French Toast, Chunky Seafood Chowder, Caesar Salad

Recipe: French Toast, Chunky Seafood Chowder, Caesar Salad

It's been 3 months since I moved to the East Coast, so I figure it's a good time to assess how my search for more Happy Places is going. Lord knows there are millions of places to look for Happy Places in the Greater Philadelphia area, which I believe is one of the ways to describe the incredibly large radius that incorporates the Philly, Southern New Jersey, and Northern part of Delaware (basically Wilmington) areas. Since I've been here, I've searched for Happy Places in the clubs of Olde City Philly and Penn's Landing. I've searched for Happy Places at a Phillies baseball game and kickboxing class. I've even searched for my Happy Place at a Polish Festival (where I ironically did not hear Polka music, but did hear really cheesy cover band music). I am pleased to say all of my searches have resulted in wonderful places to have a Happy Place. I think I'll have the ultimate Happy Place search this weekend when I jump out of a plane and take in the Greater Philadelphia area while I float to the ground from 14,000 feet in the air. Yes, I did say jump from a plane. :) I'm going skydiving this weekend! So if there was any doubt that my journey of cooking was an exploration in me finding my courage and becoming more bold...you can doubt no more. I'm pretty sure this qualifies me for a trip to the loony bin, nevermind it definitely qualifies as being courageous. But I'm super excited. I hear it's the experience of a lifetime. Some of the best 6 minutes you can experience...at least with your clothes on. I'm fully confident that I'll have wonderful stories to share and I'll also have 2 functioning arms to type my wonderful stories in my next blog. If there is one thing I'll say for myself, when I say I'm ready to get out of the middle of nowhere and start experiencing life...man, am I not joking! :)

Well even though I've had awesome searches looking for new Happy Places, I still think my ultimate and favorite Happy Place resides right in my kitchen. And since I'm spending a lot more time looking for Happy Places, and less time cooking, I wanted to really spend some time cooking this weekend. Not to mention spending time being lazy, curled up on a couch watching football all weekend. I did a great job accomplishing both. I was even able to share my Happy Place experience with Liz, Zo, and Liz's mom Ms. Betty. Liz and Zo have recently been blessed with the arrival of a beautiful baby girl, and since they are my adopted family (all of my really good friends are) I wanted to do something for them. And what says "Welcome to the World" more than a comfy dish of Chicken Pot Pie??? I unfortunately forgot to photograph my dish before taking it to the house, but you've seen it before. It's the pot pie that sent me searching for ears of corn in 2 different states a few months ago. I'm pleased to report the pie was just as good this time. And since it was pretty much gone before I left that night, I'd say my family agreed with me. I spent the rest of the weekend alternating between nonstop football watching and cooking more awesome recipes. The French Toast had orange zest and nutmeg in it. Since it also had eggs in the mixture that I dipped the sourdough bread in, it almost felt like I was soaking the bread in eggnog. It had an excellent flavor and was very, very yummy. And it provided at least 2 comatose hours on the couch after breakfast. For my dinner, I actually felt too lazy to really invest in a complicated Williams-Sonoma dish, so I pulled out my fave Seafood Chowder recipe from my Taste of Home days. The Seafood Chowder is so easy to make it's embarrassing. It's really a semi-homemade dish that uses Campbell's condensed New England clam chowder and imitation crab. Yes, I admit it's an abomination to use imitation crab while living in the land of abundant fresh seafood, but what can I say. I was feeling really lazy. :) I did peel and cube 3 potatoes, so I guess I put some sweat into the dish. And besides, it's a great chowder recipe. It has a creamy, buttery taste to it that blends really nicely with the potatoes and clam chowder. The Caesar Salad actually was a Williams-Sonoma recipe, and I think it may now also be my favorite salad. I made homemade croutons, which I made by drizzling bread cubes with olive oil, salt, pepper and after they baked, with garlic. OMG. I hate croutons, mind you and I had to stop myself from eating them all before I finished making the salad. The salad dressing was an olive oil based dressing with Worcheshire sauce, Red Wine Vinegar, salt, and more garlic. Talk about the most awesome dinner ever.

So now you know how my first 3 months in my new Happy Place has been going. I'm cooking more great dishes that I love, and enjoying more great experiences that I never thought I'd have. To use some of the words from a commercial I saw about 800 times this weekend.....Life is "So S-O, G-Double-O-D Good". :)

French Toast & Sausage

Chunky Seafood Chowder

Caesar Salad

Buttermilk Waffles, Salmon & Corn Chowder, Guacamole & Tortilla Chips, Brownies

Recipe: Buttermilk Waffles, Salmon & Corn Chowder, Guacamole & Tortilla Chips, Brownies

I've whipped through a number of recipes since my last blog. Although I will say, they weren't all at once. This week's blog is a culmination of 2 separate weekends worth of cooking. I made Buttermilk Waffles and Salmon & Corn Chowder over the Labor Day weekend. Which, was an awesome weekend. My OGP's (Original Guinea Pigs) Terraun and Sarah came down for the weekend. After their wedding they relocated from the bustling metropolis of Houston, TX/New Orleans to the even more bustling metropolis of....Towanda, PA!!!! Which is neither bustling nor a metropolis. But it is only 4 hours away from me, so I'm happy. They can use visits to me as an excuse to see some real civilization and I can finally be the person that people come visit to escape the boredom, not the one doing the escaping. And I get to cook for them, so it's a win-win for everyone. My Happy Place has now become a refuge and a pseudo-happy place for others. And what's even better, I have officially added more Guinea Pigs to my project now that I'm here and I'm close to more of my really good friends. So not only did Terraun and Sarah get to be guinea pigs last weekend, but I also got to welcome my friends Liz and Zo to the OGP family (and to the shout-outs in my blog). :) I took the Salmon & Corn Chowder to their house and the 5 of us had a great time hanging out, watching movies, and just overall having a great time. Have I mentioned I love being here????

