A Whole Bunch of Updates in One

[image courtesy of nymag.com]

I haven't updated in awhile.....and I really don't have much of an excuse. I'll admit it: I've just been lazy. Lucky for you, you get a big, update-filled post! Here's a little bit of what I've been cooking, what I've been doing, and what I've gotten myself into.

What I've Been Cooking/Eating:


I haven't made anything too ground-breaking lately aside from Chicken Marsala with actual chicken. Ryan got me a digital meat thermometer as part of my birthday gift and I thought that dish was the perfect opportunity to test it out. I had started defrosting the chicken in the morning by transferring it from the freezer to the fridge, but it wasn't really in there long enough. By the time I got home from work, the middle was still frozen. So of course these took forever to cook.

I dredged the chicken in flour and pan-fried them, then checked them out withe the thermometer. Despite the screaming hotness of the pan (which my hand hold the thermometer was well-aware of), the middle of the chicken still wasn't up to snuff. It ended up being almost burned on the outside, then fine on the inside once I was done. I couldn't really taste that too much when I ate it that night, but when I took it to work as leftovers, I could tell there was definitely a burned flavor in the background.

Last weekend Ryan was here and we went out for my late birthday dinner at John's of 12th St. I had seen it on Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives, and was pretty stoked to get some traditional Italian. I think I went into it with the wrong expectations. As an American, when I go to an Italian restaurant I expect larger-than-life portions since, well....that's how almost every Italian restaurant I've been to has served me. And we went there hungry to accomodate this. I think a lot of this had to do with our server who was either new or just never bothered to learn what was going on.

First of all, you don't get free bread at the table, which is fine because the bread is not expensive, so we ordered some garlic bread. It turned out to be really good...but we didn't get it till after our entrees. I opted for one of the specials, which the waiter described as goat cheese in tomato pasta among other things. It turned out to be ravioli. Don't get me wrong, it was definitely homemade ravioli and was fantastic, but I almost never order that type of pasta at restaurants because you get five raviolis and that's it. I like to be able to take home leftovers. Ryan got saltimbocca and asked the waiter if it came with pasta, and he assured him it did. It didn't. So it wasn't exactly the best restaurant experience, but I'm going to give it another try when my sister and brother-in-law visit.

The following night of that weekend, Ryan made dinner for me. He took green peppers and stuffed them with rice, seasoned beef, salsa, then cooked an egg on top with cheese. I'm sure this sounds a little strange, but it was great. Kind of like a healthier huevos rancheros. On the side, he made fried noodles (one of my childhood favorites) with southwestern seasoning. I am so spoiled to have a boyfriend that moonlights as a chef.

There was tons of rice leftover, so I decided to feed my Thai craving in making fried rice with peanut sauce. It was delicious, but definitely not pretty. I ate it while catching up on my DVR and caught the episode of New Girl where Schmidt pukes....and looked down at my dish and realized it looked very similar. Dinner: over.

Last night I made a simple caprese salad for dinner topped with olive oil, balsamic vinegar and basil. I went low-key because I bought myself a cupcake from Crumbs...and ate the whole thing. I bet Kate Middleton never sat down and ate a whole Crumbs cupcake on her own.

What I've Been Doing:


This is the first weekend in about a month where I'm no going anywhere and no one is here visiting me. I love traveling and I love visitors, but I slept in till 10:30 today, and sometimes that just feels really good.

I've been contemplating registering for the Brooklyn Half Marathon in May when the registration finally opens up, but I'm still not sure. I was able to run eight miles with my dad and sister when I was back in Buffalo for a weekend, but then when I wanted to do six miles here, I had to cut it off at three and a half. Granted, Buffalo is flat and Queens is most certainly not, but I was still a little discouraged. And though I supposed to be going to a yoga class today, I considered maybe going for a run this morning, and that's just not going to happen at this point. I do miss running, but by the time I get home, even if it's still light out, I'm just too tired.

[image courtesy of thevolstead.com]

I have managed to branch out a bit in the city, finding new places, not necessarily meeting new people. My friend Kelly and I tried a new slightly fancy bar on my birthday, The Volstead, and their happy hour drink prices were what I would consider a normal price at any other bar. We both had Dark and Stormys, which is rum, ginger beer and lime. I had heard all about them when I was in Bermuda, but that was a school athletics trip so there was no alcohol consumption going on, and I never got to try one. It was really, really good. So was the order of truffle fries we split.

I've looked into some pick-up field hockey leagues around here and found one that plays once a week in a place that isn't hard for me to get home from (the other one played way up town, practically in the Bronx). If I can find a way to get my field hockey stick here, I may just go for it.

What I've Been Into:


Here comes the part where I nerd out. Music, TV, games....I've managed to find plenty of new addictions. At work, I usually listen to full albums on Spotify to hear some new things and hear songs in the order they were meant to be heard, but I started to realize I kept listening to the same things over and over. So I explored the Spotify apps and found MoodAgent which creates a playlist for you based on your mood and a song. It's pretty great. I also have gone back to Pandora recently to find new things. Yesterday I created a station based on Jon Brion, and I highly recommend it if you need to relax and get stuff done.

