Holiday Bird Take 3

Well the time has come upon us. I have commited to make the Christmas turkey once again. And as of yet, haven't done any research into what I am going to do to the bird. My first attempt was a bit of a letdown, burnt the skin in the first hour. So non of that high initial heat stuff for me, I'm all about the foil til the last hour, also the brine made the gravy salty.Last year was a complete success. I think largely due to the fact that I did it in my own kitchen with all handy tools and no distraction. Focused, well thought out and properly timed. Sorrily, I didn't document it in any way so I have nothing to blog for it. Basically I brined the bird, rubbed a butter,herb and spice mixture under the skin and on it for the most gloriously browned bird you've ever seen. and I think I went with a sourdough stuffing. Don't want to stray too much this time around but like I said I haven't set my eyes on anything new. I'll check my American Thanksgiving newsletters and see what pops out, if anything.

Soup: Not you again!

After a long day of Christmas shopping and holding off on mall junk food binging. I go grocery shopping because I am going away for the holidays. So I have to finish what is left in the fridge. And out of the kindness of her heart, my wife has made a healthy mixed bean soup. Well, made as in she bought a package of pre-made(grrrr) dry soup mix from The Big Carrot (so you know it good).
Soup; there are good ones out there. My mom's greek lentil soup called "Faki" is equally good hot or cold, and gets better as the flavours meld together every passing day. But unlike my mother who puts flavour first, my wife's oh so healthy and easy soups tend to be....bland. Where is the slow sweating of the onions, celery, garlic. The richly flavoured broth with, if I'm lucky, has the gelatinous richness of a good chicken stock (which I have frozen in my freezer for such soup emergencies.)
But I know health is important and to tell you the truth the issue here is not the flavour. I can stomach a healthy, rich in folate and fibre organic soup on a weeknight meal with a wedge of cheese and a bit of bread. It's the quantity that kills me. I've got about 6 servings of this stuff and nothing else to eat.
Why does it seem that the people who try to stuff you full of "healthy" foods tend to eat out a lot more and rely on pre-mades more than us true omnivores. My wife is presently enjoying lunch at Fresh while I'm here stuck with wet legumes. And believe me I'll probably be the one finishing them off... Was that a tangent? oh well. I guess I'm just trying to put of the soup eating.

So to soup I say you're welcome to visit. But don't pack an overnight bag.

Mac n' Cheese Without the Cheese?

When it comes to cooking I believe in the truth, real ingredients for real food. No lo-fat alternative made of artificial substances, no pre-made time saver. Hell, I won't even use pre-made sausages in a dish because I consider that cheating. So when someone suggested to me that there is a non-dairy cheese alternative that was not processed beyond recognition. but actually an all natural product, I was skeptical, and when I found out it was yeast, I was a little grossed out.

But this is no ordinary yeast, it is Nutritional Yeast Flakes. and unlike Active dry yeast, it is dead, or rather, deactivated, having been grown on molasses and sugarcane, then laid to rest. and in passing has a nutty cheese-like flavour.
Kudos on the first soul to try a spoonful of this stuff.

So I was intrigued, ever on the hunt for a different take on something familiar, more to prove that there is no replacing the original than anything else. I picked up a tub of flakes and tracked down a recipe for the cheesiest of all cheesy dishes. The classic homemade Mac n' Cheese. I tracked down a couple of recipes online, amalgamating them, and to my surprise, not only was it easy to make but damn tasty. Now, I'm not going to say it's as tasty as the real deal, but I will say that Vegan mac n' cheese is to homemade MnC what what homemade Mac is to Kraft dinner. Maybe not as flavourful but probably a lot better for you. And as a former KD junkie, I have come a long way.

The recipe is similar to the classic, Start by making your pasta and straining it when done.

Then to the sauce starting with a roux of equal parts non-hydrogenated margarine and spelt flour.

Next, add water with flavour enhancement of salt, mustard, tumeric and hot sauce,

tasting it at this point you get a savoury yet empty taste but once the yeast is added,

the whole sauce become this rich full flavoured magic that has me thinking of how many other ways I can use this magical sauce.

Mix half the sauce with macaroni, then pour the rest on top.

I used brown rice mac just to go completely wheat free as well and you won't believe how utterly edible this faux comfort food can be.





I have just made my third batch of the stuff and just ran out of yeast. but believe me, I will add it to my shopping list from now on.


