The quest for 100 soups continues...

The winter here has been a quite harsh this season. It's been so cold that I actually use the space heater, wear my Snuggie (don't judge), wear socks to bed (usually don't), layer myself in three or more blankets and I have no urge to go out let alone go outside (what can I say, I have sensitive skin). The best remedy to get through the Winter blues is by making more soup. So far this year, I've made three. This is quite the accomplishment considering hat we are only on day 13 in 2011. Let's hope that this momentum continues throughout the year. Anyway, I don't know why I made this soup especially since I'm not the biggest fan of tomatoes. Oddly enough, I do have a soft spot in my heart from tomato bisque,V8 and salsa. Tomato bisque and grilled cheese sandwiches with sourdough bread ... I'm in heaven. This definitely is the COMFORT meal of the month!

Roasted Tomato Basil Soup (6-8 servings)

From Ina Garten

Ingredients

- 3 lbs ripe plum (aka Roma) tomatoes cut in half lengthwise

- 1/4 cup plus 2 tbsp olive oil

- 1 tbsp salt

- 1 1/2 tspn black pepper

- 2 cups chopped yellow onions (about 2 onions)

- 6 garlic cloves, minced

- 2 tbsp unsalted butter

- 1/4 tspn crushed red pepper flakes

- 1 (28 ounce) canned plum tomatoes with their juice (I used regular diced tomatoes in a can)

- 4 cups fresh basil leaves

- 1 tspn fresh thyme leaves (I left this out)

- 1 quart chicken stock or water ( I used chicken stock)

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.

2. Toss the tomatoes with1/4 cup of olive oil, salt and pepper. Spread them out on a baking sheet and roast for 45 minutes.

3. 15 minutes before the tomatoes are done roasting, saute the onions, garlic, 2 tbspn of olive oil, butter and red pepper flakes in a large stockpot for 10 minutes over medium heat. Once th onions start to turn brown, add the canned tomatoes, basil, thyme and chicken stock.

4. Remove the roasted tomatoes from the oven and add it to the pot. Also add any liquid that is left on the baking sheet into the pot.

5. Bring the pot to a boil and allow it to simmer uncovered for 40 minutes.

6. Take the soup off the food mill and use the coarsest blade. I don't have such equipment so just took a fork and stabbed all the tomatoes until they were broken up into smaller chunks. It made the soup less chunky but still chunky enough. You can probably also put it in a blender.

7. Get some tasty sourdough bread and American cheese and grill it on the skillet. Cut it diagonally across and serve it with a bowl of soup. Sandwiches taste better when they are cut diagonally :) Really!

Enjoy!

Review:

This soup is so good!!! The one thing downside of it is that it is a bit acidic. It lingers in your mouth just a little after sipping the soup and I think this is because of the tomatoes' acidity. Not really sure how one can make it less acidic but I would suggest eating more bread or grilled cheese sandwiches because more carbs are awesome anyway.

Updates on my goals:

- I baked for the first time in forever. I didn't even break out the whisk this Christmas! Oh the madness! The recipe is from Joy the Baker. If you go to her link (below), please excuse my poor decorating skills here. She did an amazing job with all the sprinkles and perfect glaze. You must know, I am just learning how to make glaze. :l

Chocolate Glazed Baked Doughnut Muffins

- Lethal legs class numero uno kicked me in the butt today but I shall survive! Lunges and squats are not a girls best friend.

- I ran for ten minutes last night. Yes 10. That's good enough for me :)

Life's good!

Dear Lazy,

This is a new year. With a new year usually comes the new years resolutions. So cliche but much needed. Here are your goals:

- Blog more
- Bake more
- Cook more for yourself
- Enjoy your final months in San Diego with friends
- Enjoy your new home with your fabulous boyfriend, family and friends (who will hopefully realize that San Diego is only a hop skip and a jump away)
- Stop and smell the roses.
- Stop and dance when you feel like it
- Run a 5k and become more active (closely getting there with my Lethal Legs class)

Remember, you can do it.

