Icarus Witch – “Rise”

I’m gonna start this off by saying that damn it if Cleopatra Records ain’t got a knack for signing killer bands!! And I ain’t just saying that ’cause they signed my band back in the day, either!!!

I originally heard Icarus Witch when they did a tour with Paul Di’Anno and were the opener as well as backing band for Paul. They announced they had a new vocalist, Christopher Shaner. Well, lemme tell ya: this new vocalist was one of the best kept Metal secrets in the U.S.A.!!! He freaking dominates!!! How this dude wasn’t know outside of PA was beyond me…well, that’ll change soon.

Christopher Shaner – vocalist extraordinaire!!!!

This album squeezes a lot of cool stuff into a diverse package. First thing that grabs you is the album artwork. Pretty killer photo, and I’m kinda hoping that I can find some photos of the model sans silken sheet-like coverings…but alas, no…

The highlight here is Shaner, make no doubt about it. He is a singular talent. If I had to hazard a guess, I would put Steve Perry somewhere in his favorites growing up. He has a certain majestic power to his vocals that are best experienced live, where he really shines. Here, with a slightly more compressed production, he isn’t as commanding as I have heard him live. I would have liked a more open production, something a little more raw. As it is, it’s slick and radio-ready (if there is such a thing anymore); It’s sure to please legions of AOR fans and has enough edge to grab some of the older, more ’80s Metal fans (like myself).

copyright Cleopatra Records 2012

Light and breezy

The music runs through some faster, more Metal-ish stuff and settles happily into midpaced Heavy Rock/Metal. They have a couple ballads, of which “Tragedy” is particularly grandiose and excellent. Guitarists Quinn Lukas and Dave Watson paint some wonderful canvases throughout, and Lukas in particular has some killer brush strokes in his repertoire. All-in-all a great collection of trad Metal that I think fans of everything ’80s will eat up like Ben & Jerry’s Phish Food ice cream (which is to say fast and with gusto)…
This album will find its way into a lot of Top 20 lists this year, and it will be well deserved as it really crosses over well between Hard Rock and Metal. Seriously, though, you have to catch them live if they are playing anywhere near you and you are anyway a fan of more traditional Metal.

For beer tonight we have Pretty Things Beer and Ale Project‘s Field Mouse’s Farewell. Like a lot of smaller brewers popping up around the World, these guys are semi-nomadic. That means they rent facilities to do their brewing. Mikkeller and Stillwater Artisanal being two of the better-known nomad brewers out there. This beer falls into a somewhat-Farmhouse somewhat-Golden Ale category. It’s tasty and refreshing and light, but not overly robust. The grain is really at the front, middle and back end of this beer, and doesn’t leave a lot of space for much else. You’ve had this before, and it won’t wow you, but during a hot Summer twilight, it’s rockin’ like Dokken…

copyright sometime other than today by someone other than me

Let it sink in…feel the power, the energy….

Now listen to this:

copyright 2012 by someone other than me (Nuclear Blast Records, I think)

Notice anything? OK, maybe it’s a reach, but if you didn’t know better, which would you say is the newer of the two? Can’t figure it out? Heck, neither can I…and therein lies the beauty…

The new Nile album is very close to their BEST effort yet…Seven albums in, and with genre-defining releases like “Amongst the Catacombs of Nephren-Ka” and “Black Seeds of Vengeance”, I think they have now surpassed their progenesis and transcended into a new Death Metal consciousness.

Karl and Dallas…Death Metal royalty

Did I say “very close to their best album yet”? I think many of you naysayers are out there scoffing…but I’m going to posit that this, “At the Gate of Sethu”, is Nile’s best, yes BEST, album ever…

There isn’t a weak point on here. True, neither the debut nor the sophomore effort had weak material. This is a tough argument to make…Yes, I agree with you.

Opener “Enduring the Eternal Molestation of Flame” is Nile at their quarter-mile, top fuel dragster best. Octane-fueled Death Metal insanity…Unstoppable force. Crushing in its delivery. You’ve heard Nile do this before and POSSIBLY better…I agree with you…

it’s the second track, however, that brings to the ‘fore a brutality that only a master like Karl Sanders could conjure. “The Fiends Who Come to Steal the Magick of the Deceased” is primal, raw, METAL fury. It’s riff upon Death Metal crushing riff, piled upon Kollias’ drumming which the rawer, less-compressed production has aired out. The music “BREATHES” Death Metal freely. That’s the rub with the new effort. Given a stripped down production, the music is afforded life. Not suffocated like in some recent efforts. Kollias’ drumming is front and center, and the songcraft brings out the crazy madness of it.

