Homemade Granola Bars

You know when you get a recipe that sounds really good, but it just has 86 ingredients in it, so you put off making it for a long time? Well, I've got one of those recipes for some breakfast bars, from the Veggie Meal Plans blog, but it seems that I've wandered around the bulk section of Central Market enough recently to actually complete the recipe. And besides, it's not a terribly strict recipe, it seems that aside from the base, you can add five 1/3 cup measures of basically anything you want. This time I used almonds, pumpkin seeds, apricots, pears, golden raisins, and peaches.

These are a great break from the typical granola bar, because they're soft and chewy, and studded with so much dried fruit that adding sugar would just be over-kill. I've gotten pretty sick lately of store-bought granola bars; they're either hard like an oat-y little 2x4, or they've got that chewy, crispy rice texture that is so processed and syrupy that it shouldn't be considered much better than a cookie. These bars are none of the above, and I love them for it.





I'm already thinking about another batch later on. Since you can really do anything with this recipe, as long as the proportions stay the same, I was thinking of a slightly nuttier version, with apples, raisins and walnuts. I don't think hubby likes these so much, but being the breakfast lover that I am, I've been packing them away for meals and for snacks. Food in bar form just doesn't get much better than this.

Baguettes

Yesterday, while stumbling my way around this silly, empty internet thing, I ran across a really great website about bread. I wish I could link to it, but I apparently forgot to bookmark it :( Anyways, while reading about a hundred things I had never considered in my baking before (like dough temperature, and hard water affecting the bread, for example), the craving for a nice French baguette struck me. I started thinking about goat cheese, and bruschetta, and that delicate crackling sound of the cooling crust.

So in response to that craving, today I made two of the most splendidly awful looking pair of baguettes I've ever seen. The chewy texture and complex, salty flavor were spot on, though. The crust was delightfully crispy, but not as golden and crackly as I could have hoped. The recipe I followed called for a "moist, sticky dough" and a total of almost 4 hours of rising/proofing time. So I'm not much surprised that I ended up with loose, flat, over-proofed baguettes, rather than the round, slender beauties I had imagined. These actually reminded me more of ciabatta bread, with the flattened slipper shape and bubbly, holey crumb.





But it made me feel much better to read another article that stated (after many helpful and detailed paragraphs full of some things I did not know, and some things that I did know but had forgotten about the fabled perfect baguette) that the author of the article had received better training in bread-baking than myself, and had been working on perfecting his baguette for 5 years. So certainly there are no hard feelings if my first self-guided attempt is knobby and ugly and pale. Baguettes-1, Candace-0. See ya next round, punk...

Even if they ended up over-proofed, I did confirm one thing I read yesterday--that a short rise time develops less flavor. In fact, it's recommended to use a technique called poolish, or a starter, or to rise the dough in the refrigerator. The main idea of all of these methods is that the dough is at least a day old before it ever gets any heat. Letting this dough sit around in the kitchen all day today as I went about my chores built a toasty, yeasty, salty flavor that was noticeably absent in my last white bread. It's perfect by itself, and it's heavenly with a little butter.

These beauties have a great open texture, and I can't wait to toast them up and plunge the spears of bread into a big garlicky bowl of warm bruschetta.

Notes from the Kitchen this week

Did you know that mangoes are a part of the same plant family as poison ivy, oak and sumac? I just found this out recently, and in quite an unpleasant way. Apparently, a lot of people have allergic reactions to mangoes, especially from contact with the skin of the fruit. I got a lip rash a few weeks ago, blamed it on my nasty petroleum-based chap stick, and moved on. But I went and bought mangoes again at the grocery store, and lo and behold, I can already feel the lip itch begin. Damn it. Here's the Wikipedia article about it. I basically have poison ivy on my lips.

This is really a mixed blessing for me--on the one hand, at least I know what has been causing this horrific and painful rash, but on the other hand, I probably won't have much of a taste for mangoes from now on. It would probably be possible to eat them occasionally if I was careful about the peel, but honestly the rash ruins all food (and romance) for me for about a week, so it's really not worth the risk. I've been so sensitive to foods since my little detox experiment, so I certainly won't be tempting fate with risky foods right now. (even regular old pizza makes me want to barf!)

So I guess this is goodbye forever, Mango, you sweet juicy poisonous treat. I'll miss you, but I suppose a smoothie made with other, gentler fruits will taste almost as good without you.

Some other kinks in the kitchen this week--I seem to be short on forks, I always run out of them first; my sink is leaking something fierce, and it's all full of dirty dishes; but mostly my new hotel job has been leaving me tired and achy (but not too hungry, so I guess it balances out!)

I've never worked in a hotel before, but in the past 4 days I've done some neat stuff. Plating salads and making Panna Cotta for a banquet of 150. I also helped as part of an assembly line of cooks plating the entrees--I somehow ended up as the person slapping a bloody dripping chunk of prime rib up against a rounded scoop of rice, trailing the copious blood between the pan and the plates, and side to side around myself as I slid the plates down. Panna cotta was definitely more pleasant than that, despite how much of the creamy custard mix clotted in the bottom of the huge, drum-like pot while I scooped it out by the pitcher, pouring it into dainty cosmopolitan glasses. Once set, they were elaborately topped, and finished off with a crispy triangle of bunuelo.

Banquet be damned, I came so close to snatching one and gobbling it while hiding inside the freezer! I may have to add panna cotta to my dessert file, just to toss it in the mix should I ever need to make a dessert. I've been systematically copying recipes down from all over the internet, and from all of my magazines and cookbooks (I know, it's going to take forever!) and I recently found myself 10 pages deep in pies in an issue of Gourmet from last summer. Being the finger-licking berry-lover that I am, I couldn't resist writing down all 9 or 10 recipes. You should've seen the pictures, it made me feel all bright and summery already. If I'm lucky, the price of berries will dip a little later, but for now, I guess I've gotta stick with the frozen stuff.

