31 October 2006
we're in antarctica
I wrote this between 7pm and now.
I accomplished a lot of things today. Little things, but things that nag at my psyche until I finally do them. Like walking down to the Village, buying more postage, and mailing letters; checking out four of about ten books I'll probably use for my CORE final - a huge research paper. And I started reading one - called Fasting Girls: A History of Anorexia Nervosa. (I'm writing about some aspect - I haven't decided yet - of women in autobiography and how they identify with and relate to food). I also changed the filter on my Brita water filter. I can't believe I own a Brita water filter, actually, but the tap water in our dorm tastes pretty terrible and my filtered water tastes oh so clean. I signed up for mandatory Psych experiments. I emailed a professor. And this afternoon I went for a run even though I hadn't really thought I'd be capable of doing so today... plus I went farther and longer than I'd planned. Good stuff!
But... there was no tomato barley soup like the online menu said there'd be in the dining hall at lunch, which disappointed me. And I wore my Birkenstock clogs (the ones I got in Germany this summer, and with no socks) for about six hours today and they completely chewed up my feet after hour number two. By 4 o'clock I was slowly shuffling in pain back to my dorm, where it still hurt to walk around barefoot since I had sores on four spots on each foot. I'd also been slugging around two big shoulder bags, one with normal things in it and the other with the books I got from the library this morning. Slugging around heavy bags with sore feet does not make Katherine a happy girl, and while I had woken up with the intention of running, at four o'clock it seemed a lot nicer to just curl up in bed with a book. Since Daylight Savings happened, something I completely forgot existed until last Sunday, it now gets dark around 5pm and this severely cuts down on the available hours I can run. In August and September I was bound by the temperature, and would go for a run at around 8pm as then the sun was setting and the temperature had finally cooled off to a tolerable level. Now that it is autumn, temperature is not really a problem at any hour of the day, but my body doesn't agree with exercise until I've been functioning for a few hours and been fed at least one substantial meal. And my soul likes the evening, the winding down of the day, seeing men come home from work with briefcase in hand, looking in the lit windows of houses, admiring the weak sun splashed on the leaves and sidewalk, casting everything with a long shadow. So now I need to be off by 4:30pm in order to be back just as darkness rolls in and its not completely freezing yet. I've actually taken a break from running for a few weeks and been going on hour-long walks almost every day instead. While I love walking, I just don't feel like I'm exercising unless I'm panting and sweaty and using my willpower to keep going. So recently I've been combining the two, and running for the first part and then walking afterwards to total of an hour's time spent outside. I'm completely in love with Google Pedometer, which calculates (to the third decimal place) the length of your route, which is so nice because I'm anal about knowing how many miles I ran and at what pace. I'm proud to say that I haven't even used my school's little gym yet, because all semester so far I've been rocking the beautiful residential area adjacent to campus. So I made the commitment to myself to run today, and I hate breaking those mental contracts, even when it was a cloudy, sit-inside-wrapped-in-a-blanket-and-drink-hot-chocolate day. With the sun setting I knew it was going to get dark within the hour, and this afternoon time worked against me in a beneficial way. So I kicked off those God forsaken clogs, resisted the urge to eat something or collapse on my bed, I threw on a t-shirt and shorts, pulled on two soft black socks (probably the highlight of my day), quickly put my running shoes (as this kind of hurt), and even though I could still feel the sores, it was an odd sort of pain, like a comforting pain. The socks cushioned the sensitive spots and the shoes gave them a flexible support, and it almost felt good to walk around; kind of like a massage! I walked outside with my headphones on, remembered that I forgot a watch to time myself, and then noticed that it was fucking freezing! With two reasons to go back to my room, I went in, got my watch and changed into a long sleeved shirt. I had a great run and (later) walk, and got to see the beginning of trick-or-treating. After a long walk or a run, I've started to go to a park in the area and play on the swings for five or ten minutes. I love swings, and they're a pretty big nostalgic theme from my childhood. I go very high, and I always think of the fact that now I'm an adult, no one is going to tell me that what I'm doing is dangerous and please don't go so high anymore. So that is a little reward I always give myself, and then I walked home in almost complete darkness, seeing little kids dart down the sidewalk in Spiderman and Tigger costumes. Halloween has lost most of its meaning for me, which is sad because I used to get very excited as a child about trick-or-treating. I think it's now because it's very hard to pull off trick-or-treating when you're old enough to potentially have a kid yourself. And dressing up as sluttily as possible and drinking until inebriated? How is that at all in the spirit of Halloween? So yes, I'm a jaded old Halloween grouch, but I can't wait until my kids are old enough to dress up and run around the neighborhood yelling for sweets.
Within the last few days I had two disturbing dreams. In the first one, my grandma died before Christmas. In the second (last night), my two dogs injured themselves or were injured by something... I don't remember other than their jaws were soaked in blood and bones were visible (yuck), and I couldn't help them. I don't usually have bad dreams; usually I don't even remember my dreams (although luckily I did remember an incredible sex dream last week), but I think the clocks going back as well as lots of brain activity lately has muddled up my internal equilibrium.
