chicken artichoke package

wooh!
its been a long day! and its only ... 4:45 back in cali hah. but its 7:45 here and we just finished dinner. tonight i made thai green curry with tofu. i have never had this meal before in a restaurant, so i didnt know what i was making, which makes it harder to make, but apparently i pulled it off. although i should say, extra-firm tofu my ass, it fell all apart while i was cooking it. :/ anyway, next time i know what to do to make it better.

however, yesterday i remade the chicken artichoke crescents (really theyre little packages bc apparently i cant make a crescent shape out of this pre-cut pastry but whatever), and they were goo-ood! it was one of my first repeats that we were both craving! so i think its time for this one..

So the crescent pastries that you will later stuff with deliciousness, come in these air tight tubes. aaaaand ihatethem. hate. theyre like a jack-in-the-box for grown ups! every single time i have to open one, i end up almost dropping it and screaming a little bit. you have to unravel the paper on the outside and then at some point, without warning, it just POPs open in your hand!!  and then its open and you can make your food... but really, i hate the crescent tubes. in fact, i made dipak open the second one this time. and from now on until forever.

so the ingredients you will need are:

3 cans of the scary pillsbury crescent rolls (i ended up getting the low fat ones bc they were out of the regular, and they actually taste exactly the same! and i am definitely one to always pick the fattier thing first, but really, these ones tasted the same. so why not :) )
1 packet of ground chicken (something that im sure seasoned chefs already know, but if you buy the chicken with more fat, it tastes so much better :/ this time, i got the one that was 98% fat free and it still turned out just fine... but i really wish id gotten the fattier one)
1/2 an onion (diced) 
1 tsp garlic (minced) 
1 tbsp olive oil
1/2 of a red bell pepper (or more if you like it to be a little bit sweeter)
18oz of marinated artichoke hearts (i have found the Vigo brand to be very tasty! i get 2 tiny 6oz jars- also youll want to dice these up too. its an oily mess, but its worth it!)
2/3 tsp garlic salt
1/2 tsp chili powder
1/2 tsp turmeric 
1/2 cup mozzarella (shredded)
salt and pepper to taste

start off by preheating your oven to 375 degrees :)

so you begin, the way i seem to begin everything i cook these days, heat your olive oil over medium heat, and then throw in your onions and garlic. let them simmer for a few minutes, moving them around so theres no burning. when theyre slightly browning and "aromatic" (still cracks me up.. it really doesnt have to be that technical) .. so when they smell good lol, throw in your ground chicken. now, i like working with ground chicken bc i dont actually HAVE TO touch it. i know that the grown up, super cheffy way to do this is to put the ground chicken in a bowl, pour all the spices on it and smoosh it all together with my hands.. but imagining raw chicken under my fingernails makes me want to become a vegan. (and if you know me, you know thats just ridiculous) so anyway, i just dump the chicken into my pan, and turn the heat down to med/low. i like to salt my chicken as soon as possible, so id sprinkle it all with salt and pepper right off the bat. then take your flat topped wooden spatula (assuming you have one lol) and start smooshing it all up. as it cooks, you will stop smooshing and youll just be breaking it apart.

one cool way that my second mom (dipaks mom) taught me to make my chicken break apart is to drown it in water, turn the heat up high, and just wait! its amazing. the water evaporates and the chicken is all broken up into beautiful tiny restaurant-perfect pieces! so you could do THAT, or you can just keep smooshin'!

then start throwing in your spices! your garlic salt, chili powder, and turmeric (which stains your life!! be careful not to get it on your clothes :/ ) smoosh, smoosh, smoosh! try and get the spices all over your chicken... (also, at this point im pretty sure some moms out there are reading this shaking their heads at me.. i know theres a more mature way to do this than to smoosh the hell out of your cooking chicken, but it turned out okay and i didnt have to bleach my hands after! so ...? lol HOWEVER, i am always open to new and better ideas! so comment away please!)

so now, if you have the low low fat chicken, you might need to drizzle a little olive oil over it again or even pour a splash of chicken stock into the pan. this will moisten your chicken... i think it keeps the flavors all together.. lol if that even means anything..

when the chicken is almost fully cooked, toss in your bell peppers and diced artichoke hearts :) mmmm!! i think these little jars of marinated artichoke hearts are my new favorite thing ever!

let this all cook together on med/low (more LOW tho) for about 5 minutes. then taste your chicken mix and see how much salt it needs at this point. then leave it on low, and "fold" in your cheese.

when all this is cooked together, take it off the fire and let it sit aside. itll warm up again in the oven, so dont worry if it cools off.

now for the "fun" part. :/
take the crescent rolls and pop them open. OH! make sure to keep them refrigerated until you want to use them! if theyre room temperature when you open them, the dough sticks all together and you can forget it. seriously. so when you open it, its a sheet of dough that has been pre-cut into little triangles. honestly the first time i made this, i had to google "how to roll a crescent roll" ... pathetic haha. but i had NO idea!! and they just assume you grew up eating this? or that youre not an idiot??-- wrong on both counts. :|

anyway, the triangle has one short side and two long sides.. jeez, apparently im not good at geometry either. anyway, take the short side and roll it towards the tip of the other long sides. hopefully that made sense, or youve done this before. if it didnt help, youtube it.

