It’s not that I’m a great cook, I just like to eat and buying food that is already cooked is… expensive.  And I’d rather have new shoes than pre-made food.

SO.

I invent things.  It goes like this: “What should I make?” “Well, I’m pretty lazy, and I’m craving Mexican… sounds like Mexican Casserole night!”

Then I start to google things, and I pull ideas from different recipes to get my game plan.  It’s a really scientific process.  This time, it was a recipe that said you can dump uncooked rice into your dish and boom!  45 minutes later, you’ll have a cheesy, ricey meal.  There’s no way this was going to work, but it was RIGHT THERE!  On the INTERNET.

It didn’t work.

I fixed it, but not before I sent the husband to work with crunchy rice hotdish.  After adding more water and re-baking it for 17 more hours, I gave in.  I peeled the cheese layer off and dumped the rest in a pot to steam the rice.  And by steam, I mean burn.  That was over a week ago, and that pot is still soaking in the sink.  Once the rice was cooked, though, I dumped all but the bottom layer back into the casserole dish, replaced (and fortified) the cheese layer, and put it back in the oven.  It was all fine, and the rice was overcooked.

THIS WEEK, I made it again, but with corn tortilla layers and no rice.  It’s awesome.  Here’s what you do:

Poach and shred a couple packs of chicken thighs
Mix together a can of tomato sauce, a jar of salsa, and a packet of taco seasoning
In the bottom of a 9×13 baking pan, put a little of the tomato mixture, and then layer in this order:
– corn tortillas
– chicken
– tomato mix
– green chiles if you wanna – I used them the first time, not the second.
– black beans
– frozen corn (or fresh, since it’s that time of year)
– cheese
Repeat this once or twice, and just before the last layer of cheese, dump whatever remaining tomato mix you have over the whole dish.
Bake at 350, covered, for about 30 minutes, and for another 15-20 minutes uncovered, until the cheese looks so good you just can’t take it anymore.

This is the first version, which doesn’t actually look that good.  The cheese is all dried out.  Use your imagination.

It would be really good with some sour cream and a squeeze of lime, but remember why I made a casserole in the first place?  L A Z Y.  Anyway, if it’s your thing, all these ingredients are pretty easy to find certified organic.  I’m into that.

Next up: Thai casserole.  Now accepting input.

I am not a gifted cook.  I am lucky.

I “caramelize” (burn) things sometimes most of the time.  I don’t cook with recipes unless I’m in the mood for a Fun Project.  It is not unusual for me to go to the store and buy a bunch of things that happen to make me hungry, bring them home, line them up, and start musing (or googling) how I might put them all together.  It’s kind of a miracle I don’t end up with more Oreo-Dorito casseroles.

This week, I got an organic bone-in chuck roast from the farmers market (fancy, right?), some onions, a frozen veggie mix that was sort of stir-fry-esque, and some organic tamari (like soy sauce, but not).  I almost got ginger, but I was too lazy to turn around in the store and find it.  And I knew I had garlic at home.

I got home, noticed that I also had red curry paste and coconut milk, and changed gears.

The tamari is still unopened on my counter, and once I’d had my roast browned and simmering for about THREE DAYS in coconut curry, I discovered that my delicious veggies were teriyaki flavored.  Huh?  Gross.  I guess those will have to wait.  For a day when I am REALLY hungry.  I found some frozen broccoli and threw that in instead.

So my beef stir fry turned into coconut curry pot roast with broccoli.  It’s delicious (as judged by a jury of myself), but totally not what I thought I was cooking.  As usual.

EAT ME.

“Food”  [nationofchange.org]

I heard some thing on NPR today about processed food.  I have no idea what they were talking about, as is usually the case when I turn on NPR, because I’m never in the car for that long.  I’m not sure who IS ever in the car for that long.  They don’t exactly get right to the point over there at NPR.

