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Lauren (Leel). and the journal's name is Sandrine.
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| (no subject) |
[Oct. 19th, 2009|01:44 pm] |
also, my birthday was fun, as was the visit from my dad. with my birthday gift certificate i got a fantastic mold that makes shot glasses out of ice. see:
http://www.worldwidefred.com/coolshooters.htm
its pretty exciting. i've molded 20 so far to have friends over tonight for heroes and depleating my far too large liquor collection |
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| (no subject) |
[Oct. 19th, 2009|01:38 pm] |
i've gotten super lazy writing about the things i cook lately. made pumpkin pie from scratch scratch sunday- murdered and cooked two little pumpkins from the store, mashed them, made a pie crust, or rather, mixed the things that go in a pie crust, tried to roll it out, got pissed, moushed the crap into a pie pan. its works. whatever. i learned 4.5 lbs of pumpkin does not yield 16 oz. of mashed flesh as the internet claims, but more like 36 oz.
this is important because my glorious farmers market pumpkin is 15 lbs. and will yield a metric shit ton of flesh.
also, made chicken and rice soup with carrots and onion from the market. the next day, the rice had soaked up so much of the moisture it was more like risotto |
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| sigh |
[Oct. 9th, 2009|10:40 am] |
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it snowed last night. montana, why? |
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| (no subject) |
[Oct. 8th, 2009|12:50 pm] |
my dad is coming to visit me on monday!!
since my mom etc brought me to my dorm room on '06, no one in my family has come to visit me out here.... in fact the only visitor i've ever had was katie, and that was 2 1/2 years ago.
I'm super excited. My apartment is also super dirty.
>.> |
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| (no subject) |
[Oct. 6th, 2009|11:43 am] |
also also
Very cold today, and has me remembering our formative years. eating snowcone and rachel's pomegranate at a picnic table outside in the cold. piles of leaves and lunch tents and promises we're kept to jump off things and walk down aisles in our bare feet.
if i look at it from over my shoulder, the quality of my experiences are much improved. |
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| (no subject) |
[Oct. 6th, 2009|11:09 am] |
meh. i didn't study for astronomy. i still think i did okay. now i have three hours to write my 250 word response to a question on The Reader.
so, last saturday, lasagna.
i started by making ricotta- mix milk, citric acid and salt, heat to 95, form curds, hang for 1/2 hour until its the firmness i want. to simple to talk much about.
made mozzarella. somewhat harder. milk and citric acid. heat. rennet. heat more. form curds. let sit. cut curd. heat more. pour off the whey. heat in the microwave. pour off more whey. heat more in the microwave, pour off the last of the whey, add salt. and then stretch like taffy!! only with gloves on, because it 135 degrees. ice water bath.
for those of you that tried what i brought last summer, my mozzarella has firmness now.
you shred, instead of spread it.
so i started with the sauce, which had to be moist enough that the no-boil noodles could soak a lot of it up without leaving the final product too dry.
do i had 1/2 a minced onion, garlic, sauteed in a pot. then i added 4 oz each of ground beef and italian sausage. let that cook down. then 1 14.5 oz can of diced tomatoes, with 1/4 cup reserved juice, and 1 4 oz can of tomato sauce, and 2 tbsp cream. i just used some of my whole milk from making cheese. i'm not buying cream just to use 2 tablespoons. so, the sauce simmered. i mixed ricotta, basil, egg and parm. then i assembled my mini lasagna in a loaf pan, with layers of sauce, noodle, ricotta and mozzarella. baked it for half an hour. it was really good. the basil was nice. and i have enough stuff left over that i can make the manicoti recipe later this week.
last night, made garlic cheese biscuits on a whim, just because i wanted to. |
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| (no subject) |
[Oct. 5th, 2009|12:26 pm] |
A comparitively wildly successful weekend in culinary pursuits. friday night i made tuscan white bean soup and summer vegetable gratin. the gratin, which brought me to me knees, was admitedly a pain in the ass. i sliced onions, zuchinni, yellow squash and a big-ass tomato. the squash and zuchinni i tossed with salt and put in a colander for half an hour so it could lost its excess moisture. i spread the tomato slices on paper towels and salted them- for the same purpose and let them sit for half an hour. during this half hour i carmelized the onions by slowly sauteeing them on the stove. then i mixed thyme, garlic and olive oil. when everything had reached the appropriate moisture level, i layered everything in a dish- squash and zuchinni (tossed with half the oil stuff) onions, then tomatoes in a 'single layer with the edges slightly overlapping". the rest of the oil stuff over the top. baked it for half an hour, then i spread grated parm. over the veggies and kept baking for an additional ten minutes. i let it sit for 20 after it came out of the oven, and sprinkled it with fresh basil.
then, the soup: it started with Bacon. always a good starting place. but from here it gets wierd. then i added onion and carrot and rosemary. then garlic. then water, chicken broth, beans and spinach. the spinach was an optional ingredient, for adding heartiness. its almost too hearty though...
