picture courtesy of Jewish Journal.com

I have yet to begin cooking for Rosh Hashonah and so I scoured the internet for what my two dishes would look like if I made them and cooked them to perfection, which naturally I always do.  I thank the Jewish Journal.com for these

It took me forever to find this recipe.  I knew I had it just that it was a question of which cookbook I had written it in.

It – this recipe, is one that my Aunt Rhoda gave to me when I first got married and was making Rosh Hashanah dinner.  It is the one recipe from what I remember as a child, that she, herself would make for the holidays.  Everything else was made by ‘Cook’.

You see Aunt Rhoda was brought up by a family probably considered Royalty by monetary standards and surely considered upper echelon by society standards now and back then.  She had the fortune, or as my mother would often say, the misfortune, of having been raised a Bronfman. A misfortune because, and this is solely from stories heard as a young child and while growing up in this family, they were a family who never showed or showered any kind of affection on one another.

Which is why, I now know, whenever Aunt Rhoda entertained us for the Jewish holidays; it was always a chip-in meal.  My mother made this a requirement only on the years she entertained so that we, the children-the cousins, would get good wholesome Jewish food cooked by either my Grandmother or my Mother.

Any other time, it was my mother who did the entertaining – those were the fun holidays.  Those were the holidays where we all let loose and all we did was laugh and tell jokes: it was the holidays where the food was endless and seconds were an absolute requirement.  In fact, the plates were dressed in the kitchen and then the balance put family style on platters in the center of the table.

Who took the most food and who were the loudest?  Yes, you got it; they were.  This is why my mother was the favourite Aunt and Rhoda’s favourite sister-in-law.  Aunt Rhoda didn’t know how to let her children have fun; so she relied and enjoyed the holidays my mother did.

We, as a family at holiday time, only got to eat The Carrot Ring the years Aunt Rhoda had us over.  So The Carrot Ring, handed down to Rhoda from Aunt Soph Bronfman, became a special that we looked forward to having, albeit on alternate years.  It was delicious.  It sits, to this day in memory, as being utterly delectable and unfortunately, as was the case in her house; each person only got one serving.

Seconds were never asked of and if we, as children, did ask; well we were told there are no seconds.

Aunt Rhoda, for all her faults, was a product of her environment.

Going to Aunt Rhoda’s for anything was, to my imagination even as I write, probably like eating at the Queen’s residence.  You were prim and proper at all times; you never made noise and were allowed to leave the living room to play only when you asked.  Even then, you sometimes were not allowed to and had to sit and listen to the adult talk.

She was my closest Aunt and one whom I constantly visited and had tea with.

We all disliked going to Aunt Rhoda’s for any holiday meal; but I loved The Carrot Ring. That Carrot Ring which was actually a pudding, stands out in my memory,  which is why I searched so hard to find it.

So that I never forget where it is for the years to come I am posting it:

This past year, for me, was one of many losses.  My sister died in a car crash, my mother-in-law from lung cancer.  Fights and arguments happen, as they do in many families; and situations take place that are sometimes out of one’s control.

This holiday is more a Memorial than a celebration, but the kids cannot know that.  It doesn’t matter – they don’t read my blog.  Imagine!  My own kids too busy to read their mother’s words…hmm anyone know what else I can throw into the ‘guilt’ pile?  I am composting.

With this dish, at least I can share a happy memory; one that gives me a reminder of my younger days when happiness was in abundance.

AUNT RHODA/AUNT SOPHIE BRONFMAN’S CARROT RING

2 lbs carrots (parboiled 10 minutes, then grated)

2 tbsp of Crisco

1/4-1/2 c of flour (potato starch if it is Passover)

1/4-1/2 c sugar

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp pepper

1 tbsp baking powder

3 egg whites, beating stiffly

Grease a large ring mold with the Crisco.  Grate the carrots and mix the flour, sugar, salt, pepper and baking powder together.

Gently fold into the mixture the egg whites, until it gets incorporated.

Place the empty greased mold into a bain marie (a water bath)* and then into the oven at 350 for ten minutes until the mold gets very hot.  Carefully, with both hands and oven mitts, take out the pan and place it on a flat surface that can take the heat.  Pour the carrot mixture into the mold - it should sizzle as it gets poured in. Carefully place it back into the 350 degree oven.

Bake 1 1/2 hours or until the pudding is crispy on top.

* bain marie is a water bath.  In a pan large enough to hold the ring mold, pour boiling water to 1/2 way up the mold.  This allows the pudding to solidify and cook evenly throughout.

picture courtesy of Jewish Journal.com

AUNTIE SARAH’S CHICKEN SOUP

My mother never believed that any good Jewish soup should be a consommé.  It had to have onions, it had to have the dill, and it had to have carrots.  Then I further it with parsnips too.  None of this mirepoix. No, each bowl was served with vegetables in it.

1 Marvid Chicken either whole or cut up

Fresh water to cover

Fresh dill as desired, usually 1/2 bunch

3 carrots, peeled and sliced into rings or julienned into thick slices

2 parsnips, peeled and sliced like above

2 onions peeled and slice into quarters

3 celery stalks cut into 1/2’ slices

Salt to taste

Pepper to taste

“Feesel” (literally means foot in yiddush and in this case it means chicken feet)

Chicken eggs

It is highly unlikely you will find either the chicken feet or the chicken eggs anywhere.  However, if you do, they get added to the stock pot.

Put the chicken in a big enough stock pot to hold it comfortably while allowing enough room for water to cover the chicken.  Set the burner on high until the water boils.  Skim.  Then adjust the heat lower to a simmer and continue skimming off the scum.  Do this step several times over a ten minute period.

Once the soup simmers clean then place carefully into the pot the dill, carrots, parsnips, onions, celery, salt and pepper.

Continue to simmer the soup on a low to medium heat covered for an hour or until the chicken is tender.

With a soup strainer, I use a chinese strainer, take out the chicken carefully and save for the next day’s meal when you serve it as boiled chicken.

I find, crazy me, that if my boiled chicken lacks a little in taste then my soup will be outstanding in flavour.  Crazy eh?  If the chicken is too good, the soup won’t be so good.  Nuts!!

Taste the soup and adjust the seasonings of salt and pepper.  Lately I find I like a little kick to my food so for this holiday alongside the horseradish I will place a bowl of Sriracha.

Let the soup cool and refrigerate overnight.  Before warming up to serve, defat the soup.  Make sure each bowl of soup you serve has at least two carrot pieces, one parsnip, a little dill and of course if you are so inclined A MATZOH BALL OR TWO.

Enjoy and Happy New Year.

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Tags: carrot pudding, chicken soup, Jewish Holiday, matzoh balls, Rosh Hashonah

Persevere!

Rest cannot shorten the way; going ahead does. -Tsonga (Mozambique)

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No Pictures.  Just take my word.  Better yet, Google the words ‘Kalbi’ and Bimibap’ and you will have a picture of my meal.

This  post is A Restaurant Review from Someone Who Doesn’t Have What She Thinks Are The Right Credentials To Review A Restaurant: Except Her Own Subjective Taste.

Hence, why Restaurant Proprietors and Chefs hate Critics.

We went to the above Korean restaurant the other night because of Saturday’s write-up in the Gazette by Sarah Musgrave, who does freelance work. Usually when Sarah reviews a restaurant, I run that week because she is right on in her reviews.  This time, I am sorry to say; she gave it a ‘fair bet’.  I wouldn’t have been so generous.  Yet, she has been right on in the last 6 months, for sure.

I am not a restaurant critic so I will give my limited point of view on our dinner. Of course it was the Kalbi BBQ at the table.

That is mainly why I go Korean…it is for the interactive cooking at the table and the great sweet, sour, salty and bitter.  I am settling, of course, because the fifth is supposed to be Umami, but I won’t even go there for this review.  Suffice to say, I had a hard time with the first four.

The most important part of Korean Kalbi is the meat.  Duh! At  5000 ans, I found the meat to be tough, tasteless and certainly lacking in quantity. Definitely not enough BBQ for two hungry adults.  We began with miso soup which was good. Then a tossed green salad: kind of did not expect a salad when eating Korean BBQ, however the dressing was delicious.  The chef could actually bottle some and sell it to those customers that ask like Katsura did years ago.

Almost as quickly as our large salad plate came out, came the BBQ burner, which took up more space than there was on the table…so we had to quickly divvy up and finish our salad; and hold our plates high enough to accommodate the burner.  The waitress did her shtick:  laid a miniscule amount of veggies on the sides of the grill (I still can’t figure out why they were actually necessary since they was one mushroom cut in twelve pieces, a few slivers of cabbage and one thin slice of zucchini cut in half - I kid you not) along with a few pieces of Korean cut flanken or short ribs.  She laid out half the meat and all the veggies and then disappeared.

After what seemed to be too long I continued the cooking process.  Because I know how to cook it; sorry for the fellow(s) whose first time is eating Korean BBQ because when the waitress disappears for an inordinate amount of time your food will burn.  So take the initiative and cook it and watch it yourself, including the strength of the flames.

I had to ask for rice which actually was not rice but a full plate of Bimibap. The Bimibap was lingering hot, spicy hot…so much that even on the drive home my tongue and roof of my mouth was on fire and my lips bright red. The heat overpowered any taste the Bimibap might have had. I enjoy good spice in a good way; this was just not a good way.

I certainly would have preferred the accustomed kimchi style pickles that usually, in my experience, come with Korean BBQ. The Bimibap made for a filling meal considering there was little in the way of beef. And what little there was equalled a bite before you hit bone and the meat was tough. Not enjoyable. I have eaten in cheap Chinese restaurants where there was more meat on a sparerib than on these pieces; plus those are usually soft and these were chewy. Real Chewy. Really petite pieces and Really not impressive whatsoever.  I mean it is a good thing I had my reading glasses or I would miss what to pick up with my chopstick.

The fact that beside the Rooster Sauce (sriracha) was a full set of flatware i.e. spoons and forks probably should have spoken volumes.

Now, I don’t know about the decor: hot is an understatement and we sat by the A/C which stands on the floor and vents through the door. Along with multiple fans.  Understand that the restaurant is in the basement a few flights down from the sidewalk.

Seating is at wooden picnic tables. Yes, the kind that if you are a tad overweight is impossible to get into and if you are anything past the age of ten you hate to crawl into. I will eat on picnic benches only if I have to and that is usually at a beach or park: not a Korean Restaurant. (However I relish the Japanese tables where I have to crawl down on the floor- so I guess I am no judge – except that somehow I equate sitting that way with eating Japanese which I guess goes back to school and the days when we watched Japanese documentaries on different cultures back in the ‘60’s)

I would be hard pressed to go back.

And I so wanted it to be good.  And it so wasn’t.

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Tags: bimibap, kalbi, kimchi, Korean, table top burner

To lose your way is one way of finding it: Swahili (East Africa)

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By all accounts Montreal is home to about 90,000 Jewish people.

80,000 probably live in Cote St Luc.  Yes, I hear the chuckle from my Montreal friends.

I have to contemplate what foods I am going to make for the Holy Days.  Actually if I wanted I could just contemplate where I will buy my foods for the Holy Days.  You see, for those who are not Jewish and don’t live in Montreal, these are the times that the Kosher Caterers start to scramble by putting together menus that come to the home fully cooked and frozen.

Frozen because they are, as we speak, being cooked.  The first night for our Rosh Hashanah is September8th.  Erev meaning ‘the night before.’

The Suburban Newspaper is a large English paper that usually has about 40 pages worth of ads and worthy local news that affects the suburbs like Westmount, Cote St Luc, Hampstead, the West Island; it’s how we get the local ‘what’s happening and where is it happening’ kind of info.

Yesterday I got my issue and sat down to read it.  No less than 9 Kosher Caterers had their menus advertised in the paper.  Full soup to dessert menus that included Sephardic delights as well as Ashkenazi delights and if this doesn’t fit the bill some are even advertising Chinese foods to serve.

I should note that Montreal has far more than just 9 Kosher Caterers; they just didn’t advertise because they always have their ‘regulars’.  Regulars are people who have had simchas and used a specific caterer who then, by default, becomes the go-to caterer for all the Jewish Holidays.  They don’t need to advertise.  Right Adam?  He’s my caterer.

I put Adam on the map in Montreal, when my son had his Bar Mitzvah we used him to cater the affair with, what had just come to Montreal in Kosher form, Duck.

Along with a ‘first’ for the team of the Montreal Alouettes, most of who had never been to a Bar Mitzvah but came as entertainment for the guests and as invitees themselves, Adam served Duck for the first time ever.  Kosher Duck had just entered into the market and not a sole caterer had yet prepared nor served it at a function.  He and his chef took that creature and made such a memorable meal that I still savour it as if I ate it last night.

I had guests who guffawed at the thought and sight of Duck.  For them he brought chicken.  Would you believe he used up all the chicken he brought, that is how new a concept serving Duck was in ‘99.

Then, for years after, I would ask him to prepare our side dishes.  Not this year.  Nope because this is the year of my food blog and it would be sacrilegious of me not to cook every morsel of food we will put into our mouths.

So I will.

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ONE DELICIOUS FATTOUCH SALAD

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Do not blame God for having created the tiger, but thank Him for not having given it wings: Amharic (Ethiopia)

Montreal has a big Lebanese and Middle-Eastern population and because of that we boast some of the best Lebanese Restaurants.  Living in Montreal, we also host the best Middle Eastern grocers there are.  Akahavan, Marche Adonis are just two off the top of my head that are my favourites.  They are huge and what’s more, on any given shopping day I can bump into at least three people from my ‘neck of the woods’ that shop there.

Especially since Adonis now has a Kosher meat and grocery department.

Perhaps the ‘Peace Talks’ should happen at the cafe in Marche Adonis?

I mean who can resist a grilled flat chicken sold to you on a huge pita with home made garlic sauce?  For ten bucks?

Arguably the best Shawarma in town.

Adonis, now with two huge markets in Ville St. Laurent, has just about every meat imaginable in every marinade imaginable; from lamb to veal to beef; no pork.  It is impossible to shop at these places without taking home at least a container of marinating Shish Taouk for the barbecue.  Or the Korescht and rice.

Today though, I had another reason to make my way to Akahavan.  I needed Sumac.  I was making Fattouch. Fattouch is an Arabic salad using toasted or fried Lebanese bread or pita mixed together with Romaine greens, purslane or water cress, tomatoes, scallions, radishes, green or red peppers; in fact Fattouch can be as simple as just romaine or as convaluted as you want combining all of the above and maybe even more.

POMEGRANATE MOLASSES AND SUMAC - AN ESSENTIAL INGREDIENT FOR FATTOUCH AND ZA’ATAR

Sumac is a spice that has a lemon taste to it and for me, Fattoush is not Fattoush without Sumac.  It adds that sour note and makes up where the lemon juice lags. There is no replacement, for me, for Sumac.  Although one can use more lemon juice – but Sumac is that umami of an ingredient for this dish.

MISE EN PLACE FOR THE FATTOUCH SALAD

To be honest, getting Sumac about six or seven years ago was next to impossible.  Now it is easy and I am sure for those in remote areas it can be purchased online.

DRESSING FOR SALAD

This is my version of this fabulous Lebanese salad.

FATTOUCH INGREDIENTS

1 Romaine lettuce; washed and torn or cut into smallish pieces

1 scallion, sliced

2 tomatoes; chopped (slice in half and squeezed so the juices run out of it)*

1 bunch of regular parsley, chopped

1 English cucumber, sliced bite size

1 large pita, toasted dry and then crumbled larger than bite size.

FATTOUCH DRESSING

1/2 cup extra virgin Olive Oil

1/4 fresh lemon juice, or to taste

2 tb Sumac

2 cloves garlic, minced

1-2 tb Pomegranate molasses (optional)*

* by slicing the tomatoes and squeezing the juices out over the sink or bowl, you are left with a tomato that won’t have that added juice coming out of it leaving the lettuce to sit in a damp bowl.  In most cases on wants the full juiciness of a tomato but when making a salad I try not to have added liquids where possible.  It wilts the entire salad much earlier than it normally would.

* Pomegranate molasses adds the sweetness and a little tartness. It can probably be bought where Sumac is sold.  Pomegranate molasses can also be made.

ASSEMBLING THE SALAD

Combine the first 5 Fattouch Ingredients, leaving aside the Pita.  Combine in a big bowl.

To make the Fattouch Dressing: add all ingredients into a blender and blend for a few seconds.  Place into the fridge for at least 20 minutes for the flavors to mesh together and marry.

Once the salad has been mixed, add the toasted pita pieces (Lebanese croutons) and then add the salad dressing.  Add it slowly and mix; then taste.  The amount of dressing you use will be based on the taste of the salad once tossed with the vinaigrette.

WITHOUT THE INGREDIENT OF SUMAC THIS DRESSING WOULD NOT HAVE THE AUTHENTIC LEBANESE TASTE

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Tags: Fattouch, Lebanese, Marche Adonis, parsley, pita, pomegranate molasses, romaine lettuce, scallion, sumac, tomatoes

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My husband came home today with a bouquet of flowers and a vase to put them in.  I think its a vase.

He tells me its a vase.

How the hell is this a vase?

How can a wife not be excited when her husband brings her flowers AND A VASE.

The Vazu™ Vase is an expandable decorative and see-through vase that lays as flat as a piece of computer paper and with water expands into a  vase in which to put your flowers.

The Vazu™ Vase is so decorative it would be imprudent NOT to use it as a centerpiece of any dinner table. That’s the new Vazu™ expandable vase.

Designed and manufactured in Israel to the highest green standards, the Vazu™ vase is made of layers of polymers, mainly Polyethylene and Polyester, with the print trapped between the layers. Those layers are heat-welded to create the different Vazu™ shapes. The result is a thin but strong, flexible, expandable transparent, glossy vase that won’t chip, scratch, break or fade. It’s more friendly to the environment than glass, and available in many shapes, patterns and colors.

What’s more is that since this video the vase hasn’t leaked not a drop of water, so it is airtight.  I know why he brought it to me.  Henry knows I love these kind of ‘finds’.

Thank you sweetie.  Now bring me more.

This is a lame attempt to show you how it works, like if you read the instructions you wouldn’t know how…and for the next video I am investing in a hand held camera specific to video and not my point and shoot….

It truly is what its’ pamphlet says.

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Tags: dinner table, flowers, kitchen handles, Vazu™ Vase

Slap me.

I have subscriptions to Town and Country, The Food Network Magazine, Bon Appetit and More Magazine.

I love them all and surprisingly The Food Network Magazine is not too bad.

So when I am sitting here reading September’s issue of Town and Country and come across a 3-page spread called What’s New What’s Next: I scan it because the who’s who of  the intelligentsia world-wide describe what nouveau events they are looking forward to attending on their social calendars this coming Fall.

I need to know this.  It lets me believe that rich people really do exist, even after Madoff.

Unfortunately I read this:

“SOUTHEBY’S IS AUCTIONING OFF HEIRLOOM VEGETABLES, THE EVENT, ON SEPTEMBER 23, IN NEW YORK, IS CALLED THE ART OF FARMING: AN AUCTION OF EDIBLE HEIRLOOMS, AUCTIONING 110 DIFFERENT VARIETIES, AND PROCEEDS WILL BENEFIT CHARITIES THAT TEACH CHILDREN ABOUT THE ART OF FARMING.“- Brent Ridge and Josh Kilmer-Purcell owners of the Beekman 1802 Farm and Stars of the Reality TV Show The Fabuolous Beekman Boys.

The only thought I had was ‘Soylent Green.‘ The movie.

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RICE PAPER

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First to say, I now know that a Vietnamese Summer Roll and a Vietnamese Spring roll are two different animals.

Containing usually the same ingredients, a Summer Roll is not fried; rather it is eaten once it is made and is fresh.  A Vietnamese Spring Roll is deep fried.

I made both.  DISASTER.

THAT IS NOT THE WAY THEY COME SLICED IN THE RESTAURANT

Really you can use your imagination when it comes to fillings. Shrimp, pork, bean sprouts, sliced scallions, grilled eggplant, shredded carrots, and fresh herbs.

