Milkshake Busters

It's too hot to cook.

2011-07-22T22:12:00.000-04:00

What does everyone else do in the kitchen when it's literally over a 100 degrees? Because me? I do nothing. I barely even step in there.

I am sweating as I sit in my air conditioned apartment, and the thought of turning on my oven makes me sick. I did promise my co-workers a chocolate pie as a thank you this Monday for their help while I was on vacation.

Minimal baking though. I mean, a ready made pie crust? Does that even count? I've only made a few pies in my time, but always from scratch. Did you know you're supposed to use pie weights with a store bought crust?! Not me... if only I had watched more of the she-devil Sandra Lee.

Smoked Paprika

2011-05-08T23:21:00.000-04:00

IS ABSOLUTELY AMAZING.

I bought smoked sweet Spanish paprika a few weeks ago, but hadn't used it until today.

I don't know the last time I have been this excited by a spice. I roasted a chicken, rubbed with some butter, salt and pepper inside and out, with a few garlic gloves in the cavity, and then roasted baby potatoes with cherry tomatoes, tossed in salt, pepper, olive oil and the paprika. My life has been changed.

2011-04-21T20:35:00.002-04:00

so guys (particularly The Kleins)(or is it The Kliens?)(not sure of the spelling)

when you go out in The Bruns for "The Soup" ... where do you go and what is it called? im dying to know here.

also, i am living in a hotel for the past month and for another month, so the most cooking i get done is when i microwave spinach. not fun or blogworthy. im sure i'll be posting like crazy when i finally get back to town and a stove.

EDIT: oh, double ps. post by vanessa. but logged into matt. call me lazy, but i'm not signing in/out just to post a blog about how i dont cook.

Butchering a Chicken, part f'real

2011-03-14T01:05:00.000-04:00

Where is the action in this blog?

I used a youtube tutorial and my own novice skills to butcher a chicken a few weeks ago and used a variation of this recipe for Portuguese Chicken. Since it was so long ago (it honestly may as well be years), I can only tell you what I remember: it was not that difficult. The recipe or the butchering.

I have a very short attention span and could barely make it through the tutorial and then just decided to start the process and 'feel' for where to slice. It worked out just fine thank you and was a lot easier than expected.

Butchering a chicken, part two (as in not really)

2011-02-15T12:37:00.000-05:00

I never got around to butchering the chicken, and it's currently resting in its entirety in the freezer. I will definitely try to record the process - although it may be too embarrassing to want to share.

I was recently gifted an iPhone as a belated birthday/Christmas gift, and let me tell you - I am pretty amazed at the photo quality/video. That being said, I did record a video of a sitting potato au gratin. Listen to the beautiful soundtrack of steaks sizzling!

p.s. did you know Le Creuset calls this casserole dish an Oval Au Gratin? So fancy. Thanks, Marshall's!

Butchering a chicken

2011-02-03T23:51:00.000-05:00

I'm going to butcher my first chicken in the next few days. In the past year or two, I feel like I have conquered roasting a chicken and using the carcass to make chicken stock, so it's only appropriate.

Who's done it? I'm going to rely on a Bon Appetit pictorial, as well as youtube.

I should quit my job and become a butcher or a fishmonger.

:(

2011-01-26T08:45:00.000-05:00

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/26/dining/26mini.html?ref=style

Late Night Pizza

2011-01-25T23:18:00.000-05:00

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

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

This has been posted in The Pineapple Spoon Rest too.

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

Pasta and Bread

2011-01-20T01:13:00.000-05:00

I've been in sort of a cooking funk recently, but two of my friends were coming over tonight and I knew I needed to come up with something. I don't typically do pasta dishes for guests, but like I said, cooking funk, so I made Mark Bittman's multi-grain pasta with butternut squash and ground lamb.

The recipe calls for packaged cubed butternut squash, which baffles me for a lot of reasons. Can't someone just do some of the tedious prep work the night before instead of wasting money? Cripes. Order take out or cook for real. Anyway, I didn't take any pictures, but my friend Chris did so maybe I will post those another time. The dish was pretty delicious and hearty, and the flavors were described as "subtle." I could tell with Adam's first bite he was wishing it was covered in a heap of tomato sauce. This is not that kind of pasta dish - how could it be with cinnamon and cumin?

I served it with some homemade bread from the Master Recipe from Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day, which is a recent addition to my culinary library.

After Meredith asked me to start blogging here, I realized I liked writing about food a lot and started my own blog called The Pineapple Spoon Rest. I recently wrote a very brief entry about the sham that is bread in five minutes a day. After baking and eating mini-boules three nights in a row, I can say it's delicious, but five minutes? PLEASE. I read the introduction for the book after I got in the mail, and already forgot what it said (oops), so maybe it described what they actually meant by five minutes (the ease in having fresh bread once you make the initial recipe and can lob off chunks of dough while you're prepping the real dinner), but I don't get how twenty minutes of preheating/dough resting and half an hour of baking equal five minutes. They should rename the book Easy Artisan Bread and call it a day, and then I would be a lot less agitated.

Oh It's Good to be Sixty

2011-01-09T20:37:00.009-05:00

My birthday present from my scuba-diving brother was seven succulent tails of lobsters he caught in the ocean off the coast near San Diego. He sent them via Fed-Ex on dry ice with the dates and locations they were caught. We are going to feast on every one. Tonight, a beauty caught a few hundred yards off the shore at about 35-40 feet was sauteed with vegetables and a black bean ginger sauce and eaten with fresh Chinese noodles in front of the fire. The roses were a present from my husband Larry, the chopsticks were a gift from the Benders and the Gifts of the Sea by Anne Morrow Lindbergh was from my colleague, Jocelyn. It's good to be sixty. You have something to look forward to.

This was supposed to be about Indian food.

2011-01-04T21:08:00.005-05:00

I try to bring lunch to work every day, and I try to cook dinner Monday through Thursday and Sunday. I do not often cook from a box or bag, and I try to make everything relatively healthy. But Friday and Saturday are no holds barred, and I love my local Chinese take-out spots. Like, love them. I guess that's how some people love pizza - in all its disgusting, congealed mozzarella glory. I like pizza enough, but I only really love it when it's grilled. There was this place in New Brunswick called Jack 'N Grill, and they used to make really awesome grilled pizza. The problem is they only ever made this awesome grilled pizza once, and every other time it sucked so bad that until Adam and I finally gave up and moved on to Tido's (note to self: discuss Tido 'n His Junkyard Dogs at another point in time).

Al Forno in Providence, RI has the most amazing grilled pizza, which is what the restaurant is famous for. It's topped with strands of scallions, and it's BANANAS. I celebrated my 27th birthday there, and now that I'm heading deeper into my late 20's, I realize how important it is to mark your birthdays with memorable food experiences.

Anyway, this post was supposed to be about bringing lunches, cooking dinners, and how I've cooked Indian food twice in the past week and how much I love it, but then I got distracted by pizza. I'll save my green chicken masala for another time.