I'm at Starbucks, the same one I've been coming to every day for a couple weeks, and in that time no one has ever talked to me, I've just come and done homework or read and minded my own business. (I also didn't buy a single drink here until yesterday (passion tea) because I choose to buy coffee at local places whenever possible.) But tonight three people have approached me and spoken to me - first, this high school kid in ripped jeans and Converse plunked down in the chair next to me and asked what I was doing for Halloween, which launched into a half-hour conversation about random things. He sat down a few minutes after I did, and I didn't really want to spend time talking to a stranger, but he was waiting for friends so they could go terrorize the neighborhood and he was a genuinely nice person. Steven. A few minutes after he left, an older man walked over, pointed at the open chair and said, "Can I steal that chair?" No, it's all mine! I own it! So I said sure, and he�s now got his legs crossed, eyebrows are furrowed, and he's writing something important-looking in a legal pad. And then later a well-dressed, kind of odd man walked over and asked if I had a dollar thirty-seven. No, I don't have any cash on me (the truth, actually). The guy next to me gave him a penny and they both started cracking up, and the odd man told him a story about his drunken friend from high school. He walked away, and came back two seconds later to exclaim that he found a quarter on the floor. Oh, life.
I also just ordered a soy cafe au lait, and they were just throwing out the coffee, so I waited for five or ten minutes for the new stuff to brew and therefore got my drink for free! At Starbucks!
If only I didn't have to do confusing bio homework and dread going to my four-hour lab tomorrow...
I performed an experiment on myself last week for my second Psych paper. I attempted to stop drinking coffee for seven days and only drink tea. I usually have coffee in some form (drip or in a cappuccino) every day... sometimes more than once. I'm not really someone who has to have it to function, but it's become part of my day. So the experiment worked pretty well... I only drank coffee on two of the seven days, and didn't have one sip of espresso in all that time. I really want to be someone who loves tea, because it's fun (tea bag, string, colors) and healthier, they say. And because I'm half British and it's an abomination there that I don't like tea. So anyway, today was the first day since the experiment was over that I had some coffee (the free stuff from Starbucks) and I got a headache after taking only a few sips! That has never happened to me! I never get wired or hyper, generally I don't notice any affect on myself after drinking coffee although I guess my body had just gotten used to the amount of caffeine I was drinking. I didn't have withdrawal symptoms though... probably because I cheated and had some anyway. So yeah... not so appealing anymore with headaches! It's a good thing I'm on better terms with tea... mmm, Earl Gray with a spot of soy milk and honey.
I drove back to school just now. I sat at the light for two cycles before getting pissed that I wasn't getting a green, so I turned right, huffing away, and made a U-Turn at the next light to finally get onto the road I had initially wanted to get on. And what happens but a red light pop up as I get there and the place at which I had just waited for ten minutes got a green! What?!?
I was listening to a song I don't normally listen to, it's kind of a poppy, bubbly song (and we all know I hate those) and it has the strangest lyrics. Here are some: "Let's pretend we don't exist/Let's pretend we're in Antarctica". It's like being in a videogame. (Go listen to it, it's called "Wraith Pinned To The Mist and Other Games" by Of Montreal.) But tonight I was just in the right mood, driving home in my freezing car, hands tucked inside my sleeve with only my left thumb out and secure on the bottom of the steering wheel. So I sang and nodded my head to it like a crazy person, and even when I hit every red on a street down which I sail during the day... I was still happy. The thought of the campus coffee shop still possibly having at least one pack of vegan cookies left (they're made by a small group of people on campus and are delivered Sunday � Thursday at random times; Tuesday's delivery is at 7:30pm... and don't ask me how I�ve memorized that) was too much to resist, so I flew back to the dorm, parked just within the line of the farthest-away curb imaginable since all the good spots were taken since it was 10:15pm, and huddled over to the coffee shop with a huge shoulder bag (today has just been that kind of day), and my laptop AND Bio textbook hugged to my chest, and I turned the corner and walked up to the door, looking through the window to see... yes! There are still a few left. And now I'm slowly savoring the last of three delightfully chewy, chocolately vegan peanut butter chocolate chip cookies. I don't often buy them, because a) they come in packs of three, and who is only going to eat one or two? and b) they are made with (vegan, non-hydrogenated at least) margarine. Generally, margarine is a Katherine no-no... but occasionally these cookies are a freaking amazing treat. My appetite is almost completely supressed after I exercise, so I ate only soup and pita bread for dinner. And they're vegan, right, they must be good for you!
