Sunday Fun at Whole Foods

Because the human residents of Chez Boeckman-Walker spent most of last Saturday cleaning, I decided we should treat ourselves to a bit of Sunday fun by hitting the South Lamar Half-Price Books and the flagship Whole Foods. Fun was sure to be had since the trip required us to go by Zilker Park and the surrounding area, which was lousy with ACL Festival goers who were on foot, on bikes, in pedicabs (pedicabs that were using the center turn lane as their own personal lane, mind you--dumbasses), half-dressed, too tightly dressed, shouldn't be wearing that dress and other variations of nouveau wannabe hippiedom.

A Trip With Purpose
The boy trotted out Sunday morning with news that we had to celebrate Baby Crocagator's birthday that day. We've already celebrated arbitrarily determined birthdays for Pumpkin the
jack–o'–lantern t-shirt-wearing bear and Pike the black lab puppy, so, hey, why not celebrate another arbitrarily determined stuffed animal? To make it extra special, I put forth the idea of picking up something special from the Whole Food's sin bar (aka, the dessert bar), and not only was the boy 100 percent in favor of the idea, his father, who knows well the sins of the sin bar, got on board toute de suite aussi.

Luckily that plan was fluid. When we came to the bakery, we began drooling and bemoaning our lack of money and need to stick to certain nutritional limits. And then we saw it--the perfect confection for celebrating Baby Crocagator's birthday, the pièce de résistance for this arbitrarily determined celebration. See for yourself, Gentle Reader:

While this cupcake is quite adorable with its frosting art (my inner Wilton wannabe was just screaming in delight and envy), the food itself was very disappointing. The chocolate cupcake under all that frosting was bland and a tad on the dry side. Or maybe that's how chocolate cake is that didn't start out as a powder in a box with Betty Crocker's or Duncan Hines' name printed on it. The frosting wasn't that nasty whipped grease grocery store bakeries are so fond of smearing over everything (nothing that comes out of a five-gallon bucket can be tasty, mind you), but it wasn't all that edible either. I suppose I'm a bit spoiled by the frosting that Central Markup uses on its cakes--now that's frosting, mes amis!

What I thought of the cupcake really is beside the point. The purchase was about indulging a little boy who clearly needs friends--human ones--or siblings--human ones. And the boy loved Baby Crocagator's cake and ate every last crumb of it.

A Yummy Discovery
The crocagator cupcake wasn't our only delightful food find in the bakery at Whole Foods. In a stunning coincidence, we discovered the store had apple cinnamon challah on sale.

Why was this a coincidence, you ask, Gentle Reader? Because last Friday, I received an email from the King Arthur Flour Company that contained a recipe for apple challah. Intrigued but inexperienced, I forwarded the email to my sister-in-law, who has honest to goodness real flair and experience with all things culinary and who happens currently to be living in Israel. I was curious if she'd ever tried her hand at making challah (instead of buying it at her local store) and, if so, could she confirm the recipe's warning, "Though the process is messy, the result is well worth it!"

Upon seeing the challah in the bin at Whole Foods, I decided, Screw the mess! I'll plunk down the four-fifty to enjoy a finished product that I don't have to slave over--and probably screw up badly. Given that the husband is as much as sucker for anything apple-cinnamon the way I am, how could I pass up this opportunity? Especially considering this loaf of apple-cinnamony goodness is bigger 'an a baby's head!

Unlike the cupcake, the challah is full of flavor. The apple bits tucked inside the outer band of bread are tender, not mushy, and the bread itself isn't sickeningly sweet like some cinnamon rolls are these days. It almost inspires me to try the recipe myself. Maybe one day....

Catching Up Again

I don't know where the time goes any more, Gentle Reader. I used to have the opportunity to blog practically any time I wanted. Now? Not so much. I guess between editing and keeping the boy entertained--or at least conscious--after school, my free time gets sucked down a big 'ol nasty toilet. So without further ado, let me try to catch up on my blogging yet again.

Strap It On
To make room for more recent cookbook acquisitions and help fund further acquisitions, I've endeavored to clear out some older ones, targeting primarily the Weight Watchers magazine-sized recipe collections. I went through each one to tag recipes that I'll either photocopy or, by some act of the FSM, write down on a recipe card and add to my collection. Going through these collections, I found some recipes I wanted to try sooner rather than later, including one for a fat-free gingerbread cake. And since I've been trying to find foods I can prepare for the kiddo--a kiddo who loves gingerbread, or at least the idea of it--to eat after school, I thought I'd move this one up to the top of the list.

Gingerbread Cake2 1/4 C all-purpose flour
2 t baking soda
1 t cinnamon
1/2 t ground ginger
1/2 t ground allspice
1/4 t NaCl
1 C unsweetened applesauce
1 C light molasses
2/3 C fat-free egg substitute
1/2 C sugar
1/2 C pitted prunes, finely chopped
1 C boiling water

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Prep a 13" x 9" baking pan with nonstick cooking spray.
   
2. In a medium bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, allspice and NaCl. Set aside.
   
3. In a large bowl, beat the applesauce, molasses, egg substitute, sugar and prunes with an electric mixer at medium speed until the mixture is frothy (about 2 min.).
4. With the mixer at low speed, gradually add the flour mixture; stir until just combined--do not overmix.
   
5. Add the water to the batter, stirring until just smooth.
   
6. Pour the batter into the pan, then bake for 40 min. or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool completely in the pan on a wire rack.

Yield: 24 servings

Nutritional Info
Calories: 112
Fat: O g
Protein: 2 g
Fiber: 1 g
Carbs: 26 g
Na: 144 mg

The Faudie's Futzings
Because I'm relatively inexperienced with gingerbread made from scratch, not the crap churned out in factories nine or ten months before Christmastime, I opted not to futz with this recipe. I used the bleached all-purpose flour I have, and I even bought a box of pitted prunes at Wally World. I've never bought prunes before, and I can't say that I've ever consciously eaten them either--they're quite tasty, I discovered.

The only alteration, the only deviation from the recipe I made was using blackstrap molasses instead of light molasses. Why? Because that's all I had--bought not knowing the difference between light molasses and blackstrap molasses--and I was anxious to use it up. Needless to say, the blackstrap molasses made for one very dark cake, and not a very sweet one either:


If you choose to make this cake, Gentle Reader, I feel compelled to warn you that when you undertake step 3, make sure you have nothing nearby that would be ruined if splattered by molassesy egg substitute because getting those moist ingredients to frothiness made one big-ass mess in my kitchen--and I wasn't even using a medium speed on my mixer. I'm not sure if I did something wrong (there's little to screw up in step 3, although The Faudie could surely find a way) or if handheld mixers just weren't that powerful back when this recipe was written. (Weight Watchers' Simply the Best : 250 Prizewinning Family Recipes was first published in 1997, but I doubt handheld mixers have become that much more powerful in ten, eleven years.)

