Dear Sephiroth: (a letter to a fictional character, because why not) #733
Ooof. Sephiroth... I... didn't get to bed until late last night. And I'm definitely feeling the effects, despite getting about 8 hours of sleep.
Despite the grogginess and fatigue, I woke up feeling pretty restless. My brain was swirling around with all the things I had to do today; I slept in, so my fuzzy feline children were hungry, and that needed to be addressed. I was hungry, and that needed to be addressed. I had thawed some pork belly that was now sitting in the fridge; that needed to be cooked. And... the last delivery of cat food was delivered to the wrong house, and it didn't get to us until a day later, and so everything inside had melted. They're gonna send a replacement on Wednesday for free (though our regular order is coming on Thursday, soooo...???), but we needed to go out and get good-quality canned wet cat food to tide them over, since we are out of their normal food as of today. There were dishes to do, and pumpkin seeds to be baked, and today I wanted to figure out what kind of mini-laptop to get, and at some point I have to shower, and of course, today's wishes and today's letter are non-negotiable items. It's a lot in only 12 hours.
...Well. It's a lot if you have executive dysfunction, anyway. Which I do. And getting treatment for it (usually stimulant medication that forces those parts of your brain to do their damn jobs) is... disproportionately difficult to get.
Well. I did feed my fuzzy feline children. And then, I began getting together the things I needed to make the pork belly. J cut up some broccoli and a red bell pepper for me, and we already had an onion cut up in the fridge, so we used it. I threw it all into the crockpot:
I seasoned it with these:
...Not pictured is the splash of orange juice I threw in there, and the last remaining driblets of my mushroom-flavored dark soy sauce. I'll have to get more.
I threw the pork belly on top of the veggies, skin side down. Then I threw some black garlic seasoning and some of that garlic jelly we got a long time ago on it:
I set it to cook on low heat for 4 hours.
While I was doing all this, J made me some toast with that red pepper butter; it's disproportionately yummy stuff:
I followed it up with making a tea (biscuit-flavored, this time), and putting one of R's cinnamon buns over it while it brewed.
...The resulting breakfast was pretty fabulous, actually.
Afterwards, there were still the pumpkin seeds to tend to. And I still had rendered bacon fat in the fridge. So I melted it, drizzled some on the seeds, and stirred them around to get them evenly coated. From there, I threw on some seasonings – pumpkin spice mix, paprika, salt, pepper, black garlic powder, and regular garlic powder. I was pretty thrilled:
And I thought I threw them in the oven at a lower temperature than usual, since throwing them in at 350 degrees Fahrenheit (176.67 degrees Celsius) usually ends up scorching the spices, somehow. Normally, at that temperature, you leave them in for 20 minutes; I was gonna try it at a lower temperature for 25 minutes to see if it does a little better. And then I started cooking the mushrooms to go with the pork and veggies in the remains of the bacon fat I melted, and the results turned out beautifully:
...The pumpkin seeds... well...
...I'll tell you what happened. I got my wires crossed in my brain for the oven temperature. I was gonna put them in at 25 degrees less than usual for 25 minutes. Unfortunately, my brain swapped “pumpkin seed temperature (350F/176.67C) with “bacon temperature” (400F/204.4C), and so... subtracting 25, I ended up putting them in at 375F/190.5C instead of 325F/162.78C for 25 minutes. Whoops.
So... yeah. It was bad. We had to throw them out. They weren't salvageable. Ah well. It happens that way sometimes. No biggie.
...That said though, Sephiroth, I... must be more tired than I thought, to make a mistake like that. Sheesh. I guess I'll just have to try again later.
I then tried to figure out what kind of mini laptop I wanted. I wished for something small enough to fit into my little owl backpack, while still having some USB ports and a mostly full keyboard. And I found a brand called Chuwi, who makes a laptop with a 10.5-inch screen, from corner to opposite corner. It had decent RAM, good battery life, and enough storage to put my music on. So I got it, along with a USB port expander. The whole thing was relatively inexpensive, and the pay I got from my job more than covered it, so... I'm pretty thrilled about that. Hopefully it'll be here soon.
