Conquering Risotto

I finally made risotto! This has been on my list from the very beginning. The rice-based dish is infamous forbeing intimidating, complex and time consuming. Here’s a secret. It reallyisn’t as bad as what you hear from all the rumors. Yes, it takes time andattention to detail but it’s a very relaxing process and actually quite easy tomake. I think the trick is to only be focused on making the risotto and nothingelse. My cousin and his wife and his wife’s sister invited me over to cook andeat and while my cousin grilled some salmon, I focused on the risotto.Intimidated? At first, yes quite a bit. It is definitely a recipe I made sureto measure correctly and be precise. It’s shocking how much butter you have touse, but not surprising how delicious it makes everything tastes, especiallythe abundance of mushrooms. My cousin’s wife sister made a delicious corn,tomato and feta salad, which I definitely plan to make again.

Nights like theseare truly enjoyable, just a group of people gathered around food and wine and I try to have them as much as possible.  Last week my roommate and I hosted a housewarming party and asfar as I have heard, it was a hit. Everything (besides the chips) was homemadeincluding queso, hummus, a five-layer dip and my homemade chocolate peanutbutter cups. I’m lucky to have a great group of friends and family whoappreciate food and community as much as I do.  

Here is the recipe for the risotto I made from Epicurious.I’ve got the itch to try making it again – most likely a weekend project.Although risotto isn’t the best dish for leftovers so maybe for one of thosedinner parties is in the works….

Wild Mushroom Risotto Recipe from Epicurious 

Speaking of leftovers, I attempted to create risotto cakes from the handful of risotto I brought home. Here's how:

• Roll into balls and flatten into patties
• Coat in flour
• Heat vegetable oil in pan
• Fry until golden brown and looking crispy

The risotto cakes, although tasty, were a little weird but I also don't think they were cooked long enough.

Back in September I wrote a post with a list of items I have been wanting to cook. Risotto was one of the items and I have to say... I definitely conquered this one and can scratch it off my list. 

Chickpea Faux-Viche

Ceviche is a wonderful dish typically made with raw fish cooked by the acidity of lemon or lime juice. This time around I decided I would make something similar but use chick peas as my "meat." Several vegan ceviche recipes use tofu or tempeh but chickpeas work mighty fine. I feel like the lime juice really did soak into them and cook them like the acidity would do with the fish. I could be imagining it but regardless it turned out to be a super tasty, super easy chickpea dish that wasn't Greek or Indian flavored or hummus for that matter.

Chickpea faux-viche

Well - It tastes better than it looks. I promise

1 cup cooked chickpeas (I made a big batch of dried and used the leftovers)
1/2 cup red onion minced
1/2 cup lime juice
4 Campari tomatoes chopped
Minced pickled jalapeños to taste
Sprinkle of salt
Pepper (lots)

1 haas avocado

Mix all the ingredients together and let marinate overnight (I left mine in the fridge till lunch - so about 14 hrs) When ready to eat chop up the avocado and mix it in. Grab some chips and dig in! I prefer the blue corn.

I'd say the dish had the texture and the flavor of regular ceviche without the lingering fishy taste. Great for vegans or those who can't get deal with fish.


Here is a tip about cooking dried chickpeas from my non-weirdo foodie friend Lindsey. Cook the chickpeas I'm salt water to give them a little flavor. When I used unsalted to make some hummus she glared at me and told me it needed lots and lots of salt... Plus more salt. My apologies for being skimpy on the seasoning.

Chickpea & Spinach Wonton Cups

One of my life philosophies is always have some sort of boozey beverage while cooking. More than likely my choice is wine, but there are times when cravings for other types hit. I’ve honestly been trying to cutback on the booze consumption (I know ridiculous) but I really don’t like to cook or write without it. One without the other is like peanut butter without chocolate, it’s enjoyable but you know your missing something extra sweet to make it perfect.