Speaking of frozen stuff, I made a wonderfully flavorful vegetable stock the other day, mostly from frozen vegetable scraps that I've been saving. And I'm pretty sure that my laziness played a big role in the big flavor of this rich, brown vegetable stock. First, I threw every spare trimming in the pot that I could find--I trimmed the woody ends off of some asparagus and broccoli, tossed in 2 tomatoes, smashed 3 huge garlic cloves, and added the stems from a pound of shiitake mushrooms, plus 4 dried shiitake caps. All of this in addition to the usual mirepoix (a fancy French term for onions, carrot, and celery) and bouquet garni (bay leaves, peppercorns, herb stems) that come standard for any type of stock.

I let the stock come slowly up to a simmer while I cooked dinner, and then totally forgot about it while watching Lost after dinner. By the time I remembered it, the stock had reduced halfway, and some smushy vegetables were now sticking out of the liquid like bones. By then, it was bedtime, so I put a lid on the pot and stuck it in the refrigerator, still in the pot, veggies and all. It sat steeping like this all night long, and I finally drained it at 7am the next morning before I left for work.

From a full stockpot, I ended up with only 6 cups of velvety brown mushroom-flavored stock, enough for one dinner for two of humble vegetable soup, but let me tell you that the flavor of this soup was far from humble. I further flavored the broth with red onion and garlic, some reduced sherry wine, the juice of 2 lemons, and a generous flourish of parsley. Then I filled the pot with white beans and all the bright green spring veggies I could find--asparagus, broccoli, zucchini, and peas. We had some warm, crusty buttered bread for dipping, and this simple soup came alive in our mouths.

As I greedily slurped down the last bit, drooling while trying to strain the little garlic chunks and excess parsley with my teeth, I reflected how mediocre this soup would have been had I used the canary yellow vegetable stock from the carton that I normally buy. Sure, this pot took a week or so to compose from scraps, and even at that probably cost more than the $2.99 for the yellow stuff; but gods, the dark clarity of the broth and the rich, herby, almost sweet flavor were worth that amount, however much it was!

I know that soup recipes often tell you that home made broth is preferable to packaged or powdered kinds, and while I agree, I don't always heed their suggestions. It's just simply easier to buy the carton than it is to watch that pot for an hour or two, strain it all out, and then find extra tupperware for storage. But I think I may have learned my lesson this time around; and although this soup is very much gone and digested, I'm already fantasizing about the next savory pot of home made broth.

Meal Plans

While living at our last apartment, an efficiency smaller than some people's closets, it seemed that I fell into a dinner-time slump. And in a kitchen too small for two people to work (or move), with a broken oven whose gas range served as the most effective space heater ever, who could blame me? Once every few nights I would hear, without failing, "Tacos? Again? Yea, I guess I could eat some tacos."

So upon moving into a new apartment with a huge, fully functional kitchen, I simply had to make use of it and expand my repertoire. These two motivations are what birthed my most recent project--The Recipe Card File. I know, it's so old school, but I love it! My mother hates to cook, and I never knew my Sicilian grandmother to cook either (sadly! oh the recipes that must've gotten lost in that gap!) so I never inherited a recipe card file. Not that my veggie-lovin' self would probably find use for half the recipes that could be provided by the women in my family, but I adore the idea of a family recipe file, being handed down to my kids and their kids, etc. "Spelt Pancakes, just like Grandma Candace used to make," that's what I'm talking about!





So the way I've been using my recipe cards is like so--when it gets to be the time of week to go shopping again, I thumb through my files (I recently had to expand a second box after adding over 100 new recipes!) and pick out the following items:
-4 or 5 entrees, depending on what is left in the fridge at this point
-a salad dressing
-usually a soup and a cold salad, which may be used as a side dish or for lunch
-a loaf of bread (I usually have to double the recipe to make it last all week)
-something for breakfast; muffins, scones, coffee cake, granola bars, etc.
-any ingredients that have a recipe of their own, that are specified in another recipe, such as a spice blend, marinade, or dip


After I choose my recipes, I can quickly check each card and write down the missing ingredients onto a shopping list. Many times, I find I can already produce several of the week's recipes from stuff I already keep in stock.

Just simply sitting down and doing this for myself once a week has been really great for both of us--Jon gets to eat new things other than black bean tacos (which, by the way, were some dang good tacos!), and I get to expand my horizons and make full use of my awesome kitchen without having to rifle through the cupboards every night to figure out what's for dinner. So I figured if making these meal plans has so simplified my own life, then perhaps my readers could also benefit from having a meal plan to look at. So I'm going to start posting my meal plans up here approximately once a week, whenever my kitchen empties out enough for me to make another one. Hopefully you'll be able to draw inspiration from it for your own meal planning, and feel free to ask questions when I'm slow on posting recipes for something that sounds good.

So without further ado, here's my meal plan for the week:

Dinners-
-Crispy garlic tofu bites, with sesame snap peas on the side

-Cheese & vegetable enchiladas with mole sauce, borracho beans on the side

-Spring vegetable soup, with bread and salad on the side

-Leftover veggie burgers (I have mushroom burgers & beet burgers in the freezer)

Salads-
-Chickpea & tomato salad, served on a green salad with smoked tofu (as an entree)

-Maple walnuts

-Mustard & basil vinaigrette

Bread-
-Greek "Daktyla" bread, a wheat & cornmeal bread topped with sesame seeds and made to look like a loaf of thick fingers so it's easy to pull apart

Lunches-

-Golden Potato-Eggplant Salna (Jon *hates* eggplant, so this is a personal lunch to use up an extra one leftover from last week)

-Garam Masala, for the salna

-Leftovers, salads, and meals made from odds, ends, & extras

Breakfast-
-Breakfast bars, made with oats, spelt flour, and lots of nuts and dried fruits

-Fruit salad

-Cold cereal, or oatmeal


The best thing about making recipe cards for meal plans, is that I get to try out new things every week! Check in later for some of these recipes, or poke me with an e-mail if you get impatient. You know I'm still eating delicious stuff, even if I neglect to tell y'all about it!

