recipe review, thanksgiving side dish edition

i suppose that should read "thanksgiving side dishes edition," since i decided to try not one, but two recipes to add to the dinner that quasi-landlord ordered from whole paycheck...i mean whole foods. i was a bit amused by the fact that their dinner for 4 people included a boneless turkey breast, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, and cranberry sauce, but no vegetables. at first, i was just going to roast some broccoli, but i had a bit of sticker shock when i went to jewel on tuesday and there was no way i was going to pay damn near $3 a pound for regular broccoli - hence this green beans recipe.

green beans and cherry tomatoes - i used grape tomatoes instead of cherry b/c that's what was available during the aforementioned shopping trip to jewel. in what will come as a shock to absolutely no one who reads these reviews with any regularity, i used more garlic than what the recipe calls for (i think 5-6 cloves instead of 3?) b/c garlic. if i make this again, i'd probably let the green beans cook for a few minutes longer b/c they were still on the crisp end of the crisp-tender spectrum.

maple bacon mashed sweet potatoes - i really didn't plan on making sweet potatoes at first. see, what had happened was, i was flipping through my recipe folder looking for veggie side dish ideas, right? and then i found this one and put it aside, and i read it, and that's what had happened. i don't remember exactly when i discovered the joys of sweet potato fries dipped in maple syrup, but it's one of my favorite snack/side dish treats and this appeared to be based on the same premise, plus bacon. you might need to adjust the cooking time on your sweet potatoes, depending on their size - the ones i bought at jewel were so massive that they clocked in at about a pound each, so i only used two - but otherwise? nom. i'd probably add more maple syrup next time to make them a bit sweeter. i'm sure you could also add cinnamon if you wanted.

happy friday! :-)

gobble gobble!

i'm so full right now, you guys, and not just b/c i stuffed my face full of nomz earlier.

this time 2 years ago, i was staying with bff & her mom during my month-plus of couch-surfing and house/pet sitting. i can't remember if laz had already agreed to let me punch him in the face as a goodbye to 2011 at this point. maybe? i dunno. this time 2 years ago, i didn't really know where i was going to end up after january 1. the introductions that led to my north suburban sojourn for the first 9 months of 2012 didn't happen until december of 2011.

this time 2 years ago, i was stressed beyond belief b/c i had no job and no permanent residence. i still don't have a permanent residence (yet!), but i've come so far since then that i could shed happy tears. i'm writing this while on the couch at quasi-landlord's place. i am full of nomz, the majority of which were paid for by quasi-landlord as a treat for me & her downstairs tenant, who unfortunately is sick and therefore i had to eat by myself. i have a part-time job that does not completely suck, although it definitely drives me up the wall at times. i am as stable as i can hope to be in this moment right now. my circle of friends remains strong and powerful and amazing and i am so very thankful to have them.

are there things in my life that i wish were different or more resolved? absolutely. am i still occasionally stymied and frustrated that things aren't going quite as i like? hell yes.

i'm still thankful, though.

and now, i'm gonna go watch a charlie brown thanksgiving and allow myself to slowly get into the holiday spirit. here's hoping y'all are doing well. :-)

recipe review: spinach and feta risotto

this was another recipe that i wanted to try from the slow cooker cookbook i read earlier this month. i was looking forward to it, too, b/c, well, spinach and feta. i love spinach and feta. mmm...spinach and feta...

where was i? oh, right. this recipe, which i really wanted to love but i couldn't. i'll explain why after i finish typing said recipe out for y'all b/c there's no link available:

Spinach and Feta Risotto
Serves 2 as a main dish 

1/4 cup olive oil
1 1/4 cups Arborio rice
2 cups sliced fresh button mushrooms
1 teaspoon dried minced onion
1 teaspoon dried dill
3 3/4 cups vegetable broth
1/4 cup dry white wine
7 ounces feta cheese, crumbled
10 ounces fresh baby spinach 

Use a 4-quart slow cooker. Add the oil to the insert, and swirl the rice in it to fully coat with the oil. Add the mushrooms, dried onion, dill, and pepper. Stir in the broth and wine. Cover, and cook on high for 3 hours. Stir well, then crumble in the cheese, and add the spinach. You may need to shove the spinach in to get it all to fit. Recover, and cook on high for 20 minutes, or until the spinach has wilted. Stir well and serve.

i used onion powder instead of dried minced onion b/c that's what was on hand. a 9oz bag of "regular" spinach was cheaper than 2 6oz bags of baby spinach, so that's what i bought. based on last week's risotto experiment, i decided to set the timer for 2 1/2 hours and adjust if needed. the rice was pretty tender after 2 1/2 hours, so in went the cheese and the spinach for another 20 minutes as directed.

y'all. i have made some pretty craptastic-looking meals that wound up being super-delicious. this? no. probably will not make again. it looked revolting and although the 1st bite showed promise, by the time i was finished eating a bowl for dinner last night, i knew this was not the risotto for me. i tried again tonight, thinking that maybe the flavors would have melded/hung out a bit more/improved overnight, but i was wrong and dumped it all out.

