Desperation Dinner

A freezer ready meal is a working mom's best friend.  However, ever since I read Michael Pollan's book--you know which one--and subsequently ditched the Lean Cuisines (I still jump when I see the sign in the supermarket: 4 for $12!), my freezer is full of Belle and Evans chicken parts, grass fed meat, whole wheat flour and not much else.  Not exactly the makings of a desperation dinner.

Then I had a brainstorm.  What about a frozen burrito, like the kind they have at Trader Joe's?  So I whipped up a batch for dinner, deliberately making extra for the freezer. 

Don't you just love tomato paste in the tube?  Forget Kindle, here is real progress.  I flavored two cans of pinto beans with two tablespoons of paste, onions, garlic, chili powder and cumin. 

Then I toasted some flour tortillas over my stove's open flame.

I piled each tortilla with a generous spoonful of beans, some leftover rice from the fridge, and some grated cheddar cheese.  The picture does not do it justice.  It was really good, especially with sour cream and salsa.  The only thing missing is cilantro.  Next time.

And here they are...freezer ready.  Like money in the bank!

Vegetarian Bean Burritos

1 medium onion, chopped

2 garlic cloves, chopped

1 medium japeno, chopped

2 T olive oil

1 tsp. cumin, more to taste

1 tsp. chili powder, more to taste

1 1/2 T. tomato paste

2 cans of pinto beans (15 oz.), drained and rinsed

a handful of chpped cilantro

1 c. cooked rice (could be brown rice, I guess)

6 oz. shredded cheddar or monterey jack cheese

6 burrito sized flour tortillas

salsa and sour cream for serving

1.  Heat oil in large saucepan over medium heat.  Saute onions, garlic, jalepeno, chile powder, cumin and a good pinch of salt until golden, about 10 minutes.  Add tomato paste and cook a minute or so more. 

2.  Add beans and 1 c. of water, bring to boil, reduce heat to medium and simmer, stirring occasionally until thickened, about 10 minutes.  Remove from heat.  Stir in cilantro.

3.  If you have a gas stove, toast tortillas. 

4.  Fill with bean mixture, rice, and cheese.  Fold and serve. 

To Freeze:  Wrap in plastic wrap, then aluminium foil.  To reheat: Nuke for 1 1/2 to 2 minutes straight from freezer, then bake in 350 degree oven for 12 minutes.  I think you can just microwave them, too--perfect for a work lunch!

Weird Craving

While the rest of the modern world is busy getting their post New Year's diet on, I find myself craving...a chimichanga.  Which is weird because I can't remember when or where I might have had one before.  But there is definitely a chimichanga lodged in my memory bank.  It is crispy and corny and wickedly greasy and good.  But how to make one?  An Internet search turned up plenty of recipes--but these were corpulent specimens, more like fried burritos than the crunchy little cigars I remember from somewhere.  Typing in "skinny chimichangas" was no help either--you wouldn't believe how many "diet" versions of chimis there are out there! Who in their right mind wants to eat a Weight Watchers chimichanga?
 

So, I invented my own.  The filling was easy enough--sauteed tomatoes, onions, garlic, yellow peppers, and chopped roasted chicken seasoned with cumin, chili powder and oregano, with a healthy amount of cilantro stirred in at the end.  Filling the tortillas was more of a challenge--they kept cracking, even after I took Emeril's suggestion and nuked them for a few seconds under a damp paper towel.  Eventually, I ended up twice frying them--first dipping them in hot oil for a few seconds per side until pliable, then filling and rolling them, then frying them a second time until golden brown. 

Okay, so maybe they are a little plumper than they should be...but so am I.  Happy New Year!

Ten a Day

Two straight days of cooking and some serious holiday eating has left me culinarily drained and feeling like a total beast.  Too many cookbooks!  Too much rich food!  I briefly considered a diet, then vetoed that idea--all that emphasis on foods I shouldn't eat seems to invariably lead to failure and self-loathing.  No thank you, and pass the tirimisu leftovers.  Then my sister suggested eating 10 a day--servings of fruits and vegetables, that is.  With the emphasis on adding healthy and delicious foods to my diet, this is a plan I can get excited about.

So why the chocolate, then?  It's the secret ingredient in my vegetarian chili.  I"ve made this so many times, I hardly need a recipe.  It's fast, cheap, easy and filling, and counts as at least two of my veggie servings. 

Which still only brings me to seven servings for the day.  But the night is young...and there is a pear with my name on it in the fridge. 

Last Squash Standing

This is it...the last squash standing, my final purchase at the Port Washington farmers market before it closed for the season.  He has outlasted the potatoes and shallots, and even the garlic.  He stands alone, a reminder of the vegetable bounty that was once mine for the choosing. 

And now he is dinner.  It was that, or watch him grow soft, or develop some kind of weird vegetable mold.  Admittedly, butternut squash is not my favorite.  Plus, I never seem to know what to do with them. The vast majority of butternut sqash seem destined for soup, and squash soups, despite any funky additions, always end up tasting like baby food. So once again, I turned to the following preparation, what is fast becoming my "old standby" when it comes to butternut squash.

