Getting Inspired...

It seems like wherever I turn these days I am getting the , same message about food. Go a little more natural, less preservatives, less sugar filler just the beauty of the food brought out. Use spices and herbs to enhance flavour. Snack on the basics to meet your cravings (I'm currently munching on nuts and raisins instead of my usual chips and dip and liking it). Stock up with more fruits and veggies. Drink more *gasp* water (I'm really bad at this). So I'm trying a little at a time to untroduce some changes. I figured this blog would be a good outlet for my venture (and hopefully being public about it will help me along). I also bought 3 (count 'em 3) new cookbooks this week.
The first is Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution. You knew that was coming didn't you? I'm usually not one to get on a cooking bandwagon. I don't watch cooking shows very often (weird for a foodie I know). This is, in fact, the first Jamie Oliver cookbook I've ever bought. I'd been hearing a lot about this book and caught one episode of his show of the same name. I liked what I saw. I checked out his website and the recipes he left on Oprah's site and really liked what I saw, so I bought the book. Yum! I love what's inside. (I love reading good cookbooks - not so strange for a foodie)
The other two books I credit a new friend with. We recently moved and have been meeting new people. We've dined twice at the home of this lovely cook. Her secret to amazing food comes from these books. So, we splurged and bought 2 of them. They are Jeffrey Alford and Naomi Duguid's beautiful recipe books. I bought 'Hot, Sour, Salty, Sweet: A Culinary Journey Through Southeast Asia', and 'Mangoes and Curry Leaves: Culinary Travels Through the Great Subcontinent'. I would love to get more of their books (hint, hint). I really look forward to creating with these books. We love authentic ethnic food and I have craved being able to recreate that in my kitchen.
Onto more of my goals in eating these days. 1-better breakfast, I'll blog on that another day. 2-more salads. This is one of my favorites which I never made because my husband doesn't like raw spinach. It just occurred to me that I could just make a smaller salad for myself (well duh!). Very simple, a handful of baby spinach leaves, some sliced strawberries, a shake of slivered almonds and a spoonful of Renee's poppyseed dressing. Renee's is the best I've found when it comes to salad dressings. Sorry my American friends, this is a Canadian brand, I hope you have an equivalent.

Tonight's dinner had this salad on the side of Salmon baked in a honey hoisin sauce (PC brand out of the jar) and some of Jamie Oliver's nutmeg and garlic rice. The family verdict? Salmon - very yummy, salad - only I ate it and loved it, rice - mixed opinion. My oldest son (who is 5) tried it and wasn't a fan. My husband thought it was a nice change for once in a while. I did too.
I used a basimati. Cook the rice first. Separately, in a large frying pan, over low heat, heat a bit of olive oil and a pat of butter. Add 8 cloves of garlic (peeled and thinly sliced), add a little salt & pepper to season. When garlic is just starting to turn colour add a tsp of ground cinnamon and 1/4 ground nutmeg. Add cooked rice and blend altogether. Remove from heat, squeeze juice of 1 lemon over all and serve hot.

Sweet Potato Salad

At the beginning of the summer we went to our church picnic. Everyone is asked to bring some sort of salad. One of them was the most delicious potato salad I'd ever had. The problem was, I didn't know who brought it and couldn't get the recipe. A few weeks later, we were at a Canada Day BBQ at a friend's place, the same salad was being served. My friend Erin was the creator of this masterpiece. I asked what she did and got a couple of ideas to make something similar. I have yet to get it as perfect as hers, but this one was pretty good.

2 sweet potatoes
6 small/medium potatoes
1 small onion
6 eggs
1/2 cup coleslaw dressing
salt and pepper to taste
parsley to sprinkle

Peel sweet potatoes and potatoes and cut into cubes (Erin makes her cubes a lot smaller than mine). Boil until soft. Boil eggs until hard boiled. Dice onion.
Cool potatoes and eggs. Remove shells from eggs and slice or dice, depending how you like them in your salad.
Mix everything together in a salad bowl. Sprinkle with parsley to decorate.

5 Cup Salad

This was a summer staple for me growing up. When I asked my mom for the recipe she just gave me a funny look and said, "It's 5 cup salad, just remember what was in it and it's a cup of each." Okay, I felt more than a little bit stupid then. 5 cups, 5 ingredients. So easy.

