Dressing Things Up (Veggie Burgers)

Did I tell you that I am an MOH?  Matron of honor.  Yesiree.  I have never before had this honor and I am so excited!  It means so much to me that Jeanine would ask me and that I would get to do fun stuff like try on beautiful dresses.  This is finally the one.  It will be in charcoal gray instead of pink.  It's so pretty!  

I haven't been feeling all that great.  I've been thinking about denial and stuff.  I went to the neurologist last week, we went over my MS history and he pronounced me as "primary progressive MS." This is very rare type.  I had come in planning on saying something like, "Do I really have this?  I don't fit the relapsing remitting pattern, I only have a few annoying symptoms, blah blah blah."  Denial.  

Over the years of being not 100% healthy, I have received much advice.  I've probably given other people some of that advice too.  It's crap you know.  You will not get healthy as soon as you learn whatever lesson is there to be learned.  Switching to only pomegranate juice will not fix all things.  The fact that one doctor told you there is no such thing as MS does not mean he/she was correct or that I don't have something significant.  I do not just have Lyme Disease.  And hence, I never talk about it.  Ever.  The other advantage of this strategy has been that it really supports the denial angle I've got going.  The same discussions have occurred around my spine issues - you just have to see this doctor, healer, specialist in BOSTON, acupuncturist, nutritionist, shamen, and so on.  The weird thing is that no one really ever asks me how I do deal with it or who's opinion I do take under advisement.  I'm not meaning to sound like a bitch here - it's just something I'm starting to understand about chronic illness.  People around me are desperate to see me get better.  They think they see me getting better sometimes when I am in intense pain.  Denial, right?  Sometimes I think it's because I am pretty.  I smile and joke around constantly - it's the way I am.  Does pretty equal wellness?  

I'm on some new medication for my tremors which should also turn my overall nervous system down a notch.  I am still acclimating to it and it is making me really tired.  Oh - the neurologist is very familiar with esophageal spasms and has about a million ideas.  The neuro dude is one of the best MS doctors in the country - for those of you who worry about doctor things.  He's very open to my ideas - very pro-natural stuff - just likes me to keep good data on what I do use and how it works.  

So what does this have to do with food you ask?  I was thinking about dressing something up.  I love veggie burgers and I hear people say that they hate them.  Like everything it's how you serve it.  This is a Trader Joe's veggie burger.

Veggie Burger All Dressed Up

1/4 onion, sliced

1 C spinach

4 T or more barbecue sauce (I always misspell barbecue sauce - why doesn't it have a Q?)

1 pita warmed in the oven

1 slice of Muenster cheese

Sautee onion in some olive oil until is starts to caramelize.  Make room in the middle and put the burger in the center.  Cook 2 minutes then flip.  Put cheese on.  Throw spinach over top and cover.  Keep an eye on it so nothing burns.  Serve on top of a warmed pita.  This is so good that I ate it for 3 days in a row.

Devil's Food Chocolate Cake Birthday

We've been on vacation this week.  It's the week we call birthaversary - our anniversary (5 years this year!) and my birthday (41 years this year!).

I used to be very tra-la-la-de-do-da-la about aging.  Each birthday was a "how cool, I'm older.  It's time to buy more underwear."  Now, though, after forty I feel a little weirded out.  First off, how did I get to be 41?  The idea that 41 years has happened seems mind blowing to me.  Secondly, they let me drive a car and buy houses and stuff?  I feel like a kid pretending to be a grown up a good amount of the time.  Hopefully, not because I am hopelessly immature but because I hold on to my youthful zest for life.  Yeah.

We celebrated with some nice walks and nice dinners.  We ate at Bertucci's for our anniversary.  We just love that place.  It's the rolls.  I think it is really all about those rolls.  We went to Red Stripe in Providence with Hilarie and Cara.  Always yummy there.  We ate at Not Your Average Joes one night - I had their special pecan crusted chicken with sweet potato wedges.  The chicken was so moist.  I had the other half for lunch the next day.  Last night we went to Bittersweet Farms.  It's one of my favorite places.  I had a chicken and spinach panini.  It was perfection in a sandwich.  I look forward to the second half of that for lunch today.