Ahh, bloody hell…IE just crashed and I lost the next half of what I wrote. That’s all kinds of lame, and I don’t wish to attempt to replicate it. I’m drinking A Sless’ Oatmeal Stout, from local brewer Iron Springs Pub & Brewery. A luscious, creamy and roasty brew. Track it down, and some of their other offerings, as head brewer Christian Kazakoff is doing some great stuff up here in Nor Cal…

Buy the new Nile, Metalheads, and prepare to be destroyed…

Next up is one of this Tuesday’s new releases: Gojira’s “L’enfant Sauvage”. I’ll be kind and post a pic of the cover right here:

if you don’t know, go get a glass of milk, loser…

I’m gonna name drop James Hetfield here and say the guy personally pulled me aside one day to tell me that Gojira is a “great band”…Yes, Mr. Hetfield (wingtips and three-piece suit and all), I am aware you asked them to be main support on one of your tours (I think, too many strong beers to be sure), and yes they are a great band. I used to believe their ground-breaking “From Mars to Sirius” is what I’d suggest to everyone…Not any longer…

The new album, “L’enfant Sauvage”, is a freaking masterpiece. It’s to the ’10s Metal scene what Soundgarden was to Grunge: it injects a much-needed dose of INTENSITY and INNOVATION into what has rapidly devolved into a stale genre. Sure, we Metalheads have umpteen sub-genres to applaud and laud, but rarely does a band encompass all of what is “Metal” and put something out there that can cohesively pull us all into the Borg-like collective-conscious of Heavy Metal. Gojira has accomplished this in a way few can and will and have…

go ahead, I double-dog-dare you…

The pervasive use of natural harmonics, pick-scrapes and other minor-level-brought-to-top-tier guitar histrionics are what sets these Gauls above some of their peers. The little pieces here and there that define what Gojira does, also gives their music “life”…They are trying some new stuff, they don’t give a rat’s ass if you like it, and they’ll bet a bottle of top-end Bordeaux that you fucking love it…Frontman Joe Duplantier is a force of nature live, and there is no denying it. Hell, when they toured with Polish masters Behemoth, Gojira gave them a run for their money, and that’s saying something…

copyright 2012 someone other than me…

This album takes Meshuggah and pares it down somewhat, makes it accessible, then turns the intensity up a notch by basing the whole in Metal. Not your younger brother’s Metal, but HEAVY FUCKING METAL…Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, and Black Sabbath-style METAL!!!! It’s as up your ass as current Metal can get, and it takes no prisoners.

This album is possibly the best thing that will be put out in the Metal World in 2012 (unless Pig Destroyer has anything to say about it…OK, and MAYBE Cattle Decapitation, but that’s another story…), and you, as brothers and sisters in Metal, NEED it…

Today’s beer: Ballast Point (San Diego) Big Eye IPA. If there’s a better beer – and I’m talking all-around, drink it a few times a weekend with your BBQ pals beer – I can’t find it. That’s saying something from a Santa Rosa local (think Russian River Pliny the Elder…).

no joke, biotch!

Dragonforce - "The Power Within"

Whatever the hell you called their last crappy album - this is FATHOMS and LEAGUES better than that crap was…I think they were trying to get Z.P. Theart out of there, and put out that freaking awful pap smear of an album…This is nothing like that trash…This kicks ass the way their breakout “Inhuman Rampage” did…The detractors will, rightfully, claim this is almost TOO similar to that album.  Hey, nobody’s calling out Motorhead or AC/DC, so don’t call these guys out, please (yeah, I know they don’t have the street cred yet to elicit such devotion, but spare me the hypocrisy for at least ten minutes, will ya?!)…

New vocalist Marc Hudson does an admirable job, but c’mon, he’s no Z.P. He lacks the range, so that is what it is…Sorry…

Speaking of fine ale, which we weren’t by the way, tonight we have a World Class level elite ale: Russian River Brewing’s Beatification, bottled 01/10/12 (scumbag beer snob assholes will call this batch 5. But the brewers themselves decided to eschew that label, instead opting to go with bottle-dating. If someone gives you crap about this bit of trivial minutiae, kick their ass and tell them Eugene Robinson sent you…)

Is this stuff cheesy (not the beer – we’ll get to that again in a moment…part of the problem with the “three beer” review is the rambling associated with early-drunkenness): absolutely. But it’s fuckin’ fun, and you can’t deny how much ass the guitar players kick. Just watch this early video (they drink beer in it, during the solos, ferchrissakes!!):

copyright someone other than me some year other than 2012

So, all kidding aside, this is the 2012 Power Metal album to beat right now. I hope the dudes at Metalcamp figure this out and invite Dragonforce to play as a late addition (hell, maybe they are already on the bill..I have no idea).

