Well, I really did it to myself last week.  I’ve let myself be under so much stress for so long that my body just gave out on me.  I caught a nasty flu bug and spent half of Memorial Day weekend in bed with the flu.  If you read my last post, you know that we’ve been eating way too much restaurant food and I was looking forward to some home cooking.  I planned to make this wonderful feta stuffed Greek chicken that I love so much.  I even rescued Herbert  (my sourdough starter) from possible sudden death so that I could bake bread. Bread is necessary for this meal to accompany the wonderful feta stuffing.  Unfortunately, Herbert looked pretty awful.  He had managed to produce a two-inch layer of dark gray hooch in the intervening weeks since I last baked.  I truly thought he was a goner. Once I poured off the disgusting, vile fluid and fed Herbert with fluffy wholesome flour and clean water, he was back to normal.  I made that great recipe for sourdough rye baguettes that I’ve been hooked on for awhile.  The dough was fermenting on the counter and suddenly; I felt like I was fermenting too.  The flu hit me like a ton of bricks.

I spent the rest of Sunday in bed with a fever and when all of Monday turned out to be much, much more of the same, I asked F. to put the chicken and some nice grass fed steaks we bought for Monday’s barbeque in the freezer.  I knew I wouldn’t be cooking for a while.  On Sunday, I already knew I would kiss bread-baking goodbye so I had popped the bread dough in the fridge.  The whole rest of the week went by and I never did get back to that bread dough. 

As the week progressed and I felt better and better I started to plan out those meals we missed.  I pulled the meat out of deep freeze and allowed it to defrost in the fridge.  I kept eyeing the bread dough wondering if I could keep pushing it or if I should give up and toss it.  I keep reading about other bloggers who are doing the whole “no knead bread” evolution thingy where you make a master dough, dump it in the fridge for up to a week and lop off chunks of the master dough for fresh bread throughout the week.  I am also well aware that a long slow rise in the fridge for a couple of days makes bread more flavorful. I wasn’t too worried. 

I took the dough out of the fridge this afternoon and let it warm up and rise on the counter.  I popped it out of the bowl a few hours later and kneaded it a bit.  The outer layer of the dough had oxidized.  I had hoped I could mix it in, but it didn’t really knead in, so that worried me a bit.  The dough smelled great and looked great otherwise so I decided that it wouldn’t kill me.  I formed the baguettes and let them rise.  When I baked the bread it rose in the oven really well.  I am out of practice though and didn’t notice the temp was really off in my crazy oven today.  The bread got way too brown.  Luckily, I decided to cover the loaves with seeds so it was hard to tell.  The flavor and texture were really nice on these loaves.  I learned a lesson this week.  I can probably have fresh bread during the week if I plan a couple of days ahead.  Make the dough.  Let it rise all evening.  Pop it in the fridge for a couple of days.  Come home for lunch the day I want to bake and take it out to warm and rise.  I’ll really need to do this.  What a luxury it would be to have warm bread and butter on a work night!

Take care everyone!  Please drop me a message if you have time.  I still check the old blog daily and love to hear from everyone.

I’m back if only temporarily. I’m working out one of life’s “little” challenges and have been eating restaurant food more than food from my own kitchen.  So… not a lot to blog about.  I really miss doing this and hope that anyone still hanging on out there, having patience with me, will keep being patient and wait for my life to become something vaguely resembling it’s former self. 

I have to admit something to you.  I have been holding back a pancake recipe.  It’s actually something I put together years ago and it is the recipe I go to often.  These are two-grain pancakes but the second grain is surprising. I created a whole-wheat pancake but switched out some of the flour for brown rice flour.  Brown rice flour has no gluten so using it in these pancakes gives the finished product a lighter texture and a nuttier flavor.  These pancakes can be made with buttermilk, which makes them thin, and almost crepe like.  The best way to make them however is to mix one part plain nonfat yogurt with one part milk for the liquid in the recipe and let the batter stand a few minutes before cooking the pancakes.  You will be rewarded with a thick, tall pancake with amazing flavor and texture.  Perfect for stacking.  Perfect for loading up with goodies. 

Today’s breakfast featured bananas cooked inside the pancakes until they caramelized.  We had the sweetest fresh strawberries so we generously loaded them on top of the pancakes with yogurt, maple syrup and wheat germ.  As the summer progresses, use any fruit that tickles your fancy either on or in the pancakes.  All berries except strawberries can be cooked into the cakes.  Stone fruit such as peaches and nectarines are also excellent cooked in the pancakes.  Toast pecans, walnuts or almonds to sprinkle on top.  You deserve it.

