Tag: Recipe

I Have Bad Taste in Music but…

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Have you ever noticed that “small talk” usually refers to talking about the weather, music, books and movies?

Whenever someone asks me what kind of music I listen to I usually tense up.  A typical young adult conversation goes something like this:

Person 1: What kind of music do you listen to?

Person 2: Oh a little bit of everything… (at this point the person is being polite but eagerly anticipating spouting off a list of the great)

Person 1: What are some of your favorites?

Person 2: Well, Radiohead, The Beatles, Bob Dylan, Pink Floyd… (note: if you’re talking to a hipster you’ll probably get some obscure band in there and maybe a Le Tigre or Rilo Kiley).

Person 1: Awesome, I love Radiohead.

That’s not really how it happens for me.  Usually, I avoid that question at all costs by turning it around and asking what they listen to, because let’s be realistic no one wants to hear that your favorites are Beyonce and Shakira.  Should you dare to admit which ones you actually like, you are bound to be met with a confused glare and an undoubted perceptive drop in IQ in the mind of the asker (the exception to this being foreign pop… if you like that, you’re golden.  Thank God for Juanes).

So while my musical taste may be abysmal, I feel that I have two redeeming qualities: movies and baking.

I like my fair share of ridiculous movies (ahem… New Moon… *cough*), but I like Wes Anderson movies as much as the next person and thought Raging Bull was great! I feel that I can adequately have a semi-productive conversation with a “movie snob.”

My other redeeming quality…

Blueberry Coconut Oat Muffins with Maple Oat Topping

1/2 cup apple sauce
1/2 a small banana mashed
2 1/2 tbsp almond butter
1 egg
1/3 cup agave nectar
1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1/2 cup all purpose flour
1 tbsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 cup wheat germ
1/2 cup rolled oats
1/2 cup unsweetened coconut
1/2 fresh or frozen blueberries
splash of milk, water or juice if batter too firm (I added about 1/4 cup)

Preheat oven to 350degrees. Combine all the wet ingredients in a bowl.  Add the dry ingredients (fold in blueberries at the end). Fill greased muffin pan with batter (about half full), top with crunchy maple oat topping (recipe below).  Bake for 20-25 minutes depending on strength of your oven. (Note: you can veganify them by adding an extra 1/4 cup of applesauce or another half of banana instead of the egg)

Crunchy Maple Oat Topping

2 tbsp flour
1/4 cup oats
1/2 tbps coconut oil
1 1/2 tbsp maple syrup

Mix together with your fingers to get a crumbly topping.

I may not know everything there is to know about “good” music, but I can make a hell of a muffin from scratch!

Not to mention they’re low fat and pretty healthy as far as muffins go.

Back to school work… Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

Slimmed Down Coconut Cardamom Rice Pudding

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Last week in NYC, I went to Rice to Riches for a pre-NYC departure treat with some friends.  This place is basically like an ice cream parlor, but instead of ice cream they serve rice pudding.  Let me just tell you.  It was delicious! (I even kept the cool tupperware container it came in!)

Ever since then, I’ve been wanting to make my own.  However, I realize that rice pudding can be a flat out FATTY treat.  So why not try to make mine a little healthier? (And cheaper!  My friend an I shared the “Epic” size and it was $8!  Isn’t that nuts?!!?!)

Coconut Cardamom Rice Pudding

inspired by Joy of Baking’s Rice Pudding Recipe

1/3 cup short grain brown rice (any length grain should work fine)
2 1/2 cups non-fat milk
1-4 tbsp sugar depending on how sweet you want it (4 made it EXTREMELY sweet, I would try it with 1 or 2 first )
1/3 cup unsweetened coconut
1 tsp cardamom powder
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 tbsp cornstarch

Place rice and milk in a sauce pan and bring milk to a boil (stirring occasionally to make sure it doesn’t burn on the bottom).  Simmer for 25-30 minutes (stirring every few minutes) until rice is al dente.  Remove from heat and stir in coconut, sugar, cardamom, and vanilla.  In a small bowl mix together cornstarch and some of the milk, once you’ve removed any clumps, add it to the pot.  Place back on medium/low heat stirring occasionally until thick.

