New endeavors

Today's cooking extravaganza yielded:

• vegetable quiche (with homemade crust)
• cucumber and tomato salad with gorgonzola and a dab of Annie's Goddess Dressing
• peach jam (my first canning effort - ever! If you don't hear from me, blame it on botulism...)




A Hard Day's Work: Ross was busy today too. He fabricated this rack for his motorcycle.

• bean burritos from scratch. From "scratch" you say? How can that be? Those pintos were soaked, cooked, then refried (using chicken fat from cooking a whole chicken, along with diced onion, garlic, and salt). I also tucked some delicious heirloom tomatoes in there, along with some avocado slices)
• a roasted butternut squash, to be used later in a bread
• brownies (um, I cut corners a bit and used the "No Pudge" mix from Trader Joe's... But! I did use my homemade yogurt.)
• And that reminds me... yogurt (It takes so little effort that I often forget I made it.)
• Mint cherry tabouli
• Falafel

Wow. So it might seem like a lot. But believe it or not, it's not like I was in the kitchen the WHOLE ENTIRE day. Of course, there's the usual kid watching. There was also part of a movie. We even went to a friend's birthday party.

Can I just say how *excited* I am about the jam? I grew up with my grandmother making the most delicious strawberry jam. Seriously, every year I think she made it. I don't even recall store-bought jam being in the house. And then, when we were cruising, my mom canned all of our meat. But do you think that I paid attention to either of these efforts? No. My concentration was, um, on the eating part of the effort.

But I've been thinking that I want to start canning. Something. Anything. The whole idea of "putting up" some food for the future. To be able to look in my pantry and see those lovely canning jars filling the shelves. Doesn't it just give you goosebumps of anticipation? Ok, maybe that's just me.

So last year Ross got me the Ball Blue Book of Canning (which I inevitably call "The Blue Ball Book of Canning." Seriously, couldn't they see that coming?). It was one of those gifts that you give someone in the hope that they'll start a hobby. "Here, darling. Some knitting needles!" "Oh honey, you shouldn't have! Really."

But there I was, conferring with my beloved Blue Ball Book (ahem), on how to can applesauce. Because this just happens to tie in with my Green Group Challenge of a Buy Nothing (New) Month, which I'm planning on for next month. And it occurred to me that, here sat something that I made, this lovely peach jam. Something that could be, I don't know, given as a gift. Because a certain sister's birthday is in the month of October. Hopefully, with all of the super secret code I've used, she'll still be surprised. If not, Jen, can you just act surprised? Love ya!

(PS: I promise not to send you any tabouli.)

What new hobby do you want to start? What's keeping you from it?

Dinner: It's what's for dinner

This afternoon I was feeling a bit panicky with regard to dinner tonight. Even though I'd planned out the week in advance as usual, I realized that, of my two remaining meals for the week: one was a crockpot (or, as my sister calls it, "crotchpot") meal, and the other required chicken. The chicken which we already ate. Granted, this was a chicken and shrimp dish, so I suppose it could have been just a shrimp dish. And it's not like I can skip it altogether, since I have some fresh mushrooms that I bought for the recipe, that are marching towards their expiration date. And I hate throwing out food.

So... what's for dinner? Isn't this the question we moms are confronted with every night? Actually, now that I think about it, it's more my husband that asks this, since the kids don't really care that much yet. In fact, wee lass has only recently started asking about dinner. Invariably, her response to my chirpy answer, in the naive hope that that will convince her that it's a new and wonderful dish, is a crinkled up nose and a "Bleh!" Or more recently, now that she's started kindergarten: "That's disgusting!" I try to shrug it off and not take it too personally. Anybody who is close to me is probably laughing their ass off at the mere idea of me not taking something, anything personally. Suffice it to say: I'm often described as "sensitive" (with "overly" tacked on for good measure, those meany meanies).

No, usually it's my dh who is doing the asking. And when my replies range from Quinoa Sundaes! to Sweet Potato Turkey Stew!, who can blame him for his non-committal "Oh," or "Huh." Fortunately, I have been blessed with an adventurous eater for a husband, who at least tries the recipes I've dug up from many varied sources. He is also not one of those men who declares it not to be a meal, unless there's a chunk of meat on the plate in some shape or form. Not surprising, since he used to be a vegetarian. But even still, he sure appreciates meat when it is on the plate.

Back to dinner tonight. What am I going to do? I could, of course, do one of the standby meals: leftovers or pasta. But we had leftovers last night. Now, I'm not adverse to eating leftovers two nights in a row, but we actually don't have any leftovers, um left.... over. So, pasta it is. Sigh. The sheer boredom of even writing that is surely a sign that I am not going to make pasta. I'd probably be too bored to even eat it. Hmm, well, maybe not that bored. But still.

What can I make from what I already have in the pantry? My mind goes *completely* blank. My whole approach to cooking in the past few years has revolved around buying food to make specific dishes. My pantry only contained what I needed to make the meals that I'd planned for that week. Other people are more creative in their cooking. They buy what looks good in the store and figure out how to fit it together into the completed puzzle of dinner. The few times I've used this approach, when I looked into the fridge, I just saw a jumble of pieces. Do they even fit together? Or will there be a huge hole in the panorama that could only have been filled by, I don't know, potatoes?

Even buying an extra vegetable, because it's on sale of course, is enough to throw me off. Right now, a bunch of asparagus is mocking me, "Ha, ha! I'm going to rot away in your fridge, because you don't have the creativity to add me to a recipe." I'm very "by the book."

But an interesting thing happened over the past couple of years: I developed a well-stocked pantry. I learned that there are things that I use often enough to warrant having them on hand at all times. By the same token, I'd learned that there are some things that I have a hard time using up before they expire.

And so, when I came across this recipe for Mock Risotto, I was astounded. I had all of the ingredients! Well, almost all. A few things I would need to substitute (plain yogurt for cream cheese). And I even get to use the asparagus! Ha - take that! I am victorious!

What staples to you keep on hand in your pantry for nights when you don't want to expend a lot of energy on dinner?