Vegan Hamburger buns!

When it comes to mothers-in-law, I hit the jackpot. Not only is mine a wonderful woman who accepted me from the get go (which was a good thing since I married my husband before meeting his family!) but she has also rolled with the punches when it comes to feeding me. She jumped in both feet first, actively looking for replacements for things like breads and milks, and picking up random things she just thought I might like. She's got me pegged, too. She's already sent me not one but two cookbooks, both of which look amazing and made me happy on multiple levels. I'll do a proper review of them once I've had a chance to try out more recipes (I've only tried the one from one book and haven't touched the other at all yet) but so far, so good.

Both books are written by Laurie Sadowski, The Allergy-Free Cook; her books are both written for vegans, though she doesn't push it which is nice. One of the biggest issues, for me at least, when it comes to gluten free has got to be the baking, particularly in regards to yeast breads. They just do NOT work the same! Not even close! I'll be honest here: I know part of my problem is that I simply haven't done enough experimentation with different recipes, but my ego can only handle chucking so many batches of botched baking (pardon the alliteration) in the garbage. Hello, cinnamon buns. Still, I've had a number of successes in the last few weeks, so I decided to put my ego on the line and figured that as the weather has been so nice the last little while that it was time for hamburgers. Bring on the buns!

 

 

I actually had all the flours/starches she called for in the recipe (sorghum, arrowroot, quinoa, tapioca and almond) which was nice, as most of her recipes call for at least 3 or 4 different flours and she varies them quite a bit (for future recipes, I've already picked up teff, though I will still need to get millet, amaranth and coconut flours). What I didn't have were the English muffin rings she suggested, but she gave an alternative. Since GF yeast breads won't hold up to a second rise, you generally do whatever you are going to do and then let your bread rise in the container or shape desired. Since this was for buns, you want them to rise round and contained, hence using rings. What she suggested was to make rings out of tinfoil; worked surprisingly well, too! Looks ridiculous, sorta, but works on the same principle as a soufflé ring.



 

 

So once the dough had been made up (another thing I have had to get used to is how sticky bread doughs are) and dropped into the rounds, off they go to rise. She has very obviously done this as her rise times are way longer than I'm used to seeing, because it takes GF breads way longer to rise. I will usually warm my oven for about 5 minutes at 100F, turn the oven off and then allow the bread to rise in there. That certainly counts as draft free! After about an hour, you then bake them for 15-20 minutes at 350F and then let them cool. She suggests you allow them to cool for about 20 minutes before cutting, and she is absolutely right! The buns are so spongy and soft when they come out of the oven that cutting them still warm would ruin them.

 

 

 

Since we actually had these with hamburgers, I appreciate the irony of them being vegan buns. That did not keep me from enjoying them in any way, however. We ended up with monster burgers! I kept coming up with other toppings that just had to go on, so I think that, after condiments, we had Daiya cheese, grilled onions, pickles, spinach, tomatoes and avocadoes in there. Could probably have left the burger out, and we might not have even noticed! A five napkin burger, for sure, and I am still so full I am standing to write this. I'd say that's a success, wouldn't you?

 





Co-Op La Maison Verte (shop review)

Now that spring seems to be making a concerted effort to actually show up, I am eternally grateful that there are so many shops close to my home for me to choose from. I don't like going out in the rain! And I say that having grown up on the West (read: Wet) Coast. I love that I can get just about anything that I need within what is, in essence, skipping distance. I also really appreciate that most of my favourite stores are independants. Don't get me wrong, I don't have a hate on for chains or franchises. Necessarily. I just have a great deal of respect for those who choose to put their faith where their hearts are and go for broke; sometimes, literally. I think that might be one of the reasons why I like the idea of co-ops so much. Like minded people or groups of people working to support each other (even if only in principle). As far back as the 1830's, co-operative movements were already taking root in Canada, with insurance companies for farmers and creameries and cheese factories for dairy farmers being well established by the turn of the 20th century. The early 1900's saw the creation of  prairie grain co-operatives, other farm groups such as fruit growers and livestock farmers as well as stores and financial institutions (like Caisse Pops and Credit Unions) in cities, towns and communities all across Canada. For anyone who is interested in a more detailed history, you can check out Canada's official 2012 International Year of Co-Operatives web site here.

It was my husband who introduced me to La Maison Verte, located at 5785 Sherbrooke West. We popped in before Easter (on a nice sunny day) and he had to drag me out to hunt down Peeps, or I could have stayed long enough for it to have gotten expensive. The membership fees are only $10 a year, and while members don't get a deal on everything, regular purchases will get you your fees back quite quickly. They carry a lot of a lot, to be honest. You can pick up food stuffs (both local and/or organic as well as allergen friendly), cleaning producs, personal products, plants (I am very excited that they are going to be getting in their seedlings soon!) and it is even a drop point for a CSA (community sponsored agriculture) farmers basket. Or you could go in for some reference materials (they have books), some new music from a local or independant artist, to see who has posted up new fliers or business cards, or even just for a cup of coffee and a snack!

Needless to say, we are now members and did I mention that I can't wait for the seedlings?? Nice place, friendly staffers and I highly recommend checking them out!

Dinner party nerves - check!

We are going over to our friends house tonight to cook them dinner. Usually, we would just have them come here, but unfortunately, one of them is deathly allergic to cats, but the problem comes from the fact that she plays with them anyways! So, we have our meal planned out (5 courses, no less) and I've only got 3 more shops to hit up, 4 more dishes to prep, one cake to figure out transport for, and then the simple task of getting ready. No sweat. *Cue panic!*

Unfinished cake that is a lot taller than anticipated!

Bakery Options from Premiere Moisson?

I generally avoid most commercial bakeries, mostly because I can't get anything there and people look at me funny when I whimper while looking at the cookies. Yet a couple of weeks ago, a friend of mine let me know that Premiere Moisson seemed to be offering a line of products that are gluten free. Interesting.... Now, there is no way that this would be an acceptable alternative for serious sensitivities let alone Celiac sufferers, as you would not be able to avoid cross contamination on any level. Being that it is also coming from a commercial bakery of that large a scale, I also wrote them off figuring that everything would be made with dairy. On Thursday I went to the Atwater market and, remembering what my friend had told me, popped into the Premiere Moisson just to see what there was to be seen.

They did in fact have several gluten free products on offer; two types of bread and two 'pastry' type sweets. The lady that I spoke with was incredibly helpful, and actually went off and printed the ingredients lists of what they had so we could check the dairy content. I was right, for the most part. The two sweets, an apple-chocolate and pistachio cake and an almond and praline cream financier, had butter listed as either the second or third ingedient, and once she told me that the coconut topped bread had white chocolate in it, we moved right along. The last offering they had, though, a maple walnut bread, that one I could actually eat. I figured why not, and after the nice lady changed her gloves, I bought a loaf.

