Food In Many Forms

The squash recipe from earlier did not turn out to be so great, so to make up for it, some kind of dessert had to be produced. We managed to pick out the only recipe that was not Christmas-y from a magazine of Holiday recipes - a recipe for Coffee Cake. Without reading past the ingredients, I ran to the Giant to get sour cream and unsalted butter. Ingredients Streusel ½ cup granulated sugar 1/3 cup packed light brown sugar 1 Tablespoon ground cinnamon 4 Tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into 1/2” pieces and chilled ½ cup pecans Muffins 2 large eggs 1 cup sour cream 1 ½ teaspoons vanilla extract 1 ¾ cups unbleached all-purpose flour ½ cup granulated sugar 1 Tablespoon baking powder ¼ teaspoon table salt 5 Tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into chunks and softened When I got back, I actually read the recipe and realized what I had gotten myself into. After two hours and a third trip to the grocery store, I finally was able to sit down with a cup of...

I was really buying into the Clean Eating Diet  - a diet of unprocessed, unhydrogenated, simple foods, full of whole grains and a wide variety of fruits and vegetables. The  magazine   called to me, as food magazines do in the grocery store, but it was not until now that I had the opportunity to test any of the recipes out. Maybe I picked a really boring recipe or something - Squash and Chicken Casserole - but it really needed a lot more "Oomph". Of course, I ate it anyways, but I really wish I could find that dish that everyone loves, is healthy,  looks marginally impressive and I can get right every time. Just compare the recipe from Clean Eating -  a healthy version of a "Georgia Church Picnic" Classic - to a version of the real thing: Healthy Squash & Chicken Casserole Chicken Yellow Squash Casserole 10 slices whole wheat bread Olive oil cooking spray 1 medium yellow onion, thinly sliced 3 medium y...

Knitting is something that I always seem to do in spurts. I will do it for a month and then put it down and forget where I was entirely. That is why my next project is one that I could finish before I go back to school at the end of January. I had started knitting a small wristlet from the book Boutique Knits by Laura Irwin  using a skein of red yarn I had bought from the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival over the summer, but the skein was not long enough and I had to start over. Luckily, I had bought this Manos del Uruguay yarn to start another project the day before...and started up again right away...    I always feel good about buying Manos Del Uruguay because it is Certified Fair Trade and is handspun by rural women in Uruguay. But it is a little tricky to use because it does not come in dye lots. Because of the artisan-like style that the yarn is dyed, the solid-colored yarns can have a large variation in color. My mom ending up making a striped scarf out of s...

It's been a while since I posted. Two big food holidays have passed and much food has been made. There were carrot cake cupcakes ... There was a cake for Thanksgiving... And some mini holiday fruit pies... As well as a "College" Thanksgiving... ...and two pre-Christmas dinners with friends... One of my roommates gave me a HUGE Martha Stewart Cookbook for Christmas, and Christmas Eve Dinner consisted of her glazed carrots and striped sea bass...I still have to upload those... At first I was unsure how much I could really use Martha's book because a lot of recipes seemed unapproachable, but now that I have tried two of them...Glazed Carrots with Whole Spices and Rosemary: and Roasted Sea Bass: The carrots are definitely going to be repeated, and the Sea Bass was pretty good too - although the fennel and white wine did little to add to the flavor. I think the cookbook is just right of amount of challenge to help me learn new things. I have said before how I am a fan of ...