Funny Thing About That Dark Gingerbread Cake....
Lemme now share with you a funny (not ha-ha funny but rolling-my-eyes-at-the-stupidity-and-shortsightedness funny) story about this cake. I cut a square of it (probably a smidge over 1") sprinkled some of the boy's favorite rainbow-colored sprinkles on top (because the powdered sugar I'd sprinkled on it earlier had already dissolved), put it in a little container and sent it off in his lunch for school. When I picked him up that afternoon, he informed me first that he and his classmates got cupcakes for dessert in honor of one of his classmates' birthday. (The FSM forbid we have in-room parties that feature "whoa" food--food deemed nutritionally evil in...some moronic bureaucrat's eyes--yet for the safety of the kids who might have food allergies, we're only allowed to bring prepackaged cookies or grocery store bakery cupcakes for our kids' birthdays that are then served at the end of the lunch period. Yeah, prepackaged cookies and grocery store bakery cupcakes are such great nutritional choices....) He then told me that he wasn't allowed to eat his cake.

Me: "You didn't have time to eat it?" (We've had problems in the past with the boy not having time to eat all his food, and I've always suspected the problem is his penchant for socializing, not munching.)
The boy: "No, they didn't let me eat it."
Me: "Who didn't let you eat it?"
The boy: "Someone in the lunchroom. But don't talk to them."
(Is it sad that the boy already dreads my penchant for getting peeved at a situation and wanting to intervene?)
Me: "Was it your teacher?"
The boy: "No."
Me: "Was it another teacher?"
The boy: "No."
Me: "Was it one of the lunchroom monitors?"
The boy: "It was one of the people who walks around during lunch."
Me: "Ahh. So some complete strange, some idiot, saw a dark piece of cake-like confection, assumed it was high-calorie chocolate cake instead of a fat-free, lower-sugar gingerbread cake and told you you couldn't eat it. Nice. Perhaps I should write a note to include in your lunch explaining not only the nutritional content of the foods we send with you, but also explaining that nutrition in the real world is not as moronically simplistic as 'whoa' foods and 'go' foods and many factors come into play when achieving a nutritionally sound diet, particularly for a little boy as active as you are."

Hilarious story, non? The food police do exist, and they patrol the boy's school.

The Faudie Gets All-'merican
That's right, Gentle Reader, I wrapped myself in red, white and blue this weekend. HEB has Gala apples on sale, so I picked up half a dozen or so on Friday, set to make them into an apple crisp, apple pan dowdy, apple brown betty or some apple something-something. No, not an apple pie. I didn't eat apple pie when I was a kid; Mum didn't do apple pies. She made apple things with oats and cinnamon that bubbled and baked in a Pyrex pan (I think a loaf pan was the usual) that went absolutely fabulously with vanilla ice cream. And I had a hankering for some.

Apple-Oat Crumble4 C Granny Smith apples, sliced and peeled
1/2 t orange zest
1/3 C fresh OJ
1/2 C sugar
1/3 C regular oats
1/4 C all-purpose flour
1/2 t ground cinnamon
1/4 t ground nutmeg
1/8 t NaCl
3 T chilled reduced-calorie stick margarine, cut into small pieces
6 T frozen reduced-calorie whipped topping, thawed

1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.
   
2. Place the apple slices in a 8" square baking pan, and sprinkle them with the zest and OJ.
   
3. Combine the sugar, oats, flour, cinnamon, nutmeg and NaCl in a bowl and stir well. Cut in the margarine with a pastry blender or two knives until the mixture resembles coarse meal. Sprinkle it over the apple slices.
   
4. Bake for 40 min. or until the apples are tender and the topping is lightly browned.
   
5. Top each serving with 1 tablespoon of whipped topping.

Yield: 6 servings

Nutritional Info
Calories: 171
Fat: 4.7 g
Saturated fat: 0.6 g
Protein: 1.6 g
Fiber: 1.8 g
Carbs: 32.6 g
Na: 105 mg

The Faudie's Futzings

• As you can already surmise, Gentle Reader, I didn't use Granny Smiths. I used Galas. The finished crumble came out a bit runny--there was a fair amount of juice in the bottom of the pan, and it didn't thicken and get gooey like the goo in Mum's recipes--but I don't know if the Galas were the reason or if some other issue contributed to the non-thickened goo.
  
• While I did replace the all-purpose flour with white whole wheat flour, which goes really well with oats, I didn't replace the sugar. That's right, Gentle Reader: I whipped out the C&H.
  
• Screw fat-free Cool Whip. I bought Breyers (not Dreyer's, aka Edy's) vanilla with caramel swirl fat-free ice cream. And it was damn good.

By the way, Gentle Reader, can I tell you how much fun it was to get out the pastry knife? I loved that tool when I was a wee one, and I can't remember when I last used mine.

The Boy's Got Worms

Speaking of males' baser needs and desires, this culinary misadventure started with a simple request from the boy: He wanted Jell-o.

When the boy was three or four, I signed up to bring some kind of snack for his daycare's Halloween party. Not as easy as just bringing cups or plates or punch--what the husband usually signs us up to provide--but not terribly difficult a task, right? Preschoolers and Halloween-themed snacks go hand in hand, I figured. But when I signed up, I didn't count on making something free of any possible allergen lest some kid with food allergies or sensitivities become immediately sickened and on the verge of death thanks to my snacks.

(Can you detect the sarcasm here, Gentle Reader?)

One of the boy's little friends at the time has gluten issues--as in she can't digest the stuff. (I was never for sure if she had Celiac disease or not, but it evidently ran in the family, so there's a chance it was.) So I set my mind to finding something that was kid-friendly, Halloween-themed and gluten-free. Whew, that's a lot of requirements! But luckily the idea of some kind of Jell-o treat popped into my head because I was pretty certain that it's gluten-free, and a person can do all kinds of creepy, kid-friendly, Halloween-themed things with the stuff.

I don't recall now how I came to make Worms in Dirt, also known as Dirt Cups, but that's what I did. I got a package of 9 oz. Solo cups (the squat kind), whipped up some nasty green Jell-o (because nothing appeals to preschoolers more than nasty green Jell-o) and poured it into each cup. After the Jell-o had a chance to set for a bit, I strategically placed some gummy worms into each cup. Some worms were buried in the dirt (but visible thanks to the clear cups), and some were halfway in the Jell-o and halfway out.