For my rolls I used the following:

FILLING:

bean sprouts

sliced scallions

shredded carrots

cooked asparagus spears sliced

mint, coriander and basil leaves, minced.

freshly cooked Shrimp, de-veined and peeled.

Look at the pictures and see if I left anything out.

ASSEMBLY- not so good

I used medium sized rice paper. At the table I had a bowl of water large enough to hold the rice paper. The plates filled with my various ingrdients to fill the roll and waxed paper lay on the table on which to place and roll the Spring roll wrappers.

I dipped the water until the rice paper got wet; did not over soak as it will continue to soak in the water. However, that still made the rice paper a tad too crisp.  Alas, I followed the video below, watched other videos and tried to follow what ever anyone else had to say on the subject of rolling and preparing Spring Rolls..

Nori is definitely easier to work with.

Yes, I laid the (rice) paper flat, then put whatever ingredients I was choosing in the center of the rice paper. Folded in both sides first  and then I folded up bottom over the ingredients and then like a sushi roll…gathered it as tightly as I could without tearing a hole and continued to roll until I came to the end.

I WAS NO LONGER IN CHARGE - RICE PAPER TOOK OVER

IT OFFERED NO SYMPATHY SHRIVELING UP

FILLING MY ROLL, TOO MUCH?

I dunno - either I was a chazer wanting to fill my roll to the extreme; or I just don’t want to ‘waste’ anything: either way this rolling ain’t working.  Not even close.

I suppose I can find comfort, in that, if I asked a Vietnamese girl to roll a blintze; she probably wouldn’t get the hang of it by watching a video.  No, it would take her years of watching her mother in the kitchen hand rolling a gazillion cheese blintzes (cause my mother only made cheese) to learn the needed expertise to prepare an exceptional blintze.  Except she (ma) did this on a kitchen towel…I think the rice paper will stick on a kitchen towel.

FIRST ROLL: I KNEW I WAS IN TROUBLE….

So I used ‘duh’ waxed paper cause it’s uh, waxed.  it is supposed to make cookies NOT stick to the cookie sheet.

This video I found on Youtube pretty much, I thought, was really good enough to teach me how to do my rolls.  So in thanks to Pue Pue and nBee for this highly rated and viewed video…I Failed.

I took the recipe for this Vietnamese Dipping sauce off of Michael Ruhlman’s blog which he got from White On Rice’s Todd and Diane.  His post on these Spring Rolls looked so delicious, it became a craving.

While Diane, he said, suggested to look for the Flying Lion brand of fish sauce, I could only find the brand called Three Crabs.  In hindsight this, too, was a signal, Three Crabs wasn’t the ‘good kind’.

THREE CRABS, SHIT….I SHOULD’VE STOPPED THEN

I had to adapt the recipe slightly than the one Mr. Ruhlman had printed because once the 2/3 cup of fish sauce went into the bowl along with the other ingredients, I just wasn’t able to find the balance.  Probably because it was Three Crabs and not the Flying Lion.  The fish sauce was overbearing.  So instead of 1 lime I had to add 3 limes, albeit small ones; but definitely 5 tablespoons and 1 tablespoon of lemon juice.  This so I got the sour, the sweet was fine and instead of red chillis which I did not have, I used the Sriracha sauce.

This should have been a clear shout out that perhaps it would be wise to stop here.  I mean, if I can’t get the Dipping Sauce right, how the hell am I going to do the harder thing well, or good, or properly or any other synonym, because I just don’t feel like looking one up right now.

At any rate, the sauce is currently in the fridge, marinating its flavours together and I am not completely sure the components are to taste, just yet.  Once eaten I will get back and make any changes.

DIPPING SAUCE

So, this was “The Adapted Recipe” I used for the Vietnamese Dipping Sauce:

DIPPING SAUCE

2/3 c Three Crab fish sauce

1/3 c water

3 cloves of garlic, finely minced

1-2 tsp of Sriracha

1 tablespoons of sugar

6  tablespoons of fresh lime juice or more to taste

Juice of 1 lemon

Combine all ingredients well.  Zap it slightly in the microwave for the sugar to dissolve.  Shake well, and then refrigerate.

Diane says this can last a month in the refrigerator.  I don’t see why it can’t last longer, but since she’s the expert on Spring and Summer Rolls I don’t want to give wrong information.  So a  month it is.

Some of the rolls I prepared (God Help Me) I stuck in the freezer, because one day I will deep fry them in oil 2 inches deep and 375 degree.  I will use a candy thermometer to measure the heat of the oil.  I will fry only 3 to 4 at a time so the oil doesn’t cool down too much.  The hotter the oil, the less it soaks into the roll and the crisper the roll becomes - aha!!  This I know!  Having spent a childhood as a fat kid; I know how not to fry and how to fry…which is why I bake my latkes.

THOSE BEAN SPROUTS -  EVERYWHERE I TURNED WAS A BEAN SPROUT

The other rolls, I intended we eat fresh: thus the term Summer Rolls.  For the Summer Rolls, before placing any of the ingredients on the wrapper I first lightly spread a combination of Thai Peanut Sauce and a teaspoon of Mirin that I had mixed together in a bowl.  That was a good idea.

I DECIDED TO IMPROVISE

It added great taste and is quite possibly a sin and an insult to the Vietnamese Summer Roll; and all the Vietnamese bubbe’s who are shaking their heads, as I speak.

It is a pity what I have done to these rolls.  It is a pity that I was so frustrated.  It is a pity that I ruined half the package of $2.39 worth of Rice Paper Rolls M.  It is also a damn pity that the Rice Paper was getting caught on all the hooks, both front and back, of my braces.

I nearly choked to death on a dangling piece of gelatinous rice paper that tore off and didn’t get chewed.

I KNOW I PUT THIS IN ON TOP - BUT I WANTED TO RE-INTRODUCE THE SUMMER ROLL THAT ALMOST KILLED ME

Hubby’s remarks were thus: “it’s hard to eat, ya know, when the long pieces, ya know, can’t be chewed off, ya know.  I guess, well, no, there is definitely an art to making summer rolls.  But you’ll learn.”

Yeah, right. Like I’m gonna ever make you again!  An art, you putz.

So, as I said, the ones to fry are in the freezer, individually freezing as we speak.  Then I will place them in a freezer bag until I get over this degrading and disgraceful experience, which I have forever left imprinted on the internet, which is not worse than living down the failed Spring Roll in front of my family.  Besides until they forget this experience, they surely won’t eat the fried ones, just yet.

I can’t waste all that food.  I will have to wait till the memory fades.

I want to cry.  It took so damn long to prepare the ingredients in millimeter sized portions.  Was it my fault that I wanted a full Spring Roll?  Too full, I realize.  I have a philosophy.  There are some foods one just does not make at home.  One saves going out to eat for these foods.  Like really good Lobster; I believe that to eat really good Lobster I should be in Maine.  Which is why I go to Maine - to eat the Lobster I don’t make at home.

Another food I don’t make is Hot and Sour Soup.  Thai Soup.  These are foods I know I cannot make as well as the restaurant Chefs whose expertise it is.  Shit, for under 5 bucks, I’ll treat myself.

However, you should know I make a hell of a Petchah

Anyway; we ate the rolls and you know what?

THE DIPPING SAUCE WAS SO DAMN GOOD!

UPDATE: Fried up the rest of the frozen summer rolls and here is the final version. Suffice to say they taste a whole lot better than they look.

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Tags: dipping sauce, Nuoc Cham, nuoc mam, rice paper rounds, summer rolls, Vietnamese Spring rolls

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Better the smallest present than the most magnificent meanness -Hausa (Niger and Nigeria)

Part One – The Introduction.

I write this blog; I hope people read it.  A lot of energy and thought and work goes into each post, as everyone who blogs knows.  Someone, who themselves has a blog, told me it is a thankless venture the value of which is only applicable to the writer and the reader.

One hopes they have many readers; but the reality is that there are so many blogs out there on every topic imaginable, that unless you are really good at grabbing a topic and surfing other blogs, the likelihood is that you will just be writing a diary.

Which is why this particular post is really exciting for me.

In the past few weeks, I have had such an influx of new messages and emails regarding the blog that I am actually beginning to feel as if Montreal is taking notice.  I know Israel is.  Toronto, too. I also cannot thank enough, my American friends who are loyal readers; especially Berry who solved a mystery for me that I thought I would die never knowing and Walt who never fails to give me a head’s up.  Thank you.

One such email was from Israel and from a lady who found me from another food blogger.  That’s nice.  It’s nice to be found through second parties because that means someone else is reading.

(the following pictures are actual postcards that I received espousing all the products, design and colours available.  For the true justice in quality and color please click to the Ofra-T website)

Now I get to the part where I remember once reading on the morals and obligations of a blogger; when they get asked to promote a product because they are given that product free with the intentions of promotion…do they do it?  Does it lessen their value and opinion as a blogger?

Well, I believe that if my blog can be used as a conduit to good food, good restaurants, good products and good food related resources, in addition putting a grin on a face, then I am doing the job I set out to do in giving all my time and energy into writing these posts.

Ofra-T.  Their widget sits on my sidebar.  Click it.  It has an amazing website with amazing ceramic dishes and serving pieces; the likes of which I have never seen in stores in Montreal.

I had gotten an email from Kay Levin, commenting on one of my posts and asking if she could make a formal comment, showing her URL.  Of course, that she emailed me and asked me that, rather than just putting forth the comment, was so noble l quickly responded.  I also went to the link of Ofra-T.

“Ofra-T Handmade Ceramics is a boutique workshop, offering a fine collection of unique handmade ceramic tableware in a variety of styles and colors.” A tad bit of an understatement.  Unique is the understatement.  Extraordinary, incomparable and exceptional would be words I would use to describe their stoneware.

Our inspiration is to achieve the perfect balance between beauty and utilitarianism, creating usable works of art for both day-to-day and special occasions.

We work with high-end design shops and boutique restaurants as well as with private customers.

Ofra-T handmade ceramic tableware are durable, excellent for dining and made with non-toxic materials.

(Mix & Match Plate Styles, Sizes and Colors)

I used to make ceramic platters and dishes years ago, as a hobbyist.  This is what enthralled me about their catalogue, because I could relate to the selections on hand.  I, too, have dealt in handmade, kiln-baked, clay table pieces and dinnerware.

Having actually been in studio producing pieces of handmade ceramic serving dishes, myself, made looking through this catalogue all the more exciting.  When beauty and the elegance of detail, calls out to you as an artist, then each note and each plate in this catalogue is singing. – I know how hard it is to produce this kind of detail to this element of precision, with the human hand: it just blew my mind how spectacular their current collection is.

Imagine hand blowing glass: over and over again in the same shape and the same detail; 12 years ago I stood at the glass factory in Biot, France watching the glass-blower make my dozen water glasses.  I don’t remember the cost of my set of a dozen; but I do know that when I wanted to re-order a few years ago, they were upwards of $40/per.

I still have ten of those twelve glasses.  Two with chips that were filed down.  That is the quality of Biot glasses.  I have no doubt that is the quality of Ofra-T dishes.

And I am going to find out!  Soon!

To be proud of the quality of product you make is to sign that product.  Biot does that with each glass that comes out.

In a grand gesture and I suppose, in appreciation for the widget idea, I received a huge box by the FED-EX man.  (Who I happen to know because my house is and has been his route for as long as I can remember-and I do far too much internet shopping.)(Plus I think he reads this too.)

I am so excited that I am testing myself before opening the box-I want to make sure the dog is sleeping; the husband is out; the kitchen table is clean – before I open the box.

(Don’t forget to look at each photo and below right hand corner tells you the pattern name)

The anticipation is killing me.  So keep posted until tomorrow.

Part Two – The Opening.

(Serenity:small square plate with smoke glaze gives a two-tone look and unfortunately the pictures do not do justice to the plates, when actually in hand I get a jolt of excitement at their beauty)

(Wild Line salad: Milky White Glaze)

(Waves: small square plate - Stone Glaze) the true color did not come through on this plate: the stone glaze makes it an olive green color…really quite brilliant in tone for a ceramic glazed piece)

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Tags: ceramic, dishes, handmade, Israel, Ofra-T, spiral salad plate, square plate

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“Giving is a matter of the heart, don’t say it is a matter of wealth” -Swahili. East Africa”

It was a rainy day in Montreal and I was on a mission to find Le Biftheque’s butchershop.  It is on Cote de Liesse Rd and for those of you who live in Montreal or know the city; Cote de Liesse is a road that I still have not learned how to manoeuvre.  It is one confusing road, for me.

So what would normally take not even 15 minutes from my door to Le Biftheque took almost an hour.  I kept getting lost and then when I finally found my way traffic would not let me through to the other side to navigate my way onto the Cote de Liesse instead of the Montee de Liesse…Quebec drivers.

The long and the short of it, is that I made it there and bought my Corned Beef.  I brought it home and prepared it and wouldn’t you know; I took pictures of each step and then the battery in the camera died.  I re-charged the camera, began downloading the balance of the pictures I took.  Only problem was I did a practice run of a video and then inadvertently erased not only the video but the entire memory card.

Unfortunately this included a picture of the final plating of the beautifully sliced brisket and its vegetables.  By the time I realized this, we had eaten it all up.  So no finished product.  I wanted to bang my head against the wall for this outrageously stupid act.

In spite, I am blogging about this fabulous meal anyway.

The preparation is as easy as can be.  Then just imagine it sliced against the grain, and plated on this platter

with the carrots and sliced potatoes, that cooked in the remaining water, delicately hugging the brisket and Voila!  That vision was our supper.

1 Corned Beef Brisket.   Wash the brisket so that most of the pickling spices get rinsed off the meat.  Place it into a pot large enough to hold the Brisket and be able to cover with water.

It should be noted for those cooks who have a home Sous Vide machine; Le Biftheque packages their meat ideal for this Under Pressure Cooking.

Let the pot come to a boil, skim whatever rises.  If too much water boils out then replace water to cover the brisket.  (I lost track of the timer on the oven and too much of my water boiled away.)  Then lower the heat to a simmer; cover the pot and let it cook for about 2 hours or until fork tender.  This will depend on the weight of your brisket.

Meantime prepare the vegetables you want to use.  In my case it was carrots and potatoes.  Somehow with a corned beef dinner, root vegetables seem appropriate especially on a rainy day in Montreal in July.

After the brisket has cooked to fork tender, carefully lift it out of the pot and place it on a dish or waiting platter.

Once I had placed the cooked brisket onto a platter, I then placed the potatoes into the existing and simmering water to cook for ten minutes prior to adding the carrots, since potatoes take a tad longer to get to fork tender.

At that point I used a strainer to strain the water into the sink and get the vegetables.  I let the brisket cook and sliced it against the grain into thin slices.  To plate the dish I placed the sliced brisket on a magnificient hand-crafted platter and layered the vegetables around it and took the best picture.

WHICH I THEN DELETED BY MISTAKE.

So one of two things should happen: either I re-cook the brisket so that I can have a finished product to show you or I say ‘fuggedaboutit‘ and because it got really hot and I can’t imagine eating another Corned Beef Brisket.

FUGGEDABOUDIT!

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Tags: brine, brisket, corned beef, Le Biftheque

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Bear with me.  I have wanted to do a video for the blog in the worst way.  Unfortunately it is the worst video, like ever.

The Sodastream has been on my wishlist for the longest period of time and I finally gave in and ordered it from the online Sodastream store.  Soft drinks are my soft spot.  I hate buying them; but love to drink them.  The huge bottles run out of gas about half way through; the cans are never fully drunk and therefore I wind up throwing out half empty cans.

Yes, unfortunately I do that…throw them out in the recycle bin lest anyone think I am not actively trying to turn green.

I do not save the bottles or cans for refund.  There is just no room in my house for that.

Let me get to the Sodastream.  It is a unit into which fits a cyclinder of CO2.  Each cylinder will make about 60 -1 litre  bottles of soft drink or seltzer or flavored water.  The syrups come in regular and diet - the ones I highlight are all diet.  My least favorite is the diet cola.  The best is the diet orange.

With my starter package came:  1 60L cylinder of CO2 gas; 1 unit; 1 soft drink bottle unique to the Sodastream; a free 3 pack sample of flavored water.

I purchased a second cylinder of CO2 because when the first is finished, I can send it back to get it refilled at a cheaper cost and never be without a CO2 cartridge.  Plus the cartridges get to be re-used and eventually re-cycled.

I also purchased, separately, a sample variety pack of 12 flavors which had to be returned and exchanged because it was not as described on the website.  Thus the downside to Internet Shopping.

Customer service was great and I got all the diet syrups without having to send back the regulars.  Unfortunately I don’t use regular syrups so they are sitting around;  If anyone who buys a Sodastream or has one and wants these syrups for free just send me your address and I’ll mail them.  My gift.

This is not a cheap investment, so far I have spent about $300 - but that $300 is getting me carbonated water and soft drink for the next 120 litres or 120 - 1 litre bottles, I won’t ever have to buy.  I can’t even imagine drinking  100 litres of soda-pop/seltzer water.  My initial price for the starter package listed above including taxes and delivery was CAD $226.

Then I found myself at Sears where they were highlighting the Sodastream and found myself walking to the cash with another CO2 cylinder, two more of the special bottles and two more syrups…that added up to about another CAD $70 or so bucks.

Which is also why I am feeding my addiction, rather than trying to control it.  However, imagine a life where Seltzer water is just a tap away.  Imagine not having to go to the store when company is coming over, for Club Soda or a few bottles of soft drinks.  Imagine being able to make a dynamite cocktail at the drop of a hat and not worry because you don’t have Soda water.

I do not regret one red dollar of any of the purchase except perhaps the two diet colas syrups…

Using the Sodastream is so easy you can teach your five year old to do it.  In fact since my original purchase I have bought 3 more bottles another cylinder and four diet flavored syrups, but I told you that already.  Can you feel my excitement?  I am already repeating myself.

Always keep a full Sodastream bottle of water in the fridge.  The cap of the bottle is specially made, in that, it does not allow the air or gas to seep through, meaning your bottle stays carbonated to the last drop.  Although sometimes it gets difficult to open, I must admit.

I take full responsibility should any one of you be induced towards my ‘pop’ addiction.

Yet, just carbonating water and having Seltzer on hand for any given reason;  like to use in my Tempura batter, is great.  It’s also good with a shpritz of lemon and lime in a tall glass with fruit juice ice cubes.

So here I am, with braces and elastics, which I forgot to remove.

Henry taking the video was not the only challenge I was afraid of and in true form he did not disappoint me: he is no videographer.  I always hate the way I look (like any woman does) and the way I sound (that voice pierces even my ears) and of course Henry couldn’t keep the zoom off my face.

I did not rehearse and I know I made errors like Americans call their drinks ‘Pop’ not soda…and I forgot to have a glass ready and what I was able to edit out was the full minute Henry kept the zoom on the glass until I finally said ’stop’.  Thanks Picasa for having that one editing feature I could actually figure out how to use.

For all you out there considering the Sodastream: I absolutely love it.

NOTE*** when i say ‘FUZZY’ I actually mean gas, and when I keep saying  “SCREW” I am not insinuating anything; plus I am not pregnant I simply had too much to eat that day.

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Tags: Club Soda, CO2, flavored water, gas cylinder, pop, Seltzer, sodastream, softdrink, syrup

Dear readers, I am still waiting on the debut of the Steamy Kitchen Cookbook, but I refuse to stop posting and the anticipation is definitely building up.  So I went to a movie and then to the library. 

Still reeling (no pun) from the Julie and Julia movie I went to the public library to get a copy of Mastering the Art of French Cooking. 

