Not run of the mill, a romp: 5 to go.

Posted on 2025-07-06 by Austin Brower

The Alice Network, by Kate Quinn, was quite a turn from the prior several books. A thoroughly adventurous set of protagonists make their own way — one in war and one in escaping the constrictive life of a "proper girl". The two main characters are visited in alternating chapters, and across a time gap of around thirty years, as their paths eventually intertwine. The character development is strong, the sense of place in history is even stronger, in this story set in the time of the Great War (1914-1918) and post-World War II (1947-1949).

This book was recommended to me by my sister Kelly and is in the to-be-read pile of my sister Kartika. I had to put this book down multiple times to breathe, steady myself, and confront discomfort from some of the very visceral scenes. I couldn't recommend this book to young readers, but I heartily recommend it for older readers who seek adventure, complex situations, and historical liveliness.

Counting down: 6 More To Go

Posted on 2025-07-05 by Austin Brower

It's been about fifty days since graduation weekend and it's been a wild period. After finishing the last book, my digital "hold" was resolved and I began reading The Jakarta Method (what a fantastically human book). Unfortunately, my reading pace was too slow and the book auto-returned to the library and made it to the next eager reader. I was about half-way through, so I'll end up having to acquire another copy to finish off. Very impressed by the book so far.

I had heard about Dame Jacinda Ardern's book-talk at a local theater through Explain Boston to Me (a podcast by a Philadelphia native who has moved to the greater Boston area). While the tickets were expensive, I snagged two and really enjoyed being surrounded by happy people who all shared admiration of Dame Ardern's approach to leadership and connection. Her memoir, A Different Kind of Power, is so well structured and displays her empathy so well.

This morning, I completed, in a blur of tears, The Emperor of Gladness by Ocean Vuong. This book is an exploration of empathy (interesting recurring theme), aging, age, dementia, war, and the chosen family. The novel, set in Connecticut (an interesting link to Craig Mod's Things Become Other Things), follows a more standard narrative structure than Vuong's striking On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous, but is imbued with such care for language, for people, and for story that I feel it overcomes the form.

In writing this mini recap, I've found I completed the following four out of ten:

States of Emergency
Things Become Other Things
A Different Kind of Power
The Emperor of Gladness

Two are very nouveau literary, one a classic memoir, and a more experimental memoir. I think what's next will be far more run-of-the-mill.

The Summer Goal

Posted on 2025-05-24 by Austin Brower

As I approached graduation, I felt like I'd be somewhat aimless during the summer — perhaps to an extreme — so I came up with the goal of reading around ten books this summer. Over the past couple of years, I've indulged in book buying and my physical "to be read" pile is now substantial. There are at least two books I've started and put on pause due to school and work.

This is my first full weekend post-graduation. I'm reading Chris Knapp's "States of Emergency", published by Unnamed Press. The book is challenging, set in a charged time, full of overtly literary language, and evokes a malaise that's hard to describe.

Back to Basics: Eggs in Anchovy Cream

Posted on 2025-05-11 by Austin Brower

Back to Basics: Eggs in Anchovy Cream

Dipping bread into eggs baked in anchovy cream sauce.

Print Recipe

Part of winding down my graduate studies has been a return to exploring new recipes at home. The time constraints of a full-time job and a part-time graduate program had lead to a more narrow set of meal options than usual. Now, free of that, I’ve taken to picking up occasional recipes from Instagram folk, like Corre Larkin, or cookbook authors (Jon Kung or Khushbu Shah).

What I like about food social media during this phase is the “share and share credit” approach. Corre posted a short video of Eggs in Anchovy Cream Sauce, crediting April Bloomfield, showing the approach and introducing me to a chef (and her book).

This recipe comes together quickly and is great with some sourdough “soldiers”.

Finished dish, depicting two eggs in anchovy cream sauce.

Author: Austin Brower
Prep Time: 5
Cook Time: 15
Total Time: 20 minutes
Yield: 2 1x

Ingredients

Scale

1 (large) garlic clove (crushed, peeled, and finely chopped)
1tsp fresh tarragon leaves
1T unsalted butter
2 and a half whole anchovy fillets (rinsed)
6T heavy cream
1/4 tsp finely grated lemon zest
Some paprika
4 eggs

Cook Mode Prevent your screen from going dark

Instructions

Preheat oven to 400degF

Prepare a bain-marie with an oven proof 9″x13″ casserole dish.

In a smaller saucepan, add 1T unsalted butter and bring to foam on medium-high heat.
Add finely chopped garlic and allow to slightly brown (while stirring) ~1min.
Turn off heat and add rinsed anchovies, breaking them up with a spoon or spatula.
Add cream and lemon zest and stir to combine.
Snip in tarragon leaves to your taste.
Bring to boil on medium-high heat and then remove.

As the anchovy cream sauce slightly cools, prepare two large ramekins by rubbing butter on the inside to prevent sticking.

Add anchovy cream sauce to the ramekins, then crack in two eggs into each ramekin.

Top with some chili salt or paprika.

Place ramekins into the bain-marie ( I used boiling water ) and place into the oven.

Bake about 15 minutes, remove, and then allow to carry over cook while toasting some bread!

