Category Archives: Food

[111] Quick Whole Wheat and Molasses Bread

Cover of How to Cook Everything Vegetarian, by Mark Bittman

This recipe is the result of not having the ingredients on hand to make the bread Bittman suggests eating with baked beans, and having a lot of time on my hands while my friends hung shelving.

Not that it took a lot of time. In fact, I almost forgot I’d decided to make bread until near the end, and I still managed to whip it up and serve it. Under normal circumstances, this would make me feel like a dinner hero. Under the circumstances of beans simply not cooking, no matter how much I beg, it just made me feel like at least I had something else to feed the ravening hordes.

Not that Rob, Tony & Krysti are really much of A horde, much less “hordes”.… Continue reading →

[110] (Vegetarian) Baked Beans

Cover of How to Cook Everything Vegetarian, by Mark Bittman

More beans!

Okay, beans have entered our food life in a big way. Mostly because they’re fairly inexpensive and filling, but partially also because it’s supposed to be “the” way to have a substantial vegetarian meal.

Plus, Bill likes them. Especially if they’re black beans. I don’t know why black beans are his favorite, but they are. I suspect it has to do with a woman he dated previously, and her preferences. You’d have to ask him.

This was my second foray into baked beans, though it’s the initial recipe all of Bittman’s vegetarian baked beans derive from. I tell you this so you don’t get weirded out by the sense of deja vu you’re about to have. I did, in fact, basically copy what I wrote for the Maple-Baked Apple Butter Beans and adjust what needed to be adjusted.… Continue reading →

[109] Sherried Tomato Soup

Cover of The Pioneer Woman Cooks by Ree Drummond

I made this soup based entirely on the name and the photos in the cookbook. It’s right next to the cornbread recipe, which is my new always & forever cornbread recipe (unless I have to make some other recipe to advance the challenge, I suppose), and it taunts me every time I go to make cornbread.

That’s more often than you might think, actually. We’ve become a little obsessed with “her cornbread”:http://www.metacookbook.com/archives/123-67-Skillet-Cornbread.html because it’s delicious.

I have to admit, I rarely am motivated to try something just because it sounds or looks good. Obviously, that’s a pivotal part of the process, but it doesn’t usually start there. Usually, it starts because I have an ingredient I want to try or use up, or I have a method I want to learn more about, or I’m “desperately seeking a vegetarian meal”:http://metacookbook.com/archives/211-Whats-the-longest-youve-gone-without-eating-meat.html… Continue reading →

[108] Maple-Baked Apple Butter Baked Beans

Cover of How to Cook Everything Vegetarian, by Mark Bittman

If you want a truly authentic Tasha & Bill experience, you need to add some amount of chaos to the cooking of this recipe.

Start by not being really sure about this “bean soaking” thing, because neither of you has done much with dry beans before (a.k.a. only one of you has cooked with them, and they’re all documented on this blog, probably under the “how to cook anything” tag). Refer back to the page he tells you to refer to about soaking, and then be unsure how far into everything to go. Be pretty sure you don’t want “cooked” beans, but there’s actually no specific directions on soaking. Feel like a bit of an idiot. Say, “Well, he says you can also do this recipe with unsoaked beans, it’ll just take an hour longer” to each other, and decide to do that.… Continue reading →

[105] + [106] French Toast

How to Cook Everything, Revised Edition by Mark Bittman

Cover of How to Cook Everything Vegetarian, by Mark Bittman

French toast is my breakfast enemy.

I like to eat good french toast. Most people and places, myself included, do not make good french toast. I really do not like to eat bad french toast. Most people and places, myself included, not only do not make good french toast, they make bad french toast.

That’s right. There is no “meh” in french toast. There’s only “good” and “bad”. I suppose there can be “excellent” and “horrible” as well, but there’s no “meh”. It’s that simple.

This french toast, amazingly, was in the “good, but could be excellent” camp. I’m astounded. I never thought I could make french toast that was even in the “good” category, much less in the “could be excellent” on as well.

Why did I feel I couldn’t aspire to such heights?… Continue reading →