Sweet Potato Pie

When's the last time you had sweet potato on your pie? Pizza pie that is!

Friday night proved to be another alternative pizza night at casa YJDKIY. This idea came from Pinterest, and while I didn't love it as much as last week's weird, I didn't hate it either.

I made the crust with all whole wheat flour instead of half and half, which made it filling, but also a little tough. A layer of jarred marinara and garlic, sweet potatoes, fresh baby spinach leaves, and topped with cheddar.

The potatoes, local from a Winter Harvest basket a while back, were thinly sliced and microwaved with some garlic olive oil and rosemary for 4 minutes, one minute at a time, just to make sure they were tender. I think steaming them would have been a better option since the micro is so uneven.

Compared to my overloaded veggie pizzas, this could have used more. Of what I'm not sure. Perhaps some goat cheese/feta, I could even see black beans.

Thankfully, melty cheese always makes things delicious, and otherwise it was pretty nutritious.

See I told you!

Long week! Blog posts would happen on a much more timely basis if my DSLR had wireless or if my iPhone took better pictures. :P

Last week, YJDKIY fired up the slow cooker for some cabbage & lentil stew.

I love cooking dinner while I do other chores and go about the day, or snooze my face off, but it's rare that I plan enough ahead to do this.

I let the lentils soak for about 30-45 minutes before adding them in.

Other stuff, just chop it up and dump! (onion in the bag) I also added 4 bay leaves, basil, rosemary, pepper, and celery seed for seasoning since I didn't have broth.

All ready to go, on high heat for about 4 hours and low heat for 1 hour.

This was pretty tasty.

Although the other eater thought it needed the addition of Texas Pete! Who really is not from Texas, but just a few miles away in Winston-Salem.

Long One

With FIVE entire days of work this week, the first time since 12/5/11 (zoiks, that's more than a month), it's going to be an EXTREMELY long one.

SUNDAY: Tilapia Soft Tacos
MONDAY: Tofu Spaghetti Squash, broccoli
TUESDAY: Grilled Cheese with Kale
WEDNESDAY: Tangy Tempeh Kitchen Sink Salad
THURSDAY: leftovers
FRIDAY: Sweet potato and spinach pizza

Sew What?

My Green Kitchen faces southish, so it gets lots of natural light. It is usually about 5 degrees warmer in there than any other room in the house. While I love this, it is quite the problem when I'm trying to cook and the sun is directly in my eyes. Plus, there's an alleyway back there and it creeps me out to not have the window closed at night.

A week or so ago, I started pinning kitchen curtains, but didn't really love any of them. And then I started pinning fabric, and ordered these three options from fabric.com.

 It would be prudent to note I hate sewing, I strongly dislike having to be precise, and I get frustrated pretty easily with home repair. :P That's when I saw this INGENIOUS idea.

Source: cottageandvine.blogspot.com via Emily on Pinterest

She hotgluded, but I was thinking spray glue. After a minor domestic dispute hanging the hardware, I was on my way. I went with the chevron (surprise), which proved ingenious has it has built-in 1" guide marks for cutting a straight line. Not one measure, straight pin, or stitch...and about 15 minutes...later, I had this (just iPhone pics here...sorry).

Mostly it will be short, which is good for blocking the blinding sun. But it can be pulled long, too.

Only minor problem was failing to allow room for a thicker roll. See that oddly placed light fixture in the middle of the window casing there that prevents any other type of window treatment? Yeah, it gets caught on that.

Since I had a little fabric left, I took apart the existing curtain, and cut it to fit the size of cloth leftover. I used superduper hem tape to finish the ends, left the tabs in place and poof! 15 minutes and done.

So glad I went with the bold graphic!

$7.49 one yard of fabric
$7.99 roller shade
$3.49 hem tape
$.75 hardware
spray adhesive, rod & curtain - reused

We picked up a weirdo

Friday night is pizza night in casa YJDKIY. Well, actually, it's more like, pizza night is Friday night. Because not all Friday nights are pizza, but pizza is almost always Friday night.

gee thanks iPhone - that's almost better than my DSLR

Even though I love it, regular veggie pizza was getting kinda B-O-R-I-N-G! When I started looking for new ideas, the only thing that kept coming up was BBQ Chicken Pizza. I don't like BBQ. Nor do I really want chicken on my pizza. Enter my strange world of concocting. YUUUUM. I masked the BBQ and avoided the chicken.

BBQ Chick Pea Pizza (get it!?)

1 prepared pizza crust (or homemade would be even better, but we were going for quick here)
1 c organic chick peas, rinsed
2 c washed kale torn into small pieces
1 medium sweet onion finely sliced
1 c grated Gouda cheese (not smoked)
1 c jarred low sodium marinara sauce
2 T sweet & tangy barbecue sauce
1 T olive oil

Heat oil in a skillet, add onions, and reduce heat to low. Cook 10+ minutes until caramelized and add kale. Mix well to coat kale with oil, cover, and cook 8 more minutes, stirring occasionally to prevent burning. Meanwhile, in a separate bowl, mix marinara and BBQ sauce, tasting to get your preferred balance of BBQ and tomato. Once kale is wilted, remove from heat. Spread sauce onto crust, top with kale & onion mix, and chick peas. Sprinkle grated cheese over top and bake for 11-13 minutes on 405 degrees, broil for 1-2 minutes (I use a pizza stone pre-heated with the oven).

It might sound weird, but don't throw it out of the car until you try it...

