sausage in my pocket

Well, it's a new year so I get to start my HolyCowIt'sSoCold posts all over again with a brand new quotient of times to bitch about the weather.  Keep in mind - I love Philadelphia, I love Philadelphia in the wintertime, and I love the cooler times of the year.  Still, there is no reason that I should be outside when the wind chill factors the temperature into the single digits.

Nevertheless, this morning I put on two layers of clothing, wrapped my puppy-scarf snugly around my neck, zipped my coat up to my nose, pulled on my gloves and hat and headed out the door looking very much like a ninja.

A cold ninja.

There's always something that astonishes me the first time each year that I look at the weather and see that not only is it 14 degrees right now, but it feels like it's 2 degrees and today's high doesn't break the freezing mark.  It's as though that's never happened before, even though it did, in fact, happen just last year and the year before that, too.  To anyone reading in Wisconsin or any of its neighboring states, and of course Canada, feel free to have a good laugh at my expense.  I am grateful that I've never seen the temperatures you deal with all winter long.  But for a relatively temperate area like Philadelphia, sub-freezing is our sub-zero.

When I got home, my first impulse was to make soup dinner despite Mister's inevitable protests.  I did not for two reasons (one of which became null): first, we didn't have any sandwich fixin's and I feel bad [now] serving Mister just soup.  Second, I was already thinking ahead to tomorrow's work lunch.  Granted, there are a ton of fabulous eating options within a one-block radius of the store I'm in tomorrow, but I haven't been keen on spending money going outside unnecessarily lately.  I don't want to test the strength of my "tupperware" by toting soup in my purse for a mile, so I wanted to make something a little more leftover-travel-friendly.

Enter Charro Beans with Chipotle Sausage from Vegetarian Times.  I've made this before, so why bother posting about it again?

That's why ^.  I've been meaning to try Field Roast sausages pretty much as long as they've been on the market, but they are about $1 more than Tofurky sausages and, being somewhat impoverished, that $1 has disproportionate value.  Regardless, since the recipe called for chipotle sausages and since Field Roast makes them (and Tofurky does not), it seemed the perfect excuse to splurge.

Unlike Tofurky, which is packaged similarly to hot dogs, the Field Roast sausages were actually packed as individually-wrapped links.  This made for quite the adventure trying to free them from their casings.  It resulted in my hands and cutting board looking like someone had just killed him- or herself in my kitchen - I'll spare you the picture I took of my "bloody" hand.

Once I'd coerced the little buggers out of their plastic casing, I cut two sausages in half (anticipating they would pack too much heat to stay in whole rounds like the recipe instructed) and then sliced them to add to my sauteing peppers.

After letting them cook a little by themselves, I added the beans and tomatoes, but I left out the chili powder because I was getting the distinct impression the sausages might end up being more than I'd bargained for.

Fortunately, I did have the foresight to serve them on a fluffy, bland cloud of mashed potatoes.

That may very well have been the only reason I could finish my first...and only...serving.  It was far more outstanding this time than the first time I'd made this dish, and that is owed completely to the brand of sausage, I believe.  Okay, that mashed potatoes are awesome doesn't hurt.

In any case, two things resulted from this dinner: first, Mister ended up with a generous portion of leftovers [read: all of them] for his lunch tomorrow and I ended up with a new strategy to beat the frigid temperatures outside: sausage.  By the time I finished my meal, I was nearly sweating, even though I'd turned down the heat while I was at work (Mister's fine - he's Greek so he radiates heat).  So, I told Mister I was going to carry the leftover sausages with me to warm me up like the brandy in a St. Bernard's barrel - just keep my sausage in my pocket until I need to go out into the cold.

Insert reallllllly immature joke here.

On a final and unrelated note, my healthcare for my new job is about to kick in, which is perfectly timed since one of my contacts decided to rip in my eye today.  All day I was walking around work squinting and blinking and putting drops in my eyes and complaining to my colleagues about my eyes bothering me.  I was counting the minutes until I could come home and take them out.  Upon doing so was when I discovered the damage, so I was reminded of yet another thing I love about Philadelphia and Winter.

