Belated Friday five.

In honor of the Oscars, I bring you five old movies I've only recently seen, in no particular order:

• I've Loved You So Long - beautiful and heartbreaking, just what you'd expect from those nutty French.
• 50/50 - wanted to love it but I only kind of liked it.
• The Fifth Element - not sure why I always resist Bruce Willis because everything I have ever seen with him has been completely amazing in its own special (and sometimes "special") way. 
• A Day Without a Mexican - was hoping it would be so much better, it could have been so much better.
• Conan O'Brien Can't Stop - never liked his show but now I at least like him.

Soup, week eight and nine: GF corn chowder and butternut squash, carrot and ginger.

I was out of town last weekend, so yesterday we made two soups to make up for it.  Both recipes were found that morning in about 5 minutes, as opposed to my usual hours of scouring the interwebs for THE PERFECT SOUP.  I think I've finally realized that life is too short for that nonsense.

Soup #8 was based off a question posed to him - "what's one ingredient and/or one type of soup you'd like to try?"  The answer was "chowder", and the caveat was that he'd tried to find a good chowder recipe last weekend but they all contained potato.  So this roasted corn chowder with lime, for which we could easily substitute butternut squash in place of sweet potato, seemed to fit the bill quite nicely. 

I must confess that the note at the end of the recipe about using a crock pot for this soup could have been the driver.  There has been a crock pot in my kitchen since cohabitation over a year ago and I've never used it.  And that just seemed WRONG.

making it right

The photo above was taken before we added the tofu and coconut milk.  It was a squeeze, but it all fit.  Barely.  We tasted it last night but didn't actually enjoy a bowl until this afternoon.  It was lovely - not very creamy, very hearty, very spicy.  And pretty healthy.

Soup #9 was a play off Soup #8 - since we'd have to substitute a little bit of butternut squash for sweet potatoes in that soup, why not just try a nice butternut squash (, carrot, ginger) soup as well, to use up the rest of the butternut squash?  They really had me at the name of the blog - um, "with style and grace"?  Yeah, I am so there.  The soup was delicious.

with style, grace and quinoa corn muffins

Yes, it's been almost 2 weeks since my last quinoa corn muffin, and that also seemed WRONG. We were out of yellow cornmeal so I substituted blue corn meal. I usually find this to be grittier, but in this recipe it somehow worked out. I'm totally sure the lime butter had nothing to do with that.

and so pretty!

I'll almost be sad to see this quarter end.

I won't miss all the dishes though.

Soup, week seven: homemade pho.

Always wanted to try pho, but thought it would be too difficult. This recipe looked easy enough.  So easy, in fact, that we didn't really follow it at all.  We used our homemade vegetable stock, no fish sauce, no soy sauce, more spinach and mushrooms than was called for, regular basil, and rice noodles instead of soba.

(Otherwise, we followed the recipe exactly.  Haha.)

So I'm not sure that what we ended up with technically qualifies as pho, but it was tasty, healthy and lasted all week.  That's all that really matters in the end, right?

it was really pretty, too

Belated Friday five.

Five suggestions to help you purge, in no particular order.  In fact, they're all kind of tied together in one general theme.

I should preface this post by saying that these are all my opinions, and I make no judgment of anyone who chooses to live differently than me - unless they constantly complain to me that they have too much stuff and/or no money to do what they want to do.  To those people, I say, "Read on..."

• Move every few years.  Since 1998 I have changed apartments every three years or so.  Each time I end up with carloads of items in good condition - books, clothes, kitchen dishes and accessories, even small furniture - that don't seem worth the effort to (ask friends to help me/pay for someone to) move.  These items can obviously be donated to thrift stores, but please consider your friendly neighborhood establishments instead of behemoth organizations with questionable executive salaries.
• Sub-suggestion #1: Don't buy a house. The more space you have, the more you fill it up with stuff you don't need.  And the longer you have that space, the less you bother to clean it out.  (And also when your oven breaks you have to fix it yourself, which kind of sucks.)
• Sub-suggestion #2:  And don't just throw your stuff into a storage unit, because 5 years from now you will have paid a ridiculous amount of money to save things you'll only get rid of as soon as you open the storage unit.
• Value experiences, not things.  Sure, I could have a new living room furniture set, but instead I went to New Zealand.  I could own a TV that was made in this decade, but I'd rather see a band once or twice a month and enjoy a nice meal out every so often.  I'm not one to need the latest technology or the newest fashions or a wall full of books... and as I often joke, if I ever get a proposal I want a plane ticket, not a ring.
• .JPGs are cheap.  Take pictures of things you think you can't get rid of, then get rid of them.  See how often you look at the pictures... or miss the things you got rid of.  (My guess for both would be "not very often"...)
• One (wo)man's trash really is another (wo)man's treasure.  I recently Freecycled razor blades for a razor I lost on our camping trip, the shell and press of the third French press *someone* has broken in the last 15 months, and a very old, very loud bread machine that the local thrift store probably would've trashed.  I've also gotten rid of tons of egg cartons, empty Adam's peanut butter jars and moving boxes through Freecycle, and along the way I've seen some amazing things listed (and taken) that would've otherwise ended up in the landfill.  A great site with a great mission.
• The One Year Rule.  If I don't use it, wear it, look at it, or think about it for one year, it's gone.  Period.  Most recent case in point: my basic sewing machine, purchased solely to hem pants and make curtains, sold on Craig's List for $100, and the next time I need a sewing machine I'll just borrow one. 
• Sub-suggestion: The "no new hangers" rule is also a good one - for each new piece of clothing you buy, give something away.  I've found that I am much more particular about purchasing something when I have already been very particular in filling my closet in the first place. 

Now... go forth and purge!  After all, spring is just around the corner...

Soup, week six: continuing the carrot theme.

With the newfound discovery of lime butter, I decided to go simple and healthy with this week's soup.  That way, when I lopped a big blob of lime butter on the quinoa corn muffins accompanying  the soup, I wouldn't feel so guilty.

So I found this recipe.  It was simple and healthy and delicious.  We had leftovers for lunch most of the week and we were happy to eat them.  My only regrets were not thinking ahead to thaw out our homemade vegetable stock, and running out of cumin during the soup-making (it could've used more cumin).

not as boring as it looks

As an aside, faithful readers may know that we've been making homemade peanut butter, almond milk and almond butter, blue cheese and goddess salad dressing, and various other staples for a while now (in addition to all the other generally healthy recipes we've found that avoid potatoes and wheat). 

So I'm amazed that it took us this long to start making our own vegetable stock.  Pre-food intolerance, I always resisted it because $2.50 seemed a bit excessive for what seemed to be salty brown water.  Post-food intolerance, I couldn't find one without a list of ingredients I was supposed to avoid.  Homemade, it's a great pre-compost reuse and I'm really amazed at what a difference it makes for flavor. 

It also makes your house smell AMAZING.

There are many recipes out there but our approach has simply been to toss carrot and celery ends, onion peels, mushroom stems and any other non-cabbage-like vegetable leftovers into a freezer bag until we have several cups' worth, and then boil them with some salt, pepper and a bay leaf for a few hours.  Strain, freeze, and there you have it...  Just don't forget to thaw it the day before you need it. 

And I can eat them with cheese!

homemade almond milk
equals lots of wasted pulp...
finally! a cure

Skills to pay the bills.

strategic planning:
better to employ in life
than the 9 to 5