blog

It’s that time again! Foodie Penpals reveal day 🙂 It’s like getting to relive the excitement of getting your own box all over again by seeing what everyone else got!

This month I was lucky enough to get my box from one of my best foodie friends, Sarah @ The Smart Kitchen! If you aren’t familiar with Sarah and her blog, I’m sure you’ll be racing to check it out by the end of this post. The girl is amazing. Her culinary imagination never fails to impress me and I seriously look forward to reading her blog every.single.day. Plus, she lives in Austin which, as far as I can tell, is pretty much the best foodie city ever and she gets to participate in all sorts of amazing events. AND she has an amazing job and gets to try all sorts of fun foodie products. All of these things combined make her both an amazing person, and an amazing foodie penpals partner 🙂

Let’s take a peek at what she sent me, shall we? Oh, and might I add that she somehow timed her box delivery so that it perfectly coincided with my longest day stretch of days so far this quarter where I did nothing but study for a huge midterm for approximately 4 days. After I took the test, I came home exhausted, starving and crabby…and look what was waiting for me!

I mean, how cute is that for the outside of a box?! After I spent a few minutes figuring out the best way to open the box AND preserve the frog sticker, I got to check out the goodies inside.

Helloooooooo deliciousness!

-Homemade granola- delicious on my oatmeal yogurt bowls. I’m not sure I’ve ever even had a fig prior to tasting this stuff!

-Pomegranate salsa- amazing with my favorite chips! Totally unique flavor.

-Homemade nut butter- tastes like Christmas in a jar. Seriously. Best ever.

-Dark chocolate & pomegranate…for the win! Love it. I’ve been nibbling away on this little guy every night 🙂

-Homemade (S)ara(h) bars. How cute are her labels?! These were awesome. Definitely a flavor combo I would never have tried on my own.

-If you read my blog you’ll know I already blogged about these. THEY ARE SO GOOD. I didn’t even know I liked chai until I tasted these. It’s like she knows me better than I know myself. I literally could not stop eating these!

So, if you can’t tell, I was just slightly thrilled with my box this month. Whoever gets me next month has some big shoes to fill 😉

And now it’s time for some details about Foodie Penpals.  In case you’re a new reader, here’s a reminder of what the program is all about:

-On the 5th of every month, you will receive your penpal pairing via email. It will be your responsibility to contact your penpal and get their mailing address and any other information you might need like allergies or dietary restrictions.
-You will have until the 15th of the month to put your box of goodies in the mail. On the last day of the month, you will post about the goodies you received from your penpal!
-The boxes are to be filled with fun foodie things, local food items or even homemade treats! The spending limit is $15. The box must also include something written. This can be anything from a note explaining what’s in the box, to a fun recipe…use your imagination!
-You are responsible for figuring out the best way to ship your items depending on their size and how fragile they are. (Don’t forget about flat rate boxes!)
-Foodie Penpals is open to blog readers as well as bloggers. If you’re a reader and you get paired with a blogger, you are to write a short guest post for your penpal to post on their blog about what you received. If two readers are paired together, neither needs to worry about writing a post for that month. *US Residents only please at this time- hopefully we can expand soon!*

If you’re interested in participating for November, please send me an email at [email protected] and include the following information:
-Your full name
-Your email address
-Your blog name/address
-Your twitter handle (if applicable)

I will need to hear from you by November 4th as pairings will be emailed on November 5th!

Last month we more than doubled the number of participants from the first month. Let’s keep growing!

Enjoy!
–Lindsay–

Confession #1: I wasn’t going to blog about this recipe.
Confession #2: I only took 1 picture of it initially
Confession #3: I plated the leftovers and took another picture before I put them away because it was such a big hit with the hubby.
Confession #4: I did have the presence of mine to write down the ingredients so I’m going to share the recipe with you despite the lack of pretty pictures 🙂

**Edited to add: Confession #5- I had no idea that this was actually very similar to an indian dish called Aloo Gobi!

This dish was inspired by a head of cauliflower we got at the grocery store this week. Hubby said something about a cauliflower side dish he had last time he went out for Indian and really liked it. I told him to get some cauliflower (which we never eat) and I would figure something out.

