Saturday night: Radici (new menu!) and then They Might Be Giants at The Music Hall. TMBG puts on a fun live show (2 encores!), and man, do I love the venue: Perfect sized theatre, great view from the balcony, plenty of leg room in the seats (oh yeah — I don’t have to stand the whole time), and when it’s all over it takes less than 3 minutes to exit the building and get to the car — and then home in 20 minutes! Take that Boston!

Sunday afternoon: Portsmouth Symphony Orchestra, again, at The Music Hall. It would be cool to play in a group like this: Local and volunteer — of course there’s not that many seats for winds. They did a pretty good job, although they are not quite up to the level of the UNH Orchestra. Sometimes the intonation was off, and they sound what I can only describe as “tentative” at times. But they did a great job on Dvorak’s New World Symphony.

Worst part of the concert was, of course, the audience: Arrive late? No problem, walk down the center aisle and take a seat in the 2nd row. Need to get up and fiddle with your video camera? Please, leave your seat and return 4 times in 10 minutes, it’s not distracting at all. Oh, and when you get up and disappear for the remainder of the concert, leave your coat behind, with the cell phone in it. And the ringer on. Please don’t worry about the “beep” it will make every 90 seconds for the remainder of the concert. Hey at least the beep is (mostly) in the same key as Dvorak!

After the concert: Radici (new menu!)

Or, 22 eggs, 10 gins, 4 vermouths and a few Bloody Marys.

After months of pleading, Friday night my wife’s aunt and her SO came for a visit. Long time readers may recollect that we hung nary a piece of artwork until Natalie came to visit six months after we moved in, and then she hung everything. We’d hung a few things since then, but we had a jam-up of about a dozen pieces of artwork (several of which I brought back from my father’s store before he sold it) that needed a home. But first we entertained them…

We started the night with a tasting of the ten gins in the house:

• Bombay Sapphire
• Hendricks
• Boodles
• Brokers
• Old Raj
• No 209
• Junipero
• Plymouth
• Martin Miller
• Bluecoat

Surprisingly (to me at least) Brokers was one of the favorites. I’d always thought of Brokers as safe if somewhat boring. Natalie picked up on a pleasant peppery flavor that I never noticed before. She also found Martin Miller to be cucumber-y. Hendricks is supposed to be the “cucumber gin” but indeed next to Martin Miller, Hendricks’ rose flavor is more pronounced. We moved on to sample the four types of sweet vermouth I have on hand: Martini & Rossi (blah), Noilly Pratt (fine), Punt e Mes (crucial for an official Negroni) and Carpano Antica. The last was hard to find but worth the effort — this stuff is amazingly good.

We also tried a few homemade gin concoctions — I’ve had three attempts at kumquat-infused gin stewing for a few months. The first two were not very exciting. The third however was pretty good: In addition to kumquats, I had added black peppercorns, grains of paradise and coriander. Neat flavor. Maybe I’ll make a bigger batch and come up with a house cocktail.

On to dinner:

• French Onion Soup
• Golden Beet and Blood Orange Salad with pistachios
• Meyer Lemon-Tarragon Sorbet
• Filet Mignon au Poivre with Bernaise, asparagus and pommes anna with gorgonzola
• Apricot-Almond Creme Brulee

The soup came out great… probably the best French Onion I’ve made, which is ironic since I was totally off-book. I’ve tried many recipes but they always seem to be lacking in flavor. This night’s magic recipe was: one each red, yellow and sweet onion; 2 garlic cloves; splash of amontillado sherry; 1/2 c white wine; 4 c beef broth; sourdough baguette croutons and real Gruyere.

The pommes anna were also the best in a while. Natalie and Eddie were in charge of layering. While not as geometrically rigorous as my father-in-law, they seemed to have the touch for just the right amount of “flair” (shallots, butter, cheese, salt & pepper) between layers. That, plus the gorgonzola. Need to remember to always use a little bleu cheese from now on, even though technically I’m not a fan. But it’s good in the potatoes.

With dessert, we had some Mondavi Botrytis dessert wine, which was a good pairing with the apricot in the creme brulee. We listened to some music, sang along with some musicals (one of us), talked about watching a movie (some of us), broke the DVD player (one of us), talked about family members (only the ones that don’t read the blog) and finally watched a little Robot Chicken before bed.

