Tonight we had a wonderful dinner. Aaron and I split a sirloin steak from Grass Run Farms and we had some zucchini fresh out of our garden. First I sliced the zucchini rather thick - about an inch. Then I poured some olive oil in a 13 x 9 dish, and added salt and pepper. Next I slid the zucchini around in the 13x9 dish, coating it. Aaron grilled it up. Then we covered the zucchini slices in marina and topped it with provolone. Wow, I think I drooled all over the table.

I discovered that our health insurance plan reimburses us $20 each if we both make 12 workouts a month towards a gym. We found a local gym that we think participates in the program, and signed up. (The manager didn't seem to know what we were talking about, but he's new, so hopefully we'll get it straightened out.) The really nice thing is that the gym is open 24 hours, located three blocks away, and has free daycare while you work out from 7 am - 6 pm. Mmm.

I had my first work out today, and I started a twitter account (on the sidebar, right) to chronicle my workouts. I want to eventually move up to 6 days of cardio and 3 days of weight lifting. We'll see how that goes. (Edit: I'm trying to get the twitter thingy to work so that it automatically updates and shows you the last 5 posts, but I'm having difficulty.)

Labels: cooking, random

Our garden started out looking like this. Bare, cold, gray, yet full of promise.



On June 23, it looked like this. Much more full and lush (although not all of the plants have grown as well as the ones on the back right.



These beds furthest to the west contain quite a few different plants. The one furthest back has a variety of lettuces in it that were planted from seed. The closer one has broccoli, cauliflower, anaheim peppers, cayenne peppers, and jalapeno peppers all planted from seed. It also has eggplant plants that my mother-in-law purchased for me. I had put some eggplant seeds in the bed but they did not sprout.



The bed farthest back has peas, beans, and cantaloupe all from seed. The bed closest has red and white onions, scallions, and carrots all from seed (which you can barely see in the picture).



The bed farthest has sugar peas, pumpkins, squash, pole beans, corn, and cucumbers all from seed. The bed closest has ladybug tomatoes and yellow tomatoes. The ladybugs are from seed, but the yellow tomatoes I purchased as a plant because all of my cherries and beefsteaks died in a storm.

Companion planted around the various beds are marigolds, two kinds of parsley, two kinds of basil, oregano, cilantro, and dill. I believe I planted more, but I can't remember and I'm not going out there right now to find out. ;)

Last night, we had our first meal that had ingredients from our garden in it. I picked some sugar snap peas, shelling peas, and two kinds of beans (burgundy and green) to include in our frozen mixed vegetable for our vegan shepherd's pie. I took the vegan recipe from the cookbook Quick-Fix Vegetarian by Robin Robertson. This book has recipes that really take about thirty minutes to cook and prep (sometimes a little more, sometimes a lot less). I absolutely love her Shepherd's Pie with couscous topping, but since the recipe is copywritten, I'm not going to be able to share it with you. Instead, I'll share two pictures.





Instead of plain couscous, I topped it with tri-colored couscous. It looks festive and it tastes wonderful.

----

From my house to yours, happy Fourth of July!

Labels: cooking, gardening

Down on St. Lucia nearly everyone says, "No pressure, no problem." Coming home, Aaron and I have felt a little pressure, which of course leads to little problems. Any time you go on vacation in such a slow-moving place, and then come back to your fast-paced life of kids, work, and keeping up a home, there is a little pressure. Add on to that, that you just got married and are trying to get a gazillion pages of paperwork done. Add on to that, that Aaron just got a promotion at work right before we left. Add on to that, that our two nearest cities have been devastated by floods.

Whoa, doggie.

We'll be going through the pictures from our honeymoon soon, and accompanying those pictures with lovely stories. Meanwhile, we are getting back into the swing of things. What better way to do so than by grilling out on a fine Saturday evening? (We call them Summer Saturdays, and we grill out something every week on our charcoal grill.) This week is a fine 100% grass-fed, pastured beef product formed into hamburgers with green pepper, onion, mushroom, chives, and a whole hellofalot of seasonings. Yuu-mmee. (It was inspired in part by a delicious burger at Delirius on St. Lucia, a restaurant owned by our wedding coordinater and her husband.)