New Year's Day Party

2011-01-01T21:10:00.006-05:00

These are pictures of our 2nd Annual New Year's Day party. Everyone seems to like the menu, so we will probably make the same things every year. This should make Meredith and Ben very happy because they like to bring home leftovers.

We always have little bowls of nuts and olives and lots of fresh flowers

I made a Gateau Semoline (semolina cake), center, that has raisins and is flavored with vanilla and nutmeg with a caramel glaze.

I also made gravlax, which is salmon cured in vodka for three days. It has a similar texture to lox. We also had crab cakes and french toast casserole. Dieting starts tomorrow!

Samosas are very time consuming.

2010-12-30T23:43:00.004-05:00

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

2010-12-29T13:21:00.003-05:00

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

2010-12-26T16:25:00.003-05:00

My Christmas traditions are better than yours.

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

2010-12-26T10:16:00.002-05:00

Pasta!

2010-12-24T13:02:00.001-05:00

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

2010-12-20T23:30:00.003-05:00

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

2010-12-20T22:09:00.006-05:00

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

2010-12-18T10:02:00.004-05:00

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.

2010-12-15T05:58:00.002-05:00

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

2010-12-11T09:55:00.000-05:00

Ben, you gotta read this.

How to cook an omlette INSIDE the shell.

These guys were frickin thorough

Why Hello There

2010-12-01T18:32:00.000-05:00

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.

Return of MK

2010-11-21T21:15:00.007-05:00

Made my own butter, bitches:

Basil Butter, to be exact. In stick form:

I just was curious, really. I may never do it again.

Actually, I've been cooking a lot with my roomie. I think I'm ready to get back off my ass. I've been too lazy/tired/hungry to photograph any dishes, but things will hopefully be changing.

Congee and oxtail soup tonight as well, thanks to Cindy.

Oh, and some meringues, below. I made them because I had egg whites left over from the shortbread that I also made. It was a big Sunday for us here.

Japanfest

2010-11-09T09:05:00.002-05:00

For the record, since clarification is needed, the sushi is takeout but the soup is homemade.

2010-11-04T09:47:00.002-04:00

2010-11-04T09:46:00.000-04:00

2010-11-04T09:45:00.002-04:00

2010-11-04T09:45:00.001-04:00

pumpkin soup with veal

2010-10-24T07:25:00.002-04:00

2010-10-23T18:43:00.001-04:00

i made too much sushi

2010-10-23T18:39:00.001-04:00

who's in love?

2010-10-11T20:11:00.003-04:00

oh, that's right. me. jello shots done classy.

tell me you're not also in love. and super jealous that you didnt think of it first!

concord grapes

2010-10-08T11:41:00.000-04:00

are delicious. the end.

i made jelly out of them. it was super delicious. the end.

ate it on naan bread for breakfast. stained my teeth and shirt. the end.

totally worth it. the end.

kyle needs to stop cooking for a family of 5

2010-10-08T07:23:00.001-04:00

2010-10-08T07:22:00.000-04:00

this blog should be called food i take to work.

2010-10-08T07:21:00.000-04:00

2010-09-19T09:44:00.001-04:00

Mine came to work

Kyle ate at home

2010-09-19T09:43:00.000-04:00

variations on a theme

2010-09-07T09:50:00.001-04:00

the return of nocturnal culinary experiments

2010-08-27T00:53:00.009-04:00

Its called the Freedom Waffle. Basically a french toast waffle. Its fuckin awesome.

The first set toasting. We put rum in the batter. Later ones had blueberries/chocolate chips.

Plated up with bacon and vanilla ice cream.

Kyle dips his bacon into some Kraken.

And the bite.

We had some extra so we brought them over to RUPD for the dispatchers.

on the subject of another dinner

2010-08-22T20:33:00.000-04:00

juice made of apples, carrots, cucumber, ginger.
blue brie
baguette.

not shown: cherries. lime flavored olive oil.

on the subject of dinner

2010-08-17T06:58:00.002-04:00

just some dinner

2010-08-15T07:34:00.000-04:00

on the subject of breakfasts

2010-08-09T07:15:00.001-04:00

2010-08-03T09:18:00.000-04:00

this is my new daily breakfast.
one frozen banana cut into chunks
some frozen pitted cherries that i bought when they were cheap and ripe and delicious
a tablespoon or so of peanut butter
some chocolate flax seeds
a good big slosh of hazelnut milk
blended in a magic bullet

goddamn is it delicious.

CHIA FRESCA!

2010-07-12T21:40:00.003-04:00

After reading Born to Run I've become slightly obsessed. Part of this obsession has resulted in chia fresca, a raw food energy drink. I feel like I have goddamn energy legs. It looks kinda like dragonfruit snot and if you don't watch out it will turn into a gel, but its amazing. I can't wait to bring it on my next run.

delicious healthy snack

2010-06-29T21:11:00.000-04:00

matt just said "vanessa. i've discovered an amazing, delicious, healthy new snack.

lettuce.
hot sauce.
yum"

vegan by trial

2010-06-21T19:57:00.001-04:00

Vegan Sweet Potato Gnocchi with cashew pesto

:::::::for the gnocchi::::::
one large sweet potato
two russets
a pile of flour

chop up the taters, steam em till they're soft. took my chunks (thumb sized) about 30 minutes.
pull them out, mash the crap out of them. i used an electric mixer and then went in with a fork to get the leftover lumps
wait until they cool, (or dont and just cook your fingers in this next part):
cover the potatoes with a cup of flour and mix in. then keep adding more flour and mixing by hand until it's not sticky anymore, or only barely. but dont mix until it's tough, just enough to get the flour in there. the less mixing you do the fluffier the gnocchi will be instead of like little dense stones. this isnt bread, people.
roll the dough out into logs about as thick as your ring finger (or, what you would estimate a normal ring finger looks like if you have abnormally skinny or fat fingers)
chop up the logs into finger-width pieces and roll down the back of a fork for more sauce grabbing ridges
chuck into a big pot of medium-boiling water (not super vigerous or you'll never know when the gnocci are done)
pull them out as soon as they float (too long and they'll get slimy)

like lil pillows of heaven yum

cashew pesto
chop some basil leaves
chop some cashews
chop some garlic
chop them all together
chop some more
squeeze some lemon on it, let it soak
pour in a little warmed olive oil

oh hell yea.

Perfecto Cookies

2010-06-03T15:52:00.003-04:00

I had some cookie dough left over from when I made last-day-of-school goodbye cookies for my students. I froze the dough (wrapped in wax paper in a log, then in a plastic bag) and then decided today that I had enough cookie appropriate events coming up that it was a good time to bust out the rest of these guys. Plus I thought it would be really great to heat up the house with a 350 degree oven on a 90 degree day.

