• Extra virgin olive oil (sorry, didn’t measure it, but not much)
• ~3 pounds boneless, skinless chicken thighs
• 2 pounds sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into spears
• 1 15 oz. can diced tomatoes (I used fire roasted w/ garlic), partially drained
• 1 medium yellow onion, stemmed, peeled, & cut into strips
• 4-6 cloves of garlic, peeled & smashed
• 2 cups chicken stock
• 2 teaspoons chopped fresh rosemary or 1/2 teaspoon dried rosemary, crushed
• ~1 teaspoon turmeric
• ~1 teaspoon cumin
• 1 teaspoon salt
• Freshly ground pepper, to taste

1. Heat oil on medium high in a heavy, large stockpot (I used our awesome French oven)
2. Lightly brown chicken with rosemary, turmeric, and cumin
3. Add onion & garlic and saute until onion is soft & translucent
4. Stir in remaining ingredients
5. Bring to a boil
6. Reduce heat to low, cover, simmer until potatoes are soft

I served it with roti/chapati, though I used the ready-to-make version from Costco (“Rotiland,” from Full Circle, the same company that makes the great “Tortillaland” make-them-yourself tortillas they also sell at Costco).

Sorry I didn’t get a photo—too busy eating!

[Inspired by a similar slow-cooker recipe at YumSugar.com]

Cooking With Chef Zoey: Butter with Bread from Evan Sass on Vimeo.

Evan’s Pressure-Cooker Dhal (Indian Lentil Curry Soup)

Ingredients:

• 1 TBSP extra-virgin olive oil [edit: I've started using 1 TBSP extra-virgin coconut oil instead, if for no other reason than the amazing smell it wafts through the kitchen]
• 1 yellow onion, diced
• 3-5 cloves of garlic, smashed & finely diced
• 2 stalks celery, diced
• 3 carrots, diced
• 1 or 3 tsp Patak’s Mild Curry Paste (or go spicier, or use whatever kind you can find or make your own)
• 1 can (14-15 oz.) Thai light coconut milk
• 1 can (15 oz.) diced tomatoes, drained
• 32 oz. vegetable or chicken stock (buy a box at the store, or, make your own—it’s easy!)
• 1 1/3 cups red lentils, rinsed & picked over
• 1 cinnamon stick
• 6 cardamom pods
• Kosher salt
• Freshly ground pepper
• 1 lime, cut in half

Equipment:

• Pressure cooker (ours is 6 quarts—if yours isn’t or you don’t have one, just use a regular old large pot and it’ll just take a little longer)
• Food processor or blender
• Large mixing bowl or other large container that can take the heat

Start Cookin’:

1. Heat the olive oil over medium heat, until it can run around the bottom of the pot like water.
2. Add the diced veggies and cook, stirring occasionally, until the onion is translucent, about 2-3 minutes
3. Add the curry paste and stir around until the veggies are coated
4. Pour in the coconut milk and veggie stock
5. Add the diced tomatoes
6. Stir in the lentils
7. Add in the cinnamon stick & cardamom pods (just leave ‘em floating on top)
8. Close lid on pressure cooker, bring up to pressure, reduce heat, cook for 8 minutes while regulator doohickey gently rocks.
9. Carefully transfer pressure cooker to sink (look out for escaping steam when you set it down) and run cold water over the top to force the pressure down and unlock the lid.
10. Fish out the cardamom pods (these can be hard to find) and the cinnamon stick.
11. Puree most of the soup mixture in your food processor or blender, only filling vessel up 1/2 way or less at a time to avoid steam causing a soup geyser.
12. Transfer blended soup to bowl, mix in the bit you left out of the blender.
13. Add salt and pepper to taste, and squeeze in fresh lime juice.
14. Eat up!

If you don’t have a pressure cooker, just cook uncovered in a large stock pot for about 20 minutes. Recipe inspired by "Garlicky Lentil Soup" and "Spiced Lentil Soup" in The Cook’s Encyclopedia of Soup, Barnes & Noble Books, 2002 (ISBN: 0-7607-3096-2).

"Daddy? Please can you make me some mackincheese, please? With just cheese."

"Instead of what?"

"Instead of mackin."

What would you do?

A quick search of our cupboard and the food shelves downstairs revealed that we’re out of the Annie’s organic Mac ‘n’ Cheese, and while we do have an old stash of the regular blue box stuff, I don’t really like serving that to Zoey. I decided to just make up my own, using some rotini noodles I found in the cupboard. They received Zoey’s okay, likely because they happen to come in a blue box.

