So I forgot about blogging for a month. It was pretty uneventful month in terms of crafting, though:

• I started some little felt ornaments with my mom, but decided they looked too much like something a seven year old would do in primary, and didn't finish them.
  
• We had a back-to-the-box week where we made old favorite recipes that got put into the recipe box and never eaten again (I think we have the opposite problem as most people- we almost never eat the same thing), and ate out for an unhealthy number of meals.
• I was going to sew a Christmas gift for my sister-in-law, Jenny, but kept putting it off so much that I ended up just buying her a new purse on Christmas Eve.
  
• I haven't finished sewing the Christmas gift for my friend Drew.
  

So there you have it. Almost nothing to show for the month of December. Except these, the meals we made with our goat cheese:

Lukey made a pizza with barbeque sauce, goat cheese, pineapple, and smoked gouda. I was skeptical, but it was DELICIOUS. A great mix of flavors.

I kept it simple, with grilled veggie and goat cheese sandwiches on ciabatta bread. Balsalmic vinegar, goat cheese, and warm tomatoes, peppers and mushrooms is comfort food for me.

Cotija!

Last week was one full of hispanic meals for Lukey and me. It wasn't intentional- I didn't plan the meals thinking, "Let's eat the food of our friends down south!"- but that's the way it ended up. Deliciously.

Luke lived in Guatemala for a couple years, and made for me the breakfast he had every day while there: black beans, homemade tortillas, and eggs with table cream. He fancied it up for me with a sprinkling of cotija and something he got very rarely- fried plantain (we used green bananas).

Turns out, ten years hasn't been long enough for Luke to like this meal again. I loved it, though, and was surprised at how good it tasted for how simple it was (the only spice was salt).

For dinner one night I made mexican corn cakes. I think because I never saw my parents use it the whole time I was growing up (and they cooked interesting stuff from all over the world), I'm delighted to find different recipes that use masa harina. This was one of those. Topped with tomatos from the garden and a slice of avocado, they were a simple, satisfying meal (and then for dessert I made my first flan with homemade caramel, and it was decadent and wonderful. Definitely one to save in the recipe box).

The best tasting (and least photogenic) meal was the night we had flautas. This is the meal that made me SO glad that I make extra food and preserve it- these flautas (I guess just taquitos that are folded instead of rolled?) were filled with the cilantro pesto that I froze this summer, and a little cheese. That's it. The meal was quick and so good that I made them again for lunches for days (until the last of the cilantro pesto was used up, actually. Time to replenish).

Bumble bee wallet

The wallet I made Luke for Christmas didn't hold up all that well, and was a little bigger than he'd like, anyway, so I hand sewed/embroidered him a new one that's sturdier, and a better size. I asked him what sort of thing he'd want on a new wallet, and I'm happy with what he chose and how it turned out:




It's sewn on the cotton from one of those old fashioned flour sacks (online I found a lot of other cute things that people did with these old feed sacks, from chairs, to purses, to dresses).

A few good meals

Had a few more recipes this week that were good enough to share:

Saturday we had Indian food: Matar "Paneer," which wasn't really paneer because paneer is a kind of cheese (which Luke and I are going to make sometime soon), and this recipe uses tofu. So maybe Matar Tahu? I'm not sure. Anyway, I like making Indian food because we get to use all those spices that taste and smell so good, but that we don't use very regularly- curry, garam masala, turmeric, coriander. This recipe had all of 'em, and the mix of flavors was very good (if you're from Utah: this reminds me of something from Curry in a Hurry). If you look at the instructions, you'll see that this was an easy meal to make; my only addition would be to the instruction about letting all the spices absorb: after adding the spices, let them cook together for at least ten minutes. The texture and flavor will be better because of it. I kept tasting every couple minutes, and the longer they cooked together, the better. Oh, and don't skip the step about pressing the excess water out of the tofu- it makes a big difference.

(My broken camera has an especially hard time with browns and yellows. You know how Indian curries look. This was like that.)

