Normally when I have people over for dinner I don't do the old-school Sunday dinner roast and potatoes (mostly because I am terrible at judging roasting times and I have a fear of serving overcooked meat). I finally decided to take the challenge however, and luckily Canadian Beef has a website that gave me exact cooking times by weight to acheive lovely medium-rare goodness. I wanted to change up the sides though, so I modified this pie slightly from Donna Hay's Seasons, which I received as a Christmas gift and is one of the most beautifully shot cookbooks I have ever seen.
Kabocha, Spinach & Goat Cheese Pie (serves 6):
tomato paste
1 small kabocha/butternut squash, peeled & sliced
1 small onion, sliced
1 tbsp olive oil
1 roll PC puff pastry (1/2 package), thawed
spinach
150g goat cheese
1 egg, lightly beaten
Using President's Choice pastry over Tenderflake is practically a necessity. PC comes in 2 rolls which are very easy to use, rather than the flat blocks that take forever to roll out yourself.
Preheat oven to 200C/390F. Cook onion and squash 15-20min until tender and set aside to cool. Roll out pastry to about half it's original thickness, then cut in half and place one half on a lined cookie sheet or baking pan. Spread with tomato past then top with the remaining ingredients. Place the second half of the pastry on top and press or roll the edges to seal. Brush with the egg and bake 30 minutes until golden.
Friday, April 15, 2011
Kabocha, Spinach & Goat Cheese Pie
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Pâté de foie gras
I love, love, love all types of pâté, but j'adore foie gras. Mmmm, that extra fattiness makes all the difference, and I am fortunate to have friends that understand my love and bring some back for me on each trip to France. Somehow, it seems you can always tell the difference in quality between what I have tasted that's been produced here and the original. Also, since I seem to be one of the few people I know that enjoy it, it means I get most of the tin to myself!
Wednesday, April 6, 2011
Anna Olson's Pear Almond Tart
I always seem to purchase too much fruit for one person to reasonably eat, so end up with a glut of it on the verge of going off. In my search for a way to use up some pears, I came across this gluten free tart in a recipe on the Food Network site. It doesn't really have a cake texture, more of a squidgy/meringue-y/sticky goodness texture... and if that's not enough to sell it I don't know what is.
Pear Almond Tart:
2 ripe pears
1/2 tsp cardamom
1 tbsp sugar
2 cups ground almonds
6 eggs
1 3/4 cups sugar
1/4 tsp almond extract
Preheat oven to 350F/180C and butter a 14"x3" pan or tart shell. Halve and core the pears, then toss with cardamom and 1 tbsp sugar. Blend together almonds, eggs, 1 3/4 cups sugar, and almond extract, then pour into your buttered pan. Press the pears into the batter, cut side up. Bake for 40-50 minutes.
Sunday, April 3, 2011
Chikuzen-ni
Winter is nearly over but I am still kind of in winter-mode and craving simmered dishes like stews or this one. Without the stick-to-your-bones gravy of most stews though, this is a pretty light dish that is heavy on vegetables and uses the konnyaku (almost calorie-less) to fill you up.
Chikuzen-ni (serves 4-5):
450g chicken thighs, diced in 2cm cubes
4-6 shiitake mushrooms
2 carrots, cut into rolling wedges
1 burdock root (gobo - pictured), cut into rolling wedges
1 cake konnyaku, sliced and twisted
1-2 tbsp vegetable oil
1 cup dashi
2 tbsp sugar
6 tbsp soy sauce
60g snow peas or green beans, parboiled
Heat 
the oil over high heat and add the chicken, konnyaku, mushrooms, carrot, and burdock. Cook for about 3 minutes, ensuring everything has a light coating of oil and is partially cooked. Next add the dashi and bring to a boil, then add the sugar and soy sauce. Cover with a drop lid (or a vent-lid like pictured) and simmer until reduced by about 1/3. Add in the cooked snow peas just prior to serving.
Friday, April 1, 2011
Cream Cheese + Skor = Better Than It Sounds
Don't judge me, okay. THIS DISH IS REALLY SHALLOW. After going to several book clubs and birthdays featuring this dip, I finally caved and asked a friend how it was made. Thus, my downfall. I did a quick google search to get the quantities right (the only change I made was to add a little vanilla) and had a Saturday night dessert in 5 minutes.
Monday, March 28, 2011
Beard Papa in NYC, LA... Edmonton?
I had heard about the Japanese cream puff chain Beard Papa, so when I first spotted it in New York in 2009 I knew I had to stop in even laden with shopping bags. I'm certainly glad I did. The pastry is made fresh and filled to order with a choice of vanilla, chocolate, or matcha custard.
