swept up with dandelions

race training

2012-02-10T07:34:00.000-05:00

it's 14 days until fitness expo and a little over 3 months until the cleveland half. a fellow dietetics student and i just finished a spread for the student health magazine (it looks awesome, i'll link it when it goes up!) and we focused on eating properly to make sure you can reach your fitness goals and also to fuel it and make sure it runs to perfection.

i love breakfast. i never understand how people's stomach don't grumble in the mornings or they even manage to concentrate when they have glass of juice or coffee for breakfast. not me! give me a full on breakfast and i'm a happy camper:) bfast these days has been oatmeal in soymilk with some fruit (throw some frozen blueberries in after you cook the oatmeal with some nuts!) or yogurt w/ some crunchy cereal and a banana. but today i managed to wake up earlier (and be motivated) to cook an egg (it's extraordinary how accomplished i feel). i toasted a slice of 100% whole wheat toast and topped it with sauteed kale (w/o oil with some cumin and black pepper) and then an egg sunny side up (black pepper). the runny yolk flavors everything to goodness. and now that i have to run off for school i'm grabbing a banana for the road.

happy friday everyone! i'll try an update some more on training and food

butter pecan cookies

2012-01-23T11:01:00.001-05:00

eummm. this comes from simply recipes. i didn't have granulated sugar so ended up using light brown sugar in the cookies and for the rolling and sprinkling parts. it's very difficult to get the cookies rolled in brown sugar so it might have been a lighter coating than the recipe calls for. but these are some delicious melt in your mouth cookies. make sure to use a good quality butter as that will be the dominate flavor you get and with the lower grade stuff you'll get less of a buttery goodness and more of a so-so cookie. go ahead and toast extra pecans to eat (i think i ate about a cupful by the end of the day).

happy lunar new year!

yummy lil things

2012-01-09T14:14:00.000-05:00

happy birthday to M today! and happy belated to mimi! i feel bad for those birthdays so soon after xmas b/c they get lost in the shuffle.

this is quinoa wheat bread getting ready for the oven (it's delicious and has a wonderful crunchy texture mixed within soft bread). s4 loves the bread book so that is probably going to get added to our cookbook collection

you can see all the cute quinoa grains sprinkled in the roll!

are these plates not the cutest thing in the world?!?!? they are cb2 plates and there's one more in the group but i have to find the perfect food to put on it, thanks lucy! i especially like the poor guy w/ his tongue stuck to the peppermint stick a la "a christmas story" (which, i didn't see on tv during the holidays. what is the world coming to?)

checked out this raw cookbook from the library. M wanted healthy food for her bday as the holidays were just a back-to-back food fest. i halved the date logs recipe and added in crushed pecans. they are a nice sweet (but not overly sweet) treat. the coconut and pecans are wonderful together. it kind of reminds me of a less sweet halvah that you would get in india.

this is a chocolate swirl yeast bread with a powdered sugar/butter struesel topping which i have to say using powdered sugar for a struesel is a first for me. baked this with mimi (i think the 3 loaves had 5 sticks of butter between them). it was delicious (i will find a link for you!) but i would have halved the chocolate filling and topping amount as we were having difficulty finding places for it to go. but the bread is deliciously sweet. my next goal is to bake stollen as one of my volunteers brought in a delicious loaf of stollen.

happy eating/baking!

xmas eve football spread

2011-12-24T16:55:00.000-05:00

happy day before christmas! i hope everyone is with friends/family.we got homemade nacho cheese, homemade bread and breadsticks (thanks, s4) and some cheese, apples and salami. we also got a malaysian noodle dish that was tasty!

ravens vs. browns worked out perfectly w/ most of the family home. and we got some snazzy food laid out for the game (preparing for tomorrow's feasting...haha). we got lots of different cheeses from costco (the spicy buffalo something made a great nacho dip). the picture above is baked brie, absolutely delicious with some fresh baked bread (stay tuned for more pics of bread baking). take the brie (we cut our large costco size wheel up) and drizzle honey over the cheese. sprinkle with black pepper and nice garlic cloves, wrap up in aluminum foil and bake for about 15-20 minutes at 350 F. Spread onto some bread and enjoy! go ravens!

what's cooking thursday- salad!

2011-12-15T12:39:00.022-05:00

not just any old salad! here's some more "lets use stuff in the kitchen and be healthy when we can" kind of salad :) i had to go to the grocery store for the avocado and the roma tomato but everything else was in the house. each salad includes: a handful of mixed greens, arugula, 1 roma tomato, 1/4 of an onion (sliced), avocado (i tossed the chopped avocado in lemon juice to keep the color, hopefully!), carrots, crumbled blue cheese, and a hardboiled egg for each.

all the pretty salads ready for munching.

gobble gobble! i usually don't like raw onion but it really worked with giving the salad a nice kick. finals start so didn't get a chance to cook anything but some baked sweet potato fries, half a cheesy sandwich or warm soup would have been perfect! next time. happy thursday!

what's cooking thursday- lentil burgers and glazed carrots

2011-12-08T12:58:00.000-05:00

long time no see, i've forgotten a green bean casserole entry and not sure i'll ever put it up since i had to toss most of it as compost (it's hard trying to feed people who like korean food so much)

around the holidays there always seems to be an excess of delicious foods- baked goods and rich creamy warm-you-up and make you feel toasty and happy foods. but there’s something to be said when you just work with what you have. which usually i never do, but watching Chopped has sparked some creative juices for me, so today’s meal includes only ingredients i could find already in the kitchen (which required a lot of adapting of recipes…). happy thursday!

Lentil burger (adapted from Food and Wine)

1 cup uncooked brown lentils

2 ½ cups water

About 1 tsp garlic (mine is already pureed and kept frozen)

1 tsp ground cumin

Sprinkle of red chili flakes

Handful of walnuts (about 8 or 9?)

4 slices of whole wheat bread, toasted and made in bread crumbs

1 Tbl dried parsley

2 large eggs, lightly beaten

Ground salt

½ tsp ground black pepper

Splash of olive oil (and more for cooking)

For the dip

1 cup plain non fat yogurt

½ squeezed fresh lemon juice

1/8 tsp garlic

Dash of parsley

Bring lentils and water to a boil in a saucepan, then reduce heat to simmer for about 10-15 minutes or until tender. Drain well. In a food processor, puree lentils, walnuts, garlic, cumin, and red chili pepper flakes (some of the lentils can still be whole). In a large bowl combine the lentil mix, bread crumbs, parsley, eggs, olive oil, salt and pepper. Line a baking sheet with foil and brush it with olive oil (I pour some on the pan and use a spoon to spread it around). Form ¼ cup size burgers (I got 11 patties total) and place them on the baking pan. Brush the burger with olive oil (it says to brush both sides but I forgot the bottom side). Baked at 425F for 6-7 minutes on each side (make sure the aluminum foil is well coated with oil so the patties don’t stick for the flipping part. You can also broil for about 3 minutes on each side.

For the dip- mix the yogurt, lemon juice, garlic and parsley. Serve the burgers hot with the yogurt sauce on the side.

*as the recipe had, the onions and such would have probably added a nice moist and flavorful kick, unfortunately there were absolutely no onions in the house (i think i used the last one in the wasted green bean casserole...that'll teach me)

1 lb (6-8 medium or 4 very large) carrots, trimmed and peeled

2 Tbls/1 oz butter

½ Tbls brown sugar

Dash of salt

Sprinkle of dried parsley for garnish

Put the carrots whole in a pan of lightly salted boiling water, cover and simmer for about 15 minutes or until just tender. Drain. Add the butter and sugar to the pan, then the carrots. Cook over gently heat, turning the carrots, until evenly glazed. Sprinkle with chopped parsley, to serve.

*if you want to save some time, cut the fat carrots in half and halve all the carrots to be shorter.

what's cooking thursday and well, socks

2011-12-01T10:45:00.000-05:00

have a cakebite tasting today so no real food cooking, but lots of baking goodness, which to me is much tastier.

cranberry banana walnut bread from joy the baker. here are the changes i made:
- no butter, add another banana (bringing our total to 5 bananas)
- in place of 1 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour: 1/2 cup all purpose flour, 1/2 cup whole wheat flour and 1/2 cup quick oats to bump up the nutritional value
- didn't have any bourbon (unfortunately)
- handful of chopped walnuts
- i think we only added at most the 3/4 cup of brown sugar as well.

the bread was moist and tart from the fresh cranberries (it's been rather difficult getting rid of the costco bag of fresh cranberries we got for thanksgiving.

pumpkin cheesecake puff pastries
i can't remember where the recipe came from for the cheesecake but it was
8 oz of softened cream cheese
1/4 cup of sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup canned pumpkin
1/4-1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/8 tsp ground nutmeg
blend the cream cheese, sugar and vanilla until smooth then mix in the remaining ingredients. we spooned the cheesecake into buttered phyllo dough pressed into a muffin pan and baked in a 350 F oven.

eummm, just looking at this cheesecake makes me want more- kraft 3 step cheesecake with cranberry sauce topping. the recipe was on the box of the kraft cream cheese which was of course unbelievably easy but also tasty. we (s4) and i made the cheesecake in a leftover ready made pie crust which also is easy peasy and yummy. we took leftover cranberry sauce and topped it for a tart and pretty kick.

this is just silliness, can you tell i'm ready for winter break? but really, the paw print hole in her sock was not on purpose

i am piggy, hear me roar...

2011-11-27T18:56:00.000-05:00

or just trod about in a permanent food coma. here's the best post of the year- thanksgiving recap. i'll swing through dinner real quick and then get to the main event. a lot of the main foods were repeat favorites from last year but i will insert links to the ones that are new that were based on recipes.

the main meal

the vegetarian's plate (aka, me, the rest of the carnivorous fam had hunks of turkey on their plates). the great thing about being the thanksgiving meal planner is that i get full reign on what people eat :)

- rosemary butter roasted turkey: rub the butter and rosemary under the skin of the turkey, no need to cover or put on new butter!
- smashed potatoes: half of it made up of pureed roasted cauliflower with laughing cow garlic cheese
- roasted brussels sprouts: toss in olive oil with salt and pepper
- roasted autumn squash: chop it up, use a vegetable peeler to take off the tough exterior then chop, olive oil, salt, and pepper and bake in the oven for about 20-30 minutes (flip the pieces every so often)
- rosemary bunny biscuits
- tart cranberry sauce: we used lemon juice instead of orange juice this time, delish!
- corn casserole: eum eum good. corn tastes so much better when it's loaded with cheese, i used yogurt in place of the sour cream. you can go ahead and assemble this (w/o the cheese) earlier in the day or the night before and then pop it into the oven. i also made a thin layer of cheese in the middle of the casserole.
- green beans
- cornbread stuffing
- mushroom gravy: this year we took out the soy sauce, it tastes much better. and try to get some low sodium broth- veg or chicken

dessert

i have a slight adoration for pioneer woman, so many of these came from her. i started baking pies wednesday afternoon (i should have made the pumpkin cream pie wednesday and saved one of the pies best served warm for thanksgiving day)
- nantucket pie: the crunchy topping with the tart cranberries is so yummy! i didn't add the 2/3 cup of sugar on top of the cranberries as our family really likes the tartness of cranberries, in place of the almond extract i put in 1/2 tsp of vanilla extract.

- apple pie: i realized in my quest to make a million pies that it would help to actually have pie pans...which i didn't until later when i walked to safeway and bought another. but before that happened i really wanted to bake and baked this pie in a cake pan, which meant the crust was soaked under the bubbling apple juices and never developed a crispy crust...but, heavy cream and apple mix is delicioussssss. so next time, making this in a pie pan
- sweet potato pie: i didn't use any grated orange peel and had korean sweet potatoes

- pecan and date pie: first time our family had anything close to a pecan pie, not my favorite but it was still tasty. the dates give the pie a nice texture difference with the nuts. i just used a pillsbury pre-made pie crust instead of making the one in the recipe. i also didn't have dark corn syrup so i used light corn syrup which i think still looked pretty.
- pumpkin cream pie: probably my favorite for the year. i processed gingersnap cookies and then mixed with melted butter to make the crust. man, i wish i had more...

whoosh, gluttony is probably not very becoming, especially when my pants probably don't fit anymore. i also didn't realize how much i baked until i typed it all out.

tday menu

2011-11-23T15:06:00.000-05:00

i believe this is the final menu for tomorrow's dinner! (i will post links with all the recipes once the food pics go up)

rosemary butter roasted turkey with mushroom gravy
mashed potatoes with roasted pureed cauliflower and cheese
roasted garlic brussels sprouts, green beans, autumn squash
cranberry sauce
cornbread
cornbread stuffing
kale chips
corn pudding

dessert (the most important part!)
pecan and date pie
nantucket pie
apple pie
sweet potato souffle
pumpkin cream pie

i might be missing some items but don't worry, it will still end up in my tummy

T-1 day!

