For the bride

It's not every day a girl's best friend gets married. That is an occasion that simply must be marked. Yesterday I and the other women in my dear K's life converged on Rhode Island for a shower to celebrate the bride's impending happy occasion. I volunteered to do a little baking and took with me (on the train) some cupcakes with ever-so-melty frosting (do NOT try to make cream cheese frosting in August if you don't have air conditioning) and the olive oil cookies I've been raving about for weeks now. Last time I just quoted cookbook's tweeted recipe, but this time I did some tweaking and will give you a full blow by blow.

Olive Oil Cookies
Ingredients

• 1 egg
• 7 T olive oil
• 5 T wine (this time I used amaretto)
• 1 c flour
• 6 T sugar
• 1/2 t minced fresh rosemary (I used more than that.)
• 1/4 t baking powder
• salt & pepper

1. With a mixer on medium speed, beat the egg, oil, and wine together.
2. In a separate bowl, combine the dry ingredients.
3. Add the dry to the wet and mix until smooth and doughy. Full disclosure: last time I complained about the dough being too wet, so this time I probably used more like 1 1/2 c.
4. Pinch off and form about 20 cookies. I made them quite small this time and it turned out to be 34. As to the question of "forming" the cookies, I rolled the dough into balls thinking they would spread more or less evenly in the oven. They didn't really spread and, instead, came out as delicious little golden nuggets.
5. Bake for 12-15 minutes at 375° or until golden brown. Be sure not to burn the bottoms.

**Note: the original red wine in the recipe does give the cookies a slightly more complex flavor, but the amaretto makes them more decisively sweet. Consider your preferences and venue and just go with your gut.

A slice for a friend

There's this girl I'm thinking about a lot today. She's an incredibly strong, talented, happy, generous, and generally fantastic person who's coming to the end of what I understand to have been a really, really rough year. She's also an absurdly good writer and a creative and talented cook. And she takes good photos. What I'm trying to say is that she's quickly ascending my list of Inspiring People.

One thing that makes her blog memorable (among many many memorable things) is the occasional post she dedicates to someone she's thinking of or who has a birthday or needs cheering up. So, I'm going to unashamedly copy her and say, Jess, this post is for you!

Jess is creative and thoughtful in just about everything she does and she definitely doesn't seem to be the type to be afraid to try something new. So, I thought, wouldn't it be fitting to pay her a little tribute and do something creative and new and be unafraid about it. So I decided to make quiche.

Yes, this is not a new dish. I'm not inventing something earth-shattering (Don't get me wrong, quiche is earth shattering, but I can't take credit for it, alas.), but I've never made it before and I've always been slightly intimidated by the prospect of it. But today I closed the book of fraidy-cat-ness and plunged right in. Thanks, Jess, for the inspiration. We're thinking lots of warm thoughts for you and we'll save you a slice till you're back to the blogs. Happy Humpty Dumpty Day!

Quiche with all the goodiesIngredients:

for the crust

• 1 1/4 c flour
• 1/2 c (1 stick) butter, chilled
• 4 T ice water
• 1/4 t salt

for the filling

• 5 eggs
• 1 c whole milk
• 1 c half and half
• salt and pepper
• handful fresh rosemary, chopped
• 2 small onions
• 1 small head broccoli
• 5 slices prociutto
• small block feta
  

1. Make the crust. As with pie crust, process the flour, salt, and butter in a food processor until crumb-like in consistency. Add ice water and process until dough ball starts to form. Form dough into flattened ball, wrap in plastic, and refrigerate for an hour.
2. Meanwhile, slice the onions thinly, either by hand or in the food processor. Heat olive oil and 1 T butter in a pan and stir in the sliced onions, salt to taste and a spoonful of brown sugar. Cook on medium heat, stirring frequently, until the onions have fully caramelized and are dark brown in color. Set them aside.
3. Chop the prociutto, broccoli, and feta quite finely, either by hand or in the food processor.
4. Roll out the pie dough and press into a quiche or pie pan (I used a glass deep dish pie plate).
5. Bake the pie dough for 5 minutes at 375.
6. Meanwhile, beat together the eggs, milk, half and half, rosemary, salt and pepper.
7. Remove the partially baked crust from the oven and spread dry fillings (cheese, prociutto, broccoli, onions) in the crust.
8. Reduce oven temperature to 350. Place the filled crust back onto the middle rack of the oven and pour the egg mixture over fillings up to about 1/4 inch from the top of the crust.
9. Bake the quiche for about 45 (40-50) minutes or until a) crust is golden brown, b) a knife inserted about 1" from the edge comes out clean, and/or c) the middle is set, but still a little jiggly, like jello.
10. I like to let it cool a little and serve it up while warm.