Anyway, the guy was saying something about processed food and how it could be better than it is (no kidding) but how getting rid of it entirely is not the answer, because not everyone has the time/money/concern to start cooking meals for themselves or their families all the time.  Fine.  Then he started talking about foodies and my mind wandered.  I guess I don’t really know what a “foodie” is.  People tell me I’m a “foodie.”  And because I don’t like being told what I am or amn’t, I get kind of annoyed.  But really?  Are there people who don’t like food?  No.  I’ve decided that “foodie” is probably the dumbest concept ever.

I am an Eatie.

I like to eat things.

All things.

[thegreatfitnessexperiment.com]

Well, I don’t really like eggplant.  Or mushrooms.  At least not the idea of mushrooms.  But seriously, who likes food for its own sake??  What good is it if you aren’t EATING it?  It just sits there!  On your plate!  It’s not engaging until you PUT IT IN YOUR MOUTH.
Eaties.  We’re the new 30.

“Foodies” seem to like the farmers market.  And Really Expensive Restaurants.  And organic stuff.  And wild caught seafood,  NOT FARM RAISED OMG NEVER.

Eaties like all of those things.  And Cheetos.  And birthday cake Oreos.  Seriously, those exist.  And Funfetti.  And garbage burgers.

I made lasagna the other day.  I didn’t follow a recipe.  Because of my love of eating, I’m pretty clear on how most things are made, as long as baking isn’t involved.  Baking is the worst.  I added eggplant to this lasagna, because I decided that would make it less Bad For Me.  It doesn’t, really, and I still don’t like eggplant.  But you know what it does have?  Homemade sauce.  And homemade sausage.  And more than 2 pounds of cheese.  And dreams.

And it looked like this.

And I ate it.

I eat a lot of Annie’s Mac & Cheese.  It comes in lots of flavors…  yellow, white, tuna, Mexican…  Most days, I like the white one.  It has the strongest cheezy flavor, and it’s All Natural.  I’m completely obsessed with nutrition lately – much to the teethgrinding of my husband, who prefers pizza to all things – so I must make my mac & cheese NUTRITIOUS.  By adding THINGS!

This is no longer a thing.  Disregard it.  It was found to be insufficient in cheez powder.

The first thing I do is not something I can take credit for; I owe it all to one of my most clever friends, who is so clever she will appreciate that I used a semicolon in her shoutout sentence.  This little tidbit will change. your. life.

Are you ready?

Are you sitting down?

GREEK YOGURT CHEEZ.  [photo: seriouseats.com]

That’s right, while your little shells are bubbling on the stove, take your cheez packet (I know Annie’s says it’s real cheese, and I’m sure it is, but it’s powder.  Cheez powder.) and mix it with some plain Greek yogurt.  Make yourself a nice cheezy paste.  Mmmm.

Next up: something green!  Peas.  Spinach.  Kale, if you like danger.

…or a medley.

Optional: protein.  Leftover roasted chicken.  A can of tuna.  Bacon.  Extra cheese doesn’t count as a protein, as it is in its own category and not optional.

Finally: extra cheese.  Real, non-powdered cheese.  Parmesan.  Mozzarella.  Smoked gouda, oooohhh.

Here’s the thing, though – you CAN screw this up!  If you, say, are too lazy to dirty another dish and decide not to mix your cheez paste in advance, and just dump your yogurt into the noodles and spinach and sprinkle cheez willy nilly over the top, you will end up with a weird, goopy clumpy mess.  It will… sort of taste fine… but something will be wrong.  So here’s what you do:

1. If you’re eating boxed mac & cheez, your vegetables are frozen.  Don’t pretend you have fresh veggies when your main course comes from a box.  Take them out of the freezer ahead of time if you can, and either way, throw them in the pot a couple minutes before your pasta is done cooking.  That will heat them up (so they don’t prevent your extra cheese from melting), and you can drain the water off both at once.

