TracyFood

Ask TracyFood: Sexin’ It Up 14 February 2007 4:50 pm

Posted by Tracy in : America's Test Kitchen, advice, cooking, eating, friends, people , add a comment

Last night I had dinner with two EXTREMELY attractive Italians; their physical beauty was almost perfectly matched by the delicious and effortless-looking bechamel-chicken-and-veggie pasta they made for me. I saw your invitation to ask specific food questions on the blog and I started thinking tonight, as I was making a dinner you showed me (couscous with veggies and apricots and raisins and feta and chickpeas, although next time I won’t add the chickpeas because it made the whole thing taste too muddy, low-GI protein be damned), about what kind of dinner you’d make for someone you were trying to get into bed. Ideally this would be the kind of thing that you could ask for some help in the kitchen from said person: you’re all there in the cramped kitchen, brushing against each other as you reach for the cheese grater. Or something. You know? Let me know what you think about this issue. There’s no hurry though, because the chances of my being a position to sex someone up any time in the near future are, um, low, to say the least. This is just idle curiosity… and of course, a strong desire to see what you’ll come up with and write about. Have I told you how much the blog is rockin this party eight days a week? Oh girl, it is.

I love you. And your writing. And your cooking. Love!

–Chiara
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Recipe: Herbed Potato-Corn Chowder 13 February 2007 9:02 am

Posted by Tracy in : Morning Glory, cooking, eating, recipes, soup, sundance, vegan, vegetarian , 2 comments

I got to make soup for Morning Glory for the first time last Saturday, and I’ve been oddly nervous about it ever since. Is it any good? Did I make too much? Will it sell? Is this weather too unseasonably beautiful for something rich and creamy? Stuff like that. To reassure myself that I’ve still got what it takes in the vegan soup department, last night I made a home version of the potato-corn chowder I threw together on Saturday based on my vague recollections of a similar soup I made for Sundance once upon a time (only this time, I was able to consult my notes and signage):

I’m happy to say my home version turned out great! Soon I will go to work and find out how the Morning Glory version was received! Eeeee! (more…)

Monkey Monday: Who’s down with OCD, raw milk mania and other stories, news and otherwise 12 February 2007 1:24 pm

Posted by Tracy in : America's Test Kitchen, Marion Nestle, Michael Pollan, cooking, eating, environment, health, milk, monkeys, news, sustainability, vegan , 2 comments

Who’s down with OCD? Yeah, you know me. But most of the time I’m pretty sure my obsessive attention to weird details isn’t a problem, even if I can’t quit any time I want. Allison Bechdel calls it “attention surfeit disorder,” and when it suits me, I call it a superpower. (more…)

Recipe: Vegan Mulligatawny 9 February 2007 10:06 am

Posted by Tracy in : America's Test Kitchen, coconut, cooking, recipes, soup, vegan, vegetarian , 1 comment so far

This soup is a vegan adaptation of a recipe I saw a few months ago on an episode of America’s Test Kitchen called “A Passage to India.” According to ATK’s official site, the episode originally aired two seasons ago (Season 5), which makes me wonder why my friendly local public television station is so slow to air stuff and whether I should give in and subscribe to the service that lets me watch ATK online already. But I digress.

I had never heard of Mulligatawny soup before watching “A Passage to India,” but according to Chris Kimball’s “here’s what can go wrong and what we’re trying to correct” introduction for the recipe, it’s a curried vegetable soup that made its way to the U.S. by way of the English, who of course had colonies in both North America and the Indian subcontinent. Wikipedia confirms that the name Mulligatawny comes from the Tamil for “pepper water,” so one of ATK’s goals for the recipe was to spice it up. I’m happy to say they succeeded, and (more…)

Two different kinds of rewrites. 8 February 2007 9:59 pm

Posted by Tracy in : Morning Glory, cooking, recipes, work , 1 comment so far

I got home from a closing shift at Morning Glory today and realized I’m starting to think about the café in “we” terms. Like “We share all the tips for a shift equally, none of this ’servers tip out some percentage to the kitchen’ stuff” (and I must say: Monday’s tips feel mighty fine in my wallet, even if they’re less than a third of what I made in tips today, to which I must say: hot damn, we did all right). What’s more, that realization actually gave me a warm and fuzzy feeling, much better than the ache in my feet, so to celebrate the fact that maybe having a job isn’t all bad, I rewrote the About Tracy page to reflect this little shift in my mental map of the universe, and I’m pretty happy with the result, even if it took me two Clash albums and some Belle and Sebastian that could have been used to work on recipes or something.

Speaking of recipes or something, (more…)