The Eighth Wonder of the World
Sunday, November 12, 2006
My friends, I have discovered the most amazing thing. Once you have experienced this spectacular item, you too will wonder how ever you lived without it. The magic of which I speak is the amazing, incomparable ... actually, I'll just let the story unfold, and you can read for yourself. Can you feel the suspense?!?!
The usual Boalt gang, enjoying some Quizno's after class on Monday. They were supposed to be doing an action shot, but their delayed response to that request resulted in the very nice candid pose you see here. Anyway, these are some great people, and were very supportive of the partying which was about to happen. But is Quizno's the 8th Wonder? Nope. It's pretty good, but not good enough for the adjectives used above.
Thursday night, Cocktails & Breakbeats: Berkeley Edition went off without a hitch. Leif and Xavier were here first, to help kick off the madness, followed shortly by the usual gang of Brian, Brien, Jason, Megan, and Nate. While the trusty w800i takes great pictures for the rest of this blog, it got shelved for the evening due to its uselessness in low-light situations, so no pics :-( But rest assured, we partied like wild animals until the wee hours. No neighbors complained, however, and it was a success all around. But partying is not the 8th Wonder.
The next morning, I went out to get some groceries, and on a whim, bought some oatmeal. Dear God, it's so good. As I type this, I'm eating Quaker Oats "Banana Breat" oatmeal in the "Weight Control" variety; it has 1g sugar, 6g fiber, and tastes like heaven. I threw in some dry cereal to up the calories a bit, but if ever you just want a sweet-tasting snack, the oatmeal alone delivers 160cal of very healthy high-glycemic carbs. Mmmmmmm. SO good. But not the 8th Wonder. Maybe it's Wonder 7.5 though.
After breakfasting (the morning after C&B), I headed out on the TT bike for a little spin. On a cooler, overcast day, my new Cannondale jacket made the ride an absolute pleasure. I use that jacket for everything now. It's stylish, form-fitting, warm in the wind -- but cool enough while sweating, waterproof, and converts into a vest. I had worn the vest with a sleeveless shirt during C&B to look slick, and kept it as a vest for the ride. It's the most perfect garment ever. It's not the Eighth Eonder I mentioned above, but very very close. It might be a tie. Hell, this jacket might be the Ninth Wonder. Yeah, let's call it the Ninth Wonder. I think everyone should own one.
After the ride, some fresh ground turkey meat was calling my name from the fridge, so I stir-fried a good lot of it with some mushrooms, peppers, and broccoli, all in a nice BBQ-Teriyaki sauce. Yum. Pretty good, but not Wonderous.
Time to let the cat out of the bag. What you see above is, without a doubt, the most amazing discovery of Man. That's right, the world's Eighth Wonder is, unquestionably, the Butternut Squash. I picked this sucker up while doing groceries last week, only because I was curious as to what the hell a butternut squash IS. Leif guessed that it would taste like a pumpkin.
When you cut the thing open, it does smell like a pumpkin, and has pumpkin-like seeds. Merlin tried out the seeds, but wasn't a huge fan, and mostly just stared at me while I cooked the thing, seeming to ask, "when are you gonna feed me some cheese?" What's really neat about the squash is that the seed pod is bowl-shaped, and looked like the perfect recepticle for some good stir-fry. So I whipped some up, and voila:
Don't it look scrumptious? Turkey, mushrooms, and sweet mini bell peppers in a mustard-lime-vinegarette sauce.
The squash tastes AMAZING. It has such a wonderful soft texture, and is quite sweet. The whole thing is edible, skin and all, and the natural bowl-shape makes the dish very attractive. I think the sauce was a bit too strong; it overwhelmed the natural sweetness of the squash, which might be better complemented by something mild like cottage cheese. Later on that evening, I cooked up some more squash and didn't add anything but cottage cheese (with a little more of that sauce on the side for occasional dipping). It was splendid. When I come home for Christmas, I will have perfected some kind of squash dish, and will treat the fam to its magnificence. Until then, I leave you to ponder what a vegetable with such a lengthy blog treatment could possibly taste like.
Until next time, dear readers. I love you all.
