Weekend Cookbook Challenge #8 - A Foreign Dish

The totally super and lovely Ruth from Once Upon A Feast is hosting Weekend Cookbook Challenge #8 and she chose "A Foreign Dish" as the theme.

I was psyched for this one; I had recently received a cookbook from my mom that would be absolutely perfect for this challenge.

When I was a teenager my family went to Hawaii for a holiday. I had a couple of food ephiphanies that trip and one of them was Thai food.

We ate dinner at a restaurant called Keo's that served food unlike anything I'd had in my life. It was an amazing meal for me. My mom bought the cookbook before we left so we could try to re-create some of these amazing dishes at home. Tragically we were never happy with any of our attempts, mainly because the small town we lived in did not carry most of the ingredients needed.

Earlier this year my mom gave me her Keo's cookbook to bring home. I was so excited that I filed it on my cookbook bookcase and promptly forgot about it until Ruth announced her theme. Thanks Ruth! Not only did I have a lot of fun cooking it brought back some sweet memories of vacationing with my family too.

Crisp Noodles
All recipes from Keo's Thai Cuisine by Keo Sananikone

This was the dish that always stayed in my memory - one of the best noodle dishes I had ever had in my life. If you try to make this you need to make sure that the rice noodles you use are fryable - they have to puff up. That was the problem my mom and I always had. This time I went down to Chinatown and looked for rice noodles that had directions to fry them on the package.

1/4 lb boneless chicken breast
2 oz shrimp (optional)
1/2 cup dried tamarind
1/2 cup warm water i used 1 tb of tamarind paste and 1/2 cup water
1 tsp ketchup i used 1 tb
1-4 tb fish sauce i used soy sauce
1 tb red wine vinegar
1/3 cup brown sugar
5 cups oil for deep frying
1/2 cup bean sprouts
1 green onion chopped
4 oz rice noodles

Dice chicken. Shell and devein shrimp; dice. Combine water and tamarind; blend well and strain. In a large saucepan combine chicken, shrimp, tamarind water, ketchup, fish sauce, wine vinegar and brown sugar. Bring to a boil, then turn heat to low, cover and simmer one hour. Set aside to cool. In a wok heat oil over medium high heat. Fry rice noodles a little at a time until they puff up. Remove from wok and drain on paper towel. Combine noodles, bean sprouts, green onion and sauce; toss lightly to mix. Garnish with chile peppers and parsley.

Beef Sa-teh on Skewers

1 lb combination of boneless chicken, beef and pork
3 tb oil
1 stalk fresh lemon grass
3 cloves garlic
1/2 tsp seeded and chopped red chile pepper
1 tb curry powder
1 tsp sugar or honey
1/4 tsp salt

Cut chicken beef and pork thinly into 2" strips. In a food processor or blender combine oil, lemon grass, garlic, chile pepper, curry powder, honey and salt. Blend until smooth. Pour over meat and marinade for at least two hours. Thread meat onto skewers and barbecue or broil, turning occasionally, until cooked. Serve with cucumber sauce.

Cucumber Sauce

1 cucumber
5 tb sugar
1 cup boiling water
1/2 cup white vinegar
1 tsp salt
3-5 red chile peppers seeded and finely chopped
3 green onions finely chopped

Thinly slice cucumber; place in bowl. Dissolve sugar in boiling water; stir in vinegar and salt. Pour sauce over cucumber slices and sprinkle with chile peppers and green onions.

Evil Jungle Prince with Chicken

1/2 lb boneless chicken breast
2-6 small red chile peppers i had to use green
1/2 stalk lemon grass
2 kaffir lime leaves
2 tb oil
1/2 cup coconut milk
1/2 tsp salt
1-4 tb fish sauce
10-15 fresh basil leaves
1 cup chopped cabbage i served over rice

Thinly cut chicken into 2" strips. Grind together chile peppers, lemon grass and lime leaves in a food processor or blender. Heat oil over medium high heat and cook pepper mixture for 3 minutes. Stir in coconut milk and cook 2 more minutes. Add chicken and cook for 5 minutes, until chicken is cooked through. Reduce heat to medium low and stir in basil and fish sauce. Serve on a bed of chopped cabbage.

La Festa al Fresco

I was totally excited to be invited by Lis from La Mia Cucina and Ivonne from Cream Puffs in Venice to participate in their celebration of summer - La Fiesta al Fresco.

