nummy nummy

Andrew and I spent an actual day together, meaning that I got a chance to experiment with my totally awesome cooking skills. It was part of a generally successful day of full-frontal denial about the insane workload I'm facing for the coming week, a week that includes a full day EEOC mediation, second draft of my big paper due on Wednesday, a full afternoon of mediating in Renton, and some write-ups due on Tuesday. Other aspects of Denial-Day included lounging on the couch, napping, walking, some compulsive spats of cleaning (it does happen... just not in any predictable or reliable pattern), and Jeeves and Wooster watching (the cleaning would happen a lot more if I had a Jeeves - many things would be better if I had a Jeeves). I'm about the least domestic person in the world, but making food instead of just gradually deluging my stomach with sundry snacks in my typical bovine "graze" somehow gives me a sense of validation that's hard to quantify. Also I seem to have this goal of stuffing my boyfriend so full of food that he'll giggle like the Pillsbury Dough Boy when I poke him in the stomach. I'm a long ways off from reaching this goal, so much more cooking shall ensue.

 For lunch today I made this awesome little sauce (very easy): I put a can of garbanzo beans with the juice in a saucepan, then added a half cup of TVP, some minced garlic and minced onion, some frozen veggies, and splash of butternut squash. Then I microwaved a yam until it was nice and tender (about 9 minutes turning 2/3 of the way through) and scraped the mooshy insides into the sauce pan and cooked for another five or ten minutes and served it over whole wheat rotini. It was damned tasty - I love how yams and squash both add a creamy richness without actually requiring the stomach-churning fattiness that usually goes with those adjectives.

For dinner I tried - and failed - to make teff and tvp burgers. It was a long shot, but I figured it was worth a try. I mixed 2/3 a cup of tvp with a cup of teff, 2 cups of vegetable broth, one egg and some spices, brought it to a boil and then simmered for fifteen minutes. That part was great, but the teff isn't the right consistency to gell the way flour would have and so the part where I tried to fry the cooled mixture was less successful. I actually think the teff mixture would make a good tabbouleh-type salad though, so it wasn't a total failure.** update: it is absolutely incredible in a spinach salad with cottage cheese, almond slivers, and raisins. **

Anyways, yesterday I helped set up for a very large CLE/reception celebrating the 30th Anniversary of the Clinical Law Program (confirming in the process that I may be best served by honing my cooking skills, since my networking talents are slightly inferior to your average potted plant, if that potted plant is sort of nervous and distracted and becoming in a striped purple and black skirt). It may be a poor sign of my school "style" that the fact that multiple people remarked with surprised inspiration how nice I looked, something to do with my opting to wear a skirt, brush my hair and dab on some foundation. Considering most of my undergrad was spent in costume jewelry, heels, and spiffy dance dresses, I'm not sure what to make of my dressed-down casual skirt being so impressive to so many people.