2. Stir in your yogurt cheez paste and extra cheese.

3. Add your optional protein last, after your extra cheese is melted.

4. Do not, I REPEAT DO NOT, dish yourself a bowl of this masterpiece.  Grab a fork and eat it directly from the pot.  Finish it.  All of it.  It is not as good the next day and you know it.

Next week: we put it on a burger.  WHAT.

As long as I’m not going to be late for something, I kind of like getting lost.  You get to see new things, and you get to figure your way out of whatever you’ve gotten into.  It’s fun!  Try it sometime!

I have a general disregard for “directions” and “instructions” and “other people’s ideas.”  Okay, not really the last one.  This has a lot to do with the way I cook.  I HAVE cookbooks, but I really don’t look at them.  I’m starting to, lately, but only because in some ways, I have way more time on my hands than ever before.

Pro tip: If you don’t like following directions, stick with cooking.  Baking is not for you.

Cut to me ignoring my husband’s warnings that we were low on bagels for our breakfast sandwiches.

Cut to me deciding that I was going to bake bread!  In the morning!  On a particularly time-restricted day!

It actually turned out fine, but I made two batches of dough – the second one after I realized I really hadn’t read the directions on the first one, only the quantities – so I guess we’ll be eating lots of homemade bread.  Not my best pre-vacation plan…  But it turns out it doesn’t make much difference how you put it all together, which is a good quality in a recipe.

So…. wife points: acquired!

I don’t think it will be too long before there is some kind of “National Pin Day.”  I think that schools and offices should be closed, and not just some of them.  All of them.  And everyone will spend the day crafting and cooking and organizing, all projects inspired by pins.

Yesterday was Pinterest Food Day, but only in our house.  We made sweet potato veggie burgers that were SO easy and could be tweaked in any direction, really.  You could sub peanut butter for the tahini and make them Asian.  You could add some curry and make them Indian.  You could add chipotle for some Southwestern flavor.  We left them pretty plain, and they had lemon pepper breadcrumbs on them (sometimes you have to work with what’s on the shelf), but they were great!

Photo credit: lunchboxbunch.com.  Because how can I compete with this picture?

We did them without the bun and lettuce, but with the avocado.  I thought they’d be good with black beans instead of cannelini if you were going for that Southwestern thing.

Then we made banana balls, inspired by this recipe.  We just used 2 ripe bananas, 1 cup of oats, and some chocolate chips.  If you follow the recipe, you might get more of a cookie dough taste.

Photo credit: loveveggiesandyoga.com. 

Anyway, we tweaked some of these by rolling them in unsweetened coconut before baking which turned out to be a REALLY good call.  Next time, I also plan to mix in some peanut butter chips.  or maybe just cover them in peanut butter.  Or fill them with peanut butter.  Or Nutella.  I could go on…

We ate all of these things.  They were delicious.  Then we ate some chocolate out of a jar (think Nutella, but without any hazelnuts).  With spoons… we are nothing if not civilized.

In the spirit of honesty, my mom did all the making of the things.  I just ate them.

Love comes in many forms.  Sacrifices, declarations, sonnets… beer…  Maybe it’s just because of the holidays, but there has been a lot of love around here lately.

Beer is love.  I gave my husband beer for Christmas.  Turns out that’s a pretty good thing to give when you don’t have any other ideas.  Even better, it’s reciprocal.  Requited, even.  After a particularly cold run the other day, I yelled from the shower (before breakfast, mind you) that I’d really love a beer shower.  In 5 seconds, I heard the fridge open and the bottles clinking.  Don’t worry, I didn’t DRINK the beer first thing in the morning.  But I could have, and that’s what matters.

Christmas presents.  Let’s not pretend that Christmas presents aren’t love, okay?  Yes, Jesus is the reason for the season.  But the modern interpretation of that is happy red cups from Starbucks and great presents.  Like cozy amazing slippers and a snazzy jacket to keep me warm on the aforementioned ridiculous winter runs.

