Day One of Unemployment

So back in December...December 17th to be exact, I was laid off from my job along with 9 other people. That was round 1 of 3 layoffs my company will be doing over the next 6 months. I kept working, from home thankfully, and remained on payroll up until today. Yesterday I turned in my laptop and badge and now...well, here I am on the computer because I'm not quite sure what to do with myself.

I have been employed for the last 20 years which means I've had a routine for the last 20 years. Today I got up, checked my email, and just finished the daily online job hunt (which let's face it, is never REALLY "done"), and will be going to the gym shortly, but then what do I do? It's not like I can go shopping. I can't call up friends and hang out with them because they are all at work!

I cleaned out and organized closets and drawers all last week. I still have a few more of those I can do. My house can't really get much cleaner since I'm constantly cleaning out of boredom. SIGH...I just keep waiting for that brilliant idea to hit me. You know the one that people who are living out of their cars and begging for food get hit with that causes them to invent something or open some store and go from homeless to billionaire in nano seconds? Yeah, that one. I mean how hard is it to come up with an idea like the flipping Snuggie?

Ok I'm going to stop complaining and go brainstorm while I organize a closet or something. Maybe I'll post some before and after pics.

P.S. With all this cleaning and organizing, I've lost count of how many times last week I said, "OMG, I've been looking for this FOREVER!" :)

Low calorie pasta? Yes please!

Oh. My. Yum.

So I've been subscribed to this newsletter for about 3 years now. It's the Hungry Girl newsletter. I have several of her books and I used to make a lot of things from them. But since I've recently gotten off the processed foods band wagon, I don't make as much of her stuff. Yes, she does show how to make a lot of your favorite foods low fat. But she uses a lot of processed foods to do it. I still love her though and I'm still a fan! (and no, it's not even a vegetarian newsletter. But if you're a good cook, you know how to fix that.) :)

Anyway, she also has a new show on The Cooking Channel. I was watching it earlier and she made a dish that I had seen in her newsletter before but never really thought to try until I saw her making it. It was SOOOOOOOOO good!

It's a pasta marinara dish basically. But there is no pasta involved. Hmmm....curious? You can find the recipe here.

She always has such creative names for her recipes. This one was called Slaw and Order. LOL. It uses Broccoli slaw and tomato soup. I know it sounds weird but it was SO good. AND...the ENTIRE dish was only 180 calories (the way I made it). And believe me, it makes a lot and I probably only ate half of it. It was pretty filling.

The only things I changed were to saute the garlic with some onion for a few minutes in the pan before adding the "slaw". She uses Amy's Tomato Bisque as her soup. I used Imagine Organic Creamy Tomato, because I happened to have some in the fridge.

This picture isn't really pretty but what do you expect with broccoli slaw and tomato soup? Oh yeah, and I took it with my phone! I didn't have my camera ready because, honestly, I wasn't expecting it to taste SO good! But mmm...it tasted just like pasta!!

If you try it, let me know what you think.

Mc-what?

Wow...it's been forever since I last blogged. So my dad called me tonight and said, "Go to Yahoo and scroll down. Look on the right hand side and look for the link that says "What's in a Chicken McNugget"." (I never did find this link, by the way but obviously it's there because my dad would NOT have called me otherwise) He then proceeded to tell me all the ingredients, one of them being Plaster of Paris and another one being amonia which, if ingested can cause death. He asked me why that stuff would be in a McNugget. "Shouldn't it just be fried chicken?" Of course I told him that I knew this all along. I don't walk around telling people what's in the processed food they eat. The reason I don't tell people is because (and I've talked about this before in a previous post) a lot of people don't want to know. Why don't people want to know they are ingesting an ingredient that could cause death? I HAVE NO IDEA.

I know I'm a vegetarian. I'm desperately trying to be full on vegan but I will admit...it's hard. It's not hard because I crave dairy or fish or whatever. (ok maybe cheese every now and then. :) )It's hard because my friends want to order pizza or my family wants to go to a seafood restaurant. And I will admit, I'm not one of those vegetarians who says meat stinks when it's cooking. It doesn't. I haven't had meat in over 20 years. Therefore, I don't crave it. But when someone is grilling a steak outside or one of my non-veg friends or relatives is cooking bacon...it smells DAMN good! And for one split second I'll think, "well no one will ever know if I take one bite ". BUT...I still don't give in. As soon as that "smell-craving" goes away, I remember all the reasons why I'm a vegetarian. I won't even go into them.

