A New Day

Today is an exciting day. Today I am reinventing my blog.
Joy in the Kitchen has been great but I would like to introduce:

enJOY food

A blog centered around a happy, natural approach to food.

I'm kicking it off with a month of daily blogs!
Check it out and tell your friends.

This Weeks Menu

I am going to attempt to post weekly menus again. We will see how it goes this time, I just need to find a format I feel good about.

Day One
Carrot Soup and Grilled Eggplant Salad

Day Two
Croque Monsieurs (french ham and cheese saucy sandwiches)

Day Three
Mediterranean Pizza with on spiced flat bread with feta, olives and artichokes

Day Four
Fish Tacos with Cabbage Salad and Avocado

Day Five
Moroccan Chicken Skewers with couscous

These recipes all come from a new book I received for Christmas and is great if you have an herb and vegetable garden because it uses lots of fresh herbs.

Yellow Tomatoes And Blue Eggs

What are you eating this week? And let me know if you need any of these recipes.

New York Anyone?

Introducting my new favorite: Corned Beef on Rye


Okay well it isnt a new favorite, I've loved it for a long time, but I've never tried to make it until now.

I used The Bread Bible's Rye Recipe (it's perfect)
This Corned Beef Recipe, and its amazing when you make something and it tastes just like what you would get at a deli
And we bought saurkraut, thousand island dressing and swiss cheese. Sorry, I know you are disappointed I didn't make though.

Try it, you won't be disappointed.

Fresh Fruit Terrine

What is a terrine? Basically it is a yucky pressed meaty concoction that you eat cold. Pate-ish? Yes.

Not my thing. I do like the concept though, fruit and vegetable terrines are far more delicious.

I came up with this terrine when trying to come up with a healthy dessert. It's like the fancy version of your mother's fruit jello.

Ingredients:

• 4 cups mixed fruit such as berries, cut really thin, leave berries whole (I used pears, blackberries, blueberries, kiwi, etc)
  
• 2 3/4 teaspoons unflavored gelatin (from two 1/4-oz envelopes)
• 2 cups apple juice, or some other clear juice (white grape would be good)
  
• 2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice

1. Put 1/2 cup of juice in a bowl and sprinkle gelatin over juice, let sit for 5 minutes
2. Get a loafpan and line it in saran wrap
3. Layer fruit attractively but not TOO tightly
4. Warm in microwave very slowly until it is just barely liquified, do not overheat
5. Pour the gelatin into the rest of the juice and stir
6. Pour juice over fruit and make sure it works it's way all the way to the bottom
7. Make sure it reaches the top and wrap saran wrap over the top
8. Refrigerate with a weight on it so that the bubbles come out
9. Freeze if you plan on eating it in the next few hours
10. Unwrap right before serving and serve with whip cream

Buy It, Read It, Love It, Eat It

Top 10 Reasons to Buy this Book:

1. Its about Cakes
2. It covers every aspect of cakes you can think of
3. Every recipe is about three pages long because she explains things so well
4. It's the only cake book you will ever need
5. You will gain a great understanding of baking just by reading it
6. You can learn to decorate cakes
7. The recipes are easy, almost foolproof
8. The author loves baking and teaching which makes for a good cookbook
9. If you like this book she has others
10. Because I love it and know you will too

11. Because this book taught me to make these beauties

Buy It, Read It, Love It, Eat It

Homemade Pasta Recipe

1 cup AP flour
1 egg
1 T olive oil
salt and pepper
1-3 T water


1. Put flour in medium bowl and add salt and pepper
2. Make a well in the flour and drop in egg and olive oil
3. Start mixing with with a fork, once it is mixed well, add as much water as necessary to no longer by crumbly
4. Pour out on counter and knead until the dough is smooth
5. Wrap in saran wrap and refrigerate for at least 20 minutes
6. Press and cut dough, boil

A Note: Cook dough right after cutting so that it does not stick. Put in a bowl mixed with olive oil and reboil right before serving.

Pesto and Homemade Pasta

I am excited about this picture. It makes me remember how good homemade pasta is.

Pesto is one of my very favorite sauces for many reasons.

