Apple Butter (Page 916)

RECIPE #1027

• Date: Saturday, September 12, 2009 -- 2pm
• Location: Bloomington, IN
• Kitchen: My Apartment
• Dining Companion: Matty
• Recipe Rating: A-
  

Since I was already digging out my canning supplies and sterilizing jars to make the plum butter last weekend, I figured I would go ahead and make this apple butter too! I started by sterilizing jars and lids in my boiling water canner. Then I combined wedges of peeled, cored, apples, apple cider, lemon juice, dark brown sugar, cinnamon, and allspice in a pot. I boiled until the apples were tender, then I put the mixture through a food mill (read post below to hear how I felt about that!). I put the puree back on the stove, and simmered, stirring frequently, for about an hour and a half. Then I ladled the apple butter into the sterilized jars, sealed them, and processed them in the boiling water canner. Ok, that's not actually true. Although this recipe claimed to make 4 cups, it really made only slightly more than 1 cup. That meant I had only one full jar of apple butter. So I did not process the jars but rather just the jar of apple butter. It was a shame too because this apple butter was tasty! I would have liked to have four jars of it around rather than just a smidgeon more than one jar. But I knew this would happen when I read the recipe. The recipe only called for four apples. Anyone who has ever canned fruit will tell you that one apple is not going to make enough preserves to fill a half-pint jar. So there was no way those four apples were going to fill four jars. That issue aside, this recipe was great! The apple butter had a wonderful fall flavor to it: apples and cinnamon! It wasn't too sweet, but rather had a lovely sweet-tart balance. The texture wasn't quite as smooth as that of the plum butter (see post below), but it was still very nice. Overall, a solid recipe -- I only wish it had made more!

This recipe isn't online.

Yesterday after my 18-mile run, I napped for a couple hours. It was the middle of the afternoon, and the sun was barely peaking through an otherwise overcast day. I was laying in bed, mostly asleep, while my special gentleman sat in bed next to me watching a B movie about aliens. It was absolutely perfect. I love to sleep. I find it to be a great joy. In particular I love to nap. I rarely do it though, as I rarely feel justified sleeping in the middle of the day. Sometimes I sleep for 15 minutes in my office in the late afternoon, when I am desperate for a pick-me-up, but usually I only take long naps when I am sick. It's a shame -- napping is wonderful. There is something so luxurious about sleeping in the middle of the day, with the sun streaming in the windows. Luckily after a more-than-three-hour run I feel justified getting some sleep. My Sunday afternoon post-run nap has become a weekly tradition that I very much look forward to!

Today, unfortunately, was not the type of day that involved a relaxing mid-afternoon nap in bed. Rather, it involved exam writing, and talking to students about academic misconducts, amongst other things. Ugh. It was exhausting day. In fact, I feel like going to bed at this not-so-late hour of 9:30pm!

Plum Butter (Page 921)

RECIPE #1026

• Date: Saturday, September 12, 2009 -- 2pm
• Location: Bloomington, IN
• Kitchen: My Apartment
• Dining Companions: Terry and Matty
• Recipe Rating: A-
  

Today is my dad's birthday (Happy Birthday Dad!), so I made this plum butter last weekend to send to him as a birthday present. He is trying to reduce the high fructose corn syrup in his diet (a noble cause that I don't think I could adopt -- I love candy too, too much!). Early in his efforts to cut out high fructose corn syrup he noted that one place it appears very frequently is in jams and jellies. There are a few brands made with good old fashioned sugar, but most of the jams and jellies at the grocery store are full of high fructose corn syrup. So, I figured I would make him some plum preserves, sweetened the homemade way: with sugar!

First I started by digging out my many canning supplies. I go through phases when I can frequently and phases when I don't. As of late I have been in one of the latter phases. Once I dug out all my supplies I went through the process of sterilizing the jars and lids in my boiling water canner. Then I scraped the seeds from a vanilla bean into a large pot, then added the pod, pitted and sliced plums, sugar, and lemon juice. I boiled the mixture until the plums were tender. Then I removed the vanilla pod and forced the plum mixture through a food mill fitted with a fine disk. I will admit, I don't like using my food mill. I love that thing because the results it produces are so fantastic, but it's a pain to crank and inevitably whatever I am trying to put through it doesn't want to go through so it takes forever! So I was cranky (haha!) using the food mill, but the results were wonderful: fantastically smooth plum puree! I returned the puree to the stove and simmered it, stirring often, for two hours. Then I ladled the plum butter into the sterilized jars, sealed them, and processed them by boiling them for ten minutes in my boiling water canner.

The result: yum! There have been some jams/jellies from The Book that I haven't liked so much (Nectarine Preserves with Basil comes to mind) and they eventually ended up in the trash. After my special gentleman took one taste of this plum butter he said, "Well, this one won't get thrown away!" Indeed it will not. The preserves are rich with plum flavor, and the vanilla is an excellent complement. The texture is also perfect: smooth and thick. My only complaint is that the preserves are a little on the sweet side. This bothered me when I was eating this stuff by the spoonful on the day I made it, but actually on a peanut butter and jelly sandwich it doesn't seem so sweet. I don't dislike plums, but I also never seek them out. This recipe, though, gave me a whole new appreciation for the flavor of the fruit. Yum!

The recipe is here.

When I called my dad today to wish him a Happy Birthday he was making bread. I imagine this plum butter would go well with a nice hot piece of homemade bread! I hope he enjoys it. Happy Birthday Dad!

Chicken Club Sandwiches (Page 188)

RECIPE #1025

• Date: Sunday, September 13, 2009 -- 6pm
• Location: Bloomington, IN
• Kitchen: My Apartment
• Fellow Chef: Matty
• Recipe Rating: B+
  

Finding the perfect meal to make after a long run is tricky business. It's good to eat something substantial, with a nice balance of carbohydrates, fat, and protein. But I also usually want to make something that is quick, since after running 15 or more miles I rarely feel like standing on my feet for much longer. I have settled on the following routine. I do my long run on Sunday morning/early afternoon. When I get home I eat take-out (e.g. Taco Bell) or something that is easy to make (e.g. Kraft Mac and Cheese). I follow lunch up with a nice nap. And when I wake from my nap I am usually hungry, and feeling recovered sufficiently to stand up long enough to make something to eat! This recipe was the post-run selection from last week.

I started by poaching some chicken breasts, then slicing them into 1/4 inch slices. My special gentleman browned some bacon, then stirred together mayonnaise, sour cream, parsley, lemon zest, lemon juice, salt, and pepper. He toasted some white sandwich bread, then assembled the sandwiches with three pieces of bread, herbed mayo, bacon, tomato, Boston lettuce, avocado, and chicken breast slices. The resulting sandwich was pretty tasty. I have to admit, chicken clubs are not my favorite of all sandwiches, but for a chicken club, this was quite good. My special gentleman likes chicken clubs and he was very taken with this rendition. He thought the herbed mayo was too heavy on the lemon and parsley though. I thought the parsley was unobjectionable and I liked the burst of lemony flavor, so it seems that was a matter of taste. The bacon-avocado-tomato-lettuce combination is a tried and true recipe for deliciousness, and it worked well here. I didn't think the chicken added too much to the sandwich, but it wasn't bad either. There was nothing particularly special or grabbing about this sandwich, but it was tasty and I would certainly eat it again.

This recipe isn't online.

This morning when we started our long run it was cold and thunderstorming. There were four cars in the parking lot at the trailhead: mine, my husband's [we brought both cars in case someone needed to bail early], our friend Paul's [who my husband runs with], and another car with a bumper sticker that just said, "26.2." Paul, Matty, and I looked around the parking lot and all had the same thought: only the crazies are out today! Indeed the trail was empty except for people who were clearly in training. I was not super excited about the weather for the first 10 miles or so. By mile 2 my clothes were soaked, and by mile 6 my shoes were saturated with water too. Around mile 10 I began to appreciate the weather more. Since the trail was empty and I was running alone, I sang along to the music on my iPod as loud as I could. In the 16th mile it started to really pour, and the pouring down rain was exactly what I needed to get me through those last two miles. When I hit the 18 mile mark I was tired (and very, very wet!) but I felt pretty ok. My first 18 mile training run was about a month ago now, and it was brutal. I collapsed in the grass and my special gentleman had to pick me up. During the car ride home I had tears in my eyes from the pain (blisters, and chafing, and angry joints) and I remember doing a lot of whimpering. But I have learned a few things since then. Generous and intelligent use of Body Glide and bandages goes a long way towards preventing post-run pain from chafing and blisters. And I suppose my joints are getting used to the realities of marathon training. Today there was no collapsing. I drove myself home after the run and there were no tears. Also no whimpering. It was a hard run (of course!), but it's getting easier. And I am starting to believe in the possibility of 26.2.

