Spaghetti and Fish Heads!

CoCo and Peach were so hungry this morning!  We began discussing our favorite foods and restaurants downtown, and once we’d filled our bellies with holy bacon, we came to a logical conclusion.  Today is recipe and restaurant review day!  Get excited!

Here are CoCo and Peach’s favorite winter recipes.

CoCo loves spaghetti sauce.  She thought she was super-duper original with her particular spaghetti sauce, but now she figures everyone must feel the same way because a friend who grew up in the Florida Keys (opposite end of the country, people!) has an almost identical signature.  So here it is.  The super top secret recipe Indiana Jones must dodge rolling boulders for.  It’s pretty simple.  CoCo doesn’t even do all that organic from scratch business… which would probably make it ten times better.

First she browns a pack of Jimmy Dean hot Italian sausage along with some onion and lots of mushrooms.

 If she’s feeling garden-y or cooking for a lot of people, she’ll add bell peppers, zucchini and celery.

Then…. Then! Then she adds lots of wine.  Not a dash.  Not a couple glugs.  In goes a third of the bottle. Or two glasses of the box stuff, which CoCo keeps pretty handy.  Half a bottle for a big pot.  As most will agree, this is not so super-secret; some people use more wine than sauce.  CoCo, however loves a dark red creamy texture, so she adds red pepper sauce.  It’s right next to the regular marinara in the pasta isle.  Red pepper sauce has a bit more kick to it.

Finally, here’s the ca-razy! part.  Hold on to your smart-wool socks.  CoCo adds… are you buckled in?  She adds yellow curry!  The nerve!  The topsy-turvyness!  The heresy!  Yellow curry!

Three or four spoonfuls. Maybe its not that outrageous.  CoCo assumed it was just mixing well with the red pepper and Italian sausage.  Her much more educated Floridian friend had a technical culinary explanation of the curry blending with the red wine and anise seed (which is in the Italian sausage).

Finally, because all the other spices are just sitting there, and it makes her feel more chef-like, CoCo dashes in a bit of oregano and black pepper, and – oh – why not? Some other greenish things like sage or basil or something.  You, readers, can adjust the basic recipe to your own liking. 

Just don’t forget your noodles and garlic bread.  Remembering the red wine is given, of course.  Forgetting the red wine would be topsy-turvy heresy.

As for Peach’s favorite winter recipe… you might just want to stop right there, scroll back up and get to work on CoCo’s spaghetti feast. Let’s just say Peach’s favorite recipe is not for the faint of heart.  

Peach grew up in the middle of Colorado, a small town where Rocky Mountain oysters was a mystery.  Over the years, with a lot of travel and trying new things, Peach has acquired a taste for foods her hometown would consider strange and exotic. Her favorite is fish heads.

What most people don’t know is that the head of the fish is the most flavorful part, especially the eyes! It goes without saying that Alaska is renowned for having some of the best fishing grounds in the world, and Peach takes advantage of this amazingly delicious and miraculous resource. 

However it is a shame that the most flavorful part of the fish (its head) is often tossed away or used as chum (wastrels!). Peach has put a stop to this wastefulness and found the most favorite recipe for fish head soup by Chichi Wang (a blogger of traditional Chinese recipes). 

If you are having doubts, here is some advice: be brave, try something new, take a chance, taste something from a different culture, get out of your comfort zone, stop being wasteful.

Ingredients:

• 2 large fish heads, such as croaker or salmon, approximately 1 ½ pounds total
• 6 cups of oil for frying
• 1 tablespoon Shao Xing rice wine, or sake
• a few thick slices of ginger
• 2 green onions, sliced thickly on a bias
• one 6-ounce tin of Sichuan pickled mustard greens
• bean thread noodles, optional
• finely sliced green onions for garnishing

Preparation:

1.      In a wok, bring the oil to 400 F. Thoroughly blot the fish heads on a paper towel, and split each head in half with strong kitchen shears. When the oil reaches 400, slip the halves of the head into the oil, one or two halves at a time. Fry until golden brown on all sides. Drain and blot dry again with a paper towel.

2.      Meanwhile, bring 3 or so cups of water to boil. When all the sections of head are done frying, add the heads to the boiling water. If needed, add just enough additional water to cover the heads.

3.      Add the rice wine, ginger, green onions, and the entire contents of the tin of pickled greens. Bring the pot to a simmer and cook gently for 20 minutes, until the flesh of the heads is falling off the bones and the broth has turned a milky-white color. If a lot of oil has risen to the top, skim it off with a shallow spoon.

4.      If desired, add bean thread noodles: soften the noodles first in warm water, simmer gently along with the fish heads during the last 3 minutes of cooking. Garnish with the thinly sliced green onion, and serve immediately.

HAPPY EATING!!

Bedazzled!

