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by gansie

Merry Christmas: The 12 Raw Days of Christmas

On the fifth day of Christmas
My true love gave to me
Five cacao beans

My First Pickle

This summer my little brother and his girlfriend moved in together. She keeps the apartment beautifully in shape. This includes their classy Christmas tree this holiday season. I’m not sure if my brother ever lived with a Christmas tree before. My first experience with a tree occurred during college; my roommates even presented me with my first stocking.

(Actually, funny story. That same year we also arranged a house Secret Santa and my roommate bought me a slow cooker cookbook, as I knew nothing about cooking. She bought it as a joke. She took “slow cooker” to mean not smart. Of course, the joke was on her.)

For his first Christmas tree occasion, my brother’s girlfriend bought him a few ornaments: a soccer ball, a menorah and a pickle. It’s nice to know food shows up at all the most important moments. Even if it’s porcelain.

by gansie

One Cook’s Trash is This Cook’s Treasure

Editor’s Note: Doctoral Candidate. Nature lover. Newlywed. Borracho‘s sister-in-law. Procrastinator. Phish follower. Here’s EvoDiva and her discovery of simple stock-making.

I used to think that the garbage disposal was the best invention ever. For those of us city dwellers who desperately want a compost pile to feed our non-existent vegetable gardens, I thought this device could offer me less guilt. I realize that disposal of vegetables down the sink may not be any more eco-friendly than throwing food in the trash, but it just felt better.

That is, until I threw the feathery tops of fennel bulbs down there and catastrophically clogged our kitchen sink, thus rendering our dishwasher unusable as well. After a few stubborn weeks of plunging, using the baking soda/vinegar/boiling water method, and washing dishes in the bathtub (no, I’m not kidding), we finally called the plumber and never ate fennel again.

Then I heard the most brilliant idea from a fellow grad-student and friend: he saves the tops and bottoms of onions, carrots, and celery in freezer bags. He then combines with bird carcasses to make delicious stock.

You can make deliciousness out of trash!

What Not to Buy Your Child for Christmas

Just Like Home McDonald’s Drive-Thru with Play Food [Toys R Us]
(And please check out the video from the link above)

(Photo: Toys R Us)

in Holiday 4 comments

by gansie

Tissues, Tissues, Everywhere

We’re on day 3 of not being able to fully breathe or smell in the gansie-80P household. Tissues crowd our trash cans, desks, nightstands and the front kangaroo pocket of my Johnson & Wales hoodie. It’s rough over here with two snotty, exhausted roommates. Two nights ago we ordered in Chinese (and I finally had the guts to ask for no baby corn in my noodle soup!) but tonight I felt well enough to cook. I know I missed out on the wonderful aromas of roasting squash, but the thick pureed soup felt good going down. And the heat – just for a minute – cleared my nostrils.

OH to the joys of winter colds.

Carrie Bradshaw Makes Awful Decisions

I can’t even lie and say “it’s that time of year.” Because frankly, I’m always trying to cook with what’s in my house, it doesn’t matter if it’s the end of the year, end of the month or end to Bernie Sanders reading sob letters all day. Bernie Sanders for president!

This Sunday’s lunch kicked-off the eat-what’s-here trend. It’s called crackly bacon. And my house smelled of the cured meat all day. First off, I let the bacon sizzle in the oven: 10 minutes at 425 on a wire rack over a baking pan.

And then I started to reorganize my long-sleeve shirt drawer, deciding on what to fold and return to the drawer and what to give away, while watching the episode where the girls attend Steve and Aidan’s bar opening; and Bunny shops with Trey and Char for a new bed; and Samantha is a lesbian. Wow I miss Sex and the City. Honestly, though, Carrie should have never gotten back with Aidan. And Carrie should have never married Big at the end of SATC 1. Carrie makes awful choices. It might be why I haven’t seen SATC 2 yet. But please don’t tell me what happens. I will see it as soon as it’s out on DVD.

But before I could decide whether or not to donate that black and white graphic adventure shirt from Barcelona, it was time to cook again. I decided this was the year. 80 and I would finally party with our neighbors – we attended our building’s holiday party.

Looking For a Peanut Butter Facelift

Sometimes a slight change transforms a meal. Take peanut butter and jelly. I used to hate jelly, therefore I only ate peanut butter…on a hamburger bun. Soon I came around to jelly, creating a PB&J on rye. Then it turned into an open faced sandwich with peanut butter and mashed bananas on whole wheat. Sometimes I added potato chips.

And then I forgot about PB&J and PB&B. Tomatoes caught my eye all summer as the sandwich filler of choice. But now that it’s turning cold I crave something simple and familiar.

On the last day of the farmers’ market I purchased a farm-made grape jelly (without any corn syrup!) And to switch things up, I let the peanut butter melt into a warm and toasted raisin bagel and then topped it with jelly. 80 absolutely despised the warm peanut butter, linking it to some awful childhood memory of eating hot peanut butter on a rice cake. And I’d have to agree, rice cakes would leave me with nightmares as well. But I liked the extra creaminess the peanut took on as it was heated from the bagel.

But now I’m looking for another way to enhance a peanut butter sandwich. How do you up the PB&J ante?

More in Peanut Butter
French Toast with Melted Peanut Butter
Peanut Butter: A Revolutionary Divide
Peanut Butter-Banana Pudding
Peanut Butter and Banana Sandwich
Cómo Preparar un Sándwich de Mantequilla de Maní y Mermelada (en Español)
Homemade Peanut Butter and Drunk Blogging

in Sandwich 14 comments