The Cooking Chronicles: Blog Inspiration

Cookbooks and magazines still remain a core of my recipe repertoire, but blogs are a significant source of inspiration for me. In some ways, it is less of a chore to bookmark a recipe on a blog for a rainy day than to deliberately seek one out in print. The two following dishes I made recently were gleaned from the online world of cooking – but there are many more to come!

Spiced Paneer with Spinach, Tomatoes and Potatoes

Although mutter paneer is one of my favourite dishes at Indian restaurants, I’ve never tried cooking with paneer at home. When I saw Michelle’s easy recipe for spiced paneer with spinach, tomatoes and potatoes, there seemed like no better way to start.

I had thought paneer would be available at Superstore, but that wasn’t the case (we ended up picking up a package at Spice Centre, our go-to Indian grocer). The package and white block reminded me very much of tofu, but of course, it is much more dense and firm in texture.

As promised, the recipe was very fast to pull together (we used Doef’s tomatoes and Greens, Eggs and Ham potatoes). I loved the wilted spinach, and the spice combination – great flavour, with just the right amount of heat for us. Next time, I’d likely include onions, and because I love tomatoes, I would double what the recipe calls for. Overall though, it’s a keeper!

Spiced paneer with spinach, tomatoes and potatoes (photo much less alluring than Michelle’s)

Thai Red Curry with Halibut

Trish Magwood’s Thai chicken curry is a rotating staple in our kitchen, but for whatever reason, we haven’t really used any other protein with that sauce and vegetable combination. Cream and Sugar’s recipe for Thai red curry with halibut was a good reminder that we should change it up.

We had some wild Alberta shallots from the Italian Centre, a bell pepper from Doef’s, and halibut from Ocean Odyssey, though we also threw in some green beans we had in the freezer. Similar to the dish above, this cooked up quickly, and had the by-product of scenting the condo with fragrant coconut milk.

We didn’t have fresh basil and cilantro on hand, unfortunate because I know it would have brightened up the dish considerably. Still, the curry was tasty – the halibut held up very well, and the vegetables cooked down to tender perfection.

Thai red curry with halibut (another photo that doesn’t even remotely compare to the original blog shot)

Which cooking blogs inspire you?

The Cooking Chronicles: Italian-Inspired Comforts

I’m certain that with the simplifications made to recipes these days to help the beleaguered home cook, some of the authenticity could be lost. But for the most part, I don’t mind – so long as the dish still tastes good. Two recipes I tried recently were a good illustration of this truth, at both ends of the spectrum.

Ricotta Gnudi in Parmesan Broth

I’ve posted about many Giada de Laurentiis recipes before, and I will continue to do so. Part of that reason is because I have two of her cookbooks, but the other has to do with the fact that her recipes are accessible and straightforward. Her ricotta gnudi in parmesan broth is an example of this, especially because they worked out so much better than a very similar spinach and ricotta dumplings I made a few months back.

While the chicken stock simmered with parmesan, a bit of parmesan rind and pepper, I formed the gnudi. I probably ended up making them a little larger than she had originally intended, but they held together and cooked up nicely.

Forming the gnudi

I was worried that they wouldn’t end up at all light and moist, but they turned out pretty tasty, even if they weren’t picture perfect. Served with the spicy, concentrated broth, it was comforting and something I would make again – for us, or for company.

Ricotta gnudi in parmesan broth

Bolognese with Bacon & Stout

Mack and I had just been talking about bolognese when I flipped open the fall issue of Flavours magazine to a recipe for bolognese with bacon & stout. It seemed like fate.

Besides Guinness, which we don’t normally have on hand, the rest of the ingredients for the sauce were basic – ground beef from Nature’s Green Acres, bacon from Irvings, rosemary and onions from Kuhlmann’s and parsnips, celery and crushed tomatoes. It wasn’t the smartest recipe for a weeknight (between prep and cooking time, the sauce took over an hour and a half), but it would have been worth it if we enjoyed the final product.

