Fun with Food

We found some of my old stickers from when I worked for a healthy school lunch program. Bentleigh had so much fun with them I decided to do a mini shoot with them while introducing her to some new veggies. 

Pretty darn cute, eh? 

Safe to say she loved the veggies, the spoon, and the stickers :).

COUNTRY COOKING: AUSTRALIA

I have a new favorite food group and it's called Puff Pastry. If I could eat everything encapsulated in puff pastry I most definitely would. Now, I've eaten flakey pastry carbs many times but never have I made it from scratch - or even used it in my cooking! Making puff pastry from scratch was the easiest thing I have ever done, and it definitely ranks up there with the most delicious thing that's ever come out of my kitchen. But of course butter and a little flour would equal something truly amazing...

COUNTRY COOKING: MEXICO

Mole, mole, mole! This week's international recipe is from MEXICO - Oaxaca, Mexico, to be exact. This is the real deal. No Tex-Mex here. And let me tell you, this recipe is not for the faint of heart.

EASTER EGG DYE: USING SPICES FROM YOUR KITCHEN

One night last week  (yes, at 10pm), I decided to dye some eggs for the Easter season. Although it was still snowing and 30 degrees outside, I was determined. I pulled out a carton of eggs and some spices, and I was more than excited with my beautiful outcome. And more-so than the gorgeous hues of reds, yellows, and lavenders, I was proud that my creativity in making an all-natural dye actually worked (I have my fair share of trial and error!). Here's what I did...!

COUNTRY COOKING: ITALY

knee-yo-ki. Seriously, I mispronounce this dish every time I say it. And it when I say it, it definitely does NOT sound Italian. It comes out sounding more like a Chinese dish. Either way, gnocchi is an Italian dish - and it is amazing! One of my favorite things about it is that I did not have to go find a specialty Italian market to find the ingredients... I had them all in my kitchen! And although it is common ingredients, the recipe creates a flavor and texture profile like no other pasta I've had before.

QUICK (LATE NIGHT) PITA BREAD

It was 10pm last night, and we decided we were hungry (...late night is when we do our best work... everything sounds yummy and our baby is sound asleep!). We wanted something warm and filling. The thing about eating clean is that nothing in our kitchen is really ever ready-to-go or pre-made. We had all the scratch-baking ingredients, raw chicken breasts, brussel sprouts, onions, garlic, various beans, rice, cheeses... you get the idea. Making meals from scratch is tough for the late night eating enthusiast; so we made homemade pita bread and hummus - in 30 minutes. Here's the recipe I used and my thoughts on a 10-minute pita bread sponge...

COUNTRY COOKING: JAPAN

This week we chose Japan. David Chang from The Mind of a Chef (Netlix feature) spends a great deal of time talking about all the noodles of different Japanese regions. We couldn't decide on just one - we knew we wanted to eat Udon noodles, but we wanted to try Tsuke-Men style (dipping noodles). So that's what we did. And it was an ingenious collaboration. 

There, unfortunately, is no one recipe that we followed for this meal (typical Bacon-style cooking for ya!). But because this meal was so beautiful, I do want to give a glimpse into what we did!

Noodles, broth, and spices. That's as simple as it gets. Something felt primitive about this recipe (I always wondered what recipes actually called for the neck bones I would see in the meat section!) - it was intriguing.

We boiled the fresh Udon noodles and set them aside in a "community bowl". We picked these up at a local Asian market (...actually, we learned that people travel a LONG way just to come to the Japan marketplace here in Edgewater).

The broth was the most time consuming part of this recipe. This is David Chang's recipe for the broth that we followed, here.

The meal prep and set-up was what was different (and FUN!). It was so simple actually. Each person will have their own bowl of broth and will add noddles from a community noodle bowl into their bowl to soak "as-needed".

In each personal bowl, we added (I must note that all the following ingredient amounts are personal preference!):
- A spoonful of garlic, chili paste, thinly sliced jalapenos/Serrano peppers, and thinly sliced ginger.
- 1/4 cup of white vinegar.
- Handful of plain steamed broccoli and bean sprouts.
- 1 small head of bok choy.
- 3oz meat (taken from the broth).
- Fill the bowl with chicken broth.

Dip the noodles into the broth and enjoy!

These meals are becoming the highlight of my week; I already have our next country planned. If you missed last week, you can find our exploration of Paella here!

NYC FAVORITES: SOHO CAFE JUICE BAR AND CHEESE SHOP

For the past couple days we have been out and about! The sun was shining and it was a whopping 41 degrees (I'll take it!). Since Ben was on Spring Break this week, my little-family-trio decided to stop by NYU Dental School to pick up a few things and take a walk around our favorite neighborhood - SoHo. As we find more little gems around this great big city I will be writing about them under a "NYC FAVORITES" title, so anyone can reference them when you come visit! The most frustrating thing about visiting NYC is that every coffee shop, restaurant, and boutique claims to be the best and most trendy. Well, why there may be alot of great places, I am starting a list of tried and true places that will be for-certain crowd pleasers.

COUNTRY COOKING: SPAIN

Country cookin'... and I am not referring to meals that are fried up and slathered with gravy! Ben and I have made a pact to take turns cooking traditional, authentic meals from a new country every week. We watched Mind of a Chef featuring David Chang last weekend on Netflix and haven't stopped talking about it since. Pair the documentary with a rather stagnant menu for the past few weeks - and we've got ourselves an internationally interesting challenge! Can you guess what we picked for this week?

8 (ALLERGY-FREE) GUILTY PLEASURES

I actually do not have any food allergies - like none, whatsoever. I love EVERY kind of food - which is why it was so tragic when we learned baby Bentleigh had a food allergy. After a choking reflux episode that landed us in the ER at 2 weeks old, I was desperate to help her feel better. My pedi suggested the typical dairy-free diet for 3 weeks. If that didn't work then wheat-free for 3 weeks, then nut-free... and so on. I was not about to sit around for 3-15 weeks and play the allergy game. So I cut it all out. Dairy, soy, wheat, eggs, nuts, and seafood. It was the most depressing thing I've ever (voluntarily) done.