Acorn squash with chickpeas and red rice

1. Cut acorn squash in half, remove seeds, add a little oil, salt, pepper, and brown sugar. Roast at 350-375 for an hour or more, depending on the thickness of the squash.

2. Soak chickpeas overnight, then cook them in broth with salt until they are tender. If you don’t soak them they’ll take over two hours to cook. If you do soak them, it’ll probably take an hour.

3. Cook red rice (or some other really hearty whole grain rice; I like the Lundberg brand) according to package directions.

4. Serve.

Grocery price comparison: Peapod now added

I’ve added Peapod to the grocery comparison Google doc; see below for more details on the project!

Which grocery store is cheapest, and by how much? A comparison of Whole Foods, Trader Joe’s, Market Basket

For a long time, I’ve wanted to find out which grocery stores are really the cheapest. I recently moved to Cambridge from Union Square in New York, where there were three main options: Trader Joe’s, Whole Foods, and Food Emporium, a local NYC chain. I was surprised when people in my building continued shopping at Food Emporium after Whole Foods opened, saying it was cheaper; based on every price I saw, I thought Food Emporium was actually more expensive. And I didn’t think Whole Foods was that much pricier than Trader Joe’s, if you stuck to the generic 365 brand. The Trader Joe’s was so crowded and unpleasant that we pretty much always went to Whole Foods (and the Union Square Farmer’s Market, of course).

But now I’m about to go deep into debt, as I’m going back to school. Plus, I have a lovely TJ’s a few blocks away, which isn’t crowded at all. And I have some time on my hands. So I decided to compare prices on more than 30 products I commonly buy. I went to Whole Foods, Trader Joe’s, and Market Basket; I’ll go to Shaw’s and Hannaford’s and add them to the chart if I have time. I’ve created a Google doc with the prices of each item at each store. If anyone would like to contribute and add their own grocery stores, please do! Just contact me via the About Me page.

For the most part, I looked for the lowest price I could find on any given product, with the caveat that it had to be something I would actually buy. I’m not going to buy a gallon jug of balsamic vinegar or 5 pounds of carrots, so I ignored them even though they were cheaper. I also ignored the cheapest ground beef at TJs because it didn’t look very good.

The total bill:

Whole Foods: $150.94
Trader Joe’s: 126.08
Market Basket: $106.99

How the Kindle has changed my reading habits

Last January, I finally decided to get a Kindle. I had been waiting for the market to play out so I could be confident that I was purchasing the right e-reader for me. And I made my final decision last fall, after I spent four months lugging around hardcover books that were 800+ pages long. (The first was Ron Chernow’s new biography of George Washington, and the second was slightly less intellectual: Towers of Midnight, the 12th book in the Wheel of Time series, if you must know.)

Since then, I’ve noticed that the Kindle has significantly shaped my reading habits, for better and for worse. Here are five side effects of transitioning to the Kindle.

Chana masala recipe (curried chickpeas)

It’s time for me to share my easy and fabulous recipe for chana masala (curried chickpeas). This recipe is great for three  four reasons.

1. I ALWAYS have these ingredients on hand.
2. It’s easy.
3. It’s delicious.
4. And it’s healthy.

You can use canned chickpeas in a pinch, but cooking them from scratch is pretty easy, requires only a little pre-planning, and is worth the effort. This recipe could probably serve 8 people; I make a lot at a time and usually freeze some of it. It’s best served with rice and another curry dish, such as Easy Vegetable Curry or Easy Vegetable Curry with Almonds and Coconut Milk (to be posted soon!).

First, the ingredients:

Beer & venison chili with homemade corn tortillas

I have a new goal: only buying meat that comes from well-treated animals. This means that we have to start paying more for our meat, which means we have to eat less of it. So I’m trying to cook more creative vegetarian meals, like root vegetable panade. “But Hannah,” you’re probably asking yourself, “the title of this post has the word ‘venison’ in it.” The truth is, I just couldn’t get inspired to cook anything vegetarian yesterday. So I decided to buy expensive meat instead.

The chili was delicious. But before we get started, in the interest of full disclosure, I should let you know that my corn tortillas were  a moderate failure. They tasted good, but I couldn’t really figure out how to cook them properly, and had to spend a ridiculous amount of time cleaning the pan.

First, the ingredients.

Smoothies for two

I’ve been trying to ensure that Jon and I eat five servings of fruits and vegetables per day, which, it turns out, is ridiculously difficult. So I’ve reintegrated smoothies into our breakfast regimen. It’s pretty easy, as long as you use frozen fruit and rinse the blender before leaving for work. This recipe makes yummy two 14-ounce smoothies, each with 1.5 servings of fruit.

3 cups frozen fruit (i.e. blueberries, strawberries, mango, peaches. I like using a combination of a fruit that’s high in vitamin A, like mango, with a fruit that’s high in vitamin C, like the other three.)
1.5 cups orange juice
1/2 cup plain, whole milk yogurt
1 tablespoon Green Vibrance powder or protein powder (optional; will reduce deliciousness)

Put all ingredients into a blender. Blend.