somme borscht

1 ham bone (optional)

2 onion, diced

3 stalk celery, diced

2 large red potato, diced

1 L chicken stock

1 L water

4 Tbsp dill, fresh chopped or dried

beet or chard leaves, shredded to yield about 4 loosely packed cups

1/4 cup sour cream

 salt and pepper to taste

*if you do use a ham bone be careful to taste the soup before seasoning. 

Sweat the onions in oil in a large heavy bottomed soup pot. Add the celery. Cook the vegetables for several minutes over medium high heat. Add the potatoes and toss everything around in the pot. Add the chicken stock and another litre of water. The vegetables should be submerged by at least an inch of liquid. Add the ham bone, if using (this would also be the time to toss in some cooked diced ham if you feel like making the soup a little meatier). Bring the soup to a boil then turn the heat down to medium low and let it simmer for 30 minutes. Check to see if the potatoes have cooked through. When they have cooked add the dill and the greens. Stir them around in the pot. Leave the soup for about 5 minutes to allow the greens to cook through. Remove the soup from the heat and stir in the sour cream. Taste it  then season with salt and pepper (and maybe a hit of tabasco and a few pinches of sugar).

whole wheat and honey biscuits

1 cup all purpose flour

1 cup whole wheat flour

1/2 tsp salt

4 tsp baking powder

1 tablespoon sugar

1/2 cup butter, lard, or shortening

2/3 cup milk

3 tbsp melted honey

First of all I would like to thank Fannie Farmer for the foundation for this recipe. Thank you.

Set your oven to 425*F. Combine the flour, salt, baking powder, and sugar. Rub the fat into the flour mixture with your hands until it resembles coarse meal. Make a well in the center then add the milk. Use a fork (or your hands) to incorporate flour into the milk then gently toss the mixture until the flour is all incorporated into the dough. Pat (not kneading too much!) the dough into one piece. If you must knead it a few times to bring it all together then giv’er but be gentle! Roll the dough out to a 1″ thickness and cut 2.5″ (or whatever!) rounds. Place them spaced at least 1 inch apart of parchment lined pans. Brush the tops with melted honey. Bake until golden brown (apx. 15-20 minutes depending on the size.)

Eat with somme borscht!

mirepoix – 1 part onion, 2 parts each celery and carrot

One of the reasons I get excited about the weekend is because it means that I finally have time to braise something. Yay! Of course I sometimes will break it down in stages and get ‘er done during the week but it is so much more satisfying to create a braised dish start to finish all in the same day. Chicken cacciatore ranks up there as one of my favorites. My mom would often prepare chicken cacciatore on Sundays and after coming home from church the house would be filled with the aroma of garlic, tomatoes, and goodness. She would make us wait until supper to eat it and by that time it would smell so good that even though I was the pickiest eater alive even I could not resist having a little drizzle of the sauce on my usually plain spaghetti. Over the years my pickiness has obviously abated somewhat and I now eat this dish with such gusto that I always regret not making a larger batch. I love to cook it all year round. In the summer my garden yields most of the necessary ingredients (the ones I might lack I can usually finagle from my friends mom’s garden out in Ridgeville). In the winter I make it to use up my canned tomatoes and dried herbs. MMMmmmmmm. My mouth is watering just thinking about this. Alright, without further adieu, here it is. My very own recipe for the best chicken cacciatore on the planet. If you have a better recipe we’ll just have to fight it out. I don’t mind making two test batches. More for me to eat!

chicken cacciatore

4 chicken legs or 6 thighs (skin on, backbone off)

1/2 cup flour

Salt and Pepper

Cooking oil as needed

1 onion, diced

1 carrot, diced

1 stalk celery, diced

3 cloves garlic, minced

 1 bottle wine, maybe two. red or white. whatever is available.

2 cups diced canned tomatoes

1 small can tomato paste

good pinch each of dried parsley, thyme, basil and oregano

 cooked pasta to serve with

crusty bread and butter to really round the meal out.

