I think of myself as a bit of a grilled pizza connoisseur. A year or so ago I managed to perfect a method for making Neapolitan-style pizzas on the grill and it raised the bar on what a margherita pizza should be like. Most of the grilled pizzas out there tend to be bread dough that is flattened and grilled and that makes something that is pretty tasty but most of it comes down to the fact that pizza is pretty tough to make taste bad. Because of this, I often avoid a lot of grilled pizza recipes unless they come from a good source.

When this recipe by Mario Batali popped up Food and Wine my interest was piqued. I’ve watched Mario make many pies on TV and he definitely has a hold on what makes a great pizza. The key to making a really great pizza dough is to give it plenty of time to slowly rise and develop flavour in the fridge. The proportions in this dough balance out well with a hint of sweetness from the honey and a good shot of salt to  both slow the yeast and give the dough a nice balanced flavour.

The dough turns out a bit on the wet side, but still able to handle fairly easily when rolled out on parchment. The method of cooking works well because it is pre-cooked a little before it is topped with a light set of topping to let them finish off quickly as the dough finishes cooking. The one recommendation I would make is to pre-cut the mozzarella and place between several sheets of paper towel so that the mozza won’t make the finished pizza too wet.

Grilled Margherita Pizza – Recipe

Based on the recipe by Mario Batali

2 tablespoons honey
3 cups warm water
4 1/2 dry active yeast (or 3 1/2 tsp rapid rise yeast)
7 cups all-purpose flour (2 lb 3 oz), plus more for dusting
1/4 cup olive oil
3 tbsp sea salt

28oz can whole plum tomatoes
1 lb mozzarella
Large bunch basil leaves, torn
Sea salt

1.  In a large bowl, combine the honey and water. Sprinkle the yeast over and allow it to sit until foamy – if using active yeast – about 8 minutes.
2. Add the oil, flour (and rapid rise yeast, if using), and salt and mix until blended. Turn out the dough onto a well floured counter and knead until smooth. Place the dough into an oiled bowl and cover with plastic wrap until it doubles in volume, about 1 hour.
3. Punch the dough down and cut into 4 pieces. Roll each piece into a ball on a clean counter and then place onto an oiled baking sheet. Brush each ball with oil and then cover the baking sheet with plastic wrap and place in refrigerator overnight. This time allows the dough to develop flavour.
4. Prepare your sauce – open the can of tomatoes and remove the tomatoes (leave the liquid) to a bowl. Crush the tomatoes with your hands. This is your sauce – so simple, but so delicious.
5. Cut the mozzarella into rounds and place between sheets of paper towel to remove water – otherwise it will come out as you cook and leave you little pools of water on the pizza.
6. Light your grill and once hot turn one side down to medium-high and keep the other on high.
7. On a sheet of parchment roll out each dough ball into an oval about 12″ wide.
8. Flip one pizza dough onto the high heat side of grill and peel off the parchment. After one minute it should start to firm up and be easy to flip to the cooler side of the grill. Grill on the medium high side of the grill for 2 minutes until nicely browned. Flip back to the hot side. Be sure to keep the cover closed between flips.
9. Top the pizza with a thin layer of sauce, then 1/4 of the mozza, a generous helping of basil, and a little dash of salt. Continue to cook with the cover closed for another minute then move to the cooler side and cook until the cheese has melted, about another minute.
10. Remove from the grill and transfer to a cutting board.

Enjoy!

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Rhubarb never seems to get the credit it is due. Perhaps because the season for it is quite long (yes, rhubarb is still great all through summer, not just in the spring) or that quickly after it shows up there are strawberries and other fruits trying to steal the spotlight. Rhubarb also doesn’t really help itself either, the leaves are poisonous, the stalks are so tart that they are nearly not edible when raw, and it doesnt have the showiness of a perfect juicy strawberry.