Mimi’s wheat and rice cakes

½ cup brown rice flour

1 cup whole-wheat pastry flour

½ tsp baking powder

¾ tsp baking soda

1 egg

1 cup nonfat yogurt mixed with 1 cup low fat milk until smooth, or 2 cups buttermilk

2 tbsp olive oil or canola oil

Butter for frying

Thinly sliced fruit or whole berries (optional)

In a large bowl mix together the brown rice flour, whole-wheat flour, baking powder and baking soda.  In another bowl, beat the egg.  Add the egg, milk/yogurt mixture or buttermilk and oil to the dry ingredients.  Mix well to make sure the wet and dry ingredients are incorporated but don’t over mix.  Let the batter stand at least ten minutes before you fry the pancakes.

Preheat an electric griddle to 325 degrees.  Melt butter on the griddle (for crispy edged pancakes).  Ladle the pancakes onto the griddle. If you want to add fruit, do it as soon as you ladle the pancakes onto the griddle.  Just sprinkle the fruit onto the surface of the cakes and lightly press it in.  Cook the pancakes until they look bubbly and dry on the edges.  This should take three or four minutes.  Turn the pancakes and cook them another two or three minutes.

The pancakes may have to be cooked in two batches.  If you are not serving the first batch right away, store them on a cookie sheet in a warm oven (200 degrees f.) or store them in a covered glass dish.

Enjoy!

I’m very blue.  I can’t discuss why but my blue demeanor is why there has been no activity on this blog for a while.  I’ll just leave it at that. No sense making everyone sad and worried.

Let’s talk about red.  Red is happy.  I made a sanguine risotto tonight.  I also sort of messed up on the recipe.  I bought the ingredients last Tuesday(!) and I was too upset to cook all week.  I didn’t grocery shop this weekend and when I went to figure out what there was to eat, I was amazed that the beets and basil I bought almost a week ago were in really good condition.  I was so excited that I didn’t let the food go bad that I didn’t follow directions.  I was using the recipe for Beet Risotto with Greens from Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone by Deborah Madison.  When I went shopping I made my first mistake.  I read the recipe as needing chard or the greens from the beets (I read an “or” not an “and”).  I was going to get both anyway but the chard looked bad.  I decided that the bunch of beets I got had more than enough greens for the recipe.  Then tonight, I misread that I was supposed to add chard (or ½ of those beet greens) with the rice and the rest of the beet greens towards the end.  The beet greens cooked down to a silky soft consistency that was really a pleasure to eat, but I can see where she was going with the recipe.  It might have been nice to have some greens with a chewy texture too.  Either way, this dish was super healthy and really satisfying to eat.

Beet Risotto

Accidentally adapted from Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone by Deborah Madison

5 ½ to 6 cups vegetable stock

1 tbsp butter

2 tbsp olive oil

½ of a large yellow onion, diced

1 ½ cups Arborio rice

½ cup dry white wine

2 tbsp chopped parsley

2 tbsp chopped fresh basil

3 – 4 medium beets peeled and grated in a food processor (about 2 cups)

4-6 cups beet greens (washed well to remove sand), chopped finely

Salt and pepper to taste

Grated zest and juice of 1 Meyer lemon

½ cup parmagiano reggiano

Chive blossoms (optional)

Bring the stock to a boil and then leave simmering on the stove.  Heat the oil and melt the butter in a deep, wide pot.  Add the onion and cook over medium heat for about 3 minutes until softened.  Add the rice.  Cook for one minute stirring to coat.  Add the wine.  Simmer until the wine is absorbed.  Stir in half the parsley, the basil, the grated beets and the beet greens.  Add 2 cups of stock.  Simmer, stirring until most of the stock is absorbed.  Add more stock ½ cup at a time stirring until the stock is absorbed.  Repeat the adding of stock, stirring and absorbing until you use up most of the stock.  When ½ cup of stock is left, taste the risotto to see if the rice is al dente.  If so you may not need more than 5 ½ cups of stock total.  Add salt and pepper to taste.  Add the juice and zest of the lemon.  Serve dusted with cheese and garnished with the remaining parsley and chive blossoms if you have them.