In Philadelphia, especially Center City, but even on the residential streets where the homes are three stories tall, there is a natural darkness.  This is both beneficial and detrimental, depending on your point of view.  On the one hand, it might not be so darn cold if the sun could touch you and warm you up a little.  On the other hand, I can get away with not wearing sunglasses most of the time.  When it's winter, there's even less sunshine because the days are shorter and the sun never actually makes it to the "top" of the sky, so it's possible to stay out of direct sunlight pretty much all day.

Before you think I'm a vampire, let me just point out how difficult it is to wear sunglasses with seeing glasses - it doesn't work.  Since my new contacts are at least a week away from being in my eyeballs, looks like I'll be rocking my glasses, so I'm glad I don't have to worry about sun.

That's all.

hurts so good/Mister saves the day

I truly don't know how these things happen.  I thought I was finally finished my food shopping when I walked out of Trader Joe's this evening, only to get home and start making Granada Paella from The Urban Vegan and discover that I was short a red bell pepper.  I don't know how many times Mister has gone out after I started making dinner to get something I was missing (tortilla chips, refried beans, spinach, to name a few) but we can add Red Bell Pepper to the list.

He came back with a brown paper bag and my spidey-sense* told me the red pepper was not alone.  Indeed, after Mister pulled out the pepper, he smiled and reached back into the bag and gave me chocolate, "because you ran out."  What a sweetheart! because I did eat my last mini-chocolate bar from the halloween candy last night.  I thought it was sweet that he wanted to be as vigilant about my dark chocolate supply as I am about his bread supply.
*spidey-sense: the magical ability of wives to know beyond any shadow of doubt that their husbands will return home with at least 1 item more than they were sent out to get.  I inherited mine from my mother and that's why my dad isn't allowed to go to Pepperidge Farm unchaperoned.

Anyway, I recognized that Mister was probably about to be even more helpful as I was cooking dinner.

I love this recipe - truly I do - but I keep forgetting how now that I make it correctly, it burns my face off.  This is normally how dinner goes when I make this:
Bite 1: mmmm....tasty, but hey, that's a little spicy!
Bite 2: umm.....
Bite 3: chokecough
water break
get a few more bites in: face starts to feel a little hot around the ears, eyes, and nose
water break
few more bites: nose starts running
wipe nose
water break
few more bites: now my tongue and lips are burning at a steady rate, almost ignorable
few more bites: can't quite feel my tongue
Time for 2nds! (can't help it - it tastes so good it's worth the pain)
grand finale: my nose is red, my ears are red, my nose is sniffly, my lips are burning and my tongue is nearly numb... and my husband, who by now has plowed through three bowls without blinking or taking more than two sips of water, is laughing at me.

As I've learned previously, the best way to treat these "symptoms" is with dark chocolate.

Thank you, Mister

Although Angst initially showed some interest in dinner, it didn't take long for him to decide he wasn't terribly interested in whatever was making his Lady disintegrate, so he found something else to be far more interesting than our dinner time talk about dubstep. [By the way - if you want to see something incredible, click here and prepare to hold your breath for about 6 minutes.]

Inside that large Williams-Sonoma bag live some other, smaller paper bags.  Just before we sat down, Mister added the little brown sack from Essene to that bag, but Angst really wanted it.  This is the last in a series of pictures of him climbing into the larger bag to snuffle at and try to retrieve "his" bag.

my bag.  mine.

spice and rice and everything nice

I'm already thinking [dreaming] of autumn, my favorite time of year, and even the dead cold of winter.  No, it's not actually all that hot right now, no 100+ temperature heatwaves to complain of (although Mister and Angst are wilting and weeping like there is).  I seem to have a penchant for cooking spicier-than-I-thought-they-would-be meals in the middle of summer, when the last thing I want to do is overheat my body from the inside out.  So I'm thinking of how handy Trader Joe's Soy Chorizo is going to be come the snowy, bitter winter months, when all we want is something that will heat us from the inside out.  Or maybe just keep the inside warm.

Isn't that a fabulously trippy package?  I love all the colors that really ought not be combined - quite amazing, but I'll tell you, it's not difficult to locate on the shelf!

By the way, if the meat association I made last time wasn't gross enough for you, I'm just going to let you use your own colorful imagination on this next one.  Once I had freed the chorizo from its non-intestinal casing, I thought it looked super gross.  Good thing I already knew how it tasted...

ew.