The more I bake, the more I discover that most restaurants have crappy desserts.  I ordered desserts from almost all of these places.  Don't judge.  From Bertucci's I got a lemoncello (sp?) cake - not so good - soggy and not lemony.  From Red Stripe, we got a key lime tart - not so good - lousy crust - bitter limes.  From Joes, we got the peanut butter thing - peanut butter ice cream pie with oreo crust and hot fudge.  It's always great.

For someone who likes to bake.  Just make your own cake.  After much fantasizing, I decided to make a devil's food chocolate cake.  Nate said he wanted just whipped cream for frosting.  So last night when I baked, I made up some whipped cream (which I put in my coffee this morning).  But I read online and discussed with a real baker that whipped cream falls apart as frosting.  I'm planning on adding cream cheese to it to stabilize it today and then take some pictures.  Okay, I'll be back.

(time passes)

After much time, I decide to stabilize my already whipped cream with some cream cheese.  Old faithful cream cheese.  Why not?  I melted some milk chocolate, added a bit more sugar, and a bit of cocoa powder.  I mixed up the cream cheese, then added the whipped cream and blended until incorporated.

So here are the cakes out of the oven and cooled.

Sorry, I am no where near food photo mastery.  Sigh.

So then I frosted them with my light brown frosting.  

It was too loose to truly decorate with but I think it came out okay.  I shaved some milk chocolate on top.

Okay, recipe:  The recipe is slightly modified from this recipe from food.com  It is a lovely devils food cake.  Is it devil's or devils?  Whatever.

2 C flour
1t salt
1t baking pwdr
2t baking soda
3/4 C cocoa pwdr
1 1/2 organic cane sugar
1 C veg oil (or liquified coconut oil)
1 C boiling water
1 C buttermilk
2 eggs
2t vanilla (one in the original recipe didn't seem like enough to flavor something so intense)

Sift dry stuff together into mixing bowl.  Yes, you really need to sift this one.  Pour in water, milk, and oil and mix.  Once combined, add eggs and vanilla and mix til smooth.  The recipe says it will be liquidy but mine seemed like normal cake batter.

Pour into two 9 inch rounds or similar and bake at 325 until toothpick comes out clean (somewhere between 15-25 mins depending on your oven - never believe a recipe - always check your cakes often).

Frosting:
Whip one pint whipping cream.  Add agave to taste.  Then realize that whipped cream won't work.  Add 2 packages of cream cheese.  1/2 bar melted milk chocolate, 2 T sifted cocoa powder.  Taste.  Lose yourself in the deliciousness.

Mixed Berry Crumble

Ayla is just the cutest.  She was so sweet and happy wearing bunny ears at my mother-in-law's house today.  I must add that I was so super impressed with her behavior.  On other occassions, she has been a little too hyper in that environment.  Today, she was perfect.  She slept under the table during dinner.  She kept her eye on me and Nate all day.  What a good sheepdoggie.  

I had been thinking about making this crumble for a few days.  So, when I got into the kitchen, I pretty much had a rough plan.  I knew I wanted a shortbread bottom and berries with some topping.  I'm not sure if I can actually write this as a recipe at this point, because I became sort of a ball of chaos in the kitchen.  But it's worth the effort because these were so delicious!

The bottoms were a stick of melted butter, 1 cup (plus more as needed) of flour and 2/3 cup sugar.  I stirred this together and pressed it (most but not all of it) into the bottom of a 9X13 glass pyrex thingy.  I baked it at 350 until done - golden brown.  I was normal up this point.  I saved a bit of the bottom mixture to add to the top.

I used about 3/4 of a bag of frozen mixed berries.  I didn't defrost them or anything.  I tossed those babies down on the shortbread bottom.  

In another bowl, I mixed up 3 eggs, 1/2 cup sugar, vanilla, baking soda, baking powder, and buttermilk,  I'm guessing it was 1/2 cup buttermilk and a teaspoon of each of the others.  I poured that on top of the berries.  Then I took the little bit of bottom mix I had left, added brown sugar, and 1/3 package of cream cheese.  I mixed them together with my fingers and sprinkled it over the berry egg thing.  

I baked the whole business at 350 until it was solid and didn't jiggle (I have no idea how long this was).  

