On breakfast

I am not a breakfast person. I've never been a breakfast food person. As far as I am concerned, breakfast is coffee and that means that breakfast lasts from the time I wake up until about 4pm. Then it is dinner time. Two meals per day is the standard around here. Nickolas is endlessly perturbed by my odd eating habits and nicely asks that I please eat three times a day. I think he's worried about my brain starving or something, because there's no way I am going to suddenly waste away to nothing; my hips are evidence of this improbability. This is a huge difference between us. I can go twelve hours without getting hungry, while he will be ravenous every 4-5 hours, right on schedule. It's precious. I try to have something either ready for him to eat or only 5 minutes from prep to plate at all times so that I don't starve the poor man. Really, keeping him fed and smiling is one of my highest priorities in life.

Rather than going back to sleep this morning after he got up, I harnessed this wild child dog of mine and we walked him to the bus stop so he could start his commute. I think that maybe everyone won in this situation. I got to see my beloved boyfriend for 15 glorious minutes longer than I normally would in the mornings. He got to show his fellow commuters that he is allowed to kiss a strange-looking, sleepy girl with "guess what I did last night!" bedhead (it is ALWAYS this way. I have Medusa hair that cannot be tamed) and a weird mohawked dog. Penelope got to bark at a man, who immediately walked over to pet her and call her adorable. Win, win, win.

After said bon voyaging and goodbye kissing took place, Nelly and I ambled back to Terabithia for some coffee. I was standing there in the kitchen in my nightgown (which I wore to the bus stop, thank you very much! I just tuck that silly thing into my jeans and throw on a hoodie and no one is the wiser) with my silly ladybug latte mug in my hands to warm me up and all of a sudden I was STARVING. This rarely happens to me. So rarely that the only breakfasty things I own are some soy protein shake powder (shut it!) and some oatmeal of the lame variety. It's not even steel-cut, you guys. That instantly renders it cookie ingredient status rather than breakfasty nourishment status. Ugh.

 Looking around my kitchen, my despair grew at about the same rate as the decibel level of my growling stomach did: rapidly. Super lame, friends. Super lame. I have some eggs, yeah, but I am not really an eggy person. Eggs are for Nickolas. That man could live off of eggs and I would let him, so long as he ate some oatmeal to negate the cholesterol contributions of said eggs. So no eggs. I had no potatoes, as I used those last night in a frantic substitution for the jasmine rice that I had a mishap with two nights prior*. I was thinking I was pretty much out of options until I realized that there was still banana-carrot bread left over. It didn't sound very good by itself. I tire of things quickly. Again I was thinking that I was going to have to walk up to one of the cafes and beg someone for a bagel and then I realized that I *did* have breakfast stuff that was suitable.

 

Aforementioned silly ladybug latte mug represent!

Eggs + banana bread + a bit of butter = french toast. The best french toast. After chiding myself for taking 15 tummy-growling minutes to realize what I had to work with, I got to it. Standard french toast making with the only variant being the bread used. It was delightfully crunchy outside and soft and delicious inside and with a bit of cinnamon butter, it pretty much morphed into the perfect breakfast.

Don't mock my butter stars. They taste better this way.

Next time, I'd probably dry the bread out in the oven for a little bit if it was still as fresh as this stuff was, just for the sake of texture, but overall? Delicious princess banana breakfast. 100%. 

*Ok so when I was making sme delicious panang curry for lunch the other day, I may have filled my stovetop with jasmine rice after setting the bulk bag of said rice down on the stove and inadvertantly turning the wrong burner on. Bulk bag (I don't have canisters yet!) had a little hole melt in it and all of a sudden, a *plink, plink, plink* sound alerted me to my ridiculous predicament and I was able to turn the burner off immediately without any actual damage, save for 2lbs of raw rice nesting below the burner and under the stove lid. GRACEFUL. My talents shine sometimes, you guys.

Perfection

My friend Wendy came over last night for dinner. I met her in my first quarter of school last year in English class. Our teacher referred to us as "the gingers" on account of our red hairs and constantly poked fun at us and guffawed appropriately when we were very sarcastic and wry. We became incredibly close friends almost immediately and it turns out that if you put us together, it's like puzzle pieces for the most awesome lady ever locking in. Kind of like forming a mecha robot of AWESOME. We're twins on the inside and pass for sisterly sorts on the outside, so we get along famously. It was an incredibly pleasant surprise to be able to add her to the (rather large) handful of gorgeous ladies that I consider my closest friends. 

