Archive for the 'seafood' Category
Oy.
I don’t mind sharing with you guys the fact that I’m feeling a little dogpiled these days. New drama has unfolded – an enormous laundry basket of it – all over my already tipping plate. Family stuff – Mike’s family (and thus mine – why did I not carefully screen potential in-laws and select some who love to cook and have a house in the south of France?) – and of course I just can’t get into it all without laying down so much background it would take a year to bring you up to speed. And you probably wouldn’t believe me anyway, but it would make a fabulously addictive reality TV show. Can’t we ALL just meet up for (spiked) coffee somewhere sometime and have a big ol’ chat? OH THE STORIES I COULD TELL YOU.
So we’ve spent much of the past few days in and out of the hospital, dealing with grown-up stuff that makes me want to curl up on the couch in my legwarmers and eat peanut butter toast in front of Happy Days. How did I get to be the adult here? Isn’t there some boss of me around to tell me what to do?
But besides all that, Sue and I have a book due in three weeks. An actual, real, crazy-long manuscript that has to be finished June 1. Which is very exciting of course, but the homestretch is always a little daunting. Of course in that same stretch of time (3! weeks!) I have (many! big!) stories due for Swerve, Avenue, Dogs in Canada, Parents Canada and City Palate. I have a two-day foodstyling gig and a cooking segment of my own on BT on the 17th. (And three to five other TV spots, some in Edmonton, which I haven’t yet booked.) I have meetings as part of the Slow Food Calgary steering committee, I’m teaching a class at the Cookbook Company, emceeing the Art for the Senses event at the Glenbow on the 27th (the same night as W’s kindergarten orientation-sniff), I have board meetings and work to do to organize the upcoming Gallery Calorie party in the park (you should come to that – seriously – eating and drinking and shopping on a Saturday afternoon for great causes) and ditto Ramsay Rocks, and I’m helping (sort of) rejuvenate the Hillhurst-Sunnyside Farmers’ Market. (As I type brownies are baking for the CSA Movie Night tomorrow – which is free! The movie and the brownies, that is. I’m hoping there will be some left.)
Of course I still have a weekly CBC show to do, and write here, and at the Family Kitchen. We have friends who are moving and we’ve offered to help paint, and others having a CD release party. We’re going to the Rocky Mountain Wine and Food Festival this weekend, and a birthday bash. Edgar Farms is having their asparagus festival. And somehow my days wind up filled with minutiae. Can you drown in minutiae? Hey, that’s one of those words that starts to distort itself when you say it over and over: minutiae minutiae minutiae minutiae. I wonder why I’m not getting any work done?
And a four year old. Did I mention I have a BOOK due in three weeks?
(Whitecap: Please don’t have a heart attack. I’m totally on it.)
Which is not to drone on about how busy I am – everyone is – I just don’t have high hopes for dramatic and interesting meals on our own table in the coming weeks. They’ll most be experimental and bean-based, others for stories and so not really sharable here. Dinners this week have been blurry – last night my sister ordered Chinese, and tonight she made a cookie sheet full of cheesy nachos I couldn’t get enough of. In between we’ve eaten huge bowls of almond-heavy Ichiban salad, quesadillas, the last of Aaron Douglas’ soup, and plenty of avocado sandwiches, on account of a bagful that all got ripe at the same time.
But I came across this recipe for mussels, which I made last week in under 15 minutes not realizing everyone had to scatter for soccer, meetings and miscellaneous after dinner stuff. I promptly forgot about them and never posted the recipe, but my sister has hardly stopped talking about them. I’m not a huge mussel fan, but I run with mussel fans, and it’s great to see how easy it is to make them happy. I had no idea how simple they were to cook – it would never have occurred to me that a wide, shallow bowl full of brothy mussels would take ten minutes to throw together. Seriously – this is ridiculously easy, and looks ridiculously not. I love that.