Here's the 5 ingredients, use a cup of each.
-mini marshmallows
-coconut
-mandarin oranges
-sour cream
-pineapple tidbits

Mix everything together. I find it tastes best if you make it ahead of time (the morning of or the day before you serve it)

Guest Post - BBQ by my "wonderful" Husband

This was largely an "impromptu" BBQ. I used to cook in Restaurants previously to Pastoring, Kris' Mom requested that I cook her a meal before she returned home to B.C. The meal is steak, with garlic prawns, sauteed veg. and a tortelini pasta salad.
The Steak was marinaded previously to grilling in an experiemental mixture of red wine and BBQ Sauce. I had been recommended by some friends a product which is available in Canada in the President's Choice line of products: Smokin' Habenero BBQ Sauce (it is made with habernero peppers and Tequila) YUM! I added about 1/4 cup of Red Wine (Cabernet Savignon) and about 1 cup of the BBQ Sauce. They steaks were marinaded for about 3 hours and during grilling I poured the unused marinade over the steaks. They were delicious.

The Sauteed Vegetables are simple. I chose some green and red peppers, carrots, snow peas, and onion and sauteed them lightly for 6-8 min. in a bit of oil. The carrots were cut very thin so that they were not super crunchy compared with the peppers. Avoid overcooking to bring out the most flavor.

The Tortelini Pasta Salad I made ahead of time. I bought some fresh cheese tortelini from our local supermarket and some fresh basil. Chop the fresh basil, add some ripe tomato, green onion,
olive oil, salt and pepper, and voila. The Tortelini was about 2 cups worth, 1-1/2 - 2 tablespoons of fresh chopped basil (keep all bits of stalk out), 1 whole medium tomato (ripe) you could also use a roma tomato, 1 sprig of green onion finely chopped, cover with olive oil, and a splash of red wine vinegar, salt and pepper to taste.

Next the Garlic Prawns.
I always use prawns that are either fresh or IQF - Individually Quality Frozen. I avoid any
shrimp or prawns which have been cooked and peeled previous to frozen- I find they are the equivalent to eating pink rubber. The prawns I purchased were butterflied (a cut down the back of the prawns which allows for easy peeling when thawed.) When I cook with garlic - I want to taste garlic. For about 25 prawns I pressed 2-3 cloves of garlic and set them asside.
I am a big believer in timing the cooking so that each part of the meal is perfectly cooked and is ready at the same time. Sautee the prawns in 2 tablespoons of margerine, add the garlic, and prawns and add a splash of white wine or cooking wine, and cover. The prawns are done when they turn a nice pink color, do not overcook. I hope you enjoy these recipies. I really enjoyed cooking this meal, and would certainly use these recipies again.


This is me, "the chef". The meal was thoroughly enjoyed by my Mother in Law!

Black Bean and Corn Salad and a Candy Man

Church picnic time! Everyone brings a salad. Where do I turn to find my recipe? The Podleski sisters's Eat, Shrink and Be Merry of course (the original title being Kernel Austin). It's a really yummy, but different salad offering, a nice change.

1 tbsp olive oil
4 cups whole-kernel corn, canned or frozen (thaw first if using frozen)
1/2 cup minced red onions
1 jalapeno pepper, seeded and minced (optional)
1 tsp minced garlic
1/4 tsp each ground cumin and chili powder
1 cup quartered grape tomatoes or 1 cup diced red bell pepper (I used a little of both)
1 cup canned black beans, drained and rinsed
2 tbsp freshly squeezed lime juice
2 tbsp minced fresh cilantro
1 tbsp hickory-flavored bbq sauce
1 tsp granulated sugar
salt and pepper to taste

Heat olive oil in a large, non-stick skillet over medium-high heat. Add corn. Cook and stir until corn just begins to char (don't burn it!), about 8 minutes. Add onions, jalapeno, garlic, cumin and chili powder. Cook and stir 1 more minute. Remove from heat.
Transfer corn mixture to a large bowl and add remaining ingredients. Mix well. Cover and refrigerate for at least 2 hours before serving.



This was a cute, edible craft the kids made at the picnic.

The body is a long skewer threaded with 3 large marshmallows. Put half a toothpick into each side of the body and thread a gummy worm on each for arms. A circle gummy completes it for the head. Some kids got really into it and added some gummy worms for feet and antenna too.

Post 100 is...Cheeseburgers!

So I'm still not on par with my blogging life, but I'll get there. Today was my last day of work for a little while (ahh, summer vacation), and what better way to celebrate what I consider to be the beginning of summer than a post about homemade burgers and potato salad?

Burger Patties

1 lb lean ground beef
1 egg
1/4 cup bread crumbs
1/4 cup BBQ sauce of your choice

Mix everything together with your hands. Shape into patties, your preference of size. BBQ. Add more BBQ sauce as the burgers are cooking for additional flavour. Add cheese to melt on if you wish.

