Driving home from Boston on the Mass Turnpike, I saw the most surprising sign. No, not the McDonald's sign.... let's zoom in a little...
I felt awkward taking pictures, which is why they're so bad, but if you look closely, you'll see that it's a "Local Honey" stand. The sign that got me to pull over at the rest stop was an automated road sign that said "Farmer's Market Open Today 9 AM to 5 PM" The farmer's market turned out to be two stands: one with honey and another with apples, but I was still amused at the idea of a farmer's market at a turnpike rest stop.
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
spotted on the mass turnpike
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
A Full Meal, Over Three Days
Round three of delicious homemade bread was the most delicious yet, and round four (sourdough) is bubbling up now. I really get a kick out of making bread, especially when the instructions are all: "Don't forget to feed your starter! Remember, it's a living creature!" 
To be honest though, I started with dessert. Magnolia's recipe for chocolate cupcakes and a simple buttercream icing. I improvised a little and added peppermint extract to the icing. In case you can't tell, the raspberries on three of the cupcakes spell out: "TOD", ie, transit-oriented development. 
And today, after picking up our CSA box, I was feeling inspired and threw together a roasted vegetable medley of Kabocha Squash (apparently chefs will sometimes use this as a substitute for pumpkin. I don't blame them--it's delicious.), red daikon, a couple of radishes, potatoes, and onions. Roasted vegetables are the best.
Check to see if there are CSA pickup points in your neighborhood: NYC, Chicago, and Hartford, to name a few.
Sunday, October 19, 2008
Cooking = Procrastination
So remember the Ciabatta recipe? I finally attempted it, and conclusion=delicious. Here we see a hunk with some chili I threw together (black beans, a variety of sweet peppers, some cilantro and parsely, butternut squash, and lots o' spices.)
Of course, as this picture illustrates, bread and chili should really be started early in the day, to avoid eating your delicious meal at midnight. (The clock is a little fast...)
Also, just for fun, pretty pretty California tomatoes! The time to really enjoy these lovelies is leaving, sadly, but I have enjoyed the season.
Monday, October 6, 2008
It's possible that I am becoming a slave to King Arthur's Flour emails....
I made their ciabatta bread and am totally in love with the world. Pictures for that to come. 
Today, they sent an email claiming "best gingerbread ever, guaranteed." Gingerbread that's all bready, and sweet, and dense and delicious? Ummm, yes please? I love that the recipe calls for whole wheat flour and cyrstallized ginger. YUM.
Photo from: http://www.kingarthurflour.com/shop/RecipeDisplay?RID=7
Friday, October 3, 2008
Three Birthdays in One!
I made some carrot cake cupcakes for my MUP friend's birthday!
It was also V's birthday and today is my brother's, so they'll get some pictures, as I don't think cupcakes would mail well. 
This recipe was fun and pretty easy--all you need is a food processor and you're good to go. The recipe giver, while mourning the loss of her own carrot cake recipe, also really likes the cream cheese frosting, and I agree: super tasty.
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
shockingly, chocolate chip cookies also make me feel better
See here for my first strategy at cheering myself up. But now I've come home to chocolate chip cookies that I made yesterday and discovered that they are a pretty good way to cheer up as well. 
Here's the recipe, which is my mom's usual chocolate chip cookie recipe, edited for my personal taste. (Part of my personal taste is doubling the recipe because I tend to think that you might as well double cookie recipes that freeze well.)
ETA: watching the Sox make it into the playoffs also helps. Thank you, Jim Thome and TBS (for out-of-market broadcast). Oh, and Jenks, way to be!
2 cups softened butter
1 cup granulated sugar
3 cups packed brown sugar
4 eggs
5 teaspoons vanilla
5 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 bag milk chocolate chips
6 oz. semi-sweet chocolate chips
6 oz. white chocolate chips
Fleur de sel
1/ Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
2/ Cream the butter, sugars, eggs and vanilla.
3/ In another bowl, mix together the flours, salt, baking powder and baking soda.
4/ Combine the wet and dry ingredients.
5/ Stir in the chocolate chips.
6/ Form and place golf-ball-size cookies 2 inches apart on an ungreased cookie sheet (note: I usually make them about 2 teaspoons of dough, which seems about right, and always use a Silpat.)
