staying simple

while i try to integrate cooking into my daily routine, it is sometimes hard to acquire the mindset that cooking is simple, and keep on with my goals.

oatmeal with cinnamon, cranberries, almonds, bubbling in soy milk.

well, i guess our school does make it more difficult for me, getting rid of all the kitchens when renovating the dorms, not letting anybody get off the meal plan while providing us with lower than low quality food which makes us swoon with suffering.

but still. sometimes cooking doesn't even require ovens, or stoves, or even a knife or other kitchenware. for that bowl of steel cut oatmeal (not instant add-boil-water-and-you're-done quakers oatmeal, mind you) i let the oats soak in water overnight, and just sprinkled cinnamon, some berries, and added a few almonds and my hearty breakfast was all set. 


but if you do let me rant for a while, it is a bit annoying to drag all my ingredients, olive oil, salt and also stealing additional ingredients from val (hey, i pay my tuition, im going to get the most out of it) to one of the few dorms that does have a decent kitchen. and i have to bear with all those random people who poke around curiously and suspiciously as this small, unknown, non-resident girl bustles and hustles around their kitchen which in my opinion, is not being properly utilized. so it is left to me to keep my chin up, keep my sense of taste high, and march around with forks and knives as my armor. 

and its not too bad to walk around in such beautiful weather like nowadays. so in order to pay greetings to my hellful finals week to come, i decided to whip up a simple dish of scrambled eggs and shrimp! 

the best part i like when chopping herbs is that with every slice you make with your knife, a fresh, unique fragrance billows up to fill your nose. slice, whish! slice, whish! chop, chop away i go. 


h is often in charge of the stove nowadays. i prepare and chop(more chopping!) up all the ingredients, hand it over to the master, and he stir fries them, mixes them, seasons them, and voila! we make a good combo. so today he started with stirfrying the garlic and shrimps, and just about time they were about to turn pink and plump and yummy looking, added the eggs. when the eggs started to turn creamy,  i added my chopped up cilantro. 

scrambled eggs and shrimp, with cilantro.

i personally eat the shrimps whole, as i like everything whole and crunching through the shrimp, shell and all is quite satisfying somehow. H had a bit of a hard time trying to shell the shrimps, and also fight with me to get to the last morsel of creamy eggs. all of this was done in less than thirty minutes ! (we are fast eaters thats also true)


so, go simple! and you can go simple too! if i can do it in this poorly qualifying amherst, i believe anybody can start anywhere. 


*another lesson of the day: always follow the recipe's ratio. a little bit of tinkering around is fine, but the ratio of the ingredients are important to achieve the adequate blend the cook intended. today we added 2/3 of the eggs (it did call for eight eggs... the idea of eating so much eggs made us chicken us out. pun not intended (: ) and we did have some lonely shrimps left in the pan afterwards.