Fighting and Feasting

Here is a very interesting link to an article titled, "Fighting and Feasting: The Life of a Medieval King." The article focuses on the research of King Richard III's tooth and bone chemistry and what that can tell us about his diet at different stages in his life.

Baking Frenzy

I've been in super baking mode this weekend. I get this way before it becomes full summer in Baltimore (i.e. 90-100+ temps). I live on the top floor of a rowhouse and although I have two window AC units, their cooling awesomeness does not extend to my kitchen. My summer baking plan is simple: bake a ton, early on, and freeze it. That way I can have homemade baked goods throughout the summer and not die of heat stroke. This weekend had perfect temps, so I had to take advantage of it.

Olives galore!

Yesterday, I made homemade pizza. Today I made two loaves of olive bread (one loaf with kalamata olives, the other with green olives) and three loaves of Afghan Rote (one loaf I'm going to take to work tomorrow). I slice each loaf in half and freeze them for the summer.

Olive breads cooling

My favorite olive bread recipe is actually from Cooking Light. It's a yeastless batter bread, which means there is no rise time. Just mix the ingredients and bake!

Afghan rote

Afghan rote is a lightly sweetened flat bread, with hints of rose water and cardamom, and has sesame and poppy seeds sprinkled on top. It's lovely as a snack or served alongside a hot beverage for dessert.

Of course, I also made dinner today (a warm lentil salad with walnuts and roasted red peppers), took a bus to Trader Joe's, and washed about 1,000 dishes, so needless to say, I'm beat.

But tomorrow, I'm making strawberry rhubarb crisp after work. Yum! (We picked up the rhubarb at the Waverly Farmer's Market.)

Tofu with Carrot Ginger Sauce

I have the internet at home! *and the crowd goes wild*

To celebrate, I am going to put up a recipe that I've been wanting to put up for a few months for Tofu with Carrot Ginger Sauce, which is quite tasty, easy, and looks all fancy pants.

Tofu with Carrot Ginger Sauce

Tofu with Carrot Ginger Sauce
2- 10 oz. packages of firm tofu, drained
1/2 cup orange juice
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1 tablespoon soy sauce
2 tablespoons finely chopped cilantro
2 teaspoons minced garlic
1 teaspoon grated ginger (or ginger paste)
2 tablespoons canola oil
1-2 lbs. of baby spinach

For the carrot ginger sauce:
10 oz. baby carrots
2 teaspoons grated ginger (or ginger paste)
2/3 cup orange juice
1/2 cup vegetable broth

Slice the tofu into several, almost 1/2-inch thick, slices (or cube it if you wish). In a flat glass or plastic container, arrange the tofu in a single layer. In a small bowl, whisk together the 1/2 cup of orange juice, brown sugar, soy sauce, cilantro, garlic, and 1 teaspoon of ginger. Pour the mixture over the tofu, cover, and refrigerate overnight, or at the very least, for several hours. (Because this step is pretty quick, sometimes I do this in the morning before work, then it has quite a few hours of marinating before I make dinner with it that same evening.)

In a medium saucepan, add of all of the sauce ingredients. Bring to a boil, reduce heat, and simmer until the carrots soften. Let cool slightly, then transfer the carrot mixture to a blender. Process until smooth.

Drain the tofu, reserving the marinade. Heat the oil in a skillet. Cook the tofu in batches. Cooking on each side, until golden. Remove the tofu from the skillet; set aside.

Using the same skillet used to cook the tofu, add the spinach with a tablespoon or so of water. Cook for 1-2 minutes until the spinach has wilted.

Reheat the marinade in a microwave-safe bowl in the microwave.

Top the wilted spinach with the carrot sauce, then the tofu. Drizzle with the warmed, reserved marinade. Serve alongside, or on top of, rice.

Edible Food Festival

If I had the interwebs at home, I would probably update this blog more! One day folks, one day...

What have I been up to since my last post in February? Mostly I've been working and adjusting to my new job, playing with my now 1 year old cats, and also playing in the snow that ceases to end (seriously, it snowed yesterday- albeit, it didn't stick to anything).

One of my bosses, in another department ( I work for two departments), accidentally sends color prints to my printer all the time (apparently she has to manually put in which printer she wants to send it to when color is detected- but she forgets). This usually results in me being startled because the printer directly behind me begins printing out of the blue. However, the random printouts turned out to be a blessing in disguise! One of the printouts was for a Johns Hopkins event (my employer)- the first ever Edible Book Festival hosted by the Sheridan Libraries!

The adorable flyer that popped magically out of my work printer

After staring at the flyer for several minutes then spending an hour afterward doing crazy deliberation in my head, I decided, why the heck not, and signed up for the cake contest! The main rules for the cake itself are simple: it has to be edible and it has to be inspired by a book.

