See here for the lowdown on my Encyclopedia of Me.
As you probably already know, I live in the city of Chicago. Chicago is an old city, by United States standards. Chicago has lots of two, three, four and six-flat apartment buildings have not been updated either recently or at all. While the apartments that I choose are updated, oftentimes, landlords will opt not to put in a dishwasher. As a matter of fact, out of the past nine residences I have lived in since I got married, only three had one.
With a family of five, we make lots of dishes. Loads and loads of them, in fact. Even though I sometimes don't have time, I love to cook and so most of the time, we eat in, rather than out. A year in San Diego, where I lived quite isolated in the suburbs, knew almost no one, was staying at home with a 2-year-old and my elderly MIL to keep me company. I got really good at finding where the good markets were located and the ethnic groceries were secreted away. I really learned to cook there, although I won't say I was a good cook, only that I learned to cook. Now, with the farmer's market every Sunday just minutes away and my CSA share box with veggie leafy surprises inside and I've been cooking more than ever.
So I must say hurray to the fact that I now have a dishwasher again. It's awesome! And I found this great eco-friendly dishwasher detergent by Earth Friendly. I just love it. I thought lavender would be a really strange scent to wash dishes with, but at the end of the day, as the kitchen is suffused with the relaxing scent of lavendar instead of really harsh, chlorine fumes and fake lemony freshness, I just love it. My dishwasher is old and unfortunately not water-efficient, but I only run it once a day to make up for it.
Me and my dishwasher. We're in love.
Now that the autumn is here and although it's not bitingly cold yet, one begins to think of cozy sweaters, crisp apples, raking leaves and playing outside in the last few warmish rays of sun before cold, cold Chicago winter sets in. To that end, I give you my world's easiest soup pseudo-recipe. I call it pseudo because it's not like I'm telling you exactly what to put or how much to put in it. Perfect for those evenings when you just want something easy to make and good for you, too. I'm kinda a loose cook. I don't measure, just chop and pour and stir away without getting too "het" up about it. And since I'm about to start working full-time very soon, I just know I'll be pulling those wilted vegetables and left-over meats out of the fridge to make quick dinner. Being Asian-American, we eat rice by the potful. We usually have rice with this soup, but often, I'll have some baguette on hand, or also good with biscuits (dumplings if you're so inclined and know how), cornbread, breadsticks, garlic bread, or any other carbohydrate vehicle! The soup takes care of your vegetable servings and can be made with pearl barley to make it extra healthy and cholesterol reducing, but the barley takes longer to cook. If you're not a loosey-goosey kind of cook, this is a perfect recipe to try out because it's really, really hard to f*ck it up!
One Pot Wonder
This recipe is going to be written differently than perhaps you're used to seeing. That's because I don't know what's in your fridge and pantry right now. I'm going to list all the ingredients I usually put in, but feel free to substitute for whatever's currently about to wilt itself to death or is just sitting in your cupboard. I also keep lots of frozen veggies in the freezer because they're quick to heat up in the soup and almost as healthy for you as just-picked. Try to go organic if you can, but please, don't kill yourself over it! Remember when cutting your veggies that they don't have to be perfect, but you don't want to gag on the hugeness of them, either.
- chopped onion (any kind, even green or red if you're desperate)
- chopped carrots
- chopped celery
- broccoli, cut small
- zucchini, cubed
- yellow squash, cubed
- corn (I usually have bags of frozen on hand)
- diced tomatoes (I usually used canned because they're more reliable and always on hand. Throw in the juice too.)
- tomato paste (1 teaspoon per 2 servings, so if you are making soup for 4, put 2 tsp, soup for 6 is 3 tsp, etc.)
- peas (also frozen because canned are just wrong!)
- green beans (although my family only likes them chopped up really small)
- dark green leafy veggies like kale or swiss chard, chopped small enough to not gag you when you eat them. also remove any hard stems.
- mushrooms, cut into bite-sized pieces (you can use dried porcini, but make sure you rinse and rehydrate first)
- small pasta shapes like orzo or tiny alphabet letters/stars/wheels usually found in the Spanish ethnic food section of your grocery store sold in little bags for like $0.79US, or you could do bigger pasta shapes like elbow macaroni, spirals, shells or my personal favorite, pearl barley. I've never used arborio or carnaroli rice in the soup, but I bet it' be good too. The pastas cook up quick, the rice if you have about 40 minutes, and the pearl barley if you've got about an hour. Or, you could use none, if you don't have any in the cupboard to use!
