to post/not to post

this is something i'm still deciding. writing about food isn't doing it for me these days.

in the meanwhile, i'll leave you with these. because they are awesome and they make me smile.

cherries!

before i say anything else, let me say this: always wear gloves when pitting cherries.

you'd think i would have learned my lesson at work two weeks ago, when we spent the entire morning pitting cherries for cherry chocolate pie, and i somehow felt it would be fine to forego latex gloves. i was very, very wrong. by the end of the pitting session, i was left with fingernails and cuticles so stained that it looked like i had been spending my free time rummaging through fresh corpses. this look lasted for days. it was gross. i felt dirty.

so, when i decided to make some homemade cherry jam last weekend, did i think to wear gloves? no, of course not! why would i ever choose to follow simple rules of logic? that just wouldn't be me.

and here i am, days later, still trying to scrub the last bits of red cherry juice from my skin.

the payoff, at least, was some damn good jam which i have been enjoying with toast almost every day since.

i've made simple jams and compotes before without a recipe, but since i rarely bake or cook with cherries, i decided to follow a recipe to avoid any fuck-ups. i used this one, because i love david lebovitz, and because it looked pretty simple and straigthtforward and non-recipe-ish (you'll understand when you read it). i used, like, twice the amount of lemon i should have, which left my jam with a very noticeable tang, but otherwise, it's great. next time i'll exercise some self-restraint so that the cherry flavour really shines.

aside from cherry jam, i also made a foray into the world of cherry CLAFOUTI.



clafouti has always been a dessert that's intimidated me, and i don't know why. it's the simplest thing to make, and so very tasty, yet i've never tried to bake one until recently. i think it's the custard-like consistency it's supposed to have that scares me...i'm always afraid the textures of my custards aren't right, even when i've been reassured they're perfect. french pastries in general intimidate me, and excite me, and put me into this parisian-phobic mindstate where i'm all like, "am i even doing this right??! are you sure?? will the french ever forgive me for bastardizing their perfect culinary gifts??!?" it makes no sense. but i worship the french (from a foodie standpoint, at least). and they scare me.

so this is the recipe for the clafouti i made, which is a random mash-up of googled recipes made to align with what my fridge had to offer me:

-roughly 2 c cherries, pits in (apparently leaving the pits in heightens the cherry flavour, and it's the traditional way to go)
-1/2 c 35% cream
-3/4 c skim milk
-1/2 c sugar
-3 eggs
-1/2 tsp almond extract
-1/2 tsp vanilla extract
-1/4 c flour

butter a 10" pie dish, sprinkle it with sugar (extra sugar, not the 1/2 cup reserved for the custard!), spread the cherries around over the dish. beat everything else together and pour over the cherries. bake at 325 F for 30-40 mins, or until set and slightly golden. i, on the other hand, set my oven to 375 by accident, which is why the outside edge baked up so brown and the middle is so pale. but i kind of liked it that way. it was a nice contrast of textures.

you're probably wondering by now why i had so many cherries at my disposal to begin with. it's cuz my dad bought a couple bushels full of black cherries the last time he went to the market. thank god for a dad who will gift extra food! i am always a very willing recipient.

plums: i've liked you for a thousand years

remember plumtree?



i had drinks with some of my oldest and best lady friends last night, and we for some reason had this band on the brain, after not speaking of them since childhood. see, we had this thing in elementary school where we gave each of the girls in our grade a nickname based on fruit - because, in the mind of a 5th grader, this is an awesome and totally logical thing to do. we remembered that one of us was named plumtree, after the band we didn't really know much of at the time (considering we were probably about 10 years old and didn't know our asses from our elbows), but had heard of due to the talkings of older brothers and sisters who informed our ideas of coolness. i think my name had something to do with strawberries. i was always doomed to strawberry shortcake comparisons because of my red hair. such is the life of a ginger.

aside from this random recollection, plums have played a huge role in my eating as of lately, too. they're slowly taking over my life, one sweet, juicy bite at a time. i've been craving them like mad, and i bought a giant bag of perfect little yellow ones at the farmers market last weekend that i've been munching on almost constantly since. so, on saturday morning, i decided to make something a little special with the plums i had left over. i made classic pancakes with yellow plum compote, basil, and maple syrup.



this pancake recipe is my mom's, and it's the easiest to remember and yields awesome results.

