It finally happened.  George, our Meyer lemon tree, produced real, honest-to-goodness lemons!

When we last left off (nearly a year ago?!), I had done my best to pollenate George’s flowers and we had three baby lemons that seemed to have stuck.  They were small and hard and green.

Slowly they began to grow.  I remember taking note of the point where they were about the size of golfballs, still green.  After that, it seemed as though they never grew any larger–until I’d cup one in my hand and realize it was beginning to fill my palm.  And then, all of a sudden, they were baseball-sized and turning yellow.

George’s lemons have actually been ready for a while now.  Over a month.  Maybe two even.  All three of those little green nubbers did survive, and Chris and I harvested one a while back to squeeze into our evening tea.  It was bright and tart.  It had pith and seeds.  It was a lemon.  I didn’t expect it to be anything else, but it was still astonishing in a way because I helped to create it (George, of course, gets most of the credit).  It’s been difficult for me to pick the others.  I’ve used my wanting to write this post as an excuse to delay it, but the truth is that it’s hard to let go.  They took so long to grow!

I know they need to be picked, however, and I also know that George needs a break–just look at the state of his foliage!  So today I’ve harvested the remaining two lemons. Hopefully he’ll recover some strength and gift us with a few more.

In the meantime, I need to decide what to do with the ones I’ve got.  What’s that saying again?  When George gives you lemons….

I’m not sure when or where it very first began, but sometime in the past few years I noticed a wondrous thing of beauty starting to appear on the appetizer table at social gatherings.  It was warm and creamy and spicy, and it elicited publicly inappropriate yum-noises from yours truly.  I’ve heard it go by many names, but I’m sure you’ll recognize it when I say: buffalo chicken dip.

My favorite version of this dip came courtesy of my friend Courtney.  Every time she’d bring it to a gathering, I’d gasp in delight and proceed to hover over the dish the entire night.  She was even kind enough to send me the recipe.  I made it once, and, after what ensued, I realized that if I were to retain any shred of dignity I should probably never make it again.  (It had turned into a “one dish equals one serving” situation.)

But I couldn’t give up on my beloved buffalo dip entirely.  I determined to create a lighter, more figure-friendly version so I could indulge without the guilt.  I turned to tofu for its creamy texture and relatively neutral flavor, thinking I could simultaneously veganize the dish as well.  Several batches later, I gave up.  It just wasn’t right, wasn’t hitting all the spots.  There wasn’t a single yum-noise to be heard.

Fast forward a couple years to December 2011.  As we were preparing for the family holiday party on Chris’ side, I decided that I wanted to have buffalo dip.  Since I was firmly on the veggie train and tofu hadn’t worked previously, I figured I could just use vegan cream cheese and Vegenaise to get there instead.  Screw figure-friendly.

Except, my sister-in-law is mega allergic to soy.  Whenever I make something to bring to a family gathering, I try to make sure as many people can eat it as possible; food is always best when shared.  I just couldn’t bring a soy-laden dish to the party in good conscience.  And then I had an epiphany.  Why not use beans as the base—they get nice and creamy when blended—and add some raw cashews for extra richness?

And I’ll be damned if it didn’t come out every bit as delicious as the original.

It has that classic buffalo flavor that you can only get from Frank’s Red Hot sauce.  Fresh parsley and chives hint at the ranch dressing that would typically be stirred in.  Whole chickpeas go in for texture, replacing the usual chunks of chicken.  Cheddar-style Daiya shreds contribute a buttery cheesiness and a hint of guilt to what otherwise turned out to be the lightened up dip I was originally trying for.

Also, I’m just going to put this out there: this Buffalo Chickpea Dip sat right next to a non-veg version at the holiday party.  Not only was this one gone at the end of the night, but its neighbor had hardly been touched.  Indeed, many a yum-noise was made.

