Busy.

Work and life have been keeping me away for a whole week, but here is a gem of a cookbook that I absolutely did NOT buy and did not consider buying for even a second:

I have a story to share soon about a horrid experience at my local Applebee's.

On another sidenote, I will be going to Chicago this summer for four days, so I've got a lot of food planning to do.  Since I will be staying outside of Chicago, at a yet to be determined motel/hotel that offers the option of free breakfast, I will be able to spend more money on fun, and by fun, I mean food and other memorable experiences.

Did you know McDonald's USA First Store Museum exists?  Because it does, right outside of Chicago. And I'm going.

Tamales

I had my first tamale tonight (pork!), and my god it would have been even more amazing had it been a tad less spicy.  And if I wasn't also eating a fish taco with a side of rice and beans.

Lentil Soup

Once when I was sick, or lazy, Adam went to the grocery store without me.   He came home with Dinty Moore microwaveable meals.  Do you know what they are?  Because I didn't, and I still wish I didn't.  Ever since then, I get really scared when Adam goes by himself (sorry, sweetie, love you!), which is pretty rare in itself (still love you).  He went by himself last night and came home with a can of Campbell's lentil soup. "But I make lentil soup all the time?" I asked.

Anyway.  Tonight, I made lentil soup.  The last lentil soup I made had bacon and the one before that was curried.  I didn't want to do either so I used the epicurious app to help me.  I wanted to use lentils and carrots, and while I suppose I could have thought of this easy Red Lentil and Carrot Soup by myself, I didn't.  I only read a few of the reviews before committing myself to this because I couldn't bare to read any more than a few (ADD) and because I didn't care.  I wanted lentil soup, and I got it!

I know I've mentioned how much I love recipes, but I haven't touched upon how I actually modify them to better fit my or Adam's preference:

ingredients

3/4 pound red lentils*, picked over 2 cups red and French green lentils

7 cups water 2 cups chicken broth, 5 cups water

1 cup chopped onion

3 4 garlic cloves, minced

1 teaspoon ground coriander

1 teaspoon ground cumin

1/4 teaspoon turmeric

5 carrots (about 10 ounces), halved lengthwise and sliced thin crosswise

1 diced yukon gold potato

1 cup finely chopped red bell pepper Adam does not like cooked peppers

1/4 cup packed fresh coriander sprigs, washed well, spin dry,  and chopped fine not in my fridge

1/4 cup chopped scallion greens forgot about this

cayenne to taste forgot about this too, but didn't really want a spicy lentil soup anyway

SALT AND PEPPER!!!

preparation

In a 4-quart saucepan bring lentils and water to a boil and skim froth. Stir in onion, garlic, ground coriander, cumin, and turmeric and simmer, partially covered, 15 minutes. Stir in carrots and bell pepper and simmer until carrots are tender, about 10 minutes. Soup may be prepared up to this point 3 days ahead, cooled, uncovered, and chilled, covered.

Stir in coriander, scallion greens, cayenne, and salt and pepper to taste.

Serve soup garnished with coriander sprigs

Rinse lentils.  Saute onions for a few minutes before adding garlic. Add chicken stock, water, lentils and spices.  (I would have added the spices before the liquid and lentils but I was short on time and I thought the garlic was one second away from burning).  Bring to boil, let simmer for 15-20 minutes.  SEASON with salt and pepper.  Add carrots and potatoes and let simmer for another 15 minutes.  Taste and SEASON AGAIN.  Then Booyah - Lentil Soup time.

Sea salt and freshly ground pepper are your best friends.  There is a difference between too salty, unsalted and perfectly seasoned.  Good luck.

p.s. I spilled Chimpy's food while trying to refill the container, and I contemplated leaving it all on the floor for him.  

I did not.

Kimchi and Soba

There is a Korean owned bodega across town that shouldn't even be called a bodega.  It is one of the few reasons I would want to live anywhere other than the same apartment Adam and I have been calling home for four years.  They sell amazing homemade kimchi for like $1.50!  I guess I'm supposed to say my mom's kimchi is the best, but I don't think it is.  My mom's kkakdugi, however, is the best.

Kkakdugi does not get the attention that kimchi gets, so don't feel bad if you are not cultured enough to know about it.  In fact, feel terrible about yourself.  I think the main difference between the two is that kimchi is made from cabbage, and kkakdugi is made from daikon.  The internet tells me the same thing, so that's all you need to know. The texture makes all the difference though.

Anyway, I was hungry and wanted kimchi.  Sometimes I just eat these Korean bowl noodles - yes, the kind that just require boiling water - just so I can have some.  I knew I had soba noodles, so I googled "kimchi, soba" and came up with a recipe for bibim guksu, from a Korean food blog whose last entry was in 2007.  I didn't actually follow the recipe because 1. the topping ingredients are not in my crisper and 2. any recipe that says 'thumbnail' of anything is not something that has to be followed.

I used (too much) gochujang, rice vinegar, sesame oil and brown sugar and some of the soba water as the sauce, left the kimchi on the side and then topped it with green onions.

