Food experiments: Attempting a heart attack

All week, I was doing a good job of eating healthy and exercising. This weekend, I took a flying leap off the bandwagon in some pretty darn unhealthy experiments.

For starters, Henry's friend sold us a deep fryer at a deep discount on the condition that he was allowed to come and eat some of the food we made with it. Saturday night's dinner was made up entirely of deep fried experiments, from trying to create the perfect onion ring to succeeding in making fair-quality cheese curds. Topping that off with a full yellow pepper may have added a few nutrients, but I'm pretty sure there wasn't much I could do to redeem the day.

Today was worse. Deep-frying experiments finished, we hauled the deep fryer to the superbowl party and threw in everything from cheese curds and onion rings to jalapeno poppers, mozzerella sticks and fried chicken. On top of that, my planned experiment for the week was Chicago-style deep dish pizza.

I found a great blog entry detailing how to make Chicago-style deep dish pizza, which I have to say I was pretty impressed with. I used about a pound and a half of mozzerella and colby jack cheese, a bunch of canadian bacon, a red pepper, a bunch of onion and tomato. I also made my own sauce and crust. The weak point of the pizza was by far the crust, which was a little soggy and didn't rise nearly as much as I think it should have. The homemade sauce and the toppings were pretty good, though, and with a little tweaking I'm hopful for the crust! (Picture will be following as soon as I can manage to get it off my phone!)

White Hot Chocolate: Mugg and Bean style

One of my longtime bucket list goals has been to learn how to make white hot chocolate well. It's a treat that I first ran across when I was studying abroad, and fell head over heels in love with. I spent 6 weeks in South Africa the summer after my sophomore year in college, and now, I still miss the food from my favorite restaurant there--the Mugg and Bean. It was a little chain of coffee shops that made the best pancakes and muffins, dessert (of which a serving was equivalent to 3 desserts in a US restaurant), and especially white hot chocolate. I blame the Mugg and Bean for a large portion of the 10 pounds I gained overseas, but ever since I've been hoping I could figure out how to duplicate some of the recipes that I've been missing. While I have yet to make the chocolate chip muffins the size of a softball or the amazing whole grain pancakes, this week I finally attempted a recipe for white hot chocolate that made me feel like I was back in Durban, skipping my morning homework in favor of breakfast at Musgrave Centre.

A fair warning--if you don't really like white chocolate or if you're completely dedicated to normal hot chocolate, this is not for you. If you like white chocolate, are willing to risk needing an extra hour or so at the gym and are ok with adventuring a little with your hot drinks, this is absolutely worth a try. It's decadent, warming enough to forget the snow for awhile and a pretty darn fun change from Swiss Miss.

White Hot Chocolate
Yum. I made this with 2% milk and heavy whipping cream, but I think I could have easily omitted most if not all of the whipping cream without being upset. There's just so much chocolate in this that it's still plenty decadent!

Ingredients

• 12 ounces good quality white chocolate, coarsely chopped. (I learned that you can tell good white chocolate if the main ingredient has something to do with cocoa or cocoa butter.)
• 6 cups whole milk (I reduced this down to 2% and it was plenty rich and creamy for me).
• 2 cups heavy cream (I used this, but next time I'll try reducing or omitting it).
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract. (I forgot this at first, but when I tasted it went back and added some. It's absolutely a necessary ingredient in my opinion.)
• Whipped cream, peppermint sticks or shaved chocolate for garnish (I skipped all these and was completely fine).

Directions

1. Place white chocolate in a medium miuxing bowl and set aside. This is what you'll be mixing the full batch of hot chocolate in, so make sure it's big enough.
2. Place milk and cream in a medium sauce pan and heat over medium heat, stirring frequently to prevent scalding, until warm and the sides are becoming bubbly. My recipe said this was about 4 minutes, but for me it took a little longer.
3. Immediately pour over chocolate in bowl. Stir until chocolate melts and combines with milk. Add the vanilla and stir until frothy. This takes a minute or two and is a good arm workout to make you feel a little better about the massive amount of really tasty chocolate and cream you're about to ingest!
4. Garnish as needed and stir immediately. This one is good to drink pretty quickly before it cools, as a bit of a skin develops after it sits for awhile. Some people may not mind that, but the boys declared it too weird to drink!

I was thrilled to learn how to make white hot chocolate well--that's half of a goal to cross of my bucket list. Now, if anyone has any advice on duplicating malva pudding or Mugg and Bean's kahlua freezers or chocolate chip muffins, I will be set (and about 50 pounds heavier)!

Snowboarding part 2

I have graduated to being able to snowboard down a hill (rather than have Henry pull me around in his flat yard) AND I didn't even hurt myself! Except for every muscle in my body, which definitely hurt for a few days.