Buffalo Chickpea Dip

The cashews do not need to be soaked for this dip, but if you’re the soaking type or don’t feel terribly confident in your blender/food processor’s capabilities, feel free to soak them overnight.  Also, I have found that this dip tastes its very best when made at least a few hours ahead to allow all the flavors time to meld together; cover with plastic wrap, refrigerate, and bake off just before serving.

1 15-oz can white beans, drained and rinsed
1 cup raw cashews
¾ cup original Frank’s Red Hot sauce
1/2 cup unflavored, unsweetened non-dairy milk
2 teaspoons lemon juice (about ½ lemon)
1 rounded tablespoon nutritional yeast (optional)
½ teaspoon onion powder
½ teaspoon garlic powder
Ground black pepper
Kosher salt
1 teaspoon fresh, finely-chopped parsley
1 teaspoon fresh chopped chives
1 15-oz can chickpeas, drained and rinsed
1 cup Daiya cheddar-style cheese, divided

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

Add the beans and cashews to the bowl of a food processor.  Pulse several times to break them up a bit.  Add the hot sauce, non-dairy milk, lemon juice, nutritional yeast, onion powder, garlic powder, and a pinch of black pepper.  Process until the mixture is entirely smooth (this will take several minutes), stopping to scrape down the bowl as necessary.  Adjust salt to taste.

Scrape the bean mixture into a bowl and stir in the parsley and chives to evenly distribute.  Stir in the chickpeas and 3/4 cup of the Daiya.  Transfer the dip to a 9×9-inch square baking dish and sprinkle the remaining 1/4 cup of Daiya on top. (Note: Dip can be made up to this point a day or two ahead. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate until ready to heat and serve.)  Cover baking dish tightly with foil and bake for 30 to 35 minutes, until warmed through.  Serve with tortilla chips or veggies for dipping.

Everyone has a chili recipe, a comforting, go-to, maybe even committed to memory pot of warm, hearty goodness that emerges when the weather goes cold.  A glimpse into one person’s bowl usually conveys an opinion on beans.  A spoonful can tell you whether they have a taste for heat.  Is it thick enough to stand on a plate or does it lend itself to a bowl and a spoon?  You know yours.

This one is mine.

There’s nothing fancy about my chili.  I don’t break out the chipotles or sneak in a square of bitter chocolate for intrigue.  It’s straightforward—tomatoes, beans, a bottle of beer for good measure.  Spiced but not too spicy.  Its main ingredients come from a can.

But despite its seemingly average composition, it is an excellent chili.  The flavor is balanced and those three beans–black, kidney, pinto–make it substantial and deeply satisfying.

As further evidence in its favor, I can offer the fact that the recipe yields enough for us to have dinner for three nights in a row (it could be four if we didn’t always fill our bowls to the brim), and yet I have made it at least once a month since September, always to Chris’ excitement.  Shouldn’t we have tired of it by now?

Although, one of the better attributes of this chili really is its ability to feed us for a few days.  It’s nice to take the pressure off and helpful to have something at the ready when you have a busy week ahead.  For instance, I cooked up a batch before we left for the holidays and, while we were thick in the chaos of packing and gift-wrapping, all I had to do was set the pot back on the stove for a few minutes and we had dinner.  We were able to keep the kitchen clean and still have a healthy, inexpensive, home-cooked meal each night.

And if you have more mouths to feed or want this to stretch even further, it sits beautifully atop of a scoop of brown rice.

Easy, comforting, cost-effective, healthy, and delicious?  I’m not sure what more you could ask from a recipe.  (Though if you add a good splash of hot sauce, it’s liable to clear out your sinuses too.)

3-Bean Chili
Serves 6-8

The difference between this chili being gluten-free or not lies in the choice of beer.  If you’re not gluten-free, simply select your favorite brew.  If GF is a necessity, make sure to choose a bottle labeled as such.  Also, since this recipe is one that I use to make my life easier, I measure the spices by pouring a roughly tablespoon-sized mound into the palm of my hand.  You can certainly use spoons, but I wanted to share in case you too like a more hands-on approach.

