Lifestyle Changes

Everyone goes through lifestyle changes. Usually several times in their lifetime. The changes could be the result of getting married (the new spouse might have habits worth adopting), having a baby (my mom quit smoking when she was pregnant with my brother), being done having babies (I joined Weight Watchers and lost 18 pounds and totally changed my eating habits), maybe moving to a new place, or just getting older and creakier.

Four or five years ago I joined Jazzercise and learned how to dance my way to fitness and lift weights. A few years after that I hit menopause and was too worn out and achy to jazz all the time, so I started yoga. 18 months ago I stopped eating meat. Two months ago I decided to add wild-caught fish back into my diet. A month ago I stopped drinking coffee in the morning. I thought I was stopping it altogether, and, truth be told, I haven't had any at all since I stopped, but I realize I may have some in the afternoons. The plan was to just stop turning my guts inside-out with coffee on an empty stomach. Three weeks ago I stopped drinking white wine in the evenings. It made me sleepy and then kept me awake in the middle of night. And the odd bottle would give me a raging, 3-day migraine. It turns out I like sipping cool herbal tea out my wine glasses just as much. I'm sure I won't stop drinking red in the winter, though. It's warming and good for the digestive system.

But I think probably the one change I made that has made the biggest difference in my life has been acupuncture. In March I went whining to an acupuncturist because of persistent problems with my left sciatic nerve and also bursitis in my left shoulder. She had me complete a three page questionnaire about pretty every system in my body and start whittling away at each item that was out of whack.

The first thing that went was the hip and shoulder pain. Then I began to warm up. I mean, like, my feet and hands were no longer cold. I even had a few hot flashes! Then my digestive system calmed down. Finally, my depression and anxiety began to dissipate. And now my migraines are much fewer and shorter. When I started with her in March I was taking a sleep medication, anti-depressant, anti-seizure (for persistent muscle tension), migraine medication and a statin drug for high cholesterol. Today I take the statin drug only. All in five months. I have the migraine prescription but don't use it very often. I have more energy, no anxiety, very few depression symptoms at all and my digestive system is perking along just fine. I'm back to jazzercise three times a week and yoga in-between.

I know acupuncture isn't for everyone. But for me? It's really been great. And I plan to keep it up.

MargaritaPizza

MargaritaPizza, a photo by Food Fanatic on Flickr.

I'm too lazy to look now, but I'm sure I've written too much about pizza already.

Lately I've been pre-baking the crust before assembly. I've been using bread dough I keep in my fridge (from the book "Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day"). I spread it out, slather it with ghee and pre-bake in a hot oven.
Top it, slide it in to finish and I'm done.

Cleaning out the Fridge

Minestrone, a photo by Food Fanatic on Flickr.

Minestrone is like the summer version of meatloaf (for carnivores) or frittata (for vegetarians). You just open the fridge and start pulling out all the stuff that needs to be used up before it spoils.

Today's version had:
Carrots
Fennel
Onion
Garlic
Kernels from 1 cob of roasted corn
about 1/3 can of leftover black beans
A couple of handfuls of a wild rice blend
Swiss Chard stems
Celery
2 cans of diced tomatoes
1 diced banana pepper
Some dried oregano, basil and red pepper flakes and a bay leaf
Seasoned to taste with salt
Garnished with fresh oregano

Roasted Corn Chowder

RoastedCorn, a photo by Food Fanatic on Flickr.

When you can't find what you want, sometimes you have to just whip out the knife, open the fridge, and start piling stuff up.

I had 4 leftover ears of roasted corn. They badly needed using. Usually I don't think about making soup-type stuff when it's 90 degrees out, but every once in a while it calls to you. That and the leftovers.

I like use my mandoline to strip corn from the cob. Yes, you can use a knife. If you don't mind flying bits of milky corn everywhere. With a mandoline, you just set depth and slice away. It's really quite slick!

If you don't have fresh corn, don't worry about it. Take frozen corn and push them around in a skillet with a tiny bit of fat, like ghee or oil. You don't want much oil because you don't want to saute, you are really looking for carmelization. I got about 2 1/2 cups of corn off my 4 cobs, so shoot for that amount. Set the corn aside.

First set of ingredients:

2 T Ghee or oil
2 or 3 medium-sized leeks, white and pale green parts, sliced and cleaned
1 small clove garlic, minced

saute until the aromatics are tender.
Add:

2 potatoes, peeled and diced
Milk-enough to just cover the mixture
1 Bay Leaf
1 tsp salt
2 or 3 grinds of black pepper
Red Pepper flakes to taste-I used about 1/2 tsp
1 tsp dried basil (Because my mom thinks corn on the cob should be eaten with basil. She's right.)

Bring this to a simmer and allow to cook until potatoes are tender. Then remove the bay leaf and, using an immersion blender or potato masher, mash up the mixture. Leave it a little lumpy. Some might like to take this out of the pot and blend in a blender, but I don't like to do this, as it tends to make the potatoes too starchy.

Add:
Corn kernels
1/2 red bell pepper, diced

Heat through, maybe 5 minutes.

There you go!

Ought I?

I've been hanging about all day, mulling over the 5 or 6 ears of leftover roast corn in the fridge. Thinking I made a corn chowder some time ago that had roasted corn in it. It rated a "we should have this again" from hubby. The problem? Can't find the recipe.

So I've been googling off and on, while reading "Street Lawyer," by John Grisham, and watching "Ugly Betty" reruns on Netflix (hey! It's summer! I don't HAVE to do ANYTHING!). And I can't really find anything.

Surely I blogged about said corn chowder when I made it...so I came here to my blog and did a search.

Nothing.

But Guilt. I've not written since April. Maybe I ought to do it again some more?  Write on the blog?

Ought I?

Phyllis's Eventful Day

So Phyllis had a rough day yesterday.

First, she had to go to Goodyear instead of her birthplace, Southtown Toyota. She tried not to act like a snob while she was in the company of all the gas-guzzling, metal riff raff. But it had to be endured. She had a tire problem and it had to be solved pronto.

Phyl had been telling her pet Karen that there was a problem with the tire, but Karen was so dense that she didn't realize the gravity of the situation. She also tends to get a bit lazy and just kept asking her friend, who she calls Mensa Boy, to put more air in there. Finally Mensa said he'd have to take it somewhere to be looked at.

There
Was
A
Problem

Well, by then it was Saturday and Goodyear or some other place was going to have to take care of it.

Yeah. They took care of it all right. The tire couldn't be fixed. It had to be replaced. And no, they did not have same brand of tire that Phyllis wears, so they put on another kind.


It feels alright. But Phyllis feels stigmatized by having one mis-matched tired. Deep down in her engine she's concerned that now she may be one step away from becoming riff raff herself.

Then last night there was the hailstorm. Phyllis had taken her pets to Rippington's in Waxhaw. Due to Karen's EXCELLENT parallel parking skills, she was able to sit right outside the front door and keep a headlight on her family while they ate. When the rain began she was good. A nice, massaging hard rain is good for the soul sometimes. And make no mistake: Phyllis HAS soul!

