Stuffed Zucchini Au Gratin

Here's what's up: melting cheese on things. It's a well-known fact that melted cheese can make almost anything better. Just try and think of one thing that some kind of cheese is not good with. My love of cheese is what fueled yet another recipe. This week, I decided to take a standard stir-fry mélange of ingredients and put them inside a zucchini, then melt cheese on top. Thus: stuffed zucchini au gratin.

What I used:
3 zucchinis (Hillcrest Farm)
2 maple sage pork sausages (Getaway Meat Mongers)
1 diced tomato (Noggins Corner)
1 diced onion (Noggins Corner)
1 large hunk of cranberry cheddar (Foxhill Cheeses)
1 large sprig rosemary (Hillcrest Farm)

How I made it:

I began by boiling the pork sausages until the casings turned white, so that the meat would stay intact when I cut them into small cubes. It took a lot of will-power not to eat them right off the bat, as I have a very dangerous love-triangle involving pork and maple. After an epic inward struggle, I managed to pre-heat the oven to 350 and got started on the zucchini. First, I washed and trimmed them. Then I scooped the soft seeded middle out with a spoon, setting the zucchini shells aside on a baking sheet. I then diced the insides and put them in a bowl. Into the bowl went the onion, tomato, rosemary and sausage. I gave that a good mix, then piled it high into the zucchini shells. Then I put the wonderful little mounds of goodness into the oven for about 25 minutes. I then removed them from the oven just long enough to cover them with a thick blanket of grated cranberry cheddar. Back into the oven they went, for about 3 minutes. I then took them out of the oven, let them cool for a minute too and mowed down. Om nom nom.

Creamy Harvest Soup

If there's one thing that screams "Autumn" to me, it's pumpkins. As soon as I see them, I know it's time to start making preserves and cooking up some nice hearty soups to be frozen. So here is my fall season's first hearty soup that is sure to keep me warm throughout the cold season.

What I used:

1 pound sweet potato (washed, peeled and diced)

5 carrots (w, p, d)

1 small pumpkin (w, p, d)

1 green onion

1 litre chicken stock

2 splashes of Keith's IPA

Salt and pepper to taste

How to make it:

In a large, heavy pot, boil the sweet potato, carrots and pumpkin chunks  in water with a pinch of salt until all of them are tender and sweet. This should take about 10-15 minutes Drain and set them aside. Rinse the pot and put it back on the heat, with a fine drizzle of olive oil in the bottom. Finely dice the green onion and add it to he oil. Stir constantly until it is cooked. Add the already cooked vegetables back into the pot, and add the chicken stock on top. Bring all this to a boil, then take it down to a simmer for about 30-45 minutes. Take the pot off the heat, and run the whole soup through a food processor or blender. When serving, finish it with a little bit of cream and a little bit of fresh grated nutmeg. Om nom nom.

Warm Dandelion and Blackberry Salad

The leaves are finally changing colour announcing the coming of fall, and I'm immediately drawn to wilder places than the city. So where's the perfect place to go? Point Pleasant Park of course! So off I mosy into the winding paths. Suddenly it strikes me: there is so much in this park that is edible! A dandelion puff here, a wild blackberry there, so I got down to foraging. Here's what I came up with the ingredients I found:

What I collected in the park:
Dandelion Greens
Clover Flowers
Blackberries

How I made it:
Washed the greens and blackberries thoroughly. Got a pot of water on the boil with a little sea salt, and threw the greens in for about 10 minutes so that they got nice and tender. While those were on the boil, fried up a quarter of a diced onion with a little garlic in some olive oil. When the greens were done cooking, strained them and added them in the pan with the onion, and seasoned with some sea salt and pepper. When everything was nice and mixed together, plated them and grated a generous amount of Gruyere cheese (from the market of course) on top, placed a heaping pile of wild blackberries on top and garnished with a clover flower (which is 100% edible, yum). Om nom nom.

Back-To-School Quinoa Salad!

