Thai Chicken Noodle Soup

A delicious, spicy Thai curry soup, made with coconut milk and lots of fresh herbs and spices. Yummy mushrooms and carrots mean that this will qualify as my ARF/5-a-day submission to Sweetnicks' roundup this week!

Thai Chicken Noodle Soup
3 Tbsp EVOO
1 onion, cut in half and then sliced into thin wedges to make strips about 2" long
2 c mushrooms, halved or quartered (depending on size)
1 carrot, cut in half lengthwise and then sliced into ribbons with a vegetable peeler
3 chicken cutlets, sliced into 1" strips
1-2 tsp freshly grated ginger
1-2 tsp red Thai curry paste
1 Tbsp brown sugar
1 Tbsp fish sauce (available in Asian foods aisle of your grocery store)
1 can coconut milk
6 c chicken stock
1/2 pkg maifun (rice noodles, available in Asian foods aisle)
1/4 c chopped cilantro
1/4 c chopped basil
4-5 green onions, sliced lengthwise to make long strips (green parts only)
salt & pepper

Heat olive oil in a large pot over medium heat. Saute the onions and mushrooms until mushrooms begin to brown and onions are soft and translucent, about 5-6 minutes. Add the carrots and the chicken strips, then season with salt and pepper. Go a little easier on the salt than you normally would, as you'll be adding fish sauce later and that's pretty darn salty. When the chicken strips are almost opaque on all sides (it will NOT be cooked through), add the ginger, curry paste, brown sugar and fish sauce; stir to combine well. Then add the coconut milk and chicken stock. Bring to a simmer and then add the maifun (break it up a bit before adding it or you'll have unmanageably long noodles to deal with when serving/eating). Throw in the cilantro, basil and green onions and cook for another couple of minutes, until the noodles are tender.

This soup is extremely flavorful and pretty healthy (as long as you don't think too much about the sodium content). It's even better the next day, when the flavors have all been sitting together overnight.

Dude! I have cancer!

Turns out that weird scar thing on the side of my nose is not a weird scar thing at all - it's basal-cell skin cancer. I finally, finally went to the doctor to get it checked out and he took one look and said, "That's not a scar, that's cancer." Dude!

So they gave me a novocaine shot right there and sliced off a piece of my nose to send to the lab for a biopsy. I was in & out of the Dermatologist's office in 15 minutes flat. In two weeks when it comes back, they'll ship me off to get it removed and patch up my nose with a graft or something.

Damn, y'all. I sure wish I hadn't waited so long to get it checked out; I've had it for YEARS. Lesson learned: when you have a weird scar that keeps bleeding and then healing over, get it checked out. Even if you think it might be just an irritated scar because you blow your nose all the time. Get it checked out anyway.

Hopeful

It's not a word I use often in the springtime: hopeful. In fact, spring is downright miserable for me most years, with the hay fever a nearly constant presence in my life. When I'm not sniffling and sneezing and grumping around, I'm passed out in a Benadryl coma.

But yesterday I went to visit an allergy specialist and for the first time in my life, I'm hopeful that I might actually be able to spend a spring season conscious and enjoying it. I got a couple of new medications to try (Astelin, an antihistamine nasal spray, and Singular, for both the allergies and the hay fever-related asthma I'm suffering through), but what's really got me jazzed is the sinus rinse.

What you do, basically, is you put warm salty water in the bottle and then squeeze the solution into one nostril and let it drain out the other one. Gross, I know. In fact, really really gross, and I won't let Mr Wonderful watch me do it, because...ewww. But the way I feel afterwards is heavenly. My sinuses feel clear and clean and completely free of any mucus or swelling. If you've ever seen me in the springtime, you'd know that this is nothing short of miraculous. I did it three times yesterday while in the middle of a massive allergy attack and it made me feel immensely better, immediately. It takes a few tries to get the hang of it though, and I wasn't doing a very good job yesterday, so it certainly didn't clear me up totally. But I did it again this morning and managed to use all of the saline solution to clear out my sinuses. And I can BREATHE. In the SPRINGTIME.

I feel like a whole new person.

25 things

I could write a wrap-up of the Stitches West conference I went to on Saturday, but I can sum it up in one word: Malabrigo. Malabrigo Silky (half silk, half merino, in lustrous Burgundy), Malabrigo Merino Worsted (a sweater's worth in Olive!), Malabrigo Lace (lovely cobwebby baby-soft dark blue/green Vaa), and best of all, a FREE skein of Malabrigo Sock yarn, not yet released for public purchase (or even mentioned on their official website!), in the most amazing blue/green/purple colorway. I am so drooling over this stuff, y'all. I went to the Malabrigo booth and asked the vendor when the sock yarn was going to be released, and when I mentioned that I was a member of the Malabrigo Junkies group on Ravelry, he pulled out a FREE skein, all for me! Big enough for a pair of socks! Superwash merino! The colorway doesn't even have a name yet, it's just called "Test Sample" but ooooooh, all the glorious jade, turquoise, sapphire, and amethyst colors....

Anyhoo, that's not what I wanted to write about. What I really wanted to write about is a meme I saw on Keckler's blog, The Grub Report, which is really just a list: 25 things I never get tired of.

So, without further ado, here's my 25, in no particular order:

1. Spring bulbs, pushing up through the cold gray days
2. The smell of the earth when it rains for the first time after a long dry spell
3. Fresh salty sea breeze on my face
4. Cowgirl Creamery cheese
5. Mr Wonderful's whistling. He is a master whistler. He whistles along with songs, or just when he's walking or driving or whatever, and can do these amazing Disney-animated-bird trilling noises.
6. Throwing a bunch of stuff together randomly and coming up with a great new meal that everyone in the family enjoys
7. The smell of lilacs
8. Rugrat, falling asleep while leaning up against me, going all boneless and limp, and drooling just a little bit
   
9. The "aha!" moment, when a puzzling programming issue at work suddenly becomes clear
10. A buttery, melt-in-your-mouth filet mignon from Ruth's Chris Steak House
11. That moment when you just finish a wonderful book
12. The smell of a wood fire, especially when you're camping
13. Right after the cleaning ladies leave, when the house is perfectly clean (before the kids get here and mess it all up again...)
14. Hot buttered popcorn at the movie theater; I can't seem to watch a movie in the theater without it
15. Climbing into bed every night with Mr Wonderful
16. Exploring a new city, especially if it's somewhere that requires the use of a passport
    
17. Walking through the redwoods
18. Finishing a knitting project
19. Heirloom tomatoes, still warm from the sun, with fresh mozzarella, basil, olive oil, sea salt and cracked black pepper
20. Road trip!
21. Dancing with friends at a club until we're exhausted and dripping sweat
22. Hearing a great new song on the radio
    
23. Sleeping until I wake up naturally, without an alarm clock
24. Getting a pedicure: it's a fairly cheap indulgence, and it lasts for a month!
    
25. Kisses
    

Knitting fun!

This weekend I get to go to Stitches West, which is like a super-conference for knitters. I may attend one of the little one-hour classes (depending on what's still open when I go), but my main reason for wanting to go is the yarn...all the fabulous, wonderful yarn that will be on sale in the Market. It's like the vendor's hall at a regular conference. Only, instead of selling software or whatever, they're selling YARN. Glorious, fabulous, luxurious yarn. There will be Malabrigo Silky there, I just know it! I've been looking around for this yarn for a while. It's on a limited release, so you can't just pick it up anywhere. It's a blend of merino and silk, and let me tell you, that Malabrigo merino is the softest damn wool I've ever laid my hands on.

Mmmm...Malabrigo...

And laceweight yarn! There will be lots of laceweight yarn. (I have a special lace project in mind but I'm keeping it under wraps for now.)

And sock yarn. (I don't need more sock yarn, I have enough to make four pairs of socks and I haven't even started a single pair yet!)

Ooooh, and SeaSilk! Yes, I want some of that too.

Um...yeah. So, I will be leaving my credit card at home just in case I am overly tempted. I have a bad habit of showing very little self-restraint in the face of beautiful yarn.

Corn & Black Bean Salad

A fresh, light vegetarian dish that works well as either a side dish or as a healthier alternative to guacamole. Scoop it up with chips, add it to your tacos, spoon it over an enchilada...the possibilities are endless. This veggie-filled dish is a natural for Sweetnicks' ARF/5-a-day roundup.

Corn & Black Bean Salad
1/2 red onion, diced
1 can sweet corn, drained
1 can black beans, rinsed & drained
1 basket grape tomatoes, halved
1/4 c chopped cilantro
2 avocados, cut into 1/2" dice
3 limes
1/4 c EVOO
2 tsp cumin
1/4 tsp chile powder
1 tsp sugar
6-10 shakes Tabasco, any flavor (optional)
salt & pepper

Mix the first five ingredients together in a large bowl. In a smaller bowl, combine the juice from the limes, the olive oil, the cumin, chile powder, sugar and Tabasco sauce, if using (I'd use the Chipotle flavor...mmmm...). Whisk vigorously until very well combined and the dressing begins to emulsify. Add the diced avocado to the dressing, and turn gently to coat all the sides (this will prevent the avocado from browning). Pour over the veggies, then salt & pepper the salad liberally and stir thoroughly but gently, to avoid crushing the avocado. Allow the salad to stand at room temperature for at least a half hour so the flavors can blend.

