The Moose Factory - Virtual Bar and Grill - Version 3

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Since our Thanksgiving was a month ago, Black Friday and its appurtenances are simply a set of marketing ploys (ffft, ffft, here's your Alexander Keith's, enjoy.)  We've had a few inches of snow, but it rained and it is now gone again.  At least we didn't have to shovel it.

The news from south of the border is very saddening.  The number of mass shootings is getting to be a large number.  It is sickening.  Can't happen here for the simple reason is that the populace is not armed and getting armed is difficult (not impossible).  First, you have to apply for and get a Firearms Acquisition Certificate.  Applying for an FAC causes a criminal records check as well as a mild security clearance check.  It puts you on the RCMP and police books and maybe even goes as far as CSIS.  If you get a FAC (and you may not) you can then purchase your weapon (one), but must also apply to acquire ammunition for it.  The complications mean that any ill intentions will probably be detected long before any harm can result.

You'll note, for example, that the recent terrorist attacks against our military personnel occurred by home-grown lone wolves.  In both cases the perpetrators were killed, but we did lose two members of the Canadian Forces.  The nation was shocked, but not reduced to the state of fear that exists down south.  If anything, it simply pissed us off.  We laid some memorial wreaths and are getting on with the job.

We have been relatively successful in cutting off terrorist cells.  We listen hard for their chatter on the media, and the result is often a trial for some violation of our hate or terrorism sections of the criminal code.  Our people seem to be quite good at infiltrating these guys.  RCMP just started a new program to intercept Internet criminality that they say will take them five years to set up.  The cat is out of the bag, but nobody has said that this isn't already a bag of devouring.

Funny, we only have two federal agencies beyond our normal police: RCMP for domestic affairs (kind of like the FBI), and CSIS which is our international agency for prevention and apprehension of foreign attacks (Homeland Security).  I find it hard to justify the existence in our southern neighbours of all that other alphabet soup.  If the ATF, for example, exists in Canada it is part of the RCMP.  We don't need separate, top-heavy, expensive, non-communicating agencies competing with each other.

Then we do have a very quiet arm of Canadian Forces buried somewhere in the Provost divisions of the three forces (we had them all together but it turned out to be a bust.)  The RCAF, The RCN, and the Canadian Army again have separate, but talking to each other existence.  The priorities of the three make it clear that separation is best.  One of the new cabinet ministers in the new government is separately responsible for the senior service (Canadian Coast Guard) which has mixed domestic and international duties, especially in the Arctic at the moment.  They supply ice breaker and SAR services in the north.  A semi-formal group of volunteers (Canadian Rangers) provides land services in the Arctic.  Mostly indigenous people, they do yeoman work in conditions you wouldn't want to even think about.

Do remember that our longest border in the Arctic is with the Russians.  We also deal with the U.S., Denmark (Greenland), and Norway to name the more prominent powers around the Arctic Ocean.  Polar Bears forever!

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

And so, back to food.  Tonight I made:

Potato Leek Soup

1 Leek - white part only. Discard green leaves
1/2 Large Baking Potato (peeling optional)
2 Cups Chicken Stock
Peppercorns to taste
2 Cups Milk or Half'n'Half
Salt to adjust if needed

Using only the white part of the leek (about four inches), dice into a small pot.
Dice the potato small dice (skin may be left on.) and add to pot.
Heat Chicken Stock to just under boiling and add to pot.
$%&^! the peppercorns and add to pot. The liquid should just cover the solids.

Cook the mixture over low heat to bring to a boil, then continue until contents are soft enough to puree.
Puree the mixture, trying for very smooth. (I use an immersion blender)
Add an equal quantity of Milk or Half'n'Half.
Whisk until smooth.
Adjust salt if necessary. Chicken stock is often salted.
Bring to temperature and serve. Makes three or four servings.

Variations

Grate a small carrot into the mixture at the beginning. This adds the Vichy style to the preparation. Proceed as above.
Served hot this is called Potage Printanière
Served cold in a chilled bowl with some extra heavy cream and sprinkled with fresh chopped chives, this is Vichy Soisse.

[Benedict 3,119]

[SimRico 968]

Hello ole Gang,  not back fulltime yet but working on it!   Miss all the good menus here at the Factory!

