We started the annual cooking event yesterday with the preparation of three dips. The true "El Dia de los Hammies" commemorative hamster/cooking adventure for 2008 will take place when I try to duplicate a Trader Joe's dip using nothing but the nutritional information and list of ingredients on the package. Jumping through rings of fire while wearing an Elvis suit couldn't make this more exciting, am I right?
Apparently I never properly posted about last year's El Dia, with the sweet and savoury crepes and stuff. I didn't even make the T-shirt until last week. (And then I didn't put it on the Cafepress store; I just submitted a one-off order.) So, this year we'll compensate by covering the "warm-up" (yesterday's dips) and the big event. (Whenever that may be - we must let our timetable be as free as a little hamster scurrying in the wind of its wheel.) I'm sure anyone reading this is relieved.
But first, here's a video of the new hamsters, just to get in the mood:
(I'm finally getting around to playing with Flickr's video capability. I prefer the Flickr community to the YouTube community, so let's hope this works well. The hams shown are, in order of appearance, the new elder satin male, the new satin female, Susan, and Cricket. More on Susan's vet appointment later.)
(And yes, I feel bad that the older hamsters don't have any video up. I do take videos of them, but the lighting is usually poor. These guys are too young to give me the sunbeam-stinkeye.)
Why dips this year? Because, other than My Amazing Salsa Verde (which I will have to repost since it fell off the site about eight years ago when I switched to blog format), my whole experience with making dips is opening the packet of ranch-flavoured dust into the tub of sour cream and stirring. And even that was, like, decades ago.
After we had TJ's Cilantro and Roasted Pecan dip, and especially after Mike commented on how it was a bit buttery (which is normally how we refer to a smelly hamitat - can someone tell me why male dwarf hamsters make pee that smells not unlike movie popcorn?), I knew we had a good theme for this year. New skills? Check. Hamster angle? Check. Unlikely to be disappointing (again, see last year's crepes)? CHECK!
Unfortunately, avoiding disappointment is not what happened with the Feta Pine-Nut Dip, but I'm getting ahead of myself.
The recipe calls for garlic, and I just love a recipe that does that, because it means I get to use the fresh, organic, already peeled garlic in the convenient storage package from Fresh & Easy:
You know how I always go on about F&E's markdowns. Here is one in action!
True, I can buy 99-cent parsley any time at Albertson's, but it wouldn't be organic, would it? However, that's not always important to everyone, including me. I guess a criticism of F&E might be that some items, like fresh herbs, are only available in organic form. Another criticism might be that they pre-package most of the produce. I understand why, since the stores are physically small and meant to be super-efficient, but it's still frustrating when you only want, say, one lime.
This next picture shows all of the ingredients together and measured out. I think the photo exemplifies my new motto: "If you focus on the cooking, you're allowed to not focus with the camera."
The partial teaspoon of garlic was artfully placed to really show off the barcode on that tub. I think, just from that barcode, you can tell that inside the tub is a cup of plain, Greek-style yogurt.
Next, I followed this recipe. It's really easy. Chop, crumble, stir - the end. Oh, plus you have to toast the pine nuts. Guess which part I screwed up?
This was sad. I hate scorched food. (As for the blur again, maybe I was crying so hard, the camera couldn't stop shaking?) By the way, those leaves on the side aren't meant to be funeral decorations for the nuts. I was just drying off some leaves that fell from our basil plant. (We have a lustrous, huge basil plant! $2.99 at Fresh & Easy!)
I carried on bravely. I chopped everything, even the sad nuts, and stirred in the already crumbled feta.
I then added the yogurt and mixed it all together in one of our new freebie casino mixing bowls:
The colour of that bowl isn't quite avocado green, in the same way that the smaller mixing bowl (not shown) isn't quite harvest gold. The largest bowl is kind of orange - you'll see it later. But, again, FREE!
The dip then went into the fridge for about nine hours, after which time I tried it and pronounced it bland. Mike pronounced it way too flavourful. Maybe I should've noticed that only 67% of the people on Epicurious would make it again. Or maybe I should've cut the yogurt and upped the garlic, like the reviews suggested. Or maybe I should, right now, add some spices and see how it tastes tomorrow?
(Or maybe I'll succumb to Mike's puppy-eyes and eat out. He's already licked the bowl clean on the good dip. Tune in next time for.... Nevada Compromise Dip!)
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