Foods I Made Recently

1) Beef stew. I took beef from Shopper's Food Warehouse, kosher chicken stock from the Teet, turnips, onions, carrots, parsnip, garlic, bay leaf, paprika, and dill, and cooked it for various times in a pot. I got impatient before putting it in containers for lunches, so it's a little more liquid than one might expect for "stew," but it's very tasty.

2) Mushroom and egg thing. I heated up oil with taco seasoning in it, then sauteed mushrooms in the taco seasoned oil. Then I poured the remainder of some Egg Beaters Southwestern into the pan, and finished it off with a sprinkle of cheese. Tasty.

3) Super-deluxe Fiber One® muffins. As you know, I am loath to just use Fiber One® apple and cinnamon muffin mix without adding more apples and cinnamon. This time, however, I also added golden raisins and black walnuts. It was fabulous. Black walnuts change the whole character of the muffin from "OK but box-tasting" to "hey, this is pretty complex and interesting!"

Day for Tea

I'm feeling a little sinus pressure, having spent yesterday out in the cold trying to get people to vote Democratic in Virginia (it wasn't as hard last year). So I am majoring in tea this morning.

First tea of the morning was Bigelow's "Earl Gray Green," which is an Asian green tea with the addition of bergamot oil. I like it better than traditional Earl Gray.

Now I'm on to Harris Teeter's Orange Spice Tea, which is a black tea with orange oil, cloves, and other spices. It's also quite tasty, but more of a souped-up English Breakfast taste than the Earl Gray Green.

Not sure what's next in the rotation. May move away from the caffeinated teas and go for Bigelow's "Ginger Snappish" or the Wissotzky lemongrass, za'atar, and verbena herbal tea.

I'll keep you posted.

Risotto Stories

Last night I broke the faucet. Again.

Or, more accurately, the faucet broke while I was handling it, trying to clean butternut squash risotto out of our large pan. It then sprayed me in the chest with hot water, and when I moved out of the way, shot a jet straight out of the kitchen that left a big puddle in front of the entryway.

The risotto was worth it, though. I would say that it came from the Washington Post's most recent Food section, but I doubled the recipe as there's two of us in the house, except not really, as there was only one shallot at the Teet, I have no idea whether the two butternut squash from the CSA were bigger or smaller than required, and I had just slightly more Wolfgang Puck organic vegetable broth (yes, as my brother says in his Dadaist way, I get the Nazi discount at Spago) and arborio rice than would strictly double the recipe, but I added it anyway. Also a bunch of Smart Balance 50/50 butter blend which may not have been exactly doubled. Or the fact that I couldn't get unsalted shelled pistachios at the Pentagon Row Teet.

But thanks to patience and the indestructable tastiness of butternut squash and toasted coconut, I came away with a tasty risotto, which is now in the fridge waiting for future risotto meals.

The only thing I would absolutely change in the future is to mash up the butternut squash instead of merely scooping it out and throwing it in; it was a little clumpy. Still tasty, though.

Diced Tomatoes = Improv Food Awesomeness

I have now improved two improvised meals with diced tomatoes, and I come sharing my newfound wisdom.

1) "Real America" Tuna a la Tomato

As everyone knows, left to my own devices, I eat horrible things. This is why, since we had a coupon long ago, a box of Tuna Helper stood on our shelf in the pantry. I decided to make it for at-work lunches.

After a horrible experience with Hamburger Helper and Morningstar Farms Grillers (tastes like a very bad idea), I resolved always to add other things to "Helper" meals so that they have some taste and nutritional value.

This time, on top of Costco canned sliced mushrooms, I added a can of diced tomatoes, as well as the sauce packet.

The result: not bad. The diced tomatoes turned a plain cream-saucy dish (I used skim milk) into something closer to an Italian pasta. Definitely edible.

2) The Pedant Succeeds With Goat Cheese

Today, the Sherbs and I managed to find ourselves with an unplanned dinner, so I promised to make something. I had in my head the Amateur Gourmet's blog post about a penne alla vodka recipe from Lydia Bastianich, the Sherbs's favorite WETA Create food personality.

