“did you see the menu for the first day! biscuits and gravy for breakfast and mac and cheese for lunch! Ya know how many pans that’s going to take!!?”

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the first day of school was on wednesday, meaning i’m back at work.  lunch ladies enter the kitchens one week before the first day of school.  we have to clean the kitchen, track down all supplies that got moved around during summer school, order groceries, and my kitchen has a new manager which means each lady gives her the low-down on the dynamics of the kitchen.

in true public school fashion access to paper work and computers was not available till the afternoon before the first morning.  for our kitchen that meant chaos because we had no paper work on the infamous “breakfast in the classroom” that we were going to have to prepare first thing in the morning.  no student count, no class list, no updated teacher homeroom list.  600 servings of biscuits and gravy would be ready with nowhere to go.  i decided the best mind-set to be in was that the first day was going to be an all out disaster and if that didn’t happen then well it would be a good day.

breakfast wasn’t an all out disaster but it was pretty chaotic. and then came lunch……….263 6th graders this year who all looked terrified and thought that the cafe was an all you can eat buffet.  at the end of the line i had a stack of confiscated pizza next to my register.  7th and 8th graders are required to eat in silence till they can prove that they are the young adults they think they are.  the silence is actually a little spooky.  yet at the same time oh so lovely!

the new kitchen manager has only had one emotional breakdown so far…..”i’ve been in kitchens 11 years and i’ve never been so stressed out…..its all that breakfast in the classroom mess”  i told her it be all ok. i cried the first week i did breakfast in the classroom feeling the exact same way. she said she wasn’t quitting just yet.

meatless monday —- lets do dinner!!!

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after finishing my first year of meatless mondays i decided to share my love of this day with others.  this month begins a dinner party series called “lets do dinner!!!”  twice a month i have planned meatless monday meals.  i sent out the menus to friends and people i just want to see more of, and had them sign up for dinner.  the first monday was a latin based dinner.

the menu:  black bean and mango salad, tangerine baked tofu, guac and chips,

and jalapeno-key lime pie with tequila whip cream

my favorite part of the meal

 

my plate loaded and ready to go

topics of conversation included……..vegan baking techniques, why i have so many bicycles, what exactly is the process of how to laundry money, and awkward blind dates

elise ready to dig in

 

ingrid in mid-chew

desert was a total experiment.  1 i made a key lime pie, which i have never done before and 2 i tweaked it by a lot.  i infused the key lime juice with jalapeno and added tequila to the whipped cream.  it was …….a complete success!!!! we decided it even kind of tasted like fruit loops.  ingrid and elise may or may not have had 2 pieces each.

the pie experiment

 

RECIPE:  BLACK BEAN & MANGO SALAD

serves 4-6

1 mango – peeled and diced

1 red pepper – diced

1/2 cup scallions – chopped

1 TBSP cilantro – chopped

2 TBSP red wine vinegar

2 TBSP olive oil

2 cups quinoa – cooked and cooled

1 15 oz can black beans – drained and rinsed

 

*combine in a bowl the mango, pepper, scallions and cilantro, add red wine vinegar and olive oil.  stir well.

*fold in black beans and cooled quinoa.  allow to sit 20-30 minutes.  serve at room temp or cold, either way is delicious!

 

 

 

 

 

Closing Ceremonies- the leftovers for Sunday Night Dinner

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We closed out the Olympics last night with a veggie Wellington that I dug out of the deep freeze. We call it an Artie Wellington in honor of my Dad who I made it with and was suspicious of a vegetarian Wellington to begin with…

The potatoes, Yorkshire Puddings, and brussel sprouts all came from the deep freeze too. I think it was semi-fitting to have leftovers for what was left of the Olympics, don’t you?

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And of course a Guinness was involved too.

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there’s another cook in the kitchen

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when you love cooking for yourself and others it tends to be a rare thing to have someone show up in your kitchen to cook for you.  i think for me it has happened only handful of times but i always gladly hand over my kitchen to those individuals and accept the role of sous chef.  when justin was in for a visit he took control of the kitchen and cooked up a yummy feast.

honorary chef in the farris kitchen

on the menu was a spaghetti with a chunky vegetable bolognese sauce topped with fresh mozzarella pearls………

i think i could have just eaten the sauce with no pasta, so good and chunky

and  toasted garlic bread

you really can’t go wrong combining butter, garlic and bread

 

 

summer tomato breakfast

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its homegrown tomato time.  i love using them at about every meal including breakfast.  my latest creation i’m calling “a summer tomato breakfast,”  grilled tomatoes topped with a poached egg, black pepper,  parm cheese, basil and oregano.  yes my friends that is the way to start a summer day.

light and flavorful just like summer

RECIPE —- SUMMER TOMATO BREAKFAST

serving 1

1 ripe summer tomato sliced thick (i also suggest heirloom tomatoes)

olive oil

egg

2 cups water

all to your taste:  basil, oregano, parm cheese and black pepper

*heat water in a sauce pan to a simmer, crack egg into the simmering water, lightly splash water over egg to cook through, cook egg as desired aka easy, medium or hard, (i recommend medium)

*while you are poaching the egg, have olive oil heating in a skillet over medium high heat, add tomato slices, grill till both sides are slightly toasted.

