Starfish!

In my quest to make Goldfish crackers, I have instead ended up making Pufferfish and Starfish.

Yes, Starfish! I think I burned myself a few times in the process; right now, certain skin areas on my hands feel kind of raw. Ah well.

Before I started, I firmly decide that I would follow this recipe. However, since I am PIE-314 and enjoy taking risks that make my dishes terribe, I end up tweaking everything. Though, this time I had a legitimate reason for changing stuff. The butter wouldn't mix properly.

The recipe asked for room-temperature butter. Right now, room temperature is around18 degrees C. In science," room temperature" is around 20 to 25 degrees C. The butter was hard, and hard to mix. So I ended up adding more milk than the recipe called for.

I also ended up adding less flour, because the dough was extremely dry.

So I give you STARFISH! [or any other shape, really]. - 38 to 40 crackers!!!

Ingredients:

1. 1 stick of butter [half a cup]

2. 4 tbsp low-fat milk [or whole milk]

3. 2 cups of shredded cheese. Don't worry, it'll break into smaller pieces! :) I used a 4-cheese blend.

4. 1 cup of whole wheat unbleached awesome flour plus 4 to 8 heaped tsps

5. 0.5 tsp baking powder [I think I used around 0.8 tsp, though.]

6. A bit of salt and/or pepper.

7. A lot of herbs. I used dried oregano and thyme.

Method

1. Mix butter, milk, cheese, salt, herbs. The butter will be lumpy.

2. Add in one cup of flour and the baking powder. Mix for about 20 minutes. [Or, if you're gifted at mixing, unlike me, fewer than 20 minutes].

3. Keep adding flour by the tsp [I think I used around 8 tsp] until it easily forms a ball that isn't stick. At this point, you may use your hands to knead it. It should be pretty dense, not sticky, and easily rollable without having to flour the cutting board [I rolled out the dough onto a wooden cutting board. A floured surface should not be necessary].

4. Depending on how crispy/crunchy/soft you want these crackers to be, roll out the dough. Some of my crackers are thin and have the texture of Wheat-Thins, and others look like snickerdoodles [but taste like cheese puffs...].

5. For those without ovens, microwave for 30 seconds on one side and 30 seconds again after flipping. The taste is about the same as the baked version, although the baked version has semi-burned corners [which I like]. I made 38 starfish and 3 microwaved crackers. I suppose I could've made 40 starfish in total, but I really had to try microwaving them, to see how they'd turn out [for when I have to cook in college].

Alternatively, bake them at 350 degrees F for 10 minutes on the bottom rack, and leave them there until a fork poked in comes out clean. You can also bake at 350 degrees F for 15 minutes, but if you can all your pans onto the bottom rack [which I can't], 10 minutes of baking saves more energy than 15 minutes. You can put them really closely together, since they do not poof out or expand much.

Enjoy!!!

CHILI SIN CARNE!

CHILI sans la viande - without animal pieces...instead, there are roman beans and lima beans and TVP and pickles and artichokes and tomato and parmesan and onion and crushed up tortilla chips [the leftovers].

A.k.a., awesome-everything-I-love-chili!

In fact, this chili even looks better than these here! YAY! This is just to prove to my brother that my plating, in fact, is not substandard [I've never really liked the idea of plating though, because it makes food appear more as an ornament than as a food].

Onions, artichokes, pickles, getting "gently browned"

Rehydrated TVP with dried chili and tomato paste marinade.

Adding the lima beans!

Ingredients:

1. A LOT of water. Keep adding cups of water throughout the.... 3-4 hours it takes to cook. I was initially going to make tomato/chili soup but that would mean that I used twice the amount of water. Which would've required a larger pot. Which I do not possess.

2. Lots of tomato paste!

3. Garlic

4. Onions! LOTS!

5. Pickles

6. Artichokes in oil - we have a jar of them. I don't know why, since no one in the family except for me and my brother has actually ever heard of the term "artichoke" before. I don't know who bought these... just that they've been sitting in the fridge for a while. Well, at least it covers the "oil" part of the chili.

7. Two cups of Roman beans. Soak these for a few hours. They take AGES to cook.

8. Half a cup of lima beans. They swell TREMENDOUSLY when soaked for a few hours. Literally 2.3 times their original sizes.

9. Half a cup of dried TVP, mixed with two cups of water and one scoop of tomato paste and two packets of dried chili. This way, the flavour gets "infused". Supposedly.

10. One cut up Boca burger since I dislike eating them grilled.

11. Leftover tortilla chips with the salt at the bottom.

12. Herbs - oregano, basil.

13. Quinoa, just because.

Method:

Cook everything on low heat for a few hours in a giant pot. Cook for an hour, turn off the heat, and go to XC practice for three hours. Come back later at around 9:30pm and continue letting the stuff simmer on low heat, adding water every now and then. When the roman beans are done, the chili is ready. The roman beans determine the cooking time!!

I wonder who else makes chili at 10:41 pm.

I ended up with a lot of chili. Look at that! Three boxes of chili. BUT IT'S AWESOME BECAUSE I LOVE CHILI!

The last time I made chili was the first day of school last September. It wasn't as great as this one. This one is "awesome-sauce"ly thick and beany and protein-filled! And it DOES NOT taste bland... for those of you who think vegetarian stuff is "rabbit food". It is NOT.