Diary of a Dead Serious Dilettante.

Peanut butter chocolate coconut oat energy balls

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 05 Apr 2015 06:02:00 +0000

Found this recipe on the internet and it's a perfect solution for a sweets craving if you don't want too much sugar! The peanut butter and chocolate makes it rich enough that you don't pop these like potato chips :)

1 cup old-fashioned oats
4 tablespoons peanut butter
2 tablespoons dark chocolate chips
1 tablespoon dark brown sugar (depending on how sweet you like things)
1.5 teaspoon vanilla
4 tablespoons non-fat milk
3 Pinches of salt
5 tablespoons shredded coconut (optional)

Mix oats, peanut butter, chocolate, sugar, vanilla, and coconut (if desired) in a bowl. I also added ground flaxseed for some added protein. Add milk and knead into small balls. You can eat them right away, or store them in the fridge for later snacking!

Salad for days!

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 21 Feb 2015 05:58:00 +0000

This is hands down, my current favorite salad (for the past year) that is inspired by a Kale salad from a cafe near my house. Super easy to make-- the most work you'll do is from the chopping! Here's the recipe:

For greens, use kale or spinach. What I like about kale is that it keeps really well since it's so crunchy. Even if you have this salad for several days, it won't wilt.

Chop all your veggies. I basically just choose whatever I have on hand but the ones I always use are bell peppers (a variety of colors makes your salad pretty), onions (more on that later), and beets. I love the crispness of beets and never really ate them before. So good!

I'll also chop up a fruit for sweetness like asian pear, nectarine, or apple. Any of these will do. Just whatever you have.

To add flavor, I caramelize onions. OK, caramelized onions are delicious and I will basically put them in anything I can. The added benefit of having them in the salad is that it basically flavors the salad so much that you don't even need dressing!

Lastly, I top off with sunflower seeds. You can add grated cheese if you want, but I don't think you can actually taste it so it's not worth it to me. If you really want dressing, just mix up your own with a bit of olive oil and vinegar of your choice and a bit of honey. Mix well and dress your colorful, refreshing salad!

If you want more salad inspiration, check out the NYT 101 salads list: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/22/dining/22mlist.html?_r=0

The yummiest steel cut oatmeal

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 21 Feb 2015 05:12:00 +0000

I love oatmeal plain but to many people it can be a bit too boring. Here's the latest way I've been eating oatmeal-- steel cut oatmeal to be specific-- and it's super chewy and delicious!

First, boil water. Then add the steel cut oats. I like to use the quick cook ones because it's faster, but it's not as chewy. I don't measure but just let it all cook until the water boils off. At this point, I add a sprinkle of salt. Even though this is a relatively sweet breakfast, a pinch of salt always brings out the sweetness a bit more.

Turn off the heat and add your honey. I also add my dad's homemade fig jam and it's a perfect combination.

Put your oatmeal in your bowl and top with blueberries, almonds, chia seeds and ground flaxseed. Lately I've been adding wheat germ, too. You can also add walnuts or whatever else. Sometimes I add milk if I want a creamier oatmeal.

Enjoy your hearty breakfast!

Blueberry Coconut Smoothie

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 21 Feb 2015 05:00:00 +0000

So confession time... in LA, there's this smoothie place that makes absolutely delicious smoothies. And unfortunately, it's pricey as hell. I'm embarrassed to say that I have spent $8 on a smoothie and that it might have happened several times. Because I couldn't live with the guilt anymore, I decided I would make my own. I mean, it's a smoothie, right? I worked at Jamba Juice in high school so who better than me to make smoothies at home?

This delicious, very purple smoothie includes coconut milk (the kind in a quart, not a can), frozen blueberries, almond butter, chia seeds, ground flaxseed, and dates. The secret is to get whole, pitted dates-- that makes blending a lot easier.

Now enjoy your refreshing, delicious smoothie and put that $8 in your rainy day fund!

Pot Pies!

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 07 Nov 2014 03:47:00 +0000

It started getting cold-- yes, it does get chilly in LA-- meaning in its 60s-- ha ha-- and naturally this means I don't want to eat anything cold. No salads, no ice cream.. what's more comforting and warm than POT PIE? Seriously. What? That's right.. pot pies are the very definition of comfort food! Can I tell you how it came out though? It tasted legit. Seriously legit. It might be my proudest culinary moment.

As usual, I make no measurements-- just taste.

