food diaries: home cooking #1

turning kale into lots of things, oatmeal, and sourdough

“Sometimes thinking about the dinner I’m going to make when I get home is the only thing that gets me through the day.”¹

I said this to my roommates thinking I’d get some nods, some sounds of agreement, understanding in the Objective Truth that there is nothing more relaxing than cooking an elaborate meal for yourself at the end of the day.

“Um. I like leftovers,” they said.

So turns out that most (many) people do not, in fact, look forward to cooking after a long day. They look forward to other forms of unwinding — takeout from a favorite spot, the new episode of a TV show, a long shower, a glass of wine. Not the rhythmic rocking of a sharp knife against a transluscent white onion. Not the sizzle of garlic in a pot. Not the burst of tomatoes crushed against a wood spoon.

But for me! Cooking a beautiful meal for myself is the ultimate form of self-care. And it doesn’t even have to be that elaborate or consuming! Most of these are not! So here are some of the things I’ve been cooking at home lately, if you, too, like treating yourself to a good homemade meal every now and then. Or even if you don’t.

Kale

I bought a big bag of kale at Aldi thinking I would inevitably eat a kale salad at one point in the week. And then the thought of crunching through a bowl of kale made me want to die. So instead I got creative with my kale… in the past, I’ve tossed kale leaves in some olive oil + plenty of salt and roasted them in the oven until they turned into kale chips.²

But I was craving something fresh + bright and thus… my kale was transformed into PESTO!

does anyone remember when people were flaming that girl for saying she was “Crazy” for preferring homemade pesto… bc she’s right

I did not follow a recipe for this mostly because I did not have most of the other traditional pesto ingredients in my fridge. Inspiration came from a walnut ricotta pesto I made for a dinner party a month ago. So I just blitzed together:

• leaves from like 5-6 things of kale

• like two stems of leftover basil from the fridge

• 5 walnuts (all we had left)

• a clove of garlic

• lemon juice from about half a lemon

• a tablespoon or so of ricotta cheese (parmesan works here too)

• salt, pepper, and olive oil (plus some warm water to loosen it up)

This was delicious. So delicious that I used it not only for the pasta dish I made that night but also for a lazy mushroom sausage risotto and mushroom scrambled eggs. (Can you tell I also bought mushrooms).

eat your greens!

Risotto, by the way, pretends to be hard to make but actually it doesn’t have to be if ur lazy. I loosely followed this recipe but I sauteed my mushrooms and sausage FIRST, transferred them to a bowl, then sauteed some garlic and onion in the same pan (no extra washing). You add a little butter, toast the risotto for a few minutes, then slowly add chicken stock and simmer until the risotto absorbs the stock and is al dente. You don’t even need the wine! I threw the mushrooms, sausage, and my pesto back in, stirred a few times, topped with parm and BAM. Excellent and took like 25 minutes.

Is this a real pesto? Maybe not. But was it delicious, cheap, and made with ingredients I needed to use up in my fridge? Yes!

So the next time you find yourself with some leftover greens/herbs, consider adding some fat, salt, and acid and blitzing that sh*t in a food processor (or an immersion blender which is what I did. See? Easy.)

Tacos

We went to a €1 taco spot a few weeks ago. I got five (one of each minus the vegetarian option) and they were all excellent.

“I could never make these at home,” I said mournfully.

And, yes, while I could not make five different types of tacos at home without lots of ingredients/money/time/waste, I could satisfy my taco (corn tortilla) craving. And satisfy I did.

real tacos + lots of egg breakfast tacos

I made steak³ + chicken tacos and also a spicy pulled chicken dish called pollo de tinga using a Kenji Lopez-Alt recipe that I do NOT recommend as a quick and easy weeknight dinner but was a fairly basic Saturday night dinner. I then moved into my favorite form of tacos, which are the “breakfast” kind (though I stand by eating them for all meals, and I did).

You can fill corn tortillas with scrambled eggs. Beans. Potatoes. Sweet potatoes. You can add bacon. Sausage. Tofu crumbles. Chorizo. Avocado. Sauteed veggies. The options are endlessly customizable.

I am preferential to a tostada, which is a taco except toasted so that the tortilla gets flat and crunchy and a little charred. I was topping these with just eggs until I saw Olivia Noceda make these smashed breakfast tacos. I am addicted to the Aldi turkey patties, so I split one in half, smashed it real thin, and cooked it on the tortilla. Paired with a fried egg, some greek yogurt, and hot sauce, this was delicious and thus on repeat for four meals in a row. I didn’t make any of the fancy toppings (pesto, red onion, etc.. but that kale pesto is singing to me…) so it also took literally seven minutes to make.

This is your reminder that breakfast tacos exist and they are easy and a fun way to level up your usual fried eggs. (Or, as I said, for dinner: just throw any combination of things onto a corn tortilla and you’ve got taco night).

Oatmeal

I know what you’re thinking — oatmeal isn’t a dinner to look forward to at the end of the day! Except it kind of is. One because I actually start looking forward to my breakfast at like 10pm and two because I have and will continue to eat oatmeal for dinner.

some of my most recent oatmeal bowls (my camera roll is full of oatmeal bowls)

There are so many things to love about oatmeal: oats are cheap. They are full of fiber. They are so easy and quick to make. They are CUSTOMIZABLE and VERSATILE which are also my favorite types of meals.

I make mine so that they are also high-protein (I know I’m sorry) and delicious and the secret is that I use egg whites and before you FREAK let me tell you 1) everyone on tiktok is doing it and 2) you really, truly can’t taste them. I take 40 grams of oats, cook them over the stove until they are my preferred texture, and then SLOWLY whisk in 3 fl oz. of egg whites, stirring constantly so they don’t cook into scrambled eggs. I add my favorite toppings (more on this below) and then BOOM. Sometimes I add protein powder or Greek yogurt for even more of a boost.

