Cookbook Fixation

I've Moved!

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Mon, 31 Jan 2011 03:25:00 +0000

After a hiatus I am starting to blog again. I'm changing the focus of my blog to getting in shape and eating delicious food. I am now at http://chocolateandfitness.blogspot.com/ and I hope you will come visit!

Random Meal Pictures: Part III

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Fri, 10 Sep 2010 02:53:00 +0000

Chunky vegetable soup with dill. A delicious way to use up all of the veggies in the fridge.

Soft and chewy chocolate chip cookies. Since I can’t find a recipe I completely, absolutely love, I am inventing my own. I’ve started by combining a few of my favourites; I’m getting there!

Blueberry crisp with homemade butterscotch ice cream.

The makings of Mexican pizza.

Charcuterie plate from a restaurant.

Spicy red lentil soup.

Mexican queso.

Chunky guacamole.

Homemade cocoa and black cherry ice cream.

Garlic scape pesto with gnocchi, roasted salmon and salad.

Massaged kale salad with roasted veggies tossed in tahini dressing. This was the one and only time I ever found kale in a supermarket. Why must it be so hard to find kale in Montreal?

S’mores brownies. Yes, I actually tried the Perfect Brownie Pan and no, I do not recommend it unless having brownies cut in perfectly sized pieces is a priority for you. I thought that the brownies would all have crispy edges but they didn’t. The pan is also quite small and doesn’t hold much batter. I usually make brownies in a 9 x 13 pan and this one was much smaller and quite shallow.

Buttermilk pancakes with summer raspberries.

The makings of hummus.

Chinese chili chicken.

Buffalo chicken pizza.

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Creamy Crab and and Goat Cheese Pasta

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 02:37:00 +0000

I don’t really like pasta (I can practically hear an audible gasp here), but for whatever reason I really was craving it last week. I have a habit of buying bottles and other sundry food items and taking my sweet time to use them up, so lately I’ve really been making and effort to use up more items; this pasta is a result of me trying to cook out of my pantry.

Red pepper.

Green onions, salt and pepper.

Minced chillies.

A can of crab meat. I envy people who can get fresh crab meat in bulk. That mean pretty much everyone south of the Mason-Dixon line.

Cooked through with tomato sauce added.

Delicious goat cheese.

Melted through.

With cooked spaghetti and fresh parsley added in at the last moment.

Creamy and delicious. Bliss my friends.

del.icio.us Tags: Pasta,Crab,Seafood

Chewy Cherry Chocolate Chip Cookies

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 02:40:00 +0000

I think all foodies must have an elusive holy grail of recipes that they are constantly searching for. Mine is the oh so humble but very delicious, chewy chocolate chip cookie.

I have tried many recipes but still haven’t found one that I love.

I love cookies that are big and thick yet chewy but not too sweet. Is that too much to ask? I’ve gone through every recipe on Martha Stewart’s website and for these cookies I tried the ones on the back of the milk chocolate chip bag http://www.hersheycanada.com/en/recipes/recipes/detail.asp?id=6624&page=6&per=25 but I found them too sweet. I eat things that would probably put a diabetic person in a coma so that’s saying something. Or maybe it was the fact that I very generously eyeballed the chocolate chip amount? Nah…. Anyways, dear readers, I have a request:

Can anyone steer me in the direction of a really great thick and chewy chocolate chip recipe? I and my stomach would be forever grateful.

Japanese Curry

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 02:26:00 +0000

Curry is one of those foods that is very popular outside Japan but virtually unknown outside the country. Recently, I was in a Korean supermarket and they had a small Japanese food section in which they sold Japanese curry mix. I practically did a happy dance in the aisle and then ran home to make this recipe. Japanese curry tastes quite different from Indian curries, it is a lot milder and slightly sweet, but quite delicious.

To start off with you brown onions and carrots in a pot.

Followed by mushrooms.

And potatoes and garlic at the last moment.

Most curries I have had are made with pork, but honestly, since I don’t really like meat I ended up using chicken.

At this point you add in your curry mix. It might say hot on the package but it is incredibly mild. I would have to spike it liberally with chillies to come anywhere near hot.

The curry basically looks like a gigantic chocolate bar and has the consistency of a boullion cube.

Now you add water to your veggie and meat mixture, and the curry. It will sort of melt into the water and form a stew.

At this point in time it will be very soupy but if you let it cook for a while it will thicken up.

Like this.

Usually curry is eaten with pickled vegetables and rice. I love pickled lotus roots but all they had at the store was pickled radish. They look a bit like lemon candies when sliced up, no? I wasn’t a big fan as they were too sweet for my tastes.

I also made some quick pickled green onions on the side.

I hadn’t eaten this in years so I was really happy to finally have found the mix to make it. I usually don’t cook from pre-made mixes but I wasn’t able to find a Japanese curry recipe and since everyone in Japan uses the mix, that’s good enough for me. It’s not the most photogenic picture but it sure is tasty.

