Sorry for the extended absence...Christmas dinner!

Hey anyone out there who might still check my blog...(wow, that's so sad to say) I'm terribly sorry for not posting for 3 and a half months. I went back to college, and I barely had time for my cooking, let alone for blogging (but I WAS eating my mom's amazing cooking, so don't worry!).
Anyway, here I am again, letting you know that this blog will remain alive, well, and loved, but...it might just go through long (specifically 3 months at a time) periods of inactivity until I graduate.

Regardless, merry Christmas! Today Jared and I made a dinner which we agreed to make a tradition from now on. It was also our first Christmas dinner made by ourselves together, so it was somewhat a surprise that everything worked out PERFECTLY. Besides the part where Sheila jumped up and ate all of the cheese off our freshly stuffed mushrooms...But we fixed that (restuffed, rather), so it really was great.
Here's what we did:
-Roasted and stuffed duck
-Baked acorn squash
-Stuffed Portobello mushrooms

Here are the details:
First....WE MADE CHEESE. That's right. It's been a goal of ours for many months now, and we finally did it. And it was easy! And it worked!! Here's a link to an absolutely amazing website, that is a fantastic resource for anyone interested in making cheese, yogurt, or doing other homestead-related things. And the guy is also a chemistry professor. (this is a fine example of the type of polymath I want to be "when I grow up"). Here's the link to the specific Neufchatel that we made:
http://biology.clc.uc.edu/Fankhauser/Cheese/neufchatel/neufchatel.htm

We followed his recipe exactly, I believe, plus we added 1/4 tsp of Calcium Chloride, because we used store bought whole milk, in which the calcium is destroyed by the pasteurization/homogenization process. (Something I recommend reading up on, because unless you're actually drinking fresh, raw milk straight from a cow, you're actually not getting that "calcium for strong bones" bit at all. That's basically a joke on consumers.) Anyway, once we woke up to the successful curds this morning, we cut them, and then strained it bit by bit into a sterilized (boiled) handkerchief. We found we had the best luck if we used a handheld strainer first (the kind with really fine mesh) to get out the majority of the moisture, then put the curds in the handkerchief. Once all the curds were in the handkerchief, we squeezed out a good deal more of the moisture (whey), tied the bundle up in the fridge as per his instructions, and left it only for a few hours. We went out adventuring, walked all over a frozen lake and stuff, and came back in only 3 hours or so, to find that it was already done! By straining by hand, and getting out as much of the whey as possible, we reduced the waiting time from overnight to a few hours. YAY, Christmas cheese! We mixed in a bunch of dried basil and garlic salt, then rolled it into little balls. It ended up tasting like that really fancy, expensive cheese that we always fee guilty buying. All in all, it was a super achievable thing. We spent probably half an hour cumulatively, working on it, and a gallon of milk is only a few dollars.

Anyway, I might as well now segway into the stuffed mushrooms:
We bought portobello mushroom caps, removed the stems, and stuffed them with a 1:1 ratio of white cheddar cheese, and our Neufchatel, along with crumbled bacon. Really basic. Just add enough cheese to fill them up, then put them in the oven on a cookie sheet for about 15 minutes at 375 degrees. You can stuff them with anything- different kinds of cheeses, veggies, the options are probably limitless!

The acorn squash recipe is one of the easiest out there:
-Cut an acorn squash in half, scoop out seeds
-Fill each half with a reasonable amount of butter (plus optional other seasonings- I usually love to add some brown sugar, some people like to add herbs to get a more savory thing going on. But the squash is so delicious even just with plain butter or coconut oil)
-Put the halves cut-side up in the oven, and bake at a medium temperature, between around 350-375 degrees, until they're tender all the way through.
Then you can either just scoop out the meat, or you can slice them up into smaller servings.

Finally, the duck:
We followed the cooking time and temperature recommended on the wrapper...375 degrees, and about 2 hours for a 6.5 lb duck. We cooked it in a large ceramic pot, where it was able to stew in it's own juices (I'm so sorry for using such language but there's really no better way to say that).
The preparation was fairly easy, we made sure it was cleaned out, rinsed off, and we tried to pull out most of it's quills (Unsure what these strange poky things would do to our mouths, I was getting obsessive about this, but it turned out that they soften when cooked, and weren't a problem to eat at all). I cut diagonal lines about an inch apart along the top side (breast side), just through the skin and fat, above the meat. I read that it's good to do this, in another recipe....I assume that it helps the flavor/cooking process somehow.
Then we stuffed it. We cheated on this part, pulling the newbie card....we bought boxed stuffing. It was a terrible choice. We were in the store, comparing two brands and asking "MSG or High Fructose Corn Syrup?" So guilty. Next year, we'll make our own.
We then baked this beautiful bird, breast side up, for an hour (and threw the acorn squash in there too). After the first hour, we checked it, took out the squash, then continued baking the duck for another hour. That's two hours total. Then I made a glaze for it, which we spooned all over the top and sides, and baked for a last 15 minutes. The glaze was:
3.5 tbsp orange juice
1 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp hot sauce
1/4 cup honey
Simmered until it was thick and syrupy.