7/ Place a large pinch of fleur de sel on each cookie. (Note: this is out of the NYTimes perfect chocolate chip cookie recipe from this summer, and I think it's brilliant. I can't remember the last time I craved a chocolate chip cookie, but the cookies with salt are crave-worthy. But I've been told it's not universally beloved, so since most of this batch is being shipped out, I only put salt on the ones I was keeping for myself.)
8/ Bake for 9 minutes. (They won't look like they're done, but the sugar will continue cooking even when they're out of the oven.)
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Sunday, September 21, 2008
Guarunteed Happiness
Seriously, the best ever. Thanks to KZ (and family) for spreading the joy over to the West Coast!!
Friday, September 19, 2008
things that look like poop
My ex-housemate Gretchen is known for her pithy and accurate life observations. Once, when one of us was apologizing that the dinner we'd made looked like, well, crap, Gretchen pointed out that "we've eaten tons of things that looked like poop and they were fantastic!" That's how I feel about this casserole. It's not much of a looker, but, oh man, is it tasty.
I celebrated my oven being fixed by making up a double recipe of this baby yesterday, which means that I also packaged up lunches for today and all next week.
It's the Caribbean Sweet Potato Gratin from Moosewood New Classics. I don't feel right posting the recipe, because you should all own this cookbook if you don't already. I'm actually trying very hard to think of any cookbook that has made me as happy. Which is saying a lot because I'm very fond of my cookbooks. (Maybe my waffle cookbook. Maybe.) But, basically, it's sweet potatoes, rice, black beans, and spinach layered with a coconut milk/lime juice/garlic/thyme mixture and topped with a cornmeal topping. And fantastic. Just writing about it makes me want to go heat up some. Luckily, I have plenty that didn't get packed into lunches, so that's an option. (If you're really unconvinced about buying New Classics, other people have posted the recipe online, so go to them.)
PS: I am shocked that this blog has gone so long without having a "sweet potato" label. Seriously.
Thursday, September 18, 2008
run, do not walk
To your nearest grocery store. Or I might beat you there and buy out all of the Canadian Dry Green Tea Ginger Ale. Because it's just that amazing. And I've already done so at one grocery store and a Target. (To my limited credit, that was only a total of 3 12-packs.) And, look, it's not just me who thinks so. But I may be the first to point out that it's basically canned Tea Sparkle. So until Argo opens up on the East Coast, I'll keep stocking up on the Green Tea Ginger Ale.
Sunday, September 14, 2008
ugly but amazing
I wanted pancakes all day yesterday, so I was thrilled to discover that I did, indeed, have baking powder and could make them. I used the yogurt variation of the super-simple Everyday Food recipe. (I used Trader Joe's vanilla yogurt for the yogurt.) This isn't my usual pancake recipe, but that one is in a box somewhere and this produced a completely delicious dinner. I managed not to eat all of them yesterday, so I could reprise this meal today.
Thursday, July 31, 2008
best proxy eva
This is only slightly a food post. But I thought this would be a good place to point out that lattes really are more delicious when they're drunk with a large dose of self-satisfaction. And when you've got two large doses of self-satisfaction, nothing could be better. Except maybe having people in your life who know how good it feels to pat yourself on the back.
Sunday, July 6, 2008
Dirty Rice
I was just thinking about how sad it was that there had been so few posts to the food blog. Probably a sign that none of us have time to cook. But, since I've left the firm, I've had time to cook a few things. So here's the first post. Most of you probably wont like this, but I think it's really tasty so. . .
Paul Prudhomme makes this thing called dirty rice. When my parents gave me a 10lb. bag of basmatti rice I started seeking out ways to use it. I have been making a very modified version of this recipe all year, but it has been overwhelmingly hot every time. This time however, just right, so finally post worthy.
Ingredients:
- red pepper, chopped (green too if you're feeling adventurous)
- onion, chopped
- two large chicken breasts, cut into bite sized pieces (you could substitute this with tofu I think)
- two links chicken sausage, cut into bite sized pieces
- 2+ cups of chicken broth (you can sub. vegetable broth if you want)
- 2 tbs. olive oil
Spices:
- 1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
- 1.5 teaspoon salt
- 1.5 teaspoon, sweet paprika
- .5 teaspoon dry thyme
- 1 teaspoon cumin
- 2 bay leaves
- .5 teaspoon oregano leaves
- 2 teaspoons minced garlic
Directions:
1. Chop everything up. Put the vegetables and the garlic in the pot and cook them with a little bit of olive oil.
2. Once the vegetables are soft, put the meat, in the pan. Cook it alone for about one minute.
3. Add everything else (the spices, the rice, and the broth).
4. Let it simmer until all the liquid is dissolved and the rice is tender. You might need to add more broth if it looks like it's drying out before the rice is soft.