I have temporarily deemed Wednesday as my cooking night. It just seems right for now, perhaps because I came up with a plan for what to cook last night and I had nothing else to do on this Wednesday night. I hadpretty much everything I needed to make the dish I thought of. A few ingredients that would add to the dish were really unnecessary and I reallydidn’t want to mess with going to the store. However, today I wanted a beer, I hadn’t even started cooking and a nice cold beer was calling my name. I had to have it. Ignoring the craving and distracting myself to avoid going to the store solely for beer wasn’t working so well. Luckily, I realized I didn’t have enough frozen spinach to make my dish, so off to the store I went – beer at the top of my list. Priorities right? On the way to the store I decided to makesome cookies that I had recently found the recipe for. No problem just needed a few additional ingredients. Keep in mind I hate going to the store without a plan – so I screwed that one up for myself from the get-go. When arriving backat home I realized I missed a few key ingredients for the cookies. Thankfully, my wonderful new roommate had everything I was missing! 

I cracked open a beer and began working on the idea that had been bouncing around in my head all day. 

Chickpea & Spinach Wonton Cups

12 wonton wrappers (or however many you want to make)

½ chopped yellow onion

1 clove garlic

3 slivers ginger - minced

½ cup dried chickpeas (you can of course use canned)

1 cup frozen chopped spinach (thawed)

½ cup diced tomatoes

Spices to taste*:

Garam Masala

Curry powder

Tumeric

Pepper

*I’m trying to get better at providing accurate measurements but it’s hard because I really hate cooking by measuring everything. I can’texplain it – just one of those things.

Dried Chickpeas: To prepare the dried chickpeas soak them in water for 8 hours then drain them. Place them in a medium pot with water. Bringthe water to a boil and then let the chickpeas simmer on medium heat for about an hour. I soaked my chickpeas while at work, cooked them first and let them sit with the frozen (thawing) spinach while I prepped everything else.

Wontons: Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees. Get out some muffin tins and spray them with cooking oil (or some other oily/buttery product) to prevent sticking. Place one wonton wrapper in each muffin cup. Gently pressthem so that the bottom is pressed against the bottom and the other parts arerelatively standing up against the sides of the muffin cup. Pre-cook these inthe oven for 8 minutes until the ends are slightly brown. While these arecooking you can make the filling. Once cooked, remove and let cool.

Filling: Pour about ½ tablespoon of olive oil into a pan and toss in the chopped onion. Cook until fragrant and slightly translucent. Add garlic and cook for a few more minutes. Add the chickpeas, spinach and tomatoes. Add in the spices. I suppose the spices should have gone in with the garlic, but I was preoccupied so they went in after. Cook for a bit more and taste every now and then so you get the flavor you want. To finish it off squeeze half a lemon over the filling. A good trick when doing this is to turn the lemon half upside down in your hand (rind down, insides up) – this helps prevent seeds from getting into everything.

The wonton cups should still be sitting in the muffin tins. Fill the wonton cups with the filling and put in the oven for about 10 minuteslonger, or until the ends of the wontons look brown and crispy.

These turned out pretty good. They could have probably benefited from more of a saucy filling, or cheesy but oh well. They were fun and something I came up with on my own. Considering the fact I also was making cookies at the time, everything turned out pretty darn tasty. The 1^stcooking Wednesday has been a success!

Lessons learned:

-       Makesure you have everything  you need(drinks included) before starting to cook

-        Think about the consistency of what youare making  - like I mentioned thefilling could have been thicker and more cohesive.

-       If you aren’t good at multi-tasking, don’t try to cook two completely differentthings at once.

Moving on up

I’ve graduated from grad school, I’ve moved cities and into a new apartment. My life is about to get drastically different and crazy enough it still hasn’t really set in yet. The most exciting aspect of all this is that I will FINALLY be able to cook, and blog and go out to the local farmers market for fresh homegrown produce. I’m hoping to grow some of my own stuff, join a community garden and re-do my entire foodie/recipe website.

I’ve taken some time off from the whole cooking thing but now I am hoping to jump right back in where I left off.  Especially in terms of what I am cooking and eating. I definitely noticed a change since I’ve stopped eating as healthy as I used to. I’ve decided to give myself one more week to get settled into my new place before getting back into the swing of things (Dare I say vegan?). Until then, I have a delightful buttery-cheesy recipe to share.