And that was it! So yes, now I have documented this meal to recreate next year. Future Mia, please put the mushrooms somewhere safer when you leave the room. Sheila does love that cheese.
I hope anyone else out there who might stumble across my sleepy and quiet blog will find inspiration, too! Happy Christmas.

Garbanzo Bean Curry!

Last night, I made garbanzo bean curry. Curries are wonderful because they're as easy as soup to make (throw everything in a pot and stir for a while) but they're not...soupy. This one came out a beautiful yellow color, with just the right amount of spice (I feel like 7 out of 10 times, I mess up the spices with curry...but this time it worked!!) and I served it over steamed rice with a salad on the side.
It's fast to make, maybe 15-20 minutes, if your beans are either canned or pre-soaked. If you buy dried beans like we do now, you can boil them for a couple minutes and let them rest in the water for about an hour (learned that from the back of the bean bag, haha), or you can think ahead and soak them in water over night. Canned beans are just ready to cook immediately.

Recipe:
1 onion, diced small
1 1/4 cup garbanzo beans (made 4 servings)
1 1/4 cup water

Note: If you're serving this over rice, start cooking the rice on the side. It should take as long to cook as the curry.
Boil the beans and the onion until about half the water is gone.
At this point, add the spices and things:
2-3 cloves garlic, minced
2 tsp ginger, minced
1/8 tsp cinnamon (about two hearty shakes...no need to really measure)
1 tsp cumin
salt and pepper to taste
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tsp tumeric
some fresh parsley/dill, if you have them...I just grabbed the nearest clump of herbs, haha.
2 spiced sausages (optional, but they added SO much to the final flavor)

I also added some olive oil to prevent sticking, and about a tbsp of tomato sauce.
Stir in all the yummy stuff, and then you have two options.
1) get distracted and not finish making it, resorting to last minute leftovers for dinner instead and leaving it in the fridge over night (what I did, but the time soaking in all that flavor worked extra magic on the beans).
2) Continue stirring and cooking at medium low heat until all the water evaporates and it's at a consistency that you're happy with.

Serve it with the rice!
And because nobody should ever eat a boring salad, we had ours with homemade vinaigrette (Jared's recipe...I'll have to watch him more carefully next time so I can post it here), dried cranberries, and crumbled feta.

Following the Korean theme...

Here are some really yummy green onion pancakes that I made last night! They're called Pajeon.
The recipe is here!

Instead of using "pancake mix," I used this simple recipe:
Old Fashioned Pancakes
*I used half the amount of sugar, and no butter.
I used enough water to make the batter thin, as the Pajeon recipe called for, but it was only about 1/4 to 1/2 of a cup (no, I didn't measure...just eyeball it, you can't really do any harm with pancakes).

I didn't make the sauce, I thought they were good enough to eat plain or with some soy sauce. But try it! It's probably super tasty.

Balsamic Peaches

I wanted to create just a quick post to rave about how delicious peaches are when broiled with balsamic vinegar! I thought it sounded like a weird combination, but it's fantastic. Healthy, simple, and quick. They're pretty, and make a nice appetizer, side dish, or dessert. How convenient that it's peach season!
The recipe can't really even be called a recipe because it's so simple, but here it is:

1-2 tbsp balsamic vinegar
1 peach, halved (remove the pit)

Cut the peach in half, remove the pit, and place the halves cut side up on a piece of foil or a baking tray. Pour enough balsamic vinegar on them to fill the indent where the pit was, and to coat the edges around it. Broil them in a toaster oven or oven for about 5-7 minutes. They're best if you pull them out before they crisp on the top, and they're simply heated through. But if you forget about them for a minute too long and they do burn/crisp, it's easy to just cut this part off and they're fine to eat. I tell you this from experience.

Enjoy! The flavor is reminiscent of a really, really yummy peach pie. In fact, you could even make a bunch of them, and then use them for pie filling. Ooooooh!!!

Korean night! Fried Zucchini and Spicy Pork

Last night we made Daeji bulgogi (spicy pork) over rice, and Hobakjeon (fried zucchini) on the side. Both were AMAZING. I'll post the original recipes below, then tell you what we changed (mostly due to replacing ingredients that we didn't have with things that were already in the kitchen).

Spicy pork: Daeji Bulgogi
Changed ingredients:
*4 tbsp soy sauce
*1 tsp crushed garlic (we bought crushed garlic in a jar for the days that we don't feel like mincing it ourselves, and it's very strong, so I reduced the amount by a lot. If you're using fresh garlic, their two tbsp should be fine)
*2 tbsp sweet chili sauce (instead of the gochujang)
*3 light shakes of cayenne (intead of the red pepper flakes)
*1/2 onion instead of a whole onion
 The rest of the ingredients were the same. 
I only want to tell you the differences, because I know that ours was great, and I have no idea how the original tastes. Probably equally awesome.

