Wow, it's been quite some time since my last post. I have no new pictures to post, as I've been very VERY busy. My new part-time job is quite fun, but it has very long hours, so I've been somewhat attempting to balance that, school, and my teaching job along with some down time, sleep, food, and homework. I'm lucky, I have a study hall in which I can get work done! Now, I just need to bring things to DO in it... my classes that are book- and homework- heavy are on the other days.
I have it very well at my job-- we all get 'family meal' at the end of the shift, which is usually a version of one of the specials or whatever we were serving that night, and it's always incredible! I haven't been able to work out in about a 3 weeks, though, so I think I'll just see if I can get veggies and/or meat and not the potatoes or rice. Whatever I don't eat, I usually box up and take to school with me the next day, so that works out nicely for me.
The biggest things I need to do are to remember to take a multivitamin in the mornings, cut back on coffee (I drink a cup in the morning as part of my Stewart routine, see earlier post), get better time-management, and find some way of making myself work out. I have mini-dumbbells at home, that shouldn't be so hard... I'm just exhausted when I get home, so the motivation isn't there. Ugh. Oh well, I need to get over that and just do it, ne?
Current goal(s): Make the school culinary team/ become Chapter Vice President of FCCLA.
Sunday, September 30, 2007
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
POW BIFF WHAM!
Curry chicken!! YAY! Served over egg noodles with a roux with awesome spices. Simple salad-- spinach, radish, scallion, and a little lime juice. I made biscuit-scone things from a recipe I found that was really simple and used the flour I had dredged the chicken in as half of the biscuit flour. Garnished with slivered almonds. IT WAS INCREDIBLE!! It had great flavors, I'm going to try and introduce it at the school restaurant.
Sunday, September 9, 2007
UPDATE!
Here are the promised pictures!
Mom went to a party up in NJ over the weekend, so Dad and I decided to throw her a "see ya later" dinner. Grilled flat-iron steak with steamed green beans and garlic-pepper mashed potatoes. I used a mix of Russet and New potatoes. I LOVE using red (New) potatoes, the skins are soooo pretty!
While mom is away, the chefs like to play!
Spring rolls, adapted from a nifty Johnson and Wales recipe book that was complementary with the Career Explorations program in Culinary Arts. I had NONE of the ingredients needed except for the rice wrappers, carrot, and rice vermicelli (aka Glass Noodles). Their version calls for shrimp... we used sautéed pork and apple. They called for lettuce... we used spinach! Curry powder made the whole thing just beyond-description excellent!
The sauce is a pomegranate reduction. I overdid the lime a bit, so it was more bitter than I would have liked. Next time, I'll juice the lime instead of putting in pieces.
Mmm, dinner rolls...
These dinner rolls were OUT OF THIS WORLD. My bread machine is awesome... set it to "dough" and in 1 h 30 you have any of a various list of doughs. These tasted like they came out of a restaurant.. oh wait, they did! My kitchen, that is! A little butter and jam and you had a perfect egg accompaniment for breakfast.
Shrimp, version 1!
Bacon-wrapped shrimp on basil, mozzarella, and pork scallopine. This one was my dad's creation. It was Saturday's dinner, along with the biscuits and spring rolls.
The non-photographed dessert was a chocolate whip with cream puffs. I mentally thwack myself on the forehead for forgetting to photograph it, it was a work of incredible tastiness.
TONIGHT'S MEAL!
Shrimp version 2!
This time, we added a little bit of bleu cheese and served it over chicken! I took action and added a dash of chili powder as well, just to kick it up a bit. Served over spinach and a (sadly pre-made but WHAT A DEAL; my grandfather would be proud) pickled shrimp salad consisting of baby shrimp, peppers, and onion all pickled very nicely. Also came with a roll.
Now that we know how incredible THAT was, we're thinking of trying beef next time in a surf-and-turf idea. I have a feeling that that is going to take it to the next level entirely!
Dessert: a trio of mousses.
I worked on this one for a while, but it was well worth the effort. Lemon and orange mousse and a chocolate "mousse". The chocolate is more of a whip, because it has no gelatin. I'm working on that... I think I'll just try a version of the dark chocolate mousse I made back in July next time. The lemon mousse idea was from a Johnson and Wales Open House back in May or June. I played around with it to make the orange one. It was all very good fun. And now I have breakfast! Woohoo!
