The origin story of this recipe is super weird, which one of my favorite sources for recipes. Basically, I have a friend who got this gag gift of a can of kidney beans for a Secret Santa exchange. Turns out he doesn’t actually cook or particularly like kidney beans, so he bequeathed the beans to me, with the promise that I will make him something tasty with them. One joke about kidney bean ice cream later, and here we are…
Strawberry Pineapple Mocktail
Round 2 of raiding my parents’ kitchen. Now that I know my mom is not doing alcohol at the moment, I went with a mocktail so that she could enjoy it too! She loves fruity drinks and everyone loves pretty drinks, so I went very tropical on this one.
Sambhar Shrimp (with Mujaddara and Curried Chickpeas)
This recipe springs from a lovely gift of Parsi Sambhar Masala from an Indian friend and fellow foodie.
Sambhar Masala is a spice blend from southern India composed of chili, coriander, fenugreek, mustard, cumin, fennel, curry leaves, cloves, and (in this case) mango powder. I had never used or eaten it before, so I decided to start easy and marinate shrimp in it before giving them a quick saute. To accompany it, I tried a new recipe, Curried Chickpeas from Joan’s on Third’s on Food52, and added my favorite Mujaddara with Spiced Yogurt (rice, lentils, and caramelized onions) recipe from Rivka on Food52. Even though Mujaddara is technically Middle Eastern, not Indian, Indian food often features rice and lentils, and doesn’t multiculturalism make everything richer?
To the full post!
Check out my Tips and Tricks page!
Now with more tips and tricks!
Hi guys! Thanks for reading my blog. I hope you’re finding it helpful so far. I’ve just added a bunch of new items to my tips and tricks that I’m really excited about. Check them out and let me know if you have any questions!
❤ Risa
Butternut Squash and Broccoli Pizza
Guys, I have a confession…
When I was a kid, I hated pizza. I’m not sure why. Maybe it was the strong spices in the delivery tomato sauce. Maybe it was that I was slightly lactose intolerant. Maybe I just liked being difficult… At any rate, I was the bane of kids’ birthday parties for a long time, until I hit college and realized that pizza is the most reliable source of free food – one of my favorite things! Since then, I have learned that pizza is much more diverse than the simple red sauce-mozzarella-pepperoni slices you find in dorms. In Italy, pizza is really all about the crust, with a light swirl of fresh tomato sauce and cheese. But in the US, pizza toppings run the gamut and really offer an opportunity for creativity, for taking advantage of local and in-season ingredients, and for using up odds and ends left over in the fridge (my favorite). I have come to appreciate pizza in many of its forms, although I still won’t eat it cold, and I think warm pineapple is weird. What can I say? I’m still a work in progress!
Tart Cherry Gin Fizz
Cocktail time! Please check out my Cocktails – thoughts post for some background on why I’m so into cocktail making. The way this recipe came about is that I was visiting my parents for the weekend and I felt like taking advantage of their pretty well-stocked bar and kitchen. My mom and I have a running joke that we should have a “signature cocktail” for every dinner gathering at their house, even though the gathering usually consists of me, my mom, and my dad, who doesn’t want anything to do with our signature cocktail tradition anyway. On top of that, my mom was doing a “dry month” as part of a New Year’s resolution, so the party consisted of JUST ME. But that’s FINE, because the great thing about cocktails is that you can make one at a time!
Cocktails – thoughts
I’ve gotten pretty into making cocktails in the last year, since my dad got me a shaker set for Christmas, and since cocktails at bars and restaurants are so ridiculously expensive. Plus, I have this vision of myself hosting 1920s-themed parties with my friends in fancy dress and the bar cart close to hand. The fact that we absolutely will not all fit in my 150 sq ft kitchen/living room is just part of the charm.
As an opportunity for courage in the kitchen, cocktails seem like a relatively easy avenue, because they follow two of my tenets for recipe creation: CONFINE and RATIOS. There are relatively few available ingredients – most drinks are composed of hard alcohol, liquors, juices, sugars, and sodas (I have no idea how dairy and eggs might be incorporated, although I recognize this is a thing. Definitely a challenge for later in the year). I’m hoping that if I stick within this narrow range of ingredients and follow general advice on the basic ratios, I won’t steer far wrong. That said, my familiarity with many of the ingredients is much lower than for other dishes, so my ability to guess what will go together is limited. Luckily, there are (almost) no “raw” cocktail ingredients, so tasting along the way is totally possible (if you have the constitution for it).
Things I’d like to learn about cocktail making:
What are bitters for?
What is the purpose of dairy or eggs?
How to guess how sweet or sour any particular ingredient is.
How to make a perfect twist of lemon peel.
Mission statement
Through this blog, I will use my working knowledge of the techniques of cooking, and all the accumulated knowledge of chefs and cooks before me, to give me the courage to generate my own recipes. As a scientist, I approach every new problem very methodically, so in preparation for this adventure I’ve come up with a few tenets of recipe creation (available here). These are guidelines based on my understanding of currently available recipes that I hope will help guide me towards success. I will start small, but by the end of one year I hope to be confidently taking risks and creating unique dishes that I am proud to share with all of you. Along the way, I will record my process – how I chose the dish, options for making it your own, tips and tricks, and the final product. I hope that my experience will give you the courage to take your own risks in the kitchen and share your creativity with the world. But remember, unlike with other recipe blogs, when you take risks in the kitchen, results are not guaranteed.
Phase 1. Gather the ingredients.
Welcome to my site! Please read my About Me page for details on the purpose of this site, but for now, know that I’m in process of getting everything together. Thank you for your patience and I hope you find it valuable in the future!
❤ Risa
Vegetarian Tomato Sauce (with Pasta)
Welcome to my first recipe attempt! Through the writing of this blog I hope to learn how to develop my own recipes (and inspire you to try it yourself!) based on my 5 tenets of recipe development.
I decided to start with a simple pasta and tomato sauce for the following reasons:
- I love pasta. A lot. And I make tomato sauce fairly often.
- Pasta is cheap and can be vegetarian or vegan (yay environment!)
- Tomato sauce follows one of my tenets (CONFINE) pretty well – if all you do is pour tomatoes into a pan and add salt, it will probably turn out ok. That’s an excellent foundation for creativity.
- The scariest part of cooking without a recipe is getting to the end and having produced something inedible, or just not great. For that reason, tasting along the way as much as possible will help mitigate some of these risks. Some recipes, such as tomato sauce for pasta, lend themselves to this more than others.
Results Not Guaranteed 