DSC_0056, originally uploaded by kittenlogic.

another gem from finecooking, and one of the quickest and easiest things to make. this is perfect for a night when you’re really starving but you only have a half hour or so of cooking in you.

pesto rubbed chicken with tomatoes and basil
4 butterflied chicken breasts, or chicken breast cutlets
(no more than 1/2 inch thick – if they are, pound them thinner)
home made or store bought pesto (about 1/4-1/2 cup depending on how much you like pesto)
2 Tbsp fresh lemon juice
salt and pepper
olive oil

mix the lemon juice into your pesto. lightly season your chicken breasts with salt and pepper on both sides (don’t go nuts because store bought pesto is already salted), then rub the pesto in. i did this step, then put the chicken in the fridge for a half hour while i made the tomatoes.

tomatoes and basil
one and a half big, fresh, and ripe jersey tomatoes (if you’re not lucky enough to be in the state with the best tomatoes ever, you can use 4 ripe plum tomatoes)
2 Tbsp fresh basil, chopped
1 Tbsp fresh lemon juice
generous tsp of dijon mustard
1 1/2 tsp red wine vinegar
2 med cloves or 1 large clove garlic, minced
1/2 tsp kosher salt
generous freshly ground black pepper

seed the tomatoes and dice them. combine all of the ingredients except the tomatoes and basil in a bowl and whisk til the dressing comes together. once it does, add the basil and whisk it in. finally, toss the tomatoes in the dressing and set aside (not in the fridge!).

back to the chicken. add a good amount of olive oil (i probably used 3 Tbsp) to your grill pan, then heat it to medium-high heat. when the pan is hot and a little smoky, add your chicken breasts. grill 2-3 minutes on one side, until you can see the edges turning white, then flip once to grill the other side, taking 4-6 minutes total.

serve tomatoes atop hot chicken, preferably with lemony orzo. enjoy your vacation to flavor town.

DSC_0148, originally uploaded by kittenlogic.

what we’re focusing on here is the potato salad. let me make it clear: i hate potato salad as most people know it. boiled white potatoes, eggs, onions, and mayo. i can’t even think of a combo more repulsive than that, really. so when D suggested i make this new roasted potato salad from our fine cooking magazine, i was somewhat reluctant, but figured why the hell not since the ingredients included orange juice and mascarpone? huh? how weird.

let me tell you: i have made this twice now, and the second time it was even more delicious than the first. the different flavors, the creamy yet light sauce, the saltiness, the sweetness, it’s everything. if you make anything that i post in this blog, make this. it will change your perspective on potato salad forever.

warm roasted potato and mushroom salad
6 medium yukon golds, cut into pieces no larger than 3/4″ and no smaller than 1/2″
8 oz of cremini mushrooms, or white buttons, quartered (we haven’t been able to find cremini mushrooms yet)
kosher salt
freshly cracked black pepper
1/4-1/3 c. very thinly sliced scallions, white parts are fine

dressing
1/4 c. orange juice, no pulp
1/2 c. mascarpone
1 1/2 tsp. red wine vinegar
1 tsp. kosher salt
1/8 tsp. freshly cracked black pepper
about 1-2 T. olive oil (just make sure you have this much left in the bottle)

pre-heat oven to 450 and drizzle the bottom of a baking sheet with about 3 T. of olive oil. toss the potatoes in the oil and add salt and pepper for roasting (i used maybe about 1/2 tsp. of kosher salt and 1/8 tsp pepper?), then toss again. arrange in a single layer and roast 10 minutes, then move them around on the sheet and roast another 10.

while the taters roast, mix the ingredients for the dressing in a large serving bowl and whisk until smooth and there are no lumps of cheese left. once mixture is smooth, slowly drizzle in a Tbsp. or so of the reserved olive oil while whisking briskly. it will start to thicken up a bit, so stop when the dressing is your desired consistency. i don’t like it too thick so i was probably a bit shy of a tablespoon. once dressing is how you like it, set it aside.

after the potatoes finish their second 10 minute oven party, add the mushrooms to the sheet wherever they will fit. make sure they’re touching the oven sheet, and not all piled up on top of the potatoes. roast 10-15 minutes until they’ve shrunk a bit and are browned but not totally shriveled. once mushrooms are done, immediately remove from oven and add to bowl of dressing. toss thoroughly and garnish with scallions. prepare to be amazed.

if you make this, please tell me how you liked it. finecooking.com FTW again!

so i know all i have to talk about these days is food, but when you’re lucky enough to have your favorite person ever living with you, and this favorite person of yours LOVES good food, it’s pretty hard not to.

