What I ate this weekend

So, you said you wanted visuals. On the one hand, I feel like I don't really know people at CFBT very well yet, and this might seem weird, to blog about what I'm eating but you did ask me... So here's November 30th through December 3rd. In detail. I am not going to leave anything out.

Friday November 30

Vitamins/allopurinol  at 930am plus a lot of water while recovering from class.

 12 oz latte Bedlam Coffee 10am. 

Walk a mile up the hill from Belltown to First Hill. Its a mile each way, so I get 10 miles of walking each week, which I consider a bonus of my job.

When I get to work I pour myself a 32oz water (#1) While I meet on the line with Chef, the sous chef hands me a big  fricking slice of roasted veal  from Saturday’s menu to sample at 1130am. It was delicious, actually.

At some point around midday I sampled this seafood cake stuff on a home made potato chip. I had about 5oz of this goo, which consisted of salmon, fake crab, mire poix and a lot of mayonnaise. it was pure evil, but I was food testing, its part of my job.       I ate it so fast it's not even really in focus.

I get another water (#2) to go with my lunch 1pm, I got the café cook to make me a spinach salad with feta and macaroni noodles,  fat free Italian dressing (4.5 cups total) breakdown: 1/4c cucumbers, 1/2c cherry tomatoes ½c macaroni, ¼c of feta and three cups of raw spinach.

I ate this while I checked email and met with the Marketing Director.  Since I was sitting in a meeting I figured it would look a little strange to take a picture.

 

Early in the afternoon, after my 1pm meeting  I ate a cookie. I know I shouldn’t be eating cookies. It was fresh from the oven and I was overcome. This is that cookie:

As you can see by the standard pen I have placed next to it, it is a relatively diminutive cookie. Made with margarine, not butter.

I refilled my 32oz cup of water at around 3pm (#3) I have this picture on my phone because I regularly have to remind my girlfriend to drink water, so I send her this picture occasionally. From here on out, when I mention water, I mean this cup.

Had to staff in new employees I hired Tuesday, occupied with the four of them until 430pm where at the staff meeting I had a single big bite (2oz) of Spanish Tortilla (eggs, potato, herbs with a balsamic reduction)

At 5:15pm I had a 3oz scoop of rice and 4oz of roast black cod, pictured here topped with -wow- it came out really yellow in this picture-a mandarin orange/saffron aioli. Chef handed me a thigh portion of hunter chicken, which I also ate with the same mushroom rice (3oz scoop)

I had a cup of coffee at 530pm no cream or sugar.

Now it is 7:15pm, I just ate some pineapple (maybe 3 oz) a little while ago.  This has been a typical day for me, although Marissa is out of town and often I will go home and we cook dinner together.
I walk home, on the way down the hill in the rain

I got a phone call from friends, inviting me out for drinks. As it turns out, one of my dear friends' girlfriend unexpectedly broke up with him. We had many drinks. Not good, and not in character for me. So around 2am I ate a Seattle dog on the street in front of my apartment building. That was a lot of whiskey. We were out for nearly seven hours. A lot. and some beers. I ate some cheese nips, too. Not really some, like most.

Tomorrow is another day. 

And that day is December 1st

For starters I have some water. And some vitamins and tylenol. I walk up to work, where I eat these grapes

They're delicious, but no match for what is clearly a historic hangover. Hey, nice that this picture happens to catch the band-aids and the motivational/suggestive messages taped to the desk in my office. That candy, by the way, comes from a resident named Ruth, who furtively palms it to staff here like she's Ray Liotta in Goodfellas. I don't eat it.

Needless to say, I'm well into 32oz water #1 already.

I make another water (#2) around 1:15pm

For lunch (around 1:30) I make myself a salad, I do this often. 

Olive oil, balsamic vinegar and grey poupon

as dressing. Also:

cucumber, tomatoes onions, radish, jicama and artificial crab (2 sticks)  3cups of romaine mix. Its delicious.

Around 4:30 I get cranky about some work stuff and respond by eating some of the veal roast. I didn't eat the noodles under it, by the way. Stress eating rules! I also went for refill of water #3. Still freaking at 5:30 and I ate a Reese's peanut butter cup (just one)

Working the dining room and walking around the kitchen when I notice that I just ate two chocolate chip cookies. dammit.  I ate just about the same box of veal roast again around 7:45-8pm.

When I get home I make a small bowl of popcorn (1tbsp of olive oil and some salt) and eat a few (5 tbsp) chocolate morsels with my book at about 10pm. Forgive me the sugar, I was a little hung over. Crash at midnight.

good night. 

Sunday December 2

Good morning! I eat a banana and a small yoghurt for breakfast, plus about a 1/2 c of raisins during my status meet with the AM cooks. 

