Tomato Sandwiches

I love when tomatos are good (and cheap!) at the markets. 

Tomato Sandwiches are one of my very favorite late summer foods, but there are rules. 

1.  The bread must be white bread.

It can be "cheap" grocery store bread (there is no such thing as cheap bread any more!) or fancy artisanal bread. White bread just works better and tastes better for a tomato sandwich.

2.  You must use butter AND mayo.

A very thin layer of butter, to keep the bread from getting mushy right 

away, and a slightly thicker layer of mayonnaise for flavor.  

3.  A light sprinkling of salt.

Just a smidge to enhance the flavors of the tomatos. 

4.  Slice your tomatos thinly.

Also, blot gently with paper towel so they aren't too wet.

5.  If you can handle it, some hot sauce.

Because yes.

How to : Freeze Zucchini

I bought way too much zucchini which normally wouldn't be a problem, 

but we were getting ready to go away for a week. 

I didn't want to leave it in the fridge in case it spoiled 

while we were gone,  and there was no time left to eat it. 

 What to do? I froze it.

 I washed and cut the ends off the zukes, and cut them in half lengthwise

 to make sure they would fit in the food tube of my food processor. 

Then I shredded them.

I was ready to start portioning out the shredded veg, but since

 frozen veggies can sometimes be a bit mushy once thawed, 

I decided to squeeze out as much liqiud as I could before 

measuring out 1 cup portions into bags.

The little bags were loaded into large freezer bags and then placed gently in the freezer.

I haven't used any yet, but I'm thinking baking and soups will be good 

places to see how the zucchini stood up to freezing.

Something I Like - Egg Labelling at Save On Foods

We did our grocery shopping last week at Save On Foods, and I was surprised 

and very happy by something I saw there:

Labels denoting how the hens that lay your eggs are treated!

According to this article from last year (so I am obviously very blind), the eggs are labelled in 4 categories - Caged, Cage Free Free-Run, Cage Free Free-Range, and Cage Free Organic.

Each has a description so you can understand what each category really means.

I think this is an amazing and extremely helpful tool.  The descriptions made me change which eggs I buy on the spot - the eggs I normally buy that tout their hens as antibiotic free, and fed a vegetarian diet, are caged.  I was shocked.  I had assumed that they would be cage free.

Kudos to Save On Foods!

Grocery Shop, September 7

Pizza sauce, juice boxes, coconut milk, cider vinegar, sushi rice, vegetable juice, chicken stock, angel food cake mix, mozzarella, waffles, strawberries, lemons, bell peppers, bagels, tortillas, salami, pepperoni, ham, nori

$68

It's homemade pizza night tonight - pepperoni and peppers for The Boy, salami, peppers, hot peppers and olives for the adults.

We are going to attempt homemade sushi in the near future; something I haven't attempted in quite a few years.  I'm excited, as is The Boy.

Farmers Market - September 5

It's been ages since we've been to the market this year.

Life, yanno?

It was a good, busy market, although there were some empty 

spaces - stalls done for the year already?!?!

We brought home a big haul - country bread and olive and oregano baguette from Erwins Bakery, some small heirloom tomatoes from Thistle Farms, 

as well as red leaf lettuce, red onions, green beans, zucchini, and MORE heirloom tomatoes.

I used the small heirlooms and the baguette for tomato bruschetta.  After many years of being unhappy with my attempts at tomato bruschetta, I'm finally becoming satisfied with my mental recipe.  I've based a couple of steps on the Pioneer Womans recipe, and the results are so delicious.

What you do - chop up some garlic - I used just under a pound of tomatos, and used 4 garlic cloves.  Chop the garlic fairly finely.  Heat 1 TB of olive oil and 1 TB of butter over medium heat in a small pan.  Add the garlic, and cook, stirring often, until the garlic is soft and beginning to turn golden.

Meanwhile, chop your tomatos into small pieces.  Place in a bowl.  

When the garlic is done, scrape the contents of the garlic/butter/oil into the tomatos and stir.  Add a small splash of balsamic vinegar, and season with salt and pepper.  Shred some fresh basil leaves into the bowl, or a good shake of dried.  Let sit while you get your bread ready.

Cut baguette into thin slices.  Butter one side of the pieces.  Heat a pan over medium heat and add bread slices, butter side down.  Cook until the butter has melted into the bread, and the bread is lightly crisp.  

Place the bread rounds on a plate, butter side up.

Top a slice of bread with a spoon or so of tomato mixture, and a sprinkle of parmesan, if desired.

9-4

Wedge Salad

Last time I wrote about a wedge salad was probably the last time I had one.  

We watched some cooking show a while back that was at a restaurant that served them, 

and I knew it was time again.

Last time I went pretty basic, just tomato and chives with dressing.  

This time we added bacon and croutons - so delicious!

If you wanted to continue on the decadent path, crispy onions and avocado would be amazing.

I'm kicking myself for not thinking of that at the time.