Herbed Chicken with Asparagus and Bowties

I had some chicken cutlets and asparagus that really needed to be used up, so I threw together this quick and healthy pasta dish for Mr Wonderful and I. It's super-simple but quite tasty. If you can't find pencil-thin asparagus, you can use thicker stalks, but add them earlier in the cooking process, or steam them for a few minutes before adding to the pan.

Herbed Chicken with Bowties
3 Tbsp EVOO, divided
1/2 onion, diced
2 thin-sliced chicken breasts (cutlets), sliced into 1" strips
1 1/2 Tbsp mixed herb rub (the one I used came via my wine club; it's a mix of dries garlic, onion, rosemary, thyme, sea salt, pepper...and probably some other stuff too)
1/2 bunch very thin asparagus spears, tough ends removed, sliced into 2" pieces
1/2 lb (half a box) bowtie pasta, cooked according to package directions
1/4 c chopped fresh parsley

Heat 2 Tbsp of the olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Saute the onions for about 5-6 minutes, until they've softened and become translucent. Add the chicken strips and season with the herb rub (or any mix of herbs & spices that sounds good to you - be sure to use salt & pepper if your mix doesn't contain it already). Once the chicken is no longer showing any pink (it will still be slightly undercooked), throw in the asparagus spears and cover the pan. Cook for about 2-3 minutes, until the asparagus is tender but still has a little "bite." Toss the cooked pasta into the skillet and stir everything together with the last Tbsp of olive oil. Top with the parsley and serve immediately, to rave reviews. You don't need to tell everyone that it only took you about 10 minutes to make. :)

Spicy Indian Roast Chicken

I've done roast chicken before, but this one has a bit of a twist: I coated the chicken with a spicy mustard sauce before popping it in the oven. I'm submitting this one for Sweetnicks' ARF/5-a-day roundup.

Spicy Indian Roast Chicken
1 whole chicken, 4-5 pounds, giblets removed, rinsed and patted dry
1 onion
1 lemon
4 carrots
3-4 medium white potatoes
2 Tbsp Dijon mustard
2 tsp curry powder
2 tsp Sriracha (garlic-chili sauce)
1/4 c EVOO
salt & pepper

Preheat the oven to 400.

Cut the lemon in half and then one of the halves into quarters. Slice ends off the onion, and then slice it in half lengthwise. Cut the onion halves in wedges (6-8 total). Peel the carrots and slice them into 1 - 1 1/2" long pieces, and slice or dice the potatoes into about 3/4" pieces. Season the interior of the chicken with salt and pepper, then stuff it with the lemon quarters (reserving the lemon half) and a couple of the onion wedges. Tie up the legs with kitchen twine and tuck the wings underneath the breast. Place the chicken on a rack in a roasting pan and surround the chicken with the carrots, potatoes, and remaining onion wedges.

In a small bowl, combine the mustard, juice from the reserved half lemon, the olive oil, curry powder, and Sriracha. Whisk the ingredients together until they are well mixed and make a fairly thin sauce. If the sauce is too thick, add more olive oil. Spread the sauce over the chicken with a basting brush, and then toss the remaining sauce with the vegetables. Season the chicken and vegetables well with salt & pepper, and roast in the oven for an hour to an hour and a half, until the chicken measures between 165 and 170 degrees. Be sure to let the chicken rest for ten minutes before carving, to allow the juices to redistribute in the meat.

You could easily make a lovely sauce with the pan drippings, a little flour, and some chicken stock (maybe throw in a little parsley or cilantro for extra color and flavor), and serve the whole thing over rice, but I opted to just serve it as-is. The way the chicken smelled while it was cooking was heavenly, and I couldn't wait another minute to dig in.

Yes we can!

I am convinced that Barack Obama is the only candidate who can inspire enough people to bring about a meaningful change in our country. If you haven't watched this video yet, please take a look.

Chicken Mexi-Casserole

This is another one of those simple casseroles with a generic base of noodles and chicken and canned soup. Mr Wonderful loves these, and the kids don't complain about it too much, so I generally consider it a success. ;-) This casserole would also be good with rice instead of pasta. And if our super-picky kids weren't eating it, I would have thrown in a can of fire-roasted diced tomatoes for a bit more color & flavor.

Chicken Mexi-Casserole
2 Tbsp EVOO
1/2 yellow onion, diced
1 lb chicken breast cutlets, sliced into strips about 1" wide
1 Tbsp cumin
1 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp smoked paprika
1 can Cream of Chicken soup
1 can Cream of Mushroom soup
1 lb pasta (I used tri-color rotini), cooked according to package directions
1 can sweet corn
1 small can sliced olives
1 c shredded cheese (I used Mexican mix, but plain Jack or Cheddar would work too)
salt & pepper

Preheat oven to 350.

Heat the olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Saute the onions until translucent (maybe 5 minutes). Add the chicken strips and season with cumin, garlic powder, smoked paprika and salt & pepper. Cook just until there's no more pink showing (the chicken will still be undercooked inside). Add the soups, the cooked & drained pasta, the corn, olives and about 3/4 of the cheese. Mix well. Transfer to a large casserole dish (spray with non-stick spray for easy cleanup) and top with the rest of the cheese. Bake for about 30 minutes, until the casserole is bubbly. You can broil it for a few minutes to make the casserole golden brown on top, if you like.

Monterey Aquarium

I still don't have time to do the recap, but I wanted to post the pics from our trip the Monterey Aquarium about a week ago. Enjoy!


Sleeping otter



Sunfish (with random people)



Jellyfish closeup



Hammerhead shark

Pan-fried Veal Cutlets with Pinot-Mushroom Reduction Sauce

Whew, sounds complicated, right? Well, not really. And the sauce REALLY turned out well. In fact, it was the very best part of the meal.

Pan-fried Veal Cutlets with Pinot-Mushroom Reduction Sauce
EVOO (lots)
1 Tbsp butter
1/2 yellow onion, diced
2 c sliced cremini (baby portobella) mushrooms
1/2 c Pinot Noir wine (I used Blackstone, it was on sale)
1/2 c chicken stock4 veal cutlets
1 egg, beaten lightly
1 c breadcrumbs (Italian season flavor, if you've got it, otherwise throw in some Mrs Dash or whatever with the plain breadcrumbs)
1/4 c freshly grated parmesan
salt & pepper

Turn on oven to the lowest setting.

Melt the butter in a large saute pan over medium heat with a couple of tablespoons of the olive oil. When the butter is all melted and beginning to bubble, add the diced onion and mushrooms. Saute for about 6-7 minutes, until the veggies are soft and begin to caramelize slightly. Season with salt and pepper, saute for a minute more, and then remove the veggies from the pan and add a little more olive oil.

In the meantime, mix up the breadcrumbs and parmesan in a large shallow bowl. Season the cutlets with salt and pepper, then dip them first in the beaten egg and then in the breadcrumb mixture, pressing the breadcrumbs into the meat so that they adhere better. Saute the cutlets in batches, adding more olive oil as needed to ensure that they don't stick, and being sure not to crowd the pan (you can probably fit two at a time in a 12" pan). Cook the meat for about 2-3 minutes per side, until they are golden brown and crispy on the outside. Transfer the cutlets to a baking sheet and put them in the oven to stay warm.

When all the cutlets have been cooked, return the mushrooms and onions to the pan and add the wine, scraping up any browned bits at the bottom of the pan. Allow the wine to cook out for a minute, then add the chicken stock, and turn up the heat to medium-high. Boil vigorously for a few minutes, until the sauce is reduced by at least half.

Serve the cutlets immediately, topped with the sauce. This would go great with buttered noodles, but I made garlic mashed potatoes this time.

Dashing!

I finished my first Mmmmalabrigo Dashing fingerless glove yesterday. W00t! I am really loving it. The color is so rich, the yarn is SO soft, and it's super-fantastically cozy.

Veg-tastic Spaghetti

Spaghetti
Originally uploaded by snarkmeister

I had a bag of mushrooms and a red bell pepper that really needed to get used up before we went to Monterey for the weekend, so I threw together a sweet, spicy, smokey spaghetti sauce (how's that for alliteration?) the other night. It's got some unusual ingredients, but it all blended well together, and Mr Wonderful gave this two thumbs up. The high veggie content makes this a natural choice for Sweetnicks' ARF/5-a-day roundup.

Veg-tastic Spaghetti
2 Tbsp EVOO
1/2 onion, diced
2 c chopped mushrooms
1 red bell pepper, diced
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 can (35 oz/2 lb) whole, peeled tomatoes - I chopped them up fairly small but you could puree it in the food processor or just crush them with your wooden spoon; however you like the consistency of your spaghetti sauce
1/2 tsp red pepper flakes
1 bay leaf
1 Tbsp dried oregano
1 tsp dried tarragon
1/2 tsp dried or fresh thyme
1/2 tsp smoked paprika
1/2 lb spaghetti or angel hair pasta (half a box)
salt & pepper
parmesan cheese, for serving (optional)

Heat the olive oil in a large saute pan over medium heat. Throw in the onion, mushrooms, and bell pepper and saute until veggies are soft and mushrooms begin to brown, about 6 minutes. Add the minced garlic and saute for just a minute more; don't let the garlic burn! Season with salt & pepper, then add the tomatoes and any juice from the can. Add all the herbs and spices, and let the sauce simmer for at least fifteen minutes, until all the flavors blend together.

