I probably jinxed myself when I wrote, “Fingers crossed the power stays on for good, and poor Otto can finally relax, meaning we can too.” Yeah, if only.
Yesterday, I spent a big chunk of time washing all the bedding for our bed. That’s king sheets, a duvet cover, a malaise quilted blanket, a top blanket, and Otto’s furry blanket.
When Otto is afraid, he pants and drools everywhere, buckets, it seems. After the two previous nights of him freaking out over the power failure, stuff need to be washed.
Whenever I make the bed with clean sheets and blankets, I can’t wait to crawl in and go to sleep. I am strange that I have to make my bed every day, even if it means right before bedtime. I can’t sleep in a wrinkled, rumpled bed. The wrinkles are so annoying to me that I can’t get comfortable. Now when it comes to a nap? I could sleep on a damn cactus.
At 10:45 pm, the power went out for the third night in a row! Then it came back on. Then it went out again. I am sure the other 81% of the residents in our town who lost power all said the words, “Oh, shit!” simultaneously.
Otto started his usual freaking out. I gave him Thunder-wonders right away. We waited to see what would happen. I went up to bed with Otto at midnite since he seemed to have quieted down. I lay there listening and waiting. I tried to meditate, but I couldn’t focus. I sang songs to the musical Hamilton in my head. Finally, between 1-2 am, the power came back on.
Otto didn’t freak out when the power came back on, thankfully. Marty came up to bed, and we could finally go to sleep. The bed was comfortable and smelled so clean! Just like bleach, I told you I am a little strange. To me, the smell of bleach equals clean. It’s ridiculous we have white bedding with a dog who sleeps with us, but that’s what the top blanket and Otto’s blanket are for.
I am not going to mention anything about the power today…at all! Enjoy your Sunday!
Ugh! It’s been a rough 48 hours! We live on the Southern Vermont and New York State border. Marty and I kept checking the forecast for the big snowstorm that was forecasted.
At first, they predicted 5-8 or maybe 12 inches on Thursday night, then another 4 inches on Friday. We were prepared for snow. We were so prepared that we doubled up on production earlier in the week and made deliveries first to the Rutland, VT area, then to Saratoga, NY, after production the next day.
Then wholesale orders started pouring in, which is what a business always wants, but we are a two-person team and felt like we were drowning in spätzle. Thank goodness we still had Friday to fill these orders.
I was following along on my friend Jon’s blog, Bedlam Farm Journal, his post on the storm’s track with a radar that seemed very accurate. Jon and his wife Maria, my friend and belly dance student, live right over the border in Cambridge, NY, only a few miles from us.
From what I could see on Jon’s radar, we were in for a big ice storm and not snow. Oh, shit! This is never good. 😖
Thursday, it rained all day with temps hovering around 44 degrees. As the day went on, the temperature began to fall. By 8 pm, the rain turned to ice. Everything was glazed over within half an hour. Dammit! The guys were on a rescue squad call, so I was nervous with them out there driving and walking.
Otto woke me up at 1 am on Friday. He is petrified when the power goes out and comes back on; along with fireworks and thunder. I feel terrible for him when he is so scared. Usually, I give him Thunder-wonders and wrap him up tight in a blanket.
Sam heard me up and filled us in on the scary situation. Power was out in the entire area. There was half an inch of ice on everything; trees were snapping and falling. No wonder Otto was so afraid. The sound was horrible and scary.
Friday morning our trucks were encased in ice. Trees were hanging over and some were split on their tops leaving big branches behind. A few of the new trees that we planted in the fall were crushed. I hope they can be saved.
Somehow, after a couple of hours, we all fell back to sleep until morning. In the morning you could not walk or get into your car they were so encased in thick ice. Sam had a class at the hospital that he had to get to. He chipped his way into his truck and let it warm up. He came back inside while the truck warmed up, then walking back to the truck, fell on his butt, scraping up his arm and leaving his pants soaked. He left with wet pants because he had to.
My ice gripper “rubbers.” Remember wearing the shoe kind of rubbers? Not the other kind! 😜
Of course, we couldn’t work in the production kitchen as scheduled. The simple act of walking was impossible; the only thing that saved us was ice grippers for our boots. We walked around looking at the trees down and accessed the damage.
I walked over to our neighbor’s house, who lives out of state, and took photos. A heavy tree limb ripped down the electric line from the street to their house. Definitely not good news to report to them on a Friday morning.
Our kitchen window last night.
By the time Sam got home from his class at the hospital, it was HORRIBLE! Bad, bad, bad out.! The roads were a blanket of ice, it was like a war zone with trees down, and things smashed everywhere.
