Mishaps in the Kitchen

About two months ago my food processor that my parents gave me for my birthday in October suffered it's demise. The actual motor was fine but human error did the bowl in. I was making something on the stove and turned on the wrong element. This happened on the day I made a whole bunch of stuff including the hazelnut spread and hummus. For some reason I had the processor on the stove and put it down on an element thinking it was off. When I lifted the bowl up the bottom stuck to the hot element and long, glue-gun like pieces of plastic stuck from the element to the bowl. I had melted off all the plastic catches on the bottom and there was no way it would fit back onto the base.

Since it was less than 6 months old I called the company to order a replacement bowl. This is where it got a little weird. They told me to call the local supplier in Winnipeg (just a few blocks away as luck would have it). So I called and explained and the man who answered said he would have to call me back. A couple of hours later I got a call from a somewhat bewildered sounding fellow. He said, in a kind of disbelieving tone, that because this particular food processor model was made only for Canada (it was purchased in a special set from Costco) they couldn't replace it. Weird. I told my mom was happened and she was not satisfied - being the purchaser of the processor - so she talked to Costco, then the processor company, and then they finally put her back in touch with the Winnipeg supplier too. They thought it was completely bizarre and have never been told they couldn't replace something because it was "only made for Canada" so they made a few more phone calls.

Anyway, long story short, the supplier was very helpful and because my mom is very neat and tidy with her receipts, I was able to bring in the whole food processor with receipt and they're going to send me a replacement. No one mentioned how much this is going to cost...I never expected anything for free, I just wanted to buy my new bowl and be on my way. The man at the supplier said that the company is replacing it and he'll call me when it's in - I'm hoping maybe everyone forgot it was my own damn fault and they'll only charge me for shipping or something like that.

But the point of the story is, that I haven't wanted to make certain recipes without my trusty food processor. I brought it in on Tuesday so I'm hoping the shiny new one will be in within the next two weeks.

My other recent kitchen mishap was on Thursday night. I had seen an interesting recipe by Alton Brown to make "pasta" with eggplant. I never know what to do with eggplant when we get it in the box. I think I have to face the fact that I just don't like eggplant, except mixed in with spaghetti sauce or something. I decided to try this out though, by modifying things. In the end the dish consisted of eggplant and zucchini "noodles", roasted cauliflower, red chard stock, green onion, carrot, spices, and goat yogurt. The taste was...not good. I didn't want to waste all those veggies though so when I went to bed on Thursday night I was thinking of creative ways to save it. SOUP! I had two leeks in the fridge and since I've never cooked leeks before a cream of leek and veggie soup sounded good.

So Friday morning I chopped up the two leeks, a potato, and grabbed the rest of the veggies from my "pasta" mistake and combined them with four cups of fresh chicken stock I'd made last week. My plan at this point was to make a roux but we were out of milk, so I put the pot of soup on a low simmer and ran out to take care of some grocery shopping - this was around 12. I didn't get back to the soup until around 4. In three batches I blended the soup in the blender to make it smoother. I finally made a roux with 5 tbsp of butter, 5 tbsp flour, and 3 cups of milk. Just before adding it to the soup I tasted the soup and prayed the roux would fix things. It needed a little more bite so I added old cheddar and Olde English Cheese. I threw in a bit more salt and pepper and let it sit for a few minutes and they came back to taste it. It was amazing, just the right mix of veggies, not too thick, not too much cheese. It all came together beautifully.

I don't have a recipe for this soup because it was a save but check out everything that ended up going into it veggie-wise (plus homemade butter, stock, and GF flour, milk, and spices):

• 1/2 eggplant
• 1 zucchini
• 1 carrot
• 1/2 head cauliflower
• 1 green onion
• 5 red chard stocks
• 2 leeks
• 1 potato
• 4 radishes
• 1/4 of a red pepper
• 1/4 of a yellow pepper
  

I would not have been happy if I had to throw all of that out. Instead we have a lot of soup. I threw some in a large container and put it in the fridge and took 3 single serving size tupperware containers and put it in the freezer. This is great for lunch at work on days when I don't have time to grab anything else. You just let it defrost through the morning and microwave it when you're ready to eat it.

