Not everyone plays nice

One of the reasons I have had a lot of trouble writing as I age is due to the fact that I don't understand people.  I just don't.  Logic doesn't seem to apply when I believe that it should.  How am I supposed to write anything that isn't in the first person if I can only, somewhat, understand myself?  What about all the other characters?  I haven't quite gotten to the point to where I can fake the chaos.  More importantly I seem to have lost a skill that I had, even if for a short time, in high school. Faking it.  Yep. I was a big fat faker when it came to confidence, performing and my opinion of myself.  I could use this skill right now, in so many ways.  However, as I so vividly recall... faking so much came at a very high price. Is it worth even tempting fate with the possibility of going through all of that again?  Up to this point the answer has always been 100% NO FREAKING WAY.  So while I come to terms with my humanity and dealing with other humans enjoy this hilarious meme.

Tribal dancing in the kitchen

Ok.. so here are the skates I got back in August.  Timely of me right?  I <3 them.  I may post a recent picture, as they are a bit war torn and broken in.

A lot of my joy that I find in the kitchen is through blasting music, singing loudly, dancing and creating edible art.  Recently I've been blasting Florence + the machine, Radiohead and Queens of the Stone Age.  Though many make the list.  It's liberating to have such a private moment in an area I always considered family space.  This is my office, at the moment, and where I feel most in my own element. Being away from home and being in another country makes it more difficult to eat the food I'm used to. So cooking became not just a necessity, but a way to time travel... or just travel. Yay, food therapy.  And maybe, someday, my office won't also have the laundry room in it.  That will be nice.
Baking is the best, for some reason it makes me feel closer to the women in my family... the ones around and the many who have moved on.  Note to self: purchase french cookie iron.  Ideally I would like to buy a lamb cake mold as well. There was a tradition in my family, sort of an inside joke, that you would get a lamb cake for your birthday.  I need to find out what the joke was exactly... I wrote a short story about it 5 or 6 years ago.  It was sort of terrible, but I should probably revisit that at some point.

The intricacies of social interaction and Crumbcake

It may seem like a good idea when you are new to a situation to give more experienced people the benefit of the doubt that they know what they are doing. Showing respect for others sounds like a good idea, though often can be seen as being passive or weak, particularly if showing dominance is key to success. Complications may follow when they either don't know what they are doing, or they attempt to use this power to their own benefit.  Making others feel small due to their lack of experience (or confidence) in a certain subject shows a weakness in character, and said person is best to be avoided. Often this person had confidence issues of their own. Keeping a clear distance for observation is recommended, only pursue friendship if above situations have been overcome or avoided. Watch Star Trek. Stir gently.  Repetition does not necessarily lead to success.

I have made this recipe more times than I can count.  It's turned out amazing every time. I usually use blackberry jam, but what ever you have in your fridge works just fine.  My major alterations to the recipe are using real milk and white vinegar.  Also, I don't sift things.

Swirl Crumbcake

3/4 cup soy milk (or any non-dairy milk)
1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
1/3 cup sugar
1/2 cup canola oil
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup raspberry jam

For the topping:
1 cup all purpose flour
1/3 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 cup canola oil

Preheat oven to 375 F. Lightly grease an 8×8  pan. Measure out the soy milk for the cake and add the teaspoon of apple cider vinegar; set aside to curdle. Then begin preparing the topping.
Make the topping:
In a small mixing bowl, mix together the flour, sugar, cinnamon and nutmeg. Drizzle in the canola oil by the tablespoonful (you can eyeball it, no reason to whip out a tablespoon.) Use your fingers to swish around the mixture until crumbs form. Alternate swishing and adding canola oil until all oil is used and large crumbs have formed. Some of the topping is still going to be sandy and that’s fine, just so long as you have mostly nice big crumbs. You can add another tablespoon of oil if needed.
Make the cake:
In a large mixing bowl, mix together curdled milk, sugar, canola oil and vanilla. Sift in the flour, baking powder and salt and mix until smooth.
Pour cake batter into prepared pan. Add spoonfuls of jam randomly on top of the batter and use a knife to swirl it in. Evenly sprinkle on the topping and pat it down just a bit. Bake for 35 to 40 minutes, or until a knife inserted through the center comes out clean.

