Sunday Brunch For One - Popover Edition

I woke up craving popovers. I lay in bed and day-dreamed about a tender, custard filled roll with a crispy exterior and an extra savory flavor. Sometimes you just know what you want. 

Popovers are really easy. Easier than muffins, easier than pancakes. And as with anything that puffs up in the oven they just feel really really fancy. 

I put on a kettle to make tea. Because first thing first, right? Then I kissed Mr. Tooth goodbye before he headed out to do his weekend-y things like rock climb with his friends and train his coworkers rascally dog. The morning was mine to do with what I pleased. 

UMAMI TOOTH'S EXTRA SAVORY POPOVERS

Makes 12 large popovers

4 large eggs

1 1/4 Cup flour

1 1/4 Cup milk

1 tsp kosher salt

1/2 cup finely grated Parmesan cheese

Pinch of nutmeg

Lots and lots of cracked pepper

12 small pats of Butter

Preheat the oven to 425 degree. Put your muffin tin in there to preheat with the oven. 

Mix all ingredients except the butter until well blended. If there are a few lumps that's fine. Let your batter rest on the counter while you drink tea and you call your Mom or something. 

When the oven is preheated remove the muffin tin and add a pat of butter to each muffin cup. Put the tin back in the oven for 2 minutes or so, just long enough for the butter to sizzle and start to brown. Hang up with your Mom when you hear the butter. You will need both hands for the next step. 

Using a 1/4 cup measuring cup fill each cup 2/3 full. Put your muffin tin back in the oven for 25 minutes. Do not open the door. Ever. At all.  Be patient. Sit in front of the oven and watch science (magic?) at work while your popovers puff up and get brown. 

When the timer goes off, pull your popovers out and work quickly with a pair of tongs, setting each one on a wire rack and piercing once or twice with a sharp knife to let the steam out. This will keep them from collapsing. 

Enjoy with some sautéed veggies or just by themselves. I ate mine with green beans sautéed in butter and left over champagne, garnished with almonds and dill. Fancy brunch for one!  

Breakfast At Work

I find myself eating on the job quite a bit. I can't remember the last gig I had where there was a common eating area for employees so the desk in my bay is my buffet table as well. I also can't bring myself to sit down at home to eat before i leave for work. I like my be meals to be leisurely and it's hard to enjoy myself if I'm thinking about traffic or a screening I have later in the day. Once I make it to work all that anxiety melts away and I am able to have a "civilized" breakfast. 

It's actually really nice to be able to graze all day, eating small meals at my desk while I screen footage or peruse the music bins. I like to think of it as multi tasking. 

This morning I'm enjoying raspberries, blackberries, apricots, peaches, homemade granola and kefir. And a mug of black tea of course. 

Do you eat at your desk? Which meals?

Making Peace With Ingredients That Freak Me Out

I am an adventurous eater. I ate escargot when I was 7. The waiters in their crisp white aprons quietly surprised as I tucked into the garlic filled shells, mopping up as much butter as possible with my bread. As a child I ate artichokes and curries with abandon. Sushi? Sure, no problem.

There are a few ingredients that I have never warmed to though. Feta cheese is somewhere in the top five. Something about the funky smell, sharp taste and crumbly texture has always turned me off. I've sheepishly avoided homemade spanikopita at potlucks and sharing Greek salads as a starter when I'm dining out with friends. It's my not-so-secret shame - even I can be a picky eater. 

For the past few years I've been working on my Feta issue (and the related blue cheese issue) by trying to incorporate the stuff into recipes and sometimes submitting to a Mediterranean salad when I go out to a favorite Armenian-Persian restaurant in Glendale with my ever-patient friend, Bex. 

And you know what? It's working. I have modified my palate. By looking closely at the things I don't like about feta (crumbly, funky, sharp) I was able to source some different types of Feta that do appeal to me, specifically those that are partially or all goat milk based which tend to be creamier and more delicately flavored. Problem solved. 

