Brandon Eats

Halloween is Less Fun Than You Remember

Photo by Tom Nardone and used with his kind permission.  Pumpkin carving will never be the same after you visit ExtremePumpkins.com.

I can't believe I forgot it was Halloween, but blame it on the Style 25th Anniversary Party last night.  Four glasses of wine and two chili egg rolls, or whatever those things were, can be dangerous. 

More importantly, at my house, anyway, it's been all-Halloween, all the time, with constant updates on costume decisions and changes every day for the last two and half weeks.  I've got to get some real food in my Hermione/Chinese Empress/Nancy Drew and her less fickle gypsy sister before the candy onslaught begins.  They just won't eat pizza another day this week, so for this hungover mother, thankfully, Mother Superior Ayun Halliday posted a recipe even I, with my limited mental capacities, can whip up.  Here's a link and if you're feeling a little fresher, inspired even, here's another to the kind of great little Halloween treat more temperate mommies make their little darlings on Halloween.

Cookie Madness

This little tidbit is sort of a cheat.  I've more or less decided to include great grocery finds whenever I can,  and this comes from Sammy's Bakery on MacArthur Avenue in Northside.  You couldn't really find a cookie this good at a grocery store, could you?  It's an inspired (and I'm not using that word loosely) creation; it's the cookie equivalent of big, bright tungsten filament blasting through your brain, and I have to wonder why, why, WHY did it take so long for me to find my new favorite thing?   A delicately flavored lemon cookie with a hearty chew, studded with big hunks of white chocolate is no cookie to share, nor are second or third you'll want covertly to eat.  Is it the butteriness?  The tang of the lemon?  Or the melting, vanilla-scented chunks of cocoa butter that drive me so crazy?

One Year Ago Today

I published this a year ago but I could have written this post today--in fact, I almost did.

Restaurants in this town seem to be ubiquitous (and it's RESTAURANT WEEK, god help me) and they keep getting in the way of life with less food. If I could just stick with the  Katzen/Willett diet I mentioned in a previous post, it just might work a little better for me.  The food's good, although like any vegetarian-based menu, it's almost deal-breakingly labor intensive. 

I'm more willing than the average cook (or mass murderer) to wield a really sharp knife just for kicks, but some nights the prospect of  chopping broccoli, onions, garlic, carrots, zucchini, scallions, parsley, cilantro and nuts for the main course and then turning around and toasting pine nuts, squeezing lemon juice, and mincing dill and chives for a whole grain side dish--but wait!  That doesn't include the recommended salad and gussied-up vegetable, now does it?  How about some broccoli soup or vegetable broth with corn, too?  It's a whole lot of great, filling food but occasionally (well, with more and more alarming frequency), it sends me fleeing, with my family handing me my car keys, to Su Casa, where we can order, eat, pay the check and leave, on a good night, in about twenty minutes (truly--I timed it once).  And Su Casa has margaritas--neither recommended by Katzen and Willett nor available at my house.

I Need a Prix Fixe, Now

Hey, I'm a couple days late but you still have plenty of time to go get your prix fixe during Richmond Restaurant Week to benefit the Central Virgina Foodbank.  The whole shebang ends October 28th, but the following restaurants are still happily accepting reservations:

Acacia, 354-6060
Amici, 353-4700
Bacchus, 355-9919
Cabo's Corner Bistro, 355-1144
Europa, 643-0911
Hondos at Innsbrook, 968-4323
Juleps, 377-3968
La Grotta, 644-2466
Michelle's at Hanover Tavern, 537-5250
Millie's Diner, 643-5512
Rowland Fine Dining, 257-9885
Sam Miller's, 644-5465
Six Burner, 353-4060
The Hard Shell, 643-2333
The Hill Cafe, 648-0360
The Track, 359-4781
TJ's in the Jefferson, 788-8000
Twenty-Seven, 780-0086
Zed Cafe, 261-5656
Zeus Gallery Cafe, 359-3219

And while your at it, drop off something to the Food Bank itself too--they're urgently in need of:

Canned Chicken & Ham
Canned Tuna & Salmon
Peanut Butter
Canned Vegetables
Canned Fruits
Spaghetti Sauce
Hot & Cold Cereals
Pasta & Rice

Down Under

We've all got to be somewhere--for my review of Down Under Restaurant & Lounge, see my review in this week's Style Weekly.

Further Notes on Fabulous Finds

I love yogurt.  But I LOVE yogourt.  This French-Canadian creamy indulgence is crammed full of fat and calories and, subsequently, bears very little resemblance to the tart, almost astringently healthful nonfat version we all mostly eat and pretty much like. This is like whipped cream cheese without the ick-factor--or the thick factor, and falls on the yummy dairy product scale to just this side of marscapone's richness.  That's a good thing; as much as we all love marscapone, we'd probably throw up if we ate six ounces of it at one sitting. While supplies last at Ellwood Thompson's, in the slightly crunchy, curiously foreign plum & walnut.