Friends and food.

So I bet from that title it seems like I'm going to post something about a lovely potluck I attended with friends and the wonderful food I made for it or maybe a nice dinner I made for a friend and then we sat and chatted over our food for hours. Nope. No and you know why? Because I live in a fucking retirement community and everyone here is either old or else I just don't have anything in common with them. Yes, people (and by people I really mean myself, because I don't think I actually have any readers) I am being pathetic and whining about not having any friends. Know what, though? I do not care because that's what's up right now. For a little perspective, when I started this blog I was pretty consistently either baking for a gathering of some sort or making dinner for friends or else just reveling in having the kitchen in my house all to myself. What I found was that I not only loved to cook but that it was a thread that connected me to the people in my life. Fast forward a year or so and things are very different. I've already posted here about how grateful I am to be back in Maryland. How much I disliked living in North Carolina at the end and how sick I became. It's all true of course. I would not trade my life here for anything. But there is one thing that has been very hard to overcome and that is the loss of my network. That soft web of people who held me up and who I hold so dear. They are hundreds of miles away and there is absolutely nothing that can make that hurt less than it does.

I think my Labor Day trip to Miami really put things in stark contrast for me. Or maybe it was starting school that did it. This town where I live, it's where I grew up. I knew what it would be like when I got here. Fear of loneliness is what drove me out of here back in 05 after I graduated college. This time, I knew I needed to be here. This time, I knew that even if I felt lonely sometimes, I need to be in Maryland and, for the moment at least, that meant I needed to be in Chestertown. And a few weeks ago I'd come to some peace about it. I thought, "Hey, I can do this. I like my parents, my co-workers, my two friends. That's plenty, right?" Apparently not. I mean, I love all of those people I just talked about but as I decided when I left Asheville, loving people is not a good enough reason to stay somewhere when it feels like the time has come to move on.

So anyway, I went to Miami at the end of my first week of school to see my best girlfriend for her Blessing Way (it's like a mom-shower instead of a baby shower for pregnant ladies). Our other friend flew in from Asheville. I can't speak for either of them, but to me it felt like no time had passed. Even though we all live in different cities and have for five months now, even though one of us is about to have a baby and one of us is in a serious relationship and one of us is in grad school now. It was like the easiest thing in the world to just hang out and go out to eat and I felt so comforted by their presence. With these two friends in particular, our activities have always been centered around food. Going out to eat, wrecking havoc with our various dietary needs, putting together little meals from healthy tidbits. I could have easily just stayed. But I had to return. And since then every day at school is another reminder of what it is to be young and have friends, peers to share your life with, and then I return to my home which is beginning to feel like exile again.

To me it is in no way a coincidence that my lack of peers has been parallel with my lack of enthusiasm for cooking. Aside from the fact that I don't have my own space and my mom kind of already has meals planned most nights, I just don't have anyone to share my food with. Or maybe it's not even that. I think it could be the simple fact that not having friends is FUCKING DEPRESSING and so doing anything that would normally bring me joy (including school and running) has been a bit gray lately. I don't know what the solution is. Wait, I do. It looks like moving to Baltimore. But that is a solution that takes time and effort and what I really mean is immediate solution. I do know that writing this crap down makes it better somehow, usually. I know that everything has a season and maybe this is just a solitary season for me. Maybe it's the end of a solitary season, one that I know I needed like air this past spring. I'm willing to hang in and trust, these days. In a way that I never was before. But I'm sayin', if I don't get out of this place soon I'm going to start buying orthopedic shoes and polyester pants with elastic waist bands.

Chocolate Strawberry Tart

This morning I was driving to work and the sky was doing the coolest thing, stratified like orange haze left over from the sunrise burning off the soft grey overcast. And while I was driving and marveling I thought of how the sky does this to me a lot. By that I mean it grabs my attention and causes me to stare and wonder and, often, say something out loud about it. I mean it happens a lot, so I got to thinking about other things in life that do that same thing, you know? Stop me in my tracks so I'm just right there, pouring my whole attention into that one thing and following it somewhere new. And then I was thinking about how that's why I have always loved surprises so much and how a lack of surprise and wonder tends to be what generates stagnant, miserable ennui in my life - creating a fertile breeding ground of discontent. And then I had this realization that everything in my life has the potential to be like the sky. Specifically, that my relationships (by which I mean all interactions with people- parents, best friend, cashier at grocery store), which has been my greatest challenge in this life, are really just like sunsets and great music and new recipes in that they are wild and beyond my control. In that they can lead me somewhere new if I will follow but so often I react with fear to that wildness in relationships. Instead of stepping into the unknown with an open heart I stand there in the doorway with my arms crossed, trying to figure out how I can acquire an advantage, protect my heart, and ensure that I won't get hurt before I take any chances and let down my guard. It sucks.

So all of that happened in the span of about 40 seconds inside my brain on the way to work this morning, which is pretty cool if you ask me. Are you ok? Maybe I should have warned you that you were about to go on a journey into the recesses of my mind. But then, it wouldn't be an adventure, would it? What all of this has to do with the amazing strawberry chocolate tart I made last week is that this recipe is a great example of how cooking and baking are that same thing for me. New recipes often enchant me so I can't stop thinking about them and then when I take action and actually try them, I often find myself in a sort of meditative flow that ends with me having experienced something totally new. I ran across this recipe in a book called Heavenly Feasts. It is a collection of recipes from retreats and monasteries across the country. I found it on the dining room table one day and sat down to flip through it, one of my most favorite things to do. This one recipe kept catching my eye, Chocolate Pear Tart. It's a layered pie and the combination of layers sounded like nothing I'd ever had before but really should have because why on earth wouldn't you combine these things?

The recipe in the book called for a layer of chocolate mousse made with sour cream, a layer of poached pears, and a custard layer on top. I must not have read the recipe very well because as I was thinking about making the tart I kept imagining that the chocolate layer would be kind of like a ganache. It calls for a cup of sour cream, so it was never going to be ganache but that does give me an idea for a variation. Actually the tart that I ended up making had a lot of differences from what was written, both by choice and due to a poorly written recipe. Still, it turned out amazing and I kind of wish I had some right now. It was the perfect combination of tangy chocolate mousse, naturally sweet fruit, and creamy custard all in a sort of shortbread crust. The book said to serve it warm but I think it was better chilled. A couple of things I changed include the fruit (I went with strawberries instead of pears and I can't wait to try it with raspberries, maybe cherries too, ooh and maybe even bananas!); the sour cream, which I switched out for nonfat Greek yogurt and it was perfect; and the chocolate which I decided to just buy in semi-sweet form.

Below is the recipe with my changes written in as side notes. One thing I will just outright change about the recipe, though, is the baking dish. It called for an 8 inch pie dish. I used a 9 inch one because it's what I had. The thing was still way too small so I ended up with a 2 millimeter custard layer and had to trash most of the custard mix. So, I'm just going to say use a springform or some other deep dish pan or reduce the other ingredients to make more room for the custard. Enjoy!