Bolognese with bacon & stout

Mack disagrees with me on this, but the parsnips were off-putting, so sweet and almost candy-like in the sauce. Carrots would have worked so much better. The stout also didn’t give the sauce the depth that we thought it might; there is a good reason why tradition calls for red wine.

I don’t mind trying new recipes – but of course, I always hope for an outcome similar to the one we achieved with the ricotta gnudi. Better luck next time!

The Cooking Chronicles: Well-Rounded Meals

I’ve mentioned in the past my penchant for one-pot meals, but over the summer, we tried to deviate from our usual formula with suppers made up of several different components.

Roast Chicken, Green Beans with Bacon and Mushroom Pilaf

I don’t know why the idea of roasting a chicken seemed so intimidating to me. Granted, it’s not something my Mum did often when I was growing up, but that’s no excuse. Over the summer, Mack and I bit the bullet: we bought a whole chicken from Dreamin’ Green Farm and just did it.

Whole chicken from Dreamin’ Green (home of the happy chicken!)

We rubbed the chicken with a mixture of butter, sage from a coworker’s garden, and lemon. We didn’t truss the chicken (something we’d definitely try next time), but it still turned out fine, and was really not a big deal at all! Like most roasts, it ended up being quite a passive recipe, something thrown into the oven to be forgotten about. The skin crisped up nicely (thank you, butter!), and the meat was deliciously juicy. We had enough leftovers for days – shredded meat we seamlessly incorporated into salads and soups. It is something we will definitely make again.

Crispy chicken!

For the sides I made a salad consisting of Sundog Organic green beans, Irvings bacon and a honey vinaigrette – Marilyn had made this side for dinner when we visited a few months ago, and the recipe stayed with me. The mushroom pilaf was easy to throw together, combining leftover rice with MoNa mushrooms and some chicken stock.

Roast chicken with green beans and mushroom pilaf

Of course, it tasted even better eaten outside.

Patio nights

Beef Tenderloin, Curried Couscous Salad and Grilled Corn

We had picked up some beef tenderloin steaks from Nature’s Green Acres. They were smaller in size than what one would normally think of for a “steak dinner”, but for us, it was perfect – the last time we had steaks (also from Nature’s Green Acres), we could barely finish the meat, let alone any accompanying sides!

While Mack readied the barbecue, I put together a curried couscous salad, featuring roasted Riverbend Gardens cauliflower, cucumber from Doef’s, dried cranberries and a dressing made from Bles-Wold yogurt. It was actually surprisingly tasty, with just enough heat balanced nicely with fresh vegetables, the sweetness of the fruit and a variety of textures. I replicated this dish for a potluck at work in the fall (made with vegetable stock so the vegetarians could enjoy it as well) and it was a hit!

Beef tenderloin, curried couscous salad and grilled corn

We also roasted corn (also from Riverbend Gardens) for the first time. Bobby Flay’s instructions (minus the flavourings) seemed simple enough, but possibly due to an inconsistent barbecue temperature, the corn didn’t cook through. We’ll have to try roasting corn again next year when it returns to the market.

Grilled corn

Although these well-rounded meals were a nice change, I will admit it is not something I am likely to do often; we’re not cut out for the “extra” dishes and effort on a nightly basis!

The Cooking Chronicles: One Bowl Suppers

I know it’s a bad habit, but as the weather has gotten cooler, our supper hour has migrated away from the dining table and onto the couch. I’d like to blame it on the return of the fall television season and hockey, but it’s just so easy to wind down the evening with dinner and a show.

As such, I think one bowl suppers, like soups and stews, are always go-to “couch potato” accompaniments. We made a couple of new one bowl recipes last week.

Turkey and Cranberry Ravioli

I’d been wanting to make Giada’s turkey and cranberry ravioli for some time. In the recipe header, she describes it as a dish she would make for her husband and herself when they are “craving the flavours of Thanksgiving” but are not wanting to cook a whole turkey. We wanted to see if it lived up to that kind of holiday billing!