When the hail began Karen went out to check on her and really couldn't do much but offer comfort and encouragement. She found hail the size of marbles and worried a bit, but hoped that Phyllis's fiberglass body would be able to withstand it.

On the way home, in driving rain, Phyllis suddenly came upon a tree that had fallen across the roadway. It was pitch dark and the rain was coming down in sheets. Karen barely saw the tree in time, but she hit Phyl's brakes, which dutifully went into ABS mode, and swerved around the tree. It was like a reenactment of the old tire commercials. Phyllis delivered her pets home safe and sound and rested for the night in her garage.

Phyllis has no discernible damage from the hail. But she's still a little stung by the mis-matched tire.

For Want of a Roll of Toilet Paper

We had a library board meeting last night and sometime during the meeting, we heard the book security alarm go off in the library. You know those things you walk through and they beep if you have something that hasn't been scanned at the desk?

Richard, our Library Director, said that they've had a lot of problems with toilet paper being stolen from the bathrooms at the main branch. We all kind of looked quizzical at that point, but one of our members is the daughter of the founder of H.O.P.E. of Lancaster (Helping Other People Effectively). She said that food stamps don't cover toilet paper, so it's a big issue with needy folks.

Whaaat? That makes NO sense...

So when you are putting together some items to take to your local food pantry, through in a package of toilet paper while you're at it.

SHUT UP! I'M FINDING MY INNER PEACE!!!

Scene: Wednesday night yoga class. About 20 students.

Act 1: Cell phone goes off. It's a pleasant tune...Purcell's "Trumpet Tune." It's against the wall behind me. No one claims it. Eventually it stops ringing.

<5 minutes go by>

Act 2: Same Cell. Same tune. Same result.

<5 minutes>

Act 3: Same Cell. Same tune. Student in the middle of the class turns on her mat, stomps across the room, snatches the phone from her bag and stalks to the door. Before the door finishes closing I hear this violent stage whisper: "WHAT??? Stop calling!!! I'm in YOGA for God's sake! I'll call you back." She comes back into the room, puts the phone in the bag and goes back to her mat.

<10 minutes. Or so..>

Cell phone vibrates and stops.

Regular Ordinary Swedish Meal Time - Painful Patriotic Pancakes

Suck it Uuuuup!

The kids (and adults) at school have been very very tired these past several days. Ever since we "fell back" they are dropping heads onto their desks in every classroom. I myself had a couple of mornings where I allowed myself another hour of sleep. But I also had one morning where I got up on time and dozed off during a long hold in my yoga practice, and then caught myself snoring during meditation!

"Suck it up" seems to be the most-often-used phrase these days. Our nurse told me she has sleepy kids coming to the clinic saying they "don't feel good and just want to lay down." After a drawn-out argument where she tried to explain that we don't have naptime in school, she finally told the last kid to suck it up.

As she related this to me in the staff workroom that day, another teacher who was standing at the copy machine turned around and said she used the same phrase earlier in the day. "I told the student 'we're all tired,'" she related to us. "Then I said we pretty much all have to just suck it up."

I haven't been tired during the day, thank goodness. Fewer things are more miserable than being that sleepy at your desk. But I sure will be glad when the light comes on outside a little earlier.

Polenta Gratin with Leeks, Swiss Chard and Gruyere

Tonight's supper is from a recipe I found on NPR. It was a story called "Going with While Grains" that aired a year ago.

I've adapted this recipe to accommodate the fact that I don't have any dry white wine in the house. Actually no wine at all at the moment (*gasp!*). I've also added a few grates of nutmeg because I think I pretty much have to do that with chard or spinach. Just gotta.

Stuff you need:

6 C water
2 tsp salt
1 3/4 C yellow cornmeal
1 C grated Gruyere
2 T Olive oil
3 Leeks, thinly sliced and then washed
1 tsp dried rosemary or 1 T fresh, chopped
1 bunch Swiss chard-white or rainbow, separate leaf from ribs, chop and wash
Nutmeg
Juice of one lemon
Red pepper flakes
1/4 C grated Parmesan or Romano cheese
Salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 350.

Make the polenta: Bring the water to a boil with the salt. Whisk in the cornmeal. When it's all well-incorporated and bubbling, turn the heat down to simmer and monitor it for 15 minutes, giving it a stir periodically. Stir half the Gruyere into that. Season to taste. Set aside.

While the polenta is cooking, saute the leeks in olive oil until they begin to soften. Add in the chard. Start it cooking down and then stir in the lemon juice. Put in a couple of grates of fresh nutmeg, or 1/8 tsp. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Let it all cook down until the chard is completely wilted and the edge is taken off the lemon taste.

Grease a 9 x 13 pan. Spread half the polenta mixture on the bottom, layer on the greens, sprinkle the rest of the Gruyere, and then spread on the rest of the polenta. Top with the Parmesan or Romano, whichever you are using. Bake until golden brown and delicious, about 45 minutes.

Vegetable Shepherd's Pie-the recipe

Ok, here is the recipe for the Vegetable Shepherd's Pie. My buddy Debbie Burgess tells me to go ahead and publish it. I don't know the chef who created the dish, so my only way to credit her is to point to her website, Chef Mei, Personal Chef Service in Fayetteville, NC.

Here is the recipe with my editorial suggestions in red:

Vegetable Shepherd’s Pie

By Chef Mei, a personal chef. Given to me by Debbie Burgess


Topping
Mashed potato topping**
2 cloves minced garlic
1 tsp dried basil
2 T butter
1 tsp olive oil
1 T chopped parsley.

Filling
3 T olive oil
1 large onion, finely diced
2 small leeks (white parts only), halved lengthwise, sliced ½ inch thick and washed
8 ounces cremini mushrooms (I quartered these)
3 large carrots, cut into ¾-inch dice
3 medium parsnips, peeled and cut into ¾-inch dice (next time I make this, I might try sunchokes. I almost did this time because the grocery store appeared to be out. But the produce guy found some parsnips for me)
1 15-ounce canned cannellini or navy beans, rinsed and drained
1 C frozen peas, thawed
2 T chopped fresh thyme or 2 teaspoon dried
1 T chopped fresh rosemary or 1 teaspoon dried
1 750-ml bottle red Zinfandel or Burgundy wine
1 T Worcestershire sauce
2 tsp sugar
Salt and pepper
3 T butter, room temperature
3 T all-purpose flour
4 C vegetable broth heated in microwave
½ C chopped parsley, garnish

**Mashed Potato Topping

Boil 4 large potatoes until tender, 15-25 minutes. Peel and mashed potatoes with 4 tablespoons butter and ½ cup milk. Season to taste and set aside until ready to use. You can also add ½ cup Cheddar cheese to the mixture along with some chopped parsley. Topping is enough to cover a 9x15 baking dish.


Method

Filling: Heat olive oil in a large heavy pot over medium-high heat. Sauté onions for 2 minutes; add in leeks, stirring occasionally until softened, about 5 minutes.

