Cake!

I learned that Deb was doing extensive research on vegan chocolate cake recipes, so when I needed to make a cake for work a week later, I simply took advantage of all her hard work and asked for the recipe she found. Hence, this cake and this frosting. Vegan baked goods are perfect for me because I rarely have milk or eggs on hand. My flirtation with veganism ended ignominiously, but still I so rarely eat milk or eggs (lingering mixed feelings after I found out that I may or may not be allergic) that if I get some for a recipe, I only use a little and the rest just sits in the fridge.

I didn't frost the sides because I realized that the only way to get the cake to work was to put the sides of the springform pan back on and cover it with plastic wrap. Now that I have the perfect recipe, next I'll work on my presentation technique.

Hmmm—there is leftover frosting in the fridge, and I still have all the cake ingredients...I may have to make some cupcakes tonight.

Dr. Love/Hate

On the recommendation of a colleague who said he completely turned around her energy levels, I started seeing this naturopathic doctor, and in my mind he quickly became Dr. Love/Hate. I like him because he's friendly, chipper, and under other circumstances I would totally want to hang out with him. But then he tells me to do things that sound as plausible as if he wanted me to build a spaceship to the moon.

For example, a few weeks ago he presented me with a blood test report stating that I am "very" allergic to dairy, eggs, pinto beans, and navy beans, and "moderately" allergic to beef, lamb, gliadin, gluten, malt, rye, wheat, halibut, salmon, sardines, sole, crab, shrimp, almond, pineapple, green beans, kidney beans, squash, brewer's yeast, mushrooms, psyllium seed, safflower seed, spelt, triticale, chili powder, cumin, mustard, poppy seeds, turmeric, cashews, pistachio, honeydew, alfalfa, garbanzo beans, kale, mung beans, red peppers, and watercress. These are not food allergies in the sense that they cause a reaction, because they never have, but in the sense that I produce antibodies to these foods or something.

"Just cut out all of those foods, plus all remaining legumes, from your diet for six weeks," he said. "Then after that you can have the 'moderate' foods once a week, but never again have dairy or eggs, and I wouldn't recommend ever eating gluten again either."

Sure—no big deal. I have hours and hours to research and plan all my meals as well as read every label and keep stopping to consult a list while grocery shopping or at a salad bar. Plus never eating out again, and presenting people who invite me over to eat with a 40-item list.

"That's crazy," said my therapist Dr. Knitter.

I had wondered why more people didn't partake in natural medicine. All natural, no drugs! But now I realize that natural medicine requires a high level of personal willingness to change. I consider myself willing to try such things. I don't eat meat except for fish, I've flirted with veganism, and, when I heard bad things about gluten, I started reading a blog called "gluten-free vegan." So getting to that point seemed almost plausible. But to give up legumes as well—what kind of vegan can you be without legumes? That was what put it all over the edge and made me leave his office almost in tears.

If I had a lot of time on my hands, I might even try this diet to see where it got me. But as it is, I'm just trying to avoid the foods I'm not supposed to eat when I can remember what they are. It's been three weeks. I guess I feel OK, but Dr. L-H would probably tell me I'm not getting optimal results because I'm not being super strict about it.

An interesting discovery is what I miss the most. Not dairy. Not eggs. Not psyllium seed (whatever that is). I miss bread. Bread, bread, bread. Delicious bread. I think about bread. I dream about bread. When I eat a piece of bread, it's the most delicious thing ever, and I'm euphoric for hours.

If nothing else comes out of this diet, I will have a new appreciation for bread.

Recent Co-op Finds

I get in a rut sometimes and pick up the same ten things at our local co-op grocery. Recently Stud M. improved my life by recommending these Food Should Taste Good chips.
And meanwhile I had helped myself to one of these cucumber waters from the fridge while on a mini–writing retreat/catsitting day at Veg's house. Soooo good.And finally, I picked up an intriguing tip from a box of steel-cut oats. I love steel-cut oats—they have so much more going on than regular, gluey oatmeal. But they take too long to cook in the morning before work...or so I thought until I tried this: The night before, boil two cups of water in a saucepan. Turn off heat, stir in a half-cup of steel-cut oats, cover, and remove from heat to soak overnight. The next morning, heat up or microwave as much of the oats as you want, and save the rest for the following morning. Or be like me and have it all. Mmm, steel-cut oats with brown sugar, soy milk, banana slices, and walnuts!