2 tablespoons EVOO
1 large onion, chopped
Kosher salt
4 cloves garlic, chopped
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 12-oz bottle beer (I like Bard’s Tale)
2 28-oz cans whole, peeled tomatoes
4 tablespoons chili powder
2 tablespoons ground cumin
1 tablespoon dried oregano
1 15-oz can red kidney beans
1 15-oz can pinto beans
1 15-oz can black beans

Heat the olive oil in a large pot over medium high heat.  Add the onions, sprinkle with a pinch of salt, and saute until tender and golden brown.  Add the garlic and cook for about a minute, until fragrant.  Stir in the tomato paste.  Once the tomato paste has melted into the garlic and onions, pour in the bottle of beer and scrape up any browned bits from the bottom of the pot.  Let the beer simmer and reduce by half (feel free to turn up the heat a bit to push this along).

Turn the heat down to medium-low.  Add the tomatoes by hand, breaking them up coarsely and discarding any skins and hard stem ends.  Pour in their juices.  Add the chili powder, cumin, and oregano and stir to incorporate.  Lightly drain the beans–about a one-second pour over the sink using the lid of the can to hold the beans back is good–and add them to the pot.

Bring the chili to a simmer and cook everything together for at least 15 minutes; it will hold its own over low heat, stirred occasionally, for much longer if needed though.  Can be made in advance (one of those things that is even better the next day) and will keep refrigerated for about a week.

I was always sort of intrigued by those sausage-like tubes of prepared polenta.  I walked past them in the grocery store countless times, picking one up, turning it over in my hands, sort of wanting to take it home but never quite sure what I’d do with it.  I got super nerdy excited the first time I saw that they make one studded with quinoa, but then I realized I had even less of an idea of what I’d to with that.  It was one of those weird things that I couldn’t bring myself to purchase but also couldn’t seem to ignore.

So one day I said what the hell and I tossed one in my basket.

It must’ve been the universe working in my favor because, a couple days later when I needed something to add a little visual interest to my roasted garlic tomato soup, I finally thought up a tasty and simple way to utilize the object of my longing.  Cut into cubes and crisped up in a little oil, prepared polenta makes for mighty tasty croutons.  The outside develops a light crunch and the inside goes all soft and creamy….

Which made me think, strangely, of mozzarella sticks.  So I decided to cut a few sticks out of the polenta and fry those up as well.  The result was something with a similar vibe to the cheese-filled snack, only a whole lot lighter.  Served hot and dipped in a little marinara (or even ketchup), these guys are a fun and surprising appetizer.

As for the croutons, you could drop a few into soup, like I did, or sprinkle them over the top of a salad.  If you don’t snack them all away first.

Polenta Croutons (or Sticks)

1 18-oz sleeve prepared polenta
Grapeseed oil
Kosher salt
Dried herbs or spices (optional)

For Croutons: Trim the rounded ends off the polenta.  Slice crosswise into 3/4″ rounds.  Place each round cut-side-down and trim off the rounded edges so that the piece of polenta is square.  Slice into thirds.  Cut the slices across into thirds again, creating nine small cubes.

For Sticks: Trim the rounded ends off the polenta.  Slice the cylinder in half crosswise, making two shorter cylinders.  Carefully trim the rounded edges off each cylinder so that there are four flat sides.  Cut the polenta lengthwise into three slabs.  Slice each slab lengthwise into thirds to create sticks.

Heat a small amount of oil in a skillet, enough to lightly coat the bottom, over medium-high heat.  Add the cut polenta to the oil.  It will splatter considerably, so cover immediately with a splatter guard or tent with foil.  Once browned on the first side, use a thin spatula to turn and continue to fry until all sides are browned and crisp.  Use care when turing because the polenta becomes soft when hot.

Transfer crisped polenta pieces to a paper towel lined plate to drain.  While hot, sprinkle with kosher salt and, if using, dried herbs or spices of choice.  Serve promptly.

