quinoa with roasted vegetables & wine-glazed chicken

I'm currently working three different jobs right now (two of them food-related), which along with other things, makes for a rather busy and energy-draining schedule. This brilliant dish, slightly adapted from How To Cook Everything Vegetarian by Mark Bittman, is something I've come to depend on for a much needed healthy meal, and it holds its own beautifully whether you're eating it freshly made or re-heating it for lunch the next day. I think it gets even better as it sits, even deeper in flavor, and it's quite adaptable to other ingredients if you don't have exactly what's on the list below. I've used chopped roasted brussel sprouts instead of the sweet potato, and then replaced some of the olive oil with a toasted sesame oil and mixed it with a rice wine vinegar. Different grain substitutions would work as well, such as a cooked wild rice mix, with maybe some cooked green lentils, chopped grape tomatoes, scallions and artichoke hearts mixed in. Substitute a white wine vinegar with the olive oil for the dressing, serve the mixture over some tender mixed baby greens, and you've got another stellar variation on the theme. If you find yourself on the go and needing the right kind of nourishment to keep up, this dish meets both those requirements very well. But healthy isn't the only thing going on here. As some folks like to say, this dish is flavor city.

strawberry mango arugula smoothie

When things get heavy, it's good to lighten up and change the regular rhythm of daily life a bit. It's Spring, after all, or at least it's trying to be, putting forth its best effort to shed the layers of winter and show itself off. I'm all for that, because it's something like a make-over, of the earth as it were, and I love makeovers. In fact, I'm hoping to shed a few things myself, ranging anywhere from a bit of weight on my body to a bit of length from my hair, or even, whenever possible, an uninspired attitude. So be gone, shackles of winter, I say, and hello, you sweet little strawberry-mango-arugula smoothie.

taking time to plant

We've fallen behind in starting this year's garden, with both of us working, but as soon as we can corral ourselves for an afternoon, we'll do some planting. Though I've got a tray full of herbs, I'd still like to get a few more, including sorrel, with its sharp, lemony flavor, good for sauces, soups, and pestos. Currently packed on the tray and awaiting their new locations in the garden is Thai basil, along with the standard Genovese, a spearmint to go with a chocolate mint; lavender, oregano, onion chives, thyme, Italian parsley, French tarragon, rosemary, sage, and my husband's favorite mint tea sweetener, stevia.

On the other hand, the weather hasn't exactly been ideal for getting things planted. Though the calendar says it's Spring, an unexpected two-day cold snap (which happened after the last frost date of winter and a warming spell) unkindly burned the tender new leaves on our fig trees. Though it looks like the trees are okay, I wonder if the warm up-cool down cycle we've had lately is at all confusing to the natural cycles of plants. Even so, the plants still seem to soldier on, and that is always encouraging to see.

tocino de cielo (bacon from heaven)

To follow the Pastel de Medianoche I posted last week, I give you Tocino de Cielo, with its short but magical ingredient list of egg yolks, sugar, water, vanilla and lemon juice. According to The Heritage of Spanish Cooking, Tocino de Cielo was one of many desserts made with egg yolks leftover from the process of making sherry, which uses egg whites for clarifying the fortified wine. In Jerez, the region of Spain famous for its sherry, the egg yolks were donated to the local convents, where the sisters used them to make a selection of sweet specialties.

pastel de medianoche (midnight pastry)

There are certain things I've eaten in my life that have lingered long in my food memory. One such thing was a perfect piece of toast: bread, slightly crispy, spread with butter and grape jelly immediately after toasting, the timing being critical to making those two things meld into one for the perfect delivery of buttery and sweet. I was probably nine or ten years old; our families had settled for the week in a caravan of truck-mounted campers along the beach in Mexico, and my friend Pam and I sat in aluminum folding chairs, facing the ocean and eating our breakfast. I can still taste that piece of toast in my mind, and for me it is exactly what toast should be like.

whole grain belgian waffles

We recently bought a new waffle maker, having finally given up on the old one after several attempts at trying to produce a decent waffle. The old waffle maker had removable reversible plates, molded on one side to make square waffles, and smooth on the reverse side to function as a griddle or sandwich press. It was a great idea, in theory, and one that appealed to people wanting to cut down on too many one-purpose kitchen appliances (or to husbands who really like multi-function gadgets). And it would have been great in practice, but for the unfortunate result of waffle batter sticking to the waffle mold, and the finicky temperature knob, making the whole process a bit of an ordeal, and not necessarily worth the trouble.

