Dear everyone who writes about food: Get this straight.

Palette: the board, such as the blob-shaped masonite slab used by Bob Ross, on which an artist can mix her/his paint.

Pallet: one of those wooden frame thingies on which are stacked many cardboard boxes of products so the forklift operator can move all the boxes around at once. Also useful in repurposing for gardening or building really gigantic bonfires.

Palate: the roof of one's mouth. Also, a term used in food writing in regards to matters of personal taste, or to the act of tasting in general. There may be other usages for this term, and other ways to define it. But if you're referring to taste, this is how you spell it: Palate. Not palette, and not pallet.

Chopped!

Anyone would be familiar with this feeling: You've been busy all day, the sun's gone down, your home looks like a pigsty and you just don't feel like doing anything about it now. None of that really matters anyway, because you note (a little late) that you're pretty hungry! And when you go into the kitchen and stare, glazed over, into the cabinet and then the fridge, you realize that you've not got much to work with.

You may enjoy watching (as I do) the TV game show "Chopped". It's been on Netflix lately, so go take a TV binge on that show and get in a cooking mood. I think there's only one season posted, so it won't be too time consuming. Each episode starts out by introducing a few professional chefs who begin by preparing an appetizer with three random-seeming ingredients which must all be included. The cook of the least delicious dish is eliminated after a tasting, and so on for the main and dessert courses.

So what to do when you look into the cabinet and the most promising ingredients are a can of anchovies in olive oil and a jar of Arborio rice? Then in the fridge, you haven't got much but a couple eggs, a half empty bag of frozen peas and - whoa - there's that leftover quarter of an onion you last cut a piece from about a week and a half ago.

What to make? You take inspiration from the TV game show with the random ingredient assignments! You make risotto!

This dish is not going to be pictured. Taking a look through my files, I realize that I failed to take any pictures because the risotto was so delicious that we finished it off before it was cool enough to stop burning our mouths.

Start out like this:  In a medium saucepan, heat about 6 cups of broth or stock (chicken or veggie are both fine. I like to use Better than Bouillon mixed with water.) until simmering and keep it hot on the lowest heat possible. While the stock is heating...

Take that leftover quarter of an onion (or that big shallot you forgot about in the cabinet) and cut it into the finest dice possible. Then go over it again and mince it. You want the bits to be nearly as small as rice, so they don't stand out in the finished product. Heat a nice glug of olive oil or chunk of butter or (best of all) spoonful of saved bacon fat in a medium saucepan and drop in the onion when the oil has gotten nice and hot.

I also like to mince 3 or 4 cloves of garlic and put them in with the onion. Saute this mixture for several minutes, until the onion is softened. Not over too high a heat level, or the garlic will burn. Add a few shakes of salt and a few grinds of pepper. Then pour in:

• 1 1/4 c. risotto rice (Arborio is just fine)

...and saute it for a minute until all the grains of rice are shiny with the hot oil. Then pour in half a cup or so of wine (White is usually recommended, but red was what we had leftover) and use that to deglaze the pan. Keep stirring it constantly until the liquid is almost all absorbed.

By now your pan of stock is hot and barely simmering, so take a couple ladlefuls (maybe a cup or so) and dump them into the rice pan. Give this a good stir, and stir it well again a few more times until the liquid is mostly absorbed.

Continue with this technique. If you've looked up a risotto recipe before, it probably told you to stir constantly until you are done. You totally shouldn't have to do that - just a few good stirs between stock additions will be sufficient, because if you stir it too much, it can get gummy. Blecchh. After 15-20 minutes or so, you should start tasting your rice for doneness. Ideally you are looking for a texture in which the rice is al dente, yet also suspended in a saucy, creamy liquid.

