Family favourites (old and new)
Roasting veggies brings out their full flavour and sweetness. They are great on their own, in a sandwich or tossed with your favourite pasta orrrr in a quiche! There are no rules with roasting veggies. For the quiche I happened to have green, yellow and …
My kids are not big breakfast eaters during the school week. This is a bad habit they got from me (I’m a coffee for breakfast kinda gal). So, to atone for my sins (today anyway), I’m making some healthy chocolate zucchini muffins. I have added …
Another late dance pick up another “What the ‘blank’ do I make for dinner that’s fast?” night. Quiche? Nah. Who wants to fiddle with pie crust when they’re tired. Instead…I made a frittata. You can use pretty much any veggies you have around…that Mann’s broccoli slaw would have worked well…if I’d had some. Since I didn’t I used zucchini and mushrooms. I got the “This is sooooo good.” so I count that as a win.
Preheat the oven to 425 F. Saute the onion, zucchini and mushrooms in 2 Tbsp olive oil and 1 Tbsp butter in a large cast iron frying pan. I have a monster-sized frying pan that is great for this but if you don’t have one (poor you) just grease a casserole dish and use that instead. When the veggies are soft and the onion is translucent grind a bit of salt and pepper over the top. Whisk the eggs, milk and Worchestershire together and pour over top of the sauteed veg. Sprinkle on the cheeses and the cream cheese blobs top with the ham (at my house it’s a half and half deal because girl child doesn’t like ham…boy child and mom do). Pop the whole works in the oven for about 20 minutes until cheese is bubbly and the eggs are set. Remove from oven and let cool 5 or 10 minutes before cutting and serving.
It’s November and raining in Vancouver…what a surprise. I made Jamie Oliver’s Perfect Roast Chicken the other night and rather than chuck out the carcass I did the Scottish thing – I made soup stock. But then I got lazy. So two days later we …
We love samosas. Heads up…this has a kick to it so if you don’t like strong spices…make something else. If the thought of making a gajillion samosa cones does not thrill you try a samosa pie recipe. I settled on this one from Bhavna’s kitchen. You …
On weeknights who needs to spend an hour our more cooking dinner…particularly when you’ve just dragged yourself home from work? Not me, that’s who. This is a version of Jamie Oliver’s “Jool’s Pregnant Pasta” from his 30 Minute Meals series. I like to support the local talent so I stopped by The Honest Butcher on the way home from work to get pork sausage but they only had beef. However, the ever-friendly and appropriately moustachioed David (it is Movember after all) had some house-made Farmer’s Beef Sausage that looked just the ticket so I bought 3 and adapted the recipe. While chatting (much to my kids’ chagrin I’m a “chatter”) I discovered that today is The Honest Butcher’s 1st Anniversary. So, in honour of this auspicious occasion my adaptation obviously has to be called…”Honest Butcher 1st Anniversary Pasta Sauce”. And here it is:
Ingredients
3 Honest Butcher house-made Farmer’s Beef Sausages (approx 400 g)
1/2 a large red onion, rough chopped
4 spring onions, rough chopped
1 carrot, rough chopped
1 stick of celery, rough chopped
1 pinch of dried thyme (or I think that’s what it was)
4 cloves of garlic
3 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
1 jar of Passata strained tomatoes (I used Mutti brand) (700 g)
Put the rough chopped veggies in a food processor and whiz for a few seconds. With the motor running feed the sausages through the feed tube and whiz until you get a meatloaf like substance – don’t worry it breaks up when you fry it. Heat the olive oil in a big frying pan and add the sausage and veggie ragu. Fry, breaking up as you go. Add the thyme and crush the garlic into the meat with a garlic press. Add the balsamic vinegar and cook off until the vinegar stops making your eyes water. Add the tomatoes and simmer while you bring the pasta water to a boil. Cook enough orecchiette to feed your crew. Drain off but keep about a cup of the pasta water to thin the sauce. Add the drained pasta to the frying pan, stir, add some pasta water to create a “sikly” consistency (as Jamie says) and serve with fresh grated parmesan. It would have been good with a fresh basil chiffonade but alas, alack, no fresh basil.
It was fast and given my son ate half the sauce by itself (I wasn’t quite fast enough with the pasta I guess) and even my “mostly vegetarian” daughter tried some and proclaimed it “good”. I think we have a winner. Please make more sausage David.
I got this recipe from Jamie’s 30 minute meals video series but couldn’t find the lovely pastry cases he used at No Frills (must have been a “frilly” item) so I fudged it with sweetened tart shells. So far I’m baking off 12 and I …
My family is from Timmins, Ontario. Wild rice (really a grass but, like rice, also gluten free) is readily available in the north (or was) and my Mom’s sister, my Auntie Kaija, would always make this dish at holiday time (among other treats…stay tuned). However, …
Don’t ask me what possessed me…the god of stupidity visited me in a dream and said “Gee…wouldn’t it be fun to try making home made Gnocchi?” Actually, I had seen a recipe on 101 Cookbooks called “How to make Gnocchi like an Italian Grandmother”. My first clue to as to why this was a bad idea should have been that I am NOT an Italian Grandmother. In fact, I don’t think there’s a drop of Italian blood in the family anywhere. Anyway, the clincher was the super cool potato ricer I found on sale at Ming Wo. I’m a total sucker for a good kitchen gadget. If nothing else it makes yummy potatoes.
If you choose to make this recipe you may have to fiddle with the ingredients. I don’t have a kitchen scale and I suspect my idea of what a large russet potato is did not match the recipe because I’m pretty sure I had waaaay more potato than I needed. However, since I had already drizzled on the first egg and sprinkled the whole mess with the flour I had no choice but to try and make it work. My solution was to add another egg and a bit of extra flour until I got the dough into a “billowy” non-sticky consistency. Then I spent an hour rolling it all out, cutting it into perfect little pillows and attempting to press it into the tines of a fork without making a big mess…epic fail that bit. There was much cursing thus the name of my version of this recipe. I didn’t notice until later I had rolled them against the fork with cut side in (Nonas around the world are shaking their heads and tsk, tsking me I’m sure) but I wasn’t about to start all over again so tough.
While I was in the midst of all this my delightful 14 year old walked into the kitchen and said (and I quote) “Mom, can’t you just buy gnocchi?” – the boy’s a comedian and likes to live dangerously.
So…if you want to try it, go for it. I did some with just butter and parmesan and some with pesto. The result was “ok” and my children, who have been known to be kind to the mother on occasion, ate a plateful each. Having said that I think my son had it right…next time I’ll just buy it!
Ingredients:
2 large russet potatoes (I mean monster size)
2 eggs lightly beaten
1 c white flour plus more for getting the consistency right
sea salt for boiling the potatoes and the finished gnocchi (provided you don’t give up in frustration)
Sauce of your choice. I think I overdid it on the pesto but this was a bit of a fail all around so no harm done.
The How To and the disclaimer (smart woman) are HERE.
You can use pie crust if you want but I’m lazy so I made a graham cracker crust. If you use regular pie crust you can use the recipe from the Healthy Green Kitchen recipe that I adapted to make this pie. For the graham …