Bread Obsession

I hope everyone had a wonderful holidays. I have been so busy since Thanksgiving that I haven't had time to do a lot of things including updating my blog. I got some wonderful Christmas presents from my family (pasta maker, hand blender and a silicone pastry mat to name a few!!!) so I will be up and cooking new and exciting things soon.

I have realized over the holiday season that I am a much better cook than a baker. I tried making cookies (chocolate chip and gingerbread). The chocolate chip were alright but the gingerbread not so much. I did make some dark chocolate peanut butter cookies that pretty good.
I guess I am too much of an improviser when it comes to cooking. I like thinking about a dish and then seeing ways I can improve it or make it more of what I like. It is hard to do that with baking. I feel everything has to be exact or it won't turn out right. Hopefully it is something that comes with time and practice and soon there will be a successful cookie baking post here. :)

So, onto my obsession! My job requires me to drive all over the dc area. Naturally because I am all over the place I have found many interesting stores and restaurants. A few months ago in a shopping center in Potomac, MD I saw a new store coming in. Above the door it said Breadsmith. I love bread and basically anything that has carbs so immediately I was interested. A couple months ago it opened and I now I don't think I can eat bread from anywhere else. It is amazing!!! I know this is what bread is supposed to taste like! Crusty on the oustide and wonderfully soft on the inside.

Their breads are made from scratch in the store everyday and with real ingredients (wheat flour, salt, butter..etc). Some breads are available everyday and then some varieties are baked once or twice a week or seasonally. They also have cookies, scones, muffins, rolls and pizza dough. I have tried the stoneground wheat, rustic italian, coffeecake, and cinnamon cobblestone.
They have a stores around the US (mostly in the so I would suggest seeing if there is one near you and trying it out.

Thanksgiving Pie!!!

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving! :) I have been so busy since then that I haven't had time to sit down and talk about my pumpkin pie!

When I first decided that I wanted to become a localvore, I got really excited about Thanksgiving and I was determined to make a real pumpkin pie. I went online looking for the best recipe and found a great one at http://www.pickyourown.org/pumpkinpie.php.

I bought a pie pumpkin from the farmers market a few weeks before Thanksgiving. I had organic sugar on hand ( I could of used local honey, but honestly I have never had honey in a pumpkin pie before and I wanted it to go well the first time). My mom had pumpkin pie spice from Penzeys Spices and I got organic evaporated milk at whole foods. The eggs were also from the farmers market.

Ok..so on to the pie making! First I washed the outside of the pumpkin with some warm water. Then I cut it into four sections and cleaned out the inside with an ice cream scoop.

I made sure to save and dry the seeds for some toasted pumpkin seeds. After I was done scooping the pumpkin goop I went to put the pumpkin in a metal steamer to find out my mom didn't have one. I asked if she had anything that I could use to steam the pumpkin. After looking through a lot of stuff, we finally stumbled upon a home canning pot and inside of it was a metal rack for the jars. It was also perfect for my pumpkin slices!


I steamed them for about 25 min and then took them out and spooned out the meat of the pumpkin. I then followed the recipe and put it inside my pie crust.

For the pie crust I wanted to make one out of butter. I didn't want to use crisco or anything like that so I looked online and after A LOT of searching I found this recipe. http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/perfect_pie_crust/.
The crust turned out really well!

I made the denser pie that the recipe talks about which is 1 can of evaporated milk instead of 1 1/2 and three eggs instead of 4. The pie turned out wonderfully. It was really good too so I was proud of myself. I think I will experiment a little bit more next year!

Tostadas

So, it is no secret that I love Mexican food. I could really eat it everyday. I had a craving for it today so I thought that I could try to make tostadas.

I bought the refried beans at Whole Foods, along with the tortillas that they make in store (they are so fresh and chewy!). Everything else I was able to get locally.
I made pico de gallo from fresh tomatoes and onions ( I would prefer cilantro in it too, but my husband hates it). I got the monterey jack cheese, lettuce and sour cream from vendors at the farmers market.

I put a little bit of organic canola oil in the pan and put one tortilla in for about 30 sec on each side till they were golden brown. After that you just put them on the plate and layer everything one on top of the other.

I hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving. I will be posting what I made including my attempt at a real pumpkin pie (from a pumpkin, not a can!).

Winter Farmers Market and Lasagna day!!

My husband and I were excited about going to the Falls Church farmers market this Saturday. We normally go to another farmers market during the spring/summer season, but that one closed last week for the winter so now we are making our seasonal switch. The Falls Church market lasts all winter and we are able to get apples, cider, salad mix, and a few other things all winter long.
One of the vendors was a dairy so I got some ricotta cheese and decided that I was going to make lasagna!


Umm..so yeah, it was good! It was kind of like the soup I made last week in that it surprised me with how good it was.

I made my own sauce with seven tomatoes that I peeled and then cut into chunks and simmered into a sauce with a large elephant garlic clove (I found out after eating that I should of put in another one), and about 1/4 cup of chopped onion with 4 tbsp of olive oil. When the sauce was almost done I added about 6 large leaves of basil that I chopped up and then I started on the cheese mixture. I got my ricotta and added one egg and some Italian seasoning. I shredded some colby cheese and sliced some fresh mozzarella.

