alexist

I've picked the six words from this list that I think most accurately describe me. Now I'd like you to pick six to describe me, and when enough people have answered I'll tell you which ones I chose and we can draw a psychological diagram, with quadrants and stuff:

able, dependable, intelligent, patient, sensible, accepting, dignified, introverted, powerful, sentimental, adaptable, energetic, kind, proud, shy, bold, extroverted, knowledgable, quiet, silly, brave, friendly, logical, reflective, spontaneous, calm, giving, loving, relaxed, sympathetic, caring, happy, mature, religious, tense, cheerful, helpful, modest, responsive, trustworthy, clever, idealistic, nervous, searching, warm, complex, independent, observant, self-assertive, wise, confident, ingenious, organised, self-conscious and witty

Comments are screened for the moment.

First, spaghetti and meatballs. Sauce is bubbling along nicely and is reducing properly. It smells lovely--as it should with 3 jumbo onions and a head of garlic in it. ;)

Meatballs, mixture made--we'll see how they come out. :) I always remember my favourite Italian restaurant meatballs and I know mine aren't as good. I think that they use a mixture of meats, rather than all beef, but I won't use pork and veal is too expensive (if they even have it in). The consistency is the tricky bit, though. My basic mixture is 1 lb beef, 1 egg, 1/2 onion, enough breadcrumbs to bind and some herbs. Fine. If you use it as is, it's much too coarse. But if you put it in the food processor, it's very tricky to mince it finer without it turning into a paste (which is heavy and doesn't taste very nice). I've worked out that the best way to do it is to FP it in fairly small batches, so that the bottom doesn't turn to paste before the top's been minced.

Finally, I have some choux buns in the oven that don't seem to have risen properly. I have no idea why. I made it the same way I always do (and choux is not difficult, the only thing to know is that you have to cook the paste 3 minutes before adding the eggs) and the oven was correctly preheated. No reason they shouldn't have risen. They've risen a little, but they're not as high as they should be. Weird. We'll have a look when they come out. Not that I'm serving them to company, but if they're not like balloons, there's no room for the filling!

ETA: They really didn't rise at all--had to bin them. Hmph.