Rhubarb has always made me think of spring. My parents have an enormous rhubarb plant and it was the first sign of life in the garden and a welcome spot of colour after a long winter. The sweet and tart combination of rhubarb desserts is like nothing else out there. Making jam from it has turned out to be a great way to experience that taste any day of the year.

I have been waiting all winter to use my new cookbook, Mes Confitures by Christine Ferber. This book is a classic in France and Christine is a legend in jam making. She has innovative ingredient combinations and techniques that are refined and well tested. She takes a very French approach to jam making. Unfortunately the recipes in this book are not always clear. As you may have noticed from the title, the original book was written in French but there is a little bit lost in the translation. The small vagaries of the book make it a little fun though and lead to a bit more experimentation. I ended up cutting the rhubarb a bit smaller than I think she meant for but I quite like the final texture.

I should also mention that Christine doesn’t use any commercial pectin. She takes advantage of the natural pectin of the fruit she is processing and if she needs extra she will add in some green apple jelly (high in pectin) to boost the pectin levels and help the jam set. It takes a little more faith and science to ensure you get the set you are hoping for but the results are spectacular when all goes well (I must admit that I have had one jam not turn out as desired, but that was quickly solved with a shot of pectin and some reprocessing).

Rhubarb Jam – Recipe

Adapted from the recipe in Mes Confitures

 1kg trimmed and washed rhubarb – I found that stalks 1-1.5cm  wide had the best flavour
800g sugar
Juice of 1 lemon

Split the rhubarb stalks lengthwise and cut into small pieces (you don’t need to cut it as fine as I did). Put the rhubarb in a non-reactive bowl with the sugar and lemon juice and stir to combine. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and allow to macerate overnight in the fridge. This macerating will help the pectin come out of the rhubarb and allow your jam to set nicely.

The next day, pour the rhubarb into a sieve and collect the juices in your jam pot (I just use my largest pot). Boil the collected juice and skim off any foam. Boil the syrup until it reaches 221F /105C on a candy thermometer. Add the rhubarb to the syrup and return to a boil. Skim off any foam and continue to boil on high heat for another 5 minutes (I added a few minutes) stirring. Put the jam into jars and seal.

Allow the jam to sit for a week or so in a cool place to allow the pectin to set. The longer you leave the jam, the better the flavours usually get, but don’t wait longer than a year as jam only lasts so long and this is so yummy why would you ever wait a year?!

Enjoy!

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Gin is a great for a hot day. It tastes fresh, bright, not too sharp, and doesn’t need a pile of sugary stuff added to make it good. I love a simple gin and tonic with a twist of lime on a hot day but there are so many other great gin cocktails out there. The Southside Cocktail is a classic and the house cocktail at the “21″ Club in New York. It will work well with most any gin, but I wouldn’t recommend using a fancy expensive one since the mint and lemon will cover the subtle flavors of a finer gin.

The Southside is also very easy to modify to your tastes – add a little more sugar, a splash of soda or tonic, use lime instead of lemon or both. Make it and then add a little of this and that to fit your tastes. I enjoyed it just as it was and it was especially refreshing on the deck on a hot day.

The Southside Cocktail – Recipe

2 ounces gin
1/2 ounce fresh lemon juice (no bottled juice allowed)
2 tsp sugar
4-5 mint leaves
Ice

Combine everything in a cocktail shaker with ice and shake vigorously – don’t be delicate, this will bring out the mint flavor. Strain into a tall glass filled with ice and garnish with a sprig of mint or twist of lemon.

Enjoy!

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I had the pleasure of attending the Swine and Dine Event in Edmonton on July 3rd and it was a spectacular night of great Alberta pork and connecting with Edmonton food lovers. We start at Zinc Restaurant located in the Art Gallery of Alberta (AGA), a restaurant I have been meaning to try since it opened. I had heard so many great reviews of the food and the first course did not disappoint. Sous Chef Doreen Prei wowed everyone with her parma ham wrapped foie gras paired with salted caramel. The buttery soft ham was a perfect pairing for the luscious and indulgent foie gras and then the sweet caramel just took it to a whole different dimension. The lady a couple seats over didn’t finish hers and I was very tempted to ask her if I could have it, but thought better of it since my other half might have frowned upon that. Along with the “little parcel of love” was a cold bacon and apple soup with a ground pork Parmesan crisp. I can’t say I loved the soup as the smoky flavour was a little more than I could take, but I think I could have eaten a tray of the crispy ground pork.