If you are expecting this to be like a typical bread, you will be disappointed. In taste and texture it was closer to a banana loaf or other quick bread. The Premiere Moisson web site lists their gluten free breads as being moist and as far as the maple walnut bread goes they are not kidding! I would definitely recommend that you toast this. The other thing that I found particular about this bread is that it is barely sweet and only has a hint of maple while the only place you'll find any walnuts is on the top. Which means that on first glance, the bread actually looks a little over cooked. It isn't, but it is a little off putting.

It could be interesting to see what other options they come up with (this particular bread is one of their seasonal selections) as well as if any future options might also be dairy free though I'm not holding my breath. I'm also not going to pin my hopes on Premiere Moisson's turning into a Go-To for gluten free breads, though to their credit, they are aware that they can't guarantee products free from contaminants or traces of allergens. Not a bad experiment, but I don't think I'll rush back to get any more. We'll just have to wait and see. And in the mean time, I get to keep looking for treats and breads and cafes. I love my life!

The perfect caramel? Not yet, but closer

Every year, my boss has a Super Bowl party, and every year, he'll bring the left over treats into the shop since they always get enough to feed a small army. One of the left overs this year was a bacon caramel brownie that was devoured in about 10 minutes. I guess the reason there were any left overs in the first place was because they'd gotten 2 - I think. At any rate, everyone raved about them so much that I was galvanized to make another attempt.

I did some snooping around, looking up caramel recipes and reading instructions. After finally settling on a recipe, I made my decisions about what I was going to use in place of the butter and cream, and then I started.

Having had such good success with the MimicCream, I chose that as the cream replacement, and my go-to for butter is the soy free version of Earth Balance. Basically, all of your ingredients (with the exception of the vanilla) go into your pot, you bring it to a boil, and then after 30-45 minutes at a low boil, it should reach about 248 degrees Farenheit which is also the hard ball stage. At this point you take it off the heat, stir in your vanilla and pour it into your lined/oiled tin to cool and harden. Simple, right? Well, mostly...

See, it never Got to 248 degrees Farenheit. After about an hour of low boil it changed colour as the recipe said it would, and it had achieved a hard ball when dropped into cold water, but no mater what I did, my candy thermometer indicated that it just wasn't hotter than 240. I think at one point, it even got colder! However, as I'd gotten a hard ball, I took it off the heat, added my vanilla and poured it into my parchement paper lined pan to cool. That part went well.

Once it was cold enough to cut into squares, I got a good taste of it. Sweet, rich, sticky and nutty. Nutty? Right; the MimicCream is almond and cashew nut based, and after cooking it long enough to amalgamate it and other things into caramel, the nut flavours really came through. More so than I actually enjoy.

We covered some pieces with chocolate and decided that these will make great turtles (though the next time I'll cook it less so that the caramel is actually a little runnier) and used some more to attempt the caramel brownies. Those were good! Getting a nut flavour in a brownie is something that you can almost expect, so that was ok. Still, I wasn't completely happy as I need to adjust the cooking time to take the caramel in the brownie batter into account, and I can't get over the flavour of the caramel to truly enjoy it. Nevertheless, I have a lot of volunteers for the next batch, and hope to get this right soon!

Back to the kitchen I go. Isn't life rough?! = )

Checking in on the 100 Mile Dinner

Spring in Quebec by George Campbell Tinning

I am sitting in my dinning room, listening to the 10th anniversary DVD of Les Miserables as performed at Wembley stadium. While drinking a beer. A little incongruous, perhaps, but I never promised anyone that I would be consistent. To be honest, my entire day has been somewhat all over the place. I think I got about 5 hours of sleep last night; three hours between 12 and 3 and then another two between 8 and 10 this morning. Eugh. Needless to say, I rose, but I sure didn't shine.

While ticking things off my to-do list, I was able to get more done than I would have thought by actually confining my errands to a smaller geographical area. It is truly amazing how efficient lazy people can be! I was able to order a special cut of meat from my local butcher for this weekend; looking up addresses on Google maps allowed me to find the closest cafe that sells a particular brand of treats that I have been looking for; and then once I actually made it to the market, I found not one but two home grown companies offering some pretty cool *and very tasty* products (stay tuned!)! I think that, with the advent of the internet and globaliztion, sometimes we atually make things a little more complicated for ourselves by going far afield.

Don't get me wrong, here. Most of the flours that I rely on, as well as more than half of the food stuffs I buy that accomodate my dietary requirements, are anything but local! Could I give them up? Sure, I could, but I have actively chosen not to because I believe in quality of life. Do I try to offset that by making the most responsible choices I can? Yes, but even there sometimes I have to choose for the lesser 'evil'. Am I going to feel guilty about it? Nope, not really, because I do the best I can. I think that is why the 100 Mile Dinner appeals to me so much.

Over the last couple of months, I have been absolutely amazed at the variety of local and provincal fare that we have available to us here! We have food stuffs, both farmed and wildcrafted, restaurants based on local foods, bakeries, alcohols (some of them world class) and our very own food celebrities, be they authors, chefs or TV personalities. Not bad for a place where, in 1996, 47% of the population of the Province lived in the greater Montreal region.

I will admit that the part I am having the hardest time with in regards to our locavore dinners is the seasonality of it all. I am having to not only relearn which foods are only supposed to be just showing up now but also what is seasonal for Quebec. I grumble every time my friends in Victoria post photos of themselves hanging out down at the harbour or picnicking as we have only just gotten rid of the snow (but don't look at the forecast for tomorrow as we're supposed to get more of the white stuff). Conversely, my brother who is in Saskatchewan is still up to his hips in winter, and he's 6'2". It's an interesting line to walk between local and seasonal; my husband and I have had more than one conversation about local seasonal versus local hothouse. We've decided to flat out table the discussion about local versus indigenous until later on this summer!

I think I know what I want to prepare for our next 100 Mile Dinner, and I'm steering clear of any hard and fast rules about seasonality. Yet. We'll just have to wait and see what we can find, but I'm looking forward to it, whatever it turns out to be.


Saki and Magazines

I have decided that tonight is going to be all about saki and magazines. My day was a bit of a rollercoaster, and allow me to simply state that I don't like rollercoasters. That being the case, I am going to read a couple of my newest magazines while enjoying what's left of my saki. I should probably also confess to having a slight addiction to magazines, at least if they are of the cooking (or winter holiday) variety, but I seem to have settled on Saveur and Fine Cooking, which also does a Best Of series. A little snooty on first glance, maybe, but I was pleasantly surprised when, after trying several of their recipes and tips, to find them easy to use, accurate and informative as to why some things are done the way they are. I seem to be out of saki, though, so I am going to have to do something about that.

gluten, wheat & dairy free: Cook book review

Since discovering the cream puff recipe in this book, I decided that I had to tell people about it! Now that I've worked my way through enough recipes that I feel like I've got a handle on exactly what kind of book it is, I have, after some fairly elementary research, come to understand that "gluten, wheat & dairy free: Over 70 delicious and nutritious recipes" by Love Food division of Parragon Books is no longer in print. Bugger. It is available for sale through numerous online sites, as a second hand book, and if you do happen to come across one in a bargain book section of your local book shop, it is worth a look.



