sometime towards the end of last week, i got an email titled “corn is 4 for a dollar.” and right away i knew that this was an email i would like, because who doesn’t like emails about food? true, i was a little curious because […]
do you ever find that when you’re having a dinner party, and you’re finally sitting down to eat, you…don’t actually feel like eating? it’s one part adrenaline from getting everything done, and one part nervousness about people liking what you’ve made – especially when you’re […]
what i have realized as i’ve gotten older is that i am, in fact, like my mother. every time she cooks for large groups of people (ie family), she spends almost the entire time in the kitchen. no level of exhortation gets her to stop jumping up every ten minutes to tend to whatever is cooking on the stove.
i am not quite the same, but when i surmise about why i like dinner parties as much as i do, certain similarities suddenly reveal themselves. i like dinner parties for two reasons: i like to feed people, and i like to mix my friends (to varying levels of success). but…i don’t particularly like to join in the festivities myself, because the high point for me is really the cooking part. is that strange? perhaps. but no matter how well i plan, no matter how done i am with cooking when people arrive, i’m somewhat distracted at the end of the cooking, and all i really want to do is watch everyone else have fun. in fact, since i’ve already had my fun, i’d go as far to say that i’d cook for everyone and then go to sleep while they eat. (more…)
i guess i could never be a dishwasher, because a day after the dinner party, my hands are all itchy and irritated by constant dishwashing. i just put two kinds of gunk on my hands in hopes that they will be happy soon. it’s strange, […]
alright, i’ve been staring at my computer since 6:30am, trying to make my portfolio reach that mythical land of completeness; i need a break. oddly enough, not one from the computer, but at least one from the portfolio because i’m falling asleep. i shouldn’t have […]
it’s finally getting cold, and i can’t say how thrilled i am. i was going to go to studio all day today, but since carrien is home, we’re going to make chicken pot pie – we’re roasting the chicken right now. today’s chicken has rosemary-thyme butter stuffed underneath the skin, is stuffed with apples and onions, and was rubbed with a salt-sugar-paprika-pepper mixture before being popped in the oven. same roasting method as before – 20 minutes at 400, then the rest (probably an hour to an hour and a half since stuffed that cavity pretty well) at 350. we’ll let that cool, then pull it apart and make pot pie with it. god that smells good in the oven.
an update on the chicken: that was one beautiful chicken. of course, we let it sit for maybe ten minutes before ripping it apart for the pot pie, but it was a pretty wonderful thing. i realized that i really do like to stuff my chickens with lemon wedges (we didn’t have any around), but it was good anyway – the herbs made up for it. it had beautiful color from the sugar rubbed into the skin – basically it looked like cookbook or food magazine photos of roasted chickens (though mine looked a bit ghetto with its makeshift coil-of-aluminum-foil trussing). perfectly cooked, too, so chalk that up as my first really good roast chicken. the pot pie was really good as well – i thought we wouldn’t use up all of the thyme, but instead i just put it in everything (biscuit topping, roux, and vegetable mixture), hoping it wouldn’t be too overpowering, and it was fine.
this is a photo of our delicata squash, a type of squash that has a hard rind that makes it feel like a gourd, but that’s also edible. we cut it up (with my gorgeous, wonderful santoku that i keep nicking myself with by accident) […]
ah, studio or cooking: which one is more important? well, seeing as a review is not a negotiable thing, but cooking is, i went with studio. for the past three or four weeks. in return, my body feels like it’s on its last legs, coughing […]
forgive me if you are reading this and you actually celebrate easter (as opposed to consuming large amounts of chocolate). neither jessica nor i are religious, but the allure of the mimosa resulted in an easter celebration.
i’d never had a mimosa before, but it’s apparently jessica’s favorite champagne drink. lo and behold, easter loomed before us, and gave us the perfect excuse to have mimosas. we thus structured an easter brunch around mimosas. theme : elegant. we invited eva and oded, and vicky and peter.
on the menu:
citrus fruit salad
asparagus with hollandaise sauce
herbed crepes with “spring tomato sauce” (epicurious’ name, not mine)
curried egg salad sandwiches
easter eggs!
hamantaschen
apricot souffles with creme anglaise (more…)
our menus for the week before and after spring break: 11 mars / lisa : legumes en cocotte, mostaccioli alfredo, brown sugar pound cake 13 mars / michelle : salade nicoise, pates au pistou, ratatouille, gratin d’abricots aux amandes 14 mars / jessica lee : […]