Chocolate Strawberry Tart, adapted from Heavenly Feasts

Ingredients:
3 eggs
1/8 t. salt
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup sugar (1/4 C for dough, 1/2 C for chocolate)
1/2 cup butter, cut into small pieces
3 oz dark baking chocolate (or semi-sweet chocolate)
1 cup sour cream, plus 2 T for custard
2 cups strawberries, hulled and sliced (or 2 lb poached pears, or other fruit)
3/4 cup milk

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 and grease an eight inch springform pan.

2. Whisk together flour, sugar, and salt. Cut in butter with pastry blender (which is completely worth the investment) or two knives until the mixture is a coarse, pea-sized meal. Beat 1 egg and mix in thoroughly with a fork. If more moisture is needed to make the dough stick together, add approximately 2 tablespoons of cold water, in any case enough to get the dough to stick together.

3. Form the dough into a disk, wrap in wax paper, and chill in refrigerator for 45 minutes to an hour.

4. Roll out dough and place in your baking pan. You will need to press it up the sides of the springform. Make sure it is well-greased so it will come off after baking.

5. Melt the chocolate very slowly (I used a Pyrex bowl over a pot of boiling water) with 1 cup of sour cream or Greek yogurt. If you use unsweetened baking chocolate, add the sugar now until sweet. I used semi-sweet so there was no need to add sugar and it turned out great.

6. Pour chocolate filling over the pastry and spread evenly.

7. Place the sliced fruit over the chocolate filling.

8. Beat the remaining 2 eggs, 2 T sour cream or yogurt, and milk together. Pour over the fruit.

9. Bake for 35 - 40 minutes. Serve warm or chilled (I prefer chilled).

Pulled Pollo Tacos for Papa's Day

Dear me, I have been trying to get this posted for quite a while. Every time I go to do it, though, it's late and I become overwhelmingly tired when I go to click on the button for creating a new post. It's no mystery, really. I've been running myself too hard, as I am wont to do. One really great thing (and by really great I mean really ANNOYING!) about writing a blog that talks about your life is that you have a published record of past stumbles and cycles and whatnot. So, for example, if I review last August's post about Baltimore Peach Cake and it's all like "I am so freakin' busy, I can barely see straight. I am training for a marathon and going to school and working too much and also only sleeping five hours a night. Oh hee hee , silly Kelly - it's no big deal though. I'm fine, really..." and then note that a few months later I'm posting about my digestive system going on strike, it's kinda hard to keep going on that trajectory without clear knowledge that I am being a total psychopath. (Or sociopath, whatever you call it when people do blatantly stupid things that they know will cause trouble.)

The thing is, I love training for marathons, and I really like my job, and I am over the moon about starting school, and I love to read and hang out with my friends and go to the beach which is two hours away but since I am even in love with the drive I don't mind so I'll just go ahead and make the trip down and back TWICE in four days instead of just asking off for work Monday and taking a four day vacation. I have so very much love for everything in my life and only 24 hours in every day and, as three different people helped me to realize this month, this lifetime contains far fewer of those 24 hours than we need to express everything that's in our hearts. How, then, do I make it count without running myself ragged in the process so I'm too tired to enjoy it anyway? No, really, I'm asking. If you know the answer, kindly send it to the e-mail address listed in my profile.

Ahem, now for the biggest non sequiter ever to grace the pages of this blog I'm going to talk about a chicken recipe that I love and that I made my dad for father's day. All that other stuff was just me talking and has nothing to do with the recipe. If you are still reading, thanks for letting me ramble. I know a lot of the food I post about on here is remarkably unhealthy - fried clams, cake, lasagna...I am starting to feel like I may be contributing to the obesity epidemic. But really, I have made an art over the years of learning to cook healthy food for myself that is easy enough that I can make it quickly with little thought. It's so helpful to have enough staple meals to just whip up a menu before grocery shopping and know I've got most of the week's meals covered but also not get bored (which generally leads to eating out more). One of my favorite staples is something I refer to as Pulled Pollo. It's chicken that I rub with a spice rub and then bake in the oven so that cooks in it's own juices and, when it's done, I shred it with a fork like you do with pulled pork and it's super moist and flavorful. It can be eaten in tacos, on a bed of lettuce or if you are feeling like going a little heavier, it's good enchilada filling or an interesting addition to nachos. I prefer the first two options. It just seems so much better in a light meal.

I also like to make sauteed peppers to go with it. I use bell peppers of whatever color combination I feel like eating at the time and saute them with a red onion, sliced thin, and the same spices I used for the chicken. If you leave enough time for them to cook slowly, the peppers become meltingly tender and their natural sweetness really comes through. The spices I use are a fairly classic Hispanic mix, if there is such a thing, of chili powder, cumin, garlic, salt, pepper, and sometimes cinnamon. My dad is a great lover of Latin culture and food. He's traveled quite a bit in Mexico and Central America (and has been kind enough to take me along on two of those trips). I remember the first time I went to Mexico was on a kayaking trip we took with some people from a paddling school in DC. We traveled around a lot, stopping for two days at the most in any one town over an 11 day trip. When we talk about the trip, we always end up talking about the food. It's almost never about the rivers. Instead, it's the langostino soup we ate at a restaurant right next to the river we'd just kayaked (incidentally, the same river where the langostinos and the dominant herb in the soup came from) or the liquados (milkshakes, served in a plastic bag with a straw which were insanely fresh and perfectly flavored with cinnamon and vanilla) or the street tacos which my dad can eat with impunity, owing to an iron stomach. When I had to pick something to make, I immediately thought light, Latin fair and I was right. He totally loved it...and I really enjoyed being able to take the leftover to work for lunch. Perhaps you can make it and enjoy it too. The recipe really does make an easy and healthy meal during the week and almost always provides great leftovers for the next day's lunch.

Pulled Pollo

Ingredients:
1 lbs chicken breast (I like skinless bone-in, personally)
2 T chili powder
1/2 T ground cumin
1/2 t salt
1/2 t ground black pepper
1/4 t cinnamon
1/2 t garlic powder
1 T olive oil

Method:
Preheat oven to 350. Coat chicken with the olive oil. Mix spices together until well-blended. Sprinkle or rub the spice mixture on the chicken breast. I like to rub it directly on, but it's pretty messy, just FYI. Place in a baking dish and cover with foil. Stick it in the oven and cook for about 15 minutes before turning the breasts over. Cook until almost completely finished cooking (either until a meat thermometer reads 160 or whatever method you prefer). I like to cook it for about 5-10 minutes without the cover after that point because it produces these really nice crispy bits of chicken that mix wonderfully with what is mostly a very moist chicken breast. When finished cooking, pull it out and let it cool for a minute. Then, use two forks to shred the meat apart and then mix it with the juices in the bottom of the baking dish and use it however you see fit.

