Rosemary bread: updated

This is what I call my 'stuff I sometimes need to go grab' spice rack. It's got stuff I don't use quite as often..

So, I've been told I don't take enough photos.

This is my 'I use this almost all the time' spice rack, complete with Italian seasonings, curries, steak rubs, etc.

My baker's rack that my sister'n'law gifted us, complete with chips, nuts, bowls, a soup pot I've been known to use quite a bit of; flours, sugars, syrups, corn starch.. you get the idea (and can likely see it)

I've been told I need to photograph my food and such a little more often.

 So, here's some food.

The bread after it's been mixed and had the chance to rise for about 20 minutes.

So, the recipe was as it usually goes:
1 cup warm water with 1tb warmed butter,  2-3 tablespoons of milk (good with buttermilk by the way), 1.5 teaspoons of salt, 1.5 teaspoons of yeast; let that sit for a moment. Add about a tablespoon of olive oil, 1/3 cup of brown sugar and the following spices/herbs at one's leisure:
rosemary, marjoram, basil, oregano, dried lemon peel, dill, parsley, celery seed and thyme. I really think the thyme made it last time.
Add a good handful of almonds (I love the crunch) along with 3 cups of bread flour. Make sure it all mixes in really well.

This is some nicer olive oil with some lemon peel (dried), rosemary, dill and a beaten egg. 

 Take that stuff up there (olive oil with some spices and herbs one likes, plus an egg) and put it on the bread when it's got about 45 minutes left (the time left isn't an issue. 30? Fine. An hour? Fine. But it has to have at least the chance to rise, so make sure it's an hour or less.)

It's also okay if the stuff goes down the sides. Don't go all slap-happy and poke it; I learned that fork-holing the top makes it go all insane (likely due to the salt from the upcoming cheese addition) so..Just let it drip wherever, it's okay.

Then, dust your bread with your favorite cheese. This is parm. I'm sure it's good with anything.
It bakes into a nice, golden color.

This is after the cheese has had some time (20-30 minutes?) to bake into the top of the bread.
This may screw around with how much the bread will rise, but I've not seen a lack of quality, just in size. 

So, I wanted to photograph the bread when it came out, but it got eaten before I had the chance. This is what was left, but there are about three slices (maybe?) left from that. It goes pretty fast!

Yummy Bread

I keep experimenting with bread and it's been getting better and better. Had a couple turn out not so well, but lately it's been okay.

I liked this one. It's soft and good toasted with some peanut butter.

In order in the bread machine:

1 cup minus 2 TB of warm water 

2 TB of vanilla (to make up for the lack of the 2 TB of water. See what I did there?)

2.5 teaspoons of active dry yeast

About 3 tablespoons of milk

2 teaspoons of salt

1/3 cup of coconut

About 1/4 a bag of macadamia nuts

About 1/4-1/3 (I didn't measure it) of brown sugar

About 1 TB of cinnamon

2 ts of nutmeg

3 cups of bread flour

Bake on sweet bread =)

It's super tasty, and the only thing I wish I did was add craisins. We didn't have any at the time, unfortunately. Would have also been really good with dried cherries, or apples.

Smoothie time?

I got a new blender for my wedding. It's a nice blender, actually. I was told I want/need a Vitamix. Although, it would be nice; I can't see why I'd pay for one when a friend offered me access to hers. I've tasted those milkshakes, and you better believe I'd be at the yard when she makes another.

Even so, I put some random things in the blender and here's what came out:

About a handful of spinach. Don't be picky with me now, guys.
A celery stalk
A carrot
As much ice as makes you happy
Some lemon juice (do you like lemons? Then use more. Don't like a lot of lemons? Then use less)
An orange
A banana
Enough mango nectar to getcha goin' to where you want to be

Granted, I just made a lot of smoothie. I'm considering adding toasted coconut leftover from when I garnished my lunch yesterday, but then I'd want to add nuts and chocolate and THEN just take a visit to Dairy Queen and..the cycle never ends. Besides, the noise of the blender made my cat go completely insane, and now I have a chair and a box of pens to clean up.
I love using mango nectar for smoothies because it's a bit thicker/more syrupy than orange juice. I get picked on because I don't really have an 'advanced palate' for textures, but there you have it. I don't want it to feel like water. If I want that, I'll drink water or coconut water. I actually have coconut water, and it'd likely be an interesting base to a smoothie. Must try that next time.

My end result filled the whole blender, so unless you want to give away about 5 glasses of the stuff, you might want to consider either storage options or cutting down the ingredients. I leave that to you, as this isn't my problem. :P

No dairy in this, no meat, no eggs, and not hard. Woo!

Rosemary Bread

I think this bread would be a REALLY good grilled cheese, or sandwich with local tomatoes.
I named it that because originally it has rosemary in it, but I ran out of rosemary and still make this bread. Granted, it wouldn't be rosemary anymore, but it's still really, really good.
Breads in the machine are neat just for the sheer fact that you can add things here and there (gradually) without messing up the bread by too much. Granted, that changes if you add something salty, for instance, because that messes with the yeast. Adding fluids is hard (see: honey or jams) because then it might get too gloopy.

I'm eating this bread right now (meaning I have the time to write my posts on breads I've used recently) after having toasted a slice and put honey on top. I think I made it a week ago, but I sliced it and put it all into a large tupperware container. A big thing with bread: it's not necessarily how much air is in there when you store it so much as WHERE you store it. The cool from the fridge makes it get tough faster, as it messes with the bread on a chemical level. However, being warm and in the sunlight is bad, because then things like green mold (penicillin, anyone?) tends to breed within 2-3 days. Why? Because there's no preservative in it. (For SHAME, haha.) So, I store mine in an air tight container, then inside a drawer that doesn't see light.
It's the same drawer the mouse visits, hence the thicker container. I don't know if it's alive anymore (my cat had some intestinal issues that, upon experiencing the smell, I have to wonder if she ate the mouse in question...) but it's not getting to my homemade bread, darn it.

As always, put the warm water with the yeast and any granulated items, like sugar and salt, and let them fester for a moment. It'll bubble; that's when I tend to add everything else.

