So, in my quest to be more active, productive, and proactive in the new year, I am doing more experimental cooking. Which is always a challenge in my tiny kitchen and in Japan, where I cannot identify ingredients! For example, I stood in front of the bottles for like forty minutes today trying to identify fish sauce and in the end had to leave ( Read more... )

Yeah, so I got an immersion blender! Seriously, guys, this is the Best. Tool. Ever. If you are a soup addict, anyway, which I kind of am. Well. Maybe really am. I LOVE SOUP OKAY. It's amazing! Like a drink and a meal in one! Sometimes chewy, sometimes smooth! All kinds of different interesting options to try ( Read more... )

This is a very fast cake-like gooey thing that you make if you don't have an oven and you have had a bad day/you're celebrating something, or you're not sure which.

4 Tablespoons Flour
3 Tablespoons Sugar
Pinch Of Salt
1/8 teaspoon Baking Powder
2 Tablespoons Cocoa Powder
2 Tablespoon Melted Butter
1 Tablespoon Kahlua
1/4 Teaspoon Vanilla
Two or three ( Read more... )

I made delicious food! In my rice cooker! I put about a cup of rice in, rinsed it, added the appropriate amount of water. Then I sprinkled salt on, as one does. Then I dumped in a good glug of soy sauce (approximately a tablespoon). Then I cut up a lovely garlicky sausage from the Brazilian import store down the road, and diced a carrot and dumped ( Read more... )

So, I made these muffins, and I had about a third of a can of pumpkin left and a lentil salad, which is not quite enough for dinner. And I'd recently seen this recipe for butternut squash pasta sauce. This is my extremely altered based on ingredients pasta sauce, with one rather surprising but completely perfect ingredient that turned it from ' ( Read more... )

Oh god, this game. Here is a summary of what happened: at halftime, I was making fucking awesome pancakes to console myself. Ten minutes later, I was making excited pancakes. And by the end, they were celebratory amazing pancakes. There are no words to describe the amazingness of Claudio Pizarro. And clearly whatever Schaaf said at halftime sunk in ( Read more... )

 Well, my last post got deleted before I managed to post it, due to a badly managed backspace attempt, but the content still stands. First off, it is August and I have reliable Internet, so I've got to make an effort to be less stultifying than I've been for June and July. Therefore, I give you a Basil Ice Cream recipe, which is intensely ( Read more... )

I've been wanting crepes lately. You know how it is - suddenly it hits you that it's been positively months since you've had your last crepe. So, this morning I hauled out my handy Internet, and googled 'em up.

Well. Actually.

What I did was, I checked Cook's Illustrated to see if they had a recipe. They do, which is obviously awesome, because yay ( Read more... )

 But here is her ultra-awesome Saucepan Brownies recipe, which I am Sharing With The World. Quietly. Very, very quietly ( Read more... )

 Today's lunch: melted camembert and sliced apples on toast, an egg cooked in butter and toasted sesame dressing on top of bean sprouts and lettuce (with more sesame dressing because I love that stuff). Cognac truffles from Khaldi for dessert.

Cheese and Apple Toast:
Flavor: 4/5
Ease of preparation: 4/5
Clean-up: 5/5
Overall messiness: 4/5
Appearance: 3/ ( Read more... )