The usual Boalt gang, enjoying some Quizno's after class on Monday. They were supposed to be doing an action shot, but their delayed response to that request resulted in the very nice candid pose you see here. Anyway, these are some great people, and were very supportive of the partying which was about to happen. But is Quizno's the 8th Wonder? Nope. It's pretty good, but not good enough for the adjectives used above.
Thursday night, Cocktails & Breakbeats: Berkeley Edition went off without a hitch. Leif and Xavier were here first, to help kick off the madness, followed shortly by the usual gang of Brian, Brien, Jason, Megan, and Nate. While the trusty w800i takes great pictures for the rest of this blog, it got shelved for the evening due to its uselessness in low-light situations, so no pics :-( But rest assured, we partied like wild animals until the wee hours. No neighbors complained, however, and it was a success all around. But partying is not the 8th Wonder.
The next morning, I went out to get some groceries, and on a whim, bought some oatmeal. Dear God, it's so good. As I type this, I'm eating Quaker Oats "Banana Breat" oatmeal in the "Weight Control" variety; it has 1g sugar, 6g fiber, and tastes like heaven. I threw in some dry cereal to up the calories a bit, but if ever you just want a sweet-tasting snack, the oatmeal alone delivers 160cal of very healthy high-glycemic carbs. Mmmmmmm. SO good. But not the 8th Wonder. Maybe it's Wonder 7.5 though.
After breakfasting (the morning after C&B), I headed out on the TT bike for a little spin. On a cooler, overcast day, my new Cannondale jacket made the ride an absolute pleasure. I use that jacket for everything now. It's stylish, form-fitting, warm in the wind -- but cool enough while sweating, waterproof, and converts into a vest. I had worn the vest with a sleeveless shirt during C&B to look slick, and kept it as a vest for the ride. It's the most perfect garment ever. It's not the Eighth Eonder I mentioned above, but very very close. It might be a tie. Hell, this jacket might be the Ninth Wonder. Yeah, let's call it the Ninth Wonder. I think everyone should own one.
After the ride, some fresh ground turkey meat was calling my name from the fridge, so I stir-fried a good lot of it with some mushrooms, peppers, and broccoli, all in a nice BBQ-Teriyaki sauce. Yum. Pretty good, but not Wonderous.
Time to let the cat out of the bag. What you see above is, without a doubt, the most amazing discovery of Man. That's right, the world's Eighth Wonder is, unquestionably, the Butternut Squash. I picked this sucker up while doing groceries last week, only because I was curious as to what the hell a butternut squash IS. Leif guessed that it would taste like a pumpkin.
When you cut the thing open, it does smell like a pumpkin, and has pumpkin-like seeds. Merlin tried out the seeds, but wasn't a huge fan, and mostly just stared at me while I cooked the thing, seeming to ask, "when are you gonna feed me some cheese?" What's really neat about the squash is that the seed pod is bowl-shaped, and looked like the perfect recepticle for some good stir-fry. So I whipped some up, and voila:
Don't it look scrumptious? Turkey, mushrooms, and sweet mini bell peppers in a mustard-lime-vinegarette sauce.
The squash tastes AMAZING. It has such a wonderful soft texture, and is quite sweet. The whole thing is edible, skin and all, and the natural bowl-shape makes the dish very attractive. I think the sauce was a bit too strong; it overwhelmed the natural sweetness of the squash, which might be better complemented by something mild like cottage cheese. Later on that evening, I cooked up some more squash and didn't add anything but cottage cheese (with a little more of that sauce on the side for occasional dipping). It was splendid. When I come home for Christmas, I will have perfected some kind of squash dish, and will treat the fam to its magnificence. Until then, I leave you to ponder what a vegetable with such a lengthy blog treatment could possibly taste like.
Until next time, dear readers. I love you all.
posted by Nick at 9:00 AM
2 Comments:
...maybe you want spaghetti but want to avoid the carbs...try sphaghetti squash. It goes well with ground italian seasoned turkey with a nice spicy red sauce.
De-seed the butternut squash. Cut into cubes. Season with Chili powder, garlic, salt and pepper. Put on a cookie sheet lined with foil and sprayed with PAM. Bake at 375 for 20 mins. Enjoy as a side dish.
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