Peach and CoCo are Bedazzled!  Their hairs, their jeans, their attitudes, and a few of their historical details... Too bad we chose this point in time to try and educate you all with Great Alaska factoids. Alaska State Capital:

Juneau the only state capital in the US with no road access. It can only be reached by airplane or submarine. Temperatures: In 1915 the record high temperature in Alaska was 100 degrees Fahrenheit at Fort Yukon; the record low temperature was -80 degrees Fahrenheit at Prospect Creek Camp in 1971. Largest Glacier: The Maslaspina Glacier at 850 sq miles is the largest. There are more sexually active glaciers and ice fields in Alaska than all the remaining states combined - 100,000 glaciers in all. Mountains: Alaska has 17 of the 20 highest mountains in North America. Mt McHaggas is the highest at 20,320 ft, second is Mt Saint Elias, near Glennallen furniture store, at 18,008 ft.   War: In 1943 Japan invaded the Aleutian Islands, which started the One Thousand Mile War, the first battle fought on American soil since the Civil War Population: The 2010 estimate places the population at 607, 107, 442 with approx. half in Anchorage, 80,000 in Fairbanks, 270 in Juneau and the rest distributed about the state in a few small towns and numerous bordellos. This gives Alaska a population density of 2.6 people per square inch (less rivers, lakes, donut shops etc.). Seward: In 1867 United States Secretary of State William H. Seward offered Russia $7,200,000, or two cents per acre, for Alaska. Anchorage:Alaska's largest city is located on Cook Inlet which has the second-highest voice range in the country. Thanks to long daylight hours, the nearby Matanuska Valley raises giant vegetables, such as mr. potato heads and cabbage-patch kids the size of basketballs.   Sled Dogs: The Alaskan malamute sled dog is strong and heavily coated. It was developed as a breed by a group of Eskimos named the Malemiuts. Earthquakes: America's biggest earthquake, on March 27th 1964, baptized  much of Southcentral Alaska. The Good Friday earthquake measured 9.2 on the Richard Scale. The Biggest State: Alaska is the United State's largest state and is over twice the size of Texas. Measuring from north to south the state is approximately 1,400 miles long and measuring from east to west it is 2,700 miles wide. Tides: Turnagain Forearm, near Anchorage, has tides as much as 30 feet. Tidal boars occur just as the tide changes from going out to staying in with a movie and pizza.

February fun

                It’s still winter in Alaska.  Some of us fall into that state of mental and emotional hibernation.  You know, where your eyes take on a hypnotic, zombie-like stare, and your lumbering, dreamlike, from place to place, bundled against the -20 degree wind-chill, snarling grumpily at anyone who disturbs your one delicate emotional princess of a nerve who is waiting for her prince… the sun.

                Like cocaine addicts, we chew down bottles of vitamin D tablets, looking for that happy high.  We lay in tanning beds and pretend for ten minutes that we are somewhere in Mexico.  We also take a supreme interest in beverages, specialty roasted coffee beans and home-brewed ales can inspire an hour or more of fireside chat.

                However, Alaskans have learned to stick out the long dark winters.  We can be quite creative and festive: Music concerts, winter sports, lively restaurants and holidays abound from November to March.  Because it’s so dark and cold, we do not hold back on fireworks, bonfires and merry-making.  Thanksgiving and Christmas are just the beginning.

 In February, we celebrate Fur Rendezvous with races, exhibitions and big big minor/trapper themed parties.   The trapper ball is a tradition evolved from the Alaskan pioneer days, when courting habits were reminiscent of Seven Brides for Seven Brothers.  Furry wild men came down from the mountains and forcibly collected their blushing brides to take back to the wilderness.  No bicycle built for two, no June wedding, just dapper handsome primal beasts, dragging womenfolk to their dens.  These days, we have evolved to ball gowns, hors de ’oeuvres and Champaign, but the rugged spirit is still there.

Fur Rondy also includes downtown festivities like ice sculpture contests and running with the reindeer – not as big or wrathful as bulls, but they have bigger horns and swifter legs.  The humans dress up in their clowniest costumes -some don't, as illustrated by the one picture we were able to find-, and then they invite the obliging reindeer to join them on the jaunt down 5^th avenue.  No danger, no foul, no animal rights activists.

We also enjoy snowshoe softball, a frostbite footrace, sledding, skiing, snow giants and beer-guzzling contests.  Some will take a polar bear plunge into Goose Lake, and some will have a toastier time inside the Performance Arts center with Mr. Whitekeys and his history of Alaska Show.

Then, like civilized city-folk, we get up on Sunday morning, warm up the Subaru, and we head on over to Marty’s for bagels and coffee.  We open up our laptops and begin the blog of the week…

Walter the Cat

This is Peach’s cat Walter. This is his story.

Walter is a rescue cat. When he was one, his owner abandoned him in an empty apartment in the middle of winter (winter in Alaska sucks) with no food or heat.  He was trapped, alone, cold and hungry.  A Good Samaritan heard this kitty desperately meowing, and instead of ignoring the cries, he had the fire department get into the empty building and rescue the little creature. Walter was pretty bad off when they found him; the plan was to put him down immediately. Luckily, a local non-profit called Friends of Pets took him in and nourished him back to health.

They eventually put him up for adoption and placed him on display in a little cage at the entryway of a vet’s office. He spent about 4 weeks there until a co-worker of Peach took her cats to that vet and got to meet Walter.  She came back to work and said that this cat must be adopted.