On Wednesday, we had a southern meal: catfish po'boys, okra, and baked yam wedges. I chose the meal with Luke in mind- this is the sort of comfort food he loves- and I knew it was a good choice when he talked about it for days before we made it and kept telling me, while it was cooking, how excited he was. The po'boys were a recipe from the Martha Stewart cookbook I got for Christmas from Marina, my mother-in-law. The okra was like I've never had it before, with a very interesting flavor (halfway between southern and Indian), with none of that okra slime (which really ain't so bad, but I know some people hate it). Luke, who doesn't really like okra, was crazy about it. The yam was just cut up and shaken up with a little oil and some salt and pepper and then baked at 450 for twenty minutes, stirring a couple times. The whole meal was very good. "It's not the best meal we've ever cooked," said Luke, "but it was just perfect." And then all night he kept telling me how happy I make him.


On Thursday we had broiled black pepper tofu and soba noodles with vegetables (we left out the mint). In years of eating tofu fairly regularly, I don't remember ever eating it like this- as a simple main dish, not just a part of a sauce or curry. I liked it! The lemony dipping sauce was good enough that Luke later used it as a sort of au jus sauce for a sandwich. The noodle salad was good for dinner, and then again for leftovers the next day. This dinner convinced me that we need to find more recipes that use sesame oil.


There were some recipes we planned but didn't try because stuff came up (I spent a couple days with my mom and sisters, and went out with Barbara, a mentor/friend/professor). So this weeks meals will be easier to plan!

Week of dinners:

Luke and I are continuing with our goal to spend $35 on a week's worth of meals. It's become sort of a weird obsession, not because we couldn't afford to spend more on groceries, but because the challenge is really fun. On Friday nights I spend almost an hour planning the menu for the next week, including an estimate for how much each item is going to cost, and then we go to the grocery store to buy everything at once (I remember a time when I'd get kind of sad if I didn't feel like I was being social enough on my weekends. Things've changed). It's become one of my favorite weekly activities (aside from Wednesday night quiz night) of the week.

This week was an especially good one for meals, so I thought I'd share the recipes:

On Saturday we had black bean soup with coconut milk and cilantro. My friend Drew had made it for a potluck last week, but ours turned out differently because we had the time to blend it and let the flavors simmer (he was in a hurry because all the potluck guests had arrived). Both ways were good. A creamy, spicy, vegan soup with a nice blend of flavors (would be good without the cilantro, too, for people like Whitney who don't like the taste).

Picture from Fab Frugal Food

On Sunday we had Asian chicken noodle soup, which was instantly a family favorite. We left out the mint, because we didn't want to detract from the lemongrass, ginger, and lime. Don't skip the sriracha- it makes the soup perfect!

Picture from Martha Stewart

On Monday we had caramelized salmon with mango salsa. So fresh and summery tasting, and not heavy. We ate it with tomato rice (rice + tomato bouillon in the rice maker), and it was a hearty (and very orange) meal.



On Tuesday we had tacos with homemade tortillas. For the tortillas, mix corn flour (buy a big bag of the Maseca brand for three dollars in the hispanic foods aisle of the grocery store) and water together until it's the texture of playdough. Roll out (I found it easiest to put a little patty between to pieces of seran wrap, and then smash flat (as opposed to actually rolling) with a cup), and grill. These simple tortillas are good with stuff in them, but if you wanted to eat them plain, you'd want to add salt to the dough. Soon we'll invest in a tortilla press, so we we can have round, perfectly uniform tortillas. I know it doesn't make them taste any better, but for some reason it matters to me.

Picture from Adventures in Shaw

On Wednesday we had grilled chicken gyros with tzatziki sauce. Rather than using pitas, we used a naan recipe my mom gave us (a favorite since our experiment with indian food). This dish was so good. So good!!! We changed a few things: 1) We didn't marinate the chicken for as long as we were supposed to, because we figured if we were cooking the chicken in the sauce, that was good enough. And it was. 2) We didn't remove excess water from the cucumber for the tzatziki sauce. We kept it wet, and eliminated the oil in the sauce. 3) we used cucumbers instead of red onion (partially because Luke doesn't really like onions much, and partially because the cucumber sounded better). This is one of those kinds of meals that if you ordered it at a restaurant, it would become the only thing you'd ever order there.