Potato Salad

6-8 potatoes, peeled and cut into 1 inch chunks
2 eggs
1/4 cup diced red onion
2 generous spoons of light mayo
a good squirt of mustard
salt and pepper
dash of paprika

Boil potatoes until cooked. Boil eggs until they are hard boiled. Cool both. Peel and chop eggs when cool. In a medium bowl add all the ingredients except paprika together. Mix together. Sprinkle paprika on top.

Saturday BBQ at the park

One good thing about living in a company town is that they have used some of their land to turn into a park space. And because they are an oil company they pipe gas into the park right to gas BBQ's. I love this. Several times over the sunny (and somewhat warm) season (it's not long around here) we take our BBQ up to the park for dinner and then go for a hike afterwards.

Steak Marinade

1/4 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup steak sauce
2 cloves garlic, crushed
2 tbsp lime juice
2 tbsp brown sugar
1/4 tsp ground pepper

Mix everything together in a small bowl. Pour over steaks to marinade for at least 2 hours (I like to marinade them for 24 hours, it tastes better). I also bought the club pack (read=big, cheap pack) of steak meat this week. It came with 2 large cuts of beef. I cut one into serving size steaks and trimmed the fat from it. I then marinaded it with this marinade in a ziplock bag. The other steak I trimmed the fat from and cut into strips to marinade for fajitas (look for this recipe later this week).

Chick Pea Salad

Also known as Red, White and Yahoo Salad from Eat, Shrink and Be Merry by Janet and Greta Podleski. One of my favortite summertime salads (and requested potluck dishes).

1 can of chickpeas, drained and rinsed
1 pint of grape tomatoes, (slice each tomato in half)
1 container of mini bocconcini, (slice each cheese in half) - (about 2 cups)
1/4 cup fresh basil, chopped
1/4 cup red onion, finely chopped
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp balsalmic vinegar
salt and pepper to season

Mix everything together

*Bocconcini is fresh mozzerella in little cheese balls. You can find it in the specialty cheese area (or fresh pasta area) of your grocery store. If you've never had these before, you are in for a treat. I make another salad, that's very similar with the larger bocconcinis and tomatoes and basil that's absolutely delicious too :o)

Fruit salad

I love fruit salad, it's so easy and you can pretty much put whatever kind of fruit you want in it. When I was teaching kindergarten, for our end of the year party I would have the kids each bring in a fruit of their choice. We'd then cut it all up and put it in a big bowl to mix togehter, naming it friendship salad.
This week's fruit salad had:
1 banana
1 gala apple (peeled)
2 kiwi
1 cup mixed berries
1 mandarin orange cup (1/4 cup), drained
1 tbsp lemon juice

I know, I've said before that I'm not a fan of oranges, and I'm not...but I don't mind them in fruit salad because I can pick around them and other people like them.

Also at our BBQ picnic we had Party Mix and Pop.

You'll notice that this didn't have anything to do with Memorial Day. We don't have Memorial Day. Our May holiday Monday is Victoria Day (the week before). Victoria Day falls the Monday before May 24th, which was Queen Victoria's birthday. It's in rememberance of her and an acknowledgement of the reining sovereign (Queen Elizabeth) It doesn't mark the beginning of summer holidays either (though we still think of it as an official marker of summer). We still have until the end of June before school is out. I hope all of you had a great May long weekend (regardless of where you are and what you are celebrating and when) Cheers!

Thai inspired dinner with a good friend

I've been wanting to visit my favorite Thai restaurant, Suwanna for a while now. It's a nicer place to go and we usually reserve it for special occasions (the last time we were there was my birthday back in November. We were going to go there for Jonathan's birthday a couple of weeks ago but it was closed (they take a couple of week's holiday each year). So while we went elsewhere for dinner that night, my Thai craving didn't go away. While I make a decent Thai stir-fry, there are other dishes that I love eating but have never made myself. Tonight was the night to search and experiment. Can I make more than a stir-fry? Can I brave a carrot salad and succeed? How about Chicken Satay and peanut sauce?
I did some googling and found a few recipes for each. Some I followed as written, others I tweaked.
1st up was the carrot salad. Carrot salad is something I would never have ordered were it not for the encouragement of my friend Erin on her birthday at Suwanna one year. She raved about it. I thought how good could a pile of shredded carrot be? I am not a huge coleslaw fan to begin with, why would I order something resembling coleslaw at a fancy restaurant? I am so glad I did. This carrot salad was so delicious. I found a highly rated version at Group Recipes and gave it a go.