Shrimp Dumplings with Dipping Sauce (Page 59)

RECIPE #1024

• Date: Sunday, September 13, 2009 -- 6pm
• Location: Bloomington, IN
• Kitchen: My Apartment
• Dining Companion: Matty
• Recipe Rating: B
  

This recipe was on the list generated by the random number generator. I started by pureeing some shrimp in the food processor, then finely chopping the remaining shrimp. I combined the shrimp with chopped water chestnuts, egg white, scallion greens, ginger and soy sauce. I used wonton wrappers to form dumplings, filled with the shrimp mixture. I pan fried these dumpings to brown them, then added some boiling water and steamed the dumplings until the filling was cooked. I served them with a dipping sauce of soy sauce, sugar, ginger, and scallion greens. These dumplings were pretty good. I prefer some pork in my dumplings, rather than just shrimp, but the filling still had a good flavor. My special gentleman complained that there was too much water chestnut and I think he was right about that. The dipping sauce was nice, and added a necessary punch of saltiness to the dish. These dumplings were very simple to make, and for such simple dumplings they weren't bad.

The recipe is here.

Two weeks ago this evening I was driving up to Michigan to visit my husband. Little did I know that the next day we would go through two houses with our realtor (we had probably seen 25 or 30 already!) and decide to make an offer on a house. One week from this evening I will be again driving up to Michigan. And one week from tomorrow, my husband and I will be home owners! It has been a crazy few weeks! After we made our offer, the sellers countered our offer. We countered their counter to our offer. They countered our counter to their counter to our offer. We countered their counter to our counter to their counter to our offer. And they accepted! So after much back and forth, we had a purchase agreement. Since then I feel like every waking moment that has not been spent on teaching or research has been spent either on the phone (with our realtor, or our mortgage guy, or the inspectors, or the insurance agent, or....) or at a fax machine! Man, there is a lot of paperwork and logistics involved in buying a house! I have actually been on my phone so much that it broke! (Addition to my to-do list: But new phone). But it looks like we are in the home stretch. Our closing date is set. I think (hope!) that I have done everything I need to do until we close.

I just can't wrap my head around the fact that we are actually going to own a home. We have moved around so, so much. The idea of settling into a space that is really our own is incredibly exciting. Plus, I love our new house. It's completely lovely. So, keep your fingers crossed that the next week goes smoothly for us!

Coffee Almond Ice Cream Cake with Dark Chocolate Sauce (Page 868)

RECIPE #1023

• Date: Saturday, September 12, 2009 -- 8pm
• Location: Bloomington, IN
• Kitchen: My Apartment
• Dining Companions: Matty, Mike M, and Teresa
• Recipe Rating: B+
  

Mike's birthday was this weekend, and to celebrate Mike and Teresa invited us over for some grilled meat! I offered to bring a birthday cake, and when I gave Mike his options from The Book, this was the one he chose! To make the cake I first crushed chocolate wafer cookies, mixed the crumbs with some butter, and pressed the mixture onto the bottom (and 1 inch up the sides) of a springform pan. I froze the crust for 30 minutes, then I spread softened coffee ice cream into it. I put the pan back in the freezer for another 30 minutes. Meanwhile, I crushed amaretti (Italian almond macaroons) then whipped heavy cream with vanilla and folded in the crushed cookies. I spread this mixture on top of the coffee ice cream, sprinkled the top with toasted sliced almonds, and returned the cake to the freezer. Before serving I let the cake thaw in the refrigerator for about 20 minutes, then I sliced it and served it with dark chocolate sauce. This cake was pretty good. The crust was delicious (mmmm... crushed up cookies!), and the ice cream and whipped cream layers both had a good flavor to them. I prefer ice cream cakes that have more textural contrast though. For instance, I would have liked a fudgey layer of chocolate sauce inside the cake as well. There was sauce served with it, and that helped, but I think ice cream cake with a saucy layer inside is quite nice. The cake was quite pretty, however, and I think everyone enjoyed eating it. There are better ice cream cakes out there, but for a simple and quick to throw together ice cream cake, this was a good recipe.

The recipe is here.

Lately I have had extremely intense and specific food cravings. When we were in England two months ago I had an overwhelming desire for desserts consisting of baked apples and some type of pastry (apple pie, apple crisp, apple crumble, apple dumplings....). Luckily these types of desserts are easy to find in England and I ate them every day. About a month ago I developed a taste for Taco Bell and for weeks I was craving beef tacos and chips with nacho cheese sauce. After Taco Bell it was SweeTarts -- particularly the purple ones. Last week I wanted Cream of Wheat, and indeed I ate it for dinner three days in a row. Right now I am sitting at work at 7pm, thinking about making some of the ramen that is in my desk. I don't even particularly like ramen -- I only have a stash in my desk because my special gentleman keeps one there for when he visits (he keeps an emergency stash of ramen anywhere where he spends a lot of time!). But right now, ramen sounds so good!

So I have been trying to figure out, why all the cravings? (No, I am not pregnant!) It has gotten pretty bad. Underlying all the other cravings has been an ongoing sugar craving. Specifically I have been craving candy. Now, if I kept any candy in my apartment, I would eat way too much of it. I love, love, love candy -- particularly anything that is truly empty calories: gummy bears, SweeTarts, sour patch kids, etc... I actually prefer that kind of candy to candy with chocolate in it! So, to stop myself from consuming all my calories in candy, I don't keep any candy around the house. The sugar cravings are so intense though that I have had to take some desperate measures. I have started eating Aunt Jamima syrup by the spoonful. That's right -- I am drinking fake maple syrup. And when the syrup hasn't sounded good I have resorted to another old standby: spoonfuls of brown sugar straight from the canister. It's a little pathetic.

The only explanation I can think of for my strong an inexplicable food needs is that lately I have been doing a lot of running. The food cravings hit around the same time that my weekly long runs hit the 15-mile-or-longer range. I can't help wondering if my body is responding to the abuse I am putting it through. Maybe it is trying to store calories, knowing that in a few days I will run for more than 4 hours straight, without eating anything. Or maybe it is trying to make up for the calories it depleted the last time I did that. Who knows! But for now I have decided just to go with the cravings. I figure, if my body wants these foods so badly, there must be some reason!

Cold Curried Carrot and Coconut Milk Soup (Page 88)

RECIPE #1022

• Date: Thursday, September 10, 2009 -- 9pm
• Location: Bloomington, IN
• Kitchen: My Apartment
• Dining Companion: Matty
• Recipe Rating: B+
  

The other day I was looking through my project statistics at the bottom of the Project Index site that Alex set up for me, and I was surprised to see that the Soups section is one where I am starting to fall behind. It seemed crazy because I love soup! I love making soup. I love eating soup. How could the Soups section be going so slowly? But a brief flip through the section in The Book reminded me: the first 15 recipes in the section are for cold soups. I love soup, but I love my soup hot! Aside from cold sour cherry soup (which is pretty awesome) I have never met a cold soup that I really loved. It's been hot in Indiana lately though, so I thought I should take this opportunity to make some cold soup. I started by cooking scallions, onion, ginger, curry powder, salt, and pepper in a saucepan. I added carrots and chicken stock, covered, and simmered until tender. Then I added coconut milk and pureed it with my immersion blender (I love that thing!). I seasoned with lime juice and chilled until cold. The verdict: it was pretty good, but my first thought was, "I would like this better served hot!" Carrots and ginger always make a nice combination, and the pairing was well balanced in this soup. The addition of coconut milk rather than cream or milk gave the soup a bit of an Asian taste, which the lime juice enhanced. I would have liked it quite a bit as a hot soup. As a cold soup I could take it or leave it.

The recipe is here.

