uhhh....

Well, really. This is kind of awkward. Hello Blog, it's been a while. What have you been up to? I've done some traveling, taken a Spanish class, thrown a few dinner parties, gotten a new favorite band- fascinating, busy stuff. And no blogging about it at all. Boo. 

I've been cooking a lot lately, and since my last post (waaay back in January), I've made lots and lots of things.... Here's a quick rundown of some of the best-

• Caldo Verde with collard greens. I adapted this recipe, sometimes searing sausages seperately deglazing with the soup broth and adding that back into the soup. Then I follow the recipe and top with the slices of sausage. Such a perfect dinner during the cold wet months. 
  
• Veggie-Chicken Koftas- These are amazing chicken and eggplant patties that are studded with pistachios. They are perfect with hummus and tzatziki. I can't lay any claim to them, other than the fact that I've made them about five times since January and not only are they easy and delicious, but they freeze like champs! I pre-form the patties and freeze in a single layer in freezer bags. In general I make them the day before I cook them so all the flavors have time to meld. These are also great as an appetizer formed into tiny 1" meatballs and served with tzatziki. Photos to come!
• Jerk Chicken- This is a simple and classic jerk. There's a lot of ingredients, but the preparation is pure ease. I usually save some of the marinade to make a mojo sauce by adding the juice of a couple limes, some cilantro, a minced clove of garlic and a bit of olive oil. This becomes a dip for fried plantains for the side. 
• Sonoma Chicken Salad from Whole Foods- so simple and delicious. This tastes unbelievably clean. 

I know I've cooked other things recently, but can't think of them right now off the top of my head. I should really write this stuff down. Or just use this here bloggy. hmmm....

Arts, Crafts and other stuff

Really? I haven't posted in over a month. Well, it's official, I am terrible at this! 

This weekend I hosted another party, this time at home. It was a baby shower for my wonderful friend Miss Dottie, who inspires me in many ways. In fact she is a blogger as well (though for real, not just randomly once a month)- and I'm going to "borrow" some of her topics for my posts on here (read: plagiarize). Last year she kicked off the new year with a list of the new recipes she had tried during the course of 2007, and I found it monumentally inspiring. I've made my list, still checking it twice, but will be posting it up shortly. 

Besides being incredibly smart, creative and fun; another way Miss Dottie inspires is with her genuine ability to make you feel like the most important person in the world, be you a near stranger or an old friend. She has a quality to her kindness that is pure and immeasurable. Therefore, it was an honor for me to be able to host her baby shower and gather up her closest lady friends for a day of bestowing love onto her. 

Because Miss Dottie is so darn crafty, I knew from the get go that this would need to be a sophisticated but homemade affair. And because Miss D is so humble, it had to also be unfussy. 

So firstly, the food- I kept it very, very simple- 2 kinds of seasoned nuts- coconut curry macadamias, and ginger scented pecans- both tried and true Martha recipes. Then an assortment of aram style sandwiches- smoked salmon cream cheese with cucumber, sun dried tomato tapenade, and turkey with hummus and more tapenade. Finally finished out the menu with some dips- a warm spinach artichoke dip that was cheesy but not out of control, green goddess dip with assorted veggies, and my famous coconut curry cheese ball served with rice crackers and cucumber for dipping. A friend of Miss D's made the world's cutest cake (see above. I wish I could lay claim to that bit of adorable, but no.)

Next, the decor- the baby's room is going to be white with red trim, so I decided to create a long banner of flags that Miss D could keep and use in the baby room should she so decide. To begin, I found my supplies at the East Bay Depot for Creative Reuse. If you live in the Bay area and don't know this place, ACQUAINT yourself. Really. Do it. 

                                                     

In any case, when I went in last time they had an

amazing amount of rubber stamps with ribbon motifs. So of course I bought up a bunch of them (ricrack, gingham, dots, lace, ruffles...), I also got some great red and white themed fabric, and some white fabric as well. Oh, and some 2" red and white checked bias tape, like a billion yards of it. So flags it is, that trip to the store cemented it for me. On the white fabric I stamped out some different designs. Then I cut out the fabric into diamond patterns, folded it over a clothesline, pined the bias tape ov

er it and straight stitched it all the way down. Yeah, I need more photos. 

Here's the end result:

So super cute and is going to be so adorable in little miss sugarsnap cupcake's bedroom! 

I'll pull together a better post about this later, just wanted to get something out while it was still fresh.

Eat Your Vegetables!

We are trying really hard to eat our vegetables. 

One of the charms of belonging to a CSA is that we get produce delivered every other week. This is also a drawback. I tend to think of us as almost vegetarians, but even still, we have a tough time getting through all the fruits and veggies in the box. So it's creating a challenge for us, but in the best very way. 

