Homemade Summer: Vanilla Bean Marshmallows

A few weeks ago in a post I mentioned that I wanted to do something I dubbed "homemade summer", where every week or two I would make, photograph, and write about something that is typically bought pre-made but is possible to make in a home kitchen. In our world of prepackaged and processed foods, many people don't even realize it's possible- let alone fairly easy- to make things like marshmallows, condiments, yogurt, etc at home. But it is possible, and the results are often so, sooo much better than what you would get at the store.

I thought marshmallows would be a fun way to kick off this project since they are pretty simple, delicious, and arguably the most important part of the quintessential summer treat- the s'more. I made a pretty big batch and gave some to my dad for his birthday. This recipe is really easy (I whipped it together in about an hour before I went to work on my birthday) and uses ingredients you likely already have on hand. The result is a soft, spongy, marshmallow that acts just the way a marshmallow should: it roasts over a fire, melts in hot cocoa, and squishes nicely between a couple graham crackers. It also tastes just like a store bought marshmallow, only better! The vanilla flavor is more present and it tastes sugary and fresh instead of processed. If you're so inclined, I'd definitely recommend whipping up a bag of these to take on your next camping trip instead of opting for the store-bought stuff!

I used Smitten Kitchen's recipe for marshmallows, only I decreased the gelatin slightly as I only had 3 envelopes on hand.

Ingredients
Confectioners sugar for dusting/tossing marshmallows
3 envelopes unflavored gelatin
1 cup cold water, divided
2 cups cane sugar
1/2 cup light corn syrup
1/4 tsp salt
2 large egg whites
1 scraped vanilla bean (I also added about 1/4 tsp vanilla to up the vanilla flavor, as my vanilla bean was a bit old and dried out)

Oil the sides and bottom of a 9 by 13 square baking dish. I own only one ceramic rectangular casserole dish which I have used for just about every recipe that requires a casserole dish on this website... so I made do with that. Something with sharp edges, like a sheet cake pan, would be much better though.

Dust the dish with powdered sugar

Use an electric mixer to beat the egg whites until they just form stiff peaks. Reserve in a separate bowl for later.

 Place the gelatin in the (cleaned) bowl of the mixer. Pour half a cup of the cold water over the gelatin to allow it to set.

In a saucepan, combine sugar, corn syrup, salt and the remaining 1/2 cup water over low heat, stirring until sugar is dissolved. When the mixture has become clear, raise the temperature to medium and allow the mixture to boil without stirring until it has reached a temperature of 240 degrees F. I do not own a candy thermometer, but Deb says this will take about 12 minutes so I set my timer to that and it seemed to be the right amount of time :)

Remove pan from heat and pour directly over gelatin in the mixer bowl, stirring until gelatin is dissolved. With the whisk attachment, beat the gelatin/sugar mixture until it is thick, white, and tripled in volume (about 6-10 mins). It will look a lot like marshmallow fluff, and it's just as gooey and delicious!

 Add the whipped egg whites back into the mixer bowl along with the vanilla bean scrapings and/or any other flavorings you'd like to use.

Whip until combined, and then dump the whole mixture into the oiled, dusted baking dish. Don't worry too much about getting every last bit in there, as this stuff is really sticky and gooey and hard to work with without making a mess! Dust the top with a generous amount of powdered sugar.

Let the marshmallows set, uncovered in the fridge for several hours or overnight.

Once the marsh have set, run a thin knife along the edges of the dish and then use your fingers to slowly pry the giant marshmallow from the dish. Working on a counter dusted with plenty of powdered sugar, cut the marshmallow mat into strips and then 1 inch squares

Toss the marshmallows with even more powdered sugar to keep the sticky cut sides from holding them together. And that's all there is to it! Fresh, homemade marshmallows perfect for your next camping trip or hot cocoa mug (or even a cup of coffee in the morning!)

<3 Em

What's been happening and what's coming up next:

It's that time of the semester! Final papers/projects/tests that were so safely in the distant future for the first few months of the year suddenly have very real, very quickly approaching due dates. It always seems to happen so suddenly. It's a whirlwind of work and stress and freaking out feeling like I'll never get it all done and then, abruptly, it's all over and I have the whole summer ahead of me. I'm not quite at that part yet but I am very close.