The moral of this post is that even mishaps can turn into new food processors and delicious soups if you put in the effort. :D

Now that my training is complete I have lots of new post ideas and I'm hoping to make a much more regular appearance from now on. The gardening season is approaching!

Mittens keeps a lookout for bugs...perhaps so she can snack.

Quinoa

I know. I'm long overdue for a new post. The good news is my busy month is almost finished. I've been doing a regular work week plus Saturday counselling training from 9-5 for the last two Saturdays. Home cooked meals worthy of posting have been few and far between.

The weather in Winnipeg has been phenomenal. It dipped a little cooler on Friday and Saturday but yesterday it started warming up again. Ryan and I took a long walk all afternoon along the waterfront and then stopped at The Forks to pick up some local honey, some sun-dried olives, and pork buttons - oh right, and some delicious fudge. We haven't had time to go to Frigs during the week so The Forks market is the next best (and closest!) thing. I had lots of choices for veggies because we got some great items in the box this week and we doubled our oranges, bananas and apples and it turned out to be the perfect amount.


As soon as we walked in the door after our day out I was ready to get started. We were both starving. I made a quick rub for the pork buttons and popped them in the oven at 350 and put the timer on for 40 minutes. While they started to cook I got the side dishes ready. I ended up roasting a bunch of veggies, sticking them in the oven on a staggered time-line so everything would be finished at once. My parents had me over for a turkey dinner on Friday and my mom gave me all the cranberry sauce. We had one granny smith apple left so I fried up the apple and tossed in the cranberry sauce to go with the pork. It was very tasty.

All day long I had this great idea for a side dish that would also get rid of a few pesky leftovers. Luckily, it turned out delicious. It was another pantry raid recipe but I would make it again the very same way.

Roasted Veggie Quinoa

• 3-5 red chard stalks, leaves and chard separated - stalks chopped into 1 inch pieces
  
• 1/4 of a butternut squash, cubed with rind cut off
  
• 8-10 asparagus spears, chopped into 1 inch pieces
• 1 garlic clove
• 3 green onions, sliced
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 1 pinch nutmeg
  
• 1/2 tsp paprika
• 1/2 tsp chili powder
• 1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
  
• salt and pepper to taste
• 1/4 cup feta or goat cheese
• 1/2 can of chickpeas (or more if you like chickpeas)
  

Preheat oven to 375. Take your chopped chard, squash, asparagus, green onions, and garlic and mix in a bowl with olive oil, salt, pepper, paprika, chili powder, nutmeg and cayenne pepper. Mix well and ensure all veggies are well coated. On a baking sheet place only the squash and put in the oven for 30-35 minutes. When 15-20 minutes remain add remaining ingredients and roast together.

While your veggies roast, take 1 cup of water and 1/2 cup of quinoa and bring to a boil. Let simmer for 15 minutes until the liquid has been absorbed. Remove from heat, fluff with a fork and add set aside red chard leaves torn up into bite size pieces. Mix around and let sit 5 minutes.

When roasted veggies are finished, combine in a large bowl with the quinoa and chard leaves and add the chickpeas. Add 1/4 cup of crumbled feta cheese and a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil and mix well.

The last two weeks also gave me some great veggies to use for chicken stock. I tossed in cabbage, celery, squash, onions, garlic, green onions. When Ryan and I walked in from work yesterday after it had been on the stove all day it smelled like delicious chicken soup. I'm going to have to make some tasty in the next couple of days.

Ode to Potatoes

I knew March was going to be a busy month and it definitely has been. I usually do most of my cooking between Thursday and Sunday because I'm busy all day and evening during the week. But I haven't really had much time. On Saturday I had a soccer game in the evening, on Sunday I went out for my Nana's 92nd birthday, on Monday I had my training course, and on Tuesday I had soccer again. So we have surplus veggies again, but I'll get through them. I picked up our F.O.O.D. Box today and because I've been so busy I didn't have time look online ahead of time to see what we were getting. Because it's so nice out I was able to leave it in the trunk while I worked (I usually take it in with me) and didn't see what was in it until I brought it home.