When the rice is a few minutes from being done, put in 4 or 5 fillets of anchovy. This is the right amount that will give your risotto an extra savory flavor without making it taste fishy. Might as well pour in a little of the tasty olive oil from their can, too. The anchovies will break up and incorporate into the rice as you stir it. Also at this point, add some frozen peas, whatever amount looks good to you. Maybe 3/4 cup or so? When the rice has reached a nice, creamy yet still al dente texture, let the liquid reduce until it's definitely not soupy, but still loose. Take it off the heat, then grate a nice pile of Parmigian or similar cheese (Grana Padano, Romano) into the pot and fold it in. Plate it and garnish with a little more grated cheese if you want. Take a bite and relish the burning sensation on the roof of your mouth. Go ahead, burn your mouth again... It's too delectable to stop eating now!

If you want to take this dish over the top, fry one egg per person to just past over-easy and put it on top. This is what we did at home, and it's also a good thing to do when you want to heat leftover risotto for breakfast.

Good morning Mr. Breakfast!!

When the weekend comes and you've just slept in till after 10, it's the best time to make the ideal breakfast. You'd think our lovely city of Seattle would be full of excellent diners... but it's totally not!! I think it's best to cook your morning favorites at home and try to outdo yourself now and then. You may have had one beverage too many the night before on a given occasion, but this breakfast is easy enough to make and definitely good for the soul if not for the body. If you don't try it, you're missing out! Serves 2.

Cheddar-chive scones with scrambled egg, sausage gravy and bacon.

I learned this outstanding scone recipe when I used to be the prep and pastry cook at Fuel Cafe, one of Denver's favorite fine restaurants. I can post sweet variations, which were what I usually made there, some other time!

Heat the oven to 350*.

First, fry two strips of bacon in a medium saute pan till nice and crispy. Take them out to drain them and crumble them up when they're cool enough. Leave at least some of the bacon fat in the pan so you can use it in a little while. Now you're about to have a few things to do at once. The scones need to be mixed and put into the oven next, so start here:

• Juice from 1/4 lemon
• Enough milk to make up 3/4 c. liquid when added to the juice

Combine these in a little bowl and set aside...unless you keep buttermilk in the fridge, which we personally don't, because it goes to waste unless we make scones every day. The lemon juice will thicken and curdle the milk and work just fine as a buttermilk sub! At this point, I beat

• 1 egg

...and pour just 1/2 of it into the makeshift buttermilk so I can stir it all together. Save the rest of the egg, so you can add more eggs to it for the scramble. Now it's time to get out

• 1 stick butter

Cut the stick of butter into little cubes and put it on a plate in the freezer for a couple minutes while you measure the following ingredients into your bowl (I use a Kitchenaid stand mixer with a paddle attachment, but an ordinary mixing bowl with a pastry blender and a spatula would be fine too):

• 2 cups flour

• 1 tbsp. sugar

• 1/2 tsp. baking soda

• 1 tsp. baking powder

• a good sized pinch of salt

• around 3 tbsp. of finely chopped chives

• up to a cup of coarsely grated fine cheddar (save some aside to sprinkle on top of the scones)

Get your mixer set up, turn it on Stir for a couple seconds to combine the bowl's contents, then drop in the cold butter cubes and leave it on the lowest speed until the butter combines with the dry ingredients to appear crumb-like. Then, pour in the mixture of buttermilk and egg. Allow the mixer to run just until all the dry parts are incorporated, then add a couple more tablespoons of flour if the dough looks just a little too soft (it usually does for me.)

Scrape the dough out onto a well-floured countertop and dust it with more flour. Pat the dough out to a little under 1" thick. You can make it into a round and cut it into 8 triangular wedges, or into a rectangle-ish shape and cut it into 8 square-ish shapes. Last time, I experimented with folding the dough back on itself twice before patting it into its final shape and thickness in order to make the scones more lofty and flaky. No matter what, though, work the dough as little as possible. If you get the gluten going, the scones will get hard and tough like Starbucks ones. Gross!

