Happy Boxing Day, gang. Sorry, no uni-related content today. I’m still basking in that post-Christmas glow, and I bet many of you are as well. So please bear with me as I tell how my day went yesterday — a day that mostly involved cooking, eating, drinking, good friends, and good cheer.
I had eight friends over for dinner. But the real guests of honor were these two pork rib roasts (you can click to enlarge all of these photos):
I cut open the roasts to “unroll” them, spread each one with a stuffing (one was raisin, sour cherry, and walnut; the other was apple, cranberry, and walnut), and then rolled them back up and tied them. They turned out really well:
We also had excellent hors d’oeuvres to get things started. Here we have bacon-wrapped dates (made by me) and prosciutto-wrapped sea scallops (by Kirsten):
And here are some potato latkes and homemade applesauce made by my upstairs neighbors Sam and Emily:
There were tons of good side dishes — sweet potatoes, spicy Brussels sprouts, scalloped potatoes, and more — but I was having too much fun to document any of that. I did, however, photograph the wonderful raspberry/blackberry pie my friend Liz made:
We had one other dessert: a tarte Tatin, which I had made the night before. Here are some shots showing its progression (well, some of its progression — this sequence omits a lot of steps; sorry about the shitty lighting):
And here are a few other shots the help capture a bit of the flavor of the day:
Okay, that’s it for today, ’cause I have a serious mountain of dirty dishes to clean. Tomorrow we’ll get back to standard uni-related content, promise. Thanks for your patience and indulgence.
Yum! Thanks for the holiday meal rundown, Paul! Merry Christmas!
Hey … on a side note: Anyone know who makes the current NBA warm-ups? Any idea at all?
I would assume Adidas.
Sorry, should have added the sarcasm tag … the three stripe element was MUCH more bold than any one team’s logo (that I saw, anyway).
Love the Coke machine!
Bought it for $585 in 1996. Manufactured in 1967. Still works, although I don’t plug it in very often anymore, because the compressor makes a fair amount of noise.
Here’s something I wrote about it maybe 10 years ago:
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Watching the NFL Network special on the ’71 Dolphins-Chiefs game, did anyone else notice that the hash marks actually had alternating red and aqua yard lines?? And my eyes got misty seeing the right side Dolphins helmet on the left 45 yard line and the left side Chiefs helmet on the right 45 yard line.
Lot of folks might be surprised to know the Chiefs did the helmet thing for every home game, huh?
NHL Network unveiled it’s new logo today. For all the older NHLN is, this is actually their FIFTH different logo since sign-on.
Identity crisis, perhaps?
Hey Paul…
Is that plate from The Dining Car in Northeast Philly?
I bought those plates from a surplus restaurant supply place about 20 yrs ago. No idea where they were originally from.
Here’s a little info on that Dining Car plate. Thanks to my girlfriend, I’m becoming a dish dork (her words):
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Made by Sterling China which was located in Wellsville, Ohio. Wellsville is on the banks of the Ohio River, just downriver from East Liverpool, Ohio and Newell, WV which seem to be the pottery mecca of an entire region, if not the entire country. They made a lot of dishes for railways, hence Paul’s piece was probably something made for one of our great iron horses.
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Unfortunately, Sterling China closed for good in 2004 and it’s factory was finally torn down earlier this year.
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With the Cubs having acquired Travis Wood and being assumed to re-sign Kerry Wood, I wonder what we’ll see on the backs of those two uniforms in 2012.
love the brooklyn-sized apartment!
someone should do a video podcast on how to cook awesome stuff w/ only brooklyn sized spaces
Someone did! It’s called “Tiny Kitchen”:
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That spread & especially pork looks delicious! And the pies always earn their style points.
Love the kitty on the table..he looks pretty happy too.
That was kinda Tucker’s high-water mark for the day. Once people started arriving, he got all spooked and spent most of the party hiding under the bed or around the back of the bathtub. Bit of a ’fraidy cat.
Caitlin, on the other hand, loves company, so she was very happy and sociable all day long. Somehow didn’t end up in any pics, though.
Lakers wore white yesterday so as not to contrast too much with Kobe’s special cabbage salad shoes.
Nice of them, huh.
Whoever told the Lakers to add a white uniform needs to be smacked.
That would be Jeannie Buss. Hey Jeannie- tanks for nuthin.
Actually, don’t they usually wear white on Sunday?
Yeah, but like The said, they’re terrible.
I happen to love them in a vacuum, but they don’t look like the Lakers. They’re so…purple and gold.
White for white’s sake, Mike.
Depends on how long you’ve been watching with the Lakers, I guess.
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Could be worse, they could have a black set, which would make NO sense because–technically speaking in terms of NBA policy–the golds are the aberration.
Oh, I know that.
Was just grumbling about Nike’s incessantly irritating notion of declaring certain colors “neutral” and/or “universal” when it suits them.
