Sally's Kitchen & Stuff

Warm Potato Salad

Best, and simplest, potato salad ever. Serves 6. (So if you think the bacon is unhealthy, you're really only eating half a strip per person. This tastes good fresh and warm or leftover from the fridge.

Chances are, you already have all the ingredients on hand. Also, there's no need to peel the potatoes.

Ingredients
2 lbs red potatoes (Think "a big bowl"), quartered and steamed
2 hard-boiled eggs, minced
3 strips of bacon
2 TBSP Mayo
a small handful of parsley, minced
Salt & Pepper to taste

Instructions
Fry the bacon to a crisp in a large pan, and crush to make bits. To the pan drippings (with the heat turned down low) add the cooked potatoes and toss to coat. Leave the potatoes in there and turn off the heat, and let sit for 10 minutes. Add remaining ingredients and toss while everything is still in the pan. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Crockpot Pot Roast

This is so easy anybody can make it. When we dug into it the meat was falling right off - great cooking method for cheaper, tougher cuts of meat!

Ingredients
1 beef pot roast (chuck or round), about 2 lbs
1 CAN cream of celery soup
1/3 CUP chicken broth
1/4 CUP Italian style breadcrumbs
2 CUPS frozen vegetables (I used mixed cauliflower and broccoli)
Salt & Pepper to taste
Half a head of garlic, peeled and crushed
2 TBSP clean tasting oil (like peanut or corn oil, but not olive oil)
1 Egg
2 TBSP flour

Instructions
Sprinkle salt and pepper liberally on roast and brown all sides in a pan with some oil.
Set aside. Brown the vegetables in the pan a bit, scraping up the browned bits at the bottom to salvage the flavor left in the pan from the browning beef.

In a mixing bowl, combine egg, flour, chicken broth, cream of celery soup and mix well. (I used a whisk to break up the flour bits.) Tranfer vegetables to the crockpot, lay the roast on top, and stuff pieces of garlic into the cracks where the fat separate the meat. Pour the sauce of celery soup on top, making sure that it coats the entire surface of the meat. Sprinkle the breadcrumbs on the very top, as evenly as possible.

Cook for 4 hours on high or 8 hours on low. Leftovers make wonderful Italian beef sandwiches.

Crockpot Chicken "Bake"

Since Curtis was born, my life has been a really long feeding session. So in order to avoid a fire in my kitchen, I've been cooking mostly with the slowcooker.

Ingredients
1 Whole chicken, innards removed
8 medium size carrots
2 onions, chopped
1/4 Cup BBQ sauce
1 TBSP brown sugar
1 TSP salt
Pepper to taste

3 TBSP flour

Instructions
Mix BBQ sauce, brown sugar, salt, and pepper together. Rub all over the chicken, and pour whatever is left over inside the chicken cavity. Place some carrots and some about half an onion inside the chicken, and leave the rest sitting at the bottom of the crockpot to elevate the chicken away from the bottom. Cook on low for 8 hours.

After 8 hours, lift chicken out and remove the skin and bones. Skim most of the fat from the liquid at the bottom of the pot and add flour. Whisk to break up the lumps. Turn the heat up to high and close the lid. Let it cook for 30 minutes, then turn off the heat and stir the chicken pieces back in. Serve over rice or noodles.

Gasless Chilli

Guaranteed to NOT give you gas, unlike most bean and meat chillis. This recipe will make enough for the biggest pot in your house. The meats will put you back $15. It's a $20 chlli that doesn't skimp in the beef department. On top of the chilli powder, you can also add a bunch of miscellaneous spices to taste - anything that would work on beef for you would work in it. Cumin, coriander, oregano, basil, thyme - go nuts. There is no "authentic" way to make chilli. There are only myriad of creative ways. So if you don't have a certain ingredient, you can skip it or substitute it with something you think might work.

Another thing. Canned beans are usually high in sodium because of the factory cooking process. So to save on it (and we don't need extra salt anyway - this is a sweet chilli), rinse the beans in a colander.

It will taste best if you start cooking it in the morning, let it simmer half the afternoon, cooled on the stove, then reheated for dinner.

Ingredients
2 pounds "marinating" steak, cubed (with plenty of fat running through it)
2 pounds lean ground beef
2 onions, chopped
1 Can diced tomatoes
1 Can tomato paste
1 bottle of dark ale
1 TBSP molasses
1/4 Cup sugar
2 squares of baker's chocolate or 2 TBSP cocoa
3 TBSP chilli powder
1 TBSP cayenne pepper
1 TBSP instant coffee
1 can pinto beans, drained
1 can mexican red beans, drained
2 cans red kidney beans, drained
2 cans of beef broth
1/4 cup flour
Salt to taste

Instructions
In a large pot, brown first the steak, then the groud beef a handful at a time. Don't overcrowd the bottom of the pot. You will need to do this in batches. When the meat is browned, reserve the meat in a bowl and cook the onions in the bot (scraping up browned bits) until soft. Add the meat back into the pan, and add tomatoes, tomato paste, the beer, molasses, chocolate, and bring to a boil. Add all the beans and the rest of the dry seasoning including the sugar, turn down to a simmer.

In a large bowl, whisk flour and beef broth together, then add to the pot in a drizzle while stirring. When it's all combined, put a lid on it and let it simmer for two and a half hours.

I served this with rice on the bottom and shredded cheddar on top - it was a hit. You can also serve it with spaghetti, crackers, bread, or any combination of the above.

Square Cornish Pasties

This makes for an impressive main dish, but really, MUCH easier than it looks. It is labour intensive though. I've modified the contents of the traditional Cornish pasties a bit so that it would SEEM more expensive, and used puff pastry instead of a pie crust to get a more manageable square shape. The steaks used in it can be anything, but since we're cooking it to well-done, getting well-marbled expensive beef is a waste. Just get the cheapest cut you can find.

I would suggest making EVERYTHING ahead and taking the baking sheet of pasties out of the fridge to bake 30 minutes before serving. With so many steps, things could get a big hectic.

Ingredients
1 Cup of Chinese chicken marinade
3 small 4 oz "marinating" steaks
1 Cup chicken broth
2 small onions, chopped
3 cloves of garlic, minced
2 Cups of sliced carrots
2 Cups of Cremini mushrooms, roughly cubed
2 + 4 TBSP butter / margarine
2 TBSP all-purpose flour
2 sheets of pre-rolled puff pastry (I used President's Choice)
1 eggs and 1 TBSP water, whisked together

Instructions
Marinade steaks overnight in a freezerbag. I used chicken marinate for its sweet and salty flavour, but if you don't have it, you can use soysauce, a bit of ginger, and a couple of tablespoon fulls of brown sugar. Brown steaks on both sides - don't "cook" it, just brown it. Let it cool, cube them, and slice off any extra fat.

In the pan where you browned the steaks, pour in the chicken broth to deglaze the pan. Add onions and saute until lightly browned. Add garlic and carrots and cook until the carrots lose their bite. Set the mixture aside. In a clean pan, cook mushrooms on medium heat with 2 TBSP butter until soft. Add mushrooms to previously cooked mixture.

Now this might be a bit tricky. Melt the 4 TBSP of butter in a pan on medium heat, add flour. Using a wire whisk, whisk constantly, adding hot broth/water a dribble at a time to turn the roux into a white-ish sauce. This will be our "glue" to hold all the ingredients together so it can't be too watery. Mix this with all your other cooked ingredients (add the steak now) in a big bowl and let it cool completely.

Preheat oven to 375. Unroll puff pastry and cut each sheet into half. Scoop filling onto half of each cut sheet - as much as it can hold, about 1 1/2 cups - and fold the other half over it, pinch the edges to seal. Try to leave as little edge as possible. Poke holes along the tops with a fork. Instead of lifting the pasties off the paper, simply trim the excess paper off and put the whole thing on a baking sheet. Brush with eggwash and bake for 30 minutes.

If you have extra time, put the baking sheet of pasties in the fridge before putting them into the oven. The colder the puff pastry, the puffier it gets in the oven.

Sweet Chicken Curry (Easy)

This is NOT a conventional curry - instead of pungent and savory, it's sweet and spicy. Good for having younger ones over who are not used to ethnic foods. Browning the chicken is not required, but it does give the dish a little something extra. You can go as far as keeping the cayenne out of the recipe altogether and just have a shaker of it at the table. Serve over white rice.

Ingredients
6 Chicken legs
2 TBSP curry powder
3 Yams, peeled and sliced
4 carrots, peeled and sliced
1 TBSP salt
2 boxes of low-salt chicken broth (or bouillion and water equivalent)
1 Can coconut milk
2 TBSP all-purpose flour
Cayenne powder to taste

Instructions
Remove skin and cut off as much fat as possible from the chicken. Brown both sides in a pan or the bottom of a pot. Add corrots, 1 and a half box of chicken broth, salt, and curry powder. Cover and boil, then simmer, until chicken is cooked and falls off the bone when prodded with a fork. Take the chicken out to strip bones, reserving chicken meat in a container to prevent drying out.

Add sliced yams to the pot and let simmer until tender. Combine remaining chicken broth and flour with a fork to prevent lumps. Add to the pot in a steady stream while stirring. Put the reserved chicken back into the pot and add cayenne powder 1/2 teaspoon at a time until desired heat is reached.