It was really yummy.  It's not too sweet and would really work as a brunch item with vanilla yogurt on top maybe.  Or it might be really good with chocolate chips or a chocolate ganache.  

 I neglected to take a picture of the shortbread bottom by itself.  I just threw the totally frozen berries on top of the shortbread bottom - it hadn't even cooled.  I was worried about the monstrous size of strawberries but it all worked out.

This is the egg mix on top of berries.

 Tah Dah!  Finished deliciousness.  The crumble on top got nice and golden brown.  The berries were cooked and it was not jiggling.  The approximate full recipe is at the end of the post.  Please know that I was totally estimating because I was not in the mood to measure.  As I pointed out before, some of you think I like baking because of its precision - but this is perfect evidence to the contrary.

Healing:

I've been feeling overall lousy for a few days.  I've had a rash on my chest that has spread to my face (so pretty).  I've had to take benedryl and nap.  My pain is under pretty good control, but I just haven't felt that good.  All I want to do is lie down and rest.  I forced myself out for some walks which helps so much.  

I got a new bedspread for our bedroom - see - It's nice to change up the color scheme a bit.  I bought gray curtains too.  I've just been feeling...meh.  The good thing is that I've been giving myself time to be cat-like and loungy.  I took some baths, got cozy in my new blankets, and watched Deep Space Nine episodes with my honey.  Somehow, neither of us really watched that series so we've been enjoying going through it. Sisco is no Picard, but he is strong.  I love how not-Starfleet it all is.  They make all kinds of errors in judgments.  And there were tribbles.

Mixed Berry Crumble

Bottom:

1 C flour

2/3 C sugar

1 stick melted butter

Mix together and press into the bottom of a pan (9X13).  Press in all but 2 T of the mixture.

Bake at 350 until it starts to turn golden

Top:

3/4 bag of mixed berries (I used Trader Joe's here) - pour on top of cooked bottom

1/2 C sugar

1 t vanilla

1 t baking soda

1 t baking powder

3 eggs

1/2 C buttermilk

Whisk together and pour on top of berries.

Crumbles:

Add to the leftover bottom:

1/2 C of brown sugar

1/3 package of cream cheeese

Mix with your fingers and scatter over the top

Bake at 350 until it does not jiggle.

Note for the anal retentive:  This recipe is not for you.  You need to add and subtract to your taste and your results.  Maybe you want to use a whole package of berries.  And why not?  Who's going to stop you?  Maybe you want to add semi-sweet chocolate chips at the end.  Maybe more cream cheese.  I don't know.  Please share what you do with this.  Next time, I'll measure more and get the amounts more precise for even the most anal retentive of you.  But for now, put your perfectionism aside, and bake with berries.  

Chicken and Veggies in an Indian Sauce

The situation:  Need to use up organic chicken in fridge before the weekend.

The solution:  I'll find a new recipe!  No, I'll make something up.  No, I'll find a recipe.  Ugh.

What went down:  I put half a chopped onion in a pan and threw some oil in.  When I don't know what else to do, I throw an onion in a pan and wait for inspiration.  So then I put in a hearty squeeze of ginger paste (have you discovered this stuff in the produce aisle?  it's great).  I added a tablespoon of toasted sesame oil to the mix.  I chopped 2 celery stalks finely and added them.  It started to smell lovely.  I decided to boil chicken in another pot.

After the onions were translucent, I added about two teaspoons of flour, stirred, and let it cook a little.  Then I deglazed the pan with some chicken broth (about 1 cup- add more if you need it saucier).  I remembered I had half a can of chopped tomatoes in the fridge.  I tossed them in.  Then I added the last half of a red pepper chopped coarsely.  By now, it was a good looking thing.

Spices.  Hmmm.  I was thinking the whole time about a sauce I made in February when I attempted malai koftas (Indian veggie meat balls with a yummy sauce) so I sort of went in that direction.  I added 2 teaspoons coriander, 1 teaspoon cinnamon, 2 teaspoons turmeric, 1 teaspoon cumin.

Oh.  You might be assuming I measured this stuff for real.  Nope.  I don't measure for stuff like this.  But I was thinking of you the whole time so I looked at about how much I was adding.

Salt to taste.  Hey, wait.  I have cilantro!  So I coarsely chopped what I had and tossed it in.  Side note: Cilantro seems so yummy, tangy and mild to me yet people completely HATE it.  Why is cilantro so polarizing?