For the dirt, I tracked down some Newman's Own (rest in peace, Paul) wheat-free, dairy-free (I seem to recall now the little girl had dairy issues too) chocolate alphabet cookies. Trust me, you never want to develop issues with digesting gluten and dairy. If these cookies are any indication of what food tastes like without these key ingredients, then let me either starve or my intestines explode from an immune system gone haywire due to deadly exposure to gluten or dairy. In a word, these cookies were nasty. But they crushed well and looked like dirt when sprinkled atop the Jell-o. (That the "dirt" tasted like dirt was a bonus, I suppose.)

In the end, the cups weren't touched because the party also included sandwiches and other lunch-type foods that were served before my snack/dessert. The cups didn't come home, so they undoubtedly met an ignoble end in the garbage. Oh well.

But I found myself two or three years later with two boxes of green Jell-o in my pantry. When the boy asked oh so innocently, "What is Jell-o?" and then asked, "Can we make Jell-o sometime?" as if it were some kind of exotic delicacy, I was all too prepared to meet his request. And what a better way to introduce this oddity to him than to make another round of Worms in Dirt, made with the assistance of my human sous-chef and without the nasty wheat-free, dairy-free chocolate cookies.

I realize that my Worms in Dirt is hardly anything like the many recipes for the same ...er, treat out there on them Internets. But I didn't want to mess with pudding and Cool Whip and other junk.

And Worm Boy.... Well, he discovered quickly that Jell-o isn't anything to savor. He's had one small serving so far, and I suspect this second go-round with Worms in Dirt will meet the same ignoble end that my first go-round did. Oh well.

Yummy Mummies

I think it's fair to say that male members of the human species have certain base needs. The two male humans living at Chez Boeckman-Walker are no exception. Every now and then, I indulge them in their base needs. I'll let the husband tell you about the latest indulgence.

It's never too early to start celebrating the best holiday of the year. So this morning we put up the Halloween decorations and pulled a recipe from the Taste of Home Halloween Food and Fun issue from which we got the recipe for our Canadian curry. On today's lunch menu: mummies on a stick.

I'm not going to provide the recipe for these, 'cause they're not that complicated. All you need for this party are some hot dogs and a package of prefab breadsticks. (Bamboo skewers on which to impale the hot dogs are optional. But skewering meat byproducts shaped into tubes is fun.)

That's me in the photo, wrapping a wiener, just in case you couldn't tell.

And what of the finished product? Well, I'll let the little guys speak for themselves:


With a little ketchup on the side, the boy and I made ourselves bloody mummies for lunch. Not very authentic as far as mummies go, but tasty nonetheless.

Here's Something Else That Should Scare the Hell Outta Ya

I'm taking a knife skills class!

(Yes, Gentle Reader, run for the hills and pray for the people taking the class along with me.)

Miracle of miracles, a place opened up for me in Central Market's October Knife Skill 101 class. I'd been trying to get into it or Whole Food's version without much success, but I finally got lucky. So next Saturday evening, me and my R.H. Forschner by Victorinox chef's knife will be spending a little time getting some real culinary training.

Hey, maybe after next Saturday, I'll be able to chop an onion in less than 15 minutes!

If This Doesn't Scare the Hell Out of You....

Then you must be dead from the neck up.

Ahh, sometimes politics and CNN are just the most hilarious thing on TV.



And if that bit with Jack Cafferty doesn't have you rolling in the aisle, check out this bit from YouTube, which confirms the husband's belief that Palin is Peggy.



Happy Saturday!

Friday Fun

The younger sister sent a link to this fun clip on YouTube. It helped cheer me on a crazy-ass Friday. Hope it does the same for you.

Catching Up

Hey hey, Gentle Reader, it's Thursday. I don't know about you, but this week has felt like two in one because the time has just flown, yet I seem to have accomplished nothing.

Okay, so I did accomplish a few things. Let me tell you about them!

I Fry Chicken
I don't know if I've mentioned this before, but I grew up in a house in which chicken was not fried frequently. Steak was chicken-fried with alarming regularity (how we've all lived to tell the tale amazes me, to be quite honest), but Mum wasn't one for frying chicken. No, if we wanted fried chicken, we picked up a container of it at Kwik-Pik in Fairview, often after Mass. Along with some fried potato wedges for the elder sister and Dad. Yum.

Given my lack of exposure to fried chicken, you can understand then, Gentle Reader, why I've never done it in my own home. Plus there's that whole fear of fat and fear of getting burned by hot, popping grease.... But I have successfully conquered my fear of the fried chicken with the help of the fine folks at America's Test Kitchen. I haven't said it in a while, but...

I Heart Christopher Kimball

While clearing out old episodes of America's Test Kitchen on our DVR, we came across the "Streamlined Chicken Skillet Suppers" episode from which we'd previously made skillet chicken, brocc and ziti with cheese. The other recipe featured, chicken and rice with peas and scallions, looked awfully tasty as we were scanning the episode, so I decided to give it a shot.

Skillet Chicken and Rice With Peas and Scallions4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts (6 to 8 oz. each)
Table salt and ground black pepper
1/2 C unbleached all-purpose flour
2 T vegetable oil
2 T unsalted butter
1 medium onion, minced
3 medium cloves garlic, minced or pressed through a garlic press (about 1 T)
Pinch red pepper flakes
1 1/2 C long-grain rice
1/2 C dry white wine
4 1/2 C low-sodium chicken broth
1 C frozen peas
5 scallions, sliced thin
2 T fresh lemon juice
1 lemon, cut into wedges, for serving

1. Pat the chicken dry with paper towels, then season it with salt and pepper. Dredge the chicken in flour to coat and shake off any excess.
   
2. Heat the oil in a 12" nonstick skillet over medium-high heat until just smoking. Brown the chicken well on one side (about 5 min.), then transfer it to a plate and set aside.
   
3. Off the heat, add the butter to the skillet and swirl to melt. Add the onion and 1/2 teaspoon of salt, and return to medium-high heat until softened (2-5 min.).
   
4. Stir in the garlic and pepper flakes, then cook until fragrant (about 30 sec.).
5. Stir in the rice thoroughly and let it toast (about 30 sec.).
   
6. Stir in the wine and let the rice absorb it completely (about 1 min.), then stir in the broth, scraping up any browned bits.
   
7. Nestle the chicken into the rice, browned side facing up, including any accumulated juices.
   
8. Cover and cook over medium heat until the thickest part of the chicken registers 160 degrees on an instant-read thermometer (about 10 min.).
   