Add mushrooms and and 1/2 teaspoon of sugar. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Turn heat down to medium and continue to cook until mushrooms give off liquid, about 5 minutes. Next add carrots, parsnips, and all the herbs. Simmer for about 8-10 minutes until vegetable begins to soften. Transfer vegetables to a bowl.

Add wine to the pot and boil until reduced to about 1 cup, about 10-15 minutes. While the wine is reducing, mix together butter and flour in a bowl to form a beurre manie.

Add vegetable broth (As I said in my last post, I think I’d put in only 3 cups of the broth to start, then add more if it’s needed. I felt like there was too much sauce, and too runny.), Worcestershire sauce, salt, pepper and 2 teaspoon sugar to wine and bring to a low simmer. Whisk in beurre manie until blended and bring to a simmer until sauce slightly thickens, about 4 minutes. Add back the vegetable mixture, thawed peas and beans. Simmer covered for about 25 minutes. Remove from heat and set aside.

Topping: While the filling simmers, prepare mashed potato topping as described above. Melt butter and olive oil in saucepan over medium heat. Sauté garlic and basil for about 30 seconds. Add to prepared mashed potato, stir to blend. (I think I’d thin this out a bit to make it more spread-able. Maybe pipe it on with a piping bag?)

To Assemble: Preheat broiler. Place filling in a 3-quart baking dish. Place baking dish on baking sheet. Spoon potato mixture over filling and spread evenly to cover. Broil 3 inches from heat until top becomes golden, about 4-6 minutes.

Notes: I sent this to my mom and told her I think this recipe would be just fine salt-free. The wine and butter really make it so savory that I think someone on a salt-free diet, as my dad is, wouldn't miss that tinge of salt at all. 

Vegetable Shepherd's Pie

This recipe was sent to me by my favorite personal chef (whose food I've never eaten), Debbie Burgess of the Hungry Fox Personal Chef Service in Lancaster. Because it was posted on a closed personal chef forum, I feel I can't publish the recipe here.
The real kicker to this vegetarian (well, not quite, because it has Worcestershire sauce in it) dish is the entire bottle of red zinfandel it has in the sauce. It has a way of adding zip to the vegetable broth which, in my opinion, usually needs something added to it to make it rich.
The recipe took me 2 entire episodes of "Little House on the Prairie" to watch, so it is a little mini-marathon of cooking. But well worth it!
The vegetables are typical winter fare: carrots, parsnips, leeks (and onions), cremini mushrooms and frozen peas.  A can of cannellini or navy beans also adds substance. The potato topping is enhanced with an aromatic butter mixture of garlic, basil and parsley.
Now I need to say here that I have never in my life made shepherd's pie before. In fact, I'm pretty sure I've only actually EATEN it maybe once or twice. So my problems with the mechanics of the recipe probably stem from my inexperience making (or eating) it.
For the topping, the recipe called for boiling "4 large potatoes." Well, that's fairly subjective. And I kind of think I ended up with a bit more potato than was perfect because the amount of liquid it called for adding to it really made a nice batch of mashed potatoes, but was a little thick for spreading on top of the filling. Maybe if I'd thinned it a bit I could have been able to spread it easier. But I think if I were to change the topping recipe, I'd give a measurable amount of cooked and mashed potatoes.
For the filling, I really ended up with too much liquid and it wasn't thick enough. It called for a 750-ml bottle of red zin or burgundy, which you cooked down to a cup. But then you added 3 cups of vegetable broth and the beurre manie, which was 3 Tablespoons flour/3 Tablespoons butter, really had a lot of liquid to thicken. I made another batch of 1T/1T and it helped, but I ended up using a slotted spoon to take the vegetables out of the pot and put them in the casserole, and then pouring liquid in until I felt I had the right amount. I ended up with a little over 1/2 cup of the liquid left. I think if I were change this part, maybe I'll add only 2 cups of broth and then pour more in if needed.
All in all, this is definitely a recipe I'll make again. The vegetables were wonderful, the sauce silky smooth. The garlic and basil in the potatoes really were wonderful additions. The guys loved it and so did I. If I find out at some point that the chef publishes the recipe, I'll be sure to come back to this post to point you to it.

Butternut Squash Soup

ButternutSquashSoup
Originally uploaded by Food Fanatic

As a vegetarian, I don't have a lot of use for my subscription to Fine Cooking magazine anymore. For Christmas I asked for (and received) a sub to Vegetarian Times.
I'd saved all my copies of FC, and so went through them and gave most of them to my friend Jeannie, who teaches Family & Consumer Science at my school. The only ones I kept whole were the holiday baking issues. But I did tear out a page or two of some of them...recipes that I thought appealed to me and might be likely candidates for my kitchen.
So tonight I made Butternut Soup with Cumin & Coriander. My only adaptation was that I used vegetable stock rather than chicken. The soup is simply delicious! It's not something to whip up on a weeknight unless you want to try it with frozen squash. This recipe is made with roasted squash, which takes about 90 minutes to achieve in the oven.

2 T olive oil
1 T unsalted butter
1 medium onion, diced
1/2 t kosher salt
3/4 t ground cumin
1/2 t ground coriander
1-141/2 oz can diced tomatoes with their juice
Freshly ground black pepper
Flesh of a roasted 2-lb butternut squash*
3 C vegetable stock
GARNISH: plain yogurt or heavy cream, minced fresh parsley

*Roasting the squash: Cut the squash in half and scoop out the seeds. Rub with olive oil, sprinkle with kosher salt and fresh ground pepper. Roast in a 400 degree oven for about 90 minutes, or until dark brown and very tender. Let cool and then scoop out the flesh

Soup:
Heat oil and butter in a heavy saucepan over medium heat. Add the onion and salt. Saute for 2 minutes and then cover and let sweat until translucent, about 3 minutes. Uncover and cook, stirring, another 3 to 5 minutes, until the onions start to brown.
Add the cumin and coriander and cook, stirring, for about 30 seconds. Add in the tomatoes and season with pepper. Bring to simmer, cover, and let cook for about 10 minutes.
Add the flesh of the squash, breaking it up a bit. Add the vegetable stock, bring to a simmer, cover, and let simmer for 30 minutes.
After 30 minutes, uncover, turn off the heat, and let cool a bit. Using an immersion blender, blend the soup gently, careful not to splatter hot soup.
Season to taste, warm up if needed, and serve.
Makes about 6 cups.

Melting Day

Icetwig
Originally uploaded by Food Fanatic

It's the first melting day here in the Carolinas. We got about 6 inches of snow Monday and then a nice coating of ice after that. The cold temps have allowed a lot of that to stick around. Today, however, the sun is out and the temps are to get above freezing.

We have not had school all week, and I imagine we'll have delays tomorrow. Ours is rural county for the most part, so we have worry about road conditions in the outlying areas.

So I've watched a few movies, did a little reading, laundry, floors, and actually DUSTED (gasp!). I've also baked a bit and now am very low on ingredients. I'll probably go out this afternoon to grocery store.

Sugarless Banana Bread

Banana Bread
Originally uploaded by Food Fanatic

This is my second year of staying away from refined sugar between January 1 and February 14. Doing so makes me feel righteous, but mostly it encourages me to find ways to cook and bake with more natural sugars, such as agave, maple syrup and honey.