I next came across it in LA in June of last year and of course dragged my mum with me to create another addict. This time I got the vanilla topped with chocolate. One would think that chocolate could only enhance the goodness, but these are actually better without - light and airy and not too sweet. I didn't bother stopping in Tokyo as there were too many other things to try, but now I wish I had so the title of this post would be more exciting.
You can imagine my delight when I heard that an Edmonton outpost (located near the Ice Palace in West Edmonton Mall) was opening last fall. Somehow it took me until last weekend to finally stop by, and it was delicious as usual. Standard size was $2.69 each, and they also offered mini versions for $0.99. One important note - they really do not travel well as the custard filling causes the pastry to get soggy quite quickly.
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Niche
As the last person on earth without a Facebook account, the only thing I didn't like about Niche was it's lack of a website. Other than that, the food was delicious and reasonably priced, service was good, and the interior both modern and cosy. And had I had access to Facebook I would have also known that they give free parking passes to customers (instead I drove around in circles and was late for the reservation).
Above, quinoa salad with roasted vegetables and mixed greens with a lemon tahini vinaigrette. Below, braised pork and lentil soup.
Above, Spring Creek braised beef cheeks in a wild mushroom cream with broad egg noodles. Below, roasted pork tenderloin with blackberry gastrique on mashed potatoes.
Below, brownie with salted caramel and lemon whipped cream.
Sunday, March 20, 2011
Nomiya - New Japanese!
Courtney is so mean to me! :( That's why she didn't get to come when I visited Nomiya (3803 Calgary Tr) earlier today. I was super excited to hear about new non-sushi Japanese in Edmonton. They still have sushi on the menu, but the main draw is the ramen. They also had a good selection of standard Japanese fare that is typically not found at other local restaurants.
Sunday lunch hours end at 2:30 (they reopen for dinner at 4:30) and we arrived just past 2pm with about 4 groups of people ahead of us. We luckily sneaked in just in time as we were the last allowed to be seated at the bar after a 30 minute wait. Who knew it would be so popular?
We started with the chicken karaage which was extremely tender and made with fatty chicken resulting in juicy bites of meat cooked to 
perfection. For mains we had the shio (salt) ramen and miso ramen. Both were delicious and had a rich tasty broth with a generous portion of pork. I'll definitely be back - likely on my Ikea runs as I don't often get that far south. Next time I look forward to trying the Curry Katsu.
I've added photos of the menu even though I couldn't get good shots, and none at all of the ramen menu unfortunately (there were six: shio, shoyu, miso, spicy miso, tan-tan... and one more I can't recall).
Thursday, March 17, 2011
St. Paddy's Risotto
Doin' it! Posting for real! Take that Brooke, I am the queen and you are the loser (okay, Brooke isn't actually my little sister and I'm not 7, so maybe I should take that back). Okay, it's been forever, so I know this is a bit sucky, but it is a start. I have done posts previously on how to do a basic risotto. This is the same generally, I just did it with peas and goat cheese thinking my little one would eat it since she eats rice, peas and strongish cheeses. How silly am I to think then that she would eat a combo of the three? Pretty silly apparently. I even pureed some of the peas so the risotto would look a bit green and St. Paddy's-ish. She ate a bit and then gave me a look that clearly conveyed that she would rather be eating a big pile of Cheerios. I like it though :-) Sorry the idea comes too late for most of you to use it to green up your dinner tonight.
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
Eat Alberta Conference
Okay, we are terrible bloggers who never post but always think we are about to start posting regularly again (maybe next week? haha). Anyway, I am a day late on this, but I want to support it because it is being organized by a number of my internet friends. Stop laughing, I am not a nerd for having internet friends - in fact, if you are reading this you might actually be one of my internet friends. Take that nerd. Seriously though, this event sounds amazing, and I will definitely be going provided I can get a sitter.· Sausage making
· Cheese making demonstration
· Apple pie and pastry making
· Bread making
· Pasta making
Tasting sessions include:
· Fruit wine tasting
· Honey tasting
· Coffee tasting
· Canadian wine and cheese pairing
· Goat Cheese Tasting
There will also be opening and closing keynote sessions on urban gardening and urban homesteading, respectively.
What the day looks like:
· 8:30 to 5 p.m.
· Continental Breakfast followed by the morning keynote
· Two morning break out sessions (choose from 8 different sessions)
· A charcuterie and cheese tasting lunch with artisan breads
· Two afternoon break out sessions (choose from 8 different sessions)
· Closing session followed by a “wine” down
Is it redundant to say that you had me at "wine" down?
