Meatless Monday

So for Meatless Monday this week I made a portobello, broccoli and red pepper open-faced sandwich.  OH MY GOODNESS WAS IT EVER DELICIOUS!!!  I got the recipe from my favourite criminal, Martha Stewart.  I never realised that she has some absolutely delicious recipes on her website and in her monthly publication of "Everyday Food."  Needless to say, I am a little bit impressed.  I was curious at the cost per serving (one serving being one open-faced sandwich) and it worked out to about $2.55 a serving! Hello ridiculous! Thats cheaper than the cheapest sub at subway...not to mention ten times more delicious! I started out by cutting the broccoli, portobello mushrooms and red peppers. 

 I tossed the broccoli with safflower oil (Dr. Oz says that safflower oil has the potential to cut belly fat, so hey I'll give it a shot) and salt & pepper.  I then put the broccoli under the broiler for 4 minutes.

I then added the portobello mushrooms and red peppers with the broccoli and let the veggies cook under the broiler for 9 minutes. I tossed them twice as they were cooking and the veggies turned out perfectly!

This is how the veggies looked when they came out of the oven....om nom nom!

I 'painted' two thick slices of bread with mayonaise that I had mixed garlic (YUM) into.

The assembly process begins!

I added gouda cheese on top of the open-faced sandwiches and then put it under the broiler for 2 minutes, which was the perfect amount of time because any longer and it would have been absolutely charred.

Absolutely delicious! Soo good!

Stay tuned for Meatless Monday next week! I'm thinking burritos...be excited!!! Cheers for now.

Under the Hawthorn Tree

This book was definitely a trip.  Firstly, I'm glad Miss Heather put it on her reading list.  From first glace this book is very unassuming.  Just a picture of a young girl and boy running near a hawthorn tree.  Luckily I'm not one to judge a book by it's cover because this book is quite the little gem.  It made me thankful for being born when and where I was.  Being born in Canada has made me so fortunate and blessed, which I lose sight of from time to time.  I've never had to work overly long hours for pennies and I haven't really had to worry about anything in life besides my grades when I was in school.  I will admit that I have been very fortunate.

The book takes place in communist China in the early 1970s right after the cultural revolution, or as I like to call it the cultural devolution.  During that time people were very weary of the labels which they could potentially be given as a result of mear speculation or if someone with influence didn't like him or her.  Class labels were important and it was frowned upon for people to be interacting with people in a lower class.  To me this seems absolutely ridiculous, but it is important to not that this actually happened in China.

The young girl "Jinqui" (is that the spelling?) is such an inspiration.  During her summers she would work as a temporary worker doing hard labour in order to support her family.  The majority of people I know have had a cushy life without any sort of hardship.  Everyone I know was born into a life of priveledge compared to this girl.  No one has ever had to wonder were their next meal was going to come from, or what they were going to cover themselves with if it rained since they had no roof over their heads.  This book indeed put things into perspective for me.

At the end of the book I was left with the impression that this book was actually a completely true story because of the fact that the author used a pseudonym.  A pseudonym, according to wikipedia, "is a name that a person or group assumes for a particular purpose, which differs from his or her original or true name." The fact that the author uses a pen name adds to the intrigue of the story. 

There were points of the book that added to my cynicism of men (do not even get me started).  Yet, by the end of the book I had a renewed sense that everything happens for a reason, even if it isn't easy.  This book was a bit slow at times, and a bit hard to follow with the non-western names, but I think if the characters did have western names it would have taken away from some of the charm of the book.  An emotional roller coaster, but one which I think I needed in order to realise what actually matters in life. With so many different intricacies and multiple layers to the plot, I would definitely reccomend this book to anyone looking for a renewed appreciation of their life.

Through my research, I discovered that this book was actually turned into a movie in 2010.  I am going to try and find it this weekend! I'll keep you posted :)

My attempt at pizza pockets

So every now and then I'll get these ridiculous ideas where I think it is a good idea to do something that has already been perfected by someone else.  Last night I decided I would make homemade pizza pockets.  It was just one of those days and I figured making homemade pizza pockets would be an excellent way to forget about the day.  I made the dough and the sauce.  Of course I took pictures!