Am I nuts?  Well maybe.  But until I got to the cleanup part, it really wasn’t that bad.  Really.

How on earth did I manage to get the idea in my head that I could make a soufflé on a weekday during a time when I am working harder during the day then I ever have?  It all started last night.  No scratch that.  It all happened on Sunday if you really think about it.  But then again, it was probably Michael Pollan’s fault.  Who is that?  You mean that guy who wrote the Omnivore’s Dilemma?  That guy?  Well yeah.  I bought his new book:  In Defense of food: an eaters manifesto.  While not as engaging a read as OD, his new book was full of factoids.  Facts I know already because I read everything.  Facts that should make me a healthier person, that is if I paid any attention to the facts.  But I don’t.  This book opened my eyes to the fact that although I buy a lot of veggies, I am not so successful at getting them into my body before they melt down to a little smear in the bottom of my refrigerator’s crisper.  The fact that I am perfectly happy to cook healthy meals at home and then supplement these meals with god knows what at a restaurant.

Well.  I am trying to be better.  So I bought beets on Sunday.  I bought beets because beets are a bargain.  You get two veggies for the price of one (as long as you don’t let them melt in the fridge)!  You’ve got your sweet orbs of red, orange or yellow root for cooking or crunching up raw.  You’ve got your vitamin-enriched greens to eat like chard or kale.  This is a spectacular veggie that nobody is eating. 

Last night, I suddenly remember that I need to cook the greens before they melt.  I know how to make cooked greens taste pretty good but I wanted some inspiration.   I started leafing through the stacks of cookbooks.  I picked up Deborah Madison’s Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone.  Yes!!  This has got to be the right book.  I found the recipe that would do it:  You boil beet greens for a couple of minutes and then sauté them in olive oil, sliced garlic and tomatoes.  Add a touch of dried oregano and top with Asiago (which I didn’t have so I used Parmesan).  I Plopped this ethereal mixture onto the top of a warm piece of leftover cornbread and I was in heaven.  It was the best thing I put in my mouth in a long time.

While I was looking for the beet recipe, I stumbled onto her soufflé section.  Ms Madison has this recipe for Goat Cheese Soufflé with thyme that she follows with a half dozen veggie infused variations.  I couldn’t stop obsessing over the possibilities.  As you know, I am a sucker for the bonus meal, the meal you make that comes about from the serendipity of having just the right things in your kitchen that aren’t on a shopping list that becomes something really amazing.  I thought about this recipe all day while I was at work.  You see, I never thought I could make a soufflé because I don’t own the right dish to cook it in.  Deborah Madison cooks soufflés in a gratin dish.  I have a gratin dish; I could do this!!  I could finish up that little bit of cream from last week.  I have plenty of eggs.  I can substitute Rosemary for the thyme and green onions for the white onion slices, etc, etc.  My mind kept rewriting the recipe to suit my needs.  This would work!

Well. Let me tell you! You need to make a soufflé.  Even if it is a weeknight and you are tired.  It was that good.  It was flavorful and it had a texture that was both fluffy and lightly bready.

Being the crazy gal that I am, I made a salad of two lettuces, thinly sliced yellow beets, radishes, grated carrots, green onions, avocado, and blood oranges.  I also made homemade buttermilk dressing.  Aren’t you jealous I didn’t invite you over?  Well, I’m kinda peaved I didn’t invite you over because the kitchen was grotesque and I could have used your help cleaning!

The moral of this story is, read in Defense of food.  It will make you a better eater.  Make sure you have a copy of Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone.  It is one of the best cookbooks I own.

Broccoli Cheddar Soufflé

Adapted from Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone by Deborah Madison

Butter for greasing the pan plus 2 tbsp freshly grated Parmesan for coating the dish

1 ¼ cups milk or cream or milk and cream (which is what I did)

Aromatics:  Rosemary (or thyme), fresh bay leaf (or dried), 3 2” pieces of green onion

3 tbsp butter

3 tbsp whole-wheat pastry flour

1/2 tsp salt

Freshly ground pepper

Dash of cayenne

2 tsp Dijon mustard

1 cup steamed and then finely chopped broccoli

½ cup sharp cheddar, grated

4 egg yolks

6 egg whites

Minced parsley and cilantro for garnish

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.  Butter an eight-cup gratin dish and coat the butter with the Parmesan.  Heat the milk/cream with the aromatics until it just boils then remove it from the heat and let it stand 15 minutes.  Remove the aromatics.