I'm seeing the potential to enjoy snowboarding, especially if I can strengthen my legs and get snowpants that fit me so snow doesn't continually get inside my clothes. Right now, my proud moment was going about 15 feet without falling down--it did take me about an hour to make it down the hill that kids sled down in Lakeville 3 times. But, I've been working hard at the gym to strengthen my legs so that it isn't so difficult for me to turn, stop and stand back up once I've fallen, and I'm hoping that will start to make a difference. At my last outing, I fell down quite a few times on purpose after finding out that my legs were way too tired to turn me the way I wanted to go. I still consider that a success, as I substituted falling in the snow for running into trees (or Henry)!

I have the next week off for Christmas, so I'm hoping to get to try again--maybe I'll make it a quarter of the way down the hill this time!

Merry Christmas!

Winter sport experiments #2: Snowboarding

In spite of my rather embarrassing end to my last winter experiment, I decided to once again try a winter sport. Henry was pretty enthusiastic about this decision, because he loves to snowboard and most of his snowboarding friends moved away up north, so he promised to teach me (and let me borrow all his old equipment, so all I had to buy were boots!).

I can't really say that I successfully snowboarded today, because the biggest hill I attempted was about a foot high. I learned from my last experience that I need to start ridiculously small because I HATE the feeling of sliding along when I'm not controlling where I'm going. So, I spent what felt like about 6 hours but was probably only about 45 minutes (at most!) jumping, shuffling, sliding and being pushed around Henry's yard while strapped to a big piece of wood polished to be very, very slippery.

It reminded me again, several times, that something about the cold makes Minnesotans go a little nuts. The worst part is, we've only had snow for a couple weeks now--what am I going to decide to do when the cabin fever actually sets in?

At any rate, when I was just going very slowly on flat ground, it was a little less scary than I expected. I still fell down upwards of 15 times and learned that long jackets and high pants are VERY important (I've been inside for half an hour and am just starting to regain feeling in my butt) BUT by the end, Henry pushed me in a circle all the way around his yard before I fell down! This was a very big step from the 3 feet I made it the first time and leads me to believe that maybe by March, I'll be ready for the bunny hill (although Henry's plan is closer to early December....) On the plus side, if I keep this up, I will absolutely not need to take Steamboat Willie up one her offer to have a trainer friend come up with the strength training plan. About five minutes in, my calves started to feel vaguely like they were on fire...it slowly spread to the rest of my legs and I'm pretty sure that I ended up getting better exercise there than I have in anything since Tae Soo Do.

I'm sure there will be more updates...hopefully in them the number of falls will go down! I promised to try again on Wednesday night, so hopefully I'll be in good enough shape to head all over Minnesota to eat turkey!

Mmm...Thai food

I ate good Thai food for the first time this summer, and it was DELICIOUS. I've been hoping to go back to the restaurant since then but haven't had the time or people willing to go. So, I decided to try making my own last week, and it went pretty well! I can't say it was as good as what I had at the restaurant, but it was very good. (In fact, it was good enough that Henry helped me eat leftovers all week, when he normall throws a fit after one day!) This was definitely one of my more successful recipe experiments, which I'll be making again sometime when I'm ready for all the calories--it makes a lot of food that is by no means good for you, but definitely good! I found this recipe on the Internet one day, but I couldn't tell you where beyond the note that says that it was originally from Martha Stewart.

Thai Spicy Chicken Casserole
Yum. But this makes enough to feed a LOT of people or two people for a very long time.

Ingredients
1 T olive oil
2.5 pounds boneless, skinless chicken thighs (this was cut down from the original recipe and I would cut it down further next time and replace it with more veggies)
Pepper
Salt
1 can reduced fat coconut milk (I couldn't find this, so I used about 3/4 cup regular coconut milk)
1/2 cup water
1 1/2 cups chicken broth (I used a full can of this to make up for the less coconut milk)
3-4 T Thai red curry paste (It called for a lot less, but this amount was spicy and good!)
1 T cayenne pepper (I added this--you could easily reduce it)
1 cup white long grain rice (not instant!)
2 bell peppers, chopped (I used one green and one red, but you could easily add another pepper)
8 oz. green beans, cut into 1-inch lengths (could easily add more to replace some of the chicken)

Directions

1. Salt and pepper the chicken. In a 5-quart stock pot, heat the oil and brown the chicken. You may need to do this in two batches. Remove the chicken to a plate (It will cook more later, so don't worry if it's not done as long as it's browned).
2. Add the coconut milk, broth, curry paste and water to the stock pot. Bring to a boil. Add the rice. Add the chicken on top in a layer, including any juices that leaked out to the plate. Cover and reduce heat to medium-low. Cook without stirring for 15 minutes until rice is almost tender. (If you're using a different type of rice, you may need to cook it longer, but I'm not sure if the rice will turn out as fluffy.)
3. Add the veggies on top of the chicken, cover again and cook until tender-crisp, about 10 more minutes.

