Saccharine Thoughts

Wait, no, that one also loses. How about a nice game of chess? Those rules are much more clear.

Tonight kicked off what promises to be a very busy and friend-filled weekend for me, and what better way to get started than with good food? Good food consisted of grilled pizzas, an idea stolen from A Good Appetite : 1 c warm water (110 to 115 F) 2 1/2 t active dry yeast 1/2 t sugar 4 T olive oil 3 1/4 c all-purpose flour, plus more if needed 2 t kosher salt Combine the water, yeast & sugar in a bowl & stir until mixed. Let sit 5 minutes until it gets foamy. Stir in 3 tablespoons of the olive oil. Mix the flour & salt together in a large bowl. Add the yeast mixture & stir until the dough forms a ball. Turn out onto a floured surface & knead until smooth & elastic, about 5 minutes. The dough should be slightly sticky, not dry. If more flour is needed, add it in 1 tablespoon at a time. Coat the inside of a large bowl with the remaining 1 tablespoon of olive oil. Put the dough in the bowl & turn to coat with oil. Cover & let rise until doubled about 1 hour...

I promise I don't have a fixation with bacon. No, really. I'm actually a vegetarian. Sort of, part-time, etc... I DO, however, have friends with pork problems, and I just facilitate their habits :) Just for Kim, here is the candied bacon ice cream from David Lebovitz 's archives. For the candied bacon: 5 strips bacon ~2 tablespoons light brown sugar Preheat the oven to 400F (200C). Lay the strips of bacon on a baking sheet lined with a silicone mat or aluminum foil, shiny side down. Sprinkle 1-2 teaspoons of brown sugar evenly over each strip of bacon. Bake for about half an hour. Midway during baking, flip the bacon strips over and drag them through the melted sugar. Remove from oven and cool the strips on a wire rack. Once crisp and cool, chop into little pieces - I used a food processor here. At this point in the process, you'll want to beware of adorable bacon burglars . Just a head's up. For the ice cream custard: 3 tablespoons salted butter ¾ cup ...

As you may have gathered from my latest to-do lists, I bumped a few projects so as to devote time and energy to creating a costume for a friend. Well dear audience, here are the spoils of my labor: Jon's Time Sorcerer costume for a new improv series, Guilds of Steel. I'm especially proud of this because I didn't actually have a pattern to work off of, just a picture from an online costume shop that he'd picked out. Guilds is a serial improv series chronicling the online lives of characters from an MMORPG (World of Warcraft, anyone?) and the offline lives of the players. The show has been playing every weekend since May 22, with recurring characters and all sorts of plots twists and legendary quests. I've been to at least one show each weekend and I am SO proud of my friends who have been involved in this; they were even recognized in the Austin Chronicle last week, which is a pretty big stinking deal! The makeup for the show has again been mastered by Jason Vines...

This year has flown by so fast, I haven't even noticed that it's actually summertime. Well, other than the sweltering Texas heat and the wondrous lack of university students around town... I kicked off my realization of official summerhood with a movie last night. Each summer 101X and the Alamo Drafthouse team up to present Movies in the Park - a series of movies shown on an inflatable drive-in movie screen, sans the cars. Instead, picture a field of Austinites, their kids, their dogs, blankets, lawnchairs and generally a little booze. That's what my Wednesday looked like as we attended this year's first movie of the series, which happened to be Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark . I think I've seen that movie 30 times now, and I haven't gotten tired of it yet. Give me 32, and I might sing a dif ferent tune.

Click for the Onion article . Prepare to chuckle and relate uncomfortably .