Extreme Domesticity

Okay guys, I did something really domestic the other day. I made a tart, specifically for dessert. Like, as part of complete meal. For some reason I see this as very domestic--which I'm pretty okay with, actually. This was the topper for the feast Josh and I made. I used this amazing recipe for a whole lemon tart from smitten kitchen, and it turned out really well! I cheated and used a frozen roll-out Pillsbury pie crust instead of the Unshrinkable Tart Shell recommended by smitten kitchen, but it worked out ok. It did shrink a little, but we had a little less filling (because I used less sugar) so it wasn't too much of a problem.

First, put one of your oven racks in the center of the oven and pre-heat to 325. Temperature is important here so don't mess up! :)



So here's me, mixing up the ingredients in my little food processor.

Mix together:
1 average-sized lemon. This should be a Meyer lemon because they are sweeter than normal lemons. Otherwise, compensate with more sugar. You want to slice this into thin strips, remove the seeds and throw the whole thing into the food processor. That's why this is called a "Whole Lemon Tart." Meyers can be hard to find outside of California (sorry ladies, just move here already!!) but you might get lucky. I got one in my CSA when I made this so it was EXTRA good.
1 1/2 cups (300 grams) sugar. I actually used just a cup b/c I'm not big on the sweets.
You'll want to mix the above two ingredients together until thoroughly blended, then add the rest of the ingredients.
1 large egg
1 large egg yolk
1 1/2 tablespoons (12 grams) cornstarch
1 stick (4 ounces; 115 grams) unsalted butter, melted and cooled. I also only used half a stick of butter, but we ended up with less filling so it might be worth it to go the whole 4 ounces.

Eventually, it will look like this:




Then, pour the filling into the tart shell. So as I mentioned above, I used a frozen roll-out pie crust from Pillsbury because I didn't have time/was too lazy to make the "Great Unshrinkable Crust" smitten kitchen recommends (I keep wanting to type "smitten kitten"... adorable), and it worked pretty well. Just plop the crust into the tart pan and fold the excess crust back in over the edges so the edges are a little thicker.




Since this is NOT a great unshrinkable crust, it will shrink, so it's important that you leave some space (at least 1/4 inch) between filling and crust-edge.

Then pop it in the oven and bake for 20 minutes. Increase the heat to 350 and bake for another 15-20 minutes, or until the top of the tart starts browning and looking dang delicious. Take it out of the oven and let it cool for at least 20 minutes, then devour with all possible rapidity.




It's amazing! And seriously, so easy. Try it! I hope that makes up a little bit for my lengthy absence. I promise I will try to be better from now on!

Pita Chips!

Last night Josh and I made an Indian feast, and it was amazing. We made literally the best food I have ever eaten. To go with it, we also made pita chips!

Pretty easy. Here's what I did:

3 whole wheat pitas, cut into triangles
some olive oil
garlic powder
salt
parmesan cheese



Mix the olive oil, garlic powder and salt together in a little bowl. With a pastry brush, brush the oil mixture onto the pita triangles, which should be arranged on a cookie sheet (see above). Top each with a sprinkle of parmesan cheese, and bake them in the oven for 10 minutes at 350. Tada! You might need to adjust the cooking time, so check them after about 5 minutes to make sure they're not burning.

Veggies and Spice

I didn't take any photos, but yesterday I was serious craving a large plate of veggies with some spice so I threw together this curry recipe, which was mostly made up and didn't use too many exact measurements:

Ingredients:
Canola Oil
Seaseme Oil
A couple cloves of garlic
2 inch piece of fresh ginger
cumin
cinnamon
nutmeg
cumin
cardomom pods
cayenne
coriander
curry powder
salt
pepper
1 red pepper, cut into 1 inch pieces
1 onion, cut into 1 inch pieces
1 head of broccoli, cut into florets
1 small package of hard tofu, drained and sliced into 1 inch pieces
some water
small can of coconut milk
fresh basil

Heat the oils (just a little of the sesame) on a low heat in a saute pan or a wok and then add the garlic and ginger.
Saute for a few minutes and then add the spices (to taste- i used about 1/2-1 teaspoon of each, except for the cayenne which i used a bit less of- that stuff is potent), mixing them into the oils and heating the paste for about a minute.
Throw in all of the veggies and tofu.
Toss everything together so the veggies are coated with the spice mix and pour in a little water- just enough so nothing burns.
Continue adding a bit of water and sauteing until the veggies are slightly tender, then add the coconut milk and basil and mix everything well.
Once the coconut milk is incorporated, pour the curry over rice and enjoy.