Carpets, bored dogs and new toys

We learned this weekend that although Boris refuses to play or be awake for more than 10 minutes when we're home (and shakes incessantly outside if it's below 60 degrees), he is extremely bored in our new house We discovered this when I moved the furniture to scrub our carpets and discovered that Boris had been claiming the house much more frequently than we previously thought. This was seconded when Steamboat Willie got woken up around 2 am earlier this week because Boris learned that he could make a new noise by grabbing the shower curtain and running back and forth incessantly.

We decided bored Boris was hazardous to our physical and mental health.

He is now confined to the kitchen as much as we can keep him in there while we're ast work (he's quite the escape artist) and we've been doing a lot of research on how to make our prima donna dog less bored when he throws a fit about being kept awake during normal human hours. Most of the ideas we found required much more determined, tough and energetic dogs. Ones who like to play in the snow, don't give up chasing their toys after about 3 minutes and aren't so busy sulking that they refuse to eat or drink until you come back. But, a few sounded promising and, after testing them out, I'm pleased to report that Boris is not quite as stupid as we previously thought. (Ok, fine...Steamboat Willie had faith that he would pass. But I was extremely surprised that he didn't respond as well to "Dishwasher" as he does to his name.)

Our first experiment was filling an empty water bottle with some treats and food and waiting for him to figure out how to get it out. Yesterday, all that resulted in was him smelling the bottle and then going to finally eat his food out of his dish. But today, after about 20 minutes of me alternately shaking the bottle of food at him and grabbing his paw to make him move it, it finally dawned on him. If he moved it around enough, the food came out. Then came Boris' true, very food-motivated personality, and he spent the next hour chasing, pawing, chewing and carrying the bottle around. After a little while, he even figured out that the food came out better if he threw the bottle down the stairs. Turns out sometimes, he's much smarter than I thought!

It took him most of the night, but he finally got the food out. It took him much less time to clean the peanut butter out of the Kong toy we got him. And best of all...after that, he fell right asleep and with any luck, he'll leave the shower curtain...and his tail...and the blankets all alone tonight!

"Yes, you Can Can!"

I know. It's cheesy. But "Yes, you Can Can" is the name of the class I took today to work on one of my new goals of learning to can. It was taught by Jill Jacoby at the Cooks of Crocus Hill, and while going into the class I wasn't sure if it was worth paying for (after all, there are so many books and websites on canning, plus so many people who already know!) I was thoroughly impressed. I learned more in this class than I have in probably any other cooking class I've taken. I'm sure it helped that I knew absolutely zero about canning going in, but now I have enough of a foundation to feel like there's a possibility I could successfully make something this fall. The instructor was really knowledgeable, excited about what she did and very clear. The only drawback I saw to the class was that it was only scheduled for 2 hours, and with the amount of material she covered we could have easily filled a normal 3 hours session.

It was a "methods" class, so it focused much more heavily on how to can than the recipes to use. I did get a few fantastic recipes, which I'll share when I hopefully successfully make my batches of plum jam and apple butter, but more than that I went from knowing zero about how to safely put food in jars that will last for a year or so to having a pretty good idea. Some of the most important things I learned were that you need very little equipment, really--a really tall pot, a few more heavy pots for boiling the ingredients and sterilizing the jars and lids, a ladle, the jars themselves and a good colander. I also came out with a list of cool gadgets that would be handy, but it's nice to know that I can start experimenting small and cheap. I also learned the the basics of canning are just timing (so the food doesn't boil to short and not kill all the bacteria, or too long and not jell correctly), enough acid to keep botulism from being a problem and a whole lot of sterilization by boiling water.

My last few weeks have been pretty disgustingly busy with little stuff that keeps popping up, but I'm really hoping that in the next 2-3 weeks I'll be able to set aside a weekend day and try to make a batch of plum brandy jam. Cross my fingers (and yours, if you want to get any!) and I'll make sure to take some pictures and write some specifics if that day happens.

Tosca and trampolines

This weekend I had a completely new experience; I went to my first opera. It's one of those things I've been meaning to do for quite awhile, mostly out of curiosity and partly because it just seems like something you should try once in your life. I ended up dragging my sister and brother-in-law with me to see Tosca, put on by the Minnesota Orchestra. (I figured that as music professors, bringing them was my best bet as to someone who would enjoy it!)

