So here we are. Another school year is beginning. Another semester. I’d say same s*** new semester, but it honestly isn’t this time. Everything about this now 90% online academia experience feels different. Like there are dozens of NEW ways for the semester to be a disaster that we haven’t seen or experienced yet.
Yay.
I haven’t posted in months. I can see that. I cooked, kind of, and I took some pictures, and I even wrote up half of a bunch of posts, but the truth is, I had writer’s block. Or cooking block. Is that a thing? I’ve been uninspired, losing track of time, not cooking much new stuff, and every time I think “I should share this!” I end up not knowing how to put words on the page.
Even if you’re not a home cook, if you ARE a grad student, you’ve probably experienced this with research. Or writing. If you’re NOT a grad student, I’m sure you’ve experienced this at work, or on that DIY home improvement project you keep saying you want to do but you never seem to muster the energy. You know what I mean. We are all completely burned out; our emotional reservoirs are depleted, and we need to regroup.
But in the past few weeks, I have finally started cooking again. I’m ready to start exploring new flavors and new ingredients. I’m ready to start being excited by food again. Summer brings a lot of my favorite flavors, and I’ve been cooking a lot with peaches, eggplant, corn, okra, and zucchini. I’ll confess: I do eat these even when they’re not in season, but they’re definitely better when they are in season–fresher, more locally sourced, and just generally better-tasting. Don’t worry, though-~-there are a TON of great fall flavors ahead, including Brussels sprouts, acorn and butternut squash, apples, cranberries, and fresh citrus. (You can learn more about seasonal fruits and vegetables here.)
I’ll start posting recipes and pictures very soon, starting with Smitten Kitchen’s Apple Honey Challah, which I baked for Rosh Hashanah, and maybe photos (or at least a discussion of) her Tangy Braised Brisket-Style Chickpeas, which I am now a bit obsessed with-~-all the brisket flavors we love, but vegan? What else could you want? I’ll also be trying to post some of my favorite recipes, a project that got derailed due to comps and COVID.
In the meantime, here are some seasonal recipes to help inspire you to fall back in love with food and cooking, or at least make weeknights go a little easier!
IF YOU HAVE A PARTICULAR FEAR OF INSECTS, I RECOMMEND YOU SKIP TO THE RECIPE AND IGNORE THE FIRST FEW PARAGRAPHS HERE. I did say in the title there was a small cooking horror story to be recounted.
As a graduate student, I don’t live in the nicest of housing. Also, I live in a city, in the south, in an older building, so no matter what, there has always been a risk of bugs, even if I did live in a nicer building, there would still be *some* risk of bugs. But I digress. I have had to periodically eliminate the occasional roach in my apartment, and for the first year or so, they really freaked me out, but eventually, I got over the fear, and now I mostly get annoyed by them. They scuttle about and I have to stop what I’m doing, find a shoe, and get rid of them. I actually keep shoes in various places just in case I need them. Like I said, annoying. I also have the place treated periodically, so often when I do find roaches they are already dead and I just have to remove them.
I know, you did not come here to read about my pest control issues. But here’s the thing: the first time I went to make this recipe, I pulled out my cast iron pan and found a live freaking roach running around inside it.
Source: Giphy
Obviously, I was completely freaked out. I got rid of the roach, of course, but then I was kind of thrown off. Was I supposed to still USE the cast iron pan, after having removed a roach from it? Just to be clear, I removed the roach from the pan, THEN killed it, so that didn’t actually happen in the pan. But still, gross.
So, I cleaned the pan thoroughly, and popped it in the oven at 400 degrees for 15 minutes, to make sure that it was fully sanitized. And then I summoned all of my willpower and tried to proceed with the plan. I wasn’t thrilled about it, but it was the plan I had so it’s the plan I went with.
And honestly, once I got through the initial horror of dealing with the roach and sanitizing the pan, the recipe turned out great! I have made it since, sans pest control drama, and it has remained a great recipe. As a dutch baby, it’s perfect for weeknights, because it cooks up quickly, has plenty of protein, and makes for super easy cleanup. This recipe comes from Smitten Kitchen, and is featured in the Smitten Kitchen Everyday cookbook. I disagree, however, with her claim that this feeds 4. It really feeds 2, if you’re eating it as a meal, and a side salad goes great with this.
INGREDIENTS
5 tbsp. unsalted butter, divided
2 tbsp. minced shallot (from 1 shallot)
8 oz. cremini (baby bella) mushrooms, finely diced
¾ tsp. kosher salt, divided
¾ tsp. black pepper, divided
1 tbsp. dry white wine or white vermouth
3 tbsp. heavy cream
4 large eggs
½ cup all-purpose flour
½ cup whole milk
¾ oz. Parmesan cheese, grated
1 tbsp. finely chopped fresh chives
DIRECTIONS
1. Melt 2 tablespoons of the butter in a 12-inch cast-iron or ovenproof skillet over medium heat.
2. Add shallot, and cook, stirring often, until soft, 2 to 3 minutes. Add mushrooms and ½ teaspoon each of the salt and pepper. Increase heat to medium high; cook, stirring often, until mushroom liquid evaporates and edges begin to brown, 7 to 8 minutes.