so favorite person is a big dessert man, and he HAS to have something sweet before bed. he can’t go to sleep unless he does. so for a while he was on an ice cream kick and happened upon this “maple blondie” flavor of ben & jerry’s. it’s maple ice cream with blond brownie chunks and maple caramel swirl. freakin yum, right? exactly. however, the bullshit was that it was a limited batch, and we only managed to enjoy it a couple of times before it was out of stores completely.

so my first ambitious project for the summer is to recreate this ice cream. i’m probably going to bake the brownies today and see if they’re even good (i’ve never liked blondies until i had them in this ice cream), then make some italian meatloaf for dinner, then make the actual ice cream custard early tomorrow because i always forget how long it takes to cool before you can put it in the maker.

yet again, i’m going to tell you how much i love the fine cooking magazine. when we were in the store yesterday they had the “best of chicken” issue out, and we found another 50 or so recipes that we just have to have. i don’t even know if i have enough days in my life to make all of this stuff, but i’m excited to try. poor D is having some serious dental work done today though, so it’s mushy stuff for dinner today, if he can even chew. cross your fingers for him. i’m probably going to be playing nurse to my little pain baby tonite ♥

DSC_0097, originally uploaded by kittenlogic.

guys, i’m so excited about soon being unemployed, and i gave my kids a lot less work than usual this marking period so i have nothing but free time, so D and i have been cooking like crazy people. if you didn’t read the description of this photo on flickr, i mentioned that we bought this cooking magazine at the checkout in the grocery store, which unbeknownst to us was like $10! but it’s been TOTALLY worth it – it has an amazing wealth of really tasty and EASY recipes (WITH the calorie counts for each), and the ingredients are things that you can find at normal grocery stores.

fettuccine with chicken, goat cheese, and spinach.
1 cup of dry white wine (we used crappy grocery store cooking wine – if you do this, omit the salt from the shallot sauce because the wine is salted already)
2 tbsp minced shallots (we used one really big one, but it made the sauce delightfully tangy)
1/4 tsp of freshly ground black pepper
pinch of red chile flakes (we used probably 1/2-1 tsp, and it was PERFECT)
1/2 tsp kosher salt (if your wine isn’t salted)
1/2 lb of dried fettuccine (half a box)
about 1 lb of chicken breast (we used the tenders)
olive oil
4oz of fresh spinach (we used one bag of the pre-washed baby spinach by dole or fresh express)
about 8-10 leaves of fresh basil, chopped

start your pasta water, because dry fettuccine takes forever to cook! (totally forgot about this, and everything else was done while the stupid pasta was STILL cooking.)

salt and pepper your chicken, add a tsp of olive oil to a pan, and cook chicken until golden brown and no longer pink in the middle. remove from heat to a large serving bowl. in the same pan, add the other tsp of olive oil and sautee spinach until just wilted, 2 minutes.

while your chicken and spinach cook, add your minced shallots to a small pot and begin to sweat them (this isn’t in the original recipe, but i think it made them sweeter), then add the cup of wine and 1/2 tsp of pepper. reduce the liquid by half, about 5 minutes. whisk in the goat cheese in batches, then add the red pepper flakes. simmer for another minute or two and whisk till smooth, then set aside.

drain pasta and reserve a cup or so of the water, then add everything to the bowl the chicken is in, and toss to coat evenly with sauce. the recipe recommends perhaps adding the reserved pasta water just in case the sauce gets too thick or “gunky” (as a recipe commenter calls it), but we thought it was perfect as is.

serve with some basil on top, and enjoy. yes it will still be delicious without the basil, but knowing how this tastes WITH the basil, i wouldn’t make it without!

DSC_1091, originally uploaded by kittenlogic.

it’s been a while since i’ve posted any awesome yarn since i’ve been busy hating my job and dealing with life drama. i started this one a while back but JUST NOW finished it because my bulky bobbin was acting funny. i don’t know what the issue was, but the tension was all crazy and i couldn’t get it to spin properly, so i kept sitting down to ply, plying a few yards, then would get so frustrated that i just stopped.

anyway, this is my superwash BFL in “an honest prairie life.” i loved the fiber like crazy, i LOVED spinning the singles (the fiber handles wonderfully), and i love the yarn even more despite the annoyance during the plying stage. it’s 2-ply, and about 306 yards. i guess it’s a lace-fingering weight but i haven’t checked it yet. soft, but not as soft as a merino would be. either way, i’m definitely pleased by the outcome!

it’s pretty thrilling when i realize that school is out in just a couple of weeks, and i have no obligations this summer other than trying to find a new job. i really want to get on the fiber train … i feel like i’ve missed so much time being so miserable for so long! i miss kittenlogic :(

DSC_1059, originally uploaded by kittenlogic.

