I'm sneaking in just before midnight with a tip. Traditional Oven is one of the most useful baking sites I've ever used, as it provides conversions for specific ingredients like butter, sugar, and flour. The butter converter gets the most use from me - for example, it's a lot easier to weigh 85g of butter than to try to get 6 tablespoons while it's still chilled for scones.
Friday, November 6, 2009
Thursday, November 5, 2009
Bonfire Night!
Wanting a trip to England in November may sound strange, but I love Bonfire Night so much that I would go every year if I could. It combines some of my favourite things: fireworks, food, and history. I'm linking back to an old post for this - while they may not seem like it, these little roast potatoes are the ultimate finger food. Just pop them in a little paper bag or newspaper cone and they are a great snack on a cold night.
Read More...
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
Baby not Food
I just wanted to share with everyone my reason for not posting forever! We welcomed a new addition to our family. Once I am able to sleep a bit more through the night I hope to be back to posting like usual - but will probably be doing recipes that are a lot faster :-)
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
Vegetables Galore
Just before the first snowfall, we pulled up the last of the garden (except for a few hibernating potatoes). This was my share of the harvest, and I spent a weekend preparing everything for storage and freezing. Most of the leeks and zucchini were put in the food processor and frozen for soups and baking, and the carrots were chopped, blanched, and frozen. Now I can look forward to garden veg all through the winter!
Monday, November 2, 2009
English Apple Cake
With my bags of apples from Superstore I needed some simple recipes. Attempting to bake in the midst of messy home renos was trying, to say the least. Luckily, Nigel Slater did not fail me; I often find his simple, thrown-together meals are the tastiest.
I've now made this three times as it is so quick & easy. The apples don't need to be peeled, just cored & roughly chopped, and while it needs an hour of baking time it only takes 10 minutes of prep. It also adapts well to changes, which is not always true of baking. I changed the pan from an 8" square to an 8" round as that was what I had unpacked, and switched lemon juice for lime juice (which I now prefer).
Nigel Slater's English Apple Cake:
130g butter
130g sugar
3-4 medium apples
juice of half a lemon or lime
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
2 tbsp brown sugar
2 eggs
130g flour
1 tsp baking powder
Preheat oven to 350F/180C. Line an 8" round springform pan by just pushing parchment paper inside so it comes up the sides of the pans. It doesn't matter if this isn't pretty, as this cake is pretty rustic anyway. There is no need to grease the pan, making for easier clean-up as well.
Core and chop the apples and put in a bowl with the lemon or lime juice. Toss with cinnamon & brown sugar and set aside while you cream the butter & sugar well, then beat in the eggs. Sift the flour and baking powder together and fold into the mixture. Scrape the batter into the pan and dump the apples on top with a little extra sugar. Bake 1 hour. You may be unsure about done-ness as it's difficult to tell with all the apples on top, but each time I've made this 1 hour has been perfect. 
Sunday, November 1, 2009
Spiced Applesauce
We're back! After a month-long hiatus (and some pretty sporadic posting in September), I am hoping to get back into the swing of things by participating in National Blog Posting Month. We were pretty busy in October - me with home renovations and Court with her new baby girl - and with the holiday season coming up things will probably stay that way. Hopefully we'll be up for the challenge.
Discovering orchard bins of apples at Superstore has meant a glut of baking for me recently. Who can resist apples at $0.54/lb? They're a little banged up, but perfect for cakes, pies, and (obviously) apple sauce. I tweaked this a bit by using Lyle's Golden Syrup (which I could eat by the spoon) instead of sugar and cardamom instead of cinnamon. This was warm, fragrant, and delicious... and perfect for autumn.
Applesauce:
4 apples, peeled/cored/chopped
3/4 cup water
2-3 tbsp Lyle's golden syrup
cardamom, to taste
Add apples and water to a saucepan over medium heat and cook until soft. Bash up with a spoon over the heat and add the syrup and cardamom, both to taste.
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Fall Salad
I know frequently fall arrives and all thoughts turn away from fresh salads and towards pasta and roasts, but it is actually a great time to incorporate some of the last findings from your garden into a nice salad, and it can even be a warm one if you feel the need. I went for lunch at Earl's the other day with a friend, and they had an arugula, beet and pear salad on the menu, and I used that as an inspiration for this salad. For mine though I tried to crank up the iron (last three weeks of pregnancy!) and use up some of my second batch of spinach.
Fall Salad:
A good batch of spinach
Half a ripe pear
A sprinkling of pecans
One large beet, cut into chunks and boiled until soft
Half a steak, pan fried and sliced to top
Dress with a bit of lemon juice and oil, and goat cheese coulis (which I just made by microwaving a bit of goat cheese with a bit of milk so that it could be drizzled like a dressing).