3. Reduce heat to medium low. Add wine, and cook, stirring to scrape up bits from bottom of skillet, 1 to 2 minutes. Stir in cream, and bring to a boil over medium-high. Immediately transfer mixture to a bowl.
4. Preheat oven to 425°. Wipe out skillet; add remaining 3 tablespoons butter, and place in oven until very hot and sizzling, about 3 minutes.
5. Beat eggs and remaining ¼ teaspoon each of salt and pepper in a medium bowl. Whisk in flour until mostly smooth. Gradually whisk in milk until combined.
6. Remove skillet from oven. Swirl melted butter to coat; pour batter into skillet. Bake in preheated oven until pancake is browned and rumpled, 13 to 15 minutes.
7. Sprinkle with Parmesan. Dollop mushroom sauce over pancake; garnish with chives. Slice and serve.
So, as established in my last post, the world went incredibly haywire in the past 6 weeks, which has certainly contributed to my lack of posting. But I’ve literally posted 3 times this year (this will be blog post #4), and that can’t all be blamed on coronavirus panic. No, much of that must be blamed on my time management and on grad school itself.
Here’s the thing: I, for reasons that I barely comprehend myself, agreed to TA two different classes this semester. Together they add up to a normal amount of hours of TA appointment, but they have very different requirements and deadlines for me to keep track of. As a result, it feels like I am literally always grading something, and asking myself questions like, “why did I do this” and “do people not use spellcheck”.
Source: Giphy
Meanwhile, I am working on my prospectus, which means I am desperately trying to take the mess of ideas in my head and put them on paper in a way that is a) coherent and b) plausible as three connected papers. This is harder than I thought, which I know may seem silly, but I’ve literally been cultivating this plan for years, and I figured, oh, how hard can it be to just write it all on paper and then my advisor will give me some edits and I’ll be fine?
Nope.
Source: i.pinimg.com
Okay, so, that is my excuse/explanation for the current state of things. Yes? Good? Now let’s talk about food.
I only started eating salmon a few months ago, but this is not my first salmon recipe I’m posting here, because it’s a great medium for a lot of flavors, and is really good for you. This recipe was inspired by far too many hours watching Hell’s Kitchen, which I have had on in the background because honestly it’s good to watch other people have meltdowns about things and remember I’m not alone.
Source: Giphy; Hell’s Kitchen Season: unknown
SO THIS SALMON. I know, I know, you thought at the very least the next image would be of the salmon. Sorry. I get distracted, you know? But here it is, the Teriyaki Salmon with Mango Slaw you have presumably hung in there with this post to see:
Look at that! It’s colorful, flavorful, and is totally on point for spring!
This dish is actually really simple, which is the good news. You can use thawed frozen salmon for this, which is the better news. I have no idea what the produce dept looks like at your local grocery store and cannot predict whether or not you have access to cabbage or mangoes, which is the bad news. BUT if you can get your hands on the handful of ingredients involved in this recipe, a tasty dinner is in your future.
You can do this with store bought teriyaki sauce (like I did), or you can make your own. The mango slaw is based on this recipe, but with a few minor adjustments.
INGREDIENTS
For the salmon:
2 cuts of Atlantic or Alaskan Sockeye salmon
Approximately 1/2 cup of teriyaki sauce
For the slaw:
1 cup of shredded cabbage or Cole slaw mix
1/2 to 3/4 of a mango, ripe, cut into bite-size pieces/strips
2 scallions, green parts only, sliced vertically and then into strips
2 T rice vinegar
1/2 lime, juiced, OR 1 1/2 T lime juice, store bought
2 tsp low sodium soy sauce
1 1/2 tsp sesame oil
1/2 tsp chili powder
1/2 tsp lemon pepper OR zest of 1/3 lemon
INSTRUCTIONS
Put the salmon and teriyaki sauce in a quart or gallon size bag and let it marinate for at least 15 minutes, or up to a day in the fridge
Preheat the oven to 450
Combine all of the slaw ingredients together (this can also be done up to 4 hours in advance to let the flavors meld, but needs to be allowed to sit for at least 20-30 minutes)
Cook the salmon on a sheet pan for 12-15 minutes, until fully cooked through
I was behind on updating this blog, with posts half-finished, for months.
And then the world came derailed.
Like many of you, I saw any number of threads of my life start to unspool at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Like many of you, I have been told to work remotely (which is difficult because of what I study, and also because teaching online classes when you’re not trained to do so is a sure way to get a bad headache), and am practicing social distancing by basically not seeing my friends in-person, going to my weekly sports league (also put on hold), and staying in my apartment with my dog as much as I can. (I am, however, rapidly catching up on the TV on my watch list.) A project I’ve worked hard to prepare to put in the field likely has to be put on hold because I can’t do community-based recruitment right now.