Valentine's Day, Part Two

"What do you want to eat with the steak?  We have some potatoes."
"Potatoes au Gratin."
"Are you kidding?"

We had New York strip and potato gratin.   I think Mark Bittman taught me to leave the cast iron skillet heating on the bottom floor of the oven - and that's what I do.  The oven was at 450 degrees for the potato gratin before I took out the skillet, put it on medium high and seared both sides of the steak for a few minutes. I finished it off in the oven at 350 degrees and just kept checking the internal temperature with a thermometer.  Still have not mastered cooking great meat without a thermometer...

Since I make ten times too many portions for just myself and Adam, I attempted to cut the recipe in half. I used less potatoes, a lot less heavy cream and cheese, and more garlic.  I couldn't find gruyere and used a Whole Foods shredded three cheese blend (fontina, asiago and parmesan) instead.

And then I baked the Funfetti cake, from the mix I purchased on clearance after Christmas hence the red and green, in a non-fluted bundt pan, covered it in Pillsbury white frosting and called it a day.

Here is to celebrating one, of many days, with someone you love more than small, appropriate portions of meat, potatoes without cream, and cake from scratch.


p.s. listen to the sizzle! look at cream and cheese bubble from residual heat!

Eggs!

In a previous post, I said I wanted to make this Baked Eggs in the Basket recipe.

My butter was too cold to butter the muffin pan as much as I should have, and I obviously scrambled them, but it's a pretty great simple recipe/idea.  I used whole grain bread, but I think white would be best.  Mine broke while I was forming it in the tin - perhaps too much super human strength?

I topped it with some chopped garlic chives and shaved piave cheese.

If I was ever willing to serve brunch, this would be an incredibly great idea.  But I'm not, and I never will. 

Dessert

Adam doesn't cook, bake or know what most things in the kitchen do, but he does get some good treats.

Chicken Tikka Masala

For how traditional, aka boring, Adam's palate is, he seems to really like Indian food.  I asked him last week what he wanted to eat for dinner this week, and he said chicken tikka masala.

Whenever a recipe has total time estimates, I multiply that by at least two.   Tomorrow night's chicken tikka masala will have cost me approximately twenty hours.

Food and Wine is NOT for the weak.

Sunday Breakfast

Scrambled eggs with broccoli.  Leftover herbed potatoes from dinner this week.  Rosemary sourdough.  And cup of black tea, not featured.

Hosting Dinner - The Morning After

This is what my kitchen looks like the morning, and sometimes several days after, after I host dinner for two or more people:

Thursday Dinner

Whole Broiled/Baked Branzini - My first time baking and broiling a whole fish.  Whole Foods gutted, scaled and cleaned it for me, so it wasn't too difficult.  I rubbed it in some olive oil, seasoned it inside and out with salt and pepper and stuffed it with some lemon slices. Baking it in a foil packet at 400 degrees for whatever time Mark Bittman recommended, was not enough, and I was starving, so I opened it up, turned the broiler on high and just kept a close eye on it.

Red/White Quinoa with Sugar Snap Peas and Zucchini - While the quinoa was cooking in my homemade chicken stock, I cooked some shallots in olive oil and butter and threw in the diced zucchini and chopped snap peas.  Tossed in one teeny, thinly sliced garlic clove, along with a teeny bit of rice wine vinegar and soy sauce, salt and pepper.  I stirred in the quinoa with the vegetables, and when the fish was done, I called it a day.  

Pretty sure I could eat fish every single day for the rest of my life.

P.S. The Chocolate French Bread experiment was DELICIOUS.  Better than a chocolate croissant - suck on that, people!

Chocolate French Bread

I really wanted a chocolate croissant and had to think quick.  What did I have?  A bowl of the Master Recipe from Artisan Bread proofing in the fridge for over a week, cocoa powder, and milk chocolate chips.

What will happen?  French bread with a weird cocoa flavor and even weirder chocolate chunks?  OR An amazing Tuesday night treat?

I'm scared.

Bon Appetempt, Bon Appetit, Bon Etc.

Do you know how many food blogs exist?  A LOT.  It's pretty insane.

I just came across Bon Appétempt though.  I love that her first blog entry was a failed attempt at a Bon Appetit four-layer chocolate cake.  For those of you who do not typically follow recipes, do not subscribe to multiple foodie magazines, and generally do not care about what the food looks like as long as it tastes good, will not understand what it's like when a Bon Appetit recipe fails in its final stages.  She still had the balls to put it online, and it says a lot about her and the blog itself. 

It does remind me that I need a cake pedestal and dome, similar to this one from Williams-Sonoma.  Maybe people will stop asking when Adam and I are going to get married when, instead of holiday cards, I start mailing out mock-registry-stock photos of cake pedestals and everything Le Creuset makes in kiwi.   

