Mozzarella Meltdown

Goodness, how time flies when you add work and school to cooking and blogging. So here we are, three weeks later and while I do feel like I am leading a greener lifestyle, the leaner portion of the goal isn't going as well as I would like.

It all started with two failed attempts at making mozzarella. I don't know what went wrong, but it certainly wasn't as easy-breezy as my cheese making book made it seem. Now maybe I'm the only one this has ever happened to; but my second dismal mozzarella performance sent me into a total tailspin: I mean a huffing, puffing, crying meltdown. Which only got worse when I started to get ready to meet Kevin that evening and nothing, I mean nothing, fit right.

I don't think it was all the mozzarella's fault, really I think it was a product of stress from the recent deaths in the family and the fact that I'm feeling really uncomfortable in my own skin these days. I look in the mirror and I don't see the healthy vibrant person on the outside that I feel like inside.

This minor meltdown didn't completely derail me from my goal to breakup with processed foods. Most of the items in my kitchen meet the requirements of the challenge: local when at all possible, organic, and made with four ingredients or less. But I have to admit to some serious abuse of the "eating out clause", as in I've been eating at restaurants nearly 5 times a week for the last couple of weeks. I could say my new, more hectic schedule is to blame, which is partially true; but deep down I know that's just a convenient excuse to be lazy in my food preparation.

So this day marks a new addition to the challenge: No more than 2 meals out a week and that includes snacks at Starbucks or my school's coffee shop.

Until next time, I'll still be fighting the good fight - one bag of chips at a time.

Back to reality

My oh my, a lot has happened in the last couple days. First of all, I started my summer classes on Monday, launching me back into the real world where I have more to worry about than just food and blogging. Additionally, I am happy to report that I will also be starting a new part-time job next week at Georgetown University! Although it will add 20 more hours of work to my schedule, I am committed to my new life of homemade and unprocessed food. I think the key will be making larger quantities of food on the days I have free time so that I won’t have to work as hard to come up with meals on the days that I’m particularly busy.

The second exciting event of the last few days was a trip to a Virginia farm with a couple friends, one of whom has a share in this particular farm. It may sound trite, but actually seeing how the food was grown along with all of the planning and labor that is involved in making a small family farm successful really made me appreciate the produce I’ve been eating these last few weeks. Not to mention we got some freshly picked salad greens, eggs right out of the chicken coop, seedlings for my home garden, and saw a beautiful peacock hanging out on top of a greenhouse!

Finally, my cooking skills continue to improve and my confidence in the kitchen is growing. I made a batch of whole wheat pasta all by myself (although Kevin was only a few feet away in the living room answering my questions), which I combined with onion, asparagus, and rainbow chard in a creamy white wine sauce.

Also, I made a super easy flatbread from a recipe provided by my lovely Leah: combine 1 cup flour (I used whole wheat), 2/3 cup milk, 2 eggs, pinch of salt and your favorite seasoning (I chopped up fresh rosemary); cook at 400 degrees for 20 minutes; take out of oven, add toppings, return to oven until toppings are hot and cheese is melted.

The week in review

I made it: 1 week down, 51 to go. Every day I’m excited to sample the local foods in my kitchen, learn new cooking techniques and truly understand the origins of everything I consume. Yesterday, I had a good friend over for lunch and hit a major milestone in my adult life: I had enough food in my kitchen to make an entire meal without going to the grocery store. It may not seem like a big deal to some, but for me it means that I’m graduating into adulthood and indicates that I’m cooking at home more than eating out.

Our lunch consisted of a salad with fresh red and green lettuce, tomato, onion, toasted almond slivers, crumbled goat cheese and homemade strawberry vinaigrette. The dressing was made with about a cup of whole fresh strawberries, apple vinegar, olive oil and a bit of honey all mixed with an immersion blender (add olive oil last until you get your desired taste and consistency; ours was on the creamy side). Followed by homemade pasta (flour, eggs and vegetable oil) with diced onion, rainbow chard, tomato, and shredded chicken in a white wine and butter sauce. Almost everything was fresh and local, but it was all delicious.

