DIY Month 2012!

So I'm already one week into the thick of it! That is, making everything I consume from scratch. A while ago, in a lonely stairwell in the hospital, I came across a lone tortilla chip. There, in between the sixth and seventh floors it sat for months, and the only thing that that happened to it was a little dust settling on it. I couldn't help but imagine that sitting in my stomach. I know the stairwell lacks the same enzymes in my digestive tract, but it still eeked me out. All the more reason to pursue knowing exactly what I put in my body.

The rules are the same as last year:

• I will make everything from scratch ...within reason. At this juncture, it is not currently within my means to milk my own cows, mill my own flour, press my own oil, etc. However, if I can take a step back in the process of preparing an item, I will (e.g. orange juice comes from oranges, and I can reasonably juice some oranges).
• No canned or frozen fruits/veggies/beans/etc. I chose July/August as the month to do this, as fresh produce is plentiful in Wisconsin.
• I will allow myself beer, wine, coffee, and tea, although someday I wish to venture into preparing each of these.
• I will allow myself to eat out 3 times during the month. I'm only human, and there are so many good restaurants in Madison. Also, many celebrations and social events take place at restaurants, from which I would not like to exclude myself.

I had many favorites from my forays last year, and I look forward to making those again. I also have a list of things that will be new this year. As my first week went last year, most of what I've eaten this last week consisted of fruit and raw veggies, so my week wasn't too exciting. I did get around to making some new stuff though, and I will share them in the coming week.

Frozen grapes: nature's popsicle

Happy reading!

A Year in Food

So I've decided to do it again: another DIY month! This year I've decided to go from July 15th-August 15th. I'm moving on August 15th, and I didn't want to suffer through unpacking my kitchen and having to make everything from scratch.

So I recently realized just how quickly July 15th is coming up, and besides trying to eat up everything not homemade in my pantry/fridge/freezer, I thought I'd post about some of my food adventures over the last year (most of which I had intended to blog about, but never got around to doing). So here goes:

Thanksgiving

Every year since 2005, I've made pumpkin ravioli for Thanksgiving. It started when I was a strict vegetarian and has continued on because it is that good. Trust me. It's a basic pasta dough filled with fresh ricotta, mozzarella, parmesan, and spices that is tossed with a creamy, sage-butter sauce.

pasta dough, pre-kneading

after 10 minutes of kneading

homemade ricotta, draining

Christmas

This year for Christmas, I tackled co-worker gifts by making chocolate truffles and caramels. Good stuff. I also ended up making the pumpkin ravioli again, as requested by my family in Omaha, since I had to stay in Wisconsin for Thanksgiving.

New Year's Resolution

For the New Year, Michael and I resolved to eat more sushi. I can say with certainty that this is the longest I've upheld a resolution. We quickly delved into making our own sushi (it's super easy), and we have gotten pretty creative. If it's not super clear, Madison doesn't have the greatest selection of fresh seafood, but we've done a lot of things without fish. It also helps that Muramoto has an all-you-can-eat sushi deal for $25.

bacon cheeseburger sushi with pickles 

Vegan Week

In order to reduce environmental impact and negative health consequences of eating meat, Michael has enacted a vegetarian week. It's exactly as it sounds: one week a month of not eating meat. It's a steadfast way to eliminate 25% of the meat from one's diet. Michael wanted me to join him, but as a mostly-vegetarian, it would be too easy for me to just do veg. So I decided to make the leap to veganism for one week of every month. It started out quite difficult, but it's gotten easier every month, as I find more breakfast and snack-type foods that are vegan.

delicious granola with almond milk

I look forward to you joining me for another month of DIY!