recipe

[asimplechord]

Don't know if anyone's interested....

MrIris and I have been trying to be good, both diet- and budget-wise. Instead of being lazy - cooking the same boring things, or deciding to waste money going out to eat - each weekend we pick out four recipes and shop for groceries. Then, during the week, we make them and have them for dinner and to pack left-overs for lunch.

I'm as addicted to cookbooks as I am to other books, so there's no shortage of recipes. I particularly love old or antique cookbooks, with odd measurements and ingredients that we call by different names (or can't obtain) now. However, the most recent addition to the collection is a Cooking Light cookbook, much more useful and practical in our calorie and dollar saving scheme.

Tonight's dinner was chickpea-and-corn patties with green salad. MrIris wasn't too enthusiastic when I picked out the recipe, because it has no animal products (unless you want sour cream), and he is a total carnivore. But he's eating the patties - and his words - now!

Chickpea-and-Corn Patties
2 t olive oil, divided
1 1/2 cups fresh corn kernels (we warmed frozen corn)
1 cup onion (substituted one green onion and a cup of chopped red bell pepper)
1 t thyme, minced (fresh or dried)
1 can (15 oz.) chickpeas, rinsed and drained
1/2 cup breadcrumbs
6 T cornmeal (separated to 2 + 4)
cooking spray
fat-free sour cream
salsa

*we also added a chipotle chili that had been preserved in adobo sauce to give the patties smoke and heat

1. Heat 1t oil in skillet over medium-high heat. Add corn, pepper/onion mix, and thyme; saute 2 minutes.
2. Place sauteed mixture, chickpeas, 2T cornmeal, breadcrumbs, and chipotle in food processor. Blend until combined and chunky. (8-10 pulses)
3. Divide the mixture into 8 equal portions and shape them into 1-cm thick patties. Dredge through remaining 4T of cornmeal.
5. Heat remaining teaspoon of oil in skillet coated with cooking spray. (You can just use more oil to keep it from sticking instead of the spray, but more oil = more fat = more calories.)
6. Add 4 patties, cook 5 minutes. Flip over carefully; cook until golden. Repeat with remaining 4.
7. Serve with sour cream and salsa. (I don't think it needed the sour cream, but I like hot, spicy food, so I never turn down some extra-hot salsa.)

One serving = two patties. With 1T sour cream and 1T salsa, each serving contains ~260 calories, with 5.7 g fat.

Comments

[why-me-why-not.livejournal.com]

MrI is eating them; what's your opinion? Sounds interesting though, I'm gonna add it to my recipe books. *g*

I love recipe books too. I've got some really really old ones, falling apart, but I love them. My favorite is my Grandma's cookbook from the 50's. Timeless recipes. *g*

[asimplechord.livejournal.com]

I liked them, but then I'm the one who picked the recipe. And I have a couple of cookbooks full of vegetarian or vegan recipes that he doesn't care for, so they are hardly used now that we live together again.

The chipotle chili and salsa added some spice - I think otherwise they might have been a bit bland. But I couldn't bear the idea of putting an entire CUP of onion in. Not a big onion fan.

*bookmarks that page for future use*

I have an original Hershey's Chocolate cookbook. I've only ever made one of the fudge recipes out of it - creamy chocolate goodness. Also have my mom's original Betty Crocker, which is falling to pieces, and has cookie batter stains all over it from baking experiences when I was a child. The best recipes, though, are some handwritten ones that were MrIris's great-grandmother's. They are classic! Odd measurements and directions galore. Add flour until batter is stiff enough. Huh? How stiff is stiff enough?

[why-me-why-not.livejournal.com]

haha, I have a Betty Crocker Cooky Cookbook, totally falling apart and missing pages and smudged with all kinds of stuff. I love it.

I've got some of my grandma's & great-grandma's recipes, written in and stuck haphazardly in the pages of a couple of my books. I love how some of htem are like "about a cup of this" or "a few spoons of that". Experimenting w/ cooking is fun. *g*

[fleurdeliser.livejournal.com]

Thanks for sharing! I adore recipes (I'd better, since I'm going to culinary school when I'm done with my Bachelor's degree... :D). That actually sounds remarkably like something that my mother would make. I was a vegetarian (along with my parents) until about my junior year of high school when I decided to branch out and try new things (which was really the extent of my teenage rebellion, I'm more rebellious now then I was as a teenager). Periodically she would try to go from lacto-ovo to entirely vegan and make things like that. It never lasted long as she really didn't have the time required to cook all the time and when you don't have time to cook, the easy things always have dairy products in them. *shrugs* Anyway, it looks good. I'll have to email the recipe to her.

[asimplechord.livejournal.com]

Periodically I've tried to go vegetarian. Can't go the whole way, though. I don't care for beef, pork or chicken, but I love seafood, and it's too hard to give up dairy products entirely. Soy milk and other products just aren't the same.

Any such attempts came to a screeching halt when I moved back in with MrIris. Meat is what's for dinner for him, most nights.

Culinary school? Why did I think you were going to be a teacher?

[fleurdeliser.livejournal.com]

Heh. Because I was going to be a teacher. I have since reevaluated. I love learning and knowledge and being well-informed, but I struggle with the every-day business of scholastics. Being a teacher would require more at least two more years. I'm not willing to put myself through that. I'm going to have a hard enough time just finishing the next year. Teaching also requires a strong comittment to the profession. It's not an 8-4 job. There are hours upon hours of extra work that go into it and I'm not sure that I would enjoy any of it. In short, I'm lazy. While I know that as a chef or baker I will work very hard, it will be done at the end of the day (unless of course I open up my own restaraunt or cafe, but that's a bit too far ahead to think about).

If possible, I might enjoy teaching one or two classes at the local high school for a while, but I definitely don't want to get certified as a teacher. Another indicator that maybe teaching isn't the right career path for me is that I'm in two education classes this quarter and I hate them. *shrugs*

Anyway, I'm pretty excited about the whole culinary school idea. I've already been accepted into the Western Culinary Institute (in Portland) and I'm looking forward to starting. In a year. I'm thinking about beginning at WCI and then transfering elsewhere to fun and intersting locales as London or Paris. :) Now the goal is to get through my final year of college without failing out because of lack of motivation. I want a Bachelor's degree. I'm not quitting now, however much I wish it.