Cooking For One

Let's talk food today.

Recently I stumbled on the book Solo Suppers, and I love the idea of it. Author Joyce Goldstein, after going through a divorce, realized that most traditional recipes which serve 4-6 don't easily translate into single servings, or even two servings. Which means that people who frequently cook for just themselves are left with a conundrum: cook for 4-6 and end up with way more leftovers than they will ever eat, or try to downsize the recipe at the risk of it coming out all wrong. So she came up with this book, which is full of classic recipes in smaller sizes, designed for the single person who doesn't necessarily want to be eating the same leftovers for a week.

I've been trying to cook different things lately and it's definitely hard to find recipes for one. While I do have the Lil' Bro to cook for every now and then, most of the time I'm just cooking for me. I think this book could be a lifesaver. Now only if I could get my grocery store to start stocking perishable food in smaller sizes...


Image via Barnes and Noble

Snackage

This week is uber busy for me which means instead of sitting down to three square meals a day, I will probably be doing a lot of on-the-go snacking.

To keep myself from devouring muffins at the coffee shop between class and work (and the lab, and more class, and more work...) I compiled a little list of my favorite snacks to eat when I don't have time to sit down for a meal, much less cook one.

My current faves:

• Spicy paprika and garlic almonds.
• Raw almonds and dried cranberries.
• Yogurt. Blackberry, apple cinnamon, blueberry, peach, anything but strawberry (for some reason, I hate strawberry yogurt).
  
• Chocolate milk and a banana.
• String cheese and an apple.
• Peanut butter and banana sandwich, especially if the bread is toasted and the PB is melting (mmm).
• Leftover tomato soup with chili spices, black beans, and corn (especially good when it's cold).
  
• Scrambled egg with spinach, chopped onion, and bell peppers- this is about as close to cooking as I'll get this week.

For lots of other snacking ideas, I go here.

Your turn: what are you fave on-the-go snacks? I can always use more ideas!

Comfort Food: What's Yours?

I've always had a thing for homemade potato soup. There is something so simple and familiar about it, and it always brings me back to when I was little and my grandma made it from scratch for me. If I'm ever craving comfort food, potato soup is my go-to.

Today I stumbled on the Wikipedia page for "comfort food" (there is a Wikipedia page for everything) and got to reading about comfort foods throughout the world. Potato soup isn't on the list anywhere, but chicken noodle soup was one of the common comfort foods in the States. Other common ones included pizza, peanut butter, macaroni and cheese, and applesauce (mmm). Canada is similar to the States, while the United Kingdom prefers "bangers and mash" (sausage and mashed potatoes) and Ireland likes boiled stews, soda bread, and butter. Other popular choices include fried eggs with fries or rice in Spain and miso soup in Japan. You can read the full Wikipedia article here.

Also according to Wikipedia, comfort food is usually something simple and familiar that is associated with childhood. So I guess my love of potato soup isn't so far off after all.

What's your favorite comfort food? And, just for fun, do you think it's related to where you live?

Image: chicken stew via Cambell's Kitchen. Nom.

Let's Go On a Picnic!

(via Real Simple)

Random, but lately I've been thinking a lot about picnics. Maybe it's the warm weather, but I really want to grab some friends and a big blanket and settle down in the park for sun, company, and of course some delicious food.

So let's have a fantasy blog picnic today. I'll be bringing stuffed peppers. Don't they look tasty? (I found the recipe here.) What are you going to bring? And remember, it's a fantasy picnic, so we can bring anything!

If someone wants to bring this cake I'd be cool with that.

Omigosh peanut butter-( via Cup of Jo, via You Are My Fave)

Spending Hiatus Update: Week Seven

Money poster by Howard Sokol via allposters.com

I might as well come right out with my confession.

I bought a shirt last week. A completely unnecessary shirt. It was at Take 2 Apparel, a really awesome "upscale" (i.e. no grandma sweatpants) secondhand store where they sell not used but "experienced" clothing (because experienced sounds so much more positive). I fell in love with this dark purple satin blouse- it fits perfectly and looks fab with both dark blue jeans and my slacks and skirts for work. I have been lusting after a jewel-tone satin shirt for awhile and this one was only $10, being secondhand and all. Plus, there was no guarantee that it would be around in April when this spending hiatus gets over with. And so...I bought it. I felt a little guilty afterward but to be honest shh, I don't feel all that bad. The shirt is perfect, at any rate, and I can't return it- the one downside of buying second hand.

So now that I've confessed, my good news is that I haven't felt the need to buy anything else lately. I know, I know, I keep saying that every week, but it really is true. Once I got out of the habit of shopping all the time, I haven't felt the compulsion to buy things. The one exception lately may be shampoo, because I decided to try out a new brand and it makes my hair frizzy and not at all shiny, le sigh. So I AM tempted to pick up a new bottle, I'll admit. But that would be cheating wouldn't it? I've resisted the siren call of better shampoo so far, telling myself that I will wait until the current bottle runs out (which it can't do fast enough).

Last week was, again, a pretty busy one. This quarter's classes are nearing their end and I've got research projects and exams looming, so I had to work on those during the week. The weekend was great, though, since I decided to take some time off and relax. At any rate, here are some of the things I did instead of shopping.

• On Friday I grabbed sushi with one of my coworkers and her friend. I forget the name of the restaurant we went to, but it was located in the most charming Victorian house right off the main drag and had excellent avocado sushi rolls. I even got adventurous and tried the eel sushi that my friend got, which tasted more like mush than anything.
  