Yes people I do not own a copy of my own, I do however, own, in storage somewhere, practically every book put

out by Time-Life Foods of the World Books eons ago highlighting the different foods of the world.  My favourite

being the Japanese Cookbook which if I remember correctly came in a sleeve featuring a stunningly photographed hardcover and a binder-style soft cover.  Note to self: must find those books…

 It is a good thing I never owned a copy in my 20’s because starting a new marriage, I would have taken Julia’s words as gospel, and that would absolutely, without a doubt, have meant me running for the tape measure to be exactly sure that my pans were the thickness and diameter to match the necessary requirements of the recipe, because I am that neurotic. One would think that striving for such perfection I would be perfect, but, I have yet to make a ‘perfect’ meal.  Jaden watch out and I’m sorry in advance…

 Julia’s own ways, we saw on television, never demanded perfection of us, based on her own philosophy that

cooking be fun.  A direct quote from Julia and Jacques: Cooking at Home states ” Home cooks have so many

useful techniques to learn from observing the professionals, but we don’t have to proceed at their gallop.  It’s the way to go about things professionally that we want to learn…”  

I learnt (Canada remember so it can be spelled this way) from my mother that a fork can beat eggs well to create both scrambled and omelette eggs. Julia recommends that too. Depending on the people eating I allow two eggs per person, up to a dozen at one time, but Julia tells us that it is okay to use 8 eggs, but less will yield a fluffier omelette. To this day, I always add a bit of milk or water and still don’t know why except that is how my mother showed me early on. That is what Julia’s goal was. That food be the greatest pleasure and the preparation be a joyful occupation.

  Julia Child’ s book is wonderful and I loved each page and each recipe and it is timeless and such an informative tool that indeed today I went out and bought both volumes.  A home kitchen should not be without her books as well as so many other authors out there both past and current that should be part of every home where cooking is enjoyed.  This is now my go-to gift for every wedding I am invited to.

 Thank goodness the more modern cook who writes a book allows us readers to use our supposed learned intelligence, too, and simply makes the suggestion of the pan that was used to create the recipe being followed, yet we know we can always substitute. Some people enjoy reading a novel that propels them into the lives they are reading – cookbooks do that for me.  Each recipe propels me into a luxuriously laid out, top of the line, decorator designed kitchen and has me envisioning the subliminal coming together of the final product.  There is no other way to explain it, except that in reading a recipe from beginning to end I need to visualize the action so that I can understand the end concept.  I am old enough to know that I probably had an undetected learning disability which today would have me deemed as a visual learner – in other words I need to have a picture in my head of what I read.

 In fact,  Michael Ruhlman’ Ratios(check our that video foreplay) which, when busy in the kitchen I sometimes

keep in the waist of my pants, so that I have it handy, is so hard for me to understand because it is numbers and I am not a numbers person.  However, my husband who is a numbers man and who never cooks has used Ratios on numerous occasions.  Maybe because he has to stick his hands in my pants to get it; but I’d like to think that to him, Ratios is HIS kind of book. Ratios is my kind of book too, except that it takes me a half hour to figure out how many ounces of this and how much of that is needed: I need an excel program, which is why I hope and pray that Mrs. Ruhlman, known to all who love her pictures as Donna, convinces her husband to print more posters ‘cause I lost out on getting one.  

  In all fairness to my new-found readers, I have to come clean and tell that once, not too long ago, this love-of-my-life husband hired me to be his bookkeeper and then abruptly fired me two weeks later without so much as a sweet endearing ticklish tone that might have resonated even the slightest hint of tremendous love.   That was two of the most stressful weeks of my entire married life.  To this day our standing joke is that I tried to embezzle money out of him. 

The Steamy Kitchen Cookbook will give me not only the words to visualize but the pictures to boot.  And what

pictures they will be – breathlessly talented that Jaden is.

An anecdote: on why my learning disability went undetected was not due to parent neglect, but rather my parents

 were too busy raising a son, eight years older than me, who had Tourretes Syndrome (a diagnosis made 2 yrs

after the death of my last parent) in the early 50’s when this was an unnamed disease and no known cause for it.   Therefore no cures or remedies.  My mother and father died never knowing there was a name for their son’s affliction which my mother secretly always felt was her fault. Intuition, as with anything including cooking, takes over when all else fails, and my brother has a graduate degree in Theatre Arts and Marketing, a very successful businessman born to parents who were educational snobs; thankfully. 

Thank you Gael Greene for having made changes on your  Insatiable Critic with respect to a long ago written critique. So much appreciated especially since I was a complete unknown to you and still are. Great class lady.

Over the past years I have gotten to read and get an insight into a lot of bloggers   whose blogs I have been reading and through my reads I have become a loyal follower of all that sit on my Blogs I Like Page that I have become addicted to a daily dose.

 I see, from the last few weeks of posting and the weeks prior trying to design – reading all these blogs will become an impossible task if life is to exist outside the computer room.  And if I want 32 years of marriage to become 33.

 I thank all of those giving current time to this blog and all those bloggers who gave me time of theirs. 

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Tags: Canada, Jacques and Julia Cooking At Home, Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Ratios, Time Life Foods of the World

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!!!

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 THE PIZZED OFF PART 

My Birthday PIZZES me off because not only have I stopped receiving birthday presents, nobody makes me a birthday cake. My husband stopped buying me birthday presents a long time ago because he says I have expensive taste and I always want a piece of jewelry. What’s wrong with that?

Happy Birthday to me, I turned “ǽǼ¾¥ “years old yesterday, so why do I still feel 25???

There is always something that pizzez me off, at least once a week  AND this shall now become my new Friday post.  I know, if you are actually reading my posts I am redundant but since feedburner has only recorded 3 visits so far I must keep repeating myself.  Martha Stewart would say this isn’t a good thing. Redundancy I mean.

This means every Friday I get to unhinge and tell the world what pizzed me off and it may not always be food-related, but funny in an after-the-fact, sort of way, and for sure it beats paying a psychiatrist.  Been there done that.

So first item on the agenda:  Know why nobody writes on hardcopy paper anymore? CAUSE THERE ISN’T A STORE THAT SELLS A PEN THAT WRITES A FLUID ALPHABET LETTER….

I just bought a box of a dozen BIC round stic (yes the ‘k’ is missing from the word: oddly enough) medium pens and not one of them can write a fluid letter of the alphabet in its entirety on an envelope.  And this is not the first time I’ve encountered this problem.  After buying a dozen at the Dollarama store in the ‘shmall’ I chalked it up to the pens being less than 0.15 cent each and that I deserved pens that didn’t work.  But give me a break: BIC PENS not to work…isn’t that their raison d’être?

I sound like Ed Schultz.

THE ROCKS PART

I have got to admit that I am a big menu reader and for that I give big kudos for any blog that links to a menu I can read online. Therefore the first kudo goes out to Jaden Hair (of course and who else) who wrote about and linked to a sushi restaurant she ate at while visiting   Mount Dora which is like Quebec’s  Eastern Townships

The September issue of  The Montreal Gazette Food and Wine highlighted a recipe

just perfect for yesterday’s rainy day – actually days. Our weather is all screwed up: September we are experiencing April, May weather, summer encompassed a week or two sometime in July and now when we are supposed to be picking apples and wearing fall coats, Montrealers have on their galoshes and light sweaters because it is hitting 22 degrees F.  I have yet to figure out how to add video direct to this site just click on Chef Louis Rhéaume and watch his cooking class on Thai Soup,

 ^{THIS IS A SOUP I ORDER EACH TIME I GO OUT FOR THAI.  A GOOD THAI SOUP IS INDICATIVE OF THE REST OF THE MEAL and the quality of the Restaurant.}

Now an issue for which I have no answers.  When someone writes a blog, how do they have time to read other blogs?  I have been spending so much time on writing that I am now limited in the blogs I get to read and that depresses me because I know I am missing out on great and interesting news and discussions.  In order for me to keep up now I must forget about eating or answering the phone.  Laundry has to be done so quickly that I forgot about putting my pants up to air dry and instead threw them in the dryer and shrunk them….geez I hope I shrunk them – I forgot about the possibility I could be gaining weight from all this food focus. Once upon a time I had days where I focused on the treadmill.

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Tags: Bic Pens, Chef Rheaume, Eastern Townships, Montreal Gazette Food and Wine, Mount Dora

At Holiday time I get this sentimental….Neil Diamond where were you when I was dating?

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RE-POST

Pineapple Chocolate Cake, oh Dear

don't judge a book by its cover this is fabulously delicious

The ‘High’ Holidays have just left us: the High Holy Days, the most pious of holidays for Jews everywhere. For the next month there will be many religious days coming up – my kids loved this time of year, not for the family celebrations, but for the days off they were entitled to at school. For all intensive purposes Jewish kids should start school in October that is how many holidays are pious enough to be considered a synagogue day.

Every year during my husband’s childhood his mother would bake his favourite cake and I couldn’t understand why I always heard about this cake while we were dating. It seems she took a sabbatical on baking it during his early 20’s and into our marriage and baking just didn’t ‘turn me on’. To be a good baker one has to be precise and dedicated to the art and I was just never dedicated to that art. Good thing too, because when I became pregnant at 25 with my daughter I developed Gestational Diabetes and again when my son was a bun in the oven. Two years later I developed it for ‘real’ and for the rest of my life I spent a journey trying to discover who made the best sugar substitute in the world.

I have discovered it. DiabetiSweet.

Now, after telling many of the ‘baker blogs’ about it I am still waiting to hear back on their opinions. I guess Bakers have no desire to bake with anything called a ‘substitute’.

When the children were ‘begat’ and of the age they could sit in a high chair, she renewed the tradition and so it started that this ‘Pineapple Chocolate Cake’ continuously appeared at any Sztern celebration: be it a birthday, an afternoon tea, or even a bridal shower.

THE most requested dish, it was.

And I doubt it is called the Pineapple Chocolate Cake but alas, that is how we fondly refer to it and in the next breath we also add‘ ‘Daddy used to eat the whole thing and that is why he was so fat as a kid.’ Laugh, laugh or might I say LOL.

Mom is not so well now, but the cake and its tradition must go on my daughter insists, so last year Carly and I took notes on how her grandmother makes this infamous cake. Actually it is cut into squares so it is not a cake but a Square.

We took notes as there is no hard copy recipe; it simply sits in my Mother-in-law’s memory as do all really good recipes from grandmothers who were great cooks. She claims it was given to her in 1959 by a friend and it is definitely not Polish and she knows this as she is Polish. She has no idea where it came from and so goes out the call for anyone who knows where this Square came from and what it is true name.

The following is the recipe for the written in the EXACT way it was prepared. I would have chosen a higher quality chocolate but this is meant to be an exact duplication of a beloved recipe and in 1959 refined chocolate was practically non existent and not readily available to housewives. Bear in mind (what a term) this was written as a Coles Notes: (and as always read through the recipe in its entirety before beginning)

Note: the pictures are no indication of the taste – I obviously did not use a big enough Pyrex and so it looked like this, BUT should these instructions be followed to a tee, it will turn out just like it should…Perfect I am not….but this recipe was re-done in its exactness by mother-in-law who insisted it be done ‘her way’.

PINEAPPLE CHOCOLATE CAKE

1/2 lb sweet butter (regular unsalted), room temperature and soft

1 c. sugar

1 egg, well beaten

2 c. flour

2 tsp vanilla or vanilla sugar packets (2)

2 sq semi-sweet chocolate, melted

2 cans crushed pineapple, drained

4 tb flour

2 egg yolks

1 c. sugar

FOR DOUGH:

Combine the first 6 ingredients into a bowl and crumble with hands till mixed thoroughly.

Spread this batter-come-dough, on bottom of a 2 qt Pyrex rectangular baking dish, taking away aproximately 1/2 c. of dough for garnish

FILLING

Combine the next 4 ingredients and place on top layer.

With the remaining dough break off pieces and roll into strings decorating the top in x’s or lines.

Bake 55 min -1 hour at 350 F

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Tags: cake, chocolate, coles notes, DiabetiSweet, dough, filling, gestational diabetes, Pineapple

THE PIZZED OFF PART

Should I be pizzed off? 

Daughter sent me a video that she made in honor of my birthday and what she thinks are my cooking talents.

   I have one thing to say: ‘Carly your talents in acting are just like my talents in

cooking’…

ABSOLUTELY GREAT

And I am so glad RADA paid off…now when are you paying me back?

The Rocks Part

Bragging Writes (rights). (daughter, of course)

I also just got sent to my inbox a site called Tasting Table; a  newsletter on any and everything food and I have got to say I am loving it thus far. What took you guys so long to find me?

  Did you hear? Did you read? The best post of the week:   The absolute best

post of this week and the winner goes

to:  The Steamy Kitchen

Cookbook is just about to be released!!!!

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Tags: Carly, Steamy Kitchen Cookbook, youtube video

101 Cookbooks posted a recipe she got from a vegetarian cookbook. Most of the time I read a recipe I have this power to envision the product, its ingredients and already taste the dish. Not that I have umami taste buds, or for that matter the five other receptors on my tongue. In fact, with the allergy season on its way and the fact that my nose is always stuffed up, I doubt I could judge an Iron Chef match or sit on the panel of Chopped.

I own stock in Breathe Right, or I should own stock.

Not only that, but I have stayed away from squash for a long time believing that its high glycemic content, like potatoes, is a food I need to stay away from if I was going to lose the ten pounds I want. Thanks Suzanne Somers for those great diet tips: NOT. I always hated Squash. My mother never made Squash. I have never seen Squash served at any dinner table I sat at. I know Squash as the square frozen box in the freezer isle at the grocery store – yech! Pumpkin’s only use in my house was to carve for Halloween and roast its seeds. Don’t get me started on Spaghetti Squash – just like eating spaghetti. COME ON…Nonna Lydia, is that really true?

Spaghetti Squash non è assolutamente voglia di mangiare pasta Spaghetti

Which then begged the question: If I am going to go out of my comfort zone to write a food blog about Asian food then certainly I could make a Squash.

Maybe not true for Lobster – Lobster is a fear, a true fear, to cook. For many reasons, the first being cost and the second being a screwed up expensive Lobster. I do believe there are some foods that need to be eaten only in a restaurant. One needs to be able to look forward to going out to eat and not be able to say “I could cook this at home.”

Therefore, for my 53rd birthday (I acutally look 52) I cooked An Acorn Squash and I loved it.  I loved every bit of it. I ate it cold, I ate it hot, I ate it microwaved warm. Then I made six all over

again. Help!! I am becoming an Acorn Squash lover.

“Heidi Swanson (Swanson frozen food: word association – I’m sure I’m not the only one…) you will forever be a part of me for having induced me to baking my first Acorn Squash.”

Roasted Corn Pudding in Acorn Squash

1 small (2lb) acorn squash, cut in half lengthwise and seeded

1 tablespoon clarified butter or olive oil.

1 cup milk

1 egg plus 2 egg whites

½ cup fresh corn kernels (or more if you like)

¼ teaspoon anise seed, chopped

½ cup chopped scallions

A tiny pinch of freshly grated nutmeg

¼ teaspoon fine grain sea salt

1/3 cup grated white cheddar cheese

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F with rack in the middle

Rub the orange flesh of the squash with butter/oil. Place cut side up on a baking sheet. You will want it to sit flat and not tip, if you are having trouble then slice and level off the bottom of the acorn squash using a knife. Cover the squash with foil and bake for 40 minutes or until flesh is slightly tender.

In a bowl, combine the milk, eggs, corn, anise seed, half the scallions, nutmeg and salt. Fill each squash with mixture ¾ full. Carefully transfer the squash back to the oven with spilling (tricky!). Continue baking uncovered for 30-50 minutes more or until the squash if fully cooked through and the pudding has set. The amount of time can vary wildly according to your oven temperature and the size of squash. At the last minute sprinkle with the remaining scallions and eat hot.

Serves 4-6

**When a recipe calls for sea salt or for freshly grated nutmeg, do not be afraid to use kosher salt or the bottle of nutmeg spice sitting in your cabinets. It would be more heresy NOT to make this recipe because you have not the recommended ingredients. One must always read a recipe and improvise according to one’s tastes and ingredients on hand or readily available in your part of the world.

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Tags: 101 Cookbooks, Acorn Squash, Cheddar Cheese, Heidi Swanson, Lydia Bastianich, Spaghetti Squash, Suzanne Somers

It has been a full month of posts and a full month of Wordpress and FatCow html to literally fill a Fat Cow. I have had 3 Theme Changes and Color Schemes too numerous to remember.

Now that it has been smooth sailing and actually quite enjoyable: a labor of love another blogger described his blog to be, I have yet another

change.

A NAME CHANGE Eye’z in a Steamy Kitchen Cookbook is now called

Eye’z in a Cookbook.com

The premise has not changed: I will be cooking Asian Food. I will be cooking from the wonderful cookbook entitled and soon to be on Amazon: The Steamy Kitchen Cookbook written by the wonderfully brilliant author Jaden Hair.

Once in a while I will take my tabletop burner and cook a hotpot from The Japanese Food Report Harris Salat’s Japanese Hot Pots Cookbook. Hotpots are a fabulous way to entertain a small group of two –four friends interactively

Eye’z in a Cookbook still has its purpose and

I intend not to embarrass Jaden.

I intend to serve my family Asian food at least once a week.

I intend ‘knot’ to put on any weight and to use my treadmill also at least once a week.

I intend to feed the dog any leftovers.

I intend to make each recipe sound as delicious as it was intended to be.

I intend to make Jaden Hair proud.

I intend to honour the promise I made to my Japanese Grocer to visit him once a week and buy all my Asian staples from him.

I intend to cook all the recipes that my blog was premised upon and agreed to by Jaden, even before she knew I dyed my hair blonde. Not just the easy ones – the hard ones too.

Yea, yea - The Road to Hell was paved with good intentions.

But this is a road I have looked forward to travelling through the many hours it will take and I hope to save a seat for as many passengers as are willing to come along on the journey with me.

Eye’z in a Cookbook is a good name.

Because if truth be known, I had planned on a one year tour and then Eye’z would mutate into another hemisphere with another name. THAT would have been a mistake. Let nobody tell you that changing Domain Names is easy. It is damn hard and damn time-consuming and damn expensive and Feedburner doesn’t give a shit.

I will be back on Friday as usual. But for all who have subscribed…please make sure to re-enter your email subscription and to click on the Feed so that the proper posts can enter your mailboxes in a timely fashion.

YOU DON’T WANT TO MISS A POST.

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Tags: Asian Food, Fatcow, hotpots, Jaden Hair, Japanese Food Report, Wordpress

THE PIZZED OFF PART

(Since initial writing Eater has become a National read offering all of $25.00 to each blogger if they were to quit blogging – Eater, the cost of my server is more than that – at least cover the cost of the server for a year…)

At any rate, Eater N.Y. sent me an email inviting me to a Sake Event on Thursday, September 24 which just happens to be my birthday. Should anyone feel Eater N.Y. is sending spam emails be assured that I am on their mailing list to receive all their posts. New York is the bees knees for the best of everything: shopping, food, Broadway – you name it and New York has it and they flaunt it better than any other city in the States. New Yorkers know how to walk the cat-walk walk and still shake their booties.

I happen to love Sake. I love the shitty sake that you’ve got to drink warm because it reminds me of my dating years when Sukiyaki at a Japanese restaurant was what I always craved. I love the fine Sake and I love the medium and not so fine Sake. Sake2Me (I love that name) and not in this sense, but rather the Laugh-in kind of way.

SAQ est une entreprise du gouvernement . Même si j’étais un maître sommelier je ne pouvais pas ouvrir mon propre magasin de détail vendant les meilleurs des meilleurs dans le vin ou les spiritueux

Since 1921, Quebec alcohol is a government run business, regulated by the SAQ - Societe de l’alcohol du Quebec. The government has the first, final and only say as to all things related to any kind of alcohol one is able to buy in Quebec. Their website reads as follows:

“Since its creation in 1921, the SAQ has lived through a world war, the Great Depression, the advent of radio, television and computers, and even the landing on the Moon! It has also lived through enormous changes: name, mandate and status, the beginning of self-service stores, the introduction of wine in grocery and convenience stores, labour disputes, economic recessions and many privatization attempts. Fortunately, the 80th anniversary of the SAQ coincides with the most prosperous period in its history. The SAQ is now enjoying its moment of glory*, its peak years. And this trend may be for keeps, because the foundations of the state-owned corporation have never been as solid—a story of well-earned success.” (I am choosing not to speak of Bronfman and prohibition except to say I should’ve been born a Bronfman or at least married one).

