Ryan Joy (atxryan)

With a tagline like “Get your booze on!”, is it any wonder that I would immediately fall in love with this website.

Not to mention it’s all web2.0ized with a simple interface, bold color scheme, AJAX updates, tag clouds, SMS tool, and community-feel!

I fell in love. This is before I even realized it’s a a skinnyCorp thing. skinnyCorp are the same folks that brought us my favorite online clothing destination, Threadless.

Of course, I immediately created an account and added my bar’s inventory. At this very moment, there are over 150 sweet, sweet libations I can make.

I LOVE oysters, as does Jade.

Luckily a number of our friends do as well because Jade and I bought over 100 of them on Saturday. I know, I know… you’re probably thinking, “Jesus, that’s a lot of oysters!” Well, they were on sale! What was an oyster lover supposed to do?

Throw a party, that’s what!

Mostly we ate them raw, but we also prepared a good many by lightly battering them in a breadcrumb/flour mixture seasoned with spices (cayenne, paprika, turmeric, tony chachere’s, and garlic salt) and then lightly frying them until the breading turned light brown. We also had a few oyster shooters which are just a raw oyster, vodka, and cocktail sauce in a shot glass.

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It’d been a long while since I cooked something entirely new that I’d never before attempted, so last night as I left the office and the first pangs of hunger begun to be felt I got that familiar hankering to venture out and do something new. Walking toward the bus stop I pulled up CHOW.com, who’s mobile site is very well done, on my Blackjack and decided I’d go with the first main dish that I’d never before prepared.

That dish happened to be Wild Mushroom Bánh Xèo with Red Wine Reduction. Mmmm.

Bánh Xèo (bun see-oh) are crêpes á la Vietnam. While French crêpes usually bring to mind thin pancakes stuffed with ham & cheese or some sweet dessert drizzled in strawberry sauce, bánh xèo are actually eggless and predate the French Colonial period in Vietnam.

HEB didn’t exactly have the mushrooms for which the original recipe called. In fact, HEB didn’t have even one. So, I decided that this would no longer be CHOW.com’s recipe, but my own.

Ingredients:

For the wild mushroom filling:

• 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
• 1 shallot or small red onion, finely diced
• 1/4 pound cremini mushrooms, cleaned and cut into 1/4-in. pieces
• 1/4 pound oyster mushrooms, cleaned and cut into 1/4-in. pieces
• 1/4 pound shitake mushrooms, cleaned and cut into 1/4-in. pieces
• 1 large portobella mushroom cap, cleaned and cut into 1/4-in. slices
• 2 teaspoons soy sauce
• 1/4 teaspoon granulated sugar
• kosher salt and ground black pepper, to taste

For the Pinot Noir reduction:

• 1 shallot, finely chopped
• 1 cup Pinot Noir
• 10 tablespoons butter, diced and kept cold
• Kosher salt and ground black pepper, to taste

For the crêpes:

• 1 cup white rice flour
• 1/2 cup all purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1 teaspoon granulated sugar
• Three smidgens of turmeric
• Two smidgens each of paprika and cayenne
• One smidgen of ginger and cumin
• 4 tablespoons vegetable oil
• 4 green onions, thinly sliced (white and green parts)
• 1/2 cup coconut milk
• 1 1/2 cups water
• 1/4 pound radish sprouts

Instructions:

For the mushrooms:

1. In a large sauté pan over medium heat, add the oil. Add the shallot and season with salt and pepper. Sauté until tender but not colored, about 4 to 5 minutes. Add the cremini, oyster, and shitake mushrooms. Sauté until golden brown and tender, about 10 to 12 minutes. Add the soy sauce and sugar and continue cooking until the soy sauce is almost completely reduced. Taste and adjust seasoning. Set aside.
2. Using the same or a different pan, saute the portobello strips.

For the Pinot Noir reduction:

1. In a medium saucepan over medium-high heat, combine the shallot and the wine. Cook until the liquid is reduced to a syrup. Reduce the heat to low. Add the butter, a few pieces at a time, whisking to incorporate each addition before adding more. Work the pan on and off the heat to regulate the temperature so that it does not become too hot. Keep warm.