It features this remarkably underrated product, plus some crisply sauteed shallots, and the squash roasted in cubes...

...finished with some lightly wilted baby spinach leaves and crumbled Amish blue cheese.

It was a tasty sendoff...

Oh my darling...

One of the few perks of the season are the crates of clementines that begin arriving at the market in early December.  However, even with my daily regimen of two clementines after lunch, it's still a challenge to finish a whole box before they go soft.  With six sorry looking specimens staring up at me, I quickly revised a recipe for Spicy Orange Chicken with Snow Peas and Red Pepper from my splattered old copy of All The Best Stir-Fries by Joie Warner.

Using the zest and the juice made for a bright tasting dish.  The chili paste added just enough heat to balance the sweetness.  A sunny dinner on one of the first truly cold nights of winter. 

Spicy Clementine Chicken

1 lb. skinless, boneless chicken breasts cut into 1/4 inch strips

2 T water

2 T cornstarch

1/2 tsp. salt

4 T vegetable oil

1/2 c. fresh squeezed clementine juice

Finely grated zest of one clementine

4 tsp. sugar

4 tsp. rice vinegar

2 tsp. soy sauce

1 tsp. chinese chili paste

1 T cornstarch

1/2 tsp. Japanese sesame oil

2 garlic cloves, chopped

2 T grated ginger

1/2 red pepper, seeded and cut into julienne

10 large snow peas, trimmed and sliced in half lengthwise

     Combine chicken with water in a small bowl; thoroughly stir in cornstarch and salt, then 2 T of oil; set aside to marinate for 30 minutes or up to 24 hours, covered in the refrigerator.

     Combine juice, zest, sugar, rice vinegar, soy sauce, chili paste, cornstarch and sesame oil in a small bowl.

     Heat 1 T of oil in a large skillet or wok over high heat.  When hot, add garlic, ginger, red pepper, and snow peas and toss for 1 minute; remove to a plate (be careful not to overcook snow peas!).  Add 1 T oil, add chicken, and stir-fry for 3 minutes or until opaque and cooked through.  Return vegetables to the pan, restir clementine-juice mixture and add, stirring until lightly glazed.  Serves 4.

Memories, Preserved

With summer winding down, and September and school looming large, my parents and I retreated to Shelter Island for a final weekend by the ocean.  We crashed the private beach of a swanky resort, and within moments were basking in the guazy glow of opulence and indolence all around us--without spending $420 a night!  We dug our beach chairs into the sand and concentrated hard on enjoying our last 48 hours of freedom.  For Dad, that meant making sure every inch of his bare flesh was covered with clothing, then inserting earbuds into his ears and staring vacantly at the seagulls.  Mom wasted no time slipping into an unresponsive stupor while the backs of her legs fried.  I consumed books whole chapters at a time, pausing every so often to watch the visible annoyance on the faces of the legitimate hotel guests as the wind flapped their swanky umbrellas.  It was glorious.

On the drive home, we approached Wickham's Fruit Farm, and looking to prolong our mini vacation, we stopped to pick our own peaches.  They were heavy on the trees, thick on the ground, and warm in our hands.  We were hungry, so we ate as we filled our bushel baskets with the tangy, yellow-fleshed variety, as well as the sweeter white ones.  We finished our feast with crisp, yeasty, cinnamon sugar donuts straight from the fryer into white paper bags--the best I've ever eaten.  When I got home, I made peach preserves from the recipe on the back of the Sure-Jell box.  It was my first attempt at preserving, and it was throroughly gratifying to see the peaches transformed into adorable little jars of jam on my shelves.  Whether the jam was fit for human consumption was another story.

Mid-November, I pried open a jar, and encouraged by the strong sucking sound as the cap came off, proceeded to make Jam Crumb Cake (at Epicurious) for the church coffee hour.  Beneath a layer of cinnamony crumbs, the jam tasted almost as sweet as those remaining days of summer--and the church members lived to see another Sunday.

The Antidote

Why do I always feel like a truck rolled over me at the end of the working week?  Half asleep at the wheel, I navigated my way home through the aggressive Friday afternoon traffic, staggered across the parking lot trailing fourteen bags in my wake, and stumbled through the door to find...a centipede.  And not just an ordinary centipede, either, but the great grandpappy of centipedes.  He was like four centipedes stuck together.  He was perched on the wall above the sofa, his fringe of legs undulating a greeting.  The instinct to run was very strong.
     
Have you ever swatted a centipede? They are not very quick, which is good. But they sort of explode like firecrackers, their parts flying every which way. I was grateful this guy's parts flew behind the sofa because I was free to ignore them and head to the kitchen for a glass of wine to still my shaking hands.  Then I rustled up this dish:

It's a quick hash of yellow potatoes, thick cut bacon and barely wilted baby spinach leaves, with my latest obsession nestled on top: a poached egg. This was the perfect antidote to work-weariness and an epic confrontation with an insect.  Followed by my other current obsession, Kozy Shack flan, and it almost felt like the weekend had arrived.