What's cooking?

And now we are eight! Yes, that's right. Eight regular contributors to (Never) Too Many Cooks. And we couldn't be more pleased.

Next week you'll have a chance to meet our new contributors and see what they've got cooking, but in the meantime, you can get to know each of them a little bit by visiting their blogs: Melissa, Melissa H. and Christine. (Just click on their names here, and away you go...but come back, okay, 'cause there's more.)

We'll be posting on a Monday-Thursday, two-week rotation schedule. That means each of us will post (more or less) two times a month. We're leaving Fridays open at (Never) Too Many Cooks for guest posts. So, please, if you have a recipe you'd like to share, let us know.

And yes, we're working on the ads. Hoping to resolve that soon.

Thanks again for all your support. We'd like to extend a warm welcome to our new contributors and their regular readers... It is our hope to see this blog grow into a supportive community for shared thoughts on food and all things related. We need your help to do that—so, leave us a comment, send us a recipe or just stop by to say hi!

Showing off

Sunday was one of those Southern California this-is-why-I'm-willing-to-risk-the-7+-magnitude-quake-pretty-much-guaranteed-to-come-within-the-next-30-years sort of days. We haven't had a lot of them of late; the rain, she is persistent. And while there are people who love cold, rainy days, who love the moodiness of cloud cover, who love weather...I am not one of them. Give me blue skies and sun. That's about all I need.

And so, when I actually got blue skies and sun...well, I abandoned you all, is what I did. Instead of following through with my plan to spend some time in the kitchen in order to put up a recipe for you today, I headed out into my garden with my kids and my camera. I can't say that I regret it, either. In fact, it was one of the best days I've had in a long while.

(I should say right now--in the interest of full disclosure--that most of the photos in this post were taken by Em. She couldn't take the one at the top, since she's in the one at the top, but the rest? They're hers. She's something else, that girl.)

But it was relevant to this blog, I decided, because, really, my garden is alllllll about food. The vast majority of what I plant is edible. I seriously love almost nothing more than feeding people--feeding myself--something that just came out of the ground not fifteen minutes earlier. In fact, that's exactly what I did that day; we'd invited our Sunday Gang to come and play (a total of eight adults and ten kids when we're all together, and we were indeed all together that night), and so I picked snow pea pods and baby carrots, washed them and put them out. I didn't even peel the carrots; they're thin-skinned and perfect exactly as they are.

They were gone within half an hour. And the adults had to fight off the kids to get to them.

Right now, my garden love is centered on the pea pods and carrots. (Em got excited about photographing the snow peas, and so sort of neglected the carrots. Poor carrots. Next time.)

The broccoli (what little grew from the seed I set out in the fall) is done, as far as eating goes, but it's flowering, and it's so beautiful when it flowers. (Yes, I grew up in a city, and yes, I'll admit it: It wasn't until the first time I saw my broccoli flower that it hit me...Ooooohhhhhhh. Those green dots that make up a broccoli floret? They're flower buds! Perhaps that's why they're called florets! I am quick, I tell you.)

There's cilantro and parsley, too (that's some rogue parsley twined in amidst the snow pea plants), and within the next week or so I can probably start picking leaves of romaine lettuce to make dinner salads with. There's a little bit of spinach, but not enough to do anything with yet. I've put some heirloom tomato seeds in the ground, as well as a few zucchini and cucumber seeds; might be too early for them, so I'm holding back about two-thirds for planting over the next month or so.

Not all of it will work out for me, of course; I'm very much a seat-of-my-pants gardener. I throw seeds around sort of willy nilly, and see if and where they'll grow. I'll mulch when there's stuff around me to mulch with, but often there isn't, and I watch helplessly as the ground bakes my plants into nothingness in the summer. Or maybe I'll get a few tomato plants to grow, but then the horn worms will find their way to my little patch of earth, and that'll be the end of that, because I don't really know how to keep them horn-worm safe.

Still, from March through October, more or less, there will be--on a pretty regular basis--stuff on my table that came from my garden. And as the various veggies, fruits, and herbs make their way from one place to the other, I'll share the recipes I use to show them off to their best advantage. Or, more likely, ask you for your favorite ways to prepare the things you grow.

I can't wait to hear what you have to share.

My garden. It's what's for dinner.

Daiya "cheese"

I've mentioned before that my older daughter has several food sensitivities so I've had to learn a variety of substitutions and modifications for many a meal or recipe.

In addition to being gluten free, she is also casein free (dairy), soy free and peanut free. Peanut-free is not a big deal and gluten has been fairly easy to get used to not eating.