With this one, I also just completely melt the butter and put it in with the water, salt, sugar and yeast. It doesn't seem to change much of anything, and it saves me the effort of hoping the 'softened' butter will mix thoroughly enough.
Also, don't replace the butter with anything else. I'm sure it'd be okay, but I've been reading a lot about butter vs oils, and ...I'd just stick to butter. I've always just stuck to butter if I can but.. Come to find out, and this isn't a shocker for me, canola oil helps you fatten up. It's a bad idea.


Recipe

1 tablespoon white sugar
1 cup of warm water
1 teaspoons of salt
1 + 1/2 teaspoons of  active dry yeast
2 tablespoons of melted butter
2 tablespoons of rosemary *
1 tablespoon of Italian Seasonings
3 cups of bread flour
1 tablespoon of olive oil
1 beaten egg

Mix everything in as one should. Leave out the egg.
If you are using a bread machine, put everything in on wheat (which works in mine, might not in yours) and let it go. Come back when the bread has risen a bunch (an hour or hour-and-a-half should be left). Whisk up the egg (I've been known to add about 2 tablespoons of olive oil, and about 2-3 of parmigiana cheese) and pour it over the bread. It's worked when you stab the bread with a knife, but then it muffin topped a lot; that was a REALLY good, really ugly bread, so it's up to you. Everything on the top will cover, then spill over the sides. Don't worry, it shouldn't burn. It'll be pretty tasty.

If you are using a bread pan in the oven, do the typical spiel: knead it for a while, let it sit, covered by a towel, in a container and in a warm place. Come back to it later on, brush the loaves with the egg, and then bake at 375F for a while in a preheated oven. No idea how long that takes, but it shouldn't bake for more than about an hour and a half, I'd guess. You get the same thing each time (I think this makes two bread pans, if using the oven, but then that would depend on your pan size, too).

*I haven't used rosemary in a while, but it's really good with some marjoram and parsley instead.
Also, adding macadamia nut pieces is really, really tasty.

Enjoy!

New soups

And we thought I got away from soups.

Let me tell you, that hasn't happened. I have two new recipes, mostly because of situational things. I made one soup just because I wanted to -- because I wanted to have an emergency 'I left with no real idea of what I'm eating after a while' kind of back up food. I do leave for the weekend here and there, and it's cheaper to make a soup than it is to get a burger.
On top of that, I had been given two HUGE heads of collards. I mean, HUGE. I think they were about 3-5 pounds each, and I had no idea how to eat them before they went bad. So, I cooked them. I mean, what else do you do? And that involved a lot of water and space. I think my new soup pot is 16 quarts, or some crazy thing like that. The collards didn't fit by about 4 inches over the top, after I'd broken the leaves down and whatnot. It was a lot, and I ended up freezing it all.
And then I had no freezer space AND I had just gotten married, which meant I froze some of my cake to save for my 1st year anniversary. Talk about no space! So, I made soup. It was logical, I guess, but who makes soup out of collard juice?


Then a friend of mine tells me she's sick. My response? Make soup. Make spicy soup, no less, which is obviously a good idea for sick people. She felt back to her normal self by the time she got the soup, mostly -- she said it gave her a pick-me-up kind of thing. Not surprising, since it was full of a ton of fresh veggies.

So, I posted the soup ingredients online. My soups, when I do them, aren't hard to do. I don't typically brown this, saute that, pre-cook things, etc, before putting it in the full soup. I might, given I'm really worried about extracting flavors like carmelized onions or something (the most I did was presoak the shiitakes I had in the sick-woman soup, because they're dried and in a container I got from Costco a while back. I only used them in the soup because I don't want to let those go bad, even though dried food takes a while to turn -- they will, eventually).
I posted them online to get names. I haven't chosen for the first, but the second is Melly's Sweet'n'Spicy Soup, which makes a lot of product, isn't terribly bad for you (no added salt, no sugar, but plenty of carbs; it's balanced by how many nutrients it involves from all the v8 juice, tomatoes, tubers, spice, etc). The idea was to get some energy back into her, and it worked.


Funny thing is, a friend requested soup for the Sunday night games which still go on this semester. I think they shall continue until someone graduates and moves away, and even then, unless it's Kevin and I moving away, they'll probably still keep going. Kyle says he wants potatoes and bacon. MOAR POTATOES. So many potatoes!

I shall post what I did and the ingredients I used when I can. I should shower first, because the skinny one and his visiting brother decided they want to go out, and I'm probably tagging along. I'll post by tomorrow night, given things go as I like. I have a few bread recipes I yoinked, which seem to go well with EVERYTHING I put them toward.

Mac'n'cheese

My friend Logan usually just comes over to play games on Sundays, as usual. However, I couldn't make up my mind tonight and I was running out of time. Usually, I have this planned out, but things have been insane lately as far as scheduling goes.
Safe to say, I asked another friend what I should do. He suggests mac'n'cheese. I tell everyone, and offer an opening for them to suggest things to go with it, and Logan jumps on the ability to make mac'n'cheese.

From what I saw, he did the following:


Add a cup and a half of condensed milk to an egg. Mix the heck out of this. Note: do this before making the roux.


Boil and cook your noodles of choice (enough to fill a large saucepan). Since this is mac'n'cheese, perhaps you shouldn't use spaghetti. This is up to you, dear cook. Eventually, when applicable, drain them and set them aside so the hot water doesn't make them mushy.


Make a butter-based roux from a stick of unsalted butter -- much like when I made the gumbo. You're basically lightly browning (see: malaise) a fat, such as different oils or butter. This is done on medium heat so things will melt correctly. Note: this isn't hard. Just doing boil it and you'll be fine.
While this is going, add about a half of a cup of milk (or was it a third? I doubt it'll change things much).
After this is mixed together, slowly add about a half of a pound of shredded cheese. We used a colby jack mix, but this is also up to you. It's your mac'n'cheese. If you like it sharp, then use sharp cheddar. If you like it light, use mozzarella or Swiss. If you like it smoky, use Gouda. This cheese should be added SLOWLY until it starts to thicken and become sticky, but not to the point where it readily hardens if cooled. The whole time you're doing this, stir with a whisk.

When the cheese sauce is melted, add a teaspoon or so of parsely, oregano and seasoned garlic salt -- or some salt and some more of that garlic you may have chopped for garlic bread, or minced garlic from a jar, or what have you. Just put garlic in it. Stir.