Melt butter in a large saucepan over low heat until foamy.  Stir in the flour and cook over low heat for a few minutes (it should get thick and aromatic but don’t let it burn!).  Whisk in the milk all at once, stirring vigorously for a couple of minutes until it thickens.  Add salt, pepper, cayenne and mustard.  Mix well and remove from heat.  Beat in the egg yolks one at a time until well blended.  Stir in the cheese.

Beat the egg whites with a dash of salt until they form stiff peaks.  Mix a quarter of the egg whites into the soufflé mixture to lighten it up.  Fold the rest of the egg whites into the soufflé mixture being careful not to over mix and deflate your egg whites.  Transfer the soufflé from the mixing pan to the gratin dish.  Put the dish into the center of the oven and lower the heat to 375 degrees F.  Bake for 25 minutes until puffed and brown.  Serve immediately garnished with parsley and cilantro.

Work is stressing me out bad!  I felt like I was falling behind after being gone for weeks.  Then my coworker left to have her baby and I have had to pick up her duties as well as mine.  I have been working long hours and I haven’t been eating as well as I should.  I’m still cooking but in amounts that haven’t gotten us through the week and I have been relying on a lot of restaurant food for the past few weeks.  Such bad habits I have and they are too, too easy to fall back on! 

It is such a vicious circle.  I am stressed so I eat bad things which makes me tired so I don’t get any exercise so I get more stressed and more tired and eat bad things and so on and so and so on.

Yesterday, I decided to slow the merri-go-round I have been on and do some simple baking to go with something that feels so restorative to eat.  I made a very whole-wheat version of my sourdough pitas to go with some sun dried tomato hummus.  The pitas contained the usual white flour starter I have cultivated but the dough was entirely whole-wheat flour aside from a half cup of white flour.  The bread came out very hearty but scrumptious.  The hummus was my take on a hummus I sometimes buy at Trader Joes.  The hummus from TJs is quite sweet.  Mine has a fuller flavor due to using the oil from the sun dried tomatoes and a healthy dose of Aleppo pepper.  Aleppo pepper is a Middle Eastern pepper that has a nice heat and a complex flavor.  It truly complements the sweet tomato flavor in this hummus.  If you can acquire some, make sure to use it in this recipe.  As an alternative, cayenne in a smaller amount will do just fine.

Eating these two homemade goodies together made me feel happy and very restored.  I’m not sure if it was the fiber and minerals in the garbanzo beans or calcium in the tahini or vitamin C from the garlic and lemon juice or the antioxidants in the olive oil or the lycopine from the sun dried tomatoes but this snack was definitely a cure for what was ailing me!

Sun Dried Tomato Hummus

2-3 cloves of garlic

½ cup sun dried tomatoes in oil, drained

3 tbsp olive oil from the jar of sun dried tomatoes

1 15 oz can of garbanzo beans

Salt to taste

6 tbsp tahini

Juice of one lemon

½ tsp Aleppo pepper or a dash or two of cayenne to taste

Liquid from garbanzo beans as needed

In a food processor, chop the garlic.  Add the sun-dried tomatoes and pulse until the tomatoes are finely chopped.  Measure out 3 tbsp of oil from the sun-dried tomatoes and add the oil to the tomatoes and garlic.  (Add more olive oil to your jar of tomatoes to replace the oil you took and cover the tomatoes so that they don’t spoil).  Drain the can of garbanzos in a sieve over a bowl.  Reserve the liquid from the beans.  Add the beans, lemon juice, tahini and Aleppo pepper to the bowl of the food processor.  Process until mostly smooth.  Add liquid from the beans a tablespoon at a time with the processor running until the hummus is a smooth consistency.  I used about 5 tbsp of liquid.  You may use more or less depending on the texture you like for your dip.  Taste the hummus and add salt to taste, pulsing a couple of times to mix.  Enjoy with fresh pitas.

I have no idea what is wrong with me this week.  I have been allowing myself a maximum of five to six hours of sleep per night the entire week. All week I have had trouble waking up.  I have been tired, and grumpy.  My normal brainpower has been very impaired and I’ve felt horrible all week.  This morning, with no responsibilities and no expectations, I slept and slept a luxurious sleep that allowed me to wake naturally at a quarter to ten this morning.  Mmmmm.  It felt so good.  My boyfriend was very patient and did not try to wake me up.  But after I dilly dallied browsing a Gourmet magazine and the internet, the pleasant sound of my boyfriend’s guitar gave way to a low rumbling chanting of “pancakes, pancakes, pancakes, pancakes…”   It must be time for the poor guy to be fed.  Time to set to work.