Zucchini: Hobakjeon
I followed this recipe. I had a rather large zucchini, so it took 3 eggs (beaten) and probably 1/2 cup flour to coat all the slices. I sliced them about 1 cm thick. Oh, and I also added a bit of salt to the beaten eggs, which turned out really well. We used olive oil to fry them, and ate them plain by the dozen because they were so tasty.

Enjoy!

Here's how the Gnocchi turned out!

Here's the recipe, again.
I followed the instructions when I made them. At the end, she doesn't tell you how to get that pretty golden color in her picture: After boiling, they're gnocchi alright, and they'd be great to immediately throw into a sauce. But, if you want to crisp them up (we ended up eating them plain), fry them slightly until they turn golden brown. I fried mine lightly in olive oil and basil. So good!

 Above, you can kind of see the before/after of the frying. Though it's kind of a dark photo...
Below is a close up of the finished gnocchi.

 And then we see some gnocchi hangin' out with a cinnamon roll. :)

Granola!

I've hit a bit of a creative roadblock when it comes to thinking of new things I want to make. I've just been throwing things together, and nothing has seemed good enough lately to put on the blog. Except for the granola that I made yesterday! It was delicious. So delicious, that my puppy snatched a whole pound+ of it off the counter in the night and ate all of it...goodbye, my wonderful breakfast that never came to be.
Anyway, here's the recipe:

*2 cups oats (Old-fashioned oats would be better, but we had "quick" oats on hand, and it turned out fine. Both types of oats are steamed and rolled into flakes, but quick oats are chopped up into smaller pieces, and flattened)
*1/4 cup each of whatever additions you can dream of, like shredded coconut, almonds, walnuts, raisins, craisins, sunflower seeds, flax, cheerios, etc!
*1/4 cup honey

Mix all of the above ingredients together. Melt 1/3 cup butter in a separate bowl with a pinch of cinnamon, then stir it into the granola mix. Once well-combined, add the mixture to a 9x13 baking dish, and bake for about 20-30 minutes at 350 degrees, until slightly golden on top. Let it cool, then stir and store in an airtight container. It doesn't need to be refrigerated.

It's super easy! And so much cheaper than buying granola! Like 1/10 the price.
I'll put up another post about how to make granola bars next time I make them. They're basically the same, except you have to add something to bind the ingredients together, like peanut butter, egg, milk, etc. 

Dinner: White Fish on Garlic Toast with Tuber-tarot Soup

The other night, I combined a handful of recipes to make tuber-tarot soup (I made this up, haha) out of sweet potatoes, a potato, and half a tarot root (plus other ingredients listed below), steamed broccoli on the side, and then I wanted to make something with fish, but not my usual fish-dish (I sound like Dr. Seuss!) of baked-with-a-bunch-of-flavors fish on top of -insert grain here-...I wanted to have it on toast instead! Surprisingly, nobody else has posted such an idea on the internet, as far as I can tell. So I made this up too. I was quite pleased, because it was my first time feeling creative in the kitchen again for several weeks, and it came out well! With a bunch of tweaking along the way, that is. So if you make them, make sure to tweak the recipes yourself! :)

Tuber-tarot soup:

What is a tuber?

*2 sweet potatoes
*1 russet potato
*1/2 large tarot root (this was my first time cooking with tarot, so I was hesitant to put the whole thing in, but you could try it!)
*1/4 yellow, sweet, or white onion (I used 1/2, and thought it was overpowering)
*1 yellow squash (optional....I used it because it had been hiding in the fridge for too long)
*Ground pepper, basil, salt
*1 shake of cayenne (Jared added this when he got home, it was perfect!)
*4-6 cups of water or stock: Start with 4, then as you're cooking it, if it's too thick, add more. I didn't measure mine.

Bake all four potatoes and tarot in the oven until soft all the way through, about an hour at 375 degrees F. Wrap the onion in foil and set it in the oven for about half that time, so roughly 30 minutes. This brought out the sugars.
Once baked and cooled enough to touch, peel off the skin on all the potatoes and the tarot. Throw away the skins, and add the insides to a soup pot, along with the onion, water, and squash. Boil until everything starts to fall apart a little.
Let cool, and put the entire soup in a blender or food processor, and spin it until it's creamy. Add it back to the pot, add the spices to taste, and cook on medium heat (stirring!!) for about half an hour. Voila!

