Friday, May 7, 2010
As I mentioned in my last post, Nashville needs help. If you have a tummy, and a little money in your pocket to spare please support our city in an easy way. The wonderful Doug Hogrefe, who owns Amerigo (where The Boy & I had our FIRST date over half a decade ago) spearheaded the organizing of this event. Participating restaurants will be donating 50% of the proceeds to Tennessee Emergency Response Fund of the Community Foundation of Middle Tennessee. There’s so many people that need so much help. And I am ashamed to admit, I feel as though a lot of people in my area of town (which was high & dry) just DON’T get it! I see them jogging, sitting on patio sipping cocktails, and just walking around with their CLEAN HAIR (we were asked to conserve water because one of the water treatment plants was lost in the flood). If it’s the LEAST you can do, just go out to dinner.
This event has been organized in a grassroots manner, and as a food blogger I was asked to help spread the word. You can learn more by following Eat Out for Nashville on Twitter or by visiting their Facebook Page. I’m excited about some of the restaurants that have already signed up (Baja Burrito, the brand new Burger Up, and even the Melting Pot), and I can’t wait to find out what other options there will be!
The view from Rosa L Parks Blvd in the Germantown area of Nashville. Under the tran overpass (the teal bridge) is a completely submerged van. I only found out about the van on Monday when the water receded, and you could see the top of it. The flooded Farmer’s Market is on the left. To see more of my photos, click here.
Monday, May 3, 2010
It’s a surreal scene here in Nashville. Rain came and came and came and came. I was out of town for most of it, but followed the coverage on my iPhone using The Weather Channel app, Twitter, and my Facebook friends. When I returned Sunday evening it was still raining. Luckily, my apartment is on some of the highest elevated part of town, so we’re dry as a bone up here. I just drove The Boy into work (he works at the best news station in town) because he thought the parking lots behind his station would be flooded. Good reasoning, considering the NEWSROOM AT HIS STATION IS FLOODED! I’ve walked those halls before.
The park next to his work, Bicentennial Mall Park, where we’ve ridden bikes, walked, and even once had a fun little picnic on his dinner break one day, is flooded
(photo credit: Mike Byrd, for more of his photos of the flood, click here)
And Nashville’s famed downtown? Yeah, it’s under water as well. I work downtown. My office is nestled in here.
(photo credit: twitter user @rwitherell, on twitpic)
While I’m high & dry, many MANY others are not as fortunate. Lots of people are without power, lots of people’s houses are filled with water, and were evacuated in boats. Cars left stranded. A building floated down the interstate, then capsized. A BUILDING! It was like a boat, on the interstate.
The famous Opryland Hotel? Yeah, that’s wet too. Click here for shocking video. I have two great memories of this place. One, is this is where I competed in the Slow Cooker Competition, and second, The Boy and I helped a friend surprise his girlfriend with a proposal. So sad to see it underwater.
And the amazing Vanderbilt Children’s Hospital, where my friend’s tiny triplets spent some time after their birth, experienced issues with water coming in the basement, and the ground level reception.
Please keep Nashville in your thoughts & prayers right now. Here’s a look at some of my other Nashville area blogger friends posts: Kira at Food alla Puttanesca, Lindsay and Taylor of Love and Olive Oil, Kelly at Sallaboutme, Erin of One Particular Kitchen.
Thursday, April 22, 2010
I hope everyone takes a moment to think about their impact on the planet. We recycle all glass, plastic, aluminum, cardboard, and paper. Our recycling used to be one big crazy mess, until we bought these awesome bins from IKEA. I highly recommend them!
I use energy efficient light bulbs in most sockets. I ALWAYS turn off the light when I leave a room. We keep the A/C off as long as possible. And most recently, for the past year I’ve begun to make a very concious effort to ONLY turn on the television if I have something specific I want to watch. I do NOT use it for background noise. And I pester and nag The Boy to turn it off if he’s not watching it. 😉
One of the biggest things I do is buy my vegetables in the summer as a part of a CSA. CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture. I’m about to begin my 4th year doing it. It has it’s challenging times, but overall the experience is positive. I love knowing my vegetables are in season, and grown on a farm less than an hour away, as opposed to hundreds and even thousands of miles away.