Melty Bell Peppers

Chop 2-3 bell peppers of whatever color (though I suggest including some either red, yellow, or orange because they come out a lot sweeter) into strips a little bigger than a 1/4 inch wide. Slice a red onion thinly. Saute peppers and onions until they start to soften in a bit of olive oil over medium heat in a saucepan. Sprinkle with about 1/2 t of salt so they will release some of their own moisture. Then, add about 1/2 T chili powder, 1 t cumin, a dash more of salt, 1/2 t pepper, and 1/4 - 1/8 t cinnamon and stir to coat the veggies. At this point, you can go one of two routes. One, you could add a tiny bit of water or even none at all, turn the heat all the way to low, cover and let the peppers and onions slow cook in their own juice. Or, to accelerate the cooking process you can add about 1/3 C water to the peppers, let it come to a simmer, turn down to low and let the pepper and onions cook in that until the water has all cooked off. Either way is good, but the slow way is better (which I find very irritating, just so you know). This is a good thing to put on crostini, too, if you cook then down enough. That's actually how I first had then and it was delicious. Ok, that's all. I really need to go get some sleep now. Enjoy!

For Eleanor - Lasagna and Red Bull.

How do you even begin to say good bye when you are asked to do it so suddenly? I feel like I've been doing lots of saying good-bye since March but most of that was self-imposed. I had time to prepare. There is no preparing for something like this, and I suppose that's how you know it's life. Life is messy. Life doesn't follow logic. Life is wild and free and that's what makes it the magic mystery that can break our hearts equally from joy or sorrow. And that is exactly how I would describe Eleanor, too - beautiful, messy, wild, free, and full absolutely to the brim with Life. Since I was told late Monday night of her passing, I've been thinking of her - mostly unbidden thoughts, the kind that impose themselves and make it real because right after them you realize that person is now only alive in memories. What I keep remembering is going out the the Women's Farm with her, carrying a message of hope. I remember going to her bachelorette party when she up and got married so quickly. And then, when she came back to us after that marriage, how she threw herself equally into helping others AND being her truest self. And I remember how she held her head high through conflict, principled and maybe a little stubborn but, Lord, she really got that we don't crawl before anyone.

Eleanor never ever passed up a chance to dance, to wear a bright blue tu tu, or generally enjoy the hell out of herself. She really had some things about life mastered that I have struggled with my whole life and have had to face up close recently. Most of all, I mean that Eleanor was not a person who would have to wonder if she had missed out on life when the end came. She went for what she wanted, sometimes stepping on toes along the way but always going back to make it right. Unflinchingly , without that perfectionist worry about what it will look like if things are messy, she went after every experience with all her heart. And yet, she was a never-ending fountain of love and service for others. So dedicated to carrying the word that people really can change, no matter their circumstances. The woman knew how to share her light without giving away too much of it or hiding it under a bushel. There is no higher art than that. What I've been thinking since last night, as always with death, is that life is too fucking short to not live like Eleanor. It's too short to worry about what I look like to other people, to pass up a chance to shake my butt or wear something loud or risk pissing people off by doing exactly what I want. And also too short to hold back love because I'm afraid you won't return it. I hope I remember this feeling every day, forever.

One of my first thoughts after the news was, "What am I going to cook in her honor?" That's just how I do, it's been established. The immediate answer was "lasagna... and Red Bull, of course." One of the ways that Eleanor shared her light with others was by hosting potlucks - every first Sunday and lots of others in between. For whatever reason, I remember that more than one of those featured lasagna made by her. I think she just liked making it. One of those lasagna dinners was a game night at her house and it was one of my favorite nights ever. And Red Bull is just something I associate with Eleanor and her desire to stay up late dancing. I first discovered what can only be described as a Red Bull tall boy in her hand, outside the Red Room in Asheville. She was wearing a classic B-girl outfit - red and white, with those white Adidas that have a thick rubber sole on the front. She was stoked about dancing, as always. And she was drinking the biggest can of Red Bull I had ever seen in my life. (God, I just can't imagine how she can be gone from this world.) So, despite not really liking Red Bull very much, I'm gonna wash down my lasagna with a can of it. As for the lasagna itself, I decided not to hold back on what I wanted to put into it. Yes, I am broke but I wanted a lasagna with a lot to it. I wanted sausage and spinach and mushrooms and quality sauce so, dammit, that's just what I got.

Tonight, friends and loved ones of Eleanor gathered in Asheville for a candle-light vigil in her honor. To share their grief and also stories of this bright star. I wish I could have been there but it's just not in the cards, financially and logsitically. Noodles and melty cheese and filling can't even begin to touch the honor that such a life deserves, but it is comforting and rich. It is grounding and hearty. It reminds me of the joy and pleasure of being a human, alive on earth. And it reminds me of her. Every time I dance, every time I have a chance to live life fully and start to shrink back in fear, every time I have a chance to help a fellow human to climb out of the dark I hope I remember to honor her a moment in my heart. That may come close to doing her justice. Goodbye Eleanor, I hope your spirit is free and dancing it's way back to the source from which it came. You left your mark on so many hearts and lives and now we have to let you go. Travel well, sister. I love you.

Any Way You Want It Lasagna (with a side of Red Bull)



Ingredients
1 lb lasagna noodles
30 oz of tomato sauce
32 oz ricotta cheese
16 oz mozzerella cheese
3 T grated parmesean
whatever else you want to put in it (for this I used one small onion, 8 oz mushrooms sliced, 1 package frozen spinich, garlic, and italian sausage)


Method:
1. Preheat oven to 375. Get out a 9x13 lasagna pan.
2. Cook lasagna according to package instructions.
3. Saute chopped onion in olive oil until translucent. Add sliced mushrooms and then minced garlic when the mushrooms start to soften.
4. Cook sausage, I like spicy Italian for this dish, over medium heat until cook through. It's pretty yummy if you use the fat from the sausage to cook the veggies.
5. Cook the spinach in about 1/3 C of water over medium heat, until thawed.
6. Layer noodles and other ingredients as follows, repeating until ingredients are gone:
- tomato sauce (on the lasagna pan for first layer)
- noodles
- 1/3 ricotta cheese
- veggie mixture topped with sliced sausage
- 1/3 mozz.
- tomato sauce

End with noodles, sauce, Parmesan.

7. Cover with foil and bake until bubbling. Then, bake another 10 or so minutes until browned on top. Remember to let cool a bit before serving.

Home Food: Tea Party Clam Strips

Questions of place have always fascinated me. Of course everywhere is technically a place, a point in space. But there's a difference between a place and a Place, with a capital "P." Some Places are more substantial than others in their placeness, if you will. They throw off a vibe that is certainly influenced and shaped by their various cultural elements but at the same time is greater than the sum of these parts. It's holy to me, the experience of it being one that I have always identified as the nearness of my God. There are many ways to experience that nearness and feeling the uniqueness of a given Place is a big one for me.

