Another Bout of Randomness, Cauliflower Surprise

September 23rd Cauliflower surprise! Don't everyone rush over for dinner at once. Cauliflower is that vegetable, that even for me, doesn't inspire a hearty stomach growl. It's the bastard cousin of broccoli, not as pretty, and tastes for all intensive purposes, like nothing. If you inspect any veggie platter post-party you will see a large collection of lonely cauliflower sitting in its respective tray. People just don't want it, it has no flair, no pizzazz, no taste - that is unless you add a lot of cheese. Cheese makes everything better. So as a complement to some leftover ribs (yes, mom and dad, we are still eating them, and there is more in the freezer) I took this white, tasteless substance and transformed it into something edible. The recipe is Steamed Cauliflower with Cheddar-Mustard Cream Sauce, and here are your necessities. 1 head of cauliflower chopped into broccoli looking florets 1 cup of heavy cream 1 cup of shredded cheddar (the sharper, the better) 1 Tbs of whole grain mustard (the powder, not French's) pinch of Cayenne pepper salt (to taste) pepper (same) I am going to go through this recipe as if I didn't initially screw it up. But I will tell you to keep these ingredients handy . . . 1 cup of crumbled blue cheese 1 tbs of corn starch t tbs of water The recipe I followed calls for a large pan with a steamer basket, of which, I do not have. I do have a bamboo steamer and that works just fine. Cut up the cauliflower into florets and put them in the steamer with a little water on the bottom of a large frying pan. Set the oven top to medium high and let the florets steam for about 7 minutes. After the timer dings, check them with a fork to make sure they are not still veggie tray worthy. While the cauliflower is steaming, take the cup of heavy cream and put it in a saucepan, set the stovetop to medium heat and bring it to a simmer. You want the cream to begin steaming and bubbling a bit on the edges. When it gets nice and hot, take it off the heat and add the cheddar, mustard, cayenne, salt and pepper to taste and stir, the sauce is ready. . . or so I thought. I took the sauce off too early and it was quite watery. I poured it over the steamed cauliflower and I was presented with cauliflower soup. So I took the whole kit and kaboodle and put it in a large pan and added the crumbled blue cheese. It was definately cheesier, but not much thicker. That's when I added a combination of one tbs of corn starch and water and put it in the pan (make sure the cheese mixture is boiling). That thickened the entire recipe up and it turned out quite good. It was almost like cheesy potatoes. I think if you cook the cream a little longer, you might not have to doctor it so much. All's well that ends well, which reminds me . . . Remember the movie that revived the career of Mickey Rourke titled, The Wrestler? In that movie he is working the deli counter after his heart attack and is asked to retrieve a quart of potato salad (or some kind of salad). The customer want to know whether it is fresh to which Ram Jam replies, "Fresh as monkey's breath, brother." I don't know about you but I've never heard that expression before, so I decided to look it up (all hail Google). Unfortunately, I couldn't find a damn thing, which made me wonder. Did Mickey in a moment of minimal clarity just ad lib? And if he did, why did the director keep this strange expression in his movie; it makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. When I think of deli salad, the last animal I want to be reminded of is of one that's favorite pastime is grabbing it's own feces and tossing it around the jungle. I don't care how fresh the breath is, the hands have got to be disgusting. Give me a salad that is "fresh as a daisy," or for that matter, "made today." But please exclude an animal that has been caught on YouTube sticking his finger up his ass, smelling it, then passing out when selling deli salad. The moral of this diatribe is if you are ever in New Jersey, stay away from Acme deli counter. What else? Well, I won the football pool this week thanks to the Washington Redskins. I knew I liked Donovan Mcnabb for something. Keeping with sports and football for a minute - the Cowboys and Vikings are both 0-2 on the season, and this makes me happier than a pig in shit. For one, I hate the Cowboys and think Tony Romo is the most overrated QB in the history of football. Second, and this is a little sad, but Brett Favre deserves this. He should have retired a Packer. The reason the Vikings can't score points is because Favre spent his off-season flipping and flopping like a dying fish while throwing lobs to high school kids in Mississippi. Everyone knew he was going to come back, yet he used his ankle as an excuse to prolong the announcement, and most importantly, avoid training camp. Now he comes back sans really talented weapons, and is finding that most professional football players, especially those who are 40, need that month and a half to get tuned. Last year, he was great, and if he retired at the end of last season he would have still gone down as the warrior he truly is. I will not take anything away from his accomplishments, he is one of the best ever. But this season may be just too painful to watch, and will most certainly, leave a lasting impression on his career, for the worse . . . unless you are a Packers fan. Damn transition! Is Michael Douglas hard up for cash or something? Do we really need another Wall Street movie? The first one was fine, and had a nice, tidy ending. So now we are to believe that Gordon Gecko is going to drag his tired old ass out of prison and work his way up to the top of high finance with the dude from Transformers?! In this economy?!? If the movie is to be at all believable, it would end with him working at a fast food chain with Shia Labeouf as his manager. And finally, there is a commercial that is really making me fume. It's from McDonalds featuring a man who insists that he cannot talk to anyone until he has had his coffee. Everyone around him, who may or may not be addicted to caffeine, try to say, hello, good morning, buenos dias, only to be shunned by this turd who hasn't gotten a cup of joe yet. This man will finally get his coffee, but I'm pretty sure he is friendless, living with his mom and doomed to be alone until he figures out a way to pump 10 cc's of caffeine in his bloodstream the moment he wakes up. That is all, until next time, Cowboys suck.