Monday, August 07, 2006

Lovely lunch spread and more

Bob has intern training this week at the Wesley Foundation, where he will be interning this year. This is the lunch spread that was awaiting him when he got home at noon:


It was the grilled portabella caps again, along with a salad of romaine and red leaf lettuce, mung bean sprouts, cucumber, and mango tossed in a sesame-ginger dressing, and some sweet potato "fries," which were actually roasted in a 425-degree oven. I tossed the sweet potatoes in a bowl with olive oil, lime juice, chili powder, cayenne pepper, and sea salt, and then roasted them for about 15 minutes on a lightly greased cookie sheet. Here is a close-up:


For dessert we had the banana ice cream-like stuff that I have taken to calling just "banana cream." I've made different variations, including adding some cocoa powder for a chocolate dessert, but our favorite way to eat it is still with the vanilla extract and cinnamon (and maybe some nutmeg).

Last night I attempted these chocolate chip cookies from my new cookbook. They tasted good (Bob said they were the best chocolate chip cookies he's ever had), but something didn't work out right chemically. I'm going to quote from the recipe here: "Do not flatten the cookies as they will spread out when they bake." Yet, curiously, when they were done baking they looked exactly as they did when I put them in the oven. They didn't spread or expand or anything. Weird; I followed the recipe to the letter. The dough was much thicker than I expected, which made me suspicious, but I rolled with it because the recipe warned that the dough would be thick and stiff. Any ideas on how I can avoid this result next time? (Though, actually, I think Bob preferred them this way. He seemed bowled over by these strange confections...)

Oh, on the cream cheese I made: It came out fine, but not great. It firmed up to nearly the consistency of real cream cheese, overnight in the refrigerator. The recipe used almonds blended with water, and lemon juice, nutritional yeast, corn starch, etc. all cooked together. I'm sure we'll eat it, but I don't know if it's worth making again.

Tonight: Bob has a lock-in as a part of his intern training, and spouses are invited. We're going to assume that the meal will not be vegan-friendly, and take leftover sloppy lentils with whole wheat bread from last night. Maybe we'll make some people jealous! :)
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4 comments:

KleoPatra said...

Curious cookies indeed. I always flatten mine, even if it says not to. I'm such a rebel. I wonder what happened with yours? They look good, even round-ish as they are!

Hmmmm... banana cream. What's in dat?!

Sweet po' fries... yummmmmmmmmmmmy. And i am such a fan of mushrooms. Yours in that photo caught my eye right away!

Hope the lock-in (not sure what that is) goes well!!

funwithyourfood said...

well i'm a big fan portabellas
one of my first posts ever was on sweet potatoes. I LOVE them so tasty
:)

Teddy

Mikaela said...

Those fries look great! :)

laura k said...

Hi Kleo! I actually did flatten out the second batch of cookies--it didn't really help. They were so dry and stiff that they didn't want to flatten too much. Oh well. Maybe next time I'll play with the liquid ingredients some.

Banana cream = 1 frozen banana processed with just a little bit of soy milk, some vanilla extract, and whatever else you want to flavor it with! If you add the soy milk gradually and only as much as absolutely necessary, you end up with a dessert that's yummy and sweet and very much like ice cream!

Teddy, I don't have much experience with portabellas but now that I've cooked them a couple of times I think they're GREAT!

Jam*tacular, thanks for the compliment! :) They tasted really good. Next time I might slice them just a little thicker so they'll be a little bit crisper. Just FYI! But thans for stopping by!