The best part of cooking this is how delicious it smells. It also looks beautiful with the yellow curry, red pepper, and green broccoli. Leftovers for lunch tomorrow!

CSA Numero Dos

Hooray! Talk about from famine to feast. This week I got a TRUCKLOAD of produce. I decided to bring some bags and transfer it from the box at the pick-up house, so unfortunately, no nice picture today. But this is what I got:

- 2 HUGE oranges
- 1 grapefruit, and one other thing that my roommate insists is a "pomelo" but is probably just a bigger grapefruit
- 2 of the biggest leeks I have ever seen. Seriously, we're talking palm fronds here.
- 4 sweet potatoes
- salad greens
- broccoli
- cauliflower
- 3 beets! Yay!
- Fuji apples!
- More delicious carrots
- DINO KALE (woo!)

So excited! This is a whole lot more than last week, so I'm going to have to try real hard to use all of it. In celebration I made this delicious and easy recipe from eat me, delicious.

All you need are 2 sweet potatoes, 1 of the HUGE leeks, a cup and a half of cheese (I used cheddar), half a stick of butter, and some salt & pepper. Slice up the taters nice and thin, cut off the palm fronds from the leeks and just use the white and light-green parts (clean them really carefully--mine were pretty muddy). Slice those up too, cross-wise. Melt the butter in a large bowl, add the potatoes and stir them around with some salt and pepper. The recipe said to line a 9-inch cake pan with parchment paper, but I didn't have any so I just sprayed some pam in the pan. Then line the pan with sweet potatoes and cover them with a layer of grated cheese and leeks with some salt and pepper. Layer more yams, then more cheese and leeks, then more yams. Press the whole thing down with a spatula and put it in the oven at 350 for 70-80 minutes, or until the sweet potatoes are tender.



Check out those leeks!

Vegetarian Moussaka...

...isn't like real moussaka at all. And it's way not worth the effort. Again, allrecipes.com: Vegetarian Moussaka - Allrecipes

I could see this being really good with a pasta base, or something. It's good, but not great as is.

A big pot o' soup

Thanks for the inspiration, Food Junta! Last night I got home from yoga and decided to use up the rest of my CSA box. I was fantastically successful! We were conducting interviews for the used-to-be-a-living-room empty room in our house, which meant I needed a meal that could just hang out while I participated in the get-to-know-you chatter. Food Junta gave me the idea of a soup with leeks AND onions, and I took it from there. I also got to use my new (enormous) soup pot, which was exciting.

Here's what I did:

Cut up half an onion and 3 leeks and sauteed them with some garlic until they got soft. I accidentally started boiling the 2 carrots and 2 potatoes I'd chopped up in a separate pot because I misunderstood the directions (duh), so I scooped them out of that pot and put them into the bigger one to saute with everything else. I also threw in the half of a cabbage head I had left over, chopped up nicely. After a few minutes I added a bunch of water & chicken stock (didn't have vegetable, which might have been yummier), salt and pepper, and a bay leaf and waited for it to boil. I also threw in a can of tomatoes for good measure. I dramatically underestimated how LONG this huge pot of soup would take to boil, and seeing as how I had accidentally cooked the potatoes and carrots a bit already, I decided to cut down on the simmering time and eat it after about 15 minutes. I toasted a few slices of the wheat bread I made last weekend, added some parmesan and TADA! Delish.

I'm also filing this under "recessionistas" because it can be made MAD cheaply. Basically with whatever you have in your fridge/cupboard. Also no expensive spices required! And I'm definitely getting at least 3 meals out of this. I brought some in a tupperware for lunch, and soup is always better a day or so after you make it. The flavors just soak in so nicely!

