(no subject)

[mrissa]

I just got back from Byerly's for the second time in two days. And we got Simon Delivers yesterday morning. This is an extremely bad habit I have.

"We're a yeast packet short," I said, and markgritter started laughing: "A yeast packet short of a full batch?" "Yes." "You'd better not tell the neighbors." "Dear, I think they know."

So anyway, now the yeast is activating, so I can make the double batch of rosemary buns, so that nobody cries. (I imagined telling Mike, "Other people got rosemary buns, but there weren't enough for you." Let's go with no on that one, shall we? So I went to Byerly's, because there's no sense to making a single batch now and another single batch soon.) I've already made the chili, and I've made banana bread (a double batch again, and again: "Mike, I made banana bread, but I gave it to other people, so you don't get any"; and besides, we had 6 brown bananas instead of 3). It is an extremely domestic day. I think that pounding the rosemary bun dough will give me the last little bit of energy I need to finish this short story, and it's reading pretty clean right now, so that's good. Maybe 300 words left. Surely I can write 300 words.

Also we have strawberries to clean and avocadoes to slice (because I bought some at Byerly's that will be edible today and not merely in several days like the Simon Delivers ones). Also I think I can make pear crisp without putting anything in it Pamela can't have. I'm pretty sure I can. Crisps are easy, right? You just cut stuff up and then throw more stuff on top of them and then you bake them and then they are good. That is my current theory of crisp, and I've done it with apples and and with rhubarb and with berries of various kinds, and you know what I want now? Peach crisp. I desperately want it to be peach season. I've never had peach crisp, I don't think, but I know what it ought to taste like, and I think we can get there from here.

And tomorrow we will have bratwurst on the grill, and it will not be as good as the tomato basil sausages they don't make any more, but it will still be good. And also we will have salads, and I love salads even when they have nasty tail-end-of-winter lettuce and tomatoes, although I will love them lots more when the tomatoes are fresh. Ohhhh, and then there will be heirloom tomatoes with fresh mozzarella and basil and just a tiny drizzle of balsamic vinegar and salt and pepper, and something that simple has no business being that good, but it is.

What are you eating this weekend? Are you looking forward to any food "season"?

Comments

[copperwise.livejournal.com]

All I want right now are vegetables. Fresh veggies. Corn and green beans and tomatoes and onions. And maybe some salmon.

But you could send me some of that peach crisp, please. :)

[pariyal.livejournal.com]

What are you eating this weekend?

Saturday: chips (that's fries for leftpondians) because that's traditional after fencing. We'll get our vitamins when we get home-- the three girls alone can eat four pounds of apples in two days.

Sunday: pasta with gorgonzola sauce, steamed broccoli, iceberg lettuce salad.

Are you looking forward to any food "season"?

Two weeks and two days until (Orthodox) Easter, and then it will be everything season again, but what I'm really looking forward to is melon. Honeydew, ogen, galia, you name it. I can get melons already, but they're expensive and watery; they're only really good when they're practically giving them away in the market. (Though I did get given one in the market because it had a blemish, and the stall person knows I like melon but wouldn't buy it at that price, and it was actually pretty decent)

And raspberries. And really fresh peas from our own garden which don't even need cooking (but we give them a minute or so to bring out the sweetness). I'm not a summer person except when it comes to food.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

For true about the melons. Every once in awhile I buy a canteloupe for off-season prices, and it's never worth it.

Byerly's has good raspberries all winter. They charge through the nose for them, but so does Cub Foods, and their raspberries suck in the off-season. So when I really need raspberries, there they are.

Peas. I do not cook most peas. I eat the frozen ones still-frozen, but the fresh ones are even better.

[pariyal.livejournal.com]

Oh, and can I have your banana bread recipe, please? The Turkish grocery usually has over-ripe bananas for 49 cents a kilo.

[timprov.livejournal.com]

link (http://www.marissalingen.com/gmabread.html)

[pariyal.livejournal.com]

Thanks, that looks easy!