Now, back to the beer. This is a spontaneously fremented, barrel-aged ale. It sits forever in barrels and waits until ambient, wind-and-otherwise-borne yeasts and bacterias “infect” it and cause alcohol and crazy, rambunctious flavors to enhance its beverage qualities. Its original incarnations (i.e. batches one through four) were insanely popular and hard to find. This one tastes painfully similar to their normal sour blonde, and for that reason might be a letdown to the snobs. Heck, they still have bottles for sale at the brewery, so it clearly isn’t demanding the same value amongst the beer “intelligentsia” that the earlier batches were. That’s those idiots’ problems, because I’m wickidly impressed by this beer. It’s sharp sourness, and complex barrel-aging characteristics, make me happy, kind of like the new Dragonforce!!

So, in closing: get the new Dragonforce for a good, Power Metal-ing time and drink RRB’s fine ales…’nuff said…

Jeff Loomis - "Plains of Oblivion" (2012)

Here we have former Nevermore axe-wielder Jeff Loomis‘ second solo effort, and it’s all that and a bag of crisps. I’m pairing it currently with a new-ish release from Firestone-Walker: the Wookey Jack, which is some form of black rye IPA.  Not among my favorites from them, to be sure, but it will appeal to those digging the new Cascadian Black style ales and lagers…

So, for those NOT in the know, Jeff Loomis is badass in every sense of the word (check below for one of the coolest things ever, the “guy sitting busquing on the sidewalk and Loomis shows up to shred” video from a while back).  His work in Nevermore (and, prior to that, as a member of Sanctuary) is freaking legendary.  I could spend an entire post just talking about the killer solos from his time in that band, but let’s focus on the newest material, shall we?

OK, the bad:  I’m all for adding vocals and shit, but this lady singer, Christine Rhoades, seems forced.  Maybe he’s banging her or some shit, but it doesn’t work as much as you’d like.  Check song four “Tragedy and Harmony” for the initial salvo into this territory.  Then, once she has left her taint on your mouth, perpare for the madness.    The solo sections from 3:36 up through 4:15 are fucking insane.  It’s shit like this sets Loomis apart from many others today.  It’s not just his technique, which at times rivals uber-master Tosin Abasi (Animals as Leaders), but it’s his energetic and mostly Metal delivery that takes him Sly Stallone Over the Top.  You can FEEL the intensity.

copyright someone other than me at sometime other than today

This album is a tier above the first solo effort in that he expands on his songwriting. It’s not just guitar wankery…Well, he is never a wanker. Just sayin’ is all. Whereas the first platter was very technique-centric, this is really trying to spread the wealth out. Actually, as non-Metal as it is for me to say this, it’s his SLOWER tunes – “Continuum Drift” and “Rapture” – that are the highlights. Actually, as crazy as it is to say, it’s the guest appearance by Chris Poland on ”Continuum…” that is the actual highlight. The section starting at 1:24 is majestic and shred at the same time, and really puts a complicated juxtaposition in here. Poland’s emotional delivery really sets up Loomis’ work in here (2:18 – 3:05, with a heart-rending three-note bend sequence that’s tear-jerking at 2:31)…Gorgeous…

His guest appearances are superior. Obviously the aforementioned Poland, but he also gets newly resuscitated Tony MacAlpine and also lesser known Attila Voros to lay some shred down.  Tony’s work is particularly inspired, so give it a whirl…

All-in-all, still not as full-on-madness as I would hope, but a great release from one of today’s best.  Those into guitar magicianship should not hesitate to grab this and drink a sixer of NOT Firestone-Walker Wookey Jack to celebrate…maybe something more like North Coast Brewing no.38 Stout instead…

retro-rockin' you to Hell..

Alrighty folks, enough of that food stuff…Let’s get to the real meat-and-potatoes of this site: Music. Most of what I talk about here will be music related, because that’s really what I’m into. I also like beer, American football, and ice hockey so we’ll get to that stuff as well. Finally, I muse on all sorts of pseudo-existential crap all the time, and I’ll bring that crap up on occasion as well…

But for today, it’s music. And what better way to start than with my self-proclaimed creators of the greatest album ever recorded.

