Monday again

I think the best I can hope for is updating once a week. Until I start cooking more regularly. Last week I made some good ones... a night of Spaghetti Squash, not that exciting but delicious poor man's garlic bread on the side.

Thursday I made a recipe from Dinner, A Love Story, a site that M sent me, and I've fallen in love with it. The writing style is engaging and she just seems more like a real person than any of the other writers and her meals are much more realistic for impatient, hungry, resource starved me. The recipe I made was Lemony Chicken and Greenbeans (found here) which I did not make the morning before but rather that night, and it was good, if a bit too lemony, even though I only used one lemon instead of two... but it was still really good and so were the potatoes. I'm a sucker for potatoes and their multiple forms. Mmm.

Friday, my roommate took a page from Smitten Kitchen and made one of the most delicious and tantalizing lasagnas I have ever eaten. I know it's stupid but being the carnivore that I am, I have a hard time taking lasagna seriously if it doesn't have meat in it. This was so creamy and delicious, I didn't even care, and surprisingly, despite it's heft, I didn't want to bust out the fat pants after I had a slice. Paired with a salad and a nice vinaigrette, it was incredibly satisfying.

Tonight I'm venturing to DMK with a few friends from a past life to catch up and get my burger on. No matter how many food justice classes I take I'm still going to be enamored by (grass-fed) beef...

until we eat again,
a

Just another manic Monday

So this blog is really, really sad. I think we post about once a month. Obviously our contributions to the world of cooking and baking are not earth-shattering, BAM-inspiring, or food-network-type genius, but darnit, I'm going to update this blog more regularly. I like writing on the internet, even if nobody reads it, because I like food and I like writing, and that's all there is to it.

After a weekend of hardcore partying (truthfully, it was just a string of late nights due to poor movie time decisions and ...babysitting) I woke up quite late on Sunday morning/early afternoon. I walked for a while and toyed with the idea of going out to breakfast but eventually was won over by a place I walked by with a vegan friend of mine a few weeks ago, Chicago's Dog House. (Why we did not go in together should be self-explanatory via the menu.) Lured in by the tantalizing idea of bratwurst (I'm a sucker for meat! this is difficult because I'm taking a food justice class and it just makes me want to go all out vegetarian but to give up hamburgers and bacon and sausage just seems like too much for me right now), I ended up going for a Wild Boar Dog, with melted brie and raspberry sauce, topped with sauteed mushrooms. I went all out and ordered a side of "frips" which are basicaly just pieces of potato curled through an apple peeler corer slicer and fried up (sweet potato frips... mmm) and the side turned out to be an entire basket, which I also devoured in short order.

Since my phone is a piece and I don't carry my camera with me at all times, you'll just have to believe me that this was a phenomenal lunch and completely hit the spot at 2 pm on a Sunday when I should have been eating an omelette or something a little more appropriate. Whatever.

Later that evening I went to potluck at M's and we had delicious chili, cornbread, broccoli slaw, and brownies with Reese's in the middle. It was wonderful. I'm hoping to start eating at home more because it's just ridiculous how little I cook when it's just me, and then I wonder why I feel like crud all the time. Plus, despite what Hollywood tells you, kids, real grownups do NOT go out to eat 24/7.

Tonight I'm hoping to make half a spaghetti squash and maybe some garlic cheese bread or something. It's sunny and the sky is quite blue but it's also a bit colder than I would like, so to tuck in with that sounds like my idea of a nice evening. Ah, not having a television really is quite eye-opening sometimes. Amish country feels closer every day.


talk soon,
a

First Meals

I moved recently. Away from the train and the dirt and the scary downstairs neighbors. Into a quieter part of town, next to a house that has a baby swing hanging from the tree out front, and on a street that's having a block party in two weeks. So I've moved from a somewhat young, central, hip neighborhood to straight up suburbia. Not that there's anything wrong with that... so far. I just have a hard time believing that the neighborhood I currently reside in is actually part of Chicago at all.