- water or chicken broth (rice and barley both absorb lots of liquid so plan accordingly)
- any cooked meats or protein you might hand, cut or shredded into bite-sized chunks. some that I've had good results with: steak, chicken, turkey, turkey ham, sausage, tofu
- one or two cloves of garlic, thickly sliced (thickly because if you're like my kids, you don't want to eat garlic and this way, you can get the flavor and still have them be recognizeable enough to fish out of the soup later)
- dried or fresh thyme, a pinch
- a bay leaf
- salt and pepper to taste
- Pour your cooking oil of choice (I like olive) about 2 times around your pot. Put your pot on medium high.
- Add your small pasta, barley or rice. Cook until the pasta has a browned just a bit. It should start to smell toasted. If using rice or barley, stir until coated with the oil and then for a couple of minutes more. If you're not using any of these, that's fine and go to the next step.
- If you have tomato paste, fry up about your tomato paste. If you don't, it's no big deal, but it tastes good with it.
- Throw in your onions. Stir. When they start to soften, throw in the carrots and celery. Very lightly salt to let them sweat just a bit. This is a mirepoix. These aromatic vegetables will give you your base flavor. Don't oversalt. The salt will just let the vegetables give off a bit of water so that they will steam rather than fry. Add the garlic and you can add the diced tomatoes now, if you have them.
- After your mirepoix has softened up, add your veggies in order of length of time to cook. If you don't know, usually I will go by how hard the veggies are. The harder the veggie, the longer it will take to cook. The only caveat is broccoli. Don't throw that in and let it cook for a long time or they will become soggy and gross and not taste good at all. Saute all the veggies together, including your frozen ones for a few minutes until they seem heated up just a bit, about 3-4 minutes.
- Add your water or chicken broth. If you're really trying to cut down your salt intake, use low-sodium broth or just water. The water will taste okay, but it just won't be as savory. Add enough water to float your veggies and according to your personal preference of veg to soup ratio. I myself like my soup to have lots of veg. If you're using the barley or rice, these will absorb lots of water. Especially the barley. You could always err on the side of too little liquid. If, at the end, you don't think it's enough, just add more liquid and cook until it's heated through.
- Bring to a boil. Once boiling, lower heat to low. Add your protein and the broccoli at this time. Throw in a pinch of the dried thyme. If you're using fresh thyme, add that about 5 minutes before serving. Toss in that little bay leaf, too, but make sure you don't eat it! It's only for flavoring and will cut your tender mouth and throat should you try to scarf it down, you pig! Cover and let simmer.
- If you are using the little pastas, your soup should simmer for about 10-15 minutes to let the flavors meld. If you are using bigger pasta shapes, add those about 10 minutes before you want serve. If you are using rice, start tasting your soup at about 20-25 minutes to see if the rice is soft. If you are using barley, start tasting at about 40-45 minutes to see if the barley is soft. Taste your soup, people. If it doesn't taste quite the way you like, don't forget to add salt and pepper. Go easy. Remember, it's always easy to add more, but it's a bitch to try to take away! To add a bit of depth you could add a splash of soy sauce. Try other spices like oregano or basil, italian seasoning. Experiment.
- That's it. It should be done. If you want to be extra luxurious, throw in a tablespoon or of butter and let it melt into the soup. Or not. Dish it into a bowl. Grab that hunk of bread and chow down.
I hope you try this soup and that you like it. Feel free to experiment. Try new veggies. Chances are, your kids won't even notice it because this soup makes them all taste good together. It's comfort food, people. It's easy, and to me, that's comforting! Let me know if you do and how it turns out!
See here for the lowdown on my Encyclopedia of Me.
Although I am a bit of a "popular" classical music fan, now that I've become a member of our amazing local fine arts radio station, WFMT (free awesome streaming music anyone?), I've been trying to broaden my fine arts music base. I have even been enjoying opera, and that, folks, is something I NEVER thought I'd do. Of course, I had also thought that the CBS show Sunday Morning was totally for old farts and so it just goes to show you that I must be getting old.
Anyway, I love the masters, Beethoven and Mozart are my favorites. F*cking genius', I tell you. I love that my daughters are getting exposed to classical music in a way that I never was. Sure, I was made to play it (and now cannot play anything else) but growing up, my family certainly never listened to it. But I have always, always loved it. My daughter came home singing Eine Kleine Nachtmusik. Yes, Mozart didn't intend for it to be sung, but in music class*, she learned some lyrics something along these lines:
"Eine kleine nachtmusik.
A little night music.
Mozart, he wrote it.
Mozart, he wrote it.
Mozart, he wrote it.
Mozart, he wrote it.
Wow!"