Feeds 10 easily with the cost being less than $1 per person. Yum!

Asian Baked Pork Ribs

This is by far the EASIEST ribs recipe I have on hand. It takes minimal prep-time - aside from the wait time - and tastes impressive to boot. You can roast vegetables along with it in the "open roast" process; just put your veggies in individual foil wraps.

Ingredients
1 rack of pork ribs
1 Cup soy sauce
1/4 Cup teriyaki marinade
1 TBSP grated ginger
3 cloves of garlic, grated, or 3 TSP out of a jar
2 TSP sesame oil
1 pinch cayenne pepper (optional)

Instructions
Cut pork ribs into individual servings (usually I count 4 bones to a person) and throw everything into an extra large freezer bag. Marinade overnight or at least 4 hours.

1.5 hours before dinner, preheat oven to 400. In a large roasting pan (large enough for the ribs to not stack on top of each other), lay ribs bone-side up, cover, and roast for 30 minutes. After 30 minutes, take the lid off, turn the ribs over, and open roast for another 30 minutes.

Serve with sweet peaches and cream corn and some roasted veggies.

There is nothing quite like homemade Jam

Homemade strawberry jam, to be exact. My boss' mother owns a farm, and periodically sends produce. This time, it was baskets full of strawberries. Plump, picked ripe, in season, succulent strawberries with no whiteness on the tops. I was given six and a half quarts and instead of gorging ourselves silly, I proposed a night of jam making.

When a man is ready to make jam with you, he's a keeper. Now, if he actually goes through with it, he's officially settled down. Yours for good, basically.

There are MANY recipes for strawberry jam. It's very, very simple, and you probably already have all the ingredients in the house aside from the massive quantity of strawberries. Store-bought strawberries tend to make a firmer jam (they have a higher concentration of pectin), and picked-ripe ones make a dribbly jam. You can use it on top of anything - frozen vanilla yoguart, waffles, breads. It also makes a great baking component; add fresh strawberries and rhubarb for a rhubarb pie filling.

After you've tasted this, you'll never want to buy a jar off the shelf again.

Ingredients
Two and a half quarts of fresh strawberries
1/3 cup of fresh squeezed lemon juice
2 cups of sugar
1 TSP real vannila extract (optional)

A few jam jars, sterilized. (boil them in a water bath)

Instructions
Hull the strawberries. If you don't have a strawberry huller, just pull off the stem, cut the fruit in half, and cut the fuzzy white middle bit out. Put it into a large saucepan or wide pot and mash them with a potato masher. Don't overdo it! Think of each strawberry only needs to be mashed once to release the juices. Turn the heat to medium and let it simmer for 15 minutes.

Add lemon juice, sugar, and vanilla (if using) and bring the heat up to boil. Stir constantly with a wooden spoon to prevent the sugar from burning. Afte boiling for 5 minutes, bring it back down to a simmer and cook until jam coats the spoon. Run your finger down the spoon after dipping it in the jam - the line should be clean and the jam shouldn't run back together. Careful - it's hot! The fruit should not spend more than 30 minutes in the pot.

Make sure your jars and lids are sterilized. I did this by boiling them as I was cooking the jam, but you can use the oven as well - 250f for 15 minutes. Fill your jars with your fresh strawberry jam, close the lid, and let it cool for a few hours before refridgerating. If you are using proper jamming jars with two-piece lids, there is no need to refridgerate until you open them.

The whole process took us a few hours, but we made 2 batches (about 12 1oz jars). They make great hostess gifts, and the only drawback? You probably wouldn't want to look at a strawberry for a while after eating all the jam.

Spicy Chicken with Peanuts

Made this last night. Was a huge hit. Unlike my other monster recipes, this one only serves four, or 2 comfortably with leftovers enough for lunch. I served this with a plain side of greens and steamed rice. Think jerk chicken with peanuts.

Trim ALL fat off the chicken before you start - it will cause the sauce to separate later. I like the taste of the pepper oil better (it's much, much more fiery than its "sauce" counterpart) but if your sauce will sit for a while, use a hot pepper sauce.

Ingredients
2 Chicken breasts, skin and bones removed (not those tiny chicken breast halves - if you're using those, make it 4.)
2 TSP salt
2 TSP flour
2 TBSP sugar
1 TSP fresh ground pepper
1 TSP dried oregano

2 TSP Chinese hot pepper oil (the insanely fiery kind with the seeds in the bottom)
1 handful of shelled peanuts
2 TBSP mayo (optional: peanut butter instead)
1/2 CUP of chicken broth
1/2 CUP of chopped green onions for garnish

Instructions
Coat chicken breasts in the next five ingredients evenly. Brown on both sides. 6 minutes. Add the mayo, pepper oil, and peanuts on TOP of the chicken, turn the heat down to low, and cover for another 5 minutes while it cooks. Check for doneness. (Reduce both if you're using halves, since they're quite a lot thinner) Transfer chicken to a plate.

Carve the chicken and tent with a foil. Drain the juices back into the pan. Whisk chicken broth into the pan sauce until smooth, then pour onto the sliced chicken. Sprinkle the top with green onions. Enjoy!

Beef & Spinach Dumplings

Made this yesterday and got rave reviews. I used leftover meat sauce (with way too much meat and not nearly enough sauce) and a pack of frozen spinach. If you can't find alfredo/tomato sauce, add 1/2 cup of flour, 1/2 cup of butter, and a good hunk of romano cheese to the tomato sauce you're using.

Ingredients
Meat Sauce
    2 lbs lean ground beef
    1 TBSP seasalt
    1 TSP tabasco sauce
    1 TSP fresh ground pepper
    1 bottle of store bought tomato based alfredo sauce
    1 can of diced tomatoes
Other
    1/2 cup of cream cheese
    1 package of frozen spinach, cooked and drained

    1 package of ready-made dumpling wraps
    salt to taste

Instructions
Make the meat sauce. Brown meat with salt and some oil, then dump the rest of the ingredients in and cook until thick. Reserve about 2 cups for the dumplings and add a few pinches of salt. You can use pork and reduce it if you just want dumplings out of this, but lean ground beef is by far healthier.

Refridgerate the dumpling portion of the sauce until it can hold a shape when shaped with a spoon. Mix spinach and cream cheese together. Fill dumplings with both, careful not to MIX them.

Cook in a tomato based broth with chilli peppers lightly and serve with rice noodles.

Easiest Clam Chowder - EVER

It doesn't get simpler than this. Serves 6. Prep time - 5 minutes or less, cooking time, 30 minutes.

Ingredients
1 Can of cream of broccoli soup (you can use chicken / mushroom or whatever, but I like broccoli/celery)
1 Can of baby clams
1 big can of tuna packed in vegetable oil, drained
1 lb of parisienne potatoes, or 1 lb of diced potatoes
1 TBSP chopped fresh chives or green onions
3 slices (about 1 TBSP) of ginger
1/2 TSP white pepper
1/2 TSP seasalt
1/2 Cup of milk (reserved til the end)

Instructions
Prepare your canned soup according to package instructions (with milk and water, usually), add clam juice from the can and whisk until smooth over low heat. Add potatoes and ginger, bring to a boil, then simmer for 15 minutes with the lid almost closed. Remove ginger after the potatoes are done.

Open the lid, turn the heat up to medium high, and add the rest of the ingredients including the extra milk. Stir until everything is heated through. Soup should be thick enough to coat a spoon.

Yammy Sheppard's Pie

This is as far as you can deviate from the typical sheppard's pie and still call it that. The sweetness of the yam off-sets the saltiness of the meat very well, and since it requires neither a huge helping of butter nor an addition of chicken broth, it's actually healthier on top of being tastier.

This takes HOURS unless you turn on a few burners at once. But it's tasty enough to warrant an afternoon in the kitchen, and it's pretty much guranteed to NOT fall apart the moment you dig in, and yet still moist and juicy. Pair this with a salad and some light veggies and you're set for dinner. Feeds 8 teenagers, 10 adults.

Ingredients
1 package of lean ground beef (a couple of pounds, give or take)
1 package of pork sausage (uncooked, about 6 big ones)
1 & 1/2 CUP of Italian style breadcrumbs
A generous helping of Green Pepper Tabasco sauce
1 TSP sea salt
1 TSP fresh ground pepper

1 CUP of chicken broth
2 CUPS of sliced white mushrooms
2 TBSP butter
1 TBSP flour
1 red onion, chopped to bits
5 cloves of garlic, mashed

4-5 big Yams (about 7 inches long) steamed, peeled and mashed

Instructions
In a large mixing bowl, combine beef, sausage (out of their casing), breadcrumbs, tabasco sauce, salt and pepper. Work the ingredients in with your hands until evenly mixed. Brown, in batches if necessary, in a pan, until MOSTLY cooked. Mash a little with a potato masher to expose the raw bits. (This will help the pie "glue" together in the pan as it cooks) Pack the mixture into the bottom of a roasting pan / casserole dish, as tight as you can make it. If you overcooked the meat at this point the whole pie would crumble later, but it won't affect the taste. I prefer the roasting pan because it gives the sides a nice crust, but it's really up to you.

Saute the onions in the same pan, adding 1/2 cup of chicken broth slowly to draw out the oil, while scraping the bottom of the pan to add to the sauce any browned bits from the meat. When the onions start to brown, add garlic, and water if necessary to keep it moist but not dripping. Evenly top the meat with the mixture.