I of course begin drinking water. you know, Eric I realize that I am eating better simply because I am documenting it. I may have to do this even when you no longer want to read them. So here's my breakfast, sans raisins. As you can see by the blue paint I am eating it in the Dairy kitchen. 

I made latte's for everyone, including myself.

Man I am a paragon of productivity today. Just killing it. So busy I almost don't stop for lunch, but then I take a minute and make a sandwich. I found some pastrami and cole slaw so I made this rueben sandwich. 

 and melted muenster cheese on it on the breakroom microwave. Cheese and meat can never meet in Kosher world.  Some erin's potato chips on the side (maybe a 8oz handful) its 145pm.

Ate some grapes at 4pm, and drank some water (three today)

Here's a picture of my bagel and lox (Its a Jewish retirement home, did you think that you wouldn't get a picture of a bagel and lox sooner or later?) plus cucumber slices that I just ate for dinner, its 8pm.  

Writing this all down is making me conscious of what I eat enough to make me

 1. make better decisions 

and 2. eat less. 

I hope that I made it at least slightly more interesting with the pictures. Thanks for your input and help, 

Sincerely, Chris

Monday December 3, 2012

vitamins and 1/3 of yogurt at home after lifting this morning.

12oz latte during Planning meeting
4 oz of roasted salmon over a 2 2/3oz scoop of jasmine rice with dill creme sauce and sauteed zucchini at 1245pm (dairy side, so actual cream in sauce)
No pictures...

at 4pm I get to eat this loveliness! Its chicken Shwarma over Israeli salad ( tomatoes cucumbers and lemon juice onions and herbs) This is probably a cup of chicken thighs and 1/2 c of salad

then I had a 2x espresso.
 And we have literally acres of grapes so I ate about 5 oz of them during the staff meeting.

 Then I worked the dining room, around 8pm I had a chop salad with champagne vinaigrette and more schwarma chicken (thighs) here on the right.








I went home around 9pm and had a bourbon on the rocks while I read my book and used the ball on the muscles between my scapula along my spine, them're sore. 

I wrote this letter to my mom last week and it turned into what might be a manifesto. A couple of months ago I took a three Tuesdays a month gig tending bar. I did it to keep up my skills and stay connected to the front line of service. I was looking for something to help me stay current but I got something else, too.

Mom, 

I've been watching Breaking Bad a lot recently, along with a bunch of Mad Men and it seems at least for men all that matters in the world sometimes is being happy doing what you love.

So tired yesterday when I finally got out of work, plus just overworked around the retirement home; all the residents get grumpy during Passover...then again actually everyone kind of laments Passover, I'm sorry and don't mean to offend but anyone who knows about it will agree: its a monumental pain in the ass.

We build tents for Sukkot, which is in the Fall. You're catching on! :) Anyway, got home from work at the retirement home at 645pm, and walked next door to work the bar before 7pm, straight up punchy tired. The bar got busy with friends and neighbors at 8pm, and then a post concert crowd came in around 10pm, good cool people.

 I could not have been happier, laughing, joking and making drinks for everyone. I like to entertain, I like knowing what people need before they do. And I'm really fucking good at it.

 I'm successful and happy these days because I absolutely love the HR, the scheduling and managing my big crazy staff of waiters at the Summit. Because I make (mostly) a lot of otherwise cranky old farts happy, run a smooth floor and because a few times a month after I'm done there I rock a party at the bar next door. So many friends show up that if there's someone at the bar who isn't part of the our circle, they leave that way.

 It took a long time to be OK with being so into Hospitality, all the vaguely negative letters from grandparents, "you don't really want to be just a waiter, now do you?"

Yep, I do.

Stir Fry Soup

I admit it. I over-indulge at Pike Place rather often. I buy a lot of great vegetables. I use Franks Produce. No one else.  So I always have lots of veggies on hand.

I awoke yesterday morning to the feeling that perhaps I had swallowed an extraordinarily large oyster shell and so instead of going down to the Sculpture park for Fuel Theory I called a cab and went up to Grouphealth’s Capitol Hill urgent care. I was thinking since it was 5am I could probably get in and out quick. Unfortunately there was a man (I know all the following because clearly he left his hearing aid at home, requiring the doctors to speak to him loud enough for me to hear several rooms away) who was having a heart attack who came in a few minutes before me. I hope he’s doing OK.

After I escaped the labyrinth halls of GH I headed home.  I should mention there is a game I play with myself: Fritter lotto. Here’s how you play. Walk past Top Pot on 4^th, the monorail rattle-whooshing overhead. If there are more than three people in line, keep going. If not you get to go in and get one of the most delicious apple fritters ever. Today I won.  I doubled down with a raspberry old-fashioned so I wouldn’t be empty-sticky-handed when I came home to my girlfriend. By mid-day the fritter had worn off and I was thinking of what to make to sooth my throat that would also be flavorful enough to satisfy.

