Beet Gnocchi with an Italian Cream Sauce/The Queen of Versailles

This recipe is messy. It's also a little strange because not only have I never made gnocchi before - I've never even eaten it. I think I made them too big, but that's pretty much out of laziness. I also didn't put a definite amount of flour you need to use. Beets and potatoes are of all different sizes, so you pretty much have to get the right consistency. I think I did that. I don't really care; they taste good and I hid my beets in there so I consider it a win for Kim.

For this week's viewing enjoyment, I give you this.

Are you still hungry?

Recipe: Beet Gnocchi with an Italian Cream Sauce

Homemade Hot Dog Buns with Beet Sauerkraut/Far Away, So Close!

So if you're looking for traditional fluffy hot dog buns, you should probably follow the original recipe posted here. I decided to go my own route and make them whole wheat. I also substituted yogurt for butter. I probably did something wrong because they just didn't rise. They kind of had a hard pretzel-like quality to them. I thought they held up to the beet sauerkraut quite nicely, but they did not turn out like they should have. Oh well, one of these days I'll learn how to bake. 

Also, another beet recipe. One of these days I'm going to run out of ideas. I actually just got a HUGE bag of them in the farm exchange, and I'm really struggling to come up with some good recipes. Suggestions welcome. 

Lastly, I used turkey dogs because they were an impulse buy and have been sitting in my freezer for weeks. They were actually really delicious, although I can't really remember the last time I had a real hot dog. You can use whatever you want, but I would recommend a more plain frank to let the flavor of the sauerkraut shine through.

Recipe: Turkey Dogs with Homemade Hot Dog Buns and Beet Sauerkraut.

Beet Poppy Seed Muffins/Dr. Strangelove

EDIT: sorry about this one being late - I scheduled it to be posted yesterday morning, but I guess I'm pretty clueless about this blogging thing. Wednesday's will be up on time!

I just noticed that every other recipe on here involves beets. It's ok though because they're really good for you. Or so says these guys. Helps prevent colon cancer and heart disease? I guess I can get behind that. My CSA keeps sending me beets by the pound, and I'm kind of sick of them turning all of my food, well, beet red. Which is why I got super excited when I came across this recipe from The Hearty Herbivore.

I changed up the recipe a bit to accommodate my pantry, and I also added a lemon because, well, poppy seeds and lemon belong together. It might sound a little strange to add the beets to the sweet muffins, but the earthyness actually goes quite nicely with the sweetness. They are a very hearty muffin - I had mine for breakfast every day this past week and found myself enjoying them with a fork. They do still taste like beets, but I would suggest giving them a try anyways - they might just convert you. Plus they are BEAUTIFUL.

These guys also recommend the muffins.

Recipe: Beet Lemon Poppy Seed Strangemuffins

One Pot Everything Soup/Shame/No More Netflix

Ok after this one the movies need to get lighter. I promise the next one will not be full of murdering or sex addicts. The Halloween season got the better of me.

This week is a big landmark for me. I have been a Netflix subscriber since 2006, when streaming movies wasn't a thing. After the "big split" of the streaming and by-the-mail services and the price increase, I was a bit peeved but kept going with the service and shelled out the $16 per month.

 Since moving here, I have fallen in love with this place. They have sections by director. They have an entire wall of criterion collection movies. They were the ones that had the Dario Argento shelf up in the horror section during Halloween season. It's wonderful. Contrary to what Trey Parker and Matt Stone think, people still go to movie stores.

Randy's movie store was not as cool.

I encourage everyone in the Boston area to give this place a try. The prices are a little steep for renting just one movie, but they have buy one get one free on Tuesdays. Also, if you rent a lot of movies, you can get a card for $40 that gets you 20 movies. I opted for this deal.

Anywaaays, Shame was my last movie from Netflix. You can read my review after the recipe post!

The food I made this week is kind of similar to the first post in the sense that the beets turned everything red again. It was delicious regardless, but you can just leave them out if you don't want another pink soup. As a matter of fact, this recipe is kind of a run-of-the-mill clean-out-the-fridge soup recipe. It also only uses one big pot, which is nice for cleanup. There are a lot of different ingredients you can add and take away, but I would say that the advantage of using the list I have compiled is that everything is in season. Stay tuned for Wednesday's post for the delicious bread I served alongside it (and a nice happy movie. I promised.).

Oh, also I used lettuce in my soup. Trust me on this one.

Recipe: Shamefully Simple One Pot Everything Soup

Borscht, Dario Argento's Deep Red

Well hey! My first post. Here it goes.

So my original idea was to have a movie blog. Then I realized there are a billion better movie blogs out there so I'm doing dinner and a movie. The movies will not always be new, and the food will not always be delicious, but I'm going to try my best.

Instead of preparing for the hurricane that came through the northeast the other day, I decided to cook. I get a box of vegetables from Boston Organics each Friday and like to pretend I'm on an episode of Chopped.

Hurricane supplies: jug of water, Jesus candles, beer.

I actually made two dishes during this hurricane, but we'll save the second for another horror movie and another post. This one is all about the borscht. Now, typically I'm not a huge fan of borscht and its earthy beety weirdness. Actually, it makes me think of that time in the Rugrats when Chucky gets skunked and has to bathe in borscht to get the smell out. Anyways, this is not your Polish grandma's borscht. It has some Thai inspiration and some sweet potato. I ate it every day for lunch this week and my coworker called it zombie guts. Pretty appropriate for the season/horror film post, eh? (Movie review posted after the recipe).

Recipe: Deep Red Borscht