Candidacy

A nasty five-letter word punctuates the first two years of graduate school. Quals. You see, UC Berkeley needs to put its stamp of approval on any little snot precocious enough to attempt a doctorate program.

To be fair, my program does not formally QC as hard as other programs. We have no preliminary written exams, no comps, and *gasp* no thesis defense. That's right. Eventually I just hunt down the old guys and make them sign the dissertation. They don't get to put up a fight first. Perhaps that is why they go into hiding.

Nonetheless, simply because the department depends on WWI attrition tactics does not mean that my second year class cruised effortless through qualifying exams. I needed a paper bag to breathe into during the month's preparation for my three-hour interrogation. In the words of the older student, "If you don't have an emotional breakdown some time before the exam, you aren't doing it right."

So what did I do? I read thousands of pages on stuff, swang on the swings every day, and occasionally hid in trees. I talked to the neighborhood cats about biophysical chemistry. I compared my oven to protein binding sites. In other words, I took 'quirky' and turned into 'wtf'. But in the end I passed, and now I talk to cats less often. Also, I still have friends.

The weather matched my gloom. Those four weeks were filled with the cold, foggy wetness that seeps through the skin. I sulked under multiple sweaters, hoods, hats, and occasionally a snuggie. My nose froze and my hands wouldn't type. I drank boatloads of tea, but the fleeting heat of steeped water always left me yearning for the comfort of true warmth.

A PhD candidate is supposed to come up with solutions to problems in an experiment. I could do that! Well, maybe not. TWO snuggies would be excessive. However, I persevered.
Behold, the impossibly non-photogenic hot chocolate. Brandied hot chocolate with cayenne, to be exact. I take more pride of this creation than I do of my data. It's a drink that pulls you away from reality and beckons a minute's introspection. It is simple and easily adjusted to taste. However, it is REAL drinking chocolate--no powders or rehydratable marshmallows. Finally, there is no cloying sweetness to dominate each sip. The three flavors come together with a satisfying complexity. The dark chocolate, brandy, and cayenne play a nice trio: three individual players that you can sense solo and in harmony.

It's a triple threat to cold. Rich hot chocolate warms the insides better than tea: the fat substantiates the heat. However, 2% milk keeps the drink from being too heavy. Brandy gives a little fire to the stomach, while cayenne leaves your lips and mouth with just the right tingly heat. In the words of my friend, "Sounds like a nice drink to give to a lady friend." Sounds like a nice drink to give to myself. Every morning, forever and ever.

Charlene's favorite hot chocolate

1 c 2% fat milk (you need milkfat to emulsify the chocolate. I like 2%, but feel free to try whole)
dash salt
1/4 c chopped dark chocolate (50-75%)
Brown sugar, to taste (2T if using 72% chocolate and don't like cloying sweetness)
1/2 T brandy
Sprinkle cayenne pepper

Heat milk, salt, and sugar in a sauce pan until almost simmering. Take off heat. Add chocolate. Whisk until smooth. Add brandy and cayenne, to taste. MAke sure the sweetness is to your liking before serving.

Small things

Our hamster died. Cis, the cutie with the gingersnap, died after almost three years of pawing around. Our lab is officially hamsterless.

We buried her... in front of our building. We placed her in a box and dug a deep hole in a secluded corner of dirt and dead leaves, careful to make sure no dog would sniff her out. Nothing about lab dynamics sinks in like realizing that you are digging a dirt hole with your PhD mentor like some minion of Vesalius.

If I ever graduate, I will have a doctorate in molecular biology. My thesis work will have included burying pet the hamsters that I brought to class. Best of all, people will think it's prestigious.

Pet Cemetary parodies aside, grad school is not all fun and funerals. The past two years have been the hardest mental and emotional struggle since puberty, and there is no Chicken soup for the jaded grad student soul to comfort my emo battles. The extended writing hiatus has been a partial refrain from being yet another whiny, mediocre diatribe on why the world sucks. Also, "feelings" turn me into a lazy bastard.

