recipes for change

I have recently become unattached, i.e. single. It’s for the best, and I feel pretty good about it as a whole, but there were still a few difficult days.

Behold, my patened coping process

Okay this part is important: first wallow for a few days. watch lots of movies.

THEN one morning you will wake up and feel less bad. At that point decide to do some metaphorical ball-grabbing, so sit up and:

• Go on a cleaning spree. Do all that laundry, wash the dishes, mop the floors!
• Meet up with your girlfriends! MOST IMPORTANT and you know, branch out too. meet new people.
• Make upbeat playlist while riding the metro (and/or cry a little)
• Go shopping – by ridiculous, fun things
• Then, make brownies.

When I first started baking (I mean, seriously baking, not just making weird mint cupcakes when I was ten) the first thing I made was Betty Crocker’s Chocolate chip cookies. Then I flipped a little further in the book to her brownies.

The first ones I made were utterly terrible. They didn’t even have chocolate in them, just cocoa powder. However Betty included a second recipe a few pages later, and it is this recipe that I regularly turn to. None of the other recipes I try have come close to this one, but fair warning – it’s not for the faint of heart (or waist). But you know – sometimes you just need to suck it up and eat some brownies.

Unfortunately, I am not able to bake these from scratch… and normally I’m not a big fan of box mixes but as far as they go, Betty Crocker’s Deluxe brownies are pretty dang tasty.

I was going to give you my recipe for Much Better Brownies but I realized that like a fool, I left my recipe notebook at home. But I’ll post it another time. I know the method, but I’m a little shakey on the quantities and I don’t want to give anyone a faulty recipe.

post-script: just because you feel okay for a day doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be on your guard for sad feelings. They can still sneak up on you!

Yeah they did.

consolation broccoli

I’m sorry, I know you hate broccoli. I hated it too once.

but it’s been a long-ass week and its all that I had in the fridge.

and sometimes you just have to eat your broccoli.

meh

It didn’t turn out all that well. half of it was undercooked and I realized that I never bought salt after moving here (I mean, I put feta and olives in almost everything so I usually have my bases covered)

but with about five minutes in boiling water and lots of lemon juice and olive oil… you end up with something not that bad

blerk!

don’t worry, it will get better soon. And then I’ll cook you alll the broccoli your heart desires (that is, none and I’ll make those coconut fudge things instead)

BACK FROM THE DEAD

finals are always killer, but especially this time around. They also are pretty bad for your healthy food intake. I always spend way more on take out during finals than any other time of the year.

In any case, I’ve finally settled in to my summer internship and I am semi-ready to get back on the culinary horse (so to speak).

sort of.

The Laziest Pasta

• pasta of your choice
• 1/2 onion
• 1tbs yogurt (i like greek!)
• drizzle of olive oil
• lemon juice
• extras: feta, pimento roja, whatever

this can be made with tons of variations, but basically it goes like this –

boil the pasta per the directions on the box. cook the onions over a low heat until they are soft and tasty. while the pasta is hot, put everything into a bowl. Mix it up

Yum!

Okay so this isn’t haute cuisine, but it’s easy and it only takes 20 minutes or so.

And there are tons of variations:

add butter instead of olive oil. use garlic instead of onions. add lots of vegetables. skip the yogurt, throw in whatever you have in the fridge

guys this dish is turned out non-photogenic so here is a picture of my cat.

I have a backlog of posts that I’ll try to get to in the next week or so – if anyone is even reading

study break

in the middle of what feels like the third week of finals

today: coffee smoothie – made a standard smoothie (strawberries, banananas, spinach, apple juice, no milk this time because I’m feeling sick) and added coffee.

so much stress makes it hard to eat

 

it wasn’t the best but at least it had coffee in it!

warm me up beans

some days you just feel so cold inside, no matter how warm it is. (80F for the record). even though most of my friends at other schools have finished their finals, we still have two weeks to go, and that means it is CRUNCH TIME which is not so good for general happiness.

despite being warm, the weather doesn’t help

It was a rough day. But instead of coming home and collapsing for the evening, I only collapsed for about 20 minutes. Then I pulled myself out of bed, grabbed a can of black beans and went to the kitchen.