Mussels with Garlic, Tomatoes & Lemon
1 Tbsp. butter
1 Tbsp. olive or canola oil
5-6 garlic cloves, crushed or finely chopped
1 Roma tomato, finely chopped
1 lb. fresh mussels, scrubbed and debearded
a splash of white wine (optional)
juice of half a lemon
1/2 cup heavy cream or half & half
chopped fresh Italian parsley or basil, for garnish
In a large, heavy saucepan, heat the butter and oil over medium-high heat. Add the garlic and cook for a minute.
Add the lemon juice, mussels and the wine and cook for a minute, to reduce the liquid; add the cream and cover. Simmer until the mussels are opened, which will take about 5 minutes. Discard any that don’t open.
Stir in the tomato and divide between wide, shallow bowls; scatter with chopped parsley and serve immediately with crusty bread. Serves 2.
May 05 2010 | seafood | 24 Comments »
Feel free to hate me for what I’m about to tell you: we have too much crab. I did work for them, though; with late-night runs down to the dock in the cold rain to haul up the trap in the pitch dark, with a dead flashlight, chasing the spidery little beasts across the slippery dock and coaxing them out of the trap doors into the pink Easter bucket covered with butterflies that has become the Tofino crab bucket. All the while completely freaking myself out and trying not to get pinched. Have you heard the sound crabs make when piled on top of each other in a bucket and strapped to the passenger? Sort of half hissing, half clicking, claws creeping up over the edge in an attempt to pull themselves out. The sound I imagine giant bugs or aliens might make. But hey – for the price of a fishing license and package of hot dogs, I’m not complaining.
This week I’ve become an expert at determining the sex of a crab – a skill I never thought would come in handy. (You can only keep the males.) I also learned, with my friend K, that crabs love hot dogs, and that if you drop the trap off the dock (with aforementioned dogs dangling in an empty water bottle strung up with wire and jabbed with a pocketknife) when the tide is out, as it comes in the crab will come with it, and stop in for a delicious all-you-can-eat buffet.
Too much crab isn’t quite as dreamy as it might sound – the glut of shellfish brought back Mike’s gout, and the excessive melted butter that served as dip has not helped my pants fit any better. After two nights of steamed crab legs, it occurred to me that one could do more with fresh crab than make a mess of the kitchen table with crackers and pots of garlicky melted butter. What do I love that contains crab?
California rolls. I’ll be the first to stand up and admit I’m a wimp when it comes to sushi. I scrape off the roe (it reminds me of the time my uncle dangled the smelly, bright red giant fish egg bait at me on a fishing trip, making me throw up) and I don’t venture beyond at best a slab of raw tuna or salmon. You can forget the eel and abalone and urchin – I’m happy with a nice safe California roll. Or a dynamite roll, if there is the option of crispy tempura shrimp.
Of course I have no sushi mat, but when I stopped in at the teeny Beaches grocery store I bought a bag of jasmine rice and a perfectly ripe avocado; I had bought a bag of toasted sesame seeds at a wee Asian shop in Ucluelet, just because it seemed such an odd thing to be able to buy in a town with only one grocery store and (I think) no traffic lights. I thought I’d deconstruct the whole mess – which is what happens when I try to eat one anyway – and do a sort of layered salad of sorts.
Poking around to make sure I wasn’t forgetting what went into a California roll, I discovered I wasn’t quite as originally brilliant as I had thought for the previous five minutes. I found a couple sushi roll salad recipes, which was fortuitous as I took their advice to season the rice with a mixture of rice vinegar and sugar, which made all the difference. Beyond that I added grated carrot, chopped cucumber, sliced avocado and a mound of crabmeat, moistened with a little mayo. Feel free to add some sliced nori, if you’re into that sort of thing. I’ve been crawling around on far too many seaweed-covered rocks lately.
Deconstructed California Rolls
If you’re starting with fresh crab legs, steam them for 7-8 minutes in a covered pot with an inch or two of water. (Make sure your husband gets rid of all the bits of shell when he picks out the meat.)