I know this is hard. Not being able to see other people is really, really hard, and public health experts are saying we will need to maintain social distancing measures for a minimum of 6 weeks, and very likely the time scale will range from several months up to a year or more. At some point, we will have to start balancing social distancing with our need to have our lives back, but for now, we need to make things work in our current situations. We all need to work together to flatten the curve, and the best way we can do that is by following the guidelines for social distancing to minimize the spread of the virus as much as possible.
FOOD
I’m sure you’ve already been told to make sure that you have enough shelf-stable/freezer-stable food to last up to 2 weeks, in case you have to self-quarantine or self-isolate. If you are able to find them, I encourage you to consider looking at ways to use various kinds of beans, lentils, and dried peas. Tofu is fridge-stable for up to 6 weeks, and many meats can be frozen (I’m a particular fan of frozen fish). We’ll deal with that later, though, because right now, supermarkets around the country are a disaster.
Source: ABC News
If you are suddenly going to be home a lot more than often, you are likely to be snacking more than usual. So as much as it is possible, make sure you have healthy snacks on hand, like fresh fruit (apples, pears, kiwis, oranges, and grapefruits are all in season right now, and mangoes, blueberries, and strawberries are all coming into season!), snack-able veggies like carrots, celery, and sugar snap peas. Consider pairing them with peanut butter or hummus to add a little extra flavor and protein. If you can get them, cheese and crackers, peanut butter crackers, or granola bars can all be good snacks. For more ideas, check out my previous piece On Snacking.
LOVE (Romantic and Platonic)
If you’re like me, and you’re single (and therefore not hunkered down with your significant other), this is particularly frustrating. My generation has kind of forgotten how to date: apps have made connections instantaneous and have allowed us to not really put effort into building them if they do not have immediate/short-term rewards. For better or for worse, people have kind of forgotten how to make organic connections with people and nurture them into relationships; in fact, people sometimes think it’s kind of weird when I say that I have met none of the guys I dated on apps (unless you count the guy I met in an Uber Pool, in which case, ok, I met him on an app but Uber isn’t really meant to be a dating app!). Right now, though, we won’t be going around in rideshares or chatting people up at bars, or meeting them at parties hosted by mutual friends; we’ll still be reliant on apps, and how we will use them is going to have to change.
Now, if you are thinking, girl, this is supposed to be a food blog, a) look at the title of this post and b) I’M GETTING TO THAT! I was long distance with my now-former partner for a long time, and my sister and her bf are possibly the queen and king of long distance dates (in grad school in totally different parts of the country), and we’ve both lived far away from some of our closest friends & each other (bc of college/grad school/work), so I figured I’d share some (food related) ideas for connecting with friends or dating partners (or prospective dating partners, I guess):
Order takeout together–from the same place, or from different places, and eat it over video chat. My sister and her boyfriend even order each other stuff and arrange to have it delivered at the same time, but don’t tell the other where it’s coming from or what it is-~-it’s a total surprise!
Cook a recipe together over video chat (another pro tip from my sister and her bf)
Just eat together! Planning a meal with friends can help reduce your sense of social isolation even while practicing “social distancing”. Eat whatever you were going to be eating, or have a cup of coffee, over video chat. Studies show that eating with others is better for your mental health, and helps you eat more, which can be really important since stress often messes with our appetites.
Watch movies or shows together while texting/messaging. I personally really like doing this with Disney movies (because they’re easy to follow even if you have to glance away) and competition shows, like the Great British Bake-Off or Top Chef, since you’ll start rooting for (and against) contestants
GRAD SCHOOL
Okay, first thing’s first: you need to cut yourself some slack.
Source: Giphy
Look, expecting yourself to perform at your usual level of productivity may not be reasonable right now. There’s a pandemic going on that they say is going to disrupt our lives and our work for 12-18 months, most likely. It’ll change important aspects of work, social life, and health behavior, and honestly I would not be too surprised if it resulted in some pretty notable social and economic changes (e.g. universal basic income, paid sick leave, paid family/medical leave, greater access to jobs for people with disabilities, and a re-conceptualizing of the internet as a public good). Many of us will have to hold off on things we were really looking forward to, such as travel, conferences, etc. You may have family or friends who are sick, or get sick yourself, and the anticipatory stress of this is going to make things really difficult. Many of us are now home with family members, roommates, significant others, and/or pets; for parenting grad students, trying to produce at the usual level may well be impossible while providing childcare and homeschooling supervision. We can’t just pretend this is business as usual, just from our homes instead of our offices, when it very definitely is not.
Source: Giphy
Eventually, we will find a middle ground that allows people to go back to work when and in ways in which it is safe. But in the meantime, it’s okay to realize that you’re not going to suddenly start cranking out papers and grant proposals from your living room. You’ll also need to develop new routines, find ways to hold yourself accountable, and balance your work goals with all of the other things you are dealing with. Here is some great advice I have collected from friends who do work from home, or have done so previously:
Don’t do work from bed. Choose one or more spaces in your home where you do work, and just work from there. For me, it is my dining table and my desk (and sometimes I do grade on the couch with the TV on).