What a lovely weekend! This weekend it was my special gentleman's turn to travel, so instead of driving to Michigan I stayed in Indiana and he came to me! On Friday night we celebrated the three year anniversary of our first date with a delicious dinner at Restaurant Tallent. We ate until we were ridiculously stuffed, and everything we ordered was completely wonderful. Since we have been traveling so much we hadn't been back to Tallent since we had our wedding reception there -- it was fun to be reminded of that celebration.

On Saturday we had a relaxing day -- I did a bunch of cooking. It's going to be a busy week, so I wanted to get some cooking from The Book out of the way this weekend. Then on Saturday night we went over to Mike and Teresa's to celebrate Mike's birthday. They grilled tons of delicious meat, and we had another huge meal! It was really fun. Hamburgers, lamb, guacamole, beer, ice cream cake... Yum!!

After a weekend of eating, this morning we went for a long run. I cut back to 16 miles this week (I wasn't in the mood for another 20 miler this weekend). The run went really well. It's hot here, but 16 miles still felt pretty easy, and even at the end I wasn't suffering too much. It gives me hope that in a month and a half I will be able to make it 26.2! After my long run I ate some Taco Bell, took a shower, and then a nap. We ate another big dinner tonight -- this time one we made ourselves: chicken club sandwiches and shrimp dumplings.

Now I am feeling refreshed and ready for the week ahead!

Shredded Pork and Lemon Coleslaw Sandwiches (Page 192)

RECIPE #1021

• Date: Monday, August 31, 2009 -- 8pm
• Location: Bloomington, IN
• Kitchen: My Apartment
• Dining Companion: Matty
• Recipe Rating: B
  

New love often blossoms out of common interests. Since my husband and I are both mathematicians, one might guess that math was the common interest that our romance blossomed out of. True, we met through our jobs. But I think the common interest that really brought us together was our love of food. We lived in the same neighborhood in Cambridge/Somerville, Massachusetts, and many of our early dates involved exploring the restaurants in the neighborhood together. We quickly developed some favorites, and many of our later dates in Massachusetts involved going to our favorite neighborhood restaurants over and over again. When we had the, "Where should we go to dinner?" conversation, my vote was almost always for East Coast Grill, an awesome restaurant with a national reputation, which happened to be down the block from where we lived. Most people who have eaten there would describe it as a seafood place -- not me. I would describe it as a place where you can get an absolutely amazing plate of pulled pork, cornbread, coleslaw, baked beans, and watermelon. Oh my gosh is it good. It's so good that it has almost ruined all other pulled pork for me.

So, last week I made this recipe, and at the first bite I thought, "This isn't nearly as good as East Coast Grill." And that pretty much summarizes how I felt about the recipe. It wasn't bad. Pulled pork is delicious. But the sauce didn't have a slow-cooked depth to it (probably because it wasn't particularly slowly cooked), and the pork wasn't melt in your mouth tender. On the up side, it was fast and simple to make. I cooked some onion and garlic in oil, added cider vinegar, ketchup, chili sauce, Worcestershire sauce, Tabasco, water, salt, and pepper then cooked for ten minutes. Then I added a pork tenderloin and cooked until tender. I took the pork out, shredded it, and pureed the cooking liquid. I returned the pork to the sauce and served it on hamburger buns, topped with lemon coleslaw (see post below). As I ate it, sauce dripped down to my elbows and I was pretty happy. But at the same time I was wishing that I still lived down the street from the most awesome plate of pulled pork I have ever enjoyed. That's how I felt about this one.

The recipe in The Book is the same as this one, except that the one in The Book calls for these sandwiches to be served on hamburger buns, whereas the one online calls for them to be served as wraps.

Three years ago this week my special gentleman and I went on our very first date. We ate Korean barbecue in Cambridge, MA, then sat on the porch at his place eating ice cream. It was perfect.

One year ago this week my special gentleman proposed during my business calculus lecture, in front of my 80 students. Afterward we had a very celebratory dinner at the wonderful restaurant in Bloomington, Indiana where we later had our wedding.

Tomorrow we will be dining there once again. And once again it will be in celebration. We will be celebrating not only three wonderful years together, but also the fact that we are buying a house! We don't close for another couple weeks, but we signed our names at the bottom of a purchase agreement yesterday! And we are so very excited!

What an exciting few years we have had, with so much to celebrate: our engagement, our marriage, new jobs, a new house (!)... We are very, very lucky. And luckier still that we have had the opportunity to toast all of these blessings over some delicious meals!

Lemon Coleslaw (Page 193)

RECIPE #1020

• Date: Monday, August 31, 2009 -- 8pm
• Location: Bloomington, IN
• Kitchen: My Apartment
• Dining Companion: Matty
• Recipe Rating: B
  

This coleslaw is a component recipe for some pork sandwiches I made last week. I started by making the dressing: whisking together sour cream, mayo, lemon zest, lemon juice, water, sugar, salt, and pepper. Then I added thinly sliced cabbage, grated carrots, sliced scallions, and chopped parsley. I tossed this all together and let it chill for one hour before serving it on the pork sandwiches. I wasn't a huge fan of this coleslaw. The lemon was refreshing, but the dressing was too watery. I also didn't find it rich enough for a coleslaw dressing. With only 2 tablespoons of sour cream and 2 teaspoons of mayo, it didn't have the creaminess one typically thinks of in coleslaw dressing. I would have preferred it had the dressing had less water and more mayo. My main complaint though was that the flavor of the coleslaw was overpowered by the scallions. One cup of sliced scallions is quite a lot -- the scallion flavor was certainly dominant and I didn't care for that. My special gentleman thought the parsley flavor was also too strong. Typically you want to bring out the flavors of cabbage and carrot when you make a coleslaw, but that was definitely not the case in this recipe. All that said, this slaw was perfectly fine served on the pork sandwiches. But eaten alone it left something to be desired.

The recipe is here.

I am feeling, at this moment, a little overwhelmed. Normally my life has a nice balance to it: research, teaching, running, cooking, hanging out with my special gentleman and other friends. It all seems to fit together just fine, and since I love both my job and my hobbies (and of course my husband and my friends!), I am generally quite happy. The last few weeks, though, my balance has been a little disrupted. Typically I have about 130 students per semester -- this semester I have 330. So teaching is taking more time than usual. And training for a marathon is definitely more intense than my usual running schedule. A 20 mile run takes up a good chunk of time -- add the recovery time and it can eat up half a day! Of course I am also commuting to Michigan every other weekend, where my special gentleman is getting settled. Meanwhile I am still unpacking in my new apartment in Indiana. And we are buying our first house. So basically things are a little crazy. I am going to bed early and getting up early these days -- trying to jam as much productivity as I can into each day. But it's not entirely successful. There are dishes in the sink, and wedding thank-yous that still desperately need to be written. I will be happy when I can check a few things off my list. Hopefully we will soon own a house. In a couple months the marathon will be over. And once I get settled into the rhythm of the semester the teaching will be more manageable. In the meantime, I will attempt to keep my head above water!

Mu Shu Vegetables with Barbecued Pork (Page 489)

RECIPE #1019

• Date: Saturday, August 29, 2009 -- 8pm
• Location: Bloomington, IN
• Kitchen: My Apartment
• Fellow Chef: Matty
• Recipe Rating: B+
  

It's a mystery even to me that I hadn't made this recipe yet, since mu shu is one of my favorites. It is my standard order at any Chinese restaurant. Before making this, though, I had actually never made it myself. In a way I am disinterested in learning to make the things I like to order most in restaurants. I already know just where to find excellent paneer makhani, for instance, so I don't need to make it at home. Or maybe more accurately, I worry that if I made those things myself the restaurant versions would lose their mystery and appeal. Before making this I had never thought about exactly which vegetables were in my mu shu -- it was just a mysterious and delicious blend. And I have no idea what is in the sauce that my paneer sits in when I order paneer makhani, but I like it that way. So perhaps I put off making this recipe for so long simply because I didn't want to ruin the mystery of mu shu forever. But the time came, whatever mystery there was is now gone, and I could still go for some take-out mu shu right now, so perhaps I needn't have worried!

