easy weeknight recipe – In Good Taste

Black Bean and Avocado Quesadillas

Maris Callahan — Tue, 15 Apr 2014 05:00:00 +0000

Remember how I once said that cooking in a new kitchen is like having a new boyfriend? It takes some time to get used to new idiosyncrasies and quirks, to decide what you can live with and what you might want to work on changing. Well, if there was one thing I could change about my kitchen (besides making it bigger, an oven that fully opens and a dishwasher) I would give it a window. When I turn the oven on, it seems like it heats my entire apartment by twenty degrees. Lovely in the winter, not so lovely in the spring and summer. Until I can afford the kitchen of my dreams, I’m making it work by getting creative on the stove top. Since the majority of starter house or apartment kitchens are, well, not large, I suspect that some of you might have a similar problem. Quesadillas are a Mexican-inspired dish that literally translate to “cheesy tortilla.” Fun fact: the word ‘quesadilla’ is often mistaken for the word “Quesada.” In Mexico, “quesada” means “cheesecake.” Some variations have chicken, beef or shrimp inside but others rely on beans and vegetables for taste, texture and nutrition. I’m not a big […]

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English Pea and Asparagus Risotto

Maris Callahan — Sun, 08 Jul 2012 20:20:43 +0000

I really wasn’t joking when I said I was very close to breaking my three-month blog silence with a post about risotto. Specifically, english pea and asparagus risotto. What’s even worse, it’s a spring risotto which shows you just how long I’ve had these photos sitting on my computer. That’s neither here nor there though, is it? I moved into a new apartment at the end of March, one with a much smaller albeit more ergonomically designed kitchen. Hazel and Amelia, two of my girlfriends, came over the night I moved in to help me get settled and organize four closets worth of crap into only two closets. It was a process during which we drank just a little bit of wine and I will be completely honest when I tell you that when I went to make baked macaroni and cheese a few weeks later, it would have probably taken me less time to weave a colander out of straw than it took me to find the one that Amelia had carefully stacked, Tetris-style, between my mixing bowls, pots and pans. I’ve also been working more and have been going out to eat a lot and cue every excuse in […]

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Kung Pao Shrimp [and a lesson about capsaicin]

Maris Callahan — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 20:00:19 +0000

Before we talk about the Kung Pao Shrimp recipe that I wrote for Craftzine, let’s talk about capsaicin. Capsaicin is the active ingredient in chili peppers. It’s what gives them spice, flavor and it’s what your fingers will be covered in after you cut or crush chili peppers for this recipe. Red chilies might sound exotic but they’re a pretty common ingredient in a lot of Mexican and Asian dishes: You can buy them in the produce section of your grocery store (they are dried chilies but usually live near the fresh chili peppers since a lot of recipes call for both). Now, capsaicin is the reason you should not touch your eyes after handling chili peppers, even if you have washed your hands several times over the course of cooking. You should be especially cautious if you, say, wear contact lenses because you’re almost 50% legally blind and rely on them for your vision. I only tell you this to prevent you from making the same mistakes I do. Wear gloves when you’re handling the red chilies in this recipe. If you don’t have food service gloves on hand, wrap your hands in plastic wrap. If you forget this […]

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