I was excited about my Salmon & Corn Chowder recipe because I FINALLY got to cut corn kernels off of a corn cob since I missed out with my Chicken Pot Pie recipe. I must say, it was anti-climatic. But at least I didn't drive to 4 different stores in an attempt to find the corn this time. And using fresh kernels from the cob does taste much better than using frozen or canned corn. The Buttermilk Waffles were also very good. Although I had to defer to Sarah's opinion of them to really determine how they tasted. See, I have another Waffle recipe I usually make and whenever Terraun came to visit during his Parkersburg trips, I would make them. The recipe wasn't a fancy Williams-Sonoma recipe, but they were honestly the best waffles I've ever had. No syrup was necessary with my old recipe. Just put some sliced strawberries on the waffles, and I swear you were eating a little piece of heaven with every bite. So you can imagine both Terraun and my disappointment when we took a bite of the Williams-Sonoma waffles...and they were just tasty. Not little slice of heaven tasty, but just really good and tasty. Which in normal circumstances is totally acceptable, just not when you've tasted heaven. So I had to make Sarah the subject matter expert on these waffles. Which she gave 2 thumbs up to, so we're all good.

This weekend I went back over Liz and Zo's. And since I was going, I decided to come bearing food gifts of guacamole, tortilla chips, and brownies which is a really odd combination. But hey, when the random recipe gods come knocking, you open the door and just go with it. I also made buttermilk waffles again this weekend since I still had buttermilk leftover, so I took waffles over their house also. I made my own tortilla chips for the guac and chips recipe. Which did not go very well at first. I put the first batch of tortillas in the oil too soon and once they were fried, they had soaked in oil too long so they were really chewy and not crisp at all. But once I got the hang of it, I started whipping out some really crispy tortilla chips. Unfortunately, the chewy ones were mixed in with the crisp ones so you never really knew which type of chip you'd be eating when you picked one up. Sorry about that Liz and Zo. Sometimes, being my OGP does have its drawbacks. :) I have a feeling I'll get lots of practice making guac and chips though. Both were really easy to make and I love eating both so much, I can easily see myself whipping up a batch every weekend or so and crashing on my couch eating guac and chips and watching football all day. Which brings me to a sidenote: There is some man out there in the universe that is going to be really lucky when he finally meets me....I'm just saying. ;) And I can't forget about my brownies. Nothing special or fancy about them. They had peanut butter chips in them. I think the most exotic thing about this recipe was chopping up the chocolate for the brownies. Yeah, pretty boring. Boring, but good. And easy. So maybe I'll whip up guac, chips, and brownies every weekend. Sure sounds like the staple of a great football weekend to me!

Oh, and in case you were wondering...I did survive my night shift work. But let's just say, I don't think I'll be begging to do that again anytime soon. The night time is not the right time, to stay up all night and try to work at a chemical plant. :)

Buttermilk Waffles, Fried Eggs, and Sausage

Salmon & Corn Chowder

Brownies w/ Peanut Butter Chips

Guacamole & Tortilla Chips

Braised Chicken with Tomatillos & Rosemary Spoon Bread

Recipe: Braised Chicken with Tomatillos & Rosemary Spoon Bread

So here is a tip. If you ever have to stay up all night, cooking is a great activity to keep you awake. And how do I know this? Well, now that I've been at my new plant for almost 2 months and I'm fairly familiar with how the plant runs from a high level, I thought now would be a good time to shadow the operators and really try to understand how they do their job. Day shift is always hectic with everyone running around, so I've decided to work night shift for the next 3 nights. 5pm to 5am. Oy! What am I thinking? At any rate, since it would really suck if I didn't sleep all day of my first night turn, I decided to stay up as late as possible so I can sleep all day. And since I move at the pace of a snail on crutches when I cook, I thought cooking late tonight would be a great way to kill a few late night hours. My plan was almost foolproof. I finished cooking, cleaned the kitchen, AND did some laundry...but it's still only 1am! Maybe I should've thrown a Tiramisu in there too. :)

I enjoyed making this meal. I've really come to love the taste of fresh rosemary. It's one of the herbs I've found I love the most when I've cooked these recipes. So I was really looking forward to the Rosemary Spoon Bread. I'd never heard of spoon bread before now. It is made with cornmeal, and according to Wikipedia, it is mostly prevalent in the South. Cooking this recipe started out similar to the Polentina I made several months ago. I started off boiling milk and the cornmeal, and whisking it for several minutes. But with the spoon bread, I then added butter, egg, and the rosemary and let it bake for about 25 minutes. It looks like corn bread, but it's really spongy. I could see me eating this for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. And night shift snacks! It has an awesome flavor. Rosemary reminds me of what I'd imagine it be like to eat a pine tree. Now that I think about it, not sure how that translates to one of my favorite herbs, but I'll just go with it.

I'm slightly sad about my braised chicken. It tastes really good, but my poor chickens looked so pale when it was finished cooking. Somehow I didn't brown the chicken enough before I let it braise. I got to roast my own poblano pepper for this recipe. Which isn't nearly as complicated as I imagined it to be. That seems to be a common theme to my cooking. I hear or see a technique, and imagine it will be impossible to accomplish and it hardly ever is. That is unless I'm baking potatoes. :) Other than my poor pale chicken, I'm happy with how this recipe came out. Although I can't really tell what flavor the tomatillo brings to the picture. They look like little green cherry tomatoes, but they are referred to as a fruit. They definitely didn't make the dish taste sweet. Unless it is a subtle sweetness that was overpowered by the heat of the pepper. They make the dish look cool though. So that's enough for me.