When I was a kid, opening up my lunchbox to see what kind of tasty things my mom had prepared and packed was one of my favourite parts of the school day. I loved the fresh and tasty creations she cooked up for me, and was always impressed with her creativity and ability to make new and interesting things every day. Now, living away from home, I'm responsible for my own lunches, but as classes are starting again, at first it seemed like a daunting task to emulate her wonderful lunchboxes. However, with a little thought I've come up with a fast, tasty and healthy portable lunch that's perfect for parents packing lunches or students grabbing something for between classes. The best part is that you can find all these ingredients right here at the farmer's market, which makes for a fresher taste and a cleaner conscience.

What I used:
3 cups dried quinoa (The Grainery)
1 cup diced tomato
1 cup diced cucumber
1 large sprig of parsley

How to make it:
Soak quinoa for an hour. This is a good time to dice vegetables, make some phone calls, check the mail or finish that paper you've been putting off. Drain and rinse the quinoa, then place it in a pot with a 3:1 quinoa to water ratio. Heat the pot up on the stove to medium or medium-low. Stir frequently. When all the water has been evaporated or absorbed into the quinoa, remove it from the heat and place in a glass container to cool. When it has cooled, season the quinoa with equal parts olive oil and balsamic vinegar to taste, if you have some at home. If not, make this quinoa your own! Its flavour is very versatile so get creative. Let it cool in the fridge overnight. In the morning, right before sending your kids to school, or heading to class yourself, stir in your diced vegetables, stick the mix in a portable container, and off it goes. It keeps well, tastes great and is easy and fast to prepare. Take a little stress out of your life and try this recipe! Om nom nom.

Frankenloaf!

Ever since I was a little girl, zucchini bread was by far my favourite way to eat my vegetables. Now that I'm on my own, it's still frequently being baked, but with new additions to the recipe each time. Most recently, there were so many new additions and alterations to the recipe that I could only call it Frankenloaf. Luckily, this monster of a zucchini loaf turned out to be much more lovable than Dr. Frankenstein's own creation. It was so lovable, in fact, that I thought I would share it with all of you. Enjoy!

What I used:

3 cups Speerville all-purpose unbleached flour
2 cups Noggin's Corner Farm zucchini (grated)
2 cups Millen's Farm frozen blueberries
1 cup multipurpose applesauce (see Sunday June 5th post)
3 eggs
1/2 cup Linda's Corner maple sugar
1/2 cup Cosman and Whidden Pure Nova Scotia honey
3 tablespoons Linda's Corner maple syrup
2 tablespoons homemade vanilla extract
1 tablespoon baking soda
1 tablespoon baking powder
Pinch salt

How I made it:
Preheat oven to 325 F and grease a bread pan. In a bowl, combine all dry ingredients, including the maple sugar. In a separate bowl, stir together eggs, applesauce, honey, maple syrup and vanilla extract. Pour the liquid mix into the dry mix, stirring slowly. Stir in the zucchini and blueberries, and try not to om nom all the dough. At this point, the mixture should still be fairly liquid, so that the loaf stays moist after baking. Bake for 40-60 minutes, or until your toothpick test comes clean. Let cool for 10 minutes after baking, then remove from pan and serve warm, with applesauce, jam or butter on top. Om nom nom.

The Acadian, Eh?

I have two confessions. The first is that I am French Canadian, and that, consequently, I love cheese and anything maple in a bad way. In fact, I am even known to combine the two in beautiful and sometimes alarmingly delicious combinations that make my mouth water even just thinking about them. Cheddar and maple crepes? Nom. Maple and cheese danishes? Been there. Maple grilled cheese? Yeah. That just happened. Here's how to make a kick-ass French Canadian grilled cheese.

What I used: 

Five-Grain Honey Bread from Mary's Bread Basket

Damafro Brie

One Noggins Corner Farm Macintosh apple

Linda's Corner maple syrup

Butter

How I did it:

Heat up a pan to medium and peel, core and slice your apple. Slather two slices of bread with butter. Apply one layer cheese, one layer apple, and one more layer cheese just to be safe on the unbuttered side of one of the bread slices. Put the other slice on top, buttered side facing out. Throw it in the pan and cook until bottom side is crispy and brown. Flip and repeat. Drizzle some maple syrup on top right before serving and eat that sucker up, eh? Om nom nom.

Berry Lemonade!

