Archive for May, 2009
… and Beet and Purple Cabbage Slaw, Lentil & Barley Salad, Maple Squash Puree, Grilled Vegetables, Chocolate Chip Cookies and Mini Pavlova with Lemon Curd and Blackberries. That was last night, but we subsisted on leftovers today, in between a dozen or so dishwasher loads.
Yesterday most of the ‘hood came over after our 6 hour community clean-up and the opening of a new park in Inglewood. By the time it was dinnertime we had all had too little sleep and too much sun, and the prime rib roast (left over from BT last week – yes, I froze it) had just gone onto the barbecue. (Remember my complete lack of time management skills?) The vat of sangria that arrived first did not help facilitate the dinner-making process, nor did prioritizing the simple syrup we needed to make mojitos with. (I know, you can use plain old sugar. We just wanted to be fancy about our mojito bar. Or more appropriately, the stickiest corner of the counter.) I thought I was being minimalist and was totally prepared. I was, as usual, totally not.
It’s funny – people are always telling me they couldn’t possibly invite us over because it’s “too intimidating” (or some such) to have to cook for me (which is silly, right?), or apologizing for whatever food they are serving, which is always spectacular. On the other hand I always get stressed out when people come over not because of the dust hippopotami on the stairs, but because they have such grandiose expectations of what they are going to be fed. It’s tough to live up to sometimes. OK, most of the time. So when in doubt, I deep fry stuff. Like corn dogs and mini donuts or churros. Or throw a prime rib on the grill and hope for the best. It’s a shame, though, that a mutual love for food should spur anxiety over sharing it.
I never would have trusted myself to do a $40 cut of meat on the grill had I not just done it with Ron last week. And really, it’s easy. Just make sure you have a meat thermometer – preferably a digital one. What he does, after painting it with mustard and salting and peppering it and pressing rosemary all over it (you could do any type of rub here) is crank the barbecue up to high, and when it’s good and hot (the dial will register around 600 degrees) throw it on, sear it on all sides, then turn off one side – the side the meat is on – and leave the other one high. Throw some wood chips in – he used chunks of wine barrel – and close the lid. MY mistake was to keep on opening it to throw hot dogs and burgers on for the kids – and of course because the meat was nowhere near done, all the grown ups had to eat them too – which slowed the cooking time quite a bit. It should have taken 1 1/2-2 hours for a 5 lb roast, but after 2 my dial meat thermometer wasn’t registering anything. J ran across the street and brought over two backups. The poor piece of cow had three probes in it, none of them registering at all. So either all three simultaneously broke, or the meat wasn’t even up to the lowest temp on the dial. (I do have a digital thermometer but couldn’t find the wire-probe part, which Woody and Buzz are likely using to fight dinosaurs under W’s bed, or I’ll find it in my garden ten years from now.) Finally after 2 1/2 hours and a handful of us standing around the barbecue poking at it for quite some time, we decided to take it off, wrap it in foil and let it rest for a half hour or so. (What should have happened was my digital thermometer would have let us know when the meat was 125F, then we would have pulled it off, wrapped it in a few layers of foil, and let it rest until it went up to around 142F, at which point it would have been perfectly and evenly cooked and wonderful.
It was fine. Not perfection, but not heinously overdone. But after 20 minutes of resting (and 4 hours of beer-drinking) all the guys decided to walk over to check out the new house B is rebuilding, and the second those of us left at home gave up waiting, unwrapped the thing and started slicing (by now it’s around 9 pm) W woke up (having stripped naked and climbed into bed about an hour after his back yard was taken over) and came halfway down the stairs, naked and crying, with a very high fever. So I left everyone to the meat and extras (which most people missed, having gone home with their toddlers) and went up to lie with W and mop his forehead and back with a cool washcloth.
Let me just tell you about the potatoes. They’re really called Hasselback potatoes, named for Hasselbacken, the Stockholm restaurant where they were first served, but I can’t not call them Hasselhoff potatoes. How could I? Hasselhoff is far more entertaining. Especially when he’s naked with a pair of shar pei puppies covering his bits.