Transfer pudding to individual bowls or one large container.  Serve warm or cold!

Soo good!  May have eaten a little too much…

This was like a delicious, creamy (Indian) dessert!

Now back to actual school work 😦 Not excited for this!

Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

Toad in a Hole + Eggplant Deliciousness

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Sometimes, I want to make something, but don’t want to eat it (this happens pretty often with a lot of sweets).  This morning I made the fella something fun that I like to make but don’t like to eat (namely because of my irrational aversion to crispy egg): Toad in a Hole.

I used Apple Oat Bread from Wegman’s.  Cut a hole in with a cup.  Buttered the bread.

Put it in a pan on medium heat.

Cracked in an egg.

Covered it for 3 minutes (ish)

Flipped and served!

Thank goodness the lovely fella was around to eat it!

Are a fan of toad in a hole?

Later in the day, I tried one of Jenn’s recipes that looked absolutely amazing: Eggplant Lasagna!

This isn’t your average lasagna!  Instead of pasta noodles it has QUINOA!

I followed her recipe almost exactly except I used some pasta sauce Rhoda made and added some chopped spinach to bulk up the sauce with extra veggies.

OMG delicious!  Make it now! Perfect for those who aren’t huge fans of pasta like me 🙂

Jenn, this is flat out wonderful!

Did anyone watch Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution tonight? In case you missed it, you can watch it online free at abc.com.  Since you all had a lot of great feedback/comments on my previous post on Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution, I’ll dedicate a whole post to the new episode in the days to come.

Ugh spring break is almost over 😦 Say it ain’t so!

Enjoy your night!!

Lemon Cake filled with Creamy Goodness

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I slept in til noon!  Isn’t that ridiculous!?!  Well maybe not for some, but for someone who rarely wakes up past 7:00am, it’s a miracle!  I must have been pooped from the weekend!  Sadly, I woke up with a sore throat and an overall gross/sore/tired feeling (I consumed several cups of echinacea tea  throughout the day to feel better… not working yet…).

So I lounged around most of the day and read blogs, as promised.  I also watched Pride and Prejudice and proceeded to cry my eyes out.  That movie gets me every time!  Love it!  After a full day of doing nothing, I started to get pretty bored, so naturally I decided to bake, because let’s face it, I would.

Lemon Cake

adapted from Raspberry Laced Vanilla Cake

1 1/2 cup cake flour
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tbsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
3/4 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup + 2 tbsp sugar
1/3 cup lemon juice (or juice of 1 lemon plus enough water/milk to make 1/3 cup)
zest of 1 lemon
1 tsp vanilla
2 eggs


Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Cream together butter and sugar.  Zest lemon and add to mixture, add lemon juice/water/milk, vanilla, eggs and beat for a few seconds til combined.  Add flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt and beat together until combined.

Pour dough into 2 9 inch cake pans (greased and floured), or cupcake pans, or mini loaf pans or whatever other shape (I used mini heart shaped pans).  I baked my heart shaped pans for 15 mins, for a larger cake you’ll probably need about half an hour.

Before or after, make the custard filling.

Homemade Vanilla Custard

adapted from Joy the Baker’s PB Banana Cream Pie

1 1/2 cups milk
1 tsp vanilla
3 egg yolks
1/3 cup sugar
3 tbsp corn starch
pinch of salt

Heat milk and vanilla in a sauce pan on low heat to prevent burning (stir occasionally).  In the meantime, in a bowl mix together egg yolks, sugar, cornstarch and salt.  Once the milk starts to simmer, stir in a small amount (about 1/3 cup should be fine) of the milk to your egg mixture.  Then add the egg mixture to the rest of your milk.  Stir constantly for about 5-10 minutes until thick.  Put in a bowl and cover with plastic wrap (lay plastic wrap on the custard to keep it from forming a weird film/skin/hardened layer) and chill in the fridge.

