Self Medication

I don't like doctors. It's nothing I can exactly put my finger on, but I just don't like going to see one. For anything. When I get sick, which luckily isn't very often, I shuffle my sniffly self to the drug store and stare at the medicine aisle until I find something that seems to cover all my symptoms, I toss in some vitamins, make lots of tea and hope for the best. Oh yeah, I also make what my mom calls "Jewish Tylenol", also known as chicken soup. Now normally, the "make" part of that last sentence involves heating up a can of soup, because who has the energy to cook when they're truly sick? Usually not me. But yesterday I felt too sick to leave the house, so I had to figure something out on my own. Especially since all I had for lunch was a few clementines and an avocado, and soup was all that was on my mind. Don't get me wrong, I love avocado. I don't even need anything on it other then salt and pepper, see?



But that just doesn't cut it when you're sick and you want something hot and comforting. It just so happens that I had a freezer full of chicken soup makin's, and what I didn't have I could figure out a substitution for. I'm not writing this out in a recipe format because I was basically tossing stuff into the pot and hoping for the best. Pre-chopped and frozen celery, carrots, and onions I had left over from a cooking frenzy a while ago, along with two chicken quarters and I had everything I needed. I defrosted the chicken and then browned it on both sides in a large pot with a bit of olive oil. Then I filled the pot with 3/4 full of water, tossed in a tablespoon of minced garlic (it's good for you, right?), about a cup of each veggie, about a teaspoon of salt and some pepper...and then realized that there was too much stuff in the pot and it will boil over. Damn. Okay, I can fix this. I poured off about two cups of the liquid into a bowl and cranked the heat on high. Once the pot started to boil, I lowered the heat to a simmer and left the kitchen. About an hour later I remembered that there was soup on the stove and ran back. A lot of the liquid had cooked off, and the chicken was done, but otherwise everything looked good. I pulled the chicken out and poured back in the liquid I poured off earlier, adjusted the seasoning and let the soup simmer for another half hour, while I de-boned and shredded the chicken.

Chicken soup needs noodles though, right? But looking through the cupboard all I could find were udon noodles and lasagna...hmm. If you just break up the lasagna sheets, that's almost like soup noodles, right? It'll do. I tossed that into the soup and cooked it for another 20 min to make sure the thicker than normal pasta noodles cooked all the way through. I dumped the chicken back in and poured myself a bowl.



Not too bad for my first stab at chicken soup. A little slap-shod in the making, but what do you want? I was sick.

As for the curative properties, it may have been the meds or it may have been the many naps, but I'd like to think it was the soup that cured me in the end.

Surprise Tea Party

I am notorious for ruining surprises and, as is usual with ungrateful children, I blame the parents. My dad will buy a birthday present a month in advance and he'd be bursting to give it to you the moment he gets home. He doesn't want to wait even one extra minute to see the look of joy on your face and I tend to be the same way. I try to trick myself into keeping the present a secret by hiding it from myself, which is how I end up with a closet full of forgotten presents that get delivered years later and not always to the people I bought them for. And if someone else dares to plan a surprise for me, I manage to find ways to undermine that too. One year my friends came to pick me up for a surprise birthday outing where they were going to treat me to a pedicure and manicure (that was supposed to be the surprise), only to be greeted at the door by a very excited me, showing off the freshly manicured fingers and toes that I had gone out and had done that very morning.



Despite this family history, we keep trying to make a surprise work. We keep planning surprise anniversary nights on the town, hiding that perfect present for a birthday months away, and organizing a party that for once will definitely be a complete surprise. I'm happy to announce that two of us finally succeeded! My little sister and I have set out to throw a surprise baby shower for my older sister who's expecting my second nephew, and on a one week notice no less! My job was to cook and host while my little sister's task was to keep the surprisee out on the town all morning and casually drop by to "pick me up for lunch". Considering that she's a terrible liar, she did a wonderful job because when they walked in and my sister saw a house full of her friends she was speechless (and she's almost never speechless). Is this the beginning of flawlessly executed surprises going forward? Probably not, but it felt great to succeed for once.



As usual, I got a bit carried away with the menu, and I'm going to include as many recipes as I can type out before my fingers go numb, but I wanted to take a minute to thank Olga for these lovely pictures (I was too busy tending the table, passing around plates of food and keeping the glasses full of the Blood Orange Sparkling Juice to remember my camera until it was too late). Thank you for letting me use them here :)



First up we have the lovely Pesto Cucumber Sandwiches:

Pesto:
This recipe will be a bit on the hazy side because I just tossed it together from memory. I crammed several very generous bunches of basil (let's say 3 cups?) into the food processor, added several handfuls of pine nuts (about half a cup?) and whirred it into a paste. I added a healthy stream of olive oil (let's say 1/3 of a cup), some salt and pepper, several cloves of mushed up garlic and whirred it again until the paste was uniform once again. Finally I added lots of freshly shredded Parmesan cheese (1/2 a cup?) and whirred the machine once again until I was happy. I'm sorry for the fuzzy measurements, but I assure you, as long as your ingredients are fresh, the results will be lovely even if you're a few teaspoons off on any one thing and you can always add more "stuff" if it doesn't look right to you.