i was really annoyed- clint didn't like the veggie gratin. he said it was "too much". as i said, i loved it. the veggies were all mushy, in a good way, slightly cheesy, not too moist, but with amazing juices. and the carmelized onions were amazing. i took it to work for dinner the next day. clint did like the soup though, which is good, because i though it was a little crazy.
okay, this entry is long. i'll write about amazing lasagna later. i should be studying for my astronomy test tomorrow. |
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| (no subject) |
[Sep. 28th, 2009|12:12 pm] |
and now an entry with pretty much nothing to do with food.
my great uncle Tom died over the weekend. the last two times i'd seen him were over the course of the last thirteen years, and both at funerals of other great uncles.
nonetheless, my mom is expecting me to come to washington for the funeral.
i have work. ane school. and i can't really afford it. and clint would have to drive it by himself, unless i got a learning license (they don't do permits in MT) this week and drove part of it myself with clint instucting me so he could have some breaks.
it is probably the only time i'll see my family for a long time. my aunt marys (mary fields and mary mason) are the only members of my 'grandparent generation' left, and i'm sure they won't live much longer.
i'm not really sure what to do. i'll probably just go.
also. i have a number of medical complaints. my eyes have been super twitchy lately and i have this thing on my arm. its like a bump the size of a dime. i have no idea where it came from. i feel paranoid.
i think this is what its like to be woody allen. |
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| this week in food |
[Sep. 26th, 2009|10:54 am] |
made my beef stroganoff. was delicious. made my soup. was kinda bland. added salt. disaster averted!
went down to the farmers market this morning and got some late season strawberries and raspberries that were expensive, but are delicious. i got cheese curds too! they're delightfully squeaky.
there are still three more weeks of the market, so want to go back next week and get tomatoes and squash so i can make vegetable gratin- thre's a recipe for it in my snazzy recipe magazine.
i mixed my raspberries and strawberries with some pomogranate from the store. with some toast (with the jam i made over the summer) its a tasty weekend breakfast- a far cry from the freezer waffles that are my weekday mainstay.
and now, america's test kitchen is on. yay! |
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| (no subject) |
[Sep. 21st, 2009|11:59 am] |
le sigh. last week's quiz results- not encouraging.
the enchiladas were delicious though, and continue to be, as i made a 9x13 casserole dish full of them. they were dinner saturday, lunch and dinner sunday, and will continue to be dinner until they're gone. it was a good idea to add my can of chipoltle peppers- it added a smokey heat and made up for the fact that all the cans of tomato stuff i bought were larger sizes than what the recipe called for. it would have turned out overly tomato-y, since i forgot until after i had dumped them all in that i needed 1/2 or 2/3 of said cans.
later this week i'll make the delicious standby beef stroganoff (apparently most people make it with ground beef? ewww. stew meat is the way to go) and boil chicken until it becomes chicken noodle soup by some magic. |
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| (no subject) |
[Sep. 19th, 2009|08:00 pm] |
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also, is reading about me cooking at all interesting? feedback appreciated. |
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| (no subject) |
[Sep. 19th, 2009|07:56 pm] |
i have mostly been a hopeless slackless this week, as far as the cooking department goes. jambalaya from a box, brownies from a box, rice krispie treats.
but tonight i made enchiladas. they were very labor intensive. i fried corn tortillas, i cooked chicken. i made a simmer sauce out of various types of tomatoes, onions, garlic, basil, chili powder and oregano. i dipped the fried tortillas in the sauce, filled them with cheese and chicken and stuck them in a dish. i covered that with the rest of the sauce and chesse. they will come out of the oven in twelve minutes. |
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| (no subject) |
[Sep. 15th, 2009|01:56 pm] |
also-
beef stew. clint made it yesterday, and i....... helped. (read:stole beef bits out of the pot every now and then)
i don't have it very often at all, but its so goooood. even if it was a little weird to eat yesterday when it was so warm. but it needed mushrooms and baby carrots, not just the little cut up pieces we had.
mushrooms are so delicious, but the name is so gross. mush-rooms >.> |
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| (no subject) |
[Sep. 15th, 2009|11:35 am] |
so they repainted the cross walk by my building, and then they covered it with reflective stuff- like glitter. i guess the idea is it sticks to the wet paint. however they put way to much on and the piles of incredibly iridescent glitter kind of mesmorize me every time i cross the street.
in other news i superglued my fingers together yesterday while repairing v's anklet again. finally just got the last of it off me. very satisfying.
clint has start the sookie stackhouse series now, and he was reading dead until dark and i was reading definetly dead, and it was all very cutsy.
can't wait till summer 2010... |
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| (no subject) |
[Sep. 11th, 2009|01:32 pm] |
so, two observations
the majority of gladiator sandals i'm seeing on people are amazingly ugly. why are you wearing that shit?
