First you take your beans. The recipe called for 2 cups of white beans (white navy beans). I thought this meant 2 cups of RAW beans, but no, it meant 2 cups of COOKED beans. As a result, I have SO VERY MUCH bean dip.
Anyway, take your beans, in any form. If they’re raw, give ’em a good cook. Simmer them in a pot of water for about an hour. Make sure that your water doesn’t totally evaporate, and add more water if you have to — burnt beans is a smell no one needs to have in the kitchen.
While your beans are cooking (or sitting politely in their can, waiting on your convenience), take a pan and sauté yourself a finely chopped onion with some fresh sage (or frozen sage if you’ve got it). Once the onions are translucent, remove pan from heat and plop in 6 or 7 cloves roasted garlic (about one head) just to get them warm and toasty.
In a large bowl (with the aid of an immersion blender) or food processor, combine your cooked beans, your onion/garlic/sage mixture, one or two roasted red peppers, cut in strips (from a jar or make ’em yourself), a few dashes of balsamic vinegar, and a pinch or so of sea salt. Blend that thing silly until it’s smooth and creamy.
Pile 'em on and blend 'em silly.
Serve as a dip with pita chips or crackers, or use as a bean base in quesadillas, wraps, and sandwiches.
Because I have so very much dip, I managed to foist some off on D and J, and I’m going to try to freeze the rest. I will let you know how that goes.
On Sunday the Pie and I had KK, Il Principe, and D, J, and S over for an Easter feast.
I have a lot on my plate this week (and I’m not talking about food here) so I’m going to draw the recounting of this tale out as long as I possibly can. I’ll try to give you a post a day about all the fun and fantastic things we ate.
I love to have dinner parties. I think it’s my parents’ influence again. I’m not really happy unless I can stuff someone else with food until he or she feels the need to lie down. It really makes my day.
That said, entertaining, on a small or large scale, takes a lot of work and a lot of planning. Timing is pretty much everything, and it takes practice to get it all to happen at the same time. The Pie and I have it down to an exact science at this point. We take a gander at what time things are supposed to be done, chuck them in the oven or on the stove at the various points in time we think they need to go in, then we shut our eyes tight and cross our fingers that everything will turn out properly. Most of the time we’re right but it took years to get us to this stage.
I have also learned the art of making things ahead of time. This saves a lot of panic in the kitchen when you’re trying to get everything finished at the same time. If there are some dishes on your menu that can be popped in the microwave or in the oven for reheating at the last minute then all the better. Another important thing to remember, and something that I only recently learned, is that you don’t have to make absolutely everything from scratch. There is nothing wrong with adding store-bought chips to your dips, or purchasing bread as a side. The more stuff you make the more complications you are going to have. Besides, sometimes the store versions of things are actually better. You don’t have to have absolute control over everything that goes on your menu, and so that is why, finally, it is also important to let other people give you a hand if they want to. Kª wanted to bring a salad, and you know what? I thought that was a great idea. And it was a great salad.
Pita Chips (store-bought — really, you don’t have to be a domestic maven all the time – I get the In Snax sea salt versions from In Foods Inc. They are totally tasty.)
Today is the first day after the Pie and I finished our month-long vegetarian experiment. Accordingly, we’re going to MEAT IT UP and have ourselves some burgers tonight. So much for easing back into omnivorism.
There are two very important things to remember when making burgers by hand. The first is to buy no leaner than a medium ground chuck. You may think you’ve made a healthy choice with a leaner ground but your burger will not stick together and will crumble as it cooks. The second is to touch the meat as little as possible, which is quite a feat considering you need to hand-form the patties. But it is doable, and making your own burgers really isn’t that hard.
There is a third thing you should know about burgers: KEEP IT SIMPLE. Remember that you are frying or grilling up some ground meat, which, as it cooks, will secrete slippery oil and will shrink into individual particles. This means that cohesiveness is an issue when making burgers, which is why you don’t touch them too much or get too rough with them. The more stuff you add to the chuck before forming it into the patty, the more you risk a crumbling burger. If you’re going to add things to the meat, make sure they’re small things so they don’t mess with the burger’s internal structure.
