Pages

Thursday, October 28, 2010

Shoulda had a V8

A few weeks ago I was at the gym and I looked up at the TV screen and tried to understand what I was seeing. It was very clearly an infomercial but at first I thought it was fake. I wasn't plugged into the sound so it was hard to tell if it was meant to be serious or not, but the fact that I wasn't sure seemed like a bad sign.

The commercial was for the HealthMaster Blender, and it showed people putting every conceivable vegetable and fruit into the blender and drinking up the 'delicious?' drink. Maybe it was the fact that there was no sound, but it just seemed comical. I wasn't sure if I was watching a real infomercial or something on Adult Swim. After throwing spinach, tomatoes and various other edibles into the blender, a smiling woman happily sips up the green goo because its healthy and it makes you lose weight. Righttttttttt.

As turns out, the Health Master is real and essentially is just an overpriced blender, which you can get for only 4 payments of $49.95. Of course this blender can blend stone, as the commercial demonstrates, so I obviously want it. And if I wasn't convinced already, Montel Williams will demonstrate how great this blender is by giving out samples of green juice concoction to the studio audience. You can't eat a whole plate of veggies without getting full, but you can drink one!!! Hooray!!!!

You know, if I want to drink vegetables, I'll just have a V8 because its a lot cheaper.

Sunday, October 24, 2010

Pumpkin Carving


Well today was the day of epic pumpkin carving. Man, carving a pumpkin is a lot harder than I remembered. I bought a giant one too so it was kind of a wrestling match between me and the pumpkin. I did win though. Haha! I was going to go for the traditional scary face but we have this giant spider web decoration out front of the house and no spider for it so I decided to try out carving a spider. I found this one for inspiration and I started on the ambitious task of fighting the giant pumpkin.

This has to have been the stringiest pumpkin ever. There wasn't much goop or too many seeds but the whole body of the pumpkin was just a stringy mess which caused lots of problems. This is it cleaned out.


I was tempted not to even cut the legs out cause I wasn't sure I could do it with a giant knife but with a few tiny ones and some very strong persuasion I managed to cut out the legs too. It only took ohhhh, a few hours to do the whole thing. But it was fun!



And for good measure I roasted the seeds, the few that there were and they were delicious! Oil and salt in a 325 oven for 15 minutes. Yum!

Friday, October 22, 2010

Birthday Cupcakes

It was S's birthday on Thursday so I decided to bake some cupcakes. I've had some interesting encounters with icing colors in the past because I love to play with color but for these I had a very specific plan in mind. S appreciates dorky things like I do, and he'd recently shown me a steam punk cake he'd found, so I wanted to do my best to create cupcakes in the steam punk theme. I knew there was no way that my designs could look anywhere near as cool as this cake because I don't know how to work with fondant or any of those fancy cake things and I'm not a cake artist, but I figured I'd give it a go with icing or food gel or whatever I could find.

I wasn't expecting perfection by any means, but I figured that with the right tools I could at least pull of sort of a funky, cute version of steampunk. However, finding the tools was the biggest problem since I wanted browns, golds, and silvers as my color palette and I couldn't decide whether to color frosting or try with food gel.

Before I go any further into the decorating details, let me stop off at Steampunk and explain it. Steampunk refers to a genre of science fiction which melds things from the steam power era/Victorian times with science fiction and fantasy and technology. According to the always reliable Wikipedia, the whole subculture came into prominence in the 1980's and '90s, but I've only started seeing it prominently recently. It was even featured on the abc show Castle a week or two ago. In any case, as far as design aesthetics, steampunk often fuses modern technology with steam technology. Some prominent features are gears and clocks etc. I first started noticing steampunk on Etsy.com where there are often pocket watches, necklaces, and accessories desginated as steampunk.

Anyway, back to the cupcakes. I went to Michael's and found brown food dye, silver sprinkles, gold glittery gel and clear dyable food gel. I had really been hoping for gold or silver powder or dye but I decided brown would work, like the cake above. I don't know why, but I was set on vanilla cake with vanilla frosting, even though using chocolate might have made more sense since it's already brown.

Icing is always harder to work with than I anticipate and the gold food gel didn't work as neatly as I hoped so things ended up pretty messy, but at least I tried. I played around with the brown colors to get some lighter ones and some darker ones and then dyed the food gel too. I had drawn out all these images of gears but it just didn't translate well to the cupcake. The most successful were probably the clocks, but I didn't want a box full of clocks so I tried some keys and kept trying to get the gears right. I'd say the whole thing was mildly successful. At least they tasted good and a few of them looked good. It didn't seem to stop S from eating them, particularly the clocks, so I guess it must have been ok after all.