Love,
Your new and improved lazy self ;)

For my vegetarian friends

To my Italian food loving vegetarian friends,

Have I got a recipe for you. As a once a week pasta type of girl, I've been wanting to branch out and try different Italian recipes that don't include the repetitive gesture of boiling angel hair and adding Barilla sauce. I've finally ventured out and made lasagna. It's not just any kind of lasagna though, it's butternut squash lasagna. Since it's squash season, there is plenty of butternut squash in the stores and farmers markets and recipes to go with that. Daniel forwarded a recipe from his company Health and Fitness newsletter that uses butternut squash instead of meat in a lasagna dish. Not only is it meat free, it's also healthy! Yay!

Another inspiration for making this recipe came from the book "Alone in the kitchen with an eggplant" that I'm currently reading. As I mentioned earlier last month, I want to read more books about other people's adventures in cooking. This book is actually composed of many short essays from people just like you and me. They are people who work, who go to school, who are married or who are single. They write about how they cook for themselves and try their best to cook for themselves when their significant other is gone or they don't have the company of their friends. Sounds strange that an entire book could have essays relative to cooking for yourself but as I was reading it, I said to myself "I can totally relate." When you're home alone, do you really put the effort into cooking a a nice meal for yourself or do you pull out the canned goods and PB & J? I put the effort into cooking only if I'm entertaining someone other than myself - I definitely fall into the category of keeping it simple when I'm alone (I've had countless quesadillas/grilled cheese sandwiches/ham and cheese sandwiches alone). Sad sad sad. After reading a few of these essays, I was motivated to cook something nice for myself for once. I was going to put something together that would take time, not just 30 seconds of microwaving. Alas, this is the reason why the lasagna recipe is on my blog. Ta-da!

Ingredients (enough to make 2 lasagnas with 6 servings each - I ended up making only one lasagna though so cut this in half if you want that):

- Cooking spray

- 3 cups chopped onions (I would use a quarter less because it's a little too onion like)

- 10 cups fresh spinach

- 3/4 cup shredded sharp provolone cheese (I used jack)

- 1/2 cup chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley (I omitted this)

- 1 teaspoon salt

- 1/2 teaspoon black pepper

- 2 eggs

- 1 (15 ounce) carton fat-free ricotta cheese

- 3 cups diced and peeled butternut squash (Trader Joes has it already prepared)

- 6 cups marinara sauce

- 12 oven-ready lasagna noodles

- 1 cup fresh Parmesan cheese grated (the smell is so intense)

Directions:

- Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Heat a large pot on medium-high heat with some cooking spray. Add the onions. Saute until it is tender.

- Add spinach, saute until the spinach wilts. Turn the heat off and set the pot aside.

- Combine provolone, parsley (omitted), salt, pepper, eggs and ricotta cheese in a large bowl.

- Place squash in a microwave safe bowl. Cover and cook on high for 5 minute or until tender with a fork.

- Coat the bottom and sides of an 8 inch baking dish with cooking spray. Spread 1/2 cup of marinara sauce in the bottom of one prepared dish. You are going to start layering ingredients on top of each other.

-Arrange two noodles over sauce (if you cut the recipe in half, adjust the noodles accordingly).

- Spread one cup of the cheese mixture over the noodles.

- Arrange 1 1/2 cups squash over the cheese mixture.

- Spread 3/4 marinara sauce over the squash.

- Arrange 2 noodles over the sauce.

- Arrange 1 cup cheese mixture over the noodles.

- Arrange 1 1/2 cups of the onion/spinach mixture over cheese mixture.

- Spread 3/4 cup of marinara over the spinach mixture.

- Add 2 noodles over the sauce.

- Spread 1 cup sauce evenly over noodles (if you see too much sauce, you might want to cut back).

- Sprinkle the top with parmesan cheese. Begin the same process for the second dish.

- Cover the pan with foil.

(You will notice that there might be more ingredients left on the side than in the dish. You can eyeball it and try to add more ingredients and layer any way you want. The directions are just providing some guidelines.)

- Bake for 30 minutes covered and then 30 minutes uncovered. 60 minutes total.