July's End Dinner Party, Part the second

In addition to the heavenly Gelato, I made a little appetizer for my friends.

I've long been on a quest to educate my Yankee friends in the ways of Southern food (I realize this is a bit rich coming from someone who hails from a Northern State, but hey, it's the Southern end and I grew up eating family recipes from Kentucky, so there.). I've made attempts with my mom's chili recipe (which cannot be eaten with a fork and does not resemble the tex-mex mess they serve around here), her famous orange-pineapple fluff, biscuits and gravy (pearls before swine, as Danny would say), and so forth.This time, determined to hit one out of the park, I settled on whipping up some Benedictine, which is a venerable old Kentucky Derby recipe. I admit, I hadn't had this divine goop until a couple years ago but it may be the Prime Reason I got a food processor. Googling around looking for a recipe, I found that there are MANY different variations (benedictine sandwiches served on buttermilk biscuits, benedictine with food coloring, baked benedictine...), but I wanted the stuff I've been dreaming of. So, I went to the source and got my mom's "recipe."

What you need to know about my mother is, 1. She is The Best Cook In The World and 2. She is Not the Kind of Cook Who Writes Precise Recipes. The latter may sound frustrating to some, but I like the flexibility it gives me to tweak things how I like them. (You'll see in this Recipe Suggestion that she anticipated my tweakings and preemptively shot them down. I guess she knows me.)

With no further ado, here's my mom's Recipe for Benedictine. Make a double batch. You'll thank me after you polish of the first box of crackers and are heading to the store for more.

Benedictine

"I peel, and seed English cucumbers and shred those in the food processor—then place them in a kitchen towel and squeeze the heck out of them to get them as dry as possible—this is really an important step. I also grate a small mild onion with the cucumbers in the food processor and squeeze them along with the cucumbers.Once the cucumber-onion mix is DRY combine that with softened cream cheese and 1-2 tablespoons of mayonnaise. You can do all of that in the food processor---salt to taste—and it really does need salt. Do not be tempted to omit the mayonnaise (because I know you don’t like it!) because it is important for the texture. Quantities of everything just depend on how much you want to make. For 2 cucumbers and 1 small onion—I use 2- 8 ounce blocks of cream cheese and 2 tablespoons of mayo. But you can adjust any of that to your taste preference and consistency preference."

**Note: I did depart from this and add a couple dollops of Sour Cream after seeing a number of recipes did call for it in order to make the benedictine more dippy and less spready. And anyway, how could a little sour cream hurt any dish? (It didn't.)

July's End Dinner Party, Part the first

Whenever I'm invited to dinner, I ask, "What can I bring?" like a dutiful guest. I then proceed to forget about it until the day of and then go way, way overboard. This time, I was asked to bring "something to drink or something nibbly." "Okay," I thought to myself, "I'll figure something out."

I decided yesterday to go way overboard.

It's important that you know that I have a passionate love of gelato. And avocados. Maybe, in fact, it's a thing for all food-stuffs ending in -o. In any case, when I saw this recipe for Avocado Gelato, I was intrigued. I set out to the grocery to procure missing ingredients (avocados, corn starch) and on the way decided that a pure avocado flavor might be good, but wouldn't it be better with a little something to jazz up/brighten up the flavor and make it a little sunnier? So, I got to thinking about other O-ending foodstuffs and landed on mojitos, which also make me very, very happy. I concluded that I would make Avocado Mojito Gelato. (I'm also of the opinion that an Avocado Mojito - in beverage form - is a very good idea.)