My mom graciously helped me move over the weekend and the entire time (a span of 3 days) we kept planning to make this amazing scalloped kale and potato dish. Well, moving can be quite exhausting so each day we would keep putting it off because last thing anyone wants to do after moving is cook. Finally on the night everything was moved in and organized we made this dish and boy was it worth it. We decided to make a double batch so that we could each have plenty of leftovers for the rest of the week. (pictures to come soon)

Scalloped Kale and Potatoes  (1 batch – double the recipe if you want 2 batches)

1 bunch organic kale

4 sweet potatoes

2 cloves of garlic (minced)

11/2 cups (two bags) grated swiss cheese

6 TBS cold unsalted butter (cut into small pieces)

pepper & salt

1/14 cups soy milk

Rinse kale appropriately and shake off excess water. Remove the leaves and put them in a medium pot. It may seem like a lot of kale at first, but just stuff it in the pot. Throw in ½ cup of water and cook on low until the kale is wilted (apprx. 7 minutes). Put the wilted kale in a strainer and let cool. Squeeze out the extra water and then roughly chop the kale to a desired size. While the kale is wilting, slice the potatoes; you want them to be pretty thin. If you have a mandolin – you’re life just got easier.

Pre-heat the oven to 425 degrees. Butter a 10x10 pan – we used those aluminum pans you can buy at the store for $2, I think it was 9X12 - cover the entire bottom of the pan with potato slices. Next layer on the kale, garlic, cheese and then the pieces of butter then Top with more potato slices, cheese, butter, salt & pepper. Pour in the milk slowly and lightly shake the dish to make sure the milk covers a good portion of the pan.  Bake that cheesy goodness for 50 minutes or until the top looks brown and crispy.

Be careful because once you start eating this dish, it’s really hard to stop.

Even though mom and I made double batches we somehow managed to have leftover potatoes. We knew we didn’t want to waste them so we ended up eating homemade potato chips that night too.

Homemade Potato Chips

Thinly sliced potatoes

Olive oil

Sea Salt & lots of pepper

Heat the oven to 350 degrees. Lightly coat the potato slices with the olive oil, salt and pepper. I recommend making sure all the slices you are cooking at one time are of consistent thickness; this prevents some cooking more than others. Place each slice on a cookie sheet (covered with foil to prevent extra cleaning). Toss them in the oven for 10 minutes, rotate the sheet and cook for 10 more minutes. Flip the chips and cook for 5 more minutes. Depending on how crispy and brown you want your chips, and how thick the slices are, you may want to cook for longer. 

Although this sounds like a painful process – it’s well worth it. I even made a batch of chips that didn’t have any salt and pepper on them. Just plain ol’ roasted potatoes, so good! The hard part is how to store them. I made sure they cooled and put them in a plastic container, but the next day they were a little less crispy than they were the night before. If anyone has the secret to storing homemade chips please share.

These were great because lately I’ve been super sensitive to salt. I don’t use it very often and the food we buy is usually coated in it. If I buy chips, even Triscuits, I am often disappointed because I just can’t handle the saltiness. These homemade chips are my perfect replacement – and they are great with hummus!

Traveling Treats

"blooming" tea

I've been lucky in the past few months to be able to travel outside of the lovely little {BIG} state of Texas and try some amazing food. I started my journey in the great state of Colorado. I was here for a long weekend and went to some pretty great places. If you have never been to Boulder, Colorado specifically - put it on your list. It may be a small college town, but it has got a lot of character. It's a town very similar to Austin, Texas but stuck between a lot of beautiful mountains. Apparently, Boulder is THE town to visit/live if you are a foodie. This was a shock to me, I had been to Boulder before but never got the chance to experience the true Boulder food scene. Unique, stylish and delicious can only begin to describe it.

Here we go:

Here is a brief summary of what we got into one morning... Pancake flights, an entire plate of hashbrown goodness, yes an entire plate. Hasbrowns, cheese and two toppings of your choice. Bloody Mary's, Brewmosas (belgium trippel beer and orange juice) and a specialty egg benedicts every month at a place that solely serves brunch (Snooze, an A.M. Eatery). Needless to say - we didn't eat till quite later that night.

