Let's pretend for a moment you were asked to translate yourself into a plate of food.

If you were to turn the phrase "You are what you eat" on its ear and attempt to eat what you are, what exactly would you be eating? What would it look like if you laid bare all those little bits of yourself-- your own, personal ingredients, I suppose-- and put them on a plate for all the world to see?

And what would you taste like? Would everyone want a piece of you? Would you wind up as bland and dry as Zweiback toast? Or would you be so off-putting that you'd just sit there, scorned, like a half-melted aspic on a cruise ship buffet table? It's a little unnerving to think about.

Unnerving, but interesting.

At least, to me it is.

Discovering My Inner Dish

Wandering into work one evening not very long ago, I grabbed a little food and sat down to eat in the back of the restaurant at the long, oaken table where my co-workers were doing likewise.

My friend Amelia, who was sitting across from me and quietly folding napkins, looked up said in a sing-songy voice:

"Uh-oh, Procopi-o's."

And then she went back to folding. It was just her silly way of saying hello.

"Uh-oh, Procopi-o's?" I repeated.

"Sure, just like Spaghetti-o's, but more Procopio-ier." In all my years on earth, no one had ever set my last name to a commercial jingle for canned pasta, nor had anyone ever used the adjective "Procopio-ier".

Amelia alternately suggested I might make a lovely breakfast cereal of some sort, but I was more enamored with the idea of becoming pasta. Perhaps if she had pitched the breakfast food idea at one of our pre-lunch service meals, I would have been more inclined to see myself as coated with sugar and drowned in milk.

All evening, I kept hearing her voice in my head singing that little, highly-personalized jingle, which made the instance when she came up behind me to sing it in my ear all the more wonderfully disturbing. I may have been chatting with my guests about goat stew and fried cheese, but all I could think about were Procopi-o's.

I needed to get them out of my system. And, according to my own, special brand of logic, getting them out of my system could only be done by getting them into my system. I decided to make myself some Procopi-o's, whatever those might be. I would take little bits of myself-- metaphorically speaking-- and put them into a recipe. I was going to find out what I was made of, throw it all together, and see how I turned out.

In essence, I was going to eat myself.

I tossed the idea around for days. Pasta? Of course. And said pasta would have to be circular because, after all, I was making Procopi-o's. But what to serve them with? How should they be dressed?

I wanted something cheesy and saucy and spicy, but with a little bit of ham thrown into the mix. I thought about adding a bit of bitterness to the dish but, upon second thought, I decided to remain intentionally self-delusional and opted instead for a little bit of flat-leafed parley-- purely decorative, which is how I like to see myself on my better days.

But there was something missing. "Oh, it needs a little booze," I thought. Not to function, mind you, but merely to loosen things up.

I would look up recipes, because I allow myself to be influenced by others. I would sift through them and filter them to suit my tastes. And, being the genetic mutt that I am, I would hybridize: Pasta alla Vodka meets Pasta all' Amatriciana. Boozy, hammy, and biting.

How appropriate. How perfect.

Or so I had hoped.

There was one small problem with this idea-- I have a low opinion of vodka. To me vodka: a) It doesn't taste like anything and b) serves no purpose except to make fruit juice boozier (see: girl drink drunks). I'm a gin man, so gin it would have to be. But would gin actually work in a pasta sauce?

Why not? It would certainly add a little note of interest that vodka could never provide. And, before you ask: yes, I do like to think of myself as interesting. Doesn't everyone? I think it's part of how we all get through the day.

Putting Myself Through The Wringer

I'd never given much thought to pasta-making, but when I pulled out my grandmother's old machine, I realized three important things:

1. I haven't made pasta since the late 20th Century

2. I lost the little clamp that holds the pasta maker in place at some point during the 21st Century.

3. I had absolutely no idea how I was going to form my pasta into cute little "o" shapes.

And then I thought to myself, "This is exactly why you should make this-- you never really sure of what you're doing anyway, so just do what you always do and make things up as you go along."

I hunted around the kitchen looking for a way to make "o" shapes. At the back of a little drawer where all the small, unused cooking implements go to die, I found my grandmother's cannoli forms. Those would do very nicely, I thought.

The making of the dough was simple enough: two kinds of flour, some eggs, a little olive oil, and a splash of water. Make a little well, mix it all up, and knead, knead, knead. Rather than knead by hand, I remained true to my own laziness and let my stand mixer do all the work. I thought about how that little machine was working so hard at developing the dough's gluten. And then I thought about how it has been more than a year since I've been to the gym. I took another drag off my cigarette and continued to watch.