You really don’t need a recipe for Hasselhoff potatoes. Choose thin-skinned potatoes like Yukon gold, scrub them, and slice them thinly (try for 1/4 inch), cutting not quite all the way through. At this point you could slide any number of ingredients in between the slices – thinly sliced garlic is what I did, but you could tuck in whole sage leaves or bits of prosciutto or parma ham. Set the potato on a piece of tin foil, drizzle it with canola or olive oil, dab with a bit of butter if you like, and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Wrap it up and throw it on the grill. Depending on the heat they should take about an hour; turn them once in awhile. And if your grill is full, you can throw them on the upper shelf, where they will get the heat when it’s closed, creating an oven environment. That’s it. Do as many as you want, obviously.
J convinced me as the last stragglers headed outside to the patio to take a photo of the kitchen, post-party, to post here. A picture really is worth a thousand words.
One Year Ago: Leftover Spaghetti Pie and (low fat) Lemon Bars (and an introduction to brand-new Lou!)
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May 31 2009 | on the grill and veg | 20 Comments »
And a new toilet. Mike and I installed one our very own selves. (Since then, Mike has been running around the house in slow-mo – arms in the air, singing We Are the Champions. We planned to do it at around dinnertime, knowing that our handy neighbours would be home around then in case we needed backup (we did, due to our 100 year old house’s extremely wonky floors).
After, we drank cold Strongbow with our friends/neighbours on the lawn as our assorted toddlers played with pushy things and W tormented one of their cats. And when we finally came inside it was pushing 8, so W had Raisin Bran and dried apricots, and I cooked up some bison bacon I had bought earlier specifically for the occasion of a perfectly ripe, buttery avocado, and turned both into sandwiches on toasted grainy bread. Bison bacon is very lean – much like back bacon, only leaner, and quite salty. A perfect pairing with soft avocado.
So – straight to Free Stuff Friday. To preface: I emceed Speak Out 2009 this afternoon, an event downtown in Olympic Plaza with celebrated the disabled, with a pride parade down Stephen Avenue. It was hot, and there was a great lunchtime turnout. W splashed in the enormous wading pool and flicked his feet in the fountains.
At one point, I was chatting with my Mom (who helped organize the event) and a volunteer, who had just been approached by a young boy who gave her six dollars. His grade 8 class was doing a “pay it forward” project; we later noticed that kids were wandering around handing out flowers and such. She was then supposed to pay it forward, so she gave the six dollars to my Mom. We kind of looked at each other and said, so.. what? This six dollars gets passed from person to person until someone finally pockets it? And why six dollars? It was a nice but slightly odd gesture; the volunteer was not visibly in need of financial help – there were certainly a few people around the downtown plaza who could have used a few dollars. But it seemed to me like an interesting opportunity to try to do something more. And it just so happened to occur on a Friday.
There have been a few suggestions to hold a tagline (or header art) contest here, with the prize being whatever I had on offer for Free Stuff Fridays – great idea. But this seems more important than a blog header.
So – what can be done with six dollars? I invite you all to make suggestions – you are a creative lot – and I will carry out the idea that seems most inventive or can do the most good. The winner will get the Free Stuff Fridays loot, which I am keeping secret. (Who knows – maybe more stuff will make its way into the loot bag as people pay it forward?) And I’d like to request that everyone reading this do something small to pay it forward in response to this young boy’s six dollars. If you do, post it here (so that would count as two entries – one comment for the idea, if you have one, and another for the good deed). Next week I’ll give the school principal a call, or write his teacher a letter, outlining all that came of the six dollars – it’s a great opportunity to illustrate to this grade 8 class how one action among strangers can create a domino effect in more directions than one. Don’t you think?
One Year Ago: Alphabet Wedding Soup
May 29 2009 | sandwiches | 40 Comments »
Made high tea today for donors attending the Family of Hope Tea at the Alberta Children’s Hospital; wee sandwiches with the crusts cut off, lemon scones with berry jam and cream, my Mom’s nut balls, vanilla bean meringues and lemon curd tartlets. I made it home (through rush hour) by 5, but after milling about with the neighbours out front it was suddenly 6, and so we had the last of the egg salad for dinner.