It was, of course, horrible with cold and rain outside, so we didn't want to buy anything. Which meant that we had no cream and no vodka.

However, after an excellent risotto last week, we had some leftover goat cheese. This was the inspiration.

I started with a can of Muir Glen diced tomatoes, which Cook's Illustrated considers the best brand of canned tomatoes, and a can of Hunt's diced tomatoes with random junk in it, which Cook's Illustrated did not rank highly but was on sale when I was stocking up on emergency pantry goods at the Teet (did you make out like a bandit on triple coupon weekend? We did!). Added to that the remainder of some vegetable stock, a healthy dump of garlic powder, Italian seasoning, and grated parmesan, not to mention more canned mushrooms, and it started to seem like sauce.

Then, in went the cheese and two small spoon scoops of low-fat sour cream. It creamed up just enough for true tastiness when we added the Barilla Plus rigatoni (I was too lazy to reach back further on the shelf for penne). The Sherbs and I both liked it a lot.

Food News Roundup!

1) Tribe and Sabra want every American to eat hummus. I'm game.

2) They still do not sell chive Bagel-fuls™ at The Teet.

3) They now make Splenda with fiber. I had some in my eggnog-flavored tea (which the box says is kosher dairy) this morning. I do not yet regret doing so.

4) La Tasca is not as good as Spain. Especially the patatas bravas, but also the paella. The cheese plate's good, though.

More Food Successes

First, I had a fascinating experiment with a Ziploc Zip n' Steam™ bag, one of the things the Sherbs and I have to turn frozen vegetables into edible food when we are lazy. The bag says "add frozen vegetables and seasoning," but we'd never actually added any seasoning.

So this time, I threw in with some butter peas some garlic powder, pareve "chicken" consomme, and some Teet brand dijon mustard. After six minutes, it was significantly improved, although I think it was mostly the dijon mustard.

Second, last night we made onion soup, and a lot of it. We sauteed approximately four pounds of yellow onions in a Le Creuset dutch oven, then added "beef" stock, dry sherry, and let it simmer for a while. We didn't add as much fake beef as usual, and I think that made the onion taste more heightened.

Almost got the Rathbone

So, I decided on the final menu for the party. Joining Hawaiian pizza and Vietnamese rolls will be honey-roasted peanuts (for Biden, because: Amtrak), and baked Alaska if one of my guests makes it.

For the Vietnamese rolls, I needed Thai basil. Sadly, the Teet does not carry it. H-mart probably does, though, which is good, although, like my previous trip to the H-mart, it is not so easy to find things if you don't read Korean. Also: the people in the produce area do not know the English terms for Asian vegetables.

I think what I bought is Thai basil. It doesn't really look like the Wikipedia picture, but it smells right. The scan on the cash register said "Taiwanese basil." The shelf I grabbed it from is labeled "culantro."

So, it may be time for a food adventure.

Do You Drink the Muffin Drink?

Since the news today is filled with cows attacking bears and the McCain campaign's baseless slurs against Dungeons and Dragons, I thought it would be a good idea for a similarly frivolous post, based on a prior conversation I had with the Sherbs.

How do you make a mixed drink that tastes like a muffin?

We have some cheap blackberry wine (as mentioned before, purchased at a sale at the Teet), and I think with Cointreau, vodka, and a butterscotch schnapps in the right quantities, it can approach muffin-tasting (I think it would be better with blueberries, but the Sherbs doesn't like blueberries).

With bourbon and blackcurrant liquor, you might be able to approach "raisin bran." Or create something vomitrocious (a neologism that I find not as good, but more useful, than my new favorite non-word "baconostalgia"; furthermore, it turns out that I didn't invent it; "vomitrocious" has been used in such cultural touchstones as an episode of Arthur, the PBS cartoon about an aardvark that does not look at all like an aardvark).

