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Cookbook Review: Olive Trees and Honey: A Treasury of Vegetarian Recipes from Jewish Communities Around the World by Gil Mars
Summary:
Just as the title implies, this is a collection of recipes from Jewish communities around the world that are suitable for vegetarians.
Review:
Vegans beware. When this says it’s a vegetarian cookbook, it really means it! Almost every recipe is drenched in animal products, primarily dairy and eggs.
The Introduction explains the various food cultures that have sprung up in Jewish communities around the world, complete with maps and such. This part was fascinating, although I felt that it was a bit too Old Wold focused. I know for instance that there are strong Jewish cultures in Argentina and Brooklyn, but they are not included in the book.
After the Introduction is an explanation of vegetarian foods incorporated into Jewish holidays. I found this part rather averagely done and skimmed over it.
The recipes are oddly divided up. The chapters are: cheese and dairy spreads; pickles, marinated vegetables, and relishes; salads; soups; savory pastries; cooked vegetable dishes; vegetable stews; legumes; grains; dumplings and pasta; eggs; sauces and seasonings. As you can tell, some of the recipes are put together based on the type of dish (salad, soup) and others based on the ingredients (eggs, legumes). This makes the book appear disorganized. Also the complete lack of dessert is sad.
Beyond the maps in the Introduction, there are no pictures. Additionally, the recipes are mostly designed to serve 6 to 8. I’m not sure what planet the author is from, but that is not a typical family sized meal in America. I must admit, that I didn’t try any of the recipes because I couldn’t find a single one I wanted to try. They are all completely swimming in cholesterol and insane food portion sizes. Looking at the soups, which should presumably be a healthier option, the Persian Onion Soup on page 123 contains 3 eggs and the Hungarian Cream of Mushroom Soup on page 125 contains TWO CUPS of sour cream. Similarly, almost all of the breads and pastries are fried. My cholesterol practically spiked just looking at the cookbook.
Essentially, then, this book is a good introduction to Old World style Jewish food but ignores the healthier options that I know from experience exist in Jewish communities in the Americas. It is difficult to enjoy the cookbook since there are no pictures or colors. Additionally, all of the recipes are designed for 6 to 8 servings, which is a bit large for the typical American household. Overall, then, I would recommend this book to those with a vested interest in Jewish culture and cuisine who can see past the dull layout and design of the cookbook.
3 out of 5 stars
Source: Public Library
Cookbook Review: Alive in Five: Raw Gourmet Meals in Five Minutes! by Angela Elliott
Summary:
Using mainstream ingredients and quick-fix instructions, Elliott seeks to show the intrepid new raw food cook how easy it is to incorporate vegan raw food into their everyday life.
Review:
I’m finally doing cookbook reviews! I’m afraid mine won’t be as in-depth as on some blogs. I simply don’t have the time to snap pictures as I cook and copy out recipes. But I will tell you the basics of how the cookbook is set up, how well it works, and whether I would recommend it.
I have no intention to go full raw food, but I did think incorporating some raw recipes into my week might help up my veggie and fruit intake. I also am a busy young professional so don’t have tons of time, so clearly the title appealed to me. So are these 5 minute recipes? Um. Not for me they weren’t. I’d say that on average the recipes took me anywhere from 10 to 15 minutes to accomplish, and I don’t think learning the recipes or improving techniques would help with that. Five minutes is definitely an understatement.
The book is set up with a list of all the ingredients she uses, a suggested weekly meal plan, and then divided into your typical breakfast, lunch, dinner, snacks, desserts, etc…. categories. It is a convenient size, although you will need something to hold it open for you. It is wonderfully illustrated with gorgeous full-color pictures.
I selected a breakfast, lunch, and dinner to try out since snacks are best kept simple (in my book), and I’m not much of a desserts person.
Breakfast was a smoothie. Something I am incredibly skeptical of keeping me full. It consisted of freshly squeeze orange juice (TIME-CONSUMING), half a banana, almond milk, and ice cubes. It tasted surprisingly good, but did it keep me full? HAHAHA NO. I was hungry again by the time I got to work. So that was kind of a fail. Especially with all the effort that went into making it. Seriously, I think I expended those calories purely in squeezing out the oj.
Lunch was….a salad. A salad that did not taste nearly as good as my salads I usually make. Plus, I was bothered by the fact that she wanted half of your leafy greens to be iceberg lettuce when spinach and kale are so much healthier for you. I consider this salad kind of a fail. It did keep me full, though, and others might like the proportions and such better than I did.