Desperation Roasting

What do you do when all you have in the kitchen is olive oil, salt, and fourteen pounds of CSA produce? Kick that oven up to 400 and roast away! We dispatched three leeks, an eggplant, a zucchini, three potatoes, and five beets last night. I found it helped to divide everything into smaller pans (pizza pans in my case), and put the "harder" stuff like the potatoes in earlier to give it more time to cook. Also, the beets got their own pan so they would not dye everything else red. Extra bonus side dish: roasted kale "chips"—said in the blogosphere to rival potato chips. I would not go that far, but I appreciated another kale option in what is turning into the Summer of Kale.

Bok Choy, Mmmmm

The talk of College Town this summer is the CSAs everyone has joined. It's hit some critical mass and suddenly everyone I know is trading tips for what to do with garlic scapes and anise hyssop.

I have to admit that advanced produce like the above—and my all-time favorite intimidating CSA food, stinging nettles—are still beyond me, but at least now I have bok choy down to a science. There's an easy recipe in Veganomicon that involves sauteeing it with shallots, ginger, soy sauce, and peanut oil, and then sprinkling with roasted sesame seeds. I'd never purposely sought out bok choy before this summer, and now I'm developing a serious dependence. I hope it's not about to go out of season.

CSA Madness

This summer Veg and I are splitting a half-share subscription to Echollective CSA. For about $10 each per week, we get a boatload of produce for 20 weeks. Here's my haul from Week 1 (this is half of a half-share! which leads me to ask, who gets a full share and how do they eat it all?). Luckily, for identification purposes I have The Field Guide to Produce thanks to Brother-of-Flossie and Buttercup.

This week, I have made mint lemonade, roasted asparagus, arugula pizza, and lots and lots of salad. That leaves only the leeks, bok choi, swiss chard, etc etc etc. And Week 2 veggies come tomorrow!

Mom II

Here's the other dish Mom made when she was in town: those noodles on the right side of this arrangement, chop chae. Again, I lack exact amounts, so some experimentation may be required.

Cellophane noodles, boiled and left to sit until they turn soft, then cut up
Spinach, boiled and drained
Carrots, chopped
Onions, chopped
Meat or scrambled egg (optional)
Pepper
Salt
Sesame oil
Sugar

Mix and fry in oil. Add soy sauce afterwards to taste.

That's it!

Mom-of-Flossie

Mom-of-Flossie came for a visit last week while Mr. Flossie was out of town, and I got to witness some REAL domestic-goddess skillz. It was a taste of what it must have been like for Ward Cleaver: I came home from work to a house full of delicious smells, enjoyed a hot dinner, and looked out the window to contemplate my weeded and manicured backyard. I need a wife, pronto!

Don't get me wrong, Mr. Flossie does cook dinner too, as do I, but we're usually both rushing around trying to get work done until about 7 pm, at which point we throw something together hurriedly. Coming home to a hot meal...now I understand why the patriarchy was/is so popular.

Mom and I delivered some mandu (Korean dumplings) to M and H, who promptly demanded the recipe. I tried to get her to dictate it to me, but she always cooks by memory and according to what's in the fridge. Hence, this less-than-totally-precise recipe for mandu:

1 block firm tofu
a lot of shredded cabbage
some minced garlic
2 eggs
won ton wrappers
diced carrots or other veggies (optional)
ground beef or fake ground beef (optional)
dried mushrooms, soaked in water and cut up (optional)
a little salt, pepper, and sugar

Fry up your garlic and cabbage, adding salt and pepper. Smoosh water out of the tofu, drain, crumble, and mix together with fried cabbage. Mix in eggs and sugar and whatever else you are including. Place a little dollop of mix in the center of a won ton wrapper. Beat another egg and brush it around the perimeter of the wrapper to use as paste when you bring the wrappers' corners together and seal the edges. Dip each mandu in flour. Then either pan-fry in oil so hot that a drop of water jumps out, or cook them in boiling water. If you go the boiling route, some will fall apart, but that's OK because then you have a tasty soup.

Oh yes, the most important part (in my opinion), the dipping sauce: Whisk together a bit of soy sauce, water, and vinegar. Add garlic, sesame oil, salt and pepper, sugar, and/or chopped green onions as you like.

