Drunken Pumpkin

I’m on an email list from Warren Ellis called Bad Signal. I have no idea what prompted the last few rounds of stuff from Ellis, but it contains some tasty looking recipes and some angry language. Which is why I’m not putting the text on the front page. Just click on through and you can enjoy the oddity that is Warren Ellis. By the way, Warren’s site is still in the blogroll, and for the terminally lazy, you can just click here.

email number 1

Fuck Off To The Epicure Restaurant, Then

As I once heard a barman at the Coach & Horses yell at a punter.

So people keep asking, and I’m not typing it out every single
bloody time, so maybe this’ll hold you:

You take a whole head of garlic, also known as a whole bulb
of garlic.

You draw off a big length of tinfoil, twice as much as you think
you’d need to make a large pocket or bag to contain the bulb.
And you fold it in half. And then you fold it in half again to make
your double-walled tinfoil sack, wrapping the edges together to
seal it. Leaving the top open, of course.

Saw the top off your bulb, to just expose the tops of the cloves
inside. Chuck it in the bag.

Throw a glass of white wine or sparkling wine (I often use
champagne) on top. NOTE: do not cook with any alcohol
that you wouldn’t be happy to drink on its own. NOTE: some
of you would drink paintstripper out of a dead soldier’s arse.
Imagine what an actual human would consider drinkable
and act accordingly.

You may also throw in herbs to taste — I often throw a
twig of rosemary in there.

(This, by the way, is why you want to be growing
herbs on a windowsill.)

Wrap up the top of the bag tightly, because now it’s full
of booze and you don’t want it to leak out.

Throw it in a hot oven for 90 minutes — less if you want
it less creamy and with more of its garlic bite.

What’s a hot oven? No less than 190 degrees C, 375
degrees F, gas mark 5.

This goes well with lamb: you can throw lamb in the
oven at the same temperature by the following sum:
30 mins per pound/450g + an extra 30 mins at the end.
So if you’ve got two pounds of lamb in there, that’s
90 minutes. Instead of burying it under a sauce, try
pulling the cooked meat apart with forks until it’s
shredded, and then shower it with pomegranate seeds.

Serve with an inexpensive Merlot from Chile, which have
been terrific for the last three years or so, and then
leave me alone.

– W

And email number 2

Angry Food

bad signal
CHEF BASTARDOS

Oh my god, this goes on and on.

FAQ: How To Get The Seeds Out Of A Pomegranate

Chop the pomegranate in half, like you were hacking the head
off a fanboy. Hold half the thing with the cut side facing down,
over a plate, bowl or tray. Repeatedly beat the top of the
pomegranate with a wooden spoon, as if attempting to cudgel
a small child to death. The seeds will rain out of the pomegranate
into your chosen receptacle.

Quick evening snack: handful or two of pomegranate seeds,
one sliced banana, lightly crush a bunch of shelled walnuts
in your hand and scatter, mix and eat with a spoon somewhere
away from me because I have work to do you bastards.

– W

Bon Appetit