leafing through

About the hardest part of making baba ganoush is finding tahini. That’s to say, this dish is very simple to make.

• 2 big globe eggplants
• 3 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• 3 Tbsp tahini
• 3 or 4 cloves of finely grated garlic paste
• Juice of 1 lemon (I didn’t have any and used 2 limes instead)
• 1 teaspoon of (Kosher) salt
• cayenne pepper
• 1/2 cup cilantro
• 1 teaspoon of ground cumin
• 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon

Prick the surface of the eggplants all around with a fork.  Under the broiler, char the eggplant for 20 minutes on each side.  You want it to be shriveled and mushy.

In a vessel big enough to mix the baba ganoush,  (I love saying that, baba ganoush), throw together all the dry ingredients: salt, cayenne (to taste), cumin, cinnamon.

Then scoop in the tahini, add the chopped cilantro, garlic paste, and olive oil.  I forgot the olive oil this time but it tasted delicious anyway.  To make up for it, I poured it over the top to keep it from drying out.

Mix it all together and there you go!

It’s great with pita bread, crackers, by itself.

I got this recipe from Pioneerwoman.com and Simplyrecipes.com and just changed it a bit combining both of their ideas.

So in making this dish, I learned something new.  Pyrex glass, though heat proof, isn’t broiler proof.  I laid two eggplants in a Pyrex dish and the broiler shattered it.  Luckily, the eggplants were unscathed.  It just made cleaning the broiler a big pain in the butt.  I think at least once a month, I’m cleaning up glass in the kitchen.  I’ve broken so many dishes, jars, whatever left and right I’m kinda’ getting good at cleaning up glass now.  That’s how I make more space in the cabinets and fridge.  I break shit.

Well, it was neither rain nor snow. Maybe just a flurry, but wind! Gusts of it.

Behold, my latest kitchen gadget purchase: a grater, zester, shredder, slicer contraption! Mostly I wanted it for the zester/grater. Rather than get a zester/grater and then a separate shredder, I decided to get this all inclusive set which will save space too. I also got a can opener and am still hunting for a juicer – hand operated. Cuz I’m old-fashioned like that. Plus, I need more bowls!! So I can fill up the dishwasher rather than having to wash bowls every night. I’m considering Mikasa, TJ Maxx, Marshall’s, Ikea, you know, the usuals. I only need maybe 6 or so. So I’m thinking I can get 6 different pretty bowls which would be more fun, or I can get 6 identical ones which would probably stack better. These are the kinds of conundrums and decisions that keep me up. Last night, I went to Home Goods to look for bowls and walked out with a can opener and 2 mugs. Then I went to TJ Maxx to look for bowls and found a grater, zester, shredder, slicer contraption, same make, different model, for about $4 or $5 less. I don’t wanna talk about it. I walked out with a pair of smokey topaz earrings. I don’t wanna talk about that either.

I changed my mind about liking this settling back into the usual rut! This week has been long. Every day feels like two and today, I’m wondering why I’m still sitting here. Where’s the SNOW!? And ensuing CHAOS! PANIC! Milk, eggs, bread, toilet paper people!! Get more toilet paper! I’m predicting rain.

Lent started last week some time, and it wasn’t until 2 or 3 days after that I realized I didn’t select anything to give up. So I had to rack my brain for something that wouldn’t be such a bad thing to start doing or stop doing. Something that can better my already wonderful self.

“Self,” I said, “how could you possibly be even better? (And it needs to be something you’ve already done or not done these past few days.)” And all I could come up with was coffee. I gave up coffee (again, I know) until April 4th.

First full week back to work. As much as work can aggravate me at times, I find the familiarity of coming back to my usual routine to be comforting. Plus, now that we’re nearing March, the Sun’s pretty much up when I’m heading into work (particularly when I’m running late) and it’s still mostly out when I leave the office. Thank goodness for that little bit of blessing, otherwise, coming back from Florida would’ve been even more depressing what with all the ice, slush, and dirty snow piles, which incidentally melted a good amount this weekend in 40-degree weather. I enjoyed the sunny warm climate in Florida so much that pretty much right after coming back I started planning my next vacation. To where else? Cali! I still have French Laundry, Monterey Bay Aquarium, and Hog Island to visit.

I’m watching the Olympics right now and ice dancing is so much more pleasant to watch than figure skating. And I think curling must be the only Olympic sport where you can have pregnant women participating (Canadian team). Plus they wear make up and dangly earrings. If I got to choose what sport my kid did, it’d be curling.

Yesterday, my friend’s 4 year old son randomly asked, “Mommy, what’s a slow day?” Kids ask such random questions. She made something up off the cuff, it’s a day where you can relax. You don’t have to do anything. There’s no school.
Today would be my slow day. Very slow day. I had a list of get-to-do’s I wanted to tackle but decided to just leave them. Aside from the necessaries like laundry, the floors don’t have to be cleaned. The taxes can wait. And so can the filing. I’m just going to enjoy my slow day.

Left the house today at 9:30 AM and returned at 7:30 PM. It’s now close to 12:30 and I am plumb worn out. Started the day with brunch at a friend’s house to meet her family and have lunch with them. We had bagels and cream cheese, something she made called “Christmas Bake” (bacon, eggs, cheese… need I continue?) and spinach kugel. They have a mean cat, a super affectionate dog, and 2 cute little boys, 4 and 1. The 1 year old is a cuddlebug and couldn’t care less if you were a stranger or not, he’ll come up and cuddle or hug you. After that, it was shopping from one store to another. Balducci’s. Costco. An Asian market. Dinner at Cava (delicious!). Home Depot. Office Depot. Then after I returned it was Olympics and cooking. I have to shorten the description of my shopping because reliving it is tiring. As much as I enjoy cooking and shopping most of the time, doing these marathon shopping trips can be tiring. Especially the part about Costco on Saturday.