"Chocolate muffins" are actually cupcakes, and so those suggesting Godiva liqueur recipes should take note. Vermeer is better for most mixed drinks, anyway; it's like the Cocio of chocolate booze.

Man, I wish I knew of a place that sold Cocio around here. It's not only better than Nesquick and Yoo-hoo (not hard, especially since Yoo-hoo is one step removed from the weird marsupial-equivalent-in-evolution beverage that is Ovaltine), but from the stuff you make at home with chocolate syrup. It is tasty-riffic.

Eating, Drinking, and Merriment

The Sherbs has already mostly dealt with Sette Bello; my only contribution is to add my meal there, which was a seafood medley on squid ink pasta (pretty good, although basically just stuff in a garlic-butter sauce; not exceptional) and the veal with saffron risotto entree (veal: slightly dry. Risotto: good).

At least as tasty was the pasta dish the Sherbs cooked up last night, which was spinach and garlic on whole wheat rigatoni, topped with parmesan and chopped walnuts. Really tasty.

We also made sangria yesterday to get rid of the half-bottles of cranberry wine and cheap red wine we had lying around (especially since they had a sale on fruit wines at the Teet, and we stocked up). The fruit part was contributed by a frozen fruit medley we were initially going to use in smoothies, but then we used the yogurt for something else...I can't remember what.

Tonight I am going to try to rock the wok with a paella. Wish me luck!

Best Dessert Idea This Week

JELL-O® does not have its reduced-fat sugar free rice pudding cup product on its website. The full fat tapioca pudding, sure. Just not the rice pudding.

However, it does exist (and at The Teet, even!). And it tastes great with a shot of Teichenne butterscotch schnapps, which we picked up in the Madrid airport during our day-long layover back from Israel.

The Pedant's Bone to Pick

I know this is really The Sherb's feature, but I've got a food article peeving me in a big way, so I feel I should vent.

Some food writer on the Divine Caroline website has an article called "portion sizes: then and now" which makes the case that food portions have increased over the past twenty years, and therefore we are more likely to consume more food.

An argument that more food is available is probably true, but that's not the point. This article makes its argument with the following graphics:

(picture stolen from Slashfood's synopsis of this article)

From this, and similar pictures, the point is intimated that we just sell the huge size now, that people can't get the tiny size. Maybe they're discouraged from it, but it's not true that I can only walk out of the store with the "lard boy" size.

I've been to the movies recently, and you can still get the little popcorn. I'd suggest it, since it's A) cheaper, B) not as bad for you (even with all that flavored powder you put on it), C) you're not going to get that free refill in the midst of Kung Fu Panda anyway.

Similarly, the website says "[w]hen McDonald’s first started in 1955, its only hamburger weighed around 1.6 ounces; now, the largest hamburger patty weighs 8 ounces, an increase of 500 percent."

Guess what? The hamburger patty still weighs 1.6 ounces. That you choose to buy the Big & Tasty (4 oz. patty) or the dollar menu double cheeseburger (which, in Washington, DC, is cheaper than the $1.39 hamburger) does not change the fact that you could buy a tiny hamburger if you wanted to.

Similarly, the article says that it used to be that you could get an 8 oz. bottle of Coke. I saw them in the Teet yesterday. They're a little more expensive, being in collectable glass bottles, but they still exist.

I'm just as guilty as everyone else (if not more so) in picking the super-size glutton portions of things, but it really isn't as if the lesser ones aren't available. Food just happens to be cheaper than it was thirty years ago (as Mark Bittman points out), and we like to eat.

Also, Judge Posner of the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals says that forcing people to know how much fat is in their lardburger is counterproductive, and I trust him, even if he wrote in Douglas v. Hustler Magazine, 769 F.2d 1128 (7th Cir. 1985) that "[f]ew men are interested in lesbians," which as we all know is not exactly true.

Food Worth Eating

Of late, the Sherbs and I have subscribed to a number of recipe blogs in the hope of getting even more new ideas for food.

