Archive for the 'freezable' Category
We had a bee! They came (to my house)! They saw (the piles of stuff and fingerprints on the walls)! They made peroghies!
(Aside: I’ve been fighting with my computer all night. Working on it is much like wading through tar -yes, I’ve done it before; another story for another time- with various programs deciding to quit on me or not work at all at the most inopportune moments. And so while I have it up I’m going to type fast, and let the pictures do the talking. Each one is worth a thousand words, right?)
My attempt at a mini bouquet – the only branch of apple blossoms I could reach, and a sprig of Italian parsley, in a jar. I did not inherit my mom’s flower arranging skills.
I made strawberry-white chocolate scones. This wasn’t planned, but I happened to have strawberries and white chocolate in the house. See what happens when you McGyver your way to breakfast?
(Also? Barb brought blueberry crumb muffins, but they went so fast I found myself eating the crumbs from the bottom of the bowl before I managed to grab my camera.)
We used the dough recipe from Cheryl’s baba – and yes, from about a hundred thousand other babas – it’s lumpy and ugly, then soft and smooth -and oh-so-satisfying to knead and roll with its residual warmth from the steaming water.
We had little helpers. Love the dough rolling stance. Good leverage.
We had lots of fillings: potato-cheddar, caramelized onion-potato-smoked Gouda, dry cottage cheese and fresh dill, last summer’s frozen plums tossed with sugar.
Many hands make light work… and cramped fingers? I was on dough duty – we counted 7 batches. (That’s 35 cups of flour. Thirty-five!)
Our final tally? 350+ peroghies in six flavours. Those crimped edges there? Made by hands that had never made a peroghy before. For real. See what a crash course in peroghy making will do?
So awesome. Thanks for coming, everyone! And those who couldn’t: next time!
Cheryl’s Baba’s Pyrohy Dough
from her Baba’s kitchen, and Backseat Gourmet
5 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp. salt
1/2 cup canola oil
1 large egg
2 cups recently boiled (very hot) water
In a large bowl mix together the flour and salt.
Whisk the oil and egg together in a measuring cup; add to the flour and stir until you have a coarse meal, like biscuit dough before you add the liquid.
Add the water all at once and immediately stir – it will look lumpy and ugly and as if there isn’t enough moisture to go around. Keep at it – I recommend getting in there with your hands – and the dough will come together. Let it sit for 15 minutes, or preferably 30. (We did not always do this, as we kept running out of dough!) Makes lots of peroghies.
May 21 2012 | freezable and vegetarian | 17 Comments »
I know, who makes blueberry perogies anymore? Nobody, that’s who.
And I never have either, until the subject of Alberta cuisine arose earlier this week – and while we’re known for our beef, bison, canola, and really a ton of other great ingredients, there are few dishes that get up and scream Alberta. But homemade perogies – they truly are the food of the prairies. And sure, you could stuff them with any number of potato-cheese-bacon-saurkraut combos, but I wanted to give berries a go – in fact, I suddenly felt as if it would be unpatriotic to not make them. And besides, I wanted to know if they’d translate well into little doughy two-bite pies of sorts. Browned butter, berries and sour cream-oh my.
Perogies fall into that category of foods hardly made from scratch anymore because there’s no need. At one time perogy bees were the social events of the season – the original social medium – wherein folks would gather to catch up, gossip, discuss politics and together solve the problem of how to feed their families. This is what girls did before Starbucks, I guess.
Multitasking is not new – at peroghy bees thousands of perogies could be assembled in an afternoon to feed families, raise funds, or in preparation for social events. I love the thought that at one time weddings didn’t have ginormous trade shows and magazines and everyone just got married in the church where they lived, and the community got together to make perogies and dainties to serve afterward. Is that just in my head, having grown up watching Little House on the Prairie? I loved that show. I so wanted to be Mary, except for the blind part.
This dough is one of many versions out there, and simple to mix together. The finished perigees were boiled, then scooped out of the pot with a slotted spoon and browned in a hot pan with butter until they were golden and crisp on both sides.
You don’t have to fill them with blueberries, of course, if you don’t want to – take the leftover mashed potatoes from dinner, add a handful of grated cheese, and set the kids at the kitchen table with an after-school project.
