ま- く故郷

24.5.13

before/after

20.5.13

Celery, Salt & Honey Cured Beef

I've been making celery-cured bacon for 6 months now (flickr gallery). I've tried all sorts of flavor combinations, with this as my guide:

Ingredients: pork belly, enough salt to cover the pork, half that amount of sugar, 1/2 diced celery stalk, spices, herbs.

Instructions: Mix everything well in a freezer bag. Put it in the fridge for 7 days, flipping it every day. Wash it off and soak it in cold water for 30 minutes to make it less salty. Freeze it for an hour to make it easier to slice. Then slice it.

Anyway, the pork has been extremely successful no matter what extra flavorings I added. So I thought to myself, "Why not try beef?"

Celery, Salt & Honey Cured Beef

Here's how I made absolutely delicious home-cured beef with no fancy gear or ingredients.

Ingredients:

Beef - 500g

Salt - 200g

Honey - 100g

Celery - Half a small bowl, diced.

1. Lay your ingredients out.

2. Coat in salt, then in honey. Use your hands.

3. Label your bag. (The beef is on the left. The other two are pork.)

4. Seal it in a ziplock. Try to push most of the air out.

5. Keep in your fridge for seven days. Flip it every day.

6. After seven days, it looks like this.

7. Wash it off in cold water.

8. Soak in cold water for about 30 minutes.
This makes it less salty. Skip this step and your
meat will be way too salty, trust me.

9. Put uncovered in the fridge for 12 to 24 hours. This dries the meat out.

10. Slice it. Thin or thick, it's your choice. I freeze my block of meat
for an hour beforehand to make slicing easier.

...so thin that light passes through it.

11. Eat it raw. It's delicious.

12. Or cook it. Fried, grilled, anything is okay.

13. Wrap it up. In the freezer, it'll get eaten long before it goes bad.

We eat bacon (or beef bacon?) pretty much every morning with our coffee and eggs. So simple and delicious. Though, I need a nice name for this. Maybe "Honey Cow" or "The Bee's Beef." Maybe just "Beef Bacon."

14.5.13

Robots Themed Comic Jam from April

Yet another awesome Numazu Comic Jam. Thanks for coming everybody! There's no comic jam in May, maybe one in June? I'll let you know somewhere here on this blog or on my facebook. Some of these are extra sweet!

Previous Comic Jams... Tag: Numazu Jam

8.4.13

Numazu Comic Jam - March 23rd, 2013

We had an awesome time drawing, chatting, drinking and all that good stuff. Thanks for coming everybody!

Next comic jam is April 27th in Locks at 5pm.

Previous Comic Jams... Tag: Numazu Jam

5.4.13

James Molloy of L3 Inc English School in Japan

This is the story of what happened to Lighthouse/ALS. This was Jim Molloy's old company that he abandoned in March 2013, only to start his new company "L3 Inc" in April 2013, leaving all previous stakeholders out to dry.

Long Story Short

I was an employee of Lighthouse/ALS. I worked for them for 2 years, essentially from when the company began to when it collapsed. I don’t know all the details, so I’ll avoid speculation and just explain what happened to me. Basically, this small English School was run by two business partners. One of them quit the company with less than 24 hours notice, leaving the rest of us with big problems.

>Continue

Aboard the Lamentable Ship

There once was a big ship of fairly competent size, perhaps with a history of successful voyages. This ship had paying customers who, of course, would like to journey from point A to point B, with standard accommodations , hospitality and perhaps some entertainment. These passengers had some basic expectations and reliance on this ship.

Indeed, this ship had employees. Some were directly involved with the assistance and service to the passengers, while others had duties of the more administrative type. These ship-workers must have also had some confidence in the reliability and sustainability of this ship, the passengers and its voyages.

This ship had one particularly unique feature. Not one, but two captains were in charge of this ship. In such an operation, the expression “two heads are better than one” may not have been entirely true. Upon ship-worker inquiries passenger dilemmas and even basic navigation, the presence of two captains caused some confusion. Furthermore, neither captain would take full responsibility for either of their own (or the other’s) actions. Crew and cargo management, complying with the territories’ policies, and the overall organizational-culture were oft in the category of neglect. To compound all of this, the two captains seemingly would not consult each other either before or after any kind of decision making.

Most of the passengers were happily unaware of this state of affairs. The ship-workers all had some varied (and possibly personal) version of the situation playing in their heads. Over coffees on the deck, for example, one could have often found some of the longer-termed employees debating whether or not to jump ship at the next docking. Some, frankly, did.

Here’s where our story gets interesting. At some point during a voyage, the ship –being steered by both captains- was heading for dangerous water. Icebergs or perhaps spiky rocks in the shallows were guaranteed. This was a clearly dreadful course.

Some theorize that one or both of the captains knowingly and purposely set this course. Others theorize that, through constant disagreement, mis-communication and non-communication, one or both inadvertently steered the ship to such doom. Others still theorize that one or both had simply no idea where the ship was headed and couldn't be bothered with such navigational details of certain ship-sinking proportions.

Though we may never know the cause, we most certainly know the result. Upon reaching the absolute danger zone, both captains quietly slipped away in the night. There were two little life boats. One captain for each sailed away peacefully into the night. One of the captains was never to be seen again, though his survival was confirmed.

The other captain -who may or may not have rescued a select few of his favorite ship-workers aboard his lifeboat- steered right back to the busy port and docked his lifeboat. He sang praises to others about himself and his ship captaining abilities. “A captain, you say? You need a captain? Well, I’m the best there is. I’ve captained many ships, many times! I’m even from a harbor town. I’ll save your voyage and sail your ship to most certain paradise, don’t you worry!” The uninformed peoples took this captain in happily. The reasons for this include his ability to twist trust into associates, and the mere demand for the services which he peddled.

This is certainly what any captain should do, having steered their ship into certain destruction: be the first to abandon ship with no regard for anyone else.

Back on the ship, now taking on massive amounts of water and noisily crunching into things ships should not crunch into, people started talking. The confused, scared, flustered and angry passengers questioned the ship-workers and demanded to speak to the captains. They were nowhere to be found. Most passengers were shocked to learn that this trusted ship had had not one but two captains. The ship-workers, while trying to save themselves, also had to calmly explain what little they knew of the situation and apologize for the whole drowning thing.

What happened to the ship? Instantly after hitting dangerous waters, it sank. It sank right to the bottom of the ocean, irretrievably. The passengers drowned. The ship-workers drowned. Some floated on scraps with a flickering hope of rescue.

But in the end, the two captains, cheerfully dry and secure, put the past behind them and never looked back. Meanwhile, though perhaps an understatement, it is suffice to say that the welfare of all stakeholders suffered because of these two captains.

I wonder if there had been a lighthouse nearby to guide them, perhaps they could have avoided such danger.

26.3.13

Professional Office Decor

Here's what my new office looks like. I decorated it myself, because I am an adult! Yep, I made them myself. There are a few more in the works, for the adjacent wall.