Quinoa salad with all sorts in it.

I was thinking of something to make to either be my lunches for the week, or to be in the fridge for a light dinner when I get home. With nothing in mind I decided to browse the aisles at a newly opened Loblaws near us and look for inspiration. I knew I wanted it quinoa based and that I had a sweet potato at home, the rest was to be decided. The first thing I spotted were some radishes. I normally don't eat radishes, in fact I can't ever remember specifically wanting to eat them. Today, they jumped out at me, all ruby red and full of promise. I then got some broccoli, green onions and goats cheese. The salad would be dry at this point so I went looking for limes, sun dried tomato pesto and a dip with heat. The salad had it's components. ( I had some pecans at home which I ended up using but at this point I didn't have them in mind).

While the half cup of quinoa cooked, I fried up cubes of sweet potato and added some chopped pecans to toast with them at the end. Maybe about 1/3 cup of pecans, there is no right or wrong amount. I had some in the freezer and when I started to smell the bits of potato catching it immediately made me think of the smell of toasting nuts and how much I love them! So I added them to the dish.

I added these to these to 6 finely sliced radishes (halved first then sliced), 4 green onions cut on the diagonal and 2 crowns of broccoli and stems finely cut. When the quinoa was ready I spooned about 4 or 5 tbsps of sundried tomato pesto into it and stirred it around, the warmth of the quinoa helped it soften and spread throughout it nicely. I used a 1/4 of a lime, it could have taken more but I couldn't be bothered to get it back out of the fridge again! Salt and pepper. About 1/4 cup of goats cheese that I crumbled first. I say crumbled, but it is smooth and therefore doesn't crumble, but I broke it up into pieces as best I could!

Instead of using mayonnaise to give it a creamy binding agent, I found this dip which added a whole bunch of extra depth in the flavours, with salty cheese and spice. I didn't use a lot, I don't like my salads swimming in creaminess, maybe about 1/3 of a cup.

There is such an element of the unknown in this salad, you don't know which flavour you will bite into next. The earthiness of quinoa runs through it, and the subtle spice of the dip. Then you come across bright bits of radish, sweet cubes of potato, crunchy broccoli, smooth and creamy cheese and the beautiful taste of toasted pecans. They all serve to compliment one another really well making it a full flavoured and jovially coloured dish. I bet it will taste even better tomorrow once the flavours have had time to rest together.

Mix and match Middle Eastern.

I've visited this Middle Eastern place a couple of times now and both times they were more than accomodating of my needs. I was very impressed, and the food was amazing! The menu is full of shawarmas and salads and not being a huge fan of bread the shawarmas are not ideal. However, I love the fillings! I also love their lentil soup and their lentil rice.

They were good enough to give me a serving that was half the lentil rice and half the lentil soup. The soup is made with red lentils I believe, thick and delicious! The rice has brown lentils and garlic and cooked onions in with lots of olive oil and herbs and spices, I taste fennel seeds bursting when I chew from time to time. The mix alone is enough! But I wanted more. So I got another serivng half of Greek salad and half of tabbouleh. What I love about their tabbouleh is that it doesn't appear to have any bulger in it, or maybe the tiniest bit that I can barely even see, so it is basically lots of parsley and lemon juice and tomatoes. This makes such a great accompaniment to the hearty rice and soup, cutting in with their freshness and tartness. The final addition is some of the slow cooked chicken meat, with garlic and hot sauce on it! Having it served in a container like I did meant that I could scoop the meat out of the oil that collected from it too, which made it healthier to eat.

I threw the salty, caramelised and tender chicken together with the soup/rice and had a mound of salad mix on the side, perfect weekend lunch! I rounded it off with half a pint of raspberries and am about to set to making a hearty tomato based soup packed with veggies like carrots and brussels sprouts and some bits of lamb meat to add flavour. Yum! Looking forward to dinner already!

Roasted Savoy cabbage (and what to do with the rest)!

I really felt like eating cabbage today and was met with 2 reasons why I shouldn't buy one. The first is that my husband doesn't really like cabbage unless it is in coleslaw and the second is that I always seem to throw out half a cabbage about a week or so after I first used it because I didn't get around to doing anything else with it. These reasons aside I bought the most glorious Savoy cabbage ever! It was beautifully curly with rich, dark green leaves on the outside which I knew were hiding crunchy yellower leaves inside!

My idea was to do something new with the cabbage for dinner to see if I could get hubby on board with liking it and then turn the rest of it into coleslaw which I know he likes and means that I don't risk having to throw away any unused cabbage down the line!

We were having prime rib for dinner and I decided that baked sweet potatoes and roasted cabbage would do perfectly with it, and they did! Roasting cabbage has never been easier! I cut it in half through the stem, then cut one half into 4 pieces which I thought looked like good serving sizes. I lined a tray with foil and drizzled olive oil over it then laid the cabbage pieces down. They then got a drizzling of olive oil and some salt and pepper on them too. I am sure they would be glorious even if you just stopped right there.

Because I had been sealing my prime rib roast in some hot olive oil prior to putting it in the oven, I decided to use some of that oil over the cabbage instead, to add some extra flavour. The cabbage leaves sizzled as I drizzled the hot oil over them!

They then went into the oven at 335degrees for just over an hour. This is not exact science and I am sure you can cook them at a really high heat for a short period of time or moderate heat, whatever you like, I just had the oven really low because I was cooking prime rib medium rare.

Roasted cabbage is amazing! Even hubby loved it! The outside leaves go so crisp they are almost like chips (very like kale chips if you've ever had them) and the rest of it was so sweet and melt in your mouth. I love this. I will do this again in a heart beat! I ate one and a half pieces, which technically is close to a quarter of a cabbage, and you would be hard pushed to eat that much any other way!

