Moving!

This blog is moving here to my new blog page, which is currently blank but will begin filling with things shortly… hopefully.  Magically.  Yeah.

I haven’t abandoned this blog! Promise!

I’ve been absent a lot, yes, but I have reasons.  For various financial reasons my job as an au pair is no more, and rather than switch to a new family I have been traveling in France, and am in New York now.  Will be back in Florida at the end of the week, and then will be either re-vamping this blog to include more, or making a new one that combines my personal blog with this one.  Dunno yet.  But I’m still here.  =D

Holiday Break

It has come to my realization that with the holidays, my trip to London, and my upcoming trips to Copenhagen, Amsterdam, and northern Jutland (north part of Denmark) I really just don’t have time to focus on the blog right now.  So I am taking December off, and will resume posting after the new year.  I hope everyone has a happy holiday season =]

London

Sorry about the lack of posts; I was in London and forgot to leave a post saying I’d be gone for a long weekend =/

Had fun though, so that’s good.  I’ll write up a proper post tomorrow when I have more time.  Chicken noodle soup or homemade enchiladas.  Both are recipes I’ve been meaning to type up and keep forgetting about.  =]

-Ariel

Simple Curry Soup

This one was requested by my host parents last night and paired fabulously tonight with the leftover salad from last night. Anyway before making the soup I googled half a dozen recipes and most of them seemed a bit ridiculous, so I combined the two that looked the best and simplified the process a bit to create a rich, healthy, flavorful soup that will come together in about half an hours time and only uses one pot (why do so many recipes out there require you make such a mess?  So unnecessary…)

Simple Curry Soup

Ingredients:

• 4dl/2cups chicken or vegetable broth/water and bouillon cube
• 1 standard size (14ish oz) can of coconut milk
• 1 heaping tbsp of Thai curry paste (I prefer red.  Use your favorite.  Also, use more for a hotter dish)
• 1 tbsp fish sauce, soy sauce, and/or sugar (use one, use two, use all.  It’s all good.)
• A handful of fresh coriander leaves/cilantro
• Half a lime (for juice)
• 1 tbsp fresh grated ginger
• Vegetables (I used 2 garlic cloves, 1 zucchini, 2 carrots, 1 red onion, and 1 large red pepper.)
• Feel free to add meat.  I didn’t but any kind, particularly fish or chicken (imo) would be fine.
• A couple tbsps olive oil

Cook:

1. Chop all veggies.
2. In a large pot pour enough olive oil in to sautee all the veggies and the curry paste.  If using meat, cook that too.
3. Add broth, coconut milk, fish sauce, soy sauce, sugar, ginger, and lime juice.  Stir until flavors blend (10 minutes or so.)
4. Stir in coriander right before serving.

Thats it.  Super easy, filling, and so warm on a freezing cold night like tonight is.  MMm.

-Ariel

Cranberry-Dijon Salad Dressing

Alright, so I’ll be honest with you- I didn’t measure anything while I was making this today.  I remembered having an amazing salad once with this dressing on it so I decided to see if I could recreate something like it.  We haven’t had dinner yet (it’s only barely 1pm) but I was bored enough to start the dressing now.  Plus, if I screwed up, I wanted time to find other things to make for dinner.  Luckily it tastes really good.  I’m excited.  I’m going to try to write the recipe below, but please keep in mind that all measurements are approximations and its way more important to do things to taste.  =]

Cranberry-Dijon Salad Dressing

Ingredients:

• Fresh cranberries (a few handfuls, maybe 2 cups/4dl?)
• 1 tbsp dijon mustard (this I did measure!)
• White wine vinegar (probably about 1dl/0.5cup)
• White wine (probably about 2dl/1 cup)
• Olive oil (a couple tbsps)
• Water (to bring to desired consistency.  Though I left mine pretty thick, I like the creamy texture.)

Cook:

1. Put a couple tbsps olive oil in a small sauce pan and put on high heat.
2. Add cranberries and put the lid on.  The cranberries will sorta ‘pop’ like popcorn, so you don’t want that oil splashing onto you.  When the popping stops lower heat and mash with a potato masher.
3. At medium heat add wine, vinegar, and mustard.  Stir in more olive oil if desired.  Blend together.  Add water if desired.