It was interesting. I'm glad I went to see an opera once, but based on this experience I would have to say that I definiely prefer musicals. For starters, while I appreciated the screen with some English translations to help me understand what was going on, I found it ended up being similar to watching TV with the closed captioning. I was so busy reading the words that I didn't notice nearly as much of the music or acting. Also, it drove me a little bit nuts when they would continue singing with no captions occasionally! I should have expected it to be depressing, I suppose, but I was still surprised by the complete pessimism of the story!

One of my favorite moments, however, had nothing to do with this particular show. A man sitting next to my sister shared an article he had printed off with her, about mishaps that have happened during other stagings of the opera. Without ruining too much (hopefully), there is a scene in the play when a main character is supposed to jump off a parapet to her death. In the past, apparently there have been a lot of accidents resulting in broken bones, but the article focused more on the funny mishaps. In one staging, they placed a trampoline to break this character's fall, so the dramatic suicide plunge was followed by several re-appearances over the wall. In another, soldier supposedly pursuing this character had simply been told to "exit with the principals" and so all threw themselves off the wall immediately afterwards. While the performance I went to was extremely well done (the music was beautifully done and the staging, while basic, was nice) there was a little bit of me that regretted our performance not going just a little bit wrong, in a similarly funny (and non-traumatic!) way.

Some food experiments: Grilling and sweet potato burritos

Since I found the list of 101 ideas for the grill, I've been experimenting with different grilled foods. My results: grilled asparagus, great, but don't overcook it. Grilled watermelon, not great. But my parents' dog Amos really, really liked that one--probably something about the bratwurst flavor that was infused in the watermelon after grilling. In fact, Amos liked it so much that he scarfed down all his food for the first time since I got here, with minimal coaxing! Grilled avacado is ok, but it didn't add a lot to the normal avacado flavor. Grilled peppers, very good. All in all, my favorite grill experiment so far is definitely the asparagus. I just tossed it in olive oil with sea salt (since my parents don't have kosher salt and I was house-sitting during this particular experiment) and a little bit of pepper, and grilled it for probably less than 5 minutes. The coals were super hot from the chimney starter (I'm not ready for gas or the green egg grill yet...they seem much more likely to blow up in my face when I don't know which buttons to hit) so the stalks directly over the coals were already burnt by that point.

My other experiment for the week was sweet potato burritos. I was very skeptical about these, even though they are labeled "addictive." I'm very picky about how I like sweet potatoes, and I wasn't entirely sure about the idea of a burrito essentially completely filled with smooshy food. I decided to take my chances since all the reviews were so positive, and I'm glad I did. I made all the fillings from scratch (no canned sweet potatoes or refried beans) since I heard that made a difference, and they were delicious. My cautions--they are best when you make sure the beans and the sweet potatoes are mixed well inside the tortilla, to make sure you're not getting a full bite of sweet potatoes and another full bite of beans. Make sure you have enough cheese, as the sharpness balances out the rest of the flavors. And, if you're using the smaller tortillas, make a few of these! They're good enough to eat several of and not as filling as they look. These are vegetarian, but I think you could easily add shredded pork or chicken to them if you wanted.

Lots of sumi-e

I was too lazy all of last week to post my pictures from my sumi-e class, so I have quite a lot of photos. I have to say that last week, I was not particularly interested in continuing with sumi-e. We drew a lot of baby chicks and grapes, which is a nice idea until you try to do that for two whole hours when you normally can't concentrate for more than 10 minutes. On anything. So, I ended up with a progression like this:

Instead of what I was supposed to paint, which looked more like this:

This week, I enjoyed myself a lot more. For starters, we were painting landscapes, which I find more interesting than chickens. More importantly, landscapes seemed to be more adaptable than chickens. When I got bored with the one she had demonstrated, I started to make some up that used the same strokes.

On top of there being more variety, I feel like I had a little more skill at drawing landscapes, which is a nice motivator! So, class ended with me buying some more xuan paper and some colors to try. Hopefully, in spite of the fact that the ink smells like extra strength bug spray, that means I'll keep going at least sometimes with this!

Getting things into gear

I didn't intend a pun with my title but it almost works out. This weekend, with the little bit of extra time, I managed to finally get working on some of my goals--like actually learning how to work on my car! After years of bribing and paying people to work on my car, I decided it was time to learn how to do some of the basics myself. (This may have been motivated in part by the dealership informing me that it was $400 to do maintenance that basically was an oil change and two air filter changes.) And, with only a few people helping, supervising and laughing at me, I actually changed my own oil (mostly), filled all the fluids I was low on, checked my tire pressure, and changed one of the two air filters. (I would have changed both, but one of Henry's well-meaning friends came over and started pitching in to help fix things before he figured out this was supposed to be teaching time!) Little and easy as all those fixes were, I was still pretty proud of myself when I got done.