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

It is.

[cadithial.livejournal.com]

Hmm, may I eat at your place :P I'll also volunteer to sample the banana bread. I really need to find my apple bread recipe. It's very nummy.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Mine is, too. I love apple bread. I have more incentive to make banana bread, though, because bananas go bad and then can be used in bread, whereas the apples in apple bread are supposed to be fine, and mostly I just eat apples that are fine.

You'll be invited over for food at some point, I'm very sure.

[scottjames.livejournal.com]

What are you eating this weekend?
Whatever the fiancee cooks for me tonight*, and whatever the Chinese delivery person brings for me tomorrow. Sunday TBD.

Are you looking forward to any food "season"?
Corn-on-the-cob season**. And tomatoes. Love the home-grown tomatoes (despite the fact that I will likely not grow them myself--I think I'm going to grow peppers instead). Oh oh oh! And Vedalia (Vadalia?) onions. Holy frickin' yum.

I'm hungry now, thank you so much.

*She volunteered. I've done a lot of the cooking this week.
**I used to not care for it so much. But I think my mom cooks corn-on-the-cob incorrectly.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Are you just going to let the Chinese delivery person bring you happiness in little boxes, or are you going to try to influence what said deliverybeing brings you?

Vidalia is the word you're looking for.

How does your mom cook corn onna cob? Because I used to think it was impossible to screw up, and then I learned two ways to screw it up (bad corn and overboiling).

[dichroic.livejournal.com]

A friend of mine claims it's better to put sugar in the boiling water instead of salt, because salt toughens the corn. I'm not sure I can tell much difference, but I think it's a little bit tenderer and sweeter.

It's also a moot point because since getting the gas grill my favorite way by far of cooking corn is to grill it.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I lightly sugar the water, too.

We haven't grilled corn yet. I kind of want to, but we didn't get to it last year.

[scottjames.livejournal.com]

I will influence what said Chinese delivery person (of unknown ethnicity) brings to me. Perhaps sesame chicken, being one of my all-time favorites.

Vidalia, yes. Neither way that I spelled it looked correct, but apparently the "i" eluded me.

I think she overboils it, but blames it on bad corn. Who knew that, growing up in Nebraska, you could get so much bad corn so often? I prefer to microwave it, though.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I love nuking the leftovers and then having leftover corn onna cob for lunch. That's fabulous.

I, too, love sesame chicken. What we really need is an extremely local Chinese place. I know where to get Chinese 15-20 minutes from us, but 2-10 minutes would be ideal. I would trade the Chinese place we do have 2 minutes from us for a good one. Really.

[scottjames.livejournal.com]

Neener neener neeeeeeeener.

[apis-mellifera.livejournal.com]

Fresh Jersey tomatoes from the produce stand down the street. On white bread with mayo and salt. Or just sliced, room temperature, with some salt.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I was with you except for the mayo.

[apis-mellifera.livejournal.com]

The mayo is dependent on my mood and the quality of the tomato. If it's a really good tomato, no mayo.

[merriehaskell.livejournal.com]

I am, as ever, ready for strawberry season, not that it will do me any good because I don't grow strawberries or know anyone who does (that doesn't live 3 hours away, but at least they'll send me jam at some point).

And then raspberry season. We live a mile away from a raspberry farm.

And rhubarb season (that I have in the backyard). And asparagus season. And I'm ready for new potatoes (also in the backyard; I'll be planting this weekend, in fact).

And now I want peach cobbler--but not crisp. Crisp is for apples, in my world. I don't want anything to mess with the texture of my peaches.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

It is asparagus season, or nearly so. Asparagus is a spring vegetable. And as such it goes very well with artichoke hearts and red peppers and tomatoes and basmati in my Spring Dammit Hotdish.

I don't see how crisp would mess with the texture of your peaches more than cobbler. The main difference is that the topping junk is doughier with cobbler.