Boil the pasta according to the package directions, drain, and serve with the spaghetti sauce. Sprinkle freshly grated parmesan cheese on top, if you like.

Superbowl

Yesterday, Mr Wonderful and I got home from our Monterey trip just in time to watch the halftime show of the Superbowl. I've never seen a Superbowl before. Ever. I was never involved with anyone who was a football fan, because as I think I've mentioned about a hundred and fifty million times, Mr Wonderful is "not my type."

So I was pleasantly surprised to find that as I sat there knitting my Dashings in yummy yummy Malabrigo, I was actually interested in what was happening on the TV. In fact, towards the end there, I was hollering at the players like any good red-blooded American football fan. Not that I actually cared who won or lost, but that was a darn good game, and it really all came down to the last five minutes or so on the clock (which you already know if you watched the game). Very tense, y'all.

I'll have to post more about the Monterey trip later in the week, but until then, here's a shot of the jellyfish at the aquarium to tide you over. Get it? Tide? Oh, I crack myself up sometimes....

Crispy Chicken

Crispy Chicken
Originally uploaded by snarkmeister

This is a simple oven "fried" chicken, made with a coating of fried onion strings (OMG, yum!) and romano cheese. Even our picky kids liked this!

Crispy Chicken
4 thin chicken breast cutlets
1 beaten egg
3/4 c crispy onion strings (I used French's French Fried Onions - you know, the stuff that comes in a can, and you put it on top of the green bean casserole at Thanksgiving)
1/4 c grated Romano or Parmesan cheese
pepper


Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Crumble the crispy onion strings and combine with the cheese in a large shallow bowl, seasoning with a few fresh grinds of pepper. Dip each cutlet first in the beaten egg and then in the onion/cheese mixture, pressing the coating into the chicken to help it adhere better. Bake on a cookie sheet for about 20 minutes, turning halfway through to ensure both sides get crispy.

Miscellaneous tidbits

This weekend, the company I work for is having its long-overdue "holiday party". We're all heading down to Monterey for the weekend, with a Saturday night stay at a B&B in Pacific Grove, and a kayaking trip if the weather cooperates, which...it doesn't look like it's going to do. Mr Wonderful and I are extending the trip a little bit; his day off this week falls on Friday (unusual, but very welcome!) so I took the day off as well and we'll be going down there a day early, staying Friday night at the same B&B. Nice, huh? I'm looking forward to spending a lovely long weekend eating great seafood, going to the aquarium, and snuggling with my man. It certainly sounds like more fun than sitting at home watching the Superbowl. Heh.

The other day Tomboy asked me how much I liked her daddy, on a scale from one to ten. I told her "Eleven." Her eyes bugged out a little, and she asked me if Mr Wonderful and I were going to get married. What could I say? Mr Wonderful hasn't really talked to her about it yet, but she's a smart girl; she sees where things are going. I told her that we would probably get married "someday." Her reaction was predictable: "Ewww, then HE [Rugrat] will be my brother?" And of course there was the inevitable question about babies, which I told her wasn't in the cards. She actually seemed disappointed about that, but...no. Not happening.

Mr Wonderful is planning a trip in April...on a weekend that we have the kids. He has this "once in a lifetime opportunity" to go to a free, very intensive GUN TRAINING class in Nevada. Yes. Gun training. How did I end up with a guy who thinks that spending a weekend in Pahrump running around shooting paper targets with SWAT team members is fun? Totally opposite of my "type," and yet...apparently this is my type. Anyhoo, this means that I will have the kids, all by myself, all weekend. Can I just say that I am really, really not looking forward to this? Tomboy is warming up to me, finally, but I have a feeling that this is going to be a watershed moment for us. I remember very clearly how awful I was to my stepmother when my dad took his first business trip away after she moved in. I was a raging bitch, honestly. And I am not looking forward to this karmic payback, nope, not at all.

I finished my So Called Scarf! First FO of the new year. Now I'm back on track with the Spider-man Sweater; I've picked up the stitches again at the (newly expanded) second armhole and am really motivated to get the damn thing done, finally. Once it's done, I can move on to new, fun projects, like my shrug, and my first pair of socks, and Tomboy's shrug that I'm planning to make with some gorgeous hand-dyed cotton, and my stripey top-down raglan v-neck sweater, and so on...

Ribollita

Ribollita
Originally uploaded by snarkmeister

Ribollita, for those of you unaware, is a lovely Tuscan veggie soup thickened with stale bread. Delicious and very healthy! The best part about ribollita is that it can be made with a wide variety of veggies; pretty much anything you've got wasting away in your crisper drawer can go in. Leafy greens like kale are a traditional addition to the soup, but they aren't required in the recipe below. The high veggie content means this will be my "get back on the horse" submission to Sweetnicks' ARF/5-a-day roundup this week.

Ribollita (adapted from this Rachael Ray recipe)
3 Tbsp EVOO, divided
1 diced medium onion
2 diced carrots
2 diced celery stalks
3-4 cloves garlic, minced
1 bay leaf (dried or fresh)
1 Tbsp chopped rosemary leaves
1 can (15 oz) tomatoes, diced or small diced or crushed; whatever you've got in the cupboard
2 cans small white beans (smaller than cannellini beans)
6 c chicken stock (use vegetable stock for a vegetarian soup)
3 c stale bread, without the crust, torn into small pieces (Italian or sourdough bread is best for this)
1/4 c chopped fresh parsley
Freshly grated Parmesan cheese, for serving
salt & pepper

Heat 2 Tbsp EVOO over medium heat in a large, heavy pot. Take a small handful of the diced onion, chop it very finely, and set it aside for later. Add the rest of the diced onion to the pot, along with the carrots, celery, garlic, bay leaf and rosemary. Season the veggies with salt & pepper, and saute for about 5 minutes, letting the veggies soften. Once the veggies are soft but not browned, add the tomatoes and beans (I drained one can of beans but put all the liquid from the second can in). Add the chicken stock, and raise the heat to medium-high. When it boils, add the torn bread. Simmer the soup (adjusting the heat as necessary) for 10 minutes or so, until the bread breaks down completely and thickens the soup. The soup can be as thick or thin as you like; add more bread for a thicker soup or more stock to thin it out. Just before serving, stir in the parsley and check your seasonings, adding more salt or pepper as desired.

To serve, put a couple of ladles of soup in a wide bowl, drizzle with the reserved EVOO, sprinkle with fresh grated parmesan cheese and the reserved finely chopped onion.

Shuffly goodness

Mr Wonderful got me a fabulous new iPod shuffle for Christmas. One that holds a whole gigabyte of data, which translates to 238 songs, or over 15 hours. FIFTEEN HOURS of music, y'all. On this little bitty metallic green thing the size of a postage stamp! I really love technology. And also? The new shuffle works great because I haven't spilled any meat juice on it (yet). So it actually, you know, shuffles the songs instead of just playing the same ten over and over until I want to scream.

Note to self: do not set down the cutting board with meat fresh from the oven on top of the new shuffle. You will regret it.

Risotto Review

OK, I know it's been a while. I was sick right after New Year's and we had Rugrat's birthday to deal with. But honestly, I just haven't been cooking much, and what I have cooked has been pretty basic, run-of-the-mill stuff (or stuff I've already posted about; Mr Wonderful is asking about the Yum Yum Chicken Enchilada casserole again, so I'll have to throw that together one of these days). However, Mr Wonderful and I did go out to dinner at a "new" (to us, anyway) restaurant here in Antioch, called Risotto.

The restaurant has actually been around for about a year, and I was surprised to hear that because I would have thought they'd have improved after being in business for so long. From the top:

We both ordered the prix fixe meal, as we were there on a Thursday night at around 6:15 PM. It's four courses for about $22, if you're there Sun-Thurs before 7 PM. We both got different dishes for each course, so I think we got a pretty good overview of their menu.

First up was soup: I had butternut squash/apple soup and he had the roasted portobello mushroom soup. They were both fantastic; the only quibble we had is that the mushroom soup had no garnish whatsoever and it looked like a bowl of mud. It could have used a little swirl of creme fraiche or sour cream, and maybe a bit of parsley. But the flavor of both soups was outstanding.

Next came the salad course. My salad was a wine country standard, with candied walnuts, bleu cheese crumbles, baby greens and a balsamic vinaigrette. Nice, but standard. Nothing to write home about. His salad was Greek-style, with olives, feta, tomatoes and a slightly lemony dressing (with maybe a little dill or oregano in it). Again, perfectly serviceable but nothing outstanding.

Third course was our pasta, and this is where things started to fall apart. My tortellini with prosciutto and peas was quite nice, except that the tortellini was overcooked a little. I did appreciate that they didn't drown the pasta in the alfredo sauce; there was just enough sauce without it being overwhelming. Mr Wonderful's pasta was pretty bad, though. His mostaccioli (large tube-shaped pasta) was undercooked, but the chicken in his dish was quite overcooked, to the point that it was dry and almost tough. The sauce was horribly underseasoned as well; it didn't taste like much of anything, which is pretty difficult to do with a tomato-based sauce. The sauce desperately needed salt, onions, garlic, sausage...something! It was completely bland. On the plus side, the dishes were nicely presented. We would have preferred that they grated the parmesan over our dishes at the table, instead of sprinkling pre-grated cheese with a spoon, but that was a minor quibble overall.