Dinner was a raw avocado “soup,” which basically was a bunch of things blended in the blender. You guys. This did not taste like soup. It tasted like a good dip, so that’s how I ate it. It totally would score 4 stars as a dip, but as dinner it failed. Really. A lot.
The main problem I had with this book, then, was a) the recipes take way more than 5 minutes and b) I kind of like to chew things periodically. All of this blending made me feel like an invalid.
That said, the book is definitely not bad, it is just not my cup of tea. Others might enjoy the tastes and style better than I did, and it is well-organized. Plus others might be less irritated by the fact that the recipes take 10 to 15 minutes rather than 5.
Recommended to vegans with an openness to incredibly simple raw meals being integrated into their diets.
3 out of 5 stars
Source: Public Library
Product Review: DeVant 4 Tier Mesh Shelf from CSN Stores
My lovely loyal readers will recall that I announced that CSN Stores offered me a free product in exchange for my honest review. Well, it arrived, and I’m excited to tell you all about it!
After pondering the possibilities for the price limit they set, I decided what I really needed was a shelf for my kitchen. Boston apartments are notorious for being cramped spaces, and much as I love mine, it seriously is lacking in cabinetry/places to put shit. My cookbooks were stacked up in messy piles under the microwave. Not the best for ready reference while cooking! Anyway, so I measured one of the narrow nooks in my kitchen, found a shelf that matched the proportions and was within budget, and ordered away. The delivery was faster than the spacing of my blog posts implies. It arrived a couple days or so after I placed the order.
It arrived in a nice, plain box. This is good because some companies have a tendency not to wrap the box in another box, and then it gets left on my porch for hours announcing to the world the free awesome stuff inside they could steal. So yay for plain packaging! Also, it was really easy to open. (My cat at this point in time was taking a brief break from rubbing her face all over the box. She REALLY loves boxes).
This is exactly how it looked right out of the box. Not too intimidating, eh? (To those wondering, at this point in time my cat was attempting to stuff her tubby self into the very narrow box. Hilarity ensued). I was a bit surprised that there was exactly one page of instructions for assembly, but it turned out to be quite easy. Anyone who has assembled Ikea furniture would find it to be a piece of cake. I had a few doubts at first that it would be at all stable, but actually once all the pieces are in place, it’s pretty darn stable. I wouldn’t go putting super-heavy things on it though. It’s not made for that.
Here it is all set-up! Later I moved it to be centered in that space. I don’t know why I had it in the corner for the picture. Who knows. Anyway, it fits the space well, and I now have two open shelves to do what I want with. I actually am enjoying using the top shelf as extra counter-top space when I’m cooking. It comes in handy.
And here’s a close-up of the cookbooks, because I know at least a few of you love shelf p*rn! It turns out I have a lot fewer cookbooks than I thought I did. I think this totally justifies me acquiring a few more when the budget allows it, don’t you? If you *must* know what books are on the shelf, from left to right:
America’s Test Kitchen Family Cookbook, Perfect Vegetables, Vegetarian Bible, Adventures in Microwave Cooking (college), stir-fry cookbook, vegetarian cookbook (the actual names of those two elude me), Vegetarian Cooking for Dummies (from when I first went veg, it’s an *awesome* book!), Vegetables, The Little House Cookbook, Pumpkins, Vegetarian Italian Cooking, a vintage southern cooking cookbook (bday present from my dad), Nestle’s Best-Loved Cookies, and a family cookbook from my dad’s side of the family.
Hokay, back to the review! Overall, my interactions with CSN Stores were entirely pleasant. The site is easy to navigate with convenient left-bar search features such as price, size, color, etc… Many items on the site ship for free, and the shipping was *fast*. The item arrived well-packaged, and assembly was fairly easy. I do wish the shelf was a bit sturdier, but it does its job well enough, particularly for the price. Overall I would definitely recommend buying items from CSN Stores. Their prices are competitive, they have good customer service, and their products are items any home would need.
Recipe: Perfect Pizza Crust
People tend to not realize pizza’s versatility. When it’s home-made, you can actually make sure it is quite healthy. It all comes down to what you put on it and what type of crust you make. There’s red pizza (using marinara for sauce) white pizza (using olive oil and garlic for sauce) and pesto pizza (obviously using pesto for sauce). You can put pretty much any veggie on top of pizza. If it’s something that takes longer to cook, like broccoli, just quickly boil it for a couple of minutes to prep before slicing it up and putting it on the pizza. Even carrots and potatoes can go on the pizza. Just grate them up and put them on right after the sauce. The super-thin slices couples with the sauce makes them cook by the time you take the pizza out of the oven. Also, don’t be afraid to put beans on your pizza for extra protein! I’ve put everything from chickpeas to black beans on mine.