For the crêpes:

1. In a large bowl, whisk together the rice flour, all-purpose flour, kosher salt, granulated sugar, curry powder, green onions, coconut milk and water.
2. Heat a 8-inch, non-stick pan over medium heat. For each crêpe, spray it with non-stick cooking spray. Add 1/4 of the cooked mushroom filling. Without removing the mushrooms, pour in between 1/2 and 3/4 cup of the crêpe batter. Quickly tilt the pan in all directions to allow the batter to completely cover the bottom of the pan. Cover and cook for 3 to 5 minutes.
3. Uncover and check for doneness. The crêpe should pull away from the sides of the pan, be well-browned and lacy on the bottom, and look a bit dry on the top.
4. Place 1/4 of the radish sprouts and 2 slices of portobello on top. Fold the crêpe over and serve drizzled with the wine sauce immediately.

This dish was one of the most satisfying meals I’ve cooked in a while, simply because it satisfied all the right criteria. It’s presentation was nice. I would have been pleased to order this in a restaurant. It is hot and cold, crispy and chewy, raw and cooked, and wonderfully earthy and fragrant with green onions and turmeric. It had great texture with the soft, yielding mushrooms coupled with the satisfying bread-y wrap and fresh crunch of the radish sprouts. This sexy dish is definitely a keeper.

For those in the know, SXSW day parties and media mixers are where it’s at. Paying absurd amounts of money to get a wristband only to wait in line to see the handful of bands you can actually make it to still doesn’t make sense to me. Plus, some people have jobs! This year you can find out where all the best parties are being held, what you’ll have to give up to get in, and where’s the nearest one you can stumble to next using Austinist’s Interactive Guide to SXSW Music

SXSW also release the actual official showcase schedule here.

To keep up with where I’ll be that week, check out my own calendar

• When did Karl Marx write The Communist Manifesto?
• What exactly do Kasmir Lime leaves look like and where the hell can I find them?
• Just how much of a badass is Chuck Norris?
• Is it the second or third right after Manchaca where that Christmas party is being held?
• Where are dog-friendly restaurants in San Antonio?

These are all questions I have quickly answered at a party, from within a grocery store, a bar, or while walking down the River Walk. I did so instantly by accessing the greatest store of information ever amassed - the Internet - effortlessly.

There was a New York Times article recently, Supercharged With All the Answers, that addressed this same phenomena in society at large. Surveys “show that three-quarters of Americans have cellphones and 44 percent of that number can connect to the Internet[...] The number of people with hand-held devices is much smaller, 11 percent of the population, and of that group 57 percent can surf the Web.”

I am one of those individuals who can and do surf the web from my hand-held device. I use a Samsung Blackjack and I have to agree that it is “stunning” to be able to access obscure information from the palm of my hand. It’s nothing for me to look up information, stats, or wikipedia entries when they come to mind. Of course, these trivial pursuits are in addition to the more mundane, but common tasks of checking email, news headlines, and weather. I can also perform much more technical tasks such as access a command-line shell on any number of work or personal servers. I can take and instantly share pictures on flickr and videos on YouTube.

With advanced mobile devices becoming more prolific, networks faster, and even the naivest consumers more savvy, we’ll see more and more people access the Internet from devices other than their traditional computers.

Timed to coincide with this week’s print edition, the Austin Chronicle unveiled a newly redesigned website. Congratulations to their team for this effort.

Following Jeff Beckham’s review of this redesign and original critique of their old design, I’d like to offer my first impressions:

It appears that the backend functionality remains the same as do the various components that made up their previous design. The biggest improvement that jumps out and smacks you in the face is the increase in whitespace. It also looks like the screen real estate benefited from a good deal of planning, rather than the seemingly unorganized layout that was present before.

The main page layout is much more readable now that each section is clearly marked. Readers can also easily access other options for viewing the Austin Chronicle right from each page’s header via RSS, email newsletters, and mobile content links.

The overall width of the design remains unchanged, but the amount of space devoted to content is markedly improved by removing the left column and placing all navigation in the header.