The result was, perhaps, my best kitchen effort yet and, perhaps, the cooking product of which, to date, I am most proud. At the dinner party for which I whipped up this gelato, we served it in green teacups with a sprinkle of fresh blueberries, which added a lovely tang. It could also be served with a sprig of mint as garnish or with a dash of rum over top, for that mojito experience.

Here's what I did.

Avocado Mojito Gelato

Ingredients

• 2 c Whole Milk
• 3/4 c Sugar
• zest of (approximately) half a lime - in strips
• 2 T cornstarch
• 2 ripe avocados (approximately 1 pound)
• 1 vitamin C tablet, crushed to powder (I used 1000 mg, but less would probably work just as well)
• juice of 1/2 lime
• generous handful of fresh mint leaves
• pinch salt

1. Combine sugar and mint leaves in a food processor. Process until mixture is homogeneous and pieces of mint are very small.
2. Bring 1 3/4 c milk, 1/2 c of the sugar/mint mixture, lime zest, and salt to a simmer in a heavy saucepan over medium heat.
3. Meanwhile, whisk together the remaining 1/4 c milk and 2 T cornstarch until smooth. Once combined, stir this mixture into the simmering milk, whisking continually.
4. Bring to a boil (while whisking) and boil for one minute.
5. Transfer the hot milk mixture into a metal bowl and place that bowl into another bowl filled with ice and cold water. Let the mixture cool completely and mix frequently.
6. Meanwhile, quarter, pit, and peel avocado. Place in food processor with the remaining mint sugar, juice of 1/2 lime and the crushed vitamin C tablet. Puree until smooth.
7. Add cooled milk mixture and puree until smooth.
8. Freeze avocado mixture in an ice cream maker. Transfer to airtight container and freeze until hard (1+ hour).

My gelato took a quite a while to freeze and after the subway trip to the dinner party, was a little runny, but set up again quite nicely upon being put in the freezer there. It's a pretty low maintenance gelato, so don't worry. The beauty of this recipe is that the avocado is creamy and rich enough that you can skip the heavy cream and eggs that would be necessary to get that texture otherwise. And anyway, avocado fat isn't bad for you. The vitamin C tablet is necessary, according to the recipe I adapted, to keep the avocado's color. The lime would proably take care of this on its own, but who wants to run the risk of producing brown Avocado (Mojito) Gelato? Not me.

Highlights from today's archiving

Figure One. Hamburg Rathaus by night. Expect many many more photos like this here.
Figure Two. Blurry Christine having cocktails.
Figure Three. Silly (but cool) jumping Dan.

Clip Show: Where I left off

I've embarked on the project of digitizing my black and white negatives from the last five or six years (since I started shooting b/w...). That's a lot of negatives. In any case, I'll post highlights here. Please bear with me as I learn the ropes of scanning and editing (why, hello, Photoshop). Many, many more of these will be appearing over the next few weeks (months, more likely). I'll be posting them here.
Figure One. The Hipster Photo Shoot. Dan and I did a little photo shoot while living in Berlin. He wore a fedora and we set up in the garage of our apartment building, where the architectural details and graffiti are fabulous and it was almost completely dark.
Figure Two. Liz in the wild. Smith Senior Year (2004). We were in pursuit of interesting photos for the Yearbook. There are also many photos of Kelly.
Figure Three. Peeling posters in Prenzlauer Berg, Berlin. Also from 2007.

Last night, I had some friends over. One of my really good friends is moving from DC to Boston and was in town briefly, so we decided to have a bit of a celebration. The only problem was that our apartment was (as it is today) keeping at a steady 85+ degrees. The only solution for it was to make fizzy sweet drinks and huddle around a candle on the roof. Pardon the blurry photo, but you can take it as representative of the activities of the evening.
This morning, we were in the mood for hangover food and, having a car at our disposal, hied ourselves hence to Sofra, where we indulged in not one, but two rounds of delicious food. Try the Shakshuka next time you're there. It's divine.All in all, it's been a pretty great day (and night). Much love to all who attended and imbibed. Now if you'll all excuse me, I'm going to go snack on some Moroccan style goat cheese that I brought home with me.