OR. Gather a few pals and bring back the bee. Which brings me to my idea. (Insert eye-roll via Mike.) I think it’s been too long since our last playdate, which was before Christmas, come to think of it. Should we have our own perogy bee? Should we? Should we?
I’ll make dough, and get some bubbly, everyone can bring a filling, and we’ll open the back door and let the spring air breeze in while we cover the house with dough and flour. And I’ll enlist Mike to clean-up duty with the promise of homemade peroghies with bacon, onions and sour cream.
And blueberry perogies for dessert.
Blueberry or Saskatoon Berry Perogies
adapted from Canadian Living
Dough:
3 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp. baking powder
pinch salt
2 Tbsp. butter, melted
3/4 cup milk
1 large egg
1/3 cup water (approx)
Filling:
2/3 cup sugar
1 Tbsp. all-purpose flour
2 cups fresh or frozen (don’t thaw them) blueberries or saskatoon berries
butter, for cooking (optional)
sour cream or whipped cream, for serving
In a large bowl, stir together the flour, baking powder and salt. In a small bowl (or Pyrex measuring cup) stir together the butter, milk and egg; add to the flour mixture and stir until you have a dry, shaggy mixture. Add the water about a third at a time, until you have a soft, slightly sticky dough. Knead it about 10 times, then cover with a towel or plastic wrap and let rest on the countertop for 20 minutes.
To make the filling, stir together the sugar and flour; stir in the blueberries. On lightly floured surface, roll out the dough to a scant 1/4-inch thickness. Using a 3-inch round cutter, cut into rounds. Stretch each round slightly; fill with a spoonful of the blueberry mixture, ensuring you get some of the sugar-flour in there as well.
Pull dough over filling into semicircle; pinch edges together to seal. Cover with tea towel. Repeat with remaining dough and filling. Freeze in a single layer or cook immediately.
In large pot of lightly salted water, boil perogies in batches, until they float to the top and the dough is tender, about 10 minutes. With slotted spoon, transfer to dish; drizzle with butter to prevent sticking. If you like, brown the well-drained boiled perogies in a hot pan with butter until crisp and golden; dribble the remaining butter from the pan overtop. Serve with sour cream or whipped cream. Makes about 3 dozen peroghies.
April 25 2012 | breakfast and dessert and freezable | 42 Comments »
So here’s the thing. We’re in Tofino, having decided to take off and find some green over spring break. We found it – lots of it – but also found that construction crews somehow severed the wire that was our internet connection, and the oven is broken. First world problems, I know. But that’s how it came to be that I’m sitting in my car in the rain, having trolled the town with my laptop, looking for an internet connection so I could answer some emails, send some files and post this, what with all the wireless access coffee shops being closed in the evenings. I found a lovely strong signal behind The Shelter – thanks guys! – which means I have a perfectly valid excuse for going for breakfast lunch and dinner while we’re here so that I may check my email.
Mike is no doubt wondering what happened to me. Then again not, as he does know me quite well.
As always we arrived with a carload of groceries, and plans to eat out at the many fine eateries here (they really do have a disproportionate number of fantastic restaurants and food trucks for such a small town). But still, I like cooking out here, looking out over the stormy ocean and occasional bald eagle. I found a bag of these roasted butternut squash and ricotta ravioli in the freezer – something I had made last time, and froze, I suppose. If you’re tiring of winter veg and thick-skinned squash, these might ease the burden a bit. Wonton wrappers are essentially small square pasta sheets, and make it easy to make ravioli from scratch. To make enormous tortellini, dampen the two bottom corners and bring them together, as if they were holding hands, and pinch them closed.
Roasted Butternut Squash & Ricotta Ravioli
wonton wrappers, thawed
1 butternut squash
canola or olive oil, for cooking
salt & pepper to taste
1 cup ricotta or soft goat cheese
1 tsp. – 1 Tbsp. maple syrup
Preheat the oven to 400°F. Split the squash in half lengthwise, scoop out the seeds, drizzle with oil, sprinkle with salt and pepper and bake on a rimmed sheet or in a baking dish for 40 minutes, or until soft.