First, just chop up whatever vegetables you want-- I used onion, celery, carrots and mushrooms
-- and cook it on the stovetop. Add whatever spices you want. I added pepper, salt, dill, poultry seasoning, bay leaves, and a bit of cayenne pepper to give it a kick.

Cook some chicken on the side.

Add broth to the vegetable mixture. I used chicken broth. Let it simmer! Add more spices if necessary. Taste and add, taste and add. Add a bit of milk or cream if you want. Add the chicken.

Add some cornstarch to thicken it up. Just take a spoonful and mix it with some cold water. Add the mixture to your broth and mixture.

Unroll your defrosted pie crust (store bought is super easy) into a casserole dish and then pour in your stovetop mixture! Cover with crust.

Cook at 425 for 45 minutes.

I didn't measure anything but you really don't need to for this recipe! Just taste as you go.
I also made a veggie pot pie for my sister, who's a vegetarian. Same deal except I didn't add the chicken (obviously) and added green beans, spinach, kale, and potato. Enjoy!!

Homemade whipped cream, ooh la la!

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 30 Sep 2014 03:18:00 +0000

Whipped cream is one of those things one should never buy. It's fantastically more delicious when homemade, and super easy to make-- if we're talking about ease of ingredients, that is. All you need is heavy whipping cream and a bit of sugar!

Just mix the cream and sugar (for this I used only half the sugar listed in the NYT's Mark Bittman's recipe). Then keep mixing. Really, beat the damn thing! Beating the cream and sugar with a whisk is the hardest part-- it's a workout! I added some extras-- vanilla extract and mint extract. Yum. So deliciously yummy and refreshing, and so easy and impressive. Now you're done. Just add berries!

Weekdays are for Pasta Carbonara

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 24 Sep 2014 22:51:00 +0000

Pasta Carbonara is one of those seemingly fancy dishes that seems a lot harder than it is. All you need is pasta, eggs, cream, milk, and peas! And bacon. You don't need it, but you kinda do. More about that in a bit.

Boil the pasta in your choice in salted water. About one minute before you finish boiling, throw in your peas. An easy way to cook them without using more dishes!

On the side, saute some chopped onions and garlic. This is optional. Put aside when done. While the pasta is boiling, make the sauce. Just crack open two eggs, and beat until well mixed. Pour in a bit of cream, an equal amount of Parmesan, and mix well. Add plenty of pepper and a bit of salt. Mix, mix, mix!

Drain the pasta (and peas) and save a bit of pasta water to the side. You may need this. Mix the hot pasta with the sauce mixture immediately! You need to do this so that the eggs will "cook" a bit in the sauce. Now you're done. Eat up!

Oh, and about the bacon: next time I definitely plan to add it since it adds a bit of flavor that I found missing in my dish. Just another excuse to make it soon enough!

Homemade Ginger Ale is the best Ginger Ale

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 23 Sep 2014 03:55:00 +0000

I had a hankering for some ginger ale, but none at home. I did have a plethora of ginger, and a Soda Stream. Easy enough! Making your own ginger ale is incredibly easy-- the only hard part is peeling the ginger!

Just peel and chop 1 cup of ginger, add in equal amounts of sugar (or however sweet you like it), and 3 cups of water. Boil the mixture for an hour and half until it turns into syrup-- then simply add to your carbonated water. Yes, it really is that easy to be fancy. Delish!

Gnocchi Making: A Pictoral History

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 21 Sep 2014 22:09:00 +0000

Strawberry Banana Oat Flax bread

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 29 Jul 2014 08:11:00 +0000

After a day of homework and exercise by the lake, I was looking forward to eating something yummy. Although I had a nice wrap with lots of vegetables and a sweet potato, it wasn't enough. Hence, strawberry banana oat flaxseed bread-- a twist on the Blueberry Banana Oat Flax Bread I made a couple of weeks ago. I deviated a little from the recipe this time around-- because I ran out of my regular 1% milk today, I used soy. I also added an egg. And since I bought whole wheat flour at the store two weeks ago, I decided to try it out for this recipe:

Dry Ingredients:

2 cups whole wheat flour
pinches of salt, baking soda, and baking powder
1 cup oats
3 tb ground flaxseed

Wet Ingredients:

2 bananas, cut into pieces
1 cup of soy milk (honestly, I can't remember how much I put in)
dash of vanilla extract and lemon
drizzles of honey (just used the rest of the bottle)
strawberries, cut into pieces

First, mix all dry ingredients. Set aside.

Put all wet ingredients except for strawberries into a blender. Mix.
Fold dry ingredients into wet ingredients. Mix really well.
Toss in strawberries. Mix some more!