I put a little sauce in the bottom of a casserole pan and then added my no-boil lasagna noodles I bought at Whole Foods. I was excited about the noodles being the only non-local product in my entire dinner (ok, the salt isn't local either). On top of the noodles I put the ricotta mix, and then the colby cheese, and then 1/3 of the sauce. I repeated this 3 times and then I topped it with some fresh mozzerella.

I served it with a wonderful mixed lettuce salad with some carrots added. I was nervous about using the no-boil noodles but they worked out wonderfully and I think they make the lasagna less runny because the noodles soak up all of the excess water from the sauce. Will be making this again and hopefully can get a picture of a whole lasagna instead of a half eaten one. :)

A soup kind of day

Today in DC it was about 50 outside and rainy. I was planning on sometime this week having soup so I thought that tonight would be perfect!

I have to admit that I cheated a little bit. I bought no-chicken broth instead of making my own and the rice and beans I added were Eden canned Caribbean style. Oh, and my roommates had celery they had left over from a party dip platter and they weren't going to eat it..BUT! Everything else that was in it was local.

I started with some olive oil and a clove of elephant garlic with about 1/4 cup of onions. Those sauteed for a few min and then I added chopped carrots, potatoes and celery. After those cooked for about 7 minutes I added one quart (the whole carton) of no-chicken broth. I brought that to a simmer and added one large tomato that I chopped and took the seeds out of. I cooked all of this for about 30 min and then I added a can of rice and beans. I wasn't sure if it would taste good. I kind of made the recipe up as I went along but it was AMAZING!!! I was impressed with myself. :)

I had the soup with a wonderful grilled cheese sandwich my husband made. What a wonderful meal for a cold rainy day!

Meat and Potatoes Vegetarian Style

I grew up with a mom that cooked a lot, so I know the basics, but everything I have been doing recently is new to me. A lot of my cooking so far is a combination of what I know from watching my mom and guesswork. I have been surprised at how simple cooking can be. I tell people that I now cook almost all of my meals at home and they ask me where I get the time and energy. How can I possibly make my own tomato sauce from scratch after working all day? I tell them that very little of my time is actual work. I would say on average for a meal I would spend about 15 minutes prepping. The rest of the time is spent waiting for the meal to cook or do whatever it needs to do so I can eat it.

So, I got a little excited about the beautiful broccoli that was available at the farmers market this past Saturday. I bought way to much for two people to eat so I am trying to incorporate it in every dish I make this week. I had some leftover potatoes from last week so I decided I would try my hand at some twice baked potatoes.

I coated four potatoes in Olive oil and put them in a metal pie dish in a 400 degree oven. They were a little small so I put them in for 40 min. When they were finished I let them cool while I steamed my broccoli. I cut the potatoes in half and scooped out the potato in a large bowl. Some of the skins weren't very cooperative but it isn't noticeable once the stuffing is in them.

After I scooped them I put the skins back in the pie plate and then took the bowl and added the broccoli, about three tbsp of sour cream, about 1/2 cup of milk, and 1/2 cup of colby-jack cheese and salt and pepper to taste. I mashed it all up and then scooped it back into the potatoes. After they were all back in the pie dish I put a little more cheese on top and baked them for 15 min.

I served the potatoes with a Quorn chik'n cutlet and some steamed carrots. If you haven't tried Quorn, it is amazing. I am not a big fan of fake meat, but these cutlets are really good. I just pan fry them in a little bit of olive oil and they are the perfect replacement for chicken. Yum!

Penne Vodka sans vodka

Hello All!!

I have been thinking about making a blog for a while now, but I didn't know what to write about. A friend of mine recently let me borrow Barbara Kingsolvers Animal, Vegetable, Miracle and I am now committed to becoming a localvore. The book literally changed how I feel about everything I eat and where my food comes from. I felt overwhelmed! I already frequented the local farmers market, but I didn't feel I had the time to pick up all of the fruits and vegetables and actually make things with them.

So I started about three weeks ago and so far so good. I am cooking dinner about 4-5 nights a week. I buy all of my fruits, vegetables, eggs and dairy (milk, cheese, butter) from the farmers market and then what I can't get there I buy at Whole Foods. Tonight I decided to make Penne with Vodka Sauce after my husband, who has been kind of apprehensive about this whole localvore thing, suggested it.

I started with mincing two cloves of garlic and 1/4 of a large onion and then putting that into a large pot with about two tbsp. of olive oil. After browning them I added seven large tomatoes that were skinned and cut into quarters (I like chunky sauce so if you like it smoother cut them into smaller pieces). I set it to medium heat and let it simmer for about an hour stirring it every 10 minutes or so .

After it got to the consistency that I wanted I added 1/2 cup of heavy cream and was reaching for the vodka when I realized we didn't have any. My husband even asked me when we were at the grocery store if we had vodka and I told him, "oh yeah, of course we do!".

So it turned out to be a very nice tomato cream sauce which I put over spinach penne that I got at Whole Foods. Hopefully soon I will have a pasta maker and I will be making the pasta along with the sauce!