One blog which has really provided good recipes for us is the Diet Recipes Blog. We've already had two successes from this blog, the asparagus and water chestnuts, which we had on Monday and was really tasty, and last night's dilled corn and peas, which was fantastic even without fresh dill, which the Teet would not sell in sufficiently small or inexpensive quantities. I'm having some for lunch today.

I am a prophet!

The Sherbs will attest that this is old news, but since we haven't blogged in forever, you haven't heard it yet.

Two weeks ago, we wanted to make a key lime pie for a guest who was coming over. We picked a recipe from the Weight Watchers' "comfort food" cookbook, which guaranteed that it would be acceptably benign.

Then we hit the Teet with a vengeance, getting limes, condensed milk, fat-free non-dairy topping, and a low-fat graham cracker crust. What we didn't do, though, is get gelatin, a necessary ingredient.

Knox seems to have a lock on the grocery store gelatin market. This is good, in the "Mrs. Knox ran the company for 40 years through the first half of the 20th century and therefore is a kickass feminist icon" sense, but not in the "gelatin is made from treif animals" sense, and we try to keep our apartment kosher vegetarian. We couldn't find kosher, much less vegetarian, gelatin for love or money, and not only did we try the Teet, but we tried Whole Foods (which also just carried Knox) and Trader Joe's (which carried no gelatins at all).

We went to sleep that night very disappointed, but the idea came to me the next morning in a dream: agar-agar. I then called around the local grocery stores to find some, but nobody had heard of it. I then tried the Super H Mart relatively close to us. On the phone, they had no idea what I was talking about, but none of the clerks I spoke to had a particularly accomplished grasp of the English language.

It took some searching through the claustrophobic aisles of dessicated anchovies and seaweed, but we found some packets which said they were agar-agar. We bought them with trepidation, as the "call for comment" number was in Thailand.

We used the agar-agar at a 1:1 for gelatin, and it worked out pretty well. It does have to be mixed with stuff because, when made to gel, it smells a little too much like its seaweed origins, and we were first worried that the condensed milk had gone off. That disappeared when we folded in the non-dairy whipped topping.

The pie turned out very tasty, mostly because the Sherbs rocks at pie-making. I can only claim credit for gelatin substitutes, which I can summon forth from my dreams.

Chick-a-pea-pea-pea-pea...

Spring is slowly coming, and I recall my youth in Massachusetts, when the merry chickadee would make its appearance.

Also, because the Sherbs and I made a chickpea dish out of Vegetarian Times. It was a "chickpea and butternut squash stew," or more accurately, chickpeas in prefab butternut squash soup, over couscous. It wasn't quite as flavor-riffic as I was hoping, but it was tasty, which is more than could be said for the tahini soup fiasco of last week.

I'm having my tuna casserole from last Saturday for lunches this week; it's Campbell's recipe, but with Teet brand condensed soup, baby lima beans instead of peas, canned green and wax beans instead of pimientos (who eats those, anyway?), and extra mushrooms for greater shroominess (we do this with the slow cooker hot & sour soup, too - we add Teet brand canned straw mushrooms, my favorite mushroom of all time).

Finally, this is an accurate assessment of the Wii game Cooking Mama, which I found frustrating.

Two Dishes of My Own Creation

I haven't blogged often enough, and certainly not about food, so let me tell you about two recent food inventions of mine (and no, they are far better than the stuff on Trashy Eats).

SATURDAY BREAKFAST: Deli-Style Egg & Cheese "Tartine"

Took a halved segment of whole wheat baguette, toasted both halves in toaster oven. While doing this, sauteed red onion and fresh mushroom. Set aside. Fried egg over hard, melted one of the remaining fat-free American cheese slices on top. Made two strips of fake bacon.

Half an egg with cheese, bacon, and sauteed onions and mushrooms topped each toasted baguette half. Sauced lightly with ketchup. Ate open-faced.

Pretty tasty, if I say so myself.