And last I didn't have dinner. I went to make dinner (at 11:30 p.m.)* and realized that I'd forgotten to get tofu.** Luke was getting off work at midnight and said he'd pick up some DiGiorno, but he ended up having a work meeting that kept him until two. I fell asleep around one thirty, waiting for pizza.

*One thing I find myself loving about it just being me and Luke is that we can eat dinner in the middle of the night if we want.
**Actually, I didn't realize it. I called up Luke at work, annoyed that the tofu had mysteriously disappeared (just like a can of black beans had earlier this week), and he reminded me that I actually hadn't gone to get it.

Carrot Juice

When I was younger, I ate tons of carrots. One of my best friends in high school, Amy, lived half a block down the street, and her mom bought those giant five pound bags of baby carrots. When the two of us were feeling sixteen-year-old I'm-so-ugly-and-nobody-loves-or-understands-me angst, we'd sit and talk/cry/whine over the bag of carrots, sometimes eating all of it in just a few sittings.


Now, I hardly ever eat them. I like them cooked (especially with a little butter and dill), and I like them raw, but carrot aren't favorite vegetables. Not one of those veggies that I think of for a side dish or a snack. But I stumbled across an article last week about the health benefits of carrot juice, so I decided to make some.

I don't have a juicer, but I found a good way to make it without one: I bought a two-pound bag of carrots, chopped it all up in the blender, and then poured three cups of hot water over the chopped up carrots. I let the orangey mush sit for twenty minutes, then strained out the carrot chunks, using a spoon to smash the carrots on the sieve to get as much juice as possible. Then I poured three more cups of water over the carrots and did it again. For the two pounds of carrots I got two quarts of carrot juice, which is way more than I expected. I added the juice of three oranges, which was just enough to brighten the carrot flavor, but not cover it up at all.

Luke described it as "surprisingly refreshing," and even more surprisingly, he's going to start drinking it regularly, too (usually I can't get him to drink anything that's not caffeinated).

So I definitely recommend making carrot juice this way. From what I've been seeing online, you get more carrot juice this way than with a juicer. And it's a few dollars for a half gallon- much cheaper than if you were to buy it pre-made at the grocery store (and without any added sugars or preservatives). And plus, it just tastes good.

Dust in the Wind Beneath My Wings

A recent hobby of mine is going to a local pub (Piper Down, an Irish-themed pub) every Wednesday night for quiz night. The trivia is done by a group called Geeks Who Drink, and there are 'chapters' all over- Colorado, Washington Virginia, etc. etc. It's just about the most fun I have in any given week, even on weeks when we can't for the life of us remember the name of that "Dance Hall Days" song; or don't figure out that the secret theme to the round is horses, so all the answers to seemingly unrelated questions are also kinds of horses (quarter, morgan, painter, appaloosa). I live for times like the first, where one of the rounds was about various kinds of couches, and I discover a secret well of information on the topic (who knew?), or the science round when I remembered things like adenine as a nucleobase or and flourine as a halogen. I sit there stupidly while Whitney and Scott cover all the movie questions, and Luke covers most of the science, politics, and current event questions. The four of us make up our team: The Young Republicans.

The Young Republicans, minus Scott. As usual, Luke looks like he's drunk in this picture (though he hadn't had a drop of alcohol). And who am I married to, anyway? Whitney and I are looking pretty gay here.

We're pretty good- always placing in the upper half of teams who play (ummm.. except this week). The first week we went, we did the best we've ever done (sixth place). Tonight, our most recent quiz night, we did our worst: last place. We did epically bad. As a consolation prize, we're now the proud (?) owners of this baby:

It's inflatable and more than two feet tall.

which will stay inflated at least for a week or two, as reminder of when we were the least geeky geeks in the whole place (in a bad way). I don't think prizes are normally given to last place, we just did that bad. Still though, with three dollars for a stein of beer, and two and half hours of fun, I'm not too discouraged.

