This ish is Bananas.....

To say that I'm particular with bananas is a bit of an understatement. In fact, there is a pretty small window of time in which I LOVE bananas, a little bigger window in which I tolerate them and a gaping swath of time in which, unless used in something else, they gross me out. The gaping swath starts when the first spot appears on the banana. Soon thereafter, they're going to start to smell like bananas and their skin gets all papery. Sick. Anytime after the banana is able to be peeled, I'm in. Bring on the green bananas.

That being said, I end up with a lot of bananas that cross the line before I can eat them. The husband loves the spotted bananas because he mashes them up in his oatmeal in the morning. My only use for this stage of banana was either (a) make a small batch of muffins or (b) cut and freeze for use in protein shakes. Turns out, when I'm on path (b) with frozen bananas, there is something else I can make with them. Something magical.

Behold, what becomes of bananas, once gross and spotty, then chopped up, frozen, then blended.
Magical indeed.

It actually tastes like pretty sweet ice cream. Hoo-boy. This ish is bananas.

From the lovely www.thekitchn.com who fills my Reader with more posts than I can generally get through in a day. And yes, we have tried a batch with an added dash of peanut butter. A good decision as well.

Enjoy!

Asian Chicken Salad, Modified

The original version of this salad, the one I have had pretty regularly throughout my life, has ramen noodles and the accompanying packets of chicken flavored MSG. I modified my original recipe and nixed the noodles altogether (although in the future I may mix in some rice for bulk) and used some Chicken "Better than Bouillon" in the dressing to make up for the lack of poultry flavor. The ingredients:

Salad:

One head cabbage (or a bag of shredded)

1 T Sesame Oil

3 T Sesame Seeds

6 T Sliced Almonds

3 Chicken Breasts, Cooked and Cubed (I only had two, le sigh)

Dressing:

3/4 cup Vegetable Oil

6 T Rice Vinegar

4 T Sugar

1 tsp Pepper

Better than Bouillon to taste - maybe 2 tsp?

To make:

Shred the whole cabbage:

Toast the almonds in the sesame oil, adding the sesame seeds after the almonds have a little color:

Mix sesame seeds, almonds and chicken into shredded cabbage. Mix dressing together (it takes a bit of whisking to work the bouillon into the dressing) and stir into cabbage mixture.

Mix all well and you're done!

Bullion ... Veggie, Not Gold.

Soup Monday. I've been on a recent trend of cooking soup every Monday. At first it was by chance and then it just seemed like a nice trend to keep up. Gluten-free broth is sometimes hard to find and frankly, broth is expensive for what it really is. I've had Heidi Swanson's Homemade Bullion {{http://www.101cookbooks.com/archives/homemade-bouillon-recipe.html}} on my to-make list since I first saw it on 101cookbooks and realized it was a great chance to save some money (it makes a lot!) and also control what was going into the base of my soups.

I had a lot of veggies on hand from that week's CSA delivery (shout out to farmfreshtoyou.com) so I added a few things from the store and ended up with this lot:
What's that thing on the right that looks like it belongs in a Harry Potter potion you ask? Well that's celeraic, or celery root. And its just that. The root from the stalks of celery. And it tastes like, well, celery, but in more of a jicima texture. A closer look:
Admittedly I've never used it before and clearly I'm not the only one. The clerk at the grocery store check out said, "Ew, what is this?" when it came across the belt. Nice.

The final product looked a lot like Heidi's and has been successfully used in many soup recipes. I keep it in the freezer and since it has salt in it (although we halved the salt amount in order to be able to add it to each recipe as needed), it doesn't freeze solid and it is very easy to pull a few teaspoons out for each recipe.

I used approximate measurements given what I had on hand. My sun-dried tomatoes were not fresh and didn't grind up as well as they should have. Lessons learned.

Wow.

So I wouldn't say "consistency" was one of my blogging assets. In my defense I moved this winter and had a SIGNIFICANT delay getting internet at the new abode, so yeah, I have no excuse. Nevertheless, I've been thinking about where I spend most of my time online (see exhibit A, the blog roll to the right) and what I look forward to doing most each night when I get home from work and the answer is quite clear: cooking. I love cooking (thank you Gran!) and I have a husband who is willing to try anything I attempt. I have recently discovered that I am gluten sensitive and have been eating a gluten free diet for about a month. Given that the universe has an on-going love affair with gluten, I have found myself cooking at home more than normal as of late. I will probably have pretty crappy light during the time that I actually cook, but my goal (!) is to take pics of the recipes I make (because there is nothing I hate more than cookbooks without pictures.... am I right or am I right???) and, essentially, what we have for dinner. I could only dream to be as awesome as www.lastnightsdinner.net, but a girl has to start somewhere, right?

So, yeah, that's the goal. Here's to a new path of consistency.

This is Why I Was a Midfielder.

My friend just sent me this link of a pretty nasty women's soccer match from last night. I played a fair bit of soccer in my younger days, but I never saw anything like this.



The ponytail take-down makes me cringe every time.

Poor Little Bunny

After spending the weekend with my toddler-aged niece and nephew, I have reinforced the notion that I don't have the immune system for children. I feel like ish. My wall-shaking cough has given way to the runniest of all runny noses. I haven't been sick as far back as I can remember, so needless to say, I've done a fair share of whining about my condition over the last few days. To which my husband says... Poor.Little.Bunny.

A Horse is a Horse

A little tid-bit from the Schott's Miscellany daily calendar my now-Mother-in-Law got me for Christmas last year:



A horse will live 25 days on water without solid food, 17 days without eating or drinking, but only 5 days on solid food without drinking.

-- Burroughs' Encyclopaedia of Astounding Facts and Useful Information, 1889

Two things struck me about this:
(1) Doesn't it sound strikingly like a logic problem where you're going to be asked how little you could feed and water the horse over a period of 30 days without it dying?
(2) Who in the world tested these theories??? Maybe in 1889 it was trial by error.