[mkille.livejournal.com]

Asparagus season is at Mother's Day. So Laura keeps assuring me, when I say, "Oh no, did we miss asparagus season?"

Where I live is famous for its asparagus. Apparently in England it used to be known as "Hadley grass" (that's what They Say around here anyway), Hadley being the next town north.

[dichroic.livejournal.com]

What are you eating this weekend? Are you looking forward to any food "season"?
Not this weekend but next begins Passover. We're having some friends over and I'll be making chicken soup with matzo balls, flourless chocolate torte (made with ground almonds) and other stuff in between - Ted will do a deep-fried turkey.

I don't really keep Passover but it is matzo season. I'm also looking forward to corn on the cob - my market sells it all year round but the winter corn only looks good. Taste is apparently reserved for summer.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Almond-based flourless chocolate torte is amazing, and I was going to think of making some when mnfiddledragon was here, but I just didn't get there.

[carbonel]

Could I get your flourless chocolate torte recipe? I'm still looking for the perfect flourless chocolate cake recipe.

[dichroic.livejournal.com]

Sure thing. I don't have mine with me but did a quick search: this one (http://www.joyofbaking.com/ChocolateAlmondTorte.html) is very similar with the following changes (from memory), notes and simplification:

1. I think my recipe uses 8 oz chocolate, 5 eggs, and 1 stick butter (I'll try to remember to check that). It's very forgiving, so if you vary amounts a bit it won't hurt a thing.
2. I often add a golollup of creme de cacao or kahlua.
3. My original recipe calls for pareve margarine instead of butter. I use butter because I don't keep kosher and like the taste of butter better. If this is for Passover and you do keep kosher you may want to go with the marge.
4. I don't toast the almonds.
5. I don't have a food processor. A coffee grinder works find for the almonds.
6. I often use a deep pie dish instead of a springform pan and then just don't turn it out.
7. I do let eggs sit for a few minutes to get to room temp as a general thing (supposed to be better for baking) but I don't bother separating them first.
7. My recipe doesn't call for cream of tartar. After reading the one I gave you I might try it, but you should know it works fine without.

I think that's it. Sorry for being longwinded but that's pretty much the way I cook, with a lot of tweaking.

weekend food

[dendrophilous.livejournal.com]

Tomorrow for lunch I'm getting my once-a-month pastrami on pumpernickel bagel with brown mustard and lots of veggies.

Sometime this weekend I am going to make braised herbed chicken thighs, and some other time I am going to attempt vegetarian chili with the fake ground beef I just bought, perhaps in the crockpot. That'll be an experiment; I've never bought that stuff before.

Food season: they're all good. I love fall veggies; summer has so much produce to offer; winter is perfect weather for thick stews with heavy dumplings. And spring must have some benefit too. :)

[greatestofnates.livejournal.com]

One cool feature of my apartment is a walking path passing right outside the door. One cool feature of the walking path is a Byerly's on the opposite side from my apartment.

Peach crisp is awesome. Do you ever make a crisp with multiple fruits?

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yes, and I was thinking of making this crisp with multiple fruits. But then we ate all the strawberries; the Simon Delivers strawberries were really not very good (overall--the individual ones that were edible tasted good, but many were not edible). So now I'm not sure what.

[gwyneira.livejournal.com]

Can you get blueberries anywhere? Probably not, since it's hardly the season, but peaches and blueberries together are lovely. My uncle once made a peach and blueberry cobbler that I still remember with longing.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

In fact, I can, but they're expensive. And since the peaches aren't in season yet, I'm going to stick with straight pear cobbler, I think.

[porphyrin.livejournal.com]

This weekend:

Today is going to be something quick and simple, with Dena coming over to tell us about the house she just bought and how the workshop went. :)

Tomorrow it's dinner with Jennie and Steve and the baby! It will be fried dumplings, stir fry with thick rice noodles, stir fried bean curds, and steamed buns with red bean paste for dessert.

