Oven Lovin' Girl

the ginger burned, so it became roasted carrot soup

the recipe said “maple roasted ginger and carrot soup”. maple syrup might make it too sweet, right? i think roasted carrots are pretty sweet on their own, so i didn’t add the syrup to the veggies and just roasted them with olive oil. glad i did!

i love fresh ginger and carrots together. my other favorite flavor combo is chocolate and bananas, but this one is slightly healthier.

carrots, ginger, onion all get roasted with olive oil. i also added salt and pepper. the ginger pieces were really small, so of course they got burned. duh. i should have added them later in the roasting process or cut larger chunks.

i added the roasted veggies to the blender with my homemade chicken stock and blammo — soup!

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(note: this cookbook was published in australia. i think lovage is used like parsley.)

maple-roasted carrot and ginger soup

2kg (4 1/2 lb) carrots, cut into roughly little finger-sized pieces
2 onions, cut into eighths
4cm (1 3/4 in) piece of stem ginger, cut into matchsticks
4 garlic cloves, peeled
3 tbsp sunflower oil
4 tbsp maple syrup
1 1/2 litres (2 3/4 pints) chicken or vegetable stock
a couple of squeezes of lemon juice (optional)
salt and freshly ground black pepper
chopped lovage, to serve

1. Preheat the oven to 220°C/425°F/Gas Mark 7. Place the carrots in a roasting tin with all the rest of the ingredients except the stock, lemon juice, salt and pepper, and the lovage. Mix thoroughly with your hands, then smooth down lightly. Roast for some 45–60 minutes, turning occasionally, until the vegetables are very tender and patched here and there with brown.

2. Cool slightly, then scrape into a liquidizer, including as much as you can scrape off of the brown sticky residues at the bottom of the tin. Add half the stock and liquidize until smooth, adding more stock if necessary. You may need to do this in batches.

3. Pour into a saucepan, stir in the last of the stock, adding extra if necessary to thin the soup, and then taste and correct the seasoning, adding a couple of squeezes of lemon juice if you find the sweetness too intense. Adequate seasoning will also balance this. Heat up well just before serving, and sprinkle each bowlful with chopped lovage.

Recipe from The Soup Book by Sophie Grigson.

a homemade indian meal i’ll never forget

so this post is way late. i took these photos months ago when my friend sreya, aka my baking student, came over to teach me how to cook indian food. i put them in a folder all set to post about them and then i cleaned up my desktop. yeah, you know what i’m going to say now, right? into a folder they went and out of my brain they went! better late then never.

sreya brought over the ingredients and together we made this delicious indian veggie meal. the process was amazing. we made tikka masala from scratch. we added cilantro to everything at the last minute as a flavorful garnish. the only thing we didn’t make was the naan. we had much fun that day and then sat down to a gorgeous dinner. here’s the proof!

pakora — a yummy appetizer of cauliflower, potato and onion.

this is the pakora batter….

and here they are getting the bubbly treatment. you just grab little handfuls of the batter and fry. we ate them warm while we were cooking. such a treat!

chana masala. sreya boiled the chana at home so we wouldn’t have to, which made it a lot quicker to our bellies!

aloo gobi, my favorite, starting to cook. it’s a mix of potato, tomato and cauliflower. it’s delish!

believe it or not, this is the beginning of homemade tikka masala. we actually ground up red onions in a little spice grinder. you cook the ground onions with spices and it makes for a smooth, rich sauce.

while making the tikka masala, we had another pan going to brown the paneer cubes.

here’s the paneer all crispy and ready to go into the tikka masala. y-u-m!

the perfect marriage of the 2 together. paneer tikka masala is one of my all-time fave indian dishes and this one was wonderful. the rich sauce was full of spices and we added bell peppers for color/flavor. so good.

and to sop up all that yummy sauce? naan! we put them on a griddle so they got warm and toasty.

then we had galub jamun for dessert. you fry these little dough balls and then soak them in a sugar syrup until they’re saturated. we made these first so they’d be ready by the end of dinner.

the finished product. we spent all day cooking and it was worth every second. the food was delicious, the company was lovely and i learned some new dishes to add to my repertoire. i was even left with a little kit of the spices we used that day so i could try these dishes on my own. thank you, sreya!

superbowl snack goodness

check it out — mini corn dog muffins. i made these for a superbowl party last week and they were a hit. try ‘em!

this photo kind of sucks, but trust me, these babies are delish!

i didn’t even use the corn muffin base the recipe author used, i bought good ‘ol jiffy corn muffin mix and went to town. that stuff is damn good for .99 a box!

pop a tablespoon of corn muffin mix into each mini muffin cup, top with a small slice of hot dog and bake. that’s it!

the corn muffin bakes around the hot dog and stayed moist and yummy. when i put them on the table of the superbowl party i attended, a guy asked me what these were. i told him, he tried one and declared, “i don’t like corn dogs but i love corn bread and these are great!”. yay!