The best part of the oatmeal, though, is that is a vehicle for the toppings⁴ and trust I have mastered the art of toppings. My favorite oat combinations are:

• Chocolate PB oats: Stir in a tablespoon of cocoa powder while the oats are cooking and top with a drizzle of PB and (crucially) some salt. Sometimes I add a banana.

• Chocolate-covered strawberry oats: I like to cook the strawberries down first so they’re a little jammy (you can literally just microwave them to achieve this) and then throw them in right before the oats are done with the aforementioned tablespoon of cocoa powder.

• Caramelized banana oats: Take a banana and cut it lengthwise then throw it on a pan to cook down and get all gooey for like five minutes. Throw it on your bowl of oatmeal with some cinnamon and PB if you want. Decadence.

• PB&J oats: Thaw some frozen mixed berries (microwave) or use fresh if you have them, add PB. Easy yummy childhood bliss.

I eat oatmeal bowls for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. And also dessert. In fact I now think I will eat an oatmeal bowl for dessert tonight. Don’t sleep on oatmeal bowls. Or eat an oatmeal bowl and then go to bed — best sleep of your life.

Sourdough English muffins (and other baking endeavors)

This is cheating a little bit because it’s 1) not really cooking and 2) again, not really dinner, but I feel this is information I must share. First: like half the population during COVID, I fell into the sourdough bread trap. My various sourdough starters have been through various phases, but I’ve been keeping one alive pretty consistently in Spain. I’ve made sourdough bread, yes, and also whole wheat sourdough and cinnamon raisin sourdough and sourdough blondies and crackers from sourdough discard.

I’ve also made non-sourdough treats including a chocolate babka, cowboy cookies, lemon tea cakes, a three-layer banana cake, blueberry muffins, pistachio-almond cookies, a fruit galette, and five different types of cookies for our Spanish cookie exchange. Basically I have a lot of free time on my hands and it translates to making lots of treats.

And THEN. And then I woke up to the realization that you can bake not just sweet treats and cakes and cookies but also everyday items — like bread, yes, but also hamburger buns, rolls, tortillas, and English muffins.

Which brings us to today, in this current moment, when I have 20 English muffins sitting in front of me for their second rise. They are sourdough English muffins, but if you don’t have an active starter, they’re just as easy to make with instant yeast. And that’s just it — they’re so easy!! You make the dough, let it rest, pop out the muffins, and then cook them over a skillet. No baking needed!!

I made a batch and folded some blueberries into half the dough and made blueberry English muffins! You could add cinnamon and raisins! You could top them with everything seasoning! You could add pumpkin spice! Cranberries! ENDLESS OPTIONS, PEOPLE!!

(I use philip's coffee mug to punch them out don't tell him)

Anyway. This is a slightly more time intensive task (though not even!!) but it is so rewarding to do things like make your own bread and rolls. (also if you want another TikTok recommendation, these two-ingredient naan breads are also easy and delicious).

I’ve eaten the English muffins for breakfast with some cottage cheese, for dinner with arugula and a hamburger patty, as a (blueberry) breakfast sandwich with an egg and sausage (savory x sweet combo was taking me back to Bodo’s bagels tbh), or just as a snack drizzled with honey.

So next time you have a free Saturday/Sunday/need to slap the sh*t out of something for like 5 minutes, consider kneading some dough and making English muffins!

Bonus!

I did make two things this week that I cannot recommend you try because they were 1) ingredient intensive and 2) time intensive.

The first was recreating the octopus salad that changed my life in Porto. I also attempted a version of one of the toasts we had with smoked mackerel, but did a cream cheese and roasted red pepper spread on the bottom with some honey + flaky salt. Not an exact replica, but nailed the salty x sweet x smoky combo. The salad itself was also quite good. Not even close to as good as the original, but filling and texturally very nice to eat. It actually was quite easy to prepare as well, except for the fact that you need access to octopus. Not sure how easy that is in the US, but hey, if you’re one of my Spanish readers, give it a shot!

actually a great dinner

The second crazy thing I did was make two (really four) loaves of banana bread in an effort to eventually prove a point. The point is that I do think you should judge a banana bread NAKED (ie without any mix-ins), and that most GOOD banana bread recipes are better without the addition of nuts and/or chocolate, which occlude the lovely, caramel-y sweetness of the banana. However the market (eight of my friends) did not agree, so in the name of science, I’m testing my theory.⁵

BOTH?!?!?!? IT'S NOT EVEN BANANA BREAD AT THAT POINT

Saludos to not overcomplicating things in the kitchen — or maybe doing just that :)

1. When I was writing this: turkey burger on homemade English muffin bun with onions + mushrooms + arugula and roasted sweet potato fries. Today, when I’m publishing it: literally the exact same thing because it’s so easy and good.

2. Something about me is that I genuinely love roasted vegetables of any kind and I would actually prefer to eat roasted kale or crispy broccoli or caramelized carrots over the flimsy-ass potato chips they have in Spain. hOWEVER I will not pretend these actually replace potato chips if that’s what you want.

3. I have mastered cooking chicken breast but steak still scares me. I’m somehow always overcooking it just a little. Once I have access to my mom’s meat thermometer, though… everything will change.

4. Other things in this category: frozen yogurt as a vehicle for candy, carrots as a vehicle for hummus, toast as a vehicle for peanut butter.

5. Test occurred this weekend. There were some overarching issues with the loaves (bananas not ripe enough, poor distribution of add-ins) but there was a consensus, albeit an interesting one. For the record I have decided I like nuts in banana bread. 8