Interestingly, all these things come from a post about not wanting so many things…

Bacon is definitely love.  I think we all know that, don’t we?  May I recommend that you all go to your fridge right now, and get out the bacon.  Also, the chicken and the pepper jack.  Stuff the chicken with the pepper jack, wrap it in bacon, and cook it in a cast iron skillet.  Also, make sure you’ve already got some rice with peppers and onions and tomatoes and chiles going, and put some avocado cream sauce on top.  That, my friends, is love.  Oh, and serve it to your husband.  They like to be part of the love.

Mmm…

And what will he do in return?  He will steal the covers.  That’s what mine does, ever since we had a kid.  It’s dripping with therapy material.  But I let him, because that… that is love.

This 5K thing may not hold a permanent spot in my life.  I haven’t yet learned to listen to pain until it completely stops me, so I’ve been limping around for the last couple of days (no, I have not completely dropped the baby) swearing up and down that I WILL DO THIS 5K THIS WEEKEND.  And I will, but it’ll be the most expensive walk I’ve ever taken.

So… that leaves the other issue to address.  What I’m Eating.

In the last 3 days, I’ve really enjoyed a few of the things I’ve eaten…  Chocolate cookies.  Flourless chocolate cake.  Figgy pudding (that’s a real thing!).  Apple galette from Bonnie’s with vanilla ice cream.  Tiramisu.  Yep, in 3 days.  And I’ve never had a sweet tooth!

Aside from the fact that there’s still some of this apple thing left, and still some pumpkin ice cream in my freezer, I’m going to turn over a new leaf.  Or at least look at the underside of it.

“What happened to the rest of that apple thing?” “Huh? We finished it the other day…”

But really, I’ve made some decent choices.  A few days ago I cooked and ate an entire bag of kale with a dressing of greek yogurt, olive oil, pomegranate vinegar, and garlic.

And maybe I also ate some pasta out of the pot.

I made this for a double date we hosted…

I took my own picture but hers was so pretty I wanted to show you.  It was an invention for her wedding, which makes me think I should share my wedding cocktail recipe with you someday.  Anyway, this was my fruit intake this weekend.

I also made this…

Do I know how to woo the couples or what?

It’s a recipe ripoff from an Italian deli near my house.  Last time I was there, I had a “side” of mostaccioli and I guess I didn’t really know what it was.  I’m sure I missed a few ingredients in my guessing, but it’s basically pasta tossed with ricotta and topped with red sauce.

So I added some spinach – to make it health food – and he said I had to add sausage because food without meat is not an option when my husband is home, and this is how it’s done…

Boil some water with a good pinch of salt and add whatever pasta you like.  I like rigatoni, he prefers penne.  You can see in the picture that I used penne…
Add a half pound of hot Italian sausage to some garlic and olive oil in a saute pan.  Once that is no longer pink, add a box of frozen spinach.  If you’re like me, you didn’t think ahead, so the spinach will take a while to thaw.  Open the wine.
Once the spinach has thawed, add a 15-ounce (the smaller size) container of ricotta and mix it all around.  Pour yourself a glass of the wine.
Scoop out about a half cup of the pasta water right before you drain it and add this to the spinach/ricotta.  Drink.  The wine, not the pasta water.
Drain the pasta, add it to the spinach and ricotta and mix it all up.  Put it into bowls and top with your favorite red sauce.

Eat.  Thank me when you’re done chewing.  I’ll be over here with my pumpkin ice cream.

I haven’t failed yet.  I finished the first week of training in – get this – a week.

I even got two compliments on these hilarious shoes today!  One from a cool girl on a bike who was wearing the right clothes (butnottryingtoohard) and one from a little old lady whose day was CLEARLY made by the sight of me trying to run the brightness of my shoes.  She had the biggest smile on her face, it was pretty cute.  I didn’t want to let her down, so I kept running.