Saute mushrooms in butter, 1/2cup of chicken broth and flour. Cook until it's not drippy and mushrooms are cooked. Layer this on top of the onions.

Lastly, evenly smooth on mashed yam, and brush with buttter to prevent it from drying out. Pop it into a 375 degree oven and cook for about 30 minutes. If you want browned sides, make it 40. The yam is NOT going to brown, but will stay moist and hot and keep all the moisture inside the pie.

Mom said it was the best shepperd's pie she's ever had. :)

Easy Beef & Broccoli

An all-time favorite. My version is made with Chu-Hou sauce, which makes the seasoning bit that much easier. If you have time to fancy it up, you can drizzle the end result with a little bit of cayenne pepper mixed into sesame oil, and sprinkle with sesame seeds to complete a 3-color effect.

Ingredients
1 big steak, any cut. The leaner it is, the better of a time you'd have pounding it flat (I say big, but I used a typical 8oz.)
2 heads of broccoli
2 TBSP Chu-Hou Sauce (It's sweet but has a slightly grainy consistency)
A dash of dark soy sauce
Fresh ground pepper
Cornstarch
Peanut oil

Instructions
Drech the steak in cornstarch. Cover between two pieces of plastic wrap (or cut into smaller pieces and use  ziploc bag), and pound flat (to, say, 1/4 inch or so) with a meat tenderizer. Cut into bite sized pieces. Prepare the spinach by trimming the leaves, then cut the stalks into slanted dollars, and bite sized flourettes for the tops.

Heat pant to medium high, and stir fry beef with a bit of oil, the Chu-Hou sauce, pepper, and a dash of dark soy sauce. As soon as the beef is seared on both sides, remove from pan to prevent over-cooking. Add broccoli to the same pan (to soak up all the flavours) and stir fry until stalks are darker green but still crunchy. Put the beef back in, stir, and thicken the liquid with more cornstarch if necessary.

The whole process shouldn't take you more than half an hour. Serve over rice.

Spiced Caramel Walnuts

I used walnuts, but it can work with pecans and almonds. I find peanuts have too strong of a flavour for this recipe.

Ingredients
1 flan container of walnuts halves (or pieces)
1 Cup of sugar
1/2 stick of butter (not half a block. Half a STICK. That would be 1/8 of a block.)
1/2 TSP nutmeg
1 TSP cinnamin
1 TSP seasalt or kosher salt

Instructions
I used a large skillet for this. Turn the heat up to medium and dump the walnuts in. Toast, stirring and tossing constantly, until some oils are released and they're crunchy, about 15 minutes. Transfer to a bowl to cool.

In the same skillet, dump in the cup of sugar and salt. Cook until mixture is slightly bubbly and a light caramel brown. Turn the heat all the way down and stir in butter, cinnamin and nutmeg. When the whole mixture looks homogenous, stir in the walnuts and turn to coat. If you want a grittier sugar texture, you can stir in another 1/4 cup of sugar. Now you can either let the whole thing cool in the pan or pour it onto a square of waxed paper.

Makes a great party snack. For alternate versions, you can add maple butter or other spices. (I've even added crushed bits of ginseng in!) If you want to make poppycock, double the butter add some store-bought packages of pre-popped popcorn.

Oven "Fried" Chicken

You'll need a baking sheet for this recipe. It's so easy you can get children involved. Feel free to experiement with the flavour of yogurt.

Ingredients
14 Chicken drumsticks (You can do this with chicken legs too, just not so many)
1 Cup of plain or vanilla yogurt
1 Cup of all-purse flour
1 Cup of Italian style breadcrumbs
1 TSP cayenne pepper
1 TSP salt
Pepper and other dry herbs, to taste
(You can also add crushed nuts. I like pistachio, personally.)

Instructions
Preheat oven to 400.

This is going to be MESSY. Dip chicken in yogurt, rubbing in with hands. Try not to put thick layers on, but thin, even layers.

Mix all the dry ingredients together. Drench chicken in the dry stuff until evenly coated. Brush a baking sheet down with oil, and lay chicken out evenly. Pop it into the oven for about 20 minutes, and it's done!

It's great finger-food, healthier than its fried counterpart, and the skin actually turns out crispy. The yogurt keeps the chicken moist and keeps the breadcrumbs from burning in high-heat.

Gibbets and snouts?

My grannie used to make this for me when I was a kid. Once in a while I like to make it again - the BF refuses to touch the stuff, so I substitute with chunks of sausages. (What the heck did he think sausages were made with? Real meat?)

Ingredients
2 Cups (about 1 package) of chicken gizzards and hearts
3/4 Cup all-purpose flour
1/4 Cup italian style breadcrumbs
1 slice of ginger
1/2 cup of chopped green onions
Lee-Kum-Kee chicken marinade, to taste
1 Cup of chicken broth
1 small tin of tomato paste (optional)
Enough peanut oil to cover the bottom of your fry pan

Instructions
If you're feeding this to guests (poor guests!), chop the meat into little unrecognizable bits about 1/2 inch cube sizes. Drech in flour and breadcrumbs, add ginger and a spoon of green onions, then fry for 15 minutes. It takes longer to fry innards than it does to fry meat.

Drain the oil out, add a cup of chicken broth, a dash of chicken marinade, and the tomato paste (I used this as a pasta sauce). Stir, turn the heat down to medium low, cover and let simmer for 15 minutes. Throw on the rest of the green onions at the last minute just to warm them up.

Serve over pasta or brown rice. And if anybody asks, it's chicken.

Beef. Aged. Raw.

Spotted something on metafilter today: Argentina on Two Steaks a Day.

I have an obssession with steak. Canadian beef is supposedly amazing, yet hard to get in Canada. We ship all our best beef to the States, then we get sort of ok American beef in return. I like my steak blue: it had its brief stint on the grill, enough to earn its beauty marks, yet is perfectly warmed and raw on the inside. It bleeds all over my plate and once made a date quite sick; though that's another story.

Without the luxury of an indoor grill and stuck with the Toronto by-laws (no balcony BBQ-ing) I pan-fry my marbled steaks in a cast-iron pan, and feels guilty about the lack of grill-seasoning. Broiling will work too, but nowhere near as quick as a searing cast-iron pan.

Beef is the one food that needs practically nothing - rub it with a little salt and pepper and the meat does the rest. It renders a chef quite useless, aside from providing adequate trimmings like shoestring onion rings. But oh...how I'd love to visit Argentine to have the asado.

Perogies with Bacon and Chives

This is pretty high in fat, but consider this: you're splitting 8 slices of bacon among 4 people, with no added fat (aside from the bacon itself). How bad can it be?

Ingredients
8 Slices of thick-cut bacon, cut into 1 inch pieces
2 TSP fresh chopped chives
1/2 TSP sugar
24 frozen perogies (any kind. )
2 pinches of salt

1/2 Cup mayo
1 tsp of minced garlic, or 1 clove
1/2 TSP bacon dripping

Instructions
Put water on boil and boil perogies. When they all float to the top, cook for another minute, then lift and drain. If they're sticky, brush a plate with a bit of olive oil before laying them down.

Cook bacon on medium heat in a heavy pan with sugar until lightly crispy and most of the fat is rendered out. Line a plate with paper towels and lay the bacon down to cool. Reserve 1/2 TSP bacon dripping in a separate bowl. (we need it cool)

Pan-fry perogies in bacon dripping, sprinkled with a couple of pinches of salt, 4-6 minutes each side, until lightly browned. Don't try to flip them UNLESS you can feel it lifting from the pan as you turn them, and they won't stick. You might need to do a couple of batches.

Dipping sauce: Mix minced garlic (yes, raw) into mayo, whip in bacon dripping, and sprinkle with chives. If you have time, stuff bacon pieces into the sides of the perogies where it's soft. If not, just scatter over the top evenly.

Easiest Guacamole EVER!

I figured this one out last night, after realizing that my local supermarket doesn't have cilantro OR serrano peppers. (How could they NOT have cilantro? How? It's a Sobey's!) Guacamole always kinda scared me, since it usually requires popping raw onions and garlic into your mouth. (great date food!) This recipe won't stink up your breath.

How to pick a ripe avocado: DARK, dark green. Almost brown-ish. Gives a little when lightly squeezed. If it doesn't give at all, it's unripe. I usually buy them green since nobody carries them ripe, then leave them in a bowl on the counter and check every morning until it's brown. Then I stash it in the fridge and have it that night. (They don't keep well in the fridge!) Usually people recommend that you put it in a brown paperbag to ripen, but I tend to forget about them when I do that. I'm that scatterbrained. :p

The proper way to open an avocado: cut length-wise around the seed in the middle, twist open, then quickly chop the knife down onto the seed, twist, and discard the seed. With a ripe avocado, you can turn the peel inside out and just plop the flesh into a bowl. Save the peel.

The art of the guacamole - don't measure ANYTHING. It's all eye-balled. Using prepared salsa guarantees that you won't need to chop anything. Pick a mild one and adjust the spice factor with Tabasco sauce.