1 cup long grain white or sushi rice
1/4 cup rice vinegar
2 Tbsp. sugar
1 carrot, grated
2 green onions, thinly sliced
1/4-1/2 English cucumber, diced
1 ripe avocado, peeled and sliced
1/2 lb. (or as much as you want) lump crabmeat (cooked)
1 Tbsp. mayo
salt to taste
toasted sesame seeds, for sprinkling (optional)
chopped fresh cilantro (optional)
Cook the rice however you would normally cook it, then spread it out while still hot on a rimmed baking sheet. Bring the vinegar and sugar to a simmer in a small saucepan, then pour it over the rice, tossing it about to coat.
When the rice is cool, put it into a bowl and add the carrot, green onions and cucumber. Divide among 4 wide, shallow bowls. Top with avocado. In a small bowl, stir together the crab, mayo and salt; divide between the bowls, and sprinkle with sesame seeds and cilantro.
Serves 4.
One Year Ago: Green Pea Hummus and Pink Popcorn
April 12 2010 | salads and seafood | 20 Comments »
Because Tuesday is Lobster Thermidor Day, of course. What do you have on Tuesdays, meatloaf?
I was spared from having to commit lobster murder by the frozen seafood section of the Superstore, where good-sized lobster tails can be had for $8.99. I like to think I took that shortcut because at 5pm I found myself chatting to a friend beside the lobster tank, it was rush hour on icy roads and Mike had to go out at 6:30.
I think in reality it had more to do with my not being too keen on the killing and dismembering part; of, as Julia put it, knowing they’re done when “the long head-feelers can be pulled from the sockets fairly easily”. Less appealing were her directions to “discard sand sacks in the heads, and the intestinal tubes. Rub lobster coral and green matter through a fine sieve into the mixing bowl, and blend into it the mustard, egg yolks, cream, and pepper.”
Nah.
Julia, I adore you. I really do. You make food approachable to the masses on TV, but some of these recipes are altogether more involved than they need to be. (Case in point: strain your boeuf bourguignon to simmer and reduce the sauce, wash out the dish it was braised in, then return the beef and sauce to the dish.) Cooking your way through MtheAofFC seems far huger a prospect once you’ve read through a few of the recipes.
Besides the frozen tails vs. live lobsters cheat, I weedwhacked the recipe quite a bit. Guys, I got home from the grocery store at 5:30 and had lobster Thermidor on the table by the 6 o’clock news. Not to blow my own horn, but I’d be a pretty hot commodity if I were a 50’s housewife.
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December 08 2009 | seafood | 16 Comments »
DISCLAIMER: If you are at all weak of stomach, and/or are just sitting down with a nice scone and latte at 7 in the morning, you may want to bookmark this for later. I’ll be talking about squid guts.
I enjoy an order of calamari at Earls as much as the next guy. (Perhaps a little less… you’ll never have to fight me for it.) But it is the sort of thing it would never even occur to me to make from scratch. Which is why I enjoy, at times, being pushed off the edge of my comfort zone. This usually happens when chefs or other food writers come to town and I take care of their foodstyling for TV appearances and such.
I spent today with my pal Ron – you may know him as Rockin’ Ronnie Shewchuk, self-proclaimed barbecue evangelist and winner of I don’t know how many barbecue competitions, and all-round awesome guy. He taught me how to plank brie (I’ll show you soon, I promise! Maybe this weekend?) and how to throw chunks of wine barrel straight onto your barbecue (just lift up the grate and toss ‘em in) to easily smoke a prime rib of beef, and how you can do a whole roast on the grill by placing it on the left side but then lighting the right, so that it’s indirect heat and doesn’t burn. (I wish I had remembered my camera this morning at Breakfast TV. Wow oh WOW was that piece of meat a thing of beauty. We all just stood around and sobbed with joy at it out on the street among the commuters at 8 am.) He even has a meat thermometer that comes with a little beeper that clips on his belt and lets him know when his meat is at the exact temperature he wants it. Far cooler than an iPod, no? I like to hang out with people who have smokers and remote control meat thermometers.