9. Transfer the chicken to a clean plate. Gently brush off and discard any rice clinging to the chicken, then tent the chicken with foil and set aside.
   
10. Return the skillet of rice to medium-low heat, cover and continue to cook, stirring occasionally, until the liquid is absorbed and the rice is tender (8-12 min.).
    
11. Off the heat, sprinkle the peas over the rice, cover and let warm through (2 min.).
    
12. Add the scallions and lemon juice to the rice. Season with salt and pepper to taste and serve with the chicken and lemon wedges.

Yield: 4 servings (pretty damn big servings apparently)

As always with these recipes from America's Test Kitchen, I have no nutritional info to share. Sorry!

The Faudie's Futzings

• I used canola oil because I have no straight-up veggie oil. Does that make a difference? I dunno. That's why I'm The Faudie.
  
• While I do have some unsalted butter (or at least I think I do), I used Promise. I didn't notice that its additional water content screwed up the recipe: All the liquid was absorbed quite nicely by the end.
  
• In lieu of peas, which the boys won't eat, I threw two cups of once-frozen broccoli left over from something I'd made earlier. The husband said he'd eat that, and I figured I had a better shot at getting the boy to eat the rest of the dish with large chunks of green instead of thousands of little green things. And I was right. The boy ate quite a large portion of chicken and rice along with a few mandatory brocc pieces. I declare victory!

Yummy!

By the by, I did use unbleached all-purpose flour--bought it from Bulk Foods Playland at Central Markup just for this recipe. And the scallions--those are just green onions. Since scallions and green onions seem interchangeable to some folks, I had to rewatch part of the episode to be sure what exactly the recipe needs. Now you don't have to worry!

I Have a Second Go-Round With Rice Krispie Treats
A few days ago, I experimented pretty heavily with a Rice Krispie treat recipe--and it wasn't an unmitigated disaster. Emboldened by this success and looking to whip up another quickie dessert recipe, I opened up my King Arthur Flour Cookie Companion, set it before the husband, gave him his marching orders...and he found a few recipes that are probably yummy but would be difficult to modify so that I could eat them and not be miserable with guilt. So I took back the tome, thumbed through a few pages and found something else.

Crunchy Peanut Butter Bars1 1/2 C (14.5 oz.) creamy peanut butter
1 14-oz. can sweetened condensed milk
1/4 C (2.75 oz.) corn syrup
6 C (6.25 oz.) crisp rice cereal
1 C (6 oz.) chocolate chips (optional)

1. Line a 10" x 15" jelly roll pan with parchment or waxed paper. Spray the paper lightly with nonstick cooking spray.
   
2. Place the cereal in a large bowl.
   
3. In a medium-size saucepan set over low heat, combine the peanut butter, sweetened condensed milk and corn syrup, then stir until smooth. Remove the pan from the heat.
   
4. Pour the warm peanut butter mixture over the cereal, stirring until it's evenly combined.
   
5. Use a flexible spatula to press the cereal into the pan.
   
6. Sprinkle the chocolate chips over the bars while they're still warm. As an additional option, spread the softened chips over the top of the cereal.
   
7. Let the pan sit for 5 min. and chill until set, then cut into bars.

Yield: 35 2" x 2 1/4" bars

Nutritional Info
This info is for a bar with chocolate.

Calories: 153
Fat: 8 g
Protein: 4 g
Complex carbs: 7 g
Sugar: 11 g
Fiber: 1 g
Cholesterol: 5 mg
Na: 128 mg

The Faudie's Futzings

• I used reduced-fat Peter Pan, so that probably lowered the total fat per serving some. I have some low-sodium Better 'n Peanut Butter, but I decided to just use good 'ol Peter Pan.
  
• I ued fat-free sweetened condensed milk. I have no idea if the fat-free version of this stuff impacts a recipe. Perhaps someone with experience using both kinds can tell me, for I have never used anything but the fat-free kind. Eaten? That's another story....
  
• I used half a cup of Nestle mini morsels because that's all I had on hand. Well, in terms of chocolate chips options, that is, for I'm fresh out of carob chips and any other variety of chocolate chips. I only used half a cup because a full cup of mini morsels is chocolate overload, which isn't always a good thing, Gentle Reader.
  
• I exercised the option to smear the softened chocolate all over the cereal. Why? Dunno. Because I felt like it. So there!

So how did this recipe compare to the one I half-assed a few days ago? I have to say that I prefer the earlier ones, with the cocoa I added. I found that those cereal bars had more peanut butter taste--yet required far less peanut butter--than these bars from King Arthur. The husband agrees with me about the peanut butter flavor, but I think he's partial to King Arthur's bars. Eh, to each his own.

I have a whole lot more to post, but this one's getting excessive. Perhaps this weekend I'll take a break from The Day the House Was Cleaned event we have planned here on Saturday at Chez Boeckman-Walker to share more recipes and photos with you, Gentle Reader. Or I could just declare that cleaning out my Blog Fodder folder qualified as housecleaning while the boys scrub the floors on hands and knees.

(Yeah, I know, Gentle Reader. I'm highly deluding myself if I think I could relinquish control enough to let someone else besides me scrub the floors on hands and knees. But I have to find something for them to do. I can't do it all--again.)

No, It's Not That You're Too Old

So much for that sneer "If it's too loud, you're too old"! Today's WSJ has a great article about how the new Metallica album and many other recent releases have been engineered to be constantly loud.

I noticed what the husband's termed aural blandness on the band's previous album, but I sort of chalked it up to Lars wanting his drums to be louder and more noticeable. But I guess as part of the engineering process to make the whole production louder, his drums just got all the more noticeable. (Then again, I wouldn't put it past Lars to want his drum work front and center, sort of as a "Take that, James!" after all the years of M. Hetfield's vocal stylings being front and center.)

Anyway, just some food for thought and a reminder to be mindful of your ears, Gentle Reader, when enjoying tunage on your iPod.

Get to Know the Muffin Man

I've mentioned a time or two that the boy has shown an interest in cooking with his 'ol mum, and I've posted about some culinary misadventures he and I have shared. I think I've also shared with you, Gentle Reader, that he once said he wanted to be a "cookman" when he grows up. ("So long as you also grow up to draw really good Batman comics for Mommy and Daddy like Jim Lee, dear, you can do whatever you want.")

I've been trying to channel this interest to keep him awake and entertained after school because, well, the boy comes home wiped out and famished. So instead of handing him a banana or apple to munch on while we walk home, I've been making him snacks with more protein and trying to involve him in their making.