Imagine this, sweet corn - on a PIZZA! so delicious. Pizza Locale was a quaint pizza shop where pizzas are made in an in-house brick oven. As an appetizer we had fried saffron risotto balls....probably could have just had about 10 of those and would have been completely satisfied.

An adorable french inspired creperie serving sweet and savory crepes along with a delicious americano, thus starting my terrible, terrible americano addiction.

We ended our trip at a place called Oak at Fourteenth. Here we royally indulged ourselves. We basically had the entire menu; potato gnocchi, burrata cheese with olive & kumquat tapenade, the best kale salad I have ever had with  apple, candied pecans and an amazing fresh lemony dressing, a calamari salad with grapefruit and toasted pistachios, pork belly and tomato braised meatballs (the last two I didn't have - well maybe a bite... woops). All of these dishes were shared/small plates so the four of us just shared bits and pieces of everything. Dare I say it... the best meal I have ever had?
I was also able to travel to California where I had an amazing seared tuna and a scallop and shrimp pasta topped with julienned squash and zucchini. Although I'm not elaborating on the meals, they were stellar, especially paired with a glass (or two) of wine.

Whole Living Recipes

If you are an avid cook, veggie, wellness, yoga lover you need to check out the website Whole Living.  The site features lot of amazing recipes and tips on staying healthy and maintaining a good balance through fitness, food and community. One day I came across a post about smoothies that offered more than 40 different recipes. This kicked me into "whole living" high gear. Over the past couple weeks I have been on a smoothie kick. I went to the store, stocked up on fruits and veggies and went to town. Seriously, it's gotten a little out of control.

You'd be surprised how many different combinations you can come up with, and you definitely have to be adventurous. There was one recipe that called for carrot juice and yogurt, among other things. (uh.. carrot juice and yogurt...What?) Smoothies are great because if made right, are pretty healthy, easy to make and easy to clean-up, definitely beneficial when you're really busy and don't have time to cook. They don't have to be only for breakfast either.  I must admit it is hard to maintain a strictly smoothie diet for more than a few days, but I have been feeling healthy and energetic, especi

I've been blowing up Twitter lately with all the crazy combinations I have come up with, I am sure my followers are over it. The best combination I have tried is almond milk (homemade), pineapple, banana and kale. Sounds weird, but it's seriously delicious.  This smoothie intrigued me even further because of the homemade almond milk recipe it featured. I drink almond milk all the time as well as have a stock of almonds always in my pantry so I decided to give homemade almond milk a shot.

Almond Milk

1/2 cup almonds (soaked overnight & skin removed)
1/2 tsp vanilla
pinch cinnamon
pinch of salt (very small pinch)
2 cup water

Throw everything in a blender and mix for 1 minute.

I accidently put a little too much salt in my first batch, so I just added a few more almonds to adjust the taste. Obviously, homemade milk doesn't taste like the kind you get in the store, but it's definitely drinkable and worked really well in the kale, pineapple smoothie.

Another great recipe I found from this site is a vegan banana, coconut and cashew pie. This was amazing. I've made it twice in the past two-weeks, and I usually don't repeat recipes that quickly.

 Banana, Coconut & Cashew Cream Tart {Whole Living}

• Filling: 

  • 1 cup raw cashews, soaked overnight and thoroughly drained
  • 1/2 cup water
  • 2 tablespoons plus 2 teaspoons pure maple syrup, and more to taste
  • 1 vanilla bean, split and scraped (I used a splash of vanilla extract)
  • 3/4 cup desiccated coconut
  • 3 or 4 ripe but firm bananas

• Tart Shell

  • 1 1/2 cups whole pecans (almonds)
  • Pinch of coarse salt
  • 1 1/2 cups pitted dates
  • 2 teaspoons pure maple syrup (honey)

  
  

  Start with making the tart shell. The second time I made this recipe I didn't have pecans so I replaced them with some almonds - still worked - still delicious. I also used honey instead of maple syrup (this cut back on a bit of the sweetness).  Ok so put the pecans and salt (or almonds, or nuts) in a food processor for a bit and then add the dates (15-20 seconds according to Whole Living). Make sure it's all well combined and then add the syrup. Press shell into a 9 inch pie pan or individual sized dishes. 