I had a small sampling of the chicken and bread just to see how it tastes. And as good as it was tonight, I just know once all of these flavors meld together it is going to be oh, soooo good. What a perfect midnight meal this will be tomorrow! I'm not sure how coherent my middle of the night blogging really is. So I think I'll bid adieu to my blog for tonight. Then again, I tend to ramble when it's 7pm in the evening or 10am in the morning. So maybe the middle of the night thing is a mute point. My middle of the night blogging did get me to 1:40am. Now...only 2 more hours until I go to sleep! :)

Cheddar Cheese Soup with Ale

Recipe: Cheddar Cheese Soup with Ale

After 2 months, 400 miles travelled, and 1 confused cat and dog, My Happy Place has relocated! I am now in the Wilmington, DE area. Yay! To be exact, I'm living in Kennett Square, PA. Man, is moving an adventure. I think the biggest adventure was the 6 hour drive with my cat who rarely leaves the house. I think she meowed for the first 2 hours straight. The next 4 were spent alternating between giving me death looks and making very low growling like sounds. Needless to say, we were not friends for the first few days here. :) I actually moved at the end of June. My attempts to cook with plastic utensils and paper plates did not bode very well. So I had to wait until I unpacked the kitchen boxes so I could start cooking. That may not seem that big of a deal. I mean it only took the moving guy about 4 hours to pack up the kitchen. How long should it take to unpack it? Ha! Between trying to get acclimated to my new area, my new job, and travelling a few times (including going to see Terraun and Sarah get married!), unpacking didn't exactly go as planned. My bedroom was unpacked relatively quickly. Then again, if I didn't unpack my bedroom I'd either have a really high credit card bill from all the clothes I'd be buying or I'd have no friends at work after wearing the same outfit for 6 weeks straight. I actually unpacked the first half of the kitchen in mid-July. And I thought I had all the key things I needed to cook. I even bought the groceries I needed to cook my next recipe. But I was still missing a few key things I needed to cook. And it took me another 3 weeks to get the rest of what I needed unpacked. But no worries. I used the time not cooking very wisely. I discovered Wawa Italian Hoagies in the intermission between cooking. Wawa is a regional chain of gas stations/food marts. This summer they had a special on subs called "HoagieFest" which offered 6" subs for $2.99. And since I live within walking distance from a Wawa, I used the time between cooking to get very acquainted with my local Wawa. It may sound strange to hear me say I ate mostly gas station food for the past 6 weeks. But these subs are really, really good. I actually found myself craving them sometimes. Of course after 6 weeks, I think I've had my fill. But the Italian Hoagie definitely got me through without starving in my first few weeks here. But now I'm unpacked and ready to go back to My Happy Place. And boy have I missed it.

My favorite thing about being up here is the access to so many good places to grocery shop. When I thought I was cooking 3 weeks ago, I went to a store called Jansen's Market, a gourmet market. And guess what! They have Hungarian Paprika! I had to stop and smile when I saw Hungarian Paprika in the spice aisle. It almost brought a tear to my eye. I also have a pretty decent grocery store within walking distance from me. I'm going to really really like it up here. There is one thing that has thrown me off though. Buying alcohol is totally different up here. In WV and OH, if I need a bottle of beer, I can go to the gas station and grab one. Or Giant Eagle. Or Wal-Mart. Or Foodland. Pretty much anywhere that sold food, sold beer and wine. My soup recipe calls for a bottle of Ale beer. When I went shopping at Jansen's, I found everything I needed but the bottle of Ale. I went from aisle to aisle to no avail. I asked the checkout girl where the beer was, and I noticed she looked at me strangely when she said they didn't sell it. I didn't think anything of it though. It was a hoity toity grocery store. Maybe selling alcohol would lower they're appeal as a gourmet store. I went to the store next to my house and searched every aisle again. And again, no bottle of Ale. Now I was starting to wonder if Pennsylvania was a dry state, or the county I was in was at least dry. But I knew I saw a wine shop in the same shopping center as the store by my house. So I asked the checkout guy at this store if they sold beer. And again, the strange looks. For fear of making myself look too silly, I waited to ask one of my coworkers what was up with the hidden beer. And turns out, you can't buy alcohol in a grocery store or gas station in Delaware or Pennsylvania. Huh, who knew? You have to buy beer at a beer distribution center and wine at a wine shop. At least in PA. Yes, I did say beer from a beer distribution center where they sell nothing but cases of beer. And yes, I did say I need 1 bottle of beer for my recipe. 1 bottle is much less than 1 case of beer. But I found a way to make it work. I went to one of the beer distribution centers and very nicely explained my dilemma, and he gave me a bottle of beer. They had a few cases that were damaged and opened, so he grabbed a bottle from one of those cases. Now, he actually gave me lager, not ale. But I am not one to look a gift horse in the mouth. Especially when my only other options are to buy a $50.00 case of Ale for 1 bottle or drive around aimlessly looking for the next beer center hoping they have a bottle of Ale they will give me. The cook book said Ale has a heavier taste than Lager, but the soup was still good. I'm curious if the soup will taste better with Ale, so I may make it again. I hear in Delaware, they sell beer in smaller packages than 20 bottle cases. Other than the adventure with the beer, the recipe was really straightforward and simple. And in case you were wondering, the cheeses were sharp cheddar and grated parmesean cheese. Yummy!

So there you have it. My first recipe in my newly located Happy Place is in the books. It took a while to get My East Coast Happy Place up and running. But I'm looking forward to seeing "oh the places I will go" now that I'm here. And yes...that was a Dr. Seuss reference. :)