And that glory* is a limited supply of any one kind of alcohol be it wine, sake, spirits and beer. If I missed any, they restrict that too. I don’t know why it is this way but obviously as long as I know Alcohol in Quebec it is always bought at any one of these stores- the grocery stores can carry the cheapest brands of whatever is brought into Quebec and trust me: you wouldn’t want to cook with these wines.

Big deal that our drinking age is 18- sure because at 18 you’ll drink anything alcohol – all you want to do for the next 2 years is get drunk every weekend and who needs a $50 bottle of good Sake when you can get a $50 bottle of bad sake that has a 300% markup. Tell you what, raise it to 21 and let us have all the brands and wineries in the world breaking down our doors.

To Make Matter Worse: we now have to buy our own booze bags that decorate each cash register, otherwise we are hauling bottles by the neck. Which I thought was illegal to do. But they’re not stupid - each bag holds up to 4 bottles of booze enticing one to at least make the trip worthwhile.

Plus, it makes quite the fashion statement on the streets of Montreal: Louis Vuitton slung over the shoulder, Prada Sunglasses over the eyes and the North Face Triple C long coat,(hey it’s cold here!) in black of course, Fendi scarf tucked into collar and two cashmere gloved hands clutching the neck of a wine bottle one side, the other an Absolut; hip to hip. If it was a really good day a Holt’s shopping bag could be slipped onto a few loose fingers, still clutching those booze bottles. Chez Paris. I think not.

This is why, when crossing the border, Quebecers use their allotment for the day or week to bring back booze. We buy it on the way there and on the way back. This is why Quebecers will always ask friends in Toronto to bring them back booze of a specific name – we do our research. Toronto has no problem in letting their citizens in on choice. Quebec does not allow us much in the way of choice. No Sake2Me here.

In fact the Japanese Food Report has an article on Sake tasting and I searched each bottle and each Sake maker and Quebec carries not a one. Makes you wonder who gets paid off and how much seed money goes into pockets just to get shelf space in Quebec Liquor Outlets? Wine is a whole other sad story.

If only I could get my hands on a decent bottle of Artisan Sake.

Whole Foods, when are you coming? I know there is tremendous controversy, but Montreal is very limited in our grocery stores. Besides, Toronto has one, and on that note what about a Williams Sonoma or a Crate and Barrel? Damn language laws and Bill 101 that stipulates stores must be bilingual with French being the predominant size. It is too expensive for large sized retailers to bilingualize so they stay English and out of Quebec.

Now this does not affect us Canadain bloggers but oh oh, the FTC is now going to regulate bloggers eminating out of the states. http://bit.ly/1967Pn

“The revised guides specify that while decisions will be reached on a case-by-case basis, the post of a blogger who receives cash or in-kind payment to review a product is considered an endorsement. Thus, bloggers who make an endorsement must disclose the material connections they share with the seller of the product or service. If the “connections” are not disclosed and the FTC finds out, the blogger could be fined up to $11,000, according to a TechCrunch piece in The Washington Post.”

Hey, the Canadian government taxes the tips our waiters and waitresses make: all’s equal in the eyes of those greedy tax-tors

Rest in Peace Gourmet Magazine.

THE ROCKS PART

Orangette is a blog I subscribe to, and since it goes directly to my inbox I get to scan it quicker than the ones on my Reader and most recently she has been highlighting the opening of her restaurant called Delancey. I love blogs about food, but more I love blogs about food not necessarily relating to recipes…of course my blog isn’t going that route so thankfully there are people who love blogs that cater to just about recipes. Orangette’s, on the other hand, is really like reading a first hand diary account of opening her restaurant and if anyone remembers the series (when the Food Network had great programming) called Opening Soon, these past few posts of Molly’s has been just like that. It reminds me loosely of Eric  Ripert’s On The Line which has to be the best and most indepth account of how a top level restaurant runs and the stars behind that success, ever written. Not only are the pictures beautiful art, but the layout of the book ingenious: the eye keeps moving and dancing from one side to the other making turning the page something you don’t want to do. Whosever concept this was deserves a bonus, not an IAG bonus, perhaps a Michael Moore bonus.

Starchefs Congress: What can I say about Starchefs? They have kept me busy all weekend and week long from September 20-22 reading up on their 4^th annual International Chefs Conference – the schedule looked amazing so I can definitely commend the rave reviews I have been reading from Dirt Candy, the Feedbag and every other foodie newsletter online. Starchefs is an amazing website with amazing and informative industry news that for me, not of the industry, just gobbles up. Sometimes I think, in another life, I have been in some way shape or form, in the food industry. The flip side of that is not attending the Blogher convention, which I wish I could have. There are so many conventions now for the blogger that food bloggers are creating their own directly relating to food blogging and how to get more than 3 readers….ahem ahem. Yes, I really need to go to one.

101 Cookbooks posted a recipe for Roasted Corn Pudding in Acorn Squash. http://www.101cookbooks.com/archives/roasted-corn-pudding-in-acorn-squash-recipe.html Just the name is enough to salivate on, it conjures up oomph to the taste buds. I am including this in my Rocks part because this post rocked me so hard I actually made it and posted it on Tuesday step-by-step.

Lastly and by fluke on Thursday, My Birthday, I channel surfed upon Avec Eric on PBS. Avec Eric is going to be another PBS hit and I am happy that in Montreal it is being shown on Thursdays prior to prime time programming. It was enthralling, he is enthralling, and the audience was treated to a dinner at ook me right to the Manressa website. Thank goodness for intellectual PBS programming because life is just not long enough or rich enough to visit all that is out there. And that pizzez me off.

IT’S OYSTER SEASON:IN CANADA

BEAUSOLEIL

MALPEQUE

RASPBERRY POINT

BLUE POINT

CARAQUET

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Tags: 101 Cookbooks, Acorn Squash, Avec Eric, Beausoleil, bees knees, Blogher, Blue Point, Caraquet, Delancey Eric Ripert, Dirt Candy, Eater, Fendi, Holt's, Japanese Food Report, Louis Vuitton, Malpeque, Micahel Moore, North Face, On The Line, Orangette, Oyster Season, Prada, Raspberry Point, Roasted Corn Pudding, Sake, Sake2Me, SAQ, Societe de l'alcohol du Quebec, Starchefs, The Feedbag, Whole Foods

I am a Diabetic who craves sweets.  Especially on days when PMS comes to town and drops by my house to say hello.  She used to do this once a month but lately Menopause is accompanying her and the cravings are not as strong because Menopause is one ugly duckling to look at: makes your skin crawl and takes away your hunger.  She’s got a face that could stop a clock.

Unfortunately she is completely unable to stop the clock - shucks.

With Thanksgiving Monday, came Friday marketing and way too many bananas; what does one do with lemons; they make lemonade.  What does one do with bananas; they make banana-ade… uh… Banana Cake.

I wrote too numerously to remember and to a great many pastry chefs all well known to bloggers (yes Michael Laiskonis and Shuna) to try out a product I found a few years ago that is a sugar substitute, if only to have them give a professional opinion on the product and how they used it; according to package directions or with adjustments

No one responded.  DiabetiSweet is a sugar substitute I discovered about ten years ago in Chicago in a Rite-Aid or Publix, but it is only sold in the United States and is unavailable in Canada.  I have written DiabetiSweet many times, to no avail, and I fully intend to email them this post - to hell with blogger protocol whatever that means - because it is imperative that I be able to buy DiabetiSweet without shipping or duty costs.

In fact so should other Canadian Diabetics.

The two boxes I have, that a friend brought across the border for me, cost $50 US with taxes and exchange rates, a hefty sum for 8 cups of sugar. 

DiabetiSweet, in my humble opinion, is the BEST SUGAR SUBSTITUTE on the market.  Splenda gives me ’splenda headaches’; Sweet n Low is not sweet enough and the amount I must use is scary even for me; the same goes for all the other crap that call themselves sugar substitutes. Sugar Twin I use in my coffee and I would not use it to bake with.

Sepia is the worst product on the market and I cannot imagine anyone describing it as the next best thing to sugar; Sepia has a bitter taste, and for my taste buds is not even sweet.  Sepia must be paying big bucks for its promotion in that way because I just can’t wrap my head around this product as being a sugar substitute.  No Way Hos-ay.

DiabetiSweet want me to promote you?  I am neither ashamed nor bashful and I won’t even ask for money: Just send me a bulk package of both white and brown sugar and we will be even for ever or at least until the box is used up and then I’ll call.

I love you. I live to consume you. I will bake with you forever. I will be your love slave.  But not at $50 US bucks for two packs. And whatever happened to the tin packaging.  Bags are not as airtight as the cans and the cans are far better for storage in a cupboard.  Go back to Tins.  I am ready and able to help you market DiabetiSweet properly.  Again, just a case and we are even.

THE TASTING PANEL

Son, 23, single and gorgeously handsome and a soon-to-be graduate in business

Husband, 54, married and gorgeously handsome and married to a stunning woman.

Me, 53, vivacious, sexy, voluptuous lips, married to Brad Pitt…oh, s’cuse me I got lost somewhere in my thoughts….

Each person sat down at kitchen table. On right side of each person was a hot cup of coffee in a saucer with a spoon and DiabetiSweet in a demitasse cup from which to scoop a level teaspoon or two or three.  DiabetiSweet is teaspoon to teaspoon equivalent to sugar and that is a dead-on true fact.

Below the coffee and in the center of each place setting, sat one slice ½” thick of Banana Cake with no adornments like ice cream or whipped cream.

RESULTS

Son: “mmm this is good are you going to make this again? Will there be any for tomorrow?”

Husband: “Great cake, really moist and banana-y, where’s the ice cream?”

Me: “Oh mm, this is amazingly good, better than even I expected? You know what, I need another piece.”

Son: “See that’s what I mean; now there won’t be any tomorrow.”

Me: “You could be right.” 

MY THOUGHTS

The cake could be a tad moister and it is definitely sweet enough and not at all overly sweet and in a million years you would not, could not, tell that this cake is sugar free.  Using a sugar free substitute, DiabetiSweet.  Yes, I could have added some nuts; walnuts perhaps, but the absolute taste of banana is there and this makes for a wonderful afternoon coffee and cake hour with a good read or a good friend.

I may have over-baked it by a few minutes because being Thanksgiving; the turkey had to get dressed.

This is the cake to always have on hand in the freezer - if it lasts that long. No Mixmaster needed.

THE PICTURES

I took pictures every step of the way: gathering the mise-en-place; and then various steps throughout the process of the baking.  Not too successfully.  I mean, how did Husband’s package of cigarettes get behind the mise-en-place.  I thought I had cleaned everything off the table.  Oops and then I forgot to add the milk, milk should have been in the mise-en-place picture.

–

Those sorry looking eggs. Nothing like the eggs that Donna Ruhlman took and so a light bulb moment hit and I remembered that Donna said people are entitled to use her pics (certain requirements must be met) and that is when I decided to take full advantage and use a picture.  Ta Da - her egg picture.

–

I went further because if Donna can make one ingredient stand out so elegantly, well begs the question, so can I, right?  WRONG.

My mother, may she rest in peace, always had a saying which I repeat to my kids who never let me even finish the sentence…”if you don’t try then for sure you’ll never know if you could have succeeded.”

I say that each time I buy a Loto ticket too.

So, I tried. I found myself using all these gizmos and gadgets like tape to hold up the bananas to the door handle for height. Like quickly snapping the milk so the bubbles would show…I even had a square cake plate that I had to unbox, wash and dry to hold the rectangular cake onto which I added a few bananas for the ‘decorative’ touch.

(This has nothing to do with this post but how many of you have a square cake plate?  I own round ones but for the last 20-odd years searched for a square cake plate and finally six years ago I found one.  Today I got to unpack it and use it.  I needed that square cake plate and it became a ridiculous quest to find one - but have one, I do.)

I think I might be getting the hang of Food Photography…PIMPL (pissing in my pants laughing)

–

The Simple Banana Cake listed on http://www.diabeticproducts.com/pages/pop_ups/banana.htm

and simple it is.  No mixer needed and the ingredients are always on a shelf in my house and I am not even a baker.

The following is the recipe printed on the above website and it reads as follows:

Banana Bread

Ingredients

• Non-caloric cooking spray
• 3 ripe bananas
• 1 cup DiabetiSweet
• 2 whole eggs
• 1 egg white
• 3/4 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1 tablespoon baking soda
• 2 cups flour
• 1/3 cup margarine
• 1/3 cup skim milk

Instructions
Preheat oven to 350°F. Spray 9×5 loaf pan with non-caloric cooking spray. Mash the bananas to a lumpy consistency. Beat 2 whole eggs and egg white together.  Combine margarine, DiabetiSweet, and cinnamon.  Add eggs to mixture.  Mix flour and baking soda together in a separate bowl.  While stirring, slowly add flour mixture to the margarine/egg mixture Add milk to mixture and stir until blended. Add mashed bananas to mixture and stir until blended. Bake about 1 hour (toothpick inserted into center should come out clean). Remove from oven and allow to cool before serving.

Makes 20 servings. Each serving counts as 1 starch and ¼ fruit exchange.

Each slice contains 97 Calories, 18g carbohydrates, 3g protein and 1.5g fat.

1 serving = one 1-inch slice Each serving is 1½ starch exchanges and 1 fat exchange

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Tags: banana cake, diabetic, diabetic products, DiabetiSweet, Glucose, Menopause, Michael Laiskonis, PMS, Shuna, sugar, sugar substitute

This was supposed to be a Pizz Me Off Day and Great Blog Post Day but instead I have just one thing to say:

OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD

I am going to keep saying it OH MY GOD OH MY GOD

It’s finally here. The Steamy Kitchen Cookbook. OH MY GOD OH MY GOD

I have it in my hands and it is fresh and it is cold and it is just perfect.

It has 10 fingers and 10 toes and it is pink and…No it doesn’t I’m just joking-no I am just crazy excited!

I can now really say I am: “Eye’z in A Cookbook”. In the Steamy Kitchen Cookbook

And really mean it. For Now.

And really cook it. For The Time Being

And really devour everything I cook. With Great Gusto

And really put on the pounds; all because I decided to do a food blog.

Here goes nuttin’:

And Guys It is Great.

Pizz Me Off Friday and The Blog Post(s) That Rock the Week(s) will return next Friday

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Tags: Add new tag, Steamy Kitchen Cookbook

Eye’m Zoey

Eye'z just 3 mos

Eye’z belongs to my Mommy and my Daddy

Eye'z one yearz old - And the Good Camera Broke

Eye’z was 3 months old when adopted

Eye’z 1 yearz old Today…..AND

Eye’z a Dog: ½ Boston Terrier and ½ Pug.:

I AM A BUGG

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Tags: Boston Terrier, BUGG, Pug

CURRENTLY HAVING INTERNET EXPLORER PROBLEMS PLEASE VIEW THROUGH FIREFOX OR OTHER

I thought I would be beginning The Steamy Kitchen Cookbook right from the first recipe listed but it is now Oyster Season in Montreal and the third recipe in Little Bites is creating a Raw Bar with Asian Mignonette.

I am not a Raw Bar girl and frankly I really don’t like Oysters.  However, I have been reading up on the kind of Oyster I would prefer to eat considering I do not like Oysters except perhaps for once trying Oyster Rockefeller.

The Oyster Guide on line gave me a lot of information so together with a computer print-out I moseyed (I love that word)   on over to my favourite fishmonger and together we discussed Oysters 101.  He offered a lesson on opening the oysters but Jaden gave a pretty good visual guide and together with a dish towel and the just-bought Oxo Good Grip Oyster Knife sitting in my purse, I wasn’t worried that the job would be difficult.  Man that’s one heavy oyster knife. Good soft grips and all.

Just to make sure I lent husband the camera so that he could do a pictorial close-up of the procedure.

Disregard the fingernails: I could not get to the manicurist this week.

I chose to prepare the Raspberry Point Oyster which is a good oyster for the beginner.  It originates from Prince Edward Island National Park, a majestic area of Canada that can only be appreciated in person.  The Raspberry Point Oyster is raised in pristine waters and is the ‘cleanest’ in taste and brine and would be a perfect entry for the Raw Bar dish.  And the only entry.

The clams would be out of reach for me: since unlike The Steamy Kitchen Husband, the Eye’z in a Cookbook Husband has tools that include one set of pliers and one caulking gun; hardly the necessities for opening a clam or two.

At home, immediately I put the ice that Monsieur Robitaille was kind enough to package along with the oysters into one bowl and into the freezer.  I know that Jaden says to use two bowls one inside the other - I am a ‘less is more’ kind of girl.

The’ less’ I have to wash the ‘more’ I like to cook.

Then I stuck the entire bowl into the refrigerator until I was ready to begin.

Maybe I should, maybe I shouldn’t but I scrub the outside of the oyster shells with a potato scrubber just because I want to make sure the oyster is clean that no extra dirt or grit or loose shell gets into my delicate crustacean.

Scrubbing Oysters

Here my fingers are trembling - maybe that’s why the picture is blurry.  I am scaring the bejeezers out of myself because knowing if I should stab myself in the palm; it is easily a six-hour waiting period at the Emergency room this Sunday.

That’s - a- medicare!  You can self cauterize before you even get to triage.

Anyway back to Oysters.

Look!!! An Open Oyster. A Tongue Twister. A very excited woman.  I can begin to see the tongues all salivating awaiting the first taste of Oysters with Asian Mignonette…the anticipation killing.

The second thing I do is spill all the oyster liqueur into a small bowl with a strainer so I don’t lose any, and also to catch any debris or pieces of shell that came off with the opening

It is to this bowl that I add all the flavours of the Mignonette: ginger, red and green peppercorns that I have pounded into bits, the shallots and the vinegar. The sweetness of the rice vinegar and the bite of the pepper made a completely wonderful contrast of flavours on the palate. I think I could have had a glass full of just the dressing.

Now would be a great time to you that I bought an enormous piece of ginger since I know that ginger will become a part of my repertoire of Asian goodies.  I then spent a good half hour grating the ginger on a microplane and then took Jaden’s tip of wrapping and freezing the ginger.  I love this idea.  I also do not have to do hand weights this week. Or, I should have done hand weights this week; not sure which one is correct but it is a damn good thing I am ambidextrous.  The arms they are a-killing.

Now that all my oysters are opened and the juices have been strained, I add the oyster liqueur to the mignonette dressing and spoon into each oyster.

The first one is mine.  You can’t see me now but I am dancing in circles devouring my oysters.  Not only did the final 8 become easy-peasy; but I think I am a pro.

You cannot imagine how absolutely delicious these are.  My husband, who hates oysters, is on his sixth half of the dozen we are sharing.  Only a dozen to shuck -  WHAT A SHMUCK I AM.  If only I had known how good how delicious these would be: I would have gotten a dozen Raspberry Point, a dozen Malpeques and whatever else would be on ice.

And there you have it.  Raw Bar with Asian Mignonette.  A treat to eat, a treat to make and a beautiful piece of art to look at.

All in all I’d say this is a keeper and I have become an oyster girl.  At least and Asian oyster girl

THE STEAMY KITCHEN COOKBOOK THIS ONE ROCKS

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Tags: Asian, Montreal, Oxo, oyster, peppercorn, Prince Edward Island National Park, Raspberry Point, raw bar, rice vinegar, The Oyster Guide

CURRENTLY HAVING INTERNET EXPLORER PROBLEMS PLEASE VIEW THROUGH FIREFOX OR OTHER

THE PIZZED OFF PART (and) HELP!

Years ago I moved into my dream home complete with state-of-the art kitchen. I had always wanted a hanging pot rack filled with Copper Pots. I indulged, called in the handyman and hung a pot-rack filled with the shiniest and most beautiful pots, pans, bowl, lids all hanging over my center island.

Ten years later with the oldest moving out and the house far too big, we down-sized and the beautiful copper pots went into a box and into storage, only to be forgotten.

With another move under my belt I found these forgotten pots and bowls and made the conscious decision that I was going to use these as cookware at least once before I died. Morose, I know.

After contacting the company I proceeded to take the laqueur off said pots and said pans. I tried boiling them with baking soda. I tried laqueur remover to get the balance off. I bought a copper scraper which did nothing but scrape my copper.