We haven't been able to see each other as often as we'd like due to life being life and all, so it was especially sweet to be able to have her over for an evening. When she arrived, the dog barked at her until she felt she'd been petted enough, then took up residence on her lap as I handed her a glass of wine and said something like, "Here. Drink this." While we talked and I made dinner, I set her up with the dvd my aunt and uncle made of our family videos from 1985-1987, namely the Easter video from when I was 8. There's a special gem in that video showing that I have always been the same person, just smaller. The highlight is when I am sitting at the dining table coloring a picture outline on the back of my chocolate Easter bunny's box. My aunt has the camera and asks what I am doing. 

"Coloring." 

"Ohhhhhhh. What are you coloring?"

".......Something on the back of a box."

My reply was so flat and so "Ugh DUH!" that my parents can be heard repeating it in the background. "What did she say?" "Jeri asked her what she was coloring *laugh* and she said SOMETHING ON THE BACK OF A BOX." "Something on the back of a box?" "Yeah. Just something on the back of a box." 

*sigh*

I don't try to be impossible. Truly I don't. When Wendy saw this exchange, she laughed so hard that her hand flew up over her mouth and she kind of keeled to the side a little bit. Glorious. Nick arrived shortly after and we sat down in my living room for dinner, where I told him that I'd shown her the home movie. 

"Oh yeah? SOMETHING ON THE BACK OF A BOX! Pffffft," he sneered. He loves me for these things. He must. I can't imagine why else he'd stick around. We drank our wine and talked some more and finished our dinner and then I picked that little dog of mine up, sat her in my lap like a human baby and made up a song about her bald tummy and they both laughed at me and called me a freak. This is my life, people. It could be better (I COULD HAVE A KITCHENAID STAND MIXER) but man, could it ever be so, so much worse.

A lovely night with lovely people in my tiny, weird little apartment. Perfect.

Artichokes...tsk.

Last night I prepared my first artichoke. I hated every second of it. I was stabbed, sliced and bled before I was even done trimming the thing. Granted, it was a baby artichoke so it may have been full of hatred for me since it was not allowed to live up to its fullest delicious potential and I don't fault it for that, but from now on, Nickolas is the official artichoke ambassador. No more for me.

With the approximate 1/14th of a teaspoon of artichoke heart I gleaned from that little baby, I set out to make some chicken artichoke pasta. As I mentioned before, I have zero artichoke experience points, so I was winging it. I diced up the other half of the chicken breast from lunch and browned it in a teaspoon of butter with a clove of chopped garlic and some marjoram while a handful of linguine cooked. On another burner, I made browned butter. I've had browned butter before at my favorite little dinner spot in the neighborhood I just moved from, but I'd never made it on my own. It wasn't nearly as complicated as I'd imagined; it just took a bit of patience. I prepared two tablespoons of it, though I only used one. After the pasta, chicken and butter were done, I tossed them all together with a giant squeeze of fresh lemon juice, a couple tablespoons of chicken broth and then topped it with a little bit of super finely grated parmesan. Overall, it was okay. I think I just need to experiment some more with artichokes (ones that come in a jar and don't hold a deathwish for me!) before I give up a concrete recipe for something involving them. What a shame.

 

Finally an excuse to use my great grandmother's pretty plates! 

Since I am having guests for dinner tonight, I wanted to make something for dessert that wouldn't be too terribly sweet but still satisfied. I had the baking basics, some dark cocoa, a couple of bananas that were ready to pass into the afterlife and a 5lb bag of carrots. I hit the internet to search for a banana-carrot cake recipe and came across this recipe, which looked promising. 

Something I should probably confess is that I tend to never use recipes. Nothing seems to turn out right when I follow recipes. There's always some adjustment I make in preparation or ingredients even if I've never used the recipe before to see how it would turn out if made according to instructions. It's a terrible habit and it makes it very hard for me to give people recipes they ask for if I prepare them something they love. "Oh...um. Well, I used some of this and some of that and you could use some of this too and that'd be good." UGH. 

I did modify this recipe a bit by using 3/4 cup banana, 1.5 cups of carrot pulp + 1/4 c carrot juice and only 2/3 c sugar; this would be plenty sweet without the entire amount called for in the recipe. It turned out well, but I might have added a bit more cinnamon next time just so there's no flour taste coming through in the bread. Hopefully my lovely dinner guests will enjoy it. I plan on feeding them wine before they eat it, so that should help.

Lazy lunch

After staying up until 3am or so watching monster movies, I think it is acceptable to wake up at 10am and then not eat until 2pm. It seems like the proper way to do things. Technically, I suppose you could call this breakfast, but since I am having a glass of wine with it (stop judging! it is 2pm and wine makes me feel less hatred for the fact that I have to go to the old house and move my freakishly heavy dressers over later today.) I am calling it lunch.

 

Given that my craving for curry was becoming overwhelming and I wasn't going to have any until tomorrow night when I make dinner for my dearlovelypal Wendy and Le Boyfriend, I gave in. It could be more panang-y, but whatever. It is delicious and it is in my mouth right now and I am pleased. 

