Less Free, More Food

I did not join The Pedant at the BBQ Festival today. Rather, I had a paper to write for school, so naturally I had lunch with some friends. I also did a lot of cooking. (I did do SOME work. In fact, I'm doing some now! Can't you tell?!?!)

While at the farmer's market (FM) this morning picking up some delicious produce and things, I had a great idea to take pictures of the food - before, during and after. But I TOTALLY forgot. Maybe next time? We'll see.

Q: What did I cook?

A 1: I made a black bean and corn salad: black beans, frozen corn (the FM had ears that looked good but I got lazy), FM green pepper, FM jalapeno, FM red onion and a dressing of sherry vinegar, olive oil, lemon juice, cumin, salt and pepper. It came out really well. The one single jalapeno was HOT. My fingers are STILL burning from touching it. But the salad was tasty.

A 2: I made a curried squash soup. TP mother made it this winter and served it warmed, although it was supposed to be served chilled. So I used a yellow squash from our CSA and a few more from the FM, as well as an onion from the FM and some potatoes (FM finds too!). Basically, you saute the squash and onion in oil, add garlic (from our CSA), ginger and cumin, then add potatoes and veg broth. Bring to a boil, simmer, puree, and chill. It came out really great. I cannot wait for my lunches this week of spicy bean salad and chilled curried squash soup.

A 3: Granola. We've been making our own granola. I don't know if it's healthier than buying it, but it's more fun to make. And is super easy. And tasty. A small handful works great for me with greek yogurt and fruit for breakfast. Yum!

Now, you may ask yourself, why is Sherbs making a big deal about FM finds and CSA uses. I'm not quite sure really. I'm so not into buying organic foods (yes, better for the earth but the processes can get stupid - lie organic must be certified by the government which many small farms can't afford. Plus, organic doesn't necessarily mean it's the most environmentally friendly - it could come from across the county which produces oil waste and the food is inherently not as fresh, blah blah blah). I do like buying local to support local farmers and the food is fresher and keeps longer. Plus, it's to walk around our FM on a Sunday morning. Many people bring their dogs. I like dogs.

Food for the Week

Yesterday was Sunday which means I did some cooking for the week, since between work and school I have little time for cooking. And also little money and little caloric needs for going out 2 meals a day. (However, I am probably treating myself to Subway for dinner tonight. I do love Subway. And laziness. But in fairness, I'll be passing Subway on my way home from picking up a packet for my 10 Mile Race this Sunday, so I get a pass, right?)

Regardless, back to food for the week.

I made a pasta dish with shells (they were supposed to be Whole Wheat, but The Pedant couldn't find so we have white wheat pasta which is luxurious after whole wheat...) with asparagus, peas, basil, mint, scallions, lemon zest and feta cheese. It's from Vegetarian Times and I made it last year but kind of screwed up (like, it was supposed to have "garlic oil" so I used garlic powder, which was fine, but not great and I didn't have 1 cup of fresh basil so I used waaaay to much dried and it tasted kind of funky). I fixed my mistakes: lots of fresh basil and I put 2 whole garlic cloves in the measured out oil to flavor it, but not too much. It came out really well. It's totally fresh tasting and delicious. It will be great for lunch. Plus, we got the asparagus at the farmer's market, which is always fun. We also got apples and some really amazing cheddar cheese from a new vendor. I had my book club over so we had a cheese plate - plus meringue cookies which I made for the first time and were great - and it was really great.

I also made granola from scratch (well, from Bittman) which TP and I have gotten into lately. It's incredibly easy to do and really much healthier than the stuff we could buy. I messed it up slightly so the dried fruit got REALLY hard and crunchy, but it came out well.

Although I didn't make it for the week, TP and I had some great food for lunch. We had friends over last week and made a pizza with fresh mozzarella, but had 2 small balls of mozzarella left over. So we sliced that up and put it with some of the fresh basil on chibatta rolls. I added avocado and TP had tomato. I drizzled the rolls with EVOO and balsamic. It was amazing. We had a side salad with a poached egg for protein. Very tasty.