Nonetheless, things are looking up; better medical doctors, fewer grad-school stressers, and phenomenal friends go a long way to finding stability. Well, that and the satisfaction in simple things.

Holy writing-about-life-cliche, Batman! I was referencing medieval grave-robbing anatomists not three paragraphs before. Bet you didn't see THIS coming, eh? Well, cliches are not exclusively born in the cubicles of Hallmark. One thing I can confess: there is nothing that strips away contempt of the contrite like realizing some of it is true. Investing the effort to appreciate the simple goes a very long way.
For example, tomatoes. I crave tomatoes like I had terminal scurvy. They are such a friendly fruit; full of tasty vitamins and msg (yeah, that's right). My current favorite tomatoey treat is slow-roasting all day at very low heat. A friend first explained this phenomenon, and this is the best way to turn a mediocre tomato into tomato crack.

Simply halve them, toss in olive oil, season. If you want you can add some fresh basil. I popped in some garlic for aromatic (and gustatory) flourish. Five hours later my roommate and I piled roasted garlic, goat cheese, and tomatoes on slices of fresh baguette. An epic bite: teeth sink into the chewy bread and tomato. Concentrated tomato-red sunshine bursts into the mouth. The tang of goat cheese and mellow warmth of roasted garlic provide a backdrop for one's palette to fall back on post "tomato-red sunshine explosion" (who uses these words, anyways?). My next dinner get-together will feature these guys because they pair fancy and comfort in a splendidly simple manner.
De Lycopersiconi esculenti fabrica


To begin:
Oven to 250
Cut tomatoes in half. Roma work well, as do cherry/grape tomatoes. If you have snooty/fancy heirloom tomatoes, I'd spend them on some fancy, adjective-heavy adventure. Put on a baking pan

Coat with thin layer olive oil. Season with sea salt and cracked pepper.

Take either cloves of garlic or an entire head. Cut the top of the head of garlic and drizzle olive oil on top, or coat cloves in oil as well. Also put on pan.

Sprinkle torn or chiffoned basil over the tomatoes. Pop in oven.

Here is the battle. The longer you can wait at the low temperatures, the more sun-dried like they will be. However, if Christmas morning was always torture for you, turn the heat up to 400 15 min before you MUST eat them. The tomatoes will roast themselves done. However, it's worth the wait.

Take garlic out when it smells good and is fork tender (so, start checking it once the house smells like garlic. This will depend on how much you added and the oven temp.)

The tomatoes make great appetizers with garlic, cheese, and bread. They also taste good in simple pastas, sandwiches... you get the idea.

Ode to a Toaster

THOU still unravish'd bride of breakfast
Thou foster-child of Bagel and Defrost
Able appliance, who canst thus toast
A perfect morsel crispier than sheer moisture lost

Suck it Keats. Who need ramble on the paradoxes of life and art when I have found the perfect toaster? Why expound on the paradox of dynamic life captured in a still vase when the Ideal Bagel hath graced thou'st breakfast plate?

This is my post on toast. 'Tis a toasty post, if you will.

I am still young. I have yet to experience much of the joys and sorrows of life. I have not found the depths of human love or the bitterness of piercing remorse. I live an innocent existence and burn holes in tables for the sake of s'mores.

I fell in love. My heart took off as if my chest were the Audubon. Breathing was so difficult I needed a protocol. I could not peel my eyes away from its sleek lines, shiny facade, and simple user display. Epiphany uncloaked itself in my perfectly toasted bagel.

Hyperbole, you question? Maybe. I care more about this toaster more than any baby I have ever seen. I like this toaster more than I like puppies. Puppies are pretty cool.

(picture from http://www.cuisinart.com/products/toasters/cpt-160.html)

The Cuisinart CPT-160 Metal Classic 2-slice toaster is cooler. It is simple in design. No fancy gadgets; it does not pretend it can reheat your pizza, cook your dinner, and wash the dishes, like other taosters. Nay, it knows that it can toast, and toast it does well. It's peers tell us that number 4 gives brown toast, but 4 in average-toaster speak = "burnt" This toaster does no such thing. Turn it to 4 and your toast is brown. Turn it to six and it is dark. Turn it to 1 and you wasted your time.