I was reading the February issue of Gourmet this morning when I noticed that I put a crimp on a certain page weeks ago when I got it.  The page had four different kinds of breakfast yummies on it.  By some chance of fate, I had sour cream in the house (my boyfriend dislikes sour cream so we don’t use it as a topping for anything, it is usually a rare ingredient in my actual cooking).  The recipe that caught my eye was for Cardamom sour-cream waffles with lingonberry preserves.  I had all of the ingredients except lingonberry preserves.  I do however; have a really exceptional jar of raspberry and cranberry preserves, which I thought should be tart sweet enough to stand in for the berries in the recipe.  I consulted with my boyfriend and he felt adventurous enough to give them a try.

The recipe was a hit.  The only problem I had was my normal problem that I can’t seem to make a crispy waffle to save my life.  I’m not sure if it is me, the phase of the moon or my waffle maker but my waffles always come out soft.  I suspect it is the olive oil that I fill my mister with.  I should probably oil the waffle maker with polyunsaturated oil.  But the waffles were sooooo good anyway!

Boyfriend:  These are so good.  You won’t forget to write this recipe down, will you?

As I shake my head and chew, I’m thinking: I hope I’ll remember to make these again.

Boyfriend:  Aren’t you going to blog these?  Will you remember to make these?

Chewing, I get up and find the camera.  As I keep thinking, I don’t want to get up, I don’t want to let these get cold, I already blogged a couple of days ago, grrrrr….

Click

Click

Click….

Cardamom Sour-Cream Waffles

Adapted from the February issue of Gourmet Magazine

1 ½ cups whole-wheat pastry flour

1 ½ tsp baking powder

¾ tsp baking soda

1 tsp ground cardamom

¼ tsp salt

1 cup lowfat milk

1 cup sour cream

1 tsp pure vanilla extract

1 tbsp dark honey

2 large eggs

3 tbsp unsalted butter, melted

Serve the waffles with yogurt, maple syrup and preserves (lingonberry if you can find them, if not any tart berry preserves such as raspberry cranberry preserves will do nicely.  You want a good berry flavor to compliment the floral flavor of the cardamom)

Preheat your waffle iron.

In a large bowl, combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, cardamom, and salt.  In another bowl, whisk together milk, sour cream, vanilla, honey, eggs and melted butter.  Mix wet ingredients into the dry ingredients until just well combined.  Spray or brush the waffle iron with oil.  Cook waffles according to your waffle iron’s instructions.  Store waffles in a slightly warm oven until all of the waffles are cooked and you are ready to serve them.

Chapter one

I decided to push my luck a little this week.  What is so controversial that I feel like I have to push my luck?  Chocolate.  I love, need, want chocolate.  My boyfriend tends to avoid it.  Why?  I suspect it is childhood trauma.  In fact, I would almost say it is child abuse (but I ‘m just kidding you, so don’t get all riled up). 

Here is some background about the chocolate situation in this house.  My boyfriend grew up with a Mom who studied nutrition during a time in our history when people were very keen on health food.  She not only taught her kids that sugar was very bad but she was convinced that my DBF had an allergy to chocolate.  This could be true, he seems to be sensitive to milk so milk chocolate could be a problem… but… his Dad, I suspect, did not like chocolate and used this as an excuse to ban the substance from the house.  When the mention of chocolate comes up within the family it is jokingly referred to as that stuff nobody can eat because of my poor BF and his problem with it.  His Dad grins from ear to ear when the subject comes up.

Well, he has no physical problem with it.  He can eat it and I have seen him eat it and he does not get a rash, his lungs do not explode and he does not fall over in a coma.  He just doesn’t eat it because his Mom’s good habits are severely ingrained into his psyche. 

Chapter two

I missed Valentine’s Day with my boyfriend this year due to my family crisis.  My Boyfriend promised to make it up to me.  He asked me what I wanted and I told him that I wanted a box of expensive chocolate from a local chocolatier.  He obliged by buying a larger box than he would have and he filled it with half of what I would love and half of what he would want to try.  He ate 95% of his share of that box of chocolate.