Scoop out the cooled roasted squash (you can do this in advance if you like while you’re cooking something else, and stash the squash in the fridge for a few days) and mash it with ricotta, a wee drizzle of maple syrup (and some of flax oil if you want to boost omega 3s) and some salt and pepper. Assemble them one or two at a time, placing a small spoonful in the middle of a wrapper, dipping your finger in water and running it along two edges, then fold over and press to seal, squishing out any air bubbles in the process.
Once the ravioli are assembled they can be frozen in a single layer and then transferred to freezer bags, or dropped into boiling water (don’t crowd the pot) for 3-5 minutes, until they float to the surface and the pasta is tender. Drain well and serve with butter – browned butter, if at all possible.
March 27 2012 | freezable and pasta and vegetarian | 11 Comments »
If there’s anything I’ve learned from having a sore throat for a week, it’s this:
Note: The Liberté company had nothing to do with this post – it was all me and my tonsils.
March 06 2012 | dessert and freezable and snacks | 38 Comments »
So. Christmas. It didn’t wind up being the healthiest holiday season. I thought I’d be back with too many photos to sort on Boxing Day – but as it turns out there hasn’t been much food to report. On Friday morning (our anniversary!) on which day we planned to head downtown and walk, do the last of our Christmas shopping, have a fancy coffee, then go for dinner and wrap presents, I walked in the door from my early morning BT spot feeling a little woozy. I spent the day in bed and the bathroom, and W joined in that evening – luckily I already had a barf bucket at the ready by the couch. We spent our anniversary evening mopping the floor, doing laundry, cuddling W and watching old episodes of Arrested Development. It wasn’t bad, actually, but no food to report.
Saturday we had Christmas at my parents’ house, and the big turkey dinner. It was beautiful – the setting and the meal, which featured a 20 lb organic free range heritage breed turkey from Winter’s that we went over to put in the oven that morning. The boys (five of them under 8 ) were over the top excited, building their Lego and popping crackers. Mike tracked Santa on his iPad. My sister made a killer chocolate cheesecake. I hadn’t at that point eaten since Thursday night, but as I was managing to keep sips of Coke down, I had high hopes. It didn’t go well.
On Christmas day I ate a cracker, and at dinner, with Mike’s mom and sister and half of my family over to our house this time for turkey part 2, I managed a Pillsbury crescent roll – perhaps the pouffiest, most refined food product available? And so on Boxing Day I thought I’d venture into real food territory. There were leftovers, of course, and so rather than take a stab at Turkey Dinner Part 3, or do something crazy like make turkey shepherd’s pie, I made soup.
There was mashed potatoes and peas, carrots and roasted sweet potatoes, so I made one pot of orange-red and another of green. (In keeping with the colours of the season, of course.)
You don’t need a formula to make soup. I’m not sure how many people realize this. I’m going to resist writing a recipe here, because that goes against the whole point of transforming whatever it is you have on hand into a pot soup.
So here’s what you do: put a pot on the stove, drizzle some oil in the bottom and add a dab of butter. Chop an onion and throw it in. A clove or three of garlic, too. I just slice mine, so that it doesn’t burn – we’re going to puree the lot, anyway.
Give them a few minutes to soften, then throw in your leftover veggies. In one pot I scraped in the last of the mashed potatoes – about a cup and a half? – and the peas – maybe 3/4 of a cup. Not that it matters. add however much you have. Broccoli would do well, or spinach, kale, asparagus, even roasted Brussels sprouts. In the other pot I put a spoonful of curry paste, the carrots and roasted sweet potatoes. Squash would have been perfect, too.
Add some stock to cover and bring to a simmer. (If you’re really on the ball, you may have some turkey stock already – I always keep those tetra packs of chicken stock in the pantry.) Cook for 10-20-30 minutes, or until everything is soft. Puree with a hand-held immersion blender. Add more stock or water if it’s too thick, or simmer a bit longer if it seems too brothy. You could add a splash of cream, but neither needed it. At its best, soup is simple. Any veggie dish – even just boiled or steamed veg – are delicious simmered with stock and pureed. And if you’re not in the mood for soup, it’s a great way to freeze leftovers – in soup form. Happy holidays, everyone!
December 27 2011 | freezable and soup | 14 Comments »
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