Bake!

The Bestest Chocolate Ice Cream!

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 29 Jul 2014 06:49:00 +0000

What better subject to warrant a blog reprisal than ice cream?

A couple of weeks ago, the New York Times' Dining issue was dedicated to Ice Cream.
Yes, all ice cream! Articles dedicated to old school ice cream shops, soft serve, and the ultimate ice cream recipe. As evidenced by previous posts, I once was an avid ice cream maker but fell off the wagon after moving back to California. After reading the NYT's "The Only Ice Cream Recipe You'll Ever Need," I dusted off my Cuisinart Ice Cream maker-- literally (let's not get to that point again)!

This ice cream recipe is much different from the ones I've made in the past. First off, EGGS. Lots and lots of eggs. The NYT recipe called for EIGHT egg yolks. The second different thing was stovetop prep. I usually just dump all my chilled ingredients right into the ice cream bowl to produce a delicious ice cream, but I didn't want to cut any corners here. Hello, this is the NYT. So stovetop prep it was.. on a hot summer night in a kitchen with no AC...

Per the directions, I mixed the cream, milk, sugar, salt and Ghiradelli unsweetened Cocoa Power and simmered it for a while. In another bowl, I beat the egg yolks, then mixed all the mixtures together and let it simmer for a bit more.

The final result is then popped into the fridge for some major cooling-- several hours or until you can't wait any longer. :) Then, into the ice cream maker it goes!

Here is the finished product. Isn't it beautiful, y'all??

Definitely the richest ice cream I've made. It's ridiculously decadent. One thing I didn't see in the NYT until it was too late is that it's recommended not to add the egg yolks if you decide to make chocolate. Next time, I'd probably cut the egg yolks to 3-5 instead of 8. I'd probably also add a bit more milk since it was so dark. Still delicious though.. I ain't complainin'!

For the Master Ice Cream recipe-- with variations!-- follow the link.

Sunday Yumminess-- Avocado, yogurt, homemade chips, and other goodies

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 09 Apr 2012 05:15:00 +0000

I so wish my camera worked! After barely any sleep (due to homework, not fun parties), I met my friend for our weekly walking excursions by the lake downtown. Before I left, I ate a mixture of Life and Frosted Mini Wheat cereal, topped with ground flax and strawberries with 1% milk. Yum.

After a quick 3 mile walk, ran home and showered to meet up with my friends and our token male friend's parents to eat tacos. YUM! Fried portobello mushroom taco and a fried avocado taco. Yum yum. Who doesn't like avocado? Seriously though, adding avocado to any dish makes it 10x better... raw tuna, salads, eggs.. Luckily, my parents now have an avocado tree!

Ice instant coffee with hazelnut at home. Nice for hot weather.

Dinnertime: egg scramble with tomatoes, pepper, and onion. This is the first time I've ever cooked eggs! Hard to believe, but I didn't find the texture of eggs appealing when I was young. I'm still not sold on runny or sunny side up eggs.

1st snack: plain yogurt, ground flaxseed, toasted coconut, and strawberries. Don't forget the honey!

2nd snack: Couldn't help myself. Corn tortillas, cut in pieces, drizzled with olive oil, and sprinkled with furikake. Made with leftover corn tortillas I tossed in the freezer a while ago.

Overall, a delicious day!

Coconut Pineapple Ice Cream

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 08 Apr 2012 07:04:00 +0000

Alas. Water leaked in my water bottle, which unfortunately got into my camera. While the camera isn't totally broken, it's quite tempestuous right now. So sorry for the lack of photos to illustrate the deliciousness that is...

Coconut Pineapple Ice Cream!

I went to the market with a hankering to make coconut ice cream, so bought milk, cream, and unsweetened coconut flakes. A lot of recipes online call for coconut milk, but I didn't have any, and besides, I think it may be more fattening (wonder if you could add coconut water?). At home, I suddenly realized that I had a pineapple to add to the mix!

Here are the ingredients for this deliciousness:

Milk
Heavy Cream (half the amount of milk used)
Vanilla
Coconut Extract
1/4 cup of honey (melted)
Pineapple juice (squeezed from pineapple)

Mix these together and toss into ice cream maker. Start churning.

Meanwhile, toast coconut flakes in a pan. Put in freezer to cool.

Toward the end of the churning process, toss in coconut flakes and small pineapple chunks.

Deliciousness! Trust me, it is super tasty! Besides the sugar content in the ingredients, no other sugar was added. What a great bonus!