I will say right off that, with a few notable exceptions, this is a very basic and, in some ways, bland recipe book. I think that out of the 7 recipes we purposely tried, 2 of them we will for sure do again as is, 4 of them we would modify before making again and the last one was actually just used as a guide, because by then we'd realized that the spices and flavours of the recipes as given are more mild than what we like.

The cream puffs and the chickpea fritters were the ones that we would repeat no questions asked. They were divine!! The best is that they allow for interpretations, like turning the cream puffs into eclairs and mixing up the fritters as a dinner thing or even adding to them with other spices or flavours (I'm thinking that some ham cooked Into the fritters would be lovely!) From there, though, well.... It's not that anything was bad, it's just that, well, they didn't taste like much. We made the Chicken Tacos (pg. 66) for dinner one night and while the corn meal on the outside of the chicken pieces added a nice crunch, we would definitely add cumin and/or corriander to it as well as adding some garlic to the grilled veggies and skipping their version of avocado cream and sticking with a more traditional guacamole. Also, sour "cream" and salsa were a must! The bonus on this one was that is was only 20 minutes from prep to table, so this is a good weeknight option.

 

 

 

The next meal we tried was the Seafood Tart (p.88) with the Strawberry Roll (p.138) for dessert. After reading the instructions for the crust, I didn't even try to follow. There was NO way you could have rolled that out, so I simply pressed it into the pan and did a blind bake (where you bake the crust with nothing but something to weight it down before you fill and bake the filling). I'll be using a different crust recipe should I ever make this again. The filling was tasty, but again pretty bland. Some tarragon, dill or fennel would have worked so well with seafood, and I will deinitely add some sould I do this again. This would be lovely in the summer as it's quite light, so I was glad we had some roasted potatoes and a tomato and tarragon salad to go with it.

 

The strawberry roll was yummy, very reminiscent of a short cake (though that might be because I refused to fill the roll with sweetened cream cheese and used a dairy free whipped cream instead) however there is again no way that this worked the way the book said it should have. I don't know if I overcooked it, though I went with the least amount of time, or if they just used some really good photoshopping, but while their's was white, mine was yellow, and it was more like a meringue than a sponge cake. We have decided to modify that to make the lady fingers for a tiramisu, but more on that later!

 

The last recipe was, as mentioned, used only as a guide. It was a peanut butter shrimp and noodle dish that, with the addition of some curry paste and more veggies and garlic, was really good. For dessert, we had their coconut panacota (think coconut jello!) with spiced pinapple, that with the addition of some rum will make a wonderful deconstructed Pina Colada! Perfect for summer barbeques! 

So there you have it. A couple of good recipes with a whole bunch more that need some fixing, but nothing horrible, so for someone who enjoys simple flavours or is looking for easy (I don't think Any of the recipes are more than a page long, and in a large type font to boot), this isn't a bad book. If you don't want to have to fart around adjusting things, well, at least it isn't in print any more I guess. Still, the cream puffs recipe makes this book worth it No Questions Asked!!!



Breakfast fritters!

You know when you get a new cookbook, there will be that one picture that has you going "I'm going to make that!"? Well, it only took me a year. Oops!  Turned out so well, that I am absolutely planning on having them again for breakfast this weekend!

My husband is not much of a breakfast person, so our compromise is that I don't force him to eat breakfast during the week but on the weekends, we tend to cook breakfasts and brunches. And since he's less fond of the sweets, like pancakes and waffles, we'll alternate with savoury. These were a great find! Chickpea fritters, with chives and green onions. Super tasty, and ridiculously easy to put together. Also, if you are a vegetarian that does eggs, these are wonderful option. I think the longest part was just chopping up all the green stuff. While they are at their best right when they are made, warming them up the next day they were only ho-hum, if you were to make these the morning of a lunch time picnic and kept them warm, they would be lovely!  You could absolutely do these as a "breakfast for dinner" thing too, as they are quite filling; just serve with ham and maybe some sauteed mushrooms or zucchini and you're set.

This comes from the "gluten, wheat & dairy free" cookbook from Love Food, though their web site doesn't seem to list it.

Chickpea Fritters
Serves 4
makes between 12 - 16 depending on size

• 1 cup GF flour
• 1 1/2 teaspoons GF baking powder 
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 1 egg, beaten
• 3/4 cup unsweetend milk substitute of your choice
• 2 1/2 cups thinly sliced scallions/green onions
• 1 2/3 cups rinsed and draied chickpeas
• 1/4 cup chopped cilantro
• oil, for fryin
• salt and pepper
• cilantro sprigs, to garnish

Sift the flour, baking powder, and salt into a mixing bowl and make a well in the center. Add the egg and milk and stir into the flour, then beat to make a smooth batter.

Stir in the scallions, chickpeas, and cilantro, then season well with salt and pepper.

Heat the oil in a large, heavy skillet (we used one of our cast iron pans) and add about 1/3 of a cup of the batter per fritter. Cook in batches for 4-5 minutes, turning once, until golden brown.

Serve the fritters stacked on warmed plates, garnished with cilantro sprigs. Might I also suggest having some DF sour cream and hot sauces too available too.

Enjoy!

Taking one for the team... Ugh.

Every now and again, I'll get reminded that there is a reason why I am gluten free. Namely, because it makes me sick as all get out. Those reminders, however, will often come because I'll have done something foolish, like think "One shot won't hurt me!" Ugh...

Case in point: a couple of weeks ago, a bunch of us hit up our local pub after we'd closed up shop on a Friday night. We ran into another of our coworkers who, being on vacation, was there with his girl. A couple of drinks later, he bought us all a round of shots. Sweet! Except that they were Jameson, which is an Irish Whiskey. Whiskey is made of wheat, and that would be why I don't drink it. *sigh* I know better! I should have handed it off or gotten something else, but, I did what I knew I shouldn't have. I drank it. I am so lucky that I just felt loggy and cranky because of a head- and gut ache for a couple of days after and wasn't bed ridden as can happen.

We often think that when we turn something down because it is offered, we'll offend people or look bad. Yes, that can happen, but I know (because of the people involved) that my coworker would not have had any issue! It was my ego that got in the way on that one, not his. Besides, I'm the one who felt sick after, so I have every right, and in fact an obligation to myself, to say No, thanks. We often forget that. We get so focused on being polite or helping others that we lose sight of our need to take care of ourselves too. It can be hard to remember that while your hostess might look a little hurt that you can't try one of her canapes now, she'd be a lot less impressed if you throw up all over her bathroom later!

