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Rib Eye!

So, the food situation here is getting a bit better... although if I don't go to My Store between classes on Wednesday's I am not going to have milk for a very long time...

Qesterday I made Quinoa, with a recipe that I learned from Chef Michael. Basically, brown some onions and garlic, add capers and raisons (I didn't have capers), then add chicken soup broth and Quinoa and let it cook till it's done. I took a picture, but it is going to take 1 hour to upload, so that will have to come later...

I made a ton of it, so I have lunch for all week at school!

Also, last night I went to this place called swinging doors for dinner. It's a bar, but they do a BBQ three times a week, so we al got a beautiful, perfectly cooked rib eye steak, baked potato, salad, and mixed veggies! it was probably the best thing I have eaten since I got on the island!

In a few weeks we are going to go to the Friday nigh BBQ, which is ribs! woot woot!

my quinoa!

My roommate (Jaclyn) really enjoying her rib eye steak!

Ode to no deep fried-ness

Hello friends,

I have been MIA recently with no real excuses. I am officially done lent, and it really wasn't so bad, I actually think I like not eating meat. If you haven't noticed I don't really cook with meat, mostly because it is expensive, but I also really don't like cooking it. I think the hardest part of lent was finding vegetarian friendly restaurants. Moral of the story is, I think I am going to continue avoiding meat because it makes my insides happy, and I get to try new awesome things.

Next order of business: Deep fried foods.

Last night I had a Groupon that was about to expire for an Australian pub. Devin and I split a kangaroo burger and fish and chips (yes this is meat but they had no other options, and I wanted to try kangaroo). I wasn't a big fan of the kangaroo burger, it came with an egg on it so the sandwich didn't really stay together well and it was a big mess, and it tasted meh. The fish was what you would expect and the chips were awesome! Super crispy potato devil fingers if you will. I was so full afterward I fell into a big grease coma and felt like death. I couldn't even finish my beer!

After some thought I realized that the last time I felt this way was after a trip to Calgary's famous drive-in burger joint.

On this trip it was still during lent I just got some onion rings and a large fries to split between four of us.

You see that bag that looks like it should have four meals in it? Yeah that whole bag was filled with fries! I think it was 6$ for their "large" fries, I think that is more like "extended family" size. Obviously greasy food coma followed shortly afterwards. To avoid this scenario in the future I am going to officially swear off any deep fried food until my trip to Ontario, then I will re-asses the situation.

In honour of this decision I will post a recipe that I made a long time ago.....

KALE CHIPS!!!

The idea behind it is you flavour them how you wish, using some sort of dressing of any flavour you like, then you bake them at a low temperature until they are completely dehydrated and crispy!

Being the worst food bloger of all times, I don't think I wrote this recipe down... oops?...

It was a combination of cashews, onion, and lemon juice, and seasonings like curry powder and paprika. Either way it was delicious and I encourage you to experiment with your own flavours.

Once you have your dressing, cover your washed kale evenly in the flavour.

Now spread it out on a baking sheet, and bake at 200 for a couple of hours (yes hours) fliping every half hour. When it is done the kale should be completely dehydrated. When I did this some of the kale pieces were done before others, they were removed right away to avoid burning.
The finished product. Nice healthy non-deep fried chip alternative.

See you next week! (I promise)

Island food

OK, so as I am sure most of our readers know, I recently (on Thursday night) moved to an island in the Caribbean called Saba. It is a beautiful little island, but in terms of food the choices are pretty limited. Yesterday I went grocery shopping and bought the following:
Potato bread (the other breaks were stale and/or moldy)
Lettuce
Tomato
Pear Juice
Pasta
Rice
Frozen Veggies
Chicken
Ham
Gouda Cheese

That's about it.. apparently Wednesdays are the best days for groceries, so maybe I will have some better luck.... but the bright side of this is I think the limited options may make some amazing post opportunities.

Today for lunch, I will be having a ham and gouda sandwich. It should be pretty tasty!

Last week, I ate at a restaurant in Philipsburg (St. Maarten) called Chesterfields. It was so amazing... I had Mahi Mahi stuffed with a crab filling. On the side it came with half and half rice and french fries, a few roasted carrots, and zucchini with parmesan cheese on top. It was the best thing I have eaten in quite a while!

Anyways, stay tuned for some more exciting meals...

-Sara

Ethnic food?... Part 2: How not to make pad thai

This is what happens when I branch out....but I learned one valuable lesson: the type of noodles matter wayyy more than you would think!