Sigh

I've lapsed. The one-a-day plan hasn't exactly worked out, for reasons of technology, laziness, and humidity, but I have been shooting and developing lots! The spirit of the project is not lost! For today, here are a couple of photos and one recipe.

After having a lovely breakfast and trip to the airport and watermelon ice and chat with the lovely author of Sweet Amandine (who I'm going to presumptuously say is becoming a dear friend), I felt hungry and decided to steal her recipe for Sesame Noodles. Knowing, however that I, like her sister, am very particular about my Sesame (and/or Peanut) Noodles, I adapted the recipe a bit. I used Angel Hair Pasta and made the whole thing cold. I also added a glop of chunky peanut butter and a little ginger paste. Delicious.
And this is my little hot puppy. Posing nicely for the camera. She needs a haircut, but I am loath to lose her big fuzzy bear paws.
In other news, I've been doing a good deal of for-fun reading and I have two EMPHATIC recommendations for you: 1. All Over Creation, by Ruth Ozeki and 2. Commencement, by J. Courtney Sullivan.

Both of these authors are Smithies. Ozeki has a way of being very political about farming practices while weaving a really riveting story on top of it. In her first book - My Year of Meats, Ozeki takes on the beef industry and in this one she takes aim at genetically engineered vegetables, specifically potatoes. While yes, this book makes me want to eat 100% organic vegetables, the most memorable part of it was the family's story that she tells along the way. It's kind of the opposite of my experience with The Jungle, where I remember the gruesome scenes in the meat packing plant, but don't remember the personal plight of the characters at all. Sullivan plumbs her personal experience in college and writes what amounts to a nostalgic ode to Smith. Yes, it does deal with illegal sex traffic in a pretty graphic and stirring way, but the book is really all about Smithies and love and friendship. It's like Sex and the City, but real and relevant to my life.

What strikes me about both of these books (granted, I did read the two of them in the space of about three days) is that maybe Smith did really leave a lot of us with a real desire to make a difference in the world, regardless of the arena in which we choose to work. And wasn't that the idea anyway? I still haven't found a way to do this in any concrete way in my life, unless you count the dissemination of German articles and adjective endings as some sort of social change. But these women, deeply invested in writing, which so often becomes a solitary, self-indulgent activity, find a way to comment on their (and our) lives and relationships while writing an entertaining story AND raising awareness about serious social issues. Well, done Smithies.

Rather upsettingly, Sullivan graduated a year ahead of me. I haven't published a (really great) novel yet, have you?

My beautiful friends!

One a Day... Number five

A photo and a story. I decided to make use of my brand new ice cream maker and whip up some fresh watermelon sorbet. So, I took about 3/4 of a small watermelon, cubed and seeded it and popped it into my (also brand new) food processor. Then I squeezed half a lime in and threw in a glug or two of the lime scented simple syrup I made the night before. Then I added a splash of vodka and popped it into the ice cream maker. Result: delicious intense watermelon-y flavor with just enough tart lime flavor and sugary sweetness. The texture was a little odd, but still tasty.

In other news, I've been shooting black and white medium format and rediscovering the joys of that. Will hopefully have scans soon. (Oh, scanner, how do I want you... Canoscan 8800f, maybe?)

One a day...Number three and four.

Well, I missed yesterday. Maybe because I was busy drinking these.Today: Three very happy packages arrived - food processor, ice cream maker, and film processing supplies, oh my!

One a day...Number two.

The only photos I've taken today have been analog - I finally got a new battery for my trusty old Mamiya and, oh, I've got big plans for her. So, in the spirit of at least uploading one photo every day in an effort to make myself be creative at least part-time, I give you last night's dinner. Nothing fancy, just some light buttery pasta with veg and a good, big, fat salad.