I suspect that he has had his fill of chocolate for a while.  A box of the finest chocolate available doesn’t really stop me from wanting more chocolate.  In fact, it probably feeds a flame that should be controlled or put out. 

Chapter three

I was shopping in Trader Joes last weekend and came across a bar of unsweetened baking chocolate.  Years ago I made the fudge brownies in the Moosewood Cookbook.  They were so delicious that my sister, who isn’t the happiest human being on the planet, and her wonderful husband (who we all wish was really our family’s brother/son ‘cause he’s so fabulous) ate most of them and my sister was happy.  Really happy.  Almost an entirely different person.  She was kind to me.  This was highly unusual and a most welcome turn of events.  It was unfortunately temporary.  But hey, that is the magic of these brownies that call for unsweetened baking chocolate, which is a rarity in my cupboard.  Once I had the chocolate in hand, I immediately thought of making brownies.  I started to fantasize about what kind of brownies they would be.  Why would I do that when I have a recipe?  Well the genius thing about the Moosewood fudge brownie recipe is that Mollie Katzen leaves the details and creativity to her readers.  Like her quiche recipe, it is a template that gets you started.  She provides the means to get to a moist yet cakey, fudgy good brownie.  She gives a few suggestions how to flavor them and then your imagination can run wild from there.

I made some other brownies one year for Christmas.  They were filled with raspberry jam and topped with hazelnuts.  The concept was good but the result was a dry brownie:  a disappointment for sure.  When I began to brainstorm my brownies, I decided I wanted to fill them with jam.  Brandy soaked tart dried cherries sounded like a good contrast to the chocolate so cherry jam would work well for the filling.  I wanted nuts.  Pecans sounded just right.  I set about to create my wonderful concoction.

Chapter four

My boyfriend had a bite of the brownies and declared them to be perfection.  That’s all he had and he suggested I donate them to my coworkers.  I decided to do no such thing!  I ate one last night accompanied by a cold glass of milk and I took one to work with me.  Will these brownies cause contention?   Will I gain ten pounds?  Will my boyfriend secretly scarf them down himself?  Only time will tell.

Epilogue

After reading this blog post hundreds of people made these brownies.  They were all very content.

Cherry, brandy soaked cherry and pecan fudge brownies

Adapted from the Moosewood Cookbook by Mollie Katzen

2 sticks unsalted butter, softened

5 oz unsweetened bitter chocolate, melted and cooled

1 ¾ cups dark brown sugar

5 eggs

1 ½ tsp vanilla extract

1 cup whole wheat pastry flour or unbleached white flour

1 cup tart dried cherries

½ cup or more brandy

6-8 oz cherry jam

1 cup pecans

Prior to making the brownies, soak the dried cherries in the brandy.  If you use just a ½ cup brandy you may need to stir the cherries periodically as you let them soak for at least one hour to make sure all of the cherries soak up the brandy.  When you are ready to use the cherries, drain them and reserve the brandy for another use such as drinking. (It gets flavored with the dried cherries and is something you won’t want to waste).

Melt the chocolate in a double boiler over a high simmer.  Cool the chocolate before proceeding with the recipe.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees, F.

Butter a 9”x13” pan

Cream the butter and sugar together with a mixer.  Add the eggs and mix well.  Add vanilla and then beat in the melted chocolate and the flour.  With a spoon or spatula, fold in the drained cherries and the pecans.

Spoon half of the batter into the pan smoothing the surface so that the batter covers the entire pan.  Spoon the cherry jam all over the top of the batter, carefully spreading it over the top of the batter so that most bites of  your brownies should get some jam.  Spread the remaining batter over the jam.

Bake the brownies for 25 to 30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.  Cool the brownies and then cut into squares.

Over the past few weeks, this has been anything but a food blog and my diet has been anything but healthy.  During the weeks I was away, my Mom and I ate a lot of restaurant/fast food and hospital food.  The stress made us too tired to take care of ourselves properly and there was really no time to take care of the day-to-day chores like grocery shopping and cooking.  My Dad is back at home now and getting stronger every day.  I called him a couple of days ago and asked him how he was.  He boisterously replied “TERRIFIC!!!”  Which is his standard answer to that standard question.  I instantly knew things were now normal.  Things will be o.k.

I have been cooking a few things since I have gotten back but we have gotten into a bad restaurant habit again.  Work has been stressful since I have been back so I have been easing my personal life slowly back to that place called normal. 