Fish:

*Thawed or fresh white fish fillets (I used tilapia)
* 1 1/2 tsp Mustard (grey poupon is what we have)
*2 tsp Mango Chutney (or your own creation of sweet/spicy- it could be lots of things!)
*Salt and Pepper

Coat the fillets in oil (I used olive oil) and all flavor-producing ingredients that you have chosen, and add to a pan on medium heat. Wait for them to turn white on the bottom, then flip them over and cook the other side the same way. I usually wait an extra minute longer after they look white throughout before I take them off the heat. It's a fine line, because if overcooked, fish gets tough, but I've found that the extra minute or so ensures that they're not watery/mushy. I've only had this problem with white fish, not with salmon. It might be because we buy most of our fish frozen? (Even though there's TONS of fishing in South Carolina, the grocery stores either have a very pathetic fresh fish department, or none at all...And add to that my paranoia about buying the wrong fish (unhealthy, raised in an unsustainable way, etc.), it's a pretty sad situation that leads to frozen fish. Even with frozen fish, I'm way too picky.
While I'm on the topic, here's a wonderful link to a resource put out by the Monterey Aquarium, where you can look up all kinds of fish and see what you should be looking for in the labeling when you buy them!
Seafood Watch

Garlic Bread:

This is Jared's recipe, and it's the best garlic bread you will ever eat, anywhere!

*Bread (we usually use wheat rolls, sliced into halves)
*1 stick of butter
*Many cloves of garlic, at least 4, minced
*A bit of brown sugar, about 1/2 tsp

Melt the butter, and combine it in a bowl with the garlic and sugar. Place the bowl in the fridge (or freezer if you're in a hurry) until the butter is smooth, but not firm. Spread the mixture over the bread, and toast it butter side-up (definitely not in an upright toaster...either in a toaster oven, or an oven set on broil) until...yes, until it's toasted. Easy!

Gnocchi, Stuffing Muffins, Sqaush Pasta, Pumpkin Muffins, Pop Tarts!

Okay, not much creativity today (Whaaat?? But it's only Tuesday!) so I found a whole bunch of links on Etsy for food recipes (who knew...Etsy apparently does everything). I'm going to post a whole slurry of them, just as much for me later as they are for you! Hope they're inspiring....They all have a summer theme. Here goes:

Summer Squash Pasta with Cherry Tomatoes and Pesto

Homemade Gnocchi (oh my god, it's so simple....I had no idea)

Stuffing Muffins

Ginger Pecan Pumpkin Muffins (I'm such a sucker for muffins...)

Strawberry Thyme Pop Tarts

So today, I'm going to make grilled cheese sandwiches, sweet potato fries, the squash pasta salad above, and the gnocchi for tomorrow, because as of right now, I have nothing to pack for lunch tomorrow and it doesn't look like they actually take much working time. Whoo, inspiration!

Oatmeal raisin carrot/banana muffins

During my early morning sweets marathon, I also found these yummy muffins:

http://www.milkfreemom.com/carrot-oatmeal-raisin-muffins/

They're super adaptable to whatever you have in your kitchen...I was out of carrots, so I substituted a banana which I just roughly chunked up. I used almond milk, and olive oil instead of coconut oil.

I love muffins because they're so easy and fast to throw together.

International Cinnamon Rolls

Wow, people are actually finding my blog somehow, AND looking at it! Internationally! Thanks, guys! I hope you're all finding enjoyable food. Feel free to comment, or give me feedback if you try any of my recipes...it would be awesome to hear how it went for somebody else!

I'm officially on summer break, and to celebrate, I had an early-morning baking marathon.
To start, I made cinnamon rolls! They're delicious, and I'd like to think they're a good deal healthier than store bought ones. And you can make them yourself. I think I might be getting addicted to that "I made this myself" feeling...there's just so much freedom in realizing that you can just MAKE anything that you need or want, with the right ingredients, and you can make it however you want and do your own quality control... and then you pull out of the oven this wonderful and warm piece of art into which you put all of your attention and loving care, and it's yours.
Okay, enough of the dreamy cooking ramble- here's the recipe:

Cinnamon rolls: Makes 14 rolls

Ingredients:

Dough:
2 1/2 teaspoons yeast
1/2 cup warm water
1 teaspoon sugar
1/2 cup milk
1/4 cup sugar
1/3 cup melted butter
1 teaspoon salt
1 egg
2 cups bread (or all-purpose) flour

2 cups wheat flour

Combine the yeast, warm water, and sugar in a bowl and set aside for about 15 minutes or until creamy on top. Then add all the other ingredients (starting with the wet ones, and then the dry) and stir with a big spoon until all combined. Then scoop it onto a floured surface and kneed for 5 to 10 minutes. Grease the bowl a little (oil or butter, etc) then return the dough to the bowl and let rise in a warm place until it has doubled in size. 

Then punch it down and roll out into a rectangle about 15 inches long and 8-9 inches wide. Paint the top with melted butter, and cover in sugar and cinnamon. Then starting from one of the longer sides, roll it up! This should leave you with a 15 inch log, which you then cut into about 14 pieces. If you want thicker rolls, you might want to go for 12 or even 10. 