With that done and still plenty of time before the crockpot was done cooking, I breathed life into today's wishes:
J took care of some of the dishes I thought I was gonna have to do. M went out and took care of getting appropriate canned wet food for the cats (he knows to avoid tuna, grains, and starches, because these aren't good for them). So... they helped knock out some of the things from my to-do list, and given how groggy I still am, I feel incredibly grateful for it.
The crockpot did eventually finish, and the results smelled heavenly:
I strained the leftover juices from the crockpot, put the solids back in, and set it to “keep warm”. I then cooked some rice in the juices. The rice, too, turned out fabulously:
...Seriously, you wouldn't believe how flavorful it was.
Here, want a bowl...?
Afterwards, I tried to brush my teeth, but the toasty fire in M's room was warm, and I got distracted and sat down in front of it for a while. And then J came in and sat down behind me, leaning against the foot of the bed. So I leaned on him, and we talked for a while, and I felt warm and safe, and... I almost ended up falling asleep. I did brush my teeth, yes. But only after deciding to get up because I realized that I was nodding off.
I've got about 4 hours left to be awake. In that time, I need to shower, medicate Hoshi, set up my clothing for tomorrow (so that I'm not fumbling around trying to decide what I wanna wear and trying to find whatever I decided upon), and do my get-ready-for-bed things. And I know that 4 hours sounds like a long time, but my focus is shit today, and I'll probably get distracted partway through, so... I had better get started now.
I love you so much, and I hope you can feel it, even on groggy, restless days like this one. I hope you can feel the faith I'm carrying in your safety, in who you are as a person, in your capacity to make kind, compassionate choices, and in your eventual return home.
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Back at his desk, Louis closed his eyes for a moment, trying to settle into the reality of this. He was leaving the UK for only the second time in his life. Suddenly, the holiday he took to Spain three summers ago felt like it paled in comparison. He was going to the U.S. - for work, it was true, but still - alone. He’d been all for seizing the moment when his boss had been looking at him with a gaze of steel, but now he felt vaguely nauseous.
Louis took several shaky breaths, feeling like the air was being sucked from the room, and opened the manila folder, laying it flat on his desk. His breath caught as he saw the destination, centered in a large, block font at the very top of the first page:
Robinson Publishing - Chicago, Illinois, United States of America.
~~~
After two years of living in an everlasting cycle of work, sleep, and regret, Louis finds himself wandering brand new streets perpetually haunted by the ghosts of his past.
Cowritten with the talented, brilliant, lovely @bravetemptation
Ex-Best Friends to Lovers | Unrequited Love | SO MUCH PINING | Infidelity (not between Louis and Harry) | Emotional Hurt/Comfort | Second Chance Romance | Based Heavily on Louis Tomlinson’s “Chicago” - Blame Louis not us! :-)
part two - a/n: play the that one song that came out in ratatouille
claude x reader
+The Kitchen+
Claude von Riegan was getting bolder with actions, much to your dismay. His eyes would linger on you longer than they should, his hand would brush against yours, if he didn't all together hold it to place a gentle kiss on your knuckles.
One time, he had the gall to do it in broad daylight and in public. You could hear the chatter, but what horrified you most of all was when in the distance you heard Judith Daphnel. You had managed to pull away before she turned the corner with his old professor. You gave him a sharp look before you excused yourself to continue with your duties.
Moon glowed, most of the soldiers had retired to their bedrooms, and you had successfully cleaned the training grounds, the cathedral (as much you could between the rubble and ruin), the gazebos, and now, all that was left was the dining hall; but before, you continued with your cleaning you decided to make dessert for tomorrow afternoon. It was simple and it wouldn't take long to bake as the long process was letting it cool off for the night then chill in the morning so it would be ready by the afternoon. Just because a war os going on doesn't mean people shouldn't enjoy the simple pleasure of a delicious pastry.
You measure everything carefully. The water, milk, flour, sugar, oil, powder, chocolate, rasberries, and blueberries. You took out the eggs and all of the utensils you needed. You would clean everything when you're done.
You pulled your hair up in a tight pony tail and began humming a small tune as you rinsed off the berries with room temperature water. Had you known Claude was watching you wouldn't have twirled in such an adorable manner.
You heard him stifle a laugh, you spun on your heel and finally noticed him.
