Monthly Archives: September 2009

My brother is better than yours. Period.

Up until today, Mom’s biggest fear was that Billy would get arrested this weekend at the Gopher-Badger game.

No more. Because I don’t scuffle with the law.

You see, Billy is the most awesome little brother ever (though little he is not) and called me today to offer me a ticket to the Gopher-Badger game AT FACE VALUE. Um, hello, awesome? This was not even something I thought could happen.

The sad part is, I actually had to check my schedule first. Of this, I am ashamed. But a $15 ticket, a game in the new stadium and a statewide drinking holiday? I.am.so.there. You had better believe that I am so.ready to wake up at some ungodly hour, put on bizarre layers of clothing, fest with Billy and see all of the girls.

Meringue Puffs and battling a Sweet Tooth.

Baking while fasting seems like a bit of an oxymoron. But I ADORE chocolate chip meringue puffs. They’re under 100 calories per puff and they satisfy the sweet tooth that appeared when I joined the working world.

I decided to mix up a batch because I know for a fact that by the time I get back from breaking the fast at Marcus’ cousin Marni’s house, I will DEFINITELY want to be snacking on one.

The good news? The recipe is SUPER simple. The bad news? You’ll need to have a bit of patience.

Chocolate Chip Meringue Puffs

Ingredients

  • 2 egg whites
  • 2/3 cup sugar
  • Chocolate chips

Instructions

  • Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
  • Beat egg whites until stiff.
  • Add sugar gradually until stiff again.
  • Fold in chips (and flavoring if desired!).
  • Drop on greased cookie sheet, place in oven and turn off.
  • Let sit overnight (4 hrs minimum).

Happy baking!

Confusion Strikes & No. 13: Painting my nails every two weeks

The peach crumble was a HIT. People snarfed it down within 10 minutes of it’s debut on the buffet table. The whipped cream was a nice compliment, but wasn’t needed to disguise the actual flavor of the crumble.

Before leaving, I warned the boys against telling anyone what my secret recipe was for the apple tart. Marcus told everyone that the secret ingredient was “love” and David thought that I was talking about the crumble and TOLD EVERYONE THAT THE SECRET INGREDIENT IN THE CRUMBLE WAS APPLES. IT WAS A PEACH CRUMBLE. Hah. Rock on.

I was thinking the other day about some of the things on The List that have been kind of a challenge for me. Painting my nails every two weeks is DEFINITELY one of those things. And I’m for-sure under the impression that most girls do not have any problem with this whatsoever.

So this is how it is: I paint my nails (usually a bright red color or something similarly vibrant) and my toenails. It looks decent for oh, about a day and a half. Then I think about how awful my nails look and how I should really do something about them and immediately proceed to find something more important or pressing to do…like cooking dinner. Following this, I wonder if getting new polish remover, a file, and some different colors would remedy the situation. I then brush off that idea, deciding that it would cost money to obtain such things and that it wouldn’t actually fix the situation.

For the record, today would be one of those days. I won’t cook dinner because Yom Kippur begins tonight, but I am for sure in the process of attempting to guilt myself into doing my nails because today is definitely one of those days where I don’t have any pressing things to do. And yes, I actually am engaging in the mental debate of whether a trip to Target for some new colors would help.

Predictable? Absolutely.

Oktoberfest = Baking Fest

If you know me well, then you know that I am good at cooking and not at all good at baking.

So, imagine my shock and surprise when Marcus told me that we were in charge of bringing some desserts to Tomtoberfest.

We could have copped-out and bought some cookies or, whatever. But I think you understand by now that while I do not bake, I REALLY despise buying something when I could be making something fantastic.

Below is a Peach Crumble I made a la the Fruit Crumble recipe on Epicurious. The app they’ve designed for the iPod Touch/iPhone is an absolute miracle and I LOVE IT.


I’m sure it will look even more delicious once I get to slice into it. I also made some homemade whipped cream to go along with it. So necessary. However, there are like, 30 people coming to this party and one crumble seemed like an insignificant offering. So I dusted off a secret family recipe and made an apple tart. Which looks like all sorts of golden deliciousness (that was not meant to be a pun, I actually used Jazz apples).


I’m excited for Tom’s home-brewed Oktoberfest beers, yes. But really, I’m excited to dig into these!

TGIF: "All on my own"-style

I know I feel awesome when my lungs kind of lightly burn, I feel parched, I’m exhausted and have no appetite. Rock on. In summary, beer, brats and pretzels, AKA all of the trappings of Oktoberfest @ Gasthof’s held no allure for me tonight. A sweatshirt and blankets? Sign.me.up.

So instead, girls night in by myself? I mean, it is sans polka bands and hammerschlagen, but I had the MOST delicious dinner from Panera (You Pick Two – BBQ Chicken Chopped Salad & Summer Corn Chowder). And now I’m prowling HBO On Demand. Not gonna lie, a night with Marcus’ TV to myself means that I can catch up on ALL of the chick flicks that I would never EVER watch with him. I just watched Baby Momma and found out that they just added P.S. I Love You.

In summary, I may feel crappy, but I’m feeling 100% not-sad about this situation.

What only has four letters and a whole lot of needy?

S-P-O-T

Mom and Dad are in ATL right now, even though Georgia seems like the most inappropriate place of all to be at the moment because of all the rains.