Squishy surfaces like couches, beds, and arm chairs encourage/facilitate slouching and offer much less back support when you’re sitting, so even if you feel like you want to be sitting on them, try to limit the amount of time you spend on your sofa, for the sake of your lower back. It may not be super easy to get a chiropractor appointment for a while.
Put on music or something minimally distracting on TV (e.g. something you’re not invested in, or something you’ve seen a zillion times before and therefore don’t need to pay close attention). Sometimes working from home can be *too* quiet, which can be distracting in its own way. There are lots of great ambient noise albums and such online and on Spotify, as well.
Get dressed. It doesn’t have to be what you’d wear to the office/to class, but even if it’s athleisure, change out of your pajamas and into actual clothes, to help your brain be clear that you are starting your productive hours.
Set productive hours! If you’re a grad student, I highly recommend setting aside several hours a week to exclusively work on research/writing projects whether you are working from home or working on campus or some combination thereof (and by “I highly recommend”, I mean my advisor and the author of How To Write a Lot recommend and I adhere to their advice). If you already have those hours, KEEP THEM! Do not sacrifice the hours you already set aside for writing, since it’ll help you maintain some semblance of your normal routine. Decide at what time you’ll start working and, maybe even more importantly, what time you’ll stop. Working from home can blur the boundaries of work life/home life, but those boundaries are still needed.
Take breaks! When you’re at work/at school, you probably don’t work nonstop for hours on end, right? You get up, walk around, stretch, get coffee. Do those things! They help your productivity, sure, but they’re also just good for you.
Say no to things. Working from home means people assume you have lots of extra time, sometimes. It’s okay to say that you can’t take something on right now, or that you have to pass on something. It’s okay to set and maintain those boundaries.
Eat lunch! You still have to eat, and just because you’re working from home doesn’t mean you need to eat through lunch. Take a break while you eat and watch an episode of something, or read a book for fun, or call/video chat with a friend.
BACK TO FOOD
I hope at least some of those tips will help you!! In the meantime, I wanted to leave you all with some recipes/resources for cooking during this crisis. For me, this has really challenged how I approach meal planning and cooking, because there are still a lot of ingredients not available in stores, including key vegetables I need (which makes no sense to me; if you weren’t eating swiss chard before this, why are you suddenly buying it now??), which means I’m having to improvise my plans while I’m at the grocery store based on what is there. For some, now is a great time to consider batch cooking, especially if you can freeze some of it for later. It may be a great opportunity to prepare things ahead of time, freeze them, and throw them in your slow cooker. Or you may be in need of some simpler recipes based more around shelf-stable goods. Either way, here are some recipes and resources that may be of help:
The Kitchn has created a guide consisting of 100 Ways to Turn Pantry Staples Into Complete Meals. While I haven’t made these, I’ve yet to have a bad experience working with recipes from the Kitchn, and hey, it’s your life and your palate!
If you’re just getting into meal prep now, take a look back at some of my previous posts on meal prepping: this post covers batch cooking and using leftovers for lunch, while this one covers cooking techniques suited to batch cooking such as slow cooking and sheet pan meals.
Y’all have seen me talk about the importance of breakfast and healthy snacking numerous times. A lot of granola that you’ll find in the stores falls into one of two categories: healthy but expensive, or affordable but loaded with sugar and whatever kinds of fat. But you may not realize that making your own granola, at home, is actually not that hard.
BASIC INGREDIENTS:
Plain rolled oats
Oil (use canola or coconut oil; olive oil will leave a more bitter taste & canola and coconut oil are both considered healthy fats)
Nuts (if you are allergic, obviously skip this)
Sweetener (like agave, maple syrup, or honey)
Salt
These are all things that you can easily get your hands on and most of them are relatively inexpensive, especially when you keep in mind that you can use them for multiple things.
YOUR BASIC COMPONENTS
No matter what else you choose to add to your granola, it’s easiest to stick to this basic formula:
4 parts rolled oats
1 part liquid sweetener of choice
1 part healthy fat of choice
2 parts mix-ins (we’ll get to this in a moment)
Of course, with that said, this is the breakdown I like to use:
3 cups rolled oats
3/4 to 1 cup of nuts
1/3 to 1/2 cup of liquid sweetener
1/2 cup healthy oil
1 tsp salt
None of what I just said is particularly exciting, I know. But here’s the thing: you can adjust the amount of sugar really easily with this formula, and you can really make this what you want by customizing your optional mix-ins, or, as I like to call them…
BONUS INGREDIENTS
dried fruit (if you use this, add it AFTER baking your granola)
spices (try for about 1 tsp but adjust to taste): consider things like cinnamon, nutmeg, cardamom, ginger, pumpkin pie spice (which tends to have a mix of those plus allspice in it), or a citrus zest
chocolate: 1/4 cup of cocoa powder OR up to 1 cup chocolate chips
shredded coconut, if that’s your jam
egg white, if you want extra protein
So, lots and lots of possibilities abound here! It may take a couple of tries to figure out the combinations of flavors that work for you (and to be honest, I have had a lot of bad combinations where I thought cocoa powder would work with something and it did not), but once you do find those flavors, you are equipped to make yourself some delicious granola that you can snack on, mix into yogurt, build parfaits, etc.