And that my friends, is freaking awesome!
*(my daughter's music teacher at school is just great! how many people do you know cried and was a wreck the entire day that
In case you were wondering, I am still crafting away like a madwoman. It's just that most of my projects right now are top secret. I've got a good friend's baby to make goodies for and since she intermittently reads my blog, I don't want to post anything. One of the projects is up on Ravelry, so if you're so inclined, look me up over there and check out what's going down.
Luckily, she's pretty much about to pop probably tomorrow and then, I'll be able to show you. I could show you an extreme-close-up-artsy-teaser-type photo, but remember, my camera is dead. So I won't.
More crafty fun stuff will follow shortly. I keep forgetting to snap photos of my swap packages before I send them out. They're most of the stuff that I've been crafting lately.
See here for the lowdown on my Encyclopedia of Me.
Yes, yes, how cliche can you get? Blogs and blogging, that's my B for the day.
I have a love/hate relationship with blogs and blogging. Mostly a love relationship. More like, stalkerish, addictive personality-type love for blogs and their entire surrounding hype. I love how informative, fun, social, educational, entertaining, etc. reading blogs can be. I love how by just dropping into my Bloglines (soon to be Google Reader if I can ever figure out how to use it) to see what all my virtual friends have been up to. I like finding out lots of new stuff and in many cases, getting most excellent BTDT advice from those around the world.
I love blogging. I like that there are people who actually are interested in hearing what I have to say. Interested enough to tune into my blog to find out how I'm doing. I love the friendships that I have gained through blogging and the friendships that have been rekindled that maybe went a bit dormant due to busy lives, distance, and all those other things that sometimes cause us to leave formerly good friends by the wayside.
I hate how much time these things take. The timesuck that is blogsurfing is can be quite devastating to my productivity levels. The amount of time writing and editing posts, finding and checking links, uploading photos and things of that nature make me not like to blog.
But for the most part? I love blogs and blogging. And that's my B word for the day.
I love Hello Kitty! stuff. If you know me, you might know about this particular, ahem, quirk of mine. I love Kitty-chan. She is so cute. And her little friends...adorable! Hell, I even own a Hello Kitty! toaster. But I bought it for the girls, totally on clearance mind you. Never mind that the Iceman made me return the ever-so-cute matching coffeemaker swearing that he'd rather die than drink coffee made by Hello Kitty!. Whatever! But look! So cute Kitty toast! Mmmmm!
Favor me if you will with a moment of your time. Even I, who worships at the alter of Kitty and Mimi (she's her sister!) acknowledge that Sanrio and their devotees sometimes go a bit too far. Like Hello Kitty! weddings. And HK! vibrators anyway? (don't worry, that link goes to Gizmodo, not Fleshbot, because we ALL know that Fleshbot is definitely NSFW or NSFPMABTPOYOH, aka not safe for pretty much anywhere but the privary of your own home and no, I'm not even gonna link to it dammit! google it yourself.) I know that the Iceman would kill me if I ever put HK! rims or exhaust pipe on our car. Ain't gonna happen. But imagine if you saw me tooling up in one of these extremely bad-ass vehicles.
Those last few are from Kitty Hell, a blog where the long-suffering partner of a HK! fanatic posts on the ridiculousness of HK products, some of which are extreme like the above military vehicle.
Why, just the other day, while at the music store looking for a 1/2-size guitar for A, S looks up and says, "Mommy? Can I have a HK! electric guitar?" I said, "No!"
Anyway, to get to the point of this post, if you are a cat. You should be so afraid. Because just in case people are mistaking you for some other kind of animal, your human can put you in this costume so they'll know that indeed, you are a Kitty! (via who-sucks.com, whereby you should actually read the original post because it's freakin' hilarious. oh. and thanks for the pictures, too!)
But wait! Apparently it works on dogs too? Or maybe not.
I've seen this floating around the blogosphere and thought it was pretty cute and nice way to get to know me. So read on if you dare!
Cassi over at Bella Dia, has come up with a really delightful idea to blog about one letter of the alphabet each day. She calls it the "Encyclopedia of Me" meme and was inspired by Amy Krause Rosenthal's book Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life.
I like the idea of using a letter of the day inspiration (perhaps I've watched too much Sesame Street?) as a common tie for random blatherings of my rather idiosyncratic mind. So here goes:
A is for Art!
Of course, how could I start this meme with A and not mention one of the things that is most important to me. Art. I love art. All kinds of art.
I like the instantly recognizable, familiar primitive art like the Venus of Willendorf, a 30,000 year old statuette, which is one of the earliest known human figures.
