Another night, another to die for dinner...

Tonight on the menu: Orzo with mushrooms, shallots and celery. I can't even describe the taste for you other than I needed to sit down after my first bite because it took my breath away. I started out with sauteing the shallots in some garlic and olive oil. Then I added the celery and a splash of white wine. Then I added some chicken broth and the whole wheat orzo. I also added more white wine, covered it and let it simmer. Once the orzo was near done, I added the mushrooms. The orzo soaked up the wine, chicken broth and olive oil and left me with a creamy, succulent flavor. The celery added crunch while the mushrooms added heartiness. I am so excited for tomorrow's nights leftovers!! First final tomorrow, then I am going to bang the other three out and it's sweet summer!!

PS Watch Ace of Cakes on the Food Network, Duff's awesome.

Lip Smacking Good Dinner

Tonight I made an amaaazing dinner! I love shellfish but never want to wait to eat out at an Italian restaurant to enjoy a good Zuppa di Pesce. Zuppa meaning soup, pesce meaning fish. Which is basically a plethora of seafood cooked in a tomato sauce served with pasta. The way I make it, it's so easy and affordable, you could charge someone $25 to eat it when it only cost you about $6! I basically saute onions or shallots in chopped garlic and olive oil. Then add a small can of crushed tomatoes. Of course you better be seasoning with the trio in every step (kosher salt, fresh black pepper, a little garlic powder). Then add whatever shellfish or fish you would like, I suggest shrimp, scallops, calamari, mussels or basically any combinations. A good sturdy whitefish such as halibut would be great too! You can add basil, red pepper, a wide variety of spices to make this dish your own. Serve over linguine and indulge yourself! It really is a pesce of cake!

Tomorrow night's menu: Mushroom, celery and chicken orzo in a risotto dish style sauce. Basically I am cooking orzo as if it were risotto because I found whole wheat orzo with 9 grams of fiber! Great for your diet! Orzo is small, rice shaped pasta whereas risotto is rice based. They are both delish and can be cooked similarly.

The plus side of being home studying for the past few days is I am eating good! But, I am studying all the damn time!

Is this a sign??

So as my close friends and family know, I am a terrible nail picker. I don't bite, I pick. Of course I never pick anywhere near the kitchen, mostly when I am sitting at my desk studying. However, in the week before my Hume Demo I swore I would not pick because I wanted to have nice nails for the demo. I figured the minute it was over, I would resume my picking. BUT! I am proud to say I haven't picked my nails in weeks!! Yep, I, Lauren Michelle, have very long, polished nails. They are classy and fabulous! They are definitely ready for their close ups when I cook! Could this be a sign that I could quit nail picking for the sake of food?

In more exciting news, my gastronomical salad fest continues. Tonight I made a wonderful salad with dried cranberries, hearts of palm, and other tasty salad ingredients. Try adding kosher salt to your next salad, you wouldn't believe the great flavor it adds!

Okay, now I will swear that I won't blog or do anything for ellemichelle.com because I HAVE TO study for my 4 exams in three days. I will catch up soon, once I get through my exams and smell the sweet summer break air.

I love TV Food Fan!

I want to give Mike a HUGE thank you over at TV Food Fan for plugging me on his website/blog. Click the link now and go read!! Also, look around his site, he has some great info for all you foodies out there!

TV Food Fan

Unfortunately I am still studying for finals, I have 4 tests in 3 days and then it's summer break! I did however have time to make a great salad tonight. I made my own dressing by mixing balsamic vinegar with creamy hummus then drizzled that over lettuce, cukes, tomatoes, grilled lemon-garlic chicken and sprinkled with crumbled goat cheese(it's much cheaper than the non-crumbled). I love to experiment with salads so I can always mix up an easy way to get veggies (and sometimes fruit too!). I must get back to studying, I LOVE transportation engineering... :)

Video Issues?

Word on the streets is that my College Bites videos are stopping and not letting you watch. Here's the solution: let it buffer a little so that it's not streaming. They are really large video files so that they have decent quality therefore they can't really stream. What you have to do is click the episode you want and pause it, you will see the percentage in the lower left corner increase. Let it go to like 25-45 percent then hit play and ENJOY!

