Adventures in Eclectic Home Cooking
Mar 1st, 2010 by Sarah
Another wintry birthday has come and gone. You may be sensing a theme here. Last year there was a splendiferous key lime pie. This year’s creation really takes the “cake” though. Introducing my very first birthday pot pie. Cakes are great and all but, honestly, you will win my heart ever so much more quickly with a pie of any kind instead. Continue Reading »
Feb 21st, 2010 by Sarah
What do you do when you become to busy to cook consistently? Hopefully, you have the foresight to stock your freezer with reheatable home cooked items. Happily I did manage to have a sense that things were going to get hectic around here and I was able to pack the freezer with these tasty little packages. I only wish I had thought to do the same with some larger meals, but well, hindsight is always twenty/twenty. Continue Reading »
Feb 8th, 2010 by Jen
While on a recent grocery trip, I noticed that the outdoor produce section of our favorite market was currently undergoing some major reorganization. Every stand was being cleared off, and at first I was sad that we wouldn’t have an opportunity to peruse what is usually a very diverse selection — that is, until I spotted an assemblage of shopping carts labeled “Bargain of the Day : $1.50 a bag” hiding out in a quiet alcove. What I discovered were weighty bags featuring a plethora of random fruits and/or veggies, and ignoring my auto-responsive dose of New Yorker cynicism for a moment came to discover something more than sub-perfect specimens. Continue Reading »
Jan 31st, 2010 by Sarah
I know, pasta with tomato sauce doesn’t sound very exciting. And it isn’t, usually. But when you match recipes from two of the highest quality food bloggers on the internet today, how can you go wrong? Those were my thoughts exactly.
Let me tell you, this dinner was so far from going wrong, I was asking entirely the wrong question. I underestimated how good both of these recipes would be, probably because of their delightfully simple list of ingredients. The pasta? Just egg and flour, and a dash of salt for the boiling water. The sauce? Canned tomato, onions, and butter. Instead of asking what could go wrong, I should have asked what could be better. Continue Reading »
Jan 25th, 2010 by Sarah
The pickles actually took on this unnatural looking tint of green
After all these pickle experiments, I’ve noticed that there’s only so many pickles I can eat. When I started this summer, I only had a few jars, so in order to try a new recipe I had to hurry up and finish one of the jars I already had. Now, after I’ve collected jars for months, I’ve found a way to get around the jars completely. Continue Reading »
Jan 18th, 2010 by Sarah
I love color coordinating my beans.
Weeknights have become busy around here, between new year’s resolutions, birthdays, and the usual. This is the time of year when I know I need food to function but I can’t always bring myself to whip up something new each night. The lack of fresh produce in the house doesn’t help either.
It would be really easy to succumb to take out and pre-made frozen foods, but I know my stomach, wallet, and conscience wouldn’t be happy with me if I did. To combat winter food fatigue, I’ve been making larger batches of things to take for lunch with me throughout the week. I’ve stocked the freezer so that when I’m at wits end I don’t end up ordering pizza (at least not again anyway).
This week, the savior dish was a bean and barley soup I’ve been playing with all winter. Basically, I choose two types of dried beans, throw in a cup of barley, onions, carrots, celery, a bay leaf and bouillon and we eat like kings for a week. This kind of soup is filling, incredibly healthy, cheap, and can last for days and days. I bet you could even feed it to an avid meat-eater and they wouldn’t even realize it is vegan.
Here’s my latest recipe, but this soup is flexible enough that you could substitute just about any ingredient for another similar one (except the barley which is needed for its magical thickening powers). Continue Reading »
Jan 4th, 2010 by Sarah
This picture would have been discarded if I hadn't noticed a longing face poking in.*
Half sour pickles, sometimes called “new pickles”, weren’t my favorite growing up. They were overlooked in the quest for the most lip-puckering sour garlic pickles. As my taste buds matured, however, I came to appreciate the more delicate saltiness of a good half sour pickle. From what I’ve noticed, half sours are made from very similar recipes to full sours, but are not left to ferment for as long. Continue Reading »
Dec 29th, 2009 by Sarah
Hunk of a traditional raclette cheese
While grocery shopping last week, I noticed a wheel of raclette cheese at the cheese counter. The sight of that cheese brought back warm memories of the first time I tasted it, during my time in France, with my host family gathered around the table on a cold winter’s night. The memory of raclette, the meal and the cheese, struck me as a great way to spend the holiday with family. Continue Reading »
Dec 22nd, 2009 by Jen
Split-pea soup with crispy onions
Unfortunately for me, growing up I never knew a good pea soup, let alone one outside of the school cafeteria. My mom didn’t make pureed soups from scratch often, so for me the words “Split-Pea Soup” conjured up images of gelatinous vats of over-salted green-gray mush, not unlike in the Exorcist, that would send me running from the cafeteria when appearing on the menu.
So, it’s not a surprise that a couple of weeks ago when Sarah expressed an interest in making a batch after picking up some dried split-peas at the grocery, I needed a little convincing before I was ready to revisit that childhood memory. I’m sure that not all of you grew up detesting pea soup, but after one taste of Sarah’s simple and satisfyingly creamy concoction topped with crunches of bacon and sweetened slightly by carrots, I dropped all previous stereotypes of the heartily-satiating dish. Highly recommended for cold, wintry nights alongside a chewy piece of sourdough. Continue Reading »
Dec 16th, 2009 by Jen
The bread that keeps on giving
About six weeks ago, we were gifted a so-called “Amish Cinnamon Bread” yeast starter in a zip-top bag that came along with a somewhat cryptic-sounding recipe. Due to my affinity for baking, I decided to take charge of the project. After waiting ten days and “mushing” the bag everyday, it eventually yielded what it promised – one deliciously moist cake, and four baggies of starter batter for friends.
I couldn’t help but begin to think of this adventure in baking as an edible chain letter, and low and behold, not long after that initial baking and gifting of starters on consenting friends and family, one came back to us last week. Continue Reading »