Gonna get gooey.
So you take your meat. We made some of these patties out of medium ground beef and others from ground chicken. I like to leave it out of the fridge for a while because you are going to be working it in your hands and manipulating cold ground meat feels like sticking your hands in the northern Pacific in the winter (which I have done and don’t recommend). The amount of meat you use depends on the number of burgers you want, obviously. We find a kiloof ground makes about 9 3-inch patties.
Put your meat in a large bowl that you can easily get your hands into. Remove your rings and roll up your sleeves. This is going to get gooey.
Finely (and I’m talking FINE) dice a medium onion and chuck that in with the meat. Add a few teaspoons of minced garlic from a jar, and a few sprinkles of dried oregano and basil (or any herb of your choice) and a pinch or two of sea salt and ground pepper. If you’re feeling adventurous you can add a few splashes of Worcestershire sauce and/or Tabasco sauce. Don’t go too crazy with your ingredients, because you need the meat to be able to stick to itself as it cooks.
If you have no confidence in your patty cohesiveness, or if you have ignored me and purchased lean ground beef, you can add an egg or two, but I think that’s cheating. Eggs are useful in meatloaf, but they don’t really belong in burgers. ON burgers, but not IN burgers.
Working quickly, mix the meat with your hands until all your ingredients are just combined.
Grab a handful of the mixture and pat it gently into a patty about the size of your palm. Make a thumbprint indentation in the centre of the patty and set it aside. The indentation will keep the patty from contracting too much as it cooks. Repeat until all the meat is gone.
You can freeze your patties for use at a later date. Simply separate the patties with wax paper and place them in a freezer bag, tightly sealed, with the air removed.
Heat a large skillet with a bit of olive oil (or a grill, or even a broiler) and get those patties on there. Once the patties are on the hot surface, you leave them the hell alone. You may flip the burgers, but you can only do it ONCE, usually about five to ten minutes into the cooking, depending on how well done you like your meat. Safety-wise, your burger should be cooked to an internal temperature of 160°F.
If you like cheese on your burger, put a few slices on after you have flipped the patty and they will melt into the meat.
Serve on a bun of your choice with the toppings you like. Very much a crowd-pleaser, and it covers four food groups.
I went to lunch last Saturday with Kª (of KK fame, otherwise known as The Lady Downstairs) at The Rooms, St. John’s only museum/archives/art gallery/restaurant.
One of the few vegetarian options on the menu was risotto cakes with roasted vegetables in a rosé sauce, so I ordered it, and I enjoyed it thoroughly.
The Pie and I kind of have a policy where we won’t order it in a restaurant if we can make it ourselves, and I think this is one of those things that I could easily re-create.
I had to think about this for a bit, and do some research. I haven’t made risotto in years and the last time I did so things ended badly. Not only did this risotto have to be well-done, but I had to figure out how to bake it into wedges.
I also had to think about the sauce I was going to use. I could just buy some rosé sauce in a jar from the store, but I figure if I was going to take the time and have the patience to make risotto that turned out right, then I was going to make the effort to create an original sauce to put it in.
Also, I was on a quest for the right kind of roasting vegetables. The vegetables I had at the restaurant were red, yellow, and green peppers, with eggplant and I believe zucchini. I was going to do it with red peppers only, onions, zucchini, and butternut squash because I couldn’t find any eggplant anywhere (you make do with what you have, right?).
The nice thing about this recipe, I think, is you can do all three parts separately and ahead of time, and then heat the whole thing up later on.
Toss in a bowl with pepper and salt.Oiled up like a Turkish oil wrestler.
