Soup, week four and five: carrot, quinoa and curried lentil. (And brilliant cornbread.)

We were out of town last weekend.  We ate a lot of delicious food, but we did not make or eat any soup.  So today to make up for it, we made a total mess of the kitchen... and two beautiful soups in the process.

One was a carrot soup I saw a few weeks ago and had been dying to try.  Smitten Kitchen, carrots, tahini, crisped chickpeas... there could not possibly be anything wrong with any of that.  Right?

there wasn't... not one single thing

The soup was like butter... like healthy, vitamin-C-filled, delicious butter you would eat with a spoon... and then go back for seconds... and possibly thirds if you didn't have another amazing soup in front of you.  The crisped chickpeas were a nice touch, and they are officially going to become a staple around here (on salads, in soups, in my hand about to be popped into my mouth, that sort of thing).

The other was a lentil and quinoa soup recipe I found at our lovely hostess's house last weekend. She's big on backpacking with tasty food, and we like to camp and hike with tasty food, so I perused her cookbook collection just looking for easy, me-friendly energy bars and that sort of thing.

I quickly realized I needed to own this cookbook at some point.  It features lots of gluten-free recipes and some really interesting soup ideas - many of which call for a bunch of dehydration and re-hydration (this is a backpacker cookbook, after all) but which also look like they would be just as wonderful without all that nonsense.  This was one of those recipes so I scribbled it down on the back of an envelope and recreated it tonight.

OK, he recreated it tonight.  Whatever.

mine = sans yogurt because of the quinoa
*SIGH*

Spicy and hearty and wholesome and amazing.

We both agreed that these two soups are our favorites so far, this quarter and also out of any other soups we have made this winter.  And we have made some wonderful soups.  Especially after two days this week of leftover aforementioned pumpkin corn soup that had been frozen and defrosted and reheated and still wowed me, all I can say is... that's saying a lot.

To round out the kitchen-mess-extravaganza I also made these amazing black quinoa corn muffins.  (Only I used regular quinoa because that's what we had.)  And OH. MY. they are good. 

I am never eating again

Soup, week three: African peanut quinoa soup.

This one was a no-brainer.  Let's face it, African = spicy, quinoa = protein and peanut butter = awesome.

The recipe called for sweet potatoes but leftover butternut squash from last week's roasted vegetable soup made a nice substitute (when supplemented with a pre-cut half from Whole Foods, roasted while the bacon cooked Sunday morning).

before

after

It needed a little more salt than called for, but I think that's because we made our own peanut butter and didn't add a lot of salt.  Otherwise I am pretty pleased with this one.  And thankful that he got jury duty so that I can enjoy leftovers all week...

Spring cleaning, part two.

most important rule
first freecycler to respond
is going to flake

Soup, week two: roasted vegetable and kale soup.

I wanted to love this soup.  It was alright, and it made for great leftovers, and it was most definitely healthy... but it didn't wow me. 

not the prettiest soup, either

Totally worth the experiment for the smell of roasted vegetables in our kitchen that day though.

Got to be a loner, we just do what we please.

Yesterday we had the pleasure of attending the local School of Rock's Beatles show, where tiny-to-high-school-aged children named Wednesday and T-Rex and Susiannamarie (Iann for short)* played songs about sex and drugs for two hours.

you are the youngest person in the theater

goo goo g'joob

It was wonderful.  Please support your local School of Rock. 

In related news, the hardest thing about this whole no-negativity missive is going to be dealing with people.  Specifically, Portland people.  Portlanders are, as a rule, fiercely independent.  We bike**, we hike, we run, we craft, we bake, we blog, we read.  (We read a lot, in fact.)

These are not team sports.  Sure, there are hiking groups and book clubs and knitting circles, but for the most part we are on our own.  And while we have the Blazers (yawn), the Timbers (passing fad), and the Winterhawks (for die hard hockey fans only), we don't spend a lot of time on team sports.  Therefore, we tend not to be team players.

This is my theory, anyway.***

Like the woman who stood behind us for 10 minutes yesterday, chatting loudly with her friend/on her phone and then moving to stand directly in front of us, blocking our up-until-then perfect view of the stage.  I could not help my body language when she turned around (it essentially said, "hey lady, WTF?") and she snapped, "her son is singing lead on the next song."

(Reaction #1: Well, you should've thought about that three hours ago and gotten a nice spot down front.  Reaction #2, which I wish would've come before my physical reaction: Oh, hey that's cool, whatever.  Luckily she and her friend went downstairs for photographic evidence of her son's 15 minutes of fame, and the rest of the show was totally enjoyable.)

And like me, and like my partner in crime, both of whom spent the entire day today actively avoiding people.

I really need to work on this.

Ob-la-di ob-la-da...