Black Currant Pound Cake

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Fri, 13 Aug 2010 00:46:00 +0000

Whenever I see a fruit or vegetable that I don’t recognize in the grocery store I have a compulsion to buy some and then I’m not quite sure what to do with them. Usually if it’s a veggie I roast them, and if it’s a fruit I chuck them into a pound cake.

Seriously, you cannot go wrong with pound cake. When I saw these black currants I immediately wanted to try them.

But when I tasted one they were unpalatably sour. Since I adore cranberry pound cake, I decided to give the black currants the same treatment.

I always use Martha Stewart’s recipe. It is delicious, but you must absolutely use butter, no margarine. Maybe in some other recipes you can get away with margarine but in this recipe it is crucial.

Golden and delicious, the tart taste of the currants made an excellent contrast to the sweetness of the bread. Next time I see black currants in the grocery store, I must buy some and try this out again.

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Japanese Chili Pork Ramen

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Sun, 08 Aug 2010 03:42:00 +0000

You’ll rarely see me post pasta recipes because honestly, it’s just not my thing. I do however, have a thing for ramen noodles, even though it has been years since I have had some. Traditional Japanese ramen is a huge bowl of broth, ramen noodles, and different vegetables and meats depending on the recipe; each region in Japan has their version. You’ll notice there is no broth in my version. This is just personal preference as I have never particularly cared for the broth and have always felt that it just made it messier to eat.

For this recipe you will need:

Ramen noodles	Minced pork
Sambal Oelek or another chili sauce	Green onions
Fresh cilantro	Minced garlic
Roasted sesame seeds	Salt and pepper
Baby spinach

First of all you cook your pork until nearly browned.

Then add minced garlic.

Roasted sesame seeds and salt and pepper.

Once the meet is cooked thoroughly you put in a few tablespoons of Sambal Oelek. If you don’t have any feel free to use another type of chili sauce or you could even puree red chillies and use that instead.

Next, green onions and spinach go into the pan.

I usually use frozen baby spinach, since I can never finish the fresh kind before it goes bad.

And also some fresh cilantro, right at the end.

Give it a good stir and you’re ready to serve it. If you like your green onions very well cooked leave it on the heat a while longer, personally I like when they still have a bite to them as it makes for a good textural contrast with the meat and noodles.

While all of that is going on you can start your noodles. Try to get actual Japanese ramen noodles and not just the no name stuff in the styrofoam containers.

Since I don’t care for the broth I used just enough water to cook the noodles and two of the flavour packets that came with them. If you like the broth, use more water and all the flavour packets.

To serve just take some noodles and broth, if you’re using it, put them in a large bowl and add a generous amount of the pork mixture on top.

I really enjoyed this. It had been so long since I had eaten ramen so it really hit the spot. And I finally bought a pair of chopsticks to eat it properly. The Husband can’t eat with them so he thinks I have some kind of amazing talent to be able to do it. Poor boy, so gastronomically sheltered. I’ve tried to expand his horizons, but alas, no dice. This made lots of leftovers and overall it is a really cheap meal that can easily be stretched out. The biggest expense is the ground pork but the noodles are a buck or two per package and you could add more noodles and keep the same amount of meat. This meal is both tasty and budget friendly.

del.icio.us Tags: Japanse food,Ramen

Japanese Broiled Salmon

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Thu, 05 Aug 2010 00:18:00 +0000

Ok my friends, prepare to be introduced to one of the most delicious, easy and dummy-proof salmon dishes ever. You will need:

Big filet of salmon	Sake
Pepper	Soy sauce
Ginger	Garlic
Spicy mayonnaise or regular	Furikake or nori
Roasted sesame seeds

First you start with the marinade: pepper, sake, soy sauce, ginger and garlic. I just eyeballed a generous amount of sake (since booze makes everything better), a splash of soy sauce and some garlic and ginger.

Marinade.

Salmon filet.

Marinate the salmon for 15-30 minutes. I don’t like to leave it in the marinade too long because the flavour of the salmon can easily get overwhelmed.

The special ingredient. Thai hot chili mayonnaise is life changing. If you can find it, buy some.

Take the salmon out of the marinade and slather it with mayonnaise. I know, mayonnaise on salmon? I too was skeptical when I read the recipe, but I saw the light after I tasted it. And it was good.

Now you sprinkle on the furikake, (mixture of seaweed, bonito flakes and sesame seeds usually) or crumbled seaweed.

And a generous amount of roasted sesame seeds.

Put the filet in the oven at 400 degrees until it’s cooked and flaky. How long it takes depends on how thick your fish is.

This is bliss my friends. The mayo, seaweed and salmon go so well together and I love the flavour of the roasted sesame seeds. This recipe requires very little prep and tastes amazing. You really don’t need much more than some steamed rice and some veggies alongside. This is a great dinner party recipe since you can easily double the servings by getting a larger filet.