Marty and Sam worked most of the day to get into our vehicles and work on the driveway. I stayed inside, trying to keep warm since we had no power.
Marty hooked up a small generator to our brand new heated water lines that blew two weeks ago due to zero-degree weather. We couldn’t afford to have that happen again. Literally and figuratively.
For the rest of the day, we felt like sitting ducks. Sam went to the rescue squad and heard the severity of the power outage. It wasn’t good. Our town’s sub-station was down along with many wires from all of the trees that fell or lost their branches. Fuck was all I could think when he told us that. He said we might be days without power.
It began to snow which made matters worse. The already heavy ice-covered branches didn’t need heavy snow on top of it. The town set up a warming area located at the local high school. However, it was hard to get the word out to people because there was no cell service or internet.
Before Sam left for his overnight shift, he helped Marty hook up our larger generator. All we wanted to turn on was our refrigerator and mini-split heater. We unplugged almost everything else not to make the generator work so hard. Again, we had no idea how long we would be without power.
Initially, Marty and Sam hooked up our gas fireplace insert to a small backup battery but had to shut it down quickly when the carbon monoxide detector alarm started going crazy with the word “gas” flashing on the screen. Just before that happened, I began to feel weird and light-headed. No wonder why.
I went out on the front porch with the dogs until the propane dissipated. That’s when the guys got the mini-split hooked up instead. At least we finally had a little heat which we were very grateful for.
Sam and I used a french press coffee pot. We had to go old school and look in a cookbook for the water to coffee ratio.Whenever we have to light candles for light, I imagine what this house would have looked like back in 1832.
I could cook through all of this; I just needed to light the gas stove with a match: not that I would make anything real to eat anyway under the circumstances. I wanted biscuits and gravy, but I wasn’t going to attempt that in the dark.
Finally, the hard-working Green Mountain Power employees restored our power after 18 hours. I ran around the house like a fool, showering and blow drying my hair just in case the power went out again. Trees were still falling, and it was still snowing.
81% of our town was out of power for 18-24 hours. It was a miracle the Green Mountain Power crews got it fixed so quickly. Teams came down from the northern part of the state to help, working outside for 12 hours straight in single-digit temperatures.
If it weren’t for all the road crews, who kept on top of the roads the best they could, the power company trucks wouldn’t have been able to maneuver around as easily. A big thanks to everyone who helped with the situation.
I use potato starch to make my roux. I had to add a pat of butter since there wasn’t enough grease from the lean sausage I used. The sausage gravy is done when your spoon leaves an open trail when dragging it across the pan.Finally!
After my shower, I made us biscuits and gravy since it’s all I thought about all day. I used a new gluten-free biscuit recipe that worked brilliantly! I finally had flakey biscuits that rose. Yay! The meal hit the spot on such a cold, miserable night.
We lost power again during the night. I knew immediately because poor Otto started freaking out again. The power came back on again around 4 am. We fell back to sleep eventually after he calmed down.
Out our bedroom window at 3 am. There were 7 power trucks parked down a line in front of our house.
We were now so far behind in production besides missing our farmer’s market; we still had those big wholesale orders to fill. We thought about going into production this morning, but something told us to hold off.
Trees look like crystal chandeliers! love the sunbeam shining through the trees this afternoon.
We briefly lost power a couple more times in the morning and early afternoon. If the power went out during production, that would be disastrous, possibly ruining our equipment and wasting expensive ingredients. Thank goodness we listened to our gut instincts.
Our window screen.
Sam and Marty figured out why the gas fireplace insert failed because the screen on the chimney top must have been covered in ice like the screens in the windows. Thank goodness for that carbon monoxide safety monitor. I kept thinking that the place could have blown up, or we could have been taking a dirt nap. 😵 We will be waiting until the ice melts before relighting the gas fireplace.
The beautiful sunshine today didn’t melt any of the ice. It looks pretty though.
So, it’s been a stressful couple of days. Fingers crossed, the power stays on for good and poor Otto can finally relax meaning we can too! Enjoy the rest of your weekend! Cheers!
We are trying to be a bit more adventurous with different products at the farmer’s market. There are so many veggies we haven’t even tried before let alone cooked.
I grew up eating mostly all frozen or canned vegetables, I think the only fresh vegetable my mother made were candied carrots. I ate everything that was put on my plate because I had to and never gave it much thought since I didn’t know better. Once I got a taste of what fresh vegetables were like I vowed to make them for my own family.
