Martha Stewart Sunday: Williams-Sonoma Roasted Salmon with Thyme Vinaigrette.

I've been super MIA lately because of the craziness at work and school. I'm definitely looking forward to summer and having time to cook, workout, and just hang out with my friends in the city. I just got the Williams-Sonoma Weeknight Fresh & Fast cookbook, and I'm really excited to start trying a bunch of these fresh, seasonal recipes this summer.

This salmon was my first try from this cookbook, and it turned out so well! It was delicious and made for great recipes for the rest of the week (I made it on Saturday afternoon). I doubled the original recipe to make sure I had plenty of extra salmon and vinaigrette for weekday lunches. I'll definitely be doing this again this summer.

Here's the original recipe from Williams-Sonoma, which can easily be doubled or even tripled, depending on the size of your salmon fillet:

Roasted Salmon with Thyme Vinaigrette

Ingredients:

1/2 Tbs. Dijon mustard

2 tsp. Champagne or white wine vinegar

2-1/2 Tbs. EVOO, plus more as needed

1 Tbs. minced shallot

2 tsp. minced fresh thyme

course Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper

3/4 lb. salmon fillet (I got the best wild Canadian salmon from Agata & Valentina on 1st Ave.)

3 cups mixed baby lettuces

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.

2. In a small bowl, place the mustard. Gradually whisk in EVOO. Mix in the shallot and thyme. Season the vinaigrette with salt and pepper.

3. Brush a small baking dish with EVOO (or spray with Pam if you're lazy like me). Place the salmon in the dish, skin side down. Spoon 1/2 of the vinaigrette over the salmon. Let marinate at room temperature for 15-20 min.

4. Roast the salmon until almost cooked through (15-25 min, depending on thickness). Let it rest while preparing the salad.

5. In a bowl, toss the lettuces with the remaining vinaigrette. Divide the salad between two plates. Cut the salmon in half and put one piece alongside the salad on each plate. Serve immediately.

Nutrition info:

Servings per recipe: 2

Calories: 409.2

Total Fat: 19.5 g

Cholesterol: 120.7 mg

Sodium: 240.9 mg

Total Carbs: 7.1 g

Dietary Fiber: 2.2 g

Protein: 45.4 g

Martha Stewart Sundays: Garlic-Orange Chicken.

Today for Martha Stewart Sunday, I made a Garlic-Orange Chicken dish over brown rice. It turned out spicy and fantastic! I didn't use a recipe, but just made things up from a combination of things in my fridge... like chicken... and carrots... and orange juice... and I was thrilled at how it came out! The orange juice kept the chicken super moist and tender, and well, I tend to love anything with chili powder.

No picture this week... I forgot.

Ingredients:

2 large boneless, skinless chicken breast, cut into bite-sized pieces
1/2 bag of frozen Bird's Eye Asian Stir-Fry mixed vegetables, thawed and drained of excess liquid (you can sub with 3 cups of whatever variety of frozen/fresh veggies you feel like)
1/2 C. chopped carrots
2 shallots, finely diced
2 garlic cloves, minced
3 tsp. chili powder, divided
2 tsp. ground ginger
3/4 C. orange juice
3 Tbs. lite soy sauce

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
2. Layer vegetables and chopped carrots in a 8x8 square baking dish. Sprinkle 1 teaspoon of chili powder over vegetables.
3. Cube chicken breast into bite sized pieces. Toss chicken pieces in a clean dish with 2 teaspoons of chili powder and 2 teaspoons of ginger to season (more or less to taste, my recipe makes it pretty spicy!), then layer chicken on top of casserole.
4. Pour 3/4 cup of orange juice and 3 tablespoons of soy sauce evenly over casserole dish.
5. Finely dice shallot and mince garlic and sprinkle over casserole dish.
6. Bake for 45 minutes at 375, or until chicken is cooked through and no longer pink in the center.

Divide the chicken and veggies between 3 dishes, and pour remaining orange juice sauce over. I suggest serving over brown rice (not counted in nutrition info). This came out pretty sweet & spicy, so you may want to adjust orange juice or chili powder to taste.

Nutrition info:
Servings per recipe: 3
Calories: 290.0
Total fat: 2.7 g
Cholesterol: 91.3 mg
Sodium: 774.8 mg
Total Carbs: 24.5 g
Dietary Fiber: 3.7 g
Protein: 40.2 g

(Again, I use the recipe calculator on SparkRecipes to calculate the nutritional value of my recipes. I'm obsessed!)

