Steampunk Palin

I’m sure there are words, but I can’t seem to find them.

Click Sarah's enormous tatas for the full article.

Question to all the comic book lovers in my life: Are you familiar with these artists? Is it possible that they’re kidding? I mean, they’re kidding, right?

Right?

Points to Patty O’Toole for the assist.

Sneak preview

Those of you who also follow my funnier half on Slayer Placemat have already gotten a taste of the Homeowner Funtimes that the two of us have been having here at our new house.

My take on the past week or three will be up in the next 24 hours. A warning: it’s gonna have a lot of this:

For those of you who might still harbor hopes that John McCain hasn’t yet crossed the line into irredeemable douchebaggery

There’s always this.

With love, from Germany

One of my favorite things to come home to after a long, slightly demoralizing day at work is a  package from Carita, who left DC for an extended Stuttgartian adventure just about a year ago.

Yesterday was one of these lucky days. Among the wonders contained therein: Katzenzungen, chocolates that might or might not be made in whole or in part out of fluffy kittens.

Behold, bitches!

Two great tastes.

We all get chilly sometimes.

First, there were Kitten Mittons.

Now, say hello to Chair Personality Socks.

A few of my favorite things

Oh, hi, rosemary caramel and whiskey truffle and calvados ganache and...

Volted!

Last night, two of my favorite lady friends and I hiked up to Frederick, Maryland, for an evening at Volt.

For those of you who are not Top  Chef whores, Volt is the restaurant of Bryan Voltaggio, last season’s runner up and the kinder, hunkier bro-testant.

"Oh, hi, dreamy food-making man."

How to begin my food porn vignette?

Our foodventure began inauspiciously. One of the servers brought us each a complimentary amuse bouche, a brussle sprout shell filled with cheese foam and topped with caviar that he promised would “give us a sense of what was to come.” While the foam was a nice balance of textural delicacy and potent flavor, the caviar was curiously undetectable–odd given the generous amount that had been sprinkled atop the bite–and the foam overwhelmed the nice bitterness of the brussel sprout. If this was a taste of what was to come, I feared a rather spendy bout with disappointment.

As it turned out, the amuse bouche was the only off bite of the night. The ladies and I agreed to each order a full four courses, and we chose items we were all kind of hot to try, so we could sample as much as possible without making our guts explode. (I am still waiting for someone to invent the detachable supplemental stomach, thus eliminating the eyes-bigger-than-stomach dilemma forever.)

Here’s the scorecard:

Course 1: Our contenders were a shitaake mushroom voloute (which I had no idea was a soup until the waiter set up a big spoon before it arrived … ah, French and its pesky Frenchy words), a tuna tartare, and a beet and goat cheesed salad with goat cheese made at a really awesome local dairy. Each of these courses was lovely, but the real standouts were the tuna tartare, which was topped with avocado and this insane stuff called “soy air” and just enough chili oil to give it a definitive kick, and the marvelously mushroomy soup, accented with pine nut and chili oil.

Round 1 Winner: mushroom voloute.

Course 2 contained the plate that came closest to being a dud–a scallop and cauliflower dish that, while not at all offensive, lacked acidity. My second course was a plate of veal sweetbreads, fried in a slightly cakey batter that accentuated the suppleness of the sweetbreads and accented with traces of kalamata olive, lemon, and raisin. Even better was the pork belly, which was basically a three dimensional hunk of the most marvelous bacony goodness you could imagine.

Round 2 Winner: The pork belly

Course 3: Here, one of my friends and I both went for the pork tenderloin, pepper crusted and served with brussel sprouts and sweet potato puree. I think this dish was the sleeper hit of the night. My first few bites were pleasant enough, but by the time I was finishing it up, I didn’t want it to end. It was a dish I could eat every night for the rest of my life and be a pretty happy girl. We also got to taste the rabbit four ways, which included a bit of that sous vide business that always seems to make or break the reality show cheftestants.  (Our very awesome waiter explained to us how to sous vide at home, too, which was cool of him, though I’m not sure my Tombstone-pizza-toasting-arse will be giving it a go anytime soon.)

