One of these jokes was sparked years ago when they were out to dinner and noticed, in one of their dishes, multiple uses for the same ingredient: fish, topped with (I assume) crabmeat and a sauce made from a fish stock base. Over the years I’ve overheard their elaborations, “Grilled Fish, lightly breaded with fish flakes, topped with a fish pate and served in a pool of fish sauce…” “Fish, lightly battered and fried in fish oil, and finished with a dusting of fish flakes.” I’ve never found this joke particularly funny, but I’ve put up with it because I love them.

Now, cut to last weekend. Jessica was visiting from out of town and I wanted to treat her to an impressive home-cooked meal, so I pulled out the big guns and suggested a recipe from Cook’s Illustrated. In case you’re unfamiliar with the publication, they pride themselves on their test kitchens, which (not unlike my dear friends, I suppose) attempt variations of common recipes until they agree upon on the best possible version, which is the one they ultimately publish. I decided to try the stuffed chicken breasts, which I had been eyeing for a while. According to their reports, a ricotta-based filling is too runny and a breadcrumb filling is too pasty. It turns out, the key to a truly moist stuffed chicken is to stuff it with, among other ingredients, chicken. It wasn’t until I was running my raw chicken trimmings though the food processer, that Jessica looked at me, thoroughly bewildered and balked, “What are you doing with that chicken paste? I thought you were making stuffed chicken?!” “Well, Jess,“ I responded, “it’s kind of like your favorite joke with Molly. It’s chicken-stuffed chicken, with a sauce.”

Thrilled with the opportunity to lob this old joke back into play, Jessica immediately jumped on her computer to provoke a response from Molly. Fifteen minutes later, we got this email. Her response, in all its ridiculous glory, just may have changed my stance on the nonsense I’ve merely tolerated all this time. Finally, six years later, I get the joke.

Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2011 19:03:58 -0800
Subject: chicken stuffed chicken topped with a sauce
From: molly damon
To: jessica haynes

That sounds spectacular. However, may I suggest that you enhance the recipe/evening with a few improvements?–
Start with the whole chicken (the only acceptable way to aquire a breast), remove the skin (set aside) and go apeshit on that bird until you’re down to the carcus. OK, pour another glass of wine and roll your sleeves up.  Now make a homemade stock from the bones and while that’s simmering down to a velvety, golden perfection on the stove you can take this time to gather all your dark meat and throw it in the food processor for the breast stuffing–*to achieve desired consistency add stock 1 tablespoon at a time until smooth and creamy. Nnnnmmm…ccreanmy.*  You following? Ok, good.  This will be a fine time to change outfits a few times, put on some more eyeliner and even talk about dying your hair.  Alright, back to the kitchen, bitches.  Gather up all the fat from the clucker (I know you threw it in the trash but it’s just the two of you and nobody is looking so go get it) and put in a sauce pan with some chicken buillon.  Bring to a rolling boil, reduce heat and simmer 20-25 min until fat rises to the top.  Remove from heat and immediately put pan into a a bath of ice water to stop the cooking process and let it emulsify properly. *If you don’t have any ice cubes, just chill the water best you can with some frozen chicken breasts in the freezer.* Ok, skim the fat solids off the top, mix a cocktail with the remaining liquids and SLOWLY add one well beaten egg (baby chicken) into the fat to form a thick sauce for drizzling or dipping.  Extra sauce will keep in the frigde for up to 5 days!
Now, pound your breasts thin, place 1/3 cup of dark meat chicken paste on one side, fold other half over and secure with a chicken bone.  Season the outsides liberally with poultry seasoning and brush an egg white wash on the top.  While the oven is preheating to 325F you could start an art project or smoke a cigarette–your choice.  10 minutes later you should wash the bits of fern, glue and tobacco off your hands and pop those breasts in the oven for 3-4 minutes on each side.  OK, remember that stock?  Remove the bones, set aside, and add the syrupy liquid to no less than 3 inches of oil.  Use a candy thermometer to ensure it reaches 370F.  Pull the breasts out of the oven and wrap tightly in the reserved chicken skin.  Tie neatly your little chicken breast/paste/skin bundles with some tendons and gingerly place into hot stock oil…mind the splash!  Deep fry to a golden perfection and drain excess oil on last year’s fashion mistakes.  Ready to dig in? Not so fast, ladies.  Half the enjoyment is visual and remember “we eat with our eyes first”.  Take an extra minute to plate up that gorgeuos chicken and garnish with feathers.  Don’t forget the sauce!  Enjoy!
p.s. If you are super ambitious, the bone marrow makes and excellent brulee for dessert!  But I’m guessing you’re already late for karaoke and let’s face it–there’s already PLENTY to hate yourself for in the morning without the burden of those extra pesky calories.
BON APPETIT!

Blog, I’ve missed you. A lot. You can’t imagine how many nights I’ve stayed up, wondering where we went wrong. I guess I just wasn’t feeling the spark like I used to. Let this video be a consolation, a plea for forgiveness and a promise to try a little harder to reignite the fire. Thank you for understanding.

Much love,

Emma

ABOUT THESE IMAGES:

I was once left in a car at a young age.

I don’t know when or where or for how long, possibly at the age of four, perhaps outside Tesco’s, probably for fifteen minutes only. The details don’t matter.  The point is that I wondered if anyone would come back. It seems trivial now but in a child’s mind it is possible to be alone forever.

