Welcome to the World of Tomorrow!

Wow, since I still pay for this url I thought I should check it out some time.
Looks like nothing I linked to in 2007 still exists!

Where is Amelia? Parts 1 and 3

Where was Amelia? Pt 2

Leek Quick Bread

Hello internet! 

I'm back. Well, sort of, writing this post from my phone standing in the kitchen.

I just whipped this up, and it's so good I had to share.

I've been getting too many leeks and not enough potatoes in my farm box, and it's totally thrown off my "use all the damn leeks in potato leek soup" method of getting rid of them. Right now I have 10 leeks washed, chopped, and frozen sitting in my freezer just waiting for me to do something with them.

I'd been playing around with this idea for a month or so, so when I got three more leeks in my farm box this morning I knew something had to be done. Other than just add to the bag in the freezer.

(Much thanks to Baker Bettie, who after much internet scouring, had the best adaptable quick bread recipe I found. I used to do all my quick breads by feel, but needed an actual recipe to get back into the swing of things)

• 1.5 cups AP flour
• 1 tsp,  heaping, baking powder
• .50, heaping, tsp kosher salt
• 2 eggs
• 1 cup 2% milk
• .25 cups extra virgin olive oil
• 1 cup chopped leeks, greens and whites
• 1 tbsp honey

1. Preheat oven to 350
2. Oil bread pan (I used canola, but butter would be fantastic)
3. In medium bowl mix wet ingredients except for honey
4. In large bowl mix dry ingredients except for leeks
5. Mix wet ingredients into dry
6. Fold in leeks and honey
7. Pour into bread pan and grind a little fresh pepper on top
8. Bake for approximately 40 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.
9. Enjoy! 

Where is Amelia? Fall 2013 part I

View Asia 2013 in a larger map

Two whole weeks away from Beaniac; with anti-anxiety medication and the appropriate doses of caffeine I will survive this amazing death-march that is my  job.

Working it through

Seems like most of the last year I've been suffering false start after false start.

Depression sucks.
Having walking Pneumonia for six months before I finally got a proper diagnosis and some damn antibiotics sucked.

This new wonderful mini-person in my life is amazing.
But figuring out how to readjust all the old and new priorities can suck.

Many of the ways it's changed J and my relationship are extremely painful, and every day we're doing what we can to make it work.

I need a damn good anthem to help me cope, to give me strength.

Thank you Nick Cave et all for providing.



Amen.

Where is Amelia? Spring 2013 edition

One year later...


View Eurasia 2013 in a larger map

My first big trip away from the West Coast, and the longest I'll have been away from the little one yet.
Wish me luck!

So many recipes to catch up on posting:
There's Carrot Cup-Cakes for Beaniac's 1st birthday
Sauerkraut Soup that kept us alive for months
Carrot-Ginger-Lentil Soup
Surviving 10 months of crippling postpartum depression (thankfully that's over)
And many other mushy foods easily shared by all members of the family, regardless of how many teeth they have.

It's alive!

Kinda....

Orange Fennel Salad

No baby yet, but any day now!

I'm doing great for someone 39 weeks and 4 days preggo, with ankles as swelling-free as before baby.

I am still craving sweet foods like crazy, and citrus is one of the few things other than chocolate I really want to eat these days.

How perfect is it that our farm box had a half dozen oranges and a fennel (which, at least in seed form, is supposed to increase milk supply) bulb last week?

This is one of my favorite salads. It's easy to put together, looks glamorous, and keeps well for up to three days in the fridge as the fennel softens and the flavors marry.

You will need:

• One fennel bulb with greens
• Several navel oranges or similar variety
• Extra virgin olive oil
• Sea salt & fresh ground black pepper
• A large bowl to serve salad
• Additional salad leaves like butter lettuce of romaine if desired

1. Peel off outer layer of fennel bulb, slice off the thick root end, and chop off greens an inch below their base. You want the cleaner, thinner inner part of the bulb for this salad.
2. Chop and reserve a couple table spoons of the fennel greens.
3. Cut the trimmed bulb in half from top to bottom, then very thinly slice against the grain into half moons, you want the fennel as close to paper-thin as possible. Lay your slices of fennel in the large bowl. Keep in mind that you'll want about equal portions of fennel and orange, give or take depending on your own taste.
4. Peel and halve oranges, then thinly slice them into half moons as you did with the fennel, only orange slices should be about 1/4 inch thick. I recommend using a flexible plastic cutting board to you can poor the orange juice into the salad bowl as it pools.
5. Once you have your orange and fennel in the bowl, drizzle with a 1/2 teaspoon or so extra virgin olive oil per cup of salad, sprinkle lightly with sea salt, chopped fennel greens, and ground pepper.
6. Gently toss salad to mix ingredients, the olive oil and orange juice mix to create the dressing.
7. Either serve as is, or lay atop a bed of torn romaine or butter lettuce leaves.

