Laboratory Reproduction

There is something mysteriously fertile about my lab.   In the four years in which I have been in the lab, three babies have been born, and we are not a particularly large lab by many standards.  I do not know the status of one, one was a completely unplanned surprise, and one was a truly sought-after “miracle” baby in which the couple had tried for quite some time for a child and had been discussing adoption as an alternative when they discovered they were pregnant (see? mysterious chemical in the air to aid with fertility!).  On one hand, this ability to magically impregnate anybody could be quite useful as I know I will have quite a difficult time when Husband and I do decide to have children.  On the other hand, having a child by myself while working a bazillion hours a week towards my Ph.D. with a husband living 3 hours away in a residency program sounds less than ideal.  That said, my mother-in-law has so generously offered to move down here to D.C. and live with me to take care of any children we may have, while my husband remains up in Philly.  Hmm, raising a child with my MIL instead of living with my husband?  I think I’ll take my chances and wait for children until AFTER I’m done with graduate school and have moved up to Philadelphia, thankyouvermuch.

That said, last month the lab had a baby shower for the post-doc who most recently gave birth just this week to the newest lab baby, who made his appearance a full month early.  Thankfully, it sounds like both mother and son are doing well, though the wee one has quite a few pounds to gain since he came into the world sooner than expected.  As as become my tradition for everyone I know, I crocheted a baby blanket as a gift for the parents-to-be.

I have to confess that I was a little nervous – in the past, I’ve always gifted blankets to extremely close friends or family members; the kind of individuals who would naturally appreciate something handmade, just because of how close they were to me, regardless of the actual gift itself.  I’ve also always had to mail out the blanket since they’ve always been sent to a friend far away, so I’ve never had to be there to see someone open it and perhaps see the look on their face if they were disappointed with it – this was my first “live reveal”, and in front of quite a number of people to boot, including both the PIs of the lab.  Honestly, a little part of me was wondering if they would think that if I had time to be crocheting blankets, then clearly I wasn’t spending enough time in the lab, and needed to be working harder.

I had nothing to worry about.  The blanket wound up being a huge hit at the shower – in fact, it even inspired my PIs wife to run upstairs and pull out the baby quilts that friends had made for her children and she had hung on to, and she went on and on about how meaningful handmade gifts are and how she would never be able to get rid of them because they were so special since someone made them specifically for her children.  The post-doc loved it, especially since I make my baby blankets super-sized (this one was 4’ by 4’) so it will be big enough for both her and her son to fit under together for years to come in the winter.  The women in attendance all marveled at my craftiness and discussed how their mothers/grandmothers/other relatives knew how to knit or crochet and they wished they knew how, and the men all sympathetically asked if Husband wound up having to spend a lot of time driving me to craft stores (fortunately for him, he doesn’t; I order most of my yarn online).  And as for my PI; well, he didn’t even notice that I made a baby blanket.  He was so busy playing with the son of a former graduate student in the lab that he saw the blanket out of the corner of his eye and thought that I bought it, and missed the 20 minutes of conversation that followed about the fact that I made it.  Apparently, his wife continued to discuss the blanket later that night though, which was when he realized that it was handmade, and the next day in lab he pulled me aside to state that he was so impressed that I have so many hidden talents and am able to lead such a balanced life.  As Husband loves to describe me… jack of all trades, but master of absolutely nothing useful whatsoever.

But now, for the first time in 3 years, I have no friends or family members who are pregnant, so my baby blanket sweat shop has come to a temporary close until I get word from the stork that there will be a delivery on the way.  In the meantime, I guess that means it is time that I get busy making something for the recipients of my crafty giveaway!

Passover Cheesecake (Daring Bakers' Challenge)

The April 2009 challenge is hosted by Jenny from Jenny Bakes. She has chosen Abbey's Infamous Cheesecake as the challenge.

I recently decided to join both the Daring Bakers and Daring Cooks, located over at The Daring Kitchen. I thought joining would force me to continue to push myself in the kitchen, both in baking and cooking, once Husband moves away and I will become far more likely to revert to easy salads and bowls of cereal for dinner every night. It’s not that I don’t like to cook – it’s just that I don’t like to cook when I get home from a long day in the lab. If it’s only myself that I have to worry about, then frankly, I don’t care, and I’m perfectly content with a bowl of Cheerios or a steamed handful of green beans and calling it a day. But since I’ve had Husband to cook for over the past 5+ years (yes, even as undergrads, living in our separate dorm buildings, I still cooked dinner for him every single night), I feel responsible for serving complete, homemade meals. But once he moves away and it’s just me? It’s all about the easy way out.