Put the noodles in a casserole pan. Put the two sauces in it, the white-egg sauce first. Lightly wiggle the pan so the white sauce spreads evenly, then follow by topping the noodles with the cheesy sauce.Top with more cheese to create a light cheesy-crust, or with cheese and bread crumbs if desired.
Top the pan with foil and cook at 350 for 12 minutes. Remove the foil and cook again for another twenty minutes or so, or until the cheese at the top is at the consistency you like.
Take out and serve.

Tonight: Garlic bread

• There are two parts to this: make the bread, then slice the bread and add a topping.
• As found here:  Read more: http://www.food.com/recipe/bread-machine-garlic-bread-107933#ixzz1ktop2aHl
• To make:
• 1 cup warm water (110 degrees F)
• 1 tablespoon butter
• 1 tablespoon powdered milk
• 1 tablespoon white sugar
• 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
• 1 1/2 tablespoons dried parsley
• 3 teaspoons minced garlic or 2 teaspoons garlic powder (I minced up about 5-10 cloves, so this is up to you about how much you want. If you love garlic like we do, then 3 ts is just not going to cut it.)
• 3 cups bread flour
• 2 teaspoons active dry yeast (I put in a packet. My bread keeps falling and I keep changing things to see what its issue is)

A few good shakes of the following, each: dried oregano, basil, marjoram, and a small shake of lemon peel. 

Directions:

1. 1
   Place ingredients in the pan of the bread machine in the order recommended by the manufacturer.
2. 2
   Select Basic Bread cycle; press Start.

Or... Put in appropriate pans, knead away, let it sit and rise for about 45 minutes, then bake at 350 for about an hour and a half or until it's the crust you'd want. 




To top:


Chop up a junk load more garlic. Add more seasonings of choice, as well as olive oil. Eye this to your liking and be sure to remember it may cover a lot of slices. Add butter from the fridge and microwave until it melts. Add this to slices of your freshly baked bread and allow to broil in the oven for a few minutes, until it's as crispy as you like. Serve with your yummy meal.

Baked eggplant

I'm back! I took a trip up north, spent quite a bit of time cooking at my sister in law's (basic stuff like green bean casserole and sweet potato crunch. I didn't share the recipe because, well, it's.. one is super easy and pointless to post, and the other is a recipe in the family and I'm not sure how happy they'd be if it went public.)

Considering it's a new year, I refuse to cook things that you know will turn out tasting like dirt. There are just things I like and things I don't and there's not much one's going to do to it to change my mind. On that note, I don't want to eat a lot of fried foods, red meats or things heavy in fatty oils -- like Crisco, margerine; I'm avoiding vegetable oil due to some finds I've come across. Logically speaking I'd post a link to that, but I can't find it right now.
So I'm making a vegetarian meal that sounds like it should actually be tasty.


Serves 4.
Cook time: assumedly 25-30 minutes.

Ingredients

4 eggplants, cut in half (I'm using two, because the store had three)
1 tb coarse sea salt
4 cloves garlic, chopped
4 thinly sliced onions
1 cup olive oil
1 tb freshly chopped parsely (guess who's using dried..)
2 large firm ripe tomatoes, chopped

Short version: stab the eggplant, leave it sit for an hour, cook the rest, cook the eggplant, put everything together and bake it.

Long version:
Make several deep cuts in the tops of the eggplants. Place in a colander and sprinkle with salt. Let drain for an hour. (Note: if you're going to cook rice on the side, or anything where the juice would be possibly included in the food while you're preparing, this would be good to use. The food would absorb any lost nutrients due to draining. I've been calling it the collard-green theory, because southerners often dab up the juice with corn bread).

Preheat the oven to 350.

Saute the garlic and onions in 2 tb of oil in a large pan over medium heat until browned. Season with salt, if desired. Add the tomatoes and simmer for 15 minutes.

Heat the remaining oil in a large frying pan until very hot. Fry the eggplants until the flesh is softened, about 10-15 minutes. Note: you can do this on lower heat, which would avoid destroying the chemical compounds found in the oil and the fruit. This is one reason why frying is generally bad.

Place the eggplants in a baking dish and fill with the onion mixture. Bake until tender -- roughly a half hour.

Sprinkle with the parsley and serve hot.

Considering I have more onion and tomato than eggplant, and I'm not really keen on frying it, I'm probably going to drain the eggplant after cutting it into strips. I'll saute like it says, but instead of frying the eggplant, I'll likely bake it for 10-20 minutes (which I can do while sauteing the other stuff) and then put it all together. This saves me from washing an extra pan, using up a lot of olive oil, and destroying good nutrients from the extra cooking process. I can't see how it would taste much differently, and having extra tomatoes -- therefore extra juice -- I'm not too scared of it drying out on me.


I may add a few potatoes, since, for one, I have a lot of potatoes; for another, I have company coming over; and for a third, I have a love for potatoes. Woo!

Wish me luck!

Post-eaten update

I successfully fed my husband, Eric, Dave Yates, Dave B., Sage, Alex, Danny, Heather, Heather's friend Christina (?), Logan, myself and Redd.
I added a whole chicken, 2 zucchini, 2 yellow squash, habanero spicy sauce and Louisiana cayenne sauce to the recipe. It tasted amazing!

I don't need to review too much. Anyone who's had gumbo knows what I'm talking about.
I used the stock from boiling the chicken all day (see: from 10 am til 4 pm). I then did what it said about boiling the shells with the stock water. I added the squashes after I put the stock and okra in. Otherwise, I did everything about the same. I never made roux before, but it was definitely just a creole alternative to corn starch and water, except corn starch and water doesn't brown soup. It'd be up to you if you wanted to brown oil and flour just to give a more caramel color to the gumbo. I could have skipped that and saved myself 20-30 minutes, but oh well.

A few people added more hot sauce, but no one needed more seasonings than that. I put more thyme in than it called for, but my measurements were all off. I also added chili powder instead of cayenne (cause I lost my cayenne apparently) and a Creole seasoning I found at BiLo, and I think that helped. The flavor was meant to have a more concentrated shrimp-stock flavor, but the chicken competed with that in a very good way. It was balanced, in my opinion, and I didn't hear anything even remotely similar to a complaint.