In other exciting photo news, not only did I find TWO places that have rentable darkroom space, but I also dug out my old tank and ordered up some chemistry so that I can develop my own film again! It's been a long, long time since I did it and just reading a tutorial to remind myself how it goes made me go all misty/nostalgic. I remember so poignantly the feeling of my fingers going all puckery while washing freshly developed film combined with wafting chemical smells and everything being nice and cool and clean and dust-free. And come Wednesday (when my happy little shipment arrives) I'll be doing it again, theoretically. I am a little nervous to discover that I've lost my touch or that it's not as much fun as I remember it (as with so many foolish things we did in college), but I'm sure it'll come back in a snap and be even more satisfying now since I haven't done it in ages.

All this photo-Schwärmerei was brought about, in case you're wondering, by some fun shooting in Ireland and the decision that if I'm going to have the kind of well rounded life I really want, now is as good a time as any to get started. So here we go - I'm plunging back in.

One a day...

It may be time for another attempt at 365 photos. Keep your expectations in check.

Faux toes

This is a taste of my photos from our trip to Ireland. Many, many more can be seen here.

Hot weather equals ...

An urge, a craving, and, ultimately, sweet satisfaction

Yesterday I found myself with the urge to do something in the kitchen. These moods tend to strike at the least opportune times - as far as possible from mealtimes, when I have a ton of work to do, when the kitchen is dangerously low on supplies (which, admittedly, forces creativity, but usually ends with less than ideal results), and so forth. This was combined with a craving for bread, which - tragedy! - we did not have in the house.

And so I pulled out the book that is quickly becoming a Bible for me - The America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook and started to read recipes. I quickly decided against rolls, sandwich bread, and a variety of sweet options. I landed on their quick, easy recipe for Rosemary Focaccia (my rosemary needed a little pruning, after all).

The result, with a little fiddling and a lot of shameful ignoring (How long is it supposed to rise again?), was a crispy, yet soft, chewy focaccia with the tang of good olive oil and the bite of good, crunchy sea salt. In short, it hit the spot.
Rosemary Focaccia - The Book also provides suggestions for substituting parmesan, sage, or olive and thyme. They all sound delicious.

Note: don't use dried rosemary for fear of burning.

1 russet potato (I used Yukon Gold) - be sure you'll have enough for about 1 1/3 cups grated potato (for me, this meant two small ones)
3 1/2 c. all-purpose flour
1 1/2 t. instant yeast
1 1/4 t. salt
1 c. warm water
1/4 c. extra-virgin olive oil, plus some for the baking sheet and rising bowl (I didn't measure very carefully, which resulted in a rather too-oily bread. But it's good oil, so it tastes fine anyway.)
2 T. fresh rosemary (Again, I did not measure, but instead just liberally plopped the rosemary down on the top of the dough)
3/4 t. coarse sea salt (I used too much.)

1. Cook the potato until it's easily pierced with a knife (~10 minutes). Allow to cool until it's comfortable to handle. Grate it on the large holes of a box grater. The recipe initially asks you to cut the potato into 1-inch chunks, but in the future (for the sake of grating it more easily) I would leave it in halves or quarters. The small chunks were rather unwieldy and quite messy to grate. Reserve 1 1/3 c. grated potato.
2. Mix 3 1/4 c. of the flour with the other dry ingredients (yeast, table salt). On low, add potato, water and 2 T. olive oil until the dough comes together.
3. Ratchet up the speed (medium-low) and knead until dough is smooth and elastic (~10 minutes). If the dough is too wet (sticking to sides of the bowl), add flour. I needed all of the extra flour, perhaps because of the massive humidity in Boston yesterday?
4. Turn the dough out onto the counter and knead it to form a smooth ball (~1 minute).
5. Put the dough-ball into an oiled bowl and cover with plastic wrap. I would also suggest oiling the plastic wrap, lest the plastic wrap stick to the dough, which mine did (tragedy!). Let rise for about an hour, or until it's doubled in size.
6. Finagle the dough into a 12x18 rimmed baking sheet - just try to get it to stay in the corners - with WET HANDS. This part is very important. It calms down the dough a little and keeps your hands from sticking without drastically changing the flour/oil/water balance in the dough.
7. Cover and let it rise for another 45-60 minutes. It should just about double in size and will slowly return to its original shape when prodded.
8. Preheat oven to 425. Dimple the dough with your fingers in a more or less regular pattern. Drizzle the rest of the olive oil, sprinkle with sea salt, and toss on the rosemary.
9. Bake 20-25 minutes (25 for me) until the bocaccia bottom is golden and crisp. (I found a normal spatula very very helpful in lifting up the focaccia to check the bottom.)
10. Try to wait until it's cooled a little before slicing. You won't be able to.