Why the declaration of affection? I adore carbs. I love toast. I worship bagels. Even when I was running six miles a day and living off vegetables and lean protein, I still had a toasted bagel every day. When I'm too lazy to cook, I live off toast and peanut butter.

Unfortunately for my diet, I have favored the latter lifestyle as of late. My advisor buying htis toaster for the lab chained me to the bench better than anything else: I'm convinced that I can pick up a dozen bagels at a local shop and move in for days.


Of course, it is also fun to dress toast up a little. Summer in California means all produce is fresh and cheap. I love adding romatina tomatoes and fresh basil to my morning bagel. My roommates STILL call me a food snob even though I have been living off toast for days. I'm not sure how that works.


My current favorite toasted treat is whole-grain bread with fresh avocado, baby heirloom taomatoes, and grated parmesan cheese. Avocados are like butter right now, and they are for once, affordable. Baby heirlooms bring out hidden girlishness. I would dropkick a small dog in a purse, but I happily coo over tiny tomatoes. They are so cute!! Ahem.


Anyway, my lab also thought this was overly fancy, but it took no time, and cost less than a boring sandwich. Better yet, it was filling and vegetarian, allowing omnivore and Berekley to live together in harmony.


Soft breads are sweet, but those toasted
Are sweeter; therefore, ye badass toaster
Toast on.


Favorite breakfast bagel

Poppy seed bagel
plain cream cheese
fresh basil
2-3 romatina tomatoes (cherry or grape also great)

slice tomatoes, tear/chiffon basil.

Toast bagel, spread with cream cheese, lay down tomatoes, top with basil


Avocado toast with baby heirloom tomatoes and Parmesan cheese

Whole grain bread
1 ripe avocado, sliced
1 c baby heirloom tomatoes, halved
fresh basil
parmesan cheese

Toast bread. Lay down avocados, then tomatoes. Sprinkle with basil and cheese.

Vuvuzela Warfare

My mornings have ceased to exist. I scribble this now; dashing off a few lines during a brief moment of peace. It is the breath of calm in a storm Charybdis herself could not comprehend. For the first time in almost a month, there has not been soccer all morning long.

Thank goodness the world cup lasts only a month--much longer and society would devolve into hitting each other with sticks.

This tourney has been full of interesting calls and raging let-downs: it is as if western Europe forgot how to play soccer. Thank goodness for the Spanish, Dutch, and Germans or the cup should be called "Americas and random Asia-Pacific Cup". It is amusing to watch the media turn so quickly on its idols. I guess if you play like a tsetse fly bit you on the ass, the papers have to make news out of something.

Of course, I'm brokenhearted that the US lost to Ghana again. Bigger issues lie at hand, however. Both fans and players in the US must learn consistency. 1) the US team must learn that there are NINETY minutes to a soccer game and one must play in ALL of them. 2) Fans should remember that there is this sport that the rest of the world watches. It involves athletes who aren't fat guys in some form of spandex, and they don't swing sticks or grab each other. (Note: I am a huge baseball and football fan. Golf not so much.)

On a different note: the infamous vuvuzela could be the answer to world peace. Give warring governments a bunch of these violent kazoos. Eventually one set of politicians will hemorrhage in the ears. The most complicated of treatises is suddenly self-resolving.

The South Africans (and Chinese who actually mass produce this newfangled trumpet) have inspired me to incorporate the stadium horn into my every-day life. I aim to hire a professional vuvuzelaist.

Imagine: it is time to wake up. Instead of somnolently hitting "snooze" and turning over, I'm blasted by the drone of Fitzwilliam, blaring his purple vuvuzela. I furiously awaken, sympathetic nervous system shot into high gear. From under my covers I pull out a second plastic vuvuzela. I use it not to make noise, but as a giant orange stick; I chase Fitzwilliam around my house. Fitzy, unable to perform AND sprint away from a pissed-off 23 yr old, will have to abandon his noise making schemes. Fates are decided by a full-scale combat. Crouching trumpet, hidden grad student. All before breakfast.