If I used chicken stock does it still count as veggie? :)

M&Ms

Just a quick vote, because I'm bored: Favorite M&Ms:

Plain, Peanut, Peanut Butter, Dark, or Almond?

Nutty Rosemary Bread - with a cereal digression

This is my very firstest post ever - Rosemary Pecan Bread:

A disclaimer: Joey made this bread. There, I said it. He also makes a white bread called "Amish white bread" (also on allrecipes.com) that is really freaking good.

I make cookies mostly. And sometimes damn good fajitas. And curries. Also bowls of cereal. [Let me take a moment to talk about cereal. I LOVE cereal. And I love mixing various cereals. Probably my favorite combination is shredded wheat, puffins, and granola. But recently I've just been eating the Market Basket (for non-east coasters, think cheap Safeway) brand of cheerios with granola. Lena, I need to make your granola! What if I do that today? I just miiiight. I'm going to go look for it. Here: http://www.cdkitchen.com/recipes/recs/146/Homemade_Granola38838.shtml]

But I felt like blogging about this bread because I think all y'all would really really like it. It's a good sandwich bread, but I just had it with eggs for breakfast.

Nutty Rosemary Bread
0.25 oz active dry yeast
2.5 cups warm water, divided
3/4 cup whole wheat flour
1/4 cup olive oil
1/4 cup honey
3 tblsp cornmeal
1 tblsp dried, crushed rosemary
2 tsp salt
5 cups bread flour
1 cup chopped pecans
1 egg, beaten

1. In large bowl, dissolve yeast in 1/2 cup warm water. Add whole wheat flour, oil, honey, cornmeal, rosemary, salt, 1 cup (bread) flour and remaining water. Beat until smooth. Add pecans right before kneading. Knead until smooth and elastic, about 6-8 minutes. Place in a bowl coated with nonstick cooking spray, turning once to coat top. Cover and let rise in a warm place until doubled, about 1 hour.
2. Punch dough down. Divide in half; shape into two loaves. Place in two 9-in. x 5-in. x 3-in. loaf pans coated with nonstick cooking spray. Cover and let rise until doubled, about 30 minutes.
3. Brush egg over loaves. Bake at 350 degrees F for 35-40 minutes or until bread sounds hollow when tapped. Remove from pans to wire racks.

Bulk Food Goodness

Today was a very productive day, food-wise. On craigslist, I found a brand new Calphalon soup pot for much less than I would have otherwise paid, so I went out to the Sunset to pick it up. Luckily, the woman's house was right on the N, but it was all the way on 47th street so it still took me a good 35 minutes to get there. In a lovely confluence of events, there is a fantastic store called Other Avenues, an organic and natural foods store boasting an impressive bulk foods section.

The Bounty:


So excited! I just put together another loaf of bread with the whole wheat flower. It's rising in the loaf pan now and almost ready to go in the oven!

Have I mentioned that I love grocery stores? This one is the most fun I've had in a while. There's something satisfying about weighing out your own bulk ingredients, especially the spices. ESPECIALLY when the whole total (including a lovely tote bag you can just see under all the goodies up there) comes out to just over $30. Happy Saturday!

Cauliflower Curry

Yum! Last night I got together with Danny, Steven and Steven's roommate Tamara for dinner and board games. We made this recipe and it turned out really well! Here's what we did.

Ingredients:
Olive oil
Garlic
1/2 teaspoon ginger
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon turmeric
1/2 teaspoon cayenne
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon coriander
1/2 teaspoon mustard seeds
1/2 teaspoon cumin seed
2 heads of cauliflower, cut into florets
some water
half a bag of frozen peas
a couple of fresh cherry tomatoes and a can of whole

Amazingly, I had all the required ingredients in my kitchen! I was really surprised that I had all the spices, but I have been on a spice-collecting jag. Also some of them were my roommates'.

