become a better cook

The weather was kinda dreary and I was feeling soup.

Enter in:

1/2 onion, chopped
1/2 lb celery, sliced thinly
a few carrots, sliced thinly
1 can chickpeas
1 cup barley
1 clove garlic, chopped
tbsp-ish olive oil
5 cups vegetable stock
2 cups water
dash pepper
dash salt
dash cumin
dash paprika

No real method to the madness, just sauteed the veggies with the olive oil for a bit, then added in everything else and let it simmer until my husband got home from work. He called it perfect and asked for a repeat performance soon.

We finished the leftovers for breakfast today, and they were great.

Before I left for class tonight, I made a pot of rice (that I added a clove of garlic and some olive oil to), a pot of seasoned black beans and TVP crumbles, and chopped up a white onion, jalapeno pepper, handful of cilantro and juiced a couple limes. I also shredded some extra sharp cheddar cheese.

Syed is not home to eat, but I am. And I say that this is a success.

I made this soup (http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Spicy-Black-Bean-Soup-106816) last week for dinner. Both Syed & I loved it.

This will become a regular in our household. And I even got over my dislike of transferring food to a blender to puree!

Seriously, its delicious!

I want to make something that both Syed & I happily devour.

The more I try, the better I will get.

Of the meals I made in the last week, he liked the taco salad the best. I guess it counts as cooking, but because it is so simple, I feel like I am cheating by calling it that.

Sunday night, I made a giant batch of my Gma’s salad (whole wheat cous cous, chopped green pepper, chopped red onion, a can of corn, a can of black beans, a minced clove of garlic, olive oil, red wine vinegar, a dash of paprika, cumin, black pepper & salt) and I could eat that every day for the rest of my life and not tire of it. Again though, I feel like its not really “cooking.”

Then again, maybe that is just one of my little issues that I need to get over.

and I love epicurious.com

That is all.