Umami Tooth's Feta Salad

Creamy French Feta - crumbled

Persian cucumbers - roughly chopped

Scallions - chopped

Flat leaf parsley - washed and de-stemmed 

Tapenade -  to taste

Good olive oil - to taste

Mix the ingredients up in a big bowl and eat standing up in front of the window fan because it is hot as heck!

Mud Run 2013

My friend Sarah and I participated in the 20th annual Mud Run at Camp Pendleton on Sunday.

We taped up our oldest running shoes to make them mud-ready and hit the course with a couple thousand other people. As I told Mr. Tooth via text post race, it was 80% hills and 20% mud! I've never been so happy that I made myself do those miserable hill sprints in the weeks leading up to the race. It paid off. I think this race was the perfect reminder that even if my everyday training is tedious or painful it's so worth it in the end. 

Sarah texted me with our results this morning. There were a quite a few bottlenecks on the course so our usual race pace of a 9-10 minute mile was significantly increased. Also, running through mud is so much harder than it looks... So slippery and sticky. I am so in awe of the US Marines who train on this course all the time. 

We celebrated by having a post race beer! Best idea ever! Oorah!
 

Doing Breakfast Right

Mr. Tooth and I went on a much needed getaway a month ago. The freelance life can leave you weary and turned upside down. Am I hungry? Am I tired? What do I do with myself when I'm not working? When we realized we would have an overlapping week off we hit the road and headed north to Paso Robles. 

Paso Robles is the best. Yes, the best. It's a three hour drive from LA and it doesn't require any fancy clothes or a huge budget. Mr. Tooth suggested that we stay at B&B. He's brilliant! Someone else makes us delicious breakfast and we don't have to leave the premises? Sold.

Our Inn Keeper, Amber, was just lovely. Our two days with her were relaxing and very centering. And she made us granola. Home-made granola. I hadn't thought about granola in years. I'm not much of a cold cereal fan. (Except Cinnamon Toast Crunch, and that is for VERY special occasions.) But this granola she made, so coconut-y, so crisp, so not-too-sweet. I was inspired. 

And so I made some for myself today. 

Casa del Tooth is filled with the warm, toasty scent of oats and almonds and of course, coconut. I used this recipe but modified it by using coconut oil and less sugar. I plan to enjoy my granola with some kefir (the Champagne of Dairy hahahahaha) to balance out the sweetness. Viva desayuno!

Weeknight Dinner- Savory Pancakes

I'm experimenting with quick weeknight meals. I usually get home from work by 8pm and I'm famished. Mr. Tooth doesn't cook - he prefers baking which is AOK with me. (Brown butter chocolate chip cookies anyone? This is why I married him.)

I decided to make korean savory pancakes for our Tuesday night dinner. I figured it would be fast and relatively healthy. I had a bunch of random farmers market goodies that I wanted to use up too. 

My recipe made four 8" pancakes, enough to have some leftovers for tomorrow's lunch. 

UMAMI TOOTH'S SAVORY PANCAKES

2 cups shredded, finely diced, or chiffonaded veggies (I used a combo of mushrooms, summer squash, mustard greens and carrots)

1 bunch green onions cut into two inch lengths, whites and greens included. 

1/2 cup kimchi chopped

5 large raw shrimp, chopped

Batter: 2 eggs, 1 cup flour, 1.5 cups water, mixed until smooth. 

Preheat a nonstick skillet over medium heat and add a glug of your favorite neutral oil. 

Mix the veggies and shrimp into the batter and add about 1 1/2 cups to the hot skillet. Spread around until the batter coats the bottom of the pan. Cook each side over medium heat until lightly browned - about 2-3 minutes per side.  Repeat until you have used up your batter. 

So good!

(Bruce wanted the shrimp all to himself)

Running!

I signed up for a 5K back in January with my buddy Brian. I was not a runner. Never had been. I love hiking, walking, spinning, weight lifting... It turns out I really love running. At least the racing part! I tried another 5k and then I was hooked.

I've got a 10K Mudrun in two weeks and a half marathon in August. My goal is to finish the half in under 2.5 hours. 

This new "hobby" allows me to discover new parts of Greater Los Angeles and my own neighborhood. It's really amazing to go at human speed in this car city. I see so much.