Top with some additional tarragon if desired and serve alongside sourdough bread “soldiers”; dip in and consume.

Notes

I used two larger ramekins for this, each of which easily held two eggs and the anchovy cream compound.

As ovens may vary, keep in mind that you’re trying to get a runny yolk or jammy yolk. I found longer than 15 minutes in the oven lead to yolks that were just a little too done.

Trying new tech.

Posted on 2025-05-10 by Austin Brower

I've been running a simple tech stack on some personal/shared servers with friends for years, but got out of the discipline of blogging as I fell headlong into my undergraduate and then graduate studies. Now, with the changes in routines, I may have more capacity to write more!

Making Danish Aebelskivers

Posted on 2014-11-16 by Austin Brower

Over the past three years, my housemate Ted has been acquiring more and more Lodge cast iron cookware. The collection has grown to about a dozen different pieces, from chicken fryer to wok. The latest addition is an obscure and extremely specific piece of cookware called a Danish æbelskiver pan.

Aebelskiver Pan

The æbelskiver is a Danish desert which is akin to a pancake ball. Traditionally, they would include a little bit of apple (æbel) inside, but we did not attempt that for our first time out. Not too terribly sweet themselves, these light and deliciously buttery puffballs would go well with jam and powdered sugar. We skipped the jam and just used maple sugar.

Danish Aebelskivers (courtesy Lodge)

Yield: 4 servings

Ingredients

Mix Dry Ingredients
2 Cup
Soft wheat flour (or unbleached flour or half and half)
1/2 tsp
Salt
2 tsp
Baking Powder
1/4 tsp
Baking Soda
1 tsp
Cinnamon
2 tbsp
Sugar (we used Maple Sugar)
Mix Wet Ingredients
1 3/4 Cup
Buttermilk
1/4 Cup
Frangelico (Hazelnut Liquor)
2
Egg Yolks (reserve white in separate bowl)
1 tsp
Vanilla

Cooking Directions

After separating the eggs, beat the white until stiff peaks.
Combine dry and wet ingredients until smooth then gently fold in beaten egg whites.
Bring the aebelskiver pan to medium (or just below) heat and then add 1/2 tsp of butter into each cavity. Once the butter has melted, spoon in enough batter to partially fill the cavity (generously rounded tablespoon).
Allow the batter to cook until crispy on the sides (the signs to look for are slight bubbling within the batter and cupping). Then use a skewer or chopstick to loosen the aebelskiver from the side of the cavity and spin about a quarter turn.
Repeat the turning procedure approximately every minute until the outside of the aebelskiver is uniformly golden brown and delicious.
Remove from the pan, dust with maple sugar, and serve hot!

So buttery!

Ready to eat.

Bao Bao Dumpling House

Posted on 2014-10-25 by Austin Brower

Now, in my occasional series of posts where I eat food and write about it, Bao Bao Dumpling House (133 Spring Street, Portland, ME). As seems to be the pattern, I met up with my friend Jim after a long day of driving to eat!

I found the location easily (the sign is well lit and large), near the sad remains of Miyake Diner, and there was a reasonable queue already at the door. The maître d’, Chris, took my name and number and informed me that at worst there would be a 30 minute wait to be seated. While waiting, I met up with Jim and I prepped him about the history of Bao Bao. The head chef and co-owner, Cara Stadler, is a staple of the Brunswick food scene. Her restaurant Tao-Yuan is well respected and has significant cache in the southern midcoast. The opening of Bao Bao was highly anticipated, especially with some unexpected delays this year.

The call for seating came quicker than promised and we scrambled to get to the door. Inside, the seating (in black) ranges from comfortable wall benches, a large party corner with a lazy Susan, to small pie slice tables suitable for two. The low bar is inviting with beautifully lit rice-paper backgrounds behind the bottles. On the wall above the benches a large, long golden dragon sculpture speaks to the joy and passion of the restauranteur.

Once seated, we were greeted promptly by our server Zoe and brought a carafe of water. The menu immediately makes obvious the reason for coming to Bao Bao — dumplings, lots of them. With options for pan fried or boiled, the dumplings were priced attractively (starting at $6.08 for six) and the variety would satisfy vegetarians and hearty eaters. We ultimately selected the following:

Pan Fried Chicken Cashew
Pan Fried Beef Curry
Pan Fried Lamb Peanut
Pan Fried Tofu with Cilantro
Boiled Pork & Cabbage
Shao Mai

Our selected beverages (Founders All Day IPA and Fatty Bampkins cider) were served quickly and the dumplings followed in rapid succession. The next time I go, I think I’ll time the ordering and delivery a bit more — at a small table it was easy to become overwhelmed with plates.

Available at the table were soy sauce and good chili oil, both good complements to some of the less potent tasting dumplings (i.e. Chicken Cashew). The Lamb Peanut had a good taste, but the texture of the peanut was somewhat challenging and it seemed that the lamb was a little overcooked (this dumpling was the only one where the contents easily slid from the wrapper). The Tofu/Cilantro and Pork/Cabbage were quite easy to eat and needed no adulteration. Importantly, the dough used for the wrapper is relatively neutral and didn’t damage the taste of the dumplings. The Shao Mai were nicely steamed and satisfied as they should. We quickly came to the conclusion that the Beef Curry dumplings suited us the best, followed closely by the Tofu/Cilantro.

