Road Raging Pocket Pain

The Foodie is Road Raging today cause gas prices are hurting my pocket!!

Prices are going up everywhere but New York prices are particularly bad. It's been hovering around $4.09 lately and now I can't seem to find anything less than $4.15. FOUR DOLLARS PLUS.
And summer is coming so it will just go up more. According to the gas price heat map California is experiencing the worst price hikes. The Long Island Prices should be in the hot zone too though.

MAP

I know I take driving for granted but this is not the kind of reminder I need. Thanks. Luckily I have a rather short commute at the moment but I'm still feeling the ouch when it costs $45 to fill up a little tiny car that once could get filled up for half of that.

Updates from the new place and fun foods

Since I've moved into the new house this past weekend I have not had internet. Only a week so I have just been checking in on essentials for work. At the moment I'm seated comfortably in Starbucks with my Chai Latte. Yay!

So I wanted to update on the cooking adventures I've had. So far not many but I saw this awesome swiss chard in the store the other day and I had to buy it because it was called "bright lights" chard and the stems were pink and yellow. How can I say no to that? It was also a huge bunch of it so I figured it would go a long way. Sadly my kitchen is pretty dark so my pictures don't really do it justice, but it is pretty! You can see from the picture up top that I borrowed from the interwebs what it should look like.
I decided to split my chard into two batches and cook it all so it didn't go bad on me. One batch was just cooked up with some garlic and the other was cooked up with some garlic and onions and then turned into soup. I added chicken broth and water and a little bit of onion powder and then some tofu and voila! Soup! It was actually really tasty, I must say. Yes, the chard lost its pretty color but it tasted delicious.

Cupcakes with the gift of life...

I feel obligated to share this video sent to me by my mother because it is just that odd.
This bakery has cupcakes which have induced labor in a whole series of overdue moms. No one can figure out why. The only thing special about the cupcakes is the use of lemon rind and lemon juice.

Check out the video for yourself

Also, a lemon cupcake sounds delightful.

Trader Joe's Food Reviews

Yes, it makes me unreasonably happy to use my reusable Trader Joe's bag made of recycled bottles. I've now been to the store 3 times and been able to use my bag after the first two. I've been wanting to write about Trader Joe's for a while but somehow haven't gotten around to it. So here's the low down.

I always thought TJs had the reputation of being one of those expensive hoity-toity kind of places like Whole Foods, since they always seemed to be located in somewhat upscale areas and health conscious communities, so when I discovered one in Plainview I wasn't in a rush to check it out. Then a co-worker told me she shops there all the time and that the prices are very reasonable. She claimed to have packed her whole shopping cart full for $100. That sounded impressive, as did the prices she listed. I'm a bit skeptical about the cart for $100 because I found it quite easy to spend money there, however, there were some things with very reasonable prices. What I wouldn't buy there is vegetables or cheese. I've yet to see a cooking demo which she swears they have all the time, but I also have a feeling this particular store might be smaller than some of the others.

They have a lot of frozen foods and a lot organic and interesting foods. My most recent trip tonight included some goodies. I'm trying out the Trader Joe's brand products as well as other random stuff. So far the failure has been fake sun chips. Bad texture and taste. Otherwise I've met some fun foods.

Exhibit A: Tonight's Guilty pleasure. Organic low fat chocolate syrup. Tastes a bit like chocolate pudding. But way better. Yumtastic!



Exhibit B: Yogurt. Sounds not that exciting but it is really really tasty yogurt and really really smooth, which is not always the case. I have weird issues with yogurt that has chunks in it. I'm not sure what makes this yogurt so awesome but it really is.



Exhibit C: TJ Hummus. Honestly I didn't like this very much at first. The best description I have is that tasted too light. It didn't seem like eating hummus. It's grown on me a bit but still I don't know that its the way to go. I bought an olive hummus tonight so I will give that a try.



Exhibit D: TJ's Seaweed Snack. I bought these tonight and I'm already in love. They were only 99 cents! If you like sushi then you should enjoy the taste of these. A little bit crispy at first but then they melt into that seaweed texture you get in miso soup. They are salty, thin and delicious, and I believe seaweed is good for you. Instant snack!


Exhibit E: TJ Edamame! That's soybeans, shelled and deliciouso. They have them lightly cooked and salted and oh my are they a tasty snack. I devoured half a pack over a week and then sadly spilled the other half on the floor, which was tragic.They also have frozen ones but I haven't tried that yet. I had to steal the picture cause I didn't take one. But the blog / website I borrowed it from also mentioned seaweed snacks! Interesting website to look at too if you're interested.



