097 | there was going to be more fannish stuff in this post, but then it blew up on me

[straightforwardly]

I don’t think that it’s a secret that I love food, or that I love baking and cooking even more (especially considering that I have a tag for it... and a private-locked entry full of recipes to-try...and a GoogleDrive folder full of recipes I’ve loved, all (prettily) formatted in the same way, all so I can one day make myself a cookbook full of beloved recipes…), but I only rarely share the things I try out, which I think is a shame.

So I’m going to try to fix that, at least a little bit.

Let’s see… on Valentine’s Day, I ended up trying this Spinach & Chickpea Rice Pilaf, which turned out absolutely amazing, oh my god. It’s been nearly a week, and I am still dreaming about it. I love reading Budget Bytes (where that recipe is from), but our tastes rarely align (I still remember the absolute disaster that was the African Peanut Stew...), so it was a pleasant surprise when this one turned out so fantastic.

After dinner that night, I went ahead and made these Chocolate Cherry Blossom Cookies(warning: the ad placement on that site is kind of annoying), except minus the food coloring. So they actually ended up looking more like these-- much nicer, I think. I didn’t see this version of the recipe until after I’d already made them, though, so I can’t speak for how it tastes.

I probably wouldn’t have made them, since I don’t like maraschino cherries very much at all, but I’d tried one at work a couple days beforehand, and was blown away by how good they are-- especially when they’re still warm from the oven. My family liked them too-- the batch I made was almost completely gone within two hours of my taking them out of the oven.

I haven’t been experimenting too much this past week, as I had some of my wisdom teeth taken out on Monday. So my diet was mostly pudding and yoghurt, oatmeal, savory oatmeal (I was desperate for something not-sweet, and had seen the idea floating around. It...was okay, but definitely not something I’m trying again), and, for dinner, a terrible bread soaked in a crappy chicken cream soup from a can. For three nights in a row.

I did try something new for dinner last night the night before last AND THIS IS WHY I SHOULD STOP TAKING MORE THAN ONE DAY TO WRITE AN ENTRY. Cough, anyways. Weirdly enough, despite the many days of said crappy soup, I was actually craving soup last that night. After a bit of poking around the internet, I came across this Creamy White Bean & Ham Tortellini Soup. I ended up making a few substitutions, since we didn’t have every on hand. Mainly, I put in garbanzo beans instead of canneli beans (whatever that is), sliced up a few pieces of deli ham instead of ham chunks, and put in about half a box of bowtie noodles at the same time I put in the ham, beans, etc. instead of the tortellini (which were to be put in at a later point). It was very, very good, and lasted us about two days.

Today, I ended up making soup yet again, because I think we’re all coming down with something. (It took me until today to realize that, no, I wasn’t unusually thirsty, it was that my throat was mildly sore. /headdesk) So I turned to the list of soups I’d drawn up the other day, and settled on Winter Vegetable Chicken Noodle Soup. Again, I made changes. Mostly, I left out the leeks and swiss chard, since we had neither on hand, and used ginger powder instead of fresh ginger. (Actually, I used dried versions of all the spices, because the only time we have fresh herbs on hand is during the summer.)

I also took inspiration from the bread she made too, only I used rolls we had on hand and some mozzarella cheese my mom got from work around Christmas, cooked it in the oven for a few minutes, and then broiled it. The end result was...very, very filling, but definitely good. We’ll be eating from it again tomorrow! Though, I had a bit of a headdesk moment when I realized that because of this, I’ll have had eaten soup for dinner for a week straight.

Finally! I still had the leftover maraschino liquid in the fridge, and had no idea what to do with it. So, a few days back, I turned to Pinterest for ideas, and… ended up with a list of really yummy-looking mixed drinks.

I didn’t make any of them right away, though, because most needed us to buy at least one or two extra things to make. But after dinner tonight I was thinking back to the one recipe where, as far as I could recall, we didn’t need to buy anything new to try it, so I went for it. It was a Cherry Whiskey Smash, and I… completely forgot that it needed a ginger brandy. /headdesk

I mean, I was already intending to just make a simple ginger syrup to replace it, since I don’t really like buying alcohol that I’m not sure I’m going to drink, but we didn’t have fresh ginger. So, I ended up making it without it. I also used Sprite instead of Cherry Coke, because I really, really hate cola. (I did make a version with cola for my mom; she claims it tastes better with. Do with that knowledge what you will.) In any case, I think it turned out very good.

Oh, and one more thing. We have quite a few clementines/mandarins/some sort of orange-y fruit laying around that aren’t being eaten because they taste a bit too-sour. So I’ve been thinking about maybe making something with them instead? Except, I hate orange muffins, and my entire family (including myself) think that pairing fruit with meat (or any other kind of savory dish) is basically an abomination, so… I’m not sure what to do with them?

Poking around Pinterest didn’t help too much, for once. These Clementine Sugar Cookies, and, okay, while it doesn’t actually help our problem at all, these Candied Orange Peels do look yummy. I liked the idea of these Cranberry Orange Scones too, but they don’t really use much oranges at all. So— I’m not sure if anyone on my flist actually bakes/cooks regularly, but in case any of you do— any suggestions?