DIRECTIONS:
Preheat your oven to 300 degrees
Combine the oats, nuts, and spices in a large mixing bowl
Add the sweetener, and oil, as well as any cocoa or egg white you are using. Stir everything until combined.
Spread all of your granola on a large rimmed baking sheet, greased or lined with foil
Bake for 45 minutes, stirring after 30 minutes, until toasty brown
Allow the granola to cool completely in the pan. Add dried fruit if you are using any. Store in an airtight container.
Yup, I know. I said I was back in the kitchen, and I was-~-sort of. But I got into a post-comps funk. I stopped cooking interesting things. I stopped exploring new recipes. There was a loss of the inspiration that was needed to keep producing food that I really wanted to share, as opposed to food that just sustained me. I went into a post-comps funk with my work, too; it is almost as though I lost momentum and once I lost it I had trouble getting moving again. After all, an object at rest will stay at rest unless it is prompted to move by an outside force.
But it’s a new year! You know what the best part of the academic calendar structure is? Every few months, there is a new semester. A fresh start. Oh, all the work is still there, of course. But our schedules shift. The classes we take or teach may change, or at the very least, the students in those courses may change. We get to reset ourselves through a break, through a new schedule, and that can be exciting. I still have the same papers to push out, the same data to try to make sense of. But hopefully I also have a little fresh perspective now that I’m a little less burned out. And that’s exactly what I’m hoping to have with food as well.
If you haven’t yet, now’s a good time to think about a Food Resolution. The most common resolution made in the United States is exercising more, followed by saving money, and eating more healthily. Losing weight is consistently in the top 10 most common resolutions made every year in the US. But most New Year’s Resolutions fail-~-some surveys estimate that as many as 80% of us fail to achieve our resolutions. One reason is that we’re not specific enough: we say we want to exercise more or eat healthy, but we don’t come at it with a specific plan. So before you tell yourself you’re going to “eat better” in 2020, here are a few, more specific goals that may be easier to follow through on:
Eat less sugar. Sugar is hidden all over in our food. In an attempt to reduce fat in many foods, companies often increase sugar-~-but constant intake of excess sugar is bad for us metabolically and dentally, among other ways. Take a look at the broader discussion of this I have in my post on snacking, or take a look at this piece from Harvard Medical School on how to reduce both sugar and salt in your diet.
Eat more fresh fruit. It’s a good snack, a tasty treat, and better for you than a lot of sweet alternatives.
Cook something new on a monthly/bi-weekly/weekly basis. Continue to expand your cooking skills and your palate, as well as your list of recipes you can go to for healthy and interesting meals.
Speaking of cooking, cook at home more! Cooking at home will save you money and give you a LOT more control over what you consume.
Increase your intake of foods with healthy omega-3 fatty acids, such as fish, avocado, peanut butter, nuts, and chia and flax seeds.
There are tons more food resolutions you can make, but I would caution you this: dieting just for weight loss often is not sustainable, and many diets may cause you to focus a lot on all the things you cannot eat or when you cannot eat, leading to a restrictive mentality regarding food. Don’t let your desire to be healthier or to lose weight lead you on a path towards disordered thoughts about food. There are not “good foods” or “bad foods”. There are more nutritious and less nutritious foods, but that does not mean you have to give up food you want to eat entirely just because it’s not as densely nutritious.
So go! Find your food inspiration! Find foods you like to eat, foods you’re excited to make, foods that make you feel good. Find foods that help make you healthier, foods that satisfy your cravings. And check back here, because starting soon, I’ll be doing a series of posts on my go-to recipes (vegetarian and otherwise).
If you haven’t been through a PhD program or don’t/didn’t have friends with whom you were friends while they went through a PhD program, you may not be familiar with the obnoxious ritual known as comps.
Comps=comprehensive exams. For better or for worse, almost every field requires an exam or a portfolio at some point in the first few years of graduate school to assess a potential PhD candidate’s general knowledge of the field. They may be called comps, or quals/qualifying exams. They may be administered at the university, or given as a take home exam. They may require several hours, or several hours over a few days, or even weeks to complete. But they are, universally, one of the most hated milestones of graduate school.
All of that is to say that my comprehensive exams were this month, and as a result, I haven’t been posting on the blog. I haven’t even really been cooking that much, if I’m being honest, which means I had nothing to post on here. I’m not proud of it, but I let my diet become a mess in the final weeks leading up to the exams. I ate takeout or microwaved frozen Indian food from Trader Joe’s or at simple meals like eggs, toast, and salad, and for the most part, I just tried to put one foot in front of the other and be done with the stupid exams. But now they’re over (assuming I passed), which means I am free to have a life again. And I can actually make sure that I cook, and eat better, more balanced meals, and that I go to the gym more and do other things that I have been neglecting. (My car really, really needs to be washed! Plus, I think the dog needs a haircut.)