We were talking with our market manager Steve on Saturday and he told us about some bok choy he got the week before and cooked it during the week. He described how he cooked it and it sounded delicious. The next thing I knew Marty came back to our spätzle stand with some baby bok choy.
I wasn’t sure what to make with it besides straight-up Asian food. I had waygu ground beef for burgers and wasn’t sure if that would go with the bok choy.
I looked up a few recipes online and came up with a menu. Korean waygu burgers with quick-pickle sesame cucs and Asian mayo. Also on the menu were roasted potatoes and caramelized bok choy with garlic, honey, ginger sauce.
The Asian mayo was nothing but mayo mixed with a splash of soy sauce, ginger, garlic, and a touch of Korean gochujang sauce.
I make quick-pickle veggies all the time. Basically, it’s white vinegar, sugar, salt, and water. You soak whatever veggies you want in the pickling liquid. I usually quick pickle red onions, thinly sliced carrots, and radishes; it’s funny that I never did a cucumber before. The veg only soaks in the liquid for 30 minutes but picks up the sweet, sour, and salty flavors leaving a fantastic crunch.
For the baby bok choy I cut each in half and seared them in a cast-iron frying pan with butter. I flipped them over once they were golden brown and the sugars caramelized.
After I removed the bok choy from the pan, I added a small knob it butter and sautéed garlic and ginger. I threw in a splash of soy sauce and a big drizzle of honey. I let the sauce cook just for a minute and poured it over the bok choy.
I loved the flavor of the caramelization from the bok choy. Sam said it was interesting which I laughed at meaning it wasn’t his favorite, but at least he tried it. Marty and I both liked it a lot. I can see us experimenting with more bok choy in the future.
Not the most colorful plate of food, but big umami flavors.
The burger was fantastic and the roasted potatoes were seriously delicious dipped in the Asian mayo. Here is the NY Times Korean Cheeseburger recipe I loosely followed. It still tastes like a cheeseburger, just with yummy umami.
Last week, I mentioned how excited I was to start making fancy toast. I watched a few YouTube videos for inspiration and came across a video with Brad, a chef from Bon Appetit. The guy is a total crack up and down to earth, making cooking look so fun and easy, which it is.
I learn from watching and wanted to replicate his fancy toast. He used a baguette, ricotta cheese, garlic cloves, sugar bomb tomatoes, a couple of Calabrian hot peppers, olive oil, salt & pepper.
When I went to Aldi on Friday after making deliveries, I was dumbfounded when I saw they had the same tomatoes the chef used. This meant I HAD to make this fancy toast now.
The only thing I did differently from his the first time was whipping my ricotta cheese with a handheld beater for a minute, making the cheese smooth, light, and creamy.
I threw the tomatoes, whole garlic, and a few hot chili flakes in a cast iron pan with olive oil, salt & pepper. The tomatoes began to blister just like he did, and the garlic started to roast inside its skin.
The chef was cooking in a professional kitchen and didn’t give two shits what kind of mess he made; I partially covered the skillet when the tomatoes started to splatter not to make a big mess in my kitchen.
When the tomatoes looked done, I took them and the garlic out of the pan. I removed the tomatoes from the vines and took the garlic out of its skin.
Always remove that nasty green sprout from your garlic. This happens when the garlic starts getting old; like now in January.
Next, I chopped up the garlic, mashed it into a paste, and then folded it into the whipped ricotta with a splash of olive oil, salt, & pepper.
I took an Against the Grain gluten-free baguette and placed it in the cast iron pan, soaking up some oil and juices. Then I put the baguette under the broiler.
Just like the chef did, I smeared the toasted baguette with the ricotta topped with the blistered tomatoes. He added a few fresh basil leaves, which I didn’t have but used a refrigerated basil paste.
Greatest stuff ever in a pinch.
The results were delicious! It tasted exactly as I imagined it would. Ok, maybe even a whole lot better.
Since I still had the other half of the sugar bomb tomatoes to use, I made the fancy toast again, but this time I added a balsamic reduction syrup which added a sweetness that pushed the fancy toast to another flavor level. OMG!
This will be something I make whenever I find those sugar bomb tomatoes on the vine or in the summer when fresh grape or cherry tomatoes are available since regular tomatoes won’t work.
If I didn’t watch that Bon Appetit YouTube video, I never would have looked at the sugar bombs twice. I am so happy I did!
While we were eating, I could imagine that if a cafe had this fancy toast on its menu as a small plate, people would go crazy over it. The good news is. We don’t need a restaurant to make it; we can make it ourselves! 🍅 💣
Right after I turn off my sauce, it’s my tradition to have just a little taste to make sure it tastes good.