Anyway, I started by coating pork loin in a mixture of hoisin sauce, soy sauce, sake, ketchup, sugar, and garlic. I roasted the pork to 150 degrees then cut it into thin strips. I added vegetable oil to a hot wok, then stir-fried strips of leek, minced garlic, minced ginger, red pepper flakes, and thinly sliced shitake mushroom caps for 2 minutes. Then I added thinly sliced cabbage and some sake and cooked another 2 minutes. I added a sauce of cornstarch, chicken broth, soy sauce, sake, sugar, and pepper. Then I added thinly sliced snow peas and the strips of pork. I cooked it another 2 minutes, then served it with Mock Mandarin Pancakes (see post below) spread with some hoisin sauce. This mu shu was good, but not as good as my favorite Chinese take-out versions! The pork had a good flavor to it and the composition of the vegetable mixture was nice. The recipe called for the leeks to be cut into 2-to-3 inch long strips. I cut mine about 3 inches and they were much too long. Because leeks are rather stringy, they made the dish difficult to eat. If I were to make this again I would cut them into 1 inch lengths at most. As discussed in the post below, the mock pancakes were not as delicious as the real thing, but they were super quick to make, which was a plus. My special gentleman liked this mu shu quite a lot, in particular because it was much less greasy than what you typically get in restaurants. I appreciated that too, but I think I will still be ordering mu shu rather than making this version in the future!

This recipe isn't online.

When we were growing up my parents never forced my brother and I to eat when we weren't hungry. This is something that I believe strongly in, and when I have kids I will certainly not be telling them to eat when they don't want to. I very much dislike the feeling of eating when I am not hungry, and I pretty much only do so when politeness in a social situation requires it. So today it was very unusual to be having the following conversation with my special gentleman:

Me: "I don't want to eat it. I'm not hungry."
Him: "It doesn't matter. You need to eat it."
Me: "No thanks."
Him: "You are going to finish that bowl."
Me: "But I'm not hungry."
Him: "It doesn't matter. Just eat it."

It went on like this for quite some time. Finally I caved and ate the bowl of macaroni and cheese that we were discussing. I pouted and complained throughout -- hating the feeling of eating when I really had no desire to. He was right though -- it was important that I ate it. This conversation occured about 30 minutes after I finished a 20 mile run. For whatever reason, I never feel like eating after a long run (this, I am told by other runners, is very unusual!). Since I don't feel hungry, I don't eat. Then, several hours later, I feel terrible. My special gentleman, excellent at seeing patterns, learned this long ago. He has since tried to force me to eat post-run. And eventually I cave, as I did today, and force some food into me. And of course he is right: three hours post-run instead of lying in bed feeling like I wanted to die, I felt pretty ok this afternoon. And I was genuinely hungry for more food. One thing I have learned about distance running is that my normal eating habits don't apply. Last night at dinner I forced myself to eat until I was tremendously full (another thing I don't like to do), knowing that I was going to run 20 miles first thing this morning. It definitely helps to do that (just as the post-run mac and cheese helps) but I don't like the way it feels...

On the upside, my first 20 mile run ever went pretty well! The first 14 miles felt great, the next 3 felt sort of ok, and the last 3 were rough. But that's to be expected. Now I only have 6.2 more miles to go! Whoo hoo!

Mock Mandarin Pancakes (Page 490)

RECIPE #1018

• Date: Saturday, August 29, 2009 -- 8pm
• Location: Bloomington, IN
• Kitchen: My Apartment
• Fellow Chef: Matty
• Recipe Rating: B
  

This was a component recipe for a Mu Shu dish that I made last week. This recipe was super simple. We took flour tortillas, brushed them with sesame oil, and heated them in the oven, wrapped in foil. The net result was perfectly fine, although I am not going to lie -- real mu shu pancakes would have been better. Flour tortillas are a decent substitute, but they are much thicker and different in flavor than the traditional wraps for mu shu. For dinner at home I was happy enough with this substitution, but for the real mu shu experience the traditional pancakes are a must.

The recipe is here.

It has been a crazy few days! On Thursday I taught my classes then drove up to Michigan where my husband lives. It's about a five hour drive, and since I teach until 5:15pm I didn't get on the road until about 6pm. The drive was easy enough, though, and I was there by 11pm. Yesterday we worked most of the day, and then did some house-hunting in the afternoon. We saw a couple houses we liked a lot, including a second visit to a house we had seen a few weeks ago. The second visit convinced us that we should make an offer on it -- and we did! So at 8pm on a Friday night we were sitting in our realtor's office, writing an offer on a house. Now we are just waiting -- supposedly we should hear something by tomorrow night! It's very exciting!!

Today we started the day by meeting our friends Corbett and Mary (and their adorable baby Allison!) at a county park. They also just moved to East Lansing, so we thought we would explore a bit of what the area has to offer together. It was a beautiful day -- we hung out for a few hours at the park and then my special gentleman and I headed over to the Michigan State Football game. I love college football, and we had a great time eating hot dogs and cheering our team on to victory. After a long day in the sun, I took a very relaxing nap and then we ate tons of Mexican food! It was a lovely day.

I am not so excited about tomorrow, since it will be my first attempt at a 20 mile run, and I have a feeling it is going to be brutal. Hopefully, though, tomorrow will also include good news about the house! I've got my fingers crossed!

Yuca Fries (Page 589)

RECIPE #1017

• Date: Saturday, August 29, 2009 -- 8pm
• Location: Bloomington, IN
• Kitchen: My Apartment
• Fellow Chef: Matty
• Recipe Rating: B-
  

This was my fourth attempt to make this recipe, and I am happy to say that this time I actually made it. The previous three attempts were foiled by the fact that the yuca I bought was not fresh. yuca spoils quickly, but it is difficult to detect whether it is spoiled or not from the outside (it might have an ammonia smell...). In any event, my previous 3 yucas had many black veins through them when I cut them open, indicating that they were not so fresh. I suppose yuca doesn't fly off the shelves in small town Indiana. In any event, my fourth yuca was fresh enough, so I went ahead with the recipe. I cut the yuca crosswise into 3 inch pieces and then peeled it. I cooked the yuca pieces in boiling salted water until tender. Then I cut them into wedges and deep-fried them until they were golden brown. Then I salted them and served them with ketchup. These fries were fine. Deep-fried vegetables rarely taste bad. I didn't particularly care for their texture however. They were starchy like potato fries, but substantially denser. Consequently they didn't have the light fluffy interior that makes French fries so delightful. They were interesting to try once, but I wouldn't make them again. French fries are just as easy (or easier) to make and I find them tastier.

The recipe in The Book is similar to this one, but without the chipotle mayo and the yuca fries in The Book are thicker.

When I got home from work this evening I sat down on the sofa, exhausted. It was an easy day -- I don't teach on Wednesdays, so I was just in my office all day, working on my research. But after a day of thinking hard I was tired, and the last thing I felt like doing was going for a run.

My marathon training is not going so well. I have not been injured -- I have just been lazy. I found it hard to stay on schedule while traveling, and I traveled pretty much all summer. So by the time it came around to my 18 mile long run last week, it kicked my butt. At the end of the run I ended up collapsed in the grass, unable to even walk the quarter-mile to where my car was parked. This is not good. So this week I tried to do a better job of training, in hopes of getting back on track for these last two months before the marathon.

To that end, this evening when I was sitting on the sofa feeling tired and lazy I forced myself to get up anyway, put on my running shoes, and get out of the house. As I stood at the trailhead, I thought, "Well at least it's only 7 miles." Better to be miserable for 7 miles than for 18! But much to my surprise, as soon as I started running, I felt great. It was a comfortable run and at a nice pace. So maybe I am getting into the swing of things. This weekend will be my first 20 miler. I am both nervous and excited about that milestone. You often hear people say, "If you can run 20 miles, you can run a marathon!" Who knows if that's true, but since I have never run 20 miles, it never applied to me anyway. Now it just might...