It’s fall, so I decided to lean into the warm, cozy comfort food vibe with an Eggplant Parm Pasta Skillet. This dish is, in my opinion, so much better than traditional Eggplant Parmesan. For starters, the pasta is built right into the dish, so you don’t need to make it as a side; plus, the dish is made extra nutritious through some stealthy spinach added in. As a bonus, there’s no breading and frying-~-you know, the two things that normally make Eggplant Parm taste great but also be a lot less healthy than a vegetable dish should be? This solves that problem. The recipe comes from Cook Nourish Bliss, and has been a favorite in my apt for the last couple of years. Plus, with pasta and cheese, it hit the right comfort food notes for me to be motivated to make it in the lead-up to my exams.
Don’t you just already feel cozier just looking at that??
Now, there is one kind of funky thing with this recipe. The first time I ever made this, I was really thrown off, and the reason is this: you do not pre-cook the pasta.
Let me repeat: do not pre-cook the pasta.
As seen in the photo above, you will actually cook the pasta directly in the tomato sauce, canned tomatoes, and broth. This lets all that great flavor get into the pasta a bit as it cooks, and helps keep this a true one-pot meal. Once you have cooked and removed your veggies from the pot, you’ll add in these ingredients, partially cover, and simmer until the pasta is al dente. Like I said, it totally threw me off, but it’s actually pretty brilliant. And it yields such deliciousness.
Here is the recipe, copied over from Cook Nourish Bliss:
INGREDIENTS
2 ½ tablespoons olive oil
1 medium onion, chopped
3 large cloves garlic, minced
2 to 2 ¼ pounds eggplant, cut into ½ inch cubes
½ teaspoon salt
¼ to ½ teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 (5 ounce) bag fresh baby spinach leaves
1 (14.5 ounce) can fire-roasted diced tomatoes
1 (8 ounce) can tomato sauce
1 ½ cups low sodium vegetable broth
8 ounces uncooked whole wheat penne pasta
1 ¼ cups shredded mozzarella cheese
¼ cup shredded parmesan cheese
plenty of chopped fresh basil, for garnish
INSTRUCTIONS
Add the olive oil to a large (deeper style) nonstick skillet set over medium heat. When hot, add in the onion and cook for about 2 minutes, until it starts to soften. Add in the garlic and cook for 30 seconds, until fragrant. Add in the eggplant, salt and red pepper flakes. Cook, stirring occasionally, until tender, about 7 to 8 minutes. Add in the spinach and cook until wilted. Remove all the veggies to a medium bowl and set aside.
To the now empty skillet, add the diced tomatoes, tomato sauce, broth and pasta. Mix to combine. Bring the liquid just to a boil, then cover, reduce the heat and simmer fairly vigorously for about 11 to 13 minutes, stirring occasionally (and more frequently toward the end of the cooking time), until the pasta is al dente and almost all of the liquid is absorbed.
Reduce the heat to low. Add the eggplant mixture back into the skillet and mix to combine. Sprinkle the top with the mozzarella and parmesan cheese. Recover and continue to cook for about 3 to 5 minutes, until the cheese is melted. Turn off the heat. Let the pasta stand for about 5 minutes, then garnish with the fresh basil. Season with additional salt / red pepper flakes as needed.
I don’t know about you, but I snack a LOT when I’m at school all day. I also snack a lot when I’m working from home. It helps keep my energy up and prevents weird blood sugar dips. And I know I’m not alone: only 4% of Americans say they do not snack at all during the day, and the most common eating behavior in the US is eating 3 meals a day with some snacks in between.
Source: Giphy
Just because we’re all snacking doesn’t mean we’re snacking smart, though. The most popular snack foods in America are still chips and chocolate, with healthier options like hummus further down in the rankings. The most common item Americans order as an afternoon “snack” is a burger. (To be fair, though, many of those who snack on burgers also don’t necessarily eat lunch, so maybe it would be more fair to say that the most common late lunch item is a burger?) And a lot of popular American snack foods, like cookies, Kind bars, and flavored yogurts, are high in added sugar.
I am not a nutritionist or dietitian. I am just a person who does a lot of research on the foods she eats because if you are what you eat, then I mostly want to eat the good stuff. Having desert sometimes is fine! Having a pudding or a sugary cereal bar as a snack sometimes is fine. But when it comes to fueling up, I want to make sure that I am putting good foods into my body. So, without further ado, the Grad School Girl Eats Guide to Snacking:
You’ll snack on whatever is easiest, so make sure you have healthy snacks readily available. Buy fruit and fresh vegetables like baby carrots (or regular carrots cut into sticks), bell peppers, or sugar snap peas, which are easy to snack on (just cut up the bell pepper into slices first!). Also good to have around: nuts, lower sugar yogurts (more on this in a minute), cheese (esp part-skim cheese), and dips like hummus or peanut butter. Nuts, fruits, and vegetables have the added bonus of not being processed.