To wrap things up, I opted for the apple galette while he stuck with his favorite - tiramisu. My apple tart was nearly inedible. The apples were bland beyond measure, unpeeled and again, horribly underseasoned, with a nearly rubbery bit of pastry on top. Mr Wonderful's tiramisu was a disappointment as well: the plating was disastrous, with little chunks of the tiramisu scattered around the main portion, and the texture was all wrong; the ladyfingers were soggy and had no body whatsoever.

All in all, it was an uneven meal. We'll keep it in our rotation, but probably just order soup to go rather than risk another pasta dish. And the desserts should be taken off their menu altogether; if you can't do the pastry right, just serve ice cream.

Risotto

OK, I know it's been a while. I was sick right after New Year's and we had Rugrat's birthday to deal with. But honestly, I just haven't been cooking much, and what I have cooked has been pretty basic, run-of-the-mill stuff (or stuff I've already posted about; Mr Wonderful is asking about the Yum Yum Chicken Enchilada casserole again, so I'll have to throw that together one of these days). However, Mr Wonderful and I did go out to dinner at a "new" (to us, anyway) restaurant here in Antioch, called Risotto.

The restaurant has actually been around for about a year, and I was surprised to hear that because I would have thought they'd have improved after being in business for so long. From the top:

We both ordered the prix fixe meal, as we were there on a Thursday night at around 6:15 PM. It's four courses for about $22, if you're there Sun-Thurs before 7 PM. We both got different dishes for each course, so I think we got a pretty good overview of their menu.

First up was soup: I had butternut squash/apple soup and he had the roasted portobello mushroom soup. They were both fantastic; the only quibble we had is that the mushroom soup had no garnish whatsoever and it looked like a bowl of mud. It could have used a little swirl of creme fraiche or sour cream, and maybe a bit of parsley. But the flavor of both soups was outstanding.

Next came the salad course. My salad was a wine country standard, with candied walnuts, bleu cheese crumbles, baby greens and a balsamic vinaigrette. Nice, but standard. Nothing to write home about. His salad was Greek-style, with olives, feta, tomatoes and a slightly lemony dressing (with maybe a little dill or oregano in it). Again, perfectly serviceable but nothing outstanding.

Third course was our pasta, and this is where things started to fall apart. My tortellini with prosciutto and peas was quite nice, except that the tortellini was overcooked a little. I did appreciate that they didn't drown the pasta in the alfredo sauce; there was just enough sauce without it being overwhelming. Mr Wonderful's pasta was pretty bad, though. His mostaccioli (large tube-shaped pasta) was undercooked, but the chicken in his dish was quite overcooked, to the point that it was dry and almost tough. The sauce was horribly underseasoned as well; it didn't taste like much of anything, which is pretty difficult to do with a tomato-based sauce. The sauce desperately needed salt, onions, garlic, sausage...something! It was completely bland. On the plus side, the dishes were nicely presented. We would have preferred that they grated the parmesan over our dishes at the table, instead of sprinkling pre-grated cheese with a spoon, but that was a minor quibble overall.

To wrap things up, I opted for the apple galette while he stuck with his favorite - tiramisu. My apple tart was nearly inedible. The apples were bland beyond measure, unpeeled and again, horribly underseasoned, with a nearly rubbery bit of pastry on top. Mr Wonderful's tiramisu was a disappointment as well: the plating was disastrous, with little chunks of the tiramisu scattered around the main portion, and the texture was all wrong; the ladyfingers were soggy and had no body whatsoever.

All in all, it was an uneven meal. We'll keep it in our rotation, but probably just order soup to go rather than risk another pasta dish. And the desserts should be taken off their menu altogether; if you can't do the pastry right, just serve ice cream.

Sniffle

The last week has been punctuated with sneezes, coughs, sniffles and the like. Yes, I've caught a cold.

Did that stop us from celebrating Rugrat's birthday in style? No, it did not. Mr Wonderful and I packed up the kids last Saturday morning and hauled them into the city for the day, since the kids will be at their other parents' houses on Rugrat's actual birthday (tomorrow). We spent over five hours experimenting at the Exploratorium (which Rugrat insisted on calling the "Learn-atorium"), only leaving when they finally closed and kicked us out. Rugrat was especially fascinated by the biology-related exhibits, spending quite a lot of time looking at cells and learning about DNA. Which means that my bright idea for his birthday present was spot-on: I'm getting him a microscope. (Unfortunately it's back ordered until April, but when it finally comes in I'm sure he'll enjoy the hell out of it.) Afterwards, we headed to Fisherman's Wharf and had dinner in the "treetop" at the Rainforest Cafe. Overpriced food, but the atmosphere is fun and the kids loved it.

I really wanted to take the kids to Ghirardelli Square afterwards, to visit the flagship Ghirardelli store and have sundaes for dessert. So we walked all the way down there, only to find that the store is CLOSED for remodeling until spring. *sigh* Such a disappointment. But overall it was a fun day and Rugrat and Tomboy had a blast, so: mission accomplished.

I've been slacking on my knitting recently. I've been working on my So-Called Scarf sporadically (usually while watching TV in the evenings) but I've been procrastinating heavily about Rugrat's Spider-man sweater. I had to rip a sleeve back all the way and undo a little of the side seam because the armholes were slightly different sizes and it was making the arm much, much smaller in diameter. It was a difference of maybe three or four stitches in height at the armhole, but it made a HUGE difference to the size of the sleeve. So, lesson learned. In the future I will be very, very precise about seams. Goddammit. Anyway, because of this disheartening development, I haven't even started the sleeve again. It's just so depressing to get halfway through the sleeve and decide you have to rip it back. Maybe I'll pick it up again this weekend. I better finish it soon, or Rugrat won't be able to wear it this winter...which means he'll never wear it because next year it will be too small. *sigh*

On the plus side, Mr Wonderful is still wonderful, we are still totally in love and I couldn't be happier. I know I say this all the time, but I just feel so blessed to have him in my life. And he still makes me laugh every day. Even when I'm crazy with stupid PMS hormones or sick with a cold.

Lazy days

We've had some stormy weather recently, with lots of rain and wind. Perfect weather for comfort food, so recently I've been making family favorites and haven't done a lot of experimenting. Some French onion soup one night, chicken and rice casserole another night. I did make lentil soup, but it wasn't super-photogenic so I decided to leave it off the food blog. Tasty and healthy, but definitely kind of boring-looking.

I'm looking forward to creating lots of lovely new dishes in 2008 though, so stay tuned!

Winds of change

Last night, after dropping Rugrat off at his dad's house & grabbing some dinner with Mr Wonderful, I turned back to my computer to find that Obama had won the Iowa democratic caucus.

I am so excited about this, y'all!

I truly believe that Obama is the candidate who can bring about a change in the direction of our country. I think he's incredibly intelligent, articulate, and inclusive.

Best of 2007

This year has been filled with ups and downs, just like any other year, but I think the highs far outweighed the lows, and for that I am truly thankful. Highlights from the year include:

• Knitting. I've gotten pretty deep into knitting in the last year and it's brought me both joy and frustration (damn sleeves on the Spider-man sweater are STILL giving me grief!). I've also made huge strides in my skill level, though - I may have made a lot of mistakes, but I'm learning from them.
• Quitting smoking. It's about damn time! It's been nine months now, without a single puff. Yay me!
• My new car. I love, love, love my Highlander, even if it only gets 20 mpg instead of the 30 I used to get with the Accord.
• Cooking & food blogging. I really started cooking a lot more this year, partly due to my Rachael Ray obsession and partly due to the fact that I have more than one other person to cook for now. Rugrat is a super-picky eater still, but it's a lot easier to insist that he eat the same thing as everyone else when there's more people eating it. Plus Mr Wonderful is always very appreciative of my cooking, and that makes me more willing to try new things in the kitchen.
• And last but certainly not least: love. Love finally found me again after a hiatus of several years. I had pretty much given up on the idea that I would find someone; I'd certainly stopped looking. But when I found Mr Wonderful on myspace after not being in contact with him for ten years, I knew I had to see him. And the chemistry was still there, after all that time. I am profoundly grateful every day that I have him in my life, and that we are building our family together. He is not perfect, nor am I, but we have enough maturity, and enough love and respect for each other to work things out and to talk about the hard stuff.

How about you? What's on your personal "best of 2007" list?

Crab Risotto

I wanted to make something special and comforting, but also something that would be light-tasting, since we've been eating so much heavy, fattening food (you know how it is around the holidays). I came up with this crab risotto, and it was the perfect thing for Mr Wonderful and I.

Crab Risotto
2 Tbsp EVOO
2 Tbsp butter
1/2 c diced onion
1 c arborio rice
1 c dry white wine
4 c simmering chicken stock
10 oz fresh crab meat (Dungeness is in season here in the bay area)
Zest of one lemon
2 Tbsp minced fresh parsley
salt & pepper

Melt the butter with the EVOO in a heavy skillet over medium heat. When the butter is melted, add the onions and saute until translucent, about 5 minutes. Seasoning with salt & pepper is a good idea at this point. Add the rice and stir to coat all the grains, and let them toast for a minute or two while you open the wine. Add the wine and let it bubble until the alcohol is all cooked out. and the rice has absorbed some of the liquid. Add 1/2-3/4 c of hot chicken stock. Stir frequently, letting the rice absorb the stock until it's almost gone. The rice should not get dry on top, but when you drag a wooden spoon across the bottom of the pan, it should leave a track for a moment or two. That's when you know it's time to add more stock. Keep adding stock and letting the rice absorb it, stirring very frequently, until the stock is all gone and the rice is al dente. Be patient, it takes about half an hour to do this right!