2011-11-23T10:27:00.001-05:00

even though we aren't celebrating thanksgiving until friday doesn't mean it isn't pie baking time! stay tuned for some yummy treats (including a pecan and date pie that's baking right now)

i heart pesto

2011-11-18T14:50:00.000-05:00

i highly suggest making extra servings of the broccoli and walnut pesto or any pesto for that matter and keeping it in the fridge or some frozen for later use, such as lunch the next day- whole wheat toast with pesto spread, topped with tomatoes and a fried egg. yum yum. happy friday!

w.c, thurs- broccoli and walnut pesto pasta w/ tofu

2011-11-17T13:28:00.000-05:00

happy thursday! this week has been disaster after disaster at school but once i finally get home on thursday i know that means cooking a real meal and de-compressing from the "real" world. this week's menu included broccoli and walnut pesto pasta with tofu and roasted acorn squash (impulse buy at the korean grocery store b/c the autumn squash looked strange).

we recently bought a Bella little food processor thing (which i used to make persimmon cheesecake...i will have to update on that one day...). suffice it to say i did not enjoy making the cheesecake w/ the Bella but the recipe book that came with the machine said it would work. but i decided to give it another go. i was making a couple of servings (i can't resist toasted walnuts, they are addictive) so i figured i would process all the ingredients separately and then mix it all together in a bowl. lets just say everything at the bottom of the processor keeps getting grinded (have you ever tried walnut butter...i can now check that off my list...it's also not too bad). the same thing happened when i tried to grind the broccoli up, so then i just gave up and whipped out our regular food processor and all was right in the world again.

the recipe comes from 101cookbooks which i haven't used in ages. i cooked my broccoli in a skillet with a splash of olive oil and two small scoops of frozen garlic (we food process up the fresh stuff and freeze tons of it). i forgot to buy a lemon so no lemon, chard/spinach and olives so we were short of that but i didn't mind the loss. i also didn't really measure how much i was making but i did have 2 heads of broccoli and about 3/4 to 1 cup of toasted walnuts. i kept splashing olive oil into the food processor waiting for a more liquidy pesto but after awhile gave up and figured i would be healthier with less olive oil :) the tofu was my "meat" for the dish so i could get a very nice well rounded meal. the tofu was cooked in a skillet with just a bit of olive oil.

if you run out of pasta (which i did after M & D gobbled all that) you can spread some of the pesto between the tofu and top with parmesan and broccoli (totally delicious!)

the acorn squash were looking mighty cute at the korean grocery store so we took one to try it out. tossed in some olive oil, salt and pepper the squash tastes good but it doesn't get that baked fry kind of texture i was looking for. probably excellent for a puree of some sort.

slow starts

2011-11-12T10:13:00.003-05:00

juggling school and three jobs hasn't left much room for those slow mornings that i love- reading the free Sun that comes (confession: i always skim through the coupon booklets knowing it's not worth it but wanting to buy those 3 cans of whatever to save 45 cents just because i can), sitting down and eating real food, and enjoying a hot cup of tea. but occasionally, a morning comes around where it all comes together.

it's amazing how my diet and running suffers when my schedule is such chaos but hopefully i'll get into the swing of things and be able to have more of these kinds of mornings, at least for the weekends. even on 4 hours of sleep i had enough energy to go on a nice long run this morning and then put together a breakfast (it helps to have a late starting work day). Two slices of whole wheat toast, 1 egg (runny! i love dipping toasted bread into runny egg yolk), and a nice handful of arugula salad with a sprinkling of parmesan cheese. the apple will most likely be a snack later in the morning maybe before work or on the way home from work.

i'm bundled up in my house in multiple layers and drinking some black tea with a splash of skim milk. it feels good to be healthy after days of interesting and late night food choices (i.e. my love affiar with peanut butter and spinach and artichoke dip at 11 at night on thursday come to mind).

i even packed a colorful lunch (persimmon, sweet potato and a banana). i think i'm missing something so i will probably throw in some almonds and walnuts or a Kashi bar, but it's challenging thinking of foods that are easy to eat in a couple bites while i'm working behind the desk and tourists come in.

and for everyone out there, it's 12 days until my favorite holiday! i've got to start researching foods for this year early and i'll try to post the links as i find them. here's some delicious looking pie recipes. anyone ever tried an olallieberry pie?

wct- savory monkey bread and pumpkin soup

2011-11-10T12:46:00.000-05:00

food today was a hit and a miss. kind of like my week. but at least the week is almost over. been living out of my car and crashing at my friend's place (thank you thank you thank you!) i think i would have gone crazy with the commuting. so feeling tired and burnt out which usually means i want something toasty and greasy. after my friend mentioned garlic parmesan monkey bread and we watched a marathon of "chopped" (i love that show!) i was definitely set to make it. and just like the usual sweet monkey bread, the savory version does not disappoint.

toasty, flakey, garlicky, cheesey goodness. and super quick and easy. recipe at the bottom!

i figured i should balance it out with something healthier and more nutritious (since that is my future work, hopefully) so it's with a baby arugula salad and pumpkin soup...now this pumpkin soup, i don't know if it's because i tried to combine two recipes or if it's because i used an uber healthy mayo-clinic recipe as the basis of the soup so i got something very brothy with absolutely no butter...then again, it might just be that b/c i've never had pumpkin soup i have no idea what it should taste like.

it's so darn good it needed an up close and personal. look at all that parsley! drool...

Garlic Parmesean Monkey Bread (serves 5)
adapted from all-recipes
1 Tblsp and 1.5 tsp dried parsley
2 cloves garlic, minced
dash of salt
1 Tblsp, 1/4 tsp butter melted (the 1/4 is to coat the pan...not that it seemed to help)
1 egg
1 can Jumbo Safeway buttermilk biscuits
1/4 cup Parmesean Cheese

Grease a large loaf pan (I greased a bundt pan and when putting the pieces in realized the pan was too large and didn't get a good layering action, so use something smaller). Preheat oven to 350 F.

In a bowl, mix parsley, garlic, salt, melted 1 Tblsp butter and egg until blended. Cut each biscuit into 4 and dip into the mixture. Make a layer in your dish, sprinkle with cheese. Repeat layer and cheese sprinkling. Cover loosely and bake about 30 minutes or until golden brown.

* I think I want to try the pillsbury biscuits next time, these had bits of butter in the dough already to begin with and I think it made my bread a little too buttery (although really can that crispy buttery taste go wrong?). Also, everything stuck completely to my pan, it may to do with the fact that I couldn't get a full layer of biscuit before sprinkling with cheese.

Pumpkin soup
I combined Mayo Clinic with Simply Recipes
I don't even want to write the recipe that I ended up with b/c I wasn't pleased with the end result, but I ended up with the soup from Mayo and the spice from Simply Recipes. It definitely needed/wanted the cream and/or butter that the spicy soup had.

what's cooking thursday- tuna casserole

2011-11-03T13:11:00.000-04:00

happy thursday! tried out a new recipe today, a nice combination of sorts of two recipes-

this recipe is not only nice and warm and filling but also pretty healthy!

these recipes come from a mix of a tuna casserole and a mac & cheese.

here's my final take:
Tuna Stuffed Casserole
3 cups whole wheat rotini, cooked al dente
1-2 Tblsp olive oil
1 large onion, finely chopped
2 packages button mushrooms, sliced
1 tsp salt
12 Tblsp whole wheat flour (about 1/4 cup)
3 1/2 cups fat free milk
2 tsp ground pepper
14 oz canned tuna, drained
2 cups frozen peas, thawed
1 1/2 cups mild shredded cheddar cheese
2 slices whole wheat bread, toasted and crumbled through food processor

* I prep cooked everything last night and then cooked the pasta today.
Oil a 9 x 13 pan. In a large pot heat oil over medium-high heat, add onion, mushrooms, and salt and cook, stirring until onion is softened. Add spinach until it wilts down and then sprinkle flour over the vegetables to coat. Add milk and pepper and bring to a simmer, stirring constantly. Stir in tuna, peas and 1 cup cheese until it is all incorporated. Stir in the pasta and remove from the heat.

If you want to cook it the same day, sprinkle the casserole with breadcrumbs and 1/2 cup of cheddar cheese, broil until bubbly and lightly brown, 3 to 4 minutes. If you want to cook it later, cover the pan with aluminum foil and refrigerate overnight. When you are ready to cook, sprinkle with cheese and breadcrumbs and bake, covered, 350 F for 40-50 minutes until bubbly. Uncover and cook until browned and bubbly, about 15 more minutes.
Scoop the pasta into the pan, cover with aluminum foil and place in the fridge over night.

what's cooking, thursday- chili with cornbread

2011-10-27T14:00:00.000-04:00

2nd thursday i've managed to cook a meal. this one wasn't quite as labor intensive as last week as i have an exam tomorrow (although cooking is still a great way to procrastinate...) but still lovely delicious!

as a pescatarian i'm ashamed to admit these were probably my first vegetables for the week. but at least i made it as colorful as possible! this is actually M's plate (mine was about half the size). even though it's cold and dreary outside colorful veggies (and fruits!) are a great way to stay healthy, especially with the changing temperatures. i'm thinking baked sweet potato fries next week?

this chili is as easy as pie (speaking of pie, has anyone baked chili under cornbread mix?). i sauteed half an onion, a red pepper in olive oil with garlic. i then threw in a big can (i think a 28 oz) of peeled whole tomatoes, a McCormick 30% less sodium chili mix and presoaked kidney and black beans. then boil, simmer for 30 minutes (the kidney beans were still a little undercooked, but the black beans were fully cooked). i think i have to go back to making my own chili spice mix. even though the packet was 30% less sodium it still seemed a little on the salty side. but i did like it's level of heat.

the cornbread recipe i pretty much snagged from the bag and then did the lazy cook's measuring (pour and eyeball amounts)

Cornbread
1 cup cornmeal
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 tsp salt
3 tsp baking powder
sprinkling of brown sugar (maybe 1/8 of a cup?)
1 cup milk
1 egg
about 1/4 cup olive oil

Preheat oven to 425F. Grease up a 9x9 pan (i just spread some olive oil around). Mix together cornmeal, flour, salt, baking powder and sugar. In a separate bowl mix the milk, egg and olive oil. Lightly mix the wet ingredients into the dry and scoop into the pan (spread it out flat). Bake for about 25 minutes (or until all the outside is a nice golden brown).

enjoy! and happy almost halloween (have i mentioned how much i love fall?)

birthday baking

2011-10-23T18:39:00.000-04:00

happy birthday to s3! here's some food porn for your pleasure...

there was cake...which in the bottom left corner looks either like a ginormous whoopie pie or a really soft oreo. do they make special oreos during the fall with pumpkin cream on the inside?

and there was hot apple cider...of course there was loads of other food, but really, the cake and apple cider was were it was at:D

the cake is picky palate's double chocolate pumpkin cake with pumpkin buttercream frosting. we used a dark chocolate cake mix and made our own buttermilk. we also didn't have any oil so put in the rest of our sour cream container we bought (8 oz total). the frosting and cake are delicious and once the cake all sits together the flavor really turns wonderful. rich and moist and the frosting is yum-o.

the hot apple cider was 8 cups of apple cider, 1/2 tblsp of cinnamon, 1 tsp nutmeg and 1/4 tsp ground cloves. also added were two large slices of orange and 3 cinnamon sticks. this was all boiled then simmered for 30 minutes. if you like it tart, this way is perfect, if not go ahead and add some sugar.

the first meal

2011-10-20T20:45:00.000-04:00

wha-lah! first thursday meal of the season. veggie lasagna, a-la pioneer woman and pumpkin chocolate chip cookie pie from how sweet it is.

have i told you how much i've been craving lasagna. i think that lasagna is just meant to be cooked in a huge pan to serve a huge entire italian family and when i'm usually the only one who is going to eat what i cook i can't really convince myself to make it. but here it is, finally. and i'm glad to say, leftovers are a good enough reason to make a family-size dish. i wish i had crushed the whole tomatoes in the can more because i felt like i didn't get as much sauce. i didn't use any wine but this still tasted tasty. however, in the end, sometimes it's just easier (and this economy- cheaper) to buy a tasty jar of sauce from the grocery store.

this recipe is loosely based off of jessica's gorgeous looking pie (i was going for a healthier pumpkin pie with chocolate chips than a cookie in a pie). this is very creamy and i would even take out more sugar next time.