Sunday it's pizza night with Beth and Rynn, my dyke pagan friends and the smartest people I know. With all sorts of CHOCOLATE for dessert.

I'm looking forward to cherry season.

When I ask Mike, he says he's looking forward to rosemary buns and banana bread.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Maybe when it is cherry season I will make you some of my chocolate cherry scones with the fresh cherry halves in. They are most excellent. She said modestly.

I've been hungry for steamed buns of various sorts. I should figure out dim sum with people one of these days.

[buymeaclue.livejournal.com]

Maybe when it is cherry season I will make you some of my chocolate cherry scones with the fresh cherry halves in.

::swoon!::

Now I'm hungry.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

They are extremely easy, too:

2 1/4 c. Bisquick
1/2 c. sugar
1/4 c. cocoa
1/2 c. yogurt
1 t. vanilla
1 egg
some cherries, halved and pitted
some chocolate chips or chocolate chunks

Mix. Knead slightly. Thunk down on a cookie sheet in eight lumps. 425, 12 minutes.

[buymeaclue.livejournal.com]

I'm going to have to start a new bookmarks folder just for recipes; that's the third Mris one that I've marked today. It's occured to me at last that having My Own Place will mean cooking for myself all the time, not just when I feel like it.

Yay! Thank you!

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yes, that's a big jump to make. I'm the default cook around here. I always was, but in the past timprov wasn't having back spasms that made us steer him gently but firmly away from the knives, and he likes cooking, too. And markgritter likes to cook sometimes, but he's working until 6:00 most nights, and I can't hold out much past 6:30 without at least a snack, so mostly that means me.

[buymeaclue.livejournal.com]

PS: Is that plain vanilla yogurt?

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yes. I suppose one could try it with cherry, but I think that would most likely taste artificial and weird, and you have those nice real cherries in there already; they usually don't need help.

[buymeaclue.livejournal.com]

Cool, thanks. I salivate in anticipation of cherry season.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I made these up as a birthday present to myself one year. I thought about what I wanted in a scone and was not getting, and then I decided I could fix it myself. And I could. That was one of the big steps towards thinking of myself as a good cook and not merely a competent follower of recipes. I still backslide on that point sometimes.

[mkille.livejournal.com]

I am looking forward to farmstand season, which starts about now and lasts until September.

[gwyneira.livejournal.com]

What are you eating this weekend?

Since G. is out of town and I have Liam to myself, this would be whatever I can get made quickly before Liam demands attention, which probably means some sort of stir-fry (since they're pretty easy and he likes anything with rice). I'm hoping that my mother will come up with something yummy when we go over there for dinner tomorrow.

Are you looking forward to any food "season"?

Tomatoes. I actually don't much like them raw, but I miss making fresh tomato sauce. And berries, and apricots - for eating fresh, and also I'm running out of last summer's jam.

My mouth waters every time you post about rosemary buns. Recipe, possibly?

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Sure!

7 1/2 T olive oil (a scant half-cup)
3-4 rosemary sprigs
3 c. flour
2 packages dry yeast
2 T sugar
2 T chopped rosemary
1 1/2 t. salt
1 1/4 c. warm water

Heat olive oil and rosemary sprigs to boil. Remove from heat, cover, and let sit at least 15 minutes. Discard rosemary sprigs. (This is the bit that makes it work.)

Use 1/2 c. water to activate yeast. Combine with flour, sugar, chopped rosemary, and salt. Make a well. Add remaining warm water and oil. Form into soft dough. Knead until smooth and elastic, at least five minutes. Put in oiled bowl and cover with oiled plastic wrap. Leave in warm place to double, about one hour.

Punch down dough, divide into 12 pieces, and form into globs. Place on oiled baking pans. Cover loosely and let double, 15-30 minutes. Uncover and bake 15-20 minutes at 400 degrees.

[gwyneira.livejournal.com]

Thanks! I can't wait to try it.