At this point you can add just about anything you want to the risotto. For this meal, I used crab, lemon zest, and parsley. As soon as the crab is heated through, check the seasonings and add more salt or pepper, if necessary. Makes 3-4 servings.

Chicken Noodle Soup

Chicken Noodle Soup
Originally uploaded by snarkmeister

Good lord, it's been forever since I updated. I've been cooking, but it's mostly been stuff like chicken nuggets for the kids and re-runs of things I've already blogged about. I mean, who wants to see another blog about roast chicken? I did make a Beef Barley Soup the other day, but my camera batteries had died and I didn't have anymore AA's, so there wasn't a picture for the post. It was pretty simple anyway - just the usual soup starter veggies (onion, celery, carrot), 2 boxes of beef broth, some barley grains, salt & pepper and a bay leaf.

This soup recipe is pretty much the same, with a little variation. I love basic soups - you can pull them together in half an hour and you've got a comforting meal for 4-6 people that's perfect for wintertime.

Chicken Noodle Soup
2 Tbsp EVOO
1/2 yellow onion, diced small
1 carrot, diced
1 celery stalk, diced
1 large chicken breast, diced
8 cups (2 boxes) chicken stock
2 tsp poultry seasoning
salt & pepper to taste

Heat up the EVOO over medium heat in your big, heavy soup pot. Throw in the veggies, season with salt & pepper, and saute for a few minutes, until the onion is translucent (about 5 min). Throw in the diced chicken, season with salt & pepper and poultry seasoning. Cook for a couple of minutes, until there's not much pink showing anymore. Add all the chicken stock, and raise the heat to high until it comes to a boil. Throw in the dried pasta of your choice (Rugrat's favorite is the "honeycombs" - AKA fiori, or "flower" shaped pasta), reduce heat to medium, cover and cook until the pasta is al dente (stirring occasionally so the pasta doesn't stick). That's it! The chicken will be cooked through by the time the pasta is done.

A sleeve is done!

Finally! I finally finished one sleeve. Rugrat saw a kid wearing a sweater that had little holes for the kid's thumbs to poke through, and of course he had to have that for HIS sweater, so I made a buttonhole after carefully marking where his thumb would be.

So now all I have to do is one more sleeve, the collar, and weave in all those pesky yarn ends...and we'll have a sweater!

Dyeing wool yarn

Last weekend we made a trip to Michael's, to get some glitter and food coloring for the kids (they were making snow globes). I figured since I was there I'd pick up a skein of cheap white wool yarn and try dyeing some myself, since I'd read up on it earlier in the week and it seemed pretty simple. I grabbed some Wilton's paste food coloring in forest green, brown, burgundy and teal, and a skein of Patons Classic Wool Merino in winter white.

When we got home, I pulled out some Pyrex dishes - casserole-type things - and preheated the oven to about 225. All my regular pots & pans are hard-anodized aluminum, and I wasn't willing to possibly ruin my expensive cookware on a test ball of yarn (you can't use aluminum because it is "reactive" - and I'm not sure what exactly happens, but I wasn't about to find out). I don't have any stainless still pots, so I figured I'd do it in the glass dishes in the oven instead of on the stove. I transferred the ball of yarn into a hank by wrapping it around the back of two dining room chairs (back to back) and then tied it in four places with some acrylic crap yarn to keep it in one big hank. I soaked the hank in plain hot water for about half an hour, until the yarn was fully soaked, then I drained the water from the sink and kind of pushed/squeezed the excess water out. I put 1/4 cup of white vinegar in each of the three casserole dishes, then filled each one with 4 cups (1 quart) of hot water. Then came the fun part - adding the dye. It's kind of a trial-and-error sort of thing; the more dye you add, the more saturated the color will be. I just scooped some out of the little jar with a wooden chopstick and swirled it around in the water/vinegar until it dissolved completely. I used the green, brown and burgundy for this trial (Rugrat wanted me to use the teal but I figured three colors was PLENTY to start out with). I carefully put the dishes in the oven (not real easy to make all three fit on one shelf, let me tell you!) and draped the damp skein of white yarn in the dishes, with brown on one end, burgundy on the other, and the green in the middle. I checked it often, poking it with chopsticks to make sure it was submerged all the way, and turned it over once to make sure the color saturated the top as well as the bottom of the yarn.

Finally I removed the yarn and let it cool in the sink, dumped out the remaining dye water, and rinsed the yarn. And rinsed, and rinsed, and rinsed. The burgundy bled like crazy. When it finally let up some, I took a long, critical look at the skein and decided the colors were too bright and unharmonious, so I ended up re-dyeing the entire skein in brown dye. When I rinsed it out after overdyeing with brown, there was no bleeding, and the colors were much more muted - as I had originally intended. I ended up with a lovely autumn-y variegated skein, with coppery brown, camel, olive green, and cranberry colors. As you can see from the picture above, I'm turning it into My So Called Scarf, and the pattern shows off the color gradations beautifully.

Holiday meme

1. Wrapping paper or gift bags? Mostly paper, but gift bags if they're a funky shape

2. Tree--Real or Artificial? Artificial, but only because real trees are so darned expensive now. You can get a nice fake tree for about the same price as a nice REAL tree, but the fake tree lasts forever.

3. When do you put the Christmas tree up? The day after Thanksgiving

4. When do you take the tree down? Shortly after New Year's

5. Like eggnog? I've got to have it at least once during the season

6. Do you have a nativity scene? No

7. Favorite gift received as a child? Cabbage Patch Kid

8. Hardest person to buy for? Step-dad

9. Worst Christmas gift received? I can't think of anything particularly heinous, although I was sorely disappointed the year that I got a FAKE Cabbage Patch Kid.

10. Mail or email a Christmas card? Mail ...and I am horrendously late this year, I know...

12. Favorite Christmas movie? So hard to choose! Love Actually (not really a Christmas movie, but it's set in London at Christmastime), A Christmas Story ("You'll put your eye out, kid!"), It's a Wonderful Life (of course), and most of the old-skool kids' Christmas specials, like Year Without a Santa Claus (Heat Miser!!) and Rudolph and Charlie Brown Christmas. I really love Christmas shows.

13. When do you start shopping for Christmas? Usually just before Thanksgiving, but this year I didn't start until last Friday. But I got it almost all done that day, so I'm doing pretty good. ;-)

14. Have you ever recycled a Christmas present? Yes, bath stuff and bottles of wine

15. Favorite food to eat on Christmas? Oh boy. Slow-roasted prime rib with gravy and mashed potatoes - I think that's what we'll be having for Christmas dinner this year. Homemade fudge. Hot chocolate with whipped cream. Maple sugar candy (in my stocking every year!). Almond Roca. Tangerines. A big brunch, like pancakes or scrambled eggs and bacon. Coffee (but that's nothing new, I have that every morning).

16. Colored or clear lights? Colored, definitely. The tackier, the better, when it comes to my Christmas tree.

17. Favorite Christmas song? The Charlie Brown Christmas album (Vince Guaraldi). Brian Setzer Orchestra's version of The Nutcracker Suite. God Bless Ye Merry Gentlemen, by Barenaked Ladies with Sarah McLachlan. All I Want for Christmas, by Olivia Olson. It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year, by Andy Williams. Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow, by Frank Sinatra. The Christmas Song, by Nat King Cole. What? I LIKE Christmas music!

18. Travel during Christmas or stay home? Stay home!!

19. Can you name Santa's reindeer? Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner, Blitzen, and Rudolph

20. Star or angel on tree top? Angel, but only because I've never found a star I like as much as the one we had on the tree when I was growing up. (*sob!*)

21. Open presents on Christmas Eve or morning? Christmas morning. Usually Babydaddy comes over on Christmas Eve and spends the night so we can all open presents together Christmas morning, but I guess that won't be happening this year! LOL

22. The most annoying thing about this time of year? All the noise, noise, noise, noise! Just kidding. Actually, it's the shopping I hate most. And the traffic. And the people, but I generally hate people so that's nothing new. ;-)

Advice

Note to self: stop knitting while drinking.

I keep dropping stitches and fucking things up and having to rip back the poor sleeve I finally started on a few days ago. Every time I sit down with a beer and my knitting needles I screw the damn thing up. Like, when I decided to give the sleeve a little shaping, and so I (in my ultimate wisdom) decreased one stitch every other row, but only in one direction. So the sleeve decrease started to spiral.

Ah well, I guess this is just what happens when you knit your first sweater and decide to do modifications to the pattern. Before this, the most difficult thing I'd attempted was a scarf. A really easy garter-stitch scarf. Oh, and I did do that one two-color hat in the EZ book. But this is really my first big project, and quite frankly I'm so frustrated with it right now that I dream about frogging the whole damn thing. Literally. I had a dream I did that. It was kind of liberating but ultimately a depressing dream, so when I woke up I was glad I hadn't done it.

Anyhoo, I am plugging along. I found a local knitting group and finally made it to my first meeting last night. I'm hoping to make it on a regular basis, because I think it will help a lot to have experienced knitters that I can get help from, in person, when I screw up.