Limit the amount of high-sugar and high-fat snacks you keep around. Again, you’ll eat what you can easily get to, so if your pantry is stocked with cookies, potato chips, and buttery crackers, you’re more likely to go for those items. That’s not to say you can’t have any of those things-~-I would be a HUGE hypocrite making such a claim! Just try to make it so they’re not your go-to all the time.
Read the labels and know what the nutrition info really means. Lots of fat-free yogurts make up for their lack of fat by adding a lot of sugar. A fruity low fat La Yogurt has 28 grams of sugar, and a Stonyfield Fat Free Fruit on the Bottom yogurt has 21 grams of sugar. They’re not very big yogurts, and they each only have about 5 or 6 grams of protein. In comparison, Yoplait Greek 100 Calorie Whips have 12 grams of sugar and 9 grams of protein; a Siggis has 9 grams of sugar and 14 grams of protein (and that’s still with 2% milk, by the way). Yogurt isn’t the only culprit here, though. Plenty of granola bars also have lots of added sugar, and it may vary by flavor: lots of RXBAR granola bars have no added sugar, and some Kind bars have very little, but other Kind bar flavors have more. And plenty of granola bars, regardless of sugar content, may be lower in fiber or protein, and higher in saturated fat, than would be ideal.
Put together snacks that have ingredients that balance each other. Try apples with peanut or almond butter, carrots with hummus, grapes or apples and cheese, or smoothies that have fruits or veggies and protein. (My green smoothies work just as well as a snack as they do for breakfast!). Doing this will help make sure that a quick burst of sugar is balanced by proteins and healthy fats to help keep you full and energized.
Pick things you actually want to eat! All of this advice will get you nowhere if you don’t actually want to eat the things you buy or pack. And if you do want a snack, and you’re completely turned off by the granola balls you brought with you to the office, you’re going to go elsewhere…and you may very well end up with chicken nuggets, french fries, or chips as your snack instead.
Need more inspiration? These are some of my favorite snacks to eat at home/bring to school/work:
Icelandic or Greek yogurt–it costs a little more, but the reduced sugar and extra protein makes it worth it in my book
Carrot sticks with hummus
Sugar snap peas, sometimes with ranch dressing
Harvest Snaps (No, I receive nothing for endorsing these, I just like them)
Grapes + small cheese rounds (e.g. Mini Babybels)
Sliced cheddar cheese and crackers (choose something with whole grains!)
Peaches, nectarines, pears, or apples
Protein smoothies-~-either a green smoothie or one packed with other kinds of fruit like blueberries and bananas (have to get those white and blue phytonutrients!). Adding yogurt and protein powder to my smoothies makes them a little healthier and more filling
Nuts like pistachios or cashews, often paired with blueberries, blackberries, or raspberries
Cucumber slices and a hard-boiled egg
Popcorn-~-I make it on the stove top and then store it in to-go containers to take with me to campus; this means that I know I really am just eating popped corn lightly drizzled in olive oil and sprinkled with salt
How is another semester starting already?! Where did the summer go?! Folks, the impending madness of the coming semester (and my qualifying exams) means that it is time to roll out comforting and easy recipes, starting with this one: white beans on toast.
When I first started seeing recipes for beans on toast, I was skeptical. I won’t lie: I thought this was a silly idea, and also that beans and toast do not belong together. I breezed past the recipes in my books that involved this combination, certain that I would seriously dislike it.
But friends, let me tell you: I was wrong. Mark Bittman’s recipe for White Beans on Toast made a believer out of me.
Source: GIPHY
(Side note: you all have NO IDEA how much time I spent trying to find a gif of Smash Mouth’s “I’m a Believer” with the lyrics. Couldn’t find it. Hey Arnold was the best I could do.)
The truth is, white beans on toast is great because it’s simple. It takes ten minutes or less to prepare, if seasoned right it tastes great, and the ingredients are cheap, fellow grad students. Bread is a thing you probably already have. Beans are a thing that costs $0.70 per can. If you don’t have Worcestershire Sauce, you can sub in apple cider vinegar which you may already have and if not, again, inexpensive to buy (plus you can use it for so many other things. Like killing fruit flies. More on this some other time). Dijon mustard isn’t expensive and you can use it in lots of other things, and you probably already have sugar. And that is it! Those are the ingredients! Throw in a side salad or some carrot sticks or something and you have a full meal that was inexpensive and easy to execute. Isn’t that what we as young professionals, grad students, and college students want? Or heck, isn’t that really what anyone wants?
Now, not all white beans are the same, so let me share an insight on this: if you can, use Great Northern beans for this recipe, not cannelloni beans. Great Northern beans break down better and become saucier, which is what you want for something you’re putting on top of toast. You can make this recipe with cannelloni beans and it’ll be fine, but it won’t be as good as if you use the Great Northern beans. This is something I learned from experience.