• Also on Friday, we plopped down on my couch and watched Mamma Mia! with Pierce Brosnan and Meryl Streep. My feelings on the movie are mixed. It was cheese to the extreme, but also hilarious. I am seriously lusting after some long wavy hair now.

via Wikipedia

• On Saturday we (same group as sushi the night before) hit up the gallery hop in the Short North, which is when all the art galleries open their doors the first Saturday of the month and you can walk around checking out awesome art exhibits and street performers and generally have a great time free of charge. This is also when the Shirt Buying Incident occurred, and I blame peer pressure (ahem, Sarah A., ahem). We also stopped by Jeni's, my favorite ice cream place in the entire world, which I wrote about back in January. It was the first warm day of the year, so the place was packed but the wait was worth it for a cup of Riesling Poached Pear sorbet and Honey Vanilla Bean ice cream (mmm).

Gallery Hop Night: image via the Short North website (see link above)

• Sunday I worked on this damned biology paper that would have been easy had the instructions not been vague and contradictory. That, church, and a nap consisted of pretty much my entire day.
  

At any rate, I had what I consider an amazing weekend and I didn't feel too guilty about slipping up on the spending hiatus. I have another 5 weeks to get back on track, after all.

How about you- how was your week/weekend? For those of you doing the spending hiatus, how has it been going?

You can check out the rest of my spending hiatus posts here.

PS: If anyone wants to suggest an afforable shampoo that doesn't turn my hair into frizzy straw, that would awesome! :)

It's Fat Tuesday!

Just an excuse to eat extra brownies. Or wear a sweet pink mask like this one from Etsy. I chose the brownies.

Image via artisanmaskers.

Spending Hiatus: Week 3

So last week was week three of the spending hiatus. First, the temptation:

It was $1 sale time at Rag O Rama. As the name might suggest, this is when the store (basically a trendier thrift store) takes a bunch of stuff out of storage and marks it all $1. Yes, a single dollar. Believe you me, I sorely wanted to go and "just look" but I think we all know that never really works (it only $1!) so I stayed home.

And what I did instead of shopping:

I realized on Friday that I was bored/lonely and, thus, tempted to go shopping but instead Iwent to Baja Sol and had amazing burritos with a friend. I might just have to invent a new type of therapy- burrito therapy. I think it would be a hit. They also have an awesome salsa bar at Baja Sol with at least 25 different salsas to choose from which is like heaven for me.

And that was pretty much my weekend, since on Sunday I mostly studied and cleaned. And reorganized my closet. Which sounds lame, except that I love reorganizing. Plus I got to banish my fugly blue clothes hamper to the closet so that it doesn't sit in the middle of the room anymore.

I found that I felt a lot better about going out to eat and buying gifts this weekend because I hadn't already wasted my money on other stuff. I was able to really enjoy myself because I wasn't stressed thinking "I already spent $20 on makeup (or $1 clothes), so I shouldn't really buy dinner..." Instead, I just went out and enjoyed myself. And that was really, really nice to not have to worry about the money all that much. Which is not to say that I will be eating out every night- just that as an every-now-and-then thing, it's not going to kill me IF I keep my other spending in check. Could it be that I *gasp* learned something already?!

How was your weekend? (PS I just realized that half of this post is about food. I like to eat. A lot.)

Also:
The Spending Hiatus
Spending Hiatus Week 1
Spending Hiatus Week 2

Things to Do Instead of Shopping (apparently I should add in eating a whole lot)

Cute Wedding Idea: Truffle Cake!

I have never been a huge fan of wedding cake. Cake itself is okay, but it's not my favorite. And wedding cake always ends up tasting bland and having too much icing.

Then I saw this truffle cake on the wedding blog Snippet and Ink:

How awesome is that? It's like a wedding cake, but so much tastier. I'm not getting married anytime soon, but if I was, I would definitely consider a cake like this.

What do you think about the non-traditional wedding cake? Cool idea or just too weird for a wedding?

PS: The names on the flags are the Match.com screen names of the happy couple- it's where they met! How cute is that?!

You can see the rest of their vintage movie themed wedding here.

Truffle cake images are from Greg Piche Photography, via Snippet and Ink. Copyright: Beth Hurley and Deb Mindel.

What is Jeni's, you ask?

Photo from the Jeni's website.

My previous post got me thinking that maybe some of you all aren't aware of Jeni's Ice Creams. Since that is a tragedy beyond measurable proportions, I'm here to inform you.

Jeni's is the best ice cream ever in the history of mankind and I'm not kidding.

And before you say "I don't like ice cream" just know that I have taken at least 3 self-proclaimed ice cream haters to Jeni's, and each one of them has been back since. It is that amazing.

Jeni's ice creams is located in Columbus, Ohio and has several locations in that area. In case you're not lucky enough to live just down the street from it like I am, it appears that you can order it on their website, though don't ask me how you're supposed to ship ice cream.

You can also find a flavor list here. To give you an idea, they're pretty much the only place I know that offers flavors like Riesling Poached Pear Sorbet, Olive Oil w/ Sea Salt Pepitas, Cherry Lambic Sorbet, even Thai Chili and Saigon Cinnamon (both very hot flavors, which is a weird sensation in ice cream). I also highly recommend Honey Vanilla Bean, my other fave.

I'll stop now before I start sounding like an advertisement- I just had to spread the Jeni's love.