Cooking is Caring

Ahh, so June has been some month.  Josh's father went into the hospital at the end of May and actually just got out last night.  So, obviously the month has been very difficult for Josh's family, especially his mom.  I really wanted to do something for her (and win brownie points with the hopefully-soon-to-be-mother-in-law(??) ) so I decided to cook a bunch of healthy meals and snacks that she could freeze and eat when she wanted.  I knew that cooking would be the last thing on her mind, and with Josh's dad in a hospital 30 minutes away, she wouldn't have any time or energy to cook for herself.

So, I spent an ENTIRE Sunday cooking up a storm.  I made whole wheat blueberry muffins, olive bread, mushroom & leak soup, vegetable lasagna, whole wheat macaroni and cheese, broccoli cheddar quiche in a whole wheat crust and chocolate chip walnut cookies (the real deal).

After getting everything cooked, I put the lasagna and macaroni into individual portions so they could be frozen and then thawed for a single serving.  Everything else got put into freezer bags and labeled.

Even though I know I can't take away the stress she's under, I hope that by making this she'll know that Josh and I are here for her and that we're thinking of her.  Besides, don't chocolate chip cookies just make stress go away??

No Butter? No Problem!

So, the other night I was home alone with Teddy (Josh was at class) and it was pouring rain outside.  I figured it was the perfect time to bake some cookies.  So, I go into the kitchen, put on my apron and then realize that I have no butter!  Oh no, how do you make cookies (good cookies) without butter?!

So, I go to the computer and type in "no butter cookie recipe" figuring that there would be plenty of vegan recipes that I could work with.  I found one that looked pretty good and with some tweaking was able to make it with what I normally put in cookies.  I didn't even tell Josh at first that there was no butter in the cookies, and he couldn't tell there was anything different about them.  They came out moist with a crisp bottom and a great texture due to the addition of oatmeal.  I also tweaked some of the other ingredients / measurements to try to make them a bit healthier.

The basic change between these cookies and a normal cookie recipe is that it uses canola oil instead of butter.  Just this alone makes the cookie a bit healthier, even without my addition of whole wheat flour, oats and lower amounts of sugar.  The basic differences between butter and oil is that butter contains a much higher amount of saturated fat (7 grams versus 2 grams), cholesterol (31mg versus 0mg) and sodium (82mg versus 0 mg). 

These are definitely going to make a re-appearance in my cookie line-up!

Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

• 1/2 cup whole wheat flour
• 1 cup white flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1 & 1/2 cup oats
• 2/3 cups canola oil
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1/2 cup chocolate chips
• 1/4 cup raisins (or more to your liking)

So, I go back to the kitchen with my new plan, pre-heat the oven to 350 and get my ingredients ready:

Then I combine the flours, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, sugars and oats together in the bowl of my mixer.  Then I make a hole in the center and go to add my liquids... and I realize I'm out of vanilla! Well, I had already made it this far so I went digging in the pantry and found a vanilla bean!  I scraped out the seeds and continued on my cookie-baking way.

After adding the eggs, oil and vanilla I mixed until combined.  Then I added the chocolate chips and raisins and mixed some more.  Sometimes they tell you to mix these in by hand, but I like to use the mixer still because it breaks up some of the chocolate chips and then you get little bits throughout the dough.

Using a cookie baller, 2 spoons, or your hands, form the dough into small balls and put on a baking sheet lined with a sil pad.  I like to use my little cookie scooper so that I can make sure they're all the same size and will bake in the same amount of time.  Then just take the bottom of a glass and press them all down a bit to flatten them out.

Bake for about 14 minutes (depending on size of cookie), or until lightly golden on top. Cool the cookies on the tray for 5 minutes and then transfer to a cooling rack.  These cookies tasted better after they cooled a bit and the bottoms crisped up (I know because I couldn't wait to try them so I tried one right off the baking sheet - bad idea, still too dough-y).

My batch made 32 decently big cookies.  We've been enjoying these cookies for a few days now and I still can't believe that you don't miss the butter.

So, lesson for the day is with some perseverance you can make delicious cookies even without what you think are essential ingredients!

That Time of Day

You know that time of the day when you just want a snack... for me it's usually round 3:30; a couple of hours after lunch (and 30 minutes before our cafeteria closes).

Now, I realize a good choice of a snack is an apple, or a cut up red pepper that I bring sometimes, or my 90-calorie Fiber One bar (have you tried the chocolate pretzel with caramel one - it's amazing!), but sometimes I just want my salty carbs!