Seasonal treats

Being woken up on a Saturday morning because a telephone company technician is hammering on the brick outside your bedroom window kinda sucks. Especially when the technician isn't there for something you want done; at least then you can deal with it. *sigh* Know what made it worse? We were out of coffee. This meant we did the only thing we could do: we went to the market! Being severly under caffeinated, we wisely sat down and had some of the Liquid Black Gold before making any decisions. I love hanging out at the market while people watching. Since I usually avoid being there on the weekends, particularly first thing in the morning as I don't like crowds, today was a good day to give it a go. It was still fairly chilly out, at least until you got into the sunshine, and now is prime Cabane a Sucre season, so it was just nicely populated. While I was snooping around, my husband, who was paying more attention than I was, noticed something else that is a seasonal delight: snow crab! From the begining of April until the middle of May, you can purchase live or freshly cooked snow crab from Rimouski at the Atwater Market from Capitaine Crabe, who's stall is right outside the north doors, closest to the pet food mart, Boufido. Having grown up on Vancouver Island, I truly enjoy fresh crab, but even there, snow crab is special! We probably would have gotten it anyways, but the fact that they were charging only $6.95/lb sealed the deal. We picked up 2 live ones, and the fixings for a celery root remoulade, and some GF beer (La Messagere Rousse to be precise) since I had a new recipe for baguette that I had been wanting to try out anyway.

 

 

Toss in some garlic butter and we were good!  We actually toyed with using this as our 100 Mile Dinner, as the celeriac and the crab fell into the local parameters. We certainly could have made up some mayonaise, but as the remoulade calls for sour cream and the baguette would require flours that the packages tell me are milled in the US, we decided to simply enjoy it as a seasonal dinner with local flair. Win!
 

The crab was fantastic, the remoulade is fast becoming one of our favourite salads and while the baguette recipe is good, I am not a fan of the flour mix for it. I got a new cookbook a while back, and I'm still trying it out, so I won't go into it too much, but well. We'll have to see. Still, it certainly made for a pretty picture! The recipe actually makes 2 loaves, so we will be having french toast for breakfast tomorrow I think. I really want to figure out how to make it taste the way I remember it! If I had to take a guess, it is most likely the sorghum flour I'm not liking. It has a weird aftertaste that I can't quite put a name to. Sorghum is a type of grass that is raised for it's millet like grain and as fodder plants. Makes me think of some of the bean flours I've tried. Regardless, I'm going to play around with it some more.

 

Having said that, I am not going to post up the baguette recipe today (as I had planned), but will give you the remoulade recipe instead! Warning: if you don't have a mandolin, go get one! This is not a recipe I would want to have to do by hand. If you haven't got a mandolin, you could always use a cheese grater, but as this is very like a coleslaw, having the celery root nicely match-sticked really is worth it. I think you can even find mandolins at the dollar store, so go get one. You'll wonder how you ever got on without it. This is from Diane Morgan's book Roots, which I also think you should go out and get, but I just really like root vegetables. And cookbooks. And food.

 

Celery Root Remoulade

• 1/2 cup mayonnaise
• 1/2 cup sour cream (I use Tofutti)
• 1 tablespoon whole grain mustard
• 1 tablespoon diced cornichons (gerkhins will work)
• 1 tablespoon diced* capers
• 1 tablespoon cider vinegar
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
• salt and pepper to taste
• 1 large celery root, peeled and cut into match-stick sized slices
• 1 tablespoon chopped chives
• 1 tablespoon chopped flat leaf parsley
• 1 tablespoon chopped tarragon

*I do not bother dicing the capers. They are small enough!

Mix the mayonnaise, sour cream, mustard, cornichons, capers, vinegar and lemon juice in a medium bowl. Season with salt and pepper. Peel and grate the celery root, then add it along with the chives, parsley and tarragon to the mayonnaise mix. Mix well, cover and refridgerte for at least an hour before serving, though this can be made up to 2 days in advance, and gets better on the second day.

Enjoy!

Little Victories

Somedays we should get a medal for successfully getting out of bed. We should get promotions (and raises) if we manage to not kill anyone! I am very glad that today was a day off because I'm looking for anything and everything that I can claim as a win. The reason is fairly simple: Spring has arrived! What that means for me is that the pressure outside is changing and I have a migraine. It didn't help that I woke up convinced that there was a barefoot burgler in our apartment at about 5:45 this morning. Don't ask me why the imaginary burgler was barefoot, he just was. Needless to say, today has not been my most productive day.

Still, our application for our Community Sponsored Agriculture basket went out today (more on that later!), and I did the dishes. That's got to count for something. Plus our taxes are done, and I have found not one but 2 scrumptious flourless cake recipes that I am going to get to try out in the next few weeks (one is a chocolate and the other is a meringue-based). I think that even though I didn't do exactly what I had wanted to today, I'm still going to count this day a success.

Royal Mugshots, a.k.a. Queen Elizabeth Cake

I'm not entirely sure why, but last week I woke up and decided I wanted to make a Queen Elizabeth cake. That might not seem so out of place until I tell you that I've never had a Queen Elizabeth cake. All I knew was that it involved coconut on the top. Now I also know that dates are required, as are walnuts, though they could easily be left out, I suppose, or replaced with another nut (like a pecan or a hazelnut). I'm not sure if my version tastes the way it is supposed to, but it sure is tasty nonetheless. The cake is reminiscent of a spice cake (though there aren't any spices in it beyond vanilla and the walnuts!) and the topping, a boiled coconut and brown sugar frosting, is very like a toffee. Plus, start to finish, this only takes about 10 minutes which is always a bonus when it comes to unexpected cravings for sweets. Especially ones we've never had!

While searching the internet for ideas and recipes, I was able to find out a few things about this cake in a historical context. Firstly, no one is really sure why it is called a Queen Elizabeth cake. It does appear that the recipes started popping up around the time of the Second World War, and a number of stories imply that this recipe was supposed to be used for fundraising purposes, be it for the war effort or church parishes. One story went so far as to say that it was given this name because this was the only cake that the Queen would make herself. However, that leads into the second point I came away with which is that apparently a representative for the Queen has denied that the recipe is hers (I was unable to find that as an actual quote, and am unashamedly passing on the hearsay as I got it). I am now almost as confused as to the origin of this cake as I was to begin with, but that didn't keep me from making it.

I have modfied this to keep it simple and quick. It does take a little longer to put together than the regular Coffee Mug cake, but not by much as the cake (at least) can still all be made in the microwave. The two biggest difference here are that there is no cocoa powder which makes this cake a little lighter than previous versions, but right after Easter, I didn't think anyone would miss it; also this version does not have you put the cake under the broiler, either before or after the frosting has been added. If this offends any purists, my appologies and feel free to do so. The frosting is well worth the extra pot too, but don't take my word for it!