Today the Carolinas and Georgia (and probably points beyond, but I don't care) are socked in and slammed shut with snow. Apparently it started falling around 3 a.m. and we don't anticipate it stopping today. We did not have school today anyway, as it's the teacher workday between semesters, but I as a staffer was scheduled to work.

So it was just me and a few overripe bananas this morning. I don't care much for banana bread as a rule because it's so sweet and, well, banana-ey. I like starchy bananas.

I commenced googling for banana bread made with no refined sugars and found this recipe on Cooks.com for sugar FREE banana bread:

HOME-STYLE BANANA BREAD (SUGAR FREE)
3/4 c. mashed bananas
1/3 c. vegetable oil
2 lg. eggs
1/2 c. water
1 tsp. vanilla
2 c. flour
1 tsp. baking soda
2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
1 c. chopped nuts
Beat together mashed banana, oil, eggs and water until creamy. Add flour, baking soda, baking powder and spices. Beat well. Stir in nuts. Spoon batter into oiled and floured 9 x 5 inch loaf pan. Spread batter evenly. Bake at 325 degrees for 45 minutes or until a knife inserted comes out clean. Cool completely on wire rack before slicing.
(recipe here)

The bread baked up beautifully, as you can see, with an excellent crumb:


HOWEVER...definitely needs some sweetening. If I make it again I think I'll work some maple syrup into the recipe. But for today I drizzled a small amount on my slice and was quite satisfied. It's nice to be able to control the sweetness.

Free Music!

There's a lot of free music out on the internet. And I mean legal free music. Stuff the artists offer for free, either out of philanthropy or in an effort to gain exposure.

Since I bought an iphone I've been particularly interested in owning music. I've never been one for buying a lot of music because I usually get tired of something after playing it 49-11 times and then I don't go back to it for years. I also have gotten a lot of free Christian music from my husband, who gets advance copies of some albums at his work. And I subscribe to Napster, where I can download all the music I want and listen to it as long as my subscription is up-to-date. Up until a few weeks ago (when Napster launched an iphone app), I needed to own all the music I put on my iphone.

Enter the free music sites.
Spirit Voyage , a website devoted to Kundalini yoga, offers a free music track every Friday. Through "Free Music Friday" I have discovered many artists I'd not known about before, including Ashana, whose soaring voice and crystal toning bowls offer a transcendent musical experience.

I also found Noisetrade, which offers music from all sorts of genre. They suggest you make a donation per song, but only require that you give a little information: your name, email address and zip code. This helps them get their music out there and they end up benefiting by having greater turn outs for their concerts. You can also promote the free music on your Facebook page to help them out.

I've also been following The Free Christian Music Blog, which has exposed me to artists I've not heard of before. And FreeCCM also has some great stuff. I just downloaded a new song by Chris Rice called "O Freedom." Yesterday I downloaded an entire 18-song Christian song compilation album from Compassion International by signing up at New Release Tuesday.

Most of these, obviously, are Christian. But a quick Google for free music can yield many other genre. Give it a shot!

Salt

From Blockbuster.com

I watched this last night. It was the first time I'd bought a movie on Directv. A GREAT FLICK! I loved all the plot twists...right up to the very end. They left you being perfectly okay, but knowing you will watch sequels. Angelina Jolie plays a CIA agent that is accused of being a Russian spy. Lots and lots of cool science stuff and cool acrobatic combat. They didn't muddle it with a long love story in the middle. It's just a nice, tight, spy thriller. It reminded a little of James Bond without the sex. But a lot more of Mission Impossible.

Weekend!

It's been hard to get up this week. Unfortunately, it'll be hard to get up tomorrow, too, because my yogabuddy and I are going to an 8 a.m. class over by Lake Wylie. Still, I'll get my beloved nap in Saturday AND Sunday afternoon, so I'll still be ahead.

It's been a  hectic week at school as we've begun closing out semester 1 and begun preparations for semester 2. I like the second semester much better because it has a much faster pace. Seniors are getting ready to graduate, underclassmen are registering for classes for next year...but most of all, the daylight hours will be getting longer rather than shorter!

To complicate matters, we'll be also hosting 4 elections in the coming months. We have a special election for a fire district coming up a week from Tuesday, and then SC House primaries, probably a run-off, and then election. I suspect we'll be moving the precinct out of the High School as soon as we can for the next General Election. It's just too much to try to have school and have voters coming in. We have to keep them away from the students, but most of all we have parking issues. I've told the election commission that they'll need to provide one or maybe even two traffic controllers during school hours.

Back to this weekend: I think maybe enchiladas tonight with my leftover refried beans. And I've been yearning for chocolate, so I'm sure I'll make some brownies at some point. I'm off refined sugar again, as is usual this time of the year, so I'll be making them with honey. I did that last year and got some good ones.

How Sad

I haven't written. I'm not dead.
In fact, I'm quite, very much, alive!

We had a very nice Christmas with the guys and their friends. We went to a friend's house for a huge dinner. We exchanged a bunch of cool gifts, but nothing too extravagant. We took a family photo and even sent them out in New Year's cards:

(Bear is a little attention-deficit. I have no idea what he was looking at. There's just an empty dining room over there.)

We switched to Directv.
uh...that's it. I'll write about books...the stuff I'm reading. And really I have cooked a bunch. I need to work on writing about that. In fact, I'm off refined sugar again for 40 days, so I'll be playing with natural sweeteners again for a while. And I need to take photos. And learn Photoshop Elements version 9 or whatever it's up to now.
Sheesh. I'm kind of tired thinking about all that.

Paneer Indian Cheese

I'm attempting palak paneer tonight. I found this very simple video about making the paneer. I've made mozzarella before, which you have to have rennet for, so I'm not really daunted about this. I'm pressing my first batch right now. This video does not have any amounts in it, though. I thought maybe my large skillet (like the one pictured here) would hold a gallon of milk, but it's more like a little over 1/2 gallon. I used vinegar and put in only maybe 1 1/2 teaspoons. He does not say how you know if you are using the right amount, just that you want to avoid using too much! So I poured in about a teaspoon and let it curdle. Then I added a little more to see if it would curdle more.

I'll get back to you about the palak (spinach gravy), and how it all came out.

Pasta Salad: Part Deux

Today was our second monthly "Fat Friday." It's a day when we sign up to bring stuff and then all gorge ourselves on it all. I decided to try my hand at another pasta salad, this one with a Greek flair. I'm a sucker for feta cheese and kalamata olives, so this was right up my alley.

I found this recipe on a website called "Three Many Cooks." Check it out here.

They have a nice photo of the salad there, too. But because I'm trying to shoot more, I figured I'd take another of my own. I've never shot food from the side before. I'm pretty happy with it. I maybe could have used a slightly smaller aperture so I'd have more of the salad in focus, though.

Aloo Gobi & Naan

Sounds a little like a song, doesn't it?