Evan’s Mackincheese, Hold the Mackin, Add Cheese
1. Bring 8 cups of water and a pinch of kosher salt to a boil in a medium sauce pan.
2. Stir in 2 cups of rotini noodles, return to a boil. Boil for 9 minutes.
3. Drain noodles.
4. Add 1 TBS of butter to the hot pan, return noodles to pan, and stir over low heat.
5. Stir in 1/4 cup milk (I used soy milk since that’s what we have).
6. Stir in 1/2 cup of shredded medium cheddar cheese.
7. Grate some hard cheese like Parmigiano-Reggiano, pecorino romano, or, what we had, Cougar Gold (really a white cheddar with a harder consistency like the two previous cheeses—Rona got it as a gift from one of her students) into the pot, stirring. I grated about a 1-inch cube.
8. Stir in garlic powder to taste and about a 1/4 tsp turmeric to yellow it up a bit.

Deemed highly palatable by our resident preschooler, despite the lack of dehydrated cheese food. And I found it quite tasty, to boot!

Thanks (heh) to Rona’s new wheat / milk / egg-free food plan, we had to get creative with some of our dishes. Several things were doubled up, with traditional and alternate versions. It was all good.

Ala Alton Brown, we brined the turkey for about 5 hours before roasting. This made our 14 pound turkey roast in only 2 and a half hours, and it was incredibly juicy and flavorful. To learn more, check out the recipe, or search YouTube for "romancing the bird" (the name of the Good Eats episode in which this recipe originated). By far, the best turkey we’ve ever made.

We also made a gluten-free dressing (stuffing cooked outside of the bird) that was really good! We based it on this stuffing recipe from Gluten-Free Girl, but we left out the water chestnuts, bacon, and butter, and added in a pound of Fletcher’s Italian sausage. For bread we used most of a loaf of the house gluten-free bread from Flying Apron Bakery in Fremont. All of our chicken stock was frozen, so we just used one bouillon cube in 1/2 cup of water, and the dressing turned out great. (Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem to reheat in the microwave as well as does traditional stuffing’s eggy buttery goodness, so get your fill when it’s fresh from the oven.)

Rona made mashed potatoes with almond milk and possibly Earth Balance Soy Garden spread (not sure if she put that in or not). To go with it, Rona and Jen made awesome gluten-free gravy with the turkey drippings and some sweet rice flour.

The food went on and on (haven’t even mentioned the walnut streusel-topped yams with apple rings, the bacon green beans, or our version of Blue Ribbon Cooking School’s roasted beet salad) with some dishes not even getting touched. Good friends, good food, good times. Thanks!

You can see all the Thanksgiving 2007 photos on Flickr.

Ingredients:
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
2 Japanese eggplants, washed and cut in 1/2 inch slices
1/2 small yellow onion, diced
2 cloves of garlic, thinly sliced
Kosher salt, pinch
1 cup chicken stock
1 teaspoon brown sugar
Citrus soy sauce (or whatever kind you have on hand–you just need a bit)

Heat the oil in a wok or skillet on medium-high heat.
Add the eggplant, onion, garlic, and salt.
Stir-fry until onion turns translucent and eggplant starts to get soft.
Add the brown sugar and chicken stock and stir, cooking until liquid is mostly evaporated, about two minutes.
Finish off with a drizzle of soy sauce, stir it up, and serve.

I didn’t actually get around to trying it, but Rona reports it was quite tasty.

From World on a Plate:

Nestle Chocolatier Brownies

Quite possibly this is one of the best brownie recipes around. The brownie is rich, moist and chewy. Clearly many mothers did not bake in the style of the "moms" at Nestle! This final recipe shared here is a slight variation from the one on the package and from the product’s website, verybestbaking.com where there is a cookie recipe that I’ll be trying later this recipe with the 52% morsels.

3/4 cup granulated sugar

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter

2 tbsp water

10 oz. pkg of Nestle Chocolatier 62% bittersweet morsels

2 large eggs

2 tsp vanilla extract

1 cup AP flour

1/4 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp. salt

Directions:
PREHEAT oven to 325º F. Line 9-inch-square baking pan with foil; grease.

HEAT in a double boiler the package of morsels, sugar, butter and water over low heat, stirring constantly, until morsels and butter are melted. The consistency and color should look like vanilla pudding. Pour into medium bowl. The liquid should be warm but not steaming hot before proceeding to the next step. Stir in eggs, one at a time, until mixed in; add in vanilla extract. Add flour, baking soda and salt; mix well.

POUR into prepared baking pan.