On to breakfast… Eggs Benedict (scrambled) with homefries and Bloody Marys. It was while scrambling up the eggs my wife suddenly pointed out our carton was empty… which was surprised me considering I had just bought 2 dozen. Then I did the math: bernaise (3), creme brulee (8), hollandaise (3), scrambled eggs (8)… ugh that’s a lotta yolks. They say oatmeal lowers cholesterol right? For the Bloody Marys we used this great local mix we discovered at an Artichokes wine tasting: Bloody’s by Buz (he’s got a great cucumber soup recipe too).

After brunch, Natty re-arranged the pictures in our house and found homes for the new additions, while Eddie somehow fixed the DVD player with his magic touch (he took it apart, poked at it, and put it back together), before they hit the road for their next night’s adventure with friends in Dover.

I could never afford a new clarinet in college — not that I particularly felt I needed one. I didn’t have ambitions to be a performer, so I just kept playing my trusty old intermediate student model. However since starting to play again, I’m been reminded of certain difficulties, and figure why not setup myself up with something easier to play? So I bought a new clarinet. It’s a Patricola, made in Italy. The majority of clarinets are made from grenadilla wood (almost black or at least stained black), but this one is rosewood. Pretty cool looking. Rosewood is supposed to sound the best, but be difficult to machine (when making the clarinet) and temperamental about changes in humidity (for the owner) which is why you don’t see them often. This one just came from Arizona, so hopefully is adjusts ok to its new climate.

Tonight I also went to my first rehearsal of a local wind ensemble I found. Their audition process sounded rather intimidating (as bad as auditioning to get into college) but after going I’m not so worried, and the rehearsal turned out to be just good fun. I didn’t take the new clarinet since I didn’t want to be flashing around a weird looking instrument I wasn’t familiar with on my first night.

We drove down to Boston Friday night to see UNH v BC at the Garden. The game started at 5pm and ended 5 hours later. It went into 3 overtime periods. Yes, I actually watched all of them. It was kind of an edge-of-your seat game. BC made the game-winning goal. They were almost perfectly matched, and it seemed pretty clear to me that the reason they lost was a bone-head move by UNH… one of the guys lost his stick, and so decided to blatantly get on his hands and knees in front of a BC player to trip him. BC was able to score the game winning goal during the resulting penalty, 1 min into the 6th period. I didn’t realize hockey overtime was sudden death, so I was disappointed when I saw the teams shaking hands and figured out it was over just like that. The UNH goalie Kevin Regan is just amazing — 62 saves in the game. He’s like the Ditka of college hockey (Note: all I know about Ditka is from those old Sat Night Live sketches). I wonder if I will still like hockey next year without him?

And yes, we even went back down to Boston the following night to watch BC beat VT. That wasn’t as interesting to me, although that’s ok, I had enough stress the previous night. And it gave me a chance to get an ice cream sundae (excuse me, they serve gelato now in the Garden, not ice cream). Which ended up with hot fudge all over me thanks to the concession staff. Last time I do that.

We had a pretty good dinner before Saturday’s game at Flat Iron Tapas Bar which is within walking distance of the Garden. Pretty good food, and we had a great cocktail (Belveder Pomarancza, Drambuie, Ginger Beer) although the bar service was pretty bad… it took us 25 minutes to get our first cocktail, three of the signature cocktails we attempted to order they couldn’t make because they didn’t have the secret ingredients made up, and even when the waitress mentioned “maybe” we could have those instead for our second round and we were clear that we would do that, they still had not gotten around to puréeing the Asian pear or whatever. Ah, well, all that really matters is the food is pretty good and they are within walking distance of the Garden.

One rehearsal, one dress rehearsal (no stopping) and two performances — my first musician gig in a long time is behind me. It went OK. I think opening night went a little better than closing night… there were a couple places where the singers and the orchestra didn’t exactly cooperate. Our conductor deserves a lot of credit for holding it all together, especially with no piano to cover. But most importantly, I didn’t embarrass myself — I’m not saying I played every note — just that I didn’t play any unintended solos or let out a squeak. And I nailed that high fast part in the Entr’acte.