I pick a small bowl and put one meatball and one sausage in it. I top it with a little sprinkle of parmesan cheese. I always stand next to the pot on the stove and eat it. I think I always say, “Oh damn, that’s good.”
It’s not really that I need to find out if it tastes like “my sauce” because I have already tasted the tomato sauce a few times to adjust the seasoning. It’s because I have to taste it after smelling it for hours on end.
Ever since Sam was little, whenever he sees a pot of sauce on the stove he gets a big smile on his face. He takes the same kind of small bowl and does the exact thing I do, having just a little taste.
Today, he came down in his scrubs, and while fixing his coffee before heading off to his overnight shift, he asked, “What’s in the pot?” He asked this with a big shit-eating grin on his face. He knew what was in the pot from the smell of the house.
He wasn’t going to have time for his little taste, so he packed up his little bowl along with two slices of his favorite butter bread to go. He likes to get to the hospital early before starting his shift so that he can eat it then.
I always think Sam is like Marty with his intelligence and interests, but I know he is very much like me with everyday life stuff. I already know my oldest son Noah is very much like me artistically and personality-wise. This all makes me very happy. Happy Mama Julz. 🥰
Our freshly painted and updated kitchen isn’t quite complete as we are still waiting for a couple items to arrive. It’s taking forever but we special ordered those items knowing it would take longer.
Just moved all glassware to wipe the shelving! Freshly sanitized countertops.
I am out of my mind obsessed with keeping the white cabinets and shelves as clean as the day they were painted. This leads to constantly wiping down our honed black granite countertops that are already 16 years old. Best purchase eve by the way.
The countertops are in the same condition as the day they were installed. They look great when they are clean compared to the cleanliness of everything else.
Listen, I cook hard in my kitchen; I mean the way I used to in professional kitchens. Flimsy, home kitchen cookware and utensils don’t hold up to #10 cans and constant use. They all end up bending or breaking. For instance, this morning I was making a pot of sauce for Tuesday and my Oneida can opener shit the bed mid-way opening a #10 can of San Marzano tomatoes.
In the trash…
I was being so careful when I was frying up the Italian sausage and while making my meatballs to not make a mess. The more I try to be neat, the messier things get. Then I had to contend with this mid-open can issue. Shit!
SOB!
All I could imagine was while I was prying open the can with a cleaver and church key, cursing my head off, was the can would open and splatter the whole clean kitchen.
As I was struggling for over ten minutes with the cleaver and can I kept thinking maybe a newly painted and updated kitchen wasn’t such a good idea for me. It couldn’t handle it when I got into beast mode cooking.
Finally, I got one side opened a little bit; just enough to pour the whole tomatoes slowing into the blender a little at a time. Hallelujah! The rest of the sauce making went off without a hitch.
Yes, of course I deserve a nice and clean kitchen but I can’t let it make me turn into a crazy person. I have to cook the way I cook and clean up afterwards. Hell, the old kitchen held up pretty well for 16 years of hard cooking and making thousands of meals. I literally mean thousands. I figured it out one night while laying in bed trying to fall asleep with insomnia.
Now, the sauce is on a low simmer for the day and the house smells so good! The kitchen is clean and I don’t have to worry about messing it up again later since we were invited to Martin’s house for dinner tonight.
The three of us love having Sunday dinner together and playing an extremely competitive game of 5 Crowns; which turns out to be the most fun card game ever!
After I publish this, I will be sitting on the couch, still in my pjs reading my book, “I, Eliza Hamilton” which I am enjoying very much. I still have a few hours before I have to get ready to go to Martin’s.
Sharing the sectional with Klausie-boy and Otto.
We are back in the production kitchen early in the morning to fill a bunch of wholesale orders that came in over the weekend. Thank goodness the orders keep coming in; we are very blessed. ☺️
I love waking up to flowers on my dresser.
Enjoy the rest of your Sunday and weekend guys. We are one day closer to spring! I even bought myself a bouquet of flowers at Aldi the other day to remind me that spring isn’t that far away!
Today much of the East Coast is being pounded by a nor’easter, dumping over a foot of snow “down the shore” in NJ with more on the way! Yikes, they never get snow like this!
The Boston area has received a foot and a half of snow in some areas. Blizzard warnings are in effect until Sunday morning, with another 4-7 inches of snow expected.
Our area of the North East was spared from the blizzard snowfall by only getting an inch or two but fell into another deep freeze. Again! The last three Saturdays, which are our Troy Farmer’s Market days have had sub-zero temperatures not counting the wind chill. We are under a wind chill advisory tonight, with wind chill temps as low as 20-30 below zero. That is cold AF!