Granted, blueberry muffins aren't exactly high-protein snacks, but you get a dozen of 'em from the mix, and the boy likes 'em. Plus he got to help me stir the batter and fold in the blueberries, which he did after he put paper liners in each of the muffin cups. Here is my little cookman in action:

Every Girl's Crazy 'bout a Sharp Dressed Muffin Man
In honor of his interest in what Mommy does in the kitchen, I decided to make him an apron to go along with the toque he's commandeered from me. And I decided to make one for the husband as well because I found a nifty giant dragaon iron-on dirt cheap at Michael's when I was buying the aprons. (I still have a third apron waiting for me to get my Martha Stewart on again. Perhaps inspiration will strike again. Maybe.)

Check out the boy modeling his new threads. As I've said before, he's got all the right expressions to be a professional model.

The Faudie Does Rice Krispie Treats
The boy is not the only male resident of Chez Boeckman-Walker who aspires to kitchen competency. His flirtation with pizza-making aside, the husband is fairly experiences dans la cuisine in some areas. Baked desserts is not one of those areas. For that reason, back in August I let him buy Chocolate and Vanilla by Gale Gand, a nifty albeit a bit gimmicky cookbook flips: One half contains chocolate-based recipes, and the other half--you guessed it, Gentle Reader--contains vanilla-based recipes. For half-price at The Surly Table, we could afford to fall for the gimmick.

One of the recipes that caught his eye--and his stomach-- as he browsed through the book is a spin on the "classic" Rice Krispies treat: It uses Cocoa Krispies instead of Whitey McWhitey sugar delivery devices (aka, Rice Krispies), and there's not a marshmallow or jar of marshmallow creme in sight. Okay, sure, it's got light corn syrup, which is probably one of the worst things you can put in a recipe, but what's a faudie to do?

(By the way, as of 2007, Korea still enjoyed Coco the Monkey on its Cocoa Krispies, which has a long and sordid history.)

Peanut Butter Cocoa Crisp Treats4 C cocoa-flavored crisped rice cereal*
1/2 C brown sugar
1/2 C light corn syrup
1/2 C creamy or crunchy peanut butter
4 oz. semi-sweet chocolate, melted

1. Put the cereal in a bowl, then prep a 9" x 13" baking pan with nonstick cooking spray. Alternately, prep two or three mini muffin pans with nonstick cooking spray.
   
2. In a saucepan, combine the sugar and corn syrup. Bring it to a boil over high heat for 1 min. Remove from heat and stir in the peanut butter.
   
3. Immediately pour the syrup over the cereal, stirring quickly to coat the cereal completely.
   
4. While the cereal is still warm, press it into the pan(s), then let it cool at least 15 min.
   
5. Drizzle the cooled treats with the melted chocolate. If using the mini muffin pans, remove the rounded treats before drizzling with chocolate.

*That's the way the lawyers have the author get around trademark stuff and having to pay royalties or a first-born child to Kellogg's.
Yield: 3 dozen

Nutritional Info
Gand does not include nutritional info in her book. That would spoil all the fun!

The Faudie's Futzings
Unfortunately, we don't have any Cocoa Krispies in our house, and I wasn't going to buy any just to try out this recipe. (Not even the HEB or Quaker bagged send-off kind. Yes, Gentle Reader, I'm that damn dead set against awful cereals being in my pantry.) But for some reason--and I'm not sure what it was--we wound up with HEB-brand Rice Krispies taking up space in our pantry. This recipe, if anything, would be a great way to get rid of them, right?

But how to address the heart of the recipe: the chocolate. Well, if you look at the product's name, you've got a solution, don't ya, Gentle Reader! Just add cocoa powder. But how much to add? A teaspoon? Two teaspoons? A tablespoon? A fourth of a cup?

After deciding to start by adding just a teaspoon of cocoa (a little goes a long way, I seemed to recall), when to add the cocoa powder was my next dilemma. Since the cereal awaits its bath of sugar sweetness in a bowl, I couldn't exactly sprinkle the cocoa on top and expect it to stick. So I figured adding the cocoa into the syrup would work best. But did I do it before bringing the combined brown sugar and corn syrup to a boil, or did I wait and add it when I added the PB?

I won't keep you in suspense, Gentle Reader. I added it (a heaping teaspoon total) along with the PB. The syrup wasn't terribly syrupy to begin with because I used Splenda brown sugar blend, so I had to put it back on the heat after stirring in the cocoa and peanut butter so that I might have a chance in hell at getting it to actually coat the Rice Krispies. The stuff wound up smelling a lot like No Bake Cookies (that's not the recipe the husband and I used when we made these sinful confections, but it's just a reference in case you're unfamiliar), and the husband and I eventually got the cereal coated and pressed into the pan for chilling.

We also faced another chocolate dilemma: I had no semi-sweet chocolate suitable for melting. But I did have some fat-free chocolate syrup in the refrigerator. Voila! Problem solved!


That improvised syrup, by the way, tastes a lot like the goo inside a Snickers. Delish!

Date Night

When I was in yoga teacher training several years ago, I had the opportunity during one of my fall classes to eat a Medjool date, and I immediately fell in love with their sweetness and gooey, slightly chewy texture. Sure, I'd had dates before--the prechopped, pebble-like kind Mum bought occasionally in a box to add to certain dessert recipes. But if you've had those kinds of dates before, Gentle Reader, and then have had the chance to eat a whole date that's fresh (or relatively close there to), you probably know what I mean when I say there's a world of difference.

Since that first Medjool date that fall (mad props to Mehtab, by the way), I find my hankering for dates increases come autumn. With the triple-digit hit losing its grip on us here in Tejas and cooler breezes greeting the boy and I when we walk to school each morning, you can be assured, Gentle Reader, that my thoughts have been turning to dates with a vengeance.

Fortunately for that hankering, I've been slowly making my way through Trail of Crumbs by Kim Sunée, founding food editor of Cottage Living and Korean adoptee. Sunée's memoir of her years in Europe and her quest for a sense of belonging, of place, of roots is quite a sensual affair: It offers a feast for the entire senses, so long as you can believe a book can inspire the imagination to do all that work. Other readers might find it to be an autobiography about a woman who often deals with issues in her life with cooking. Either way, Sunée offers some intriguing recipes that let the readers taste and reflect on her childhood in New Orleans, her time in various places in Europe (primarily in France), her adventures on other continents (including a return to Korea).

Among the recipes are an orange couscous salad and chicken thighs with cinnamon and dates. While the latter is pretty obviously a Moroccan dish (ladies and gentlemen, start your tagines!), the couscous I think of too as a North African dish (as well as a Middle Eastern dish), so in my mind the two seemed like a natural pairing even though the coucous recipe appeared at the end of the chapter preceding the one ending with the chicken with cinnamon and dates recipe. I later found proof that great minds think alike since the author recommends serving the chicken dish with couscous.