We'll be accompanying that with homemade baked french fries, seasoned of course (who do you think I am?!) and a nice beer, cider, or wine. We've got a bit of a stock in all three, as we like a nice beverage with dinner.

If we like the hamburger, I'll tell you how we made it. How's that for a deal?

Labels: cooking

I'm new to gardening, I'm new to sustainable living, and I'm sort-of new to cooking (I've been doing it for four years now, self-taught). Really, I'm just a large novice striving to learn as many things that will benefit my family as possible. I'm acceptive of constructive criticism ("You planted your plants too close together," "That cold-frame layout may not work," "You could try adding more flour to your pie crust," "You may want to re-think using peat pots, since peat takes gazillions of years to form."). In fact, I beg you for it. I want to know what you are thinking. I'm not preaching to you, often times I'm thinking through things as I write them to learn something about myself. I'm not up on a high horse; I'm trying to learn and share.

So please, feel free to write to me and share your thoughts in the comments of this blog or in e-mail. It really helps me to come to conclusions. I try very hard to look at all sides of an issue.

And, to prove that I'm certainly not perfect and I don't think that I am, I've decided to show you the pie I made a few days ago. This poor pie was my first time at making a homemade crust, and I certainly think you can tell.



Oh boy. I think I need some practice! Aaron and I loved this delicious "healthified" pie. Here's the recipe. If you end up trying it, please let us know! I wouldn't mind having other people's opinions. I think the crust was a little too hard and difficult to cut through, but that may as well just have been my own ineptitude!

Lastly, it is my pleasure to thank Jonathan profusely for his wonderful wedding gift. Aaron and I were both stunned to receive this, largely because we never thought anyone would actually give it to us, and also because it is what I wanted more than anything from my registry. I think today I'm going to make some homemade bread with it, and tomorrow I'm making another one of those pies to take to Aaron's family's Easter party. It's so nice not to have to do it all by hand (as I don't currently have a mixer). Aaron and I were tired of whisking eggs by hand to soft or hard peaks, that's for sure!

Thank you. Thank you. Thankyouthankyouthankyouthankyou. As always, you swoop in with a wonderful, tasteful, and thoughtful gift.

Labels: cooking

3 - 15 ounce cans of black beans, drained & rinsed
2 - cans corn or 1 package frozen corn
1.5 c vegetable broth
1 c salsa
5 t lime juice
3 t ground cumin
1 t garlic, minced
1/2 t smokey tabasco sauce
2 cups cilantro, roughly chopped
1 jalapeno pepper (opt)
4 green onions, sliced (opt)

sour cream (opt)
cheddar cheese (opt)


Take 1.5 cans of black beans and one cup salsa and pulse in food processor until smooth. Pour into a sauce pan on medium heat, add remaining 1.5 cans of black beans, vegetable broth, corn, lime juice, cumin, garlic, cilantro, tabasco and jalapeno. Heat on medium until boiling, simmer for 10 minutes or until its a good consistency. Pour soup into bowls to serve and top with a dollop of sour cream, a sprinkle of cheddar cheese, and some green onion to taste. Leave out the cheddar cheese and sour cream for vegan recipes.

This was so delicious! I looked at a bunch of different recipes for black bean soup and then pulled out ingredients to try in my own. I'm very glad I did. If there is any part that you don't like (except probably the black beans, ha!), I'm sure you could fiddle with it and it'd still come out great. :)

Labels: cooking

Avocado-Tomato Tacos

3 avocados, peeled and pitted
1/2 cup onions, diced
1 - 15 oz can diced tomatoes, drained
1/2 t garlic salt
2 t cumin
12 - 6" corn tortillas
1 bunch of chopped cilantro (about 1/4 cup per taco)

Place the avocado and onion in a food processor and process until mix is smooth with few chunks. Put the avocado-onion mixture in a bowl and add tomatoes, salt, and cumin. Mix. Warm up the tortillas in the oven or microwave. Spread the mix on the tortilla (makes 12) and top with some chopped cilantro.