After Thanksgiving, I went a little nutters in the kitchen and made a couple gallons of chicken stock to keep in the freezer. Then with that and our sweet potatoes tried out this soup, with some modifications. The changes we made were pretty minor- one more cup stock, one less cup half and half; cayenne; and only half of the maple syrup. It was rich and velvety and slightly sweet and spicy. (I'm on a bit of a blended soup kick right now, they taste so luxurious without being too fatty. I love that!) I still have sweet potatoes left over from the last box, trying to figure out what to do with them. 

Also left over are collard greens, persimmons, red pears, bok choy, and one meyer lemon. It's a challenge to not just quickly saute the greens in olive oil and more on. We are trying to keep them interesting, but my repertoire needs to be expanded. Any ideas for these winter greens/ weeds? And this coming week we are getting so much more stuff! I can't wait to try out this with some kale. I don't think I can imagine a more homey but sophisticated dish. It seems like the perfect thing for a nice late Sunday lunch. Hmmm... 

Sunday Supers and then some

So, I have no photos for this post. Hmmm... I don't know that I am yet qualified to call myself a blogger as I have lots to learn!

Yesterday, despite being dog tired I went hog wild in the kitchen. I roasted a butternut squash to make this beauty. It's all assembled in the fridge for tomorrow's dinner. I think I will throw together a simple salad with greens, pears and some toasted almonds to go with. This is my first ever lasagna. It was pretty easy to put together and I can't imagine that the preheating of the oven and baking is going to be too hard either! I'm trying out gluten free noodles, we'll see how that goes. I don't particularly trust gluten free products to be great, but I have hope that in between layers of cheese and roasted squash that these will do the trick. 

I also roasted a chicken with sweet potatoes and fennel for dinner. We had it with rainbow swiss chard that I sauteed in olive oil with chile flakes and then added the pan drippings from the chicken to make it ultra savory. The leftovers from the squash and chicken are going to be made into enchiladas tomorrow night for cooking later in the week, or maybe to bring to a friend's brand new house, so that they don't have to worry about cooking. I am far too lazy and cold tonight to assemble now. 

Tonight's dinner was dreamy in its simplicity. We had rice, pan fried sole, and stir fried bok choy. Everything was perfectly seasoned and very complimentary to one another. 

Here's a rough estimate of a recipe for the bok choy-

Heat oil in wok, add 1 onion chopped, let soften. Add one hot pepper sliced into rings, stir and heat through. Add 4 heads baby bok choy, leaves separated, stir to combine. Add 2 cloves chopped garlic, 1 thumb chopped ginger, 1/3 cup low sodium chicken stock, 1t black bean paste. Stir fry until bok choy softens and sauce coats the leaves about 4 minutes. finish with about 1/2t sesame oil. 

We made a simple rice with homemade chicken stock and for the fish, we seasoned with fresh black pepper and a little reduced sodium temari (wheat free soy) sauce. Quickly pan fry. Dinner in 20 minutes! It was quick, easy, healthy and beautiful. AND though I am documenting it here, I did none of the work. Even better. 

Catering Parties

Yesterday I catered my friend Claire's birthday party. Here's what was on the menu:

• stuffed mushrooms (stuffed with zucchini, mushrooms and onion)
  
• curry cheese ball
  
• sweet and spicy shrimp with mint sauce
  
• zucchini rounds stuffed with spicy chicken sausage
  
• caramelized onions, blue cheese and walnuts on toasts
  
• mushroom pate
  
• goat cheese balls
  
• veggies with green goddess dip (yummm)
  
• endive leaves with smoked salmon mousse
  
• cheese/ crackers/ fruit/ bread and gluten free crackers for the birthday girl

This was the first time I have catered an event alone, besides dinner at home. Claire and I have been known to pull off good parties together, but the birthday girl couldn't work for her own party! (though she did help chop up veggies)

What would I do differently? Next time I don't think I will get such a stinky cheese (Cowgirl Creamery Red Hawk - mind you it was delicious, so oowey-gooey, but man, did it stink, we had to put a dome on it, and every time it was opened, heads turned!), I would have had maybe only one cream cheese based thing, but at the same time, it is so well received and loved that it's hard to say. I am mostly thinking from a textural point of view (mushroom pate and curry cheese ball are both cream cheese based). 

Otherwise, no complaints. In fact I got so many compliments, it was kind of overwhelming. Quite simply, I love food and I love my friends, so it becomes very easy to do things like this for them. Would I like to become a caterer as some people suggested last night? I don't know. I've definitely thought about it, and continue to do so. But for now, I'm happy being able to experiment, and have the outlet to let my creative and hyper-organized sides mesh happily. Sometimes even more so than the cooking I like the planning. Just thinking about the world of options is so exciting, and then formulating a plan for execution, now that is the good stuff, but that's another post. 

What am I hungry for?

I am hungry for more time with friends and family, a nice meal, adventure, a delicious wine, an organized closet, classic cocktails, vacation.......

Speaking of vacation, we are headed to Mexico in 4 weeks for about 10 days. I couldn't be more excited. In fact if you were here right now it would be all I would talk about. I guess I already am doing that.