I turned the remaining half cabbage into coleslaw really quickly. I grated 2 carrots into a tupperware, added half a Savoy cabbage finely sliced, the juice of 1 lemon, roughly 1tbsp rice vinegar, 1/4 cup ceasar dressing, 2 tbsp mayonnaise, 1 tbsp honey dijon mustard and some salt and pepper to taste. The ceasar dressing gives a lovely garlicy punch and the honey dijon a gentle sweetness cut with the tartness of the lemon. You could add more or less mayonnaise parts to lemon/vinegar parts depending on if you like creamy coleslaw or not. It was a win win situation all round tonight for me because hubby decided that it was the best coleslaw he'd ever had too!

Zesty chicken and mango salad.

I don't have a photo of this salad because I ate it for lunch at work but hopefully you can get by without one. This salad was so powerful and beautiful with brilliant colours and vibrant flavours!

I used the flesh of one nearly all the way ripe mango, so it was still a beautiful orange colour just not soft and gooey. It was fairly finely chopped into strips.To this I added a small sprinkling of finely chopped red onion (I wanted the flavour contrast but I am not a huge fan of onion breath!), a cut up grilled chicken breast that had nothing on it but salt and pepper, some cilantro and some blue cheese crumbled bits. I mixed it all together with a few mixed green leaves and dressed it with a mixture I put together of thai sweet chilli sauce (sweet, hot, garlic), rice vinegar and fresh lime juice. 

So, this salad had only 6 ingredients (if the mixed greens count as one and the dressing doesn't count), ranging from soft and sweet, to light and fragrant with pockets of heat, fresh citrus and salty blue cheese. It was an amazing combination of flavours, colours and textures. I actually made everyone taste it to see how yummy it was! And it was very filling with all that protein, veggies and fruit!

Left over pumpkin/pumpkin pie filler?

One of the biggest tasks facing the owner of left overs is how to make them into something new and interesting. I think some people lack the motivation to re-create or just do not like left overs full stop. I am one those weird people that doesn't like to eat the same thing 2 times in a row so if I did have left overs they would have to wait for a day. Or have been doctored to be different enough.

I have some pumpkin pie filler in the fridge, left over from the cheesecake that I made on the weekend and I was waiting for an idea to present itself. This morning, I put it in my oat bran porridge and it was one of the most delicious versions of porridge that I have had. You would have to be using plain oats obviously as other oats are already sweet enough (or too sweet in my opinion). I heated up a few heaping dessert spoons of it in the microwave then added my hot porridge and mixed it all in. The spice was just right and the pumpkin added such a great flavour and colour, it was an amazing way to start the day!

If you have regular pumpkin your options are broader than the sweetened version. I would go for using it to cut mashed potatoes either as a side or on the top of a cottage/shepherd's pie, or in a risotto, or even in the recipe I wrote about a while ago that was for a butternut squash and coconut lime rice. Awesome addition to baby food. Or in a good old soup, similar to the one I wrote about in my first blog entry almost a year ago now!

Thanksgiving potluck

9 of us and a dog gathered for Thanksgiving potluck on Mon. It was the perfect combination of the finest food and company to remind us what we are most grateful for, family we were born into and family that we chose (friends).

There was so much food that I couldn't get it all in one photo! The buffet line started with mashed red skinned potatoes with garlic and sour cream (and some left over tzatziki), brussel sprouts sauteed in pancetta and onions with sherry and balsamic vinegar, quinoa stuffing with leeks.mushrooms and sausage, baked cauliflower with a tri-cheese crust, steamed corn (cut straight from the cob in mid Summer and frozen in all it's glory for this occasion), crisp coleslaw with cranberries in it, home made cranberry sauce (with wild cranberries) and the bird! Cooked in a bag, think it took about 2 and something hours to cook a 16lb bird this way. I wasn't convinced when I first heard the idea but it does work, the bag catches all the juices conveniently for you too and the meat doesn't dry out. I went to carve it and it pretty much fell off the bones! Only thing you don't get is crispy skin, so if you are a fan of that then you have to compromise for the speed and neatness, or just go about it the old fashioned way!

We rounded up dinner with the maple/pumpkin cheesecake and a ginger/pecan crust and a traditional home made pumpkin pie. And then the turkey coma set in...

Gluten free stuffing!

One of my other contributions to the pot luck lunch for Thanksgiving is stuffing. Seeing as one of the party goes gluten free and I try to avoid it, and because I love quinoa, this seemed like the way to go!....leek, mushroom and sausage quinoa stuffing. The recipe idea comes from good old Quinoa 365 but has been doctored a little.

I quartered and finely chopped a leek and started it frying in some olive oil in a medium sized pot. On top of that I added 2 sticks of finely chopped celery and about 8 cremini mushrooms chopped. Once this had fried a bit, I added about 1 1/2 cups of quinoa and maybe 3 cups of chicken stock. I was meant to add savoury and a bay leaf but in their absence I added a generous pinch/pinches of basil, thyme and rosemary and a few shakes of Worcester sauce, salt and pepper! I put the lid on and let it cook away on a low heat until the quinoa was almost cooked, about 10minutes.  Add liquid as needed, if needed. Turn the heat off and let it sit for another 10minutes.

In a frying pan I fried until brown the meat of 3 sausages. I chose traditional British banger style ones, though mild Italian would be good too or even a breakfast sausage. Just split the skin with a sharp knife and take the meat out of the casing and break it up with your fingers as you drop it into the pan. Fry it until it is brown. Then I took it out and finely chopped it on a cutting board and added it to the rest of the stuffing with a few generous knobs of butter (tbsps x 3 or 4). I made it today and mixed it all together and am letting it sit overnight so that the flavours infuse and hopefully tomorrow it will taste even better.