MONDAY DINNER: Asian Something

The Sherbs was coming home late on Monday, which put me in the solo seat for food preparation, but we also had a standing order to get rid of our remaining tofu before it went bad and to use some of the garlic, because we bought a bag of bulbs at Costco, not realizing that they are packaged there in a quantity more for vampire prevention than for the timely supply of garlic to a couple who do not work in food service.

I realized that, having made a trip to a Fairfax County Asian grocery, that I also had preshredded nori, soba (Japanese buckwheat noodles), and a bag of lotus root. My course of action was clear-

• Mince garlic
• Put garlic in pan with mixture of Kikkoman low sodium teriyaki sauce and San-J Szechuan sauce; heat
• Start water for soba
• Cube tofu, cut lotus root into quarter-rounds
• Cook tofu and lotus root in sauce/garlic mixture, stirring until coated
• Cook soba
• Drain soba
• Put soba in bowl
• Put cooked tofu and lotus root, which have basically absorbed all the sauce, on top of soba
• Sprinkle on shredded nori and sesame seeds
• Get lazy about vegetable side dish and use one of those Bird's Eye Steamfresh pouches that I bought at the Teet because we had a coupon

The Sherbs and I both thought it was mighty tasty, but today I realize that, had I just done a little internet search, and stopped by the Teet for some kale, I could have used even more garlic, plus parmesan cheese. Now, I get the powdered stuff in the green Kraft bottle (also from Costco), but if Germany can call it "parmesan," so can I.

Faux Burger Time!

Last night was a party for "the awards show," whose name I do not mention because the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has registered it, just as the National Football League compels me to refer to their football championship as "the Big Game" unless I have their express permission (at least they've backed off on preventing churches from showing the Big Game).

The Sherbs and I had a party for the show. We made many foods tenuously (but amusingly) themed on various nominated movies. I was responsible for vegetarian mini-cheeseburgers, which were related to this year's winner for Best Original Screenplay.

The mini-burgers were facilitated by shopping trips to both Costco and the Teet. The ingredients:

• Martin's Famous Potato Dinner Rolls
• Dehydrated chopped onion
• Original flavor Boca Burgers
• Kraft fat free American cheese slices

First, I sliced the Boca burgers in fourths after a little defrosting. I won't defrost them next time; they get gooey and almost as bad as raw meat (which is no good because ground chuck is so much tastier). I then cooked the burger fourths, melting the cheese on top, and reserved them for later.

In a small bowl, I placed the dehydrated onions in water and let it sit for a while as I was cooking the burgers. I also halved the rolls and lightly toasted them in the toaster oven.

Once all the cheese patties were done, I laid the toasted burger bottoms a large Pyrex cooking plate. I then put on a small amount of the rehydrated onion, topped it with the cheese patty, and finished it with a bun top. I put the Pyrex into the oven at 250 degrees for ten minutes, then left it on "Warm" until the party.

The verdict: more White Castle-y than I was hoping for - actually pretty tasty. Might add a pickle slice or finish with ketchup next time; the burger can take the extra flavor.

Mid-Prep Blogging

I am blogging mid-cooking, waiting for my eggplant rounds (soon to become miso-glazed eggplant) to absorb the salt I sprinkled on them a while back; Cook's magazine's Best Vegetable Recipes cookbook says thirty minutes, so I'm in a lull. In the first part of the thirty, I chopped a scallion and prepared the miso sauce.

Evidently, the miso that the Teet sells comes in a cantankerous bottle. If you do anything like squeezing it, it bolts out of the bottle and sprays across the cabinets, the countertop, and your jeans. After a quick cleanup and wardrobe change, I finished the dressing, and now I am here, blogging to you.

Thirty minutes is almost up. Time to find the sesame seeds.