My sweet boy Otto watching me while putting on multiple layers for the market. His eyes said, “Come back to bed Mama Julz.” Or, “so long sucker!” Lol.
It was a cold, snowy ride to the market this morning. We got stuck behind a plow truck for miles going under 25 mph, making the ride to Troy feel like it took forever. I shouldn’t have been so eager to get there as I sat in Marty’s warm truck with heated seats.
The Artium building that houses the Troy Market isn’t used during the week; however, the heat gets turned on Fridays. Our spot at the market is 20 yards from one of the entranceways making it super cold without any heat.
We thought the last two weeks at the market were cold, but the cold was different today than the previous two Saturdays. It was relentless and unsympathetic with strong winds.
My Parisian mask Sue made for me!
We dress appropriately making me feel like the Michelin Man but it honestly doesn’t matter when you aren’t moving around for 6 hours. I usually wear a surgical mask but today I wore a heavy three-layer cloth mask; which seemed to keep my face from freezing. The market manager’s wife makes them from super cute fabric and gives them out to the vendors. Thank you, Sue!
Here is an FYI…we use toe warmers on these cold days and they really work keeping our toes from cramping up standing on the cold tile floor. I bought two six-packs of toe warmers and now can’t find the other package for next week. I put things away in easy-to-find places for when I need them; then I can never find them. 🤦🏻♀️
I use anti-fog wipes for my glasses that work brilliantly. You have to take your time and use them correctly. I wipe my glasses and let them dry, then repeat two more times. The problem I had today was instead of my glasses fogging up; they kept glazing over with a thin layer of ice. 😖
We found a warm spot in the building before the market started and set up a picnic area. We had fancy toast with avocado egg salad. Actually, we had toasted whole-grain gluten-free english muffins from River Canyon and they sucked! The texture wasn’t good but thank goodness the avocado eggsalad was lit!
I made my normal eggsalad but instead of using mayonnaise, I added mashed avocado. It had a great consistency with “good” fat from the avocado as opposed to “bad” fat in mayonnaise. I ended up eating some of the eggsalad off the english muffins. The package of 4 english muffins cost $6.99 a disappointing purchase. I never mind spending money on good things, but I was pissed about these. Now, what the fuck will I do with the other two? I hate throwing food away.
We made it through the long, cold market and were slapped with temps that felt colder than the morning. I stayed dressed in my down coat zipped up, my scarf, hat, and gloves on the entire ride back to Vermont. When we got home the temperature here was 5 degrees colder than NY. Is there really a difference when we are talking about such extreme bitter, and ungodly cold temperatures?
I had the tea kettle on as soon as I stepped inside. We were cold inside and out. I made Marty a cup of tea and a hot chocolate with a shot of Bailey’s in it for me. The plan was to grill wagyu burgers outdoors tonight but the hell with that idea! I have no clue what to make now and have no backup plan. It happens to all of us…the great dinner dilemma. It will probably end up heating up leftovers.
Stay warm my friends and don’t overdo it with the shoveling. The white stuff will still be there in the morning.
I’ve written about my love of Chinese food; one of the hardest decisions of my childhood was to have Italian or Chinese food for my birthday dinner.
Photo credit The Jale Isle. My all-time favorite Chinese restaurant was The Jade Isle in Scotch Plains, NJ. I loved the shrimp in the pineapple! As a kid, I couldn’t wait until I was an adult to have one of those fancy drinks with umbrellas!
Growing up in NJ, there was a lot of good Chinese food from take-out only to my favorite place called The Jade Isle. Technically it was a Polynesian restaurant, but they had Chinese food and a pool inside with turtles and fish. I loved their pupu platter!
Photo credit Four Square. Pupu platter and other dishes at the Jade Isle.
Being gluten-free has put a damper on my ability to eat Chinese food. We used to go to PF Changs, which has a gluten-free menu with ok joined and ok food. Then we heard about Ala Shanghai in Albany.
Ala Shanghai is very gluten-free friendly, with choices clearly marked on the menu. Some of the menu items are a gluten-free dream come true, like sesame or crispy beef. Other fried dishes are prepared in a non-contaminated fryer; dishes like General Taos, sesame, sweet and sour, and orange chicken. This may not seem like a big deal to some people, but these items are never available in Chinese restaurants because the frying oil has wheat in it.
Dinner at Ala Shanghai. The drink was delicious even without an umbrella.