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Random Meal Pictures: Part II

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Mon, 02 Aug 2010 01:39:00 +0000

Mini appetizer pizzas.

Lamb chops marinated in garlic, lemon, rosemary and olive oil served with broccoli and cheesy twice baked potatoes.

A salad. Just for proof that I do eat veggies.

Oven baked fries and a carmelized onion burger. Grinding you own meat is the key, my friends.

Barley and duck confit soup.

Buckwheat pancakes and berries.

Cajun dirty rice.

Something for The Husband involving meat and copious amounts of cheese.

Rosemary rubbed leg of lamb.

Butternut and apple soup.

Blueberry muffins with a brown sugar soy nut topping.

Tacos. The filing is hiding under the greenery.

Baby back ribs.

Home-made cherry cheesecake ice cream.

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Byblos Cafe- Restaurant Review

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Sun, 25 Jul 2010 02:07:00 +0000

A few weeks ago I went to a cafe called Byblos in Montreal’s Plateau neighbourhood with a friend.

Byblos is a very cute Persian cafe with a really cozy atmosphere. The menu isn’t large but it’s divided into main courses, a brunch section and a section with yogurt and legume based dips.

To start off, I ordered a rosewater sherbet. The syrup was at the bottom and you had stir it to mix everything up before drinking it.

The little black bits are chia seeds. I really enjoyed this as I like rosewater but the flavour can sometimes be so overpowering that it feels like you are drinking perfume. This was perfect, not too strong and not too weak.

My friend Alex had a mint tea which came with lumps of sugar. I wanted to try this but the day we went it was 35 degrees outside and there was no air conditioning in the restaurant.

We ended up ordering a few items to share. This was a trio of dips: hummus, a lentil and eggplant dip and another lentil dip. The first two were good but the last one was really bland. Neither of us liked it.

This was a trio of yogurt dips: a beet one, a spinach one and another one which I can’t remember. We liked all of these; very refreshing in the hot weather.

There was also a generous amount of pita bread.

We also ordered these chicken and mushroom pastries. These were a tad overdone and the filling was very dry. In general a lot of restaurants tend overcook chicken, unfortunately.

I would go back again. I liked the atmosphere and some of the menu items were rather unique. I liked the commensality of sharing dishes as it’s a fun way of trying new things. The service was a little slow and I had to flag down waitresses more than once to make sure we were able to order or get more water. The prices were fair and it’s a nice place to go catch up with a friend.

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Okonomiyaki- Japanese Savoury Pancake

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 02:47:00 +0000

This my friends, is Okonomiyaki, a Japanese pancake that usually comes filled with cabbage, green onions, pork or seafood. This is super quick to make at home and while it might require a trip to an Asian supermarket you can make this without the harder to find ingredients and it will still be delicious.

You will need:

Roughly 2 cups of flour	Roughly 2 cups of water
Japanese or regular chili powder	Bonito (dried fish flakes)
1 or 2 eggs	Nordic shrimp
A head of Chinese cabbage	Green onions
Sliced pork cutlets	1/2 of Panko
Tonkatsu sauce or BBQ sauce	Japanese or regular mayo
Furikake or seaweed flakes

To start off you mix 2 cups of flour with 1 cup of water or dashi stock (Japanese stock). I actually used chicken stock but plain water is fine.

As you can see it’s not the smoothest dough at this point. Since you’ll be adding a lot of wet ingredients it is better to leave it on the dry side at this point.

Next you add in your shrimp.

The panko. This is actually a substitute for tenkasu which are little fried bits of tempura batter since I couldn't find them.

One head of Chinese cabbage, chopped.

Japanese chili pepper.

For four portions I used 4 thin pork cutlets cut into strips.

At this point you mix everything together. You will need to add more water to get everything to stick; the batter should glue everything together and shouldn’t be too runny. I actually ended up adding a bit too much water and had to add a little more flour.

I cooked this in a crepe pan. If you don’t have one try to use a low sided pan. Cook it on medium and put a lid on it. This helps the inside cook since you want to make sure that your pork is thoroughly cooked.

After 8-10 minutes remove the lid and check the bottom to see if it is browned.

I use the “cover the pan with a plate and flip method”. I’m always scared I will drop something but it generally works. At this point cut two slits in the pancake and do not cover it so it won’t get soggy. In another 10 minutes it should be done.

The toppings: bonito flakes, furikake, tonkatsu sauce and Japanese mayo. If you can’t find these products just use some BBQ sauce, regular mayo and crumble some seaweed on top.

Layers of toppings.

This is one of my favourite Japanese meals. The toppings really make the meal and it is really filling with the shrimp, pork and cabbage. This would make fun party food with an electric griddle. You could have everyone cook their own pancake and customize them. This recipe make enough to feed an army so you will have plenty of leftovers.