But I just don't understand why people don't want to know, and get mad at me when I tell them, what's in their food!!! I mean...ok, fine. You want to eat organic, grass-fed meat? Go ahead. THAT...I can deal with. I know there are people that LIKE meat and they don't want to give it up. And I'm fine with that. But when someone tells you there are chemicals and non-food products and things that statically contribute to cancer and heart disease and a long ass list of other health problems...why the hell would you want to keep eating that?? I just don't understand.

It's very frustrating. I know people don't want to hear this. There are so many vegan blogs out there where I notice that the blogger never says anything about this. They just talk about what they eat every day. It's probably because they have given up trying to change peoples minds or their way of thinking. Well I'm still a new blogger. I just wish more people would pay attention to what's in their food for their own healths sake.

Anyway...I know not many people will see this. But it feels good getting my thoughts out there at any rate. Isn't that what blogs are for? :)

Good night peeps. For the record...my dad said, "I don't think I'll be eating McDonalds chicken anytime soon." Yay Dad!

Spaghetti Casserole

Mmm mmm. Tonight I decided I wanted some comfort food. Last night my roomie made spaghetti and it smelled SO good. I hadn't had spaghetti in ages. So today on my way home from work I decided that's what I wanted to have. I made a pit stop at the grocery store and bought all the stuff. But I decided to put a little spin on it and make a casserole. So along with all the spaghetti "stuff", I got some Panko (Japanese bread crumbs). Well I've never made anything with bread crumbs nor have I ever really warmed up any bread in my oven. So I don't really know how to use the...ahem...broiler.

Needless to say, after 15 minutes on bake, the bread crumbs still weren't getting brown. So my roomie suggested I turn on the broiler for about 6 minutes. So I did. But my oven has a "HI" temp and a "LOW" temp for the broiler. I didn't ask which one to use. Just flipped it on (HI) and kept it at the minutes the timer was already on, which was 4. BIG mistake. When the timer went off, my spaghetti casserole was nice and black on top. LOL. So we scraped off most of the top layer and what do you know? It was STILL fabulous! Next time I'll know to cook it on "LOW" for about 5 minutes. And I will be making this again because it was so freaking good.

I would have taken a picture but...well you know....the black didn't look very appetizing, even though it was. I'll take a picture the next time.

Here's the recipe:

1 15oz can tomato sauce
1 cup of red onions, chopped however you like
1 small red bell pepper, chopped however you like (I kind of like my veggies chunky)
1 15oz can of diced tomatoes
3 or 4 garlic cloves (diced)
Oregano to taste
Basil to taste
Parsley to taste
Salt & pepper to taste
1 pkg whole wheat noodles

Pre heat the oven to 350. In a non-stick pan, sautee the onions and garlic until onions are translucent. Add in the red peppers, sauce, tomatoes, salt and pepper and spices. Let this simmer on low heat while the noodles are cooking. Cook the noodles until ALMOST al dente. Once the noodles are ready, strain and pour into an 8x8 casserole dish. Pour in the tomato sauce mixture. Then sprinkle the panko on top, covering the entire dish. Cover with foil and cook for 10 minutes in the oven. Then uncover and broil ON LOW(!) for about 4 or 5 minutes. You may just want to keep an eye on it. :) Serve and enjoy! It's probably going to be even better tomorrow for lunch!

My $150 Butternut Squash Soup

It's been one of those days that I love...Sunday, rainy, cool...ALMOST October. I can't wait for Fall if you can't tell. I woke up this morning and saw that it was supposed to start storming around noon. I wanted to make some soup for lunch. It was a Barefoot Contessa recipe that sounded delicious. So I dragged my roomie out to the grocery store because we both needed to go. I wanted to get home before the rain started.


I LOVE SOUP. I eat it probably four out of seven days when it's cold out. So when I saw the Barefoot Contessa episode with Butternut Squash soup I knew I had to try it. The pic above is of the veggies roasting.

Now let me explain why the title of this blog is "My $150 Butternut Squash Soup". First of all, the next time I make this I will be buying pre-peeled, cubed butternut squash instead of trying to peel and cube my own butternut squash. What a pain in the arse THAT was. I think it probably took me a good twenty minutes just to peel the squash. It's very oddly shaped in case you aren't familiar with it. Thank god I have awesome knives or it would've taken me forever to cube it. So after peeling it, I took the peelings and stuffed them down the garbage disposal, turned on the water and flipped the switch. BIG MISTAKE. My disposal is now clogged and I'm waiting on the plumber to get here. I tried EVERYTHING...plungers, Drano, resetting the disposal, using that little "key" thing, sticking my hand in the drain, trying to clear it...nothing worked. SIGH. SO...I had to call a plumber. I'm guessing that it's going to cost around $100-$150 and that's why this soup is called the $150 Butternut Squash Soup. Next time it will probably only cost me about $10.