Next up: Mom's chap chae.

The Humble Crouton

I recently had the brilliant idea of making a big pot of soup and thus providing myself with a multitude of lunches and quick dinners. So I made a double batch of this cilantro-chipotle-potato chowder that I had never made before. Unfortunately, I was underwhelmed with the soup from the first bowl. And I had about 20 bowls to go!

I needed to add some flavor and interest to this soup, especially after about a week of having it for lunch every day. Domestic goddess M. gave me the idea of making croutons, and so I roasted a head of garlic in the toaster oven, mashed up the garlic with some olive oil and lemon juice, and drizzled it over stale bread cubes and toasted them. Dropping in a few garlic croutons really picked up that lackluster soup.

Like I said, it's not about big projects right now, but little things that I can do in a few minutes.

Raising the Bar

Now that Domestic Goddess M. is my co-worker, lunch has been taken to the next level. I can't exactly eat out of the vending machine when she brings delicious homemade lunches every day. Not only that, but M. upped the ante when, after I coveted her glass jars and bowls, she bought me some for my very own for my birthday.

Hence tomorrow's lunch: white bean and roasted garlic soup (from Vegan with a Vengeance) and green salad. I'm also smuggling in a toaster to make some toast.* Yum.

*We don't have a kitchen at work, just a fridge in a locked room for which you have to get the key (and which is sometimes inaccessible during lunch), and a microwave that's in very high demand during certain hours. Toasters are verboten. I feel so transgressive!

Al Fresco

I made the Niçoise salad from The Urban Vegan, using greens from the Amish guy at the farmers' market, and we ate it on the front porch. Delicious.

After months of propagandizing myself with podcasts of Vegan Freak Radio, I've been trying to eat as vegan as possible given my laziness and lack of willpower.

Tasty But Not Photogenic Fried Rice

(So instead of the fried rice, here's another shot of the landscaping.)

I threw together this fried rice tonight after glancing at some recipes on the web:

sesame seeds
block of firm tofu
onion
spinach leaves
rice
egg (optional; I'm vegan-friendly but not there yet)

Throw rice in rice cooker and dice tofu and steam it for 10 minutes. Brown sesame seeds in vegetable oil and then add and cook ingredients in this order: tofu, diced onions, spinach leaves, rice, and beaten egg. Stir in soy sauce.

This recipe has the Mr. Flossie Stamp of Approval.

#40 Take a cooking class

I've crossed out my first thing from my 101 Things list. I took Veg's vegan cupcake class at the Co-op. Entertaining and informative! Veg is a pro. She had a supply of amusing anecdotes on hand for pauses in her masterful baking of three different kinds of cupcakes.

I frosted these three rather hastily, because I wanted to EAT DEM! They are (were) coconut lime, agave-sweetened orange, and chocolate cherry crème tower. Nom nom nom.

Here is Veg and her stand mixer, her rapt audience, and her assistants/minions.

5-Second Recipes

Forget 20-minute recipes; who has the time?

1) We call this spritzer "brain food": mix one part Minute Maid pomegranate-blueberry Help Nourish Your Brain juice blend with two to three parts lime sparkling water.



2) Take a pita. Brush it with olive oil and sprinkle with garlic salt. Toast in toaster oven at 350 degrees for 8 minutes. Voilà—snack.

Sloppy Joes

I have this strange liking for certain meat products. The more disgusting the better. Sloppy joes, Slim Jims, Taco Bell crunchy tacos. Now that I'm not eating meat anymore, I'm not above pseudo-meat. This sloppy joe from Veganomicon magically transforms ingredients like lentils, tomato sauce, yellow mustard (?), and maple syrup (??) into something that does the trick. For me. Mr. Flossie claims to like it but would probably argue it isn't a bit like the real thing.

When I worked for a food editor, I once interviewed someone in the beef industry. He told me that a steak doesn't have any flavor on its own; it's the salt and fat that give it the flavor. I thought that was interesting. When I have cravings for specific foods, I try to break down what element I am actually craving. Salt, sugar, fat? Or am I just hungry? Usually I can divert the craving away from things I feel conflicted about—like, say, beef jerky. Of course the underlying issue is to break the addiction to salt, sugar, fat....but let's not get ahead of ourselves.