I am always writing new recipes, so I don’t often get around to making dishes from other blogs.  It’s a pretty special thing when I find a recipe elsewhere that I can’t resist recreating in our kitchen.  Below are links to a few of those such recipes.  I thought you might like to have them too.

Orange Pan-Glazed Tempeh – Irrationally tasty.  If you’ve had a bad experience with, are new to or on the fence about tempeh, give this one a try stat.

Eggless Egg in a Basket - This is one of the cutest, most clever things I’ve ever seen.  Also, I am smitten with the photos on this blog.

Caramelized Cauliflower Soup – Healthy but filling and deeply flavorful–almost tastes like it’s full of cream, but it’s not.

Mark Bittman’s Autumn Millet Bake – So it’s not “autumn” anymore.  These flavors still jive with the chilly season.  Not to mention, it’s super easy.

Chewy Almond Macaroons – Insanely sweet, but a little piece of heaven if you enjoy that intense almond/marzipan-like flavor.

I’ve been avoiding speaking with specificity here about the changes that I’ve made in my life over the past few months.  I needed time to understand them better for myself first, and, if I’m totally honest, part of me has been nervous about how some of my choices will impact things in this space.  My food has changed.  It’s still delicious, and in a lot of ways better really, but it has definitely changed along with me.

It was at the end of September when I finally decided I’d had enough of feeling awful.  I was tired all the time, I felt uncomfortable in my skin, and, more than feeling heavy, I felt swollen.  Inflamed.  My fingers were like sausages and my joints resisted when I bent them.  It was impossible to take my rings off to do the dishes without first sticking my hand in the freezer to reduce the swelling, and even then it was difficult to force them over my knuckles.

Something told me it was more than just the extra weight.  Something in my body felt wrong.

About a year ago, while Chris and I were on our honeymoon, I started experiencing intense aching in my feet and shoulders.  I thought it was maybe the hotel bed, or all the walking, or that brutally bumpy mountain jeep tour.  By the time the holidays rolled around, though, the pain had moved up into my neck and down into my wrists and hands.  I hardly slept at night because every position hurt and I was only able to lie still until I could no longer bear it.  By January, my feet would ache more and more intensely as the day went on, to the point where I was hobbling as the sun went down.  The evenings also came with another scary impairment: my hands stopped working.  They grew too weak to hold anything and I began to have panicked thoughts: What if I can never use a knife again?  Or write?  Or hold my future children?

Realizing that these were more than run-of-the-mill aches and pains, I paid a visit to my doctor.  He wrote me a prescription for prednisone, which made me feel not only better but slightly superhuman, and ran some bloodwork.  The results came back and said maybe arthritis?

(One thing we did find was that it wasn’t lupus.  It’s never lupus.)

So, I saw a rheumatologist, who didn’t seem convinced that it was arthritis but put me on a heavy cocktail of arthritis meds anyway.  I began to feel even more tired than I already was, like I was continually parched despite guzzling tons of water, and I started having strange heart palpitations.  At a follow up visit with the doc, he told me it was all in my head.  Upon reading the pamphlet full of fine print that the pharmacy is kind enough to provide along with all the pills, I learned that those were actually side effects of my medicinal medley.  I made the executive decision to stop taking the meds and stop seeing the rheumatologist.

Luckily, in the days after I stopped the medication, the pain stayed away.  It was a bizarre couple of months and I came out on the other side hoping it would prove to be an isolated episode in the grand scheme of my life.

All that to say that, when the stiffness started setting in this fall and I started feeling inflamed, I knew changes needed to be made.  I didn’t want to feel like that ever again.

And then something clicked for me.

Preparing a delicious plant-based Christmas dinner. Photo courtesy of my lovely Aunt Cindy.

You know what was different during the period of time that Chris and I were on our honeymoon and also while we were in the Midwest for the holidays that year?  I was eating a ton of meat and animal products.