Everyone left full, at least if they left at all. Eric and Logan are still here.

I'm so excited this turned out to be so tasty! :D

I have photos, but they're on a camera that's busy charging. Go figure. I'll post up pictures eventually!

Recipe: seafood sausage gumbo

Let me preface this by saying that Heather donated a chicken from Earth Fare she said she'd never eat. I can't see why, but that means she used it as a buy in for this soup.
This soup is not cheap. So don't be angsty about my charging a buy-in. I've been pretty lenient this semester.
So, I am boiling the bird. Why? Because it was frozen. But I'll use that stock in with the gumbo. I can't see how that'd hurt anything. I do intend to de bone the bird, and if you choose to do the same thing then kudos -- it's a better soup, I think, when you go through the process like this. I know I love my turkey stock and I still have some left in the freezer.


As one can see from the recipe, this one is going to take me a lot longer. The roux will be 20-40 minutes; the shrimp shells simmer for 20; part 7 is 20 minutes; 8 is about 40-45. I'm sure I can multi-task, but some of that is a consistent bout of attention (see: the roux, which I'm scared I'll end up burning but such is how things go sometimes). I can definitely see this taking two hours. On the upside, my house should be quite warm. I'm also doing peppermint-brownies since it's so close to Christmas (a week!!)   =)



It says it serves 10-12 - if you add a whole chicken this won't be the case anymore :P

3 lbs raw shrimp, in shell (yes, I'm boiling the shells with the water that the chicken's in right now.)
1.5 quarts water
4 onions, 2 quarters
4 bay leaves
3/4 cup veggie oil
1 cup all purpose flour
5 tb butter
2 green bell peppers
4 celery stalks
1.5 pounds polish or andouille sausage (we actually have some jimmy dean links that were on sale, so just about whatever sausage should work)
3 cups fresh okra (in my case, frozen, since it's December)
3 garlic cloves
1/2 ts thyme leaves
2 ts salt
Black pepper and white pepper
1 ts cayenne pepper
2 tb red pepper sauce
2 cups chopped plum tomatoes (or a sweet tomato of your choice)
1 pound fresh crab meat
boiled rice for serving

1: Peel and devein the shrimp. Keep the heads and shells. Cover and chill  the shrimp while you make the sauce.

2: Place the shrimp heads and shells in a saucepan with the water, quartered onion and one of the bay leaves and let it boil. Partly cover the top and let it simmer for 20 minutes. Strain and set it all aside.

3: To make a Cajun roux, heat the oil in a heavy bottomed skillet. When the oil is hot, add the flour, a little at a time, and blend into a smooth paste.

4: Cook over medium low heat, stirring constantly for 25-40 minutes until the roux reaches the color of peanut butter. Remove the pan from the heat and continue stirring until the roux stops cooking and cools down.

5: Melt the butter in a large, heavy-bottomed saucepan. Finely chop the remaining onions and add to the pan with the peppers and celery. Cook over medium-low heat for 6-8 minutes until the onions are soft, stirring occasionally.

6: Add the sausage, stir well, and cook for 5 minutes longer. Add the okra and garlic, stir, and cook until the okra stops producing white 'threads'.

7: Add the remaining bay leaves, thyme, salt, peppers, and make sure it's to taste. Stir well and then stir in 1.5 quarts of the shrimp stock and the plum tomatoes. Bring to a boil, partly cover the pan, lower the heat and let it simmer for about 20 minutes.

8: Whisk in the Cajun roux. Raise the heat and bring it to a boil, whisking well. Lower the heat again and simmer, uncovered, for 40-45 minutes,

9: Stir in the shrimp and crab meat. Cook for at least 3-4 minutes or until the shrimp turn pink.

10: To serve, put a mound of hot, boiled rice in each serving bowl and ladle the gumbo over, making sure everyone gets a little of everything. =)

Won-ton Soup Recipe

It says this is usually served as a snack. Knowing how the crowd eats, though, we won't need much more than that anyway. I did dessert last week, so munchies are up to everyone else this time.


Says it serves 4.

• About one cup, generous amount, of chopped pork
• 1/2 cup minced shelled shrimp
• 1 ts light brown sugar 
• 1 tb rice wine or sherry 
• 1 tb light soy sauce
• 1ts minced fresh ginger root
• 24 ready made won-ton wrappers
• about 3 cups of stock
• finely chopped scallions for garnish

1: In a bowl, thoroughly mix the pork and the shrimp with the sugar, rice win, soy sauce, scallions and ginger; set aside for about 30 minutes to blend the flavors.
2: Place about 1 ts of the pork mixture in the center of each won-ton wrapper.
3: Wet the edges of each filled won-ton wrapper with a little water and press them together with your fingers to seal. Fold each bundle over.
4: To cook, bring the stock to a heavy boil in a wok. Add the won-tons and boil for 4-5 minutes. Season with the soy sauce and add the scallions.
5: Transfer to bowls and serve hot.








As seen from Chinesefood.about.com, here's how one can make won-ton wrappers. It's not that hard, and I'll be making my own because I'm too lazy to go to Greenville to see if the Asian markets have any. It's just flour dough, guys, it's not that bad. =)





This recipe yields about 24 wonton wrappers.
Prep Time: 1 hour
Total Time: 1 hour
Ingredients:


1 egg
3/4 teaspoon salt
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/3 to 1/2 cup water, as needed
Extra flour as needed
Preparation:


Lightly beat the egg with the salt. Add 1/4 cup water.


Sift the flour into a large bowl. Make a well in the middle and add the egg and water mixture. Mix in with the flour. Add as much of the remaining water as necessary to form a dough. (Add more water than the recipe calls for if the dough is too dry).


Form the dough into a ball and knead for about 5 minutes, or until it forms a smooth, workable dough. Cover and let rest for 30 minutes. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface. Roll out until very thin, and cut into 3 1/2-inch squares. Store in a plastic bag in the refrigerator or freezer until ready to use.

Carrot and Ginger soup

Everyone's eating it now. I served eight again, but two of them are different than the original crowd due to how the cards fell, if you will.
Carrot and ginger are fantastic together. I was scared that, due to carrots and sweet potatoes both being roots, it would be very similar to a sweet potato soup. Thankfully, it doesn't. The cost is extremely low; I spent about 20 bucks for the full amount of ingredients and didn't quite use it all, then have enough maybe to feed about 20 people (I obviously changed up the recipe).