Eat. This is a great meal to take to work or to eat on the go. I think everything meet could be replaced with a fake meat product or tofu without having a negative result.
Pesto, it can happen to anyone
I'm growing basil in a pot on my back porch, and it's producing like crazy. Thus, every so often, I am forced forced to trim off big bunches. And as everyone knows, big bunches of basil means pesto making.
However, I don't tend to keep pinenuts (a key pesto ingredient) on hand, but I tend to forget this until the basil is pureed with lots of olive oil. What to do?
This time, I had a bunch of pecans so I threw some of those in, and while I wasn't totally sure, it actually turned out really tasty. Not a pure pesto, but it had an interesting, meaty (like hearty, not like meat) flavor. I know am curious what other nuts will do to the basil and olive oil mix. Or what about different oils?? Sesame? I don't know, but I would love to hear if anyone else has experimented with this, and what they have discovered.
Saturday, July 5, 2008
The Best and Easiest Sorbet Ever
Hopefully some of you remember the delicious banana, pineapple, and other fruit sorbets that came out of Elizabeth and Keren's kitchen back when that room was shared between the two of us. 
I realized the recipe for those desserts wasn't on this blog, and was sad for us all. Thus, Banana Sorbet, and some variations. Please include your own!
Step 1: Dissolve half a cup of sugar in half a cup of boiling water, making sure to stir until sugar is dissolved. Let cool slightly, and then refrigerate until cold.
Step 2: In a food processor or blender, puree 2 medium bananas and 2 tablespoons of lemon juice until smooth. Add the sugar syrup. Pour the mixture into a 9-inch square metal pan. Freeze until solid, several hours or overnight.
Step 3: Break the sorbetto into chunks. Place in food processor and puree until smooth and creamy. Enjoy!
Other sorbets follow the same pattern, with differing amounts of syrup.
Pineapple sorbet: 3 cups of pineapple and 1 cup of water and sugar for the syrup.
Blueberry sorbet: 1 pint blueberries and 1 cup of water and sugar for the syrup.
Chocolate calls for milk (2 cups) with 1/4 cup sugar dissolved in it, and 3 ounces chocolate melted into that. (This I may have to try...)
Saturday, June 28, 2008
Chocolate Macaroons
I bought a chocolate macaroon this afternoon, and it was so good, it prompted me into FINALLY making the macaroons from the ingredients that have been residing in my pantry since KZ told me "Make them, they're easy!"
Since her recipe is for normal macaroons, I hired consultants to figure out how to adjust for chocolate.
There were lots of versions, but I wanted one that called for the ingredients I had. Apparently, it's the "southern" way. Southern Illinois, maybe?
Cook Time: 12 minutes
Ingredients:
* 1 can (14 ounces) sweetened condensed milk
* 3 squares (3 ounces) unsweetened chocolate
* 1/4 teaspoon salt
* 8 ounces shredded coconut
* 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Preparation:
Generously grease cookie sheet.
Combine condensed milk, chocolate, and salt in the top of a double boiler. Cook over boiling water, stirring frequently, until chocolate is melted and mixture is thick; remove from heat. Add coconut and vanilla; stir to mix well. Drop by rounded tablespoons about 1 inch apart on prepared cookie sheet(s). Bake at 350° for 10 to 12 minutes, or until cookies are set. Remove chocolate macaroons from cookie sheets to wire rack to cool completely.
Makes 2 to 3 dozen chocolate coconut macaroons.
The double boiler is probably unnecessary, but since I have one, I like to use it when possible.
Final judgment: yum!
Saturday, January 19, 2008
Party Popcorn!
This is also from Iron Chef: Popcorn for New Year's, and also from Nigella Express (Nigella Lawon).