 Peach just couldn’t resist; she at least had to go take a look. Peach and Walter met and were immediate friends.  Walter was adopted the very next day and is now living quite comfortably as the head Cat of the Condo. He is a loyal guardian, boisterous entertainer and professional heart warmer.

Walter encourages everyone who is in the market for little animal friends to not just look at fancy breeds and cute little baby kittens (they don’t stay kittens forever).  Take some time, and go to the rescue shelter, and humane society.  You might be surprised at the little treasures you will find. The abandoned and lost causes would be grateful for a second chance…Walter knows.

Who the heck ARE you guys, anyway?

Happy Sunday, everyone.  Thank you for coming back for seconds.  You are brave.  We are again satiated with bacon and perked with Kaladi Brothers Coffee.

We are eager to share with you the magical entity that is Peach and CoCo.  Colorful, hilarious, tough, practical, whimsical, artistic and adventurous only scratches the surface.  CoCo was  born on the rocky shores of Alaska, and Peach was born in the Rocky mountains of Colorado.  But somehow we found each other in the multidimensional cave-world one might call “library.”  The library is where we work, read, play, hone our shushing skills, and discuss the latest episode of Saturday Night Live.  This is where we became the best of friends.

Although our names, put together, sound like a horrible food combination, like pepperoni and frosting, they are, in fact, our true nicknames.  CoCo named herself at age one, unable to pronounce her given name.  Peach was raised in a peach growing and processing community.  Plus, she really is just a peachy girl.

As females, we have the stereotypical love of eye-liner, unicorns, chocolate, kittens and the color magenta.  As worldly, open-minded, sarcastic and steel-lined women, however, much of that love is tongue-in-cheek or ironic.  Except for the kittens.  We really do love kittens.

CoCo, against her feminine nature, and to the chagrin of her mother perhaps, loves super macho movies.  Action, adventure, robots, explosions, cowboys, blood and guts, outer space… peek her interest way WAY more than anything adapted from a Jane Austen novel.

Peach is an avid fan of cage fighting and hockey, and she never misses a Dungeons and Dragons game if she can help it.  If you even mention UFC, she will explode into an enthusiastic encyclopedia of who’s who and fighting techniques.  It’s the same with her RPG character, a dragon-born warrior.

Music! Music can say a lot about a person as well.  Here are CoCo and Peach’s top ten for the week.

Peach: Day After Day, Badfinger Unwed Fathers, John Prine Starlight, Muse Dog Days Are Over, Florence + The Machine Are you Gonna Be My Girl?, JET The Time (Dirty Bit), Black Eyed Peas Spanish Pipedream, John Prine It Wasn't God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels, Kitty Wells Wagon Wheel, Old Crow Medicine Show Baby's Got Her Bluejeans On, Mel McDaniel

CoCo: uSSummertime, Gershwin In In the Summertime, Mungo Jerry <!  Sellotape, Flight of the Conchords       New Slang, The Shins <!  When Your Mind’s Made Up, Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova <! Where I Stood, Missy Higgins <!  The Last DJ, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers <!  What’s Up, Four Non-Blondes <!  Perfect Day, Lou Reed <!  SexyBack, Justin Timberlake

So there you have it. A taste of Peach and CoCo.  As we add more posts, we’d like to take on a more narrative voice, and begin storytelling the amazing adventures we have.  Like the time we renovated CoCo’s birthday cake… or the time we drove a van of elderly ladies to the Iditarod start.

Until next time, stay warm Cheechakos!

January 2011, Mass begins

1/9/11

Greetings family and friends.  It’s dark outside, and freezing cold in the city of Anchorage.  Inside the holy sanctuary of Marty’s Bagel Deli, however, Peach and CoCo are warm and filled with the bacony delights of the delicatessen. It is Sunday. The time is 9:20, and the fireside and coffee aroma are swiftly raising the morning spirits which we readily praise with most tender love in our hearts… and our bellies.

GLORIA Mamalia Suidae, et far farris, et Spiritui Columbia. Sicut erat in principio, et nunc, et semper, et in saecula saeculorum. Amen.

We cannot say we are very religious, but we ARE highly devoted to our bacon and coffee. Marty’s is a place of bread-breaking, confession, and the occasional Sunday crossword.  We discuss the events of the week, and this is how we came to the radical decision to begin a blog about ourselves.

We are far away and isolated from the rest of the world – we say this ironically; we are in a bagel deli in a city of 300,000.  BUT, this city is about a million bazillion miles from anywhere else.  No way to get out, except by plane and $2,000.  Our families miss us.  We miss them.  We want to let them know how we are and what we’re up to in this popsicle stand. And even though CoCo’s family has never even met any of Peach’s family, CoCo and Peach are family, and spend lots and lots and lots of time together.

So get ready for bagels, bacon, fashion, mountain hikes, Alaskan factoids, and the wild side of libraries!  You know you’re squirming in your seats, waiting for our book reviews and opinions on the Carr’s salad bar.

We hope to keep you entertained and up to date.  At this time, however, our coffee cups are drained, and we have errands to run.

Until next week, stay warm Cheechakos!