If Im not mistaken…

Ok, so maybe cooking quinoa in apple juice wasn’t a perfect idea.  It was just a little “too much”.

Too tart, too overpowering, too warm?  It was better with a bit of milk which cooled it down and mellowed the taste.  I’m not one who likes milk in my porridge so; I wasn’t initialing going to eat it that way.  I put the milk in my son’s bowl—his first time trying quinoa—and he seemed to like it.

Next time, I’ll cook it plain and add applesauce.  That might be the way to go.

But the apple juice may be useful for a cold quinoa salad, a nice accompaniment to tuna?  I do enjoy tuna melts with granny smith apple and cheese.  Ah, something else to try.

Have you tried Quinoa yet?  It’s quite a strange little grain or seed, texture wise.  I’ve tried it a couple times as an accompaniment to stir fry.  The last time, I cooked the quinoa in pineapple juice which was really wonderful.  I think I will try it for breakfast next.  I see some recipes online that call for cooking the quinoa and mixing it with cooked apples.  My idea is to cook it directly with apple juice.  Wouldn’t that be easier?  Add a bit of cinnamon and whoo hoo!  I wonder if it will need some sweetener?   A little brown sugar? 

You can read more about Quinoa here.  Recipes. 

Looks like it contains about 6g of protein per serving.  (1/4 cup of dry)

Are you thinking about inexpensive ways to treat your sweet tooth on Valentine’s Day?

Well, Dairy Queen has me craving the Chocolate Covered Cherries Blizzard (ok, Choco-Cherry Love).  What could be better for a mid-winter pick me up?  Two spoons?  Aw!

Little Debbie has Be My Valentine cakes, cute and pink and perfect to make someone smile!

Actually, if you are feeling creative, you could buy pretty much any cookie and decorate them with frosting and sprinkles like gingerbread men.  Or you could even write personalized messages or names. 

In the book Hello Cupcake! By Alan Richardson and Karen Tack there are instructions on making the coolest mini cupcakes that look like boxed chocolates.  (Brown paper liners and all)

Mmmmm….don’t forget the cinnamon hearts, chocolate covered marshmallows on sticks, and shall I go on?   

It’s chilly soup weather here.  One of my family’s favorite soups is a vegetarian version of French Onion Soup. 

To make it you’ll need:

2 Large yellow onions.  About 1 large yellow onion per person/serving  (it may seem like a lot but the onion shrinks when you fry it)

1 Vegetable bouillon cube.

Approximately 3 cups of water.

5 stale pieces of bread.  You can place your bread on a tray in a preheated 300’ oven and then turn the oven off so the bread dries up without burning.

Approximately 2 cups of shredded marble cheese.

Olive oil.

Salt, pepper, garlic, cayenne and any other spices you like can be added to taste.

Cooking Instructions:

First step is to soften the chopped onions.  Heat and stir the onions over medium heat with 1 tbsp of olive oil.  You’ll know when the onions are done because they’ll be starting to brown on the edges.

Add the water and stir in the bouillon to the pot. You can also add spices at this time.

Let the onion soup base simmer while you chop up your stale toast into croutons and shred your cheese.

You’ll want to place the soup into oven safe bowls.  The bowl will be about ¾ full of your soup base, place half of your dried bread chunks into each bowl (this will soak up some of the liquid) and then half of your shredded cheese on top. 

Bake at 350’ for about 15minutes or until the cheese is nicely melted, like a pizza.

Let it cool for a few minutes before eating.  It will be HOT!

Enjoy!

Here’s a couple more of my favorite soup recipes found online:

http://theppk.com/recipes/dbrecipes/index.php?RecipeID=2061

Chickpea  noodle soup

http://ginews.blogspot.com/2008/11/low-gi-recipes-of-month.html

White bean, carrot & ginger soup

Are dried chickpeas a good deal $ or a good deal of work?

I decided to forego buying canned chickpeas and finally try a bag of dried.  At first look, these little beans look like wee stones, oh yum!

First step in softening them up—soak ‘em all night long.  Get down the biggest bowl you have, these beans will expand.

Second step—be amazed by the overnight growth and the overwhelming smell of, well, beans.

Third step—change the water and pluck out the icky looking ones (dark or green in colour) but I’m sure you will find more odd ones as you cook.

Fourth step—boil the chickpeas for ten minutes, rapidly.  Then cover the pot and simmer for another forty-five minutes.

Fifth step—drain and let them cool.  I packed mine into Ziploc sandwich baggies and tucked them in the freezer for another day. 

Not too bad for work.  Takes time to get the chickpeas rehydrated though.  I enjoy having the beans in the freezer for easy reach and, personally, I like frozen vegetables over canned.  So sure, I’ll go for the dried beans again…when I eventually run out of my freezer stash!