So yeah, my presence here on this blog has been limited because of that and probably will continue to be for at least the next week as I finish things up. I had a 5 page paper due this past Monday, another one yesterday, an assignment due this evening, and a couple little short papers to do this weekend... then a quick presentation next wednesday, and then 2 finals and one more 5 page paper between May 6th-8th. Shouldn't be too horrible, but enough keep me busy and remind me that it's not summer, not yet.

There's a lot to look forward to when the semester finally is over, though! My 22nd birthday is on May 10th, and although I'll actually be working and doing pretty much nothing interesting on that day, Colton and I are going to leave the next day for a vacation in honor of my birthday. There's nothing in particular that I really want, so a trip instead of presents is my kind of birthday celebration. We'll be spending some time in Prescott for Mother's Day and my dad's birthday, which is the day after mine, and then heading to LA to go to Disneyland and California Adventure! After that we are spending a couple days in San Diego where we'll hit up the beach, maybe go to a baseball game, and just relax. Should be a lot of fun :) It will be the best way to end the school year and kick off the summer!

Speaking of summer, I'm planning on doing a little weekly feature here on my blog for about 15 weeks through my summer vacation. It's going to be called "homemade summer"- every week I'm going to try to cook and blog about something that one would typically just buy already made at the store. A blog I read called Macheesmo does something like this that he calls the homemade trials, where he tries to deduce whether it's better to buy something premade versus making it yourself at home based on cost, time, taste, and nutrition. I'm not going to be trying to figure out if/convince you that making something at home is better, I'm just going to be doing it to a. see if I can, b. have fun, and c. appreciate the differences!

Here are a few things I'm thinking of trying to make: Ricotta, mozzarella, marshmallows, pickles, corned beef, butter, bagels, yogurt, chocolate, nutella, mustard, and many other things. If you have any ideas for things that are possible to make at home but that most people just buy at the store, let me know!

Alright, I'm off to work on a couple assignments before I go to work tonight. Have a nice weekend!

Slowcooker Chicken Tikka Masala

Food and cooking are pretty high on my list of priorities. It's really important to me to be aware of what I'm eating and to do my best to make sure that I make it myself from wholesome, healthy ingredients. Sometimes I'm a little TOO obsessive actually- I have a tiny panic attack whenever Colton wants to go out for lunch or I'm attending an event where I'm not in control of (and thus don't know the calories/ingredients of) the food. Still working on loosening up with that, but it's really just because I care very much about what fuels my body!

A lot of times though, spending 30 mins- an hour cooking, as much as I LOVE it, is not what I want to do or have time for in between working and going to school. I only end up cooking 4 dinners a week (the nights I don't work) and try to use up the leftovers for the other 3 nights and lunches throughout the week. Usually at least 1 and often 2 of the days that I cook, I use my crockpot to cut down even more on prep time.

I loooove my crockpot. Colton bought it for me this last Christmas and it has gotten a ton of use since then. There is so much you can use it for! My favorite thing to make in it is some variation of shredded chicken and sauce. We've done buffalo chicken sandwiches, bbq chicken sandwiches, asian glazed chicken, salsa chicken, and this really yummy chicken tikka masala, among other things.

One thing I DON'T like about crockpot recipes is that often they are paired with other "shortcuts" that totally ruin the nutritional value of the food and thus the point of cooking at home! I hate and NEVER use crockpot recipes that tell you to use cream-of-anything soup (full of fat and sodium), seasoning packets (like ranch, italian dressing, gravy, etc- they are all full of chemicals and sodium and are an expensive and unhealthy stand in for real, better tasting spices), or whole bottles of preservative-laden chemically sauces when it's easy to just make your own. In my crockpot recipes, I try to break the bond between 'easy' and 'unhealthy/processed/as-few-ingredients-as-possible'. This meal is tossed into the crockpot in 10 minutes using all natural ingredients and is super delicious!

Chicken tikka masala is everybody's favorite Indian dish that isn't really an Indian dish ;) creamy, tangy, spicy, and over a scoop of rice it's a delicious and filling meal! It tastes decadent but this recipe, which uses fat free greek yogurt and just a smidge of half and half is only 181 calories per serving of chicken. With rice and parsley or green onions on top, the total is only 353 calories per serving. This is based off of 3/4 cup of chicken with sauce and 1/4 cup DRY rice which is usually between 1/2-1 cup cooked rice.

