Cooking and Eating as Entertainment

Maki over at Just Bento wrote this week in her Bento Challenge that,

By no means am I saying that everyone should stop eating out. I love going to good restaurants myself. But my reason for going to a restaurant is not really for sustenance. (When I do the household budget, I categorize restaurant meals under ‘entertainment’, not ‘food’.) It’s to have a good time – to try out new dishes and wines, enjoy the ambience, and of course to have a good chat with my friends. If you have the time and money to do this every day for lunch, you are probably not reading this anyway! I’d rather save up by making bentos most of the time, and splurge (entertainment wise and calorie-wise) once in a while.

I feel exactly the same way about eating out. I was so happy to read this idea summed up in this way, and would like to expand upon it.

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Tomato Rice Soup

Note: No matter what angle, placement or camera settings we tried, none of the pictures came out right. If anyone has any photography tips on clearly showing off a bowl of soup, I’d love to hear them, please!

This soup got me through months of laziness and countless colds. It is warm and can be as flavorful, or not, as you need it to be. I used to add a dash of cayenne, which would clear my sinuses out in no time when I was stuffed. Now I like it to be a little less punchy and a bit more savory.

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Cheesy Macaroni with Baked Acorn Squash and Tomato Sauce

Tonight we revisited a successful dish we had found on the Food Network’s website once when we had an abundance of acorn squash. Basically, you fill baked acorn squash with pasta, sausage, tomato sauce, red onions, cheese, and re-bake. We followed the recipe pretty closely the last time we made it (using ditalini shaped pasta instead of rigatoni and halving the recipe). I really liked this dish, except that I found that there ended up being a bit too much squash per serving for my tastes. The squash tasted best to me when it had come into contact with the pasta and sauce, so the deeper areas of squash flesh were left a bit too “squashy” for me. We remedied that issue this time.

The adjustments we made to the recipe were to make it like a big casserole. We followed most of the instructions (except we were low on sausage so we supplemented with some meatballs, and we halved the recipe again). After the squash baked, I scooped it out of its skin into the big pot where we had combined all of the other ingredients. Instead of having the beautiful little servings of pasta inside the squash, the squash flesh is now a part of the sauce. Less adorable, but far more tasty and practical. We thought about baking the entire pot of everything but it was still very warm and we were hungry, so we dug in right away. We also have a ton of very portable leftovers from this dish to take for lunch tomorrow.

I’m quite glad we returned to this dish after 2 years. It doesn’t look like much but its packed with flavor, and thanks to the squash, more varied nutrients than any regular bowl of pasta in tomato sauce.

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Beef and Lamb Chili

On Monday night last week, we made a big vat of chili. I ate chili that night, on Tuesday for lunch, on Wednesday for lunch and on Thursday I was sad that I didn’t have any more chili for lunch. It was so hearty and satisfying each time that I didn’t need any afternoon snack. I thought I’d be sick of it, but this chili seemed to get better each day that it aged in the fridge.

And except for one new ingredient (for us), we didn’t do anything special. That’s why chili rocks – a decent chili can be made with a wide assortment of ingredients. This is a chili we made up, and I’m sure we’ll never make it exactly the same way again but I’ll probably come back to this recipe as a good base since this particular conglomeration was such a success. We weren’t sure about the beans and corn, but they really helped stretch the flavors in this much farther, not to mention help us squeeze a few more servings out of the vat than we could have done without them.

Note: I’m sure we broke dozens of chili “rules.” For one, we didn’t use any chili peppers (or any other hot peppers). You can definitely rectify that if you so choose. If we had had any habanero peppers (the store was out and we were lazy), I definitely would have used them since I love heat.

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Being Gluten-Free and the Benefits of Whole Grains

To be honest, I, like many people, have often been confused by “gluten-free” labels on many products. For one, I had no idea what gluten was. Two, why would someone need to be free of it? I know several people who cannot eat gluten because of Celiac’s Disease, but the gluten-free labels on products these days sort of seemed fadish. A friend of mine had started a “gluten-free” diet when she was trying to lose weight. Since I do not believe in weight-loss diets (just simple well-rounded, moderated, healthy eating all the time), I found myself moved to find out what gluten is and what benefits exist in leaving it out.

These questions have stayed with me for some time and I still haven’t found answers. Though I know that some people truly need to keep their diets free of gluten because of the digestive issues it causes them, it’s hard for me to believe that this disease is so prevalent as to create the buzz I am often hearing about it. Don’t get me wrong, gluten-free restaurants and product lines are great for the people who need them, but is there a reason for someone who doesn’t to patronize them? Please, someone who knows more about this inform me, because it baffles me.

Emily over at Dragonfly: Tales from the Phantom Rickshaw just wrote an interesting post on her family’s reasons for being gluten-free (and dairy-free) and how they did it. She also sprinkles in some interesting points about generally maintaining nutritional value through using unrefined sugars, and fresher, uncracked grains. I learned a lot, and if you are confused about these things as I am, check out her “Gluten-Free Brain Dump,” parts 1, 2, 3 and 4. The last part is especially interesting as it includes her recipe for rice milk and its uses. I think I might try this soon, as rice milk is just plain delicious, and sometimes my stomach is just happier if I avoid dairy.

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Syrian Lemon and Olive Chicken

This recipe was adapted from Jeff Nathan’s “Syrian Lemon Chicken Stew” from his Adventures in Jewish Cooking. I’ve shortened the process by using chicken breast and played around with the seasonings a bit.

This dish combines Mediterranean flavors of cumin, lemon and olive to create a savory but light stew. I love this because it gives me the opportunity to cook with olives, which are fruits I usually only get to enjoy cold. The generic Spanish salad olives I used hit the spot for me, but since the olives are a main source of the flavor in this dish, better olives (or any Mediterranean green olives you like best) will enhance the overall flavor. Pimento is not necessary, but I like it for its briny flavor and the contrasting red color it provides in this otherwise green-yellow concoction.

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