Once you cut them, grease a cookie sheet with a thick coat of butter (heavy butter+pastry dish= best) and -this is optional!- some honey drizzled (or sugar sprinkled) all over. The thinking is that this will not only keep them from sticking to the cookie sheet, but the sugar (or honey) will soak into it from the bottom and give you that characteristic gooey-ness that we all love about cinnamon rolls...

Place the rolls cut side up however they'll fit on the cookie sheet, then set aside for as long as you can wait- ideally until the rolls have doubled in size. Then bake them for about 30-40 minutes, until they've puffed up and start to get golden on top. 

While they're in the oven, melt some more butter (about 1/4 cup) and combine with 1 tsp vanilla extract, and powdered sugar, honey, or brown sugar, or whatever you've been using for the rest of the recipe until think enough that it forms a glaze. When the rolls come out of the oven, spoon the glaze over each of them and let cool. Then eat them! 

They freeze very well, too, just so you know.

Mushroom Lo Mein!!

Along with pizza, we've decided that this recipe will be one of our staples that we just always have on hand...It's SO GOOD.
The ingredients below made dinner with seconds for both of us, and enough leftover for Jared for lunch today.

Ingredients:
8+ mushrooms, sliced
1/2 cup soy sauce (divided)
3 tbsp rice vinegar
1 1/4 cup chicken broth
1 tbsp sesame oil
1/2 tsp ground black pepper
6 oz. linguine pasta or lo mein noodles (basically the same thing!)
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 tbsp ginger, minced
2 tbsp olive oil
6 green onions, sliced
2 carrots, sliced into long slivers
1 can water chestnuts
3/4 cup green peas (I use frozen peas...)

Directions:
-Cook noodles as directed, then rinse with cold water in a colander until the noodles are cool to the touch. Then transfer them to a plate (or anything to keep them out of the way for a while) and toss with olive oil to prevent them from sticking together into a gelatinous sticky lump.
-In a large frying pan (or wok if you have one!!), saute the mushrooms in a tablespoon of soy sauce, rice vinegar, and olive oil, with the garlic and green onions. Cook and stir until the mushrooms are soft. There will be some moisture remaining in the pan, don't worry about it! It'll go into the final step.
-In another pot or pan, combine the broth, rest of the soy sauce, vinegar, sesame oil, ginger, pepper, green onions, carrots, peas, and water chestnuts. Boil until the peas are cooked. The carrots won't be soft yet, but they'll be lightly cooked.
-Pour the broth and veggie mixture into the frying pan/wok with the mushrooms, and combine them all together. Then add the noodles, and stir thoroughly. Let the noodles sit in the sauce for a few minutes to soak up some of the moisture and flavor, and then serve!

Don't be alarmed by all the ingredients. Most of it is probably stuff that you already have around the kitchen, and of course you can experiment with substituting and eliminating/adding things! That's what I did with the recipe I found, and this is the result. Make it your own!

Not the best picture, I know...not like in all those fancy food blogs, but we were in the middle of dinner and I said, "I HAVE to take a picture!" (Jared is used to these stop-for-photo-op outbursts by now, haha). So this is my mid-dinner, but you can see what it looks like!)

Cheese Cake and Cheesy Herby Dinner Rolls

Weird combination for the title, I know! I'm lumping these two recipes together because they're both videos on allrecipes, and I'm very fond of the guy, "Chef John," who does them. He taught me how to make cheesecake...that was before the start of this blog, back in April for Jared's birthday.
Here's the recipe:
New York Cheesecake
I remember I ran out of sugar, and so I used brown sugar...it gave the cheesecake a cool almost caramel-like flavor. Also, I made this in pie pans, rather than a cheesecake pan, and it resulted in 3 cheesecake-pies, and 4 cheesecake-"muffins"...there was extra batter, so I poured it into a jumbo muffin tray (with crust on the bottom of each cup, of course!). Tips, if you do it this way: It will take less time to cook them than in his recipe. Keep an eye on them. Cook the muffins in about half the time as the others, or else they'll be way over done...not burnt, but not classic-cheesecake-flavored any more. I baked everything for the same amount of time, and the muffins ended up tasting just like caramel! I loved them, but they were odd, and I was the only one who would eat them.


And here's the recipe for the dinner rolls which I am about to make right now:
http://allrecipes.com/video/578/garlic-parmesan-dinner-rolls/detail.aspx?prop24=RR_RelatedVideo
Trying to stock up on packable lunch foods while it's still sunday and I'm ahead and enthusiastic...there's a point that comes around midweek, where I can't think of anything else to make, but I need to make something for dinner and lunch the next day, and, "ahhh!" But if I do enough of these random things over the weekend, stuff can be frozen, and then I have something to pull out of the freezer come Thursday. Huzzah!

Fried Mushrooms, Potato Curry, and some Fiber Education!

