Last weekend we celebrated Megan’s birthday with dinner and some friends out on our porch. We were lucky to have a fairly cool evening and the bugs stayed away at least for the first part of the meal…

I should have been better about taking more pictures of the people and food, but I was busy grilling.  Megan also made a chocolate almond cake topped with cheesecake topped with dark chocolate frosting with raspberries on the side that was every bit as delicious as it sounds!  Here are some of the recipes so that I can repeat them some other day.

Spiced Chicken and Grape Skewers

These were fun because most people haven’t had grilled grapes before. They go really well with the chicken, and their juiciness makes up for the fact that I tend to overcook everything when I grill!  This is pretty much identical to the recipe from the Food Network.

Ingredients
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 tsp lemon zest
1 tbsp lemon juice
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 tsp ground cumin
1/2 tsp salt
1 pound chicken breast, cut into cubes
1 1/2 cups green grapes
8-10 skewers

1. Whisk together the oil, lemon, garlic, and spices in a small bowl.
2. Pour over the chicken and let marinate for 30 minutes (I kept it in a plastic bag for easy mixing).
3. Alternate grapes and chicken pieces on the skewers
4. Grill for about 3 minutes per side

Veggie Kebabs

A simple vegetable marinade with some middle eastern spice that goes well with the grape chicken above.  This recipe is also similar to one from the Food Network.

Ingredients
2 bell peppers
1 onion (I forgot to do this)
1 zucchini or summer squash
a few handfuls of grape tomatoes
1/2 container of mushrooms (not sure how big the container was…)
2 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp ground cumin
1/2 tsp paprika
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
1 1/2 tbsp honey
1 tbsp lemon juice
salt and pepper

1. Chop up all vegetables into skewerable shapes, cut mushrooms in half
2. Place vegetables on skewers
3. Whisk together all marinade ingredients
4. Brush marinade over vegetables and sit for 10-15 minutes
5. Grill for about 3 minutes per side

Deluxe Israeli Couscous

This is basically the recipe you get on the back of the box from Trader Joe’s Israeli Couscous, but it is even better if you use their Harvest Grains mix since it has couscous and a few other colorful grains as well:

Ingredients
1/2 cup chopped onions
1/3 cup pine nuts
3 tbsp butter
1 stick cinnamon
1 bay leaf
1/2 package TJ’s Harvest Grains(or just Israeli Couscous)
1 3/4 cups chicken broth
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup raisins
1/4 cup dried cranberries
optional: lemon rind, parsley, etc
(Note: this is from memory, and may be wrong… if in doubt, follow the package)

1. Fry up 1 tbsp butter and the pine nuts until golden (2-3 min), then set aside.
2. Add remaining 2 tbsp of butter and fry up onions until tender
3. Add cinnamon stick, bay leaf, and couscous. Fry 5ish minutes, stirring occasionally
4. Add chicken broth and salt and bring to boil, then reduce to low heat
5. Wait until liquid is all absorbed (10ish minutes)
6. Turn off heat, add pine nuts, raisins, cranberries, and any other goodies you can think of

I’ve been farming virtual popcorn on this blog for a while now, but this year Megan and I decided to try our hand at some plants for our back porch.  The term porch is a bit generous, it is more likely an empty concrete swimming pool sticking off the back of our townhouse, but at least it is outside!

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One of our good friends and former roommate, Gal, was recently deported back to Israel due to visa issues. To commemorate his departure a group of us had a farewell dinner with a ton of good food and a liquid ton of good wine.

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Two weeks ago was the height of cherry tomato season at our farm share.  My roomates and I gathered about 9.5 pounds worth of tomatoes! Delicious…

They were all gone by the end of the week.

On July 4th, Megan, Gal and I had a picnic lunch at the top of Mt. Holyoke. Unfortunately the weather was quite cloudy, so the views weren’t as nice as normal, but at least it didn’t rain on us. At the top of the mountain is an old hotel which used to be quite the hot spot, hosting guests like Abe Lincoln and some famous opera singer whose name I forget. The state turned the area into a park in the 40s, and it is now a small museum. We toured the hotel, had some sandwiches, and wandered along the ridge for a bit, enjoying the scenery. Read more »

In late may Megan and I headed down south for her cousin’s wedding in South Carolina. Along the way we made a few stops, the first one in New Jersey to visit my family. My dad gave us a tour of his vegetable patch in the community gardens at Barclay Farms. I didn’t see any popcorn sprouts (they grows in small, microwavable bags, right?), but lots of other things were starting to come up.

Time to chronicle more delicious meals.

• BHD #13: Filip made pig with baked sliced potatoes
• BHD #14: Tim made Yaki Soba
• BHD #15: Filip made cod and Emily’s (in)famous rum cake (which has no rum in it, but lots of vodka)
• Intermission: Tim and Filip realized they had been cooking too often
• BHD #16: Gal and Avigail made a kosher meal with orange and apricot chicken, asparagus, and fresh baked challah

The Dinners

The Diners

My housemates and I are planning to get a farm share at a local CSA (community supported agriculture) this summer. The main options I’ve found for the Amherst area are Simple Gifts Farm, Riverland Farm, Brookfield Farm, Stone Soup Farm, and Foodbank Farm. Here is some info on each one.
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For my birthday I received In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan.  The book covers how the American diet has changed over the last century, mostly due to influences from processed food companies. It is more than a little disturbing how much control these companies have gained over government health advice, and in turn, over our diets. Pollan argues that the food companies are increasingly trying to push processed foods into consumers’ shopping carts since they can be made more cheaply, and allow for a higher price markup, than regular food items. Pollan’s suggestions for a healthy diet make sense to me: Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants. Read more »

The Cushman Market is a small grocery store and cafe up the road from where I live. The front half of the store has an eclectic mix of groceries, many of which are organic or locally made products. Walk back past the reasonably stocked wine and beer section and you get to a nice cafe that serves sandwiches for breakfast and lunch, and serves drinks all day.

It is great to have such a nice place within walking distance. We often head over there on weekend mornings for breakfast, particularly on Sundays when there is a small jazz band playing in the back. I’m partial to the “egg, cheese, and bacon on an everything bagel”… delicious.

Tonight we were short on food and it was beginning to snow, so I took a quick walk over there to pick up some food. I snapped this shot of the cafe, which is the first night time picture I’ve taken with my new camera. It’s a little blurry from me shaking (or shivering–it was cold out!), but it still came out pretty well.