And now for my favorite, Exhibit F: Avocado's Number Guacamole. This was highly recommended and I must say I haven't been disappointed. Usually I would just make my own because its pretty easy, although I don't have the gauc skills that J has, but since this I was informed that this was "the best guacamole you will ever eat" I had to try it. I'm pretty much a sucker for avocado in any form anyway. Plus, who can beat the clever name? Not Avagadro's number, but avocado's because there are 5 whole avocados in each package. Winner!


I have more products from TJs that will likely end up in another post when I get around to them. Sneak peak? Trader O's, TJ's Pho,Low fat Havarti, Organic PB and chocolate chip cookies.

New Look

I decided to try a more spicy look for the blog. Summer is coming (eventually) and so is fresh food. It was also difficult to read the other layout because of the light colors so here it is. Tada!

Not quite dead yet....

If anyone is still reading this, I apologize for the sporadic nature of the posting going on here, or more accurately, the lack of posting. I was away in Ohio for a week and then I was concentrating on finding a new place to live since I'm having problems with my current situation.

I wanted to point out a few things from my Ohio trip.

1- In Columbus, when we actually got to visit the downtown area of the city, they had a pizza truck for the late hours of the evening. Brilliant I must say. It was located in the area where all the bars were and we all know that drunk people like pizza.

2- Cereal in particular was ridiculously cheap, at least in Target. They had regular sized and jumbo sized boxes and none of them were over $4. What??? How is that possible? My only guess is that aside from NY prices being truly obscene, Ohio is in the breadbasket region, or close enough so grain is cheap.

3- Not everything is cheap. My roommate on this trip was crazy allergic to almost everything and so she had to seek out the health food store in order to get foods she could eat. We went to the Whole Foods equivalent, called the Raisin Rack. Man, did they have everything. There was a gluten- free, yeast-free, sugar free, whatever free option of everything. There was a whole section of things made out of tapioca flour, which is apparently a gluten alternative.



There were also an astonishing variety of milk alternatives including the usual rice and soy as well as hemp, oat and coconut. None of this stuff was cheap.





There was even a section of alternative mayonnaises.


So overall, a pretty interesting store. Unfortunately all the free food we got from our hotel wasn't generally that great, but oh well. More cooking adventures will likely be on their way in a bit.

Not Your Grandmother's Food Stamps

Well folks, I've now officially started off the application process for Food Stamp/SNAP benefits so my thirty days until I supposedly get benefits starts now. Unfortunately I know there's a huge backlog at the Department of Social Services so that's unlikely to actually happen. Still, the process has been started.

Part of my service this year is to sign people up for benefits like SNAP, which is the new name for Food Stamps. New is a relative term since it changed in '08 but NY has been slow to get on board with the changes. SNAP stands for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, because that's apparently classier than saying food stamps. The theory behind the name change is that it will erase some of the stigma around Food Stamps. Many people are hesitant to apply because
1) the application process is a nuisance and confusing if you don't know the rules
2) they think they are taking money away from someone else who might need it more
3) their pride just can't handle having someone give them assistance.
4) they don't know they are eligible
5) They just don't understand the system.
6) the Dss or Food Stamp distributing agency in your state often treats people with very little or no respect.

This is something I'm working on this year. There are a lot of things people should realize about SNAP that might make them reconsider.
1) If you are paying taxes then you are funding SNAP by default so technically you are or have been ( if you're out of a job) paying for your own food funding.
2) You can apply online now, like I just did. You still will have to meet a case worker unless you have extenuating circumstances but it takes some of the initial unpleasantness away.
3) SNAP benefits are available to all who qualify. You will not be taking away benefits from anyone else by applying.
4) Many seniors, legal aliens and just ordinary low-income citizens may qualify
5) You can apply for all sorts of state benefits in the same application as SNAP
6) SNAP benefits and other state benefits come on an Electronic Benefits card called EBT that you can use like a debit card.
7)SNAP puts money INTO the community because people can use their benefits at local store. $5 in SNAP benefits produces $9 of economic activity according to the USDA

So that's my plug for SNAP. Let's count the days before I hear from a caseworker and get to submit all my documents! If I get them by June I will be impressed. As for being treated with no respect, well I'm interested in going down to DSS and seeing what it is like. I have heard the horror stories and I'm not really looking forward to it, but I think its good job research.