Breaking the Fast

I know it's only been one week, but my detox program is through. I fasted for a little over half the time I meant to do so, and I started eating cheese again on Saturday, but I think, all things considered, that I did something I had never done before for an admirable length of time, so even though I only reached the halfway mark, I still feel good about myself for doing that much.

You wanna know the thing that broke me? Stromboli. I borrowed this crazy awesome bread book from a friend of mine, and then had to scramble to copy down all the recipes I wanted when she asked for it back--I was trying to avoid looking at it during my experiment, because I know how easily bread can break me! But this book plus Jon's encouragement finally led to the production of this scrumptious bread-- a rolled focaccia dough, swirled with oozing cheese and herbs, with a crispy olive oil and salt crust.....I'll do a full post on this stunning Italian bread a little later, but for now trust me (and this photo) that it was my undoing, and that it would have been yours, too.





But aside from the breaking of my fast, I would say the best thing about doing it was all the fruit. I bought so much fruit for juicing and munching that I had to find a second fruit bowl!








All that's left of that juicy arrangement now is a bowl full of oranges, topped with a random lemon and brown banana. I meant to juice more, but I didn't mean to do the dishes and dig out the pieces, so it didn't happen as much as I had hoped. But I got a chunk of ginger yesterday, which I forgot while at HEB, and did all the dishes, so now it's on for some orange carrot ginger juice!

And in non-food news, remember how a while back I said I would post a picture of my green-friendly recycled curtains? Well I finally got them up a little while ago, and here is a picture of my lovely (I think so, anyway) thrifty curtains. Much much better than $10 a panel, and more funky, too!

The Most Important Meal of the Day

Somebody once asked me, "If you could eat only one thing for the rest of your life, what would it be?" My clever answer is breakfast. Maybe that's not a fair answer, but I like it anyway. Really, you can have anything you want for breakfast--bacon and eggs, cold pizza, quiche, cereal, tea, toast, muffins, or just plain fruit--yup, I could eat nothing but breakfast forever.

Here are some great healthy breakfast ideas to help you get out of that cereal slump.

Juices and Smoothies are always a refreshing way to start your day, and they even work for people on the go. Just blend it up, pour that cool, creamy concoction into a travel mug, and you're good to go! To increase the "full" feeling from a liquid breakfast, be sure to use solid fruits and veggies for their fiber content instead of just juice, and add a scoop of protein powder if you have it. You can really put anything you want into a juice blend or smoothie (try and resist the urge to add ice cream!) so here are some suggestions.





-Amazing Apple Smoothie: (serves 1)
half a honeycrisp apple (THE best kind of apple, I kid you not!)
1/4 c. apple juice
1/4 c. orange juice
2 tsp maple syrup or to taste
1/4 c. yogurt
a pinch each of nutmeg and cinnamon

-Green Tea Smoothie II: (serves 1)
1 c. vanilla soymilk
2 green tea bags
1 frozen banana
1 c. frozen mango
juice of one orange
honey to taste
For this one you want to steep the green tea bags in the soymilk, so to avoid watering it down with ice, you may want to make the soymilk tea the night before and chill it.

-Apple Carrot Juice: (serves 1)
1 whole apple, chopped
1 large carrot, chopped
1/2 cucumber, chopped
Depending on your juicer, this may not produce as much juice as you want. I think some juicers are more efficient than mine, but I know that I would have to put in at least twice this recipe to get a nice tall glass of juice.


Eggs are a French breakfast classic. I've never been a huge fan of sulphury-tasting eggs, but I can eat them if they've got enough yummy veggies mixed in so that I don't taste the eggs much. Here are two such recipes, both of which require a little bit of extra time in the morning. Save these ones for a special Saturday morning breakfast.

-Spinach & Potato Frittata: (serves 6-8)
6 sliced red potatoes
olive oil, to saute
1 c. torn fresh spinach, or 1/4 brick of frozen spinach, thawed & drained
2 Tb. sliced green onions
1 tsp. minced garlic
6 eggs
1/3 c. milk
1/2 c. shredded cheddar
Cook potatoes first in a cast iron skillet. Add other veggies when potatoes are tender, then pour egg-milk mixture over, and sprinkle cheese on top. You can either finish it on the stove over low heat, or pop it in the oven at about 325 until the eggs are set.





-Zucchini Omelette (serves 1)
1 lb. zucchini, grated & drained
1 tsp. salt
pepper to taste
olive oil, to saute zucchini and omelette
1 tsp freshly chopped marjoram leaves & flowers
2 eggs
splash of milk
sour cream to garnish
Saute the zucchini a bit first before adding the egg mixture. I got this recipe from Gourmet magazine, and the chef who created this recipe insists that it tastes best about 30 minutes after it's been cooked.


Paninis are a relatively new trend for sandwiches, so why not replace that smelly old egg mcmuffin with a snazzy new breakfast panini?

-Peanut Butter Panini: (serves 4)
1/4 c. golden raisins
1/4 c. peanut butter
2 Tb. honey
8 round whole-grain waffles
1 apple, cored and sliced
4 Tb. jam
2 tsp butter, to saute
If you don't have a fancy sandwich press, you can always place a clean pot or pan on top of your panini to help press it down. This recipe came from Vegetarian Times magazine.