-1 egg
-1 c milk
-1-2 tbsp melted butter
-1/2 tsp salt
-1/2 tsp baking soda
-1 c flour

mix it all up and pour into a hot, greased pan. cook, flip, cook, done. perfect pancake.

as for the plum compote, i pitted and sliced about 8 small yellow plums, and cooked them down in a small frying pan with 2-3 tbsp water, 2-3 tbsp sugar and 1/2 tsp vanilla. these quantities are really rough and can be tweaked depending on the sweetness of the plums and the desired consistency. i cooked the peaches down for 15 mins or so on med-high heat, because i like mine to have a texture between an applesauce and a jam. a little runny but still meaty, y'know?

once it was done, i spread the compote on the pancakes, sprinkled it with some fresh chopped basil, and drizzled the pancakes with maple syrup. amazing. basil is really great with a lot of fruit, and this fact is so overlooked! mint is paired with fruit all the time, and when you think how similar basil is to mint in terms of flavour, it all makes sense.

basil isn't the only herb that's rad with fruit. rosemary is great with cheddar in apple pie crust, and thyme works really well with peaches and plums. i test out random combinations all the time - some work and some don't, but experimentation is the only way to get really comfortable with food. as someone who has no formal culinary training but works in the industry nonetheless, a lot of what i learn comes not only form what i pick up on the job, but from random disasters/miracles when cooking at home in my own kitchen.

but i digress...to continue on the herby/plummy tip, i recently made creamy polenta tarts topped with roasted red plums, thyme, and a drizzle of honey. they were so rich and so good and they looked pretty hot, too.



to make the shells, i used the savoury dough recipe from my last blog, cut it into rounds, and fit the rounds into muffin tins. i baked them at 325 F until golden. at the same time i roasted some red plums with a little brown sugar, until hot and juicy and tender, and tossed them with a little more sugar and some thyme once done.

while the tart shells were baking, i prepared the polenta. i dunno about you, but i never make polenta according to strict ratios. i just keep stirring water into the cornmeal over the stove until it's the consistency i like. i made it a little firm, because once it was done, i stirred in a generous glug of 35% cream and a couple of dollops of mascarpone cheese for extra creaminess. but wait. that's not all! i also stirred in some diced and pan-fried PANCETTA, along with all the drippings, to give it even more flavour. just when you though this dish wasn't fatty enough...

finally, i filled the tart shells with the polenta mixture, topped them with the roasted plums, and garnished with a sprig of dried thyme and a drizzle of honey. i haven't decided if this dish is one i'd consider savoury or sweet. but i don't care. it's smack in the middle and it's rad just the way it is. in the future i might make these polenta tarts topped with pulled pork and bbq sauce, or some kind of rich vegetable ragu. they're all-purpose and can be served with pretty much anything delicious on top. they will become a staple in my current repertoire, i think. despite the protests of my waistline.

a weekend of desserts

last saturday and sunday were a mess. two family events, two days, two desserts for each. a.k.a. mad baking, and mad lack of time with which to complete said baking. a very enjoyable and wholesome and exhausting couple of days. but i should plan ahead more thoroughly next time.

for tim's family, i made some simple but yummy apple tartlettes.



the savoury pastry is what makes these amazing. mix 1 1/4 c A.P. flour, 1 tbsp sugar, and 1/4 tsp salt. use a pastry blender to mix in 1/4 c butter and 1/4 c shortening, both cold and cubed. then mix in 2 to 3 tbsp water to bring it all together. it's really fast and easy, and it doesn't get tough (because of no eggs!) i cut out dough rounds and fit them into cupcake tins, filled them with a mixture of chopped apple, white & brown sugar, cinnamon and a bit of flour, topped them with a simple rolled oat/sugar/melted butter crumble, and chilled them until the pastry was cold. because pastry is always flakiest when the fat is kept cold! then baked them at 325 C for half an hour to 45 mins, until golden and crispy.

i made a bigger free-form gallette with the leftover pastry, apples and crumble. we kept that one at home for ourselves. a reward, if you will, for all of our efforts.



also made some peanut butter chocolate squares, which are basically an alternate take on the classic hello dolly square. in a lined 8" square pan, i pressed in a basic graham crumb base (about 1 1/2 c graham crumbs, 1/4 c sugar, and 1/4 to 1/2 c butter). over the base, i spread a cup of dark chocolate chips, half a cup of peanut butter chips, half a cup of crushed peanuts and a cup of shredded coconut. then i covered it all with a can of sweetened condensed milk, and baked it at about 325 till evenly golden on top. the quickest dessert ever, i swear.



for my family, i attempted a dark chocolate, espresso and pistachio tart, which didn't quite work to my liking. i tried pressing a crust of oreo crumbs and ground espresso into a fluted tart shell, knowing perfectly well in the back of my mind that it would likely crumble once i tried to remove it. and it did. but the layer of dark chocolate ganache over the pistachios held its shape, so i just snapped the whole thing into pieces like a brittle and served it as if i meant for it to be that way. quick thinking saves dessert failures. changing the name from "tart" to "brittle" made all the difference. sometimes you gotta fake it to make it.