Playing catch-up

It's been a busy week, what with Thanksgiving and all. The holiday was nice; it was just Mr Wonderful and I with the kids, but the food was delish (even if the kids didn't appreciate it). I spent all day cooking, but it was worth it.

Unfortunately, I've been slacking on the Spider-Man sweater. I haven't touched it since Thanksgiving and I really need to get back in the saddle if I'm going to have it finished in (eek!) less than a month. I did find a knitting group that meets at the local bookstore on Tuesday evenings, so that may help me get motivated, if I can ever get to a meeting! I wanted to go this week, but had to take Mr Wonderful out to pick up his car at the shop (again...*sigh*); that was the only night we'd be able to do it this week.

Current pet peeve: people who give out the wrong phone number. Some woman named Karen must have accidentally put my cell phone number on her business cards or something, because I keep getting calls for her. Just about every day I get a call for her. I may just stop answering my phone if this continues.

This weekend, we're taking the kids up to the mountains, where Mr Wonderful's sister & her family live. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like there will be snow (now THAT would be a treat for the kids!) but I'll finally get to meet her.

Last but not least, there's been a little change on my blogs. Maybe you've noticed the Google ads in the right column? Well, I finally set up Google Analytics (stats, to tell me how many people visit my blog each day) and Google AdSense (the ads you see in the columns). I'm not really expecting to make much money out of it; anything I earned would just be icing on the cake, frankly. But I am quite interested in the stats. I looked this morning and there were visitors from Thailand and Ireland! How cool is that?

Scalloped Croque Monsieur

Mr Wonderful's birthday was two days after Thanksgiving. His absolute favorite food is scalloped or au gratin potatoes, so I decided to make a variation by adding classic Croque Monsieur flavors: mustard and ham. In addition, we had a lovely salad with apples, candied pecans, bacon, caramelized balsamic onions, blue cheese and balsamic vinaigrette. And for dessert we had Tiramisu, another favorite of his.

Russet potatoes are an antioxidant-rich food, so this will be my submission for Sweetnicks' ARF/5-a-day roundup. Click the link to see more great recipes from food bloggers!

Scalloped Croque Monsieur
4 Tbsp butter
1/4 c flour
2 c milk
1 Tbsp good grainy mustard
1/4 tsp nutmeg (freshly grated, if possible)
1 1/2 c shredded Gruyere cheese (or other good swiss-type, like Emmenthal or Comte)
3 small russet potatoes, peeled and sliced thinly
1/4 lb thinly sliced deli ham
salt & pepper

Preheat oven to 375.

In a saucepan, melt the butter over medium heat. When the butter starts to bubble slightly, add the flour and cook for a minute or two. Add the milk slowly, stirring or whisking constantly to prevent lumps. Raise the heat to high, and continue stirring constantly, until the sauce begins to thicken. Remove the sauce from the heat and add the mustard, nutmeg, salt & pepper (go easy on the salt; cheese is salty) and 1 cup of the shredded cheese.

In an 8" buttered baking dish, layer the potatoes, sauce and ham, starting with a little bit of sauce on the bottom, and ending with a bunch of sauce on top to make sure it's all covered. Sprinkle the casserole with the remaining 1/2 cup of cheese. Bake for 50-60 minutes, until the potatoes are soft and the casserole is golden brown on top. Serves 2-3.

Thanksgiving Dinner

I obviously didn't spend much time on plating, but maybe you'll forgive me if I tell you that I was halfway through a bottle of wine by the time it hit the table, since I spent ALL DAY cooking for only four people. Oh, and only two of those people actually appreciated the food and ate it without making nasty faces.

I skipped the apple crisp, figuring that Rugrat wouldn't eat it and I'd be plenty full from dinner anyway. But I did put out a crudite platter for everyone to snack on during the afternoon, and whipped up a quick batch of stuffed mushrooms for Mr Wonderful and I. The kids won't touch mushrooms with a ten foot pole, which was just fine with me, because stuffed mushrooms are one of my favorite things.

Mashed Maple-Brown Sugar Sweet Potatoes
3 c baked, peeled & mashed sweet potatoes
1/3 c half and half
1/3 c good maple syrup
2 Tbsp melted butter
1/2 tsp salt
2 egg whites, lightly beaten

Preheat oven to 350.

Mix all ingredients together and spoon into an 8" buttered baking dish. Then, combine the following ingredients with a pastry cutter (or in a food processor or stand mixer, if you're lazy like me) until it gets crumbly and the butter bits are smaller than peas:

1/4 c lightly packed brown sugar
1/4 c flour
2 Tbsp cold butter

Sprinkle evenly on top of the mashed sweet potatoes, then bake for about 30 minutes. Serves 6-8.


Stuffed Mushrooms
1 Tbsp butter
1 Tbsp EVOO
10 mushrooms, cleaned
1 Tbsp minced shallot
1 Tbsp chopped parsley
1 tsp fresh lemon zest
1/2 c cracker crumbs (I usually use saltines; this time I had oyster crackers on hand, but you can use Ritz or whatever)
salt & pepper
2 Tbsp finely shredded Parmesan cheese

Preheat the oven to 350.

Remove the stems from the mushrooms and chop the stems finely. Place the caps, hole side up, on a cookie sheet. Melt the butter with the EVOO in a small saute pan, then add the chopped mushroom stems, shallot, parsley and lemon zest. Cook for about 3 minutes to soften the mushrooms and shallots, and to blend the flavors together. Add the cracker crumbs. At this point, you may need to adjust a little - if the stuffing looks too wet, add a little more cracker crumbs; if it's too dry, moisten with a bit more EVOO. Cook for another minute, to bind everything together and toast the crumbs a little, and season with salt & pepper to taste.

With a teaspoon, stuff each mushroom cap with the mixture. You should mound it up and kind of press it down a bit with the spoon, making sure it's well packed. Top the mushroom caps with the shredded cheese and then pop them in the oven for 5-10 minutes, until the mushrooms give up their liquid and start to brown a bit. Serve immediately. This recipe will only serve about 2 people, though, because they are really yummy and you'll be scarfing them down as fast as you can.

Thanksgiving Menu

This year I had given my family over six months' notice that I would be doing Thanksgiving. Six months! And still, nobody is coming, as far as I know. I extended a last-minute invitation to my aunt & uncle, and my cousin & her son, but no word yet on whether they'll be attending. I guess the party jinx extends even to family parties now. :-(

In spite of that, though, I'll be making a FULL Thanksgiving dinner. Mr Wonderful and I and the kids will be here to enjoy it, and even if we're stuck having leftovers for a month, I won't skimp on Thanksgiving. So, the menu is:

Sage, Onion & Apple Cider-Roasted Turkey (a 12 pounder!)
Apple-Herb Stuffing
Green Bean Casserole
Brussels Sprouts with Bacon (will probably add some apple cider to this to sweeten it and tie it in to the turkey/stuffing)
Funeral Potatoes (I've been dying to make this - no pun intended)
Mashed Maple-Brown Sugar Sweet Potatoes (recipe will be posted after Thanksgiving)
Cranberry Sauce
Rolls
Pumpkin Pie
Apple Crisp

I dislike Pumpkin Pie, but Mr Wonderful thinks it wouldn't be Thanksgiving without it, so that's why we've got two desserts.

Spider-Man Logo

Spider-Man Sweater
Originally uploaded by snarkmeister.

The Spider-Man logo I used for Rugrat's "Weasley Sweater" in place of an initial.

Chart (Excel format) can be found here.

Clam Chowder

So much fresher and healthier than the canned stuff!

Clam Chowder
3 Tbsp butter
2 Tbsp EVOO
1 c diced onion
1 c diced celery
1 c diced carrot
2 c diced potatoes
1/4 c flour
1 bottle clam juice
4 c chicken stock (one large box with a pour-spout)
1/2 c half and half
2 cans whole clams, drained (juice reserved) and checked over to ensure there are no little bits of shell
1/4 c chopped fresh parsley
salt & pepper

Melt the butter with the EVOO in a large soup pot or a dutch oven over medium heat. Add the onions, celery, carrots and potatoes, and salt & pepper to taste. Saute for about 10 minutes, until the veggies are tender and the onions are translucent. Add the flour and cook for a minute or two. Add the bottled clam juice slowly, stirring constantly to prevent lumps. Add in the chicken stock and bring the heat up to high, stirring often, until the soup begins to thicken. Reduce the heat back to medium. Add in the half and half, reserved clam juice and the clams. Cook just for a few minutes, until the clams are cooked through, then stir in the chopped parsley and serve.

Makes enough soup for 4-6 people.

Edited because I forgot about the potatoes! Whoops!

I'm on Ravelry!

Ravelry is like MySpace for knitters/crocheters. The site is still in beta, but I signed up for a beta account and finally, after nearly a month, got my invite. :) I'm "snarkmeister" on Ravelry, if you're a fellow Raveler.

Vacillating

I was absolutely positive that I didn't want any more children after I had Rugrat. Rugrat is more than enough for me to handle, thankyouverymuch. And I have an almost-stepdaughter now, who is a wonderful new part of my family. But when Mr Wonderful offered to have a vasectomy, I told him to wait. Why? I don't know. Because I'm still in my early thirties (OK, mid-thirties) and there is plenty of time for me to change my mind. But I was still sure that I didn't really want to have one...I just wanted to have the option available. Does that make sense?