Anyway, the soup was freaking delicious. I really could not stop eating it. But I had to because my roommate is making a yummy dinner tonight. So I didn't want to be too full for that. Here's a pic of the finished product.
It's very savory, very filling and kind of sweet. I kept adding salt trying to cut the sweetness until I got it to my liking. You'll just have to do the same. Here's the recipe:

Ingredients:

3 to 4 pounds butternut squash, peeled and seeded

2 yellow onions

2 McIntosh apples, peeled and cored

2 tbsp olive oil

Salt and freshly ground pepper

2 to 4 cup chicken stock (I used veggie stock of course)

1/2 tsp good curry powder (I used WAY more curry powder. Just a preference)

DIRECTIONS:

1. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.

2. Cut the butternut squash, onions and apples into 1-inch cubes. Place them on a sheet pan and toss them with the olive oil, 1 tsp salt and 1/2 tsp pepper. Divide the squash mixture between 2 sheet pans and spread in a single layer. Roast for 35 to 45 minutes, tossing occasionally, until very tender.

3. Meanwhile, heat the chicken stock to a simmer. When the vegetables are done, put them through a food mill with the medium blade. (Alternatively you can place the roasted vegetables in batches in a food processor fitted with the steel blade. Add some of the chicken stock and coarsely puree.) When all of the vegetables are processed, place them in a large pot and add enough chicken stock to make a thick soup. Add the curry powder, 1 tsp salt and 1/2 tsp pepper. Taste for seasonings to be sure there's enough salt and pepper to bring out the curry flavor. Reheat and serve hot. YUM!

Pasta with Walnuts in Sage Butter Sauce (Vegan)

So last night I decided, on a total whim, that I wanted something with sage butter sauce. I saw something in a magazine with that in the title earlier that day and couldn't stop thinking about it. So I started googling "sage butter sauce recipes" and came up with a total keeper. I found it here It sounded delicious so I knew I just HAD to try it.

I actually used whole wheat angel hair pasta and Earth Balance Buttery Spread as opposed to the Fettuccine and stick butter. But I'm sure it tasted just the same.

Excuse the poor picture quality. My roomie, with the mad photography skills, was MIA when the pasta was ready for it's close-up.

This was a perfect Fall dish. It was earthy tasting and savory. Even though my roomie was MIA with her camera, I still made enough for her because I'm sweet like that. She loved it. I will definitely be making this again...especially on a brisk fall night.

My BFF and Her Awesome Jewelry

So I need to take a moment to talk about my BFF, Cassandra. We worked together for about seven years but didn't really start hanging out until about two years ago. Weird, I know. We didn't really work in the same department but we knew who each other was and always said hello in passing. But it wasn't until we both got promotions in the same department and another office that made us start talking.

That first day we both showed up in the same lobby at the same time and didn't know anyone except each other. So of course, we bonded. And the rest, as they say, is history. Now we're roommates!

Anyway, she has a great blog and an awesome Etsy shop where she sells really GROOVY jewelry that she makes all by her little self. :) She makes some really cool stuff. And everything she ships out goes in these cute little packages...so pretty that you don't want to throw them away. Maybe, one day when I win the lottery, I will hire her to be my personal jewelry maker!

Want to know the benefits of living with a jewelry maker? She gives me stuff for free every now and then! WHOO HOO!

Saturday Took a Turn For the Unexpected!

Last night my roommate and I decided to stay in and chill. Well I bought a whole...um..bushel (?) of basil at the farmers market that morning for a whopping three dollars! So we decided to make margherita pizza for dinner. So out the door we went and headed towards the grocery store to buy the rest of the ingredients.

Somehow between my front door and the grocery store, my roommate decided she wanted to get her nose pierced. She had been thinking about it for a long time and finally made up her mind to do it as we were driving to the grocery store. So, we made a pit stop at Psycho Tattoo which is less than a mile from my house.

Once we were inside the store, I started thinking about a tattoo that I've been wanting for probably about the last 13 years. The more I thought about it, as I was watching her fill out her piercing paperwork, the more I decided I wanted to finally get my tattoo. So I did it! It's very small, in fact I can cover the whole thing with the tip of my thumb. It's on the top of my foot just under my big toe. I LOVE it! Don't ask me why the purple man in the moon. It doesn't have any significance. It's just something I've always wanted.