 

 

black bean and quinoa while waiting for Muifa

The island of Okinawa has been anticipating typhoon muifa for a few days now.  It seems to get slower and slower.  As of this moment all non essential personnel are at home in anticipation of the storm. 
It looks very eerie outside.  Almost like the start of a severe thunderstorm.  Most people that are from the area where I grew up can tell you the sky often becomes a calm greyish green right before cloud rotation is in the area.  It looks very much like that outside right now.  But I'm a wuss and have no desire to go outside.  I learned a few years ago not to mess with nature.  If you ask for it, you will receive it.  I would never invite destruction.
I'm currently blasting music from the 90's and 2000's while drinking beer and cooking. to keep my mind off of this very slow moving storm.  I've been in the kitchen for about three hours playing around.  I made the cookies from the previous post again and i made another favorite of mine.  I usually make a half recipe because I'm the only one who eats it.  this is my version of the half recipe.

Black Bean and Quinoa

1/2 teaspoon olive oil

1/2 onion, chopped or whole onion. either way is great.

1-1/2 cloves garlic, peeled and chopped

1/4 cup and 2 tablespoons uncooked quinoa

3/4 cup vegetable broth

1/2 teaspoon ground cumin

1/2 cup frozen corn kernels

1 (15 ounce) can black beans, rinsed and drained

Heat the oil in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Stir in the onion and garlic, and saute until lightly browned.

Mix quinoa into the saucepan and cover with vegetable broth. Season with cumin. Bring the mixture to a boil. Cover, reduce heat, and simmer 20 minutes,
Stir frozen corn into the saucepan, and continue to simmer about 5 minutes until heated through. Mix in the black beans

Vegan cookie love

What do you do when you are running out of milk and eggs but you have to have CHOCOLATE???  Vegan cookies of course!

I've never been much of a meat eater.  Dairy and other animal products make a daily appearance in my diet and items I use (aka leather skates) but they aren't always essential.  It's not a bad idea to figure out alternatives now anyway who knows how long our current life style will be sustainable.  Plus, I have some moral objections to certain animal farming techniques.  But I don't want to get into my moral philosophy on this blog.  Unless its Star Trek related.
I have great respect for anyone who can commit to it.

My favorite vegan cook book author is Isa Chandra Moskowitz. She also has great blog with variety of recipes from her published books. This is the recipe exactly from the website but I made some major mods.  For one I used real milk ( I know, I'm bad) .. parchment paper? nope, none of that in my house.  I didn't use the cayenne pepper either.  I'm a wuss when it comes to pepper.  I used a mix of allspice, cardamom and nutmeg to give it more flavor.

Mexican Hot Chocolate Snickerdoodles

1/2 cup canola oil
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup pure maple syrup
3 tablespoons almond milk (Or your preferred non-dairy milk)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon chocolate extract (or more vanilla extract if you have no chocolate)
1 2/3 cups flour
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon cayenne

For the topping:
1/3 cup sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Preheat oven to 350 F. 
Mix the topping ingredients together on a flat plate. Set aside.
In a medium mixing bowl, use a fork to vigorously mix together oil,  sugar, syrup, and milk. Mix in extracts.
Sift in remaining ingredients, stirring as you add them. Once all ingredients are added mix until you’ve got a pliable dough.
Roll dough into walnut sized balls. Pat into the sugar topping to flatten into roughly 2 inch discs. Transfer to baking sheet, sugar side up, at least 2 inches apart (they do spread). This should be easy as the the bottom of the cookies should just stick to your fingers so you can just flip them over onto the baking sheet.  Bake for 10 to 12 minutes, they should be a bit spread and crackly on top. Remove from oven and let cool for 5 minutes, then transfer to a cooling rack to cool completely.