Then there's dairy. If you have to be dairy-free, it's not too bad if you can have soy products. There are many decent soy versions of things like cheese, butter and milk. If soy is a problem, though, look out.

The single biggest thing that I miss is being able to cook with cheese. There are quite a few decent Vegan cheeses out there, but most contain soy. The ones that don't are, in my opinion, blech. In addition to not tasting very good, they don't melt.

Then I started hearing about a new soy-free Vegan cheese called Daiya. Blog reviews were raving that it not only tastes delicious, but it melts. That means we could make pizza! And quesadillas! And grilled cheese!

With little hesitation, I shelled out a small fortune for 2 8-ounce bags of this miracle food.

And true to what other reviewers said, it was outstanding. Here's how it looked before going into the oven. Looks just like regular shredded cheese, no?

After baking, Daiya was everything I hoped it would be on a pizza. Melted beautifully, tasted wonderful.

My dairy-free daughter, who hasn't had pizza in over six months, devoured it. She may have eaten half the pizza herself!

However, a few days later I decided to make another pizza, and this time she wouldn't touch it. She said she didn't like the cheese.

Stunned was I.

Since she's the only one in the house who has the sensitivity to dairy, it's unlikely I'll buy Daiya again. I admit, I'm disappointed. I was looking forward to HER being able to enjoy pizza again -something she used to love. But I guess maybe she didn't enjoy all that much.

Despite my picky daughter, I'd recommend Daiya to anyone who's looking for a casein-free, soy-free cheese.

Bon appetit!

A bit of housekeeping

If you are in the habit of reading our sidebar, you might have noticed that we are now five friends, instead of four. Yes, that's right: We have a new regular contributor to (Never) Too Many Cooks, and we couldn't be more pleased.

I'll let Emily go ahead and officially introduce herself to you tomorrow—for now, let's just say, you are in for a treat because, really, how fabulous will it be to have another voice, another perspective, even MORE great recipes and ideas, and, yes, regular posts on FIVE days instead of four!!

In other news, we are getting closer to one of our original goals, which was to pull in advertising to generate revenue for a good cause. We hope to have the ads in place within the next few weeks. We'll keep you posted on our progress (which may also include a small redesign of our layout to accommodate a column of ads).

This also seems like a great time to simply say thanks. We hope you like what you find here—the recipes, the friendship—this blog is truly dependent on your input and your feedback. If you'd like to be a guest blogger here, don't forget to drop us a line, or leave a comment on any of our posts. We've learned a lot from our guests, and the door is always open.

In the meantime, look for Emily on Fridays. Her first recipe will post tomorrow, so be sure to stop by and give her a warm welcome.

Eating locally

Rather than share a recipe today (Kristen and I were obviously on the same wavelength this week), I wanted to talk to you about something that I have become somewhat passionate about.

Eating locally. That is, choosing to eat food from my local foodshed. A term has been coined, even, to identify people that are striving to eat locally: locavore. Isn't that a great word?

Local eating isn't entirely a new concept to me. I've heard about it from time to time in the past but, if I'm being completely honest, the people that were talking about it weren't anything like me. These were people who lived more rurally, or who were already into all things organic. In some ways, they struck me as modern-day hippies.

I'm a typical suburban housewife with a minivan and two kids, one of whom will probably eventually play soccer. Eating locally, and how I could be part of this movement, just didn't hit me.

That all changed when I began reading Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver. I was inspired to read the book after watching the documentary Food, Inc., and deciding that I wanted to switch to completely organic produce as well as avoid foods containing genetically modified organisms (GMOs).

The documentary as well as the book were very eye-opening to me. I have no farming roots, my parents never planted a vegetable garden, I know next-to-nothing about growing my own food. It was shocking to learn how large corporations have taken over farming, rendering small family farms nearly obsolete.

And, as is all too often the case, when large corporations take over anything - profit becomes the driving force. Squeezing as many rows of corn as possible onto every acre. Breeding the so-called "perfect" tomato that can withstand long-distance transportation and also fit neatly into a case pack, and can be available year-round (devoid of all taste in my opinion).

Eating local food has many benefits - not just to us, the consumer, but also the local economy. Here are just a few:

Eating locally is the best way to know the source of your food. A quick review of the frozen food section at your local grocer will reveal broccoli and peas (just to name a few) that are grown outside of our borders. Broccoli flown to my supercenter on a jet plane from China? No thanks.

When you eat locally, whether by joining a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) or shopping local farmers market, you can get to know the person who is growing and caring for the food you are putting your body.

Local food is fresher and also tastes better. Commercially produced vegetables and fruits have to be able to withstand a long, oil-fueled commute to the supermarket in your area. It has been in transit or cold-stored for weeks. At your local farmers market, the produce you are buying was likely picked during the previous 24 hours.