So..I have made pad thai before...and it has always been pretty tasty. One day, Brent and I decided we should make it for dinner (before the mother mother concert)... and I totally screwed up!

So, we will start with the easy part:
Cube some chicken and/or tofu (1 cup)
Prepare some shrimp (deshell, etc...however much you want)

mix cornstarch in soy sauce and marinade the chicken/tofu/shrimp if you want... it makes it better, but I am usually too lazy for this step

The sauce:

1 tbsp tamarind paste and about 1/2 that of water (you can substitute for a rice vinegar/ orange juice combo)
1-2 tablespoons of fish sauce
1 tablespoon of chili sauce (or more if you like it spicy)
2 table spoons of brown sugar
a bunch of cilantro or coriander (same thing?..i'm not sure)
garlic
1/4 cup chicken soup stock if you feel you need more, add more
a little bit of sesame oil
garlic (a few cloves)
and i usually add some lime juice

So, you basically put all those in a sauce pan and cook them a little.

In a separate pan, with a little bit of veggie oil, cook the meat/tofu. The cook the veggies (usually onions, bean sprouts, an that's it, but I always add more stuff)

Then you cook the noodles. Use rice noodles...but buy the ones that look like linguini....not the ones I bought.

Then you mix it all together with the sauce, add some peanuts and a lime wedge..and voila!

BUT, when we made it, we used rice noodles that you soak instead of cooking..and they got all mushed together and tasted like starch, and literally were more like dumplings than noodles :(

Jupiter’s Royal Acorn

Hello!

I realize we haven't been updating very often, and I completely failed my goal of posting all of the recipes I wanted to get done before the month was over... I am going to make a more realistic goal of posting once a week, hopefully with something new and exciting each time.

Today I will introduce you to something I made back in February... I think...

Candied Walnuts

Ingredients:

- 1 cup walnuts

- 1 Tbsp sugar

- 2 Tbsp sugar syrup

- Achar masala

Directions:

- Toss nuts in sugar and spice.

- Bake at 325 until sugar starts to bubble ~ 15 min. Be careful not to burn the sugar, no one likes burnt sugar.

- Let cool & enjoy

Warning... they may be addictive.

Until next time (which will hopefully be sooner rather than later).....

Veggie Deluxe Pizza

Hello Everyone,

So if you have been reading regularly you might remember I have given up meat for lent. I guess it has been two weeks now, the time has just flown by. The one, single occasion where I even considered wanting meat was the day after St Patrick's day. I wanted deep fried chinese food SO bad!

After my roommates original protest they have been fairly supportive. There have been some tasty stir-fries and this epic pizza!

Veggie Deluxe Pizza

Directions:

On Fleishmanns pizza yeast there is a pizza crust recipe; I follow that but used whole wheat flour. It is super easy and delicious.

Roll out the dough and give it a thin coat of olive oil, then cover in your sauce. We used Newmanns Own marinara sauce on one and a mix of that and BBQ sauce on the second one (I preferred the mix).

Now top with your favourite veggies:

- onion

- spinach

- broccoli

- asparagus

- tomato

- carrot

Top with some sharp cheddar cheese

Bake at 350 C for about 15-20 minutes, until the cheese is melted and the crust is crispy.

Before baking......

Fresh out of the oven... it didn't last long

What are your favourite pizza toppings?

Ethnic food?... Part 1: My tribute to Brent (and other hungarians)

Hello world,

I have failed at blogging. The excuse: I had laser eye surgery a few weeks ago and was instructed to not look at screens for too long. Plus I work at a computer all day at work, so I couldn't really go one when I got home.

Soo...I decided to do a little tribute for my next few posts. It's going to about what happens when an Itallian tries to make food of different ethnicities.

Part 1 is going to be about Goulash and Spätzle!!

It was my mom's idea to make some Hungarian food. She was inspired by a Hungarian family friend, who is an amazing cook and always makes us wonderful things. My mom was at his house, and started looking through cookbooks, and the next night she decided to try one.

The "Goulash" (which I later realized was actually chicken paprikash) was cooked in our new pressure cooker.

"Goulash Mix"

Ingredients:

boneless, skinless chicken breasts 

12 oz. sour cream 
chicken broth 
1 onion, chopped
Hungarian paprika (which is way better than regular paprika)

"Goulash Mix" (which is more paprika, caraway seeds, marjoram, and onion power i think)garlic  

salt

black pepper

Directions:

Basically, put everything except for the sour cream in the pressure cooker and let it cook for a while, till the onions have "melted" and the chicken is cooked. Then, as it is cooling a little, add the sour cream and mix it in.