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Italian Poached Eggs

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 03:09:00 +0000

In the list of things that are tasty but photograph badly Italian Poached Eggs are pretty high up. This is one of those recipes for which anyone can eyeball the proportions, no matter how little cooking experience you have. This is extremely hard to mess up and oh so tasty. If you have practically nothing left in your fridge I can guarantee you will probably have the ingredients to make this. You will need:

-Tomato sauce, or the ingredients to make one

-Fresh basil (nice but not absolutely necessary)

-Eggs

-Cheese, I like smoked gruyere but you could use any Italian or non Italian cheese

-A nice baguette for mopping up the tomato sauce

I rarely have pre-made sauce on hand since making some is rather easy. After I browned an onion and some garlic I poured in some pureed tomatoes and let it reduce. Once that was done I cut some fresh basil in a chiffonade and seasoned with salt and pepper. If you have pre-made sauce just throw it in the pan, heat it and add the fresh basil if you are using it.

At this point you crack your eggs into the hot sauce, spacing them evenly apart. I was serving them for brunch so I used two per person. Bring the sauce to a boil, cover and then crank down the heat.

The eggs only take about 5 minutes to cook. Before they’re done take your grated cheese, distribute it on top and let it melt.

This isn’t going to grace the cover on any magazines any time soon but it is really good. It’s fun to grab a piece of bread and get all the sauce or you could make some polenta and ladle this on top. Either way it’s a really quick and delicious brunch main course.

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Honey Cake

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 05:00:00 +0000

I have a deep abiding love for Bundt cakes. Maybe it’s the texture? I do love cakes with something of a heft in them so when I saw a recipe for Honey Cake in a recipe book and offered to make it for The Husband he was enthusiastic. Apparently he had been reading a fantasy book in which the elves ate honey cakes to sustain themselves which made him want to try a real one. Yes, we are geeks and have a basement full of Star Wars posters to prove it.

The recipe I used is a lot like this one except I used coffee instead of milk, beat the egg whites separately and didn’t use whiskey. I’d type the one I did use but I don’t want to have to pawn off my KitchenAid mixer should I get sued for copyright infringement.

Whipped egg whites.

Flour, cinnamon, ground ginger and nutmeg.

I just had to show you guys the pretty hand painted jar in which the honey came.

Milk. The colour looks weird because I had measured the honey in there as well.

Wet and dry ingredients plus the egg yolks.

All mixed up together.

Carefully cutting the egg whites in.

Ready to go in the oven.

Since I am incorrigible I made a glaze with icing sugar, honey and some milk.

Before icing.

After. I made too much glaze and it ended up running off the plate. I took one for the team and ate the excess off a spoon.

This cake was delicious. Usually I’m a chocolate dessert kind of girl but the spices and the honey went together wonderfully. It was very moist, dense and kept really well. The Husband was very please except he was expecting mini cakes since apparently that is what the elves in the fantasy book ate. No, I am not making this up, even after 10 years, he still cracks me up.

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Mustard Roasted Fish

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 04:26:00 +0000

I’ve been on an unplanned blogging hiatus for the past month, slowly filling up my camera and biding my time until I had a chance to sit down and finally get down to business. Happily, my night classes are over for the moment (hooray!), so I finally get to blog without a nagging little voice in my head reminding me that I really need to finish my homework.

Sometimes when I’m posting I struggle to find good pictures of certain dishes because alas, not everything is photogenic in proportion to its deliciousness; Mustard Roasted Fish being a prime example. The recipe is here and is from Ina Garten. Although she rivals Paula Deen in lavish and sometimes gratuitous use of butter, I can’t remember ever having made a bad recipe from her and this one is no exception.

Creme fraiche is 40% milk fat which is why it is so good. It’s not available everywhere so if you have a hard time finding it you could substitute full fat sour cream or full fat Greek yogurt. My parents actually make their own but they’re hard core foodies that way.

If a recipe calls for white fish, I always end up using tilapia. It thaws quickly and has a really neutral flavour; you can’t go wrong.

Capers, green onions, Dijon mustard and grainy mustard. I always drive The Husband mad because I always have 4-5 kinds of mustard in the fridge at one time but they come in handy in recipes like this.

All mixed up together.

Poured over the fish and ready for the oven.

You’ll know it’s ready when your kitchen smells amazing and the fish flakes easily with a fork.

Unfortunately once plated it’s not as pretty looking but it tastes amazing. The green onions and the capers did a good job of cutting through the richness of the creme fraiche and the mustards paired perfectly with the fish.