so i took each triangle of dough, and spooned a scoop of my chicken-asparagus mix and put it near the end of the short side of the triangle. then roll it, and fold the ends over until its a little package of dough and meat. this is just one of those things that you just need to do to see how to do it. its really easy. i cant roll a crescent and i could do it lol so youll be fine :)

place your packages of deliciosity onto a slightly greased baking sheet and pop them into your oven for 12 minutes. (or until the crescent dough is golden and a little browned on the top)

and this ones great bc for once, i can take my food out of the oven and NOT worry about it being undercooked :) bc we did all the cooking already! woo!

enjoy! and let me know if you try it out!!

9.5 vodka sauce!

i think its time to give out my vodka sauce recipe! i already emailed it to Natalia, who passed it to Negin, whos making it tonight :) :) which makes me so happy! so i figure i should put it up here too..

i never thought i could make a sauce properly. but it turned out better than i could have imagined! dipak in all his infamous wonder, gave it a 9.5! and since he refuses to give almost anything an actual 10, thats huge news haha.

so heres something so obvious, and yet i didnt think it was true.... food is named after its ingredients. lol .. the things that particularly confused me were things like "tequila chicken" or "vodka sauce". did you know that vodka sauce actually has VODKA in it??! i didnt! ... and it does. a whole cup! ...and tequila chicken has tequila too but this isnt about that.

also, you should know that this recipe makes a whole jar of sauce! if you dont have an empty jar sitting around, use tupperware. its totally worth saving! the ingredients are:

1/2 stick of butter
1 onion (diced)
1 tsp garlic (minced)
1 cup vodka (i bought this random vodka called 360, the bottle is so cute!)
1 giant can (28oz) crushed tomatoes (or two 14oz cans obviously lol)
1 pint heavy cream (you dont have to use the whole pint.. we'll get to that)
1/2 tsp dried oregano
1 full tsp dried basil
1 tsp red pepper flakes
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper (leave out the peppers if you dont like spice)
2 tsp sugar
salt to taste

find a big skillet that is deeper than your other skillets ... put the heat on medium and throw in your butter. move it around until it gets melty, then throw in your onions and garlic ... is it just me or do i start all my recipes like that? - anyway, when the onions get slightly brown, pour in your cup of vodka! let it cook on medium heat for 10 minutes!

when your alcohol has cooked for 10 minutes solid, pour in your big can of tomatoes, and all your spices now. stir it all around and mix everything together properly, and then let it cook on med/low for 20 minutes. stir it around every few minutes so that the bottom doesnt burn.

honestly, at this point you COULD totally stop and youd have awesome marinara! in fact i think ill do that next time and jar that too! taste it at this point and see how much salt it needs. however, continuing on to the next step will create the vodka sauce!

after that, you can decide how much cream you want to use! i used about 3/4 of the pint.. but then your sauce will be thick when its all finished and cooled off a little. (thats another thing i learned, when sauce cools, it becomes thicker. these things seem super obvious, but i had no idea until i did it myself) if you like your sauce more soupy, then you can use all your cream. the first time i made it, i poured the cream until the sauce became the orange color i wanted.. then i stopped. so you choose how orange you want your sauce :)

when you pour your cream in, cook the sauce for another 10 minutes on low heat, stirring occasionally.  and then pour it over your cooked pasta! suuuuper good!

when i made my vodka sauce pasta meal, i also took a handful of cheese and tossed it into the sauce at the end, with chopped up andouille sausage! it was amazing!! the cheese made the sauce even more chunky, but it was still awesome. and in this photo, i wanted to have garlic bread, but we only had naan, so its pasta, vodka sauce and garlic naan lol

my SOMETHING banana bread!!

this will probably be my shortest entry ever bc im so excited to tell you the recipe that i dont feel like gibber jabbering for an hour.. for once lol :)

i wanted to save this for later, but im too excited! last night i made banana bread, and it turned out SOOO good!!! i think its my favorite thing ive made so far! maybe im getting ahead of myself.... but this might be my "something"!! :D (to get that, youd have to read my very first blog entry lol)

so i attempted to make this bread a couple times.. buying a few too many bananas, waiting for them to become "very ripe" but then the first couple times i ended up throwing them out bc i waited too long and they just became "very gross" hah. but this time i waited just enough! (there was still a little yellow at the top and bottom of the bananas, but the middles were all spotted with brown.)

i bought apple sauce for the recipe and realized it was the first time id ever bought apple sauce.. its just not something my sister an i have ever liked to snack on as kids. and i dont think my mom has ever used it in recipes before..  i think its kind of cool to buy something for the first time.. that you know youll use forever.. bc then when you have kids, and they're buying it for their first time, they'll be like "oh get this one, its the one my mom gets" :) i think thats pretty awesome. to be able to set traditions (no matter how small) :) haha maybe im a little cheesy lol i like it.

