Archive for June, 2008
Vacation time and some drunken noodles!
josh and i are getting ready to leave for disney world really early tomorrow morning, like 3 am kind of early, and we’re super excited. we went to disney in 2005 and then stayed at my aunt mar’s house in venice (which is where i’m from) for about a week, and it was great! so we’re going to recreate that vacation by doing it again this week.
we haven’t been cooking all that much lately. the intentions are there, as in we bought the makings for a few different meals, but sometimes it’s so much easier to just go out and have someone cook for you. we did however make these bangin’ drunken noodles a few days ago. we like to go to this thai place called “thai diner too” and every single time we go i get the drunken noodles because they’re soooo delicious. the noodles we made ended up tasting a lot like the dish i get there, so that’s always good.
there’s an asian food market near us so we went there to get the ingredients. we found this case of thai peppers and we just loved all the gorgeous colors. we also got a huge bag of thai basil, which is the kind of basil with purple stems and smallish green leaves. that’s pretty much the flavor that makes drunken noodles so delicious. the sauce consisted of tamari, vegetarian oyster sauce, brown sugar, lime juice, and a little canola and peanut oil. we sautéed up some red and green bell peppers, the thai peppers, and some onions and then added the sauce, the thai basil, and a few chopped roma tomatoes. the noodles we bought weren’t exactly the right kind, and they ended up sticking together and causing a big fuss..but regardless we added those into the pot once they were done cooking along with some tofu that josh had deep fried (yum) and stir fried everything all together for a few minutes. the flavor was to die for…
everything tasted really well together..and next time we make it we’ll use the right kind of noodles (i think rice noodles works best) and hopefully it will turn out even better. another thing that we always get when we go to the asian market is these canned soy milk drinks..
it’s totally different from any kind of soy milk i’ve had. it’s sweeter than regular soy milk, and if you drink it super cold or over ice it’s sooo yummy. it was perfect for combating the spiciness of the drunken noodles.
so now i’m spending the day getting ready for the trip. i just made up a batch of the most awesome delicious bakery style (hint hint) blueberry muffins i’ve ever tasted so those will be perfect for breakfast or for snacks on the ride down. oh and i also twisted my ankle the other day so i’ve got my foot in an ankle brace type ace bandage and i’m hoping that it will be better on sunday when we get go to the parks. i’m supposed to stay off my feet as much as possible, but there’s baking to be done! 
we’ve also been doing a lot of research about disney world’s vegetarian/vegan food options, and while most of it seems to be glorified boca burgers and fruit salads (there was a website telling what is vegetarian at each of the restaurants at disney and one of them actually said “the fresh fruit is vegan”…a duhhhh), apparently if you call ahead to specific restaurants you can have a vegan meal made for you. there’s even a place that is said to be able to make you vegan pancakes! needless to say we’re gonna be making a call to those fine folks. so we’re probably going to be out of commission for about a week as far as posting goes.. but we’ll be back with lots of pictures of us reeking havoc at the most magical place in the world..sure to be quite amusing.
9 comments June 27, 2008
Risotto Verde
do you ever feel like you just want to eat something green? there are some days where josh and i don’t eat well at all. we’ve been working a lot lately so we’re lucky if we get to eat breakfast or lunch..and then making dinner is usually the last thing we want to do when we get home. it’s been like that a lot this past week and we’ve ended up eating a lot of crap..like papa johns breadsticks at 10pm and calling it dinner. yeah. so the other day i was starting to feel really gross and unhealthy and i really wanted to eat something green.
i grabbed a few cookbooks that i usually go to when i want a good recipe, couldn’t find anything in there, so i grabbed this tiny little vegetarian cookbook that i’ve had for a long time and started looking through the pages. luckily this cookbook has a photo of every recipe and that helps a lot when you’re creativity is a bit on the low side and your hunger is through the roof. i came across this recipe for “risotto verde,” and the picture looked absolutely delicious. it was green! just what i wanted.
it has leeks, garlic, and fresh spinach in it. i ended up changing the recipe a lot to make it more fresh and yummy. i added lemon zest to bring out the flavors a bit and josh added a lotttttt more white wine. it came out so delicious. it was just what i was craving. usually josh isn’t really wowed by risotto but he had like 3 servings and finished off the pot, saying “this is the best risotto i’ve ever had.” score.
i also made a batch of seitan cutlets from v’con and josh pan seared them with some margarine and lemon pepper to go with the risotto. i got a little fancy pantsy when i was taking the pictures using one of those circular metal rings to plate the risotto and josh was like you should do that on top of the seitan..so we did! i think it looks super fancy and fine dining-ish…
…or maybe we’ve just been watching too much top chef.
either way, i think this risotto is great for summer time because it uses fresh ingredients and bright flavors like lemon and thyme. so go make it..you’ll love it.