Ingredients
flesh of 2 ripe avocados
Half an avocado peel worth of prepared salsa - plain jar will do
1 squeeze of half a lime
2 pinches of garlic salt
1 dash of fresh pepper
As much green pepper Tabasco sauce as you want

Instructions
Sprinkle salt, pepper, and add lime juice to avocados in serving bowl. Mash. (I used a potato masher) Throw in the salsa, mix.

Taste test. It might be enough if you want it mild. Add tobasco sauce, then mix with more salt to taste, if necessary. Serve with plain tortilla chips.

Stu and I polished the whole thing off as dinner, but as a snack, you can probably pass this around 4-5 people. If you need to make more, do batches as needed, because no matter how much lime juice you throw on avocados, it's still going to oxidize and turn brown - eventually.

30-Minute Chicken Marsala

Nope, it's not your typical chicken marsala. It involved no chopping, no dicing. I make this when I have absolutely no time. You just need one large skillet.

If you have a rice cooker, start the rice before you start cooking. Dinner in 30 minutes!

Ingredients - serves 2
4 chicken thighs (skin on/skin off. Your chioce. I like skin off.)
1 TBSP light oil
1 TBSP unsalted butter
1 TSP garlic salt (or garlic powder and salt to taste)
1 TSP marsala powder
1/2 TSP chilli powder
1 TBSP flour (any kind you have)
2 CUPS frozen mixed vegetables (I used Asian mix)

Instructions
Heat oil and butter on medium heat. Cover chicken with the spice mix, and stir fry. 15 minutes. Life chicken from pan, add flour, stir. Add frozen vegetables. Cook for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Last 5 minutes, return chicken to pan, let heat for 5 minutes. That's IT! Tastes divine spooned over rice. You can double the portions for company (it really does taste good enough and looks pretty good, depend on the veggie you use), and it freezes ok. But since it only takes 30 minutes to cook, why bother?

Smoked Salmon Skillet Quiche

You will need a skillet, preferably deep, since this stuff is going to RISE. You'll also need a whisk, a basting brush, and a pizza lifter type of tool to lift the slices out. VERY decadent. ;)

Ingredients
12 regular eggs or 10 large eggs
1/2 TBSP seasalt
1 TBSP President's Choice Creamy Mild Seafood Sauce
1/3 cup table cream (18%)
2 TBSP light oil (not olive or other strong flavours)
1 TBSP butter
1 package fresh smoked salmon, pre-sliced
3 TBSP cream cheese at room temperature
1 TBSP capers, drained

Instructions
Preheat oven to broil. Oil your pan with a brush. Oil the SIDES as well as the bottom (otherwise the quiche would cling and not rise). Turn the heat to medium. Add butter.

Whip eggs, cream, salt and seafood sauce together until lightly frothy. You can employ a mixer for this job, but a whisk will do. Pour into oiled, preheated pan, immediately turn off the heat. Wait 5 minutes and check for doneness with a fork - you want it done 50% from the bottom up. Press 1/3 of the smoked salmon halfway through the egg in an even layer, then add blobs of cream cheese and half the capers in the same manner.

If you have a plastic handle on that skillet, wrap it loosely in foil, shiny side out. Shove the whole lot into the oven, spinkle with more capers (the heat will dry them out a bit) Cook, uncovered, unti done, but NOT brown. Not even LIGHTLY brown. It should've climbed to twice its original size by now. Remove from oven, and let sit for 5 minutes before topping with remaining smoked salmon. If you top it the moment it's out of the oven, the salmon would cool it down a little and not allow the middle to continue to cook, and you'd end up with cooked samon topping. Ick.

Serves 6 as an appertizer, or 4 as a main dish. This can keep in the fridge for ONE day, max, tightly wrapped. Do not freeze. It'll reheat just fine in the microwave, but I suggest peeling the salmon off, heat, then put the salmon back on.

Make-ahead Honey Roast Beef

Roast beef will always taste better 2 days after it's been taken out of the oven. So why bother waking up early and making it on the day of? This will actually keep well in the fridge up to 5 days.

You will need: Roasting pan with rack, pastry brush, wire whisk, and a really big knife. I chose the round roast because the stuff is always cheaper and on sale, at around $4 a pound. You can feed 6-8 people with about 4 lbs or so.

Ingredients
For roast:
4 LBs beef roast - bottom round roast, but really anything as long it's boneless. Confused? Check this page.
1/2 cup peanut oil
1/2 cup honey
1 TBSP Coarse salt
1 TSP cracked pepper

For gravy:
1 TBSP beef bouillion powder
1/4 cup flour
2 Cups water

When reheating:
2 TBSP oil
1 Cup chicken broth

Instructions
Make sure beef roast has been sitting in room temperature for at least 2 hours. Preheat oven to 350F.

Place the roast in a rack, lining the bottom with foil. Mix salt, pepper, and oil together, and brush ALL over the roast. You might have a bit left. Save it for later.

Roast beef, uncovered, for 1 hour. Lower heat to 250, roast for another hour and a half. Take it out and check it by pushing it with your thumb - you should meet with some resistance, but still have some bounce. and brush it down in a mixture of honey and a bit of oil/salt/pepper. Now put it back in and roast at 300 until it burns. You heard me. Roast it until you can smell burnt honey, then take it out. (Yes, it's underdone. If we cook it to medium now, then by the time you serve it it'd be overdone.)

Tent with foil for the next 20 minutes, remove the oil and let sit 20 minutes. Carve and collect the juices in a pan. Put in the gravy ingredients, turn heat up to medium, and whisk until very thick. Add more flour if it's not. I used whole wheat flour, so it might not be as nice if you use refined. It's okay if it's just a bit thicker than you normally like it - we're going to thin it out later. Pour over sliced roast beef (use a bowl), making sure that it's ALL over the beef, not just on the outside. Cover, let cool, and refrigerate.

When you're ready to serve, heat the pan with oil, add the beef and gravy, and when it starts to sizzle, deglaze everything with chicken broth. I served this with roasted (frozen) vegetables and mashed potatoes.

You CAN freeze the whole package if you like - just make sure it's defrosted overnight in an airtight wrap before you toss it onto the pan.

Taro - the purple potato

You can find it in Asian markets. They look like small potatoes, dark brown, with horizontal crossing lighter lines. The flesh is purple and starchy with a distinctive sweet taste. The leaves are often used to wrap sticky rice and such (no, they're not "lotus" leaf. It's actually taro leaf) with pork and duck egg.

What nobody EVER tells you is that the taro is dangerous. When eaten raw it has the effect of a bee sting on a person who's alleric to beestings - your tongue swell, your face itch, and in some people the effect is exaggerated as to cause suffocations. Don't say I didn't warn you. When you're cooking taro, PLEASE make sure it is cooked all the way through.

Taro Rice Pudding
3/4 Cup tapioca pearls - the small kind sold in little bags in China town
6 Cups water
1 Can coconut MILK (shake the can. The kind that sounds watery will not do. You want the kind that's already mixed, not the ones with juice on the bottom and oil on top.)
2 Taro
1 Cup of sugar or more to taste
1 pinch of salt

Instructions
Steam taro until a fork goes right to the middle with little resistance. Peel and dice. Soak in a mixture of 1 cup water, 1/2 cup sugar, and coconut milk.

Cook tapioca pearls in water on boil with a pinch of salt, stirring constantly. If you don't stir it, it will not only stick to the pot's bottom, it'll stick to one another and form a lumpy mess. When the white dots in the middles of the pearls start turning transparent, add sugar and keep stirring. If it's getting too thick, add another cup of water. When a wooden spoon is inserted, it should come out with a transparent sticky liquid on the spoon along with a few pearls.

Stir in taro mixture, and serve either immediately hot or chilled overnight in the fridge.

Cheesy Chicken Bake (mildly spicy)

I made this last night. Leftovers are also good in a cold chicken sandwich - just add lettuce. I made this in a roasting pan, but ideally, it should be baked in a lasagna dish. You can add any spices you want in the flour mix. It just has to WORK. That means no cloves.

To tell you the truth, anything that works on a pizza could work in this dish. Just mix whatever you want to add in the pasta sauce - mushrooms, peppers, pineapple, bacon...enchovies. Take your pick. I probably dropped in a near 1/5 of a bottle of tabasco sauce, and it still wasn't spicy enough.

Ingredients
16 boneless, skinless chicken thighs
1 CUP shredded mozzarella cheese
1 CUP store bought tomato based pasta sauce
1/2 Cup oil (optional: peanut oil)

3 CUPS of flour (optional: whole wheat)
2 TBSP BBQ seasoning powder
1 TBSP salt
1 TBSP dried basil
1 TSP Coriander, marsala powder, paprika, sage, etc. (optional: really, just throw in whatever you like)
1/3 of a tin of Pringles in Sour Cream & Onion flavour, crushed (optional)
Tabasco sauce
2 Eggs and 2 TBSP water

Instructions
Heat the pan on medium, add half the oil. Preheat oven to 400.

Put 1 Cup of flour in the first bowl.  Whip the eggs, water, and tabasco sauce in the 2nd bowl. Combine 2 Cups of flour, all dried spices, and the chips, in the 3rd bowl.

Dip chicken, 1 piece at a time, in bowl 1, 2, then 3. Try to keep one hand dry, one hand wet to prevent clumping.

Fry chicken on both sides, until the flour mixture is set, but the chicken is NOT cooked through. You're only frying it to keep the flour ON the chicken. Change the oil halfway through.