Super Fruit Buttercream Frosting

1/2 cup butter (1 stick), softened
1/2 cup Crofter’s Super Fruit spread (I used the South America Flavor, but any type of jam, especially raspberry would be delicious)
~3 cups powdered sugar

For the frosting, cream together the butter and fruit spread, gradually add powdered sugar until you get your desired consistency.

In addition the the Super Fruit Buttercream, I made a traditional buttercream with just butter, powdered sugar, vanilla and milk.

To assemble the mini cakes (once cakes have cooled), level off the top of each mini cake (or each big cake if you used 9 inch round pans), spread a layer of fruit spread (suggest you microwave it for a few seconds for easy spreading), then a thick-ish layer of custard and press on the second cake layer (repeat if you want to do more than 2 layers).

One of these will go to the fella.  The other three plus the 4 cupcakes are up for grabs.

Well I guess that sufficiently entertained me for a few hours and also made good use of leftovers (had some egg yolks left over from an omelet and milk left over from Pi Day).

These probably would have been a good idea for Valentine’s Day.  Oh well!

Off to bed!  Have a great night!

P.S. In case you’re interested, here are some more pictures from NYC!

Stew in a Jar

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Food bloggers are weird.

We take pictures of food…

Have an unnatural obsession with strange health foods (I mean who else really eats Chia seeds…)

We get super excited about new jars of nut butter…

and even more excited when the jar is empty so we can have oats in a jar.

Now, you can have another reason to get excited about an empty jar of peanut butter: Stew in a Jar

Stew in a Jar

1 tsp coconut oil or olive oil
1/2 onion, diced
2 tomatoes, diced (or a small can of diced tomatoes)
1 carrot, chopped
1 celery rib, chopped
1 garlic clove, minced
1 sweet potato, diced
1/2 tsp curry powder
2 shakes of cinnamon
Cayenne to taste
3 shakes of paprika
1-2 cups water or vegetable broth
salt and pepper to taste
1 nearly empty jar of natural peanut butter (or just a spoonful of peanut butter)

Heat the oil, add all ingredients onions, garlic, celery and carrots.  Cook til onions are translucent, add tomatoes, sweet potato and spices and stir.  Add water or broth, bring to a boil and simmer for 20 minutes.  Spoon stew into nearly empty PB jar.  Stir and enjoy!  Serves 2-3.

Pretty delicious!  Definitely making this again!

I feel like I’m so close to the end!  Today I was in the library from 11:00am til 5:00pm with a short break for a 1 hr class (which I ended up cutting short…) and a 20 min nap.  Got a lot done though!

In the next hour, I hope to:
-Wrap up my econ paper: I’m doing an economic analysis of the Proposed NY State Beverage Tax!
-Finish 1/4 of a question and rewrite my econ take home midterm… I can draw a mean indifference curve!
-Do the dishes!

Wish me luck!

Have a good night!!

Pies Galore!

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Happy Pi(e) day!

My department had a pie contest!  I made Peanut Butter Banana Cream pie!

Graham cracker crust.

Layer of dark chocolate.

Layer of Peanut Butter.

Layer of homemade vanilla custard mixed with fresh sliced bananas.

Topped with real whipped cream.

How can you go wrong with PB, Chocolate AND Banana all in one delicious pie!?!?!

I thought it was pretty darn delicious!  I think others liked it too!

I’m not sure who won 😦 I left early to work on my fitness (…Fergie style…), busted out 4 miles on the treadmill and 20mins (I think… short term memory loss I guess…) on the elliptical.  It was great!

Seriously folks, I am all sugared out.  I hadn’t really consumed any refined sugar all week and this weekend I had a ton.  I literally feel a bit ill. Cooling it on the sugar as usual!