I had a small spectator for the duration of the cooking expedition.

typhoons and other stuff

Well... it's been a while since I've updated the blog.  No excuse really, I've just been occupied.  So lets see... what have I been up to...
I had a temporary job selling wine.  It was pretty interesting, I got paid almost as much as I did as an Assistant Manager at my old job, which is hilarious in a bad way.
Quite a lot of derby over the past 4 months, though most of it has been our off season.  I purchased new skates with the money from my temp job.  I really wish they'd get here already.  I will be posting a picture as soon as they get here.  Probably too excited about this.
Taking lots of pictures of the food I've been making over the past few months.  So lots of recipes.  I've been dabbling in more vegan, or vegan-ish recipes.
Cross Stitching.  Yes, I was the nerd that started cross stitching at age 9 or 10.  Looking to open an etsy shop.  I will post here when it goes up. :)

oh... right.  Theres another typhoon on the way.  It's supposed to hit sometime on Wednesday.  That's going to be far more interesting than i want it to be.

I made pita bread for the first time ever.  It was considerable more easy than i thought it would be.  I got the recipe from the bpal.org forum.  Even though I haven't worked with yeast bread very much, this was a very easy introduction.

Pita Bread
3 cups all-purpose or bread flour, plus more for kneading
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
2 teaspoons yeast
2 teaspoons salt, preferably sea salt
1/2 teaspoon sugar
1 cup lukewarm water

1. Dissolve yeast in water. Add in olive oil, salt, and sugar. Stir gently.
2. Add flour and knead to incorporate. I often add a little extra water (just a few tablespoons) at this stage, since I prefer to use all the flour. Sometimes the specified amount of water just won't "take" all the flour. Knead until the dough is mostly smooth.
3. Put the dough in a warm (but not hot) place to rise for 1-2 hours. The dough should be roughly doubled in size.
4. When the dough has risen, divide it into 6 or 8 roughly even pieces. Roll each piece into a round ball and place on a lightly floured surface. Cover loosely with a tea towel and let rest for 20 minutes.
5. Roll each ball out to less than 1/4" thick, using additional flour as necessary. Do not stack the disks or they will stick together. For ideal "puffing" let the disks rest a few minutes and make sure to cook them in order.
6. Heat a heavy skillet over medium heat. I wouldn't advise non-stick, because these cook best with no oil and I don't like to heat non-stick pans empty. Once the skillet is preheated, add one pita disk. Cook for 15 seconds on one side. Turn. Cook until browned, then turn and cook the other side. Be prepared for this to take as much time as 5 minutes. Set aside, repeat with remaining dough.

The recipe turned out very well.  I will be repeating this often.   it's so much better than any flat bread that can be purchased on island. Its not as good as restaurant naan, but then again what is?  If only I could figure out have to make lavash I'd be set.

Missouri Fury and the knock out recipe

In the new form of roller derby it is customary to pick a nick name.  Usually they are puns, a play on words or other delicious forms of humorous fun in name form.  After much deliberation I decided to choose Missouri Fury.   I love my home state and I have been known to go into fits of rage.  It's perfect.

I found something amazing recently.  When we moved to Japan we were introduced to curry and it has become a favorite when we go out to eat. I recently found a fairly easy meatless variety I could eat all week.

I made a few revisions to this recipe.  I used two Japanese eggplants and did not peel them or pre cook them since it was not needed.  I also made my own "garam masala" out of spices I had in my kitchen.
Eggplant Chickpea Curry

1 teaspoon olive oil
1 small white onion, finely chopped
3 cloves garlic
1 teaspoon mined fresh ginger (i used dry)
1 pound tomatoes chopped roughly (i used canned)
2 pounds eggplant cut into 3/4 inch cubes
2 teaspoons mild curry powder
2 teaspoon garam masala (i made my own)
1 teaspoon cumin
1 cup vegetable broth
1 15 oz can chickpeas

Saute onion in oil over medium heat 5 mins. add garlic and ginger for another minute. mix eggplant and tomato in stirring constantly for a minute. put in all the spices and vegetable broth. cover and bring to a slow boil for about 40 minutes, stirring occasionally. add chickpeas and cook uncovered for 10 mins.
Serve over rice. Yummy!!