I like sculpture, painting, architecture, design. I like quirky primitive folk art. I like sleek, contemporary modern art. I love industrial design. I love anything that is pleasing to the eye (and sometimes not so pleasing) and I love anything that makes you stop for a moment to take a second look.
I can't even make a list of my favorite artists and artisans because it's too hard, it's too long, and frankly, you might find it a bit boring.
Am I an artist? I certainly don't think so. Do I like to create art? Yes. Would other people consider it art? Probably not. And don't get me started on the whole stupid Art vs. Craft debate. But do I consider the things that I make art? No. However, the process that gets me from point A to point B. That unseen, intangible commodity that keeps me going and revs me up better than a Trippio from Starbucks? Now to me, that's Art!
But yes. A. It's for Art. And Art Rocks.
(many thanks to HypnoDesign for their awesome Smith Corona alphabet icons!
I love pandas. I think they're so cute! Although, what's with the funky-colored goodie-box area of the big one? Keep your eyes on the "toy" panda at its feet. (via Oh My, That's Awesome!)
Since my poor camera has bit the dust, but I finally have managed to keep the cable somewhere where I can find it, I give you some pictures from when I was on my blogging hiatus.
In August, we attended Stitch n' Pitch night at the Chicago White Sox. It was great fun and the kids had a blast. Since we didn't get to see any fireworks up close over the 4th, we were extra-happy to be up close and personal for the Sox fireworks presentation after the game. Too bad they lost, but I made good headway on my first pair of socks!
The kids had so much fun rocking out to the music and the entire night would have been a blast except that this group of Lincoln Park Trixies all traipsed in about halfway through the game and after fighting with the people behind us about their seats, all sat down. That would have been fine, except the girl DIRECTLY behind me was apparently a Mariners fan and had to proclaim this by screaming so loudly that her voice was obviously getting hoarse. Loud Girl kept screaming how the Sox were losers and and that Seattle was the best place in the world and proceeded to list all the big companies that were HQed there. I think Boeing, some others and Microsoft? Microsoft? Really? That makes a city the best place in the world? Anyway. Everyone kept saying either to give Loud Girl a beer because she was getting so hoarse, or to tell her to stop drinking because she was obviously drunk. Upon which, her friend replied that Loud Girl had not even had anything to drink. Geez, at least you coulda blamed your stupidity on the booze, Loud Girl!
Still, it didn't really faze me UNTIL, little S, decked out in Sox garb got up from my lap, annoyed from all the screaming and went over to the other end of the row where her dad was sitting. Loud Girl's friend said, See, you're scaring away the little kids!" in an obvious attempt to get Loud Girl to shut up. Loud Bitchy Girl then said, "Well, once a loser, always a loser," under her breath but obviously in reference to my precious little cutie pie. I whipped my head around so fast and gave them the dirtiest look. I would have gotten into it with her, but didn't want to be a bad influence on my girls and having to explain to my daughter that someone called her a loser and Mommy got thrown out of the ball park for fighting. Plus, we were up very high and I didn't want to fall over and tumble down out of the upper deck! Loud Girl's friend got a very scared look on her face but Loud Girl was too busy trying to see what was going on. Whatever. I'm there to knit. Not fight! They left the next inning. Thank God! Stupid Loud Girl notwithstanding, it was still a good time.
How could you possibly call this little cutie a loser? Okay, so the Sox have been pretty much sucksville lately, but that doesn't mean she does!
Oh yeah, and here are the socks that I was working on!
Oh, woe is me! My precious little cutie camera has finally bit the dust! I've been most horribly abusive to it, not even putting it into a case when in my purse. It's all my fault and I feel just awful about it. I threw it in my purse and let it bump and jump around all nekked and whatnot. Me and this little Canon Powershot Digital Elph SD300 have some good memories together. Lots of fun pictures and for only being 4.0 megapixels, it was a great little workhorse.
I love the Digital Elphs and will probably buy another one. I love the compactness of them and they're very easy to use. I'm kinda excited because I so need that fancy anti-shake they got going on with these newer cameras. Mine is about 4 years old, I think? Pretty ancient stuff. Still...I think I want this one. Not too big, not too expensive (because I'm horrible about my electronics). I'm not sure if it has that anti-shakey thing, but it seems about right. Lightweight, big screen, buttons and dials in about the same place as my old one.
Of course, I'm always open for suggestions. If you have a good one, that's not ridiculously expensive, let me know.
My Groups
-
Chicago Updated: 1 hour ago
-
weird parents Updated: 1 hour ago
-
The Anti GV Movement Updated: Yesterday
