Zesty's Help the Student Series

Fellow food blogger Zesty over at Zesty Cook is publishing a series this month called Help the Students. As you might imagine, the plan is to give easy , usually healthy recipes to students who might be on their own and cooking for the first time. An extra feature is that most of the recipes are guest posts from other bloggers, including me.

Of course, easy recipes aren't just for students! I'm particularly looking forward to trying:

• Easy Creamy Stovetop Mac & Cheese
• Stuffed Sweet Peppers (with lentils or beans instead of meat)
• Coconut Tempeh Bites and No-Bake Honey Oat Bars
• Super Easy Brie Bake You Will Love

Have you checked this series out yet? What are your favorites? Do you have a super easy recipe that you would add?

My Apologies

Hello everyone,

I'm sorry that I've been gone so long. As you can see by my last post, I have a troubled relationship with food and cooking, and it got overwhelming for a while. I did manage to keep cooking, some of the time at least, but blogging seemed like too much.

Part of the problem is that there was this big wedding at the end of July... that happened to be mine... so I was a little busy! The wedding went great, though, and the food was amazing. We went through all Michigan vendors: Paesano for the Italian buffet, Sandhill Crane Vineyards for the wine, the Jefferson Market Cakery for cupcakes, caramel favors by Nanci Jenkins of Sweet Sensations, plus Michigan-made beers. You can see some wine and cupcakes to the left (and my mother's beautiful table decorating!).

Now that I'm back home, with lots of new toys for the kitchen, a weekly CSA subscription, and no wedding to plan, I'm trying to get back into regular cooking and more frequent blogging. Please bear with me if it takes a while to get back into it. And if you come over for dinner, remind me to take pictures - I keep forgetting.

To tide you over, here's the bread recipe I've been adapting lately to make bread several times a week. It's a ridiculously easy recipe written in a very friendly and approachable way, so if you've never made bread before, it's a good place to start. If you live near me I'd be happy to share some dry yeast; you probably already have the other ingredients.

Thanks for sticking with me!

Love,

Katie Mae

Trade-Offs (I)

Confession: I've hardly cooked this week. When I have, it hasn't been noteworthy or photogenic, with the exception of Katerina's Strawberry-Rhubarb Cobbler, which I forgot to photograph anyway. Even worse, I haven't used any of last week's CSA share... I'll put the picture with this week's for you to see, but it may go to waste, and I feel guilty.

Usually I really like the challenge of cooking and feel energized by it. But sometimes, especially when my kitchen is messy or I'm not feeling great, cooking a "real" meal is too daunting. You've all been there, right?

I think in my case it's also complicated by my sometimes-conflicting goals for food and cooking. I want to support local farmers, but that often takes more time and money. I want organic food where possible, but again - more expensive and harder to find. I want to make quick meals on weeknights, but cooking with produce and grains = lots of prep (usually), and I'm worried about the BPA in the canned food I use to save time. I want to be vegetarian and it's difficult when I eat outside my home. And I recently started reading more about low-carbon cooking, and the author of the book advises against oven- and stove-intensive cooking like roasting, but that's my favorite way to cook my local produce. So health, economy, environment, taste, time, and budget - trying to do well in all those areas really narrows cooking choices. That's why I end up eating leftover soup, or fried rice with frozen veggies....

This post is called trade-offs (I) because I want to revisit this set of challenges as I get better at navigating them. So please forgive the complaining. Next time I will try to have more solutions.

Hiatus

Sorry it's been so long. As you probably know, I'm planning my wedding and house-hunting too. Between that and volunteering 1-2 nights a week, I'm not cooking much and not up to blogging about it. I will post when I can, but don't expect much in the near future.
-Katie

Hello!

I'm Katie.  I'm a recent university graduate living in Michigan.  In the last year I've become more interested in cooking as a way to eat healthier, save money, and live more sustainably.  Most of what I cook is vegetarian, for the above reasons and because I don't like dealing with raw meat.  My favorite flavors to work with are garlic, coriander, rosemary, and lemon; my favorite vegetables are spinach, bell peppers, and broccoli, and my favorite proteins are lentils, white beans, and black beans.  Also, I LOVE SOUP. 

 

I started this blog after I realized I was calling my mom on a weekly basis seeking maternal validation for my latest cooking adventure.  Now, she can follow me online and see pictures and recipes - I still call her, though.  My plan is to post at least once a week, showing what I've made and passing along some great recipes from other cooks. 

 

I hope people will want to recreate some of my dishes. Unfortunately, I don't usually measure my ingredients unless I'm going off someone else's recipe; I'm trying to get a feel for cooking.  If you really want measurements, let me know and I'll see what I can do.