Stomachs on legs are proud to present

Spokane karaoke-killing DJ/psyche-boogie frontman/producer James Pants has just released his new cult-inspired LP 'Seven Seals' on Stones Throw. It's definitely one of my albums of the year, packed with new wave despondency, Pharrell-like synth shards and old-fashioned broken disco. Two of my fave tunes on the album have a slight food twist: titled 'I Live Inside An Egg', and 'A Chip In The Hand'. Mystic Pizza should've sounded like this.

Pants' mom supposedly made him the cultish cupcakes above - but judging from the instructional James Pants curry video below, I have a sneakish suspicion of who really baketh the spiderweb cakes around thither.

All noodle stands close on Mondays in Bangkok for the purpose of street cleaning and repairs which often leaves me in a dilemma. What to eat? I love noodles and can eat them happily everyday and I usually do. But on Mondays I am left to my own devices. It was on Monday the 11th of August that I devised this exceptionally yummy bastardisation of tom kha hed and kanom jeen. Usually served cold or rather at room temperature I had mine hot because I couldn't be bother waiting for them to cool down.

I took one packet of tom yum ingredients available at all Thai food supermarkets. It contains a knob of galangal, 3 stalks of young tender lemon grass, saw tooth corriander, chilis, lime, kaffir lime leaves and shallots. Slice and tear as appropriate and add chilis as desired



One pack of tom ka paste.


I used lobo

Cup of coconut milk (canned, the way it was meant to be)

Water

Fish Sauce (optional)

Rice noodles dried or fresh, (not vermicelli made from bean starch)

Assortment of herbs including dill, mint, thai basil

Mushrooms, oyster, shitake, black cloud, etc


tablespoon of sugar

Bring noodle water to the boil and cook rice noodles

In a small-ish sauce pan bring can of coconut milk to the boil with tom yum fresh ingredients and packet. Add water if needed. I added about a cup. Add mushrooms. Season with sugar and fish sauce to taste. Cool (or not)

Ladle soup over noodles.

Serve with the following condiments fish sauce, fresh herbs, pickled chinese vegetable (optional), green beans, boiled eggs, bitter melon sliced and raw green beans and bean sprouts.

It was yummy, and I later emailed Hock about it to tell him to make this bastardisation for his menu...turns out he had already thought of the same thing and was writing a more funked up recipe for it......he's my twin food soul and together we signfy the death of all that is good and "authentic" in Thai food...he he he he he

The Catherine Tate Show: Janice & Ray

3-Pound Truffle Found in Italy

A white truffle weighing more than three pounds, dug up in Tuscany by a truffle-sniffing dog, will be auctioned this week in Florence for charity.

Truffle hunter Cristiano Savini said Tuesday he was searching for truffles with his father last week in Palaia, about 25 miles from Pisa, when his dog, Rocco, started sniffing "like crazy."

With Rocco leashed to a tree to prevent him from digging too furiously, the Savinis carefully extracted a truffle they said weighed about 3.3 pounds, which they contended was a record.

The Guinness Book of World Records lists a 2.86-pound white truffle found in Croatia in 1999 as the biggest. Cristiano's father, Luciano, said the truffle had been weighed at the traffic police station in the nearby town of San Miniato, which issued a certificate attesting to its weight. The station said the officer involved in the weighing was not immediately available for comment. On Tuesday, Cristiano Savini brought the truffle to Rome to publicize the planned auction, to be held Saturday in a palace in Florence. Truffles can fetch $5,500 a pound in Rome, although they usually weigh from 1 to 2.8 ounces. Slivers of truffles, with their strong aroma, are prized in Italy to flavor pasta sauces and rice dishes. Proceeds from the auction will go to an Italian organization that helps sufferers of genetic diseases, a group that helps street children in London and Catholic charities in Macau.