FDA says to avoid pistachios & pistachio products – salmonella again.
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Archive for March, 2009
Put down the pistachios…
Monday, March 30th, 2009Pot Pie Puffs, Round 1
Sunday, March 29th, 2009
So, about a month ago, I mentioned the Curry Chicken Pot Pies that I had at a party. I wanted to give them a whirl, but of course, I couldn’t stick with Alton’s original recipe… (Sorry, Alton!! But I’m sure you understand.)
It’s still not perfect by any means, so this is round one – but they are still pretty tasty! I skipped the curry – my brother isn’t a fan (bad childhood experiences) which was fine, I’ve been looking for a decent “plain” chicken pot pie filling recipe to start with, and this looked like a good base.
First, I wanted to do some sort of bite sized version like my friend did. I couldn’t find puff pastry (I am sure my market has it and I was just looking in the wrong places) so I went with fridge biscuits and used about 1/3 to 1/4 of a biscuit for each section in a mini muffin tin.
I added some garlic (because everything needs garlic) to the onions & celery, and used sweet onion since the white onions around here have been insanely strong this year.
Cut the 4 cups of veggies to 2 cups and added 2 cups of diced white potatoes. (I also microwaved them for a few minutes, as I had no faith that they would cook through just sitting in the oven with the veggies – I would have boiled them if I had thought of it soon enough.)
Finally, rather than letting the sauce thicken and then folding in the veggies & chicken, I just went ahead and added it all at the same time and letting the chicken simmer in the sauce & seasonings. Added them to the biscuit cups and popped them in the oven for 10 minutes at 350 (the temp called for on the biscuit package.)
And the results:
I put some of the leftovers in the fridge – 5 minutes at 400 degrees in the toaster oven is just right for reheating without burning the biscuit part. The rest are in the freezer, we’ll see how well they can be thawed and reheated for snacks.
Now, the changes I need to make for next time…
– Cut it in half. The original recipe says 6-8 servings. That is 6-8 servings for people who really, REALLY like chicken pot pie! (Seems most 4 serving recipes will feed myself and my brother, and then I have a small serving left for lunch the next day.)
– More potatoes, less veggies. :)
– A little bit of bacon. Cause everything is better with bacon, and I think it would give it a little something.
– Find where the grocery store is hiding the puff pastry.
TJ’s score
Saturday, March 21st, 2009There is a Trader Joe’s just under 5 miles from my house, yet I rarely get there because it’s just in a weird spot that I’m never around when I’m out running errands. Well, this morning I was out and about and happened to be right next to it, so I figured I’d pop in and see if there was anything I couldn’t live without. Of course there was!
Wild Sockeye!!!! My local market only has farmed, which isn’t the worst thing in the world, but wild is awesome. For anyone thinking, OMG, FROZEN??? WTF??!? Well, if I go buy a pound of salmon, I end up just lopping it into single serve filets and freezing it anyway. Perhaps heresy, but TJ’s simply saved me that step.
I’m going to have kickass lunches this coming week. :)
I don’t hate fast food.
Tuesday, March 10th, 2009Those words right there disqualify me from ever holding any foodie status, but there they are anyway.
Now, why on earth would someone who is just about 3 weeks into a weight management project have anything other than utter hatred and contempt for fast food? Because I love McGriddles, that’s why. This morning I had to drop the dog off for a grooming and there is a McD’s right next door, and I was hungry and they were still having breakfast, and well, you can guess the rest. :)
Fast food has it’s place. There are few in our society that are really able to live at a slow pace – I can only think of two groups – the retired and the unemployed. And fast food even has it’s place for those folks, too. You’re out running errands, you get hungry, you’re nowhere near home – why not stop in and get a snack? That’s exactly where I was this morning.
Sure, a McGriddle isn’t exactly what you’d call a “healthy” breakfast. It has 420 calories. But for crying out loud, it’s sausage and pancakes and syrup all together in a wonderful little sandwich!!!!!! How could it be MORE perfect??!?? Only if they sold it all day! (Did I mention I REALLY love these little fat grenades?)
But let’s stop and take a look at how often I have them. Not very often. Honestly, it’s probably been about 6 months since I had one. And it will probably be another 6 months before I have another one. How often do I have fast food in general? Maybe every couple of weeks. It’s not a staple of my diet.
I think the fast food industry has been unfairly demonized because consumers *choose* to make their food a staple of their diets. The last time I checked, McD’s didn’t have people standing out in parking lots dragging people into their stores and forcing them to buy Big Macs. Little Wendy isn’t knocking on people’s doors begging them to buy chili and a Frosty, lest she end up homeless. Chihuahuas don’t end up in the animal shelter because you didn’t buy enough tacos and bean burritos.
Fast food does have it’s place. Grab a Happy Meal every now and again if you like. But don’t blame the industry for your food choices.
It’s here!
Saturday, March 7th, 2009My lovely kitchen scale is here, and I love it. It doesn’t take up much space at all, the display is easy to read, and it couldn’t be easier to use. The tare function works beautifully and switching between grams, pounds and ounces is no problem at all. And I will admit, I have been geeking out a little with it. :)
So far I have learned that 2 ounces of shaved ham is a lot more than I thought, which bodes well for my ham sandwiches, and (with some help from MasterCook) that 1/2 cup of my chicken salad is 256 calories. (And worth every one of them in my mind.) And that the croissants I get at the market run 375 calories a pop. (I had four of them, weighed them all together, discovered they are 3.265 ounces on average.) Yes, I am a bit of a dork. But a happy dork.
Oh, and as a complete aside, Picasa3 now has a built in watermark function – much easier than having to use a separate piece of software for it.
Fascinating idea…
Wednesday, March 4th, 2009I’m watching Mark Bittman’s interview from last night’s Colbert Report and there was a mention of how he is “vegan until 6PM”.
It just struck me as a brilliant idea for anyone trying to cut back on meat and add more vegetables and such to their diets. You wouldn’t even have to go full vegan, or even until 6PM. Say, vegetarian for the first half of the day. Even that could make quite an impact on your overall diet and health.
It’s something I am definitely going to have to give more thought to.
A little site maintenance…
Tuesday, March 3rd, 2009You may (or may not) have noticed that user registrations have been disabled. There has been a rash of new user registrations in the past few days, and most of them appear to be completely bogus.
You don’t need to register to comment or to use the Subscribe to Comments feature, and this will hopefully keep any future spam to a minimum. (Akismet has been doing a bang up job so far, but anything else that helps is good.)
Just a quickie – Curry Chicken Pot Pie
Monday, March 2nd, 2009No pics, sorry! I was at a party this weekend and the hostess made Alton Brown’s Curry Chicken Pot Pie, and put the filling in little phyllo tarts so they were bite sized.
They were SO GOOD – I HIGHLY recommend this recipe. The curry is not at all overwhelming, it just gives it a little bit of a kick.
I am definitely going to have to give these a whirl at some point.