The recipe comes from the New York Times perfect cookie search. The first time I used this recipe, I basically used it as an outline and the cookies were just alright. This time around, the only thing I changed was to use "buttons" instead of "discs" for the chocolate. Sticking to the recipe produced some of the best cookies I have ever made or eaten! Resting the batter, high quality chocolate, and a flour blend I think are key here. I guess sprinkling on some salt does something too.

When I made them for my students, I used probably half-sized dollops of batter to make little quarter-sized cookies, which I thought were a nice little treat and spread them out better amongst 30-ish teenagers. The ones from today are about 5 inches in diameter.

Coffee

2010-05-18T12:50:00.000-04:00

So, it's terrible. I've been making (and eating!) tons of delicious meals, and yet I never seem to remember about the camera until after I've polished off the whole plate! Also, I'm trying to go somewhat vegan... as in, I dont use milk products or eggs or meat at all if I can help it at home, but I'm not pressed enough to keep from ordering my favorite breakfast at a diner that has it (creamed chipped beef over toast with a side of bacon). I know, it's dichotomous.so what.

But anyway, here is a quick update to make sure that this blog doesnt die:

here's the meat and potatoes: i bought a cappachino maker. oh yeah. this is almond milk steamed up with a (big) shot of espresso in it and a teaspoon of dark brown sugar. this shit is the bomb, and amazing. and almond milk is awesome in coffee, way better than soy or rice. those guys suck. almonds rule! YUM.

I've been making some good brunches lately

2010-05-03T09:57:00.004-04:00

It's like I said. Even though things have been nuts around here, I've been finding a little time to make some pretty epic brunches. I've done some things with french toast, pancakes, benedicts, etc. This week I was inspired by the egg sandwich. I never thought I was an egg sandwich person, but I had my first one ever recently and realized that they are pretty great. This one here has cheddar cheese, spinach, tempe, ketchup, and artichoke hearts with a side of hash browns.

On the side of THAT we have some homemade whipped cream and fresh fruit.

fried tortellini and veggies

2010-04-13T04:40:00.001-04:00

If you can fry dumplings, why cant you fry tortellini? Amirite?

Jesus, just to get the veal off the front page :( :(

2010-04-05T17:55:00.001-04:00

How do you make vegan french toast more palatable? cook 'em in butter! And serve with sausages yum.

Great French Toast (from www.thekindlife.com, a pro-vegan website run by alicia silverstone)

INGREDIENTS
Yeast-free bread slices (French Meadow Summer Bread or whole spelt bread are good options) 
1 1/2 cups firm tofu 
1 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
2 tablespoons rice syrup 
1/2 cup soy milk 
1/2 teaspoon sea salt 
1 tablespoon corn oil 
1 teaspoon vanilla 
Oil of your choice (olive, safflower, sunflower, etc.) for frying  

STEPS
Blend all ingredients together until smooth and creamy.
If too thick, add more soy milk.  
Dip bread in batter and fry in hot oiled skillet until browned on both sides.   

Topping:
Serve with maple syrup.
Or you can make a great cinnamon butter by mixing cinnamon together with Earth Balance to taste.
You can also make a maple/flax syrup by mixing 1/2 cup maple syrup and 2 teaspoons flax seed oil (that kind of ratio, because you don't want to make more syrup/flax than you will use)
Mix them together well.
The oil adds a nice layer to the syrup.

Don't Hate

2010-04-05T01:01:00.006-04:00

Vealburger cooking

Vealburger on toast with coarse mustard, jarlsburg, spinach, tomato, onion

Baked Udon

2010-03-21T07:32:00.002-04:00

In my old house we had 4 gas burners to 3 people and it was never enough. Imagine a house with 4 people and 2 electric burners. Needless to say, sometimes you just cant cook when you want to. The other night Kyle and I ran into this predicament before work. Our idea, make Oyako Don/Udon in the oven. My mother gave me two cast iron cobbler pots that were still unseasoned and I figured it was time to break them in.

Below: First we preheated the oven, added some sesame oil, and dropped in the cut chicken and onions.

Below: We added udon noodles over the chicken and dropped some broth over it.

Below: Everything cooking up nice? Time to add some mushrooms.

Below: We dropped in some beaten egg and scallions and let everything cook in and set. The final product. Delish. Needed just a little bit of soy sauce but everything was cooked to perfection.

Conclusion? Fuck electric burners.

Just dinner

2010-03-09T06:14:00.002-05:00

Mashed sweet potatoes, sauteed veggies, and beer steamed sausage.

dumpday 2010!!

2010-02-27T16:41:00.002-05:00

So we had a dumpling party. I almost want to let the pictures speak for themselves...

Snacks:

Assembling the ez-make dumpling assembler:

Going to town on some dumpling ingredients!:

Yeah, matt's "that guy". The mustached guy creepin in your picture, smilin from the corner. haha

Our hair is a swingin! Go dumplings GO!

I'm not really sure who JT is giving the L for Loser. But i'm sure they're crying about it D:

Sarah's pretty ferocious. Like lion. Certainly not the one crying about John!

First you put the dumpling wrapper in the machine. Then you flip it off.

Then you put filling on the dumpling.

Then you flip it off.

Even molasses can be a filling! These were awesome: molasses (grandma's, no less!), apples, and spinach. DEE LISH.

We also had two kinds of tofu. Cause we rule.

The green stuff is sauteed cabbage. Which smelled terrible while cooking, but tasted AMAZING with shrimps and garlic.

So you have your dumpling wrapper and filling, and you turn the crank, AND....

BOOM. You flip it off.

BOOM

BOOM. FRY IT.

BOOM FRIED.

BOOM EATEN.

BOOM DELICIOUS. Flip it off.

So many dumplings! JT is pointing to the top of the pile! it's ALL THE WAY UP THERE!!!!

Mer is getting into the nitty gritty, right before she bounced citing "school" as a reason ... psssht. shoulda been studying the fine art of dumpling making, that's where the money's at!

They're on a dumpling high!

The last dumpling maker. So brave. So diligent. So many dumplings!

There'd be more pictures of dumplings if we hadnt eaten them all immediately. BOOM.

Red lobster Biscuits

2010-02-10T18:21:00.005-05:00

I love shrimp. They are delicious and I wish I was eating some right now. However, during my most recent visit to our friendly neighborhood red lobster for endless shrimp, it occurred to me that the garlic cheddar biscuits are even better than my favorite Crustacean. One google search later, homemade awesome red lobster-ish biscuits. Boom.

http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/Recipes/story?id=2788706

I ate 8 of them and had a pretty bad stomach ache, definitely worth it and plan to do the same thing very soon.

p.s. shrimp are a vegetable, so they are OK to eat.

