FreeBSD svn client and https server

Posted on 2010-08-30 by Jim Vanderveen

We recently moved our Subversion repository to the University’s central svn server.
When I tried to checkout a copy of the repository to a new FreeBSD server today, I got the following error:

svn: Unrecognized URL scheme 'https://svn.web.server'

I checked the output of ‘svn ––version’ and verified that subversion didn’t have anything configured to handle the http[s] protocols.
(Our old server was using the svn+ssh.)
A couple of web searches later, I found that I needed to use the Neon or Serf ports (or both).
Since Neon was listed as one of the defaults in FreeBSD’s subversion Makefile, I modified our /etc/make.conf file to require Neon:

.if ${.CURDIR:M*ports/devel/subversion}
WITH_NEON=foo
...
.endif

Subsequent rebuilding of subversion pulled in the Neon port, as expected,
and ‘svn ––version’ now lists ra_neon as the module handling http and https schemes.
Success!

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Garden chili

Posted on 2010-07-26 by Jim Vanderveen

Barb and I made some *amazing* chili tonight. We didn’t take notes while whipping this up, but I’m pretty sure we remembered all the ingredients. We haven’t got many ripe tomatoes yet, so we just grabbed a bunch of cherry tomatoes and one or two of each of the hot peppers we’re growing.

– 2 jalapeño peppers, roasted and peeled
– 1 “Big Jim” pepper, roasted and peeled
– 1 chile relleno pepper, roasted and peeled
– 2 lbs ground chuck
– 2 cloves garlic, minced or pressed
– ½ onion, minced
– about 1 dozen cherry tomatoes, halved
– 1 can (15 oz) tomato sauce (we used Fire Roasted Chipotle)
– 1 cayenne pepper, minced
– 1 pepperoncini, minced
– 2 Tbsp homemade chili powder
– ½ Tbsp cumin
– 1 tsp paprika
– ¾ tsp oregano
– ¾ tsp salt, to taste
– 1 can (12 oz) beer

Fire up your grill and roast the peppers. You want the skin to char, so get the fire pretty hot. Be sure to pierce the peppers! Otherwise they tend to burst. Once the peppers are nicely charred all around, place them in a paper bag, fold it closed and let them sit on the counter for 20 minutes. Meanwhile…

Over medium-high heat, brown the beef in a large casserole. Drain the excess fat and lower the heat to medium-low. Add the garlic, onion, tomatoes and sauce. The roasted peppers are probably ready by now, so scrape the char off and removed the stems and seeds. Mince all the peppers (roasted and fresh), and add to the beef. Add chili powder, cumin, paprika, and oregano and mix well. Pour in the can of beer and adjust heat to fast simmer. Add salt to taste. Let simmer for at least 30 minutes.

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Another excellent meal from “Mastering the Art of French Cooking”

Posted on 2010-03-19 by Jim Vanderveen

Barb and I made an awesome dinner tonight (if I do say so myself)! We put our own spin on two recipes from Julia Child’s “Mastering the Art of French Cooking”: Suprêmes de volaille aux champignons (chicken breasts with mushrooms and cream) and gratin de chou frisé aux oignons (kale braised with onions). Nicely complementary, and even Caitlin loved it!

I’m not going to post the entire recipes, only our modifications. I’ve written before (and I’ll write it again) — if you’re even moderately interested in cooking, you *need* to buy a copy of “Mastering the Art of French Cooking”! We got the two-volume hardback edition from Amazon for about $40 IIRC. Probably one of the best bargains *ever*.

Here are the changes Barb made to *Suprêmes de volaille aux champignons*, MAFC vol 1 pg 269:

– “at least four times” the mushrooms called for (Barb really likes cremini mushrooms, can you tell?)
– substitute lemon pepper for black pepper
– use garlic salt instead of plain salt
– add a bit of Tabasco sauce to taste

I made *Gratin de chou frisé aux oignons* based on the gratin d’épinards (spinach) recipe, MAFC vol 2 pg 360:

– obviously use kale instead of spinach
– added a dash or two of Tabasco with the salt and pepper

I didn’t take the time to cut the stems out of the kale, and this was a mistake. It didn’t taste bad, but the texture of the stems was a bit odd. Next time I’ll take a few minutes to trim the kale before blanching it.

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Boeuf bourguignon

Posted on 2009-12-30 by Jim Vanderveen

Traditionally on Christmas Day we have my parents over for dinner. This year we made boeuf bourguignon for them, and it was *fantastic*!

Anybody who’s seen “Julie & Julia” knows that boeuf bourguignon was one of the uncredited stars of the show. It wasn’t terribly difficult to make, although it took almost four hours — some of the most excruciating time of our lives, while we smelled it cooking! This one recipe is totally worth the cost of “Mastering the Art of French Cooking”.