**Another prop for this book - they have EXCELLENT descriptions and photos of how to know when the dough is too wet. Very useful for those who are uncertain about these sorts of things. It's a SERIOUSLY good cookbook for cooks at any level. Also, they provide rationales for a lot of their recipe and ingredient choices, which is reassuring.

Lessons I learned in Ireland

Figure One. Scones are better in Ireland. So is the butter.
Figure Two. Guinness is good for you.
Figure Three. When asked the question "Would you like a bit of cream with your raspberry crumble," say yes.
Figure Four. When making a sandwich, good bread is obviously a necessity (good Irish brown bread, in this case). Also highly recommended, however, is shredded cheese instead of sliced.
Figure Five. Even if it doesn't look like much, fish and chips is truly a memorable meal when you're near the sea and have lots of salt and vinegar at your disposal.
Figure Six. If you ever find yourself in Kenmare, County Kerry, go to Mulcahy's. Order the pork.

Radio Silent

I'm off to the land of Guinness, shamrocks, and Leprechauns. Don't expect to hear much from me for a couple of weeks.

Lasagna and clafoutis and cocktails - oh my!

In other weekend eating news, I tried Sweet Amandine's clafoutis recipe with a few too many berries (again with the moisture issue), but it came out gorgeously. (See the pre-batter photo, as the post-baking result wasn't as pretty as it was delicious.) The clafoutis was dessert for a rather decadent dinner involving lasagna and a newly invented cocktail.

But first, the lasagna. I followed the America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook recipe (if you don't have this book, buy it immediately). They handily start with a vegetarian version (Simple Cheese Lasagna) and offers options for other versions (Meat, Mushroom & Spinach, etc.) and clear instructions.

First, the sauce recipe (it is delicious for lasagna or other pasta).

1 T olive oil
1 minced onion
6 cloves minced garlic
1 can crushed tomatoes (28 oz.)
1 can diced tomatoes (28 oz.)
1/4 t. dried oregano (I used fresh)
1/8 t. red pepper flakes (I used cayenne)

You basically do what you would expect to: cook the onion until it softens, add the garlic until it's fragrant. If you're making it MEATY, add the meat (I used 1 lb. ground turkey and 1/2 c. diced prociutto) now. Then tomatoes (don't drain!) and season with oregano, cayenne pepper (or pepper flakes), and salt and pepper to taste. Simmer until it's a little thicker.

And then the process of the lasagna itself. The book (quite rightly) recommends no-boil noodles, but I only had yes-boil noodles on hand. There are four basic layers that you repeat as long as your pan holds out.

1. Sauce. You can make the sauce from the recipe above or use jar sauce.
2. Noodles. Three standard lasagna noodles will cover the bottom of a 9"x13" pan.
3. Happy, rich ricotta mixture. This is comprised of 15 oz. ricotta mixed with 1 c. Parmesan, 1/2 c. minced fresh basil, an egg, and salt and pepper.
4. Mozzarella, grated.

Layer these one over the other until the pan is full. If you've ever seen me packing a suitcase, you understand the method I find useful to employ: pour in more goodies and apply pressure until it all fits. Just be prepared to get a little dirty. Finish this layering process with a layer of noodles, then sauce, then a cup of mozzarella and the final 1/4 c. Parmesan. Then cover the lasagna with oiled aluminum foil and bake for 15 minutes at 375. Remove the foil and continue baking for 25 more minutes until bubbling and brown on top.

But, as I mentioned before, there have been a couple of cocktails created in the last week: First, the heady one. I have a little herb garden growing on my balcony, which includes a curious plant called Pineapple Sage. It is primarily decorative and aromatic, but is perfectly safe for culinary use and I had read it recommended for cocktails. So, I got adventurous.