Lets make some BREAD PUDDING

2010-02-10T17:55:00.000-05:00

I'm not much of a recipe writer-downer. i like to take little notes about whatever i'm currently going to cook or bake and write them down on scraps of paper. if the food turns out good, it means i put the scrap of paper somewhere in the kitchen, usually on the fridge - YAY! it also means that i have about 45 scraps of paper which all have some sort of variation on X cups of sugar, X tbsp butter, X cups of milk, splash vanilla, bake at 350 for 35 min. So I rarely know if my recipe is for cookies or cupcakes or whatever. Which is why, in order to keep this recipe special and out of the "scrap o paper pile" - i wrote it on a netflix return envelope. I love this recipe. It was handed down from my great grandmother and has been a favorite of mine for my whoooole life! But apparently my great grandmother was like me, and didnt put any sort of descriptions on her recipes because here is the entirety of her notes:

4 cups milk

2 cups old bread

1/4 tsp salt

3 eggs

3 tbsp melted butter

1/2 tsp vanilla

2 sq unsweetened chocolate

1/2 cup sugar

Make custard. Pour over bread.

I mean, did everyone in the 30's just KNOW how to make custard? cause i have no idea. all the joy of cooking says is "it is imperative to not overcook the custard or you will obtain an undesirable texture". good grief, way to be super unspecific. so i did some research on the intertubes and sort of wung it (past tense of wing it, winged it? i like wung it) and the rest is history. i tend to make this about once a month, or whenever matt and i have enough leftover crusts of french bread to make this delightful and delicious dessert.

so you make the custard. this involves pouring milk (although i like to use light or heavy cream. it's more tasty. and keeps the fat on that keeps me warm during these cold NJ-stormed nights!) into a sauce pan on med-low or low heat, add the butter and the sugar and the eggs. whisk so that the eggs are incorporated into the milk, and keep whisking as the butter melts, about once a minute or so. in the mean time, chop up the chocolate.

I like to use Bakers chocolate because it's the perfect size squares and is pretty cheap and pretty good quality. also, because it harkens back to my g-gramma's time so you know that it's time-tested YUM

So while your chopping in between your whisking, the butter will melt all up into that deliciousness and then you're ready to throw in the chocolate. the point is to keep whisking as the chocolate melts and as the milk and eggs slightly cook so that it gets thick. so you can either start with warm milk and eggs and butter, or all of them cold and heat them up at the same time (the lazy way). once you've chopped the chocolate, its time to start chopping bread!

chop chop chop

fill up a casserole dish with chop chop. throw in all the crumbs!

the custard should look like this and be kind of thick. if it's not thickened, dont worry, keep going. just make sure that all of the chocolate is incorporated into the mixture (not stuck to the bottom of the pan or unmelted or whatever)

pour pour pour

see how it didnt get on all the breads? get to smushing the bread into the custard. smush smush smush

bake bake bake. about 350 for something like 45 minutes or so. put on a lower rack or else the top breadies will get a bit toasted and you'll have to pick them off later (unless someone in the house likes burned chocolatey bread! it's pretty tasty, acutally. leave em on. dont pick em off)

All done. Pay no attention to the dirty oven.

Eat with a ton of whipped cream. fucking YUM.

yum yum yum

Work Potluck 1

2010-02-09T09:33:00.006-05:00

At work there are 3 of us every Thursday. We decided it would be nice for us to all bring in a dish from now on if we're all here. We invited the CSO's to join us as well, but theyre all lazy assholes.

Originally I was going to do fried stuffed risotto balls but there was no way I was waking up early enough to do that in one day so I made chipotle, cheddar and chive mashed sweet potatoes. I tried to make them a little less spicy than normal but who am I kidding. Those bitches gotta be hot. This pushed Jess out of potato territory and into salad and cookie land. Loretta made a Hungarian chicken dish I cannot for the life of me spell or pronounce.
Below: plated up!

Below: the containers

All in all successful. We are doing another this week where I WILL wake up in time for risotto.

This reminded me of Ben. Also Vanessa.

2010-02-04T18:09:00.003-05:00

You can make "chocolate" out of anything. This one is ketchup.

can someone fix this

2010-01-28T12:29:00.003-05:00

I'm getting feedback from multiple sources that our bylines are hard to see. Does anyone feel like doing something about it?

Sorry, Ben.

2010-01-28T09:00:00.003-05:00

Looks like you got yours drank again by our friends at the New York Times.

dumplingoff

2010-01-27T16:41:00.001-05:00

coming soon. ben's house. bc vanessa and i have this.

2010-01-21T18:11:00.000-05:00

omg you guys. are you guys chocolate lovers? i really like chocolate - but mostly just dark chocolate (milk chocolate is wussy and should only be brought out at easter) (unless it's filled with something badass like salted caramel or bacon)

so, that's my segue to this: http://www.womansday.com/Articles/Food/8-Curious-Chocolate-Covered-Creations.html

read it. and want chocolate covered squid, bacon, carrots, and fritos - all on one plate - because that's what i'm doing right now. instead i'm prolly going to eat cereal for dinner. poop.

also, this: automatic mini cupcake maker
i know what you're thinking. DUH VANESSA THE OVEN IS AN AUTOMATIC CUPCAKE MAKER! DUH! but hold on! here's whats awesome about this one: it cooks mini cupcakes in 5 MINUTES. THATS RIGHT FIVE. i want this and i want to put it on my dresser in my room. i could fill it up at night and set it to turn on when my alarm goes off, and by the time i'm done brushing my teeth i could have a full complement of cupcake breakfast goin on in my mouth. BUHM.

and in other news, french onion soup is easy and addictive. when i make more, i'll document the perfected process!

how do I work this thing

2010-01-20T20:15:00.007-05:00

Okay, so uh my cousin V invited me to join this after I posted a picture of my Thanksgiving dinner on my LiveJournal but I don't really know what I'm doing or whether this post is appropriate for this blog or anything. In short, oh god how did this get here I am not good with computers.

Here is a good meal, photographed shittily.

It's shallot-garlic sautéed asparagus and whole wheat spaghetti (we were out of fettuccine, which by the way oh my God it has two "c"s? no wonder Bookworm doesn't think it was a word, dammit I was so pissed about that) with pumpkin alfredo sauce. The recipe called for evaporated milk (?) but we were out so I cobbled together something from it and the alfredo recipe from Joy of Cooking and it turned out pretty good, if a little less rich than I might have wanted because I didn't want to use a cup of heavy cream and settled for a mix of milk and half and half instead. Certainly better than it looks in the picture, which turned all orange for some reason and that certainly doesn't help with the contrast when half of your dish is orange in the first place.

Did I do it right?

French Onion Soup

2010-01-15T14:00:00.002-05:00

Any of you guys have recipes for French Onion Soup that you would swear by? I'm lookin to do some cookin!

Ben's going to say "put an egg in it"

2010-01-07T15:42:00.006-05:00

So we tried to make some Soup. you know, The Soup. well, maybe.