I don’t see how we can possibly make *every* recipe in this book, because we’re going to be making this one pretty often! Barb just finished the last of our Christmas leftovers, and she’s already hinting that she’d like me to make it again, preferably tonight.

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Tonight’s dinner…

Posted on 2009-12-28 by Jim Vanderveen

I was feeling a bit ambitious tonight, so I made three new dishes from [Mastering the Art of French Cooking][mafc]: suprêmes de volaille archiduc (paprika chicken w/ cream sauce), risotto, and petits pois étuvés au beurre (buttered peas).

I had been planning on making a longer-cooking chicken dish, so I started cooking that first. Big mistake! The chicken was ready quite a while before the other two dishes. I should have started the risotto first, then got the water boiling for the peas, *then* started the chicken.

I made the chicken with hot paprika, which was a bit too spicy for Caitlin and even Barb to a lesser extent. Next time, I’ll try half hot paprika and half normal.

Barb suggested trying shallots instead of onions for the chicken. And the risotto. And the peas. (Barb *really* likes shallots!)

I used 2 cups of chicken stock and 1 cup of white wine in the risotto, came out pretty well I thought.

[mafc]: http://www.amazon.com/Mastering-Art-French-Cooking-Set/dp/0307593525/ “Two-volume set of MAFC from Amazon.com — no, I’m not getting a kickback from them.”

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“Mastering the Art of French Cooking”

Posted on 2009-12-21 by Jim Vanderveen

We got “Julie and Julia” via Netflix a week or two back. Good show, definitely worth watching. But the food *really* got our attention! We started looking for a copy of “Mastering the Art of French Cooking”, (hereafter MAFC), and found the [2-volume set available at Amazon.com][mafc-amazon] for a very attractive price! (If I recall correctly, the 2-volume set was cheaper than either of the individual volumes separately.) Volume 1 is a great introduction to French cooking, while Volume 2 has an extended section on vegetables (along with plenty of other material).

Last night we made our first two recipes from MAFC, and they were both fantastic!! I made supêmes de volaille aux champignons (chicken with mushrooms and cream sauce) while Barb was busy with gratin mornay de brocoli (broccoli with cheese sauce). Our timing was off–the chicken was done long before the broccoli, and it smelled too delicious for us to wait until both were done. Barb took pictures of each dish, which I’ll post later.

I’ve added “mafc” as a tag on this blog, and I’ll be posting our adventures with these books under that tag. I won’t be posting any of the recipes from MAFC, so do yourself a favor and buy these books!

[mafc-amazon]: http://www.amazon.com/Mastering-Art-French-Cooking-Set/dp/0307593525/

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Twinlead slim-JIM antenna

Posted on 2009-11-28 by Jim Vanderveen

I finally finished my first antenna tonight! I made a [twinlead slim jim][] and tried getting on the air. Unfortunately, there aren’t many people on this late on a holiday evening. I *was* able to make one contact with a gentleman up in Placerville. He reported me 5×5, so I must have been hitting the repeater fairly strong. I’ll try again tomorrow, during the noon net at least.

The only difficulty I found with this design is the feedpoint. Stripping the insulation mid-cable is a little fiddly, but a sharp knife does wonders. When I soldered the coax (RG-58), I should have done the shield first–it was a *bear* to solder the (stranded) shield once the center conductor was already attached. A pair of “third hands” may have helped.

[twinlead slim jim]: http://www.hamuniverse.com/2meter300ohmslimjim.html

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Artichoke dip

Posted on 2009-11-26 by Jim Vanderveen

This is a recipe we got from Carol Hopfe.

– 2 cans (~14 oz ea) *non-marinated* artichoke hearts, drained, rinsed, and chopped
– 1.5 c mayonnaise
– 1 can (~5 oz) diced green chiles, drained
– 1.5 c parmesan cheese
– (optional) 4 jalapeños, seeded and chopped

Mix all the ingredients and add to a buttered casserole dish. Bake in a 325˚ oven for ~30 minutes.

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T minus 1

Posted on 2009-11-25 by Jim Vanderveen

Thanksgiving Eve! 🙂 Things to do today:

– Make stuffing
– Get mac-n-cheese ready for the oven
– Make pie crust(s) dough
– Hard-boil the eggs for deviled eggs
– Make another pumpkin roll (Barb thought the first one would disappear too quickly)

And finish cleaning up the house!

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T minus 2

Posted on 2009-11-24 by Jim Vanderveen

Two days until Thanksgiving, time to start preparing our feast! Today (Tuesday) is when we:

– De-bone the turkey (which has been defrosting in the frig since Saturday)
– Make turkey stock with the bones
– Make the cranberry sauce
– Mix up the spinach dip
– Try the pumpkin roll recipe (in case it doesn’t work out, we have time to do something else tomorrow)
– Cornbread (for our stuffing tomorrow)

We also be making mashed potatoes with our dinner tonight, since we need some leftovers to make poppy seed rolls.

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