From Zinc we wandered over to Hundred Bar & Kitchen – since it was pouring rain we actually ended up weaving our way through the underground maze (aka pedway system) from the AGA to Stanley Milner Library. Since we were being a little tardy we were quickly greeted by our second course of chicken fried pork shoulder and waffles prepared by Chef Andrew Cowan.

This course had a lot going on and managed to balance out nicely. The waffle was savory and infused with bacon, cheddar, jalapeno, and beer. The popcorn gave a nice spicy kick thanks to some sriracha and then on the side was pickled mustard melon to give some sweet and sour notes. You got a little sweet, sour, salty, and spice in each bite and everything managed to play well. I overheard there were some naughty sounding analogies for how this tasted.

The last stop was right across the street at Moriarty’s Bistro and Bar with Chef Cory Welsch. I almost didn’t manage to get a photo of dessert since it looked so yummy that I couldn’t wait to eat it (I ended up eating one of mine before taking a picture). Luckily Sue needed a specially made one without peanuts so I was able to get a second shot at it.

This was Chef Cory’s play on the campfire s’more. On the skewer was a marshmallow flanked by two chunks of peanut butter banana bread. They then dipped those morsels into chocolate and finished it with a healthy dash of peanuts and bacon bits. It was diabetes inducing, but so yummy. I was stuffed but refused to leave any of the dessert on my plate.

A big thanks to Sharman for organizing this event though Passion for Pork and I can’t wait for her to put together another one.

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The food culture in Edmonton seems to have finally come of age a little. Farmers Markets are popping up everywhere you look and they are full of things like organic mushrooms, amazing jams, pickles, pasta, and of course plenty of baked goods. The restaurants in the city have kept right up and you can get great food at a great price. Competition is high for the dollars of Edmontonians and this is both a blessing and a curse. It means that progress is accelerated and the cream rises to the top while the rest are left behind.

Sadly, it also means that some overlooked gems might be accidental casualties. Good Food Box recently announced that they will be closing their doors. In March d’Lish Urban Kitchen and Wine Bar also announced they were closing. Those were sad days for me, but the saddest was certainly when I heard that Kerstin’s Chocolates was closing. Kerstin’s wasn’t necessarily closing because they weren’t doing okay but I would have to think that if they were booming it might still be open. They offered so many amazing chocolates in that store and I was blown away by the variety of textures, flavours, and smells that they could offer.

As soon as I heard they were going to be shutting down I made a purposeful trip to the store and left with a large bag of chocolates, including some stunning Taza orange mexican-style stone ground chocolate. I had heard many times about Mexican hot chocolate but so rarely came across the necessary chocolate that I never went about making it. Mexican style chocolate is quite course and often has a good amount of sugar added along with a little bit of spice such as cinnamon or chili. The bar I picked up was orange flavored and made a great cup of hot chocolate, but we decided to bump it up a little with some fresh orange zest. I highly recommend adding the zest since it is an amazing complement to the rich chocolate taste.

Mexican Hot Chocolate – Recipe

Makes 2 cups

2 cups whole milk
4 tbsp (25g) unsweetened cocoa powder
pinch of salt
About 3 oz (85g) Mexican-style sweet chocolate, chopped
Zest of 1/2 an orange

1. Whisk the cocoa and salt into the milk in a small heavy saucepan.
2. Heat over a medium-high heat while constantly whisking until it comes to a full boil.
3. Remove from the heat and whisk in the chocolate until completely melted. (You can add the zest here and then strain it out if you like.)
4. Pour into two cups and top with the zest.