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Pie
2 large eggs
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1/4 cup white sugar
1/4 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 stick of butter, melted and cooled to room temperature
3/4 + 1/3 cup canned pumpkin
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 Tblsp ground cinnamon
3/4 tsp nutmeg
1 cup chocolate chips
1 unbaked pie shell

Preheat the oven to 325 F. In a bowl beat eggs until they are foamy then add the flour and sugars. Add the vanilla, pumpkin and spices and then blend in the butter. Gently mix in the chocolate chips (I forgot to toss the chips in flour but they didn't sink) and scoop into the pie crust. Bake for about 45-50 minutes until the center is cooked (it may look a bit strange but once out of the oven the texture looks much more normal).

food pics to tide you over until the real meal

2011-10-20T12:53:00.000-04:00

i love fall. fall means the leaves are changing, hot apple cider, corn mazes, and baking. tons and tons of baking. pumpkin desserts, muffins, cakes, you name it, and i'll want to make it. having the time to actually get around to all of it is an entirely different topic. but i've decided since thursdays are my one day off i'm going to make them my cooking day. a full out meal and dessert. and guess what, today's thursday:) while the food cooks here's some pics i've taken this fall.

a friend of M's brought over fresh beans still on their vine (is that what it's called?) so i got to spend an afternoon shucking beans. which was really fun. when the lady first brought them over i got really excited because they looked like edamame, but once you popped them out they were this kidney bean-esque color. we steamed them, cooked them into rice cakes, i think i even tried to roast them (still working on that one...)

first time i ever saw a chestnut in it's plant shell. it's seriously spikey and then you have to wonder about the first person who thought to wait for it to open (that also makes me think of lobster and crab and their tough exoskeletons, plus creep legs).

the spikes are really sharp and stiff, but luckily, if you wait long enough they crack open and inside are two beautiful chestnuts. makes me want to try making chestnut bread or some sort of chestnut pastry. any good recipes?

going middle eastern

2011-09-01T14:08:00.000-04:00

hiiiiii! i've missed you world of food experimentation. luckily i passed biochem (barely) and just started fall semester yesterday. i've made my thursdays a little more easy going and so i jumped right back into cooking.

i was craving tabbouleh and baba ghanoush after eating it in cleveland (ahhh mazing food there, btw). my first try and both turned out pretty well. the recipes come from david lebovitz (the link for the baba ghanoush). i made my own tahini paste (not as difficult as i thought it would be, and the smell of ground sesame seeds is really delicious...maybe b/c it's so close to a peanut butter smell...haha)

unfortunately, i didn't quite understand his meaning of "medium" eggplants, and i think i ended up w/ 2 large ones instead. which made the consistency of my baba a bit too much on the eggplant side and too little on the creamy tahini side. i might try to add in some more tahini later to make it creamier. oh, and i also had quite a fun time getting the pulp out of the eggplant. i ended up peeling the skin off the eggplant...a plus for anyone who is hands on about their food.

the tabbouleh turned out great. i bought two bunches of parsley but only ended up using 1 bunch after i realized the quantity confusion from the baba. instead of bulgur i used quinoa (how does anyone just make 3 Tblsp of quinoa???). i didn't put in the mint b/c the parents would freak, but it still tastes delicious. add in a side of homemade pita chips and veggies and i was a very happy girl.

happy cooking!

on a mission

2011-07-20T23:08:00.000-04:00

i'm on a mission to find a place in HoCo where i can study. somewhere that isn't too crowded (so they won't mind me spreading out on a nice big table all day long), that's open late, and of course has good food. tuesday i was planning on going to nora cafe but when i drove up around lunchtime it was packed. and i mean packed. so then i checked out fresco cafe (i think that's what it's called) by the walmart off of 40 but they close at 3 pm...so i ended up at the pottery stop on 40 which closes at 9. unfortunately, they don't have food food, but by then i just needed to study. i got their peppermint blended coffee drink (sugary goodness) and then tried their chai tea latte (not good at all, had to toss it out). tomorrow's options:
- forest diner (8pm, and who doesn't like breakfast food all day? and of course endless coffee is always a perk, AND it closes in 3-4 years)
- panera (creamy tomato with asiago cheese bagel. plus, people are always hanging out there foreverrrr, but it's a chain restaurant and i'd rather help out the little guy and try out a new place)
- riverside coffee (i've heard good things!)
- dunkin donuts (it's open 24/7, what else can i say)
- bob evans (10 pm, again, it's a chain...)
- charter deli (7pm, i used to study here back when i went to HCC)
- deli town (8:30pm, don't know anything about this place...)

biochem is kicking my butt, so with all this studying i'm sure i'll cross a lot of these off my list...

cookies for father's day, hit and misses

2011-06-19T08:31:00.000-04:00

happy father's day to all the dads out there! i used to think M was where i got my sweet tooth from, but when i started baking cookies and watched D inhale 5 at a time, i realized i didn't stand a chance in those genes. so of course for father's day cookies were on the list of treats for him. there's pretty much only one major rule for baking desserts for my dad- something soft for his mouth so i chose two recipes hoping for the best. i woke up early yesterday to bake a super easy recipe before heading off to the beach w/ some friends (a bit of a guilty conscious in baking these since i was going off somewhere else, but he went golfing on his own anyway...)

these come from picky palate- her fluffernutter cookies. somehow i only ended up w/ a 7 oz. jar of marshmallow fluff (this stuff is dangerousss) and then was guessing on the amount of peanut butter i had and they flattened out too much, i figured i had too much fluff so i added more peanut butter...

but then i guess i added too much peanut butter and they became too buttery and crumbly in a sad way...so good thing i had another recipe!

it's getting hot outside so even though i got to bed around 2 am (i confess i didn't get to take a shower after coming back from the beach so i was slightly gross going to bed...) but anyway these are from eagle brand- coconut raisin treasure cookies. i wish condensed milk weren't so cloyingly sweet, but these cookies are still tasty and are nice and soft and you can definitely throw in whatever suits your dad's fancy. i used 1 cup of instant oats and increased the flour to 1 cup instead of using graham cracker crumbs. these are like oatmeal raisin cookies w/ more surprises (which i guess is the whole point of the "treasure" cookies name). i love how many add-ins there are, and the walnuts and raisins and coconut together are oh so delicious! now if only D would get back from golfing so i could stop staring (2nd confession, and sampling) all the cookies.

oh, and if anyone is in the md/de/va area and is heading to the eastern shore this summer sunshine crepes in bethany beach makes some delicious sweet crepes:)

preakness balloons

2011-05-21T08:50:00.000-04:00

the ants are still rulers of the kitchen so no baking...

but, today was the final day of the preakness balloon festival in turf valley. went last night to try to watch a launch/glow but there were only about 2 balloons and nothing was happening. but this morning i managed to haul out of bed at 5:45 am and run down to turf valley. it's a lot nicer running to a destination especially when it turns out looking this nice.

unfortunately the wind was blowing the wrong direction so the balloons weren't actually allowed to launch. but pretty awesome to watch them inflate. i wouldn't mind having a bunch of inflated hot air balloons decorate my backyard :D happy saturday (and what could apparently be the end of the world, but at least i can say i saw hot air balloons up close before the end).

here's another shot- the flower one and patterned one with teal were my two favorites.

instant gratification

2011-05-13T14:53:00.000-04:00

nothing to post yet, but i've come to the conclusion that baking is my catharsis from school. no matter how poorly i do on an exam (it's finals week) when i can bake something together i know (usually) that something wonderful will come out. something that i can share with others and that others will enjoy. here's to baking and stress relieving. what's your secret to a really bad day/week/month?

oh, and safeway was having 4 lbs of strawberries for sale, and since i'm the only one at home i have a feeling something yummy will be made:)

happy friday, despite it being the 13th

pillsbury bakeoff adventures

2011-04-10T09:55:00.000-04:00

the pillsbury bakeoff adventures should also be known as- this is when you invest in a fire extinguisher challenge. it's been a lot of fun, but also quite scary but i don't know if you can win the million dollar prize by setting fire to your dessert (unless of course it's intentional)

first experiment was pillsbury chocolate chip cookie dough wrapped around their brownie mix. it looks really cute and yummy pre-baking (kind of those delicious thumbdrop cookie things) but then it bakes, spreads and then you get funny butt cookies. if my dad is any indication, they were delicious (he ate all 5!) but not quite what i was looking for...

not that this is what i was hoping for either. i didn't use up all the cookie dough or brownie mix for the cookies so i tested out making a cake. i first baked the bottom layer of brownie for a bit, then flattened discs of cookie dough and layered it on top of the brownie and baked that. then topped with mini marshmallows and tried out the broiling button for the first time. apparently broiling on high on the top shelf for 10 seconds results in a fiery flaming dessert...i smelled the fire and when i opened the oven door flames were licking out of the top and all that came to mind was "they taught us to never put water on burning oil" which of course was completely useless in this situation. so i tried to treat it like an overlarge marshmallow i set on fire when making s'mores and tried blowing it out. which thankfully worked and i and the kitchen are all in one piece. can't say the same for the dessert which probably would have been gorgeous with some toasted marshmallow on top, but we can't have everything. :D

but, scrapping off the burnt part of marshmallow did lead to this pretty cake, which is pretty tasty (the brownie and cookie dough weren't completely cooked in the center, but ooey gooey goodness is much less life threatening than flaming marshmallows). i don't know if it was because of setting them on fire, but the marshmallows had a rather artificial not so tasty flavor to them so i peeled it off (it also becomes rather difficult to cut, so nix the marshmallows in general)

baking extravaganza, aka, i need to go on a detox after this

2011-03-27T22:14:00.000-04:00

wow, i crammed in as much baking for my last few days of break possible. so lets get right to it!

these are called "food of the gods" but like pioneer woman, i feel the name is a bit odd. but they are drool worthy and melt in your mouth goodness (it helps that there are 3 sticks of butter in it...but don't let that stop you from trying this out). i wish i had more nuts in it, so i would recommend trying out pioneer woman's idea of adding chopped pecans. i've never used dates in my baking before but these were yummy. i wonder how dried figs would taste instead?

the bars wrapped and boxed up for s2 and s3!

it was a tough decision trying to decide what to make for my birthday "cake" and the winner turned out to be a cookie rather than a cake. these are picky palate's s'mores stuffed chocolate chip cookies. these are delicious and so cute! i made my s'mores insert half the size of picky palate's, got lazy and only made 7 of them, but wish i had made all the dough into s'mores stuffed ones b/c the cookies actually tasted better with the s'more inside. but it was so cute! the stack of s'more with cookie dough on top and bottom reminded me of those weird sponge bob square pants candy shaped like burgers (which i haven't tried and am a little too freaked out to try...). and out of the oven the marshmallows just oozeddddd out of the cookie.

oh, and did you notice, i finally got a silpat! love love love. although with waiting for the cookies to cool and such i still ended up using aluminum foil to bake the rest of the cookies so i wouldn't waste the heat of the oven. hopefully one day i'll have enough silpat to just bake away to my hearts content (how dangerous that day will be)

so in less than 2 hours i'll be 24. phew. this year is going by so fast. oh, i forgot to mention my family tried chick n' friends for my birthday (i was in the mood for super low key kind of birthday celebration). and yes, the vegetarian got fried chicken food for her birthday (but i had fried fish!) but i forgot to get a waffle! time for me to get some sleep now that spring break is ending, too bad i couldn't have another week of spring break. but it's probably better this way as i need to go on a bit of a fried food/baked goods detox.

faberge cakebites!

2011-03-24T19:54:00.000-04:00

so spring break is almost over. it's amazing how i still got up around 6 am and yet the day was too short to get everything done that i wanted! but today ended up very fun. this was completely experimental, can it be done, kind of fun. and my fingers and back are feeling it. but totally fun. i looked up faberge eggs to get some designs to create on the cakebites, but i only really managed to recreate one design. and shaping the cakebites into egg shapes was so strange and yet difficult! who knew eggs were such a funny shape.

i kept a real egg next to me while i shaped the cakebites (carrot flavor!)

this was probably my 3rd or 4th egg i decorated. the first couple did not come out so nice. i need to work on my piping. the two side flowers were made from individual flower sprinkles, but the top flower i made by using a toothpick and shaping a flower on parchment paper then transferring it dried onto the top of the cakebite.

this is one of my favorites! the blue flowers are so cute and it looks like a very simple daisy chain (not so clean looking because this was pre-tweezers)

i'm amazed i'm not permanently cross-eyed from sticking all the teeny tiny candy beads onto my egg. but once i figured out to use tweezers to pick the little beadies up once i dipped them in the chocolate instead of using my fingers and making a mess of things it was a bit easier. it still took about 2 hours, but look how fabergey it looks!

here are all the eggs i decorated that i find okay looking (the others got the axe- into my mom's or dad's tummy). do you like all the upside down shot glass stands:) happy early easter!

cookies like crack

2011-03-13T18:54:00.001-04:00

now, i've never actually tried crack, but i really am addicted to these cookies- chocolate chocolate marshmallow pudding cookies. my all time favorite cookies at this point (and i've had a LOT of cookies). AND this is without the peanut butter chips. i can't imagine how many i'll inhale once i can have peanut butter again. i used some milk chocolate chips in place of the peanut butter chips. thank gosh these were going to my friend for her birthday or else they would have all ended up in my stomach!

i baked the first couple batches on aluminum foil, terrible idea because when the marshmallows melted onto the foil it never let go. but parchment paper worked out much better.

picky palate is my new favorite blog right now. every single recipe makes me want to get in the kitchen. it's downright wrong that so many of them have peanut butter, but i'll look forward to trying them out in april!

oh, and i got to fire a musket at work today! i don't think i ever mentioned it before but i work at the b&o museum elliott city station and the reenactor taught me how to shoot his musket. even with just powder and no bullet i could feel the kickback, but it was pretty fun shooting it:)

candied ginger lime cookies

2011-03-10T07:14:00.000-05:00

wow, it's been a while since i've updated this. my bad! school is going along, chemistry is trying to bury me, but somehow a 61% gets curved to a B. it seems strange that i'm not really getting the material but our professor doesn't expect us to so he just curves it. an odd way of determining whether or not you understand the material.

anyway, this time instead of baking in place of studying i waited until after all my midterms were over and then let myself go crazy:)

making the chai cookies again (a half batch) and with the same recipe i'm ignoring the addition of chai and making a half batch of candied ginger lime cookies!

this is my first time making candied ginger, and i'm not sure i got it right and it's taking an awful long time to cool (i think i had too much liquid left) but it was fun to try it! i ended up putting the ginger in the oven for a bit to dry out and then tossed with some sugar.

i only had one lime in the fridge so i zested the whole thing and added it and the juice of the whole lime into the cookie.