I know that to some of you that may sound like a leap, but the realization really connected for me. During the months after my “arthritic” episode, I continued to eat more meat and especially dairy than I had in the year or so prior, and I felt fat and lethargic and swollen.  It made me think back to a time when I remembered feeling really great and energized and healthy.

The month of January, 2010.  When I was eating vegan.

I mentioned this plant-based stint in a post I wrote later that year about my struggles with eating meat.  Reading the post now, it sounds sort of like I knew what I was saying, like I had a coherent point to make.  That is totally surreal to me today, because when I was writing it I felt so scattered and conflicted that I was a tiny bit disgusted with myself after I hit publish.  I was saying that eating meat was fine, and I argued several points in its favor, but deep inside I still didn’t really know why (or even if) it was okay for me.  I didn’t know how I’d made the leap from lovingly raising a chick back in high school to feeling comfortable cooking and ingesting one.  I couldn’t reconcile the fact that I’d just said that eating vegan had made me feel amazing and glowing and had improved my cooking, and yet here I was making a case for why I was moving away from it.

You know how sometimes you have an argument with someone and there are things that pop into your mind and bother you about what you said or didn’t say after the fact, sometimes sticking with you years later?  That’s how I’ve felt about that post.  Something about it has never sat right with me and always made me feel frustrated.

Which of course makes sense now.

So I decided that for the month of October I would eat a plant-based diet to jumpstart my wellness and cleanse my system.  Just as before, I started to feel fantastic.  The inflammation went down (it was like someone let the air out of a balloon) and I felt clear and had a ton of energy.  As the days passed, I began to struggle again with, if I feel so amazing eating this way, why am I not doing this all the time? 

There are a few reasons, I think.  One is that I already have a pretty major dietary restriction, one that trips up a lot of people and that I know can make me a challenging dinner guest.  I don’t have any say in the gluten-free thing.  It is what it is.  Eating vegan on top of that, however, is absolutely a choice.  It has seemed selfish in my mind to add another significant dietary restriction, and one that ultimately eliminates every key element of most American diets.  What do you mean no bread, meat, eggs, or dairy?!

I think the biggest issues for me, though, have been based in fear and uncertainty:  How will my steak and cheese curd loving family react?  Should I call myself vegan?  Will other vegans judge me if I’m not vegan enough?  Will my omnivorous friends be understanding or think I’m crazy?  Can I really commit to never eating cheese again…ever?

When I step out of my head, though, all of those concerns seem silly.  The most important thing is how I feel.  The longer I eat this way, the more it makes sense to me.  I feel inspired by the fact that my diet has a lower impact on the environment and, for all the stress over local/organic/etc today, I feel lighter now that I don’t also have to wonder to what degree another living being suffered for my meal.  Every time I prepare a colorful, nutrient-dense, plant-based dish, I feel uplifted knowing that my body will feel energized and nourished after I’ve eaten it.  By contrast, the handful of times that I’ve eaten animal products over the past few months have left me feeling weighed down and swollen (a bit of research and the documentary Forks Over Knives confirmed my suspicions about animal products and inflammation). I’ve now lost over twenty pounds without depriving myself, and I continued to lose weight over the holidays while straight-up indulging.  My skin is clear, my mind is focused, and my hair, nails, and eyelashes(!) are growing like crazy.  I’ve never felt better in my life.

So now you know a little more about what I’ve been doing for my health and why the recipes here may start to look different.  Rest assured that they’ll still be every bit as delicious—just a whole lot healthier and made with even more heart.

A mightily belated Happy Thanksgiving!  And Happy Holidays!  Happy New Year!

I’ve been on what I began referring to as a “holiday hiatus.”  It was completely unplanned, unintentional, but somewhere around Thanksgiving I just stopped checking Twitter.  Before I knew it a week had gone by, and then two.  It felt so good to take a break from all the noise that I just kept going.  I even stopped blogging.