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Apple muffins


So recently I found a use for all the remaining apples. They've already been eaten plain and with cheese, and baked with nuts and sugar but now they have become muffins. I chose two recipes because neither one needed very many apples and I wanted to try them both. One was apple cranberry muffins and the other was apple yogurt muffins. Here's a little visual tour of the process.

First the cranberry apple muffins get mixed up and then off to the oven. Sadly I only seem to have one little muffin tray to work with so its a long process. And the kitchen gets messy.




And apples get naked.
Finished! They came out a bit more crispy on the outside than I wanted and a bit more flat and smooshed but they were ok.

The consistency of the next batter was much lighter and more springy so I had a better feeling about them and sure enough they came out very moist and light. They also got a nice cinnamon sugar topping. Anyone want some? I still have a bunch.

Saturday, October 16, 2010

Halloween Peeps.... chocolate covered

I saw the chocolate covered pumpkin peeps in the store weeks ago and couldn't decide my feelings on them. Fortunately my mom bought one each for my dad and I so I got to try one. When I opened the package I was surprised that the pumpkin has kind of a creepy face. It sort of like a freaky baby, or like a bath bar from Lush.

Anyway, I was excited to find that when biting into the pumpkin that it was, in fact, orange! I love orange food! Or orange anything.
There doesn't seem to be any crunchy layer of sugar, the way normal peeps have, but there's definitely some gooey sugary something between the marshmallow and the chocolate. I dissected the last bit of mine...

As it turns out, Just Born created chocolate covered chicks for Easter, though I don't recall ever seeing them. And the pumpkins also come in dark chocolate versions as well. All in all, I wasn't thrilled by them. They were actually a little too sweet. Peeps are meant to be too sweet, that's why they're awesome, but this is the wrong kind of too sweet. The whole experience was just ok, but not exceptional so I probably won't go out of my way for them in the future.

And as a throwback to living in Allentown, I found this from The Morning Call

Kiwi Syrup

So there are lots of interesting food things going on this week but I'm going to start with something I found while walking around H&Y Asian market. I wouldn't say it's particularly asian, except for the brand, but I'd never seen it before and I was intrigued.Kiwi Syrup!! The chocolate syrup makes sense but kiwi syrup? What does one do with such a food? Well, according to one company that makes this syrup it can be used in Italian sodas and mocktails. I'm not entirely convinced I'd want to drink this, though I'd be willing to give it a try. Maybe an Italian Soda would be nice.

Here's one recipe I found for a drink.. I couldn't find too many mentions of kiwi syrup in recipes.

Fruit Cocktail Recipe
Grapefruit Juice
Kiwi Syrup
Lime Juice
Mango Juice
Passion fruit Juice
orange juice
Pineapple Juice
Shake with a glassful of broken ice and pour unstrained into a wine goblet. Garnish with fruit, add straws, and serve.

Wednesday, October 13, 2010

Weary Wednesday

Today is a weary Wednesday. Know why? Because I'm weary of stupid drivers in the left lane on highways. I can't say I never have been guilty of the left lane laziness, the kind where you forget you're in the left and supposed to be going fast.Generally though if people start passing me on the right or are getting really close behind me I wake up and move over. Not so for everyone. Today I was in the left and the car in front of me was going 60 mph. Granted, that was the speed limit, but as everyone knows, the left lane is not for obeying the speed limit. (M and I had this problem on our trip out to Oklahoma many times. M is also a Jersey driver and was annoyed by the number of people who ride in the left lane at the speed limit or five miles over. The left is for super-speed. The end. )
I tried to suggest that he should move over into the right by getting a bit closer to him. I don't like getting tooooo close because that leads to accidents, which many people on the road should learn. He was totally oblivious for quite some time and I could tell I wasn't the only one who was annoyed.
There was a car next to us on the right but the guy in the left could easily have moved over if he slowed down or sped up a bit. This apparently was far too challenging for him because it involved actually being aware of other cars on the road. Who does that? So I was forced to cut over all the way to the far right and go around him. Several cars copied me as well.
I know everyone gets stupid sometimes when they drive. I know I make mistakes, but some people are just oblivious and it makes things more complicated than they should be. So please, left lane drivers, if you are on a highway with limited or no traffic then stop blocking the left lane for people who want to actually drive. Thanks.

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

One for the Vegetarians...