Every so often I give in and go down to the cafeteria and get a bag of pretzels.  I just can't help it.  It makes the whole day better. 

However, on a recent excursion to the cafeteria in search of something salty, I found these:

These are hallow pretzels.  They are literally just the crunchy, salty pretzel shells without any of the inside.  Now, it's not that these are necessarily healthier (they still have 110 calories and 22 grams of carbs in 1 oz), but they ARE all natural, and have only 5 ingredients: unbleached wheat flour, canola oil, salt, yeast & soda.

I'm just saying, if you're going to eat pretzels, why not eat the all natural ones with no preservatives?  Besides, the whole point of a pretzel is for that salty crunch, and that's all you get in this bag :)

Where Did May Go??

Wow, it's June?!  When did that happen?  I feel like May just flew by in a whirlwind of graduations, birthdays and fattening food!

The diet has not been going well.  It's so hard to stay on track when there are so many celebrations going on, and my May 2012 was just chock full of 'em!

First, there was Mothers Day / Bubby's Birthday / Molly's Graduation party.  This was a complete brunch catered by my mom (which meant that at least there were low fat, whole wheat and healthier options - not that I partook in those...).  The party was a lot of fun and we had a full house for it! 

During the next week were Molly's graduations.  Tuesday was the Steinhardt School Graduation at Radio City and Wednesday was the NYU All School Graduation at Yankee Stadium.  I can't believe my little baby sister has graduated.  Not only graduated, but graduated from the same school I went to!  Being at her graduations definitely brought back a lot of memories for me. 

At the Steinhardt School graduation Molly got her name called and got to walk on stage to get her "diploma" (ie: fake piece of paper that they hand out).  I have no recollection of doing this - either I blacked it out or they don't trust Tisch students to walk across a stage without making a scene.  

My mom, dad and I all had a great time at this graduation, although sitting through all the name calling got pretty boring towards the end.  They had intermittent performances by the Steinhardt singers and dancers which was a lot of fun - I had no idea such talented performers were in other schools at NYU besides Tisch! Also, Molly's best friend, Joey (whom my family has gotten close to), was selected as the student speaker, so it was great to be able to see and hear his speech.  Afterwards, our family and Joey's family went out for lunch at Dojo in the village as a small "good-bye" to NYU.  (I think I ordered the brown rice and steamed broccoli platter in attempts to be healthy and then I ate Molly's french fries and shared an appetizer of sesame noodles - oh well, I had good intentions...)

The next day Josh and I ventured to the Bronx for Molly's Yankee Stadium Graduation.  While the trip in was horrible and stressful, the day was great.  We made it to our seats with about 3 minutes to spare before they ceremony started.

It was especially great for me because my graduation was at Yankee Stadium as well.  It was fun to see it from the other perspective and just watching the graduates there made me remember 4 years ago when I was sitting there!

After the Yankee Stadium graduation it took about 7 years to find Molly (AT&T had bad service combined with Molly's usual lack of organization (:P) and the 32,000 people there) and once we did we had time for a few pictures and then we were off for lunch at Saigon Grill!

The NYU Graduates from left to right: Josh ('07), Me ('08), Dad ('81), Molly ('12)... just missing Bubby, class of 1948!

The next weekend I had arranged for a photographer to come and take family portraits of us.  We haven't had these done since Molly and I were little, so I thought for Mothers Day it would be nice.  Unfortunately, Josh had class and wasn't able to join us, but the rest of us had fun getting ready for our "photo shoot" and posing for the camera.  Teddy was by far the star of the day though... that boy was just made for modeling!  We actually got the "sneak peak" shots today, check some of them out below:

Then that next week was Michael's (Josh's brother) birthday.  We went out for a nice family dinner and then had a delicious tirimisu cake back at Josh's parents house!  Celebrating the birthdays of people who are younger than me is really starting to make me feel old!

Not too long after it was my birthday.  My big 2-6.  I think this is the first birthday that I was NOT looking forward to.  What's the point of getting older now?  Nothing good happens.  It's great to turn 16, 18, 21, even 25... but who wants to be 26?? It's just getting closer to 30 now...

For my actual birthday Josh, Greg and I went out to dinner at a trendy Asian-fusion restaurant and then went back to the apartment for some drinks.  We were all exhausted and looking forward to the upcoming 3 day weekend!  

