statgrrl's Profile

Yum, love kale chips. About a month ago I served them to my toddler daughter, who up until that point had absolutely refused to eat anything green, and for some reason she liked them. We call them "Crunchy Kale" because she loves anything crunchy, and she now asks for it with her dinner nearly every night. They are crumbly and she loves squeezing them in her fist and making a big green mess, but the fact that at least 25% of the kale ends up in her mouth is good enough for me, and makes it worth the 75% mess. :-) I make small batches just for her in the toaster oven -- it's a 10 minute job, to offer my daughter something green and healthy. So great.

I totally sympathize with your parents. I seem to have this minor sensitivity to garlic, such that if I eat rich garlicky food I will probably feel queasy for a while afterwards; I've tested it and it's the garlic that makes me queasy, not the richness. And, like your parents, I hate the smell of garlic, both the way it clings to the house when cooking and the way it makes me (& my husband!) stink. So I almost always put in less garlic than the recipe calls for, and I often leave it out altogether, with no substitutes made. I almost never miss it -- if your parents are sensitive to the flavor/small of garlic then they probably will be quite happy to leave it out and not miss it. It's really easy to cook without garlic, especially if it's a good recipe and you're using fresh ingredients.

When I make the dough in my food processor it's too easy for me to cut the butter too small and lose some of the flakiness. I've found that it's easier for me to monitor if I use my stand mixer -- dump in the flour and butter (cut into slices or chunks), mix on med-high until the butter chunks are mostly pea-sized. Turn down to low, pour in water just until the dough comes together, and then it's done. I use a standard 3:2:1 dough recipe (3 parts flour, 2 parts fat, 1 part liquid, by weight), and sometimes use cider vinegar &/or egg for part of the liquid. I tend not to worry too much about keeping everything ice cold, and my crusts always turn out well. Although I will say that on the few occasions when I have taken my time to chill everything and give it extra rest times, the crust did turn out flakier. :-)

I don't understand why you're saying that we need to re-calculate the amount of baking powder &/or soda in a recipe. If the original recipe was written with the proper ratio of leavening agent to flour, and accounts for any acidity in the batter, then that ratio would hold even when everything is doubled. I don't see any reason to do any calculations other than multiplying everything by 2.

You could try making cacao tea -- steep the nibs in hot water for 5-6 minutes, strain, and then add sweetener or milk to taste. The flavor is very mild and you'll want to steep a lot longer than you would steep tea leaves, but you might find that you like it, and it definitely won't be too crunchy for your teeth!

My favorite cupcake cookbook is "Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World", and they have a recipe for carrot cake cupcakes with cream cheese frosting. This is one of the few recipes in the book that I haven't tried, so I can't vouch for it, but all the other recipes are super easy and super tasty. I'm sure it could easily be adapted to a layer cake by doubling the recipe (each recipe makes 12 cupcakes, which I think would probably just make one layer), and adjusting the bake time.

@jenawithonen, it's true that most carrot cake recipes use oil rather than butter, but they also use eggs.

I've found that my toddler is more likely to eat purees than whole foods, for some odd reason. For example, she's rarely willing to eat broccoli, no matter how I cook or sauce it (unless she's in a really accommodating mood). But when I made a pureed broccoli soup over the weekend she was happy to eat up every last bite.

I also like everyone's ideas of separating out the components of the grown-up meal. The only problem for us is that my daughter would eat the "protein" and "carb" components of the meal and skip the vegetables. :-)

And for what it's worth, I put a lot of effort into trying to teach my daughter to eat well -- constantly remind her to try everything, serve her the same food we're eating, etc etc. But, I have to admit that there are plenty of dinners when I get tired of seeing her eat nothing, and tired of reminding her to try one more bite, and I'm tempted just to make her a PB&J, so that I won't have to deal with it. And I'm not a single mom, I have a husband around for extra support. So, CDID, I definitely sympathize and know what you're going through. I hope some of these tips will help!

I'm surprised at how many posters have such strong feelings about this chair, because I've never seen it or even heard of it before. Is it really the most recognizable chair of the 21st century?? I guess I'm too IKEA for stuff like that.

My favorite food memory: I was on a tiny island off the coast of Turkey. Somehow my friend and I had befriended the live-in caretaker of the island, who lived in a little stone cottage and chatted up the tourists as they arrived by boat. We went back the next day and he had caught mackerel that morning, which he fried up for us for lunch. It was the freshest fish I'd ever eaten, and cooked perfectly -- crispy on the outside and tender on the inside. With the sun shining on the Mediterranean, sitting under the shade of an olive tree eating the best fish ever, and no tourists that day except for us, it was absolutely divine.

Actually, there's a food holiday for every day of the year. I once checked out a cookbook from the library that provided recipes for all 365 days.