I think my obsession with Places stems from the way I relate to where I am from and how that has made me who I am. I am from Maryland, the greatest state in the union bar none (sorry if you're from one of the other 49 states, it's nothing personal). Apparently, Marylanders are unique in their reverence for their home state. I remember once, I was walking down the street in Newport, Oregon with two Maryland friends who were temporarily living there. We stopped and looked up at the front of an old sea-weathered looking inn only to see a Maryland flag fluttering in the breeze. At my college in North Carolina, a guy I graduated with always hung a Maryland flag out of his dorm window and then wore the thing around his shoulders when he walked accross the stage at graduation. It's like, if we are living in another state, we find it necessary to let everyone know that we're from Maryland. I have it on good authority from multiple sources that people from other states don't act like that. Usually, I have a theory about why things are the way they are but on this one, I got nothin'. I am content to simply feel my heart smile about it.

In any case, my exploration and pondering of this question of Place has always contained food as an important element. All my favorite places are defined, in large part, by the food I have experienced there. Philly is spumoni from Anastasi's, prosciutto and fresh mozz pinwheels from DiBruno brothers, and, yes cheese steaks. (But not from Pat's like everyone thinks. The best ones actually come from Tony Luke's over near the fish market and while you're there you might as well pass on the cheese steak and check out the roast pork sandwich with extra sharp provalone and rabini because it blows the best cheese steak straight outta the water.) North Carolina is barbeque. Not just one kind either, but a subtley different kind for each part of the state. Daytona Beach Florida is Angel and Phelps chocolate and sandwiches from the Flagler Fish Company. Even places I haven't been to are defined by food. My family's homeland of Lithuania, where I haven't ever visited (YET!) is dumplings, meat, potatoes, sour cream, and poppy seeds in some combination I have not experienced but can feel in my bones as hearty and good.

When I became aware that I was living in exile in North Carolina and that my heart was begging me to go home to Maryland, I started craving and cooking foods that invoked this place to me. Old Bay on everything, tapioca pudding like my dad always made me growing up and that you can buy pre-made at the grocery store, scrapple (delicious block of corn meal soaked in pork broth that you slice and fry up nice and crispy). Food, as much as missing my parents and friends and the landscape and the country and the city and, well, pretty much everything, drew me home. It was a major bummer when I thought I was gluten intolerant because pretty much every food that spoke of home to me, that I was looking forward to eating when I finally got to come back here, has gluten in it. Downey's fried chicken, Procolino's pizza, Berger's cookies, beaten biscuits, Lake Trout sandwiches, fish fry fare, scrapple, prezzle dogs from the Crumpton sale, Amish baked goods at the farmer's market...oh sigh, it just wasn't fair. Thankfully, two months of rest and being very nice to myself but also asking myself a lot of questions, and a couple weeks of thyroid hormone replacement therapy have healed me of gluten intolerance and I can eat it again. My gratitude for this fact cannot be overstated. Every bite of gluten-containing foods that I thought I could never have again is a prayer in itself. My body and soul whisper in unison "thank you." I am much happier this way.

And so, to express my gratitude, I plan to post a smattering of posts called "Home Food" to honor the foods that are uniquely of this Place to me, that make me know I'm where I belong, and that I am so very thrilled to be able to eat once again. I was going to call it "Maryland Food" but the truth is I grew up traveling to Philly a lot and to Deleware and really some of the foods I would want to share are not in Maryland, though most are. Home food for me seems to be a combo of authentic Italian influence, typical Northeastern greasy fare, Pennsylvania Dutch/Amish food, some things that are distinctly Maryland in that they meld north and south (they don't call it the Old Line State for nothin') and, of course, seafood. First up is a food that I truly only eat once a year at the Chestertown Tea Party. The Tea Party is a street festival that my colonial home town holds every year to celebrate the pre-revolution protest that was staged here in support of the Boston tea party. People dress up as British soldiers and Tories and colonial radicals and throw each other and some boxes of tea into the Chester River. Complete with canon fire, very fun no matter how many times I see it. Besides the reenactment, the Tea Party is special for the food that is sold there, particularly these tasty clam strips. Breaded and deep friend clams. They are equal parts greasy, crispy, and, um, oystery (I guess?). It's not easy to describe, you really have to eat them to know what I mean. The best I can do for you is show you these photos. I love how they turned out.

Carrot Cake for Mama

My ma, she's an awesome lady. But I haven't always recognized that. In fact, I have at times been a really crappy daughter - a critical, know-it-all, ingrate to be exact. So much of living at home again has been about living amends - to amend meaning to change, so living change is what I mean - in my relationships with my parents. As good a kid as I was, I can see from my much more adult perspective the ways that I have taken my parents for granted, like most kids do, but also under appreciated my parents as people. Actual adult humans with lives and personalities that have nothing to do with me being their child. Revolutionary!

One very cool thing about my mother that I have thanked God for, literally, in the last few months is the way that she taught me to eat. Both of my parents had a huge impact on my food life - dad being a chef who comes from Lithuanian foodies (more on him later) and mom being the ultra-health conscious mom before Whole Foods made it cool. My lunch in school always had whole wheat bread and carrot sticks while everyone else got to have Lunchables and pudding snacks. It was a major bummer back then. Today, I am finally grateful. Truly proud of my mom for buying Powerhouse sandwiches from the Railway Market in Easton, which consisted of sprouts, lettuce, shredded carrot, and tomato on super duper whole grain bread while everyone else's parents were showing them how to subsist on McDonald's.

Note: I am not sorry if that sounds snobby or self-righteous. I'm just not, and here's why. The ways that I relate to food and eating and my body have caused me a great deal of pain in life. In all my struggles with food, particularly this past year, I have come to recognize the importance of the way my mom ingrained healthy eating in me from the very start. My programming, it's a little wacky to be sure. But I think of people like me who also have to deprogram poor nutrition habits before they can even start to get better. It's like I got a Skip Ahead card. And that's what I really appreciate about mom today. All the ways that the bar was raised in my life because she was so brave and did things differently from her mom, made life different for herself and for me. I'm not just talking carrots sticks here, but my joy for eating healthy, fresh food that feeds my body well and gives me an edge in dealing with life is one of the more tangible gifts of being my mother's daughter. On Saturday, my mom had a birthday. Since I'm broke as hell, making food was really the only gift I was able to give.

Memorial Day weekend has always been a big deal - my home town has a big street festival, my mom's and high school best friend's birthdays are then and it's the gateway to summer time, often the point at which Maryland's weather heads for humid and never looks back until sometimes October. So, I made a perfectly summer meal - grilled lamb, corn on the cob, and salad made of fresh lettuce from our garden. And, to celebrate my mom's birthday, a carrot cake with lemon ginger cream cheese frosting. It just felt appropriate when I asked myself what I should make her. She's always made a delicious carrot cake that was my paternal grandfather's recipe and carrots just remind me of my mom, always will. And really, as cakes go carrot cake is fairly healthy. There are almost 2 cups of shredded carrot in it, walnuts with their Omega-6 fatty acids, and oil instead of butter which allows for more unsaturated and less saturated fat. I'm not even going to try to pass cream cheese icing off as healthy, but lord it is sweet and heavenly. My recipe is from the Joy of Cooking but as I was baking, I kept thinking of variations that would be fun to try, so I will list those below also. One way that I deviate from the recipe is that they say to use two round cake pans or a loaf pan, but I am partial to the bunt for carrot cake. Fortunately, this gave me an opportunity to use one of these lovely cake pans that I got from a local charity thrift store - for like $5 total.