With the beets and steak being served warm, as well as the goat cheese coulis, this made a really satisfying lunch on a chilly day. I will definitely be bringing it back as a lunch choice through the winter.
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
"English" Onion Soup
Sometimes I have a good husband. He spends lots of time on the internet and watching TV instead of doing things I want him to like taking out the garbage on garbage day, but then every once in a while when I am super miserable, he does something like make me homemade onion soup with onions from our garden and then I like him again. Although he didn't follow the Jamie Oliver recipe to the letter, it was the base he used, and it turned out very well.
Jamie:"There's something so incredibly humble about onion soup. It's absolutely one of my favourites but unfortunately I only ever get to make it in the restaurant or for myself as the missus thinks she's allergic to onions. (She's not, because I whiz them up into loads of dishes without her knowing!)
"If you have the opportunity, get hold of as many different types of onion for this soup as you can - you need about 1kg in total. Sweat them gently and you'll be amazed at all the flavours going on"
(Serves 8)Ingredients:
A good knob of butter
Olive oil
A good handful of fresh sage leaves, 8 leaves reserved for serving (we used thyme)
6 cloves of garlic, peeled and crushed
5 red onions, peeled and sliced
3 large white onions, peeled and sliced
3 banana shallots, peeled and sliced
300g of leeks, trimmed, washed and sliced
Instead of all the above we used close to 1 kg of whatever onions we had (regular and dividers) from the garden.
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 litres of good-quality hot beef, chicken or vegetable stock (we used beef)
8 slices of good-quality stale bread, 2cm thick (as you can see there was no skimping on this)
200g freshly grated cheddar cheese
Worcestershire sauce
1. Put the butter, 2 glugs of olive oil, the sage and garlic into a thick-bottomed, non-stick pan. Stir everything round and add the onions, shallots and leeks. Season with salt and pepper. Place a lid on the pan, leaving it slightly ajar, and cook slowly for 50 minutes, without colouring the vegetables too much. Remove the lid for the last 20 minutes - your onions will become soft and golden. Stir occasionally so that nothing catches on the bottom. Having the patience to cook the onions slowly, slowly, gives you an incredible sweetness and an awesome flavour, so don't be tempted to speed this bit up.
2. When your onions and leeks are lovely and silky, add the stock. Bring to the boil, turn the heat down and simmer for 10 to 15 minutes. You can skim any fat off the surface if you like, but I prefer to leave it because it adds good flavour.
3. Preheat the oven or grill to maximum. Toast your bread on both sides. Correct the seasoning of the soup. When it's perfect, ladle it into individual heatproof serving bowls and place them on a baking tray. Tear toasted bread over each bowl to fit it like a lid. Feel free to push and dunk the bread into the soup a bit. Sprinkle with some grated Cheddar and drizzle over a little Worcestershire sauce.
4. Dress your reserved sage leaves with some olive oil and place one on top of each slice of bread. Put the baking tray into the preheated oven or under the grill to melt the cheese until bubbling and golden. Keep an eye on it and make sure it doesn't burn! When the cheese is bubbling, very carefully lift out the tray and carry it to the table. Enjoy.
Jamie:"There's something so incredibly humble about onion soup. It's absolutely one of my favourites but unfortunately I only ever get to make it in the restaurant or for myself as the missus thinks she's allergic to onions. (She's not, because I whiz them up into loads of dishes without her knowing!)
"If you have the opportunity, get hold of as many different types of onion for this soup as you can - you need about 1kg in total. Sweat them gently and you'll be amazed at all the flavours going on"
(Serves 8)Ingredients:
A good knob of butter
Olive oil
A good handful of fresh sage leaves, 8 leaves reserved for serving (we used thyme)
6 cloves of garlic, peeled and crushed
5 red onions, peeled and sliced
3 large white onions, peeled and sliced
3 banana shallots, peeled and sliced
300g of leeks, trimmed, washed and sliced
Instead of all the above we used close to 1 kg of whatever onions we had (regular and dividers) from the garden.
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 litres of good-quality hot beef, chicken or vegetable stock (we used beef)
8 slices of good-quality stale bread, 2cm thick (as you can see there was no skimping on this)
200g freshly grated cheddar cheese
Worcestershire sauce
1. Put the butter, 2 glugs of olive oil, the sage and garlic into a thick-bottomed, non-stick pan. Stir everything round and add the onions, shallots and leeks. Season with salt and pepper. Place a lid on the pan, leaving it slightly ajar, and cook slowly for 50 minutes, without colouring the vegetables too much. Remove the lid for the last 20 minutes - your onions will become soft and golden. Stir occasionally so that nothing catches on the bottom. Having the patience to cook the onions slowly, slowly, gives you an incredible sweetness and an awesome flavour, so don't be tempted to speed this bit up.