There seriously isn't really a recipe for this, I don't think, unless you count a scavenging of the cupboards and subsequent plate of nutrition a recipe. Half a can of coconut milk, one small diced yellow potato, a clove of chopped garlic, 3 rounds of chopped sweet onion, handful of chopped basil, half a chicken breast, 1 tablespoon panang curry paste: cook for 20 minutes and eat over rice.

Sort of sweet, sort of spicy, mega delicious. MEGA. My favorite panang curry paste for the money is the one from Thai Kitchen, but that's also because it's the most widely available.

It's only a few bucks and if you're all by your lonesome, it will last you a few months in the fridge. My friend Wesa first introduced me to panang curry over dinner at her apartment with her husband Carl. To date, it is still the best panang curry I have ever had, but this stuff doesn't do too badly if you're unable to find kaffir lime leaves in your area. I'm pretty sure that my neighborhood does offer such bounties, but since I am a hobbled recluse this week, I probably won't be walking to any of the groceries to find out.

Speaking of my neighborhood, check out how awesome it is! We have two cupcake shops, incredible pizza, an amazing pet supply store, a bunch of cafes and coffee shops and tons more including art galleries, a tequila bar, gourmet grocers and the beach is just down the hill. Overall, it's a happy little place with a lot of wonderful people and amenities and the sense of community here is much different than my last neighborhood. You should come visit sometime. We'll go eat a cupcake. Goodness knows we have choices.

Oh, you guys

 

I fail tonight. Dinner is a glass of white zinfandel. There might also be some ramen involved. Maybe Oriental flavor. It should be noted that while ramen is the perfect vehicle for transporting drops of scalding hot deathsaline (what saline would be if you boiled it down to 1/1000th of its original volume, thus concentrating it to lethal levels, the likes of which could be used to slay all manner of enemies including but not limited to rhinoceri, robbers, dwarves, trolls, werewolves and Bella Swan) directly onto your eyeball.  Eyeballs, not for lack of trying, cannot taste deathsaline in Oriental flavor or ANY other flavor, so the beauty of it is lost and frankly it feels sort of unfair that I always flick myself in the eye with this crap while it's on its way to my mouth, which is always full of regret, woe and hatred for me after tasting such a thing.  

Anyway. The reason I am ingesting such a wholesome meal is because I am flummoxed as to what I should do with this lone baby artichoke I got from the farmer's market. Should I have purchased two baby artichokes? Are two enough? Should I have purchased three (thus satisfying my neurotic need to have an odd number of *everything* so that there is always a "middle")? I don't know. I don't know how to cook a baby artichoke. I don't know how to cook a not-baby artichoke. I know that I totally cut my hand open on the damn thing, but that's about all I know. Nickolas made us some artichokes once and I ate the leaves or petals or armored plates or whatever it is that they're called, but the heart was toooooo much for me. Tongue overload. I was going to save this sad little fellow for him, but he's getting sadder already, so I am thinking maybe some sort of chicken-artichoke-peppadew pasta. Maybe. I am still reading. By the light of my awesome bulldog lamp that my friend Sean bought for me. He is so hideous and glorious. Sort of like this stupid artichoke I am trying to learn how to cook. Look at that lamp. He is amazing.

Anyway, I suck. Maybe I will make something delicious for lunch tomorrow, but I figured it would only be fair for me to advise you that sometimes I am kind of pathetic and tonight is one of those nights. Maybe even MORE pathetic because I have dulce de leche Haagen Dazs for dessert. It has dairy in it so it counts as food. So shush. Goodnight.

Squash Blossoms

As I mentioned yesterday, I snapped up some squash blossoms at the farmer's market on Sunday. I had no idea what to do with them other than to put things in them and then eat them, so I consulted the all-knowing internet for ideas. I pored over probably a dozen different recipes and most of them indicated the use of cream cheese or goat cheese, as the boyfriend has made them before. Neither of these options appealed to me because I don't really like cream cheese and I especially dislike goat cheese. Its very....goaty. I don't know. I don't really like sour cream, blue cheese or cottage cheese, either. I have a contentious relationship with dairy products. I love what I love and really can't stand the things I don't love. There isn't a middle ground in this situation, but I'm working on it. I swear I am.


Disdain for smeary cheeses aside, one recipe that I saw that appealed to me used basil and mozzarella.
Another one that sounded promising contained bacon and ricotta. Upon consulting with Nickolas on which approach we should use, he left it up to me since I am the picky one. So much to choose from! Cornmeal crusted or flour crusted? Ricotta or mozzarella? Bacon or no bacon? Both the ricotta and cornmeal options would necessitate a trip to the store, which Nick generously offered to undertake, but I am intensely greedy in terms of my time with him and when he got here after work, I wanted to make dinner, eat and cozy down for the night. I nixed the cornmeal and ricotta approaches and settled on mozzarella and flour.