This is a cold taco, so I recommend it for hot summer nights. Alternatively, you can add some taco-seasoning spiced veggie crumbles to add a bit of heat to the taco. Of course, you can also toss more things in like a jalapeno (or add a pepper sauce at the end per taste). I really liked it! :) Serves 6. Takes about 20 - 30 minutes to make total.

Labels: cooking

A friend of mine from Fazed (Warning, Warning: Adult Content Web Site Hither.) posted his world-champion award-winning Lasagna Soup. Well, okay, I don't think it has actually won any awards, and probably isn't a world-champion. But it should be. Unfortunately for me, his soup had meat in it. Rather than give up completely, I decided to vegetarianize it.

I often take meat recipes and make them vegetarian recipes. I'd love to figure out how to make them vegan recipes, but I haven't gotten quite that far yet (which is why I've included a lot of vegan cookbooks on my wedding registry, because I don't have the skill yet to make them up on my own). This lasagna soup has quite a lot of cheese in it, so I just halved the amount I put in the recipe, reducing animal product consumption (and that's my goal, remember?).

Now, this recipe had "bulk Italian sausage" in it. Obviously, that had to go. I replaced it with a pound and a half equivalent of veggie crumbles. A pound (equivalent) of veggie crumbles would be good, too, but I happened to have a pound and a half on hand. Veggie crumbles are a ground beef substitute for vegetarians. You can normally find them near the frozen breakfast food section of the freezers in your local Wal-Mart, Hyvee, or Target. I don't know where they'd be located in other stores, but always feel free to ask an employee where the "vegetarian meat" is at. Boca is one company that makes them and Morningstar is another.

There is a big difference between veggie crumbles and Italian sausage. That difference is spices. I looked up a few recipes that comprise homemade Italian seasoning, and decided to give that a whirl.

Jen's Italian Seasoning (Mix and Mash of other people's recipes)

2 T dried oregano
1.5 T dried basil
1.5 T dried parsley
.5 T garlic powder
1 t dried thyme
1 t dried rosemary
.5 t onion powder
Black Pepper (about 1/8 - 1/2 of a teaspoon is good, depending on your taste)
Red Pepper (same as above)

Next, I took one tablespoon of Jen's Italian Seasoning (feel free to put the rest in an airtight container and hold on to it for later) and one tablespoon of dried fennel, and put it in a coffee grinder. I ground it all together until most of the fennel was chopped into smaller bits, and then dropped it and a tablespoon of olive oil into a large stockpot on low heat. After the herbs had spent a little bit of time simmering in the olive oil, I dropped in the pound and a half (equivalent) of veggie crumbles. I mixed those all together with my handy dandy spoon.

After that I looked back to Toonz recipe and added in two cups of chopped onions. Again, I deviated a tiny little bit, adding two cups of sliced carrots next (instead of one cup of minced carrots). Then, following his recipe, I added in two tablespoons of bottled minced garlic. I sauted that together on high heat for around four minutes altogether.

Next I added in two cans of vegetable broth (equivalent of four cups), 1 can of Italian-stewed tomatoes (whole, with juice), and 1 can tomato sauce. I brought that to a boil and added in two cups of uncooked gemelli pasta. After about 3 minutes, I brought the heat down to medium-low and let it simmer for an additional ten - twelve minutes. Last, I dropped in a bag of fresh spinach (around two cups, whole leaf) and stirred it until it wilted (but not so much that it resembled spinach from a can, because I'm not a fan of that stuff).



To serve, I put in half of a handful of shredded mozarella cheese, ladled the soup on top, garnished with a small amount of shredded parmesan, a few sprinkles of dried basil, and more red pepper (to taste).



Aaron's rating? "I wouldn't be able to tell this was vegetarian." Score!

