Introduce Yourself (Example Post)

This is an example post, originally published as part of Blogging University. Enroll in one of our ten programs, and start your blog right.

You’re going to publish a post today. Don’t worry about how your blog looks. Don’t worry if you haven’t given it a name yet, or you’re feeling overwhelmed. Just click the “New Post” button, and tell us why you’re here.

Why do this?

  • Because it gives new readers context. What are you about? Why should they read your blog?
  • Because it will help you focus you own ideas about your blog and what you’d like to do with it.

The post can be short or long, a personal intro to your life or a bloggy mission statement, a manifesto for the future or a simple outline of your the types of things you hope to publish.

To help you get started, here are a few questions:

  • Why are you blogging publicly, rather than keeping a personal journal?
  • What topics do you think you’ll write about?
  • Who would you love to connect with via your blog?
  • If you blog successfully throughout the next year, what would you hope to have accomplished?

You’re not locked into any of this; one of the wonderful things about blogs is how they constantly evolve as we learn, grow, and interact with one another — but it’s good to know where and why you started, and articulating your goals may just give you a few other post ideas.

Can’t think how to get started? Just write the first thing that pops into your head. Anne Lamott, author of a book on writing we love, says that you need to give yourself permission to write a “crappy first draft”. Anne makes a great point — just start writing, and worry about editing it later.

When you’re ready to publish, give your post three to five tags that describe your blog’s focus — writing, photography, fiction, parenting, food, cars, movies, sports, whatever. These tags will help others who care about your topics find you in the Reader. Make sure one of the tags is “zerotohero,” so other new bloggers can find you, too.

After Thanksgiving improv casserole

After Thanksgiving you may still have leftovers, but can’t face yet another full on dinner of mostly white food or leftover sammich.

So look to the fridge to build a different style dish.  Here’s my mexellent-three-sistersish-refrigerator-casserole.

Opened or previously cooked stuff in the fridge to use:
Hominy
Lima beans
Jar of sofrito
Half cup enchilada sauce (homemade from dried chilies)
Half an onion
Bag of baby carrots
A big jug of broth – mostly prominently leek flavored

From the pantry:
Sweet potato
A cup of cashews
Tin of green chilies (perfectly fine but possibly nearishly past expiration date)
Part of a bag of blue corn chips
Nutritional yeast (nooch)

Assembly:

I sautéed the sweet potato, carrots, and onion in sofrito and some of the broth.  I then blended half of this with the enchilada sauce, more broth, cashews, some of the lima beans and some nooch to make kind of a cheesy sauce.  I want the sauce pretty loose and wetish so that the tortilla chips will soak it up.

Cover the bottom of a baking dish with the sauce.  Layer on tortilla chips, sautéed veggies, green chilies, lima beans, then repeat ending with sauce on top.

Bake 325 for about 45 minutes.

Serve with a side salad and any other mexcellent toppings like avocado, salsa, cashew creme, hot sauce or anything else you like with Mexican food.

Happy New Year! Taco Cleanse and Marvel actors in a Jane Austin Classic

Happy New Year!

While not exactly traditional blacked eyed peas, these Black Calypso beans from Rancho Gordo will do nicely in a taco.

Here’s my New Year’s taco inspired by the new Taco Cleanse book.  You can’t beat a practical taco cookbook with a humorous take on fad cleanses.  Tacos everyday is a New Year’s resolution I can stick to!
Today’s bean and sweet potato taco
Tortilla
Mashed baked sweet potato

Cooked Beans 
Nutritional yeast
Salsa
Avocado
Vegan Sour Cream
Toaster oven style:   Place tortilla in the toaster oven on 350 for about 3min.  If it’s a little stale run some water over it quickly and it will bake off when heating and soften the tortilla.  Check it often, and pop it out when warmed but still pliable.

For a no-frills quick queso, mix some nutritional yeast with a little water then add salsa.  

