A Quick Fix

Today I am sick. So sad. The sick where you are completely exhausted and can barely make it off the couch. But I am hungry. I already had pb&j for lunch, and my husband is at work late so I went to my quick fix. It's fast, easy and delicious.

Sick Day Pasta for One

Ingredients:
1 T butter
1 T balsamic vinegar
1 clove garlic, minced
1 t mustard
2 T Romano/Parmesan cheese
salt and pepper
1/4 pound of pasta

Cook pasta. Mix other ingredients in bowl. Add pasta. And some pasta water to pasta if sauce is too thick to stick to the noodles. Yup it really is THAT easy.

Enjoy and feel better!

Perfection from Imperfection

Yesterday I made EMPANANDAS. I've made empanadas before but I used a new dough recipe and they just didnt turn out as good as usual. The dough was a little tough and just didn't look very INSPIRING. I decided to see the good in it though. I had extra cheesy-corn-tomato filling though and thought, why not bake the empanadas again with the extra sauce all over them. My husband dubbed them ENCHINADAS and they were perfectly lovely.

The only thing that can truly ruin food is too much salt, anything else is fixable. Be creative, give it a chance, and find a solution.

Exactly How Big is a Spoonful of Sugar?

Here is a beginning lesson or reminder of measurement conversions, once you can remember these it makes it a lot easier to half/double recipes.

Volume Measurements:

3 teaspoons= 1 tablespoon
2 tablespoons= 1 ounce
8 oz= 1 cup
2 cups= 1 pint
2 pints= 1 quart
4 quarts= 1 gallon

Measuring with weight is always more precise than volume. This is handy in baking because the more accurate you are the better the product will be. The reason weight is more precise is because 1 cup of flour one day can weigh more than it does another day depending upon how compacted it is. So if a recipe calls for weight try to measure accordingly and not convert it to cups as it will not be nearly as accurate.. Water, milk, juice and egg whites are the only things that have the same weight as they do volume.

And remember when cooking that measurements are not nearly as important. I rarely measure anything with cooking. Once you get the feel for spices and how much they impact your food it will be second nature to add spices without worrying that you are over/under spicing. The most important thing with cooking I can say is to TASTE things. It's a lot easier to fix something that is still in the pan than something that is on the table.

Why My Feet Are SO DIRTY

Today one of my dreams came true. I know am the proud tender of my very own vegetable garden. We made the framework for the box garden a few months ago, but because of the hot arizona summer we decided to wait to plant until Fall. Today was the day. Two tons of dirt, 3 trips to home depot, too much raking dirt, and one plant shopping trip later we have a garden.

This fall I planted:

Roma Tomatoes
Broccoli
Eggplant
Anaheim Peppers
Artichokes
Butter Lettuce
Zucchini

Some of these are supposedly great for winter here, others we are just hoping, praying will work (tomatoes) because we miss garden fresh ones so dearly. I also bought new basil, more thyme, rosemary and mint(mint mostly because it smells so pretty). I put those in pots beside the garden, for one because I got overly ambitious on what could fit in the garden and for two I thought it gave the garden some nice variance. We also put in a drip line for easy watering and put up some temporary (homemade) sunshades to keep the still 105 degree sun off the plants.

And now, I am in heaven.

The Skinny on Fats

I have a lot of opinions on fats. I believe in butter. I’ve never bought margarine and never plan on it. I use Crisco to practice my cake decorating but that is just because it’s cheap. I don't actually eat the frosting I make out of it. And I don’t use lard. I put a piece of bacon into a meal and will use that as the fat in the meal. And I love olive oil.

MY REASONS:

Butter- Butter melts at mouth temperature. If you have ever noticed a filmy taste on the roof of your mouth after a dessert, 9 times out of 10 its because they used some other fat. It can be harder to work with at times, but I think it is worth it. And I just don’t believe margarine is healthier than butter. Yes limit your intake, but it you are going to do something, I say do it right. Go with unsalted for ALL BAKING and COOKING. Only use salted for toast or sandwiches (I have to admit a love for salted butter, I though it was just amazing restaurant butter until I found out that all we had in my house growing up was unsalted, but I still never buy salted. It helps me eat less because I never smear it on bread)

Bacon- one piece of bacon thrown into a sauce or pasta or pizza can add so much flavor. And one piece of bacon isn’t going to hurt you. We never cook bacon for breakfast, it is always an ingredient, not a menu item. Using it this way gives great fat flavor that goes farther.

Olive Oil- It is the good kind of fat and delicious. If you don’t like the strong flavor or high price go for one that isn’t extra virgin. Save that for when you want that flavor (salads, dips, etc.)

Canola/Vegetable Oil- It is cheap, has little flavor and it good for making brownies or quickly sautéing something. Really that is the only reason I use it. Use it when you don’t want the fats flavor to be noticeable.

Easy, Wonderful Rice

I grew up hating rice. That white sticky stuff that had no flavor, and just seems to stick in my throat on the way down-- no thank you.