It is a really good option for stuffing being gluten free and full of protein. It can easily be made vegetarian by using vegetable stock and no sausage. It could also be eaten on it's own as well as it is so filling and wholesome, but I am looking forward to paring it with turkey and letting the richness of the pork and herbs compliment the turkey meat.Yum!

Pumpkin/maple cheese cake on a ginger/pecan crust - Happy Thanksgiving!

Once again, it has been a while. I received an email from my cousin and dear friend today saying that she was about to give up checking my blog because I may never write again! That was motive enough. Poor excuses to follow; long working hours, not home for dinner, nothing of interest to write about......

It is Thanksgiving this weekend and I am going to Megan's for a potluck dinner which she and I basically had planned weeks ago and have been looking forward to ever since! Needless to say there will be a full report on the actual dinner itself, but for now, a little on what I have been working on in anticipation of it.

Dessert has to be pumpkin related that goes without question. Tis the season. And while the typical pumpkin pie is tempting, I decided to try out a pumpkin cheese cake. A quick Google search brought up a multitude of options so I browsed through them all and came up with a mish-mash recipe that had all the things that sounded good to me.

For the crust I found a packet of ginger snap biscuits (cookies) that had cinnamon in them, they were called Spice Snaps I think. I put 3/4 of the packet in a ziplock bag and beat it with my rolling pin and then rolled it with the rolling pin to turn the cookies into crumbs. I did the same with some pecans, aiming for a total of about 2 1/2 cups of dry ingredient. My cheese cake tin is slightly bigger than the usual one so I had to try and beef up the recipes so that they wouldn't look pathetic at the bottom of my pan. The usual recipe used 1/3cup of melted butter in the crust, I used slighlty more because I was using more crumb matter. I mixed it together and pressed it into the tin and baked it at 350 for 10minutes then let it cool.

I had let 2 tubs (400g each) of cream cheese warm to room temperature for a while so that they would beat nicely. The recipes used pumpkin puree and because I had left it so late there was none to be found and I had to settle for pumpkin pie filler, which is already sweetened. This meant using less sugar in the mixture as it was already half way there. I like the idea of maple with pumpkin so I used some maple syrup and a tiny bit of brown sugar to help it along the way. The recipes used 3 eggs but my eggs were small and I used a little more filling than usual too so I used 4 eggs. I think 3 would be fine. So, beat the cream cheese, sugar, maple syrup, vanilla essence together and add the pumpkin, half a can, which is about a cup. Then you beat in the eggs one at a time. I had also let the eggs warm to room temperature as they are easier to work with like that.

One of the recipes did some fancy marbelling thing with half the mix plain and the other half with the pumpkin so it swirled cream and orange coloured. I put pumpkin in it all and then added even more pumpkin (another half cup roughly) to the last cup of mix to make it richer in flavour. My marbelling skills were not up to par but you could tell there were 2 parts to it at least.

The cheese cake baked at 350 for 55minutes. I had a dish with water in the oven at the same time to keep the air moist in an effort to stop it from cracking. Note 'effort'. There were still some cracks but not too bad. Your cheesecake should wobble in the middle when you take it out because it will continue to cook for quite some time once it has come out of the oven and you do not want a dry cheesecake.

I made the cheese cake last night and today I decided it was due a taste test before it went round to be presented at lunch! I love the ginger and pecan in the crust, it is a deal maker! I think there was too much butter in it, but then it could just be that I am not used to eating rich foods anymore and noticed it. The cheese part was smooth and beautifully flavoured with pumpkin and spice, not too sweet, and you could tell where the marbelling was because it was a different texture. Very rich, but you should expect that with any cheesecake. I am very happy with the outcome. I will serve it with a vanilla/brown sugar whipped cream tomorrow, not that it needs any more richnes to it but it will look pretty!

Savouring the last of the good BBQ weather.

We had some friends over on the weekend and were hoping for a BBQ by the pool. We had to settle for a BBQ in the park with some of us wearing sweaters and then dessert inside. None the less, it was nice to be outside eating, food always tastes better to me when you are outside in the elements, catching the last of the days rays. We had to carry our picnic down to the communal park in our condominium so a little organisation was needed to get everything in one go and not have to come back up for anything that got forgotten. And a little pre-thought meant the food was all easy to cook too.

I had some steaks marinading in olive oil, salt and freshly cracked black pepper in a ziploc bag. I also had some portabello mushrooms in a bag in the same marinade. Another bag had some half cooked corn (I boiled it for a couple minutes and dropped it into cold water to stop the cooking process just as it started to give when I poked it with a knife) in it. I had a tupperware with a simple salad of grape tomatoes, peeled and diced cucumber, avocado, sheeps' feta, lemon juice and olive oil. A few drinks, plates, cutlery and salt, pepper and butter and we were set. Everything went on the BBQ for about the same amount of time, easy as.

I couldn't believe how easy it was to take food somewhere else to cook and eat. I would do it again with the same menu in a heart beat. And I cannot emphasis how much I LOVE corn on the bbq. The sugar in it caramelises so well, it is like a different vegetable all together. And always so good when it came fresh from my in-laws garden, first pick of the crop, very impressive. As much as I love the Summer produce I have to say that I am very happy to have Fall in the air again, it is my favourite time of year. With the blue skies and crispness in the air. Starbucks have their pumpkin spice late out now and I had a chocolate cupcake with pumpkin frosting from Prairie Girl Bakery yesterday, yummy! Thank you to Megan who dropped the treat off in work for me, it really made my day!

What happens when you don't cook or blog for a long time...

