Cucumber Raita

From the Curry & Chili Cookbook by Bay Books

Peel & finely chop 2 Lebanese cucumbers & combine with 1 cup plain yogurt in a bowl. Set aside. Fry 1 teaspoon each of ground cumin & mustard seed in a dry pan for about 1 minute until fragrant. Add the toasted spices to the yogurt mixture with 1 teaspoon grated ginger (I used ground ginger & toasted it with the other 2). Mix well to combine. Season well with salt & black pepper. Garnish with a bit of paprika. Serve chilled. Makes about 2 cups.

"One of the secrets, and pleasures, of cooking is to learn to correct something if it goes awry; and one of the lessons is to grin and bear it if it cannot be fixed."~Julia Child, My Life in France

Fresh Bread

My friend Leslie came up with the brilliant idea of making a loaf or two of fresh challah for the girls once a week.  I think starting next week I will do that.  We have Cookie Monday, why not something like Fresh Bread Tuesday?  Any leftovers can be used for Challah French Toast....what could be better?!

Fruit Salad vs Fresh Fruit

Fresh fruit is extremely popular.  Hard to keep it on the salad bar in fact.  Depending on what kind it is though, I've noticed that things like melon go faster when mixed with other things.  Strawberries & blueberries go pretty quickly on their own, but again, even faster when mixed together.

I wonder why?!

Today's Food

Homemade tomato soup & grilled cheese sandwiches.

Citrus chicken w/rice pilaf.

Treif

Yes, a Jewish chef can cook treif.  You may or may not be surprised by the amount of people who give me grief about that.  Touching bbq pork will not immediately result in me bursting into flames.  Sigh. 

And so it begins

Work week downtown for the girls.  We did breakfast Monday for all 50 of them.  It was loud in there.  DANG.  But nice to see everyone back.  Tuesday was lunch, which was supposed to be around 30 but I think most of them stayed.  Never seen such a mess on the salad bar before.  Craziness.  Yesterday there wasn't much going on, since I had no meals to serve, but the girls kept asking if there was food, so I ended up putting pbj stuff out.  This & the sweet/unsweet tea in addition to water is apparently making me very popular.  Hopefully they will remain so easy to please. ;)