Keeping it real cheap.

Luke and I have been challenging ourselves to eat well on $35/week. Between the two of us, that's about 31 meals; $1.13/meal per person. Without eating a lot of boxed/prepared foods (Ramen, frozen burritos, mac & cheese), it's hard. Hard, but satisfying. One thing that's helped is having a freezer chock full of nettles, stone fruit, soup, berries, stock, pesto, and homemade dough.


Another thing that helps is that I love preparing menus (on little scraps of paper left around the house. I'm my mother's daughter), and find huge satisfaction in being able to have gnocci, kebabs, curry (and soda), etc. and spending only thirty dollars. Tonight we tried a recipe from Everyday Food: grilled pizzas. The magazine had delicious-looking toppings of grilled asparagus and ricotta; or fontina, fennel and onion. We kept it cheap with peppers, tomatoes, mushrooms, and a little sausage.


The whole meals cost us less than four dollars, and was delicious. If you like thin crust pizza, you'd like this. The dough recipe is here.

Lukey and I made nettle ravioli for dinner tonight. Delicious.
(rough pictures for the next bit- camera on the fritz)

Elderflower syrup

My mom took my sisters and Luke and I up the canyon in search of elderflower. We should've gone a week or two earlier, but we were able to find enough. I've been googoo gaga about elderflower since I first tasted a fizzy elderflower drink from the British store, and wished that it wasn't seven dollars for a liter. So I decided to make my own elderflower syrup, which I'll mix with soda water for practically the same drink for pennies, rather than dollars. (I hear that IKEA makes an elderflower syrup like this, which I will see if I can find next time I'm there, since I don't think I'll have enough to last me until next elderflower season).

I think this an awesome picture of Luke. I like how he wouldn't miss out on the flower-picking action just because he was smoking.

My sisters

The process is a bit time consuming, because you have to get all those tiny little flowers off the stems and into a bowl (the bark and leaves of elderflower plants are mildly poisonous), but it was a good thing to do while watching a movie.

I used about twenty heads of flowers. I put the flowers in a bowl with the juice and zest of two lemons. Then I dissolved four cups sugar in four cups water over medium heat, and poured the simple syrup over the flowers.

The mixture sat steeping on top of the fridge for five days with a towel over it, and then I strained and put it in the fridge.So that's it! Mix two ounces of syrup with two cups of sparkling water, and you have a refreshing, flowery, sweet-but-not-too-sweet elderflower soda!

Wild Plums

My BFF Whitney picked me a big bag of wild plums from one of the houses where she dogsits. Last night I made jam. Deciding I wanted this jam to be thicker than usual, I boiled it a long time, forgetting how much pectin plums have-- turns out, I have a plum jelly with clumps of fruit. Still, a good flavor.


I had Lukey watercolor little plums for labels, because as easy at it seems, I couldn't draw plums that looked like plums (if we every make an apple jelly, though, I'm ready! I could also probably handle a banana, too. Too bad those aren't good for preserving). I liked the tags so much I made him do one for the plum chutney we're giving to my grandparents when we see them next week. Isn't it the cutest?

Ew.

Last night was one of those nights where Luke worked late and I cooked dinner for him. As soon as I saw it at the store (two weeks ago), I knew it'd have to be a Thursday night surprise dinner, and that he would love it. He did. Last night was the first time I've ever made cornish game hen.

And it totally grossed me out! I'm not a big meat person, and I especially don't like having to handle it when it's raw- and this was beyond mere handling: I had to pry the skin from the meat, and shove herbs in the space I'd made; then from the outside, I had to rub the skin in order to spread the herbs around in the breast. It was all very cold and slimy and gross.

This picture cracks me up.

In the under-skin cavity, I put about 1 1/2 tablespoons of a mixture of fresh rosemary, thyme, pepper, and olive oil. Then I basted them with butter, salt and peppered them, and put them in the oven at 400 degrees for an hour.