For my personal favorite Indian dish that happens to be a vegetarian version of this recipe, check out my recipe for Paneer Masala! It's a bit more complicated and probably a bit more heavy on the calories but it's just as delicious!

Chicken Tikka Masala
Serves 4

1 chicken breast (raw=31 cals/oz- this recipe based on a 13 oz raw breast)

¼ yellow onion

2 cloves garlic

½ tbsp. fresh ginger

1 cup tomato puree

½ cup greek yogurt

½ tbsp. garam masala

1 tsp cumin

½ tsp paprika

½ tsp salt

¼ tsp cinnamon

¼ tsp cracked black pepper

½ tsp cayenne

1 bay leaf

¼ cup half and half

1 tsp cornstarch

2 tbsp parsley or green onions

1 cup dry brown rice 

 

 Finely dice 1/4 of a yellow onion and toss into your crockpot.

 Peel the ginger and garlic, mince them up, and throw them in with the onions.

 Get together all your spices. You can just measure them right into the crockpot or make a spice mix separately and add it in a bit at a time to taste. I used all the spices called for, I just wanted to take a picture of them :)

 Add the tomato puree, greek yogurt, and spices to the crockpot and stir to combine. This is when you could adjust the spices to your preferences if you'd like. Toss in the bay leaf once everything is all mixed up.

 Grab a chicken breast- frozen, thawed, whatever- and add it to the pot. Spoon some sauce over the top to coat it. When I buy chicken breast (usually in packs of 5) I put them all in individual ziplock bags and freeze them so that I can just grab one whenever I need without having to defrost the whole bunch.

 Put the lid on the crockpot, turn it to 'low' and let cook 4-6 hours. Since there is only one chicken breast, it doesn't take too long (I don't know why crockpot recipes are always designed to serve 5 million people). Once the chicken is fully cooked, shred it right in the sauce. You also have the option of using a thawed chicken breast initially and cutting it into bite sized pieces before you cook it. I never remember to thaw chicken over night and I don't like defrosting in the microwave... and I prefer the texture of shredded chicken so I usually just go with that :)

 Combine the half and half and corn starch and then add to the crock pot and stir to combine. Let cook for about 30 more minutes with the lid off to thicken slightly. During this time you can cook the rice and chop up your desired garnish.

Serve a heaping 3/4 cup of chicken over 1/4 of the cooked (1 cup dry) rice and garnish with parsley or green onions. Yum! 

Calories:
Total recipe (chicken):725.5
1 cup dry brown rice: 680
1/4 serving chicken (about 3/4 cup): 181
1/4 serving total (chicken, rice, and garnish): 353    

Spinach and Mushroom Enchiladas

The picture might not look like much but this is one of my FAVORITE healthy meals to make! I've made it twice in the past week, if that gives you an idea. Onion, spinach, and mushrooms are sauteed with just a smidge of butter, some garlic, and some spices, rolled into corn tortillas, smothered in a smooth, tangy, roasted poblano pepper cream sauce, topped with montery jack cheese and baked until bubbly and golden. The end result is a very un-photogenic heaping pile of deliciousness on your plate that tastes like the zillion calorie restaurant version but is actually only 764 calories for the whole recipe, which can be two or three servings depending on how hungry you are.

I really enjoy cooking at home and finding ways of reducing the calories in my favorite meals. I order spinach enchiladas (which are usually doused in a sour cream/cheese white sauce) almost every time I go to a Mexican restaurant. The spinach makes me feel like I'm being healthy but the sauce reminds me that I most certainly am not! This super easy homemade version tastes the same but cuts out all the unnecessary calories that restaurant meals like to tack on.

|A word about the photos for this recipe- this was the first time I attempted to photograph/blog about a recipe in the house I'm currently living in. It was night (since I was making dinner), but the lighting in my house is rather dark and mediocre in general. And my walls are yellow so that makes everything else photograph a bit yellow. To counteract this I grabbed my clamp-on work light which lights my light tent and tried to use it as a lighting source. It kind of worked... and kind of not. 

Exhibit A..