Adding to that, I weeded my garden and figured out that everything except the asparagus and the strawberries is growing pretty darn well! The asparagus never came up and the rabbits ate my strawberry plants for a snack before I got my fence up, but I can replant both of those next year. In the meantime, I'll have some good vegetables in a month or two, and maybe even a small raspberry crop in the fall.

To top it off, I successfully made some of my recipes from my cooking class. Apparently with a little extra sleep, motivation and relaxation, I gained at least a little bit of skill. Now, I just hope that will continue for the future! I was getting tired of screwing up all my new recipes.

This seems like a good start heading into June, when I'll be starting a couple new art classes, continuing my gardening and hopefully enjoying every bit of the summer!

Gardening...a beginning!

I hardly went inside yesterday. It was beautiful outside and I got my first Minnesota sunburn of the season. It was wonderful.

Last year, Henry and I dug a garden outside his house for me to plant. I had been whining for awhile about how I wanted one and wished I could cultivate the deck in my apartment, and I think he finally got sick of hearing it! Either way, this spring I uncovered a huge patch of black dirt waiting for me.

After many, many phone calls to my mom trying to figure out what exactly I should be doing, I planted my first seeds yesterday. I had no idea what I should be planting this early (really, I wouldn't have thought I should be planting anything at the beginning of April, if it was up to me!), but I figured out that there was actually quite a lot of things I should be planting. Yesterday, I took care of my snap peas, carrots, onions and potatoes.

Tomorrow, I'm planning on adding broccoli and cauliflower, and in another week or so I'll plant my squash in a pot to get it started. I don't think I'll actually be able to say I've achieved my goal of planting a garden for another month of so (when it's warm enough to put in the peppers, tomatoes and strawberries) but I have a good start!

Minnesota Melting Pot Class

Monday was my ethnic Minnesota foods class with Kevin Ryan, and it was once again a great class. We learned to make a Hmong stew, a Somalian chicken stew, juicy lucys, Swedish meatballs and a Norwegian apple cake. The class was a lot of fun, the food was incredible, and I felt like I learned a lot so--yesterday I tried to make the jucy lucys. They seemed to be the easiest recipe in the class and whenever I wait for a long time to make the recipes I've learned in a class, I always seem to forget some key steps.

At least, so I thought. After the jucy lucys, I think it might just be that I lack some important skills! I made them inside (which may have been my first mistake) because it was a little too windy for the grill. And they ended up charred on the outside (rather than seared a nice brown) and missing a lot of pieces of hamburger which are still stuck fast to the bottom of my pan. What I learned from this is that it probably is important to use the high-fat hamburger that he asked for, rather than the much leaner ground buffalo that I had in the freezer! So, in another week or so I'll try it again and see if I can improve with the correct hamburger and either a grill or a much cooler pan.

Juicy Lucys
Ideally, this is supposed to be over a grill. Inside, he said to use a very hot pan to sear the meat on the outside. He also said the hot pan is more likely to cook the meat pretty quickly so the cheese doesn't bleed out.

Ingredients
4 slices good quality white sandwich bread
1/2 cup whole milk
1.5 teaspoons garlic powder
1 teaspoon black pepper
1 teaspoon salt
3 pounds 85% ground beef
About 12 1" squares cheese, 1/4-1/2 inch thick
8 hamburger buns

Directions

1. Rip the sandwich bread into small pieces and mash with milk and spices in a small bowl until it makes a paste.
2. Mix in hamburger until well mixed. Try not to mash the hamburger too much, or it may become stiff.
3. Form hamburger patties around about 3 squares of cheese, making sure that the patty is evenly distributed on around the cheese and an even thickness.
4. Cook over the grill or in a hot pan with no oil until done. Try not to burn to a crisp like I did!

Red Pepper Bagel Sandwiches...finally!

After a week of alternately being busy and fighting with an unpleasant case of food poisoning, I'm finally ready to write about my last vegetarian experiment. And since I made it on Monday, it's about time! I'm really torn between French and Mexican food for this month's experiment. I had every intention of working with French food, so I can really use the cookbook I got from my sister for Chistmas and do some good experimenting. I've heard that this guy wrote some of the best cookbooks for learning French food, which definitely interests me. Also, I've never really eaten much French food, and I'd like to have a general idea of what's going on when I head over to France this fall. But, a lot of the food that really appeals to me in the book is a little beyond my level of need at the moment...as much as I would like to cook a 3 pound chicken every week, I really don't need that much food! And I LOVE Mexican food an unnatural amount. So, I'll do some pondering and hopefully come up with an idea before I go grocery shopping!

