Saturday Laugh

Via ICHC.

Restaurant Review: Nelson Fisherman's Market

Today Dad and I took one of our frequent trips to Nelson, ostensibly for the purpose of shopping at Save-on Foods, but we always have lunch, too, and we always debate and agonize where to go to eat. This time, Dad actually suggested the Nelson Fisherman's Market, even though he detests fish. We'd never been there before but had heard good things about it. One side of the business is an actual fisherman's market, selling fresh and frozen fish and shellfish, and local hormone, grass-fed beef from Creston in addition to other meat products in a small butchery section. The other side of the business is a fish & chip shop - I think it's called The Dock, but I can't find anything online to confirm this. The address is 577 Ward St. In addition to fish & chips, there is a beef burger option, which is what my dad went for. I had cod & chips.

My meal came wrapped in a newspaper cone and the presentation was really cool. Unfortunately, I found it a bit awkward and eventually asked for a plate. I didn't really want to eat this with my hands. My dad's burger came in a little basket with plenty of chips and he said it was really good. The coleslaw that came with my meal was nice and creamy, just how I like it.

The fish was excellent! The batter was lightly seasoned and feather-light, and the cod was perfectly cooked - moist and flaky. The chips were excellent, too, and you can always tell the ones that are fresh cut on the premises and blanched before deep-frying. A simple iced tea topped off my meal and I came away very satisfied.

There was one dessert on offer, and here is the little sign advertising it:
I though this was kind of funny, but as you can see, it's apple pie and nothing made from seal meat. But both Dad and I were too full to partake.

Lunch for the two of us was about $24 with drinks. The service was nice & friendly and the atmosphere was casual and relaxed. Here is a shot of the interior:Definitely a recommend in my books if you're ever in Nelson and in the mood for great fish & chips. Next time I'm trying the calamari.

Lunch at Trail's End Cafe

Yesterday, my very kind SIL treated me to lunch at the Trail's End Cafe in Trail. I've previously blogged about them here. We had another excellent lunch! Most items on the lunch menu - which includes meal-size salads, pizzas, sandwiches, and pastas - are around $10 and the service is fast and efficient. They also have really delicious iced tea. Here's the rundown.

I had the BBQ chicken & mango wrap with the house soup, which is a super Hungarian cream of mushroom, with dill & paprika. I've had this wrap before and it's very yummy!

Shan had the grilled ham, tomato & swiss sandwich with the house soup. She loved it.

Here is a closer look at the soup. I can't tell you how good it is! Shan & I speculated over what was in it so we could try to recreat it at home. Another little project for me!

We indulged in dessert. Shan opted for the Grand Marnier Creme Brulee, which was topped with some berries. I love the dish this is served in.

I had the Chocolate Paisano cake, which is to die for. It's basically layers of chocolate cake & ganache topped with a layer of...wait for it...tiramisu! Oh, this was so heavenly and so worth the calories! I asked the server if this was made on site, and it's not; it comes from their supplier. But I don't care - it's amazing!

Thanks for the treat, Shan! I really appreciated it - you're the best!!

Dad's Plaited Loaf

My dad was very good about making an emergency trip to the vet's this past weekend, so I owed him a loaf of bread big-time. Dad doesn't believe in white flour at all, so the loaves I make for him are often dense, rich, and a bit funny-looking because of their low gluten content. He's totally OK with this, plus he buys me the ingredients, so I'm not complaining.

Tuesday, I made a version of the Healthy Heart loaf I posted here quite some time ago. I added 1 tbsp of vital gluten to the recipe, and used barley malt syrup instead of sugar. I also put in a spice blend my dad got specifically for his loaves.

I decided to make this an extra special loaf by braiding it.
I haven't done this in a while, so it looked a little weird...
To me, it looked like a section of intestine, but whatever. I egg-washed it and added some poppy seeds...And the end product looked like this:Dad said it was super! He said the consistency is perfect! Thanks, Dad!

Salmon Burgers

OK, I've had some serious cat drama for the last several days, so I'm very behind in my posting and commenting. I do have several things coming down the wire, I just need to get my act together and my anxiety under control so that I can sit down & write the posts.

Here, however, are the burgers I made to go with my homemade burger buns the other night, burgers I had to abandon in mid-meal because I had to rush Juno to the vet.