I turned the dough out onto a floured cutting board and shaped it into a disc and let it sit, covered, for thirty minutes to let it rest. I followed its lead by crawling back into bed for the same amount of time with a collection of James Thurber's short stories.

You know, for inspiration.

After the dough and I were sufficiently rested, we met up again in the kitchen. I fed it bit by bit into the pasta maker, holding onto the machine with my free hand so that it didn't fall over onto the floor and onto my feet, all the while imagining myself being put through that same wringer. "Well this feels familiar," I said to the dough as I thought of the ghosts of boyfriends past.

I managed to achieve the shape I wanted for my pasta by rolling it around the cannoli forms, but worried how the pieces would perform when thrown into hot water. Would they hold up or would they fall apart? It amused me to think that nearly every step of this whole food preparation process had some sort of glaring corollary to my own life.

There was nothing to do but plunge the Procopi-o's into hot water. It was mildly discomforting to stand over a pot of boiling pasta and stare into it as though one's life depended on it. But, there they were-- those little bits of me slowly floating to the top of the foaming water, surviving. And mostly intact. I scooped those babies out of the pot with a little bit of their bath water and let them cool. Then I tasted one of them.

I was disappointed.

It's hard to imagine what it was I expected from a small circle of flour and egg. It tasted like pasta. Of course, it was pasta-- a little doughy, but pasta, nonetheless. I was disappointed not because it was bad, but because it wasn't perfect. I caught myself staring at a bowl of pasta-- one that was supposed to represent me-- with scorn.

"Well, there you have it," I thought, "So self-critical that I'm shaming myself over a fucking bowl of pasta." Was I really so upset that it wasn't perfect? Temporarily, yes. I stepped back for a moment and thought how ridiculous I was being.

And then I thought back to what a friend of mine said to me the other day. He left a comment on one of my previous blog posts stating that he was a little relieved I couldn't come to a party was throwing, because I would have "spotted the flaws" in his desserts. He was nervous about "having a gaggle of food bloggers" standing around, judging them. In response, I wrote the following:

Dear Honky,

But here’s the thing… I adore flaws. Flaws are like fingerprints; they express an unavoidable individuality. To me, a home made dessert with a little flaw thrown in is infinitely preferable to the factory-made, calibrated sameness of anything that is store bought.

Long may the flawed flag wave.

Well, helloooo, hypocrite! Suddenly, I thought of a little song and hummed it to myself, though not as tearfully as the little girl below:

I tend to give others (or so I like to think) very good advice, but I very seldom follow it myself. I'm flawed. You're flawed. Everything that's worthwhile is flawed. If anyone on this earth were perfect, he or she should probably be whisked up into heaven like Jesus's mother because there would be nothing left to do or learn here.

Flaws are what make people interesting, myself included. If I were perfect all the time a) everyone would hate me and b) I would be a complete bore. And since I consider being a bore a major character defect, we'd just be getting back around to being imperfect, now wouldn't we?

Flaws are what make us individuals.

With that in mind, I tossed my little Procopi-o's into the gin sauce, put great spoonfuls of it into a bowl, topped it with its awaiting garnishes, and dug in. Not perfect, but warm and cheesy, a little smoky and a little spicy. And it did not smell of booze. It was oddly satisfying.

Just like me.

Pasta alla Gin

I hope you'll forgive me for not writing down the recipe for Procopi-o's. Like myself, the recipe needs a bit of work. Besides, very few of you reading this are real life Procopios anyway, and those of you who are more than likely won't be making "o"-shaped pasta any time soon. I suggest you find your own shapes and dishes- ones that better fit your own preciously flawed self.

The sauce, however, is worth making. Seriously. With gin. If you've got pancetta or guanciale lying about, you could certainly substitute that for the bacon but, other than one or two people I know, who has guanciale sitting in their refrigerator? I've used ingredients that are more or less easy to find because, well, I'm more or less easy to find.

Serves two to four of you. Or two to four of me. Given the subject matter of this post, it's nearly impossible for me to tell.

Ingredients:

1 28-ounce can of crushed tomatoes (San Marzano, if they're available to you)

1 pound of any tube-shaped pasta you like (penne, rigatoni, mostaccioli, etc.)

