New Year’s Resolutions 2011

I’ve posted my New Year’s Resolutions online since 2005. As I explain every year, it’s an exercise in personal motivation. If I tell the world (or the small handful of people that visit this site) that I’m going to do something, then hell, I may just do it.

2010 Resolution Review:
1. Continue to increase creative output, and if enough suitable work is ready, submit to at least two publications per month. Writing-wise, I kept this up for the first few months of 2010. I wrote a bit more, submitted to a few journals (nothing published), but I lost momentum as projects at work bled into my evening hours. Art-wise, I took a watercolor class and produced about eight paintings. Overall, not a total success.
2. Maintain a daily journal. Also kept a journal up for a little while in 2010, but ultimately stopped.
3. Increase the balance in my savings account. Well, I do have a savings account, but those funds are wedding-only.
4. Take care of myself, both physically and mentally. This means regular check-ups at the doctor and maintaining a healthy work/life balance. I now have a primary care physician and dentist. I also had my wisdom teeth removed after years of putting it off. The health work/life balance was lost mid-year, but has recently been regained.
5. Attend more cultural events in New York. Overall, this was a success. The average was probably 2-3 events or excursions per month. (The Spider-Man musical counts, right?)
6. Go on a culinary adventure at least once a month. Not accomplished. There were adventures, but not on a monthly basis.
7. Cook dinner or have leftovers four days a week. Related: Bring lunch to work four days a week. I met the cooking requirement almost every week, but rarely brought my lunch to work. Lunch usually consisted of a cheap salads from the glorified bodega by the office, and on stressful days (see: most of last year), a box of junior mints.
8. Post here at least twice a week, ideally three times a week. Oh, definitely not.
9. Redesign my personal website. Done.
10. Go on weekend adventures. Montreal? Jersey? Boston? Anything’s game. Accomplished. A few weekend adventures included trips to Thomas Edison’s house, Teddy Roosevelt’s house, apple picking, the Jersey Shore, and more.

Resolutions for 2011
1. Finish planning the wedding and maintain my sanity.
2. Stick to a strict budget to save for aforementioned wedding. No credit card debt.
3. Related to three: Cook four nights a week. Bring lunch at least four days a week. (This starts next week with the arrival of my ridiculous bento-style lunchbox from Amazon. I may have also purchased a backup set of red inserts with my Christmas gift cads, because god forbid I carry/wear/eat out of anything that isn’t red and/or black.)
4. Post on Apartment Dining at least twice a week.
5. Read fifty books. I’ll be tracking my progress on GoodReads. (This one is inspired by my friend Alison’s quest to read 100 books in 2011. Check out her list of favorite books from 2010.)
6. Learn how to draw.
7. As finances allow, attend more cultural events in New York.
8. Document more. The next year is going to be fun, stressful, crazed, and momentous.
9. Maintain a work/life balance. Work in the evenings when it’s needed, but devote more time to creative pursuits.

Looking for Classic New York

Ramsey and I will mark our fifth anniversary in less than two weeks and we want to have a classic New York dining experience. We’re not looking for anything that’s too expensive (less than $40 for an entree is ideal), but we want to be dolled-up and not look out of place. We’re leaning towards Raoul’s in SoHo, but I’m open to suggestions. If you know of any classic New York spots that don’t require reservations months in advance, let me know in the comments.

Irish Soda Bread

Hi there. I should start this post by acknowledging things have been very quiet here since late February. Between having limited internet access at my apartment for the past three weeks due to shoddy Road Runner service, long days at work, and a minor boyfriend medical emergency, I haven’t been cooking or posting much. I have been documenting my existence with daily photos and uploading them when I can. I’ve also been eating a lot of sandwiches, my favorite of which has been this week’s melted brie, apple, and blackberry jam on toasted whole wheat.

But let’s get down to the business at hand. It’s St. Patrick’s Day. You may be reading this through Guinness goggles; perhaps you have a bottle of Jameson nearby. You may not be drinking and just wearing a wool sweater, or still giggling to yourself about the suckers you saw wearing wool sweaters on a day that hit sixty degrees.

I have no sweater or booze. Instead, I have a large chunk of crispy, sugar-topped Irish soda bread. This is the first soda bread I’ve made that couldn’t double as a doorstop or weight training tool and I owe it to this recipe from Epicurious. It’s not be the most traditional recipe, but it was a hit this morning at work, and I’ve consumed half of a second loaf by myself. Its scone-like consistency and flavor may make it a staple in my breakfast bread rotation. The only issue is tracking down buttermilk and having plenty of raisins on hand.

