64 More Ways to Eat Food

As if we need any more! Seriously, when did eating get so hard? And when it's not hard, well, it's way too easy. I'm not an advocate of diets or diet rules, because everyone is different, but I do appreciate Michael Pollan's simple and humorous writing on the food industry and health. Who can forget "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants."? Pollan has come up with a tiny little guide filled with similar, memorable advice to guide you through the grocery store and your eating life. Read more about Food Rules in this NYT interview with Tara Parker-Pope.

Urban: Community Supported Agriculture in NYC

If you are obsessed with good food and wonder why a hamburger costs less than an apple, you might be interested in learning more about Community Supported Agriculture in NYC. Don't know what that is? Community supported agriculture is a new (or not depending on how you view the modern food industry and how people "used to" eat), and developing model of agriculture and food distribution which is meant to reconnect the individual/consumer with the farmer/producer. CSA's have sprung up nationwide, allowing individuals and families to receive weekly shipments of fresh produce directly from local farmers. I'm desperate to join one, but have no idea what to do with a whole boxload of fresh fruits and vegetables (and sometimes dairy products) - feed myself for a month and store it in a an icebox since I have a studio-friendly skinny fridge? Alas, I may have to wait a while before it makes sense to join one.

To find out more, visit the link above or read up on some Michael Pollan. Happy food.

I'm Not The Only One Who Loves Goat Meat

Apparently, The New York Times has finally discovered it as well:

How I Learned To Love Goat Meat

Henry Alford is one lucky goat meat-eating dude who would definitely meet one of my few requirements . Goat meat parathas in Jackson Heights! Goat meat tacos at Cabrito! Jamaican curry! Goat ragu! Such delicacies even I have not had the good fortune of experiencing. I have, however, been eyeing the tacos at Cabrito for a few months now - I might have a restaurant review/goat meat love letter up soon!

12-Year-Old Food Genius & The Boy Who Could Have Been

12-Year-Old's a Food Critic, and the Chef Loves It

Where was this kid when I was 12? I was waiting for a proposal to be best friends with my future husband. He could've been it.

This kid is all that most people must hate about NYC - an Upper West Sider who gets his own $25 to get dinner while the parents are out, and ends up sampling prosciutto and cheese at the hippest new Italian restaurant in the neighborhood. What a life.

This falls into my Only In New York category. I'm jealous, and I want to be him when I grow up.

Chicken Recipe

I love to cook, although I have a pretty old-fashioned way of doing it, a methodology I owe to my dear mother, who is a true Maestro in the kitchen. After spending many an hour in the kitchen "eyeballing" (to use Rachel Ray's term) ingredients, improvising cake recipes, and making lunch while growing up (not to mention eating a lot), I have developed I love of cooking and frankly, feeding myself and others.

So here's something I recently whipped up, which is really nothing, but tastes yummy after a day at work and class spent blogging and/or thinking about blogging.

What you need:
A package of 4 skinless chicken breasts
Thai peanut marinating/dipping sauce
Ketchup or canned tomato sauce
Cayenne pepper
Black pepper
Salt
Garlic powder
Any hot sauce

Olive oil for cooking
A skillet
A spatula

What to do:
Cut up chicken into pieces slightly bigger than "bite-size" - about 1.5 in. Heat up a skillet/pan on medium-low and warm up about 2 tablespoons of olive oil in it for a couple of minutes.

Toss in the cut chicken. It's particularly fun if it forms a big fat mound in your skillet. Then you get to un-mound it later. But be careful not to let it fall over the sides - this shouldn't happen unless you're using a dollhouse-sized skillet.

Add about (I say about because I "eyeball" it) - 1/2 tbsp garlic powder, 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper, 1/4 tsp black pepper, and salt to taste. Also add 2-3 tbsp ketchup or tomato sauce. Add in about 3 dashes of peanut sauce and hot sauce to taste. Yep - just throw it on top of the chicken. Stir.

The above are conservative numbers. If you eat prefer more flavor/spice, be my guest and sprinkle away. It also depends on how big/thick the chicken pieces are.

Time before you can dig in:
~15-20 mins. More if you like the chicken to be seared a bit in which case, raise the heat a little when adding ingredients and turn down before letting the chicken fully cook.

That's the first time I wrote a "recipe." Enjoy.

Chai Time

Somewhere during the course of the last few years, I have become somewhat of a coffee/tea person. It was purely an accident. With the arrival of one of the first Starbucks in the country in my town, it had become quite fashionable by late high school and then college to be constantly sipping on something completely unnecessary. I drank tea here and there at home with my grandma, who dips Ritz Crackers into her tea bag tea with milk and sugar. In college, it felt cool to drink several calorie-laden specialty drinks a few times a day, especially when determining who was the most wired/stressed/depressed/hopeless/screwed/exhausted.

After several vacations in India during those four years, I started to prefer hot, sweet, milky chai over everything else and needed to sip something hot at least once a day. Since then, and after returning from another year in India where chai was my sustenance, I have been semi "brewing" my own milky concoctions at home. Most teabags such, however, and I have little patience for fresh leaves. Then this past winter, I discovered Tetley's flavored chai teabags at a local Indian grocery store. It comes in 3 flavors - Masala, Ginger, and Elaichi (cardamom). I am nearly obsessed with the elaichi one. My family is now sold on it too. The tea itself is genuinely good and strong, and the elaichi flavor is just perfect. I throw in a teabag every morning with 3/4 water, 1/4 milk. Elaichi chai begs for some sugar, so don't skip or use a substitute - a little will go a long way in enhancing the elaichi flavor. It's also a great tea to entertain with because it always tastes more like freshly brewed leaves.

My mom loves how I found this thing, and it has further convinced everyone that I should get married in oh, about 2.5 hours. Silly. Trix are for kids, and this tea is for cool quarterlifers like me. $9.00 for 72 teabags @ select Indian grocers (or online).

Elettaria

Next to product (and oh yeah, subcontinental things, and books), another obsession is food. It's one of the few things in this world that is neither lovely nor awkward. Of course, of late it is highly contentious and political topic (I'm reading Pollan's work) as well, and now the premise for yet more reality shows. While I'm trying to be more informed about food and nutrition (really - another part of the many evolutions taking place on this site), the last thing I really care to do is critique it - if it looks good (although not necessary), smells good, has been prepared as hygienically as possible or as much as I allow myself to care, I'll pretty much eat just about anything. Hunger is usually not a precondition.

Since I have yet to explore NYC's many culinary delights, I'm of late trying to keep track of reviews and such so I can eventually visit them all - muhahahaha. Here's the latest from the NYT Restaurant Review - not the best review, but man, ribs coated in garam masala and crab meat resala sure sound good enough to me. Funny that this restaurant's name means cardamom in Latin - I sure have a things for all things elachi.

Elettaria @ W. 8th & MacDougal Streets