I wanted to make a few dishes tonight so they could marinade in the sauce over night. I’m hoping the flavors will have a chance to absorb and blend better.

The first was a bean salad. Canned beans (any kinds you like), chopped red onion, lime juice, salt & pepper, Adobo (optional), cilantro, olive oil. The recipe had called for edamame but all the ones sold at the Asian market were from China and you know I’m not gonna eat that.

The next dish was this curry which started out small and wound up being a potful as most of my dishes generally turn out. This came from desultory thoughts.
In a blender: ginger, onion, coconut milk, garlic, lime juice, salt, and curry powder. Or food processor. Add cayenne too if you want a bit of spicy.
Cook the chicken until it’s just done, set it aside, saute some onions, add curry sauce and more curry powder, then add carrots and peas, any other vegetables then chicken. Simmer.

Being the lazy cook that I am, I didn’t set aside the meat. I just pan fried it in oil. Then added onions, then the vegetables, then poured in the food processor sauce.*

Oh, look. From Home Depot. Them chinchillas are chewing on the wood around their room! But it was either the painter’s tape or …
This! Do I hear a collective “Awww…”? The wooden house chew toy has cut down on the chewing a bit but Marco is unstoppable, as shown here.

*Update on the curry: Veggies in the curry will add a natural sweetness to the sauce. Add some cayenne to balance it out. I like a bit of spicyness to my curries anyway. If you like a thicker sauce like I do, use some corn starch. Also, next time I might add lemongrass. And go ahead and make a ton of curry for extra leftovers. It seems to get better the next day, and the next day, and the day after that. The flavors just meld and absorb more.

As sad as I was to leave warm Florida, I was glad to get to see my babies again. The shipment of toys and water bottle arrived too so they’ve been chewing on their wooden log cabin and timothy hay since yesterday. The log cabin wound up being too small for them even though I’d ordered the bigger one. They’ve grown too big! So they’re wooden chew toys now. I’m hoping it’ll spare the wooden furniture but my guess is, I’ll still have to keep an eye on them.

And my other babies. At work. Yes. Alas, it’s back to my babysitting job once again. My life wouldn’t be the same without these kids.

Happy Lunar New Year! I come back from Florida and what do I see? More snow! Not enough to keep me from going to work tomorrow though. Durnnit. Ah well. I guess 10 days off was a good run.

Where do I start with this trip?
Food.

Manatees.

Food.

Olympics.

Cruise. (This is Thomas Edison’s house, tucked in the trees with the red roof.)

Parade.

Food.

The amazing view.

Wonderful!

There was tons more food but these were all I captured. The rest flew into my belly before the shutter even had a chance.

I love this rice cooker! When I first moved, my parents gave me a rice cooker which they got as a gift from a newspaper subscription. It was one of those traditional rice cookers with the nonstick inner pot. The kind that can only cook rice, although it did have an inner steamer basket. Overlooking the fact that it was made in the P.R. of China, seeing as how it was free, I tried using it a few times. The first batch of rice came out dry and kinda’ hard. The second batch burned the bottom and patches of it were undercooked. It had no on and off button either. If you plugged it in, it was at least on “warm” mode. And the warm mode burned already cooked rice. To make up for the dryness and burnt bottoms, I added more water, which resulted in mushy rice on top, with still that layer of burnt. To be sure it wasn’t some other reason besides the fact that it was just a crappy rice cooker, I even tried Asian rice purchased from the Asian market! To no avail. So after a batch of mushy rice which was terribly hard to turn into fried rice, I finally gave in and purchased this rice cooker yesterday night (Incidentally, it was my first time out since last Friday afternoon.). This thing can steam eggs, buns, make soup or rice porridge, reheat foods. It is a multifunctional rice cooker, made of stainless steel (no Teflon)! AND, get this: it has an on/off switch.

Just kidding. Too much food is more like it. Busted open a huge hulking leg of ham yesterday. Already I’ve eaten too much of it and feel ill. I’ve OD’d on ham!   It’s so tasty though.  The hardest part about planning a menu while being trapped indoors is trying to keep fresh produce on hand. Fresh fruits and vegetables ripen or rot. So I had to eat all of that first. I’m down to a few apples, half a cut up pineapple, frozen vegetables and onions. Hence, fried rice for dinner yesterday. Besides, there’s no way I’m going to finish an entire ham without changing it up a bit. Today, ham and bean soup. I can tell I’m going to be hammed out. Oh wait, I already said I already ham. Ahh-hahaha!  This is going to be like Iron Chef, the secret ingredient is: HAM!

Recipe for the Slow-cooker ham and beans:

• The bone of the ham with most of the meat carved off and some chopped pieces of the meat.
• Soaked beans (you can pre-boil them) – any dried beans will work
• Black and white pepper
• Ground mustard
• Garlic – fresh or dried.  I used dried because my garlic press broke and I’m too lazy to chop.
• One chopped sweet onion
• A drizzle of maple syrup or brown sugar (whatever you have on hand)
• Broth or water or a combo

I soaked the beans for about 5 hours and I put in all the ingredients except for the onion and chopped ham pieces into the slow-cooker last night.  This morning, I added the ham and onions and I plan to let it cook until dinner time.  I may or may not add salt once it’s done cooking.  I mean, ham is salty enough isn’t it?

Update: Don’t add any salt.  The ham and ham bone makes the soup plenty salty enough.