I added all of the dry ingredients. Smelt pretty good because the recipe called for onion and garlic powder!

And the mixing begins...If only I had a kitchenAide stand mixer...

I think I over-mixed the dough. I tried to leave it alone for a bit to see if that would help at all.

Intruder? No, that's just my Doris. She gets really chatty when I'm in the kitchen. I think it has something to do with the fact that I'm not paying complete attention to her - only child syndrome, clearly.

The pizza sauce! Consists of tomato paste, garlic, parsley and oregano. I added just under a cup of water to it because it was super thick.

Diced green peppers waiting to be sautéed with mushrooms.

Mushrooms and green peppers in the skillet with a little bit of extra virgin olive oil.

Doris makes another appearance in the kitchen craving some attention from yours truly.

The redneck in me made an appearance.  I don't have a rolling pin, so I used a finished bottle of wine and covered it in flour so that the dough didn't stick to the bottle.

The assembly process beings! I cut off a portion of the dough (I don't think I rolled it out thin enough) and then I put some of the homemade sauce on it. I stuffed it with salami (couldn't find pepperoni), the green peppers and mushrooms AND of course cheese!

Baked them in an oven at 450 for 10 minutes and this is the end result.

I must say that I was kind of disappointed with these pizza pockets.  The sauce ended up being a little bland, the dough was wayy too thick and I'm pretty sure I overworked it. Next time I'll try using different flour since this time I used a wheat/white flour blend. I think I'll add more spices to the pizza sauce in order to combat that blandness.

What an adventure!

A book I cannot get through...

Every once in awhile I come across a book that I simply cannot force my self to finish.  The most recent culprit of this atrocity is "Room" written by Emma Donoghue.  I picked up this book because I noticed that it had won a plethora of awards, plus it was on Heather's List!  Usually Heather picks really great books, but alas this one to me was an utter dud!  

The book is told from the point-of-view of a young boy, which I think is where the problem of the book lays.  Since the narrator is five years old, the grammar matches.  I understand that the poor grammar was done on purpose by the author, but I couldn't wrap my head around it.  I think I would have liked the book (and maybe would have even finished it) if it were told from the perspective of the mother or if the narrator was omniscient.  

The story takes place in a room (what a witty title eh?!?) and it chronicles the life of the young boy and his mother in this room.  The boy and his mother are being held by a man, why?  I have no idea.  From what I read it was very confusing and every time I pick it up I just get angry.  This book is definitely a book that I will never finish!

The one thing that I do like about this book are the pages.  My copy of the book has this awesome vintage-looking pages. 

Black Bean Burritos

Being as it is "Meatless Monday" I decided to make meatless burritos for dinner!

The ingredients of the burritos are as follows:

• half a sweet onion
• one diced red pepper
• one can of black beans
• two cloves of garlic
• half a brick of cream cheese
• two teaspoons of dried cilantro

And of course because I'm excited about this blog thing, I took pictures as I was cooking!

Step One: chop onions and red peppers

Step Two: place chopped onions and red peppers into hot skillet.

Step Three: Add black beans after onions and peppers have cooked for five minutes.

Step Four: Add garlic to the black beans! (YUM GARLIC)

Step Five: Stir in cream cheese....the flash then died on my blackberry so now everything has this lovely yellow hue. 

Step Six: Fill burrito shells.

Step Seven: Stir in cilantro.

Step Eight: ENJOY!!!

The burritos were pretty darn good, but they needed some Jalapeño peppers for some kick! Definitely my fault for overlooking that in the recipe. I declare Meatless Monday a success!!!

Hello!

Hello hello!

My first post! Quite exciting, I know!  I plan on chronicling my cooking and reading adventures as well as fun things from everyday life!  I've been meaning to start a blog for a long time, but I just kept brushing it aside!  I was inspired today so I decided to put pen to paper (or fingers to keys?) and get'er done! Hopefully it isn't too complicated! *fingers crossed*


...stay tuned!