7 comments June 19, 2008
A rant
usually whenever we write a post it’s to tell about a delicious meal we had or about some new culinary creation that happened in our kitchen, but this is no such post. i need to rant a bit.
i was reading a few blogs yesterday (on my new macbook pro!! sweet!) and i stumbled across a website that was talking about vegans and the vegan diet. the author of the article mentioned that she used to be vegan for quite some time, but that it all ended when she was out to lunch with a friend who ordered a caesar salad and she found herself drooling over the cubes of feta cheese when finally her friend said “just eat it already!”..and she did. you could tell the article was geared towards a more skeptical audience…the author made it seem like vegans are starving martyrs who are constantly on the edge of giving into that bit of cheese and cutting their losses.
we’ve all met the type. the “oh, i used to be vegan” or “i used to be vegetarian”..as if it’s this phase that we all end up going through. one of my friends from school chose to go vegetarian about a year ago and when he told his mom she said “yeah, i was vegetarian in college too”, as if to say, you’ll get over it soon. i never know what to say to those people, the ex-veg’s of the world. i always wonder why they aren’t vegan or vegetarian anymore, how they could choose such a compassionate and healthy lifestyle and then give it up after living that way for sometimes years. i guess i could possibly see a vegan going back to vegetarianism…possibly. but a vegetarian going back to eating meat? and i’m talking about the ethical vegetarians, the ones who chose to be vegetarian for the animals. how could you know what you know and then decide one day to eat that hamburger and never look back?
it’s always boggled my mind. i mean we all have our cravings. we all have our achilles heel..usually the thing that took the longest to choose to stop eating. i think cheese pizza was my last non-vegan food to stop eating, and it also happens to be what i crave every once in a while. my mom’s biggest craving is scrambled eggs..but i think it’s more of what we associate with those foods and not really the food itself. for me cheese pizza reminds me of trips to new york or those weeknights when we would order pizza when we didn’t feel like cooking. scrambled eggs is my mom’s comfort food. it’s what she would always have my dad make her when she was sick, scrambled eggs and toast. it’s that comforting feeling you get from the food, not the fried chicken embryos and the knowledge of how those eggs were obtained.
i guess i just don’t understand how there can be such a gap in understanding. how people can claim that they’re animal lovers, be vegetarian or vegan for however long, and then go back to eating meat as if nothing ever happened. as i’m writing this josh is watching one of those animal cop shows on animal planet, where these “animal cops” goes and saves dogs and cats who are being abused by their owners. they talk about “how could people treat these animals like this” as they hold a starving dog who’s been kept in a tiny cage for months on end. everytime i watch this show (which isn’t often because it’s hard to watch) i find myself yelling at the tv about how if they want to see some animal abuse and if they really want to protect animals from animal cruelty they should go down to their goddamn slaughter house. i guess the only animals they care about is the ones that we call pets. i bet after these “animal cops” go out every day and save these dogs and cats they come home and eat a steak (i told you i needed to rant.)
anyway..i guess i just have to take comfort in knowing that for as many ex-veg’s and “i’m an animal lover but i still eat meat”-ers our there, there’s just about as many truly ethical vegans out there, and it’ll take a lot more than a bit of cheese to bring us down.
12 comments June 13, 2008
Caramelized Onions- Two ways
Another thing that I’ve been really into lately is caramelized onions. Slow cooking onions for about a half an hour releases their natural sugars and caramelizes them, making them sweet and even more delicious. When I told Josh that I wanted to make something with caramelized onions he went on to tell me how you really have to be patient and let them cook for 45 minutes to an hour to really achieve that dark, caramelly onions, and I could tell that he was gonna get on my case if I was impatient and said “Ok they’re done!” after 10 minutes of cooking. So I said yea yea and went about my caramelizing business. Well of course Josh was right and I learned after attempting to caramelize onions several times that the longer you wait and the longer it slowly cooks, the sweeter and more delicious they are.
My first attempt was when I made this orzo pasta with sun-dried tomatoes, roasted asparagus, and of course caramelized onions. I had never had orzo before. I categorize orzo with couscous and other small pasta that seems super tedious to eat. But I saw someone making an orzo pasta on tv and thought I should give it a try. We ended up getting this tri-color orzo, which was kind of cool because it had all the colors of the dish I wanted to make right in it.