The things in the bags are endive, butternut squash, green beans, and lettuce. This was exactly the kind of stuff I was hoping for this week so it was a pleasant surprise. Yum yum yum.

Overnight my insulin pump wasn't working properly and I woke up with a very high bloodsugar and just generally felt queezy. Even though my bloodsugar has been back to normal for hours when I wake up really high I haven't had a chance to catch it early (because I'm asleep) and it really takes me out for the day. I haven't felt like eating much all day except a smoothie, some soup, and potatoes!

This blog is still pretty new so you may not yet know that I looooooooooooooooooooove potatoes, in pretty much all their forms. You can do so much with them and they're so easy if you have a bit of time. They're good for you and full of vitamin C and B, potassium, calcium, and iron. I almost never peel potatoes anymore because the skin is not only delicious, but is also excellent for you. Not to mention the sweet potato, which is high in betacarotene. But that's another post I think.

Even though I'm feeling kind of queezy still I was starving when I came home. So I made something that woudn't be ready for 35 minutes. I turned to good ole' oven fries, probably my new favourite way to eat potatoes. This is a pretty basic recipe, but give me a break, I'm sickly!


Spicy Curry Oven Fries
*Single serving

• 2 potatoes (I used red chieftan potatoes from our box)
• 1.5 tbsp olive oil
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp pepper
• 1 tbsp curry powder
• 1 tsp paprika
• 1 tsp chili flakes
  
• a pinch of chili powder for an extra kick

Preheat oven to 400. Chop potatoes into small wedges, about 8 wedges per potato. In a large bowl mix all ingredients and toss until potatoes are well covered and spices are well mixed. Since the potatoes should already have a coating of oil, you don't need to oil your baking sheet. Place potatoes skin side down (so the wedges are standing) in rows. Bake for approximately 35 minutes or until potatoes are tender. Enjoy with some honey dill sauce. If you want a recipe for honey dill here's an easy one. Take mayo, honey, and dry dill. Mix together until it tastes the way you want it too. Yay, you're done!

Back to the grind now.

Everything-But-the-Kitchen-Sink Spaghetti Sauce and Twice Baked Potato

As usual, I've been extremely busy. Somehow when we get our food box it always seems like sooooo much food to use in a short period of time but we always manage to get through pretty much everything each week. Since the last time I wrote I've been busy as usual with work and my counselling training and I've also accepted a new counselling position at work. I'll be split between two positions of coordinating and counselling and I'm pretty excited about it but I'm not exactly sure when I'll be starting. It also means not a lot of cooking has been going on.

When I was offered the job on Friday, Ryan and I went out to celebrate at our favourite Vietnamese Restaurant, Viva. I probably go there at least once a month, especially now that it's pretty close to our apartment. I always order the exact same thing; rice noodles with charbroiled pork and a chopped up spring roll on top - amazing and so simple.

Then on Friday we ended up going to The Keg. My aunt and uncle sent me a $50 gift card for Christmas and we never seemed to find the time to go use it so we had a bit of a "date night". Well, sort of. We walked to The Forks to buy some loose tea (mmmmm....organic peppermint!) from Human Bean and some sun-dried olives from Fentons - the reason I buy the olives from Fentons? They're only .89 for 100g. I was standing behind someone at Superstore today who bought a small container from the olive bar and paid just as much as I did for 350g of olives. Then we walked to the downtown Keg for dinner, which was very nice. The manager actually came over after I ordered to assure me the food I ordered was safe so I was impressed with that. We shared a spinach salad and I got a baked potato and sirloin and it was tasty. I only eat red meat once every couple of months...not because I don't like it but I sort of forget about it. It was a nice treat anyway. And after we walked home through the park by the river and then we watched Love Actually because Ryan had never seen it and I felt like something light. It was a nice relaxing evening for once.