It says it serves 6. I tripled it, so it's about accurate.

Ingredients:
2 tb butter
1 chopped onion
1 chopped celery stalk
1 chopped medium potato
5 1/2 cups chopped carrots
2 teaspoons minced fresh ginger
1 1/2 quarts veggie stock
7 tablespoons whipping cream (or, to taste)
A heavy pinch of ground nutmeg
salt and pepper to taste

1. As per usual for a lot of these, melt the butter in your pan and saute the celery and onion. Let it soften.
2. When that's done, add the carrots, the potato, ginger and stock. Bring it to a boil, then let it simmer for twenty minutes or so. This isn't strict. Stir a bunch.
3. Process this into smoothness in whatever fashion you prefer. I still love my stick blender. Bring it back to the stove and let it warm up; add the spice, cream and the salt'n'pepper all to taste. I'd love to say to stick with the recipe, but everyone's going to prefer something a little different. Let it heat back up.
Optional: garnish with a small dollop of yogurt to each bowl.

This takes up time just because of the chopping. If you do it before hand, you'll be able to have this cook in about a half an hour. Make sure to cook it long enough to make the carrots mushy; it doesn't really need to cook much longer than that, so depending on how they're chopped (or processed) it could be done sooner.

Analysis: Thai Coconut Chicken

• Flavor
• Texture
• Cooking ease
• Price
• Estimated healthiness
• Creativity of the recipe
• Completeness 

Out of 70 points.

Last post for today. =\ Not done..

I must start off by saying that those who don't like coconut came close to ruining it for those that do, but that's okay. The coconut really made this; it's okay without it, but when I tried a bowl that had some in it, well, WOW. :D Toasted coconut must be in the top ten tastiest items ever.

Flavor: 10/10. My husband picked this because of his love for Asian-themed soups. I agreed because I lost my list (still have no idea where it is and I've been winging it since the weekend I made this). It's a little thick, in a good way, and that lends well to the flavors of the noodles and all else.

Texture: 10/10. A few subtle things are going on: the fats are smooth on the tongue, again, with this soup; the coconut is nice and crunchy, but the chicken is nice and soft as it should be. The thyme and cilantro leaves add a little playfulness to the tongue -- you can't actively identify it, but the soup would feel empty without those being there.

Cooking ease: 9.5/10. Chop a few things, cook them in juice, and toast coconut. I took the .5 off just because of the coconut; I burned mine a little. Come to find out, it doesn't matter. No one noticed. I mean, I saw a little smoke, and it still tasted amazing. I tried to be as objective of my own cooking as possible, and I still fell in love with the finished product.

Price: 10/10. I used 10 chicken thighs and a few other cheap little deals to feed 8 people, and I had a little left over. I had some coconut frozen already, so I didn't have to worry about that. Again, cooking a large soup pot was efficient as usual.

Estimated healthiness: 9/10. Cilantro is like a lot of other things: it's healthy. I forget why, but eating it is good. Coconut is a little fatty, so I'd be careful on that end. Garlic is good for the blood. Etc., etc. I'd eat a few soups, for healthiness, over this, but this one isn't terrible.

Creativity: 10/10. I love coconut and chicken and cilantro and garlic all together. It's a great, great, unexpected combination (due to the cilantro, mostly. I could have figured the rest out on my own.)

Completeness: 10/10. The noodles bring that about, and it's a good thing I put them in there. The coconut is the last thing to be added, but you're looking forward to that. The substance is in the noodles moreso than the chicken due to the amount. It worked out extremely well.

I'm rushing. It got a 97.8, or a very high A. I'd eat it next time I'm thinking Asian cuisine -- again, as always, be creative and have fun! /runstoclass

Grade: Caribbean Vegetable Soup

• Flavor
• Texture
• Cooking ease
• Price
• Estimated healthiness
• Creativity of the recipe
• Completeness 

Out of 70 points.

Flavor: 10/10. My job of replacing ingredients because I couldn't find that one thing turned out very well, and I hope the thing I replaced tastes like what I used (does that make sense? :P ). So much was going on. It's fruity, fun, playful, and would go well at a summertime party with fruity-alcomaholic drinks and some Caribbean music. It definitely merits the wearing of bathing suits while eating.

Texture: 10/10. What is not right about this thing? I love full, hearty soups. I learned some time back that hearty doesn't necessarily mean meaty, or heavy, or thick; it can be busy, or full. The Caribbean soup seems to take everything awesome and stick them together. It goes against what we seem to think of Caribbean as, but I'm thinking it makes sense. They probably sleep on banana trees (I jest; that wouldn't make any sense, but we have to import them from far away which isn't fair. Our deal locally is berries, pears and apples, really; we don't get neat fruits like bananas.)

Cooking ease: 8/10. DEAR GOD I CHOPPED EVERYTHING. I chopped ahead of time, thinking I'd need to, and although I was correct I didn't have enough bowls to put everything in. I had bowls everywhere, and I still had more to chop. And when I dumped in the first wave of food, I had to continue chopping. By the time I had everything in and cleaned up, it was close to done. And, my dears, it smelled AMAZING. Fruit soup = very large win. I think this and Apple soup may be my two favorites. Just.. get used to chopping.

Price: 9/10. Melons and plantains and so on and so forth do add up and I get that. Some of these you may have already (e.g. bananas, carrots and squash; everyone has squash when it's in season). Some may not, but that's okay. It's very filling and it's not a sinful food; you can have seconds and be okay with it.

Estimated healthiness: 9.5/10. If you're diabetic, this isn't for you due to the glycemic index of the fruits, plus the potassium in things like the bananas/plantains that are included in the recipe. But for the average person, I highly recommend eating more fruits and veggies -- like any future RD should -- but that doesn't mean in the conventional sense. You can team this up with other things like bread, meats and cheeses if you're creative, and save it for later for when you're too lazy to cook up some smoothies or head out to the store for more fresh fruit. It freezes well but takes freaking forever to microwave. The butternut squash soup, 5 ladel-fulls, took about 5 minutes; this one, same amount, could take 8-10, so keep in mind that warming it back up may be a challenge but it's worth it.