Davison Orchards

No Summer is complete for our family without at least one trip to Davison Orchards in Vernon.

Kamloops Community Gardens

The Boy and I got a chance to peek in the Community Garden down on River Street.

The plants were amazing!

Gigantic tomatoes, beautiful chard.

Gorgeous peppers and corn.

There's a new garden this year down in Riverside Park, but I haven't had a chance to visit yet.

More info on Community Gardens in Kamloops -

Kamloops Community Gardens

Interior Community Services

Facebook

Lemongrass Restaurant

Finally, FINALLY, the day has come - Kamloops finally, seriously, FINALLY!!!!!!! has a Vietnamese restaurant. 

I truly didn't think it would ever happen. 

Lemongrass opened last month in the newish building on Summit Drive next to the firehall - 

1211 Summit Drive, to be exact.

 We stopped by for lunch earlier this month. I was beyond excited. 

 The decor is very nice - lots of light, wood, and greenery.

The grownups started with Vietnamese Iced Coffee.  

Normally you get the coffee filter dripping the hot coffee into a cup with condensed milk, and a glass with ice on the side for when it's finished brewing.  

Then you stir the coffee and milk together, and pour over the ice.  

Here they do all the work for you.  And the glasses are super cool.

Bun Cha is my very favorite Vietnamese dish - grilled meat and noodles.  

At Lemongrass they have some great options.  

The Mister got the 2 Skewers and 1 Spring Roll  - with the grilled pork.

I went with the One Skewer and 2 Spring Rolls  - with the grilled chicken.  

I also got rice instead of noodles.

The Boy was unsure about what to have, so we got him some tempura, 

and he picked at our plates as well.  

Everything was delicious.  The meats were nicely grilled and flavorful, and the spring rolls were crispy and soooo good.  

Service was a bit spotty.  Our server abandoned us shortly after taking our order - so we relied on whoever we could flag down for water, extra napkins, and sauces.  

I can't wait to go back.  I'll have the Bun a couple more times, then move on to the Pho.  

I've heard good things.

Lemongrass Restaurant - on Facebook here 

Home Ec - Grade 8

One of the best things I came across when I cleaned out all my recipe notebooks was this page from my Home Ec work in Grade 8, which was a long, long, LONG time ago, for Homemade Egg McMuffins. 

I was absolutely blown away that I could make something as sophisticated (I didn't get out much, even back then) as a breakfast sandwich from a fast food restaurant!

I made them at home for my parents, who were as impressed as I was.  

Or at least, that's how I remember it.

It was a thrill to having them turn out perfectly, and really get cooking.  

And want to do it some more.

I can't wait for my kids to have that experience one day too.

Cleaning house

I've been on a very slow cleaning spree the past few months.

De-cluttering as much as The Mister and The Boy will allow.  Which is not as much as I'd like.

One area of clutter that is completely my fault is my cookbooks, notebooks, and loose recipes.

I've long pretended it wasn't out of control, but I was up to 19 notebooks and binders of recipes, plus a large shoebox full of loose pages.  Too much!

It took me a few days, but I went through each page. 

I saved my favorite recipes, family recipes. Also recipes that I know I would really like to try. 

The rest got recycled, and I now have enough paper to fill maybe 2 binders.

I feel good about it!  And I have an entire shelf open to fill with new crap. 

Hooray?

Instagram - 30 books reviewed

I've reviewed 30 cookbooks from my shelves, and 23 have stayed put. 

I was tidying up a couple of weeks ago getting ready for some company, and I stopped to take a hard look at my cookbooks shelves.  

I pulled off 8 books that really held no appeal for me to cook from - 6 were retro cookbooks from various used book sales, and 2 were juicing books.  

I do own a juicer but we never use it.  It seems so wasteful to not just eat the fruit and veggies, once you juice and see how much stuff you throw away.  

But it was a gift, and that stops me from getting rid of it.

The cookbooks went to the thrift store untested, and I feel good about it.

I'm not going to cook from books because I feel like I have to.
This is supposed to be a fun project, not to force me to cook food we don't want to eat.

I'm trying to be tough, to pare down my collection but I do find it hard.  

I am more sentimental than I'd like to admit sometimes.

In which we take a perfectly nutritious vegetable, and fry it

I often buy vegetables with the best intentions, and then when I get them home, I'm like, now what?

(The current victim in my fridge are some pattypan squash from the market.)

I bought some lovely thin green beans recently, then promptly buried them in the fridge and ignored them.

After a week I was at the "use it or lose it" stage, so I found inspiration in my food cravings - something fried.  I was going to have a healthy main dish - roasted vegetable wrap - so why not doll up the beans and make them naughty?

The batter was equal parts flour and beer - 1/2 cup of each, and then some water to thin it down a little more, because The Mister was finishing off the can of beer.

The sauce.  Ah.  Sigh.    We have a bottle of Franks Red Hot Bollywood Sauce that we got at Target in  a combo pack with their regular sauce.  It's so delicious, sweet and spicy.  I've never seen it anywhere else, and I don't see it on their website now, so maybe it was a promotional thing?