It took much experimenting with many pizza crust recipes and a bit of tweaking on the one I finally found that was close to what I wanted. The crust is the core of the pizza, so I present to you–the perfect pizza crust.
The Result:
A wonderful warm, slightly crunchy, slighty bready, tinged with rosemary crust that perfectly holds its own to however many or few toppings you want. It works for thin or thick crust. If you want thin crust, either roll it out super thin and use a large pizza pan or divide it into two and make two regular-sized pizzas. For thicker crust, just roll it out to a regular pizza-size.
The Recipe:
1 cup warm water
1 packet yeast
1 Tablespoon sugar
1 Tablespoon dried rosemary
2 Tablespoons olive oil
pinch of sea salt
1 1/8 cup whole wheat flour
1 1/8 cup white flour
More flour for rolling out the dough
Put the water in a large bowl. Add the yeast and the sugar. Allow the yeast to work for about a minute.
Add in olive oil, rosemary, whole wheat flour, and white flour.
Mix. I use a hand-held electric dough hook, but it works by hand or with a real electric mixer too. If you’re using a dough hook, the dough is ready when it starts to climb up the hook. If you’re doing it by hand, it’s when the dough is no longer watery but still kind of sticky.
Put the dough in an oiled bowl in a warm location. I use my microwave, personally. Allow to rise for 30 to 45 minutes. 45 minutes is better, but if you’re pressed for time, 30 minutes is ok.
Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Prep your toppings.
Spread out flour on a surface. Flour your rolling pin. Plop the dough on the surface. Flip it a few times to spread out the flour. Roll to your desired size.
Top with whatever toppings you want.
Cook for 15 to 25 minutes. How long depends on how many toppings you put on/what your oven is like/what mood the dough is in.
Enjoy!
Source: Tweaked recipe from Emeril Lagasse
Friday Fun! (Nina’s Back, Refunds, and Gardening)
This was a busy, but overall fun week for me. One of my closest friends, Nina, was on a two month trip to Israel, and this week she returned home! (She kept a blog of her trip, check it out!) She and one of my other good friends came over Wednesday night, and we all cooked together. Well, Nina and I did. E was the cheering squad. Also, she brought the chocolate. Nina made tehini the way they do in Israel, and we had that with whole wheat bread for an appetizer. It’s a lot like hummus, only more bitter. For dinner we had whole wheat crust pizza topped with vodka sauce, marinated tempeh, shredded carrots, avocado, onions, spinach, and cheese. You guys, vodka sauce lends such a nice sweetness to a pizza. Swoon. Also, Nina brought me a lovely tapestry from Israel. I believe she said it was made by the tent dwelling Arabs, but I was also tipsy when she gave it to me, so I could totally be wrong about that. Although it is many colors, it is predominantly a vibrant shade of red with hints of black, so it will go really well with my living room. I’m so happy Nina is back, and she and E are going to be roommates, so I’ll be seeing much more of both of them.
In tidbits of news, my state refund came in, so there’ll be a bit of shopping this weekend. I was going to get a Wii, but I think I’ll wait for my federal refund for that. Instead, I’ll probably get a new tv, mostly so I can finally hitch up my mac to it and stream Netflix. Also, what’s the point of having a Wii if you’re playing on an old tv? (Don’t worry, budgeting types, some of the money will be going into savings and some into the terrifying undergrad debt).
I’ve decided (partly spurred on by my librarian friend, Kristi, check her blog out), that come hell or high water I will get some gardening done this year in spite of the fact that I have neither yard nor balcony and a kitty who is very determined not to share windowsills. I found a windowbox that is a bit sturdier and fits on the windowsill better, so hopefully she won’t knock it off. I’ve also got some other ideas up my sleeve (such as the topsy/turvy planting thing). I’m planning on growing tomatoes, herbs, peppers, and strawberries. I’m also considering potatoes via an indoor method Nina learned about in Israel. I am, however, known to have a brown thumb, so hopefully this pursuit won’t be in vain.
Happy weekend everyone!
Friday Fun! (Me vs. Turnip Greens)
Upon the realization that my budget went flying out the window in the last six months of 2009, I decided it was high time to get frugal again. This of course was spurred on when I got my annual free credit report and saw my student debt all summarized in one place. Anyway, to this budgeting end, I got two apps for my iTouch–Budget and SpendLite. I used Budget to outline my monthly budget. This left me with a set amount for food/necessities and one for fun. I added those two numbers together, divided by four, and there you have my weekly fun/food/necessities allowance which I plugged into SpendLite. I can add new expenses right on it as I go without having to save receipts and it automatically subtracts it for me. A world where I have to do less math is a world I like.