Sorry if I’m missing something, but what does Nike have to do with this? The NBA is an Adidas league.
Kobe’s special shoes, which(except by extreme extension because they do include some purple) have nothing to do with the Lakers’ colors.
Ah, right. Gotcha.
it doesn’t
it’s just that kobe wears nikes, so i guess the line of thought is that it was HE who dictated the lakers wearing white (despite the fact that for the past several years they’ve ALWAYS worn white at home on sunday)
probably a veiled reference to when lebron pulled a similar stunt a couple xmas’s ago and forced the cavs to wear (i think) their blue unis at home, so they’d match his special xmas day shoes
i guess rick thinks that a teams’ super-duper-stars can dictate the uniform the team will wear on any given sunday, and that would be the uniform that least clashes or most compliments their $100+ million shoe contract’s latest creation
I was joking.
But I do think that if Nike were to make a special Adrian Peterson cleat in orange and neon green he wouldn’t be allowed to wear it playing for the Vikings in an NFL game.
And people here would scream loud and long if he did.
That’s one thing that bugs me about the NBA…that the apparent stepping aside and saying, “Well, he DOES have a shoe deal, y’know,” is perfectly okay with most people.
Well, in order for anyone on here to complain about non-uniform-matching-shoes in the NBA, they’d have to actually watch the NBA. Who wants to do that?
i think one difference (there are others, of course) is that in the nfl, players are, for the most part, wearing cleats (although i guess in some cases, they’re PE’s which are just sneakers with different soles) … so the ability/desire to “wear what the players are wearing” is a bit mitigated
with hoop, if you have an extry 2 hundy just burning a hole in your pocket, you can ‘wear what the pros wear’ right out of the box
so, while AD might have a shoe all the kids want, it would need to be slightly modified, but you can buy the new kobe’s straight from the nike store…im no sneakerhead, so i don’t know what drives people to covet a certain shoe, but i would think this is part of it
also, and i don’t think anyone will argue this point, the nba is FAR MORE of a look at me/star driven league…one against five, not one of 11 versus another team of eleven
and, as such, more emphasis is given to the footwear
and isn’t the NBA allstar game (and related events) just one big sneaker fashion show anyway? clearly the nba knows this and would be much more willing to ‘bend’ the footwear rules than the NFL
so, would AD be able to wear a special orange/neon green shoe? sure…he’ll have plenty of time on the sidelines now to show it off
on the field…??? probably, not so much
All true.
But this…
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…was the Magic Johnson special from Converse.
If team colors don’t matter, then the point can be made: Kobe works for Nike…he just plays for the Lakers. And the NBA understands that, apparently.
ahhh….but was it the earvin johnson christmas special?
lessee…
melo wearing green, KG in red…
so it wasn’t just kobe, was it? i guess on xmas, there are no sneaker rules
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all the better to sell more shoes, right? i mean, who wouldn’t want the melo green & red lace special? that pretty much matches everything in everyone’s wardrobe, no?
Didn’t mean, by any stretch, to say it applied only to Kobe.
But, then again, that’s basketball, the better you get the more the rules stop applying (see: Traveling, as stated by rule and as it’s called, or not called, in the NBA).
And isn’t that a great lesson for us all.
It is MUCH worse in soccer. Every brand creates ridiculous colorways that do not match uniforms, but the players simply wear the clashing cleats to promote the latest line by their respective shoe sponsor. Check out the cleats worn by Neymar and Lionel Messi from the recent FIFA Club World Cup, where Adidas almost provided an identical colorway of your hypothetical cleat (orange and neon yellow) for Messi:
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Both the NFL and NBA have loosened their stances on footwear colors in recent years, where players can wear all-color shoes in regular season games. I’m a major sneakerhead who collects Player Editions (PEs) from all sports and I pay attention to these things to the point where everyone I know thinks there’s something wrong with me. While I was at college, I gave a presentation for my American Sports Culture class arguing that the NFL and NBA league structures emphasize team and individual players, respectively. Shoe contracts were a major focus.
The Ulysses S. Grant in me says that little bar setup could use a bottle of Old Crow.
It had a bottle of Wild Turkey. So the world of avian-themed bourbons was ably represented.
That Coke machine in your kitchen/dinning room is awesome.
Thanks. Scroll up to the second comment of the day for more info on it.
I just saw that. Have you noticed that all of Tony Romo’s bio pics have him wearing a hat backwards, revealing a companies logo? How is that acceptable?
His bio on ESPN.com has him hatless, but most game telecast has him wearing a backwards hat with the logo. This obviously isn’t a coincidence, since he endorses the company. Still think it’s stupid.
As beautiful as the food looks, I couldn’t eat a thing from your table knowing the cat has been there. Still, I hope you and your friends had a wonderful meal. Happy Christmas!