29 October 2006
oh, grocery woes
I often want to scream when checkout people in the grocery store ask you, "Did you find everything alright today?" and "Will that be all for you?" The first question is just nonsensical, not to mention gramatically incorrect. What if I didn't find something easily? What if I spent half an hour circling the store and gliding down aisle after aisle scanning item after item for the fifth time before finally stumbling upon it? Yes, I've down this before, always at a huge chain like Safeways where the aisles tower over you with no escape once you've entered their path. The products stare back at you, demanding your attention, to be picked up, thought about, won. So why even ask if no one cares? The monotone voice and lowered eyes easily give it away. The person is just talking to fill in the empty space, talking about things that are unimportant and unnecessary and therefore unoffensive, like the American thing about asking, "How are you?" every five seconds. You don't know me and you don't care how I am! I don't care how you are! Just stop talking to me! So sometimes I'll say, "Well, no, actually it took me quite a long time to find X, it's really not very well placed" and -- and -- they stall for a moment, not having a book of words to reply to an extraordinary response to a question that implies the only correct answer is, "yes". I've come to the conclusion that they only ask the question so that 99% of the time, they hear what they want to hear: "Yes, I did, thank you. Your store has bought my soul, and I will be coming here every week until I keel over and die."
I can understand the second question if and only if the customer is at a store where they sell bagged ice, since it's usually kept near the registers and you don't want it out of the freezer until the very last minute. At Trader Joe's, however, there is no ice. Or at least there's no ice at the one here. At that point all my groceries have been rung up and I couldn't really say, "Oh, wait, I forgot to pick up a can of vegetable broth. Can you wait for four minutes, shouldering the glares of all the people behind me while I just dash over there and grab it?" Or at least I wouldn't say that. If it wasn't important enough to remember the first time around, it probably can wait a few days... or hours, at least. So please, only say things that are meaningful, such as "Oh, this goat cheese pairs really well with La Brea's french bread" or "Next week these apples will be 10 cents cheaper!" If you don't have anything helpful to say, just ring up my groceries so I can be on my way.
26 October 2006
a smattering of fallen leaves
I've been going out a lot lately with my laptop to cafes to do homework. I prefer to be out of my room whenever possible, and I need to be emerged in regular life often. I have to know that I'm not tied down to an existence with only my peers and the same foot-trodden paths I take to get to the few buildings I visit each day. I am well aware of "the bubble" so I pop the one here every day, and as soon as I turn off-campus I'm thrust into the real world, and I love it. In retrospect, I've concluded that my personality would have been better suited at somewhere other than a sleepy liberal arts college. So almost every day after class (and sometimes before it) I drive a short distance (five to ten minutes) to one of a few places I go to regularly, laptop and power cord in bag, and set up camp at a table or, in the case of Starbucks, in a large, poofy, somewhat dirty chair. This week I've had two substantial writing projects to do as well as lots of reading, and cafes are my favorite study spot. I like to mix it up and change locations usually once each day. I like being around people because then I don't feel like I'm alone, and the music or chatter blends together into "background noise" which doesn't bother me. However, a loud single conversation nearby is frustrating because I can't help but overhear. But I've had good luck this week in avoiding this, and I bring headphones to tune out to Norah Jones or Keane in an emergency. When I'm in the car, I put my laptop (I have no carrying case because my old one was thrown away) on the passenger seat when I'm driving, sometimes under my bag but sometimes, if I'm not thinking, just leaning against it upright. Now I always turn it off when I carry it anywhere after learning from a tech guy at CC last year how easy it is to destroy your hard drive when it's still on and spinning. Sometimes, when I have to stop rather suddenly at a light, I usually remember to fling my arm across my bag-and-laptop couple, like a mother instinctively protecting her children. But occasionally, if I deep in thought or vocally committed to whatever song is being repeated for the fifth time that day, my unsecured laptop will fall backwards flat onto the chair or even hurtle towards the glove compartment and then drop to the floor. This makes a rather dull noise, akin to a cell phone dropping on the floor, but when I noticed that it was actually my laptop and not my worthless mobile, I let out an audible shriek and leaned over, picked it up, hugged it to my chest and checked it over for damage, all while driving. There is a clip from a film (or maybe the TV show The OC) that resonates in my head whenever I do this: a woman drops her cell phone and reaches for it, taking her eyes of the road and veering into oncoming traffic, paralyzing her neck, or something equally as awful. Luckily I'm almost always focused on driving, but I did glance down for a second when I lunged for my abused laptop yesterday, and it didn't escape my mind that I could have been in an accident in that second and it would have been entirely my fault. The computer was fine. I had the foundations of a paper in there that wasn't saved anywhere else in virtual space, and damage to my computer would mean death for my rough draft.
