Post-Holiday Eating: Savory Roasted Chickpeas

My arteries wrote this morning, and they're pissed. Christmas in the Midwest means meat overload, appetizers infused with mayo and cream cheese, mixed nuts by the handful, cookies at every turn, and general overconsumption. I'm not a calorie counter and indulge in the foods I love without guilt, but by January every year I'm ready for salads, juice bars, whole grains, healthy oils. Etcetera. There's nothing like gluttony to make gluttony seem rather nasty.

Today I succeeded in remedying the nut craze that overtook me in recent days. Yes, I just said nut craze. And, yes, I know nuts are healthy. But not in the amounts consumed around these parts since the third week in December. I needed a nut cleanse.

(Yup. Just said nut cleanse.)

The Seabiscuit of Smoothies: Green Apple

The spectacular thing about language is its propensity for pliability. When I explain to an inanely picky almost three-year old, for example, that the foreign substance in his breakfast cup is a green apple smoothie, there's a pretty good chance he's going to put that phrase together in such a manner that the smoothie is made out of a green apple, when in fact, green and apple are adjectives describing the smoothie, and the former is representative of a couple ingredients not toddler-approved. Luckily for me, it passed the taste test, and I didn't exactly have to lie.

Speculoos Cranberry Pumpkin Muffins

There's nothing like the imminent arrival of guests to inspire spontaneous housecleaning, which is the main reason I invite people over, and the main reason our house gets tidied up. Win-win. The key is to leave one area laughably messy, so the eye is drawn to the chaos. Then no one notices food caked on the side of the high chair or the dust bunnies convening under the sideboard. It's similar to the deceptive but undeniably effective way I approach personal hygiene.

The other day, a very dear friend showed up with some very bad news. The good old US of A is eating up yet another one of my friends, right in time for Christmas. Bah humbug, times a bazillion. In a last-ditch effort to charm her into staying, I served her my best breakfast burrito, my favorite muffins. Although my pitch failed, at least my house got clean, I got to squeeze one of my favorite people, and she left with a full belly.

Burrito Algorithm: A Twelve-Step Program

Butter, Baby.

I was commissioned by the mister to bake for his colleague's baby shower. Totally awesome; I am always happy to quantify my love in flour and butter, even if for a roomful of strangers. Since the context was a high tea, I settled on shortbread. Bummer. (Not.)

Following my tradition of joining flavors in ambrosial matrimony, I went with three, hoping at least one would be exactly what the almost-mama was craving: glazed lemon + earl grey, double chocolate, and pumpkin topped with gingered chocolate.

Slacker Smoothie

Most days, I skip showering without realizing I'm skipping showering. I wearily grab the day's outfit out of the nearest laundry bin of clean but unfolded clothing. This morning, after a confusing conversation in which an elderly woman at the supermarket asked if I was okay, I pulled out a compact and realized I'd slept with mascara on and not consulted a mirror before leaving the house. It was an all-time low for me: pushing a double buggy around with raccoon eyes. Bad ones. 

Maybe this is the beginning of Letting Myself Go. Maybe it's a short-lived phase. 2010 Jess (before kids) would have been curled up in a ball for the rest of the afternoon, completely ashamed. No, wait, this NEVER WOULD HAVE HAPPENED to 2010 Jess, under any circumstances (unless we're talking natural disaster or imprisonment). October 2013 Jess is too tired to care. She shrugged, said "Nee, dank u wel.", cleaned up with her hoodie sleeve, grateful that the hoodie, too, was black, and walked off mostly unfazed.

From Napoli, with Love: The Sweetest Trifecta

While you were busy singing "I scream for ice cream!", I went home and whipped up two batches of the stuff: strawberry rosewater, and vanilla bean. And a chocolate cake.

I've never been a plain vanilla ice cream person, but David Lebovitz' recipe turned my stubbornness on its ugly little head, bean by crunchy minuscule bean. I followed the recipe exactly, except I doubled it. Because not filling my ice cream maker to capacity is a sin I just can't commit. And then I hit the repeat button but added boiled-down fresh strawberries, scaled down the vanilla, and tinged it with rosewater. Add Nigella's flourless olive oil chocolate cake, and I had a ramped-up, multimedium version of one of my favorite childhood ice cream flavors.

Rosewater Apple Crumble

This is a recipe from The Great Apple Orgy of 2012, which I photographed, consumed at an embarrassingly rapid pace, and never got around to posting (hormones, remember??). This clean, delicately-flavored dish stands out from all other apple desserts and their reliably delicious but equally predictable pairing with cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, ginger, blah blah blah.

B.T.Y.M. (Better Than Your Momma's) Chocolate Chip Cookies

I know I've said it before, but this time I mean it, dammit. Like, really, really mean it. I've found the holy grail of chocolate chip cookie recipes, the result of which dances through the dreams of the vast majority of Americans but remains at bay. This is the cookie I never thought existed. It does, in all its buttery, chewy, tender glory. And after about a hundred taste-testers' approval, I've got a solid case.

