dear readers, i need to tell you about something that doesn’t make me proud. the above picture represents my breakfast from a few months ago. skfl and i started house hunting and were running late to meet our realtor. i thought it would be the perfect excuse to hit up a mcdonald’s drive-thru. they were of course understaffed and overcrowded at the two locations on the way. that led to more time lost. with ten minutes left on the clock, the only logical solution was a stewart’s shop. [one of the things i love about skfl is that he actually says the whole name of the place, no straight up stewart’s like the rest of us. he even pronounces rensselaer the correct way]

i wasn’t thinking clearly and knew that caffeine was a must. the bright blue packaging spoke to me and i went for it. the frosted flakes were a long lost friend and the red bull, well that was my first and probably last experience with the stuff. the snack did the trick and was an important reminder to always make enough time for ugly oatmeal.

this morning i’m trying out something different. the alarm went off at 5:25 am, a half hour earlier than normal. i thought it might be nice to get a jump start on the day instead of hitting the snooze button a few times in an effort to postpone it. how will an extra few minutes in the morning in front of my computer help me throughout the day? guess i’ll find out.

i still hit the snooze twice, but made it out and grabbed a long hot shower. i had no idea the water was warmer and would last longer in the five o’clock hour! i hope to go at this at least 30 days so that it becomes a habit.

i even grabbed my camera in an effort to capture the time. for some reason the first shot taken is always my favorite. so i will post it here for you to see. there are a lot of things wrong with the photo, but i’m not going to try to correct them. let me just put it out there as is, and do the same for myself today.  wow, that feels good.

as i was pulling my lunch out of the microwave at work today, a co-worker asked “hey, what do you have there? some hot pockets?” oh no he didn’t!!! i responded with a friendly “well i guess they are something like that, but on the homemade side of the spectrum.” this kitchen buddy was inquiring about my black bean, sweet potato and roasted poblano empanadas. i made the dough from scratch and even soaked, cooked, and refried the black beans. a hearty, delicious and somewhat healthy lunch for a nene. and this guy thought they looked like a mass produced preservative-laden, nutrient-devoid food product. i decided to take that as a compliment.

isn’t the goal of home cooking to make it look like something you would buy out? maybe not. the goal is to have a nourishing, fulfilling, healthy and tasty meal that is lovingly prepared. or as my dear old friend might say, something to fill your hungry hole.

well our hungry holes were filled with empanadas last night. for some reason they tasted way better reheated today. skfl and i are both fighting off a cold and maybe our tastebuds were affected for the first round. the dough tasted really salty and took away from the flavorful beans. that was my second time soaking and cooking black beans and i am hooked! i don’t really remember the process of the first attempt too well, except that it felt like i was biting into rocks. (that’s what he said)

the black bean, sweet potato and roasted poblano is now my standard mix for all mexican foods whipped up in the kitchen. it works well in a quesadilla, taco, tamale pie and empanada. (each combined with cheese and sassy salsa of course. although i’ve started making a yet-to-be-named green salsa that’s working out pretty well too.) maybe i’ll write a book one day called nene’s mexican feast and it will feature ten items that you can mix and match. kind of like the tim gunn’s ten wardrobe essentials. hmm…

i love going to yoga class, but often have a tough time letting my mind rest for the end meditation. last time i completely visualized myself on the conan o’brien show talking about kitchen confidence. we high fived, shared a few laughs and i coached him through a simple sauté of greens. i opened my eyes to realize that i was sprawled out on the floor of a beautiful yoga studio minutes from home. but i really saw it – the cold chillin’ with conan! a premonition? doubtful. i have no clear plan for the future of almost foodies. i can’t seem to get this website where i want to be and potlucks are the last thing on my mind these days. maybe the yoga will help.

tonight while trying to meditate, i started to worry about what to have for dinner. i always leave yoga starving and tempted to stop off for a greasy treat before getting home. now i’m on a budget and did not want to waste my money on empty calories. so instead of freeing my mind, i was mentally scanning the contents of the fridge and freezer. pita, eggs, pepper jack, butter and onion. ding! a namaste and a few high fives later, i was on my way to dinnertown.

the meal cooked up in minutes and was scarfed down in seconds (after spending a few additional seconds not caring about lighting while snapping a photo or ten). the butter melted while i diced up a tiny piece of onion. i threw the frozen pita directly on the burner (no time to heat up the griddle when you are dizzy with the hunger). it thawed and nearly burned in an instant! what a fulfilling and delicious treat. i’m not sure it was really a meal, but i’m full enough. it’s keeping me from grabbing a beer. beer and eggs? barf. or should i go find out? nah, i think sleep is in order.