I started with google and found this recipe. Then I tweeted and my girl Parita came through for me, emailing me this recipe that she’d used before. I didn’t have Pav Bhaji Masala so I decided to just wing it.

I started with garlic, onion and ginger…added potatoes and cauliflower…added some spices and curry paste…threw in some green beans, chickpeas and tomatoes…added a bit of coconut milk and called it a day!

Sidenote: this is pretty spicy so feel free to scale it back a bit if you’re not a fan of spicy dishes 🙂

Enjoy!
–Lindsay–

So, something rather annoying happened over the weekend. My oven stopped working. I used it to make some naan to go with dinner, and then when I turned it back on two hours later to make some brownies, it wouldn’t heat up. The stove part still works fine, but the oven is definitely not ok.

I consider myself to be pretty creative in the kitchen, so it hasn’t become a major inconvenience yet, BUT I have another test coming up and we all know that when I get stressed, I bake. So….this problem is gonna need to resolve itself pretty quickly.

Meanwhile, I’ve still been whipping up some pretty tasty meals in the kitchen. As you may recall, we’ve had a surplus of guac this week so I LOVE guac on my burgers….so I decided to whip up some black bean burgers. I’m still working on finding a go-to bean burger recipe that sticks together really well. This one did a pretty good job, but still crumbled a little bit. I’ve gotten better about not trying to flip them too often and that helps a lot. I also like to bake them, but clearly that wasn’t an option this week.

I used these as an inspiration.

 

These burgers had great flavor and I loved the crumbled goat cheese.

While the burgers were in the freezer, I got to work on some baby potatoes. I roasted them in my cast iron skillet since I couldn’t use the oven.

And voila! Dinner is served.

Enjoy!
–Lindsay–

Want to make the best sandwich ever? I thought you might.

Here’s what you need to make one for yourself and a friend:

 

[print_this]

The Best Sandwich Ever

4 slices of this homemade bread
2 scoops of my favorite homemade hummus (Roasted Garlic & Red Pepper w/ Sweet Potato)
3 eggs, fried
2 slices of cheese
1/2 a red pepper, thinly sliced
1/2 a small avocado, sliced

Directions:
1. Butter the bread. Top two of the non-buttered sides with hummus.
2. Cook the fried eggs in a small pan and add one and a half eggs to each sandwich.
3. Top with a slice of your favorite kind of cheese.
4. Add the avocado and red pepper and top with the remaining pieces of bread, buttered sides out.
5. Place on a panini press or George Foreman for a few minutes until the outsides are golden brown.
6. Slice in half and serve with roasted potatoes.

[/print_this]

 

Enjoy for breakfast, lunch, or dinner.

Seriously….life-changing. In fact, why don’t you just go ahead and make both of those to eat for yourself.

Enjoy!
–Lindsay–

I was cleaning out the freezer last week when I came across a partial box of puff pastry. I love using as the top for my pot pies, which we enjoyed last night…but I thought it was about time that I get a little more creative with it.

This dinner came together in a snap thanks to a little advance prep work! The night before I was planning to make this, I was whipping up a batch of soft pretzel bites for a get together we were having. While the dough was rising, I diced up a bunch of vegetables and stuck them in the oven to roast. I used potatoes and sweet potatoes so I stuck those in first and after about 20 minutes, I added some carrots, green beans, onion, red pepper and broccoli and let them roast for another 20 minutes.

After removing them from the oven, I put them in a container with a few cloves of minced garlic. I love roasted garlic, but not when it’s diced, because it always burns….so I just mixed it in later. I also pulled the puff pastry out of the freezer and stuck it in the fridge.

The following night, I cut the puff pastry into 6 squares, put veggies on top of 3 of them, sprinkled each one with black and red pepper and paprika and then topped them with slices of goat cheese (Yep, more goat cheese…once I buy a log I have to find ways to use it up!) I added the other pastry squares to the top and brushed them lightly with an egg wash.