So today I was procrastinating and looking at old posts and I realized that it probably seems like I eat a lot of junk.  Haha! I promise, I actually don’t!  Well, I eat a fair amount of sweets but I like to balance it out with vegetables and other healthy eats!

For example, for breakfast today I had a green monster and an egg white omelet:

4 egg whites… the custard in the pie required four egg yolks… No point in throwing the whites away!

For dinner, bok choy, leeks and scallions stir fried in some coconut oil and Ponzu with a Boca patty!  Sooooooo Soooo Soooooo good!  I wanted more! Also had a pear!

Just so you don’t think my hot bod comes from cookies alone… I eat vegetables 🙂  A lot actually!

Just thought I would clarify that!

Ugh tomorrow is Monday… but Thursday is the start of spring break with a class trip to NYC!  WOO!  Then a whole week off!!  And I’ll be seeing the lovely fella AGAIN!  We may or may not go on a mini road trip… any spring break plans for you?  Has spring break already passed for everyone??

Have a great night!

Chipotle Homefries

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Hellooooo!  Today was another busy day!  My work day plan is working out pretty well.  I got home around 6:00pm and was ready for something quick and easy.

Last week, I baked a few potatoes to eat throughout the week.  Tonight I ended up using them.  The theme was Mexican Breakfast, because I had a can of chipotle peppers in adobo sauce that needed to be used leftover from my Ginormous Chipotle Beans Extravaganza.  Here’s my creation:

Chipotle Homefries

2 potatoes, baked (or cooked in the microwave) and chopped into large chunks
1-2 tsp adobo sauce, from can of peppers
1 chipotle pepper finely chopped, optional or less if you want it less spicy
1/2 tsp garlic
1/2 tsp paprika
1/2 tsp onion powder
salt and pepper to taste

Combine all the ingredients in a bowl and mix around to coat.  Add some oil (I used about a tsp of coconut oil) to a pan and heat.  Add the potatoes turning every few minutes and cook on medium/high heat til heated and crispy.

Serve with sour cream (or Greek Yogurt like I did) and eggs.

These were picante but delicious and much healthier than any homefries you would get at a restaurant! I bet these would be even better if you let them marinate in the stuff before stir frying.

Perfect meal enjoyed in front of the laptop, catching up on Lost!

I’ve been behind on the blog reading but hopefully I’ll catch up soon!  Hope you’re all having a great week!  It’s half way done!  Have a great night!!

Best Salad Ever

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This morning, I did something I haven’t done in a LOOOOONNNGGG time…

Updated my ipod!

Check out the sweet new playlist:

This made my 3 mile treadmill jaunt AMAZING!  I wanted to keep going but had to leave to get ready for class!

New music always gets me excited about a work out.  My current obsession is Jay Sean’s “Do You Remember”
What’s your favorite work out song(s)??

As promised… Here is the Best Salad Ever!

That’s it!!  Just kidding….

Chop up some romaine.  If you’re eating at home, put it in a large bowl.  If you’re taking it to go, cool whip containers work… great conversation starter too!

Add your desired veggie toppings: cucumbers, carrot ribbons and artichoke hearts (ideally this would have tomatoes and bell peppers but I’m out of those)

Add your protein:  1 chopped up string cheese and 1 chopped up veggie patty

And finally… the best part… Barley!!

Remember my obsession with Annie’s Buttermilk Dressing?? I found a homemade replacement!  Prepare to be amazed…

Creamy Lemon Tahini Dressing

adapted from Culinate’s Lemon-Tahini Dressing

2 tbsp tahini
2 tbsp water
juice of 1 lemon
1 clove of garlic, minced
3/4 cup greek yogurt (any fat should work, I used nonfat)
dash of cumin
few shakes of paprika
few shakes of cayenne
sea salt to taste

Combine all the ingredients and be prepared for deliciousness!  Play around with the spices til you find what tastes best to you!

I pack mine in an old garlic container.  No need for fancy tupperware here!

I almost wouldn’t call this a salad!  It’s just intense and delicious!

