Wow, the last meal plan I posted was in June. I have written up meal plans for myself since then, but not as regularly as I'd like. Glad I'm back to not only making them, but sharing them.
It's a quiet week, so I have a bit of time to cook. A good foodie friend gifted me with a Bon Appetit subscription for my birthday, and the first issue arrived this week. I'm definitely inspired, and one of this week's recipes is from there.
Monday
Pork chops with cabbage
Steamed barley (saving some for Wednesday's meal)
(since this meal has already happened, I have a few edits to share. The original plan assumed I had pork chops in the freezer. Sadly, I discovered only one package of two, which is nowhere near enough to feed two adults and two carnivorous children. I had just ordered a package of Boerwors (South African sausage) from Cool Springs Ranch, so I decided to add those to the recipe as well. When I read to the bottom of the recipe, I noted Martha Stewart recommended serving the chops with a side dish of carrot and parsnip puree. I have those! So I made that as well. The results blended together beautifully. Nutty barley, sweet cabbage and carrots, savoury meat...mmm. It may be a strange idiosyncrasy, but I love braised cabbage.)
Tuesday
Roast chicken
Roasted sweet potatoes and (more) parsnips
My mom's frozen bean and carrot medley
Tossed salad
Wednesday
Baked Wild West Steelhead trout (from Lucky Lake)
Warm Cauliflower and Herbed Barley Salad
The salad is from my first issue of Bon Appetit, and I was delighted to discover I have virtually all of the hard-to-find ingredients, like gigante beans (I buy them regularly from Italian Star Deli) and fresh parsley and tarragon (well...mine aren't fresh, but I froze some fresh from my garden, and that will work for my purposes)
Thursday
Ragout de Boulettes (a winter favourite that we haven't yet enjoyed...and dare I say we might be running out of winter...in the next month or so?)
Pugliese bread from Christie's Bakery
Raw veggies
By the time we get to Friday, I'm guessing we'll have leftovers, and I am scheduled for a book club event that night, so I may leave 'the boys' to fend for themselves. There you have it. Something of a plan.
Thursday, March 21, 2013
Sunday, February 24, 2013
Back-to-Back Dinner and Brunch
Every once in a while, events crash into each other. I had booked a brunch with some old friends whom we rarely get to see anymore. We had a monthly brunch event happening for a while, but somewhere along the way, due to new babies and life in general, it had fallen off the radar. I'm hoping today's event will help to reboot the tradition. We had agreed on a date some weeks ago, and we were all really looking forward to spending some time together.
I had spent a week traveling, so was ready to get back into the kitchen after not being able to cook all that time. I was fantasizing about making a brunch of miniatures: mini-muffins, mini-quiches, mini-sausages, and so on. And then the events started to pile up.
In a parallel universe, my husband was trying to connect with an old friend of his, who also has a four-year-old. They at one point had talked about getting together for dinner. Hubbie got a text mid-week asking if we were still on for dinner on Saturday. My question: who's cooking? His answer: we're renovating our kitchen. So that would be me.
My miniature brunch plan went on the backburner in order to allow me to make two back-to-back meals for guests. It was doable; I just had to think carefully about how to simplify it.
Then the next event landed in my lap: my parents wanted to take me and the boys on a road trip to North Battleford to pick up a desk that my aunt wants to give me. When my dad asked, "Are you free Saturday?" I said, "Well, I'm making dinner for people that night." He said, "Oh, we'll be back in lots of time. It'll just take the morning to do it."
Uh-huh. Well, it's an hour-and-a-half each way, and we were leaving North Battleford at 2:30, rather than getting back to Saskatoon. Our guests arrived before we did, since we had asked them to come early for a playdate before dinner. The good news is, Hubby's friend is very patient, he brought an excellent bottle of wine, and he helped me carry the desk to my office.
The bad news is, we didn't eat til 6:30. Not the end of the world. But I did cause his son to have an allergic reaction. He's fine, but we learned an important lesson about whether chestnuts will cause an allergic reaction to people with nut allergies. Oops. (I didn't serve him chestnuts; they were part of the stuffing for my Christmas goose, and I used goose stock to make the pilaf for supper, and some goose meat and fat in the rillettes I made as an appetizer. But the trace amount was enough to cause a problem.)
I digress. Now that you have the background, I'll share my menus for the two meals. First, dinner for four adults and three kids; second, brunch for eight adults and six kids.
Once again, I am so grateful for the fantastic meat that lands in my freezer. I made full use of the wild game in both meals. The lesson here is that with the right freezer/pantry products, you can make a fabulous meal in no time at all.
Quick gourmet dinner:
Goose rillettes (inspired Hunter Angler Garden Cook), using frozen goose meat from Christmas, as well as duck broth and fat, and some Stonewall Kitchens fig and walnut butter, on brioche.
Spinach salad with pomegranate and feta, dressed with a simple vinaigrette using Rozendal vinegar (still my favourite)
Moose medallions with chokecherry brandy sauce (inspired by a recipe for bison medallions in Anita Stewart's Great Canadian Cuisine: The Contemporary Flavours of Canadian Pacific Hotels. This book appears to be out of print, but if you come across it, snap it up. There are some gorgeous recipes in it, and I've used several)
Quinoa pilaf (I made extra, so I could make savoury quinoa biscuits for the next day's brunch)
Roasted cauliflower
Chocolate pudding
I have eaten a lot of meat in my life, so I can say with authority that the moose tenderloin we ate last night was the most beautiful meat I have ever eaten. It was shockingly tender, beautifully flavoured, and just a tiny bit of sweetness from the simple chokecherry brandy sauce (I simply deglazed the pan with beef stock and homemade chokecherry brandy). And the Wolf Blass Grey Label Shiraz-Cabernet Sauvignon was an excellent match.
After our guests had gone home and our kids fell asleep, I did a bit of prep for the next day: I made elk sausage patties and put together the dry ingredients for the biscuits I was going to make the in the morning.