My very favorite thing about summer is tomatos. In summer there is sometimes no better meal than a freshly picked tomato, and plate and a knife.

Sadly I did not inherit my mothers green thumb for gardening so I rely on the farmers market to keep me in the good stuff all summer long. That season is almost over, so we are taking advantage of the tomatos while we can, eating them every day, in any way we can think of.

Here are two of our favorites. Ivonne and Lis I hope these two dishes fit in well with the rest of the feast!

Double Tomato and Prosciutto Panini

Makes 4 sandwiches

8 pieces of bread of your choice (i use 4 pieces of focaccia, split)
100 grams prosciutto
150 grams cheese (i like brie)
fresh basil
4 slices of red onion
1 large tomato sliced
3 tb mayonnaise
1 tb sun dried tomato pesto

Preheat your panini/george foreman-type grill.
Mix the mayonnaise and pesto together and spread on all 8 slices of bread.
Divide the cheese between 4 bread slices and top with the basil, prosciutto, onion, tomato and remaining bread.
Grill until the bread is toasted and the cheese melts, 4 or 5 minutes.


Tomato Tart

serves 4-6

1 tube pillsbury pizza dough, or your own crust
3 large tomatos, sliced
1 tb oil
1 red onion thinly sliced
2 garlic cloves minced
100 grams feta cheese
100 grams mozzarella cheese shredded
fresh basil

Preheat oven to 450'. Roll or press out dough to 1/2" thickness. (Dough does not need to be round.) Move to a baking sheet.
Heat pan over medium heat and add oil and onion. Cook onion until softened and light brown. Add garlic and continue to cook 3 more minutes. Spread onion mixture over dough, leaving a 2-3 inch border all around. Crumble feta over and top with mozzarella cheese. Season lightly with salt and pepper and scatter basil over. Cover all the cheese with tomato slices, then pull up the sides to close in the cheese but not to cover the top. Bake until golden brown, 25 minutes. Let sit 5 minutes before cutting.

August Movies

Here's something new I may or may not continue on a monthly basis - a list of all the movies I've watched that month.

My stellar reviewing system will include Yes (if I liked the movie), No (if I didn't) and possibly Eh (if I'm ambivalent). It will also include an "R" if I've seen the movie before.


Fantastic Four NO!
Lords of Dogtown Yes
Dave Chappelle's Block Party Yes
Kiss Kiss Bang Bang Yes
The Squid and the Whale Yes
Fun With Dick and Jane NO!
Something The Lord Made YES!
Billy Elliot Yes
Memoirs of a Geisha eh
Hustle and Flow (R) Yes
Transamerica Yes
Roll Bounce (R) Yes. A movie about rollerskating? With a skate off? What's not to love?

What year do you belong in?

Far out man! Thanks to Cyndi at Cookin with Cyndi for the link.

You Belong in 1969

If you scored... 1950 - 1959: You're fun loving, romantic, and more than a little innocent. See you at the drive in! 1960 - 1969: You are a free spirit with a huge heart. Love, peace, and happiness rule - oh, and drugs too. 1970 - 1979: Bold and brash, you take life by the horns. Whether you're partying or protesting, you give it your all! 1980 - 1989: Wild, over the top, and just a little bit cheesy. You're colorful at night - and successful during the day. 1990 - 1999: With you anything goes! You're grunge one day, ghetto fabulous the next. It's all good!

What Year Do You Belong In?

Bits and Bites

This week was a long tough week. I worked a lot of overtime, but when I left work yesterday it still looked like a bomb had gone off in my office.

The highlight of the week? Yesterday afternoon two of my coworkers and I snuck out of work when my boss wasn't looking and drove to Marble Slab Creamery in Chinook Mall. I actually tried something different this time. I highly recommend the Cheesecake Ice Cream.

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Last week at the market I bought some edible flowers. The lady I bought them from suggested in addition to using them in salad to try them in a sandwich or on a pizza. I have done none of those things and they are still in my fridge.

This morning at the market I bought a bag of borage flowers. I have seen these included in recipes for Pimms. This afternoon I made myself a Pimms with Borage flowers. It didn't taste any different, but it was pretty.


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In my second Vegas post I mentioned that I am not crazy about buffets. You'll be happy to hear that I have eaten 4 meals at buffet restaurants this week.

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Calgarians, the Community Natural Foods store by Chinook is selling bags of peeled frozen organic bananas for $2.00. Perfect for baking or smoothies.


