New Address, New Blog Name

Hi folks,

It's been a nice long run here at old Neuf Routes. Thanks for sticking with me over the last few years! Effective immediately, this blog will shift over to a new address, koenrat.blogspot.com, so you can follow Joshua and me in our new joint (ad)venture. For the moment we're calling it Koenrat's Gazette, because Ratkoenk was too onomatopoetic. I'll still be blogging, and Joshua will chime in from time to time, who knows, he may really take it to it!

More or less all the posts from Neuf Routes will be over at Koenrat's Gazette in case you ever need recipes or dated advice on french bike parts.

So update your RSS feeds and your bookmarks - we'll see you over at the new place!

xo
hk

Hotel Alexander, Dar es Salaam

This hotel is awesome. It's on the same street as Rob, our Chief of Party, and was turned into a hotel about a year and a half ago (or so the staff tells me). Downstairs there's a comfortable, well-decorated dining room with two long tables, and two wings of rooms stretch out from the back, flanking the garden/pool area. The food is AMAZING, fresh fish, huge prawns, very reasonable, and cooked perfectly. Seasoning is not skimpy, the cook knows how to use salt well, but not overpower you.

The rooms are large and there's a third story bar above the dining area that is open on the sides, with three cushiony nooks on the long side that one can settle down in with a book or a laptop or a group of friends, and a few tables for dining off to the far side. Gorden, the owner, is warm and welcoming, as are the two main staff, Felix and Mohammed.

Only drawbacks are that the wireless doesn't quite reach to my room (when I'm sitting on the bed - which makes it easier to concentrate on work!) and the a/c fans are quite loud, but these are definitely not dealbreakers. My ethernet cable setup at the desk works fine, or I can go upstairs to the bar to work wirelessly.

From Travel

From Travel

Ibex Tuck Gloves Review

These gloves are softshell, with wool lining. They are bulky. And they are warm. The leather palms are nice, but the nosewipe ("flock" nosewipe) leaves a lot to be desired. Not that I used it on my nose during the testing period! It's just not at all fuzzy - same as the outside softshell of the glove. The seam running between the thumb and forefinger felt bulky and irritating on the left hand, but not the right, so it's possible a different pair would not have that issue, but it made for noticeably uncomfortable biking.

I've ended up sending both these Ibex gloves back and turning to a more tried-and-true approach - glove liners (currently my cheapo H&M gloves) and a windblocking shell (Joshua's pair from last season). Warm enough and the least bulky option out there.

I really don't understand

wireless power.

Ibex Shak Gloves Review

Between Christmas and New Year's I biked into the office for three days, in bitter cold and blustery winds. My regular fleece gloves were not doing the trick and my thumbs got froze and painful by the end of the 2 mile trip.

I ordered a pair of Ibex Shak Gloves, which have leather on the palm and a double layer of wool on top, and didn't think that they would be terribly warm or windblocking for the bike ride, but this morning it was 25 degrees and my hands felt fine on the ride in. The fit is a little long in the fingers and that helps to trap air, but doesn't seem to interfere too much with dexterity.

A couple other pairs of gloves are on their way for review and testing, and I will keep you posted.

Ingenue

From Kima

Double Blink Picture Fail!

From J&H Photos General

New Year's Eve Dinner

Fergus Henderson's Duck Legs and Carrots. Lessons learned:

"Add chicken stock until duck legs are showing like alligators in a swamp" is not the same as 1 3/4 cups of stock.

From Food

From Food

This is too much. I unbasted most of the liquid about an hour through the 90 minute cooktime, but then we got to make it into soup with the leftover carrots the next day, so no harm no foul.

So you end up with this:

From Food

Bitman's Chicken Liver Pate ( a little blurry) - so cheap, so easy, so delish.

From Food

Duck, bread, and roasted teeny brussels sprouts. Happy 2010!

From Food

Oh yes and don't forget dessert - Molten Chocolate Lightning Cake.

From Food

Really, it takes ten minutes. I stole this from Hedonic Monica when looking for a chocolate dessert I could make in a ramekin. I used 54% Bakers semisweet chocolate.

1/2 c butter
4 oz dark chocolate (I use 62% Scharffen Berger)
1/4 c sugar (I use brown or white interchangebly)
2 eggs
2 egg yolks
2 tsp flour
pinch salt

berries, coulis, mint, chocolate sauce, fresh vanilla cream, or powdered sugar (for decor)


Butter and flour four ramekins. Preheat oven to 450. Using a double boiler, melt chocolate and butter. In a separate bowl, whisk eggs, yolk, sugar, and salt. Whisk in hot chocolate-butter mixture, slowly and carefully so not to create a chocolate omlette. Divide amongst ramekins. Either bake for 10-12 min (depending on how molten you prefer your center), or refrigerate until ready to use. After baking, run a knife around cake edge and turn carefully upside down onto a plate. Allow to set for 1 minute before pulling off ramekin. Decorate and serve warm.

MORE FOOD

Der te der, what's this? Leftover wild mushroom risotto? Dearie me, I seem to be forming it into golf ball sized forms, and stuffing it with a little piece of mozzarella, oh my goodness.

From Food

Nooo, the dreaded flour-egg-Panko triple threat!

From Food

It spares no fingers!

From Food

Phew, at least someone is making sure we are eating green leafies around here.

From Food

and their steamy stems, too!

From Food

Deep Fried Risotto Alert! At 370 degree F, these turned golden in .6 seconds, but didn't burn like I thought they would, even after about a minute. Probably I just need to fry more things, right? Right??

From Food

Ah yes, our complete tapas meal, "Tuscan" bread from Whole Foods, white-bean/rosemary/garlic spread (thanks Jamie Oliver), Swiss Chard, and a few delectable arancini (the technical term for 'fried leftover risotto balls'). We have blurred the photo to protect the innocent.