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Kitchen Sink Cookies

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Thu, 20 May 2010 03:05:00 +0000

Some people do yoga to relax but I like to bake; it is my tasty form of meditation. I’ve seen a recipe floating around the internet for “Compost Cookies”, basically chocolate chip cookies into which you add whatever sweet and salty ingredients that you happen to have on hand (i.e. chocolate chip cookies and potato chips). Since I’m not a big fan of sweet and salty mixed together I made this all sugary, gooey version. I based my version on this Martha Stewart recipe.

I wanted to add toffee chips to my cookies. Since I couldn’t find any, I improvised.

I unwrapped a bag of toffee candies.

Chucked them into the food processor.

And voila! They weren’t all perfectly uniform in size but close enough.

In addition I decided to use white chocolate chips, milk chocolate chips and marshmallows. Because clearly, I believe in moderate amounts of sugar.

White sugar, brown sugar, butter. My brown sugar decided to turn into a brick so I had to microwave it to try to soften it up. I beat all of this really well, until it was super fluffy, since I’ve read that it helps the cookie texture.

The eggs. Oops, forgot to take a step of the flour stage.

Adding in all the glorious mix-ins.

I had a taste of the raw cookie dough. For quality assurance purposes, of course.

I tried to make sure that I got a nice mixture in each cookie.

These cookies were absolutely glorious. The toffee bits and the marshmallows became really gooey and added a really great texture. They spread more than I wanted them to but they were so good. I gave away a lot of them and everyone loved them. You cannot go wrong with toffee chips, white chocolate, milk chocolate and marshmallows.

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Afternoon Tea Pudding

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Sat, 08 May 2010 02:22:00 +0000

I am pretty good at “reading” recipes. Meaning I can usually tell by looking at the ingredients and the proportions if the recipe will work out or not. Last week however, I made a recipe for Southern biscuits that didn’t turn out that well. They were too flat and not fluffy enough, so while I am still looking for a good biscuit recipe I decided to hunt around for something to do with the leftovers. I found a recipe for “Afternoon Tea Pudding” which is basically bread pudding made with jam and scones. While biscuits aren’t scones, they’re fairly close so I decided to make it.

Leftover biscuits.

I cut them in half in order to make more layers.

I buttered a dish and spread strawberry jam on each of them and stacked them with the jam side facing up.

For the custard I started off with 3 whole eggs and 1/3 cup of sugar.

Vanilla extract.

Whisked together.

To that I added 1 and 1/4 cup of heavy cream and 3/4 cup of regular milk mixed together and heated up in the microwave.

I added it gradually to the eggs while whisking to make sure that I didn’t end up with scrambled eggs.

I slowly added the milk/egg mixture to the biscuits and let them soak for 10 minutes to allow them to soak up some liquid.

To cook the pudding I put it in my largest lasagne pan and added in boiling water around it. It went into the oven for 35-40 minutes at 350 (or it might have been 375, sorry, I can’t remember).

When the top was golden and the custard was cooked thoroughly I took it out of the oven and let it cool down.

This was really good. The custard was sweet but not overly so and the biscuits were soft but not mushy. The jam was a nice touch as well, adding and extra layer of flavour and texture. I had some Devonshire cream so I added a dollop on the side. Surprisingly enough this tasted even better the next day and it was even good cold. This is a really great way to use up leftover scones or biscuits which are going stale that you might have laying around the kitchen.

del.icio.us Tags: Scones,Biscuits,Bread Pudding

Chicken Liver Pate

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Fri, 07 May 2010 02:30:00 +0000

Let me start off by saying that even though I will eat pretty much everything I will not eat liver. I love trying pretty much anything but I would have to be on Survivor and have to eat some to have immunity and even then I would choke it down. Why then did I make chicken liver pate? Because the husband requested it. So without any further ado, here is my no recipe version of chicken liver pate loosely based off of a version from Gordon Ramsey.

After trimming the chicken livers I left them soaking milk overnight. Why do this? I have no clue, but since I don’t know anything about cooking liver I followed instructions.

Before cooking them I let them drain thoroughly for a few minutes. I think that it would take a whole passel of photographers to make damp chicken livers look good.

When in doubt, start off with bacon.

I crisped it in the pan and saved the fat.

For a change and for the flavour I decided to use French shallots instead of plain onions.

As Martha would say, “frying onions in bacon fat; it’s a good thing”. Hmmm I think I just unleashed my inner Paul Deen with that sentence.

Once the onions were browned I chucked in the chicken livers.

I also added in salt, pepper and thyme.

Once all the liquid had evaporated and the chicken livers were cooked thoroughly I pureed them in the food processor until the mixture was smooth. This is completely random but in French a food processor is called “un robot culinaire”. “Culinary robot” sounds much more interesting than “food processor” don’t you think?

All done.

The Husband enjoyed his pate although it made a lot more than I was expecting. Poor guy, he’ll have to finish it off on his own because this time, since it involves liver, I’m not taking one for the team!

