Shrimp Boil Video, Finally
Here it is, the edited video from our authentic Southern (aka “low country”) shrimp boil, which we held for Ricky’s birthday. This event actually took place in July…but six months late ain’t bad!
Gotta love low country food.
Belize Photos
Back from Belize. It was a great trip with lots of snorkeling, diving, lobster eating, and Belikin beers. And, unfortunately, sand bugs.
Anyway, check out my Belize photos.
Geek Humor
But I still think it’s funny!
An infinite number of mathematicians walk into a bar. The first one orders a beer. The second orders half a beer. The third, a quarter of a beer. The bartender says “You’re all idiots”, and pours two beers.
Internship Is Over
My year of hell is finally over! No more notes, no more pre-rounding, and no more writing H&P’s. Now only two more years of general medicine before I begin training in what I’m truly interested in.
Penne Pasta with Meat Sauce
This is another great recipe taken straight from Simply Recipes. It is actually very simple to make. Just make sure you have two big pans, with one of them cast-iron ideally.
- 1/2 pound penne pasta
- Salt
- 2 Tbsp olive oil
- 2 cups chopped onion (about 1 large onion)
- 2 cloves garlic, chopped
- 1 teaspoon Italian seasoning
- Dash red pepper flakes
- 1/2 teaspoon fresh thyme
- Salt and freshly ground black pepper
- 1 pound (16% fat) ground beef
- 3 fresh basil leaves, chopped
- 2 1/2 cups canned chunky tomato sauce (almost one 28-ounce can)
- 1 teaspoon sugar
- 1 Tbsp chopped fresh parsley
- Boil a pot of water, add the pasta to the pot, and cook until al dente. Drain.
- Once you’ve started to heat the water, start working on the sauce. Heat olive oil in a very large skillet on medium heat. Add the chopped onion, Italian seasoning and red pepper flakes. Cook for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the onions are softened. Add the garlic, fresh thyme, season with salt and pepper. Cook for an additional minute, until the garlic is fragrant. Remove from heat and set aside.
- Heat a large cast iron pan on medium to high heat. Once the pan is hot, break up small chunks of ground beef and add them to the pan, without stirring. You want the meat to get well browned, not burned. Once the meat is browned on one side (a couple of minutes), flip the meat over to brown on the other side. At this point you can remove the pan from the heat.
- Use a slotted spoon to lift the meat from the cast iron pan and add it to the pan with the seasoned onions. Add tomato sauce and break up the bigger chunks of meat into smaller pieces. Add basil. Add a teaspoon of sugar. Bring to a simmer on low heat, let cook, uncovered, for 15 minutes.
- Adjust seasonings. Add salt and pepper to taste, add a little more sugar if the sauce is too acidic, and add more tomato sauce if the sauce is a little dry. Stir in the cooked penne pasta. Sprinkle with chopped parsley. Serve
Serves 6.
Aruba
It’s vacation time! I have two weeks off from hell (the hospital) and I spent the first week in the Caribbean with a friend from medical school. Aruba was a nice place, but not nearly as nice and tropical as I thought it would be. I saw everything the island had, and so I probably won’t return again.
Photos will be up soon.
My New VW Rabbit
Thanks to a generous check from my car insurance company, I was able to buy a new 2007 Volkswagen Rabbit. It has a pretty strong engine for such a small car, and like all VWs it has nice interior design, especially the blue dashboard lights (it makes you wonder if American car companies pay any attention when designing their cars). The stereo is also extremely intuitive, more than any car stereo I’ve ever seen.
Some details (not bad for what is probably an entry-level car):
- 2.5L 150hp 5-cylinder engine
- 10-speaker stereo with 6-disc changer
- Seat warmers!
Anyway, I just hope it doesn’t get stolen for at least a few months so I can enjoy it for awhile. For more photos, see my photo album
Jeep Wrangler, RIP
My poor Jeep Wrangler was stolen. Stolen again, actually, as this is the second time it has been stolen. Unfortunately this time, however, it hasn’t been found yet and it probably won’t be. Pretty shitty circumstances, too…I walked out of the hospital post-call (i.e. after working a 30+ hour shift) and noticed my car wasn’t there. What kind of loser steals cars from a hospital parking lot?
It’s a tough loss since I really loved this car. I drove this car everywhere — across the country and back again, as well as up and down the East Coast. It will be missed. Click here to see the page I created when I first bought the car on April 29, 2001.
Seared Tuna with Basil Oil
This one is from the website of the Food Network — which, by the way, has a lot of great recipes. Make sure that the middle of the tuna is nearly raw, otherwise it’s not properly seared.
