This morning I took my egg timer for a run. I’ve been on a ten-week scheme to learn to run for twenty minutes- for about seven or eight months now. Last week, I decided enough was enough and that the scheme will be finished by the end of the year. This means I have to go running about every other day or so. Normally, I time the intervals on my phone’s stopwatch. Yesterday I forgot my phone at my man’s house, though, so I was faced with a choice: skip my run or find something else to measure time.
The obvious choice, you might think, would be to strap on my watch and call it a timepiece. And it would be, except for the fact that my watch has been sitting in the windowsill for months with a broken strap. (Yup, I have an unfortunate tendency to let small tasks take forever. Moving on.) A search of my box-of-useful and my cupboard-of-miscellaneous did not yield a stopwatch or other such device. I’d almost given up getting any timed exercise when I wandered through my kitchen and the egg timer caught my eye. Aha! Not only would I be able to time my run, there would be sounds to tell me when to stop. You know, because I have a tendency to keep running and not heed time. (And by “keep running and not heed time” I mean obsessively checking my timer every twenty seconds or so, pouting when time obviously slows down just to spite me.)
So I took my egg timer for a run. Around the block and into the park we went, beeping and huffing and puffing along nicely. I was feeling quite pleased with myself, hiding the timer up my sleeve, only surreptitiously pulling it out when it made noise. To the casual onlooker, I might have looked like a real (if red-faced and panting) runner. And then I ran into these folks, just as I had the timer out, shooting it pleading looks to slow down so I didn’t have to start my last stretch of jogging. Right. Okay. Maybe they thought it was a mini-dumbbell?
Anyway. To take this story back into the realm of the culinary, I could liken the color of my face at the end of my run to red cabbage, or maybe an anemic egg plant. But that would be lame, so I won’t. Instead, I will share with you the recipe for my post-exercise breakfast: warm quinoa with cinnamon, maple syrup and apple (based on this recipe Heidi at 101cookbooks.com brought us). Another fitting use for my egg timer, if I do say so myself.
Warm breakfast quinoa
Adapted from 101cookbooks.com
Serves 1
¼ cup of quinoa
¼ cup of milk
¼ cup of water
dash of cinnamon
1 apple, peeled and cut into bite-sized pieces
1 tbsp of maply syrup (or more to taste)
Combine quinoa, milk and water in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and let simmer for about 15 minutes (stick around, because the mixture is prone to bubbling up and you might need to remove it from the heat briefly to prevent spills) or until most of the liquid has been absorbed and quinoa is cooked through. Add more water if liquid is absorbed before quinoa fully cooks. Remove from heat and let stand for a couple of minutes.
Stir in cinnamon and maply syrup to taste. Put apple in a bowl and pour quinoa over the top. Serve warm.
Sunday, November 23, 2008
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Nutty cauliflower soup
Ouch.
I’ve burned my tongue.
I worked late this evening and had to go for a run when I got home. You know those nights when it feels like your shoulders are glued to your ears? It was one of those, and nothing but exercise would do. When I got back I was Hungry (and also Sweaty). Luckily, I’d planned to make cauliflower soup. From start to finish it took about thirty minutes to make and I even had time to hop in the shower while the white florets were boiling away. Still, with onions, garlic and two kinds of paprika it smelled so good that there was no time to wait for the soup to drop to somewhere closer to body temperature before I took a bite.
And that’s where you get hurt.
But it’s okay. Smoky, slightly spicy and with a nutty flavor to enhance the cauliflower’s natural earthiness, this soup was worth it. It is based on a recipe from Sarah Raven’s Garden Cookbook, which includes almonds and bay leaves. I’ve always thought cauliflower has a bit of a non-descript flavor so I replaced the subtle bay leaves with two kinds of paprika for more oomph. Swapping the almonds for hazelnuts was born out of necessity (no almonds in the kitchen, no intention to leave the house again before I was fed), but worked well. Paired with a few buttered crackers, this soup was just what the doctor ordered after a long day.