________________
* not their real names... but essentially their real names
** and by "we" I mean "not me"
*** and by "my" I mean I stole it from someone

Soup, week one: curry lentil.

I bought a bag of dried lentils a bazillion years ago and never did anything with them, so when this completely easy and delicious recipe caught my eye, we totally went for it during a halftime of football.

And it was awesome.

Our only recommended deviations from the original recipe: go with at least 2 tbsp of curry from the start (we skimped at her recommendation and added a tbsp more or so near the end), and add a few dollops of whole fat yogurt along with the lemon and onion before serving. 

just say yes

I am so excited about the next 11 weeks.

Belated Friday five.

One sentence each on five movies we have seen, in no particular order:

• Jiro Dreams of Sushi (an overdue review) - truly fascinating... and hunger inducing.
• National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation - I finally saw this for $3 at the local pizza/pint/playhouse, and finally learned that it is definitely worth seeing.
• Searching for Sugar Man - very inspiring, and possibly the only reason I've seen to want to visit South Africa (other than maybe swimming with sharks, which is coincidentally another good movie).
• The Hobbit - enjoyable enough in 2D, but with a made-for-3D feel.
• Bullitt - my dream car for many years was an electric blue 1964 Ford Mustang, Steve McQueen is no Paul Newman, and that's about all I have to say about this movie.

Spring cleaning, part one.

it seems criminal
to recycle hemingway
coffee-stained or not

So not a Friday five.

Five things that I am going to do, starting in 2013, in no particular order:

• Eliminate selfish, thoughtless negativity.  In my work relationships, my personal relationships, even the entertainment I choose.  My time on this planet is too short and deserves more laughter and less frowning.  (This one is gonna be tough.  I admit that wholeheartedly.  Please bear with me.)
• Read more.  A whole lot more. Time to get back to my Read-a-Thon-stuffed-McGruff-the-Crime-Dog-winning-days of elementary school.*  
• Write more.  It's fun!  I like it.  I hope you do too.
• Yoga.  I do it now, sporadically, when time permits and/or when muscles are achy and/or when it's really cold and rainy outside.  I think that defeats the purpose of yoga.
• Slow down.  Because really, unless someone is dying or about to give birth, nothing is that important.

These are not resolutions, because resolutions are (frankly) copouts.

These are things I am going to do. 

Dammit.

Happy forthcoming 2013!

________________
* Don't worry, I won't ask for $0.10 for every book I read.  I might raid your kids' next bookmobile visit though.

We survived! Hooray.

Now that the world hasn't ended and the holiday madness is starting to subdue, it's time to recap the last 3 months... 

Find free fun - other than teaching English once a week, which is still really fun: check, sort of.  Walks around town are fun.  Photo walks, always fun. 

with my ragtop down so my hair can blow

Not entirely free but most definitely fun: Laurelthirst free music (free if you don't buy a drink or tip the band, but not supporting the pub or the band is lame).  Game night sponsored by Goodwill (chess and 1987's National Geographic are our recent faves, approximately $3 each). 

so, it is down to you

and it is down to me

 also a fave

(but only when I win)

Those are not "free" per se.  Free is nerdy and/or wanderlust and/or local historical DVDs from the library, and OPB - none of which involve getting out and about, or any interaction whatsoever, really.  So, yeah... more to explore in this "free fun" arena.

Branch out on gluten free baking: ehhh.  I made none of the aforementioned recipes, but I did make these (with peppermint extract and candy cane topping, probably should've left both out), and some things from this (transformed into GF goodness when needed), and the aforementioned maple almond butter sandwich cookies.  But rest assured.  I am going to make this soon.  And these.  Maybe.

and we did make this delicious ginormous 

gluten free peppermint ho ho

Finish Wildwood: check!  I SAID, CHECK!!  Yes, I am quite excited about this accomplishment.  After several hundred pages of PhD-level vocabulary, enough references to 12-year-olds doing yoga/meditation to last a lifetime, and constantly getting "Bandit Queen" stuck in my head, I was ready to call it quits. But all of the sudden there was a rabbit using a colander as a helmet which was AWESOME so I plowed onward. I can see how others might love it, and it did make me want to listen to all the albums again.  But I think I'll skip Volume II for now.

Anything on The List. Nothing this quarter but something is coming soon.  A new transmission means that selling my car and therefore, #12, likely looms in my 2013 future.

Speaking of...here's what is in store for January:

• New soup recipe every week:  I love soup.  Really, really love soup.  Soup like this, and this.  Looking forward to three months of delicious soup.  And a lot of lentils, apparently.  

the first "this"

(with fritos)

• Spring cleaning: time to pare down.  Significantly.
• Shamrock Run 2013... Q: what's 9 miles after 13.1?  A: cake.
• And yeah, learn how to drive a stick shift well.  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And here... we... go!