Belltown is severely lacking in the budget Pho department. 

Here’s the recipe for what I made yesterday: Stir Fry Soup

Large fry pan or the wok if you feel  up to it

Stock pot with 3 cups of water set to boil.

One breast of chicken.   Slice it thin then slice those slices into large tiles of chicken. Set aside.

Three cloves of garlic chopped

Thumb sized knot of ginger peeled and chopped

About a ¼ cup of course chopped onion

Chinese five spice 1Tsp

Red Pepper Flake 1TSp

Thyme ½ TSP

Chicken Stock 1 cup

Soy Sauce

Package of ramen noodles

Carrot

Celery

Water chestnuts from back of the pantry –bonus!

Saute the garlic, ginger, and onion in 3 Tb of olive oil and 1 Tb of sesame oil

Add the chicken, red pepper flake, Thyme and Chinese five spice when the onion and garlic are translucent

Add chopped vegetables. I used typical soup stuff, but feel free to experiment.

Sauté until vegetables are soft. Hit it with a dash of soy sauce. At this point you are looking at a decent stir-fry.  Pour in the chicken stock and let it simmer.

Meanwhile over here at your boiling pot of water:

Add the ramen. I had a package and an half of noodles, one had a seasoning packet and I added that to the water at the same time as the noodles. Boil three minutes. Remove pot from heat, do not drain.

Add stir fry to the stock pot and serve, season with Siracha or Sambal, sit on the living room floor and watch Bravo until you feel better.

 

Dream Fragment 3

Dream Fragment 1 http://coatpocketfragments.blogspot.com/2011/05/dream-fragment.html

Dream Fragment 2 http://coatpocketfragments.blogspot.com/2012/01/dream-fragment-part-two.html

The coin tumbles in the ether black of the water. Heads. Tails. Heads. Twisting past strings of black pearls and bio-luminescence, the unflinching face of the coin flickers like so many mackerel caught in the half light of the night moon’s occasional penetrating gloom. Landing at last on the jagged reef; An astronaut stranded in a cratered lost place. Now a member forever of the unclaimed, the missing and the drown. Countless coins, thousands of beautiful women and millions of torn and rotting ships named for women now call him home. He calls them home too, nestled in the fetid breast of this angry oceanic garbage slough.  Will he pass from the colon of this black sea some day? Spat back into a place of light? Or is there a place more dark than this? 

The boy struggles to wake. He knows or hopes he is sleeping, and wants not to be here any longer than he has already been. Too far to return would he just die? Fear comes over him again and wrestles greedy fingers into the meat of his soul. He is hemorrhaging and strength is leaving him, seeping into the dark sand near the reef. He looks up at the stars and wonders which of them is his home. The wasted copper capsule of his spacecraft nearby has already begun to decompose. The Milky Way is made up of tiny fish that flash quickly as they turn and disappear leaving the absolute darkness felt only when the zeppelin of a nightmare passes blotting out all thought of light. 

The pain is stunning and rips a hole in the nightmare. Some bird is tearing a hunk of his head, its chunky beak and head thrashing back and forth to dislodge his ear from the tattered remains of his cheek. He screams and hears the bird speak in a language he cannot understand, “Fucking thief in my shop, yer skinny little fuck you’ll wish ye had died in the plagues when I’m done with you, wake up!”

Does honey go bad?

'ello! I am zee 'oney bear, yeaz! Perhapz yoo 'ave heard of zee Paula Dean? I deed that! 
Muhahahahaa!

Dear Seattle

Dear Seattle, 

It’s getting out of hand. The hand out crowd. I appreciate that everyone has his right to freedom of speech and all that. I get it that the sidewalk is a public place but I'm a nice person and should not be made to feel like a bastard each and every time I step out into your streets. 

Here's the thing. I am sorry that life has dealt you a shitty hand. I really am. Money is important for survival. So what sort of person would willingly pour out his life savings? With all certainty of a sample from last week’s commute I could give out -at just one dollar a person- close to $15 dollars every morning on my walk to work. And another $10 on my walk home at night. $25 dollars a day. 

$25 dollars is about what it costs to sponsor a non-profit or a child in Latin America for a month, while I’m on a roll. Maybe I should stop dodging the clip board wranglers too.

Seattle, you scare my mom. And friends from New York. The menace of being verbally assaulted has been known to be followed up by the actual threat of physical assault. I could go on about how many of these panhandlers spend the money handed to them on drugs, or talk about teaching a man to fish, but I know you’re not listening. 

I just want a little change downtown, is all. Can’t you help me? Fine, keep walking, ignore me.

Asshole!

Feels good, doesn’t it? 

Sincerely,

Chris

Pike Place Lights

Pike Place has always had a lot of art, next time you're taking the stairs down to Western on the back side of the market keep your eyes out for the light fixtures. They're walking around above you.