This show was at Slim’s in San Francisco on Monday, April 23rd, 2012.  For those that have never been, it’s really a landmark among the music lovers in the Bay Area.  They consistently get great acts booked here, have decent, if not quite superior, sound and the food is serviceable without being excellent.  Taken individually, each isn’t enough to really impress anyone.  But when you’ve been to as many shows as I have, you come to realize that nobody hits them all on the head.  Heck even the Warfield and Fillmore don’t do well in at least one area (that being the food)…Slim’s gets at least decent marks in all areas, and nobody really books as consistently great as they do…

Much love to this venue...

I am not at all familiar with either In Solitude or The Devil’s Blood. My knowledge extends to knowing In Solitude sounds somewhat like Mercyful Fate/King Diamond and The Devil’s Blood has a female vocalist. The end. I should mention that this tour was sponsored by Decibel Magazine.  I used to be a huge fan of this magazine, but when I no longer took the commuter bus to San Francisco, I basically stopped reading it.  Maybe that will change in the near future (fingers crossed)…

In Solitude led off the evening.  They did not impress me as much as I would have liked.  I believe this is because the singer was on an off night.  He had an ENORMOUS scarf tied around his neck, and immediately left the stage when his vocals for the final tune were done (the band had about a minute of additional music to play, also…curious).  He was on and off: sometimes sounding great (and the Mercyful Fate analogies are apt), but often he was out of key and flat in his delivery.  The music wasn’t inspiring, either.  Oh well, such is life.

hey, I never said I was a professional photographer...

Next up were The Devil’s Blood. I got way more than I expected out of this band. First off, let me say they must not be nearly as cool on CD as they are live. They have three guitar players on stage, and they do some really-well-rehearsed and very tight harmonies with them. Innovative and very creative stuff, too. I loved them for this reason. The music is a kind of bluesy take on Metal. The singer was very good, and her powerful voice meshed very well with the Retro-Rock style of the band.  Sometimes they venture off into guitar jam territories, and they work really well.  All-in-all a great band to see live.

By this point the club was packed.  A sold-out Slim’s is fun to experience as the energy is emphatically palpable.  Watain took full advantage of this with their set, stirring the crowd up intently with their tunes comprised mostly of newer stuff.  Considering their ouvre, this was a tad disappointing as they really have some great material spanning thirteen years.  The new album is so excellent, however, that a set list made up of its tunes works great.  (Un)fortunately, they no longer seem to pour animal blood all over everyone and everything, and that is probably a good thing.  Maybe they do when they headline, but they didn’t this evening.

it's really red, innit?

Before we get to a recounting of the beast that is Behemoth, a couple things to note. First off, the merch was painfully priced. $45 hoodies, $20 ball caps, and $35 t-shirts are pretty much out of the question. All bands had to adhere to these prices, also. It felt like a rip off, and that disappointed me. That said, they still sold shitloads of merch and I’m sure that made everyone happy. Second, and very importantly, Behemoth frontman extraordinaire Nergal (nee Adam Darski), recently (as in like four months ago recently) won a battle with Leukemia.  How this guy can do that and immediately go on tour speaks volumes about the kind of person he is, and I applaud him for that.

In a word, Behemoth was PUMMELING. The Polish Death Metal scene is famous for how great the bands perform in the live setting (don’t believe me? Check out Vader sometime…’nuff said). Behemoth has turned the live stage into their bitch, so to speak. And we’re not talking soft-porn level either. Their show is an almost seething display of power, one that might even leave Sasha Grey mouth-agape at its ferocity. The older material got some play, and it is truly excellent, the highlight being live staple “Decade of Therion” off their album Satanica.

mehhh...

The material off of Demigod, however, proves why Behemoth are so at-or-near the top of all Death Metal acts. It’s like having a glacier dropped on you: cold and crushing. Nergal was his usual charismatic self, commanding attention everywhere he roamed across the stage. In closing, and a moment of Bruce Dickinson-like near-hilarity, he donned one of his many used-in-videos masks for the final, and curious, tune which was less power and mostly an atmospheric tune (I’m terrible with remembering what songs are which and albums the tunes come from, but it was likely the closer from their most recent album). Kind of an odd switch to close the show.

In closing, Behemoth is worth seeing anywhere and anytime. The rest are fun and if I had to say go see one of them with your s.o., I’d say go check out The Devil’s Blood.