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACK BLOOD!
I lie, that's the pomegranate reduction. I thought it had a nice arterial-blood shade though. I have some new Halloween tricks now! That and the glass noodles as some sort of squishy brain-mass or something... teehehehe.
And that is how I spent my weekend!
Mom went to a party up in NJ over the weekend, so Dad and I decided to throw her a "see ya later" dinner. Grilled flat-iron steak with steamed green beans and garlic-pepper mashed potatoes. I used a mix of Russet and New potatoes. I LOVE using red (New) potatoes, the skins are soooo pretty!
While mom is away, the chefs like to play!
Spring rolls, adapted from a nifty Johnson and Wales recipe book that was complementary with the Career Explorations program in Culinary Arts. I had NONE of the ingredients needed except for the rice wrappers, carrot, and rice vermicelli (aka Glass Noodles). Their version calls for shrimp... we used sautéed pork and apple. They called for lettuce... we used spinach! Curry powder made the whole thing just beyond-description excellent!
The sauce is a pomegranate reduction. I overdid the lime a bit, so it was more bitter than I would have liked. Next time, I'll juice the lime instead of putting in pieces.
Mmm, dinner rolls...
These dinner rolls were OUT OF THIS WORLD. My bread machine is awesome... set it to "dough" and in 1 h 30 you have any of a various list of doughs. These tasted like they came out of a restaurant.. oh wait, they did! My kitchen, that is! A little butter and jam and you had a perfect egg accompaniment for breakfast.
Shrimp, version 1!
Bacon-wrapped shrimp on basil, mozzarella, and pork scallopine. This one was my dad's creation. It was Saturday's dinner, along with the biscuits and spring rolls.
The non-photographed dessert was a chocolate whip with cream puffs. I mentally thwack myself on the forehead for forgetting to photograph it, it was a work of incredible tastiness.
TONIGHT'S MEAL!
Shrimp version 2!
This time, we added a little bit of bleu cheese and served it over chicken! I took action and added a dash of chili powder as well, just to kick it up a bit. Served over spinach and a (sadly pre-made but WHAT A DEAL; my grandfather would be proud) pickled shrimp salad consisting of baby shrimp, peppers, and onion all pickled very nicely. Also came with a roll.
Now that we know how incredible THAT was, we're thinking of trying beef next time in a surf-and-turf idea. I have a feeling that that is going to take it to the next level entirely!
Dessert: a trio of mousses.
I worked on this one for a while, but it was well worth the effort. Lemon and orange mousse and a chocolate "mousse". The chocolate is more of a whip, because it has no gelatin. I'm working on that... I think I'll just try a version of the dark chocolate mousse I made back in July next time. The lemon mousse idea was from a Johnson and Wales Open House back in May or June. I played around with it to make the orange one. It was all very good fun. And now I have breakfast! Woohoo!
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACK BLOOD!
I lie, that's the pomegranate reduction. I thought it had a nice arterial-blood shade though. I have some new Halloween tricks now! That and the glass noodles as some sort of squishy brain-mass or something... teehehehe.
And that is how I spent my weekend!
Glee!
I have a job now!!! One that pays!! Yeah, the catering business is great-- as long as you actually have jobs lined up.
This job is incredible: part-time, weekends, dinner shift garde-manger. I'm sloooooowly working my way up to become (assistant) pastry chef. I went for a go-see Wednesday and it went really well! I felt all official in my chef coat, red bandanna, and Seabee cap... and I actually got to bring my knife bag of awesome! I do so dearly love my knives... they are very nice. It's just too bad I (don't think) I'll be able to use them at J&W U. They give you a very nice knife set though, and it's included in the tuition cost.
We had some Roadrunners from J&W U come to our culinary class last week. What/ Who are Roadrunners, you say? They are students who take a term off (or employees) to talk about the university and its awesomeness. At any rate, one of the Roadrunners is a former student of my school and was on our culinary team for competitions in FCCLA. She's a Baking and Pastry major, so we all got a nice lesson in prettifying puff pastry and making cute little apple tarts. They were adorable AND tasty! A very enjoyable experience.
I have some lovely photographs of the food from the past two nights, which I will be updating tonight. I just have to finish tonight's!