If using a roasting pan, line with tin foil. If using a ceramic baking dish, just dump the chicken in. Put 8 pieces along the bottom, layer with 1/2 cup of pasta sauce, then sprinkle with 1/2 the cheese. Repeat with a second layer. Put a lid on, and bake for 25 minutes. After 25 minutes, open the lid and let it bake for another 10 minutes while the cheese browns a bit.

Feeds 8. Serve with brown rice and salad.

Sinful Hot Chocolate

Nothing like home-made hot coco on a cold winter night. Like this one. You need a double boiler. Some recommend putting instant coffee into their hot coco, but I like cayenne pepper instead.

Ingredients - serves 4
4 cups of whole fat milk
1 cup of chopped pure dark chocolate
1 cup of sugar (this really depends on the sweetness of the chocolate you chose - best to add later to taste. Go a bit under though, since marshmellows add sweetness)
1 TSP cayenne pepper
16 pieces of marshmellow (regular sized ones that you usually put over a fire)

Instructions
Heat Milk on low (preferably in a doulbe boiler), to almost hot but not bubbling. Add chocolate, whisking to make sure that nothing's sticking to the bottom. whisk in sugar and cayenne pepper. Pour half the mixture into cups.

Using kitchen scissorts (or a knife, but scissors make it easier), cut marshmellows in halves. This creates a moist area for them to fizz when they hit the liquid. Top the hot coco with marshmellows, then pour the rest of the coco on top. Garnish with bits of chocolate left over from the bar chopping you were doing earlier.

You can substitute the cayenne pepper with 8 TBSP of cream de menthe instead, for a minty coco.

The perfect prime rib roast.

Prime ribs went on sale at my local sobey's last week, and I just couldn't resist. Prime rib? Half price? I'm so there. We got a $40 5 lb roast for $20, and the bf helped me roast it since I wasn't home. The prep work, however, makes all the difference. Usually, this REQUIRES a thermometer, but with this method you can pretty much get away with not using one since we're slow roasting.

You will need a roasting pan with a rack, as well as something to carve that giantic hunk of meat with.

Ingredients
Prime rib of beef - this is the best cut (imho) of beef. It's usually the most expensive. It's worth every penny. Count the bones on the bottom for serving sizes - 1 bone = 2 servings.
Salt
Fresh cracked pepper
1 TBSP of flour
a tin of prepared gravy in any flavour that you like
Onions, carrots, celery - go nuts.

Instructions
Make sure that the beef is at room temperate - leave it out, covered, for four hours. Then season it on all sides with salt and pepper, and that I mean liberally. Sear with a little bit of oil, 2 minutes per side. Save the drippings.

Pre-heat oven to 200. Put the veggies on top of the rack, so that you actually have 2 racks - one made of steel, and one made of crisscrossing carrots. Sprinkle a bit of salt and pepper on top. Transfer the beef from pan to roasting pan, FAT SIDE UP, BONE SIDE DOWN. If it's having trouble staying up, prop it with an onion. Roast, uncovered, at 200.

For each pound of roast you have, roast for 45 mintues. During the last 30 minutes, take it out of the oven and cover with foil. The roast is still cooking out of the oven as the internal temperature rises. Then remove the foil, transfer to a plate and let the temperature drop a bit for 15 mintues. If you carve BEFORE letting it rest, all the juices will leak out and you'll have a dry hunk of beef.

While the beef is resting, lift the veggies out of the pan, spoon out the top layer of fat, and put the pan over the stove at medium low heat. Add flour and stir until dissolved. Add the tin of gravy and whisk constantly so the flour won't clump.

Carve off the bones on the bottom, then carve the roast perpendicular to the grain. It should have a dark browned exterior, and a gradual fade in to pink in the center. Serve with the roasted vegetables and a big hunk of yummy garlic mashed potatoes.

Just remember NOT to ever overcook this! If you enjoy "well-done" beef, this recipe is not for you. You can get away with using much cheaper cuts of meat if you want it well-done. If you spend the money on a prime rib, you're insulting it by over cooking it. Prime rib is meant to be rare to medium rare. Usually you'll find instructions such as "roast at 350 for 25 minute each pound" on the packages, but with that method you'd end up with a well-done exterior and a BLUE interior, since we're talking about a roast about 7 inches across and at least 5 inches high.

Asian meatbone soup *gluten free*

I hosted another dinner for the kids yesterday, and as per usual in a group of people, there are dietary restrictions to follow. I had one vegetarian and one that requires gluten-free food. I caved in to the demands of one and not the other (I practically created a separate meal for her though), and made a nice meatbone soup without starch.

Entire cooking time is three hours, and preparation time is 5 minutes. :) Or less. It can feed 20 people as a main course with rice, and really, it'd cost you $6 to make, tops. You can buy meats bone-in and save the meatbones in the freezer.

This is a "Chinese" version of the soup. Alternate version of the soup exists in Japan, Korea, Vietnam. It all depends on the spices you choose to throw in.

Ingredients
6 pork back ribs
1 pkg of frozen spinach
5 eggs
1 1/2 TBSP coarse salt
1/2 TBSP black pepper
fresh/dried herbs to taste. (I used sage, oregano, tarragon)

Instructions
Use the biggest soup pot in the house, fill it up to 1/2 with water, and bring to a boil. Add the meatbones, add salt and herbs. Bring down to a simmer and let simmer for an hour. Add the pack of frozen spinach, wait another hour, then drop in the eggs and stir. Let it simmer for another hour and you have a great soup in a pot. Remember, if you take the bones out, it's not asian anymore. :p

My grandma used to serve this over a small scoop of rice to make it a nice hearty autumn soup.

Easy, huh. One of my singers had 5 bowls yesterday and I think she still wanted more, but wanted to save room for that veggie stirfry. :)

Eggy Surprise French Toast

This is easy, and kids love it. It's a very filling breakfast item though, so don't say I didn't warn you. It's a revision of the old french toast - crisper, and you can use fresh bread. I also took out the soaking process.

We visited Port Hope on Saturday, and bought some fresh maple syrup at the farmer's market, along with strips of smoked backbacon and farm fresh eggs. Mmmm. If you live in the city, chances are, there is a farmer's market less than 30 minutes' drive away. In Ontario there's almost one in every town; even south Etobicoke has a farmer's market on Saturdays, 8 AM - noon. I wholeheartedly recommend it.

Ingredients - serves 2
4 slices of bread, use whatever you have. Use fresh, not stale bread.
2 eggs
A sticky jam/butter. I used maple butter, but you can use nutella, whipped honey, jam, preserves...
1 pinch cinnamon
1 pinch nutmeg
1 TBSP icing sugar
As much fresh maple syrup as you dare

Instructions
Pre-heat oven (or toaster oven) to 450.

Using a cookie cutter - or a knife, cut a circle about 2.5 inches wide into middle of two slices of bread. Save the circles, and either toast or fry them in a bit of butter.  Glue, with jam, one slice of holed bread onto the slice of whole bread. Pop an egg into each hole, sprikle nutmeg and cinnamon on top. Bake until egg WHITES are set, but not the yokes. Cut off the crust,  cover with the saved tops, sprinkle with icing sugar, and drizzle liberally with maple syrup.

Why eggy surprise? You won't know there's an egg in it unti you cut into it. :)

All-in-the-pantry Orange Chicken

You can make it right out of the cupboard, with some fresh or frozen chicken. I used frozen chicken breasts from M&M. Anther thing - this works equally well if you have 2 salmon fillets or steaks.

Ingredients - serves 2, feel free to double
2 chicken breast halves
4 TBSP orange marmalade
1/2 cup flour
1 TSP cayenne pepper
1/2 tsp chilli flakes
1/2 cup chicken broth
Splash of Light oil
Sprinkle of salt & pepper
half a lemon

Instructions
Sprinkle salt, pepper and cayenne pepper over chicken. Dip in flour and pat off excess. Preheat pan, add chlli pepper, toast for a couple of tosses, then add the oil. Heat through, and fish out the chilli pepper flakes with a spatula. Brown chicken on both sides.

Microwave marmalade for 30 seconds, stir, and pour over chicken. turn to coat. Add chicken broth to pan, and lower heat. Simmer until chicken is cooked through, about 6 minutes per side.

Serve on a bed of coleslaw and squeeze lemon juice over top. Makes a great midsummer meal. Ever notice that the hotter the climate, the spicier the food? Spicy food actually helps you cool down.

Cheezy Chicken

I made this last night and Stu absolutely LOVED it. Think Chicken parmasean, without the tomato sauce (I HATE tomato sauce), and very little parmasean. :D

You will need a roasting pan (with a rack) and a large skillet for this recipe. Foil helps.

Ingredients
12 chicken thighs, bone & skin removed
about a cup of frying oil
2 eggs
1 TBSP water
1 CUP flour
1 CUP breadcrumbs

Seasoning mix
1 TBSP Salt
2 TBSP garlic powder
1 TBSP dried basil
1 TBSP fresh black pepper
1/2 TBSP parprika
1/2 TBSP sage

Topping
1 CUP grated mozarella cheese
1 CUP grated aged cheddar
1/4 CUP parmasean cheese

Instructions
Preheat oven to 450.