I love this recipie because it’s quick and easy, but also intensely flavorful. It’s a Greek take on the traditional grilled cheese sandwich. Because these cook so quickly, you need to have all your ingredients prepped before you start frying them.

I have a lot of comments on these as I have made them countless times and tweaked things here and there.

First, I can’t stress the importance of using organic, vine-ripened tomatoes enough. You need tomatoes that are sweet and intensely falvorful or the feta will overpower them.

make sure they aren't TOO ripe, though...

Second, the olive oil you use should be the same high-quality stuff you used for the nuts. The oil is one of the necessary components and if you skimp, it will be noticeable.

Third, I like to use sourdough bread for these, because it seems to work well with the flavors. I prefer the Sebastopol Sourdough from Village Bakery.

Fourth, I use a trick I learned as a line cook: when the sandwiches are in the pan frying, I splash a little water in (no more than 1/2 tsp, though) during the cooking process, and cover the pan with a lid. The resulting steam will help hasten the melting process for the cheese, and tends to give the sandwiches the overall consistency I’m looking for. Add it to each side of the frying. Make sure not to pour it on the sandwich, obviously. You need it to hit the hot pan and turn to steam immediately.

Fifth, you can use dried oregano in place of fresh (for shame!!!). The flavor is more robust, so use less than you would of the fresh. Also, I eliminate the pepper and add only a tiny dash of salt.

Finally, and most importantly, these sandwiches are best when they are allowed to sit for five to ten minutes after cooking. This wait time allows all the tomato juice to soak into the bread and gives it a certain excellent texture. I like them to have some crispiness on just the outside of the bread, but to be a tender amalgam of the ingredients on the inside.

These sandwiches are my true crowd pleaser over pretty much everything else, and they will disappear as quickly as they are made, so you’ll need about six for every ten people. I have yet to find a person that doesn’t enjoy these, picky kids included.

Well there you go folks. Hope you at least gathered a piece of decent info and maybe a good idea or two for your next get together. I’ll finish this series with the greatest end to any Super Bowl I’ve yet seen, and I’ve seen most of them. Feel free to dispute my pick, but this will always stick in my mind as the best finish.

Copyright someone other than me

What you talkin' 'bout, Willis??!!

Pretty much follow the recipie on this. I love this recipie because you pack all the goodies UNDER the chicken skin, and the herbs and salty awesomeness infuse the chicken grease from the skin…It’s quite delicious sounding, and tastes even better than it sounds.

The timing of this dish kinda sucks, however. It’s so quick and easy that you really need someone else to watch the grill, because you’ll likely be putting the finishing touches on the pork dish at the same time. If you don’t, the chicken might end up like this:

Oh yeah, they'll never notice it with that lemon on top...

Other than that, once this dish is done, YOU can finally take some time and have a(nother) beer and some of your tasty and well-made grub. That is assuming, of course, you’ve washed the dishes that have probably accumulated.

Just hire someone to clean up already!

A word about serving: I always use paper plates now…It REALLY cuts down on the cleaning. I do, however, use actual forks and knives and such instead of plastic. I’ve generally found that plastic utensils are good for cake and soup, and that’s about it…MAYBE ice cream, too. They suck ass for everything else, in my opinion.

Another great idea is to use different color rubber bands to identify party-goers’ drinks. They work great because they will wrap around pint and juice glasses, beer bottles, cans, and you can also fit them over the base of wine glasses such that they hang loosely about the stem. This will help keep folks from catching each others’ cooties, and every six-year-old knows how awful cooties are…

In our final installment, we’ll talk about the greatest sandwiches ever…

Leave me alone already!!! NOBODY comes to this site!!!

Moving right along…

We’re up to our main dishes…I have two that I’ll traditionally make: One pork dish, and one chicken dish. Sometimes, I’ll substitute something else for the chicken dish. This past year I found a wonderful North African style lamb stew that didn’t come out quite as good as the first time I had made it. Likely a couple of reasons which I won’t go into here. Suffice it to say I need to work with that one a couple more times to get it right again.

Let’s talk about the OTHER white meat: Mr. Piggy. There really isn’t anything that satisfys quite like pork fat. Its savory awesomeness really can be equated, in a sense, with sour cream, in that it pretty much makes everything better, except itself.

Speaking of moving right along and Mrs. Piggy (yeah yeah, I know, I said MR. Piggy…), the classic:

Copyright someone other than me, but it’s gotta be close to fair use at this point…

This pork dish is so freaking easy, and comes out so gosh-darned tasty, that I can’t imagine hosting a Super Bowl without making it. Literally, it takes about 20 minutes of YOUR time, and most of that is cooking the greens at the end.

