tiny linkspam

[kaberett]

1. Dinner last night (and lunch today) was a modified version of Smitten Kitchen's baked chickpeas with pita chips and yoghurt. I am delighted that I now have The Knowledge Of The Pita Chips, which I adore but have not been able to find at prices that don't make me cry in this country, and we consumed the lot. Variations were: I couldn't face acquiring tahini to make up the yoghurt dressing as described and just ate yoghurt; I also didn't bother with the pine nuts. The salad-y thing was equal volumes tomato, cucumber and parsley, and I didn't bother dressing it. (I really like parsley.) It was tasty. Would eat again.

2. Via inoru_no_hoshi on the tweetrz, an exciting ScienceDaily summary of a Nature Geosciences paper on the topic of iron, the Earth, how it got here, and why it is where it is. tl;dr the vaporisation pressure of iron is significantly lower than we thought it was, which is why the Moon has sod-all of the stuff and not all of it on Earth has ended up in the core, even with the Late Veneer. There is the truism that Nature Geosciences papers are always wrong (extensible to some extent to Nature itself), but this looks pretty exciting to me.

3. My favourite band are releasing a new album called Elevator Music and it makes me cry every single time. It is bitter and vicious and cynical about the space age and space exploration and generation ships and existentialism and forgettability, and I adore it. The Last Man Who Walked On The Moon breaks my heart every single time, even the first time they played it in public and Simon warned us in advance that he hadn't finished writing the lyrics yet and did indeed end up singing "something something something something -ation" in the middle, because -- soon there will be no-one/left that I can call/just space suits in museums/with mission details on the wall. And then breath/they simulate our breath/to make us feel at home. And. This band.

4. Dave Hughes and the Renegade Folk Punk Band have also just released a new album, Rise, Again. I have not got my act together to listen to it yet (see also: depression), but expect to find it comforting, because I love a lot of what these folk do. (Currently the lyric of theirs stuck in my head is is it a love song/if I tell you that I love you/but I can't see me sharing your bed?//though there are days/when I don't think of you/they rarely outnumber/those I do...)

5. P thought it important I meet this baffling collection of photographs of unspoons.

6. Music I have particularly enjoyed recently: Singzu Joint - Fly and this one Taiwanese music video about marriage equality (has English subs; warning: WILL MAKE YOU CRY)

Comments

[hairyears]

Always interesting, hearing about advances in Geology: I wonder if that analysis will ever be refined so far as to explain the distribution of the other metallic elements.

Meanwhile, the Last Man on the Moon: you know Gene Cernan lived and worked in London for a couple of years?

[davidgillon]

Have now tried the pita chips/crisps recipe, yum! Even the over-done bits had a satisfying crunch. No brush to be had, but I found making up the oil/herbs/garlic mixture on a saucer and dragging them through worked fine.

[kaberett]

Yeah, I tend to drizzle oil over shredded things, toss, and hope for the best :-) I have also concluded that M&S-brand bagged pita chips are (1) inferior and (2) overpriced.

[alexseanchai]

...yeah, that warning on that music video is well-deserved.

[davidgillon]

Further minimal prep variation for the pitta chips (at least if you tend to have pittas frozen in the freezer as I do):

Lob frozen pittas in the toaster
Make up oil+herbs+whatever while waiting for them to toast
Once they're toasted they should be a) defrosted, b) puffed up, making it easy to split into two layers, c) partway cooked already.
Slice up (I piled four layers together and used a pizza wheel - knives obviously are just as usable)
Dredge in oil+herbs mix
Pop in the oven - I didn't time it but they were done very quickly, basically in the time while I was popping the recycling in a bin bag