So I'm lumping these two recipes together here because that's what I did for dinner.
These mushrooms are perfect for when you come home starving and need something quick to make.
I only had one mushroom before Jared accidentally ate them all while I turned around to make the curry...if that gives you an idea of how delicious they are.
Mushrooms:
http://www.jamieoliver.com/recipes/vegetables-recipes/mushrooms-fish-and-chips-style-with-posh-vinegar
Unless you plan ahead, don't worry about the "posh" vinegar...we just dipped them in balsamic vinegar, and it was just great.
Basically, I simplified and just fried the mushroom pieces in salt, pepper, and some torn up basil leaves thrown in at the last second. Fast and easy!

Potato curry:
This was a combination of several different recipes, as I liked the idea and so started throwing ingredients together, realizing along the way that I didn't have this or that, and then improvised... (FYI, marinara is basically tomato puree, for all I know...)
So I would encourage you to improvise as well, because there's absolutely no real way to go wrong with curry!

Ingredients I used:
-Two russet potatoes, chopped roughly into 1- 1 1/2 inch chunks
-One large sweet potato, chopped slightly smaller than the potatoes (sweet potato takes longer to cook than potatoes, so I figured it was good to increase the surface area)
-Three carrots, sliced thinly
-Two roma tomatoes, sliced however (they fall apart while cooking no matter what)
-About three tablespoons marinara or tomato puree
-Three cloves of garlic
-Cumin, salt, pepper, chili powder, cinnamon, tumeric, and dried basil, all to taste (this is what happens when Mia runs out of curry powder, haha).

In a large, deep frying pan, add some olive oil (I used the leftover oil from the mushrooms) and water, and the potato and sweet potato pieces. Add the carrots, garlic, and spices, too.Stir to coat all the chunks with the oil, then cover and cook/steam until the sweet potatoes are soft enough to break easily with a fork (the potatoes will be much mushier by this point). Add more water and continue to steam if needed.
Add the tomato pieces, marinera, and anything else you haven't added yet, and continue cooking until the mix becomes creamy and the tomatoes have broken down. I was stirring it constantly, because I'm paranoid from my history of burning food in pans...stir however you deem necessary, and serve when it looks good!

I served the curry over some cooked barley, which I recommend highly as an alternative to rice. It's high in soluble and insoluble fiber, and so does lots of awesome stuff in your gut. Check out these links:
About Barley's health benefits:
http://www.whfoods.com/genpage.php?tname=foodspice&dbid=127
About the benefits of eating more fiber:
http://kriscarr.com/blog/tips-to-live-in-harmony-with-high-fiber-foods/

And then, I made more rice pudding...

Pasta salad and more pasta

This is the best pasta salad ever: 
http://allrecipes.com/recipe/zesty-southern-pasta-and-bean-salad/

Last time I made it, Jared added a can of artichoke hearts, and it was so good! Olives are also a good addition.
Rather than buying italian dressing, I looked up a few recipes to make it from scratch, and both times I made it, I used different recipes...I didn't write either of them down, but they're basically olive oil, any type of vinegar you have on hand (balsamic is yummy), and a blend of spices, salt, pepper, etc. Use your instincts! Fresh herbs go a long way, I used both basil and parsley.

Also, I'm making this tonight: A squash/ricotta pasta bake. Like a lasagna, but new and exciting!
http://www.jamieoliver.com/recipes/pasta-recipes/squash-and-ricotta-pasta-bake
I love this guy.
I made his fried mushrooms last night, as an appetizer for some potato curry...oh gosh, okay, I'll make a new post for those. That would be the organized thing to do, wouldn't it?

Mango Chilli Chutney

Here's something else that is way too expensive to buy from the store in a fancy little jar! Spicy Mango Chutney. It's spicy jam! Yay!

Ingredients:
2 mangos, cubed
1/2 onion, diced
1 dried red pepper, minced
1 lime (juice and zest)
About 1 tsp minced ginger
1 1/2 cups strong pepper green tea (directions for this below)
1/2 cup rice vinegar
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp mustard (I used Grey Poupon)
1/4 tsp ground cloves
2 tsp salt
1/2 cup sugar

Directions:
Boil 2 tsp of green tea leaves with 1 1/2 tsp whole peppercorns (in whatever you use to brew loose leaf tea) until the tea is as dark as it can get. Then measure out 1 1/2 cups.
Add tea, all the spices, onion, vinegar, red pepper, and half the mango to a large pan.
Bring to a boil, then simmer until thick.
Eat some of the waiting mango, because it's delicious.
Optional: Transfer the contents of the pan into a blender or food processor, and "chop" for five seconds, then return to pan. This gives the body of the chutney a smooth and pretty consistency. I did this because the onion pieces were annoying me.
Once it's thick, ass the rest of the mango, and the lime juice.
Boil it for one more minute. The finished chutney should be smooth with chunks of mango dispersed throughout.
Portion out into sanitized jars, and let cool.