if you decide to make this, i'd cut back on the mushrooms (1 cup should be plenty - 2 cups seemed like overkill), and maybe adjust the wine/vegetable broth ratios to give it more flavor? i don't know. this was a culinary experiment gone wrong and i'm not inclined to give it another go. that bacon risotto, though? i'd totally make that again.

recipe review: bacon risotto

quasi-landlord is out of town for a week, and so are her dogs, so i suppose you could say that i'm on a staycation of sorts for a week. the house being relatively empty means that i can cook w/o said dogs barking up a storm. it also means i can cook w/o having to worry about quasi-landlord's allergies.

i decided earlier this week that i would attempt 2 different batches of risotto during the coming week. i read a cookbook a couple of weeks that said you could make risotto in a slow cooker, which, when i think about it, makes sense and i feel a bit dense for not thinking of it sooner. i mean, i love risotto, but i don't have the patience/attention span to make it at home.

first up? bacon risotto. i don't really need to explain why, do i? i mean, c'mon. bacon risotto. 2 of my favorite foods in one dish? yes, please. sign me the entire hell up.

unfortunately, i don't have a link (i may or may not have photocopied this recipe from the aforementioned cookbook), but since it's relatively short, i will type it out for you here:

Bacon Risotto (serves 4) 

6 slices thick-cut bacon, diced
1 white onion, diced
2 garlic cloves, chopped
1 1/2 cups Arborio rice, rinsed
4 cups chicken broth
1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese (to add at the very end) 

Use a 4-quart slow cooker. In a large skillet over medium heat, add the bacon, onion, and garlic and cook, stirring until the bacon is crisp and the onion and garlic are translucent. Drain off most of the accumulated grease (retaining about 1 tablespoon) and pour the mixture into the insert. Add the rice, and swirl it around until the rice is nicely coated in oil. Pour in the broth. Cover, and cook on high for 2 to 4 hours, or until the rice is tender (check after 2 hours; it usually takes 2 hours, 45 minutes in my machine). Stir well, and add the cheese. Turn off the cooker, and let the risotto sit with the lid off for 10 minutes before serving.

i used 3 garlic cloves instead of 2 b/c regular readers of these reviews know that i love me some garlic. i used low-sodium chicken broth (and even got the organic low-sodium kind b/c it was on sale at jewel - win!), and went with a few handfuls of shredded parmesan cheese instead of grated b/c that's what was in the fridge. oh, and i added some black pepper before i added the broth - maybe a 1/2 teaspoon or so? i eyeballed it and therefore can't give you an exact measurement.

the slow cooker that quasi-landlord has is probably a 6-quart model, if not an 8-quart one, so i set the timer for 2 hours on high and figured that the rice would be tender by then. i was right. i added the cheese and then left the slow cooker on the "warm" setting until i was ready for dinner. i had some leftover broccoli from the other night, so i warmed that up and added it to my dinner bowl. nom. i definitely recommend some sort of vegetable on the side or mixed in to cut through the cheesetastic goodness.

if i make it again, i might cut back to an hour and 30 minutes of cooking time. the risotto was tender almost to the point of being gummy, which i'm ok with, but it could have been better. and yeah, i'd probably add more garlic. i was impatient and didn't let the bacon get fully crisp b/c the onions and garlic were in that sweet spot between perfectly browned and oh shit everything is burning. maybe i'd cook the bacon first and then let that drain while cooking the onion & garlic in the bacon fat. oh, and i didn't drain anything b/c there was barely a tablespoon of grease by the time i deemed it ready to go in the slow cooker.

the same cookbook has a recipe for spinach and feta risotto, which i'm going to make before thanksgiving. mmm...spinach and feta...

stovetop and scandal

(spoiler alert: discussion of scenes from last night's "scandal." if you're a fan of the show and you haven't watched the episode yet, please govern yourself accordingly.)
(trigger warning: discussion of rape/sexual violence)

but first, let's talk about this stovetop commercial i saw last night while watching "scandal."




as soon as the ad finished airing, i tweeted something along the lines of "gee, cultural differences much?" if stovetop = thanksgiving, then i've never had a proper thanksgiving, then. hell, i never even had stovetop until i was well into my 20s. my family played it pretty traditional (read: southern/soul food) when it comes to thanksgiving dinner. yeah, there was turkey, and veggies, and cranberry sauce (s/o to everyone else who grew up with that canned cranberry sauce that you'd slice based on the ridges the can left behind), and there was dressing.

dressing: cooked outside the bird. stuffing: cooked inside the bird. we always had dressing. not stuffing, and certainly not stuffing from a box.