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Mini Corn Dog Muffins

Makes 48 mini muffins

Corn bread recipe adapted from AllRecipes.com

Ingredients:

1/2 cup melted butter (or 1/4 cup butter + 1/4 cup unsweetened applesauce)
1/2 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 cup buttermilk
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup cornmeal
1 cup all purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
8-10 all-beef hot dogs, cut into 1″ bites

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Combine butter and sugar in a bowl, and whisk to combine. Add eggs and whisk to incorporate. Add buttermilk and whisk to incorporate.

2. In a separate bowl, combine baking soda, cornmeal, flour, and salt, and stir to combine. Whisk into wet ingredients in two batches.

3. Spray a mini muffin tin with non-stick spray, and spoon 1 Tablespoon of batter into each mini muffin cup. Place one hot dog bite into the middle of each cup.

4. Bake for 8-12 minutes (oven temperatures vary), or until cornbread is golden brown. Cool in mini muffin tin for 5 minutes before serving. Store leftovers in the refrigerator, and re-heat for 20-30 seconds before serving.

Recipe from Iowa Girl Eats

another meatless monday

i love mushrooms. i ate them more often when i didn’t have a husband who hates them. it’s not like he forbids me to eat them or anything, it’s just easier to cook one dinner a day, ya know? so the other day i’m pinning (yes, and i am slightly obsessed) when i came across a lovely photo of mushroom barley soup from mango & tomato. i pinned it with the intention of making it soon. i thought it would be perfect for a dinner and some lunches this week.

so guess what i made today? and meatless for monday, so less!

this is the veggies all cooking before adding the broth and barley. can i just tell you amazing my kitchen smelled at this moment? i actually took this photo to remind myself of that yummy smell. the recipe is very easy and the soup comes together quickly. i didn’t use as much stock as the recipe calls for, but i may end up adding some as the week goes on. the soup is full of wonderful earthy flavors with the mushrooms and thyme. i only had fresh thyme and i added some dry oregano, too — just for kicks.

this is good stuff! easy to make and very tasty. olga recommends adding leftover meat to the soup, which would make it even heartier. yum!

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Mushroom Barley Soup

Ingredients
1 cup pearl barley
4 cups water
salt
2 teaspoons olive oil
4 carrots, peeled and chopped
1 large white onion, chopped
2 garlic cloves, chopped
4 celery stalks, peeled and chopped
2 teaspoons dry thyme
16 ounces sliced baby bella mushrooms
8 ounces sliced white mushrooms
8 cups chicken broth

Directions

1. Cook pearl barley: add pearl barley to salted water, bring to a boil. Lower the heat, cover, and cook for about 35 minutes.
2. In a soup pot, heat the oil. Add carrots and cook for 5 minutes.
3. Add onion, garlic, celery and thyme and cook for 4 minutes.
4. Add mushrooms, season with salt and pepper and cook for 15 minutes.
5. Add the chicken broth. Bring to a boil, lower the heat and simmer for 5 minutes.
6. Add cooked pearl barley and heat it through.

Recipe from Mango & Tomato

a new reason to have a bbq

i found this vintage metal tray in cambria right after the holidays and i can’t wait to use it! won’t it look fun filled with cocktails or big slabs of meat?

i had a souper wednesday!

i did it again. i made another pot of soup. i know, i know, don’t go crazy, fg. trust me, i’m nuts and i know it!

we called it chicken pho, but it wasn’t really pho. very similar, but not exactly. i used martha’s recipe out of everyday food magazine (thanks mom for the free subscription!), but went with my own broth rather than use her soup base, just like i did with the minestrone last week. i used 2 cartons of trader joe’s chicken stock, 1 low-sodium and 1 free range cos i’m not a salty kind of girl.

i made the pot when i got home from yoga, ate my share and then left it on low until hubby got home 2 hours later. the soup has rice noodles in it which don’t absorb liquid the way regular pasta would, so they didn’t get all gooey and the broth stayed the same as when i had it. to make this even easier than it already is, i used a store-bought chicken and just shredded the meat myself. quick, quick, quick! i added some sliced jalapeno, cilantro and basil for flavor. hubby put sriracha in his and loved it. now all i need are some big bowls and those cool little asian soup spoons for the full effect. hubby said, “you can make this over and over and over if you want”, so i believe it will be in the regular soup rotation!