We just bought a package of Spätzle (didn't want to get too overzealous for our first time) and we made a side of brussels sprouts (which are actually my favorite vegetable)

"Chicken Paprikash"

You are going to LOVE my nuts!

Hello,

I have quite a few blog worthy recipes in the queue currently, and I am going to try and get them all out by the end of this month... so get excited!!

Cashew Almond Butter:

The ingredient list is pretty straight forward... cashews and almonds! Word on the street is that almonds aren't oily enough to make but butter out of without adding oil or roasting them first, so I decided to mix them with their oilier friend the cashew.

Ingredients:

- 1 part cashews

- 1 part almonds

The container you are going to use to store the butter = 1 part

This made one full jar of nut butter!

It is pretty straight forward... add nuts to blender or food processor and GO!

(I have no idea why this is underlined and or how to fix it)

The finished product! Oh so tasty... you should keep your eye out for many more butter recipes coming to an SBK post near you!

Today I won my first roll up the rim at Tim Hortons... After I had a huge rage out because the one here on campus is incompetent.

A few of us in my lab are working on a theory that you win more often with XL drinks compared to medium and large drinks. What are your roll up the rim stats? Does it fit with my size theory? I am one for three and I am calling it quits there in hopes to get the best win ratio in the lab.

St Patricks day 2011... Edmonton edition

Hello Everyone,

Today is one of the greatest days of the year St Patricks day. Now here in Alberta it is way less cool than the good old days at Western so I decided to compensate with some breakfast treats.

First up is the mint chocolate smoothie

Mint Chocolate Smoothie

Ingredients:

- 1 cup of spinach

- 1 banana

- water (or milk)

- mint extract

- Chocolate chips

- ice cubes

Directions:

- add, spinach, and banana and liquid until about half of the high of the contents into blender... blend until smooth

- add a few drops of mint extract and fill up with ice... blend until smooth

- add chocolate chips and enjoy.

Yes, one of the main ingredients is spinach... it is wonderful.. trust me.

Also there were no fresh banana's so I used one from the freezer. I "defrosted" it in the microwave and ended up squeezing it out of the peel much like Andre does in his method two of how to eat a banana.

I think peppermint extract is my new fave. Do not fret, if you don't have any the spinach banana combo is delicious on its own... sounds a bit crazy... but it is good. Sometimes I add chia or flax for a bit more of a nutritional kick.

Beer? Spinach? Why not both?

(On a side note this awesome shirt was gifted to me by Sara. It is epic!)

Next up, green pancakes, and you may or may not have guessed that there is no food colouring involved. I used Bisquick mix and (extremely) loosely followed the pancake directions... replacing the water it called for with 1 cup of pureed spinach and 1 cup of Guinness.

Who doesn't like beer in their pancakes?

A work in progress.. for some reason I like small pancakes better than big ones... maybe its because I can eat more of them that way.

Devin showing off his master flipping skills.

A modification on Irish Car Bombs...we didn't have any whiskey so we used Irish cream. I dub it the Irish Pipe Bomb!

Happy St Patricks Day Everyone!

Cheers,

-Kirsten

Morning food

Hello,

I revamped the recipe page this week so that it is easier to navigate and find your favs. I also added a breakfast section so I better get going on that...

Oatmeal= awesome breakfast, but sometimes it is hard to have time for the good stuff.

Lazy Oats

Ingredients:

- 1/3 cup oats

- 2/3 cup water

- 1 Tbsp Chia seeds

- 1 banana, mashed

- 1 tsp vanilla

- 1 small handful of Crasins (or other dried fruit)

Directions:

- Mix all of the ingredients in a bowl and let sit in the fridge overnight

- Heat up in microwave the next morning.

I am mostly too lazy/don't have the time to make fresh oatmeal in the morning, I am NOT a morning person. Soaking the oats over night makes the non-instant oatmeal a bit easier on the morning schedule.

Now we just need some dessert recipes...

Happy Early St. Patricks Day!

-Kirsten

Saturday Soup

As per usual I only seem to want to cook when I have a lack of food in the house, or my food is going bad. So today I made some Lentil soup. A colleague at work mentioned it to me a while back, so a while back I bought a tin of lentils. Seeing as how the only fresh vegetable in my fridge was an onion, it was time to go to the tins.