anyway! here we go with the recipe. the magical ingredients are:

3/4 stick of butter (i used unsalted this time- but only bc it was the only one i had)
1 cup of sugar
2 large eggs
3 very ripe bananas
1/2 cup of unsweetened apple sauce (smooth, not chunky)
almost 1 tsp vanilla extract (i tend to skimp on the vanilla bc i think it takes over)
1 tsp cinnamon (make it a full tsp)
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
2 1/4 cups of flour
(also some people like walnuts in their banana bread... i tend to eat around them lol so now that i have control, im ditching the walnuts!)

preheat your oven to 300 degrees to begin with :)

melt down your butter and add it to your sugar. whisk together here very well! add your eggs, one at a time. whisk well again.

then in a separate bowl, mash your peeled very-ripe-bananas with a big fork. try to get them as smooth as possible! do all the mashing in this bowl, bc once you transfer the banana's to the other bowl, it will be harder to find lumps and mash them without making a mess. (i JUST made this mistake, and it was quite annoying.) so then once your bananas are all mashed up, add your apple sauce! mix them together well. the apple sauce makes the cake really moist! other recipes call for sour cream, which also makes cakes super moist... but i figured with banana bread, i should try something less fattening than sour cream.

then take your banana/apple sauce mixture, and pour it in with your butter/sugar/egg mix. whisk together. to this bowl, add your vanilla and cinnamon. then pour in your flour, salt and baking sodas/powders. so ideally, you should mix your flour, salt and baking powders and baking soda together separately.. and THEN pour it into the wet mixture. however, im lazy so i just dump everything in together and it seems to --- wait... maybe THATS why i have so much trouble with my baking. :/ anyway.. whatever, this one turned out great!

so now youve mixed all your ingredients together. pour your batter into your pan (i used a meatloaf pan... it was the size i wanted, so i got one of those disposable ones from Publix for like 2 bucks) dont forget to grease your pan, and then pour in your batter. then stick it in the oven for at least an hour! after an hour, i would check on it every 10 minutes until my baking-stick came out of my banana bread all clean. for my oven, this time, it took about an hour and a half. a bit long :/ but worth it!!

its so good!! im obsessed! its so soft and sweet and yum!! if you try this recipe out, let me know :) i cant wait to hear how much other people like it too!! <3

matar paneer = peas and cheese :)

enough people have been asking about indian food, so todays the day :) hah.. i wonder if anyones even reading this lol
anyway, at first i was VERY intimidated by the thought of making indian food. very. and when dipak moved to florida initially, my second mom (dipaks mom) helped him move and set us up with all the spices that are fundamental in indian cooking! which is so helpful.. especially considering it took me a month to find the indian store... which ended up being down the street :| however, she has way too much faith in me and put the spices in these cute little unmarked jars. they look adorable! however... it took me a session with google, and dipak sitting next to me to figure out what was in them. i was too embarrassed to call her and ask "whats the yellow one? okay... and whats the less yellow one?" haha so NOW i finally know what i have... in hindsight, i shouldve just called her a month ago.

anyway, i think ive figured out one of the secrets to amateur indian cooking.. if i use 4 specific spices in my cooking, dipak likes it! those are: turmeric, chili powder, garam masala (which i bought like 5 pounds of and keep in a giant tupperware in my spice cabinet) and cumin powder/seeds. im pretty sure if you put those spices in equal parts on anything, itll taste indian. it seems simple enough, but i am literally stoked out of my mind at figuring this out!

So i always begin a new dish by looking up a recipe. i go to google, and type in "simple _____ " and then tweak the recipe to taste better while im making it. at first though, i was too scared to even deviate from the written recipe by 1/4 of a tsp! so everything took longer.. and ended up being a little weird.

i realized its almost impossible to perfectly duplicate someone elses food from just a written recipe. the only recipes that turned out perfectly when i didnt try to make it my own, was Alton Browns'! and thats bc i watched it on youtube :) which i  HIGHLY recommend!!

anyway, i googled simple matar paneer and got a dish that had a bajillion steps to it and had about 6 ingredients that i didnt possess at that time. so i changed it.

the ingredients that i used are:

2 tbsp olive oil
1 onion (diced)
1 heaping tsp garlic (minced)
1/4 tsp ginger powder
1 tsp chili powder
1 tsp cumin powder or seeds
1 tsp garam masala
1 tsp turmeric
2-3 tbsp of tomato paste
water
1 tbsp ketchup
1 packet of paneer (cubed)
1/4 cup of peas (but i substituted peas for edamame)
a splash of cream, half & half, or whole milk

take a big skillet/pan (what is the difference between a skillet and a pan???) and put the heat on medium. heat up your olive oil, and throw in your onions and garlic. hit it with a little salt. (apparently the salt brings out the flavors).. saute the onions and garlic for about one minute on medium, and then turn the heat down to med/low and add all of your spices. stir around, and let the onions absorb the spices (about 1 minute) and get "aromatic" haha, then turn the heat to low.