O.K., I know, I have long been absent and it has pained me. I am very aware of the fact that I haven't written for a long time and that also means that I haven't cooked much in order to have something to write about. I shall do better now that I am in a routine, though this routine sees me at work over lunch and dinner, so not too much cooking will happen. Hopefully I find some interesting things to write about none the less and the weekends hold lots of promise for home cooked food. I have friends telling me on Facebook that I am slacking on my Blog, friends emailing me to check on the reason for the absence and a husband who misses his wife's cooking! 

Today I got home at 8:30pm and I knew hubby was making dinner. He had been catching up on the Blog and a couple of weeks ago asked for the Garlic Sausage Penne meal. I had some of the ingredients in the house but never got around to making it on the weekend. He finally decided to make it himself. I arrived home to a somewhat sheepish man on the couch and when I walked over the stove top he leapt to attention and raced into the kitchen (to defend himself). I took the lid of the pot off and came face to face with sausage soup! With half curdled yoghurt in it. All I did was look at it and he said that it was my fault that the dish hadn't turned out! I asked why it looked the way it did and he said because he had added yoghurt to it and he thought he may have added it too fast. I asked if he wanted it to be the way it was and he said no. I asked if the yoghurt was because he had made it too spicy and he said no. But that he had made it too spicy and had used a can of condensed tomato soup to try and dilute it. The yoghurt was to thicken it. I didn't understand this part and he assured me that my Blog told him to do it. I re-read it and decided that no it did not, that I used cream cheese instead of cream because it would make it thicker than cream and that yoghurt could be a substitute for cream if you were watching calories in a rose sauce. 

I then remembered that he had said it was too spicy so I asked him how many chilli flakes he had used. He said he had used 3 of the chillies in the fridge. I almost choked! The chillies in the fridge are the tiny, extra hot, killer kind of chillies. Ones that I use whole when I cook so that some hotness seeps out of them and then I remove them from the food for fear that someone will burst an eardrum with heat pressure if they accidentally ate one. And we had 3 chopped ones floating around in our 'soup'. A few minutes later he went to the bathroom to wash his face and started yelling because he had rubbed a chilli finger in his eye! At this point I lost control and burst out laughing with tears running down my face, and he joined me, and then we went back to the kitchen to eat 'the crap' he had made, so he called it. 

It wasn't that bad. You could taste the soup in it and we used a slotted spoon to catch the veg and sausage bits out of the liquid and we are both full and happy. Though I guess I should get my apron back on and get into the kitchen more often to save my husbands ego and chilli burned eyes. 

P.S. I have his permission to write this, he is just happy I am writing something after so long!

Ginger marmalade (in peach pie and rib marinade).

I saw a picture on a Facebook friends' profile the other day of a peach pie, and it looked delicious. I asked for the recipe, but it is a secret of her Mothers', so I got some general guidance and one of the key ingredients was ginger marmalade. Genius! I went ahead and made a peach pie using it and it was/is delicious! 

I was being lazy so I picked up a Dr.Oetker pie crust mix but I know a home made pie crust would have been better. So, do as you will/can there. I was making this pie and a smoke cured salmon pate at the same time, as well as making lunch and eating it, all with a couple hours to go before having to be in work, so it was a little messy in the kitchen but I was happy. 

I made the crust according to packet directions and baked it blind a little first. I find this helps the crust to cook and not be soggy. I peeled and cut up 6 ripe Ontario peaches (yum!) and made a crumble/crisp topping. I wanted to avoid wheat as much as possible and make this as healthy as possible so I made the top out of oat bran and ground almonds, brown sugar and butter (not that the sugar and butter is good but there is no avoiding that part!). It doesn't have the same consistency as when you use flour but I knew it was better for me and it was filling and tasty. I also chopped up some pecans to go with it. 

I spread the ginger marmalade onto the hot pie shell and it helped it soften and spread evenly. Then I filled the shell with peach pieces, sprinkled some all spice on it and topped with crumble and pecans. In hindsight I would have added more ginger marmalade on top of the peaches, or melted some and mixed it with the peaches before hand, one of the 2, in order to incorporate more of the flavour and gooey-ness. The cooking instructions said to cook high for a few minutes if the filling was uncooked and then reduce temp and cook for about 30minutes. I found that the high heat actually made the pecan pieces and areas of the crumble burn so I would avoid this instruction level or cover the pie (which I did afterwards having spotted said burnt bits and removed them) to protect the topping and to help it cook better. I laid a piece of foil over it but didn't tuck the edges under.

We've eaten the pie cold and it is really good. I like warm pie and I am sure it will be wonderful warm! I think it could do with more ginger marmalade in it, but it has a lot of Autumn flavours in it and feels really wholesome and natural. Big fan of this! Especially when peaches are in season. 

I was then wondering what else ginger marmalade would be useful for and came up with the idea of using it in a rib marinade.

They are cooking as I write and they smell amazing! I had them in marinade for a couple of days before hand, actually, that was what else I was doing while making pate, pie and eating lunch, making marinade! It has Thai sweet chilli sauce (which is sweet, hot and garlic-y), ginger marmalade, soy sauce, tomato ketchup, rice vinegar and hot sauce. Lots of fragrant, bold flavours! We are going to have them with a big salad and some baked sweet potato! 

The art of eating artichokes.

I can't tell you how excited I was when Krista asked if I wanted to join her for lunch and then told me she was making artichokes with hollondaise sauce. I have never cooked or eaten an artichoke and I was eager to learn. I have had it in dips before, but never in it's original form and it can look somewhat intimidating!