BAKE for 16 to 20 minutes until wooden pick inserted in center comes out slightly sticky. Cool in pan on wire rack. Lift brownie from pan with foil to cutting board. Carefully remove foil. Cut.

(See the set of photos on Flickr.)

* Bake for about an hour, provided your oven works. You know, in case you’re interested.

Anyway, after we left, we picked up an iron supplement and some herbs from Dr. Tracy’s office. The hospital staff tried to give me a prescription for iron plus a stool softener for the side effects. I did get their prescription for Methergine. That was helpful and cheap! Tracy’s iron and herbs are working perfectly (no stool softener needed, in case you were wondering).

We finally got home around 5:30pm. Thank goodness for the kindness and patience of Susan and her kids, Prydwyn and Aiavel. They took care of Zoey all day. They played dress-up. They played with the train set and all the toys that were unpacked. And read books and played the piano. And they went on cookie missions to the downstairs freezer. We are so grateful to you for hanging out all day long and finding what you needed to take care of everything!

Susan was our doula for Zoey. She was to be our doula again for Oliver … and I guess she was. We love you Susan!

In the days since then, I have slept and eaten many iron-rich foods. I have started to eat red meat again. I had to remember how to cook it. We have started with top sirloin steaks. I can remember my mom making them from my childhood and how she sliced it up all pretty. Well, we had to check on the Alton Brown site to see how to make them. Surprisingly, it is pretty easy and less expensive than I thought (we bought beef raised with no hormones, grain-fed, etc.).

How to cook top sirloin steak:

• Place some aluminum foil (with edges crimped up to contain grease) on an oven rack on the very bottom setting.
• Place your other oven rack on the next setting up.
• Preheat your broiler.
• Brush the steak lightly with olive oil, then add salt and pepper to taste.
• Place steak directly on the oven rack. (We cheated and put it on aluminum foil.)
• Broil for 5 minutes.
• Tip: Make a "snake" out of yet another sheet of aluminum foil and close it in your oven door to keep the broiler from shutting off too soon.
• Turn the steak over and broil for another 5 minutes. (Don’t forget to replace the snake in the door!)
• Move the oven rack with the steak to the top setting and broil for 3 minutes.
• You might need to move the grease-catching oven rack up to the notch just beneath the steak, but we didn’t need to since we were cheating.
• Turn the steak over and broil for another 3 minutes.
• Remove your steak from the oven to a wire cooling rack, and don’t touch it for 3 to 5 minutes.
• Your steak will be a perfect medium doneness, pink in the middle.

This recipe was swiped wholesale from foodnetwork.com, but was at least typed from memory (not that it’s that complicated).

I have also eaten other iron-rich foods such as lentil soup, stir-fried kale, strawberries, and thanks to Angela, Korean seaweed soup. Very tasty! So, I am feeling better and better. Stairs don’t wear me out anymore.

Evan and I are doing pretty well about this whole thing. I truly believe it is nature’s way. We are planning a small ceremony for Oliver. I don’t know when or exactly what it will entail yet, just that we will be planting trees (we still have Zoey’s placenta which we have always intended to plant with a tree for her).

As part of our closure, I asked Monica to do an astrology chart for him. It was pretty cool. Aquarius with a Libra moon and a Pisces ascendent. Everything about his chart was purposeful, planned, and specific. I now understand why the pregnancy was so easy (well, until the last little bit), too. It is a lot to go into here… But, we know that he is around us in spirit form.

Nicole made her world-famous lasagna rolls, and then shared the recipe with us all. Because good food can’t be hidden away, here’s her recipe:

Here’s the recipe, so you can relive the summit from the comfort of your own homes!

(I use Classico Spicy Red Pepper sauce with this meal. Meat-eaters can add 1/2 pound of cooked ground meat in addition to or instead of the spinach.)

Ingredients:
1 cup grated Parmesan cheese, divided
5 ounces shredded part-skim mozzarella cheese (1 1/4 cups)
15 ounces lite ricotta cheese (1 carton)
10 ounces frozen chopped spinach (1 package), thawed, drained, and squeezed dry
9 cooked lasagne noodles
vegetable oil cooking spray
sauce

Directions:
Coat bottom of baking dish with sauce. Set aside. Combine 3/4 cup Parmesan cheese, mozzarella cheese, and ricotta cheese in a large bowl, and stir well. Add spinach, and stir well. Spread about 1/3 cup of cheese mixture on each lasagne noodle. Roll up jelly-roll fashion. Pour sauce over rolls, cover with additional cheese.

Cover and bake at 350° F for 30 minutes. Uncover; top with remaining parmesan cheese and bake an additional 15 minutes.