It was a straightforward recipe – I made cranberry sauce for the filling, combining it with Greens, Eggs and Ham ground turkey, Romano cheese, bread crumbs, parsley, eggs and salt and pepper. Then, while Mack put together the ravioli (using won ton wrappers), I made the very holiday-worthy gravy (between the butter and heavy cream, it’s definitely not for everyday consumption).

The ravioli only needed three minutes or so in the boiling water to cook, and drizzled with gravy and a bit of the leftover cranberry sauce, it really did taste like Thanksgiving in a bowl. The cranberry sauce in the ravioli filling was a bit lost in the mix, so the sweetness from the garnish really helped cut through the richness. We also would use fresh pasta sheets next time instead of won ton wrappers – they turned out to be a bit gummy from absorbing the cooking liquid.

Turkey and cranberry ravioli

As a whole though, I would make this dish again. At the very least, it’s an interesting take on a filled pasta!

Creamy Coconut Carrot Soup

Mack isn’t the biggest soup fan, but even he didn’t mind this one. For me, I liked that it was a recipe that used pantry staples in a different way – it’s always great to have those dishes on the backburner in the event the fridge is bare save for those basic items.

I had clipped a recipe for a creamy coconut carrot soup from See Magazine, which was printed to accompany an article on vegan diets. Packed with vegetables and fruit – carrots, sweet potato, onions, apples – it made up for the turkey ravioli the night before, but with the addition of red lentils and coconut milk, added a different dimension to it.

The balance of our soup ended up mostly being sweet potato, but that was fine – the earthiness and creaminess the pureed potato brought was very pleasant. The slight sweetness from the green apple was also appreciated.

Creamy coconut carrot soup

Eaten with a bit of bread I picked up at the Queen of Tarts, it made for a nice supper, and a decent lunch the next day as well.

Do you have a favourite TV dinner, too?

The Cooking Chronicles: Beautiful Simplicity

Do you ever come across a recipe that astonishes you? That makes you wonder why you hadn’t ever tried it before? The kind that only involves a handful of ingredients, but tastes like something even greater than the sum of its parts? This tomato pasta was one of those dishes for me.

This recipe celebrates the best of summer – sun ripe tomatoes, fragrant basil – and enhances it with a silky touch of butter. We had picked up some gorgeous tomatoes and garlic from Sundog Organic Farm at the market, and plucked leaves from my still-flourishing basil plant. Diced tomatoes were sprinkled with salt, their juices combined with sauteed garlic and butter to form the sauce. Tossed with spaghetti, basil and parmesan, it was a pasta dish where seconds were a given.

This was simplicity at its best.

The Cooking Chronicles: “Vij’s At Home”

One of my coworkers was absolutely raving about the cookbook Vij’s At Home, authored by Vikram Vij and Meeru Dhalwala, proprietors of the wildly successful Indian eatery Vij’s in Vancouver. She gave it perhaps the ultimate compliment: “If I could only choose one cookbook to use for the rest of my life, it would be this one.”

A few weeks ago, I came upon a copy of Vij’s At Home at the library while browsing its shelves, so I borrowed it to see if it was indeed worthy of such high praise. On first glance, it might be. It features long narrative sections that read like part of a memoir, while the recipe preambles are insightful, instead of an afterthought like in other cookbooks I’ve come across. As a whole, the recipes feel personal, and as my coworker remarked, one wouldn’t feel out of place curling up on the couch with this cookbook.

I’ve only had the chance to try three dishes from the book so far – I’ll either have to renew it to the limit or buy myself a copy to make the other recipes I’ve marked!

