The first entry.

This is the first full entry that I wrote in the new year. The last one, posted on the first was started well before, so, this is the first.

The good news, the great Hope at work happened. We got some major new business and the next three months will be hectic with bringing on a flood of new people and preparing the agency for the new work.

Also, the Teams Task Force is going all out with a trial of MS Teams and I’ll be a big part of it for training and troubleshoot.

I find it funny that there are quite a few people in the task force don’t understand the scope of the project. They all insist on making it a comparison with Slack when that shouldn’t be the case. It should be whether MS Teams is a good and efficient tool in doing work and nothing else. If it is, then great. If it isn’t, then we’ll have to pass.

So, work is going to be crazy, but it’ll be a good crazy and things are looking up and up. Let’s just hope the economy doesn’t tank under the new administration.

Hope.

* * *

The New Year.

It’s going and I’m going along with it.

I’ve made a significant dent in my cooking project already. I’ve already five dishes in and today will be the sixth with a Spicy Tomato and Onion Jam. I was inspired by the burrata dish that we had at Marzano’s up in Tacoma over Christmas break.

I thought it’ll go well with bread and so I’m baking a few loaves over this weekend. Six loaves, in which I’ll give five away.

With these loaves, I’ve upped the hydration to 70% and hope to get a good grasp on the dough and have an open crumb. I’m using the same technique that I used for the 65% hydration dough from Trevor J. Wilson at Breadwerx.com.

I am confident that at least a few of the loaves will turn out okay, even though I didn’t follow his recipe to a T. I forgot to put the freshly mixed dough in the fridge and then take it out for the overnight autolysis. I just mixed and left it out. But, I think it’ll be fine. It was a little cool last night, so the heat wouldn’t affect it too much.

I guess we shall see tomorrow.

I think I’m going to do a 10+ hour cold proof in the fridge and bake it in the afternoon tomorrow.

Then, I can have my burrata and tomato jam. I can’t wait.

I don’t know why I’ve been so gung ho about cooking this year. On the first, I decided to do the traditional Southern New Year’s tradition that the Carters introduced to me; eating black-eyed-peas, collard greens, and fried chicken to start the New Year.

The peas are for luck/fortune, whereas the collards are for money/wealth. I didn’t make the cornbread from scratch, but used a box mix instead. I still counted it, I didn’t care. It was a little dry, but I think that’s how cornbread should be.

I’m not sure.

That feast was a little impromptu and was more of an urge to make and since it was meant to be eaten on New Year’s Day, I had a time limit to just do it, otherwise I’d have to wait another fucking year.

I had originally planned to make umbricelli instead, but I put that on the back burner for a day or two.

Umbricelli is a flour and water based pasta where you roll out the noodles by hand instead of using a machine. The noodles will be round and thicker and very rustic, taking different sizes and length.

It was amazing. There was a great chew to the noodles and the beef and mushroom ragu I made the night before was amazing. I used a plain can of tomato sauce and added my own flavors. Next time, I’ll use tomato puree and make my own sauce instead.

The trick to creating a tomato sauce is to make it the day before. Overnight sauce adds more flavor and is just plain better.

* * *

I was ambitious last night with my fifth dish of the project. Kimchi.

I still had a head of napa cabbage from Sister in my fridge and wanted to do something with it. I didn’t know if it was rotten or old or what, I just know that I wanted to make something out of it and thought of kimchi.

I got the ingredients and started to work on it. The cabbage was a little old, but I used it anyway. I didn’t want to go out to the store and buy a fresh head.

It’s a long and arduous process, but it’s actually pretty simple to make.

I decided to make a cucumber kimchi also with the remaining paste.

The cabbage kimchi will sit out on my kitchen floor for about two days before I put it in the fridge to ferment for another day or two before I open it and taste it. The cucumber kimchi should be ready tonight. It’s been in the fridge and I have no idea how any of it is going to turn out.

I have faith that it’ll be edible, but who knows.

* * *

Cooking. Being alone. Solitude.

It just heals my mental health. I just cook and listen to a book or even some stand-up comedy. Something to pass the time.

It’s so much a part of my life and habit now, that I can’t imagine not doing it.

Let’s see if I can focus on other aspects of my life and hobbies, like writing.

The year is still early and long. There’s a lot of time to do everything.

* * *