Saturday, September 19, 2009

And The Reasons I Love Jon Stewart Just Keep Growing...

And the hits just keep on coming!

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-january-18-2000/indecision-2000---iron-chef

The Daily Show does Iron Chef!

I had some technical difficulties and couldn't imbed the video, but go watch it. It's funny.

Monday, September 7, 2009

The Theresa/Paula Deen Project Is Off To A Rousing Start!

The Theresa/Paula Deen Project is off to a rousing start!

My unsuspecting first recipe was Mexican Chicken:

One 10 3/4 ounce can Cream of Chicken Soup
One 10 3/4 ounce can Cheddar Cheese soup
One 10 3/4 ounce can Cream of Mushroom soup
One 10 ounce can Ro-tel tomatoes
1 whole chicken, cooked, boned and chopped, or 4 cups leftover cooked chicken
One 11 1/2 ounce package flour tortillas
2 cups shredded Cheddar cheese

In a large bowl, stir together the three kinds of soup and the tomatoes. Stir in the chicken. In a greased 13x9 inch pan, layer the tortillas and the chicken mixture, beginning and ending with tortillas. Sprinkle the cheese over the casserole and bake at 350 for 30 minutes.

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I put alot of footwork behind this recipe. I bought a package of chicken breasts, and I had a package of chicken legs, and boiled the both. Then I pulled the chicken - which admittedly took a long time, because the little buggers were HOT - mix up all the soups, throw them in the oven, good to go, right?

As we sat down to dinner, my fiancee confided that he didn't believe that this recipe was worth the amount of work that I'd put into it.

Can I tell you? The picky eater, who never gets adventerous, and hates to try new stuff? Had THREE plates. THREE! T-H-R-E-E. Can you tell that I feel like I've slayed giants here?! And not only did he personally have three plates, but my three year old, who eats like a bird, cleared his!

I'm on FIRE!

This recipe serves 8, so I divided the recipe into two different plates, and put one in a glass casserole dish that we cooked today, and put one in one of those disposable pan, that my non-chef picky eater fiancee has been given instructions for ow to reheat for another day this week. I take college classes on Tuesday and Wendesday, and that'll make a perfect dinner for another night. Even someone who doesn't cook can hang with "warm it up until the cheese melts"!.

I've also got a mess of chicken left to do something with. The Chicken Casserole recipe is probably my next suspect. I've got all the ingredients, save for pimentos. And you know, for having the reputation that all of Paulas recipes start with a pound of butter, an awful lot of them start out with a can of cream of mushroom soup.

Until tomorrow! :)

The Theresa/Paula Deen Project?

Last night, as a joke, I suggested The Theresa/Paula Deen project to my fiancee as a joke. He took me up on it!

If you don't know the spirit of which the joke was intended, here's a few facts:

The Julie/Julia Project is the blog that the movie Julie And Julia was based on. Julie Powell decided to cook her way through Julia Childs "Mastering The Art Of French Cooking", and keep a blog while she did it.

My fiancee is quite a picky eater. Like, the level of picky that it's easier to tell you what he will eat, then it is to tell you what he won't eat. And we got a new kitchen table this weekend, and for some reason, he got all sorts of inspired, and started talking about Paula Deen.

Which brings us back to my suggesting the Theresa/Paula Deen Project, and him taking me seriously. He was totally into it. Go figure!

So I selected "The Lady & Sons Too!" this afternoon at the bookstore, and I'm in the process of making the Mexican Chicken recipe as we speak.

The Theresa/Paula Deen Project might have gotten it's official start! Exciting!

Sunday, September 6, 2009

Food Journaling

This isn't usually the sort of thing I write about here, but does anyone else food journal? I just picked up a notebook to start a food journal, and it's funny how fast it seemed to work.

Weight Watchers is an organization that really preaches the importance of the food journal, and they say that the reason is that once you have written record of everything going in your mouth, lots less stuff will go in your mouth!

And I've already got proof that it works. We went to Wal-Mart today, and got a big package of pringles. We get the ones that are portion measured out already (they fit in Jims lunch box the best), and I broke one out and gave it to James (my three year old).

I wanted one of those packages of Pringles so bad, my mouth was nearly watering. But I did NOT want to have to write down that I'd eaten it! So I didn't take one.

Viola! Just like that, the food journal worked! I lived, clearly, without the pringles and I got what I wanted and didn't have to write it down.

Yay for food journals! :) It doesn't have to be fancy - mine is a 30 cent notebook from Staples that's pink, and I just hooked an ink pen through the wire.

I'm weirdly proud for turning down those pringles. Man, that dress better look smokin'. :D

Friday, September 4, 2009

Michael Chiarellos Rules For Cooking

Right now, I've got pretty much every Michael Chiarello cookbook my library would let me take out at once, and I found something fun that I thought I'd share.

In the front of "Flavored Oils: 50 Recipes For Cooking With Infused Oils", he offers his "rules for cooking". They are:

1)Don't cook if you don't want to.

2)Don't cook when you are full.

3)Shop when you are hungry.

4)Cook with the ingredients in the biggest displays. This is usually produce at the peak of its season.

5)Make the food your own - substitute and experiment - just never say "I can't make that because I don't have that exact ingredient."

I like number four. It makes total sense, but who thinks of that? I never had.

Thursday, September 3, 2009

YouTube! What's UP?!

I have a cousin that is currently mourning the loss of the youtube, swearing that it just isn't what it used to be.

At the same time, I'm mourning the loss of Top Chef. Yes, it's true. I just moved, and the only cable company I could get doesn't carry Bravo as part of their basic cable package.

At this point, insert my "YouTube! What's UP?!"

I present, ladies and gentlemen...Top Chef!





Alright! Top Chef is back in my life, baby! I have know idea if this is the complete episode. The user that posted these seems to have only posted two parts, so it's either the whole episode, or all he was willing to post.

Interestingly, or maybe not, Eve, who owns a restaurant in Ann Arbor, Michigan (not far from where I am), is a brunette in all the pictures of her that the papers and blogs around here are running, and she's a blonde on the show. Bravo makeover?

Wednesday, September 2, 2009

Gluten Free?

Little obsessed with the idea of trying to make a gluten free cake, won't lie to you. I got the idea in my head, and now I seriously can't get it out. Evidentally, I need a trip to a specialty store, because everything that I'm finding says gluten free isn't an easy think to do - there's alot of stuff that goes into substituting for cake flour!

But, I just found a gluten free red velvet cake recipe that in it's own way, looks better then original red velvet.

If I can, I'm doing it this weekend. Family cookout, and I'm gonna taste test, and make them decide which is better. Admittedly, I'm a pastry chef at heart, so they generally cringe when they see me coming for fear of what confection I've got neatly tied under my arm, but this might be a challenge their willing to take on!