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Baked Tofu and Soba Wakame Soup

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Fri, 30 Apr 2010 02:38:00 +0000

I collect food like other people collect knick knacks. While I plan out the week’s menu in advance and shop accordingly it still doesn’t stop me from tossing in various other things into the grocery cart. Lately, to use up some of the surplus, I’ve been trying to cut back on the pre-planned meals and improvise in order to use up everything I’ve been hoarding. This recipe was the result of me poking my head into the pantry and trying to figure out what I was going to have for dinner at the last minute.

I’m one of those people who actually likes tofu, even though it is pretty tasteless by itself.

Instead of adding in plain tofu I decided to marinade it before I tossed it into the oven to bake. I used a mixture of garlic (sorry, I was having a lazy food blogger day and used the stuff from the jar), ginger, sesame oil, maple syrup and rice vinegar. I was short on time so the tofu ended up just soaking for five minutes.

Going into the oven.

After 10 minutes at 450 I took them out of the oven to turn them.

After 20 minutes they were done. They look a little burnt but it’s just the marinade that makes them look so dark.

Instant soup. *gasp*. I can’t find dashi or dried wakame where I live so I ended up using instant soup packets. Even though I try to avoid using pre-packaged food sometimes I don’t have much of a choice.

I had some soba noodles that had been hanging around the pantry for a while that I decided to add to the soup. I love soba even though I don’t think about using it often. The noodles are made out of buckwheat flour and have a hearty texture and a slightly nutty taste.

Also some green onions.

I threw all the ingredients into the pot and let them boil away until the noodles were tender.

For an improvised meal this was pretty good. I liked the flavour of the tofu but next time I will let it marinate a lot longer so that the flavour gets stronger. The broth was savoury and went perfectly with the taste of the noodles. For a veggie meal this was rather filling. I don’t make a lot of Asian meals so this was a nice change.

del.icio.us Tags: Asian Food

Double Chocolate Jam Brownies

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 02:55:00 +0000

I am currently learning how to drive at the ripe old age of 28. Unfortunately we are still in the stone age and own a manual car. This leads to much cussing and me holding up traffic while I try to get the blasted car started again. Since chocolate will magically smooth away all crankiness I came home from a particularly rough driving lesson and made these brownies. While I wish that I had much more constructive way of coping with stress, say jogging or cleaning like some people I know, baking does have its own rewards. This recipe comes from a cookbook called “Cook in Boots”. I could not find a recipe online and since I don’t want to get sued I can’t post it. Sorry!

Ingredient collage: butter, semi-sweet chocolate, brown sugar, white sugar and eggs.

As much as I love all things sugary made out of white flour they make my blood sugar crash. Since whole wheat flour makes baked goods taste more like hockey pucks I am trying out an enriched white flour blend. It has the texture of white flour but the fiber of whole wheat. Other than the fact that it is a little darker than white flour it pretty much has the same texture.

Here are all the ingredients together with some vanilla extract.

The batter.

The chocolate melted along with the butter.

All together now.

A handful of chocolate chips, hence the double chocolate in the recipe title.

I had just opened a new jar of jam which I wasn’t super crazy about. It was good but way too tart, so I decided to mix it in to the brownies for extra flavour.

I had to mix everything really well since the jam came out in one big gelatinous blob.

Ready to go in the oven.

After 35 minutes. I actually ended up using a bigger pan than what the recipe originally called for. Next time I will use an even bigger pan so everything cooks more evenly.

These came out very dense and are halfway between fudgey and cakey. The jam added a nice subtle flavour although next time I would add white chocolate chunks for more contrast instead of the chocolate chips. These are really good and they most definitely made up for my bad day!

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Cheesy Beef Noodles (a.k.a. Homemade Hamburger Helper)

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 01:21:00 +0000

This is another recipe to put in the “Husband Friendly Food” file. I’ve never actually had hamburger helper but I image that this is what it tastes like. This recipe is pretty basic: cheese, noodles, sauce and meat but it’s pretty tasty and economical.

First off onions. I think there are very few recipes that don’t start off with chopped onions.

While that was going on I started boiling some egg noodles.

The original recipe calls for ground beef but The Husband bought ground bison instead. I personally like ground bison better than beef, it is actually leaner and has a nicer taste. It’s becoming more and more available. If you see it in the supermarket do give it a try.

I browned the meat along with the onions in a pan and added salt, pepper, minced garlic and chilli powder.

Also a dash of Worcestershire sauce and soy sauce.

To make the sauce I threw in a heaping tablespoon of flour and roughly a cup of chicken broth as well as a generous amount of cheddar cheese.

I let everything come to a boil until the cheese was melted and the sauce had thickened.

Once the noodles were done I drained them and stirred them into the sauce. I turned the heat on low and let the pasta sit so the flavours could come together and everything could thicken further.

This a nice change from the usual tomato based meat sauce and comes together really quickly. It really is one of those recipes for which you do not need to measure and pretty much any meat loving spouse or small child will eat.