The next day my parents came out to Long Island in order to do a family dinner to celebrate my birthday.  We were just hanging out on the couch with Teddy when my front door opened and Molly and her boyfriend, Danny, came up the stairs!  It was such a great surprise that they came for my birthday.  I was completely shocked.  My family is not very good at keeping things secret, so I can't believe that no one (especially my dad!) spilled the beans.  

That night we all went to Peter Luger's steakhouse for my birthday dinner celebration.  This is the first time my family  has ever been out to a steakhouse together.  For so many years my mom, dad, sister (or some combination of the three) were vegetarian, so steak was always out.  This is the first time we all eat meat - and boy, DID WE EAT MEAT!  We got the steak for 6 and had just enough left over to bring home for Teddy. 

Then the rest of Memorial Day weekend was spent relaxing with Josh and Teddy. 

And now it is June.  Time to get back to the healthy cooking!

Quick, Easy and Satisfying Dinner

Growing up my mom would make these amazing sesame noodles.  Once I moved into my own apartment and started cooking a little, I asked her for the recipe.  It was super easy and you could eat it hot or cold.  It was also really cheap, so it was the perfect thing for a college student to make for dinner (and have plenty of leftovers!)

However, the recipe is not very healthy.  It has a lot of sesame oil and peanut butter, which is why it tastes so good.  Recently I've been experimenting with the proportions of ingredients in attempts to make it healthier.  I've also added some ingredients to make it more of a well rounded meal. 

Josh and I love this dish and it has become a regular in our dinner rotation.  It's also great because I always have the ingredients in the house, so it's perfect for those nights at the end of the week when I've run out of groceries but still want to make a good dinner.

Sesame Noodles with Chicken and Edamame:

• 1 lb pasta (I use whole wheat for this recipe to make it more hearty)

• 1 teaspoon ginger (I don't like having pieces of ginger in my food so I use ginger juice, but you could also use powdered ginger)
• 1 clove minced garlic
• 3 tablespoons sesame oil
• 5 tablespoons soy sauce (reduced sodium)
• 4 tablespoons white vinegar
• 2 tablespoons peanut butter (I use Trader Joes Better'n Peanut Butter which is all natural and has 85% less fat than regular peanut butter)

•  1/2 pound chicken cut into bite size pieces and marinated in a combination of soy sauce, ginger and garlic (I didn't measure these, just kinda threw it all into a zip lock bag and stuck it in the fridge for 30 minutes until I was ready for it)

• 1/2 cup shelled edamame (I buy the frozen kind from Trader Joes)
• Sesame seeds for garnish 

This is a really fast dinner and comes together in less than 30 minutes.  

First, get the chicken cut up and marinating.  While it's marinating, get your water boiling for the pasta.  While you're waiting for the water to boil, mix the ginger, garlic, sesame oil, soy sauce, white vinegar and peanut butter together.  I mix it all together in a mixing cup to make it easy for myself. 

 Once the water has boiled, drop the pasta and take the chicken out of the refrigerator.  Put a pan on medium heat and cook the chicken.  Once the chicken is almost cooked through add the edamame.

Once completely cooked, turn off heat and put in a colander to get rid of any excess liquid.  Put back in pan and drain pasta in same colander.  Once drained, combine pasta, chicken & edamame and sauce in the pot you cooked the pasta in (I hate making extra dishes) and stir to combine.  Then just serve up in bowls and sprinkle some sesame seeds on for garnish and crunch!

Josh and I each ate a bowl of this for dinner and were very full.  We still have at least 3 servings left and since this dish can be eaten warm or cold, it makes an easy snack, lunch or quick dinner.  When I put the recipe into the weight watchers calculator it comes to 65 points.  I think we'll get 5 servings out of it which makes it 13 points each serving - not bad for dinner!  You could serve it with steamed broccoli on the side and get 6 servings out of the recipe, making it only 11 points each serving.

Then for dessert I made some homemade chocolate chip & walnut cookies.  I won't even begin to figure out the points in these... but they sure were yummy!

Treats for Teddy

I made Teddy some dog biscuits a few weeks ago and even though he gobbled up the first few, he got tired of them very quickly.  I found that he had been hoarding all of the biscuits that I had been giving him in his play pen, so he obviously wasn't eating them!  I figured he was sick of them so I gave them out to Teddy's friends (i.e. my friends who have dogs).