Spaghetti with Italian Sausage & Haricots Verts with Shallot & Lemon

Recipe: Spaghetti with Italian Sausage & Haricots Verts with Shallot & Lemon

So, after 2-1/2 weeks off, I'm back to blogging. Although, I'm not really back to my cooking project. I didn't cook anything new from Williams-Sonoma tonight, but more on that in a second. See, there has been a lot going on and it's been a little hectic for me to cook the past few weeks. It's not a bad hectic though. In fact, it's all good. My Happy Place is taking a road trip! A permanent one. :) Yep, that's right. After 9 years of calling Parkersburg, West Virginia and the Mid-Ohio Valley home (15 years if you count my time at Ohio University in Athens, Ohio), I am bidding adieu to this fair town and will now be calling Wilmington, Delaware my new home. I will finally be able to shop for all the many obscure ingredients Williams-Sonoma throws at me and have a pretty high confidence of finding all of them. This is so very much a good thing. It's funny how quickly things in life can change. One moment, you feel utterly frustrated with your life. The next second you get a phone call and find out your life will be completely different and you have what you've wanted for a very long time. I applied for the new job I will take in Delaware about the same time I started my cooking experiment. And quite honestly, I think I owe a part of my life change to this experiment. In the beginning, I said I wanted this process of cooking foods I'd never cooked before to push me to get more bold with things in my life. And since my Linguine with Lobster Tarragon Sauce experiment over 3 months ago, I've started to evolve into a person that I'm really really starting to like. I'm starting to go after the things I want in life instead of curling up in a ball and just wishing things were different. It's amazing how much I've changed through this short time. And maybe all of the evolving I've done was in the cards for me anyway, and snipping fresh herbs or making pie crusts has had nothing to do with my newfound self-confidence. But somehow, I don't think it's a coincidence. This cooking journey has been a gift that I am still not quite sure I get the full impact of yet. But I am grateful for this adventure. And I don't care if it takes me 5 years to finish this cookbook. With the things I've gained from this experience after cooking just 18 recipes, I'm highly intrigued to see what I'll discover when all 360 are complete. So although I probably won't cook much of anything this month while I get ready to move, I will definitely be back in full gear once I'm settled in my new city! I've got more evolving to do. And a new city to do it all in. :-D

Okay, okay...enough of the mushy stuff. Back to my cooking. :) If you haven't noticed yet, one of the recipes in the title should look familiar. Yep, I made my HV's again. Don't worry, this isn't an obsessive love affair like I have with the Brussels Sprouts. I made an impromptu decision to cook tonight, and I knew the HV recipe had a short ingredients list and I could remember most of it off the top of my head. Although I did have to ask Sarah to help me remember a few things. And the spaghetti was another "Lashonda" original. And by original, I mean I took a jar of Classico spaghetti sauce, doctored it up with a bunch of stuff, and called it my own. Although I must say, it was very, very good. I actually only cooked because my original resident guinea pig, Terraun, is in town again. With all of the stuff I've been doing in preparation of moving (meeting with realtors, fixing up things to make the house more appealing for sale), I've been eating out a lot. But since I really do enjoy cooking for other people, I thought it would be good to cook tonight. So on impulse, I decided to whip up spaghetti and HV's. The spaghetti sauce was amazingly good. Only problem...I was sort of just throwing stuff in the Classico sauce so I'm not quite sure I can duplicate it. :) One thing I did add to the sauce that definitely helped make it amazing was Shiraz, a red wine. And red hot pepper flakes. Which could explain the heartburn I have while I sit here typing this. I also believe there were bottles of Oregano and Thyme pulled out of the cabinet. But don't quote me on that. I guess if I really wanted to duplicate it, I could. But then again, it was a lot more fun just making it up as I went along. Some say life is the same way. You can sit and try to just duplicate what you've seen other people do. Or you can have fun and make it up as you go along. See I tell ya, who knew there were so many life lessons to be found in the kitchen. No wonder it's My Happy Place. :)

Polentina with Bananas and Maple Syrup and Black Bean Sausage Chili

Recipe: Polentina with Bananas and Maple Syrup and Black Bean Sausage Chili

So I cheated a little this weekend. How did I cheat? Well, I'll get to that in a second. My cheating all resulted from a major case of the blah's. What are the blah's? Well to me, they are when you just feel off your normal game or not your normal self. And I'm not sure why, but I had the blah's all weekend. And with the blah's came very little motivation to do anything. I was supposed to cook Polentina, Rosemary Spoon Bread, and Tortilla soup. I went grocery shopping on Saturday, got everything I needed and came home with the intention to cook, looked at the large pile of dishes in the sink from the Tuna/HV adventure on Wednesday, gave a big sigh and retreated to the couch to watch my DVD's of The Wire, season 4. Cooking makes me very happy. Cleaning up my cooking messes does not. And seeing the 3 day old pile of dishes particularly depressed me Saturday for some reason. I sometimes get overwhelmed at the thought of something and mentally check out. Sometimes it's not even a major event that overwhelms me. I mean they were just dishes, for pete's sake. But I just didn't feel like dealing with anything on Saturday. After a few hours of trying to motivate myself, I said screw it and decided to cook on Sunday. On Sunday morning, I got up, cleaned up the kitchen and felt like I had my mojo back. After cleaning the kitchen, I moved on to making my Polentina. Polentina is a breakfast dish made with corn meal. Polenta is a boiled form of corn meal, and Polentina refers to a more liquid or creamier form of polenta. It's a very comforting food, and it's very easy to make. It's also a very filling meal, similar to the way oatmeal is filling. If you don't like oatmeal, or want a change, I would definitely try this. To make it, boil milk, water, sugar, and salt and whisk the corn meal into the boiling liquid. Then for the next 15 minutes, let the mixture simmer while stirring it every couple of minutes. Top the bowl of Polentina with sliced bananas, warm maple syrup and melted butter. It is so very good. I sat down with my comforting bowl of Polentina, a cup of Mint Green Tea, and watched "The Other Boleyn Girl" all before noon. I was so proud of myself for getting back on track. And then....well let's just say the comforting bowl of Polentina was a little too comforting. So comforting in fact, I ended up falling asleep until 4 in the afternoon. :)