Brunch for Eight Adults and Six Rugrats ("Build your own" Breakfast Sandwiches)
Coffee
Mixed berry smoothie (using frozen raspberries, strawberries and blueberries from last summer, a splash of cranberry/pomegranate juice, a dollop of yogurt and a tablespoon of chia seeds)
Fruit salad
Savoury quinoa biscuits (recipe posted earlier)
Elk sausage patties (half elk, half pork (1.5 lbs each), mixed with 1 t. crumbled sage, 1 T. kosher salt and 1 T. brown sugar)
Baked scrambled eggs, mixed with salted herbs, and cut into rounds (An experiment: I scrambled 16 eggs, mixed with herbs, and poured them into a buttered flat-bottomed roasting pan. I baked them at 350 for about 20 minutes, then cut them into rounds. The kids got the trimmings that were left over after cutting. It worked like a charm!)
"Fixins": cheddar cheese, sliced tomato, lettuce
Brunch came off without a hitch. The breakfast sandwiches will definitely be happening again.
I managed to take some time for a walk in the lovely weather this afternoon, before balancing our meat-heavy meals with a Sunday supper of Urad dal and millet with corn and coconut milk (from Mark Bittman Food Matters) These are not normally meant to go together, but I wanted to use Urad lentils, and I was in the mood for coconut. The combination was filling and comforting.
Stay tuned; I'll be posting my meal plan for this week (long time since I've done that) soon!
I had spent a week traveling, so was ready to get back into the kitchen after not being able to cook all that time. I was fantasizing about making a brunch of miniatures: mini-muffins, mini-quiches, mini-sausages, and so on. And then the events started to pile up.
In a parallel universe, my husband was trying to connect with an old friend of his, who also has a four-year-old. They at one point had talked about getting together for dinner. Hubbie got a text mid-week asking if we were still on for dinner on Saturday. My question: who's cooking? His answer: we're renovating our kitchen. So that would be me.
My miniature brunch plan went on the backburner in order to allow me to make two back-to-back meals for guests. It was doable; I just had to think carefully about how to simplify it.
Then the next event landed in my lap: my parents wanted to take me and the boys on a road trip to North Battleford to pick up a desk that my aunt wants to give me. When my dad asked, "Are you free Saturday?" I said, "Well, I'm making dinner for people that night." He said, "Oh, we'll be back in lots of time. It'll just take the morning to do it."
Uh-huh. Well, it's an hour-and-a-half each way, and we were leaving North Battleford at 2:30, rather than getting back to Saskatoon. Our guests arrived before we did, since we had asked them to come early for a playdate before dinner. The good news is, Hubby's friend is very patient, he brought an excellent bottle of wine, and he helped me carry the desk to my office.
The bad news is, we didn't eat til 6:30. Not the end of the world. But I did cause his son to have an allergic reaction. He's fine, but we learned an important lesson about whether chestnuts will cause an allergic reaction to people with nut allergies. Oops. (I didn't serve him chestnuts; they were part of the stuffing for my Christmas goose, and I used goose stock to make the pilaf for supper, and some goose meat and fat in the rillettes I made as an appetizer. But the trace amount was enough to cause a problem.)
I digress. Now that you have the background, I'll share my menus for the two meals. First, dinner for four adults and three kids; second, brunch for eight adults and six kids.
Once again, I am so grateful for the fantastic meat that lands in my freezer. I made full use of the wild game in both meals. The lesson here is that with the right freezer/pantry products, you can make a fabulous meal in no time at all.
Quick gourmet dinner:
Goose rillettes (inspired Hunter Angler Garden Cook), using frozen goose meat from Christmas, as well as duck broth and fat, and some Stonewall Kitchens fig and walnut butter, on brioche.
Spinach salad with pomegranate and feta, dressed with a simple vinaigrette using Rozendal vinegar (still my favourite)
Moose medallions with chokecherry brandy sauce (inspired by a recipe for bison medallions in Anita Stewart's Great Canadian Cuisine: The Contemporary Flavours of Canadian Pacific Hotels. This book appears to be out of print, but if you come across it, snap it up. There are some gorgeous recipes in it, and I've used several)
Quinoa pilaf (I made extra, so I could make savoury quinoa biscuits for the next day's brunch)
Roasted cauliflower
Chocolate pudding
I have eaten a lot of meat in my life, so I can say with authority that the moose tenderloin we ate last night was the most beautiful meat I have ever eaten. It was shockingly tender, beautifully flavoured, and just a tiny bit of sweetness from the simple chokecherry brandy sauce (I simply deglazed the pan with beef stock and homemade chokecherry brandy). And the Wolf Blass Grey Label Shiraz-Cabernet Sauvignon was an excellent match.
After our guests had gone home and our kids fell asleep, I did a bit of prep for the next day: I made elk sausage patties and put together the dry ingredients for the biscuits I was going to make the in the morning.
Brunch for Eight Adults and Six Rugrats ("Build your own" Breakfast Sandwiches)
Coffee
Mixed berry smoothie (using frozen raspberries, strawberries and blueberries from last summer, a splash of cranberry/pomegranate juice, a dollop of yogurt and a tablespoon of chia seeds)
Fruit salad
Savoury quinoa biscuits (recipe posted earlier)
Elk sausage patties (half elk, half pork (1.5 lbs each), mixed with 1 t. crumbled sage, 1 T. kosher salt and 1 T. brown sugar)
Baked scrambled eggs, mixed with salted herbs, and cut into rounds (An experiment: I scrambled 16 eggs, mixed with herbs, and poured them into a buttered flat-bottomed roasting pan. I baked them at 350 for about 20 minutes, then cut them into rounds. The kids got the trimmings that were left over after cutting. It worked like a charm!)
"Fixins": cheddar cheese, sliced tomato, lettuce
Brunch came off without a hitch. The breakfast sandwiches will definitely be happening again.
I managed to take some time for a walk in the lovely weather this afternoon, before balancing our meat-heavy meals with a Sunday supper of Urad dal and millet with corn and coconut milk (from Mark Bittman Food Matters) These are not normally meant to go together, but I wanted to use Urad lentils, and I was in the mood for coconut. The combination was filling and comforting.
Stay tuned; I'll be posting my meal plan for this week (long time since I've done that) soon!
