Lagniappe: I'm Almost Sorry For This One

I *live* for corny jokes.

Lagniappe: TEDTalks Jamie Oliver "Teach Every Child About Food"

Seems like such a simple idea, doesn't it? Teaching kids about food? I mean, we spend plenty of hours teaching them practically useless bullshit in school like algebra and geometry--surely we'd wile away at least a few hours teaching them how to put food in their face holes, right?

Right?

False, brosef. And it's the most disappointing thing in America, and that includes Kim Kardashian.

(And before any of you nerds get all fired up about algebra and geometry, I challenge you to give me examples in the comments of when, as a NORMAL FUNCTIONING ADULT, you have used algebra/geometry three times a day *every* day in your life. No? OK so yes, food education is more important.)

How can we expect anyone to eat right if they don't know their ass-end from a rutabaga? How can we explain to an insecure crash-dieting teenager girl that she doesn't need to do all that crap to be slim--all she has to do is eat some damn chicken--or beans, or fish, or other high protein food combined with a fibruous vegetable on the side...?

It's not rocket science and it's (clearly) a subject I feel passionately about. Jamie Oliver does, too. The next time you're making one of my yummy recipes, because of course you are, prop up your laptop or iPad or whatever and hit play on his great TED talk, below.

You can find the original link here.

Everyone's a critic, though, and I get that too. "Jamie Oliver has millions of dollars and a bunch of assistants, of COURSE he has the time and resources to feed his kids properly." I hear you. I can also recognise that I am a young single kidless person. Granted, I have no money, but you'll notice I'm not spending my meager funds on garbage food. Who knows, maybe when I spawn I'll be stuffing my kids with all the same fried poison--but I doubt it.

Why? Because I know better. Because I taught myself. Because no one else did, and certainly not in school. Jamie Oliver is trying to change that, and I applaud and support his efforts. Knowledge is power. I hope that I can do the same, even if it's on the tiniest scale, even if it's just one recipe from this silly little blog that someone decides to cook instead of tossing some frozen chicken nuglets in the oven or whatever.

And you know what dudes! The stuff I post isn't crazy stuff. That's my whole credo, for crying out loud. Good food (and when we say "good" I mean both good-tasting and good-FOR-YOU) doesn't have to be expensive, or complicated. As cheesy (hah) as it is, sometimes the best things in life are the simplest.

Last thing I will say on the subject: life is about balance. So is eating. You're not going to do permanent damage to your body if you have a McDonald's double cheeseburger every ONCE in a while. It's the day-to-day decisions we make that make all the difference.

Take a look at that video, friends, and pass it on. Let's all make a commitment to changing the way WE eat, and then serve as examples for the next generation.

Lagniappe: I'm Back!

Well, kinda.

Hi all! Do you all remember me? Sorry for the long lapse in posting, but I do have a very, very good reason, namely, that over the last month I quit my job of three years, packed up my stuff and moved 1000 miles away from DC back to central Florida to go back to college at the University of Florida. April was filled with case finalisations at work, endless packing, pantry clean-outs, and many many going away parties--the last of which was epically thrown by my incredible friends and fellow Chivers that wound up raising $1000 for a charity very near and dear to my heart, the Hanne Howard Fund.

Yes, that's me, front and center. With the crown. Don't act like you're in any way surprised.

Being back in Florida and starting this new chapter of my life is a good thing, but I'm not sure yet what that means for this blog. My Dad is a very active, athletic individual who tries to eat very clean and lean, so de facto when I'm with him I'm somewhat restricted in what I can cook. We eat a lot of salads. Like, A LOT. So I think you can expect more "healthy eating" entries here, though I promise I won't be doing salads 24/7 because even I get bored of that pretty easily.

Another caveat is that I'm a college student now, so, there's that money thing...in that I DON'T HAVE IT. I'm being forced to trim my grocery budget to about half of what it used to be (*sob*) so I'm challenging myself to be more creative with less. No more short ribs at $14 a pound for awhile. I'm also cooking out of a tiny student kitchen I share with two other roommates with limited supplies which is even more entertainingly challenging.

If you think the cocktailing is going anywhere though, you're mad. I may be a college student (and yes, I've already enjoyed wine out of a box--DON'T HATE) but that doesn't mean I'm resigning myself to guzzling bathtub gin jungle juice only!

I have a few entries in draft that I'll work on getting up soon as I work on getting settled and established in this new life. Until then, eat and drink well my friends.

Lagniappe: Boozing On A Budget, Part 1

The actual FULL title of today's post is "Boozing on a Budget: Everything You Need to Have a Perfectly Well-Stocked Cocktail Bar to Get You Through The Week and Life in General" but that seemed a bit excessive.

Let's talk about cocktails! We talk about them all the time here, don't we? I like to drink. I come from a family of Europeans raised in Latin America, and we have a GRAND old time with a great whiskey or aged rum. It's in my blood. No seriously, I'm pretty sure that at any given time there is a measurable amount of alcohol in my blood somehow, someway.

To my future employers: HAHAHA! I was just kidding about that last line, of course. Move along.

Now I do love a great wine, red or white, with my personal favourites being Cabernet Sauvignon and Pinot Noir, and Sauvignon Blanc and unoaked Chardonnay, respectively. Wine is my go-to when I am legitimately stressed out and just want to unwind after a long day. Cocktails though, liquors, with their myriad of accompanying bitters, mixers, garnishes, infusions, and variations--it's an absolute PLAYGROUND for me, just as much as food is! In fact, I've got some blackberry vodka infusing on my countertop as we speak that I hope to play around with for a tangerine spritzer cocktail.

The problem is, I have no money. Boo, hiss! LIQUOR COMPANIES, PLEASE SEND ME FREE ALCOHOL! I will write about you in this most winning fashion, and you will thank me. Though my liver might not.

Until that happens (or I marry for money, whichever comes first), here's how I mix things up on a budget:

Essential Items for Cocktailing: Equipment
That's a word. I'm making it happen.


Cocktail Shaker: Whelp, I guess I fail at my own list because I don't even really have one of these. Bear and I have a cheap stainless steel one in our house that I suspect is some sort of "drinking governor" type device, because it will only let me make one drink before the metal expands to the point where I can't pry the lid off to make a second one. I DO NOT APPRECIATE BEING JUDGED ON MY DRINKING HABITS BY AN INANIMATE OBJECT. So I use a to-go coffee cup! It's metal and it has a small opening to strain out the ice. Make do, bitches.

 Yeah...I'll probably be upgrading here soon. THIS ISN'T EVEN MINE omfg why haven't my roommates kicked me out yet.

Jigger: A jigger is a double-ended shot glass, usually 2 ounces on one end and 1 ounce on the other. You can just use a regular shot glass, of course, but make sure you know exactly how much it measures. There's no real standard, so you could be pouring anywhere from 0.75 ounce to 2 ounces without realising it. For years I wondered why all my friends complained that my drinks were too strong--as it turns out, before I got a jigger I was using a Marine Corps stamped shot glass that was a deceptive 2 ounces instead of 1. Whoops. (Marine Corps...shoulda known.) 

Muddler: Another fail. I'm doing well, aren't I? A muddler is a stainless steel rod with a ridged plastic end that is used to mash up ingredients at the bottom of a glass to release oils, juices, etc as in an Old Fashioned. I use a wooden spoon. *shrug*

Glassware: This is an obvious one, but if you're really on a budget you probably only have two basic types of glasses: drinking glasses and wine glasses. If you're trendy, possibly Mason jars as well. I'm lucky to live with someone who owns a set of rocks glasses for my whiskey on the rocks (where the name comes from, obvi), Old Fashioneds, and most of the cocktails you see on this blog. We recently acquired some stemless wine glasses that I've been using as a slightly more elegant option but I'm going to have to leave both of these behind when I move next month.

It actually PAINS me a great deal that I don't have the correct set of glasses for all the drinks I want to make, because a truly classy, well-stocked cocktail bar would have the following:

• Champagne flutes: for any cocktail that involves champagne or prosecco. The tall, slim shape allows the bubbles to emit in long thin streams and keeps them concentrated for longer. 
• Coupes: this is probably what you envision when you think of Gatsby! Coupes are used to make a champagne tower at wedding receptions (but has anyone ACTUALLY seen that at wedding reception?!) but fell out of favour fairly quickly because the wide surface area of the mouth makes the champers lose its carbonation more quickly.
• Martini glasses: after doing some research I realised that this is actually technically called a "cocktail glass"; it became known as the martini glass after its most popular usage. However, the general idea of a martini glass revolves around the stem; in this you serve any drink that is meant to be enjoyed cold but not actually over ice, because the stem keeps the heat of your hand away from the drink. It always strikes me as finicky to drink that way though. Hmm.
• Rocks glasses: I call them"rocks glasses" because that's what I grew up hearing, but they're also called lowballs or Old Fashioned glasses, after their most famous (and delicious!) contents. It's a short tumbler with a thick base often used to serve drinks "on the rocks" or any drink that involves muddling of things on the bottom. A good, classic, clear glass rocks glass with a spot of Maker's Mark in it, floating around an ice sphere, is a damn beautiful site!
• Collins glass: A tall, slim glass, the Collins glass is used to serve sippin' drinks with ice, things like Long Island Iced Teas and Whiskey Gingers, things that people drink in the South on the porch in the summer while the condensation slips down your hand. Perfection!

Y-Peeler: Like a regular vegetable peeler, but shaped like a Y. This is used to take peels of citrus fruit, usually orange or lemon, as a garnish for sophisticated cocktails. You CAN use a paring knife as well, but I find a y-peeler to be more controlled and precise. They *are* harder to find, though. 

There are also several other odds and ends for a nicely stoked bar like a strainer, a citrus squeezer, matches or a lighter to ignite citrus peels and their essential oils, a set of tongs to match an ice bucket, etc.  Ain't nobody got time (or space) for that, though.

In the absence of a rich Saudi husband, I plan to hit up some thrift stores (or my father's house--head's up Dad!) to find unique "solos" of all of those to build up my hodge-podge collection, but lemme tell you--a Carlos O'Brien tastes just as delicious in a rocks glass as it does out of a wine glass or a Mason jar or a coffee mug. I'm just saying. It's nice to be able to enjoy a cocktail in the most perfect, refined way possible, but don't let yourself get so hung up on the details that you no longer enjoy it. :)

Coming up next, the fun stuff: booze!

Lagniappe: Wonder What That's Like

I hope I never have to find out.

Lagniappe: How to Boil an Egg

Today's post is an instructional one, since several of my recipes recently have called for hard or soft boiled egg of some sort and I've been eating a lot of them, too. In fact, I recently discovered that it is ABSOLUTELY DELICIOUSLY POSSIBLE to make egg salad without any mayo whatsoever. Yep, just do a half-and-half mixture of plain Greek yogurt and avocado, mix in an acid of your choice (I dig Dijon mustard) and salt and pepper, and you've got yourself a fantastically light green, rich, lean egg salad. If you hate avocado (you're wrong) and simply have to have your mayo, at least do a 50/50 mix of mayo and Greek yogurt. I promise you will not notice the difference, and you'll have just cut your calories in half: one tablespoon of mayo has 90 calories, one tablespoon of Greek yogurt has 17 calories. Don't say I never did anything for ya!

 Photo from Bon Appetit, credit Danny Kim

Anyway, back to boiling eggs. Everyone has their own way of doing this and everyone's so sure they're right, but I'm pretty sure I'm the MOST right. You'll notice I reference "piercing" the eggs--this is SOP in South Africa and Europe but I find it's not as well-known here. Y'all are at a disadvantage! Piercing the large end of the eggs make the shells less likely to crack during boiling, and I think it makes them infinitely easier to peel, too. I use a gadget like this one, but you can also just use a pin or a needle.

It's simple! Place the pierced eggs in a medium sized pot and cover with cold salted water. Use a big enough pot so that the eggs can have room to move, and enough water such that the eggs are covered by at least an inch. Cover and bring to a boil. The SECOND it comes to a boil, start the timer for 1 minute. After 1 minute of boiling, remove the pot from the heat and let sit, covered, for 12 minutes. When the 12 minutes are up, immediately dump them into a bowl of ice cold water to shock them. This instantly stops the cooking process. Wait 'til they're fully chilled, and peel. Dunzo.

Soft boiled eggs are a bit trickier. That was my favourite breakfast as a kid: soft boiled eggs with little toast soldiers for dipping. I'm 23 years old and that is STILL my most comforting breakfast! The way I like them, with very soft yolks, is to bring a pot of salted water to a rolling boil. Pierce the eggs and lower them gently into the water with a slotted spoon. Boil for 5 minutes, then shock with ice water. "Decapitate" them (slice off the top 1/3 with a sharp knife) and serve in an egg cup with sliced toast for dipping.

There's also an in-between egg, the kind that's served on top of soups, sort of a medium. It's the exact same instructions as a soft boiled egg, but you cook it for 7 minutes instead of 5.

Bon Appetit has the most amasing visual graphic here, if like me, you like pictures. And it is because they have this lovely graphic that I don't have to bother with taking my OWN multiple egg pictures. Everybody wins.

Bon Appetit!

Lagniappe: Don't Listen to Her

Lagniappe: It'll Be Over Tomorrow

Lagniappe: You're Like Hot Chocolate

'Tis the season of love, or something something something friends-with-benefits. Whichever.

Lagniappe: That "Filter" Thing

I do not have it. 

Lagniappe: Blanche is my Spirit Animal

Lagniappe: A Small Tattoo With Meaning

Accurate.

Lagniappe: Happy Birthday, Dad.

Today is my Dad's birthday, and he is my best friend in the whole world.

See, I had this lightbulb moment the other night. I didn't really grow up in a "foodie" family, and no one is as crazy passionate about it like I am. My Dad does love photography though, and he likes detail, and he likes colours and patterns. So he often texts me pictures of food he eats or makes--largely because a couple of years ago I introduced him to the Food Network show Chopped and he became obsessed with the concept of plating. "PLATING! Look at this wonderful PLATING job I've done here Gracie!" is the caption that comes through with a snap of a salad he's constructed. It's basically the sweetest thing in the world.

This kind of enthusiasm isn't really new, though. One of my most precious memories was as a young teenager helping my Dad assemble a salad for dinner (we're big on salads where I come from, apparently) and whilst slicing a beautiful red juicy Roma tomato, he suddenly tossed down the knife and exclaimed, "My God, Gracie, just come and look at this. Look how beautiful this is! It's just gorgeous, so perfectly designed and deep red with the seeds all arranged just so in each slice...I tell you, this is proof to me that there is a God. GOD IS IN THE TOMATOES, MY SAUSAGE!"

Yes. "Sausage." That's what he calls me. 

My first instinct was to check him for a head injury of some kind, but failing that, I just laughed--because this is my Dad, and this is what I learned from my Dad: to see the beauty in simple, small things. To appreciate that a humble tomato can be a source of magnificence and design, and is worthy of a prayer of gratitude for its blessing, however small. Once you realise how many components actually go INTO a salad, it becomes pretty evident that in one white bowl lies the proof that we are SURROUNDED by amazing, inspiring, beautiful things and we have more to be thankful for than we know what to do with.

So when I'm standing in the farmer's market, shaking with excitement over finally finding the most perfect, melt-in-your-tongue goat cheese coated in mineral ash and exploding with creamy richness, or I'm getting near teary-eyed at the rows upon rows of beautiful, BRIGHT, fresh green lettuces and greens--I am not batshit crazy, as my poor friends looking on and watching this escapade would assume--I am, simply, my father's daughter.

Happy Birthday, Dad. I love you to the moon and back.

Lagniappe: Women Belong in the Kitchen

TGIF, y'all.

Lagniappe: A List of Things I Made Over Christmas Break That I Did Not Photograph and Therefore Cannot Properly Blog About

I drove home to Florida to spend the holidays with friends and family, at around 35 hours of total driving time and about 2,500 miles. Thank God for hybrids, audiobooks and 5-Hour Energy!  (I drove 15 hours nonstop overnight on the first leg.)


Food

Banoffee Pie: A British classic, made with graham cracker crust, the most delicious toffee, sliced bananas, whipped cream, and chocolate. It's even BETTER than it sounds, I assure you.

Rocket Pizza Bianca: Not a true pizza bianca, of course, since my boys wanted red sauce, but we assembled this pie of wonder with baby arugula (known as rocket in Europe), buffalo mozzarella, goat cheese and prosciutto. That's the life!

Pan Seared New York Strip with a Bleu Cheese Crust: Just like Ruth's Chris Steakhouse makes it, sizzling in butter and paired with garlic mashed potatoes.

Spaghetti Bolognese: I was bold enough to feed this to an Italian. Sometimes I stun even myself with my bravery. Lucky for me, it's a solid go-to recipe that involved ground beef and Italian sausage, carrots and white wine, and an all-day simmer. I PROMISE, this recipe will make it onto the blog one day.

Baked Clams: I was forcibly relieved of my reign over the kitchen with the aforementioned Italian when he prepped his family's traditional Feast of the Seven Fishes dinner (absolutely positive I was Italian in another life, btw) for Christmas Eve. Even with just the two of us, he somehow managed to make a lobster tomato sauce (involving an entire lobster, natch) with shrimp and mussels served with linguine, a shrimp cocktail appetizer, and about two dozen baked clams. Once I was permitted back in the kitchen, we stuffed those suckers with panko bread crumbs, diced bacon, shredded cheddar cheese and scallions--and then stuffed ourselves. Not exactly seven fishes, but we were stuffed to the gills with deliciousness as it was. (See what I did there?)

It goes without saying that I played around with the lobster and made it dance like it had maracas before it was seized from me and dismembered into the pot.

Drinks

White Christmas Sangria: Made with Granny Smith apples, cranberries, and fresh rosemary--this was a sweet and festive Christmas Eve drink.

French 75's: A fantastic cocktail introduced to me by my tres chic friend Lily, it will get you super drunk on a mixture of champagne, gin, lemon juice and sugar. A Happy New Year's Eve it was, indeed.


I SUCK.

Sorry.

But I hope your holidays were grand!

Lagniappe: 18 Thanksgiving Cooking Fails

Just in time for Thanksgiving!

I'm writing this kind of rambling non-post today because I've eaten way too much sugar and can't focus on ANYTHING, so here's a randomly compiled list of all the cooking type moments that will make you want to *headdesk* this Thanksgiving, except we're in a kitchen and not the office so it's more like a *headcounter* but that just doesn't sound as nice...as nice as banging your head into an inanimate object is, anyway.

Commence!

1. When required to sift flour or confectioner's sugar. YEY! It's snowing on my counter! Let's make sure this goes EVERYWHERE EXCEPT IN THE BOWL!

2. When required to "soften butter" but you were too busy to plan ahead and now you have two cold hard sticks of butter and no time. You consider just sticking them down your top because you are drunk, but then decide against it when faced with howls of judgement from your friends. Who are not helping. Commence second-by-second battle with the microwave to get butter softened to the "right" kind of soft.

3. When you place a spoon or ladle into the sink and then turn the tap on. SPOON BETRAYAL! Dirty dish water everywhere, including in your eyes! WHY SPOON WHY!

4. When you have to truss the turkey. Trussing? What is trussing? Sounds like an extremely fussy form of torture. It involves string and seventeen types of sailor's knots? Ugh. No. (No, but really.)

5. When you have to season the inside cavity of the turkey with salt and pepper. Someone please explain to me how I'm supposed to do this with only two hands. One hand to hold the turkey up so I can peer down its butt, the other hand to shake the seasonings into the cavity (LOL IF YOU THINK YOU'RE GOING TO USE A PEPPER GRINDER) and the...extra...hand to rub them in/make sure they're evenly distributed inside that skin-cave. Seriously, PLEASE someone explain to me how I'm expected to do this without getting raw chicken grease all over the seasoning containers!

6. When you're instructed to brine the turkey. Brining, are you kidding me? I have to go to Home Depot and buy a 5 gallon bucket specifically for the purpose of giving this turkey a salt/spice bath the day before? Get out.

7. When you have to diced up vegetables of all shapes into symmetrical, even, square pieces for roasting. I failed geometry in high school so it's no wonder I have no idea how to make a wobbly-oval sweet potato into perfect squares. Oval > square.

8. When you have to peel the skin off onions. OH MY GOD WHY WON'T THIS INTERMINABLE TASK END??? Because of course you need only about 9 onions, for everything.

9. When your gravy won't thicken properly, and so you keep adding more and more flour/water mixture to it, and nothing and nothing and nothing and then BAM! Suddenly, sludge. Dammit, gravy, get it together.

10. When someone asks you if what you're preparing for them to stuff their faces with for free is gluten-free/vegetarian/GMO-free/vegan/paleo/dairy-free. (Without advanced notice or bringing their own food.) The only freedom we have here is for me to drink as much as I like and for you to shush.

 
11. Injuries. Oh, the injuries. If there is ever a year I don't peel off my top layer of hand skin with a vegetable peeler, nick a fingernail with a knife, burn my wrists on the top rack of the oven or scorch some part of my body with steam...then I guess that's a year I'm not cooking.

12. When you have to spoon cupcake batter into tins evenly. It only requires one ice cream scoop (fail), two large spoons (I will never get that time of my life back) or a large ziploc bag with a hole cut in the corner (get out). Ugh. Cake. You're all getting cake. One large cake.

13. Forgetting to set the timer. Don't think you can just "keep track" in your head, either, because as we all know, 5 minutes when you're sober and 5 minutes when you're...um...LESS THAN...is definitely not the same amount of *actual* time. (Sidebar: I once got really drunk at a bar with some friends and said I was just going to lay my head down on the table for five minutes. I woke up in a very different place five minutes later, extremely confused, to my friend saying "Yeah that was two hours ago. And in a different state.") Protip: Use your iPhone, just don't drop it in the mashed potatoes.

14. When you put butter into mashed potatoes but then can't taste it in the final product. What HAPPENED to that entire stick (or two, no shame here) I put in there?! Where did it GO? Too many questions.

15. When you run out of wine, attempting to put an end to the aforementioned questions.

16. When you have to clean up. Except there's no way in hell I'm doing that--that's what YOU are here for. Yes, you. "Guests." Chop chop.

17. When the smoke detector goes off, even though nothing is even REMOTELY smoking, except me, because I am smoking hot. Ba-dum-bump!

Fan me, peasant, I am hot.

18. When you're expected to cook breakfast the next day. WHAT EVEN.

But at the end of the day...cooking is fun! Wherever it happens to land in your list of priorities...

I'm headed off for holidays for about 10 days here and likely will not be blogging much unless my company is extremely, extremely boring--or I am left to my own devices without supervision for too long. Most people learn not to allow this, though.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Lagniappe: A Note on Healthy Cooking

I'm a stubborn person.

For those who know me, this is not a shocking revelation. Stubbornness and tenacity are two very similar qualities, though tenacity, I think, can be meant as more of a compliment--until in my worse moments I take it too far and become stubborn, often to my own detriment.

However, I do not feel AT ALL badly about my stubbornness when it comes to healthy cooking.

Case in point: pie crusts.

Pastry and I do not get along well. YEAST, my mortal enemy. Any bread recipes you see here will not involve yeast, because I simply can't do it and haven't gathered up the patience to keep trying yet. Pie crusts drive me insane because I've never been able to master that perfectly flaky, golden, buttery halo atop my Shepherd's Pie to my contentment. Why is that? Because I refuse to use shortening. Yes, that's the forking secret! CRISCO! I discovered this dirty, dirty secret a couple of weekends ago when I tried my hand at some Meat and Potato pies, and caved to the recipe that called for shortening. So far, I have refused to touch the stuff. It's bad for you. Like, really, really, terrible for you. I will use butter all day every day because, while it's not "healthy" in that it is a fat and is therefore not good for you in major amounts--I KNOW WHAT BUTTER IS. And so do you! It's one of the simplest things you can make yourself; two ingredients: heavy cream and salt. In fact, I posted a recipe on how to make your own just yesterday.

Shortening? What the hay is vegetable shortening? Read the ingredients; do YOU know what the hell that stuff is? Didn't think so. Me neither. IF YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT IT IS, YOU PROBABLY SHOULDN'T PUT IT IN YOUR MOUTH. You are not a 2-year-old.

Much to my chagrin...my pie crusts turned out effortlessly fabulous. They were delicious, and buttery, and flaky in all of their golden perfection--and, undoubtedly, toxic and cancerous. Sigh.

That's why I'm not posting the recipe here. It's why I won't be making it again.

Look, I believe in living life to the fullest. Ricky Gervais said it better than I ever could; the ultimate aim is to "stay alive and eat more cheese and drink more wine." I just wanna do what I can, stack the deck in my favour as much as I can, so I can stick around on this planet long enough to know what caviar tastes like and to maybe score the man of my dreams and change something in the world. I will ALWAYS continue to indulge in the good things in life and that occasionally means things that might not be "healthy": butter and cheese and wine and bacon.

That doesn't mean vegetable shortening.

That doesn't mean canola oil. (We'll get to that soon.)

That doesn't mean cream-of-god-knows-what tinned soups, or endless sodas, or margarine, or iridescent maraschino cherries.

Hey y'all, I'm not complicated when it comes to food. I want to cook, eat, and share good, tasty, non-pretentious food that won't kill me. Or you. 

(Yes, even you there. You know who you are.)

Happy (healthy) cooking, my friends.

Lagniappe: Can It With Your Cholesterol Bullsh*t & Eat Some Eggs

Occasionally I'm going to blog about eating good food. Not food that just TASTES good, but is actually good FOR you. I'm fascinated with it and studied nutrition for a few years, but I am FAR from being an expert. I've just learned a few things over the years that help me to make healthier choices, because knowledge is power and NO ONE IS TEACHING US ABOUT FOOD. Nutrition and health classes (REAL health classes, not this condom-on-the-banana horsefeathers) are not mandatory in schools, and our parents' generation didn't have a tenth of the research and data on food and health that we do now, so where the hell else are you gonna learn it? RIGHT HERE KIDS.

I'm working on a blog entry about how to choose the correct cooking oil for whatever it is you're chilling with in the kitchen (and I wish I could fry the borderline-manic Rachel Ray in EVOO for the pusher than she is) but tonight, I'm talking about eggs. Incredible Edible Eggs. Those things that make you think "Who in the hell was the first person to see a chicken poop one of these things out and think 'Hey, I bet this shit's delicious!'?" Because, nothing will make me go from zero to Healthy Hulk faster than someone complaining "Oh I can't eat eggs because they're bad for my cholesterol."

BULLSHIT.

Your cholesterol is shitty because you eat triple fried chicken with a side of Crisco, not because of a couple of eggs. Get outta here with that nonsense.

I'm trying not to blame you for your ignorance, but I really want to shake you. Eggs have gotten a bad rap for YEARS and still do because smart, intelligent doctors are still drinking the same Kool Aid as everyone else. (Even the Mayo Clinic is still preaching this bullcrap on their website.) Did you know that the majority of medical school graduates receive 25 hours or less of nutrition education? When...

Hey, it isn't really their fault and I'm not slamming doctors. If they wanted to learn more about nutrition they'd have to do it on their own time and I don't know if you know any doctors but there is no such thing as your own time. Those residency schedules are cray. It's simply more an indictment of the general American culture that STILL does not understand what is displayed so nicely in that cute little poster above--what you put into your body is what you get out, and it's a complex dance that requires a bit of knowledge to make fun and life worth living.

/rant

Anyway, back to eggs.

Here's the thing: there are two types of cholesterol: dietary cholesterol and blood cholesterol. IT'S NOT THE SAME THING. It's the same WORD, but it's not the same thing. The type of cholesterol that is in eggs (primarily in the yolks) is not the same thing as the stuff that's coursing through your blood and building up in your arteries and can cause heart attacks. Trust me, I eat about two eggs every day and my cholesterol is lower than my bank account on the Thursday before payday, that is to say, practically nonexistent.

ASK MEN, of all damn places, has a fantastic article about it here. Go read it, because I've had three drinks already tonight and I am not typing all that out here for you.

You're back? Good. So we've established that eggs have very very very little to do with the bad cholesterol in your blood; they are FULL of essential vitamins, minerals and amino acids; and they're a fantastic source of complete protein that will keep you full and fueled without resorting to snacking on weak weight-gaining crap. Any more arguments?

Oh, I have one more: organic eggs.

I swear I'm not one of those health freaks that's going to bind you up with hemp rope in the kitchen (although that sounds kinda fun on a totally different level) and force feed wheatgrass down your throat. However, I'm also not an idiot--one day, cook yourself a regular cheap egg and an organic egg (which is probably cage free, hormone free and antibiotic free, too) and you can immediately see the difference. For one, the shells of the organic eggs are usually stronger instead of being weak and practically see-through. Why? Because the chickens making those spheres of deliciousness aren't pumped full of disgusting toxic medication, sick and dying of oozing festering infections, and sure to wind up ground up in your McNuggets shortly. You'll also notice the yolks are a more vibrant color and actually taste of something! Plus, you know, you won't be second-hand poisoning yourself with all the non-human-grade toxins, antibiotics, vaccines and shitty food that "they" put into those poor chickens. You are what you eat, fools, and you are what your food eats, too.

Don't sit here and use the argument that organic eggs are too expensive. Look I'm piss-poor too, but a dozen organic eggs costs me $4.69 which works out to be 39 cents per egg. Are you really going to bitch about spending 80 cents for breakfast?

Sidebar: I've heard there's such a thing as low-cholesterol eggs. That freaks me out. How are they controlling how much cholesterol is in an egg? That is freakin' weird and you shouldn't touch it because it doesn't make sense. Just give me a fresh egg from the butt of a healthy non-spastic chicken and I'm a happy gal. 

Eggs aren't just for breakfast either. For a busy single chick like me, they're the perfect hot and fast thing to cook up for dinner, and Lord knows I like hot and fast. I made a sandwich for dinner the other night that consisted of two pieces of wheat toast topped with sliced tomatoes, avocado, shredded cheddar cheese and one fried egg, sunny side up--and it was, in a word, DELICIOUS. As I always say...sometimes, truly simple is just delicious.

Vitamins, minerals and amino acids are served, y'all.

Lagniappe: FAIL.

Consistency is not my strong suit. My best friend Ghost once told me I was predictable in my unpredictability, so it's safe to say I won't be sticking to some sort of blogging "schedule"--my life is structured enough, thanks!

It's not that I'm not cooking though. I always am, usually about 5 days a week, tooling around with new recipes or finessing old ones with the eventual goal of posting them here. But, like any human I am prone to failure and not all of these recipes are successes! Whether it's due to human error on my part or a poorly written original recipe, the gaps in posting can be chalked up to something that didn't work out.

My godfather Harry suggested that I *do* write about my failures to have a more balanced viewpoint, but without any positive conclusion (this recipe was totally screwy, but LOOK, here's how I fixed it!) it's just a long FAIL blog post and no one wants that. For example, do you want to read an entire post about how the Lemon Blueberry Loaf I attempted on Monday was too moist, too dense, and wayyyyy too much work with glazing this and sifting that and zesting this and the other thing? At the end of the day it's just me being mad at a cake on my counter and what is THAT? No.

If I think a recipe is worth another shot (that cake is not, btw) I will continue to work with it and tweak it (like the Crispy Zucchini Cakes I attempted and screwed up--too much onion, too much moisture, cakes too big and tall) until I have a success, where I will write about it and mention how I royally effed it all up before so that you don't have to waste your time making my same mistakes. See: History; repeating itself, et. al.

tl; dr I don't blog about my failed cooking escapades because that's stupid and not the point of this blog.

I'm in Long Island with my Bonus Parents (godparents that are way more than godparents) this Labor Day weekend so I won't be doing much experimenting. In the meantime, drink one for me to toast the end of summer (BUT WHO IS REALLY WANTING TO TOAST THAT??? COME HERE SO I CAN SMACK YOU!) and I'll be back in the kitchen with flour on my nose and sugar sparkling on my skin next week.

The shitty, ill-fated Lemon Blueberry Loaf.

Lagniappe, or, A Little Somethin' Somethin'

I used to date a guy (we'll call him Lupin) from New Orleans who taught me all sorts of awesome Cajun slang while we were together, to my increasing amusement. They sure do have a fascinating way of talkin' down there! My favourite word is "lagniappe" which sounds ugly the way it's spelled (lag-nee-ap-pay?), but is actually pronounced "LAN-yap". It means "a little extra" and is used when purchasing something from a vendor. For example, when a baker throws in an extra donut for free (to make a baker's dozen of 13), that is lagniappe; or if I were to go to a street market and purchase some veggies and said to the vendor "How about some lagniappe?" he might throw in a bunch of cilantro or something for me. Apparently it's still widely practiced in Louisiana and I LOVE this concept and custom.

I'll be using this word in my blog post titles for things that don't fit strictly into the "Lekker" (food and dessert recipes) or "Liquor" (drinks, obvi) categories--just a little somethin' somethin' extra.

So, here's today's lagniappe, which had me laughing my ass off on Pinterest yesterday.

MIND. BLOWN.