3 cups grated carrots
Vinaigrette:
1/4 cup rice vinegar
3 tablespoons fresh lime juice
1 tablespoon fresh orange juice
1 tablespoon orange zest
1 tablespoon chopped fresh cilantro
3 tablespoons maple syrup
1/4 teaspoon red chili flakes
1 cup chopped peanuts
Finely chopped fresh mint for garnish (I didn't have fresh mint so I left this out)

Directions
In a food processor blend all the vinaigrette ingredients except peanuts and mint. (I used a hand blender to mix)
Wash the carrots with a brush and grate into a large bowl.
Add the dressing and marinate for 20 minutes before serving. (ours marinated for closer to an hour)
Garnish with chopped peanuts and mint.

The result was a lovely salad. All adults at the table loved it. I say adults because my kids took one look at their plate of salad, rice and chicken and kind of shook their head. Elijah ate the rice, tried the chicken and salad before rejecting it. Jeremy didn't even get that far. He immediately grabbed the salad into his hands and said, 'No like this' and started to pile it onto my husband's plate. At that point I figured it would be a lot easier (and quieter) to make them each a snack plate supper of cheese and crackers, yogurt cups and dried fruit. It worked!




Thai stir-fry and basamati rice I could probably make in my sleep by now. I made the stir-fry and curry sauce plain (no shrimp or anything) and added more veg than I would if I were making this with a meat. I halved the sauce from my usual as I had only half a can of coconut milk left over from the satay marinade.

Stir-fry

1 tbsp cooking oil
1 onion, chopped
1/2 red pepper, chopped
1/2 yellow pepper, chopped
1/2 green pepper, chopped

Stir-fry all of the above over medium low heat until just soft, add the sauce (below) and allow to cook together to let the flavours blend into each other. Add some fresh chopped cilantro just before serving.

Curry Sauce (1/2)

1/2 can coconut milk
1/2 tsp red curry paste
few dashes of fish sauce

Boil altogether in a small saucepan, whisking well.



Chicken Satay

The chicken satay recipe I found at All Recipes.

1/2 cup canned coconut milk
1 1/2 teaspoons ground coriander
1 teaspoon yellow curry powder
1 teaspoon fish sauce
1/2 teaspoon chili oil
1 pound skinless, boneless chicken breast halves - cut into strips
1 tablespoon chopped fresh cilantro (did not add)
1 tablespoon chopped unsalted peanuts (did not add)
12 wooden skewers, soaked in water for 15 minutes (we just grilled the chicken without being on skewers)

In a medium bowl, stir together the coconut milk, ground coriander, curry powder, fish sauce, and chili oil. Add the chicken breast strips, and stir to coat. Cover, and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes, and up to 2 hours.
Preheat an indoor or outdoor grill for high heat. Thread the chicken strips onto skewers. Discard marinade.
Grill chicken for 2 to 3 minutes per side, until no longer pink. Time will depend on how thick your strips are. Transfer to a serving plate, and garnish with cilantro and peanuts. Serve with peanut sauce for dipping.

*We didn't skewer it and I didn't add the cilantro and peanuts at the end because I already had a couple of dishes with both. Also, when I started the marinade I was out of ground corriander so I used 1 tsp thyme and 1/2 tsp parsley in it instead. I did have to make a grocery run for a couple of things (highly unusual for me, I know) and ended up picking up some ground coriander while I was there and adding it to the marinade when I got home. I think the chicken sat in the marindade for a good 3 hours before we grilled it on the BBQ. I also managed to convince my husband to BBQ in the rain for me for this, which I am very grateful.

This chicken was really tasty. I would definately make it again.



Peanut Sauce

The peanut sauce I had a harder time finding. I read a lot of peanut sauce recipes and never did find one that I thought would be really good. What I ended up doing was basing mine on a recipe I found at All Recipes and then adapting it based on the comments it had received. It made a lot more sauce than I was expecting, and I ended up cooking it in a small saucepan over low-medium heat in order to get the peanut butter to a really smooth consistancy.

1/2 cup crunchy peanut butter (I used smooth, natural)
2 tablespoons soy sauce
1 teaspoon white sugar (I used brown sugar instead and increased it to 1 tbsp)
2 drops hot pepper sauce (I increased this quite a bit, probably 4 or 5 good shakes, not drops)
1 clove garlic, minced (I increased this to 2 cloves crushed)
1/2 cup water
*I added a little bit of chili oil and threw in some sesame seeds too

In a small bowl, stir together peanut butter, soy sauce, sugar, hot pepper sauce and garlic until well mixed. Gradually stir in water until texture is smooth and creamy.
*These directions didn't work for me. I combined everything into a small saucepan and whisked it together over low-medium heat instead.