Egg salad, in my opinion, must be eaten on soft white bread, spread with soft butter. Crusty bread and rolls are the natural enemy of egg salad, causing it to squirt out the other end upon biting. All teas must have small sandwiches, and among them must be egg salad and cucumber (I did mine with chives and fresh mint from the garden), but plain old egg salad, though I love it, seemed dull. So along with the mayo I stirred in a bit of curry paste (powder would work as well), a handful of finely chopped red pepper, tore in some cilantro and snipped in some chives. It was pretty fine, if I do say so myself. Luckily, having made a batch using 18 eggs, there was enough left over.
For dessert – now here is an example of how a few sad leftovers quickly reassembled turned into something that when you describe it sounds downright fancy – I had a few extra lemon biscuits (or scones – pretty much the same thing – scones tend to be sweeter and denser, with an egg added, but these are sweet too – scones without the density and egg?) and a bit of whipped cream, but no berries save for frozen wild blueberries. So I thawed them with a drizzle of maple syrup and swirled that into the small dish of leftover cream, which had sort of deflated after several hours, and then got a bit watered down from the juicy berries and maple syrup, and made a kind of fool, albeit a sloppy one. A sloppy fool on a flaky bun. You are what you eat, I guess.
Large-Batch Lemon Biscuits/Scones
I used a small biscuit cutter to make mine, but the open end of a tomato paste can is perfect. Or for square scones, which look very cool, simply cut them into squares using a pastry cutter or knife. If you like, add fresh or frozen blueberries as you stir the milk into the dry ingredients – if they are frozen don’t thaw them, or they will turn your dough greenish and wet.
3 cups all-purpose flour
2 Tbsp. sugar
1 Tbsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
finely grated zest of 1 lemon
2/3 cup butter, cut into chunks (I used roughly a third of a pound of butter for each of three batches – it doesn’t have to be exact)
1 cup milk, plus a little extra for brushing on top
coarse sugar, for sprinkling (optional)
In the bowl of a food processor (or a large bowl), combine the flour, sugar, baking powder, salt and lemon zest. Add the butter and pulse or work with a pastry cutter, fork or your fingers until the mixture is well combined and crumbly, with bits of butter no bigger than a pea – you want to leave some larger bits, rather than blending it completely – the larger chunks are what will make them flaky.
If you used a food processor (this is my favourite way) – dump the mixture into a bowl. Add the milk and stir just until you have a soft dough (you may need to use your hands). Pat the dough out about 3/4″ thick and cut into small rounds with a biscuit cutter, glass or open can rim, or a knife. Place on a baking sheet that has been sprayed with nonstick spray, spacing them an inch apart. If you like, brush the tops lightly with milk and sprinkle with coarse sugar.
Bake for 20 minutes, or until golden. Cool on a wire rack. Makes 30-35 biscuits.
Header update: Thanks, really, for all your input. The cookies were a place holder really, I didn’t want to spend too much time on this if the consensus was a big thumbs-down. I thought I’d use this template and do up several with different images, and then add some sort of plug-in to make them automatically rotate. Or change it altogether. Or something.
Any thoughts on a different tag line? Some of you may have mentioned in passing that it’s stale and cookbooky, which is definitely not what I want to portray. You all know this site better than me even, being on the other side of the screen.
It’s difficult to encapsulate yourself in a graphic design format, particularly when a) you’re not a graphic designer and b) you can’t figure out this stupid new computer program. And yes, it had occurred to me to call an artist/graphic designer friend (and I’ve had some offers- thank you!) for help, but I wouldn’t want to presume that dinner might be a fair trade for their time and skill. Plus – graphic designers all have their own sense of style too. What if they don’t jive? I’ve worked with many (not friends!) that came up with things I just didn’t like, or that didn’t quite grasp what I wanted. Of course, I don’t even know what I want, except that it be hip/fun/current/usable as a header with elements that could be used on their own for a logo. Like a header transformer. I would hate to not like what they do, or be ultra high-maintenance and force them to do a dozen different things and then go back to the first, or change my mind and do something completely different. I don’t want to be one of those people.
