Eat & Enjoy

Super Simple

2012-02-11T07:13:00.000-08:00

In the spirit of keeping things super simple, this post will be short. :)

Lately I've been heading to he gym twice a week. And generally speaking I would pick up a BBQ chicken from the hot food section to bring home after a workout. The Superstore has amazing rotisserie chicken.

A couple of nights ago, I was googling "what to eat after the gym". The 3 S meal popped up - salmon, sweet potatoe and spinach.

First, I love sweet potatoe. Hello?! Sweet potatoe with marshmallows on top - such an awesome dish. One of my favourite dishes during Christmas dinner and thanksgiving. But even without the fluffy white goodness, it's just as good.

On another note, spinach is pretty good - especially in stuffed cannelloni (another recipe I should share - but another day).

Oh and salmon...yum (enough said).

This is one of my favourite dinners to make. Something fairly quick and super simple.
The article called for cooked spinach. However, instead of cooked spinach, I grabbed some spinach salad (dressed it with balsamic vinaigrette) - equally as good. Took my sweet potatoe and cut it into thirds (it was a decent size potatoe) - cooks faster and cuts down the portion. Also, after the potatoe was done cooking, for me it was just good plain and simple - no salt added. I took my salmon and dressed it with a little salt and pepper, pan seared making sure that it was cooked but not dry.

To be perfectly honest, it pained me that the sweet potatoe took longer to cook than the salmon. Really, I was super hungry and waiting for the sweet potatoe was insanely painful.

That being said, the wait was worth it. I always take comfort in the thought that a dish so simple can be so delicious. 3 pieces to the meal - 30 minutes tops.
Seriously, try eating the salmon and a piece of sweet potatoe together. It's just amazing.

Although I love the simplicity of this recipe, I'm thinking of taking another stab at this and making it more fancy. Most likely going to mash the sweet potatoe and pipe it or lay it over the salmon. (Just a thought).

Seriously, try this one.

Ribs...drool

2012-01-30T19:23:00.000-08:00

Prep: 5 min
Cook: 55 minutes
Makes: Never enough...for rib fans

Thank you Canadian Living (Dec 2010) issue.
Found a recipe for 'Oven-Baked Ribs With Maple Barbeque Sauce' recipe also here.

The picture (middle pic) was so tantalizing. Literally... made me drool (think Homer Simpsons' donut face).

This was also a special dinner, because I don't usually cook for my Mama and Papa. But not only did I cook for them, my aunt, my uncle and my mom joined for dinner.

(Actually, my auntie was my sous chef for the night).

Don't worry, ribs weren't the only thing served - we had sides: mashed potatoes (flavoured with garlic butter, reg. butter and milk; salt and pepper to taste) and salad.

Now, I'm usually the one who consumes the ribs. I've even been to multiple Ribfests with my aunt.

But I was ready to tackle this 'beast'. Hoping the recipe would be just as good as my dad's ribs (a.k.a. The King of Ribs).

Actually, he was the one I turned to first.
"Dad, is it better to cook the whole slab at once or cut it first"
His response: "Whole slab, 300 degrees F for 2-3 hours"

My mouth DROPPED. Who has that kind of time during the week?! 2-3 hours? Yikes.

Thank goodness for this recipe. The whole recipe took an hour to make (prep + cook time).

The best part of this recipe, is that it's super easy. Really - 3 components.
A) Ribs
B) Dry Rub
C) Home made bbq sauce

The dry rub was super simple - 1 tbsp paprika, 1 tbsp sugar, 1tsp salt, 1tsp ground cumin, 1/2 tsp ground coriander, 1/2 tsp cayenne pepper (gives it a kick) and 1/2 tsp dried oregano.
After combining all the spices together rub the ribs.

At first, I thought the rub wasn't enough...that I'd have to make some more for 1 rack of ribs - but I was wrong. This is just the dry rub. More than enough spice to go around.

Once you've used up all of the dry rub pop the ribs into the oven (as per recipe - 425 degrees F for 45 minutes, flipping once).

As the ribs start cooking, I made my bbq sauce with ketchup, cider vinegar (couldn't find any - so bought apple cider vinegar), maple syrup (good ol' pancake syrup), Worcestershire sauce (couldn't pronounce this to save my life) and chili powder (or in my case, cayenne pepper).

Let me be honest, everything was going smooth until I accidentally subbed the chili powder with cayenne pepper. Let me tell you, it was a bit spicy. As the bbq sauce was coming to a boil on the stove, I taste tested it...and WOW! SPICE-Y!

Had to add some more ketchup, apple cider vinegar and W-sauce. After drop, slowly tasting it more. Improvising definitely brought the spiciness down a bit.

Although the recipe called for cooking the ribs for 45 min and then basting the ribs, then cooking for 10 more minutes...we decided that when we flipped the ribs, we would baste them. Turned out just as good.

