It’s a Marshmallow World in the Winter…

…when the snow comes to cover the ground!

Good morning, friends!

After a good night of sleep (I slept until 8:30, which might be the latest I’ve slept in years!!  Of course, we didn’t go to sleep until around 1, but still!) we awoke to this:

Snow!  It’s funny– neither of us had checked the weather forecast, so we had no idea that this was coming! Yesterday, it was pretty mild and even got sunny in the afternoon.  Crazy weather.

I actually really like the snow around this time of year.  Back in October when it snowed, it just felt TOO early, and when it’s still snowing in March, I’m sure I’ll be sick of it, but right now, it’s lovely!  A winter wonderland

As promised, here are the (vegetarian) recipes from last night’s meal.  The chicken recipe, for you curious meat-eaters out there, was a variation of this recipe that I found on the food network’s site.  I didn’t taste any (obviously), but according to the other diners, it was quite good.  

As for these recipes, I just kind of made them up as I went along.  You could definitely vary the spices according to your taste.

Curried Chickpeas

1 onion, chopped

1 tbsp. fresh ginger, minced

1 tbsp. olive oil

2 tbsp. garam masala

1 tbsp. yellow curry

1/2 tbsp. red curry

1 tsp. coriander

1 tsp. cumin

1/2 tsp. cloves

1/2 tsp. cinnamon

1/2 tsp. cayenne pepper 

4 16 oz. cans chickpeas, drained and rinsed

2 cups water

2-3 tbsp. tomato paste

salt and pepper, to taste

Directions

In a large pot, heat olive oil.  Add onion and cook for 5-10 minutes until soft.  Add ginger, and cook for a few more minutes.  Add all the spices (garam masala through cayenne pepper).  The dish will be quite fragrant at this point.  Cook for 4-5 minutes, until spices have blended and coat the onions.  Add the chickpeas, tomato paste, and water.  Stir until all is well-incorporated, and bring to a boil.  Once boiling, reduce to a simmer and cook for at least 30 minutes (the longer you let them simmer, the better they’ll taste.  I actually cooked these and put them in the refrigerator for 5-6 hours before re-heating and serving.  The longer the flavors can meld, the better.).  If the dish seems dry, you can add more water before serving to make it “saucier.”    

In the pot:

Yurm!

And here’s the recipe for the raita.  Raita is simply a yogurt side dish used for a cooling effect with hot and spicy Indian dishes. 

Raita

2 cups greek yogurt (I used Oikos)

juice of 1/2 lemon

1 cup chopped cucumber

1/2 cup chopped green onion

1 tbsp. fresh mint, chopped

salt and pepper to taste

Directions

Combine and enjoy!

Voila:

And of course, dessert!

Chocolate White Chocolate Chip Cookies

1/2 cup butter, softened

1 cup granulated sugar

1 tbsp. vanilla

1 egg

1 cup flour

1/2 tsp. baking soda

1/2 tsp. salt

3/4 cup unsweetened dark cocoa powder

3/4 cup white chocolate chips

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350.  Cream together butter and sugar.  Add vanilla and egg, and beat until fluffy.  In a separate bowl, combine the dry ingredients (flour through cocoa powder).  Slowly, incorporate the dry ingredients into the wet.  Stir in white chocolate chips and mix until all is incorporated.  Roll dough into golf-ball size balls, and drop onto an ungreased cookie sheet.  I made mine quite large, but you could make them smaller if you were so inclined.  Mine made 12 VERY large cookies.

Cook for 10-15 minutes, until cookies have begun to crackle at bit on the surface.  They will still look quite wet and doughy when you pull them out of the oven, but after you pull them out and set them aside to cool, they will “deflate” and harden into crunchy cookies.  If you want less crunch and more chew, I would suggest pulling them out around the 10 minute mark. 

Sorry that I didn’t take more pictures of the “cooking process” for these recipes; I was distracted and just thinking about doing everything as quickly as possible!  They’re all pretty simple recipes though.  Easy and tasty!

Even though we were exhausted, we cleaned the kitchen last night until it was sparkling.  It’s so nice to come downstairs to a clean kitchen, instead of a big old dinner party mess.  Today should be pretty low-key…especially with the snow coming down!  I still have a lot of papers to grade from my composition classes, so I’m sure that will take up a large part of my day.  I’m currently drinking a BIG bottle of water…I think I had a leeetle too much wine last night

Hope you have a great Saturday.  Maybe it’s sunny where you are? 

See ya!

*Edited to add:

Look how much snowier it’s gotten, just in the time that it took me to write this blog post:

Wowza!