Fruit Salad is one of my favorite things ever, morning noon or night. You can spruce it up a bit with a sprinkle of lime juice and some chopped mint, or even with some Mexican cheese, as suggested in this recipe from Gourmet.

-Aurelia's Breakfast Fruit Salad: (serves 6)
1 pineapple, trimmed, cored, & diced
2 lb. mangos, peeled & diced
2 c. orange juice
1/4 to 1/2 tsp. cayenne pepper, to garnish
1/2 c. or 2 1/2 oz. crumbled cojita or queso fresco, to garnish
Put the fruit chunks into serving bowls and pour the juice over it like cereal. Sprinkle each portion evenly with the garnishes just before serving.


Now this is by no means a comprehensive list of my breakfast ideas--I figured I'd save some of the special ones and give them their own post. But for now, hopefully these recipes will help you pull through that morning fog in a healthy, bright, and delicious way!

Ok, so I caved.....

Today is the second day of my fast--I could hardly believe I made it all the way through yesterday without having a bite! I cheated a little bit today by sleeping late (I figure the fewer waking hours I have to endure, the easier it will be for me not to eat!)

Yesterday I felt mostly normal, and the hunger pangs I did experience were easily drowned out with water and reading (The Gunslinger series by Stephen King; its an amazing story that thankfully has nothing to do with food!) Today though, I seem to be a little bit light-headed, and the hunger is a little stronger. Which is not bad if I plan on hanging around the house again, but that doesn't seem to be in the cards for today.

So to energize myself just a little without breaking my fast, I decided to blend up a nice refreshing fruit & veggie juice. I knew I bought that juicer for something...

Orange and Veggie Juice
makes about 2 cups of juice

4 oranges
3 stalks of celery
1 carrot
1 apple
1/2-inch piece of ginger

Peel the oranges, and chop everything into chunks that will fit into the juicer. I discarded the apple seeds, because they are mildly toxic (cyanide, yikes!), but I'm not sure if it does anything in such a small quantity. Stick it all in the juicer and enjoy (and make sure to drink the froth on top, it's the very best part!)

Fasting

Sorry for my delinquency in posting, things have been a little nuts around here for the past week! Between cleaning out my mom's cluttered, chew-toy littered house to make it presentable for visiting family, and traveling to the border for an old-fashioned Mexican wedding, I simply haven't had the brains nor breath to sit down and give y'all a new recipe. The recipes and pictures exist, for certain--I haven't stopped running, but I haven't stopped eating either! So don't worry, I won't forget to catch you up on all the delicacies I may have missed telling you about.

In the mean time, though, I'm starting a 2-week detoxification diet, and I'm kicking it off with a 48-hour fast. That's right, ladies and gentlemen, I haven't eaten a single thing all day today. It's insane, I know! Now all I have to do is stay preoccupied with non-food activities tomorrow, and I'll be gold.

There are a lot of reasons why someone would go on a fast, but today I've been finding it sort of difficult to concisely explain to people just why I'm fasting and detoxing. So I'm going to make a list here to sort of organize my thoughts on why I've decided to do it.






1. To conquer addictions and prove to myself that I can be more disciplined that I usually am.
In oder to allow my body to purge some of it's funky buildup, I'm going to need to stay away from certain types of food (some of them that I really really like!) for a while, and I'm also going to have to abstain from smoking, drinking, or having caffeine. I don't really know if anyone has seen me lately without a cupcake in my hand, and right now I really need to prove to myself that it is possible for me to practice self-discipline. I often feel like laziness or a lack of motivation preclude my success whenever I try to establish new habits. Writing or yoga, for example--I really want to do these things, but when I think about what I'm going to do today, they always get pushed aside. I think I need structure in order to accomplish anything, but I'm very bad at creating and following that structure for myself. Fasting and following a restricted detox diet for just an easy-peasy 2-weeks will hopefully help me to better control my habits and appetites.

2. To discover any hidden food allergies.
I've read that it's possible for you to have reactions or allergies to foods without even realizing it. Certain foods that you may eat everyday may have such a subtle reaction (heartburn, constipation, itchiness, cloudy head, sluggishness, etc.) and may always be eaten with so many other foods that you never know what the culprit is. Even eating too many vegetables from the nightshade family (eggplants, tomatoes, and peppers) can cause reactions. Or if you eat something everyday, it can build up in your system over time and give you problems. So, as part of my experiment, I'm cutting out foods that often cause allergic reactions, such as wheat, corn, cow's milk, soy, etc. and will slowly reintroduce them later and see how my body reacts when I am eating them vs. when I'm not. I suppose I'll have to keep a journal to watch how I feel.


3. To try and help clear up recurring minor ailments.
Your body is an amazingly complex system, and everything in it works together. So when something is out of balance, other things that seem unrelated can begin to show problems. This is, in fact, one of the basic principles of natural medicine. I have recurring problems with rashes, acne, candida, brittle cuticles & nails, and a smoker's cough that just never goes away. I'm really hoping that fasting, followed by a period of restricted diet (and restricted intoxication) will help me to deal with some of those issues.

4. Because I often feel the need to experiment and change up my diet.
It's true! You can just ask hubby about the time I decided to go vegan, but caved and ate some egg-noodles at work 2 days later. Or when we cleaned out our ENTIRE kitchen, donated everything to a friend (2 or 3 trash bags worth!), and decided to go raw. We were eating tacos by dinner time the next day, but the point is this--I have a very strange relationship to food, but even still, sometimes that relationship needs a little shaking up. Periodically, I strive to achieve something *more* from my diet, so I try to push a little further and see where it takes me. It usually takes me to Taco Cabana, by the time I'm through, but hopefully the act of making this list will help cement in my mind why I should keep doing it.