Monday, February 11, 2013
Leftover Series #3: Great Uses for Porridge and Pilaf
In keeping with my promise to make good use of all the food we have and avoid wasting, I have discovered wonderful uses for two of my least favourite leftovers: porridge, and pilaf. Cold porridge used to either get ignored on the stove until it was inedible, or packed into the fridge and left there until it was past its prime.
I have already published other posts about leftover porridge, and have made bread and cookies from it in the past. I have also been regularly making cooked oatmeal scones, thanks to this recipe. My husband often blends quinoa and large flake oats to make a filling and protein-rich breakfast. If there's even a cup leftover, I'll save it and turn it into equally filling and protein-rich scones.
That got me pondering another possibility: probably our biggest food waste issue is pilafs. I often make a whole-grain side dish of some sort, from barley, quinoa or some other grain, and there's always more than we can eat, and all of us are less than enthusiastic about seeing it a second time. It often sits until it's beyond using, and then I grind my teeth about waste as I scrape it into the compost.
But if you can make great scones out of leftover porridge, why couldn't you use the same basic recipe and make biscuits out of leftover pilaf? The answer is: YOU CAN!
Using the same recipe but adapting it for the savouriness of the pilaf, I pulled off some excellent biscuits—studded with onions, mushrooms, peppers and celery, which had all been cooked with the quinoa I used as the base—that lined up beautifully next to a slow-cooked lamb and beans recipe I served to guests on Saturday night. There will be many more batches of these little lovelies in my future, since there always seems to be pilaf around. And we will all enjoy them far more in their biscuit form (and they're freezable, too!)
Savoury cooked grain biscuits
2 T. butter
1 c. cold leftover pilaf (I used a quinoa and vegetable pilaf, but I will be experimenting with others)
2/3 c. milk
1 3/4 c. whole wheat flour
4 t. baking powder
1/2 t. salt
1/2 c. grated cheddar cheese (optional)
Melt butter and stir into pilaf along with milk. Mix dry ingredients together and stir into the grain mixture. Add cheddar cheese, if using. Batter should be stiff but quite sticky. Gather together and place on a well-floured surface. Pat into 3/4" thickness, and cut into squares, triangles or circles (or whatever shape you like). Bake at 350 F for 15-20 minutes.
One more waste prevention tactic in place...check!
That got me pondering another possibility: probably our biggest food waste issue is pilafs. I often make a whole-grain side dish of some sort, from barley, quinoa or some other grain, and there's always more than we can eat, and all of us are less than enthusiastic about seeing it a second time. It often sits until it's beyond using, and then I grind my teeth about waste as I scrape it into the compost.
But if you can make great scones out of leftover porridge, why couldn't you use the same basic recipe and make biscuits out of leftover pilaf? The answer is: YOU CAN!
Using the same recipe but adapting it for the savouriness of the pilaf, I pulled off some excellent biscuits—studded with onions, mushrooms, peppers and celery, which had all been cooked with the quinoa I used as the base—that lined up beautifully next to a slow-cooked lamb and beans recipe I served to guests on Saturday night. There will be many more batches of these little lovelies in my future, since there always seems to be pilaf around. And we will all enjoy them far more in their biscuit form (and they're freezable, too!)
Savoury cooked grain biscuits
2 T. butter
1 c. cold leftover pilaf (I used a quinoa and vegetable pilaf, but I will be experimenting with others)
2/3 c. milk
1 3/4 c. whole wheat flour
4 t. baking powder
1/2 t. salt
1/2 c. grated cheddar cheese (optional)
Melt butter and stir into pilaf along with milk. Mix dry ingredients together and stir into the grain mixture. Add cheddar cheese, if using. Batter should be stiff but quite sticky. Gather together and place on a well-floured surface. Pat into 3/4" thickness, and cut into squares, triangles or circles (or whatever shape you like). Bake at 350 F for 15-20 minutes.
One more waste prevention tactic in place...check!
Monday, January 21, 2013
Easy (and Healthy) Chicken and Waffles
So up here in Canada, there's not much of a 'chicken and waffle' culture. But it's catching on. I've heard there's a local restaurant that serves a version for Sunday brunch. And I've seen it enough times on Diners, Drive-ins and Dives that I perk up at the mention.
An ex-chef friend of ours invited us for dinner in November, and tried his own version. He fried the chicken in a traditional style, and then served it atop the waffles with a dollop of cranberry sauce, creme fraiche and smothered the whole thing in a maple-chicken reduction. I vaguely remember coleslaw on the side.
The entire dish was amazing—every mouthful made me think, "MORE!" Half-way through my serving, I was thinking, "I am definitely going back for seconds." (in spite of the fact that this was the third course of a rich meal, following creamy cauliflower soup with bacon and mussels and a fantastic mushroom quiche). However, my body caught up with me. Only two bites later, the deep-fried, creamy, sweet concoction hit the bottom of my stomach with an almost audible thud, and I was instantly over-full and uncomfortable.
Isn't that always the trouble with fried chicken?
Well, in a sort of meandering way that I've started to adopt in the kitchen, thanks to an overstuffed freezer and a workload that often gets in the way of my preferred meal plan approach, I managed to make my own version of chicken and waffles today, which was relatively low in effort, healthy (aka lower in calories and high on fibre), and absolutely delicious. So the answer to "does the chicken in 'chicken and waffles' have to be fried?" is, no. Unless you're a purist.
I am often a purist, but on weekdays, I allow myself to stray far from pure.
I began considering what to do with some turkey pieces that I have in my freezer (as an aside, I ordered a gorgeous fresh farm turkey this year for the sole purpose of cutting it down so that I can use the breasts to make Turkey Mole Poblano. The benefit of getting the turkey breast is that I also got a fresh carcass with which to make stock and I froze two packages of a single leg, thigh and wing together to make other meals. Since the Mole Poblano requires a substantial time commitment, I haven't yet accomplished that, but I've really been enjoying the turkey pieces). There aren't a lot of recipes online, or anywhere, really, for turkey pieces. You're usually expected to cook the whole bird, or just the breast, or use ground turkey. But I discovered tonight that you can truly just season and roast the pieces for a couple of hours, with great success.