The first meal I made in my new home was something I had attempted before, with success. White bean and tuna salad. Nothing fancy, but got me my core protein requirements :) After a week or so of eating take-out or restaurant food due to the total time-suck that is moving, this dish was perfect. I used cherry tomatoes from the garden, and a few leaves of basil as well. One can of white beans, one can of tuna, a generous sprinkling of garlic salt, pepper, and a splash of olive oil made it all come together nicely. The basil was so fragrant, the girl who lives on the third floor of the three flat was wandering through and poked her head in for a taste. To round it out (okay, I was starving, I'm not gonna lie here), I tossed it with a handful of penne pasta. Mmmmm. Other toss-ins can include red onion and whatever else is in your fridge.

I have also somewhat printed off a recipe from Smitten Kitchen for homemade tomato sauce (from scratch!) so the fruits of my labor will be posted as soon as I can find a few hours to squeeze in the simmering time. (3 hours?) Exciting stuff, folks!

Finally, here is a story from Serious Eats, another website I adore. I wish I was clever like this author. Alas, a girl can dream...

sushi school

Alex and I opted to spend our usual Friday night date learning about food rather than dining out. We took a hand-on sushi workshop at The Chopping Block at Merchandise Mart. Wednesday night I received a call from a class coordinator saying no one signed up but the 2 of us, and do we want to reschedule or is that okay. Our response was pretty much, "Is that okay? No, that's AWESOME." So we spent 2.5 hours with private attention from the sushi instructor. We learned how to make the rice, made shrimp tempura, spicy tuna rolls, and California rolls. We rolled inside out rolls, right side in rolls, and nigiri. We made a TON of sushi, what with it being just the two of us, and got to take over the leftovers. The cat enjoyed the leftover nigiri.

We enjoyed a 15% discount in their store on any tools or ingredients used in the class, so we bought 2 sushi mats, a pack of yaki nori (seaweed), and a bottle of sriracha hot chili sauce to make spicy tuna.

All in all, it turned out to be a great date, and I can't wait to make sushi at home! Below is a link to sushi instructions, as well as some important tips I learned. Enjoy!



Sushi rice should be seasoned with the following mixtures: 1 cup rice vinegar, 2 tablespoons sugar, and 2 teaspoons sea salt. Gently heat the mixture in the microwave or saucepan.

One skill you'll want to get down is cutting the rolls. Make sure not to press the knife down and smoosh the roll (you don't want to get to this point and have all of your hard work ooze out of the sides!). Use a sharp knife and use a quick sawing motion instead of a flattening chop.

Check out this site for all the deets!

cooking vs. baking

Everyone seems to have his or her preference. I'm not much into baking myself. But I never really thought about why until my recent food preparation revelation.

Despite the fact that I'm writing in a "food blog," I've never really been fond of working in the kitchen in any capacity. I love to eat, but I never found getting to that part to be much fun. Lately, however, I've grown sick of the regular marinara sauce from a jar (I eat a LOT of pasta) and have been throwing together random sauces involving olive oil, veggies, butter, whatever I have. It's nothing fancy, but it's been much more enjoyable, and I'm learning what works and what doesn't. This is what made me realize why I don't bake: it requires sticking precisely to the recipe. Sure, you can sometimes substitute this for that, but it doesn't always work that way. And it's not just the ingredients that are important; the order of the preparation is important, too.

I learned this a few months back when I was baking oatmeal raisin cookies with students at Chicago Youth Centers. Instead of sticking to the recipe and mixing wet ingredients, then dry ingredients, and then mixing the two together, I had the kids mix the ingredients in whatever order was convenient. Needless to say, the cookies were less than desirable. Baking = chemistry.

Cooking, on the other hand, allows a little more freedom. I can skip what I want to in the recipe. Don't like mushrooms? Toss 'em. Prosciutto too expensive? Just throw in some deli ham (or any meat, for that matter). I don't have to go to the grocery store to get the specific ingredients; I can just use what's already in my fridge.

So tonight, I made rigatoni with an olive oil and butter sauce, tossed with red onions, garlic chicken sausage, Italian seasonings, garlic seasoning, salt, and pepper, sprinkled lightly with parmesan. Because that's what I had. And it was delish.