2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

2 tablespoons butter, salted or unsalted (it really doesn't matter)

1 cup finely diced yellow onion

4 cloves finely minced garlic (garlic is minced, onions are diced-- please discuss)

As much crushed red pepper flakes as you dare.

1 teaspoon of salt (or more, if you feel it needs it)

1/4 cup gin, stirred, not shaken. And very dry, please.

1/2 cup cream

Freshly-ground pepper, as much as you please

About 1 cup of freshly-grated Parmigiano-Reggiano

Finely-chopped Italian parsley

4 slices of bacon, cooked, cooled, and chopped into adorable little chunks

Preparation:

1. Bring six quarts of salted water to a boil, which means turning the burner all the way up to "11". Dump pasta into the boiling water and stir. If you are using dried pasta, cook for 8 to 10 minutes (until al dente), if using fresh pasta, just cook it until it's done. You're a big boy/girl; go with your instincts. Save about 1/2 cup of the water, drain pasta, place in a bowl, and mix with the water (to prevent the pasta from drying out).

2. In a food processor (or food mill), purée the tomatoes. Stare at them for a moment or to for no other reason but that you think they're pretty and wonder that, if you stick your finger in for a taste and accidentally cut yourself on the blade, would any one notice? Would it change color? Would bleeding into the sauce take this whole "cooking myself" business a step too far? Add salt.

3. In a large skillet, heat olive oil and butter until hot and bubbly, but not so far as to brown it. Add onions and cook over medium heat for about two minutes. Add garlic and crushed pepper flakes. Cook for another minute.

4. Add your (blood-free) purée of tomatoes to the pan and stir. Bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer. Add gin: 1/4 cup for the sauce, 1/2 cup for the cook. Continue to simmer for another five minutes or so.

5. Turn off the heat and add the cream, gently incorporating it into the sauce. Add ground pepper and about 1/2 cup of grated cheese and stir in. Taste again, adding more salt and pepper flakes, if you feel the urge.

6. Add pasta to the sauce, gently tossing so that each piece is coated thoroughly.

7. Transfer the pasta into either a) individual serving bowls or b) one, enourmous communal trough. Garnish with bacon (or pork product of choice), parsley, and more grated cheese.

8. If you are eating this dish alone, pour yourself a large glass of wine (or a martini, because it pairs nicely with this particular dish), pick up a fork, and slowly cannibalize yourself. If you are serving this pasta to guests, sit back and watch them dig in, all the while saying, in a quiet little voice, "Eat me."

And say it like you mean it.

I decided to start my mocktail quest off with that simplest of drinks, the gin and tonic. With multiple nuances brought on by using different gins, it's probably my favorite cocktail -- biting, tart, and tinged with bitterness, it reminds me of myself on my best days.

Now, the main problem with the gin and tonic mocktail is the complete lack of, well, gin, so it is key that the tonic be the shining star for once. Have I bludgeoned you to death with my opinions on tonic? Yes, I know I have, so I will skip all that, because you now KNOW that Fever-Tree is the only way to go, and head right to the gin conundrum.

Enter DRY Soda. Well, the DRY Sodas are a bit sweet for me to call myself a big fan, but that doesn't mean I was against trying their newest juniper flavor as a gin stand-in. Nothing could be more simple than to measure out two ounces of Juniper DRY and mix it with Fever-Tree tonic and a wedge of lemon. (Or a lime if your intro to gin and tonics didn't start in a British pub in the late 90s as mine did.)

The result? Well, maybe it's a the taste equivalent of a placebo effect, but I was pretty damn happy with my faux gin and tonic. All I was after was something refreshing with a non-alcoholic edge to it, and the Fever-Tree tonic definitely provides that needed edge.

The only problem with this mocktail is that the lack of alcohol means I suck them down with abandon and then spend the rest of the night wearing down a path between the living room and the bathroom. Oh, well, at least I'm hydrating myself!

2 oz. Juniper Dry Soda
Fever-Tree tonic water
Lemon wedge, for garnish

Combine all ingredients over ice and enjoy.

It's always an honor to be asked to be part of or contribute to a wedding, but it's even more flattering when your culinary skills are called upon for said wedding.

In October, Kim specifically requested I bring my "famous potato salad" to her post-Scotland wedding reception, and last weekend, Catherine, Jeff, and all of us wedding guests toasted their happiness with my Lady in Red at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel.

