Sassy Radish

The day after I wrote about the delicious Korean pancake, I came down with the cold to end all colds. And 12 days since the day I fell sick, I am still dealing with its remnants, which manifest themselves in pressure in my sinuses so bad, I have an upper jaw toothache. The same cold that managed to make me cough up a lung, develop a case of nasty pink eye, that very same cold has been unresponsive to antibiotics and other medicine. I’m seeing my doctor today again for hopefully stronger meds – I should be getting frequent flier miles there. I’ve used up numerous tissues and might be on the government’s special monitor list for buying too many decongestants. I swear, I’m not making anything out of them!

And so without a doubt, this long weekend was to be spent at home, recuperating and gaining my strength back. My boss also asked me to babysit her two pugs for a day, and while the dogs are very cute and friendly, I must say, I am a large dog person after all. For one reason or another, we couldn’t leave the pugs at home to take a walk outside – one of the dogs looked as if he was going to have a heart attack when he realized we might be leaving. So I sent KS off to watch the new Indiana Jones, while I puttered around the kitchen. We had some lemons left over and some yogurt I had to put to some good use in order not to throw it out, and so I once again, relied on Ina Garten’s recipe for her lemon yogurt cake, which I have made with blood oranges and Deb over at Smitten Kitchen made with grapefruit and other citrus things.

I omitted the glaze from my cake because I find that glazes generally ruin baked goods for me. I dislike glazed cakes the same way I dislike frosted cookies – I find them overly sweet. Without the glaze, the cake is a wonderful morning accompaniment to coffee, or stands as a snack on its own. And were I to make any other enhancements, I would say, use about half the oil the recipe asks for and you will wind up with a lovely, moist, seductively-scented cake. I can’t resist lemons in anything – and with the sun shining and the warm weather finally settling in, this lemon cake just makes me want to grin from ear to ear.

Of course, no cake of this nature for me would be replete without cranberries, as I like a little bit of tartness in the otherwise sweet dough. As some of you might know, each November, I buy about 6 bags of cranberries, use about 2-3 bags on the holiday itself, and then freeze the remaining 3 bags. They last me about a year and make a fantastic addition to things like pumpkin bread, apple pie and the above creation.

Continue reading lemon yogurt cake with cranberries.

People, it’s been a busy week and it all started on Monday when KS and I attended a wonderful benefit, which was inspirational and motivating. I’ve been asked to try to create a Russia-based branch – so we’ll see if I am successful in launching a Russia chapter. Would be swell!

The other weeknights, tonight included, KS has been galavanting around town for business-related functions, and I (sigh) have been left home alone, forced to fend for myself and cook single portion meals, which could at times be daunting. Well, not this time!

While catching up on my daily food blog reading, I came upon David Lebovitz’ recipe for a Korean pancake. And it looked so good that I resolved to cook it that very evening for my own single-portion dinner.

Except, when it comes to cooking for myself, I am quite shockingly lazy. I mean really lazy. Lazy enough that I had to stand in the kitchen making a mental list of pros and cons of whether or not I should cook this dish for myself. We’re talking about a five minute dish, here. But I was all, “Meh, I have to clean up after myself and I don’t wanna,” and “All I want to do is watch Freaks & Geeks on dvd, not cook and clean up!” People, I mean stupendously lazy. But I was so ashamed of just how lazy I was, that my own self-shame, propelled me to get off my behind and make this pancake.

Which. Was. Amazing.

I know that David instructed to let this pancake cool before eating it, but in my book, that just wasn’t happening – I was far too hungry to wait. I ate it warm, drizzled with Sriracha sauce (ok, so not really Korean, but still) and a side of kimchee, which I could eat daily for breakfast, lunch and dinner. And it was heavenly and I was even more ashamed of having even debated making it.

And so, tonight, with KS being out and about again, I am left to my own devices. I have a bunch of scallions left over and a jar of kimchee in the fridge. I think another pancake is in order for dinner. I just hope that I don’t have the same internal laziness debate when I get home – that would be truly embarrassing.

Continue reading korean pancake.

I’m going to make this short and sweet for several reasons. First of all there is little I can say about chocolate-covered matzo, other than it’s super easy to make, it tastes really good, and it gives you a great way to use your leftover matzo, which you probably have grown sick of in the 8 day span when Passover ran your life and diet.

Me, I had a few boxes left over, reminding me of my over-zealousness in preparation for the holiday. Also, chocolate-covered matzo is so easy to make, it’s almost embarrassing to dedicate a whole blog post to it, let alone give you the recipe for how to make it. It’s almost as if I would talk down to you all, it’s that easy. And talking down to you is the last thing I want to do.

But here’s the thing – this simple snack tastes so good, I want to tell the world, you don’t have to eat your matzo plain, or with cream cheese or butter – you can have it with chocolate. (As if I needed another reason to have chocolate.)

And lastly, I want to keep this short because today is my 30th birthday(here come the wrinkles!) So I want to go and revel in the day – I think I deserve it. Maybe I’ll make myself a chocolate-covered matzo and stick a candle in it.

Continue reading chocolate-covered matzo.