Seriously! Aren't they darling? Anyway, recipe with proposed variations is below. Happy Birthday mom!

Carrot Cake with Ginger Lemon Cream Cheese Icing (variation on Joy of Cooking)






















Preheat oven to 350. Grease and flour two 9x2 round cake pans, two 8 inch square pans, or a bunt pan (this recipe also makes really great cupcakes).

Whisk together thoroughly in a large bowl:
1.5 C flour
1 C sugar
1.5 t baking soda
1 t baking powder
1 t ground cinnamon
1/2 t ground cloves
1/2 t ground nutmeg
1/2 t ground allspice
1/2 t salt

Whisk together in a small bowl, then using a rubber spatula, stir in the flour mixture just until combined:

2/3 C vegetable oil
3 large eggs

Stir in:
1.5-2 cups shredded carrots
1 C chopped walnuts
(optional: 1 C golden raisins, 1/2 C canned crushed pineapple, lightly drained)

Scrape the batter into whichever pan or pans you've chosen and spread evenly. Bake until a toothpick comes out clean, usually about 25-30 minutes though it will probably be shorter if you do cupcakes. Longer if you do one large pan.

Variation ideas:
I have never tried the JoC suggestion of adding pineapple, but it got me thinking about the possibility of trying that with lime zest and ginger in the cake itself (and possibly making the icing with that as well) for a slightly more summery version. The other thing I've been thinking about is adding other shredded stuff that may compliment the carrots, like parsnip (I actually substituted parsnips for carrots once, it was delightful), coconut, and zucchini. The add-ins can always be changed up. Some I thought of were crystalized ginger, chopped dried fruit, and other types of nuts like pecans or hazelnuts. It's a good recipe to play with so try whatever strikes your fancy. Icing recipe is below.

Lemon Ginger Cream Cheese Frosting

Ingredients:
8 oz cream cheese, softened
1/4 C butter, softened
1 lb (about 3.5 cups) confectioner's sugar, sifted
zest of one lemon
1 t. ground ginger

Cream the butter and cream cheese until smooth.
Add zest and ginger and beat until incorporated evenly.
Slowly add confectioner's sugar. It's best to add it in three additions.

Note: This makes a TON of icing. If you aren't doing layers with icing between them, it will be way to much so only make half.

Coming home to me with Nigella's Remembrance Cake

I just read the date on my last blog entry - February 4. Almost four months since I last posted and it's not like I was ever that consistent but seriously, that lapse is perfectly indicative of what's been going on in my life. I began this blog with the intention of cataloging my culinary adventures, even the seemingly mundane ones, and the places where they intersected with my life - the life within me that I try to be as conscious of as possible every day and the life without that the rest of the world gets to see. My relationship with food has always been very important to all aspects of my life and I wanted to write about it.

When I started, I was feeling pretty A-game. I'd just gotten out of a long-term relationship and was standing on the edge of the life of my dreams. I knew what I wanted and I was spending lots of time doing what I loved best. The name I chose for the blog was a tongue-in-cheek reference to that saying about the best way to a man's heart being his stomach because I finally knew for sure that I wanted to find a really great guy and get married to him, eventually (and by eventually I mean in the next four years, just sayin'). But really I meant that the best way to attract anything good that I want in my life is to go after what makes my heart happy. For me that includes cooking, obviously, and running (long distances that most people cringe at when I tell them my mileage), working on this dream I have to teach high school English and, of course, the people in my life who I hold so dear. Then there's this other thing that's always pulled at my heart and that is home. My sweet wonderful home state of Maryland. As my relationship was ending last spring one thought kept occurring to me - "once this is over, I can go home." And about five seconds after we ended it for good, the same thought. "Now I can finally go home."

It sounded nuts. I had seven years of building a life where I was, in Asheville, North Carolina. Seven years of connections, almost three years at my job, plans to go to graduate school in North Carolina. It seemed illogical to uproot just then. But, to borrow from my man Delmar O'Donnell (which I really hate to do but it's the truest, most fitting statement in this case) "it's a fool that looks for logic in the chambers of the human heart." I was foolish then in ways that I hope never to be again. So I kept on, and then the little voice said it again when I visited home in the summertime. And I said "no." And in the end, I learned what happens when your heart says go and you stay instead. Life got very painful and, as will happen any time I sacrifice my heart's desire for that which is not true, I began to lose the things I loved the most. Running and food and my love for people got so twisted around that I ended up very sick, physically and, I have come to realize most of all, spiritually. In short, I developed some frightening behaviors and thinking around food and exercise so quickly I couldn't stop it and from that, all manner of self-abandonment and misery followed. I will skip most of the details because I don't want to go all TMI on you good people, but in the end I got beaten into submission and I moved home to Maryland, with only two week's notice to my job and my roommate, to recover.

And that's what I've been doing for the last two months. Recovering and recuperating and watching Law and Order marathons on cable and spending a lot on medical bills because I don't have health insurance. And you know what, today I feel better than I did before all this mess started. All I've wanted for the last six months is my joy back and that is excatly what I have today. When I consider the facts, it happened in a flash but any time I am separated from my truth, it feels like an eternity. It is a wonder and a blessing to feel good again. There is so much to celebrate and that is exactly what I've done this week - all over the places that make Maryland so unspeakably perfect to me. I've gotten in lots of time with one of my dearest homegirls, the one person who never stops believing in me and tells me so until I finally believe in myself (who also writes a killer blog by the way. Run, don't walk, over to The Impulse Itself). Thanks to help from other people, my relationship with food is better now than it was before things got dark. With the help of both western medicine and a dose of self-reflection, my health seems to be back to normal and I ran a stellar 12 miler today. Holy crap, I think my life is finally mine again!

The return of good health includes, it would appear, being able to eat gluten again! Which brings me, finally (were you like, "when in the HELL is she going to talk about a flippin' recipe?!") to the Rosemary Rememberance Cake I made tonight. I'm not sure why it felt necessary to tell the whole story before I talked about the lovely cake I'm about to tell you about, but it did. For one thing the cake is for Secret Bakers, which I should have sent three and half months ago and I was supposed to post pictures from everyone else on my blog but you know what my life kind of exploded so sorry about that. That's not the only reason, though. Like I said before, this blog was always meant to be about food AND life. I know I'm not the only person who gets way out in the weeds and forgets who they are and I know I'm one of a lot of women who've had destructive relationships with food and their bodies. Anyone who just wants a recipe can go to Cooks.com or open a recipe book. It is my hope to share my self and offer more than a list of ingredients and how to mix them together and heat them up.