Ever since I watched part of Food Inc. I've been increasingly interested in eating less meat or hopefully meat that is prepared with some humanity. I don't think that I could ever give up meat entirely because I just need a burger every now and then, but my dad is a vegetarian so a lot of times we have meatless meals in my house. Over the years my family has tried quite a number of "fake meat products" and although we've run into a few not so hot ones, there are actually a great number of imitation meats out there.

I pretty much exclusively eat veggie hot dogs because hot dogs kind of creep me out on principle. I don't really have a problem with taste but somehow their legend of horror got to me and I can only remember eating two real ones over the last ten or so years. I've encountered some purple bouncy fake meat hotdogs in my time but the brand we buy exclusively is Tofu Pups. I won't say they taste like a hot dog is supposed to (whatever that is exactly) but I've gotten used to the taste of them smothered in mustard and I like them a lot. As far as burgers go, Boca burger is really the only way to go if you wan't an experience that is anything like meat.
My family is also pretty into our fake breakfast meats like bacon and sausage. I'm a lot happier eating fake sausage than real sausage ( again something about the ground up bits of meat just creeps me out), but I find real bacon hard to resist. It's really the only pig product I will eat without serious coercion. My college roomates were entertained by my my Morningstar Farms Facon. J said the taste was alright but she didn't understand why it was attempting to look like real bacon in color. S also said it tasted alright after being coerced into eating some by my parents, but he didn't particularly seem thrilled by it. I think it has a pretty smokey taste and isn't too bad a substitute for bacon, although nothing will ever replace real bacon.
I decided to branch out into new types of fake meats last week by purchasing Smart Deli "Bologna" by Lite Life. I have to say I was pretty impressed. The serving size said it was 4 slices but I found each to be rather thick and have lots of flavor so I only used two and it really had the right taste to it! New awesome food found!

And lastly, my dad bought Lite Life's Italian style sausages, which surprised me by being incredible. They don't even need anything on them or with them to taste authentic. All the right spicing is there and all the flavors. I cooked them up with some onions and peppers the other day to make Italian Sausage and peppers on a sub/ grinder/ hoagie. ( Side note... the name for such a sandwich will have to be another blog post for another day because there is much debate between North and South Jersey as well as the rest of the country). Certainly going to keep these around.



Sunday, October 10, 2010

Sunday Driving Special


Today we feature the car/driving section of this blog. Has anyone else noticed these bumper protectors that have been cropping up all over the place? I just don't understand them. They look like a mat that's stuck to the back of the bumper, presumably with the intention of preventing scratches, dents etc on your bumper.

Let's think about this for a second.... it's called a BUMPER, which means it may get BUMPED. And yes, that means it may not always be perfect looking. Here's what wikipedia says: Bumper (automobile), the part of an automobile designed to help it withstand the impact of a collision.

Ok, so you're telling me that this part of the car is DESIGNED to withstand the impact of a collision? Sooooo why do I need extra protection exactly? If someone slams into me hard enough to cause massive damage I don't think having a rubber mat over the back of my car and protecting the shine of my bumper is really going to be my top priority. Just a thought.

Additionally, even though all the images I can find online of these hideous things are pretty symmetrical and not totally ugly, every single one I've seen on the road looks like someone took a rubber mat off the floor of their car and tacked it haphazardly onto the back of their car. Let me tell you, it isn't attractive looking. You'd be better off with dents. Now maybe these ugly mats have some other purpose, since I can't seem to find any that resemble the one's I've seen. If this is the case them please, someone enlighten me. Maybe they are just so ugly no one wants a picture of them?

Saturday, October 9, 2010

APPLES!!!!!

Despite the very confusing East Coast weather these days, it is supposedly Autumn which means it is apple season. I've recently just had two very apple filled experiences which I'd like to share as both resulted in the consumption of a massive quantity of apple products and apples.

The first apple adventure was last weekend in Ithaca, NY at the Downtown Ithaca Apple Harvest Festival, now in it's 28th year. I had the opportunity to visit some friends and attend the festival with them, which was lovely but also challenging during the peak of the festival on Saturday. The entire commons area of the quaint little hippie town was so jammed with people that it was difficult to even walk. The food however, was delicious! I only managed to pick up one bag of apples for myself which included some hybrid apple that crossed a red delicious ( not usually my favorite) with another type of apple. I did snag some very delicious and filling Indian food and some cold cider.

We purchased a sizable few bags of apples to cook which through some team work and recipe alteration we turned into an absolutely mouth-watering apple crumb pie. Think apples, brown sugar, white sugar, butter, oatmeal and cinnamon in a pie crust. Yum!