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Thanks you, Benedict.  SimRico welcome back.  Here we are in the throes of advent so theoretically we should be preparing for the big Feast of the Nativity.  Here's a little collation to tide us over:

Advent Menu - Dinner

Cabbage Soup with Polish sausage or
Borscht with sour cream

Beef rolls stuffed with sauerkraut, ginger snap sauce
Hash browned potatoes
Harvard beets

Apple Pie Slice with French Vanilla Ice Cream on the side

Bar Service

[SimRico 968]

1 hour ago, A Nonny Moose said:

Thanks you, Benedict.  SimRico welcome back.  Here we are in the throes of advent so theoretically we should be preparing for the big Feast of the Nativity.  Here's a little collation to tide us over:

Advent Menu - Dinner

Cabbage Soup with Polish sausage or
Borscht with sour cream

Beef rolls stuffed with sauerkraut, ginger snap sauce
Hash browned potatoes
Harvard beets

Apple Pie Slice with French Vanilla Ice Cream on the side

Bar Service

Mmmm!  Comfort food !  The Moose Factory is one of my top dining experiences!   Thank you Mr. Moose!

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

So, mon cher ami, what did you choose?

[raynev1 1,887]

That last menu had my mouth watering . You sound like quite a chef .

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

@raynev1

With the exception of the 20 years when I was married, I have been cooking for myself since I got my first place in 1963.  One picks up a lot of tricks when one has the income to spend some of it on fine dining.  Did you look at my Soup recipe I posted a few days ago?  Simple, but easily converted to a standard French cuisine item.  And yes, I have read Escoffier from cover to cover.  Large volume cooking for the French court, but some really good techniques.  However, even his desserts are impossible for the home chef.  His Bombe a la Glace for example starts with 36 eggs, separated.  When you read the whole recipe, what you see if French vanilla ice cream.  C'est la guerre.

So here is yet another set of comfort food for Advent.

Oyster Stew; or
Beef Barley Soup

Rosemary-Garlic Pork Chop - Pan sauce
Baked Potato with real sour cream, butter available
Steamed chopped Kale with Bacon Bits

Sour Cherry Pie with Whipped Cream

Bar service.

Bon appetit.

[raynev1 1,887]

   I hope all goes well with your doctor's appointment  . That last menu looks scrumptious , all but the oysters . I may be from Baltimore,Maryland  though oysters or mussels are not my cup of tea . Now crabs and shrimp are a different story . I haven't eaten crabs in years , a friend of mine in Baltimore told me cras have exceeded $100.00 a bushel  . A price I am not willing to pay . I' get back at you later . Have a good day Sir .

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Well, things are up in the air for me medically.  I am being scheduled for a CT scan.  They need better definition on the thing they found in my colon, but them's the breaks.

So you like crab and shrimp.  Neither one are one of my outstanding favourites because Lobster is better IMHO.  But not everyone likes sea bugs.  There is a story from the 1800s about the jailor of Halifax whose wife was the prison cook.  One day she got a letter from the corrections department saying that the inmates had complained about getting the same stuff at every meal.  She was enjoined to only serve lobster three times a week.  [ In those days, lobster was the cheapest thing in the market.]

New Menu:

Crab Cakes with Hollandaise Sauce

Tempura Jumbo Shrimp with mixed green salad of arugula and watercress
Shoe String Potatoes
Glazed Steamed Carrots with nutmeg and cloves

Spotted Dog with hard sauce

Bar Service

Spoiler

You are lucky I didn't just whip up a plate of Fish and Bruise, or some old hunk of cod fried in maggoty butter.

 

[raynev1 1,887]

   Another great sounding menu . But what is a spotted dog ? I know of two spotted dogs ,Dalmatian and Speckled Springer Spaniel . Is it Vietnamese ? Oh yeah , thanks for not using that butter . 

   I went to the doctors yesterday for my back . So now they want to give me a MRI of my whole spine and even my brain . Why my brain , I don't know . Reflex tests found none in left arm . And that arm doesn't bother me much . Strange . I figure they'll just find a big empty dark space between my ears . And it will be okay .

   Good luck with everything , it stinks getting more mature . I don't like using that other word . All that I can say is , hold your head up high and be proud of who we are and what we've done . Best wishes .

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Well, you can tell I am feeling sort of middle European about menus lately.  This cancer thing can be beaten.  My next door neighbour has the same type of cancer that Jimmy Carter was just cured of and is undergoing the same treatment.  Jury is still our on my colon cancer pending the CT scan and the pathology results.  I will know more January 5th (apparently).  Good luck with whatever is going on with you.  I hope it is something trivial.

Freedom 1956 Menu

French Onion Soup with Parmesan-Reggiano croute

Hungarian Goulash with lots of paprika (Imre Nagy)
Baguette for dipping in the sauce

Black Forest Cake, whipped cream (schlage) on the side.