Course 3 winner: I admit a bias, but I’m going with the pork here.

Course 4: Ahhh, dessert. We had the textures of chocolate, the dulce de leche, and chocolate torte with clementine sorbet. The textures of chocoate was a bit sweet for my tastes, but my chocolate/clementine dessert was a wonderful combination of bitter/tart/sweetness. The big winner here was the dulce de leche, though–which, despite the name, consisted primarily of wonderfully tangy goat cheese cake and a granny smith apple sorbet that I wish was sold by the pint. Oh, heavens.

Course 4 goes to: dulce de leche

In addition to all this yumminess, we were treated to some pretty kick ass house-made biscuits (mine was seasoned with bacon and thyme, and doubled as a pretty awesome soup ladle while it lasted) and a complimentary plate of the tiniest of ice cream sandwiches, each made with quarter-sized cookies. The service ranged from fine to excellent, with my two major complaints being that 1) we waited way too long for our wine bottle to arrive at our table and 2) the hostesses lacked the polish that you’d expect at a fancy place like this, even if it is the kind of  fancy-but-deliberately-laid-back place where all the waiters wear chucks with their dress shirts and pants.

The final verdict: Well worth the trip to east-bumble-Frederick, well worth the hundred buckos a person, and, yes, well worth getting to catch a glimpse of a Voltaggio as you scooted past the kitchen on the way to the powder room.

ISO enlightenment

If anyone can explain to me what the big deal is about the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, I’d appreciate it.

While you’re at it, you can help me out with Animal Collective’s Merriweather Post Pavilion. I loved Strawberry Jam, but this one just sounds kind of monotonous, and, well … moist.

“Moist” does not constitute a positive description of anything except cake.

Ladies’ Room Etiquette

Yes, folks. It’s the long awaited second installment in my Arbitrary Etiquette Series!

While I doubt it will be as contentious a topic as ladies’ locker room decorum proved to be a while back, there are still a goodly number of shared ladies’ room etiquette issues that need to be addressed, despite the fact that they should be self-evident to those of us raised in this wonderful thing we call modern civilization.

Shall we?

• Ladies, please do not hover. I know what you are thinking, namely that the horror show of a toilet seat you are faced with is such an aberration to all things happy and holy and good that actually sitting on it is unthinkable. While I sympathize, I feel the need to point out that the very aberration that is leading you to loom over the toilet in a thigh-quavering squat is the result of someone before you doing the same looming/quivering/squatting thing you’re doing now. You can’t aim when your legs are trembling. You just can’t. Thusly, the pee-covered seat. Thusly, the subsequent hover. Thusly, more pee on the seat. And so this whole vicious cycle thing gets started. Vicious cycles are the same thing that caused our subprime mortgage crisis. This means they are bad!
• Ladies, please do not answer your cell phones in the bathroom stall. Besides the fact that no one in the bathroom needs to hear a one-sided account of why your ex-boyfriend is such a douche, and besides the fact that no one on the other end of the phone needs to hear strangers making myriad bathroom noises in the background of your conversation, there is the unavoidable issue of how exactly one manages to maintain a cell phone conversation whilst taking care of their bathroom business. Please do not leave your fellow ladies’ room patrons to wonder how you’re managing this juggling act.
• Ladies, please do not start conversations with passing acquaintances or strangers whilst in the stalls. Especially if they are conversations in workplace bathrooms about workplace issues. Unless the conversation goes something like, “Sue? Is that you? Your cubicle is on fire,” followed by, “Oh, holy shit, Margaret. Thank you for letting me know.” Though even in that case there’s not a whole heck of a lot Sue can do about said cubicle fire until she’s done doing her business in said stall. Because she’s busy. In the bathroom. Right.

things that make me confused, #50

J.Crew sells “summerweight” shorts. As opposed to those shorts designed for winters endured in harsh climates.