Main Dish: Chicken With Cinnamon and Dates
Here's the recipe as it appears in Trail of Crumbs. You can already guess, Gentle Reader, that I didn't follow it precisely.

1 t olive oil
2 sausage links (such as Merguez, spicy Italian pork or lamb), about 1/2 lb.
6-8 skinless chicken thighs
1 1/4 t NaCl, divided
1/4 t freshly ground black pepper
1 large onion, thinly sliced
3 garlic cloves, smashed and coarsely chopped
1 T freshly grated ginger
1 t ground cinnamon
1 t ground cumin
1/2 t hot paprika
1 1/2 C low-Na chicken broth or water
1/2 C fresh OJ
1/3 C golden raisins or currants
2-3 carrots, cut lengthwise and halved on the bias
1 large orange, cut into 8 wedges
12-15 dates (preferably Medjool), pitted or 12-15 large pitted prunes
2-3 T freshly chopped cilantro
Garnish: fresh cilantro, toasted almonds or pine nuts

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
   
2. Heat the olive oil over medium-high heat in a large ovenproof pan or Dutchie. (If you're using a tagine to bake in, a wide skillet will do.)
   
3. Cut the sausage links in halves or thirds, depending on length, removing casings if desired.
   
4. Add the sausage and chicken to the pot in one layer, then sprinkle with half of the NaCl and pepper. Let cook 5 min., then turn the meat over, season with the remaining NaCl and pepper and let cook 5 min. more. Remove the chicken and sausage to a plate or, if using a tagine, place them in the bottom of it.
   
5. Add the onion to the pot. (If brown bits are stuck to the bottom of the pot, add about 1 tablespoon of white wine, water or OJ and scrape off the bits.) Let the onion cook about 5 min, then add the garlic, ginger, cinnamon, cumin and paprika. Stir and let cook about 3 min.
   
6. Add the chicken broth and OJ, raisins and carrots, then stir. Pour this mixture over the chicken and sausage in the tagine, or add the meat back to the pot.
   
7. Add the orange wedges and dates, stir, then cover and bake for 1 hour 30 min. or until the chicken and carrots are fork tender. Taste the sauce and adjust the seasoning as needed.
   
8. Top with cilantro and serve with hot buttered couscous and harissa paste or coriander chutney. Garnish if desired.

Yield: 6-8 servings

While the book does not include nutritional info for each recipe, I doubt this one's going to clog your arteries or put another lump or two of cottage cheese on the backs of your thighs.

The Faudie's Futzings

• I didn't use sausage in part because I don't like organ meats and also because I'm not familiar with or know for sure I don't like the sausages Sunée recommends.
  
• I used three boneless, skinless chicken breasts instead of thighs. I didn't weigh them, but I aimed to use about a pound since the recipe needs about a pound of meat.
  
• I have no idea if the paprika I bought from the bulk spices at Central Markup is hot. It's not the Spanish variety that the store has, and what I'd read about the heat varieties of paprika earlier this summer has completely slipped my mind.
  
• While I did have fresh oranges in my house specifically for this and the couscous recipes, I didn't squeeze one of 'em to yield the fresh OJ for this recipe. No, I whipped out one of the little cans of unsweetened OJ I bought the other day at HEB.
  
• Golden raisins rock. Giant--big as a baby's head--golden raisins that have soaked in a stew of cinnamon rock harder. That's all I'm going to say.
  
• I sprinkled probably about a tablespoon of freshly chopped cilantro atop all the ingredients in Chive before baking. The boy has that aversion to cilantro after all, and I suspected getting him to eat this dish would be hard enough without it being covered with the stuff.
  
• Speaking of baking, I only had Chive in the oven for 45 minutes, and the chicken came out melt-at-the-touch-of-the-tines tender. Based on my relatively limited experience with and knowledge of edible chicken parts, I could understand the need for thighs to bake longer.

This recipe tastes a lot like the Acapulco chicken I've made a few times in the pressure cooker, and it should since the ingredients are pretty similar. However, Chive produced far more tender meat while my Fagor tends to slightly overcook the chicken, leaving it a bit dry and tough. While Chive did a fabulous job, I wouldn't mind adding a tagine to my collection of pots and pans. Those things just look cool, plus they remind me of the chimeneas I saw quite frequently when the husband and I lived in Santa Fe (although many of those, I'm sure, were only for decorative purposes--I doubt you could buy a chimenea from Jackalope's that was actually fire-worthy).

Side Dish: Orange Couscous Salad
I've never had couscous before, but I knew it was somewhat related to rice, and I love rice. The boys love rice. How could I go wrong?

And no, Gentle Reader, that last line was not a setup for an anecdote about how awful couscous is or how royally I mucked up this recipe. The Faudie had pretty astonishing success with this one, even though she very loosely followed it.

1 C water
10 oz. medium-grain couscous
1/4 C extra-virgin olive oil
1 t NaCl
1/2 t pepper
1/2 small red onion, thinly sliced
2 oranges
2 T freshly chopped flat-leaf parsley
2 T freshly chopped mint leaves
1 cucumber, peeled, seeded and chopped
1 C golden raisins, currants or chopped dates

1. Bring the water to a boil.
   
2. Pour the couscous in a large bowl, then pour the boiling water over it. Stir, cover the bowl with plastic and let the couscous steam 5 min. or until it is tender. Fluff with a fork.
   
3. Stir in the olive oil, NaCl, pepper and onion, then let the couscous cool slightly.
   
4. Zest both oranges. Juice on of them into the couscous. remove the pith from the second one and chop it. Add the zest and chopped orange to the couscous.
   
5. Stir in the parsley, mint, cucumber and raisins, then cover and chill in the 'fridge 1 hour. (Store the couscous in the 'fridge up to 2 days.)
   
6. Taste and rectify the seasoning by adding more NaCl and pepper, olive oil and juice before serving.

Yield: About 4 1/2 cups

The Faudie's Futzings

• I'm not well-versed in couscous, so I just bought 10 ounces of whole wheat couscous from Bulk Foods Playland at Central Markup. It didn't require any more time to cook, but I did use 1 1/2 cups of water per the label.
  
• I used maybe a fifth of a cup of olive oil. My fear of fats reared its ugly head as I was measuring out the oil, and I just couldn't commit to the full quarter-cup called for by the recipe.
  
• In addition to the juice I squeezed from one of the oranges, I threw in what was left from the little 6-ounce can of unsweetened OJ I tapped for the tagine meal.
  