On today’s agenda was calamari – on the grill. How the hell do you do calamari on the grill without all the little bits falling between the grate? I had no idea how it was going to work out, and had serious doubts. I grudgingly went to the store and bought a box of squid (easy to find in the frozen seafood section), which after leaking grey inky goo all over my (clean!) fridge, turned out to be whole. Great, an upgrade in my calamari/biology education. (Mike’s too, as we figured out how to pull the heads off, thus extracting the guts and a pretty cool looking clear cartilage, then cut off the tentacles right beneath the eyes, which were intriguingly detailed in a disturbing sort of way. Then we dissected and opened up the tube-like bodies, scraped off the purplish skin, and once the bodies were clean, scored them on the fleshier insides in a criss-cross pattern so that when they cooked, they’d sort of turn inside out and be tube-like. It sounds like an awful lot of work, but as Mike put it, it was boring, but not at all difficult.)
When it was all done, we ended up with a tidy pile of tentacles, another of tubes, and a third of guts, which we decided against feeding to Lou. (I’m not cleaning that up.) So far more squid than we needed for the show, which sent a pretty clear message to me that I should try my hand at Earls-style calamari while we were at it. What else do you do with calamari? (I know, there are a million things – salads, pastas – baby steps.) So I threw half into a container with olive oil, minced garlic and a hefty pinch of red chili flakes, and the rest I cut into rings for the battered kind. I had no dinner plans yet anyway.
As is the norm when I attempt something new, I browse around and see how other people are doing it. Some doused the calamari in buttermilk before the flour, and that seemed like a good idea. So I thought – why not let it sit in the buttermilk for awhile, rather than just dipping it, and add a minced clove of garlic to the mix as well, since buttermilk is such a great carrier of flavours? (Makes a great chicken marinade, tenderizing the meat as it adds whatever flavours you stir in.) So that sat in the fridge for the afternoon.
This afternoon included grilled calamari, which worked out just fine, didn’t fall through the grill at all (the secret is to get it really hot – not a problem with a gas barbecue) – Ron just threw them on, straight out of their oily marinade. They looked at first like they were trying to escape, but didn’t – they curled and charred and went from flaccid and grey to all spazzy-looking (the tentacles, anyway) and purple; the tubes crosshatched, grill-marked and white. It was very cool, very fast, and will definitely be fed to my vegetarian friend(s) who come for barbecues this summer.
But I didn’t think I’d like it. They looked like the very epitome of fish gum. The purple tentacles weren’t helping. I wouldn’t have even tried any had Ron not thrust a forkful at me. I fully expected to be chewing for awhile, but I wasn’t. It was fab – smoky and charred and garlicky with a kick from the chilies. And not even battered and deep-fried.
Seared Calamari with Fresh Tomato-Basil Salsa
If you don’t want to divvy the calamari onto individual serving plates, you could serve this family-style out of a larger bowl or platter the same way. Slightly adapted from Barbecue Secrets Deluxe, by Ronnie Shewchuk.
1 lb. cleaned squid, equal parts bodies and tentacles
1 Tbsp. kosher salt
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1/2 tsp. crushed dried red chili flakes
Salsa:
1 pint cherry or grape tomatoes, halved
1-2 Tbsp. chopped fresh basil
1 Tbsp. olive oil
1 Tbsp. rice or white wine vinegar
salt and pepper
Sprinkle the squid with salt, then rinse it well with cool water. Slit the bodies open and score the underside in a crisscross pattern, not cutting all the way through the skin. Put all the pieces in a bowl, cover with olive oil, add the garlic and chili flakes, stir and refrigerate for about an hour.
Preheat your grill on high. While it’s heating, toss the cherry tomatoes, basil, olive oil, vinegar and some salt and pepper in a small bowl; toss to combine. Divide among 4 plates.
When the grill is ready, gently place the calamari on the cooking grate, taking care not to let the pieces slip through the cracks. (You could get a grill-topper designed for cooking small pieces of food, but it’s not necessary.) Stand at the grill with a pair of tongs – don’t walk away! – and turn the squid as they cook. They will need no more than a minute per side. Once opaque and char-marked (don’t overcook – like shrimp, they could get tough), transfer the pieces to the plates, and sprinkle with salt and pepper. If you like, give each plate an additional drizzle of olive oil.