I downloaded a 6th and final app.  I know, I have a problem.  But I think this one is a winner.  The trainer is super nice (they have a mean option but I’m not ready for that) and I figured out how to put music on my phone so I can listen to some Flo-Rida while I sweat.

The graphics of it are friendly and cartoony and it kind of helps me forget what is happening.  The whole thing starts with a warmup walk, and then alternating walking and jogging for 20 minutes, and then a cool down walk.  I’ve never tried this approach, I’ve always just gone out the door and jogged as far as I could and then tried to go farther next time.  That approach does NOT work for me.  This interval thing is much better, and while I hate everything/am starving the whole time I’m running, I can handle 60 seconds.  And next week, I hope I can handle 90 seconds because that is what I am expected to do.  Ugh.

I feel like I should say that this isn’t about weight loss.  I mean, obviously I’d like to get back into shape, but I’m not as bothered by my current state as I thought I might be.  This is about Couch and Blanket and my borderline unhealthy relationship with them.  My couch is a neutral ultrasuede, like lots of couches were about 10 years ago.  It has curved arms, but isn’t overly feminine.  I can stretch all the way out on it without hitting the other end.  It’s perfect.  And my blanket.  Ohhh, my blanket.  It’s from Restoration Hardware and is that crazy soft stuff that is made from the eyelashes of bunnies and kittens.  It’s chocolate brown, and I love it.  The only weapon I have against Couch and Blanket is this 5k.  They haven’t given up, though, they were waiting for me when I got back from my jog this morning.  They have the persistence of my husband.

In other news, I am a genius.

I was whipping up breakfast this morning, a little banana and peanut butter, no big deal.  I poured myself a cup of coffee (husband has been putting apple pie spice in the grounds, he is also a genius) and walked past a little bowl of cinnamon sugar on my way to Couch.  Once I caught a whiff of that, it all became clear.  Cinnamonsugarpeanutbutter.  Obviously.

Why, yes, that IS 3-buck Chuck in the background.  No, I did not have that with my breakfast.

I had to put a lot of cinnamon sugar in the peanut butter in order to taste it, so it was kind of a cookie dough consistency.  But oh. my. goodness.  If you’re still reading, you are wasting your time.  GO to your kitchens and do this.  Spread it on something.  Anything.  A banana, an apple, a cracker, your arm… you’ll thank me.

That was the only funny cartoon I could find on the topic of the Sabbath.  Valid question!

For about 3 months, I’ve been waiting for my husband to leave.  I thought he was going to leave in June, but it got pushed to July.  It’s not that I don’t want him around, you all know how good he is at reaching things and opening jars.  But there’s something in the airport that I can’t get to.  So I needed him to go away so that I could pick him up at the airport.  So that he could bring me the stuff.

What could be oh-so-important that I need my husband to leave the time zone for 4 days, you ask?  Oh, I’ll tell you.  Chicken.  And waffle fries.  And lemonade.  AND WAFFLE FRIES.

I hear they just switched to bendy straws.

He comes home tomorrow, which is a little detail that should have gotten my attention from the start.  Tomorrow is SUNDAY.  This chicken chain is so quaint that they are CLOSED on SUNDAYS.  For the Lord.  I get it, and I appreciate it, and it’s adorable.  But now I am forced to decide between picking him up from the airport when he lands, or possibly not until the next day, so that he can bring me my chicken.  You have to be a ticketed passenger to get in there, you know.

I have a possible solution: supposedly, there is a Chick-Fil-A counter at the food court at the big university here.  I’m newly determined to find it, despite my fear of getting lost/a parking ticket/very hungry if I try to find it.  Odds are that if I try to leave him at the airport until Monday morning, he’ll just call a cab and come home anyway.  So I might as well go get him… But on Monday, we are going to get us some chicken.

Yes, it’s that good.  And maybe I’m that pregnant.  Stay tuned.