Layer the sweet potato, beans, salsa queso, avocado, and vegan sour cream on the warmed tortilla.  Enjoy!
Crockpot beans:  Not pre-soaked.  Cover with plenty of water.  Turn on.  After reasonable cooking time, when they’re soft, taste several beans for doneness.  These took about 5 hours on high.  If you have lots of time, leave it on low, and test after about 8 hours.  This works well for overnight or while you’re at work.  As long as there is plenty of water you can set it and forget it for a really long time (I’ve forgotten it and left about 24 hours before.) 
Baked Sweet Potato:  It is actually important to prick the skins on potatoes – says one who once didn’t believe this was essential and learned the hard way when scraping exploded baked potato off the oven.  

No frills Queso:

Blurry tacos – too hungry to focus…

For a relaxing post new year’s afternoon, and if you can’t get enough Jane Austin on film or Marvel Universe connections, check out Mansfield Park with both Agent Carter and Mr. Jarvis.  It’s streaming on Amazon and free with Prime.  For Dr. Who fans, Billie Piper is the lead.  

Too hot to cook? Cold summer vegetable soup.

The secret ingredient is cashew cream, but I’ll get to that in a minute.
When my first world complaint is that there’s simply too much broccoli in my CSA share,  it’s time to make soup.
Soup is always about the ingredients and the fresher the better.  A few simple tricks can make this an almost instant treat.  Advance planning when it’s cooler, and you can create a simple base that can be used to create quick soup throughout the week.
This soup had about four big heads of broccoli with the stems.  The addition of carrots and potatoes did lighten the green tint.
Almost Instant:
For instant cold smooth soup, add pretty much any vegetable or bean combination (raw, pre-cooked, frozen, or whatever you have that you like) to the blender or food processor about halfway up and completely cover with water or vegetable broth with about an extra inch above the vegetable line.  Blend this first and you can quickly see if you need it thinner or thicker.  It’s a good time to add some salt or vegetable bullion to taste and blend again.  Add more broth or water for thinner.  I don’t use raw potatoes because I find them gritty raw, but I usually add some cooked potatoes or dried potato flakes to make it thicker.  I also generally opt for only a small amount of raw garlic, scapes, shallot, scallion, or sweet onion. Too much or a really potent one can totally overpower your soup.  I add a dollop of cashew cream to blend in.  It’s a bit tangy and salty and balances out the veggies nicely.
Advance planning version:
If you’ve got too many veggies that are at risk of going bad in the fridge, making a soup base will help preserve them.  I do prefer them cooked generally so basically add them all to a pot and include some potatoes and more of the onion family.  Carrots and celery are also good bases.
Last week I had carrot, onion, garlic, shallot, celery, both cooked and raw potaoes, some unidentified root vegetables, the aforementioned too-much-broccoli, parsley, and some cooked lentils.  Put it in a large pot, cover plus one inch with broth and water, salt to taste, simmer about an hour and blend it all together.  I store it in the fridge in quart mason jars after it’s cooled but not cold.  Not canned, but the mason jars get sort of vacuum sealed and it lasts more than 2 weeks in the fridge.  This is good reheated or cold, but in 95 degree weather, who am I kidding; I’m opting for cold.  If it gets too thick in the fridge I add some cold water to make it less like baby food and top with cashew cream and a dash of seasoned salt.
You can also use the base as the canvas for other more complex soups or add herbs and spices or more diced veggies or beans after blending. It is incredibly diverse and versatile.
I made the cashew cream topping with rejeuvalac, but that requires advance planning so the cheater version is below.
Cashew cream:
1 cup unroasted unsalted cashews
Juice from one fresh lemon
Salt to taste
Soak the cashews in water for about an hour and drain.  Blend together.  Add a little water if it doesn’t come together or is too thick.
Really it’s all about the cashew cream, but getting more vegetables and soup is always a good thing.

BLT sushi rolls

Here’s my iron chef sushi submission.  Weirdly it’s the tomato that’s the oddball ingredient as the bacon is tempeh, and avocado (swapped for the lettuce) is a fairly normal American sushi roll ingredient.  

Topped with a vegan mayo mixed with some sriracha.  
I brought the rice cooker into the office and made this at work.  I did pretty good with the rolling.  
Mixed verdict with the tasters.  I usually waited until after they tried it to mention “fermented” and “soy” in the same sentence with “it’s not really bacon.”