• I omitted the red onion (even though I had it sliced and ready to go), parsley (didn't have any), mint (didn't have any) and cucumber (don't like it). I'd planned originally to replace the parsley I didn't have with cilantro I did have, but in the end I didn't, partly because I knew if I added it, I'd be risking giving the boy even more ammunition to reject the dish and partly because, well, I doubted cilantro's compatibility with orange. I know it works really well with lime, but with orange? I'm not yet convinced. Maybe next time.
  
• I didn't refrigerate the couscous at any time. I planned from the beginning to serve this as a warm side dish, not as a salad. Now that I've eaten couscous, I can see its possibility as a cold dish, but I didn't want to try it for the first time cold. Maybe next time.

Since I'd never had couscous before, I had no idea what to expect when I removed the plastic lid from the bowl after the 5 minutes of steaming were up. I thought perhaps the finished couscous would be granular like rice, but it was more like one big idli in that bowl. Nifty! Of course, that makes sense since couscous--or at least some varieties of it--is more like semolina.

Dinner Date
As I'd suspected, the orange couscous and chicken with cinnamon and dates were the perfect pairing. Because the chicken has some tasty cinnamony sauce, the couscous absorbs some of it and the cinnamony flavor when served on the same plate with the chicken--and if you've ever doubted that cinnamon and orange aren't a winning combination, think again!

And yes, the boy did reject both the couscous and the chicken. His rejecting the chicken was a bit of a shocker because I really, really figured he'd at least eat the chicken. But no. Oh well, more for his father and me!

Speaking of more, we had a lot of couscous left over, and I'm looking forward to leftovers. I might even try a bit of it cold.

Date Night Includes Dessert, Naturally
Okay, the date-rific dessert we enjoyed with this meal, oatmeal-date bars, I actually made Tuesday, but they fit the theme, so I'm blogging about them now. Like it or lump it, Gentle Reader.

I'd made these bars before, not long after I first reclaimed my kitchen. I enjoyed the results tremendously but unfortunately had failed to write down the recipe or note where I'd found it. Luckily, I happened upon it again in the Weight Watchers' Quick & Easy Menus recipe magazine before I sold it at Half-Price Books! Here it is:

Oatmeal-Date Bars1 1/2 C chopped dates
3/4 C water
2 1/2 T lemon juice
1/3 C stick margarine, softened
2/3 C firmly packed brown sugar
1 t vanilla extract
1 C regular oats
3/4 C all-purpose flour
1/4 C whole wheat flour
1/2 t baking soda
1/8 t NaCl

1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Prep a 9" square baking pan with cooking spray.
   
2. Combine the dates, water and lemon juice in a medium saucepan and bring them to a boil. Reduce the heat and let simmer, uncovered, for 5 min. or until thick, stirring frequently. Remove heat.
   
3. Cream the margarine, then gradually add the brown sugar, beating at medium speed with a mixer until light and fluffy. Add the vanilla and beat well.
   
4. In a medium bowl, combine the oats, flours, baking and salt. Stir well, then add the mixture to the creamed ingredients, stirring until teh mixture resembles coarse meal.
   
5. Press 2 cups of the oat mixture into the baking pan, then bake for 5 minutes or until the crust is puffy.
   
6. Spread the date mixture over the crust, then sprinkle the remaining oat mixture on top.
   
7. Bake for 20 minutes or until golden, then remove and let cool on a wire rack.

Yield: 16 bars (one bar is one serving)

Nutritional Info
Calories: 159
Fat: 4.3 g
Saturated fat: 0.8 g
Protein: 2 g
Carbs: 29.7 g
Fiber: 2.3 g
Na: 92 mg

The Faudie's Futzings

• Stick margarine? Try Promise.
  
• Instead of regular 'ol brown sugar, you know already, Gentle Reader, that I went for the Splenda brown sugar blend.
  
• While I appreciate that the recipe calls for whole wheat flour, I didn't follow it and use all-purpose flour. I got out the King Arthur white whole wheat flour because I know it and whole wheat flour work well with oats.
  
• I don't have a 9" baking square. I have two 8" ones, but a 9"? Nope. And it's probably better that I used one of my 8" jobbers because I have the worst luck with pressing oat-flour-butter crusts: The stuff sticks to my fingers and not the pan, and I end up with an uneven crust. But I did a good job getting the crust fairly even, and I (well, Lumpy) did a great job with the initial baking time. Check out the goldness and puffiness:

The only problem with this recipe is that it doesn't make too many bars. Okay, yeah, 16 is a lot of bars theoretically, but I love dates and I love these date bars, so they're gone too soon. Wah!

Speaking of being gone too soon, if you haven't left by now, Gentle Reader, congrats on getting all the way through this excessively long post! I'm now at the end, so go have yourself a date night!

Shiver Me Timbers!

Ahoy, mateys, it's International Talk Like a Pirate Day!



Can't talk like a pirate? No problem! Learn the lingo on the celebration's official Web site. And if ye can already sing a sea shanty and want a buxom beauty, try your luck with some pick-up lines. (Although methinks a good pirate wouldn't need a pick-up line to get a beauty.)

Cap'n Faudie says to grab ye some grog and have ye'self a smashing good International Talk Like a Pirate Day--lest I make ye walk the plank. Arrr!

Blorf!

Blorf: (noun) The sound Worf makes when he barfs.

As you may know, Gentle Reader, the husband and I were quite the rabid fans of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine in our younger days. When Worf joined the cast a few years into the show's run, we had some good, snarky fun and came up with blorf. It's a great, all-purpose word, really, so feel free, Gentle Reader, to use it when you need to invoke the powerful, evocative image of a Klingon ralphing.


Which leads me to this week's Frightening Food Find--

BBQ Pie
Yes, it's another blorfalicious recipe from the fine folks at AllRecipes.com. Imagine updating your inbox one beautiful, carefree morning and having this monstrosity greeting you. You too would feel the urge to blorf.

If you need a laugh and can overcome the urge to vomit at the mere thought of this dish, you must check out this all-'merican recipe, Gentle Reader. For the FSM's sake, it uses Bisquick and Van Camp's Pork and Beans--ya can't get much more all-'erican than that. I'm surprised the recipe doesn't call for Velveeta instead of regular cheddar cheese (although perhaps you should use Wisconsin cheddar just to be safe).

Ace of Cakes Gets His Own Toys

How friggin' adorable is this!

Yup, one of my favorite cakies now has his own toy. Lucky bastard. When am I gonna see a Faudie figure?