Anyway, mayo, couple of grated cloves of garlic, some bollywood sauce.  Even the boy liked it!

I don't really like frying at home, but green beans are so thin that they're easy to fry in minimal oil.

Which, unfortunately, means I can make them again and again.

Salted Peanut Butter and Jelly Blondies

I have such a weakness for peanut butter. And jam. 

Sandwiches, cookies, toast, crackers, waffles. Spoons. 

I'm in a treat zone right now, where I'm trying to make sure we always have some sort of cookie, cake or square available for snacking. 

It backfires on me fairly often as none of us are super big sweets people, so I end up freezing things until I can give them away. 

But still I persist. 

I took advantage of the recent break in the hot weather to try out a newly saved recipe on Pinterest - Salted Peanut Butter and Jelly Blondies from Bon Appetit. 

I thought the recipe was a bit stingy on the amount of jam, 

so I just spooned on jam until it looked good to me.

I had to be stingy with the peanuts as there were only crumbs left in the container.

I loved how rich but not overly sweet these are.  

Comfort food but sorta fancy.  Also - my first blondie!

Recipe: Salted Peanut Butter and Jelly Blondies

Something I like - Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?

On the perks of babysitting 

' "Mommy wanted to know who ate all the turtle shaped bagel pizzas, and I knew it was you, but I lied and said it was me." She burst into tears. I hugged her and told her, "You can never tell her the truth." ' 

One night stands

'I guess nothing puts a damper on a one-night stand as much as your friend pointing out all the opportunities where you might have been killed.' 

Fashun

'That's because my parents dressed both my brother and me according to roughly exactly the same aesthetic: Bert from Ernie and Bert.' 

 Also, great essay titles. 

Why Do Men Put On Their Shoes So Slowly? 

In Defense Of Chest Hair 

The Day I Stopped Eating Cupcake

Eggs and Potatos

This was an off the cuff breakfast that made me so happy. 

 3 ingredients! 

 I grated 2 small sweet potatos and 1 large yellow potatos. Cause that's what I had. 

Then! 

I heated a couple of spoonfuls of coconut oil in a large pan over medium heat. I added the shredded spuds and cooked, stirring often, until the potatos are cooked and crisp and brown in spots. Season with salt and pepper if desired. 

And! 

When the potatos are almost done, cook some eggs. Scrambled, fried, poached, sunny side up, whatever you like.  I did scrambled for the boy and attempted fried for the adults.

Lo ! 

Plate your taters and top with your egg.

I really love the flavor of the potatos and the coconut oil. Delicious. 

 I overcooked the egg, but that just means I get to make this again.
Practice makes perfect.

Burgers

A lot has changed in my life lately, but there is one constant - burgers. 

Ha!  Not really.  Except sort of.  

We love burgers a lot.  We rarely go more than a week or two without making them.  

And make them from scratch.  No pre-made patties around here!

I have lots of books and recipes for burgers, but I mostly just throw in whatever we have around.

When I was a kid, my mom had a friend who made us burgers a few times.  They had onion soup mix powder and raisins in them.  Heavenly!  I've never tried to make them because I'm afraid they won't live up to my memories, and it's a good summertime memory.

Lately I've been making the same burger and no one is complaining.  It's juicy and savory and perfect.

A pound of meat, some dehydrated onion, a couple of spoons of hoisin.  Mix it together, form 4 patties and barbecue.  BBQ sauce and cheese are a nice touch but not necessary.

Huh.  I think I know what's for dinner tomorrow...

Bay Tree

I impulse purchased a little bay tree this Spring and planted it in our garden. 

I've done no research into if it will survive the winter, but it was only $10. 

I am hoping it will survive, I've long envied European cooking books and shows that flaunt their fresh bay. 

 In other garden news, I added another type of mint, bringing my total to 3. 

The chives are trying to take over the garden, and for now I'm letting them. We've cooked with chives this year more than any other. 

The oregano has been neglected the past few years, and I'm thinking of pulling it out; we never use it. 

Peas and raspberries are our big crops again this year. 

They are the boys favorites; it's a fight for anyone else to get any if he's around.

Jacob's Noodle and Cutlet

I finally got to eat at Jacob's Noodle and Cutlet a couple of months ago. 

 They've been open about a year now, in the former Felix on Fourth location at 260 4th Ave. 

The place was busy, the service was pretty good. 

I had the Spicy Chicken.  It was spicy!  But delicious.  Served with rice on the side.

The Mister had Lunch Special A - pork cutlet, tempura, salad, and miso soup.  

His was served with 3 dipping sauces, plus sesame seeds in a mortar and pestle that were to be ground up and sprinkled over.....something.  

Our waitress told us nothing about the sauces or what to do with the seeds.  We survived, but some advice would have been nice.

Website here - Jacob's Noodle and Cutlet