Who needs coffee when you have CCR?

Busy night? Yeah. A couple hours of interrupted sleep, on home call night no less.

How do I fix this zombie-like sensation?

1. CCR - who needs coffee when you have them? 




2. Fresh ground coffee, just for good measure
3. Avocado scrambled eggs - I made these a few months ago when I had some extra guacamole lying around and the results are MARVELOUS. The avocado add this extra creaminess in the eggs that just make it melt in your mouth. Added some cilantro, feta, cheddar and grape tomatoes today. Hallelujah! 

Walt Jr. would be so proud.

Salmon

I was wandering around the market today and noticed an apparently good deal on salmon at one of the fish stores. It was for "wild chum salmon". I asked the seafood man behind the counter what the difference was between this and other species, he just mumbled something about it "just being another species". Thinking it was no big deal, I shrugged and bought a sizeable amount and feeling smug about scoring what I thought was a bargain.

Not familiar with the "chum" salmon, I google image searched it on my way home and discovered that...

I had just bought the salmon clan's ugly cousin! Who could love such a creature! My further research found that it has a milder flavour, is more lean and is often used in drying. Fair enough, but seriously how hideous are these guys?

I felt so duped.

sunny boy: just can't get enough!

The other day while shopping at IGA for Cream of Wheat (yes, I have weird cravings), one of the grocers recommended I get this "Sunny Boy" cereal instead. He said it just plain tasted better. So I went for it! And now I just can't get enough!

[youtube="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_6FBfAQ-NDE"]

Thanks, Depeche Mode. And he REALLY does look like Shia LaBoeuf hahahahah

Candied pecans

Amazing how much adding candied pecans to a salad really livens things up. I'll give credit to the goat cheese which is turning out to be the unsung hero of the kitchen thus far.
The spinach salad I made was pretty standard - grilled chicken (salt, pepper, cayenne, splash of maple syrup), spinach, strawberries and goat cheese. In hindsight I guess I could've thrown on some diced purple onion.
"Candy"-ing the pecans was simple enough. I just mixed in a tablespoon or so each of olive oil and balsamic vinegar with 1/4 cup (ish) of brown sugar into the frying pan on medium heat. Constantly stirred until the sugar had melted, and it was bubbling assertively. Threw in a cup of pecans and tossed it around to really let the mixture coat 'em up. Maybe 4 minutes for the initial mixture and another four to sweeten the pecans. Gotta make sure it's evenly coated. I then spread it out on some wax/parchment paper and let them dry for about half an hour. Make sure to separate the pecans individually because by the time they're done cooking they're already sticking together.

vegetarian lasagna

Had Q and Court visit this past weekend so I thought I'd whip up something special for them. Unfortunately, I've never made lasagna before so it was quite the process. We were all famished after a hike down Happy Creek Trail, so I'm amazed they didn't put up more of a fuss when I was taking so long to make the whole thing. It's a good thing they picked up some triscuits and hummus to munch on while they waited.

Anyways, the lasagna turned out great. About 98.2% of the effort goes into the prep, 1% goes into deciding how to layer it, 0.2% goes into the layering process and the final 1% in waiting. I used a recipe from my allrecipes.com iPhone app as a guideline, and improvised a lot from there. (Will update the post later when I upload photos from the making of)

First off, I decided to go with a from-scratch pasta sauce. Turns out it's really not hard - just sliced about five tomatoes into (rough) cubes, threw them into the frying pan with olive oil under medium heat for maybe about 6 minutes and let the tomatoes just fall apart. Added basil, salt, pepper, cayenne and brown sugar to taste. A bit too much cayenne pepper fell in, but I enjoyed the extra bite of the sauce.

Chopped up the mushrooms (less than the recipe), green pepper, onions and garlic. Decided to throw in some grated carrots in there too. Let that mixture grill in olive oil for a couple minutes (in the proper order too) before adding the sauce to the mixture.

Lastly, the cheese. Lots of open contemplation on how to deal with this layer. I had goat cheese (~350 g) and spinach (1 bunch) which I was excited about, but wasn't quite sure how to put the two of them together. James brought up the great idea of blanching the spinach and then using his hand blender to make into a paste. We then spread the paste on top of each (WHOLE WHEAT) lasagna pasta layer. It worked great.

In the end, the layers went as follows from bottom to top: Drizzled olive oil, thin layer of pasta sauce (maybe 1.5 cups?), pasta/spinach+cheese paste, then sliced zucchini. Repeat the sauce, pasta/paste and zucchini layers until the top where it was topped with a healthy layer of mozarella. It was baked in the oven at 350 degrees for 40 minutes, with the last 2-3 minutes on broil to help brown the cheese.

Seems a lot simpler writing it down, but I guess the disorganized array of vegetables around me and indecision slowed down the process quite a bit. I was super happy with the from-scratch tomato sauce. I honestly don't know what I'd change for next time except maybe try it with different types of cheese (feta? ricotta?) and maybe some parmesan on the top.

Cod fail

Tried to grill some cod today. Should have remembered I suck at frying whitefish. I was trying a pineapple marinade that included some brown sugar and soy sauce, but I think the soy sauce overpowered the sweet flavour.
Potatoes were also an awful side. Should have gone with rice, but I guess I panicked because a few of my spuds began to sprout. Should know better than storing them in the cabinet between the oven and the fridge.

Believe me, the picture looks better than it tasted. Can't win them all I guess.

Impromptu penne with spinach and asparagus alfredo

Remembered that I had some extra asparagus and spinach from last week. Mixed it in with Alfredo sauce and it turned out surprisingly well. Grilled the asparagus briefly before pouring in the sauce. For the most part spinach cooks fast so I just mixed it into the sauce near the end. Very quick to make.

Steak

Made it last week. Quite the adventure with a frying pan and olive oil (low boiling point). It turned out all right though, and was as rare as I wanted for the most part.

Asparagus was my favourite part. Oven-roasted it actually - 10 minutes at 425•C I believe? Tossed it in balsamic vinegar, olive oil, salt and pepper. I do enjoy the flavor that was preserved in the oven vs. the conventional steaming.

First week: cooking

A brief overview of my culinary excursions this week (since I didn't so much "excursing" outside of the condo) --

Monday: Mung bean soup
A simple dish that was one of my favourites from Taiwan last year. It's a meal and a dessert! I added some coconut milk for flavour which turned out pretty good. Definitely feels like it's missing something though and if I ever learn how to conjure up those bubble tea tapioca pearls, those are going in next time.

Tuesday: Thai green curry chicken with coconut jasmine rice
Sounds exotic, but not too difficult if you're cooking from a curry paste. Cop out, I know but I gotta start with the training wheels on this one. Stir fried the chicken, onions and peppers with soy sauce, fish sauce, ginger, garlic, olive oil and sesame oil first. Added the paste and coconut milk later. Sort of wish I had a bit more coconut milk because that paste was REALLY spicy. Very tasty, but room for improvement.

Wednesday: arugula and spinach chicken salad
Nothing special here although I did try a honey/garlic concoction to flavor the chicken. I was especially excited since the honey came fresh from a classmate's parents who are beekeepers! Topped with feta, balsamic vinegar and olive oil. Next time I'll take James's advice and try to mix in goat cheese to add something special to that vinaigrette.