Belated Friday five.

Five recipes I've tried and enjoyed recently, in no particular order:

• I used to love Annie's Goddess salad dressing.  LOVE IT.  It was the only salad dressing I used for years, and I would also use it instead of vegenaise on sandwiches, as a dip for grilled cheeses, with pita and falafel...  (I would only buy it on sale, though, because really, $4.50 for a tiny bottle of salad dressing?)  But then came the food intolerance which meant that in addition to soy sauce, xanthum gum and therefore all store-bought salad dressings were out.  Last week we had some leftover tahini after making hummus and I ran across this simple version (with tamari instead of soy sauce) which was pretty close, although I think this one might be better. 
• I'm not a big cauliflower fan, but this roasted cauliflower soup was amazing.  We used cream instead of milk and surprisingly, it wasn't overly rich or heavy.  Roast the onions with the cauliflower and add crumbled bacon to take it over the top.
• Ran across this carrot and leek frittata recipe while looking for something that contained no gluten, potato, dairy, or soy to make for some friends last weekend.  I left the milk out, obviously, but it was really lovely and even looked almost exactly like the picture!
  

  

• Cashew garlic sauce on... something. I can't remember what we put it on, but I remember the cashew sauce I had on the walnut pesto "pizza" at Blossoming Lotus and this was very similar. So easy, so tasty!  It would probably be delicious with the broccoli I'll be steaming to go with the recipe's Wild Mushroom, Lentil and Olive Burgers. Yunno, whenever I get around to that.
• To my surprise and delight, I learned by accident a while back that corn+dairy apparently doesn't have the same gastronomic ill-effects as other grains+dairy (thank you, Fritos, cheese and September road trip).  Have I not posted this cornbread yet?  How is that possible? I think we're on batch #3.  We just keep making it and it just keeps getting better and better.  This last time, we used bacon grease instead of butter, half-and-half yellow and blue corn meal, and muffin tins instead of an 8x8 pan.  The muffins went really well with the aforementioned cauliflower soup and will be going really well with the Mexican corn soup on the menu for later today.

When I got my "diagnosis" this summer, I told my naturopath that I was excited about the challenge ahead of me.  Apparently, I was the only patient she'd had who'd ever had THAT reaction.  I have my weak moments for sure (hello, crappy pizza I had after that show two weeks ago) and I will continue to taste things even if I can't eat/drink them.  But despite all that, the diet continues to be challenging but fun, worth it for the physical/mental health benefits, and oh so delicious at every turn. 

(About either of them.)

just a smidge jealous
joy met barefoot contessa
say "who?", you're disowned

Or the foundation of a beauty school dropout.

welcome to my world
in which tp rolls become
christmas ornaments

happy holidays!

Well, with 8 hours of sleep in between... and some coffee.

today i learned that
four drinks, no dinner, late show,
twelve miles = possible

"Where's the turkey, Chuck? Don't you know anything about Thanksgiving dinners?"

It's hard to get excited about Thanksgiving when you can't eat mashed potatoes or gravy.  Just sayin'.

Regardless, we were headed a few hours south for dinner Thursday so I wanted a couple of simple recipes we could make the night before or that morning, that would travel well and not require precious oven space upon arrival. 

I found two from my new hero, The Wannabe Chef, whose motto ("love the ingredients, not the food") and totally simple, mostly gluten-free, handful-of-ingredients recipes won me over a few months ago. 

First came the maple roasted brussel sprouts.  Apparently this maple-syrup-brussel-sprouts business is really common, but it was news to me earlier this week.  Good news, it turns out.  They were a bit overdone but still delicious, and they traveled well. 

not pictured: the brussel sprouts we actually used to make the dish

Next up: maple almond butter sandwich cookies.  I am all for homemade nut butter but I bought pre-made almond butter just for convenience this time.  We used the whole jar for a double batch of the cookies (which took about 3 seconds to whip up, by the way) so I had to improvise for the filling.  After a 10 minute showdown between my As Seen On TV Faboo Quad Pro food processor and the filling ingredients, I decided to settle for chunky almond creme, and I actually think it made for a more interesting texture and tastier filling.  And I'm not just saying that because I'm lazy.

The kids tore into the cookies as soon as we put them out after dinner, probably because they looked like peanut butter cookies and tasted like gingersnaps and had creamy sugary buttery mapley goodness in the middle.  The adults got a few as well.  We set aside a few cookies while packing food that morning (which will go fast) and a few spoonfuls of filling (which will go wonderfully on... something yet to be determined...  pancakes, perhaps?  who am I kidding?  I suspect it will go wonderfully on a spoon on the way to my mouth).

no spoon necessary

Finally we threw together a quinoa pecan salad with parsley, mint and lemon.  I overcooked the quinoa just a bit the night before but in the end it didn't really matter.  So easy, so tasty, so protein-packed! 

 note to self: make more

Couple all of this with turkey, ham, fresh veggies and homemade wine (and maybe some ill-advised cheesecake sans crust too close to the quinoa salad, but only mildly ill-advised) and I'd call my first healthy Thanksgiving a success.