This recipe was the one that I wanted to make for Secret Bakers from the moment I conceived of the idea, which was "baking in miniature." I just knew the teeny loafs would look adorable with a sprig of rosemary on top. Problem was, I was not eating gluten because of what appeared to be an intolerance and I couldn't send someone something without tasting it and gluten free baking is super expensive and I was not having much luck with it. So , like I said life got hectic and the cake just now got made, finally. It is a recipe from Nigella Lawson's Feast, which is a fabulous collection of recipes for specific occasions, like weddings, holidays, and funerals. This recipe comes from the last category. It is a simple butter cake recipe, very moist on the inside with a perfect crust on the outside. Rosemary is for remembrance, hence the name and significance of the cake, and the sprig of rosemary running down the top of the loaf not only looks cool, it adds a light herbal flavor. Rosemary in sweet applications is delightful, I highly recommend trying it. There isn't a ton of sugar in this cake so the butter flavor comes through without getting stepped on by overboard sweetness. I used Sugar in the Raw and ground it in a little food processor to get it fine like caster sugar. The recipe calls for a stewed apple, which helps with the moisture. This cake is yummy and comforting in the most perfect and simple way. If you wanted to add a little lemon glaze, I bet that would go perfectly but it doesn't need anything extra at all.

When I first thought to make this recipe for Secret Bakers, I didn't realize I'd be leaving Asheville. But now, it is so perfectly symbolic. No one died, but there is much for me to remember. So many special things about the city that was my home for almost eight years - amazing restaurants and favorite running trails and the way the clouds and sun broke around the mountains some mornings. So many people who helped me grow up in those years that I was away from Maryland and helped me become who I am. Ironically, of all the far flung people I could have drawn for Secret Bakers, I ended up with the one that lived in Asheville. So I'm sending my remembrance cake to the place that I had to leave to get back home to myself. I hope my recipient enjoys it.

Nigella's Rosemary Remembrance Cake

INGREDIENTS: 1 eating apple (approx. 180g in weight)

1 small sprig and 1 long sprig rosemary

1 teaspoon caster sugar (usually called Superfine sugar here in the states, or just put some granulated in a food processor)

juice and zest of 1/2 lemon

1 teaspoon butter

FOR THE CAKE BATTER:

225g butter (about 1 C)

150g (about 3/4 C) caster sugar plus

1 tablespoon

3 eggs

300g plain flour (about 3 C)

2 teaspoons baking powder

Serving Size : Makes approx. 10 slices

METHOD

1.	Peel, core and roughly chop the apple and put into a saucepan with the small sprig of rosemary, the teaspoon of sugar, the lemon zest and juice, and butter. Cover the pan and cook on a low heat for 4–8 minutes until the apple is soft. How long this takes really depends on the variety of apple you’re using.
2.	Leave to cool, and fish out the rosemary sprig when it is cold.
3.	Preheat the oven to 340 degrees. Butter and flour one 9 inch loaf pan or three mini loaf pans.
4.	Mash the cooled apple with a fork. Then add the butter, 3/4 C sugar, eggs, flour and baking powder and process to a smooth batter.
5.	Spoon and scrape into the loaf tin and smooth the top. Sprinkle the surface with the remaining tablespoon of sugar and then lay the long sprig of rosemary along the center of the cake. On baking, the rosemary sheds its oil to leave a scented path down the middle of the cake.
6.	Bake the cake for 50 minutes (more like 40 with the mini loaves) or until a cake tester comes out clean, then leave to cool on a rack. Slip the paper-lined cake out of the tin once it is cool.

I made some alterations so if you want the real deal go here on Nigella's website. Enjoy!

Secret Bakers roll call!

A few months ago, I discovered the food blog of someone in my real life community through the virtual food blog community that is Tastespotting. Her blog, Blueridge Baker, is in my links at right, and it's both mouthwatering and visually pleasing. (Go there as soon as you finish reading this.) I love when stuff like that happens! Anyway, around the time that I discovered her blog, Sarah posted about a fun project that she and some other food blogger ladies came up with called Secret Bakers. People sign up and are randomly assigned a bakee to make some treats for in a specified theme. Then, everyone sends their packages on the same day and we get surprise treats in the mail! Generally, everyone takes photos of what they receive (I forgot this time, sorry!) and the host will post the pics with the name of the person who baked them. Seriously fun, so I signed up for the second round, which was Christmas cookies and was hosted by Margie at Tea and Scones. Round three was healthy treats, hosted by Tracey at Tracey's Culinary Adventures.

I have really enjoyed being part of this - it makes me feel like I am part of the bigger world out there in a tiny but tangible (and delicious!) way. When the call went out for a round four host, I had an immediate inspiration for mini-treats as a theme and I volunteered. So that's what we're doing! If you would like to join in on the fun and bake some traditional treats in miniature or any other small-size sweets, please contact me via e-mail (it's listed in my info) and let me know your name, blog if you have one, any dietary restrictions or taste preferences, and the address where your baker should send your package. Sign-up will run until Sunday night and I will send out bakee assignments on Monday. The send date will be Tuesday February 16. Hope I can rope some new folks into the fun!

Simple Almond Flour Bread and my gluten free adventure.

I mentioned in a previous post that I was having some tummy problems. We will not get into details here because this is a food blog, where you come to be appetized and, well, you know... Anyway! I've decided to refer to my new dietary guidelines as my Gluten-Free Adventure. The alternatives, which included "my gluten-free pity party" and "my gluten free temper-tantrum" didn't sound nearly as fun. So, in the interest of my health I am not eating gluten (which means wheat, barley, rye, triticale, and most oats). If, after a couple of months things haven't changed I will march directly to Dunkin' Donuts and order a baker's dozen just for myself. However, I think I'm already seeing some very direct evidence in favor of this diet so, I am willing. Pain, whether emotional or physical, will do that to a person.

It's kind of exciting, though, for a number of reasons.

#1: I get to be special at restaurants. This is fun because my two favorite partners in crime are also special at restaurants - one is vegan, the other is gluten and dairy free - so we can be pains in the ass together. Servers of Asheville, beware!

#2: I get to buy things with this fun retro-style label on them -







#3: I will actually list a serious one now - what an awesome opportunity to expand my culinary horizons and discover new flavors and textures and ingredients! In the west, we rely so much on wheat flour, you'd think there was no other kind. This is a falsehood and I am pretty stoked to start discovering new types of flour and new ways of baking. My first new flour discovery was almond flour, which I tried last night in a nice, simple bread recipe.

