Around the World in 80 Meals

Creative Scarcity: Canadian Roasted Red Pepper, Garlic Soup

2014-01-19T08:31:00.002-08:00

Back around Halloween, I roasted a pumpkin and froze most of it, with plans to introduce my British friends to homemade pumpkin pie at a later date. The pie never materialised, and I defrosted the pumpkin for a mad muffin experiment (half a success). The leftover-already-defrosted pumpkin sat in my fridge for a few days and by yesterday was highly in need of use. With half a month to go on the rapidly decreasing funds of my last pay check, I looked around the kitchen to see what ingredients were on hand to transform the blended pumpkin: a red pepper, sweet potato, and a head of garlic. The following recipe was born!

Ingredients for 4 bowls of soups:

olive oil and canola oil

1 sweet potato

2 cups pumpkin puree

1 head of garlic

1 red pepper

1 onion

1 tsp. dashes ground nutmeg

1/2 tsp. chili powder

1/2 tsp. red chili flakes

4 cups broth

1 tbsp. balsamic vinegar

1 tsp. tomato paste

1/2 a fresh lime

Salt and Pepper to taste

Rub the whole red pepper in canola oil and use a fork to prick the sweet potato, before placing both vegetables on a cookie sheet in an oven preheated to 475 degrees. Let cook for about 20-30 minutes, turning the pepper over half way through (it should be chard on the outside). Remove once the pepper is soft and charred, and the sweet potato bubbling.

Place the pepper in a bowl and cover with plastic wrap, holding the moisture in. Let the bowl stand for about 15 minutes, this will allow the skin to detach from the flesh of the pepper. After 15 minutes, you should be able to peel the skin off and discard it along with the seeds and stem.

Cut the top off the garlic head, pour olive oil over the whole thing, and sprinkle with salt. Turning the oven down to 300, roast the garlic for about 30 minutes until soft and beginning to brown. Remove all the cloves from their shells.

Now you have your roasted items: the favour base for the soup!

Chop the onion and fry it in a pan with enough olive oil to cover the bottom. Add the dashes, chili powder, and chili flakes and sauté for a few minutes. Once the onions are soft, pour the broth into the heated pan and add the roasted garlic cloves, pepper, peeled sweet potato, and pumpkin puree, and blend this

mixture with a hand blender.

On minimum heat, add the vinegar, tomato paste, lime, and salt and pepper!

Enjoy!

P.S. I thought fresh basil would be a great addition to this recipe, but unfortunately I didn't have any. However if you have some toss it in!

Ode to Mull: A British Classic

2014-01-10T09:47:00.002-08:00

Last year in Oxford as the weather got colder, I was introduced to a winter drink significantly more enticing than hot chocolate: mulled wine. My winter experience was revolutionized! My friend had bought a few bottles of mulled wine from the supermarket, for us to heat and take to 'Bonfire Night,' (another tradition new to me), and it was love at first taste! I have such fond memories of that evening, clandestine mull drinking, a wintery cycle, and beautiful fireworks. The evening ended, but my love of mull had just begun!

Having taste tested a number of supermarket additions, I moved on to home-made attempts. The results thanks to some research were delicious. This is a lovely drink to enjoy curled up in front of a fire with a good book, after a winter romp, or my personal favourite in the great outdoors and out of a flask.

Once I had tried mull, I discovered references everywhere!

Here is my mulled wine recipe:

2 bottles of red wine (Chianti or Merlot…. or whatever)

1 1/2 cup white sugar

a lemon

a lime

an oranger or tangerine

a dash of whiskey

two cinnamon sticks

4 star anise

'a thumb' of fresh ginger chopped

1 tsp fresh grated nutmeg

Pour 1 bottle of wine into a big pot and add the sugar. Heat this mixture on medium heat, until the sugar dissolves.

Turn down the heat and let simmer, adding 3 or 4 peelings of the lemon rind, 3 or 4 peelings of the orange rind, the juice squeezed from the lemon, lime, and orange, the cinnamon sticks, star anise, chopped ginger, and grated nutmeg.

Once all of these ingredients are added bring to a boil for 1 minute. Then let the mixture simmer adding the whiskey and the other bottle of wine. After 10 minutes of simmering skim out the giant pieces of 'stuff' and your Mull is ready!

Turn of the heat and pour into a flask or leave it on low with a ladle to serve!

Sugar and Spice and Everything Nice!

Christmasy Cinnamon Buns

2013-12-23T06:55:00.000-08:00

Last weekend I spent a lovely day anticipating Christmas: drinking mulled wine, making snowflakes and cinnamon buns.

I have many early childhood Christmas memories of my parents making huge batches of cinnamon buns, rolling out the dough and slathering it with melted butter, brown sugar, and cinnamon. In an attempt to maintain the original aim of this blog (promoting my interpretation of foods from around the world), I did a bit of research on the origin of cinnamon buns. Apparently cinnamon buns, or "kanelbulle", are a Swedish invention, with close cousins in the German "schneken" and English "chelsea bun." Here is my personal take on this Northern European festive treat, or sweet tooth's breakfast.

Sweet Dough

2 c warm water

1 tsp white sugar

2 tbsp yeast

1/2 c olive oil

1 egg

8 c flour

1 tsp salt

2 tbsp sugar

This sweet dough is a recipe that I adapted from my friend Rachel's blog http://homesteadyhousewife.blogspot.ca/2013/11/homemade-spelt-bread.html

Thanks Rachel!

