Archive for October, 2009
Sorry, that’s Saturday morning breakfast, not Friday night dinner. Come to think of it, dinner was apple cider and Kinnikinick cookies at the very first Calgary Food Summit in honour of World Food Day, where I spoke a bit to the group of 130 and was involved in lively discussion/brainstorming session on the issues of food security and policy and everything related to creating a sustainable food system, trying my best not to touch anything or anyone and washing my hands so obsessively they now look like they should be attached to a 90 year old.
By the time I got home last night I felt on the verge of a full-on flu smackdown. (I couldn’t manage to hold myself upright at the computer, looking desperately around my cluttered office for something good to give away, and finally crawled into bed and called it Free Stuff Saturday mornings.) W is up and down, a little more feverish again last night and kept falling asleep throughout the day, and we spent another night with him twisted around me, hacking out a lung. Mike has gout again – there appears to be a connection with long car drives. Between us we’re a bit of a mess. (As I write this, W is trying to take Lou’s temperature – it’s a good thing he only knows the under-the-tongue technique.)
Since I was roused by phlegm and simultaneously pushed out the side of a king-sized bed at just slightly after 4 (!!) this morning, I decided I was in particular need of comfort food. Not scones, or a loaf, or oatmeal.. I needed something more. I needed a grilled cheese sandwich made with aged white cheddar on raisin bread. Guys, you have to try this.
The idea was still swimming around in my head after reading my Tell Simmer interview, in which I fessed up my most disgusting snack habit (it’s not the grilled cheese – you have to read it to find out). I answered all these questions in the motel in Salmon Arm en route back to Calgary the other night, drinking shiraz from a plastic Travelodge cup. At some point toward the end I managed to erase the whole thing (I blame the shiraz. And the cup) and I had to start over. (It would be interesting to see how I answered that same list of questions this morning, in an entirely new time and place!) Simmer till Done is on my short list of favourite, funniest food blogs. I have a ton of Marilyn’s recipes bookmarked to try. I wish I wasn’t still in a daze and could do it more justice with my description – suffice to say it’s well worth a read.
So for Free Stuff Saturday Mornings (we’ll resume our normal Friday programming schedule) would you take a new cookbook? I have a new, big chunky one from Readers’ Digest, which I’m sad is struggling (although the Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing doesn’t apply to Reader’s Digest operations in Canada) – I’m hoping it isn’t at risk of going under along with Gourmet – news I’m still seriously stunned by.
It’s called Just 5 Things, because each recipe uses only 5 ingredients – seems like a good idea as we start to get into the busy season. It’s huge – 700 pages! – with a flexible hard cover, and EVERY RECIPE HAS A PHOTO. Each recipe is on its own page, and the facing page is a full-colour photo. It’s one of the best laid-out cookbooks I’ve seen.
So – I do want to know what everyone is eating – and you could in fact cheat and recount the best meal of the week – it doesn’t have to be last night! Do you have any 5 ingredient (and under) favourites?
October 17 2009 | sandwiches | 62 Comments »
We’re home. W is on the mend (H1N1? Not sure – the symptoms were consistent though) – still snotty and coughing and chlorine-eyed and very particular that everything be done EXACTLY according to his bidding. Yesterday Mike and I felt like we were being dragged down with him but bounced back after a particularly gratifying sleep in Salmon Arm. The bottle of shiraz, drunk out of plastic Travelodge cups (yes, I am the lass in class) might have helped.
We came home to snow, slush and icicles hanging from every window, but I don’t even care because I’m back in my own kitchen. I have overdosed on car snacks and restaurant food, despite my best efforts to arm myself with healthy stuff. Since Vegas (and Toronto, and now Vancouver) I’ve loaded my luggage down with granola. The real stuff – like the nutty bag filled with chewy dried cherries made by Joy Road Catering that I picked up at the Penticton farmers’ market – is a good balance of complex carbs, healthy fats and protein (if you cram it with nuts, seeds and flax, like I do), doesn’t spoil or go soggy or get crushed. It takes up next to no space, and fills the void even when you should be eating a real meal. And when you need something a bit more substantial, it’s usually pretty easy to find yourself a cup of yogurt. If I manage to get a room with a mini fridge, I’ll go buy a big tub of yogurt – I’ve been known to spoon it directly into the zip-lock baggies that hold my granola – sort of like a grown-up version of those little boxes of cereal you opened from the side and poured your milk right into. The yogurt-granola combo doesn’t leak as much.
