Shortcakes

Even though it was a cold and rainy 4th of July I thought it would be fun and appropriate to make strawberry shortcakes for Independence day. This is a foolproof recipe and doesn't require any technical equipment.

Ingredients:

3 cups all purpose flour
3 Tbsp granulated sugar
1 1/2 Tbsp baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
12 Tbsp cold unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
1 1/2 cups heavy cream
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
Method:

Sift the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt into a large bowl. Toss with a fork to combine. Cut the butter into the flour mixture with a pastry cutter or a fork (or fingers if you have cold fingers like me) until the largest pieces of butter are the size of peas. Combine the cream and vanilla in a liquid measure. Make a well in the center of the flour and and pour the cream mixture into the well. Mix with a fork until the dough is evenly moistened and just combined; it should look shaggy and still feel a little dry. Gently knead by hand five or six times to create a loose ball.

Turn the dough out onto a piece of parchment paper and pat it into an 8-inch square, 3/4 to 1 inch thick. Cover with plastic and chill for 20 minutes in the refrigerator. Heat the oven to 425ºF. Remove the dough from refrigerator. Cut the dough into 9 even squares and spread them about 2 inches apart from each other on the baking sheet. Pain with thin layr of cream. Bake until the biscuits are medium golden brown, 16 to 20 minutes.

Makes 9 biscuits.
Serve shortcakes filled with macerated strawberries and vanilla whipped cream. We had some left over biscuits. As these weren't too sweet they might be great the next day with eggs for breakfast or with a good fruit preserve for afternoon tea.

Mum's Broccoli-Hazelnut soup

Having your mum cook for you NEVER gets old. No matter how much I love to cook, nothing beats my mum's cooking. She also happens to be the most creative cook I know. This soup is a great example. We had a a tonne of broccoli and some left over toasted hazelnuts. Voila! Tasty, healthy goodness. I love you mum.

Ingredients:
* 2 heads of broccoli broken into florets
* 1 Tbsp flour
* 3 Tbsp Vegetable Oil
* 1 large Spanish onion, chopped
* 4 cloves of garlic (or more to taste)
* 1 cup 1% milk
* Salt and pepper to taste
* 1/2 tsp garam masala
* 1/2 tsp chilli powder
* Pinch nutmeg
* 2-3 Tbsp ground toasted hazelnuts (We had raw hazelnuts in the shell which we toasted in a 350F oven for 15-20 minutes until aromatic. We then ground them in the blender)

Method:
1. Saute onion and garlic in vegetable oil until transparent
2. Add flour and stir until flour loses its raw flavor
3. Add broccoli and 2-3 cups of water
4. Boil or pressure cook until very soft
5. Blend broccoli mixture with hazelnuts
6. Return to pot and add milk and spices
7. Warm soup and add salt and pepper to taste.

Red Rice Revelation

It's cold in Seattle so something warm and comforting for dinner is in order. To me nothing says comfort food more than rice. Something about growing up in an Indian family I suppose! Tonight I made fried rice with eggs, broccoli, bean sprouts, insane amounts of both ginger and cilantro and RED RICE. This stuff is chewy and nutty and adds great texture to vegetarian meals. This was a fantastic quick Monday night dinner.

$4 well spent!

Oh my gosh, Luke, Tony and I had dinner at the happy hour at Ivar's salmon Bar. I was very skeptical because the only other time I had been to Ivar's it was pretty awful and my memories are of fried blah! But tonight we had great food including an amazing beet, arugula and blue cheese salad for 4 dollars! I had the hummus plate with pickled onions and carrots and olives (also $4...wtf?). Luke had the fish and chips and Tony had the oyster shooters and seafood chowder. Plates were clean fairly quickly. Anyway, I'll be going back very soon...

Green beans and coconut curry

This is possibly the best weeknight dinner we have cooked in a while. Vijay is the sambar master so he made a pot of that and I made green bean poriyal (aka green bean curry with coconut). I have no measurements but I'll give a basic breakdown of what to do. Listen up Iacopi:

Put a big splash of any kind of vegetable oil in a high walled pan and throw in a half a palm full of mustard seeds and wait for them to start spluttering. Then throw in a quarter palmful of urad dal, a teaspoon of asafoetida, 2 teaspoons of tumeric and some dried red chillies into the now seasoned oil. Thrown in a few pounds of thin green beans (harico vert if you want to be fancy and french) and a handful of dessicated coconut. At this point I also add a tablespoon or two of my favorite hot curry powder and some extra hot chilli powder to taste (i.e., LOTS). Add a 1/4 cup of water, stir every 5 minutes until cooked (about 20 minutes). Enjoy with sambar made by Vijjy Pijjy and rice. Mango pickle would have been great but we are currently out.

Amy, you should come over and eat this!!!

Birthday Fruit Tart

My staff had this fruit tart made for me this morning instead of birthday cake because they know what a health nut I am :) I love those ladies!!

Veggie Quesadillas

I went to the University Farmers markt this Saturday for a lovely walking lunch which included unpasturized milk fresh from the farm, vegetable quesadillas and a roasted garlic ciabatta. These cheese and vegetable quesadillas on sundried tomato tortillas were especially scrumptious. The University farmers market in Seattle (50th and University Ave) is year round and full of great places for a walking lunch!