Blueberry Banana Oat Bread

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 01 Apr 2012 02:10:00 +0000

After a long, very rushed week with little sleep to match, I came home on Friday after class to work on my project from home. I worked a bit, and then turned to more important matters that have been on my mind for quite some time-- banana blueberry oat bread!

Usually, I'll google several recipes and take a bit from each to conjure my own Frankenstein. No eggs, no oil, and no butter (mostly because I don't have these ingredients). I added very little sugar but was surprised how sweet it came out. Here's the recipe! (I don't measure in the traditional sense, so some are estimations):

Dry Ingredients
Flour: 1 1/2 cup. I used white flour since I couldn't find the wheat flour.
Uncooked Oats: 1/2 cup.
Ground flaxseed: Several tb.
Salt: dash.
Baking Soda: dash.
Baking Powder: dash.

Wet Ingredients
Milk: 1/3 cup
Bananas: 2 middle-aged ones.
Vanilla Extract: 1 tb.
Lemon Juice: dash.
Brown Sugar: 2 tsp.
Honey: 2 tb.
Vanilla Nonfat Yogurt: 1 ice cream scoop for the hell of it.
Blueberries: Whatever you desire.

Mix all the dry ingredients together and set aside.

Mix wet ingredients except blueberries together. I used a blender for this-- not fun to mix bananas

Fold dry ingredients into wet ingredients.

Mix in Blueberries!

Bake at 350 for 40 minutes. You now have yummy and super chewy bread!

Just one of the very many bites I ate!

Grocery List

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:18:00 +0000

Day off!

There's nothing nicer to have a day away from the everyday grind to have a break. Well, I had class this morning, walked home, and then drove to the market. I bought the healthiest stuff. Too healthy, perhaps; I'm feeling all high and mighty about my purchases like the people who silently judge what you put on the conveyor belt. Ha, ha.

It's getting hot, so I bought frozen strawberries and mangoes to make smoothies. I'd rather drink a smoothie than eat a hot lunch right now. With my past career at Jamba Juice, I have a ton of options. Instead of using juice, I bought plain soy milk (juice has too much sugar).

Also bought a whole pineapple, bananas to take on the go, extra sharp cheddar cheese (the most magical ingredient that makes everything taste yummy), red bell pepper, red and yellow onions, celery (to eat with my peanut butter), pudding, jello, dark chocolate (yummy), asparagus, broccoli, and whole wheat tortillas, which has nearly the same nutritional content as flour tortillas. Also 1% milk and cereal for breakfast.

I bought two new things-- a sweet potato-- never cooked them before-- and ground flaxseed. Ground flaxseed is something that I've been curious about but never tried. It was the most expensive item out of my list-- $5!

Apparently, it is rich in fiber and omega-3 acids and helps with cholesterol, digestion, and blood pressure, etc.... and dry eyes!! We shall see about that-- my eyes most always feel like they're going to pop out of my head. I'm going to sprinkle it on top of yogurt, cereal, smoothies, vegetables.. the list is seemingly endless. Not sure if it'll taste good, but will report back.

Happy Friday!

The kitchen and living room are a mess.

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 23 Mar 2012 01:48:00 +0000

As usual, I barely slept last night and went to work with just 3.5 hours of rest. It was the perfect day-- sunny, warm but not hot, and beautiful clouds. I wanted to sit at an outdoor bar and drink something delicious. Instead, I went home and promptly washed my car. It seems strange, it's just a seriously productive case of procrastination.

Car washing is no joke! There's a reason why we pay good money for someone else to wash our cars for us-- it's strenuous, messy, and a chore. After I was done, I was starving but too tired to make food. Yet I didn't want to eat a frozen dinner or ramen either.

I made a quick dish of pasta with pepper, parmesan, and peas-- something I learned from my cousin (although mine came out nowhere as scrumptious as hers did).

It was tasty, leaving me in a good mood, so I wanted the rare after-dinner coffee. But I got too adventurous. I brought out the espresso maker that has not been touched since I broke the decanter before it was ever used.

sad espresso machine sitting in the corner

Yes, that's my living room floor. Unfortunately (fortunately?) the cord is short as to prevent any accidents, so... there it is. What followed was a ridiculous process of guessing how this machine operates. 10 minutes after plugging it in, I decided to download the manual and discovered that water is needed to produce steam (obviously..). Then stupidly, I touched the machine, burning my hand. The milk exploded a bit. Things got dirty.

But I was left with this frothy milk atop of my coffee!