Which reminds me – I haven’t told you how easy it is to make your own yogurt yet, have I? Sorry about that, I’ve been meaning to. I’ll just go ahead and scratch that one off my to-do list.
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October 14 2009 | breakfast | 47 Comments »
My cousin got married this weekend, in a sunny afternoon ceremony at the Rowing Club in Stanley Park, with a brilliant red maple tree acting as a backdrop. A gentle breeze set hundreds of leaves fluttering as they finished their vows, as bikers zipped down the path and couples strolled by and stopped to look up and watch. It was stunning. I took hundreds of photos. I thought I’d let them speak for me – they’re worth a thousand words each, I hear.
But it turns out when I downloaded the software onto my new MacBook before we left, I didn’t actually open it, which is when you have to plug in your serial number, which you have to do before you can actually use it. So you’ll have to wait.
Before the ceremony we went for breakfast at Sophie’s Cosmic Cafe – bacon and eggs and pancakes with berries and whipped cream for the kids. After the ceremony we took a sunset cruise around the island, under the Lions Gate Bridge (did you know it was built by the Guinness family in 1937? it’s true) and past the Granville Island Market, through False Creek. On the boat we were served a lovely buffet turkey dinner with all the trimmings. W spent most of the meal either crying and lying on the floor because the seat he wanted was taken, or standing wistfully by the galley kitchen, hoping to catch a glimpse of the chef, who picked up on how smitten W was and brought him in for a peek.
Later, back at the Rowing Club, there was a tower of chocolate cupcakes, an open bar and dancing. At 11pm, they put out a poutine buffet – fries and cheese curds and coffee-sized carafes of gravy – I never saw so many happy drunk people. At one point I looked over from the photo booth (oh yes, I’ll be scanning those once we’re back home) and saw Mike upending his paper french fry cup full of gravy (whomever dreamt up serve-yourself poutine didn’t anticipate Mike being there) into his mouth like a giant gravy shooter.
Needless to say no one got much sleep that night. After brunch the next day, W collapsed into smoking-hot ball of snot – throbbing with symptoms, they say, that are in fact indicators of H1N1. (Then again, they could be symptoms of most any flu.) Which has kept us more or less in the hotel room since then. (It’s a good thing it’s a nice one. But get this: there’s a MOTION SENSOR in the mini bar. As in, you move it, you bought it. The hotel’s answer, I assume, to those who get the munchies, eat all the $4 bags of M&Ms and then go to 7-11 the next day and replace them. AND there’s a teeny stuffed dog in a box strategically placed beside the $8 bottle of Evian on the corner of the folding table with the coffee maker on it, which is also apparently sensored, so that if it moves you end up with a $16 charge on your room bill. And not only is the mini bar the exact right size for a preschooler -and not locked- that dog is right at 4 year old eye level. We moved it behind the TV so that he couldn’t touch it, and today they replaced it with another one. I can’t imagine the debates that go on at the check out counter over $96 worth’ of stuffies on your room bill.)
Last night Mike and I snuck out for a quick dinner at Memphis Blues – on our must-visit list every time we come to Vancouver. Shrimp swimming in barbecue-spiked butter with wedges of cornbread, perfect pulled pork with creamy coleslaw on soft buns, and brisket that was not the least bit dry, and deliciously crusty on the edges.
I’ll fast forward through the post-Canucks game traffic jam and not particularly exciting events of today to dinner – out again as my parents took over W duty and we had a chance to (finally!) sneak out to Vij’s just off Granville, where I’m a bit reluctant to admit I’ve never actually eaten (no reservations-go early on Thanksgiving and you might just nab the last table).