Toss the chicken in a bowl with flour and a hefty pinch of salt and pepper until well coated. Heat up a frying pan over medium high heat. Add the chicken pieces on at a time taking care not to crowd the pan overly much. When the pieces are well browned remove them to a plate. Use the same pan to saute the veg and garlic until it is cooked about halfway through. Place the tomatoes and tomato paste in a slow cooker. Add the sauteed veg. Deglaze the pan with a good few glugs of wine. Pour yourself a glass. Stir everything up then nestle the chicken thighs into the mixture. Sprinkle a schwak of herbs over everything. Put the lid on and turn the slow cooker to high heat for at least four hours. Sit down and drink the rest of the bottle of wine. Cook the noodles at some point. Lazily. Check on the chicken in a little while. Maybe take the lid off for the last hour of cooking to let the mixture reduce a little bit. When the chicken is very tender carefully remove it from the pot of the slow cooker. Toss the noodles in with the sauce and give it a good stir. Open a second bottle of wine. Eat and drink with gusto.

mise en place

floured chicken fry fry

what a beautiful color

A very good and dear friend of ours suffered two massive brain anerysms on Thursday night. Everyone is just waiting. Grant keeps going to the hospital and hanging out there, but I have nothing to do. I don’t know what to do. I have to do something but there’s nothing to be done. How do you just keep on…… how do you “go about your business” as if nothing is wrong. How do you play peek-a-boo and chase and do stickers with a two year old when inside you are just devastated…

I mean. I guess you just do. And that’s all there is to it. You just do.

I’ve baked muffins and loaves and have food ready for at least four or five meals for 10- 20 people if anyone should feel like eating or hanging out here or need anything sent to the hospital.  Not that I expect anyone to. I don’t think it’s going to happen. Everyone is just waiting. Everything is very quiet. Phone conversations are all quiet. We speak quietly to each other. Everyone is just sitting around shaking their heads and trying to wish the whole situation away.

I feel entirely useless and not hungry at all.

Ben Kramer’s team 2009

Iron Chef Centrex 2011 draws ever nearer. The dates for this years food show are March 20 + 21 and it will be held at the Winnipeg Convention Centre, as per usual. If anyone is interested in checking the competition out please DO IT!!! We have 8 competing teams from Winnipeg’s finest restaurant, hotel, and foodservice operations. The winning team last year was Ben Kramer’s from Diversity Foodservices at the U of W and the runner-up was Alex Svenne’s from Bistro 7 1/4. What an astounding round! They put so many plates up the judges could hardly keep up with tasting them! We had a blast!

This will be the third year that Melissa and I have run the Iron Chef Centrex competition. Each year it has gone a little more smoothly so we are feeling pretty pumped about 2011. We had no idea what we were getting in for when we originally approached Centrex about reviving the competition as an element of the show. We walked in to the tradeshow the first year to start setting our mise en place up and both of our jaws dropped at the size and scope of our display. WOW! Centrex has been absolutely wonderful and it has been a very co-operative process to keep the competition running each year. We value their support and the resources that they provide us with. It has been great working with the organizers and getting a glimpse of what goes into planning and running a show of that size. I am proud to be a contributor to their success.

So far for this year we have seven teams confirmed. There is one more spot up for grabs. Melissa and I are planning some exciting things for the competition this year. They are secret things though! I’ll try to remember to blog about how everything goes after the fact.

Two teams battle it out

I still need to find my judges. I have 21 judging spots to fill. I generally contact about 40 people trying to fill the positions. We have three judges per round and try to keep things as fair as possible by including at least one chef, one supplier and one celebrity in each judging panel. Last year we had awesome judges. I was super appreciative of the time they took to come down to the show and that they participated in our competition. I was especially excited for the enthusiasm with which they approached their task. I really hope I can convince them to come back for Iron Chef Centrex 2011.

 Melissa is the champ who mainly takes care of organizing the common table and sourcing our products. She was a superstar the first year we did this as I had an infant to lug around with me everywhere. I wasn’t as involved as I had hoped to be, but she totally rocked it. I think (/hope) that I made up for it last year. We usually spend the week prior to the competition running around gathering equipment, supplies and food products. We spend most of the day saturday portioning out ingredients for the teams common tables. We give them set quantities of most things, like arborio rice for example. Last year we gave them 200g. We try to keep our common table pretty basic and have ingredients that we can foresee being used in at least three or more different ways. We also want to provide enough diversity to provide the teams with creative options when they are given their secret ingredients. We want them to put up great plates and we want to facilitate the creation of them. We have switched up the common table ingredients a little bit this year. We hope that the chefs are excited by the changes. And while we continue to get questions from them regarding the inclusion of molecular gastronomic additives and chemicals we have once again used the basic rule that “you want it, bring it. But bring enough to share between EVERY team.” We want this competition to showcase basic culinary skills. If you are crazy enough to spend part of the one hour time limit making carrot pearls as a garnish for your dish, by all means bring in the sodium alginate and calcium chloride. We would have to ensure fairness by making such things available across the board though.