It's sweet with just enough pepper for an "afterthought" kick of spicy...it's really good on whole wheat bagels with cream cheese! Or crackers. It would be a great compliment to any cheese...and hey, it just sounds so fancy..."I know how to make chutney."

"Would you like some...Chutney?"

I guess I've just always seen it as one of those hoity-toity gourmet things that I couldn't really afford. It's always next to the $15 pieces of cheese...But it's so, so easy to make!

Jams!

Next project: Buy a few green and gala apples and make a new jam!

 http://www.foodinjars.com/2010/01/honey-lemon-apple-jam-recipe/

I've been reaaaally into making jam lately. It started with marmalade, and then we found a very large patch of wild blackberries, and then we found a farm that sold pick-your-own strawberries...these were THE BEST blackberries and strawberries that I will ever eat. Store-bought fruit sucks, to put it lightly. Anyway, berry jams are gone and given, and I want to start experimenting with more! I saw a lavender jam that I want to make in a few months when back in California, and we eat apples all the time...

I'll do a quick explanation of how easy it is to make jam. Keep in mind that you can make it with frozen fruit as well.

Marmalade: Some people grate off just the zest, so the white pith (which is the bitter part) doesn't get in the jam, but I keep it in there because that's where the natural pectin comes from, and the sugar that you add either takes away the bitterness (longer cooking time) or you end up with a blast of bitter AND sweet in every bite (cooked less- less time to soak up the sugar throughout).
So, take the peels of about 4 oranges (save the peels after making juice, eating the fruit, etc. You can freeze the peels if you're not going to make them into marm. for a while, just thaw them a day ahead of time in the fridge), and slice them into the size that you want them to be in the final jam. They don't break down in size too much.
Put the peels in a pot, and pour enough water in to cover them. Important: measure the water that you use, and remember it for later. Then cook them like crazy, maybe for about an hour or so...they'll go through several transformative phases, but they'll eventually become very obvious mush, which means the rinds are soft enough to break apart effortlessly when you bite them, and the pith has broken down and released all it's goodness into the water. At this point, add the sugar/sweetener of your choice. I've used brown sugar before, and it was yummy. White sugar works well. Use organic/raw sugar if you can, because refined sugar is horrible for you. The amount of sugar is kind of scary on this one...the original recipe I found said to use equal amounts water and sugar (so if you pour 4 cups of water in the beginning, you're going to need 4 cups of sugar...that's way too much, in my opinion), but what I do is start with about 1/4 the amount of water. So with 4 cups of water used, start with a cup of sugar. If that turns out to be too bitter still, just gradually add more! But you might find that it doesn't need all that much sugar to be delicious.
After adding the sugar, make sure you keep an eye on it, turn the heat down to medium or lower, and DO NOT FORGET THAT YOU ARE MAKING MARMALADE. Probably seems obvious, but you have been cooking it for a while already, and it's easy to get distracted...It's not like I ruined my marmalade twice by doing this or anything...
As soon as you've added the sugar, you'll see it get much thicker and syrupy. This is what makes it very easy for it to burn to the bottom of the pot, now. So keep stirring, and allow about 30 minutes to go by with the cover on except for when you're stirring, so that the sugar really has time to infuse into the fruit.
Then, remove the cover, keep stirring, and cook it this way until enough of the water has evaporated out that it's a very thick syrup. Note that it will also thicken as it cools, too. And don't worry, if it's still too watery once it's cooled, just bring it back to a gentle boil and cook it (stirring all the while!) until it evaporates a bit more. You might have to do this a couple times before it's perfect, I still do.

And now, I just ladle the jam into jars without worrying about technically "canning" them by creating a seal, because I know that the amounts that I make will be eaten quickly enough that we don't have to worry about spoilage. But if you are interested in canning, it's really easy, and I've put a good resource for learning how over in the side bar, called Food in Jars.

As for making other jams, now that we know how to make marmalade? It's basically the same process:

1*Fruit, cover with water, boil until soft and breaking down.
2*Add sweetener, reduce heat, continue to boil until sugar absorbed by fruit, covered and stirring often
3*Remove cover, keep boiling and stirring until excess water evaporates and you have jam!

With ripe berries, you hardly need to add sugar, if any, because they're already so sweet. I don't add pectin, because again, we eat it quick enough that it doesn't need to be preserved, and I have found that I can achieve the right thickness just by adding sugar (just a tablespoon or two if you don't need it to sweeten the fruit) to create a syrupy consistency. Once you evaporate enough of the water, the syrup ends up creating a jam that has plenty of body to it. Plus, there's natural pectin in many fruits, like oranges and blackberries, and firm green apples, etc. Strawberries have a very low amount of natural pectin, so I add a bit more sugar when making strawberry jam, and it works out. But, if you're making jam to last long term, find other sources, like Food in Jars, that can get you more by-the-book jamming details.