All of this leads me back to my cheating. I woke up from my nap, and realized the motivation I had took a nap with me. But unlike me, my motivation did not wake back up. At that point, I realized this just isn't my weekend for being productive and I said "Yeah, I'm not cooking spoon bread or tortilla soup tonight". And then I decided to cheat. I pulled out one of my old standby Taste of Home recipes, Black Bean Sausage Chili. It's quick and easy to make. Oh, and most importantly, it's freaking delicious. And since I did cook something, it made me feel less like a slacker. To make it, cook Italian sausage with a few cloves of garlic. Then mix in chopped green pepper and onions and cook for a few more minutes. Next pour chili powder, diced tomatoes, black beans, corn, tomato paste and sauce and a handful of dried herbs (no dicing fresh herbs for me tonight!) and let it all simmer for 30 minutes. Before serving the chili, top it with shredded cheddar cheese. If you ever need a meal and are short on time or motivation to cook, this is the recipe for you. So there you have it. I guess since I did make something from my Williams-Sonoma cookbook, it's not truly cheating. I just didn't accomplish all I wanted to accomplish. But I will say, the Black Bean Sausage Chili isn't too bad of a back-up plan. Quite honestly, cheating has never tasted (or looked) so good before. ;)

Polentina with Bananas and Maple Syrup

Black Bean Sausage Chili

Seared Tuna with Italian Herb Sauce and Haricots Verts with Shallot & Lemon

Recipe: Seared Tuna with Italian Herb Sauce and Haricots Verts with Shallot & Lemon

I didn't just cook for 1 tonight! Yay! My friend Sarah is in town for work and is staying with me. So I got to have another guinea pig for my experiment. And Sarah is engaged to Terraun, my other resident guinea pig. So now, being my guinea pig is a family affair. And since I was sharing my adventure, I invited my friend Henry over also. I love cooking for other people, especially when they like the results. Cooking for yourself is lonely sometimes. And after 4 days of Chicken Pot Pie, no matter how good it is...it gets a little monotonous. So I was very excited to be able to share my adventure with my friends. This was another very fancy, stylistic meal. And another one to add to my dinner party portfolio. This one actually looks fancier than the pork chops and twice-baked potatoes meal. It wasn't quite as simple as that meal, but by no means was it stressful to prepare. Now, have you wondered what Haricots Verts are yet? When it popped up randomly, and I saw what the recipe was, I was thinking, "What the heck is this? What odd vegetable has Williams-Sonoma come up with now?". Being the inquisitive person that I am, and being very afraid I wouldn't find these Haricots Verts anywhere in the Mid-Ohio Valley area, I googl'd them. And yeah...they're green beans. :) So apparently the French term for green beans is Haricots Verts. Ha! That sounds so much more fancy than green beans. So from this moment on, I shall call green beans Haricots Verts. Or HV's, which is what Sarah and I ended up calling them by the end of the night. Verts is also an acceptable term.

So for these two recipes to have come up randomly, they complemented each other very well. I started by making the Italian Herb Sauce because it needed to sit for an hour so the flavors could meld. And man did it have a lot of flavors in it to meld. I put an anchovy fillet, a minced garlic clove, Italian parsley leaves, fresh mint leaves, capers, dijon mustard, and red wine vinegar into a food processor and pureed it all until it was smooth. I was somewhat nervous with the anchovy at first. Although I've never had anchovies, it just seems they aren't a very well liked food. While I was shopping for food today, I told Sarah I would be home after I found my anchovies, and she also took pause for a second. I think when people hear the word anchovy, they immediately get grossed out. It's like one of the red-headed stepchildren of the food family. But in the essence of my adventure, I shall try all foods, the loved and unloved alike. And Sarah was happy to commit as well. Turns out, we had nothing to worry about. All of the flavors were pureed together so well there's no chance we would've tasted the anchovy anyway. So while the sauce was in the fridge melding, I started working on the HV's. I boiled the HV's for about 6 minutes, and then put them in ice to stop the cooking so they stayed crisp. I sauteed shallots for a couple of minutes and then added the HV's and continued sautéing them. Then at the end I added lemon zest and sauteed for 30 more seconds. I added chopped parsley, salt, and pepper to season. And this dish was complete. I knew it was good well before the meal was ready to serve because Henry kept sneaking over and stealing pieces of HV's. In fact, I almost had to ban him from the kitchen. I'd never think to put lemon zest on HV's, but it gives it a really fresh taste. Hmm, I wonder what other vegetables would also benefit from lemon zest? Brussels Sprouts, perhaps??? :) To sear the tuna, I just cooked the steaks on high heat for 90 seconds on each side. Then, after asking my guests if they wanted rare, medium rare, or medium tuna steaks, I cooked each side for 60 seconds longer for medium. Actually, I think they were more medium-well, but they were still really good. In fact, this was an awesome meal. It was fancy and healthy and easy to make. And Sarah and Henry both loved it. Yay! In fact, in addition to my usual picture to show how the meal turned out, I have the "5 minutes after the meal was served" pictures of Sarah and Henry's plates. Needless to say, they devoured this meal. A definite sign of a successful experiment. :) So while I didn't have much left over from this meal, seeing my friends enjoy it was a much more fulfilling reward than eating HV's for the next 3 days.

The final masterpiece

Sarah's plate before it was devoured

Henry's plate, 5 minutes later....

Sarah's plate, 5 minutes later...

Pork Chops with Apple & Onion and Twice-Baked Potatoes

Recipe: Pork Chops with Apple & Onion and Twice-Baked Potatoes

Finally! After exploding potatoes, a badly managed weekend, and being incapacitated by a bad toothache last Wednesday, I finally made my twice-baked potatoes! Fourth times the charm, eh? I have to say, the recipe was worth the wait. Both of them were. When one day I am living in a new area and have all kinds of wonderful dinner parties for my friends, this meal will definitely be on the menu. And it only took me 2 hours to cook both dishes. Since the potatoes had to bake for one hour, I'd say I didn't do too bad at all with time management this time. Sometimes when I cook, I like to listen to Inspirational music, especially Hillsong, to get me in the mood. But not this time. I went all the way random on the music playlist. I had everything from Kanye West to AC/DC to Stevie Wonder to Santana to 2Pac bumping Saturday night. Music is my other "Happy Place". I love to escape into the beats of a track or find something I can connect to in the lyrics of a song. As strange as it sounds, I think music was my first best friend. As a kid, when I really couldn't verbalize what I was thinking or feeling, music did it for me. And for some reason, with the combination of my fully random music library going and finally being able to cook a meal I've been attempting to make for 2 weeks, I was in a zone.