Place the dough pieces onto a parchment-lined baking sheet and brush the tops with milk. Sprinkle them with the rest of the cheese and put them into the oven. Check them after 15 minutes: if the tops are golden and spring back when you poke the biggest one, then they're done. It might take a couple more minutes too. Meanwhile...

To the bowl with the leftover half of a beaten egg, add 3 more eggs and a splash of water and beat well with a fork. Now start the gravy. In the pan with the little bit of bacon grease left in it, scoop out about 1/4 - 1/3 of a log of breakfast sausage and begin sauteing it and breaking it up into little chunks with a spatula. When it's cooked, add a few tablespoons of flour and stir that in well. Then pour in some milk, maybe just under a couple cups, and stir till combined, using the milk to deglaze the pan. Turn the heat to low, and continue to stir the gravy very frequently, adding salt, pepper and hot sauce. It will only take a few minutes to reduce and be ready to eat. If it starts to look like not-quite-enough gravy for two plates, you can add some more milk! Meanwhile...

Butter a small saute pan, heat it, and add the eggs. Scramble them as usual. By now the scones should be done, so put one (or two if you're starving) in each shallow bowl. Top each scone with half the eggs, then half the gravy, then one strip of crumbled bacon. Serve with more hot sauce!

You should have at least 4 scones left, so wrap them individually and save them for tomorrow. A couple minutes in a toaster oven will make them good as new the next day, and they're excellent on their own.  If you are making breakfast for several friends, just make a lot more gravy and scramby eggs, and use all the scones!

Whew. That was a lot to do, but take a bite. It was totally worth it, right? Enjoy!

welcome to my world.

I am doing this the lazy way and making a blog before I start creating the true zine that I really want to do. Bad Housekeeping is a name I thought was fitting, due to my interest in DIY, crafting, and especially cooking. It's also in keeping with my laxity towards cleaning up after myself following such endeavors.

Good Housekeeping is the perfect magazine for the conventional housewife. Bad Housekeeping will be the perfect magazine for the unconventional reader's day-to-day life.

To start off, here is a recipe for Albondigas soup I adapted last night from this recipe http://www.food.com/recipe/best-albondigas-soup-107281 and another recipe my husband brought home from the cooking instructor at Whole Foods when he used to work there. I didn't have the ingredient ratios from the latter, just a list saved in an old sent email I had to dig up.  This is a Mexican meatball soup that is about the best thing to eat EVER during the wintertime. You can get it done in about an hour, eat a big bowl, and still have a nice amount to eat for the next day or two. It was super cheap to make too!

I am not the type of cook that follows non-baking-related recipes precisely. Just look at the reviews on any online recipe - it seems like everyone makes up their own version anyway.

For the meatballs:

1/2 lb. ground beef

1/2 lb. chorizo
1/2 cup cooked rice
2 cloves minced garlic
1 egg
1/2 cup cilantro, finely chopped
Salt & pepper
Several good shakes each: Cumin, oregano, smoked paprika

For the broth:
Mirepoix (I used 3 celery stalks, 6 very small carrots, and a quarter of a large red onion, all finely chopped)
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 c. cilantro, finely chopped
Cumin, smoked paprika, hot pepper
6 c. stock (I used veggie Better Than Bouillon + water)
16 oz can of plain diced tomatoes (I used about 2/3 can of San Marzano cos they come in really big cans)
3-4 small Yukon potatoes, 1 cm. dice

• Mix all the meatball ingredients thoroughly in a big bowl and roll into 1" balls. Put aside in the fridge on a plate.
• Saute the mirepoix and garlic in a pot for a few minutes with some bacon drippings (start putting your bacon grease in a jar!) or olive oil.
• Add spices and cilantro and stir a minute till fragrant.
• Stir in the stock and tomatoes and heat till simmering.
• Drop in the meatballs and potatoes. Return to a low boil, cover and cook for 20-30 min. Season to taste with salt, pepper and hot pepper.

Think that's delicious today? It's going to be even better tomorrow!