And, I'm back (again)...

 The problem w/a blog is if you don't keep at it, you lose track of how long it's been. Well, I'm starting again. Starting to cook again as a place of refuge and joy. Starting to cook with and for friend. Starting to post pictures of the amazing things I'm making again. So, without further adieu...

I've been making things that comfort me and others. For instance, I made the best meatloaf, mashed potatoes and, of all things, peas and carrots. When I said I was going to make peas and carrots, Walter's immediate response was "eeeuuuwww." But then I reminded him this isn't cafeteria peas and carrots - I took frozen peas, fresh carrots, cooked them in a pan w/a little butter and balsamic vinegar. Delicious!! 

Next up, was Christmas! And my contribution was Pumpkin rolls and cheese filled pull-apart bread. I think I nailed both of them - The pumpkin rolls were delicious and I owe it to a mistake. I bought pumpkin pie filling instead of pumpkin, but went ahead and used it because it was what I had. Turns out the extra liquid made the rolls very moist, but a bit sweeter than I wanted them to be. So I reduced the sugar in the cream cheese frosting, and overall, it all worked out 

The bread rolls were stuffed w/cheddar, and the ones w/the jalapeno rings on top also had jalapenos in with the cheese. It's hard to go wrong w/bread, cheese, and jalapeno, for sure.

Next up, savory bread pudding for brunch with friends. Nourishing the soul and the body. Ham, cheese, custard, broccoli and a torn up loaf of bread I'd made earlier in the week. 

Finally, I made ratatouille flowers. I had so much produce this summer that I found myself looking for different things I could make w/squash, tomatoes, and carrots. It's not traditional, but it was delicious.

I'll be back w/more things that I made and ate. I need to start remembering to take pictures of everything again. I've missed writing this and sharing my food adventures with you. I hope you've missed hearing from me... See you soon! 

Eating with Friends

Eating with friends is a multi-faceted activity. It can nourish our bodies and our souls. Or it can deplete them. I find myself wanting to eat with friends to fill my soul especially when other things are depleting me. Right now, I've got a lot going on, both on the personal and professional front. My company is being acquired and my job is being eliminated so I'm both keeping things going at work and looking for a new role. It's been difficult having a foot in two worlds, one that is ending and one that hasn't quite started yet. I've also started a class to become a certified coach, which is exciting and draining - School habits are so very different than work habits for me!! So, it's time to nourish my soul with some people that know and love me and that I know and love. 

I headed to Chicago a couple weeks ago (I know, Chicago in February???) to visit those friends, including one of my best friends. She and I spent about a week hanging out and reconnecting in person by spending time catching up, going to an orchid show, the auto show (the cars!!! the rides!!), and watching some movies and the super bowl. Of course there was food, because there always is!

For Super Bowl Sunday, we decided to make a cheese plate, some dirty martini dip, and some dirty martinis. Now, for those of you that do not like the dirty martini, I can only express my deep sadness for you. For me, the perfect lightly dirty martini is a drink that is both complex and simple. It's only 3 ingredients; vodka or gin, olive juice, and dry vermouth, poured over ice and stirred or shaken. I'm not here to debate stirred or shaken with anyone - live and let live on this one. I prefer shaken because I want my alcohol "bruised."  We also had vodka, because that's what we felt like. I am not usually a vodka drinker but sometimes I like the way it can step into the background and let the other ingredients in a cocktail sing. We also had some hydration tools available, because if you're going to start with a dirty, you are going to need to give your liver some support...

Our cheese plate was a delight and was a clear example of how our eyes are often bigger than our stomachs. We made the mistake (but was it really a mistake??) of getting our cheese at Costco, where everything comes in a size Large or greater. In our defense, we did look for a pre-made cheese plate, but alas, there was none. So we went about getting massive amounts of cheese. Making a good cheese plate isn't hard but it can be painstaking. I'm a firm believer we eat with our eyes before we eat with our hands and mouth, so making it pretty and having a variety of visual textures is important to me. Moving on to tastes: I like a lot of flavors and textures, so I use different types and strengths of cheese flavors, along with lots of different accompaniments - fruits, nuts, and a little prosciutto on this one was perfect. Now,  to that dirty martini dip - We were smart enough not to shop for the ingredients for the dirty martini dip at Costco, but weren't clever enough to make a half recipe. I found the recipe on Instagram and it's super simple - cream up some cream cheese, sour cream, olive juice, blue cheese and either gin or vodka together. The add in diced olives and blue cheese crumbles and fold in gently. Let it chill for a few hours (we did over night) and use your favorite dippers. YUM!!! 