5. Because I believe that it will help me achieve better overall health.
That's the best reason why! All mental games aside, the real reason for embarking on this culinary adventure is to do something nice for myself. If all goes as planned, I hope to experience an increase in health, strength and vitality, and to have fewer lazy hazy days checked off on the calendar without checking off anything on my never-ending to do list.


So those are my reasons! I don't blame you if you still think I'm nuts. Just tell me you think I can do it anyway! I'm more or less following this book I got from the clearance aisle at B&N, but I may have to go find that old RAW forum I used to surf for some good tips and juice recipes. So for the next two weeks on my blog, be looking out for minimally processed, minimally cooked super-fresh entrees, juices and smoothies, and hopefully (if I'm lucky!) a good gluten-free, yeast-free bread.
Oh, and the iced pumpkin muffins from last week ;)

Lovely Pictures around the Kitchen

Lo and behold, my paper towel sprouting idea has worked! I've been keeping my little seed-babies moist, and this morning when I looked, I had at least 10 or 15 sleepy little green tongues peeking out from several different seeded rows. (I apologize for the quality of my pictures--I really need to get photoshop!)





The pink ones are my rainbow chard!





Hooray! Saturday I'm gonna have to stick my spatula up under hubby's behind and get the ground prepped and ready, cuz some of these little sproutlings are ready to go in the ground. I cant wait, I cant wait, I cant wait!

The rest of this post is devoted to some (rather nice, I think) random photos taken this week that in one way or another apply to this blog, but that I haven't had the chance to make up a blog specifically for them yet.

Some days, it just makes me smile to go and open my refrigerator. More refreshing than a cup of coffee, for sure.





My cat is a total spaz who likes to squeeze herself into the smallest (and most irritating) spaces she can find. Among her favorites are the bathroom sink, the fruit basket (whether there's fruit in it or not), and on top of any pile of clean towels, no matter how well put away they are.





This is a birthday gift for a friend of mine who I worked with at the bakery. It's always nice to have a few friends who share your passion for cooking, so to show my appreciation for her, I made her this bouquet of spatulas and cooking utensils.





And for the grand finale, I'll show you my trusty steed. Six miles a day with this baby if I can; we've been tight since middle school.





Check back next week for Beet Burgers, Beer Bread, Pumpkin Muffins with Cream Cheese Icing, and more tasty pics of my budding kitchen-garden.

Some Progress in the Garden

So yesterday I learned how sweaty and difficult yard work really is. I always give Jon crap for saying he'll dig me up the garden of my dreams and then procrastinating on the yard work, but now I can see why. My hands are very unhappy with me right now, needless to say...and all i did was scrape up the leaves and chunk them all behind the shed in a crunchy, sprawling pile. I'm debating whether I need some sort of fence or container to pen it all in for compost.

Not like it matters much anyway, 'cuz by the time it's ready, our gypsy souls will probably be beneath a different set of stars; but just in case we're still here in another year and half, I'm gonna use the stuff anyway.

Here are my new mentors --


I need to call my grandpa. I meant to set up a garden with him at his house this summer, before we got the new place with the nice backyard. I love my grandpa, but the bus out to his house is not easy to catch, and still requires a ride or several miles of bike-riding along the highway. Ouch. Maybe I can get him to come out to my house and mentor me in my garden. Teach me some of his darkest tomato secrets...




I also got some seeds started. Since I didn't have any dirt, I made rows of seeds on a paper towel-lined cookie sheet, and layered more paper towels on top. I'm gonna try to keep it moist and put it out in the laundry room where it can catch some sun. I need to remember to buy a mint plant, as well--I forgot about it until I bought a sprig at the grocery store for $2, and began to reminisce about the days of my spunky wild mint plant that quickly took over the entire 2 foot planter box, before spilling luscious green leaves over all the sides and onto the patio. I can smell the fresh spearmint tea in my dreams, mmm...

I can already tell that this is going to be quite a delicious summer. In addition to the spoils of my own toils, I've found a few untended fruit trees in the neighborhood, like the loquat tree in my very own front yard.







I also found an orange tree while walking along the train tracks to the bus stop the other day, but it was really close to someone's backyard and they had a big ol' mean dog jumping and barking right next to that tree. All these wasted smashed oranges on the ground next to this mean ass dog. Sigh. There are rumors of lemon, orange AND grapefruit trees up by the Quik Stop, so I must go on a hunt for those one day. Now if I could only figure out which tree dropped all those pecans on me, find a nice bank or office building with the flowering kale out front, and plant some soybeans (i can make my own tofu heehee), I would seriously NEVER have to go shopping except for condiments, dairy and cleaning products. Nice, nice, nice. I AM a cheapskate.

Speaking of which, I bought some new "curtains" from the thrift store the other day. Now I'm not sure if you'll ever hear this specifically stated in one of those "Top 100 things you can do to be more Green!" lists, but I think reusing goods rather than buying a new one from Wal-Mart, fresh from the Chinese factory, is all in the same spirit as changing out your light bulbs and carpooling. Its one more small thing that I can do to feel like I'm a part of the solution without dropping too much cash.

Anyways, these new curtains of mine are just a collection of mismatched bedsheets and curtains. I will definitely post some pictures once they're hung (and before the cats get to them!)--I think the bohemian feel we're going for will come together with the contrasting shapes and colors set against the soft grain of the wood floor and walls. I'm looking forward to a little morning shade, anyway...

Chocolate Berry Scones

There are precious few flavor combinations so decadent as the dark richness of chocolate crossed with the sprightly summer gush of fresh berries. The last time I experienced these flavors together in all their glory was with some chocolate-hazelnut muffins, warmed and spread with all-fruit raspberry jam. Simple but amazing for breakfast, desert, or no reason at all. Lately, though, I seem to keep running into scone recipes, so I decided to reincarnate that holy chocolate-berry sensation into a sugar-crusted scone.