Alternately, you can lay round (instead of half-moon) fennel and orange slices on a platter and drizzle them with the olive oil and juice, much as you would a caprese salad.

Happy 60th Mr. Adams

On the occasion of Douglas Adams' unrealized 60th birthday.

It's time to re-watch this lecture he gave at UCSB in 2008, shortly before his tragically early death.

Remember, we are the puddles.

Posted by me back in 2010 too.

Friday Cute / Madness!

Not like any of the rabbits I even had.

MLK Cake 2012

Martin Luther King Jr cake for 2012, J & my 7th meeting-anniversary, and 8th MLK Cake.

Raspberry cake with vanilla butter-cream frosting and chocolate glaze.

Post under construction!

2005 3 days after meeting the love of my life

2006-2007 lost on an old hard drive somewhere

2008

2009

2010

2011

Pumpkin Bread

Maybe it's the season change, maybe it's the pregnancy and my new fondness for baked goods, but this year I haven't been able to get enough pumpkin bread/ muffins/ pie/ etc...

To celebrate the darker days and annual turning-on-of-the-heater I've been baking pumpkin bread. It's inspired by my mom's delicious original recipe, but I've tried to make it a tad healthier by cutting sugar and adding some fiber. (To you know, counteract all that butter in the picture above.)

Pumpkin Bread (1 standard loaf)

• DRY ingredients
• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1 cup flour
• 1/2 cup teff flour
• 1/4 cup oats
• 3/4 tsp salt
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp nutmeg
• 1/4 tsp ground cloves (if you don't have all these spices 2 tsps pumpkin pie spice mix wil do)
• 1 tsp baking soda

• WET ingredients
• 2 eggs
• 1/2 cup oil
• 1/3 cup milk (eggnog makes a great substitution!)
• 1 cup canned pumpkin

1. Mix dry ingredients together.
2. Mix wet ingredients together.
3. Combine wet and dry.
4. Optional- Add 1 cups walnuts or other nuts/seeds, etc (for the loaf pictured I use 1/2 cup each chopped pecans and persimmon.)
5. Pour into lighted greased and floured loaf pans.
6. Bake one hour ten minutes in 350 oven.

I've also learned some really valuable lessons about substitutions in baking during the process...

• Though it has a delicious nutty flavor, teff flour makes for a much crumblier loaf than all-purpose flour. Be warned your sliced loaves will fall apart.
• You cannot substitute molasses for sugar. The flavor may be good, but the loaf will collapse.
• Neither can you substitute equal parts bran for flour, see collapse problem above.

And the real prize, for sticking with me, my mom's pumpkin bread recipe:

Makes two standard loaves

3 cups sugar
3.5 cups flour
1.5 tsp salt
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp nutmeg
.5 tsp cloves
2 tsp soda

4 eggs
1 cup oil
.67 cups milk
2 cups pumpkin

Mix dry ingredients together.
Mix wet ingredients together.
Combine wet and dry.

Add two cups walnuts or other nuts/seeds, etc (optional).

Pour into lighted greased and floured loaf pans. Bake one hour ten minutes in 350 oven.

still alive!

We made it through the new year!



And I experienced my first hangover-free New Year's Day in, oh, more than my "adult" life.

It was grand.

A couple weeks ago J & I took our last pre-baby vacation to visit some friends in Oregon and play in Portland for a day.

It was also grand.

Here's hoping all the changes we're expecting (ha!) 2012 to bring aren't too crazy!

Our kind of Christmas

Happy Christmas and 6th night of Hanukkah to everyone!



Latke and pumpkin bread recipes in the tubes.

No wine for me this year, but I've got a date set for next year.

Thursday reminder

Today's mantra:

“People take different roads seeking fulfillment and happiness. Just because they’re not on your road doesn’t mean they’ve gotten lost.”
― Dalai Lama XIV

Works wonders when working with the great unwashed public, especially those closest to our hearts.

End of Summer Soup

So good I only got pictures of one 1/2 eaten bowl

This hearty end of summer soup is a great low-attention one-pot meal for when the skies cloud over and the weather turns cold.