Enjoy!!! Sorry no final product photos because I ate it. LOL. :D

To come -

Slow cooker recipes (I got a slow cooker - one of the coolest birthday presents ever! Thanks Fran!)

Thanksgiving side dishes - I'm actually going to make them from scratch as I only have to feed 5 people :)

Sweetened Quesadillas

Two years ago, my friends got me an awesome gift for my birthday - tickets to see Jason Mraz in LA. Before going to the show, we wanted to have dinner and I called my friend who lives in LA to ask her what restaurant we should check out. She mentioned this cute little place called Cha Cha Chas. This place is known for its sangrias and interesting twist on Latin foods. While browsing the menu there, Daniel and I saw something that we just had to try. It sounded so different, so interesting and a little bit weird. It was their guava and goat cheese quesadilla. It was SO tasty! I loved the combination of the tart- like cheese with something so sweet - the guavas. The combination was like heaven on your pallet. So there is a reason why I'm talking about this quesadilla that I ate about two years ago. I went to the Irvine farmer's market this weekend and bought myself some fresh goat cheese that traveled all the way from Mojave, CA. The vendors infused the goat cheese with garlic, chives and different flavors but we ended up taking home the cucumber flavored one. It's so refreshing you can just eat it by the spoonful! Anyway, I had plenty of tortillas left over and goat cheese that I thought "Hey why not make some of the those fruity little quesadillas?" I went to Bristol Farms and bought figs. I couldn't remember that Cha Cha Chas actually used guavas and kept thinking I ate fig and goat cheese. Well, as I went online to see if there was a recipe I could use, I found out that the ingredient was indeed guava and not fig but I had three figs now so I had to use them. No biggie! I've come to terms with substituting things in recipes because sometimes everything is not available (guavas are not in season right now anyway). Here's the recipe:

Ingredients
- Goat cheese (I used fresh goat cheese but you can use those prepackaged logs in the store)
- Flour tortillas
- Figs or guavas

Directions
- Take the back of your spoon and spread the goat cheese evenly onto one half of the tortilla.
- Cut open the figs and scoop out the flesh and spread it with the back of your spoon on top of the goat cheese. It will become mushy together but that's how you want it.
- Fold the tortilla in half and place it on the skillet. Heat it to your liking. I like it crispy and slightly brown.

That's it! Even though I didn't use guavas, the figs were still sweet enough to give it a lightly sweetened taste. I think next time I'll have to scoop more of the flesh out and make my tortilla more pink on the inside. Since guavas have a bit of a stronger taste than figs, I would highly recommended doing the guava version since it'll give a sweeter fruitier taste. In one tortilla, I use whole cut figs, the other I squished the figs into jam. :)

So the quesadillas were just an appetizer for my dinner last night. The main course was mahi mahi and whole wheat cous cous. I marinated the mahi mahi with a pesto and garlic chili paste that I bought at another farmer's market so I didn't make it myself (therefore no recipe). It was so tasty! I tried just one fish fillet with the marinade and the other I left plain with just some pepper and lime juice. I placed it on the grill and in the mean time, I made this aioli sauce that was on the fish package from Trader Joe's. I really like garlic and sometimes mayo, even though it's not healthy, so this was something nice to try on the fish. I can't entirely remember the recipe but I believe it was one part mayo (tbsp), one part lemon juice, some pepper and small piece of garlic (chopped up). Use a spoon and just really whip up the mayo with the liquid and then add the two last ingredients. Make sure that the garlic is chopped up finely or else you'll be biting into big chunks. Bon appetit!

Blue tortillas + red sauce = purple enchiladas?

As a big fan of enchiladas, I decided that I should try making my own. When I lived on campus at UCSD, my Wednesdays (and maybe the occasional extra day) consisted of me going to have some cheese enchiladas at the Mexican restaurant. Not chicken, beef or anything else - just cheese. It was my comfort food and it always brought a smile to my face :). I didn't try any fancy recipe but instead tried tweaking two recipes that I found on two of my ingredients - the back of a mozzarella cheese bag and the back of Trader Joe's enchilada sauce bottle. While my enchiladas didn't come out as saucy as the ones I usually get at Mexican restaurants, they were still tasty. Since I try not to add too much sauce (an entire bottle seems a little overboard) I try to lighten up my dishes by using only 3/4 or 1/2 of what the recipe asks for. I also try to make my dish look a little more colorful by using the blue corn organic tortillas instead of the plain corn tortillas. Unfortunately blue tortillas and red sauce do not add up to purple enchiladas. Nonetheless, still tasty and somewhat colorful.