Over the summer, Catherine -- for whom I once designed a simple birthday cocktail to go along with her gift of St. Germain elderflower liqueur -- asked if I would shake up a special wedding cocktail. Her only request: it had to be red to match her dress.

After first assessing what the Mandarin Oriental stocked in their bar, I set about to concocting the cocktail. Aside from staining its cheeks crimson, I wanted this cocktail to be three things: seasonal, celebratory, and reflective of the bride's tastes. Well, not all of that happened.

Ignoring sangria and all other wine-based cocktails of that ilk, I knew that the red hue was going to come from cranberry or pomegranate juice (seasonal!), and after a few (read: nine) attempts, I ditched the cranberry juice. It was too easily diluted in both color and flavor. I also had to ditch my idea of including both bourbon and ginger ale in this cocktail (the bride's signature drink) because no matter what I did, the bourbon came out too...bourbon-y.

A few weeks later, I started with a whole new plan and a whole new red. Now working with the stronger, tarter pomegranate juice, I cried, "Eureka" after three passes and then set to refining the flavors.

Victorious and hung-over, I presented the recipe to the bride along with a list of potential names: Ruby Slipper, Scarlet 75 (the drink is an adaptation of the classic French 75), Red Letter Day, and Lady in Red. (She chose "Lady in Red," so if you now have Chris de Burgh in your head, it's not my fault.)

(Okay, maybe it is.)

On my reserve list of names was Study in Scarlet, Red-dy or Knot (my husband's contribution), The Red Menace, The Scarlet Letter, The Cat's Meow, My Love is Like a Red, Red Rose, and Redrum. (I will be saving that last one for a blood-soaked mojito or daiquiri in case Stephen King ever wants me to design a wedding cocktail for him.)

Lady in Red

2 oz. pomegranate juice
1 1/2 oz. gin
4 oz. ginger ale (preferably very spicy ginger ale)
Sparkling rosé
2-3 dashes Angostura bitters
Pomegranate seeds

Shake pomegranate juice and gin with ice; strain into a cocktail glass. Add ginger ale and top off with sparkling rose. Finish with bitters. Garnish with four pomegranate seeds for health, happiness, love, and laughter.

I am pleased and relieved to report that the drink was extremely well received. Even my French friend, who I thought preferred champagne to everything, was seen drinking more than one Lady in Red. Additionally, the bartender told someone else that he's seen a lot of guest-created cocktails pass through his shaker, but he had never seen one reordered so many times. Finally -- and most importantly -- the bride, the groom, and all my cocktailing friends loved it.

I hope you do, too.

When it come to ginger ale, I've had only one opinion: drink it when you're fluish. Since that was the childhood application for me, it's pretty hard to separate fever, nausea, and vomiting from those emerald green bottles.

Until now.

After my last Fever-Tree musing, I was invited to participate in intimate Fever-Tree event at Perbacco. Not only did I get to meet the charming Tim Warrilow, the Fever-Tree "plant hunter," but I got to experience side-by-side comparisons of Fever-Tree mixers against the leading brands.

I had already done the tonic water comparison myself. The only difference was that I had completely ignored the idea that Canada Dry tonic was even worth the plastic it was bottled in. To me, Canada Dry tonic water has a sweet, glue-like smell and an even worse flavor. At the tasting, it assailed my tastebuds with high fructose corn syrup and choked out my throat with unctuous spittle. Not attractive.

However, the ginger ale taste off was a completely different matter. Canada Dry's offering smelled and tasted like Sprite. Fine, but not really ginger ale, right? Schwepps' offering smelled like a cleaning product and tasted like practically nothing. However, Fever-Tree's ginger ale not only spiced my nostrils with raw, sliced, heady ginger but it actually tasted like ginger. In the past, I have held firm that ginger ale in cocktails is nothing compared to ginger beer. That is has to burn going down and make you sneeze after one sip. When it comes to Fever-Tree, I stand corrected. For this particular brand, I might actually relax my ginger beer stranglehold.

Fever-Tree's ginger ale, like all of Fever-Tree's mixers, are made from "all natural ingredients, sourced from around the world. A blend of natural botanicals, spring water and a touch of can sugar, Fever-Tree mixers are free of artifical preservatives, ingredients, sweeteners and coloring." Specifially, Fever-Tree Ginger Ale is made up of three different kinds of ginger: fresh, green Ecuadorean ginger, Cochin ginger from India, and Nigerian ginger from Africa.

