Heart Eyes, Vol. 11: Jane the Virgin, Bag Organizers, and Shakshouka
Happy Friday afternoon, friends! Today feels like the opposite of last week, when so many things were literally and figuratively on fire: last night was Northern California's first rain of the season, my mom is watching The Good Placeand texting me about it, and I have a weekend of baking, seasonal celebration, and friend time ahead of me. All wonderful things! I hope your weekend is equally full of sweetness. Enjoy.
What To Watch: Jane the Virgin on the CW and Netflix
Here is a reminder I, myself, needed: you should be watching Jane the Virgin. You'll love it! I've been watching this self-aware telenovela since it premiered, but I missed the end of last season. This week, in catching up on the episodes I missed, I was so taken with how glowy and funny and sweet it is, and how confidently it pulls off some amazingly high-risk plot points—all of which I knew, I just...forgot. The fourth season started this week on the CW, but you can and should catch the three previous seasons on Netflix.
As elevator pitches go, Jane the Virgin can be kind of a hard sell—it is, yes, a CW telenovela about a twentysomething virgin who gets pregnant due to an OB/GYN error—but I promise it's wonderful. It's essentially two very different shows woven together: there's the goofy, fast-moving, ever-shifting telenovela, which I sort of pay attention to and sort of don't because everything's always changing anyway, and there's the pitch-perfect dramedy full of flawed and lovable characters; it's ultimately the story of an unlikely extended family, told with enormous grace, humor, and truth. (If the emotional heart of Gilmore Girls speaks to you at all, this is your show.) If you've never tried it, or you've thought about trying it but never pulled the trigger, or you've only been watching Game of Thrones for half a decade and want something different but also excellent, I say give it a shot.
How To Deal With Your Stuff: Bag Organizer Inserts
When I leave for work in the morning, it's with half the contents of my apartment stuffed into my bag. At the very least, I've got my breakfast and my lunch, my book, sometimes my knitting, my wallet, sunglasses, sunscreen, tissues, phone, and earbuds, my makeup pouch, my work badge and transit card, two reusable shopping bags, one to three layers for when I get cold either inside or outside my office, and sometimes my running clothes, and that's not even counting the sea of empty mason jars and "Tupperware" (read: yogurt containers) I've forgotten to take out from previous days. I recently got a new everyday bag for all this schlepping; it's beautiful and enormous...and it's one giant compartment, aka a brewing container for the primordial soup of all the stuff I collect and haul around. Just as I was trying to figure out how to keep it from turning into a black hole, New York Magazine told me about bag organizer inserts—little fabric caddies covered in pockets that sit in the bottom of your bag and keep you from spending the entire rest of your life groping blindly for your keys. After much Googling and an embarrassing amount of soul-searching about fabric color and number of zippers, I chose one from Periea; it's not pretty, but it's lightweight, cost $12 for the biggest size, and has thirteen pockets, including two that zip. (The Internet is also full of elegant felt ones, but they were expensive and none of them fit my bag.) One week in, I'm a convert: everything in my bag is exactly where it was when I packed it the first time, with a few empty pockets to grow into if necessary, and the joy and satisfaction I feel when I reach into my bag and find what I need feels like it will never get old. I mean, maybe it will. But so far, so good.
What To Cook: Shakshouka
It occurred to me the other day that there was a time not that long ago when I had never cooked or eaten or heard ofone of my very favorite foods: shakshouka. That says to me that maybe some of you have also never cooked or eaten or heard of shakshouka, and that simply cannot stand. Shakshouka is a dish of eggs poached in a tomato sauce, usually with peppers and onions and garlic; it's found in various forms all over the Mediterranean and North Africa, and it's one of the best and simplest things I know how to make. It's perfect for breakfast, lunch, or dinner; I make it for myself all the time, but also regularly serve it to guests; it's healthy, inexpensive, forgiving, and convenient as a pantry meal. I've even figured out a way to carry it with me for workday lunches. And don't tell anybody, but here's a secret: everything here is negotiable, except maybe the tomatoes and the eggs. Don't be afraid to leave out the peppers and onions (I do it all the time), swap out the spices or ignore them if you want it mild, add other ingredients (Claudia Roden, of my Middle Eastern cookbook, says you can add sausage or potatoes if you're feeling crazy), whatever. Shakshouka loves you, regardless.
Shakshouka
3 TBS olive oil
Half an onion, diced
1–2 bell peppers or 4–5 smaller chiles; I like anaheims or poblanos
3-5 cloves garlic
28 oz. canned tomatoes (crushed, sauce, or whole, if you're willing to break them up a little)
1 tsp. cumin
1 TBS paprika (smoked, hot, sweet, whatever)
Salt, to taste
4 eggs
Feta cheese (optional)
Herbs (optional)
Bread (optional)
Heat the oil in a medium or large pan over medium heat. Add the onion and peppers and let them cook until a bit softened. Add the garlic, cook for one minute, then add the tomatoes and the spices. Reduce heat and simmer for ten minutes. Crack the eggs into the tomato sauce, do not stir, and cook them to your desired level of doneness, five to ten minutes. I find covering the pan helps the top cook before the bottom gets hard-boiled. Scoop into bowls, sprinkle with feta and/or herbs if you have them, and eat with bread. (I like toast rubbed with garlic.)
(When cooking for myself, I usually poach just one egg, then reheat the rest of the sauce for future meals—either poaching new eggs in the old sauce or frying/soft-boiling the eggs separately and breaking them on top. To bring this to work, I soft-boil my egg at home, wrap it in a cloth napkin for transport, microwave it for twenty seconds at the office, and add it to reheated sauce. Works like a charm.)