Things I like to make with chickpeas…hummus, stirfry, just baked as a snack, mixed with rice to form veggie burger patties, oh, veganomicon’s noodle soup.   

I recently tried soy beans in their pods for the first time.  I have been purchasing frozen shelled beans, now and then, for a nice fast snack.  I would prepare them by soaking the soy beans in boiled water and draining a couple times.  Add a bit of salt and they are good to go! 

The fuzzy pods take a little getting used to.  Not that you are eating the pods themselves but, having them up to your lips as you slip out the beans is a tad itchy.  I cooked these pods by steaming them.  Again, adding salt to taste.

There is a lot of talk about how good, or bad, soy is for you.  Yesterday, I came across this article http://blog.macleans.ca/2008/12/04/will-soy-make-my-son-gay/  Just the title made me crack up. 

I know a couple who have made their own tofu.  I wish I saw the process of how it went from fresh green beans to white curd.   I do think fresh is best.  But isn’t it always?

When I first saw Paula Deen, the Queen of all things sweet, make ice cream from snow, I couldn’t believe it!

 I mean, here I live in Canada, where we get a ton of snow each winter.  So much snow, we don’t know what to do with it.  We simply move it around, make taller and wider mounds, sometimes we make forts or snowmen, pack it down with snowshoes, run over it with snow machines, or try desperately to melt it.  However, I’ve never heard of making something edible with snow.  (Well, except for eating it raw, obviously)

So tonight I took the plunge.  I put that 15 cm of white stuff that fell earlier in the day to good use and tried the recipe.  Can you call something a recipe if it only calls for three ingredients? Sure.

Yum!  Snow, condensed/sweetened milk and vanilla extract truly made great soft serve ice cream.  It did melt quickly, so if you rather, it could also become a favourite milkshake recipe.

If you would like the original recipe surf over here:  www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/paula-deen/snow-ice-cream-recipe/reviews/index.html

 I do enjoy trying new recipes.  So when I saw the eggnog instructions on www.cookingwithkids.today.com  I thought it would be something festive to try. 

Now the directions seem easy enough, but I seem to have a hard time working with eggs.  People may have their specialties and I know that eggs are not mine.  I have a 50% success rate in tempering my egg mixture correctly for rice pudding.  Sigh.

First, let’s start with the pan.  A sauce pan, sure, skimmed right over that.  I don’t think I own a sauce pan anymore.  My pan’s are of the thick, hard working sort– not thin and dainty.  Why is this important?  Well, I followed the temperature directions “on low”, and stirred for 20 minutes without it doing anything!  Duh.  Ya, crank up the heat, girlie.

So that is what I did.  After a while it started to thicken.  Quite quickly and at the very moment that I was asking my husband to check other eggnog recipes for a clue on “how thick do I want this?” or “what the heck am I looking for?”    It was a nice yellow creamy colour but as he was informing me, “you want it thick enough to stick to a metal spoon.”  It became curdy and thick.  Not so attractive.   

I told my sister in law about my experience and she instantly pictured curdled milk.  It wasn’t that gross.  I mean, it tasted good and my son and I sucked it back.  Only once in a while would a chunk would plug up your straw.  Ah, we’re tough…and festive! 

About a year ago, I said good bye to my microwave and put it into storage in the garage.  Why?  I simply started feeling strange using it and I wasn’t sure if the feeling was just my mind playing tricks on me.  I can’t totally describe the feeling I was getting.  It wasn’t a definite dizziness or pain.  It was only a sensation of something not being right.

We’ve heard of people with pace makers, for their heart, being effected by microwaves but what about the average Joe?

Most of the websites I’ve come across talk about how microwaving destroys nutrients in food.  Of course, all cooking destroys some nutrients, but is the microwave worse?

The most well rounded article I came across was this one:  http://www.willthomasonline.net/willthomasonline/Nuked_By_Your_Microwave.html

What an eye opener!

So, how was a year without a microwave?  It was no problem or hassle at all.  It was only my husband who didn’t want it to go in the first place.  He’d miss being able to warm up a meal or cup of tea quickly, but honestly he never complained.  I would only miss making popcorn from time to time.

Will we bring it back into the kitchen?  I doubt it.  These days, I feel odd enough without it.

It all started with a long time friend innocently passing on a starter bag of Amish Friendship Bread/Cake to me.  I followed the instructions: squish, squish, squish, add flour, add milk, add sugar, squish, squish, squish and then add more ingredients.   The end result is I’m left with four bags of goo to pass on to my dear friends along with enough goo to make two pans of cake for my family.  The bread does end up being good but the ten days of thought and mixing has everyone running. 

It seems, once you make it that first time, you’re not as excited about the process or end result.  So what do I do with these unwanted starters?   Well, I just put them into the freezer to wait.  I’m thinking about trying to make mini-cakes, without waiting the full ten days.  It would be an experiment and what could be more fun than that?