..and Exhibit B

For one thing I had to keep moving it between different outlets as I moved from cutting board to stove and back. There was no good spot to clamp the light in either location so I had to hold it in my left hand while photographing with my right. It was pretty amusing, you should have seen it. A lot of the pictures still look like something with a very bright light being focused on it in an otherwise very dark room, but it was ok for a first attempt! I'm going to work on setting up a more consistent lighting arrangement for future posts.|

Note: The calorie counts in my recipes are deduced from the information on thecaloriecounter.com as well as certain brands of products (as products vary), which I will try to specify. Substitutions and variations may work but are not recommended for those watching their calories as they will alter the calorie total of the recipe.

Spinach and Mushroom Enchiladas
Serves 2-3

Ingredients
1 clove garlic
1/4 yellow onion
10 mushrooms (about 2/3 small box of mushrooms)
6 cups (1 large bag) spinach
1 tbsp butter, divided
1/2 tsp paprika
1/4 tsp cayenne (omit or reduce if you do not like spicy food)
1/2 tsp black pepper
1/2 tsp oregano
1/2-1 tsp salt (or to taste)
1 tbsp flour
2/3 cup vegetable broth (I use Safeway O organics brand)
1/2 cup 1% milk
1/2 cup nonfat plain Greek yogurt (I prefer Fage)
1 oz monterey jack cheese
1/2 roasted pasilla (poblano) pepper (instructions below)
6 white corn tortillas (Mission brand)

To roast a pepper:
Preheat oven to 450. Rinse pepper well and dry. Place on center rack (no need to use cookie sheet, right on the rack is fine) and bake for about 5 minutes. Check for charring and blistering on the skin of the pepper and rotate to ensure even cooking. Cook for a few more minutes. When pepper is about 70% charred/blistered, remove from oven and place in a plastic bag. This will kind of steam the pepper as it cools and make it easier to remove the skin. When cool enough to handle, slice open pepper, remove seeds, and peel off outer skin, rinsing if necessary. Tada, roasted poblano pepper!

Preheat oven to 400. In a skillet, melt 1/2 tbsp butter. Roughly dice up the (1/4) onion and add it to the skillet, tossing to coat.

Mince the garlic and add it to the skillet. Cook the onion and garlic for 3-5 minutes, until slightly browned and translucent.

Meanwhile, wash and dry your mushrooms. Yes, I wash my mushrooms. With water. If you don't want to you don't have to but I'm going to, cool?

Slice them up (about 1/4 inch per slice)...

...and add them to the pan. Stir them around to mix with the onions and coat with butter. The pan will probably seem a bit dry but don't add any more butter or liquid! Soon the mushrooms will relinquish all their moisture and everything will be just fine ;)

See? Let them cook until browned and tender.

When most of the liquid has evaporated, add in allll the spinach. It will be a lot in the pan (especially my tiny pan) but the steam from the mushrooms should rise up and help it wilt fairly evenly.

While the spinach is heating, get your spices together.

And once it's almost completely wilted add them to the pan. Stir it around, let it cook a bit more to git rid of excess moisture, taste and adjust seasonings, and the filling is done!

If you want, you can measure this and divide it into 6 equal portions. I just move it around the pan with my spoon into 6 kind of equal piles.

Now for the sauce. Grab a small (not teflon, not scratched up and horrible looking) sauce pan and throw in 1 tbsp flour and the remaining 1/2 tbsp butter. Heat over low heat to form a roux, whisking constantly. This will be a very dry rue, since there is twice as much flour as there is butter. This makes it twice as easy to accidentally make butter-flour dumplings and have to start over! The key is to keep the heat low, add liquid verrrry slowly, and whisk super well while you add the liquid in to break up clumps. Don't worry about getting a very dark roux, just cook the flour and butter until combined and a light golden color.

You can combine the veg broth and milk before adding to the roux or do the veg broth first. At first just drizzle in a tbsp or so at a time, whisking to combine, and then add larger portions (like 1/4 cup). Once all liquid has been added, let cook a couple minutes to thicken up slightly. It will still be pretty thin.

Dice up your poblano pepper and add it to the sauce. Remove the sauce from the heat.