Queen Elizabeth Mug Cake
Serves 2

• 6-8 dates
• 3 tablespoons water
• 1/4 cup GF flour
• 4 tablespoons sugar
• 1 egg
• 2 tablespoons oil
• 3-4 walnut halves, chopped
• Dash of Vanilla and Salt
• 1/4 cup coconut flakes
• 3 tablespoons brown sugar
• 2 tablespoons DF butter
• 2 teaspoons DF cream or milk

For the cake, put the dates in your mug or bowl along with the water and microwave in 20 second intervals, until they turn to mush when stirred with a fork. *NOTE: You can choose to chop the dates first to make it easier to break them up in the hot water, but you don't have to.

Add the flour, sugar, egg, oil, walnut pieces, vanilla and salt; whisk to combine and then cook in the microwave for approximately 2 minutes, till cooked. It will come out looking moist, but don't over cook it. Carefully invert onto plate and allow to cool.

While your cake is cooling, put the coconut flakes, brown sugar, butter and cream into a pot on the stove over medium heat and allow to boil, stirring all the while. Allow it to boil for about 3 minutes being careful so that it doesn't burn, then remove from heat and pour over your cake.

This is delightfully sticky and sugary while still being fairly light. Enjoy!

 

Coming Up - April

I absolutely can not believe that it is April already. Partly because the temperature dropped tonight and we are back to bloody cold again, and they are even making noises about snow tomorrow. Boo. Oh well; all that means is that I can justify staying in and playing in my kitchen! At any rate, March went by so quickly my head is still spinning. I felt like I spent the whole month running from one project to the next without actually getting to spend any time on anything. Oddly enough, now that I'm not rushing, I'm not sure what I should be doing!

New Book!
 

I firmly believe in planning. I also like to think that I'm wise enough to accept that "Plans never last past the First Engagement" (I think I learned that from a Mercedes Lackey "Heralds of Valdemar" novel, and while she meant it in regards to battle plans, I think it just makes good sense!). So what does that mean for April? Community Sponsored Agriculture and farmers baskets (I am sooooo excited!); how easy it is to think "I'll be fine!" so as not to offend or appear rude, and what that really means; new recipes, books, products, shops and more! Plus, the next installement of the 100 Mile Dinner and finding out if my Thumb is more Green than Black.

Without going into it too far, here are some hints as to what's up. Enjoy!!

Lazy Sunday

I've only recently started getting 2 day weekends with my husband, and for the most part we try to make the most of them. We'll do brunches with friends, market days, trips out of the city to hit up flea markets and such or big cooking/baking projects. It's probably a good thing that we had actually planned for this weekend to be on the slow side. I have writers block, you see.

This is what writers block looks like, today. Our little kitten, who is little really only in comparisson to our other two boys. For some reason, her favorite place to snooze is on whatever book I happen to be reading or writing in at any given moment. That is true to form for kittens, though. Since we've already made breakfast as well as the cake for dessert and dinner is only for 7 or 8, we took her example, and ran with it!

Happy Sunday to you. May you have the opportunity to truly enjoy it in whatever way you will!

Peeps, the marshmallow ones!

My husband and friends spoil me with chocolate on a very regular basis; one of my closest friends bought me 6 high quality bars as part of my birthday present! In some ways, I think I might actually eat more (and better) chocolate now that I am completely dairy free than I did before. Having said that, I am really not too fussed when Easter rolls around. Sure, there are piles of different shaped chocolates to be had, but now-a-days, it doesn't really matter the holiday; there are piles of chocolates around! Whether it's chocolate hearts for Valentines, chocolate bunnies for Easter, chocolates of all description for Halloween and Christmas, we are completely surrounded by more chocolate than any of us need. Provided you need to Need chocolate, of course, but that is another story. Enter: Peeps! My squishy little friends.

Peeps, in case you haven't ever been confronted by one of these fluorescent little fellows, are chick and/or bunny shaped marshmallows (though they do have special, seasonal peeps for all of the above mentioned holidays) covered in various coloured sugars. Some will have additional flavours to them; we managed to find "Party Cake" Peeps today, and they had different coloured speckles on them. My not-sister in Texas called me a hag because she can't get those ones. Still, I can find only green and yellow chicks and pink bunnies, while she can find an array of colours. I'd say that makes us even = )

I am hardly the only person, let alone adult, to be enamoured of these little treats; the Washington Post does an annual contest, Peeps Show, where the contestants use peeps to create dioramas of various settings and this was year 7! The number of images pertaining to Peeps that come up on a Google search is impressive, too. I didn't realize that you could (or that you'd want to) make a dress out of them and I'm not really sure why you would want to microwave a whole box of them, but apparently they explode (and for anyone tempted to do so, the mess it leaves behind is spectacular, so have fun cleaning it up!).

Needless to say, I have already eaten enough Peeps today to have a pretty good sugar buzz going on, but I think I'm going to go have another one, just because I can!

Food Rules by Michael Pollan

Food and eating is such an integral part of life that you wouldn't really think a book on rules pertaining to said would be neccessary. In truth, it isn't necessary so much as incredibly helpful! When you consider that the vast majority of human beings now live in cities or other urban areas, which makes us so far removed from the source of what we eat, it is not surprising that we can use a hand when deciding what we should be picking up for dinner. But who are we going to listen to?  The marketers? The food scientist? Politicians?? We are constantly bombarded with external stimuli trying to get our attention, "buy this product", "you need this!". This is why it's nice to have the occasional reminder that we really do have choices when it comes to what we want, and that some basic guidelines (for all that the title involves rules!) can help.

Food Rules, also by Micheal Pollan and following in the wake of In Defense of Food, is a very simple and little book that for all of that will likely stay with you a little longer than some of his other works. Not because his other titles are worse, but because it is laid out in a series of Rules, 64 to be exact, that pertain to what, where and why we eat. I think I read this in about an hour, and the best part is that he flat out says in the introduction that if you remember only 3 or 4 rules from each section (there are three of them) you will be ahead in the game. The principle of little changes amounting to big differences really resonates with me, so I truly enjoyed this, and was able to apply several of his Rules without having to even think about it.

 

In the same way that In Defence of Food was divided into three sections, Food Rules is as well. Section 1, "What should I eat? Eat Food" has some very simple yet profound rules for what we have to choose from. Rule 2: Don't eat anything your great-grandmother wouldn't recognize as food is fairly self explanatory. Rule 12: Shop the peripheries of the store and stay out of the middle is something I already do as most of what I have to avoid is found in the middle with the processed stuff. Rule 13: Eat foods that will eventually rot only has me worried in terms of planning for the zombie appocalypse, but I'm sure we'll figure that out if necessary (I have the trailer for World War Z on the brain, sorry.)

 

Section 2, "What kind of food should I eat? Mostly plants" deals with the "Do I pick this or that?" of eating. Rule 22: Eat mostly plants, especially leaves leads into Rule 23: Treat meat as a flavouring or special occasion food. I am a big fan of Rule 25: Eat your colours, because pretty food with lots of colours is so much more fun! I am also a big fan of Rule 43: Have a glass of Wine with dinner, and the reasons for that should be obvious.

