Tuesday, August 31, 2004

Corn


corn
Originally uploaded by Lemon3000.
How beautiful is this corn? And it tasted amazing too.

mojito's are good too!


mojito2
Originally uploaded by Lemon3000.
Picked up some mint at Millarville on Saturday so we could make some more Mojitos.

24 mint leaves
1/4 cup (or more) sugar
1 cup lime juice
1 cup rum
1 cup fizzy water

Smash the mint and sugar together in a pitcher until mint is in small pieces. Add the lime juice and rum and stir until sugar is disolved. Add the fizzy water. Makes 4 drinks, and is pretty.

Wednesday, August 25, 2004

Buffalo Steak

Had the best dinner last night. When we were in B.C., we bought some buffalo steak. Last night we cooked it up.

Scott ground up some rosemary, garlic, chives and olive oil, and marinated the meat. We also cooked a rib eye steak too. I soaked that in some teriyaki sauce (my favorite). We made some potato salad, and had some corn that we had bought back from BC too, where we had gone to a corn boil. Instead of boiling or steaming the corn, we cooked it on the bbq. I pulled off some of the outer husk, and then pulled them down and pulled out all the silk. Then I replaced the husks, and threw them under some water for a minute. When the barbie was hot, we threw them on, and then turned them every 5 minutes or so, until the husks were charred and some of the kernels were brown/black. It seemed to take longer than we had expected, but I think our cheap barbie was having trouble keeping the temperature up with the enormous storm we were standing in. Anyone in the Calgary area knows what I am talking about. When we moved the bbq onto the driveway to start it up, the weather was so-so. Ten minutes later, the wind was howling, there was thunder and lightning and hail. We got completely soaked.

But was it worth it! The steak was good - I had never had buffalo before, and it's similar to beef. The corn was the best I'd ever had, especially the charred bits. I would do both again, but especially the corn. I think that the corn would work really well in recipes too. I have one for corncakes that I usually make when we have ham, and I think roasted corn would be great in place of raw corn.

The trip and some of our dinners lately have revved up my need to cook again. I have been reading cookbooks a lot lately and have found lots of new things to try. I do like to cook.

Stuffed Jalapenos

Well, here is my jalapeno recipe. I have one word of advice though. When you halve the peppers and remove the seeds, make sure that you get out as much of the white membrane as you can, otherwise, depending on the pepper, they may still be really hot.

You need:

Cream cheese
Cheddar cheese, you want about equal amounts of both cheeses
Jalapeno peppers, cut in half lengthwise and seeded and deveined
Milk
Flour
Bread crumbs
Oil

Soften the cream cheese, and then mix with the cheddar. Stuff each pepper half with the mixture. Put the milk, flour and crumbs in separate bowls. Dip the peppers in the milk, and then into the flour. Let sit for a few minutes, then dip in milk again, and then in the crumbs. Let sit for a while to let the breading firm up. Heat up the oil, and carefully fry until light brown all over. Let sit for a few minutes, and then dig in!

Friday, August 13, 2004

Julia Child is gone.

I wasn't planning on posting any more today, but I have just heard that Julia Child has passed away at the age of 91, just days away from her 92nd birthday.

I am so sad, I really loved her. I have 3 of her cookbooks, including Mastering the Art of French Cooking, and she was just SUCH an inspiration to me.

Please read this, it is a lovely article.

Also, if you go here, you can see Julia's kitchen that she donated to the Smithsonian.

She truly was a treasure, and will be remembered in wonderful ways.

L

Wednesday, August 11, 2004

Shrimp "Fritters"

This weekend we made an antipasto platter of olives, bread, ham, 2 cheeses - Brie and Gruyere, tomato slices with lemon basil, olive paste, and those eggplant rolls stuffed with cheese and tomatos.

I am seriously addicted to those eggplant rolls. They are so good I hate to share with anyone, including Scott, when I buy them.

We also made "shrimp fritters" from Nigella.

We sort of fudged the recipe a bit. But were they ever GOOD!

We peeled, deveined and chopped up some shrimp (probably 3/4 cup chopped.) We mixed it with some chopped green onions, 2 cloves garlic chopped, salt and pepper, sherry, and some flour, and then added some water to make a thickish batter. We let it sit until we were ready to eat, then heated up a couple of inches of oil, and made patties of a little less than a soup spoon at a time. They only took a couple of minutes a side. Scott made a spicy Mayo while I wasn't looking.

They sure were a hit. They only bad thing was that I didn't think to take pictures until they had all been eaten! Oh well, I know for sure we will make them again.

Thursday, August 05, 2004

Souvlaki

I made chicken souvlaki the other night for dinner. It was really good. I marinated the chicken in some olive oil, lemon juice and spices, and made some tatziki - yoghurt, lemon juice, dill, and garlic.

I made a platter of olives, tomatos, feta, pita and the tatziki. I brought the leftovers for my boss, and he went crazy. He followed me around saying "Did you really make this? Really? Really?" I guess I'll take that as a complement.