The website Simply Recipes gives a great instruction on how to eat them, so you will find tips there very useful. When I got there the artichokes were boiling away madly. Their stems and tops had been cut off and the tips of the bottom petals that were sharp had been trimmed back. They boiled for about 45mins. Only once I was eating them and said I could taste something citrussy did she tell me that she had put a half lime and tangerine into the water as they were boiling. Genius! I think Simply Recipes calls for a lemon, you can add all manner of things to help flavour it. The hollondaise sauce was egg yolks and melted butter that she whisked over a steaming pan. You can also just dip them in melted butter, I think this would be delicious too!

This is what the artichoke looks like before you start eating it. You take it apart a petal at a time and eat the fleshy, lighter part at the base of the petal. You do this by scraping it between your top and bottom teeth. Sounds strange but I love the kind of food that you have to work for, crab being a prime example!

You keep peeling the petals away and eating them.

The very centre is pink/purple. The closer to the centre you get the more of the petal you can eat.

In the very centre you will find this. The artichoke is a thistle after all! Using a spoon scrape the wispy part out (called the choke) and you will be left with a basket or bowl shape. You can see half of it exposed here. This basket is actually the heart of the artichoke. Eat the basket! Yum!

And if eating the artichoke wasn't good enough, look at the absolutely stunning pile of petals that was left behind after. So beautiful! What a glorious Summers' day lunch.

Semi frozen lemon mousse with blueberry swirl and drinks.

This is a continuation of the Saganaki post - it was all one evenings dining but I felt that the food deserved it's own entry........

So I was busy at work and feeling that it was a waste of money to buy a dessert to take over when I could buy ingredients and make one. I had an hour and half at home to make one before I was meant to be at dinner, so I got thinking. Quick desserts? Summer desserts? Lemon mousse came to mind. On the way home I picked up cream and lemons and blueberries, because blueberries go so well with lemon. Thankfully we now have internet because the first thing I did was Google 'lemon mousse' and browse through some recipes for a good one, and a fast one. Epicurious had the answer. Though my half dozen eggs weren't enough for the recipe (yikes!) so I ran back out to buy more and got cracking on dessert.

It was really easy.

1 cup sugar ( I only had brown sugar and I used just under a cup because I don't like things too sweet)

3/4 cup lemon juice

1 1/2tbsp lemon zest

6 yolks

2 eggs

Mix these in a metal bowl over simmering water. Whisk until it thickens and the internal temperature is 160degrees (this took longer than I thought it would and at one point I thought about taking it off early but it did eventually reach the temp). Cool and whisk occasionally. I cooled it by sitting it in some cold water in the sink initially and then putting it in the fridge. Time was of the essence to me.

You also beat 1 1/2 cups of cream.

Once the lemon curd mixture is cool, add a small amount of the whipped cream to it to lighten it and then add the rest and fold it in. It is so beautiful, this light yellow with streaks of darker yellow where it didn't mix in. The Epicurious recipe has you serve the mousse with whipped cream on top and then fruit. I decided otherwise.

I had blueberries to go with it. In my mind I was going to gently cook them and make a form of coulis which I would drizzle into the mousse and swirl it around and it would look beautiful with the dark purple streaking through the yellows. I put half a pint of berries in a small pan with the juice of half a lemon and a spoon of sugar and let them come to the boil then simmer for a minute or so. Then I mashed them with a potato masher! And put the pan in the freezer for rapid cooling.

I wasn't sure what adding this liquidy stuff (once it was cool!) would do to my mousse but anyway. I made pockets in the mousse and dropped some blueberry stuff in and then dragged it around with a knife in swirls. It pretty much went through the whole dish which was fine. It ended up in the freezer at dinner through lack of space on the fridge and when we ate it it was semi frozen. I had taken it out and mixed it a few times as you would if you were making ice cream. It was amazing, even though I say so myself. There is something to be said about fresh lemons and berries in a creamy, cold form. It was still tart and crisp.

We had dessert with a drink of Xante, which is pear and vanilla flavoured Congnac.

It is so delicious, but really strong, I managed a few sips of it, then traded it off for some more dessert!

Krista has these frozen champagne grapes in the freezer which were great as ice cubes or as decoration.

We rounded out the evening with tea. Mulberry Magic tea from Davids' Tea. If you ever thought that there was a limited variety of tea you were wrong, this place has walls and walls of teas, full of flowers and fruit and all kinds of things. This one is mulberry leaves and macadamia nuts and it was divine. It almost tasted sweet, from the nuts, which is my one complaint with those kinds of teas, that they don't taste the way they smell. But this one did.

Me thinks a trip to Davids' Tea is in the forseeable future. This was fine dining at it's finest. All el fresco with candles and beautiful china! What a treat!

Saganaki with Kefalotyri cheese.

How beautiful does that look?! Yep, I know, and it tasted just as amazing!

I was round at my old neighbours place for dinner on Saturday, it is nice to be back in the same neck of the woods and to be close to old friends. We had been discussing during the week about what we wanted to eat and neither of us could come up with anything until the day before when Krista text me to say she had found the cheese that the Greeks light on fire and yell Opa! Greek it was. She found some lovely slouvaki skewers at Kensington Market at the same time. I was bringing some salad stuff and was in charge of dessert but because I was working that day I worried that I would have to opt for a bought dessert or maybe just some really nice chocolate from a new chocolate shop. They make chocolate the old fashioned way with just cocoa and sugar! It is very tasty! I digress, as per usual. Saganaki.

So she had this beautiful hard cheese called Kefalotyri. Apparently there are a few cheeses that you can use to make this. They got a cast iron pan heating on the bbq until it was smoking hot. In the mean time, Krista cut the cheese and ran it under the tap. Instead of patting it dry she tossed it in flour. It then got fried in oil in the really hot pan and put straight onto our plates.