separately, take your tomato paste and combine it with one tbsp of water at a time. stir stir stir until the tomato paste has the soupy consistency you want... i like it to be like the consistency of a thick tomato soup! during this step, you can add as much or as little tomato paste as you want! if you want extra sauce, then use a lot! if you want less sauce.... use less- you get it lol. you'll see, while youre doing this step, how much the paste turns into when you mix it with water. then you can decide :)

take that tomato-soupy-love that you just made, and add it to your onion-spice skillet. mix it all together and then add your ketchup. (i think thats in lieu of sugar. but it was in the original recipe and i dont know why i didnt change it.. but it tasted good, so now its in the recipe forever! lol) so add your ketchup, and then throw in your paneer! fold it into the sauce you made (i find that if im too rough when im mixing the paneer, that i crumble the edges of it.. so "FOLD", dont just stir, willy nilly)

when its all folded together nicely, spill in a little cream. id say maybe... 3 tbsp's? just however much you want until the color is the way you want it. -i seem to judge my food by its color... seems to work :).. also, at this point, taste your sauce. if its not.... flavorful enough, go ahead and add another teaspoon of garam masala and re-fold. (also garal masala is VERY powerful. i think if youre not used to eating indian food, the food must be very flavorful at this point, but dipak is a veteran and needs a LOT of spice in his life lol.. so i tend to over-flavor things- for him i add extra chili powder AND garam masala)

so then, i took my edamame (which should be peas) and microwaved it for about a minute, until i knew it was fully cooked through and not frozen anymore. I then turned the heat up to medium on my paneer skillet, and added my veggie. (traditionally, this meal is made with peas.. but dipak doesnt like peas. he really likes edamame, so i took a chance and subbed it in. he loved it! :D) anyway, cook it on medium for another few minutes and then serve with either naan or rice!

i prefer naan.. i buy it from the store (i have yet to make any kind of bread... although tonight im going to try making banana bread! which isnt the same lol but ill let you know how it goes) so i buy it from the store, turn the oven to 375, put butter and minced garlic on the naan, and bake it for about 8 minutes. its my favorite part of every meal! :)

enjoy!! and let me know if you make it and what your experience was! <3

OH cool! i just figured out how to make my pictures bigger! lol - it takes me a while, but eventually i learn things haha

apples in a tub

so my least favorite thing to do is think of what to make for dinner. i know thats cliche, but now i understand why the cliche exists. youd think, hey, when you start cooking, you can have whatever you want every night! - not really... i have stopped craving anything since ive been here. i miss california :/ plus i cant make dipak have taco bell every night! for one, its so bad for you blah blah blah and for another, we're not 18 anymore.

anyway, i decided there is no solution to this problem ever. not only can we never think of anything to make, once we do think of something amazing and new, im too intimidated by the recipe to make it or its too expensive - speaking of which! i found this recipe for a less fattening fettucini alfredo. and pretty much anything in an alfredo sauce is my favorite! so i thought yay, lets do this. so i went to the grocery store (which in florida is called Publix! lol i love finding stores that are totally normal in one place that just dont exist in another :) i just love it for some reason hahaha.. anyway i went to Publix and yknow what, cheese in the fancy part of the store is EXPENSIVE!!!! the recipe says i have to use "fresh parmigiano-reggiano".. which is about 12 dollars for a measly little wedge. id end up spending like 30 dollars for all the ingredients! :( so that recipe will have to wait until i find a job :/ i cant bring myself to buy 12 dollar cheese yet.

back to the prupose of this blog: today ill write about a desert! ive never really had much of a sweet tooth, but dipak does! :) it comes in handy when i need a taste tester.. his favorites are the chocolate lava gooy ones hah and MY favorite desserts are the ones no one wants to order: key lime pie, carrot cake, cheese cake (plain), apple tart... the ones that i feel like no one wants at a restaurant lol. anyway, i decided my first dessert would be something id actually eat. i made mini apple pies! they SOUND difficult.. at least they did to me. but theyre probably the easiest, most impossible to mess up dessert ive made so far.

the ingredients are:

2 apples (i get the red/yellow ones. theyre crispy and a little sweet)
2 packages of pillsbury pie crusts (you really just need one and a half but yknow.. they frown upon splitting packaged materials in the grocery store)
2 tbsp flour (heaping)
2.5 tbsp sugar (heaping)
1 tbsp brown sugar (heaping)
1 tbsp cinnamon (heaping)
2 tbsp butter

Also i never mentioned, but most of my recipes are perfect for about 3 people. i cook for me and dipak and tomorrow's lunch. and most of my desserts make 12 cupcakes or one 9" cake pan. just fyi :)

begin by preheating your oven to 400 degrees! (400 takes MY oven all freakin morning!)