Jen's Take On Toonz's Lasagna Soup
1 T Jen's Italian Seasoning
1 T Fennel
1 T olive oil
1 - 1.5 pounds of veggie crumbles
2 cups onion, chopped
2 cups carrots, sliced
2 Tb minced garlic
4 cups vegetable broth
1 can (14.5 oz) Italian-stewed tomatoes, whole
1 can (15) tomato sauce
2 cups uncooked curly pasta (I used gemelli)
2 cups fresh spinach
shredded mozzarella
shredded Parmesan
dried basil & red pepper for garnish

If you try it - let me know what you think! I'm love with the scent and colors of this meal, not to mention the amazing taste. (Thanks Toonz!)

Labels: cooking

A week or so ago, I decided I wanted to make some greek-inspired food: caponata, baklava, and what Giada calls "Crispy Smoked Mozarella with Honey and Figs."

The caponata is composed mostly of things that I can grow in my garden, therefore, it makes a very good meal. The ingredients are one can diced tomatoes, two zucchini, two summer squash, two tomatoes, one large eggplant, one red onion, one potato, three garlic cloves, olive oil, salt, black pepper, and oregano. (Click the link above for specifics.) If I actually can my tomatoes this year, I could get the first four ingredients out of my garden, and the first seven if I plant red onion and garlic. Perfect!

First you put in a layer of diced tomatoes in a 9"x13" casserole dish.



Next you slice up all the vegetables and combine them in a bowl as you slice them.





I used some tongs to mix all of the vegetables so the spices and olive oil equally coated them. After that, I just poured the vegetables on top of the tomatoes in the 9"x13" pan.





Last, you put it in a 400 degree oven for 30-40 minutes until the vegetables start to darken. While this was happening, I was working on the baklava and mozzarella.



We put our caponata on slices of fresh sourdough bread. It was heavenly. This dish is very easy to make and it tastes amazing. I recommend it heavily. (Again, the full recipe courtesy of Giada de Laurentiis is provided through the link above.)

The baklava was a little harder to make and it was my first foray into the world of phyllo. First I had problems getting it to defrost and then I had problems getting it to stay pliable without tearing apart. This was definitely a little more difficult than most recipes I try. However, now that I've done it once, I could do it again with no problems at all.



You take these extremely thin sheets of phyllo and plaster six of them together, layering each with melted butter. You cut your sheets into 12 pieces. Then you take the ingredients which you minced via a food processor and place a tablespoon in each 1/12th of a phyllo sheet. You fold them up into a mini-muffin pan, and then you start over again with another set of phyllo sheets, to make 24 total. You are actually supposed to "twist" the tops of the baklava packages, but that surely wasn't happening. I just kind of smushed mine in.



These are so delicious that I will certainly make them again. ...or I'll at least make the filling. (By the way, the phyllo was hardening too fast, so I had Aarons help in smushing and filling. Thanks honey!)

Last, I made the "smoked" mozarella. Unfortunately we couldn't find any smoked mozarella, so we just used plain mozarella. It worked out perfect. I absolutely despise frying, so I got the packages ready for Aaron, and he fried them for me.



They look rather like tiny burritos and mushrooms, instead of mozarella wrapped in phyllo and figs. Neat!



Num, num!

Labels: cooking

Some background: in recent years I have been a Diet Coke addict. We're talking 4-6 cans of Diet Coke a day. For a variety of reasons, I didn't want to sustain this habit. It's bad for me, it's expensive, and it's bad for the environment. I decided back in November to quit Diet Coke cold turkey and start drinking tea. As long as I drink caffeinated tea, for the most part I'm able to do this. Every once in awhile since then I've had to indulge long and hard in my Diet Coke habits and then I'm able to drink tea for days.

My friend Jory has been a supporter of loose tea for a couple years now, and on my most recent trip he turned me. Then, for my birthday, he gifted me some tea from Adagio. Oh my. I'm in tea heaven.

I had purchased genmai cha a week back, and then his shipment arrived. I now have my tin of genmai cha, two tins of cha cha (oops, the shipping document states one), a jasmine sample, an apricot green sample, a tin of vanilla, and a valentines sample.