Regardless, I chugged along, combining the various components of Granada Paella from The Urban Vegan and testing the true capacity of my 2.5 quart pot (because I was too lazy to clean up the pot I meant to use last night - Fridays are not good for my energy level).

I'm pretty sure if it could have overflowed, it would have.  I was kind of envisioning the funny moment in almost every sitcom or comedy movie in the late 80s, early 90s where the pot of popcorn pops too much and pushes the lid off of the pot and spills onto the stove and floor.  You do know what I'm talking about, right?

Okay, so stupid memories and poor analogies aside, it made for a very tasty and very innard-warming dinner.  Not the best thing in August, but at least I have another hot meal in my arsenal for that first bitter chill this fall.

When I told Mister it was the same chorizo I used to burn my face off with the tacos, he laughed incredulously and asked me why I used it again.  I explained my expectation that the basmati rice would calm the flavor a bit.  It did, actually - it was still quite spicy and hot (if I haven't made that clear yet), but the rice dispersed the heat and made it tolerable enough that although my face still turned red and my nose still got sniffly, I only needed my Apothic Red and a little TJs Belgian chocolate to sooth the burn this time around.  Which is fortunate, since I didn't want to test my luck trying to get ice cream home from TJs today.

So, in the interest of saving money (and showing Whole Foods they aren't the only game in town - I'll let you know when the post is up), I'm making a habit of doing my menu and grocery list on Friday night or Saturday morning, then stopping at Trader Joe's on my way home from teaching.  Since I was doing my best to get everything I would ordinarily get at WF, my bill was a bit higher than it's been...but it was still well under $40, so I consider it a total victory.  I filled my basket with many tasty things to make:

1. Panang Cucumber Curry from the new Vegetarian Times magazine that made my mailbox happy a few days ago.  I don't know if I've ever actually cooked cucumber, so this should be interesting, to say the very least!

2. Braised Cabbage with Seitan from Appetite for Reduction, which has been feeling a little left out lately, so the rest of the menu is also sourced from that amazing cookbook...since I know I can count on Isa to never let me down!  This is actually in a section of the book some people might consider appetizers or side dishes, but it looks substantial enough to me - protein, veggies, served on Basmati for a starch...we're good to go!

3. Forty-Clove Chickpeas and Broccoli, which I intend to serve over mashed potatoes, because that's awesome.  It's also awesome that at Trader Joe's, they call russet potatoes "The" Potato and only charge 29 cents apiece.  Compared to other produce prices at Whole Foods, I'll admit that $1.79/lb sounds like a great deal for potatoes...until you realize that most russet potatoes are nearly a pound each!

No, I'm probably never going to stop being awed by how much I'm saving by shopping across town.

4. Pasta Con Broccoli to make up for the blandest meal I've ever made.


5. Ginger Bok Choy and Soba.  Maybe.  If I can find soba and bok choy.

6. Moroccan Chickpeas and Zucchini which I realized, as I was flipping through the pages, I've never made before.  I scanned the ingredients and discovered that this may be the first recipe I'll make that has the word "Moroccan" in the title and does not include fake ground meat.  So, of course, I needed to try it.  Let's see if Moroccan food can be tasty when it's only vegetables!  (I'll bet it can.)

speedy vegan?

I was originally going to title the post "Speed Vegan" but I didn't want it to be confused with the cookbook by the same name.  Although I sure would enjoy the SEO hits that may result from such a clever title, I don't want to be the cause of all the disappointment people would feel upon discovering this was not an associated blog.

However, I do want to share with you one of my cookbook gems: Vegetarian Times Fast and Easy.  This is a pretty good book - a lot of recipes are surprisingly tasty.  That truly was not intended to be the backhanded compliment it looks like.  What I mean is that some of the recipes combine bizarre (and sometimes difficult-to-find) ingredients but it always comes out well.  Other recipes you can look at and just know they'll be great.  I enjoy the first kind - I love being surprised by dinner.  This is actually pretty funny, considering what a picky eater I was as a child and how I hated to "try new things."

A few nights ago, I made one of the latter - an old, faithful standby, Tuscan Vegetable Ragout.