Matt and I watched "Ramen Girl" (you know, that brittany murphy movie about how she's a rich little girl who doesnt know what to do with her life so she moves to japan with her boyfriend who really doesnt like her all that much so he moves to china somewhere and she gets really bored and finds a ramen house and decides she wants to make ramen so she endures the brusque japanese personality of the ramen house owner and she doesnt speak any japanese but in the end she moves to america and makes soup. you know, THAT movie) and we got inspired.

so we took some ramens and threw out the flavor packets and boiled em up in some water. also, we took some dried mushrooms and reconstituted them in about 4 cups water on the stove and while they were cooking threw in some frozen green beans and carrots and shrimpies to cook (pulled 'em out when they were done and put to the side), and microwaved some spinaches. to the broth i also added about a tbsp of soy sauce, at big tbsp of miso, a tsp of balsamic vinegar, a big shake of garlic powder, and just for kicks, some brown sugar.

we assembled the whole thing and started to chow down and guess what. guess frickin what. it was bland as all get out. omg so bland. i put in so many things! the broth tasted AMAZING until we put the noodles in. matt resorted to adding some of the flavor packet but it just didnt seem to help. now we know what brittany had to go through and why the old japanese man threw out her broth time and time again.

poop. at least it looked pretty. and the shrimps were DELICIOUS.

any suggestions? especially you Soup connoisseurs?

cupcakes - a really old endever.

2009-12-29T11:02:00.005-05:00

First things first: i made these the week before thanksgiving. i shoulda posted then but i was embarassed that i hadnt figured out anything clever to do for ben's MSB challenge so i sat on this post until, oh, about now. sorry ben.

I really wish that i had a "before" picture of these cupcakes - it was pretty cool to see how easy it is to disguise a special treat for kids! if you can see, the icing is just plain white, the decorations are snow caps (white on dark chocolate) and the wrapper is silver. which meant that they looked like plain ole boring ole stupid ole cupcakes. TRICK!

this one kid took one bite and said "OMG OMG OMG OMGOMGOMG!!!!! RAINBOWS!!!"
and then he asked me what they were made of and i said "magic!" but matt told me i should have told him 'clown blood'. DARN. i totally missed that opportunity.

they're really easy to make, just make white cake (from a box is fine - the point of this recipe is to look good, kids dont care if it's boxed cake or a gourmet recipe) . divide the icing into 6 bowls and dye the crap out of each bowl with food dye. the colors will get less brilliant during baking, so really just go wild. then transfer the contents of each of the six bowls into one ziplock baggie for each color. line the cupcake tins and tilt the whole shebang by setting one end of the cupcake tray on a thick cookbook (this will make layering the colors easier) and start piping in a solid line of each color. try to not fill the cupcakes more than 1/2-way full, or you may get overflow and overflow toasts a brown color and then you've just used a bunch of food coloring for nothing because it turned brown in the end.

anyway, yum. go cupcakes!

Improvised kitchen tools

2009-12-28T11:07:00.008-05:00

Ben saw in America's test kitchen that you can use the top of an onion as a steamer for vegetables. Naturally, Ben extended this to eggs. Benedicts to be exact. These are their stories:

First, the onion layers were sized and buttered.

Egg One (the first one was much better than the second, much like with siblings):

Ben thought it would be a good idea to see what a beaten egg would do. Egg two was not as delicious. We ended up having to add some water around the onion to get it to cook evenly.

WHOOOAAAA MONTAGE EGG BENDER!

Here's what I made. Poached style. I am less adventurous.

The end.

recipe minimalism

2009-12-27T15:08:00.005-05:00

I made my own tomato sauce. I hate tomatoes. I respect tomato sauce conceptually, but have only met one or two versions that didn't make me gag or at least where I could hold off picking around for the first few bites. As I've gotten older, I've grown out of my childhood preference for perfectly smooth sauces that are basically watered down tomato paste, which don't cut it texture-wise, though they do have the advantage of not having any offensive tomato pieces or skins.
I decided now that I don't have 20398542 things to do every second of every day, I could try to tackle this thing in a responsible way. Basically, I made my own sauce and it was pretty great. The end.

Part of the reason for this sauce story is that when I was puttering around the house running this entry in my head, it occurred to me that, much is the style here generally, transmitting a recipe on a blog for people who already know how to cook doesn't require much more than a list of ingredients and cooking method. Variation is inevitable whether ther is a proper recipe or not, but personally, I end up changing it anyway (unless it's dessert/baking). Sooooo, I was flipping through this guy recently:

The recipes are paragraphs outlining what's in the dish and anything notable about the process. For people who are into cooking and reading about cooking in this way, check out this and everything else that Mark Bittman ever does. I remember reading in one of his "101" recipes collections a "recipe" that was something like "take x and wrap it in bacon."

shepherd's pie doesn't photograph well

2009-12-22T08:12:00.003-05:00

Also, this is a little blurry, I think because the glass of wine pictured was not my first of the evening. This was the night before an exam, after a snowstorm, and the only overlap of free time that Kerensa and I had pretty much for the whole break.

So! Veggie Shepherd's Pie! This is an adaptation of another Klein Kid Non-Recipe. The things that we generally throw in here are lentils, carrots, pearl onions, and other usual suspects, with a red wine sauce. I also added butternut squash and shallots, seasoned with cinnamon, cumin, salt/pepper, and coriander. No mushrooms this time, but I like to do a mushroomy version sometimes. Leeks or fennel are also a nice addition. Also, we don't keep milk in the house, but Kerensa had made some red velvet the night before, so we put some of the leftover buttermilk in the pototatoes. OMG. To round things out, I did a combination collard and beet green sautee on the side.

I'm Still Here (Sunday Dinner)

2009-11-29T18:21:00.003-05:00

Taking a break from paper world, I finally took a minute to cook up the stuff I got at the AMAZING Inwood farmer's market (more on that later). I like to do a Sunday night dinner that is a little awesome since the rest of the week is so insane. Here we go:
-roasted fingerling potatoes
-sauteed collards
-roasted spaghetti squash with vars spices
-baked soy-mustard crusted tofu

P.S. HAZ! (thx Ben!)

Eating Appreciation Day

2009-11-26T18:39:00.010-05:00

Thanksgiving is not just my favorite holiday, it's the only holiday I like. At all. Turkey + stuffing + gravy = heaven. For me, it's the perfect meal. So much starch. Butter in EVERYTHING. I wish it was more complicated than that. But it's not.

Ever since the first time I had a less than satisfactory Thanksgiving meal I've wanted to make my own. The first time I did it was two years ago when, through a series of misunderstandings, Sara and I were left with nowhere to go on Thanksgiving. So, I made the whole meal for just the two of us, while we sat at home in sweat pants and listened to old episodes of This American Life on line. That was perhaps the best Thanksgiving I've ever had.

This year I went to my aunt's house and made all of the sides, plus two pumpkin pies. I didn't think to take pictures beforehand, but here are a few phone shots of the aftermath:

Sweet potatoes with marshmallows:

I really wish I'd taken a picture of this before all of the marshmallows melted. The marshmallows were all perfectly browned. It was ridiculous. Like in a goddamn magazine. It was disgusting how awesome it looked. I'm not even a big fan of sweet potatoes and I just kind of winged this. Boiled them and then mashed them with some butter (of course), cinnamon, brown sugar, and evaporated milk (mostly b/c we only had fat free milk and I had it left over from making pumpkin pie). I think you can do just about anything to sweet potatoes and everyone who likes them will love them.