Just as a word of note, both the Daring Bakers and Daring Cooks have specific reveal days (27th of the month for the bakers, 14th for the cooks), so rather than only on weekends, there will now be some weekday recipes sneaking in instead.

I have to confess that I was totally disappointed to discover that the first Bakers' Challenge recipe in which I would be participating was a cheesecake. I’ve never baked a cheesecake in a water bath before, so the challenge did serve the purpose of expanding my baking skills, but personally, I loathe cheesecake and find it to be an absolutely repulsive waste of perfectly good cream cheese. While Husband would be happy to eat an entire cheesecake on his own, he certainly doesn’t NEED it, so I adapted the recipe to make it Kosher for Passover, and served it as one of the desserts at the Passover Seder I hosted earlier in the month.

The original plain recipe can be found at Jenny Bakes; we were given the “freedom” to spice up the recipe as desired so I went for a chocolate swirl cheesecake and listed below are the modifications for the cheesecake that I made. Using a water bath, rather than dry baking, definitely prevented the cheesecake from cracking and created a far creamier cheesecake than I’ve made in the past. It was SUPER rich – in fact, despite everyone gorging themselves on cheesecake at the Seder, Husband was still eating leftover cheesecake for a week (and couldn’t have been happier!).

Ingredients:

• 1 can chocolate Kosher for Passover macaroons
• 3 (8-ounce) packages of cream cheese, room temperature
• 1 cup sugar
• 3 large eggs
• 1 cup heavy cream
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 4 ounces unsweetened chocolate, melted

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350F. Begin to boil a large pot of water for the water bath.
2. Grind contents of can of macaroons in food processor. Press crumbs into bottom of 9” springform pan. Set crust aside.
3. Combine cream cheese and sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer and cream together until smooth. Add the eggs one at a time, fully incorporating each before adding the next. Scrape down the bowl between the addition of each egg. Add cream, vanilla, and lemon juice and blend until smooth and creamy.
4. Remove one-third to one-half of the batter into a separate bowl and stir in melted chocolate.
5. Pour vanilla batter into prepared crust. Drop chocolate batter by spoonful into the vanilla batter and swirl with a knife into the vanilla. Tap the pan on the counter a few times to bring all air bubbles to the surface. Wrap the springform pan first with three layers of saran wrap, followed by three layers of aluminum foil (ensure that all saran wrap is covered by aluminum foil; layer of foil will prevent saran wrap from melting in the oven).
6. Place springform into a large roasting pan and pour the boiling water into the roasting pan until halfway up the sides of the springform pan.
7. Bake 45 to 55 minutes, until almost done – the sides of the cheesecake should hold together, but the center should still have significant jiggle. Close the oven door, turn off the heat, and let rest in the cooling oven for 1 hour. This allows the cake to finish cooking and cool down gently enough to prevent cracks at the top. After one hour, remove the cheesecake from the oven and lift carefully out of the water bath. Let the cheesecake finish cooling on the counter and then cover and finish chilling in the refrigerator.

Delightful Day in D.C.

I absolutely love living in D.C. (if it weren’t for Husband moving away for residency, I’d be content to stay here permanently!), but after living here for almost 8 full years I’ve discovered that I’ve just started to take everything for granted.  Whereas we once used to seize every opportunity possible to enjoy all that the city has to offer, over the past two or three years, Husband and I have just been so overworked and exhausted that if we happen to have a free weekend, we either spend it running errands, having a low-key night in with friends (or once in a rare while a not-so-low key night out, with appropriate recovery time the next day), or the most likely scenario – we each sit on our respectable couches, and he relaxes with his Playstation and I do some data analysis from home and then catch up on reading blogs and do a little knitting.  That’s not to say that we don’t get out at all – over the past several months, we’ve made it to the new location of the Newseum and to the Portrait Gallery, but if we are able to have a day off, chances are that we don’t do anything with it at all.

