or like today, almost any other day like today, but today i matched up two analogies with cooking; i once only stated that doing organic chemistry experiments were like cooking, broths of sweets and sours (esters and ammonia compounds respectively) - they did seem so at the time and still are, while smashing vegetables dipped in liquid nitrogen against the laboratory floor, but today, almost like any other day like today i started cooking a chicken makhani (indian butter chicken), past the stage of frying onions, garlic-ginger paste, past adding the spices: garam masala ground cumin chilli powder cayenne pepper salt & pepper, past the stage of adding butter, milk and crème fraîche, and chopped tomatoes, past the stage of then dipping the chicken in to let it poach for more tenderness than if fried prior (as the recipe suggested), then... when i noticed the spice colours diluted by the dairy ingredients i peered into the culinary warlock’s cauldron and uttered what fiction critics would have said of a bestseller spy novel... ‘mmm... the plot thickens.’ side dish? lemon rice.