After about 20 minutes in the oven, dinner was served 🙂 They were eaten in a hurry so I apologize for the lack of pictures of the finished product!

I liked these just the way they were, but if you are looking for some sort of sauce to go with them, you could try just plain old marinara sauce to dip each bite in!

Enjoy!
–Lindsay–

Happy Anniversary to my hubby!

Thank you for keeping me grounded, but still letting me to live my dreams.

I love you!

9.27.08

Hi Friends!

Here’s a quick easy recipe for you. The other day I found farro in the bulk bins at Whole Foods. I can’t even accurately express how happy that made me. I’ve been looking for it forever and all I could ever find was a tiny package for like $10. Crazy.

So I immediately snatched some up and earlier this week I whipped up a tasty little side dish. I was roasting potatoes anyways, so I while the oven was preheating, I started boiling some veggie broth. While the farro was cooking, I put some tomatoes and garlic in the oven to roast. The combination of all of these flavors, plus a little Parmesan cheese equals deliciousness.

Ready for the recipe?

 

 

It may not look pretty, but it’s darn tasty!

Do you like farro?

Enjoy!
–Lindsay–

Hi Friends!

Today is another first day of school for me…so I’ll probably be blog MIA. Have no fear though, my best friend Katharine is here to entertain you! You may remember her from her Fancy Feast guest post! She’s been experimenting with an elimination diet and recently embarked on an adventure in banana bread making! Take it away, Katharine:

————————————–

A lot of people seem to have childhood food traumas: they were forced to eat peas until they threw up or they were locked in the basement with rats after they groaned “meatloaf again?!?” Food was pretty much a non-issue in our house. I ate the, more or less, healthy meals in front of me and didn’t get too philosophical about it. My Wisconsin-born-and-raised father cultivated in me an unwavering love of peanut butter, ice cream, and cheese.

Several weeks ago I was on the phone with a dietitian-turned-integrative-doctor and family friend. We were talking about a blood disorder I discovered I have that results in a severely low platelet count. She suggested I try an elimination diet, removing certain foods from my eating regime and slowly reintroducing them one at a time. This seemed like a ridiculous suggestion at first (uh, hello, blood is in your veins…food goes in your stomach…two don’t really mix…) But I masked my skepticism with “uh huhs” as she continued on. She explained that the majority of your immune system is housed in your stomach and GI tract; therefore, problems with your diet/digestion can potentially cause problems with your immune system, maybe even make your body go all auto-immune on itself as in my case.

I’m now in my second week of the elimination diet. (“elimination” and “everything you love to eat but can no longer eat” being interchangeable.) The idea is that you embark on a 21-day stint of eating anything you’d like except dairy, gluten, soy, corn, refined sugars, caffeine, and alcohol. Easy, right?! Actually, there are many substitutes that allow you to cobble together meals that adhere to the diet. The only thing I’ve really missed is cheese (and no, there is no substitute for cheese, especially not a liquified nut), but I’ve discovered many culinary wonders I would have otherwise never considered food: coconut butter, garbanzo bean flour, arrowroot, brown rice pasta, hemp milk (this was one of the less pleasant finds, in my opinion, as it tastes like a dirty foot), and coconut aminos to name a few.

Unlike my dear friend Lindsay, I am no whiz in the kitchen. I make my way through recipes like a three-legged dog makes his was through an obstacle course–slowly and peeing on everything. (Ok, kidding about that last part.) For the past nine days, however, I’ve been doing my best hacking onions, boiling lentils, and mixing dairy-free, gluten-free, refined-sugar free, soy-free banana bread. Sounds gross, doesn’t it? It’s a lot less sweet but the texture and flavor are pretty damn close to the real deal.

To make this “banana bread” as delicious as possible I suggest listening to Fleetwood Mac’s Rumors album, the ultimate goal being to time the bread’s placement into the oven right as The Chain is cuing up. If you achieve this, then you have reached culinary greatness.