My favorite is their steamed shrimp dumplings, another thing you can’t get at traditional Chinese restaurants. The owners are very nice, and the service is fast and professional. Even if you aren’t gluten-free and in the area, you should check it out. Call ahead for a reservation since the place is always packed.
Making Chinese food in a home kitchen is hard to do. I make pretty good Thai & Korean food, but Chinese cuisine is still a challenge. It never really tastes like authentic Chinese food except for Chicken & Broccoli.
I have been making this Chinese dish for ten years. The recipe is easy and on point. I have posted photos and the link to Simply Whisked recipeon my Facebook page for years. Many people have used the recipe with the same success. Even though I use a Chinese wok, you can use any large skillet.
Chicken and broccoli are dishes I also used to order at Chinese places. Because it has soy sauce in it, which has wheat, I can’t have it anymore. Gluten-free people use tamari sauce with us like soy sauce just without wheat.
The well-known brand La Choy’s soy sauce is also gluten-free and cheaply found in any grocery store. It says gluten-free right on the bottle. Their teriyaki sauce is gluten-free as well.
I use boneless chicken thighs when making this recipe. It takes a bit extra time trimming away the fat, but the thighs have more flavor than boneless breasts and stay moister.
I won’t take credit for this recipe because it isn’t mine. It is one of the very few recipes I follow and don’t change. I included the link to this recipe above.
Egg drop soup is a very simple soup to make. My recipe tastes pretty darn close to egg drop soup at a Chinese restaurant. I experimented with different ingredients and amounts until I found what I liked best.
Most recipes don’t tell you to keep the ginger and scallion bottoms whole, steeping them in the broth. This takes away the task of fishing out ginger and scallions in your broth. I remove them before I add the cornstarch slurry and eggs. The flavor is subtle, but it’s there. Another trick that I learned from trying many recipes is adding the sesame oil to the eggs while scrambling them. It helps the eggs come together better in the broth without it.
I have written many times about trying a new recipe once to see if you like it, if you don’t you can adapt it to your taste. With this recipe, I taste it throughout the process. After adding the ginger rounds and scallion bottoms, I let the broth simmer for 10 minutes; I taste it.
Tonight, I was satisfied with the taste coming from the scallions and removed them. There wasn’t enough ginger taste, so I added another ginger round and let it simmer for five more minutes. That did the trick! I removed the ginger rounds from the broth.
Egg drop soup.
The other secret to making egg drop soup is to stir the broth in a whirlpool manner while adding the cornstarch slurry. I check to see if the soup is too thin or too thick. I make adjustments if necessary. I do the same whirlpool method when adding the eggs and sesame oil.
I give the soup a taste and decide if it is salty enough. Instead of adding kosher salt, I add 1/2 tsp soy sauce at a time to adjust the seasoning. This depends on the saltiness of the chicken broth you used for the soup. Tonight I added 1/2 tsp to the finished soup. Some recipes call for white pepper in their egg drop soup. I don’t like it, so I leave it out but add it if desired. Be careful; it is potent stuff. I think it takes away from the lovely ginger flavor.
I hope if you are a Chinese food fan like me, you will try these recipes that have proven successful over and over, saving yourself a trip to get Chinese take-out.🙂
Egg Drop Soup
Ingredients
4 cups chicken stock 2-3 rounds of fresh ginger 2 white scallion bottoms 2 Tbsp cornstarch 3 Tbsp water 2 large eggs 1/2 tsp sesame oil 2 sliced green scallion tops
*** 1/4 tsp white pepper optional ***Soy sauce to taste
Directions
Add the chicken stock, ginger, and scallion bottoms to a pot. Bring to a boil. Simmer for 10 minutes. Taste the broth. Remove the ginger and scallion bottoms when you are happy with the flavor.
For the cornstarch slurry, mix the water with the cornstarch well in a small bowl. Stirring in a circle, add the slurry to the simmering broth. Stir aggressively to prevent lumps from forming.
In a small bowl, scramble the eggs well and add the sesame oil to the eggs.
Add the egg and sesame oil mixture to the broth in a circular motion to the thickened simmer broth. Add the sliced green scallions. Simmer for 5 minutes.
Check for seasoning adding optional white pepper or soy sauce to taste.
To serve, garnish the egg drop soup with more sliced green scallions. Enjoy!
I’ve had two words on my mind since Saturday, fancy toast. Fancy toast? One of my friends who has to follow a strict gluten-free diet told me about fancy toast. Toast doesn’t just mean breakfast anymore but can be for snacks, lunch, or dinner. I remember cereal commercials that said something like, “Juice, toast & Trix.” There was always toast included.