This can be refrigerated for about a week.  I’m making a chopped salad for it tonight with grilled chicken, turkey bacon, almonds, leeks, apples, a red onion, mushrooms, cranberries and parmesan cheese.  Should be good =]

-Ariel

Linkage

I know I usually only post feminist-related links, but today isn’t Friday and I feel like posting some a little more blog-related.  So here are some other things I’ve been reading recently:

Cook:

• Paula Deens cheese-stuffed mushrooms. Its recipes like these that  make me wish half my host family weren’t on a diet.
• The great debate: which direction is best to cut a sandwich? Ah, NPR.  You make me smile.
• Talk about deliciously elaborate Christmas dishes. The Christmas rocky road at the bottom looks particularly delicious.

Hook:

• The patterns at Monster Crochet make me feel lazy and/or untalented/uncreative.
• Look at how cute the squirrel is! And other things.
• Ignoring the poinsettia on last weeks post (I don’t like poinsettias,) this blog is also pretty cool.

Book:

• From Sweet: “Three Lyric Essays“
• From Sunsets and Silencers: “The Trouble with Dream Interpretation” and “Words for This”
• From Sugar House Review: “Our Last Christmas Eve,” “What Any Stone Can Tell You,” “Side Effects May Include,” “Handling Your Audio Media,” “Sinflower,” and “But in Chinese Yellow Is Erotic”

Spinach Stir-Fry

This is what we just ate for dinner tonight (it’s 7pm in Denmark as I’m writing this) and was very yummy.  I’m glad I searched the freezer and found frozen spinach now =]  I’m excited for my leftovers for tomorrows lunch.

Oh, and this can easily be made vegetarian by simply leaving the meat out.  Still good.

Spinach Stir-Fry

Ingredients:

• Rice (and water to cook it)
• Meat product (choose your favorite)
• 1 package frozen spinach (defrosted and drained)
• Mushrooms (whichever kind and however much look good to you.  I prefer lots and lots.)
• 1 large onion (and any other vegetables you feel like adding, but I stopped there.)
• 4 cloves chopped garlic
• Soy sauce (2 parts)
• Vinegar  (1 part)
• 2 tsps sesame seed oil and vegetable oil
• Seasonings (salt, pepper, red chili flakes, coriander seeds, and basil to taste.)

Cook:

1. Marinate meat and/or veggies in sesame seed oil, soy sauce, vinegar, and seasonings for 20 minutes-2 hours.  Soy sauce and vinegar should be 2:1 parts just enough to coat all the meat and/or veggies with a bit at the bottom of the bowl.
2. Cook rice and chop vegetables if not already chopped and soaking.
3. Add vegetable oil to a pan or wok and cook meat and vegetables until meat is done and spinach wilting.  For more well-done meat products, add the vegetables after the meat has had a chance to cook some of the way.  Serve over rice.

-Ariel

Glogg

Glogg.  I tried this for the first time today at a Christmas party.  It tastes just like the holiday season.  Very sweet and spicy, in the same way as hot apple cider.  I haven’t tried making it for myself yet, but I found this recipe online that look good.  From what my host family has said about making the drink, this one is the most authentic I’ve found.  They also say sometimes to make the drink people soak the fruit and nuts in schnapps overnight and then add them to the bottom of the glass, rather than soaking them with the spices overnight.  Anyway, just something small to share today.  Enjoy =]

-Ariel

Feminist Friday Quick Clicks, 10 and Open Thread

Linkage:

• “Why Amurika is F*cked”– eight minutes and twenty-two seconds of youtube wtf interviews with people waiting in line at a Sarah Palin book signing
• In the UK a straight couple was denied a civil union because those are for the gays?
• Escalation in Afghanistan.
• “Dinosaurs are for Boys (Girls Allowed)“-  Sociological Images discussing androcentrism, “or the idea that boy things are good for everyone but girl things are only good for girls”
• On BPA in all our food packaging, how it’s effecting us, and who to contact to help stop it.
• Hillary Clinton and Obama in a caption-this-photo.
• Cats actually are evil.  I win.
• [Edit to include this sexist pig’s shit:]  Glenn Beck is OK with a Beck-Palin 2012 ticket, but Palin-Beck 2012 is too rich- she should just get back in the kitchen where she belongs.

This list is short.  Sorry- most of what I’ve read this week wasn’t particularly share-worthy (imo) or filtered into my Google Reader at a time when I was just skimming.  Anyone have any links or stories to tell?

Also, hope everyone had a happy Thanksgiving =]