A foray into vegan-ish baking.

Do you ever really want to make something, and then realize that you don't have half the ingredients? Or better yet, your milk/eggs/SUPER IMPORTANT INGREDIENT is expired?

This seems to happen to me a lot... Maybe because I don't buy groceries that often. Or because life gets in the way and I don't actually cook anything when I originally planned on it... So I experiment!

A few weeks ago, I was planning to make Martha Stewart's Pumpkin Layer Cake for Thanksgiving, bought all the ingredients, and then we didn't have time to make it. And here, 3 weeks later, I still had all the ingredients... except the eggs and milk are expired... and there's no way in hell I'm going out in the freezing rain in NYC today just for some stupid eggs.

Experimentation! I've never tried vegan baking, but I've heard good things about it. Basically, you replace the wet ingredients like milk and eggs with things like applesauce, mashed banana, pumpkin puree, canola oil, etc.

After googling a few recipes, I started with this one for Vegan Old-fashioned Soft Pumpkin Cookies in mind... and added some other things to make it into cake batter... My additions are in pink.

INGREDIENTS

• 2-1/2 cups all-purpose flour (I nixed the 1/2 cup whole wheat flour because of course, I'm lucky to have ANY flour at all, let alone whole wheat)
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger (I didn't have ground cloves either, so I added an extra 1/2 t. of ginger)
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 cup butter, softened (So I cheated, it's not vegan anymore... because I have regular old unsalted butter in my fridge, no vegan margarine)
• 2 cups Libby's canned pumpkin
• 1/2 cup applesauce (The recipe called for 1 T. of applesauce for the cookies, so for cake batter, I added extra applesauce)
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• about 1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil (I wasn't measuring this... but adding it little by little until I got the desired consistency)
  

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
2. Grease cake rounds.
3. Combine flours, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, and salt in medium bowl.
4. Beat sugars and butter in large mixer bowl until well blended.
5. Beat in pumpkin, applesauce and vanilla extract until smooth.
6. Gradually beat in flour mixture. Beat in olive oil little by little, guessing as you go to achieve desired consistency.... Cross your fingers...
7. Divide batter evenly into two cake rounds.
8. Bake for 30-35 minutes.
9. Pray to God that it turns out...

I cheated again and topped it off with Martha's Light Cream Cheese Icing... again, not vegan, but that wasn't really the point. The point was using up what I had, which was lots of cream cheese!





Annnnd the taste test...



It turned out really great! Of course, everything's better with icing... but no, really, I'm really happy with how it turned out. It's moist and dense and not overwhelmingly sugary or pumpkin-y. It kind of reminds me of the pumpkin scones from Starbucks. Success!

Update: I brought my two pumpkin cakes into work this morning, and they were completely gone by lunch!

Thanksgiving Part 2: The Big Day.

After a good night's sleep and fun morning watching the parade from the window of our hotel room at the New York Athletic Club (pictures to come tomorrow), we arrive back at my apartment around 1 p.m. to put the finishing touches on our Thanksgiving meal.

Thursday, 1 p.m. I lay out the appetizer spread. We have celery and carrots with T. Marzetti's dill dip, water crackers and pita chips with herb-shrimp dip and blue cheese-walnut spread, the goat cheese stuffed mushrooms, and an assortment of marinated olives and dill pickles from Agata & Valentina's. The mushrooms go in the oven for 20 minutes to melty-perfection. They called for red pepper flakes, and I didn't measure the amount... they were a bit spicy, but absolutely delicious! They were one of my favorite dishes of the day. The dips were both really good, too, and I'm excited for those leftovers the next few days.

Thursday, 1:10 p.m. We pop the turkey back in the oven to heat it all the way through and mix the rest of the ingredients for Martha's simple stuffing into a crock pot (borrowed from my aunt Diane). The recipe didn't call for sausage, but I thought that Italian sweet sausage might be a nice addition. The dried bread seemed to be taking up too much space, even with the 3 eggs, 1/2 a cup of wine, and 2 cans of chicken broth, so I'm a bit concerned about this. We can't get all the bread into the pot just yet either. At this point, we also peel and start boiling our 5 pounds of red potatoes (no recipe for this, I make great mashed potatoes on my own!) and start boiling our Minnesotan wild rice with a mix of sauteed mushrooms and onions.