Spicy Peas and Mashed Potato Toasted Sandwiches and Spicy Cauliflower “Steak”

I haven’t yet made samosas from scratch, but maybe I won’t ever have to, given simpler alternatives with similar flavours like the spicy peas and mashed potato sandwiches exist! It was a pretty simple recipe – we boiled Greens, Eggs and Ham pixie potatoes (perfect given their yielding skins that meant no peeling required), mashed them up, then combined it with peas and onions that had been cooked with spices. Spread inside toasted ciabatta buns with a little yogurt-based Indian dressing, it was a little messy to eat, but worth every bite. We had lots of leftovers, which heated up well in a toaster oven.

Spicy peas and mashed potato sandwiches and cauliflower steak

We served the sandwiches with spicy cauliflower “steak”. I cut a head of Riverbend Gardens cauliflower into large sections, and simmered it in a tomato masala (the recipe recommends crushed tomatoes, but I found hand-mashed diced tomatoes worked just as well). The cauliflower cooked perfectly, and was enhanced by the sweet-spicy flavours of the sauce. This was a dish that definitely improves with time – the masala was even better two days later.

Mushroom Medley in Potato Curry

Though I would like to say that serving the mushroom medley as a curry on rice was a deliberate decision, that would be a lie – it was more of an accidental assumption. Reading through the preamble, one gathers that the “medley” is a soup, and not a traditional curry, but given the recommended accompaniment was rice, I figured it was just a loose suggestion.

We added a package of firm tofu to round make the dish a meal, and found it to be a good textural addition. More mushrooms would have been fine as well (like a small variety basket from MoNa), and Mack and I both noted that we would have preferred to have kept the potatoes in diced form, instead of lightly mashed – it didn’t exactly thicken the base as we thought it might have.

Mushroom medley

Serving it on rice tempered the spice a little, though the buttermilk gave it a distinctly light creaminess that balanced it nicely. The next day, we enjoyed it as a soup proper – it was actually quite oily on top, as the overnight chill did not treat the broth’s cohesiveness well. So unlike the previous two dishes, this one is best consumed in one sitting.

Have you tried Vij’s at Home? Are there other recipes you would recommend from the book?

The Cooking Chronicles: The Art of Balance

I’m not sure what it’s been, but if you don’t count experiments with our new barbecue, we haven’t really been trying out as many new recipes as of late. I think part of it has to do with summer – we’re doing our best to take in as many festivals as we can so we’ve ended up falling back on recipes we know and love.

Anyway, two new dishes we made recently were both pretty well-received, and exemplified the need to balance between recipes you want to make all the time and recipes you should make more often.

Pastitsio

I saw a brief clip of Ina Garten putting together pastitsio, a Greek-influenced baked pasta (while at the dentist of all places!), and was sure it would be a dish Mack would enjoy. But then again, like bacon, it would be hard for him to pass up a cheesy, sauce-entwined casserole.

Pastitsio

One bowl was enough

My only grievance with the dish is the length of time it took to make from start to finish – about two and a half hours. Between the meat sauce (we used beef all the way through), béchamel, and baking time, it’s definitely something you had to plan for. On the plus side, we had leftovers for days!

Quinoa-Veggie Burgers

I was immediately attracted to the quinoa-veggie burgers pictured on the July 2011 edition of Chatelaine. On a day where I wanted anything but a heavy meal, it was the perfect dish to make. Mack’s biggest problem with the dish was its name. To him, the word “burger” connotes meat, and bread. This recipe features neither, being both vegetarian and gluten free.

The patty was comprised of sautéed vegetables, quinoa, egg, cornstarch and seasonings, and came together quite quickly. I also loved the technique of pressing the mixture together into a measuring cup – overturned into the pan, perfectly circular patties were formed once the mounds were pressed down.

Quinoa-veggie burger

I loved the crunch – both from being pan-fried and the inherent texture of the quinoa. Instead of the mushroom base though, I would have actually preferred a bun. Roasted tomatoes (as recommended in the recipe) would have been a great addition, as would have been the tahini sauce, also recommended.

Mack’s verdict? Besides the fact that it shouldn’t have been called a burger, he liked it enough to say we should make it again! How’s that for a coup?