So I made this Aloo Gobi, which is an Indian dish consisting of cauliflower and potatoes. You cook them with onions in a skillet for a while and then add this amazing sauce you've pureed out of tomato, garam masala, turmeric, cumin and chili powder. The garnish should be cilantro but I didn't have any. Also the recipe called for lemon juice. None of those around, but this lime was happy to fill in and add color to this photo.

Taylor and I had this with naan and I have to say this was my best batch yet! Each time I make it, I refine my technique just a little bit  more. Tonight's addition was brushing it with the milk solids I had saved from my super-clear batch of ghee from Sunday. Sprinkled on a little kosher salt and we were good to go!

So now I'm overstuffed with bread. Ugh. But a nice meal. It didn't take long to put together, either. I found this recipe on About.com. Here, try it.

On a side note, and completely unrelated, I accidentally called my poor mother this morning. At 6:30 their time. OOOPS! SORRY MOM! Each morning I call Taylor at 7:30 to make sure he's gotten himself awake. Since iphone STUPIDLY DON'T HAVE AUTODIAL, I use "recent calls" to call him each day. Unfortunately, I guess my finger slipped and I hit Mom & Dad's number instead.

But look at the bright side...at least I had been a dutiful daughter yesterday and CALLED my mother. Otherwise, she wouldn't have been in "recents!"

Pure Ghee

PureGhee
Originally uploaded by Food Fanatic

This is my purest batch of ghee yet. I used my little slow cooker. The one that you use for stuff like appetizer dips? I put my 4 sticks of unsalted butter in there and just let it go.

I skimmed off the milk solids as soon as the butter had melted. I've left those in a bowl on the counter for now. I figure I'll stir them into something later tonight.

Then I just let it go for another 3 hours. The rest of the milk solids cooked to a nutty brown crumbly consistency. I strained the ghee through my All-Clad hand-held strainer and let it cool.

Considering the very small amount of work involved, and the high cost of store-bought ghee ($7 or $8 for this amount), I'd say I have now adopted a new habit.

Baby Carrots | Eat 'Em Like Junk Food | Indulge

Ok. NOW we're talkin' good advertising!

Pasta Salad

pastasalad
Originally uploaded by Food Fanatic

So I usually don't make pasta salad. And the reason is very stupid. It's because the pasta salads I've had have always been terrible. The one that brings bile to my gut has pepperoni in it and is made by dumping in bottled Italian dressing. Even worse, some is made with low-fat or nonfat Italian dressing. Ugh.

But today I decided to Google pasta salads. I'd been thinking of making potato salad, but by the time I got prep time for it, it was noon or 1 o'clock and would have maybe not gotten cold enough for supper.

So there are a lot of pasta salads out there and I decided to try this one from allrecipes.com:

1 (16 oz) pkg penne pasta (I used these here spirals)
1/4 C vegetable oil (I used Olive)
1 tsp lemon juice
1 tsp dried basil
1 tsp ground black pepper
1 tsp garlic salt
2 tomatoes, chopped (I used a pkg of grape tomatoes)
1 green bell pepper, chopped
1 cucumber, chopped
1 sweet onion, chopped
1 c black olives, chopped

Cook the pasta.
Make the vinaigrette.
Chop up the other stuff in a big bowl.
Combine it all.
Chill for 30 minutes.

I think it will be good. It's chilling now. I'm serving it to the carnivores with their roast chicken. I'll have this and a green salad.

Graham Hill: Why I'm a weekday vegetarian | Video on TED.com

Graham Hill: Why I'm a weekday vegetarian | Video on TED.com

I like this. It should be easy enough, but I think still difficult for those families that don't have a cook. By that I mean there are many families out there that just don't use their kitchens anymore. They pick up prepped food, fast food, and eat out. Either they are too busy or just not motivated.

And then there are vegetarians and vegans that actually don't eat many VEGETABLES! I had a vegan friend of mine tell me last winter that he was trying a raw food diet because he wasn't eating enough veggies! Yes, some so-called vegetarians are filling up on carbs, simple and complex, and not getting their daily needs met.

btw: He's the founder of TreeHugger.com

Scam Cookies

Surely I've told you Mensa Boy's theory about oatmeal cookies. I have, haven't I? Well, to recap, he says that oatmeal cookies are "scam cookies" because they look like chocolate chip from a distance.

MB is a man of simple tastes. Ice cream should be vanilla and cookies should be chocolate chip. That's it. Oh. Pies should be apple. 

Here is a conversation I had with him via email today:

ME: I ate a scam cookie this morning. 

It was actually good. 
I suspect the icing on it helped.

HE: I’m glad you were able to get through it. Most people don’t survive the shock.

(photo stolen from http://www.joyofbaking.com. (thanks folks!))

It's Hard to be Poor

When you just want one of these:

Hiding

Pearl
Originally uploaded by Food Fanatic

Do you ever feel like this?

Mistress of the Art of Death

Just finished this excellent book! I seem to be continuing down the path of historical fiction/medical-related! In this case, it's not a doctor, per se, but a coroner, whose skills I am reading about. This one takes place in 12th century England, where young children are being lured and then tortured and killed. Of course the Jews, who "murdered Jesus," are the only suspects. King Henry II, who is fond of the Jews because of how well they keep his coffers filled, has written to his friend William, King of Sicily, and asked him to send a "death master" to read the bodies of the murdered children in order to ascertain the true perpetrator.

Being 12th century England, the death master, who is a woman, for pete's sake,  is accompanied by her manservant and an investigator. The manservant acts as the true doctor and she as his assistant.

I'd say this is great murder mystery fiction a la Patricia Cornwell, but I think this one is actually better than Cornwell's novels. 

Fall Gardening

Here in the Southeast we get a second growing season for vegetables that lasts until nearly Thanksgiving. The fall garden goes in right about now and we are able to put in collards, cabbage, lettuce, broccoli and cauliflower and onion sets. I'll check for garlic locally. I haven't seen any yet, but if I can't find it, I'll order it online.

Yesterday we cleaned out the spent summer garden stuff...mostly tomato plants...they failed pretty miserably. I'm not sure why they did. But I do think we have to get over our loathing of the heat and take a walk through the garden every single day. I suspect that neglect may have been the culprit in some instances. Liz and I are gardening together and I think we each may have thought the other was doing things they weren't! At any rate, we learned a few things from our summer garden:

1. Lettuce was good but really we get perfectly good organic lettuce from the grocery store.
2. Cage and stake the tomato plants earlier.
3. Plant green beans. We missed them this year.
4. Weed control between the beds needs to have a higher priority. We lost plants in the weeds when they spilled out over the beds.
5. We can really get a great harvest of cucumbers, tomatillos and hot peppers! Also stevia turned out to be a GREAT GROWER!

But all in all, I suspect Liz and I are more cut out for fall gardening. We both are Vata doshas and tend to wear out quick in the heat.

We have some great bugs in the garden. I shot a photo of a writing spider there yesterday on a habanero plant. I used my cellphone camera.

The Last Jew

I finished the third of a bunch of books I've read by Noah Gordon now have ordered the only two others that our library has. If my love of this author continues I may have to (*gasp*) buy the rest!