45 minutes later, I present to you:

The Best Beans I Have Made Yet (though that’s not saying much.)

They’re subtle but still flavorful and not too spicy. (I am really proud of the spices though – I’ve been shy with them recently, but this turned out really well!)

Cooking them for about 20-30 minutes leaves the beans softer but still holding their shape and texture, avoiding some of the overcooked sad that has left my pan. I apologize for the lack of measurements – this was kind of spur of the moment.

non-photogenic kitchen!

Ingredients:

• 1 and 1/2 cans black beans
• 1/4 large yellow onion
• olive oil
• garlic powder (or actual garlic)
• Smoked paprika (less spicy than what I normally use)
• cumin, my fav!
• oregano

Rinse yer beans – I don’t like the goopy stuff that comes with them straight from the can. I have a colander (actually we have three. thanks roommates!) but you can rinse them in a bowl and drain most of the water. Put the beans in a pot with some water. I used ~1/2 cup, but you could stand to use a little less. In any case, the beans shouldn’t be covered in water. You can always pour some out at the end though.

Add a “drizzle” of olive oil (this probably translates to about 1/2-1 teaspoon). Then libreally add garlic powder, paprika, cumin and oregano. I put in the most cumin and paprika and the least garlic powder since it’s pretty potent. They probably all came in around the 1/4-1/2 teaspoon range. The nice thing about these beans is that you can always add another can if it ends up too cumin-y or something. Also! add a dash of salt. Don’t be like me and forget.

Then let those lil fellas cook on medium heat for ABOUT 30 minutes, stirring occasionally.

now then, chop your onion up. Add a little olive oil to the pan (enough to coat the bottom – for this reason, I recommend using a small pan). Put the onions in and let the whole thing sit over low-medium heat for about 30 minutes, stirring occasionally to keep them from burning. They should get soft and a little sweeter.

Taste it periodically, and eat it when the texture is good. We had it with mac n’ cheese because I didn’t have a burner for rice.

Verdict from Dmitry: “I did not expect to have such a delicious dinner tonight!”

wine pairing: just kidding, but it is nice to eat with guava juice

I gotta say, I feel much more cheerful now.

and it’s not even altered!

(some of the credit should go to David Bowie though)

afternoon snack

there are a lot of downsides to living where I do, but woah the mangos are good.

We used to eat mangos with chili powder and lime when we lived in Mexico (Actually I refused to eat them with chili because I was a wimpy child). Delicious, easy and cheap if you know where to look.

a very late anniversary present

Food makes up for a lot you guys (photo courtesy of Elena)

What is the perfect present to give on a budget?

Answer: food!

What are the things Dmitry likes to eat?

• Tea
• Anything with coconut
• Tea
• things to eat with tea
• steak
• berries

Solution: coconut cookies. If you have ever been to a Passover seder you are probably familiar with coconut macaroons, and they seemed like the perfect thing.

this kind, not the French kind

Our anniversary is in early January. It’s May.

These are very belated cookies.

I kept getting busy and putting them off – I know, not very nice. In my defense we did exchange other gifts, so it wasn’t like I forgot completely. But still.

See, we went to the aquarium

sting rays are so romantic

I finally got my act together after seeing smitten kitchen’s recipe for raspberry macaroons. It turns out my aunt had made them for seder and they received rave reviews. How could I resist? More importantly, how could he resist?

So this weekend I got to work.

Picture courtesy of my talented roommate

These cookies are very good – chewy and tangy, with a nice texture. The recipe is pretty easy and the ingredients are cheap aside from the raspberries. If you feel like an indulgence, this would be a good choice.

