the buzzing of the lamb

My second week in Philadelphia I have settled in to a hotel with modest cooking equipment including a two-burner electric stove. Overambitious, I picked up some lamb tips from Trader Joes and returned to my room to make dinner.

Limitations of the provided cookware aside, I question the wisdom of providing cooking facilities in poorly ventilated hotel rooms. Within minutes of applying heat and lamb to the pan, the smoke overwhelmed the pathetic range hood. Realizing this, I tried hastily to abandon my plans, plunging the lamb and pan into the sink, but to no avail, as the smoke alarm began its horrible bleating above.

Hotel staff seemed accustomed to this, swiftly arriving at my room and disabling the siren. Happily the alarm for a little smoke in the room is separate from the evacuation alarm and the sprinklers and the only outcome was some mildly annoyed neighbors. Returning to my soggy lamb, I’ve decided braising to be the best form of cooking available to me, and indeed finished as such the lamb was more than palatable.