My Autobiography class has just gotten really deep this week, and I'm getting really into it. After weeks of reading memoirs and autobiographical excerpts, we just finished a three-day discussion of a book about the philosophy of autobiography, so it's about ethics, the "I" versus the other, accountability, the body and recognizability and lots of really mind-twisting stuff. The book takes some getting used because each sentence is completely loaded with meaning, but this week culminated with a final short paper ("engagements", as she calls them, because we're "engaging" with the text) that was due today, and which I only had time to start focusing on last night after dinner. Despite the short time frame, I really worked hard on my ideas and I think I wrote a pretty good paper. I've written some of my best papers the night before; if I don't feel pressure to produce a worthy essay then I usually can't stay focused on it. Philosophy is pretty cool and I sometimes enjoy trying to grasp these abstract questions and ideas and then trying to logically explain on paper what is in your head. I love being in a class where you really enjoy the subject, and even greater is this is a subject - a specific literature - that I've never taken before. My professor is supercool; she's seriously like my role model, and I love when she occasionally talks about her life or her kids or just anything that isn't related to our discussion. Love!
22 October 2006
a ode to arizona
"I want to be forgotten, and I don't want to be reminded."
What Ever Happened, The Strokes
Damn, that song from the Marie Antoinette commercial is catchy. I saw it (the film, not the commercial) on Friday night, and it was super. Anything Sophia Coppola touches turns to gold, in my opinion.
Well, I'm at school, yes. I'm not really into school right now, as in homework and studying. Sophomore slump? Transfer slump? Who knows. Biology (lecture grade) is going quite terribly. (My lab grade is better). It may sound strange, but to me, biology is a foreign language. This is the first time I've experienced the feeling of a subject just never really clicking. Novels, philosophy of autobiography, comparative politics, foreign languages, psychology, economics, even mild calculus... I can understand these. For me, Bio is like trying to translate Czech amongst lots of people who absolutely love speaking Czech. Psych is a joke, as I've maintained all along, and Core is fine, we read things, talk about them, write our thoughts down, it's familiar. But I do not want to have to take another science class next semester. But I don't even get this one! Gah!
We're eight weeks in with eight weeks to go until Christmas, four to Thanksgiving. Since I've been back, I've been spending a lot of time off-campus at several coffee shops that I like, and also driving down new streets to explore. I went to the Whole Foods in Pasadena on a whim on Saturday afternoon. When I feel like I need to do this, I do. I'm not unhappy here, but I know that I would have been better-suited somewhere other than the suburbs. [Sigh] but of the options I had, this was (or I thought this was) the best. And being here means I'm able to go home frequently - a nice bonus once you leave and realize how sweet life really is at home. Being back in Arizona last week made me remember how much I love it. Coming from me, that's a funny thing to hear. I spent four years dying to get away from the desert but now that I'm in a more crowded one, Scottsdale/Phoenix is so obviously better! I miss it's wide, open streets, clean air, uncongested freeways, proximity to everything, having any kind of restaurant within a twenty minute drive, having health food stores nearby (with the exception of TJ's, Whole Foods is the closest fifteen miles away), summer monsoons, the smell of the air afterwards, the friendly cacti, the unseen but intricate desert life, the most gorgeous sunsets... suburban LA is pretty gross, honestly. And old-town Scottsdale and Phoenix are really coming alive these days too. It's probably pretty fun to live there as a young twentysomething. I also miss certain aspects of ASU - being anonymous. Being surrounded by lots of diverse people. Walking around the huge but contiguous campus. Having a kickass downtown that caters to college students. Discovering the gems of professors. Sitting under my favorite tree reading in-between classes. Being in a sweet Honors College that offers lots of awesome classes. Finding some of the professors to be unbelievably adorable. Being one among thousands, Meeting kids who really really want to be there. Admiring so many people for juggling school and a job and bills. Knowing that your experience there will be what you make of it. Yeah, of course some things weren't so hot, but isn't it interesting that (unlike CC) I only really remember the good things? Sometimes I'm embarrassed to go to a tiny, private, privileged college with a $40,000/year price tag. Is it really worth that much? I liked being just another kid at the big state university, where everything was equal and you bumped into all kinds of people. Here, there's quite a good chance that the girl sitting next to you in class is white, upper-middle class, Californian, thin, athletic, fashion-conscious, and wearing Rainbows. I also liked the educational philosophy at ASU, instilled partly because it's a huge public university that can't afford to do what Scripps does and partly because it's the mission of that kind of university: do what you need to do without someone constantly watching out for you, live where you want to live, take as many or as few classes as you want, get your work done; if you can't or don't want to, that's okay, just come back when you can and pick up where you left off. There are so many opportunities to shine there, if you only seek them out. And it's so, so much cheaper. We pay so much in taxes that one might as well take advantage of the subsidized education. I'm so glad I went to ASU for a semester and changed my unfounded opinions about the school. It's a great place. Transferring mid-year is a huge bitch in terms of meeting people. That and not having a car made my life pretty bland. If somehow I could have transferred there at the beginning of first semester and met other Barrett transfers, and had a car... who knows where I'd be now if I'd stayed. Some of this is just "the grass is greener..." but part is that I know a big, universal kind of school is better for me and my personality. That and I really unappreciated Arizona for a long time, and I miss it. So unlike CC (which I will never care about), a small piece of my heart will always be at ASU. And the good news is that if I fuck up really badly here, they'll always take me back!