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Spicy Seafood Romanov Pasta

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Tue, 20 Apr 2010 02:36:00 +0000

I love scallops but I rarely think about making them. On a whim I decided to buy them at the supermarket this week without having any specific recipe in mind. One of the things I like to do when I don’t know what to do with an ingredient is to go on foodnetwork.com and look for recipes and get ideas. Looking around I found this recipe for creamy spicy seafood pasta. I decided to play around with it, keeping in mind that a lot of the reviews said that it was bland and try to “kick it up a notch” a la Old School Emiril.

Ingredient collage: Garlic (as much as you can stand), onion, red chilies, pureed tomatoes, chopped parsley and lots of vodka. Notice I put the most important ingredient in the middle? Booze makes pretty much everything taste better.

First of all, as usual, I browned the onions along with salt and pepper. Right before they were done I added in the garlic to cook quickly. I loathe burnt garlic so I don’t mind if it is under rather than over cooked.

Next was a big glug of the pureed tomatoes along with a splash of cream, a cheerful amount of vodka and the red chillies. I let it reduce a bit until it had a smooth creamy consistency.

I decided to rinse my scallops really well, I’ve eaten scallops that still have some sand in them and it does not make for a happy meal.

All the scallops went for a swim in the creamy sauce which resulted in them getting poached. On the plus side this makes for less dishes and faster prep, on the negative side this waters down the sauce. Next time I will pat the scallops dry with a paper towel and then sear them before adding them to the sauce.

Once the scallops were cooked I threw in the parsley and gave the sauce a taste. I ended up adding plenty of smoked Spanish paprika (buy this, it will change your life), a pinch of oregano and a pinch of dried basil as well as more salt and pepper. I taste everything as I’m cooking and constantly adjust the seasonings. Obviously, I don’t do this when there is raw meat involved as I have no interest in ending up in the hospital.

Make this. Impress the in-laws, the parents or just yourself. Unless you’re one of those lucky souls who lives near the ocean and has access to cheap seafood this isn’t exactly budget friendly as a family meal. This would work equally well with Nordic shrimp or shredded imitation crab. The ingredients are pretty much pantry staples and the whole thing takes less than half an hour to pull together. Definitely a repeat.

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Cauliflower and Potato Curry- Aloo Gobi

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Tue, 20 Apr 2010 00:46:00 +0000

As you can probably tell from my blog, I love Indian food. I’ve tried many different kinds and when I saw this curry in William Sonoma’s “A Taste of the World” cookbook I knew I wanted to try it. In the description it said that this is a mild curry which is very popular with children but since I like heat I ended up adding chilies to the recipe.

The ingredients: potatoes, onions, chopped red chilies, coconut milk and fresh tomatoes.

I started off the recipe by cooking onions over low heat along with the chilies, cinnamon, coriander, cumin, cayenne, ginger, ground coriander and minced garlic. Most Indian recipes call for ghee (clarified butter) but since I don’t have any and can’t be bothered to make some I just use regular butter.

Once the onions were browned and soft I added two tomatoes which had gotten too soft to eat raw and a few heaping tablespoons of tomato paste.

At this point I added in the cauliflower, the diced potatoes and the coconut milk. I let the mixture come to a boil and then put the lid on and lowered the heat.

After roughly 20-25 minutes everything was done and I added in a generous amount of chopped coriander right before I served the curry. I love adding cilantro at the last moment, it gives dishes that nice bit of green. I know a few people that absolutely loathe cilantro, among them The Husband, but to me not eating cilantro is a bit unfathomable.

This curry was really mild with the tomatoes and the coconut milk. It would be something that you could make for someone who doesn’t like spicy food to help ease them into the world of Indian food. As much as I liked this dish I have to confess that two hours after eating this I was absolutely ravenous since there is pretty much no protein in this dish. If you’re someone like me who required protein to feel satisfied I would add some chicken breast or tofu to make this into a full meal.

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Turkey Bacon and Mushroom Macaroni and Cheese

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Sun, 18 Apr 2010 04:28:00 +0000

There is a show that comes on Food Network Canada with two sisters who try to redo recipes to be healthier. One of them is brown haired and flaky and the other one is blond haired and bitchy and I always want to smack her. Anyways, I digress. This recipe comes from that show (the original is here) and is their take on macaroni and cheese. While I love a good straight up macaroni and cheese this version, full of veggies and turkey bacon is actually pretty good.

This recipe is a good way to sneak vegetables onto the plates of small children or spouses that still eat like small children. I have one of those and this dish works on him. There are mushrooms, petit pois and onions. I always use petit pois instead of peas since we both find peas way too starchy. Since I didn’t feel like grating my cheese I just cut it up into cubes.