Thursday, 1:50 p.m. The turkey comes out of the oven to rest, and the green beans go in to cook for 45 minutes. The potatoes are done boiling, so I mash them with my $7.99 hand mixer from Target with skim milk, butter, salt, pepper, and 4 ounces of cream cheese.

Thursday, 2 p.m. We mix some of the juices from the turkey in with the dressing, stir vigorously, add the rest of the bread, and pray to God that it will cook more in the final half hour.

Thursday, 2:15 p.m. Mom mixes up the gravy. I've never made gravy before and don't feel like trying it today... maybe next year! Mom also carves the turkey while I'm dishing up everything else into the serving dishes and heating up the rolls. I mix up a special drink in a big pitcher of 1 bottle of champagne, 2 cups of cranberry juice, and 6 ounces of grand Marnier, decorated with cranberries frozen in ice cubes. On the table in wine glasses, the drinks looked really pretty and festive, and they tasted delicious! Also at this point, my dad and uncle pulled out my awesome gate-leg table, flipped up the other side, pulled out the extra chairs and set the table.

Thursday, 2:25 p.m. I realize all the clean silverware is in the dishwasher still, stop the dishwasher mid-wash and pull out burning hot forks and knives for the whole family. No need to panic :-)

Thursday, 2:30 p.m. We sit down to the table, say grace, pass the dishes and dig in! The turkey and stuffing were actually probably my favorites. I don't normally like stuffing, but I really liked this recipe, especially with the extra sausage. Way to go Martha! Mom was worried that the gravy was a little lumpy, but it was delicious so no one else seemed to notice. Of course, I always love Minnesotan wild rice with gravy, but that's a given!

Thursday, 4:30 p.m. After cleaning up a bit, flipping through some of the advertisements for Black Friday, we serve up our apple pie from Agata & Valentina with vanilla ice cream for dessert. The pie was really good, also one of my favorites from the day.

Thursday, 5:30 p.m. My aunt and uncle get on the road back to New Jersey, we clean up a bit more, and then everyone (kitties included) is ready for a nap and some good old fashioned, American television.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Thanksgiving Part 1: The Preparation.

Because it's my first year in New York, and my first year in my own apartment, I had this crazy idea to host my parents, my brother, and my aunt and uncle from New Jersey for Thanksgiving this year. In my tiny apartment. My parents and brother will actually be staying in my apartment, and my aunt and uncle will drive in for the day. Fun!

Unfortunately, my brother, who is the real gourmet chef in the family, was asked to work on Friday and won't be able to come up now until Friday evening after work. So I'm all alone with my Martha Stewart recipes for the big meal! My mom is a decent cook, but she's not one for following directions. I think the phrase we heard a lot in her kitchen growing up was, "Good enough!" This will be an adventure.

To make things even more exciting, I have some sort of cold/flu that hit me over the weekend, bad enough to make me miss work on Monday. So I lost some valuable prep time this weekend.

Here's how it went:

Sunday, 10 a.m. Loads and loads of grocery shopping. Luckily, my crappy little market had everything I needed. I'm still shocked that one tiny little bottle of vanilla extract cost $6.99 in Manhattan, but I guess I shouldn't be surprised by anything anymore. I didn't have time to check other stores, so I just carted everything home in my old-lady-shopping-cart. And then I practically cried when I had to carry everything up to my fourth-floor walk-up.

Monday, 2 p.m. Drag myself off deathbed to move the 8.5 and 7.5 pound turkey breasts to the fridge to thaw. I decided to do turkey breasts because they're smaller and will cooker a little faster. Besides, I don't like dark meat anyway... For the five of us for dinner tomorrow, we really only need one, but I'm going to make a second while we're at, freeze the meat, and use it for soups, etc. this winter. Plus, I feel safer making a turkey breast "on my own" when my mom will be here to supervise.

Wednesday, 8:30 a.m. Drag myself out of bed to frantically clean my apartment before my parents arrive at 10:30. Play loud Christmas music to annoy the old hag that lives below me. Feed the naughty kitties. More cleaning.

Wednesday, 9:38 a.m. Take a break. Cleaning is hard!

Wednesday, 10:15 a.m. Not quite done cleaning... AND my parents arrive! Hugging ensues and the kitties snuggle their grandparents tentatively.