Measure 1/2 cup of cool, creamy, greek yogurt. Let the sauce sit and cool for a minute or two- this is very important whenever you make a dairy based sauce, like for mac and cheese! If you add your dairy product (like the cheese in mac and cheese or the yogurt here) when the bechamel is boiling, the product is likely to break down, curdle, and get grainy. blegh. Especially if it's low fat. So make sure your sauce isn't too hot!

Urgh. Looks disgusting in this picture but is delicious, I promise! Add the greek yogurt and stir well to combine. The sauce will become much thicker and creamier.

not the best angle for my hand

Now for putting the enchiladas together. Pour about 1/4 cup of sauce in the bottom of a small rectangular glass pan (like a loaf pan) and spread it around. Wrap 6 tortillas in a couple layers of paper towels and microwave for 30 seconds. Take a hot tortilla, fill it with 1/6 of the filling, and roll it up tight. Place in the pan, seam side down.

continue with all six tortillas

Grate up 1 oz of cheese (I cut my cheese into even 1 oz cubes when I buy it so I always know how much I'm actually grating/eating. It helps!)

Then drizzle the rest of the sauce all over the enchiladas. Top with the grated cheese. You should have a LOT of sauce so it should fill all the nooks and crannys of the enchiladas.

Bake for about 5 minutes to heat through, then crank up the broiler and cook for a few minutes to brown the top and crisp up the cheese.

Serve with hot sauce (I like Sriracha. I know it's weird to put sriracha on mexican food but it's delicious. meh.) and beans and rice if you please. I usually just eat 3 enchiladas with no sides and it's a TON of food- and a very filling and satisfying dinner!

I imagine you could freeze this after you put it all together and pull it out for an easy weeknight dinner down the road as well :)

Calories
total: 764
serving (half recipe/3 enchiladas): 382
per enchilada: 127

<3

This post is full of Irish

St Patrick's day happens to be my FAVORITE holiday! I have the best memories of spending the whole day (which always comes around during spring break) with my friends, cooking Irish food, listening to Irish music, watching Irish movies, wearing the colors of the Irish flag, and of course drinking Irish drinks.

It was my first st. paddy's day as a 21 year old, but I'm avoiding alcohol (and all its empty calories) at the moment so I was a bit unsure of how I would celebrate this year. I was also scheduled to work from 4-CL, which was a good reason for me to not join the masses at the bar but also left me with very little time to do anything celebratory. And lord knows I can't just let a holiday (let alone my favorite holiday) go un-celebrated.

SO, I did what I could with the time and restrictions that I had... I donned the attire, I ate the food, and I even bought the booze... I just mixed it up with massive quantities of sugar and fat and flour and fed it to my coworkers :) I didn't get drunk, I didn't overeat, I didn't attempt a game on the Devil's Dancefloor, and I spent an insanely long and busy 7 hours asking progressively drunker people the same questions (what can I get for you? any toppings? anything else? what's your name? for here or to go? would you like a copy of your receipt?)... but I still feel like I sufficiently celebrated and enjoyed St Patrick's Day :)

In the morning, I put on my favorite new mint green lace dress. That wasn't quite Irish enough for me so I also tied green and orange ribbon around my wrist and my hair.

Colton and I went out to breakfast, which we do every Sunday. We went to Mother Hubbards, one of our very favorites that specializes in homemade Native American/Mexican influenced breakfast and lunch. So good. Yesterday I had to opt for the St Paddy's Special though... "Irish Rarebit". It was basically a cross between Welsh Rarebit and Eggs Benedict with a whole lot of Irish thrown in there. 4 triangles of 12 grain bread covered with dragoon stout cheddar cheese sauce, chopped corned beef, spinach, and two poached eggs. It was sooooo gooood.

I decided I wanted to do some Irish cooking of my own so we stopped at the store on the way home. I bought ingredients to make homemade Irish cream (to make it a little lighter calorie-wise, not as thick and sweet, and to avoid having multiple open bottles of liquor sitting around the house), Irish car bomb cupcakes, and Irish cream pudding shots.

I used this recipe for the Irish cream, and it turned out amazing. Tasted just like baileys!

I then mixed one cup of homemade Irish cream with one small package of instant vanilla pudding and one cup 1% milk. I poured this into 10 dixie cups to make pudding shots! There's hardly any alcohol in them but they were pretty tasty. I took them to work so everyone could have one after we closed.