After the tasting, I scuttled home to try out a new and very simple cocktail. Full disclosure: while Fever-Tree did give me tonic water samples, which I totally didn't need since my husband and I had just stocked up on a recent trip to BevMo, they did not give me ginger ale samples. Those I already had in the house, just for kicks.

While on the same aforementioned BevMo trip, I picked up a bottle of gin that had been a curiosity to me for quite some time. Tanqueray Rangpur gin has all the clean notes of regular Tanqueray, but has the added kick of being distilled with Rangpur limes. We first sampled the gin in a very dry straight-up martini, but the aggressive lime tones convinced me I was drinking some old l'Occitane verbena perfume. However, when combined with the Fever-Tree ginger ale, the lime was slightly muted but, like Eddie Murphy in Coming to America, still very happy to be there. The ginger sung out spicy and strong without being overly sweet, and the fragrant lime just played right into its piquant hands.

It's a great summer-time sipper that can be enjoyed when the weather gets hot again.

Rangpur and Ginger

2 ounces Tanqueray Rangpur Gin
Ice
Fever-Tree Ginger Ale

The Shake:
In an Old Fashioned, add the gin, ice, and fill to the top with ginger ale.

I'm a gin girl. Gin and Ginger, Gin and Sin, Pink Gin, Greyhound, Gin and Tonic -- I love them all. Yet despite that, up until a year ago I was unknowingly depriving myself of an entire world of gins. Sticking primarily with Tanqueray, I treated myself every once in awhile to cold, elegantly aquamarine bottles of Bombay Sapphire. It was my gin of indulgence. However, everything changed when I discovered a whole nother country of gin. Forget the Brit brands, I suddenly found myself swimming in premium gins in my own Californian backyard. First there was Gin 209, then Junipero, and now, a new gin.

New to me, Sarticious Gin is locally made in Santa Cruz by Jeff Alexander.

Two years ago, Peggy Townsend wrote a piece on the Sarticious guys for the Santa Cruz Sentinel and she explains where the crazy name came from:

It comes from this time Alexander is up in Alaska drinking, watching the Northern Lights and listening to this song by some guys called Dead Can Dance. And even though these dancing dead guys are singing about "her surreptitious smile," he hears them say "sarticious smile."

Then, when this Alexander guy can't figure out what in the heck "sarticious" means, he decides it's like if the word "sartorial" and "luscious" got together and had a baby and it would be "sarticious," which sounds like something you'd like.

How completely out-of-control awesome is that? Naming a gin because of a "Wrapped up like a douche" moment? I love these guys already!

I took one sip of Mathra's lovingly made Sarticious gin and tonic and breathed, "Citrus!" Kim -- the one responsible for taking our Sarticious virginity -- thinks it tastes like pine. Mathra thinks it tastes like Granny Smith apples. All reactions are true and valid ones, and now, after a brief scurry to BevMo and a slap-down of $30.00, I am a proud pourer of this amazingly fresh and complex gin.

Gin makers are notoriously secretive about what all goes into their gin. Other than the usual juniper berries, there is a dizzying swirl of botanticals that all conspire, flirt, and whisper behind painted fans to perfume the gin with their ethereal souls. Bombay Sapphire has tactile white etchings down one smooth side of the gem-like bottle. Run the tip of your finger over each rough botantical representation -- both in words and sketch -- and you will learn that Bombay Sapphire gin contains angelica, grains of paradise, lemon, licorice, almonds, orris root, coriander, cassia bark, and cubeb berries. The secret is how they are all balanced.

Sarticious, on the other hand, will only reveal that their gin contains "the artful blend of the best juniper berries, organic orange and cilantro, and other fresh botanicals." Very well, you can keep your cool shadowy shroud, Sarticious, for all I require is a moonstone of your gin in my glass. That is my satisfaction.

And just in case a single sip of this taste bud-smacking gin isn't recommendation enough, Alexander has liquor chops that run very deep -- he has made wine, beer, and even made Hanger 1 vodka at St. George Spirits back in the day.

The spare Sarticious site has a list of recipes, but quite frankly, the only accompaniment Sarticious needs is a few ice cubes and a splash of really good tonic water. More on that next week.

Sarticious Gin Distillery
427A Swift Street
Santa Cruz, CA

Sarticious Spirits is open for wine and gin tasting from noon-5pm, Friday-Sunday.