And they came out looking picture-perfect. They tasted really good, too: good mixture of flavors, tender, moist. Luke liked them as much as I thought he would (he likes eating things that make him feel like he's in the middle ages). But I don't like picking meat off bones, or shoving herbs under pimply chicken skin, or massaging raw chicken breasts, so unless he makes them, we'll probably never have these again.

Ravioli, Take 2

This time with spinach and ricotta.

We remembered to try drying them for an hour before boiling. It didn't make a huge difference, but they were a little better- chewier, or something.


And we were better about sealing them, so none opened while boiling.


With a simple tomato basil sauce, they were quite good
(but not even close to as good as those butternut squash ones).

Sur La Table = pretty food

For my birthday, Luke's sister Rachael gave me a gift certificate to Sur La Table. It was my first time going there, and it was basically my version of heaven. I spent forty minutes wandering up and down the aisles, picking up wonderfully unnecessary cooking tools and imagining all the things I could make (Shortcake cups that look like baskets? Molded shortbread? Properly funneled pies? (and if I'm ever rich, I would love to buy myself this)). I could've even stayed longer, but Luke got anxious to leave (he'd already gone to the Apple store, played with the new iphone, and come back). Before leaving, though, I was able to grab a couple not-needed-but-loved things that I've been wanting to get for a while- one thing I like about myself is how little stuff like this makes me so happy.

First, a tart pan. Pie tins work as just as well, but don't turn out as pretty. And it's impossible (for me) to cut a slice and get it onto a plate without messing it up a little. With a tart pan with removable bottom, you get beautiful looking quiches and tarts that look just as nice after being cut.


We usually try new things when we cook, but quiche is one of the few things we make on a regular basis. It's so cheap, so easy, and so yummy! And for a meal that lends itself to so many variations, we almost always have it the same way: spinach, mushrooms, and cheese. This quiche was good (after his first bite, Drew started swearing. In a good way), but what I'm really looking forward to is making tarts with light, flaky crusts and brimming with bright fruit.

My second purchase was a fluted ravioli cutter. Who needs it, right? But I've wanted to make ravioli for a while, haven't, and saw this as a way of getting me excited and motivated. And it worked. Tonight Luke and I made butternut squash ravioli with a browned sage butter drizzled on top. It was much easier than I thought it would be, and after eating huge platefuls, Luke and I leaned back and complimented ourselves on what good cooks we are.



The recipe (makes about 30 ravioli):

For the filling:
1 small butternut squash
salt
pepper
cinnamon
nutmeg
about 1/4 c mozzarella

For the dough:
3 C flour
1/2 t salt
2 eggs
About 3/4 flour

1. Cut the butternut squash in half lengthwise and scoop out the seeds. Brush the cut sides with olive oil, sprinkle with salt and pepper, and put in a 400 degree oven for about 30 minutes.
2. When the squash comes out of the oven, let it cool while you make the dough.
3. Sift together flour and salt. Make a well in the flour mixture and crack the eggs into the well. Lightly beat the eggs with a fork. Mix the eggs and flour together, and slowly add water until a stiff dough forms.
3. Knead the dough til smooth, and then cover and let it sit fifteen minutes.
4. Scoop the squash out of the shells, add dashes of cinnamon and nutmeg, and add the cheese.
5. Divide the dough in half and roll out each half as thin as you can get it- between 1/16 and 1/8 of an inch.
6. Put the filling in little globs (about 1 t) about 1 1/2 inches apart on the dough. Cover with the other rolled out sheet, and press the sheets together around the filling to create little pockets. Cut with the ravioli stamp.

7. (Looking at recipes now, after the fact, I've learned that you should let the cut ravioli dry for an hour. We didn't do that, and it turned out well, but I will try that next time to see what a difference it makes).

8. Cook the ravioli by boiling it in salted water for 10-15 minutes.

9. Meanwhile, melt 2-3 T butter a pan, add sage (about 1/2 t), and brown.
10. Drizzle butter over the ravioli and serve.

It was so good!

