Author: futurepotato777

Cooking in Quarantine #2: Chickpea Stew with Spinach

Post author By futurepotato777
Post date May 20, 2020
5 Comments on Cooking in Quarantine #2: Chickpea Stew with Spinach

Chickpeas. Known by different names such as gram or Bengal gram, garbanzo or garbanzo bean, Egyptian pea, Chana, and Chole, they are filled with protein and can be cooked in many different ways. Such as in cold salads, soups, stews, etc. One of the first names ever given to the grain, was chiche pease, from Middle French, pois chiche. In Old Spanish, It was named garbanzo and has been kept that way. In English it was named garvance during the 17th century. But after many years, it finally came to be known in English as chickpea. Chickpeas date back all the way to late Neolithic (about 3500 BC) in Greece. You can read more about the chickpea where I researched it, on revolvy.com

Today we will make the ancient legume in a stew accompanied by spinach.

Ingredients

Chickpeas
Chopped onions (As many chopped onions as you want.)
Chopped garlic
Ground Pepper
Salt
Spinach
Achiote Powder
Cumin Powder

Attention

Leave chickpeas in water for 12 hours before the day your expecting to cook them. Don’t put salt when boiling the chickpeas. Don’t use canned spinach, try to use fresh spinach. Depending on how much chickpeas your making, you will need to calculate how much water you’ll be using and how much spice you’ll be using.

Procedure

Step 1: Wash your hands and clean your working space.

Step 2: Get a pot and fill it up with water and leave it to heat up.

Step 3: While your water is heating up, drain and rinse the soaked chickpeas out of the water you left over night, and proceed to put them in the pot covered by fresh water. When you see bubbles starting to develop at the bottom of the pot.

Step 4: Leave the chickpeas to simmer for an hour and a half. Move them every 10 minutes to make sure they don’t stick to the bottom. Add more water if necessary.

Step 5: After they’re done cooking, proceed to take a take a stock pot where we will cook the whole stew. Heat some olive oil or vegetable oil in the pot to medium low. Then proceed to put your chopped up garlic to simmer for about 3 minutes then proceed to put the chopped onion. Constantly move them until the onions are golden.

Step 6: Then add a hint of ground pepper, salt and the amount of spinach you’ll be using. Cook it and move it constantly.

Step 7: While cooking your spinach, add Achiote powder and Cumin powder and let it cook for 10 minutes.

Step 8: When done cooking your spinach, add your Chickpeas and the water it boiled in to add it’s juice and leave to cook for about 15 more minutes.

Step 9: Serve and Enjoy

Cooking

Cooking in Quarantine #1: Homemade Tortillas

Post author By futurepotato777
Post date April 15, 2020
6 Comments on Cooking in Quarantine #1: Homemade Tortillas

They’re sold in almost every store in NYC and popular among us latinos, usually eaten with tacos, burritos, and traditional Mexican food like barbacoa (steamed goat) or frijoles con cecina y salsa (clack beans with homemade hot sauce and salty beef). Originally named tlaxcalli , Tortillas originated in Mexico by Aztecs before European contact. Ever since then people have known tortillas most commonly in tacos and in other Mexican dishes.

Ingredients

Tortilla flour or tamale flour
Warm water
A tortilla press and two pieces of plastic or by hand
A flat cooking pan

Attention

You must only use these types of flours. If you do not have a tortilla press you can do it with the palm of your hands. You must use warm water and you must have the two plastic sheets if your using the press.

Procedure

Step 1: Wash your hands and clean your working space.

Step 2: Pour the amount of flour you will be using in the container you will be using and make a little crater in the middle. Every cup of flour will yield 5 tortillas.

1 cup flour = 5 tortillas
2 cups flour = 10 tortillas
3 cups flour = 15 tortillas
Etc.

Step 3: Warm up your water and pour it in the little crater and mix it with both hands, Until it feels like soft play doh.

Step 4: Grab a portion of your tortilla dough and create a small ball between both of your hands, the size of your ring finger. Do this until all the dough is rolled.

Step 5: One by one put a dough ball between the two plastic sheets in the tortilla press and press down as hard as you can, until it’s flat. While your doing this, heat up your flat pan.

Step 6: Put your tortilla on the heated pan and leave it there for 10 seconds before flipping and leaving the other side for a minute or 2.