That's okay, though, because our new waffle maker cranks out perfect Belgian waffles in just a couple of minutes. We even ended up eating breakfast for dinner after testing this recipe, which produces light and tender waffles with a crispy exterior, and is adapted from the little instruction booklet that came with the dependably efficient, one-function gadget. So if you've got a reliable waffle maker, I think this recipe could become a basic favorite, easily switched up by varying the spices, sweeteners, or oils, and made to order in your very own kitchen.

green lentil cakes with mustard vinaigrette

I stumbled on this recipe while thumbing through How to Cook Everything Vegetarian by Mark Bittman, and commenced making it a number of times, making little variations each time. My husband loves lentils, and since the only other thing I've ever made with them is soup, I figured it would be worth a try. Lentils are high in protein, don't require pre-soaking, cook in a short amount of time, and come in an interesting range of colors (red, brown, black, yellow, and green). As Bittman suggests, green or brown lentils are best for these cakes because they hold their shape fairly well after cooking. Although the original recipe bakes the cakes in the oven, I liked the texture I got when frying them in a cast-iron pan with a little olive oil, resulting in a nicely caramelized top and bottom, while still leaving a tender inner crumb.

With a few suggestions from The Flavor Bible, I ended up with a cake that has some nice herbal notes from sorrel and parsley and a little bite from raw shallots and sherry vinegar. I made this version with brown rice flour and potato starch for a gluten-free profile, but you could easily substitute flour or even bread crumbs instead. If you don't have every single element, don't fret. Try red onion instead of shallots, use just parsley and add a little lemon zest to mimic the sorrel, or even substitute a different cheese if you like. The point is, I think, to make and eat these lentil cakes as best you can. After all, to cook is to improvise, and there is simple pleasure to be found in the freedom of following your own path.

innovation is in the air

I'm of the persuasion, as abstract as it may sound, that great ideas somehow float in the air around us, waiting to be discovered by an open, attentive mind. I heard a friend say this many years ago, and I immediately thought it to be true. Even so, discovering, or should I say, receiving a creative idea doesn't always come quite so easily. And often, it's because things just get in the way. It's encouraging, though, when the channels are open, because innovation is an exciting thing, and it's desperately needed to help solve the problems that exist in this big world of ours.

When it comes to farming and gardening, there are definitely some very tuned-in minds out there. You may have heard of hydroponics, but you may not have heard of aquaponics, which is a combination of hydroponic and aquaculture techniques. I found out about aquaponics when talking to my local small farm owner, where I often buy our raw goat's milk and fresh eggs. In fact, they're building their own aquaponic operation, involving a greenhouse and fish ponds, and apparently it's a very sustainable solution to growing food. You can read quite a bit more about the subject at the website The Aquaponic Source.

cocoa sunflower seed butter

Lately, for variety's sake, I've been trying a simple homemade sunflower seed butter in my smoothies. For whatever reason, for me the sunflower seed butter tends to have a certain aftertaste I don't like, making it a less favorable choice than the almond or cashew butter I also make at home. I don't remember where I came across the suggestion to combine the flavors of chocolate and sunflower seeds, but when I did I filed it away for an opportune moment to experiment. Certainly, mixing chocolate with nut butters is fairly common, such as chocolate and hazelnut, or chocolate and peanut butter, but somehow I didn't think it would work with sunflower seeds too. As it turns out, chocolate works very well; with a few other complementary ingredients, it nicely rounds out that pesky aftertaste, and then some.


Cocoa powders, from L to R: natural, dutch-processed, and raw

mini almond cakes with lemon ganache

Technology, when it makes life simpler, is a very helpful thing. I've finally, at long last, gotten the latest version of that phone, the one that when first introduced proceeded to revolutionize the world's mobile habits, and I'm so very happy with how much easier it is to organize my life with it. And because it is so much easier, that underlying frustration that comes with having to tolerate something that didn't work well is gone, gone, gone; and good riddance to it.