I've only heard of people eating squash blossoms as a delicacy, so I was a little bit hesitant. They looked weird and I didn't think a delicacy should look like an alien eggsac, but I was intrigued by the way Nickolas has spoken about them since we first got together. Determined not to be grossed out by weird things people eat (JUST THIS ONE TIME. I am still totally repulsed by people eating whole shrimps and stuff - that is an ENTIRE BODY going into the mouth at once. it seems obscene!), I gave it a shot. All of the delicacies that friends and family have tried to get me to eat before have been met with a stern, "NO that is not going in my mouth," so I figured that if I am going to experience something that people think of as a culinary treat, it might as well be something as harmless as a flower. If you haven't tried squash blossoms yet, I think you should. Honestly. Despite them looking all weird and shrivelly and the petals feeling kind of like those spiderwebs that get stuck on your eyelashes when you walk into them, they are surprisingly tasty. And really pretty easy. Here's how we made them:


Squash blossoms stuffed with bacon and mozzarella

 

Our female blossoms had tiny zucchinis growing from them!

10 squash blossoms (male or female) - separated from any fruit, pistils/stamens removed

4 pieces of bacon - cooked crisp and crumbled

1 clove garlic - finely chopped

2T onion - finely chopped

1 medium tomato - seeded and finely chopped

1/3 c zucchini - finely chopped

1/2 c shredded mozzarella

1/4 c roughly chopped fresh basil

2 eggs - lightly whisked

1.5 c plain flour

1t unsalted butter

oil

The first step is to remove the pistil or stamen from each blossom, depending on whether you have female or male flowers. This is a delicate operation since the blossoms tear *very* easily, as evidenced by the photo above, which shows a blossom that I completely butchered with my giant hands. It is easiest to float the blossoms in some ice water for a few minutes, pull the petals apart gently and snap off the internal structures with your index finger, then turn the blossom upside down and let everything shake out. The pistil/stamen won't make you sick or anything; it will just be a horribly untasty hard NUBBIN in your mouth.  Do you want a nubbin in your mouth? I didn't think so.

Melt the butter in a saute pan and add the onion, garlic, zucchini and tomato. Saute them over medium heat until the onion just begins to go translucent - about 2 minutes. Add the basil and bacon, remove from heat and set aside in a separate bowl.

Whisk the eggs in a medium-sized bowl and place the flour in a large, shallow dish. Lay all of your blossoms out on one plate for easy access next to the eggs and flour, then combine the mozzarella with the vegetables. 

 Don't let the facial expression fool you. He actually likes me. I think. I put him in charge of the flower-stuffing and cooking because he is an expert and I had NO IDEA what I was doing.

Using a spoon, stuff the blossoms with the vegetable-bacon-mozzarella mixture. It should take between 1 and 1.5T of filling for each blossom. The tops of squash blossoms naturally want to twist closed, so gently pull the edges of the petals together and twist them slightly. If the blossoms aren't staying closed, you can secure them with a toothpick or baker's twine, whichever you have handy. Luckily, we didn't need either one, which is good because I don't have any of those things at the moment.

Heat your pan with 1/2" of oil in it to between medium and medium-high. Too hot and these little guys will burn. Not hot enough and they will end up a soggy, oil-filled mess that is not in any way delicious. If you're using a deep fryer, between 350 and 375 degrees would probably be perfect. I used the world's tiniest cast-iron pan, but you could really use whatever you prefer, so long as it provides even heat and can tolerate high temperatures. 

Roll the blossoms in the flour first, then dip them into the egg, making sure they are completely doused. Roll them again into the flour, coating them evenly, give them a tap to shake of any excess and place them immediately into the pan or deep fryer. In the pan, Nick let them cook for about a minute on each side, which was perfect. You only want to cook them until golden and crisp. Cooking them any further won't make them taste any better. In a standard frying pan, you could probably do 5-6 at a time with no problem. In my 6" cast iron Nick was able to cook 3 at a time. In hindsight I probably should have just purchased 9 blossoms so that there wouldn't be one lonely little one in the pan all by itself, but I just remembered I actually bought 12 and ruined two of them, so had I been less of a clumsy gianthanded girl, we'd have had 4 snug little batches of 3 blossoms each, all happy and content in their neighbor's company. I also realize that I sound crazy right now and apparently love run-on sentences, so I will move on.

The blossoms immediately after frying.


After each batch is done, place them on a paper towel to soak up any excess oil. I would then recommend eating them. 

Mozzarella is perfectly melted and holds the vegetables and bacon together without being too gooey. 
 