Stuffing:

I love stuffing. It's probably my favorite part. This is a really basic stuffing that I made with veggie stock instead of chicken stock so that my vegetarian sister could get a little joy out of this bird-eater's holiday.

Cranberry Sauce:

Again, as simple as it gets. Cranberries, sugar, water. I don't know why anyone would ever buy this already made. It's even fun to make. A monkey could do this.

And finally, Pumpkin Pie:

I never liked pumpkin pie until one year when my mom made it from a cheese pumpkin. I think she only did this once, but it was so memorable that I always wanted to try it myself. I started doing it in like '03 or '04 and have done it every year since. I've had people say it was the best they've ever tasted. You'd think that would be the ultimate compliment, but it sounds so made up. Still, this pie RULES.

2009-11-22T20:07:00.003-05:00

yo ben: this guy. oh man, this guy. you're going to have a conniption.

i think thisi is the guy who really drank your milkshake.

oh man.

Challenge Entry: The Cucone

2009-11-20T02:16:00.009-05:00

Meet the cucone.

Based on the bacone.

Here's me holding it.

Here's that guy with his.

The bacone is a cone make of cooked bacon filled with scrambled eggs, cheese, country gravy, and topped with a biscuit. The cucone is a cone made of peeled cucumber, filled with poached egg whites, goat cheese, and topped with a piece of smoked salmon.

I'd say this guy speaks entirely for himself, but... Boo-Yah!!!

I'm going to hell

2009-11-12T09:39:00.004-05:00

for eating female crabs. but by god were they tasty!

(sexing crabs)

happy halloween, SHARK STYLE

2009-11-09T12:49:00.002-05:00

this year, i carved a shark. you cant see it, but he has some fearsome teeth and a terrifying looking tail! but greg and matt said he looks like a dolphin. eff that. dolphins suck. "vanessa!?!" you might cry, "dolphins are intelligent and friendly!" to which i would reply (to quote cartmen) "yeah, intelligent and friendly on rye bread with some mayo"

stupid dolphins.
matt's pumpkin was much more fierce. not in a 'project runway' kind of fierce (go christian!) but in a IM GOING TO EAT YOU AND SUCK THE MARROW FROM YOUR BONES kind of fierce. it's SHARK X.

shark x comes from a long-standing tradition which was started by jon soto. while i may not approve of his lack of a flat-top hair cut, the man knows how to start a bad-ass tradition.

For dinner we ate shitake mushrooms sauted with olive oil AND butter, salt and pepper. After about 5-10 minutes of that, i threw in about 3/4 cup of white cooking wine. once that bubbled down a bit, i added some salad greens that were hanging out in the fridge and about to turn into salad-green-soda (gross).

all of that over noodles. i loved it. it was delicate. YUM. matt wished there was some sort of sauce. maybe next time i will take the stems from the mushrooms (which you dont want to really put in the dish because they're pretty tough) and make a broth-y sauce with them. cook em with some water and more butter and some seasonings. but that's all for next time.

and o man you guys. we made pumpkin seeds by soaking them in buffalo wing sauce and then baking them. it was brilliant. wait until we fine-tune the recipe and then BOOM WE'LL BE DRANKIN ALL THE MILKSHAKES OUT THERE.

Pesto is the answer

2009-11-03T21:30:00.002-05:00

I am revealing to you my trump card for every potluck or backyard bbq. Roasted russet potatoes and haricots verts with pesto. Usually I would put this over watercress. Sometimes I add capers but the pesto was a little salty this time. Why I am making it in the middle of the week on a school night when I have 42309324 pages of reading to do for tomorrow I am not sure except that it is difficult to concentrate with basil aging in the vegetable bin.

¡Chili con huevos!

2009-11-01T15:18:00.002-05:00

Vegetarian chili topped with spinach, cheddar cheese, and a poached egg. Kind of like The Soup but it's chili instead of soup. I'm tempted to say that my chili recipe is TOP SECRET but I already gave it to Laura and it's here for anyone to see. I make it with NO TOMATOES BECAUSE I HATE THEM. Also, I can not stress enough how much of a difference bulgur wheat makes to a vegetarian chili. Much meatier. Or you could just put in meat.

Fortune

2009-10-31T22:06:00.000-04:00

I got this fortune cookie at the sushi place yesterday:

Milkshake Busters Challenge #4

2009-10-21T09:30:00.005-04:00

The next (I believe 4th) Milkshake Busters Challenge has been announced! We will each have one month to prepare...

FATBLOG DEFATIFYING CHALLENGE!!!

Yes! It's finally come! Each contestant must select one item from the infamous thisiswhyyourefat.com and healthy that son of a bitch up! Now keep in mind, some of these recipes, in order to remain as their original post, will have fattening elements. It is your job, however, to take something from the fatblog and turn it into an everydayish meal. Points go to healthiness, creativity, difficulty level, and closeness to the original.

Go forth and make their milkshakes healthy... then drink the shit out of them! Your time beings... NOW!

Keep in mind, all those who abstain from participation may be subject to loss of posting privileges.

FISH > YUENGLING

2009-10-20T21:55:00.007-04:00

Look at that fish. look at his beady little eyes. i ate him. yes i did! i ate him right up.
him and his brothers. the red snappa' brothers. i ate all of them. like the gangsta i am, i first laid them on a bed of salt (that i added some whipped egg whites too). also i stuffed those mothah fuckahs with some lemon and onion and garlic, because THAT IS HOW I ROLL.
look at them all snug in their beds made of salt! so cute. that's like 5 pounds of salt there. and like 6 whipped egg whites. that's a lot of salt.
here they go -- into the oven at 425 for 30 minutes. there's no real way to tell when they're done, so just know that a 1.5 lb fish wrapped in about an inch or more of salt will take 25 minutes to cook. TRUST THE TIMING. i added a few more minutes because i cooked two fish to the pan. i mean bed. bed of salt.
then... then i cracked that salt right off. and threw it in the GARBAGE. fucking salt. it also got everywhere. but not inside my fishies! awesome. they have dead eyes now. right when they came out of the oven, the eyes were all swelled up because the liquid inside boiled, but then after a few minutes they caved in. animal eyes are cool.
yeah, this is me de-skinning those delicious fishys. you take that skin right off and the meat inside is delicous and moist. and surprisingly not salty at all! omg. i'm going to have to tell you guys about going to the fish market in trenton. oh man. matt just threw me off track for a second. where was i?
oh fuck yeah. that's such a good combination. dale's pale ale (the best beer in existence in a can) (also Matt says it's damned delicious and he's got a pretty good repoire when it comes to beer tasting) (also it's just a fact) and some red snapper. oh yeah, i was going to tell you guys about this place - ok, so. FISH AS FAR AS THE EYE CAN SEE. seriously. like 30 varieties of fish, all ready to be de-scaled and de boned and gutted and everythign by my helpful mexican de-fisherizer. he was amazing. there were also tanks of live fish in case i wanted to take home my own tilapia for a pet. also, there was a WALL of SHRIMP. i almost lost my boyfriend to grocery section! and whole rock crabs and blue crabs (but only the females which is just tragic because they take em out of the waters and then who will be there to make the next generation of little crabbies for me to eat?)lauren got really grossed out by the eyeballs. and the spine. personally, i like looking at all the parts of something i'm eating... i mean, hell. it's going inside you, you might as well get a good look, eh? am i right?

