Dinner And A Cupcake

manifestation of our many interests. The wandering interests, we gots ‘em. In fact, most of the young professionals we know these days are prone to wearing many hats.

Saturday we welcomed Chris, Cheryl, and their daughter Naomi to the table, a young modern family that exemplifies this truism. Chris is a musician, designer and father, Cheryl is a programer, chemical engineer, mother, and blogging starlet. Naomi, at the ripe old age of four months, hasn’t yet executed her first WordPress local install. Cheryl started blogging on a whim, out of a love for the artistry of food and baking. She runs the very popular site Cupcake Bakeshop, and has been doing so for nearly three years now. Check out one of her recent works in the photo browser above, an Adzuki Bean Paste Filled Chocolate Cupcake with Matcha Green Tea Frosting.

Cheryl and Chris both eat meat on occasion, and Tanja was excited to tackle the challenge of inventing a hearty and omnivore-quenching meal for them. The answer? Portobello mushroom steaks. Served with… yet more mushrooms of course. Herb marinated crimini, mini hedgehog and white maitake mushrooms were served over a bed of julienned parsnip pasta, with a lightly spicy red pepper romesco sauce. In addition we prepared a holiday-inspired, three-beet salad with pine nuts and capers. The Portobello steaks were marinated in nama shoyu and olive oil, then pressed to facilitate a bit of relaxing and breakdown. The result of this method is a tender yet not too giving mushroom fillet. Just like meat? No. But wonderfully satisfying none the less.

Originally we were planning to focus discussion on the strengths and challenges of communicating to a niche using modern media, but instead our spectrum of hats came out in full force. Though we did manage to discuss blogging and vlogging for a hot minute, we quickly got diverted toward other topics. We touched on health care, video and photo tips and tricks, parenthood, and the state of the union before the table was even set.

In our respective mediums, we fill a niche. Cheryl, the world of fine-art baking, Tanja and I, the world of vegan, raw foods. Fortunately though, we have a plentitude of other interests. And also fortunate is that we work in mediums (blogging/vlogging) that [so far] retain a bit of flexibility tolerance. While we in new media can stray from subject and arbitrarily do a show about say, solar science for example, it is unlikely that conventional media would let the same happen; Sylar will probably never stray too far from being an uninventive, dimensionless, and wooden super-villain wannabe.

Speaking of straying from subject, I’m struck more and more by how much I love beets. I liked them as a kid, but only really had them sweet-pickled. In the last couple months we’ve been experimenting with them quite a bit, and have found them a rich, earthen, often under-appreciated vegetable. Barb went crazy for the beet salad, and I think we’ll be making it again soon for one of our upcoming Christmas episodes. The mushrooms worked as intended, that is, heartily. By the time dessert arrived I wasn’t really in the right frame, but verily I could not resist. Tanja made a white chocolate raw vegan icecream, using some amazing pressed cacao oil that we’ve been rationing like one pack of peanuts on a twelve-hour flight. It was complimented with a chocolate sauce with walnuts and ripe banana, for a banana split that brought the evening to a proper conclusion.

Conclusion, yes, time to sleep. In short, viva la straying. Life is short, so indulge in some capacity in all of your many interests, until you either expire satisfied in your circuitious efforts, or find the one thing that forces you to toss other interests aside due to its inescapable gravity. For me that’s not Rushmore though I do love the movie dearly, it’s probably not even video blogging. Maybe it’s the lovely Tanja Andrews.

Be good to each other,
Oscar

PS- be sure to notice our Romanesco Christmas tree, you’ll be seeing more of it in the near future.

EVENT :: This week the Freshtopia.net crew is presenting at Video Salon Redux in San Francisco, along with Ryanne and Jay of RyanIsHungry, and a video blogger chap called Dr. Popular. If you’re in San Francisco on Friday, swing by and say hello.

FOOD :: We’ll feature the recipe for the pressed Portobello Steaks in this week’s issue of The Freshtopian. If you haven’t signed up yet, consider entering your email address in the widget at top-right.

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