* somehow my batter for the ginger lime cookies turned out really dry and i didn't have anymore butter on hand, so i added some crisco and milk, which (i can't believe i forgot this) biscuit-cake like cookies. not terrible tasting, but not what i wanted. i wanted buttery melt in your mouth cookies. next time i'll remember what crisco and milk together do to recipes before i start adding ingredients willy-nilly. oh, and the ginger flavor didn't come out as strong as i had hoped.

happy new year!

2011-02-03T07:25:00.000-05:00

it's the year of the rabbit, which is also my year! apparently the year is the time to catch your breath and calm your nerves. so relax!

maybe this will help:)

tres leches cake from pioneer woman! it is soooo delicious. i used skim milk (b/c what would i do w/ the excess whole milk?) and soaked it for 48 hours b/c our bday celebrating for the D was pushed back a bit. but seriously, she's not joking when she says you have to make/eat this cake.

happy new year! have some ddukgook

appley apple bread!

2011-01-20T22:39:00.000-05:00

this bread is soooo good. and i'm saying this over a week after i made it b/c apparently having a final tomorrow means i'll do anything to avoid studying for it. so i'm finally getting around to posting up this recipe.

still working through the apples at home (the ones from catoctin mt. orchard). and this recipe is going to be made again (although i'm going to tweak it a bit to see if i can lower the sugar amount and still get that sugary goodness that is sweet and kind of crispy (but not in a bad way) yumminess.

Apple Bread (makes two loaves, and you'll want both!)

1 cup whole wheat flour

2 cups all-purpose

1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

1/4 tsp baking powder

3 eggs

1 1/2 cups sugar

1 c applesauce (unsweetened)

1 Tbl vanilla extract

2 cups diced apples (i used four various medium apples)

extra sugar and cinnamon to sprinkle on top of the bread

Preheat oven to 350 F. Grease and flour two bread pans.

Mix flour, cinnamon, baking soda, salt and baking powder in a medium bowl. In another bowl, beat eggs and add sugar and applesauce in a large bowl. Add vanilla and dry ingredients. Stir in apples. Dump into the pans (it will be a thick batter) and spread evenly. Liberally sprinkle cinnamon and sugar over the loaves (this will give the bread some extra nice texture)

after my final tomorrow i'm going to try to play around w/ the ingredients a bit to find out if i can put less sugar in. i still need to make a real apple cake!

apple bites

2011-01-13T09:05:00.000-05:00

something about studying makes me want to eat or bake, so as a reward for getting through my food science midterm (not that i did well...but that's besides the point) i decided to bake (the eating came during the studying!)

there are still so many apples in the house i knew i wanted to bake with apples and looking through my favorite blogs i saw a lot of delicious looking apple cake recipes (check out bakerella's and smittenkitchen's) but 2+ cups of sugar plus a cup of oil was daunting (maybe it was all the talk about eating healthy foods in class that's killing me) that i decided to fiddle with some muffin recipes and ended up with muffins chock full of apples = apple bites! i found this recipe online somewhere and tweaked it (i think it was for some diet program since it had points)

Apple Bites (makes 12)
1 1/4 c. skim milk
3/4 c. cornmeal
1/2 c. all-purpose flour
1/2 c. whole wheat flour
2 tsp. baking powder
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda
a little less than 1/4 c. honey (i didn't have a lot of honey left so this is why i used less)
2 Tbl plain yogurt
1 egg
3 medium apples, peeled and diced small (i used a granny, golden delicious and i think a mcintosh)
some cinnamon and brown sugar
1/2 cup chopped walnuts (optional)

Preheat oven to 350. Grease and flour a muffin pan. Toss the apple chunks in cinnamon and brown sugar, set aside. In a large bowl combine milk and cornmeal, let stand for 10 minutes. In a medium bowl, combine the dry ingredients. Whisk honey, yogurt and egg into the cornmeal mixture. Stir in apple and flour mixture. Spoon into the pan and bake for about 15-20 minutes.

*next time i want to try soaking oats in the milk instead of cornmeal. i like the kind of grainy texture you get from cornmeal but i'm thinking oats would make this much more moist. the apple bites weren't very sweet (which is nice) and the nutty bites of walnut helped make it extra tasty.

pb rice krispy cake

2011-01-09T19:12:00.000-05:00

happy birthday to M!

this is peanut butter rice krispy treats topped with a semi sweet chocolate shell and stacked on top of one another to make a different kind of birthday cake. you can never go wrong with rice krispies especially in my family. and adding peanut just makes it that much better!

pb rice krispy cake
1 cup corn syrup
about 2 cups peanut butter (i eyed this amount)
10 cups rice krispy cereal
2 bags minus about 7 marshmallows
about 2 cups semi sweet chocolate chips

butter an 11 x 13 pan or i buttered two spring form pans (and layer with buttered parchment paper for even easier removal). melt and boil the corn syrup and peanut butter. add the marshmallows and let them melt completely (i also tossed in a couple later to have little chunks of whole marshmallows). when it's all a melted gooey mix take the pot off the heat and mix in the cereal. once that's all mixed in, dump it into whatever pan(s) you're using and press down with a buttered spoon. once it's cool you can melt the chocolate chips and spread it over the whole thing and then let that cool until the chocolate rehardens.

happy new year!

2011-01-01T16:39:00.000-05:00

made this for some friends from college when they came to visit.

this comes from smittenkitchen. it's a mushroom and blue cheese galette. the crust is store bought (sometimes it's just that much easier:) and used some large button mushrooms and some mushrooms i'm not quite sure the name of but they were good. the recipe is ridiculously straightforward and easy. happy 2011!

christmas and the end of holiday food (i hope)

2010-12-27T08:19:00.000-05:00

the sisters and i were wishing that the holidays were split up more so the gluttony of food would be spread out throughout the year. but at least we're almost to the end of the holiday season. soon it'll be people packed into the gym in january and nothing to look forward to but summer. hope everyone had a wonderful christmas. ny got a nice blizzard so s2 got stuck here, hope everyone traveled safe and sound.

xmas meal: scalloped potatoes (from the everything cookbook: not the most attractive thing when it's made, but very easy and yummy), french bread (from king arthur flour, also very easy to make and no knead!), mushrooms stuffed with brie, delish!), pepper crusted salmon with lemon and garlic, olive and rosemary bread (not sure where this is from, s4 made it), rum cake (self-explanatory deliciousness), buche de noel

the pioneer women cooks' rum cake is so so good. the pecans chopped on top and baked into the cake were delicious once the rum/butter/sugar glaze soaked into them. it was a bit difficult to stab the cake where the pecans were so next time pouring more of the syrup before the cake is flipped out of the bundt pan. it was also hilarious watching s2 pour an additional shot of rum onto her cake slice!

the mocha buche de noel is a bit more time consuming than the rum cake, but light and airy with a nice chocolate glaze that hardens when it dries. the added instant coffee really adds to the flavor.

happy xmas eve!

2010-12-24T09:48:00.000-05:00

the cake bite thing is in full swing. had some crazy busy days since it was the holidays and i'm so glad s4 was here to help me out. don't forget to check out the new designs and orders. running your own business is definitely something that is different and interesting everyday- a lot of work but hopefully once i get all the kinks worked out it'll be smooth sailing.

the holidays = baked goods. which is not so good for my waistline but oh so fun to make! rice krispy treats are just so easy and pretty much anything can be added- chocolate chips, holiday stripes, sprinkles, etc. we also topped some shortbread cookies with white chocolate and then striped and added little green swirls. happy holidays!

it's beginning to look a lot like christmas

2010-12-19T03:38:00.000-05:00

christmas music has been playing in my car non-stop probably since thanksgiving and there was actual snowfall so christmas is definitely less than a week away! not that any present buying has occurred but that's a work in progress. my sweet shop blog is coming along and i finished my first order (check it out).

walking through old ellicott city the windows for the shops are decked out in full holiday happiness!

it's amazing how the pink and purple ended up looking so festive!

i almost thought about trying to hanging ornaments with ribbon against the white wall that runs along our stairs but wasn't sure if it would hang right...

and of course, holidays = holiday baking!

Double chocolate coconut peanut butter cookies (now that's a delicious mouthful!)
1 box chocolate cake mix
1 can condensed milk
about 1/2 cup coconut*
about 1 cup peanut butter (we used smooth, but crunchy works too)
about 1 1/2 - 2 cups semisweet chocolate chips
1 egg

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Combine all ingredients and then roll into however large cookies you would like and bake for 10-15 minutes (depending on the size) until the bottoms are browning (which is a bit more difficult with cookies that are already brown, but they do have a different color!). these cookies sink and harden a bit once they cool so don't worry too much if they are very soft when they first come out of the oven, just make sure the bottoms are brown.

the coconuts give it a nice crunch, i'm sure lots of different add-ins would be great. some holiday colored chips would also probably be adorable. these are about the easiest and tastiest cookies ever

popeye's chocolate lava cake

2010-12-12T08:51:00.000-05:00

my parents came home yesterday from golfing and as usual picked up some fried chicken from popeyes. this time around they were given a package of this chocolate lava cake to try out. according to restaurant news this lava cake was tested out in september to give you the "feeling that you did something."

i'm a big fan of popeyes' biscuits and maybe they should have stuck to that. i don't know if it was because it's a chocolate cake or because of the black plastic container it was sold in but when i opened it i thought i was looking at a worm hole. i couldn't tell what i was looking at. plus, the ingredient list (pretty much everything but the title and the boxed nutrition facts on the left picture) was a bit frightening. the ingredients to make a cake normally were in bold to make you notice them more i suppose, but then all the preservatives and such were in regular font in between. the cake container serves 4 and each serving is 320 calories (170 from fat, 8 g sat fat, 22 g of sugar). so i heated it up and gave it a try. i don't know about you but when i think lava cake i think a cake that when you dig into it, oozing chocolate goodness wells out from inside. this was more of a chocolate cake with oozing icing on top (when heated). the cake seemed standard box cake texture and taste, the icing/lava was a bit odd. there was some sort of aftertaste that i didn't enjoy (probably from the preservatives). i put the leftovers in the fridge for anyone else to try and this morning when i looked at it there were white flecks of something dotting the cake. ew. the packaging says use within 5 days of purchase, so who knows what's going on with the food. i think if i was craving dessert i would buy those break and bake cookies (has anyone tried those sweet moments desserts in the refrigerator aisle?) and put in the extra couple minutes instead of getting this cake.

sugar overload

2010-12-08T13:29:00.000-05:00

oy vey. felt like baking today and since i'm loving toasted coconut, chocolate and nuts so much i decided to try out the recipe on the eagles' sweetened condensed milk can. i didn't have enough graham cracker so i cut more than half the butter (also in an attempt to make it "healthier" :) and also cut back on some of the chocolate chips. i toasted the coconut beforehand and had chopped almonds, walnuts, and pecans. really the easiest recipe in the world to make, but boy is it a cavity maker on the first bite!

this is their chocolate chunk magic cookie bars. it's very simple but looking at their other recipes i think i'd rather add in peanut butter or salty nuts or something to balance the sweetness. i'm glad my coconut was unsweetened because that would have really sent me into a diabetic shock. so i will be enjoying some fiddling.

getting back on track...again

2010-12-02T14:46:00.000-05:00

there's something about the holidays that just means letting go a bit. which is not a bad thing, as long as you can keep focused on the long term. fell off the healthy eating a bit w/ all the thanksgiving leftovers (which are still hanging around staring at me...) but i think i finally got it figured out today. i can't decide if it was from the handfuls of semisweet chocolate chips i was eating from the baking bag or the celery and pb bonanza (if you know me at all, you know pb is my crack). but i got on the treadmill (it's finally too cold to run outside) and somehow cranked out 80 minutes on the thing without noticing and then whipped up a veggie and salmon dish with pesto. can i just say i love the wild alaska salmon burgers from BJ's? i just bake it up and then cut it up and toss into whatever i want (see pizza from before). so here's to eating healthy and having those not so healthy days that are just as important to being happy:)

cooking is so much more fun with family

2010-11-28T20:14:00.000-05:00

finally had our thanksgiving feast on saturday! it was a bonafide feast with everything made from scratch-
top to bottom, left to right: turkey, garlic mashed red potatoes with mashed cauliflower, roasted cauliflower with paprika, cornbread stuffing (the recipe for the cornbread in the 2nd row is also from the nytimes recipe), roasted brussels sprouts, cranberry walnut sauce, krispy kale chips with lemon yogurt dip (the brussels sprouts also tasted delicious dipped in the yogurt), cornbread (so so so good), "three sisters" stew (very homey and warm), apple pie (prepared the same way as the ones before but this time with all all-purpose flour, i prefer half wheat flour), and coconut sweet potato pie.

we also made vegetarian mushroom gravy for the first time (ate gravy with my mashed potatoes for the first time in years!) and it was very simple and tasty.

we taste tested the sweet potato pies and s3 went for the coconut sweet potato and mom, s2, s4, and i went for the other sweet potato pie (the one from my last entry). the coconut sweet potato pie is much creamier and smoother while the other one has an almost chunkier and heartier texture. we also toasted the coconut before putting it into the graham cracker crust which really adds to it (everything tastes better toasted!)

food coma yet?