I think that calls for some sausage.

Friday five!

How totally cliche - five things I'm thankful for, in no particular order... except for maybe the first and last ones:

• that my basic needs of food, clothing and shelter are met every day
• being able to run 3 or 9 or 13.2 miles in a row
• peanut butter
• winter sunrises and sunsets
• my small but powerful support network (here, near and far) who keep me grounded, open their homes and hearts to me, teach me something almost every time we talk, and make me laugh

_______________
What?  You're thankful for peanut butter too.  I know that you are.

Plans!

three emails this week:
"portland!"  "portland?"  "in portland"
love when friends visit

Pins and needles...

good job, florida
lookin' good, my maryland
virginia... deep sigh

ears versus forehead
this is how some people vote
sadly not kidding

i'll give YOU four years
and a crapload of issues...
let's see what you do

organic farming
not seventeen billion kids
sends the right message

varied results from
fox vs huffington post
quite interesting

really, fox?

however it ends
democracy in action
is pretty damn cool

 

to democracy!

Belated Friday five.

Five movies we have seen recently(ish), in one sentence and no particular order:

• The Hunger Games - everything about this movie bothered me and yet I liked it a lot.
• Moonrise Kingdom - I'm really not sure how Wes Anderson keeps topping himself, but he has now officially set the bar impossibly high.
• Beasts of the Southern Wild - could've done without the prehistoric monsters, but otherwise a really interesting and moving film.
• Samsara - the aliens must think we are ABSOLUTELY INSANE.
• The Dark Knight Rises - I had so many questions afterward, the main two being "why the hell does anyone still live in Gotham City?" and "why the hell are they still making Batman movies?"

Holy cow, it's almost November.

A little late on the recap.  Hmm... a lot late.  Patience patience patience. 

• practice patience - check... mostly
• get healthy - check... mostly (I looked back through food pictures and many of them prominently feature bacon or sausage, and I'm not doing nearly as much yoga as I'd like, but the gluten-free potato-free diet continues rather successfully and I did start training for a half marathon)
• be crafty - this in June, not so much during 3Q, but 4Q is shaping up nicely (thank you, holiday cards!)
• anything on The List - nothing done but numerous things are in progress (hey 6, 12, 20, 24, 29 - I'm talking to you)

I struggled with the patience goal.  I'm just not a very patient person, especially when it comes to myself and the very high bar I set for everything I do...  Or the lack of time in the day...  Or people in general...  Or work.  Especially not work.  I found that smiling helped a lot at work.  I smiled extra big during a meeting a few weeks ago when I explained that 3Q was up and my patience goal had officially expired.  However, I would like to informally continue this goal.  To help with that, in late September I started a volunteer gig in which I teach English once a week.  I've found this to be a good patience test with the added bonus of it being in a positive and constructive environment. And it's also just terribly fun!

So now the next 3 months:

• find free fun - other than teaching English once a week
• branch out on gluten free baking - it's winter, which means rainy Sundays, which means lots of time in the kitchen with a warm oven and recipes like these
• finish Wildwood
• anything on The List

Why free fun, you ask?  Why not?  Spending money does not guarantee fun or enjoyment, and I'm tired of watching my hard earned cash slip away for an experience I don't remember fondly.  Last weekend we went to the apple tasting festival at the local nursery - a few hours, a full belly of apples, and zero dollars.  (Well, except for the $6 we spent on apples.)  Last night we spent $40 on happy hour and entertainment, and it was alright but not worth $40.

(I just re-read that last paragraph and I think it's safe to say that I'm officially old.  Now ask me about my senior discount, and then get off my lawn!)

The tricky part about the baking goal is that I can't eat dairy and grain together, which eliminates 95% of the recipes I find online.  A while back I said I would still bake with real flour and just not eat the result...  Well, after making apple brownies last weekend and having to see them in the refrigerator every day, that resolution has been thrown out the window.  Perhaps a side effect of this goal will be to find a website actually dedicated to people with my exact food intolerance?  (Or to start one?)

And about Wildwood.  I bought it a year ago.  I even went to the reading and got a signed copy.  I was very excited about it.  Since then I've started it about six times and just can't get into it.  I get tripped up on the expected audience.  Twelve year olds won't know a lot of the words he uses, and 37 year olds don't have patience to look them up.  This makes me sad (faithful readers will know how much I celebrate Mr. Maloy's entire collection) so I will keep trying, and maybe by New Year's Eve I can label it as "read" and move on with my life.

And here... we...  go!