Smooth Hummus

 

I'm pretty certain I've figured out what can make people go crazy.

This hummus.

That's right.  This here hummus that I made nearly drove me crazy.

I know that I've made regular chickpea hummus on this blog before.  I generally don't repeat recipes, but this new recipe is worth it.  While the first hummus recipe was quite tasty, one of the things that drove me absolutely nuts was the texture of the hummus.  Not to compare my recipe to store-bought hummus (Heads-up: I'm going to do exactly that), but I found that I was getting some chunky hummus.  No major chunk-age, but most definitely not smooth.  Is it so wrong to have a smooth and creamy hummus?  But no matter how much I ran that food processor, the texture just wouldn't improve.  So I satisfied my hummus cravings with chunky homemade hummus.  And that was that.

Or so I thought until I read Deb's blog post a while back.  Apparently (and thankfully), I wasn't the only person facing this problem.  The culprit behind my texture woes turned out to be a part of the main ingredient itself: chickpea skins.  If you look closely, you can see a sheer outer layer to canned chickpeas.*  That layer needs to go in order to give you that super smooth hummus that I'm craving.

This leads me into the part where I wasthisclose to poking my eyes out: the de-shelling process.  Did you know that chickpea skins can and will stick to ever-y-thing?  Deb must be a de-shelling machine because she stated that it took her 9 minutes to do this.  My chickpeas took me about 45 minutes.  Is that ridiculous?  In case you're unsure, the answer is "Yes".  Yes, it is ridiculous.  However, once I started the process, I was committed. And once the hummus was made, I was glad that I went the extra mile to get exactly what I wanted.

Cranberry-Almond Chocolate Biscotti

I want to let you guys in on a little somethin' somethin'.  I'm moving.

No, this blog isn't moving.  (At least not yet.  I actually do want to make it snazzier but that's not happening for a bit. Sorry!) I'm physically moving my junk from one apartment in Hoboken to another apartment in Hoboken.  I've been living in the same spot since I started this blog a few years ago, so this is an exciting, yet nerve-wracking, time for me.  I have a few blog posts lined up for the next couple weeks, so you most likely won't even realized I've been busy packing, unpacking, assembling furniture and decorating and the likes (crossing my fingers!).

However, you'll probably see a difference in the pictures that I start taking in a few weeks.  Will it be a good or a bad difference? Uh, that remains to be seen.  I actually previewed the new place at night-time, so I'm not certain of that situation just yet.  I'm hoping hoping hoping that I still have a good source of natural light.  If I don't, it will probably take me a few posts to figure out how to fix that....so what I'm saying is that I'm possibly gonna need some slack here.  No judgements, right?  Fab.

Oh hey, and I also have this biscotti recipe for you.  In the spirit of cleaning things out of the kitchen, I found some dried cranberries in the cupboard and slivered almonds in the freezer.  I've been going through a huge carb-craving phase lately, so I was inspired to adapt Katie's cherry-hazelnut biscotti recipe based on the ingredients I had on hand.

Red Wine Risotto with Peas

I'm really trying to write this blog post, but at the same time I am riveted by the History channel's presentation of the Bible.  I can't take it.  It's so good!  It's very well presented and even though I know what's coming, I'm sitting on the edge of the couch to watch every scene.  (OK, in reality, I only know when a few important scenes are coming.  I haven't sat in a Religion class since my Catholic high school days. PS - I'm not even Catholic.  Figure that one out.)

So.  Pretty much the above paragraph is all I wrote while watching a 2-hour presentation of The Bible.  In order to get some writing done, I had to switch to Worst Cooks In America.  There's a show that makes me ecstatic to have picked up cooking so easily and so quickly.  In all honesty, when I moved to Hoboken a few (ahem...several) years ago, I had an idea how to cook maybe 3 things. 

Which naturally meant that the first new recipe I decided to teach myself was...risotto.  Yeah, totally went big on that one.  I made a butternut squash risotto that was delicious, if I may toot my own horn.  Which I will.  I was actually pleasantly surprised by the outcome and was encouraged to expand my cooking horizons, if you will.

Recently, I stumbled across a Giada recipe for red wine risotto.  Wha...?  You know I love me some red wine.  And then I realized she also put peas in the recipe.  I love me some peas too!  And as icing on the cake, I didn't have to buy anything for this recipe since I obviously had red wine and peas at the ready.