Wednesday, 10:30 a.m. My mom wants to get down to business. We're chopping and sautéing the vegetables for the dressing, the green bean casserole, and the wild rice. We mix up a shrimp-herb dip, a blue cheese-walnut spread, and prepare the filling for the goat cheese stuffed mushrooms for our appetizers. Dad's job is to keep the darling, curious kitties out of the kitchen. They've been known to jump up on a cutting board in the past and knock chef knives crashing to the floor... nearly missing my feet... so Dad made sure to keep them busy with a laser pointer while we were cooking away!

Wednesday, around noon. I completely botch the sauce for the green bean casserole, and we have to throw it away. I'm not too sure of my ability to make the roux for the sauce correctly, so we scratch that idea, and just mix some cream of mushroom soup in with beans and call it a day. We store the green bean dish wrapped in foil in the fridge, ready to bake in the oven on Thursday.

Wednesday, 1:30 p.m. We create Martha Stewart's herb butter, rub down the turkeys, prepare the pans with quartered carrots, celery, and onions, and pop our first turkey breast in the oven - only one will fit in my tiny oven at a time! We have about 3 hours to kill until it's done. We're doing one today and one tomorrow.

Wednesday, 2:00 p.m. Everyone's tired and ready for lunch. We head to Agata & Valentina's on 79th and 1st Ave. to pick up lunch and our apple pie and bread for tomorrow. The supermarket is a complete mess. There's a line all the way around the entire store à la Trader Joe's Union Square at rush hour.

Wednesday, 5:30 p.m. Turkey's all done, perfectly golden brown on the outside and smells delicious. We pop it in the fresh covered in foil and are all done for the evening.

We head off to the New York Athletic Club, where we rented a room just for Wednesday night/Thursday morning to watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. Everyone's tired after a full day of prep work and running errands!

I like snow days!

As promised, here are a few pictures from the snow day last week. As you can see, the kitties and I took it pretty easy for a day...

The kitties fighting.
I made this cake. It turned out awful. HUGE fail. It was a new, lowfat recipe. When I cut a slice out, all the liquid leaked out of the cake and filled the space where the slice was missing. It was gross. And I definitely baked it long enough. But the liquids (grossly) separated. I had to throw the whole thing out.

Kittens watching the snow.

The view from my window.

I like cooking.

I really love cooking, making delicious, homemade meals to savor. Although I don't always have the time to make something spectacular, even putting together a simple meal makes me feel better. I think especially because I live alone now, cooking makes me feel like a little homemaker, like I have a real home.

Cooking healthy meals isn't always easy either. I love fried chicken, mashed potatoes and macaroni & cheese, so sometimes it's hard to choose a healthy meal over one full of flavor (and usually fat). I've come to a place where I try to make at least a few healthy substitutions in every new recipe or to lighten up some of my old favorites. At the very least, I'm learning to eat high-cal foods in moderation.

That being said, I'd like to share some of my recipes with you single girls out there. I swear, it's all easier than you think! And while it's not all low fat, a lot of it is, or could be with a few simple swaps.

I forgot to take a picture of tonight's dinner, but I swear I will in the future!

Low-Fat Turkey Meatloaf

(I know not everyone likes meatloaf, but it's one of those weird homey things that I actually really like. Also, this recipe isn't revolutionary, but even this seemed daunting to me when I first started cooking)

1 lb. lean ground turkey

1/2 c. warm water

1 thick slice whole wheat bread, cut in 1 inch cubes

1/2 c. roughly chopped onion

3/4 c. ketchup, divided

1/4 c. mustard

2 egg whites (or 3/4 c. liquid egg whites)

1 tsp. black pepper

1/2 tsp. cayenne pepper

1/2 tsp. garlic powder

Also, a good loaf pan is not to be under-estimated! I have a silicone pan from Silicone Solutions, and it's so great because absolutely nothing can stick to it no matter how much you burn something! If you don't have a loaf pan, you can also make mini loaves in a muffin pan.

Pre-heat your oven to 375.

In a large bowl, soak bread cubes in warm water for 10 minutes.

While it soaks, chop your onion. I like it in pretty big pieces, but a smaller chop is fine, too, if you prefer.

Mix ground turkey, egg whites, 1/2 c. ketchup, mustard and spices into the bread mixture. Mix very thoroughly. You can add extra cayenne if you like it spicy, or a dash of hot sauce or Worcestershire sauce, to your liking. I like it with just cayenne.

Pack mixture into your loaf pan, or divide into individual muffin pans. Spread 1/4 c. ketchup on top of mixture.

Bake for 1 hour at 375, slice, and enjoy.