So let’s start with the vegetables. Preheat your oven to 400°F. Cut one large onion into eighths and chuck in a large baking pan. Chop 2 small zucchini into thick discs and add it to the pan, along with a red pepper, cut into long thick strips, and one butternut squash, seeds and stringy bits removed, cut into wedges. Season with salt and pepper, and toss with olive oil until all the vegetables are coated. It’s easiest to do the tossing in a bowl, actually. Cover tightly with foil and bake until golden and aromatically soft, about 30 minutes or so. I then uncovered them and baked them for a further 30 minutes so they crispened up a tad. Use your judgment. Leave the vegetables to cool for a bit while you do other things, but leave the oven on.
Roasty toasty.
While the vegetables are doing their thing you can start on your sauce.
Finely chop about 6 or 7 regular-sized mushrooms. Sauté them in a large pan with a bit of butter and a bit of olive oil (the oil keeps the butter from burning) until brown and tender. Add 3 or 4 teaspoons of minced garlic (from a jar, because that’s how I roll) and reduce the heat.
Sautee with butter.Spice it up.Add cream and stir carefully.
Add a 28oz can (about 800mL) of crushed tomatoes to the pan. Add a 5oz (150mL) can of tomato paste and mix evenly over medium heat. Sprinkle in generous amounts of dried parsley, dried basil, and dried oregano. Let this simmer for about 15 minutes, then add 1/4 to 1/2 cup heavy cream (whipping cream). Alternately, you can use plain yogurt or coconut milk. Stir carefully until fully integrated, then reduce heat to low and leave it like that, stirring occasionally to prevent sticking.
Now we can work on that risotto of ours. In a medium saucepan, melt some butter with some olive oil (again, to prevent the butter from burning), and chuck in one whole onion, diced. Sauté that sucker for a little while until translucent.
Saute until translucent
Add in one cup arborio rice (that’s right, it’s not actually called risotto — risotto is what you make out of it), one cup of dry white wine, and a heaping tablespoon of powdered vegetable broth. Stir at high heat and allow the liquid to evaporate.
Add wine and rice.
Add one cup boiling (or very hot) water to rice and stir occasionally to release the stuff that sticks to the bottom. After about 3 or 4 minutes, the water will have been absorbed by the rice. Repeat this step twice more, so the total amount of liquid you will have added will be 3 cups of water and one cup of wine. It will take about 20 minutes for the risotto to achieve its signature creamy consistency. While it’s doing that, carefully butter a springform pan and set it aside.
Creamy risotto
Add 2 tablespoons butter to the rice as well as 3 tablespoons grated romano cheese. Remove from heat and beat in 2 eggs.
Quickly stir in the eggs.Level the top.Bake until set and golden.
Pour the risotto mixture into the buttered springform pan and level the top. Pop the pan in the oven and bake for 30 to 35 minutes, until the ‘cake’ is firm and golden. Allow to cool for about 15 minutes.
Run a soft spatula around the edges of the ‘cake’ and pop it from the springform pan. Allow to cool a bit more, then cut into wedges.
Cool and cut into wedges.
While the risotto cake is cooling, go back to your vegetables. Peel the skin from the roasted squash and roughly cut the vegetables into bite-sized pieces.
Add the vegetables to the rose sauce and heat the whole thing up until it starts to bubble a bit.
Heat up the vegetables and sauce.
Arrange one or two wedges in a bowl and surround with vegetables and sauce. Sprinkle with more grated romano cheese. Serves 4-6.
If this were a real mouse it would be in trouble for being on my counter.
Cry havoc, and let slip the dogs of war.
Because a war this has become.
The little mouse is taunting me, baiting me daily with its bold exploits across my floors.
The Pie and I have come to the conclusion that perhaps there is only one mouse, and we simply see it on multiple occasions. It’s always the same colour, same size, and it picks the same routes through the house every time.
It gloats over my frustrated attempts to keep it out.
Remember how I jammed dryer sheets into every crack in the fireplace? Well it’s not coming through the cracks – it’s coming through the dripping, sagging, and fetid pink fibreglass insulation that is blocking my chimney. There is obviously a hole in said chimney, as well, because the mouse, if thwarted coming out of the fireplace, can go through the wall some how and come out in the closet with the water heater. From there it makes a bee line for the kitchen, goes under the fridge, behind the dishwasher, and then into the pan drawer under my stove.
