HeatCageKitchen

May 29, 2013 Amy

Hello, Readers:

Well, I’ve got a couple of things to tell you about, so let’s get started.

First off, reading the Houston Chronicle online this morning, I discovered that the empty space in the Houston Downtown Tunnel I’ve been walking past for the last month on my lunch hour is the spot of a newly-opened cupcake spot called New Addiction. I knew they were doing something back there, but I didn’t know what. Well, today I went back there for a minute and talked to a couple of nice ladies who I will attempt to interview this week, just for you, and some pictures, too. I did ask about gluten-free; they are working on the recipe and should have it in about four weeks.

DARNIT!!

The article also discusses another cupcake shop that does have gluten-free already available, so I may check them out tomorrow.

So later, I’m ridin’ on the Metro into downtown (anyone remember that song?), reading my Wall Street Journal, and what do I see but an article about Ree Drummond, The Pioneer Woman! No kidding, the fifth season of her cooking show starts Saturday on The Food Network.

I’ve written about Ree before, and met her at a book signing back in November when she came to nearby Pearland to sign her new book Charlie and the Christmas Kitty. I got to read the book while in line (it’s a kid’s book and not very long) and since I had the time, told her what I really thought of her TV show–it’s like a visit to the country every weekend, and hanging out with your country cousins for a while.

I also told her that a few months before, I made her Orange Marmalade Muffins for a Buddhist activity. We had some new members attend our little meeting, and they were very surprised to learn that I baked them from scratch THAT MORNING. Well, DUH–but they didn’t know me, so they didn’t assume anything. Then when we were leaving, everyone scooped them up! I was glad, of course, because I didn’t want to take them home. They were that good that I would have eaten them all myself. Really, they were scooping up these little morsels and couldn’t get enough. They’re not an everyday item, and as Ree told me, “one will give you a sugar rush.” (I think it’s in her first book.)

Yes, I know, it’s a 22-minute cooking show, but it’s really much more than that. You learn what it’s like to live in another part of the US that most of us will likely never see or experience, and see real cattle ranchers in action–not a Hollywood rendition, the real thing. Remember that Ree is also a college graduate of USC, and lived in California for many years–that’s why she’ll occasionally wish for a Starbucks in the middle of one of her pastures. (I’m sure when she makes it to Tulsa, Starbucks is first.) She’s a redhead with a sense of humor much like mine, and took a turn that completely changed her life’s direction.

Irony alert: Ree was a vegetarian for many years, and Ladd reintroduced her to the pleasures of the flesh. Oh, that’s a story in her bio that’s hilarious.

I met Marlboro Man, too, separately in Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport last year in late April when I was leaving Phoenix and he and the boys were arriving. They got off the plane I was getting onto, I think. He really is that handsome, very nice when I ran up to him, suitcase in tow, and the boys are absolutely adorable. It’s great that he has a sense of humor and enjoys doing the show, too.

Note: the link here is to the video; you have to log into the site to read the article, but you can log into WSJ.com with Facebook if you like, or open a free account just to access it. You don’t have to subscribe to WSJ. If you like The Pioneer Woman, it’ll be worth it to sign up for an account.

One more thing on The Pioneer Woman and I’ll shut up: if you want to read something very funny, check out this article, and the one before it that’s linked, on how she had more experiences doing a Bobby Flay Thanksgiving Throwdown than you saw on TV. I couldn’t stop laughing when I read it. I didn’t really pay attention to Ree until 2011, when her bio came out. I needed a good read after a bad breakup, and that fit the bill–I finished it on a Saturday night. Hey–no date, why not?

And now for a change of subject. . . .

A few years ago I dated a guy who had this bizarre idea that I would just LOVE to live in a mobile home in the middle of nowhere. He was partially right. I would like to live out of the city, but under no circumstances in a mobile home, anywhere. He’d actually done the mobile home thing and loved it. Me, I’ve been in one or two. They’re lovely on the lot. . .and then the word “tornado” turns that lovely abode into a pile of rubble. No. But I did start doing a bit of gardening, and although last year was mostly a wash after I was laid off (long story) I did, finally, after our recurrent spring-winter ended, get started on my own garden.

The plot I have is 5′ x 8′, a lot smaller than Ree Drummond’s garden (she has oodles of room to grow stuff!) and so I’m particular about what I’m growing back there. (Basically, I want food.) I worked my paws off getting the weeds dug out and the plants I bought up and running. For the last year or so, the rosemary has been growing just fine, and the mint plant I’ve had for probably 3 or 4 years. Sometimes I forget to water it, and there aren’t many leaves; then I remember to water it, and POOF! Mint juleps all around (or whatever you like fresh mint for.) Mint MUST be planted in a container, or it will take over the garden; it’s very invasive. (I know that from Martha Stewart.)

BTW, when Martha Stewart talks about “container gardening,” she’s using lovely, hand-thrown artisan-made pottery. When Amy talks about “container gardening,” she’s using 5 gallon paint buckets from Lowe’s and Home Depot. I don’t mess around. I’ve used the hole punch to put drainage in the bottom of the buckets. Works so far.