Interaction is also given more prominence as each article has a tool block which allows reader comments, letters to the editor, print & email functionality, and submissions to social bookmarking services such as digg and del.icio.us. I would also like to see Facebook added to this list. We live in a college town already teeming with Facebook users and those numbers will only increase now that they’ve started to allow anyone to join. Plus, digg and del.icio.us may be great for getting the Chronicle’s stories out to the world, but their biggest impact is and will continue to be local. Allowing readers to share local content and events with local friends can only bring good things.

Again, I’d like to congratulate the Austin Chronicle on a well done redesign. I look forward to their efforts in the future as they continue to engage their readers beyond their weekly editions.

Al Minns & Leon James doing the Charleston set to Daft Punk’s “Around the World:

View the original video here.

I spent this brisk February morning mountain biking through the Barton Creek Greenbelt with a few friends. I’d never been before, but after today I can see myself hitting that trail a lot more. It was a lot of fun and one helluva work out. We started at Hwy 360, rode through the Greenbelt to Zilker and then did a lap around the Hike & Bike trail before heading back to 360. Overall the ride was about 12 miles today.

I’m going to try to ride with these guys as many Sundays as possible. If you ride, let me know!

SXSW unveils first list of performers

SXSW finally got around to releasing the first peek at this year’s lineup for the annual music festival.

Plus… Public Enemy, Ozmalati, Mastodon, Against Me!, the Riverboat Gamblers and more are set to play free shows at Auditorium Shores.

I received a voicemail this morning at my work phone number from a Bill Barkus claiming to work for Representative Tom Cole (R-OK) and the National Republican Congressional Committee. According to the message, the RNCC wants to recognize me with their “national leadership award”. Of course I’m immediately skeptical as I consider:

a.) why would a Rep. from Oklahoma want to recognize me as a national leader?
b.) why would the RNCC want to recognize a Democrat?
c.) how did they get my work number?

I thought surely that someone had nominated me as a joke.

However, I needed some answers so I searched on the Internet for “Tom Cole leadership awards“. Lo and behold the first site that came up was another blog about these so-called ‘leadership awards’ and I learned that many, many people had been called. You can read all about it here.

Apparently they ask permission to use your name in a full-page ad they’re taking out to “support further tax cuts and to defeat the Democrats in the upcoming elections” and they also ask that you donate a few hundred dollars to help out with the “media blitz”. I’m assuming that their goals have changed since the Republican defeat in November. Then again, maybe not. They may just be that out of touch.

The common link seems to be registered business owners, but it’s still odd that I was called on my work number. My DBA doesn’t list my work number. The other commonality seems to be that we’re all Democrats (or at least vote that way), but I don’t believe that can be substantiated. Perhaps it’s just Democrats who were skeptical enough to research it further on the Internet.

I haven’t called the number back yet, but I think I might tomorrow sometime just to have a little fun. I did, however, put a call into MY Congressman, Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-TX) to inform his office of this scam on the part of the RNCC in case they were not aware. I’m hoping that someone will introduce a symbolic resolution demanding that the RNCC stop harassing and trying to dupe voters across the country. That should embarrass Mr. Cole, Mr. Reynolds, and the already disgraced Mr. Delay.

Update: (03/16/2007): I just received another phone call from Mr. Tom Cole’s office. This time the caller identified herself as Amanda Peyton on my voicemail, but gave the same spiel. They should google their name and their award. They’d see that I come up first.

Update: (04/27/2007): Congratulations to this guy. It’s a real honor to be considered for this award and not just some money-making scam that casts a wide net.

Update: (05/02/2007): These guys are UNBELIEVABLE! I just got another voicemail, this time from a Douglas Wilson with the Business Advisory Council telling me that Congressman Cole would like to invite me to dinner with President Bush on June 13th. This time I was instructed to call 888-383-8065, so it looks like they’re changing up a little bit.

Update: (05/11/2007): It will never end. I returned from lunch just now to find yet ANOTHER voicemail from Jacqueline Grupe (sp?), my contact at the Business Advisory Council. I was asked to call the same 888-383-8065 number as before and to do it with urgency to be able to have dinner with President Bush. Tom Cole must really, really want me to join them for dinner.