My book of choice: A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

Specifically, I wanted to recreate the 1972 book cover by David Pelham. The colors really popped and the design is very stylized. I didn't want to choose a book that might be too obscure. (Random fact: did you know that the book was first published 52 years ago?)

1972 David Pelham book cover of A Clockwork Orange by
Anothony Burgess

I started out making two, 8-inch square, layers of a basic white cake with rose water. The filling was buttercream with a layer of thinly sliced strawberries. I wanted to use fondant for the cake design, because 1) I've never used fondant before and thought it would be fun (and it was- it's kind of like Play-Doh), 2) I thought it would be easier to make the design than to try to do so with frosting, and 3) I really wanted bold colors so that it would stand out and match the book cover. For fondant to adhere, it's best for there to be a thin layer of something sticky over the entire cake. It can be a thin layer of buttercream frosting or melted jam. I opted for a thin layer of melted strawberry jam.

My psychedelic Clockwork Orange cake

The event was a lot of fun and a ton of people came (I mean there were like 20 cakes to eat and for free at that). At the end of the festival, I left on a sugar high and with $50 worth of gift certificates in my pocket because I won "Best Dessert that could be mistaken for a book!"

Check out the Tumblr link earlier in this post for more pictures of the cake submissions (the Silence of the Lambs cake is AMAZING)!

Winter Trip to Amsterdam

Me eating a stroopwafel

At the end of January, Nick and I took a week-long trip to Amsterdam. He went for a philosophy conference. I went for the heck of it. Since he’s been abroad roughly 100 times these past few years (okay, I might be exaggerating a tad on the amount), I felt it was finally my time to go with him!



Belgium Waffles

I must admit that Amsterdam was never in my ‘Top 10’ of places I longed to visit. However, I can assure you that I am glad I went! We had a wonderful trip, filled with wandering the beautiful canals, eating local fare, visiting many fantastic museums, and even getting to see and explore several windmills just outside of town, and this is despite the weather being rainy and cold for the entire length of our trip.

Pannenkoeken with strawberry rhubarb compote & koffee verkeerd

Eating abroad can sometimes be tricky if you’re a vegetarian, but it wasn’t a problem in Amsterdam. You often run into a problem of wanting to eat local specialties that more often than not, tend to be meat based. Sliced raw herring (or raw herring in a sandwich) as well as various types of sausage are popular. Other dishes such as stamppot or hutspot (both are a similar dish of mashed potatoes with vegetables) may also contain sausage (especially rookworst- a smoked sausage). I had an awesome dinner for one (Nick was at his conference) at De Blauwe Hollander, near our hotel, that was a vegetarian stamppot with cheese croquettes and a side of pumpkin soup with a biscuit of cheese.

Most amazing hot chocolate EVER with whipped cream (slagroom)

We ate many a pancake (pannenkoeken) on our trip. Dutch pancakes are more like a large, crepe (thin, and about the diameter of a medium-sized pizza). You can get a number of sweet or savory fillings.

Pannenkoeken with mushrooms and Edam

Stroopwafels, folks, are where it’s at! They are a chewy, caramel-flavored syrup filled cookie. They are somehow very flat and weigh a TON. We brought back several packages of them. Sad will be the days when they are gone! You can purchase them everywhere in the city. You can also buy freshly made stroopwafels of various sizes at the Albert Culp Markt, a street market in the De Pijp neighborhood.

While we were perusing the wares at the market, we decided to eat lunch at Cafe Flinck, where we had delicious open-faced sandwiches and shared a plate of fries.

Open-faced sandwiches from Cafe Flinck with fries (patat)- look at all that cheese!

We also ate at Bird’s Snackbar, a Thai restaurant in Amsterdam’s Chinatown. The restaurant was maybe a tad too cozy (roughly the size of a large closet), but the food was remarkable. Indonesian food is also quite popular and we ate at a restaurant behind De Nieuwe Kerk, where we had some warm comfort food in the form of gado gado.

Fries (patat) with mayo (background) and curry fries (foreground)

What would a trip to the Netherlands be if I didn’t eat cheese like it was going out of style? The Dutch make some of my favorites cheeses (kaas) like Edam and Gouda. One night, we bought cheap wine and expensive truffle cheese and crackers and had a wonderful evening. Most of the cheese shops we went in had samples of most of the cheeses they had for sale.



Applegebak (deep dish apple pie)



Okay, so I know that my pictures are mostly of sweet foods, but what can I say- I like sugar! (But honestly, I just forgot to take pictures of our lunches and dinners.)

Souvenirs/Airplane snacks