The Cooking Chronicles: Variations on Poutine

I’ve written many times about our love for poutine – what’s not to love about fries topped with cheese curds and gravy? This love pushed me to create some variations on poutine – based on dishes that we’ve enjoyed while dining out.

Asparagus Bacon Breakfast Poutine

Wake Bistro’s breakfast poutine was an excellent way of integrating poutine with a dish fit for brunch, substituting hollandaise for gravy, and skillet potatoes for fries. I decided to cross that idea with an asparagus bacon hash, to create an asparagus bacon breakfast poutine for supper.

I cooked up some Irvings bacon, then in the bacon fat, browned baby potatoes from Kuhlmann’s, then added some diced onion. Edgar Farms asparagus was the last vegetable to go in, cooked only for a few minutes. This mixture was transferred into bowls, topped with Cheese Factory cheese curds, our favourite yogurt-based hollandaise recipe (made with Bles Wold yogurt), and a poached Greens, Eggs and Ham duck egg.

Asparagus bacon breakfast poutine

No question, it was a pretty rich dish, so the addition of asparagus helped brighten each bite. Mack thoroughly enjoyed it, but you would be hard pressed to find a meal featuring bacon, cheese and eggs that Mack doesn’t like!

Poutine Sandwiches

A sandwich I still think warmly of is the chip butty from Free Press Bistro, featuring fries and melted cheese sandwiched between pressed ciabatta. My only suggestion was for them to serve it with a side of gravy instead of an aioli, making for the perfect poutine sandwich. It’s been a while since I’ve been to Free Press Bistro, but I was inspired to make our own poutine sandwich tonight.

In the process of making this dish, we made two recipes that I can see becoming staples in our kitchen. First, Ina Garten’s recipe for homemade gravy worked amazingly well, and was incredibly flavourful given I did not have any meat drippings to incorporate. It also had a wobbly sort of consistency, ideal as a sandwich spread. Second, an adapted Cook’s Illustrated recipe for baked fries was without question the easiest and most successful we’ve tried for fries (we didn’t add garlic or cayenne because we wanted a neutral flavour), with the potatoes turning out wonderfully crispy on the outside, but soft on the inside.

We assembled the sandwiches using our remaining Cheese Factory cheese curds and butter buns from Bee Bell Bakery, then toasted them on the stove for a few minutes to melt the cheese.

Assembling the sandwiches

Oh, this is not for the faint of heart. Nor should we have made the serving size two sandwiches each.

Poutine sandwiches

The butter buns were the wrong type of bread to use; something closer to the Free Press’ ciabatta would have been better, but other than that, the poutine sandwich tasted exactly how I imagined it would: salty and squeaky. Mack declared them “money”, then promptly fell into a food coma.

They’re something we’d consider making again, but very sparingly. I think our hearts will thank us!

The Cooking Chronicles: Dinner with Julie

I had mentally bookmarked two of the recipes seen on Dinner with Julie for future reference. It was a bit of a coincidence that I ended up making both of them in the same week.

Though Julie does feature some dishes that are a bit more complex, I find that a majority of them are perfect for time-conscious weekday dinners. And because she posts nearly every day, there’s always something new and interesting up on her site to be inspired by!

Poached Eggs over Warm Lentil Salad with Bacon

Julie’s recipe for a warm lentil salad with a poached egg on top appealed to me as a one-bowl dish with a little bit of everything (it wasn’t, unfortunately, a one-pot dish, however). It was also a great way for me to throw in some of my farmers’ market purchases.

While the lentils were simmering, I cooked up several slices of Irvings bacon, then, in the fat, sautéed some onions, mushrooms, Riverbend Gardens carrots, and Edgar Farms asparagus. A splash of red wine vinegar was added, then once it cooked out, I stirred in the bacon and softened lentils. The salad was topped with a poached duck egg from Greens, Eggs and Ham.