I've also been tired of trying to figure out side dishes. I think it's partly the winter blues, and resenting having so little good quality fresh food to work with, partly a lingering virus that has been sapping my energy, and partly burnout from the Christmas cooking season. Anyway, I thought through all the grains I have and the options of root vegetables, and couldn't really get behind any particular recipe. Until I thought about waffles.
We had just had an impressive breakfast of pumpkin pancakes (our favourite pancake recipe, with a 1/4 c. of pumpkin, 1/2 t. cinnamon, a pinch of cloves, and 1/4 t. each ginger and nutmeg), crisped prosciutto and scrambled eggs with salted herbs, and I was still swooning over the pancakes. Could waffles be a side dish? Why not? They're a traditional match for chicken, after all! We also had some mediocre chicken gravy left over from a slow cooker chicken that my hubby had prepared on the weekend while I was attending a conference. The chicken had since been turned into lunch time noodle soup, so the gravy needed using. I thought, "I bet if I added maple syrup to that gravy, it would be just the thing for chicken and waffles."
So I put the turkey on to roast, seasoned with Kosher salt, black pepper, and smoked paprika. I found a delicious sounding whole grain waffle recipe in Mark Bittman's Food Matters. The recipe was thoughtfully posted by another blogger, stirandstitch, here. I must also say that one of the reasons I hadn't yet tried the recipe is that dividing eggs and whipping up egg whites is a little too involved for me, early in the morning. At dinner time, however, it's a-ok. I also added a cup of frozen corn kernels, just to make it a bit more dinner-like.
I topped the waffles with a bit of roast turkey, drizzled the maple gravy over top (I really don't know how to tell you quantities for the maple gravy. I re-heated about 1 1/2 cups of gravy, drizzled in a couple of glugs of maple syrup, stirred, tasted, and added another glug. Probably about 1/3 of a cup, if I had to guess, but don't quote me. Just glug and taste), and served with a side of steamed green beans and a tossed salad. The kids at the table were VERY quiet, which we always judge to be a good sign. And my husband and I liked it too. And it did not hit my stomach like a lead weight, as fried chicken is wont to do. So I could have seconds!
An ex-chef friend of ours invited us for dinner in November, and tried his own version. He fried the chicken in a traditional style, and then served it atop the waffles with a dollop of cranberry sauce, creme fraiche and smothered the whole thing in a maple-chicken reduction. I vaguely remember coleslaw on the side.
The entire dish was amazing—every mouthful made me think, "MORE!" Half-way through my serving, I was thinking, "I am definitely going back for seconds." (in spite of the fact that this was the third course of a rich meal, following creamy cauliflower soup with bacon and mussels and a fantastic mushroom quiche). However, my body caught up with me. Only two bites later, the deep-fried, creamy, sweet concoction hit the bottom of my stomach with an almost audible thud, and I was instantly over-full and uncomfortable.
Isn't that always the trouble with fried chicken?
Well, in a sort of meandering way that I've started to adopt in the kitchen, thanks to an overstuffed freezer and a workload that often gets in the way of my preferred meal plan approach, I managed to make my own version of chicken and waffles today, which was relatively low in effort, healthy (aka lower in calories and high on fibre), and absolutely delicious. So the answer to "does the chicken in 'chicken and waffles' have to be fried?" is, no. Unless you're a purist.
I am often a purist, but on weekdays, I allow myself to stray far from pure.
I began considering what to do with some turkey pieces that I have in my freezer (as an aside, I ordered a gorgeous fresh farm turkey this year for the sole purpose of cutting it down so that I can use the breasts to make Turkey Mole Poblano. The benefit of getting the turkey breast is that I also got a fresh carcass with which to make stock and I froze two packages of a single leg, thigh and wing together to make other meals. Since the Mole Poblano requires a substantial time commitment, I haven't yet accomplished that, but I've really been enjoying the turkey pieces). There aren't a lot of recipes online, or anywhere, really, for turkey pieces. You're usually expected to cook the whole bird, or just the breast, or use ground turkey. But I discovered tonight that you can truly just season and roast the pieces for a couple of hours, with great success.
I've also been tired of trying to figure out side dishes. I think it's partly the winter blues, and resenting having so little good quality fresh food to work with, partly a lingering virus that has been sapping my energy, and partly burnout from the Christmas cooking season. Anyway, I thought through all the grains I have and the options of root vegetables, and couldn't really get behind any particular recipe. Until I thought about waffles.
We had just had an impressive breakfast of pumpkin pancakes (our favourite pancake recipe, with a 1/4 c. of pumpkin, 1/2 t. cinnamon, a pinch of cloves, and 1/4 t. each ginger and nutmeg), crisped prosciutto and scrambled eggs with salted herbs, and I was still swooning over the pancakes. Could waffles be a side dish? Why not? They're a traditional match for chicken, after all! We also had some mediocre chicken gravy left over from a slow cooker chicken that my hubby had prepared on the weekend while I was attending a conference. The chicken had since been turned into lunch time noodle soup, so the gravy needed using. I thought, "I bet if I added maple syrup to that gravy, it would be just the thing for chicken and waffles."
So I put the turkey on to roast, seasoned with Kosher salt, black pepper, and smoked paprika. I found a delicious sounding whole grain waffle recipe in Mark Bittman's Food Matters. The recipe was thoughtfully posted by another blogger, stirandstitch, here. I must also say that one of the reasons I hadn't yet tried the recipe is that dividing eggs and whipping up egg whites is a little too involved for me, early in the morning. At dinner time, however, it's a-ok. I also added a cup of frozen corn kernels, just to make it a bit more dinner-like.
I topped the waffles with a bit of roast turkey, drizzled the maple gravy over top (I really don't know how to tell you quantities for the maple gravy. I re-heated about 1 1/2 cups of gravy, drizzled in a couple of glugs of maple syrup, stirred, tasted, and added another glug. Probably about 1/3 of a cup, if I had to guess, but don't quote me. Just glug and taste), and served with a side of steamed green beans and a tossed salad. The kids at the table were VERY quiet, which we always judge to be a good sign. And my husband and I liked it too. And it did not hit my stomach like a lead weight, as fried chicken is wont to do. So I could have seconds!