So over the weekend I bought two tomato plants, one Meyer lemon tree, a strawberry plant, one flat-leaf Italian parsley plant, and a bell pepper plant. (I think it’s red bell peppers.) One of the tomato plants is called “The Container Tomato,” and I hope it gives me some. The other tomato plant is something else, but when I got it home, I realized it had three tomatoes already growing on it:

The two larger tomatoes at the base of the plant

The little tomato at the top of the plant

So, I figure if nothing else, I’ll get three tomatoes out of this plant. But I’m hoping for more.

I’ve not had good luck with tomatoes, nor with cilantro parsley, but I keep trying.

If you wanna just grow something, I do have a suggestion: green, or spring, onions, aka scallions. No kidding, they’re incredibly easy to grow. Next time you go shopping, pick up a pot to plant in and some potting soil (or use what you have already, if you do.) Then next grocery trip, buy some spring onions, and cut off the white root end, and plant the white root end into the soil. No kidding. I read that online, tried it, and I haven’t bought green onions since. That was, maybe, 3 years ago? Now, the ones I bought were big, thick ones, and they grew back skinny. Do you think I care? Just remember to water them. Take a look:

Fresh green onions, basically free after the initial cost

Yes, that’s green onions. However much they cost at the grocery, you’ll never buy them again if you just plant the white root ends and water them. (That’s an aloe vera plant and a few more green onions on the left side; the aloe vera is new, those onions in the round pot are also 3 years old.)

I grow the green onions and the rosemary to make a couple of my favorite dishes whenever I want, and I’m also going to try and re-grow a sage plant (which I had but lost last summer) and also garlic. Now, you can buy garlic seed bulbs from nurseries, but what I’ve done is waited until my grocery garlic sprouts and plant the cloves. I love, love, love, the shoots that grow out of the ground from the pods. However, in order to harvest full heads of garlic, you have to leave them to “over winter,” or give it until next spring. No kidding. I have yet to be successful doing that, but I do love nibbling on them garlic shoots. (I’m not kissing anyone, so who cares?)

Also growing is the top of a pineapple cut last year from one bought on sale at the grocery. It’s a Hawaiian pineapple, and, well, it’s growing, but I don’t know what the heck to do with it. So I leave it in the pot. Maybe one day I’ll have a tree with pineapples growing on it.

Basil, I was hopeful for, but the snails have gotten to my plant once or twice, and it seems stalled. I’ve watered it, transplanted it into a bigger container, and well, it seems like it doesn’t want to grow anymore. Might pick up a packet of basil seeds and plant more around the base of the plant. I want my freezer full of freshly made pesto, darnit!

I’ve also planted some sunflower seeds back there, and will plant some summer mesclun lettuce this weekend (’cause I forgot last weekend.) When they start growing, I’ll post some pictures.

So, to show you my back patio area, here you go:

This year’s HeatCageKitchen garden

Why do this? Because I WANT to. I want fresh tomatoes at my fingertips, and the ability to give them to friends if I can’t eat them all in time. I WANT Meyer lemons that I don’t have to go to Trader Joe’s for. I WANT fresh bell peppers all the time!!!

And if I ever get my wish of a place to hang out in the country and write blog posts all day, I can eat good without having to head to HEB before doing so.

It doesn’t hurt to dream.

And hey–if you live in an apartment, don’t think you can’t grow stuff, either–today’s WSJ also has an article on gardens for apartment dwellers. (Pun alert!) Believe it or not–this apartment gardening industry has its roots in, ah, well, the non-legal green herb trade. (You know what I’m talking about, and it’s not houseplants.) Solar energy and solar-powered stuff also sprouted from these non-legal growers of the herb I won’t mention here.

If you can’t trust *those* herb growers, who have been growing indoors since the 1960’s, who can you trust to help you grow lettuce and basil indoors?

Well, anyway. . .I’m going to bed early, so enjoy the linked articles, and sit tight–I plan more interesting foodie things soon.

Happy Dining!

Considered opinions

Memorial Day

May 27, 2013 Amy

Hello, Dear Readers:

Once again I have been OBE, or “overcome by events,” and it has been another two weeks since I wrote. My apologies. I have one started and in the can (the draft folder) about a foodie adventure I went on recently, and can’t wait to tell you all about it. But today, I have lots to share.

First, let me say that Memorial Day is to honor the fallen soldiers, sailors, airmen, Marines and Coast Guard members who work hard to protect our rights and our lives in the US. (It is not about a day off, or great deals on furniture, cars and carpeting.) Because of those who died protecting this country, I can bring you this silly foodie blog, along with countless other folks who blog about a myriad of subjects. Cooking. Sewing. Cats. Cars. Gardening. Ranching. Homesteading. Theater. Traveling. And yes, (gulp) politics. People in the US who blog about their interests utilize their First Amendment right of free speech, which you don’t necessarily get in other countries. Some have died for what they’ve written because they were not allowed the freedom to express it (and not always politics, either.) You name it, there’s a blog for it, and we in the US all owe a debt of gratitude for the men and women who have given all in defense of our country.