oh the remains. the best parts were the fishmeats on teh bottom of the fishies because the juices soaked through all the lemons and garlics and got just a touch salty and it was amazing. that's my fork right there, i was picking the remains. YUM.
greg says "THIS FISH IS BETTER THAN YUENGLING" and then got in a philosophical discussion with matt about how yuengling is just adequate and then john terry piped in with how yuengling is to beer what dante's peak is to movies. but everyone agreed that the fish was better than both of those things.
and that's what's left. not too shabby for less than 10 bucks a head! (including salad and greenbeans as a side dish) (also there was a tart that i made from almost overripe fruit that was pretty bangin but is an entry all its own) (BEN WHAT? TOP THAT WITH YOUR MINI EGGS. I DARE YA, and matt just fucked your milkshake)

butternut squash fries

2009-10-19T06:50:00.003-04:00

I whipped these together as a treat to prevent myself from crying over my math homework. Peeled and seeded butternut squash, cut into sticks, kosher salt, olive oil, bake, eat. I had them with some aioli on the side.

breakfast like WHOA

2009-10-17T14:50:00.003-04:00

OK SO: ben, quit bitching. here's some picturesque deliciousness which even features EGGS and JOHN TERRY!!!! Woooooh!

we made somethign amazing. this is the pancake batter. it includes sour cream, beaten egg whites, RICOTTA!! lemon juice, and yes... you're seeing those yellow flakes! that's lemon zest. i fucking LOVE lemons. this is going to get even more delicous. you cant wait.

Here... here we have the pancakes cooking. they're like an inch thick and so awesome. FLUFFY GALORE.

Ok so, on the side we got some molasses. Grandma's molasses. the ORIGINAL kind. we dont fuck around with the molasses.

You ready for this? we cooked the EGG in the MOLASSES.
THAT JUST BLEW YOUR MIND.

And this is how it turned out. dripping, luscious. full of the sweet stuff. (kind of wierd)

Final plate:
we took some powdered sugar and put a teaspoon of fresh lemon juice in it and smushed it around and put THAT on the pancakes! amazing!

Even JT said "yeah, ok. these pancakes are ok! awesome."
and that's the end of that chapter.

Marinated Pork

2009-10-13T19:17:00.003-04:00

Marinated pork and veggies over a bed of sushi rice and wakame. I used a mixture of honey, mirin, miso, sesame oil, and garlic and let it sit over night. Turned out excellent. Very tender. The extra pork fat and drippings were great for the veggies. Sushi rice turned out really well too. No I didn't rinse it. I like the extra starch. At the last minute i threw in the wakame so it soaked up a little of the water and was just finished at the same time as the rice. Good stuff. Still waiting on someone else to post.

Lamb

2009-10-05T07:22:00.003-04:00

Weeknight dinner collaboration. Lamb, mashed sweet potatoes, and steamed asparagus. Comes with excellent gravy.

Who's Your Frydaddy?

2009-10-05T07:03:00.010-04:00

Because I've been called out, I will tell you all about the time I was woken up to a wonderful text message. Being that it was my day off, the time was 8pm. As per the message, it was time to deep fry something. I had recently acquired an electric deep fryer via the internets and my housemates decided to christen it. Here are their stories.Above, Blake batters some chicken. These babies were amazing. Below is the chicken strips sitting on a rack draining. They were first floured, then egged, then floured, then egged, then floured. Wonderful crispiness.Those bitches look gooooood, right? Well they were. I also wasn't satisfied with just christening on chicken so I pulled some other stuff out of the kitchen to fry. It didn't all make it in. Below are the oreos and pickles prefry.The oreos didn't make it, what did hit the cut were the pickles and some fries. Below are the fried pickles, french fries, and the final table layout before dinner.As you can see we baked up some biscuits and threw down some excellent beers. By the end nobody was sure whom would have the first coronary. Excellent bathroom time was had. The fryer is still holding the extra oil for later use when we can finally throw down on those oreos. All are invited.

BEN I'M CALLING YOU OUT

2009-10-04T18:52:00.002-04:00

today i made an apple pie. it was just ok. and i forgot to take a picture. there was cheese on it.

but this post isnt about my pie. it's about ben.

BEN.
I HEAR YOU ARE COOKING.
WONDERFUL THINGS.
AMAZING THINGS FULL OF EGGS.

where are all of your posts?
if you dont post soon, i'm going to stalk your kitchen, make your meals, and post them myself. THEN WE'LL SEE WHO DRANK WHOSE MILKSHAKE THEN.

le quiche du moi ooh la la

2009-09-10T23:46:00.020-04:00

Pardon ma French, but I couldn't rehzeest..

I made this quiche two weeks ago, and am just posting the documentation of it now..

Elli and I took a lot of photos, and I was intimidated by the thought of having to organize them so it took this long... Anyways, here's what happened:

The crust:

I'd never made pastry dough before, so I thought I'd try it..

1st, the flour,

mix it with sliced, then chilled, butter until it's "grainy" (LOTS of butter):

Then take out some chilled vodka

and put in 2 tablespoons and then start mixing into the dough:

Then mix in a little water until it feels right, and mush it up with your hands.

It shouldn't be too sticky (too much water... mine had a little bit too much water, but it worked out okay.)

now listen to Sir Mixalot until you produce a nice pile of sweet buttery dough that scents the kitchen air.

Next, wrap it in cling-film/plastic wrap, place it on a plate, and make sure your wrap warps a little in the photo (I just got a new wide-angle lens for my camera that morning, maybe contributing to my obsessive pic-schtick)..

Stick the dough in a fridge for 30 mins (or, if you wanna use it much later, freeze it, then thaw it before using it).

Meanwhile, dust stuff with flour..

and roll!

I think the stickiness of my dough (excess water) combined with guessed thawing durations made it hard for the dough to be right in time for the photo shoot and rolling pin.

So I had to kind of club it with my rolling pin until it was flattish.

Then I used my fingers and patted it into the baking pan. The butter in the dough was a little melty by now, and the dough was heading towards being a paste.

The foil goes on, then usually pie weights, if you have that. I used my cast-iron pan. Then stick it in the oven (350F) for 12-15 mins to half-bake it.

At this moment in time, you have completed a major task, and may also half-bake yourself as a reward.

Now the filling:

This part is super easy after the last part cos now it feels like you'll be making an omelette without the completely making an omelette. They are in the same area of the spectrum of French cuisine.