My modifications are very few.  I usually use regular salt chicken broth.  I also usually make more of the honey basting sauce than they recommend, because it creates a wonderfully sweet and slightly crispy coating to the meat.  I never really measure out the additional amount.

It can sometimes be difficult to find a 4-lb. slab of pork roast for this.  I recommend trying to get one piece of meat for it.  It cooks so much more succulently than if you go with smaller cuts that it is really worth calling ahead to your butcher for it.

The greens are really the key to this.  I like to go with organic greens if at all possible, specifically for the more concentrated flavor usually present in organic produce.  The honey/pork fat/salt braising broth that is present at the end that you will be using to cook and coat the greens makes them, in a word, AWESOME, and the flavors meld perfectly with the roasted pig flesh…

Organic produce ALWAYS if you can...

I wanted to speak about how I came about the two main dishes. In the nacent years of my get togethers, I usually tried to have it be a food theme. One year it was Cajun, one year Italian, etc. The problem became one of effort – I was never sure how much effort I would need to put into all the cooking, because some styles of food take much longer to make, and are more labor intensive. The Cajun jambalaya I made one year was so incredibly tasty…but it took like 45 minutes just to caramelize the tomato paste!!! And it required constant attention, so I had no time to attend to other things. If you time things right, or even make it a day ahead, you can probably reduce the effort. But, and this is the rub, you really don’t realize a lot of these things except in retrospect. Hindsight being what it is, it allows you to say to yourself “OK, self: Make that a day early next time”…

In any event, one year I chose Greek style cooking. I have a great friend who is Greek, so it seemed fairly apropos since he was helping me cook that day. The food turned out to be excellent and unusually easy to prepare and cook. Not much prep time, and the simple flavors worked so well together that it made it a no-brainer to continue cooking Greek food in the subsequent years, which I have. Some of the more involved recipies have been cast out over time, but the three primary ones have remained and are still crowd pleasers to this day.

Next time, well go over the chicken dish and, ultimately, we’ll end this much-too-long series with the surprise excellent small plate dish…

For now, let’s remind ourselves why Sharon Osbourne sucks ass and why you can’t possibly contemplate a Sabbath reunion WITHOUT Bill Ward. The entire 1970 Paris show!!! Watch and weep over the amazing awesomeness…

Copyright someone other than me…

Mine are certainly not presented this fancy...

These are time intensive, and the cooking of them is labor intensive. I usually double the recipie for ten or so people and because these are a completely different texture and flavor mish-mash than the jalapeno bombs are, your guests will devour them, so have plenty of them made.

By time intensive I mean they gotta sit for an hour before you cook them. I can’t stress enough that they must sit for AT LEAST the time recommended in the recipie. You will be amazed by how much water is extracted from these as they sit. One thing I found out by accident one year: the salt is a necessary component of the water extraction. I forgot to add it one year, and the zucchini was not draining at all. I added the salt and, VOILA!, all of a sudden they started to weep.

Salma brings tears to my eyes, also...

The reason you want the water out is that they will be very gooey and hard to handle if there is too much water in them. These should come out with some chewy-gooey-ness, but they should also be firm and easy to hold and dip.

I actually don’t spend too much time trying to squeeze the water out. A quick three or four second squeeze and then into the mixing bowl.

A word on the cooking of these. I actually over-cooked them this last year, and in my opinion they came out better. That said, I think you want them to come out a tad darker than in the picture above. Mine were a wonderful, crispy light brown (darker than golden brown, but not burned). The crunch on the outside, coupled with the tender cheesy center, makes for a really killer texture juxtaposition…

UM, I said NOT burned…copyright someone other than me…

As for the dipping sauce – I don’t like yogurt for it. Not sure why. Plain sour cream actually works best with these. They have enough flavor that there is no need to doctor them up with a sauce.

The biggest issue with these is getting rid of the used oil. It’s going to be in a huge pan taking up valuable stovetop space, and will be hotter than the surface of the Sun when you’re finally done cooking the fritters. You can’t pour it into your trash – that’s just a mess waiting to happen. Milk cartons aren’t sturdy enough to handle the heat. If you have a method for dealing with this hot frying oil, by all means please tell me. I’ve always had to wait for it to cool and then use an empty milk carton to get rid of it.

Next time, we’ll get to the theories around main dishes and bring out the first super easy yet wonderfully tasty dish…