About Me

My photo
Portland, Oregon, United States

Sunday, November 30, 2008

Mockingbird Hill

My mom sang to me a lot, because her mom sang to her a lot. This is one of the songs they sang/sing:



It makes me feel happy and safe. I hope it makes you feel good too.


My mom also sang me THIS song, and I never knew that it was from "Jesus Christ Superstar" until Jessie Christensen mysteriously began to sing it one day. I was stunned and asked her where it was from. Then I remembered my mom loves that musical. Oh well. I love this song too.

Sunday, November 23, 2008

Pumpkin Muffins!

I made these last night and they were AMAZING. The recipe is from the Co-op monthly specials flyer.

Thanksgiving Morning Organic Pumpkin Muffins
2 1/2 cups flour
2 cups sugar
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon allspice
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
3 eggs
one 15-ounce can organic pumpkin (i substituted 1 3/4 cups pumpkin puree)
3/4 cup oil
1/2 cup raisins (i left these out)
1/2 cup walnuts (left these out too)

Cinnamon/Sugar Topping
2 tablespoons sugar
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Sift together flour, sugar, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, allspice, and cloves. In a separate bowl, beat eggs until well combined. Add pumpkin and stir to combine. Add oil gradually, stirring to mix well. Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients and mix. Do not over-mix. Add raisins and walnuts, stirring just to combine.
Grease and flour or line 12 large muffin cups or 16 mini-muffin cups 3/4 full or two mini-loaf pans and sprinkle lightly with cinnamon/sugar topping (to make tops hard and crunchy). Bake 30 minutes or until tops are firm.

Thursday, November 20, 2008

LOL



Found on I Can Has Cheezburger

Sunday, November 9, 2008

The Mixtecs




I've been doing a research project about the Mixtec of Mexico. They are most famous for their Codices, which are books of pictographic writing that tell stories of their history.
These are the signs for the days in the Mixtec calender:
Names of the Days in the Mixtec Calender
And this is the coolest pictograph I've come across so far :-)

I think I'll write more when I'm done with my project.

Thursday, November 6, 2008

Baking, cooking, computers


I just made Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookies and they are delightful.


In other news, Evan and I discovered that the reason it seemed like the overheating had gotten worse is because it has. My computer's fan isn't running at all, which explains a lot. So I've ordered a new one for $50 and Evan is almost certain he'll be able to install it for me. The intense heat of the computer killed my hard drive so I just had to buy a new one of those for $100 and have Evan install THAT. Also, my battery is pretty much shot, so unless I want to use my computer plugged in all the time, I'm gonna have to invest in one of those too. The heat killed that part too. Evan is pretty sure that the rest of the computer should be fine. He was saying that if it doesn't work, it generally won't turn on, there's no gradual for the rest of the parts(sort of). But he doesn't know if it's affected the life of the computer, so it might not last as long as I'd like it too. I'm still going with fixing it though, because a couple hundred bucks is a lot cheaper than a grand, which is what a new one would cost(i'm not buying some shitty PC again, I'll buy a new Mac and take better care of it for my next computer). The good news is that my new hard drive is 3 times as much memory(320 GB) so that'll be nice to have.

Other things I've baked lately:
Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins but I substituted brown sugar for white, butter for the oil, did a whole cup of pumpkin(which I baked and pureed myself the other day), and heavy cream for the water. I also didn't have any cloves, so left that out, and I forgot the chocolate chips but didn't even realize it until I'd eaten two of the delicious delicious muffins.

I also made Pumpkin cookies the other day but now I can't find the recipe I used. Oh dear. The people who were at my Halloween Party will vouch for their deliciousness.

What else have I been making...? Oh! I made Chicken Tikka Masala from scratch on Tuesday night! I got the recipe from the Co-op monthly advertisement. I'll type it out so you can make this too! I'm sure it would work just fine with tofu, or just leave the "meat" out of it, and pour the sauce over rice and veggies.

To make the marinade:
Combine 1 cup of plain yogurt with juice from half a lemon, one teaspoon of fresh chopped ginger, 2 teaspoons of black pepper and one teaspoon each of ground cumin, ground cayenne pepper, cinnamon, and salt.
Place 2 pounds of boneless chicken breast or thighs, cut into one inch chunks, into a glass or metal bowl, add the marinade and refrigerate overnight.

To make the sauce:
3 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 medium onion, diced
1 serrano pepper, diced [i substituted some jalapeƱos from my garden]
2 tablespoons garlic, peeled and minced
2 tablespoons fresh ginger, peeled and minced
1 teaspoon each of garam masala [i found this at the co-op in bulk, so I'm sure you can find it wherever you live, too!], ground cumin, paprika, and coriander
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1 tablespoon tomato paste
1 cup tomato sauce, plain
1 cup heavy cream

In a 6 quart sauce pan [or 5 quart soup pot, in my case], heat 3 tablespoons of vegetable oil and saute the onions until translucent, about 5 minutes. Add the garlic, ginger, serrano pepper, garam masala, cumin, and coriander and saute 3 minutes more. Add the tomato paste and simmer 3 minutes. Add the tomato sauce and heavy cream and simmer 15 minutes.
While the sauce simmers, in a heavy skillet over medium heat, heat 2 tablespoons of vegetable oil and saute the marinated chicken, stirring often. Add the cooked chicken pieces to the warm sauce and mix well. Serve over basmati rice.