It's an incredible melange of crunchy, creamy, squishy, and squeaky.  Squeaky?  Well, yes - haven't you ever noticed how sometimes artichoke hearts make a squeaky sound?  You'll notice now.

Anyway, there are general ingredients - white beans, tomatoes, zucchini, artichoke hearts - which make up the standard Italian cuisine base, wouldn't you say?  Then there are embellishments, just like a good opera. [If I could take a brief detour: through my adolescence, I was trained as a classical vocalist.  One of my favorite things about Italian music was the Aria - the purpose of an aria is to showcase the ethereal voice and undeniable talent of, normally, a soprano.  As luck would have it, that was the part I sang.  The structure of an aria is similar to a canon in instrumental music - you start with a simple theme, but then to "show off" you sing through the exact same tune a second time but with wild - yet tasteful and perfectly articulated - ornamentation.  I am not saying that I fulfilled all the lovely descriptions I just gave of the Diva, but I did adore singing the second round of an aria.]

In Tuscan Vegetable Ragout, the ornaments take the form of cubed smoked tofu, sliced kalamata olives, and occasionally small pasta.  I skipped the pasta this time around because I felt like the menu was already quite noodle-heavy, so I served it on brown basmati instead.

The flavors of the various parts combine into a mouthful that is at once sweet (from the artichokes and tofu) and a bit savory (from the tomato-drenched beans and zucchini) with the satisfying crunch of zucchini combined with the smoothness of creamy cannellini beans.  There is nothing outstanding about this dish other than how perfectly its parts come together to make a whole.

Tonight's dinner, on the other hand, was quite outstanding, flavor-wise.  Tonight I made Singapore-Style Noodles with All That Other Stuff.  I nearly forgot how stirfries worked, which is amusing to me as they were all I did know how to do before I learned to cook.

I have gotten so used to chop-as-you-cook recipes that when I know I'm making a time-saver, I tend to automatically go to that.  You cannot pull of a successful stirfry this way.  No, fortunately, I remembered just in time that you really do need to prep all of the ingredients before you heat the oil.

This required 4 prep bowls, 2 knives, 2 measuring spoons, 2 measuring cups, and 1 whisk to accomplish, but I did pull it off and the result was terrific.  Love at first bite for Mister.

Me?  Well, it bit me.  Does it look tasty?  It totally is.  Does it look spicy?  It definitely is.  Furthermore, it's that sneaky spicy that doesn't hit you at first and then all of a sudden you're like "holy cow, my mouth is on fire!"  This should have been obvious as I was whisking nearly a tablespoon of curry powder and a teaspoon of harissa into the sauce, but it wasn't really.  I'm still stupidly brave about both of those ingredients and continue to forget how much harissa especially likes to kick me in the throat halfway through my meal.

It was absolutely worth it, though - I could only handle one bowl.  Mister had plenty of time to plow enthusiastically through two bowls while making mean jokes about dinner eating me.  He also had a good laugh as I tried to cool my burning tongue and lips by unwrapping the last Li'l Dreamer and pressing it to my tongue, which was sticking out through my lips.

Hey, ya know what?  I may have looked like a doofus, but it worked.  And it was delicious.

tonight's winners: Angst and Chorizo

At work, we frequently run little daily contests to inspire our sales agents to do their very best (Silly me, I usually regard that as "work ethic," but what do I know?).  Since our sales department is open from 7am until Midnight, there are a number of shifts that spread across the day, so normally, we'll have a "day shift" winner and and "evening shift" winner.

Angst is our Morning Winner.  I guess.  Remember the struggle of skill and wit that has been playing itself out in our kitchen?  Last night, the score was stuck at Mouse 2, Me 'n' Mister 0.  This morning, the score changed a little... as of this morning, the score was Mouse 2, Me 'n' Mister 0, and Angst Won.  In case I needed a reminder that Angst is neither vegan nor buddhist, stumbling out of the bedroom to find him batting a dead mouse around the kitchen is a great way to remember.  By great I actually mean nauseating and not the best way to wake up.  I was simultaneously proud of him for behaving like a cat and so, so sorry the little mousey wouldn't let Mister and I catch him and release him into a nice, grassy, cat-free area.

Mister was proud of me for disposing of the mouse without waking him up, even though he told me I could have.