  
  

  

  For the filling. Throw the cashews in a food processor or blender and mix until you get a nice paste is formed. Next add water, syrup and vanilla and blend until smooth. Pour in as much or as little coconut as you want and continue blending. Pour the filling into the shell.  Slice some bananas and arrange them nicely on top of the filling, or you can just throw them in a big heaping pile - whatever suits your fancy. Sprinkle with coconut. 

  
  

  Since I have made this recipe twice I would recommend you throwing this delicious treat into the fridge before consuming. I know this will be hard, but trust me it tastes way better when its chilled. 

  
  

  For you vegans or adventurous folks out there. If you didn't know already, cashews are a great substitute for any kind of cream sauce. I have made an alfredo sauce and an avocado cream sauce for enchiladas. To make a simple basic cashew cream sauce all you combine is the raw pre-soaked cashews and water or veggie broth, then you add whatever other flavors go well with what you are making. It's unfortunate cashews are so expensive, but I'm telling you... it's pretty worth it. 

  
  

  Enjoy!   

Homemade Pizza with Lemon-Thyme Olive Oil

Everyone loves pizza. You can't escape the little spell that melty cheese puts on you. Even vegans can't escape, trust me I have seen and tried plenty of vegan pizza's.

Pizza gets a bad rap because it's known to be pretty unhealthy for you. The only way to avoid this catch-22 situation is to make your own. Another benefit is that it's a lot cheaper than going out or ordering in. 

The other day I was having one of those days where pizza was calling my name. It wouldn't leave me alone! My original intent was to avoid the cheese and make a vegan pizza with hummus, somehow between deciding I want pizza and my trip to the store that intention disappeared. I decided some fresh mozzarella cheese would make much happier than hummus that day. I also wasn't really in the mood for tomato sauce - I know this is sounding weirder and weirder considering this post is dedicated to pizza but totally defying all the pizza rules. Instead I got creative, and honestly, I don't think I am ever going back to tomato sauce again. I found some frozen pizza dough that was only $1.50, so naturally I stocked up. 

I had a little bit of a brain fade with the frozen pizza dough. Wanting pizza that night, I forgot that when things are frozen you have to defrost them. It is recommended you defrost the dough in the fridge overnight. I decided to cheat,  and began scouring the internet for a quick way to defrost pizza dough. A lot of sites recommended throwing the dough in the microwave, but that didn't sit well with me. I decided to out the packaged dough in a hot water bath. The package had a lot of air in it so I had to put a pan on top of the packaged dough to be able to submerge it appropriately. This process took about 30 minutes. The middle of the dough wasn't exactly defrosted all the way but it worked out. 

Homemade Pizza 

lemon-thyme sauce

• 1 package Il Fornaio frozen wheat pizza dough 
• 2 tbs olive oil
• 1 clove minced garlic
• dried thyme
• squeeze of lemon

Pre-heat the oven to 450. 

While the dough is defrosting, mince one clove (or two if you want more) of garlic. Combine with olive oil, thyme and a squeeze of lemon. Let marinate while prepping everything else. The lemon is the secret key ingredient here. Just writing about this makes me want to make another pizza with this "sauce."

When the dough is defrosted, roll it out on a floured surface to about 12 inches. Put the dough on a lightly oiled pan and cover it with the lemon-thyme olive oil goodness and layer on your toppings. I chose artichokes, black olives and spinach, along with my fresh mozzarella. 

Put the pizza in the oven for about 12 minutes, or until the edges are brown and the cheese is melted. 

Voila - easy and so delicious. 

I honestly don't know if I will ever order pizza from a restaurant again. This was the cheapest, most delicious pizza I have ever had. I probably spent less than $5 on the whole thing. Obviously the mozzarella was the most expensive ingredient but that was for the whole package, so I am not sure what the actual calculation might be.