Jyaa ne!
This job is incredible: part-time, weekends, dinner shift garde-manger. I'm sloooooowly working my way up to become (assistant) pastry chef. I went for a go-see Wednesday and it went really well! I felt all official in my chef coat, red bandanna, and Seabee cap... and I actually got to bring my knife bag of awesome! I do so dearly love my knives... they are very nice. It's just too bad I (don't think) I'll be able to use them at J&W U. They give you a very nice knife set though, and it's included in the tuition cost.
We had some Roadrunners from J&W U come to our culinary class last week. What/ Who are Roadrunners, you say? They are students who take a term off (or employees) to talk about the university and its awesomeness. At any rate, one of the Roadrunners is a former student of my school and was on our culinary team for competitions in FCCLA. She's a Baking and Pastry major, so we all got a nice lesson in prettifying puff pastry and making cute little apple tarts. They were adorable AND tasty! A very enjoyable experience.
I have some lovely photographs of the food from the past two nights, which I will be updating tonight. I just have to finish tonight's!
Jyaa ne!
Monday, September 3, 2007
Labor Day FEAST
It's Labor Day weekend in the US, so I have NO SCHOOL TODAY!!!! Wheeee!! I got to spend my morning baking a cake that turned out to be pretty darn tasty:
Then I got to visit my most incredible boyfriend of 7 months, Captain Obvious, and give him some!
Here's a bit of what I gave him for his birthday:
The big thing in the middle is a mudcup (what happens when I leave eggs out of a torte, decide it's edible, and FREEZE IT). The things on the side are the actual tortes, which I turned into muffin-like things to make them bite-sized. I also made a version of the Milano cookies from my all-time favorite brand of cookies and made them from scratch out of an almond cookie and a mint-chocolate or raspberry chocolate ganache. The leftover raspberry ganache went into tart shells and made cute little choco-raspberry tartes.
I made some candies, but also forgot to photograph those. They were a variation on those found in the Hershey's chocolate recipe book from the 80's. They were a BIG hit, so now I'm going to play around with them even more and make more flavors.
Anyhow, back to today!
I decided I was going to try something new, since it was a holiday and I had the time. Lucky for me, the local grocery store had ground chicken on sale as well as some house-made sausages. One was blueberry cinnamon (not bad, I made them for breakfast). The other was sweet Italian (INCREDIBLE). I made chicken-burgers out of the chicken, with chopped scallions, Herbes de Provence, (gr, I DESPISE how hard it is to get proper French spelling in here without a long involved process), tarragon, an egg, and some breadcrumbs (probably about... 1/2- 3/4 cup for the whole pound and a half or so of chicken). They grilled beautifully!
Here are the results:
Chicken burgers, sausages, and ciabatta bread.
POTATO POTATO POTATO!
Kudos to Dad on his mad presentation skills of the vegetables! Tomato, lettuce, and fancy cucumber!
The full burger.
The all-inclusive plate, now with carrots! (Oh yeah, we had salad too)
Overall, a mad-awesome labor day. Much feasting.
BONUS PIC!! AND WEEBL REFERENCE!!
PEACHES! (and cream... and chocolate shavings)
Then I got to visit my most incredible boyfriend of 7 months, Captain Obvious, and give him some!
Here's a bit of what I gave him for his birthday:
The big thing in the middle is a mudcup (what happens when I leave eggs out of a torte, decide it's edible, and FREEZE IT). The things on the side are the actual tortes, which I turned into muffin-like things to make them bite-sized. I also made a version of the Milano cookies from my all-time favorite brand of cookies and made them from scratch out of an almond cookie and a mint-chocolate or raspberry chocolate ganache. The leftover raspberry ganache went into tart shells and made cute little choco-raspberry tartes.
I made some candies, but also forgot to photograph those. They were a variation on those found in the Hershey's chocolate recipe book from the 80's. They were a BIG hit, so now I'm going to play around with them even more and make more flavors.
Anyhow, back to today!
I decided I was going to try something new, since it was a holiday and I had the time. Lucky for me, the local grocery store had ground chicken on sale as well as some house-made sausages. One was blueberry cinnamon (not bad, I made them for breakfast). The other was sweet Italian (INCREDIBLE). I made chicken-burgers out of the chicken, with chopped scallions, Herbes de Provence, (gr, I DESPISE how hard it is to get proper French spelling in here without a long involved process), tarragon, an egg, and some breadcrumbs (probably about... 1/2- 3/4 cup for the whole pound and a half or so of chicken). They grilled beautifully!