Also, people in Oklahoma are suffering, so if you can donate, please do; if not, at least keep them in your prayers. There are a number of organizations helping tornado survivors, including the Salvation Army, Mercy Chefs (they bring mobile kitchens to disaster sites and hand out hot food to affected people) and others. I like that–and when I get to it I’m planning to give Mercy Chefs some funds myself. I’ve done it before, and I know they’re legit; but if you have a preferred charity, by all means, the great state of Oklahoma needs some help now. Ree Drummond, The Pioneer Woman, also lists these organizations that are helping out.

It’s not always about Texas. Even when it is. Anyway. . .

So what have I been doing? Snoozing on the bus when I’m trying to read going either to downtown or home from it. I’m still hacking my way through a book, but while it’s a good book, and I need to re-read it now, I can’t help but doze off. Glad to have my little travel pillow stuffed in my commuter bag.

I’ve had a weekend where I should have been drinking but wasn’t (not for lack of alcohol), but today I’ve done some cooking and planted the HeatCageKitchen garden (that’s another blog post, with pictures.) I’ve done both flower planting in the front and veg/sunflower planting in the back, and I’ve even bought a Meyer lemon tree. Let’s see how that works out. Unfortunately, didn’t realize that Mr. Snail was inside my dirty gardening clogs that I just intended to rinse off (I wore my tennis shoes and socks to protect my feet.) I found him after I’d rinsed them with hot water in the bathtub, so I’m guessing when I tossed him back over the fence, it wasn’t to a new life, but to a burial plot. Sorry about that, but I don’t like snails much anyway, and no, I’ve never eaten escargot. Nor do I intend to, I don’t care if Giada de Laurentiis makes it for me.

This weekend I did some sewing, too, but didn’t get as much done as I wanted. Later in this post, I’ll give you the recipe for the official HeatCageKitchen yeast-free, gluten-free, dairy-free ultimate Breakfast Quiche. It’s got a lot of eggs in it. (And boy, do I need a shower.)

First, an update: I am thoroughly enjoying having a salad when I get home at night. Lettuce sealed in jars is a fantastic idea and I am happy to report that it’s well worth the small amount of trouble. I’m telling you, if salad is your thing like it is mine, you really gotta try sealing lettuce in the jar for yourself. It works perfectly, and the lettuce is totally delicious a week out. Don’t believe me? Check out this pic I took this morning:

The lettuce lasts all week!

Two heads of iceberg lettuce were chopped, rinsed, spun dry, packed into glass jars and sealed up with the Ziploc tool method. However, the two in the front were packed up 8 days ago. No kidding. Today is Monday, and those two front jars were packed a week ago yesterday. I ate one of them today with a huge tomato. Know what? It was STILL GOOD. Fresh and tasty, just like I packed them. I realize that a month down the road the lettuce might be a little funky, but for lettuce to last a week in the fridge like that, and perfectly crisp. . .yeah. I’m enjoying my salads. Heck, even plain iceberg lettuce with a bit of olive oil and salt is good, too–long as it’s not limp and brown.

This weekend I also put half a pork roast in the crock pot with some homemade BBQ sauce, (I bought a three pounder and cut it in half, froze the other part) and roasted two turkey thighs. I love turkey thighs; they taste so much better than breast meat, they’re available in most bigger grocery stores, and they’re usually a lot cheaper. Also made a batch of Five Minute Hummus. Just ’cause I could.

So. . .drum roll. . .I think I have created the perfect breakfast dish. The HeatCageKitchen Supreme Breakfast Quiche. It’s a hit! (It’s really good.) But first, a little background: I realized that my previous attempts were missing something: MEAT! I love sausage, but conventional sausage usually has sugar in it, so I leave it alone.

I was thumbing through Dr. Hotze’s Optimal Eating Plan looking for something else when I came across a recipe for homemade breakfast sausage. It calls for ground turkey, but I had some ground chicken I wanted to use for something, and it fit the bill. A little salt, a little pepper, a little fresh sage, and it’s pretty darn good. (I bought some fresh sage and planted some organic sage seeds so I’ll have it all year long. I hope it grows.) I cooked it like ground beef, crumbled in a big cast-iron skillet with all the ingredients, and then put it in the greased pie plate:

Topped that with a jar of chopped sun-dried tomatoes in oil, oh, yeah:

I didn’t lose any this time.

Then beat the heck out of ten eggs with some almond milk poured in (maybe a quarter cup?) and a few shakes of Chipotle Tabasco. This type of Tabasco has some heat but doesn’t burn you; when you add a couple of shakes to eggs in this fashion, it gives a smoky flavor but no heat to speak of.