At first I figured I would give up on the idea of making homemade treats for Teddy.  If he was going to get tired of them after having only 3 or 4, what was the point of spending 2 hours making them??  It's so easy to buy a package of treats from the store.  But then, at the store, when you read the list of ingredients you remember why you want to make your own - so you can control what goes in them.  Besides, how do we show those that we care about that we love them - with food!

I wanted to make Teddy something that I knew he'd like, and what does every dog like?  People food.

Teddy loves carrots.  Every weekend when I go food shopping I buy a bag of baby carrots, because I'm sure that I'm going to be good and snack on carrots instead of junk food.  Yeah right.  Needless to say, by the end of the week half the bag gets thrown away.  This week though, I decided to add those carrots to a dog biscuit!

Carrot Dog Treats:

• 1 medium banana (ripe)
• 1 cup shredded carrots
• 1/4 cup unsweetened apple sauce
• 1/8 cup water
• 1 1/2 cup whole wheat flour (plus more for rolling)
• 1 cup rolled oats

Tip: use a food processor to shred your carrots, it will save you A LOT of time and cut fingers (I know from experience).

Preheat your oven to 350.  In the bowl of your mixer mash up the banana (the browner the banana is, the sweeter and softer it will be, so I saved my banana for a few days until it had lots of brown spots) and mix in the shredded carrots.  Add to that the water and applesauce.  Next, add in the flour and oats.  Stir together until it is thoroughly combined.  Knead mixture until a dough forms (it will all clump up on the kneading attachment and scrape the sides of the bowl clean).  Put the dough on a floured surface and roll out to about 1/2 inch thickness.  Using a cute cookie cuter, cut into biscuits.  Place biscuits on a lightly sprayed baking sheet (or just use a sil pad).  The baking time will depend on how hard you want the biscuits.  Teddy likes them a little soft so I baked them for 25 minutes. They'll harden a bit as they cool, but if you want them very hard you'll have to bake longer. 

These were definitely Teddy approved!

 

** If you are going to make your own dog treats, make sure to not add anything that can be dangerous for your dog.  Here is a link to the ASPCA's list of harmful people food for dogs. 

No More Broken Promises

Before I moved to my apartment on Long Island I bought a cookie jar.  It was from Neiman Marcus and I fell in love with it.  However, when Greg and I decided to live together again, he forbid me from bringing my amazing cookie jar.  Now, if you know me, you know that I do not take no for an answer - the cookie jar was coming. 

The only way I could get Greg to allow me to keep my cookie jar in the kitchen (and not in a closet) was by promising to always keep it stocked with homemade cookies.  This lasted for a couple of weeks and then I stopped baking because I didn't want to keep eating cookies!  But yesterday, I remembered that promise I made to my dear friend and I was going to keep it!  No more empty (amazing) cookie jar.

I decided to use a Weight Watcher cookie recipe, with some changes, so that I hopefully wouldn't feel as guilty when munching away on cookies. 

Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookies:

• 1 cup white whole wheat flour
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 cup salted butter, softened
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 2 egg whites
• 1/3 cup mini chocolate chips

The original recipe calls for white flour, but I've recently discovered white whole wheat flour and it has changed my baking life. 

I've tried baking cookies with whole wheat flour but they come out too hearty and dense, so I save the whole wheat flour for breads.  The white whole wheat flour is lighter than the whole wheat but still maintains the higher protein and nutrition.  The way they do this is simply by milling the grain from hard white spring wheat rather than red wheat which is what whole wheat flour is from.

Anyway, preheat your oven to 350 degrees. 

Combine the flour with the baking soda and salt in a small bowl and set aside. 

Beat butter and brown sugar with a mixer at medium speed until it's light and fluffy, then gradually add the granulated sugar and beat well.  Next, add the cocoa and egg whites, beating well.  Gradually add the flour mixture, beating until blended.  Finally, stir in chocolate chips.

Drop onto baking sheet (I put a sil pad on mine instead of spraying it with non-stick spray to avoid having to wash it) and bake for 12 minutes.  Cool on the pan for a few minutes before you attempt to move them to a rack, as they come out very soft and harden as they cool. 

The original recipe made 40 1-point cookies, but that would be too tiny!  I made 30 cookies, so it came out to 3 weight watcher points in 2 cookies - not too bad. 

Best of all though, the cookie jar is again full of cookies and fulfilled promises.