April 13, 2010

Living in Vancouver, one learns to love Indian food. Especially being a vegetarian in Vancouver, which I was for about 4 years. However, my attempts at actually making Indian food are few and not exactly complicated. One can easily buy, at any grocer with an "ethnic foods" section, blocks-o-curry that can be tossed in with a stir fry. Not that said blocks-o-curry aren't delicious, but I wanted to try a dish with a bit more complication, something other than curry, something more on the traditional foods spectrum.

When I think Indian, I think Naan. Now I know Naan is traditionally made in a tandoori oven, which obviously I don't have. But I figured it's like pizza - tastes better when cooked that way, but possible to bake otherwise. So I found a lovely Naan recipe from the BBC by Anjum Anand. Anjum hosts BBC's Indian Food Made Easy, and a glance through many other Naan recipes, she is definitely right in her show title. Most other recipes call for strange ingrdients. Nothing in this recipe that one wouldn't stock in an ordinary kitchen.

Recently, I worked in an office with a woman who brought in her Indian mother-in-law's amazing homemade pakoras. I am a huge fan of pakoras, so I decided to see about making those. Unfortunately, I no longer work in that office (the nature of temp work!), and so I had to search about on my own. I'm lucky, and I live several blocks from Vancouver's Punjabi Market, so finding a market that sold the specialized ingredients required in Manjula's Bread Pakoras was not a problem.

And because a curry MUST be part of any Indian dish, I charged Alex, my most-frequent diner, to make a curry his girlfriend had recently raved to me about. Nothing like sharing duties to make me a little less stressed about winging a dish!

First off, I was not 100% satisfied with this Naan recipe. I think in future, I'm going to attempt some of the more complicated recipes. This turned out a bit more like pita than Naan, which I attribute entirely to the fact that the bread never rose to twice its original size. I gave it two attempts, and left each for over an hour to sit. They rose nary an inch. And when looking at the actual recipe, it's hard to see what would make it rise. My bread-chemistry knowledge is low, but something didn't seem right.

Other than that, Alex's curry was delicious! We served it over a bit of saffron-rice. It was spicy and flavourful, and the chunks of yam were perfectly cooked. And the pakoras. Oh the pakoras. I think I will be making these again, though not often, because I think my arteries clogged from just looking at the amount of oil I was using! I'm not a fan of deep-frying, but these were definitely something that made me want to take it up!

April 6, 2010

I grew up in the United States, on the West Coast, which of course means I grew up eating tons of Mexican food. Or rather, I grew up eating "Tex-Mex", the delicious combination of rice, beans, tortillas, tomatoes, avocados, and meat that Americans like to pass off as "ethnic" food. And you'll get no apologies from me for that, because I love it. It's one of the things I miss most living in Canada - the serious lack of Mexican food up here.

I was inspired recently by Serious Eats' Eggplant-Almond Enchilada recipe. I love enchiladas, but a vegetarian alternative can be difficult to find, other than just bean and cheese, which is rather boring.

I also thought this other recipe for Mint-Chili Grilled Artichokes looked like it would compliment the enchiladas well. To beef up the "Mexican" theme, I threw on some box-Spanish-rice, and some canned refried beans, garnished with avocado, and we had a proper "Tex-Mex" feast, complete with WAY too much food!



Before I get to my review of the recipes, I have to mention our appetizer/drink of the evening. Garreth, a frequent diner, lived in Spain for awhile and brought over fixings for Calimocho, a mix of red wine and coke that's like the Basque version of iced tea or sangria. Let me tell you now, I am planning for this to be my drink of choice for the summer. It is positively delicious, and will be so perfect with some frozen citrus slices on a hot summer day.

Now, onto the reviews. The enchiladas were FANTASTIC. They were quite healthy and filling, if they weren't so damn tasty I gorged myself on them! They did take a significant amount of prep time. Making homemade enchilada sauce is not for the pressed-for-time. It takes about an hour or so, but it is well worth the effort. And the eggplant mix was a good substitute for meat, since it had a similar texture. I will definitely be making these again.

The artichokes, unfortunately, didn't turn out. Their flavour was fantastic, spicy and minty, all around good. But the recipe didn't really specify if it was intended for the artichokes whole or hearts. I think grilling up the hearts in the spices, and adding the mint and chilis a bit earlier would make for a better result. In the end they were too tough to eat, and not quite flavourful enough.