When I came home from my Ithaca adventures my family was a little disappointed by the small bag of apples I returned with, however I got the opportunity to make it up to them this Friday with a trip up to Warwick NY to pick my own apples at Masker Orchards. Check them out.
I have to say, every apple we tasted was delicious. Since they literally came right off the tree and into our hands they were as fresh as physically possible. We got a whole variety including Cortlands, Jonagolds, Macintosh, Empire and some we weren't even sure what they were.

The Red Delicious also had the chance to redeem itself from the mealy, soft, boring quality that I normally experience in this apple. The ones that came off the tree didn't even resemble the typical "teacher apple" you normally see. The color was much more vibrant and the shape was much rounder, and the taste and texture far superior to any red delicious I've ever had the misfortune to eat. All in all the experience was a really nice one- walking through the orchards and choosing our own fruit. Now I need to find something else to cook involving a massive quantity of apples, although it seems almost a pity to cook these crisp apples into a mush. I'm extremely picky when it comes to apples, and if they aren't break your teeth crunchy, as my mom likes to say, then I don't want to eat them.

Here's the bag I brought home:


Apples actually are really fascinating, as I learned watching The Botany of Desire, based on Michael Pollan's book. Apparently if you plant an apple seed you don't get the same type of apple as the apple the seed came from. What?? There's a whole grafting process of putting the seed with an already growing branch in order to get back the same type of apple. Pretty crazy and awesome, but I find botany pretty cool in general.

Friday, October 8, 2010

Grilled Cheezus

I feel that any food blog would be remiss if it didn't mention the recent stint of the grilled Cheezus on Glee. I've only recently started watching the show with any sort of regularity, but I have to say that the grilled Cheezus is just awesome. If you haven't seen the show or the episode, just know that an image of Jesus on a grilled cheese sandwich causes one character to start referring to the sandwich as Grilled Cheezus and asking it for wishes.

A few popular quotes from the episode:

"Dear Grilled Cheesus, first of all, you're delicious."

"What up, Grilled Cheesus. I need to ask you something. I didn't go to Sunday school, so I don't know if God works the same as a genie and I only have three wishes ..."

Introductions, Welcome and all that...

Welcome to Road Raging Foodie!! I'm starting this blog because I find that I love talking about food just as much as I love eating it. I end up raving about delicious pumpkin donuts and scrumptious Pad Thai to anyone who I think might care. With that in mind, I figured, why not write about it?

Let me be clear though, this isn't going to be a restaurant review blog- though I may end up doing some reviews- but more of a documentation of my encounters with interesting food, which can include anything from commercialized food to things off the beaten path. As far as cooking goes I'm interested in baking and also fresh, natural farm grown foods. Nothing like seeing your food go from the earth to your mouth! I'm hoping to go live on a farm at some point in my life. For a while now it has been my (not so secret) dream to open a little bakery with gorgeous cupcakes filling the windows. Unfortunately I don't think I possess the skills or the endurance for that endeavor so it will remain a nice little fantasy along with culinary school. When I do cook I'm all about experimenting, since I generally don't know what I'm doing anyway. So far I haven't killed anyone.

Now, you may be wondering about the first half of this blog's title, so let me explain. I grew up in New Jersey and New York so I see a lot of crazy drivers! Jersey drivers are notoriously bad and the more I drive, the more I think that no one in this country is capable of driving properly ( and yes I mean the ENTIRE country, not just the tri-state area). My constant amazement at the things I see while driving has been the cause of many rants on my part, so while I intend to devote the majority of this blog to food, I may have a somewhat regular feature regarding the current state of driving as I encounter it (ahem, use your turn signals people!!)I also like to travel a lot so there may be lots to report.

So that's pretty much the gist of the blog here- and here's a little bit more about me: I recently graduated a liberal arts college where I studied Philosophy, Asian Studies and Creative Writing. I love all things artistic and have dabble in some from various instruments to photography, pottery, pastels and pretty much anything involving glue and paper. I design and sell jewelry on Etsy.com and you can see all that annoying plug info at the bottom. I'm also an aspiring poet and writer. I'm intrigued by the concept of food and travel writing so I'm hoping that starting my own food blog will be a good start for at least one of those. I'm a huge dork and I love sci-fi and all sorts of dorky things. If any of this sounds interesting to you then please stick around and read on...


All that annoying Promo info:
My jewelry site - www.mistydragon.etsy.com
My Twitter (mainly for etsy updates) - http://twitter.com/dragon_trove