Black Coffee or Bar Service

___________________________________________________

Spotted Dog (from earlier) is the Royal Navy name for Spotted Dick, a fruit pudding.  As a former yachtsman, this is the name I know it by.  It was frequently served at the Captain's table in the Nelson's Navy times.

 

  Edited December 17, 2015 by A Nonny Moose  
Definitions

[raynev1 1,887]

   Since today marks the 28th anniversary of my girlfriend and I being together , service for a party of two please . With two black coffees and a couple glasses of the house's best wine . 

   Hang in there Sir , turn on a little  Brahms or  Beethoven and have a drink on me . Cheers , "To good times" .

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

10 hours ago, raynev1 said:

   Since today marks the 28th anniversary of my girlfriend and I being together , service for a party of two please . With two black coffees and a couple glasses of the house's best wine . 

   <snip>

28 years?  That's a long time to be going together.  So, we give you a full service table waited on by the KK Dragon in full livery and serve

Ice Wine frappé
Shrimp Cocktail with piquant sauce (Nunavut Shrimp from the Arctic)

Tournedos of Alberta Beef, medium rare with Bearnaise Sauce
Steamed Haricot (long green) Beans with slivered Almonds
Whipped P.E.I. Potatoes with drawn butter

Strawberries Romanoff

Black Coffee (Kona)

Chilled Veuve Cliquot Champagne served throughout

Background Music: Selections from Mozart

[raynev1 1,887]

   Thank you Sir . Next anniversary we'll have to return here , nowhere else could compare .

   Actually we had roast beef , mashed potatoes and broccoli with a butter sauce . Maybe a little plain but still delicious .

   28 years just sounds like a long time , but only feels like a couple weeks . We have something many find it hard to obtain , and I'm grateful for having her in my life . We keep each other straight . If I didn't have her , I probably wouldn't be around today .

Have a good day Sir .

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

^ You are most welcome.  As you know the autosystem serves whatever you like.  I hope you enjoyed the champagne.  It is from our special reserve, and was my wife's favourite.  As you can see, we don't fool around when it comes to celebrations.

Drop in later.  We have some really excellent Black Forest Cake and you might like a Café Royale with it.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Celebrate the Feast of the Nativity with us at the Moose Factory.

There will be a reception with hors d'oeuvres on Christmas eve beginning at 2000.  A chamber orchestra will support singing of carols and those who wish may attend midnight mass in the back room celebrated by our local bishop.  All welcome.

Christmas dinner: (Service starts at 1700 local time, December 25th)

Orange Blossom Cocktails
Hot Hors d'Oeuvres
Amuse tray of nuts and sweet pickles

Main service starts at 1830

Arctic Shrimp Tempura

Roast Young Canadian Tom Turkey with Wild Rice and Chestnut dressing
Mashed Potato with pan gravy
Mashed Turnip with nutmeg
Cole Slaw
Corn Niblets with finely diced red and green capsicum peppers

Open faced Squash Pie.  Choice of ice cream, whipped cream or clotted cream.

Tray of selected cheeses with biscuits -- A fine old Amontillado (port wine).

Chilled Champagne available throughout
Our bar service is always available

After dinner carol singing encouraged for those who feel up to it.

Accommodation for guests who should not drive will be made up by the KK Dragon in the back room.  The back room is a bag of holding and therefore the accommodation is unlimited.

All welcome, bon appetit.

 

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

We have no turkey leftovers to offer this year.  We went out into the highways and byways inviting all we could to our feast to fill empty seats, and pretty much everything is gone.  The autosystem is now reordering our staples, and our bureau Français is seeking to resupply our champagne cooler.  With climate change, we worry about our viticulture world wide as climates may become wrong for good grape growing.

[raynev1 1,887]

   So they wiped out the old autosystem . I take it you didn't have a white Christmas either . It was 65 F degrees here yesterday and spring flowers are emerging from the ground , crazy isn't it . You guys will be able to grow your own grapes up there , and maybe growing pineapples here where I'm at if this global warming continues . Santa will have to trade in his reindeer for an ATV next year if this trend doesn't shape up .

   

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

The thing that worries me around here is that the hayfields are greening up.  If we get the usual January/February freeze it may kill this crop which will make fodder very expensive for the people raising local hogs and cattle.  This will send food prices through the roof or wipe out some farms or both.  Temperatures here have been barely above zero and we have no snow at all.  The farms around here that raise cash crops may find themselves collecting crop insurance and facing higher premiums.  This "nice" weather isn't so nice if you are a farmer.