The best freaking sandwich of your life

Tonight when I got home from work the apartment was approximately 9000 degrees. Poor Tobias is so hot all the time he just lays around and stares at you with his big beautiful eyes, begging to be put in an ice bath or something equally pleasant. I turned on the a/c and a few fans and tried to think of what I could possibly make for dinner that wouldn't be too difficult or hot.

I had the whole train ride home to ruminate, and I had switched back and forth from pasta to sandwich back to pasta but walking in the door and the wave of heat that awaited me was all the convincing I needed to switch back to sandwich for good. I had been making garlic bread with mozzarella on it for the past few nights and I decided a grilled cheese would hit the spot.

I don't usually experiment in the kitchen because it turns out horribly and just not as good as I imagined but grilled cheese is pretty hard to mess up. I melted some butter and sprinkled in herbs and garlic salt and mixed it up really well. Then I cut up the fresh mozzarella (which is the best mozzarella I have ever had, by the way.... I got it from Whole Foods and it has taken every ounce of will power not to eat the entire tub in one sitting... it's so good it doesn't even need anything on it, not even olive oil! I just eat it with a fork. om nom nom) and some (prepared, I'm ashamed to admit) pesto. At the last minute I threw a spoonful of tomato sauce on the other slice of bread, which already was layered with mozzarella. I heated the pan and put the two halves of the sandwich over high heat. I turned it down to almost nothing and covered the pan, and everything got nice and melty and bubbly. Then I flipped one side on top of the other and voila! Deliciousness.

I gobbled the whole thing immediately, and it was wonderful. I felt like a human being for the first time all day, and the prep and cook took maybe 15 minutes. If you're feeling less crazy ravenous, and would like to be more healthy (always a good thing), you could skip the butter and use olive oil instead. Otherwise, this is a good meatless dish, and the possibilities are endless: a place near our old apartment had M and I going for their brie, turkey, and apple paninis. Mmmm.

Thursday is the farmer's market at Daley Plaza, so expect updates from that soon :) I'm feeling a little fruit and veggie deprived. Last night I made some frozen green beans and was a bit sad. I was going to try and save some of that delectable mozzarella for a tomato salad thinger but I'm pretty sure that last piece of cheese will meet it's match sooner than Thursday. We shall see... in the meantime, keep on munching.

Comfort Food

This past week my Grandma died. It wasn't too sudden but it still took me by surprise, like death usually does. One of the last things I bought for her was a box of Zebra Cakes because apparently she ate them like a fiend. My uncle had bought her a few boxes (yes, boxes, not individual cakes) a few months ago and apparently she polished them off in a matter of days. Anywho, Grandma ended up being on a restricted diet lately and being the good granddaughter that I am I decided to eat the Zebra Cakes myself. I don't like to make a habit of eating before bed but after a long day I would crawl into bed with a book, a crossword and a pack of those little dudes and munch a little before bed. Make no mistake--these are not a fine pastry or delicacy. In fact, they have a cloyingly sweet aftertaste of something not quite natural. But I ate them anyway, thinking of Grandma as I munched and laughing to myself, thinking of her munching away as well, perhaps while watching the Golden Girls.

It's been a pretty crappy week all in all but one thing that has remained constant is the food: the massive amounts of food that have been showing up at Grandma's house, my family's house, the luncheon after the funeral, etc. M mentioned in an earlier post how hard it is to cook for one and how much better the food tastes when you have people to share it with. Food and comfort seem to just go together, it's the most natural response I can think of when I want to show someone how much I care about them. Sure, it takes more time than is necessary to whip up a batch of cookies (measuring, baking, cleaning, the whole nine yards) but that's the point. It takes a long time and generally (if you're doing it right) you're thinking about the recipient most of the time. And even though I've been really sad lately, not eating is the last thing Grandma would have wanted, as evidenced by the bulldozed boxes of Zebra Cakes :)

Thanks to all for the food, prayers and love.