Prepare 3 bowls, and a plate. Divide seasoning mix into bowl #1 and #3. In #2, whisk eggs and water together to form egg wash. Heat some oil in the skillet to medium. Mix the flour into #1, and the breadcrumbs into #3. Now, get into rhythm. Dip into #1, pat pat, dip into #2, drip drip, flip a couple of times in #3, then off onto the plate it goes. Once you have four, start frying. You want to get a nice golden color on both sides, don't worry about cooking it all the way through. Keep working until all of them are nice and crispy on the outside.

A handy tip for a right hander like me is to work from left to right. Left hand goes into the egg-wash, right hand does the flouring and the covering with breadcrumbs. That way you won't get gobs of batter on your hands.

Line a roasting pan with foil, put a rack on top of the foil, then line a layer of chicken over top. If you have a large roasting pan, you should only have one layer; but I have a small one, so I did two. Cover with cheese, try to concentrate them on the middle of each piece of chicken, and off to the oven they go for 25 minutes until cheese is melted and slightly browned on top.

Serve with mashed potatoes and vegetables - it's a bit too dry for rice. If you cut leftovers into pieces, this can toss right into tomato sauce and pasta.

Oven Crispy Chicken

This is a low fat version of fried chicken. :) Who am I kidding? This is just a easier version of fried chicken, and you get the side dishes along with the main course. I try to make a lot of throw-it-in-the-oven-set-a-timer-forget-it recipes. It gives me reading time.

For this recipe, you will need a large roasting pan and a frying pan. I'm partial to the chicken thigh because it gives the MOST flavour out of any other parts of chicken, and you can always trim the big pieces of fat off if you're concerned about the fat content. You can always substitute with breasts, but I can't promise that it will taste as good.

You'll also notice that I cook in large quantities. Why? You can always freeze leftovers and microwave them much later. It takes just as much time to cook a meal for 2 as it does a meal for 8, and if you can make 4 meals for 2 in the same amount of time, why not? It's also cheaper to buy family packs.

Ingredients - serves 8
8 Chicken thighs
1 Cup all-purpose flour
2 eggs
1 TBSP water
1 Cup Italian style breadcrumbs (I used PC)
1 bunch (about 8) carrots, cut into halves (lengthwise, making some very thin carrots)
1 whole onion, coarsely chopped
3 cups chopped button mushrooms
1 TBSP salt
1 TBSP fresh ground pepper
1 cup of light oil (grapeseed)
4 TBSP garlic butter

Instructions
Preheat oven to 400, along with the roasting pan. Use 3 bowls, a rack, and lay out the dipping ingredients:
1st bowl: flour, sprinkled with salt and some pepper (use a dash of each)
Wire rack. Use dried papertowels if you don't have one.
2nd bowl: 2 eggs whipped with the spoon of water.
3rd bowl: breadcrumbs.

Coat chicken with flour, then lay on wirerack. You want to do all 8, let it sit for a few minutes, then do the eggwash and breadcrumb coating - it helps the flour stick. Preheat pan to medium, and start heating up some oil. Use a piece of onion to check if it's hot enough; if it sizzles, it's hot enough. Lightly fry chicken, 3 minutes per side, making sure the sides are fried as well, to make a nice crispy coating. Don't crowd the pan and don't overcook. Leave on a wire rack with some papertowels to soak up excess oil.

Take the roasting pan out of the oven, and cover the bottom with garlic butter. Lay on the onions and mushrooms, add the salt and pepper, then make a lettice rack with the carrots on top. No, you don't have to weave them. :) On top of that, evenly lay the chicken. Sprinkle remaining breadcrumbs through the cracks. Now throw that all in the oven and roast, open, for 30 minutes. After 30 minutes, check to see if juices are running clear from the chicken by poking a small skewer in it. If it's pinkish, throw it back in for another 15. Then check again.

Once it's done, turn off the heat, and let it sit for at least 10 minutes so that juices can settle. I served this with mashed potatoes, but you can serve the veggies over rice with the crusty (breakcrumbs!) pan sauce. I made this last night and the guinea pig (*cough* boyfriend) loved it.

Spiced Coconut Tapioca Pudding

The kids loved this. The key is not adding too much sugar when you're cooking it, so that people can add as much icing sugar as they want later. I made these in mugs because it made it easier to serve around the couch, but you could make this a elaborate dessert with moulded cups. Just remember to oil the moulds a little with light oil (grapeseed) before you pour pudding in to make sure nothing STICKS.

Ingredients
3/4 cup of tapioca rice
5 cups of water
1 can of coconut milk
1 TSP ground cinnimon
1 TSP nutmeg
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar

Instructions
Bring water to a boil, and cook tapioca (boil then simmer) until completely cooked. You can tell by their transparency - you need to cook them until the white dot in the middle disappears. Combine sugar and spices in a bowl, then add to the pot. Sugar helps to break up the spices so you don't get any lumps, but even if you do, it's ok. Don't panic. It still tastes good. After the sugar mixture dissolves, add the coconut milk. Reduce the mixture by simmering until it is thick enough to coat a spoon.

Scoop into individual mugs, cool, and refrigerate for at least 2 hours. Top with a spoonful of icing sugar and serve. It has a mild flavour, and doesn't scream sugar like most desserts. The inspiration is from the Chinese Sai Mich Lo, a tapioca coconut cold soup.

Chicken Soup with Leeks and Rice

This takes HOURS. The result is extremely tasty, however, and well worth the trouble. Serves a whole lot of people - I lost track because one of the kids who was over had 5 servings on his own. Make this in the biggest pot you own. I used a 12 L pot, and it was almost not enough.

Ingredients
3 Chicken Legs, fat trimmed and skin removed
1 Box of Chicken broth
1 TBSP salt
5 Cups chopped leeks
1 1/2 cups of fragrant rice
3/4 pot of water - add as necessary.

Instructions
Bring the water to a boil, add chicken and salt. Turn the heat down to medium, close the lid, and let it boil for 30 minutes. You're trying to make a nice base for everything else. Set the chicken aside. Add rice to the pot, stir, bring to a boil again, then simmer until rice is cooked. Add the rest of the ingredients (strip the chicken and throw that in as well) and simmer until you can't distinguish individul pieces of rice in the soup. Add water as you go along to thin it out, stirring often.

You should end up with a creamy texture and a soup that holds the heat in. Stu calls it "atomic chicken soup" because it'll burn your tongue even if you've already left it on the counter to cool for 15 minutes. I like to garnish it with chopped green onions.

This is actually my version of the Chinese congee, which is a traditional breakfast food in China, served with fried breadsticks. It is easy on the stomach; it's practically pre-digested, with all that boiling. It warms you up on a cold winter day, and wakes you up on a warm day with some lettice and peanuts.

Roasted Garlic Butter

This keeps well in the fridge for a maximum of THREE days. I generally make it as I roast other things in the oven, since bulbs of garlic take up very little space. This stuff makes a nice aromatic garlic bread without the bite, or serve with your steamed veggies to add a little somethings special.

Ingredients - this was enough to serve 5 at my party, and we had leftovers.
2 Bulbs of Garlic
2 TBSP Garlic butter
Olive oil, salt to taste

Instructions
Preheat oven to 450. Cut the tops of the garlic off with a serrated knife - expect to take about 1/4 to 1/3 of the top off. If you see any cloves that are still completely enclosed, give them a little cut to expose them. Place on a square of aluminum foil, top facing up. Drizzle lightly with live oil and a pinch of salt. Wrap the garlic with the foil, by folding up the corners, and roast for 25 mintues.

Unwrap partway, leaving the tops exposed. Using a washcloth, or anything else that would shield you from the heat, squeeze the roasted garlic into a small bowl. Mixed in chopped garlic butter, and whip with a fork. Mmmmm.

Soya and Garlic Spareribs

I don't live near Chinatown, so it was out of the question to get bean paste in a hurry. Instead, I used a mixture of dark and light soya sauce, and a lot of braising, to get the right flavour. You can cook this right in a large skillet.

Ingredients
2 strips of spare ribs - approx 1.5 ft long each, cut into squares
1 bulb garlic, peeled and crushed
1/2 cup dark soya sauce
1/2 cup light soya sauce
1 TBSP spicy garlic sauce (or just hot sauce will do)
Light oil, such as grapeseed

Instructions
Preheat pan to medium heat, add oil, and lightly fry the garlic until JUST golden. Set aside. Brown the squares of ribs on each side to seal in juices. Pour the leftover oil out, and add the rest of the ingredients. Close the lid and lower the heat to medium low. Briase for 30 minutes, tossing a couple of times to ensure even doneness. Chop up the garlic set aside earlier and toss with the pan sauce.

Easy, huh? Serve this over rice, and some steamed broccoli.

Spicy Mini (pan) Burgers

What do you do if you don't have an indoor grill? You can always make pan-fried burgers. I serve these with tortillas instead of the usual burger buns.

Ingredients - makes 8 mini burgers
2 lbs lean ground beef (you can use mix of any meat, except lamb - it's too fatty.)
1/2 cup breadcrumbs
1/2 cup shredded harvati
1/4 cup ground parmasean
1 1/2 TBSP salt
1/2 TBSP paprika
1 TBSP dried basil - you can use fresh, but double the amount
3 cloves chopped garlic - minced if you want a milder taste
Light oil - grape seed oil / peanut oil

Instructions
Combine everything but the meat into a large mixing bowl. Mix in minced meat with your fingers, separating the clumps as you go. Combine with your hands, careful not to PRESS or overmix. (You'd end up with one tough burger.) Separate into 2, then 4, then 8 meat balls. Coat the outside of each with breadcrumbs, flatten to 1/3 inch patties.

