New Year's Eve

Yesterday both DH and I were not feeling well. One of the nephews that visited passed on a bug to us, and we have been down for the last couple of days. So for supper yesterday I wanted to make something that was comforting and not greasy takeout. We have been eating at a couple of places since we got here - Mama Fu's Noodle House and a chinese restaurant called Tai Pan. Mama Fu's has a pho soup dish that I am pretty fond of. Tai Pan has a good wonton soup that has bok choy and green onions in it that I am pretty fond of. So I decided to make my own Asian inspired soup to help us feel better. I've been reading through a Thai cookbook that I have also, which made me want to experiment with those flavors.

So here is the product of my experiment. The noodles from the dish are wonton wrappers that I cut into strips. Basically by taking a stack of 5 wonton wrappers and cutting them four times straight. I call it:

Rhonda Fu's Spicy Asian Noodle Soup
1 Tbs. canola oil
1/2 c. carrots, julienned or super thinly sliced
1 c. napa cabbage, coarsely chopped
4 c. broth - chicken or vegetable
5 wonton wrappers, cut into strips
1 Tbs. soy sauce (optional, taste before adding)
Black pepper to taste
1/4 c. thinly sliced green onions
1/4 c. fresh cilantro, coarsely chopped
Juice of 1 lime
1 Tbs. brown sugar (more or less, to cut the acidity of the lime, use as desired)
Couple of shots of hot sauce, or 1/4 tsp. ground cayenne (don't use Tabasco or other strong flavored sauce)

Heat a medium-sized saucepan over medium heat. Add the canola oil and the carrots, stir to coat them with the oil. Saute for a few minutes and then add the napa cabbage. Saute a few minutes more and then add the broth. Drop the wonton strips one at a time into the broth to make sure that they are seperate. Add the black pepper. Continue cooking over medium heat for about 10 minutes. Add remaining ingredients and turn off the heat. Let stand for a few minutes to let the flavors mesh.

Note: If it's cooked too long the vegetables will get mushy. It's better to have them slightly underdone than overdone. The quantities feed about 3 people or so, it's not a large amount.

The Cookie Monster

I've been a cookie baking monster for the last few days. Having people in the house to bake for makes me happy, and I've been taking full advantage. In the last week I have baked:

Chocolate Thumbprint Cookies with Cherry Filling

Cranberry Orange Cookies

Snickerdoodles

Pumpkin Oatmeal Cookies

And finally today I baked:

ANZAC Biscuits (pictured above)

I haven't baked the ANZAC biscuits in a while, because hubby is not that fond of coconut. ANZAC biscuits are an Australian/New Zealand cookie, named in honor of the Australian/New Zealand Air Corps and I believe they are traditional on ANZAC Day there. I found some cane syrup at the store and figured I'd make some for our guests. They came out much better than the last time I made them - I love my new stove.

The houseguests are leaving early tomorrow morning, so we'll have a lot of cleaning to catch up on. :)

Wo0o0o0o0o0oT!!!!!!111one1

I thought it would never get here, but it's official :) 10 days off from work, woohoo! I worked my last second shift tonight. Before I went in to work, I made these Chocolate Thumbprint cookies to give to the people at work who have helped me so much. They were a really big hit, and I wish I'd made more because it wasn't nearly enough to give to everyone I wanted to. I only got to eat one of them. ;) My husband and I went to eat at our new Friday evening ritual, eating at a Chinese restaurant over by where I work. The waitress has our order memorized, and it's not busy even at 8:00 pm on a Friday night. Tonight was a bit annoying because they had a large party in the room in the back, and there were some really annoying loud teenage girls. But it didn't stop us from enjoying our food.

We will be very busy tomorrow, getting things ready for the family coming in. Our friends are going to stop by to take a look at the house, now that we have furniture in it. We have to get groceries, and finish fixing up the place.

Oh, and.......W0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0T!!!!!!!

Food Coma

Our second shift had a potluck luncheon tonight, and since I'm the firsunsecon supervisor I came back for it. In case you aren't familiar with that, that's a first shift supervisor who has to stay late and help take care of second shift issues until our new supervisor comes onboard. One of our guys is from Utah and had never had Southern food before. So we decided it would be a bring your favorite Southern dish potluck. I made a pot of black-eyed peas, some fried potatoes and a pan of cornbread. It turned out pretty good, and I thought I was doing good to stay awake for the drive home. But since my mind is always on either eating food, planning on what I'm going to eat for the next meal, plotting out what I'm going to cook the next day, and making menu plans for weeks in advance I decided to get a headstart on tomorrow.