One Year Ago: Tim’s Everything Bagel, Old Cheddar Cheese
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May 28 2009 | cookies & squares and eggs and sandwiches | 51 Comments »
I spent a few hours last night staring at/fiddling with this website, and editing some photos for an article I was working on, and then went to bed at a little past eleven, thinking I was doing well. And then woke up in the middle of the night realizing I had neglected to mention dinner. Again.
One definite bonus to working as a foodstylist is at the end of the day, you generally have dinner. Some (most) people just throw stuff out after shows, having been out on display or whatever, but as you know I hate to waste stuff. Especially food.
So last night was grilled pork shoulder steaks a la Ron. I have only cooked shoulder blade in the slow cooker or braised it in the oven; I would never have thought to throw them on the grill. I assumed they would be too tough. They weren’t. You have to navigate the ripples of fat, unless you are the type to devour that part and the leftover bits on everyone else’s plates too, but the meat in between was divine.
Ron paints the steaks with a little Dijon – I only like the grainy kind – and then sprinkles them with toasted cumin seed, which sticks to the mustard. (I thought it was a little cumin heavy, so I’ll just leave that out next time. Nothing against cumin, just, you know.) Then he liberally flings a spice rub overtop – and you could use any one here – and drizzles them with some olive oil. These looked as great when I did them at home as when we made them in the parking lot at Shaw on Tuesday. But when I threw them on the grill, a lot of the rub stuck to it. I likely didn’t massage it all in like I should have – I loved that sort of rustic look. At any rate, they tasted fantastic. Just grill them for a few minutes per side, until they’re just cooked through.
Ron’s Pork Shoulder Steak Rub
2 Tbsp. ancho chili powder (or any chili powder)
1 Tbsp. granulated garlic (the stuff that looks like sand)
1 Tbsp. granulated onion (ditto)
1 tsp. freshly ground black pepper
1 tsp. chipotle powder or cayenne
1 tsp. dried oregano
1 tsp. dried parsley
Mix together; rub over pork or beef steaks before grilling.
With them, leftover puréed butternut squash with maple syrup and ginger, and some marinated asparagus – I made another batch of the stuff from the recipe Elna Edgar gave me. (Everyone’s coming to the asparagus festival this weekend, right? We’re heading up on Sunday.)
Maple Butternut Squash Purée
Adapted from Barbecue Secrets Deluxe, by Ron Shewchuk (I boosted the maple syrup and cut back on the butter! And omitted the parsley garnish. I hardly ever garnish at home!)
2 butternut squashes, peeled, seeded and cut into 1″ chunks
6 carrots, peeled and cut into chunks
1 tsp. ground ginger (or 1 Tbsp. grated fresh)
1 Tbsp. pure maple syrup
2 Tbsp. each butter and canola or olive oil
salt and pepper
Put the squash and carrots into a steamer basket in a large pot, or just into the pot with a couple inches of water; bring to a boil, cover and steam for about 30 minutes, until very tender. Transfer to a bowl, add everything else, and mash with a potato masher until smooth. Transfer to a food processor or use a hand-held immersion blender (oh yes – mine is a Phillips “Billy”! I love it. I used a fancy-looking big chrome industrial one the other day and it was crap in comparison) and puree until smooth. Add a bit of hot water if it’s too thick. Serve hot, or chill and reheat later. Serves 6.
One Year Ago: Coffee and Chocolate Bread Pudding
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May 28 2009 | on the grill and pork | 7 Comments »
For all you regular readers out there – I’m trying to redo my header, lose the reference to the new year (for those who weren’t around last year) and come up with something that is also useable as a logo for a new (super secret, for another week or so) project I’m involved in. Thoughts? I may keep changing the header over the course of the day, just to take them for a spin. I can’t figure out how to do as much on this new photoshop program on my mac as I could do on my old computer. It’s making my brain feel like that skinny guy on the beach who gets sand kicked in his face and told to dry up and blow away.
May 27 2009 | leftovers | 70 Comments »
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