Nutty cauliflower soup
Adapted from Sarah Raven’s Garden Cookbook
Serves 2
1 smallish head of cauliflower, broken into large florets
1 tbsp of butter
1 onion, chopped
1 clove of garlic, minced
½ tsp smoked paprika
½ tsp spicy paprika
30 gr roasted hazelnuts, ground fine
½ litre of chicken stock, or more
Melt the butter in a soup pot. Cook the onion in butter until soft. Add garlic, both kinds of paprika and hazelnuts. Stir. Add stock so that cauliflower is completely covered. Simmer for about fifteen minutes or until cauliflower is tender. Use stick blender to liquidize soup. Serve warm (but don’t burn your tongue).
I’ve burned my tongue.
I worked late this evening and had to go for a run when I got home. You know those nights when it feels like your shoulders are glued to your ears? It was one of those, and nothing but exercise would do. When I got back I was Hungry (and also Sweaty). Luckily, I’d planned to make cauliflower soup. From start to finish it took about thirty minutes to make and I even had time to hop in the shower while the white florets were boiling away. Still, with onions, garlic and two kinds of paprika it smelled so good that there was no time to wait for the soup to drop to somewhere closer to body temperature before I took a bite.
And that’s where you get hurt.
But it’s okay. Smoky, slightly spicy and with a nutty flavor to enhance the cauliflower’s natural earthiness, this soup was worth it. It is based on a recipe from Sarah Raven’s Garden Cookbook, which includes almonds and bay leaves. I’ve always thought cauliflower has a bit of a non-descript flavor so I replaced the subtle bay leaves with two kinds of paprika for more oomph. Swapping the almonds for hazelnuts was born out of necessity (no almonds in the kitchen, no intention to leave the house again before I was fed), but worked well. Paired with a few buttered crackers, this soup was just what the doctor ordered after a long day.
Nutty cauliflower soup
Adapted from Sarah Raven’s Garden Cookbook
Serves 2
1 smallish head of cauliflower, broken into large florets
1 tbsp of butter
1 onion, chopped
1 clove of garlic, minced
½ tsp smoked paprika
½ tsp spicy paprika
30 gr roasted hazelnuts, ground fine
½ litre of chicken stock, or more
Melt the butter in a soup pot. Cook the onion in butter until soft. Add garlic, both kinds of paprika and hazelnuts. Stir. Add stock so that cauliflower is completely covered. Simmer for about fifteen minutes or until cauliflower is tender. Use stick blender to liquidize soup. Serve warm (but don’t burn your tongue).
Monday, November 17, 2008
Food Plans, November 17
This week’s bag’o’vegetables contains kohlrabi, alfalfa, pears for poaching, bok choi and a cauliflower. Left over from last week is a bag of mushrooms and 2kg of apples. Somehow, quite unintendedly, a bag of curly kale also made its way into my shopping basket when I was at the store buying butter and chocolate for brownies. Nothing to do with my crush on Molly’s boiled kale, I promise. (And by "nothing", I mean "everything", of course.)
Anyway, lots of fruit and vegetables to get through this week, so I need a plan. Here goes:
Monday: Stir-fried bok choi with peanut dressing, brownies for Pieter
Tuesday: Pasta with Sarah Raven’s Really Rich Tomato Sauce, topped with garlicky mushrooms
Wednesday: Cauliflower soup with nuts and smoked paprika, Deb’s apple muffins for a departing secretary
Thursday: Boiled curly kale with bread and a fried egg, poached pears with cinnamon and star anise
Friday: Dinner at a friend’s house
Let this be a good week.
Anyway, lots of fruit and vegetables to get through this week, so I need a plan. Here goes:
Monday: Stir-fried bok choi with peanut dressing, brownies for Pieter
Tuesday: Pasta with Sarah Raven’s Really Rich Tomato Sauce, topped with garlicky mushrooms
Wednesday: Cauliflower soup with nuts and smoked paprika, Deb’s apple muffins for a departing secretary
Thursday: Boiled curly kale with bread and a fried egg, poached pears with cinnamon and star anise
Friday: Dinner at a friend’s house
Let this be a good week.