2010-11-25T21:46:00.001-05:00

happy last few hours of thanksgiving! our family is celebrating on saturday when s2 comes home so today was a pseudo-trail run for the real thing:) which means lots and lots of baking! s4 came home on tuesday morning and we pretty much baked non-stop on wednesday except to eat and give the oven a break!

first up is a sunflower seed bread from joy the baker. it's delicious. the only thing we would change is increasing to 3/4 cup of the sunflower seeds going into the bread and only 1/4 cup for sprinkling.

this is a pumpkin pie ice cream cake from eating well. we decided to make it not so healthy and add chopped pecans into the crust (gingersnap cookies, eummmm) and use breyer's vanilla bean (half a gallon!). the pumpkin mixed into ice cream with cinnamon and nutmeg is unbelievably tasty, but i wish it were a bit warmer to enjoy the coolness of it. the pie tastes best after it has enough time to chill or else you start getting a little icy crystaly (any suggestions on storing an ice cream cake/pie?)

we have another coconut sweet potato pie but we're saving that until saturday so we made another version of sweet potato pie to do a little taste testing. this one comes from a recipe i used last year but we subbed in a graham cracker and toasted coconut crust. the pie mix is sweet potato, condensed milk, sugar, butter and spices. i'll try to find the link for the recipe!

a glimpse of the oven- the sweet potatoes baking on top, sunflower seed bread and an apple crumble. we made another version of apple pie in a bundt pan that turned out really well. we took the other half of the KAF pie crust i made for pop tarts and covered chopped up apples mixed with cinnamon sugar in a bundt pan and it was just like apple pie...topped with ice cream. so so good. did i mention we ran twice today? haha.

there was real food today! pizza on naan! the left one was naan topped with pesto, onions, tomatoes and mozzarella. the back pizza has onions, tomatoes, salmon chunks (from frozen salmon burgers from bj's, which are really really good) and pepper jack cheese.

i think we baked something else but it's slipped from my mind. we're still making at least one more pie tomorrow (apple pie in a square dish!) and then starting the preparations for eating on saturday! anyone going black friday shopping to burn off some more calories?

sweets by s5

2010-11-24T13:07:00.001-05:00

finally getting around to figuring out this cakebites/sweets bakery. so introducing s5.

this is a prototype 1 pound box that holds 8 large cake bites. i'm still working on the logo and such, but i'm so excited to finally get around to this. i'll have several flavors. for more information- sweetsbys5@gmail.com

apple pop tarts

2010-11-22T17:12:00.000-05:00

man, today was a productive day! so after my swim, i had class, then i went grocery shopping to pick up bananas (i just can't live without bananas! unfortunately all the bananas were completely green, bleh) then came home and went on a baking frenzy. i guess thanksgiving is so close, but not close enough to warrant baking the pies already. so i baked everything except a pie! this included a spice cake mix (to try out spice cake bites), peanut butter blossoms (love love love these, and so simple- box of yellow cake, can of condensed milk, 1 egg, 1 cup pb, and wha-la, press in a hershey kiss after they come of the oven if you want some super cute chewy cookies), and attempt two at pie crust to make- homemade pop tarts!

the crust recipe comes from KAF from the baking demo little guide book and i cooked up three different apples (the parents went to catoctin on sunday and came back with bushels and bushels, yay for apple desserts!) with some fresh squeezed lemon, cinnamon and nutmeg. i finagled with joy the baker's pumpkin pie pop tart recipe.

my crust came out terribly (i used 1.5 cups all purpose and 1 cup whole wheat) b/c i don't think i added enough water (which worries me for thanksgiving since i had those now frozen crusts at the same consistency...i will just have to keep trying). but it actually turned out pretty well that my crust was falling into pieces b/c i used all the little pieces to make these mini apple rolls that were a perfect bite size piece. not the prettiest things around but man are these oh so delicious.

i topped off some just-out-of-the oven pop tarts with vanilla ice cream and served it as dessert to the parents, success!

oh, and my run was wonderful. i had to eat something after class so then i was waiting for it to digest and then i get distracted by baking but i made it out for the beautiful sunny weather (and got a farmer's tan and vitamin D along the way). i did take my mp3 player but i've decided music makes me really happy and i was almost smiling my entire run. which was amazing. and i went out of my way to pass the blow up turkey (i'll try to get a picture!) which cracks me up. and breathe:)

finding my endorphins

2010-11-22T08:41:00.000-05:00

i can't say definitively that my swim this morning was due to reading a book or from having a break day yesterday, but can i just say i had the best swim this morning and i found my endorphins again!

let me start with the book. i just finished reading born to run by christopher mcdougall which is his quest to find out why his body was giving out on him when he ran. it took him to the tarahumara indians in mexico, ultrarunners (and by ultra, i mean running 100s of miles per session) and ultrarunners around the world. the thing that really stuck out to me was that the tarahumara enjoy running, they don't look like they're about to pass out on a hill or anything. in fact, their real name is raramuri (the running people or something to that extent). running started out as something to get out and clear my head but it slowly became a chore and the after run high, those wonderful chemically charged endorphins, went bye-bye. after finishing the book late last night i wanted to immediately go out and run, but i didn't think a run outside at 10 pm would be the safest or smartest thing to start out in my own quest for that running fun.

which brings me to this morning. i woke up excited to swim hoping that the ideas of running would translate into swimming (even though a lot of the theories in the book were about how humans were evolved to run) but i figured as long as i could get my head into it i would hopefully get the same results. and wha-la, i only stopped swimming because i had to take a shower to get to class, but i felt that endorphin high again and i was smiling in the shower and just thinking "i wish i had my sneakers so i could go out for a run now" so on my next run i'm going to go without my mp3 player and i'm going to try to be light on my feet and just enjoy the motions of getting from point a to who knows where

so, how do you feel when you run?

KAF and persimmons

2010-11-12T19:16:00.001-05:00

i went to a KAF baking demo today on pie crusts and tart shells. i've never been to one of their free traveling demos and i'm really glad i did! i've never been a fan of making pie crusts but she made it look so easy that as soon as i got home i followed their recipe and stuck the dough in the freezer, so now i'm set for thanksgiving (well, at least for the apple pie...i have to go get more butter for the pumpkin, sweet potato and whatever other pie concoctions i think of before then:) then, b/c i was feeling so pumped up with baking i decided to try baking with persimmons (they were on sale and we have pounds and pounds of fuyu persimmons!).

i didn't know this, but every september in indiana they have a persimmon festival and one of the desserts the state is known for is their persimmon pudding. now, this is clearly not persimmon pudding, but i went off the persimmonpudding website and found a persimmon cake recipe that looked like fun. mostly b/c it didn't really seem to have specific guidelines on cooking or amounts so i took some liberties with the recipe. it's getting gobbled up by the parents. it's moist and dense and the addition of walnuts makes it even tastier. i added nutmeg and cinnamon but i'm not sure how much or how little makes a difference to the flavor (fuyu persimmons don't have the strongest of flavors to begin with so i didn't want to overpower them). next time i think i will try making persimmon pie/pudding or a bread! and btw, persimmons are a good source of vitamin C and a very good source of dietary fiber, vitamin A and manganese. see recipe at the bottom on this entry.

this is a little something i made this week that i've finally gotten around to posting. this is another variety on my veggie chili. this time i added carrots and zucchini and i used an Amy's spicy chili seasoning packet and marinated the crumbled tofu in it for a bit before simmering and chowing down. don't forget to have this with some rice or bread to get a complete protein for those non-meat adding cookers!

Persimmon Cake (makes 16 small (but rich!) squares in an 8 x 8 pan)

2 cups persimmon pulp (about 6 fuyu persimmons)

3/4 cup brown sugar

2 eggs

it said "butter the size of a walnut" and i used up all my butter to make pie crusts so i took a medium spoonful of shortening....i think it gave the top a nice crunchy texture (like brownie)

2 cups flour

2 tsp. baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp cinnamon

1/8 tsp nutmeg

1/2 cup chopped walnuts (maybe next time toast these)

Preheat oven to 350 F and grease and flour an 8 x 8 pan. This was a kind of dump and mix method, but I tried to mix all the dry ingredients together first and then add the wet (the nice things about one bowl cooking). Drop mixture into pan (the mixture is very thick) and bake for about 50 minutes (or until a toothpick inserted into the middle comes out clean).

don't take a drug test:)

2010-11-08T18:53:00.000-05:00

celebrated s2's birthday this weekend and got to try out a new recipe! this one comes directly from smittenkitchen with no changes. and it's delicioussss. i've never had poppyseeds before but anything with lemon and this much butter can't go wrong:)

the cake has a dense eggy buttery flavor which reminds me of some of the cakes/breads in korea. i wish the lemon flavor had come through a bit more, but really, it tastes wonderful and looks so pretty. it's perfect for those that don't like too sweet of a cake but still want a cake.

all the little seeds are taking over!

dietary fiber kind of day

2010-10-28T12:28:00.000-04:00

another food/picture dump. i'm doing really well this week in terms of updating. maybe it's b/c i'm doing so well in finally preparing meals. this has become my go to lunch pretty much everyday this week. i can pretty much top the salad with whatever i'm in the mood for. this one has the mixed spring lettuce, tuna, chickpeas, yellow and red peppers, slice carrots and of course topped with salsa (not pictured, but i'm loving the safeway select hot southwest salsa)

going a bit out of order, i made a pumpkin chickpea curry for breakfast before going on a run. i wasn't sure how it would turn out but i figured it wouldn't hurt to try.

chickpeas/garbanzo beans are a good source source of protein, dietary fiber, manganese, and copper. it's also low in saturated fat. go chickpeas!

Pumpkin Chickpea curry (serves about 1) this is all very estimated
1/4- 1/2 cup diced onion
olive oil
some water
1/2 cup canned pumpkin
2 tsp curry powder (or however you like)
3/4 cup chickpeas
1/2 cup rice

Saute the onions in a small pot with the olive oil until they are nice and limp. Add some water (I think in total I added about 1/2 cup?) to make sure it kind of has a watery mix. Add the curry powder then canned pumpkin. Add the chickpeas and simmer on low for 5-10 minutes (you want to get the curry powder and pumpkin flavor into the chickpeas). Once it's all simmered, add the rice and mix it all up. Eat!

pumpkin is highly nutritious- it's a very good source of dietary fiber, vitamin A (beta carotene!), vitamin C, riboflavin, potassium, copper and manganese.

fall into pumpkin

2010-10-25T17:10:00.001-04:00

although my neighborhood looks like fall has already come and gone, once you leave my street the trees are still in full autumn colors. the reds, oranges and yellows are gorgeous, and they make me think of- pumpkin and all sorts of pumpkiny goodness that can be baked and eaten:D

this recipe comes from simply recipes. i tweaked a couple things- i ran out of granulated sugar, so ended up using about 1/2 cup of granulated and 1/4 cup of brown sugar (you'll see in a bit why i used less sugar). then i substituted unsweetened applesauce for the oil (and since the applesauce is sweet less sugar needed). plus, i'm still lacking allspice in my pantry so i dashed a bit more cinnamon and nutmeg.

the bread is super moist. and pumpkin with cinnamon and nutmeg is about the best combination ever. is it pumpkin pie time yet?

i couldn't help but take a picture of the fruit, probably the last strawberries i'll see/eat until next summer, but honeycrisp (they're juicy and kind of tart) apples will keep me company while it's cold.

vegerific

2010-10-22T10:56:00.000-04:00

somehow reading more about nutrition for my class makes me feel like i'm still not getting enough vegetables in my life (although as a vegetarian it is very easy to just sustain yourself on carbs). so here's some food ideas of the week (minus the carbs b/c i'm going through a bit of a detox after birthday celebrations). these are really small servings b/c i'm basically eating every two hours. which is really fun and good for people like me who like to graze:)

red pepper stuffed with tuna, diced onion, black beans and of course spiced with oregano (i love this stuff). it would be great with some quinoa or wild rice and an egg probably would have held it together better. you can blanch the pepper for a couple minutes first, then stuff and then bake for about 10-15 min (or longer for beef or chicken ingredients).

stir-fried peppers and onions, scrambled eggs spice w/ oregano! i had some other veggies but they weren't quite as pretty.

oh, and i finally watched some videos on youtube for swimming technique. tried them out this morning and man am i sore. hopefully, once i can swim more than the 8 or 10 laps with the correct technique i can improve my mile time.

s3's birthday

2010-10-20T22:22:00.000-04:00

it's technically not s3's birthday until tomorrow but we celebrated a bit early. i forgot my camera for dinner but we went to zaytinya's (in d.c.) for dinner. the food is very good and the pita bread they have out for noshing is even more dangerous:D we can't celebrate a birthday without cake! made chocolate matcha bundt cake for her birthday.

the swirls came out really pretty as i filled the bundt pan (note to self, the bundt pan needs serious greasing and cocoa powdering)

the cake is delicious and bakerella is right, it tastes so much better warm. i just wish i had a kitchenaid to get the mix nice and mixed because i felt mine was still a little lumpy with hand mixing. plus, i think bakerella's texture looks much more fluffy and mine def came out dense. dense but tasty!

i love fall and probably because it means i can bake to my hearts content AND heat the house. these are a brownie mix with some canned pumpkin tossed in. i attempted to make spider webbing designs on the top but forgot that the pumpkin would sink into the brownie and that the brownie would rise and make the spider webs look funny. but as usual, they were eaten

is it too early to eat?