IKEA Love/Hate

Today we finally put up the pot rack from IKEA we bought six months ago. We screwed it into the window molding because the walls are plaster and it's always highly nerve-racking to hang anything on those walls. They are just as likely to chip clean away as end up with the desired drill or nail hole. As it turns out, I like the over-the-window aesthetic. It's kind of a pseudo–window treatment.

We also put up the racks for the pot lids. Oh IKEA, you think of everything. Too bad shopping there is like being in a madhouse and then you're sweating as you count those funny-looking screws back at home, hoping there are enough in the package to assemble your product because the nearest IKEA is 200 miles away.

But then again, this has really freed up some cabinet space in our small kitchen.

Staving Off the Chaos

Leaves are clogging the gutters, a light fixture keeps zapping bulbs, and the downstairs toilet won't stop running. There are times when I feel like entropy is getting the better of me.

Oh well, tomorrow I'll call the pros, but in the meantime I had to do something, so I cleaned off the fridge. All the better to showcase Mr. Flossie's charming "Eat" and "Die" magnets, and the (this time I'm not being ironic) delightful bicycle magnet I got for my birthday.

Hey, Free Food!

Yesterday, I cooked and ate an acorn squash from the plant that grew from the old compost bin. I wish I could say it was great, but it was just OK.

"What did you expect?" said Mr. Flossie. "It grew out of garbage."

I scoffed mightily at him being so out of touch with nature, but continued to wonder why it was just OK. I was perhaps overly excited and picked it too soon. The Interweb said to pick an acorn squash when the yellow dot on the skin turns orange. I have to confess it was still mostly yellow. Also, this may be an old plant that has been in the compost bin for years. (I vaguely recall a squash plant appearing last year, but not producing any squash.) Except aren't squash plants annuals? Maybe it's a mutant.

One site on the Internets that I read too late said that winter squash should cure in the sun for seven to ten days after harvesting. Maybe I'll try that next time.

Best Lunch Ever.

I have eaten this for lunch all week and am not sick of it yet. My friend A. The Francophile sent the recipe to me way back in 1999; it's been in my recipe binder ever since.

Black Bean, Orzo, and Tomato Salad
1 c. orzo
2 (19 oz.) cans black beans, drained and rinsed (though I only had one can, and it was still fine)
1 1/2 cups diced tomatoes
1/2 cup chopped sweet red onion
1 1/2 T(ablespoons) Dijon mustard
3 T red wine vinegar
1 T minced garlic
1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
6 T olive oil
3 T chopped fresh basil
2 T chopped fresh parsley

Cook orzo according to package instructions. In a bowl, combine cooked orzo with beans, tomatoes, onion. In another bowl, whisk together mustard, vinegar, garlic, and pepper flakes. Gradually add olive oil. Toss salad with dressing. Serve, or refrigerate and bring to room temperature 30 minutes before eating. Toss with basil and parsley just before eating.

Becoming Presentable

I spent eight hours on Sunday dusting, vacuuming, weeding, mulching, doing laundry, cleaning bathrooms, and cooking. Oy vey. I'll be glad to forgo any domestic activities for the rest of the week. We were having T. and R. over for dinner, and somehow having people over for dinner puts me in obsessional-cleaning mode. Mr. Flossie can do things like write whole book proposals the same day people are coming over, but I can do nothing but clean.

Making meals for people also freaks me out a bit. To show how bad we are at returning dinner invitations, when T. and R. last had us over to dinner they announced that R. is pregnant. Last night I asked when she is due and she said next month!

Luckily, with all the cleaning and gardening, I planned something easy for dinner. We grilled portobello mushrooms marinated in lemon juice, garlic, and olive oil to make "burgers" and also grilled some veggie burgers for the mushroom-averse. We grilled corn too. I am somewhat wary of the grill because I never know when it crosses the line between too hot and not hot enough. But everything went well (I did a test run earlier in the week and learned that keeping them on the grill longer is better than shorter--it ended up being just over ten minutes for each mushroom/burger/corn). We served store-bought potato salad and T. and R. brought a green salad.

I weeded our "mulch garden" because I thought we might eat outside, but it ended up being too humid. The main visual difference, besides less weeds and more mulch, is this circle I made of bricks around the forsythia, in the hopes of preventing it from being weed-whacked to a nub again.

Much appreciation to T., R., and others for being the guinea pigs in my first forays into domesticity.