FoodFash

Adventure Begins in the Kitchen

Archives for November 2011

Soup For The FoodFash Soul

by

What. A. Monday.  You know those days when you really try to do your best? You wake up 30 minutes early, early enough to blow dry your hair, pick out a cute outfit, fit in a few chores?  You show up at 8 AM on the dot, prepared for all your meetings, prepared to be a ‘yes man’ and cruise through every deadline that’s handed your way?  Today, I showed up at work as nerd-tastic as ever.

And today, I returned home not nearly as chipper as when I had left, and for no reason in particular.  The second I walked in the door I changed into a long-sleeved Gator tee I’ve managed to hold onto since college orientation, I hung my dry-cleanables, and curled into bed, with no thoughts of dinner, and continued where I had left off with the Kindle.

It wasn’t until I was interrupted by a phone call that I considered dinner should be a thing that happens tonight.  The first things that crossed my mind were soup, noodle soup, easy soup, comforting little kid soup…

FoodFash Chickenless Noodle Soup

Boil 1/2 cup dry noodles (I used wide egg noodles) until they are fully cooked. Pour the cooked noodles and about 2 cups of the noodle water into a soup bowl. Dissolve one Not Chick’n bouillon cube in the bowl and, when the soup has cooled down a tad, enjoy!

This soup has zero nutritional value, but I tell ya, the comfort value is off the charts.  Back to Kindle-land for me!

Some Sunday Randomness

by

I woke up this morning with an itty bitty problem: my car was still parked at Val’s house from Friday night.  And the bigger problem was that all of my friends that were in town would most likely hold me captive for Sunday Funday brunch before dropping me off at my intended destination.  I was not going to let that happen.

I grabbed my phone and  keys and walked a music-less 3.23 miles across town. I thought about how much smarter it would have been to eat something, drink water, anything, before I left.  Apparently, from the moment my eyes opened, I was on a mission to get that car!

By the time I arrived, not only was I super thirsty, but I was craving juice in a bad, bad way.  I headed to Village Health Market, with hopes they’d have something M Cafe like.

I ordered apple, celery, carrot, ginger, and beet juice.  It wasn’t really what I was craving, I really wanted a lemon-ginger combo, but it was still really refreshing.  And it was really pink, so I suppose that was fun.  I also ordered an Oriental tuna sandwich on Ezekiel bread that came with a side of veggie chips, a pretty standard order for this girl.

I spent the afternoon looking for a new ebook to download, creating a wish list on my public library account, downloading and reading 40% of You Lost Me There  (love Kindle stats!), and picking at the second half of the tuna sandwich.

Did you have a good weekend?  How did you spend your Sunday?

Touristing Around

by


Pumpkin pie for breakfast should always happen in November.  Pumpkin pie for breakfast on an alarm-less morning on a day off of work in November  is the rightest of right things!

I snacked on pie and took my time getting ready.  It’s been a while since I’ve had a day off of work without traveling involved.  And I had no particular reason for taking the day off other than I was at a breaking point, both literally and figuratively, with my project and it seemed like the logical thing to do.

I ran some errands and then headed over the bridge to meet my mom in downtown St. Pete.  Whenever I go to the State Theatre for a show, there are a slew of stores that I make a mental note of visiting if I’m ever in the area during small store business hours.  Today was my day to do just that.

Unfortunately for me, but fortunately for my wallet, I didn’t find any fashion gems.  But since I wasn’t looking for anything in particular, I had a fine time rummaging through potential treasure and chatting it up with my mom.

Afterward we headed to Ceviche for an outdoorsy lunch.  I still maintain that Ceviche’s ceviche is top notch goodness.

Now we’re sitting across from each other at Starbucks, sipping on warmth and typing away on our respective laptops.  What a lovely day!!

Community Pie

by

Cafe Hey appears on FoodFash frequently.  It’s almost exactly halfway between my house and my office.  They have the most vegan options in town. They don’t cringe when I butcher their VLT cause I don’t do T.  I love it there.

And since I compulsively refresh Facebook newsfeed throughout the day and Cafe Hey updates their status almost as often as I refresh, we have a pretty solid virtual friendship as well.  Typically, their updates include info on daily soups, grain salads, and quiche, but yesterday…  I noticed they were hosting a vegan pumpkin pie cooking class for Tampa Freeskool.  Hurrah!  I signed up.

As soon as everyone arrived, we got friendly in the kitchen.  We learned that a pumpkin is a gourd, a calabaza is a sweet Caribbean squash, and that you could use either of these in a pumpkin pie and they would taste equally, if not more, delightful than your run-of-the-mill Libby’s.

Soon after, we stood in a circle, utilitarian bowls in hand, and waited as the ingredients were portioned.  At that point, I think Anne, the owner, was concerned that we weren’t getting enough hands-on time with the ingredients.  What she didn’t know?  Measuring is my least favorite part of baking and she was doing this cook a tremendous favor!

Getting my hands dirty made me realize how I badly I want to get back into bread baking.  And watching this stand mixer do it’s thang reminded me how much I’ve neglected my own.  Me and bread are gonna happen this weekend.

We mixed and mixed and splattered and mixed until the pumpkin-ness was ready to be poured into our ginger and molasses crust.

And then we parted ways, carefully so as not to spill our pies, rushing home to bake our creations.

An hour later…  The pie turned out A+ and I have to believe that’s largely due to how much fresh ginger was both in the crust and filling.  The crust puffed up nicely, like a soft cookie, and complimented the creaminess and the spice of the filling nicely.

Thanks a million Cafe Hey and Tampa Freeskool for reeling in such good company to make delicious community pies!