Fast and easy...in the kitchen...

...That's what she said.

Some people may be disappointed by the ACTUAL topic of this post: Food. Recipes.

Cooking is a good sign of my mental state, I think. It means I spend some time being creative in the kitchen (again, purely in a preparing-food-sort of way). It means I do not feel pressure of trying to get something done. When I feel pressure to get something done, I usually procrastinate by cleaning/laundry (as can be seen in this previous check list). But thanks to finishing a draft of my manuscript, I can spend some time in the kitchen!

Without further ado, I bring you 'Fast AND Easy' first.

This was brilliantly inspired for by my sister. Even though her kids will DEVOUR sushi and raw shell fish, they are surprisingly picky about every-day food. This, they were happy to eat.

Ramen makes a good base for dinner. In college, I would add in some broccoli when the Ramen was cooking, then add the flavor packet and cooked chicken to the drained noodles & broccoli. I can tell you that this suped-up version is way better than that.

Fast and Easy Ramen - 10 minutes, From the kitchen of Jenski's sister
(Scale up as needed)
Ingredients: Eggs, Ramen, premade coleslaw (or broccoli slaw!) mix
Whisk an egg
Cook Ramen per package instructions
After noodles cook 3 minutes, coax them aside and stir continuously as you add egg(s).
Add a handful of coleslaw mix from the grocery store and as much of the flavor packet as you would like.
Vary as needed/desired.
Serve up your egg noodle soup!

I had a red pepper that needs to be eaten, so I added some of that. I used half a flavor packet and added a couple spoonfuls of curry sauce, and only an egg white because I had eggs for breakfast. When my sister and her kids were here, we also added some sriracha to spice it up. The permutations are endless and easy!

                                               
Second, I bring you 'Easy'. I could add 'Healthy' to that too. The reasons I made this were three-fold:
1.) I have searched out tomatoes in a jar to no avail where I live. Sure, tomatoes come in a can. You know what else comes in canned tomatoes? BPA*. I am happy to have my own source of tomatoes with less BPA.
2.) My town has a pathetic excuse for a farmer's market. The man who tries to get vendors has a smoothie truck there every week. They FINALLY have other food and products, but he is the one manning the veggies for the farmers still! Because I had commented a couple of weeks in a row on the FB page, I felt I needed to go. Well I did. And then bought organic tomatoes for $12/pound. I appreciate fewer chemicals. I do not have an income that allows for costly tomatoes, no matter how delicious or chemical free. Therefore, the tomatoes must go to GOOOOOOOD use.
3.) Ridiculously easy tomato sauce in your crockpot.

Before

 After

My variations on Bean's recipe were few.

Crockpot tomato sauce
Chopped onions
Chopped tomatoes
Pressed garlic
Dried oregano (~1 tsp)
Dried basil (~1 tsp)
Dried thyme (~1/2 tsp)
Salt
Pepper
Sugar (~1 Tbsp, or I added agave syrup)
And I added some chopped carrot and olive oil too.

Mix. Cook on low in crock pot for 8 to 12 hours. I then blended it (which you probably would not need to do if you peeled the tomatoes). Blending it would probably let you hide other veggies in the sauce too though (more carrots than I added, pepper, a little squash...).

Made me wish I had a submersion blender. Then I put the sauce in glass jars with space at the top and stuck them in the freezer. If my sister-in-law and I lived closer together, I would have recruited her canning expertise.

FYI, SIL, At some point I envision a massive canning experience:
Make something in the crock pot overnight. Can in the morning. Set up the crock pot with something else. Can stuff like pickles throughout the day. Can the crock pot recipe #2 at night.

What else did I do between the end of work yesterday and lounging on my couch tonight? Walked 5.5 miles two times, tried indoor rock climbing for the first time, read a National Geographic, made the above recipes, ran some errands, and photographed the sunset. Again.

* If you have not heard of BPA, it is something used in plastics. It is also in those white cavity fillings and receipts. I could write a whole bunch about BPA. I did research on it before I started grad school, and can tell you that prenatal exposure affects mammary gland and neuro-endocrine development (otherwise known as boobs and brains). YOUR exposure to BPA can affect you, your children, and your grandchildren. I figure if I can minimize my exposure, might as well!

Pumpkin donut holes

These pumpkin donut holes were a serious pinterest success. I did not do the butter dip and roll in cinnamon sugar. If I were making them for others, I probably would.

Out and around

Groundhogs at the zoo. They are adorable.

Butterfly garden at the zoo.

A Great Blue Heron chillin' and reflectin' in the lake.

Can you see the heron's prints going across this picture? Its prints were huge!

My nephew put on a cooking show, complete with accent, on my porch when they visited. My niece assisted in making a pesto with various leaves and flowers from my garden. We even ate some.

 Found a bug emerging in my garden.

Out on a walk, I came across this fence.

Check! The Manuscript Version

I am pretty good at procrastinating. Many of those things needed to be done; some did not. BUT, I finally drafted, edited, updated, referenced, pdf'ed, and emailed a draft of my paper to my boss and another co-author. My boss is out of town, so I do not know when she will get to reading it.

I finished a draft of the paper on Tuesday and then got a great break with my sister, niece, and nephew visiting. It was good to not think about the paper and go back and revise some before emailing it out.

For now, it is on to another training walk, maybe some baking because it is in the 70s (F, obviously), and job applications.  That's right - more writing and applying. A year from now, I might be living in a city/town near you.

Just do it.

I MUST FINISH MY RESEARCH PAPER.

Here's the deal. I need to apply to jobs, and the academic hiring process starts in August for the following school year (2013). I have found really relevant jobs in VT, PA, and WI so far, and it is early in the job posting season. One of my friends in academia thinks there may be one at school near Boston because she has some insider info too.

Since last year I: Got a fellowship, mentored two undergrads, took a short-course on teaching, and gave a talk at a meeting, among other smaller stuff. This is all good for my CV

The icing on the cake will be a paper. I had hoped that I would have a draft done in May before my undergrads started for the summer, but that did not happen. Putting together the data in the figures/pictures is almost done. Most of it is at least outlined. I am in a good position to finish it SOON.

Today my boss and I talked to the grad student with whom I overlapped briefly. I had emailed her twice about her data that we wanted to include in my paper - it makes it stronger, and more would have to be done on her project to publish it and she works on something different now. When she emailed back about her data, she emailed my boss and did not copy me. I worried that it would be an awkward conversation.

But, it was not! She had looked at the data, thought about my figures, and said it was a very thorough analysis and a good story. She is a very intelligent and hard-working woman. That was a relief.

And now I must finish my paper. And I hate starting sentences with 'and'.

Sometimes I get into the groove at home and get work done. Tomorrow is the one-monthiversary of my car's AC dying, and it is supposed to be in the 90s, so I think hitting the town's coffee shop will be the best bet to GIT 'ER DONE, as they say.