Creativity: 10/10. I don't know whether people in the Caribbean would agree -- if this is really something they'd eat in the first place -- but over here it's freaking brilliant. I would have never put those things together, or replaced that one thing with the melon and the squash like Magz the Food Scientist suggested, but it came out extremely well. It's colorful, bright, happy, and busy, and it's filling. It's just plain the best soup ever.

Completeness: 10/10. What the heck else could you PUT in this thing? It's not a gumbo. You don't necessarily need things like okra or sausage, but you could, I guess. The okra would be bland when eaten with the rest of the very sweet fruits and things, but the sausage would hold it's own. However, the fattiness from the animal meat would make the texture change, and I can't predict how that'd work out. I'm not sure I'd be okay with making this soup greasy. It works so well all on it's own. The only thing I could say, really, is to add some leafy greens, perhaps. But that's pushing it, and that's all I can really think of.

Grade: 66.5/70 = a strong A. And I agree, whole-heartedly. I recommend getting what you can at local markets to enhance the flavor, but I know some of that (e.g. bananas) won't be available here in the States like that. Do remember it's supposed to be chunky, with bite-sized things floating around. There's not enough room for floating juices; there should be enough so you can freeze it and not ruin the solids.

As always, enjoy cooking!

Analysis: Spontaneous Soup

• Flavor
• Texture
• Cooking ease
• Price
• Estimated healthiness
• Creativity of the recipe
• Completeness 

Out of 70 points.

I know, I know, it wasn't a REAL soup -- I didn't post a REAL recipe or tell people I spent hours picking it from a book of hundreds. But you know what? It was yummy, so shut up.

Flavor: 9.5/10. I love potato-type soups. Squash, potatoes, etc., all have a texture I really enjoy. Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not a squish-only type of person. But this one really hit the spot when I had a craving, and it left me with some meal options for later which was a plus. I enjoyed this every time I cracked it open. I know this isn't the texture section, but that leads in: if it tastes like potatoes and squash but doesn't FEEL like potatoes and squash, then we have a problem. The flavor grade wouldn't be so high if what was going on didn't match what it actually did. Does that make sense? It tasted like it was meant to, to be clear.

Texture: 10/10. I said it before, the texture hit the spot for me. I doubt I'd change this around if I made it a staple recipe for my kitchen.

Cooking ease: 9.5/10: I didn't make this because I was feeling difficult. I was hungry, and I wanted food ASAP. I wasn't going to roast, marinate or otherwise take more time than was needed. You don't necessarily have to to achieve a tasty product -- or a healthy one.

Price: 10/10 I think I spent about twenty-five dollars, if that, according to the post where I put up the recipe and ranted about spontaneity. I had a FULL pot, lending about maybe 20 servings give or take for 25 dollars. Go out and buy soup that costs 80 cents and see how much you like it.

Estimated healthiness: 9.5/10. I didn't add any cream, but the salt content still bothers me. I think, when I go for round two, I'll make my own stock ahead of time and freeze it. When I go to make a soup, I'll know that I didn't add any salt to the stock. Salt is a misnomer: people think they need it for flavor, but when you wean yourself off of it you realize you don't want it. Average items then become a bit disgusting after a while because of how obsessed with salt everyone seems to be. So, guys, lose the salt, your body will thank you.

Creativity: 8.5/10. I can toot my own horn for a while, but, really, all I did was buy every veggie I liked for that day and stick it in some hot meat-juices. So, honestly, it wasn't too creative. Spontaneous -- yes! But chopping up some crap you dug up doesn't make you creative, it makes your forearm more muscly. There's a difference.

Completeness: 10/10. I literally couldn't fill it with anything else. Everyone loved it. We ate the heck out of it. It really went a long way for us, and it was good even upon reheating. Do keep in mind that a very full pot of soup might get us through two weeks; I tend to have a serving twice a week apart from Sundays. At the price it's at (and the fact I charge my room mates for their share of the food for the month), I don't really keep it around long as it is. This one went faster than some of the others, which tends to tell me that maybe I did something right. I can't think of how I'd change it, anyway.

Grade: 9.571/10, so a high A. Of 'course I'll grade it high -- I made it up! But, case in point, you should be able to be proud of yourselves, so don't let my ego get in the way. Trust me, I still think something you've made up would be fantastic if you just let yourself go and do it. You think I thought about how much I might screw it up? Never even crossed my mind. Screw it up, psh.. Since when do I mess up?

Caribbean Vegetable Soup Recipe

Oh. My. Gosh.
Everyone loved this. I'm not even kidding. I'm having a hard time keeping my freezer-full-of-soups anywhere near capacity. My husband, especially, just finds himself wanting to eat it by the pound.

This would be me. I always wear my butterfly apron =)

Recipe:


2 tablespoons butter
1 chopped onion - to preference
1 crushed garlic clove
2 sliced carrots
1 1/2 quarts vegetable stock
2 bay leaves (see? Always with the bay leaves)
2 sprigs of fresh thyme (almost always goes with the bay leaves..)

This is usually what my counter looks like. It's my only one, and it's limited, but it works

1 minced celery stalk
1 1/4 cups peeled and cubed white yams (po-ta-toes!)
2 green bananas, peeled and cut into 4 chunks
2 tablespoons red lentils
1 chayote, peeled and chopped
2 tablespoons of optional macaroni (go whole wheat with it!)
salt and fresh black pepper
chopped scallions, to garnish

1: Melt the butter or margarine. Add the onion, garlic and carrots to fry for a few minutes. Stir occasionally until they begin to soften. Add the stock, bay leaves and thyme and let it boil.
2: Add everything else. Season it as you see fit and let it simmer for 25 minutes, or until things are at the cooked consistency you like. Serve with the garnish.

You could do that. Or you could lead my relatively hectic lifestyle and have no idea where to find chayote -- unless it's at a stupid Whole Foods store; they're stupid 'cause I don't feel like driving for 25 minutes to get to it.
Instead, you could call a fellow food science major and ask them what the heck chayote is. She, we'll call Magz the Scientist, will do what we do best: Google it. Upon doing this, we discover it's a gourd similar to other light-flavored gourds. Can't find one? It's somewhere between a cucumber squash (or something close to it; I keep wanting to say spaghetti squash but it's a lie) and, oh, honeydew melon. Sure. So we went with that.