(Look closely and you will see Chef Tilly-my cat-presiding over the baking)

So once you’ve got Niki Stix tuned up, preheat the oven to 350. Mix the following:

-1/4 c. walnuts, finely ground in blender
-1 3/4 c. brown rice flour
-1/2 c. arrowroot (This definitely smells like something that would be an ingredient in a homemade bomb. Don’t be alarmed, it is just tapioca.)
-2 tsp. baking soda
-1/4 tsp. salt
-1/2 c. chopped walnuts

At this point I realized I only had one banana. This is kind of a problem when making banana bread…To compensate I used, oh say, about a 1/2 c. ground walnuts. Then, in a separate bowl I mixed together:

-1 mashed banana (I would recommend, well, at least two bananas)
-1/8 c. sesame oil (Recipe calls for 1/4 cup–they are idiots.)

And then I realized I was also lacking another ingredient–apple juice concentrate. No fears, I had unsweetened apple sauce. So I added
-7 tbsp. unsweetned apple sauce (And then later, because the dough was dry, the rest of the jar.)
-2 “eggs” (“Eggs” are nothing like eggs. “Eggs” are made by combining 1 tbsp. flax seed with 1/3 c. water. You let this sit for about five minutes and you’re left with a gooey, liquidy substance that will, in the absence of real eggs, bind your various baked goods together. These “eggs” work surprisingly well until you try to make an omelet.)
-1 tsp vanilla extract

To compensate for the lack of fruit I added a handful of dried cranberries and dried cherries. I take a very Joey-from-Friends approach to cooking. My thinking is that if an ingredient by itself is tasty then surely when mixed with other tasty things it will yield one very delicious thing! That’s math, folks. So at this point add in whatever else you want to, like some agave nectar, then mix all that dough together. And then realize you also lack a bread loaf pan. (There may or may not have been a flurry of swears at this point.) In the absence of a proper loaf vehicle, an 8″ x 8″ ceramic vessel works just as well. And because this is going on Lindsay’s blog–Lindsay who’s never licked a piece of raw dough in her life, Lindsay the most disciplined person I know, Lindsay who is actually a cook with restraint–for this reason, I will underscore the fact that because there are no raw animal products in this recipe, all of you raw-dough-eating maniacs can go crazy.

Now the careful reader might be suspiciously scrolling upward to reread that part earlier about alcohol. Wait a second. I thought she said she couldn’t have alcohol? But you’re using vanilla! That has alcohol in it! You cheater!! Yes, it is true. I cheated. Five days after I started the diet I had already rationalized alcohol back into the diet as long as it was only consumed once a week and as long as the alcohol’s ingredients adhered to the diet. For those of you who know me, I’m sure you’ll agree it’s better for everyone this way.

Depending on the pan you’re using bake anywhere from 25-55 minutes, or until a pointy object of choice inserted into the middle comes out clean. Let the bread cool for about 10 minutes then eat that sucker! It’s perfect for breakfast or for after dinner when you’re craving sweets.

In the end, I have no idea whether this diet will make one platelet of a difference. If it doesn’t, it still proved edifying. One reason I greatly admire Linds is because she thinks about what she eats and in that way respects her body. I used to think that if it was in a grocery store then it must be okay to eat. Reading ingredients labels at Whole Foods is an eye-opening experience–even there I had to search to find a chicken broth that didn’t contain evaporated cane juice or corn starch. I think everything in moderation is a good motto, but every once in a while there’s something to be learned from extremes.

———————————-

Have you ever done an elimination diet? Was it helpful?

Enjoy!
–Lindsay–

Over the weekend while we were back cleaning out the house I grew up in, we spent a lot of time in the kitchen. As I was cleaning out cupboards, cabinets and drawers, I found myself lost in the memories of all the times I spent in that kitchen.

The kitchen was definitely the center of our house, both literally and figuratively. It’s where I spent some of the happiest times with my mom, learning to make new things and making things that we’d made together 100 times. It’s where I learned how to bake, how to cook without measuring and how to clean up the dishes as I went.