So as a fan of real food where would I place this? There is not an artificial flavour in this dish, nothing pre-made or highly processed. So yes, it is real by my standards. The only thing unreal about it is to call it mac n' cheese but the alternative Mac n' Yeast isn't as appealing. So I'll stick with MnC for now, until I come up with a word that defines the amazing flavour of the sauce better. Maybe Mac n Crazy Good?

Christos's Classic Cookbook: Mains is Complete!!!

I like most foodies love cooking magazines. And at certain point the time comes where the collection of these magazines becomes overwhelming. I don't want my shelves cluttered with them but I can't bear to throw them away. So I decided to clip the best recipes I could find and catalogue them in a binder. And so the C.C.C. was born. This was roughly 3 years ago and I'll have to admit I have been working on it sparatically. So the clipping began and as I was cutting out the recipes I have been collecting for possibly the past 10 years from magazines and the internet. I soon realized I was "going to need a bigger boat" So I broke them up into Volumes. As of right now there are 4. Appetizers, Vegetables, Mains, and Desserts. Knowing that over time I will be adding and removing recipes I catalogued the pages in groups of ten rather than numbering each page. As the years go on I will keep on adding to the collection So I may break it down into even more Volumes, Pastas, Fish, etc. But as of this morning I am happy to say it is complete. Over 240 pages of Breads, Soups, Pastas, and Meats,Condiment, Rubs, and Sauces. All in one go-to book. Now onto Appetizers, or maybe Desserts. That one seems like it's going to be a big one.

Makeshift Falafel with Donahini Sauce

I omitted this important step in the recipe, Pulse chickpeas in the processor on their own first before adding other ingredients!!! Now back to your regularly scheduled blog entry.

My wife has been soaking chickpeas for three days.
She intended on making a healthy soup to torment me with but it was a busy week for her so it never happened. So what does one do with fermenting chickpeas? Make Falafels!!!
The chickpeas were re-hydrated to the point that they were getting soft. This is exactly what is required for falafels. I found this out just as we were beginning to boil the garbanzos out of them. So I immediately pulled the peas off the fire, drained them and into the processor they went, I had no fresh parsley and trying to get through the entire day without taking off my track pants, I opted for about 2-3 tbsps of dried parsley I had, up until now any homemade falafel I made came from a box so if dried parsley was good enough for me then, it would do now. along with the other ingredients I cobbled together, and then baking them instead of frying (I know, I know, but we ordered in the night before and I think I passed my greasy goodness quota. (BTW, Orderit.ca + Sammy's Eatery = good times)I managed to make a pretty decent tasting Falafel, better the next day if left out for a few hours, the baking doesn't get them as crispy as frying but air drying remedies that.

Online on Saveur magazines site I saw a Tahini sauce which I have had and found just a touch too bitter for my liking. So instead I took a note from the Donair shops on Pizza Corner in Halifax, For their Donairs they use a sweet sauce made of condensed milk and sugar which for those of use you are use to Tahini was gross at first but then became somewhat addictive. So I made a hi-bred Donair-Tahini sauce for us which I dubbed the "Donahini" Sauce.

On a sad note we bought some "Pita Break" multigrain pitas from our local Metro which kinda got me thinking about Falafels in the first place. But alas they were completely mouldy less than a week after buying them. Way to go Metro. So we made due with some toast and salad. But overall very pleased and will do it again as soon as I buy some more parsley and onions and oversoak some more chickpeas.

The Pot Roast Experiment Pt. ll

Success!!!
The brining did embue the meat with a salty, almost pastrami like smell, which isn't a surprise because that is what pastrami is. I then made a makeshift steak rub with very little salt, black pepper, paprika, garlic powder and anise seed for a twist. Then in a roasting pan seared the meat, removed it from the pan, added 2 sliced onions 3 min. added some wine, maybe 1/2 cup to deglaze the pan, then 3 carrots broken into big chunks and quartered sweet potato (next time I'll go with a stronger white potato, this one turned to mush in the cooking. I had some turkey stock I made in the freezer about 2 cups, so I added that and the meat and into the oven it went for three hours, I think I turned the meat every hour and by the end of the time and by the end. Wonderful. I then strained the beautiful cooking liquid and made a gravy by adding it to a roux. Other than the veggies being too mushy for my wife a total success meat and gravywise.

So what do I think of pot roast now? I'm happy with the outcome, generally I think beef should not be braised because it may flavour the sauce but the meat is left bland. The extra step of brining helped immensely and as for cooking beef, I don't do it often and at home, barbeque is my first choice, but I'm happy to have this under my belt and will try this again if I have a hunk of meat and it's not BBQ season, maybe I'll add a touch of liquid smoke to it in the cooking phase and make it in a pie form next time.
I must remember to take photos for my next experiment.