When I started this challenge, my intention was to meticulously record what I spend, unfortunately that hasn’t exactly worked out as well as planned. However, I can tell you that I spent approximately $200 on all of my groceries for the last seven days. That may seem high, but consider this: I was eating out at least 5 meals out a week, spending an average of $15 each meal; plus $3-5 a day for coffee and bottled water; plus about one $40 trip to the grocery store a week – totaling around $150 – so this week’s total really wasn’t that much more.

Furthermore, I just bought a book about cheese making (which was one of the most expensive local purchases made this week); when I start that endeavor my grocery bill should noticeably decrease. This leaves free range meat and eggs as the most expensive items that I must purchase from a farmer’s market. Hopefully, by growing some of my own vegetables, baking bread and making cheese, I will mitigate the cost of meat and eggs. Only time will tell, but I’m ready for the ride!

Ben & Jerry's Revenge

For those of you who aren’t familiar with my “ground rules”, one of them is that I will not buy anything from a store that has more than four ingredients (to clarify, I’m not opposed to making something myself with 4+ ingredients). Therefore basic items like bread, salad dressing, ice cream, etc. must be homemade by me. Now I don’t want to lead you to believe that I eat a TON of ice cream, but I partake in a fair amount of Ben & Jerry’s (Super New York Fudge Chunk is my favorite followed closely by Strawberry Cheesecake). So perhaps the fact that my mint custard didn't freeze properly in the ice cream machine is some sort of retaliation by Ben and/or Jerry’s to my bold step away from their Vermonty goodness?

I realize that may be a pretty far-fetched scenario; but what is true is that something went awry with my ice cream making last night. I put the chilled custard into the frozen ice cream maker and let it churn… And churn and churn and churn. After nearly an hour in the machine (it’s supposed to take about 40 minutes) the custard was still runny. Kevin tried to thicken it by reheating the custard and adding another egg yolk, but after churning it again this morning nothing changed. I think we need a new recipe… Ben & Jerry: 1; Amanda & Kevin: 0

On the plus side, I put what I had into the freezer and it actually froze quite well; the consistency isn’t exactly correct (it’s a little bit icy) but it tastes really good. And that’s not the only tasty culinary outcome of the day, dinner was delicious: a turnip puree, grilled asparagus, and grilled lamb chops marinated in fresh mint, white wine, lemon juice and honey (http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Lemon-Honey-Lamb-Skewers/Detail.aspxx). The recipe is for lamb kabobs, but I just used the marinade portion and it was great. As a side note, we only marinated the chops for 3 hours because the lemon juice started to cook them.

For dessert? A loaf of chocolate strawberry bread that is amazing warm topped with butter. Find the perfect recipe at http://sweetpeaskitchen.com/ (scroll down, its past the lemon whoopee pie recipe).

Save the egg whites

Today was step two of the ice cream making process: making the custard, letting it cool and then putting it into the ice cream maker (where it is now, stay tuned for pictures tomorrow) You can find the recipe at http://www.davidlebovitz.com/2010/05/mint-chip-ice-cream-recipe-chocolate, among other ingredients it calls for 5 egg yolks. Which brought up an interesting topic between Kevin and I: if you can’t taste the ingredient, does it have to be local, organic, etc.? In terms of taste, we both agree that the eggs I bought at the farmer’s market are much better than what we’ve had in the past. However, it comes at a price: free-range eggs from a local farm cost twice as much as those in the grocery store that come from all across the country from chickens who are packed in hen houses like sardines and rarely if ever see daylight.