Team Mirlycourtois 2009

So last year our competing teams came from: Provence Bistro, La P’tit France, MTS Centre,  Bistro 7 1/4, The Fairmont Hotel, Glendale Golf and Country Club, Bonfire Bistro, and Diversity Foodservices. Everyone did an amazing job and I hope that they had as much fun cooking their food as we did watching them serve up dishes to the judges.

This years competition will take place March 20 and 21. We start the one hour rounds on Sunday at noon and go on until 5:30 pm. The semi finals will again be held on the Monday of the show and will be at 11am, and 12:30 pm with the finals taking place at 2:30 pm.

I’m getting excited for the competition already. I hope that y’all come on down and see the show. The semi finals and finals are always pretty fierce. There is $1000 of prize money at stake as well as some serious bragging rights. Take ‘er easy and have a great week.

Iron Chef Centrex 2009

Sometimes you actually get it right.

This is one of my favorite recipes from the Muffins and More cookbook. If you don’t own that book, you should. Every mom in my family has a copy. It is loaded with tried, tested and true recipes for all sorts of muffins, loaves, quick breads, and a few coffee cakes. Unlike most of the other books in this series the recipes from Muffins and More almost always work out as predicted and yield delicious results. Splendid. Go buy it. Bake more often.

The following recipe for Pumpkin Tea Bread is on page 73 of Muffins and More. I have included in parentheses MY alternations to the recipe. Take them or leave them as you like. The quantity of batter that this recipe produces is far too much for one standard sized loaf tin. I would suggest dividing the batter between two tins and not filling them quite as full as you would normally.

 Pumpkin Tea Bread

1/2 cup butter or margarine, softened (canola oil instead)

1 1/2  cups sugar (1 cup only)

2 eggs

1 cup canned pumpkin, without spice

1 Tbsp grated orange zest (grated zest of one orange)

1/4 cup orange juice (juice of one orange, strained)

2 1/4 cup flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp cloves

1/2 cup chopped nuts (golden raisins or whole cranberries)

In mixing bowl cream butter, sugar and 1 egg. Beat in second egg until smooth. Mix in pumpkin, zest and juice.In another bowl measure all remaining ingredients. Stir well. Add all at once to batter in mixing bowl. Stir just to moisten. Pour into greased 9x5x3 inch loaf pan. Bake in 350*F oven for about 1 hour or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean. Cool in pan 10 minutes. Remove loaf from pan to rack. Cool and wrap. Yield: 1 loaf.

This loaf is really one of my all time favorites. It has a great pumpkin flavor with a little hit of orange. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do. Remember!!!! Bake more often!   It is a worthwhile way to spend your time. If you find yourself living alone and incapable of eating so much loaf by yourself try doing what I do: Wait until the loaf is cool then slice it into thick slices. Butter each piece, individually wrap them and put half in the freezer and half in the fridge. Voila! Snacks ready to take with you to work for your lunches or to eat on the way out the door in the morning. Enjoy!

Image by Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library via Flickr

West African Peanut Soup aka Senegalese Soup aka FANTABULOUS!!!!  I had been making regular batches of this soup because I love it and many people I know love it and it was in high demand but now my daughter seems to have a peanut allergy. So who knows when I will ever make this again?! I might as well share the recipe with y’all so as to spread the love that is West African Peanut Soup. Enjoy!

west african peanut soup

1 onion

1 stalk celery

3 carrots, peeled

1 yam peeled

1 cup pumpkin cooked or raw(optional)

1 L chicken or vegetable stock

1 L water

1.5 cup smooth peanut butter

2 cloves garlic

thumb sized piece of ginger, sliced

1/2 lemon squeezed

2T cayenne pepper

salt and pepper to taste

Roughly chop up the onion, celery, carrot, and yam and pumpkin if using. (I usually have some cooked pumpkin left over from baking in my fridge to use up. If you are using the cooked stuff, wait until after the stock is in the pot to add it. If you are using raw pumpkin or squash add it at the same time as the sweet potato.) Saute the veg with a bit of olive oil in your soup pot. Toss in the garlic cloves and the ginger. Add the water and the stock. Bring to a boil then turn down to a simmer for at least one hour or until the vegetables are totally soft. Puree with a wand blender. Add the peanut butter, lemon and paprika. Puree again. Taste and adjust seasoning.  