When I was a kid and watched cereal commercials, I wondered why they always had orange juice as part of a healthy breakfast. In my experience, orange juice and milk from my cereal tasted like vomit. Kind of drinking orange juice right after brushing your teeth. Bla!
It’s hard to pop in anywhere and find a muffin, scone, or breakfast sandwich when you are gluten-free. It’s equally hard to find something simple and easy like soup and a sandwich for lunch. It’s the same story with dinner. When you have to be gluten-free it gets tiring looking for restaurants or delis that have gluten-free choices. Gluten-free choices that can be trusted are a whole other issue. Luckily, there are a few very good places in the Albany Capital District area in NY.
It’s easier to eat at home when you are tired of always looking for someplace safe to go. Unless we are on the road, we eat three meals a day at home. It’s hard enough to come up with dinner ideas, but figuring out breakfast and lunch dishes as well is exhausting. It’s easy to get caught in a food rut so I was excited to hear about fancy toast.
Fancy toast goes one step further than avocado toast. Avocado toast became mainstream and trendy in the 2010s. When people think of avocado toast, they think of California and hipsters.
Images from The Feed Feed.
True, Californians and hipsters love their avocado toast, but you can now find it in the most remote, unlikely places. In the beginning, people couldn’t wrap their heads around a piece of toast costing $3 with just some avocado slices, salt, pepper, and a squeeze of lime juice. Today, avocado toast costs between $7-10 dollars in some areas!
Avocado toast has run its gamut to many people, and they over this trendy food. Enter fancy toast. Fancy toast isn’t new; it has been around since the mid-2010s but now gaining popularity.
Fancy toast isn’t anything new in England, where they have been eating Welch Rarebit since the 1500s. Welch Rarebit is a piece of toast topped with melted cheese, mustard, and spices. It’s economical, easy to make, and tasty! Today the Brits still love their Welch Rarebit, but their favorite is beans on toast.
Beans on toast. I loved baked bean sandwiches on white bread when I was a kid, so this sounds delicious to me. They don’t fancy up their beans; they pour them right from the can over their toast. I would still be in on this one as well, plus the Welch Rarebit. Yum!
Now being gluten-free, we can’t have our fancy toast on gorgeous slices of sourdough bread, crusty peasant bread, or crispy baguettes. We have to have our fancy toast on the best gluten-free bread we can find. Most toasted gluten-free bread tastes and holds up better than untoasted bread anyway. We have found the companies Schar and Trader Joe’s bread the best.
Image from the Feed Feed.
My friend shared with me what they made that week for fancy bread. She showed me pictures from Instagram #toasts for all. The photos were gorgeous, with so many fantastic ideas. I also looked at #fancytoast and found more. Marty went on YouTube and found endless fancy toast videos.
From Parade Magazine.
What I am most excited about the new fancy toast idea is you can be as creative as you wish with endless possibilities. All you need to do is look in your refrigerator and pantry.
My friend found lots of fancy toast components in Trader Joe’s. She bought different fruits and vegetables than she usually buys. Then looked in the cheese section for anything spreadable or meltable. There are plenty of sauces, jams, pestos, and hummus to choose from as well.
We will be making a trip to the Albany area on Tuesday, another delivery day. By then, I will have a list of items to pick up at Trader Joe’s for our fancy toast. I want to pick three sweet and three savory ideas whose ingredients can be reused and recreated for at least six other toasts. The beauty of the elements is that they aren’t raw meats that must be defrosted or purchased for a meal idea.
From Feed Feed.
I have saved many fancy toast ideas to inspire me since I am new to the toast scene. I thought I would share them with all of you too. Many of the ingredients we already have in our fridges and pantries, we are one step from a new idea for breakfast, lunch, or dinner.
For the folks that are watching their carbs, there is plenty of low-carb bread to choose from and sweet potato toast. Sweet potato toast! Who knew? Well, I did when I was watching my carbs, which turned out to be a bust, but that’s an old blog post.
Sweet potato toast is a thick slice of raw sweet potato that is lightly coated in oil and then baked until crispy. I made it once, and it was terrific. It’s a lot more work than toasting a slice of bread, but the idea and recipes are out there if anyone wants to give it a go.
Now it’s time to put on my thinking cap and decide what first types of fancy toast I will be making. Of course, I will share them with you and let you know what I think. Tomorrow I am making a batch of hummus to have on hand. I am also going to Aldis for groceries and start my fancy toast hunt.