Talk about truly bizarre coincidences… As we picked up our tickets Saturday night (my wife, sister and first cousin-once-removed were seeing the show) someone came up to the ticket table to complain that their front row seats were obstructed by the barrier put up to protect the harpist from the audience. They had three tickets, as did we… I was just considering whether we should offer to swap since of course my family would prefer to sit right next to the orchestra (right?), when I looked up to see the woman conferring with someone else in her party who in profile looked an awful lot like my wife’s aunt [my wife’s mother’s brother’s wife, for those keeping score at home]. I couldn’t see her full face and certainly didn’t think it was conceivable she would be there. I was actually trying to catch my wife’s eye and nod to say, “Hey doesn’t that look like…” when her uncle appeared out of the crowd and said jovially, “Jeez, the nerve of some people, this guy just keeps staring at you!” Turns out they had a niece in the show and had made the trip to see it.

So, now I have to figure out what to do next. I’m not sure how long I’ll last just practicing on my own with no real goal. I wish there was a nice low-commitment group to join. The only ensemble I’m aware of around here is the Strafford Wind Symphony, but they rehearse in Rochester and it sounds like they already have clarinets coming out of their ears.

Seacoastonline.com: UNH’s Regan has been outstanding for Wildcats

So… what’s new with me? Well, a few weeks ago, in between hockey games, I started practicing clarinet again after a dozen-or-so year hiatus. I’ve been saying I was going to do that for a few years. I’d get it out every 9 months or so and noodle, but the instrument needed to be refurbished to really be playable and I never got off my butt to take it to Manchester. What I needed was a goal…

I have a friend (a lapsed music education major like myself) who is an administrator at an area school and happens to musical direct their high school musical every year. This year he convinced me to get my act together and play in the pit orchestra. I’ve been practicing for a few weeks, and the show is this weekend. It’s a nice big 17-piece orchestra (better than most musicals in Boston lately) with a mix of faculty, professional musicians and a few students. We only had two rehearsals with the kids, which were a little dicey. We’re still getting emails with last minute notes on cuts, repeats and other changes. So we’ll see how opening night goes.

I played clarinet for 12 years, and then took about as many off. That I hadn’t been playing as long as I’d ever played kind of shocked me. In my own mind, I never quit I just hadn’t played lately — and then *poof* 12 years go by! Starting again was not hard — much of it really is like riding a bike. I didn’t forget how to read music, nor rhythm, nor how to finger the notes. My biggest challenges are retraining my fingers to move smoothly and evenly when playing fast passages, and endurance. I used to be able to play a mean hemidemisemiquaver chromatic scale — apparently my brain has replaced that with the ability to type my username and password really quickly. As for endurance, luckily, I get plenty of breaks in the musical — I’m playing 2nd clarinet so I spend quite a bit of time with my clarinet in my lap counting (hopefully without moving my lips).

It’s nice to come home from work to do something other than more work or make dinner and watch TV. It’s also nice to have something to do while the wife plays on her new Wii. And it’s strangely comforting to have back these little aches that I grew up with… the sore right thumb joint and the raw callous behind my lower lip (Bite your lower lip… see where your bottom teeth dig in? Repeat).

While I wasn’t paying attention to the instrumentalists’ world, technology marched on… I was surprised to see that several players in the orchestra had these little flat screen LCD monitors instead of sheet music, and they can even write on them with a little stylus. I’d never seen nor heard of the MusicPad. Pretty cool. Why didn’t I think of that?

Next up: Kreblog, your turn to break out the French Horn… there’s a pent up demand for horn players in this area.

[guest entry by the wife]

We picked a good time to start going to UNH hockey games. Saturday night’s 5 to 1 win over Boston college clinched the Hockey East regular-season championship. We’ve gone to three games now and I’ve learned a few things:

• The Whitimore Center is cold and waiting in the funnel of people to climb the stairs on the way back to A lot is even colder
• Getting tickets by signing up for an “alumni event” is like getting a free weekend away to a place that sells time-shares - you have to sit through the presentation where they try to get you to give them your money.
• There are seats with backs in the last row of the student section!
• Doesn’t matter that there are seats with backs because everyone in the student section stands up through the entire game.
• I’m getting too old to stand up through an entire hockey game. It’s to the point where I’m actually glad to see the TV commercial light come on because it means I can sit down for a couple of minutes. :p
• Walking by the concession stand with the shirts/hoodies/jerseys gave me an idea for Mr P’s upcoming birthday.
• UNH is ranked 2nd in the NCAA.
• The current UNH goalie Kevin Regan, who was the Defensive Player of the Week in Hockey East for the past two weeks, is a senior. Translation: it could be a very different experience next season.
• My plan to turn YouWho into a hockey fan might have actually started working (insert evil maniacal laugh here).
• There is a 10 year waiting list for season tickets, so I have a while to carry out my plan.