So, start with five large eggs,

and for 5 eggs, you need 1 pint of half-and-half or cream/milk mix,

plus seasoning (white pepper, black pepper, salt, cayenne, etc.)

Mix it up well, and add whatever else you want to it. I put in little torn-up pieces of broccoli, mushrooms. I forgot to photograph that part, so you'll have to imagine it.

Before you get lost in your imaginations for too long, don't forget to take out the half-baked crust in time! You want it to look lightly toasted.

Pour your eggy mixture in to the crust, and top with a good sharp cheddar. Then in the oven it goes!

I had excess mixture. Eggstra. So I poured it in the little cast iron pan, added some onions, and designated it my scout.

Basically it was a tiny but creamy rich fritatta cooking alongside its quiche cousin.

Now smell the kitchen and wait...

Keep checking on it and keep an eye out for the color of the surface, the color of the crust, etc.. No burning allowed! Not after all this effort!

When you're feeling good about it, stick a toothpick in and see if it comes out dry.

Then take it out when it's done and let it cool for a good 10 mins.

Greed and gluttony overtook and all patience was lost for photos. So all we got are these two pics of the last remaining piece, the runt, that we took the next morning:

The dough could've been "better" (less personality?) but it was still a pretty damn good quiche.

Capiche?

well, there it is...

2009-09-09T14:33:00.003-04:00

NY Times talks about bento boxes

failed failed failed

2009-08-28T17:39:00.003-04:00

it was too juicy. so i tried to pour some of the excess liquid off off. it fell in the sink.
then i burned it.
it never recovered.

thin sliced plums (some too ripe, some not ripe at all)
honey with cardamom (too much), ginger (too much), and some hot sauce
filo dough slightly rolled out, folded around the edges with twisted corners.

yuk.

this is kind of a ben recipe

2009-08-23T16:48:00.007-04:00

Savory Duck Fat Doughnuts

Polenta with parmesan, crimini mushrooms, white beans, olives, and broccoli rabe

2009-08-23T13:54:00.003-04:00

Here I have some repurposed leftovers. I had the polenta and BR in the fridge from the previous night, so I thought I'd dress them up for lunch. The polenta was made by boiling and constantly stirring coarse cornmeal. I let it set up in a shallow round dish, then cut into triangles. I fried the leftover triangles on both sides in a hot pan, then garnished with some fresh parmesan cheese.

In the same pan, I threw in some mushrooms, chopped oil cured black olives, the leftover rabe (which had been sauteed with lemon juice), and some white beans, which I drizzled with olive oil and lots of black pepper.

Ashiq's first post

2009-08-23T12:18:00.007-04:00

Hey everybody out there!

I'm blogging! And this is my first post for Milkshake Busters.
Something simple -- a simple delicious breakfast.
You can alter any of the ingredients to your liking.

Here's what Elli and I had this morning:
Prep time: 1 minute.

1. Fresh, ripe blueberries.
Of course you can use raspberries, strawberries, or whatever. It's a nice summer Sunday, so we went with these.

2. Your favorite cereal.
Here we used Dorset Muesli
in Vanilla Almond Breeze.
Yum!

3. Arrange and enjoy!

Fish N' Chips

2009-08-21T09:12:00.007-04:00

Kyle and I were hungry the other night but didn't know what to make. We did know that we needed to go grocery shopping. We ran out to the store and realized we wanted fish. To our delight there was some delicious cod on sale and we knew we had a shitload of potatoes back home about to go bad. We took that cod home and got it ready. Above is some potatoes and a tool. Yes. Tools. We have evolved. This one is for fries. Below you can see what we did to those potatoes with that tool. Yeah, I know what you're thinking. That's a lot of fuckin' potatoes.
As you can see below its a good thing we had so many. Those bastards turned out golden awesome. Just look at those chips. Golden fuckin' goodness. Makes you jealous, don't it? Sea salt on those bitches too.
Here's the fish all prepped. We let it slip into something a bit more comfortable. Flour, then egg, then flour, then egg, then bread crumbs. The egg, as per house rule, was mixed with paprika.
And here they are golden delicious. Much like the chips, a source of envy. Perfectly juicy and flaky on the inside.
We finished cooking with just enough time for me to pack a lunchbox for work. I squeezed out some tartar sauce and ketchup in there cuz I wasn't sure what we had at work. Wonderful. Excellent lunchbox dinner. You should be so lucky.

Hot Day -- Lunch Sandwich

2009-08-20T17:28:00.004-04:00

It has been really hot out. I just wanted a not hot thing to eat. Whole wheat bread, cold tofu, spinach leaves, hummus, avocado, cheddar, cucumbers. Olives and carrots on the side.

Giant Enchilada Fiesta

2009-08-20T07:41:00.011-04:00

Omg, Enchilada Night at the Maxwell. We threw together the leftover steak from the other night and some veggies. Jenn cooked it up with like a whole fucking bottle of enchilada sauce. Amazing. Then we dumped an entire bag of cheese. Kraft may want us to use half a bag, but fuck them. I've never heard anyone say anything was too cheesy (except for maybe my karaoke but I still think I'm solid gold on the mic). Amazing dinner. I can't wait to do this again.
Here's an overhead view. These things were fuckin' huge! I don't know why we made so many and I know even less of why I ended up with two of them on my plate. I topped them with refried beans to start. The rice wasn't my best. I have to relearn my rice timing and ratios for this goddamn electric stove. I cooked it up with a bullion cube, peppers, onion, and some other shit I can't remember. Just the usual.
Here's a picture of the dinner table set for us to start. We put out chips with guacamole and lots of rice and refried beans.
The last bites with some guacamole. Excellent choice. I couldn't believe I made it through two of these bad boys. Kyle finished just after me. It was intense. Jenn wussed out and only had one. The second didn't last long in the fridge before someone snagged that bitch. The consensus at the Maxwell is that this was the largest and best dinner we've collectively made. They were so amazing. Gotta love enchilada night.

Zucchini Challange - Zuch and Peach Roulade

2009-08-13T11:24:00.002-04:00

This zucchini and peach roulade was made with a cheddar souffle spread with a zucchini pesto with saturn peach slices layered on top, rolled up and chilled, then served with a soy-ginger orange sauce. yum!

Lauren tried it and said "um, i'm not hungry. but this is ok. i'd eat it again" - soooo yeah. but i liked it. and matt liked it! it was light and delicious and tasted like summer.

the roulade was basically a white roux which was salted, peppered, and with cheddar cheese melted in which was then folded into egg whites which had been beaten to smooth, stiff peaks. the mixture was then baked.

the zucchini pesto was created by cutting the skin of the zucchini off and some of the white and puree-ing it with a few leaves of basil.

the orange sauce was created by puree-ing a mandarine orange with some orange juice, flour, ginger, and soy sauce and reducing that until the consistancy was as you see here.

then we ate it! and we're going to eat it again for dinner tonight. YUM.