Bell Peppers and Freezers

All day long I had those three beautiful bell peppers on my mind. That is between moving 5000 pounds of bulk and directing the same people I directed yesterday to the same products....funny how that works.

But about those peppers. I bought them several days ago because they were just so pretty. And they are a strange mixed comfort food for me because in my memory we ate them ALL the time, or at least too much. And I did not like them all that much. Mom made them with ground beef and used many different fillers; cracker crumbs, rice, grated veggies, I don't know what else. They were always good, filling and cooked in a pot with lots of tomato products. I think as a kid I did not like the spicy tartness of green bell peppers. That has certainly changed.

I knew that I would not be using any meat because today is Meatless Monday and I do try and keep at least dinner meatless. I also knew that I had to pick up our son at 8:00pm, and I would not want these stuffed peppers to be too heavy. So out to the deep-freeze to see what looked interesting.

My goal right now is to get the level of food down in the freezer because I like to buy several turkeys when they are on sale (or free) for smoking later. Having several cut in half and freezer wrapped makes it easy to roast for a great meal and sandwiches later. But the freezer is way too full.

Rummaging around I find three veggie patties. The box is long gone but they are individually wrapped and look good. I think I can use these in the filling. Some spinach, maybe some cracked wheat cereal. This is sounding really good.

My foraging took me to the fridge where I found a half jar of tomatoes, some left-over cooked rice, a baggie of black olives and some cilantro. Let's put a Mexican twist on these peppers.

'CORN' MEXICAN STUFFED PEPPERS

I had never heard of "CORN" for dinner until my children clued me in on it! Clean Out The Refrigerator night, duh! Sometimes I amaze myself. But that's what these hearty, flavorful peppers did at our house, and can do at yours too.

3 large bell peppers, cut off top, remove seeds, save top for filling
3 - 3.5 oz veggie patties, broken into small pieces
1/4 cup cracked wheat cereal, in microwaveable bowl, rinsed and covered with 1 cup water. Cook on high for three minutes until softened. Try not to let it boil over like I did!
2/3 cup cooked rice
2/3 cup frozen spinach
2/3 cup canned tomatoes
2/3 cup juice from tomatoes
1/2 cup fresh cilantro with stems
1/4 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp oregano
1 tsp spicy chicken seasoning
1/2 tsp seasoning salt
1/2 granulated garlic

1/4 cup grated cheese, optional
Black olives (3-4 per pepper, cut in half) optional

In food processor, combine veggie patties, partially cooked cracked wheat. Pulse. Add rice, spinach and tomatoes. Pulse. Add juice if you think you need it. You may and then again you may not. Pulse.

Add spices, pulse to just blend.

Place peppers in ovenproof glass or ceramic baking dish that has been lightly sprayed with cooking spray. Divide filling in three and heap into peppers. You can add the olives by poking them into the filling. Cover baking dish with foil and bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes, or until toasty hot.

Remove foil, sprinkle with cheese, return to oven for 3-4 minutes until cheese is melted.

Serve with crusty artisan bread and a salad and enjoy comfort food that's good for you.

Serves three.

Another word on Wordstock.

I, of course, attended several talks by either cookbook writers or nutritionists or both. Michael went off and saw other authors. When we met up I told him about some of the questions that the audience had for the speakers. Is it just me, or do some people just embarrass themselves and the rest of the audience with their questions? Several times and with different speakers, the same question came up. "How do you have TIME to cook?" WTF! Why would you attend a talk given by someone who had produced a book full of RECIPES if you cannot visualize yourself taking the time to cook! Turn off the TV, grab your kids, spouse, Mother-in-Law...whatever, and get in the kitchen. Prepare a meal made with love, real ingredients, not some darned box, sit at the table and have a conversation then round up everyone again and do the dishes together. You might be amazed what you learn about your family and yourself!

Sorry. I cook nearly every night. I work full time. Sometimes these meals are fancy, sometimes they are simple. But they are always made with wholesome ingredients, balanced for nutrition and served with a healthy dose of love. Try it. Way better than "Lost" or "Dancing with Stars". Really.

Nutty for Coconut

It just showed up one day in our freight. A 25 pound box of Coconut. Janice and I looked at each other and asked in the same breath, "did you order this?" I trotted over to the bakery, no, it wasn't theirs. No one wanted this Coconut.

So I bought it! I was sure that I could find lots to do with it, Captain Daddee uses it in his Oatmeal Cookies, and his Tropical Delight Cookies, so it would have a good home.

So when I needed to bring a dessert to a meeting last Wednesday, I thought that something with Coconut as the star would be great.

Well, that was not as easily said than done. I Google'd many different request for Coconut recipes and nearly all called for Coconut creme, Coconut extract and various other forms of Coconut. Not just the fluffy, white flakes I had tons of!

So as I was pondering what to make, I wondered if maybe there would be something in one of the several bread machine books I have. Eureka, I found one that just called for Coconut! Woo hoo!

The crazy thing was the entire recipe was made either in a mixer or in a bowl, you know, by hand. Then dumped into a bread machine pan with the kneading blade removed and then baked. What's up with that? I do have an oven and my bread machine does not have a removable kneading blade, so I got the kitchenaid out and went to town. I made a loaf cake for work and a bunch of cupcakes with the second batch. Very good either way. And the surprise was no one turned the cake down. Even people who are not crazy about Coconut.

COCONUT CAKE

1/2 cup butter, or margarine, softened
scant 1 cup sugar
3 eggs, lightly beaten
2 cups, dry shredded coconut
1 cup self rising flour (1 cup flour with 1 1/2 tsp baking powder, 1/2 tsp salt)
3/8 cup sour cream
2 teaspoons grated lemon zest

loaf pan, sprayed with cooking spray and lightly dusted with flour

Cream the butter or margarine and sugar together until fluffy and pale, then add the eggs a little at a time, beating well after each addition.

Add the dry shredded coconut, flour, sour cream and lemon zest. Mix.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Spoon batter into prepared pan. Bake at 350 for 60-70 minutes. Check with toothpick starting at 50 minutes.

Let stand 2-3 minutes, turn out onto wire rack to cool before slicing.

As I said, I also made a batch and baked them in silicone cupcake cups. They took about 25 minutes to cook, possibly more. They were delicious! I also think this changed from lemon to almond extract would be delightful. I certainly have enough coconut to play around with this!

Wordstock and Writers

Today was the opening day of Wordstock at the Convention Center in Portland Oregon.

If you have never attended or even heard of Wordstock, please take the time to go to their website and check it out. www.wordstockfestival.com I actually lifted their mission statement:


Wordstock is Portland's Book & Literary Festival

"Wordstock is an annual festival of books, writers, and storytelling in Portland, Oregon. To date it has hosted over 550 writers, who have read and performed for nearly 55,000 people at past festivals. Wordstock features ten author stages, a book fair with over 150 exhibitors, a special children’s area and children’s literature stage, a series of workshops for writers and for K-12 teachers, a special broadcast of Live Wire!, the popular public radio variety show, featuring writers from the festival, and more. Although it only began in 2005, Wordstock is already the largest celebration of literature and literacy in the Pacific Northwest, and is one of the largest festivals of its kind in the nation.

Wordstock is also a nonprofit that works to promote writing in the classroom. Wordstock for Teachers is a professional development program for K-12 teachers that seeks to improve student writing performance by training and supporting teachers of writing. In other words, it helps kids become better writers by making writers of their teachers. The board, staff, and volunteers who stage Wordstock are honored to help such an important and effective program make a difference in the education of thousands of children."

It is quite possibly the best thing happening with regards to books, writers, publishers and the people who love them all! Set up with wonderful stages, numerous small booths where authors can talk to us crazy reader types, loads of workshops and books galore. And surprise of surprises, I saw my friend Linda Dalal Sawaya, author of "Alice's Kitchen", Traditional Lebanese Cooking. I bought this book several years ago at Wordstock and then Linda and I attended a cookbook writers class last year and reacquainted ourselves.(www.dianemorgancooks.com) Linda is not only a gifted writer, but an amazing artist. What originally caught my eye was the copy of "Aramco News" that she had on her table. My husbands Father worked for Aramco many years ago in Saudia Arabia and for years we had read the magazine. Linda did such an amazing job illustrating the lengthy article. Check out her site too: www.lindasawaya.com

And I apologize for calling you "Alice", Linda. You are so connected to your Mother that I slipped up; actually I probably was having a senior moment!

But the reason I am posting today is because whenever I get around creative people, I get inspiration. Funny how that works. I come home excited and ready to write, with all sorts of thoughts careening around my head. And I have been chewing on several ideas, actually far more than several.

When I wrote about Congee I received the nicest message forwarded from my SIL, Gwen. The gist of the nessage is that people do not know how to cook, and certainly are not willing to improvise in the kitchen. Several of the speakers that I was delighted to hear today also said the same thing. And my darling husband always questions me when I say,"I really followed the recipe on this one!", because he knows the next word out of my mouth will be "except".

I have always cooked like that. If a recipe calls for pork and I have chicken, so be it. If the herbs are mint and oregano and I have dill and lemons, I will choose to make something rather than do nothing. Some have been real hits, some not so great. And sometimes when I have followed the recipe completely, it has been a disaster. I always think of the spinach dish that I made for my parents that had walnuts in it. My Dad, who would eat cardboard spread with library paste and find something nice to say, looked me in the eye and said, "This is awful!" I loved him for that, and we all laughed like crazy. If I remember right, even the dog would not eat that mess.

So here is my point. We know that GMO foods are killing us. All we have to do is look around. We have lived with cheap food for far too long and we have the medical bills to prove what a disaster that experiment has been. The cards are all on the table and they all look like a losing hand. So lets roll up our sleeves, turn off the TV and get busy creating great food for our families.

In 1999 I turned off our TV. I caught a lot of crap for that, believe me. Even though we did not watch as much as the average family, we could easily get sucked into dumb shows and it wasted too much precious time. When we moved to Oregon our kids again tried to get cable and I resisted. The most we do is rent the occasional movie. Network TV just doesn't live here.

I started back to work part-time in May of 2007. It did not take long before that changed into full-time and with my commute I am gone for the better part of the day. I also work the closing shift three of those days and so I do not get home until after 10pm. But I still cook, I just have learned to do it differently.

On these late shift days, I may start soup or stew in the crockpot. I do not use any mixes, almost never. I think because I do not feel that is cooking and I am ALWAYS disappointed. It is not rocket science to add some meat, some broth, some veggies and some spices to a pot and let it simmer. Then I may start of loaf of hearty bread in the bread-machine and bingo...dinner is well on its way. Or marinate a piece of meat and put it on the smoker, nice low heat, hubby checks the fire every few hours and pulls it off when it is done. Some baked potatoes or rice or couscous, a salad and several meals are done. Dinner today and lunch tomorrow!

On those early mornings, (I get up at 4:30am), I am stoked because I will be home early enough to be able to prepare a meal that requires more work. Honestly it is infrequent that I find this a drag, I really relax in the kitchen.

So tonight, as I am writing this, a nice pot of applesauce is simmering on the stove. Molly brought over three buckets of apples, and I love warm applesauce as dessert. Tomorrow I will make more and can it for the winter.

Cinnamon Applesauce

3 pounds apples, cut off the core in random sizes, skin on
1/2 cup water
1 tablespoon cinnamon
honey to taste

Put water into a heavy pot with a good lid. Add apples. Simmer until apples are cooked to your desired taste. I like the way some of the apples will cook completely to mush and some will still have a bit to them. I think that is because I keep adding apples as they are simmering. Some people strain the sauce, I think that is an awful waste of fiber. Don't do that.

When Captain Daddee and I first married he did a bit of cooking. By bit, I mean he made spaghetti sauce and chili. And sometimes it was hard to tell the two apart. He was not real adventuresome at using spices. We laugh about that a lot. He has developed into a fantastic cook, a great bread maker and is the cookie king. And when I do dumb things like leave a recipe for him to complete (I took that chicken out of the freezer two days ago, ran out of time and something has to be done with it....here) as I dash out the door, he improvises when I don't exactly have half of the ingredients and made a fantastic Chicken Tikka Masala. He made Basmasti Rice and we had a lovely late meal. What a guy!

There is such comfort in cooking, baking, preparing food for those you love. When you offer it up you are saying I care for you. Please enjoy. And when all the flavors develop and that first taste is heaven on your tongue, it is magic.