Serves 4.
And then the battered stuff. It was easier than I thought, albeit messy, and Mike, a true calamari lover, loved it. I kind of did too – something I was reluctant to admit until I found myself picking at the bits in the bottom of the bowl, having finished the whole thing between the two of us in about 10 minutes. It’s light and crispy, and not at all doughy. Finish it with sea salt and if you like, a squeeze of lemon.
Buttermilk Battered Calamari
about 1 lb. squid, tubes and tentacles
1/2-1 cup buttermilk
1 garlic clove, crushed
1 cup all-purpose flour
salt and pepper
pinch cayenne (optional)
canola oil, for frying
Put the calamari into a bowl with the buttermilk and garlic; set it in the fridge for as much time as you have – half an hour or overnight.
When you’re ready to cook, put the flour into a plastic bag (the ones from the produce department work fine) and season generously with salt and pepper, and add a pinch of cayenne if you like. In a wide, shallow pan, heat about an inch of canola oil until it’s hot, but not smoking – test with a small piece of bread – if the oil bubbles vigorously around it, it’s ready to go.
Lift the calamari out of the buttermilk using your hand or a slotted spoon, letting the excess buttermilk drip off. Drop the pieces (all at once, or half at a time) into the bag of seasoned flour and shake it about to coat everything well. Drop pieces into the oil, separating them a bit as you do (you don’t want massive clumps) but don’t shake the flour off or anything. Cook, turning with a slotted spoon as you need to, until they are golden. Remove with a slotted spoon to paper towels to drain.
Season with salt and serve while they are still warm. Preferably with a dish of tzatziki.
Serves 4-6.
Tzatziki
Regular yogurt, preferably thick Greek yogurt, is far superior to the runny low fat or fat free varieties that are most commonly found at the grocery store. If you like, strain the yogurt through some cheesecloth for several hours to thicken it. (Save the nutritious drained-off liquid to use in pancake or muffin batter.)
1 small cucumber, peeled if necessary
1 – 2 cloves garlic, crushed
2 cups good quality plain yogurt, preferably Balkan-style
salt & pepper to taste
Grate the cucumber with a box grater onto a double thickness of paper towel. Gather up the cucumber in the towel and squeeze out as much excess water as you can.
Combine cucumber, garlic, yogurt, salt and pepper in a bowl and stir until well blended. If you like, add a squeeze or lemon. The garlic flavor will intensify the longer it sits. Makes 2 1/2 – 3 cups.
Per 1/3 cup: 45 calories, 1 g total fat (0.6 g saturated fat, 0.3 g monounsaturated fat, 0.1 g polyunsaturated fat), 3.5 g protein, 5.6 g carbohydrate, 3.7 mg cholesterol, 0.3 g fiber. 20% calories from fat
One Year Ago: Bison Burgers topped with Grilled Portobello Mushrooms
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May 25 2009 | appetizers and on the grill and seafood | 27 Comments »
I know – a little ridiculous, isn’t it? Lobster? Me? On a Tuesday of no real consequence? I don’t think I’ve ever bought and cooked a lobster tail before, but found myself picking up a frozen one yesterday in order to address the issue of a glut of last year’s frozen lobster in the Maritimes (which doesn’t seem to be affecting prices on the prairies at all) on the show this morning. Marketers are calling it the new bologna. (Which, I can’t resist saying, is baloney. Bologna is selling for $2-$4 per pound, lobster is still around $30+ for the frozen stuff.)
If a couple weeks ago I went through a cake phase, I’m now tripping through a sort of dumpling phase; these food themes seem to come out of nowhere. I never plan them; if I do, they hardly ever pan out.
This week I have made peroghies, two kinds of ravioli, pork wontons, spinach pasta (I suppose that doesn’t technically count, although it was doughy) and sourdough dumplings. Am I missing something? Oh yes, my waist. Not that I had one before.