And then the other day, at Mr Wonderful's parents' house, he was joking with me, trying to cheer me up about some little thing that I was in a funk about (probably work calling me and needing something while I was ON VACATION). And he lay down next to me and talked into my belly. And I felt something like a cramp of desire to be pregnant. Because when I was pregnant last time I didn't have that, that supportive loving dad who was all excited about the baby. It almost made me cry, when he did that, and to be honest I'm crying on my couch right now, just thinking about it. Of course that's mostly because I am hormonal and on my period, but...still. It was hard, not to just tell him right then and there that I wanted this more than anything else in the world. But I had to wait, I had to really think about it, and I know that really, I don't want another child. I don't. Being a parent is a huge responsibility, and we're halfway to having the kids out of the house at this point. Getting pregnant again would mean starting all over. And with the sleep deprivation and the dirty diapers and the miserable pregnancy shit...no. I don't really want it.

But it's all I can think about right now. So let's just fucking get past this stupid hormone surge, shall we? I don't want any more kids. I told Mr Wonderful that he can't do that belly-talking thing any more, because it makes me wish I was pregnant. And part of me was really, really sad at having to tell him that. And part of me wants to tell him that we should just throw out the birth control pills when we get married. But another part of me, the larger, saner part, knows that I will get past this weird baby fever and that I really, really DON'T want another baby. Even though he said he would totally talk into my belly if I were pregnant, and put headphones on my belly to play cool music for the baby, and all that supportive daddy-to-be stuff. Oh god, I don't really want another baby. I don't.

Meet the Fockers

Well, it's done. We've made the rounds now, and officially received blessings from the parental units.

Mr Wonderful's mom & stepdad are super-nice and loads of fun. We spent a couple of days there, swimming (yes! In November!) and playing dominoes and shopping and eating...and of course drinking lots of margaritas. Yum! Then we headed down to San Diego to see my mom & stepdad, and spent a couple of days hanging out with them. Mr Wonderful and I did manage to get to the beach (I took him to Coronado and La Jolla) and also out to visit my aunt & uncle, who I haven't seen in several years. We saw my stepsister & her family, too, including my two twin nephews, who I'd never seen. They were absolutely adorable, toddling around and screeching and bumping into each other. That girl must have loads energy to keep up with them all the time, though - they were exhausting!

I got lots of knitting done on the trip; I'm about two-thirds of the way through with the back of Rugrat's sweater and will be working on it every night in order to get it finished in time for Christmas. And now I need to plan for Thanksgiving; nobody's coming (party jinx in full effect, of course) but we'll have the kids that day and I am making a full T'giving dinner. Last but not least, it's time for Christmas shopping and cards. It's going to be busy for the next six weeks, so if I don't post very often, you'll know why.

Vacation, all I ever wanted

I am so ready for a vacation. On Wednesday Mr Wonderful and I are driving down to SoCal to meet the moms. It's not a real long vacation but it will be relaxing (I hope). Some swimming, some eating & drinking, some bonding with the parental units....we're overdue for this, I think, and it's certainly something we need to get done before we make things official. It looks like this will be my month to meet most of his family, because he's talking about us taking the kids up to his sister's house in a little less than two weeks.

Mr Wonderful's birthday is coming up soon too, right after Thanksgiving, in fact. So I'm looking forward to making all his birthday wishes come true...starting with Tiramisu for his b'day dessert. I'll have to food blog that one for sure.

Have I mentioned?

I am in love with Sriracha. It is the asian garlic-chili sauce that comes in a plastic squeeze bottle with a rooster on the front. And it turns out, as well-publicized on the show Top Chef, it really does go well with everything (except ice cream).

It adds a spicy, vinegary kick to just about anything. I love the way it brightened up the mac & cheese. It was indispensable in Mr Wonderful's Comfort Stew. It's fabulous to add to those bland, child-approved casseroles and pasta dishes. I am telling you, I would marry this stuff if I could, I love it that much.

Mr Wonderful's Comfort Stew

A cross between a stew and a chili...I wanted to pamper Mr Wonderful a little bit at the end of a long, busy weekend, so I set out some chips & salsa and a cold beer for him to snack on while I finished making this "comfort stew" - a rib-sticking Mexican-inspired dish. With the healthy beans, potatoes and tomatoes, this stew will be my contribution to Sweetnicks' ARF/5-a-day roundup this week.

Mr Wonderful's Comfort Stew
2 Tbsp EVOO
1 diced onion
1 pkg kielbasa (four sausages), sliced lengthwise and then cut into 1/2" slices
2 russet potatoes, cut into about 1 1/2" dice
1 can black beans, drained
1 can white (navy or cannelini) beans, drained
1 can diced tomatoes
1 Tbsp cumin
1 tsp garlic powder
1 c pork broth (use chicken if you can't find pork)
1 Tbsp Sriracha
1/4 c chopped fresh cilantro
1/4 c thinly sliced green onion
salt & pepper
Shredded cheese, for serving (cheddar, jack, or similar) -- optional
Sour cream, for serving -- optional

In a large soup pot or dutch oven, heat the olive oil over medium heat. Saute the onions until translucent, about 5 minutes. Add the kielbasa and saute until it gets a little golden brown. Add the diced potatoes, season liberally with salt & pepper, and saute for about 5 minutes, until they start to turn golden brown. Add the two cans of beans, the can of tomatoes, the cumin, garlic powder (or fresh garlic; I was just being lazy), the cup of broth and the Sriracha. Add enough water just to cover the stew, and raise the heat up to medium high. When the stew just starts to boil, reduce the heat and simmer, stirring occasionally, for about 20 minutes or until the potatoes are tender and the stew has thickened. Taste for seasonings & adjust as needed. Add the cilantro and green onion at the very end.

Ladle into bowls, topping each bowl with cheese and/or sour cream if you like (we added a little dollop of sour cream to each bowl and the cool creamy goodness was the perfect counterpoint to the spicy stew).

Mac & Cheese

Made from scratch, with four different kinds of cheese and a buttery breadcrumb topping...this was decadent and delicious.

Mac 'N' Cheese
1 pound cooked pasta (penne, macaroni, or similar)
6 Tbsp butter, divided
1/4 c flour
2 1/2 c milk
1 tsp freshly grated nutmeg
4 oz Gruyere, shredded
4 oz white Cheddar, shredded
4 oz Brie, diced (rind removed)
1 1/2 c fresh breadcrumbs
2 tsp Sriracha (optional)
2 Tbsp freshly shredded Parmesan
salt & pepper

Preheat oven to 350.

Melt 4 Tbsp butter in a saucepot over medium heat. When the butter starts to bubble slightly, add the flour and cook for a minute or two. Add a little salt and some pepper (go easy on the salt because the cheese is salty). Add the milk and stir immediately to blend everything without lumps. Raise the heat a little bit, and cook, stirring constantly, until the bechamel sauce thickens enough to coat the back of the spoon. Add the nutmeg. Take the sauce off the heat and add 3/4 of the Gruyere, Cheddar and Brie cheeses. Stir until cheeses are melted and completely incorporated. Add the cheese sauce to the pasta and pour into a large casserole dish. If you want, at this point you can drizzle some Sriracha on the mac 'n' cheese. It adds a tiny bit of kick and brightens up the dish. Top with the rest of the Gruyere, Cheddar and Brie.

In a saucepan, melt the remaining 2 Tbsp butter and add the breadcrumbs. Cook, stirring gently, for a couple of minutes, until the crumbs are pretty evenly coated with melted butter. Spread the breadcrumbs evenly on the casserole and sprinkle with the shredded Parmesan. Bake for 30 minutes, until the casserole is bubbly and the topping is golden brown.

New favorite show

Pushing Daisies. I love it. I love the bright colors, the narrator guy (the same guy who read the Harry Potter books in the audio versions!), the silliness and the characters spontaneously breaking into song (OK, maybe only Olive, but OMG awesome!). I love the dry humor and the plot point that will keep Ned & Chuck from ever getting jiggy. I love the flashbacks. I love Ned's partner, who has freaking AWESOME lines and who KNITS and has to get reward money to fuel his yarn habit. Totally, totally cool. I love Chuck's hair, and I covet her stylist, because I have curly/wavy hair that's very fine & prone to flyaways just like hers, but her hair looks GORGEOUS every week. And I love, love, love Olive. She dresses like a Brady Bunch tart, and throws herself at Ned every chance she gets, and did I mention the singing? Yeah, like when she started singing Hopelessly Devoted To You in the pie shop. Or this week, when she busted out with They Might Be Giants in the car. God, how can you resist? Throw in a bedazzled resurrected pigeon, and you've got comedy gold, folks.

I'm sorry, what??

"[So and so] [did something] propissively."

Me: Huh? WTF is propissively? Is that like permissively? Propitiously?

Turns out: "on purpose." The word you're looking for there is "purposely." Or "purposefully." I know I am a total fucking English grammar nazi, but...propissively?? And he uses it All. The. Time.

Help. How do I gently, non-confrontationally, non-aggressively tell my significant other that he is regularly using a "word" that doesn't actually exist in the English language?