I've mentioned the 8-people-feeding-frenzy we have weekly. It really is a bit insane. I cook. I yell at people who get in my kitchen. The longer the night goes on, the more I have to yell. The smell of nearly-done food seems to make them respond like shark do to bloody waters; eventually, every single one of them will just continually walk in circles through my kitchen, into the hall and back again.



This soup satiated the men-sharks.

These are man sharks. Don't be fooled by their present lack of movement; they eventually become troubled when hungered.
See the redheaded one? He's going to be the first to fall victim to his own stomach. I had to watch him carefully, to be sure I could complete my meal.

Thanks to Magz the Scientist, I ended up doing just what it says. Except I tripled everything. And I couldn't find green bananas, so instead I used plantains. Red lentils? What about a can of red kidney beans instead? Whole can. Why not? Chayote turned into 2 zucchini squashes and a whole honeydew melon. 2 carrots turned into half a bag of baby carrots I'd found on sale. 3 celery stalks, 4 red potatoes and a stray sweet potato later, and what was an attempt to fix a missing ingredient turned into Frankenstein-Caribbean Vegetable soup.

Frankenstein Soup

Contrast is off, but I wanted everyone to see how chunky it was =)

I also added some Caribbean spices I found at Bi-Lo some time back. Everything was put into chunks. I didn't garnish. You don't garnish DND nerds -- there's no point. It went over EXTREMELY well, and I must say it was probably the biggest hit of the semester. Is it anything like the original recipe? I'm disappointed in myself for straying, and it probably isn't like the original, but no one cares.

This is my best shot of it. The colors and everything are right; it was hard not just to eat it right then, too.

Indian Beef and Berry

Okay, for one, I've noted a lack of my (preferred) spices. That is, this soup book lacks generally any spices at all except the occasional thyme sprig or bay leaf. That being said, I found this soup to be pretty mild but widely acceptable.
Also, I didn't go by the recipe as much as I should have. It's my man's fault! So don't blame me. I asked for stew-beef and he gave me ground beef, but, then again, at the price of meat I was okay with it.

If using ground beef, and it's anything like the one I used, be sure to let it cook for a while with some extra water to soften it all up. The recipe really does lend to tender meat, and ground beef is a bit chewy and resistant to be the texture it should. Keep in mind, too, that this generally makes your house smell like sausage and you may find yourself feeling like eating breakfast for lunch.

The recipe is as follows:

2 tablespoons veggie oil (I use olive for things like this)
1 pound TENDER BEEF STEAK. Or, if you're me, then ground beef.
2 onions, finely sliced
2 tablespoons butter
1 quart good beef stock or bouillon
1/2 teaspoon salt, if desired (that's your choice)
1 cup fresh huckleberries, blueberries or blackberries, smashed up some (I attacked mine in a small bowl with a shot glass. It works well.)
1 tablespoon honey (Go local!)

1: Heat the oil in a heavy bottomed saucepan (the one you've been using for any of these other recipes) until almost smoking. Add the steak and brown on both sides over medium-high heat. Remove the steak and set it aside.
2: Lower the heat to low and add the sliced onions and butter to the pan. This will smell fantastic with the beef still looming in the air. Stir well, scraping up all the meat juices. Cook over low heat for 8-10 minutes or until the onions are soft. (This made everyone in the house melt. I swear it was this step that made them almost run me down to get to the finished product.)
3: Add the beef stock or bouillon, and salt, and bring to a boil while stirring often. Stir in the mashed berries and the honey and let simmer for 20 minutes.
4: Meanwhile, cut the steal into bite-sized slivers. Taste the soup and add more salt or honey as you see fit. Add the steak to the pan and let simmer for 30 seconds, stirring the whole time. Serve when desired.

Orange cupcakes.

Homemade icing :D

If you're like me and you have ground beef, don't take it out of the pan. Let it cook for a few hours and then just add the butter and onions to it like you normally would; this would turn out slightly different, I'm sure, than the original recipe, but not by much. Also, it saves you from having another pan to clean, which is amazingly useful after one serves 8-people like I do.
Also, I added a few trace things -- some rosemary, curry powder. Not a lot, but it seemed to help. The berries definitely make it and you don't want to overpower them, so be careful with strong herbs and spices like that. Be sure to taste the soup FIRST, and add things gradually.

Also, I made more cupcakes. They were delish. I never had the chance to take a photo of them with icing because they all got eaten pretty fast. =)

Hope this works

I'm on an old computer in the school's kitchen, so I'm not sure how well this will publish, if at all.

I ran through the estimated serving sizes / proportions of potato-to-squash from the soup I made last week. It means I also found the location of the 'low sodium vegetable broth' option, which was eluding me in the program I've been using. Hello, improvement!

Basically what this means is I have an idea of what went where. I think I have my amounts about as close as I can get - four potatoes and about 4 pounds of squash equal a lot. 

This is what I found, as a general idea:

• Serving size: 414 grams or about 14-15 ounces (a filling amount)
• Calories per serving: 2.5g
• Saturated fat: 1.5g
• Trans fatty acids: 0
• Cholesterol: 5mg
• Sodium: 150mg
• Carbs: 32g
• Fiber: 5g
• Sugars: 9g
• Protein: 3g
• Vitamin A: about 500%
• C: 70%
• Calcium: 10%
• Iron: 10%

I think, for a craving food, this is pretty good. I would grade this soup, but it needed something to offset a tangy, almost bitter flavor I was receiving. More potatoes? No pepper? I love the pepper flavor, though. So I'm not ready for that just yet.
It's obvious significance lies in the Vitamin A, in my opinion. It has a perk of having very few calories, saturated fats (an obsession now with people due to Clinton's weight loss), low sodium, healthy carbs, decent amount of healthy fiber, a small amount of protein, and some calcium and iron.

According to a site from Harvard, Vitamin A is related in not just eye sight, but in bone remodelling, white blood cell activity and the ability to grow and regenerate new cells. There are definitely downsides to having a deficiency in A, but according to the site there are a couple things related with overdose, as well, so if you take a supplement, this soup may be something you'd want in moderation (much like any other food high in X-nutrient). The things related with overdose are hip-fractures and pregnancy problems, but they weren't specified exactly as to why. Too much of a good thing is bad, which is all I know right this minute (which can also apply to Vitamin C, which people uselessly consume the living heck out of. It doesn't make your colds go away. Sorry, dears!)