I've seen some Ethopian recipes that intrigued me, but for most of them you need two particular ingredients: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berbere and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niter_kibbeh. So tonight when I got home and my latest order from http://www.penzeys.com/ was here, I got on the ball to make some. Berbere is the spice mix, and you are supposed to toast the spices after you mix them. Let me tell you, that's a good way to clear out your sinuses. I didn't even make it as hot as they call for in the recipe I used. The niter kibbeh is heating on the stove right now. Tomorrow I'm going to be making my first Ethopian dish, a recipe called Yetakelt Wat which is a cabbage stew. I'm hoping that it turns out okay, because I bought black cardamom seeds instead of the green pods. Somehow it reminds me of smoke and cough syrup. :)

Homestretch

There is exactly one working week until the long holiday break, and I can't wait. I can barely fathom 11 days off without working. The closest I have come to that is 10 days between when we left NC and moved here. But that was hardly a vacation. Of course we'll be busy this time too, with the In-Laws coming with the 4 and 5 year old nephews. But I won't be having to worry about work :)

To finish the banana marathon, I made the Banana Pineapple Snack Cake I posted earlier. I froze the rest of the bananas because I'm not really in the mood for more banana goodness. I think people at work are starting to hide when they see me carrying in a plastic container now :)

Tonight I created a new recipe, surprise, it is for a soup :) It came out pretty good. A bit of a change up from the bean and lentil creations I've been making lately, which is a relief to the spouse.

Cream of Cauliflower Soup
1 medium head of cauliflower, broken into florets
1/4 c. butter or margarine
1 stalk celery, finely chopped
1 small onion, finely chopped
2 Tbs. flour
1 tsp. ground mustard
1/2 tsp. smoked Spanish paprika
1 tsp. dried thyme
2 c. stock
2 c. milk, soy or dairy
Salt and Pepper to taste
2 Tbs. nutritional yeast (or use 1/2 c. or so of shredded cheddar)
Heat stock in a soup pot and bring to a boil. Add the cauliflower and then cook until tender. Remove cauliflower from the pot and mash. Retain 2 c. of the cooking liquid and set aside. Melt the butter or margarine in the soup pot. Add the onion and celery and saute until onions begin to brown. Stir in the flour and spices and toss to coat the vegetables evenly. Add the stock and milk and whisk to combine. Add the cauliflower and nutritional yeast or cheese and stir well to combine. Reduce heat to low and continue to cook until soup thickens to desired consistency.

The Banana Marathon

My friend's wife picked up a case of bananas or two when she went shopping today. Normally I like bananas okay, but I usually don't get them used up before they get too mushy for me to want to use them. So when I became the custodian of three bunches of them today I wasn't sure what I would be able to use them for and if I could stomach that much banana-flavored goodness. You see, I already have four containers of frozen banana mush that I was waiting to use for baking, and I don't have any more containers for it. The problem is that not only am I going to be eating all of my banana baked goods, she's going to be trying to pawn off hers on me too. Which is what I plan to do to her. I don't know if I'll be able to look at a banana after this. I wasn't sure if I was up for the challenge, but I've started the marathon.

My first entry is a recipe for Monkey Bars. It's a recipe that I veganized out of Cooking Light, my favorite magazine ever. I substituted the rice milk for buttermilk, and 1/2 cup of extra banana for the egg whites that the recipe calls for. Because of the extra banana, it's more flavorful, but a little sweeter than the original recipe. If you don't like sweet that well, then cut down the brown sugar a bit to compensate for the extra banana.

Monkey Bars
1/2 c. raisins
1 1/2 Tbs. apple juice
1 c. all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt
3/4 c. packed brown sugar
1/4 c. margarine or butter, softened
1 c. mashed ripe banana
3 Tbs. rice milk, or buttermilk
1 tsp. vanilla extract

Combine the raisins and apple juice in a microwave bowl. Microwave at high for 1 minute, and set aside. Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a bowl, stirring well. Set aside. Combine brown sugar and margarine in a large bowl, and beat until well blended. Add banana, milk and vanilla, mixing well. Add the flour mixture and mix until just combined. Stir in raisin mixture. Spread the batter into an 8-inch square baking pan coated with cooking spray. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes or until golden. Cool the bars completely on a wire rack.

P.S. I'm willing to start a betting pool on how long it's going to take the people at work to start hiding from me when I bring in a container of baked goods. :)

New Baby

We were out grocery shopping today when I saw this over in the florist section. I'm a sucker for orchids at any time, but since winter seems to have finally set in spring gardening season seems to be a long way off. It's been a pretty quiet day otherwise, I tried out a new recipe for a plum upside-down cake that turned out quite tasty but not very photogenic. It stuck when I was trying to take it out and the top got a little botched. ;)

We found out today that my in-laws and our nephews are coming to visit for Christmas, so we are going to be decorating and doing stuff for Christmas after all. We haven't had a tree or ornaments before, so I'm going to try to come up with some crafty things the kids can put together to decorate the tree with. And since we will have people to cook for it should be fun. :)

Holiday Party

Tonight is the company holiday party, which I'm not crazy about going to. But since I'm a supervisor it's one of those things that you have to do. I'd prefer to stay home and do other stuff, but oh well. We went out this morning to do a bit of shopping, and when I got home I felt like baking something. I saw a post earlier on the PPK forum for some Brown Sugar Shortbread and thought I'd try it out. I've had a shortbread pan for a long time and never really used it. So here's the outcome. :)

Recipe is found here:

http://www.postpunkkitchen.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=15863

Scroll down to the sixth post :)