I like this shot best because you don’t see the cat’s homeopathic allergy drops, which are sitting right behind the mixer. I did not add them, despite the formula’s alleged “bacon flavor.” That’s for the cat.

I beat the eggs to a nice little froth with my Suzy Homemak. . I mean, Suzanne Somers super-duper hand mixer. No, there is no milk, cream, cheese or other milk-based foods in this dish (and no tofu, either, forget that.)

My regular 4 cup measure was in the dishwasher (round 1 of 2) so I grabbed the seldom-used 8 cup, which I have for occasions that I need more room. Good choice, ’cause I could beat them eggs but good!

So then you just pour it over the sausage and tomato mixture and bake it at 350F until it’s done.

I don’t know, you bake it until the knife comes out clean. I wasn’t paying attention. I had dishes to wash, you know. You time it and get back to me on it, OK?

I used the countertop oven. Why? Well, think about it–110v vs. 220v. In Houston. In summer. I use the countertop much more than the regular stove anyway. Because it works. I still have to clean it, though.

So after it’s baked, this is what you get:

Oh, yeah. . .that’s what I’m talkin’ about. Not too rich, not too light, meaty but not heavy, with the wonderful tomato taste tossed in. Yeah. Oh, and I skipped that crust part. Got sick of it, actually, but I do like the golden flaxseed meal for other things, like that gluten-free sandwich wrap you make in the microwave. I need to make those again soon, they’re so delish.

So, there you have it–the perfect breakfast quiche. No gluten, no soy, no breading, no milk, and all real food. (Yes, sun-dried tomatoes in oil are real food. I can eat a whole jar.)

The recipes are as follows:

Breakfast Turkey Sausage (from The Yeast Connection Cookbook by Crook & Jones)

1 lb ground turkey (ground chicken also works well)

3/4 tsp sea salt

1/4 to 1/2 tsp black pepper

1/2 to 1 tsp dried sage or 10-12 fresh sage leaves, minced.

Mix all ingredients using a fork or food processor for less than a minute.

You can turn this mixture into patties, cook and freeze, or freeze raw.

For this quiche, however, after you mix the ingredients, put it into a large pan and brown as you would ground beef:

HeatCageKitchen Breakfast quiche

One recipe Breakfast Turkey Sausage (above), browned

One jar sun-dried tomatoes in oil (chopped)

10 eggs, beaten with 2 shakes Chipotle Tabasco and 1/4 cup almond milk (if not doing yeast-free, milk of your choice.)

Layer the sausage in a greased pie plate, covering the bottom.

Layer the chopped sun-dried tomatoes on top

Pour the beaten eggs over the top and allow to settle. Bake in a 350F oven until a knife inserted into the quiche comes out without liquid eggs.

Enjoy!

Breakfast,Considered opinions,Fast & Easy,Ingredients

Making hay while the sun shines

May 12, 2013 Amy

Happy Sunday, Fellow Foodies!

I hope you didn’t think I abandoned any of you. No, I’m back in the world of employment, for a while, anyway, and have been having long days and obstacles. While I don’t want to bore anyone with details, I will say that it could end up meaning I may be cooking in a new kitchen at some point. We’ll see. I have a lot to do, and cooking on Sunday has worked for me for the last couple of weeks.

I sewed yesterday, and completed two simple garments (one with several buttonholes) and yet another bag. Hey–you gotta be stylish downtown, OK? The Lunch Purse will be in my briefcase and be used on the occasions when I step out to lunch and need to be stylish but don’t need my whole purse, just my wallet and cell phone.

I made it into Trader Joe’s again last Sunday, except this was the store on S. Shepherd in Houston, not the one in the elegant Woodlands part of Houston. This store in town has a little less stock, I think, but the cashier told me that they do that to slowly introduce the brand into a new market. Kind of silly, since most people in that part of town know what Trader Joe’s is, just like they do in The Woodlands, since many people in Houston have either traveled to the west coast or moved from there. Since the TJ store in The Woodlands has been there longer, they have more stuff. Well, OK. they had those trimmed fennel bulbs, but I still didn’t get any.

I now work downtown and have access to the somewhat famous Houston Downtown Tunnel, and have been walking for 30 minutes every day down there. It’s basically several miles of food court as well as some shops, doctor’s offices and other services thrown in. Love it, and there are three Seattle’s Best Coffee shops down there. THREE!

My bud Eddie says that when he worked downtown he spent a lot of time down in the tunnel. I plan to explore the branches of the tunnel when I figure out how to get back to where I need to be. I also want to take trips on the free Greenlink bus, but that’s an after-work thing.

Seattle’s Best Coffee disappeared from the rest of Houston a couple of years ago when Borders closed up, except for a couple of freestanding stores inside the 610 loop and the tunnel. Note: it’s not safe to crack jokes to police officers in Seattle’s Best at 7:45 in the morning.