Number one: I love herbs and garlic
Number two: You don't have to cook it
Number three: It can be changed to meet what you have
Number four: It's cheap (as long as you grow your own herbs)

Joy's Pesto Sauce

2 cloves garlic
2 handfuls of herbs (usually basil, I used arugula and parsley for this batch because my basil is so sad)
1/4 c parmesan, or a similar cheese
1 lemon's zest
1/4-1/2 c nuts, toasted (traditionally pine nuts, I use walnuts usually because they are cheaper and work well)
salt and pepper
olive oil

1. Blend in a food processor the garlic, zest and nuts
2. Add the herbs, blend
3. Add the cheese, salt and pepper
4. Add olive oil until it resembles this
It will be really thick but I prefer to thin it out with pasta water(the water in the pot after you boil pasta. It's healthier, cheaper, and makes the pesto stick to the pasta really well.

On the side I served Veggie "Meatballs". I used the rest of the filling from the Stuffed tomatoes, shaped them into balls and put on a baking sheet with olive oil and cheese on top. Bake until it is really browned.

Vegetarianism Revisited- Stuffed Tomatoes

For a brief moment last year, about a month, I was for the most part a vegetarian. An i eat fish and dairy products vegetarian. I can't remember the name for it, but it made me feel good. No heartburn, I could work out even right after dinner, it was a good way to live. Then Christmas came and with it a month spent at my parents as well as my husband's parents houses. Both families are definitely meat eaters and have a hard time even imagining a dinner without meat. Therefore I ate meat in December. A lot of meat (don't get me wrong I enjoyed it, but....). I have to say not only I but also John both need a break (John is more to do with the fact that he has been eating in restaurants for a month). So I am back. I am returning to my semi-regular vegetarian meals and my stomach has been thanking me this week.

Dinner last night was delicious. Very easy, and tasty and so veggie filled. It was a take on something that was made for me once in Paris. Except when I was offered it there it was stuffed with nearly raw ground beef- no thank you.

Veggie Stuffed Tomatoes

1 small zucchini or squash, grated
1/4 onion, grated
2 small new potatoes, grated
1 artichoke heart, diced
1 T sun dried tomatoes, diced
1/2 egg(or mustard, just a little something to hold the ingredients together)
1/4 c bread crumbs
1/4 c grated parmesan, or any cheese you wish
salt, pepper, garlic powder
2 tomatoes

1. Mix all ingredients but tomatoes together
2. carefully cut the core out of the tomatoes. The using a spoon carve out the seeds in the tomatoes so you have a hollow shell (its easier than it sounds), try to keep the tomato in 1 piece
3. salt and pepper the inside of the tomatoes and spoon in filling, add extra cheese on top
4. Bake at 375 degrees for 45 minutes to an hour until the tomato is slightly shriveled and the cheese is browned.
5. I served with pasta as a main course but it could also make as excellent appitizer

My New Favorite Rice

I love rice, it's quick, easy and feels like a whole meal when you put in in a bowl. Just like Jack in the Box's new commercials.

1/2 onion chopped
1 cup rice
2 t cumin
2 t chile powder
salt and pepper
1 T sugar
1 1/2 c canned tomatoes
1/2 c lemon juice

Saute Onion. Add rice and spices. Add everything else and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low and cook with lid on for 20 minutes (don't remove the lid!) Turn off stove and let rest for 15 minutes. Serve. So good!

DECEMER ...

oh yah....

I had a lot of high hopes for December. Healthy habits, getting healthy, instead

My life turned a little more upside down.

John was "temporarily transferred" to the o.c. and I moved into my parents house for the interim. It was the best option to be close to John but still be able to get things done during the day.

I have cooked...
maybe one meal in the last month.

Do you have a mother? Is she a great cook?

Exactly.

I feel rusty, I feel out of place and I need my kitchen back.

Hence the lack of blogging. It is difficult to write about cooking when you aren't cooking.

What have I been doing:

I've been typing up:
my mom's recipe collection (thank you iphoto book)
my grandmothers recipes (thank you blurb)

From this I have learned:

How much recipes have changed in the last hundred years, do you even know what suet is?
How time consuming writing a cookbook is, but at the same time how incredibly worthwhile to preserve something of worth.
How grateful I am for history, for the women who came before me.

What does the future bring:

Some more finishing touches for my Grandma's book
Finishing a never-ending old-fashioned quilt (but that's more my sister's specialty)
Moving back to my own house... next week... I hope I hope!
More recipes, coming soon,
because I need to get

JOY back in the KITCHEN