Around the same age I began to feel a deep affinity with animals – in particular their plight at the hands of humans. I remember watching TV and seeing footage of a dog being put in a plastic bag and being kicked. What appalled me most was that the dog could not speak back. It’s muteness terrified me.

I should say that I was a well-loved child and never abandoned and yet it is clear that both these experiences arose from the same place deep inside me: a fear of being alone and unheard. Perhaps this is a fear we all share at some level, I am not sure.The images in this series explore that feeling, both in relation to myself and to animals in general. The camera is the perfect tool for capturing a sense of silence and longing: the shutter freezes the subject forever and two layers of glass are placed between the viewer and the viewed: the glass of the lens, the glass of the picture frame and, in this instance, the glass of the car window further isolates the animal. The dog is truly trapped.When I started this project I knew the photos would be dark. What I didn’t expect was to see so many subtle reactions by the dogs: some sad, some expectant, some angry, some dejected. It was as if upon opening up a box of grey-coloured pencils I was surprised to see so many shades inside.

I hope that these pictures are engaging and perhaps a little amusing. I want to show that there is life in the dark places within us.

I will stop writing now and you can stop reading. Words can only get us so far. After all, we are all animals.

Martin, Sept 2010

I think we need to start allowing for the possibility that there are contemporary Fashion Artists running amok on our runways, masquerading  as Designers.

First, let me say, folks- this is not my first rodeo. I can recall at least two incidents in which I confronted an animal in the wild. It is shocking beyond anything else I’ve experienced. Not shocking-scary, but shocking in the way it so suddenly shifts your sense of expectation and reality. Like seeing a celebrity in the grocery store, only a lot weirder.

My first experience happened at 6 years old. I was heading up a walkway, littered with toys, on my way to a friend’s house. I blindly reached down to pick up a rubber snake and the fucker started to wriggle in my hand. It was visceral and horrifying and completely unpredicted.

Then there was the time at the beautiful, serene Buddhist retreat center in Thailand. The last thing you expect while strolling the woods of a Zen Buddhist colony during a silent retreat is to come across an exotic animal in the wild. It was so shocking that Molly, who caught sight of it first, blurted out, “is this an alligator farm?!” I looked up to see a giant reptilian-looking animal, plodding across the path, not 50 yards in front of us. People, I kid you not. It was a komodo mother-fucking dragon.

And yet, I have never been assaulted by a wild animal, until tonight. Before, we were just co-existing. Two animals of a different species moving through the banality of our wild lives. I didn’t bother them and they barely noticed me.

Tonight, I was sucker-punched by a beast on a mission.

Ambling through the hood after a 15-hour work-day, I was in a very perceptive, but non-judgmental mood. Thoughts came, I noticed them, and watched them leave without needing to take a stance or conclude anything. Thoughts like, “it smells very strongly of urine right here.” Or, “my armpits feel really sticky.” It was pretty wonderful, actually. I passed a pile of garbage bags, evidently containing a whole potpourri of rotten things and thought, “New York is kind of like India.” Then, out of nowhere, a rat darted across the sidewalk not 10 feet in front of me.

That’s when the New York evening stroll lost its charm for me. My mind immediately went to the judging place. In normal neighborhoods, squirrels dart across the sidewalk. And cats. Domestic cats, that sleep on people’s beds at night and are fed and stroked and spoken to. At home, in Burbank, the neighborhood smells like fresh cut grass and orange trees.

I couldn’t get over it: a rat, disgusting. I’ve never seen any kind of animal in this neighborhood before, and now on this balmy midnight stroll, I’m dealing with rats?

As my mind replayed contemptuous thoughts toward the rodent, I noticed a big bag of neatly packed recycling on the curb. What a jackpot that would have been for the woman this morning I saw sifting through trash in search of just one of these carefully rinsed milk jugs. As I’m watching the bag, I hear a rustling and before my mind could even register the thought:

that’s not wind

a furious, grimy, claw-footed wild beast darted across the sidewalk, scampered over my foot and grazed my bare ankle with it’s wiry, hairy fur!!!

It was a mother-fucking rat.

I’ve seen komodo dragons in the wild; snakes have come alive in my grasp. I’ve touched every possible animal at the petting zoo. But I have never been the victim of a merciless, barbaric, miserly rat, literally stepping over me to get where he was going. What animal does that? Wasn’t he startled enough by my foot nearly stomping him to make the slightest effort to careen around it?

The worst part is the aftermath. I can still feel the weight of his body, the texture of his claws, the greasiness of his coat as it grazed the three inches of exposed skin beneath my rolled-up pant cuff. Three inches, I should note, that I’d noticed not five minutes earlier, when the cuff to my other pant leg had fallen. I looked ridiculous to have one rolled cuff and one fallen cuff, but apathy had gotten the better of me; I just didn’t care. It was that apathy that cost me the skin to fur contact. I’m not driving at a moral to this story; I know it’s not my fault. But, let’s just say I’ll be taking precautions with my lower leg-wear in the future.

Photographs by Huang Qingjun

Photographs by Yu Xiao

Oh, I just LOVE this series! The combination of this very posed little girl, standing larger than life in front of miniature model representations of childhood play grounds, expressing such a real and adult sense of sorrow! Boy, she really nailed it.

Charlie White Teen and Transgender Comparitive Study #2

Erwin Olaf Self Portrait – 50 Years Old