 

Section 3, "How should I eat? Not too much" is as much the social aspects as it is the psychological set of Rules pertaining to eating and eating well. There are the physical rules, like Rule 46: Stop eating before you are full and Rule 47: Eat when you are hungry, not when you are bored. There are rules like #44:Pay more, eat less and Rule 51: Spend as much time enjoying the meal as it took to prepare it, which when you think about it, can signify a majour shift from currently held ideals. The socially pertinent rules, however bring us back to how meals used to be: Eat Meals (Rule 55) at a table (Rule 58) in company (Rule 59).

 

So much of Food Rules really can be said to contain more traditional folk wisdom as anything else, which makes this both incredible homey and comfortable while still containing the seeds for radical change if you want it to. I do think that he saved the best rule for last though, as it really does sum everything up: Rule 64: Break the Rules once in a while!

Scalloped Potatoes

In my house growing up, if there was a special occasion or holiday and a dinner was to be cooked, we had turkey. Regardless of which holiday it was, we had a turkey. Skip ahead a few years, and I am now married to a fellow whose holidays were far more traditionally observed in terms of what was had for dinner. So, what with it being the Easter long weekend, we get to have baked ham, asparagus and scalloped potatoes. The problem here, if this can be said to be a problem, is that my husband and I differ on what we think of as being scalloped potatoes. What could I do? I cheated and made my version on a day when I got home first!

There are probably as many variations for scalloped potatoes as there are cooks, and recipes for said are, like the Pirate's Code, more like guidelines anyways. They can be made with a variety of potatoes or even other roots (think sweet potatoes, rutabagas and even celeriac, if you want to get creative), a cream or a stock sauce, with or without onions, spices, herbs and (this is where my husband and I see things differently) cheese. It is my firm belief that there needs to be cheese on scallope potatoes. Lots of it. Strongly flavoured by preference.

I will admit that this recipe can be a bit of a pain in the backside to make if you have to cut all the potatoes by hand; it takes time and concentration to get the slices thin and uniform. I've only had a mandolin for a couple of months, but it has fast become one of my most favourite kitchen toys! You don't need to spend a small fortune on a mandolin as there are some fairly reasonable ones in the $40 to $60 range, but if you spend a lot of time in the kitchen chopping and slicing, this is a very worthwhile investement. Still, the prep without a mandolin will likely be about 25+ minutes easily, so put on a good CD and have fun with it!

This is my most basic recipe, and is supposed to be a side; sometimes if I have left over ham from another meal, I'll make the potatoes and put the ham in it so that it's more of a casserole or a one dish meal. I also use sliced raw onions here, but sauteeing them first brings this to a whole new level.

Cheesy Scalloped Potatoes
serves 4

• 2 large Yukon gold potatoes, washed and sliced about 1/4 inch thick  
• 1 small onion, thinly sliced
• 1/3 cup Earth Balance, or other dairy free butter substitute
• 2 tablespoons gluten free flour
• 1 cup Almond, Soy or Rice milk or Stock of your choice
• 1 cup MimicCream or other dairy free cream substitute
• 1/4 - 1/2 teaspoon Nutmeg, ground
• Salt and pepper to taste
• 1/2 to 1 cup grated strong dairy free Cheese (I use Daiya Jack)
• chopped chives as garnish (optional)

Preheat oven to 350. Butter or grease an 8"X8" baking pan.

Thinly slice the washed potatoes about 1/4 inch thick or so; thinly slice the onion. Place about half of the sliced potatoes in overlapping columns in the bottom of the pan, cover with the sliced onions and then top with the remaining potatoes in the same way.

In a sauce pan over medium heat, melt the Earth Balance or butter substitute and then whisk in the 2 tablespoons of flour. Add the dairy free milk or stock, whisking all the while to make sure you don't end up with lumps. Once the liquid has been absorbed, add the MimicCream or other dairy free cream substitutes, still whisking. Once blended, remove from heat and  add in the nutmeg, salt and pepper. Pour sauce over potatoes, cover with grated cheese and chopped chives (if using), cover in aluminum foil and bake in preheated oven for 1 hour.

Enjoy!!

Management meetings and Mango Margaritas!

I had a plan for today, and while it did include a management meeting, it hadn't taken mango margaritas into account, let alone 3 of them. Or the tequila shot. Um, yeah. Needless to say, I think I'll save the recipe for scalloped potatoes for tomorrow, and leave you with a picture of a mango margarita while I peruse recipes for said!

'Night!

Duck! Our first 100 Mile Dinner

This was an incredibly busy weekend in terms of cooking, because not only did we do a lot of it, but it was very mindful cooking. There are some days when you know that provided whatever you throw together from what you can identify in the fridge can be covered in hot sauce, you'll be fine. This whole weekend was about as far from that as you could get.

I knew that I wanted to hit up the Jean Talon Market for the ingredients for our first foray into conscious local eating, in part because there were a few items on my grocery list that I could only get there but also because we were going to be shopping for our Ethiopian dinner too. Talk about going in opposite directions at the same time! We spent the afternoon asking ourselves if every particular thing we bought had to be local or if it could come from elsewhere, constantly double checking where things were from and, while it made me a little dizzy, it was fascinating. Until I started looking for it, I had never noticed that so many vendors list where their food stuffs come from. Made my job easier, though at the same time it was a bit of an eye opener too.

I had timed the dinner to be after the "official" start to spring in the hopes that some of those plants I automatically associate with spring (dandelion leaves and mushrooms for example) would be available from local sources. Apparently I was more than a little optimistic. Hey, I grew up on Vancouver Island and the folks out there are already in full cherry blossom and picnic mode, so I thought that dandelions...? Maybe? *sigh* I was told that that would be more like mid to late April. Now, I did find dandelions from Texas, but needless to say, we left them at the market. I ditched my idea to use one of the recipes from the 100 Mile Diet book as a sort of homage and figure that I can always just send them a picture.

On to fooding!

From the get go, I knew that our first dinner was going to include duck of some kind. Why? I just really like duck. Fortunately, so does my husband. Sourcing local gave me a few moments of pause, but once I realized that everything at Boucherie Prince Noir falls into our parameters, we are pretty much now set for any meats we are going to need. One meat course - seared duck breast with a little sliver of foie gras and we were good to go. From there we turned to more practical matters. It's March, in Montreal, and we just got a nice dump of snow. As previously mentioned, our options for fresh green veggies were not so good. That made it fairly simple. We went with local potatoes and carrots, though the one real splurge were the forest mushroom mix we got from Jardins Sauvages. Ok, shameless plug here, but these guys are great! They have a kiosk at the market, and if you get a chance, pop in if only to say hi. I had quickly mentioned on a previous visit what we were doing, and the woman working remembered me on sight and greated me by asking what we were having for dinner! She was the one who suggested the mix we got, and it was just a really cool experience. We will so be going back there. Now that dinner was covered, there was no way we could overlook a dessert. With conventional baking out (at least for now) we knew we were going to keep this fairly simply, and while it might seem too easy, we decided to do maple baked apples. We even managed to randomly find organic dried cranberries from Quebec that made it that much better.