March 17, 2010

A few interesting updates: since my last meal, a few massive changes have occurred. I anticipated a long hiatus due to the Olympics, but the hiatus was made much longer due to the fact that during the Games, our apartment had a fire, and we were forced to move out! So any spare time post-games was devoted to finding, moving into, and organizing out new apartment. The bonus -- the new apartment comes with a huge kitchen and a huge upgrade in space! I also used the opportunity to get myself some new cookware, namely a new set of pots and pans. And even though much unpacking remains to be done, I decided to make my return to Taste of Tuesday on my favourite holiday: St. Patrick's Day!

Irish cuisine is not necessarily something people admire or aspire to cook - it's based primarily around cheap simple ingredients and concoctions that were easy to eat en masse and on the go. And the central ingredient is the russet potato - not exactly a shining star! But two of my favourite things are soda bread and Guinness stew, so I decided to attempt them on my own!

I had soda bread for the first time at Paddy Coyne's in Seattle. It was delicious - soft, sweet and salty at once, and kind of crispy on the outside. The ideal bread. I fell in love with Guinness Stew at a pub we started frequenting awhile back, The Atlantic Trap and Gill. Now, Guinness Stew usually has lamb in it, but due to our recent move, I'm a little too broke for lamb at the moment (how very Irish of me). I decided a third dish was in order, and decided a Red Cabbage and Apples recipe fit the bill.

Unfortunately, my camera was will packed away somewhere, so no photos this week. But the results were interesting. I had never really made bread (other than banana bread), so the soda bread was an adventure. I didn't have carroway, so I substituted a mixture of cumin and cardamom, which turned out to add a nice punch to the bread. Unfortunately, I over cooked it a bit, and it ended up a tad dry. And though the recipe instructs you to place the mount of dough in the oven, I think a loaf pan would do for more even cooking. The cabbage was tasty, and a new type of flavour to me. I'm not usualy a fan of cabbage, but I actually preferred it warm to cold! One of my diners is a cabbage fan and thought it was delightful.

The Guinness Stew, I thought, was the star. It served 6 people heartily - most of us didn't feel like we needed other dished after just one bowl! And since the ingredients are just celery, carrots, onion, and potato, it is extremely cheap. The most expensive ingredient was the Guinness itself, which only cost about $3-4 a can! It was quick to cook up as far as soups go, and will definitely be added to my regular meals!

February 9, 2010

The Olympics are coming to Vancouver, and, as I'm going to be working evening shifts the entirity of the Games, I will inevitably have to take a hiatus from Tuesday night dinners. So for my final meal before said hiatus, I felt like I had to go all out with cuisine. This was going to need to expand beyond my tiny closet-kitchen. So I enlisted the help of one of my regular diners, who offered to host (his kitchen is a respectable size!).

For theme, I scoured the internet for holidays, celebrations, etc. I figured the meal would be kind of a good way to kick off what was sure to be two weeks of massive partying during the Olympics. I was in luck, because Tet is February 14, certainly close enough to justify cooking some classic Vietnamese cuisine. And nothing screams Vietnamese like Pho!

I've been meaning to go out for Pho since my aforementioned foodie former-roomate raved about it years ago. Unfortunately, most Pho is made with beef stock, and since I'm quite anti-beef, I hadn't made my way to finding a veggie - or at least chicken-based option. Luckily, I found a recipe for Vegetarian Pho. Lemongrass is also a key componant to Vietnamese cooking, and I found this delicious-sounding Lemongrass Tofu with Mushrooms. Then I figured I needed a spicy tropical salad, so I added a Cucumber Tomato and Pineapple Salad.



The Pho turned out fairly well. The broth, considering the lack of meat, was a very tasty flavour. The noodles I chose, unfortunately, never softened quite right, and ended up fairly doughy. I would make sure next time to use rice noodles. Also, this is definitely a time-consuming venture, and only to be attempted on days when you have more time! The Lemongrass Tofu was, on the otherhand, fairly easy to make and clean up. I think the recipe skimped on the lemongrass flavour, and I would modify it to try and infuse the tofu with that woody-citrus more. The salada was fantastic - very very spicy! In fact, the part that sang in this meal was the pineapple. For a great appetizer, you could just put the dressing on the pineapple and serve it in rings. It was the perfect blend of sweet, tangy and spicy!

It was definitely a treat to finally try Pho, and the motivation is on to find a vegetarian or chicken option, to try someone else's recipe. It was also a treat to cook in a real sized kitchen, and to have assistants for some of the lengthy prep for this meal!