i left for belmont by 11:30am. i packed the remaining reuben sandwich ingredients: rye bread, sauerkraut, swiss cheese, and butter. since we were saving the corned beef until dinner, i made some leftover rice porridge and egg pancake for lunch.
my mother asked me to cook the corned beef now even though we weren't going to have it until the evening, so it'd have more time to cook and tenderize. so i opened up the package in the sink to prepare it for the slow cooker. right away i noticed something was off. there was a horrible smell coming from the corned beef, something like stinky cheese, or stinky tofu. i asked my father to take a sniff, he said it smelled awful, but figured that had something to do with the pickling process. so i prepared the beef regardless despite the foul odor, submerged it in boiling water, added some pickling spice, then put on the cover. i was hoping that after it had some time to cook, the smell would eventually go away.
i inspected my aeroponic plants yesterday but one thing i didn't do was to inspect the roots as well. there are just as dramatic changes happening under the cover. there were a lot of roots, and i noticed many of the mustard greens had a single taproot that reached all the way to the bottom of the container. naturally the healthiest plants also had the most amount of roots. the chinese celeries only had a few roots, but it's a good start. i'm curious to see how much more roots will be growing by next weekend.
as for the nutrient level, anywhere from 1-2 gallons have already been used up. once the water level on the gauge gets to the halfway mark, i'll add more nutrients to the tub. i also should really take a pH and ppm reading, just to make sure the water chemistry is still optimal. judging from the health of the plants though, i think we're still at healthy levels.
i went with my mother on a walk around 1pm. we went down to visit all the american-greek-persian grocery stores on mt.auburn street. i was also hoping to see some early spring plants but all i saw were a few bulbs. we passed by cafe vanak and the place was packed. walking down mt.auburn street, we noticed the red lentil vegetarian restaurant was also packed. something else we noticed was many of the businesses there are closed on sundays. from coolidge hardware, sevan bakery, fastachi nut store, massis bakery, even fordee's falafel and deli. the only two local markets that were opened was arax and roksana a few blocks further down the street. we didn't buy anything from arax but bought a few things from roksana, including pita bread, fruit leather candy, green raisins, and some ceylon tea. we walked back to belmont via hillside road. we got back home by 2:30pm.
first thing i noticed when we got back was the awful smell in the house from the corned beef. even after it's been slow cooking for nearly 2 hours, the rotten meat smell was still strong. we decided to press forward regardless. i flipped the corned beef over so the other side could be submerged. there was white foam in the cooking water, and foam was oozing out from a hole in the beef. i picked it up with a scoop and gave it a smell. that where the foul smell was coming from.
frequent blog readers know that i'm a master of eating suspicious meats that have gone well beyond its expiration date. so to say even i was starting to get worried about the smelly corned beef was something. my father still said it was okay, and i figured the worst that could happen is all three of us would get awful diarrhea for eating bad meat. but when i told him the corned beef only cost me $5 (normally it's $24, but on sale because of st.patrick's day), he was receptive to my idea of running down to the nearby star market and get another corned beef.
my mother ended up going with me. i thought the mt.auburn star market would have a big selection, but they had less than the somerville star market. the biggest size they had were 3 lbs, so i ended up buying two 3 lbs. corned beef. we also got some boneless chicken thighs on sale and cases of polar seltzers that were on sale (buy 2 [at $7/case], get 3 free).
when we got back to belmont my 3:30pm, my father had already taken out the bad corned beef and washed the slow cooker container. the new corned beef we got when we opened the package had no odor, which is how we knew this was good corned beef. the instructions said to cook at 50 minutes per pound, so 3 lbs. that means 2-1/2 hours, so the corned beef should be ready by 6pm, just in time for dinner. i didn't know what to do with the rotten corned beef, so i put it in a stainless steel bowl and left it in the sunroom, so it can be thrown out eventually. partially cooked, it was still putrid. we dodged a bullet by not eating it. kind of strange that it happened, we've never had a bad corned beef before, and you'd think the pickling process would preserve the beef. maybe there was a rip in the packaging, but i didn't notice any leaks.
it was a little jarring that sunset wasn't at 5:50pm like it'd be normally but instead at 6:50pm. it made it feel not so late even though judging by the clock it was getting a bit late. we checked on the corned beef at 6pm, it was cooked (meat thermometer read 170°F internal temperature), but my father said it was still too tough. so we left it to simmer for another 30 minutes. at the 6:30pm mark we checked again. my father said it was still tough, so we pushed it back another 30 minutes. but by that point we got tired of waiting, and decided to finally take out the corned beef.
even though it seemed though, it was pretty tender once we cut inside. the slices had very nice marbling on the interior, which added to the flavor. flat cut are lean cut and they're more expensive; we bought the round cut which are fat cut and they're cheaper but they have far better flavor.
my father cut the corned beef into slices first before making the rest of the sandwich. we grilled the rye bread in a pan before grilling them again with butter. once out of the pan, i added a piece of swiss cheese but they wouldn't melt, so i put the slices with cheese on them into the toaster oven. i think that's actually the easier way to toast and melt the bread at the same time. toasting them in the frying pan risks scorching them and it's not easy to control. with the bread ready, it was time to assemble: thick layers of corned beef, followed by squeeze-dried sauerkraut, then a slathering of russian dressing. we cut the reuben sandwiches in half to make them easier to eat before serving. my mother waited impatiently in the living room for dinner to be served.
it was good, but i think it'd be better with fresh swiss cheese from the deli than ready-made prepared packaged slices. we could also use some mustard instead of the russian dressing for some spiciness. since the water in the slow cooker was still hot and full of spices, my parents said we should cook the 2nd piece of corned beef as well. i took it out of the package - no smell! - and placed it in the slow cooker on high setting. the second corned beef should be ready by 10pm.
i left belmont by 7:40pm, getting back home in time to watch the start of the oscars. this was a rare academy awards where the favorite to win many awards was actually a movie with wide audience appeal and a movie i'd actually watched (everything everywhere all at once (EEAAO)).
right off the bat they started with the best supporting actor award. i'd read that barry keoghan might be a dark horse for the banshee of inisherin but in the end the presumptive favorite ke huy quan won for EEAAO. the presenter teared up when she read his name, it was pretty touching, and ke huy quan was crying tears of joy when he came up to the podium to accept the oscar.
next up was best supporting actress. angela bassett was the expected winner, so it was an upset when jamie lee curtis won for EEAAO as well. from the split screen you could tell bassett was upset and she didn't bother to stand or applaud when curtis went to accept the award. when JLC won, it made me think: could everything everywhere all at once win all the awards it was nominated for? was it going to be one of those nights?
in the end, EEAAO won seven of the total eleven oscars it was nominated for: supporting actor, supporting actress, editing, original screenplay, best actress, best director, and best picture. i read they were also expected to win best costumes but that honor went to black panther, it's only win of the night. EEAAO also lost for best original score, which i wouldn't even be able to identify if my life depended on it.