Before I get to the specifics and the booze, allow me to divulge the cost for our extravagance. I hear all the time about how expensive eating well is, and yes, food can cost a ridiculous amount. There is also a time factor involved. I know that I spend a ridiculous amount of time in my kitchen, but for me it's play so I don't mind at all. Would you be surprised if I told you that our dinner and dessert cost us $16.68 per person? We paid less for both of us than you would likely pay for one Duck Breast entree at most restaurants. The bonus was that it took us about 45 minutes to put the whole thing together, since dessert cooks while you eat. Score!

Now. The cooking. Since I haven't yet confirmed any local oil/fat sources that do not come directly from what I already happen to be cooking, we decided to just go with that. We scored the fat side of the duck and seared it in a cast iron pan till the skin was crispy and a nice dark brown, then flipped it to sear and stuck it on a plate. We tossed the quarted potatoes and small carrots directly into the pan, tossed everything to coat it in the fat and then stuck it into the oven at 375 for about a half an hour. Once the potatoes were easily pierced with a knife, we put the duck in the oven, directly on the top of the potatoes and allowed it to cook for about 5-10 more minutes (less for more rare as that's the way we prefer it). Once we had pulled the pan out of the oven, we tented the duck to rest for a about 5 minutes, but left the oven on. While the meat was resting, we sauteed the foie gras till browned on both sides, tossed the extra fat onto the potatoes and carrots and quickly sauteed the mushroom mix till hot.


While the potatoes and carrots were in the oven, I corred the apples and now I am going to admit to a cheat. If I were not dairy intolerant, I could very easily get local, farm fresh butter. But I am dairy intolerant, and until I can find something else, for the desserts at least, I will continue to use Earth Balance. My call, and I have some ideas for the future, but I am not going to feel bad about this one. I stuffed each apple (recipe at the end!) and then, once we had pulled the meat and roots out of the oven to rest, we popped the apples into the oven at the same temperature. We got the table set, plated dinner and just before we sat down to eat, we turned the oven off but left the apples inside until we were ready for them.

I like my booze. Anyone who knows me knows this, so not having to give up my glass of wine with dinner is wonderful. Being able to go to a store and know that everything in it is local, at least by the parameters we have set for ourselves, is heaven. At the Jean Talon Market, just as you enter Le Marche des Saveurs du Quebec is my new go to for 100 Mile Booze. The lovely lady behind the counter was very helpful in her suggestions for what I ought to pair with our dinner, making several suggestions and answering questions with honesty and a curiosity of her own. After we had made our choice, L'Orpailleur - a decent little white fut-de-chene that was quite nice with the stronger flavours of our dinner, she offered us some samples of other products they had and made devotees of us by introducing us to a Maple Cider from Coureur des Bois that is outstanding! The first smell has you thinking that you are about to take a sip of straight maple syrup (can a smell be described as thick?) but the first flavour to hit your tongue is apple cider. Divine!! My husband asked for a bottle after his first sip and the both of us simultaneously thought of a friend who will probably drink this straight from the bottle with a straw. Yes; it's that good, and I don't like ice ciders and wines. Get some.




















All things said and done, I think that our first experience with the 100 Mile Dinner was a success. We ate very well, hardly felt deprived, and though I would have liked something green on my plate, every ingredient could stand on it's own while simultaneously fitting into a whole dinner. I think I knew it was a success as we were planning next months meal while we ate. I have a lot more research to do, but if this is our jumping off point, I'm looking forward to it!

Maple Baked Apples with Cranberries
serves 2

• 2 Cortland or other baking apples
• 6 pieces of maple sugar (we bought a little bag of pure sugar candies to use)
• 2 tablespoons of organic dried cranberries
• 2 small dollops of 'butter', we use Earth Balance
• drizzle of maple syrup

Heat oven to 375. Wash and core apples, making sure to leave the bottoms intact. Put a dollop of 'butter' into the well in each apple and top with a small maple sugar piece, the cranberries and another piece of maple sugar. Place the apples into a bread pan that has about a quarter of a cup of water in the bottom (to keep the apples from sticking and burning, and also to keep them moist), drizzle each with about a teaspoons worth of maple syrup and place in the oven. If you are able to pop them into the oven about 10 minutes before you sit down to eat, turn the oven off but leave the apples inside and they will be ready when you are. If you need to have these done before dinner, bake for about 15 to 20 minutes (depending on how mushy you want them) before pulling them out to cool. Serve with the final piece of maple sugar placed decoratively on the top (the textural difference is between the hard sugar and the melted sugar is fun).

Enjoy!

Ethiopian Wats = Really Good Food!

Some time ago, my mum sent me a gift box set of mixed spices that were supposed to be used for African meals. There was an Algerian tagine spice mix, a Morrocan vegetable stew mix, and an Ethiopian berbere spice mix that, for some reason, I decided from the get go I wanted to save to serve with goat. Now, I'd never eaten goat when I got the gift and at that time all I knew of Ethiopia was that my brother used to threaten to mail our sister to Adis Ababa, which is the capital city. Skip ahead a few years, and I have been introduced to a great little hole-in-the-wall Jamaican place that does a curried goat with rice and peas that was worth waiting for, and I have reconnected with a friend from high school. What makes that pertinent is that about 2 years ago, she and her husband adopted a little boy and a little girl from Ethiopia. Not only are these two utterly adorable, the stories she tells about her kids either makes me giggle-snort laughing or shake my head at the never-ending and too often overlooked wisdom of children.

One of the stories she shared was that while in the grocery store line up, her son was staring at all the glossy magazines on display. I think he was maybe 8 or 9 at the time, right about when the front cover of a Cosmo might start to look interesting, when he looks up at her and says "Mum, it is so sad that all those ladies in the magazines are so skinny; they must come from countries without enough food for the people. I will pray for them." Talk about out of the mouthes of babes. It got me to thinking though; here is a little boy who grew up (at least for a time) in an orphanage in a country that so many simply assume is constantly starving and has (by dint of Not Being North American) not much to offer. Wow is that wrong. Ethiopia is widely considered to be from whence Homo sapiens first set out towards the middle east; it is widely believed that the Queen of Sheba of biblical and Solomon fame was in fact Ethiopian, and that the original Ark of the Covenant is to be found there today; they have an incedibly rich cultural history with art and learning playing majour roles, and from what I've read, the people are warm, friendly and take care of each other before worrying about themselves. I hope that I'm not doing the country or its people a disservice by skipping anything of majour import, though I'm sure I am, yet I hope they will forgive me in my enthousiasm to get to the food!