It was dark – too dark to do the food justice, so I liberated myself from my photographer duties and diverted all my attention to the experience. The serving staff ran like a well-oiled machine; as we sat down they brought steaming mugs of chai (which-honestly? could convince me to ditch coffee if I could recreate it) and as we perused the menu dishes of steaming zucchini pakoras and other nibbles I missed the names of came by for sampling. We started with samosas stuffed with lamb, beef and paneer with coconut chutney and two “Punjabi heart attacks” – round, ornate silver soup spoons filled with a chunky mulch of spicy cashews, raw sugar, paneer and ghee, chased with a light, lemony quinoa salad. We followed that with BC spot prawns and halibut with black chick peas in a coconut-lemon curry (that was tomato-based, not creamy) and incredibly tender wine marinated lamb popsicles and turmeric spinach potatoes bathed in a fenugreek cream curry. All, of course, came with naan and perfect rice. Bliss.
And now to digest, and pack, and mop W’s brow, and time his breathing again, and try to get some sleep with my fleshy little space heater. We’re heading home tomorrow after my meeting with Whitecap, skipping a stop at Sue’s on the way because their household is also experiencing a flu smackdown.
Sometimes holidays are like delicate houses of cards-one sneeze brings all your nicely-balanced plans right down.
October 12 2009 | eating out | 15 Comments »
So now we’re in Vancouver. All of us, this time. It took 12 hours or so to get here, slowed down a bit by a highway closure near Golden, which caused a few hundred people to cram into the Tim Horton’s beside the intersection of said closure, all with a not so subtle eye on the situation outside, and at the first sign of traffic being allowed through the mass exodus was like, I don’t know, something really funny that I might be able to think of if my brain was functioning at a respectable level.
I got home from Toronto last night at about 7, and the next few hours were a frantic flurry of laundry, reading to W, packing, wrapping gifts, charging electronic devices and catching up on work, with of course a break at 10pm to watch Jim marry Pam.
I’m not sure how long we’ll be gone this time – definitely almost a week, possibly a bit more than. Which meant kicking everyone out of the fridge that might get nasty and stinky over time. There was half a carton of buttermilk and a half a butternut squash that needed using up, so I made muffins – when traveling with a 4 year old and an 11 year old (my niece, Emily), having a sack of homemade muffins at the ready to deflect evil drive-thrus and gas station snacks is a very good thing.
Morning Glory muffins are a little like carrot cakes – typically made with grated carrots and apples, with handfuls of nuts and/or raisins and/or coconut thrown in. I just swapped grated raw squash for the carrots – did you know you could do that? Yes you can! And with sweet potatoes too! – and a pear and a half for the apple. Same dif.
Squash & Pear Morning Glory Muffins
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 cup sugar (white or brown)
2 tsp. cinnamon
2 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt
2 packed cups grated raw butternut squash or carrots
1/2 cup chopped pecans or walnuts
1/2 cup raisins
1/4 cup flaked coconut, sweetened or unsweetened (optional)
1/2 cup canola or light olive oil
3 large eggs
1/2 cup buttermilk or plain yogurt
2 tsp. vanilla extract
1 pear or apple, coarsely grated (don’t bother peeling it)
Preheat the oven to 350°F. Spray muffin cups with nonstick spray or line them with paper liners.
In a large bowl, stir together the flours, sugar, cinnamon, baking soda, and salt. Add the carrots, pecans, raisins, and coconut and toss to combine well.
In a medium bowl, whisk together the oil, eggs, buttermilk, and vanilla. Add to the carrot mixture with the grated apple and stir just until the batter is combined. Don’t worry about getting all the lumps out – overmixing will make the muffins tough.
Fill the prepared muffin tins almost to the top. Bake in the middle of the oven for 25-30 minutes, until the muffins are golden and the tops are springy to the touch. Tip them in their cups to help them cool by allowing steam to escape.
How did it possibly get to be Friday again? This week I have a really cool little item to give away – I just learned of a new Calgary-based party planning service called Party Designers (started with the idea that more people should be cooking, entertaining, and enjoying time with friends and family around food), and the owner offered us up some gift certificates for her services. (You don’t have to live in Calgary.) It seemed timely – ’tis the season to start thinking about parties!