So, we chopped the garlic and sauteed it in a HUGE pan (with a lid--important) with some olive oil, then added all the spices. It started smelling awesome, so we added about 1/4 cup of water and the cauliflower, lidded it and let it stew for 10-ish minutes. Once the cauliflower was a little tender, we added the peas and stirred it for another few minutes, then added the tomatoes. Once they were hot, it was done! Easiest meal in the freaking world.

While the curry was cookin' away, Danny made rice and heated up some garlic naan in the oven. Voila, delicious dinner! It turned out really well, but a little spicy for me--I'll cut the cayenne next time. This is definitely entering my regular cooking repertoire!

Great Minds

Hey, friends. Just thought I should post about this. Phoebe (in purple) is a wonderful woman (B'07) who sent me a message on facebook about her blog with her roommate Cara about....being a 20-something who wants to cook awesome-and-cheap food. Looks like there are a lot of recessionistas out there.

Omg, bread.

This weekend, I made a miraculous discovery. BREAD: easy to make and delicious!

I used this amazingly simple recipe and made three loaves in three days. I am SO proud of this bread you guys--you have no idea. It's very basic but SO yummy. A little too buttery for sandwiches or soups, but perfect for toast.


This is what it looks like. Yes, that is the most beautiful slice of toast you have ever seen.

When I told my mom about my bread making adventures, she told me about bread she used to make with onions and dill. Sounds delicious! I'll have to start experimenting. I'm also planning on using wheat flower and less butter/sugar. Yummy bread ideas anyone?

My Blogroll

So, I've heard that if you post too many links, blogger will suspend your account for a bit (this happened to the not of it men and women), but I am willing to take that risk with our accounts to share some valuable blogs that I read. Food, Farming, Freshness, Policy, Advocacy, Rooftop Gardens, etc etc. Read on:

Graze the Roof - Rooftop Garden Info on top of Glide Memorial Church in SF. Amazing.
The Green Fork Blog - The Eat Well Guide's Blog. Mostly posts written by interns and employees. Good stuff. Very topical.
City Farmer News - Urban Ag stories. I dig it. HA! Dig! Ha!
Civil Eats - The post-Slow Food Nation blog. Gordon Jenkins (one of the posters) is a new friend and says that they are always looking for more bloggers, if any of us are into the idea.
Bread and Honey - The most like ours - a collaboration of friends and food. Check it. I like it.
Food Junta - For the poor, empowered, and hungry (ie me next year. Shizeee, what am I about to do with my life?)
The Irresistible Fleet of Bicycles - Awesome. Everyone needs to read what they do (ie motivate
the young to farm and unite). Woot. Also they are going to be promoting their movie "The Greenhorns". We should keep an eye out.

I'm hungry. What to eat? Oh, the eternal question.

Sorry for the blog-poop. I thought I'd just share what I have.

XOXO

First CSA Box landed!!!

Today I went down to the Castro and picked up my first CSA box. Inside:


It's ok.... not really as much as I'd expected. But doesn't that produce look beautiful!!!

Tonight I'm making a couple of yummy things: one is garlic bread, which I just threw into the oven. I used half a loaf of Trader Joe's cheesy sourdough bread that was about to go bad, brushed some garlic, salt, olive oil and parmesan on the slices, and popped it in the oven wrapped up in tin foil. I found a recipe online instructing me to keep the loaf in the oven for 40 to 50 minutes, but that seems like a lot. I'm going to try 30 and see what happens.

Then, I'm making the recipe provided by Terra Firma for this week's box: Rice Noodles with Cabbage & Tofu. Here's the recipe:

For the dressing, combine the juice and zest of 1 tangelo with 1 T. soy sauce, 2 T. olive oil, and 1 T. minced green garlic (stems and/or leaves).
Cook 2 C. dry rice noodles (“rice sticks”) in boiling water for 2 minutes. Drain and rinse.
Crumble 12 oz. firm tofu, then drizzle with 1 T. soy sauce and 1 t. sesame oil.
Cut a cabbage in half across its “equator”, and then shred one half (or both halves of a small cabbage) as finely as possible.
Toss the ingredients together, then let sit for 1/2 hour. Serve with fresh spinach leaves.