On second thought, I don't think the world needs to be moi sculpted in cheap plastic with a four points of articulation.

It's Monday and My Mind's in the Gutter

"The Daily Dish," a daily email from AllRecipes.com, just arrived in my inbox. I scanned through it, came across the header below and had to titter.

Your Vegetarian Option
Vegetable Pasties

Boy was I disappointed when I realized I was thinking of the wrong kind of pasties....

These tasty pasties.


Not these Tasty Pasties.

Murgh Me

For those of you who aren't well versed in Indian food or any of the languages of India, murgh is chicken. Aloo would be potatoes. Dal is lentils. Put 'em all together and you get a happy belly.

But Saturday's Indian feast focused on murgh. Murgh pulao, or chicken and mixed sweet pepper pilaf, to be precise. Bored with the tried and tried again recipes in my recipe box, I opted to dip into my library of Indian cookbooks and found this one in Suvir Saran's American Masala, I book I initially passed over when I first saw it on sale at The Surly Table, bought on a "eh, let's see how it is" whim when I saw it at Half-Price Books and have surprisingly found it to be quite a treasury of tasty dishes I hope to make. I like those kinds of surprises.

Murgh PulaoJuice of 1 lemon
1 T ground coriander
1/2 t cayenne pepper
1/4 t turmeric
Pinch of ground peppercorns
1 1/2 lb. boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut crosswise into 1/2"-wide strips
3 T canola oil
1 1/2 t cumin seeds
1 large red onion, halved and sliced
2" piece of ginger, peeled and grated
1 red bell pepper, cored, seeded and thinly sliced
1 yellow or orange bell pepper, cored, seeded and thinly sliced
2 garlic cloves, peeled and finely chopped
1 jalepeno pepper (cored and seeded if you prefer a milder flavor), halved lengthwise and thinly sliced crosswise
1 T koser NaCl
3/4 C chopped fresh cilantro
2 C basmati rice
4 C water

1. Mix the lemon juice, coriander, cayenne, turmeric and ground peppercorns in a medium bowl. Add the chicken, toss to coat and set aside.
   
2. Heat the oil with the cumin seeds in a large pot or Dutchie (preferably one with a lid) over medium-high heat, stirring often, until the cumin turns golden brown (about 2 min.).
   
3. Add the onion and ginger, then cook, stirring often, until the onion is soft (about 3 min.).
   
4. Add the bell peppers, garlic, jalapeño and salt, then cook until the peppers soften slightly (3-4 min.).
   
5. Mix the cilantro in with the chicken, then add it all to the Dutchie. Cook until the chicken is browned (4-6 min.).
   
6. Add the rice to the Dutchie and fry for 2 min., stirring only once or twice.
   
7. Add the water, bring the contents to a boil, then cover and let simmer for 20 minutes (or until the rice is tender and most of the liquid has been absorbed).

Serving yield: 6 (pretty damn generous portions)

I have no nutritional info to offer for this recipe. Sorry!

The Faudie's Futzings

• I used two red bell peppers because I have a good supply of them currently (they're on sale at HEB--woohoo!) and because orange and yellow bells are too damn expensive (sorry, I won't pay $2 for a pepper--no way no how).
  
• I used a teaspoon of minced garlic, which the jar says is the equivalent of two garlic cloves, instead of chopped garlic.
  
• Instead of a jalapeño, I used a long strip of a Hatch chile pepper from the batch I roasted and peeled last weekend. I'm not sure how this substitution might have affected the flavor profile, but boy did that container of roasted and peeled Hatch peppers smell damn good!
  
• I used brown Texmati instead of white basmati, so while I upped the protein content of the recipe, I did have to let it simmer about 10 minutes longer since brown rices take longer to cook than white rices. I probably should have let it cook 40 minutes since the rice absorbed even more liquid after I'd turned off the heat and let it set while we were eating supper.
  
• Next time I'll probably heat the canola oil in the Dutchie before adding the cumin seeds. I don't know if Saran intends for the cumin seeds to absorb some of the oil in order to release their fragrance, or if he expects the oil to heat really quickly in the 2 minutes he proposes letting the cumin seeds toast. Cast iron takes a while to heat, so the oil took a while to heat, and the while it was heating, the seeds just swam in the oil and never really got golden brown.

New Recipe, New Ways
The making 'o the murgh pulao marked two changes to my cooking style. First off, I grated my own ginger. This I did because I failed to read the recipe carefully. I read the ingredient line listing the 2" piece of peeled ginger, but I completely missed the bit about grating it. I have grated ginger in a jar, which is wonderfully convenient, but I found grating my own to be surprisingly easy (it's easier to grate than cheese, if you ask me) and somewhat satisfy. Plus it left my hands smelling of fresh ginger, which is a delightful bonus.

Secondly, I exerted effort to achieve mise en place in a way that would truly reduce cooking time. Don't get me wrong, Gentle Reader: I usually try my best to have all my ingredients at the ready before I start cooking anything. However, this time I measured out some of the ingredients and placed them in prep bowls so I could just toss them into Clive when it was time. Why? Because this recipe called for ingredients to stir fry for certain lengths of time, and I wanted to try to keep true to the recipe.

In the past I've avoided full on mise en place because, to be honest, you wind up with a lot of dirty dishes. You dirty not just the tools you use to measure and prep ingredients with, but you also dirty several bowls or other containers you place the prepped ingredients in while they await their time to be added. And I'm not terribly keen on washing dishes, even now that I have a dishwasher. Our dishwasher is a little small--or we just use a helluva lotta dishes--and excessive dirty dishes require more water and soap, and that's costly. However, I can really see how a sound mise en place can save cooking time. I don't know that I'm ready to convert, but we'll see.

Oh, and my M&P made its debut at long last! Sadly, I wasn't the one wielding it. No, the husband got the honors because I was busy prepping other ingredients and mise en place-ing. He kindly ground up a few peppercorns for me, and he reports the M&P did a kick-ass job. Just a few twist-and-grind movements, and those peppercorns were done for. See for yourself, Gentle Reader:

Nifty, non?

By the way, even if you don't like red bell peppers or a lot of red onions, I recommend mixing up the lemon juice, coriander, cayenne, turmeric, black pepper and cilantro for a different kind of chicken marinade. It's quite tasty, and the volume of each ingredient as given in this recipe makes precisely enough marinade--there's not a lot left over, nor is the chicken left wanting for coating.

Results Show
So how did the murgh pulao turn out?


Quite deliciously, thanks for asking! Even the boy declared after a few bites that he now likes red bell peppers. That a recipe can manage to change his mind about a food is a miracle, if you ask me.