(no subject)

The Game: Angel
Publisher: Eden Studios, Inc.
Familiarity: Medium. I’ve never actually played Angel, exactly, but I’ve played the Buffy roleplaying game about four times, one of them as the "Director." I’ve seen a handful of episodes of the television show.

If you’ve seen Angel, the TV show, you know what the game is about. If you haven’t, let me tell you a little. The game is a dark modern fantasy, urban and gritty, with serious noir influences. There’s a thread of the whacky running through the story, too. There are demons living in alternate dimensions that want to eat you in some creative way, but there are other demons who run karaoke bars. There is power available to mortals that can drive them mad, but there are heroic ensouled vampires who want to be human again so they can go back to their girlfriends.

( Fighting the Good Fight )

Up next: Buffy the Vampire Slayer, followed by my first serious classic… Call of Cthulhu!

New Recipe: Grilled Tuna with Herbed Butter

Courtesy of Weight Watchers, which Abby and I have recently joined, courtesy of her mother.

Don't laugh! I'm lighter than I've been in years, and feeling great. There are some things in life I need structure for, and apparently eating is one of them. Having an online tool to tell me how much of something I can eat is great for me, since I haven't been able to develop the instincts myself.

Onward! This is the recipe. I'll add how it turned out as an edit later.

Ingredients
1 pound tuna steak
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 teaspoon fresh lime juice
cooking spray
2 no, 3 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
1 tablespoon fresh chives, chopped
1 tablespoon fresh parsley, chopped
1 tablespoon fresh tarragon, chopped
1 teaspoon lime zest, minced (you thought i was going to say chopped, didn't you.)
1/4 tablespoon salt (to taste)
1/8 tablespoon black pepper (to taste)

The original recipe called for steamed spinach, but as Abby doesn't eat green things, we're replacing that with whole wheat pasta.

Instructions
Step 1: Coat both sides of the fish in the olive oil and the lime juice. Since I'm getting my lime juice straight from a lime, I'm going to just squeeze the lime all over the fish. Now my fish is limey and oiley. Delightful.

Step 2: Coat the grill with cooking spray and heat it over high heat. Since I'm actually pan-frying my fish (on account of not owning a grill - shhh! don't tell anyone!) I'll skip that step. The last thing I need is to burn my oil. But if you were using a grill, this is where you'd want to start your grill preheating.

Step 3: In a metal bowl, combine the softened butter with the chives, parsley, tarragon, lime zest, salt, and pepper. This is the point at which I call this recipe a liar. A dirty, rotten liar. There is no way in hell that all that... stuff is going to fit in that little butter. I'm adding butter. Just you try and stop me.

Step 4: Grill the tuna, 3 minutes on each side (or however much you like your tuna grilled, or pan seared, or whatever). Also, melt your herby butter. The recipe says to do so on your grill, but since I'm cheating, into the microwave it goes!

When you serve it, you can do so with steamed spinach (as per the recipe) or whole wheat pasta. You pour the melted butter over the fish and pasta/spinach and eat it right up. Yum.

...

End result: an enthusiastic success. I'd eat it again. The only troubling thing was the pan-searing. I've been having a hard time getting my pan-seared things to turn out, well, not raw. The fish was ok, according to one of my cookbooks' illustrations, but rather raw, and disturbingly cool in the center. Hopefully I won't die. I think the trouble is that I tend to freeze my meats.

Anyway, if you try the recipe, let me know how it turns out for you.