I was about halfway through with my first blossom when Nick asked what I thought of them. I chewed and chewed and couldn't really give an answer yet, so I told him I wasn't sure if I liked them or not. The flower has a definite flavor, but I think we sort of ran that over a bit by frying them, as one food blog warned we would. Female flowers are apparently more expensive than males. I paid 50 cents for each and figured that wasn't so bad since they had baby zucchinis attached to them and they were adorable, but I also don't have any comparisons on price whatsoever, so maybe I got a swingin' deal or something. Still I'd like to try grilling or baking them to see if I can bring more of that flowery taste out in them. Once I got around the whole thing about eating a flower that wasn't a violet (which the boyfriend may have ribbed me about just a lttle bit), I really liked them.



Overall, it was a good first try. Nick seemed to like them and he went back for more, so I consider it a success. The blossoms do lose some of the crunch when using the flour coating, so next time I make them I will try the masa coating to see if I can't retain some of that awesome texture. If I can find the blossoms again, I'd like to try them with a sundried tomato, basil, procuitto and ricotta filling and a cornmeal crust. Maybe served with some polenta. Maybe on a spinach salad. I don't know. I do know that I'm sad that these aren't in season all year long and that the window for finding them is shrinking as I type this.


I'm going to make it a mission to head down to the market this week and see if I can't find a few more to experiment with. If they are delicious, I will let you know. If they're not, I won't mention it, just like I didn't mention the fact that I lobbed off the end of one of my fingers and a good hunk of the fingernail itself while making that lentil soup the other day. Such things are unimportant and impermanent. Besides, it'll grow back. I hope.
 

On Sundays and sisterly bonds

There are things that I sometimes feel guilty about. Scolding the cat for batting at the dog. Not going to see my mother as often as I want to. Failing to wake up earlier than Le Boyfriend so that I can surprise him with breakfast in bed. Tiny guilts. Little ones. They pass and then they come around again; it's cyclical.

There are other things I don't feel even the slightest bit guilty about. Sometimes I don't eat breakfast and just drink 3 pots of coffee instead. A good example of this is the way I blew my entire food budget for the week at the West Seattle Farmer's Market yesterday. I did something immeasurably painful and inconvenient to my back last week and it's grown progressively more irritating each day. I've been stuck in my apartment for what seems like eternity. I can't stand, sit, walk or lay down for too long, so I alternate between these things here at Terabithia and wait for people to come to me. I'm an INVALID here, people. Oh, and yes. Terabithia is the name of this wee apartment. I have to name things. It's somewhat of a compulsion for me. I've no idea where it comes from, but there it is and there it stays and everything has a name by which it is referred to.


When it came to naming my first apartment, I solicited opinions from my dear friends and from one certain sister of mine. You see, I have a very large family. Very. Large. I have one older brother in California and seven younger siblings here in the Seattle area. Five sisters and two brothers. Wonderful people. Smart, incredibly funny, wry, AWESOME people. They are my minions and I love them all. Lindsy, the sister in question, is the next in line after me in terms of age. My mother and stepfather brought her home when I was 3.5 years old and we've been a hellraising power team ever since. She is of the sassy variety, which doesn't really surprise me much. Through her teenage years and both of us moving to and from different parent's houses, we spent a lot of time together and you know....my sass rubs off a little. We've had some good times. We've done typical sisterly things like sneaking delicious rum daiquiris into her apartment swimming pool to kick back properly, indulging in manicures and drinking copious amounts of espresso while shopping for garments suitable of ladies with a hiney-shaking agenda. We've also butchered a Mariah Carey song to make a suitable ditty about hiding beer in dresser drawers and once convinced ourselves that, while sitting in a pedestrian overpass above the main hill to our neighborhood, we saw a UFO and, more importantly, it saw us and was coming to get us. No lie there, though. That sucker made a u-turn in the sky as soon as we mentioned it. I've never run home so fast in my life. I think she'd agree.

It's nice having someone not terribly far behind in age that I can ask advice of. I hope I return the favor and I quite enjoy the adventures we have. She has tastes quite different from mine in most areas of interest. Books, music, clothing, movies and leisure activities don't really match up for us all of the time, but she has my best interests at heart, so when it came to naming this little slice of apartment heaven, I enlisted her help. I sent her an email asking for ideas for the new place and approximately 3 seconds later received a reply that said only "Terabithia." Having never read Bridge to Terabithia but knowing that she loved it so, I immediately implemented the new name. She'd never suggest such a thing if it weren't suitable, and so it was. Terabithia is now home, though not quite to the homey stage. I anticipate that will come as I get to know my own tastes a bit better. I've never had the opportunity to decorate before, so I have some lovely things in mind. Things involving a vinyl tree silhouette on my wall, with these flowers dotting it and a few of these adorable guys perching on the branches here and there.