We didn't flame ours, but we did drizzle it with fresh lemon juice and olive oil and top it with tomatoes, olives, oregano and cracked pepper. It was delicious. The cheese is really firm, and salty, with crisp edges from being fried. It didn't 'squeak' against your teeth like haloumi does. It is a must! I can't wait to eat this again.

Cream of Buckwheat.

My new favourite thing is cream of buckwheat. Yum! I found it while looking for a breakfast cereal that didn't have wheat in it. I am also eating less carbs and buckwheat is a complex carb so it is better one to eat in general. It seems to be another of those extremely good for you foods along with my old favourite quinoa! It is actually the seed of a fruit rather than a cereal or grain and is very popular for it's gluten free properties. You can find it in noodles (soba) or pancakes and it is even used in making gluten free beer. I did some Googling of it and there was lots of positive things to find.

It was easy enough to make this 'porridge'; bringing some milk or water to the boil, adding the buckwheat, returning to the boil, reducing heat, simmering for set amount of time. No problems! It is actually smoother than oatmeal porridge which I was really pleased about. I used to love Cream of Wheat, and this was getting pretty close to that. I also make corn porridge occasionally but I find it takes a lot of cooking.

It is a great way to start the day, I put a little brown sugar on it and it's good to go! Very filling and keeps you full for a long time.

Pan seared tuna and cold rolls.

The next meal I made in the new place was more adventurous because I had been grocery shopping and because I actually had some food cravings to address. The cravings were mainly for cold food - fresh, crisp veggies and some seafood. Can you tell that a trip for sushi would have cured this? Well, that it would, but I needed to cook! I would have been happy with the cold rolls on their own but I came across some tuna steaks and I have never cooked tuna before so I thought I would give it a go! I had also been reading Small Food and was inspired by some of the recipes in there.

The casing for your cold rolls is rice paper.I found this with the help of a friend in the Ethnic food aisle at the grocery store. The packaging does a very good job of telling you what to do so don't worry if you have never used it before (like me). I set about getting my fillings ready.

I thawed some frozen cooked shrimp and finely cut some cucumber (with the seeds removed), carrots and green onions. I also had some bean sprouts and avocado. I made a dipping sauce with some sweet chilli sauce, fish sauce and lime juice. Be careful with fish sauce, it is really strong and can take over a dish in a matter of drops if you put too much in. The dipping sauce was wonderful, sweet, spicy, sour, all the good things!

Now that the fillings were ready I turned my attention back to the rice paper. The sheets are round as you can see in the picture. They are stiff, so you need to soak them in warm water for 5-10 seconds then put them on a damp towel so that they don't stick. I had a rubber trivet/heat proof mat which I thought would work just fine and it did. You work with one at a time. I put a little of everything in the centre of the paper and by the time I went to roll it the paper had softened even more and was easily manipulated. You roll it like a taco, with one end tucked in and the other end open.

Under instruction from the packaging I laid my rolls on lettuce leaves and covered them with a damp towel (or face cloth in my case!) and left them while I cooked the tuna. This stops them from drying out.You can make cold rolls ahead of time and keep them in the fridge for a while.

I rubbed the tuna with olive oil, salt and pepper then placed it in a smoking hot pan. I learnt from Chef Stu to oil the meat rather than the pan, amongst a multitude of other useful tips! I reiterate that I have never cooked tuna before. I also know that you shouldn't eat it raw unless it is sushi grade tuna. This made me a little nervous about leaving it as rare as I wanted it to be. I seared both sides until they were a rich brown colour and then went on to lightly brown the edges as well. In hind sight, the last step may not have been necessary as the fish was medium well by the time I ate it. However, you can never be too careful and with fish just from the local grocery store (rather than fish monger), better play it safe than sorry. 

I added a side of soya sauce with chilli in it for dipping the fish in. It was a wonderful meal, so fresh, so full of goodness, so many bold flavours and textures! So filling as well. The tuna is like a real steak, make no mistake that because it is fish it will be light. It was heavy and dense. Small portions!!!!!

It felt so good to sit and eat a meal that took lots of attention to detail to make and that was all new to me! And even better that it was a success.

Chunky vegetable soup.

Apologies for being absent for so long, and I say this to myself as much as anyone else because I have really suffered from the lack of contact with my culinary world! I can tell that my soul suffers when I don't cook! I am pleased to announce that we are now comfortably ensconsed in our new home after a haze of apartment hunting, finding, moving, unpacking, furniture buying and utility set ups. We finally got internet this morning, hence the hasty visit to the blog! Right, that said, lets move on the real reason we are here, food!

The first meal I made in our new place was vegetable soup. I had a fridge full of odds and ends of vegetables that we had dragged around from place to place with us and I had had enough of them! One time solution to odds and ends is soup. You can do this with anything that you have in your fridge, no need to use exactly what I had. I had a couple of onions, a zucchini, some mushrooms, several carrots, some squash (1/2), cabbage (1/4-1/3) and celery. The only things I used that weren't from the crisper in my fridge were a can of diced tomatoes and a chicken stock cube, and water from the tap! And pepper!

I cut up the onions and fried them in the bottom of a pan with some olive oil. I added to this cm cubes of squash and let them fry along too. After they had had a head start I added the can of diced tomatoes and then the rest of the vegetables cut up, a stock cube, a cup of water and some pepper. And I let it cook. Easy. There was enough salt from the stock cube I found. You could use broth if you had any instead of the stock cube. It cooked for maybe 20minutes, check on it and see when your biggest chunks of veg are cooked, which in my case were the squash cubes. It is then ready to eat. My husband put some chilli sauce on it for a kick which was very tasty.