I drink. A lot. Of anything. Diet coke, beer, liquor, water. I can drink gallons. I'm not going to tell you how much tea I actually drink in a day, at this point, because I'd find it extremely humiliating.

But I will tell you that I feel like I'm floating away. On tea.

Edit: Here's an easier way to get your $5 gift certificate.

Labels: cooking, random

I promised you pictures of my new teapot and the flowering teas. I do not disappoint. I don't know if you are aware of this, but making a good pot of tea takes an immense amount of work. I feel I should be given an award for all of the effort I put into this beautiful experience. (Please click on the images to be taken to my Flickr site where they are larger, if you want to see more detail. It's really neat.)


Step One: Have a clean teapot and a flowering tea bundle.


Step Two: Open bundle and remove flowering tea. Place tea in empty tea pot.


Step Three: Pour hot water into teapot right on top of flowering tea.


Step Four: Watch it start to unfold.


Step Five: Marvel at the flower that has taken up residence in your tea pot.

Labels: cooking

And cookies are delivered. These cookies are incredibly sinful, and I normally eat much healthier food. For some reason on Wednesday, I just had a craving and jumped right in.


Double Nut Chocolate Chip Cookies*
1 - 18.5 ounce package moist yellow cake mix
1/2 cup butter
1 egg
1 cup semisweet chocolate chip cookies
1/2 cup chopped pecans
1 cup sliced almonds (divided: 1/4 and 3/4)

1) Heat oven at 375 degrees F. Grease cookie sheets.
2) Melt butter in sauce pan over low heat. Pour butter into bowl, add egg and cake mix, combine.
3) Stir in chocolate chips, pecans, and 1/4 cup of almonds.
4) Shape dough into balls, press top of ball into remaining almonds (3/4 cup) - (I didn't do this in the above picture because I was feeling lazy. I just added the entire cup of almonds into the mix in step three.)
5) Place on cookie sheet and bake for 9-11 minutes until lightly browned.

Per serving approximate: 409 calories, 24.9 grams total fat, 39 mg cholesterol, 368 mg sodium, 44.7 grams carboyhydrates, 2.6 g dietary fiber, 5.2 grams protein.

*I have no idea where my sister got the recipe for these cookies.

Labels: cooking

For the last three weeks, I have been taking the kids to the story hour at the local library. Nate has really been into picking out library books and reading two stories every night before bed. (I read them. He listens intently.) The normal story time routine seems to be a song, a book, a body play (you know, like I'm a Little Teapot), two books, and an activity. Sammi runs around like a mad woman and Nate alternates standing and jumping with sitting down and staring so hard I'm afraid there will be holes burnt into the book.

Several months ago I bought the book Simple Cooking Fun for Nate and I to bond over. The concept is that you read a book, then discuss the book and the cooking project, create a snack or meal together, then have some activities. They follow it up with some additional books that are somewhat related to the book you just read or meal you just made.

Last week I thought I'd combine the two activities and get a library book from the list in the activity book, get the groceries, and do one of the exercises. Unfortunately, as I mentioned yesterday, I have a little problem with getting to the grocery store sometimes. Improvising, I realized that we had Miss Spider's Tea Party checked out. I asked Nate if he wanted to have a tea party, and since he hasn't yet realized what his gender role is, he was more than happy to contemplate drinking tea and eating muffins.

Scrambling through the cupboards, I found a box of lemon-glazed muffin mix. Nate and I measured and poured, sipped tea, and read the book. When it was all over, Nate asked me if we could have another tea party.








Whenever you want, honey.

Labels: cooking

Parents everywhere know what a problem it is when you just haven't had the time to go grocery shopping because the laundry had to be done, or homework had to be supervised, or the weather outside was and is not conducive to dragging two little kids around. This particular afternoon the problem reared its head when I realized that I was nearly out of everything except organic creamy peanut butter and a variety of jellies. In the last few weeks I have had at least four different kinds of PB&J sandwiches, but, alas, a PB&J is still pretty much the same regardless of what kind of jelly is on it. (I particularly enjoy orange marmalade.)



