Frozen Flakes of Doom!!! Day Two, Cabin Fever Sets In

Well, for those of us in Atlanta, it looks like it's going to be a long, cold road out of this one. As you can see, although the ice on the roads is melting, they're still pretty covered, and it's supposed to go down to 19 degrees Fahrenheit. That's too many degrees below zero Celsius for me to want to think about right now.



Now that we're on our second day of enforced staying home, a little bit of cabin fever has set in. Bailey has taken to attempting mind control to get us to let him out (he doesn't go outside):



Meanwhile, Tabitha has started gazing longingly at one of the pictures Hubby took on last summer's trip to the Pacific Northwest, which makes for some interesting typing and tweeting with her fat self on my laptop keyboard. Maybe she's reminiscing about getting us humans out of the house for a while.



I was going to deal with the cabin fever by baking all day, and I did make a batch of yummy blueberry muffins:


Hubby was also climbing the walls, so we decided to head out to the nearest pub within walking distance, the James Joyce. I typically don’t go there since they allow smoking after a certain time, and I did come home smelling of smoke tonight, but it did feel good to get out. It was especially fun after we ran into some friends and met "head busboy" Daniel Acree. It felt like a real neighborhood pub.

I, of course, forgot all about those healthy eating intentions and went straight for the comfort food, a Barbecue Bacon Cheeseburger, and Chimay Red beer:


Hubby enjoyed the fireplace (they have two on the porch):


No, we didn't sit out on the patio:


Wow, even the fountain lions look cold:


The sun is supposed to come out tomorrow, and I'm hoping to make it back to the office in the afternoon so the week isn't a total loss. Meanwhile, I'll watch out for those killer icicles:

Frozen Flakes of Doom!!! Day One...

Yes, two blogs posts from me in a week! I promised to keep you apprised of the developments at the World Headquarters of Random Oenophile Enterprises as the winter weather moves through, so this is my entry for Day One.

So, as you probably know by now we got some snow:


It started here last night around 8:00 and went steadily to around 1:30, and then I went to sleep and can't tell you what happened after that. Apparently the snow turned into something called "freezing drizzle." It's kind of like the post-nasal drip of wintery precipitation: steady and annoying, and likely to leave a crust on things if you're not careful. Okay, that was gross. Sorry. The cabin fever might be setting in.

Hubby made an executive decision that we'd do the Duck Confit Tacos last night. We had originally thought we'd do a head-to-head comparison of Cab vs. Pinot as a pairing, but after Hubby made the salsa according to directions, he decided it would be too spicy for the Pinot and went a completely different direction: beer. He's the best Hubby ever, so he made salsa for me that was mild, and I had the 2006 Texas Hills "Kick Butt Cab." Medium bodied and with great fruit and caramel notes, it had enough acidity to cut through the fattiness of the duck and enough sweetness to balance out the salt and spice.

Although we hadn't bought milk, bread, and eggs this weekend, I decided to engage in an act of solidarity with our panicked brethren and make French toast. We're out of maple syrup, so I did some strawberry topping:


A couple of friends of ours who have the French Tart blog are absolute Pho addicts. For those who don't know, Pho, pronounced "Fuh," is a type of Vietnamese soup. It's also apparently a really good hangover remedy. We decided we'd make some Turkey Pho, courtesy of Cooking Light and their annual "what to do with leftover turkey" article from a few years ago. It turned out really pretty and tasty, especially paired with the 2009 Montinore Estate Borealis: The Northern Whites. The blend of Miller-Thurgau, Gewurtztraminer, Pinot Gris, and Riesling had distinct vanilla notes at the front, and the savory-salty soup accented the citrus notes and minerality of the wine. Sorry, there's no picture. Blogger kept flipping my bowl of soup on its side, and I didn't want it to spill.

No snowstorm blog post would be complete without a few pictures. I took these around the yard, and you can see that the freezing drizzle had, indeed, coated everything with a thin layer of ice.












Like most other things in the city today, the bird bath is closed:


Frozen berries:


Last night's carnage:

Pondering food and wine to survive Frozen Flakes of Doom!!!

As most of the country is aware, there is a snow/ice/sleet/OMGwe'reallgonnadie storm headed to the Atlanta area. Forget the rest of the Southeast that will likely get it, too… We've got the airport, so we're more important, right?

I admit to some skepticism until the first flakes start falling. You see, I grew up in Birmingham, Alabama. We'd get days of hype about the weather, and then it would end up being rain or nothing much at all, dashing all our schoolchildren hopes of a day off. No, school-age kids never seem to get the concept of "you'll have to make it up later." Kind of like New Year's resolution dieters. But I digress…

My parents live on a big hill, and the only access to it is two roads, both pretty steep, so when the inevitable ice storm came, we were trapped for a couple of days. This typically occurred without power because of the following equation:

Ice + Above Ground Power Lines + Trees (Pine are the worst!) = power interruptions. For days.

After the historic blizzard of 1993, which I remember vividly because my high school boyfriend had just dumped me (I later killed him off at least three ways fictionally – fear the pen!), we were without power for five days. It sucked. Probably even more so for my parents, who had to deal with a mopey teenager. Thankfully, they kept one of these on hand:



Theirs was red. We knew it was serious when the camp stove came out and they hooked up the propane. It was nice to have hot food, especially because that was before they had a generator, and the stove and oven were electric. Ours are gas.

Hubby grew up in Montgomery, which was usually below the snow/ice line, so he didn't get the camping at home experience. You'd think that most of our discussions around the impending Frozen Flakes of Doom!!! would center on important things, like whether and how we'd get to work (more important for me since I have my own business, and if I don't work, I don’t get paid). Nope, we've been discussing food, likely because he plans on working "from home" (aka, the pub). Here's the plan:

1) We'll stick to cooking things that we can make or reheat with only our gas stove, using the grill as necessary. We've decided on Duck Confit Tacos and Turkey Pho.

2) If we lose power, we'll keep the freezer closed and put the refrigerated stuff in a cooler on the back porch or garage. It's going to be cold enough. If you try this, please keep an eye on outside temperatures. Food poisoning sucks. It's even worse with icy roads.

3) We stopped off at Ale Yeah! yesterday to stock up on supplies. Sadly, the Gouden Carolus Tripel didn't make it through the night. We do have plenty of wine, though, and as one of my Twitter friends reminded me, corkscrews do not require electricity.

I'll tweet and blog pictures and pairings as we cook. Meanwhile, I hope everyone stays warm!


P.S. As I'm writing this, Hubby's on the phone with his parents, who are in Montgomery. They're getting snow. I hope they have a camp stove handy.

P.P.S. For all you northerners who are scoffing at us, remember what happened a couple of years ago when the northeast got a true ice storm. You can't drive on ice any better than we can, so stuff it.