Heat pan to medium high, then add the oil - always. If you leave oil to heat with the pan, it would burn before you put anything on it. Fry the burgers, 8 minutes or so on each side, half covered. To check for done-ness, cut one open. If you must, make a few extras, and use those to gauge how cooked the other ones are. It is very important, when cooking ground beef, that everything on the inside is well done. Fish them out onto a paper-towel covered plate, and let it sit for 5 minutes before serving.

Chicken Liver Pate

This is modified from an old Jewish recipe. An ex-boss (who's around 75 I believe) kept a recipe file from her grandmother, and I took a copy of it. I though it tasted a bit blend so I added more spices. You will need a roasting pan / baking sheet, a food processor or one of those handheld processors. Beware - the handheld one will take you ages.

Ingredients
1 1/2 lb chicken livers
1 whole onion
1 TBSP fine ground seasalt
1 TBSP garlic salt
1/2 TBSP pepper (ground fresh pepper works best)
1/2 TBSP paprika
EVOO

Instructions
Preheat oven to 400. Using kitchen scissors, cut fat and rough parts off the livers. Place evenly on a baking sheet and sprinkle with pepper and half the salt. Roast until tops are brown, approximately 30 minutes.

FINELY chop onions, and saute with EVOO. Cook until caramelized. Add the rest of the spices. Using a food processor, blend onions and livers together. If it's too rough/dry, add a bit of EVOO. Blend until desired consistency. Scrape into mould and refrigerate.

Best served over plain Matsah bread.

Leftover Shepherd's Pie!

Ok. So if you use my shepherd's pie recipe, you'd have enough for 10. Maybe even more, if you use a bigger baking dish than the one I had. So what do you do with the extras? I used a package of frozen pastry, and made mini cornish pasties. It's actually VERY simple.

Mash the shepherd's pie until it's just a heap of mixed meat and potatoes. Take a sheet of pastry and roll it out to 1.5 times its original size. Cut into 4 pieces, and put a scoop of shepherd's pie in it. You can use an ice cream scoop. Flatten it, and fold the piece of pastry to a triangle. Seal with a dab of water (press to seal it - like playdoh.) and brush the top with melted butter, and stab a fork through the top for steam to escape. Repeat with as much shepherd's pie as you have left. Bake in a 400 degree oven until top is golden brown, about 30 minutes. Let it cool on a wire rack for at least 10 minutes before serving.

You can wrap them individually after they've completely cooled and freeze them if you like, but pastry tastes best when they're fresh. Reheating in the oven is ideal; microwaving them will cause the pastry to get soggy. These are so good you might even consider halving the shepherd's pie recipe and make it into pastie filling instead - it's a perfectly acceptable appertizer.

Juicy Shepherd's Pie

You should use a glass / ceramic baking dish for this, but you could get away with using a roasting pan. I do that a lot. You will also need a large skillet for cooking the ground meats in.

Ingredients - serves 8 as a main dish
2 lbs ground beef
1 lb ground lamb
1 TBSP garlic salt
1 TBSP Italian style breadcrumbs
1 TSP fresh ground black pepper
1 TSP paprika
1 red onion - chopped
1 head of garlic (yes you do need this much), roughly minced
2 cups sliced mushrooms
1/2 tin of beef gravy (you can use gravy mix and water)
2 cups mashed potatoes (leftovers work best - with butter)
1 cup sliced baby carrots
1 cup frozen peas
EVO, Salt and pepper to taste

Instructions
In a large bowl, mix beef and lamb together by hand. Add garlic salt, breadcrumbs, pepper, paprika, and mix in well using fingers. Set aside. Preheat oven to 400.

Saute onions with a bit of salt in some EVO; add carrots, peas, garlic and mushrooms when they start to caramalize. Cook until carrots are cooked through. Using a slotted spoon, lift mixture out and set aside, leaving a bit of oil on the pan. Cook the ground meat until no longer pink, add the onion and mushroom mix back in and toss with beef gravy. Reduce until mixture is thick and sticks together - add a little flour if necessary.

Pack the mixture into the bottom of the bakin dish, sprinkle with remaining garlic. Cover with mashed potatoes, and slide into the oven. Bake until potatoes are starting to brown, about 25 minutes, depending on how moist the top layer is. Let it sit in its juices for at least 15 minutes at room temperate before cutting into it.

If you're not picky about the meat sticking together, you can use more gravy, and use all of the pan sauce without reducing. It actually makes a much juicier, moise shepherd's pie, but the pie will not hold its shape for very long; it'll most likely fall right apart the moment it hits your plate. But if you're not picky on how it looks, a shepherd's pie that falls apart actually tastes BETTER.

Chicken a la King

You will need a ceramic baking dish and a frying pan. If you don't have a ceramic baking dish, you can get away with using a small roasting pan. If you don't have a certain ingredient - pan sauce, or veggies - just substitute with chicken broth and frozen vegetables.

Ingredients
Leftover chicken (I had 4 chicken thighs)
Leftover pan sauce/juice/soup/water from cooking the chicken
Leftover veggies served with last night's chicken
1 can of Campbell's Cream of Chicken Soup
2 cups of sliced white mushrooms
1/2 of a red onion, chopped
2 cups of fragrant rice. You can use any rice you want.
splash of EVO
salt and pepper to taste

Instructions
Preheat oven to 400. Put all the leftover stuff in the baking dish, and throw it in the oven. Let it heat while you prep the other ingredients. Saute onions and mushrooms with some EVO on medium heat - use a bit of butter if you want to spoil yourself silly. Set aside. Boil some water in a kettle. Heat the cream of chicken soup on low heat in the pan.

Take the chicken out of the oven, and if not stripped, strip the chicken. Discard bones. Roughly chop chicken. Pour two cups of rice into the baking dish, cover with pan sauce, veggies, and chicken soup. Now add hot* water until you have enough to cover the rice with 1/3 inch of liquid on top. Put a lid on that and bake for 25-30 minutes.

When that's done, it should be very moist. Mix in the chicken, mushrooms and onions, adding salt and pepper to taste. Pack tightly, and put back in oven for another 10 minutes to dry the top out to create a crust. Leftovers never tasted so good!

This is an ideal recipe for using up leftover turkey and gravy. You can substitue cream of mushroom/celery/broccoli/etc for different flavours; you can also use a different mushroom. There are a few things you have to watch out for. First, make sure you don't put the chicken in with the rice to cook - the water will dry it right out. Second, the water must be hot when it pour it down the cream, otherwise it'd simply separate into chunks of soup. Third, don't burn the soup while it's in the pan. Since we're not adding any water, burning it would be extremely easy to do.

Tomorrow's forecast: I'm making shepherd's pie tonight with leftover mashed potatoes. Mmmm.

Honey Garlic Short Ribs

Braised, not baked. This is real simple. All you'll need is a frying pan big/deep enough to put everything. You could, conceivably, make this in a soup pot. For an alternative recipe, halve the garlic, and substitute mustard. To make it real fancy, garnish with mustard seeds.

Ingredients - serves 4 as an entree
6 pork short ribs (they're about 12-14 inches long, and 1 1 1/2 inches wide) cut to 3 inch sections
1/2 red onion
1/2 head of garlic, crushed and roughly chopped
1 cup of water
2 TBSP honey
1 chicken boillion cube or equivalent chicken soup powder
Flour or potato starch
Garlic salt, pepper, EVO to taste.

Instructions
Sear the ribs, fat side down first, until browned on all sides. The idea is to fry the fat out of it. Put aside. Drain the pan of all but 1 TBSP or so of fat. Add a splash of EVO, pinch of salt & pepper. Sautee the onions until lightly caramelized.

Dissolve honey in water, add chicken cube. Add garlic salt if it's not salty enough. Turn the heat to medium high, add garlic, layer the ribs on top, add the honey mixture, and close the lid. When it starts to boil, turn the heat down to medium low, and let it simmer for 25 minutes. Lift the ribs out and set aside.

Turn heat up to medium high. Add potato starch to pan sauce, a teaspoon at a time stirring constantly. You shouldn't need more than 3. Let it boil, then simmer until sauce coats the spoon. Toss the ribs in the sauce, and serve.

Leftover sauce from this recipe is beautiful spooned over mashed potatoes.

Egg Foo Yong (Vegetarian, simple)

My grannie used to make this for me when I was a kid. *sigh* I miss her. This would be a western equivalent of a scrambled eggs with vegetables.