It gets better. Fitzwilliam will play his loudest concerto every time I'm stuck in traffic or next to some 'badass' junky car blaring rap music so loud the S.A. fault shook. Best of all--every time some uppity teenager has to talk on the phone about her shopping trips before prom, Fitzy will save my day. Meanwhile, my hearing would slowly go to shit.

I still dream of coming up with a vuvuzela shaped dessert. Perhaps I could make thin cookies and shape them into tiny trumpets. Perhaps I could take ice cream cones and turn them into vuvuzela cones. Perhaps I will try these things when I actually have time to clean up a kitchen coated in sugar. Yet, I do not kid: just wait for the latter recipe.

What I have managed to do, however, is make ice cream. I bought myself an ice cream maker as a congrats gift for snagging a fellowhip I bitched about immensely in the fall. Ice cream is quite simple to make. Although I am terrified of scalding milk or scrambling egg yolks, in reality making a rich ice cream base takes less than a batch of cookies dough.


Naturally, my first inclination was to add alcohol. Surprisingly I resisted the urge the first few times. Eventually however, I caved in.

Hence, Bailey's-chip ice cream. (pictures to come) The pale background with tiny chocolate chips makes a round scoop look almost like an edible soccer ball. Ok, it is a bit cheesy. I don't care. I merely hope my pants still fit after this ice cream binge. Besides, a scoop of this stuff in one's morning coffee while screaming at the television is better than beating people with plastic sticks.


Bailey's-chip ice cream

5 lg egg yolks
0.75 c sugar
2 c whole milk
1.25 c heavy cream
pinch salt
1/4 c Bailey's
1 c MINI chocolate chips

Whisk together yolks, salt, and sugar until mixture is pale, yellow, and thick.

Combine milk and cream. Heat until the edges bubble. Don't let boil. Remove from heat.

Temper yolks: add about 1 c of hot milk mixture to the yolk mixture, whisk briskly. Now that yolks are used to hot dairy, add yolks into the milk-cream and whisk.

Slowly cook over low heat until thermometer reads 170 F. Turn off heat. Mix will continue to heat until 175-180, depending on the pot. Stuff should coat the back of a spoon, and a line drawn down the back should hold.

Strain through a fine sieve (important! keeps mix silky). Chill in fridge, about three hours. Add Bailey's.

Pour into ice cream maker, follow directions. In the last 10 min of churning, add chocolate.

Once stuff is done it will be soft. If you can wait, put it in a container and let it age in the freezer for a couple hours. However, it is really good straight out of the machine.

Teddy bear campfires and kitchen tables

Ah, summer; a glorious release for the free spirit. Although I know I will eventually grow up and have a job that does not change with the seasons, I fiercely cling to the concept of summer vacation. The timbre has changed slightly: summer no longer signifies a chance to intern across the country, take up Polish, or backpack across Costa Rica. Yet, now summer is both a chance to be productive in lab and enjoy a flexible schedule. The undergrads are gone and class no longer dictates my experiment schedule. Best of all, extended sunlight dissipates long-day blues.

I do have small protests about the Berkeley summer. For one, it isn't actually summer. Being close to the Bay is meteorological thorazine: it assuages the bad, yet it numbs variation to a humdrum, flat line. I flat out refused to bike to work one day in May because it was freezing cold and raining. After four years in the hot sun I refused to be pathetically cold and wet just days away from June. In the worlds of a friend, "Yep, here you never quite put the pants away."

Climatic quibbling aside, I will be sad when summer ends. My roommate David celebrated his birthday in early June, so fellow roommate Maddie and I took him to dinner to celebrate the continued survival of his autonomic nervous system.

Sitcom-worthy chaos ensued before we picked a restaurant, and an hour of disoriented banter led us to a cozy table at a swanking Sicilian trattoria. The scrumptious Italian meal far outclassed us madcap graduate students, but we headed home afterwards the traditional birthday necessities of cake and candles.