[guest entry by the wife]

You Who gave me the best present ever for Christmas this year: a planned trip to Las Vegas! The key word there is “planned”. The idea started when You Who listened to a review on NPR of the soundtrack from the new Cirque du Soleil show called Love. We listened to the album and liked it so much that we talked about going to Las Vegas with the express purpose to see the show. Of course it does help that Vegas has recently become known for having a lot of celebrity restaurants — after all our vacations are usually all about the food. Anyway, I digress…

We had this idea about going to Vegas for a long weekend, going to the show and going out for some great meals, but we never seemed to get it together to pick a weekend to go. Being the great husband You Who is, for my Christmas present he planned a trip, booked the plane tickets, hotel reservations, got tickets to the show and made dinner reservations. He even contacted my manager and made sure I would be able to take the time off of work. Christmas morning I was presented with a professional looking report binder containing all the details of the trip. It was awesome!

• Tomorrow we are flying to Philadelphia and going to Iron Chef Morimoto’s restaurant. You Who had the idea of making the stop in Philadelphia to make the most of our trip and not have to spend the whole day flying to Vegas.
• Friday, we are flying to Vegas! We are staying at the MGM Grand Hotel. Friday night we are going to Tom Colicchio’s (head judge on Top Chef) restaurant Craft Steak and the Cirque du Soleil show Love.
• Saturday night we are going to Michael Mina’s restaurant Nob Hill and another Cirque du Soleil show.
• Sunday will be spent flying home to our kitties, who I’m sure will be eagerly awaiting our return.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot that part of my present was tickets to a UNH hockey game! You Who isn’t really into sports, which works out great for me most of the time. So, it was very sweet of him to get tickets (which isn’t easy) and sign up to go with me to a game. I had so much fun and You Who hung in there and sat with me most of the game (in the past he has disappeared for the 2nd period to assess the concessions and find ice cream). He followed the game and asked me questions about the rules. I had flashbacks of being a little girl and our family going to a Capitals game, where I would sit next to my dad and ask him questions throughout the game. It was a great game — UNH beat UMass 5 to 3!

I’m off to California for a week, but before I go, a quick re-cap of this weekend’s culinary experiments:

Saturday: Cider Braised Chicken [Gourmet, Nov 2007], broccoli with pink peppercorn vinaigrette and roasted fingerling potatoes. Very easy recipe, great flavor in the sauce. Made with bone-in, skin-on split chicken breasts which I salted several hours ahead. Added a little cider vinegar to the sauce at end, to suit my tastes. Maybe cut down on the cream next time to make it a little healthier? Used this recipe as the starting point for vinaigrette although added mustard. Wine: Altos Los Hormigos Malbec 2006.

Sunday: Grilled Pork Chops with Quince Sauce, Onion Port Marmalade [Gourmet, Oct 2007], green beans with radicchio and royal rice blend. I like finding ways to try quince, and using it in a savory recipe is something I haven’t tried yet. The sauce had a unique flavor (in a good way). Sauce on bottom, pork, marmalade — when all mixed together it worked very well and had a nice complexity. Used 2 quinces (probably 0.75 lbs chopped). Wonder if quince paste would work? Used too much sugar in marmalade by mistake — added red wine vinegar to try an compensate. Wine: Santa Rita Medalla Real Cab 2005. Pumpkin-Cranberry croissant bread pudding [Fine Cooking, Jan 2008]. Meh. I like the blueberry croissant bread pudding recipe I have better.

I hear these female musicians on the radio all the time, but for some reason I can’t keep them straight, so here’s my little cheat sheet:

• Rilo Kiley (a band, actually)
• Joanna Newsom (harp)
• Lily Allen (British)
• Cat Power
• Feist (1234 iPod ad)
• Neko Case (also member of The New Pornographers)

One I can keep straight: Amy Winehouse. Blech. (Sorry Kreblog).