For the buns:

3/4 c melted salted butter

You are welcome to use unsalted butter, I just enjoy the extra little kick of the sweet/salty combo!

1 c brown sugar

4 tbsp cinnamon

Dissolve the sugar in the warm water and sprinkle the yeast on top. Then set it aside to rise. In a large bowl mix 3 cups of flour, the salt, and the sugar. After about 5 minutes, the yeast will be puffy add the oil and egg and then add to the dry ingredients. Stir them with a wooden spoon until all mixed.

Then continue adding flour, 1/2 cup at a time, until you have a nice dough - you might not need all the flour or you might need a bit more than noted. Go on the feel of the dough and stop adding flour when its nice and smooth. As the mixture gets thicker it will be easier to ditch the spoon and use your hands!

Once you have a nice ball of dough, place it in a grease bowl and set it aside, in a warm place, covered with a tea towel, to rise.

After about an hour the dough should have doubled in size: punch it down and roll it out into a large rectangle about 1/2 inch thick.

Now use a spatchula or pastry brush to spread melted butter all over the rectangle of dough, Then spread the brown sugar. I am the worst at measuring, I always eyeball everything and go by feel so these measurements are estimates - if you end up needing more brown sugar to cover the rolled out dough than use it! Sprinkle the cinnamon over the brown sugar and roll up the rectangle into a long log.

Cut the log into swirls about an inch thick and place in a greased pan (you will want a deep baking dish) with a little bit of room between each roll. Once you had placed all the swirls in the dish, set it aside covered with a towel to rise for about 30 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 175 and bake for about 20 minutes or until the cinnamon buns are golden brown and the brown sugar mixture is bubbling!

Enjoy!

Vegan Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies

2013-12-02T13:28:00.000-08:00

Last year a roommate who was very health conscious and an excellent friend and cook always criticised me for cooking and baking deliciously unhealthy meals. This summer I began exploring the world of 'healthy' baking. I tried one recipe for chocolate chip cookies which were sugar-free and contained chickpeas. I had discovered the recipe via an appealing Facebook image of a chewy, chocolatey soft cookie. Despite promising cookie dough, my finished product from this recipe did not live up to the expectations raised by the picture.

Last week I stumbled across this recipe on another blog: http://vegangela.com and decided to give it a try. I halved the recipe and it made about 18 cookies, even though the original claims to make 4-5 dozen. (Why are do cookie and muffin recipes always make fewer items than they claim?) Regardless, the cookies were a success! My roommate said they tasted like a combo between a granola bar and cookie: my combination of healthy and delicious!

Ingredients:

1 c. coconut oil (semi solid)

3/4 c. brown sugar

1/4 c. white sugar

1 tsp. vanilla

1 1/2 c. flour

1/2 tsp. salt

1 tsp. baking soda

1/3 c. boiling water

2 c. rolled oats

1/2 c chopped walnuts (I used pecans instead because it was the first thing I found in my cupboard, and I think I prefer them)

3/4 c. chocolate chips or chunks

Beat the coconut oil until fluffy, then add sugars and vanilla. It took me adding the sugars and vanilla to get the coconut oil to a fluffy consistency.

Add the flour and salt and blend.

Dissolve the baking soda in the boiling water and add to the mixture.

Mix in the oats, nuts and chips.

(next time I might try adding some shredded coconut too)

Roll into balls and flatten with a fork. The dough was a bit crumble so I found it easier to flatten with my hands rather than the fork.

Bake at 350 F. or 175 C. for 10-12 minutes. I say more 10 than 12 minutes~

Enjoy!

Thai Inspired Peanut Aubergine Satay

2013-11-28T14:59:00.001-08:00

My roommate is a vegetarian, and we often eat dinner together, thus I'm continually searching for creative vegetarian options. This is one I came up with last year by combining a number of recipes I found online and adding a sprinkling of my own limited ingenuity. Its simple straightforward and delicious. I hadn't made it in a while but I rediscovered it tonight. I have always made it with kale but I didn't have any this evening and I had a ton of spinach to use up so I through that in, instead. Verdict: as good as ever and perfect for a chilly evening!

Ingredients:

Fresh - 1 aubergine, 2 carrots, 1 red pepper, big bunch of kale, thumb of ginger, 1/2 red chili pepper 5 small shallots, 2 cloves garlic, handful of fresh cilantro, 1 lime, 2 handfuls of bean sprouts

Cupboard Stalkers - 1 can (400ml) Coconut milk, 2 Tbsp Fish sauce, 1/3 cup Soya sauce, 2 Tbsp Brown sugar, 1/3 cup Peanut Butter, 1 dollop of olive oil

Optional - Tofu

If your using tofu cube and fry desired amount till crisp and set aside

Chop aubergine (eggplant) into bite size pieces and steam in 1/2 of water in the bottom of a big frying pan or walk till water evaporates.

Then add oil, finely chopped ginger and chili, sliced carrots and shallots satay add finely chopped garlic and sliced red pepper.

Push the fresh ingredients to the side of the pan and stir in fish sauce, soya sauce, brown sugar, and peanut butter. Once that mixture is mixed in add the coconut milk and kale (if you use spinach add it later with the bean sprouts it doesn't take as long to cook as kale. Let simmer and thicken for a bit and then add the lime juice, sprouts and cilantro.

If you can be bothered, add the fried tofu on top.

Salt and pepper if it needs it - I'm one of those people that always need it!

Tonight I ate this over brown rice, its also awesome on rice noodles.

Enjoy!