Even though the holiday is almost over, give the recipe a shot and enjoy a slice on Sunday morning with a cup of tea.

Meatless Mondays in NYC Schools?

The City Room reported today that Scott M. Stringer, the Manhattan borough president, is pushing for meatless Mondays in New York City schools to promote healthy eating and cut down on costs. Baltimore’s public schools have taken up the program and offering options like eggplant parmesean and black bean nachos. Each meal costs 20 cents less than an average meal with meat.

A program like this makes perfect sense in a city where one in five kindergartners is obese, and when you consider the environmental impact of not producing those weekly orders of thousands of pounds of meat, it’s a no-brainer.

Polenta Pie

polentadone

My mouth is still not fully healed from my surgery, but this weekend was the first time I branched out beyond pasta and I may have gone a bit overboard. Saturday dinner was barbecue from Fette Sau, Sunday morning brunch was vegetarian eggs Benedict at Brooklyn Label, and Valentine’s Day dinner was a chicken taco by Ramsey at my request. The whole weekend was rounded out with a game of Scrabble and an assortment of Italian pastries from Fortunato Brothers in Williamsburg. Oof.

I felt a recipe from The Moosewood Cookbook was in order for dinner tonight, and I chose Polenta Pie. Photos and a short recap after the jump. Continue Reading →

Recovery Dining

I had my wisdom teeth removed last Wednesday, and over the past four days, I have learned some valuable lessons.

The nutritional drinks typically consumed by the old and infirm taste pretty good. Chocolate Ensure is like a thin milkshake in a handy little bottle. The only downside is that the second ingredient is sugar. The third? Corn syrup.
Organic pureed soups in a box are also surprisingly good.
Despite my love of mashed potatoes, no amount of butter can make them satisfying four meals in a row.
Chocolate pudding is very easy to make from scratch. I chose a recipe from Simply Recipes because it didn’t require a double boiler, and with an egg involved, I convinced myself eating two cups in one sitting helped my protein intake.
Do not schedule wisdom tooth extractions before major food-related holidays. Today should have involved a chicken finger sub, but instead I nibbled on some boiled dumplings.
No amount of painkillers could make The Watchmen seem like a good movie. All I wanted to see was a giant squid attack.
It’s difficult to focus on reading post-extraction, but I was able to get some design work done. You can see the redesign of my personal website at mocahill.com.

Liquid Diet

My wisdom teeth are coming out tomorrow. I’ve stocked up on juices, pureed soups, jello, Ensure, potatoes, and I bought supplies to make chocolate pudding from scratch. Will I have the motivation to shuffle to the kitchen in a pain killer haze and use a double boiler? I’m not sure, but if I do, I will document it here.

Undergoing major oral surgery is bad enough, but tomorrow also happens to be a big potluck at work. I’m lucky to have a number of colleagues that are avid home cooks, so the fact I will be unable to consume any of their dishes is a culinary tragedy. There is a regional theme, so I made a batch of Irish cream cookies as the boiled foods of my homeland aren’t the best crowd pleasers.

I’ll see you on the flip side, AD readers. If I believed in a higher power, I’d ask you to pray for me, but instead, just eat a whole lot of crunchy, spicy food on my behalf.

Five Ingredients: Butternut Squash Pasta

butternut

I had an intense smoked meat sandwich today from a new Brooklyn delicatessen called Mile End. The options for the sandwich are not a choice of meat varieties but a choice of fat level: lean, medium, or fatty. It was a delicious, heart-stopping, and slightly overpriced meal that drove me to finally join the gym this evening. And yet, I don’t regret my lunch choice because I’ve been enjoying lighter vegetarian meals the rest of the week.

A prime example is the butternut squash pasta I made on Sunday. It was easy to make and it used almost five ingredients, but a sprinkle of Parmesan cheese put it over the top. I’m placing it under my “Five Ingredients” category anyway because the amount of cheese is minimal enough to count as a seasoning. Continue Reading →

Recipe Rookie: Carrot Soup

carrot1

After a weekend of parties, movies, and a trip to Teddy Roosevelt’s house in Oyster Bay, I spent Monday winding things down and preparing for the week. As I was cleaning items out of the refrigerator in the morning, I discovered that I had a pound of unused carrots on the bottom shelf. I turned to the New York Times’ Recipes for Health, where recipes are broken down by main ingredient and, as the title of the website section suggests, they’re good for you.

A pureed carrot soup looked like a perfect option. I had most of the ingredients on hand, and other than peeling and chopping two pounds of carrots, preparation was simple. You can find the recipe here and some photos from my adventure after the jump. Continue Reading →