2010-10-07T11:45:00.007-04:00

since M and D get up before the crack of dawn and stop eating by 3 or 4 pm i suppose it's okay to eat something like this at 7 am:) it's super easy and delicious! i got this recipe from Eating Well and based on what i had in the pantry it became more of a "mexican" lasagna. and even with all the changes it tastes good!

Mexican Lasagna (serves about 5-6, or one and a half M's)

1/2 Tblsp oil
1 medium onion, diced
1/2 zucchini, diced
about 9 oz of black beans, drained
1/2 tsp cumin
about 9 oz salsa of your choice
3-4 small whole wheat tortilla wraps, quartered
1 cup grated pepper jack cheese

Preheat oven to 400 F. Lightly grease a 9 x 9 pan. Heat oil in a skillet over medium-high heat. Add onion and cook until brown (about 5 minutes). Add the zucchini, black beans and cumin and cook for about 3 more minutes. Make a layer of tortilla wraps on the bottom of the 9 x 9 baking pan. Top with the vegetables, then a layer of salsa and then cheese. Repeat. Bake covered for 15 minutes. Bake uncovered for about 7 minutes or until the edges bubble and the cheese is melted.

and with all the tortilla wraps left over nothing like baking them w/ some olive oil and sea salt to make a stacy's pita chip kind of goodness.and to round out a productive cooking/baking day made a loaf of banana bread! running out of my breakfast granola bars (finally) so i went back to banana bread. i made a few changes again.

Banana Bread (Adapted from The Everything Cookbook)

Yield: 1 large loaf

1 2/3 cups whole wheat flour
1 cup instant oats
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
a little less than 2/3 cup applesauce (unsweetened)
2 Tblsp maple syrup
2 eggs
1 1/2 cup mashed banana
1/2 cup greek yogurt

Preheat oven to 350 F. Spray and flour a large loaf pan. In a medium bowl mix together the flour, oats, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Set aside. In a large bowl mix together the applesauce and maple syrup, add in eggs one at a time. Add the mashed banana. Add the flour mixture in thirds, alternately with the yogurt. Blend quickly and pour into pan. Bake about 45 minutes or until the center tests done.

i couldn't taste the maple syrup unfortunately, so i'm thinking next time of soaking the oats in the yogurt and maple syrup to really suck up the flavor. but probably the healthiest bread you could make that still tastes delicious. now i just need to get some pumpkin butter to mix with peanut butter and spread on top!

brrrr...time for lentil soup and other fixings

2010-10-06T12:03:00.003-04:00

it's chilly enough here that i'm wearing all my winter clothes inside the house. and that just means it's time for warm and toasty fill-up-my-tummy goodness. i recently signed up for newsletters from active.com and this recipe is compliments of their site. it's a quick and easy recipe, really good source of protein and makes your tummy all warm and cozy. i did have to put an extra dash of salt and pepper into my bowl though. speaking of quick and easy. i'm trying to eat an actual meal after class instead of just running into the kitchen and haphazardly looking for food that can get into my mouth as soon as possible. b/c that leads to the peanut butter jar and then i just feel a bit sick afterward. this takes a bit to cook. toss in whatever chopped veggies strike your fancy (i have potato, zucchini, and broccoli) and then toss in pesto (i have a frozen jar of bj's pesto) and wrap in foil and stick in the oven for about 40 minutes (until all your veggies are baked, the potatoes do take a while, fyi). and now onto a bit of a food dump. never got a chance to upload pictures from our labor day cooking b/c my laptop is a bit unhappy. but it was delicious! eggs italiano and stuffed french toast. the bread was stuffed with a strawberry and cream cheese mix. the eggs italiano was a saute of tomatoes, zucchini and onion on top of a whole wheat english muffin and topped off with a poached egg (which is really fun to do!). smittenkitchen has a great picture how-to on poaching eggs. oh, and i just noticed how huge the cheese looks on top of the egg. this is what happens when you don't have a cheese grater...but it still tastes good:)

oops moment and macadamia flour

2010-10-02T14:05:00.003-04:00

this past sunday s3 and i ran the bachman valley half marathon which is hosted by the WRRC. it's almost an hour drive to get there so i put on some flip flops so i wouldn't be wearing my sneakers on the drive up. as i stood in line to pick up my race number i realized that i hadn't put my sneakers in the car! thankfully, s2 wasn't running and she had on an old pair of her running shoes and we're the same size. so wha-la, i had socks in my bag and a pair of holey sneakers to run the race (too bad my lovely new inserts i had bought during training were now sitting in my sneakers at home). despite forgetting my shoes, rain right at the beginning of the race, it was a lovely course and well organized and i got a new PR (2:01:46)! Almost under 2 hours, the last couple miles a huge blister was forming on the bottom of my foot and i was just trying to push myself to get under 2 hours. next time. but i highly recommend the race!

had a bit of experimentation with macadamia flour from ecuador. i wish i had a picture but unfortunately my own computer is on the fritz so i'm pictureless. tried baking shortbread cookies and substituted half the white flour with macadamia flour. i wish i had nicer butter (or maybe it was the combination of the butter and the natural butteriness of the macadamia) and the texture was a bit too crumbly for my liking. i think the macadamia flour would be great for a good buttery crust.

breakfast (or dinner) of champions

2010-09-01T12:36:00.004-04:00

along with the granola bars i decided to make some banana bread (what else would you use leftover sour cream for??) to also have as handy dandy breakfast on the go. the recipe is similar to what i've made before except this time i used sour cream and greek yogurt (in place of the butter). of course it was about 3/4 whole wheat flour and the rest white flour and it tastes really good. especially with some pumpkin butter spread on top. eum eum.
reading my nutrition book for my online class i feel more and more like i'm eating unhealthy. which i'm really not compared to how i used to eat or how most americans probably end up eating due to time and budget. so i finally cracked and made huevos rancheros b/c i've been talking about them forever and it's a complete protein and has veggies (sort of). plus it's really easy to make. i cooked the black beans earlier in the day (you can just get the canned version and just rinse the sodium from it) and a can of salsa (this is safeway's southwest salsa medium), eggs, and a tortilla wrap. there's something about having the runny yolk mix w/ the salsa and beans that is just sooooo tasty. i'm drooling just thinking about it again.

granola bars

2010-08-31T10:06:00.003-04:00

forgot to take a picture but this granola is delicious and about as easy as pie (maybe about as delicious as pie, if it were pumpkin pie maybe a close second:) i sort of used a recipe from smittenkitchen but had to change up a lot of the proportions and ingredients due to what i didn't have in the kitchen. also, since i was working with a 10 x 13 pan i tried to increase the ingredients to fill the pan (didn't quite fill out the pan...)

Easy Granola bars
2 1/2 cups of oats
1 1/2 cups walnuts
about 1/4 - 1/2 cup honey (i just used the rest in my jar)
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 egg
1.5 cups raisins

I followed smittenkitchen's procedure, adding in the egg because i didn't think i had enough honey to get the granola to make bars. this stuff is tasty, it'd be great broken up into yogurt also. i chopped the granola up into bars and froze them so i could grab one before class.

baking with friends and 20 miles on the NCRT

2010-08-25T20:28:00.003-04:00

finally got together with some VM friends yesterday and got to baking. these are the black&white cookie's from The All-American Cookie Book by Nancy Baggett. the cookies are delicious, not too sweet and a wonderful butteriness to them (it helps that it has a stick and some butter AND shortening) the icing, at least the way we made it came out sort of interesting. the chocolate side made the cookie taste like a berger cookie (no complaints there) but the plain vanilla side was a bit odd. will have to look into adding more water so it pools on the cookie instead of having to be spread. but really, these are delicious cookies. i also love baking time consuming recipes with friends b/c everything gets split up and you get to spend some time together. now, since i have a huge bottle of corn syrup left, any takers on making more with me:)
today, after eating one too many b&w's i made my way to the Northern Central Railroad Trail which runs north through MD and into PA (i think eventually ending in York, PA). the first 10 miles are flat and lovely and the weather was perfect. the woman at monkton told me there was a lovely waterfall at mile 12 but by the time i reached mile 10 i knew my feet wouldn't like an extra four miles tacked onto a 20 mile walk. i wish i had my bike b/c i would have loved to go further up. there's some great history along the way and at mile 8 is the monkton station? and there's a sandwich and snowball place and real bathrooms. there's not a single trashcan though, which i found a bit odd

running pains

2010-08-20T13:56:00.003-04:00

i've been MIA for a bit. trying to fix my laptop so the endless and random "e's" that go across my screen would stop so i did a bit of spring cleaning (which was desperately needed) and so far only one instance of "e's" dancing across my screen. i'll keep my fingers crossed.

not much in the baking front, trying to keep from baking without other people to enjoy it with me (or at least eat the stuff that's made). instead, focusing on training for the bachman half marathon in sept. i was doing really well, was even at 10 miles, but then the pool is closed for maintenance and i was running everyday so of course my body decides to die out on me. so the whole week has been a bit of limping as i try my best to destroy my body because i have nothing better to do but run. maybe it really is time to give my legs a break...

solo exploration

2010-08-06T18:51:00.005-04:00

finally went on a road trip today. took the historic national road/md 144 west and just drove until i would see something interesting. starting from howard county i drove through carroll, frederick and part of washington county. the historic national road was the first federally funded road that connected the east to the west (opened in 1807). 170 miles of it run through maryland (it ends in vandalia, illinois). if you decide to travel the sections that i did, keep your eyes peeled for the "scenic byway" signs because this route is not a straight shot on one road. it involved a lot of turns and quick lane changes (sorry!). and yes, this was a solo trip so that means i took some of these pictures while driving...i know i know, bad me. oh, and the sign for "wings and more" was more hilarious b/c the little drive-in building it was set up had "banana splits" as the more. such a random combination of american and chinese.
part of the reason i didn't make it as far west as i had hoped was a detour in downtown frederick, which is a happening place, but there was definitely also a lot of vacant shops (probably from the recession). the weather was much less muggy today so it was nice to walk around the city. founded in 1745 by english and german settlers, frederick definitely looked more german than old ellicott city. i used the walking tour to look at the old buildings and along carroll creek park. i saw the top of the spire for this church and took a shot from below (the one on the left) and when i was driving out of the top floor of the parking deck (3 hrs free if you get your ticket validated by the tourist center!) i saw the top of the church again (much nicer view). unfortunately, with only the 15 minutes to get your car out of the garage (half of which i spent trying to find my car) i could only pause and take a quick shot)
this is the community bridge mural along carroll creek park. the bridge is actually concrete painted to look like stone. crazy isn't it?and this is a shot i took from below one of the bridges crossing carroll creek.

oh, i didn't get a good shot, but did you know there's a funkstown, md!

quinoa and unemployment

2010-08-04T12:24:00.004-04:00

it's funny that such different topics ended up together as my title, one is a food (a complete protein at that) and well the other...i think everyone has a pretty good idea of what the other one means.

but that is where i am, unemployed, and with time on my hands it was finally time to get down and cook some quinoa. which is very very easy, it was just everything else with it that became time consuming (which is why i would only do this unemployed and yes, that means i am not quite so creative about eating nutritiously when i'm employed.

yesterday was my last day as a Volunteer Coordinator for AmeriCorps/Volunteer Maryland. the last 10 months were such an experience, learning about volunteerism, about my organization and about myself. i'm still driven to volunteer and i'm thinking about getting into community health once i get this dietetics degree under my belt. which brings me back to food (doesn't it always come back to food?)

this reminds me of 101cookbooks quinoa recipe. which looks divine. mine includes baked autumn squash (this is a real time consumer to peel the outside, chop and bake), black beans (how come i can't cook these suckers right?), toasted pine nuts (yum!), sauteed green pepper and of course, quinoa. delicious and nutritious. at least i have tons of leftover cooked ingredients so at least i can eat these for the next couple days without having to do any cooking. thank gosh for the small things. happy eating!

food dump

2010-07-28T16:00:00.004-04:00

wow, it's been awhile, so there's a lot of catch up on. i'm sorry that i'm too lazy to find a pretty picture of the 100 cupcakes i made. i have to say though, i love cream cheese frosting. but that's over and so is orgo, so here is a cornucopia of foods that were made in the midst of orgo studying. haha. study breaks= baking. zucchini tart up above. yum, as usual.
best muffin recipe everrrrr. it's so healthy also and so easy to substitute ingredients to make different varieties. we made carrot raisin, chocolate zucchini and banana walnut chocolate versions and each was yumminess. although i think the carrot raisin was my favorite. scroll to the bottom to get the full recipe.
strawberry icebox cake! so easy and delish and perfect for the heatwave we were having. some cool whip, nilla wafers and strawberry, refrigerate and presto- deliciousness! it's seriously like crack. i think i had a whole 3rd of it the first night i tried it...