use a peeler to peel the skin off the apples.. i dont like the texture of the skin when its been cooked :/ i have texture issues lol. so peel 2 apples and cut them up into little cubes. i try to make little half inch cubes. (with two apples you will have a little left over... i still dont know exactly what to do with the left over.. so MAYBE take 1/2 an apple and just save it for the end. if you come up short at the end, THEN cut it up.)

anyway, 1/2 inch cubes of apple. put them in a bowl. dump in your flour, sugar, brown sugar and cinnamon. then use two spoons to mix it all around and try to evenly coat all the apples. i dont really care if one little pie has more cinnamon or sugar than the other.. they all taste awesome anyway :)

then unwrap your pie crusts and unroll them. i have a cutting board that i only use for bread, or dough, so i unroll the crust on that.. then the recipe i looked up initially, says use a cookie cutter to cut circles in the dough that are big enough to fit in the muffin pan with a little hanging out the top. does that make sense? like make little tubs of dough for the apples to eventually sit in ... :) cute.

i didnt have a cookie cutter.. i still dont. BUT i do have an unopened can of Planters Almonds.. so i took the top of it, washed it, and used that. its a perfect fit for me! so line your muffin pan with your dough circles. and then scoop your dusted apples and spoon them into their tubs! fill each cup until the apples are making a mound thats a little taller than the cup. the apples shrink up a little when they cook. when youre done filling the apple-tubs, take your butter and cut it into little cubes and place one small cube on top of each mound of apple.

then use the scraps from your pie crusts and make little lids for each apple cup. you can make little designs, or just slash at the dough.. i dont really care what the lids look like. you can tho! have fun with that :) ..at the very end, i take a tiny bit of butter and melt it down in the microwave, then use a brush (or your finger.. bc i dont have a brush) and put a little melted butter on top of each lid so that it'll turn golden in the oven :)

bake these little bad-boys for about 18 minutes! theyre amazing!! dipak loves having one with a little scoop of vanilla ice cream! and you can store them in air-tight tupperwear, and reheat them in the microwave for like "13 seconds" says dipak. haha

enjoy! let me know if you try this out! its one of his and my favorites!!

Stuffed Chicken :)

First things first: HAPPY BIRTHDAY YAS YAS!! love you lil' cuz!! :)
back to business lol ...

Now, at the request of my gorgeous friend Dolly, todays blog will be about this random dish i made up that i just call stuffed chicken. which is what it is.. but i think i need to think of more creative names lol. any suggestions will be taken into serious consideration!

so this meal was inspired by hours of watching cook shows one afternoon when i first got here (which is a habit i got from my little sister, whos been watching cooking shows since she was 7- so thanks nils, love you!) i was watching the woman with the white-blond crazy hair and the mismatched socks (Ann something), and she made chicken stuffed with livers and goat cheese. as you can imagine, i sat with my grossed out face thinking "blekh who would eat that" (yes. i have the taste of a child) but then i thought.. i could still stuff the chicken with things that dipak and i would eat! and thus, my stuffed chicken was born of grossness.

i should also mention that raw chicken may as well be .....im going to look up a poison..... Boric Acid. when i touch it i feel like im going to get salmonella in 5 seconds unless i wash my hands.

anyway, i decided to stuff my chicken breasts with spinach, bacon and gorgonzola... normally i dont eat gorgonzola :/ its also too fancy for me. but one time i had this gorgonzola pasta.. it was all melty an yum, so i thought, maybe when its cooked ill like it. i kinda didnt actually. but dipak loved it! so i think, again, it was a case of my childish taste.

the ingredients i used are:

3 chicken breasts 
Extra virgin olive oil
1 tsp minced garlic (i used a heaping tsp! i looove me some garlic)
1/2 lemon (youll juice it later)
salt and pepper (just keep them on hand for sprinkles here and there)
and i dont know if this is allowed but... i use 1 tbsp of bacon bits (no judging!) just get the ones that are made of real bacon, and not the crispy weird ones that are definitely made of gravel -OR if thats unacceptable, of course you could use 1 bacon strip cut up into tiny pieces, or MINCED, but i just dont like buying real bacon. its part of that restaurant magic i dont like to mess with.
almost 1/4 cup of chicken stock (basically a splash of it)
gorgonzola crumbles (however much makes you happy- or you can replace this with any other cheese too. next time i wanna try mozzarella)

preheat your oven to 375 degrees. while its heating up, put a skillet that can fit all three chicken pieces in it on the stove and put the heat to medium low. Add your olive oil and minced garlic. when its hot and "aromatic" (which means it smells good i think lol.. another cooking term i see everywhere) then add your spinach. something that trips me out about spinach is that when you put it on the stove, it looks like youre using way too much.. but then as soon as it cooks a little, it shrinks up sooo small! so fill up your pan with spinach.. like until you think its ridiculous. when the spinach begins to wilt, add your chicken stock. (after it begins to properly wilt, turn the heat to LOW)

Let it heat up a little and then add a squeeze of lemon, salt, pepper and your bacon bits. (((if youre using real bacon, id cut it into little pieces before and sear it in the pan FIRST and then use the grease that comes off it to cook your garlic in... does that make sense?? i hope so :/))) Stir this all together until your spinach is very wilted. and btw, i usually super dislike anything healthy, but this spinach is gooOood! in fact id eat it without the chicken! :) and if you know me, thats saying something.