I've made a vow to start venturing out into LA regularly. On my list is downtown Pasadena, San Clemente (to stay with Danielle's family for a weekend and see an art exhibit in Laguna Beach), Malibu, the famous Santa Monica Farmer's Market, and Disneyland. If I'm going to be spending two-and-a-half years of my life studying in the stifling suburbs, then in my spare time I want to get to know the actual city.
Let's give some ASU and general Arizona love:
19 October 2006
one more time again
Well... I'm back at school. I don't know exactly how I feel about that (or maybe I do and don't want to admit it), but I do have pictures of the past week's glorious kitchenfest. So, here we go, chronologically. I'm only showing photos that came out well (and I didn't photograph every single thing), so you're not seeing Friday night's roasted vegetables, Saturday's almond milk, chocolate chip pancakes, and pumpkin pie (not a success), a few excellent salads and other simple meals that just didn't send me the photography vibe.
Cherry-Walnut Banana Muffins from Fat-Free Vegan Kitchen. I've had many, many disappointments with fat-free or low-fat vegan baked goods - things just don't cut it without some kind of fat, be it oil or chocolate or butter. But I keep trying, just to see if I can match the challenge and finally make something that rocks. These breakfast muffins are the answer. The reason? Banana. It acts like an egg by binding the mixture, and also brings much-needed moisture - two key things to almost all baked goods. The recipe is for cherry-walnut-banana bread, but it worked perfectly in muffin cups too. But no olive oil, no margarine, no fat at all! And whole grain - I used spelt flour since I bought a small bag in the summer for RFD Chocolate Chip Cookies - plus it technically has fruit in it! There is some sugar, yes, but give the guys a break. My dad even liked these, a first ever for a vegan muffin of mine. They tasted better with each day that passed, being sublime on day three.
Smoothie made with organic plain nonfat yogurt, frozen mango and raspberries. I liked the colors!
Roasted Vegetable Frittata from Gluten-Free Goddess. I had made her roasted vegetables (now a staple in my repertoire) on Friday night (carrots, bell pepper, parsnip, onions, sweet potato - mmmmm) and had a perfect one cupful leftover... and I had a strange, nostalgic yearning for an eggy, cheesy meal for dinner on Saturday. I substituted light sour cream for the light cream and used just a sprinkling of good English cheddar, but it was good, if a little odd. I haven't eaten that much dairy in one meal in forever and I did experience a few bodily side effects. That was the only meal involving cow's milk cheese and eggs I ate this past week. (In another post soon I'm going to discuss my evolving opinions with dairy and soy products.)
Next up: homemade orange juice from five oranges, from the fruit to my belly in ten minutes.
The beautiful dough from World Bread Day, after its first rising...
and the bread itself!
Homemade hummus. A little heavy on the tahini and thus could have used some more olive oil to thin it, but still some good-quality stuff.
The same night, I had an Indian meal of lentil dal, curried vegetables, and chapati.
The dal recipe is from The Yoga Cookbook and one I've used many times. The dal's consistency changes with a change in lentil variety, and I also sometimes have a problem with the right amount of water to use. Luckily this was spot-on. Good dal is good.
The vegetables don't look thrilling but they were good, just a bit dry. And the chapatis? Found them in the freezer from this summer when I made them. They lost something from being defrosted and toasted, but I brought them out mainly to be a hummus-scooping tool.
Rice pudding. I never ate this as a kid, and I've only had it a few times at Indian restaurants where it is very thin, but this break was all about indulging strange childhood/nostalgia-related yearnings so I just go with what I feel. We had a box of cooked brown rice in the fridge and I found a recipe through Google that was easy and fast enough - put cooked rice, (almond) milk, cinnamon, nutmeg, and raisins into a saucepan, bring to a simmer and hold for ten minutes, let cool and eat warm or cold - and it was a complete experiment with successful results. It was very thick and I added chopped dates and currants as well as raisins, because I'm a dried fruit lover, but it rocked. I had the leftovers cold for dessert the next night.
Pumpkin Oatmeal Cookies from Vegan With A Vengeance. Gorgeous things made with spelt flour, rolled oats, raw cane sugar, pumpkin, baking soda, olive oil, raisins, walnuts and spices. I modified the recipe a bit - cut down the oil to 1/3 cup and sugar to 1/2 cup without compensating anywhere for the reduced liquid, so I was worried they would be too dry but fears dissolved after tasting one. I managed to leave them alone for half a day, and each day made them taste better - today being amazing, even out of a ziploc bag in the car as I was exiting the freeway. Again, my dad really liked these. Two hits in five days! That's progress!
Peach lassi, a yogurt drink from India. Just like a smoothie but with only one kind of fruit and a dash of cinnamon. I liked the bubbles after being whizzed in the blender. Sweetened with agave nectar.