My focus has been elsewhere for the past month or so.  I’ve been thinking about and acting a lot on my health and my self (the spacing there is intentional).  Always a proponent of unapologetically owning who you are and what you believe, I’ve been working on allowing myself certain things that seemed selfish in my brain but, it turns out, make me a better person in real life.

This time has been important and I’ve learned and realized a lot that I may have missed had I spent it plugged-in.  Plus, it’s been really nice not to think in witty, 140-character blurbs (those of you who tweet know what I’m talking about).  I do plan to significantly limit my social media time going forward, but I’m ready to be back here.

We have a lot of catching up to do.

I hope you all had a wonderful holiday season.  I hope it was filled with great food, wonderful people, and lots of love.  I’d love to hear about any highlights and any resolutions/intentions/plans you have for the coming year.  2012 is already looking pretty darn great from over here.

If I’m going to do a write up on a restaurant, I’ll often head there with those very intentions, camera in hand, so that I can return and give you all a nice, detailed, photo-filled report.  I’m going to bypass all of that this time–not because this restaurant does not deserve the full shebang, but because I was treated with such consideration on our last visit that I’m still feeling grateful two weeks later and don’t want to wait any longer to tell you about it.

One of the things Chris and I love most about our neighborhood is the abundance of small, independently owned restaurants and shops (I still avoid making eye contact with the Dunkin Donuts/Baskin Robbins combo that unfortunately popped up here a couple months ago).  Testaccio is one of these fantastic little spots.  It’s a classy-casual restaurant that offers traditional Italian dishes and great wine.  It is always one of our first suggestions when friends and family visit and we have never left disappointed.

In addition to being close to home, what makes Testaccio particularly wonderful for us is that they offer gluten-free pasta.  They don’t advertise it on their menu or their website, but they do keep it on hand.  And they’re thoughtful about making and serving things to their gluten-free customers.

When we went for dinner a couple weeks ago I ordered a pasta dish that I’d never had before.  The majority of their pasta dishes are fine once you sub in the GF pasta, but just as the chef was about to add the sauce to my gluten-free pasta that night, he remembered that that particular sauce was made using a demi glace that contained flour.  The waitress was extremely apologetic and asked what I would like instead.  I wondered if another item that I recalled seeing on the menu would be okay and, after consulting with the chef, she said that–just to streamline things and be totally safe–he was going to go ahead and whip up a sauce especially for me.

Due to all the confusion it took a little longer than usual for our meal to come out, but when it did it tasted better than ever.  It could have been the fresh-from-scratch sauce, but I have a feeling it had more to do with the fact that, even though I made their night a bit more complicated, the chef and the waitress were nothing but kind and accommodating to us.  This is why we love Testaccio.

Yes, the food is quite good, the atmosphere is great, and we don’t have to hop on the subway in order to get home, but we wouldn’t continue to go back if we weren’t also treated well.  The service, while not so doting under typical circumstances, is always pleasant and respectful.

I may have written about Testaccio eventually…though maybe not.  It’s our own little neighborhood gem and we feel sort of special that, despite the lack of signage, we know about their stash of gluten-free pasta.  After that experience, however, I felt like they deserved whatever kind of endorsement I could provide and that you deserved to add another quality restaurant that can feed you well to your list–and I mean that whether you’re gluten-free or not.

Testaccio Ristorante
47-30 Vernon Boulevard
Long Island City, NY
(718) 937-2900 

Note: Since it’s not something that they advertise/specialize in, if you have your heart set on ordering GF pasta, call ahead just to make sure they have it around.

And here it is folks.  The sunshine and the roses.

I woke on Saturday morning to find that I had officially lost ten pounds since beginning my weight loss journey several weeks ago.  It felt good.  But even more than that, I felt good.  I felt good enough to pop out of bed and take Nilla for a brisk walk with Chris before even thinking about doing anything else at all.