Quickie

Just filmed a new episode...more info to come...

Episode 4!

The latest installment of College Bites is now posted for your viewing pleasure! I make 3 great appetizers, a cocktail and an awesome dessert. Go watch and share it with a friend! The appetizer party is in honor of the Food Network Awards Show. Although after all the food we ate, we wanted to sleep instead of watching tv. It was amazingly delicious! GO CHECK IT OUT!!

Food Adjectives

I would love everyones input on new food adjectives. I need to spice my vocabulary up... What are words would you like to hear?

Ketchup Confusion

My favorite condiment is ketchup, plain and simple. I put it on practically everything. I have been using ketchup my whole life but have yet to figure out the perfect amount when I squirt it out. When I make chicken fingers and fries, I love a lot of ketchup yet I always squirt out too much and the rest goes to waste. However when I make an omelet, I never squirt enough and have to get up to get more. Is there an answer to this question? How will I know what the perfect amount of ketchup is?

In other news, College Bites will be in another newspaper! Yep, that's right! It's going to be in The Miami Herald, the newspaper down south. YIPPEE!! I love all the interest College Bites is getting because that means I am teaching people and making a difference.

I don't know where College Bites will bring me in the future, but it's looking sunny. I can't wait!

Updates!

Check out the new updates on ellemichelle.com! I will talk about them tomorrow...

PS: HAPPY 2 MONTH ANNIVERSARY ELLEMICHELLE.COM!!!

Happy 3500!

ElleMichelle.com has had 3500 hits in 2 months! This is just the beginning of it all, there will be much more to come...

Awards Show Episode

So I am about halfway done editing the episode of College Bites that was filmed on Sunday night. I have one that I filmed a few weeks ago but I am going to post the Awards Show episode first. I made some great dishes, I hope you all try them. Finals are coming up which means I have to take a forced hiatus from College Bites but has no fear that I will resume the minute I am done. I have been really under productive lately so I need to get a jump on my school work. Do you have any requests for future CB episodes? Send them in! I also would love to answer more questions!

Loving all the press!

So I knew today that I would be in the Gainesville Sun but I had no idea I would be in the Alligator again! I was reading the paper casually and my name jumped out at me! The editor did her editorial on me, of all people, me! I am so glad my show is being so well received because that means I can help and teach people, which is my main goal. I am also going to have a column in the fall in the Gainesville Sun every 2 weeks to every month, look out for it! I also hope that everything works out with GatorWell and we get some of my demos shown on channel 8 on campus. In the meantime, here are the articles I have been in!

Food Network Awards

Tonight at 9 PM ET are the first ever Food Network Awards on the Food Network (duh)!! Make sure you watch it and look for me! I will be right behind where George Duran passes the awards out and in the front on the red carpet. I can't wait to watch. I am celebrating by hosting a Food Network Awards Viewing Party to be taped for an episode of College Bites. It's going to be so much fun!

The Article

So I rushed to campus this morning before my transportation engineering field trip to seek out a (okay many copies) an Alligator. When I turned to page 8, I could hardly believe what I saw. There was a large, color picture of ME! I was the only article on the page and it looked amazing. I will scan the article and put it online. I finished editing the demo so it will be up shortly. The only reason I edited was because I wanted to cut the time down a little (I knocked 5 minutes off). I hope you enjoy it!!!!!

Alligator link

Here is the link to the newspaper article about me and College Bites:
http://www.alligator.org/pt2/070413cooking.php

GO READ IT!

PS I am up at 6 am for my field trip...

Complete Success!!

Well the Hume Demo was tonight and it went flawlessly (at least I think so). I had so much fun. I can't believe it's over now and all my nerves were for nothing. I will give you more details tomorrow because I have to go to bed and I am POOPED out! I have a field trip tomorrow to the Florida Department of Transportation with my transportation engineering class so I need to be up early. It's so funny how one night I am cooking in front of a group of students and the next day I am at the FDOT learning about transportation. Anyway, tonight was amazing. More details to come! Most importantly: PICK UP THE INDEPENDENT FLORIDA ALLIGATOR NEWSPAPER TOMORROW (4/13) AND TURN TO PAGE 8 FOR AN ARTICLE AND A PICTURE ABOUT COLLEGE BITES AND MY DEMO AS WELL AS MY CHAI RICE PUDDING RECIPE!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The big day is tomorrow...