Additionally, because the foods are purchased in season, they are at their peak taste, available in abundance and are the least expensive.

Eating local supports your local economy. Yes, there is chance you will spend a little bit more than at your local mega supercenter, but the dollars go directly in the hands of local farmers who are not only supporting families, but they are keeping pasture land open and undeveloped.

The benefits don't stop there, though. Shopping locally allows for greater variety for consumers, healthier and fresher food, and unique products.

Eating local isn't just for produce either. In nearly every community you can find pasture-raised, antibiotic-free beef, pork, chicken, dairy and eggs. Click here to learn more about the benefits of eating pasture-raised meat and dairy.

There are a variety of ways one can find local food in your community. In my town, the newspaper lists the farmers markets every weekend. You can also visit Local Harvest to find locally grown products.

For our part, we have decided to join a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture). We pay a fee which buys us a share of the farm. That share entitles us to 18 weeks of fresh produce, approximately enough to feed our family. The CSA uses organic farming standards, and with our membership we are able to buy fresh chicken and eggs.

It's going to be a big challenge, to be honest. I am going to be getting a LOT of vegetables week after week after week that are going to be completely new to me. I didn't grow up loving a variety of vegetables, and have very little experience with fresh vegetables outside of a dinner salad. We're talking a steep learning curve.

Fortunately, there are many great resources out there. And I plan to use this blog to share my trials and hopefully solicit suggestions for what else can I do with another head of cabbage.

I'm curious: do you shop farmers markets or do you belong to a CSA? I would love to hear your experience!

Kitchen style: What would you do?

Most weekends I'm cooking for family, so if I don't have something planned for Monday's post, I make an effort to document an old recipe or try something new on Sunday.

But this week, I just didn't have it in me. I made TC's mom's chicken with crunchy rice on Sunday because it's easy and it's delicious and, honestly, I didn't feel like cooking. It's the kind of meal that's perfect for when you don't feel like cooking. You just load up the pan, toss it in the oven and make a salad.

The truth is, I didn't feel like cooking all weekend. Friday night, in fact, I went to dinner with a friend to celebrate my birthday belatedly and her birthday coming up. We went here. I had the most delicious chicken (I'm partial to chicken, it seems). It was cooked in Yucatan spices and it was moist, tender, true perfection.

Anyway, I don't have a recipe for you today. But I do have some thoughts on kitchens. Mine is small and galley-like, but it's a good layout. I have ample storage and an easy to use workspace. When we bought the house, we assumed we'd eventually extend the kitchen and add a half-bath on the main floor. But this plan, for a huge variety of reasons, never panned out.

Last week, we replaced our back door, the one that leads from the kitchen to the back yard. The old one was rotted, the sill was broken away, and what we found when the contractors got into it was a lot of old termite damaged wood that needed to be replaced. So now we have a new back door and storm door, we've ordered a new window, and suddenly my very workable little kitchen is looking old and tired against so much new.

Since major construction is out of the question, we're leaning toward a simple facelift. Paint and a new floor. I'm a simple girl. I don't need much. There's just the three of us here, after all.

We've updated our appliances little by little and I am in love with my Bosch range and dishwasher. The fridge—eh, I have yet to find the fridge that would make me truly happy. Bottom line: we don't need appliances.

If this were more than a facelift, I'd probably be looking for a farmhouse sink, bronzed fixtures and new lighting. I'd be thinking about a wood or bamboo floor, maybe even radiant heated tile. (I would not be thinking about granite—too shiny and common.)

If it were more than a facelift, I would be interested in seriously upgrading surfaces and inching my way toward my "dream" kitchen.

But, as I said, it's a facelift. And, if we do, in fact, keep this simple, use less costly materials, we can probably manage a decent overhaul without spending too much.

Anyway, here's what it looks like now.

Long, narrow, but good cupboard space, natural light, and plenty of usable countertops.

What you can't see too clearly in the photos is the horrible unmentionable broken linoleum floor tiles and the really tacky (though thankfully dark) faux wood cabinets.

And here's what I'm hoping for.

Yeah. I know.

Seriously, this is what I'm hoping for.

A faux Euro-stone floor, freshly painted walls and cabinets, and a natural concrete countertop, all in shades of olive and gold and plum. A very Arts & Crafts sort of look to go with our 100-year-old Prairie style four-square in the quiet little town of Mayberry.

If you could change one thing about your kitchen (or a lot of things), what would you do?