Obviously, this on its own is not quite enough for dinner. Paired with a salad or a slaw, though, it makes for a nice, simple meal. I recommend checking out Smitten Kitchen’s Broccoli Slaw (for a vegan version, check out Pinch of Yum’s Clean Broccoli Salad), the Kitchn’s Tangy Cabbage and Jalapeno Slaw, or Pinch of Yum’s Green Goddess Detox Salad. Or, just pair it with a regular side salad using whatever salad greens and other veggies you have on hand!
I hope I’ve sold you on the idea of beans on toast! Remember: pick a good bread. If you’re vegan, pick a good, vegan-friendly bread-~-something with plenty of fiber and whole grains. As previously mentioned: this is an easy, quick meal, and it’s worth adding to your lineup!
RECIPE (Yields 4 Servings) (Source: Mark Bittman’s How to Cook Everything Fast)
INGREDIENTS
8 slices of any good bread, preferably thick slices
1 T olive oil
1-2 garlic cloves, minced
4 cups cooked or canned white beans (2 15-oz cans)
1 tsp sugar
1 T Worcestershire sauce
2 tsp Dijon mustard
salt and pepper, to taste
Several springs of chopped fresh parsley for garnish
Optional: 2 tsp lemon juice
DIRECTIONS
Heat 1 T olive oil in a medium saucepan over medium-low heat
Add the garlic to the pan and cook until fragrant, 1-2 minutes. While you’re doing this, toast the bread.
Once the garlic is fragrant, add the beans to the pan, along with all the other ingredients except for the parsley and lemon juice
Raise the heat to medium and cook, stirring occasionally, until the beans are warmed through and the mixture is slightly saucy. Taste and adjust seasoning. (If using lemon juice, add it now)
When the beans are cooked and seasoned satisfactorily, spread them over the toast and garnish with parsley.
This blog post features Half-Baked Harvest’s Balsamic Peach Pork Chops with Feta and Basil. This is a great summer recipe for which I take absolutely no credit for developing-~-and it doesn’t require that many ingredients. Most importantly, it features peaches, my favorite summer fruit.
I have been quiet for a few weeks, but that’s because I have been finally wrapped up my master’s thesis! Don’t worry, though-~-I was always in a PhD program, not a master’s program, so I am far from done with grad school.
Wait, why do I think that’s good again?
Source: Lego Grad Student
I’m (mostly) kidding. I actually do like my work. I learned a lot through working on my thesis and I am hopefully that my advisor will sign off on it really soon. But I can’t be talking about life (and cooking!) in grad school once I graduate–and somehow “Assistant Professor Woman Eats” doesn’t have the same ring to it? Assuming, of course, that I get an academic job which is, as we know, nowhere near a safe assumption.
You know what, let’s set all of that aside to remember that I FINISHED WRITING MY THESIS! I spent months busting my butt trying to solve incredibly weird coding errors and I only got my models to run two weeks before the deadline to hand in my thesis, so I had to speed-write the entire back end of the paper, but I DID IT! It may not be my best writing but it is written and being evaluated by my advisor and I don’t have to look at this paper again for at least a few months.
Anyway, let’s get to the actual food, yes?
Ugh, look at that gorgeousness. Fresh peaches are one of my favorite summer ingredients. There is just something about peaches (or nectarines) that tastes like summer (peaches, and watermelon). They work so well with the fresh basil and feta in this recipe-~-in fact, all of the flavors in this work really well together to give you a balanced, complex dish.
My partner and I absolutely loved this dish; it was easy to make, caused the kitchen to smell great, and was delicious and summery in all the ways we wanted. I won’t bore you with more of my rambling; without further ado, Half Baked Harvest’s Balsamic Peach Pork Chops with Basil and Feta!
NOTE: Our oven and broiler did not work when we made this, which was, frankly, a huge disappointment and a curve ball I did not appreciate, but cooking the whole thing on the stove top was actually fine! Instead of adding the balsamic sauce to the pork chops and then putting them and the peaches in the broiler, I took the pork chops out of the pan, sauteed the peaches until they were becoming tender, and then added the pork chops back in along with the balsamic sauce, and cooked until the sauce reduced and thickened. I know it’s not exactly what the recipe intended but it still turned out pretty darn good!
. Heat a large skillet over medium high heat. Season the pork chops all over with kosher salt and pepper. Add the olive oil to the skillet, when the oil shimmers, add the pork and sear on both sides for 3-4 minutes. Reduce the heat to medium and continue cooking for about 8-10 minutes, or until the pork chops are cooked through.
. In a small bowl, whisk together the balsamic vinegar, honey, and oregano. During the last 2 minutes of cooking, pour the balsamic sauce over the pork chops. Remove from the heat and add the peaches. Transfer the skillet to the oven and broil for 4-5 minutes or until the peaches are lightly charred. If the balsamic sauce starts getting too thick, add ¼ cup of water to keep it saucy.
. Remove from the oven and top with feta, fresh basil, and chili flakes. Serve the pork with the peaches and balsamic sauce from the pan. Enjoy!
Grad School Girl Eats 