So tomorrow is my Hume Hall cooking demonstration. I am about to go to bed and my stomach is in complete knots. I am so nervous. I just spent a few hours editing the latest College Bites and I never realize how much I cut out. I can't cut anything out tomorrow! I have to say everything perfect on the first shot. Luckily I will have everything prepped tomorrow and I don't usually when I film CB. So I have that going for me. I also got some great prizes to give away at the end when I ask some questions and I think the food will be a hit. Also, big news! There will be an article in Friday's Alligator (big paper around UF) about me and College Bites!! Look for it on alligator.org, I can't wait! I know there is always that chance that it doesn't make it in, but I am being very optimistic. I need to go to bed because I have a long day tomorrow, but my nerves are driving me crazy! Wish me luck tomorrow...

Happy Wednesday

It's the middle of the week and I have a smile on my face. Why you ask? Because tomorrow is my Hume Demo. Whee! I am very excited. I hope it all goes well, this is the first step in practicing for a demo at the Wine and Food Fest. One can wish, right? It looks like it's sunny out today and not rainy which would be amazing because the weather the past few days has been very dreary. I have a few classes to go to and then a quiz to take and then more prep work for tomorrow! So I was talking to my mom today and we got to thinking about a collaboration show. Wouldn't it be fun if Dave Lieberman and I had a show together? I think we would look good next to each other, think about it...

I am busting with excitement!

There are so many great things going on in the world of Elle Michelle. Tomorrow I will finally get around to editing episode 4 of CB. It's a great dish, look out for it. So I will hopefully have it posted by Thursday! Yippee...4 episodes!! It feels like just yesterday I was learning how to use Movie Maker and had one episode in the works. The next piece of exciting news is that my Hume Hall Cooking Demonstration is only one day away!! It's going to be Thursday on the 4th floor of Hume West. Come on by! I just practiced all my recipes today and they came out SOO good! There are people from GatorWell (the campus health promotion services) who are coming to watch, I am so psyched to have them there. I am also getting interviewed tomorrow for an article by a journalism student. I can't believe all of my good fortune! I bought bay scallops for dinner because you get so much for you money. I haven't decided to cook them yet, but I will figure out how in a little. I MUST go study now, I have been playing in the kitchen for far too long. Come see me in Hume on Thursday...

Alive and kicking!

So I am slowly recovering from this cold. I feel better and am ready to finish this semester off with a bang! There are so many exciting College Bites things happening this week and I will talk all about them later. When I reformatted my computer, I couldn't get into Blogspot but I just uploaded Mozilla and I can now post! Thank goodness! I am going to do work now but I will come back later and post all the news. Be back...

Little by little...

Well after winning the championship, I celebrated my heart out and became sick. All of my roommates are sick and I was so careful to not catch their cold but it was inevitable. Oh well! This is a good excuse to stay home, catch up on TV and dream of new recipes. I think the next episode, aside from the Food Network Awards viewing party will be Meatloaf and Mashed Potatoes. I have never really made meatloaf but it's an American staple and I am going to try it out. So I installed my new hard drive (myself!!) and am working on getting the computer up and running. In the meantime, I will get episode 4 footage on my external hard drive and start to edit. Thank you to everyone that checked out the new recipes. Look for more to come!

The Gators are the champs!!

Well, the Florida Gator Basketball team managed to bring home another championship and I could not be happier!! Watching the game was a blast and so was celebrating afterwards! I need to get on the ball with recording a bunch of shows to get me through the summer. Anyone have recipe requests? Also, next week I am doing a food demo in Hume Hall on campus. I am going to teach dorm residents how easy it is to make an asian themed meal in the dorm kitchens. GO GATORS!!!

Updates

So ellemichelle.com is finally updated! I added four recipes and a food tip. College Bites will be edited this week once my computer is up and running. Check out the new recipes and GO GATORS! Chomp the Buckeyes again!!