posted by Anjali on June 8, 2012
Lunch when I don’t feel like making lunch: smoked trout salad with Ak-Mak and celery. (Follow me on Instagram: anjaliruth.)
What I’ve been reading:
The Mulberry’s the Worst Berry There Ever Was! – Gilt Taste
The End of “Ethnic” Food - CHOW
Teeny Tiny Pig Overcomes His Fear of Stairs to Get to a Bowl of Delicious Oatmeal – Jezebel
Isn’t It Always About the Dress? – Skinny By Monday (My pal Jen just started this blog about her amazing weight loss journey with Weight Watchers, told with lots of humor and sass.)
What I’ve been cooking:
Or not cooking: a lot of simple salads made with sliced heirloom tomatoes and the first summer peaches, drizzled with California Olive Ranch extra-virgin olive oil. Simple and good.
…and thinking about cooking:
Nobu’s Fried Asparagus with Miso Dressing – Food52
Socca & Leek “Tart” with Herbed Almond Spread – Love & Lemons
posted by Anjali on June 4, 2012
I missed the whole Pinkberry thing. I was living in Japan when the popularity of frozen yogurt exploded, so by the time I moved back to LA, the backlash had already begun and everyone I knew hated it. When I finally got around to trying Pinkberry, I thought it was just…fine.
All of this is to say: I don’t go out for frozen yogurt very much.
I suspect it is because I see frozen yogurt for what it is — an occasional dessert — rather than what many people hope it is: a healthy habit. On the Master Dessert Spreadsheet I keep constantly updated in my brain, frozen yogurt ranks far below ice cream or sorbetto or milkshakes or many other frozen treats, no matter how many probiotics there are. I’ll get my Lactobacillus from kimchi or plain Greek yogurt, thanks.
So my ever-cynical eyes were open when I stopped by a local frozen yogurt spot with some friends last week. The place was packed, and all I could think besides Yum, coconut frozen yogurt was This is such a scam. Here’s why:
The Nutrition Information: At the Froyo Life shop I visited, each self-serve yogurt flavor had a nutritional information card next to it. At first glance, all the yogurts look remarkably low-calorie, clocking in around 22-25 calories per serving. Until you look at the serving size — one ounce. Five quarters weigh one ounce. A slice of bread weighs about one ounce. Would you ever serve yourself just one ounce of frozen yogurt? (And could you? Those machines spit the stuff out fast.) It would look ridiculous, especially in the big cups they give you, which brings me to…
The Cups: They are abnormally large. Rob filled up the smallest available cup to the brim with yogurt (I’m still not sure if this was an error in judgement or just his poor yogurt machine operating skills) and we calculated it to be about a pound of frozen yogurt. A pound of frozen yogurt.
Pinkberry’s cup sizes are similarly skewed. The nutrition info PDF on their website has slightly more realistic serving sizes, around 3.5 ounces or ½ cup per serving, but the only cup size that actually holds the equivalent of one serving is the Mini. The Small cup holds 1.4 servings and the Medium holds 2.3. If you get a Large, you are consuming 3.7 servings of frozen yogurt, or between 370-444 calories and 56-104 grams of sugar. That’s a lot of quarters and bread slices.
The Toppings: Frozen yogurt is not King Midas. Crumbled up Butterfingers and Oreo cookies do not transform into low-calorie, nutritious foods because they are touching yogurt. They make a fantastic DESSERT topping to your DESSERT of frozen yogurt, but they are not part of a healthy snack.
Sorry to the the Grinch of Froyo, but the veil of nutritiousness needs to be lifted. Frozen yogurt is a dessert — a low-fat, high-sugar dessert that tastes really good with a bunch of crumbled up candy bars and cookies on top of it. But then, what doesn’t?
(Image: ajcreencia/Flickr)
posted by Anjali on May 17, 2012
Rob is out of town for the week, back in Massachusetts visiting his mom for her birthday (happy birthday, Moe!), which means it’s just me and the pets. Which means lots of funny little meals made up of things I just feel like eating, okay? And chickpea salads. Because I’m crazy about chickpeas and Rob is not.
So my solo week started with soaking a cup of dry chickpeas overnight and cooking them in the slow-cooker for a few hours. (WOOO! PARTY!) In the end they were soft but not mushy and ready to soak up a garlicky lemon vinaigrette.
This week I also joined a super-local CSA, Silver Lake Farms, so I mixed the chickpeas with a few handfuls of arugula leaves from my box, but this salad actually works with any type of green, cooked or uncooked. I’ve made it with spinach, kale, chard and even purple mustard leaves.
The original recipe was published a couple years ago in the excellent Recipes for Health column in The New York Times. I made it after a marathon baking session I did for a friend, and after a weekend of tasting cookies, brownies and caramel corn, it was just what I needed: nourishing, garlicky and bright with lemon and herbs.