When I decided to go gluten-free I immediately started searching for food blogs that would help me with recipes. My favorite so far is Elana's Pantry. She bakes in a way that is healthier all-around, not just in the gluten-free department, and she keeps an eye out for the Glycemic Index. Her flour of choice is almost always almond flour, which she explains on her site. Last night I tried her Simple Bread recipe, linked here because I'm afraid to reprint it because of copywrite. Plus I want everyone to visit her awesome blog. The loaf was fairly compact but not overly dense. Almond flour is rich and sweet, only a little nutty because almonds are pretty mild as nuts go. The crumb was soft and tight and the crust was perfectly crisp and a little salty, somehow. It was such a treat with just a little fruit-sweetened jam. And yet, I did not have the "I must now eat the entire loaf" reaction that I have almost always had to baked goods before. I felt satisfied with a couple of slices (each about 1/16 of the loaf, making them just over 100 calories each) and then I stuck the rest in the freezer. Almond flour is hella expensive, so I probably won't use it too often, at least not by itself. But I also can't wait to make cookies with it because they will be out of this universe amazing, I just know it!

Tater-tot waffle, will you marry me?

Hey, so it's a good thing I made that food for myself last week because moving was every bit as insane as I thought it would be. The problem now is that I'm all moved and didn't get to go to the store for groceries because we got slammed with a foot and a half of snow yesterday and I am snowed the heck in. Therefore, I am eating a like a frat boy. The food I actually got moved over with me includes various frozen foods like fish, a goose, some blueberries, homemade chicken stock, and tater-tots; some eggs, a carton of egg whites, applesauce, prune juice, oatmeal, coffee, condiments, various dried beans, one can of diced tomatoes, and all of my spices and cooking liquids - olive oil, agave, vinegar. At this point the applesauce is gone as are the blueberries and the can of diced tomatoes. I made some simple stuff like oatmeal with blueberries, red lentils and quinoa with tomatoes. As the food is dwindling, though, I am relying more and more on my bag of tater-tots and it is almost gone. (Side note, all-wheel drive vehicles are only useful in snow if you keep the tires up to date. My two front ones are bald and that's the real reason I'm stuck.) For my post-snow shoveling session meal, I put four tater-tots in a bowl with the rest of the diced tomatoes, some egg whites, cumin, salt, and pepper and it was plain yummy. And really not bad in the nutrition department, I might add. However, the star of the snowed-in cooking show so far has to be the tater-tot waffle.
As I mentioned before, I am now in love with my waffle iron and only beginning to discover what it is capable of. Yesterday when I got home from work, I was bone tired and there was already about an inch of snow on the ground. All I wanted was to eat something satisfying and take a long nap. Below is what I came up with and it was seriously one of the best things I have ever eaten in my life. I will say it again, IN MY LIFE. And I eat a lot so that's sayin' something.

Tater-Tot Waffle

For 1 waffle:
8 or so frozen tater-tots
2 T egg whites
1/2 t salt
1/2 t pepper

Defrost the tots in a microwave if you have one. Otherwise, I'd maybe just stick them in a bowl over a pot of boiling water. Just get them soft.

Mush them with a fork in a bowl and add the egg white, salt, and pepper. Stir to incorporate.

Spread to about 1/4 inch thickness on a preheated waffle iron and close the lid.

I think that I left them in for about five minutes and they came out perfectly crispy, golden brown on the outside and mushy on the inside. If I'd been less tired, it would have been impossible to resist making another.

Let's hope I can get to the store and buy some vegetables soon, though folks. The Nashville marathon is going to be a pipe dream if I keep eating like this!

Keeping it simple.

I mostly just want to pop in and say a little something, even though I don't have any big news or cool new recipes to share. My life is on crack right now. This week I have to do the following: remake my organization's financial system in its entirety, move my life out of a 900 square foot home and into a 12x12 room, go to the doctor about my train wreck of a digestive system, and then the usual training for a marathon and being a grad student, bla bla bla. SO, that is not to say "please feel sorry for me" because I'm sure that most anyone who is reading this is probably like "oh yeah well listen to my crazy week." We're all busy. It's the American way. My point is really just to share the way that I try to maintain my sanity by eating well even when I don't have all the time in the world to cook. Most people I know who don't cook but would really like to cite lack of time as their biggest dilemma. In an attempt to maintain my sanity this week, I decided to cook a bunch of food yesterday that would allow me to eat well without a lot of effort. They aren't big crazy dishes that required a lot of time, in fact it's all stuff that I can throw in the oven with little prep time and just leave in there while I do other stuff. The past year of my life has been a bit of a whirlwind in general so these are dishes that I learned would feed me well and I wanted to share the little bit of food wisdom I have. Enjoy!

Roast Chicken

Roast chicken is probably one of my favorite things to make. It makes a tasty but simple meal to feed other people or to have a bunch of lean protein around for the week, requires little prep time, can be varied in flavor with minor changes, and can be made into yummy homemade stock (again, with little effort). I should say now that I didn't come up with this idea on my own. Alicia Lynn Carrier over at Bread and Honey (who is both hilarious and has awesome taste in food and draws really cool drawings that you can see here.) is sort of my role model when it comes to using food as a center point for sanity. She blogged about how much more cost effective it is to buy a whole chicken and how great homemade stock is and I just did it because she made it sound so good. Here is what I do:

1. Preheat the oven to 400.

2. Rub the outside and inside the cavity of a whole chicken with a tablespoon or two of olive oil.

3. Put your spices into a small dish so you don't have to touch your spice containers with nasty chicken hands. I do about 2 teaspoons of salt and a teaspoon or pepper. Other good spices include Old Bay (the most amazing spice mix on the planet. Most Marylanders will agree with me on that point. Side note: I make it a hobby to see just how many dishes I can put Old Bay into. Last week I put it on a salad!), lemon and dill is a great combo, garam masala...you get the point. You can put whatever the heck you want to on the chicken. Just rub it on there and inside the cavity after you get the olive oil on it. Oh, and you can also put onion, carrot and celery inside the cavity for flavor or cut slits in the skin and stick garlic cloves into them, or fresh herbs.

4. If the bird isn't trussed, you may want to tie it's little legs together with some twine. It's not necessary but makes for a juicier bird.
5. Put it in a roasting pan on a rack or just in whatever sort of baking dish you have. The glass kind you use for lasagna work. My roasting pan is kind of deep and I need to get a rack for it because keeping it up off the pan makes for a crispier skin. Otherwise it kinda steams in there.

6. Put the chicken in the 400 degree oven for 15 minutes and then turn the heat down to 325. It will take about 20 minutes per pound. I usually get a 4-5 lb. bird so it takes about an hour, maybe a little more.

7. You can baste, or not. The salt on the outside helps it keep the juices in so you will end up with a pretty moist chicken even if you don't baste. I like basting though so I usually do. Bake until a meat thermometer inserted into the thickest part of the thigh reads 170. Let cool on a plate before putting it in the fridge if you can. And make sure you eat at least some while it's still hot because it is flippin' delicious.

Roasted Sweet Potatoes

Sweet potatoes are perfect. End of story. They can be made into amazing things like pie and waffles. But they are also great in very simple preparations. The following can be made with just sweet potatoes but is also good for making nearly any root vegetables like other potatoes, beets, parsnips, celeriac. The trick is to dice them so that they cook kinda fast and get the crispy outside/soft inside kinda thing going on.

