It took six days for the power to come back on. Six. Days. And we’re among the lucky ones. As of this posting, there are still about 100,000 Connecticut customers in the dark, eight days after the Oct. 29 freak storm.

Even though we were doubly lucky to have a comfortable place to stay, it’s still no picnic to be uprooted for a week. It meant a flurry of canceled and rescheduled appointments, last-minute work accommodations and worries about our property from 70+ miles away. I woke up around 4:45 a.m. Thursday in a panic, remembering that the power had gone out Saturday while we were cooking dinner and oh my God, did I even think to turn the stove off? Would the power come back on while we were away and start a fire?

Rob returned to Connecticut Thursday for a work meeting and I stayed behind in Massachusetts. On Friday morning, I’d had enough and decided to just book a hotel for a weekend getaway. And in a classic case of “a watched pot never boils,” our power was restored around 1 p.m. Friday, just two hours after I secured reservations near the Mystic area. I got a jubilant text from Rob as I was driving home on the Mass Pike.

Our first order of business was to clean out the fridge and freezer. We’d trucked the “important” food (newly purchased milk, lunch meat, cheese and other perishables) around in a cooler for a week, but plenty more remained, thawing. Rob had most of the job finished when I arrived home, and as you can see by the photo, he tossed everything. Everything.

I’d been meaning to clean the fridge for quite some time. I guess it just takes a natural disaster to light a fire under my ass.

The week-long power outage is something I never want to experience again, but some sick part of me is thrilled by the pristine fridge, rid of old sticky stains and papery garlic skins and a leftover lemon wedge moldering in the forgotten back recesses of the shelves. At the same time, restocking everything in it is going to be a slow and expensive process. I lost my sourdough starter, for one, and frozen Connecticut-grown strawberries and herbs that I’d hoped to enjoy through the winter. Obviously, tiny inconveniences in the scheme of things, but not easily replaceable.

But I’ll tell you this – I have NEVER been more excited to cook again. Or do laundry. Or vacuum, or clean the kitchen. Electricity is the best thing ever.

This is the same embarrassment of a grocery store that sold Dave a horribly fatty slab of corned beef. Every time I go in there for basics, I walk out shaking my head.

Yesterday, Rob and I hit up the seafood department at Big Y, looking for some fish suitable for grilling. We settled on halibut, which for the record is excellent topped with fresh fruit salsa.

That should have been it. But of course my eyes wandered to the shellfish on display. Among excellent-looking  jumbo shrimp and lump lobster meat rested two Dungeness crabs, on sale for $5.99/lb.

I first had Dungeness on a 2004 trip to San Francisco, where it was everywhere, from street carts to fancy restaurants. The meat is sweet and tender. Suddenly, the halibut wasn’t enough – I needed that crab.

(Rob is the master of going to a store and getting exactly what he needs, no deviation. The look on his face was nothing short of “Are you serious?”)

But what to do with it? Thankfully, the crustacean was pre-cooked. The seafood clerk advised us to toss it into boiling water for a few minutes before eating. I decided we’d eat it like boiled lobster – crack open the body and legs and hunt feverishly for meat.

As an homage to Homer Simpson, we nicknamed the crab “Pinchy” before we gave it a very hot bath.  It wasn’t until I took this picture that I realized Pinchy had a face. Oops.

But the crabmeat was delicious, especially when sprinkled with Old Bay seasoning and dipped into melted butter, then washed down with a 2007 Bonterra Chardonnay. California wine for our West Coast seafood. Yummy.

File this one under “random.” Yesterday, I went to get some grocery necessities for our dinner of handmade turkey burgers. I picked up a bag of garden-salsa flavored Sun Chips. The bag emitted a noise so surprisingly loud that I jumped. The HELL was that?

Then I remembered that Sun Chips recently announced a commitment to make their chip bags from compostable material. And then recalled a Facebook discussion between some eco-minded buddies, who couldn’t believe that anyone would have the gall to complain about the bag’s decibel level.

In full disclosure, I would not call myself an environmentalist. I try not to do anything really egregious, like use too many plastic water bottles, drive a Hummer or club seals. And I give Frito-Lay a lot of credit for coming up with this new packaging. Apparently there’s something in the makeup of the new material that causes the noise.

But there’s no getting around it: this thing is loud. Loud enough to drown out normal conversation or television noise, depending on how vigorously you open it and grab for chips.  Forum posters describe the bag noise as “like a goddamn thunderstorm” or “a car crash.” Yes, hyperbole is funny. But they’re not that far off.