Claude was leaning against the door frame with a mischievous twinkle in eyes as he watched your shocked state in amusement.
"Don't stop on my account," He said.
Your cheeks flared at the sight of his cheshire grin.
"S-shouldn't you be in bed, Duke Riegan?" You stuttered out.
Claude pushed off the door frame and stalked towards you, "Planning on joining me?"
Bolder, indeed.
"Absolutely not!" You exclaimed.
You huffed as you turned back against him and quickly made your ways towards the other ingredients.
Maybe, you could ignore him by focusing on the task on hand.
Of course, that hope was in vain when he came so incredibly close to you.
"Duke Riegan, I'm sure you've heard of the term: personal space, correct?"
Claude cutely cocked his head to the side, feigning ignorance, "I don't believe, I have."
You pursed your lips together. If he wouldn't move then you would make him move. You leaned over to grab the empty measuring cup and dipped it into the bag of flour (not the one you had perfectly measured in the container, you were not going to ruin that one). You didn't take too much flour out, just enough to cause an inconvenience if it 'accidently' happened to fall on his clothes. You were bit clumsy, everyone is, but you didn't try to hide the fact that you were trying to get him to leave when you purposely dumped the flour on his gold jacket.
"Oh my, I am so sorry. You should head to your room and clean up, and turn in for the night." You tried to usher him away quickly.
Claude stood stunned for just second, but a grin soon took its place on his lips and the glint of mischief returned to his eyes.
You soon regretted your decision of throwing flour at him when he took a hold of your waist and then proceeded to throw sugar powder from the container on your uniform.
"Two can play at this game, princess."
You tried suppress a giggle but the smile didn't leave your lips amd it escaped as you said: "That was perfectly measured."
You grabbed some of the flour in the container and dropped it on his dark hair.
"I believe that was declaration of war, princess."
"Hardly the time to be joking about such-" you were interrupted when threw more powder and flour at you.
And war it was, as the two took shots at each other with baking ingredients. You only tried to escape his grasp once but he quickly caught as he dumped more flour on your hair. Not that you knew, but he would've gladly chased you.
Your laughter filled the dining hall and he reveled in it. He had only seen you laugh a handful of times, he was glad that he was the reason why you were laughing so joyously.
In an effort to win, you grabbed the container of sugar powder and let it all fall on his head. When he didn't say anything or didn't move... You started to worry.
Did you take it a little too far?
"Duke Riegan, are you alright?" You whispered softly.
You moved closer to and brushed some of the powder off his eyes, "Duke Rie-"
Claude abruptly grabbed your hand and held it to cup his cheek. He laid a sweet kiss on your palm.
Pink dusted your cheeks as you tried to pull your hand away, "I think-"
Suddenly, you felt flour fall all over you; you gasped when it made contact with your skin. Your mouth agape in surprise, you looked at Claude bewildered while he had the nerve to have a childish grin plastered on his face.
You dusted off the flour of your face and scoffed, "You are foul and a cheater! I was worried!"
You threw a raspberry at his face while another smile graced your lips, however, you didn't expect him to catch it in his mouth.
Claude swallowed the raspberry, "Oh, princess, I've always been known for foul play."
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I've had this bag of wheat gluten in the pantry since forever when I first learned of the existence of seitan. Finally today, I went and looked up a recipe and got on with it.
I can distill the steps down to:
Mix gluten flour with seasonings
Add your hydration - if using a stock, make it weak! The entire flavour strength and saltiness remains in the final nuggets!
Knead the dough - it'll remain stodgy like a lab experiment gone sideways - at least in comparison to making bread dough, not the same experience at all!
Rest it for 15min
Chop into nugget sized chunks
Simmer it for 30 min - don't oversalt here either, I suspect seitan absorbs a lot of the liquid directly
Cool it
Chop it up and use it in stir fry, soup, etc
Mine came out overly salty because I used the broth in the hydration stage - and it was at "pasta cooking" levels of saltiness... 🤮
I've got plenty more gluten flour left so I'm sure I can figure imthe flavour balance out.
Texture wise, it's a bit wibbly. Like some cross between a grainy potato dumpling and an oversoaked mushroom...