Monday, November 10, 2008
Orange-Carrot Almost-Perfect Sunday Morning Remedy
Yesterday morning I woke up, stumbled out of bed, looked at myself in the mirror and screamed a little. It was not pretty: pasty skin, mascara in unlikely places and hair sticking out at funny angles. Saturday night was great. Sunday morning? Not so much.
My gut reaction to the Sunday morning mirror scare is to hide under the covers and ignore the rest of the world. Which is not a bad idea in theory, but in practice my head starts to hurt if I stay horizontal too long. Also, it doesn’t solve the problem. Inevitably my growling stomach forces me back into the real world after a while. By then, I am usually so hungry I have no problem devouring a day’s worth of calories in snacks deciding “what to have for breakfast”.
Obviously, my natural reactions need suppressing and I am always on the look-out for effective Sunday morning blah-reducers. Deb’s German oven pancakes are good. Fresh bread with good cheese isn’t half bad. But my favorite one so far? Orange-carrot juice. Ever since I had my first taste, it is what I crave when my body needs a bit of help. It tastes bright enough to put the spring back in my step, yet mellow enough not to offend. It is sweet but not too and with every sip I can feel the vitamin C fighting whatever toxins the previous night threw at me.
Not unimportantly, making orange-carrot juice is something I can handle on a fragile morning. Rinsing and chopping up a few organic carrots, skinning an orange or two: that I can do. Add a juicer and a bit of arm-action and -bzzzzz- greatness. The only thing standing between this drink and Sunday morning perfection? Someone in my apartment grateful enough to share that he will clean the juicer. And the sticky counter. And the juice-stained floor. Yeah, no Saturday night has been that great yet.
My gut reaction to the Sunday morning mirror scare is to hide under the covers and ignore the rest of the world. Which is not a bad idea in theory, but in practice my head starts to hurt if I stay horizontal too long. Also, it doesn’t solve the problem. Inevitably my growling stomach forces me back into the real world after a while. By then, I am usually so hungry I have no problem devouring a day’s worth of calories in snacks deciding “what to have for breakfast”.
Obviously, my natural reactions need suppressing and I am always on the look-out for effective Sunday morning blah-reducers. Deb’s German oven pancakes are good. Fresh bread with good cheese isn’t half bad. But my favorite one so far? Orange-carrot juice. Ever since I had my first taste, it is what I crave when my body needs a bit of help. It tastes bright enough to put the spring back in my step, yet mellow enough not to offend. It is sweet but not too and with every sip I can feel the vitamin C fighting whatever toxins the previous night threw at me.
Not unimportantly, making orange-carrot juice is something I can handle on a fragile morning. Rinsing and chopping up a few organic carrots, skinning an orange or two: that I can do. Add a juicer and a bit of arm-action and -bzzzzz- greatness. The only thing standing between this drink and Sunday morning perfection? Someone in my apartment grateful enough to share that he will clean the juicer. And the sticky counter. And the juice-stained floor. Yeah, no Saturday night has been that great yet.
Monday, November 3, 2008
Bag'o'vegetables
There is a pile of wild spinach sitting on my counter, nestled against a pile of red onions and thick carrots. In the corner are three pears and a package of bean sprouts. Just looking at the abundance makes me feel fit- maybe its vegetable healthiness is transferable through sight?
The produce came to me through a scheme students at my university run. You order one week, pay them a small sum and the next week you get a bag’o’vegetables, full of organically grown vitamins and fibre. And flavor, lovely flavor. I dig the scheme, and not just because I get a surprise selection every week. Or because they give me a recipe for each kind of plant I get- although that is much appreciated. No, it is because I find out about vegetables I wouldn’t have discovered otherwise. Have you seen scorzonera, for instance? Not a pretty-looking root even on a good day. I had never yet been able to work up the courage to buy a bag of the gnarly, dark brown sticks. And there it was in my bag’o’vegetables last week and I had to do something with it. (Other than tossing it, which would have been wrong-wrong-wrong.)