Will the volume of the bag affect sales? Who knows. Personally, I like Sun Chips enough to deal with it. But I wouldn’t bring a bag to a quiet office, or a library, or anywhere near sleeping babies…

Look, I drank half of it.

My friend and colleague Marie, along with her boyfriend, Todd, follow elements of the ‘raw’ diet to stay healthy. Never heard of it? It’s a diet and lifestyle based on unprocessed, uncooked plant foods. Heavy on fruits and vegetables, it also incorporates nuts, seeds and grains. Food is never heated above 116 degrees, as raw foodists believe it diminishes the ‘life value’ of the food’s nutrition.

At first it sounds crazy restrictive and not too much fun. But as we learned more about it – and three other Courant colleagues underwent a 30-days raw experiment in the spring of 2008 – we found that you can get really creative with raw-approved ingredients like nuts, agave nectar and sea salt. See Marie and Todd’s raw apple pie demonstration on YouTube, for example.

Even healthier – and easier – is the green smoothie, which I’m enjoying for breakfast today as part of this week’s healthy eating kick. It’s a blend of leafy greens, frozen fruit and water (I used frozen spinach, papaya, mango, pineapple and a splash of OJ for more flavor.) It’s a fantastic way to get in several servings’ worth of fruits and veggies.

Trust me when I say it’s not nearly as scary as it sounds. I grew up on MicroMagic cheeseburgers and at nearly 29, I’m still working on learning to love veggies. If I can do it, so can you.

Here are some of Marie’s favorite green-smoothie recipes…

• 2-3 cups any greens of your choice, 2 cups papaya, 2 oranges, 3 dates
• 1 handful lettuce leaves, 1 handful mint, 4 bananas, 1/2 cup water
• Winter Smoothie – 1 cup organic frozen berries (any kind), 2 cups fresh spinach, 1/4 inch fresh ginger, water
• Spring Smoothie – fresh orange juice, ripe bananas, frozen mangoes, and several large leaves of kale
• 1/2 bunch romaine lettuce, 1 cup strawberries, 2 bananas, water
• 4-5 kale leaves, 4 apples, 1/2 lemon juiced, water
• 2 big handfuls mixed baby greens, 2 pears, 2 mangoes, 1 cup fresh or frozen blueberries
• Choc-mint – 2 cups spinach, 10-12 mint leaves, 3 bananas, 2 Tbs. carob powder, 1 cup water
• 1 handful of spinach, 2 stalks of celery, 2 bananas, 2 pears, 1 apple, 1 cup water
• 1 small handful of spinach, 2 cups arugula, 2-3 mangoes, 1 cup water
• 1/2 head romaine lettuce, 1 small pineapple, 1 large mango, 1-inch fresh ginger
• 1 handful wild greens (e.g. dandelion), 1 small handful mint leaves, 3 cups honeydew melon
• 3-4 stalks celery, 2 ripe persimmons, 1 banana
• 1 handful chard leaves, 5-6 kale leaves, 3 large bananas, 1 cup water
• 1 handful parsley, 3 cups of peeled papaya
• 1 frozen banana, 1 pear, 1/2 cup of pineapple, big handful of baby spinach, 1-2 kale leaves, and a mint leaf.

It’s that time of year, when everyone vows to fit back into their ‘skinny clothes’ after overindulging on rich holiday treats. It’s so inevitable that gym owners count on a spike in January membership signups to boost their numbers all year.

And then by February, it’s a distant memory…

If you ask me, I think the New Year’s resolution concept is a stupid gimmick. While there’s nothing wrong with self-improvement goals, who says you have to set them all in January and stick to them rigidly for 12 months? Seems like a recipe for failure and disappointment.

I’m probably the last person on Earth who should be doling out diet advice (actually, that honor might be reserved for the editors of This Is Why You’re Fat) but I’ve rounded up some links to healthy recipes on popular cooking websites. And if you find a dish as tasty as it is nutritious, please feel free to share with us!