However, there would be no peanut butter and jelly sandwiches today. I put my foot down; I refused.



Unfortunately, all I seemed to see in my fridge was that collection of jelly. I took a deep breath, and readied myself for the tastes of a classic PB&J. But.. But, wait! What was that in the crisper?



Thoughts started spinning in my head too fast for me to catch. Maybe, maybe I could pull it off. It would never end up on the Food Network's reality show The Next Food Network Star. But, would the kids eat it?



Jen's Daily Dilemma Surprise
1/2 can of Progressive's Vegetarian Tomato Basil soup (give the other 1/2 can to your kids, because if you are like me, you can't stand it, but they'll lap it up)
~ 1.5 cups of chik'n strips (made from soy or something)
1/3 bag of broccoli slaw (use the other 2/3 for a stirfry)
2/3 cup of mozzarella cheese (use the rest of the bag on Pita Pizzas)
4 small whole wheat tortillas (mmMMM good)

Yes. Yes, the kids would eat it. I'd have pictures but just as I was getting ready to take one, Nate informed me he'd pooped on the chair.

Exciting.

Labels: cooking

Local Foods Connection caught my eye about a month ago. I've been looking for a good place to volunteer after not enjoying my time with Big Brothers Big Sisters and the one day I put in at Miracles in Motion (how I loved the horses). LFC uses volunteers to earn credits on local CSA Farms, gets cash from families and some grants, and then turns around to donate shares from the CSA Farms to local low-income families. In short, they support the local agricultural economy while simultaneously helping low-income families receive fresh fruits and vegetables most likely grown in an organic sustainable manner.

How cool is that?

I know that I plan to spend a lot of time helping LFC in any way I can. Helping on the farms? Sure - it'll help me gain insight on how to manage my own backyard garden. Helping in the office? Why not - I am bored most of the day. I was even told if necessary I could bring my kids with me. Score! Right now I'm volunteering from home, helping update some of the website.

And once I get some cash on the side, I will definitely be donating to this organization.

Does anyone else know of any organizations like this in their local community?

Labels: cooking, environment, volunteering

I plan out our family's menu a week in advance in order to ensure that we have a variety of foods, and so I can plan ahead for sales and fruits and veggies that are in season. Cooking has transcended just the "necessary" to a true hobby in my life and I have accordingly started branching out in different genres from macaroni and cheese and hamburger helper (is that truly cooking?). I have at least seven cookbooks on my kitchen shelf that I use in constant rotation (that picture is old). One of my favorite resources is the Food Network.

I take it even a step further, though. I don't just willy-nilly plan out our menus - I strategize. One night we'll have tex-mex, the next a stirfry of sorts, followed up by some good ole American burgers, then perhaps a Deutsch dish (German, not Dutch), some curried vegetables and meat, and lastly a nice light pasta. Every week I vary what cultural identity our food has to ensure that our children have eaten a wide range of the food available to them. Eventually, my sushi isn't going to look disgusting, but for now I practice on myself only.

Last night we had Giada's lovely Lemon Spaghetti. Aaron had a look of surprise on his face when he bit in and tasted all of the flavor (I cheated and doubled the amount of lemon). The kids scarfed it down. I almost swooned. It was amazing. It was also the first time I used real lemons and not the concentrated lemon juice. I have no idea if it made a difference or not (and will have to experiment later), but I'm definitely sold on the recipe.



The entire ensemble included white zinfandel from Barefoot, a rosemary-topped french bread, and blackened chicken (I had blackened chik'n strips). Wow. Just.. wow.

Labels: cooking

This project took me a little under sixty minutes. You can see the project via five photos on our Flickr site, but I'll also describe the steps briefly here.