And for when your preggo taste-buds finally start responding to a wider range of flavors than fat and sweet.

• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 1 large yellow onion, diced
• 2 carrots, chopped
• 2 stalks celery, chopped
• 2 bell peppers (one yellow one red), chopped
• 1 jalapeno, finely chopped
• 3 springs thyme
• 6 sage leaves, torn
• 1/4 cup basil leaves, chiffonaded
• 4 cups chicken broth/ stock (veggie or mushroom as a substitute)
• 1/2 cup roast turkey, roughly chopped or torn to bite-size pieces (baked tofu if making a vegetarian/vegan soup)
• 4 cups roughly chopped ripe tomatoes, heirloom, beefsteak, red, yellow, purple- doesn't matter, just don't bother peeling or seeding
• 1/3 cup feta cheese, crumbled (pasteurized for us preggos, none for vegans!)
• 1/2 cup dry egg noodles (substitute with orecchiette if going vegan)
• 1 egg, lightly beaten (vegans leave this out, obviously)
• 4 cups well-washed spinach, dried and chopped
• green olive bread, lightly toasted and buttered

1. in large non-reactive stock pot heat oil at medium high. add chopped onion and saute until fragrant & translucent
2. add celery and carrot and saute a few more minutes
3. add jalapeno, bell peppers, sage, thyme and turkey (tofu) saute until peppers are fragrant and soft, giving a good stir every minute or two. the goal here is to get a light coat of brown on as many veggies as possible. however, your pot might be a bit crowded, so don't worry if it doesn't work out
4. toss in all the tomatoes and reduce heat to medium low, cover and let cook until tomatoes are thoroughly broken down, stirring occasionally. this will probably take around an hour. here's where your laziness in not peeling or seeding pays off- the confetti of colorful skins adds visual interest and texture to the soup
5. once the tomatoes have broken down into an easy liquid, stir in your broth and bring back to a simmer, let simmer another 10-15 minutes covered
6. thoroughly mix your crumbled feta, egg noodles and beaten egg in to the soup. cover and set a kitchen timer for 5 minutes
7. when the alarm goes off stir in basil and 1/2 the chopped spinach, leave uncovered and set alarm for another 5 minutes
8. when the alarm goes off again, remove your soup from the heat and fold in the remaining spinach. keep soup covered, away from heat until it's cool enough to dish up
9. if you can find one, serve with a green (or black) olive baguette- the combination of sweet, salty, spicy soup and sour bread is heavenly.

This is happening?

Today is J & my four-year anniversary!*

And an excuse to post.

The recipe posting has been negligible over the last few months because I haven't really been interested in food.

In fact, I've only been eating capital B Boring foods.

Cottage cheese, roast turkey, avocado, string cheese, plums, yogurt, and more cottage cheese.

I've also been incredibly lazy about cooking.

Thank god the Trader Joe's in Davis opened; I didn't really miss not having one around for the last eight years, but their frozen dinners have been a savior to the overly sleepy cook with suddenly, horrifyingly, bland taste-buds.

Last night I had wilted spinach with 2% milk poured over it for dinner. Really.

Three weeks in Asia was truly great, but having to be careful about every bite I ate, and extra-vigilant against food poisoning left me feeling more than a hair on the wrong side of boring.

For a naturally shy girl, not going out for drinks with colleagues, or having Perrier with a twist of lime as my "fun" beverage, was a new experience.

Good thing I seek out new experiences.

Since a lot right now is falling under that category...

And if you haven't guessed it already...

If everything goes according to plan...

(and the whole thing has so far)

The July 8 post was a clue...

In March our lives are really going to change.

(This picture of our bean is almost a month old, but it's another month til we get a new one)

Life is surreal.

I am so happy and lucky to have four years of marriage with the best husband ever, and excited for what the future years will bring.

Happy anniversary love of my life ♥

*Blogger has it's time zones wrong- this was posted 2011.09.30 even though Blogger thinks it's the evening of Sept 29, no where on the planet is it still the 29th.

Return

I'm so excited to be home for the cool weather and first rain of autumn!

Where is Amelia? September 2011 edition

For those following along at home:


View East Asia 2011 in a larger map


So I've joined the ranks of long-abandoned blogs at last.

Other life events have kept me relatively uninspired in the kitchen (can anyone say spruced-up Trader Joe's frozen foods?) but those will get their fair address when I'm back from these three weeks in Asia.

In the meantime I'll try to update from the road as time and firewalls permit!