To this post: I have a dining room table full of copper ‘stuff’ which no longer have sheen and no longer have beauty. They have become the ugli-fruit. Dark, with blemishes so black I am embarrassed for them and by them.

$25.00 worth of copper cleansers did absolutely nothing to restore their beauty. Then I did the unthinkable, I place an online order for Bar Keepers Friend Copper Glo from a Canadian online kitchen supply company along with two other products to make the shipping costs worthwhile.

Guess What? canada post lost the order. canada post even though they had a tracking number that cost an extra ten bucks – lost the order!!!

Never have I had that happen in all the years I am using Canada Post.

The Online Kitchen Supply Company had only one Bar Keepers Friend Copper Glo left and they had shipped it to me. No, no more on order, not for another six months….too bad Natalie.

Un-efff’in believable.

I give up! Those copper pots, those copper pans, those copper bowls can go _____ bleep bleep THEMSELVES.

The saying that sometimes things just never go right is so true. You know how you sometimes regret ever beginning or starting a task especially when you have a sinking feeling you really don’t know what you are doing?

Now every morning I wake up and sitting on my Dining Room Table staring at me are these, the ugliest copper pots I have ever seen – so any suggestions from anyone? Cause I am really pizzed off.

INTERNET EXPLORER DOES NOT SHOW MY BLOG IN ITS ENTIRETY.

SOMETHING IS SCREWED UP IN MY CODING FOR INTERNET ON WORDPRESS

BUT

FIREFOX AND ALL OTHER SEARCH ENGINES WORK FINE

In Fact a Wordpress Member told me I had the MOST CODE VERIFICATION ERRORS he has ever seen!!!

Do they give medals for that?

So if there is someone willing to help I would be grateful. Otherwise not only will I have given birth to a new name: this baby might be changing Themes too.

THE ROCKS PART

See directly above: This Baby Will Soon Be Looking Mighty Different

What would a week be without reading the Gurgling Cod. Half the things he writes I don’t understand and the other half I get the gist of. Great writing talent. I’m sometimes to stupid to understand him.

The Kitchn: Apartment Therapy printed my question on how to clean my copper pots and the comments were great. I love that people actually respond with input when it comes to reading and blogging online. The Apartment Therapy website has fabulous articles and editors and Thanks very much.

Adrianemoore.blogspot.com had an interview with an anonymous Michelin Guide inspector.  That was a great insight and interesting tidbit of information…good idea and great post.

On the other hand I fixed my Blackberry Curve when an error code JVM 102 popped up and neither technical nor store support could help.

AND I got my Food Network Magazine even after I sent in an address change. Boy it’s FAT. Have they eaten Gourmet?

Is it possible that Pinch My Salt puts out a Wordless Wednesday September 9 showcasing her Boston Terrier, the cutie, and she STILL is getting comments to this day? Pinch My Salt…good for you…and will you be at Blogger Camp? Does your Boston hide his treats like mine does? She just walked out of her 2 by 4 crate having left behind her teether bone; does she really think she hid it? And cries if she can’t find a good spot.

Just before this is going to post don’t you think I get this fabulous rustic apple pie recipe in my mailbox from Simply Recipes:

Now I am off to get the ingredients and start the oven…that and some ice cream: Why Not Go All The Way!

And I thought not much this week Rocked.  I spent most of my time on the computer fixing, YES FIXING,  the Blackberry, I DID, and then trying to fix Internet Explorer language glitch for Wordpress. I DID NOT. So this week probably had a lot of Rocks, but I didn’t get to read them. I hope next week give me more free time to roam the world; but I’m telling you now: If it snows I will be plenty pizzed.

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Tags: adrianmoore.blogspot.com, Apartment Therapy, Bar Keepers Friend Copper Glo, BUGG, Copper Pot, Firefox, Food Network Magazine, Internet Explorer, Michelin Guide, Pinch My Salt, Smack, The Kitchn, Wordpress, Zoey

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Just so you know, I am not going to win any awards for Photography.

Monday’s are the day I take it easy on dinner.  Friday is Barbecue Chicken night from my butcher who makes an utterly delicious eat-the-bones kind of chicken: truly finger lickin’ good.  Saturday night we go out with friends and Sunday night is football night which means a whole lot of pizza.

Monday’s are an awful day just because it starts the work week.  If Tuesday started the work week, it too. would be an awful day. So on Monday I take it easy on everyone’s stomach and make a light dinner. Tonight it is eggs.  It will be accompanied by the Steamy Kitchen Cookbook’s version of Ginger Scallion.

With all of Jaden’s posts that I have been reading she has left me carboned-copied with some great tips. One being the ginger, which you see in my prep picture.

The other tip was telling her readers not to be afraid of letting your stir-fry sit in the pan frying, that it is not necessary to constantly move the food around.  This was always my mistake.  However, this dish relies on that belief so much so, the oil must get literally smoking hot.  Probably as smoking hot as I am afraid to let it get.

But this is going to be the key to the dish.  Pouring hot oil that sizzles as soon as it touches the food.  For this dish I am going to use the copper gratin dish that I talked about previously.  This will be the very first time I am using copper to cook with and the very first time this pan, which has been in my possession for ten years, will be utilized.  Properly, I hope.

Following Jaden’s advice on chillis, noting her debate on the spelling, I used both red and green chillis: the red with their pith and seeds and the green seeded.  Since garlic called for only 1/2 tablespoon and that is not enough for my husband who could eat raw garlic as he does an apple, I used probably a whole tablespoon.  So next time, I would stick to the 1/2 tbsp. I also added, on my own volition, a 1/4 teaspoon of the hot siracha chili sauce (the rooster sauce) because the red chillis I bought were sweet and I wanted a touch of heat to the dish.  I noted that Jaden says the smaller the chilli, however, even though these red ones were small; I found them quite sweet. The added rice vinegar gave the oil a really umami taste.

This was an easy dish to prepare; the hard part was the oil.  Going against my nature of letting oil smoke was hard but necessary and I think I did okay cause there was that audible sizzle was crazy sounding.

Having my daughter call me long distance three times during the cooking process upset my instincts.  Imagine the electrician fixing her oven didn’t know how to turn the broil on…apparently it is such an old oven there is no indication on the knob…daughter needs a new oven.

This was a cinch to make and a great side dish relish to the cheese omelet I cooked.  Next I will be preparing all of the sauces that I can do in a day.  I hope to be able to double their quantities and store them in the fridge for the following recpies that will include them.  Asian sauces are delectable.

Since I did make a few changes to the original recipe and adapted it to my family’s tastes, I will give my ingredients as follows:

2 scallions, diced
1 teaspoon minced garlic
1 tablespoon of the minced ginger
3 small red chilli pepper sliced in rings
1 small green chilli pepper sliced in rings
1 teaspoon rice vinegar, unseasoned
pinch of salt
1/3 cup of high heat cooking oil

In a heatproof dish combine the first 7 ingredients and when oil has been heated on stove to smoking point, carefully pour over the ingredients and hope for an audible sizzle sound.

There you have it - Ginger Scallion adapted from the Steamy Kitchen Cookbook which has its place day in and day out; week in so far and week out; on my kitchen table.

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Tags: chilli pepper, chilli sauce, garlic, ginger, Ginger Scallion, Salt, siracha chilli sauce, unseasoned rice vinegar

Blogging, Emails and Etiquette

I admit to being a new food blogger and I admit that I am an avid commenter of food blogs I love to read and find stimulating.  I hope that the blog owners appreciate my comments: I don’t make a comment when a post is uninteresting or un-appealing, therefore my comments are either always positive or there is a question involved regarding the contents of that post.  A relative question I believe.

An interesting and very negative situation happened to me when I posted my Friday blog.  I added a picture from a blog I regularly read and linked back to the sight.  Apparently I did not link directly to the recipe.

I quickly had an inbox email.  Trying very hard to understand my mistake and in a few emails that went back and forth I tried to ask the newbie questions in order to correct the post and give the original author her dues.

For the first time since blogging; for the first time since I began emails; I got slammed and slapped in the ugliest email one could get, from the blog owner.

Now it is not that I tried to out rightly steal something because I emailed her telling her I linked; I tried to understand what she wanted and asked a simple question when the return email slammed me against the wall.  What did I do?  What were the hating and biting words all about?

I was told that she had no ‘time’ to explain things to me and if I didn’t already know what to do I should just take down her picture.  She had no time for me.  She boldly told me that Food Blog Alliance was only for ‘professionals’, (yes I joined and asked a question in the wrong place, so what?), and again in the following emails that ensued, I, in no uncertain words, was told to ‘link properly or take the picture out.  How menacingly mean a statement to make.

Her nastily written explanation was that I didn’t deserve her time nor any of her effort and blamed me for my lack of knowledge; I had asked her permission and if I didn’t do it according to her way; I should remove it – never once did she thank me for liking her recipe and never once did she thank me for even making the attempt to link to her.  Moreover,  my first email to her was all about the fabulous recipe.

In the end, I realized my mistake, did a proper link back to the recipe AND took her picture out of the post.  It was never my intention to cause harm to her professionally nor in my assumed negligence and certainly not to add to her disdain.

My confusion came because if you scroll to the very bottom of her page this is what you will see the following:

(   Link to this recipe
Bookmark this page using the following link: http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/apple_walnut_gorgonzola_rustic_tart/

Do you have a website? You can place a link to this page by copying and pasting the code below.
<a href=”http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/apple_walnut_gorgonzola_rustic_tart/”>Apple Walnut Gorgonzola Rustic Tart</a> )

So I thought she wanted me to link the website version of her since I assumed she read my ‘website’.  I easily know how to link back to a recipe as is evident in my previous posts.  However, she wasn’t intelligent enough or intuitive enough to envision why I could have misunderstood her.  Could you Elise?

Emails are words; they have no connotation nor do they have tone so it is my experience that when communicating via email the writer needs to be keenly aware of the words she chooses; men seem to get it right.

Well, newbie or not I was not taking this lightly because I did no wrong and my intentions were to do no wrong.  I blasted back and we emailed for six times.  True she apologized for her ‘bruising boldness’ but she wasn’t “bruising bold” she was downright rude.  As if bruising boldness is her right of passage and a pride she wears as a badge.

How the subject came about to tell me Food Blog Alliance was not for me was elitist and snobbery at is highest level that I have encountered since I have been reading food blogs. I was told that Club Med was only for ‘professionals’ and that the attendance in Blog Camp was meant for the already initiated blogger and not the ‘newbie’ I am.

I admit I once placed a question on Food Blog Alliance and got a nasty note telling me just that, from the same person.  So I guess she already was irritated with me.

All this and she and I don’t even know each other.  At least I didn’t think so; but obviously she must know about me and resents me in some way; although logically and intellectually I don’t know how.

Communication should be a bloggers raison d’être.  Alienating a reader should be a no-no.  Now I understand that this particular and many other bloggers are busy 24-7 on the internet trying to make a living by writing and scouring other blogs, newspapers, authors etc.  I understand that.

But the time it took for us to email back and forth didn’t have to be.  She could have, in a very nice tone, simply told me how to link her and her picture; instead she chose to reprimand me.  And reprimand me so boldly that it shocked me.

One thing that is important for all people who email and especially bloggers is that when one is all the things this blogger is: Rude, Snobbish, an Elitist – at the very least she should have tried to hide it with her words…but she couldn’t hide any of it she was so irate.

This is not a girl I will remember for her journalistic ability.  This is not a girl I will remember for her proficiency and knowledge of  food.  This is not a girl I will remember for her contributions to food blogging.  This is a girl I will remember for being the most abrupt, abusive and savage lassie I have encountered on the internet in the last fifteen, or so years, I have been using emai

And this begs the question: Do bloggers who reach a certain echelon of fame be allowed to slam those bloggers just starting out?  Is there a jealousy, a fear of perceived competition or are there bloggers who just feel they are riding the high wave and damn the others trying to follow suit?  Is that an assumption and an instinctual reaction?

I now see, that my kind of ‘newbie’ is like a pimple on the face of seasoned bloggers and like a clique of popular girls I should not come to Blog Camp.  I would assume that if blogs are begun, it is exciting to include other bloggers and even just the readers as your client base no matter.

Seems this blogger doesn’t agree with me.

So, is this a blogger who needs etiquette rather than teach it?

AND NOW THE ROCKS OF THE WEEK

I was accepted into the Foodie Blogroll.

And I am off to Toronto and The Sound of Music where I will be going backstage after the event (it’s so good to have a daughter ‘in the industry’)…

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I am in Toronto this weekend visiting my daughter who is working The Sound of Music at the Princess of Wales Theatre - she is an actor (term actress does not exist anymore, just like stewardess does not).  However, I did not want to leave my post empty and I won’t be around to cook a recipe out of the Steamy Kitchen Cookbook.

Instead I am leaving you with food for thought and a mission: not a mission impossible but a mission for most of you, improbable.  My late mother gave me a cookbook when I got married called A Treasure For My Daughter.  It originally printed in 1950 as a fundraiser by the Ethel Epstein Ein Chapter of Hadassah, Montreal.  A group my mother was a member of and probably contributed a few of her own recipes, none of which I actually know are hers.  But this book and all its recipes are indeed the recipes I grew up on.  The Beet Borscht is the exact soup I ate every Saturday I returned home after a day at the ski hill - not sweet, not sour: just perfect and it always evokes the same memories, like good food should.

A Treasure For My Daughter has had thirteen printings since its very first and was revised in 2000 and re-printed again in 2001.

When chefs like Chris Cosentino promote foods like sweetbreads, brains, beef cheeks to the newer and younger gourmands, he is promoting history.  The history I know is that of the European Jews, but most cultures that ate Offal all have a history and their children have, in one form or another, either experienced the food itself or certainly heard about it.  As have my children; one of which I finally succeeded in getting to eat pickled tongue.

Oh Pickled Tongue, thou doth maketh my stomach full with each and every bit I savour your very essence.

Oh Pickled Tongue if only you were bigger then I could feel safe to share you. Instead I harbor you all for mine-self

Oh Pickled Tongue I could not imagine a month without the aroma of your very pickled essence boiling in my Le Creuset.

Oh Pickled Tongue you cost a bloody fortune.

Which brings me to the punch line of this post.  It has been a long time that I have seen a sweetbread or a calf’s brain, however the other day a new butcher opened near my house and inside his freezer was a full shelf of frozen sweetbreads, frozen individually packaged calf’s brains and beef cheeks.  Now I have never had beef cheeks and always thought it was an Italian delicacy because I had never heard of beef cheeks until Molto Mario.

So I was surprised that it was in this butcher’s case: a Kosher butcher.  I don’t keep Kosher, for a few reasons: one of which is basic; I don’t keep a Kosher kitchen and never grew up in one so I didn’t have a tradition to carry on nor a strictly Kosher relative to cater to. The other reason, being thankful for the first one, is that Kosher meat is double and sometimes triple the price of non-Kosher meat.  Note:  I always buy Kosher chickens because I find they are cleaner with fewer feathers, and their diet makes them juicy with very little fat. The French Canadians also buy Kosher chickens for that very reason.

What what makes a chicken Kosher is the way it is killed and the Shochet who is specially trained by Rabbincal Councils for this purpose.

24.99/kg for sweetbreads…21.99/kg for beef cheeks …and 11.99 for each calf brain.

Wow!! Those are mighty steep prices even for Kosher.  Then, I remind myself that one cow may provide a lot of rib steaks, and other cuts of meat; but they have only one brain, two cheeks and one set of sweetbreads.  So with the onset of the revival of all things Offal, I suppose the supply and demand allows them to price accordingly.

If I had been home this weekend to cook and post for today, I would be posting from the Steamy Kitchen Cookbook.  This is not the case and so in advance, I am setting forth this recipe from the A Treasure For My Daughter cookbook, which happens to be an easy recipe to follow and is deliciously like a breaded veal chop and for the uninitiated a very easy recipe to follow.

I would use oil instead of chicken schmaltz and I would add a beaten egg to a bowl in order to coat the sweetbread prior to breading so that the breading will stick.

Sweetbreads and Mushrooms

1 lb sweetbreads

1/2 to 3/4 c. fine dry breadcrumbs or Panko

1 c diced onions

1/2 lb (1 1/2 c) fresh mushrooms of choice, sliced

2 tb fat: schmaltz or oil… (use oil) and if you should buy the canned schmaltz may your fingers fall off!

1/2 tsp paprika

Salt, Pepper to taste

Defrost the Sweetbreads, if frozen. Blanch by cooking in acidulated salted water (2 tablespoons vinegar and 1/2 teaspoon salt in 1 quart water) for 15 minutes.  Drain, cool and cut in cubes.  Roll in the crumbs.  Sauté the mushrooms and onion in the fat until lightly browned, sprinkling with paprika, salt and pepper.  Add the sweetbreads; cook 30 minutes longer over low heat turning occasionally, until browned.

Makes 6-8 servings

If  that doesn’t hit the mark there is one more recipe I want to add.

This is one that would be impossible not to love because it is a Latke and who doesn’t love a Latke.  Okay, so this Latke is not potato, big deal.  It’s better:

Just picture the shock when you tell the kids what it really is, after they’ve eaten it all up. Great with applesauce or sour cream.

Brain Latkes

1 pair of calf’s brains

1 egg

1tsp grated onion

Salt, Pepper to taste

Matzo meal about 1/4 c

2 tb chicken fat (oy-again!) but use oil

If brains are frozen defrost first. (Like the kids brains aren’t frozen - and impossible to defrost)

Blanch by dropping in acidulated water (1 tablespoon vinegar for each 2 cups of water)…I know its different from above…hey I’m just following the recipe…Cook 3 minutes, remove and pull off outer skin with a sharp knife.  Mash brains with a wooden spoon (don’t ask why wooden ’cause I don’t know).  Add the egg, the onion, the seasonings and matzo meal; blend well forming a paste;  Heat fat in skillet, add mixture by spoonfuls to hot fat, fry until crisp and golden on both sides.

Makes about 12 latkes.

And a room full of crying kids.

*pics courtesy of Cook’s Thesaurus

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Tags: A Treasure For My Daughter, Beet Borscht, calf brain, Chris Cosentino, Cook's Thesaurus, Hadassah, Kosher, Latke, Molto Mario, Offal, pickled tongue, Sweetbread

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PIZZED OFF FRIDAY AND THE POST(S) THAT ROCK THE WEEK(S)

I know it is Pizzed Off Friday, but having come home from Toronto on Thursday, sick as a dog; there is nothing that can Pizz Me Off or Rock My Week.  I came home with a cold, a cough, probably fever and who knows, the H1N1 flu, cause that is just my kind of luck.  I am brain dead.  Plus I packed away three bags of Solea Cracked Pepper and Salt Olive Oil Chips coming and going.  For those of you not in the know, Solea chips are made with olive oil and sea salt and usually sit in the kosher aisle at your supermarket.  These are, if NOT THE BEST, THEN SECOND BEST potato chips IN THE WORLD.

For those not entrenched in the Entertainment Industry, particularly Theatre, I want to describe just a bit about my Cultured Weekend.

Downtown Toronto must be one of the only cities certainly in Canada that without exaggeration and literally has a restaurant, a cafe, a small dive Japanese-style, a bar, an ice-cream store holed up in every second store-front.  I am not kidding; and I am not talking Canoe, One, or any of the high-end costly restaurants.  Those exist too and right now rival any out of New York or Chicago and I would venture to say San Francisco.

Susur Lee get your ass back home and continue because your following is anxiously waiting your return.

New York might be dying in the Restaurant Industry, but Toronto is booming.  This weekend I ate breakfast out twice; three cheapie lunches and two high end dinners:  I won’t critique because I am not a restaurant critic and won’t bore my readers with nonsense about the food I ate but I will let you know that each and every place I went to was jammed full of people.  Where is the recession here?