I made roasted red pepper bagel sandwiches for my experiment this week, and they were surprisingly both a lot better and a lot more filling than I expected. I made them from a recipe from Cooking Light magazine and followed it pretty close, but did make a few changes. First, I served it on a normal sized bagel--I was looking for dinner, not appetizers! The first time I made them, I did include the garlic cloves. When I made them again for lunches at work, I left that part out so I wouldn't kill everyone around me with the garlic smell! My only objection to these is using the canned roasted red peppers--they're convenient, which is wonderful, but I had a hard time getting over how slimy they looked and felt pulling them out of the jar. They tasted great, but each time I took I bite I was expecting a mouth full of slime.

Roasted Red Pepper Bagel Sandwiches
My version. These are great, quick and surprisingly filling.

Ingredients

• Plain bagels
• Fat free cream cheese
• 1 jar roasted red peppers (or roast your own to get around the slimy look!)
• 1 clove garlic, minced (optional--when I did this, I used a whole clove on one sandwich and it was good and spicy!)
• Black pepper

Directions

1. Toast the bagel.
2. Meanwhile, combine enough cream cheese for 1 bagel (about 2 big spoonfulls), minced garlic and black pepper and whip them together until well mixed.
3. Coat both sides of the bagel with the cream cheese mix.
4. Add the red pepper.

It's really that fast and simple, and tastes a lot better than I expected with the simple ingredients. Yum.

Happy Easter to everyone tomorrow! Enjoy your jellybeans and deviled eggs :)

Food Experiments: Tomato Pesto Pasta

I always think that I like pesto until I actually eat it. It sounds and looks good, but when I finally eat it, it's just too oily for something so green and healthy looking! Today, I decided to try it again with a new recipe, hoping that the tomatoes would make it a little better. It worked to a point--I liked the taste of the pesto better, but I would still prefer to make it next time with less oil. I got the recipe from Cooking Light and adapted it to what I had in my kitchen.

Tomato Pesto Pasta with Feta Cheese

Ingredients

• 1/4 box fettucine
• 3/4 cup sun-dried tomatoes in oil, drained (next time, I would try using the dried sun-dried tomatoes with a tablespoon or so  of olive oil)
• 1/4 cup fresh basil leaves
• small handful chopped walnuts
• 3/4 cup crumbled feta cheese, divided
• 3 cloves fresh garlic, minced
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper

Directions

1. Cook pasta according to package directions.
2. While pasta is cooking, combine tomatoes, basil, walnuts, 1/4 cup feta, garlic, salt and black pepper in a food processor. Process until finely chopped.
3. When pasta is finished cooking, drain and reserve 1 cup of water. Mix reserved water with the tomato mixture and whisk together. Add pasta and mix until coated.
4. Top with remaining 1/2 cup of feta.

Food Experiments: Slow Cooker Risotto

I don't think I've ever had risotto before, so I can't really judge if the recipe I made just turned out badly or if I just don't like risotto. Either way, I now have a big container of weird cheesy rice mush in my fridge that I've been trying to convince myself I should eat for about three days now. I hate wasting perfectly good food, and this really isn't that bad, but...it just reminds me of overcooked cheesy oatmeal. And when I have other, perfectly appetizing food around (even if it is Kraft mac and cheese or something that will take me another hour to cook), that somehow always wins over cheesy oatmeal.

I can't really pass judgement on the recipe itself for several reasons. One, I'm really not sure if I like risotto. There's a good chance that this tastes like it's supposed to and I just made an experiment that wasn't good for me. Two, I started this in a hurry after oversleeping one morning and didn't see that it was only supposed to cook for 2 hours, not 4, so it really WAS overcooked. Outside of my carelessness, though, this was a really easy recipe that was very quick to throw together in the morning. If I were to try it again, I'd make sure I was home so it didn't sit on the warm setting all day and possibly try a different type of cheese (I think mozzerella or gruyere or any other white cheese would probably work equally well and I might like the taste better). And I probably wouldn't make it for the night after a work party that was largely based around a food competition, because this just can't stack up to potato skins, homemade bread and honey butter, or mint brownies.

After this week, I'm starting to realize a little more that being a vegetarian must be hard. I'm having a really hard time finding recipes that aren't either really difficult, full of expensive ingredients, or full of eggplant and/or cabbage (yech). Hopefully next week will be a little easier!

Food Experiments: Moroccan Lentil Stew and Kickboxing

When I first joined the gym by my house, I had been out of college (and my college-era martial arts training) for about a year. One of my goals was to get back into something close to the great shape I had been in for martial arts, and I decided that I wanted to go to a few kickboxing classes. I miss martial arts still, but I will probably never be willing to sell my soul to them to become a black belt. To remedy this, within my first month, I went to my first kickboxing class.

It was pretty darn horrible. I thought I was going to throw up for most of the class, and I was surrounded by skinny little high school students who were doing everything I couldn't, six inches higher, and laughing and cheering the whole time. That was about two years ago, and today (at Steamboat Willie's instigation) was the first time since that I have decided to go to a kickboxing class. This was the class I originally had wanted to go to, because it adds weighted gloves and a heavy bar to the exercises to add some resistance.