Now for the news: recent article in the esteemed Wall Street Journal discussed something that has become one of my favorites recently, hummus. Not just any hummus, but this recipe from Real Simple a few years ago, and I’ve been making it ever since. I think I’ve written about it before, but the difference is that I halve the amount of lemon juice, because what they suggest absolutely screams lemon. Yuck–kills the taste of the sesame and chickpeas. But no, this article discusses the, um, spreading in popularity of this staple of Middle Eastern countries.

Oh, I feel the puns coming. Look out. . . .

Hmmm. . .red pepper hummus, which has a big dollop of pureed red bell pepper right on top. They have snack sizes with pretzels, too, and differently flavored types, which aren’t exactly Middle Eastern, as pointed out in this second WSJ article, because slightly weird comedian Stephen Colbert complained about it. Remember that this is the same comedian who a) got a treadmill named after him that ended up on the International Space Station, and had astronaut Sunni Williams announce it on his show, and b) tried to get a Washington, DC toilet named after him.

BTW, chickpeas are also called garbanzo beans, a term I actually like better. Dunno why. So I’m going to quit using the former term and use the latter one. Garbanzo.

So because hummus is spreading in popularity, the Sabra company is looking to spread out their growing operations to get more garbanzos to make the hummus with, including contacting tobacco farmers. Cool! I’m not a fan of cigarettes, (I’ve never smoked) and it could help farmers make the switch if they want to (their choice, of course.) One farmer didn’t know what they were and at 71, actually tasted garbanzos for the first time–and liked them. We’re on the right track.

Anyway, the focus of the article is the Sabra company which is gaining in popularity after handing out samples all over the US. I like that recipe I gave you, and will eat it with celery or in a small bowl with a spoon, but I thought I might check out Sabra in my weekly visit to the League City SuperTarget. Found it! Right with the fancy salad ingredients and fresh herbs. I pick up the container, and looked at what they used to make it.

First ingredient: soybean oil.

DAMMIT!!!

You wanna try it, you’re on your own. I do NOT DO SOYBEAN OIL.

Anyway. . .garbanzos are a bit of a pain to deal with dry, so I suggest buying the canned grocery store brand and rinsing them yourself in a colander, removing any loose skins you might find if you want to. Today I went to my local HEB and bought two more cans. I can’t put my hands on my grocery receipt, but I think they’re 69 cents a can; Target is about 82 cents for their Market Pantry brand.

The most expensive part of hummus is going to be the tahini, or sesame paste, which is available in most larger grocery stores in the international section, since it’s primarily a Middle Eastern staple. (It settles like natural peanut butter so be sure to stir it really well before you refrigerate it, or just empty it in to the bowl of your stand mixer and mix it really well and then store it. Ditto for natural peanut butter.) However, you don’t use very much at one time, the garbanzos are the bulk of the recipe, and hummus is a magnificent sesame flavoring that blends well. Admittedly, I used to have a recipe for hummus made with peanut butter, but I think that was in a book I don’t have anymore. That’s OK. Unless you live on a ranch in the middle of Oklahoma, you can likely find it locally, somewhere. (And I’m sure the lovely Mrs. Drummond knows where to get it in Oklahoma, too.)

So what else have I been up to? Well. . .as I did last weekend, I cooked up a storm and will be re-running the dishwasher soon as I finish telling you, then ironing for the week. In addition to roasting some turkey thighs and two packts of thick pork chops that were on sale at SuperTarget today, I made a batch of my favorite Yeast Free Brownies and a gluten-free, yeast free breakfast quiche by literally throwing a few things together. Without cream or milk, I was somewhat limited in what I could use for a binder for the eggs, so I tried guar gum.

Don’t do it. Just made lumps and a messed-up texture. No, this week I threw in some almond milk, and it seems to be fine. So the basics were this: grease a pie pan with coconut oil, and toss in some of those ground golden flaxseeds to make a bit of a crust:

Last week I added some leftover cilantro and the end of some celery, and put some of this interesting sandwich spread in it:

Someone gave me the sandwich spread in a holiday basket, and I didn’t know what the heck to do with it, so I used it last week. Olives, sun dried tomatoes, olive oil, and some other stuff. All natural, no sugar or chemical ingredients, and yes, gluten free. It doesn’t say that on the label, but if you read it, you see what’s in it, so yeah, it’s gluten free. I put it all together and it looked like this:

Mixed up 10 eggs with the ill-advised guar gum, and baked it for, um, I don’t know how long. I just watched it and when it was done, took it out. That was it.

This week, I wanted to make it again, and went shopping. I got more eggs and stuff, and went looking for that Mezetta sandwich spread.

Now go find more.

I’ve seen this stuff for years and never paid any attention to it. Never did find it. After thinking about how to try and make this week’s similar, I got some sun-dried tomatoes in olive oil, a bag of frozen chopped broccoli and put that together. Gotta be good, right?

Yes, I have one of those curvy knives like Nigella Lawson. And unlike Nigella Lawson, right after I took that picture, the cutting board slipped and four tomatoes went on the floor. AAAAHHH!!!! But I still had plenty.