Similarly, I'd like to suggest that these little cakes might just have the power to make a bad mood go away, or really improve a so-so one. They're an uncomplicated cake to make, turning out very tender and sweet, and appropriately glazed with a lemon zest-tinged chocolate ganache. You'll also find this dessert is an elegant solution to finish a special dinner, should you be making it for two, or four, or just yourself, in which case, you will be very happy.

simple soup to salve the soul

Well, folks, I had different intentions in mind for this week's post, but those intentions were waylaid by an unwelcome visitor that caught up with me at the beginning of the week. Though the flu season is reportedly waning, the wicked virus flicked its forked tail on its way out and pulled me along with it. Not wanting to be the bearer of bad germs, I spent most of the week hunkered down inside our house, exiting only once to buy groceries. The good news is that I had a secret weapon stored that served me well, and you can make and store this little powerhouse too.

The secret weapon is this; homemade bouillon cubes, super sources of healing gelatin, and ready to use at a moment' s notice. This genius idea comes from Nourished Kitchen's Jenny McGruther, and though I posted a link on my Facebook page several months ago, it's worth sharing again. I've slightly adapted Jenny's recipe for the homemade bouillon cubes, using this recipe for classic chicken stock from Food&Wine magazine, and freezing the cubes instead of letting them dry out. When you need to make a quick, nourishing soup, these deep amber-colored cubes will bring sweet comfort to your beleaguered flu-laden soul.

an omnivore's quandary

I am an omnivore, through and through. I've never subscribed to removing an entire category of food from my diet, (aside from the overly-processed kind), though from time to time I eat less of something or take a break from it for a season. For me, cooking is life, and sharing a good homemade meal is true joy. If you're like me, and you read a lot about food, you may be weary of the changing tides of nutritional advice. Nutrition tends to be a rather inexact science, given the very individual response to food, and even though we all need the basics (protein, carbs, fat), there's never a diet that's perfect for everyone. What is important is that you listen most carefully to your own body and determine what works for yourself.

Nonetheless, in conversations I keep hearing of more and more people who have difficulty with gluten, dairy, or both. They feel better or eliminate chronic symptoms when they eat less of these two things, or not at all, which may indicate the presence of a developed sensitivity or allergy to that food. And although as I stated above, I like to eat everything, unfortunately my husband and I find ourselves dealing with this problem as well; he with dairy, and myself with wheat. With that being said, we don't feel the absolute necessity to completely eliminate either wheat or dairy from our diets, but rather reduce the amount we consume and find better alternatives. In our case that means using wheat with less gluten, eating more grains with no gluten, using raw cow or goat milk, and making alternatives such as nut milks and coconut milk. In any case, I do believe it's worth trying a period of time without eating gluten or dairy to see how you feel, and you'll find my reasoning in this low-key and informative post. If you find that entirely eliminating gluten and dairy works better for you than simply reducing the amount you eat, then by all means, do what your body responds best to.

coconut maple flan with sesame caramel

If there was one thing I was reminded of this week, it was this: I don't have as much experience as I'd like as a cook. Because of this, I sometimes end up testing recipes much longer than a very experienced cook would, and I try things a seasoned chef wouldn't bother with. What I lack in experience, though, I make up for in creativity, and in sheer determination to keep at it until I achieve what I had in mind. I love it when an idea works, and somehow in the long process of getting there, I wasn't completely exhausted. I'm guessing it may have been the small doses of sugar I had from testing this recipe that kept me going.

Sugar is the theme here, but it's balanced by a creamy full-fat coconut milk. To make the sesame caramel work, a pure white refined sugar is necessary, but to sweeten the flan custard, I used a combination of a deep, dark grade B maple syrup and a caramel-ly coconut-palm sugar. Perhaps it's more accurate to say that caramel is the theme here. This leads me to the next point, and the reason for the longer than normal recipe-testing process: getting the hang of caramelizing sugar. If you're like me, you'll probably need more than one attempt to get it right, unless you're lucky, or you've watched someone else do this technique often. It definitely takes more than one try to get comfortable with caramelizing sugar properly, and since you are heating it to the point to almost before it burns, at a high temperature, it's a good idea to educate yourself. David Lebovitz has ten tips and a very helpful tutorial on the matter, and Elise Bauer of Simply Recipes has a short instructional post too. If you're not an experienced caramelizer, take time to read those posts, and you'll at least be well-informed on your first attempt.