The biggest cooking project I tackled was these Irish Car-Bomb Cupcakes! I've wanted to make this recipe for years... I talked about it within the first month that I had this blog 3 years ago when I did my first St Paddy's day countdown. Even though I only had about 3 hours until I had to go to work by the time I was done with errands and at home ready to cook, I decided to attempt to whip these up. I broke out my beloved kitchenaid mixer (which works like a dream but weighs a million tons and is a bitch to store/clean in my teensy little house), used every pot and bowl in the house, and in the end produced 24 pretty little filled and frosted cupcakes. Which tasted AMAZING, by the way.

I used the above linked Smitten Kitchen recipe exactly, except I used greek yogurt in place of sour cream in the batter (I never have sour cream in the house anymore and greek yogurt tastes/works the same but is way healthier) and used quite a bit more whiskey in the ganache filling and Irish cream in the buttercream. I wanted each part of the cupcake to taste distinctly like the Irish Car-Bomb role it was representing and I found that with the measly teaspoons and tablespoons Deb suggested the flavor was lost under the sugar, butter, and chocolate. I just drizzled, tasted, and repeated until I got the intensity I wanted.

Chocolate Guinness cake filled with Jameson chocolate ganache and topped with Irish Cream buttercream. Dusted with green and gold sugar!

I made 24 and brought 12 to work. I broke them out after the aforementioned loooong and busy shift while everyone was closing and I think they (hopefully!) raised everyone's spirits a bit.

After work I promptly went home, got into my pjs, got into bed, and fell asleep. I think the rest of the world partied hard enough without me, based on the debauchery I witnessed on fourth avenue last night.

I hope you all had a nice holiday and spring break! It's back to school at 3 for me today :)

Love,
Em

20 in my 20th: Eat a Habanero

1. Eat a habanero. This could be raw, whole, or cooked in some dish. No ditching the seeds though.

For literally months, I would buy one habanero every so often while grocery shopping. For months they would one by one shrivel up, start to get funky dark spots, and get thrown into the garbage. 

Finally, one night (apparently last April 10th, according to the time stamp for this photo in my phone), while hanging out watching netflix by myself at my apartment, I convinced myself to just do it.

I grabbed the pepper, sized it up for a moment, and then took a big bite.

crappy phone pic

It was hot.
It made my eyes water.
It had surprisingly nice flavor.
It was really, really hot.
It made my belly hurt.
I wouldn't recommend it.

Yeah, it was pretty much crazy hot. Not anaphylactic-shock-inducing hot, but definitely oh-god-do-we-have-milk-in-the-house?! hot. If you're going to eat a habanero raw I hope you have tastebuds and intestines of steel.

They are pretty nice when used sparingly though, like in salsa or to spice up a marinade or something. They have kind of a fruity, mellow flavor beneath the heat.

I do kind of feel like a badass for having done this though. Way to go, year-ago me!

Healthy and Delicious Vegetable Soup

So, this past weekend I went up to Prescott and then Flagstaff to spend some time with my parents and to go skiing with my Dad. I hadn't gone skiing since I was very little so it was definitely interesting... I got up at 6 am (which is SO early for me... closer to my usual bedtime than the time I usually wake up!) and we got to the Flagstaff Snowbowl around 8. I was pretty unsure of my abilities and was basically downright terrified for the first bit. I could only go across the slope in an ever-so-slight decline (as opposed to going vertically down the slope) at a snail pace... and I was on the bunny hill (which toddlers were learning on!). BUT, we took a two hour lesson from 10-12 and it helped so much! I fell a few times, but after a couple tries I was able to stop myself, turn, speed up and slow down, and actually go down the slope in the direction intended. After the lesson, I was able to go down the entirety of the hill easily and even rode the ski lift to one of the higher starting points and managed to ski from there as well!

Unfortunately during the first half of the day I stupidly forgot to put on sunscreen... even though it was just a few morning hours, my face got SCORCHED! Having never really skied before I didn't know snow sunburn was such a serious thing. Basically you get double sunburn from the sun reflecting off the bright white snow. Anyways, by the next day my face was bright pink (aside from a few attractive pale sections from my hat... ugh) and blistered! The blisters turned to scabs and now for the past couple days my face has been dry, tight, flaky, and still bright red. I can't WAIT for it to heal and for my face to go back to normal. Working the counter at Brooklyn on Sunday and Monday was NOT fun.