This time I mixed a dozen eggs with some almond milk and a couple of shakes of Chipotle Tabasco in it. they’ve baked up a lot better than the ones with guar gum in them, so I’ll let you know how it came out later. Looks good:

Last week’s was pretty good, but it needed salt. Let’s see what this one tastes like.

No, the cat food is just on the stove for my convenience. It only goes into Jezebel’s food bowl, not mine. However, I once implied to my mother that I was eating cat food. . .”with crackers late at night, it’s pretty good!” She believed it for half a nanosecond.

It’s all about getting ready to head out the door by 6:56 to catch either the 6:55 or 7:03 am bus into downtown. This helps a lot. I’ll keep looking for good recipes that don’t involve milk or cream to blend with the eggs, too.

How about a peek inside the fridge of the Heatcagekitchen?

No kidding, that’s seven sealed jars of lettuce I set up this evening, or two prepped heads of iceberg lettuce. I love it!! (And strawberries on sale at HEB, too.) I’m tellin’ ya, the salad-in-the-jar thing works like a charm. The Ball jars are about $2.50 at Cost Plus World Market, but you can get them anywhere. I’m loving my nightly salad, y’all, and done correctly, the lettuce really does stay fresh and crisp all week. You will not regret this, as long as you get all the air out the jars. (Check my previous post for instructions.)

And to complete your Sunday night, here’s a completely unrelated picture of a neighborhood kitty cat I caught a couple of pictures of this morning:

“Hey. . .how yoo doin’?”

He was someone’s inside kitty, until someone moved away and left him and two brothers locked in a unit. When they were found, they were set loose and lived outside for a while. Two have been adopted, but this guy has been a freelancer, getting fed by a few folks and enjoying life on the lam. He’s not feral, but I can’t take him in, since I’ve got one step kitty and he needs fixin’. And shots. (And a bath!) Out of my range right now. We call him Jojo, but we don’t actually know what his name is. He’s friendly til you do something he doesn’t like. Otherwise he’s pretty happy.

Well, folks, the dishwasher has finished its first go round, and I need to empty, refill, and re-start it before I go iron something to wear to town tomorrow.

I’ll try to post again soon and not wait too long.

Happy Dining!

Fast & Easy,Special considerations,What's for Dinner?

The Sunday Cooking Spree

April 28, 2013 Amy

Happy Sunday, fellow Foodies:

Boy, have I been busy today! I’ve been baking, I’ve been cooking, I’ve been washing. We had some good rain last night, and even had gravel-sized hail for a little while. I thought my neighbor’s lovable pug wanted to come in and get at the cat food again. Hoping for lots of basil so I can pack my freezer with pesto this year. Supposed to rain all week, so I’ll be extra careful on the short drive to and from the park and ride.

The dishwasher is running for the second time today, and while I put out garbage yesterday morning, I also had to put it out again a little while ago. I sewed most of the day yesterday, as well as made a pot of chili. I finished some handmade gifts and a little repair work, and will finish that shirt and suit next weekend. But before I tell you about today’s cooking spree, let me tell you about something fishy I read in the weekend edition of The Wall Street Journal. . . .

The European Seafood Exposition was recently held in Belgium, and, if I read it correctly, it is to current trends in seafood is what the Houston Metro Cooking & Entertaining Show is to food and cooking. I think. (I went in 2011 and had a blast; nearly everything I sampled was either chocolate, garlic or olive oil.) Fish wasn’t exactly on the menu at this conference, but other forms of “aquatic cuisine” were available. Craig Harrison of Britain’s Big Prawn Company have been trying to win the Prix d’Elite with all sorts of, um, temptations. Creations like Fresh Seaweed in Sea Water, Black Pudding with Squid Ink and spreadable algae were available to tempt (or test the strength of) the taste buds of judges in Belgium. Oh, and one piece de resistance from last year’s contest was called simply, Jelly Shots, consisting of alcoholic seafood jelly shots with a jumbo shrimp floating in a mojito jelly. Um, what? “Mr Harrison claims that British night-clubbers fell for the drink hook, line and sinker. ‘Unfortunately, it didn’t sway the judges.'”

NOOOOOO. You think????? Maybe it was the alcohol the night clubbers had BEFORE the Jelly Shots, which the judges didn’t have the benefit of?

Then there is the “oceanic greenery” they want to start calling “sea veg.” In other words, seaweed. And now, because “French beaches are strewn with it,” Christine Le Tennier of SAS Globe Export is harvesting and promoting “gourmet algae.”

Algae is what develops in your swimming pool when you forget to put the chlorine in it. “Gourmet algae” is like like “clean dirt.” You can have it.

Now look–I love shrimp, crab, crawfish, regular fish, and the occasional scallop as much as the next seafood fan. But I can sum this article up for you in one word.

EEEEEEEWWWWWWWWWW.

Reminded of the songs my brother has frequently written (or re-written) about my cooking, I sent him the column. Let’s see what comes back.

