Saturday, April 24, 2010

who you callin' fattoush?

For the past three weeks, I have been working on a very large freelance project: copy-editing and Americanizing a British cookbook for publication in the U.S. It is unlike and much longer than other project I've worked on (thanks to my former life as a magazine editor), and it's been both exciting and grueling. Ironically, since I began working on it, I haven't cooked a damn thing. Instead, I've spent most of my time hunched over a desk, scribbling out computations and proofreading symbols, and the time not spent working has been spent wailing about how busy I am. My balls-to-the-wall approach to this task has left no time for kitchen business.

So, after handing in the first half of the assignment on Monday, I pulled out my knives, cracked open my cooking bible, and set to work turning the uber-stale whole wheat pitas festering on my kitchen counter into a big, refreshing dinner. Though I looked to Mark Bittman's recipe, I confess that I didn't measure a single ingredient. After days and days of being so structured with my time, so focused on a single task and exectuting it as perfectly as possible, I was sick of trying to be perfect. I threw those pitas in the oven to toast at a temperature we will never know and for a duration equally mysterious; meanwhile, I reached for vegetables, a bunch of parsley, a fragrant lemon. It's like I was on autopilot--mostly checked-out from my brain, but aware enough that I knew how good it felt not to be following directions or adhering to a schedule.
Oh, and it tasted really, really good.
Fattoush (Lebanese bread salad)
Adapted from Mark Bittman
Serves 2 to 3
Note: all quantities are approximations and/or outright guesses.
2 whole wheat pitas
A big pile of minced fresh parsley that, to you, looks like it might be about 1/3 cup
1/2 small or medium red onion, diced finely
10-15 grape tomatoes, halved
1/2 English cucumber, sliced into rounds and then cut into quarter-rounds
1/2 red bell pepper, cut about as small as the cucumber
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
Juice of 1 lemon
Extra-virgin olive oil (4-6 Tbsp. or to taste)
1. Throw pita into a 250-350*F oven and toast until lightly or heavily crunchy; lightly crunchy is nice, but heavily works, too.
2. Combine parsley, onion, tomatoes, cucumber and bell pepper in a large bowl.
3. When pita is toasted to your liking, or when you remember it and pluck it from the oven, tear into bite-size pieces. (If it's really crunchy, just break it up as best you can and break up any pointed edges.) Add to bowl.
4. Season everything with salt and pepper, drizzle lemon juice and oil on top, and toss to combine. Serve immediately or, if your bread came out extremely crunchy, let salad sit a while for bread to soak up some liquid and soften to a eater-friendly consistency before serving.

Thursday, February 11, 2010

I'm here, I swear

Urgh.

That, dear blog reader, is the sound of my frustration. You haven't seen a post from me in more than a month. The reason for this? Blogspot hates me. You see, I have done all sorts of delicious cooking so far this year. Spanakopita! Minestrone with five different kinds of vegetable! Oatmeal breakfast bars! The list goes on. But every time I try to upload photos, write a post, anything, the website goes wonky and nothing works right and I get reeeeally frustrated, hurl objects and expletives at my computer, and retreat in utter defeat.

So, that's why I've been a failure of a blogger for the past several weeks. I've been doing a hell of a job cooking awesome foods, and I've actually attempted to post every new recipe here. It's just that my efforts have been thwarted. I'll keep plugging away with this #&$@~^% site, but I cannot promise that anything good will come of it.

Monday, January 4, 2010

happy birthday to IDEB!

Cheers! As of three days ago, I Don't Eat Bacon is a full year old. I certainly haven't been diligent about what, how and when I post here, and I definitely haven't taken the writing process very seriously. But that's what I like about this little blog o' mine, that I approach it much as I approach cooking. The processes are creative, impulsive, not always well thought out, almost always pleasureable.

I will continue to eat and cook new foods in 2010, so I see no reason why not to continue to maintain the blog, too. And though I tend to resist the pressure to make resolutions, I do hope to keep cooking--and blogging--toward the top of my personal want-to-do list. Too often, when I get bogged down with day-to-day stresses, I view cooking as an inconvenience, when almost always it is a real joy, with delicious rewards. The blog is that way, too: more satisfying than I usually think.


Oh, and I finally uploaded pictures to a few recent posts, of mac 'n' cheese, chili sweet-potato hash and some of the raw materials for Christmas dinner. Enjoy!