Then I went to culinary school. Apparently there is rice out there that has flavor. Now rice pilaf and risotto are two of my favorite meals. My rice pilaf is a mexican rice, but can be easily altered to work for any kind of meal.

Ingredients:

1 cup long grain white rice (the normal stuff)
2 cups water
1/2 onion, diced
1 chipotle in adobo, minced
1 clove garlic, minced
1 T red chile powder
1 t cumin
salt & pepper

In a pot saute onion in a little oil on medium heat. Once it is soft add the chipotle and garlic. Add the rice and stir to coat with the oil. Add spices and mix again. Add the water and wait for it to come to a boil. Once it boils put on the lid and turn the heat down to something low. On my stove that is three, but it could be different on yours, you'll just have to test some batches until it comes out just right. Leave it for 20 MINUTES. DO NOT LIFT THE LID. After that time turn off the heat and let it sit for 15 more minutes. This is a test of your patience, you must still not life the lid. After that time is up you can unveal your rice. It will look very compact. Take a fork and fluff it, and you should have PERFECT rice.

You can change out almost anything in the recipe. The big point is to have 2:1 liquid to rice. We sometimes do half broth/ half water, or add some mexican marinade to the liquid. I personally do not recommend doing all broth if it is store bought as it tends to have a strong flavor that gets a little unpleasant in big quantites. Sometimes we add corn, tomatoes or cooked spinach to the rice after it is cooked to give it more color. With rice, the more flavor the better, make it a vehicle for all the flavors you love. It is such a big part of every major nations cuisine because it is such a good background(and it's cheap, which isn't a bad thing either).

Simply Elegant Dessert

Panna Cotta? What's that?

Panna Cotta is an absolutely delicious Italian dessert. It is a bit like mousse, but I think is even better. It is so simple to make. I usually make a vanilla bean panna cotta, but you can easily change the flavorings to suit what you like. I like it as vanilla though because it is an excellent backdrop to adorn with any fresh fruit.

Ingredients:

1 1/4 cup milk
1 1/4 cup cream
1/4 cup sugar
1 3/4 tsp gelatin
3 TBL cold water
1 vanilla bean, split

1. put water in a small bowl. Sprinkle with the gelatin slowly so it absorbs. Do not stir, and let sit for at least 5 minutes.
2. scald milk and cream with vanilla in it to infuse the milk with the vanilla flavor.
3. microwave gelatin for 5 seconds! do not overheat, it will destroy the gelatin. If it isn't liquid microwave it for 5 seconds again.
4. strain milk to remove the outside of the bean, it should be smooth but have the vanilla speckles. add the gelatin. keep stirring over a bowl of ice so that the temperature starts to come down. The mixture must be partially set before you put it in the mold in order for the vanilla beans to not all sink to the bottom.
5. pour into molds. You can either make one big panna cotta, or personal sized ones. Refrigerate until it is set, you can even freeze them to work faster. Once they are set in the molds you can warm up the outside of the molds with you hands to extract the panna cottas.

I hope you enjoy!

Something new for Me

I love APRONS. It's a byproduct of my love for clothes and love for food. ANTHROPOLOGIE has some of the most adorable aprons you'll ever see, for a pretty reasonable price. But after months of thinking about it...


Today I made an Apron. It was surprisingly easy, I've just been so scared to make one for a while because believe me, I am no SEAMSTRESS. I love it!

My favorite parts, the pockets, the hemp ricrac, the wide waistband and the pleats.

WHAT are you SCARED to do? WHAT do you think is OVER YOUR HEAD? Because there is a good chance you are UNDERESTIMATING yourself.

Thirty in Thirty

I recently heard of a man who ran 50 marathons in fifty days. My sister's idea seems less daunting. 30 blogs in 30 days. She has started this with her blog (plaidsandprints.blogspot.com), so for anyone who needs a creative outlet, or a few quick ideas or hints, now is a good time to check her out.

So here is day one of my thirty.

INTERNATIONAL COOKING sometimes seems overwhelming. You decide to make something and then REALIZE you can't even PRONOUNCE some of the spices, let alone have them in your pantry. But international food is AMAZING. There is so much you might not even REALIZE you are missing. Last night we had GREEK night.

Menu:

Grilled Chicken with a LEMON vinaigrette
SPANAKOPITA
Cucumber TZATZIKI Salad
and for dessert:

Apple Toffee BAKLAVA

YUMMY! And honestly it was all so easy. My tip of the day:

COOKING AROUND THE WORLD FOR DUMMIES

That's right. We even used this book as a textbook in my international cooking class. It is excellent, has great recipes and really breaks things down well. I'm a bit of a SNOB though, so mine is wrapped in brown paper, because it is a bit embarrassing to have a dummies book.

So now there's no excuse.

I am feeling INDIA later this week, but likely a QUICK TRIP to ITALY first.

So the QUESTION is WHERE are you going this week?