While my potatoes were baking, I snipped the stems off my spinach leaves, minced my shallots, and shredded my cheese for the potatoes. Then since I still had time, and I was on my time management game, I sliced the yellow onion and the green apple for my pork chops. I even had time to make the rub for the pork chops. Now, I've always known that sage is the magic seasoning for turkey because it brings out a good flavor in the turkey. But I never knew it was the same for pork also. For my rub, I took sage, salt, and pepper and rubbed them over my 4 pork chops. I had to let them stand at room temperature in the rub, so I let the pork chops do that while I worked with the twice-baked potatoes. Actually, by the time I finished fixing the rub, my potatoes were done baking so I went right from prepping the pork chops to working on my potatoes. I'm telling you, I was time management queen. And yes, I actually pulled 4 whole, intact potatoes from the oven. Of course, if you could have seen the way I pierced those poor potatoes before I put them in. :) Let's just say, it's a good thing there's no such thing as protective services for vegetables. I think I would've been taken in for domestic abuse by way of stabbing. To make my filling, I sautéed the shallots in butter and garlic and then added the spinach. I was skeptical when adding the spinach at first. I used two bunches of spinach leaves, which is a lot of green leaves. At first I was somewhat concerned I had misinterpreted what 2 bunches really meant. But the leaves wilted to about 1/4 its original volume by the time it was all said and done, so I felt much better. Next, I scooped out the potato flesh from the shells, mashed more butter, sour cream and salt and pepper in, and mixed the mashed potatoes with the spinach mix. This entire mixture was loaded back into the empty shells, and back into the oven the potatoes went for 20 minutes. A very tasty and fancy dish, that is a piece of cake to make. Of course, that is if you can make sure your potatoes don't explode in the beginning. :) Now, while my potatoes were baking a second time, I switched back to my pork chops. The technique for this dish was also pretty simple. I just seared the pork chops on both sides until they were brown and not pink on the inside. Then I took the chops out of the pan, and added the onions and apples to the pan and sautéed them in the pan drippings. After about 5 minutes, I deglazed the pan with Chardonnay, and viola! The pork chops were complete. And I have to say, apples and pork chops together is definitely a keeper on the list of things I'll be eating again and again. They were sooooo good.

Sometimes things seem much more complicated than the really are. If I were to look at the picture of my dish, I would think it took a lot of effort to cook this meal. But this meal offers style, without the stress. And that gets a two thumbs up from me. Of course, when I serve it to my dinner guests, they don't have to know it's a no-stress dish. They can all think I worked for hours to prepare a stylistic and tasty dish for them all. Of course, that means I'll have to invite people that don't read my blog. But that's just a minor detail...

Chocolate Chip & Pecan Cookies

Recipe: Chocolate Chip & Pecan Cookies

I had this great menu planned out to cook this weekend. I was going to remake (or make for the first time) my Twice-Baked Potatoes, Pork Chops, and for dessert Chocolate Chip & Pecan cookies. But once again, my Time Management curse strikes again! Somehow with not much to do all weekend, my entire weekend flew by and I'm not sure how. And I only completed 33% of what I wanted to accomplish. Dang life and how quickly things go by. :) No complaints, I did good stuff this weekend. I actually de-cluttered my house and unpacked from my recent trip out of town (which is why I didn't cook last weekend). I went to the beauty salon (always a good thing). I did an impromptu bowling outing with some of my work friends. And I had an awesome workout with my trainer. Earlier this month, I started working out with a trainer. And I have to say, I'm liking the results. I could say, I'm liking the way my arms and legs are starting to tone up, or how I'm seeing my waistline slimming down. But seriously, my favorite result so far has been...my bowling score. Bowling for me usually results in a lot of gutter balls until I drink about 2 or 3 beers. Then I can at least hit 6 of the 10 pins. But typically, I don't often break 75 points in a game. But wouldn't you know, I broke 100 twice last night. Yay! I think the muscle I'm building helped me throw a more controlled ball. Now, none of this has to do with cooking, but it does make me happy. And since the blog is not just about my cooking in my happy place, but my journey to finding more happy places, there ya go. My journey is going to find me one buff, tough cooking machine before it's all said and done.

But back to my cooking adventure. After I worked out on Sunday, I went to the store to get groceries. By the time I got home, it was 3:30. I'm thinking, not so bad. I should be able to do 3 recipes in 5ish hours. What was I thinking??? I thought I'd do the cookies first so I could bake them and get them out the way. Then I'd have the oven free for the baked potatoes and I could prep the rest of the meals while the potatoes were baking (and hopefully not exploding). But my first mishap was when I realized I didn't have Vanilla Extract. I always check before I go to the store, and I swore I had Extract. So...back to the store I went, which lost me 30 more minutes. I finally got in a groove though. But the groove was a slow moving one, as usual. One of the things I liked about this cookie recipe, was that I ground the pecans in with my flour, baking soda, and salt. I also put bigger pieces of chopped pecans in with the cookie dough at the end, but grounding them into the flour mixture was a new one. I'm happy with the way my cookies turned out. And they looked just like the cookbook! Usually the picture in the book tends to vary some from my final production. But my cookies looked exactly like the cookbook. I had enough of the cookie dough before they finished cooking to know they were good. Eating cookie dough is my favorite part of baking cookies. I wish I could just make cookies to just eat the dough. But I don't know how healthy that would be. Between all of the cookie dough and the cookies I ate, I think I undid every second of my workout today. But man were they good. Oh and what did the rest of my cooking adventure in for the night was when I got on the phone with my friend Terraun. I actually got on the phone while making my cookies, but while I waited for them to bake we kept talking and reviewing the most recent events of Pop Culture. And a 20 minute conversation turned into 90 minutes. And next thing you know...it was 7:00. And I decided to punt on the potatoes and the pork chops. At least I got my cookies done. :) And they are really good. Maybe I should be nice and take some to work tomorrow. Or maybe, I'll savor them all for myself. Then again, I've already undone one day of working out. Not sure I really want to undo the last month. But then again....