• Whole Foods: Resolve To Eat Right
• Bon Appetit: Healthy Recipes Search
• Food Network: Healthy Cooking Month
• Epicurious: Healthy Recipes
• Cooking Light: http://www.cookinglight.com/
• Hungry Girl: Recipes (editor’s note: if you can get past the annoying cutesy recipe names…)
• Self Magazine: Food and Diet
• The Delicious Life Of Holly Pinafore: Healthy, tasty gluten-free recipes and how-to videos

Some of Fun With Carbs’ favorite healthy recipes: baked turkey meatballs blended with a red bell pepper/onion/garlic ‘puree,’ chicken stir-fry with vegetables and brown rice, grilled salmon with orange glaze, egg white omelets with spinach and feta, crockpot chicken soup with orzo, spinach salad with almonds and goat cheese crumbles. Mmm…maybe this ‘diet’ thing won’t be too terrible.

Fun with Carbs is going to be eating two Thanksgiving meals this week (I’ve got in-laws now) so posting will be light. Here’s a roundup of news-you-can-use as you prepare for your own Turkey Day:

Wines: If you missed it, our guide to Thanksgiving vino.

Turkey Day Guide: Recipes, tips and more

Thanksgiving Dinner at CT Restaurants: If you’re not up for cooking a 20-pound bird.

Leftovers: Food Network’s guide to next-day recipes.

What’s your favorite Thanksgiving meal? Turkey, stuffing, potatoes, pie? And does anyone love canned cranberry sauce as much as I do? It’s hideous, I know, but I love how it retains its cylindrical can shape.

Those mushrooms better STAY ON THEIR OWN SIDE.

Since we’ve discovered the crispy, melty deliciousness that is pizza on the grill, we’ve never looked back. Trouble is, it’s become a full-blown project in our house, starting with homemade dough and ending with attempts at precise heating instructions. But it’s worth it.

The foundation of good pizza is always good crust, which starts with good dough. And let me just tell you, dough and I aren’t very good friends lately. Last week I completely spaced out while making a gift loaf of French bread, forgot to add yeast to the bread pan. I opened the bread maker to find a completely unleavened pile of crap waiting for me. Yesterday I improvised on a pizza dough recipe (since we found our previous mainstay too bready and heavy) and the culprit was either too much water or too much yeast, because the dough literally POURED out of the bread pan. Round 2 was more successful but still a little too moist.

My dough recipe roughly translated below:

3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup warm water
1 tbsp sugar (I use white, granulated)
1 tbsp cornmeal
1 tbsp olive oil
2 tsp active dry yeast
2 tsp. salt
1 tsp garlic powder

Blank canvas for yummy toppings

Once the dough had risen, Rob kneaded it and rolled it out onto an oiled cookie sheet. Our pizza stone, dusted with cornmeal, was heating up on the grill, ready to receive the dough.

On my side of the pizza: pretty much any gourmet ingredient I had in the fridge. (It’s my house and I can be a pizza snob if I want to.) Homemade alfredo sauce, fresh mozzarella, roasted garlic, sun-dried tomato, feta, ricotta and parmesan, finished off with sprinklings of basil and ground pepper and a touch of olive oil. Rob kept it simple with pizza sauce, fresh mozz and sliced mushrooms, and I monitored the process to make sure no fungus touched my side of the crust.

Here’s  a quick rundown of the grill process:

• Heat grill up to 400 degrees.

• Using a cookie sheet coated with olive oil and corn meal, place pizza on top shelf for approximately 6 minutes.

• Then, turn down the heat and move pizza from the cookie sheet down to the pizza stone for approximately 3-4 minutes, or until the cheese starts to brown slightly.

• Be sure to rotate pizza during the grilling process for best and most consistent results.

Other grilled-pizza fanatics like to put the dough right on the flame, but we haven’t yet figured out how to do that without completely incinerating the bottom. Our method gets the dough appropriately crispy without blackening it. The pizza stone is key there.

The pizza cutter slid through the crust with a satisfying crunch, but the slices were still chewy and doughy where it counted. All of my cheeses melted together into creamy oblivion.

I know not everyone will have the time or patience to make fresh dough, but the end result is pretty spectacular. We’ve found store-bought dough difficult to work with, especially when it’s cold and unyielding. If you use it, make sure it’s fully defrosted, preferably at room temperature, when you start to roll it out.

And it just so happens I have a couple of slices left over for breakfast…

We like to cook here at Fun With Carbs central. Sometimes there’s nothing more satisfying than eating a delicious meal and knowing you created it yourself. Plus, that way you know exactly how many tablespoons of butter went into the dish. (but sometimes, ignorance is bliss.)