This may seem simple but it is not how my days typically begin.  Mornings have been difficult, almost painfully so.  Each day, I blink my eyes open, drift back off for another half an hour, and repeat several times before finally lumbering out of bed, feeling achingly far from rested.  I throw down a puppy pad for Nil, put on a pot of coffee, and sink into my day.  Only during the past week has this started to change.

After our walk, a healthful breakfast, and a tiny bit of TV, Chris and I got ready and went out to lunch at Café Blossom (the food was good, the service not so much).  Feeling energized after eating, we spent the afternoon meandering our way down through Central Park.

We breathed in the cool air, smelled the leaves, squinted happily into the sun.  I stopped to take photos occasionally.  At one point, I snapped a couple shots of Chris and he reached for the camera so he could take a couple of me.  I taught him how to tell when the lens was focused (my 50mm is manual) and let him go.  When we reviewed the shots and he saw that, after taking a step to the left, the photos were suddenly over-exposed, I explained aperture and shutter speed, touched on ISO, and showed him how to keep an eye on the in-camera light meter.

I felt proud that I was able to relate it with clarity, moved that he was interested.

We stopped for a bit to admire a bride and groom having their photos taken.  Then, not twenty minutes later, began to lose count of how many flashes of white we saw through the trees.  Borrowing loosely from Billy Idol, it was indeed a nice day for a wedding.

After emerging from the park, we took a leisurely trip to Whole Foods, scanning every aisle for needs and wants.  We came home.  I made dinner.  We took Nilla for another walk.  We sat quietly and read.

This is the kind of day I have been dreaming about for so long.  We have them occasionally, but the “going out” portion of it usually ends with both of us exhausted—happy, but still exhausted.  It makes things difficult when you’re fighting fatigue.  Moreover, it makes it easier to just stay inside.

When Chris and I sit down and talk about what we want to improve on and what will make us happier in our lives, this sort of day is what we often come back to.  We want to take Nilla for more walks, eat at places we generally consider “out of the way”, explore the parts of our city that we rarely see.  We want to experience and share more.  During these talks we set goals and make plans, but the resolve always dissipates once we get a day or two away from the motivated conversation.

I used to imagine we’d only consistently have days like Saturday when (if) we move out of the city.  Only then will our lives change; only then will things feel easy and slow and happy.  Surely it’s the city that has held us back.  Remembering those thoughts in the context of now, I was reminded of something I read by either Thoreau or Emerson over a decade ago.  I’m not certain that this is exactly what I was looking for, but this excerpt from Emerson’s Self-Reliance seems about right:

“Traveling is a fool’s paradise. Our first journeys discover to us the indifference of places. At home I dream that at Naples, at Rome, I can be intoxicated with beauty, and lose my sadness. I pack my trunk, embrace my friends, embark on the sea, and at last wake up in Naples, and there beside me is the stern fact, the sad self, unrelenting, identical, that I fled from. I seek the Vatican, and the palaces. I affect to be intoxicated with sights and suggestions, but I am not intoxicated. My giant goes with me wherever I go.”

You can change where you are, but who you are comes along too.  Uprooting oneself can be a bit like geographic plastic surgery, a surface application in an attempt to adjust something askew on the inside.  Of course, not all cosmetic alterations or physical relocations are done for those purposes.  It’s when the sentence ends with “…and then I’ll finally be happy,” that you’re likely to end up right back where you started, only with a different face or a new address.

It turns out we’ve just been too tired to live the life we’ve been dreaming.  Not because of too much work or a lack of sleep, but because we haven’t been taking the best care of ourselves.  This, I’m realizing with more force and significance than I imagined, is one of the most important results of making oneself healthier: the increase of energy.  A beautiful consequence of eating better and treating yourself well is that you live more fully.

Once you take on your giant, even home can be intoxicating.

The ten pounds was nice, but days like Saturday are the blood and breath I need to keep me on this path—days like Saturday and the promise of more to come.