I’d suggest that 36 dumplings for two people is a little too much — there wasn’t much space to try an appetizer or dessert. It’s hard to resist the dumplings, though, as the taste and texture are great! I highly recommend visiting Bao Bao and trying the wide variety of dumplings (natch) and the very interesting appetizers.

Cost: $28/person, not including tip.

Food adventures.

Posted on 2014-06-10 by Austin Brower

Back in 2012, I first visited Pai Men Miyake and raved about their noodles and pork buns. Since then, I’ve returned multiple times and sampled additional menu items. My most recent visit I ventured into trying the brussels sprouts. The sprouts, quickly deep fried and tossed with a fish sauce vinaigrette, cilantro, and mint, are a delightfully salty complement to beer. The dish was quickly demolished. Later, my friend Jim Troutman joined me and had already discovered how tasty the sprouts are. It was a great time.

Today, I had to deal with my collection of brussels sprouts that are taking up space in the fridge. Harkening back to my last visit to Pai Men Miyake, I decided to try my own version of their deep fried sprouts. I prepared the sprouts and cut the larger ones in half.

One of my housemates recently purchased some grape seed oil. I have had a hankering to try it out and it’s supposed to be a good frying oil — in the cast iron it went! I set the stovetop at about medium heat and let the pan and oil come up to temperature. Then, I added the brussels in small batches. The first batch, of course, ended up a little darker than I wanted, but the second looked great! For best effect, a couple un-cut small brussels sprouts should be allowed to cook through — they’ll have a nice “pop”.

At the suggestion of Morgan, the first attempt was a mix of Maine maple syrup, soy sauce, ginger, and a little sriracha. Totally delicious, but a little too salty. The second, again tweaked by Morgan, contained Maine maple syrup, worcestershire sauce, ginger, and more sriracha.

The third version, to my mind, ended up a total winner. It contained a dab of ginger paste, about half a tablespoon of maple syrup, soy sauce, and rice vinegar, and sriracha to taste.

Cooked Brussels Dressed

Needless to say, the brussels sprouts disappeared into hungry mouths rather quickly.

Since I had left over frying oil, I took a couple chicken breast cutlets, coated them in mayonnaise and chipotle panko, and gave them a quick fry. The chicken ended up moist on the inside and had a nice crunch on the outside. The oil was a little too hot for the panko, but the slight burning didn’t spoil the dish too much.

Chipotle Panko coated Chicken with Brussels Sprouts

The obscurity of open source software projects.

Posted on 2014-04-13 by Austin Brower

With all the sturm und drang about the OpenSSL so-called Heartbleed vulnerability, I spent a good chunk of the previous week examining servers I own or maintain to determine whether I’ll need to upgrade, regenerate/revoke certificates, etc. It has not been pleasant, nor easy.

The challenge of maintaining infrastructure that seems to hum along without intervention can’t be overstated. In my personal and work life, turn up of servers is not a day-to-day occurrence. Maintenance work gets slotted into the “do when there is slack time” column. And since those servers just keep chugging along without too much noise, they don’t rise up and get noticed. The unfortunate side effect of this is a slow, but steady, growth in open attack vectors on those critical infrastructure elements.

The obvious way to deal with this “low priority/high importance” work is to aggressively schedule it and get buy in from management and one’s personal scheduler. It always takes more time than estimated to perform these maintenance tasks, because of changes in software features and operation — and sometimes obsolescence. The problem of obsolescence is the most dogged one, I believe.

I’ve used Cacti for many years to graph SNMP interface statistics, traffic, and memory usage collected from Linux, Cisco, and Zhone platforms. It’s a PHP application utilizing the LAMP stack and is lightweight and easy to use. In the chronology of web based graphing of SNMP data, Cacti came after MRTG/RRDTool and allowed for easy creation and viewing of graphs from a web front end. Over the years, the pace of development and release cadence has slowed where the last released version was in August 2013. Since then, there seemingly has been a major restructuring of the code, but I can’t determine where the project is going.

There are tons of projects like this, powering important parts of the Internet’s infrastructure. Each with communities that swell and wane as itches are scratched and new challenges found. Right now, ElasticSearch and the “ELK Stack” are hot and cool and fast — and quite useful — but in 5 years will there even be a way to download the code reliably or documentation that reflects the way the code actually works? I discovered OSSEC last year and was blown away by the completeness of the solution and the excitement of those who had been using it. But now the support of Trend Micro may be in doubt. Will the project sink into obscurity as attention wanes?

There are big challenges for those who must maintain infrastructure built on these tools. As the different software stacks “evolve” on different timelines, it falls to the users/administrators to step up and dig deeper into the code and discover, document, and attempt to correct problems. This is the lifecycle of FLOSS software and, upon writing this entry, I think that it’s a damn good thing (compared to the pay and pray model with commercial software).

Date Nut Pudding

Posted on 2013-04-15 by Austin Brower

[amd-recipeseo-recipe:6]