Wine Bottle Baking

I have Neline to thank for this post's title. 

This week I decided to make myself stromboli. As soon as I unrolled the rectangle of pizza dough from its canister, I noticed that one end was wider than the other. We don't have a rolling pin, so I was grumbling and stretching the dough (I did learn something during my time at Kinnelon Pizza) when Neline had a great idea: I should use the (only) bottle of wine on our rack as a rolling pin! She didn't mind a bit of flour on the bottle, so I set to. 

I actually think it worked better than most rolling pins I've used 

because the weight was nice and even. 

I didn't end up putting meat in the stromboli, but I did layer in plenty of spinach, ricotta and mozzarella cheese, diced red pepper and carrots, and--this is the fun bit--some of the leftover sauce from an Indian restaurant we went to. Thought the spices might make the stromboli a bit more interesting!

Kind of a quiet week, for which I'm grateful. I'm actually starting to feel like I've got the whole Editorial Assistant gig under control--I've finally gotten ahead of the things that had backed up before I was hired, I'm working well with authors, I've gotten excited about some projects I might work on... I took an afternoon tea break with Leila to check in about the "Editorial Assistant timeline" and get some feedback. I did get one contract back from an author who had "edited" it as they saw fit and made absolutely absurd requests. I'm tempted to print it and hang it on my wall for when I need a laugh, but something tells me that would be a bit unprofessional.

The most exciting news at work is that the Business, Economics, and Finance lists have been made their own "department," separate from humanities, so it'll be a bit easier for us to pool our resources and work more as a team instead of individually. As part of this change, we'll be welcoming a new Editorial Assistant tomorrow, which means we'll all be able to focus more on acquisition and research than on the administrative tasks that make up most of an Editorial Assistant's work, but which BF and CC had been helping out with to make everything work. 

Our Production team is working hard to get our December books ready to go, so a few of us headed out after work to let off some steam. The original plan was to go to a bar, but we got side tracked by a tapas bar--which I thought was an especially fortuitous change to the plan! Apparently this restaurant, Las Ramblas, is quite well-known. It's tiny and always crowded, so when we saw that there was a table open, we went for it. One of our number had never "given olives or mushrooms a chance," and when she did, she found that she liked them. Yay! (Guess who ordered the mushroom dish? Yup, yours truly.) She got some payback, though, by ordering mussels. I gave them a try...and liked them! So I now like mussels, though I don't think I'd want to eat many of them, and certainly not plain. We also tried two different kinds of sangria--pear and pomegranate. 

Yesterday was a day for stay-at-neighborhood chores and enjoying the lovely warm air. After choosing this week's meals I went to get the groceries to make them...but, search high and low, I could not find kalamata olives. Tell me, how is this possible in Astoria, one of the most Greek-influenced areas in New York City? Aiyah! Afterwards I did laundry in a laundromat for the first time. So exciting, I know. But I did do a bit of writing while I waited, so I guess that's what I'll be up to on laundry days. 

For the evening Neline and I met up with one of her friends to see 12 Years a Slave. Shockingly, I am not going to break it down as I have done with other films. It was excellent and brim-full, and I'm still chewing it over, really. Some of the reasons that I'm driven to write about films are their disregard for human life and decency and the problematic or completely absent handling of complex social issues. 12 Years a Slave was, obviously, a film that had those kinds of concerns at its heart. The only things I will say are these: 

1) I hope with all my heart that Lupita Nyong'o has a wonderful career ahead of her 

2) I need to watch some more Steve McQueen movies   

3) Listening to the audience react was just as important a part of the movie experience, to me, as the lighting, the costumes, and the historical accuracy 

4) Benedict Cumberbatch should be fined for his atrocious "Southern" (US) accent

Afterwards we went up to "Curry Hill," which I'd never heard about--an area with a high concentration of Indian restaurants. Hey, I'm certainly not complaining! Neline and I got some absolutely delicious lamb at Tamba, though we're not quite sure what we ended up ordering since there was apparently some confusion in the kitchen. This is the source of the sauce that went into my stromboli. 

And that's it! I'm sure you're relieved. Kate'll be over next weekend, so there should be more interesting things to write about then.