Monday, November 26, 2012
Foodie Book Review #3: An Everlasting Meal
A close foodie friend recommended I read An Everlasting Meal. When I was stocking up on foodie books at a recent visit to Powell's Books in Portland, I picked up a copy. I don't know what to call it: a love affair with food, a lifetime reference, a life-changing read...all of those fit the bill.
Tamar Adler has cooked with Gabrielle Hamilton, Alice Waters, and several other famous American chefs, and she manages to combine thrift with a passion for cooking and eating, something I've never really experienced before, at least not in such a way that was so committed to both using every scrap of food and thoroughly enjoying it at the same time.
I get that. I absolutely LOVE turning a chicken carcass into stock, and picking off all the bits of meat to use for soup. I love reducing a fat, healthy bird to nothing but a tiny pile of bones, knowing that we have enjoyed several meals from it, and that the animal did not die in vain. I petition my dad constantly to save organs and soup bones from the animals he butchers. And I love transforming leftover rice into a pie crust for a quiche, or rice pudding for tomorrow's breakfast or dessert.
But I had never considered half of the ideas in Adler's book for stretching vegetables, beans, broth and meat into amazing and flavourful meals--like turning stems, leaves and cores of brassicas and dark leafy greens into pesto (although I did take great joy in making radish leaf pesto from my garden this year, so I wasn't that far off), or turning fresh pea shells into stock for pea soup. I will have this book on my recipe shelf from now on, and I'm pretty sure it will become studded with sticky notes, to mark my favourite ideas and recipes.
I have already made her recipe for White Bolognese (inspired by Amanda Hesser, but calling for homemade beef stock rather than beef bouillon mixed with water), which, it turns out, is the whole food version of my mom's classic "hamburger goop," otherwise known as ground beef fried with onions and celery and then bound together with a can of condensed cream of mushroom soup. Using real beef stock, Italian sausage, porcini mushrooms and fresh cream makes it WAY more delicious and even more comforting, which I hadn't thought possible.
Besides some creative approaches to food in general, Adler's approach to sharing food continues to work its way into my mind. She argues it doesn't matter what you serve, as long as you serve something. It's the coming together for the meal that gets your guests excited about a dinner party, more so than the menu itself. She encourages you to offer something—anything—the moment your guests arrived: radishes with butter and salt; celery and carrot sticks with crackers and butter; warmed olives, or stale bread toasted and drizzled with oil and herbs. It got me thinking more creatively about what I have in my pantry and refrigerator that people can eat. Suddenly, the options seem much broader than they did before I read the book.
She also suggests making dishes that allow the host to relax with her/his guests, a lesson which I have yet to learn, since my approach was to redesign my kitchen so that my guests could sit and have a drink while watching me cook. She encourages involving your guests in the preparation of the meal, again, something I need to practice. This quote is echoing around in my head: "Only remember what is plainly and always true: the act of serving fulfills itself. It doesn't matter what you serve."
So my cooking resolution is to try not to be so rigid in what and to whom I serve. I'll embrace the idea of creating meals with what I have available, without running to the store for that one ingredient that will perfect a specific recipe. I'm pretty sure thinking this way will make me a more creative—and relaxed—cook.
Tamar Adler has cooked with Gabrielle Hamilton, Alice Waters, and several other famous American chefs, and she manages to combine thrift with a passion for cooking and eating, something I've never really experienced before, at least not in such a way that was so committed to both using every scrap of food and thoroughly enjoying it at the same time.
I get that. I absolutely LOVE turning a chicken carcass into stock, and picking off all the bits of meat to use for soup. I love reducing a fat, healthy bird to nothing but a tiny pile of bones, knowing that we have enjoyed several meals from it, and that the animal did not die in vain. I petition my dad constantly to save organs and soup bones from the animals he butchers. And I love transforming leftover rice into a pie crust for a quiche, or rice pudding for tomorrow's breakfast or dessert.
But I had never considered half of the ideas in Adler's book for stretching vegetables, beans, broth and meat into amazing and flavourful meals--like turning stems, leaves and cores of brassicas and dark leafy greens into pesto (although I did take great joy in making radish leaf pesto from my garden this year, so I wasn't that far off), or turning fresh pea shells into stock for pea soup. I will have this book on my recipe shelf from now on, and I'm pretty sure it will become studded with sticky notes, to mark my favourite ideas and recipes.
I have already made her recipe for White Bolognese (inspired by Amanda Hesser, but calling for homemade beef stock rather than beef bouillon mixed with water), which, it turns out, is the whole food version of my mom's classic "hamburger goop," otherwise known as ground beef fried with onions and celery and then bound together with a can of condensed cream of mushroom soup. Using real beef stock, Italian sausage, porcini mushrooms and fresh cream makes it WAY more delicious and even more comforting, which I hadn't thought possible.
Besides some creative approaches to food in general, Adler's approach to sharing food continues to work its way into my mind. She argues it doesn't matter what you serve, as long as you serve something. It's the coming together for the meal that gets your guests excited about a dinner party, more so than the menu itself. She encourages you to offer something—anything—the moment your guests arrived: radishes with butter and salt; celery and carrot sticks with crackers and butter; warmed olives, or stale bread toasted and drizzled with oil and herbs. It got me thinking more creatively about what I have in my pantry and refrigerator that people can eat. Suddenly, the options seem much broader than they did before I read the book.
She also suggests making dishes that allow the host to relax with her/his guests, a lesson which I have yet to learn, since my approach was to redesign my kitchen so that my guests could sit and have a drink while watching me cook. She encourages involving your guests in the preparation of the meal, again, something I need to practice. This quote is echoing around in my head: "Only remember what is plainly and always true: the act of serving fulfills itself. It doesn't matter what you serve."
So my cooking resolution is to try not to be so rigid in what and to whom I serve. I'll embrace the idea of creating meals with what I have available, without running to the store for that one ingredient that will perfect a specific recipe. I'm pretty sure thinking this way will make me a more creative—and relaxed—cook.