Oatmeal Muffins general (i've starred the ingredients i added to make the carrot raisin version)
1 cup instant oats
* 1 cup raisins
1 cup milk
* 1 cup finely grated carrots
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup applesauce
1 egg
* 1 tsp grated orange peel
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 Tbl baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
* 1/2 tsp cinnamon (estimate, i kind of just sprinkled into the bowl)
* 1/4 tsp nutmeg (same as the cinnamon)

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Spray a muffin pan (or line with liners). Combine the oats, * raisins, and milk and refrigerate for at least 2 hours or overnight.

Combine the *carrots, brown sugar, applesauce, egg, and *grated orange peel in a bowl, mix in the oat mixture. Combine the dry ingredients, quickly mix into the wet ingredients. Spoon into muffin pan and bake for about 15 minutes.

Makes 12 large muffins

(If you want to make the chocolate zucchini muffins substitute zucchini for the carrots, or do half-half, put in chocolate chips instead of raisins and a dash of lemon juice instead of orange peel, cinnamon and nutmeg. for banana chocolate walnut, take out the grated vegetable and spices and throw in the banana, chocolate and walnut.)

100 cupcake mission, part 1

2010-07-19T22:13:00.003-04:00

i'm not sure what i was thinking when i decided to take on baking 100 cupcakes that were 1) healthy; 2) during school; 3) required shredded carrots (i want to marry a box grater). but here i am on part 1 and i've successfully shredded and finely chopped 12 and something cups of carrots. while chopping these carrots all i could think of was making some oatmeal and walnut muffins dotted with finely shredded carrots. that will i suppose be my next experiment. but after i survive this first.

i take it back, thinking of muffins wasn't the only thing that popped in mind. i also amused myself with the idea of forgetting this dietitian thing and just entering culinary school. b/c clearly expert chopping skills=chef material:) it felt very julia child in julie & julia where child masters the onion chopping the fastest!

the enormous bag of shredded carrots are hanging out in the fridge. i'm thinking of baking 50 cupcakes before class tomorrow night and then 50 after class? the biggest hurdle will be trying to figure out where to put them in the fridge or even how to transport them. any suggestions?

1 mile!

2010-07-16T10:56:00.004-04:00

i finally swam a mile!!! it's only week 4 of the 6 week program i was following but i was feeling good enough to chug through the 58 or whatever laps i did:D and to celebrate, here's some food:
stopped by the grocery store from the pool and picked up an avocado and tomato and wha-la, made a nice omelette (threw in some ricotta cheese and black beans too).and of course, potato chip cookies:) i don't know if i really notice the potato chips in the cookies, they cookies are good, crispy on the outside, chewy on the inside, super buttery. i based the recipe off of a country living recipe. i decreased the sugar to 3/4 cup for both the granulated and brown since i figured the chocolate would make it sweet enough (half batch with chopped up hershey kisses and the other half w/ lavendar candy melts, both leftover chocolates hanging out in the fridge) i also didn't add the salt to the recipe since the potato chips are already so salty. all in all, not a bad way to use up stuff sitting around the house.

oh, and for those in md, did you feel the earthquake this morning?? i was in bed and it felt like everything kind of picked up and rolled. sort of cool and freaky at the same time.

studying for orgo means...baking like sandra lee

2010-07-13T21:35:00.003-04:00

orgo exam on thursday. and that means i'm feeling stressed and would rather bake than study...but with work and classes, no-bake is as good as it's going to get. which is pretty darn good, if you ask me:) this is about as easy as dessert can ever get. store bought graham crust, half vanilla and half banana cream instant pudding (i never knew it only took 5 minutes for the stuff to mold! it's amazing i say!) and slices of banana. of course some whipped cream on top just to make it that much more fun:) the top right picture is a banana, blueberry, whipped cream and vanilla pudding parfait. that ended up being part of my dinner. which is terrible for me to admit since i want to be a nutritionist, but every once in awhile, whose to say pudding parfait can't be dinner? besides, i have to swim 1400 yards tomorrow.

the only thing that made me sad about the pie was i couldn't get a nice slice out. the crust just crumbled and the pudding was moving too much. maybe i needed to decrease the milk amount and fold in cool whip instead? oh, and i love picasa 3. i didn't realize i had the older version but this mosaic stuff is so fun! i'll have to learn more about editing pictures which is also a great way to procrastinate.

of course life isn't always about dessert (just always first!). there was a huge autumn squash in M's garden so i baked it with some olive oil, salt and pepper (delish!) and tasted like mashed potatoes. took that and scrambled it with egg and fresh green beans. very filling and nutritious and kept me full for a long time. too bad all the squash is gone now though...

happy tuesday almost sort wednesday! and happy no-baking (which is also good for hot, muggy summer days) i'm thinking about potato chip cookies after my exam this thursday:)

a little west coast love

2010-07-07T14:17:00.003-04:00

just got back from seattle for s1's wedding and i'm missing it already. there's something about waking up and being able to run to water and breathe in fresh air and see the mountains in the distance. it doesn't hurt that the east coast is suffering from a heat wave and seattle was having an abnormally chilly summer.
traveling of course is all about the food, so it was a food filled frenzy. but hands down the best salmon ever was at crow's (they were from copper river). i'm ruined for all other salmon. and where else to eat and see food than pike place market. these hanging vegetables were so nice!the wedding was originally going to be outside but rain struck and it was moved indoors. playing at kerry park while we looked at mt. rainier.

success?

2010-06-26T17:58:00.002-04:00

i think i may have a winner. that or the thrill of making a healthy cupcake has completely left me:) this is a carrot cupcake with a greek yogurt based frosting. i made slight changes to this carrot cupcake recipe and used this frosting recipe.
it was a whirlwind afternoon. i searched at work for a recipe and then raced home to get started on this thing. i divided the recipe in half so i would only have to figure out how to get rid of 6 cupcakes instead of 12 (thank gosh for google and it's online calculator). i took out the oil and put in greek yogurt instead (i think it took away a lot of the potential moist/fluff factor) but the cupcake is overall good. oh, and i also decreased the sugar amount b/c i'm using regular mott's applesauce and that has sugar added into it. i only had baby carrots in the house, let me tell you, trying to grate those little suckers on the shredder do-dad is dangerous business. and i have two band-aids on my fingers now to prove it. i think they came out pretty nice looking, but i think i will try to chop up the carrots some more so they aren't so noticeable.

as for the frosting, i didn't have any powdered sugar so i took some granulated sugar and pounded it w/ a wooden pestle (or is it the mortar part, whichever part you smash things with). so that was more interesting times. then threw in a spoonful of yogurt and a dash of vanilla extract (i was only trying to ice one since no one in my family digs the greek yogurt). the frosting is a bit runny and tart, not quite the "cream cheese" frosting that usually shows up on top of carrot cake/cupcakes. and just to make my picture look cuter i threw a blueberry on top. i will have to fiddle with the frosting, any suggestions?

when healthy is too healthy...and my love affair w/ greek yogurt

2010-06-25T12:31:00.004-04:00

hello hello! it's not as humid today! 3 cheers for that. so i don't think i got to tell you but i'm giving a one hour little talk on healthier sweets to a group of kids at an at-risk summer camp. the goal is to give them a healthy cupcake and this is becoming a major difficulty! i figured the diet cola cupcakes just didn't have enough nutrients to make it worth it to give the kids so i took a regular chocolate cupcake recipe and substituted in some whole wheat flour, applesauce instead of oil and got this weird thing. they're pretty (it helps that i stuck some reese's cups in the middle, just to kill the "healthy" factor) but they just taste too...

healthy.

which i guess was the point, but if they don't taste almost as good as the real thing, personally, i would just go for the real thing. why have dessert (in moderation) if you can't enjoy it to it's full buttery, oily potential. phew. i just needed to get that off my chest. but yes, this is my sad attempt at a healthy cupcake. i'll try again tonight or tomorrow. i might just mess with a cake mix box since i like the fluffiness i usually get from those.

this lovely cup is a bowl of greek yogurt, a chopped peach, handful of raspberries and sunflower seeds. i've had this for dinner in some combination of this (bananas, blackberries, strawberries, walnuts, etc.) for at least the past month and i still haven't gotten tired of it. amazing how much i love this stuff. especially now that it's so hot outside, nothing like yogurt with a bunch of fresh fixings to make my day. yum yum

oh, and i swam my 900 yds this morning in less than 30 minutes (but i probably still look like a drowning rat, but that's a work in progress)

not studying for orgo= baking!!!

2010-06-18T13:14:00.005-04:00

wow, it's been a very dessert productive morning and i have to thank organic chemistry for such good times. have my first exam on monday and to avoid at all costs looking at compounds i went a little overboard on the baking.first up: a little experiment, cola cupcakes. this is about the easiest and cheapest thing to ever make. just a box of chocolate cake mix with a 12 oz. can of diet cola. although trying to find a 12 oz. can made this not so easy. stopped by the grocery store, only 12 oz. and their soda machine was broken, at cvs they only also sold the 20 oz, so i just caved and bought the darn bottle. who wants 8 oz of diet coke:)

2nd one up is peanut butter cookies straight from simpl y recipes. also very easy and they come out so pretty! although it was a bit difficult to press the cookie w/ the fork and get the dough to let go of the tines. i ended up mushing a couple. i also need to figure out how to make the cross marks deeper. anyone know why pb cookies get the cross hatches? i baked them at the higher temp for shorter and they still seem soft in the middle but it has that great brown crisp outside. they have a nice crispy texture, although i may have to try the softer chewier cookie next time. my first ever cookie stacks!
and last but not least reese's peanut butter chip cookies (recipe from the bag). these have sooo much sugar and butter in them, but hey, they're cookies, live a little. for the last batch i had i threw in some chopped minature reese's cups.* just tasted these. way too sugary for my liking, however, when i tried the one w/ the minature reese's cup it was much better, mebbe the mini gives it some extra salt flavor. but these are def a can't finish a whole cookie kind of recipe. will need to fiddle w/ the proportions next time, that or just take a regular chocolate cookie recipe and throw in some reese's cups.

return of the cakebites (and me)

2010-06-06T07:51:00.000-04:00

i know i know! it's been forever since i've posted anything up here, but aren't you glad i saved something beautiful to share??? it was my "lil sis's" grad party so made her some lavendar and white cake bites. the circular ones were funfetti cake and the square ones were oreo with a piece of cookies and cream candy inside! i thought that making something that didn't require using the oven (minus baking the funfetti cake) would make this less of a sweaty job in almost 90 degree weather but i was wrong. without a/c, i was sweating up a storm just crushing the oreo cookies! but i persevered! but i have to say the heat does not like forming pretty cake bites. especially the round ones, i shaped them once and then let them hang out in the fridge overnight and then re-rolled them so they would be smooth. but the lavendar color is gorgeous and the yellow bow (look how pretty i made it!) pops so nicely against it. i'm just glad i finished making them, this is definitely at least a two person adventure. so who's with me next:)

mother's day and bibimbap

2010-05-09T16:59:00.003-04:00

happy mother's day to all the mothers out there! somehow, even though it was mother's day, M ended up making a huge amount of food all weekend. it was delicious:) she made tons of veggies for bibimbap (eum eum). thanks, M! the before and after of getting all those veggies.

running and food

2010-05-06T08:25:00.004-04:00

this week has been good, i'm going to give some kudos to my twin, i think not having pb for a while really helped me feel not so sluggish. and the more i run the less i want to fill my body w/ sweets.

last night's dinner- stir fry spiced with cumin (which is all sorts of good for you!)this is breakfast today, got in another 4 miles so breakfast of champions- half a toasted bagel, egg and some baby carrots. i'll throw in an apple or something in a bit:)

day 7 and chai cookies again!