Serve the soup garnished with sliced lime segments, a dallop of plain whipped cream and some crispy fried leeks if you are feeling very fancy. I generally eat it straight up, as quickly as possible.

As easy as this sounds to make West African Peanut Soup is one of my favorites. Please make it often! Spread the love! Maybe one day Maddy will grow out of her allergy and I can once again make this soup in my kitchen. Until then, enjoy!

Image by bgreenlee via Flickr

I’ve recently discovered the secret to making the perfect Honey Garlic Sauce. I’m very excited about this because it is January and stir-fry’s are featuring pretty heavily on my weekly menu plan (at home and at work for staff meals). I have this insatiable craving for little crispy bites of meat with steamed vegetables and rice. I could eat stir-fry for every meal this entire month. I need to detox from the heaviness of turkey dinners and gorging on chocolate and baking. I want clean light flavors and crunchy vegetables. I want healthy. Well, I want…….. sort of healthy with LOTS of honey garlic sauce. Mmmmm…. liquid gold. Ambrosia of the gods. Soooooooooooo damn good!

Honey Garlic Sauce

1/4 cup soy sauce

1/3 cup honey

4 cloves of roasted garlic, approximately ***

1 cup water

1 Tbsp cornstarch mixed with

1/4 cup cold water

Cracked black pepper

*** I roasted my garlic the day before making this sauce. The oven was on for something else and I figured “Hey! Might as well roast some garlic!” Always good to have on hand and easy to use up. To roast garlic is very simple. Take a whole head of garlic, unpeeled, and cut off the top quarter to expose all the little cloves inside their husks. Place garlic on small pan, drizzle with olive oil (right in the head of garlic), cover with foil and pop in oven for about 40 minutes at 350*F. The garlic should be very soft when you remove it from the oven and may take a little longer than I’ve said. Poke it with a skewer or toothpick to test its doneness. Leave the garlic on the counter to cool for a loooong while. When you can easily handle the head, pick it up and squeeze the cloves out by holding near the base and squeezing. Ideally you should have something resembling a puree. Pick out any bits of husk that might have fallen in or push the lot through a strainer to remove them.

For the honey garlic sauce:

Place the soy sauce, honey, and water in a small pot and bring to a boil. Turn the heat down to medium high. Add roasted garlic. In a separate bowl stir together the cornstarch and second measure of water until the cornstarch is dissolved. Whisk the cornstarch mixture into the sauce. Whisk often until the mixture boils again and the sauce is no longer cloudy. It should be nappe consistency, or it should coat the back of a spoon and stay in place when you run a finger down the center of the spoon.

Crack some black pepper into the sauce and taste it. It should blow your mind!

This recipe will make enough sauce for several rounds of stir fry. It is also great on wings or ribs, or as a glaze for salmon. It is both versatile and delicious! Enjoy!

whole wheat crepes

2 eggs

2 cups milk

1 cup whole wheat flour

1/2 tsp salt

pinch sugar (optional)

Beat eggs well. Alternate adding milk and flour until used up. Beat well with a whisk until totally smooth. Add salt and sugar if using. Strain through a fine mesh strainer if any lumps remain. Cover and let rest in fridge for AT LEAST 30 minutes or overnight. When you are ready to start cooking your crepes gather up the following equipment: one dinner plate, one 3 oz ladle, one (or two if you feel capable) non stick frying pans 8 or 9″ in diameter, one silicone spatula, canola oil pan spray, and the batter from the fridge. Set it up around your stove so that everything is close at hand. The ladle goes in the bowl with the batter, use the spray spray to grease the pan well (I re-spray a little after each crepe), the spatula is to help you lift the crepe to flip it and plate is to put the finished product on. Heat the pan over medium high heat. When hot, spray spray it with oil. If you are right-handed, hold the pan with your left hand and the ladle full of crepe batter with your right. Take the pan off the heat and hold it up in a position that is comfortable for you to be able to twist it around. Pour one ladleful of the batter in the pan and swirl the pan to coat the bottom of it. Use the ladle drips to fill in any little holes. Don’t worry if your first (or second, or third) crepe doesn’t work out. It takes a bit of practice to get comfortable with the technique. Put the pan back on the heat and leave it for a minute or two. When I am making crepes I like to have just a little bit of color on them, but not too much. To check the doneness of the first side use the spatula to lift one end and take a little peek underneath. When you are ready to flip the crepe use the spatula to lift it and your thumb and forefingers of each hand to grasp and flip it. Flip it away from you and wiggle it into place in the pan. This is easier than I’m making it sound. Be prepared to mess up a few before you get the hang of all this. It can be fun once you get it down. To check the doneness of the second side I just giggle my pan. Once the crepe is no longer sticking and is loose in the pan I use the spatula to slide it off onto the plate. Spray spray and proceed with the next crepe. Once all the crepes are cooked use plastic wrap to tightly wrap the plate. The warmth and condensation from the crepes will soften the crispy edges and make the crepes more pliable and easy to use. Put them in the refrigerator until you are ready to use them. To reheat crepes either warm them briefly in a pan or microwave several at a time, covered, for a minute.