Monday, October 29, 2012
Healthy(ish) Halloween Treats
D's preschool is having a Halloween party, and parents are asked to bring something to contribute to the snack table. Last year, I brought Martha Stewart's Goblin Flatbreads. My kids liked them, but they weren't popular with the group, because no one knew what they were.
This year, I'm still going savoury, but hopefully a little more recognizable. I've opted for pumpkin-shaped cheese crackers, based on a recipe from King Arthur Whole Grain Baking Cookbook. It's their wholegrain version of homemade cheese nips, which I adapted using the flour I had (how I ended up with every kind of flour under the sun except the barley flour called for, I do not know. Well, actually, I do know—from making a few batches of the Graham cracker recipe from the same cookbook.)
These aren't the healthiest things ever—they do contain processed cheese powder, something which has not crossed my threshold, either in the form of a box of macaroni and cheese or otherwise, until today. But the cheese crackers are good enough that I will probably make them again. And I wouldn't turn up my nose at some of that cheese powder on my popcorn, either.
So here are my cute little pumpkins, which turned out to be quite soft due to the oat flour I used in place of the barley flour. But they have a nice flakiness to them, kind of like a tender, cheesy pie crust. I don't think the kids will complain. Next time, though, I will have the barley flour on hand to make them 'right'. They're easy enough to make, using a food processor, that I may consider replacing the ubiquitous Goldfish (or the organic version: Cheddar Bunnies) with the occasional batch of these.
After the fact, I wondered about a cracker recipe that used real cheese, which of course would have been easy to find if I'd just Googled it. Guilty Kitchen posted one last year. Maybe THAT's the one I should try, instead of the one that uses barley flour and cheese powder. Ah well, there are many more years of cheese crackers in my future, so I'm sure I can try both and get back to you on which one I prefer.
Cheese Crackers (adapted from King Arthur Flour)
1/3 c. whole wheat pastry flour
1/3 c. whole barley flour (I used oat flour instead)
1/2 c. bread flour
1 T. dry milk
1 t. baking powder
1/2 t. baking soda
1/4 t. salt
1/8 t. paprika
1/2 c. Cheddar cheese powder
6 T. butter, chilled
1/4 c. buttermilk
1/4 t. salt mixed with 1 T. cheese powder for topping (I didn't use this. The crackers were salty enough already)
Mix together dry ingredients in the bowl of a food processor. Add butter and blend until the mixture is a fine meal. Add the buttermilk and mix until the dough comes together. Turn the dough onto a floured board and knead lightly for a minute or two, incorporating extra flour if the dough is sticky. Pat the dough into two flat rounds, wrap in plastic and chill for 30 minutes.
Preheat the oven to 325 F (I used 300 F on convection).
Remove the dough from the fridge and roll it as thin as possible. Cut it into pumpkin shapes using a cutter, collecting scraps and rerolling as necessary. Make faces on your pumpkins using a knife.
Bake for 10-12 minutes, until the edges begin to brown. Enjoy!
Thursday, October 25, 2012
The Joys of Roasted Tomatoes
First and foremost I must apologize for my lengthy absence. September and most of October have been a mad rush of working out of town every week and juggling events and travel on almost every weekend. In September my husband turned 40 and I hosted the party (and was so busy I had to hire Caffe Sola to cater...although I did bake the cake(s)), we took a road trip to Calgary, I went on a girls' getaway to Portland, OR, we spent a weekend at Elk Ridge Resort in northern Saskatchewan while my husband was at a conference, and I also worked a weekend evening at the Premier wine festival. D started preschool three days a week, and I started playing volleyball on two teams in a Sunday league.
In October, it has been slightly more quiet, except for my dad's 60th birthday party, which my parents hosted and combined with their 40th wedding anniversary celebration. This involved 200 guests, and the roasting of a whole pig and 3 barons of beef. I was again in charge of the cake; I made a three-tier puffed wheat cake, with Rice Krispie 'frosting'. My dad doesn't like real cake, but he loves puffed wheat cake, and this is the third celebratory puffed wheat cake I've made. The other two were wedding cakes. Thanks to my girlfriend who forwarded this photo of her puffed wheat wedding cake after I mentioned I didn't have one.
I travelled slightly less often, but my days were filled with the frantic efforts to harvest the last of my garden. I got all the basil processed and gave the rest away, and froze and dried herbs late into the night in late September. And then the frosts came, and whatever didn't get done was beyond saving. The garden is (mostly) put to bed, and probably as much as it is going to be, considering there is now snow on the ground. I had intended to dig some Jerusalem artichokes, but haven't got to them yet. They may have to wait until spring.
All that I have left of the summer bounty are the bags of root vegetables harvested from our garden, my mom's garden, or purchased from the Farmer's market, as well as a big box of spaghetti squash. And then there are the tomatoes. My tomato plants didn't yield much this year, but I did get a bumper crop of cherry tomatoes. My neighbours have been keeping me in big beautiful Beefsteaks and Golden Boys, and my mom passed on a bag of Romas.
What does one make with so many tomatoes and so little time? My new favourite recipe is roasted tomatoes. All kinds, with the large ones cut into chunks, and the small ones tossed in whole, a handful of whole garlic cloves, salt and pepper, some fresh or dried herbs and a generous glug of olive oil. Roast them in a dish of some sort (they look prettiest in some sort of pottery or stoneware), and roast them at 325F for a couple of hours, stirring occasionally. I froze the results, which can be used as is as an excellent pasta sauce, used as a base for anything requiring tomato sauce (my husband cooked quinoa in some of the sauce, and it was wonderful), or pureed and turned into soup.
It was also the easiest option for the days when the tomatoes needed attention and I had no time to give it. Simply chop, toss, throw in the oven, and ignore while doing other things. Perfect!
I was also committed to making roasted salsas, which are my absolute favourites. In fact, I don't make simmered salsas at all. There are a few steps to a roasted salsa, and it requires a few cookie sheets and a blender, as well as some wrestling with chiles (I always forget to put on gloves and suffer an evening or two of burning fingers as the chile oil permeates my skin), but the final results are so superior that I never begrudge the effort.