Isn't it cute? And no my foot isn't dirty. It's just ink that stained my foot. It should come off in the next day or so. But I can't believe the tattoo artist was able to get so much detail in to such a small tattoo! He did a great job!

We finally made it to the grocery store after that and bought our ingredients for the pizza. It was delicious by the way. We used lots of my fresh basil, slices of mozzarella cheese (which melt much better on a pizza than shredded cheese, and yeah I know, NOT vegan), some sliced cherry tomatoes, some red pepper flakes and a whole wheat Boboli crust. We took a "before" picture of the pizza but forgot to take an "after" picture. I think we were so excited to eat it that we just forgot! All in all, it was a very fun, unexpected Saturday night!

Quinoa Salad

I decided to try a recipe I've had forever tonight. I can't remember where I found it but it was really good. I had a little taste to make sure it was seasoned well enough but I didn't actually eat it for dinner because it's supposed to be eaten cold. It will be good and chilled tomorrow for lunch. YUM!

3/4 cup uncooked quinoa

1 can black beans, drained and rinsed

1 carrot, diced

1 celery stalk, diced

6 cherry tomatoes, quartered

1 scallion, chopped

2 cloves garlic, minced

Juice from 1/2 lemon

1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil

1/4 cup apple cider vinegar

Dash cayenne pepper

Dash cumin

1. Boil quinoa in a saucepan with 1.5 cups of water until all water is absorbed. Set aside until cool.

2. Combine all chopped vegetables and drained beans, along with the lemon juice, oil, vinegar and spices. Fluff the quinoa and toss with the vegetable mixture. Add salt and pepper to taste and chill for at least an hour. It's also good with a little hot sauce!

* I used the juice of a whole lemon just because I love lemon and I thought that made it much better.

Holy mother of all sweet potato dishes!!

Last night I decided it was CUBAN THURSDAY! Thursdays are usually champagne Thursdays but I was out so...I had to drink wine. Darn. :) I'm in love with Alicia Silverstone's book The Kind Diet and I've been making all sorts of yummy stuff from it.

I've been dying to make one of the recipes in particular...Cuban-Style Roasted Sweet Potatoes. I picked up some sweet potatoes from my local farmers market last weekend just so I could make it. While thinking about the potato recipe, I thought, hmm...what else can I make to go along with the Cuban theme? I had a can of black beans in the cabinet, a red onion and some AWESOME salsa, made right here in the ATL that I also got from the farmers market. I also had some collard greens, which really doesn't go with the theme but right then and there I knew I had my dinner planned. My roomie had a chicken breast in place of the greens but I did make her squeeze some lime juice on it to go with the Cuban theme.

Don't those sweet potatoes look freaking delicious? They were!! My roommate and I couldn't stop "mmm-ing" every time we took a bite. Here is the recipe:

3 large sweet potatoes, peeled and quartered (about 3 lbs)

4 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil

Fine sea salt to taste

Freshly ground black pepper to taste

1 large garlic clove, minced

1 tbsp fresh lime juice

1 1/2 tbsp chopped fresh parsley

Heat the oven to 400F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and set aside.

Place the sweet potatoes in a medium bowl, toss with 2 tbsp of the oil and season to taste with salt and pepper. Spread the potatoes on the prepared baking sheet and roast until they can easily be pierced with a knife, about 30 minutes. Let cool for 15 minutes or so.

Transfer the potatoes to a large bowl, and toss with the garlic, lime juice, parsley and remaining 2 tbsps of oil. (I used a little more lime juice than the recipe called for because I love lime and it totally made it for me.) Adjust the seasoning to taste with salt and pepper. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Here's the recipe for the yummy beans:

1(15oz) can black beans, rinsed and drained

Purple onion, diced (use as much as you like)
1/3 cup of your favorite salsa

Saute the onions until soft. Put the beans in a saucepan and add the onions. Then add the salsa and stir. Just heat until warm. I sprinkled on some fresh cilantro right before I served it. If you're in Atlanta, go to your local farmers market and see if you can find Zocala Salsa. There are different flavors. My favorite and the one I used in this recipe is Mole Rojo. It's by far my new favorite salsa and it's spicy. (Ready for the cornball comment?) It's like a party on your tongue! Ok, I'll stop.

I had all that with my side of collard greens that I sauteed with some Olive oil and even threw in some red pepper flakes to make it go with the theme. Maybe next time I'll have a shot of tequila instead of wine with this dinner. Ick...ewww...no. I'll stick with the wine. :)