Don't Roast Veggies When It's Over 60 Degrees Out

Perhaps it's the Mad Men binge I've been on, but I've been particularly domestic in the little part of this week that has transpired. With a full Sunday ahead of me, I was feeling bored and decided to plan out all my meals for the week- of course, making enough to have leftovers at lunch each day - and so I have not one, but two meals to share with you.

After grocery shopping last night (where I always get more food for my money, thank you cheap-o grocery store), I came back to make Sole Gratin with Tomatoes, Olives and Capers. And yeah, that's exactly what the dish is.

As you've probably already figured out, I didn't use Sole. Not only because my grocery store most likely didn't carry it (they don't even carry Brussels sprouts), but also because I have plenty of tilapia and didn't see the point in buying more fish. Here's how it works. You take a baking dish - or a gratin dish if you have it, I don't - and coat it with olive oil. You then rub the fish in the oil and season it with salt and pepper on each side. The actual recipe has you layer each fillet on top of the other, but I was cooking for one. Next, you thinly slice and onion. I used this same cut when I helped Kelly cook this past weekend, more on that later. I only used a quarter of an onion (again, cooking for one) and made thing slices of half moons and then separated the layers so that the onion would cook quickly.

It then called for canned plum tomatoes to be crushed through your fingers. I bought natural plum tomatoes, having read the recipe incorrectly, and opted for grape ones instead. Though I did still crush them with my hands because playing with food is fun. I also managed not to get any juice on my white Run DMC shirt while doing so. Who's awesome?

I chopped up some black olives and added it to the tomatoes and onion along with some capers, then tossed it all in olive oil, salt and pepper. This mixture was spooned over the fish, and then came the breadcrumbs. The recipe requested me to mix the breadcrumbs with oil beforehand then sprinkle them on top. I felt like I was playing with sand. It did help brown to breadcrumbs without burning them though.

This all cooked for about 20 minutes at 350 degrees. Thanks to the handy meat thermometer, I didn't have to demolish the dish to see if the fish was cooked all the way though. Got it on the first try!

The dish was really great, not too salty as I had feared with the olives and capers. It was nice to get away from my usual pan-searing of fish for a slightly lighter take. My only issue was the amount of oil at the bottom of the baking dish. Between what I coated the dish with and what came into the dish with the tomato/onion/olive/caper mixture, it was a little much. Next time I think I may actually spoon rather than dump the mixture on top of the fish. Also a surprise, no cheese in a gratin? Mind = blown.

Tonight's dish was another unique take on a meal I thought I knew so well: Pasta Primavera.

For some reason I've always thought primavera required some sort of creamy sauce. According to Giada, that's not so. Let me preface this by saying that I made an Everyday Italian meal that I hadn't made before - huzzah for revisiting the original goal of the blog! Moving on, Giada said that traditional primavera requires you to cut all the veggies, steam/boil/however you normally cook them, then blanch them, all in separate bowls. Thank god she didn't want me to do that, because I only have so many bowls...I live in a studio apartment.

Instead, Giada's version takes after my mother's own roasted veggie pasta, but is slightly different. It also took much longer than I anticipated (try one and a half episodes of Law & Order: SVU). I started by covering a baking sheet with tin foil for easy clean-up later. I then sliced half an onion the same way I did yesterday, and separated the layers out over the greased and covered pan. Next I peeled carrots and cut them into long, thin strips. Didn't take too long, but the worst was yet to come. I did the same with zucchini - without peeling it beforehand - and spread that out over the sheet.

Then came the worst part: acorn squash. I cut the squash in half, and was encouraged by how much easier it was to slice through it than a butternut squash. It wasn't any easier to peel it though. Actually, it may have been more difficult since its size required my hands to get closer to the peeler. I even incurred an injury. After searching the apartment for band-aids and failing, I cleaned the cut and covered it with medical tape...which I'm not really sure why I have it?

Anyhow, once the squash was (mostly) peeled, it was easy enough to thinly slice and add to the sheet. Last came one red pepper, which was exponentially easier after the squash debacle.

Considering I like my roasted veggies caramelized, I divided the now sliced veggies onto two covered baking sheets so they could make a nice, even layer. After the separation, I tossed them in olive oil, salt, and pepper, then threw them in the oven for 10 minutes at 450. At the 10 minute mark, I tossed them around, then put them back in for another 10.

Meanwhile I started cooking some spaghetti, though the recipe recommended farfalle (bowties), but I unfortunately didn't have any, and knew the elbows I did have just wouldn't have worked. I drained the pasta and left a bit of the starchy water in it, then took out the veggies and added them to the pot. The pot was just a bit too small to toss it all, but I made it work. I then topped it with tomatoes and fresh shredded parm and some Italian seasoning.

Honestly, this was delicious. The veggies get so caramel-y and sweet, and leaving the tomatoes out of the roasting adds a nice subtle crunch. I was scared it would be bland, but it really isn't at all. It's amazing how water and cheese just work like that. The difference between this and my mom's dish is the tomatoes, which she usually roasts along with garlic, then smashes them both together for the sauce. It's awesome. Oh and by the way, don't roast veggies at 450 on a day that's over 60 degrees. Especially when your ceiling fan doesn't work...and you don't have A/C...in March.

I just thought everyone should know, that in the middle of writing this post I took my garbage out and locked myself out of my room for an hour and a half. It's been one of those nights.

As for this past weekend, Kelly and I went to a yoga class at Yoga to the People where the donation for the class is suggested but not mandatory. My kind of place. I've also fallen in love with yoga...and definitely felt its effects for three days.

After yoga we went back to Kelly's apartment and she made us a dinner of quinoa, roasted kale and sweet potatoes and onions, topped with balsamic vinegar and oil and craisins. Super healthy and filling! We then came back to my place and Kelly crashed on the futon, and we ventured to the good ole diner for breakfast in the morning. The rest of the day is housewife history.

More to come later in the week.

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.