While there is butter in the cheese sauce it is mostly made with evaporated milk and flour which allows it to get a thick consistency but be a lot lighter than a traditional béchamel. The recipe calls for dried mustard but I always chuck in a generous amount hot English mustard instead.

The finished result. I always put macaroni and cheese in the oven to broil in order to get a crunchy top.

I actually like this recipe better than run of the mill mac and cheese recipes since it has more things in it. The mushrooms and turkey bacon go really well together and the extra veggies make it more of a main course rather than a side.

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Cranberry and Chocolate Chip Buckwheat Cookies

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 02:03:00 +0000

My posting has slowed down a bit, sorry! My life has been very hectic and stressful lately and it’s a bit hard to find time to post. You will probably see shorter posts but I should be able to post more often. Ok, now back to our regularly scheduled programming.

One of the thing I like to do is take a pre-existing recipe and try to make it healthier. I actually like healthy food but unfortunately for me I also like unhealthy food. I don’t discriminated, I’m an equal opportunity eater. ;) Anyways, this recipe is a healthyfied version of the chocolate chip cookie recipe on the back of a bag of milk chocolate chipits. The original is here.

Whee! I’ve discovered the joys of Picasa so now I’m playing around with making collages. Here are the ingredients I decided to sub in: buckwheat flour, flax meal (basically ground flax seeds), dried coconut and dried cranberries. When subbing in dried ingredients you can generally sub in an equal amount. As an interesting note we get our buckwheat flour from a stone mill nearby. It’s the oldest working stone mill in North America and grinds everything old school, with water power and giant stone plates.

Instead of using brown sugar like in the original recipe, I used agave nectar which is a lot sweeter than sugar so you can use a smaller amount; I used 1 cup of agave to sub for 2 cups of brown sugar. The only problem with agave is that since it is liquid you will have to add extra flour in order to make sure that your recipe isn’t too runny. There were also eggs.

Not to be forgotten, the baking power, baking soda, milk chocolate chips and vanilla extract. At the end after I had mixed everything together I added more flour until everything had come together.

Another shot of the texture of the cookies.

I cooked them around 10-12 minutes until they were starting to brown. Since buckwheat is so dark it’s a bit hard to tell when they’re browning though.

I love the bright red colour of the cranberries. Unlike whole wheat flour which can produce very dense cookies, buckwheat produces light almost crumbly cookies. It has a nice nutty taste so it add an extra layer of taste. I also loved the taste of the flax seed meal, it adds texture as well. Don’t get me wrong, I love white flour chewy chocolate chip cookies like everyone else but sometimes it is nice to go for something different. They’re quite filling because of the whole grains and they make a good snack to take to work.

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Restaurant Review- The Oyster Shack

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy@ChocolateAndFitness) — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 00:45:00 +0000

I love seafood so I was really happy that the blogger meetup group to which belong was going to The Oyster Shack. Then again, I did pick the restaurant. ;)

The Oyster Shack is a restaurant which tries to replicate the food and the atmosphere of an East Coast seafood shack. I think they succeed and the inside is nice and cozy. We went on a Friday night and it was lively but not too loud.

When we got there we found out that Martinis are only 5 dollars on Fridays. I had had a rough day on that Friday so this instantly made me perk up. My friend Irina had a dirty martini.

I had a lychee martini. They didn’t have any lychee juice so they used cranberry, hence why it was pink.

For my second martini I had a melon one.

I was starving by the time we ordered so I was more than happy when the bread was brought to the table. It was warm and crusty. I really appreciated the fact that it was warm since most restaurants serve stone cold bread; it was a nice touch. Service was a bit slow and it took roughly 45 minutes for all the appetizers to come. Unfortunately that always seems to be the case when eating out in a large group.

Fried Calamari.

Oysters Rockefeller.

Crab cake.

Clam Chowder.

I hadn’t ordered an appetizer and after seeing everyone’s food I was really wishing I had. Lucky the main course came soon after.

Mussels.

Fish and chips.

Lobster and steak surf and turf.

I had a bucket o’ scallops. Sorry about the blurry picture. It was deep fried scallops on top and fries on the bottom.

It actually came in a little silver bucket which was rather cute, along with two dipping sauces.

Lobster roll and fries.

The food was really good and the seafood was of good quality. The scallops were nice and tender with a light, crisp batter. Everyone else also really liked their food.

Since I had skipped the appetizers I decided to have dessert which was only two dollars more. I had a Tia Maria vanilla cake with chocolate icing. The cake came with candied citrus peel sprinkled on top and it was really good and not too heavy.

Vanilla custard. The custard had a top layer of caramel pudding with vanilla custard underneath.

Chocolate profiteroles. I forgot to ask whether or not that was ice cream or whipped cream.

All in all the food was delicious and more than worth the price. The seafood tasted fresh, not frozen and the scallops in particular had a great texture and were not rubbery like some restaurants make them. Everyone was happy with their meals and I most definitely will go back.

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