Anyway, so to this end, I realized I need to go back to the creative cooking that I established in my super-poor student days. I’m also attempting to eat more seasonally, as you guys know, because it’s cheaper and it exposes me to new foods. This week when I was grocery shopping, I came armed with a list of seasonal veggies–sweet potatoes, turnips, butternut squash, and kale. I quickly found the sweet potatoes and decided against butternut squash since I still had a backpile of frozen butternut squash ravivolis made last week. The turnips were disturbingly pre-cut and individually shrink-wrapped. WTF?! They looked like little deformed heads in shrinkwrap. Kinda like the heads in Futurama only without all that fun water to bounce around in.
Defeated in the turnip arena, I decided to brave the leafy green land of kale. One of my best friends loves kale and insists it’s easy enough to stir-fry up, so I approached the leafy green portion of the produce aisle that I usually give the evil eye to as I walk by. The problem with my grocery store is that it sticks labels of what the leafy greens are on the top in a manner that seems to have zero bearing on the leafy greens down below. You’d think that the lables would be in the same order as the leafy greens, but apparently not. After much searching, I decided that I’d probably found the kale. It was leafy. It was green. It looked fresh. It had a produce number on it, which the signs unfortunately didn’t have, but this meant I could type in the produce number at the self-checkout and be sure.
Upon arrival at the self-checkout, I typed in the produce number, and it informs me that I just bought around $1.50 worth of turnip greens.
Turnip greens?! What the fuck is a turnip green?!
However, the practical and very cheap portion of my mind reminded me that turnips are in season so probably the greens are too, and did I notice that this was only costing me $1.50? So I bought it. Plus removing things you’ve already keyed in at self-checkout is just annoying.
Using my mad librarian skizzillz, I discovered that most greens are cooked pretty similarly and that on the bitterness scale (what kind of veggie *needs* a bitterness scale?!) it is more bitter than spinach. Erm, ok. The next night, I had already determined to make pizza for dinner. The only veggies I had to put on it were sweet potatoes, black beans, turnip greens, and red potatoes. I learned from Vegan with a Vengeance that you can put potato on pizza if you thinly slice it and place give it enough oil to soak up to keep from being crunchy. I’d done that before, and it was amazing. Sweet potato, black beans, and cheese does not a filling pizza make, imho, so I pulled up info on cooking turnip greens on the interweb. Apparently you can make greens less bitter by quickly boiling them for a few minutes prior to cooking them in whatever you want to cook them in. Using copious amounts of garlic was also recommended. The number one recommendation though was to add pork grease. Yeah, that wasn’t going to happen, and I couldn’t help but wonder how bad these greens taste if you have to soak them in what essentially equals bacon grease. But I soldiered on.
I took the huge leaves, ripped two in half, and put them to boiling. Guys, turnip greens do not have a pleasant aroma when cooking. It was like smelling armpits. I drained them, stuck them on a cutting board, and soaked them with lemon juice. I read somewhere that putting lemon juice on spinach draws out the iron, and I figured it wouldn’t hurt the turnip greens. I then stood staring at them trying to determine the best method for the pizza.
Since the sweet potato slices have to be on the bottom of the white pizza to soak up the oil, I decided to do the herbs, garlic, and oil, then sweet potato, then ripped up bits of turnip greens topped with more garlic, followed by black beans and three kinds of cheese. One thing the interwebs didn’t tell me is that turnip greens are kinda stringy. I tossed the stems that extend up into the leaves ad infinitum and placed the pieces on the pizza. I crossed my fingers after assembling and stuck the whole thing in the oven.
Surprise, surprise, the pizza was a success! It was yummy and garlicky and the greens cooked to perfection sandwiched between sweet potatoes and garlic. I’m still not sure how I feel about a veggie that smells like armpits when you cook it and that needs to be soaked in other things, like garlic, to taste good. In any case, I still have about 10 leaves to use up somehow over the next week.
Happy weekend guys!
Friday Fun! (Happy 2010!)