MEANWHILE, over to the chicken:  rinse your chicken and pat dry.. cut slits in the breast across the long side of the chicken.

back to the spinach: at the very end, throw in your cheese crumbles. stir them around for a couple minutes (turning the heat up to a solid Medium)
back to chicken: now bring the two together, and take little handfuls of the spinach/cheese mix, and stuff it into the chicken where you cut it before. pack the chickens as full as you can! (this part is beyond gross to me. so i had to bust out the gloves for it. raw chicken, wilty spinach AND cheese i dont eat :{ i almost couldnt do it) anyway, stuff the chickens.

then re-oil the pan that had the spinach in it. place the chicken in the pan and "sear" it. (i think searing means heating up a skillet and putting the food in it...?) anyway, turn the heat up to med/high and put the chicken in the pan. sprinkle one side of the chicken with salt and  pepper. (be kinda generous with the salt.. its more necessary than i ever thought when it comes to flavoring the chicken), then turn it over and sprinkle the other side the same. when the chicken looks brown on one side, flip it, and sear the other side. (this wont cook the chickens all the way through, but thats okay. we're getting to that :))

When both sides are brown and beautiful, take the chickens and place them on a cooking sheet (ALSO! cover the cooking sheet with aluminum foil before using it, it makes clean-up unbelievably easier!! so much easier that this extra step is worth doing!) put the chickens on the sheet and put them in the oven for 16-18 minutes.

i do not know how to check if chicken is done and im scared of the oven heat, so i very ungracefully take a huge long knife and hack an edge off from in the oven and look at it really closely and then eat it hah. its usually too hard to cut the chicken from so far away if its not cooked and tender- i havent poisoned myself yet lol

and ENJOY!!! :) dipak reeeally liked this one! he ate one and a half.. chickens! ... i was about to say breasts lol but i caught myself hahaha... humor of a child too :) loll

let me know if you try it! :) and how it turned out!

Corn bread!!!

Hello again :) this is kind of exciting! lol- also! i realized what i wanted to say with the title of my blog. you cant learn to do things in your brain and then say you know how... what i mean is, you cant read everything about cooking and then know how to cook. you have to cook to learn. and thats what im doing! cooking to learn!... to cook. lol

aaand ive been cooking for about a month now. at the beginning of the month i was content making food that didnt poison us. now i want a little more...

at first.. and still actually, when im looking for a recipe, i look for the MOST simple recipe possible. unless its like my favorite thing on earth, then ill go through the trouble. otherwise, forget it. the thing that intimidates me still is scanning the ingredients and seeing something ive never heard of before! and that happens to me.... um.... on a daily basis lol. corn starch? what is that? shortening?? i was looking for it next to the sugar. i dont know the difference between parsley and cilantro.. still dont. OR if i see directions that i dont understand.. i didnt know what "mincing" was. i do now. it means cut it up real small! lol - i wish theyd just say that! or "poach"- i still dont really know what that means.. im pretty sure it means boil. ? i dunno. im still learning.

anyway, the first thing i made with JUST ingredients was corn bread! it made me SO happy that it turned out the right color lol..  so, i want to tell you how to make it. its super easy and SO good with butter :) :)

the ingredients are:

1/2 stick of butter (salted i think- i still dont know how different they make the food ?)
2/3 cup of sugar (then i add 2 more tbsp at the end)
2 eggs
1 cup buttermilk (which is curdled milk btw!! i didnt know. and yes. its gross. but trust me)
1/2 tsp baking soda (apparently, even tho it looks inedible its not. in small doses. i still dont know why this is different than baking powder? but for now, whatever.)
1 and 1/4 cups cornmeal (i got the finely ground meal.. there are different kinds, i guess it depends on how grainy you like your corn bread.. i dont like grainy)
1 cup all purpose flour (and from now on ill just say "flour" and if the purpose of it isnt "all" THEN ill specify.. otherwise i dont get the point)
1/2 tsp salt

so first, our oven takes approximately 78 minutes to heat up to a usable temperature lol.. so BEGIN by preheating the oven to 375.

put your stick of butter in a glass bowl and put it in the microwave for like 15 seconds.. or until its soupy but dont nuke it! pour your melted butter into your mixing bowl and mix in the sugar. whisk together quickly then add your eggs. BEAT WELL! at this point i feel like it looks like the inside of a bear claw :) mmm -- but dont eat it. this batter is gross at all points!

then when you pour your buttermilk into a measuring cup, also toss in your baking soda. mix them together in the measuring cup and THEN pour them into your other mixture.

now add your cornmeal, flour and salt. mix them up until theyre well blended (you can leave some lumps.. i dont like lumps. but some people do... im assuming the same people who get grainy cornmeal lol) - OH also! if your batter is too watery, you can add a tbsp of flour.. stir and see if its better. keep adding flour until its the consistency of a thick cake batter.

pour your batter into a cake pan or a muffin pan (dont forget to oil the pan.. i use PAM. verrrry convenient) and bake for 30 minutes. then check on it... and the trick is to stick a toothpick into the cake part to see if its done. if the toothpick comes out clean, no goop or crumbs on it, then the cake is done! (THAT trick i knew from my previous obsession with funfetti cakes lol) 

so try it out and let me know how yours tastes!

helloooo :) and risotto!