It’s taken me a long time to get the timing right when cooking. You know the scenario, rushing around trying to get all the dishes done simultaneously, and in the meantime, something always gets cold, burned, or forgotten about. I can’t tell you how many times I forgot to serve those delicious little Pillsbury crescent rolls I used to make before we had to go gluten-free. I also burned them a bunch of times! 😖
When my sister Jennifer was here, we talked about the stress of everything being done at the same time for dinner. I told her my secret…my oven. If I use the oven for baking a dish, when it’s done I will pull the dish out and turn my oven down to 140-180 degrees. Once the oven cools down, I put the dish back into the oven and any other component that is done already.
When using your oven as a warmer, you are practicing good food safety. When food isn’t kept at the proper temperature, bacteria can grow and cause foodborne illness. Now, this won’t happen in a short amount of time but can occur if you prepare a lot of dishes for a dinner party or holiday dinner.
Hot food must be kept hot and cold food must be kept cold. Food temperatures between 41-135 degrees represent the danger zone. The longer the food sits in the danger zone, the greater the risk of bacteria growing on food.
Think about how long potluck dinner dishes, both hot and cold, hang around on the table at a 4-5 hour event. The danger zone begins when a dish is taken out of the oven or from the refrigerator. Then the dish is transported to the potluck and sits at room temperature for hours.
Getting food to the proper temperatures to start off with is an essential part of cooking. If you aren’t using a thermometer to check the temperatures of your food, you are putting undue stress on yourself, worrying if the food is done. Checking food temps take the guesswork out, therefore, taking away the stress and worry.
Barbeques and cook-outs always make me nervous when I see the person barbequing chicken and not checking the temps. I would not and have not eaten chicken at a bbq for this very reason.
Below find proper cooking temperatures for the following foods:
Poultry, stuffing, or pasta dishes made with poultry, meat, seafood, or fish must be cooked to 165 degrees.
Ground beef, pork and other meats, flavor injected meats, ground, chopped, or minced seafood should be cooked to 155 degrees.
Seafood, steaks & chops (beef, pork, veal, lamb), roasts of beef, pork, veal, and lamb should be cooked to 145 degrees.
For grilled steak temperatures and doneness click on this link.
When preparing cold dishes, you must get the food into the refrigerator as soon as possible. Cold food should be kept at 40 degrees and below. This also includes making food ahead for the next day, such as a pot of spaghetti sauce, stew, or soups. The quickest way of cooling the dish down before it sits too long in the danger zone is to put it into a shallow container and get it into the fridge as soon as possible. (Within 2 hours.)
Don’t put steaming hot food directly into the refrigerator on the flip side. This can lower the temperature of the entire refrigerator placing everything in the danger zone until the temperature goes back down again.
When using the oven to keep food warm, be sure to have the oven temperature at 140 degrees or above. Cover food with oven-proof lids or aluminum foil to prevent food from drying out.
Reheating leftovers can be done in a saucepan, microwave, or oven. Temperatures should be taken when reheating leftovers as well. Leftovers should be reheated to at least 165 degrees. Be sure to cover the food being reheated in the oven to prevent them from drying out.
Yesterday morning, I made Marty and me Sunday breakfast. I made Belgian waffles with sausage links. The greatest thing about my new equipment pantry is getting to my small appliances easily and quickly! I have not made waffles in the past because I didn’t want to take everything out of the cabinet to get to it.
I love having countertops without clutter anymore and simple white dishes.
I started the sausage on the stove and made the waffle batter while the sausage was cooking. After the sausage was done, I popped it into the 160-degree oven to stay warm.
Next, I heated up the waffle iron and started making waffles. I have the type of waffle maker that flips back and forth. When I remove the waffle from the maker, I put a big spatula on one side, flip the waffle on the spatula, and put it into the warm oven.
I put a cooling rack on the oven rack when keeping waffles warm. The cooling rack holds the waffles keeping them crispy and not soggy like a sheet pan does.
I eat small portions.
We didn’t have eggs with our waffles yesterday, but if we did, keeping the waffles and sausage warm in the oven while the eggs were cooking is the way to go. I used to put the waffle and sausage on the plate while cooking the eggs, but they got cold quickly. One of my biggest food pet peeves is food that isn’t hot.
Nothing is more off-putting to me when I eat out is lukewarm food. I want my food hot and my cold food cold. I hate when I put a meal on the table at home, and it isn’t hot enough. I have reheated it in a fit of swears and fury in the past. I can control myself in my older years to not just take the whole plate and throw it in the trash like I would have when I was much younger. Imagine that? 😬
Look for a blog post soon following up on food thermometers. I use four different types for various things, but having one good one is all you need.
