My holiday gift to you

I spent a large chunk of today looking about the web for a good way to corral the recipes I find online, add my own and have access to all of it on my phone. Since I’m a nice person, I shall share with you the fruit of my labors.

First and foremost, I spent a worthwhile bit of time consolidating and organizing my bookmarks in Chrome so that it syncs them all and everything is in easily identifiable folders on all the computers I use. AMAZING. There is no proper reason for me to feel as smug about this as I do.

Some time ago I purchased the Real Simple android app and it was worth the $5. You get to choose the amount of time you have to cook as well as a protein and then it gives you a list of options to choose from. Every recipe I’ve ever made from Real Simple has been fantastic and the app is a collection of those.

Today I added OurGroceries (free), so that Spouse and I can avoid duplicating purchases at the grocery store. It syncs the lists so we each know what we need and can check them off as we go.

But what about the initial premise- adding stuff I find online and my own recipes? I attempted My Cookbook first but when you attempt to add a recipe from a webpage, it’s rather a shit show as to what will actually import correctly.

Through a vast amount of googling and some trial and error, I tripped upon ChefTap (free). I tend to be skeptical of anything that claims to be “the first” to do anything but I’ve got to tell you this app is the shit. I imported recipes from no less than 5 websites, all of which look vastly different in structure, and where MyCookbook failed ChefTap kicked ass. They imported brilliantly and formatted exactly as desired. The only downside to this app: no desktop, so you’ll have to do the browsing from your phone or send yourself links to add the recipes from webpages. On the other hand, it’s vastly superior to me having to type in ANYTHING on my own.

As a second bit of awesome, ChefTap will also sync and import any recipes from epicurious.com and allrecipes.com (neither of which have mobile apps that sync across all platforms). This has persuaded me to open an account at epicurious and the sync feature is pretty brilliant.

In related free apps, I also got Sweet and Spicy Indian Food so I’m pretty stoked to try that out as well.

I’m starting to add my frequently made/favorite recipes/recipes from mom on Epicurious and then searching out other faves online so that I’ve got them with me all the time.

I also took a bit off the BrokeAss Gourmet’s Cranberry-Zinfandel Brownie Bites and adapted them for fresh cranberries and high altitude. I’m pretty happy with how they turned out, thought I think I might want a mini-cupcake pan since I made mine in regular cupcake liners.

Incidentally, this was all prompted by making a fantastic General’s Chicken recipe for lunch today and wanting it on my phone for a shopping list. Spouse is working out and I’m couched in the basement with a bottle of Snow Day and Dr. Who Netflixing on my TV.

Hppy

It’s going to be a long week.

I’m traveling at the end of this week and it would be a lie to say I’m looking forward to airports, airplanes and rental cars.

Lately I’ve been on a mad Buffalo Chicken kick. Once upon a time I was a vegetarian for a couple of years and the thing that got me back in the meat wagon was the Buffalo Chicken Sandwich at Hooters. Ever since then, good buffalo sauce has been my Kryptonite.

This is my quick and dirty fix : (I’m partial to Frank’s Red Hot but you can use whatever you like in this recipe.)

1 boneless chicken breast, cut in pieces and cooked

Buffalo/hot sauce to taste

Palmful of precut cabbage mix

Diced tomatoes

Lt. Blue Cheese dressing to taste

Whole wheat tortillas

Heat the chicken and add hot sauce
Warm the tortilla and fill with all ingredients

If you like Piña Coladas…

I’ve got a half-assed recipe that turns out well and is even less terrible for you than the average piña colada.

WilderColada:

Fill blender 1/2 full with ice

small can (8 oz) of chunk pinapple (drain just enough juice that you can see the tops of the pineapple

1/2 cup light rum

3/4 cup lite coconut milk

1 Tablespoon agave syrup

Chuck it all in and blend to your desired consistency. Tastes like summer!

High Altitude Cornbread

First attempt and it turned out pretty well. I kind of bastardized a recipe from somewhere else, but here’s what I did:

1 c all-purpose flour

2 c corn meal

1 c creamed corn

1tsp salt

2.5 tsp baking powder

2 eggs

2 T sugar

1.5 c milk

Baked at 425 for 35 minutes in a 9×9 pan.

It baked up really well, good texture and color. Next time I’ll add more sugar but that’s all I’d change.

Samosa recipe roundup

Madhur Jaffrey’s.

Mamta’s.

Samosas baked in puff pastry.

Chutneys

Mint Cilantro

Cilantro

Mint, part two

I’m going to be testing these out (and maybe making my own variations – sweet potato samosas sound delish) over the next week.

eta:

Chicken Vindaloo, for good measure

All about food!

Yesterday I made Crab Stuffed Mushrooms and Chicken Souvlaki as our appetizers. I had to tweak the recipes a little bit but they both worked really well.

The mushrooms were great. I had to use a bit more butter because if the altitude and propensity for loss of moisture, but the flavor was great. I actually doubled the batch of stuffing and am going to make crabcakes with the leftover today. It was quick prep time and baked for 20 minutes, so it made a really nice, really quick starter.

Probably I made the most changes to the Souvlaki recipe. First, no skewers. I’m a fan of finger food but I’ve never had a meal on skewers that wasn’t a pain in the ass to get off the skewer, and I’m the kind of person who would end up launching a chunk of chicken across the room and into someone’s lap or drink. So no skewers. I cooked it in a saucepan with a bit of the marinade. I also marinated the chicken for about 6 hours (because I could).

The grocery I went to did not have Greek yogurt, so I got Bulgarian. It was a thinner consistency and slightly more sour, so I added some sugar to the sauce (about a teaspoon) and used Garam Masala instead of cumin (because I was out). I also added a dash of Asti because the sauce had a slightly bitter taste (even after the sugar) and then refridgerated it for about an hour. Letting the yogurt sauce set is VERY IMPORTANT. It has been with every tzadziki I’ve ever made and this was no exception. When I got it out of the fridge, it was still a thinner consistency (more like soup than yogurt) but super delicious.

I cut several pita into four pieces and we just used the pita as an accompaniment to the chicken rather than trying to make a sandwich.

Everything was very tasty and I’ll definitely use the recipes (or some variation of them) again. I’m on the lookout for the best souvlaki marinade. I had souvlaki in Greece when I was in college and have never found a comparable recipe. 

Today I’ll probably make crab cakes and I’m going to attempt vegetable samosas with a hari chutney.