New Recipe Thursday*

Hallelujah it's Thursday...starting the week one day short is the best idea ever. Well, having the whole week off was actually the best idea ever, but that's not really practical.

I'm not really sure what inspired this concoction, but thankfully (spoiler alert) it worked! Often I simply think about what think would taste good together and then, well, put it together.

Our Winter Harvest baskets featured a Siberian kale from a new (to me) farm:

"Dane Fisher from Fisher Farms has just returned to providing us produce. Dane is a professor at Pfeiffer University and one of area's earliest supporters of buying local and eating local. He has grown Siberian Kale for us. When young, this interesting kale variety is peppery and smooth. As the cold comes, the flavor is milder but richer. " 

I don't think I've had this variety, but I could tell it was going to be tasty! So much so that I decided to save a little out of the recipe for steaming so I could taste the true flavor.

Anyhow, chop up the butternut it pretty small pieces ~ 3 cups. Transfer to a microwave safe container, add 1 T water, and cook for 5-8 minutes until tender and mushy.

Love the Ikea foldy cutting mats, but really, REALLY wish they could go in the dishwasher.

Meanwhile, saute kale & green onion. Microwave 4 breakfast sausage style links and mash (could easily substitute regular sausage here). 

Combine 4 eggs or egg equivalent**, 1/3-1/2 cup low fat ricotta cheese, and desired amount of garlic powder, sage, and rosemary. (I never ever measure, but it was maybe 1 t garlic, 1 t sage 1.5 rosemary). Mix well until smooth.

Combine sausage crumbles, kale, and butternut and mix with eggs. Pour into pre-heated deep dish pie crust. Top with parmesan cheese and bake for 30 minutes on 400 degrees, plus a 3-4 minute broil.

The kale was phenomenal. Due to it's dainty leaf style, it is here by named Fancy Kale in this house.  The quiche was the perfect flavor/texture combination, not too eggy, and felt more filling than some others.

Definite keeper!

*note that unlike Wordless Wednesday, this will likely not be a regular feature :P

**egg substitutes are probably not the most wisest choice when it comes to nutrition, local eating, organic, or sustainable, but for me, I choose the lack of cholesterol as more important to make this "healthy" for me. It's totally your call.

Late Start

The menus are a bit late this week, but since I'm still trying to remember what 6 am looks like (oh, I will miss you 10 pm, perhaps we can meet again soon), back to work week has the schedule all off. Mainly this was because I procrastinated food shopping until Monday, which actually turned out to be the smartest thing I've done all 2012. Mid-day, mid-week shopping changed my cooking life. 

MONDAY: Gnocchi with Chard & Beets - wild mushroom & sage olive oil
TUESDAY:  Nature Burger, carrot sticks
WEDNESDAY: Butternut Quiche with Sausage & Chard
THURSDAY: Primavera with Salmon & Penne
FRIDAY: BBQ Chickpea, Carmelized Onions, Spinach & Gouda Pizza
SATURDAY: Crock Pot Curried Lentils with Sweet Potatoes & Kale

Artistic Oil

A New Year's Day hardly ever goes by without the traditional meal. Last year the peas got a little burned, but we managed because the collards were perfect (supposedly they are for coins and cash, which we sure did spend really well in 2011!).

This year, the peas were perfect and the collards were so-so. I had some organic ones, and planned to make sweet potato stuffed leaves, but I love my perfect GK collards so much that I couldn't resist the usual way!

The star of the 2012 show though, was a Christmas present from Art of Oil in Boone (the present was bought there, not actually FROM the store, as in to YJDKIY from AoO.) YJDKIY received a gift of 6 samples. These two were first up to go on my beet salad. Warm beets over salad greens, with pine nuts and feta and a dressing of walnut oil and maple balsamic.

These are the other four to figure out how to use:

The flavors are surprisingly potent (unlike Garlic Gold, which was all the rave, but which I can not for the life of me taste any garlic flavor in). Sesame is definitely for something Asian, Walnut will be tasty with chard and gnocchi. Blueberry will probably go on a fruity salad, but I'm a little stumped on what to do with the espresso balsamic. It smells and tastes divine, but I'm not sure what the flavor complement will be yet!

Round Here

The blog has been sort of slack lately, but that doesn't mean we haven't been COMPLETELY enjoying a solid 7 days of no schedule. Here are a few of the things we've been up to...

We took a little trip

And did a little (antique?) shopping. 

I loved these glasses in the 80s...does that make me an antique?

A framed neon jalopy, just what every house needs right? 

This is all the fault of my recent pinning addiction.

And spending lots of internet time here:

We've been eating out at new places like Bangkok Downtown,
where the food was delicious and the service was horrendous.
And The Sweetest Thing, where I had a grilled Brussels sprouts sandwich
...who knew?

Plus I did cook a few things, besides the disaster, like this yummy Sandy Creek Farm shiitake & collard quiche (which you saw if you follow me on Twitter).

But some of us simply salivate over a piece of cloth. 

And ruin our new Christmas toys in less than a week!

A more angelic version of the grand-dog was immortalized in oil.  

Crafty + 65 degree Christmas = outdoor pretties

Actual house number changed to protect identity, and prevent doggy-napping. 

But not actual dogs napping. Hello Canine Stink Protector 4000.  

(PS: I promise the numbers look way cuter than that.
Also, those are the most stinky fragrant pansies ever!)

Alas, it's not been all play. Organization ensued. 

Even if this is still true.

The best kind of crafty: re-purposed and reused!

Merry Christmas it was and a Happy New Year to you!