What's for dinner? (III)

These are the most amazing vegan stuffed shells ever.  Seriously.  If you need proof Andy ate them.  EVEN AFTER I TOLD HIM THEY HAD TOFU IN THEM.  And he said they were good.  And he ate seconds. And he took leftovers for lunch the next day.

You would never know they had tofu in them.  I don't have an intense hatred of all things tofu as Andy does, so that's not necessarily a deterrent for me, but I do like real cheese.  Generally I find vegan things that try to imitate cheese fail.  This one succeeded in a major way.

This recipe comes from the Chloe's Kitchen cookbook, but you can check out her website here, and there are some similar recipes available for free.  If you ask me, this cookbook is worth it.  I have only made one recipe from it that was not well liked.  One.  Not bad.  The majority of the cookbooks I purchase I make one recipe from, and it turns out ok.  Then the book just ends up collecting dust on the bookshelf.  This one is in my kitchen and covered in food stains, because it's awesome.

What are you having for dinner tonight?

"Miss, what color are your pants?"

For the record this conversation actually happened:

Student:  Miss, I have a question.

Me: Yes?

S:  It's going to sound really stupid.

Me:  There's no such thing as a stupid question.

S:  Ok . . . um, Miss, what color are your pants?

Me:  What?

S:  Like, they're not red, but not brown either . . .

Me:  They're maroon.

S:  What's that?

Me:  A color.  It's what color these pants are.

S:  No, that's not a color.
Me:  It is, do you want to look it up in the dictionary.
S:  No Miss.  I guess I believe you.

I'm Wearing:

Jacket - Charlotte Russe

T-Shirt - JCrew

Pants - New York & Company

Boots - Clarks

I'm standing kind of funny because I splattered coffee all over the right side of my body.  Hopefully it will come out.  If not this jacket is at least half the age of my students so I wouldn't be devastated if it met it's demise due to beverage stains.

What is your most bizarre colored piece of clothing?  Do people comment when you wear it?  I didn't consider these pants to be that out of the ordinary, but they gave me an opportunity to teach something other than history to my students.

What's for Dinner? (II)

Like every other blogger/human out there it seems I am eagerly anticipating fall weather.  I feel sorry for people that don't live somewhere with seasons.  There are many things I look forward to about fall, one of those things is food.

Now don't get me wrong, I love pumpkins and pumpkin based foods.  However, when you are sick of all the fall pumpkin foods and want some real good comfort food for a lazy night hanging around home watching netflix this is what you should make.  If you're not sick of pumpkin stuff I bet this would go awesome with a pumpkin beer . . .

The Chickpea and Dumpling Soup recipe from Peas and Thank You has to be the epitome of comfort food. It totally tastes like something my grandmother would make.  The broth is flavorful and the texture of the dumplings is perfect.  Your kitchen will smell divine when you're cooking it.

I did think this fell a bit short in the soup department though.  The recipe only recommends 4 cups of vegetable stock.  I put in an extra cup of water just because I wanted to thin out the veggie stock flavor a bit.  Even with the extra cup the soup to dumpling ratio seemed a bit off.  We ended up with some extra dumplings we tossed because we didn't have enough soup to go with them.  I think next time I'd do an additional 4 cups of water and just double the seasoning suggestions (again I'm not a big fan of the taste of vegetable stock/broth, you could easily do more stock if you wanted).

Despite a liquid shortage I'll definitely be making this again.  I predict this becoming a weekly meal once the winter hits.

What are you having for dinner tonight?

Weekend Highlights II

This weekend my parents came down to visit.  They're looking into moving closer to us, so Andy and I got to tag along while they looked at some houses.  We were fortunate that the weather was so nice.  It was a perfect fall weekend, so we brought them to visit one of our favorite places, Newburyport.

When we weren't out and about my parents thoroughly spoiled Thor.  He got a whole bunch of treats, presents, and non-stop attention.  He was pretty bummed out when they left.

It was the perfect weekend following my first full week of school.  It's actually starting to feel like fall.  I felt like I couldn't get my head in the game for this school year because it still felt like summer.  Now that it's getting chillier out I feel even more excited for this school year . . . and wearing my boots with tights . . .

What did you do this weekend?

Opulent Raglan in Progress

At the beginning of the summer I started making a heavily cabled sweater from a pattern in Interweave magazine.  I had ordered a bunch of pink Wool of the Andes with the intention of making some kind of pullover, because I don't have any hand knit sweaters in that color.  I messed around with the gauge and sizing and began making this beautifully patterned sweater.

Although the cable pattern looked awesome something just didn't feel right about it.  I don't know if it was that I had altered the gauge/sizing from the original pattern, or that the pink was just too bold for a heavily cabled sweater, but I put the project on hold.

While poking around a bookstore I came across The Best of Knitscene and saw the Opulent Raglan pattern.  I instantly knew it would be perfect for the pink yarn.  The pattern is so simple and elegant, but not overwhelming in the bright pink.  A new pink pullover project began.

So far this has been a simple top down knit.  The cable pattern is super easy.  I think I'm going to make some mods to the hemming on the bottom, but otherwise the pattern is perfect as is.  I'm so glad I found this pattern, I feel like it will give me the perfect pink cable sweater to add to my collection.

What's for Dinner? (I)

This school year I plan to really make an effort to cook dinner most nights of the week.  Since there are only two of us and most recipes are for 4 -6 people there are typically leftovers.  This means I have a lunch for the next day, and usually a way better lunch than whatever I'd be able to get from the school cafeteria.  I've been trying out some new recipes lately.  I'm a vegetarian, so everything I cook is meat free, and a lot of it is vegan.  It can be hit or miss with Andy, but this one was a major hit.

The Garden Enchilada Bake from Peas and  Thank You is super quick and easy to make.  My version isn't vegan, I used real cheese, and I also swapped out the zucchini for corn.  After making enough zucchini baked goods to survive the zombie apocalypse I need a break from zucchini.  I also felt that corn was more fitting for the recipe.

I used red quinoa, which I love the taste of.  If you're not a quinoa person you might want to use the regular kind.  Both Andy and I thought this was super awesome.  I might add some onions to it next time, but otherwise it was perfect.  The leftovers didn't last longer than 24 hours.

What are you having for dinner tonight?

Child 44

Child 44 by Tom Rob Smith
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This was totally the epitome of a good summer beach read, or ideal for bringing on the plane.  It's a quick, easy read.  The writing and character development is mediocre but the plot is pretty good.  There were plenty of plot twists.  Some of it was a bit predictable, but I wasn't able to guess exactly what was going to happen in the end.  I also enjoyed that this was set in Soviet Russia in the intermediary period between Stalin's death and Khrushchev solidifying his power. The historical details were generally broad and/or vague, but still interesting and seemed factual enough.  I'd recommend this book to anyone who likes Tom Clancy or Dan Brown novels, it had some similarities to both.


View all my reviews