Thanks to Pam for turning us on to Mad Men, a fascinating look at 1960s Madison Avenue ad men… a time when the men were men and the women were… well, whatever the men wanted them to be, apparently (wife/secretary/easy). I can get over all the smoking, but the drinking! It seems so bizarre… Scotch when your boss comes in your office, scotch when the younger guys come in your office, Bloody Marys for the client meeting in the conference room, Martinis for lunch. Was everyone a high-functioning alcolholic back then? (If I am to believe Cheever’s stories and The Man in the Gray Flannel Suite, the answer is a resounding “yes.”)

We caught two episodes on Tivo and liked it enough that I went back and got the earlier episodes on iTunes. My favorite line, from the pilot; a man to his fiancee, tenderly spoken without irony: “Of course I love you. I’m giving up my life to be with you, aren’t I?” Charmer! Let’s hope he writes his own vows.

I’ve been reading a lot of books on, around or about Cape Cod recently, includng one (The Widow’s War) about life in 1761 Satucket village (now Brewster). It prompted me to get on The Google and see what I could come up with on my family. I knew we’d been around the Cape a long time. Turns out I was able to trace my paternal side straight back to Plymouth circa 1623:

1. Me (1972-)
2. David (1949-)
3. Robert (1923-1999)
4. Everett (1899-1976)
5. Austin (1877-1947)
6. Capt Noah (1845-1902)
7. Noah (1811-1885)
8. Noah (1787-1863)
9. Stephen (1761-1844)
10. Barnabas (1730-1802)
11. Israel (1686-1760)
12. John (1649-1717)
13. John (1623-1691)

I was lucky in my search because, after John moved from Plymouth, every generation stayed in the same town until Everett (my great-grandfather whom I can remember), and someone had taken the time to put all of the town’s old records online. Unfortunatey I found no record of how John showed up in Plymouth. However, I did find that if I follow the tree another way, it would appear my 10xgreat-grandfather John was also my great-something-uncle (or, put another way, 3xgreat-grandfather Capt Noah married his something-cousin some-number-of-times removed):

1. Me (1972-)
2. David (1949-)
3. Robert (1923-1999)
4. Everett (1899-1976)
5. Austin (1877-1947)
6. Capt Noah (1845-1902) was married to Emma (1847-1928)
7. Isaac (1809-1859) was Emma’s father
8. Elisabeth (1770-1854) was Isaac’s mother and her father was…
9. David (1733-?)
10. David (1701-1741)
11. David (1662-1745)
12. John (1623-1691)

I also found a great collection of family names in the extended tree (almost reads like an Andrew Lloyd Webber song): Apphia, Azuba, Bethiah, Dorcas, Ebenezer, Eleazer, Ezekiel, Ezra, Jedediah, Levi, Matilda, Meltiah, Mercy, Nabby, Nehemiah, Octavia, Reuben, Solomon, Zibiah & Zilah. My those Puritans sure did like their Biblical names! My sister called dibs on Nabby and Dorcas (for kids or pets). I’m split, since I feel like good old New England names like Ebenezer and Ezra deserve a resurgence, but I’d have a hard time not going for Azuba or Zibiah.

Despite my abhorence of reality TV, I’m a big fan of Top Chef. I like Top Chef, because unlike other cooking reality shows, this one is actually about food and the culinary arts — not degrading contestants — and I feel like I learn something and get some ideas. (And I think Bravo just knows how to do reality without making it all trashy).

That said, I am a little disappointed where we stand in Season 3 heading into the finals. I don’t think any of the finalists are truly Top Chef material — at least of the caliber of the Seasons 1 and 2 finalists. I think the judges screwed up by sending home some pretty solid contenders who took risks earlier, although really no one in the cast seemed to be a Harold or Ilan.

I will say though, Howie had some pretty good recipes. I’ve made his Fennel Crusted Pork Chops with Apple Fennel Salad and Raisin Emulsion twice so far this summer, and it is awesome. The recipe for the Apple Cider Reduction alone is wicked awesome.

Saturday night we had a passel of in-laws over for dinner, which included my parents-in-law, Uncle Gary the (as of yet uncertified) organic farmer from nearby Greenland, and Steve & Debbie from Landaff. Pictures were taken at each course — hopefully we’ll get some posted here.