i think i mentioned in my last post that i’m trying to cook more at home and take things to work for lunch instead of a) wasting money and b) eating crappy disgusting school lunch. so to go with some chicken and roasted zucchini and squash that i made, i threw together this really simple white bean salad. it is time consuming if you don’t already have roasted tomatoes sitting around – they have to bake for quite a while – but other than that, the actual assembly of the salad takes like 5 minutes.

white bean salad with artichokes and roasted tomatoes
2 14 oz cans of white beans
1 jar of artichoke hearts (i used the marinated ones)
~ 2 tbsp fresh rosemary (you can chop it, mince it, leave it whole, it doesn’t matter, and neither does the quantity. use as much as you like)
little lemon juice (~tsp or so)

roasted tomatoes
2 large, fresh tomatoes
some of that rosemary
~ tsp salt, optional
~ tsp pepper, optional
about 1 tbsp of olive oil

preheat oven to 400. in a foil lasagna pan, drop in the olive oil, salt, pepper, and rosemary. slice the tomatoes into eighths, then toss in the olive oil/salt/pepper/rosemary mixture. make sure each piece is evenly coated, then lay meat-side down and roast until soft and fragrant, 40 mins to an hour depending on how much bite you want. let them cool.

drain the water and extra bean juice from the cans of beans. in a large bowl, gently mix beans, lemon juice, the rest of the rosemary, artichokes, and cooled tomatoes. you don’t want to break the tomatoes too much.

it’s edible immediately, and the longer you let it sit in the fridge to marinate, the better it tastes! it can be served hot or cold; i prefer it cold. yum!

DSC_1037, originally uploaded by kittenlogic.

i have all of these amazing things i plan to do with my life, and to be honest, i was really excited to find out i was going to be unemployed because i would finally be able to do them.

one of the things that i love to do is cook. a small change that i DID make is to start shopping on friday or something, then cooking over the weekend so i’d have homemade meals for the entire week. i must say that it has made me feel a lot better tummy-wise, and i do love all of the attention my food gets at the lunch table ;)

so this delicious dish isn’t one that i made for work, it’s one the boy and i made for ourselves, but i’m incredibly excited to make it again for this coming week. it comes from the BBC good food site, and came out just perfect. i’ve always been intimidated by thai recipes because they require so many exotic ingredients, but i discovered that things like red chili and lemongrass come in little tubes in the fresh veg section of the supermarket so i don’t have to drive all over creation to try to find them.

thai red curry
vegetable oil or sunflower oil (i used olive)

13.5-14oz can of coconut milk

chicken or beef, pork, fish, peeled shrimp and vegetables about 2 cups in total; cut the meat and fish into bite-sized pieces and veg into smaller pieces or slices so it all cooks through quickly (i grilled chicken separately for satay, and used some of it in this recipe.)

curry paste
3 shallots, roughly chopped

3 garlic cloves

3 long red chillies, deseeded (leave some in if you like it hot) (we used the squirty kind, recommend 1.5 tbsp if you like it mild. we used 3 and it was a scorcher!!)

a walnut sized piece of ginger, peeled and chopped

1 lime, zested and juiced

1 tbsp fish sauce (this can be replaced with light soy sauce for vegetarians)

1 tsp ground cumin

2 tsp ground coriander

1 tsp freshly ground black pepper

lemon grass stalk, roughly chopped (we used 1 tbsp of the squirty kind)

take all of the paste ingredients and drop them in the food processor, processing until you have a really smooth paste. heat a tbsp of oil in a large pan or wok, and when it’s hot, fry the paste until it becomes wonderful and fragrant. add the coconut oil. bring to a boil and add the meat(s), then larger/thicker veg first. we only used sweet red and yellow peppers, because those were the only decent veg i had in the house, but next time i will make it more authentic and toss in some bamboo shoots, green beans, and fresh basil.

DSC_0976,
originally uploaded by kittenlogic.

as usual, i made my way down to maryland this year for the s&w, and found it even more packed than last year. it’s really getting totally ridiculous. we sat in traffic for an hour and 20 minutes trying to go the last half mile to the fairgrounds. people had bailed out of their cars and were walking! it was literally like, crazytown.

in addition to the completely unreasonable traffic, it was about 90 degrees yesterday, the hottest i ever remember it being for this festival. after meeting with my dad and stepmom real quick, we went directly into the main exhibition barn where i pillaged littlebarn’s booth like a fiber hungry she-viking, then returned promptly to the car to deposit my lewt since it was super heavy and i felt my death approaching. i got no pictures of the actual fest except for a couple of alpaca loaves i snapped on my phone, because it was so damn hot i had to abandon my purse.