I had made a Kahlua chocolate-swirl cheesecake for the occasion. Cheesecakes require three strict criteria: gradual temperature changes, even thermal distribution, and not too much air. These three culminate into one golden-custard rule: patience. Patience and I do not always get along. So, the cheesecake was a little cracked. No one cared, it was decadently creamy.

As we futilely tried to cram more calories into our overwhelmed stomachs, Maddie started playing with the candles. All of us are a touch pyro, so a slender match sending delicate drops of wax sliding down the curvy sides of a candle was fascinating. Yet life, like candlewax, is a slippery slope. One candle grew to two, to three, to all of them. This progression ended in a tiny bonfire on the plate: match sticks fueled by birthday wax.


Biological research is every day life for us, but the importance of NOT lighting fires INSIDE THE HOUSE is too difficult to grasp. Proudly, I brilliantly thought to roast mini-marshmallows (I always have a stock for making homemade fondant).


Which brings me to a recipe as idiotic as it is delicious: indoor teddy graham s'mores. Chocolate chips and teddy graham bears were on hand from the cheesecake. Mini marshmallows set aflame and waved around to loo like tiny sugar meteors quickly melt the chocolate and make adorable morsels.

the aftermath? Fortunately for us, (and to the chagrin of Smokey the Bear programs everywhere) we did not burn down the house. Unfortunately for us, we failed to understand that plates conduct heat. And wood burns with heat and oxygen. And our kitchen, like the rest of the atmosphere, is full of oxygen. so when the plate was lifted, there was a nice burned spot on the table. Oh well. Sandpaper and varnish is a well-worth chaser for such a delicious adventure.


Teddy Graham S'mores

Teddy grahams
Chocolate Chips
Mini-marshmallows

Step 1: light fire inside house
Step 2: don't think about it
Step 3: roast marshmallows
Step 4: put marshmallow on bear with chocolate chip on it
Step 5: pop in mouth, continue not thinking about it.

Repeat. They are tiny little bears.

lipophilicity in San Francisco

In the search for life's meaning there comes a time to bow to the cliche and carpe diem. Why? Some days you wake up and Indiana Jones is your soundtrack. Some days tantalizing possibilities beckon through your curtains like sirens to Ulysses. Some days excitement replaces the plasma coursing through your veins. Some days you have to get apple-bacon maple doughnuts in San Francisco.

Stereotypical, I know. Yet another reference to how much I like bacon. Yet I had heard of these mythical creatures since coming to Berkeley. Friends and food snobs alike had described this breakfast chimera of sweet and savory. United by a common dedication to fat, the bacon doughnut is proof that sometimes two lower-class foods can combine to attain 'gourmet' status at three dollars a pop. My roommate David and I had to experience this first had. It was the perfect excuse to invade the city.

Wandering around SF was a pleasure in itself. Dynamo Donuts is a tiny nook hidden in the Mission, a district of SanFran known for it's Latino sabor. Within five minutes David, born and raised in Mexico City, was scheming with me as to how we could schlep pounds of chicharron and mangos around the city. Murals covered buildings, suggesting that a young Siquieros was hiding behind a nearby shop counter. We strolled through the idyllic weather, assured that today would be a new echelon of wonderful.

We were correct. Bacon doughnuts give surreal a new name. Dali, wax your mustache and sit down, because bacon gives a salty surprise to the sweet fried dough, while apple and maple sing like blue jays in a coffee commercial. It defied every diet on the planet, and I did not care. That doughnut was Motown happiness on a plate.


What, then could be a proper chaser to such divinity? The city never fails. We waddled back towards Humphrey Slocombe. One of a handful of fancy-pants-all-organic-ice cream shops, all with too many adjectives, the chefs twine intriguing and delicious into one creamy, irresistible scoop. Our weapon of choice? Secret Breakfast: cornflakes and bourbon.