To top it off, this morning I made lobster gnocchi. Or rather I made the actual gnocchi last night, in between shifts searching in the cold, windy dark for a lost dog. I mixed the dough, rolled it into ropes, cut and rolled the pieces on the tines of a fork while talking on the phone (to a friend who kindly went out in search of said dog. No, it wasn’t Lou – have I mentioned I’m dogsitting, and currently have three in my charge? Does inhaled dog hair count as fiber intake?) It is due to this circumstance I can attest making gnocchi by hand is neither time consuming nor requires a particular degree of focus. The idea came from one of my favourite dishes at Brava Bistro. You can find the recipe on their website, but it was altogether too complicated for my level of motivation. I decided to dumb it down a little, and wing it.
I was going to make ricotta gnocchi, but the ricotta was used up in that lasagna, so I ended up throwing a few russet potatoes into the oven to make plain old potato gnocchi instead. I thought I was settling. I was not.
My biggest problem with gnocchi has always been that it’s just a little too much – too heavy, too gummy. Something I can’t eat an entire bowl of, even when I have no problem downing that much pasta. It just tends to sit in a lump in my stomach. But these were ethereal little dumplings, even eaten plain, straight out of the pot. They were even better tossed with melted butter, which is how W ate his. (After much protest, let me tell you.) But with the lobster stock, simmered down a bit and whizzed with butter? There are no words.
Seriously, I thought this would be a nice sort of thing to make for a special occasion. And it would, but it isn’t nearly as fussy as I imagined it would be.
Potato Gnocchi with Lobster
If you like, throw a handful of frozen peas into the water along with the gnocchi.
Gnocchi:
4 small-medium russet potatoes
1 large egg
2 Tbsp. cream (heavy or half&half)
1 tsp. salt
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 lobster tail, thawed if frozen
1/4-1/2 cup butter, cut into bits
To make the gnocchi, bake the potatoes in a 350 F oven for about an hour, or until tender. (This keeps them from getting watery, and also retains more nutrients and potato flavour.) When they are cool enough to handle, peel them and press them through a potato ricer (looks like a giant garlic press – very effective in getting rid of all lumps) or mash until smooth with a potato masher. Stir in the egg, cream and salt until well blended, then stir in the flour. You should have a nice, soft dough – if it’s sticky, add a bit more flour, a spoonful or so at a time.
Divide the dough into 6 chunks, and roll each into a rope that’s about 3/4″ thick. With a knife or pastry cutter, chop into 3/4″ pieces. Roll each piece over the tines of a fork (I do this by rolling the back of the fork back and forth over each piece, starting at a cut side so that it grips better), then place them on a lightly floured baking sheet. At this point, the gnocchi can be covered and refrigerated for up to 2 days, or frozen.
To cook the lobster tail, put it in a medium pot with about half an inch of simmering water; cover and cook for 7 minutes. Remove the tail and set aside; continue to simmer the small amount of liquid until it reduces a bit, then add the butter and cook until it melts. To emulsify it, put it through the blender or blend it with a hand-held immersion blender – it should remain liquidy but as it cools will have a consistency closer to hollandaise. Pull the meat out of the lobster tail and chop it.
When your lobster and sauce is ready, cook your gnocchi: bring a large pot of salted water to a boil and cook the gnocchi in batches, not crowding the pot, for about 4 minutes or until they rise to the surface of the water and puff up a bit. Remove to a bowl with a slotted spoon.
Drizzle the sauce and lobster meat over the gnocchi, season with pepper if you like, toss to coat and serve.
Serves 4 (with extra gnocchi left over).
Have I expressed strongly enough how excited I am to be sharing my starter with you? And that no one (who identified themselves, anyway) thought I was crazy? I am frantically cutting and feeding bits of it in jars that are quickly taking over my fridge like a giant science experiment. I will come up with the logistics of distribution (and try drying some) soon!
One Year Ago: Homemade Mozzarella
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March 31 2009 | one dish and pasta and seafood | 13 Comments »
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