Raspberry Coconut Macaroons

ingredients

• 1 package of sweetened flaked coconut (2 cups)
• 6 0z raspberries, fresh if at all possible
• 3 egg whites
• 1/3 – 1/2 cup white sugar

For this you need a blender or a food processor. I suppose you could do it by hand but it would probably be more effort than it was worth unless you really like macaroons.

Preheat the oven to 325°

Put the coconut in the blender. Pulse it so that it’s mostly broken up – you will probably have to blend it a few times, stirring it around in between. Add the sugar and the egg whites, blend until combined. You can add sugar to taste – the recipe called for 2/3 cup and I found them to be overly sweet.

Add the raspberries. Blend until the raspberries are mostly broken up. If you want you can take about half of the coconut mixture out beforehand and only add the fruit to half of the mixture – if you do this you can make pretty marbled cookies, but I didn’t bother.

Get a cookie tray and cover it with parchment paper*

*parchment paper is good for baking cookies and bread. If you don’t have it you can lightly grease the pan, but if you’re baking a lot it’s nice to have around.

Using a spoon, scoop the mixture onto the tray, forming them into little “haystacks” of about 1 inch.

pop them in the oven for 18-25 minutes. and then boom!

It’s cheesy but it went over well

deliciousness!

verdict: YUM
They may have been late, but Dmitry didn’t seem to mind.

two days later and they were all. gone.

happy anniversary!

(the other photos look a wee bit unappatizing, so use your imagination! or just go to smitten kitchen’s website)

oh no!

A five hour bus trip to buy groceries is consuming all of my free time this weekend (I don’t have much of it) so I probably won’t have time to cook anything substantial this week! But I’ll try to keep you updated anyway — I am really excited about a certain couscous recipe

just like this cat

thank you for reading !

key lime cupcakes

Every time one of our friends has a birthday, Corey goes to great lengths to throw a party. She plans it, reminds everyone to go (no small feat), collects money for dinner (pizza or going out to one of those cheap restaurants we frequent), finds weird little gifts, and more often than not, baking the cake. This last year she & dmitry threw me a very sweet surprise party.

the cakes of birthdays past

Of course, the rest of us help her (I am often involved in the cake baking) but she is really the driving force behind these parties – and there are quite a few of them. Her birthday happens to be in June, so we aren’t at school, and can’t celebrate it.

So a few weeks ago, a friend of ours decided we should throw her a surprise party. (she was very surprised)

Matt and I made the cake.

Well, cupcakes. Coco likes to read Joy the Baker  (link here) and had recently commented on how good the cupcakes looked. Matt and I agreed that these spring cupcakes would be perfect.

A week later, I dragged myself awake at 10:30 am on Sunday morning about five hours after I had gone to bed and went to the kitchen to bake these suckers. (to be honest, I probably wouldn’t have made it if Matt hadn’t called me around then.) We had an hour and a half to bake the cupcakes before we were supposed to meet everyone for lunch.

Despite a pounding headache and the lack of any labor saving technology like mixers, these were still pretty easy to pull off.

Key Lime Cupcakes with cream cheese frosting (closely Adapted from Joy the Baker)

• 1 cup  flour
• a scant 3/4 cup sugar
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• pinch of salt
• 3 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1 egg
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• juice of 2-3 small key limes

Prep 10-20 minutes, bake time 20-25 minutes

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees

Mix the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda together. Add the butter (which seriously needs to be softish if you don’t have a mixer. Put it in the microwave for a few seconds if it’s too cold. But let it sit out if you can). Mix it up until it has a “sandy consistency.” You can use a spoon to do this, or even your fingers. Gradually pour in half of the milk.

Whisk the rest of the milk, the egg, the vanilla, and the lime juice together, and then mix it in to the dry ingredients.

Line your cupcake pan, then spoon the mixture in evenly. (it will be a little more than halfway). Pop them in the oven. Her recipe says 20-25 minutes, but ours were done in just under 20, so play it by ear depending on your oven.

