Samosas are very time consuming.

Samosas are not worth my time, or yours, during the work week. Letting the dough sit, prepping, cooking and cooling down the vegetables, rolling the dough out, cutting, stuffing and baking (or frying) = too much time, especially when you have to make the rest of the meal and have to do laundry.

I used a recipe from the Vegetarian Meat and Potatoes Cookbook, which is probably my favorite and most used cookbook, and omitted the peas because I hate them (that texture? bursting in my mouth? gross). They also suggest cutting the dough into squares, which I did and will not do again. They turn out looking like dumplings, as they did the last time I made them, and it leaves you confused as to why you are eating samosas shaped like dumplings when they should be like big, fluffy clouds.

For the main dish, I made a curried lentil soup and was able to christen my most beloved 2010 Christmas present: the 14-cup Cuisinart food processor. I had to double the recipe and did not use a large enough pot, so it was filled to the brim, which makes it difficult to stir and adjust with more water when needed.

Aside from being inaccurately shaped and a bit too spicy, the samosas and soup were delicious. Brown and ugly, but nutritious and hearty.

Also, Meredith and I made dinner tonight! A pretty simple stir-fry with tofu, onions, kale and white button mushrooms and brown basmati rice on the side. I made a sauce with gochuchang, a Korean hot pepper paste, sesame oil, soy sauce, garlic and ginger. I've used a similar sauce for a pork dish, and it came out more flavorful - maybe next time we will let some of the flavors marinate more, but still a proud accomplishment for a joint dinner venture.

A slice of the future

As the title suggests this is my first post but it certainly won't be my last. This is the first pizza I made, I won't get into the specifics of the dough (as my recipe is quite unique and employs a rare blend of flour, water and yeast). The cheese is a combination of part-skim mozzarella and some shredded Monterrey jack, also as soon as I removed the pizza from the oven I used a carrot peeler to shred off some chunks of romano cheese. I look forward to my second attempt at this as on the first go around I didn't have a pizza paddle and was relegated to rolling the dough out on the counter, placing it on a deformed cookie sheet, and then used a combination of a large spatula and my hands to pull it from the sheet onto the stone in the oven.

Hopefully within the next several weeks and months I'll have some new dishes to post and perhaps a more detailed pizza post (as I do consider myself something of an aficionado). With that being said it's good to be on the blog and I look forward to showing ya'll the simpler side of collegiate cooking.

Bacon Cornmeal Waffles

My Christmas traditions are better than yours.

Please post for Mom: sometimes its good to just go easy!

Pasta!

Since the last of my frozen summer tomato sauce was used up, I haven't eaten a lot of pasta. I don't typically cook or eat pasta all that often, to Adam's dismay, but if I don't have any sauce or when I'm not in the mood for red, I use garlic, olive oil and throw in some tuna. I had no tuna and only clove of garlic, which is always kind of sad and you always wonder how you let that happen.

Anyway, I rehydrated a few sun-dried tomatoes tomatoes in hot water while the pasta started cooking. I sauteed the lone garlic clove, some shallots and sun-dried tomatoes with olive oil and threw in the pasta when it was done, along with some of its water.

I added a tiny bit of butter to thicken it up and topped it with breadcrumbs and freshly grated parmigiano reggiano. I eat cheese even more infrequently than I eat pasta, but a good wedge of parm is worth every single penny.

Happy holidays from my pasta plate to yours.

Hi & Thanksgiving Part two

Hi, I'm Jennifer, and Meredith made me do this. I like to cook and bake, and I like to follow recipes. I tend to make something once and never again, because what is the point when there is so much food to go around?

On Thanksgiving, my boyfriend Adam and I were gifted a free twenty two pound turkey, along with an eight pound turkey breast. We have always done our own Thanksgiving, in addition to the one with his family, but since the turkey was so big this year, it became a bit of a production. I usually keep it pretty simple when roasting anything - just salt, pepper and butter, sometimes lemon - but again, since the turkey was so big, I turned to Martha Stewart and her recipe for Perfect Roast Turkey this past Saturday. It is definitely a rich recipe, calling for a cup and a half of butter, and time consuming, having to baste every half hour for four hours.

You will never have a more moist or beautiful looking turkey in your life. Ever.

I served this with pan gravy, buttermilk garlic mashed yukon gold potatoes, wheat/white bread stuffing with sage, caramelized corn with mint, pomegranate cranberry relish, a sweet potato casserole with marshmallows, and roasted Brussels sprouts with mushrooms and cream (I wasn't kidding about loving recipes).

The key to serving a feast of any kind is obviously to do as much prep work before dooms day. I made vegetable stock for the stuffing a week and a half ago and froze it. I toasted the breadcrumbs a week ago and bagged it. I seeded and juiced the pomegranate and made the relish three days prior, so on and so forth. Do you know a good tip for mashed potatoes? Make them the night before and let them warm up the day of in a slow cooker. Thanks, internet!

Tomorrow I'm going to use some of the leftover turkey for enchiladas, but I will be cheating and using canned enchilada sauce. We can't all be Martha Stewart.

Chops

We were going to make ton katsu don, but by the time we got back from a long, hard day of abuse from teenagers and staff meetings and fellowship meetings, it just wasn't in the cards.

This was a super quick recipe for chops. Pork chops were about an inch thick, so not too big. Lots of salt and pepper, oregano, allspice on both sides, brown, then roast until the thermometer says 145 in the middle. Perched atop some wilted watercress and crispy chopped bacon. Everything gets done in one pan: first brown the chops, then brown the bacon while those are in the oven, add the greens and garlic, a little vinegar, salt/pepp. Take everything out and reduce some chicken stock, mustard, vinegar, salt/pepper/oregano in the same pan and make a little puddle there on the side of the plate. Brown rice too.

Maybe 30 mins cooking time -- not bad for a Monday night.

ref

Guest post from my mom: morning-after-fritatta-overload

Listen up folks. I taught Meredith and Ben their approach to creative cooking and it went something like this--if you are hungry, look in the fridge. There's plenty there. This is what I call a morning-after-fritatta-overload and it's particularly good if you entertained the night before. In this case, I chopped up and combined some leftover salmon and roasted potatoes we had for dinner and combined it with the olives and goat cheese we served for appetizers. I added a lonely artichoke heart that had been in the fridge for days. I mixed that with a few egg whites (cutting calories where I can) and made my fritatta. I served it with last night's salad that marinated in its dressing overnight. I ate it while doing an old Times crossword puzzle. This morning's puzzle would have seemed too fresh. Love, Mom

I Roasted my first whole chicken last night.

I'm pretty sure I'm a grownup now. (Also, it was delicious.)

Ben, you gotta read this.

How to cook an omlette INSIDE the shell.


These guys were frickin thorough

Why Hello There

My name Mr. Extra Large Gummy Bear
I have a secret.

I am a sot.
A lush.
A drizzy drunk little sauced up little ursa major.

I'm here hangin out with my friend. He's a XXX bear.
Not in the gay-sex-subculture kind of way.
in the "i go to shows and mark my own hands and think loose sex is dirty and not fun"
in the "i dont do drugs, not even the awesome ones"
and i DEFINITELY do not drink. Not a drop.

That's why my little friend over here is so small. drinkin gives you a bit of extra chub. Skinny little bastard.

How to make the magic:
Get some gummy bears. Soak those drunks in vodka. For DAYS. then eat. woooo!

PS. that plate is not filty, i just ate some cookies off of it prior to putting the gummy bears on it. QUIT JUDGING ME.