So as Billy is on campus, I have to go and take care of the world’s most needy Siamese every day.

For reference, when I was chopping up cucumber salad, Spot decided to pull the seal pup pose on my foot and proceeded to do cat gymnastics while maintaining contact with my body the entire time. After shelling the shrimp, Billy had to wrestle him away from the trash bag.

Totally ridiculous.

Billy says Yes

I did not miss going back to school this fall. That is for-sure something that I am not disappointed about at all. But what’s been weird is not seeing Billy CONSTANTLY. See, I was used to seeing him irregularly in the summer but on campus, I usually saw him every day. By last spring, we walked to class together on Mondays and Wednesdays, which was actually pretty cool.

So, I’ve started calling him once or twice a week so that we can catch-up and he shares his colorful stories of campus. Most often, related to the inappropriate apparel choices that others have made. I told him to start snapping photos with his cell phone so that I can share these little treasures with you all.

As we don’t have any of those as of yet, he found a colorful site that he thought I would dig and I definitely think you will all get a laugh out of. So check.it.out.

People of Walmart

EDIT: I wasn’t aware I mis-keyed the link in. It should work now!

Something to eat with a spoon!

Preface: Until last week, I had approximately two appetizer-sized plates and 14 bowls in my cupboard (I had normal-sized plates too). Now, I have eight appetizer plates and 14 bowls. My ratio of forks to spoons is similar. For the record, my apartment has one permanent resident.

-scene-

I found out via my Twitter feed that a friend recently started a blog, Foodie in the City. I still don’t really get the concept of photographing everything that you eat, but true to form when we worked together, girl has some clever food ideas. And whilst perusing her blog, she turned me onto the idea of “Yogurt Messes” aka Parfaits.

I’m pretty sure that I purged the aforementioned dish from my life PERMANENTLY after I started college. Eating granola while lifeguarding and working at summer camp? Totally acceptable. Eating granola when you’re not going to go do something that’s you know, super-active? Most ridiculous idea ever. I had a Training Director once who posed to me the idea that eating granola was like how pigeons ate stones to assist in the digestive process, and oh by the way HUMANS DON’T NEED TO EAT ROCKS. That one stuck with me. I don’t even know if pigeons do that. BUT THE IMAGERY!

Fact: I have been in a food rut for breakfast. Since I moved into my apartment, I’ve eaten an english muffin with whipped cream cheese, a slice of tomato and a sprinkling of s+p every morning. It is delicious, yes, but it is NOT variety.

So when I was at ALDI on Sunday, I decided to go big and threw the plain yogurt and low-fat granola into my cart (I already had bananas at my place). The result? Incredibly delicious and super-pretty breakfasts for me.

Totally worth it.

More importantly, I can use my bowls.

No. 64: In the summer, choose fresh produce from Gregor Farm/produce stands first

Oh my god, how I love Gregor Farms. The sweet corn that they have is unreal, they have a stellar vegetable selection, and you actually have to go to their farm to purchase any of their delightful things.

Thus, while I’m not particularly mournful about the passing of a summer that was colder than warmer, I am superbly bummed that we’re almost to the point where I will no longer be able to drive out to the farm to grab basically everything Marcus and I eat for dinner that’s not the meat.

So, why the farm? If you know me, then you know by now that I’m not a huge organic person. However, it is kind of pleasant to know where your food has come from and the people who are producing it. Right? Plus, food that comes from a place that is two miles away from your home and has just been picked/harvested tastes totally different from food that is flown in from New Zealand. Don’t get me wrong, I am ALL about globalization. If not for modern transportation, we’d be eating apples, dried meat and root vegetables for the duration of the winter. But when I have the choice and it is affordable, I LOVE eating local.

Can it be next summer yet?

All things butter

On Rosh Hashanah, you’re supposed to relax in the afternoon. Cool. I can totally handle that.

But coming off of a sushi-induced coma from the most delicious lunch we had at Kobe, it took me a spell to think of a proper afternoon project. At which point I remembered this article from the NYT Bitten Blog and another NYT article on making butter.

NYT: Making Butter

NYT: Curd Mentality

Sounds easy enough, right?

Armed with a pint of Heavy Whipping Cream from Marcus’ refrigerator, I rolled over to my parents’ place to take a whack at making butter with a hand mixer (I do not have one at my place). I dumped the cream into a metal mixing bowl and set the speed on the hand mixer to high. Simple enough. When I felt like I was getting close, which was about three minutes after “whipped cream,” I tasted the mixture and could feel my butter just screaming to come out. The solid was there, but it was WAY too wet. So, I switched the speed from high to low, which solved the problem of how to get the buttermilk out. My bowl went from “moist solid” to “solid chunks of butter in a pool of buttermilk,” instantly.

This is the result after mixing – I’m draining the buttermilk off.

Which then brings us to the finished product – a salted butter with dried tarragon. I figured that was a good combination because it would taste nice on bread or would add a savory flavor if I threw a tablespoon of it into a dish.


I split the final product in half so that my parents could enjoy it too as I, you know, took over their kitchen for a couple of hours. Mom and I tasted the finished product on a slice of wheat bread and it was definitely delicious.

That leaves us with one final question mark – what does one do with the leftover buttermilk? Fear not. Thanks to my iPod touch, I hit up epicurious.com and found this recipe for a nice salad dressing.

Basil Buttermilk Dressing