So, I was thrilled when the absolutely delightful Preppy Chemist, Ph.D. moved on up to D.C. and I had the opportunity to take her around on the standard monument tour two weekends ago – a reason to head out on what turned out to be a beautiful afternoon (once we waited for the rain to pass), visit some old sites I used to frequent back when I was in undergrad, and even catch the tail end of the cherry blossoms, which I would have otherwise missed in my typical “I live in D.C., I can see them any year” attitude.  We took the typical tourist route: Vietnam War Memorial –> Korean War Memorial –> Lincoln Monument –> Tidal Basin –> Bench where Husband Proposed (what do you mean that’s not a standard tourist location? it is most certainly a Very Important Spot!) –> FDR Memorial –> Jefferson Monument –> Washington Monument –> White House and back to where we started.

We had a lovely time, and I am looking forward to more adventures with Preppy Chemist (perhaps the zoo on another nice day)?  And of course, should any of you other blogfriends happen to make it to the D.C. area, certainly come give a knock on my digital door beforehand – showing people around reminds me of how much I love this place!

Diary of a Doctor’s Wife, Episode 005

I certainly cannot attest for all marriages, but ours seems to be one based on double-standards of doctoring. The frustrating double-standard of the moment deal with the Rules of Sickness.

The Rules of Sickness are as follows:

1. When Julie is sick, she must sleep on the couch and avoid the bedroom at all costs, as not to infect Husband with germs, because he is a Doctor and is therefore Very Important and Saves Lives, and cannot afford to get sick.
2. No matter how sick Julie is feeling, she is still expected to cook dinner for Husband, because he is a Doctor and therefore works Very Hard at Saving Lives, and comes home hungry and tired and needs to replenish his energy.
3. When Husband is sick, he still gets to sleep in the bed, because he is a Doctor and works Very Hard and needs a Good Night’s Sleep and therefore should never have to sleep on the couch.

As a result of these rules, 9 times out of 10, when I am sick, it does not spread to Husband (fortunately for him), and 9 times out of 10 when he is sick, it does spread to me (unfortunately for me).

At this point, if you are like my parents, my mother-in-law, my labmates, or any of my friends, you might be thinking to yourself, “Well, at least your husband is a doctor; surely, when you are sick, it is useful to have a doctor to take care of you!”

Rule #4: Husband is a Doctor and works Very Hard all day taking care of Real Patients in the hospital and therefore has No Patience to come home and take care of Wife-Patient.

So, in other words, being married to a doctor makes me more likely to catch whatever germs he brings home from the hospital, and less likely to have someone who remotely cares that I have become sick. It’s totally a win-win situation.

And, in other humorous news, I’ve gone from raspy nails-on-a-chalkboard voice to no voice at all. And today, my PI asked me to call around and get price quotes on both a fluorescent plate reader and an ultrasonic bath. At the end of the day when I hadn’t done it, he was obviously quite visibly annoyed. Er, I have no voice – am I supposed to try to set up an iChat session with our Fisher representative and mime out “ultrasonic bath”?! Come to think of it, I was always pretty good at Charades…

Mandelbrot vs Kamish Bread

One of the things that I find so fascinating about Judaism as opposed to many other religions is that regardless of where in the world families originate, the traditions, customs, and foods are the same. In other Western religions, this just isn’t the case – Polish Catholics have entirely different traditional foods from Italian Catholics. But Judaism is so much more than just a religion; it is truly a culture in and of itself.

One thing we cannot agree upon, however, is how to spell things once translated into English, or sometimes even what to call things. One example of this is the mandlebrot/kamish bread debate that comes up every year for Pesach. My Mother-in-Law and I both make essentially the same thing (the recipe I used called for Kosher for Passover margarine; hers uses oil, but the taste is the same)…. but we cannot, for the life of us, agree on what to call it.

She says kamish bread, I say mandelbrot. What do you say?

(Obviously, it’s mandelbrot).

Either way, it’s a Passover tradition. Much like my beloved once-a-year Hamentashen, Husband loves mandelbrot (for those who have never tried one, it’s kind of like a softer biscotti). Many families make it year round with flour, but both my MIL and I only make it once a year, at Passover, with matzoh cake meal in lieu of traditional flour. And so, Wednesday night, I whipped up a triple batch to last Husband through the next week.

Passover Mandelbrot

Ingredients:

• 3 eggs
• 1 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup oil
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 1/2 cup matzoh cake meal
• 1/2 cup potato starch
• 6 ounces chocolate chips

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350F. Grease cookie sheet.
2. Beat eggs. Add sugar.
3. Gradually incorporate oil, vanilla, cake meal, and potato starch.
4. Stir in chocolate chips.
5. Let stand for 15 minutes.
6. With well-oiled hands (dough will be heavy and sticky), divide dough into 3 long oval loafs on cookie sheet.
7. Bake for 30 minutes. Remove from oven, slice into cookies (must slice while hot or cookies will break), and return to oven for another 5 to 10 minutes.
8. Cool on wire rack and store in air-tight container for up to 1 week.