Okay, so 2 things about Ethiopian food right off the bat: 1) if you don't like onions, this is not going to be your thing (I think more than a dozen onions sacrificed their lives so we could feast yesterday), and 2) it is anything but bland! As a matter of fact, if you like bland, this is not going to be your thing either. I believe the word I am looking for is "Spicy" (my friend suggested that I make one particular dish hot enough to make Satan cry, and while I took some pity, I'm sure he whimpered). But did I mention tasty???

As previously mentioned, for some reason I decided that my first foray into Ethiopian food needed to include goat. About 2 weeks ago, I happened to take a closer look at some of the meats available at one of my favourite butchers at the Jean Talon Market (Boucherie Prince Noir) and guess what I found?! Excellent, so now I had to figure out what to do with it. One jubilant and probably ridiculous email to my friend later, and I now have 10 recipes in my possession, and fankly, I actually only used half of them! Good thing too: this was a very labour intensive meal.

This photo was taken after I had already done one set of dishes, and I probably spent a good 6 hours in the kitchen. First thing on the list was to boil up some eggs. The eggs went into the goat stew at the very end, but boiling the eggs first allowed me to feel like I was getting something accomplished while drinking my coffee. After that, I actually made up a dish called Ayib, which is really just a home made soft cheese for everyone else. (Note: if you can eat dairy, do this! You'll need it later to help cut the heat. I simply used a vegan sour cream instead.)  For some reason, this didn't actually work so well for me. Amazingly, I couldn't get it to curdle, go figure. Eventually it worked, but I'm glad we didn't need much.

From there, we went on to make up Nit'ir Kibbeh, which is an Ethiopian spiced butter that is used in most of their dishes and Oh. My. Goodness!!! This stuff is amazing!!! We liked it so much (the flavours are phenomenal) that not only did we decide to make up more just to have on hand, but we were loathe to throw out the spices we had used to infuse the butter (and when I say butter here, I mean Earth Balance) so we kept them with the intentions of baking up a squash to be used in a chickpea and collards soup sometime in the near future. I really wish we had made more the day of; it is really that good.

Next up was putting together the Shiro powder for the Shiro Wat. I should probably back track a little here and explain that a Wat is the name for whatever stew or curry you are cooking up. That might be a bit simplistic, but I mean no offense. Shiro powder, essentially dried and ground chickpeas, lentils and fava beans, when combined with onions, nit'ir kibbeh or oil and spices, is a staple in Ethiopian cooking. My friend suggested that we find some in an import shop, but since we couldn't find any, we made up some of our own. Turned out to be ridiculously simple, and we now have a nice supply set away for future use. (We used this recipe for the Shiro powder.) After that, we realized that I had underestimated how much berbere spice mix I had versus how much we would need, so we put together some of that too. Now I got to start cooking. !

First up was the goat stew. I actually, after a bit of reserach, simply took the recipe for Doro Wat, a chicken stew that is also the national dish, and substituted the goat me. This calls for about 6 cups of red onions and a cup of nit'ir kibbeh, plus about a half a cup of berbere spice mix, and once the spice mix hit the oil I got a hint of what we were in for! Pungent and rich and oh my were some of the first things to cross my mind. Toss in the meat, which has been sitting in acidulated water for maybe half an hour, add enough water to cover and that was about all I had to do there except for stir occastionally. The peeled eggs get tossed in right at the end, about 10 minutes before serving, and while it might seem odd, they actually complement the dish beautifully.

From here on, all the recipes are, since we don't use butter but Earth Balance, vegan. Bonus. The Shiro (chickpea) Wat was a joke to make in terms of simplicity, as was the Red Lentil (Mesir) Wat. The only sort of fussy dish was the sauteed kale (we were supposed to use collards but couldn't find any) and the pancakes I made to go with. Traditionally, all of this ought to be served on a pancake-like bread called injera, which is apparently a pain in the butt to make (they suggest leaving the batter on the counter for up to 3 days!) and my husband and our friends who came for dinner don't like it anyways. It uses teff flour and apparenlty has a bit of a weird, sour after taste to it. But as the different stews are supposed to be served on top of the injera which is then torn to small pieces and used to scoop up the meal, I decided we needed something to compensate. I quickly made up a batch of  thin, chickpea pancakes which worked really well if I do say so myself!

This was by far and away one of our better experiments! The food was soooo good, can be modified very easily to accomodate a dairy free diet and not One of the recipes I used called for anything with gluten in it to begin with. With all the different wats to choose from, feeding vegetarians and vegans is a snap, and if you have any spice lovers in your circle, this will make them smile while they sweat! One of our guests brought over a mango sorbet as well as a coconut, ginger and lime sorbet which were amazing in their own right, and finished the meal off spectacularly.  Next time probably won't be so spicy, but I'm a wimp and the left overs seem to be even spicier.

I totally recommend giving all of these a try, but for now enjoy the nit'ir kibbeh and original doro wat recipes!

Nit’ir Kibbeh (Spiced Butter)

1 lb unsalted butter

½ medium red onion, coarsely chopped
1 garlic clove, minced
One 3-inch piece ginger, peeled and finely chopped
1 tsp fenugreek seeds
1 tsp cumin seeds
1 tsp cardamom seeds
1 tsp dried oregano
½ tsp ground turmeric
8 basil leaves

Melt the butter in a medium saucepan over low heat, stirring frequently. As foam rises to the top, skim and discard. Continue cooking, without letting the butter brown, until no more foam appears. Add the onion, garlic, ginger, fenugreek, cumin, cardamom, oregano, turmeric and basil, and continue cooking for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Remove from heat and let stand until the spices settle. Strain through a fine-mesh sieve before using.

Refrigerate in a tightly covered container up to 3 weeks. (Makes 1 ½ cups)


Doro Wat

10 boneless skinless chicken thighs
1/3 cup lime juice
6 cups red onions, chopped
½ to ¾ c. berbere
½ c. water
1 cup spiced butter
¼ tsp. black pepper 1 T chopped garlic
1 T grated ginger
salt to taste (needs quite a bit)
6 hard boiled eggs

Soak the chicken in a bowl with lime juice and enough water to cover. Brown the onions in a pan without grease. (This is key to both the dark brown colour and the right flavour.) Add spiced butter. Add berbere and mix well. Cook for 5 minutes. Add 1/2 cup water and all spices and blend well. Simmer for 5 minutes.
Drain and rinse chicken. Add chicken and enough water to cover and cook on low heat for at least an hour.
At this point you can transfer the doro wat to a crock pot and let it simmer on low for a few more hours. This is handy if you are making more dishes as it frees up another element on the stove. If you continue to simmer it on the stove instead, you may need to add a little more water. Add the eggs about 10 minutes before serving.
Notes: Traditionally, this should be made with bone-in chicken. But it’s easier to eat with boneless – especially if you are serving to people who are not familiar with Ethiopian food. If you use the boneless thighs and cook it long enough, they do not need to be cut up – the meat will separate nicely in the stew.