Since we started doing cranberry-orange scones at the bakery upon the request of one of our wholesale accounts, its occurred to me that maybe people don't know what a real scone is; that you're probably more familiar with the cake-y starbucks version. So let me re-define the scone for those of you who may be wondering what exactly it is.

Scone n. 1. A small, rich, biscuit-like pastry or quick bread, sometimes baked on a griddle.

In short, a scone is basically a sweet biscuit. Some people dislike the almost dry crumbliness that characterizes a good scone, so I can understand why everyone's favorite coffee chain would make a puffy, frosted version of it. But nothing goes better with a good cup of hot tea than something a smidge less sweet, with a bit more texture and a pinch more class. Sometimes the mood of afternoon just calls for a little tea time.

Edit: At least that's what a good scone is supposed to be like...after trying these guys, it seems I've made a scone to make starbucks proud...soft and cakey, like a flat muffin. Not the texture I was shooting for :( I'm thinking maybe it could be made more dry by adding the buttermilk only a little at a time until the dough will just stick together, or perhaps by adding a little more flour. Of course, the taste is just fine made according to the recipe...

Chocolate Berry Scones

makes 8 small scones

2/3 c. buttermilk
2 eggs (one for the mix, the other for eggwashing the top)
1 tsp. pure vanilla extract
1 3/4 c. all-purpose flour
1/4 c. dutch processed cocoa powder
1/2 c. white sugar
2 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1/3 c. cold, diced butter
2/3 c. mixed frozen berries
1/3 c. semisweet chocolate chips
coarse sugar, to top

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Mix buttermilk, 1 egg, and vanilla together in a small bowl. In another bowl, mix together flour, cocoa powder, sugar, baking powder and salt.

With a pastry blender, or 2 knives, cut the butter into the flour mixture until it resembles coarse crumbs.

Add fruit and chocolate chips to flour mixture, stir to coat and evenly distribute them throughout the batter. Add the liquid and stir until it just comes together--do not over-mix it or the scones will be tough. (I had to turn it out onto the counter and knead the last bit of flour into the dough.)





Knead or fold the dough just a few times, and pat into a circle. Mine was pretty sticky, so to make it easier to cut I put it on a circle of greased wax paper in a 8" round cake pan and set it in the freezer for a little while--not until frozen, but just until it was cold and stiff enough to cut it without making a sticky mess. When you do cut it, you can use a knife or bench scraper to cut he disc of dough into eighths and place the slices on an un-greased cookie sheet. (I buttered mine and they spread out a lot, so I would suggest not buttering the pan.)





Brush the top of each scone with eggwash and then sprinkle with coarse sugar, if desired. Bake at 375 for about 15 minutes, until a pick inserted in the middle comes out clean. Allow the scones to cool on the pan for 5 minutes or so before removing them to a rack to cool the rest of the way.

Serve with a nice milky Chai or Earl Grey tea.

Backyard Blues

So last year, when we had a real house with a real backyard that was all to ourselves, it took us until June to mow the lawn, dig an 8x8 plot, and stick what little seedling babies were still hanging on for dear life into the ground. This year, hopefully it won't take quite so long to get it started; although we do obviously have a ways to go.

Here are the before pictures....

Notice the sexy waterlogged mattress off to the right side. And what you can't see is at least 2 inches worth of leaves, pecans, and other organic debris. I guess I need to get some compost going, too. Wish I had caught some of those pecans before they hit the ground and got rained on, too.

But here are all my delicious hopes and dreams laid out. Jon thinks it's weird, but I do fantasize about food. Copying down recipes can be just as tantalizing and juicy as reading a smutty novel. (I'm soo lame, I know...)

Maybe this year we'll get on the stick about it and have some veggies and herbs to munch on by the time summer rolls around. It'll help balance the grocery bills against the air conditioner, anyway. Guess I should take my time off and keep on sweating huh?

Something Sweet

Wow, so now that the bakery is closed until further notice, I have no steady source for my daily sugar fix. I grabbed a couple of our gi-normous, soft-baked cookies and a gallon-bag full of cranberry orange scones, but of course all of that is gone now.

I also left with a few other delicacies my budget rarely allows--2 red bell peppers, a pound of green grapes, and tender baby spring mix--I figure why let it go to waste if there's going to be no one around to serve lunch anymore? The result of my vegetable greed (however appropriate it may or may not have been on the day we went out of business) is this fine salad, delicious to begin with, but made more so by it's free-ness :)





The question that remains, though, is what should I bake to fill the hole in my heart left by the buttery cinnamon rolls, the biting lemon squares, and the softest dulce-de-leche cookies you can imagine? I'm thinking it ought to involve chocolate (of course), maybe a chocolate scone, or something with mixed berries? Or both! I never buy sweets at the store, which is inconvenient for the impromptu sugar-craving, but it serves the valuable purpose of igniting my bake-shop creativity---what sweet creation shall I devise next? Stay tuned to find out which direction my super-sized sweet tooth leads me....

Neatball Subs

Most of the time, and especially at restaurants, it would be easy to perceive the world of sandwiches as solely meat-centric. After all, a vegetarian sandwich at Subway, and many other sandwich chains really boils down to a salad on a bun, or perhaps a Boca patty if you're lucky. But sandwiches are so versatile--you could really put almost anything between two pieces of bread and eat it, so why can't any restaurants think outside the box on this one?

Well, you're in luck because thinking outside the takeout box is one of my specialties. I recently found a collection of recipes online for vegetarian "neatballs" and have been itching to try one ever since. I've made several varieties of veggie burgers at home before and I always like mine better than the frozen kind, so I felt ready to take on the traditional, tomato-sauce laden pork sandwich.





Rather than copying the rich, heavy style of the meat version, I opted for a light, lemony pesto mayonnaise, with mushrooms and hazelnuts forming the base of the neatballs. Add a little lettuce and tomato to round it out, and suddenly the sandwich board lights up with some fresh new flavors!