The important takeaway from that first time making it was that chickpeas were made for a garlicky lemon vinaigrette. From there, you’re free to go in any direction you like, mixing it with whatever herbs and cheese you like. Or don’t use cheese and make it vegan. It’s your solo chickpea party*, go crazy!
* You don’t actually have to eat this alone; it makes at least two servings. But I actually preferred eating it as a dinner for one because there was enough left over to eat the next day over brown rice with a fried egg on top. (WOOO! TWO-DAY PARTY!)
Garlicky Chickpea and Arugula Salad
{ Ingredients }
1 1/2 tablespoons lemon juice
1 large garlic clove
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup mint
1/4 cup parsley
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
2 cups cooked chickpeas (or 1 15-ounce can, drained and rinsed)
2 large handfuls arugula
Pepper
2 tablespoons feta cheese (optional)
{ Directions }
Place the lemon juice, garlic clove and salt in the bowl of a mini food processor or chopper. Pulse a few times to combine and dissolve the salt. Add the mint and parsley. While the processor is running, drizzle in the olive oil. Continue processing until the herbs and garlic are finely minced and the dressing is thoroughly combined.
(If you don't have a mini food processor or chopper, finely mince the garlic and herbs. Combine them with the lemon juice and salt in a small bowl and slowly whisk in the olive oil.)
Put the chickpeas in a large bowl. Pour in the dressing and stir, coating the chickpeas evenly. Add the arugula and a few grinds of fresh pepper and mix thoroughly. Crumble the optional feta on top before serving.
Additional Notes:
• Almost any green leafy vegetable can be used in place of the arugula. Tough or bitter greens can be steamed, blanched or sauteed before being mixed in.
• This salad is good warm or cold, and tastes even better the next day, after the chickpeas have had time to soak up the dressing.
posted by Anjali on April 20, 2012
This week I discovered the magic of pet photos + purikura apps. (Thanks, Jenn Marie!) This is Cricket, one of the dogs we dog-sat last weekend, as seen through Decopic.
What I’ve been reading:
I Love My Kitchen Because: Miho Hatori – Saveur
Are Most People in Denial About Their Weight? – New York Times
How to Charm Your Sushi Chef – CHOW
Drinking On The Job: Is 2012 The New 1966? – NPR
What I’ve been cooking:
Lemon Yogurt Ice Box Tart – my recipe on The Kitchn
Warm Chickpeas and Greens with Vinaigrette – New York Times
…and thinking about cooking:
Scallion Pancakes – Food52
Tsukune (Japanese Chicken Meatballs) – Bon Appetit
posted by Anjali on April 17, 2012
Long ago, when my romance with Rob consisted mainly of flirtatious instant-message chats, meaningful looks across the cubicles and long lunch picnics in the sad park next to our office building, we used to talk about taking a trip to Hawaii together. It sounded thrilling and utterly impossible.
Nearly a decade later, the impossible happened — but not without a little agonizing. Was a Hawaiian honeymoon too cliched? Were we being lame?
All our fears were for nothing, it turns out. A honeymoon in Kauai is just as thrilling as it sounded long ago, back when the idea was just words on a computer screen and I was still nervous about even holding Rob’s hand.
So here’s how we did it:
We rented a cottage on an organic farm in the town of Kilauea, on the North Shore of Kauai. It was perfect — well-equipped for cooking simple meals, full of hippie books and “artwork” and a mere $99 a night. We fell asleep to the sound of wind in the palm trees and woke up to wild roosters in a nearby field, which I found more pleasant than Rob did.
We took a boat ride on a catamaran — looking very nautical — and saw 3000-foot sea cliffs. We snorkeled in a calm bay and got back to Kilauea in time for the weekly farmers market.
It was a small market, but everything was so vivid, it almost leapt off the tables. I bought bunches of bright greens, a knobby chunk of ginger, little yellow tomatoes and a bunch of sweet bananas.
Rob hates farmers markets and hippies, so we didn’t stay long. We made a quick stop at the fish market across the street and bought three pieces of super-fresh ahi. With a nice bottle of wine from the town’s small but well-stocked grocery store, we were ready to head home for dinner.
I cooked every night and Rob did dishes every night. Neither of us complained about our respective duties. This is the magic of Hawaii.
We hiked through the jaw-dropping views of Waimea Canyon and stopped for shave ice at Jo Jo’s on the way home.
We never had a chill-out-on-the-beach day, but we wandered around a couple sea caves and Rob herded feral chickens. On our last day, we rented bicycles and found a sea turtle on the beach. We thought it was dead, but it was just living very slowly. As sea turtles do.
We lived very slowly too, the six days we were there. I can’t imagine a better honeymoon.
My name is Anjali and I'm a food writer, former personal chef and current graduate student studying to be a registered dietitian. The recipes I share here are what I like to cook at home: healthy, economical, mostly vegetarian meals that are easy to prepare at the end of a long day of work or school. 