Here are two of my favourite recipes, both from Rick Bayless's Salsas that Cook:
Roasted Poblano-Tomato Salsa
Chipotle-Cascabel Salsa with Roasted Tomatoes and Tomatillos
When a good friend of mine tasted the chipotle-cascabel salsa, he told me I should quit my job and just start cooking. I didn't think I should quit my job just because I could follow a recipe, but I do agree that this is about the best tasting (albeit quite spicy) salsa I have ever tasted. It is tangy, smoky, spicy and savoury all at once. It is also too hot for my kids to eat, or at least I thought so. D is up for the challenge, and if we warn him it's spicy, he keeps a glass of milk close by to cool the burn (I'm glad he's trying it. Gives me hope that one day, they'll like hot stuff as much as we do!). Even the roasted poblano salsa, while mild by almost anyone's standards, is a bit on the hot side for my kids.
Which is probably one of the reasons I haven't made them in a couple of years, besides the issue of renovating my kitchen last year, and having a brand new baby the year before that. But now, I'm back, and I am delighted to have three kinds of salsa in my freezer, ready for the winter.
While I was at the salsa making, I may have lost my mind a little bit because when the recipe called for tomato puree, I decided to make my own. It came out tasting quite a bit like ketchup, and the little bit that I had left over also went into the freezer.
While I'm a huge fan of the roasting technique, and will finish up this post with my new favourite pasta sauce recipe, I did make a bit of simmered tomato sauce, mostly because I had leeks, and my favourite basic sauce for freezing calls for them. I now have some regular red tomato sauce and a couple of containers of pure yellow tomato sauce ready for pulling out of the freezer whenever we need it over the winter. It is a fairly simple recipe, and I've been referencing it in The Occasional Vegetarian for over 10 years.
3 lbs. fresh tomatoes, peeled and seeded (to peel, heat a pot of water to a boil. Drop whole tomatoes into the boiling water and leave for a minute or two. Scoop out with a slotted spoon, let cool til they can be handled, and slip off the skins. To seed, cut in half and gouge out the seed pockets. Or watch this tutorial to learn how. I don't always seed the tomatoes, because it feels wasteful. This year I did, though, because I had so many tomatoes. It does make a thicker sauce if you let them go. You could always dry them for seed!) or you can use 4 c. canned tomatoes, but I usually make a different recipe if I'm using canned.
2 T. olive oil
1 1/4 c. chopped leek (I have also used onion if I don't have leeks)
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1 t. salt
1 t. sugar
1/2 t. pepper
Heat olive oil in a large frying pan and add the leek and garlic. Saute gently for about three minutes, until soft. Add the tomatoes, salt and sugar, and bring to a boil. Simmer for about 30 minutes, or until the desired consistency is reached. Use this as a pasta sauce, add whatever herbs you like, or use it in any recipe that calls for tomato sauce. I freeze it in containers and add the necessary herbs to turn it into pasta sauce, pizza sauce, a soup ingredient, or whatever. I delight in not having to buy tomato sauce all winter.
But back to tonight's dinner, which was another experiment in roasting. And I have to say, I am IN LOVE. I only had time to do the standard roasted tomatoes, and I decided to just do that and pasta. I wondered, though, if I could add other ingredients to it, like anchovies and capers, and do a roasted Puttanesca sauce? It turns out I can, and the results were extremely satisfying.
The simmered version of the sauce is easy, too, and it is up to each individual whether they prefer the stovetop method or the oven roasted method. For me, I loved being able to stick it in the oven and walk away. I was also efficient with my oven use, since I baked a plum torte for dessert at the same time. The final result was a perfectly balanced umami sauce that blended beautifully with some rustic "Ferretto Calabro" artisan pasta. My kids asked for seconds and thirds of the meal, and we enjoyed it just as much. It's a keeper!
Roasted Puttanesca Sauce
2 lbs. mixed tomatoes (I used red and yellow cherry tomatoes left whole and large red and yellow tomatoes, coarsely chopped)
1 head garlic, cloves broken up, unpeeled
4 salt packed anchovies, soaked, filleted and chopped
2-3 T. salt packed capers, rinsed
1/2 c. or a medium handful of Kalamata olives, pitted and torn in half
Generous pour of olive oil over all (about 1/2 c., or about a 1/2 inch deep in the roasting pan)
Several grinds of fresh pepper
In a roasting pan that will hold the ingredients to about 2 inches deep (a well-packed single layer), toss tomatoes, garlic, anchovies, capers and olives. Pour olive oil over, sprinkle with pepper and toss again. Place in a 325F oven for two hours, stirring when you remember.
Cook your favourite pasta to al dente. Drain and put pasta back in the cooking pot with the sauce. Toss with the sauce until the noodles soak up the sauce and it thickens slightly. Enjoy!
In October, it has been slightly more quiet, except for my dad's 60th birthday party, which my parents hosted and combined with their 40th wedding anniversary celebration. This involved 200 guests, and the roasting of a whole pig and 3 barons of beef. I was again in charge of the cake; I made a three-tier puffed wheat cake, with Rice Krispie 'frosting'. My dad doesn't like real cake, but he loves puffed wheat cake, and this is the third celebratory puffed wheat cake I've made. The other two were wedding cakes. Thanks to my girlfriend who forwarded this photo of her puffed wheat wedding cake after I mentioned I didn't have one.
I travelled slightly less often, but my days were filled with the frantic efforts to harvest the last of my garden. I got all the basil processed and gave the rest away, and froze and dried herbs late into the night in late September. And then the frosts came, and whatever didn't get done was beyond saving. The garden is (mostly) put to bed, and probably as much as it is going to be, considering there is now snow on the ground. I had intended to dig some Jerusalem artichokes, but haven't got to them yet. They may have to wait until spring.