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Asian Chicken Soup

Ingredients

Recipe from Martha Stewart’s Everyday Food magazine.

wait. i turn it on and dinner is ready in 8 hours? no way!

i’ve never been able to wrap my head around this concept. i mean, i know it works and many people use them, but cooking in a crock pot has always seemed weird to me. if there’s no work involved, then it’s like dinner never happened. ya know? hubby used to make chili in the crock pot all the time, until i found an on-the-stove recipe that kind of kicks it’s ass. my grandma gave me her old crock pot when she was cleaning out her kitchen, but i never used it. my anutie nette (her name is annette, but i’ve never once called her that…how fun is that?) recently proclaimed that she broke the ceramic insert of her beloved crock pot and needed to get another one stat. hubby offered to get her a new one for christmas and she said she couldn’t wait that long. and we’re talking like 2 weeks away! she told me she uses it several times a week to make delicious meals that come from one pot.

so i was looking through some magazines my mom handed down to me last week and i came across a recipe for beef and carrot ragu. the picture was most appetizing (see above….looks good, huh?) and the ingredients were few, so i ripped the page out. upon reading the directions, i discovered it was made in a crock pot. i figured this was fate and bought the ingredients a few days later.

side note: my butcher bf told me to get regular short ribs and cut the meat off the bone. he said if i ask for “boneless short ribs” they’ll take some other cut of meat and try to pass it off as short ribs and it won’t be what i want. thanks for the advice, butch. you’re the best!

the other thing about crock pot cooking is there is light math involved and i am not a math girl. at all. if i want to eat by ______, then i need to get this pot going by ______. now i know that’s not rocket science, but putting time limits on when i need to start dinner just perplexes me. i did figure out that to eat by 7:00 pm, i needed to get this pot going by 10:00 or 11:00 am. whew!

ragu before turning on crock pot. just a bunch of ingredients layered in the thing.

ragu during cooking (around 4 hours of cooking) and after a good stir. kinda looks like stew, huh? it doesn’t look like much, but my house smelled incredible! this is where i left the house, took a bikram class, showered at the studio and drove home. the most amazing thing was that i came home to an almost complete meal!

ragu after and on top of pappardelle pasta! i did shred the meat apart a bit cos the chunks just kind of stayed together, even after 8 hours of cooking. the sauce was very good and chock full of carrots. we added some chopped basil and grated parm for a garnish and it was most good! i ended up calling auntie nette last night to let her know of my crock pot adventures and she sounded very pleased. she named many things she makes in her crock pot, such as beef stew, spaghetti sauce, bbq pork…she even cooks a whole chicken or 2 in hers. i’m now going to search out some more recipes and get this baby in the cooking rotation!

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warm soup on a cold night

guess what i had for dinner tonight? yep, a big bowl of minestrone and it was darn good! the recipe was for chicken minestrone, but i decided to add extra veggies and ditch the chicken. hello meatless monday! except it was tuesday. ;)

this is how the soup was supposed to look, but i used different pasta and 86’d chicken. i also didn’t use the soup base recipe that martha made, i did my own thing. i used organic chicken stock and added some low sodium chicken base for extra flavor and the soup was done much quicker. i also recommend adding the parmesan rind because it adds a rich flavor to the broth. yum!

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Rustic Chicken Minestrone

Ingredients

christmas caramels

i made fleur de sel caramels to share for christmas.

that is all.

volunteering makes me feel good

here’s my second cake for the non-profit cake4kids. they requested a cake with strawberries and bananas, so i made a yellow cake with fresh strawberries and bananas in the middle. i also used a non-dairy whipped cream to frost the cake, which gave the whole thing a nice, light texture. it’s amazing how much butter weighs! this cake was light as air when i put it into the box. i opted to use pre-made Cars decorations (another request from the birthday boy) as I knew my hand drawn Lightning McQueen and Mater would be unrecognizable. serious. i am in love with my colorful sprinkles, though. i used them on the last cake i made and have a feeling they’re going to be a staple. don’t they add a festive touch?

i delivered it to the foster office for the birthday boy and the women who worked there were very excited about it. it made me feel so good! they said this was only their second free cake with cake4kids and they were so happy to be involved with them. i hope gilberto enjoys his birthday and cake!