I could have eaten this soup every day! I loved it. So simple, so easy, you know everything in it is good for you! It was a complete lunch, or a good half of any meal. I kept it in the fridge in a container and it would heat up in a bowl in minutes, so handy! I will also add that I made it so thick and chunky that it could really be vegetables with a little bit of liquid rather than a soup., but you can adjust that with how much water you add! It was the perfect starting meal in a home where we lacked all basics in the kitchen.

Sunday's communal feast.

We were at our friend Megan's on Sun for the traditional Sunday get together and it was a rather large gathering this time round with 8 of us! Everyone helped out in some way and it was a very festive evening, much needed in our chaotic world of apartment hunting (and finding!) and all that goes with that.

The centre piece was Megan's roast pork shoulder. In fact, there were 2 shoulders, but one was for the rest of her week! So, there was an entire pork shoulder that had been slow cooking all day basically and was melt in your mouth delicious! There was a non pork eater in the room so some chicken thighs had been done too.

To go with our insanely good meat was some mashed carrots and turnip, garlic/soya sauce stir fried cabbage and roasted yellow beans and asparagus! I had also taken some guava jelly over to go with the meat, which had been brought all the way back from Zambia for me by dear friends. Yum! What a feast. And the mounds of veggies really balanced out the rich meat. 

We were treated to 2 desserts! A home made peach pie (similar recipe to the rhubarb pie previously written about, only using cream instead of butter and eggs) and a blueberry mouse cake from 'Irene and Cakes'! The cake was a light, simple sponge which set the stage for the glorious mouse, not too sweet, gorgeous colour as well!

You can find 'Irene and Cakes' on Facebook! 

Loving the Pink Lady.

I love Pink Lady apples! Just love them! They are everything that should be right about an apple, in my humble opinion. Things that should be right are a great flavour, fresh, not too sweet, not too sour and a crisp texture. I am not a fan of red apples, something about the texture, not being crisp enough and I find that the green Granny Smith is often too tart for me. And although we are spoilt for choice with the selection of apples we get here, because there are SO many, my favourite is the Pink Lady. And what a lovely name too! They have been getting me through this hot working week, thank you Ladies!

Banana Sour cream cake.

For the first time since I started writing this blog I am working. And thus busy, with less time to focus on cooking, especially when working evenings. We are also lacking a permanent home at the moment, which means getting used to temporary kitchens and using what you have at your disposal. All of which means, less focus on cooking for me right now. It is also incredibly hot in Toronto, 31 but feels like 39 at 9pm! Joy! This also makes you less inclined to want to cook big meals. All in all, several excuses for no entries, none of which is particularly strong or long term! For now, I will write about the last great meal we had which was a communal one at Megan's last weekend. Everyone brought something. It was delicious! The most interesting and delectable part of it was the dessert that she made - banana sour cream cake with caramel sauce! Oh wow! I was camera less, otherwise you would see a photo by now. 

She said she just Googled 'banana', 'sour cream' and 'cake' because she knew what ingredients she wanted to use and wanted to find a recipe. She had 6 bananas in her freezer to use and likes cakes with sour cream in them. Makes sense! She also is a 'tweaker' of recipes and used the one she liked best but changed a few things like using all 6 frozen bananas when the recipe called for 4 (though frozen ones do amount to less than regular ones) and using different sized pans according to what she had. 

The cake was delicious, so moist and packed with banana flavour. She had also made a caramel sauce to go with it and served it with vanilla ice cream and some raspberries. What a wonderful memory, even as I sit here melting away! 

Moral of the story is - Google ingredients to find recipes! I would also recommend Epicurious (epicurious.com) as a great search engine for recipe ideas and how to use up ingredients. 

Megan's Rhubarb Pie recipe

This is an addition to the entry a few days ago on Megan's easy and delicious rhubarb pie! And it is easy!

Cream:
2 tbsp butter
2 eggs
1 1/2 c sugar

Add:
2 heaping tbsp flour
3 c rhubarb

Pour into pie shell/pastry shell.

Cook:
10mins @ 400
40mins @ 350

Cool, eat. See blog entry for further instructions and photographs!

Megan's glorious nachos.

This was our last meal at Megan's (last meal whilst staying there, definitely not last meal ever!), combined with watching The Bachelorette, which she is unashamedly obsessed with! They were so good that my husband said he would come back again on Bachelorette night if she made them again! Though I don't know if she would allow us as we gave a full running, and very critical narrative the entire time, filled with scathing comments, disbelief in scenarios and even animal likeness comparisons! Back to the nachos. 

We used multigrain chips as a base, which I love! Though I am finding chips these days to be very salty? Which says a lot when I find something salty! She had some left over chicken in the freezer which went on top, and some bacon bits, some finely chopped sweet onion, green onion, green pepper and jalapenos. There was also some left over bruschetta that went on it which had tomatoes and feta and basil in it. She made it in 2 layers so that there was lots of topping per chip throughout, and used lots of shredded cheese, a mixed bag. She said she always grinds some pepper over them before they cook! Then a little bit of time in a hot oven to let the cheese melt and things warm through and voila! We had little bowls of salsa and sour cream to go with it and Caesar! What a perfect combo! 

Roasted veggie quinoa salad, with bacon wrapped fillet mignon and green beans.

We were going to bbq some bacon wrapped, pre marinated in peppercorn marinade, fillet mignons bought from the market last weekend. The only thing to think about was what to go with it. We were cooking quinoa to make that chocolate quinoa cake so decided on a quinoa salad with the left over quinoa, perfect! And some local green beans bought at the market too. 