If you’re looking for recipes, email me at leeanne@funwithcarbs.com – I’m terrible at following recipes and would rather cook to sight and taste, but I can try to approximate. This is what’s been coming out of the kitchen lately…

Spinach and eggplant pie

Spinach and eggplant pie. I found this recipe, in of all things, a soup cookbook that my mother gave me to me a few years ago. It’s essentially a cross between a hot spinach dip and a quiche. The cookbook says it can be served hot or cold, but it tasted better heated. The ‘spinach dip’ filling is a mixture of chopped spinach, egg, feta cheese, ricotta, Greek yogurt, lemon, onion and garlic. I sauteed the eggplant in olive oil and layered it throughout the pie. One key ingredient – that I’d leave out during my next try – was brown rice. The recipe called for a layer of it between the pie crust and the spinach filling. It may have served to soak up moisture, but it just lent an incongruous, unwelcome texture.

Shrimp scampi

Shrimp scampi. Not much recipe to this dish: the shrimp was sauteed with crushed garlic, olive oil and a squeeze of lemon, and then simmered briefly with white wine and a splash of fat-free half-and-half. But shrimp scampi always reminds me of the first time my husband and I ever cooked for each other as sophomores in college. I think I made pizzas, for that was all I could handle at the time. He tried shrimp scampi, but couldn’t for the life of him figure out how to procure lemon zest. Remember, this is before Food Network was big, before Rachael Ray grated lemons and limes all over your TV set. So he went out and bought a teeeeny jar of lemon peel for probably $8. I cringe and laugh when I think about college-days cooking and the time four of us watched a pan of chicken parmesan like hawks to make sure the chicken didn’t come out raw. (Like you can tell when it’s smothered with sauce and cheese.)

French bread

French bread, which is quickly becoming my specialty. Since I’ve had a bread maker in the house (THANKS ROB best Christmas present ever) I’ve been thrilled to create loaves of bread on a near-weekly basis. My former coworkers used to clamor for the ‘pretzel bread’ recipe (French bread glazed with egg white and coated with kosher salt, served with honey butter) but lately I’ve been sticking to a lower-sodium version with a drizzle of olive oil and a sprinkling of sea salt. I set the bread maker on the dough setting and let the dough rise in a covered bowl when it’s through mixing, then bake it in the oven at 350 degrees. It stays fresher days longer than any loaves I’ve baked right in the bread machine.

Tonight, we’ve got a small roast in the slow cooker that will become beef sandwiches on onion rolls. I’m downright fascinated with the crockpot, so I’m hoping to use it a lot this winter. Soliciting your favorite slow-cooked recipes…

When we were honeymooning in Greece, my husband started to wax rhapsodic about American fast food. In particular, Pizza Hut. Greek pizza, with its pastry-like crust, just wasn’t doing it for him. So upon our return, after he promptly came down with what we think might have been the flu, I ordered in Pizza Hut for the patient. His aches and pains and coughs seemed to vanish as he blissfully finished half a pie. The next day, he told me Pizza Hut had called back to conduct a customer survey, and he reported that he had given high marks across the board for its crust, sauce, cheese, delivery time and service.

Shudder.

I’m not a Pizza Hut hater, really. In fact, I love the crispy, buttery crust. However, if you ask me, the sauce is reminiscent of canned Spaghetti-Os and the cheese’s texture is more than slightly plastic. And we live in Connecticut, home to some of the country’s best pizza. But it made me think – do other foodies have their own pre-packaged, highly processed, chain-restaurant guilty pleasures? They must…

Some favorites I’ll admit to:

• Kraft Macaroni and Cheese, especially Easy Mac. But I can’t stand the sodium-packed taste of the orange cheese powder on its own, so I always add a little milk and a sprinkle of canned parmesan. I also love the Annie’s Organic mac and cheese with the bunny on the box.
• Dunkin’ Donuts egg-white flatbreads. Yeah, I know they’re pre-frozen and tossed into a toaster oven for two minutes. But man, do they taste good with a medium French vanilla, skim and one Splenda.
• Anything from Sonic. At this moment in time, there are no Sonic Drive-Ins within 2 hours of me. But thanks to my very patient friend Kate, I’ve been able to visit an outpost in Jacksonville, Fla. Cheeseburgers. Tater tots. Onion rings. Grape slush. <Homer Simpson drool>

Your turn. Don’t be shy. Tell us your favorite foodie guilty pleasure…