Unschooling Cooking

Anyone else have the obsessive desire to just scrap recipes and experiment on their own? I'm living on my own now, and discover that my fridge, while stocked with a whole bunch of interesting things, doesn't always have exactly what any recipe calls for. So now, I've just been experimenting a lot to use what's there. Anyone else done that much? And if so... any ideas?

Here are my suggestions:

• vegetable soup. Basically, I boil any combination of vegetables together, throw in a bit of chickenbroth mix and presto...

• vegetable sandwhich spreads? I've been experimenting on finding the right combination of blended vegtables to make a nice sandwhich spread. Any ideas?

Some questions...

• what can you do with eggplant? How do you cook it?

• Ah! Eggplant! One of my favorites! you slice it thinly, dip it something wet, like milk, and some sort of crumbs and fry!(make sure that the pan is thoroughly heated, then put in the oil, and stuff doesn't stick at all, really) Then, you eat it: eggplant parmesan (fried eggplant, melted cheese on it if you are not vegan, some sort of pasta, some sort of tomato sauce...) You can also put it betwixt some bread with whatever is on hand and looks good. Or if you are in a salad-y mood, you can include it in a salad ~ I quite like fried eggplant with tomatoes, that's all. Yum! Another thing: take an eggplant, cube it, toss with oil, salt, cook in 400 oven til it tastes cooked through (10-20 minutes?) meanwhile, make up a sauce with an onion, some garlic, oil and a can of tomatoes, and some pasta. when the eggplant is done, stir it into the sauce. (this is eggplant puttanesca) There are other things... soups, (which look a bit... weird, too diluted purple looking), rataouille (but it's not summer) rather involved vegetable terrines (which can be very very good, but are a bit of a project at the begining..) Baba Ghanoush.. (requires specific ingredients) (.....)
• Eggplant.. yum. My mum made an eggplant soup the other night.. It was so yummy. It had pork, which was OK but it would have been fine without it. :) I love eggplant. It's the coolest thing. Fruit. I think it's a fruit. It has its own seeds in it, so I guess that makes it a fruit. One day I will eat the ultimate eggplant dish: Grab that shiny purple oval-shaped-bouncy-fruit and just take a bite. I wonder what that would taste like? (mari, feeling silly and neato :)
• I've done that, it tastes like... flowers. Like raw eggplant. *giggles* Would you share your mum's eggplant soup recipe, because it sounds good, and I haven't had a eggplant soup that tasted very good.

 shaving tiny bits
 of cheese
 onto the bread
 that floats in my soup
 I realize
 I don't need to worry
 about who I am
 or what my inner self
 is.
 All I need to do
 is shave the bits of cheese
 with care
 and love.

Omelets are fun when you have a bunch of crap you want to throw together for breakfast. I made some neat omelets when I was visiting Dawn & family in Alberta. One morning, I had no idea what to eat, and I knew I'd never eat if I didn't do something fast, so I just grabbed a bunch of random stuff and tossed it onto the counter. Eggs, cheese, crackers, broccoli, etc. If you make eggs with matzo, that's called matzobri, and it's really really good. Especially around Passover because that's when it's supposed to be served.

Boil potatoes, then cut them into slices and put them into an oil-laced pan. Put chives, basil, and whatever other spice you want on top and fry them until they're nice and brown and crispy-looking. Near the end, put grated cheese on top and let it melt. Serve with ketchup and salt, and some black pepper. Mmmm.

Salad is meant to have tomatoes, lettuce, red peppers, carrots, and lots of cheese on top. Lemon pepper too!

Okay, so this stuff isn't completely original, but it's what I like to cook... when I do get around to cooking.

~Eire

Homemade Breakfast Cereal:

Mix any or all of the following: rolled oats, flax seed, sesame seed, sunflower seeds, almond chunks, dried banana flakes, wheat germ, dried cocunut.

Then add a tiny bit of vegetable oil, and enough honey and/or corn syrup to make it crumbly. Bake for a few minutes in the oven, so the oil, honey and cornsyrup dries on, being careful not to leave it long enough that the seeds burn. Store in a sealed container and enjoy.

ever since camp i have been pretty obsessed with biko's tea. i'm sure you remember it: cayenne, ginger, hibiscus, lemon and honey. it kicks my ass in the best of ways. so i have become pretty interested in unusual and excruciating teas. anyone have any particularly unbearable combination they'd like to share? -courtney

• Kicks my ass too, when courtney made it for me at her house, even though we didn't have enough stuff to make it quite as strong as usual. Thats some amazing tea though..... ~Jasmine

Ever since I was little, I've been cooking on and off and I was always very much against recipes. Still am. : ) Over Thanksgiving, Selena and I made up our own stuffing recipe (vegetarian) which had to do with recycling Alex's homemade-a-few-weeks-ago-so-now-hard-enough-to-maim bagels....Turned out rather well too. But I've never written down a recipe I've made up either. When I was at Sarah Brown's, she made this wonderful eggplant dish to put over spaghetti that she made up off the top of her head...when I got home, I was really craving that flavor again so I went and tried to re-create it.. and it actually turned out rather well. I love cooking. :) ~Jasmine

The standard on "Charlie's Island" (Waldron Island in Wa.)is that you aren't an islander if you can't substitute everything and I mean everything. I managed by will power alone to make challah with two eggs when I needed 6 and had a kick of a good time. Amazing how flexable these thigs really are...

Shippy (on Heather's computer)