Fried Artichokes (Page 519)

RECIPE #1016

• Date: Saturday, August 29, 2009 -- 8pm
• Location: Bloomington, IN
• Kitchen: My Apartment
• Fellow Chef: Matty
• Recipe Rating: B
  

This recipe came off the list generated by the random number generator. Conceptually, this recipe was very simple. Prepare artichokes. Simmer then in oil for 15 minutes. Deep-fry them in hotter oil for 45 seconds. Sprinkle with salt. Serve. In practice, most of the work was involved in the "Prepare artichokes" step. It involved a lot of tearing, cutting, paring, scraping, etc... to get the leaves off, the green fibrous parts trimmed off, and the choke out. Once the artichokes were ready to fry there wasn't much to this recipe. The fried artichokes were certainly not bad, but neither of us was terribly excited about them either. When I saw the title "Fried Artichokes" I had some hope that they would be breaded and deep-fried (yum!) but there was sadly no breading to be found in this recipe. So the end result was just artichokes, fried. Even generously seasoned with salt they were a little bland. That said, the texture was interesting. The leaves had a delicate crunch to them while the heart was nice and tender. I didn't dislike them at all -- I just didn't find them interesting enough to want to make them again. The recipe would have been better had it contained a nice dipping sauce for these fried artichokes.

The recipe is here.

Well the first day of my classes has come and gone, and so far both my classes seem great. The students were friendly, they participated, and they generally seemed to have a positive attitude. I have a good feeling about it. And although I wasn't feeling too sure that I would like standing on a stage and wearing a microphone while I teach, the big class (250 students) was pretty fun.

Other realities of the semester are also starting to set in though. In other words, I miss my husband. I have been sitting on the couch for the last 45 minutes, nursing a headache and trying to rally to take a shower. Instead of getting up I have been thinking about how I miss my special gentleman. Of course I chose to stay in Indiana another 8 months rather than moving with him. So I have no right to complain. Further, we are only going to be apart 3 nights a week. So, I am really whining about nothing. We have lived much further apart before, and I was just fine. But since we got married it has been so nice being together all the time. I am sad to give that up. If there is any downside to having a really great husband it's that when he is not around, I miss him a lot. So I'll pout tonight. And maybe I'll pout tomorrow night too. But Thursday night I will be headed up to Michigan for the weekend, and hopefully by this time next week I will have adjusted a bit.

Cold Buttermilk and Shrimp Soup (Page 85)

RECIPE # 1015

• Date: Saturday, August 22, 2009 -- 6pm
• Location: Okemos, MI
• Kitchen: Matty's Temporary Residence
• Dining Companion: Matty
• Recipe Rating: C
  

Since we haven't yet succeeded in buying a house in East Lansing, my special gentleman is renting a house from one of the professors who is on sabbatical. I made this recipe on our first weekend in the house, selecting it because it required few ingredients and little equipment, both of which are key when cooking in an unfamiliar kitchen. To start I cooked some shrimp in their shells in boiling water. Then I peeled, deveined, and chopped them. In a bowl I whisked together buttermilk, dry mustard, salt, and sugar. I then added chopped, peeled cucumber. Now here's where it gets a little sketchy. I am reading the recipe now and seeing that next I was supposed to add chopped chives. I remember buying the chives, but I don't remember chopping them. And certainly in the picture above I don't see any chives. What I do remember chopping is radishes. And indeed I see flecks of radish in my picture. Mysteriously, there are no radishes in the recipe. So what happened? Well, I bought ingredients for two recipes that day, and the other had radishes in it. So there were radishes in the fridge and I was thinking they would get used. While I was making this recipe my special gentleman flipped the page back to see the name of the recipe (which was on the preceeding page from the ingredient list). Coincidentally, the recipe before this one (also a chop-it-up-and-stir-it-together cold soup) called for chopped radishes. Not realizing the page had been flipped, I saw the word "radish" and chopped them up. Whoops. So, this recipe didn't end up exactly as it was intended. This fact makes me a little hesitant to give it such a harsh grade, but I feel pretty confident that it would have deserved it in any case. This soup tasted just how it sounds: it was buttermilk mixed with a bit of mustard, with shrimp and cucumbers floating in it. Not my thing. It didn't taste bad exactly, but it also wasn't something I felt compelled to eat. When my special gentleman asked me if I liked it I said, "Well not really, but I don't love shrimp." His response: "I do love shrimp, but this recipe might change my mind." In summary: we didn't love it.

The recipe in The Book is the same as this one, except the one in The Book calls for only 1-2 teaspoons of dry mustard.

On Saturday morning, as I was lying in bed trying to motivate to get up, I was thinking about how it seemed almost too easy to change my name. The process was so streamlined and simple that it made it seem like a non-event to give up the last name I have lived with my whole life and adopt a new one -- my husband's. Or so I thought anyway...

On Friday I had gone to the Social Security office, where I explained to them that I wanted to drop my middle name (Meredith), make my maiden name my new middle name, and change my last name to my married name. This seemed like the perfect compromise. I didn't feel ready to abandon my maiden name (which would be impossible anyway -- I can't change my last name professionally, as I have already published in my maiden name, so my colleagues and students will always know me by my maiden name), but I did want to change my last name legally. It was easy, the social security woman was super friendly. She entered it in the system, told me to wait 24 hours and then change it at the Bureau of Motor Vehicles.

So on Saturday morning I was trying to motivate to go the BMV when I was thinking about how simple a name change was. Eventually I rallied, and waited in a very long line. When I got to the front, I explained very happily about shifting my old last name to my middle name and changing my last night. The woman paused for a second and said, "I can't do that." It turns out that in order to drop my old middle name I need a court order. So my options were to have two middle names (which didn't appeal to me) or to drop my maiden name entirely (which also didn't appeal). As I stood there, trying to deliberate quickly, as there were dozens of people behind me in line, it occured to me that this was the stumbling block I had asked for -- the event that would make me really think about the gravity of changing my name. So I picked what I thought I would like better, dropping my maiden name entirely, and I left the BMV irrationally frustrated and upset.

Yes, I could get the court order to have my name as I wanted it. But I doubt I ever will. Partly I am lazy -- there are many forms and you have to run notices in the newspaper announcing your name change (so as not to evade creditors...), etc... It sounds like a huge pain. And frankly, having now lived with my new name, Teena Meredith Hedden, for a day and a half, I like it just fine. My maiden name will always be on my office door, in the course catalog, on my research papers, etc... Legally, of course, it is no longer part of my name. But I think that is ok with me.

Santa Fe French Toast (Page 652)

RECIPE #1014

• Date: Thursday, August 20, 2009 -- 7pm
• Location: Bloomington, IN
• Kitchen: My New Apartment!
• Fellow Chef: Matty
• Recipe Rating: B+
  

Most things I see on TV don't stick with me for long, but occasionally something is shocking enough that I remember it for years. Even more occasionally, something is so shocking that I remember not only what was on the television, but also exactly where and when I watched it. One such memory: My parents were visiting me in Boston one fall while I was in graduate school and they were staying in a hotel downtown. My mom and I were in the hotel room, waiting for my dad to get back from a workout, and we were flipping through the channels. We happened upon the Food Network, where Paula Deen was preparing some of her specialties. Now, I have nothing against Paula Deen. I have only seen her show a few times, but it never fails to make me smile when I do watch it. On this particular segment, she was preparing an appetizer. For her appetizer, she started with a can of Pillsbury biscuits. Admittedly, those biscuits are pretty delicious, but they are terrible for you. Typically one prepares the biscuits by putting them on a baking sheet and baking them in the oven. Not Paula Deen! Rather than baking them, she deep-fried them! And if that wasn't crazy enough, once they had been deep-fried, she used a squirt bottle to inject them with honey butter, so that more sugary, buttery goodness would ooze out with every bite. She kept referring to this item as an "appetizer" and I kept thinking, "If that's an appetizer, what will she make for dessert?" The answer: she made bread pudding where the bread was replaced by Krispy Kreme donuts and the milk was replaced by sweetened condensed milk. By the end of the episode I was laughing so hard I was crying.

Why do I mention this? Well, this French toast recipe was striving towards that level of absurdity. The typical method for making French toast is, generally speaking, as follows: take some bread. Soak it for some amount of time in some mixture of milk, eggs, and possibly vanilla. Cook soaked pieces of toast on stovetop in some butter. Serve with syrup. What results is certainly not a health food, but it is delicious. This recipe was like that, except where one would normally use milk, this recipe called for heavy cream. And where one would normally pan-fry the pieces of bread in a bit of butter, this recipe called for them to be deep-fried. Crazy! What resulted was incredibly rich and, not surprisingly, delicious. The French toast came out moist and eggy on the inside, and golden and slightly crisp on the outside. It was very flavorful, hardly needing any syrup (and certainly not needing any butter on top!). My major complaint was just that it was so rich that it was hard to eat enough of this to make a meal out of it. We ate this for dinner, and I could only eat two pieces (each a half a slice of bread) before I was so saturated with cream that I just couldn't eat any more richness. But if you are looking for some ultra-rich special occasion French toast, this is pretty tasty. Paula Deen would be proud.