The Pot Roast Experiment

I've never made a pot roast before, Odd? Maybe, but the thought of taking a beautiful piece of meat and slowly boiling it in stock never really appealed to me. But I am committed to clearing out my freezer before spending any more money filling it up again and I happened upon a 2kg pot roast. Now I could have minced it for a pie. I have an abundance of butter that I need to use and thought to make pie shells out of it and a meat pie would work, but I recently made a wonderful Shepard's Pie and minced some lamb shoulder to make it so to desecrate two cuts of meat would just be wrong. So I'll go with the pot roast.
My first strange twist is a brine, I have no idea what this will do to the meat but if it's infused with salt and spicy flavour like my chickens do it should work well. Otherwise I've ruined a good piece of meat. The brine consisted of Water, Salt, Peppercorns, Garlic, Bay Leaf, Allspice, Chilli Flakes, and dried Rosemary. I'm thinking overkill but let's see. I have to wait for a phone guy at home tomorrow so why not do the roast while I work and wait.

Cowbell just didn't ring for me

Cowbell is one of those restaurants that you want to like before you go there. Their philosophy is 1. buy from local farmers and 2. make it from scratch, from there breads and butters to their own sausages. This is the kind of place I want to support both in support of our local farmers and fellow purist cook so we gave it a try.
First thing you should know is that it is in Parkdale, If you don't know Parkdale, it's shady, well, some locals would refer to it as "colourful" I have lived and presently work in the area and believe me, the colour fades quickly. And if you are attempting to pay for your parking you will be relentlessly hounded for spare change. That is just a fact, if it's a deterrent, so be it. For me it is, I don't want go too far into it but I see eating out is a total experience and if I feel any discomfort or irritation, it will be a factor on whether I return or not.
As we left our earthy doorman a few dollars heavier, we entered the dimly but sufficiently lit restaurant with paintings of food on the walls and a hexagon-ceramic tiled floor I have seen in many converted house/apartments friends of mine have rented in the city. The seating is not too crowded for a small place and there is a little bar in the back which serves little purpose in my eyes but I didn't come here for the scotch. I must stress that you should pick your seats wisely, because as we were being seated we were not given menus, Rather I was asked to refer to the chalkboards that were strategically placed on the walls and unfortunately I had the menu to my back. Okay Cowbell's menu is ever evolving based on what is in season and what cuts of meat are available so I understand them not wanting to waste paper on each new menu but let's get some chalkboards on the waitstaff or mirrors, swivel chairs? Save on chalk and just have the waitress commit it to memory? As for the waitstaff, polite, unobtrusive and a bit organic, more organic than Starbucks, less than Fresh.
We started our meals with the homemade charcuterie or as I know it the salamis and other cured meat. It's been a while but I remember at least 6 different selections, small portions but very nice, my preferences being for the smoked meats (which are also done on the premises) accompanied with some mustard, pickled pearl onions and an assortment of breads and butter also freshly made. Very nice starter. And for dinner I ordered a Cassoulet. A rich french stew with sausage, duck and beans I have always wanted to make but knew I would be the only one eating the entire thing. So I thought it would be perfect to see what a stew made with real homemade sausage would taste like. What I got was not a stew but a deconstruction of a stew. Two different sausages, a duck leg confit ( braised in it's own fat), some roasted vegetables all on a plate of beans. Maybe the idea of making a sausage only to have to cut it up to flavour a stew was too painful for the chefs of Cowbell, but I wanted a melding of all those flavours. I won't buy a cake if it's a loaf of sponge and bowl of icing. I want a cake. Bad analogy but hopefully a clear one. Individually the sausage was good, as was the duck, but the beans were underdone, my wife actually ordered a bean dish as well and hers were also underdone. This may be something in the chef world that I am not familiar with, maybe in some cooking schools beans are meant to be al dente but to us uncultured folk, they was underdone.
After our meals we politely paid our waitress, as you may have guessed it was a bit pricey but not ridiculous for the quality of the ingredients. and quickly got back into our car before our doorman came at us again.

Overall Cowbell seems like place with a great concept and ideals, I just worry that the owner/chef is tooting his own horn too loudly to hear what the costumers want. Will I go back, maybe to give the menu another chance, but still not looking forward to the doorman.
6 out of 10 spoons.