My reading odyssey all began with "The Physician," which Nate gave me right before I left for Minnesota. I was turning the house upside-down for a paperback for the plane and he produced it. It was required reading for a class of his at Erskine. "The Physician" is about a little guy who loses his parents and is given to a traveling barber surgeon. Now, this is 11th century London, so he's a traveling "doctor," such as they were. The boy learns all about the business of helping people with minor ailments, as well as selling a potion they called "physick" and juggling and telling stories to bring in more income. After the barber dies, the boy decides he wants to be a real, learned medical doctor. But they are few and far between and the one he knows of and wants to apprentice with won't take him on because he's not a Jew. He travels to the school in Persia where the Jewish physician took his training and gains entrance to study under Persian physician Avicenna by pretending to be a Jew (there is a ban on Christian students).

It's a wonderful book that I hated to see end:


After finishing that one, I ordered "Shaman," which is about this same physician's descendant. It takes place on the Illinois frontier in the civil war era. I wrote about that one here, but didn't say much. It covers the advent of anesthesia and hygiene, as well as early American apothecaries and Indian medicine. "Shaman" is particularly interesting because this doctor is deaf as a result of contracting Scarlet Fever as a child.

The "Last Jew." Now this one was hard to get into at first. I actually started it and then put it down for 2 weeks. It's very dry at the beginning, but I picked it up again because I remembered that the other two were a tiny bit slow grabbing my attention. So I stuck it out a few more pages and then was hooked. It takes place during the Spanish Inquisition, and the "last Jew" left in Spain, who survived by keeping his Jewishness, (and his circumcised penis,) under wraps. Our hero, Yonah Helkiah, wanders around Spain after surviving the decimation of his family (he'd hidden in a cave). He takes on several odd-ranging jobs and names as he wanders, ultimately apprenticing to a metal master and then later, that master's brother, who is a physician.
Another book I hated to see end!

An Abridged History of American-Centric Warfare. Using Food.

Ghee

Ghee. Clarified butter, essentially. But cooked a little longer to really get the oil purified and separated from the milk solids. I've been reading quite a bit lately about Ayurvedic medicine and cookery and ghee is much-touted for it's healthy properties. So I decided to make some myself. I used salted butter because that's all I had, but it does turn out very very salty. I compensate for that by being doubly careful not to oversalt food that I've cooked in ghee.

Yesterday I had a hankering for french fries at lunch time but we didn't have any in the freezer. So I peeled a potato, cooked it in a sandwich bag in the microwave, and then sliced it. I fried the slices in ghee. I got some wonderfully golden brown and delicious home-fried potatoes! Ghee, since it does not have the milk solids, has a much higher smoke point than butter. In fact, I've read that you can deep fry in it.

I'll be experimenting a lot more with my ghee. I think the next thing I'll make is chapati. I've made chapati quite a bit, but have not cooked them with ghee.

Shaman by Noah Gordon

Get this book.

I read "The Physician" while in Minneapolis and had to get the next book, "Shaman." The main characters are the descendants of the main character in other book. But not hideously over-worked. There's a connection, but just blood. The stories don't dovetail or anything. GREAT BOOK! It takes place during the Civil War.

End of Week One, Day Five

We all breathed a collective sigh of relief today at school when the bell rang at 3:30. We managed to complete our first week of school!

Yes, there were a few kids that were mis-directed. Placed in the wrong classes. A couple of disciplinary incidents already. Still no receptionist. A few classes filled to overflowing. Much paperwork done and data entry completed. More to do in the coming weeks. But 3:30 came and we all bid our students goodbye and considered the weekend.

I grocery-shopped with Taylor. We parked in a "Customer with Child" spot. Just to be rebellious. He drove the car in the store. We discussed food. He chose tacos for supper and so I made those...bean ones for me.

I also made my first batch of ghee. A pound of butter, simmered for a couple of hours. Skimmed the milk solids off the top and used a bit to fry my beans. SALTY!!! I guess that's where all the salt in salted butter goes! I'll have to make the next batch with unsalted butter. I'm looking forward to playing with the ghee. I think I'll make fry bread tomorrow with it.

Somewhat Wordless, Unlike Someone Else!

I haven't written much, and I blame it on Facebook. It's easy enough to write a 140 character observation about something. Harder to write a missive for a blog.

That said, I observed something today on our school fax machine that gave me pause. You know those stupid scamming emails about the dude from Nigeria that wants to send you a bucket of money because he has no other place to put it? He'll give you some percentage of it if you pay him to ship it to you? Something like that?

Today on our fax machine was a newer version of that scam. One I consider to be a new kind of low in the area of scamming. This one was a letter from "Robert Barnes," a US Marine serving in Afghanistan. It uses a whole bunch of jarhead jargon to tell you that things are really bad there but they found this stash of abandoned cash. Here's the kicker paragraph that sort of got me hot:

"I don't want you to judge me by what you just read. I am a Devil Dog with a lot pride and honour. No amount of money can make up for the pain and sacrifice we all got through here in the hell hole in service for our country. But I have to also secure my future and have something to bank on after my active service."


ugh.

Another Perk

So when we were in Minnesota week before last (has it been that long already?), we were staying at my parent's house. Each morning my mom would begin the day the by saying, "We need to plan supper."

Usually this conversation happened right after I stumbled into the house from the camper and poured my first cup of coffee.

Why did she need to know this so early each day? BECAUSE CARNIVORES HAVE TO TAKE STUFF OUT OF THE FREEZER TO THAW! We vegetarians? Not so much. The only advance planning I do anymore is to soak beans overnight or start them in a crockpot during the day. My freezer is full of bread flour and frozen blueberries.

I'm just sayin'

The Invisible Wall: A Love Story that Broke Barries

Mom encouraged me to read this book. I believe it was an Oprah book club selection at one time. I loved it. The book was the first written by this author, who is in his 90s. 

It takes place in a small English town right around the beginning of WWI. It's about a street where the Christians and Jews live across from each other and the barriers of religious beliefs that are evident. Autobiographical, the book is about the author's own family and their struggles to survive poverty. To complicate matters, Harry's sister falls in love with a Jewish boy across the street. It's sort of Romeo and Juliet and Angela's Ashes all rolled into one. Happier endings, though.

There are more books written by this author. I'll be looking for them.

My Summer is Coming to a Close

My summer break ends Sunday night and I will remember this one fondly. It did not involve raves or speedboats, but I had a great little party of my own all summer. I took a lot of naps, I read a lot of books. I played with my food and did a lot of yoga. I got a new car and a new phone, both of which have stretched me technologically. I played with my friends and family. We took a nice trip to Minnesota, where we saw all our family...both sides. Even the ones in Saskatchewan! We saw one niece play her senior recital and another get engaged. We met our one of our new grand-nieces, too.

And the other day we said hello and goodbye to our second son, Riley, who graduated from Army Basic Training. We had a graduation dinner at Yesterday's in Columbia, where he experienced for the first time the gratitude of our country for his service as the owner thanked him and paid for his lunch.

Any regrets at all about this summer? I don't think so. The only thing I didn't get to do that I wanted to was see a Twins game at Target field. But I figure that will be around  for many years to come.