Don't forget to check out my previous post, where you can find out how to make the buttermilk hoagie rolls with which I stuffed these delicious little mushroom balls.

Once again, I doubled the recipe so that I could use half for these sandwiches, and half for another recipe (marinated veggie kabobs, mmm...) I modified it from it's original version, and would add a few more modifications now, having made it once. First, the original recipe included 2 tsp of nutritional yeast. Not being a vegan, and liking my cheese "with an s" just fine, I don't keep this crap around. I tried it in a cheez sauce for vegan eggplant parmesean once, and I could taste the blasphemous absence of said delicious cheese in the gooey soymilk sauce. *Shudder* now let's never mention that recipe again.

Second, there's an equal amount of mushrooms and hazelnuts in this recipe; however, mushrooms are sticky when pureed, whereas hazelnuts give the dough a crumbly, mealy texture. Next time I would probably go 75% mushrooms to 25% nuts, and add a variety of mushrooms instead of just buttons, for better mushroom flavor. If I had mushroom black soy sauce around, I probably would've used it instead of regular soy also, for the same reason. 'Cuz mushrooms just taste good.

Finally, I added an egg (and regretted not adding a second one), rolled them in cornmeal (which I guess would've made more sense for frying than baking), and baked them, rather than simply mixing and refrigerating for 30 minutes, because I wanted a hot sammich--that's what meatballs are all about, right, so why not neatballs, too?

At this point, I'm not really sure if I'm just crappy at taking directions, or if my creativity and cheffing sensibilities are constantly (if unconsciously) improving all the bum recipes I pick up around the web. Probably some stubborn mix of the two.

Anyhow, I'll post the recipe as I found it here, and let you decide whether to do it their way (cold, for pate or an appetizer), or hot for your very own vegetarian neatball sub sandwich. And stay tuned after the neatballs recipe for the lemon-pesto mayo, also!


Mushroom Hazelnut Neatballs

makes about 6-8 balls

1/2 chopped onion
1 c. chopped mushrooms
2 minced garlic cloves
1 c. whole hazelnuts
1/4 c. freshly chopped parsley
1 tsp. soy sauce (or more)
1/2 tsp. onion powder (if there aren't enough fresh aliums in this one for you already, you can add some more here)
2 tsp. nutritional yeast
1 tsp. ground black pepper

Saute your veggies and then process with remaining
ingredients. Shape them into small balls or patties (this part reminds me of making falafel!)





After shaping, you can either roll them in cornmeal, breading etc. and fry them, or bake them in the oven, or just refrigerate them until they firm up a little bit--it all depends on how you plan to use them. They can go on a sandwich, be served on top of a composed salad, over pasta or rice, or sliced and spread as a pate. These versatile little mushroom-nut balls can be the star of many different dinners!

And let's not forget the
Lemon-Pesto Mayonnaise

This is more of a taste as you go type recipe--start with 1/2 cup mayonnaise, add a tsp. of pesto, 1/4 tsp. lemon juice, and a little salt and pepper. Taste it to see if it has the herby flavor of the pesto, and just enough lemony zing without being too sour or overpowering, and adjust it until it tastes just right to you. If you're not careful, everyone else may steal it to use on their bland old cold-cut sandwiches, too!

I Stand Corrected....

So I just started looking up stuff on how to make a sourdough starter, and I found this website, Carl Griffith's 1847 Oregon Trail Sourdough Starter. Apparently, you send then a self-addressed stamped envelope, and in 6 weeks or so, you receive a dried sample of the sourdough starter that this Mr. Carl Griffith apparently used way back in the day. Sweet!

I'm gonna buy me some envelopes as soon as I get paid, yippee!

Buttermilk Bread

I *love* to make my own bread at home. There's just nothing quite as satisfying as your own kitchen filled with that awesome aroma of fresh-baked bread. Lately, I've been dissatisfied with the spongy, dyed-brown 89 cent wheat loaf at the grocery store. Nor would I be happy spending $3 on half as much of the good stuff (which probably still has high-fructose corn syrup in it too, for whatever reason they put that stuff into anything, I'll never know.) So what's the happy medium for a bread-lover like me? Make it!

Many people have trouble parting with the 3-4 hours it takes to make bread from scratch each week, but for someone who really appreciates the art of bread-making, it can be a very fulfilling and relaxing experience to feel the dough come together, sticky between your fingers, and then to knead it back and forth until you're almost hypnotized by the motion, and then the magical swelling like a pregnant belly but so much faster. Plus, I always try to keep my odd culinary senses sharp (like wine tasting, cake decorating, etc. --they won't always come in handy, but often they will!) so weekly bread-making is just good practice for me.

Anyhow, I've been thinking about sourdough lately, but I have no idea where to buy a sourdough starter culture--I just remember this 5-gallon bucket kept in the baking classroom at culinary school; it was full of what looked like sticky flour paste, and you had to "feed it" with more flour, but if you did that it could stay alive for generations. You could cook the same loaves of sourdough as your grandmother made in her time.

So, when I read the recipe in Vegetarian Times magazine for a Buttermilk Boule, and it said that it tasted a bit like sourdough I just had to try it out.

I'm not really sure what the rules are for re-publishing a recipe from a magazine, but here it is anyway, in case you feel compelled to duplicate my experiment without a lot of research to find the recipe from the source. I did a double batch, and formed the dough into hoagie rolls rather than a boule (round) shape.


Buttermilk Boule


makes 1 boule, or 4 large hoagie rolls

1 package dry yeast
1/2 c. warm water
3/4 c. buttermilk
1 1/2 Tb. honey
3 C. bread flour
1 tsp salt
(I would add an egg or some butter to the list, to brush the top before baking; my loaves came out rather ashy looking from the flour, and I think they would look tastier if they were shiny and brown.)