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I went to Shoppers Drug Mart this morning because they were having a sale on paper towel (I know! My life could not be more exciting!). They had Thai Kitchen soups on 5 for $3.00. I grabbed 5 but when the cashier was ringing them thru, they were showing up as their original price of $1.20. I asked her about the sale so she sent someone to check it out. While we were waiting she told me that if the display showed they were on sale, I'd get the soups for a penny each. I laughed, assuming it was a joke. Sure enough, the display had the sale price and the cashier really did charge me $0.05 for all 5 soups. SCORE!

Croque Monsieur

Oh, how I love a Croque Monsieur sandwich. I don't know if I'll ever be lucky enough to eat one at a cafe in Paris, but no matter. My version is pretty wonderful.

This is definitely NOT an everyday sannie. But for a bit of a fancy dinner, what is better than ham cheese and white sauce? Not very much.

4 sandwiches - for 2 to 4 people.

1 1/2 tb butter
1 1/2 tb flour
1 cup milk, warmed in the microwave
salt
pepper
nutmeg
2 cups grated Gruyere cheese
3 tb grated Parmesan cheese
8 slices white bread (Scott likes this sandwich because it's one of the few times he gets white bread!)
dijon mustard
8 slices of ham
Preheat oven to 425'

First, make your sauce:

Melt the butter over medium low heat, add flour and cook, stirring for 2 minutes. Add in the milk and whisk until thick. Add half of the cheeses and whisk until melted. Remove from heat and season to taste with salt pepper and nutmeg.

Toast the bread. Spread dijon on 4 pieces. Top with 2 pieces of ham each and spoon some sauce and cheese over top.
Top with the remaining bread, sauce and cheese. Place sandwiches on a baking tray and bake for 5 - 10 minutes.

Turn on broiler and broil until lightly browned on top.
Serve immediately.

Espresso Affogato

The simplest dessert in the world, and one of the very best. Here's our version:

Espresso Affogato
for one

good quality vanilla ice cream
1 shot espresso
good quality chocolate

Scoop the ice cream into a bowl. Pour over the espresso, and grate some chocolate on top. Serve right away.

How easy is that?

Spinach Salad

Until I was in my 20's I hated spinach with a passion. I refused to eat it in any way, shape or form.
I can't remember what dish made me change my attitude towards this wonderful vegetable, but now it's one of my favorite foods, and this salad is one of my favorite ways to prepare it.

Spinach Salad

4 servings

1 bag spinach
1/4 lb mushrooms, cleaned and sliced
4 slices bacon chopped
2 tsp sugar
3 tb cider vinegar
3 tb water
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper

Place the spinach and mushrooms in your serving bowl.

In a medium pan, fry the bacon until crisp. Remove the bacon from the pan and drain on paper towel. Add the rest of the ingredients to the bacon fat in the pan. Stir over medium heat until the dressing is hot and the sugar has dissolved.
Pour over the spinach, toss well and serve right away.

Penne with Marcella Hazan's Favorite Tomato Sauce

I first saw this recipe over at The Amateur Gourmet and thought it was a good idea, but promptly forgot about it. Then I bought a cookbook called Dishy, and low and behold, he had the same recipe. I decided to give it a try; I've never made a tomato sauce with butter before, and the onion intruiged me.

This recipe is FANTASTIC. It is incredible that 3 ingredients can make such a wonderful and complex-tasting sauce. I beg you to try it. You won't believe your taste buds.

PENNE WITH MARCELLA HAZAN'S FAVORITE TOMATO SAUCE
from Dishy, by Kevin Gould

2 - 400 g cans plum tomatos
80 g butter
1/2 onion
500 g penne, spaghetti or other pasta
Parmesan cheese for grating
salt and pepper


Put the canned tomatos in a heavy pot with the butter and a pinch of salt if desired and place over medium heat. Peel the skin from the onion half and add it to the pot. Cook, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon, until the mixture starts to bubble. Turn the heat down to low, and when the butter has melted, use the back of a spoon to squeeze the tomatos against the side of the pot to make a smooth sauce. Cook for up to 45 minutes, until the sauce is smooth and has a buttery sheen. Meanwhile, cook the pasta as directed. Just before serving, remove the onion from the sauce. Toss with the drained pasta, and serve with freshly grated Parmesan cheese. Serves 4.

Blog Party #13 - Cool As A...