Anyway, this Sunday is Indian Beef and Berry soup, a thing of which I don't have the recipe for right this minute. That's what my trip to the store tomorrow evening will entail. I'm looking forward to it -- it's leaning in a cultural direction I don't head to very often, and the only reason I ever really do is if I pull out some curry just to mix things up once in a while. An India-inspired soup sounds exciting, so I'll be sure to have photos up again this week (and they won't be phone photos this time, which apparently make my red pepper soup look like it's infested with ghosts. It's not, but I still wouldn't eat too much of it. Habaneros. Yikes.)

For anyone who reads, feel free to comment. I'm not trying to push people into it, but I think I may come across as a bit judgemental or overly Type-A personality. Typing gives me time to breath and actually decide what to say, so I'm generally nicer through here than in real life (I think). I'm just excitable -- I promise, I'm still approachable! =)

On a note of commenting, I will be needing a project for sometime next year (roughly 2-3 weeks into the month of January). I'm thinking of something that primarily utilizes baking; for the summer, I want something that primarily utilizes the crock-pot or the grill outside, hence why I'm saying to continue to use my stove. It helps warm my house up through the winter, but that's not welcome come May or so. If anyone ever comes up with any ideas, or has a recipe suggestion for me to look over and work on, I definitely welcome it. If you want me to test taste your favorite meal, then lower the salt or fat content in some way, I'm willing to give it my best shot. It's great for preparing for my career, so we'd both be winning out in that situation. Just a thought!! This Monday and Tuesday are also days I have break, and I may be willing to do a mini-experiment at home.. Hint hint.

Happy cooking!

Spontaneous Soup

I know this might not be specific enough for some people, but I'm going to give this a shot anyway for those that can break away from the standard recipe chain.

I had an urge to cook soup. The last one, due to my urge to use up my hot peppers, turned out to be hot enough that I didn't want to use it for school left overs. I typically take a frozen serving, for lunch, and eat it between labs, but there's no way in Earth I'd be eating that before statistics legwork.
So, I didn't make soup yesterday because I couldn't find time, but that left me with the soup-making bug. Between that and the fact I'm attending a study session Sunday night, I wanted to do this. I also wanted to do another, but I got carried away, so I think I'm set for soup for a while. I'm running out of freezer-ready containers...

I went to the store. I know, I know, that's what happens when one makes soup. Bear with me. My original thought? Get a medium butternut squash, maybe a couple of sweet potatoes, an onion, some celery, some cream, and head out. What actually happened was similar: celery, an onion, some squash and potatoes. Except it turned out to be four large potatoes, one very large butternut squash (maybe 8 cups worth? 6?) along with another small-medium-ish squash (3 cups? 4?) And half-and-half, which I didn't even end up using, but I'll find a use for it regardless.

The process for making soups couldn't ever really be much easier, and I find that a recipe is just a good guideline to give you an idea for how long things should be cooking. Squashes and potatoes take a little longer than, say, celery and onions to be considered 'cooked'. Carrots fall a little closer to potatoes due to their size, but, again, it depends on how you cut them.

I have a pot that fits perhaps a gallon, maybe a few cups more. I filled it with squash, to give you an idea of how much I had bought. And then I had more, and filled it almost 3/4's with potatoes. All of that, plus an onion, about 4 celery stalks and a red bell pepper (snatched it on the way out), filled my large pot. I'd say I got about 40-50 ladel-fulls; I can say that because I ladled them all out into the Gladware containers. It came out to about 17-20 servings, depending on how one would define a serving.

Now, this was tasty. Tasty. How did I do it? I cut up everything into cubes, and added everything but the pepper, onion and celery. I put in about 75 ounces of stock (cooked some chicken in the process for a later meal), and about a stick of butter. Why butter? It goes with squash. And, someone had left it out. I didn't want it to go rancid, but I don't think it was worth putting back into my fridge.

I didn't add any cream mostly because I didn't have any space. After I let it cook on medium-high for an hour (needed to be that due to the amount of things cooking; otherwise it never came close to simmering), I added the onion, celery and pepper for about 10-15 minutes. Then, I went back to my trusty stick-blender and annihilated the heck out of everything. It was a lot, so it still had a few chunks, but I like it that way. Has the occasional bout of color and texture that a soft soup doesn't usually present.

This whole thing cost me maybe 25 bucks. Could have been cheaper if I decided to find things on sale; this was pretty spontaneous, considering my lack of planning. I was also really hungry, so there went my financial worries for a minute or two. But, if you consider I have at least 15 servings out of all of it, that's about $1.67 a thing -- and I filled them up to be enough to fill the average stomach, or at least be quite satiable. So, I don't think I did too shabbily.

Why am I posting such a post? I mean, it's not nearly as well thought out, prepared or otherwise clearly written as the others. Well, for starters, I was hungry. For another, and more to the point, I think people are losing their cooking touch. I mean, this isn't that hard, and people seem to be horribly afraid of trying stuff like this out. Potatoes and squash go together in soups; tons and tons of soups have onions, pepper and some salt; most of the vegetable based ones have celery. It takes about 30-45 minutes to really soften cubed potatoes and squash; if you cook it more, then, well, it's even easier to soften with a stick blender.

My point here, people, is to go out and make some soup. You like apples? Make the one I posted about a couple-few weeks ago. Tomatoes? Go for it. Mushrooms? Probably cooks like tomatoes, except you replace tomatoes with 'shrooms. And a lot of those have cream. Gosh, so far, everything is better with cream (in most opinions I've heard so far) and you can't usually go wrong with adding it. You can add noodles, corn, broccoli, spinach, you name it. Bacon. Peas and bacon go great, and people love bacon. Heck, I've been asked to do some crazy concoctions, and I think to myself every time: why don't you try it? Why does it have to be me?

I might compile some stranger ideas and give them a shot next year. But, for now (and hopefully for a while, if not ever) just make some soup. Have something you like. It doesn't need a guideline, really. And if it stinks, well, so what? Don't do that one again. Try something else. I threw things together I was craving, and, may I say, it turned out amazingly.