To see some of the recipes, and experiences I’ve had with my CSA vegetables, click on my CSA tag. I hope you enjoy!
What are some things you do to save the planet?
Monday, April 19, 2010
There’s a group of four gals in my department who always lunch together. Between the four of us there’s some good baking and cooking going on as well! This makes birthdays especially fun. Some of the past birthday desserts have included Carrot Cake, Peanut Butter Cake, an incredible Coffee Cake, Pumpkin Cupcakes, and the list seriously goes on and on. This year, as Kristen’s birthday approached, Liesl & I had a conversation something like this:
Liesl: Let’s do something different for Kristen’s birthday. I’ll be getting my ice cream maker right before that, so I want to make a yummy ice cream!
Me: Ok, good idea! How about you make the ice cream, and I can make cookies, and we can do homemade ice cream sandwiches!
Liesl: I want to do S’Mores Ice Cream!
Me: Oooooh I’m going to do Homemade Graham Crackers.
And thus, this amazing combo was born. I had actually made these cookies back in July, for my 4th of July get-together with my friends. Along with homemade marshmallows, they made for some pretty freaking amazing s’mores. I did manage to get a couple photographs of them, but I hated all of them. And, I can’t stand to post a photo that doesn’t do the food justice! Besides, I knew these cookies were so delicious (and surprisingly easy!), they would get made time and time again.
On their own, these cookies are so delicious. Slightly softer than a storebought graham cracker, but 1000x more delicious. And they still have a bit of a crunch. They are definitely not exotic, but they give you this wonderful, warm, homey feeling when you eat them. When you pair them with the S’mores Ice Cream, it truly is a match made in heaven! The texture of the cookie was absolutely perfect. Not too hard, and not too soft. If you’re worried about the ice cream smooshing out when you bite in, have no fears, the cookies softened up just enough when you bite in to keep the ice cream inside the sandwich at all times. The ice cream was a marshmallow base with chocolate and graham crackers mixed in. It had such a creamy, and fluffy texture and flavor. Seriously, absolute perfection. You can learn all about the ice cream on Liesl’s Confection Dissection. If you’re a s’mores lover (like the birthday girl is) you will absolutely LOVE this combo. I guarantee.
Print
Homemade Graham Crackers
adapted from Martha Stewart Cookies cookbook
(recipe located online here)
YIELDS: Approx 20
Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for working
1 cup whole-wheat flour
1/2 cup untoasted wheat germ
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 cup unsalted butter, softened (2 sticks)
3/4 cup packed light-brown sugar
2 tablespoons high-quality honey
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Whisk flours, wheat germ, salt, baking soda, and cinnamon in a medium bowl; set aside.
Put butter, brown sugar, and honey into the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment; mix on medium speed until pale and fluffy, 2 to 3 minutes, scraping down sides of bowl as needed. Reduce speed to low. Add the flour mixture, and mix until combined.
Turn out dough onto a floured surface, and divide into quarters. Roll out each piece between 2 sheets of floured parchment paper into rectangles a bit larger than 9 by 6 inches, about 1/8 inch thick. Stack parchment and dough on a baking sheet and chill in freezer until firm, about 20 minutes.
Remove from freezer. Using a fluted pastry wheel (or a pizza cutter works fine, if like me, that's all you have), trim the outermost edges of each rectangle, and divide into three 6 by 3-inch rectangles. Score each piece in half lengthwise and crosswise, to form four 3 by 1 1/2-inch crackers. (I skipped this step)
Pierce crackers using the tines of a fork. Transfer to large baking sheets lined with parchment paper. Bake, rotating halfway through, until dark golden brown, 7 to 8 minutes. Be careful NOT to overcook, and remove as they just begin to golden. Repeat with remaining dough. Let cool on sheet 5 minutes; transfer crackers to wire racks to cool completely.
Bookmark/Share
Subscribe to RSS Feed
Subscribe via Email
Follow Me on Twitter