Creamy Basil Tomato Soup with Italian Sausage

The other day I had to take my car into the shop for a routine oil change.  It's bad enough that I usually leave with a host of other services that my car also allegedly needs (really?!).  But!  I usually take my car to the local Sears Auto, which just so happens to be attached to a mall.  This is not good for my wallet. In the past, I have wandered around outside to extricate myself from the vortex of mall shopping.  No good can come from that.

Unfortunately, there is a Target down the street...We ALL know the end of that story, right?

So on this particular day, I decided that I would save myself and my wallet by bringing my own cup of coffee and plastering my bum to the chair in the Sears Auto department so that I would not wander around and buy that sparkly green eyeshadow and my seventh infinity scarf of the season.  (Even though I neeeeeed those!) Somehow, I made it through a three-hour wait and was able to return home, empty-handed!  So I promptly rewarded myself with soup.  Not just any soup.  Creamy Basil Tomato Soup with Italian Sausage.

Beer Batter Bread

Can we just get ready for St. Patrick's Day already?  This is pretty much my most favorite holiday of the year, primarily because it's a day to celebrate drinking.  Yes, I'm sure there is another, deeper meaning behind St. Patrick's Day, but that's not where this blog post is going.

For the past few years, my roommate and I have had a St. Patrick's Day morning/brunch party in Hoboken.  Hoboken's St. Patty's Day is celebrated on the first Saturday of the month of March.  It's a long story, but that's how it is.  We didn't do that this year since my roommate is in the process of selling the apartment.  We wouldn't want a repeat of that wine-on-the-ceiling incident that occurred a few years ago...That would be no bueno.

But what I could have is this beer bread.  I whipped this up in a matter or minutes, and uh, it didn't actually make it to any parties anywhere.  I sort of ate it.  Could you blame me?  It's all buttery and beer-tasting and stuff.  So go make your own.  It takes no time at all.

Spinach Bacon Blue Cheese Quiche

Ya'll.  I was back to work this week.  Let me tell you that I am not a happy camper.  I forgot how much I liked doing nothing.

Actually, that's not true.  I didn't forget how much I liked doing nothing.  That's the real problem, for sure.  But I have to be a grown up now and get back to being a productive legal alien in this country.  Nothing I can do about it....other than get married to an attractive and insanely rich man and become a kept lady.  Yes.  That is my future plan.  But until that happens, I will re-learn how to maximize my time.  I figured it would be best to start off with a quick and dirty quiche recipe.

OK, it's not really dirty.  Because that would be a bad thing.  Anything food-related that is dirty is most decidedly a bad thing.  Peep that.

Where is this language coming from?  I must be tired.  Ugh.  Here's the recipe.  Let's just do this!

Chai-Spiced Scones

So here we are again...splashing coffee in the general direction of my left eye (thank goodness for glasses!) on a cloudy afternoon while writing the alphabet in the air with my recuperating foot.  No big deal. 

Lately I feel as if I've been drinking a lot of coffee.

Make no mistake.  I have been.

Interestingly enough, though,  I haven't been drinking more coffee than I normally would.  The difference is that now I'm actually making it myself, with my Keurig at home.  Since I'm typically traveling 4 days out of the way in the wilderness of Pennsylvania (OK, that's a little dramatic), I usually have someone at Starbucks or Dunkin Donuts pass me a cup of coffee on my trek into work.  (See, I told you I was being dramatic.  Obviously I'm not in the wilderness if there's a Starbucks around.  Duh.)  I've actually been so guilty of visiting my local Starbucks so much (potentially up to 3 times a day) that my morning barista offered to bring me coffee in NJ.  So yeahhh, I may have a slight problem.

But what I really want to tell you about has nothing to do with my clumsiness, the recuperation of my feet, or my favorite barista.  It has everything to do with finding the perfect complement to that cup of coffee.  I choose scones.  Specifically, I choose chai-spiced scones.  The perfect blend of warm spices really brighten up any cup of joe.  The scone isn't overly sweet and wouldn't object to a quick dunking in the coffee cup, either.  Even scones love coffee.  That's the truth.