1) Wash the glass thoroughly and dry.
2) Grab a stencil, place it on a regular piece of computer paper, and mark the picture. Apply non-permanent adhesive to the back of the piece of paper.
3) Cut out the picture and apply it to the glass.
4) Brush Armour Etch on in a thick coat. Wait 5 minutes.
5) Wash off Armour Etch with warm water. Let dry.

Easy!

I have a ton of old glass jars and candle holders that I can turn into unique gifts (and gift wrapping) by etching neat designs on them. This was my first foray into glass etching, and I know that I didn't take a lot of time on it. It certainly isn't perfect. However, it was a great test project and I can't wait to do more. :)

The pattern I re-used is one that I painted on our kitchen wall above our window a month or two ago. I figure I'll use this quite a few times in different ways throughout our house, because I really like it! Right now I'm just hoping to find the perfect glass containers for our flour, sugar, coffee, and other such staples. I can't wait to etch 'em!

Labels: cooking, crafts

This morning the children and I drove over to the library for the weekly story hour. This was the first one we've gone to even though we've lived in the area for over a year now. The topic of choice was snowmen, with two books being read, a cute dance about a melting snowman, and a craft where the kids pulled apart cotton balls and glued them on a piece of paper. We checked out five children's books (one of which Nate has already thoroughly enjoyed - about pirates) and Kathy Reich's Deja Dead. So far I'm only at chapter three, but I'm really enjoying the book. Anyone out there a member of Good Reads? I enjoy that I can keep track of what books I've read and possibly scope out new authors. I'm also a member of Book Swim, which is nice because I can get books quicker from them then I can from the library here (as it is a small town library). I'm possibly ashamed to also admit that I adore Netflix, and am currently watching The Highlander Season One.

Do you know what I would like? An unbiased report of which activities weigh out heavier in terms of environmental-related issues. I'd like to know which is worse - purchasing a DVD from Wal-Mart or renting a movie from Netflix. When I purchase a DVD from Wal-Mart I have all of the production pollution square on my own head, plus the transportation around the country to my Wal-Mart, then my transportation to purchase it, and then it sits on my shelf. With Netflix, the production pollution is shared among everyone who watches that movie, the transportation from the factory to my house is square on my head, and the housing it comes in (paper) is recyclable.

Now - which is better? How about with Book Swim? Purchasing or renting via Book Swim? Probably even better is when I buy movies on iTunes and download them to my computer, or when I go to the library. But really, where is the objective scientific proof? Numbers? Quantifiable data? I'm curious!

Anyway, the other major event on today's platter is the caucus tonight. Myself, my sister, and Aaron are all going to have a part in the country's political process. I was informed by someone official that I can take the kids with me. Let's see how that goes down... I'm looking forward to the event.

And, on the menu tonight? Couscous Shepard's Pie from Robin. Mmm, sounds like a good day all around!

Labels: cooking, news

I received some very nice gifts this year, but I'm not going to list them all. However, I am going to briefly discuss two books I received from my aunt: Quick-Fix Vegetarian by Robin Robertson and Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone by Deborah Madison.

Robin Robertson has written a very concise cookbook with few illustrations of the food with easy recipes. The title Quick-Fix Vegetarian: Healthy Home-Cooked Meals in 30 Minutes or Less is a realistic claim. I've completed Chipotle-Kissed Black Bean Soup and Linguini with Edamame Pesto. Both were tasty (although Aaron decided that the linguini with edamame pesto needed more pepper) although since we've grown up with the staples of spaghetti, casserole dishes, steak and potatoes, tacos, etc, the colors were new! Chipotle-Kissed Black Bean Soup is black-grey with splashes of other color from the other ingedients in it and Linguini with Edamame Pesto is very lime green. Of course, they should be (black beans and edamame?) but it was still novel!

I'm only on page 125 out of approximately 730 pages in Deborah Madison's cookbook. I haven't tried any recipes yet, and I'm fairly excited to check them out - perhaps next week.

And, as I sit here reading these books, I realize that I'm only 1/4 of the way through my CIA text book: The Professional Chef, 8th Edition. Now that I have some time again, I need to finish it up!

Labels: cooking