The recipe is here.

Quatre-Epices (Page 931)

RECIPE #1013

• Date: Thursday, August 20, 2009 -- 7pm
• Location: Bloomington, IN
• Kitchen: My New Apartment!
• Dining Companion: Matty
• Recipe Rating: B-
  

We were home for one evening between our trip to California and leaving for Michigan. I wanted to cook, but it was essential for dinner to be quick and require only cookware which had already been unpacked at my new place. This recipe fit the bill. I ground white peppercorns, whole nutmeg, and cloves in a spice grinder until finely ground. Then I stirred in ground ginger. That was it! This was certainly one of the simpler recipes in The Book. It's hard to grade such a thing, of course, since it is not meant to be eaten by the spoonful. Rather quatre-epices is a traditional seasoning for pates and sausages. So in order to enjoy and grade this recipe I threw together some quick sausage, which I seasoned only with this spice mix and some salt. The spicing was certainly appropriate for sausage, but I had one complaint -- this mix was much too heavy-handed with the ground ginger. I love ginger, but ground dried ginger has a distinct flavor to it, which in large quantities is not so delicious. In this case the ginger was so pronounced that it completely drowned out the flavor of the cloves (an impressive feat really). With half as much ginger in the mix I think I would have enjoyed the sausage much more.

This recipe isn't online.

What a day! After a fitful night of sleep last night, today my special gentleman and I put an offer on a house! We intially put an offer on a house about five months ago now, but it was a short sale, and the owner's bank never agreed to forgive him the difference between our offer and his debt. In fact, the owner's bank apparently never even got around to looking at our offer. After four and a half months of waiting, we decided to surrender, and yesterday we started looking again. We went through several great houses, and after much deliberation (and a night of practically zero sleep) we decided to do the unthinkable: we put an offer on another short sale! We have our fingers crossed that this one won't include months and months of waiting for the owner's bank to reply. The house we put the offer on is gorgeous, and we are hopeful, but our offer was rather low compared to the assessed value of the house, so it seems like it might be a long shot. This house is also very different from what we thought we would buy (it's bigger and fancier than what we had envisioned for ourselves...), which is part of what kept us up last night. But in the light of day this morning we felt confident that we were making the right decision. And now we just wait...

Grand Marnier Souffle (Page 844)

RECIPE #1012

• Date: Friday, August 14, 2009 -- 10pm
• Location: Palo Alto, CA
• Kitchen: Emilee and Brian's Apartment
• Dining Companions: Brian, Emilee, Chris, Emily, Alex W, Nick, Alison, and Jamie
• Recipe Rating: B
  

I originally suggested Pavlovas with Kiwis for dessert at Emilee and Brian's place last weekend, but that suggestion was not met with squeals of delight. So I started listing various other dessert options. When I hit this recipe it was the clear consensus. It was a good choice too, as Emilee and Brian had the perfect 16-inch pan for the recipe, which I do not. This was a fairly standard souffle recipe. I started by making the souffle base. I made a roux of flour and butter, cooking it for 5 minutes. Then I added hot milk and sugar. I removed the pan from the heat and added egg yolks and Grand Marnier. I then let the base cool to room temperature. Once the base had cooled I beat egg whites with salt and cream of tartar until stiff, then folded them into the base. I carefully transferred the mixture into a gratin pan, which had been buttered and sprinkled with sugar. I baked the souffle for 25 minutes. Since this souffle was baked in a low gratin dish rather than a more typical high-sided souffle dish, it didn't puff as dramatically as a typical souffle would. It was still extremeley light though, with a perfect souffle consistency. The flavor was nice -- not too eggy -- and the Grand Marnier came through clearly without being overpowering. The recipe, surprisingly, didn't call for any vanilla, and I think it would have been better if it had. The flavor was very one-note. The addition of vanilla would have given it a little more depth. My other issue with this recipe was that the souffle was really calling to have a sauce with it. A nice creme anglaise would have done wonders for this dish. Without a sauce (and because the flavor wasn't so interesting) I found the dish a bit dull. That said, it still tasted good, and almost everyone aroound the table enoyed it.

This recipe isn't online.

Yesterday my special gentleman and I caravaned from Indiana up to East Lansing, Michigan. As we passed the Welcome to Michigan sign at the Indiana/Michigan border, a wave of excitement went through me. For the first time it seemed real that we are moving to Michigan and staying there indefinitely. True, I am not really moving for another 8 months, but my special gentleman has moved, which feels like our officially beginning in Michigan.

We haven't bought a house yet. The house we put an offer on was a short sale which means the owner's bank ultimately has to accept it. Our offer sat at his bank for 4 months and they didn't even bother to look at it. Very frustrating. So we are going to start house hunting again. In the meantime, we are renting a house, which is lovely and huge, with a jacuzzi bath and a big, wooded backyard.

Last night we ate Indian food and went to the movies. I couldn't help but wonder, "How many times in our life will we eat these dishes, at this restaurant?" Or, "How many times will we go to this theater?" We will, most likely, stay in East Lansing for a long, long time, which makes this move extra exciting. It's as though we are slowly unveiling the things that will become part of our everydays lives here. On that note, we have already started the search for a nice place to run. Fortunately, that didn't take much searching. We ran our 7-mile morning run today along the Lansing River Trail which was completely lovely. Around the two mile mark, two deer ran in front of us and then swam across the river. Watching them, I thought, "I think I will like it here." The trail was long and beautifully maintained, every person we passed waved and said hi, and the weather was cool and breezy.

Now that I have a great place to run, I just need to figure out where to grocery shop...

Sauteed Purslane with Garlic and Balsamic Vinegar (Page 573)

RECIPE #1011

• Date: Friday, August 14, 2009 -- 9pm
• Location: Palo Alto, CA
• Kitchen: Emilee and Brian's Apartment
• Fellow Chefs: Matty, Chris, Brian, and Emily
• Dining Companions: Emilee, Alison, Nick, Jamie, and Alex W
• Recipe Rating: B-
  

I was hanging out at Emilee and Brian's place last week, lamenting the fact that I can't find some of the ingredients I need for recipes remaining in The Book. I started listing things I can't find, and at some point I mentioned purslane. Brian jumped in with, "You need purslane? There's some growing as a weed in my garden." I thought he was kidding, but he was serious and I was ecstatic! In the years since I started this project I haven't seen purslane once at a grocery store or farmer's market. Luckily Brian had some Pigweed (aka Purslane) sprouting up amongst his beautiful tomato plants. He picked me some puslane and Matty, Emilee, and Chris helped me prepare it. Picked at a different point in the season I am sure it would have been easier to prep. But as it was, it had tiny seed pods on it which contained very small seeds. For both flavor and textural reasons all those seed pods needed to be removed before I cooked the purslane and that was no small task. Even with four of us working on it, it was time consuming to get off all those little pods. Once the purslane was ready though, the recipe was very simple. I minced some garlic, and cooked it in olive oil. I added the purslane and cooked until it wilted. Then I tossed it with some balsamic, salt, and pepper. This recipe wasn't great. The flavor was ok -- purslane has a slightly sour flavor to it, which the balsamic complemented pretty well. I didn't like the texture though. The recipe said to leave in stems thinner than 1/8 inch, but I found myself wishing I had removed them all. Had I done that, however, there wouldn't have been much substance left to the dish. This dish wasn't any more special than a standard leafy-greens-cooked-in-garlic dish, but with more textural problems than if the dish had been made with, say, spinach. It wasn't terrible, but I wouldn't make it again.

This recipe isn't online.

As I am inching towards the end of this project, people have started to ask me, "Is there anything good left in The Book?" I have made 1012 of the 1293 recipes in The Gourmet Cookbook, and I can definitely say that there are some promising recipes left in the 281 I have remaining. It is also the case, however, that many of the recipes that I have left are recipes that I have put off for one reason or another. A few of those reasons are as follows:

• Ingredients I can't find. Example recipe: Sauteed Salsify with Garlic. If anyone knows where to get one's hands on salsify I would love to know!
  