I'll be sure to post about the apple jam, once I make it! And oh my gosh, I never posted about my spicy mango chutney....

Rice Pudding!

Last week, Jared bought a tub of our favorite rice pudding, and...I ate it all while he was gone. And then I felt really fat and guilty. So I decided to make a whole bunch of it from scratch to make it up to him.

So I made it last night. He ate a bowl of it, and...I ate the rest of it throughout the day today. And now I feel even fatter and very guilty. BUT! I now know how to make rice pudding!

It's delicious, warm or cold. In my opinion, it's way better than the stuff we -used to- buy! And, as I keep on saying, it's so much cheaper than buying it! And it's so much healthier because you can regulate how much sweetener goes into it, and you know exactly what your ingredients are- they're as quality as you thought to buy, so you know they're up to your standards. No mysteries, no fluff, no inflated cost because of the fancy packaging and the fact that it was shipped across the country.I'm never buying pudding again.

Here's the recipe I found, and I would highly recommend trying it out, and then altering it as you please! I added about 1/2 cup of flaked coconut to the rice as it was cooking, which smelled amazing. Almond milk in place of the milk and much less sugar will be my next alterations. (Also: I'm new to the pudding world, but I don't know just how important the egg is...it might come out just fine without it, and then with almond milk, it's vegan!) ....I just might make another batch tomorrow...
 http://allrecipes.com/recipe/creamy-rice-pudding/

I really, really want to suggest eating it warm as soon as you make it. So, sooo good.

More resources for us all:

I just found this website, and I thought "wow, they're parallel to Jared and I! Except they have a farm..." Okay, maybe more like Jared and I in 20 years. BUT, they're trying to reach the same goals, from what I've read so far.
So I thought next, "well, I just have to blog this." Of course. It's not like I have an essay to write that's due today or anything...
Here it is!
http://www.arcadia-farms.net/2012/10/18/bread-and-broth/
That right there is exactly how we make broth too! So now you know, and I don't have to type the whole thing out, haha.

And here's their pinterest "Recipe Box," which...wait for it....waaaiit....IT HAS RECIPES! Shocking, yes. They have some yummy stuff on there! My eyes went to the muffins first...oh, muffins...
http://pinterest.com/arcadiafarmscsa/recipe-box/

Their story really resonates with me, because I would love to end up like them one day soon. So inspiring, for all of us, even if we can just take a piece of the inspiration and turn it into something that works for all of our different lifestyles. It's going to be up to the communities to make the changes that we're overdue to see, not the governments. We have to make it happen, how we want it to. And we can do that! This is a fantastic idea.

Anyway, I was just inspired! It's cool to hear from other people out there who are making changes for themselves (and others...even better).

Tahini "Goddess" dressing recipe and HUMMUS

This is my favorite salad dressing/dip/sauce in the ENTIRE WORLD, buuuut if you buy it from Annie's, it's pretty expensive! So I found a really simple and fast recipe for it on About.com! You just have to hunt down Tahini, which is made from sesame seeds.We finally found it in the gourmet section of our local store, but I've heard it can also be found sometimes by the peanut butter...

Here's how to make your own Tahini, if you can't find it in stores, or you just want to be SUPER awesome and make it yourself!

Tahini recipe

And here's the recipe for the dressing...
Goddess dressing

Once you have the Tahini *does triumphant tahini dance around kitchen* you can also make Hummus with it...I'll be posting about that soon, once I make it!

____________
UPDATE: Jared came home and we ended up making hummus! It was super easy. Basically, we took the recipe for the dressing, which I had left in the blender, and added half a can of garbanzo beans (chickpeas) to it, then blended it until smooth. This made it a bit thicker, because it was actually fairly thin, considering the recipe said that it would be thick. I think it might have been because I used apple juice instead of apple cider vinegar? If it's too thin, add garbanzo beans! Flour might work too?
Anyway, after adding half a can of garbanzos, we poured about 1/3 of it into an empty salad dressing jar (save your jars, folks!) and put it in the fridge. To the remaining dressing in the blender we added the rest of the 2 1/2 cans of garbanzos, gradually while the blender was set to puree.
Please note that this would be much better to do in a food processor, if you have one. Our blender started to smoke a little bit (poor dinky motor...), but it still works fine. My advice to you: just use lots of common sense and good judgement on this one. Or get a food processor. We probably will, before we make this again.
Anyway, the result was PERFECT HUMMUS!! We added a bit of dry basil, and it's amazing. It makes a lot of hummus, so it's definitely way more cost-efficient to make it than to buy it in those little tubs. Each can of garbanzo beans was less than a dollar, and the tahini was about $4, but we used maybe a quarter of the container on just this. The rest of the ingredients used were worth pennies, and you probably have them already. Good deal! We ended up with one jar of dressing (alone, this would have cost about $4), and 42 oz of hummus!