Meanwhile, make the frosting

Cream Cheese Frosting

• 1 package of cream cheese (8oz), room temperature
• 1/2 stick of butter (this is 1/4 cup or 4tbs), room temperature
• 3/4 – 1 cup of powdered sugar
• 1/2 tsp of vanilla extract
• juice of 2 small key limes, to taste

Sorry college students, you really do need powdered sugar. Frosting turns out kind of weird if you use the granulated kind. It’s not very expensive though, and you can make quite a lot of frosting with one bag.

Anyway, mix the butter and the cream cheese together. If they are not at room temperature they will not mix very well (and you will end up with something lumpy and weird.) Let them come up to temperature, or put them in the microwave for 10-15 seconds – you don’t want them to melt, just to be soft. Once they are reasonably mixed together add the vanilla and lime juice and add the sugar a little at a time. Mix it up! It will get shiny as the sugar is mixed in.

You can make this as sweet or tangy as you want. We settled on about 3/4 c sugar and 2 limes, and it was pleasantly tangy and not too sweet. This recipe makes a ton of icing, so half it or be prepared to have leftovers.

Ice the cupcakes! Ideally, you should wait for them to cool. They’ll look prettier but sometimes you don’t have the time (or patience!). There are tons of fancy ways to ice – but I haven’t mastered any of them yet. (Share any tips you have!) I decorated the top with a small slice of lime.

result of 15 minutes decorating time!

And away we went!

A few hours later, we returned to eat the cupcakes.

VERDICT: AWESOME, reminiscent of key lime pie

I thought so and I totally hate cupcakes most of the time!

They were denser than your average cupcake, and the outside had that delicious carmel-y texture that muffins sometimes get. The cupcake itself was pretty sweet, but this was nicely offset by the tangy frosting. Squeezing the slice of lime on top turned out to be pretty tasty.

They garnered high praise. I wish I had had more time to take photos but my friends were getting pretty impatiant waiting for their dessert

It didn’t take them long to polish these off, and the party drifted apart (it was ~3:30pm after all)

At which point I promptly fell asleep for the rest of the afternoon

If you want a good cupcake recipe, try this one – I know I’ll be making it again. it’s easy, delicious, cute. GO FOR IT

Dmitry’s “advanced” chicken salad

Dmitry is on the HUNT for PROTEIN

that doesn’t take the form of beans or cafeteria food!

When we were first years* Dmitry used to eat these little tins of Vienna Sausages that his parents bought him — “you won’t starve with them!” — but now he is on the quest for more delicious, more nutritious forms of meat.

He tried tofu, but is worried about eating too much of it. He likes protein powder but it is $$expensive$$. And sometimes a boy just gets tired of frozen turkey balls.

If only we could eat this all the time.

So he tried making some chicken salad.

Dear readers, fear not. Dmitry’s advanced chicken salad is actually the easiest recipe ever. It’s good for sandwiches and quick lunches, & though I think it needs more acidity he really likes it.

Ingredients (approximately – he actually didn’t measure anything)

– 4 cups of chicken

– 4 stalks celery

– 1 c. green onions

– 1 1/2 cups of artichoke hearts and their liquid (these were supposed to be green olives. improvising!)  

– 2/3 cup mayonnaise (“thank God it’s low fat”) 

– “a couple teaspoons” of lemon – or one very large slice

– 1 1/2 tbs spicy mustard

– a little salt & pepper – don’t add too much salt though! There’s salt in the ingredients already! 

It’s easy! 

Step 1: Chop everything up into bite size pieces

Step 2: Mix it all together

Step 3: Get your tub of Mayo and glob it in! Dmitry just approximated it and then licked the spoon while reading the nutrition facts. (Cue my horrified face!)

Step 3.5: go back to your room to pick up all the ingredients that you forgot

Step 4: Add yer mustard and yer lemon juice, yer salt and yer pepper and mix it together. Exclaim “man this seems like a lot of mayonnaise!”

Verdict: YUM

Dmitry is pleased — “Man, can I make a chicken salad or what!”

He can dear readers, he can.

*our school doesn’t have freshman, WUT