We started with hors d’oeuvres of Cheese and Crackers, Roasted Red Pepper Hummus and Bagel Chips and Roasted Garlic Baguette with Parmesan dipping sauce. For cocktail selections we sampled a couple from the newest addition to my library, The Art of the Bar: Peaches and Herb (with Uncle Gary’s homegrown peaches and my homegrown sage) and Venetian (recommended for Campari enthusiasts). We also made our new favorite, the Sapphire Savoy and an old favorite, the Moscow Mule.

Nights are getting cooler, and my 6 tomato plants are slowing down their production, so I figured this would be the last hurrah for a summer heirloom tomato salad. We wanted to go out with a bang, so my father-in-law came up with the concept of a tomato salad served inside a large hollowed tomato, on a bed of arugala. I couldn’t stand to see the tomato guts go to waste, so I strained them and used the tomato water as the base for a vinaigrette, along with some champagne vinegar and blood orange olive oil, et voila: Ten Tomato Salad with Arugala, Mozarella, Filipino sea salt and Tomato-Blood Orange Vinaigrette. The ten heirloom varieties were: Brandywine, German Striped, Green Zebra (my own), Yellow Peach, Yellow something-else, Black Nyagous (my own), Black cherry, Sun gold cherry (my own), Yellow Pear (my own) and Pink Grape (my own). The salt was something we picked up last November in San Francisco at the Ferry Building. It has a big crystal that looks like it might be uncomfortable to eat, but they’re hollow and so they crumble in your mouth. (It was included mostly because Gary was making fun of the fact that I had more than one salt.)

Uncle Gary has an abundance of yellow squash, and I just happened to have a 16oz bag of coriander seeds purchased a few weeks ago at Atlantic Spice (if anyone needs some coriander let me know), and so: Chilled Yellow Squash and Leek Soup with Coriander and Lemon Creme Fraiche. This was pretty good, although there is one difficulty with the recipe: Running the soup through a blender does not break the coriander seeds down into comfortable bits for eating. I ended up straining it and re-blending several times, and finally just tossed out what was left. I will probably just grind them up prior to cooking next time.

Next up, a little palate cleanser. Uncle Gary also has an abundance of white peaches from a tree in his front yard. The only white peaches I had ever had were from the supermarket and they were pretty bland — it’s amazing how much better Gary’s were. So, I put the ice cream machine to good use and made up a White Peach-Lemon Verbena Sorbet which turned out great and I will probably never be able to recreate. The Lemon Verbena was my own, and I’ve been baking it into all sorts of things this summer.

On to the main course. The Inidividual Beef Wellingtons with Duxelles, Gorganzola and Madeira demiglace were cooked gray throughout — I’m lucky no one called the SPCA on me. Thankfully the puff pastry crust, mushrooms, gorganzola and demigalce made them edible. I know where I made my mistake — in the future I will sear only the top of the filets before wrapping them. In addition we had Red Apple Inn Corn Pudding (always a favorite, first time this summer), Roasted Golden Beets and Apricot-Glazed Roasted Asparagus. For wine we had Chocolain Carmenere Reserve 2004 (Chile), Susana Balbo Crios Malbec 2005 (Argentina), both purchased from a nice wine shop in Provincetown on a recent visit to the Cape.

And finally, dessert. There was much debate on the menu, but creme brulee seemed a clear favorite and I hadn’t made it in a long while. My torch had been out of commission, but my father-in-law figured that out, so I made Apricot-Almond Creme Brulee, which is essentially almond-flavored creme brulee with a little apricot jam on the bottom. I thought it was a little too firm — owing to the fact that I misjudged its done-ness in the oven and overcooked it — but better than the runny batches I’ve made in the past. I used Demerra sugar for the top, and it brulee’d up much better than anything I’ve tried before. Everyone seemed happy, and if they weren’t we had some dessert wines to keep everyone otherwise occupied: Moscato d’Asti and Mondavi Botrytis. Ah yes, we also had Aunt Debbie sample some Chartreuse — the “elixir of life” made by French monks beginning in 1605 from a secret recipe of 130 “alpine herbs” — and she is the first person to whom we’ve served it who claimed to enjoy it!