lemon filling

This filling is great with crepes or in cake or in a trifle or served in a cup with some fresh berries and whipped cream. It is damn good. Once again, this recipe comes courtesy of my Nana’s Fannie Farmer Cookbook. I freaking love that book. It is awesome.

1 cup sugar

2 1/2 tbsp flour

1/4 cup lemon juice

2 lemons zested

1 egg

1 tbsp butter

Mix everything together in a heavy bottomed stainless steel pot. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly until thick and smooth. Cool before using.

*** I brought my mixture just to a boil then poured it into a container and pressed plastic right on top of it to prevent a crust forming. Put it in the fridge to chill before using.

the finished product

Whip 1 cup of whipping cream and fold half of it into the lemon filling, reserve the other half for garnishing. Heat the crepes one by one in a nonstick frying pan over medium heat until just warm. Spoon or pipe or scoop about 2 tablespoons of filling into the center of each crepe. Fold the sides of the crepe in toward the center, then roll it up gently like a burrito. Place two crepes on each plate and garnish with a dollop of whip cream, a little fresh lemon zest, and a couple of raspberries for some color. Serve accompanied by some bacon, sausages and hash browns for a complete breakfast or as a lovely dessert to impress your dinner company with. Enjoy!

baking powder biscuits

turn on your oven to 425*F

Combine:

2 cups flour

1/2 tsp salt

4 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp cream of tartar

1 tbsp sugar

Rub 1/2 cup vegetable shortening, butter, margarine, or lard into the flour mixture until it is incorporated

Make a well in the center and add 2/3 cup milk

Stir until the liquid is just incorporated. Knead several times until the dough comes together

Turn the dough onto a floured counter, roll it about 3/4 ” thick and use a floured glass or circle cutter to shape the biscuits. Place them on a parchment lined pan. Knead remaining dough together, reroll it and cut more biscuits. Continue until all the dough is used up. Then make a lumpy bigish ugly sort of biscuit with the rest. That is always my favorite one to eat.  Brush the tops with cream (or milk, or butter). Bake them for about 10 minutes or until golden and a tester inserted through the center (via the side!) of the biscuit comes out totally clean.  

Variations:

Crusty Baking Powder Biscuits: Roll biscuits to 1/4″ thick and place 1″ apart. Bake in a 450*F oven for 12 minutes. This will yield almost twice as many biscuits.

Buttermilk Biscuits: Use 2/3 cup buttermilk instead of sweet milk and 1/2 tsp baking soda, cutting the  amount of baking powder in half – i.e., 2 tsp

Cheese Biscuits: Add 1/2 cup grated sharp Cheddar cheese to the dry ingredients

**my note: for a little extra deliciousness also add 1/2 tsp dry mustard powder to cheese biscuits and a twist of the pepper shaker

Drop Biscuits: Add an additional 1/3 cup milk and drop by teaspoonfuls onto a buttered baking sheet.

I only tried the original recipe, thinking to myself “hm.. that is a lot of baking powder, but we’ll give it a go”. WOW! These are definitely the best and softest biscuits I have ever made. Great recipe. They were perfect for dunking in and eating alongside a giant bowl of Minestrone soup.

Maddy ate three biscuits and two bowls of soup! Vegetables and all! Hooray! 

Green Summer Pasta Salad

4 cups cooked pasta: penne, fusilli, or rotini

2 T sundried tomato pesto

1 cup cooked and shelled soy beans/edamame

1/4 cup feta

2 tbsp olive oil

chopped chives, parsley, basil to taste

salt and pepper to taste