I also found that even the cheapest of Japanese Sushi joints down on Bloor were so busy that it delighted me to sit and eat and pay those small prices because damned if the fish wasn’t going to be the freshest that day.  Restaurants like New Generation Sushi can’t help but have the freshest fish because they sell so much of it.  For $12.95 CAD I had a soup, salad, a bowl of Seafood Chirashi with Octopus, Squid, Salmon, Tamago and Whitefish. Then I ordered an 6.95 rainbow roll which consisted of the entire 8 pieces of the freshest mouth-melting rainbow collared maki which melted down my throat that I didn’t even feel full after the roll.  It left me wanting for more.

I am sorry but I am not yet at the period in blogging where I will take out a camera to photograph my food.  Sorry but I can’t EVER see me doing this; I commend those that do, but it is just not me - the day I do will surprise and shock even me.

It’s tacky, it’s bourgeois, and it’s embarrassing. I’m far too snotty to do this, YET.

Another place I went to was called the Grapefruit Moon and it is a throwback to my teens and the places I ate at back then.  Very Bohemian atmosphere with the best on-tap Ontario beer to be had - what the Grapefruit is known for.  It is also known for sponsoring only Ontario fresh farmed produce and products including their milk, cream, breads, fruit of season and fair trade coffee.  So when I ordered a bagel with cream cheese and jam, I thought and hoped I was eating farm-fresh, home-made artisan creamed cheese.  Instead it turned out to be Philadelphia which meant to me that the menu promoting their philosophy was probably  full of crap and priced according to that crap.  Yet, it is a beloved Annex mainstay and rightfully so because whether or not their philosophy is true - I ate there twice.

I did love the old milk bottles though and indeed they entitled a local farm. Plus the lady beside me told me that their hamburgers are simply the best in Toronto: she should know, she said, she eats there every day. Add to that, without asking for, a pitcher of water and glasses go right on to the table.

Now for the reason of my trip.  Daughter works at The Sound of Music which is closing January and wanted me to finally step foot to see her at work and to meet her friends.

As glamorous as the Front of House at the Princess of Wales Theatre is, the diametric opposite is backstage.  The musical was marvellous; the Cast brilliant and The Kids.  …Wow, The Kids were great. (and they are all reading this)…’You Kids Were Awesome!!”  Each one brimming with such amazing talent.  I only got to meet the ‘oompahs’ and not the second cast of kids which are known in-house as the ‘loompahs’.

It was fun going backstage; the actors in street clothes, revved up and making plans to go next door for a drink, didn’t resemble their on-stage characters at all.  I had a hard time recognizing some of them but they all knew me!!  The Mother.  Carly’s Mother.

I have one word for stage actors: Humble.  It is unimaginable that these actors day in and day out go on stage, sing, act, dance like the world is their oyster and then are as humbled by a compliment as shy little girls.

All I can say is that the stage designer is…is…is…words escape me that would be his due.  I thought the Lion King had costuming, no doubt the greatest I have seen - but the physical scenery and imagery of The Sound of Music was pure genius. To see Maria on a mountain and then sitting on a rock and walking her way back to the Abbey within one song was a sight to behold and just downright amazing.

Backstage during performance, I am told, is a madhouse, an orchestrated chaos, and the least glamorous place; full of wood and iron and dirt and indeed there are wires and sliding staircases and sliding stages; but what struck me the most interesting was that when the chorus sings or when the children sing, to fill a void and add depth, they have singers backstage, closeted and hooked up to the mikes with visual screens in front of them and they sing backstage. That surprised me.  So when the next Broadway or Musical you go to see and the house is filled with song and sound: know that there are backstage singers also adding to the voices of the onstage ensembles.

And yes, the stars have their own dressing rooms.  When actors get presented awards and they thank the cast and crew there is a very good reason.  Without the costumes, the set designs, the producers, the stage hands, the orchestra, the conductor, the various directors, plus everybody else- there would be no show.

Oh Oh and something really important happened before I left. Remember how Pizzed I was at Canada Post for having lost the package I ordered containing a bottle of Bar Keeper’s Friend Copper Glo. Well, just before I left guess what got delivered. Yup that package with the Copper Glo that happened to be the last one the internet had and was going to have for a while.

I used the Copper Glo on the hideous copper pots and Presto: they glowed.  So Copper Glo really does give a glo!

YOU CAN IMAGINE WHAT THEY LOOKED LIKE BEFORE IF THEY LOOK LIKE THIS NOW!

After a week like this who could be Pizzed Off?

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Tags: Bloor St, Grapefruit Moon, New Generation Sushi, The Princess of Wales Theatre, The Sound of Music

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I have had this Guacamole recipe in my repertoire since, I don’t know.  I call it Rick Bayless’s Avocado Spread.  I believe I have read it in other blogs as other titles and most recently in Restaurant Girl as Topolobampo’s Mango Guacamole. This weekend Food Network Canada highlighted Rick Bayless on their hit show At The Table With and craving to be sitting in Mexico right about now I needed a hit of guacamole. Especially since Haas Avocados are on sale.

Before I go any further into this discussion, it revolves around a topic that held great discussion in Jaden Hair’s the Steamy Kitchen Cookbook and which I have mentioned before.  Chile…or Chilli…Chile? She states she researched the topic of how to correctly spell the fruit of the Genus Capsicum, and it came down to “chilli.”  I went on to Rickbayless.com and searched for all three spellings.  Chilli (double ‘l’) came up empty. Chili came up and so did Chile.  As of this writing I have emailed Rick his opinion and will follow up with his answer.  Discovery.com, as the links shows, spells it Chili.  Go Know!!

Just last night I watched an episode of Bobby Flay doing a Throwdown episode on Chiles Rellenos and caught just the piece when the two brothers were describing how their mother taught them to judge the heat of a Poblano by whether the stem was straight or curved.  I think that is a myth, but if anyone reading this knows if it is one of life’s little secrets, please write in.

Having had a sister living in Chicago I spent many weeks there every year either with the kids for holidays or just for a shopping spree week to visit my sister and her husband.  Going to either Topolobampo or Frontera Grill was always the first night out to eat, weather permitting or not.  Many a night I lucked out on seeing Rick walking through the restaurant greeting guests and yes, he is as good looking in person as on television: maybe cuter.  Living in Montreal it seems so much easier to come across Asian ingredients than Spanish or Mexican except in the recent couple of years there are popping up Latin Grocery stores one end of the city.  Chiles are still hard to find, like the Poblano or the Habanero; the Jalapenos, the Thai Bird chiles, and the Jamaican Scotch Bonnets are quite common.

Rick would probably be the first to point out that there exist so many Guacamole recipes that it is impossible for any one to put a credit to any one recipe.  However, I have made this one always with the knowledge that it was Rick Bayless who originated it and perhaps along the way has been adapted, whichever which way who cares.  This is a fantabulously delicious spread which I prefer to make chunkier and can eat with a spoon while watching PBS re-runs of Mexico:One Plate At A Time.  Just a note: I could not find any Serrano chiles and the chile I am using is supposed to be a Habanero; instead I found it to be very mild and so I think it is actually and perhaps an heirloom variety of the yellow bell pepper.

**A Note on using onions be they red, or regular: to easily peel them without crying I peel under lukewarm water and have never shed a tear; at least over onions.  Also running onions, once diced or cut under water will take away the sharp burn of the onion taste and actually make it milder.

Adapted from a Rick Bayliss Recipe of Avocado and Mango Guacamole

3 large, ripe avocados
1/4 cup diced red onion
1/2 to 1 serrano chile to taste, seeded and finely chopped
2 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro, plus a few sprigs for garnish
1 tablespoon fresh lime juice
1 large, ripe mango, peeled, flesh cut from the pit, and diced
Salt
Cucumber and jícama slices or tortilla chips for serving

Procedure:

Remove the stem at the top of each avocado. Cut the avocados in half, running your knife around the pit from stem to blossom end and back up again. Twist the halves in opposite directions to free the pit, and pull the halves apart. Dislodge the pit, then scoop the avocado flesh into a large bowl. Coarsely mash the avocado with a large fork or potato masher.

Gently stir in the onion, chile, chopped cilantro, lime juice, and two-thirds of the mango. Taste and season with salt. If not using immediately, cover with plastic wrap pressed directly on the surface of the guacamole and refrigerate, preferably for no more than a few hours.

When you’re ready to serve, scoop the guacamole into a serving bowl. Garnish with the remaining diced mango and the cilantro sprigs. Serve with the cucumber and jícama slices or tortilla chips.

Serves 6-8

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Tags: chile, chili, chilli, Frontera Grill, guacamole, Habanero, Jalapeno, Jamaicon Scotch Bonnet, Mexico One Plate At A Time, Poblano, Rick Bayless, Thai Bird Chiles, Topoolobampo

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THE PIZZED OFF PART

The other day I wound, up not at Tim Horton’s where I normally go for a quick coffee and to finish reading The United States of Arugula, but at a supposed breakfast place they call Chez Cora.  Chez Cora is a breakfast place and not a supposed one.  Walk into any branch of Chez Cora and you will be caught off-guard with the whimsical and colorful sunshine cut-outs of all their breakfast menu ideas.  Indeed their menu is a bevy of delicious choices, coloring-book quality drawings of all their delicious entrees, or small appetite bite ideas for breakfast or brunch.  I mean, how bad can a restaurant do on making eggs to order or a stack of pancakes with a side of bacon?  Yogurt and granola in oversized sundae glasses and each and every dish comes with fruits cut up like they were meant to decorate an exotic fruit platter.  Yes, Chez Cora can get an award for the size and decor of their plated dishes.

THEIR COFFEE IS TOILET WATER.

I am a coffee freak: no less than 3 cups before I leave the house and a must-have around ten.  Lunch is definitely a diet coke, but afternoon tea in my house is coffee.  Coffee.  It’s a deal breaker.

It’s a no-brainer. If you’re going to open a slew of restaurants and then franchise some of them, and these restaurants specialize in breakfast of every imagineable food; for goodness sake invest in market research and buy the best damned coffee you can.  Even if it means raising the cost of the menu and offering a more expensive, deeper, better roasted, fair-traded coffee bean. Why serve the most important beverage of the day if it isn’t the best tasting beverage available.  It’s a deal breaker and a no-brainer and I will never walk into a Chez Cora again.  Their coffee is TOILET WATER at best.

I am a really early-riser.  Before the sun early-riser, and when on a cruise ship, the top deck is just where you want to be when the sun rises, with a big cup of coffee in hand.  So when I took a cruise with hubby and woke up one morning to find him outside the galley, already seated and a waiter who looked completely helpless at the coffee machine, I got pizzed.  Couldn’t find a bloody cup and blurted to the waiter to get me a cup.  He came back with a cup and a saucer and politely placed it in my hands.  Poured my coffee but couldn’t find the sweet n low, uncharacteristically and in an unusually rough tone I demanded the waiter find me the sweet n low, which after running through entire rows of tables, he managed to find.  But there was no cream.  Uhhh, waiter go get the cream.  Yes ma’am and away he went through the double doors into the kitchen and came back with cream.  After asking me if there was anything else I needed and could he get me anything at all, I said no and walked up the few stairs to greet hubby at an outside table.  Two minutes later up the stairs comes the waiter whereupon my husband says to me “There is Manny Sanguillen.”

“That’s not Manny Sanguillen”, I say. “That’s the waiter. Who’s Manny Sanguillen?”

“Are you nuts? I’m telling you who that is. I know.  He’s a baseball player!” (with an expletive I am quite used to)

“Henry”, I insist, cause I always insist I am such a pushy broad, “That is THE WAITER.  He just finished getting me coff…”

I didn’t get a chance to finish cause up went my husband to shake the hand of, yes, Manny Sanguillen while I sat, shocked and in shame and absolutely speechless.  Here, I, who am always so polite and careful and kind, treated this ‘waiter’ like a servant because I couldn’t down a cup of coffee in my own time.  I mean, how do you explain to a man why you thought he was THE waiter?  How do you apologize to someone who just finished running through the galley and kitchen of a cruise ship he is a guest on, like you, just to make sure you got a cup AND a saucer full of coffee, sweet n low (a harder thing to find than the sugar on tables everywhere) AND cream - milk wasn’t good enough.

After much apologizing; he joined us and spent the better part of the morning having a much better time shmoozing with my husband.

So, when I say coffee is a deal breaker; I mean it.

Besides if you Chowhound Montreal, there are so many good and great places for a cup of coffee; mine is usually taken at Patisserie de la Gare.

TWITTER pizzes me off.  What is TWITTER?  What is it for?  Why do people over the age of 25 use it?  I un-follow anyone who advertises goods, I un-follow anyone who RT’s someone other than me…my nails are too long to type properly and my fingers too arthritic to type fast.  Was it really necessary for the New York Times Dining Section to have a recipe contest in 140 words or less.  Like for who?  Lawrence (Downes), you must be my age.

I twitter when I make a new post, I twitter shit because I feel I have to twitter, who reads it, and the twits I really want to respond to don’t follow me so they can’t read shit about what I twit.  I actually feel like a twit - So explain to me why a person Twitters.

WTF is TWITTER?

THE ROCKS PART

Thanks go out to all the people who took the time to write to me and comment on my Simply Recipes Pizzed Off post.  I was thrilled to find out and hear from people and to know that what I write actually gets read.  It’s quite an unreal experience.  I hope I never get so busy that it becomes impossible for me to respond.  When someone takes the time to write whether it be one line or several; the proper etiquette is to respond back.  There are plenty of blogs where I take the time to make a comment that goes unanswered and you know what - I am no longer writing them.

Michael Ruhlman, probably the only busy man I will accept a non-response from, posted on a new concept of E-commerce that he is a part of called Open Sky.  The best part about Open Sky, aside from the obvious, is that having called their 1-800: true to their word they called me back in a timely fashion to tell me that all ground delivery to Canada is Free….Freee.  I love that word.  Aside from the Food Experts associated with the project and who are known to me, I also found Marta Wohrle, the Expert who writes Truth in Aging, my beauty bible to which I have been subscribing  for years.  So, Marta how come you haven’t mentioned Strivectin? (Vanity thy name is WOMAN) Free ground shipping, Marta,  I”d order two.  My one complaint is that no Expert has recommended my all time favorite Olive Oil from Nicolas Alziari, a product of France and impossible to buy in Montreal.  I also wish someone had recommended the Aerogarden - in US Dollars with free ground shipping it would be a steal for me and a product I soooo want.  And the soda stream.  And…and…and…now I know why the c.c is maxed out.

This oil was discovered on a visit to Charleston when the Williams Sonoma there held an Olive Oil taste test of over 40 bottles of oil and I tasted Nicolas Alziari and fell in love with the fruity taste of the oil.  They no longer carry this artisan oil; in fact I don;t recall seeing any food products recommended by any of the Food Experts.  I will have to keep an ‘open eye’ regularly perusing the Open Sky.

David Chang, chef/owner of Momofuku Noodle Bar, SÄam Bar, Ko, and Milk Bar will be here in Montreal for an exclusive book signing at my favorite cookbookstore called Appetite for Books.  For $65 I will break ‘buns’ with David and his co-author New York Times Columnist, Peter Meehan at this very special event, have a glass of wine, chat, get the book, Momofuku, signed by both authors, eat a lot, network a little, schmooz with the store owners and even have some time left over to flirt.

I have also gotten to join two Food Blogger sites this week whose content and publishers and members run the gamut of good and interesting issues regarding not just recipes but food issues as well.  Foodbuzz thank you for having me come on board and I hope to become much more active in the weeks following.

Lastly it seems everwhere I turned, this week, Rick Bayess popped up.  Including my own posting on Tuesday.  So, naturally, I am twitter-following Rick.  Or at least I was twitter-following because boy, oh boy, does this man twitter…he twitters more than I blink and if I ever want to read someone else’s twitter then Rick has to go.  Now tell me someone, please…What The Hell Is TWITTER For????
Easily, though, a post by The Kitchn : dessine moi un project is probably the best post this week.  They post such great ideas but for someone who loves to craft in the kitchen: baking your own utensils  and bowls to eat.  Prior to retiring from the Domestic Shelter I worked at, I always looked for ways to keep the mothers and kids occupied with fun artful projects to do and this would have been a wonderful way to get the kids and mothers involved together and spend time away from their worries and troubles.  The kitchen was always the place where worries and troubles never seemed to follow.  It’s true.  Enter a kitchen and what do you immediately begin to think about?

My big ‘thing’ is soup in a cut-out round small pumpernickel bread bowl. Everything tastes better in a cut-out round bread bowl: tossed salad, tuna salad and egg, layered meat with mustard, lettuce, pickles, onions and tomatoes: the ideas are endless. Have a great weekend.

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Tags: Appetite for Books, breakfast, Chez Cora, coffee, David Chang, Open Sky, Patisserie de la Gare, Rick Bayless, Tim Horton, twitter

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MY FORETHOUGHTS

I know I am supposed to be cooking out of the Steamy Kitchen Cookbook, but sometimes a recipe pops up on another blog that just screams “Make Me!”.  That happened with the post Michael Ruhlman placed on introducing Michael Symon’s new cookbook Live to Cook.:  Recipes and Techniques to Rock Your Kitchen.

I am addicted to reading Michael Ruhlman (interesting his brand, notice I didn’t say ruhlman.com) and now that his wife is on board with amazing photos, it has become a blog that I actually wait for. (I don’t know of a more talented couple who compliment each other’s professions like this couple).  So when he posted a recipe as easy as Mac and Cheese with Roasted Chicken, Rosemary and Goat Cheese on a day when I was sick as a dog with the worst chest cold since 2008, I knew immediately I had to blog this.  Otherwise I wasn’t blogging this week.

With such a cold it is impossible not to care less what one eats let alone one’s family. Now the dog is a whole other story; that baby eats no matter who is sick, Mama makes sure of that. LOL.

I digress.

Now Michael Symon whom I never met, he is a ‘celeb’, seems like a genuinely homegrown down-to-earth guy.  These ‘celebs’ who have personalities that shine through the cameras, like Michael are rare.  Another I have found and actually communicated with is John Besh.  I watched him leap through my television into my room with his smile, from ear to ear, and those blue eyes; another is Oprah. Yes, Oprah Winfrey.

Oprah and I had occasion to speak for about 15 minutes once (I am no stranger to television…) and she has that same aura.  Anyone who has never met Oprah or ever met Oprah should know she is a ‘close talker’.  Truly, she gets in that space that is meant just for you.  BUT this girl emits an angelic light that completely surrounds her and for the time you spend talking to her, she acknowledges no one else.  She exudes that ‘you’re my best friend’ personality that is really rare in people.  So non-judgemental; so full of compassion without even having to use her words which is exactly why she is ‘who Oprah is’.

I am lucky enough to have another friend like that.  Her personality so bubbly, so friendly, you just want to be around her more and more: Judy L, I have always loved that about you.  Ever since I was 17, got drunk and fell off the top bunk bed in camp, and nearly got fired – you are my oldest (uh-huh in BOTH ways, sweetie) friend.

Of course, I lack all those qualities.  Which is why, Michael Symon, when I read this recipe the first thing that popped into my head did not exactly fit with the title of your book: Live to Eat.  Ahem…ahem, a Quart of Cream... That was my ‘always on a diet’ alter ego. The real me, the chef me, after reading through the ingredients couldn’t imagine a more homogeneous group of ingredients.

The Alter Ego, that itch-bay, is always so conscious of healthy foods, she really, at times, pizzes me off.  She never uses too much fat, too much sugar or too much chocolate; she never fries anything but latkes and certainly never makes a pasta with cream sauce.  This recipe was going against every grain of her alter ego being.  Except that she loves cheese.

I love cheese, and could eat cheese all day long especially goat cheese.  I love its strong but tangy creaminess; give me a bowl of goat cheese, a spoon and a cup of coffee and I could make dinner out of just that.  I love a cheese that melts in the mouth with the warmth of a sip of coffee.

The goat cheese, sold me on this, however, I am compelled to make a non-comical, very serious notification to Michael Symon. It’s very important and he need not answer me, but take heed, Mister.

“Michael Symon, if my husband drops dead within a week of eating this - you had better find me a replacement!”  “And fast.” “While you’re at it you can make sure he’s rich.” “And bald is not a problem.”

Hubby looks like he could pass for a WWF wrestler and be riding a Harley Davidson, tattoos and all.  Very sexy.