It's finally summer in Halifax! The rain is gone, for the most part, the tourists are getting off the giant cruise ships and the mist is burnt off by mid-morning! I'm currently writing from my sun-drenched balcony, listening to OK GO and enjoying the sunshine, sipping on some fancy lemonade. Going to the market this weekend was a great treat, because of the great weather and the fresh berries in season! All this great weather and sunshine calls for a lemonade recipe to help keep yourself cool so I'll share with the you the recipe for the one I'm drinking at this very minute!

What I used:

Trinity Gold homemade lemonade concentrate

Millens Farm frozen blueberries

Noggins Corner Farm strawberries

How I did it:

Filled a pitcher with with one part Trinity Gold and four parts cold water. Thought about replacing the water with iced tea, for a tasty Arnold Palmer, then got too impatient to make iced tea. Poured the mixed lemonade into tall glasses, replacing ice cubes with frozen blueberries (an awesome trick I borrowed from my mom) and garnished with slit strawberries. Drank it in the sun with Stu and a sense of well-being and happiness. Om nom nom.

2-Minute Blueberry Sorbet

Wandering around the market, it's easy to find great deals on frozen or bulk foods. For example, this week we found a stand that sold giant 5 lb boxes of frozen blueberries... for 20$. How could we say no to enough blueberries to keep us going until they're ready to picked fresh again next season for such a good price? Naturally, we were all over that. When I got back to the apartment, I was in need of some refreshing from the uphill walk home in the humidity, so I decided to make some sorbet to cool myself down.

What you need:

2 cups of frozen blueberries

1/2 cup honey

Here's how I did it:

Basically, just throw everything in the blender and blend. It takes all of 30 seconds and it's SO tasty and refreshing. You can also add in other frozen fruit, berries or even vegetables, and with a little yogurt or whole milk you have yourself a smoothie. Om nom nom.

Pink Brie Scramble

A few weeks ago at the market, Stu and I came across a man who sold not only whole chickens and turkeys, but also chicken and turkey eggs. He showed us the oversized freckled eggs (being sold at the same price as the chicken eggs) so we had to buy some to see what they were like. Apart from being fairly hard to crack and huge, they were very like chicken eggs, but with a faint turkey taste. This discovery of turkey eggs got us on such an egg kick that we ended up having eggs every day, making elaborate breakfast dishes revolving around eggs. I am a huge fan of omelettes, but sometimes they are hard to flip if they have lots of ingredients in them, so a lot of the time I just end up making a scrambled egg with lots of tasty ingredients to make things more interesting. This week, we had a lot of fresh beet greens left over by Friday, as well as some nice local brie, so I decided to throw them into the mix. To my delight, this resulted in a gooey, creamy, pink omelette with lots of flavour and definitely an interesting look

What you need:

4 eggs (turkey or chicken, but you could even use ostrich eggs if that floats your boat)

A large handful of beet greens

As much brie as you want (can there ever be too much brie?)

Olive oil

Sprig of rosemary

How I did it:

Start by washing and trimming the roots off the beet greens. Chop them into bite-length pieces. Heat a little oil on medium in a pan, and throw the greens in, stirring frequently. When the leaves are wilted and they start giving off a pink juice, add the brie in, in small chunks. Melt the brie in with the leaves and watch it all turn pink. Put your eggs in and cook as dry as you like, stirring often until it's all cooked. You should have a lovely pink scramble, that you can top with chopped rosemary. Om nom nom.

Herbs!

Oh my gosh, I cannot get enough of herbs. Recently, Stu and I planted some herb seeds in pots (as we have a tiny apartment and no garden) and we're really excited to start seeing some shoots! We bought sweet basil, tarragon and rosemary plants, as well as curly parsley and chives. We decided to get them so that we could have a choice of the freshest herbs freshly picked from our own balcony when we're cooking. There have been a few problems copping up though, and we're trying to work through them. For example, our plants were attracting little fruit flies so we decided to put them outside, where they started wilting from the cold. Any advice on indoor herb gardening/ outdoor herb upkeep?

Multipurpose Applesauce!