Enjoy!

Update:

I meant to put in a little note in this post on where to find Mexican chocolate in Edmonton now that Kerstin’s has closed and totally forgot. So my recommendation is to check Paraiso Tropical (9136 118 Ave) since I think the last time I went in there they had them. If you know of any other places that carry Mexican chocolate, please let everyone know in the comments below.

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“Simple” ethnic recipes often look deceivingly easy but end up being difficult to get right. It usually comes down to knowing certain visual cues during the preparation, but sometimes I think they have a secret or two that they don’t tell us about. Tomato sauce, pyrogy, and of course even a great sandwich are some other great examples of “simple” recipes that can be hard to prefect.

Almost everyone has eaten guacamole and most of us have had good and bad versions of it. Unfortunately most of the versions I have made at home never lived up to the best versions I have had and it has always frustrated me. Guacamole is made of just a few ingredients and that makes it all the most frustrating. Tt looks so simple but somehow others are able to coax so much more from them.

Recently I hit the delicious green jackpot when I was looking through the Alice Waters cookbook, In the Green Kitchen. In it Gilbert Pilgram, of the illustrious Zuni Cafe, details how to take the humble ingredients and transform them into a zesty, bright, and flavorful guacamole. The part that I seem to have been missing was macerating the onions in lime juice to remove their sharp raw taste. He also uses a lot more lime juice than I ever did and emphasized the need to balance the favors of the acid from limes, the creaminess of the avocado, the heat of the chili. and the salt.

It’s funny that Gilbert describes guacamole as “forgiving” and I have to agree and disagree. It is indeed tough to make a bad guacamole since everything is so good in it, but it does seem hard to get just the right balance to make a great guacamole.

Where have you had your best guacamole?

Guacamole – Recipe

Makes enough for 3-4 people

2 large ripe avocados
Sea salt
3 green onions
2 limes
1 jalapeno pepper
Small bunch cilantro
1 tomato – optional

1. Halve the avocados and remove the pits. Scoop out the flesh into a mortar and season with a good pinch of sea salt.
2. Slice the green onions and place in a small bowl. Juice the limes and add to the onion with a pinch of salt.
3. Cut off the end of the pepper and discard. Slice the pepper lengthwise and remove the membranes and seeds. Flatter the jalapeno and finely dice it.
4. Chop the tomato, if using. No need to skin it.
5. Lightly mash the avocado – I love a chunky guacamole. Add the onion with juice, jalapeno, and tomato to the avocado and mix until combined.
6. Taste and add more salt if needed. Chop the cilantro and add to the guacamole.

Enjoy with tortilla chips!

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Every American consumes over 30 pounds of cheese per year. It’s an amazing and kind of sad statistic when you realize that almost all of that comes in the form of bland supermarket cheese or even worse – packaged and processed “cheese” slices. Thankfully Edmontonians don’t need to be tied to eating mediocre cheese thanks to a new cheese shop in the city of Edmonton – Everything Cheese.

I recently went to the store in Southwest Edmonton to see just what all the buzz was about. I met Lydia, one of the owners, and we chatted at length about the food scene in the city. Of course I also tried a few cheeses and left with a couple to enjoy that night with a nice bottle of red.

Lydia is very passionate about her cheese and the food culture of Edmonton, which she hopes will continue to blossom and develop into something to rival her hometown of Toronto. Cities like Toronto, Montreal, and Quebec City have multiple artisanal cheese shops and it is common to see excellent cheeses on restaurant menus. Edmonton is slowly catching up on the cheese shops thanks largely to Everything Cheese, but restaurants are still lagging far behind and continue to serve a lot of mediocre cheese that you would expect to find at the nearby Sobeys. There is hope though, as Lydia was happy to point out, as there are a few progressive restaurants that have put more emphasis on developing their own knowledge of cheeses.