Every day it poops in my muffin tin.
I used the muffin tins the other day to make blueberry muffins and so the tins were out for a wash. You know what the mouse did?
It pooped in my loaf pan.
It pooped in my loaf pan.
I pulled that out to wash it. This morning, I pulled the drawer open to take a peek, and what did I see in my other loaf pan?
TWO POOPS.
TWO POOPS
The daily deposition of that dessicated black grain is really getting to me. I think the two poops were made out of spite for the fact that I chased the mouse through the house last night.
I have NO IDEA what this mouse is eating. My floors are swept daily, and there are no crumbs behind the dishwasher. My recycling bin, next to the stove, is full of clean plastic. My pantry is impregnable and shows no signs of breach. But every freaking day I have mouse poop in my drawer.
This is a call for vengeance. If the mouse cannot be repelled, then it will be beaten back. The Pie has convinced me finally to pick up some mouse traps. Should I be successful I will look upon the body of my beaten foe and rejoice.
I’ve had passionfruit before, either in ice cream or in salads or whatnot.
I’m still not sure how I feel about it.
I bought two of them today from Sobeys. They were $1.99 each, which in Newfoundland currency, means they’re CHEAP.
Apparently, you’re supposed to pick the ones that are already ‘deflated’ a bit because that means they’re ripe. The ones I chose were slightly moldy and wrinkled. I took that to be a good sign.
I hacked them open and I have to say I was disappointed at the amount of pulp inside. I think I got a tablespoon out of each one. Certainly not worth $1.99.
The Pie balked at eating the pulp. I can’t say I blame him. It looks like some form of bilious kidney stone, or larval alien or something.
Having the right knives on hand turns cooking from a chore into a real pleasure, and it’s worth shelling out a few extra bucks to find the right ones that fit your hand and do the job the way you like it.
I have a million of them, but I only use three of them on a regular basis: chef’s knife, paring knife, bread knife. In the preparation of most of my food, I really only use one of those.
Our major go-to knife is the stupid sharp chef’s knife. I stay ‘stupid sharp’ because these are the kind of knives that if you look at them funny they will remove your fingers. We prefer the ones made by Henckels, which you can get at a restaurant supply store like Hendrix.
Another good one, and one to which the Pie has lost much blood, is the Peasant’s Knife from Lee Valley.
We use the chef’s knives for pretty much everything – chopping, carving meat – you name it. They are so sharp you can use them on pretty much anything.
Good knives do dull after time, and you need a good sharpener. This one from Lee Valley is the one we use, and I have heard that this one is also very good.
Seriously, is there anything better than roasted garlic? I’m not sure there is. I got this idea from Martha Stewart, of course.
Preheat your oven to 400°F.
Take some garlic, still in its head (I used five, because that’s what came in the package), and carefully slice off the top quarter of the head. Make sure the garlic sits flat and arrange the heads, cut-side-up in a baking dish.
Cut off the top quarter or so.
Season the garlic heads with salt and pepper, and sprinkle with some fresh thyme (or frozen, if you have some on hand).
Sprinkle with salt, pepper, and thyme.
Slowly drizzle olive oil over each head, letting the oil soak into and around the cloves. My heads were small, and I used about a tablespoon of oil for each head.
Drizzle the oil so it soaks in.
Cover the dish tightly with tin foil and roast until the cloves are golden, very soft, and starting to stick out of the head a bit, about an hour. Let them cool until you can hold them comfortably in your hand.
Starting from the bottom, squeeze each head to push out the cloves and peel the skin from any cloves still enclosed. At least, that’s what Martha told me to do. I found it was easier to peel the outside layer of skin away and pop out the roasted clove.
Pop out the roasted cloves.