so in addition to eating nonstop and drinking a gallon of liquid (literally a gallon; i had 2 lime fizzes which were in 32oz containers, and one huge travel cup of lemonade, and my thermos of koolaid), my travel partner grabbed some really pretty sparkly yarn and a shawl pin, and i located creativelydyed so i could snatch up more of her amazing merino/seacell blend.

it was a day well spent, and i think i may have enticed another person into the joyous world of spinning, since my travel partner wanted to borrow my old wheel for a while! she was really checking out the hitchhiker while we were there, but couldn’t drop $300 on something she might not be into. so i gave her my old one til she makes up her mind, and figured hey, come october, you can commit if you’re really into it. so in a few months, we’ll have another awesome fiber adventure ahead of us.

anyone else go, or was it just jessica and me? how’d you do?

just seeing how this thing works; i’ve been tooling around with my domain and i feel like i need to use it for something other than holding nonsensical files and hosting kittenlogic, which is pretty much being run from etsy at this point.

blogger and i had to get a divorce because as of saturday, they will disallow posting via FTP, which is a really stupid move. so i installed wordpress, and yadda yadda yadda, trying to crosspost.

hopefully this will persuade me to post more often in both locations! more to come.

ETA: goodness gracious, how friggin ugly is that footer?? need to change that asap. barf.

blogger apparently wants to alienate its users. even though only .5% of us used FTP to post, we still existed and we loved it. perhaps we used FTP for a reason, such as being able to manage several blogs from one domain, instead of having the entire domain point to one stupid blog?

well, it doesn’t really matter now, does it? because i have to move on and set up a new thing, start my new blog life.

so it’s been real, blogger. real crappy.

also, i just wanted to add: if you’re just stumbling upon this blog, i’m in the process of fixing it as of this post. unfortunately, i have a job and everything, so i can’t just chillax and edit code to my heart’s content, though i would enjoy that. so if you try to click on something, it’ll probably be broken or weird. apologies. this should be up and running within a week or so. i really need to get the ball rolling.

just testing out what this blockquote will look like, also what bold and italic will look like, since i’m super anal and have to customize everything.

i be validatin’.

i need to get myself organized. i have 100 projects that i’ve started in various locations. there is no reason for this kind of tomfoolery.

i’ll have plenty of free time to work on these endeavors since i’m friggin laid off. how awesome.

zencart and i will never ever be friends. i realize this now.

sometimes i wonder if i’m making the best decisions.

my mom is giving me her old computer, which is a dell dimension 8300 from 2002. no one uses it, and i need a second comp for geeky purposes. (so i can run a private maple story server for my buddies. yes, i know.)

i kinda want to buy some more memory for that comp since it’s only a 512, but it’s like $50 per 1gb stick and you can only install it in pairs, which = $100 for an old ass computer.

i can get a blazing fucking fast desktop tower (since i have 2 monitors already) for like $400. should i even buy the memory or just wait till i get my tax money back and just buy a new laptop? i really hate that you can’t get a new computer anymore that isn’t running vista, though. i’m having a problem deciding what to do. help?

it’s frigging freezing today. the weather forecast for tomorrow, according to my firefox weatherbug, is “igloo.”

my heat works like shit so i’m sitting here under a blanket. i came home from school today (my room is a cozy 55-60 degrees during the school day; we’re not allowed to change the temperature so we have to cover the box in wet paper towels to trick the heat into coming on) and just passed out on the couch under a ton of blankets. i’m getting in bed early tonight just so i can be warm.

we’re officially halfway through the year, and though it’s not as crappy as last year, i’m pretty tired of the stupid kids. how many times can you get kicked out of class and still think it’s cool? at any point do you stop to think that you’re just an asshole? i can totally understand where those teachers who don’t teach are coming from … how nice must it be to just run off 100 copies of some worksheets every day, sit at your desk, and tell the kids to shut up and figure it out?

anyway, i was working on a yarn yesterday but i’m way too cold to continue tonight. i’m so happy we have a 3 day weekend! i will greatly appreciate this personal time.

IMG_1151
Originally uploaded by kittenlogic

i dyed a ton of fiber on sunday, then finished up the last batches last night. i like to do two of each, because if i dye something i love, i have a hard time putting it up for sale. this way, i know that there’s at least one left for me :-)

i wish i had more time. i really want to spin, but i have so much school stuff to worry about that i’m having a hard time scheduling it in. i DO have a 3 day weekend this week, though, so i guess i’ll take advantage of it.

anyway, those ridiculous pink/purple/orange batts are made from some of that fiber that holly sent me a while ago. 75% wool and 25% alpaca. i love love love the way it spins. so hairy and wonderful, like romney. the hard-to-see lime/purple/teal batts underneath those are 50/50 wool/alpaca. i’m excited to work on those!

i need a longer dayyyyyyyy. oh, and more money. because i don’t have ANY.