The other day I tried making flour tortilla enchiladas and the texture was ... interesting. Daniel thought I had made him some kind of a lasagna. It wasn't terrible but the corn tortillas are needed for just the right texture.

My own version of enchiladas (my first recipe?)

Ingredients:

Package of corn tortillas (medium size)

Medium onion

1 chicken breast (I actually made chicken enchiladas, not cheese!)

1 bag of shredded cheese (jack or mozzarella)

Enchilada sauce (I like the Trader Joe's brand but anything else can work)

Cilantro (optional)

Chives (optional)

Recipe:

- Cook the chicken thoroughly (thank you George Foreman!) and allow it to cool for about 15 minutes.

- While the chicken is cooling, dice half the onion (about half a cup). Place it in a bowl and pour half a cup of enchilada sauce into the onion bowl.

- Take half a cup of cheese and mix it in to the onion bowl.

- Shred the chicken by peeling it into thin strands. Place the strands into the onion bowl.

- Use a fork and mix all the ingredients in the onion bowl together to make sure that everything is coated in the red sauce.

- Spray an 8 x8 oven dish with cooking oil. Pour a little of the enchilada sauce into the dish and spread it out (by tilting the dish back and forth or using a spatula).

- Preheat the oven at 350 degrees Fahrenheit.

- Take one tortilla at a time and scoop a spoonful of the onion bowl mix into it. Make sure that it doesn't clump in one area but is spread out along the tortilla in a line down the center. It is up to you how stuffed you want your enchilada.

- Roll the tortilla up to create a small burrito and place it flap side down into the oven dish.

- Continue to do this until all of your mix is gone or until you fill up the entire oven dish.

- Once you've got them all lined up in the dish, pour half a cup of enchilada sauce over the rolls to get them all covered with the sauce.

- Sprinkle cheese over the enchiladas (as much as you'd like).

- Place it in the oven for about 10 minutes (or until the cheese is completely melted and just the way you like it). Enjoy!

For dessert or a snack after try the Chex Mix muddy buddies recipe. It's so fast and easy (though probably not healthy) to make! Part of my goal this month and until the end of the year is to make some snacks for my co-ed softball team. My first snack were the muddy buddies. I usually don't like uber sweet things but this was good. I love Chex cereal in general - sans sugar- but with the chocolate and peanut butter melted all over, it was so hard to resist! Plus it makes for a great treat for an entire week! Since I don't have as much time to make as many sweet now, having a sweet treat that lasts for a while is quite nice. Snacks are important to me everyday now that I'm in the classroom. Something about walking around to the students for two hours straight makes me a very hungry person at around 10:00 am everyday. Anyway, here are some snapshots. Enjoy!

Foodie Books to Read

I'm almost done with my new book "The Sharper Your Knife, the Less you Cry" and am ready to jump into other food related books. Currently I have Anthony Bordain's Kitchen Confidential on my bookshelf but I don't know if I want to start with that one just yet. After watching a couple of his shows, I don't know if I can handle his personality or his writing. Here are some that I found while browsing Amazon that might be a little more kind hearted. Let me know if you want to read any of these with me. I like doing book clubs so let's chat about some of these!

Going Solo in the Kitchen by Jane Doerfer

The Pleasures of Cooking for One by Judith Jones - This one sounds interesting. I don't really find the joy in cooking for just myself because recipes always make more than one serving. Plus good food should always be enjoyed with good company :) but I hope that this book teaches me something new.

Alone in the Kitchen with an Eggplant by Jenni Ferrari-Adler

Do you notice a trend in the author's names? They all start with J... Isn't that interesting?! Especially since the book that made me want to start a food blog was also written by someone with a name starting with J. I guess it's just coincidental.

