Tonight seemed like a good night to bother with photographing my food. Not because what I cooked is going to win any awards, but because it is colorful, and nutritious, and vegan, and falls into the "what I could with what I had" category.
I am, however, beginning to realize that I need a tripod. Unlike the authors of all the other glamorous, beautiful food blogs you read, I have a day job. This means photographing stuff when it's dark outside and i can't take advantage of any natural light streaming in through my kitchen windows. The flash makes things look strange, and I'm afraid I'm not *quite* steady enough to hold the camera still during macro-focus, low-light situations. Maybe next time I'll try bringing a lamp into the kitchen. i have one of those ones from Ikea with the bendy neck.
As for the food, I've been thinking about whole wheat orzo pasta a lot lately. My container is dwindling and it seems impossible to find in Sacramento. The only reason i have any at all is because my sweet boyfriend bought me ten lbs for Christmas last year at Rainbow Grocery in SF.
Damn. Before this post wins a "Stuff White People Like" award, I'll get to the pictures.
I heated up some olive oil and diced up a big white onion. Into the pan it went, followed by two cloves of garlic, some sun-dried tomatoes, a can of garbanzo beans (rinsed & drained), and some S&P.
After the onions had some nice caramel-ly brown-ness, and the sun-dried tomatoes were looking bright and soft, I shut off the heat, put a whacking great handful of spinach on top, covered the pan with a lid and let the wilting begin!
While that was happening, I chopped up some canned black olives and some chives that I needed to use like, yesterday. Perhaps it speaks to the lameness of my palate that the only kind of olives I really enjoy are the fat, salty, black ones out of a can. My only regret is that my fingers are too big to wear the olives around the kitchen and make goofy faces. I mean, I guess I could make goofy faces no matter what, but it seems somehow less fun without olives on each of my fingertips.
While the spinach was wilting and the olives/chives were meeting their grisly demise under the blade of my 10" steel, I boiled some Better than Bullion "No Chicken" chicken broth with a slug of olive oil. Into this went some whole wheat orzo until it was perfectly al dente and the broth was thick and rich. I have to say, I'm really impressed with the broth. It has a really good flavor that I remember very much from my days of cooking with chicken broth.
Once the orzo was finished, I tossed the whole great mess together and came up with this:
I love eating this colorfully during the winter. Rest assured it was delicious, my bowl didn't look like this for long:
As for the hooligan portion of this blog, there hasn't been much lately. I've been commuting to work here and there on the SV when the weather isn't too dreadful. Really, the coolest moto-related thing I've done lately is to knit my friend Donna a balaclava. How's this for totally ridiculous:
I was really proud of myself for knitting it so quickly and (if I do say so myself) so well. Then i put it on and realized the wool was too scratchy for facial consumption. Back to my stash for the Debbie Bliss Cashmerino and some frantic knitting as I attempt to finish everything in time for Christmas!!
Thanks for reading.
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