November 19, 2013
A few weeks ago my friend and blogger Val of more than burnt toast and I went to micro bar bites on Water Street shortly after they opened. We love the compact space, sitting at the beautiful long wooden bar and had fun and delicious food prepared by the talented chef Evelyn Takoff. I especially enjoyed the small plate of roasted shishito peppers, a mildly flavoured Japanese chili pepper that is harvested while green but will turn... View Article
November 12, 2013
This roasted potato is a Swedish beauty first served at the Hasselbacken restaurant in Sweden (hence the name) a couple of hundred years ago, or so I hear. It’s a fun diversion from the usual potato dishes and quite easy to produce. The trick is to slice the potatoes thinly and down to about 1/4 inch from the bottom without cutting them right through. If you happen to cut one right through you can still... View Article
November 11, 2013
Most people love potatoes and for some, a meal is not a meal without them. This ubiquitous veggie is of global importance being the fourth most important food grown worldwide after corn, wheat and rice. Potatoes appear in every cuisine and sustained civilizations for thousands of years (Peru, Incas). Potatoes grow in a wide range of soils, climates and geographical conditions and to this day help enhance food security because they are easy to cultivate and calorie... View Article
November 7, 2013
No, not that kind of a wedgie. This is a wedge of crispy iceberg or head lettuce, served with blue cheese dressing and confetti of chopped vegetables. It’s one of my favourite salads. If you don’t like blue cheese (some don’t), serve it with another dressing that you like. I know that head lettuce went out of vogue a long time ago, when the baby greens were born, but someone revived its popularity with this... View Article
November 6, 2013
I hope you are cooking with squashes this fall. Don’t miss the season to use these beautiful and versatile fall vegetables when they are at their best. This season I have been cooking especially with Sweet Dumpling squash. Unlike other varieties, this one is easy to cut: its skin is not as hard as some of the other varieties and your knife will not be permanently jammed into it’s flesh. Sweet dumpling is a lovely... View Article
October 30, 2013
Sometimes I am in the mood for potato chips. It’s hard to avoid them altogether. If I happen to have a bag of good chips at home I am not beyond getting into it it once in a while. However, here is a better version of chips, using variety of vegetables to create a lovely melange of vegetable chips with or without oil. Commercial potato chips, after a few handfuls they lose the appeal and... View Article
October 23, 2013
Squashes are in season and make my head spin when I am at the market. So many varieties, colours, shapes and sizes. Needless to say I love them all and pile my kitchen counter with a few of these gorgeous things. What can I do? Vegetables are my “thing”. I get so excited I almost forget the weather is changing and it’s getting cold outside. There are the usual varieties of squashes, like butternut and... View Article
October 20, 2013
I recently jumped on the bandwagon for spoon appetizers, I wonder where they started. I liked the idea right away, when they first came into vogue, but it took me a while to follow this trend. Once I begun making them though, I was hooked. Yesterday I had the opportunity to make some pre-dinner appetizers and my inspiration was a lunch at Noble Ridge Vineyard and Winery prepared by Chef Darin Patterson of Bogner of Penticton restaurant.... View Article
October 20, 2013
People for some reason have a love-hate relations with brussels sprouts. They either love them or hate them. I was asked by a hostess recently to bring vegetables to a pot luck dinner and was told in no uncertain terms Not to bring brussels sprouts. Why is it I wonder that such a lovely veggie is so maligned. They are beautiful to look at, have significant health benefits, are easy to cook and at least... View Article
October 10, 2013
I am still buying wild mushrooms, can you blame me? They are in season. I am going on a mushroom foraging day soon with my friend Val of More Than Burnt Toast (Laura of An Uneducated Palate, when are you joining us?). Val and I have been everywhere this fall, attending restaurant openings, going to vineyard dinners, attending food and wine events, visiting wineries, eating at inetresting places and taking pictures, pictures and more pictures. We... View Article
October 5, 2013
Fall mornings are a fabulous thing. Who invented them? Morning hot chocolate on the patio is ever more enticing as we watch the fog lifts slowly off the lake to reveal the beautiful silver blue of early morning. Although we know it is coming, fall seems to arrive suddenly. One morning it’s summer, the next morning it’s fall. “Don’t remember summer even saying goodbye” says David Mitchel in Cloud Atlas. Suddenly the days are shorter and... View Article
September 29, 2013
I have already talked about the abundance of wild mushrooms at the market right now. This is the thing about seasonal cooking. The season is short and if you want to enjoy the bounty it means using the same ingredients in different ways for a while until…….. The King is dead long live the King….and new produce dominates the market stalls. I have featured wild mushrooms in Stuffed Zucchini, quesadillas and risotto and today in this gratin... View Article