This month's Blog Party over at Dispensing Happiness is all about staying cool and using the stove and other appliances as little as possible. Usually a wonderful idea for August. But of course here in Calgary our weather has taken a downward turn. I had to wear a jacket this morning to the farmers market! That is just wrong.For the party I made 2 snacks and 1 drink - Corn and Black Bean Salsa on Chips, Watermelon Margarita Salad and Long Island Ice Tea.
We made our Teas with rum, vodka, tequila, lemon juice and cola. Lethal!
The Watermelon Salad was wonderful! Very cool and refreshing.
Some of the chips have just a dot of sour cream, some are just salsa. These went fast - I had to make up 2 more trays after this picture!

Stephanie always has some great music lined up, and I'd like to throw in a song that I love that sprung to mind when I was flinging tequila everywhere - Sol Ja Camba by Fantcha. It's a beautiful song.

Thanks to Stephanie for another great party!



Watermelon Margarita Salad

I made mine with half a medium watermelon.

Watermelon, cut into bite sized cubes, chilled
2 tb finely chopped basil
2 tb finely chopped mint
4 tb lime juice
4 tb tequila
salt
sugar

Place watermelon cubes on a platter. Scatter the mint and basil over, then sprinkle with the lime juice and tequila. Top with a couple of small pinches each of salt and sugar. Serve right away, or let stand for 30 minutes or so.



Corn and Black Bean Salsa on Chips

salsa:
3 tomatos, seeded and diced
3/4 cup corn kernels
1 cup black beans
2 tb oil
2 tb lime juice
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cumin


tortilla chips
sour cream (optional)

Mix the salsa ingrediants gently together and let sit for a few hours or overnight.

When ready to serve, lay chips out on a plate. If using sour cream, put a small dab on each chip before topping with a spoonful of salsa.

Serve right away.

Farmers Market

We've got cauliflower, white and red potatos, cucmber, 2 bags of green beans, tomatos, and a huge zucchini.

Got some good stuff lined up for all this.

Vegas Part 3

OK, just a few more pictures and then I'll stop. I promise.
This might be one of my favorite pictures, after Scott and the showgirl. This was a ceiling in the Wynn.
A fountain at Caesars.
He was delicious with a lemon-caper sauce. (kidding!)
I'm thinking about quitting my job to go pro. What do you think?
The Wynn.
The Venetian outside.

The Venetian inside.
This might have been in the Venetian too, I'm not sure.

OK that's it! Back to food and stuff.

Vegas Part 2

I should have told you yesterday that if you're hoping for fabulous pictures of fabulous meals, you going to be out of luck. We were rarely hungry - it was just too hot. When we were hungry we were never around anything very exciting. Go over to Sarah Janes blog. She was in Las Vegas just before us and read about her meal at Fleur de Lys, which was a beautiful looking place. NEXT TIME, I'm going to do some serious eating.

We went to the buffet for lunch at the Monte Carlo. I'm not a huge fan of buffets, as they are not usually done very well, and I just can't justify the price. Scott and I are not huge eaters, so unless it's a truly amazing buffet it's usually not worth it. This one was not worth it. The only two things I really enjoyed were the salads - a tomato salad and a pasta salad. I didn't like the beef at all. As we say around these parts, if it ain't Alberta, it ain't beef. And the rest of it was only ok. Not worth the money or the wait.
I did enjoy all of my alcoholic beverages. Scott insisted we pay extra so we could have my margarita in this plastic mug. Why, I don't know.
The crepe shop at Paris. The food here sounded great, but everytime we were around it, we weren't hungry. It's on my list for next time too.
We went all fancy for an hour and had drinks at the Bellagio. I had a Mojito and Scott had a beer. This was truly the best mojito I've ever tasted. The waitress told me they use rock sugar syrup instead of regular sugar syrup and they dusted the whole thing with powdered sugar. Totally worth $12.00 US.
Here's my straight up margarita and Scott's beer. This might make me sound like a raging alcoholic, but I really enjoyed how you can walk around everywhere and drink at the same time.
Hey! Mexican food!
Scott had a fish taco and a shrimp enchilada. His enchilada was great. I had a veggie burrito.
I always thought a macaroon was a chocolate-coconut candy until I saw stuff like this and this. I'd never actually seen this kind of macaroon before but they sold them in a bakery in the Paris hotel. Unfortunately you had to buy a box of them. But then I saw them being sold individually ($3.00 a pop!) at a shop in the Wynn Hotel. We tried a pistachio macaroon. It was good, but quite sweet.

