Toad in the Hole with Crock Pot Onion Gravy

Go ahead giggle.  That was the hole point of standing the sausages on their ends in the muffin cups.  Which requires a little bit of fiddling and a pair of tongs, just so you know.

It all came about when a friend asked me for a recipe for Spotted Dick.  Seems her hubby wanted to know what a Spotted Dick looked like.  But when I told her it was steamed-suet pudding….well, we came up with another plan with an equally risque name.

Toad in the Hole is an old English comfort-food standby.  Sausages, lovely and browned, cooked in Yorkshire Pudding batter that rises light, crisp and hollow — so you have a bowl for the gravy. :) … Continue Reading

Tea Poached Fish and Oven-Braised Yam Fries

Occupy Our Food Supply is a day of global action (today) to think about where your food comes from, who produces it and how safe it is.  The fact of the matter is that our food system has undergone a massive consolidation in the last thirty years.  A shockingly small number of corporations now hold the reigns of our food chain.

A recent article in the Huffington Post lists some sobering statistics:

• Of the 40,000 food items in a typical U.S. grocery store, more than half are now brought to us by just 10 corporations.
• Today, three companies process more than 70 percent of all U.S. beef, Tyson, Cargill and JBS.
• More than 90 percent of soybean seeds and 80 percent of corn seeds used in the United States are sold by just one company: Monsanto.
• Four companies are responsible for up to 90 percent of the global trade in grain.
• And one in four food dollars is spent at Walmart. … Continue Reading

Pork Scallopini with a Porcini-Gorgonzola Pan Sauce

Actually, what you see pictured is more a schnitzel than a scallopini.  But I’m going to do something radical here, and suggest that you not do what I did.

We love a good schnitzel around here.  Pork tenderloin, chicken…I make a lot of schnitzel around here.  So I kind of went on auto-pilot here until it got time to dress it up a bit.  I’ve been working pretty hard, locked up in my office, and our meals haven’t been as elaborate as late.

As I was dredging the pork, I remembered the dried porcinis and gorgonzola in the fridge.  Immediate visions of this glorious pan sauce burned my third eye, and at that point I realized I had over-breaded.  Too much breading (and too much clean up too).

So, like I said, don’t do what I did.  A simple dip in some seasoned flour is all there is to it.

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Za’atar Crusted Tuna with Buckwheat & Barley Risotto

I expected Howard to fight me on this one — so I only gave him a small scoop to start and topped it with a little extra tuna. (He’s a sucker for seared tuna.)

But he’s not fond of buckwheat, see…I’ve tried a few variations, but never received a lot of enthusiasm in return.

So I was a little surprised when he came back to the kitchen looking for more before I had even finished taking the photos of my plate (food blogging can be a drag at dinner time).

And then I sat down and had mine — and went back for more, almost right away.  It’s full of simple flavours, and the juxtaposition between the seared, almost cold, tuna and the creamy comfort of the barley/buckwheat is a surprisingly perfect pairing of opposites.

In other words, it’s really, really good.

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Marinated Wild Salmon with Sorrel Sauce

Occasionally, this blog becomes my confessional.  I think most personal blogs probably do.  But even for a confessional, this is a little extreme.  I’m practically sweating in my boots.  You see, today’s admission is one that a dedicated food blogger and chef should never have to make.

I blanked on Thanksgiving.  Yup, that’s right.  The first major food holiday of the season and I just realised 30 minutes ago that it’s only 2 days away.

But never fear — I’ve cut and pasted the different intro that I wrote for this post onto my desktop.  I’ll work it in further down — because, just like that, this delicious Indian-inspired dinner has become a quick-to-put-together alternative to your traditional all-day turkey and sides.

My menu of marinated, steamed salmon with sorrel and yogurt sauces on a basmati pilaf is a local, sustainable, seasonal, pescatarian Thanksgiving feast that makes for a Pacific Northwest harvest celebration just as good as turkey and sweet potatoes, in my humble opinion.  Not to mention that it’s also low-carb, gluten-free, high in Omega 3s and pretty darn good looking too.

In fact, if I hadn’t just gotten off the phone from booking us a table at Poet’s Cove for Sunday, this is exactly what we’d be having at our own Thanksgiving dinner.  But it seems I couldn’t even convince myself to go alternative.

What can I say?  Old habits die hard and this body remembers turkey.  (Even if the mind can’t remember Thanksgiving.)

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