So here goes: how can anything with goat cheese, cream and pasta be bad?  I just have to say that goat cheese is my all time favorite cheese next to Oka Cheese, made only in Quebec.

My Mise-en-Place began with the above.

Adding to the cream, chopped Rosemary

On a low slow simmer, so as not to scald the cream.

Carefully simmering so that the cream can reduce and coat the spoon - not quite there yet.  My go-to spoon is always a wooden one and if you are careful to notice: this one is for LEFTIES…

Reducing cream is looking good.

Adding the al-dente pasta to the Rosemary, Goat and Cream mixture which has been reduced successfully.

My son’s bowl to eat.

MY AFTERTHOUGHTS

We are in the middle of eating Mac and Cheese and I had this terrible urge to ungraciously leave the table and turn on the computer to blurb my sentiments. (Like anyone actually closes their computers now-a-days). They begin something like this: OH MY GOD, this is plain and simply THE best Pasta dish to hit my table in a long long time and I am not sure I have made enough to satisfy the three of us eating.

This Mac and Cheese recipe hits a home run out of the park.  It has to be the easiest dinner to make on the fly, the tastiest Mac and Cheese to ever be cooked on the Sztern Stove and the best thing of all: husband survived, so far in.  Seriously it is so good even my alter could care less the amount of cream and cheese.

The flavors of the rosemary coupled with the goat cheese just simply raises this dish to an extraordinary level of simple complexity that makes it impossible to stop eating.

If this one recipe is any indication of the other recipes in this cookbook called Live to Eat; then Chef Symon can start making plans to create a cooking school at Princeton and call it curriculum (hey I might have an ‘in’)…Encroyable!

FOUR DAYS LATER

I have finally finished the last of my Mac and Cheese: three forkfuls that have been refrigerated as leftovers.

Note:** I adapted the original recipe to use leftover rotisseried barbecue chicken and I salt my water for pasta with enough salt that it tastes like saltwater.  With any recipe please read through before beginning the cooking process and needless to say a mise-en-place is a very necessary process of cooking or baking.  Essential.  Also essential is to not be afraid to add your own instincts, common sense and enjoy the process.

The recipe I printed from ruhlman.com blog reads as follows:

Mac and Cheese with Roasted Chicken, Goat Cheese and Rosemary

From: Live To Cook: Recipes and Techniques to Rock Your Kitchen

Kosher salt as needed

1 pound dried Rigatoni

1 quart cream

2 tablespoons chopped fresh Rosemary

8 ounces goat cheese

2 cups of shredded roasted (or barbecued) chicken

Bring a pot of water to a boil (add enough salt so that it tastes seasoned). While it’s heating, pour the cream into a large sauce pan, add the rosemary and a 1/2 teaspoon of salt and bring it to a simmer, careful not to let it boil over.  Reduce the cream by about half.  Add the goat cheese and chicken and keep cooking it till the cream coats the back of a spoon.

Cook the rigatoni till it’s al dente, about ten minutes.  Drain the pasta, add it to the sauce.  Toss the pasta in the sauce till the sauce resumes a simmer, then serve.

Serves 6 to 8

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Tags: goat cheese, leftie, Live To Cook:Recipes and Techniques to Rock Your Kitchen, Mac and Cheese, Michael Symon, mise-en-place, Oka cheese, Oprah Winfrey, rosemary, wooden spoon

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THE PIZZED OFF PART

Padma, Padma, Padma Lakshmi, am I jealous of the way you look? Darn tooting right I am.  First time I saw you was on the Food Network years ago when you hosted a cross culture cooking show, then the second season of Top Chef: since then I have seen you drive the internet berserk when a hint of gossip surrounds you (is that old geezer really worth it?), then it was the sexy commercials, all the magazine shoots, I even love your jewellery website and now a pregnancy.  The most shocking is 30 Rock alongside a Baldwin, my favourite intelligently written and acted boob toob show.

Just tell me how is it your voice never alters in pitch?  Not up, not down, it stagnates whether you be overjoyed or unhappy; I need your voice coach in as much as my voice can reach pinnacles that give me headache.

On a much sadder note I had to miss the book signing of David Chang.  Thankfully I did not pay in advance - A previously scheduled and un-noted Doctor appointment took priority, especially this doctor. (Thank goodness for reminder calls).  Since recent years living in the land of Medicare; Doctors have the dubious choice of kicking a patient off their appointment list for many reasons primarily missed appointments.  My particular doctor has a 3 year waiting list of patients literally dying to see him and I ain’t giving up my spot for David Chang.  Don’t worry I am not dying; he is a rheumatology specialist who was the only one to properly diagnose and treat my swelling fingers five years ago.  Getting him to agree to see me was a chore too difficult to describe, but Martha Stewart knows, it’s a good thing to know people with ‘pull’. My swelling fingers put a whole new spin on ‘let your fingers do the walking through the Yellow Pages’, or was that just a Canadian thing, those yellow pages?

David Chang, believe me I agonized over you and your ‘buns’.

Monday is a day I will remember forever, I think.  IT was truly a PIZZ ME OFF day.  It was the day a Labradoodle nearly killed my Bugg.  Yes, these are dogs believe it or not.  The dog du jour in my area of the city is a ‘doodle’ anything: a Cadoodle, a Goldendoodle, a Schnoodle - all cross breeds of a standard Poodle.  Mine is a Bugg: 1/2 Boson Terrier 1/2 Pug and all of 16 pounds.  This Labradoodle was my waist height and probably my weight and it took off after my little thing, unprovoked.  All I heard was yelping and crying from my Zoey as the crowd of dog-owners all tried to get that thing off my pup.  In the end, which seemed forever, my traumatized pup was bitten in three places, deep - but thankfully there wasn’t enough time for the Labradoodle to go for the neck - because for sure he would have killed her.  Fighting dogs is a scary sound…I have a hit out on the Labradoodle.

The dog’s owner I think was as horrified as I was.  The worst part is that this dog turned on a dime because the first half hour everyone was at play.  Then I heard from a distance “Natalie pick up Zoey. Pick up Zoey”.  But before I could turn around it was too late.   For the past week, if I were a Kangaroo, my dog’s life would be complete.

My question to the owner was if he had kids.

THE ROCKS PART

I may hate Twitter, I know I hate MySpace (does it still exist) But honies, Youtube has to be the genius that revolutionized the internet.  Youtube is what crib notes were to school. What Coles Notes are to Canadian students.

On Youtube I have learned how to tweak Photoshop, and now how to learn the ins and outs of my new camera the Canon SX200.  Out of box, this camera was daunting, especially because it is so small that I needed the extra special set of magnifying glasses I made for small print.

So, what does a middle-aged woman do, who has no patience to learn a camera that I need an engineering degree for:  She googles Youtube for a Tutorial.

Thank you all those people out there who spend the time and hours it takes to actually make a Tutorial on anything…anything…even Wordpress.

The award of the week for the best post to Rock is the following copy and paste:

http://eatingtheroad.wordpress.com/2009/11/09/the-all-inclusive-all-you-can-eat-buffet-guide/

by Eating The Road and to which I was alerted by Diners Journal.  I spent the better part of fifteen minutes reading this intricately written-left nothing out-so true hilarious satire to eating at an all-you-can-eat buffet.  Sensational.

Now I must tell you, the most embarrassing time I had at an all-you-can-eat BBQ ribs outing took place while on vacation at the elegant island of St. Maarten, the Dutch side.  At the hotel restaurant was an all-you-can-eat for bubkes in price, and so we and another couple we met went to dine.  We were all staying in the Time-shares on the beach.  Hungry early, we ordered drinks, whatever appetizers came with the meal, if any, because I have no re-call of anything prior to my humiliation.  Our two big guys, having spent the better part of the day doing all kinds of beach sports, were famished and began their indulgence into man-size ribs drowned in sauce and juice which dribbled down their chins like a gentle waterfall.  The waiter could have put a 3 foot stack of knapkins on the table and it wouldn’t have made a dent in the amount they actually needed AND used.  First came the plates with four ribs twice.  Then ordered again and the four ribs were gobbled up.  Somehow between discussions and talking there was time for their stomachs to empty because the next order shocked the waiter a bit and out came two plates, this time with three ribs each.  The excuse being they were so sweet and melt-in-your mouth made them order another dish.  One rib each.  They needed another.

Then came that paralyzing moment: a moment never ever repeated again thus far in my life, thankfully.  The waiter refused more ribs.  The higher being told the waiter to serve them no more.  That is exactly what the waiter said: “No more because we need to have for the rest of the guests and I am not allowed to serve you more.”  I wanted to die of embarrassment: they wanted to argue the point.

It is like going to a Chinese restaurant and having the waiter tell you, you assume for your own sake, that you ordered too much food.  Then ignoring him, proceed to wipe the plates clean, proving him wrong.  Yes, that happened too, and still does sometimes.

Eric Ripert, oh Eric Ripert could your accent be more sexier - it is nothing like the French Quebecers who speak English, no, no comparison but you know that…I  am talking Eric Ripert’s On The Line hardcover book that I just finished reading.  If reading is what you can call it, because it is far too involved a book just to be a read - it is the adult version of Pat the Bunny Book without the touchy feely pop-ups.  On The Line is at the top of my great books list because if readers who have been reading this blog know, I love to read cookbooks, and menus and anything I can get my hands on that talks about the ins and outs of owning and running a restaurant like Le Bernadin and this book is a must read on that subject.

Most importantly though, kudos have to be given for the layout of this book. If I could have one wish for books, it would be to have this designed layout. There isn’t one inch of unused space on any given page and the eye darts from left to right, up to down, making it almost impossible to want to turn the page and making each page a wonderful stay for a much longer length of time.  Plus the bios of all the chefs, their duties relating to their stations; the layout of the kitchens both up and down and ultimately and in detail, the front of house.  A pure pleasure visually, an intellectual and learned read, I found On The Line to be the best book I invested in this year and why I know this is because I am constantly going back to it and re-reading parts just for the pure pleasure of reading elements of its contents.

This is too fine a book not to lend out and yet it will not leave my possession.

Lastly, not only and always thinking of food I do read the gossip columns on the net.  I don’t know, it’s just instinct perhaps and a desire to know the ultra rich also have their demons.  When I read of Hulk Hogan and his fight with Rick Flair it brought back flooding memories of a Rick Flair story I have.  Having once owned a Time-share in St. Maarten we always spent March break there (in Canada March break dates differ from the States and it is always so much quieter).  Apparently so did Rick Flair whom I knew from nowhere.  One day at the beach, a quiet day, this gigantic white haired, muscular man, who looked 60 back then, approached me and asked if my kids knew who he was, as they were the only two in the water with their dad.  I said, ‘I don’t know, who are you?”  He answered “Rick Flair”, I wrestle with some kind of wrestling organization and I think he said WWF cause it’s the only one I actually knew about. Yes, okay, I had been known to be found sitting at a few WWF shows with a huge crush on the Hulk. Past tense. Oh, okay so go ask them I thought.

A half hour went by and they were already back on the towel but not for long as they zoomed back to the water, with me in tow this time.  Rick Flair came into the water and as he was tiptoeing his way right next to us, he kindly came over and asked the kids the same question.  They definitely knew who he was and together the three of them spent the next hour playing in the water together.  He was down there making plans to open a gym at the hotel, spoke of his kids who at the time were in their twenties and how he was getting ready to retire.  A nice guy; and what interested me the most was he was all about my kids and their having spent time with him, which I found to be a real act of character for the man, but definitely he was a tad whacko.

Later we found out he was staying in the villa directly above ours and made plans to get together, which never happened.  But the most interesting thing I observed was his not-so-beautiful wife asleep on her water lounger slowly drifting out to sea and him scrambling up and down the rocks frantically looking for a way to get to her: this act in and of itself not so glamorous, not so WWF, but genuinely human.  In the end everything came up fine but I never did see the two of them together that entire week.  Now the secret: how he gets his hair to stay so white: he dyes it every day with bleach so much to the point the hairdresser at the hotel refused to do it but instead let him have complete access to the salon: Here, I always thought vanity thy name is Woman, but I guess it is also vanity thy name is Celebrity. My Rick Flair story.

Have a great weekend.

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Tags: 30 Rock, BUGG, Canon SX200, coles notes, David Chang, Eating The Road, Eric Ripert, Labradoodle, Le Bernadin, Momofuku, On The Line, Padma Lakshmi, Pat The Bunny book, Top Chef

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Eye’z Am Crisped with Fish Cakes…yumm

CRISPY FISH CAKES

Glad to be back in my Steamy Kitchen.  This recipe is still from Little Bites and Appetizers and is called as above.  There is a reason for that title, because they need to be eaten just after coming off the stove to maintain their crispness…if they last that long, because in my house, son, who was taking some pictures, was getting paid with crispy fish cakes.  He demanded payment in advance of my seeing the pictures and it is a good thing too, because otherwise he wouldn’t have gotten paid.  You’ll see why later on in this post.

One thing I find about making a chinese recipe is that there are a lot of ingredients, all in small increments, each spice or condiment adding its own individual identity which when combined create a delectable dance of taste.

This recipe is no exception and unfortunately for me and for you: I did not get a chance  to make the dipping sauce because as I stated, son was getting paid in Crispy Fish Cakes and he wasn’t about to wait until I prepared the sauce so instead he grabbed the Nuoc Cham Vietnamese Dipping sauce out of the fridge and added 1/2 teaspoon of  Chinese black vinegar to it, and voila, he created his unique dipping sauce and you know what, it wasn’t so bad.

Son's Dip Sauce

Next time I make this: I double the recipe.  To those who have never worked with rice paper, you have to dip the sheets into a bath of warm water and count to 30.  You don’t want the paper too stiff nor too soft.   I worked on wax paper and laid the finished product on a plate covered with a damp cloth so as not to dry out the rice paper.

It was only upon having finished all my little packages that I noticed Jaden had tied them with two chives and I used only one.  Hers looked nicer.  My chives got dark and didn’t stay too green after frying, hers did. Hmmmm…

Thankyou goes out to my manicurist who cancelled my appointment today.  Otherwise I doubt I would have been able to tie the chives into a knot: one must have nimble fingers to do this, as well short nails.

Jaden suggested using an inexpensive fish like Tilapia, which I did.  However, in Montreal, it is no longer a cheap fish.  Supply and Demand has kicked in here.  And I guess Demand is winning out, because my Tilapia priced in a little under the Salmon Trout it sat next to.

Heated pan I use for toasting spices

Coriander seeds being toasted...Watch carefully: when you smell them, take them off the stove

I constantly move the pan from side to side so as not to burn

An old coffee grinder grinds the spices

Ground coriander

bigger pic of ground coriander

2tsp of fresh lime juice came out to be a half of a lime and the extra coriander seeds that I toasted and ground, I mixed together with some Kosher salt and made a coriander salt.  For the actual entree, tonight I made some more Tilapia and seasoned it with the coriander salt and I must say this became one heck of a delicious seasoning.

One more tidbit of info:  when I don’t use a measuring spoon, I use a regular teaspoon and I fill it until one more drop pours out the spoon.  Then I know I have a full teaspoon.
Also a great way to get your kids to eat fish, if they are not so nuts about eating fish

Mise-en-place

Chinese chives make glorious foliage

Prep for rolling- I used waxed paper for my surface and a paper towel to wipe dry

Tying of chive

First batch came a little too dark because heat was too high

First shot son took: now you know why he wanted payment up front

second shot son took: now you know why he wanted payment up front

Last shot son took: now you know why it is bad to pay in advance!!

Final product: a beauty

I suppose this is why acrylic cookbook holders are sold...

Crispy Fish Cakes by Jaden Hair of The Steamy Kitchen, or facsimile of, pretty close to, just about or thereof:

1/2 lb of fish, I used Tilapia at Jaden’s suggestion, cut into 1-inch chunks
2 tb finely chopped cilantro
1/4 cup of Panko bread crumbs.
2 tsp freshly squeezed lime juice, which comes to a half a lime.
2 tsp fish sauce
2 cloves garlic, minced.  I did a horrible thing and used the jarred garlic. Smack my hands. I had no fresh garlic
1 tsp grated fresh ginger
1/2 tsp minced fresh chile pepper
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp ground coriander, I used seeds which I toasted and then ground because that is what I had in stock
1/4 tsp sugar

1 tb cornstarch, or flour
1/4 c water
8- 9-inch dried rice paper rounds
8 Chinese chives, softened in warm water, optional
2-3 tb high heat cooking oil

In a food processor add the Fish Cake ingredients and process till it becomes like a coarse paste.  Divide this into 8 equal portions.
Combine the cornstarch and water and mix well untill dissolved.  This is called a slurry.
Fill a large shallow dish, or pie plate with warm water.  Dip one rice paper round into this water and depending on the rice paper either count to 10 or longer until it has softened.  Place the round on a piece of waxed paper or dry surface.
Using your hands, form one fish paste portion into a flat square and place it on the rice paper.  Fold the botton piece of rice paper up over the fish paste and fold over the two sides, as if wrapping a present.  Dip a pastry brush into the slurry and then onto the tip of the last piece of rice paper which will seal it closed tight, when you fold it up as the last fold.
If using the chives, tie like you would a package around the fish cake and place the fish cake on a clean dry plate and cover with a damp cloth so as not to dry out the patties.
Repeat with remaining portions and rice paper.
In a large non-stick frying pan, on medium-hot heat, add the oil.  When hot place 4 patties into the pan and fry on one side then the other.  Repeat with remaining fish cakes. Make sure the rice paper do not touch each other or they will stick together.  Fry for 3 minutes on each side or until browned.  Serve immediately with a dipping sauce.

Delicious and definitely crispy.  However, these cakes when cooler loose their crispiness so be sure to make these as close to serving as possible.

Update:

The new camera has arrived, in box.  After Donna Ruhlman so graciously explained the F-stop and Aperture settings, I hope in the coming weeks to display photos worthy of this blog.  Me thinks I have a lot of homework.

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Tags: chinese chives, Donna Ruhlman, Nuoc Cham, panko bread crumbs, photography, rice paper rounds, Tilapia

“Why have a code?

In Ethics on April 30, 2009 at 9:52 AM

“As the blogging world expands exponentially, more and more people in the culinary world believe that food bloggers—as a group—are unfair, highly critical, untrained and power hungry individuals empowered by anonymity. As writers, trained journalists and food bloggers, we feel it is unfair to be labeled something we aren’t. By creating a food blogger code of ethics, we hope to elevate our craft and draw attention to the food bloggers who hold themselves to higher standards.

Why should I subscribe to the ideas of The Code?

We believe you should be able to write about your experiences as you wish. We know everyone’s truth is different and we thoroughly appreciate the diversity of opinions within the food blogging realm. We are not against free speech. We do not believe in censoring. We do, however, believe in civility, honesty and truth.
We strive to make our blogs stand out from the rest through our writing and story telling. We created The Code because we felt it was important to define what our ethical standards were and clearly state them so that we could hold ourselves to those standards.  The Code is not meant to be a mandatory thing for everyone in the blogosphere. This is our way to define what our standards are.

We are proud to be bloggers and hope to give the blogging community a better reputation. We wrote this because we were concerned that food bloggers were being unfairly judged as hacks, which the majority of us are not – with or without journalism degrees. And that by creating a code of conduct should give us MORE freedom to be honest, not less.”

This is a citation directly from the Food Blog Code of Ethics…. http://foodethics.wordpress.com/2009/04/30/why-have-a-code/

The Real Truth is that to be labeled “unfair, highly critical, untrained and power hungry individuals empowered by anonymity” could not be closer to the Truth. Your small elitist clique believe in “believe in civility, honesty and truth” is the biggest lie. I am a case in point and I know I am not alone.

A few years ago, I befriended Jaden Janice Hair and in my naiveté truly enjoyed her articles, manner of writing, what appeared to be her true persona and character. Also at a similar point in time I took great pleasure in reading food blogs written by Elise Bauer (www.simplyrecipes.com), by Diane Cu (http://www.whiteonricecouple.com/todd-diane/), by Jaden Hair (http://steamykitchen.com/)  and many others.