I am curious why you didn’t opt to alternate the chairs as you did plates. You’ve got one that doesn’t match anyway, but I think the look would have been…better.
Finally, did you have seven friends to dinner or eight? I count the last spot as yours, unless the cat was guest number eight.
The cat wasn’t just on the table. I also had him walk on each plate, traipse thru each serving dish, and take a nibble from all the food. Just for you!
I considered alternating the chair (would’ve looked better, I agree), but there were logistical reasons for setting it up the way I did. Not worth explaining, but there were good reasons for it. Trust me.
Eighth guest showed up late.
…and I thought I was spoiling my cat by letting her have an occasional pizza topping.
Plus he took a dump in the Brussels sprouts, but nobody seemed to notice.
awesome
if you look closely, i think you can see some tuckerdoots
Too bad he didn’t bury them in the ice cream sprinkles.
That would have looked so festive.
Mashed sweet potatoes always visually remind me of kitty puke–Although I bet they tasted a lot better.
Tucker would have been welcome on my lap.
“Sparkling Clean”….nice touch!
More photos from yesterday, including some of me, taken by my friend Friederike:
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Really tough to beat good food and good company, isn’t it.
Mmmmmm…
By the way, nice shirt, Paul. I’d wear that.
Thanks for the light content today. Gotta run, but wanted to check in and say I hope everyone had a great day yesterday. Happy Boxing Day!
Go Cavs.
/off to redeem my iTunes cards
That’s the first time I’ve seen Paul’s kitchen – I figured as much – is that design from the 1940s? – the man is a living time warp! (the only thing missing is a skinny tie & a pack of filterless cigarettes in the front left pocket)
Chesterfields, one would hope.
Friederike is a pretty good food photographer. Does he do photography professionally?
She. Yes.
Oops, sorry about the gender assumption.
I have an interesting Philly Flyers story. Yesterday I was watching “The Gong Show Movie” link
and saw one of the characters wearing a Flyers sweater with a memorial number 4. Doing some research, I see that was a tribute to Barry Ashbee. Just thought it odd to see a Flyers sweater in such an obscure movie (and based in LA to boot) not to mention that she wore the probably-somewhat-rare tribute sweater.
Chuck Barris, the creator-host of The Gong Show, was a graduate of Drexel U in the Philadelphia area, and is a big Flyer fan, IIRC. I think on at least one occasion, he hosted the program wearing a Flyer jersey.
Got the old yule log burning the monitor there… classy.
on the monitor
That was actually a suggestion/link from Brinke “Collector’s Corner” Guthrie, who provided me with a YouTube link for a two-hour fireplace video. Provided just the right ambiance.
What shape is that cutting board in?
The state of Wisconsin, dontcha know? Paul’s favorite vacation destination!
Aaah, thank you sir
Kee-reck.
That thing is awesome. I’m a Wisconsinite and I’ve never seen anything like it! Now I want one!
pretty good shape considering it’s seen a lot of action
Was gonna say, Yeah, it’s cut.
I’m not a fan of plain mashed sweet potatoes. For every large sweet potato, I also mash a small turnip. It cuts the sweetness nicely.
sure that’s not yam?
Does sweet potato + turnip = yam?
well, although yams and sweet potatoes are both angiosperms, they are not related botanically…yams are a monocot and from the dioscoreaceae family…
sweet potatoes are a dicot and are from the convolvulacea family…
so, no
As an easily distinguishable rule, Yams have a thick, inedible skin and sweet potatoes have a thinner, edible skin.
Jonathan Vilma is missing the logos on his sleeves.
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He must think he plays in the NBA.
(Don’t you love it when discussions tie together?)
For everything domes take away from football, at least they allow the referees to wear proper (and better looking) white knickers and striped socks in the Saints game. I forgot how much better they look than the long black slacks.
Speaking of black slacks, the Saints never look good in theirs. Today is no exception.
Funny, I was just thinking the other day (and surprised that I found myself thinking it) that I’d forgotten how silly they look in the white knickerbockers. Maybe, it’s actually the stupid wide black stripe that bugs me. That seems really forced, much moreso than the black pants, which at least are practical, if we allow ourselves a moment of realism.
The long pants are far less of an affectation. More like hockey officials…functional first. Also makes football officials a bit less visible (compared to the white pants).
Totally agree on the Saints, though. All they need is droopy leg warmers to really complete the look.
Devery Henderson is also wearing red and green socks along with Robert Meachem
All of the Saints with the red and green spat/tape have it gone for the second half….
I like the vintage beer glasses in the last photo. Old Style and Grain Belt at the front of the table. Those of us from Wisconsin can spot those a mile away.
Deron Williams had on some adidas adiZero Speedwrap ankle braces with his Nike Hyperfuses against my Wizards. He’s sponsored by Nike.
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