Ooooh cookies!

While in the local crappy supermarket picking up sponges and buttermilk (for pancakes this weekend), I gave a close look at the bags of beans and grains -- I'm doing a class tomorrow on grain, making a simple rice pilaf and a farro & sausage dish. I saw a box of buckwheat, and it made some bells ring -- kasha varnishkes. I have some in the freezer, the same brand I've been eating since my parents introduced it to me as a kid.

The real thing is some serious Jewish Eastern European soul food -- like matzo farfel, it's a bit of a delivery system for chicken fat. I looked up some recipes on the iPhone and it's really dirt simple -- cook some buckwheat in stock to fluffy. Caramelize some onions in chicken fat. Toss with egg bow tie noodles. Season with salt and lots of black pepper. We already have the fat, stock and the onion at school, so I'm gonna bring in some egg noodle and buckwheat as a bonus recipe...

BREAKFAST: 7:30am, smoothie, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5
Two new elements to the standard smoothie: frozen organic raspberries and a teaspoon of homemade vanilla extract. This was a seismic shift to the flavor profile. All of a sudden, it tastes somewhere between fruit punch and a red lollipop (in a good way.) Curious what pineapple would do to this mix.

LUNCH: noon, Stouffer's french bread pizza, 1.25 bowl, hunger 4/5

DINNER: 6pm, spinach linguine with pumpkin, spinach and bacon, pumpkin chocolate chip cookies, a small wedge of cheesecake, 1 glass of wine, water, 1.5 bowl, hunger 4/5
B's friend A came over and we baked pumpkin chocolate chip cookies together from a Southern recipe. Shortening instead of butter, a wallop of freshly pureed pumpkin, they came out nice. We took bets as to how long it would take B to start mowing down the cookies -- A said 15 seconds, I said 30. When B got home and saw the cookies, it was about 8 seconds before she was gobbling. If she skipped the "OOO COOKIES!" shout, she probably could of gotten it down to 5...

I sauteed some pumpkin chunks with bacon lardons and some spinach, spiked it with wine reduction, grated parm, a shake of thyme and basil, mixed in a beaten egg at the end. Pretty groovy.

The cookies were OK, but it was the cheesecake that got me. Ahhh, sweet reward!