Look how I have digressed. First I am not guilty about buying vegetables and then I am naming apartments and high-fiving my sister because we're awesome. Let's get back to vegetables, hm? As I was saying, my food budget for the week is tiny. I am a poor, unemployed student. With this comes eating cheap while trying to be inventive enough to eat awesomely. As I said, I was sick of sitting around in this little home of mine and wanted to get out. The farmer's market is a scant three blocks away and takes place every weekend, year-round. I figured I'd grab some onions, garlic and maybe some pretty tomatoes and I'd make some pasta sauce on the cheap and organic tip. I took my Trader Joe's canvas shopping bag with me and before I knew it, I'd filled my ENTIRE bag with leeks, 3 kinds of garlic, tomatoes, 2 kinds of basil, some peppadews, a chili, a bottle of delicious raspberry apple cider, gorgeous onions, pattypan squash, the world's tiniest purple cabbage, a baby artichoke (cute!!!) and 12 female squash blossoms. I've never seen squash blossoms before, but Le Boyfriend has instilled in me the importance of snapping them up when I see them so that he can give me a delicious dinner experience with them. I will report back on that debacle tonight after we've eaten all of the poor darlings.


Yesterday, though, I was famished when I got home. Since I routinely skip breakfast (sorry, Honey!), I was looking at an early dinner, which is just fine with me. The basil and tomatoes were calling me. I'm terrible when it comes to eating. If I don't really want and crave something, I just won't eat. If I eat something that isn't exactly what I want, I don't enjoy it. Basically, I suck. But not when I have tomatoes and basil.

This delightful lunch-dinner (dunch? linner? DOES IT EVEN HAVE A FORMAL NAME?) took about fifteen minutes from start to finish. It was rich without being terribly guilt-inducing (this might be a total lie) and I got to use up another third of my little loaf of focaccia.

Basil parmesan pasta

1 big handful of fettucine - cooked al dente

2 cloves garlic, smashed and chopped
1/6 sweet onion, roughly chopped
1/2 T unsalted butter
3 T chicken or veggie stock

1/4 cup heavy cream
1 big handful of basil, rinsed and chopped
1 adorable little pattypan squash, rinsed and sliced thinly
8 tiny heriloom tomatoes, rinsed and sliced in half
1 T crumbled parmesan

coarse salt
white pepper

olive oil


Heat the oven to broil, drizzle a bit of olive oil into a baking pan and place the tomato and squash slices in, then flip so that both sides are covered with a bit of oil. Sprinkle with coarse salt and a bit of pepper, then place under the broiler.

In a large pan, melt the butter over medium-high heat, then add the garlic and onion. Cook for one minute and reduce heat to medium. Add the basil and let cook for about a minute, then add the stock and the heavy cream. It will begin to bubble and will then reduce a bit to make a thicker sauce. Start to get EVEN MORE HUNGRY.


By now, the tomatoes and squash should be cooked through and maybe have a tinge of color around the edges. I like mine to be a bit browned, but that is just preference. 2 minutes under the broiler would probably be enough for anyone that liked them a bit less done. After this, it's just a matter of tossing everything together and plating it.


I loved this pasta because the basil was prominent but not overwhelming. Little hints of the garlic and onion flavored the cream sauce but they didn't stand at the front of it. The tomatoes were sweet, so hitting them with some salt (which I didn't add anywhere else) seemed to bring that out even more. They had a lovely balance of sweetness and acidity and I am convinced that there MUST be a way for me to grow tiny baby tomatoes year round in my apartment so that I never have to be without this little taste of summer again.



AND!!! Just to show that even when I am lazy, I am still somewhat creative, I give you today's lunch:

 

Pizza? YES PIZZA. I am lazy today and my back is telling me that I am paying for all the walking around I did yesterday while I was hoarding vegetables. People always eat pizza when they're lazy. This is a fact and I defy you to prove me wrong. What? All those Pizza Hut charges on your bank statement aren't yours? Psh. It's okay. I don't judge. I just happen to make *my* pizza out of 2-day-old focaccia, mashed potatoes (THEY NEEDED TO BE USED OKAY), mozzarella, basil leaves and leftover broiled vegetables from yesterday's pasta. And it is DELICIOUS. And I get to remain a penny-pinching student while I eat this pizza.

Bonus Maya shot:

Who needs tomato sauce when you have garlic mashed potatoes hanging out in your fridge? Not us. Not any of us, for we are a forward-thinking, carbohydrate loving tribe. Aren't we? I think so.

Lentil and carrot soup with rosemary-sea salt focaccia

Yesterday I made the lunch of queens. After throwing a bunch of carrots and some bananas into my juicer for breakfast with Le Boyfriend, I had a ton of carrot pulp left over. Not being one to waste delicious things (that are also full of vitamins!!!), I scooped that mess out, plunked it in a bowl and sat and stared at it for a few minutes before the idea of soup came to me. Soup is delicious and to be honest, I'd eat soup for nearly every meal if allowed such indecencies. But what kind of soup?