Hello! I just want to say that applesauce is one of my favourite foods in the whole world. There are many reasons I love it so much, but my top reason is because of its versatility. It's great as a condiment, as a substitute for butter (for all the vegans and lactose-intolerant people out there) and just as a snack on its own. Luckily, living in Halifax provides me with plenty of opportunities and lots of choice in terms of local apple supply, so I make applesauce all the time and use it in everything I bake. Here's my recipe, so you can also get your applesauce fix.

Prep time: 10 min. Cook time: about 20 min.

What you need:
5 pounds of apples (Cortland have yielded the best results so far. Try for an apple that doesn't brown quickly)
1 cup sugar
Pinch of salt
Cinnamon to taste

How to make it:
Peel, core and roughly chop all the apples. I recommend doing this with a friend because it's pretty tedious on your own. Put enough water in a large pot so that all the apple pieces boil. Pour the apple chunks into the water and bring to a boil. Try to resist munching on the apples. Sprinkle your pinch of salt and the sugar over the chunks. Cover your pot partially and let it boil until the apples are soft enough to mush with a potato masher. Check frequently, stir every once in a while. Once the apple chunks are nice and soft, pour your cinnamon in the pot and start mushing. If you're short on time, you can use a food processor, but the manual mushing has always been my favourite part. Let it cool a little and enjoy! Om nom nom.

Potato Pancakes!

One of the easiest and tastiest local meals to date have been some crunchy-on-the-outside soft-on-the-inside potato pancakes with green onion. I first saw a variation of this on a Food Network special about left-overs, and have been making them ever since, changing the recipe and toppings according to what's available at any given time. Basically, It's a pan-fried hash-brown with some tasty vegetables cooked right into it. I really love this because they're perfect for when you have leftover potatoes and odds and ends of vegetables left that you don't know what to do with. I call them portable potato pancakes because they can easily become ideal picnic food, if you pack them chilled and bring toppings. Here's how I made them this time:

Start with: 

Potatoes (pre-cooked and cooled or raw) 

One green onion (finely chopped)

Olive or canola oil

From there:

Roughly grate your peeled potatoes into a bowl, and mix in the onions with your hands, being careful not to smush the potatoes too much. Heat a little oil in a pan at about medium, or a little higher. Next, you're going to want to make a potato-ball in your hand, about the size of your palm (but, once again, try not to smush it too tight. You want it to be a fairly loose ball). Now place the potato ball in the hot oil and press down with a spatula so that it becomes flatter, but leave it so it's about half an inch to an inch thick. If you're doing this with cooked potatoes, then you're  just going to have the watch the colour forming around the bottom edge of the pancake. When The edges have turned nice and brown, you'll want to check it. You can do this by flipping and checking to make sure that the colour is even. When the one side looks nice and brown and crispy, it's time to cook the other side, so flip it over so the not-browned side is on the pan. For people using raw potatoes, you'll have to watch the colour changing throughout the pancake. So watch for the brownness creeping up the side of the pancake, because even though the flat of the pancake might be brown, the inside might still be raw potato. When the pancake has cooked about halfway up, flip the pancake and watch it until it's cooked through. It's important to have a plate ready with paper towel to absorb the extra oil, because the pancakes will initially be pretty greasy when you take them out of the pan. So before you serve them, lay them on the paper towel and allow the grease to get absorbed. From there, you can top it with almost anything. Two of my personal favourites are topping it with sour cream, chives and smoked salmon or a simple soft-poached egg on top, with salt and pepper. Eating local is so good to me. Om nom nom.

Food Philosophy: The Omnivore's Dilemma

On a side note, I've started reading Michael Pollan's "The Omnivore's Dilemma" and it's blowing my mind. Basically, it's a piece of investigative journalism written about the food industry and all the implied questions (moral, political, environmental, economical...) that really go behind the question of "what's for dinner?" I'm about halfway through and so far I've had a peek at the evolution of the corn industry, the complicated dynamics of pastoral farm systems and been presented a lot of questions as to what seemingly simple terms like "industrial" and "organic" really mean, and how flexible they are. Right now I'm on the section about pastoral farming, polyculture (the practice of growing many symbiotic species together instead of segregating one species and growing it en masse-- monoculture) and the many advantages of eating local and knowing where the food you eat comes from. Honestly, reading this book makes me happy that I have the option to get my supplies from the farmer's market and chat with the people who grow my food about its production, the sustainability of their farming and the philosophy that goes behind it all. I have yet to read the sections on the hunter-nature relationship or the section depicting "The Perfect Meal" (a meal that Pollan hunted, gathered and prepared entirely himself) but I can't wait to pick it up again. For all the people who like to ask questions about the philosophy of their food: I highly recommend this book. 