As a food blogger, I often feel pressured to write recipes that present with a certain “wow factor.” I think it’s in part about wanting to be innovative and interesting, and when I develop those kinds of recipes I definitely feel a sense of accomplishment, like I’m really stretching my creative muscles.  Plus, the pretty, complicated, or outside-the-box dishes are a fun addition to any food-centric narrative.

I think that it can be easy to get caught up in cooking to impress, though.  There’s nothing wrong with wanting to flaunt your culinary prowess, but it’s not exactly a sustainable daily practice.  It’s certainly not the norm around here, especially as of late.  Sometimes you just need to eat.  Still, when deciding what to make for dinner, there are many times when I find myself questioning whether what I’m about to cook will be blog-worthy.

Blog-worthy?  What does that even mean?  Should everything I put on this blog be stunning to look at or fun to say or full of ingredients that you may or may not be able to readily find?  If I’ve made it and Chris and I enjoy it—sometimes enough to have it several nights in a row and make it all over again—isn’t that good enough?

I’m thinking it is.

Also, in an effort to eat better, I’m baking much less these days.  I don’t feel too bad about this.  The past few months were filled to the brim with cakes and fritters and all sorts of goodies that will hopefully keep your ovens busy while the focus here shifts for a bit.  There will still be sweet treats, but you may notice a change in their tone.  Serious baking will be far more occasional.

So, I’m going to loosen up my silly concerns regarding what a blog-worthy recipe is.   It doesn’t have to be a fancy baked good or a decadent, multi-step main course. Weeknight dinners are now fair game.  I’m sure many of you will appreciate the more everyday attitude of these recipes.

Let’s start things off right with a roasted garlic tomato soup.

This soup was something I threw together one morning so that I could bring a jar of home-cooking to a friend and also save a small stash in the fridge for me and Chris.  The “hardest” part of the whole thing is roasting the head of garlic, which really isn’t so hard at all (see roasted garlic step-by-step).  The rest is a tiny bit of chopping and sautéing, opening a couple cans, and blending it all together.  Full of sweet, buttery, roasted garlic flavor, it only tastes like it’s complicated.

You can serve this healthy soup all on it’s own or as a side with dinner—it’s particularly nice with foods that lend themselves to dipping.  While it doesn’t need a garnish, a sprinkling of chopped herbs or dollop of something creamy never hurts.  You can find out how to make those cute little polenta croutons here.

Roasted Garlic Tomato Soup
Serves 6-8 

1 whole head garlic
EVOO
Kosher salt
1 medium onion, chopped
Ground black pepper
2 cloves garlic, chopped
2 tablespoons tomato paste
2 28-oz cans whole, peeled tomatoes
2 cups water
2 tablespoons honey or agave 

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.  Cut off the top third of the head of garlic and use the tip of your knife to pop the tops off any remaining cloves.  Set the head of garlic on a piece of foil, drizzle it with olive oil and sprinkle with a pinch of salt.  Gather the corners of the foil above the head of garlic and wrap it into a little package.  Roast in the oven for 45 minutes.  Remove and allow to cool enough to handle.

Place a medium sized pot over med-high heat.  Add about 2 tablespoons of olive oil and, once it is hot but not smoking, drop in the chopped onion.  Season with a good pinch of kosher salt and black pepper, and sauté until translucent and just beginning to turn golden brown.  Add the raw garlic sauté for one min.  Next, add the tomato paste and squeeze the head of roasted garlic upside down over the pot, squishing the softened cloves out of the papery skin.  Pour in the tomatoes, breaking them up coarsely with a spoon or potato masher.  Stir in the water, bring to a simmer, and cook until the tomatoes have softened, about 15-20 minutes.

Carefully transfer the soup to a food processor (alternatively, use a regular or immersion blender), working in batches if necessary, and puree for several minutes until smooth.  Return the soup to the pot and place over medium heat.  Stir in the honey and season to taste with salt & pepper.  Depending on how meaty your tomatoes were, you may want to pour in a bit more water to thin the soup to your liking.  Cook for an additional 10 minutes or so to allow the flavors to blend.