For four generous pours:
Muddle:
8-10 small Pineapple Sage leaves, roughly chopped
2 T. brown sugar

Mix in about 4 oz. gin

Pour about an oz. of this mixture into each glass and top with ginger ale. Garnish with an additional sage leaf.

The other cocktail was a little less aggressively flavored (probably a good thing, as it followed lasagna and clafoutis and we were all practically collapsed with heavy food). It was smooth, citrusy, and herby and went down quite easily.

Muddle:
ca. 5 large basil leaves, roughly chopped
2 T. powdered sugar
1 lime, cut into eighths

Mix in about 4 oz. vodka. Pour about an oz. of this mixture into each glass. Top with club soda. Drink up! Oh, and I haven't named these cocktails yet. Any ideas?

More Cooking Adventures

It's not often that I find myself arrested by a recipe with an urge to try it immediately, but it happened yesterday. A few weeks ago the New York Times did a profile of Twitter-users who tweet recipes. The most impressive of them is, in my opinion, Cookbook. She tweets entire recipes in the allotted 140 characters, with the help of a battery of abbreviations and sometimes curious punctuations. This epicurean Morse code is sometimes difficult to parse, but the effort of condensing them and eliminating all those pretty words seems herculean. Anyway, over the weekend the following popped up in my feed:

"Olive Oil Cookies: beat egg/7T oil/5T wine. Fold+c flour/6T sug/.5t mince fresh rosemary/.25t bkgpdr&s+p. Form~20t's; 12m@375F/190C to brwn."

"Hark!" I said to myself," Hath someone shown me the way to eat olive oil and sugar at the same time!?" And I sprinted to my kitchen. A scant 25 minutes later, the lovely, chewy little morsels you see to the right came out of the oven with a puff of olive oil scented steam. A note, however. (And this was a theme of the weekend.) The dough for these cookies came out more like a batter, so I added a little more flour to thicken them up. This may have been unnecessary, but I couldn't see a way to "form" anything out of the slurry that resulted from the above proportions.

In any case, the cookies came out (with a little extra baking time, which confirms my suspicion that my oven runs cold) delicious, chewy in the center, crispy on the edges, and with a complex, sweet, mildly salty, peppery flavor that surprises and challenges the taster. These cookies go equally well with wine and coffee and on their own. Oh, and being lighter than butter cookies (blessed, blessed olive oil), it's easier to eat a whole batch in one sitting. Try these immediately!

The promise of things to come

I've decided that maybe the key to making beautiful photos (as Jess does over at Sweet Amandine) is to consistently surround myself with beautiful things.

For a brief period a few years ago, I spent more of my time making and printing photos than doing almost anything else. Anyone who knows me has heard me say that the best part of the process was being in the darkroom and experiencing what my (batty) photo teacher called the "alchemical process" of developing photos. I liked to watch the photo paper swimming around in the developer and the faint ghost of an image creeping onto the paper and then the full, vivid image appearin all in a rush.

I feel sort of the same way about my plants. I like counting the buds of new leaves and blossoms and watching them unfurl by the day. And now I have vegetable plants that are similarly exciting to watch! And so, here are a few mundane flower and veg shots to get myself back in the swing of things.Figure 1. My sweet little "Bell Boy" pepper plant! Near the top you see two teeny little peppers and at the bottom, one bigger one! The biggun is about two inches long and about an inch in diameter.
Figure 2. One of the meaty little Peonies I bought yesterday.Figure 3. The meatier of the two Peonies I bought yesterday.Figure 4. And look what they did today!Figure 5. You can imagine how I'm ogling these sweet little green buds. And the actual snappy blooms aren't bad either.

Clip Show: June is almost over?

This is what I've been doing lately.
Fig. 1. Photobooth pictures were taken.
Fig. 2. Rooty trees were ogled.
Fig. 3. Just maybe the happiest place on Earth was visited.