2010-04-30T12:56:00.003-04:00

it's the last day of no pb:D and i'm really excited to eat some tomorrow. but it hasn't been too bad. i definitely ate tons of tuna salad and carrots for lunch in lieu of peanut butter sandwiches, which is good all around fun. but let's get to the good stuff...
i am really liking these chai butter cookies. but since it's supposed to be in the 80s today i didn't want to waste heating up a whole oven to 400 degrees. so i'm using the baby oven and i feel like i'm using one of those toy ovens. i also added about 2 tsp of orange zest to the recipe but i'm not really tasting it. but who cares, it still is some yummy chai goodness. you can see an orange flake and the pretty sugar crystals!

pb detox day 1

2010-04-24T10:56:00.003-04:00

i'm going to blame it on it being the end of the week and being tired from work, but somehow my twin managed to convince me to try to live without peanuts/peanut butter for one week. 7 days! good grief, this sounds pathetic. but this is probably for my own good. i have an unhealthy love for all things peanut. i think i could have been carver's prize pupil. i would have been open to any and all peanut testing. we'll see how this goes- b/c the peanut butter jar was already giving me a sad look when i passed it by this morning...

chai butter cookies

2010-04-16T18:37:00.005-04:00

these make the house smell deliciousssssss. that's all i have to say. plus, finding great uses for the Ann's House of Nuts chai seasoning mix. this recipe comes from All Recipes. the only changes of course are that i used Ann's House of Nuts chai mix, i took out 1/2 cup of sugar b/c i think the chai mix is sweeter than the mix on the recipe, and only used 1 tsp of salt. these would taste perfect w/ some coffee or tea. or you can do it my way and i have it with some ice cream:)
i forgot how fun it is to press down on dough with a fork! and it definitely gives the cookies that extra special look

orange bread

2010-04-15T16:58:00.003-04:00

spring is up and running! greens, yellows, pinks, all sorts of colors. and especially orange. well, at least orange zest. this is actually the frozen stuff from over the winter that i've been wanting to use to make some orange bread from simply recipes.
the bread is good. not too sweet. nice orange taste (i added about an extra tablespoon of zest). i didn't make the glaze b/c i'm not a big fan of confectioner's sugar, but i am wondering how some orange juice would work in the bread. the crust has a nice crunch and the inside is a wonderfully soft and moist and light quality to it. the bread comes out beautifully so it would make a lovely gift!

an ode to butter, and chocolate, and everything in between

2010-04-12T16:56:00.004-04:00

wow. can i just say that. i mean, look at them! you can't say they don't look good. and the smell! and when you bite into one you get that slight crisp crunch on the outside and ooey gooey goodness on the inside. i think i need another one:) i didn't bother to even do something pretty for a picture, these cookies just wanted a picture pronto
the cookies were a bit difficult to slice from the roll. it might have been b/c i didn't chill the batter first and then roll it into a log. next time. also for future reference to make actual round ones, probably doing a little shaping before popping them into the oven would be a good idea

i cant' believe it's butter

2010-04-11T23:21:00.004-04:00

i am embracing butter. loving it, creaming it, smushing it...
maybe i should back track. after a day at work and then studying for a chem exam, i wanted nothing more than to bake. and not the "healthy" baking that doesn't quite taste the same, but real sugar and real butter kind of baking. the only reason i need to re-embrace butter- "chocolate pooh cookies" so cute, but so wrong in taste

so i went back to the first cookbook my sister and i ever got- nestle cookies. and even went to the beloved chocolate chip cookie recipe. and let me tell you, i went from no butter to a whole cup! did i also mention that it's almost midnight? maybe it's something about a silent house and a whole kitchen to myself that makes it okay to let loose (albeit, in a very quiet, try not to wake anyone up kind of way). since it's dark outside, it seems even my usual photo composition became more of a look into the kitchen. welcome, make yourself at home:)since it's late and i have some sort of realistic thinking to life that maybe trying to bake 5 dozen cookies at midnight when i have work and an exam tomorrow isn't such a grand idea, i'm trying the "chill overnight so the egg yolk can work its magic" technique. too bad i can't remember what the cookies tasted like pre-chilling. but they're enjoying their time in the fridge. come back tomorrow for some fresh baked cookies!

when it's 90 degrees outside...

2010-04-07T19:10:00.003-04:00

this is some strange strange weather! but, if the heat is getting to you, this is something I found when browsing the wonderful world of online food blogs- fake me out fruit sorbet

blend frozen fruit (i had strawberries) with a little bit of orange juice, and ta-da! a delicious, cold, nutritious sorbet-ish snack/dessert!

chicago

2010-04-05T12:59:00.003-04:00

went to chicago for the weekend. first time in the "midwest." although from my own ideas/sterotypes of the midwest, chicago does not come to mind. it was a weekend of eating, walking, and just hanging out w/ my darling mims. probably eating too much food, but that's the fun part! the picture is from under the bean. i love the fact that the city is so walkable, and everyone is out and walking their dogs. we visited the chicago institute of art for free w/ the free first weekend of the month deal with bank of america. if you've never heard of it and have a bankofamerica card check it out for your city.

be the picture

2010-03-30T21:07:00.002-04:00

i just finished filing my md tax return. boy oh boy, i wish i had some common sense in money. i kind of just with whatever the online thing says and who knows if i'm doing it right or if i'm actually getting back my money! and don't get me started on my federal tax return. that is a whole nother mess of a story with turbo tax! but back to the picture, i wish my life could be as tranquil and beautiful as a sunset. those trees are actually some of the cherry blossoms in dc, they're just going for a bit of a swim in the flooding waters:)

so enjoy the little things and take it easy w/ the money and the future. do a little baking or something, eh?

if you've had too much pb&j

2010-03-27T09:22:00.006-04:00

the problem with having to pack a lunch is that it invariably requires some amount of planning- is there bread to make a sandwich? how much of the pb is really left after i took a spoon to it last night, and so forth. and there's the fact that you can't eat pb&j sandwiches everyday (or i could try, but then there would be a pb shortage...) so these are some efforts on my part to incorporate some vegetables and non-pb&j sandwiches into my life.the red peppers in this picture look like giants taking over the meal! i add a spoonful of pesto, freeze this whole thing and then the day i want to eat this for lunch just zap it in the microwave and the spinach gets cooked.i bought some hot curry powder from a middle eastern market the other day hoping it would taste like indian curry. it didn't. however, it tastes like the yellow curry used by koreans. it's just some onion sauteed with the curry powder, then potatoes and any vegetables that were hanging around in the freezer. you can see that i couldn't wait for the food to cool before snapping a picture!

spring!

2010-03-21T08:44:00.002-04:00

hellooooo spring. where have you been all my life? it's been about the most perfect weather possible this weekend so nothing like a picnic with friends to really top it off. got these candied kiwi from ann's house of nuts (so much fun!) and they just pop with a beautiful green spring feeling. happy spring!

breakfast of champions

2010-03-19T09:53:00.002-04:00

it's a baking withdrawal...probably best that way so my stomach can resume some sort of non-pregnancy look:) this was an easy breakfast i threw together. fry the thinly sliced potato first in a little butter, then throw in the spinach, then an egg or two with some red pepper. salt and black pepper and ta-da, a beautiful and nutritious breakfast!

cake bites (again!)

2010-03-14T10:09:00.005-04:00

these are another variation on our crushed cookie in baked cake, cake bites. these have fudge striped shortbread cookies in a white cake mix box. s4 and i tried out plymouth pantry almond bark instead of our usual wiltons candy melts. the bark is cheaper and doesn't seem to mind being microwaved at full power but there was only milk and white chocolate flavors. we also shaped the bites into squares! it's much harder to be square than round:) life is like a box of chocolates (or in this case, like a tub of chocolates)

chai latte muffins

2010-03-12T21:47:00.005-05:00

can you smell that? it smells like warm chai tea...this recipe comes from baking bites. s4 and i had stopped by ann's house of nuts earlier and they were selling prepared mixes of chai with unknown ingredients (but it smelled like chai, so probably in some proportion of cinnamon, cardamon, and such) but it was so cheap we couldn't say no. and talking to the lady she recommended trying out making cookies or something so here we are to moist deliciousness! it's vegan friendly too! yay to s4 for pictures and tinting/sepia fun times:)

cake bites!!!!

2010-03-08T09:51:00.005-05:00

yarm yarmmmmmm. cake bites from bakerella! we made the nutter butter cake bites and then added a surprise on the inside of half a hershey kiss or half a minature reeses peanut butter cup. the oreo cake bites are a bit different. it was sort of like the red velvet cake bites but a white cake mix with crushed oreos baked into the cake (s4's idea). it comes out much lighter than just the oreo version but it's a nice fluffy white kind. an army of cake bites....they don't stand a chance against my mouth.
one more look at drool worthy goodness

rocky road candy

2010-03-05T09:21:00.003-05:00

eummm. any excuse to bake is a good enough excuse for me. these are from anna at cookiemadness. they were about the easiest thing to make ever. well, except for when the marshmallows kept rolling away from me:) i used salted peanuts. they're disappearing so fast in my house (it helps that we're all so addicted to peanuts). good thing i wrapped some up to give away before they all got gobbled up.

oh deer me

2010-03-04T08:00:00.003-05:00

this doesn't look like food...

i figured if i can't bake i can at least take pictures of interesting things. the deer were passing right through our backyard and even with a window between us i still got a great shot. school and work are piling up. but once i get through my bio test today tomorrow will only be work and baking! which of course, is the best part:)

adventures in freezing

2010-03-02T09:16:00.003-05:00

these might look like little granola bites, but surprise, frozen cookie dough! i've been reading the bakers' banter from king arthur's flour these days in between my "studying." one of their posts were about freezing cookie dough so then you could bake however many cookies you want at the time you want them! how brilliant. so i decided to try it out. but i think i did something a bit off. b/c mine aren't baking right or maybe it's the oven. too bad i didn't think to bake a cookie before freezing it to see. i'm guessing it's either the applesauce that doesn't let the cookie become a cookie (mine stay round, and i press them down with a fork halfway through baking to get the whole thing cooked) and the bottom gets burnt too quickly! i will have to try the recipe again sometime.

oh, and yay for me, i actually used half butter half applesauce in this recipe (i do get a better crispiness to it when baked)

Chocolate Orange Cranberry Cookies

Makes 2 dozen

¾ cup all-purpose flour

½ tsp baking soda

¼ cup packed brown sugar

¼ cup butter (1/2 stick), softened

¼ cup applesauce

1 egg

1 ¼ cup oats

1 cup semi sweet chocolate chips

½ cup dried cranberries

1 tsp orange zest

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.

Combine flour and baking soda in a small bowl. Beat brown sugar and butter until creamy in a medium bowl. Add apple sauce. Gradually beat in flour mixture. Stir in oats, morsels, cranberries and orange zest. Drop by rounded tablespoons onto ungreased baking sheet. Bake for 9 to 10 minutes.

Adapted from Choc-Oat-Chip Cookies from Nestle Toll House

cranberry orange cookie/muffin

2010-02-26T10:21:00.006-05:00

this recipe comes from my "twin" who is helping me through my baking disaster from last time:) even though she said the cookies came out perfectly, i still have my aversion to baking with butter (i have no problem with eating it) so i used applesauce instead. so of course i get a bizarre cookie/muffin. which is great for people like my D whose teeth are not what they once were...they almost look like meringues because the texture is so smooth but the eating texture is definitely more muffin like. maybe pressing the dough down flat before baking will make a more crispy/chewy cookie.

Cranberry Orange Cookie (courtesy of my twin, although i bet hers tastes much yummier)
1 1/2 cup all purpose flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 c packed brown sugar
1/4 c applesauce
1 egg
3 Tblsp orange juice
2 tsp grated orange zest
1 c dried cranberries

Directions:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Lightly grease cookie sheets, or line with parchment paper.

In a medium bowl, cream together the white sugar, brown sugar, and butter. Stir in the egg, orange juice, and orange zest. In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt; mix into the orange mixture. Stir in the dried cranberries. Drop cookie dough by heaping teaspoonfuls, 2 inches apart, on the prepared cookie sheets. Makes about 20 cookies

Bake for 10 to 12 minutes, or until edges are starting to brown.

something wrong...

2010-02-24T21:46:00.003-05:00

so after the deliciousness of yesterday's muffin i bought some sweetened dried cranberries (they were on sale) to try to make some citrusy cranberry muffins. plus, i finally got around to buying some greek yogurt since i've heard so much about it. i figured it would lend itself to giving a light and moist muffin. but no, the result is something so hard to describe, not quite muffin, not quite cookie, wish it had butter kind of baked good. i guess i can't get it right everyday...even my camera was scared away by the strange food. any suggestions on best proportions or uses for the greek yogurt in baking? i'm thinking maybe some cranberry orange cookies would be really delicious!

orange chocolate muffins

2010-02-23T16:19:00.000-05:00

i don't even know how to tell you how delicious these are for how simple they were to make! they're getting gobbled up so quickly by the M and D. they are so soft and with such a great orange zing with chocolate that i had to put this up as soon as possible to share the yum! you can even see some orange zest in the picture! this was kind of spur of the moment "i feel like baking instead of studying for my chem" test next week that will more than likely kick my butt...but at least i have these muffins to make me feel better:) unfortunately, it was very much a throw whatever proportions into it so i'm not quite sure on measurements but here's the best i can remember

Orange Chocolate Chip muffins
1 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup instant oats (cooked in water)
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1 spoonful brown sugar
3 spoonfuls applesauce
1 egg
2 Tblsp orange juice
1 Tblsp orange peel, finely chopped
3 handfuls semisweet chocolate chips, to your own preference

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease and flour a muffin tin.

Cook the oats, it should still be pretty watery. In a bowl combine flour, baking powder, baking soda salt and brown sugar. Mix in the cooked oatmeal, then mix in the applesauce and egg. Add the orange juice, orange peel and chocolate chips. Scoop into muffin tin and bake for about 20 to 25 minutes (the muffins will be pretty tiny, but oh so delicious!)

i will fiddle around with the proportions to make sure i have this right. the M has said this is the best bread yet that i've made so it will definitely be made again!

zesting orange old school

2010-02-22T18:06:00.000-05:00

so everyone talks about the best ways to use every part of a piece of food and taking the peel off of citrus fruits to use later for breads and such is always a big one. better to use every part possible of a food and never waste and i finally got off my lazy bum and just zest the darn things. (i only did 3 today:D so slow and steady is going to be my motto)i don't have a zester so i used my regular old peeler and then chop chop chopped at it. it's all frozen in a cute tiny tupperware until i crave some orange chocolate bread or something!

good news, my laptop is back to life! probably the fastest fixing of a virus happy pc every:)