From Food

Food photos courtesy of new schnazzy camera!

Christmas Food Blog

We ate so many good things at Christmas, but I only took a few pictures. We arrived four days late due to the Baltimore snowstorm, but started the holiday off right with roast pork in milk curd sauce, an italian dish. The next night was lamb loin, cardoon gratin (too bad I didn't get any pictures, cardoons are wacky - they look like barbed celery, which, not endearing AT ALL) and rosti (a swiss shredded potato cake sauteed in its weight in butter).

Christmas Eve we made lobster ravioli with the remains of a five-pound lobster that a student of my Dad's brought him, in thanks for helping him through a tough job search, and two salads. One was fennel and parsley; the other, a tricolore salad with a buttermilk chive dressing.

Then the GOOSE.

From Food

Take one goose. Stuff some prunes with duck foie gras.

From Food

Now, put those in the goose. Roast your goose, mostly on its side, turning it like one does in a tanning booth for extra golden color. Apply hot water from time to time to keep the pores open and the goose schvitzing.

From Food

Meanwhile, make a mushroom soup using approximately 8 lbs of butter and 1lb of mushrooms. The pomegranate is for scale, and also to go with the roasted butternut squash cubes + cilantro. This was delicious, btw, and sorry, no pictures. Dad made up the recipe.

From Food

Also meanwhile, make some twice-baked potatoes. Paprika, we have decided in the end, is basically sine qua non, even if Mom thinks it looks tacky. Note additional butter on top, after having stirred in 2 sticks of it during the mashing process.

From Food

Ah yes, the goose must now be done.

From Food

Throw in some spinach cooked in butter (of course) for some greenness on the plate, while you're at it. Finish it all off with lemon tart to cut the butter. Ha! Just kidding. There's butter in there too.

From Food

Most of these recipes from Julia Child. The goose was delicious, very very very dark meat. The squash/pomegranate/cilantro was amazing. The buttered mushrooms, potatoes, and spinach - well, let's just say, I've never been happier to be full of butter. Dee-lish. I think the secular Koenker household can take on any Jewish household during Hannukah season in a butter-off, I'm just sayin'.

New Year's Resolutions

1. Bike to work as much as possible.
I basically took the whole fall off, and didn't start again until the car was up in Philly between Christmas and New Year's. Even in the cold and wind of late December it was nice to get some exercise, and the streets were not so scary, as long as I stayed on Fallsway and Guilford.

2. Cook really delicious things more often.
This won't be as hard when Joshua and I are in the same house all the time, but until then, even when he's not around, I want to cook more fun things.

3. Run, climb, and walk Kima a lot. I've been so far mostly successful by biking to work and running on days that I didn't bike.

4. More tricks with Kima. I have all these books, and I have a clicker, and really, the more training the better!

Porcini

I found some porcini at home yesterday that were still good (another package was infested with grubs). So I zipped up to Eddies to get some crimini mushrooms and started this mushroom risotto recipe from Gourmet (via Epicurious). The best part is you can make the leftovers into fried risotto balls with melting mozzarella in the middle.

Mushroom Risotto
yield: Makes 4 to 6 servings
active time: 45 min
total time: 1 hr
This recipe serves 4 as a main course after you set aside 3 cups to make the mushroom and mozzarella arancini or the mushroom risotto cakes.... more ›

ingredients

1 oz (28 g) dried porcini (1 cup)
3 3/4 cups hot water
5 1/4 cups reduced-sodium chicken broth (42 fl oz)
1 tablespoon soy sauce
1 tablespoon olive oil
3/4 stick (6 tablespoons) unsalted butter
1 small onion, finely chopped (1 cup)
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
3/4 lb fresh cremini mushrooms, trimmed and thinly sliced
1 lb Arborio rice (2 1/3 cups)
2/3 cup dry white wine
1 oz finely grated Parmigiano-Reggiano (1/2 cup)
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1/4 cup chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley

Special equipment: parchment paper (if reserving some risotto for another recipe)
Garnish: Parmigiano-Reggiano shavings

The importance of background music

You all have seen countless video clips with dramatic background music highlighting development issues in Africa. This one's a little different, and a welcome change!

No more running around in the playground when it's cold out!

Kima's tailio got froze again this year. Video is from last year.

Yesho Raz

(Once more)

Origins of Breakdance

It's worth watching the whole 3 and a half minutes.

Grass Fed Beef and Fishy Taste

We had three different steaks on Saturday, two grassfed and one grainfed. The massive thick grassfed steak had a fishy taste most noticeable in the fat. Strong, like the dried fish in Gabon. The meat itself was fine, it seemed, but the grainfed steak was milder (and I suppose more familiar). It was a disconcerting experience. Turns out, though, that grassfed beef has higher Omega-3 levels, and this contributes to the fishiness (as it does in wild fish).

Ask and Ye Shall Receive

Blackberry Pearl 9100 should be able to do everything I need....maybe.

Kima not that dumb

Tried to cut her nails again last night without muzzle or headlock, and she wasn't having any of it. So, back to square one. Or just have the kennel do it this week while she's having a Thanksgiving vacation.

Craving a new smartphone

The Pearl has been good to me, and fits in most any pocket, but recently has begun to slow down. Nifty new apps are available for faster, bigger, nicer smartphones. But those won't fit in my pocket!!

Please note this is not a ploy for any holiday gift giving, just befuddlement. Would it not be cool to have Evernote on my phone? Or Epicurious? Or be able to implement one of those auto-shut-off-when-phone-senses-it's-in-a-car dealios? Or map all my Africa travel down to the clinic level?

Advertisers are so damn good at creating a need. Curse you and your slick Flash popups!