Evening Winner

I had intended to make Mama Pea's Chickpeas and Dumplings tonight, but for inexplicable reasons, I walked into a home that was in no way as chilly as I needed it to be to want to make a homey, hearty stew with dumplings.  Mister decided it wasn't hot enough to have the A/C on, which I appreciate as our financial situation could almost always be better, but I have to admit - I disagreed.  Nevertheless, my desire to make the stew was gone with the air, so I opted to make the Chorizo Veggie Wrap from Katie Briggs at Philly Broadcaster.

Freeing the vegan chorizo from the "casing" came the closest I've been to feeling completely disgusted toward meat since...well, since this morning.  I did my best to banish thoughts of dead mice from my visual memory as I squished the bloody red faux sausage out of its plastic tube and into the sizzling skillet.  It immediately smelled the way I thought it should, which was delicious, by the way.  It smelled very similar to the chorizo they use at Farmicia, but as I ate my dinner I became convinced that it is most certainly not the same, since my face has never actually caught fire at Farmicia.

Fortunately, I was generous in my slathering of guacamole.   I didn't realize at the time that it would save my face from falling off; I just really like this guacamole.  It's the best guacamole ever.  It's so good that I have absolutely no problem sneaking up on strangers at Whole Foods and telling them they should buy it because they'll never eat better guacamole.  It's so good I can ignore the frugal side of me nagging about how there's no good reason it should be that darn expensive.  No reason except that it's the best guacamole ever.  So, since I had applied about a half-inch layer of guacamole, I was able to at least partially battle the chorizo for the ethical treatment of my tongue.

The arugula added a fun crunch and a bit of cool, crispness amidst a very spicy dinner.  Unfortunately, it had the tendency to grab hold of something slimy of either the guac or chorizo persuasion and attach that thing to my lips when it slurped past.  In the future, I'll probably chop up the arugula so it just sits there like it's supposed to with its little green hands folded in its little green lap.

Seriously, though, these wraps are phenomenal.  The chorizo was quite a bit spicier than I expected it to be (for no good reason, other than the less spicy nature of the chorizo at Farmicia).  In fact, it was so spicy that I went through two large glasses of water and a small cup of almond milk and Mister laughed at my red nose and sweaty brow.  But, it was so tasty that I still had a second [smaller] wrap [loaded high with mouth-saving guac], even though I knew it would burn my lips.

But hey, that's what chocolate's for, right?

I've found that spicy things make me crave chocolate.  I'm sure there's a scientific reason, but I'm not terribly interested in that right now.  What I am interested in is how Trader Joe's packs so much amazing taste into these little dark chocolate bars?  What's even better?  They sell these 1.65 oz Belgian chocolate bars in three-packs at the cash registers for about half of what I normally pay for one Endangered Species bar.

Good thing I plan to go back for more chorizo....

memories come in different flavors

Do you remember buttermints?  I do.  I remember going to the Candlelight Diner with my mother, sister, and grandmother.  I couldn't possibly tell you what I ate there, but I remember two things distinctly.  Each table had its very own individual juke box that played a variety of songs.  The only one my sister and I played, over and over, was the theme for The Greatest American Hero.  By the way, William Katt is actually a fantastic actor and did a terrific job in one of my favorite musicals, Pippin.

Anyway, the other thing I remember is the little glass bowl of pastel-colored buttermints at the cash register.  This was way before people knew about things like germs and how gross it was to touch things other people touched, so it's really a miracle I lived to adulthood considering how much I loved grabbing a handful of those mints.

I'm a fan of dessert before dinner, and even though I ate dinner first, then had a little dessert, I want to tell you about that first, while it's fresh in my mind and relevant to my trip down Memory Lane (but don't worry, folks, we're far from finished that joyride).  When I was stocking our brand new, clean freezer, I wanted to get some Mint Chip Tempt "ice cream."  Unfortunately, Essene didn't feel like stocking it the day I was there, but not to leave empty-handed, I picked up Rice Dream Mint Carob Chip, despite my ambivalence towards carob as a chocolate substitute.

I haven't spent a lot of time with rice milk because I'm perfectly happy with soy, almond, and/or coconut.  However, since I put so much effort into making the Rice Vegan "cheese" slices melt, I figured it couldn't hurt to try the "ice cream" and see how it compared to some of my favorites.