Hi! So im starting a blog. mostly at the encouragement of my sister, Neela and an adorable email from Tamera and some posts on facebook from awesome friends. <3 thank you all for your support! i think thisll be fun!

So i began trying to cook bc, as most people know, i recently moved across the country from California to Florida. and in florida, i know NO one. well now i guess i know some people hah.. but no one that i could call or text out of the blue and say 'hey lets waste time together.' which is why i had to find a productive way of wasting time alone.. SO i decided i would learn to cook! ... also im becoming a wife soon :) (and hopefully a mom soon after that) and my dream is to be the mom who makes The Most Amazing something... so im working on finding my "something". i dont care what it is to be honest... the most amazing pasta sauce? the most amazing birthday cake! (that would be a good one!) the most amazing homemade french fries? whatever. just SOMETHING. something thats all mine for some reason.. and that no one can make like me.. lol .... and yes. my need to be the best at something stems from my own unique issues :) lol but thats for a different blog.- anyway, the mom who makes the best something has to start somewhere. and im starting in florida with an electric stove :/ (i HATE electric stoves btw. i need fire!)

... i dont know where to start really... cooking has been really therapeutic since ive been here. its something to really put all my energy and thought into bc mostly i have nothing else to do. i feel like its a really good, productive way to spend my time... and dipaks money :/ hah

i am a suuuper picky eater. so buying cook books is a no go for me. its just not useful to buy a book with 50 recipes in it when ill probably be grossed out by 48 of them lol.. thats why i never thought i could cook  properly. pretty much everything about raw food grosses me out. i dont like getting my hands dirty... and thats not a pun or expression or anything. i literally hate when theres ANYTHING on my hands... flour: blekh, batter: yuck, raw chicken: dont even talk to me. so every time i make something, its like a freakin adventure from beginning to end. and im constantly washing dishes. as SOON as the chicken is done touching the cutting board, im washing it. its all very uncool.. unnatural, chaotic lol.. nothing like Giata at home. im about 30 pounds heavier than her and my brow MUCH more furrowed the whole time im cooking.

That having been said, im still trying. and yknow, spending all this time in the kitchen is making me actually feel better about having all these crazy neuroses. you CAN eat only 5 foods and learn to cook lol. so anyway.. dipak really likes chicken. ive never been so crazy about chicken. BUT ive learned to make chicken so that i like it too!! apparently the trick is to NOT overcook it. lol who knew. - oh also. another thing you should know about me.. i pretty much LOVE restaurant food: american, greasy, steak n' potatoes, all american, not at all home-made, food. in fact, most of the food i make at home, i eat a few bites and decide if its re-makeable, and then have cereal. :/ ... should i be telling you this? whatever, its true. im NOT a "foodie" by any means. but when i DO like something, o.m.g. i dont just like it, i fall in LOVE. in fact im pretty much like that with my whole life. any of my best friends or family can attest to that. So the things ill put on this blog will be the things that i LOVE.. or the things that dipak LOVES- and i should also say that he is the TOUGHEST grader(critic?) on this earth. even worse than my 4th grade teacher who rolled her eyes at my native american missions diorama. most things that he really enjoys, barely gets above a 7. recently we went to Ruth's Chris steak house.. super fancy, amazing butter-covered steak- he gave it a 6 and a half. lol... gotta love'im :) so you can guarantee that if he likes it, its good.

despite the first couple meals i made getting a 6, i kept trying! and now i have a few meals under my belt (and in my love handles) that are pretty good! my most recent cooking-dream-in-life is to make amazing fried chicken. ive tried it a couple times... but its never any good. stay tuned for my third attempt. the chicken is always nice and tender.. and i make cornbread with it (which is my fat-asses favorite part!!!) and the cornbread is always amazing! but the chicken falls short. to be fair, im trying to fry the outside and then bake the rest... i feel too guilty fully deep frying things in my house. i feel like deep frying should be magic that is saved for restaurants :) (like bacon strips)..

so the other day, i made risotto from scratch!!! first of all, i had no idea that risotto is just a certain kind of rice. i thought it was little tiny pasta.. lol - again, REALLY NOT A CHEF haha...

so ARBORIO rice. that is the traditional short fat rice that is used to make risotto :) Alton Brown taught me. he is my second love. (dipak, youre still #1 :)) so the ingredients are:

1 cup Arborio rice
3.5 cups chicken stock (get the ones that have less sodium, just so you can control how salty it gets)
1/2 a cup white wine (i got a cheapy pinot grigio. no one tells you what KIND to get. and cooking wine smells awful lol)
1-2 tsp butter (more if you love butter lol.. less if youre trying to be "healthy" blekh)
1/2 an onion - finely chopped (i use the little yellow/white ones)
1/2 tsp minced garlic (you can buy whole jars of minced garlic btw!! best thing ever ever.)
1/2 a lemon
about 6 asparagus stocks (cut into inch long pieces- and put more if you want obviously)
about 1/4 cup of corn (i use frozen corn :/ i dont think its worth all the work to make a whole freakin corn stalk for a few kernels -- anyway, use more or less if you want.. the reason im writing these little tid bits is bc when i was cooking, i wish someone wouldve assumed im an idiot making food for the first time ever so that i wouldnt have to feel so scared the whole time.. then once you make it once or twice, then youll know what to expect and you can make your own decisions. but if youre like ME..... youre welcome :) ***)
about 1/3 of a cup of fresh finely grated parmesan cheese (this was the first time i had ever bought an actual block of cheese from the fancy section of the grocery store.. and it was worth it!! when you grate fresh parmesan, its so fluffy and light and amazing. and its not stinky or dry or pizza-storey at all!)

So once you have all those things, see if you have an electric kettle. if so, my Alton says use it! itll keep your liquid at a simmer which is so cool! you dont have to think about it anymore once its in the kettle- SMART! so you take your wine and your chicken stock and pour them into the kettle (or a little pot- heat on med/low).

put a medium sized skillet on the stove (i also hate when recipes say things like that, bc what is a medium size?? compared to what?? but now i get it... theres no other way to say it lol. so just not the biggest pan in your pantry... the SECOND biggest pan haha) so put that pan on the stove and put the heat on med/low.. throw in your butter and let it get melty. i like to use my wooden little spatula thingy to move the butter around and coat the bottom of my pan. then when its almost all melted, throw in your onions. then stir them around and let them "sweat" - apparently that means letting them get soft and kinda see-through and smelly :) (a good kind of smelly) ALSO! keep the heat LOW! in this recipe, "if it starts to brown, turn it down!" nothing should be actually COOKING- keep the heat on med/LOW. ...mostly low.

after a couple minutes, take your cup of uncooked rice, and pour it into your pan of butter and onions. -im being specific bc when i first looked up different recipies for risotto, i didnt understand if they wanted me to put the rice in the liquid (which seems normal) or put the uncooked rice in the skillet (which seemed insane)- do the insane one. uncooked rice in the skillet! stir it around for about 5 minutes (i set a timer for everything...just so i dont forget) stir the uncooked rice constantly and in that time, the rice will absorb the butter and onion flavor.. KEEP THE HEAT LOW!

after that 5 minutes, add some of your stock/wine liquid. add just enough to cover the rice slightly in the skillet. then, some recipies say to stir constantly, some say dont. im lazy and scared of splatter, so i dont stir it. and then i saw an episode where my Alton said DONT stir it :) so yay! after about 3 minutes, push the rice aside with your spatula. if you can wipe it aside and see the bottom of the pan clearly, then its time to add more liquid. add just a little more. maybe just enough to fill the space you just made with your spatula. KEEP THE HEAT LOW :)

keep doing that over and over again until only 1/4 of your stock/wine liquid is left, then taste the now-risotto (the rice should be getting fatter and more creamy looking now). if its still a little hard, keep going. also at this point you can add salt! youll need it i think.

VEGGIE TIME: around the end of your stock/wine, grab your already cut up asparagus and put it in a small pan with some butter and that minced garlic, squeeze that 1/2 a lemon, and some salt. just to taste. you really cant mess this up btw.. i also would hate it when people said "salt to taste" bc i refuse to taste things that arent finished :/ more of my crazy controlling weirdo-dom- im getting better about this. anyway, the asparagus- you really CANT mess it up. just throw it in the pan, cook on medium for about 5-7 minutes with all the little fixins. at the last couple minutes of the asparagus, throw the corn in so it has time to thaw and cook a little. leave the veggies on super low after theyre done.. your risotto should be pretty done now too! ***(SIDE NOTE: you can take ANY two vegetables that you like/love, and substitute them and it will be even MORE amazing, bc youll love it more... lol obviously bc you can choose lol- but corn and asparagus are MY favorite)

when the risotto tastes done, and has absorbed most of the liquid in the skillet, add generous sprinkles of the parmesan you grated and fold into the risotto! mmmmmmmm :) im thinking about it and getting hungry... at midnight. OH its midnight! HAPPY BIRTHDAY SHIGGY!!!!! I LOVE YOU!!!!

lol okay then throw in your veggies! and youre done!! its freaking amazing!!- personally, i looove risotto so i am veryyyy picky about it! and i just LOVE this recipe! so try it! :) and then tell me how it went!