It's been pointed out amongst those that know me that I don't exactly eat like a normal human being. I'm cool with that opinion. Hell, all of you are entitled to your wrong opinion.

It's been well documented that a man can survive on nothing more than pork products and the occasional spice. I'm not here to dispute science.

What I did tonight was a celebration of food. A way to satisfy my hunger combined with a sacrifice to the prosciutto gods. It was a pretty good night.

It started with a recipe from Mario Batali's Molto Italiano. It called for kabobs of flank steak rolled up with a strip of prosciutto and a sage leaf, brushed with olive oil, and seasoned with salt and pepper. Pretty simple.

Until you show up to your local grocer and they're out of sage.

Fucking grocery store. I swear to god they stopped carrying, or stopped stocking with any sort of frequency, every fucking item I've tried to buy over the last year.

Organic washed romaine lettuce? The only sku in the section constantly out.
(Yes, I understand I just outed myself)

The olive oil I like? All 6 varieties banished.

The chicken I started buying like wildfire? Out of stock for a month.

Cheese and garlic croutons? "Not sure what product you're talking about, sir."

Three Peppercorn Pasta? The only sku disco'd out of the 6-variety brand.

And on and on and on.

If this place wasn't walking distance from my apartment I'd be punching it in its face. (Quick side note: I never walk.)

So they were out of sage leaves, among other things I'd want to buy, so I was at a loss for what I could do to replace the sage. I called the BoyGenius for a replacement spice. He talked about spice for spice swapping and how there wasn't an easy swap for sage.

In the end he suggested oregeno. I decided to use that idea for a couple kabobs and then used a few different spice blends for my other ones. There was a clear winner and loser.

Without sage I had only a few options at my disposal. I made two with oregano, two with a spice rub called Nantucket something or other, and one with an Italian herb blend.

Cut the steak into 4in strips, place a matching piece of prosciutto on top, spice (or lay a single sage leaf if your grocer doesn't suck donkey balls) and roll them up. Brush them with olive oil and salt and pepper before broiling or grilling. I had to broil since my apartment complex is worried I might burn down our building if I'm allowed to have a grill on my deck. (I probably would)



This part was pretty easy. The only problem I had was that I didn't go to a butcher so the steak was too thick. I had to utilize my knife skillz (Honed during ninja school as a young shaolin monk) to cut that bitch in half. I need a sharpener and a much better cutting board, but I still have all my fingers.

Cook those bastages until they're done to your liking, which in my case was the toughest part. I'm getting better at it, but I'm still not that great at nailing the proper temp and time with dishes like this.

Despite a little too much time in the oven they still turned out delicious.



The recipe called for cubes of pancetta to go in between the rolls, but my awesome grocer again couldn't come through for me, so I figured I still needed something else on there and went with a red pepper. Yes, Elizabeth, I actually ate a couple of them.

Clearly the spice blend from Nantucket Offshore won the battle. The Italian blend was second and the oregano came in as the least tasty of the group.



From their website: Rosemary, sesame seed, red pepper, oregano, minced garlic, dried tomato, lemon peel.

What the photos don't show is the cheese I was eating while making the rolls. I also feel like I should mention it took me way too long to prepare this easy dish, and as a consequence I had a sizable amount of wine in my system before any real food made it in there. I have quite a nice little headache this morning, but it was worth it.

See how valuable I'll be in the kitchen? I can totally cook.

A little.