After devouring most of Food: A Culinary History or whatever it was called, I decided I couldn't live any longer without trying goat milk yogurt. I tried a small carton of the plain kind, since even vanilla means an extra twenty teaspoons (I kid you not) of sugar. It was kind of sweet with a hint of saltiness... it was hard to shake from my mind the image of this being milk from a goat, and I added some agave nectar because the taste is quite different than plain cow's milk yogurt, which I'm used to by itself. There is hope yet! Today I bought one large container of goat's milk yogurt and one of cow's milk yogurt from Trader Joe's, and perhaps I'll be able to wean myself onto the former. How cool would it be to be into goat's milk yogurt? The only downside is it's almost impossible to get it in a variety other than whole milk, so it has quite a lot of fat although not any more than whole cow's milk. But perhaps low-fat and nonfat dairy products aren't all they're cracked up to be? There will be a discussion about this further.
This is probably a good time to talk about my almond milk experience. I'm pulling away from the soy devotee bandwagon, just because I think it's unhealthy to eat too much of any one thing, and soy does contain many natural hormones which might not be the best thing for me to consume mass quantities of. So almond milk is something I make (or buy) when I want a break from soy. I've talked about it here before, but basically you blend one part almonds with four parts water and then filter the nut meat out, leaving you with beautiful clear almond milk. The last few times I've used whole raw almonds with the skins on, and although some people say to soak them in water for 4-8 hours and/or then blanch them, I've been too lazy (perhaps impatient?) and done it without prepping the almonds and just filtering the milk like mad. This has always been fine for me, but this time I made half the batch with the summer's leftover raw almonds (soaked for five hours) and the other half with some slivered blanched ones I found in the pantry. The difference in labor was incredible - the blanched ones were a breeze to use and there was minimal almond pulp at the end. Tiny bits from the pulp of the unblanched almonds kept slipping through during filtering (I admit; I tried to use only a fine collander instead of a cheesecloth - bad idea, the cloth does really work even if it doesn't seem like it) so I ended up with a slightly gritty milk that was not enjoyable to eat on cereal or in drinks; anything where texture is important. Next time I will only use blanched almonds and avoid the pulp issue altogether!
And: The Last Supper. Last night I created Provencal Stew, Roasted Potatoes and Rosemary Aioli all from the same feast in The Voluptuous Vegan. My last homemade meal for five weeks.
First and foremost: I always put on some good jazz and pour myself a glass of wine.
Sizzle, sizzle! Adding the white wine to the stew.
Ooooh, the colors and shapes!
Chopped up russet potato slivers ready to be roasted. [Funny story: my brother and mom stole some of the (cooked) potatoes during dinner, and my brother thought they were frozen french fries that I had thrown onto a baking sheet and baked! When my mom asked me what kind of potato they were, he exclaimed, "Wait, you made these from scratch?!" I guess I can slice a mean spud (but it's really not that hard). These roasted potatos were seriously addictive and so simple: cut up two russet potatoes into slices, toss with olive oil and sea salt, and roast for 45 minutes at 400 degrees, turning every once in a while. Roasting is by far my favorite cooking method.
Mmmm, fragrant roasted garlic about to meet its fate in the blender to become...
roasted garlic and rosemary aioli! Aioli is a kind of mayonnaise dip popular in Europe for dipping with french fries. This is made with - shhhhhhhhh (silken tofu) - of which I had a lone box bought months ago that desperately needed a purpose, so it became this. I don't like tofu and I'm very wary of using it in silky dishes like dips and cheesecakes, but you honestly wouldn't know it was in this because of the garlic, lemon juice and herbs. I definitely made 99% too much - you barely glide a potato stick over the aioli because it's quite strong... so if anyone wants some aioli, call my mom and she'll get it out of the fridge for you.
At least my break went out with a bang.
16 October 2006
hark the herald angel sings
It's World Bread Day! (Well, it's actually less than hour from being over in almost all of the world except Alaska and Hawaii...) This morning I was browsing the food blogs I read and there was all this talk about World Bread Day. So I made a loaf myself. I'd post a picture but, of course, I can't until Thursday. It's whole wheat with sunflower and flax seeds (I followed Ilva's recipe after my mouth was done salivating over at her blog) and I had a piece with fresh goat cheese for lunch.
