Every weekend, I review a cookbook in an attempt to lend some guidance in a field that has become overrun. These days everyone is writing cookbooks and it is incredibly upsetting to buy a dud and have it sit on your shelf for years – staring at you, mocking your poor judgment.
It’s very rare that a publisher send me a copy of a cookbook unsolicited, but it does occasionally happen. I don’t mind it, especially if the book is good. I try to only review books that I think would be generally useful for my readership (you guys) or I may occasionally review a book that is very popular that I don’t like.
So Betsy and I leave for our little European vacation tonight. It doesn’t quite feel like we are leaving yet. I’m sure it will hit me when I’m on the plane. But, I am super-excited. I’ve never been to Europe and I’m excited to hang out in some new places and see some new sites.
It should go without saying that I’ll be trying all kinds of new foods while I’m there (Look out Haggis, here I come!) Hopefully, it’ll give me some new ideas for food that I can bring home and make back state-side.
A few administrative notes: Obviously, I’ll be a bit less available for the next two weeks or so. Feel free to shoot me an email or Tweet anyway though. I’ll answer you when I get a few minutes. I do have a bunch of posts scheduled for Macheesmo. They won’t be everyday, but you can count on 4 or 5 a week. Depending on my schedule I might find time to squeeze in an update or two from Europe. (Do castles have wireless?)
On Friday, Betsy and I are going on an almost two week vacation to visit some friends in England and her brother in Amsterdam. We are going to swing through Scotland for a few days as well. I’ve never been to any of those places, so I’m really excited to see new places, eat new food and take lots of photos with some of my newly acquired photo skills.
While I’m gone, I will have pretty limited Internet access so I’m not going to be able to work on Macheesmo actively during that time (don’t worry, I have some posts scheduled to give you all something new to look at). While I won’t be working on it, I am going to spend some of the airplane time and walking time thinking about where I want Macheesmo to go in the next 6 months to a year.
But I thought I would give you all the opportunity to chime in on what you would like to see on Macheesmo. I created a quick poll of some ideas I’ve been tossing around. Feel free to check off as many as you find interesting.
Also, if there are things you would like to see that aren’t in the below list, leave a comment or shoot me an email. Thanks for reading everyone.
I was really excited to have this food blog battle with Pete from Pete Bakes mainly just because we realized we could have an in person tasting! If this is the first time you’ve seen a food blog battle here, they are pretty straightforward. Each person picks an ingredient from a list and then both competitors have a certain amount of time to make their dish.
These were our ingredients for this battle: Leeks and Lamb
The ingredients of choice.
So, once again, and I know this because we ate them together, I managed to make almost the exact same dish as my competitor. We both went for a lamb burger slider. This was the basic recipe I used:
So Pete and I were planning on posting our awesome battle today, but we had too much fun last night and simply didn’t have time to write the posts. Tomorrow will be the day.
Meanwhile, I thought I would write about a simple little shrimp taco dish I made a week or two ago. I also found a fun way to use my left over rice and beans from the burritos I made.
Healthy and tasty. Who knew that was possible?
So this dish was not my idea. It was actually Betsy’s idea. She saw it in a book called “Cook Yourself Thin” that I’m actually reviewing this Sunday. I wouldn’t have picked up the book, but a few people told me it was good.
Every month in 2009, I am writing a post detailing some specific things about food in the upcoming month.
As I’ve said a few times over the last week, we are in full effect summer here in DC. It’s muggy, hot, and pretty swamp-like. Occasionally, it will cool down a bit, but there’s no doubt that the heat is on. The good news is that there is a ton of wonderful fruits and veggies that are ready to be munched.
As I wrote last week, I was considering joining a CSA this year but I think I may pass. I researched a bunch of different options but all of the CSAs that had drop-offs in the DC area were sold out already (my fault!) and I don’t have the time to make the trip out to VA every week to pick up food. That’s okay though, I’ll stick to my farmer’s market schedule and try to get on the boat earlier next year.
I am the worst at eating breakfast in the morning. I usually wake up between 6:30 and 7 and work on Macheesmo for a few hours before heading to work. Some days I eat an apple. Some days I forget entirely. And yes I know that breakfast is the most important meal of the day!
So I’ve been trying to find creative ways to eat reasonably healthy things in the morning that are also fast to make. It doesn’t help my little problem that I really dislike cereal.
What I do like though, is breakfast burritos! A few weekends ago, I made enough burritos to last me a week and had some for dinner also.
Nothing fancy about it.
Since I’ve been trying to eat less meat these days, I decided to use spicy rice and beans as my base for the burritos. This is my quick take on rice and beans. It is far from the traditional variety, but produces a pretty solid result and is also relatively fast.
Every weekend, I review a cookbook in an attempt to lend some guidance in a field that has become overrun. These days everyone is writing cookbooks and it is incredibly upsetting to buy a dud and have it sit on your shelf for years – staring at you, mocking your poor judgment.
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