And so on Monday I'll go back to work rested and happy, peaceful and calm. Maybe it will be Endless Summer in my mind.

Back into the Oven!

We have had the most unseasonable weather here this past week. The temps have only been in the low-to-mid 80s and we've gotten up to high 50s in the mornings. But that will end now, as we start to climb back up to the high 90s.

I'm grateful for the new car. Mensa Boy bought a 2010 Prius for me when the van decided to retire. Big Green had 182,000 miles on her, and she was going to need a couple thousand dollars of the work in the coming months. The most pressing of which was the air conditioning. Again. The new car cools off in minutes and this week I will be thinking about that whenever I get into it.

I have to confess I'm a little sheepish about the car. People exclaim and congratulate me, and my best pal has been teasing me unmercifully about it. But it seems so extravagant right now. I loved my van and could have happily driven it for many more years (if they'd ever been able to stop that creaking noise it made when I turned the steering wheel). With a kid in college and new carpet needing to be bought for the house, my salary and days being cut this coming year, and Bob's salary still the same as two years ago, I really feel dumb taking on a car payment. But at least this will be a known car expense and not something that bolts you out of the blue like car repairs do.

So when people exclaim over the vehicle and talk about it, I find myself wanting to just say "let's talk about something else."

This year's Independence Day was probably one of the most fun we've ever had. Mensa Boy organized the "First Ever Henry Nesbitt Grand Day Parade," which was a whopping 1/10th of a mile long. Henry Nesbitt is the end of our Shelley Mullis Rd as it crosses into North Carolina. Apparently you can't just let a SC road name cross the state line, so that last 1/10th of a mile is named for someone else. We still aren't sure who Henry was, but he was probably a war hero of some sort. Could be Revolutionary War, could be "The War of Northern Aggression," who knows?

So after the 10 of us marched down to the end of the road and then marched back, we repaired to our home for supper. We grilled portabello mushrooms and corn and had sliced tomatoes and watermelon. After supper we progressed to Kriz's house, where we lit a bonfire, shot off fireworks and had blueberry cobbler and homemade ice cream. A great time was had by all, particularly Taylor and Ken, who tended the pyrotechnics. Mensa Boy was too tired to stress about the explosives, so Taylor just went to town with them...I think maybe he'd never done that before.

All in all a very nice 4th and a wonderful weekend. Now it's back to the hard work of...oh wait! I still have a month of summer left!

Oh...the Tour! If anyone thinks watching a bike race is boring, they should have watched yesterday's stage 2. Crashes, underdogs, demonstrations...it was all there.

Roast Okra

RoastOkra
Originally uploaded by Food Fanatic

I know I've written about this before. But I truly think that roasted okra is one of the really good things about living in the south.

Not slimy.

At all.

Drying Stevia

DryingStevia
Originally uploaded by Food Fanatic

YogiLiz picked up two Stevia plants this spring when she was wandering through the garden centers. They are extremely easy to grow and taste wonderful! Just picking off a leaf and chewing on it gives a wonderful blast of pure sweet.

I've used it here and there for garnishes, but this last weekend I cut a big bunch of it to dry. When I'm satisfied that the leaves are sufficiently dry then I'll crumble them up and put them in a couple of empty spice jars. I think they will be excellent added to tea.

Surya Namaskar A X 108

It's the summer equinox and one traditional yogi way to celebrate it is by doing 108 sun salutations. And so I thought, "why not? I've got all day..."

I gathered 27 coins and put them on the upper right corner of my mat. As I get to to pose 10 pictured there on the right, I flick a coin off the mat onto the floor.

I am not doing 4 and 9. Instead I am going back to plank after 3 and then straight to uttanasana after 8.

I did the first 54 to a sanskrit chant. After doing shoelace to rest and stretch the hips, I switched to African drums. Now I'll start the next 27 to Gregorian chants and then finish off with Donna Delory.

Happy solstice! The longest day of the year. Make the most of it!

I found this picture of the sequence on Google Images. Here.

Blackberries

Blackberries
Originally uploaded by Food Fanatic

The first of the summer. I got about 1 1/2 cups. I was not dressed for blackberry foraging (long pants, long sleeves, boots, gloves), so I did didn't get very aggressive in my picking.

In my defense, this photo looked a lot less washed-out on my computer before I uploaded it.

Oh. That's a sprig of stevia on top. We are growing some in our yogagarden.

Tostada Night

Tostadas
Originally uploaded by Food Fanatic

When you decide to go vegetarian, and you are the only one in a family of carnivores, you really have to step it up in terms of "interestingness" when it comes to supper.

Sure, we've had tacos. Lots and lots of tacos. Using store-bought taco mix and hamburger and then all those tortilla chips or taco shells you buy in the bags and boxes. But this. Now THIS...it is the BEST WAY to eat that kind of food. The old-fashioned, fried-in-oil way.

Here's what I wrote about tostada night. And I should tell you, I had to kind of hunt for yellow corn tortillas. White corn rules the market. I think it's semi-tasteless.

Tostada Night

You know how you end up with days and days of leftover pinto beans whenever you cook up a pot? I mean … I like them. Don’t get me wrong. But I can only eat them so many days in a row before I’m ready to swear off them forever.  Of course that wears off after a month or so and then I’m ready to cook up another batch.

                One way I’ve discovered to use those up is to make homemade refried beans with them. Most of us are used to just opening cans of refritos (refried beans) and using those for our tacos or whatever.  But those canned varieties really miss the boat in flavor when compared to the homemade variety. They always seem a little watery to me. And bland. I’m giving you a recipe that I’ve adapted from “The New Moosewood Cookbook,” by Mollie Katzen. I think the cumin really makes or breaks these beans. See what you think.

                Tostada night is a great weeknight dinner event, and a fantastic way to get the family together to hang out and eat. I draw them into the kitchen when I start frying corn tortillas. It works every time. When I was a kid there were no bags of tortilla chips, or prepared taco shells. My mom cooked corn tortillas in oil on the stovetop. Nothing beats that flavor. I think we gave up that practice because we started shying away from frying due to its’ status as an unhealthy way to prepare food, and it was a messy and left oil clouds hanging in the room for a few hours. I keep the mess down by putting my frying screen over the top of the fry pan. I can’t do anything about the oil clouds, but my 10-foot ceilings sure make it easier to ignore!

                Lay out some lettuce, salsa, onions, tomatoes and grated cheese (or go really authentic and use queso) and start frying tortillas. Let the family build theirs as they come out of the skillet. They will stay there and eat them, waiting for the next one to come out of the skillet. And as they stand there, you will hear a lot more about their lives. Just be careful not to fry your tortillas too long. They really only take about half a minute or less on each side. 

Refritos (refried beans)

By Karen Paulson

Adapted from “The New Moosewood Cookbook,” by Mollie Katzen

 Leftover pinto beans, drained (maybe 2 cups)

1 1/2 C minced onion

5 or 6 (or more) medium cloves garlic, minced

2 tsp ground cumin, or to taste

Salt and pepper to taste

Heat a small amount of oil in a large skillet. Be sure it’s an old skillet that you don’t care about scratching. Add the onions, garlic and cumin. Heat, stirring, until the onions and garlic are starting to get soft. Add the beans. Heat and smash the beans to the consistency you prefer.