Commenting Problems?

Mudphudder just informed me that he has been having trouble leaving comments on my blog. Has this been an issue for anyone else? I am wondering if it is the embedded comments that is causing it, though I have been using them for quite a while now.

I would say “leave a comment to let me know if you are having problems!” but er… well… you get the point.

So, while it requires far more effort on your behalf, do me a favor and actually send me an email to ethidiumbromide (at) gmail (dot) com (or just click on the “Contact” link in the upper right hand corner) and let me know that you are having problems and what browser you are using. I finally figured out how to get my RSS feed working again, so next up I’ll try to tackle this commenting problem!

Baked Stuffed Eggplant

Really, all I have to say about this is that it is, hands down, one of my absolute most favorite things that I have ever cooked.  If you like eggplants, make this.  Immediately.  I made this about three months ago and enough time has passed to sneak it back into the rotation (anything which features vegetables stuffed into more vegetables cannot make too regular an appearance or Husband would riot), so there are currently two eggplants sitting in my refrigerator waiting to be stuffed and baked this week (with matzoh meal, instead of bread crumbs)… I am getting hungry just thinking about it!

Baked Stuffed Eggplant

Ingredients:

• 2 eggplants, sliced in half lengthwise
• 1 (1-once) slice bread (I used oatnut bread)
• 1 teaspoon olive oil
• 1 1/2 cups diced onion
• 1 1/4 cups diced red bell pepper
• 1 cup diced seeded cherry tomato
• 1/4 teaspoon dried oregano
• 2 garlic cloves, minced
• 3/4 cup (3 ounces) crumbled feta cheese
• 1/4 cup chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon fresh ground black pepper

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 400F.
2. Score cut side of each eggplant half by making 4 crosswise cuts.  Place the eggplant halves, cut side down, on a foil-lined baking sheet coated with cooking spray.  Bake for 25 minutes or until tender.  Remove from oven; cool on baking sheet for 10 minutes.  Remove inside pulp, leaving a 1/3 to 1/2-inch thick shell; reserve eggplant shell.  Chop/smush pulp.
3. Reduce oven temperature to 350F.
4. Place bread in a food processor and pulse until coarse crumbs measure 1/2 cup.  Drizzle the breadcrumbs with olive oil and pulse to combine.
5. Heat a large nonstick skillet coated with cooking spray over medium-high heat.  Add onion and saute for 3 minutes.  Stir in the chopped eggplant, bell pepper, tomato, oregano, and garlic; cover, reduce heat, and simmer 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.  Uncover and cook 5 minutes or until liquid evaporates, stirring occasionally.  Remove from heat; stir in cheese, parsley, salt, and black pepper.
6. Stuff each eggplant shell with 1/2 cup of onion mixture; sprinkle with breadcrumb mixture. 
7. Place eggplants on a baking sheet and bake at 350F for 30 minutes or until thoroughly heated and lightly browned.

The best laid plans…

…somehow always go awry.

As I’ve mentioned before, Husband is moving back to his hometown of Philadelphia in June, leaving me here in D.C.  I may not have mentioned that he will be taking his car with him, and seeing as how he (now we) has a massive medical school debt, we aren’t exactly in the position to purchase a second car so that I can have one.  So, I will remain carless.  This wasn’t really a concern – I’ve never had a car with me in D.C., and one of the huge perks of living where we do is being in walking distance of so much.  Walking distance to the lab/hospital, a drugstore, a major chain grocery store, etc.  Well, until the end of the month.

Husband was reading our little neighborhood newsletter which is left in the atrium of our condo every month when he let out a little gasp of shock.  Wondering what could possibly be of such interest in our neighborhood (the last interesting tidbit was the busting of a prostitution ring in the neighborhood “spa” nearly a year ago), he read a blurb detailing the major renovations of our grocery store… indicating that it would be closing in 2 weeks, the entire building would be razed to the ground, and rebuilt, with an estimated closing time of 9 months.

Right in time for Husband to drive off to Pennsylvania with the car.

A girl can survive on popcorn alone for 9 months, right?