 

I searched through my cupboards and fridge for inspiration and came across some pasta, potatoes, black rice, brown rice, jasmine rice...the list goes on. In the last cupboard above the fridge, I found the answer: a canister of green lentils I'd purchased in bulk a few weeks ago during a poor snap (like a cold snap, but with less money). I immediately broke out the butter and my trusty knife named Maya and set to work.

Lentils are pretty amazing. They are high in protein, iron and fiber and sweet mother of pearl, are they ever delicious. There are a few rules of thumb when cooking lentils; first, you need to dump them out and inspect them for cooties (beetles!), rocks and sticks. These things do happen, as evidenced by the tiny alien-looking bug I found and plucked out yesterday during the washing process. If any of the lentils are shrivelly or ugly, pitch those, too. They won't do your tongue any favors. Rinse and drain them, then begin the cooking process. 2 parts water/stock to one part lentils is the general rule, but you can adjust up or down depending on how thick or thin you'd like your end product to be. There is rumor that salt in the water can make legumes harder to cook. I've never tested this theory and I really don't want to be cooking the same pot of lentils for 43 hours, so skip the salt for now. Lastly, watch how long you cook these little guys. As I learned in the Great Red Lentil Mush Experience of 2005 (it was my first time cooking them. Give a girl a break!), lentils go from being just done to a pot of gloop very quickly.

Anyway. The soup. It turned out delicious. To be honest, I may have eaten leftovers for breakfast. I know I said that I could eat soup for any meal, but this soup was good enough for anyone to eat for breakfast. I promise.Also, I know it's summer and summer isn't really soup weather, but humor me and put this in your mouth ASAP.

Lentil and carrot soup:

1 cup green lentils - inspected and rinsed

1 cup carrot - diced, shredded or grated 

2 stalks celery - diced

2 cloves garlic - smashed and chopped

1/2 sweet onion (I like Walla Wallas) - roughly chopped

1.5 cups water

1 cup chicken or vegetable stock*

1/8 cup fresh chopped parsley or 1T dried parsely

1/3 t Beau Monde seasoning salt (most markets have this)

generous pinch of finely ground white pepper

*smoked chicken, turkey or pork bones (optional)

dash of heavy cream (optional) 

food processor/blender

*If you're using bones for flavor (which you certainly don't have to - this soup can absolutely be vegan or vegetarian), throw them in the oven at 350 degrees for about thirty minutes prior to starting the soup. This bring out more of the flavor in the bones and that will translate to your soup base. My former roommate has been smoking chicken at work and bringing me some now and then, so I toss the bones in the freezer for later use in dishes like this. After roasting the bones, put them in a pot, cover with water and simmer on medium-high heat for an hour. Remove the bones and discard, then use the simmering water as the base for the soup.

Place lentils, carrots, onion, celery, garlic and parsley in a high-walled pot. Add water and stock (if using no stock or water from simmering bones, increase the plain water to 2.5 cups), then bring to a boil. Turn the heat down to medium, add ground pepper and let simmer for 20 minutes. Add Beau Monde and simmer another 25 minutes or until lentils are soft. Remove 1/4 of the soup and puree in a food processor or blender with a few tablespoons heavy cream, then return this puree to the pot and stir into the rest of the soup before serving.

The bones I used gave it a nice smoky flavor reminiscent of split pea soup, but without any of the meatlings one might encounter in such a dish. I also really love the way the carrot pulp rounded everything out. It wasn't too sweet or too carroty; it just gave it a really lovely background. This should yield 4-6 bowls of the good stuff, leaving opportunity for lunch leftovers or freezing some for later.

Rosemary-sea salt focaccia:

Ok. This is where I admit that I am a total cheater. While I do make my own bread every day, this focaccia isn't anything super fancy. Not even close. I actually used the Master Recipe from Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day. Le Boyfriend's mom mentioned something about baking bread on her Facebook one day and I asked for her recipe so I could make some for Nick, since his parents live a ways away and I like to spoil him if possible. She assured me it was easy and delicious, then sent the recipe to me in a care package. I tried it out a few times and was hooked. Not only is the bread delicious, but I can make it whatever size I want to so it doesn't go to waste AND it takes all of 45 seconds of actual hands-on work. Thanks, Marcy!

