Cheesy Smashed Potatoes

So given that I had this corn bread (which is pretty much the heaviest bread I've ever eaten and almost a meal in itself, but not quite), I needed something to go with it, so I made mashed potatoes with baby Yukon gold potatoes, garlic (fried in olive oil), basil, and brie. The brie was creamy enough such that I didn't need to add butter or anything else, really. And I found out that my metal spatula is perfect for smashing potatoes. The basil was left over from the MSU Organic Farm club (which is AWESOME and I can't wait to buy more stuff from them).

So my new favorite game is typing in things I have in my refrigerator and "pantry" in google and seeing what kinds of recipes I get. This was one of the first hits I got with "potato brie basil garlic". Yay dinner!

Corn Bread

This one was stolen from Chris. Again. Also, I made it a couple days ago, but I've been busy... not that anyone reads this. Mostly, I wanted to log it for posterity... or something.

And I also managed to take a picture here because I had my camera out and I was uploading all of the pictures from Hawaii onto my computer. There are some pretty awesome pictures from Keck and Mauna Kea and Volcanoes National Park.


1 c flour
1/3 c sugar
1 tsp. salt
1 tbs baking powder
1 1/2 c corn meal
1 1/2 c milk
2 eggs
14 tbs butter, melted


Sift together flour, sugar, salt, and baking powder. Add the cornmeal and make a well in the center. Whisk together eggs, milk, and butter. Try not to freak out when the butter gets solid in the milk... just keep whisking. Pour into a WELL GREASED bread pan and throw into an oven for 45ish minutes at 400 F and try not to get butter all over the bottom of your oven. It's kind of a pain to clean up.

It actually turned out a lot more savory than I had anticipated, but in a good butter-soaked sort of way. I also didn't grease the pan well enough. Oops. It's okay, though. The bottom was all crispy and delicious anyway.

Balsamic Chicken Stir Fry

This one didn't work at all. It sounded good in theory... chicken+balsamic vinegar+garlic+fresh basil, but most unfortunately it never came together.

chicken
glug of olive oil
1/3 cup balsamic vinegar
1/2 cup chicken stock
2 tablespoons sugar
1 clove garlic, crushed
several basil leaves
mushrooms
broccoli
zucchini

Create a marinade with the vinegar, chicken stock, sugar, garlic, and basil. Let the chicken sit for 20 minutes. Pour the marinade into a small saucepan and let it reduce and then cook the chicken in a separate pan with the olive oil. Add the reduced sauce and veggies+fungi. Cook until you will no longer die of food poisoning. Serve over rice

So I suspect that what didn't work was a combination of me being a subpar cook and the fact that my ingredients weren't the *best*. I didn't have chicken stock, so I ended up using soup mix instead. Oops. I should get on getting a box of actual chicken stock. I also think that my love of balsamic vinegar extends only to the salad world. I foisted the meal upon one of my friends who thought it was fine and, "tasted like stir-fry."

I was all excited about getting the basil and zucchini. The MSU Organic Farm club was having a sale outside of the Aud today and I picked up a nice zucchini and some nice basil for two dollars. I was all happy about it. The basil will probably become part of something pasta like tomorrow, as I have it and I have no more meat. Sadness. I'm trying the curry again soon. I have Thai basil, garlic, and I'm going to get actual chicken stock next time, damnit.

Dad's Famous Eggs

Dad's Famous Eggs should probably be called Dad's Famous Egg, given that it consists of toast topped with cheese (preferably American, hey I need to pay respect to my white trash roots) and one poached egg. So I wanted to see how to poach an egg. Attempt number one didn't work.

I used the toaster as an egg timer, but when I cracked the egg in the pan, it didn't really stay together well. The white started to cook, but the top didn't, so I put a lid over it to try to "steam" the top cooked, but that didn't so much work well because the water managed to boil and the egg stuck to the bottom of the pan ever-so-slightly such that a lot of the yolk ran into the pan. I did salvage it enough to put it on my toast'n'cheese. Oh well. Maybe next time.

At least I have cheese'n'crackers...

Thai Green Curry Chicken

So I was introduced to the sweet sweet nectar that is Thai food this summer in Honolulu. The absolute favorite was definitely Thai-style curry. The first dish I cooked when I got back to my apartment was green curry with chicken. It came out too bland to justify the amount of spiciness, but I know what adjustments I want to make to it the next time.

1.5 Tbsp green curry paste
14 oz. Lite coconut milk
3 pieces of boneless Tyson chicken (really small pieces) cubed
1.5 Tbsp fish sauce
1 Tbsp brown sugar
1/3 c. chicken "stock"
1 small golden potato sliced thin-ish (about .75 cm)
1/4 green pepper, thinly sliced
1/4 serrano pepper, very thinly sliced

Add curry paste and coconut milk to pan and combine on medium heat for five minutes. Add diced chicken, as well as everything else. Cook until the chicken is done enough such that it won't kill you immediately after ingestion... or even shortly thereafter.

So the next time, I'm adding fresh garlic and basil. I'm also decreasing the curry paste by about 0.5 tbsp and ditching the serrano pepper because I'm fairly certain the one I was using wasn't ripe at all. Oh well. I'm also (hopefully) going to watch the next one more closely and not let it get to a boil. To top it all off, I won't burn the rice the next time and I'll get real chicken stock, as opposed to making broth stolen from the Mrs. Grass' noodle soup packet.

Inaugural Address

So I'm not giving this out to anyone. I might bury it in facebook and see if anyone cares, but mostly I want a diary of my cooking adventures in cliche blog form. Maybe it's because everyone else has a food blog... or maybe it's because I really wish I could be a food blogger too. Maybe, just maybe, one day I'll post foodpr0n... but porn is usually something desirable, I think. (I wouldn't know.) Don't hold your (you plural, not you personal) breath.

Recipes and stories to follow...