I was absolutely terrified.


But, I am pleased to announce that the last two years of working out must have paid off, because...I made it all the way to the burpies at the end of the class before I thought I was going to pass out! And it was fun, in a horribly painful sort of way. But then again, I suppose that is kind of the point of anything based on martial arts. At the very least, it gave me a taste of what I had been missing, and it could definitely have the potential to get me back into good shape!

After about a half an hour of walking and stretching until I no longer looked like a cherry tomato, I was happy to come home to my next vegetarian experiment...mostly because it was in my slow cooker and ready to eat. This Moroccan Lentil Stew is my first experience with the lentil, and I can't say it's a bad one. The stew itself is delicious, and the lentils don't seem to have a lot of taste to me. AND for my vegetarian or mostly-vegetarian friends who have a hard time getting in enough protein--the beans and apparently the lentils add quite a lot of protein to this stew. As does the cheese that I smothered it in when serving it!

Just in case, I'll copy the recipe for this below, but I would strongly recommend visiting Stephanie's blog or buying her book if you have any interest in cooking--both are fantastic!



Moroccan Lentil Stew
I made this in a 5.5 qt crockpot...the programmable kind that I love because I can be gone all day and it never burns! It took me aboput 20 minutes to chop everything up and add it in the morning. And you can find dried lentils right by the dried beans in the grocery store, for those of you who have never used them before! Also, keep in mind that this makes a LOT of stew, but she says that it freezes well.

Ingredients

• 1 cup dried lentils
• 1 can garbanzo beans, drained and rinsed
• 1 can pinto beans, drained and rinsed
• 1 onion, chopped
• 2 garlic cloves, smashed and chopped
• 1/2 cup chopped celery
• 1/2 cup chopped carrots
• 28 oz can of diced tomatoes (and juice)
• 4 cups vegetable broth
• 1 1/2 tsp garam masala
• 1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
• 1/2 tsp cumin
• 1/4 tsp nutmeg
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon
• 1 inch ginger, peeled and grated

Directions

1. Chop the veggies and add them to the bottom of the crockpot.
2. Drain and rinse the beans, and add them with the lentils.
3. Grate the ginger and add it with the dried spices.
4. Stir in the vegetable broth and tomatoes.
5. Cover and cook on low for 10 hours.

Vegetarian Experiments month

After a month of dessert, I decided it was time for something a little healthier. As much fun as it was for me to have two or three desserts in the fridge at all times, I can't say it helped my pants fit any better!

So I'm declaring this month a vegetarian challenge month. I have a few inspirations for this--first of all, it would be nice to have some recipes I could make when my sister comes home that I know are good. Second, I continually hear that cooking vegetarian once or twice a week is a great way to save money. And finally, I recently found this website with a ton of recipes that sound really, really good!

This week, I made a broccoli brown rice bake (I'll also copy the recipe below, although I'd recommend visiting the website to get some more ideas!). It was good, especially considering how healthy it was, but I think next time I'm going to try adding in a cream of mushroom soup (or something else to add some liquid) and some more smaller vegetables. The casserole was great the first day, but dried out pretty badly on reheating. Also, since the broccoli usually comes in larger chunks, it didn't mix in very evenly with the rice. I think it might be better if I added in some green peas, chopped okra or carrots, or something of a similar smaller size. It is still definitely worth trying, though--for such a simple dish, it was surprisingly good.

Broccoli Brown Rice Bake
I made this in a 9x13 pan, and about a sixth of the pan is a serving.

Ingredients

• 2 cups long-grain brown rice
• 5 cups water
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 cup celery, finely chopped
• 1 cup onions, finely chopped
• 4 cups broccoli, florets and peeled stems
• 4 ounces (half a brick) low fat cream cheese (I added about 2 extra ounces for more moisture)
• freshly ground pepper and salt, to taste
• 1 teaspoon dried basil

Directions

1. Cook the rice according to package directions (in a pot or rice cooker) until tender. Transfer to a large bowl and set aside.
2. Preheat the oven to 350 and lightly grease a large, shallow casserole dish.
3. In a large skillet over medium-high heat, heat the olive oil. Add the celery and onion and sauté for about 7 minutes, or until onions are translucent.
4. Add the broccoli, stir to combine and sauté for another 3 minutes or until broccoli is not quite tender.
5. Add the cheese to the skillet, breaking it up and stirring it to make a slightly thick, creamy gravy that coats the vegetables. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
6. Scrape the vegetable cheese mixture into the bowl with the rice and toss to mix well. Season the casserole with the basil. 
7. Transfer the mixture to an oiled casserole dish, cover with foil and bake for 30-35 minutes or until heated through. Serve hot.