Sorry for the hiatus last week, guys. I was recovering from my New Year’s Eve fun. For New Year’s Eve I acquired First Night buttons so I could go see the Kaiju Big Battel (sic) taking place in Boston. (Side-note: I cannot for the life of me understand why it’s called First Night and not Last Night. It’s the last night of 2009, not the first night of 2010! Ideas?!) I happened to catch some crazy Middle Eastern dancing that was occurring on a stage nearby while I was waiting. I have no idea what kind of dancing it was. It wasn’t bellydancing, and they hopped around waving their arms and fake swords a lot. Anyway, so Kaiju Big Battel is essentially WWE only the wrestlers are wearing monster costumes ala Godzilla and the stage has miniature buildings set up that they also smash. Two of my favorite characters of the night were Plantain and Dusto Bunny. Dusto Bunny was actually dusty! (Sorry I have no pictures of Kaiju to show you. I have yet to upload them from my camera). Anyway, then I met up with friends in the Common to see the ice sculptures and rang in the new decade on the Esplanade. It was definitely a fun night!
This week has been busy busy busy at work. They’re renovating my library (again). Currently all of us are crammed in one room while they work on the rest of it, but the exciting part, you guys, is I’m going to go from having a cubicle to an almost office! It’s pretty much an office minus a door, but I’ll have a divider up in lieu of a door. Plus they’re building me bookshelves, and I’m getting a brand new wood desk! I’m excited to move into my new office. It’s going to make me feel much more part of the team, since currently I’m the only one without an office.
In cooking this week, I tried out making gnocchi from scratch for the first time using sweet potatoes. It’s pretty simple, actually. You just cook the potatoes, pass them through a sieve, then combine it with spices, egg, and flour. The tricky part, I discovered, is adding just the right amount of flour. The consensus upon eating it was that it was neither good nor bad. A bit too floury. However, on reheating the leftovers, it went to good. I’m thinking maybe I just didn’t cook them long enough? I’ll definitely try it again. I think it’s one of those recipes you improve with over time. Kind of like pizza dough.
Oh, also, I’m all caught up in Lost now, so I’m totally ready for the new season. Bring. It. On!
Have a great weekend everyone!
Friday Fun! (On Thursday)
You guys get Friday Fun a day early this week, since I’m taking a three day weekend to visit my family in Vermont–father, brother, nephew, sister-in-law, grandmother, aunt, and uncle. I didn’t go up for Thanksgiving, since I had to work the day after, and Christmas is out of the question since that’s pretty much exactly when my very pregnant sister-in-law is due. So, we decided to do a visit mid-December and a visit mid-January instead. I like it. It means I get to skip lots of the holiday traffic.
Last Saturday was the first time I’ve washed my laundry in machines since June. Now, don’t think I’ve been wearing dirty clothes; I haven’t. I don’t have a washer/dryer at my apartment, and the nearest laundromat is a solid 1.25 miles away, so I’ve been handwashing everything. Yes, including towels. Well a couple of weeks ago, my drying rack broke (we’re fairly certain the kitty broke it), and I hadn’t had time to pick up a new one, so my laundry pile was enormous. Thus on Saturday I decided it was necessary to use machines if I was ever going to catch up, and guys can I just say, holy crap I’d forgotten what fabric softened clothes and towels feel like. *sighs* I don’t mind the upper body workout of handwashing, but my god I miss the fabric softener.
Also this weekend I officially became addicted to Lost. I’d almost finished the first season, which I was enjoying but not loving. But I decided to watch the season finale and start the second season anyway. Omg, the second season. I wound up having a mini-marathon, and I am now determined to catch up before the new season starts in February. The only other shows I’ve ever enjoyed this much are Buffy and True Blood, and I have to say that I think True Blood comes slightly behind Lost. I know; I can hear you gasping now. I am so into it; I even do the yelling at the screen thing. (Please remember I’m only in the second season, so no spoilery comments puhleeze!)
I wrapped all the presents I’ve bought so far, and they are now camped out under the tree. I’m almost completely done with my Chrismukkah shopping. I need to pick up a couple of little things, a present for my grandmother, and something for the kitty (yes I buy my pets Chrismukkah presents). Also a few presents I bought online haven’t arrived yet, and I need to bake cookies. It all sounds so busy, but it’s all stuff I enjoy doing, so I don’t mind.
I had really meant to get a book review up this week for the next Dark Tower book, but I still have about 50 pages to go, so it looks like you’ll have to wait for that until next week. It has been a very busy week with finals and life and all that, so I’m not too surprised I haven’t quite finished it.
Next week I’m giving my final presentation in class with my teammate, and then I’ll officially be on winter vacation! I’m also having some friends over for a Chrismukkah gathering, and other holiday activities. As long as I survive the visit home, it should be a pretty awesome week.
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This work by Amanda Nevius is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
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