this is not me disparaging stovetop, mind you. i was at a potluck brunch last weekend and someone made a casserole that used stovetop and shredded potatoes and meat and cheese and other so-bad-for-you-it's-good ingredients, and it was delicious. my point is that stovetop, or whoever's in charge of their ad campaign, seems to be a bit tone-deaf on this one. there are plenty of folks who had different thanksgiving traditions - and plenty of folks who don't have thanksgiving traditions at all - and to imply that their holiday celebration or lack thereof hinges on the presence of stovetop just seems wrong, somehow.

and speaking of wrongness (remember those spoiler and trigger warnings i opened this post with? they're coming into play now) - let's talk about last night's episode of "scandal." specifically, let's talk about the scene where mellie gets raped by her father-in-law. let's talk about the fact that there was no warning at the beginning of the episode telling viewers that some of the imagery might be more graphic and upsetting than usual. let's talk about the fact that a fair number of sexual assault/abuse survivors, myself included, watch and enjoy "scandal" on a weekly basis. remember when i was all excited about kerry washington tweeted me? i wear my gladiator badge proudly, as anyone who's subjected to my twitter stream on thursday nights can attest.

but this? this scene was too much, and i know i'm not alone on this b/c my twitter feed is still talking about it 24 hours later. i'm not even going to get into the "hey, let's explain this character's backstory by having them suffer some serious trauma" storytelling trope, b/c there are others who can, have, and will explore that way better than i'm able to.

do networks still have standards and practices departments? are primetime shows exempt from any sort of parental advisory or other warning labels? i don't claim to know what would have been an appropriate warning for this episode, but i really feel like we needed one. we needed to be prepared. we needed to know that this scene might leave us curled up in the fetal position, and that it might bring back memories that we've worked hard to address and deal with in such a way that we can go about our daily lives w/o erupting into all of the feelings, and that maybe, just maybe, one of our favorite shows wouldn't sucker-punch us in this way. we watch "scandal." we're used to shonda and her fellow writers embracing all kinds of crazy. it's part of the show's appeal.

being subjected to a depiction of rape is not appealing. reading comments after the show about how mellie set herself up to be raped and other victim-blaming bullshit is not appealing. finding yourself visibly shaking and drinking all of the wine in an attempt to get yourself under control after a rape scene is not appealing. feeling like shonda and the writers had no concern for your emotional well-being and just sprung the scene on you with no warning like "hahaha let's make our predominately female audience squirm with all of the discomfort" is not appealing.

what's appealing is trying to create a space for yourself where you know you won't be mistreated or disrespected, where your friends and family care about you and support you, where you can, even if it's for the briefest of seconds, not think about the rape/sexual assault/sexual abuse/violence you endured. that's appealing. you watch a frothy drama and you connect with some of the characters and you join a whole family of fellow fans and that's appealing. you watch and you talk and you tweet and you read fan sites and that appeals to you. you settle in on thursday nights (or friday mornings, or whenever you're able) and you watch and you are entertained and then a character gets raped and you did not predict that in all of your discussions about the various plot twists and no one warned you and you are left sitting on the couch practically in tears b/c the one thing you didn't want to think about for at least that hour has now returned to the front of your mind and that is not appealing. at all.

i don't expect a resolution. i don't even expect an apology. what i do want, not only for myself but for all of us survivors and allies who had our hearts broken all over again by this scene, is to regain our ability to create and maintain safe spaces for ourselves. to be surrounded by people who care about and support us. to continue giving voice to the fact that we are here and we'll be damned if we're gonna give up on ourselves. to keep believing and knowing that we are worth every moment of fighting that we've done and will do for ourselves. that's appealing.

week in review of sorts

monday: had an interview. after i was done, i walked out with a gut feeling that something was amiss, even though i still can't pinpoint how/why. one thing that set me off, though, was the receptionist at the organization. i had to spell my first name at least 5 times before she got it right on my name tag, which i was willing to forgive b/c let's face it, my name isn't super-common or easy. but then she said that my mother shouldn't have named me "eulalia," and my side-eye kinda went out the window at that point.

oh, and the bears beat green bay and there was much rejoicing.

wednesday: quasi-landlord had an extra ticket, so off we went to see "cyrano de bergerac" at the chicago shakespeare theatre. it was hilarious. i'd tell y'all to go see it, but the play closed today. i was amazed at how much of the plot i remembered from seeing that steve martin movie a bazillion years ago.

thursday: butter cookies from al's deli (they close at 3:30pm, fyi) + isabel wilkerson lecture = happy me. it was weird being back in harris hall for the first time since graduation. crc'ers of a certain age will appreciate the fact that i saw ava greenwell. fun fact i learned from isabel wilkerson's lecture - jesse owens' name is really james cleveland owens. when his family moved north, his new teacher asked his name. he said "j.c.," b/c that was what his family called him. his teacher heard "jesse" and that's what stuck.

sunday: last sunday at work! last bears game of the season that i have to miss b/c of work! exclamation points! woo!