Cabernet Sauvignon: a special vintage

Have you heard of One Hope? The California wine company is donating 50 percent of its profits on bottles of its award-winning 2006 Cabernet Sauvignon ($18.99) to charities supporting autism awareness and therapies.

Needless to say, this is a cause near and dear to us over here at (Never) Too Many Cooks. So when TC showed us the link, we agreed it was worth a mention. Let's face it—excellent wine, good food, family and friends, there's no better way to spend the holidays.

And I have to admit, there's something about this story that speaks to my heart and it's not just the fact that they are supporting autism causes. "Our name symbolizes the idea of a group, no matter how small or big, coming together as ONE and working towards HOPE for the future."

Hope for the future. God, I love that.

I can't wait to place my order.

Cocoa-orange-braised chicken

It's stressful trying to figure out what your very first recipe is going to be on your very new group cooking blog. Especially when the mere IDEA of having been invited to hang out with these three other incredible women makes you want to jump up and down and squeal like a little girl. (I'm 45 years old. When jumping-up-and-down excitement happens? It may be an appropriate response, but it's not pretty.)

So, the first recipe. It needs to make a statement, I thought. It needs to tell readers something about me, I thought. It needs...to have photos.

Oh. Yeah. I almost forgot about that part.

See, a lot of my favorite recipes are things that you just don't make during a Southern California middle-of-fall heat wave. (That was earlier this week, by the way, when I was cooking for this entry. Today? FREEZING. Like in the 60s! Brrrrr. And yes, I know you all hate me right now.) Or they're things that you just don't make when you're in the middle of having a mini nervous breakdown over your youngest child's upcoming IEP, because they take too much planning or buying or thinking. (That can apply to either the receipes or the IEPs, by the way. In case you were wondering.) Or they're things that just weren't SPEAKING to me at that particular time on that particular day. And I like my food to speak to me. In a figurative way. Not, dear god, literally.

All of which meant that, while I could tell you all about how to cook these favorite dishes o' mine, I couldn't show you them. And I want to show you them.

And so I decided to start from scratch, as it were. To do that, I went to the cookbook shelves.

I should say, here, that most of my cooking is of the improvisational variety. But, as you can see from the above photo, I do love me some cookbooks. And some cooking magazines. and some handed-down-from-my-grandmother-and-her-friends recipes.

I have more recipes than I could ever possibly use. But that doesn't mean I don't actually have another set of cookbooks in addition to those above on the other side of the kitchen.

(No, it would not be wrong for you to think quietly to yourself that I have more than a little obsessive-compulsive disorder lurking inside.)

Anyway. When I hit the cookbooks, I came across one I'd never tried before. One I'd never even seen before that I could remember. And then I saw that it had cocoa in it. And that it was quick and easy to make. And that it had COCOA in it. (Did I mention the cocoa?) And I was sold.

Cocoa-Orange-Braised Chicken (adapted from Best of Sunset Weeknight)

2 pounds boneless, skinless chicken thighs, fat trimmed (I used closer to three pounds, I think. Because that was what was in the on-sale package of thighs I bought.)
2 T olive oil
1 onion, peeled and chopped
2 cloves garlic, either minced or pressed
1 1/2 T unsweetened cocoa powder
1 1/2 T chili powder
1 tsp sugar
3/4 tsp ground cumin
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
chicken broth (The recipe calls for 1 1/4 cups. But then the directions had me using only 1/2 cup. In the end, I upped that to about 3/4 cups, and I was happy with the amount of liquid the chicken was in. You might need to eyeball this.)
2 oranges (You'll need to grate peel from one--about 1 teaspoon's worth--and squeeze juice from it. The other one is going to become your garnish, if you want to follow the original recipe exactly and be all fancy like I decided to be.)
1/4 cup sweet dessert wine (They suggest an orange muscat wine. I used the cheapest sweet dessert wine I could find at the store. Which, for the record, was Barefoot. Barefoot Moscato. Love Barefoot wines. As you can see, I love to cook, but I'm clearly no gourmand.)

So, now, the how-to:

1. Rinse, pat dry, and cut up chicken into chunks.

2. Pour oil in a 12- to 14-inch frying pan or skillet; when hot, add chicken and brown all over. Transfer chicken to a plate until step 4.

3. Add onion, garlic, cocoa powder, chili powder, sugar, cumin, and cinnamon to skillet; you want the onions to be translucent and the spices to start really giving off fragrance. At that point, add your chicken broth (see note above), and stir to loosen any spices sticking to the pan bottom. Simmer for a few minutes.

4. Return the chicken to the pan. Add the orange peel and juice to the pan. Simmer it all until the chicken is cooked through, which if you're me, means cutting into random pieces, being sure you still see pink, and then simmering for way longer than the 8 minutes the recipe thinks you'll need at this point. (Remember that OCD?)