*place tomato slices onto a plate, top with poached egg, garnish to taste, black pepper, basil, oregano, and parm cheese

meatless monday — summer garden vodka sauce

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nothing is better than a big bowl of pasta

as you all probably know steph and i are just a tad obsessed with paul newman’s vodka sauce.  it is not only the best vodka sauce that can be bought in a jar it is EXTREMELY hard to find.  we have been known to buy multiple jars when we stumble across it.  my favorite is when one sister finds it and calls the other sister going “i’m at this store, they’ve got it.  how many jars you want?”  so if there is a jar in the cabinet, of this sacred sauce, it has to feel just right to open it up and use it.

meatless monday last week just seemed to be calling out for mr. newman’s vodka sauce.  dad’s garden has started chugging out vegetables like crazy and those tomatoes, zucchinni, onions all just seeded calling for a pasta dish.  as i sat down and tasted my creation i knew i had been right……….. mmmmmmmmm

 

The worst meal I have ever made

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Looks nice doesn’t it?
Hmm. Don’t trust it.

But why? It looks like a lovely lemon pesto with whole wheat linguine and a salad.
All I have to say is thank the Cooking Gods for the salad.

What went wrong?
Lynley was visiting for the weekend, so of course we needed to cook together. We made a pesto recipe (Linda McCartney’s, whom I love but I have found out has some, Paul forgive me, questionable recipes).

Granted, I don’t make pesto very often, maybe once or twice a year, so neither of us realized what was going wrong.
What might that be, you ask? Oh. Let’s just say the recipe called for 8-10 cloves of garlic.

Yeah, that first bite was a doozy.

NOW I know that normal pesto only has about 2-4 cloves of garlic AND that is plenty.

The taste was just heat and no flavor at all. I laughed at the delicate, gentle squeeze of lemon I had added to the sauce thinking about the citrus flavors. HA!
We both tired to fix the situation. I added tomato sauce, olive oil and more cheese.

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Lynley went for more cheese and a heck of a lot more olive oil.

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Nothing worked. It tasted awful. And the worst part was that the taste wouldn’t go away.
Frozen custard Sundaes with homemade whipped cream for dessert couldn’t even put out the garlic fire in our bellies.

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The next step for me- Tums.
The next step for Lyn- a shot of whiskey.
Needless to say when we got up in the morning, Linda’s pesto was still with us.

Even good cooks have bad days. Did we laugh? Oh, yes we did.
I’m just glad we cooked our worst meal ever together.

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(Lynley grinning and whipping up a hopeful antidote).

There’s no going back…

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I’ve officially crossed a line…I am now a baker. You might say, yes, but you don’t have a degree and you’ve never worked in a bakery.
All true – however,I now buy all baking supplies in the largest size possible or in bulk because I am baking so much. To me this means only one thing- I am a baker.

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There is no going back my foodie friends and I couldn’t be happier about it.

a havana kind of sunday

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i had one big request when i was in knoxville last for a visit, that was to make a trip to asheville.  i love me some asheville, nc and its only an hour and half away with a beautiful drive through the mountains.  kind of a perfect way to spend a sunday or so my friends justin, erin and i thought.  while you really can’t go wrong wherever you eat in asheville, my favorite place is Havana, a cuban restaurant that is worth the drive.  cuban food is one of my top favs and if you aren’t in florida it can be hard to find.

i had a pork cuban bowl that had rice, beans, pork, topped with salsa and plantains.  erin got a plantain sandwich that had guac on it and justin went for a tilapia with a side of plantains.  have you noticed the them of the meal…..plantains!

that is what i call a bowl of food

justin and erin about to dig in

justin’s request for a “serious” photo

i’m on a catfish kick

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in the last week i’ve eaten catfish twice.  i don’t know what has gotten into be but i can’t seem to get enough of it.

it started at the Bluegrass Restaurant in Ballard County Kentucky.  i have been eyeing this restaurant for some time on my drive between knoxville and springfield.  this time i actually stopped.  what made the restaurant so intriguing the sign that said they had their own pond raised catfish.

the sign that caught my eye

the bluegrass restaurant is worth the stop

i had to order the catfish at the Bluegrass, ya know the saying “when in rome….”.  it was the best catfish fillet sandwich i have ever had.  cornmeal breaded which made it flaky and crisp but not overly fried.  the catfish was the lightest, flakiest catfish without an overpowered catfish taste,(i feel i’m not conveying this to its worthiness).  while i ate i was entertained by a tv that flashed pictures of all things local that have happened in the last year, parades, proms, 4H competitions.  i’m thinking this is now going to be a regular stop on my tennessee-missouri route.

and the french fries weren’t bad either

BUT WHAT THERE’S MORE………

i think the bluegrass got me a little addicted to catfish.  when the fam had lunch at cafe roswitha i had to get the catfish special.  her fish was a cajun seasoned catfish with mashed potatoes and a salad.  the plate looked like a ton of food, but shockingly it was light and not heavy which may have allowed some room for coconut cream pie!

mmmmmmm now that is lunch