Sandwiches:
Once you have your pesto, just slather it onto a slice of white bread and cover with thin slices of cucumber. Spread some softened cream cheese on another slice of bread and sandwich the two together. Cut off the edges (they can be tossed or one of your guests can nibble on them behind your back) and cut on the diagonal into two triangles. Repeat for as many sandwiches as you want or as long as the pesto/bread/cucumbers last.


Next up were the popular Zuccini Triangles, the recipe for which I've had for years and I think came from Betty Crocker. They're in the lower right-hand corner of the picture of the table above.

3 cups shredded zucchini (3-4 depending on size)
1 cup Bisquick mix
1/2 cup finely chopped onion
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon seasoned salt
1/2 teaspoon Italian seasoning
1/8 teaspoon pepper
1 garlic clove, finely chopped
1/2 cup vegetable oil
4 eggs, slightly beaten

- Heat oven to 350ºF. Line a rectangular pan with foil and brush with olive oil.
- Stir together all ingredients in a great big bowl and spread in pan.
- Bake about 30 minutes or until golden brown.
- Let the pan cool a bit, lift out the foil onto a cutting surface and cut into squares, triangles, or whatever shape you like.
Note: if you make these in advance, they don't mind a quick turn in the microwave one bit.

Yikes! I've let the time get away from me once again and now I must go to sleep, but stay tuned and I'll post the rest of the recipes in the next day or so.

P.S. Don't you just love the heart shaped sugar cubes up above? They make a cup of tea just that much sweeter :)

Eat-N-Shoot

Today I did something a bit different. Inspired by my own laziness when it comes to studying photography from a book or cooking lunch on the weekends, I signed up for an Eat-N-Shoot class through a Photography Meetup group that I have recently joined. It was hosted by Chef Naveen of Rasoi. He invites small groups of people into his home and throws a party where you can take pictures, help him cook and meet new people interested in the same stuff as you. It was a blast. Its funny how technique and creativity will develop almost on it's own when you're forced to take a bazillion pictures every minute of everything that goes on around you. Or when you're NOT forced to do the dishes :)


I will share one of the recipes at the end of this post because it was the perfect thing to make for a crowd. The Lemongrass Shrimp was absolutely delicious, easy and very flexible and doesn't it look pretty?

We also made the super easy Spring rolls. Pretty much it's just julienned carrots and cucumbers, bean sprouts, cilantro, minced ginger marinaded in some sesame oil and chili sauce mixed with some blanched asparagus and wrapped in a spring roll wrapper. So easy, so fast, so healthy but still absolutely delicious.



There was also some tandoori style chicken, chicken kebabs, and yummy yellow rice, but by that time I was really getting into the picture taking craze and I didn't pay as much attention to the recipes, which was fine since he gave us handouts to take home, so I'll be making these again for the next dinner party I throw...when I am not insanely busy that is.


Did I mention how wonderful it was not to worry about doing the dishes?



Lemongrass Shrimp recipe, by Naveen Sachar of Rasoi

1lb raw shrimp, tail on, peeled and deveined
1 medium onion, sliced
2-3 tbs fresh cilantro, chopped
1-1.5 cups chicken broth
1/2 inch piece fresh ginger, minced
4 inch piece of cleaned lemongrass stalk, sliced
1 fresh lime cut into wedges
Thai Chili sauce, to taste
Fish sauce, a few tsps
Freshly ground pepper

You will need to cook everything in batches to make sure that the shrimp cook properly.
Bring 1/3 cup of stock to a rapid boil in a hot wok. Add 1 tbsp of the lemongrass, some of the chopped onion and some of the ginger and bring to a boil again.
Add about 10 shrimp, chili sauce, fish sauce and pepper. Cook for 2-3 min until the shrimp is cooked through and remove onto serving platter. Repeat till all the ingredients are gone.
Squeeze lime juice, garnish with cilantro and serve with sliced bread for soaking up all the wonderful juices.
Yum.

The woes of working from home

This post will be a bit different from the norm purely due to necessity. I had a dentist appointment this morning and decided to work from home after rather than drool over the keyboard and mumble incoherently at my co-workers in the office. Unfortunately, this would mean that I wouldn't be able to eat anything until about 4pm seeing as how I never eat breakfast at home (I keep cereal and milk at work), I haven't had time to either grocery shop or cook anything in days, and that's approximately when the Novocaine will wear off and I'll be able to put something in my mouth being sure that it won't fall out without my knowledge. Had I been in the office this would have been solved by a trip to something like Jimmy Johns, but things being what they were, the occasion called for musgoes (sp?). This is a term I learned at my friend's house and basically it just means that whatever's in the fridge must go. I realize that usually what I consider to be an empty fridge would feed my little sister and her college roommates for two days, as long as you add ketchup and a bit of ingenuity, but I was lacking inspiration....and then I remembered the package of handmade white wine linguine that I bought at the farmer's market last weekend. I dug up a package of mushrooms and the last onion and made a quick sauce with some beef broth and thyme, tossed it all together and voila! Lunch and dinner! I so have to go shopping tomorrow.