5. Now's the time to be fancy if you want, and peel and cut the other orange into thin slices, which you'll place on top of each serving of the braised chicken when you plate it out. This made my 12-year-old daughter, Em, giggle with delight.

6. Finally, when the chicken is cooked through, add the wine and bring to a boil over high heat. Add salt to taste. Put into bowl or on plates and garnish with orange (and parsley sprigs if you really want to go all out).

Makes about four servings, maybe more. And Sunset says it's about 440 calories per serving.

I served this with garlic mashed potatoes, because Em wanted to help me cook (she actually declared herself my sous chef, and did a lot of the measuring of ingredients for me as well), I had some small white potatoes in the house, and she loves her some mashed potatoes.

She was also beyond thrilled when I took a picture of HER creation and said I'd include it in my new blog. It's the little things.

Anyway, I thought this was delicious, though there was something about the chicken thighs I bought that was just...wrong. They never seemed to finish cooking, no matter what I did. So, next time, I'm going for white-meat tenders, so I don't have to do as much cutting off of fat, which I hate doing and am terrible at anyway. Plus, as much as I appreciated Em's sous chefdom, this dish NEEDS to be served over rice, in my opinion.

Baroy and Em enjoyed it, too.

N had cereal. This is not unusual. Sigh.

So, in the end, I'm pleased with Best of Sunset Weeknight's suggestion for my evening. But it's never going to replace my all-time-favorite go-to cookbook, which is The Joy of Cooking. I know it's probably no longer cool to admit to adoring Joy, but I do. It's just so...perfect. Easy. Versatile.

What about you? What's your favorite cookbook? I think I need some suggestions to add to the collection. And an addition to the house, of course, to store them all.

A little of this, a little of that—and voila!

It started as an off-handed comment. "I would love to write a food blog." Because, really, who doesn't love food?

And from there, the conversation took off. We talk about food all the time, anyway. Share recipes, ask what's for dinner, lament the things our kids won't try. So, we said to ourselves, sure—why not? Why not do it together, and to give something back.

That's the short story.

The longer version involves how we came together in the first place. All of us moms, each raising a child with special needs, finding each other and fostering friendships within a larger online support group of parents and caregivers, teachers and therapists. We are a modern mixed up virtual blended family.

My name is Kristen Spina. I am a writer at work on my first novel. And I love to cook. Being in the kitchen is my therapy (one day I'll have a kitchen large enough for a couch!). I read recipes for fun, but unless I am baking, I rarely follow directions. For me, cooking is intuitive. A long time ago someone told me, "Baking is chemistry. The formula matters. But cooking? Cooking is art."

I couldn't agree more.

When the four of us started talking about our ideas and what we hope to accomplish with this blog, it was clear that our individual talents and interests were an ideal foundation for what we want to achieve.

Two of us earn our living as writers. All four of us are moms to children with autism. We have three girls and three boys between us, all school age. Ironically, our most adventurous eater is a five-year-old former micro-preemie who only recently "convinced" his parents and his doctors that he was done with his feeding tube—by repeatedly yanking it out! He wanted them to know he was more than ready for a seat at the grown-up table (and wait until you see the incredible meals his mom prepares for him).

Every blog is a work in progress. This one is no exception. We'll open the doors to our kitchens wide and share our favorite recipes. We'll talk food and wine and technique (and kids), and there will probably be a lot of chocolate. We'll use fresh and real ingredients—can you say butter?—as often as possible, knowing too, that sometimes life leaves us no option other than to open a box and add water. Some of us will have a lot to say about gluten free and casein free cooking. We'll share ethnic dishes and desserts. And when words fail us, we'll show you a lot of nice pictures.

We are a geographically diverse group. West coast, east coast and two points in-between. Three of us are heading into winter, thinking about soups and stews and the kind of food that warms the soul. Our fourth will likely be sitting down to Thanksgiving dinner in a tank top and shorts. In other words, four bloggers, four unique kitchens and four inimitable styles—a little bit of this, a little bit of that.

So, please—pull up a chair and stay awhile. We are anxious to hear your thoughts. Visit often, comment a lot. There's plenty of room at our table.

Soon we will be making a decision about the charitable angle we hope to include here. It is our intent to generate revenue through advertising and possibly even sponsorship to donate to a cause within the special needs community we all know and love. A community that has sustained us through so many of our own ups and downs.

But in the meantime, let's get cooking, shall we?

Food. Friendship. Fun.

And to kick things off, tell us, what's for dinner tonight? Chicken, fish, pasta, popcorn?