March 3, 2010 - Spanakopita

I'm not sure what motivated me to make this on a Wednesday night, since it was pretty time-consuming.  The phyllo sheets had to be cut, and each layer buttered, before the filling could be wrapped into individual triangles.  At the end of the night (yes, it was pretty late by the time it was done) it was very tasty!  The part I enjoyed the most was the hint of dill in each piece - somehow it made it taste refreshing.    I made a whole bunch and put most of it in the freezer, so next time I need some appetizers I can just pop these in the oven and I'm good to go!

This recipe was from All Recipes.  If you're looking for more recipes for Spanikopita, I recommend ones that have dill in them.

February 24, 2010 - Chicken noodle soup

Decided to make chicken noodle soup to fight off a cold.  This is another Alton Brown recipe.  For those of you who don't know Alton Brown, he is the creator of the show, Good Eats.  Goods Eats is not just a typical cooking show; it's a very educational show that teaches you not only how to cook, but why we cook things in certain ways, and also the science behind cooking.  Highly recommended for any foodies out there.

February 23, 2010 - 40 cloves and a chicken

No, it's not a typo - this recipe calls for 40 cloves of garlic.  Trust me, and trust Alton Brown and his recipe.  I was a bit skeptical going in, worried that the garlic will be too overpowering, but I was wrong.  After an hour and a half in the oven, we had a nice golden garlicky chicken. 

And what to do with all that garlic?  Toast some baguette and use the garlic as a spread, and sprinkle on some parmesan! Yum.

February 14, 2010 - Osso bucco

The first time I made osso bucco, I made it with lamb since I couldn't find veal shanks.  I promised myself that I'd find veal shanks next time.  When I did, I decided to save the opportunity for a Valentine's Day meal.  It's nice to go out to a romantic restaurant, but we thought it would be just as nice to avoid the crowd and spend several hours cooking together.

Just like before, we had the saffron risotto, and a bottle of amarone to go with it.  The osso bucco with veal was way better than lamb.  The veal was way more "fally-aparty", and the bone marrow gave it a good touch of flavour.    

And for dessert?  Valentine's Day is not complete without chocolate!  We made a trip to Kitsilano in the afternoon and visited a local chocolatier called "Chocolate Arts".  I really like how their boxes of chocolates aren't organized in trays.  Each one is different in this box, so it was a lot of fun picking each time.

February 8, 2010 - Mystery chicken

If you are a keener you might have noticed that a lot of my posts are made quite a bit after the date the photos were taken.  This is certainly an area of improvement for my blog, because posts like this can happen:

"..I wonder what this dish was called.  Hm, there seems to be some chicken, mushrooms, and tomatoes in it.  Maybe some onions or shallots?  Ah, what the heck, just call it 'Mystery chicken'!"

Now time to catch up on more posts...

February 7, 2010 - Breakfast omelette

Eggs + leftover vegetables in the fridge + some cheese = breakfast omelette

Eating a good breakfast on a Sunday morning makes me happy.  With a homemade latte it's even better.  What would be better is if I were to enjoy the meal on our balcony, but that's something to look forward to when summer is near.

February 5, 2010 - Shougayaki (Ginger pork)

Shougayaki is another dish that is typical in Japanese home cooking.  The slices of pork are cooked in a sauce that includes a lot of juice from grated ginger.  Since the slices are thin, they only need to be marinated for a short time.  If you have a chance to make this dish, I would recommend having it with mayo on the side (preferably Japanese mayo).

February 3, 2010 - Seared tuna with mango salsa

Whenever we go to a grocery store and see big chunks of ahi tuna steaks in the seafood section, it is a big temptation.  It's a bit pricey, so we only seldomly indulge in this temptation, but whenever we do, we know exactly how to cook it.

Searing!

I love my tuna sashimi, but a good seared tuna has different levels of flavour and textures that a slice of sashimi doesn't have.  It's tricky though, because if you overcook it, the result is a huge disappointment (in my opinion, like a well-done filet mignon).

February 2, 2010 - Salmon burgers and yam fries with chipotle mayo

As you saw on the previous post, we bought a whole salmon and cut some into steaks, but there was still a lot of salmon left, so we wanted to come up with something different.  That's when we came up with these salmon burgers. 

I love getting yam fries at restaurants, so we thought, why not try it at home? Deep-frying has always been the most difficult method of cooking for me since I don't have a deep-fryer at home. These fries tasted good but were a bit on the soggy side (a result of difficult temperature control?).  I think next time I will just bake them.

The best part of the meal was the chipotle mayo.  It was so easy to make, but tasted almost exactly like I've had at restaurants, and as expected, it went very well with the slightly sweet yam fries.  It was also great with the salmon burgers.