The first taste was a shock - extraordinarily minty, far more than I was expecting.  At first I thought it was disgusting but I wanted to give it a chance.  I realized, mid-mouthful, that it tasted like a frozen version of my beloved buttermints...but without all the artery-clogging butter and germs.  So, that was a happy little surprise (so were the spoon "tracks" that showed Mister tried a little bit, too, while I was at work).

Speaking of segues...I mean, Speaking of Mister....
I woke up at 5:30 AM this morning because a kitty jumped over my head.  In my groggy state of Why-the-H-am-I-Awake, it took me a moment to remember he wasn't supposed to be in the bedroom and that we close the door every night to keep him out.  I turned to see if Mister was going to kill the cat, but Mister was not there...which explained how the kitty got in... Apparently, Mister's good night of sleep two nights ago was kind of like the one time in 2010 that I didn't have trouble cooking brown rice - a fluke.  Last night, his insomnia returned in full force, so sometime in the early morning hours, he got up and decided that it's never too early for metal.

When I finally dragged myself from the bedroom at the late, late hour of 7am, Mister was wide awake and strumming furiously on his little guitar (with headphones on, thank God).

Why don't we head back down Flashback Alley for a quick safety reminder.  Remember when you were a kid, but finally old enough to "help" in the kitchen?  Maybe mom let you use the fancy can opener to open the baked beans or something?  What did she always say? Be careful; the edges are sharp.

 
Looks like someone didn't listen very well.
Or maybe, someone was just a little overzealous about getting the last three artichoke hearts out of the bottom of the can where they had all crammed themselves against each other and wouldn't come out until I bled.  Until "someone" bled, that is.

Regardless of my injury (and you were worried about germs on the buttermints?), our Tuscan Vegetable Ragout was a delightful and filling dinner.  It really makes a huge yield, causing me to ponder whether to replace my saute pan with a 4-qt or if I should just go for the gusto and get a 5-qt...only time and space will tell, I suppose.

I think it gets bigger (and better) every time I make it.  I need to start reining myself in - just because I can add smoked tofu and macaroni to the 14 oz of Killer Artichoke Hearts, 2 zucchini, 14 oz tomatoes, and 28 oz of cannellini beans doesn't mean I should.  Perhaps in the interest of my 3-qt saute pan, I'll learn some restraint before the next time I make this.

 

Or maybe I'll just buy a bigger sauteuse.

After all, it's not like this is the only recipe I run into that trouble with.  I could have made the bulgur pilaf in a saute pan if I thought it would have held the kale.  I had a little trouble combining all the ingredients for our dinner tonight, too: Warm Chickpea Ragout with Swiss Chard, Carrots, and Harissa from Vegetarian Times: Fast & Easy.  In case you were wondering what's in it....

You don't really need me to spell it out for you, do you?  After all, the book pretty much did that in the recipe title.

Despite Harissa repeatedly kicking me in the back of my throat, this really is a wonderfully tasty dinner.  My only grievance was with the tomatoes.  I used a different brand of fire-roasted tomatoes than I usually do and I could really taste the difference - these were acidic, not nearly as sweet as other brands.  The sweetness of the other brands are what allow me to actually eat this dinner, rather than choke and sputter through it as though I had accidentally made Martha's Apple-Chickpea Curry.

Due to time constraints, I substituted bulgur for the rice upon which I usually serve this.  As a result, I may need to pull a creative little switcheroo a little further down the week.  We'll see how that turns out.  Stay tuned - this could get exciting!

chili; it's not just for dinner anymore

I know we're not quite a full month into "official" winter, but I have to say something:  I am really getting tired of the bitter cold.  I can't remember a winter being this consistently painfully cold.  I am truly fearing February, especially since it seems to rain a lot, too.  Rain and cold are quite possibly the worst combination, aside from rain + cold + wind.  Yup.  That one's definitely the worst.

Anyway, the great thing about winter is that it snows!  I love snow and it never stops making me happy.  I love snow so much that I chose to walk home, a mile, through it last night.  I feel like I should make some smarmy comment about going up hills with no shoes on, too, but I'll stick with walking a mile in the falling snow.  By the time I got home, I was covered - my hat, my hair, my coat, even my purse - covered with "snowflakes that cling to my nose and eyelashes."  Yes, they did that, too, as well as stealthily flying up my nose.  I could have done without that.