Ingredients
6 Eggs
2 1/2 cups frozen vegetables (I used long green beans and carrots)
4 cloves garlic
2 TBSP olive oil (or more, if you're not using a non-stick pan)
2 TBSP light soya sauce
Chicken broth (optional)
1/2 TSP pepper (optional)
1/2 TSP salt (to taste)

Instructions - takes less than 15 minutes!
Peel and crush garlic. Heat olive oil on medium. Add garlic, sprinkle with salt and fry until ligh brown on both sides. Lift the garlic out, mince, and set aside. Add frozen vegetables, cook w/o lid for approx 8 minutes. If it gets too dry, pour in some chicken broth or water. Add eggs directly to pan, scramble and mix until eggs are lightly cooked - LIGHTLY! Add soya sauce and mix in. Remove from heat, add garlic to the pan, and put a lid on it. Wait 10 minutes, and voila! The steam finishes the cooking, and your eggs are light and fluffy. Now just spoon that over a bowl of rice and splash with a dash of hot sauce and some sesame oil and you're in heaven.

There's something magical about eggs cooked in broth with soya. It's like...instant Chinese food. Mmmmm. Reminds me of home.

Yay! Pipes!

The repairs took 2 hours, but eventually the plumber found the right pipes. There will be cooking in my kitchen tonight.

We had KFC chicken and fries for dinner, with Coke. I'm really going to have to join that boxing gym to work all this junk off.

Updates to Kitchen Halted.

My kitchen sink is inoperative. The U pipe have rusted out, and I noticed it early Sunday morning. I was going to post a new recipe today from Sunday night's experiement. But Sunday night's experiment turned out to be Korean food downtown. I had meat bone soup (my favorite. I really ought to stop ordering the same thing everytime.) Stu had had pork on rice. When I remember the name of the place, I'll definitely post it - we stuffed ourselves and the bill was $12, with tip, that's $15. Not bad for an authentic Korean dinner with sidedishes.

Some things you just don't know how much you'd miss until it's gone away...such as smooth kitchen plumbing.

Perfect Mashed Potatoes

You will need a steamer for this. My cookware set came with one, which is basically a pot with holes on the bottom that fit over another pot. Keeping that in mind, you can use a big collapsable steamer that fit over pots. You will also need a potato masher - an acrylic one will do, and you can get it at pretty much any corner store for $3 or less.

Ingredients - serves 4
5 white potatoes, chunked
2 cups water
1/2 TBSP salt
1 TBSP minced garlic
1 TSP chicken broth powder or one chicken bouillion cube
1/2 cup cream
1 TBSP margarine

Instructions
Steam potatoes on high heat. It should take about 20 minutes. if a fork go right through it, it's done.

Remove the steamer from the pot, along with potatoes. Turn the heat down to medium high, and add the rest of the ingredients to the potato water. Once everything is mixed / dissolved, pour into a jug. Now turn the heat off, and put the potatoes back into the pot. Mash with a masher, adding the sauce as you mash. You should use up all of the liquid, and end up with a smooth, creamy, yummy pot full of mashed potatoes.

You can easily double this recipe, and use left overs for shepard's pie.

Easy Chicken Curry

Anyone can make this - it's practically college boy proof. All you'll need is ONE HUGE POT and a few hours. Don't skimp on the time; it's definitely worth it. I haven't served a person who doesn't like this curry. I make this when I have a lot of people over - this feeds 10, but it's easy to double/half/triple. Serve over plain steamed rice.

Ingredients - serves 10!
6 chicken legs (full - skin and bones and all. If you want to cut down on fat, peel the skins off. Then again, if you're trying to lose weight you won't be eating this.)
8 Yukon Gold potatoes, peeled, cut into large chunks*
1 bunch of carrots, peeled, cut into large chunks
1 tin of chicken broth
1 tin of coconut milk
2 TBSP chinese hot chilli oil with seeds**

Spice MIX
1 TBSP salt
3 TBSP curry powder
1/2 TBSP paprika
1/2 TBSP pepper

Instructions
Open the tin of coconut milk. If you bought the right stuff - authentic thailand coconut milk - there should be a thick layer of pure white cream on top, and liquid underneath. Scoop out a spoon of the cream from the top, and start heating it up on medium. Layer 3 chicken legs on the bottom - SKIN SIDE UP OR IT'LL STICK, sprinkle with half the spice mix. Then lay 3 chicken legs on top, skin side down, sprinkle with the remaining half. Close the lid and let the chicken cook in its own juices for about 15 minutes. Now turn the chicken so that the lower layer is now the upper layer. Close the lid again and wait another 15 minutes.

Add chicken broth, the rest of the coconut milk, the potatoes, and enough water to cover the chicken. Bring to a boil, and turn the heat down to a simmer. Stir occasionally to make sure nothing is sticking. Let simmer for about 45 minutes. Read a book nearby and make sure it doens't boil over. Fish all the chicken out into a bowl, and remove the meat. It should be falling off the bone at this point. Discard the bones, and put the chicken meat back in the pot. Add the carrots. It's all ready when the carrots are soft. Add salt to taste. Lastly, add the Chinese chilli oil, 1/2 TBSP at a time until desired heat. Remember, you can add. You can't take it away. It should be thick enough to stay on the spoon, nevermind coating the spoon.

*Don't use white potatoes! If you do, you'll end up with a VERY THICK curry with no potatoes in it. It'd be potato paste when all's said and done.

**You can buy Chinese chilli oil in Asian supermarkets. It usually look like it's full of pepper seeds, and red in color. It's FIERY. If you can't find it, use red chilli paste. You want something that doesn't have much flavour (some are sour, sweet, etc.), but just give the curry a kick. Something with too much flavor would interfere with all the spices you already have in that pot.

One thing I love about this recipe is that it turns into a solid if you put it in the fridge. So if you have leftovers - and you WILL - just put it in a big tupperware box, and store it in the fridge overnight. The next day, scoop them into meal-sized chunks, and wrap with shrink wrap, then cover loosely with another layer (prevents freezerburn), and freeze. You could be eating it for up to 3 months. Just heat it in a skillet on low heat and serve over rice.

Pantry Seafood Pasta

You will need a saucepan, and a pot for boiling water for the pasta. A strainer is helpful, but you can always just use a lid.

Ingredients - Serves 4 as a side, 2 as main course
4 cups of spirali pasta (you can substitute with penne or macaroni.)
1 tbsp salt
1 tin of smoked oysters
4 strips bacon
1 tbsp dried chopped chives. (if using fresh, use 2 tbsp)
1 clove garlic, minced - optional
1/2 cup cream (you can use milk.)
1 tsp enchovy paste (I use Beck's. And this is MANDATORY. Doesn't taste the same without it.)
EVO (Extra virgin olive oil) to taste.

Instructions
Fill pot with water, bring to a boil on high heat. Add pasta and salt, and cook to al dente. I leave the lid off, and use a LOT of water - twice the pasta. You can techinically leave the lid on, but make sure you keep an eye on it or it'd boil over and leave a huge mess. After you drain it, DO NOT rinse the pasta. The extra starch on the top will help the sauce stick to the pasta.

Cook the bacon in the pan until crisp. Leave on a paper towel so they'll stay crisp. Leave 1 tbsp (or so) of dripping in the pan, and add the enchovie paste. Stir until dissolved. In a bowl, mash the oysters with a fork. add a splash of olive oil if it's too dry. Mash in the garlic if using, and add the dried chives to let it soak in the oil. Throw it all into the pan. When the garlic start to sizzle, add the cream, stirring to thicken. Roughly crush the bacon to bits.

Toss pasta with the sauce - it's it's too dry, add EVO until desired consistency; toss bacon bits in at the very end. You can throw in some parmesan if you like, but the enchovy paste make this very flavourful.

This recipe usually take as long as the pasta needs to cook. About 25 minutes.

Honey Garlic Chicken with Parisianne Potatoes

For this recipe, you will need a large saucepan and a roasting pan with a lid.

Ingredients - serves 4
8 Chicken Thighs (you can use legs, breasts ... any meaty part)
1 small bag of parisianne potaotes
1 Red Onion, chopped
1 head of garlic
4 TBSP Honey
2 TBSP EVO (extra virgin olive oil)
1 TBSP salt
2 1/2 cups mushrooms, chunked (cut into quarters. Leave the stems on)
1 can of chicken broth
1 cup of cream (I use 18%. You can go as low as 2%...skim is not recommended - the sauce won't thicken.)

Instructions
Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees fehrenheit.

Steam the potatoes until JUST tender. Don't overcook it! To check for tenderness, stick a fork in the potato. If it meets no resistance, it's cooked.

In a large skillet, caramelize onions on medium heat with olive oil. Peel, crush and chop the garlic. In a cup, mix honey, chicken broth, and cream. Add mushrooms and honey mixture to onions. Let simmer, half covered, until mushrooms are wilted.

Pour half of the mushroom mixture into a roasting pan. Add chicken in 1 layer - if the chicken doesn't fit, get a bigger roasting pan or use less chicken. Pour the rest of the mixture on top of the chicken, spread the garlic, and lay the potatoes evenly along the top. Put a lid on it, and put it in the oven for about 25 minutes. After 25 minutes, take it out, take the lid off, and test. If juices run clear (not pink), it's cooked.

It should come out moist, tender, and full of yummy flavour. I like to pour the sauce back into the pan to thicken it a little with a bit of flour, but at dinner parties I like to bring the whole roasting pan to the table. It stays HOT until the end of the meal, and the potatoes soak up a lot of the sauce when it's in the oven. YUM. You can also prep this ahead of time, leave it in the roasting pan until it's ready, or leave the leftovers in the pan and shrimk wrap it. The next day just throw it back into the oven and reheat @ 300 with the lid on.