I'm in the middle of reading Food: A Culinary History which I picked up this morning on a whim at the library. It's pretty good, and while it's academic it's thankfully not reminiscent of my history texts from History of Islam last fall where I wanted to lay down and die after three pages. I'm in the Medieval Ages right now, and I'm reading about peasants eating ground spelt flatcakes and pork boiled in a pot. It's utterly astounding that a) I live in a home that is temperature-controlled and electricity-equipped with a kitchen for only five that contains an oven, stove top, refrigerator/freezer, dishwasher, two sinks and running water, b) there are no less than five grocery stores of varying size within five miles of my house, c) right now, if my heart so desired, I could buy Valencia oranges flown in from Australia, tomatoes and strawberries that are genetically modified and engineered to grow out-of-season in California, and mangoes imported from South America, d) that kids grow up believing carrots grow in the shape of bullets and beans come in cans, never thinking about the hands that worked to get food effortlessly into their home and e) there exists such "food" as cheese-flavored fish-shaped crackers, microwaveable popcorn, instant toastable jam-filled sprinkled-covered pastries and sugar-flavored bubbly water in a metal container. While the technological advances are undoubtedly wonderful, some people are now eating things that are manufactured by scientists in labs. Is it any wonder that there is an obesity epidemic? Our society may be sprinting ahead, but our bodies are still wanting to be fed foods it recognizes and knows - foods that exist in nature, in their purest form. Bread made with flour, water, salt, and yeast. Soup made with broth, vegetables, and beans. Pasta, boiled, buttered and sauced. Meat from a pig raised in the backyard, roasted over a flame. Fish sauteed in olive oil. Milk from a goat, unhomogenized and unpasteurized. Whole fruit. Are things that are shrink-wrapped in plastic or that never see natural light really going to nourish and protect our bodies? Where do they come from? What's in them? How do their chemicals affect our fragile biological nature? We are not robots. Anyway, the book is fascinating, and it isn't a subjective history... but what I say in this blog definitely is!
Happy World Bread Day... now go bake some, or buy a really nice loaf from a good little bakery somewhere, and eat it with locally made, organic cheese and a beautiful pear or apple, just as it was done a thousand years ago.
14 October 2006
i can read your mind
Pumpkin is one of those words that looks really strange pretty quickly after seeing it over and over again.
I'm currently in the alternate-reality version of my life, the one where I blend in seamlessly at home as if I haven't been away at college this whole time. But maybe that's just normal, since I do in fact live here too.
I've been cooking up a storm, but I left my data transfer key at school! So all the photos will have to wait until Thursday. But rest assured, I have a satisfied soul - a glorious thing.
12 October 2006
countdown
Phew! It's over! This time tomorrow I'll be home :)
11 October 2006
move along move along
Time is very strange. Until this week it felt like I've been here for a long time, but now that I'm leaving for a bit I can see that I really haven't been here that long at all, a blip of my life, really (7, 8 weeks). When you want something to come quickly, it doesn't, and when you want something to stay far off in the future, it comes around much faster than expected, and when you don't want something to end, it's over before you know it. I've been waiting for tomorrow night to come for about ten days now. So only sixteen more hours until freedom! Tomorrow afternoon I have a midterm (which I'm all studied up for), and then I'm basically done with school for almost a week. I'm going home on Friday! So excited! Here are all the things I'm excited for: driving to somewhere far away and having a destination, not needing a map, seeing how long I can drive without stopping, singing to myself and not having to talk to anyone, pulling into the driveway, seeing my dogs, being in an empty house, seeing my family, making my own food, going to bed in a room that no one else sleeps in, experiencing that weird parallel between home and school / temporary break and upcoming reality / familiarity and awkwardness / shared experiences and a big divide, going to Pita Jungle and/or Green with Ali, being able to watch television if I wanted to, being able to sit somewhere comfy other than on my bed if I wanted to, having the New York Times around all the time, having plenty of food provisions available to make delicious things, going to Sprouts and possibly seeing that boy I saw there all summer, eating at a proper table with a glass and a china plate and not seeing any plastic trays, not caring about what I wear, not having to take out my school ID ten times a day, seeing how my somewhat-regular running kick works outside around the neighborhood, not having to think about a dining hall for six days, not having to eat dinner by 6:30 every night, not having to coordinate who I'm eating each meal with, not having to think about what fun thing to do on the weekend, listening to my parents talk about their days, having free wine available, hanging out with my brother and sister and feeling relatively old and kind of freaked out that they're so (relatively) old too, knowing the lay of the land like the back of my hand, and at the end of it, hopefully being ready to come back to school.
If anyone will be home between Saturday and Wednesday, llamame. That means "call me". I don't know if any other schools have breaks and you East Coast kids probably won't be flying back for that short amount of time but it's been a distant few months so I don't know what everyone is up to.
While summer is now undeniably over, I'll leave you with a picture of one of its delicious bounties: fresh watermelon. Good watermelon is so, so good (and bad watermelon, as often found in our dining hall even in mid-October and probably all the way through May, is really, very bad).
This was so good.
08 October 2006
hush now child
A jolly stroll through the neighborhood at dusk...
05 October 2006
i do everything you want me to
After finding my mailbox perpetually empty, I receive three packages in one day! A care package from my mom, a Halloween care package from the Bells through my family's church (thank you!), and some Burts Bees stuff I ordered. My roommates were jealous.