I started out cooking the onions in some olive oil until they started to get translucent, then I cranked the heat all the way down to low and walked away..something that was very hard for me to do. I’m a stirrer. Ask Josh, ask my Dad..I love to stir the pot. It makes me feel like I’m doing something productive. But I actually walked away, peeking over my shoulder at the pan of delicious sliced onions, and really tried to wait the 45 minutes that Josh told me about. Of course I ended up waiting like 20 minutes instead and then added the sun-dried tomatoes..I thought it might infuse the oil with its rich, sweet flavor.
I cooked them for maybe 10 more minutes after that, and as you can see in the picture the onions were far from being caramelized but they were starting to goddamnit and that’s good enough for me. The orzo pasta turned out really well..I thought the combination of the roasted asparagus, the sun-dried tomatoes and the halfway-sort of caramelized onions went really well together. It wasn’t one of those holy-shit-this-is-our-new-favorite-dinner dishes but it was still very good.
My second attempt was when I was making one of our usual dinners, ziti with Tofurky Beer Brat sausages. It’s a quick pasta dish that we make once or twice a week and it hasn’t really gotten old yet. Since I was still in my caramelized onions kick, I was trying to incorporate it in any dish possible. So I thought how awesome would caramelized onions and beer brat sausages be together? Answer: super awesome.
Each time I make this I try to cook the onions a little bit longer to test my culinary patience, and I think the last time I made it up to the 30 minute mark. Not too shabby.. The onions are delicious. You could seriously eat them plain and call it a day. Instead I put them in my favorite diced tomato and fresh basil sauce with some beer brats and called it supper. Before I started using the onions in this sauce I used to put a couple garlic cloves…and since the onions give it a sweeter flavor it totally transforms the sauce. Especially since sausage and onions already go so great together.
Here’s a shot of my plate after I started eating. After our dinner is finally done cooking we’re both super hungry, and normally we wait for each other to get our plates and sit down at our coffee table (where we eat every night), but if it’s something that I want to take pictures of I give Josh the ‘ok’ to start without me. So usually I try to take a quick shot before I go and guff up the plate but sometimes a shot of the half eaten dish is just as good, right?
4 comments June 5, 2008
Bread bread bread and more bread
A few weeks ago I got the urge to start baking homemade bread. Josh and I go through bread really fast since we eat sandwiches for lunch every day and usually a loaf of crusty bread for dinners through the week. I thought it would be really nice to make the bread ourselves, that way we know exactly what’s going into it. I’d much rather have bread with 4 ingredients in it than the store bought bread with a list of 50 ingredients for a simple sandwich bread.
Some people (like my dad for example) get really intimidated by anything that has to do with yeast. Well actually my dad gets intimidated by baking in general. But I guess that’s one thing he didn’t pass along to me, because I happen to really like the whole kneading and rising and all that stuff that goes into making yeast bread. It’s almost like you’re tapping into this ancient ritual of making food that our ancestors have been doing since forever. It’s a long process but it gives you an excuse to be alone in your thoughts and know that you’re creating something so yummy out of flour, yeast, and water. Genius if you ask me.
I started by making a batch of country white bread from the new bread cookbook I bought. While it was rising I got a little bored waiting around for it so I started a batch of my Aunt Toni’s Oatmeal Bread, which I ended up giving my mom for Mother’s Day. I love that bread because it’s a hearty white-ish bread but it’s just slightly sweet and goes great with pretty much everything. After my grandma learned that we were so into baking bread, she was super nice and gave us her bread machine. Now while there’s not much connection with ancient artisan breadmakers of the past while you push a button and let the machine do it’s job, it’s great because you can still have fresh, homemade bread even if you don’t have a day to set aside to make it by hand. So we would put all the ingredients in the machine at night before bed and in the morning we would have fresh yummy homemade bread for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
My favorite bread in the whole world is sourdough bread, so the thing that actually sparked all of this bread making was me creating a sourdough starter. I fed and cared for that thing like a little jarred baby for over a week. I even took it to my parent’s house one weekend and everyone looked at me cross-eyed while I lovingly poured flour and water into a glass jar and placed it on the refrigerator every 24 hours. I did this for over a week until I left it in the oven and accidently baked it. But I don’t think it was working anyway so I guess I’ll just have to start again. Until then, I’ll just have to stick with boring old bread like this basil and garlic focaccia bread we made the other day. Life is tough.
4 comments June 2, 2008