The results were quite tasty.

Dinner was followed by mango sorbet and chocolate chip cookies. Very tasty.

So a little while back, Mommy Gourmet challenged us to have a meal with a friend (or friends) and write about it. I really wanted to do this, not for the contest of it, but because I really enjoy spending time with my friends. Because of the chaos that is our lives at present I was starting to think that I wouldn't have the time to share an evening with everyone. We did have dinner with friends over the past month, but it's been dinner out, not dinner in.

This morning after church, my husband was chatting with a very good friend of ours, Debbie. As I joined them I kept getting the nudge to invite her over for dinner, so I did. (Hey, when God speaks, I've learned to listen). As soon as the words were out of my mouth, Jonathan said, "I was just thinking that, yes, you should come over for supper tonight." So she agreed.
It has been too long since we've had Debbie over. We don't live close to our family (life having taken us to the complete opposite side of Canada), but we've been fortunate enough to make some friendships here that truly have become more than friendship. I would count Debbie as someone who is more family to us. She is one of Jeremy's godparents. She is someone that we have travelled with. She is someone who has cared for our children when we've gone away (she looked after Elijah when I was labouring with Jeremy). She's one of the first people to know what's going on with us. She prays for us and with us. She's just a really lovely person. Her daughter, Christy is also very close to us and is the first person we call to take care of the boys when we want a night out. Christy was away tonight for the long weekend, so it was just Debbie, which was neat because we often don't get to see Debbie, just Debbie.
The boys were so excited to see her. She is one of their favorite people. You can always tell with the kids who they like and who they don't by how much they show off, and it was full force show off mode tonight.
Most of the night took place in the kitchen (because let's face it, I'm somewhat of a Maritmer now and that's what Maritimers do) and we just talked. We talked while I finished up supper. We talked while we ate. We talked while I cleaned up. We talked during dessert. And we talked over tea (Darjeeling - me) and coffee (Starbucks blend - Jonathan and Debbie) afterwards. Those are some of the best nights. You don't need to plan any entertainment (and really, a two year old running around in his diaper telling you he's naked is entertainment - and hey, there's always his four year old brother doing his best Elvis impersonation using a hockey stick as a guitar too). It's just friends being friends, catching up and being comfortable with each other. There's no pressure to be anyone in particular, just yourself.
Debbie loved the food. She fully admits to being a functional cook. She makes sure that there is always a nutritious meal set out (she and another friend of ours run a place called Jordan House, which boards women who need a place to stay), but she's not one to experiment with food. She had a good laugh that my kids would turn down this 'gourmet meal' for cheese and crackers. She thought the carrot salad was so tasty (never having had Suwanna's to compare to). She asked how I made the stir-fry (and had seconds, always a compliment to the cook). And just seemed to really enjoy the meal. She also had a giggle over me taking pictures of what we were eating, but was intregued enough to want to see the blog after supper.
I don't think you can ask for much more than that. Good friend, good food, good time.



Debbie with Elijah

Simple Salad

We had a potluck this week and I signed up for salad duty, figuring that I could work with what I had in the house already. Here's what I came up with:

6 cups organic field greens salad mix
1 cup blueberries
1/2 cup sugared walnuts*see below
1/4 - 1/2 cup poppy seed dressing (I like Renee's) - to your own liking

Mix everything together just before serving.

Sugared Walnuts

1/2 cup walnut pieces or halves
2 tbsp margarnine, melted
2 tbsp sugar
1 tsp cinnimon

Heat oven to 300*. Coat walnuts with melted margarine by shaking together in a ziplock bag. Spread walnuts into a jelly-roll or loaf pan. Sprinkle sugar and cinnimon onto walnuts. Mix together. Bake in oven for 20-30 minutes to toast.

Greek Salad

Usually I use Renee's brand Greek dressing for this, but I was out, so I made up my own dressing. Here it is:

1/2 cup olive oil
1/4 cup lemon juice
1/4 cup water
1/4 cup Greek seasoning mix
1 tbsp oregano
(I'd probably crumble feta into this too, about 1/4 cup)

Mix everything together well. Makes 1 cup of dressing.

The Salad:

1/2 English cucumber, chopped into 1/2 inch chunks
1 tomato (I prefer Roma, but any tomato will do), cut into 1/2 inch chunks
1/2 green pepper, cut into chunks
kalamata olives, as many as you like (I don't like these, but my husband does)
1/2 cup crumbled feta
2-3 tbsp finely chopped red onion

Mix everything together. Add dressing (drizzle enough for your likeing) just before serving (salad gets soggy if sitting in dressing for a long time).