also, chicken cordon bleu is ugly too. i don't object to its existance, though its pretty salty. but it you insist on putting meats inside of other meats- you shouldn't photograph it. |
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| (no subject) |
[Sep. 8th, 2009|11:41 am] |
so i DID go camping this weekend, but with different people. very fun- swam in a montana lake with crawfish claws along the bottom.
the roasted chicken was very good, and enjoyed while watching Two Gentlemen of Verona. Made a lemon juice/olive oil sauce thing that was very tasty and had just a little spice. the Test Kitchen generally calls for cooking chicken to 165, not the 190 that food safety insists on. 165 leaves the meat not pink but still juicy. what the hell- throw caution to the wind!
this week will prove to be very boring so far as culinary exploits go- we're both very poor from clint buying our train tickets for chicago this christmas, and me buying textbooks. camping leftovers it is.
also, an amusing note. clint had an interview today to work for montana caregivers network. aka medical mj of montana. he's all excited about helping people. he would be a call agent making appointments with patients. much better than directv, where people called to yell at him because their cable service had been shut off (because they hadn't paid).
fingers crossed.... |
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| sauteed chicken breasts |
[Sep. 3rd, 2009|01:19 pm] |
well. not hard, not boring. well browned on each side over medium high heat. then i made a sauce of shallots, broth and white wine (which was tasty!) finished with milk and cornstarch, to thicken.
we ate it with peas.
tonight, roasted chicken that i will make as quickly as possible, because i might not get out of class till 5, but shakespeare in the park starts at 6!
its amazing how quickly i revert back to student lifestyle.
also, not going camping this weekend after all. i found out half the people going are people i don't know or dislike- that would be unpleasant. |
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| (no subject) |
[Aug. 31st, 2009|12:10 pm] |
so... tortilla cassarole. shreding chicken is a pain in the ass. i have no idea what to do with the rest of the can of chipoltle in adobo sauce. the meal itself was chippy, since it called for 1/3 of a bag of tortilla chips. and it made a lot. tasty, with just a little heat from the aformentioned chipoltle.
last night i made meatloaf. a tiny meatloaf, that was way too much work to just feed two people. onion, garlic, mushroom, thyme and tiny amounts of tomato paste (and what do i do the the rest of that can?). you're supposed to use a food processor. i didn't, i don't have one. then you mix that with 10oz of lean ground beef. and add it to mustard, soy sauce, salt, pepper and egg white. seriously. once its cooked to the point of being mostly food safe, you glaze it with ketchup, brown sugar, hot sauce and apple cider vinegar.
it was actually pretty good.
more absurdly conplicted versions of simple meals yet to come- sauteed and roasted chicken dishes this week, the few nights i'll actually be at home.
camping the weekend, my last hurrah of the summer! (because today is the first day of school) |
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| judge me not |
[Aug. 28th, 2009|11:59 am] |
so, being midly inspired by julie/julia, but having a small fraction of the ambition, i'm thinking about actually reporting on my culinary investigations. most lately i've been delving into "cooking for two" a pulication of america's test kitchen, which i love. they test and research the shit out of anything they do, the end result being a recipe the epitomizes the best qualities of whatever the goal food might be. so "cooking for two" is some of their best recipes of the last year paired down. but its not just the portions they've changed- they're streamlined time consuming things like chicken mole and included recipes for tiny desserts and offered tips like making a tiny lasagna in a loaf pan.
the trouble is, most of the tine desserts i'm so enamored with call for a food processor and 4 1/2 springform pans. or 12 oz ramkins- mine are sadly only 6 oz, for making creme brulee.
but i made their recipe for apple dumplings last night. they were awesome- and i even managed it hungover. i felt immensly proud of myself - i made a reduction! they were buttery, and not too sweet, with the pastry equal parts chewy and gooey in the reduction, and the apple was cooked throughly but still firm, and tasted strongly of what it was- all thanks to the exacting work of America's test kitchen, a magical place somewhere in Boston.
today i'm making their recipe for skillet tortilla casserole- for lunch, because i have to go to work at 4.
one note- despite my general worship for these people i have noticed that they have a strange thing for shallots and chicken broth. |
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| hey folks |
[Jun. 9th, 2009|12:30 pm] |
my goals for the summer:
-camp
-make cheese
-read
-introduce clint to as many of the people and places i love in portland and seattle as possible. in less than two weeks.
my goals before the end of the year:
-continue improving the GPA that my freshman year left...lacking
-hopefully introduce clint to my family (parents, siblings and both sets of aunties)
...and maybe meet his mom at christmas (i think she looks down on me for being a "city girl", and i'm kinda scared)
-be less introverted at school, and try to get over the fact that i don't really like my fellow pysch majors... if only for the totally selfish end of having study buddies and note friends.
-continue holding onto the treasured folks back home
-continue my cautious introduction to the world of wedding planning
-use my school's rec center (and don't let illness and schoolwork permanently throw me off course like they did last semester) |
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