Curry Lentil Soup:


Ingredients:
1 can lentils
chicken stock
1 onion (diced)
curry powder
Carrot (I didn't have any on hand)

In pot, add a bit of oil, and curry powder, cook powder a little then add diced onions. Cook onions until they start to brown. Add lentils (I guess you could drain them but I just dumped it all in). Add stock. Simmer for 15min

So apparently lentils are pretty good for you, they are high in protien and other nutrients. It turned out pretty tasty although a bit of carrot would have been nice to round out the flavour and add a little variety.

That about sums it up, hopefully my next post will be a little more exciting.

Until then,

Citrus Yum

Hello,

So I was just writing up this recipe to post at a later date and it was accidentally posted. OOPS? I made this last night when I got home from work, the original plan was something along the same line but with some grapefruit in it. After having this tasty treat I would pass on the grapefruit next time and add some apple.

Ingredients:

- 1 banana

- 1 kiwi

- 1 cup of pineapple (frozen)

- 1 cup of ice-cubes

Directions:

- Blend the fruit

- Add ice and blend

- Eat

This was an awesome, easy, and fast treat. I somehow even snapped a picture before devouring half of it, which is something I haven't been very good at recently.

Enjoy,

-Kirsten

Falafel O-clock

Hello everyone,

Veg for lent update:

Tuesday night I broke the news to my roommates that I was going veg for lent. Their initial reaction was anything except supportive, it involved comments such as "DON'T DO IT" and "I am going to fry everything in bacon fat". Needless to say it was a bit discouraging, however this afternoon my roommate stopped by and asked if I would be home for dinner to know if it should be Kirsten friendly or not. I was shocked/ very impressed after last nights little freak-out. Who knows what will happen in the next 40 days (although I am pretty sure lent is longer than 40 days so 45 days?)

ANYWAYS... back to the important stuff.

This recipe is inspired by some falafel chips my roommates brought home from planet organic. They were corn chips seasoned like falafel and possibly

containing some chickpea flour. They were delicious. I am not sure if you guys know this... but I am a big falafel fan.

Falafel Crackers

Ingredients:

- 1 cup chickpea flour

- 1 cup water

- 2 Tbsp olive oil

- 1 Tbsp parsley

- 2 Tbsp garlic powder

- 1 tsp dried chili (optional)

- 1 tsp Sriracha hot sauce (optional)

- 2 tsp sesame seeds

- 1 tsp salt (preferably coarse sea salt)

Directions:

- Pre-heat oven two 375

- in bowl mix chickpea flour, water and oil

- in mortar and pestle grind seasoning (except sesame seeds and salt) until it is a fine powder

- mix in the seasonings

- pour into cookie sheet and spread evenly (this can be done on parchment paper but it wasn't a problem without it)

- top with sesame seeds and salt

- bake for 20 minutes, at this point take them out and cut into square bite sized pieces

- bake for another 10-20 minutes (depending on thickness), the outer ones should be completely crispy and the thicker ones should be close to drying out.

- remove from oven, let cool, and serve

The Batter

The finished product... or what is left of it.

Happy crunching,

-Kirsten

Chocolate Banana Frapachino

Hello Again!

This is also a recipe from my week of sick, even though that was forever ago. I have this weird thing against milk products when I am sick--someone fed me the idea that milk makes you produce more flem and promotes infection. I am no doctor, but I definitely have negative thoughts towards milk products when sick. I think that knowing I shouldn't have it makes me want it more, so I always crave creamy things when sick. To over

come this obstacle I made almond milk in-situ for this recipe! This also helps out all of those lactose intolerant peeps out there.

Chocolate Banana Frapachino

Ingredients:

- 1/2 cup of milk (I added 1/8 cup of almonds and 1/2 cup of water)

- 1 cup ice cubes

- 1 banana

- 1 tsp cocoa powder

- 1 Tbsp chocolate chips

Directions:

- add 1/8 cup of almonds and 1/2 cup of water and blend until no large chunks of almond remain

- blend banana, ice cubes and milk until no big ice chunks remain (this should have a snow cone consistency)

- add chocolate chips and cocoa powder and blend until mixed (I like the chocolate chunks even though they sink to the bottom... spoons help!)

Can you tell I was parked on the couch in front of the TV for an extended period of time?

YUMMMM!

Lent is upon us. I am not a religious person, however I do like to give things up for lent. It starts tomorrow (March 9th) and goes until April 28th. This year I am going to give up MEAT! Yikes! I have always wanted to try but have never been able to commit to it. So from lunch tomorrow (I am going to have steak) until April 28th NO MEAT!