The other side of the story of the long process of recipe testing is what identifies a good flan; very creamy, very smooth and yet still solid enough to hold a form when unmolded. The importance of cooking the custard to just the right point, much like the caramel, is a deal-maker or a deal-breaker. For discriminating flan eaters, like my husband, it makes every bit of difference, as it will to you when you get it right. If you don't judge the doneness quite right the first time around (undercooked and too soft, or overcooked and grainy), you could blend the unmolded cooked flan in a blender until smooth, pour it back into the ramekins, and treat it as a creme brulée. I have a batch waiting to be used just like this.

So that's my story, and after this long week of recipe-testing, I'm glad to have gained a little more experience as a cook. And since it involved sugar, who's complaining? Definitely not me-and I hope you won't either when you eat this flan.

roasted garlic, broccoli and potato soup

Temperatures have dropped quite low recently, and we've even had a second occurrence of snow. Though we do get ice storms, the soft fluffy white stuff is somewhat uncommon for these city parts of Texas. As old and expiring car batteries are prone to do, mine chose the snow day to fail to start the car. Fortunately, the cable guy working on a neighbor's house was willing to loan his van for a battery charge. Still, the process involved me digging the jumper cables from among the clutter in our garage, removing the plastic protective cover from the battery, and properly attaching the large positive and negative clamps to their very small matching bolts on the battery. I somehow did this without blowing anything up (though the cable guy had to re-set the clamps a bit), as my husband's words "just don't let the clamps touch each other" were clearly in my mind the entire time. Did I mention it was freezing outside?

So it wasn't surprising, that the very next day, I made this soup, inspired by the "Creamy Potato and Roasted Garlic Soup" recipe from Anna Thomas' cookbook Love Soup. Aaahhh...have I mentioned the restorative properties of the aroma of roasting garlic in a warm kitchen before? Well, it is restorative, just as roasted broccoli and potatoes and a touch of creamy coconut milk are. Add to that the subtle undercurrent of turmeric and sweet smoked paprika, both warming spices, and this soup, with its substantial texture, more than made up for the very cold weather and previous day's troubles.

Most importantly in a good soup is the stock, so as always, I recommend you make your own for the best flavor and restorative effect. I made use of the remaining stock from the oxtail we made for visiting family this past weekend, but a good, rich homemade chicken stock would provide a great flavor base too. I like my winter soups to have lots of texture, so that they're almost chewy. To get the same texture as you see in the picture below, be careful not to purée the soup too long, unless of course you prefer it smoother. Take it from me; if you're in need of some inner therapy, and are weary from the weather or the week, I recommend a bowl of this well-balanced potage unreservedly.

my kitchen apothecarium, part two

I thought I'd re-visit the topic of homemade personal care items with another recipe, this time with a lavender-scented hair gel made from golden flaxseeds. When cooked in hot water, flaxseeds release a clear, thick liquid that works great as a gel. This recipe is adapted from Naturally Healthy Hair by Mary Beth Janssen and will work for both girls and guys. I've added a teaspoon of coconut oil for its conditioning benefits; though I've not tried them, olive or almond oil might be nice too. If you prefer a scent other than lavender, you can try a different essential oil; before doing so be sure to read the "important note" section in the recipe below.

The consistency and feel of the gel, which is very similar to egg whites, is a little different than commercially manufactured gels. Because of this, the gel takes a little getting used to when applying, and may take a time or two to know how much to use to get the result you want, which is also dependent on how thick of a gel you make. I've been using variations of this gel for several months now, and I really like it; it's nourishing and doesn't build up with repeated use, and it works for wavy, curly, or straight hair days. Along with the money I save and the extra additives I avoid, it's another thing I'm happy to be making from my kitchen apothecarium.