back, soon enough Borriello Brothers will have a downtown store.

Food Entry 3: Pasta Puttanesca

Angie made some wonderful Pasta Puttanesca, with a little cream added for consistency. It was fabulous, and I had three helpings! Sadly, this left nothing for leftovers. The sauce is tomato based with capers, olives, garlic, and anchovies. We've never used, eaten, or seen anchovies in my house so that aspect is always left out. Traditionally, the dish is Spaghetti alla puttanesca, and I would certainly love it with angel hair, but we used first Penne (which is my personal favorite), and then Spaghetti when the Penne ran out. Great job, Angie!

Food Entry 2: Alton Brown's Leek Soup

I like to try new things, whether they be in the garage, kitchen, backyard, or bedroom. I also like to think I have a pretty good handle on things in the kitchen-related area. Last night, we decided to try Alton Brown's (of Food Network Fame) Leek and Potato Soup. The recipe called for about seven ingredients and an hour and fifteen minutes to prepare. Everything seemed to be going fine, even though I had never held a leek, let alone chop it into similar sized pieces. The final preparation required the use of an immersion blender (one of those stick things that have the blender on the bottom), which we did not possess. I judged it to be fairly easy to remedy the situation by plopping the soup (as it was not quite soup yet, perhaps I should refer to it as "cooked vegetables ready to be pureed") into my regular blender. When Angie and I started dating, it was decided we would only need one blender, and I think we got rid of the wrong one, but now I'm not sure why we kept this crappy plastic one and got rid of the heavy duty glass one. Suffice to say, as soon as I put a portion of the "soup" into the blender and hit the puree button, much of it escaped out of the top and bottom to cover me in scalding hot liquid (and some small vegetable pieces). That would not be terrible enough had I not been wearing a very nice outfit (since I had just come home from work). Also, I take my cooking seriously, and an incident of this magnitude removed all my ability to think or act accordingly, so I had a nervous breakdown. As I fell to the floor, covered in piping hot soup bits, my wrist smashed into the hardwood and broke my watch. I lay, weeping and screaming myself hoarse, for twenty minutes or so before I could bring myself to admit that there really was nowhere for my spirit to go but up. The day had not progressed well, but it did not end badly. After cleaning myself off the floor and taking a shower, we finished the soup (it was rather tasty, but needed salt...perhaps bacon), watched an episode of Chuck from season 1, and fell fast asleep. I awoke tired and irritable, which means today started off terrible and can only go up, right?

Food Entry 1: Alice's Mexican

I have eaten a ton of food over my 29 years of life. Literally. According to the Food and Drug Administration, the average person eats roughly 1500 pounds of food a year. Since I'm 29, that means I've eaten an average of 18 tons of food, (not the 21.75 tons you would have expected, eh?) taking into consideration that I did not eat almost a ton of food when I was little. No wonder I feel fat all the time! Recently, I had the chance to eat at a restaurant I've been wanting to check out for a while. It is called Alice's Mexican, and it's located down the alley between Nevada and Tejon, on the same block as Jack Quinn's. I have to say, I was a little disappointed with the food AND the prices. I ordered a chile relleno plate, and the mush that came out looked like it had been frozen and then thawed poorly in the microwave. When I mentioned this to the waitress, who I think may also be the owner, she said that the style they cook them (in an egg batter) causes them to be very soft and mushy. She said the crispy rellenos are a Tex-Mex version and require a special breadcrumb crust for frying. I am still not positive I believe her. To top it all off, the cost of this monstrosity (at lunch) was a whopping $9.95 without tax. For a lunch menu item to be almost ten bucks, I would expect more. However, I was let down. If it wasn't for the fact that ALL the lunch menu items were around ten dollars apiece, I would give this place another try, but I won't. So there.

-Ben

New Year, New Blog

I would like to apologize to anyone who has been let down by the lack of updates over the past year. The truth is that it was a really terrible year for way too many reasons. This year, I'd like to use this blog to keep people updated, but also to keep track of good food we eat. The next post and many afterwards will have to do with this new "food" craze. I hope this doesn't dissuade anyone from checking us out every once in a while.

Love,
Ben

Christmas Eve Eve

Today is December 23rd...or Christmas Eve Eve. It's hard to believe that the year has passed so quickly. Time is flying by and I wish I could catch it, put it in a jar and save some for later. Alas, no luck.
Ben and I spent the weekend with his family, celebrating his Dad's 60th birthday. His mom flew in a bunch of his friends as a surprise and we bascially partied it up with them for the last couple of days. I think we must have gone thru 20+ bottles of wine :)
Tomorrow is Christmas Eve and we've still got a lot to do. I think we are going to celebrate our own Christmas festivities together at home on the 24th. With so much family in town, it'd be difficult for us to try to squeeze it in on Christmas Day.
Then next week it's up to Estes to stay at the Stanley Hotel! I really can't wait for this! I've wanted to go there for SO long. It'll be even more special because we are celebrating our one year anniversary up there. Two days of beautiful, peaceful, wintry bliss! Hopefully we'll get some great pictures and post.
Speaking of pictures, sorry we keep saying we'll add some and never seem to. We take pics all the time, we just never seem to have the camera WITH the computer, so the pictures are all just sitting on my memory card. Maybe I will remember to do that over the upcoming long weekend. But soon, I promise we will have pictures of so many things...K.
Anyway, I'm off to get some work done.
Happy Holidays everyone!