Today was the first day I really felt home.  It was the first day that I really got excited about getting back into the kitchen.  I woke up and wanted to make pancakes.  If you have been browsing around this blog, you know that Saturday mornings mean breakfast at my home.  Saturdays are all about sleeping in late and then settling into a yummy plate of something sweet or savory and very filling, a glass of fresh squeezed orange juice and a mug of something hot, bitter and steamy.

I wanted pancakes and after brushing off the remnants of a strange dream where I was traveling somewhere on a Greyhound bus and my Mother was loading an unending supply of plastic bags of groceries onto the bus for me, my mind was ready to use the energy from that dream state and come up with something beautiful in the real world.  For some reason, I began to think of carrot cake and how wonderful pancakes would be if they were carrot cake instead.  I found a small bunch of thin, sweet carrots in the vegetable drawer of our fridge.  They were too small to peel, so I scrubbed them well and shredded them.  Using a favorite recipe for sweet potato pancakes as a general roadmap, I came up with some fragrant dried fruit and vegetable pancakes that take getting your first serving of vegetables for the day to another plain of experience altogether.

Carrot Cake Pancakes

2 cups of shredded carrots

2 tsp. finely grated orange peel

2 large eggs, scrambled

2 cups milk

1 cup currants

4 tbsp olive oil

1 tbsp dark honey

2 cups whole-wheat pastry flour

4 tsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

2 tsp cinnamon

¼ tsp nutmeg

¼ tsp ginger powder

½ tsp allspice

Butter for frying

Maple-cinnamon yogurt (recipe follows)

Toasted Walnuts

In a large bowl, combine shredded carrots, orange peel, eggs, milk, currants, olive oil and honey.  In another bowl, combine flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, and allspice.  Mix dry ingredients into wet ingredients.  Let the batter stand for at least ten minutes.  (This will result in a fluffier pancake with softer currants).  If using an electric griddle, preheat the griddle to 350 degrees F.  Melt butter onto griddle surface.  Ladle batter onto griddle.  Cook pancakes until bubbles form and the edges begin to dry out about 3-4 minutes.  Turn pancakes.  Cook second side until lightly browned, about 1-2 minutes more. 

This recipe makes a lot of pancakes, even with a large electric griddle you will need to make two batches.  Keep the first batch warm in a covered dish or a preheated 200 degree F. oven  Serve these with Maple Cinnamon Yogurt, Maple Syrup and toasted walnuts to get the full effect of carrot cake for breakfast.

Maple-cinnamon yogurt

1 cup of plain nonfat yogurt

1 tsp ground cinnamon

1 tsp maple syrup

 Combine yogurt, cinnamon and maple syrup with a whisk until smooth.

I used to love to hike.  That was before I got a sedentary a job and then another sedentary job and promotions to more sedentary jobs.  My boyfriend has never let himself get unhealthy.  He is quite active.  I’m not.  He always asks me to hike with him.  My answer is usually, “ummmmmmm…..”.  The reason why boils down to the fact that I get halfway through a hike and my head turns hot and red and feels as if it is going to blow off.  This happens because my fit partner hikes at his speed, lets me stop occasionally to breath or drink water and then keeps going at his speed.  Today I learned how to get through a hike.  Bring a camera.  The time it takes to set up a shot is just the right amount of time to slow things down so that I can endure more hills and more distance. 

A favorite hike of ours here in Santa Barbara is Rattlesnake Canyon.  Some Southern California hikes can be dry and hot.  This hike follows a creekbed that has some water all year long.  The water supports a lot of pretty trees and vegetation.

We had gotten a lot of rain over the past couple of weeks so flowers were blooming and the creek was running.  There were many pretty waterfalls to see.

At a certain point in the trail, before you begin to gain a lot of elevation, there is a view of the hills above you.  There is a monastery up there and a few other homes, but I always like to see this round house.  It is further up the trail and by itself.  Something about the architecture and the landscape reminds me of some place older like the mediteranean.

Once you climb in elevation enough, you get a view of the city below, the ocean and the fog shrouded channel islands

As we hiked higher and higher, we saw so many pretty flowers blooming happily because of the moisture from the storm and the warmth of the first springlike day.

Everything was so pretty and I felt happy to be up there after weeks of stress and worry. 

Even the trees were in bloom.

Life is good.

Let’s be distracted together. 