Kevin’s point is, if we’re just using the eggs as a thickening agent and can’t taste them, is it really necessary to spend more money? One could add: why go out of your way to find a farmer’s market when “Giant Supermarket USA” is right down the street and will sell all the same things plus fruits and vegetables that are out of season in your area for a cheaper price? While I understand this point or view (acutely as I am the one who typically buys the eggs), my choice to purchase eggs from a local farmer is about more than just taste (although that’s a major component). It’s about supporting local farming families who are trying to keep their farms and families afloat in a culture where low prices seem to be more important than taste, sustainability, or another’s well-being. I guess that’s why I’m doing this year-long challenge, to prove to myself that choosing to support local and sustainable business is feasible and also to begin to really appreciate fresh, ripe foods. In the end we both understand the other’s position and ultimately decided that the most important thing is not to waste anything. So, as you might have guessed, there are five egg whites chilling out in my fridge waiting to be made into a healthy fresh omelet tomorrow morning. Also, I just realized today that the greens attached to my farmer’s market turnips are turnip greens (it was a blonde moment, please forgive me). They were a little wilted, but I threw them in a pan with olive oil, red pepper flakes, salt and pepper and they tasted pretty darn good.

Nothing will be wasted in this household.

Cheese sauce saves the day

After yesterday’s “fowl up”, I was a little nervous to step back into the kitchen today and at a loss as to what to make for dinner. Lunch was easy: a great big salad full of veggies from the farmer’s market and chicken from last night. However, I had no clear idea of what to make for dinner; my farmer’s market haul is starting to get a little low and I’m not super experienced in the kitchen. So I spent a little bit of time googling, looked through my fridge and pantry and tried to channel my mother’s inventiveness (no matter what we had on hand, she always managed to make something work).

Finally, I found a basic cheese sauce recipe that called for butter (check), flour (check), heavy cream (check) and havarti (nope, but I do have Mountaineer, an “alpine-style cow’s milk cheese” from a dairy in Virginia – that will work). I used the last of my store bought pasta, asparagus, bacon and chicken breast to make a pretty yummy pasta dish. Paired with a glass of chenin blanc (I thought it was from VA, but just realized it’s from California… Oops – I invoke the drinking exception) it was quite tasty.

I also got started on some homemade mint chocolate chip ice cream. A good friend was kind enough to let me borrow her ice cream maker, so I started the process by heating up some heavy cream, whole milk and sugar with a big bunch of fresh mint from our yard. I’m letting it sit in the fridge until tomorrow to really infuse it with mint flavor. Looks good so far, I’m pretty excited!!

Roast chicken and bird s#*t

The main event of the day was my attempt to roast the whole chicken I purchased at the farmer’s market. Overall, it went pretty well although I was a little nervous about cooking it thoroughly. I ended up taking the temp three times until it got to the recommended165 degrees and still had to throw the leg I ate in the microwave before eating it... Kevin is recooking the remaining pieces as we speak (I also had trouble trying to break it down, so I gave up and let him do it this evening). I think I will do a couple things differently next time: first, buy a smaller chicken (this one was 4.5 lbs, I think I’ll go with 2.5 to 3lbs next time) to speed up the cooking process; and second, increase the oven temp by about 50 degrees. Although I had trouble with the temp, the flavor was really good so I included the preparation below.

Also, the carrots I cut up didn’t quite cook properly; I think that’s because they were old and getting a little dry. Typically I would have put more veggies under the chicken (probably a mirepoix which is a combination of carrots, celery and onions), but I only had carrots on hand from before I started this challenge so I went with them and their lack of quality and freshness was clear.

Kevin’s Roast Chicken

Start with a brine the night before you plan on cooking the chicken:
Fill a pot large enough to fit your chicken about halfway with water, add salt (about 1 cup), and 5 whole cloves.
Bring to a boil and turn off heat.
Be sure you cool the water down before placing the chicken in the pot (otherwise it will begin to cook), we added ice cubes until the brine was cool.
Let sit overnight, but dump out brine first thing in the morning.

Chicken Prep:
Stuff with a handful of thyme, oregano, rosemary and one lemon or lime cut into quarters.
Coat skin with olive oil and light salt and pepper.

Cook to appropriate temp.

If you’ve read this far then you get the gratification of hearing the chicken s#*t portion of the title. While the chicken was cooking I went outside to read and enjoy the sunshine. I cleaned off the table and chair and practically skipped with glee into the house to grab a book and some strawberry rhubarb crisp. I got back outside and sat down without a second thought, directly onto a fresh pile of bird poo. Apparently they were protesting my new found interest in cooking their feathered friend.

For the record, I’m not above eating a pigeon.