Archive for July, 2010
I’m going to spare you too many words tonight – mostly because I’m making 100 pork satay for the kitchen theatre in the morning (I’m missing the World Cup final! Boo!) – and because each picture is worth a thousand, right? We took the boys to the parade yesterday. They selected their own cowboy attire. Think they’ll make the Sartorialist? My favourite part is the bagpipes. I get all verklempt.
The cowboys enormous bulls make me even more so.
Later, on the grounds, we went to MacKay’s -they’re finally in Weadickville this year instead of Breyers- and got some mini donut ice cream. I do also recommend the cowboy coffee, Saskatoon berry and coconut… the beer is subtle and interesting, but I’m not a beer fan myself. Seventeen flavours to choose from is altogether too much pressure.
We had pepperoni sticks wrapped in cheese bread (once a year – in lieu of corn dogs this time) in the grass, and after dragging ourselves back across the tarmac, through the stables (love the Clydesdales) the boys needed to cool off in the river before we made it all the way home.
I have a really great Stampede-themed recipe for you tomorrow. Just wait.
July 10 2010 | leftovers | 8 Comments »
It was a long, hot day between the Stampede parade and hours on the grounds and midway today, and I’m just sitting down now to upload photos. I had another event tonight, arrived home after 9 and spent an hour of the remaining evening looking for the dog, whom I had forgotten I brought along for the ride on a coffee run (he was in the back of the car). A great use of time and energy, don’t you think? Even the neighbours came out and offered to help (likely in an attempt to get me and W to stop walking up and down the street shouting LOOOOOUIEEEEEE!)
And it’s about a thousand degrees outside, or perhaps I haven’t yet recovered from the +30 on the asphalt (which adds another 20, I’m sure) and so because this week of 5-5:30 am wake-ups has greatly reduced my brain function and made me prone to extreme run-on sentences, I’m going to put off the dozen or so photos of the day and tell you about a particularly spectacular salad we had a few days ago, that I completely forgot to report.
Which reminds me: my spinach is growing! It’s about a tenth of a centimetre across right now, but not bad when it began as seed – it’s an easy, cool-weather crop (it’s partly in the shade) that can be replanted as it’s harvested, providing a steady supply throughout the summer. Presuming of course one is on the ball about it. I predict mine will be at its peak around the time we arrive in Tofino.
But my sister, being far more regimented and scheduled and prone to planning ahead than me, planted hers in a timely manner, and it’s good to go. Also, Emily brought a bucket of eggs back from her Dad’s parents’ house out of town, where the chickens (the only names I remember are à la King and Salad Sandwich) were sent to live when the city told my sister she couldn’t keep them in Lakeview anymore.
The combo of course smacks of a bacon and egg spinach salad. It would have been nice to sauté the spinach with some garlic and top it with an egg, or push it aside in the pan and crack the egg in to cook in the garlicky emerald oil (how Nigella did I just sound right there?) but when leaves are so baby-perfect I have a tough time wilting them.
So I cooked some bacon, and toasted some croutons, and made salads, and topped them this time with soft-boiled eggs instead of poached, which I love on a salad but can sometimes be watery. Regardless of how you cook them, there isn’t much better than runny yolk oozing out over greens, mingling with a balsamic vinaigrette.
Bacon & Egg Spinach Salad
This salad is also brilliant with a chopped tomato or ripe avocado.
1/2 baguette, cut into chunks, or about 3 cups of cubed or torn crusty bread
olive or canola oil
1 garlic clove, squished
1 big bunch fresh baby spinach (or 1 bag)
3-5 bacon slices, cooked and crumbled
4 eggs, poached or soft-boiled
Dressing:
1/2 cup extra-virgin olive or canola oil
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
1 Tbsp. grainy mustard
1 tsp. sugar
salt & freshly ground pepper to taste
Spread the bread chunks out on a baking sheet. Pour some oil into a small dish and swish the garlic clove around in it; drizzle over the bread and toss to lightly coat, then toast in the oven until golden. To make the dressing, shake everything up in a jar or whisk together in a bowl. Store in the fridge for up to 2 weeks. Build your salad with greens, crumbled bacon and croutons, then top with an egg and drizzle with dressing.
One Year Ago: Coconut Macaroon Bark
July 10 2010 | salads | 11 Comments »
Avery, this one is for you. (Or more for Ruby. Could she be any cuter? She picked up a baseball in the yard yesterday and said in her teeny voice: “baseball”. Is she brilliant, or what? She’s totally going on the list of girls next door(ish) that W is allowed to date. In 20 years or so.)
If she loves Popsicles and watermelon, these as you said may blow her little mind. And of course they’re pure fruit, and don’t contain high-fructose corn syrup and various colours, stabilizers and gums, like most store-bought varieties do. All you do is puree watermelon – cut it in chunks and whiz it in the blender or food processor – because it’s mostly water it purees really well. Pour it into popsicle molds, add some fresh fruit if you like (blueberries, halved grapes, chopped kiwi and the like) and freeze them. If you don’t have popsicle molds, pour it into paper dixie cups, cover the cups with plastic wrap (to hold the stick in place) and poke a popsicle stick through, then freeze.