There Will Be Blood (Orange Tea Cookies)

In the final days lying (heavily, uncomfortably, and whiningly) in wait for Miss Frankie June, I busied myself making and freezing food until my sadly diminutive freezer drawers creaked under the burden of my neuroses, which manifested themselves in the form of lasagne Caprese, herbed mac & cheese, vegetarian pot pies, blueberry muffins, espresso chocolate muffins, and a double batch of blood orange tea cookies. The last item on the list is what I point to now and shout "THIS WAY, THIS WAY!"

Homespun Necessities: Vanilla Extract

I use vanilla extract (or bean) excessively and I'm shamelessly snobbish about quality. My most suitable solution to the inverse relationship between my addiction and the sub-standard caliber of the supermarket extracts has been to buy Taylor and Colledge from the mostly British expat shop in town. While the quality is superb, the price includes importing and is blindfold-worthily steep. Especially for someone who goes through a bottle every two weeks. Solution o'clock needed to happen, like, six months ago.

Homespun Necessities: Apple Cider

This post is a mathematical breakdown of abundance. Follow closely.

{Autumn is synonymous for radiantly red maples and steaming mugs of apple cider, at least where I come from. Since Moeder Nature does a damn fine job on her own with the former, and I haven't found the cider of my dreams in Holland, I'm focusing on the latter. [I've tasted everything even sort of resembling the cloudy, brown-tinged drink. None of them is just right.] I want Christmas in a cup, spiced and warm.}

Persisting Oven Woes; Thus, Pumpkin Ice Cream

The pompoenen at the market have been exceptionally beautiful the last couple weeks. Normally, I'd buy a few without hesitating and preheat my oven. 

This time of year, I dream of all things pumpkiny and baked. Unfortunately, I'm going on week five of having a defunct oven (culprit=a really slow-shipping part); I was sort of clueless in a hands-up sort of way about why else I could possibly need a pumpkin. Until I stopped sulking and started thinking. Duh. Ice cream. And to whom would I turn in such a time of desperation? David Lebovitz, that's who. Err, whom. 

Homespun Necessities: Butter

I always imagined that making butter involved a contraption large, creaking, and wooden, and a serious arm workout. Churning butter sounds so serious, and like it requires bonnet-wearing. So, as official research (yes, let's call it that) for my newly conceived series on creating kitchen basics by hand, I googled "how to make butter." What I found, friends, blew my tiny little brain. Into tiny little pieces.

(German) Chocolade (Cake) Therapie

To say I've been feeling a little ill the last few days is a vast understatement. Even my favorite foods have been about as appealing as a pile of wood shavings... or dog vomit, depending on the day.

Apparently, though, chocolate heals all. Last night, I crawled to bed with a cup of fennel tea, unable to believe I'd ever see another day. This morning, I pulled on my rain boots and splashed over to a friend's house to help her with a German chocolate she was making for her birthday celebration in the afternoon. Within minutes of arriving and getting elbow-deep in chocolate, I was cured.

Being Adult, and Fresh Mint Chip Frozen Yogurt

My oven is still gebroken; but instead of despairing and being tempted into another adult temper tantrum, I've chosen to go the soup and ice cream route, or any other culinary path that leads me away from the oven (and subsequently subjecting it to acts of physical violence).

Homespun Necessities: Hot Chocolate with Cinnamon Whipped Cream

I have a deeply woven desire to know what's in my food, and to make conscious decisions about what I consume. Mass-produced foods have one main purpose: shelf life. And in many parts of the world, kids grow up on products that are 1. made to last in a package, and 2. can be so easily replicated in a more wholesome manner if product longevity is no longer an issue. 

You Say "Tomato", I Say "Pour Me a Bowl."

Den Haag is sidling up next to soup season. And there's nothing more I love for a lazy weekend lunch than grilled cheese served next to a steaming bowl of tomato soup. The real kind, not the stuff from a can.

Parmesan, Celery, and Chickpea Salad

I just realized that, from my posts, it looks like my diet is almost entirely comprised of sweets. Funny! The truth is, I'm enamored with fresh, healthful ingredients and love creatively composed salads (see Exhibit A and B). I just get really excited about making and photographing desserts because they're exquisite, a bit vulgar in their decadence, and fun to share with a crowd. But although they get less public attention, salads brimming with texture, color, and flavor are regular and welcome guests in our home.

Notebook of Revelation

So, there it is. The reason I've avoided outfit posts. In case you've never had your own, until a bump is truly a bump, it just looks like one's had the cookie jar perpetually full and the lid permanently propped open.

Our three will become four sometime around February fifth, which we couldn't be more pleased about.