Fire

If you haven't been living under a rock the past few days, you know about the wildfires raging down in Southern California right now. I've got quite a lot of family down there - mom & stepdad, aunt & uncle, stepsister & her hubby & twin boys, and cousins all living in the San Diego area. None of them have been evacuated yet (or at least as of 8 AM today, when I talked to mom). But there are fires burning within just a few miles of all their homes. It's not looking good; the fires down there are not even close to being contained - they're totally raging out of control. I have friends in the LA area too, and I haven't heard from them yet.

Scary, y'all.

Knitwit

I'm so excited. I bought two new knitting books online, ones I've been looking at for several months, and they came yesterday. So very, very soon I will be starting my first sweater from the Fitted Knits book.

But first I need to finish Rugrat's Spiderman sweater....which is actually coming along quite well now. I'm up to the point where I think I can add in the spider, so it will at least be interesting for 30 rows or so, while I'm doing the two-color knitting. Then back to plain boring blue stockinette. I'm hoping to get it done by Christmas, so I really need to just bang it out.

I am also in the midst of making a pair of felted wool slippers. The original idea was that I would find a felted slipper pattern in order to try making a pair of socks in an overlarge size and big needles, so they'll knit up quickly, and since they're felted they won't show any mistakes. But it turns out that the pattern I selected is not really a standard sock pattern; there's no short rows and turning the heel and stuff, so the original reason for doing this is kind of lost. But it will still be nice to have a new set of slippers. :)

In other news, Mr Wonderful has moved in. He's been spending every night here for a couple of weeks now, ever since he brought over his cat. And almost all of his stuff is moved out of his old house (and into my garage, LOL). It's great going to bed with him every night, and now that the weather is getting colder the snuggling is awesome. But the commute is brutal, and it's really taking a toll on him. He's commuting 3-4 hours a day, and the worst is Tuesdays: Monday he works 9am - 6pm, then goes to Aikido class afterwards. He doesn't get home until 9:15 at the earliest on Monday nights, and then they always schedule him to work at 6am on Tuesdays, so he's gotta be out the door by 4:30am at the latest. So you can imagine that Tuesday mornings are tough on him. I hate that it's so brutal, and I wish I could make things easier on him. But it's just something we'll have to live with until his transfer goes through and he's able to work closer to home.

And the furniture project is nearly done. Babydaddy needs to come out and do some finishing work on the pieces (trim and stuff), but I've got the desk painted, and two other pieces patched, sanded and primed. Once those are painted and ready to go, I'll move them in and move the other two pieces (which are currently in the house, holding stuff temporarily) out to the garage where they will get the patch/sand/prime/paint treatment.

Birthday surprise!

My 34th birthday, on Monday, arrived with a bit of a surprise: a trip to the ER! Let me explain...

Saturday, after a quick shopping trip to buy Tomboy a new twin-size mattress, I started sanding & priming some of the furniture Babydaddy is making for me. I thought I'd be clever and buy some spray-on primer, figuring that would save me a bunch of time, and I'd have the desk all finished with a couple of coats of paint by Sunday night. So I made a trip to Home Depot, picked up the supplies I needed, and headed home. I sanded, wiped off, and laid on the first coat of primer. I laid on a second coat of primer. I did all this in my well-ventilated garage with the door wide open. I did not use a mask, not even a cheap one, but I did take several breaks to walk out and breathe fresh air, and pulled my t-shirt up over my nose & mouth. I took a shower and made dinner (beef stew) for everyone, and we settled in for the night.

Sunday morning I awoke thinking, "Gee, my face itches. I wonder if I have a rash?" Sure enough, not only did I have a lovely red rash all over my face, but my face was all swollen and I looked like the Pillsbury dough boy with a sunburn. Greeeeeaaaat. I figured it was probably due to the primer, but I really wanted to get that desk finished so I went out to the garage, lightly sanded the desk, wiped it down again, and laid on one more thin coat of primer. Perfect, now it was ready for paint.

But my face was swelling up even more. I washed my face & hands and decided to take some Benadryl to counteract the swelling/allergic reaction. I ran out to Cost Plus, bought and picked up a new dining room table & chairs, and then came back home and crashed out for several hours, thanks to the Benadryl coma. I got up around four and made dinner (Chicken and Brown Rice Casserole, yum!) and celebrated my birthday with Mr Wonderful and the kids. I got some lovely flowers on Saturday from Mr Wonderful, and a big new electric griddle for making big family breakfasts on the weekends. I also received a new alarm clock (desperately needed), a couple of circular knitting needles, and a knitting book. Dad sent me an amazing genealogy report which goes back to the 1700's! Anyhoo, I got some great stuff and we had a tasty cheesecake for dessert (mmm, my fave!).

Mr Wonderful took Tomboy to her mom's house and I got Rugrat ready for bed. The Benadryl had worn off and my face was swollen and itchy again, so I took a shower and popped some Benadryl before vegging out on the couch with Mr Wonderful in front of the TV set. But I started coughing in the shower, and Mr Wonderful got all concerned about my breathing, telling me that I should go to the hospital. When we finally laid down to bed, I felt like there was a weight on my chest and I kept coughing. Finally I gave in, and around 10:30 we decided it would be best for me to go to the ER. I woke up Rugrat, popped him in some footy pajamas, and we all bundled into the car for the long drive out to WC (the local Kaiser hospital doesn't open here for another month). We were luckily able to catch Babydaddy at home, so we dropped Rugrat off there to sleep rather than drag him with us to the hospital.

We got to the hospital shortly before midnight, and after being triaged we were sent to the ER waiting room. The triage nurse had checked my vitals, and my oxygen level was just fine. We discovered, after being there for a couple of hours, that the wait was going to be several hours more...it would likely have taken longer for me to see the ER doc and get a bed in the ER than it would have for me to just go see a doctor in the morning at urgent care. So we figured that since my oxygen level was fine, we could just as easily (and more comfortably!) sleep at home as we could in the waiting room, and we left with stern instructions from the triage nurse to call for an urgent care appointment first thing in the morning. Happy birthday to me! It was 2 hours into my birthday at that point.

Monday morning, we awoke around 8:30 am and I promptly made the appointment to see a doctor later that morning. When I got there, she checked me over, gave me a prescription for Predisone (a steroid to reduce swelling) and Atarax (which she described as high-dose Benadryl, for the itching), and sent me home. I crashed out for most of the day after taking the meds, so my actual birthday was pretty uneventful.

Now the swelling is down, and my face is chapped beyond belief. The rash is peeling and itchy, which the Atarax doesn't help with all that much. But even with all this weirdness and hospital visits and everything, I still think I had a pretty darn nice birthday. It was so lovely to have all of us together this weekend, working on building our home together. And Mr Wonderful and I are both still feeling very blessed to have found each other; it's just so nice to have someone else to pick up the slack sometimes, and to support you when you need it. It's wonderful to have a partner.

Chicken and Brown Rice Casserole

The photo is a bit overexposed, but this dinner turned out really well, using frozen Trader Joe's brown rice, topped with cheese and some sliced green onions. But the best thing was when I added a little Sriracha to it. OMG, fantastic!

This is my submission to Sweetnicks' ARF/5-a-day roundup this week, thanks to the mushrooms and onions and the uber-healthy brown rice (even if it's not technically an ARF).

Chicken and Brown Rice Casserole
2 Tbsp olive oil
1/2 yellow onion, diced small
1 cup crimini (baby portobello) mushrooms, cut into quarters
Four thin-cut chicken breasts, sliced into 1" strips (about 1 1/2 pounds)
1 can Cream of Mushroom soup
1 can Cream of Celery soup (can use two cans of Cream of Mushroom instead, but I only had one can of that)
2 bags frozen Trader Joe's brown rice
1 cup shredded cheese - jack, cheddar, mexican mix, whatever you have on hand
2 green onions, white & green parts - sliced
2 Tbsp (or more) Sriracha sauce (optional) - this is an Asian hot garlic-chili sauce, it comes in a plastic squirt bottle with a rooster on the front
Salt & pepper

Preheat oven to 350. Spray a large casserole dish with non-stick cooking spray.

Over medium heat, warm olive oil in a large saute pan. Sautee yellow onions and mushrooms until onions are translucent and mushrooms are golden brown, about five minutes. Salt & pepper the veggies. Raise the heat a little and add the chicken strips, throwing a little salt & pepper on them once they're in the pan. As soon as the chicken strips aren't showing any pink on the outside (they will still be undercooked inside), add the canned soup and decrease the heat to low.

Microwave the rice bags for three minutes (cut a little slit in each bag first). They might still be a little cold when you pull them out, but that's ok. Mix the rice into the soup/chicken mixture and add the Sriracha, if using. Pour everything into the prepared casserole dish. Top with shredded cheese and bake for about 30 minutes, until everything is bubbly. If the cheese isn't slightly browned after 30 minutes, broil it for a couple of minutes until it is. Top with sliced green onions and serve immediately.

When I made this, it was originally a dish for the whole family so I intentionally made it rather plain. About halfway through my dinner I looked at Mr Wonderful and said, "You know what this could use?" and he replied, "Yeah - jalepenos." My thoughts exactly. But then I thought, what about Sriracha? It is glorious on lots of stuff, and could easily be added to just the parents' servings after being dished out. So we tried it...and it was fabulous.

Beef Stew

A traditional beef stew with red wine, carrots, potatoes, celery, rosemary, garlic, etc.

Recipe coming soon.