i’ve decided to taste test as many oktoberfest beers as possible this season. i haven’t figured out the best way to do that yet. my original plan was to profile one beer a week, but the oktoberfest season is so short and there are so many beers to tackle. in the spirit of alex and cati’s wine taste-off, i thought we could host an oktoberfest taste-off here at chez skfl/nene. since we were the winners of that taste-off, i think it’s our responsibility to carry the torch and because i like to put my own flare on things, why not completely change the main beverage. how rude!

i sampled two of the four beers pictured above. one rocked me and the other made me mad with its predictable flavor. wanna guess which ones? once a rating system is worked out, i will get going on some reviews. and then there is the issue of daylight and proper photos. the above photo was taken right when i got home from work, before the beer went into the freezer for a quick chill. by the time i sat down to drink and eat dinner, it was dark out.

i need to figure out and make some sort of a light tent. it’s a good thing i plan on using up all of that vacation time after my job ends on the 21st. craft projects and drinking! oh wait, i could do the drinking and photographing during the day! okay, i obviously have some more things to work out. is anyone else wondering why i’m spending so much money on beer when i will be without a paycheck in a few weeks? eek!

oh rick bayless, why can’t i seem to get your recipes right? several years ago when i was new to the chipotle, i tried to make this wonderful sounding smoky chicken and spinach dish. i misread the recipe and instead of adding two canned chipotle peppers, i added two cans of chipotle peppers. (there is a reason why this is almost foodies) i spent so much time preparing that dinner and it was so over the top spicy, the whole thing went in the trash along with a few tears.i decided that today would be the day to face my fears, so i checked out his most recent book, mexican everyday, from the library. when i saw the mouthwatering recipe for swiss chard tacos with carmelized onion, fresh cheese and red chile i just knew i could conquer it – or something.

i wasn’t able to find the cheese at my local suburban supermarket, so i decided sour cream would be a fine substitute. i’m not sure if it was a substitute at all, but it totally worked. i’m trying to overcome some cheese fears and really didn’t feel like revisiting feta tonight.

i bought some corn tortillas without reading the package first (how dare i). if only i had taken the time to at least glance at the ingredients, i would have noticed that lime was added. i luckily discovered this when snacking on a crumb while the rest were steaming. they were horrible and tasted like chemicals, so i chucked ‘em in the trash. ooh – another reason to buy myself a tortilla press. yes! thankfully i had some whole wheat tortillas in the cupboard, so i quickly moved on to plan b.

the suggestion for reheating the shells is to wrap them in a kitchen towel and then steam like you would vegetables on the stove (i’m totally misinterpreting that suggestion – again with the almost foodies). maybe that works for the corn tortilla, but there was a mishap in the land of whole wheat. one of them stuck to the towel! and yes, it went in the trash, right on top of the lime and corn tortillas. hey, at least we’ve got a fun new phrase around the house – “i’ll throw you out like a tortilla towel!”

so my trip down rick bayless avenue was not a total disaster. we had a somewhat delicious meal of a theme and variation on the original recipe. i’m disappointed that i couldn’t get the right ingredients to give it a fair chance. i’m also kind of hungry because i didn’t have the energy to cook up some beans for a side dish. for some reason it can be extra time consuming trying to follow a recipe. i will think about that some more at another point. i will definitely tackle this recipe again, along with a few others in the book. cheers to conquering fears!

i’m so lucky to be renting an apartment with nectarine trees growing in the plot next door. i’m even more lucky that my gracious landlords shared the harvest with me. there were so many in the bag, but most of them were past their prime. i didn’t have enough shortening to make a pie, so i went for an easy alternative – the crisp.

i decided to totally improvise with the fruit. i’ve made apple crisp tons of times and it’s always a delicious treat. it’s the standard recipe from the joy of cooking – you blend together flour, sugar, butter, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt for the crumb topping. i didn’t think about how the nectarines would breakdown in the oven. they got peeled and sliced, then i added some sugar and flour and threw them in the pan. they were so juicy, i feared a mess in the oven. somehow it miraculously did not boil over.