Is anyone else giving things up for lent?

-Kirsten

Roast Beef, Risotto, and Eggplant dinner partyyyyyyy

Hello to all of the lovely fans of our food blog,
First of all, I would like to apologize for being MIA for a while- work has pretty much taken over my life for the past few weeks.

A couple of weeks ago, me and a few good friends decided to host a dinner party, and I would have to say it was pretty successful. It was a "one course" meal, with 3 main components to our entre. However, if you count the delicious goat cheese brie (appetizer?) and chocolate (dessert?) that we ate while cooking, I guess it could be considered a three course meal..lol

So, here are the recipes:


Roasted Eggplant


Ingredients: 
2 eggplants, Olive Oil (EVOO, enough to cover eggplant), A few cloves of garlic


Directions:

1. Quarter the eggplant, lengthwise. 
2. Cover in EVOO
3. Crush garlic overtop
4. Roast in oven at ~350 for 10 minutes or so (until tender)

Commentary and hints:

Our guests seemed to like the eggplant, although I thought it was a little dry. If I did this again, I would cover them with tin foil and cook them longer. I think it might help keep some moisture in, and cooking them longer would make it more tender. Or just forget it and grill them or make babaganoush (sp?) instead. 

A hint I picked up from my mom: If you cut up eggplant, you should coat it in salt and let it sit for about 10 minutes, and then rinse the salt off with water... it makes the eggplant less bitter. 

 

eggplant before cooking

eggplant after cooking

Shitake Mushroom Risotto

Ingredients: 

Italian risotto rice, olive oil, chicken bouillon, 35% cream, parmesan cheese

Directions:

1. Heat Oil in a large pan
2. Add rice (remember it pretty much doubles in volume, so don't make too much!) and let it cook in the oil, stirring occasionally. Wait until the rice has a browned slightly. The more brown it is, the nuttier the flavor.
3. Add dried and diced shitake mushrooms. I usually put about 1/4 the volume of mushrooms to rice, but you can add more or less depending on your preference.
4. Mix some chicken bouillon powder with water until smooth. The amount of bouillon is a personal preference; if you like your food saltier add more. If I make a cup of rice, I usually add enough to make a cup of soup. Slowly add the mixture to the rice (careful for spattering oil). Add about 2 teaspoons at a time, and let it cook and absorb into the rice before adding more. Continue stirring, so that the rice does not burn. Keep adding this mixture, or more water, until the rice is cooked through (try some, and make sure it is not hard).
5. Remove from heat. Add about 2-3 tablespoons of cream (more is tastier, less is healthier) and the same amount of parmesan. Stir it all together, and let it sit covered for about 10 minutes. 

Commentary and hints:

This is one of my favorite foods. If you add less water, and more cream it tastes so good! but its also really fatty. You can make it with no cream, but be careful, cause it is usually pretty dry tasting. Also, go easy on the parmesan. If you put less parmesan you can taste the amazing compliment to the mushrooms, but if you add to much it can overpower everything else. 

Inside Round Roast Beef

Ingredients: 

Inner round roast, carrots, onion, garlic, orange, rosemary, salt, pepper, oil, horse radishI'm not sure what else...

Directions:

1. Cut carrots garlic and onions, and place in bottom of a large baking tray. Cover with the zest of an orange. Add orange slices, the juice of an orange, and a little water.
2. Season the roast with salt and pepper
3. In a large pan, on high heat, sear the outside of the roast.
4. Put the roast over the veggies, cover, and cook in the oven at 350F for a while.
5. Remove from the oven, cover, and let it sit for a few minutes before serving. serve with Ryan's yummy gravy, and/or horseradish. 

Commentary and hints:

Ryan made this dish, so I really don't know much about it... There is an internal temperature that he used a meat thermometer to check to make sure it was ready. If I were to do it my way, I would follow my moms advice which is don't overcook it.. take it out of the oven early, let it sit and cook more. Feel it (the hardness) to see if it is ready, and DO NOT cut it until it cools down a little (if you do, you loose all the juices)

Ryan also made a delicious sauce, which involved the juice that came out of the over tray, the oily mixture from searing the meat, and some corn starch. I'm not sure what else went into it, but MMMM it was good! :)

**Hint.. do not eat a spoonful of extra strong horseradish. It may make you cry...

Zesting the Orange

Searing the roast

Prepping for the oven

Chopping the....something...

The Finished product (and us enjoying it)!!