I'm going to start uploading other recipes soon. Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend :)

Boeuf en Croute Champignons avec Sauce Vin Rouge

I'm turning French! Well, sort of. I'm currently reading a book called "The Sharper Your Knife, the Less you Cry" and it's made me a little French food fanatic. The book is a lot like Julie and Julia; the only difference is that this author sets out on a journey to Le Cordon Bleu to learn how to be a chef and doesn't try to Master the Art of French cooking book. While J&J was somewhat comedic, this book makes going to culinary school sound like a terrifying experience - it kind of scares me to even consider culinary school. I've given pastry school some thought after going to the Culinary Institute in Napa Valley this summer but after reading a few chapters in this book, I think I'd rather make my kitchen my classroom and stay here where no one is breathing over my shoulder or critiquing my food. Also, no one will make me pluck a fish's eyeball out with a paring knife. Yeah... this book can get kind of descriptive at times. Other than the terrifying details of what it's like to be trained by top French chefs, this book has some great recipes that the author learned while learning to be a master chef in France. I never knew how time consuming French cooking could be until I skimmed all of the recipes in this book. Not only does it require a lot of time for preparation, it also requires a lot of time for slow cooking either on the stove or in the oven. I guess it's true that great food does take time! Lucky for me I found some time between classes, life and everything else to make a wonderful steak recipe :)

Boeuf en Croute Champignons ave Sauce Vin Rouge (for four) from Kathleen Flinn

Red-wine sauce recipe - To drizzle on the steak or on the mashed potatoes

1 cup dry red wine

2 ounces stew meat or beef trimmings

1 tbsp olive oil

1/4 cup chopped onions

1/4 cup chopped celery

1/4 cup chopped carrots

Parsley stems (I didn't include this)

1/2 teaspoon dried thyme

1 tbsp flour

1 cup brown beef stock

1 tbsp butter

salt, pepper

1. Reduce the wine by half in the small saucepan over medium-high heat. Reducing means to just heat the wine until it reduces in amount.

2. While the wine is reducing, sear the beef in oil in another pan on medium-high heat.

3. Add onions, celery and carrots and stir until softened (3 minutes) then add thyme and flour. Stir to coat the ingredients with the flour.

4. Add the reduced red wine and beef stock and bring to a boil. Skim the foam off the top and reduce to heat. Let simmer for half an hour while you finish the other part of the recipe.

Mushroom-Crusted Steaks recipe

8 ounces mushrooms, sliced

2 tbsp butter

1/4 cup bread crumbs or panko (I used half and half)

1 tbsp parsley (I left this out)

Salt and pepper

4 beef-tenderloin fillets (about 6 ounces each)

1 tbsp olive oil

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

2. Saute the mushrooms in the butter over medium heat until browned.

3. Strain the mushrooms and chop it finely together with the bread crumbs, parsley, teaspoon of salt and black pepper mixed in.

4. Season the meat with salt and pepper on both sides.

5. Heat the oil over high heat in a skillet and sear each side of the steak for 2 - 3 minutes.

6. Remove the steak from the pan to a cookie sheet lined with foil or parchment.

7. Press the mushroom mixture on top of each steak and place the cookie sheet in the oven. Turn the oven to broiler mode. Broil the steaks until the mushroom coating gets brown and the meat firms to medium-rare (about six minutes).

8. Remove the red wine sauce from the stove and strain the veggies and beef out of the sauce. I saved the veggies and beef for another dish but you can discard it. Return the sauce to the saucepan and stir in a knob of butter to finish. Serve the sauce alongside the meat.

For the mashed potatoes, I peeled three potatoes, chopped them into small cubes, and boiled them on high until they were tender (about 20 minutes). Remove the potatoes from the water and mash it with a fork in a serving bowl. Pour in a little heavy whipping cream and garlic bits to soften it up. Pour the sauce on top like gravy and enjoy!

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Review: If you like your steak rare to medium, this process of cooking the steaks in the oven works really well! The mushroom topping gives the steak so much flavor and texture. The meat cuts really nicely too and is easy to chew (who wants tough steak anyway?). Definitely a do-again type of recipe.