I have been trying really hard to make virtual friends in the Blogosphere but the idea of jumping in and playing with my new friends and potential new friends has been a little intimidating.  Joining in on blogging events, you know, the ones where you do something like bake a treat each month was too much commitment for me.  I’m a little bit of a commitment-o-phobe.  I have been dreading that little thing called a Meme since I first discovered blogging.  It’s not that I don’t like to share things about my personal life; it’s just that I like to share what I want to share.

But I need a distraction from my problems.

Dylan from Sourdough Monkey Wrangler is my best blogging friend so far.  We have a shared love of goopy, gloppy, fermented things.  Dylan must have sensed something was up here at Delectable Tidbits when he didn’t see me posting as frequently as usual and he decided to tag me with my first Meme.  How can I say no to Dylan?  But wowsa!  What a Meme this is!  I needed to come up with 5 sordid facts about myself.  OK.  Deep breath.  Here goes.  Distraction is a good thing.  Distraction is a good thing…

First the rules:

1. Link to your Tagger and post these rules.
2. Share 5 facts about yourself.
3. Tag 5 people at the end of your post and list their names, linking to them.
4. Let them know they’ve been tagged by leaving a comment at their blogs. And now without any further interruptions, 5 sordid facts about Mimi 

1. I am debilitatingly shy.  If I don’t know you, I won’t have much to say to you.  I really want to meet you and have a big exciting intellectual conversation or maybe even just small talk but I can’t help it. I just clam up.  Therefore, I tend to love people who are the opposite of me (as long as they are nice people).  If you are friendly, funny and outgoing enough to talk to anyone you see, I will gladly gravitate towards you.  Unfortunately, you won’t notice me because I am the boring person who keeps annoyingly staring at you while my lower lip quivers as I keep trying to think of something to say to you.  It’s really a shame because I have a decent sense of humor.  People seem to like me if they ever get the chance to talk to me.
2. I hide chocolate.  I don’t know where this behavior comes from but I do!  I hide chocolate!  When my boyfriend and I were first dating, I offered him some of my hidden candy.  If I remember the situation correctly, it was in a bag of candy under my bed.  He thought it was very strange that I would have candy stashed away.  He liked me anyway.  We are still together after a couple of decades.
3. I am an orchid killer.  Not too long ago, I used to be an orchid addict; I owned a couple of thousand dollars worth of really nice plants.  My interest in them completely dissipated.  I was really depressed a few months ago and nearly stopped taking care of them.  Recently, after two weeks of not watering them and then three weeks sitting in a hospital waiting room, more of these orchids than I care to think about are dead.  Here is what they looked like when I loved them.  Don’t tell my estranged friends at the Garden Web orchid forum.  Shhhhhhh!
4. I am a terrible housekeeper.  Even though I love to cook and you would think I would love to feed people, this problem coupled with sordid fact number one keeps me from inviting anyone over.  Ever.
5. I love animals but I tend to dominate them.  When I was a kid, I used to catch things, mostly bugs and reptiles.  I taught my dog to pull me by his neck while I glided along behind him on my skates, I taught him to climb a tree and jump over our fence to escape (he was too lazy to escape on his own, he only did so on command).  I had an Amazon parrot that I taught to lay upside down in my cupped hands (play dead).  I used to make houses out of shoeboxes complete with doors and plastic windows and put my parakeets inside.  They would stare out the windows and chirp at me.  They loved to chew their way out.  My Rabbit would roll balls back and forth to me.  My guppy learned to hang out in my hand and my flounder would do back flips out of his tank and into my hand.  Before you get all PETA on me in the comments.  They all loved me and no animals were actually harmed in the making of this entertainment.

Memes are like chain letters or viruses so let’s pass this one along.  Tag you’re it:

1. I’ll shoot this meme up to Alaska and ask my new friends, the Arctic Carbivores to share some sordid details with us
2. Hey Germany!  Scholli2000, do you have 5 sordid facts for us?  (This blog is in German so here is a link to Google translate if you need it. It doesn’t work very well, but the results can be amusing)
3. I love reading the Diary of a new old-fashioned Gal.  Normally, there’s nothing sordid happening there, just a fun read with good solid writing.  Let’s see what sort of sordid details we can get out of Becca
4. I’ve never seen a meme on Baking with Sourdough Starters but hopefully Teresa will play along with us.
5. Another blog that is the home of a wonderful writer is Baking and Books so I’ll tag Ari as well.