• Ingredients with very short seasons. Example recipe: Shad Roe with Lemon Butter. Shad roe is only available in a short window of time, and is certainly not available in the small Midwestern town in which I live. This was the second spring in a row when I didn't manage to be in a big city during the shad roe season. Next year!

• Equipment I don't have. Example recipe: Poached Salmon in Aspic. This recipe required a 24-inch long fish poacher, which I just don't have.
  

• Recipes that are crazy expensive. Example recipe: Classic Foie Gras Terrine. Eventually I will certainly shell out the cash for the 1.5 pounds of Grade A foie gras called for in this recipe, but I haven't talked myself into it quite yet!

• Recipes that don't sound too delicious. Example recipe: Crispy Sweetbreads with Parsnip Potato Puree, Braised Endives, and Port Sauce. Can't you just imagine me inviting friends over for dinner? They ask, "So what are we having?" If the answer, "Thymus glands," alone wouldn't scare them off, the answer, "Thymus glands with parsnips," would be sure to!

• Recipes I have promised to save for certain friends. Example recipe: Molasses-Cured Pork Shoulder Bacon. Essentially every man I know has requested to be present for the cure-your-own-bacon adventure!

• Recipes that are ridicuously unhealthy. Example recipe: Santa Fe French Toast. This French toast has heavy cream instead of milk in the soaking mixture, and is deep-fried instead of pan-fried. Crazy! I have put it off due to how insanely unhealthy it is, but I think I am finally going to make it for dinner tonight!
  

So, yes, many of the recipes that I have left are ones that I have postponed for a reason. But there are also some easy, delicious-sounding recipes on the horizon. For example: Brandied Sour Cherry and Pear Tarlets. I am sure the next year will be just as delicious as the last couple have been!

Panko Scallops with Green Chile Chutney (Page 48)

RECIPE #1010

• Date: Sunday, July 19, 2009 -- 1pm
• Location: Westerville, OH
• Kitchen: Karen and Dave's House
• Fellow Chef: Matty
• Dining Companions: Brad, Deniz, Karen H, Dave, etc...
• Recipe Rating: B+
  

I made these scallops for the wedding celebration Karen and Dave hosted for us in July. I started by making the chutney. I blended together cilantro, scallions, coconut, serrano chiles, vegetable oil, ginger, lime juice, and water in a blender, then seasoned with salt and pepper. I cut my scallops in half (because they were enormous -- this wouldn't usually be necessary), then seasoned them with salt and pepper. I dipped them in egg, then panko breadcrumbs. Then I fried them in vegetable oil and topped them with the chutney. These scallops were pretty good. The scallops were nicely cooked, and the breadcrumb coating was very tasty. Unfortunately the coating didn't stick to the scallops so well, so some of them lost much of their breading in the frying process. The breading that stuck was delicious though. The chutney was quite nice -- aromatic and tasty, with a bit of a kick from the serrano chiles. The chutney was simple to make and added a lot to the dish. They would have been cuter had I not cut the scallops in half, so were I to make this recipe again I would look for some smaller scallops.

The recipe is here.

I am sitting in the San Jose airport, ready to board yet another flight, just thinking about how crazy this summer has been. Between planning a wedding, getting married, and trips to Minnesota, Wyoming, Utah, Colorado, Chicago, Germany, Wisconsin, Ohio, England, Norway, and California, this summer has been a little bit busy! There is only one more trip on the immediate horizon: Michigan. Soon I will be home in Indiana, settling into my routine. I have definitely enjoyed the traveling this summer -- it has been pretty awesome. But it will also be nice to be at home, and be able to do the things I usually do: work, cook, run, etc... There are many small things about home that I have missed these last few months: microwave popcorn at night, eating Cream of Wheat for dinner, walking to and from my office, eating a sno cone after a long run, movies at the theater, etc... In a week I will be home again to enjoy all those things. In the meatime, I will have one day at home before we drive up to Michigan to resume our house-hunting, get Matt settled in, attend Michigan State orientation things, etc... What a crazy summer!

Crab and Coconut Dip with Plantain Chips (Page 21)

RECIPE #1009

• Date: Sunday, July 19, 2009 -- 1pm
• Location: Westerville, OH
• Kitchen: Karen and Dave's House
• Dining Companions: Matty, Brad, Deniz, Karen H, Dave, etc...
• Recipe Rating: B
  

I made this crab dip for the party Karen and Dave threw for me and my special gentleman to celebrate our marriage. The dip portion of this recipe was super simple. I blended coconut milk, scallion, jalapeno, and cilantro in a blender. I whisked mayonnaise, lime juice, and chopped cilantro into this mixture. I stirred in crab meat and salt and served with plantain chips. This crab dip was OK. It had a decent flavor to it, but it didn't look too appetizing. It has a greenish color from the blended jalapeno, scallion, and cilantro. Green seems like not such a great color for a seafood dip, as it somehow gives the impression that the creamy mixture isn't too fresh. The dip was also much too heavy for the delicate chips that were to accompany it. The result of those factors combined was that while the delicious chips disappeared very rapidly, not so much of the dip got eaten. It certainly wasn't a bad recipe, but while I will definitely make the plantain chips again, this crab dip will not become a standby for me.

The recipe is here.

We are wrapping up our beach vacation in Aptos, California and about to head back to Palo Alto for another couple days. When my special gentleman was in college he was on the swim team, and he made many close friends through the team. The swimmers that were his year are still very close and the seven of them get together frequently. All of them are married now (or essentially married) and some of the couples are starting to have kids. I find it very impressive the way they still manage to come together as a group several times per year, in various locations around the country. This weekend we were on the beach in California. The last get-together was at our wedding in May, the next will be in Tahoe on Super Bowl Weekend. Not everyone shows up for every trip (this weekend, for instance, 10 of the 15 people in the group came), but each person seems to show up a reasonable percentage of the time. For a group of people that lives in San Francisco, Miami, Denver, Washington DC, New York City, Providence, and Indiana, it's amazing how often they see one another. I am still very close to some of my college friends, but we don't have a tradition of traveling together. I wish that we did -- it means a lot to my special gentleman to see his friends often, and everyone inevitably has a great time.

Plantain Chips (Page 22)

RECIPE #1008

• Date: Sunday, July 19, 2009 -- 1pm
• Location: Westerville, OH
• Kitchen: Karen and Dave's House
• Dining Companions: Matty, Karen H, Dave, Brad, Deniz, etc...
  
• Recipe Rating: A
  

In July my special gentleman's parents threw us a party with some of the extended family and friends of the family to celebrate our marriage. I took the opportunity to make a couple of hors d'oeuvres from The Book. These plantain chips went with some crab dip (which I will blog about next). To make them, I scored the skin of the plantains, then let them soak in warm water for 5 minutes. I then peeled the plantains, and used a vegetable peeler to slice them very thinly. I deep-fried the slices in vegetable oil, then sprinkled them with a mixture of lime zest, salt, and cayenne. These plantain chips were AWESOME! I like plantains quite a bit, and plantain chips are always tasty. But typically plantain chips are made by slicing the plantain into round. The method in this recipe, where I used a vegetable peeler to slice the plantains into very thin strips, produced much nicer chips. For one thing, they were very pretty this way. But more importantly, it did great things for the texture. They were super thin and extremely crispy. They were so thin that I think they were a little too delicate for the crab dip they were meant to be eaten with. But for eating these chips on their own, the delicate crispiness was perfect! What really took these chips to the next level, though, was the lime salt. It was a simple mixture of lime zest, salt, and cayenne, but it was wonderful on the chips. It brought out the flavor of the plantains, while giving the chips a bit of a kick. One note: The Book says to use green plantains because more ripe plantains won't work as well. Indeed I tried both, and it was impossible to use the vegetable peeler to get thin strips from the ripe plantains, as they were too smushy. So make sure to buy green ones! In summary, these chips were delicious -- I highly, highly recommend.

The recipe is here.