Virginia is for Wine Lovers

Today I, the Sherbs, and a close relation visited some of Virginia's wineries. We went out to Amissville, Virginia (due to fiat by the Sherbs, I am not allowed to say "there's something awry in Amissville" every time we pass through, just as I am not allowed to make variations on "the glory that is Rome" since we saw the HBO series Rome, and how I am not allowed to refer to myself as "McLovin'" for reasons that I assume are obvious), and worked our way through three wineries.

The first was the Gray Ghost Vineyards, the largest winery building of all the ones we went to. They have a fabulous structure to sell wines in and they do not scare off committed Northerners such as the Sherbs by keeping the Confederate guerrilla raider memorabilia to a subtle minimum (they do have an object that purports to be his saddle somewhere on the premises). The wine was tasty, but a little pricier than we'd hoped for - we left with one bottle of a nice table wine.

Next on the list was the Unicorn Winery, a winery started by a Californian and run by a Long Islander that just happens to be in Virginia (you get that vibe on the way in because, well, the unicorn on the logo seems a little fae, which is not the usual feeling one gets for logos from Rappahanock County - see Col. Mosby above). Regardless, the vineyard is a multiple award winner whose wines are served in the fabulously expensive Inn at Little Washington.

At Unicorn, the tasting is of a long list of wines, and they are generous with the free cheese, chocolate, and crackers - we would have bought more of the cheese, but we are dangerous around soft cheeses; we bought some at the Teet for dinner tonight but I am sure we will be sorry because we will eat too much with it. We bought one bottle of a classy table red, and two bottles of a sweet blush they call "Slightly Embarrassed" for a party.

After lunch, we went on to Pearmund Cellars, a winery I like to call "the clutching hand" due to its quasi-martial logo (just put your hand in the same position as the one on the logo, and say "the clutching hand" in your best Ming the Merciless voice, and you'll see the appeal), which was about to close because no one had shown up. Fortunately, the people working there were generous enough to keep it open for a tasting, which was very nice as we were able to chat with the vintner's representative one-on-one. Last time I was at the Clutching Hand, it was a madhouse (it's one of Virginia's most popular wineries) and it wasn't as much fun. We left with two wines based on the viognier grape; one white table wine which, after left open for ten minutes, was fabulous, and one dessert wine which was pretty darned incredible. They also make a sweet wine called "Vin del Sol," where the Clutching Hand logo is made to grasp an entire sun, Galactus-style, but it was too pricy for our wine-buying tour.

Now we have a lot of wine, and we need to have a dinner party to get rid of it.

Successful Meals and OK Yogurt

I love both the piña colada and coconut cream flavors of the Teet's store brand of light yogurt, but the banana cream flavor is just not as good. A ranking of the current Teet yogurt flavors, from best to "meh," I've tasted would be:

1. Coconut Cream
2. Piña Colada
3. Vanilla
4. Key Lime
5. Peach
6. Strawberry Cheesecake
7. Banana Cream

Anyway, the jicama salad and the other things we prepared for the dinner party last Friday (a mushroom risotto which was all the Sherbs' doing and she carried off masterfully, and stuffed zucchini) all were quite tasty. We had a lot of leftover jicama salad, so I cooked it into fritattas the next day, with mixed results. The Sherbs was a fan; I, not so much - cooking jicama seems to cook out the sweetness, leaving it a little too much like eating warm radish.

Jicama . . . what the hell?

No, seriously, what is up with jicama?

The Sherbs and I foolishly decided to make a salad involving the mutant apple-radish that is jicama (it also includes beans, avocado, green pepper, and tomato). At the Teet, we got the produce guy to find us some jicama, and he gave us a huge, mutant thing weighing about five pounds that looked like a failed cross between a coconut, a turnip, and an heirloom tomato.

No, they did not have any smaller jicama available.

Turns out, only a third of the jicama was actually necessary for the salad (we only needed two cups of jicama), which is good because we did not have the machete necessary to effectively cut off more of the tough root vegetable. Then we had to peel off the stringy, leathery skin, a thankless task.

The salad, at the end of the day, is tasty. But I dare Rachael Ray to make jicama into anything in thirty minutes or less.