For the focaccia, I set my oven to "warm" until it was preheated before turning it off. I tore off a chunk of dough from the bowl (about 1/2lb), oiled my hands with olive oil (extra virgin!), then spread it thinly in a lightly oiled rectangular cake pan. I tossed it in the oven to rise for an hour (it spread and flattened best this way with the extra 15 minutes of rising time), removed it from the oven and preheated again to 400 with a cupcake pan 1/2 filled with water on the bottom oven rack. As the oven heated, I chopped up two big sprigs of fresh rosemary and ground some Vietnamese white peppercorns with my mortar and pestle. Into the rosemary and pepper, I mixed some coarse sea salt (1/2 tsp or so), brushed the top of the dough with a bit of water, then sprinkled on the rosemary/pepper/salt mixture. The water seems to help the salt mixture stay on and become part of the bread, rather than just falling into a pile of crystals and twigs in your lap when you go to take a bite. After baking for 17 minutes, I had some delicious bread.Then I ate 2 pieces of it with a bowl of delicious soup. It was a darn good afternoon, Internet.

Now that all the soup-making and bread-cheating talk is over with, I have something to show you. Something lovely and sexy and altogether wonderful. Are you ready? Okay. Here it is. Behold my farmer's market haul from this morning:

Look at all that! You guys have no idea how excited I am about making use of all these vegetables this week. The tiny heirloom tomatoes are DELICIOUS, the pattypan squash is perfect and there were squash blossoms. I've never even seen squash blossoms before, though I know they are a favorite treat for Le Boyfriend. So maybe I bought 12 of them. Heck, I don't know how many you're supposed to eat, but we will find out now, won't we? Hmmm? I have my fingers tightly crossed that I don't find them disgusting and leave him with the responsibility of downing a dozen of those suckers, but if so? So be it. At least he will gorge himself on something he loves, rather than on something yucky like mushrooms or whathaveyou.

Did I neglect to mention that we don't do mushrooms? We don't. Ever. I'm sorry. I can't help it. But if you want to eat them, you should. Please. Eat an extra one for me. Because I like you and I want you to be happy.

Tomorrow: delicious results of my farmer's market shopping trip. I wish the internet was scratch and sniff for this.

An introduction of sorts

I suppose that in starting this I should give some sort of of overview, non?

I'm a 31 year-old Social & Human Services/Chemical Dependency/General Counseling student in Seattle. I've lived here my entire life and I adore it. This city is full of some of the brightest, wittiest, most talented people I have ever known. I come from a rather varied family, full of different sets of parents and 7 younger siblings. After a decade of living with the same roommate, I am all by my lonesome in a quaint little apartment on the west side of the city. My neighborhood is filled with fabulous restaurants, bars and bakeries and everything I need is within a short walk or bus ride.

It's currently week three here by myself and it's been an adjustment, to say the least. Cooking for the family and the roommate has conditioned me to feed a herd rather than just one and I am struggling with this, folks. Upon moving in here, I found that I lived just a few doors away from someone I went to high school with. Being the kind soul that he is, he has offered to eat any surplus of whatever I make so that I don't have to feed it to the compost bin. Such the gentleman! Overall, I expect this blog to focus on cooking all manner of delicious things in quantities suited for one person (maybe with some leftovers for lunch or repurposing), with a smattering of things related to my favorite cosmetics, DIY projects and some photos here and there.

In general, I have a massive love affair with coffee, pie crust, potatoes, gnocchi, pasta, broccoli, apples, cheddar cheese and basil. Thyme, rosemary and tomatoes round out my list of must-haves and the entire list together comprises the dinner components most likely to be found in my kitchen any given night of the week.

I should also introduce some key players that will likely come up repeatedly.

This would be me. And a crab. he's very handsome, yes?

 

The tiny black, hairy one is Penelope. She is a 3 year-old mutt of unknown lineage that was a going-away gift from a former boss I had. She is obstinate, hilarious, too smart for her own good and serves as my shadow at all times. She currently sports a head-to-tail mohawk that suits her feisty little personality perfectly.

The handsome one in the hat is my boyfriend Nickolas. We met in 2006 when we began working in the same office together and began dating in late 2007. He is brilliant, witty, handsome, lovely, hopelessly enamored with Marvel superheroes and the best bedwarmer and kitchen cohort a girl could ever ask for. I love him like crazy and I'm pretty darn lucky that he loves me madly, too. The photo below sums up our pairing nicely:

 

We're ridiculous. We know.

This handsome gentleman is Peanut. He came to me as a feral kitten when I was 23 by way of jumping on my shoulder, burrowing under my hair and refusing to leave. He is grouchy and opinionated and talks back whenever spoken to, but he suffers the dog humorously and though he pretends he despises her, I catch him giving her headbumps and curling up with her at night. Due to his right front foot having an extra toe, he is affectionately referred to as Little Big Foot.

That being out of the way, I am currently embroiled in making some rosemary-sea salt focaccia and carrot-lentil soup, which I will post photos and recipes for tomorrow if my luck holds out and they don't taste like shoes. Which they shouldn't. Because I am fabulous.