So, my goal is not to have to cook at all this week, except maybe for some breakfast, and I’ll think about that soon, too. My toaster oven has been baking nearly all day, and I have completed, since 8:00 am, the following:

1 loaf “Stout Bread” from The Joy of Gluten Free Sugar Free Baking, a gift for a friend
1 recipe Lemon Poppy Tea Cake from Babycakes, also a gift for the same friend
1 recipe Yeast Free Brownies (sweetened with Somersweet)
6 roasted chicken thighs (in the freezer since last July)
1 large Meatloaf from The Wheat Belly Cookbook with ground chicken instead of ground beef (otherwise made to spec)
1 packet of thin steaks

Not included is a pot of chili made yesterday and a small spaghetti squash I roasted yesterday, all for lunch and dinner this week. Glad I finished the last of the Spicy Shrimp Marinara, too.

I’m thinking baked eggs and some kind of meat with it. I’ll think about it some more. Since the yeast-free diet is coming soon, I’ll have to think carefully, since so many things are verboten, like cheese, butter and milk.

Oh, and in order to make that meatloaf, I had to go out and get a few things: one carrot, some celery, and. . .tomato juice, which I have never bought in my life. But I do it, ’cause I don’t mess with the recipes the first time I make them. I didn’t go to my my HEB, or even Kroger. No, I went to our neighborhood Food Town. . .and if you are in Houston, you know what that is–local, and basic, No almond milk, gluten free anything or sugar snap peas, but lots of biscuits, pizza and ice cream. It’s close, so I went. I didn’t take a picture, but they had something called Tastykake Dreamies, which look suspiciously like. . . Twinkies! No, I didn’t buy any, even though they were not expensive. But with all the hoopla surrounding the end and the new beginning of Twinkies, obviously it wasn’t long before someone got the idea to replicate them while they were away. Let’s see what happens when Twinkies begin to populate grocery and convenience store shelves again. Holy Shish Kebab.

Well, that’s the capitalist free market system, isn’t it? Give the customer what they want, customers vote with their dollars, and the best one will win. If the Dreamies taste as good, or better, than original Twinkies, then they’ll be the favored brand. If not, they will be bought once, and if they are found to be inferior, then, nobody will buy them and wait for the Twinkies. If the new Twinkies are bad, then the market is open for someone else to “build a better Twinkie.” It’s that simple.

Yes, in America, we take our junk food VERY seriously the way the French take their wine and escargot seriously. That’s what makes us a great country!!

Anyway. . . .

I had planned to utilize a crock pot today, but I never got around to it, so that’s one less thing to wash up. That’s OK, I’ve gone through some soap this weekend!

I started doing the weekly cooking/ironing on Sunday back when I was a student at Tulane and worked 40 hours a week. THEN I went to work for Tulane while I was a student, and made a salary, had regular employee health insurance, paid holidays, and eventually, an employee tuition waiver. I had to take Sundays for setting up for the week, because I didn’t have time to get all that done in the morning, especially if I got home at 10:00 or 11:00 pm at night, which I did frequently. If I went to bed late one night, I didn’t get to catch up until Saturday. (Nobody seemed to understand that for a long time.)

Even though I’d mostly kept it up while I was unemployed, I still did some cooking during the week. Now, this may not work with large families, or even couples–but for me it works like a charm. If you’re thinking about how to make it work for you, a crock pot would work wonders, IMHO–but you gotta do what works for you. Freezer meals may be what you come up with, and a lot of people do it that way–either on the weekend or making “one extra” of something and stashing it in the freezer.

In any case, I highly recommend “cooking ahead,” especially if you are of the busy sort. If it’s just you and a spouse and y’all aren’t picky, well. . .but if you’ve got a schedule of any kind and not much time to cook, carving out a few hours and/or putting out that crock pot is essential.

And let’s face it–how nice is it to come home, take your shoes off, get comfy and heat up a home-cooked dinner? Yeah, I Know, you can just buy frozen dinners . . .well, if you want to. Me, I’m gonna keep pushing the limits of my kitchen and having home cooked dinners ’til I can’t cook anymore. (Remember that Julia Child cooked after the age of 90, although she wasn’t make Boueof Bourignon anymore.)

Now onto the wardrobe setup for the week with our rainy, somewhat chilly Houston weather this week.

Happy Dining!

Considered opinions,Fast & Easy,Ingredients,New Trends,What's for Dinner?

Thursday shrimp and strawberries

April 25, 2013 Amy

Good evening, Dear Readers:

Boy, have I got a new shrimp dish to tell you about, and it’s quick easy and fairly cheap. Best part: you can’t screw it up! (My favorite part.) A few days ago I received the May issue of Martha Stewart Living, and with it was an Everyday Food supplement. (You can download it at that link!!)