Preheat oven to 350.
1. Dice two medium size sweet potatoes into 1/2 inch dice. I ended up with about 2.5 cups of potatoes.
2. Dice about a cup of red onion.
3. Toss onions and potatoes in a bowl with 2 T olive oil, 1 T apple cide vinegar, 1 t. salt and 1 t pepper.
4. Spread in a glass baking dish or a cookie sheet if that's what you have and throw it in the oven for about half an hour. Just keep an eye on them and pull them out when they reach the doneness that you prefer. Easy as pie (or a piece of cake, if you like cake better than pie. I like both of those things equally so I could go either way.)

Roasted (seeing a pattern here?) Spaghetti Squash

I recenly decided to stop eating gluten for a little while in an attempt to figure out my crazy tummy issues. So when I saw a post on Tastespotting about using spaghetti squash instead of spaghetti, I was in. Back in the summer I posted about using shredded yellow squash to take the place of spaghetti noodles and it never even ocurred to me to use spaghetti squash to do that. Sometimes I'm slow to recognize the obvious. Last week I made some black eyed peas and ate them over roasted spaghetti squash. It's seriously the best compliment to almost anything. It's got enough of it's own flavor to be good with just salt and pepper but not so strong that you can't pair it with other flavors. I like to roast a whole squash, scrape out the inside, and just keep it in a container in the fridge to eat with whatever. It's lower calorie than noodles, obviously, but has a lot of nutrients. Don't ask me which ones cause I don't know. May I suggest Google? Here's what I do:

1. Cut a spaghetti squash in half. You'll need a sharp knife for this because those bad boys have thick skin. Scrape out the yucky guts and seeds. Lightly oil and salt the cut side and put in a bakign dish, cut side down. Put a little bit of water in the bottom, like a quarter inch.
2. Bake on 350. It will start to get soft after about 15 - 20 minutes. At this point, I like to flip it over, add little water if it's all cooked off, and let it cook like that until the meat it fork tender all the way through.
3. When it's done you can just pull it out, let it cool, and scrape the inside into a container or onto your plate. The skin is really thick so if you wanted to do stuffed squash, like with a risotto or quinoa or something like that, this is a good squash for that.

Flourless Sweet Potato Waffle.

I feel like I've stumbled on something big here. First, let me admit that I didn't invent it. The inspiration came from a blog called Waffleizer (dedicated entirely to waffleing non-traditional things. I'm kind of smitten.) which I found on my beloved Tastespotting, as is often the case. They had a hash brown recipe made in a waffle iron, which is seriously genius. The picture featured hash browns with a sunny side up egg on top. A sunny side up egg - or poached egg, or even a soft boiled one - is a pretty sure-fire way to get my attention. So if you ever can't get in touch with me or I seem like I'm not paying attention, an egg with a runny yolk is your best bet. Anyway, I thought to myself "I have a waffle iron, what an amazing use for a waffle iron!" I'm a sucker for novelty, what can I say? Add to this the fact that I'm really striving for healthier eating (particularly to feed myself properly while training for the Nashville Marathon) and making shredded potatoes in a waffle iron is cause for jubilation. I'm watching the flour and sugar, basically, because they make my blood sugar and hunger level and mood go all wacko. No, I'm not quitting them. Just paying attention and finding ways to do something better, which generally turns out to be more flavorful and enjoyable to cook anyway so it works out.

This morning, I was still thinking about those waffle hash browns with the egg on top and realized I had a sweet potato in the fridge. It was kind of a big one, so I cut it in half and shredded it into a bowl so that I had about 3/4 cup of shredded sweet potato. To this, I added an egg and beat it in. I was thinking that would help it hold together better and it did. Other than that, I added a little salt and pepper, spread it on the waffle iron, closed the lid and waited about 5-7 minutes (I think?). The result was seriously amazing. Because the potato was shredded, it softened enough to sort of all meld together and not be all that different from a regular old waffle, including the crispy outside that regular waffles get, and I imagine that adding a little oil or just leaving it in there longer would make that even more pronounced. I think that if I didn't add egg, it would be more like a hash brown and less like a waffle, which would be cool. Like I said the sweetness of the potatoes also came through well. Naturally sweetened foods always have more complex flavor, while refined sugar seems to run a shock and awe campaign on my taste buds so I can't really taste much besides sweet. Plus, lest I forget, it's shaped like a waffle!!! That's so fun!! I shall have it for breakfast again tomorrow, that's for sure.

Just a few thoughts for future adventures in waffle iron meets root vegetable land:

- The sweetness of the sweet potatoes would be great with some maple syrup or honey or agave and cinnamon/ginger/nutmeg type spices thrown in.
- A more savory version could look like very finely chopped onions, sauteed in a pan, and other herbs (rosemary comes to mind) thrown in there.
- This is a great option for people who are gluten free or try to avoid flour. It's basically a whole food waffle - that is really great in my book. To make it vegan, you probably just need some egg replacer. I'll try it soon to see.
- Waffles are not just for breakfast and there are many ways in which this could be served with meat or beans and turned into a dinner.
- Fat free greek yogurt on top. Heck yeah.
- I'm thinking that any root vegetable and probably most types of winter squash would work just as well with this. Here are some variations I have in mind:

• Beets with apple cider vinegar added.
• Plain 'ol white potatoes - red skinned Yukon gold, whatever - which get a much worse rap than they deserve. The things still have fiber that processed flours don't, ya know. It would be a great way to make potato pancakes without flour and without frying them in oil.

• Purple potatoes with pureed carmelized onion and herbs.
• Butternut squash (peeled before shredding) with maple syrup and cinnamon. Could add shredded apple to this one as well. Savory spices would work too. I am now drooling.
• Any combo of root veggies (beets, potatoes, parsnips, carrots, turnips) and/or winter squash (acorn, butternut, pumpkin - just make sure you peel these) with the option of one of the many varieties of apples for some sweetness.
  
• Ooh and what about drained crushed pineapple in one of the hardier savory verisons?
• Add toasted nuts for crunch, bits of dried fruit or oats for chewiness, candied bacon for intrigue, chocolate for, um, chocolate.
• Which leads into a whole realm of desert-like options and then makes me wonder about pureed vegetables instead of shredded ones?! Whew!
  

Ok, that was intense. I think I need to take a shower. One thing about this that isn't so great is that not everyone has a waffle iron. Unlike some kitchen appliances (i.e. juicer) that I have gotten and then resented as I moved it from place to place but used it like once a year, I am really sure that a waffle iron is a good investment. I mean, mine was given to me so maybe I'm not qualified to say that. But I bet you can get a cheap one at Target or even eBay. (FYI, My pots and pans came from eBay back in 2004 and they have served me super well so don't be afraid to buy kitchen stuff from there.) In the meantime, I think that spreading these on a cookie sheet and baking in a 400 oven may give you a similar effect. Okie dokes, enjoy!