The trek to Everything Cheese was long for me since I currently live in the Northeast (soon to be shorter as I am moving to Sherwood Park), but with such amazing cheeses on offer I will be making the special trip again and again to try new and interesting cheeses. I must admit that my own palate for cheeses is desperately under-developed, but I aim to change that this summer and would like to make my way around the world of cheese makers. From excellent local and Canadian cheeses to some of Europe’s best raw milk cheeses.

Cheese making has been around for thousands of years (perhaps as far back as 3200 BC) but most of us know far too little about the process and even that it is relatively easy to make fresh cheeses at home. I hope you will take some time out this weekend and make the special trip to Everything Cheese and experience what real cheese should taste like and to get a bit of cheese education from the great folks there.

Everything Cheese
14912 45th Avenue
Edmonton, Alberta
T6H 5T5
@everythngcheese

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I hope wherever you are reading this it is also beautiful out and you can mix up your favorite patio beverage and make a yummy sandwich from the series. If you missed any of the sandwiches, here they all are…

avocado melt

prosciutto with sprouts and greens

olive lover’s sandwich

fried bittersweet chocolate bread

grilled chicken and vegetables on focaccia (with a killer focaccia recipe)

grilled cheese

sausage sandwich with sauerkraut

chicken milanesa torta

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Milanesa is an old and well traveled dish. The origins are from Milan, but the dish is seen all over Europe and is well immersed into South American cuisine. It refers to a piece of meat prepared by breading and then frying. Someone was raving about a version of this sandwich they had from a restaurant and based on their rudimentary description I decided to try my hand at making a representation of it.

I wanted a soft flavourful bread and I was lucky enough to still have a loaf of focaccia left from the grilled chicken and vegetables sandwich. I found a recipe for chicken milanesa in my Evernote archives and then I decided that feta would be a good representation of the cheese they used. None of the parts of this sandwich are very glamorous, but everything combines to make a sandwich that is worth blogging about.

Start stretching your jaw because you will need a larger mouth in order to eat this sandwich. It measured about four inches in height and even with a lot of squishing it didn’t get much under three inches. It’s pretty fun to eat and each bite is a challenge as you try and find an angle of attack. The breading and frying can be a little intimidating for some but it’s really not too bad and is relatively quick.

This recipe is the last of the sandwich series and what a fun series of recipes it was. The simplicity and freshness of sandwiches is almost incomparable. Lay on top of that all the great memories you have from childhood of enjoying sandwiches with friends and family. I smile thinking about these sandwiches and how much I enjoyed making them, eating them, and all of the great memories they awakened within me. Please make a few of them and let me know what you think and what your favorite sandwich memories are.

Chicken Milanesa Torta – Recipe

Serves 4

Chicken Milanesa

Recipe based on Cook’s Illustrated

4 small boneless skinless chicken breasts, tenderloins removed
1/2 cup kosher or 1/4 cup table salt
1/2 cup sugar
1 1/4 cups Panko bread crumbs – these give the chicken a super crisp crust, but regular bread crumbs work too
1/4 cup Parmesan cheese, finely grated
Ground black pepper
3/4 cup flour
2 large eggs
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
3/4 cup vegetable oil, for frying

1.  Pound the chicken breasts to 1/2 inch thick.
2. Dissolve the salt and sugar in 1 quart of cold water in a bowl or large ziploc bag. Add cutlets and refrigerate for 30 minutes.
3. Remove chicken from the water and dry on a triple layer of paper towel, pressing another three layers on top to absorb moisture. Sprinkle dried cutlets with pepper on both sides.
4. Combine the Panko and Parmesan on a plate. Spread the flour on another plate. Whisk the eggs and oil and place in a third dish.
5. Dredge the cutlets one at a time in the flour, shaking them off to remove excess. Dip them in the eggs second, allowing extra to drip off and keeping only a thin coating. Finally press them into the bread crumbs to form an even and cohesive layer. Place the cutlets onto a wire rack when finished.
6. Heat half of the oil (6 tbsp) in a heavy 10-inch skillet over medium-high heat for about 2 minutes. The oil should be shimmering but not smoking. Place two cutlets into the pan, laying them down away from you so that if you splash oil it goes toward the stove, not you. Fry for about 2 1/2 minutes until they are deep golden pressing down on the cutlets with a spatula to ensure even browning. Use tongs to flip the cutlets and fry on the other side for another 2 1/2 minutes. Remove the cutlets to a paper towel lined plate.
7. Discard the oil and carefully wipe out the pan with a wad of paper towel. Use the remaining oil to fry the second batch of chicken. I recommend transferring the chicken to a clean wire rack to finish cooling as this will keep the coating crisp. The chicken can be rewarmed the next day using a toaster oven and will crisp up the coating nicely.