Last Sunday my special gentleman and I traveled back from Norway to Columbus, Ohio (a trip which took 26 hours -- very painful). We stayed with his parents in Columbus for a day, to recover from our jet lag, then drove home to Bloomington on Tuesday. On Wednesday I frantically worked on unpacking boxes at my new apartment (which we moved into before our three weeks of travel, but didn't have time to actually unpack anything). Then on Thursday we flew out to California. We spent a couple days in Palo Alto with Emilee, Brian, and Sam, and now we are on the beach for the weekend, with my special gentleman's friends from his college swim team. There are ten of us staying in a huge beach house in Aptos, California. It's really nice. Yesterday we spent most of the day on the beach -- swimming, boogie boarding, playing catch, etc... Today there are rumors that we are going kayaking (although everyone but me seems to still be sleeping...). Tomorrow my special gentleman and I will head back to Palo Alto, then on Wednesday we fly back to Indiana. We will stay in Indiana overnight, then head up to Michigan, where we will get my special gentleman settled in before his semester begins. I'll head back to Indiana after a week or so in Michgan, so that I can attend course meetings and get myself ready for the semester. And just like that, summer will be over!

With all the traveling we have done, this summer has just flown by. We haven't been home for more than a couple consecutive days in several months. Crazy!

Salmon Burgers with Spinach and Ginger (Page 291)

RECIPE #1007

• Date: Wednesday, June 24, 2009 -- 7pm
• Location: Bloomington, IN
• Kitchen: My Apartment
• Dining Companion: Matty
• Recipe Rating: B+
  

I completely forgot that I made this recipe until I found the picture of it on my camera, so I am going to backtrack a bit and blog about this one. I started by cutting a piece of salmon into 1/4-inch dice, then stirring it together with chopped spinach, grated ginger, scallions, salt, pepper, egg white, and soy sauce. I formed the mixture into patties, then cooked them in vegetable oil in a skillet. I topped them with pickled ginger and served. This recipe was super quick and pretty tasty. When I formed the patties I thought to myself, "There is no way these are going to stay together." Indeed, they were falling apart as I formed them. But I very carefully set them into the skillet, and very carefully flipped them halfway through the cooking, and they did manage to stay together! These salmon burgers were much better than I expected. They were very flavorful and moist. There was a lot of spinach relative to the amount of salmon, but it worked really well for the dish. The burgers were nice and light -- certainly a healthier alternative to a more traditional burger. I served them with rice and soy sauce, and that seemed to go better with the flavor of the burgers than buns would have. For a simple weekday supper, this was a nice dish.

The recipe is here.

The conference I was attending in Norway last week officially ended on Friday, and most participants left on Saturday morning. For anyone who was interested, though, there was the option of staying an extra day and going for a long hike. When my special gentleman agreed to travel all the way to Norway with me, I had promised that I would attempt this hike with him. My special gentleman and I hike a lot, but this particular hike was certainly more challenging that what we usually do. The hike was essentially straight up, then straight down a mountain. It took about nine hours (5 hours up, a little rest at the top, then 3 and a half hours down). The total elevation change was 1848 meters, which is more than a mile (a mile sounds like not-so-much, but as a change in elevation, it's a lot!). The photo below was taken about halfway up, when we encountered a beautiful lake on the mountain. At this point we were both still feeling pretty good:

The view from halfway up was quite nice. The hotel where we started hiking from is one of those buildings near the water in the valley.

At about 1100 meters, the weather took a nasty turn. It became very cold and very windy. We were certainly not prepared for how cold it would be. As you can see, my special gentleman was hiking through the snow in his shorts. Where it wasn't snowy it was very rocky near the top, which meant that we were climbing more than hiking.

Eventually we reached the top, where we were delighted to find that there was a shelter! Apparently in Norway in very remote places where people like to hike there are often these shelters. The shelter had a wood burning stove and tons of food in it. You could take whatever food you wanted and leave money to pay for it -- honor system style. This shelter also had a second level where people could sleep. And most importantly, it had many, many blankets inside, so we all wrapped ourselves up while we ate lunch and tried to get warm.

The views from the top were spectacular. The pictures don't do it justice, but here are a couple anyway. Here's a picture of me at the top. Standing up there it was hard to believe that we had started all the way down by that lake that you see in the picture.

Here's a shot of me and my special gentleman at the top, trying not to get blown off the mountain. It was windy!

The way down was easier than the way up, although much more painful. Going down very steep terrain is hard on your knees and the muscles in your legs. It also took a lot of concentration climbing down the rocks. I was happy that I made it through the rocks without falling, but then in the last hour of the descent I slipped twice on two steep muddy sections and fell twice on my butt! Whoops!

Overall it was a fun, although challenging day of hiking. The ascent kicked my butt, but when I made it to the top it felt like a real accomplishment! After the hike I sat in the hot tub at the hotel for an hour or so, then ate a huge dinner. It was a nice way to end our Norwegian adventure.

Korean Barbecued Beef in Lettuce Cups (Page 57)

RECIPE #1006

• Date: Wednesday, July 8, 2009 -- 1pm
• Location: Madison, WI
• Kitchen: My Mom's Apartment
• Fellow Chef: Matty
• Dining Companions: Teri, Mel, Melissa, Donna, etc...
• Recipe Rating: A-
  

A few days before Melanie's wedding, she had a girls-only luncheon for some of her family and friends. I made the food for this event. Because I wanted to be sure the food would good (it was part of her wedding festivities after all!) I made mostly things I had made before. But I wanted to try one new recipe from The Book, and this was it. Despite not being allowed at this girls-only event, my special gentleman helped me prepare this hors d'oeuvre (Side note: I forgot to bring one of these back for him, so he didn't even get to taste his handiwork! He was not happy!). We started by marinading skirt steak in a mixture of soy sauce, rice vinegar, scallions, sugar, garlic, ginger, sesame oil, and chili sauce. I reserved some of the marinade mixture before adding the steak. We made a salad of sticks of Gala apple and mango, and tossed the fruit in a mixture of lime juice, chili sauce, and salt. I cooked the steak under the broiler, then sliced it into strips. I tossed the steak with the unused marinade, then divided the meat amongst leaves of Bibb lettuce. I topped the steak with the apple mango salad. I had concerns about this dish when I tasted the apple mango salad by itself. It was quite spicy! The steak, too, had quite a kick to it. The components were spicy enough that I wondered if The Book had meant sweet chili sauce rather than spicy chili sauce. But, amazingly enough, when the dish was assembled it wasn't too spicy at all. The lettuce really mellowed out the spice of the dish beautifully, so it was a touch spicy, but certainly not overpowering. I thought this dish was very tasty. The beef was delicious -- the marinade and sauce on it had tons of flavor, and the quick cooking under the broiler gave the marinade a nice bit of carmelized crunch to it. The apple mango salad was tasty, and provided good textural contrast. And the lettuce brought it all together with a lovely crunch and a handy way to wrap everything up before eating it. It was a tasty dish that people seemed to enjoy -- I would make it again.

Here is the recipe.

Hello from Norway! I am at a math conference which is taking place in the Nordfjord region of Norway. Often our conferences are held at universities, but this one is being held in a resort hotel surrounded by mountains and fjords -- it's pretty awesome! Plus my special gentleman came with me to enjoy the beautiful surroundings (the math happening here is not so similar to the math that he does!), and it is fun to have him here with me! Here is the view from the balcony of our hotel room:

I gave a talk at the conference on Tuesday. It's always nice to speak near the beginning of the week because I find it hard to relax until my talk is done! I think it went pretty well though. A typical summer conference will run from Monday to Friday with an excursion on Wednesday afternoon. I don't know how this tradition started, but it is very common. So on Wednesday afternoon we had no talks, and instead we took a boat ride out to a glacier, and then went for a short hike. Here's a picture from the boat of the glacier we were headed towards. You can see it in the background, wedged between the mountains:



And here's a picture of the boat we took, which I am adding simply because it captures the incredible color of the water here. It is so brightly aqua colored that it looks fake!



This is definitely a special location for a conference. I wasn't too excited about the last leg of the trip here, when we had to ride a little propeller plane and experience some glacier winds before landing at an airport with just one (short little) runway! But it was worth it. The conference has been interesting, the scenery is incredible, and our hotel has 2 pools, 2 jacuzzis, and 2 waterslides! I can't complain.

We have one more talk this afternoon, then tomorrow we are going for a long hike up a big mountain! On Sunday we are headed back to the States for a few days at home before we head to California. What a crazy, crazy summer!