- 4 quarts water
- Salt
- 2 cups packed basil leaves
- 1 cup plus 1 teaspoon olive oil
- 4 (6-ounce) sashimi grade tuna steaks
- 1/4 teaspoon pepper
- 1 lemon, zested and juiced
- Bring 4 quarts water to a boil and add 3 tablespoons salt. Set up an ice bath. Blanch basil for 2 minutes in boiling water, then transfer immediately to an ice bath. Cool for 2 minutes, drain, then squeeze excess water from basil. Blend basil and 1 cup olive oil in a blender until well mixed. Strain in a coffee filter or cheesecloth.
- Heat cast iron pan over high heat until very hot. Season tuna with salt and pepper. Brush lightly with olive oil. Place steaks in pan and cook until bottom is brown and crusty, about 3 minutes. Flip tuna and cook for 1 minute. (Tuna will be just seared on the outside and raw in the middle.)
- Remove to a plate. Drizzle with basil oil and garnish with lemon juice and zest.
I’m Famous!
AOL came across my online photo album and must have liked what they saw. So much so, apparently, that they selected one of my photos — one from my Thailand album — to feature on their AOL Pictures homepage. Here is a screenshot I grabbed:
Celebrity Sightings
Now that I don’t live in Los Angeles I probably won’t have anymore celebrity sightings, which is one thing I’ll actually miss about that city. These are the few sightings I had during my four years living in LA, arranged chronologically (earliest listed first):
- Vince Vaughn — I spotted him and then followed him around for awhile at The Grove. He kept turning around and giving me dirty looks. Probably because I was stalking him.
- Geoffrey Rush — Spotted him during the same trip to The Grove. (I didn’t stalk him, though.)
- Luke Wilson — he entered Cuban restaurant Versailles while I was eating there. He also looked like shit, as if he hadn’t slept or showered in 3 days.
- Molly Shannon — in the Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf on Robertson. We held the door open for her and her infant child; she seemed pretty nice.
- Paris Hilton — outside some fancy shops on Robertson, surrounded by hordes of paparazzi and flashes…looking clueless as ever.
- Viggo Mortensen — at Empenada Place, ordering in Spanish(!).
- Annoying and Ugly — I don’t know her name, but she’s the Indian girl from The Office. Saw her at the Arclight.
- Tara Reid — at the restaurant El Compadre. She looked pretty coherent so she must not yet have started boozing.
List of Beers in Czech Republic
The last post made me want to list all the different beers we drank on the trip, starting with the first beer in the San Francisco Airport — Sam Adams. Here is the full list:
- Sam Adams
- Boddindgton
- Carling
- Pilsner Urquell
- Velkopopovicky Kozel
- Budweiser Budvar
- Gambrinus
- Stella Artois
- Staropramen
- Staropramen Dark
- Pivovarsky India Pale Ale
- Stepan Svelty
- Pivovarsky Master 18
- Primator Weizen
- Krusovice
- Singha
- Pivovarsky Klasiky Lezak
- Pivovarsky Banana
- Pivovarsky Sour Cherry
- Pivovarsky Koffee
- Pivovarsky Nettle
- Pivovarsky Blueberry
- Kozel Dark
- Dreher
- Kaiser
By the Numbers
Here are some stats regarding my last few weeks of traveling.
Overall:
- Number of countries visited: 5
- Number of new continents visited: 1
- Number of new passport stamps: 18
Czech Republic:
- Total number of beers we had: 64
- Total liters of beer we drank: 20
- Unique types of beer we drank: 25
- Number of new beers we tried: 22
Not too bad…
Trip Log: Czech Republic 4
As our final hurrah in Prague, Ricky and I wanted a beer at the Golden Tiger. That name is the translated version of its Czech name (U Zlateho Tygra), and this pub is well-known for being one of the few very traditional pubs still in Prague; in fact, then-President Havel (of Czech Republic) brought Bill Clinton here in 1994 to show him what a true Czech pub was like.
Whether it was due to our anger, thirst, exhaustion, or something else, we quickly found our beer mugs empty (our 0.5L beers mugs). We subtley signaled the waiter for the next round and immediately there were two more mugs in front of us. Down they went, too. The best liter of beer I’ve ever drank.
Anyway, a great end to a great trip.
Trip Log: Budapest 2
Budapest is apparently the food capital of Central Europe, and with tasty dishes like veal stew it is easy to see why. Something else they are famous for is palinka, a traditional fruit brandy that is very flavorful and strong.
I only know this because our last night in Budapest we were taken to dinner by friends of friends, who live there. As a sort of appertif (pre-meal drink) our friends recommended we each drink palinka, and we did — Ricky had apricot and I had plum. Even though the drink was very strong, neither of us tasted any alcohol. Here are some photos of the event.
Before (with an apricot in Ricky’s glass and a plum in mine):