After you wait for a minute or 2, flip and you may see that it will start to puff. This is a good sign. Leave it there for a minute before taking it out and leaving to rest.

Step 7: After you finish with all your tortillas leave them to rest for a minute and cover them with a paper towel to contain the warmness.

Step 8: Enjoy them any way you like !!!

Tags Homemade tortillas, Mexican Food, Quarantine

Battle of the Books

Movie vs. Book: Lord of the Rings Trilogy

Post author By futurepotato777
Post date January 15, 2020
1 Comment on Movie vs. Book: Lord of the Rings Trilogy

For years, people have debated if the book is better than the movie or if the movie is better than the book. This series will be focusing on these two questions and answering that million dollar question: which is better?

The book

The Lord of the Rings, one of the most iconic books out there written by J.R.R Tolkien. Filled with mystical creatures and beings, the story takes place in somewhere called Middle Earth. The story starts off, when nineteen Elves from Eregion forge a total of nineteen rings made for a total of nineteen people: three for the the Elves, seven for the Dwarves, and nine for mankind, but not only nineteen rings were made, one forged at the peak of Mount Doom stands out above all. Created by Sauron, The Dark Lord, this ring is filled with malevolent power and corruption. It’s purpose is to rule over all Middle Earth and end the era of mankind. To avoid this, one must destroy the ring. This is the destiny of a Hobbit named Frodo.

The book is filled with descriptions about beautiful landscapes, lifeless war zones and dangerous creatures, such as orcs and giant spiders. The book also shares with us the emotions of the main characters, such as the fright Frodo experiences when he tries to hide the ring from the nine kings, now known as The Nazgûls.

The Movie

In December of 2001, The lord of the rings was released in the theaters and received a total of 91% of rotten tomatoes and a score of 8.8 in IMDb. Throughout the United States, the movie was praised by it’s scenery and the amazing acting of each and every character, such as the acting of Ian McKellen, as the wizard Gandalf. As David Denby from The New Yorker stated,

“Consistently beautiful and often exciting — despite some dead passages here and there, it’s surely the best big-budget fantasy movie in years.”
David’s compliment is also supported by one of the lines from the first book The Fellowship of The Ring.”The braids of her dark hair were touched by no frost; her white arms and clear face were flawless and smooth.”

This was one of the thousands of compliments given to the Lord of the Rings by critics and, well the general public itself. The movie has been watched over and over by the public and fans, although some have called out some flaws that the movie had as well, for example Jonathan Rosenbaum from The Reader had stated,

“It’s full of scenic splendors with a fine sense of scale, but its narrative thrust seems relatively pro forma, and I was bored by the battle scenes.”
This is also supported by the first book and it shows that the battle of Minas Tirith was 3 chapters long!! and has a total of 30 pages.

Therefore, The Lord of the Rings wasn’t perfect, but it did meet the expectations of mostly everyone.

With these results we can conclude that the movie is BETTER than the book, by pure scenery and elaboration towards the script. Well, that concludes all for this second post! See you in the next Movie vs Book.

Tags Book vs. Movie, Lord of the Rings

Book vs. Movie

Movie vs. Book: Wonder

The Book

Wonder by R. J. Palacio is filled with emotional content and heart breaking moments, Wonder is packed with characters with intimate and difficult problems, all of which they all try to overcome. One of these characters is a ten-year-old boy named August with a facial problem, who has a tough time fitting in. Others with a social problems, and acceptance by their peers, you get the idea. To be honest the mood that represents this book at first is heart warming, but as you proceed through the book it gets more serious and a bit extreme such as August being called Dark Sidious, a star wars character who’s face is burned. I recommend this book to those out there with insecurity, people who feel left out and for people how just don’t feel like they fit in.

The Movie

The movie on the other hand is almost as similar as the book itself. The plot is the same and some of the lines in the movie are as identical to those in the book, but most of the time skips some. Even though the book delivers the content in a unique way, such as giving extreme detail and expressing the characters thoughts and feelings, the movie does the same thing but in a visual way which gives the audience a different point of view. Such as when August tries to snap out of the fantasy he lives in, in which he thinks he’s normal ten-year old, which sadly he is not. He ends up crying and we see his parents giving him comfort. This is a time where the movie show a feeling instead of using voice over.

With these results we can conclude that the book is BETTER than the movie, by just pure detail and elaboration towards the descriptions within the book. Well that concludes all for this first post!