it was that very juice that absorbed all of the crispy crumb topping. my improvised nectarine crisp became a thick glop of unattractive dessert. after several attempts, i couldn’t make it look beautiful in photographs. i topped things off with some quality vanilla ice cream. it was so tasty, even for breakfast and dessert!

having a formally trained chef on the almost foodies mailing list is so awesome. we are planning another mexican themed potluck on wednesday. this dude very casually threw out a suggestion and then as an afterthought said “oh, make your own sour cream, it’s a very little effort job, plus it takes three days to culture so you’ll have a friend to watch on your counter.” say what? make your own sour cream? who knew? well, he knew. i remember reading about making crema in a rick bayless cookbook back in the day. it seemed like too much work for me at the time.

tonight i started the sour cream making process. it should be done just in time for the potluck on wednesday night. here is what i did (under the direction of trained chef dude):

2 cups heavy cream

2/3 cup buttermilk

mix together and pour into very clean pint glasses

cover with plastic wrap and make a tight seal. chef dude says put a rubber band around the plastic wrap. i used painters tape (hey, it was either that or yarn). mark the time you sealed them up, store in a cool, dry, dark place and then check on it in 36 hours. look for the separation of the solids. spoon out the clump of white stuff on the top, chill and whisk. discard the really thin liquid along with any orange stuff.

i feel a little weird posting the recipe without knowing how it will work out for me (or if i even interpreted it right). i am documenting the progress over on flickr. i’m pretty excited, but am trying not to get my hopes up too high.

i love being able to make a meal prepared with local food. it’s such a treat to get up on a saturday morning, watch a little 90210 while eating cereal, and then head out to the farmer’s market. i think next year we will go in on a csa. the market has been really overwhelming and so crowded these days. a csa seems like it would be so much easier to manage. plus you’d have to identify random vegetables and figure out how to prepare them. it would be like school – only fun! i recently stumbled upon the clever blog one local summer. they challenge you to prepare and eat one local meal a week. i rolled up too late to participate, but it’s nice to keep in the back of my mind while meal planning. here is a weekly staple in this household:

.:grilled spring onion bread with tomatoes and herbed chevre:.

.slice up a loaf of fresh bread (one inch thick)

.place on the grill until crunchy and marked with those beautiful lines

.cut up some fresh dill and chives and mix them into plain chevre with a little salt and pepper

.slice up a few tomatoes

.bring it all together by spreading the herbed chevre on the warm bread and top it off with the tomato slices

well would you look at that. (okay, you just did) i wrote a recipe. it’s dinky, but delicious. it still needs a sassy name. maybe.

i am constantly making mistakes and usually get so down on myself. i often wonder how i even pick myself up and move forward. usually a long cry is in the mix, followed by a self loathing trip to mcdonald’s. i used to buy a new plant, now it’s sneakers or a fun kitchen gadget. i wish i could pick up my old knitting projects (i used to make so many beautiful knitted chokers for that “business” i was “starting”), but that would mean i’d have to organize the brown room filled with my crafts and skfl’s comic books. maybe this fall. brown room, brown leaves, the need for warm knitted items. i’ll think about that for a while (aka put it off until i have to locate those iron on transfers).

there are so many things i want to do. so many things i keep thinking of, while revisiting that list of things i’m putting off. it seems that most of my time is spent worrying about what i’m not doing instead of actually doing something. how does that happen? how do you break through that? tonight i think i figured out a way. instead of focusing on myself, i went to work on a new recipe. i even wrote out the process first in my new little pocket journal (as it turns out a notebook with a little bit of bling is very inspiring).

unfortunately i forgot to write down the working name and it’s long gone (a glass of wine and a road trip to the ice cream stand is to thank for that). i think it was something corny like ‘quitters revenge’. yeah, i know. here are the ingredients (in no particular order):

- swiss chard – lemon juice – lemon zest – crushed red pepper – garlic scapes – garlic – vidalia onion – white wine – vegetable stock – parmigiano reggiano – orecchiette – olive oil – butter – sea salt – crushed black pepper

i think a tomato would have made a lovely addition, as well as a few chickpeas. the process is pretty standard. sauté the scapes, onion and garlic in the butter and olive oil. then add the wine, lemon juice and stock. cook that down, add the lemon zest. meanwhile, blanch the swiss chard and cook the pasta. bring it all together and add the cheese and you’ve got a meal.

luckily it was really delicious and boosted my confidence a bit. now if i could just figure out the measurements and then test it out with the tomatoes and chickpeas.  oh, and nail down that name.