Roux-thickened beef stew, booze, and impotence

This weekend was an odd tapestry, all told. Orpheus and I spent a good deal of time together, and I finally got Chemie's computer set up right, more or less. There was probably some minor damage to the installation of Windows I had to re-do when I used the installation utility to partition the SCSI disk to make way for Ubuntu, but it seems like that should be easy enough to repair… And it'll probably
only mean doing something with the drivers so it recognizes the Ethernet port, again.

I cooked a cheap version of Coq au Vin with chicken breasts and instant stock (Julia forgive me), which yielded enough sauce to make a nice high fat/protein treat last night whilest O. and I were getting wasted and watching Barbarella: Queen of the Galaxy. Before Sunday, I never had any idea that, 1) such an absurdly fan-service-oriented sci-fi flop could exist, and 2) Dino de Laurentiis was such a freak, though Dune really should've clued me in… Also the fact that Giada is Giada, for the Foodies amongst you. I also made a minor-league unfortunate decision in cooking a vegetarian version of my orange walnut pork as the principal dinner dish for dinner that night, and it didn't work out terribly well. I think the addition of a nice duxelle of portobellos to the sauce may do it, or soaking dried mushrooms, reducing the resulting mushroom-y water and adding it to the thin, large strips of tofu to marinade. It just needs a slightly meatier flavor. The texture was spot-on.

Incidentally, this post also takes care of last night, which was a mixed thing, all told. Orpheus had to work late, and I wanted to get things done at my place after cooking a wonderful meal with Bulgaria… But Basso, he of the super-flakiness, wanted to come over and “watch a movie.” So, we congregated at O.’s place, popped in Barbarella, and got to poppin’. Unfortunately, I had been drinking rather heavily, and wasn’t exactly up to the task, which is quite a shame… Let’s just say that, usually, I get to be the guest of honor at these little gatherings in terms of the active role, and, as in Hamlet, too much alcohol may increase desire, but it takes away certain abilities to perform. God, how I hate booze right now.