Out came Sarah Raven’s Garden Cookbook (which, by the way, is one of the loveliest books about food I have met to date) and a recipe for scorzonera in garlic butter. Raven has you simmer the peeled scorzonera until they are soft, bathe them in a butter with gently fried garlic and finish with a big handful of chopped parsley. What you end up with is a subtle sunchoke flavor, enlivened by garlic and enriched with butter. (I substituted a few chili flakes for the parsley, mainly because I didn’t have any parsley. The replacement added a warmth I would have been sad to miss.) A simple, wintry dish for a simple, stormy Monday- what more could you ask for from a bag?
The planning for this week’s discoveries has begun. I am thinking:
Soba noodles with bean sprouts and peanut dressing
Orange/carrot juice
Chocolate-dipped pears
Garlicky spinach with quinoa and a fried egg
Onion tart with goat’s cheese
But that’s just the start…
Scorzonera in garlic butter
adapted from Sarah Raven’s Garden Cookbook
Six scorzonera sticks
Splash of red wine vinegar
Knob of butter
A pinch of ground chili flakes
Sea salt to taste
Peel the scorzonera and place them in a bowl of water with red wine vinegar. Bring water to a gentle boil and simmer scorzonera until tender. Drain.
Melt a knob of butter. Crush a clove of garlic and fry gently in the melted butter. Mix in ground chili flakes. Add scorzonera to butter mixture and mix. Sprinkle with sea salt.
Serve hot.
The produce came to me through a scheme students at my university run. You order one week, pay them a small sum and the next week you get a bag’o’vegetables, full of organically grown vitamins and fibre. And flavor, lovely flavor. I dig the scheme, and not just because I get a surprise selection every week. Or because they give me a recipe for each kind of plant I get- although that is much appreciated. No, it is because I find out about vegetables I wouldn’t have discovered otherwise. Have you seen scorzonera, for instance? Not a pretty-looking root even on a good day. I had never yet been able to work up the courage to buy a bag of the gnarly, dark brown sticks. And there it was in my bag’o’vegetables last week and I had to do something with it. (Other than tossing it, which would have been wrong-wrong-wrong.)
Out came Sarah Raven’s Garden Cookbook (which, by the way, is one of the loveliest books about food I have met to date) and a recipe for scorzonera in garlic butter. Raven has you simmer the peeled scorzonera until they are soft, bathe them in a butter with gently fried garlic and finish with a big handful of chopped parsley. What you end up with is a subtle sunchoke flavor, enlivened by garlic and enriched with butter. (I substituted a few chili flakes for the parsley, mainly because I didn’t have any parsley. The replacement added a warmth I would have been sad to miss.) A simple, wintry dish for a simple, stormy Monday- what more could you ask for from a bag?
The planning for this week’s discoveries has begun. I am thinking:
Soba noodles with bean sprouts and peanut dressing
Orange/carrot juice
Chocolate-dipped pears
Garlicky spinach with quinoa and a fried egg
Onion tart with goat’s cheese
But that’s just the start…
Scorzonera in garlic butter
adapted from Sarah Raven’s Garden Cookbook
Six scorzonera sticks
Splash of red wine vinegar
Knob of butter
A pinch of ground chili flakes
Sea salt to taste
Peel the scorzonera and place them in a bowl of water with red wine vinegar. Bring water to a gentle boil and simmer scorzonera until tender. Drain.
Melt a knob of butter. Crush a clove of garlic and fry gently in the melted butter. Mix in ground chili flakes. Add scorzonera to butter mixture and mix. Sprinkle with sea salt.
Serve hot.
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