Basically, ground salmon, formed into a patty & seasoned with salt & pepper. I grilled them on the old George Foreman, and served the burger with a lemon garlic aoli, sliced avocado, and on the side I had a nice spinach salad.
Hopefully, regular food-blogging will resume shortly.

Magazine Monday #41: Hamburger Buns

Despite having a seriously ill kitty over the weekend, I still managed to bake, and I chose to make hamburger buns. The recipe came from this month's Gourmet magazine in a feature about making the ultimate burgers and accompaniments all from scratch. The recipe looked simple enough but the high cream and whole milk content is what drew me to it. I was intrigued with how they might turn out using such ingredients.

The recipe is here. You can also make your own hot dog buns with this dough.

Man, were these ever fan-fracking-tastic! They are probably the nicest buns I've ever made in my life. The cream and whole milk made them incredibly rich and buttery, and the higher sugar content gave them a nice sweetness. I used a 3 1/2-inch cookie cutter rather than a 3" because I felt that the 3" one would have been too small.

The burgers I made to try my buns out will appear in a future post.

Family Dinner

Last night I went over to my brother and SIL's place for dinner with my dad. Dad donated a roast of beef that Shan BBQed, and it was fabulous! We also had a variety of other stuff, too.

Here is the roast of beef on the BBQ. Shan made a spice rub for it, and a homemade BBQ sauce. She started the roast off at a higher temperature, then brought the temperature way down to slow roast it.

She also somehow stuffed the beef with whole cloves of garlic - yum!

For an appy, Shan sauteed edamame in garlic, six spice mix, sea salt, and a bit of soy sauce. It was awesome!
Shan makes wicked salads...
And we had some grilled veggies...

There were also some potatoes with fresh dill & sour cream. Here is my dinner...

For dessert, I brought a selection of cookies I've made recently and frozen, including these, these, and these. There was also ice cream with Shan's homemade caramel sauce, which is just to die for!

Awesome dinner, and I came home with a pile of left-over roast beef, so I'm set for sandwiches for a while now!

Zucchini Hummus

I had some leftover zucchini kicking around my fridge this week, and way, way at the back of the fridge, I had a bit of tahini languishing, too. Last week, the the issue of Clean Eating Magazine came out and this recipe was in there. I immediately bookmarked it and made it this afternoon.

"Raw" Beanless Zucchini Hummus, adapted by moi

3 raw zucchinis, peeled & chopped
6 tbsp lemon juice
4 cloves garlic
2 tsp paprika
1/2 tsp cumin
1/2 cup raw tahini
1/4 cup chopped cilantro
salt to taste

Blend everything except cilantro in a food processor until smooth. Add cilantro after desired consistency & flavour is achieved.

The original recipe called for soaked sesame or sunflower seeds, which I didn't see as necessary, and I didn't have any turmeric or cayenne pepper as specified, either. I added the cilantro on my own because I just love the stuff.

The recipe's write-up claimed that you wouldn't be able to tell that there weren't chickpeas in this, and it was actually right. I quite like this recipe because it's much lighter in texture than a lot of hummuses I've had in my time.

Totally a keeper recipe!

Making Pastry

Despite my training and experience, I've had a lot of trouble over the years making pastry dough. It's weird, but I just have never been able to have a successful result with a variety of recipes, except for a couple: a butter recipe (here, scroll down) and a recipe from Gourmet (here). Today at work, I was asked to make pastry dough for the chicken pot pies being served for dinner. I was a little skeptical that I could pull this off, but I actually did it! I have no idea where this recipe came from, but I suspect it came from a shortening box. The shortening we use at this place is often purchased from Wal-Mart, and it's the Wal-Mart brand, and it doesn't have a recipe on the box, so that's not the source. But whatever the case, it worked out.

Pastry Dough

2 cups flour
1 cup shortening
3/4 tsp salt
1 egg
2 tbsp cold water
1 tbsp vinegar

Whisk together the dry ingredients, and then cut in the shortening with a pastry blender. You'll have something that looks like this:
Crumbly, with some larger chunks in it - it doesn't have to be perfect.

Whisk together the wet ingredients and add them to the dry.
Stir until combined. I was making three times the recipe and I wound up using my hands, and my dough was a bit sticky, so I just added a bit more flour.
The work surface needed to be well-floured for easy rolling, and one of the things I love about commercial kitchens is that you have a lot of room to roll pastry out and you can use as much flour as necessary without it making a huge mess.I needed 36 tops for 36 chicken pot pies, cut with the oval ramekins the pies were being baked and served in.Cute, eh? I was pretty pleased with myself. My confidence in my pastry-making skills has been restored!