It was only two months ago at a time when I was so very inspired by these people, in particular Jaden, when I finally decided to start a blog that I believed I would truly enjoy. For one, I truly enjoy writing…I also have a great love of interesting and inspired food recipes and finally I love the culinary arts.

As I had been in regular contact with Jaden, I learned that she was authoring a Book called The Steamy Kitchen Cookbook and at that time I asked Jaden if she would agree to allow me to do each of her recipes in the Book, comment on them and photograph them in my upcoming Blog. She loved the idea and agreed…so I purchased a domain 2 months ago and named it Eye’z In The Steamy Kitchen Cookbook. It took me a great deal of time and effort to acquire a working knowledge of Wordpress to enable me to start on my pursuit of what I hoped to be a fun and interesting Blog.

Several weeks and posts after launching my Blog, Jaden contacts me and asks that I rename my Blog so that the name Steamy Kitchen does not appear. I didn’t understand her reasoning, but I readily complied and invested some money to have my domain and site renamed to Eye’z in a Cookbook. At the time I did not see her true motives.

Then a few weeks later, I decided to make reference to a wonderful recipe in an article in Elise Bauer’s website (Elise Bauer is a very close Blog buddy of Jaden’s) however, innocently and inadvertently, instead of creating a certain type of link, I simply created a hyperlink to her post. This enraged Elise and she blasted me using words not befitting a drunken sailor. She also told me that I do not belong in the food blogging world of their’s as I apparently did not meet their high standards. I was shocked and outraged at Elise’s crude and brutal assault and it was at that time that I realized that the food blogging community was actually comprised of a very small tight knit group of people who had no intention of allowing anyone in.

In response to Ms. Bauer’s rude and antagonistic assault, I stated my mind to her and posted a comment on my own Blog providing my view of what had happened. This created a stir and not more than 2 weeks later, I received an email from Jaden Hair suggesting that I was linked to some person on the Internet who apparently has created some havoc in the community and whose views I have never been privy to. Jaden didn’t even ask…she presumed that somehow our names “popped up” and therefore I was associated with this person. I explained precisely to Jaden that I never had any contact with this person and that I would never be interested nor have a common interest in anything he had to say. I not only advised Jaden but also emailed a number of other known food bloggers to ask if they had heard this same information. Not one food blogger worth their weight replied….an incredible loud silence.

Jaden decided to ignore my explanation and just 2 days ago, on November 21, 2009, she decided to “google” my entire family, including my husband and children. She then proceeded to collude with Diane Cu, another one of her blog buddies, and arranged for Diane to email my daughter demanding to know if she was the daughter of yours truly and her husband and then threatened her that Private Investigators wanted to meet with her. My daughter was in shock….my husband and I were in shock and enraged.

When we analyzed what caused this chain reaction of events, it became clear that Jaden and her clique did not want me in the world of food bloggers and decided to use intimidation tactics to ensure I no longer existed in their world.
This behavior is elitist, snobbish, corrupt and ugly….I now see it is shared by the small group that apparently control this food blogging society. One might ask…what is it that they fear…is it their plagiarizing of other people’s recipes, is it their concern that people will really learn that they are charlatans….is it that their sponsors will learn that they are just smoke and mirrors with no substance…….is it a combination of all of this and more……..what is their fear??

They obviously have no code of ethics but their own distorted code that would lead to the menacing threats they have proceeded to impose upon my own daughter. They clearly have no honesty nor truth as they would not have created the illusion and excuse that I somehow, without any logical basis, would or could be associated with someone who has clearly expressed some very ugly views, not one of which I share.

They profess to be civil, but civility does not exist in their vocabulary…..they are what they are….a gang of thugs whose avarice and low self esteem rejects anyone who is not “one of them”. Yes…I am speaking of Elise….Jaden…..Diane……and a group of silent well known bloggers who stand and watch and do nothing. Shame on you….you people have created unearned reputations with well known newspapers, journals, TV networks and numerous sponsors….these people will all learn your dirty little secrets.

Rest assured that I will not rest till each and every one of you are exposed for what you are…..you started this and I will end it!

And Eye’z in a Cookbook shall go on.
UPDATE

After much discussions amongst family members, it was decided that the RCMP be notified of the email Diane Cu sent.  The RCMP because this message was sent through cyberspace across International borders.

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CURRENTLY EXPERIENCING INTERNET EXPLORER PROBLEMS:  VIEW IN OTHER BROWSER IE. FIREFOX It’s Saturday and my entire family is home. Even Montreal had a Black Friday and quite frankly I am pooped. Walmart, The Bay, Ogilvy’s, and Louis Vuitton saw me, showed me, reached into my pockets and picked up my Amex, took it to the cash and took away many of my bucks. Too many. They even took my grocery cash, damn them. So, in order to prepare hubby for the end of the month I thought I would fatten him up for the kill, and prepare those once-in-a-while recipes he loves so much. The first being a Baked Salami from a recipe I got, who knows where. So many recipes out there are the same; save for one or two ingredients and over the years I have accumulated so many that I actually get to go back to my Cooking Light Cookware Program from the early 90’s where I store each and every favourite recipe since eternity, and sometimes even catch a thief on the net.

(That Cookware Program is a story in and of itself and one used to be able to buy and download a package of recipes purchased online and sold monthly by subscription from Cooking Light Magazine. Until the whole thing disappeared. In fact, it was a program I purchased on an actual floppy disk: remember those. Since then every recipe I accumulated via the internet has gone into this program and it gets backed up monthly like the rest of my computer. Hey, I hope people back up monthly because those that do have suffered the way those that don’t soon will.)

Let’s face it, we are all thieves in one way or another when it comes to recipes, especially if one reads Ratios. Ruhlman highlighting that all recipes in one form or another have to be based on a ratio, if just for the science of it. I can’t tell you how many times Baked Salami has been served to me at parties or brunches and how many different ways there are to prepare it.

This is my way and it comes out at the end of 4 hours as the most succulent, soft, and addictive salami one could possibly hope to attain in 4 hours of pure baking. How easy a meal is this?

You can make sandwiches, add it to scrambled eggs, slice into a Chef’s Salad, eat it off the counter as you are emptying the dishwasher; any way you choose. Buy a salami: I like to buy a Kosher one; don’t ask me why. Make it a real salami not an Italian one, a hard one or anything different than a good old salami made the American way.

Take 1 cup of orange marmalade,

and 1 cup of Dijon Mustard.

Now here is where creativity and instinct in cooking comes in: any mustard can be used just like any marmalade or jam can be used. The above is simply a suggestion, so GO FOR IT. Use whatever is in the fridge if you want. I like mustards, all kinds including the yellow, which has its place among mustards. For this recipe I used a Beer Mustard; the tang is what I was going for. Mix it all together and yes, it is a lot of mixture for one salami; then use two. Slice the salami into 1/8-1/4 inch slices straight through but not entirely SO STOP BEFORE YOU HIT THE DIRT…1/4 inch above the cut that goes right through. Massage that mess of a mixture into your salami with lots a love making sure to get into the slices. Balance goes on top and salami, which has been wrapped in strong tin-foil, is then placed into a low oven at 350 for 4 HOURS. 4 hours baby; which means the dog can get walked, the lawn mowed, take the kids tobogganing, get a haircut and even attend the Church Bazaar.

By hour 2 the house smells so good, the neighbors will be envious. If you’re lucky, the young’un will have friends over just in time for a slice or two and by evening that mother will want the recipe.

Baked Salami

1 whole American salami

1 cup orange marmalade

1 cup Dijon Mustard

Set oven to 350 F. Mix last two ingredients together and shmush and massage over salami. Roll in tin foil; not tightly so there is room to grow (but it will shrink). 4 hours later take it out, open the foil and let it cool slightly. Yes, Rachel Ray it is indeed Yummo.

Next thing I prepared was Soupe a L’oignon gratinée.

Before I give this recipe, let it be known that we count amongst our friends a pride of lawyers, including one judge, and one who has argued twice before the Supreme Court of Canada, a feat only a handful of lawyers in Canada can attest to. Yes, Brent; the only Anglo fighting for our rights and who has been a good friend to my husband all these years. The rest of them are of French Canadian descent and if they saw this recipe they would be aghast at the insult I am about to do to a dish considered a French Canadian classic.

Hey, sue me.

Ready for the Broiler

It goes like this: and chefs around the world I apologize for this - but it is so damn good and so damn easy and is so contrary to the true Soupe a l’oignon gratinée that I call it a ‘copycat’ recipe.

2 14oz cans of Condensed onion soup

1 1/2  cans of water

1/4 cup of Sherry or Good Red Wine

3 or 4 slices of French bread or baguette, cut fairly thick and toasted

1/2 cup grated Swiss cheese

1/ cup grated Mozzarella cheese

Optional ingredient 3/4 cup of canned French Fried Onions

Mix the cheeses together. In a saucepan, combine the soup, water, sherry or wine, and heat. In individual oven proof bowls or onion soup bowls, place a slice of the toasted baguette and some of the optional fried onions. Pour in the hot soup and top it with the cheeses that have been mixed together. Broil until cheese is melted and golden brown. You would swear you just ordered it from La Crêpe Bretonne.

The Third in this trilogy of easy and somewhat ‘copycat’ recipes belongs to an original recipe from The Original Orange Julep in Montreal.

A copy in an original

The Orange Julep must be given its history and the following pays homage to an institution in Montreal going back to the 1940’s: What is not mentioned is that the OJ,  from its inception, was a hang-out for teens and early on was THE last stop everyone went to after a Saturday night out. Many a marriage was made at the OJ. The OJ never, ever lost that reputation for the generations of teens to come; the Orange Julep never had a generational gap. They still meet up here. It is the place where a teen who got their driver’s license celebrated THAT DAY.It was when my brother and sister were teens, it was when I was a teen, it was when MY KIDS were teens and I have no doubt it is that today.

The Orange Julep was the last of its kind to have its waitresses (only waitresses btw) come up to the car window and take an order. It was the last of its kind to have the trays that used to sit on the driver’s side window, rolled half-way down, with hooks.

The Orange Julep had an opening and a closing: that is how Montrealers knew that Spring was on its way and Winter was about to come. THE ORANGE JULEP EITHER OPENED UP OR CLOSED DOWN. You never missed an OJ opening: it was a mandatory event like Apple-picking is to us - A MUST HAVE AND A MUST DO. The Orange Julep has been written about by every journalist and every newspaper numerous times and the following is from the Wiki page….take time to go to the link and read…especially if you are an expat.  And think of the summers when who had the coolest car was the most popular…uhhh like today.

“The Gibeau Orange Julep (also known colloquially as OJ or The Big Orange) is a roadside attraction and fast food restaurant in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.[1] The building is in the shape of a giant orange, three stories high with a diameter of forty feet. The restaurant was started by Hermas Gibeau in the 1940s to serve his trademark orange drink, similar but not identical to that of Orange Julius.[2]It is believed Gibeau intended to live in the three-story sphere with his wife and children. [3] The restaurant and its orange sphere was rebuilt further back from the roadway when it was widened as the Decarie Expressway in the 1960s. For a time, the Julep was noted for rollerskating waitresses but customers today order food in the more conventional fashion of a fast food restaurant. Food can then be taken away or eaten at one of a number of provided picnic tables. [4] The restaurant operates 24 hours a day during summer and reduced hours in winter. [5] Today, it also hosts classic car and motorbike enthusiasts on Wednesday nights from May-August. [3] The restaurant is located at the corner of Decarie Boulevard and Pare Street, just off the Decarie Expressway, in the borough of Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grâce. It is just north of the equestrian harness racing track Blue Bonnets, and directly across the expressway from the landmark hotel Ruby Foo’s. It is within walking distance of Namur Montreal metro station.”

And now I present to you the copycat recipe of an ORANGE JULEP…

5 ounce can of frozen orange juice can

1 cup milk

1 cup water

1/4 cup sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

6 ice cubes

Blend all together in a blender. Pour - stick a straw in- and drink.

None of these recipes can be attributed to me as an original recipe.  They were either handed down, read in a magazine or told to me by a friend.  Of course, should you never have heard of them: most definitely you can call them Natalie’s recipes, but I doubt it. Well, kids.

Thththththththat’s All!

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As Parents, do we ever get a break?  Isn’t there a day off when all we have to think about is ourselves?  No and Never.  From the moment of inception we no longer have the liberty of selfishness.

The Twenty-something’s are worried about the pregnancies, the parents of these Twenty-something’s are already well into worries.  The Thirties bring the worry of toddlers and early education.  Having kids with learning disabilities, and worse.  Then the Forties are high-school and teens and we all know what is associated with that.  The Fifties: me.

I worry about my Adult children: and soon my grandchildren (hopefully).

Why so nostalgic, I am listening to an afternoon of Ed Sullivan Classics and the House of the Rising Sun….oh a toke would be woefully good.  See, my age is showing: is it still called that?

I had a teen in drug rehab; another  a rebel. Now he’s graduated and runs his own company and she studied at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts, in England and works in Toronto.

And I’m listening to oldies off the television…

And thinking that we, as Adults, didn’t prepare our kids enough for the onset of the internet.  Somewhere we dropped the ball.  We didn’t have the forethought to teach our kids enough about the dangers of the internet and the good and terrible and terribly bad things to come of it.  We didn’t because it was a Tsunami that hit us without time to prepare for the unknown.

Silicon Valley in its heyday socked it to us each and every six months that we barely had time to digest one aspect of the world-wide web when another was being shoved down our throats.  Some of us didn’t swallow and some couldn’t swallow and then there were a few who swallowed, but it took time, like me, and finally those that sniffed it up so hard they learned how to shit without a toilet.

So, then we got Dateline to go face to face with just a smidgen of those tricksters, we call the Pedophiles on the net.  We got Facebook to replace MySpace and needed to ‘friend’ one another.  That didn’t stop a ‘friended’ mother who ‘bullied’ a teen so badly, she committed suicide.  We have Twitter who’s worse than Uncle Sam in watching us.  We have bully’s on the internet, who just happen to have found me, an educated 53 year old girl (I swear I look 51) who decided to retire from working in a shelter with victims of Domestic Violence, now writing a 2 month old blog.

We have bonafide and reputable magazines closing down and newspapers firing journalists because, increasingly, we are being replaced by sets of people called ‘bloggers‘.  Not necessarily news reporters, not necessarily journalists, not necessarily writers, yet taking the place of actual educated members of society, while spouting out illusions of information as if it were facts; completely unedited nor monitored….these are teaching our kids. Leading us to niches and nooks of pieces and specs of information, most of them have no knowledge of and yet profess proficiency and experience.  Some might say deceivers.

While those that HAVE the accomplishments were so busy, they lost track of the eye of the hurricane: Cyberspace.

(*These bloggers came on board much later and write with those same accomplishments and knowledge and experience thus giving credence to all that is good on the internet.)

The internet, a place where people become keystrokes which then become figments of imagination.  Some that belong in a nuthouse and abuse us with their nonsense and some that are normal but still abuse us with their nonsense.

The internet is a Disney World of the unknown.  A bigot’s dream house.  An innocent’s nightmare.  This is what is teaching our kids and preaching the gospel of any and every subject imaginable.

Call me old-fashioned; but I want to be taught by professors.  Professionals and learned individuals with proven successes.  Not winners of a cooking contest; or survivors on an island. I refer to these because I have yet to see a reality show involving Engineers, Doctors or Lawyers.  Neither Nurses, or Dentists, or Journalists.  I have seen motorcycle gangs, tattoo parlours, bounty-hunters, people who increase our problems ten-fold by having ten (or more) kids, and the list could go on.  My point, I believe, is quite clear.

I was on a reality show.  I was on a talk show.  Give me the highly orchestrated, scripted, and directed talk show.  Reality shows are not reality.  They are scripted; but we write it and then someone says…”no stop let’s do it again…and again”…of course, because we are doing a reality show and we are fakes and fakers and the worry is that our audience might really find out that fact.

So how and who are we?  Who really knows?  A name, a face; the only ones we know, ARE the ones who were employed by the magazines and the newspapers, wrote researched books and textbooks; their faces and respectability is documented, way before the internet.  So, yes, we know who they are and we trust them.

Everyone else, in my opinion and this is always about my opinion because it is my blog and involves freedom of speech,  is a sham.  Online television is a joke.  It’s a joke that is now our reality and our lives and it is by which we now measure expertise.

It’s a short ruler and each and every day it gets shorter.

Such is the legacy we are leaving our kids, our grandchildren and gosh I don’t even want to go farther than that generation.

Yes, we made our mistakes with Global Warming…that was our parents’ legacy to us but I fear the legacy we leave is much worse.

We are leaving young adults and kids to get their education from other uneducated and illiterate adults and all this is being done over the internet whose best interest is in and of itself.

Is this truly the higher education we hoped for?  People’s fame and fortune being earned via cable lines.  Cable lines that when cut just disappear.  Poof: gone.  Next!

Why do I have tinglings of the bust-up in Silicon Valley and the bubble burst of Wall Street.

Would Madoff have done so well and gone so long unnoticed if we still dealt in hardcopy paper that can’t be photoshopped? Not that he had to Photoshop, he had a computer and what our computers can’t do Photoshop does.

It is my belief, based on history; there will be a burst in the world of blogging. When is the question.

Those that have a background anchored off the internet will continue and all else will drop off - which is why the fame gathered online teeters and sways like a hammock in a hurricane. So much that the paralyzing fear of falling off outweighs all else: logic, intelligence, integrity, grace, breeding, civilities, comportment and conduct…let us not forget pure legalities.

I am smart enough to know I can be completely wrong.  What I worry about is those that aren’t.

Oh it’s a sad, sad, place we live, this internet.

Yet, the days my internet goes down, I am grief-stricken. I don’t know what to do with myself.  First thing in the morning I check my email, then every ten minutes thereafter. Heck, I don’t even have to check it: it contacts me.

I learnt how to empty my dog’s anal sacs and it didn’t cost me a visit to the vet.  It was the vet who suggested the web.

I don’t have to use the telephone to have instant communication with my family.

My dying mother-in-law gets to visit with her grandchildren daily through Skype.

There are so many good things about the internet which is why it is so addictive.  Which is why it is so valuable, when used properly…
1. Instantaneous updates of news and other events happening world-wide.
2. General access to data bases and information, which would otherwise be difficult or impossible to find.
3. All government, school, insurance forms, etc. that are available on-line making life so much easier.
4. Taxes can be filed online.
5. Vast array of knowledge.
6. Uniting family and friends.
7. Meeting new friends.
8. Finding missing Family.
9. Finding missing persons.
10. Shopping, for those that are housebound and those that are not.
11. Online schooling.
12. Tutorials from those willing to share their experiences.
13. Research capabilities.
14. The freedom of speech and ideas.
15. Laughter.
16. Banking.
17. Digital books.
18. Music.
19. Warnings of threats and dangers.
20. Weather forecasts.
21. Driving directions.
22. Google Earth.
23. Real Estate.
24. Skype.
25. Proper cooking techniques.
26. New recipes.
27. The Arts and Culture.
28. Learning of other cultures and traditions across the world.
29. Being kept abreast of starving cultures, diminishing foods, sustainable foods, and animal kingdoms.

….And so much more…

It’s a good, good place we live, this internet

WHICH IS HOW I FOUND OUT THIS:

Le Cendrillon is a Quebec made chèvre. A goat cheese that this past summer, in the Canary Islands, won the coveted title of World’s Best Cheese 2009, having stolen the crown away from the Europeans who held onto it for years.

It’s the first time a Quebec cheese took such a prestigious title and unfortunately for us, as soon as the win was announced, the cheese disappeared.

Susan Semenak had the honour of reporting this story for The Montreal Gazette, and she describes Le Cendrillon winning World’s Best Cheese as a Cinderella story for the fromagerie, La Maison Alexis de Portneuf.

Le Cendrillon is an ash-covered soft surface-ripened soft goat cheese with a strong, tangy taste that a lot of specialty cheese shops here, have described as not such a great tasting cheese.  At six bucks for a 125 gram pack; it is also an inexpensive cheese.

Yet, a month into the win the cheese all but disappeared off gr