I made dinner in the dorm kitchen tonight. I had originally planned this for Monday night, and had gone to Trader Joe's that afternoon to pick up veggies (tomatoes, bell peppers, and carrots), olive oil, TJ's Curry Simmer Sauce and some pre-cooked brown rice. Each night this week ended up being busy, so it wasn't until today that I had enough time to haul my bags down to the kitchen and set up temporary camp. Using the Simmer Sauce makes it so much easier than buying making curry from scratch, but I was still sad that I was forced to half-ass it. The experience reminded me of the few times when I cooked dinner at ASU in the spring, in the early weeks of the semester when I was still living in my dorm Monday through Thursday. I've got the process down-pat - in a sturdy container like a plastic storage box, bring down everything you think you might possibly need, like ziploc bags, paper towels, tupperware containers, spoons, scissors, a can opener, a plate and several bowls, a cutting board, a knife, etc. You also need the ingredients, obviously, and you have to figure out where you're going to eat, and if that place is your room, you need to think about how to transport the various parts of your meal without spilling anything. And then you have to hope that when you get there, the kitchen appliances will all work. See, it's complicated! Having a kitchen six feet from the dining table is magic, pure magic. Having even a dining table is gold. It was a freaking good dinner. I'm pretty fed up with the dining halls. Eating "the Katherine way" is practically impossible. The only whole wheat food offered is raisin bran, the soups have an oily orange sheen on top, my daily salad is boring me to tears, and the chances of getting a vegan entree that isn't swimming in oil, made with tofu or wrapped in a white tortilla are slim to none. But I'm just incredibly picky (or full of food knowledge and blessed with a discerning palate? haha) which is why I need to cook for myself which unfortunately is only offered to a few groups of upperclassmen. If you aren't too concerned about what you eat, you'll eat well here. So I spend quite a few meals eating in my room, and while my philosophy is to eat as freshly and naturally as possible, desperate times call for desperate measures. You generally can't go wrong with Fantastic Foods products, hummus lasts in the fridge for about ten days, Luna Bars make a nice vegan cookie, rice cakes are a satisfying, crunchy way to eat whole grains, and if Trader Joe's was a man I would marry him. Pre-cooked brown rice, simmer sauces, asceptic soups, frozen berries, figs, whole wheat pita bread, and bran muffins? TJ's is the reason I haven't gone crazy. The more I think about it, and the more my friends suggest it, I'm thinking more and more about working around food as a career. Perhaps I'll go to culinary school after college? I have my perfect restaurant planned out in my head for one day. I'm still keeping up with my food blogs although I simply save recipes into my huge Word folder for winter break and summer vacation. Oh, what are we going to do with this girl?
Frozen banana, soy milk, half a peach, and lots of strawberries. And then some more. Thanks to Danielle, the Magic Bullet Blender is my awesome little friend.
And for dessert? Mom's homemade chocolate chip cookies! These are definitely not vegan and not healthy, but if I'm going to eat dairy, I want to eat good-quality stuff. You can taste both the real butter and the love in them.
05 October 2006
I was born in...
I've just spent the last four hours intensely recounting my entire life for a psychology paper on childhood development. It's pretty cool to have my life through age eighteen officially on paper, although I could go way more into it if the limit wasn't five double-spaced pages. I've been reading lots of autobiographies for my Core class and because its my professor's concentration, I'm learning much more about it. Biographies are fascinating. It's always been important to me to translate memories into words and sentences. Maybe one of my life projects will be to get my immediate family's biographies written at some point. That would be pretty sweet.
01 October 2006
foresight is a precious thing
Remember, remember, the first of... October?
October!
I love October. It could be my favorite month. If September teased you and flirted with you, that flighty devil, October will be true to you. There will be an inevitable drop in temperature, a splendid five-day break from school sprinkled in the middle, and then Halloween, followed closely by my birthday. While I cannot really immerse myself in the foods of the season because I don't have a kitchen (tear), I still eagerly await the arrival of pumpkin, corn, parsnips, apples, pears, pecans, cranberries, and thick, hearty soups with crusty bread. Oh, tickle me pink!
I ate an absolutely delicious Afghan dish last night called boarani badenjan, or grilled eggplant and tomato with garlic-lemon yogurt on top of rice pilaf. This definitely was not courtesy of the dining hall, but of a restaurant in the Village. Eleven of us had a wonderful dinner and the only letdown was being unable to have a glass of wine with my meal (that's all I want! Do you know how hard it is to come back to the US from Europe and suddenly be deemed too immature to drink?). Ah well, I got my hands on some wine later. Rum isn't half-bad either. The night culminated in a poor night's sleep and a slight hangover which wouldn't have been missed, but after a hard week of studying, one night of foam, dancing, friends and boys was probably worth it.
For some reason today I've been able to harness that little piece of my brain that produces readable and understandable essays, and I magically spit out a pretty good paper for my Autobiography class! I love it when that happens!