You can also make a stir fry using most of the ingredients:
After marinating the tofu, stir fry it until it gets crispy. Remove the tofu from the wok, then stir-fry the cabbage and noodles for 3 minutes and remove from the wok. Add the dressing ingredients minus the oil to the hot wok, then stir in 1 T. cornstarch mixed with 3 T. water. Stir until it begins to thicken, then return the other ingredients to the wok and stir fry for another 1-2 minutes along with a few handfuls of spinach leaves.

This recipe meant I had to run down the street to the corner store and buy some vermicelli, which I'd never bought before but remember liking in Asian dishes at restaurants. I think I'm going to make the stir-fry version--it's cold, I need something warm and toasty. Speaking of which, I made some toast from the bread I baked yesterday (bread post soon to come). Yum!!!

RESULTS:
I need a bigger pan. Or a wok.


I had nowhere near enough room for all the cabbage, noodles and tofu to fit in the pan at once! Things kept falling out the sides and everything got a lot more cooked than I wanted it to be. Oh well. The sauce turned out pretty well, a little goopy but we added water. Even though the cooking didn't go as well as I'd hoped, the dish actually ended up being really delicious. And the garlic bread turned out well too. Leftovers for lunch!

I LOVE UNCLE SAM CEREAL!!!! the dinosaurs definitely probably liked it too when they were frolicking around....i know you think this is a joke, but seriously.....

Ingredients

1 medium- to large-sized bowl/vesicle
a small summit of Uncle Sam cereal
a placid lake of Trader Joe's "original" flavored soy milk
1 spoon
10000 ready tastebuds

Butternut the Juggernaut

So this might be the hardest time for anyone trying to eat "fresh" in Providence. The winters farmers market is filled with bread, meat, eggs, and value-added but the precious sweetness of peaches (though there still are apples, albeit close to the end of their shelf life) and the savory tastes of asian greens is a distant memory. BUT...if you were thinking ahead you might still have some reserves waiting patiently in a dark corner of your kitchen, the storage veggies. Now, my dark corner is not so dark so the potatoes and onions are sprouting but I still have my precious butternut squashes, the crowning jewel of my storage collection. I would love to break out in a long soliloquy about how we, me and the butternut squash, have a long and loving history but I have four potlucks to cook for this week and no time for that type of indulgence. So tonight, the agenda is stuffed butternut squash. General recipe:

-Cut butternuts in half and bake at 425 till tender
-While baking put some couscous, quinoa, and other grains in pot at appropriate time with some chicken stock (once the chicken stock is boiling, of course), cook
-when both are done, scoop most of the flesh of the butternut squash into a bowl and mix with your grain mixture, I also added some grated carrots and goats cheese- any other additions such as raisins, other cheeses, tomatoes would be great
-refill the shell of the butternut and bake for another 5 minutes

Onward and upward- next will be butternut squash soup. MMMM

Food for Dinosaurs-- Welcome

Welcome to Food for Dinosaurs!

This blog arose as I started becoming more invested in my food--what I buy, where I buy it, and how I cook it--and I wanted a place to collect all my thoughts and experiences in what feels like a completely new phase in life. Since moving to a new city in the fall and investing in some of my first "very own" cooking implements, I've been cooking and baking like crazy, and am just getting started. I'll pick up my first CSA box from Terra Firma Farms today, and I'm really excited to get going on some yummy seasonal recipes. I was looking around online for a seasonal/local/farmer's market-inspired food blog, and couldn't find much (though I'm sure there out there and I just improperly google'd), so I thought I'd contribute what I can.

My plan for this blog is to post a few times a week, depending on how busy I get. I'll usually talk about something I made, and hopefully include some pictures and the recipe I used. I'm also opening it up to some of my foodliest friends for their insights and experiences, so you'll see entries from all over the country soon enough!

The name: Some of the healthiest food you can eat comes in the form of big, green, leafy vegetables--the kind of food (herbivorous) dinosaurs would love!