Well I’m off to class!  Have a fantastic day!  Eat a salad! They’re delicious! What’s the best salad you’ve ever had?

Vegan Coconut Cardamom Oatmeal Cookies

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If you recall, one of the girls in the discussion section I TA for is a vegan.  She presented today (I’m having them all do presentations so they all talk.  The point is for them to practice Spanish after all…).  So I thought I should make a vegan treat in her honor.

Vegan Coconut Cardamom Oatmeal Cookies

adapted from Chewy Coconut Oatmeal Cookies

1/2 cup Earthbalance (vegan non-butter) (if non-vegan, just use butter)
1/2 cup (heaping) of sugar
1/4 cup applesauce, unsweetened (if non-vegan use 1 egg)
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup rolled oats
1/2 whole wheat pastry flour (or all purpose)
1/2 cup shredded coconut
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tbsp honey
1 tsp cardamom

Cream together the “butter” and sugar.  Add the applesauce and vanilla.  Then the rest of the ingredients.  Chill in the freezer while you wash dishes and pre-heat the oven.  Roll into tablespoon size balls and place on a greased baking sheet.  Leave A LOT of space between the cookies, they flatten and expand when they bake.  Bake 10-12 minutes.

These turned out REALLY flat.  I would almost venture to say they were a fail but they tasted so darn good!  Next time, I would say freeze the dough and bake to see if that helps.  Or maybe add more baking powder?  Any other suggestions?

You’re not going to believe these but I forgot to give them to my class!  Oh well, I gave them to my next class (not one where I TA, just where I am student).  I think I had mixed reviews… I guess a lot of people don’t really eat cardamom that often?

Oh well!  I liked them! I am a little sweeted out for a while though… then again Pi day is in less than a week 🙂

In other news…

Holey moley today has been the busiest day ever!  I’m applying for an internship, have a ton of reading to do, supposedly a quiz tomorrow and have a presentation on Wednesday!  Tons to do!  For lunch today I had the MOST AMAZING SALAD EVER!  I’m planning on having it again tomorrow so I’ll share the recipe tomorrow 🙂

Until then, have a great night!

Carb-a-licious!

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Hi everyone!  Happy Saturday!

I woke up this morning still full from last night!  That African food was dense!  After a Green Monster and some internet perusing, I headed to the gym where I ended up doing 4 miles on the treadmill.  My knees felt fine, probably because I did a run/walk combo (run 2 mins/walk 1 min).

I came home to try something new:

Barley!

I’ve realized that complex carbs keep me full for longer.  The past two days I’ve come home ravenous after a basically complex carb free lunch!  So I’m going to try to incorporate whole grains and other complex carbohydrates into my lunches to see if that helps keep me from wanting to gnaw my arms off around 4:30pm.

I made a delicious stir fry with a bit of coconut oil, garlic, zucchini, bok choy, scallions and Kikkoman Ponzu. On top of that, I added a chopped up Spicy Chik’n Patty and helping of barley!

Delicious!  Very filling!  Finished off the meal with two cuties and huge cup of green tea!

I basically did nothing today… I went to TJ Maxx to return the fantastic red heels that didn’t fit 😦 and to Target to pick up some cleaning essentials.

Later in the evening, I decided I wanted a labor intensive dinner, because reading wasn’t looking that good…

Pizza!  Using this dough recipe from Eating Well.

Toppings includes: sauce, a layer of finely chopped spinach, fresh mozzarella, chopped artichoke hearts, and grated romano cheese.

Artichokes make everything delicious!  What are your favorite homemade pizza toppings?


I also ventured and made Chocolate Chia Pudding…

Sad to say this is the first bloggie recipe that I did not like.  I threw it away 😦  Oh well!  Can’t love them all!

Since today was full of slacking, tomorrow is a study day.  Dreading it already.  The Oscars are on tomorrow!  I can’t wait to see the dresses on the Red Carpet!

Have a fantastic night!!