Delicious Eats

Well, the latest culinary endeavours both come from Eat, Live, Run - what can I say, the woman knows what's she's doing! - and we'll definitely be making them again. (Probably.)

First up:  Homemade pad thai. That actually tastes like legit pad thai, rather than a pale imitator! (Even though the dish is pretty pale. Whatever, don't get picky with me!) It has some pretty authentic ingredients, like fish sauce and tamarind (I now know exactly what it feels like to be looking for something in the grocery store when I have no idea what it looks like. At least I was in the right section!). This is probably why it tastes surprisingly close to what you'd get from an actual Thai restaurant. Verdict: YUM. And bonus that the hubbub liked the tofu! He was pretty skeptical. We will definitely be making this again.

Her pad thai, not mine.

Next up, we have split pea soup. This is the probably making again recipe - only because we haven't actually had it yet. I made it on Tuesday evening (it takes a GOOD 3 hours to make), and froze most of it, but preliminary examination indicates that tonight's dinner should be YUM. It was really not labour intensive, the ingredients were pretty cheap, and it makes a large batch, so really - all signs point to "making again." As long as it is fairly yummy. Which it should be. (I'd chop up the carrots smaller next time though - rookie mistake!)

Again, not my split pea soup. Crackers are a good idea, though.

Yes.

So. Grey, cloudy day here, chilly day in the office (I have a space heater on!), and it took a while to wake up, but my Monday is looking good, and I've got high hopes for the week! Hope you do too!

1. Unclutterer has a post about mise en place while cooking. I'm a big fan, especially for new recipes. It helps avoid doing the "oh crap, I don't have that essential ingredient" in the middle of delicate recipes, and makes the whole thing more enjoyable.
2. Speaking of cooking, we had excellent culinary adventures last week. I made a whole roasted chicken, and then we made meatballs, and then we made broth from the chicken carcass. Tonight, it'll be home made chicken soup... and it's perfect weather for it, too!
3. Our first pre-AGM Think Tank is this afternoon! In 45 minutes! Going to finish some stuff, grab a coffee, and head to another one of our libraries to help facilitate it. So excited!
4. Last week was the Week of Contracts. This week will also be the Week of Contracts, only it is shaping up to also be the Week of Excellent Negotiation Results, which I am eminently pleased about.
5. This week is also a Short Week, followed by a looooong, family and cottage a turkey-filled weekend, which I am looking forward to.

Ready, set, cook!

Fun With Eggplants

So, Sofya has done it again (again because I use her yogurt recipe) with her Easy End-of-Summer Moussaka recipe. We had an eggplant that we needed to use, so I picked up the other stuff we needed, and gave this a shot this past weekend. It actually was really easy, and super yummy. I actually had 2 eggplants, so I think I ended up with an unfavourable meat : everything else ratio, but I wouldn't change anything other than making sure to use enough meat next time!

Eggplants are so pretty! I love their purpley goodness.

 Of note, I did soak the eggplant to get rid of the bitterness, which I think was a good call. I've always been intimidated by cooking with eggplants, and I've been slowly making my way towards cooking them more (putting them in with other roasted veg; hubbub makes baba ghanoush), and this recipe is an awesome one for a beginner eggplant-cooker. The eggplant was easily my fave part of this dish!

Also, it makes great leftovers. Yum! I think next up I'll try my hand at ratatouille.

Soup Weather, Carrot-Ginger Style

So, it's been cooling off here in Ottawa. Saturday and Sunday were ickily humid, but yesterday - yesterday's weather was perfect. I love the fall so much - not least of all because I can cozy up with a delicious bowl of soup. Ever since picking up an immersion blender, the idea of blended soups has gotten MUCH less daunting.

Love it. Use it all the time.

Yesterday I made an amazing carrot ginger soup, from Eat, Live, Run. Seriously, try it. I'm on my own for dinner tonight, so I may have to make more (the hubbub ate the leftovers), because it is just that good.

Plus, I now have a bag of shallots I need to use up. Anyone have suggestions on what to do with them?

Attack of the Yogurt Monster

So, I've gotten in the habit of making deeeelicious smoothies in the morning. And I plan on keeping it up! But, a half a cup per day, this means that I go through a significant amount of plain yogurt (seriously. If someone were keeping an eye on our recycling, I don't know what they'd think). So when I saw a blog post about this recipe, I decided to give it a try. Worst case, I waste a bunch of milk. Best case, I become self-yogurt-sufficient!

So last night, I gave it a try. The milk took FOREVER to heat up (I ended up having to turn the crock pot up to high, because it was just not getting hot enough), but then took much less time to cool than mentioned in the recipe (which was nice, because I really didn't want to be up at midnight, turning hot milk into yogurt).

Milk, Crock Pot, Digital Thermometer, Recipe... ready to go!

After it was innoculated, I stuck the Crock Pot in the oven with the light on, and went to bed for a good night's sleep. I was a little nervous when I went to check on it this morning. Did it set?

Shroedinger's yogurt

When I took the yogurt out of the oven, it was still warm, but definitely yogurt-y! It's a bit thin tasting, so I think next time I'd use whole milk (we had 2% at home, so I used that), but I'll definitely be doing this again. It's way cheaper (about 2$ worth of milk for 2 quarts of yogurt, instead of about 3.50$ for 750ml!), and pretty low effort. Hurray!

Mmm, yogurt!