Bacon donut, check. Cornflake bourbon ice cream, check. Nunchucks in case we were attacked by angry nutritionists, check. Incapable of eating for the next several hours, we walked over to the MOMA for a little modern art. The next hours we mused over installations and paintings, some which merited awe, and others that drew ill-suppressed giggling. Wandering past these manifestations of artistic thought instills a pensive contentment; it makes one feel like a better human than that frumpy Babbit who rolls out of bed in plaid PJs every other day of the week. I took added satisfaction that I got my art-fix with too much bacon, bourbon, and doughnut rolling around my stomach. I can only imagine what would've happened if I was also lugging around pounds of fruit and Mexican sausage in my purse...

The rest of the day followed a symphonic scheme. We had a quick third movement scherzo of salami, pancetta, and prociutto from the best in charcuterie, Boccalone's. We then wandered up to Coit Tower, in hopes of finding both a fantastic view and a way to burn off colossal quantities of fat. The day ended with a west-coast Pacific sunset, drinks, and interesting people. We chatted up a man taking pictures of his girlfriend "Hell, I'm not even a tourist. I'm just Asian, I f*cking love taking pictures," and a young man who told us he flew F18s for the Navy, "Actually I thought I would tell you I worked as a chef in Napa--figured after hearing that crap you'd believe anything." We talked about sneaking flasks to baseball games and the genius of Carl Sagan.


Honestly, if I heard someone else tell me this story, I'd hate him/her a little. Perhaps some are impervious to jealousy, but I certainly am not. What do I suggest? Go buy some bourbon cornflake ice cream. Even if jealousy persists, the ice cream is so cold the tongue is too frozen to do anything other than enjoy.

What recipe would complement such a day? Ironically, I went vegetarian. Perhaps a herbivorous day is a karmic response. Perhaps my body was simply crying out for dark greens. Perhaps the subsequent sweet potato fontina pizza buried under peppery arugula is delicious any day.


Hubris aside, it is a great pizza. Fontina cheese does not merely melt. Nay, it sheds the confines of society and relaxes into creamy luxury. Sweet potatoes give a nice color and sweetness, and they have more beta carotene than carrots, double win. Arugula is to fontina as scandal is to politics: each has a following separately, but in reality the two are inextricable. It is more fun that way. A drizzle of olive oil and balsamic vinegar on top and my friends feel validated in calling me a food snob. even though it took the same amount of time as an overglorified pasta dish.

Sweet potato fontina pizza with arugula

Favorite pizza dough (when I'm lazy I just pick up fresh dough from my local Trader Joes or grocery store)
Olive oil *
2 c Fontina, grated
1 small sweet potato, sliced as thin as possible
2 c Arugula
Parmesan cheese, balsamic vinegar, olive oil

Brush crust with oil. Sprinkle cheese on top of crust. Lay down potato slices to create a thin layer. Bake at 375 until cheese bubbles and potatoes are more or less tender. Pile on Arugula. Drizzle oil and vinegar on top, grate Parmesan over everything to garnish.

* If I'm feeling less lazy, I'll carmelize an onion: slice a small sweet onion, saute in olive oil until soft and translucent, add a splash of balsamic vinegar and water, let simmer until onions are really soft. Put that on the crust, drizzle olive oil on top.

Ethical hamsters and raspberry chili salmon

Some days the spirit simply refuses to listen to the logical. I find these are the days I disappear from the world with a book, reveling in literary escapism, or insist on playing on the swings when I'm two hours late for work. Tonight I unfathomably refuse sleep and strangely want to write something with the word "lugubriously" in it.

Fortunately, I have no personal need for such a modifier. Of course I adore the little adverb--it flourishes its connotation so well. Truly, onomatopoeia is not limited to monosyllabic interjections from comic books. Yet still, this has nothing to do with hamsters.

Neither pet hamster in my current lab is definitively lugubrious. There are two, cis and trans, and they are strictly pets. The closest either gets to being an experiment is running over my desk and nibbling at my lab notebook. The cute little bastards do what hamsters do best: eat, pee, and look adorable.

I was coddling Cis while an experiment ran one day before I was unhappily reminded that I had ethics class in twenty minutes. (ironically, Trans has become incorrigibly fat and bites. Love may be blind, but hamsters merely warrant fascination, which can most certainly discriminate.)

