A few weeks ago, while searching for Irish recipes for my St. Patrick’s day feast, I came across a recipe posted in celebration of Mardi Gras. I bookmarked it, and went along on my Irish expedition. With none of the anticipated ‘luck of the Irish’ I should naturally have, I found nothing that really piqued my interest. (Better luck next year?)
That weekend, I pulled out this recipe and decided it would be a great start to my discovery of Cajun food, with a new technique!
I should start a category for family recipe requests! This one comes, via Facebook, from my second(?) cousin.
I’ve had this recipe for many years now, but I never wrote it down. It wasn’t given to me – it was demonstrated to me, back in high school, by my high school BF’s Mom.
This dish was inspired by the combination of fennel and smokey, spicy sausage.
There’s something about the sweet licorice taste of the fennel, mixed with the salty, spicy, smokey, greasiness of the sausage.
Maybe I should have left out the greasiness part.
Continue reading Pasta with Smoked Sausage, Fennel and Arugula
Personal Challenge time!! Crème Brûlée is one of my very favourite desserts, so I had to learn how to make it!
Kitchen torch in hand, I was all set!
This combo gave me an excuse to mix three of my favourite things right now: custard, Scotch and lemon zest powder.
This month’s Daring Cooks challenge takes a stab at Peruvian cooking.
There used to be a Peruvian restaurant in Toronto that J and I liked quite a bit. They offered delicious ceviché, lots of great fish options… generally, quite a bit to choose from for us pescatarians. We were sad when it closed, and wondered where we would get our fix of Peruvian food…
I guess the moral of the story is that if you want something, get off your duff and try to make it yourself!
It all began when I made a recipe that claimed to be ‘Indonesian’. It was from a cookbook (that will remain nameless) that was culturally unaffiliated, and was generically boring.
I decided that it would be better to get inspiration from someone who actually knew about food in Indonesia, and since then I have been pestering her for recipes.
Something happened on the way to the last Daring Kitchen challenge…
I actually divided the challenge up, and did the work on three separate occasions. To accompany the tempura, I thought I would try making a soba noodle soup. I have long been a fan of the lovely Japanese soup broths I’ve tried, and figured it was time to try it for myself!! So worth it!
I have had Moroccan food on my ‘to-do’ list for EVER!!! The problem is that I didn’t know where to start, dish-wise. Instead, I decided that I would have to make my own Ras el hanout blend first… and since I didn’t have some of the ingredients, I just kept putting it off.
Not only did I actually make a first attempt at Ras el hanout, but I made my own harissa and a dish to actually use them in! Now I’m both excited by the outcome, and disappointed by my procrastination.
Noodle soups are one of my favourite things to have in the winter. It gets to be an addiction to slurp up the noodles and broth, with a hit of spice.
Funny I hadn’t tried to make many until this year. This time around, I decided to try making Tom Yum soup with some noodles added to make it into a meal. The results weren’t quite what I expected, but it sure did hit the spot!
I’m really just happy to have made it through this one alive! Funny how it sounded so easy at first…
This month’s Daring Kitchen post includes a serious of HILARIOUS (sarcastic) errors by yours truly. Somehow, we still ended up being able to eat most of what was prepared.
