Attack of the Kitchen Toys

Chez Boeckman-Walker is a very toy-filled house. That's appropriate considering we came to own notre maison to accommodate the husband's vast collection of Star Wars action figures, vehicles, accessories and other detritus. The boy has picked up on his collecting bug (plague is more like it), but we're trying our best to keep it in check. Moi, I don't have tools or technology--I have toys too.

And yesterday, I got some news ones for ma cuisine and for the Star Wars room/study where I work (work to earn money, that is, not to stay in shape or provide fodder for this blog).

Falling into the category of "Christopher Kimball told me to buy this" is the new 8-inch chef's knife.


Per the Cook's Illustrated equipment review, I acquired a Forschner (Victorinox) Fibrox and I can most definitely see why it was so well received at America's Test Kitchen. Phallic imagery aside, I certainly feel...empowered wielding this thing because, well, it fits so nicely in my hand and it does its job efficiently and quickly.


It lets me do the job of slicing, dicing, etc. efficiently and quickly. If you spend any amount of time in the kitchen preparing meals that don't requiring simply adding water or unsealing and nuking, then get yourself one of these babies. It's a solid investment.

My second toy was.... Well, I don't quite know how to explain this, but I found myself obsessed with mortars and pestles. I've read over and over and over again how they're practically the center of an Indian kitchen, and I realized that without one, all the seeds and pods I've acquired for various Indian recipes are just going to go to waste. While I doubt I'll ever go so far as to make my own garam masala and freshly ground cumin and other spices for which a mortar and pestle are essential, I'm thrilled to have one.


If you're ever in the market for an M&P (as I saw them oh so cleverly referred to as on a number of sites), don't get lost in all the rave reviews for the lava rock-like ones from Mexico or the "ultimate" Thai ones. Unless you're a foodie (you know, a food snob--one who's all about about image and having the "right" stuff), you don't need to go to the expensive--and they are expensive, probably because those foodies are tripping over themselves to acquire them and driving up the price and because, well, the damn things are heavy. I myself was torn between the Cordon Bleu model and a high school chemistry class-worthy model for about half the price. I opted for the Cordon Blue model because it was larger (I think--can't say that I took the time to do the math to figure out the exact size of the science class model) and because adding it to the chef's knife order at Amazon scored me free shipping. With the shipping free, I practically got the mortar and pestle free. Woohoo!

Supper, Fast and Easy
I was quite busy yesterday editing drug monographs then scanning and packaging those scans into a PDF to upload for the coders in Delhi, and that little activity required four or five computer restarts and, eventually, the installation of Adobe Creative Suite (or Adobe Creative Sweet! if you want to be geeky). I'd picked up the boy from daycare on my way back from yet another HPB visit so that the husband could go directly from work to the gym to claim his license (yes, it wasn't lost after all, just forgotten Saturday morning in the gym's kids' care center), so I was a little hard-pressed for time and attention to make a grand feast.

And when you're hard-pressed for time and attention, you make a quick and easy chicken stir fry using heat-and-eat low-fat, low-sodium chicken breasts (sweet chili flavored), a bag of sugar snap pea veggie mix for stir fry and the sauce/glaze from a quickie stir fry recipe. Oh, and you also throw in a pot of bowling water two bags of 10-minute brown rice.


Looks pretty tasty, non? And I didn't even break a sweat for this one, which was a nice change of pace.

The sweet chili chicken breasts added a nice kick to the stir fry because that recipe is totally lacking in flavor if prepared as directed. May the FSM bless HEB for its quality quick-serve products!


As wonderful as this meal looks plated, it wasn't a total hit with the fam. The boy--being the boy that he is--outright refused to eat any mushrooms that might have been served unto him. Getting him to eat the few sugar snap peas he did eat took quite a bit of coaxing, and he took forever to eat the carrots.

Then again, his sluggish ingestion pace was largely due to our choice of dining entertainment. While at HPB, I found the Voyagers! complete series on DVD. I have fond memories of this show, which aired when I was in the first grade, and oddly enough, I'd been thinking about it just that morning on my way home from the gym. Imagine my surprise and delight to see the boxed set on the shelf. And the clerk who rang up my purchase shared with me how much he'd loved the show as a kid. That's the nice thing about HPB: You don't get the pretentious, snooty unemployable Lit Ph.D. grads that you often encounter at other book stores. Or at least if they are Lit Ph.D. grads, they don't feel the need to show off their education.

Les Chats Dans la Cuisine
If you haven't picked up on it yet, Gentle Reader, I'm a crazy cat lady. I can't help myself--although the husband strongly wishes I would, even though he has a bit of crazy cat lady in him. (And no, that wasn't a sexually slanted line.) Since the kitchen is one of "my" rooms in the house, my three feline kids tend to spend a lot of time there. Okay, they spend a lot of time there because they think they're going to get more food. Especially Parmer (aka, Parmer Lane, Mr. P, Parmer Dude, P. Dude--yes, he's vying with P. Diddy/Puff Daddy/Diddy/Puffy/StayPuft for most names assumed in a lifetime), whose poor damaged brain must not be able to send or process hunger signals properly because he's always meeping (Parmer meeps; he doesn't meow) for more food, sometimes within minutes of eating. Since he can't control his appetite, Parmer's.... Well, Parmer's my big boy.


Last night, Parmer decided he wanted to help me with the dishes. Or thought he might be able to find scraps in the dishwasher. Or decided the open dishwasher door's plastic was cooler on his enormous belly than the ceramic tile floor. Or--well hell, I don't really know what motivates Parmer to do anything that doesn't directly involve food. But here's Parmer making his blog debut at last.

(And no, please don't contact me to rant about how unsanitary cats in kitchens and cats sitting on kitchen appliance doors are. I really, really don't care. Humans are far too clean for their own good, and, hell, I've cleaned up enough feline bodily fluids and byproducts and enough human bodily fluids and byproducts that nothing bothers me. The residents of Chez Boeckman-Walker are all in damn fine health. Except for Parmer, and he'll tell you his problem is glandular.)

Of course, Parmer wasn't the only cat in my kitchen. The husband got creative while waiting for me to finish up scanning, uploading, emailing and everything else I had to do to send off my first batch of edited monographs.


I really think this is an expression of how the husband feels at times. He would be Bats. Me, I'm Catwoman (heh, doesn't the husband wish!) with my brood of cats.


If you'll look closely, you'll notice Bats is smirking. 'cuz that's what he does. He's not going to show you that in some way he's enjoying the torture, but he is. The husband...well, he's not going to fully admit that he's enjoying the torture of me and my horde, but he is. Or else he gets the whip!