I'm really unhappy with these photos today, but what can you do...

After all this, I better get more sleep tonight!

More Food

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 16 Mar 2012 01:16:00 +0000

Last night before going to bed, I felt like making oatmeal bars. It's too bad I didn't check to see if we had oatmeal, though. We didn't have whole wheat flour like I thought, either. I was probably thinking about my kitchen back in Texas.. aiya. Anyhow, I improvised with white flour, walnuts, half the sugar, an egg, milk, and pear and apple (as a substitute for butter):

Does not look appetizing

All that turned into this very chewy bread with a slightly sweet taste:


Does not look appetizing either, but it was tasty!

After visiting my parents today, V went home and I went to my friend E's house. She has an absolutely magnificent orange tree!

These oranges cannot be used fast enough-- tons of them just from one tree.

We chatted while she made delicious coffee with her machine-- I haven't even used my own at home. Now I've got to try! Yum.

Perfect frothy milk

As I left, E gave me five beautiful oranges. I squeezed several of them, added a lemon and lime, threw in some simple syrup (which I also heard about from M) and mixed it in with carbonated water made from V's soda maker. Delicious!

Another Simple Pasta Dish

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 15 Mar 2012 04:53:00 +0000

I'm so happy to be an Angeleno! Got out of Austin just in time for the crowds visiting for SXSW. Since being in LA, I've eaten lots of yummy food, but tried to keep up with the healthy eating and cooking.

Tonight I made pasta, topped with light cheese and roasted broccoli (we learned how to roast broccoli from our friend M who had us over to try our wedding cake!). It was a super hack-- I just took two monterey jack cheese slices-- meant for sandwiches-- melted them with a little bit of butter and olive oil, mixed them with the pasta and the broccoli. V made stuffed tomatoes, but unfortunately, I forgot to take photos of them before I ate them!

Apparently, broccoli is a super vegetable-- doesn't lose nutrients when it is cooked!

Leftover tomatoes, I turn you into healthy tomato sauce!

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 07 Mar 2012 19:32:00 +0000

It's funny how busy I am in grad school. Lately, I've been thinking about what I'm going to do with all my free time post-graduation-- learning how to properly cook, exercise, sew, start reading books again--! until I realized that I said those same exact things while I was working. I can't wait until I go to grad school so I can finally start exercising! Learn how to cook and sew-- and I can read again! Just goes to show you that if you want to do something, you just need to set time aside and do it.

But seriously, after I graduate, I'm going to start. Forreals.

I'm trying to eat healthier-- less processed meals and more simple foods. Eating fresh food isn't very difficult to prepare. During this health kick, I've been wary of pasta. I didn't want to use canned sauce anymore, but I really wanted pasta. Since I'm working from home today, I decided to make some:

Does this not look delicious? I dare you to say otherwise!

I used to buy too many tomatoes. Since I love them, I thought I could eat them all, but always ended up throwing them away when they went bad. I started freezing them-- just plopped whole tomatoes into the freezer. No cutting or Tupperware necessary.

To create a sauce to top my whole wheat pasta, I threw two of my frozen tomatoes into the microwave. Chopped up two cloves of garlic and threw in some red wine vinegar and olive oil and .. voila! Just add pepper and top on pasta. I'm surprised how flavorful it turned out! Plus, tomatoes are a good source of lycopene, an antioxidant (I think?).

I bet eggplant would be good, too. Maybe next time!

A Nutrition Kick

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 04 Mar 2012 07:45:00 +0000

In addition to exercise, I'm trying to eat more fruits and vegetables-- I'm ashamed to say that a couple of days can go by without eating any vegetables! The cooking life of a grad student includes an abundance of cereal and pasta. After I come home from school and work, I'm exhausted-- plus I need to start working on projects and homework-- there's just not a lot of time and enthusiasm to cook. Lots of onions, noodles, and canned sauce. No more.

I loved my breakfast today-- no cereal! Not to say anything negative about cereal, which I love (shredded wheat, yum), but sometimes, a change is needed. Apparently, pineapple is nutritionally awesome, despite being high in sugar. According to the online internets, pineapple has high amounts of vitamin C and manganese, a mineral that is reportedly good in all things health.

I wish I could eat leisurely like this every morning, but unfortunately, I usually wake up and rush out the door just 25 minutes later!

Avocado, Pineapple, and Yogurt. Don't forget the coffee! Yum.

Recommendation of the day: Lately, I've been addicted to this food blog. Check it out! I especially love the posts about food eaten at home since it seems like something I could follow!