Poached egg over warm lentil salad with bacon

I overcooked the lentils a touch (fifteen minutes probably would have done the trick), and we found the red wine vinegar a little too sharp (lemon juice would likely work better). That said, the runny yolk gave the salad a punch of richness, accented by salty pops of bacon. As a whole, it was a perfect one-bowl dish to be eaten while watching the Lightning take it to the Bruins (yes, back in Game 6), and one that we will definitely make again.

Bacon, Onion, Mushroom and Fontina Pancake

More Irvings bacon found its way into a pancake recipe we adapted to make use of the ingredients in our fridge and pantry. Well, it was more like a pancake crossed with a frittata.

It begins the same way as the previous recipe, by crisping up some bacon, then cooking down onions and mushrooms. But then, a batter of eggs (we used two Greens, Eggs and Ham duck eggs instead of three chicken eggs), flour, mustard, sugar, salt and pepper was added to the pan, topped with fontina (our favourite melting cheese) and baked off for fifteen minutes. We served it with a side salad of greens picked from our balcony (I’ve never been able to say that before!).

Bacon, onion, mushroom and fontina pancake

I really liked the pancake, probably more than the frittatas that we usually make. The half cup of flour made a world of difference in texture, replacing the usually dense egg centre with that of a fluffy cake. I also loved the hint of mustard in the batter (and using the Fitz’s mustard Mack brought back for me from London studded cake with grainy gems).

It was another winning recipe that will go into our rotation. Thanks, Julie!

The Cooking Chronicles: Meat-ful Recipes

I really like the current trend of “meatless Mondays” – though Mack and I don’t subscribe to a specific day of the week substitution of meat, I think the campaign does help raise awareness of the health and planetary benefits of reducing our collective meat intake.

Of course, our current cooking rotation does include a fair amount of meat. I know a part of it has to do with recipes that appeal to us because they’re what we’re used to, but I’m hoping we’ll continue to expand our vegetarian repertoire. If Ellen can do it, we can too! Anyway, here are a few meat-ful recipes in the meantime!

Potato-topped Lamb Pies

Donna Hay’s potato-topped lamb pies from No Time to Cook is a variation on shepherd’s pie, featuring a scalloped crust instead of a mashed one. I had picked up a package of ground lamb from the Italian Bakery one day, knowing I wouldn’t be able to get to the farmers’ market that weekend (they now sell lamb and veal, among other proteins in their freezer section).

It wasn’t a difficult recipe to pull together, and from it, we were able to make a nine inch pie, and two individual ramekin pies.

Potato-topped lamb pies

Although the potato topping didn’t get as crispy as we would have liked, we were more off-put by how fatty the meat ended up being. I probably should have drained the fat, but I really wasn’t expecting it.

Pie filling

More than anything, Mack was reminded that he again doesn’t really care for lamb. I’m not giving up on lamb though – we’ll just have to find a different recipe to try!

Turkey Meatball Subs

I don’t know why I was so excited to make meatball subs, using Mario Batali’s recipe for turkey meatballs, but I was. We used ground turkey from Greens, Eggs and Ham, and pork sausages and prosciutto from the Italian Centre as proteins.

After assembling the meatballs, we had to let them rest in the fridge for an hour.

During that time, I made a basic tomato sauce.

Then, came browning of the meatballs.

Next, I baked them with some of the sauce and wine.

Lastly came assembly of the sandwiches, topped with provolone, then broiled. This is where we made the mistake – the bread ended up scorched from being placed too close to the element in the oven.

Don’t cry over burnt bread

I will admit to being upset, partly because of my anticipation for the finished product, but also because of the lengthy process involved. We cut off the burnt ends, and while both Mack and I did enjoy the sandwiches, it ultimately didn’t seem worth the effort.

The saving grace was the amount of leftovers we had, which made subsequent meals quick and easy – meatballs served with a side salad, or tossed with pasta and the remaining cups of tomato sauce (which, I should mention, is something I will make again – I loved the texture of the sauce, emboldened with sautéed onions and grated carrots).

Hopefully the vegetarian recipes I’ve bookmarked will go better than these two did!

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