If you really want to add flavor, cook your pinto beans with a couple of halved, seeded jalapeno peppers. You can also consider adding a small bell pepper to the bean mixture when you make it in the skillet.

Frittata: The Vegetarian's Meatloaf

Since I became vegetarian in January, Frittatas have become my new meatloaf. My go-to dish. The entrée I whip out when I don’t have a lot of time or imagination. Like meatloaf, frittatas are made from whatever ingredients you have on hand, they have a short prep time, and a little bit of oven time to give you a chance to gather your wits about you (read: drink a glass of wine and check out the newspaper).

                Similar to quiche, frittatas are egg-based and can be the vehicle in which to hide all kinds of edible treasures from meat to veggies to cheese or all of the above. Most frittatas are started on top of the stove and finished in the oven. That’s how I do mine, although you can do the entire dish from start to finish on the stovetop. Unlike quiche, frittatas are generally not known to have a crust. Mine does. So if you are a frittata purist stop reading now. You’ll see my version as an abomination.

                My frittata recipe culminated out of my love for all things hash browned. As far as I am concerned, no egg-y meal is really complete without hash browns on the side.  The crunchier the better, I figure. And so I played with my food one afternoon and conceived this fine frittata with a hash brown crust. I hope you enjoy it.

Hash Brown-Crusted Frittata

2 medium-sized russet potatoes

6-8 eggs, beaten and set aside

1-2 C veggies of your choice, lightly sautéed and set aside

1 C cheese of your choice

Herbs of your choice

Salt, pepper, red pepper flakes

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Microwave the potatoes on high for 3 minutes. They should be softened, but not cooked all the way to a mashable stage. Handling them carefully so as not to burn your hands, grate the potatoes on the large side of a cheese grater. You can leave the peels on or take them off.

Preheat a non-stick skillet on medium high. Heat 1 Tablespoon oil and 1 Tablespoon of butter. Swirl it around to coat the pan. Transfer the grated potatoes to the skillet, patting it down into an even layer on the bottom of the pan. DO NOT STIR AFTER THIS POINT! After about 4 or 5 minutes, gently tilt the pan that you can glimpse the underside of the potatoes. Are they getting brown and crisp? Keep checking until they look like golden, brown and delicious hash browns.

In another oven-safe skillet (cast iron is really the best), heat 1 Tablespoon oil and 1 Tablespoon butter. Drizzle it over the potatoes in the non-stick pan. Then carefully invert the second skillet over the first one and flip over. Now your potatoes are in the second skillet and on their way to hash brown perfection.

Once you are satisfied that the potatoes are well-browned on the underside, remove the pan from the heat. Arrange the reserved veggies, cheese, herbs and spices over the potatoes. Pour the eggs over the mixture and lightly tamp down anything that’s sticking up out of the eggs. If you need more eggs, go ahead and beat them up and pour them in.

Put the frittata in the preheated oven and bake until the eggs are set, usually about 10 minutes. Remove from the oven and allow to finish cooking in the pan on the counter. 

Suppertime: Eggplant Gyros

My good friend Debbie Burgess (The Hungry Fox), sent me a link to this recipe on Cuisine Recipes and I was immediately sucked in by the gorgeous photo. This is my own shot, which I'm sorry to say is not quite as nice.

Anyway, our yogafarm produced some very fine cucumbers this week, which immediately made me think of tzatziki, which then made me think of gyros, which then reminded me of this recipe.

That's how my mind works.

The recipe on this site calls for a sauce made of yogurt and feta. I'm sure that is quite good, if not a little bland. Homemade tzatziki has that tangy zip of fresh garlic, which I think is needed in this recipe.

And now I'm going to see what how the leftover eggplant stuff tastes on an omelet.
Footnote: Eggplant stuff VERY GOOD on scrambled eggs. Think of it as eggplant pico de gallo. Scramble a couple of eggs and then drop some of the eggplant mixture on top. Mix in with the hot eggs to take some of the refrigerator chill off. Sea salt finishes it off!

34th Regiment: Always Forward

Riley is in the 34th Regiment at For Jackson. Apparently "Always Forward" is their motto. Riley is proving himself to be always forward. At least in my mind.

His girlfriend said he got a cut on his forehead and suffered a concussion on the "Victory Tower." He went to the infirmary and they told him he may have to take 3 weeks of Basic over again. He said "no way," and went back to his platoon. That's rough.

He's struggling. I've been ok with him being gone. Ok with him being in Basic. But now I'm starting to be a little anxious. His letter yesterday said he was awaiting word on his punishment for a weapons violation. Apparently he shot his (it was loaded with blanks) prematurely during a training exercise. His buddies said they'd help him cover it up, but he elected to tell his drill sergeant about it instead.

He's lonely and usually has a lot of friends around him. He doesn't know many of the guys and I think he'll start to feel better as he gains friendships.

I'm proud of him. And praying for him. I hope you will too.

Suppertime: Shiitake and Sweet Pea Risotto

Last night Taylor grilled burgers for himself and Nate while Liz and I enjoyed this recipe from Cooking Light. I didn't take my own photo of it this time. Too hungry. And you know? Mine was not quite as appetizing-looking as theirs. Because my risotto was a darker brown color. I think it must have been because of the very rich vegetable stock I used instead of the recipe's chicken stock. But boy! Was it delicious! We accompanied it with roasted and sauteed golden beets. I love to do that: roast the beets in the oven, slip the skin off, slice and then saute in butter.

I visited the chickens again this morning before work. I usually don't do that, but I had some very bland cherry tomatoes that needed to be disposed up. Chickens love juicy, seedy things. So I sliced them in half and took them over to the yogafarm. I was there at 6:15, when the sun was just starting to think about coming up. Obviously the chickens thought I was out of my mind for being up so early. None of them came down from their roosts. They just sat up there an murmured at me. I did feed them this time, since I received instruction from YogiLiz. I'll take some videos of the birds when Bob comes back with the camera.

Giant, Hairless Raccoon

That's what the chickens may think I am.
I went to Liz's and let them out this morning. But I could not figure out where their feeder is, so I didn't feed them (Liz was home, just not up yet). They followed me around, glaring at me and bwaawk bwaawking at me...getting all up in wing at me.
Then I took the one egg they'd laid and left.

Proud Parent of a Soldier

Mensa Boy has that sticker on the back of his car. I don't have it on mine yet. My car is too dirty to stick stuff on right now.

Riley is safely ensconced in Basic training at Fort Jackson. I just received the letter with his address. He's in Delta Company, 1st Battalion, 34th Infantry Regiment. Here is his address:

Pvt2 Porter, Jack R
Company Delta Platoon 3rd
1/34 In Regt
Fort Jackson  SC  29206

Family day is July 28
Graduation is July 29

We can follow his regiment on facebook. Here is the address:
http://www.facebook.com/134AlwaysForward