As for grapes, ever hear of the Niagara Bench?  We make champagne process wines down there that caused a furor in France a few years back.  Our old labrusca grape roots were grafted with European stock about fifty years ago and we are producing wines that rival anyone.  Problem is we can't make enough to export very much.  Unlike California and Southern France, we have a hard time finding the right soils and climates.  Maybe things will improve, but if that happens we might have to give up production of our world class ice wine.  The ice wine comes only in half-bottles and splits and is generally served frappé as an apéritif or as a dessert wine.  Wonderful stuff, but it costs more than the average moose can afford.

We are working on the time-transport effects of the autosystem.  This year for out New Year's Eve we'd like to have Guy Lombardo's band led by Guy in person.  We are increasing the power system by adding a small nuclear reactor for this.  Nothing very exciting, just a small hot shot with Plutonium fuel.  Picked it up second hand from the DEW Line.  More later on our New Year's plans.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Success!  The KK Dragon has successfully brought forward, temporarily, the entire Guy Lombardo Band, Guy included.

A Traditional New Year's Eve

Music by Guy Lombardo and the Royal Canadians with Kenny Gardner

Dine and dance at the Moose Factory 2000 to 0200 local time.

Requests accepted with a donation to Simtropolis.

[raynev1 1,887]

   Well Mr. Moose , did you get to enjoy Guy and the band ? My grandmother use to play "Auld Lang Syne"  every new years at the stroke of midnight , faithfully . With a couple glasses of eggnog (spiked I believe) , because she would get a little tipsy and sing along with Guy and the band . Those were the good old days , She would put that 45 on the record player a half an hour before midnight and wait so anxiously for the ball to drop on TV . 

   Best wishes .

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

The KK Dragon was host on New Year's at the Moose Factory.  I was involved instead with the tenant's association party which we held here in our lounge.  Sometimes, you have to accept an invitation, especially when tendered by a group of elderly ladies.

I was sorry to miss Guy.  The KK Dragon told me later that his time fields expired just after 2 a.m. and everyone was snapped back with their memories of the event erased.  I gather a fun time was had by all.

Next year we'll have a try for the future and see if we can get the band from Tatooine.  Blasters will have to be checked at the door.  We are researching that time line, because we don't think it was long ago in a distant galaxy at all.

[raynev1 1,887]

   How do you do Mr. Moose , Is there a chance I could get a mug of hot chocolate from the autosystem ? 

   I think winter might be setting in now . We had a dusting of snow the other day . It pretty much freeze dried away and about to get more . 23 degrees F by morning and tomorrow night it's to go down to 10 F . Are you staying warm up there ?  Take care , I'll get back at you later .

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Hot Chocolate it is.  Winter has definitely arrived.  I had an appointment cancelled today because of snow.

[raynev1 1,887]

   Another hot chocolate please . It's Fr Fr Freezing here .

   What a coincidence  , I had to cancel an appointment for the 13th that I didn't know I had until the 11th . Not much time to arrange for a ride . And then to top it off the snow . The icing on the cake , right. Take care and stay warm .

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Here's your drink.  If you like, we could add a slug of Tullamore Dew to it for extra warmth.

Winter has definitely arrived here in the frozen north.  The east coast is taking an awful beating.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Well, I hope everyone survived Blue Monday (what a scam!).  I had to go to Stratford, ON for some tests through the blowing snow.  It was nip and tuck but we made it.  So here is a mid-January menu for your delectation and delight.

Mid-January Menu

Beef Barley Soup with grated parmigiano-reggiano (optional).

Baked Ham slice with Pineapple Glaze, Maraschino Cherry, Raisin Sauce
Mashed Sweet Potato - Sauce Español (Brown Gravy)
Glazed Carrots flavoured lightly with cloves
Harvard Beets

Hot Spy Apple Pie with Caramel Sauce, cheddar cheese slice on the side (optional)

Bar Service
 

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Today being the third last business day of the month, my bank account was temporarily fattened today by my government pensions.  So ...

Pay Day Nibbles

Tapas plate with German Salami, Olives, Miniature Brie rounds, Baguette

Lamb chops, medium rare.  Mint sauce.
Baked potato, butter, chopped chives
Steamed Broccoli with sauce Mornay (that's Bechamel sauce with some cheddar melted into it.)

Left over plum pudding with caramel sauce

Bar Service.