On Sunday I went for an 11km x-country ski with my older brother at Sandilands Provincial Forest and didn't get home until 7:30 and Ryan was out for dinner at his grandpa's so no cooking again. I was so tired I just got Ryan to pick me up a bag of chips and that's what I had for dinner (with cream cheese on the side...mmm...healthy!) But yesterday I was feeling like using up some of the veggies in the fridge. I have a few different go-to recipes to use up everything in there but I felt like spaghetti yesterday. I literally go through my cupboards and see what veggies need to be used and toss 'em in. So here's my "recipe".


Everything-But-the-Kitchen-Sink Spaghetti Sauce

• 2lbs ground meat (I used a mix of beef and pork from Frigs)
• 1/2 onion, chopped (F.O.O.D. Box)
  
• 2 carrots, 1 sliced or you can use a mandolyn, 1 shredded (I just used a peeler) (F.O.O.D)
  
• 6 red chard stalks and leaves, stalks chopped and leaves torn into small pieces (F.O.O.D.)
  
• 1/2 can chickpeas
  
• 2 cloves garlic
  
• 1 tomato (F.O.O.D.)
  
• 1 can tomato paste
  
• 1 cup beef (or other) broth (I had none in the freezer so I used oxo powder)
  
• 1 handful fresh parsley (F.O.O.D.)
• 1 tsp each, paprika, coriander, salt, pepper, chili powder, red pepper flakes
• 1 bay leaf
  

In a large pan or pot cook the ground meat until no longer raw on med-low heat. You can remove the juices but I like to leave them in. Add the onions and garlic and cook until the onions are transluscent and fragrant then add everything else. Stir until it's all well mixed and then let it simmer for at least 30 minutes. I prefer letting it sit for an hour so the sauce reduces a bit and gets thicker, plus it gives a chance for the taste to really come out. And you're done!

This makes a good amount of sauce. I think we had about 3 cups leftover (but there are only two of us) so I always stick about two cups in the freezer and I have the other bit in the fridge since it makes an easy lunch. We pretty much only eat our spaghetti sauce one way - baked. I used sweet potato and buckweat soba noodles which only have to be cooked for 3 minutes and taste exactly like wheat flour noodles. I turned the oven to 350 and sprinkled on the asiago cheese that we picked up at Fentons a few weeks ago on top. Popped it in the oven for 10 minutes, and then put the broiler on high. Keep a very close eye at this point, it shouldn't take more than 5 minutes to have a nice cripsy cheesy top like so:


Lastly, I was just feeling plain lazy today and I was starving when I got home from work but didn't really want to make something with effort. I had a snack to tide me over but I decided to go for a good ole' potato. I love potatoes. They're so easy. I went for a twice baked potato with the last of the asiago cheese on top. This is a pretty basic recipe that's easy and is really good comfort food.

Twice Baked Potato - Single Serving

• 1 russet potato
• 1 tbsp oil
• 1 tsp butter
• 1 tbsp milk
• 2 tbsp chives
• 2 pieces bacon, cooked and smashed into bits
• 1 tbsp sour cream
• 2-3 tbsp shredded asiago cheese
  
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp pepper

Preheat the oven to 350. Wash your potato and pour the oil (I used olive) and cover potato. Bake for 1 - 1 hour 15 minutes. When finished baking split potato down the middle and use a big spoon to scoop the potato out of the skin and put it in a separate bowl. Try not to break the skin when you're doing this. Add the butter, chives, 1/2 the bacon bits (I like to put the rest on top after it comes out of the oven), milk, sour cream, 1-2 tbsp of asiago cheese, salt, and pepper and mash or mix with a fork. Spoon the mashed mixture back into the skin and fold it mostly closed. Sprinkle on extra cheese to your liking and bake for 10 minutes and then broil on high for 2-5 minutes, watching carefully. Let cool and enjoy!

Nom, nom, nom...worth the wait. It was devoured quickly.