Then I tasted it.  Yum.  I added some lemon zest.  I shredded the chicken breast that had been boiled and let the whole thing cook together on very low heat.

You could serve this over rice and it would be lovely.  I can't really digest rice right now so I had it straight up in a bowl with organic crescent rolls on the side.  (Whatevs, don't judge.  LOL).  I squeezed a lemon wedge on top.  Oh my.  So delicious.  

Here's the recipe in a list like normal people would do:

2 chicken breast, boiled, shredded

8 oz canned chopped tomatoes

1/2 large yellow onion

2 stalks celery

1/2 red pepper

1 T ginger paste

2t flour

1 C chicken broth

olive oil and toasted sesame oil

2 t coriander

1 t cinnamon

2 t turmeric

1 t cumin

 chopped fresh cilantro

salt

This makes enough for two hearty servings.  I made my lunch for tomorrow (bottom picture - sorry it's weird and upside down).

Healing 

I had an awesome session with my counselor yesterday and she said this great thing.  I can't paraphrase it right - Lighthouses can go out in the sea looking for ships to save; they stay on the shore shining their light to guide.  For me, this is about holding boundaries, not giving my power away, being the light that I am.  

She also said this cool thing:  

Time for a mental garage sale:  time to let go of a belief that is not supportive of the life I want to be living and replace it with one that is.

Also - biggie for me - I really am working on receiving.  Receiving love and care from others.  Receiving gifts from the universe.  Letting it happen.  Less controlling.  Yeah.  Hell yeah.  

Just Cake for Cake's Sake

This silly self portrait of Ayla and me makes me laugh.  Ayla is so snuggly and adorable and nearly impossible to photograph.  She always moves at the last minute.  So although this picture is grainy, I'm including it for joy.

I made a box cake tonight.  It's good on a Monday when there is no dessert in the house to consider a box.  We went to Trader Joe's yesterday (yay!!!) - and bought all kinds of yummy things, including a box cake of theirs.  I actually stuck to the box preparation recipe and it was great.  All you add is eggs, oil (or butter but I chose oil), and water.

The bottom line is that I have a real thing for yellow cakes with chocolate frosting.  I mean, I can't get enough of that right now.  I can't even think of baking other things.  I have to keep making different versions of it until I am done with it I guess.  This one had more chocolate in it by melting down Trader Joe's milk chocolate (big giant bars of baking chocolate in the baking section).  It's nice to have a cake without any butter as my last yellow cake was way too buttery.  Also, I'm not a fan of butter in my frosting.  A lot of cream cheese frosting recipes call for half cream cheese and half butter but it's just too much for me.

Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting

1 8 oz package cream cheese
1/4 C cocoa powder
1/4 C melted milk chocolate
2T heavy cream (milk would work too)
Blend til smooth.  

Health-wise, I had a tough day.  My nervous system was tweaky today and I spent a good portion of the day being shaky.  I've been diagnosed with MS but it's a weird form of it.  I don't have major attacks and I've just had funky neurological stuff for years and years.  It may be the cause of the esophagus problem but who knows?  Oh, and I have a weird rash on my chest that is driving me batty. I was supposed to see the surgeon today to make some plans but I rescheduled it.  I NEVER reschedule doctor appointments.  I was quite proud of myself for knowing that I needed to stay home tonight and chill out and make frosting and a box cake.  I did, however, talk to the surgeon on the phone and we are hoping to wait until June for the next surgery.  He said it will be same day or one night in the hospital.  Easy to plan and only a few weeks of recovery.  I don't know how I can get myself to feel ready for it, except that the leg pain is so insidious.

You know, I gave myself this blog to think *out loud* about my health and struggles but I feel terribly self-conscious about it.  I think you think, "Is she done whining yet?"  or "maybe this chick should eat less frosting and sugar" or "whatevs get over it already."  Oh, inner critics are very judgey and snarky.
I'm surprised that snarky is not a spell check red line and judgey is (even if I spelled it judgy).  I love making up words.

Anyway, here's pics of cake.  Come on over and sit on my new leather couches and eat cake with me.  And then watch me grade 2 mountains of class work!