Anyway, at some point in recent past, I was receiving ALL of the following (somewhat) food-related magazines at one time:  Bon Appetit, Saveur, Real Simple, Everyday Food, and Martha Stewart Living.  With the exception of Saveur, they were all free, but Real Simple became less about home and food and Martha Stewart was for people who had expensive hobbies, big backyards/gardens and a penchant for interior design.  Everyday Food was fine, but more often than not, kind of boring and uninspiring.  

However, around Christmas, they sent me one of those "please reconsider your subscription with us, we will give you two years for TEN DOLLARS" and I caved.  Apparently I do not need to be inspired to cook, I just need a good deal.

Saveur, I am waiting for your version of the desperate "please don't leave me" notices before I make my final decision on whether or not to renew.  Let me know.  I will be waiting.

Saturday (Late) Breakfast

I have been too lazy to put my slow cooker away and do not have my regular table space to cut the pizza, so I have been unintentionally spiting my landlord by cutting on the counter next to the stove.

Late Night Pizza

I made the Master Recipe from Artisan Bread in Five Minutes A Day on Sunday, and it's been proofing in a bowl in the fridge since then.  I put the grill pan on high, turned the broiler on high, and rolled out a mini-pie for myself.  I grilled both sides of the dough, slathered on some homemade tomato sauce (which is one of those things that will never taste better from a jar), tossed on fresh mozz, and then let it finish in the broiler for a minute.

Took about the same time as your average frozen tv dinner.  And much fucking faster than making a loaf of bread from a book that is the ultimate lie.

This has been posted in Milkshake Busters too.

p.s. You know there is a specific line in my lease about NOT using knives directly on the counters?  Because there is.

Coconut Shrimp

I went to an event tonight hosted by a non-profit to thank their volunteers (me!) for their time and to show their general appreciation with networking opportunities, good company, free drinks and free food.  Not that this blog ever deals with work or jobs or volunteering - but every non-profit I've ever encountered is  fucking amazing with what they hope to accomplish and the underrepresented people, men, women and children, that they serve, and it's inspiring.  All the really good people do this type of work full-time, and I stand by that forever.

How this relates to food?  The bar that hosted the event had this amazing coconut shrimp.  I don't eat shrimp that often, in fact, I don't even know the last time I cooked it at home (although I have frozen shrimp in the freezer), so each and every time I have it out, it's a treat.  It's an even better treat when it's free, fried and tossed with coconut and panko.

Fucking BANGING.

Roast Chicken and Vegetables

One of the easiest and most impressive dishes to make for people is a roast chicken and vegetables.  After rinsing and drying the chicken, I rub it with some butter, about a tablespoon, and season it with salt and pepper.  That is it.  Sometimes I will stuff the inside with some garlic and lemon, but that's the extent of the wild things I do to a small chicken.

I always roast the same kind of vegetables when I am making it with chicken - sweet potatoes, red potatoes, carrots and onions - and again, like the chicken, keep it simple.  Toss it in some olive oil, salt and pepper and you can call it a day.

Happy Friday Night Dinner.

Baked Eggs

Can someone say Weekend Breakfast?

 

I'd scramble them though, because truth be told, runny yolk makes me gag.  Always has, always will, no matter how hard I tried to convince myself otherwise.

Bread

One of my recent cookbook purchases was the following:

Five minutes a day is kind of a lie though.  And by "kind of a lie," I mean a straight up lie.  You've got to preheat the oven and let the dough rest for about 20 minutes before baking.  You've got to let that beast bake for another half hour or so.  Let's not mention cooling time either.

I've only made mini-boules from the Master Recipe so far, and it's been delicious, but really, five minutes is a fucking lie.

Monday - Friday: BREAKFAST

Eating breakfast is a necessary component to my 9-5, and it sort of baffles me how many people do not eat something to start their day right.  It's not to say I am the Master of the World's Most Nutritious Breakfast or anything, but I can't function properly if I do not incorporate the meal into my morning.  For a brief period of time, I woke up early enough to make tea and have toast at home.  Those days are dead and gone. 

These days my breakfast mainly consists of a combination of the following goodies: yogurt, oatmeal, a croissant, a chocolate croissant (a recent addition to the line up), a banana, coffee, a latte, or tea.  I try not to have the everything bagel with cream cheese or egg sandwich with bacon super often, mostly because the latter would throw off my appetite for lunch.  The most recent Food and Wine has a recipe for breakfast quinoa that I would really like to try, as an alternative to oatmeal, but with raisins instead of apricots.  I still can't get down with a lot of dried fruits.

The first time I ever had Greek yogurt, it was revolting.  It was Fage Total, and it was like a super stiff whipped sour cream.  Adam always preferred regular yogurt with fruit on the bottom, and I soon transitioned out of the pre-blended, strawberry-banana combos, but I wanted to give greek yogurt another shot.  I purchased Chobani Champions at our local grocery store - yes, Greek yogurt marketed towards children - and I was sold.  Marketing for children works on everything, especially with food.

I still can't eat the total varieties and try to go for 2%, but Stonyfield makes my current favorite: