Crepes: The First Is Never Perfect

This past weekend was Senior Ball. Desiring to squeeze into our dresses, my friends and I wanted a light dinner. After a lot of brainstorming and rejected ideas, I finally won by shouting "SAVORY CREPES!" I had dabbled in crepes two summers ago and had suddenly found myself with a burning desire to go back into the world of crepes once more. 

When I first made crepes, the idea seemed daunting and advanced for such a lowly home cook as myself. To my surprise, crepe making wasn't that hard! I now know that I don't have to count on going to the Mosaic Cafe to get my crepe fix. Just follow this recipe!

Basic Crepe Batter: (adapted from Alton Brown's recipe)

2 large eggs

1/2 c milk

1/2 c cold water

1 c all purpose flour

1/4 tsp salt

2 tablespoons melted butter, cooled

Combine all the ingredients in a blender and blend until smooth. If you don't have a blender - whisk the eggs, milk, and water. Slowly continue whisking and add the rest of the dry ingredients (flour, salt). When smooth, continue whisking in the cooled, melted butter. Continue whisking until the batter is consistent and without lumps. Put in refrigerator whilst preparing the fillings.

Filling Ideas:

Cheese (extra sharp white cheddar), caramelized onions (slice an onion thinly, add 1 tbsp butter, and cook over low heat until brown and sweetened - approximately 30 minutes), asparagus (simply cut, put into a pan with a small amount of olive oil, and steamed for 1.5 minutes after a tbsp of water when pan is very hot), ham

Cooking the Crepes:

Just remember, as my grandmother once told me, the first crepe never come out right. Do not worry, it's only uphill from there. When you are cooking crepes, try and use an nonstick pan. If you do not have one, use a shiny bottomed saute pan. No need to oil/butter the pan! There's butter in the batter. In addition, if you make the crepe thin enough, it will never stick.

So, pour just enough of your crepe batter into your medium/high heated pan (for a 10 inch pan, about a 1/4 of a cup). As soon as it hits the pan, tilt the pan every which way to coat the whole bottom. Work quickly! The batter will start cooking as soon as it touches the hot pan! Wait a little (20 seconds) before checking to see if there are little bubbles aerating to the surface. Shake the pan and hopefully the crepe will move around easily. If not, just give it a lift with a spatula, and flip the crepe. Cook for another 20-30 seconds and then transfer them to another plate to cool. Allow fellow hungry friends to fill and devour their crepe, while you continue cooking because you are now addicted to trying to flip them successfully without a spatula. It's fun! Be fearless and try it!

Bon appétit!

Dining in DC

While traveling, one of my favorite things to do is randomly explore the restaurants around. The past spring break, I went to Washington DC with some friends and had some fantastic dining experiences. The following are my Top2 favorites.

1.     The Diner

 

(Picture from Yelp)

(picture from Yelp)

Located on 18th St NW in Adam Morgan, The Diner has a nice outdoor seating area, a TV inside, and enough space for each table. The atmosphere there is very relaxing and family friendly. Our waitress is extremely welcoming and knows the menu very well. After consulting her, we order steak salad, lamb mini burgers, honey banana milkshake and strawberry chocolate milkshake.

Steak Salad

The steak salad consists of medium rare steak slices, romaine lettuce, cucumbers and cherry tomatoes. The portion size is huge and all of the ingredients are really fresh. We season the salad with only salt and pepper to enjoy the nature flavor of the ingredients and it is delicious.

Lamb mini burgers

These grilled lamb burgers are served with slices of ripe tomatoes and red onion in pita bread with a fresh tasting cucumber sauce seasoned with fresh mint and garlic. I'm not a huge fan of burgers but I have to admit that I love these mini burgers! The juiciness of lamb, the sweetness of read onion and the freshness of mint go really well together and create a harmonic taste.

Milkshake

The milkshake comes in tall goblet type of glass and it tastes heavenly. The waitress even bring us the silver blender-cup that she make it in, so it was like having two glasses of milkshakes!

2. Kintaro

（Picture from Yelp)

Kintaro is a Japanese restaurant located in Georgetown, one of the most historic neighborhoods of DC. I went there with my high school friend who is now studying at George Washington University. She told me that though she had already been to many great restaurants in DC, Kintaro is still her top favorite. It is a tiny family-run restaurant. All the chefs and waiters are Japanese and most of the diners were speaking Japanese, which makes the place seemed very authentic to me. 

Spicy California Roll

Miso Ramen

We had a spicy California roll, miso ramen and a delicious fish sushi which I can't recall its name. From want I know, Japanese cuisine is about the simplicity and freshness of ingredients and all of these dishes embodied that. The crab meat in the California roll and the fish meat on the top of the sushi were all extremely fresh and soft in taste. The miso ramen contained seaweed, noodles, some veggies, one half of an egg and two slices of pork. The broth was tasty but not overly salty or flavorful and it was a good bowl of Ramen on the more simplistic side that focuses on the few ingredients it has.

So, if you are going to visit Washington DC and will pass by these areas, try these restaurants. I promise they will make your trip a more fulfilling one. 

Variety and Atmosphere at ZEN, Northampton

Zen makes the perfect destination if you find the menus at the Thai, Japanese, and Chinese restaurants in Northampton too limiting. It’s the ideal one-stop shop for noodles, appetizers, and sushi.

Even on a busy weekend night, a hostess at Zen immediately greeted me with a smile and seated me. With some four separate dining rooms, Zen has the most seating of any restaurant that lies directly on Main Street, though some of the dining rooms could benefit from table rearrangement. In the upstairs dining room, I found myself able to rub elbows with the patrons at the table adjacent to mine and the proximity made it impossible not to eavesdrop on nearby conversations nor candidly partake in my own. This aside, the atmosphere of Zen is well orchestrated. The dining room features warm, soft orange lighting emanating from chic cylindrical lighting fixtures. The furniture, windows, and shelving behind the sushi bar are all comprised of long rectangles, providing a decorating motif that is both modern and tranquil. Not an atmospheric hair would be out of place were it not for the oppressively shrill J-, or possible K-Pop playing on the stereo system.
To start, I ordered a pot of chrysanthemum tea and crab won-tons. The tea tasted more buttery than floral, and so subtle in flavor that I found myself thinking I could have merely ordered hot water and saved some cash. The won-tons were expertly plated on long, simplistic china with a ramekin of house-made sauce and an orchid giving the plate computational elements in the periphery. The plate came with six won-tons which are even tied closed with an edible rice product. They arrived coated in a thin veneer of fresh fryer-oil, adding a scrumptiously greasy element. The won-ton wrappers coupled the elements of soft and crunchy perfectly, ensuring each bite texturally dynamic, and the passion-fruit sauce that accompanied the treats was a delightfully half-tangy, half-sour spin on the fruity duck sauce you’d get at a competing counterpart. Unfortunately, the stringy and oily won-ton filling was more crab than it was cheese. Meanwhile, their size made them impossible to pop into one’s mouth all at once, while their shape makes splitting the won-tons into bites cumbersome. Ultimately, I’d almost prefer the artificial and mass-produced crab rangoons you’d get at a cheap Chinese restaurant. The modest price, $7, however, makes them a pretty guiltless departure from the Chinese take-out menu.
The sushi offered reprieve from this disappointing starter. I ordered the dragon roll (eel, avocado, crab, and cucumber) and the spider roll (soft shell crab tempura). The dragon roll featured the freshest of eel - lightly salty and melting in your mouth, rather the chewy and briny fish you might find in lesser sushi joints. The avocado wrapping only added to the melt in your mouth quality, and the greenery in the roll coupled with the fresh, subtle fish made for a crisp, refreshing palate. The spider roll added a nice foil to this roll in its warmer, more savory qualities. The tempura, of course, added a complex crunchiness to the softness of the rice and vegetables, but the breading overpowered the crab in both volume and flavor. They were plated together on another oblong piece of china with a meticulous drizzle of spicy sauce providing their aesthetic and flavorful foundation. Zen is not my choice for a budgetarily responsible dining, but given the quality of these rolls, $10-13 each seems like a bargain.
Along with the sushi came an order of the Thai noodles, which is comprised of flat, rice noodles, a peanut sauce, chicken and shrimp and a kitchen sink’s worth of vegetables - from sprouts and carrots, to tomatoes and leafy greens. By the time I tried the noodles, my stomach was bursting at full capacity, but the nutty warm noodles made for a worthy carb-o-load. Some of the vegetables seemed out of place, but the meaty and savory flavor of the chicken and shrimp helped to highlight the sweetness of the peanut sauce. I underwent remorse over not saving more room for this satisfying dish. Though, the remorse could be equally attributed to the dish’s steep cost - $14.
Totally stuffed, I declined dessert. But, Zen will forever be my first choice when I’m willing to splurge. The detail-oriented decorative scheme as well as the flavorfully complex and methodically plated dishes make the experience of eating at Zen utterly decadent. Most importantly, I so relish in the opportunity to order food with notes from a variety of Asian cuisine all in the same menu. If you haven’t tried Zen yet, their sushi alone will likely make the eatery your new favorite location for a romantic, celebratory, or financially impulsive outing.

Chocolate Chip Cookie Ice Cream Sandwiches

I don’t think anyone’s a stranger to the Chipwich, that cookie sandwich you could get from the ice cream truck on hot summer days during a long afternoon at the park. I know two things to be true about this treat: 1) It was always at least two full dollars more expensive than everything else at the truck and 2) One always risks breaking several teeth if one intends to eat their cookie sandwich immediately following purchase. I ask you, is this wallet and mouth shattering dessert worth it? Yes. The answer is yes. Whoever thought this up was a hero*. Ice cream AND cookies. You don’t have to choose between them any more!

I’ve recently realized that the ice cream truck no longer goes down my street every day. And if that weren’t heartbreaking enough let’s also keep in mind that since the tips I made as a café-counter girl over the summer are the majority of my spending money (and oftentimes I made a grand total of $1.75 in a full half day shift) I can’t really afford to spend double that on a snack. Sigh. Can you hear the violins playing? Who wins at first world problems? This girl! I decided that the economical decision here would be to make my own version of the Chipwich. And boyyyyy was I right. These are awesome. I’m so serious. Plus I went for the rainbow sprinkle side decoration instead of the more traditional mini-chocolate chips. Make these. I’m not kidding.

*His name was Richard LaMotta. And although he was not a hero, he did go to law school and start his own record label before inventing the Chipwich, successfully marketing it, and eventually selling it to a division of Nestlé. This guy.

Cookies (adapted from Nestlé Toll House) 
- 2 1/4 cups flour 
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp kosher salt 
- 1 cup (2 sticks) softened butter 
- 3/4 cup granulated sugar 
- 3/4 cup packed light brown sugar 
- 1 tsp vanilla extract 
- 2 eggs 
- 1 bag bittersweet chocolate chips 
- 1 cup chopped nuts (optional (walnuts or pecans are the best))

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Line several baking pans with parchment paper. Sift the dry ingredients in a medium bowl and set aside. In a mixer beat the butter and sugars until creamy. Add eggs one at a time, beating well between additions. Add vanilla with the second egg. Stir in the flour mixture. Fold in the chocolate chips and nuts until just combined. Drop rounded tablespoons onto cookie sheet and bake 9-11 minutes. Cool completely on a wire rack before moving to preparation of the sandwiches. 

Sandwich Preparation 
- 1 gallon (more or less) of your favorite flavor of ice cream/frozen yogurt (I was going for classic so I went with vanilla, duh)
- Rainbow sprinkles for outside decoration (feel free to get creative here: chopped nuts, peanut butter chips, candied ginger, etc) 

Once the cookies have cooled, place them back on the baking sheets. Line the cookies upside down on the tray. Slightly soften the ice cream and place generous scoops on half of the overturned cookies. Use a spoon to smush down the scoops a bit and turn the other cookies right side up on top. Place the sprinkles in a bowl and roll the edges of the sandwich in them. Put the sandwiches in the freezer for at least 15 minutes and then devour!

 

Figtastic Bananza

Punning: It's a Disease.

Good news first: I have been seeing very positive effects from being (mostly) gluten-free this past month and a half! My eczema has been steadily improving, even with all the stress of finals and weather changes.

The bad news is that whenever I do eat a piece of toast or drink a beer, my eczema flares like crazy. It feels almost like an on-off switch, which is incredibly fascinating as well as frustrating.

The only problem is that I love eating hot, wholesome things in the morning, such as oatmeal and baked granola with tons of fruit and nuts. I used to love a hot bagel or toasted PB and J, but that is off the table as of right now. Unfortunately, a few days out of the week Cushing's dining room has no oatmeal, just cream of wheat, toast, eggs, and muffins, which are all out of my dietary range.

Here is my recipe for a simple and deliciously
 hot breakfast. This has become my life-blood the past few days, and is easily varied.

Ingredients:
Three minced, dried figs (I got a half pound container at Cornucopia for four dollars!!)
10 chopped almonds
1 diced banana
1 cubed pear
3 tablespoons good gluten-free granola (most granola is gluten-free)
1/2 cup unsweetened almond milk
a few good shakes cinnamon
a pinch and a half of nutmeg

Combine everything very well in a big bowl. You can microwave the whole thing for forty seconds, or just steam/heat the almond milk and that will be enough to heat the rest of the ingredients. The figs and fruit are sweet and taste like pie when combined with hot milk and spices, and the almonds granola add great, protein-filled crunches to the mix. It's delicious, filling, wholesome, gluten, soy, and animal product free! Enjoy :)

Composting at Home

Composting at Home

Here in my back yard I have two years of composting, all in different stages of decomposition. The extra peels, egg shells and other scraps after a night of cooking adds up and what better to utilize the nutrients and grow more food. You just need a place to put the compost, sun and moisture. Compost is essential to back yard gardening (at least in my back yard garden).


                7 months old          14 months old                   
 

The compost bin are made from old pallets my husband found at work; however if there isn't enough room there are smaller units that can be bought. The smaller unit is much quicker for composting and cleaner. The model we have is shown below.

This portable composter is super easy and it just needs moisture and a couple turns a day to keep it working. I also like the fact it is right next to the back door, so it is easy and quick to fill. So what can be put into a composter? Almost anything!!

Coffee and Tea grounds
Cereal products
All veggies (skins and seeds) Make sure to chop the seeds up though because they will start to grow
Dryer lint (seriously)
Leafs
Old chips
Paper products (tissues, paper towels, napkins)
Beer and wine (if there is any left)
Wine corks
Egg shells
News papers and junk mail

This is a short list but for more visit  http://www.mnn.com/your-home/organic-farming-gardening/stories/81-things-you-can-compost
for a list over approximately 80 things that can be composted.

Things that are not compostable are:

Meat
Dairy (it will compost but will also attract bugs)
Cooked pasta and rice (same as above)
Bread (same as above)
Cooking oils
Walnuts


There is also a form of composting that uses worms to quicken the decay process, it is called Vermicomposting. I have not tried this yet, not sure I will. Either way composting is an excellent way to use the scraps that would other wise be thrown out. Reduce Reuse Recycle starting right in your own back yard.












Scones!

I think we can all agree that scones are delicious, especially homemade, fresh out of the oven scones. 
Here are a few variations on my mother's scone recipe

Basic Ingredients: 
5 cups flour
2/3 cups sugar
2 tbsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1/2 lb butter (cut in small pieces)
2 cups half and half

Chocolate Orange Scones: 
Add 1/2 cup of chocolate chips and the zest of one orange

Orange Pecan Scones: 
Add zest of one orange and toasted pecans (or any nut of your choice)

Lemon Ginger Scones: 
Add zest of one lemon and 1/2 cup of candied ginger. 

Procedure: 
1. Mix dry ingredients together in mixer bowl
2. Turn on mixer, add the butter pieces and extra variation ingredients
3. Slowly add half the cream
4. Stop mixer, scrape bottom, then add the cream to bottom of the bowl 
5. Turn on mixer again (do not over mix)
6. Throw dough on table and knead by hand to form a big ball
7. Divide said big ball into 4 smaller balls, then form those into wheels
8. Cut wheels into quarters
9. Place on parchment lined sheet pan
10. Bake at 375 for about 15 minutes. 

ENJOY! MMM

Fun Facts from Buzzfeed

       I came across a buzzfeed post called "60 Facts that Will Blow Your Minds." Some of the facts are pretty interesting. Apparently the most popular carrot used to be purple and popsicles were invented by an 11-year old in 1905. Other facts, such as 75 hamburgers are sold by McDonald's every second, are less surprising, but still interesting. While the buzzfeed post is fun to browse through, I do question the truthfulness of some of these facts. For instance, number 38 is that ketchup was used to treat diarrhea among other things in the 1800s. However, when I followed to link to the source of this fact, the article did not appear to have any solid references, making me a bit skeptical. Though that particular link was questionable, the links are definitely needed. Just because the buzzfeed post says that bananas can be used to fight depression (fact number 45), it does not mean I should go and eat ten bananas to make myself feel better. The source connected to this fact lets the reader know that bananas contain tryptophan, which can be converted into serotonin, which is said to be the "happy-mood" neurotransmitter. Here is the link to the buzzfeed article if anyone is interested: http://www.buzzfeed.com/justinabarca/food-facts-that-will-blow-your-mind

Just Don't Eat It!

On my first trip to Lush (awesome natural bath supplies/cosmetic store), I couldn't help but notice how almost everything there looked edible. The whole place smelled wonderful and between names like "Honey-Bee Toffee Bath Bomb" and "I Love Juicy Shampoo", I walked out of there hungry. And it's not just Lush. The trend for making body care items look and smell like food is everywhere. From cupcake soaps to "juiced berry" perfume, people seem oppressed with making themselves feel and smell delicious. But what is it about these items that lures people in? One possible explanation is that if an item resembles food, then subconsciously a person could believe that it is safe to use. We don't often stop to think about all of the chemicals required to produce that "perfect berry smell'. Just like the food industry is often messing with our food and adding potentially harmful ingredients, so is the hair and body care industry.One of the more common preservatives used in soaps and shampoos in paraben, which mimics estrogen receptors in the body and can cause both reproductive issues and cancer. We need to be aware of harmful chemicals in our soaps and take care to read labels carefully and not be fooled by the harmless look of products.

If anyone is interested in making their own products, below are some recipes. Most of these are my variation of recipes that I found.

Moisturizers and Lotions: 

Coconut Body Scrub
Ingredients: 1-1/2 cups epsom salt8 drops of essential oil
1/3 cup of liquid coconut oil

Coconut Lotion
Ingredients: 1 cup of steeped chamomile tea8 drops of essential oil
1/3 cup of coconut oil

Instructions: 
Melt coconut oil in a small pot. Add other ingredients and mix. Pour into a container to cool.

Soaps and Scrubs:

Simplest Soap Recipe
Ingredients: 
1 cup glycerin soap
8 drops of essential oil
assorted herbs for visual effect

Grapefruit Sugar Scrub 
Ingredients: 1-1/2 cups white table sugar 8 drops grapefruit essential oil 1/4 cup jojoba oil 1/4 cup liquid castile soap 

Garden Mind Soap 
Ingredients: 4 ounces avocado oil
24 ounces coconut oil
28 ounces live oil
4 ounces castor oil
9 ounces lye
20 ounces steeped mint tea
8 drops grapefruit essential oil 1/4 cup jojoba oil 1/4 cup liquid castile soap 

Bath Bombs 

This recipe makes 4 to 6 bath bombs. You can buy molds in craft stores or online. Do not oil the molds beforehand; just make sure they are clean and dry. 

Dry Ingredients: 
1 cup baking soda 
1/2 cup citric acid (do not substitute ascorbic acid) 
1/2 cup corn starch 
1/3 cup Epsom salts or coarse sea salt 

Wet Ingredients: 
2 1/2 tablespoons sunflower or other light oil (like sweet almond oil) 
3/4 tablespoon water or rosewater (be careful not to start the fizzing action by adding too much water) 
1/4 – 1 teaspoon essential oils 
1/4 teaspoon borax as an emulsifier 
vegetable or other natural colorant (optional) 

Instructions: 
Sieve the dry ingredients together until they are well blended. Measure and combine all the wet ingredients and borax in a clean jar. Cover tightly and shake vigorously. Slowly drizzle the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients, gently stirring to prevent the reaction from starting. Make sure you mix in all of the wet ingredients. Afterward, you’ll find that the mixture is dry and crumbly and has to be packed in the molds quite firmly to keep shape. The mixture should just start to hold together when pressed in your hand, like slightly moist fine sand. You can unmold the bombs after 30 minutes, and let them dry for a few days before using them. Store them in a dry place


Shampoos:

Baking Soda Shampoo 
Ingredients: 
1/2 cup baking soda
5 cups of boiling water
10 drops of essential oil

Vinegar Shampoo 

Ingredients:

2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar

There are millions of more recipes out there to make your own, natural beauty products. Enjoy! 

Mdrn Day Ckbks

After the in-class presentations this week I started to wonder what were some of the whacky modern day cookbooks that not only say something about our culture today but that would likely inspire a great deal of criticism and disbelief among a group of students discussing cookbooks in 50 years from now.

Source

One of those cookbooks is called "Eat Tweet"by Maureen Evans. Evans started off at a Twitter user who posted "tiny recipes", listing ingredients, quantities, prep time and directions, all within 140 characters or less. Although she still uses her Twitter as a base to share her recipes with her 224k follower, she compiled a bunch of those recipes (1,020 to be exact) featured on her Twitter account into a shiny blue paperback cookbook. According to the blurb on Amazon.com  

There are recipes from around the world, from Kashgar Noodles to Biscotti, as well as homey favorites like Garlic Chicken and Chocolate. In addition, Eat Tweet contains kitchen tips and techniques (also 140 characters max) and a lexicon for translating Twitterese cooking terms like s+p (salt and pepper) and tst (toasted)

It does indeed require some decoding to figure out the meaning of some characters in the recipes. It makes sense in the Twitter sphere where you are in fact reduced to a limited number of characters, but when compiling the book where you have infinite space and no restrictions, why not just write out the ingredients in the full word form, why not give more direction than was provided by the original Tweet? If it was truly a cookbook concerned with offering practical skills to the reader and teaching them a new recipe, I think these words would be written out in full and more instructions would be given. However, this cookbook seems to be more a marker of time, preoccupied with saving the "authenticity" of the online Twitter format than with providing insight and acting as a resource to its audience. It's entertainment. A means for inspiration. Even if I found any one of these recipes intriguing I would be more likely to search the recipe in its full, fleshed-out form than follow the 140 character recipe that could trick me into tasting the coconut instead of toasting it.

From Maureen Evans' Twitter Page (source)

Chocolate Cake: Beat¼c sug/2egg. Sift⅓c flr&cocoa/½t bkgpdr&soda/⅛t cardamom&cinn&salt. Mlt6oz choc/¼c cocontoil&coffee. Fold all. 40m@350F.

Cookbook Glossary fo Terms

-Stacey Ladusch

Gleaning Fields and Loving Neighbors

This week's Torah portion (you read a portion of the Torah every Shabbat, and finish and begin again during the holiday Simchat Torah every year) happens to be the one that I read when I became a bat mitzvah. It is the portion that contains the Golden Rule, and a few other rules to keep holy.

This portion is especially attractive to me in light of this class, and this line in particular is really enlightening:

When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not fully reap the corner of your field, nor shall you gather the gleanings of your harvest.

ט. וּבְקֻצְרְכֶם אֶת קְצִיר אַרְצְכֶם לֹא תְכַלֶּה פְּאַת שָׂדְךָ לִקְצֹר וְלֶקֶט קְצִירְךָ לֹא תְלַקֵּט:

I included the Hebrew just because I think it's really pretty next to the English translation. 

Essentially, this line says that when harvesting the fields, the farmer must leave behind a portion of the harvest, and any leftover bits that fell to the ground while harvesting, for the less fortunate. That is, take what you need, and leave behind what you don't for those who are still in need. I think this is a beautiful concept to keep in the forefront of my mind, as so often I find myself surrounded by things that seem, at first, necessary but are, in reality, luxuries. I find that sometimes I lose perspective while in school, and am so intent on work and my own social agenda. This portion came at the perfect time (as reminders always seem to do) as Finals have a way of making everyone insane/blind to joys or problems other than their own (and I am at fault too!). 

There are a lot of other commandments in this reading. Things like "don't lie" or "don't steal" are next to a commandment for letting your fruit trees grow for three years, waiting another year, then finally it is permissible in the fifth year to harvest the fruit. The juxtaposition of very practical advice with moral obligations suggests that this portion is meant for a community to adopt with eventual development into a cohesive unit with a conscience. I love being a student, especially at Smith, because it allows me the opportunity to gain a wealth of knowledge that may lead to change for the better, and hopefully engage part of a community. The study of the Torah and its commandments is supposed to be because you think it is the right thing to do (the Hebrew word 'lishma' means "for its own sake") and I want to leave the corners and the gleanings; I might just need those occasional reminders. 

Katie's Birthday Dinner at Mama Iguana's

Until this past Wednesday, I had never stepped foot inside the crowded Mama Iguana's restaurant in Northampton. It looked popular, there were always people crowding the sidewalk tables, but something about the over-the-top stereotypical Mexican window decorations put me off.

 

Never-the-less, for my friend Katie's birthday, we decided to go. I was wary, but excited, Mexican food is one of my favorites and I had whole heartedly supported her choice of cuisine. We were looking for something authentic, low key, and delicious. That is exactly what we got. As an added plus the inside is so much prettier then I expected.

 

 

The tortilla chips came quickly to the table, brought by a very cute waiter, and tasted homemade, paired with a delicious spicy salsa.

Lily and I split the vegetable fajitas, which came out on a sizzling plate, complete with rice and beans, flour tortillas, sour cream and cheese (omitted due to Lily's veganism and the fact that I am not a fan of either on fajitas), and salsa. Fun to put together, and easy to split, it was a great choice. Our friend Molly, who is a connoisseur of Mexican food, even confirmed its authentic taste.

 

It was a delicious meal, with wonderful people, and it ended with one very happy birthday girl.

 



Charoset From Around the World

Charoset, is a traditional Jewish Passover dish that symbolizes the mortar that Jews used in Egypt. Although it is a staple food at the Seder and it is always used to symbolize the same thing, different places around the world use different ingredients to represent the same story. Below, are a few different recipes for haroset all over the world.


Ashkenazi Charoset:
This is the charoset commonly made by Jews in Eastern Europe. It is also the most common haroset found in America.

Ingredients:

• 3 apples, cored, peeled, and finely chopped

• 1/2 cup walnut pieces

• 1/2 tsp. of cinnamon 

• 2 tbs. of sweet red wine

• 2 tbs. of honey

Sephardic Charoset:
This is the charoset of Middle Eastern and African Jews. It utilizes fruits more commonly found in this climate, mainly dates.
Ingredients:

• 15 pitted and finely chopped dates

• 2 finely chopped or mushed bananas

• 1/8 cup figs, chopped

• 2 tbs. golden raisins

• 2 tbs. purple raisins

• 2 tbs. of date syrup or honey

• 1/2 cup of almond dust

• 1/2 tsp. of cinnamon

• 1/4 tsp. of ground cloves

• 1/4 tsp. of ground ginger

• 1/4 tsp. of allspice

Brazilian Charoset:
I recently discovered this recipe and it's absolutely wonderful. Avocado is not a food commonly found in all other charosets, but it works.


Ingredients:

• 1 large avocado, mushed

• 1/4 cup golden raisins

• 3 apples, thinly sliced

• Juice of half a lemon

Tropical Charoset:

Never heard of this before today, but it sounds wonderful! 

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup crushed pineapple

• 5 mandarin oranges, chopped

• 1 banana, sliced

• 1 cup papaya, cubed

• 1/4 cup shredded coconut

• 1/4 cup dried mango pieces

• 1/4 cup orange juice

• 2 teaspoons candied ginger, chopped

My family's Recipe:

Ingredients:

• 1 banana, sliced

• 2 oranges, chopped

• 2 red apples, finely chopped

• 1 green apple, finely chopped

• 2 pears, finely chopped

• 1/2 tsp. of cinnamon

• 1/3 tsp. of ground ginger

• 3 tbs. of honey

Enjoy!