Proof the yeast in the warm water, while microwaving the honey and buttermilk together until warm, but not hot. Preheat the oven to 375 (you don't have to preheat this early, but I find that the extra warmth in the kitchen helps the bread to proof faster.)

Add the buttermilk mixture in with the yeast mixture, and then add salt and bread flour. Turn out onto a floured surface and knead until smooth and elastic (you know it's done when you hold a small piece of the dough up to the light, and it can be gently stretched between your hands so that you can see the light through it without tearing a hole in the dough.)

Let it rise, covered with a towel until doubled (40 min to an hour) before dividing and shaping the dough. Let it rise again on the baking pan, again covered with a towel.

To prep for baking, brush it with the butter or eggwash, and score the top. Bake for 35-40 minutes, until you can tap on the bottom of the loaf/roll and hear a hollow thump.


Tune in next time to see just what I did with these yummy sandwich rolls....

Basil Noodles

It's sad to say that even in a house like mine, where bad food is just unacceptable to me, and central market feels like a playground, that my grocery bill is sometimes compromised by other, more pressing bills. Dear hubby has been pushing me to reduce to $75 per week. Ooooh, a challenge.....

So many of my most innovative dinners would fall into a category of meals I like to call "day before payday" dishes. These recipes are generally composed of some basic pantry items I keep on hand, plus whatever random fresh or frozen vegetables I have lying around. There are of course, specific veggies that would match the best with the flavors in the sauce, but I don't discriminate. I try to love all veggies equally :)

The other night's creation was a pleasant surprise, since I thought it ended up tasting like one of my favorite dishes at our favorite Thai place here in town, Thai Dee (if my memory serves me correctly, which it often doesn't.) Sorry there's no picture, (I must get into the habit of taking pictures of all of my food now) it was just so good that I couldn't bring myself to go find the camera after I sat down for the first bite. Enjoy :)

Basil Noodles

Serves 2

Two bundles of egg noodles, half of an 8oz pkg.
1/2 brick of firm tofu, cut into cubes or rectangular pieces
1/2 white onion, diced
1/2 jalapeno, sliced
1 or 2 thin coins of ginger
1 or 2 crushed garlic cloves
2 c. veggies of your choice (bell peppers, bamboo shoots, and straw mushrooms work well with the sauce)
Handful of fresh basil, chopped (to garnish)

Sauce:
~1/4 c. soy sauce
1 tsp. lime juice
1-2 tsp. curry powder, to taste
~ 1/4 c. cho sauce (this is a mixture that I keep on hand for flavoring rice used to roll sushi.)

Cho sauce:
1 c. mirin (Chinese cooking wine) or white wine
1/2 c. seaweed stock (put a 2x2 inch square of Dasima in 1/2 c. water and boil, let sit for an hour or so until cool.)
1/2 c. sugar
1/4 c. salt
1/4 c. maple syrup
1/2 c. 5% vinegar

Start boiling water for the noodles, and add a little oil so they don't stick together. Heat a large, nonstick skillet with oil and add the tofu when it is nice and hot but not smoking. Saute until several sides of the tofu are golden brown.

Add onions, jalapenos, ginger and garlic and continue to stir-fry on medium-high heat until onions are translucent. Add other veggies as appropriate to their cooking time (add harder vegetables that must cook longer before softer vegetables, or green ones that you want to keep their color and crispness.) Sprinkle the curry powder over the cooking vegetables. Put as much or as little as you like, but a little bit may go a long way--the frying spice will probably burn your eyes a little and make you cough!

Once the veggies have gotten slightly browned but are not finished cooking, splash the soy sauce, cho, and lime juice into the pan.I didn't measure these ingredients, I literally just splashed some in, until the veggies were less than 1/4 covered by the sauce. Allow the sauce to simmer down while stirring around the veggies to coat them. Drop the noodles into the boiling water if you have not done so yet.

Drain the noodles and arrange on the plates. Cover with tofu, veggies, and sauce. Top with the chopped fresh basil.

Welcome!

The Green-Eyed Gourmet is a new blog by poet and pastry chef Candace Caceres (that's me!) After months of showing off my mad skillz to every neighbor and friend willing to take a taste, I finally decided to take the cult of my cooking online and share the delicious doctrine with you, dear readers.

The basis for the "green-eyed" theme is that I love to eat my veggies. I've been a vegetarian off and on for almost 8 years, so a large part of this blog will be dedicated to the many amazing vegetarian recipes that I try out each month. I inherited a very intuitive" dash-of-this, pinch-of-that" cooking style from my Italian grandmother, but I will certainly make an effort to be friendly to everyone out there for whom the recipe is more gospel than guideline; to mark my quarter-cups and teaspoons so that you can make it taste the way it was intended.

Also, I am green-eyed as I ponder the whole "green lifestyle" dilemma from the perspective of a small young family on a tight budget. This perspective makes some green choices easier, like making our bicycles our main form of transportation, and keeping a veggie garden as a cheaper alternative to organic store-bought produce; but it can also make some choices more difficult, as the free-trade, organic, etc. products seem to be much more expensive, and consist of more corporate hype than actual quality. So in addition to my recipes and other odd food-related experiments, I expect that I will from time to time discuss my feelings about a "greening" society.

I work as a pastry chef and cake decorator, so although my recipes are vegetarian, some will not be "healthy" per-se, and many more will not be vegan. The whole idea of the vegan "cheez" sauce icks me out, so the vegan recipes you will find here will be coincidentally vegan, and not forcibly vegan. What can I say--a life without cheesecake hardly seems worth living. :)

So thanks for stopping by, and please check back again later for some taste-bud tickling treats, Green-Eyed Gourmet style :D