The Chicken Milanesa Torta (Sandwich)

Soft supple bread such as focaccia
Head lettuce, shredded
Feta, packed in brine
Tomato, sliced
Onion, thinly sliced
Avocado
Sour cream
Chicken Milanesa

1. Slice open the bread and spread a good coating of sour cream on the top half.
2. Slice the avocado in half lengthwise and remove the pit. Using a dull knive, slice up the flesh (without piercing the skin) and then use a spoon to scoop it out.
3. Layer the chicken, tomato slices, an inch of lettuce, avocado, onion, and feta onto the bottom half. Put the top half on and give the sandwich a good squish – it will be quite tall if you put enough of everything in there.
4. Do jaw stretches.

Enjoy!

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The news is constantly filled with warnings about meat. From pink slime to nitrates to heart disease, it makes me feel tht even looking at a sausage is going to kill me. I wanted to get a better handle on what the real scoop was so I did a little digging about the evil nitrates that are used in meat processing to extend their shelf life. It turns out that yes, they do react to form carcinogens and can be quite bad for you. But, much of this is a result of high heat cooking.

Bacon is that meat that gets most of the heat, literally and figuratively. It is cooked at high temperatures and this yields nitrosamines which has been linked to cancer. The nitrates used in preservation are not bad by themselves and are present in many vegetables and are considered antioxidants.

This meant that a BBQ’d sausage is not the way to go, nor is frying. Frankfurters and hot dogs are precooked which means there is really no need to use high heat on them and the goal should only be to bring them to a good temperature for eating. After a little research into the was you can heat franks I realized the best method would be to steam it. It keeps the flavor and moisture in the sausage and head it up without using especially high temperatures.

Now I could eat my frankfurter without feeling guilty and turn my focus to building something delicious. The frankfurter had be the best I could find because I do not like the taste of most supermarket brands. Sunnyview Farms produces a range of sausages using their own meats <check the facts> and they taste the way you would expect. The bun had to be soft, supple, and white – almost so soft that it sticks to the top of your mouth.

Growing up in a Ukrainian household means being exposed to sauerkraut. I hated the smell and moaned and complained when my mom would make her “sauerkraut soup”. I am still not a fan of the smell, but I realized that I had not actually eaten saurkraut for longer than I could remember. With so many people professing how good it was on a hotdog I had to take the plunge and return to my Ukrainian roots. On recommendations from Nigel Slater I slathered a little mustard on a supple white bun, add my steamed frank, and laid down a thick layer of warm sauerkraut.

It was divine and took me right back to being a kid eating a hotdog in the backyard. I love the combination of tangy mustard and salty sausage. The acidity of the kraut is similar to that of the mustard but less pungent and with a little freshness remaining from the cabbage.

Sausage Sandwich with Sauerkraut – Recipe

Sausages – any kind you like but I definitely love a great frankfurter
Sauerkraut – go to a farmers market and get some properly made stuff, not the mass produced stuff
Some good mustard – I like something on the simpler side, not dijon
Great hotdog buns
Some good beer

1. Steam your sausages for several minutes until they are hot all the way through
2. While you heat the sausages, toast the buns.
3. Spread mustard on the bottom of the bun, top with sausage and then the kraut.

Enjoy! (with beer)

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