That was really the only low of my weekend... the rest of the (short) time was spent with my aunt and uncle in Flagstaff and my parents in Prescott. I don't have the opportunity to come home all that often, but it's nice when I do because it's kind of like being a teenager again. I can sleep in my old (pink) room with all my old things, sit on an actual couch (not a futon!) and watch an actual tv (not a laptop!), and eat from a fridge full of food I didn't have to pay for (or cook!). The last thing is particularly nice because my parents eat very healthfully... and they have the money and skillz to do it right and make it super delicious!  I try to be very health conscious down here in Tucson, but it's expensive.. and between cooking from scratch every day (on top of school, work, and everything else), researching recipes, and meticulously calculating, counting, and recording calories... it is work. When I can open a fridge and have a ton of fresh, healthy stuff already there ready to eat, it makes me happy.

And that's where this vegetable soup comes in. My mom made some last week from a recipe loosely based on the 7 day diet 'wonder soup' (oh gee, another crash diet that has you eat practically no calories in order to lose 10 pounds in a week- miraculous!). This version bulks up the veggies, adds spices, vegetable broth, and tomatoes (and V8, if you like) for flavoring, and comes with no hyperbolic weight loss claims! At 60 calories a cup though, it doesn't really need to.

I ate this with a simple soup for lunch 2 of the 3 days I was out of town... it probably would have been 3 for 3 but I spent one of the days on the slopes! It is SO yummy and filling. I liked it so much that today, 3 days after being back in Tucson, I whipped up a batch for dinner tonight and lunch for the next few days. It was so easy too. If you're looking for a simple, low calorie, nutritious meal you can eat throughout the week, definitely try this one out! It's the perfect thing alongside a salad or sandwich.

I was going to take pictures while I was making this to go with the recipe... I took a picture of the veggies sauteing... and then put my camera down and forgot about it. Oops. I do have a picture of the finished product before I had it at my parents' house.

Simple Vegetable Soup 
Ingredients
1 tbsp olive oil
1/2 large yellow onion, diced
2 large carrots, diced
2 large celery stalks, diced
1 large green bell pepper, diced
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 tsp oregano
1 tsp basil
1 tsp salt
1/4 tsp  fresh ground black pepper
1/4 tsp red pepper flakes (omit if you do not like heat)
1 box (4 cups) vegetable broth (I used Safeway O Organics brand)
1 14.5 oz can diced italian stewed tomatoes (regular Safeway brand)
1/2 head cabbage, roughly chopped
2 cups baby spinach
4 cups water (or v8, if desired)

1. Heat olive oil in large pot.
2. Add onion, carrots, celery, and bell pepper. Sautee 5 minutes, or until slightly softened.
3. Add salt, pepper, spices, and garlic. Continue to cook until veggies begin to brown.
4. Add vegetable broth and tomatoes. Bring to a boil.
5. Add cabbage. Cook for 2-3 minutes, or until beginning to soften.
6. Add spinach. Stir to incorporate until spinach has fully wilted.
7. Add water and/or v8 and boil to reach desired broth:veggie ratio. Taste and adjust  seasonings.

That's it!

This recipe (made with water) makes about 9.5 cups with a 1 cup serving equaling about 60 calories.
The total calories for the recipe is only 557! Crazy, right? It will be about 200 more if you use 4 cups of v8 as opposed to water... so then it would be about 80 calories a cup. Still fantastic.

The salad is a mix of spinach, arugula, and kale with cucumber, carrot, cherry tomatoes, onion, celery, and a squeeze of fresh lemon juice for dressing.

20 in my 20th: Make Ina Garten's Mac n Cheese

Back in May of 2011, a few days after I turned 20, I had the idea to make a list of 20 things I wanted to do in my 20th year. I did a handful and blogged about them, and then I stopped blogging when life got crazy. I actually still did a few more before my 21st birthday last May though, about half in total. I even have pictures, I just never blogged about it. So, over the next few weeks I'm going to be posting a few 20 in my 20ths that never got their rightful post back when I did them.