When I reached into one of the cabinets and pulled out a stainless steel mixing bowl, I immediately thought of monster cookies. They were one of my favorite cookies to make with my mom because there was very little measuring involved. And they could be different every time….and still taste just as good. Whenever we made them, she would let me throw in whatever we had laying around- even cereal- on one condition: There must ALWAYS be M&Ms. You can throw in as many things as you want, but if there are no M&Ms, they’re just not monster cookies.

I didn’t take that bowl home with me. I have plenty of mixing bowls already. But I did take home the comfort of knowing that even when circumstances force you to get rid of your “stuff”, they can never force you to get rid of your memories.

So today, on my last day of vacation before school starts back up again, I made some monster cookies in my own kitchen for a friend’s birthday tomorrow. And as I sat there eating one fresh out of the oven, I made a silent little toast to memories of the past, and to all those memories still to come.

Over the years I’ve healthified these just a bit, cut down on the butter and sugar, used brown rice krispies instead of regular, switched to natural peanut butter and added more oats. In the interest of making a recipe, I’ve given you my best estimation on how much of all the mix-ins I used…but really, it doesn’t matter. Just throw them all into the bowl, mix them around a bit and enjoy.

And NEVER forget the M&Ms.

 

What was your favorite childhood cookie?

Enjoy!
–Lindsay–

On Saturday we went to the Farmer’s Market and I came home with, among other things, a GIANT bag of basil. I immediately came home and made a batch of pesto. I used this recipe and it turned out great!

Then I immediately made these breadsticks that I’ve been dreaming about ever since Nicole posted them. The only change I made was to use mozzarella cheese instead of Parmesan.

Please ignore my pictures and go look at Nicole’s. They’re much prettier 🙂

Yesterday I continued on my pesto kick and whipped up a little side dish that accidentally turned into dinner.

If you’re a long-time blog reader, you know we’re big fans of roasted potatoes in our house. Last night I kicked them up a notch by tossing them in pesto before roasting them. Then the plan was to enjoy them with some fresh mozzarella cubes….but while they were roasting I took it one step further and added in some corn and tomatoes.

 

Oh, and in case you’re wondering, putting all these ingredients (minus the potatoes) on a piece of naan makes a killer pizza 🙂

So yes we ate the whole bowl of potato salad and the pizza and called it dinner last night. Oh well 🙂

Enjoy!
–Lindsay–

In December of 2006, I graduated from college the first time with a BA in Psychology. After working a few jobs totally unrelated to that major, I made the decision to go back to school again. In January 2009, I began taking classes for a Dietetic Technician program. In June 2011, I graduated from that program and this morning I took the national exam to become a Dietetic Technician, Registered…

…AND I PASSED!!

Somewhere in the middle of my last program I decided that I didn’t want to stop at being an DTR and wanted to go the extra mile to become a Registered Dietitian.

So I’m still in school. I have 3 more quarters and getting matched to an internship still ahead of me.

But for now, I have three weeks off (yay!), a mini vacation planned (double yay!) and lots of sleep to catch up on.

And tonight, I’m off to make this happen:

Have a great weekend, friends!
–Lindsay, DTR–

I’m just gonna go ahead and sign my posts like that for a few weeks if you don’t mind 🙂

This could also be called Clinging-to-the-end-of-summer-fruit-and-chickpea-salald.

Last night we grabbed what is probably one of the last watermelons of the season while we were grocery shopping. I used one of my favorite kitchen tools, the melon baller to get most of it ready to eat but I had just a little bit extra that wouldn’t git in the container. I immediately decided I would use that part to make something for lunch tomorrow…I just didn’t know what.

After sleeping on it, I woke up this morning ready to go out on a limb. For some reason, pairing watermelon with chickpeas was stuck in my head and I couldn’t get it out. After a quick google search, I appears that this is not the most popular combo out there…but I went with it anyways. And you know what? I loved it!

I ate this by itself but you could also probably eat it with chips, more like a salsa.

Enjoy!
–Lindsay–