All that I have left of the summer bounty are the bags of root vegetables harvested from our garden, my mom's garden, or purchased from the Farmer's market, as well as a big box of spaghetti squash. And then there are the tomatoes. My tomato plants didn't yield much this year, but I did get a bumper crop of cherry tomatoes. My neighbours have been keeping me in big beautiful Beefsteaks and Golden Boys, and my mom passed on a bag of Romas.
What does one make with so many tomatoes and so little time? My new favourite recipe is roasted tomatoes. All kinds, with the large ones cut into chunks, and the small ones tossed in whole, a handful of whole garlic cloves, salt and pepper, some fresh or dried herbs and a generous glug of olive oil. Roast them in a dish of some sort (they look prettiest in some sort of pottery or stoneware), and roast them at 325F for a couple of hours, stirring occasionally. I froze the results, which can be used as is as an excellent pasta sauce, used as a base for anything requiring tomato sauce (my husband cooked quinoa in some of the sauce, and it was wonderful), or pureed and turned into soup.
It was also the easiest option for the days when the tomatoes needed attention and I had no time to give it. Simply chop, toss, throw in the oven, and ignore while doing other things. Perfect!
I was also committed to making roasted salsas, which are my absolute favourites. In fact, I don't make simmered salsas at all. There are a few steps to a roasted salsa, and it requires a few cookie sheets and a blender, as well as some wrestling with chiles (I always forget to put on gloves and suffer an evening or two of burning fingers as the chile oil permeates my skin), but the final results are so superior that I never begrudge the effort.
Here are two of my favourite recipes, both from Rick Bayless's Salsas that Cook:
Roasted Poblano-Tomato Salsa
Chipotle-Cascabel Salsa with Roasted Tomatoes and Tomatillos
When a good friend of mine tasted the chipotle-cascabel salsa, he told me I should quit my job and just start cooking. I didn't think I should quit my job just because I could follow a recipe, but I do agree that this is about the best tasting (albeit quite spicy) salsa I have ever tasted. It is tangy, smoky, spicy and savoury all at once. It is also too hot for my kids to eat, or at least I thought so. D is up for the challenge, and if we warn him it's spicy, he keeps a glass of milk close by to cool the burn (I'm glad he's trying it. Gives me hope that one day, they'll like hot stuff as much as we do!). Even the roasted poblano salsa, while mild by almost anyone's standards, is a bit on the hot side for my kids.
Which is probably one of the reasons I haven't made them in a couple of years, besides the issue of renovating my kitchen last year, and having a brand new baby the year before that. But now, I'm back, and I am delighted to have three kinds of salsa in my freezer, ready for the winter.
While I was at the salsa making, I may have lost my mind a little bit because when the recipe called for tomato puree, I decided to make my own. It came out tasting quite a bit like ketchup, and the little bit that I had left over also went into the freezer.
While I'm a huge fan of the roasting technique, and will finish up this post with my new favourite pasta sauce recipe, I did make a bit of simmered tomato sauce, mostly because I had leeks, and my favourite basic sauce for freezing calls for them. I now have some regular red tomato sauce and a couple of containers of pure yellow tomato sauce ready for pulling out of the freezer whenever we need it over the winter. It is a fairly simple recipe, and I've been referencing it in The Occasional Vegetarian for over 10 years.
3 lbs. fresh tomatoes, peeled and seeded (to peel, heat a pot of water to a boil. Drop whole tomatoes into the boiling water and leave for a minute or two. Scoop out with a slotted spoon, let cool til they can be handled, and slip off the skins. To seed, cut in half and gouge out the seed pockets. Or watch this tutorial to learn how. I don't always seed the tomatoes, because it feels wasteful. This year I did, though, because I had so many tomatoes. It does make a thicker sauce if you let them go. You could always dry them for seed!) or you can use 4 c. canned tomatoes, but I usually make a different recipe if I'm using canned.
2 T. olive oil
1 1/4 c. chopped leek (I have also used onion if I don't have leeks)
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1 t. salt
1 t. sugar
1/2 t. pepper
Heat olive oil in a large frying pan and add the leek and garlic. Saute gently for about three minutes, until soft. Add the tomatoes, salt and sugar, and bring to a boil. Simmer for about 30 minutes, or until the desired consistency is reached. Use this as a pasta sauce, add whatever herbs you like, or use it in any recipe that calls for tomato sauce. I freeze it in containers and add the necessary herbs to turn it into pasta sauce, pizza sauce, a soup ingredient, or whatever. I delight in not having to buy tomato sauce all winter.
But back to tonight's dinner, which was another experiment in roasting. And I have to say, I am IN LOVE. I only had time to do the standard roasted tomatoes, and I decided to just do that and pasta. I wondered, though, if I could add other ingredients to it, like anchovies and capers, and do a roasted Puttanesca sauce? It turns out I can, and the results were extremely satisfying.
The simmered version of the sauce is easy, too, and it is up to each individual whether they prefer the stovetop method or the oven roasted method. For me, I loved being able to stick it in the oven and walk away. I was also efficient with my oven use, since I baked a plum torte for dessert at the same time. The final result was a perfectly balanced umami sauce that blended beautifully with some rustic "Ferretto Calabro" artisan pasta. My kids asked for seconds and thirds of the meal, and we enjoyed it just as much. It's a keeper!
Roasted Puttanesca Sauce
2 lbs. mixed tomatoes (I used red and yellow cherry tomatoes left whole and large red and yellow tomatoes, coarsely chopped)
1 head garlic, cloves broken up, unpeeled
4 salt packed anchovies, soaked, filleted and chopped
2-3 T. salt packed capers, rinsed
1/2 c. or a medium handful of Kalamata olives, pitted and torn in half
Generous pour of olive oil over all (about 1/2 c., or about a 1/2 inch deep in the roasting pan)
Several grinds of fresh pepper
In a roasting pan that will hold the ingredients to about 2 inches deep (a well-packed single layer), toss tomatoes, garlic, anchovies, capers and olives. Pour olive oil over, sprinkle with pepper and toss again. Place in a 325F oven for two hours, stirring when you remember.
Cook your favourite pasta to al dente. Drain and put pasta back in the cooking pot with the sauce. Toss with the sauce until the noodles soak up the sauce and it thickens slightly. Enjoy!
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