Jammin'

It's canning season! We got twenty-four pounds of peaches from our food co-op, and last week we made some jam, since we only have a couple pints left over from last year's peach batch. Again, we made plain peach (which we mostly use as a syrup for pancakes) and peach ginger (which has been a big hit with everyone who's tried it- good on toast, good as a chicken glaze, good on ice cream, etc).

Then this year we added to our jam repertoire a peach lavender jam that I think will be lovely (haven't tasted it since it gelled, only while it was cooking). We made the peach like normal, and then added the lavender water that resulted from dried lavender flowers steeping in boiling water for twenty minutes. I'm imagining crackers with cream cheese and peach lavender. Or warm bread with a unhealthy amounts of butter and cold peach lavender jam. If it's half as good as I imagine it to be, it'll be delicious.

summer night dinner

Luke and I do about 95% of the cooking together, which is why it's fun, every once in a while, for one of us to cook for the other. I've grown to really like Thursday nights, when Luke gets off at 11 pm. In the winter, by eleven I'd be feeling sleepy and lazy. In the summer, I've waited for it to cool down outside, had a nice walk to the grocery store, and have dinner ready just a couple minutes after he gets home. Midnight dinners happen a lot at our house during the summer.

We get food from a co-op every week (if you live in Utah, Idaho, Wyoming, Texas, Washington, Nevada, or Arizona, I highly recommend it- Bountiful Baskets- for $16 you get $30-40 worth of fresh produce), so all I needed for summer vegetable. sandwiches was some french bread and mozzarella. I cut the bread in half lengthwise (somehow, in my head, eating half a loaf of french bread with tons of stuff on top didn't seem like too much for two people. I was wrong!), brushed with olive oil (and next time, balsamic vinegar), and piled with grilled and fresh veggies: eggplant, zucchini, mushrooms, peppers, and tomatoes. Topped with cheese, broiled for a bit, and we had fantastic summer night sandwiches.

Sundays at home

Luke and I spend one Sunday a month at each of our parents' houses. The other two Sundays are for us to relax at home and spend time together. We decided that we want to start making big breakfasts together on the Sundays at home, a 'tradition' we'd like to continue when we have kids, too. This week, the first week, we made tomato/spinach/bell pepper omelettes, toast, and the strawberry basil lemonade.

Isn't our new table cute? I've spent almost a month looking at consignment shops and antique stores, and finally settled on this blue formica one, which fits perfectly with the 50s tablecloth-turned-curtains in our kitchen.

We took our coffee out to the porch, and then we spent the afternoon up the canyon hiking and mushroom hunting (it's still a little too early, I think, but we found a couple kinds).

I think this summer, Sundays are going to be my new hobby day. And this was a good one.

Lemonade

The weather still feels like spring in Utah right now (and I love it!) but I've been hankering for some summery drinks (and using the reamer I just got). Last night I made some lemonade concentrate. I juiced six lemons, and brought the juice to a boil with about 1 1/2 cups each water and sugar.

(Then I did it all over again, because after filling the mason jar with the hot lemon concentrate, I stupidly decided to rinse it so it wouldn't get sticky, and the jar broke in my hands. Even though it was one in the morning, Luke could tell I had my heart set on morning lemonade, so convinced me that we really should go back to the store for six more lemons.)

This morning, I filled the glasses a little less than half full with the concentrate, added some muddled basil and strawberry purée, a couple ice cubes, and filled the glass to the top with cold water (I think next time I'll try sparkling water, because a fizzy lemonade would be good, too). It was, seriously, the best lemonade I've ever had.

Best part? I still have enough concentrate to make it a couple more times.

Only semi-related:

This blog's supposed to be about me developing hobbies. So why a picture of my graduation?

1) I like this picture because of how clear I am in comparison to all those dudes/dudettes whose hands I'm shaking;
2) I just graduated law school. I don't have to have a reason!
3) Every time Luke wanted me to stop studying and give him attention, he'd tell me it was time to give up this silly little law hobby of mine.