Vegas Part 1

I can't even start to tell you how much fun we had! It was a total blast and I'm so glad I went. I am slowly recovering and catching up on my sleep. My poor feet are still hating me - we did a lot of walking.

Thanks to all of you who left me suggestions on things to see and do. Unfortunately, I didn't see any of the comments before I left! But don't worry, I've got them filed away for next time. Oh yes, there will be a next time.

Here, have some pictures.

This was a section of a gorgeous wine cellar in a restaurant in Mandalay Bay. It was 3 or 4 stories tall, I forget which.

Border Grill restaurant. I've said for a few years now that when I go to Vegas I would eat here.
I didn't eat here.

Scott gets down to business.

The New York New York Hotel at night.
Statue of Liberty.
MGM Grand. There was a guy all dressed in black that had climbed up the side of the hotel on some scaffolding. I thought he was a worker at the hotel and was fixing something until the police came and hauled him away.
The Excalabur.
I think I took this from the walkway between New York and MGM.
Has anyone been to M&M World? We didn't go in, but almost everyone we saw on the street was carrying shopping bags from there.


So the first night in Vegas was crazy - we just went all over the place looking at everything. It was so hot there, and so loud and busy. I don't think anything can prepare you for how truly BIG everything is. We just kept going and going and drinking and laughing and stuff, and then the next thing we knew it was 4 in the morning. And we hadn't eaten since lunch. I can't remember which hotel we were in, but there wasn't much open for food. So my first meal in Las Vegas was...





A CHEESE DOG! God it was gross. But at four in the morning, beggars can't be choosers, huh?
This was my breakfast late (very very late) the next morning. After all that alcohol, it was the only thing I could imagine keeping down. And a very delicious frozen mocha frappuccino it was.

Weekend Cookbook Challenge #7 Lucky Number Seven

The round-up for WCC #7 is up over at the WCC blog. Go ch-ch-check it out. Did you forget to join in this time, or have you just discovered WCC? No worries mate! The next challenge is already up! Ruth from Once Upon A Feast is our lovely co-host. Hope to see you there.

Vegetarian Week, Interrupted.

Hi guys, I'm sorry to tell you that Vegetarian Week has been stopped at Day 5. Why, you ask?

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I'M GOING TO LAS VEGAS, BABY!
Yes, in just a couple of hours Scott and I are heading to the airport. This trip is so last minute, it's scary.
Even though I'm going to VEGAS, where I've never been before, where I've wanted to go for AGES, I actually feel pretty bad about not finishing this week off on the blog. While I have made a decision to eat less meat in general, I don't think it's fair to poor Scott to go somewhere so fun and not to be able to eat whatever he wants.

So I promise we'll do another Vegetarian Week again real soon, and I have another theme week planned too.

Have a fantastic weekend. I know I will! See you mid-week, and hopefully Blogger will let me post tons of pictures.

Cheers!

Vegetarian Week DAY 5

Stupid Blogger won't let me post any pictures.

Breakfast this morning - toasted crumpet with wine jelly and a plum
Lunch - Went out for a Bean and Corn Quesadilla. I'm going to have the leftovers for lunch tomorrow.
Dinner - ooooh so good. Last night I made Meena's Chickpea Curry from Hooked on Heat. We had it tonight - wow what a super dish. You should go check out her great site. We had some salad and another new recipe - Twice Baked Potatos with Indian Spices and Peas from The New Best Recipe. Fairly quick to make (excluding the baking of the potatos), very aromatic and wonderful.

I am running short on time tonight, so I'll paraphrase my version of the recipe for you.

For 2 or more servings, bake 2 potatos. Let cool slightly and cut in half so they sit nicely on a baking sheet. Scoop out most of the flesh, leaving a solid shell. Melt 2 tb butter in a pan and add half a chopped onion, 2 garlic cloves and a small knob of chopped ginger. Cook for a few minutes, then stir in 1 tsp cumin, and 1/4 tsp each cinnamon, tumeric, and cloves. Cook for a couple more minutes, then add in the potato flesh and a couple of tablespoons of water. Cook for 3 or 4 minutes, then add 3/4 cup of thawed peas. Cook for one minute, then spoon back into the shells. Return to the oven for 15 minutes and serve.