inspiration.

hey neighbors,
it's saturday,
and i have totally been crushing so hard here in the test kitchen of
the Folk Life & Liberty Fortress that i'm almost out of propane!

holy crap, what a dummy i can be-
my monomaniacal focus has been so fixated on what goes on
in between all the bread,
instead of what powers the pans, and now i'm in pinch.
i'm serious.
i guess i should've been more mindful of the ovenly consumption,
and maybe more logistically aware that this much exxxtra cooking,
coupled with the heroically indulgent hot showers i've been enjoying,
was going to eat up all the fuel.
damn.
so,
today is the kind of rainy day where the propane man comes out as an s.o.s.,
what's the difference?
well,
he'll be giving me those weekend rates,
with the shoulda-paid-attention tax added in.
ugh.
the thing is-
i CAN'T let the fire go out, duders.
no sir...
it's still sandwich week,
and we've got more treats to eat.
yeah.
rules is rules, and the sandwich world is calling me.
huh?
oh sure,
i could grill up something tonight, under the eaves,
whilst avoiding the drips and drops of a soggy saturday night,
but then, what about tomorrow?
see?
the foresight i previously lacked is returning in spades.
great.
interestingly, to me at least,
while i've not got a lot of big ideas yet for this evening's resplendent repast.
i DO have some brutally large batards,
(which, in non-english aren't insensitively named at all!)
and i think that means long, fat lengths of somethin' are bound to happen.
(t.w.s.s.)
lucky for me,
a quick prework trip to the grocery yesterday yielded some proper inspiration,
and in relatively short order,
i activated an appropriate usage for all the new ingredients.
friends,
check the big-hot-french-type teleport:

BOOOOOOM!!!!
grabbing a really crackly crawnchy baguette is always going to get
my creative juices flowing, and when there's the perfect loaf,
staring me right in the eyes at my preferred local bread spot?
the ideas are gestating before i can hand over my sweet moolah.
mmhmmm.
i bit off one of the butts on the way to home after work,
and that crusty magic had me engrossed immediately.
i get so excited when something tastes so rewarding,
it makes y'wanna make a new dance move up.
the bread game was covered.
so what happened next?
guys,
crisp, tart, sweet jazz apple slices, for jump-off jammie-jammin' like a champ!
yeah!!!
that's the bottom most base for this burly beast.
then,
there's lightly oiled wilted arugula, because leafy greens are what i can relate to-
...especially the mildly bitter ones.
on top of THAT, though, is where the future met the present...
dry-fried thinly-sliced portobello mushroom steaks,
lightly salted to soften 'em a scooch, and suck away any overt wetness,
only to see 'em get deglazed with white balsamic vinegar, liquid smoke, soy sauce,
and a pair of pinches of rosemary.
the bouquet on that stuff! the texture!! the taste!!!
all so expert!
i could've just eaten that, and been in heaven......
....if i was a diaperbaby with no flair for extravagance.
good thing i'm a berserker barbarian battle-beast,
with an appetite for overdoing every damned thing, right?
no doubt.
that's why there's also all those blackened concentric circles of grilled leek, too.
aaaaaaaand the molassesy majesty of that tempeh bacon.
(i made it in the morning, so i knew i had at least ONE thing started for supper)
now,
that would've been incredible as a sandwich,
but too much is the right amount,
and sometimes,
the universe is unsubtle when suggesting that you've left something out.
i'm over here scurrying around, pans blazing, dog underfoot,
him wanting a little supplemental snack after his supper,
me wanting to stop tripping over him.....
i opted to bribe him into leaving me alone for a little minute,
and as i was sprinkling weird biscuit dust on a piece of apple for him?
the light bulb lit above my baldspot,
and i realized i hadn't hit this sandwich up with a key component.
yup.
just like that,
i had a pan and some oil getting hella hot,
because i KNEW i needed some kind of sprankles.
word up.
fried almond and garlic slices, mimicking each other in shape and size,
stuck in place with fresh basil aioli!
hmm? what's that? it sounds amazing?.
i knowwwwwwwwwwwww.
it was.
i know another thing, too-
the sides really took the plate to eleven.
i'm just sayin'.
lemon-kissed cabbage and radish salad, seasoned simply wit salt and pepper.
the tang of the lemon, and the spice of the radish kept me interested in each bite.
and i got my lycopene from an array of rainbow tomatoes,
split up between that salad, and that whole-grain superhottness on the other side...
farro is expert,
and with shredded spinach, GPOP, and a little olive oil, it's even more so.
i pulled it out,
and tonight, i've got to do it all over again.
i mean,
c'mon.
anybody can make some b!tch-A* boring jauns,
but i'm over here on day seven of turbo-fresh boomfire fuego for my face.
it doesn't matter what you're doing, as long as you're doing it as hard as you can.
i'm pretty sure that's a thing.
if you're not already all about it, give it a shot-
i'm betting the good ones out there among you will LOVE it.
all the rest aren't welcome to pig out at my table.
savage stormswept serious shark-gluttony is what we want;
never quiet, never soft.....