This was the first batch of ribs that we made - it was still spicy, despite me improvising and trying to lessen the spice of the sauce. I think it's the combination of cayenne pepper in both the sauce and dry rub that gave it the kick.

One other thing we noticed with batch one of the ribs was the smell and taste of the cumin. Definitely a strong flavour in the rub. However, in the second batch of ribs it wasn't as potent. I may want to hold back on the cumin a little.

My main concern with making ribs was that it would be dry - but with the high heat and the cooking time, the results were delicious. The ribs were so moist and succulent.

4 stars for this recipe

Seriously, if you decide to make this recipe invite me over :)
Also, I think I made my dad proud with these ribs!

2012 - More recipes & reviews

2011-12-31T19:34:00.000-08:00

2011 was a great year.
I plan on making 2012 an even better year.
First new year resolution - blog at least twice a month.
The blog will still consist of recipes I've tried. But also restaurant reviews. :)

2012. Bring. It. On!

Julie & Julia inspired Bruschetta

2011-07-10T14:33:00.000-07:00

Everytime I'm in the mood to watch a movie, I always find myself watching:

He's Just Not That Into You
P.S. I Love You
Sex and the City
Julie and Julia

Everytime I watched Julie and Julia, I vowed I would make the bruschetta (with the different colour tomatoes). I finally made it.

It was delicious. One night I was scouring google for the perfect bruschetta recipe. But not just any bruschetta recipe, Julie & Julia's bruschetta.

Finally, the recipe - "Bruschetta the Julia Child Way" posted by Susan Sohn. I followed this recipe to the tee. Turned out phenomenal. I may have used a bit too much oil while frying the bread, but I'll skim it down next time.

This recipe was so quick and easy. The hardest part was toasting the bread (no exaggeration).

I will find every excuse to make this recipe again.

Delicious.

On top of spaghetti...

2011-07-10T14:15:00.001-07:00

This was the second challenge for the weekend.

Spaghetti and Meatball cupcakes

I think while I was decorating these cupcakes, I was humming:

"On top of spaghetti, all covered with cheese, I lost my poor meatball, when somebody sneezed"

I've seen this recipe all over the internet and thought I'd take a stab at it. This design was super easy, but it still didn't taste great.

All you need:

Favourite cake mix
Vanilla frosting (store bought is fine)
Yellow food colouring
Ferror Roche
Strawberry Jam

Bake your cupcakes according to the back of the box.
Tint your vanilla icing with a little bit of yellow, this will be your 'pasta'.
Once your cupcakes have cooled, pipe the yellow frosting all over your cupcakes. Don't worry about being neat, it's supposed to look like heaps of pasta.
Unwrap the Ferror Roche balls and in small bowl combine it with a couple of spoonfuls of jam.
Place each chocolate ball ontop of the cupcakes.
Spoon the jam on each cupcake, around the chocolate balls.

Even though, the cupcakes looked amazing, I found that the combination of strawberry jam and Ferror Roche was too sweet and just an odd taste. To be honest, I was disappointed that I had wasted 6 Ferror Roche's on a yucky recipe.

What would I do next time? I'm thinking that maybe we could use a powdered sugar + red food colouring + water combination to create a glaze. I just still think it'll just be too sweet for a cupcake topping.

THUMBS DOWN on this one!

No raw eggs and alcohol, thanks!

2011-07-10T13:11:00.000-07:00

This weekend, I decided that I'd take on 3 culinary challenges.

1. Tiramisu
2. Spaghetti and Meatball cupcakes
3. Bruschetta (inspired by the movie Julie and Julia)

The first challenge, tiramisu. Oh, how I love tiramisu. I remember for last new years my parents took my sister and I to Blackshop and I had the most amazing dessert. It was a tiramisu in a white chocolate cone. My mouth is salivating as I think about it. It was the most amazing dessert I've ever had.

I told my mama when I got my kitchen aid mixer that tiramisu was one of the recipes that I would learn to make.

While trying to find a tiramisu recipe, I realized that a lot of recipes called for brandy, dark rum or coffee liqueur. I didn't feel comfortable letting the kids eat a dessert with any alcohol. Also, I didn't have to time to run to the liquor store and pick up a bottle of any alcohol.

Another criteria for this recipe was, no raw eggs. I am definitely the first to eat raw cake batter and cookie dough right from the bowl, but not everyone in my family is keen on eating raw eggs.

So the hunt began. Find a recipe with no alcohol and no raw eggs. Oh, did I forget to mention, no espresso. Picky, picky, I know. But I needed a simple recipe that didn't hurt my pocket.

Countless hours and google searches later and I find this AMAZING recipe for a quick and easy tiramisu that fit all my criteria's.

