VirgysKitchenandGarden

  When a special event comes around, I create a menu of foods my family requests or foods I want.  This Christmas (December 25, 2020), I asked, but no one had a list of special items, so I made the list of the generic foods everyone likes.  Depending on the pocket of space I have for preparation, the list grows and is altered with scratches.      I cook in a methodical way, which any chef/cook knows. Start with desserts that must be prepared and chilled the day before. Move to meats and other dishes (Nigerian stew made from fresh tomatoes) that take an hour or longer to cook. Move to sides (carbohydrates mostly) and vegetables that cook for a long time. Finish with veggies and other dishes that can be cooked in minutes.      Now we feast! From top left to bottom left: steamed long-grain rice, Nigerian stew made from fresh tomatoes and Scotch Bonnet pepper (only one), black-eyed peas, fresh codfish, brown rice pasta, the veggie trio of cauliflower, carrot, and broccoli steamed in a wok

I watched the 2009 movie “Confessions of a Shopaholic" and loved, loved Hugh Dancy. Before that, he stole my heart in the tragic 2007 “Evening.” That’s another story. Now, let me face my handicap. I confess that my shopaholism was so bad I bought things for future wants and needs. I acquired unnecessary catering service wares. Any psychologist who has diagnosed a shopaholic knows that any reason is good enough to fill a car with unnecessary purchases several times a week without a twinge of guilt. I confess for the lunacy of my shopaholism. I bought all the service wares featured here (and more) to give to my daughter and to friends in the future and to use some of the items to cater future events. For example, I bought several items for my future grandchildren. Never mind that I did not ask my daughter and her husband if they wanted those items.  I bought Godinger Dublin highball glasses and kept them for years. When a friend came down from New York in January 2020 (before COVID-

I read somewhere that each bowl of beans we consume adds years to our lives because of the high fiber beans contain. I eat beans daily in all sorts of ways. Today, I wanted a nutritious and quick snack that I can eat alone or use as a dip. Featuring: Seasoned black beans, Mozzarella cheese, and Sriracha sauce.          --Frances Ohanenye maintains this visual "cookbook" that features processes and ingredients in pictures. Cooks and chefs need to calibrate according to their locale, availability, and preference. Please click on the "Open Source Cooking" tab for additional information. Thanks for visiting. Have a fruitful day

According to Science Digest , breakfast is the most essential meal of the day. It optimizes alertness, performance, health, and so on .  As nutritionist Adelle Davis famously put it back in the 1960s: " Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince, and dinner like a pauper”  ( Sifferlin, 2013 ).  The latest evidence indicates that we should aim to consume around 15–25% of our daily  energy intake  at breakfast (i.e., 300–500 calories for women and 375–625 for men;  Spencer, 2017 ; though see also  Betts et al., 2014 ). Evidence from large-scale surveys suggests that 18–25% of adults ( Haines et al., 1996 ,  Kant and Graubard, 2006 ,  Spence, B.,, 2017 ) and as many as 36% of adolescents in North America skip this putatively ‘most important’ meal ( Seiga-Riz et al., 1998 ). Therefore, breakfast deserves extra time to prepare and to enjoy, the effort to display it, and the creativity to turn it into art. Lately, I am focusing on how to turn waffles, fruits, a boiled egg, peanut bu

  I have not cooked or eaten okra/okro/okworo soup in a while. I cannot overemphasize the simplicity of this incredible vegetable. Without meat or fish, it still tastes incredible! Believe me, I have testimonies as to the deliciousness of my okworo soup. A friend came over one day to eat. He polished the entire mound of foo-foo, was uncomfortable, but he just could not stop eating because of the soup. He mows calls it “Your world-famous okworo soup”.  Another testimony: When an older Nigerian mother who is a renowned cook and who owns a restaurant asks for your recipe for herself and for her daughter-in-law (who also ate my okworo soup), you know you should open your own restaurant! Simple ingredients for this okra soup: 2-12 oz packs of Kroger southern-style cut okra, water, Knorr chicken bouillon, spinach, and crushed red pepper. THAT’S IT. No palm oil or any oil, no broth, no black pepper, no onions, etc. I got both the spinach and the okra free with my Kroger Rewards mailed-in cust

Today (August 6) is my daughter’s birthday. I am usually in Georgia for the summer until her birthday before I return to work. We (Cassie, Correl, and I) go out to eat before they take off to whatever surprise he has in store for her birthday. This year, the coronavirus has a different plan.      Anyway, I made this breakfast for her because French toast is one of her favorite foods. Lately, I have been making them with French bread because they look far much better. I sent her the pictures. Her reply was, “ Yum, thanks, Mom.”  I also sent Cassie a box of “feel-good” items as much as I could squeeze into the biggest post office box I could find, little things that make a big difference in life. I used to do this every Christmas until she graduated from college. It usually takes months to assemble the items she likes and put them in a big TJ Maxx bag, the types that hang around the checkout aisles.  Being the decorator she is, Cassie arranged the gifts I sent her in a basket such as a s