Transfer the garlic and the cooking oil to a jar or other airtight container and keep in the fridge for up to two weeks.
The Pie had some classmates over to collaborate on a project, and I never feel like a good host unless I have something to serve for a snack. This recipe makes about 24 muffins, which leaves you with some to eat now and some to freeze for a time when you aren’t at leisure to bake.
These blueberry muffins are a modification on the classic recipe, and they’re super easy and super moist. They remind me more of a cupcake than a muffin. The yogurt keeps the batter dense and soft, while the lemon and nutmeg make for a tangier taste.
I mix these by hand because the batter is supposed to be lumpy, and I find an electric mixer tends to overmix. I also prefer using a large whisk to do all of this, as it keeps flour and liquids from sloshing all over my kitchen.
Preheat your oven to 400°F and spray two 12-muffin pans with non-stick cooking spray.
In a large bowl, whisk together 4 cups all-purpose flour, 2 tablespoons baking powder, 1 teaspoon baking soda, and 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg.
Use a whisk to prevent flour clouds from attacking you.
In another, smaller bowl, whisk together 4 large eggs, 2 cups plain yogurt, 1 1/3 cup granulated sugar, 1 cup melted butter, the juice and zest of 2 lemons, and 2 teaspoons vanilla.
This gooey mass will be muffins soon.
Add the wet stuff to the dry stuff and mix only until the dry ingredients are moistened (a whisk will help you to prevent overmixing).
Add 1 to 2 cups frozen blueberries (depending on how berry-full you like your muffins) and mix in.
Add in as many frozen blueberries as you can handle.
Spoon generous amounts into the prepared muffin pans and sprinkle the tops with a little bit of cinnamon and sugar.
Bake about 20 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the centre of the middle muffin comes out clean. Leave to cool in the pans for a few minutes, then use a fork to gently pry out the muffins and place on a rack to cool completely. Once cool, the muffins can be stored in plastic freezer bags and frozen for a couple of months.
Eat as soon as possible, or freeze for future snacking.
I am not a perfect person, and it is my habit to make mistakes when trying new things. And this blog is not about the perfect dessert or the best paint job – it is about experiments in grown-up living. What follows, then, is not the first, and not the last, of my epic fails in the kitchen. It has, however, inspired me to try again to see if I can get this right. I have added it to my DIY To-Do list on the right-hand column.
***EDIT: The Pie wanted you to know that, despite the aesthetics of the thing, this was the best-tasting pie I have ever made.***
I found a pound of key limes at Sobeys about a week ago so I thought I would make some key lime pie. Obviously.
Key limes made in Mexico?
Key limes are smaller and sweeter than their more common cousins.
You can use regular limes, but purists will tell you it's not the same.
Now, key lime pie and lemon meringue pie are easy. Really easy. I decided to experiment a bit with the recipe. The problem was that I was missing certain ingredients, which inspired me to experiment still further, and I was also coming off a rotten day, so making mistakes in the kitchen only added to my general frustration. DON’T BAKE WHILE ANGRY.
The recipe I will give you below is how I should have done it, and I will explain as I go about how I actually did it.
I have two very shallow 8″ pie plates, and this recipe filled both of those. I also have a deep 14″ pie plate, and it would probably fill that one by itself. One of my next purchases is going to be a standard 9″ pie plate.
Preheat your oven to 350°F. Start working on your crumb crust. In a bowl, mix together 1 cup chocolate cookie crumbs, 1/2 cup unsweetened coconut, and 2 tbsp granulated sugar. In the normal recipe, you would use plain graham crumbs and leave out the coconut. But that wasn’t fancy enough for me.
Getting fancy with the crust.
Add in 1/2 cup of melted butter and stir until the mixture is crumbly but still dry. You should be able to squeeze a handful of the crumb mixture between your hands and have it stick together, but not be greasy. My major failing with the crust is that several of the recipes I was using for inspiration had me add an entire cup of butter, which made my crust soggy and prone to collapse. You might need more than 1/2 a cup to make your mixture cohesive, but you shouldn’t need much more than that.