#15. Make this mac and cheese

I wanted to make this mac and cheese ever since I saw the Barefoot Contessa episode where Ina Garten makes it. I only have three distinct memories of Ina Garten. An episode of BC where she put a tbsp of butter inside each hamburger patty,  the episode of 30 rock where Liz Lemon fantasizes about Ina inviting over for a bruschetta and a bottle of white wine, and the episode in which she made this macaroni and cheese.

Ina's recipes are always kind of over-the-top decadent, but where Paula Dean's zealous misuse of butter seems startling and unwarranted, Ina is so sweet and soft-spoken that all your calorie woes are easily forgotten.

Enter this mac and cheese.

It has a full pound each of pasta and cheese, a quart of whole milk, sherry, and yeah, a sh*tload of butter. But it also has mushrooms, so.. yeah.

I made this probably like a year ago and it was a. expensive (10 dollars for 3 oz of truffle butter, not to mention the 12 oz of gruyere....) b. time consuming (shopping for all the obscure ingredients, chopping a pound of mushrooms, etc) and c. one of the best thing's I've EVER cooked or tasted. I seriously remember the night I made it, sitting at home by myself with a plate of it in front of me and marveling at how out of this world amazing it was. It was quite a moment. I haven't made it since... mostly because it's hard for me to ever justify making mac and cheese (even though it's one of my favorite things to cook), let alone one that will set me back 60$. But IF the right time should arise again... say for a holiday, or if I could somehow get people to pay me for it... I would gladly do so.

This recipe is pretty much copied and pasted from foodnetwork.com, just with some of my pictures added. I made no variations to the recipe when I made it.

Also forgive the quality of these photos... they were taken in my old, old apartment complex (Lantana). I have since lived in two different homes, both of which have much better lighting. better pretty much everything actually.

Ingredients

2 tablespoons unsalted butter
Good olive oil
1/2 pound shiitake mushrooms
1/2 pound cremini mushrooms

3 tablespoons cream sherry
Kosher salt
1 pound pasta, such as cavatappi
3 ounces white truffle butter (recommended: D'Artagnan)
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 quart whole milk, scalded
12 ounces Gruyere cheese, grated (4 cups)
8 ounces extra-sharp Cheddar, grated (2 1/2 to 3 cups)
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
2 garlic cloves, chopped
3 tablespoons freshly chopped parsley leaves
1 1/2 cups fresh white bread crumbs

Directions

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.

Remove caps from mushrooms and slice into 1/4-1/2 inch slices. (I sliced mine 1/2 inch but found that some of the bigger shiitake pieces were a little overwhelming and difficult to eat)

that's a lot of mushrooms..

 Heat the butter and 2 tablespoons of olive oil in a large (12-inch) saute pan, add the mushrooms, and cook over medium heat for 3 to 5 minutes, until they are tender. Add the sherry and continue to saute for a few more minutes, until the sherry is absorbed. Set aside. (I did this in two batches. seriously, sooo many mushrooms)

doesn't look that appetizing... but just the mushrooms cooked in butter, olive oil, and sherry were so yummy

 Bring a large pot of water to a boil and add a splash of olive oil and a pinch of salt. Add the pasta and cook for 6 to 8 minutes, until al dente. Drain well.

Meanwhile, melt the truffle butter in a large (4-quart) saucepan and whisk in the flour.

Cook for 2 minutes over low heat, stirring constantly with a whisk. Slowly whisk in the hot milk and cook for 2 minutes, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon, until the white sauce is thickened and creamy. Off the heat, add the Gruyere, Cheddar, 1 1/2 tablespoons salt, the pepper, and nutmeg.

Combine the pasta, sauce, and mushrooms in a large bowl and pour them into a 10 by 13 by 2-inch baking dish.

Place the garlic and parsley in the bowl of a food processor fitted with the steel blade and pulse until they're minced. Add the bread crumbs and pulse to combine. Sprinkle the crumbs over the pasta and bake for 35 to 45 minutes, until the sauce is bubbly and the crumbs are golden brown. Serve hot. 

I have no idea why I didn't take a picture of it actually served. Hm. Anyways... This was crazy decadent, delicious, and hands down the best mac and cheese I've ever made or eaten. Glad I got the important things done in my 20th year ;)

Love,

Em