I haven’t had a chance to actually make them myself today, so I totally used the photo from the National Watermelon Promotion Board (with permission!) – but isn’t it pretty? I wish I could find molds that would make popsicles that look like that. And I wish I could then take a photo that looks like that without said popsicles melting all over the table, or getting dog hair stuck in them. Although I suppose it would add extra fiber.
In other news – check out who stopped by A’s house today to buy some lemonade! The Stampede Queen and two princesses were parched, and so pulled over up the hill. A brush with royalty. They got to feed the Queen.
One Year Ago: Lemon Buttermilk Pudding Cake
July 08 2010 | leftovers | 7 Comments »
I’d like to get back to normal here, please, maybe with a nice regular dinner report and recipe? Perhaps before the insanity of Stampede hits. Which is imminent. Tomorrow morning is the CBC ATCO Blue Flame Kitchen Stampede Breakfast (in the parking lot beside the CBC building on Memorial Drive), which means it’s also Sneak-a-Peek, which means Friday is Parade Day. And then it doesn’t stop for ten days. And then we leave for Tofino. There may be corn dogs and mini donuts in between.
We drove back from Edmonton this afternoon, arriving at dinnertime. W had spent the best 24 hours of his life (thus far) with Grandma & Grandad, having his first sleepover (that’s right – our first night away and we go to Edmonton to work, rather than take off to Vegas or some such) and then going to see Toy Story 3 before a trip to the zoo. What does he need us for anyway? He came back, glanced at us briefly, said hi, and went down the basement. Perhaps he’s turning 15, not 5, on his next birthday.
I had some leftover rice from one of my shows in Edmonton, and some already cooked crumbled ground beef in the fridge, so I made a sort of Mexican rice skillet that’s exactly the sort of thing that doesn’t inspire me at all, and yet was completely delicious. Oh crap, I told you about that already.
Then lets revert to lunch. Or breakfast. On BT this morning I was fooling around with watermelons, and one of the recipes I made was this watermelon caprese salad (traditionally made with tomatoes, but upgraded with fresh watermelon – which, did you know, is far higher in lycopene?) – you could get all fancy with caramelized onions on top, or just lay slices of watermelon and buffalo mozzarella (or bocconcini), drizzle with balsamic and oil or a thick balsamic reduction, and tuck in a few fresh basil leaves. If you want to get all cute about it, cut shapes out of your watermelon slices with a cookie cutter, then use the scraps to make some agua fresca or a nice strong margarita.
With a bunch of watermelon halves taking up real estate on my kitchen counter, I also made the boys some watermelon sno-cones. Scoop out the flesh using an ice cream scoop, freeze it, dip in vanilla yogurt and douse in sprinkles, then stick it in a sugar cone. They’re thrilled.
One Year Ago: Deep-fried Macaroni & Cheese
July 07 2010 | leftovers | 9 Comments »
So you’re interested in the watermelon cupcakes, huh?
Yeah, it was an odd experiment. It seemed like a good idea – don’t you think? Watermelon, being 92% water, purees very well, and so I thought it might just slip right into a white cake batter. I tried it with a cake mix – just because it was there – that called for 1 1/3 cups of water. I added 1 1/2 cups of watermelon puree. (Just chunk it and whiz in the food processor or blender.) The batter was a beautifully dusty pale pink – a shade that reminds me of my great aunt Noreen – and tasted of watermelon. I had high hopes.
What came out of the oven were almost neon orange cakes – something I totally didn’t anticipate, having opted out of chemistry in high school. Heat does odd things to the colour of food. My red velvet cake made of beets, for example, was a brilliant red going in; a dull brown coming out.
The watermelon cakes tasted funny – not bad, but somehow like candy. Like something sweet you’d buy for kids and wonder what flavour it’s supposed to be. They were nonetheless gobbled up without complaint (which may have had more to do with the icing and sprinkles on top). Colour-wise, the formula may come in handy at around Halloween. I may give them another go, though – with a from-scratch recipe. The sugar in the watermelon calls for less in the batter – perhaps that tweak, paired with real ingredients (as in, not a mix), will make them taste more like cake and less like pouffy candy.
Speaking of watermelon, I loaded my car up with them and will be cooking with them on BT in Edmonton tomorrow morning. I’m hoping that this year, my pants won’t fall down as I carry my melons down Jasper Avenue after the show, right in front of rush-hour Tim Horton’s. A few extra appropriately-placed pounds will no doubt ensure history won’t repeat itself. (Yes-we’re in Edmonton again! Deja vu! Not as much time to linger at restaurants this time though. Which is a shame, now that I’ve found some I love.) I brought a black bean and quinoa salad with me in the car. How virtuous am I? (Says she who ate peach, blueberry and cherry cobbler with thick vanilla yogurt for breakfast this morning. I’d do it again.)
July 06 2010 | leftovers | 8 Comments »
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