Twice-Baked Comedy

Recipe: Twice-Baked Comedy

Don't worry, you aren't reading things incorrectly. And Williams-Sonoma didn't discover a new food no one has ever heard of. For today's adventure, I was to make twice-baked potatoes. I took 4 large potatoes, scrubbed and pierced them, and let them bake for 1 hour. While they were baking, I even tried to work on my time-management by doing random chores for the first 30 minutes and then cutting the shallots, preparing the spinach leaves, and shredding my extra-sharp cheddar cheese during the final 30 minutes. I was in a good zone. Close to the end of the hour, I was even thinking "Hmm, I'm not sure I'll have much to talk about tonight". The Universe always seems to find a way to address my concerns. J

With like 1 minute left on the timer, I hear this pop in the oven. I look inside, and one of the potatoes has exploded clean out of the skin. I think I just stood there in confusion for a few seconds like, "What just happened?". This has never happened to me. I did Google exploding potatoes later and found this isn't an unheard of phenomenon. I believe that is the benefit of piercing the potato, it should keep it from exploding. I actually never thought before about why I pierced them. I just knew it was what you do. I guess now I know why. Maybe I didn't pierce this guy enough. Or seriously, maybe the Universe was really throwing me a bone for my blog. It seemed to be a "fixable" solution though. The flesh of the potato was still in one piece. And the skin was too, except for where the flesh of the potato bust out of the skin. So I'm thinking, maybe I can still save it and while it won't look pretty, it would still be edible. I had 3 other potatoes I could still use as a photo op. Yeah...not so much.

As I go to grab the flesh of the potato off the rack, it then proceeds to crumble. About 2/3 of it broke into 2 or 3 smaller pieces. The other 1/3 crumbled into very small pieces and fell to the bottom of the oven. So much for my salvaging plan. At this point, I'm thinking continuing to bake in an oven with bits of potato at the bottom is probably not a good idea. The kitchen has seen more than enough smoke in it the past few days. And since I was supposed to actually scoop the insides of all of the potatoes to make the twice-baked filling of the potato, and since 25% of my twice-baked filling was now out-of-commission, I painfully made the choice to punt on this recipe tonight. This is one of those times were you can get really annoyed at the events that transpire or you can see the pure comedy of the events. I chose the latter. So...how about we talk about twice-baked potatoes Saturday? J In the meantime, enjoy the photo of my adventures with twice-baked comedy. I threw out the bigger pieces before it dawned on me I could still take a photo. So the only thing I have to share is the bottom of the oven. But, I think it still speaks for itself.

Perfect Fried Eggs, Blueberry Pancakes, Sautéed Chicken Breasts with Whole-Grain Mustard Sauce, Asparagus Stir-Fry with Bacon and Tomatoes

Recipe: Perfect Fried Eggs, Blueberry Pancakes, Sautéed Chicken Breasts with Whole-Grain Mustard Sauce, Asparagus Stir-Fry with Bacon and Tomatoes (a Lashonda original)

It’s been almost 2 weeks since I’ve blogged. It’s not been quite that long since I’ve cooked though. The weekend after my chicken pot pie, I went home to celebrate a belated Easter with my family. I wanted to keep up with my adventure so I cooked dinner for my family. I made Sautéed Chicken Breasts with Whole-Grain Mustard Sauce and (wait for it…..) Brussels Sprouts!Okay, okay. I think I have an issue, I’m addicted to them so. Actually, they were so good when I made them for Easter, I really wanted my family to experience them. And wouldn’t you know, they weren’t as tasty this time. They were still good, I ate them so they couldn’t have been bad.But the wondrousness that I experienced the first two times I made them wasn’t there. I have a theory. My sister has a gas stove. I’ve cooked very rarely on a gas stove. I think I may have made something at my sister’s one other time. I’ve heard gas stoves are wonderful and people that use them never want to cook on a non-gas stove again. But I learned a lesson, they may be wonderful to cook with, but they are definitely different. They heat faster. And there may lie my issue. Usually I bring the Brussels sprouts to a boil in the apple juice/water mixture and once it boils I let it simmer for 15 minutes. Usually it takes at least 5 minutes or so to come to a boil, so the Brussels sprouts are soaked in the apple juice for 20 min or so. At my sister’s house, they came to a boil after like 2 min. It through me off, I was busy prepping for the chicken so I didn’t know if I lost track of time or what. But after tasting them, I can tell they didn’t cook in the apple juice long enough. So lesson learned. Lower heat is definitely best with a gas stove. And as for the chicken, the reason I didn’t blog last week was I forgot my camera! And I can’t talk about my great adventures if I can’t show the final masterpiece. So I decided to remake it this weekend so I could talk about it. My mid-week adventure last week was postponed because I went to dinner with a friend. I can easily see how easy it could be for me to get sidetracked from my cooking adventure. Especially when I move to a bigger city and life gets busier and more active. And since there are 360 recipes in this cookbook, and after 6 weeks I’ve only just completed recipes 11, 12, and 13, it’s a pretty good assumption that it will take me months (if not 2 or more years) to finish at this rate. However, I don’t think I could do more than twice a week (not to mention afford it, food is expensive!). To be honest, I do worry about my ability to commit to this and see it through to the end. Commitment has often not been my strong suit. Or as my friend Kate calls it “stick-to-it-ive-ness”. As I’m going through this journey of exploration, that is one of the things about myself that I’ve really had to face. I can (at times) be flaky. I get really excited about something in the beginning, and when it’s new and fresh I’m all in. But as things get boring, or monotonous, or (sadly) too hard sometimes, I flake out or check out. I’m not beating myself up. Clearly if I couldn’t stick with anything, I wouldn’t have made it close to a stage to accept my degree. But when it isn’t something that doesn’t involve a life-changing movement, I tend to not be as committed. I’m not sure I’m looking for any answers by writing this. Maybe by putting it out there, I’ll somehow unleash my “dirty little secret” and free myself from my issues with “stick-to-it-ive-ness”. I really want to stick with this. I’ve gotten so much from this in just 6 weeks. And not just really good food to eat. J I think this has helped with my self-confidence. I really am beginning to see I can truly cook. And I’m not just a casual cook, I can take on more complicated things like Tiramisù. And my passion for cooking excites me. It’s got me thinking maybe something could grow from all of this. You never know what paths life will take you down.And more than that, this has given me something I look forward to. This experience is like my baby of sorts. So I’m hoping all of the passion I have for this keeps me going as life gets hectic.