The theme of this issue is “get more from the store.” One section discussed using store-bought baking mix–yes, Bisquick–to make homemade muffins four ways: Lighter Blueberry, Banana-Walnut-Date, Chocolate Cherry (I’d almost go off gluten-free for that one) and “kitchen-sink muffins,” swapping out the blueberries for a half cup grated carrots, and adding in a quarter cup of golden raisins, pepitas (pumpkin seeds) and chopped pecans, plus some cinnamon. New uses for familiar stuff. Love that–it’s what made Everyday Food so great.

There are two features on stuff from the canned goods aisle, canned tomatoes and oil-packed cat food, I mean, tuna. When buying it for my late kitty Catmandu, all the tuna was in either water or soybean oil, so you would be looking for imported Italian tuna, that they describe as “worth the splurge.” Sorry, y’all, it all tastes like cat food, OK? Cat food with an Italian accent is not, in my opinion, “worth the splurge,” but if you like tuna, go for it. A splurge is that gluten-free cupcake I had at Frost Bake Shoppe last week.

Since tomorrow I return to the land of the employed for a while, I made something delicious that will likely be either lunch or dinner tomorrow, along with two Chocolate Chip Brownie Larabars. (I’m enjoying my favorite things before I start the yeast-free diet.) The Syclovir/Yeast Control arrived today, so I’ll be working getting yeast-free situated this weekend, including baking some yeast-free brownies. I haven’t had any since last summer. And this evening I made an Everyday Food recipe from this new issue that is yeast free, gluten free, sugar free, and almost fat free.

On page 14-15 (and it is available online) is a recipe for Three Ingredient Marinara. Yes, three ingredients and it’s quick and easy. The recipe next to it is Spicy Shrimp Marinara, and it takes about ten minutes to make. Admittedly, I did not use the entire 1.25 tsp of red pepper flakes; I just shook a few in.

SOOOO delicious!! You make the marinara, then when it’s nearly done, cook the shrimp according to the recipe, take the shrimp out and dump the marinara in.

I have long told folks that when I cook with tomato sauce, my kitchen looks like a crime scene. I’ve got the yellow tape around the stove while the dishwasher washes up the first batch of dishes. I’ll finish cleaning up that crime scene in a little while.

One of the ingredients is a 28-ounce can of whole peeled tomatoes. Of course, what I think of and what they think of are two different things. I think of the 28-ounce can at HEB that was $1.07 when I bought two on Tuesday. What Everyday Food thinks of is a $3.59 can of San Marzano tomatoes imported from Italy or a $4 can of Muir Glen Organic. (Some cans are closer to $5, depending on where you buy them.)

Let me tell you a secret: I have a soup recipe from Suzanne Somers’ first book that uses a chicken carcass and that same 28-ounce can of tomatoes, among other things. For years, I bought the HEB brand (which was 79 cents when I started buying them in 2004.) A couple of years ago I got the leftover turkey carcass from the office holiday luncheon, and did the same thing with it–turned it into a pot of the soup. This time, I bought the fancy imported organic Italian tomatoes instead. Know what? The soup tasted exactly the same. No difference. Not better, just exactly as I’d made it for many years. I gave two neighbors and a co-worker a container of that soup, and they all loved it. And that was the last time I bought a pricey can of peeled tomatoes.

If you make this quick, easy and tasty marinara sauce for any reason, use your own judgement when buying those tomatoes, OK?

Checking the Everyday Food blog, they also have additional uses for extra marinara sauce. I like the recipe for baked eggs in tomato parm sauce, and might make it this weekend.

Now, if you’re curious about what dinner finally looked like, well, this is the delicious Spicy Shrimp Marinara:

A basic salad of lettuce, (yes, THAT lettuce) tomato and cucumber with a bit of oil & vinegar with salt:

Dessert, one of my favorites–huge strawberries sliced down to a manageable dice, sliced with a sprinkling of Somersweet:

They were on sale, and the size of Roma tomatoes. That’s why I diced them like that.

Strawberries are very special to me. When I was a little bitty kitty, my grandparents used to take me with them to Ponchatoula, Louisiana to get strawberries by the flat. We would get bunches of them for the family, stacking them carefully on the back seat for me to guard. One of the ladies working there handed me a huge one and said, “look, this one Easter-egged itself!” Like I said, I was a little bitty kitty then, but I still love strawberries. I’d love to be able to make a lovely strawberry dessert for my grandmother, but. . .well, she passed in 2005, so I can only think about making something for her.

Truth to tell. . .she was particular, and probably wouldn’t like it, nor the shrimp dish. Gourmet food is my forte, my grandmother wasn’t wild about new interpretations, like a chocolate ricotta pudding with strawberries in it.

Louisiana strawberries are the best, followed by Texas’. California’s, unfortunately, aren’t quite as good by the time they get to Texas. But that’s a highly prejudiced opinion on strawberries, too.

Anyway. . .tomorrow is Friday, and if you’re in the mood for something quick, easy, and a little different, give this Spicy Shrimp Marinara a try. If you read and follow the directions, you can’t screw it up!

Happy Dining!

Considered opinions

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