Food!

Since I've been home, I've been cooking.  A lot.  So this post will just have a bunch of pictures from all the food I've been making!

Up first: SUPREME GOURMET SANDWICHES

Yum, caramelized onions...

Grilled bell pepper and portobello mushroom...

Roasted red pepper cream cheese and several kinds of deli meats and cheeses...

Yum...

Stacked in the fridge to squish so they'd be a) easier to eat, b) more delicious because the flavors could mingle...

Can anyone say delicious?

Next, the sugary wonderland of RAINBOW CUPCAKES!

Yeah, I know they don't look really rainbow in this picture, but wait!  (They do look pretty cute, courtesy of Marta using leftover filling to pipe on top.  Although I'm not sure how I feel about a wedding ring cupcake)

Here's what we did: divided our lemon cupcake batter into three separate bowls and added a different color of food coloring to each of the bowls.  Then we put one spoon of each into the cupcake cups and baked!  The colors didn't meld together and they were so exciting!

Then, against Marta's wishes, I made cupcake filling (note to self: different recipe next time, this one was too sugary) along with frosting - PURPLE frosting.  Jealous yet?  Oh, and I piped the filling into the already-baked cupcakes.  It was a new experience, and it rocked my world.

This is Tess, high on sugar from these cupcakes.  She's still pretty cute though :)

This is my favorite cupcake.  I ate it.  It was delish.

Next, the SHAKSHUKA

Shakshuka is an Israeli dish with eggs poached in spicy tomato sauce.  Even with limited time, this was easy and amazingly good.  The stuff on the top is parsley and feta.

It was supposed to be served with warm pita.  Unfortunately, the make-do flat bread was burned when I was finishing the soup.  Still good though!

A few of the other things I've made recently: 

Spinach soup with rosemary croutons - AMAZING.  I substituted chard for some of the spinach and it was great too.  I highly recommend this recipe.  Besides being yummy, it's like a warm salad - healthy but good for cold weather.

StrawberryTart and Lemon Tart - I made both of these and they were REALLY good.  The best part, though, was probably the pastry dough.

Spaghetti with chard and garlic chips - admittedly I only roughly adapted this recipe, using the signature three ingredients with no help at adaptation from the recipe.  But it was good.  Very good.  

Garlic rosemary artisan bread.  Using the artisan bread recipe here, separate one loaf's worth of dough.  Knead in approximately two finely minced cloves of garlic and enough fresh chopped rosemary so it's studded throughout.  Bake as usual and then enjoy!

Blue cheese burgers.  I am very proud of myself for making these.  A pound of ground beef, 2 oz. of blue cheese, a spoonful of dijon mustard, some chopped green onions, salt and pepper, approximately 1/4 cup chopped raw bacon, an egg, and 1 T of water.  They were AMAZING in every possible way.  

 Levi's birthday dinner - yesterday (HAPPY 10th BIRTHDAY LEVI!!!).  Because Levi requested several Chinese dishes and I also made a cake (more on that later), Mom insisted that we do store-bought for most of the food.  Egg rolls, potstickers for won ton soup, and the orange chicken were all made courtesy of the freezer section of my favorite store, Grocery Outlet.  I made homemade ham chow mein, using the Oriental cookbook I bought last week at a garage sale.  Luke put together the won ton soup.  Marta and Mom collaborated on the orange chicken.  It was great.  But this is the best part of the entire meal:

Here is the power tool that Mom used to cut the hunk of frozen ham shown below.  She's a beast.  

Notice how straight and even those cuts are.  Amazing.  

I have made a ton of other dishes, but as Marta closed all the tabs on my computer, I don't have a digital record of what they were.  Grrr....  Oh well.  These ones were the best anyways.  And any I think of later I'll add!  

<3

Eliza

(Who is somewhat sad that work starts next week, because it will make it very hard to cook as often as I have been doing.  Although I will not miss the constant grocery store stops)

P.S. The cake recipes are coming up tomorrow in my next post.

P.P.S. A quick look at what's coming up in my world of cooking:
-Bretzel rolls
-Ratatouille
-THIS (Just kidding.  Do you think I really want to make the perfect cake, a cake that would compel me to eat until it was all gone and I was 20 pounds heavier?  Maybe I'll just save the recipe for a special occasion...)
-Chicken salad (still looking for the ideal recipe, although this one appeals to me) with a light brioche bun...
-Perfection in a cookie: pumpkin peanut butter chocolate chip cookies.  I still have to adapt/create a recipe though.  Stay tuned.

I love cooking at home with only part-time work :D