2. When your onions and leeks are lovely and silky, add the stock. Bring to the boil, turn the heat down and simmer for 10 to 15 minutes. You can skim any fat off the surface if you like, but I prefer to leave it because it adds good flavour.
3. Preheat the oven or grill to maximum. Toast your bread on both sides. Correct the seasoning of the soup. When it's perfect, ladle it into individual heatproof serving bowls and place them on a baking tray. Tear toasted bread over each bowl to fit it like a lid. Feel free to push and dunk the bread into the soup a bit. Sprinkle with some grated Cheddar and drizzle over a little Worcestershire sauce.
4. Dress your reserved sage leaves with some olive oil and place one on top of each slice of bread. Put the baking tray into the preheated oven or under the grill to melt the cheese until bubbling and golden. Keep an eye on it and make sure it doesn't burn! When the cheese is bubbling, very carefully lift out the tray and carry it to the table. Enjoy.
Thursday, September 17, 2009
Ratatouille Tarte
As mentioned last week, I took the Ratatouille I made, and used some of it in a tarte. Really, a tarte is pretty much the same as a quiche for all intents and purposes. In this case I threw some goat cheese in with it because who doesn't love goat cheese with roasted veggies? I served it up with a nice little spinach, bacon, pine nut and goat cheese salad for lunch when my mom came over. Isn't this such a girls lunch?
Ratatouille Tarte:
Buy or make a pie crust (I buy, I am crap at pastry)
Add your fillings (ratatouille and goat cheese) so that they cover a good deal of the bottom of the tarte, but don't pile up above the rim of the crust.
Mix up eggs and cream at a ratio of two eggs per quarter cup of cream so that you get a consistency that isn't quite the same as an omelet. Give it a good whip so that it comes out light and fluffy. The amount you need will depend on the size of crust you use - I made two at once (and froze one after baking), and used seven eggs in total.
Bake in a 400 F oven until it is set (about 40 minutes). I cover it in foil for the first half and then uncover it to brown for the second half.
Throwing an extra in the freezer after they are done baking is a great way to have a little snack on hand for when you get surprise lunch guests, and all you need to do when you are ready for it is throw it in the oven covered in foil at 350 until it is reheated.
Friday, September 11, 2009
Ratatouille Nicoise
I swear that Monday morning after the long weekend I woke up and it was dark in the morning. I know it makes no sense that this would suddenly be the case, but it was like fall arrived that very day. This weekend is supposed to be warm enough to make it feel like summer still, but the cool nights will not allow us to be tricked like that. It is fall, winter is on the way, let the mourning begin. On the bright side, I have some fall "crops" that are performing well. As is always the case, all of a sudden I have a zillion zucchini. What to do? Of course I have shredded and frozen many baggies full (pre-measured) so that I can make zucchini bread through the winter, but when I say I have zillions, I mean I have zillions. Last year I spent a couple weeks of the summer in France (along the Basque coast), and while there I picked up a lovely little cookbook that appears to be the equivalent of the Betty Crocker one here. By that I mean it was the one everyone was given back in the 70s when they got married. It has a great recipe for Ratatouille Nicoise that I whipped up, and then used to make a ratatouille and chevre tarte (to be posted next week) based on one I ate there. It wasn't quite like being there, but it was the best I could do without the expensive plane ticket.
Ratatouille Nicoise (translated from French, probably badly):
3 onions
4 eggplants
4 zucchini
500g tomatoes
2 peppers (I used red)
1 tbsp olive oil
2 cloves garlic
Bouquet garni (parsley, thyme, bay leaf)
salt and pepper
Peel onions and then cut all the veggies into strips. Heat the olive oil in a casserole dish - I can just see all the French ladies using their le cruesets - and then saute the onions for a minute. Add the other veggies, the salt and pepper and the bouquet garni and cover to simmer in the oven for 1 hour and 30 minutes. The recipe doesn't give a temperature, so I went with the ever popular 350 F. Don't forget to take out the bouquet before serving (or at least don't scoop it out into someone's bowl, they will be confused).
Nothing feels more french to me than using a bouquet garni. When I was staying there, the woman who was hosting us seemed to use a bouquet of fresh herbs in every dish she cooked and I swear it made everything seem twice as delicious. If I don't have string with which to tie the herbs up together I often use non flavoured dental floss.
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