and, finally, because it was my cousin julia's 5th birthday, i was obviously obliged to bake some adorable little cupcakes. cuz that's just what little girls' birthdays deserve. they didn't quite turn out the way i had planned aesthetically, but cute nonetheless. i somehow managed to misplace all my most prized piping tips (BUMMER! and still not found), so i had to use a spreader instead to ice them old-skool style. and i didn't have time to make the fondant shortbreads i was gonna bake to top them, so i piped some designs on parchment in merckens chocolate and placed them on the cupcakes once they were dry.



the awesomest part of these cupcakes, though, is the icing. the pink are strawberry, the orange are creamsicle (YES, CREAMSICLE!) and the yellow are lemon. i cannot give away the recipes, sadly, because they belong to my work, but you'll just have to believe me when i say they are the best. and if you want some, you should order a dozen from us!

first veg!

LITTLE BABY EGGPLANTS!



i left my house this morning tired and irritable and hungover, wanting nothing more than to crawl into a hole and die. i was too lazy to even pick up the watering can on the way out the door, fully intending to ignore everything and everyone till i was home, but with one glance at the garden i noticed these dudes staring back at me! and i was instantly awake and happy and no longer regretting the barfest that was the night before. amazing.

also, CILANTRO SPROUTS! that bare patch from my last post is no longer so empty.



so adorable. gardening is turning me into a huge loser. rather, a bigger loser than i already am. but i'm okay with that.

the garden: redux

i said i'd write about it eventually, so here i am: the garden! tim and i rescued a tiny plot of land located just outside our basement apartment door, between our home and the neighbours'. it doesn't get a ton of light, and the soil was in extremely poor shape, so i didn't have high hopes for any growth on the outset. but a little tlc made it more than suitable for the thriving plot we have going now.

before we planted, the soil needed a LOT of work. it was very dry and rocky and neglected. and totally full of garbage. straws, bottle caps, wire bits, cigarette wrappers, miscellaneous chunks of broken plastic. all buried just inches below the surface. we tried to clear it out as much as possible, and turned in a very thick layer of black humus to try to revive the soil a bit. we watered it every day for a few days to get some moisture in there, and then planted our seedlings. two months or so later, we've gone from this:



to this!



i'm pretty proud of the improvement, considering i have very minimal gardening experience. my parents always grew tomatoes and basil in the backyard when we were growing up (like true euros do), but not much else. the whole thing is an experiment to me, to be honest, but i'm learning a lot through trial and error and observation. we've been adding and subtracting plants as we go along, to fill up space or replace plants who've already come to their season (for example, our lettuce, which was ready to pick a few weeks ago). it's such a rewarding feeling to put your hands in the soil and help something grow and see a tangible, edible, delicious result in the end. i can't wait till our veggies are ready to go.

so let's take a look at some plants...

here we have two sage plants on the left, mint on the back right, behind our very sad-looking parsley plant. it seems to be sun-scortched and dry in spite of the relatively low light. in front of the parsley is golden oregano, and the bare patch to the left of the oregano will be cilantro. soon.



eggplant! my favourite veg. a fairly new addition to the garden, and the plants are sprouting little blooms, so it seems that all is well with these guys.



staked early girl tomato, cherry tomato and sweet bell pepper plants. they're tall and strong, but every time they grow a little bloom, it seems to disappear the next day. i will chalk this up to squirrels, possums or raccoons, because our area is infested with all 3. one of these bastards gnawed all the way through the stalk of one of our pepper plants and left it decimated. we will seek retribution, you can be sure of that.



celery, which we hope will fill out and get a little thicker. it grows quickly and is one of the sturdiest plants we're growing right now, so i have faith.



besides all these, we're also growing basil, lemon thyme (which i've roasted with chicken along with the golden oregano, and is AMAZING) and rosemary. we originally intended for the garden to be strictly herbs, but once we started with the first tomato plant, we couldn't stop adding veg.

a few days of rain are coming. the garden will be very happy.

quebecer cuisine

montreal was rad. saw stevie wonder (fer reals), hit up some galleries, walked the streets, shopped, drank, etc., and most deliciously of all, sampled some food.

the best:



classic poutine and a smoked meat sandwich. for breakfast, no less.

the worst:



lobster bisque the colour of rust and salty as sea water, served with two hollowed-out LOBSTER HEADS (!!) to casually observe me as i dined. laughworthy and barfworthy, all at the same time.

je me souviens.