Recipes, Pt. 2

Here is another recipe that I hope to try out in the next couple of weeks.

Italian Vegetable Salad

* 1/4 lb. cooked rotini pasta
* 5 ounces Eat Smart® vegetables, (any blend)
* 1/3 cup plus 1 Tbs. Italian dressing
* 1/2 medium tomato, chopped
* 3/4 green onion, sliced
* 2 ounces reduced-fat feta cheese
* 1/3 cup plus 1 Tbs. green, red or yellow bell pepper, chopped
* 1/2 cucumber, peeled, seeded and chopped
* 3-1/4 Tbs. Kalamata olives
* 2-1/4 Tbs. fresh parsley, chopped
* 1 Tbs. plus 2 tsp. oil-packed sun-dried tomatoes, chopped
* 1/8 tsp. salt
* 1/8 tsp. ground black pepper

Cook pasta according to package directions. Drain and cool. Set aside. Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Add Eat Smart® vegetables and cook for two minutes or until slightly tender but still crisp. Drain and rinse with cold water. In a large bowl, mix pasta and Eat Smart® vegetables with 1/2 cup of dressing. Refrigerate for 2-4 hours to marinate. Add remaining ingredients. Mix and serve.

Recipes

Listed are a few of the recipes that I am eager to try out over the next few weeks. My only hope is that my results can look half as good as the pictures shown with the recipes.

Stuffed Roasted Organic Chicken

Ingredients:

Stuffing:

1 onion, diced
2 cloves of garlic, smashed and chopped fine
1 pound zucchini or summer squash, grated
1/4 cup ricotta cheese
1 cup pine nuts
4 tablespoons soft butter
2-3 sprigs each of fresh marjoram, thyme and Italian parsley leaves chopped
1 egg
1 cup parmesan cheese
Salt and pepper to taste

Chicken:

One 3 to 3 ½ pound chicken or larger
1 sprig each thyme, parsley and marjoram leaves, chopped
2-3 tablespoons of olive oil
Salt and pepper to taste

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 400˚
2. Grate zucchini and salt it. Drain in a colander for 10-15 minutes to remove water.
3. Meanwhile heat 1 tablespoon of butter in a sauté pan and add onions and sauté for 30 seconds. Add garlic to pan and sweat onions with garlic until tender and translucent.
4. Rinse the zucchini and squeeze dry. Heat another ounce of butter in a sauté pan and sweat zucchini in butter. Let cool.
5. Combine the remaining ingredients in a bowl and salt and pepper to taste.
6. Cut the backbone from the bird with kitchen shears. Lay and spread flat on a a wood cutting board (wood cutting boards are the safest to use with meat), skin side up. Using the back of the knife strike the breast bone firmly, breaking the breast bone, collar bone, wish bone and the rib cage. Gently loosen the skin with a pairing knife around the breast, legs and wings to prep for stuffing.
7. Combine the herbs for the chicken in a small bowl and add the olive oil. Stir to combine.
8. Place stuffing underneath the skin of the chicken. Rub herbed olive oil all over the skin of the bird. Salt and pepper bird to taste.
9. Place chicken breast side up in a roasting or oven safe pan (like cast iron) and roast until internal temperature reaches 160˚, about an hour to an hour-and-a-half depending on the size of the chicken. Baste chicken as it browns.

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Narrowing down the choices

With another week of classes behind us, I've had more time to think about the upcoming By Hand Project. As I mentioned in my last blog post, I want my craft project to incorporate a new skill that I would be able to learn, while also possessing an aspect of social commentary to it. I can't stress how important the political aspect of the project will be to the overall success of my experience. It will be crucial to demonstrate that the new skill that I will be attempting to learn will ultimately reflect a social or political belief of mine.

With that being said, I've become very interested in learning how to produce as well as cook organic-style food. At a first glance, there is a variety of different ways that I can go about this project. Initially, I will be very interested in potentially growing my own produce as well as buying local. In particular, there are great resources in Bloomington to draw inspiration from such as the restaurant, Farmbloomington, and at the local market Bloomingfoods.

Taking it to the next level, I will also be very interested in crafting/making ("cooking") of organic meals. From this aspect, I will be very interested in taking cooking classes and taking to specific individuals who cater to this particular style. When trying to relate this craft project to our recent text, my desire to take up an interest in organic food resonates with Paul Atkinson's description of Lifestyle DIY. This type of activity that I am attempting to undertake is of my choice and is not done out of necessity. Also,

Perspectives Gained from Handmade Nation

At this point in the early semester, I have yet to decide on what my focus should be for this semester-long project. On my information card I listed pottery and some types of food as some of the crafts that I have a little bit of experience in. However, I am not sure if I would want to pursue working on either of these skills at this time. This project gives me the chance to learn a completely new type of artform/skillset that I would not necessarily have the opportunity to learn otherwise. Because of this, I am currently contemplating what exactly will be the emphasis of my project.
Despite not presently knowing what type of craft I want my project to focus on, after reading Handmade Nation: The Rise of DIY, Art, Craft, and Design, I feel more inspired to start narrowing down my options and begin writing about my progress. The featured artists exhibited an incredible variety in the crafts they made. But even more interesting, the reasoning behind why these individuals craft such items are even more varied. Some of the artists' rationales include: starting a website for fun, wanted to see things that haven't been seen before, motivated by a constant itch to evolve art, having the urge to re-make things into something cool, and taking things that were discarded and transforming them into functional items.
Additionally, I was even more impressed by the political messages that were embedded into the crafts of several artists. In particular, I especially enjoyed Knitta's stance against industrialization and Stephanie Syiuco's sense of activism which her work displays against consumerism, materialism, and capitalism. Again, while I don't presently know what my project will entail, I would very much like to display this same sense of activism in my to-be-determined craft, thus reflecting my stance on a certain issue that is of importance to me.