Here are the results:
Chicken burgers, sausages, and ciabatta bread.
POTATO POTATO POTATO!
Kudos to Dad on his mad presentation skills of the vegetables! Tomato, lettuce, and fancy cucumber!
The full burger.
The all-inclusive plate, now with carrots! (Oh yeah, we had salad too)
Overall, a mad-awesome labor day. Much feasting.
BONUS PIC!! AND WEEBL REFERENCE!!
PEACHES! (and cream... and chocolate shavings)
Wednesday, August 8, 2007
The Pictures, they are here!
Here are all of the photos that I've been meaning to put up but haven't. Truth is, I had lost the camera for about a week-- my mom had put them back in the "case" they're supposed to be in and I didn't know. I combed my room (a mess on a good day) for them (cleaning it in the process, yay!) and didn't find them. I looked in all the places around the house I had been recently. This morning, I tried again and decided to flip open the camera bag to see if the other camera was in there, and *shock* there were BOTH cameras! Yaaaay.
Without further adieu:
Great big bag-0-cookies. Yum! The combined efforts of the entire baking and pastry class bundled into one giant piece of plastic wrap.
Convenience! This is my class-issued apron that has now become a carrying case for the uber bag of cookies and some other tasty treats.. shown below!
Yaay! For Squished Pastry! This is what happens when you use an apron as a carrying case and the only method of carrying your goods is with a plate and some plastic wrap!
I hate wasting food, that's why I took 5 shortcakes. They were well-enjoyed by my family.
Ahhh, home again. And so is Dad.. whee! He brings BAGELS from NEW JERSEY! *happy dance*
It is IMPOSSIBLE to find bagels like the ones from "up north" here in the South. This one has sliced tomato, capers, and sauteed onions. If we had remembered to grab some smoked salmon at the grocery store, then there would've been that on there too. And cream cheese.
Shrimp! Joy! Shrimp cocktail, half plain, half with melon balls and cappacolla (Dad, fix my spelling please on the cold cuts) from Casa Del Sol, one of the best places in Hillsdale, NJ to get good Italian stuff. Especially cold cuts. And fresh mozzarella cheese. The cocktail sauce was made by my dad and contains ketchup, worcestershire sauce, and wasabi paste (we were out of horseradish!). It was AWESOME.
Course the second of that night of feasting: Parsley mashed new potatoes (new potatoes are those little red ones that taste so good with the skin on); blanched green beans with sauteed garlic, onion, and slivered almonds (yaay prepackaged snackfoods!); and a braised pork chop. The pork chop was floured before cooking with garlic, paprika, chili powder, salt, and pepper. YUM.
Now for something completely different!! This was a course in a 3-courser I made while it was just mom and I. This was course #2: Grilled eggplant with heirloom tomatoes, mozzarella cheese, and gorgonzola cheese topped with a basil leaf. I love summer only for the food-- the tomatoes come out with all sorts of tasty varieties!
This one was fun-and-a-half to make and eat! Fajitas turned into lettuce wraps due to a lack of tortillas! This is grilled steak, and sauteed veggies including bell peppers, mushrooms, onions, celery (odd sounding but was a nice subtle difference and filler), and garlic. The sauce was a brainchild of my dad's containing soy sauce, coffee, wasabi, and a few other things that currently have slipped my mind.
Here it is without the lettuce, and some crunchy noodles I picked up at the Bon Odori! Ta-da, instant culture change.
What do you do when papaya's on sale? You eat it! And make fun desserts out of it. This one was neat, involving a "bird's nest" idea. A ring of papaya with bananas Foster in the center topped with a mound of vanilla ice cream and some whipped cream with a plum sauce. WOW was it ever good. It was a tropical awesome-explosion.
Finally, the plate of doom. This was a way to use up a bunch of the cold cuts at once. It started out with an idea for an antipasto but turned into a platter of doom. Sopressata (sp?) hot and sweet, cappaccolla (hot and sweet), prosciutto, mozzarella (sadly it was the storebought not fresh), artichoke hearts, and tomatoes on top of a salad of lettuce, onion, cucumber, carrot, and sliced black olives. We had just re-located my dad's mandolin (slicer) from about 30 years ago or more and I had some FUN with it.