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 cup (unpopped) popcorn
4 tablespoons butter
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
2 teaspoons ground cumin
2 teaspoons ground paprika
4 teaspoons table salt
4 teaspoons sugar
1. Put the oil into the biggest pan you with a lid over high heat, add the popcorn, and quickly put on the lid.
2. Let the popcorn pop, shaking the pan every now and then to keep the kernels moving. You will hear it, but don't be tempted to look, unless you want to get shot at, and once it has stopped popping - a couple of minutes or so - take it off the heat.
3. Melt the butter with the spices, in another pan, salt, and sugar, then pour it over the popcorn and put everything into a large paper shopping bag. Fold the top over to hold in the popcorn.
4. Shake, shake, and shake the bag again to mix the popcorn and get it thoroughly coated in the spicy butter.
5. Arrange in several party bowls.
Makes 12 cups.
Sweet Corn Chowder with Toasted Tortillas
This is the soup from our famed Iron Chef: Popcorn for New Year's edition. The recipe is from Nigella Express (Nigella Lawson). I'll type the recipe as it reads in the book (I'd hate for you to miss things like "...serve immediately to very grateful people") and then comment on our modifications below.
Ingredients:
6 cups frozen sweet corn, defrosted
3 scallions, each one trimmed and halved
1 clove garlic, peeled
1/4 cup semolina
6 cups hot vegetable stock made from concentrate or bouillon cubes
15 cups lightly salted tortilla chips
2 cups grated cheese
2 long red chiles, deseeded and finely chopped, optional
1. Preheat oven to 400 F.
2. Drain the corn and put into a food processor with the scallions, garlic, and semolina. Blitz to a speckled primrose mush; unless you have a big food processor you may have to do this in two batches.
3. Tip this mixture into a large saucepan; add the hot vegetable stock, and bring to a boil, then turn down the heat and let the chowder simmer, partially covered, for 10 minutes.
4. Meanwhile, spread the tortilla chips out on an aluminum foil-lined baking sheet and sprinkle over the cheese. Warm in the hot oven for 5-10 minutes or until cheese melts over the chips.
5. Ladle the soup into bowls and put a small mound of cheese-molten chips into the middle of each bowl. Sprinkle over some of the red chile, if you feel like it, and serve immediately to very grateful people.
Our modifications:
We couldn't find red chiles, so we bought serranos and also roasted some red bell peppers. We pureed the red peppers and added them to the processed corn. KZ wrangled the serranos, and we added them chopped to the mix. I think the serranos added a nice kick!
Using the tortilla chips was actually important with the addition of popcorn to the top of the soup, as we figured the tortilla chips would offer a nice buffer to keep the popcorn from turning to mush so quickly. Plus, it was the perfect opportunity to use the delicious red and green tortilla chips.
The popcorn topping the soup is "Party Popcorn" which will be my next blog entry.
Friday, January 4, 2008
Popcorn O'Rama
Sometime this fall, Columbia Law School held an iron chef competition. Since I have no friends at Columbia (at least none with demonstrated cooking ability), I decided this would not be a viable competition for me, though it did seem like a lot of fun. Then in a late night phone conversation, Hannah and I decided this would be a fun New Years "weekend" activity. So, on January 1, the throw down took place.
The logistics of the process were as follows: There were four of us competing. We decided to make a four course meal with an amuse-bouche for each team (so six courses in all). Each person put a secret ingredient into a hat and we chose. The chosen ingredient (as the title of this post suggests) was popcorn (my pick). I was scorned for this selection at every step of the way, but I maintain that it provided a good amount of challenge and some tasty results. After we had an ingredient we selected teams and courses and the game began.
I'll leave it to everyone to post their individual recipes, and I think Hannah took some pictures of the whole thing that are pretty amusing. In the process of preparing the recipes, two patterns emerged: (1) grind up the popcorn and use it as a substitute for bread crumbs/flour or (2) season the popcorn and add it to things you already like.
While we never engaged in any official scoring, Hannah unilaterally declared that she and Elizabeth won because, while Christine and I won for taste (no bias here - this was her declaration), we lost badly on plating (because she claims we copied her). While I readily concede that we did serve little shot glasses of Corona with our amuse-bouche (copying their shot glass of milk), there were no further instances of copying in the plating department. Since taste is worth 10 points and plating only 5, I submit it must be a wash at best (the other scoring category is originality, an area where I think we pretty much tied). Regardless of score, it was a pretty fun time, even though I think most of us are not too anxious to see any more popcorn for quite some time.
Here's the menu:
Lessons Learned (if we ever decide to do this again):
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