As for what I cooked this weekend, since I didn’t cook mid-week, I wanted to make up some ground. So I went through and found a few recipes that wouldn’t be too taxing. And since it was the weekend, I thought making breakfast would be a good idea. There were only slight differences in this fried egg recipe and others I’ve used. Differences such as, after letting the eggs cook in the pan with the cover on for 3 minutes, I flipped the egg over to make it over-hard. I think in the past I just let it cook in the pan covered for 5 min or so. And I didn’t season them at all until they were done. I think I’ve seasoned them in the pan before. But I learned that salting eggs during the cooking process will mar the yolks. The blueberry pancakes weren’t too spectacularly different either. Flour, baking soda, baking powder, sugar…yep all the standard things you’d expect in pancakes. Even the method for cooking was pretty standard. Although I did seem to run into an issue while cooking them. The book had me brush butter on the griddle before starting and then after each batch of pancakes finished, brush more butter on before doing the next round. For some reason, I had the darndest time with the 2^nd round of pancakes.Although I didn’t turn the heat up, they cooked faster than the 1^st round. And since me and my “follow the recipe to a T” self was going strictly by the time the cookbook suggested for each side, my 2^nd round of pancakes got darker than I’d like. I refuse to say they were burned…but yeah, they got a little well done. The 3^rd batch went the same way. And it was only after 6 “well done” pancakes that I thought maybe I shouldn’t take the recipe strictly as gospel. I rinsed the pan with cool water after round 3, and started with a clean griddle. And after that, things went better. I also started doing one pancake at a time just to be safe. And thanks to this cooking adventure, I’ve probably got breakfast at work all week! I’m still trying to balance trying to learn these new techniques with when should I punt and do my own method to get good results.I’m sure each thing Williams-Sonoma says is for a purpose and will result in some fancy dish in the end. But I think I may need several cracks at a few of these recipes before I get it down to a science.

While I cooked breakfast, I put on my inspirational music to set the mood. But when making my Sautéed Chicken Breasts with Whole-Grain Mustard Sauce, I decided to watch the Food Network while I cooked. I used to watch the Food Network all the time when I cooked, but it’s been awhile since I’ve done that. I’m glad I did though. I watched a few episodes of the ultimate cooking challenges while I cooked, and having those cooks in the background going through all kind of mini-catastrophes was a good setting for my experience. J The recipe isn’t difficult. Take 4 chicken breasts, season them with salt and pepper, and then brown the chicken in melted butter and canola oil. This did provide a new technique I’d never heard of. While browning the chicken, don’t move the chicken at all. After 2 minutes, flip the chicken and brown, without touching, for another 2-1/2 minutes. I’m not sure what the benefit of not touching the chicken is, but I will say they were extremely juicy chicken breasts once done. Now, regardless of the purpose of the “no touching” method, it is where my mini-catastrophe began. After 2-1/2 minutes on the second side, the chicken wasn’t done. And it needed to have no pink before I moved on to the next step. So I kept rotating sides at 30 second to 1 minute intervals. After 5 minutes, I still saw a little pink. And…I was starting to see black at the bottom of the pan where the butter and oil was starting to char. However, the next part of the recipe calls for you to use the chicken residue to make the sauce. So I didn’t want to cook the chicken in a new pan that wasn’t charring. This same thing actually happened at my sister’s too, it took longer than the cookbook said. But maybe this is where the “cooks hotter and more evenly” gas stove was better. At my sister’s, the chicken eventually got done and the residue in the pan wasn’t completely charred. At my house…not so much. I refuse to say the residue burned…but yeah, it got a little well done. J (Do you see a theme for the day?). Once I saw no pink, I put the chicken in the oven to keep warm. To make the sauce, I had to sauté a shallot in the “well done” residue for a minute. Then I deglazed the pan by pouring ½ cup of Chardonnay in the pan and letting it reduce down to 2 tablespoons. (Yep, that’s right…I used more alcohol). Once the wine was reduced, I stirred in salt, pepper, and heavy cream until the sauce was thick. The last step was to whisk in the whole-grain mustard. Having made this the previous week without “cooking it well done”, I could tell there was a hint of char redness to the sauce. But the mustard flavoring is so strong and distinct; it overpowered most of the charred taste. It was better when I made it for my family, but still good this time. And I have yet another Williams-Sonoma technique to master. Between the 2+ years it takes me to cook all of these recipes, and the 2+ years I’ll need to repeat each technique, I won’t need another cookbook until 2015.

Now for my last recipe, I actually made it up. Don’t get too excited, it wasn’t anything fancy. In one of my other recipes I sautéed something in the fat from a few strips of bacon. I liked that concept. I also love asparagus. Somehow I merged the concept of sautéing in bacon fat with asparagus and decided to cut up asparagus spears, sauté them in bacon fat with diced red onion, add tomato and sauté for another minute, and then sprinkle parmesean cheese and crumbled bacon on it. I call it a Lashonda original. It was really tasty. I’ll probably only use 2 slices of bacon next time though. I used 4 this time and it produced a little more bacon fat than I would've liked to use. But the flavor was really good nonetheless.

Four recipes in one day! Not sure I’ll be trying that one again soon. Or instead of blogging about my level of commitment, I’ll be blogging about being committed. J Just kidding.