Here's the link to the Amazon webpage

http://www.amazon.com/Omnivores-Dilemma-Natural-History-Meals/dp/0143038583/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1305419396&sr=1-1

Ludicrously Easy Pickled Lettuce

Hello again! Still don't have internet in the apartment, so I'm writing from the Wired Monk cafe and sipping some matcha (tea was one of the things we absolutely could not give up while eating local, along with salt, pepper and olive oil) So, last week Stu and I had our friends Torin and Anna over for dinner, and we decided to wow them with our mad culinary skills. So we got some fresh trout from the market, some arugula, some spinach, some rainbow carrots, some lettuce and some onions to make a tasty trout-topped salad. We were feeling pretty adventurous though, so we decided to step the salad up by pickling the lettuce! This seemed like a daunting task at first, pickling being somewhat foreign to Stu and I, but after a little brainstorming and experimenting, we found a seriously easy and delicious formula for perfectly sweet and tart pickled lettuce. Here's how we did it:

Start with:

A head of lettuce (we used iceberg, but other kinds would probably work as well)

A cup of water

Two tablespoons salt

Two tablespoons unpasteurized honey

Six tablespoons vinegar (we used apple vinegar for the sweetness, but balsamic or just plain white can also be used)

From there: Wash, drain and rip lettuce into desired size of pieces, and set aside in separate bowl. Mix all other ingredients in a pot and boil very briefly to make sure all the ingredients combine nicely. Allow the mixture to cool, then pour it onto the lettuce, mixing it all together with your hands, making sure every leaf is bathed in the mixture. Let it sit for about half an hour, then pour it into a jar or whatever closable container you have lying around. Stick it in the fridge. Optimally, you want to let it sit in the fridge for a day or two, because then the lettuce has time to really absorb the pickling juice. From there, use it on salads, in sandwhiches or really wherever you would ordinarily use pickles! My favourite part of this recipe is that once the lettuce is gone, the pickling juice makes a ready-to-use salad dressing. Om nom nom.

Fresh Start!

Welcome, and thanks for reading! I've just moved into my new apartment and decided that this would be a great time to start something new. So this week is my first week of eating strictly local, apart from what supplies I had left over (which, of course, I'm not going to waste) After combing various grocery stores in the area, I have a fairly decent stockpile of fresh and local produce that I can't wait to start playing with.  My first local meal was a delicious stir-fry, made completely of local ingredients!

Springtime in Halifax Stir-Fry:

A few handfuls of (leftover) chick peas
One whole onion, diced finely
Three leaves of ripped up baby bok choy
Few sprigs of parsley
A handful of (leftover) pasta
A spoonful of salted butter
Lots of medium aged gouda (flavoured with local herbs)

Cook chick peas until soft, if bought dry, and cook pasta al dente in a separate pot.  Drain and cool both when cooked. Heat up a pan to about medium heat (we don't want to burn the butter) and sweat the onion in the butter. When the onion has begun to caramelize, throw in the rest of the greens and cook them all down together, allowing the flavours to mix nicely. The best part about using baby bok choy with butter is that it absorbs the tasty butter flavour while still staying relatively crunchy, adding a nice texture as well as the pretty leafy look. Now, add in the pasta and chick peas to warm them. Ideally, the chick peas will lend a meaty texture to make the stir fry a little more satisfying. Toss the whole mix a few times, and serve in a bowl or large plate, with or without rice. I didn't use rice and it was perfectly filling. Generously grate in the gouda (or whatever salty cheese you have around) while the stir-fry is still hot and toss the whole thing a few more times. The cheese should be melty and delicious when you serve the stir-fry. Nom nom nom. Delicious.