Feast for a visiting friend

Recently, the puppy and the hubby and I played host to a dog called Snoot - Lucy's best friend from puppy-hood who tragically moved to California with his human, whom we shall call Ishmael. Ishmael came over to visit Snoot one day and I cooked a little feasty goodness for lunch. So very lovely to see this good friend and his gorgeous dog. Ishmael calls himself a Vegetarian of Convenience, so we decided to be a little inconvenient and eat fish (which he adores and which you all know is a recent project of mine).

I did a rerun of the lemon-tomato-baked chicken I posted about earlier, this time with Scrod purchased from the Court House Fish Market (about which I will be separately posting very soon). But! Before we get to the main course! The appetizer - swoon.What you see there is the end - it was so good I forgot to take a picture of the whole dish before diving into it - of a small green salad topped with some olive oil, some SERIOUSLY good Balsamico, and one plump, moist, delicious, melt-in-your-mouth, gorgeous scallop* with a little ribbon of prociutto. The salad was simple. A few mesclun and butter lettuce leaves, oil and vinegar, and that's it. The scallop was almost that simple. I wrapped the prociutto around the scallop and tossed it in a pan with a little olive oil (loose ends of the prociutto on the bottom for starters) and cooked it til it was golden brown on that side (about a minute?) and about 30 seconds on the other side (just til it started to brown). This resulted in a little crispy edge on each bite, but a creamy just-done middle. Delicious.

So, Ishmael, we enjoyed having you and Snoot visit. I hope you enjoyed the food enough to induce a repeat visit!


*Note: If you know me, you know that next to chocolate, nothing makes me go weak in the knees quite like a perfectly-cooked scallop.

Cute Puppy Photo of the Day

Sesame Crusted Mahi-Mahi with Orange-Soy sauce

A success story from last week's creative cooking! I took two frozen mahi-mahi fillets, defrosted them and crusted them with sesame seeds (dredged in egg, rolled in sesame seeds). Then I pan fried them (canola oil) and made a little glaze-y orange-soy sauce. (garlic, juice of one valencia orange, drizzle of soy sauce, salt, pepper) Served with steamed Asparagus. Delicious!

Necessity is the Mother of Invention

My need, in this case, is twofold: One: to get healthy; Two: to lose a little weight. My problem with these projects is also twofold: One: I hate working out; Two: I hate diets. And 'healthy' food.

So, in this series I'm going to try to cook healthily (i.e. less pasta, more healthy protein, less cholesterol) within the guidelines of the South Beach Diet, with which I had a lot of success in the past.

IMPORTANT NOTE: This is the only mention of the Diet that I will include (save the occasional Phase notation). My plan is not to write a Diet Blog (Those irritate me and you all don't need the blow-by-blow of my fight with my thighs.), but rather to share some recipes - some plundered, some invented - that are indistinguishable from Real Food. Wish me luck.

Today:

Lunch: Turkey burgers

-ground turkey
-drizzle of olive oil
-salt, pepper, garlic powder to taste
-smidge of pesto

Smoosh all the ingredients together, form into burger sized balls, squish onto hot griddle and cook until done (juices run clear, golden brown surfaces, internal temp of ca. 165° F).

Dinner: Crock Pot Lentils

-16 oz. bag of dried lentils
-1 carton chicken broth
-1/2 can crushed tomatoes
-1 small yellow onion, diced and browned
-2 cloves garlic, sliced
-salt, pepper to taste
-generous heap of Ras el hanout (thank you, Jamie!)
-smidge of ground cumin
-a few mushrooms, quartered
-also a dash of cinnamon

I searched briefly for a good crock-pot lentil (not soup) recipe, but quickly became bored with samey recipes that included many many ingredients I don't have on hand. This recipe is very much a "what do I have on hand" invention. I know it really needs some freshening up - celery would do wonders. Carrots would also be nice, but this is a Phase I recipe. I'll be adjusting liquid and seasoning as it goes, but my goal is to cook it on high for about 5 hours and hope they don't turn out too soupy. At this moment, they smell disarmingly like the chili my mom made when I was a kid.

I'm going to serve this as a side with some as-yet-undetermined chicken or fish dish. Yes, I need to go to the grocery. Stay tuned for updates.