KITCHEN ADVENTURES: First, from the Cranky Professor, a spinach suggestion: “For a little crunchy goodness, as the butter melts toss in pine nuts–the more the merrier. …[T]hey toast…and the only trick is to stop the toasting before they get dark brown. So I never add them until the butter is well-melted–stir them around a little so they’re toasting, then as soon as they start to brown on the edges do the spinach thing. I sometimes add them to rice, too. Yum!”

Hard-Boiled Egg: You can laugh now, but I’d never made one before! I basically did what this page told me to do, and it worked perfectly. (My freezer still doesn’t work, so I used a bowl of water chilled in the fridge rather than a bowl of ice water. Didn’t seem to affect the result.)

Hot Cocoa: mix one large spoonful of cocoa (I used Hershey’s plain cocoa–maybe a heaping tablespoon?), three smaller spoonfuls (maybe three level teaspoons?) of sugar, and maybe about a quarter-teaspoon each of cayenne and cinnamon. Fill the rest of the mug with milk, stir stir stir, and microwave on high for about two minutes. Serve with buttered bread.

When I first heard about this, I was intrigued–I love spicy-sweet–but also wary. Toast and cocoa is one of my all-time comfort foods, up there with macaroni and cheese. Did I really want to mess with success?

Yes. Yes I did. This was fantastic! The first sips were definitely spicy-hot, and I needed the buttered bread to cool me off a little. The spiciness diminished as I drank, though, or else I got used to it. The cinnamon and cayenne worked really well together. OM NOM NOM NOM.

I’m guessing this would be the basis for an excellent mixed drink, as well, though I don’t know exactly what the liquor would be. Dark rum, maybe? Would pepper vodka be too weird?

Two lime-butter pasta sauces: 1. Put a hunk of butter in a saute pan. Squeeze half a lime over it and add a splash of balsamic vinegar. Cookity, adding chopped garlic (I think I used three cloves), until everything is brown and rich and sweet, stirring and messing with the heat to boil off much of the liquid and then keep the rest simmering. At the last moment, dump in some fresh chopped tomato, stir and cook quickly, and serve with pasta, black pepper, and parmesan.

The result: I mostly loved this–the lime-balsamic-garlic-butter combination worked so well. My quibble was that I should probably have cooked the tomato much longer, rather than basically just heating it through, so that it could stand up to thick spaghetti; or else I should’ve used angel hair pasta and left out the parmesan at the end. The tastes here were a little too thin and bright for the pasta.

2. This was inspired by the way my hands smelled after washing the dishes from the previous two recipes! …Put a hunk of butter in the pan. Squeeze a lime, or half a lime, over it. (I used a whole lime this time, but had such a hard time getting juice out of it that I think the previous recipe might’ve had more lime juice.) Cook with chopped garlic, cinnamon, cayenne, pepper, cumin, and chopped tomato. Serve with buttered spaghetti.

The result: Absolutely delicious. A subtle citrus taste, under the darker, richer spices and the deep, glossy taste of the tomato.