February 1, 2010 - Miso-ginger marinated grilled salmon

 

This might be one of my favourite salmon receipes.  This recipe from the Food Network website is so simple. The marinade is only for half an hour, but the flavour seeps in really well, and since it's cooked on the grill, that part takes almost no time at all.  Highly recommended for weeknight meal.

Oh, almost forgot.  This is what the salmon looked like before:

January 30, 2010 - Pancakes

Mmm.. pancakes!  With our busy lifestyles, it's a rare occasion that we have time to make breakfast and enjoy it at home.  Because of my limited breakfast cooking skills, previous pancakes I've made weren't the best, but these ones came out pretty good and fluffy.  The best part is pouring maple syrup over it.  Being in Canada, maple syrup is stereotypically an important part of the cuisine, but in my kitchen it still has an exclusive use for pancakes!

January 28, 2010 - Chicken enchiladas and mexican rice

Recently the only enchilada's I've been making were the "Enchiladas with salsa verde", so I decided to go for the more typical enchilada, and it turned out well. (Although I think I still prefer the salsa verde) The rice has a nice cumin flavour too.

January 26, 2010 - Minestrone

How often do you make soup?  Most of the soup I eat are from a can, but sometimes it's nice to take the time to make it from scratch.  This home-made minestrone was a hearty soup with lots of vegetables and a slight kick to it - perfect for a winter evening!

January 25, 2010 - Thai red curry with shrimp

This was one of these nights where I hadn't planned anything for dinner so I opened and closed both the fridge and the freezer many times before I came up with something I could quickly put together.  The red curry paste we made a while back that was in the freezer saved the day!  Added some coconut milk, prawns, chicken, young coconut, and it turned out to be a pretty good meal.

January 20, 2010 - Shiojake and nagaimo

Tonite's meal:
- Rice
- Miso soup with tofu and wakame
- Shiojake (salted salmon)
- Kimpira gobo- (braised burdock and carrots)
- Nagaimo (mountain yam) with ponzu

I would say these are typical dishes in Japanese home cooking.  Often people that know about sushi and teriyaki ask me what actual Japanese people eat at home.  I find this really difficult to answer, because often a meal consists of multiple dishes, and it's hard to explain what they're like in a generalized way.  This is also why I find Japanese cooking so challenging - when it comes time to make a meal, you have to think of so many small dishes to prepare! 

 Here's a close up of the nagaimo.  Looks familiar?

January 19, 2010 - Milk green tea jelly

I decided to make this green tea jelly because a while ago I impulsively bought a bag of "koshian" (smooth sweet red bean paste), and it had been sitting in the fridge for some time.  It was very easy to make, and the red bean paste definitely made it taste very Japanese, since I think about 90% of Japanese sweets include some form of red bean paste.

January 18, 2010 - Mexican cucumber salad

This is a refreshing salad with cucumbers, green peppers, stewed tomates, and corn, with a hint of Mexican flavours.  Very easy to assemble, and I love the fact that it includes corn.  Maybe I'm weird, but I really enjoy salads that have corn in them. Back in my university days when I barely knew how to cook, I used to have a lot of "corn salads", which basically meant corn from a can with dressing on it.  I'm happy to say that my cooking has improved since then!

January 18, 2010 - Chili and corn bread

Chili is good.  And so is corn bread.
The best part of chili is that once you make a whole pot, you can enjoy it over and over again! 

January 14, 2010 - Bhindi Masala (Spicy Okra)

Like a lot of Indian dishes from my other posts, this is from Manjula's Kitchen.  I usually don't buy okra, because one, I don't know many recipes that use okra, and two, because a lot of okra dishes I've tried in the past have been slimy.  The surprising thing about this dish was that it wasn't slimy at all!  For those of you who are getting tired of typical curries and want to try something new, I would definitely recommend this.

January 13, 2010 - Christmas leftovers?

I know it's not Christmas, but I just had to experiment a bit more with my new lighting set.  I grabbed some random things from the living room and decided to trying something a bit more artsy than a raw onion, and this is what I came up with.

January 12, 2010 - Raw Onion

Happy birthday to me!!
Look at this onion, notice anything special?  For my birthday I received a lighting set so that I can take photos of food at night without struggling with poor indoor lighting.  The set came with a bright light, reflectors, and various background colours.  Now I have a tiny studio set up in the living room. I'm very excited about how much this will improve the quality of my photos!

January 9, 2010 - Grass-fed steak

Sometimes we splurge and go to our local butcher to buy chunks of good meats.  One of our favourites is the grass-fed steak.  They're not marbled like high-quality Kobe beef, but very tender and juicy.  Just look at the perfectly cooked medium rare steak!  Days like this I'm happy I'm not a vegetarian.

January 8, 2010 - Garides Tourkolimano (Greek Shrimp)