Following the recipe 'Tiramisu (No Raw Eggs Here!)' posted by SD Cali Girl was just amazing. My two taste testers (kids) enhaled the test piece. I told them, "If it tastes great, I'll eat it all and give you another piece. If it's not so good, I'll give it to you to try and you let me know what you think".

I kind of altered the recipe a little, by not using all the lady fingers. I only used however many would fit in my glass dish. I also separated the mascarpone cheese + whipped cream in half to ensure that I had 2 layers.

I took a teaspoon scoop of the tiramisu and almost died. It was so good. My taste testers grabbed the plate and proceeded to devour the piece. All I heard was,

"This is so good, I want it for my birthday cake"

That's awesome. I had to HIDE the cake from the kids.

I wouldn't change the recipe at all. However, next time I'd like to try to make it in a spring form pan so that I can remove the sides of the pan and serve it.

The only negative comment I'd have about this dessert is mascarpone cheese is ridiculously expensive. Once I saw the price, I was hesitant on making the recipe, but I rationalized with myself that this was a one shot deal and I wouldn't make it everyday.

As I finished combining the macarpone cheese with the whipped cream, I prayed that the dessert would turn out well or I'd be very disappointed that I was breaking the bank for a not so good recipe.

PHEW! It was delicious. Seriously, layers of deliciously goodness...I highly recommend this recipe.

Cake what?

2011-07-10T01:03:00.000-07:00

Cake balls...

Earlier this summer my sister got confirmed.

I promised her I would make her dessert.
A couple of ideas that I ran past her were cupcakes with a rosary fondant on top, a big cross cake and cupcakes arranged to look like a rosary. My mom then had an amazing idea to make cake balls and arrange them into a rosary. BRILLIANT!! Thanks mom.

And thus, the cake balls rosary dessert was born. All I can say is, with a project this big I am very thankful for the amazing helpers I had. My aunt and cousins helped me out a great deal with making the cake balls and coating them in melted chocolate. This dessert took a couple of hours to make (not including baking the cake). I would imagine it doesn't always take this long, as in this instance we made 50 something cake balls...oh vey!

Cake ball recipe: http://hubpages.com/hub/How-to-Make-Cake-Balls

We followed the cake ball recipe above. When molding the cake balls we used little measuring spoons to ensure that each cake ball was the same size.

I didn't stick the cake balls right onto the cake board. Instead, we coated all the cake balls and once they hardened (on parchment paper) I rearranged the cake balls to ensure that the placement on the cake board was how I wanted it.

Once I was pleased with the placement, I used sturdy whipped cream to 'glue' the cake balls to the board. I piped a long line of whipped cream underneath the cake balls instead of a dolup, this acted as the rosary 'string'. The same whipped topping was used to make the cross and for the lettering on the board.

Tip: This did not transport so well. Next time, I'd use royal icing instead of sturdy whipped cream. It'd be a better glue.

Brand of cake used: Moist Deluxe Butter Golden Cake Mix
Candy melts: Wilton white candy melts

All & all this was a fun dessert to work on...tasted great and looked good too.

Chirp, chirp! It's spring-time!

2011-07-09T23:44:00.000-07:00

Even though this post is in July, these cupcakes were made a while back.

I'm a big fan of cupcakes, and Googling 'Easter / spring cupcake designs' definitely brings up a lot of cupcake images.

My favourite picture was of cupcakes that looked like a birds nest that housed a few eggs.
I knew from the moment I saw the picture, that I wanted to make a batch of these 'bird nest' cupcakes for the beginning for Easter.

The birds nest was made out of coconut shavings that had been toasted to give it a little bit of a brown/gold colour. Adobs! Only problem was, I'm not a fan of coconut. Unless it's in a Pina Colada...
I even found pictures that had a nice chocolate swirl (as the nest) and a couple of 'robins eggs' on top.
It was simple and it didn't contain any coconuts. Yes!

But, being me and wanting to give the cupcakes the extra umph that the toasted coconut shavings gave, I settled on.... shaved chocolate.

HOW TO START

To be honest, I used a box recipe for cupcakes. Which brands? Moist Deluxe Butter Golden Cake Mix and Moist Deluxe Devil's Food Cake Mix. (Absolutely two of my favourites)

Once the cupcakes have cooled, ice them. What brands? Whipped Chocolate Frosting and Whipped Fluffy White Frosting.

Shave a bar of milk chocolate. (I used Hershey's chocolate bar)
Tip: I froze the bar of chocolate, but you definitely have to work fast with it. It was melting pretty quickly in my hand.
^ This was the hardest part. Trying to get shavings from this chocolate bar was such a hassle. The shaving just weren't curling the way I wanted. In the end, I took a knife and chopped the chocolate bar into smaller pieces.

Sprinkle the shavings / chocolate bar pieces all over the cupcakes.

After you've sprinkled the shavings, place a couple of Cadbury mini eggs.

This was a simple approach to spruce up a cupcake.