Food experiments: Better than Sex Cake

I've been slacking lately on writing, and so I have a lot to catch up on...like this. I've heard about better than sex cake for years, but until a few weeks ago I'd never tasted it. A coworker asked for this for his birthday cake from Steamboat Willie, which she made on the day before Valentine's Day.

Yum. I had one piece at work, and promptly changed my plans for Valentine's Day dinner to include it. I hear there's a lot of different recipes for this out there, but this is the one that I definitely enjoyed!I would make this cake at least 6 hours or so before you need it, and the night before would be even better. The longer it sits for the toppings to soak in, the better it gets. Really--I had this cake leftover for over a week, and it was far better on the last day.

Better than Sex Cake
This reminds me of one of my favorite cakes that my mom used to make, but easier.

Ingredients
1 package devils food cake mix
Eggs and oil as required by your mix (usually 1/3 cup oil and 3 eggs)
1 can condensed milk
1 cup butterscotch topping
1 cup hot fudge topping
1 container Cool Whip
a few handfuls of toffee, chopped or crumbled (Heath bars work, but I used leftover toffee from my Mom's Christmas candy)

Directions

1. Bake the cake according to the package instructions.
2. Let cool for about 10-15 minutes.
3. Use a fork to poke holes all over the top of the cake--not big or deep, but just to perforate it enough for liquids to soak in.
4. Dump the can of condensed milk over the cake, spreading it as evenly as you can. Let it soak in for around half an hour or until it's mostly absorbed. It may not absorb well right away, but you can still put the other toppings on.
5. Dump on the cup of butterscotch, again spreading it as evenly as possible and letting it sit for awhile. Repeat the process with the hot fudge.
6. Let the cake sit until you are ready to serve. If the cake will be sitting out overnight, refrigerate it.
7. Just before serving, top with the Cool Whip and the toffee crumbles.

Food experiments: Mad Men (cont.), green beans and mashed potatoes

While green beans and mashed potatoes certainly don't fit with my dessert experiments theme for the month, I learned some great information in my Mad Men class that I'd like to share. In particular, some tips for great mashed potatoes and an incredibly easy recipe for the best green beans I've ever eaten (and thankfully, it has nothing to do with green bean casserole!). I really do want to give credit where it's due, and thank Kevin Ryan for a great class and a lot of knowledge.

I always thought that mashed potatoes were a pretty simple, self explanatory food. Cook potatoes, smash them up and add various unhealthy things for flavor. When you add science (as I suppose you can't help doing if you have a Ph.D. in food science), it becomes a lot more complicated and a lot tastier. The tips I learned:

• Potatoes are usually overcooked (at least mine are!); they are done if you can stick a knife in the potato, lift it up and it slowly slides off. If you can't lift it up well, it's definitely overcooked.
• When the potatoes are done boiling, put them back in the dry pan over heat for a short time to dry out the water. This will give you a richer flavor, since it won't be watered down by the residual moisture.
• Never mash potatoes in a food processor--it breaks down the starches and turns them into the texture of wallpaper paste. (I've never done this, but I'm sure at some point in my life I would have been tempted. Disaster averted.)
• Add all your liquids and most of your seasonings to the potatoes BEFORE you add the butter. The butter coats the potatoes so thoroughly that they won't be able to absorb the rest of the ingredients. You can still add ingredients after the butter if you don't want them absorbed by the potatoes--sort of the equivalent of salting food that's already finished as opposed to salting food and then cooking it. Adding the seasonings after the butter is going to add it on top of a finished product.

The green beans recipe is remarkably simple--I don't know why I haven't tried this or how it turned out so good, but it did. This can also be used on most other vegetables.

Roasted Green Beans
These are seriously amazing. This recipe serves about 8.

Ingredients
2 lbs green beans, ends trimmed off
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon sugar (optional)--this speeds up the roasting process, but you won't taste it. It's optional here, but he highly recommended using it if you make broccoli in this way.

Directions

1. Adjust the oven rack to the middle position and preheat the oven to 450.
2. Line a rimmed baking sheet with aluminum foil (for easy cleanup) and spread the beans on the baking sheet.
3. Drizzle with oil, and toss them to coat. Sprinkle with 1/2 teaspoon of salt and sugar if used, and toss to coat.
4. Spread the beans evenly on the baking sheet. Give them some room and don't let them touch, or the beans will steam rather than roast.
5. Put in the oven and roast 10 minutes.
6. Pull the baking sheet from the oven and use tongs to redistribute the beans. Put them back in the oven and continue roasting until the beans are browning in spots and have started to shrivel, 10 to 12 minutes longer.
7. Add any additional salt and pepper as desired, and serve.