I stopped for a couple of pictures because it just looked so beautiful.

freezing at the train station.
it always seems colder there.

 

walking home through Washington Square

After I shook off the coating of snow that had accumulated on me during my traipse through the city, I changed into my Cozy Clothes - yoga pants, slippers, and a hoodie.  The problem with changing into Cozy Clothes, though, is that frequently I lose my motivation to cook once I'm comfy and warm.

So last night, we heated up the Potato-Spinach Curry and basmati rice that had been hanging out in the fridge for one day short of Too Long.  Having given it time to let the flavors thoroughly meld, I have come to the conclusion that it needs a lot more salt, maybe 1.5 tsp, but we'll see what happens next time I make it - I think a little improv is in order.

Tonight, I returned to dear Isa for our dinner:  Classic Black Bean and Veggie Chili from Appetite for Reduction

this is what dried out limes with no juice look like:
fuzzy flowers, like lime asters

I don't know what went wrong with the lime, but I cut it open, massaged it a little, but when I tried to squeeze out the juice, I might possibly have gotten ten drops from then whole lime (both halves).  Instead, the insides just turned out and created a dry little fringe around the edge.  Despite my dismay that my lime was dried out, I thought it looked pretty neat, so I took a picture to share, in case you've never seen this before (I know I haven't!).

Mister and I agreed that there was too much broth.  Very, very good chili, but we both prefer it to be less soupy because according to Mister, if utensils are involved in chili at all, they must be forks.  But normally, we just use tortilla chips to help the chunky chili to our mouths.

It was a little hotter than I might like to make it in the future - I keep forgetting that Isa is one of those people who likes things spicier than me.  Next time, I'll use 33% less chili powder and 100% less broth.  I don't think it was necessary at all - the juice from the tomatoes should be sufficient.  It was a great way to defrost from tonight's walk home, though.  Since my Spicy Threshold is pretty low, despite years of training, when I eat food like this it really warms me up, making it a perfect meal to repeat often between now and the Great Thaw (aka late Springtime).

oh the weather outside's delightful

And since we've no place to go (because it's midnight), let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

I love snow. I have loved snow all my life and people keep telling me I'll hate it when I'm older, but I'm still waiting and I'm still loving it. It's so magical to look out of the window and it feels like you're inside of a giant snowglobe!

It's been snowing for hours and the streets, sidewalks, newspaper stands, and cars are all covered with inches of happy white snow. According to weather forecasts, in which we all know I have a ton of faith, when I wake up tomorrow, it will have eaten the entire city - twelve to eighteen inches!

What's funny about the amount of substantial snow we've gotten so far this winter is that the weather has been just frightful enough to prevent me from renewing my driver's license. The reason that's funny is because I had the exact same problem exactly sixteen years ago, when I was trying to GET my license. So now you know how old I am, if you are even mildly proficient in arithmetic. Anyway, hopefully it won't take me until May to renew my license like it did when I got it to begin with, exactly half my lifetime ago (that really weirds me out).

So, since it was really nice out yesterday and all cold and snowy today, it seems natural that I made Spicy Peanut Soup last night. As soon as I had the first broth-soaked crumb of bread in my mouth, I remembered the first time (only time) I made this soup. It is not even remotely spicy - and remember, I think black pepper packs some heat. I really don't know why it's called "Spicy" unless I'm using the wrong kind of chili powder and/or I didn't read the part that calls for massive amounts of cayenne or harissa. Actually, I had intended to stir in about a tablespoon of harissa but I forgot to.

Don't get me wrong - this is a very tasty soup and it is substantial enough to count as food in Mister's eyes. The finished product didn't take very pretty pictures, but the rainbow of finely chopped vegetables that went into it was too beautiful to neglect. You see there red peppers, orange carrots, yellow potatoes, and green celery, sauteed with garlic and chili powder. The quart of broth I added just barely covered that delicious pot of veggies. It was a chunky, satisfying, but definitely NOT spicy soup.