And congratulations to Elizabeth, our newlywed newbie soup-maker, who by some culinary miracle won herself a CrockPot! (It wasn’t the pitch, honest! The random number generator did it!) We’ll fully expect her to become a slow cooker diva this winter.
Since it’s Thanksgiving weekend, I’d love to hear what’s on your menu – party or not!
One Year Ago: Pulled Pork and Baked Beans
October 09 2009 | bread and breakfast | 48 Comments »
I’m back from Toronto. I miss my clean, empty hotel room with its crisp white sheets and view of the city.
This afternoon I spent a blissful 2 1/2 hours wandering down Queen Street, through Chinatown, past the Ontario College of Art & Design, where everyone wore great-fitting jeans and cute blazers with hip, poufy scarves and rode bikes and had perfect skin…
to Kensington Market.
I bought cheese – Wensleydale, as a coming-home gift for W, who adores Wallace and Gromit and loves to say Wensweydale in the cutest sort of way, and a thin wedge of emmental – at the same cheese shop my mum brought me to when I was little and we lived there. I bought a glossy, tawny sesame seed bagel at the Market Bakery, and walked past the fish mongers, recalling having walked through that same stretch when I was pregnant and had a bionic sense of smell, and the aroma coming from that cluster of fresh fish shops had me hunched over the gutter.
And I’m pretty sure I saw Bob Geldof running to get into his car before he got a parking ticket.
I also saw a bright orange squid bra in Chinatown. Honestly – doesn’t this look like it would feel ultra-realistic? And with tassels! You’d just have to get past the smell…
And impossibly cheap produce – 5 pomegranates for $1? Three heads of lettuce for $1?
I stopped for lunch at Little India on Queen Street, temptingly close to John Fluevog, and ate spinach paneer, curried chick peas, sweet, almost ketchupy butter chicken, lamb something or other and crispy zucchini pakoras. A great deal for $11.
Back home past 7, the boys had eaten so I settled on a wedge of gingerbread I made earlier in the week using pumpkin puree and stout (like Guinness, or any dark beer) and topped with cream cheese frosting. Time to unpack, repack, and get some stuff done before heading to Vancouver tomorrow before dawn.
And wow, look at that, well past midnight already!
Pumpkin Stout Gingerbread with Cream Cheese Frosting
1 cup dark stout, such as Guinness or Wild Rose Alberta Crude Oatmeal Stout
1/2 cup molasses
1 tsp. baking soda
3 large eggs
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup canola oil
1 cup canned pumpkin puree
1 Tbsp. grated fresh ginger
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 Tbsp. ground ginger
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 tsp. allspice
1/4 tsp. freshly grated nutmeg
1/4 tsp. salt
Cream Cheese Frosting (optional):
1/4 cup butter, softened
half an 8 oz. (250 g) pkg. regular or light cream cheese
2-3 cups icing sugar
1/4 cup milk
1 tsp. vanilla
Preheat oven to 350°F. Spray a Bundt pan really well with nonstick spray.
In a medium saucepan (you need room for the mixture to foam up), combine the stout and molasses over medium heat. Bring to a boil, then remove from the heat and stir in the baking soda. Set aside until the foam subsides and the mixture cools slightly.
In a large bowl, whisk together the eggs, sugars, oil, pumpkin puree and ginger. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, ground ginger, baking powder, cinnamon, allspice, nutmeg and salt.
Add about a third of the dry ingredients to the egg mixture and stir just until combined. Add half the molasses mixture, then another third of the dry ingredients, the rest of the molasses mixture and the rest of the dry ingredients, stirring after each addition just until combined.
Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake for an hour, until the top is springy to the touch. Cool for a few minutes, then invert onto a wire rack while still warm. Cool completely before spreading with cream cheese frosting.
To make frosting: In a large bowl, beat the butter and cream cheese with an electric mixer until creamy. Gradually add the icing sugar, milk and vanilla, beating until the mixture is creamy and well-blended. Add a little more sugar or milk if necessary to achieve a spreadable frosting.
One Year Ago: Bean Cookies
October 09 2009 | cake | 30 Comments »
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