Food

I love food. I have come to the conclusion that I love to shop for food. I love to cook food. I love to read about food. And most of all I love to eat food. I always wonder what made me so inclined to choose Electrical Engineering in college instead of just going to culinary school. Or why didn't I do culinary school after college? I did take a tour of the Portland culinary school but it cost $15k to go, I was about to get married, I wanted to be a Mom (which I wanted to do more than culinary school), so I just didn't. I don't really think I ever will want to do any type of 'school' again. Electrical Engineering burnt me out. (though, I'm not too disappointed that I did EE because I love math, I met my husband and had a pretty nice job before I had Luke)
Anyway, today I had some fabulous food. We went downtown to the Portland Farmers Market just to check it out. I didn't think there would be much down there since it's only May but there was! We walked around looking at everything. We even had lunch at one of the stands. Ben had pizza, which was delicious. I had a veggie pita. It had garbonzo beans, lettuce, cauliflower, wheat berries, onions, with taziki sauce and chili sauce all wrapped in a whole wheat pita. Mmm it was good.

We ended up getting asparagus, lettuce and a bundle of mint. What will I use those for, you ask? Ben and I have been hooked on the Green Smoothie from the blog "Raising a sensitive child". How I made it today is as follows.
1/2 a bundle of chopped romaine lettuce
1 apple chopped and cored
1/2 a banana
a handful of cilantro
the juice of one lemon
1 1/2 cups of water
It made enough for Ben and I, with a little for Luke. I forgot to take a picture because I drank it too fast. It's really, really good.

Tonight, I made asparagus risotto with the asparagus I got at the farmers market. The recipe is as follows.
1 1/4 cups of Arborio rice
4 cups of chicken stock
2 cloves of garlic minced
1 small onion or shallot, diced
some asparagus cut into 3-4 inch pieces
some fresh spinach
1/4 -1/2 cup of white wine, something you'd drink. It could be optional I guess if you just used a little more chicken stock, but the flavor is wonderful.
1/2 cup parmesan cheese
the zest of one lemon
butter
olive oil

Heat the pan with olive oil and a teaspoon or so of butter. Have the chicken stock warmed on another burner. Add the onion and asparagus. Give them some salt. Sauté until tender. Add garlic. Then add the rice. Stir it around the pan for a minute so it absorbs the oil and butter. Then add the wine. Keep stirring. Once the wine reduces all the way, add a laddle of chicken stock from the other pan. Let that reduce. Keep stirring the whole time. Then repeat until all the chicken stock is gone and the rice is soft. Turn off the heat. Stir in the cheese and grate the lemon zest. Add salt and pepper to taste.

It's kind of tricky and time consuming to make and definitely not one I would make on a week night where I have to watch Luke and make dinner. But since it's the weekend and Ben and Luke played, it was easier. So that's what I ate today. Sounds good doesn't it, I bet you're hungry now?