I just rambled about the ebb and flow of daily life, so I needn't bore you further on the matter. Allow me to present figure 1 instead:


Thus, you can imagine the appeal of sitting through the antiquated mumblings of a nice (yet ancient) professor on a topic that is inevitably oversimplified or overcomplicated. I joked to the lab "might as well as take the hamster with me for company."

Let me tell you, there comes a strange pleasure in showing up to a class on scientific ethics late, holding a 2 L flask with a hamster sloshing around inside. Ethics. hamster.

It wasn't as bad as it could have been. I did not show up to a vegan rally with a T-bone steak. Yet, the look on a friend post-doc's face when I sauntered in, tiny rodent cruising around the roomy glassware-turned-hamsterflask. suggested that I hide from the PETA Gestapo for a little while. I practiced as much discretion as a hamster in a flask will allow, and placed it at the feet of a bewildered classmate before promptly falling asleep.

I woke up halfway through class and played with Cis. She was having the time of her life. Imagine, your meager existence confined to a hamster cage! Makes one wonder about self-posing microcosms and loss of perspective. New smells, too much food, all of these strangers; why go back home? I nearly had an issue when runaway hamster jumped off my lap and scurried towards the 52 pairs of feet connected to students re-learning why James Watson is an utter bastard. Fortunately, my neighbor and I scooped her up.

Do not mistake me-- I think ethics are exceedingly important, interesting, and necessary for mental development in science. Ethics in fish are also very important. It is an amusingly awkward segway, but I did recently start reading about environmentally sound choices of fish. For some fish, it is best to buy farmed, while for others wild caught is better. Furthermore, although many 'pescatarians' suggest that eating fish is less of a crime against animals, eating certain kinds of fish can actually be quite damaging to both species and ecosystem.

Anyway, it's cool, you should check out the list before heading out to sushi:

http://www.montereybayaquarium.org/cr/seafoodwatch.aspx

That being said, I was cool enough to buy a lot of Alaskan salmon from Costco, because Costco makes you forget you live on under 30K a year. My current fast and easy fish dish I happily made up a few months ago. Chili garlic sauce that I bought on a whim at the store for 2 dollars mixed with raspberry jam left over from a cake, splashed with some OJ makes an interesting sweet-spicy combination that compliments the meaty fish. Caramelizing some shallot or onion beforehand makes the entire thing very easy, healthy, and interesting.

I love to serve a small portion of fish with a mountain of spinach and arugula--that way I can be too lazy to prepare some sort of carb, and I can pretend I'm Popeye. Yet seriously, they provide a very nice canvas for the simple flavors at play. The colors even contrast so nicely that people think you are a far better cook than you are. I made this for a friend, and he thought he was special or something for such a meal. Little did he know I just knew I had to cook the fish, and it would take less time than making anything else. Buahahaha. Ethical? Delicious.



Raspberry chili salmon

Salmon: could be a slice of fillet, or even a salmon steak.
Salt, pepper
1/2 onion, diced finely

2 large spoonfuls of seedless raspberry jam
1/2 spoonful of chili garlic sauce
healthy splash oj

Pat dry salmon. Season with salt and peper. Heat some olive oil in a pan, sear fish over high eat, a few minutes on each side. Hint-- for fish, it will slide on the skillet when that side is done. If it doesn't move, don't poke it. Take fish, wrap in tin foil to make a loose packet, and pop in a 300 oven while you make sauce.

Pour olive oil into pan. Add onions, turn heat down, and cook until onions are tender and verging on carmelized. Add remaining ingredients, stir to mix. Let simmer down and allow onion to get really soft.

Pull fish out of oven every 10 min to ensure it is not over done. Hint-- fish is done when flesh is flaky, but does not look dry. If fish is still undercooked (deep pink in center, not flaking) just pop in microwave for 30 seconds and so. (Real fancy, eh?)

Plate salmon on bed of greens. Spoon sauce over fish.