Tonight, we had my old favorite Mediterranean Pasta with Artichoke Hearts, Olives, and Tomatoes. I can't tell if I did something wrong, since I haven't made it in many, many moons or if I've just gotten spoiled by the recipes I've indulged in for the past six months (can you believe that's how old my little blog is?), but I remembered it being much better than it was. It could be that tomatoes are completely out of season and that the large part of the dish's sweetness comes from those little grape tomatoes. It could be that I didn't let the artichokes soak up enough of the white wine vinegar. It could be that I neglected to sprinkle the sizzling veggies with kosher salt, since I felt the Kalamatas should provide enough umami. Whatever it is, this was not as exciting as I'd hoped it would be. It was fast, though, and that's what Mister and me and our exploding heads needed.

I think tomorrow will probably involve another soup recipe, but I have to see if I want to trudge many blocks through the snow back to Whole Foods/Italian Market (Spice Corner) because I never did get my cumin and paprika, and I'm not paying Superfresh $5 for two tablespoons of cumin. Thieves.

sweet? hot? no, I'm not talking about me

Heeding the advice from the Mel-Gibson-looking WF employee, I traveled alllll the way to The Spice Corner in the Italian Market yesterday on my way back to Whole Foods. There, on the top shelf, almost out of view was the prize I sought. Not just one, but at least a half dozen boxes containing tubes of harissa sat there, neglected, unpurchased. I hopped up and snagged my long-searched-for treasure, picked up a bag of chili powder and headed for the register. The checkout girl was unimpressed when I excitedly told her that they are the only source in all of Philadelphia for this oddball condiment. Granted, I think that's because she didn't have the slightest clue what it was. Regardless, I got me some harissa.

Yesterday, Mister and I made a joint effort to consume as many of the leftovers as gastronomically possible since my generous workplace has been stuffing my face for the past week and a half. I have to suffer through one more day of the Vice President hand-delivering my special veggie lunch before I can return to the usual bliss of bringing my leftover dinner to eat cold or at room temperature because I hate microwaves. I think I can make it...it's been an awful struggle though.

If you don't know I'm kidding, we need to have a conversation about my humor.

Anyway, tonight, we finally had Warm Chickpea Ragout with Chard, Chickpeas, and Harissa. I have to admit, I was feeling more than a little intrepid as I gently squeezed the harissa into the Tablespoon measure, and I will also admit, I was not exactly generous in my portion. Like I mentioned when I shared my menu, I never trust people who say "Oh, it's not that spicy, it's just kind of hot." I'm Irish. Black Pepper is spicy.

Also, I'm not sure what happened, but I swear I bought the fire-roasted tomatoes this recipe uses, but I will be darned if I could find them tonight. I ended up stealing the whole [not fire-roasted] tomatoes intended for another supper, since I have to get Vegetable Broth anyway. Apparently, SuperFresh hates vegetable broth quarts because they are never in stock. Ever. So, when I find a quart of vegetable broth somewhere, I will also have to remember to pick up more whole tomatoes.

I know you're just reading this and are unaware that I just sat here staring at the screen for five minutes, but I feel the need to share that my momentary stupidity is the direct consequence of trying to figure out just exactly what is wrong with the elephants who live upstairs. Moving on...

I stirred, chopped, saute-ed, and simmered for probably a little less than a half an hour. It occurred to me towards the end of the cooking process that I should have prepared some kind of grain to lay this melange upon, but by then all I could think to make was couscous. Thematically, it definitely would have matched, but I just couldn't deal with it, so we ate our dinner carb-less.
That's very unlike us. I kept waiting for Mister to insist we needed bread and raid the fridge, but he didn't. Instead, he teased me about whether dinner was hot enough for me and made repeated comments about how much he liked it.
I liked it, too. To my incredible surprise and delight, the harissa really did add a "sweet heat" to the meal without making it overbearingly spicy. There were a few times towards the end when I found myself reaching for my water more frequently, but it was actually a thoroughly enjoyable meal. It was also one of the first times I have been able to recognize how the spiciness can bring out the other flavors in a dish. I will definitely make this again, which is fortunate, because that is one big-a$$ tube of harissa in my cupboard. (I didn't curse, Mom - those are dollar signs)

Oh! I also managed to convince Angst that the chard was spinach and he ate three pieces!