Put your crumb mixture into the pan and pat it up the sides and across the bottom evenly. For a nice, flat crust surface, press a slightly smaller pie plate into the larger one to smooth the edges.
Press a smaller pan into the larger one for smooth crust.
Place your crusts in the oven and bake them for 10 minutes. Let cool and ‘rest’ while you do the rest of this.
Take a pound of key limes (about 24) and gather the zest of about half of them. I use a fine food rasp from Lee Valley with a zester catcher. It makes my life a lot easier. I recommend you pick one up. You can use a wood rasp as well (that’s pretty much what this is, anyway).
Pick up this rasp from Lee Valley.
Zesting 12 tiny limes took quite a while, and only rendered about 2 tbsp of zest, but that’s all you really need.
Careful when rasping - it's easy to get your fingertips caught.
Now we juice the limes. First, roll each lime on the counter while pressing with your hand. This will bruise the flesh inside and make them easier to juice.
Cut all the limes in half and juice those suckers. This took forever for me because the juicer kept sliding all over the place. I had to put down a silicone baking mat, kind of like this one from KitchenAid, to get the thing to stay still. Have patience. You should end up with about a cup of juice. Feel free to add more from a bottle if you feel you need more.
Juicing 24 tiny limes is a pain.
After this, I was already frustrated, and things started to go downhill for me. As I’ve said, I put too much butter in my crust, which had sagged to the centre of each pan. I pressed paper towels into the molten crust to remove excess butter and shored up the edges as best I could before baking them again and letting them cool.
This is easiest with a mixer.
Moving on … separate 6 egg yolks and plop those suckers in the bowl of your mixer. Most recipes say to use 4 yolks, which is what I did, but I had problems with the stuff setting. I will explain why shortly. Add your zest to the bowl along with 2 tbsp granulated sugar and mix on high for about 6 minutes until the stuff is pale and fluffy.
Pale and fluffy.
At this point you add your condensed milk. All the other recipes call for a 14-oz can of condensed milk (or, if doubling the recipe, two cans). What I have discovered, however, is that a 14-oz can is slightly over 400 mL, while the available cans in Canada seem to only contain 300 mL. Also I only had one can and I needed two. I did, however, have a 500 mL can of baker’s coconut milk (this is why I added the coconut to the crust). I figured adding the coconut milk would make the filling not as sweet, which is why I added a bit of sugar to the yolks and the zest. I might even add more sugar next time. Anyway, the coconut milk makes everything a little more runny, so that is why I suggested using 6 yolks instead of 4, just to make sure everything sets.
So you add in your coconut milk and your condensed milk and mix it on high again for another 5 minutes or so, until thick. Pour in the lime juice and mix until incorporated. Pour into the cooled crusts and bake for 25-35 minutes or until the filling has just set (as in, it shouldn’t be liquidy). Cool on a rack, then chill for at least an hour and serve with whipped cream.
Having only used 4 yolks, I had trouble getting my pie to set, though it was all right after I had chilled it. It was certainly not a pretty pie, but I plan to make up for it.
While your beans are cooking (or sitting politely in their can, waiting on your convenience), take a pan and sauté yourself a finely chopped onion with some fresh sage (or frozen sage if you’ve got it). Once the onions are translucent, remove pan from heat and plop in 6 or 7 cloves roasted garlic (about one head) just to get them warm and toasty.
f sea salt and ground pepper. If you’re feeling adventurous you can add a few splashes of Worcestershire sauce and/or Tabasco sauce. Don’t go too crazy with your ingredients, because you need the meat to be able to stick to itself as it cooks.
dful of the mixture and pat it gently into a patty about the size of your palm. Make a thumbprint indentation in the centre of the patty and set it aside. The indentation will keep the patty from contracting too much as it cooks. Repeat until all the meat is gone.
Serve on a bun of your choice with the toppings you like. Very much a crowd-pleaser, and it covers four food groups.
