Cooking Adventures with Megan

Taking a break from more serious posts, I have been exploring and playing around in the kitchen! While not all of my experiments have turned out wonderfully, I am only going to tell you about the successful ones. Muahaha! The power of controlling information!

This all started when a friend posted a link to this recipe site: whatmegansmaking.com. It is a dangerous website filled with all sorts of delicious unhealthy goodies.

They may have looked a little strange but they were wonderful!

Back when I was up at Notre Dame, the last friday of my archaeology dig was approaching. It just so
happened that National Archaeology Day fell on the same date. To celebrate, we made these delicious oreo truffles. They were a dig favorite and I left with barely a crumb out of the forty-five that I brought to the site. The making was almost as exciting as the eating in this case. Because we were cooking using the dorm kitchen, we were missing a few supplies. A food processer, for instance, to crush the oreos. In lieu of actual useful tools, we intellectual college students combined saran wrap, a mini-Crisco bottle and pizza cutter to chop up whole oreos into minuscule bits. Inventive, eh?

Oreos add deliciousness to everything. Who could refuse oreos? 

But that's not all! My cooking adventures continued on vacation in Texas where my Nana taught me how to make an easy no bake cheesecake. I was able to be fancy and cocky impressive when I made it a second time for the cousins as the recipe was so simple that I recalled it from memory! I'm sure I ate most of it but that is beside the point. Food is meant to be enjoyed -- even if only by the chef!

Served with a side of marinara.

Since I have already gloated over my small skill with desserts, I decided to take a big step and try and make an actual meal! My parents served as my guinea pigs and as far as they will tell me, they were happy to do it. First up, I wanted to create a twist on a Carraba's favorite: the Zucchini Fritti, aka zucchini fries! Instead of frying them I baked up a blend of Italian bread crumbs, parsley, oregano and sunshine to get this yummy appetizer. 


But! My dinner was not complete without a main course. Because I am still learning what on God's green earth I am doing in a kitchen, I decided to make a skillet meal of pasta, broccoli and chicken. Using fresh broccoli, a lot of spices that I don't remember the names of and a half cup of white wine, I came up with this beauty:

Serve with a dry white wine for added tastiness!

Even then, my adventures in the kitchen weren't over. Today I had a surprising amount of energy and the day off from volunteering so I decided to try something new: Pepperoni Pizza Puffs! Unfortunately, we were missing a few key ingredients like whole milk and pepperoni...so I improvised. Mixing 2 tsps of butter with skim milk replaced the whole milk and bacon replaced the pepperoni. Served with some of the marinara left over from the zucchini fries (yay leftovers!), they came out of the oven piping hot!

Ok, I'll admit it. I (attempted to) plate the dish and staged the picture. 

To wash these puff pastries down, I whipped up a peach lemonade which I don't have a picture of but is definitely in the "Make Again" category. I'm starting to have fun now. Can you tell? I've got a few different desserts waiting to be made so who knows? I might just become a pseudo-chef. As long as I've got guinea pigs to be my tasters (thank you, my dear parents), I'll keep this up! Happy cooking!

345 Coffee Shop: Open for Business

It seems as if I have opened my very own little coffee shop out of my dorm room. Now, I do not drink coffee. I've tried it a few times but am unable to stomach the taste. I've had good and bad responses from this. The good: 'That's great, that way you can't get addicted to it and there's more for me!' and the bad: 'What? You don't like coffee? How do you survive?' As to how my little coffee shop came to be, that's another story.

For my birthday, my parents wanted to give me a true princess gift: something that was absolutely unnecessary yet would be a convenience. Enter Keurig Coffee Maker. The fancy Keurig machines are sweeping offices across the nation--and college dorm rooms-- to provide quick and easy access to coffee at the click of inserting a K-cup and the push of the brew button.

As I sit here typing and drinking my English Breakfast Tea, I can tell you that the machine does not only make coffee but makes all sorts of hot drinks. All you need is the specific K-cup for the drink you want. They are all available online and most are spectacular. My Keurig was bought knowing that I would only be drinking hot chocolate (dark, milk, and white) and tea hence the 'princess gift'. Now, note that I am not complaing. I absolutely love my Keurig coffeemaker!

However, when I opened the box for the Keurig, there were six boxes worth of sample K-cups and guess what? All of them were caffeinated coffee! From the purchase of a second Keurig machine made by my brother and I for my parent's anniversary, I have their sample boxes since my Dad only drinks decaf and my mother, tea. So here I sit, the fanciest contraption currently out on the market on my shelf and over sixty K-cups for coffee. What do I do? Share with my fellow dorm-mates, of course!

I made the offer to all my friends and to the freshmen living in my section that if they want coffee in the mornings that I have 8:30am classes MWF and would be glad to supply them if they brought their own mugs. All I do is write "Coffee's hot!" on my white board. As such, I have three regular coffee drinkers who stop by at different times during the day to get something hot to drink. Slowly but surely, my stockpile of undrinkable (to my eyes) coffee is being drunk by people who enjoy it. I can't believe it has worked out so wonderfully! Once I run out of coffee, I'll give the girls the website to order more of their favorite and tell them that they can store their K-cups under my futon and can have coffee whenever they want!

Got to love my Pdub girls! I know I'll be refilling the water a lot come winter time. Bring it on, South Bend! I have Keurig on my side!

Three Days Worth of Traveling!

Hello everyone! I'm currently in Newark, NJ posting from the airport. I'm waiting on my flight to Amsterdam which leaves in a few hours. I thought I'd pop a quick post up here saying 'hi!' and add onto it as I continue to travel. Lord knows, I have a lot of traveling to do!

There is surprisingly good food at this airport; I just ate a delicious panini/flatbread-like creation that I am certain my friend over at The Improvised Chef would have loved! It was a Chicken Delicato Panini with roasted red peppers and a creamy pesto sauce to die for! Even at obnoxious airport prices, it was worth every bite! Sandella's Flatbread Cafe, take note of it!

I found another friend on the flight here and we had a wonderful time talking across the aisle for the two hour flight. I'm not sure the 4 people sleeping around us enjoyed it but hey, that is what ear plugs are for! I'm out for now. I'll try to update once I'm all settled in Amsterdam...depending on whether I can find free internet or not.

Until later!

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I am finally safe in Amsterdam and at my gate for my next flight! I can't believe it has been over 10 years since I have been in Europe. I have one more super long flight before a six hour layover in Mumbai. I'm still trying to trick myself into thinking it really is 8am when my internal clock says it is 2am and I should be asleep! Oh well!

At least I get one hour of free internet in the Amsterdam airport. It's all about the little things! Speaking of little things, I was oh so lucky enough to get one of the twenty or so seats on my last flight that had a malfunctioning TV. You could play music and games but couldn't watch any movies or television! Needless to say, it was a looong flight. That was rather frustrating but my fingers are crossed that I'm on a different plane for the next leg of my trip. My seat assignment is actually the exact same. Fingers crossed!

I'll try to find free internet when I get to Mumbai. Everyone back home, sleep well and know that I am extremely jealous that you are sleeping and I am not!