There are all of the photos I've been meaning to upload but haven't. Enjoy!
Without further adieu:
Great big bag-0-cookies. Yum! The combined efforts of the entire baking and pastry class bundled into one giant piece of plastic wrap.
Convenience! This is my class-issued apron that has now become a carrying case for the uber bag of cookies and some other tasty treats.. shown below!
Yaay! For Squished Pastry! This is what happens when you use an apron as a carrying case and the only method of carrying your goods is with a plate and some plastic wrap!
I hate wasting food, that's why I took 5 shortcakes. They were well-enjoyed by my family.
Ahhh, home again. And so is Dad.. whee! He brings BAGELS from NEW JERSEY! *happy dance*
It is IMPOSSIBLE to find bagels like the ones from "up north" here in the South. This one has sliced tomato, capers, and sauteed onions. If we had remembered to grab some smoked salmon at the grocery store, then there would've been that on there too. And cream cheese.
Shrimp! Joy! Shrimp cocktail, half plain, half with melon balls and cappacolla (Dad, fix my spelling please on the cold cuts) from Casa Del Sol, one of the best places in Hillsdale, NJ to get good Italian stuff. Especially cold cuts. And fresh mozzarella cheese. The cocktail sauce was made by my dad and contains ketchup, worcestershire sauce, and wasabi paste (we were out of horseradish!). It was AWESOME.
Course the second of that night of feasting: Parsley mashed new potatoes (new potatoes are those little red ones that taste so good with the skin on); blanched green beans with sauteed garlic, onion, and slivered almonds (yaay prepackaged snackfoods!); and a braised pork chop. The pork chop was floured before cooking with garlic, paprika, chili powder, salt, and pepper. YUM.
Now for something completely different!! This was a course in a 3-courser I made while it was just mom and I. This was course #2: Grilled eggplant with heirloom tomatoes, mozzarella cheese, and gorgonzola cheese topped with a basil leaf. I love summer only for the food-- the tomatoes come out with all sorts of tasty varieties!
This one was fun-and-a-half to make and eat! Fajitas turned into lettuce wraps due to a lack of tortillas! This is grilled steak, and sauteed veggies including bell peppers, mushrooms, onions, celery (odd sounding but was a nice subtle difference and filler), and garlic. The sauce was a brainchild of my dad's containing soy sauce, coffee, wasabi, and a few other things that currently have slipped my mind.
Here it is without the lettuce, and some crunchy noodles I picked up at the Bon Odori! Ta-da, instant culture change.
What do you do when papaya's on sale? You eat it! And make fun desserts out of it. This one was neat, involving a "bird's nest" idea. A ring of papaya with bananas Foster in the center topped with a mound of vanilla ice cream and some whipped cream with a plum sauce. WOW was it ever good. It was a tropical awesome-explosion.
Finally, the plate of doom. This was a way to use up a bunch of the cold cuts at once. It started out with an idea for an antipasto but turned into a platter of doom. Sopressata (sp?) hot and sweet, cappaccolla (hot and sweet), prosciutto, mozzarella (sadly it was the storebought not fresh), artichoke hearts, and tomatoes on top of a salad of lettuce, onion, cucumber, carrot, and sliced black olives. We had just re-located my dad's mandolin (slicer) from about 30 years ago or more and I had some FUN with it.
There are all of the photos I've been meaning to upload but haven't. Enjoy!
Sunday, August 5, 2007
Whoops
Wow, it's been a while since I said I would post the pics, hasn't it? It's been quite a busy past two weeks. We had a huge yard sale yesterday, so getting ready for that was quite time-consuming. I have also applied for numerous jobs and have been prepping for the Bon Odori!
What is the Bon Odori, you ask? It is Charlotte's version of the Japanese "end-of-summer" festival that is usually held on the 8th of August. Quite fun. Pics tonight (hopefully)!
What is the Bon Odori, you ask? It is Charlotte's version of the Japanese "end-of-summer" festival that is usually held on the 8th of August. Quite fun. Pics tonight (hopefully)!
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