Not sure if I mention this before, but Ryan gave me his old PS3. With that came my purchase of the Sims and Katamari Forever, and his other part of my birthday gift in the Sims Pets. I don't think I need to go into detail of how addicting the Sims is, but my god, the Pets one is too freakin' adorable. I created a character that looks like me and a dog that looks like my dog, and I was freaking out over how cute it is. Plus, you can play as the dog!!! If you're unfamiliar with Katamari, it's basically like a crazy overly cute acid trip. See below:



I can't get enough of it.

With the PS3 comes the ability to watch blu-rays, meaning I've finally been able to finish watching Lost. I'm on season 5 now and have one season left after this....though I've already seen the finale. It's still really good. The PS3 can also stream Netflix, and I've become addicted to Mad Men. Seriously, I can't explain my love for this show. I hate almost everything Don Draper does, but I'm rooting for him for some reason. Watch it and you'll understand. It's also made me thankful I'm not a woman in the early 1960's.

Also, Draping is better than planking or Tebowing.

I think that pretty much covers everything. Oh, and Happy St. Patrick's day? I'm not Irish (er, I'm only slightly Irish, probably less than 5%) so I've never really felt the need to get into this. Maybe I'll commemorate it with some sort of beer later.

Trial & Error

Today was a day of learning. Not only in cooking, but in life. It was my first day of classes and it started off pretty well. I had plenty of time to get ready in the morning, I put together a great outfit, and made it to all my classes with more than enough time. I met up with Katie for lunch again and we dined al fresco seeing as it was a beautiful day.

I had to go to the field house during my lunch break to get into my practice clothes, then went to my 2 p.m. class then straight to the turf for practice. Being that it was the first practice after preseason, our team was beat. We really didn't have much spark left in us. However, since we didn't lock the shed Saturday night and forgot to bring a bunch of equipment to the high school clinic yesterday, we had to run a timed mile on the spot. Lesson learned: Make sure the little things are taken care of.

For me, practice was terrible. I couldn't seem to do anything right, and if I did do something right, I didn't know because I wasn't told so. There were moments when I focused solely on field hockey and it seemed as though I improved, but those were few and far between. Lesson learned: Concentrate on one thing at a time.

Oh yeah, and did I mention that it rained during practice like it has all throughout preseason? I can't tell you how sick I am of being outside in the rain. However, lesson learned: There's no sense in complaining about things that we can't control.

When I got back to my dorm, not only was I hungry, but I was relieved because it was time to cook and that is what I look forward to all day! As I mentioned in my previous post, I wanted to make something with chicken and eggplant. Not to toot my own horn, but I definitely need to give myself an A for creativity tonight. What is pictured above may not be the prettiest of dishes, but it was sure delicious.

Let me first start by saying I went in and out of my room at least five times to grab something I forgot before heading down to the kitchen. Hot start, right?

I started by peeling a huge clove of garlic and cutting a tomato in half. I seasoned both with salt and pepper and a teaspoon of EVOO, and let them roast in the oven at 450 degrees. I then cut the end off the eggplant and peeled it while a big pot of water was set to boil. My intention was to create a faux pasta out of the eggplant, so I used my vegetable peeler (which is pink) to create some eggplant "ribbons." This was much easier in theory. Eggplant should come with a warning that reads: "If you intend to peel this, it WILL take you an eternity." As I got down to the middle of the eggplant, I halved it and then just cut thin strips to save some time.

Once the water came to a boil, I added some salt and tossed in the eggplant ribbons to cook. Next, I chopped some garlic and heated it in a pan with another teaspoon of olive oil. I then cut my chicken into smaller pieces and seasoned it with salt and pepper. Once the pan was hot enough, I added in the chicken.

At this time, the tomato and garlic clove in the oven were perfectly roasted. I pulled them out of the oven, let them cool, then put them into a glass bowl. Now this next part is not my original idea, therefore, I will now give my mother MORE credit. I smashed the tomato halves and garlic together to create a light sauce for my dish. Note to self for next time: add some basil too!

I then put the boiled eggplant into a strainer (which is also pink) once it was nice and soft. As that sat, I continued to cook the chicken. Chicken is another thing that should come with a warning that should read: "If you do not properly defrost this, it WILL be tough and you WILL have a difficult time checking to see if it is completely cooked." I had thought about putting the chicken in the fridge this morning while I was getting things together, but never followed through since I was trying to do ten things at once. Lesson learned: Concentrate on one thing at a time.

Once everything was ready, I put the eggplant on the plate, added the chicken, then topped it with the sauce. I gathered all my supplies and pulled a major Rachael Ray back upstairs to my room (I'm pretty sure I could give her a run for her money. She only carries all her ingredients from the fridge or pantry to the counter. I carry all of mine up and down two flights of stairs). As I walked back, I looked down at my dish and noticed a lot of water collecting along the sides. I knew I hadn't added too much oil to anything, then realized I didn't fully drain the eggplant. Lesson learned: Make sure the little things are taken care of.

The dish turned out very well overall after I drained the watery-ness out of it. The sauce turned out great and the eggplant was perfectly al dente. We'll work on the chicken for next time.

After a long and stressful day, my food therapy and writing therapy were exactly what I needed. I now must get ahead on my reading for classes so I will have time in the future for MORE cooking and writing :)

Update: I forgot to mention that I did add a bit of parmesan cheese to the sauce. Just in case anyone wanted to try it for themselves!