We may have overserved ourselves with both food and drinks that night. I mean, it's possible. In fact, it's likely. Ok, we totally did. So the next day was for recovery. We ate a late breakfast of cheeseburgers and fries, and then walked it off at the orchid show and the car show. Two different events in so many ways - one at the Chicago Botanic Gardens, filled with the feel of living, growing things. The other at the Chicago Convention Center, filled with the sound of car engines and man-made creations. On Tuesday, it was back to work for my girlfriend, and I focused on job searching and getting back on track. So, back to body nourishing food, simple and comforting as well. That meant a breakfast scramble with potatoes, spinach and some Trader Joe's zhug sauce - spicey and familiar, all at the same time. 

Walter joined us on Wednesday and the adventures took another turn. We met some other friends for dinner out, had a fantastic date night on Friday, and headed to the Brew Pub Shootout on Saturday. Then headed home on Sunday, stopping for a Torta at Frontera in the airport on the way. I've been back for a bit over a week and the rhythms of life are back. I'm still thinking about my trip, and taking nourishment from it- remembering the conversations and the tastes, the hugs and the flavors, the comfortable silence of being with someone you love and the comforting textures of familiar foods that wrap you like a warm hug. I'll be nourished by this trip for a while.

Endings and Beginnings

 I've read that when one door closes another one opens. Or when all the doors seem closed, look for an open window. Well, there are definitely doors closing in my life and openings, although I'm not sure whether they're doors or windows, Actually, I'm not sure it matters.

Back in August, we found out that DCP Midstream (the company I work for) was being acquired by one of our parent companies. Having been through this and seen it in my consulting work, I assumed there was some writing on the wall. Sure enough, most of the Denver office, mostly made up of back office functions, are being let go. And, yep, I'm one. My last day is projected to be June 1, 2023, and I'm definitely looking for my next job. It hasn't been easy - I've been one of the last 2 candidates three times since August. It's been kind of crazy, and disheartening, and invigorating, and all the  things. I'm continuing to look and network and ask questions and give it my best shot. But not to have only one iron in the fire... 

Along with my job search, I've started my coaching certification process. I plan to be an executive coach at some point, and this is the first step toward my third career. I'm excited and nervous - learning new things is fabulous and exhausting. 

I'm also looking at the doors closing in my personal life. I've realized (finally some might say) that I'm getting older. I look at my nieces and nephews, and my amazing great-niece, and realize that I'm the person they are starting to take care of instead of the other way around. I'm not sure how I feel about that - I thought I'd always be the young one. Go ahead, laugh. I'm laughing at my pride and sense of invincibility that only took 50 years to wear off. 

So, here's to endings and beginnings, and all the things that come along with them.

Here we are again...

 Well, it seems that I've gone another 2 years between posts... I have a ton of reasons why that is - I got a job (yay!!), I got preoccupied (booo!!), I got lazy (even more boo!!). And all of them are valid. And all of them are excuses. And all of them are true. And all of them are a little self-serving. And at the end of it all, here I am again.

So, what now? I start writing again. I pick up where I left off, and probably add some new things. Maybe a little on my current health journey. Maybe a little on my current job situation. Maybe a little on how I'm feeling, when I'm feeling things I want to share. However, the one thing I can say is I'm going to strive to be more consistent this time. To write even when I get busy. 

So, here we go again!!