I like colourful. I halved some beautiful cherry tomatoes, roughly chopped/halved/quartered some shallots and cut a yellow and green zucchini into 4 strips then into chunks. See colourful! I tossed them in olive oil and balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper and spread them out on a baking tray so that they would cook fast. Into a hot oven they go. On the tray I also had a head of garlic with the top chopped off and some olive oil drizzled over it, I wanted some roasted garlic for the dressing. You want to roast the veggies till the onions and zucchini are soft, tossing them several times so that they caramelise on all sides and cook evenly.

Into the salad bowl goes the left over quinoa, cold, though you could use hot just as easily. I would say there was about 1 1/2 - 2 cups. Top this with the roasted veggies (pint of cherry tomatoes, 2 zucchini, 5 or 6 shallots). Make a dressing out of a couple scoops of mayo, or yoghurt, or whatever alternative you want to use, juice of half a lime, salt and pepper and the roasted garlic which you need to mash into it nicely. I used the whole small head of garlic, use however much you like to your taste. Mix. You don't need a huge amount of dressing because the veggies have balsamic and olive oil on them and the tomatoes will ooze some of their juices into the salad so you will be getting lots of moisture from them already and tonnes of flavour. 

We ate it with a medium rare steak and fresh Ontario green beans, you can't go wrong with that! The salad will keep in the fridge and is a great snack or lunch or side to other meals. I would always make more than you will need so you have some left over to keep in the fridge! Extend the joy!

Megan's Easy and Delicious Rhubarb Pie.

We were at the Farmer's Market again on Saturday and Megan had decided that she was going to make us her rhubarb pie, it is so easy to make and so good she said. And she was right! She bought 2 bunches of the strawberry rhubarb, some farm fresh free range eggs and some frozen pie shells. 

She cut up the rhubarb, which she says is literally the hardest part! What you don't use you put in bags in the freezer so it is ready to use another time.

You put the rhubarb in a pie shell and cover it in a sugar, butter and egg mixture which will cook around it in a deliciously warm, soft, creamy blanket! And because you don't put a cover on the pie you get to see how beautiful it looks with all the pretty pink and green bits of rhubarb poking out from the golden mixture. As they were cooking the whole apartment filled with a divine smell and we could not wait to try them! We were a little disappointed when she told us that we had to wait for it to cool and set before we cold eat, though it was definitely worth the wait.

The pie comes out while it is still 'wobbly' in the middle, so if you take the dish and shake it, it will still be jelly like in the middle. This means that when it cools it will set perfectly rather than be overcooked and dry.

Once it has cooled and set it is ready to eat. Just look at this thing of beauty! And imagine that it tastes as good as it looks! Because it does!

It is almost like eating lemon curd, the tartness from the rhubarb has permeated the creamy filling giving it that freshness! The pie shell is beautifully crisp, the rhubarb is still holding it's shape in the little pieces, I cannot begin to tell you how good this pie is. It also has magical properties and disappears when no one is looking! Thank goodness she made 2 and there is a back up one for when the craving sets in!

You will be pleased to know she promised to share this oh so easy recipe so that everyone can enjoy the goodness of fresh in season rhubarb! Recipe to follow when she gets home from work and I have had a chance to harass her for it!

Berry/Limoncello Cocktail.

What to do on a really hot evening in the city? Make nice cocktails and drink them on the balcony while the sun goes down and the city lights come out! I'm not normally an alcohol drinker but decided that I wanted a drink and this was what we created. 

There were some frozen strawberries in the freezer and some Limoncello. Good place to start, very nice contrasting flavours! Into the blender went 6 small ice cubes, 6 or 7 strawberries, 1/4 cup fresh raspberries, a shot of Limoncello, 1/2 a shot of vodka and the juice of 1/2 a lime. Blend, lots of noise! You now have a beautifully bright and fresh mix which needs diluting somehow. In the fridge I found some lemon Perrier, perfect, though regular soda would work just as well. 

In a glass put a few ice cubes, some Perrier and then the berry/booze mix. I think if there had been some mint around I would have used some to decorate or muddle but it was very good as it was! There was a perfect combination of sweet and sour making it very refreshing! Word of warning, this is very easy to drink, and watch the seeds at the bottom!

Strawberry/Rhubarb/Banana smoothie.

What to do with strawberries and rhubarb when you don't want to make more crumble or pie because it isn't exactly part of the 'being good' (most of the time) diet!? Well, you can go ahead and stew them at least. I hulled the strawberries and left them whole, trimmed and cut the rhubarb then put them in a pot with 2 tbsps of brown sugar and the juice of 1/4 lemon. Put it on a low heat, the lid on helped create some steam and then I removed the lid and let them very gently stew. 

I kept a tub of the stewed fruit in the fridge and have eaten it on top of yoghurt and in smoothies. The smoothie took one banana, a few large spoons of strawberry/rhubarb compote, a few large spoons of strawberry yoghurt and some milk, maybe 1 cup depending on how thick you like your smoothie. We shared this between the 2 of us, though you could have it to yourself if you wanted or add another banana and more milk if it wasn't enough for 2. Tasty!

Ontario asparagus, soft boiled egg and light feta.

Another weakness from the Farmers Market was asparagus, lots of it, for such a good price. I came home with 2 large bunches for only $7! I was hungry mid morning yesterday so decided on making a snack before we went out and this little creation sprang to mind.

I put a pan of water on to boil for the egg and a frying pan on with a couple mm of water too. While those worked on boiling I snapped the ends off some asparagus. When the water in the frying pan was boiling I dropped the asparagus in it and let it cook, moving it around a bit, for a couple of minutes then drained it. The egg should be ready around the same time as the asparagus if you time it right. Cook it how you like. I arranged the asparagus on a plate, crumbled some light feta over it then topped it with a soft egg and some cracked pepper. Perfect, light, little meal!