How cocktails fit into a healthy diet

Sometimes it's hard to come up with a new thing to eat every night. I find myself falling back on the same things, but with variations. For example, right now nachos are a frequent dinner because it's easy - take whatever leftover meat you have, put it on some tortilla chips and top it with cheese. About 20 minutes in the over, and dinner is served. I also made some meatloaf on the grill. It was really delicious, a mix of pork and beef, lots of herbs, and topped with BBQ sauce. It had a little smoke flavor from the grill which put it over the top. But these dishes don't sing to me. They don't really ask to be photographed either. They're the work horses of the belly - filling and comforting, but not always sexy to photograph. I'm not sure that today's blog is sexy either, but it was good and the cocktails were cold.

For dinner last night, we switched it up and made some fish. We had some red snapper in the freezer, so we thawed it out, salted both sides, and sauteed it on the stove top. While that was going, I cut up a red pepper, some broccolini, and some butternut squash, and sauteed them on the stove with some chive oil that I made and a bit of ketjap manis (sweet soy sauce - If you haven't tried it, I'd highly recommend it). When it all came together, it was a very simple dinner, but filling and light.

We also made a couple of cocktails - right now, I'm really into gin. Brown liquor feels like winter to me, and when it gets warmer, I go to gin and rose wine mostly. My current favorite cocktails are the vesper or a 50/50 martini. Walter's go to remains the manhattan - he's less affected by the weather in what he drinks. 

Signing off now - I'll think of something more exciting to show you later in the week. Who knows, could be tomorrow!

Brioche is not the same as other bread

It should go without saying, but I'm going to say it - some breads  are harder than others. Brioche is one of these breads. For those of you that watch the Great British Baking Show (and those of you that don't, why???), I'm guessing you've watched the contestants freaking out and being unsure of whether what they are doing is right. And if you're like me, you may sometimes think, or even say out loud, "what are they freaking out about? You've made bread before. How hard could this type of bread be?"  Well, I have now learned a valuable lesson. It can be pretty different and hard. 

Brioche is what is called an "enriched" dough. This means it has a lot of butter, eggs, and some milk in it. This makes for a really light and delicate bread that is very flavorful. It also means that you work the dough a lot less and it's pretty sticky. It also spreads out much larger than I thought it would. I started as usual, by searching out lots of different recipes, and finally settling on this one from Delish (https://www.delish.com/cooking/recipe-ideas/a28848483/brioche-bread-recipe/). One of the first things I noticed is the sheer amount of butter and eggs (2 loaves of bread, 6 eggs, 2 sticks of butter), but hey, things that taste good often have lots of  butter. The recipe starts by having you make a sponge - flour, yeast and milk together to give the yeast a chance to activate before putting  it in the dough. This is important because having this much fat in your dough can retard the yeast growth. There's also a longer rise time involved - these loaves rose twice for 90 minutes each. 

I had  the idea that I was going to make hamburger buns out of 1/3 of the dough, but they turned into mini loaves, as seen here, but other than that, this bread came out amazingly.

With that, I'm off  to take care of some other projects around the house. And think about what's for dinner tonight. Stay happy and healthy. 

Remember when canned food was good?

I remember when I was a child, canned food wasn't looked at the way it is today. I remember liking some things out of cans, and I still do. Not everything, mind you. I remember loving asparagus in a can. It was a special treat. We'd warm it up, and (literally) slurp it down. Now, I don't like my asparagus cooked that long, or that color, so I buy it fresh and cook it myself. I still like corn from a can, and I still like Spam. It does need to be sliced thin and fried until it's crispy, just like when I was a kid. Another thing I like is corned beef hash. 

There is really nothing like the corned beef hash that comes out of a can. The potatoes are teeny tiny squares, the corned beef is smooth and salty, and you have to scoop it out to put it in the pan. Once you get it there, we smash it down so that it's almost a flat layer in the bottom of the pan. There's just enough fat in there to make it amazingly crispy on the outside while it stays moist in the middle. MMMM!!!

Walter and I tried to recreate that experience with the rest of the corned beef he made last week. We ground it up in the food processor, and combined it with some hashed brown potatoes. It was close, but no cigar. We decided there's just no substitute for some things.

Almost right!

Today I'm back to bread making - I'm trying brioche. I think it looks right - we'll see how it turns out on tomorrow's blog. Until then, I hope you have all you need, and much of what you want!