Depression Food: Encore

Mood disorders - particular those of a unipolar nature - often produce cravings for comfort foods. For me, this means chocolate, sugar, and carbs in general.

Today, while perusing my usual food blogs, I saw on Girlichef's blog a recipe for chocolate & peanut butter chip cookies in which a cake mix had the starring role. I've seen recipes for cookies using cake mixes quite a bit in the food blog world, but I've never gotten around to making any, until now.

The recipe is here. As Girlichef says, the brown sugar didn't seem necessary to her, so I didn't add it and I didn't feel these cookies lacked a thing because of that omission.

I loved these! They were simple and quick, which was perfect for me in my current frame of mind. There was near-instant satisfaction. The cookies were also delicious, cakey, and fudgey, and the peanut butter chips were fantastic. It doesn't get much better than chocolate & peanut butter combined.

Thanks Girlichef!

Saturday Laugh

Shrimp Burgers with Stuff

So, I have this book that's been taking up valuable space on my bookshelves for years and years and that I've rarely used. It has a recipe for shrimp burgers that I'd always wanted to make but never got around to it. In the original recipe, you lightly batter the shrimp whole and fry them, then make a cocktail sauce. For some reason, and I have no idea what that reason is, this recipe came to mind this week, and I gave it another look. I decided I didn't want to fry my shrimp whole, so I made a shrimp patty, loosely following the recipe and this is what I came up with.

I took about 15 or so raw shrimp, two green onions, two cloves of garlic, and a handful of cilantro and pulsed this all together in a food processor. I then added enough bread crumbs to bring the mixture together so it would form a firm patty. I grilled the patties on my cast iron grill pan and made a simple aoli with mayo, lemon juice, and garlic powder. I served the burger with asparagus roasted with homemade balsamic dressing and the remainder of my homemade dill pickles.

Super meal, actually! The burgers were a bit strong on the cilantro side, and, as you can see, they're very green, but that's OK with me. It was a simple dinner to put together and tasted great. I'll definitely make these again.

Chicken Fingers

You might recall that I made homemade onion rings not too long ago as part of my review of Bobby Flay's Burgers, Fries & Shakes. I had some leftover buttermilk from that recipe and was wondering what to do with it. I had initially wanted to make calamari but I can't get any decent squid at the local overpriced grocery store; all they had were the pre-cut rings and they were freezer burned. Blech. I then remembered this post by Denise at Keeper Worthy Recipes (Denise credits Coleen for the original recipe - both are bloggers I admire, so check them out) and an idea was born.

Am I feeling better? No. I'm feeling worse, and the oppressive heat isn't helping me. But I had a good appointment with my doctor today and I got a wicked hair-do yesterday, so I could be much worse. I felt like something junky to eat tonight, and this recipe filled that bill, too.

I adapted the recipe to suit my needs. Basically, all I did was make the chicken as I did the onion rings, and shallow-fried them in the same oil I used for the onion rings, too. I added some garlic powder to the flour mixture in addition to salt & pepper.

The result was great: crispy, lightly battered chicken strips. I served them with a side I'm making fairly regularly these days, fingerling fries.

Tortellini in Herb-Garlic Dressing

If you don't already read Donna-FFW's blog, I highly recommend you do so! You'll learn a lot about food and sex, two things that go great together, and one of which my life sadly lacks. TMI? Too bad!

Anyway, when I saw this recipe I was immediately on the hunt for some tri-colour tortellini. You'd think this would be an easy enough thing for me to find, but no; the local overpriced grocery store sells fancy stuffed pasta, but none if it I like and, like just about everthing at the local overpriced grocery store, the stuffed pastas are overpriced. Luckily, I found some one sale at Save-On in Nelson last week.

Donna-FFW's recipe can be found here.

I tweaked it a bit. I added a cup of diced zucchini, and instead of basil & parsley, I used a whole bunch of cilantro. I also added a tad more garlic. The end result was fabulous! This was a simple meal to put together, and it was light and tasty - just what I needed on a hot, stress-filled day.

Thanks again for another winning recipe, Donna-FFW! You rock!

Coconut Muffins

Coconut is one of my favourite flavours, and last week I saw a recipe for Tropical Coconut Bread on Denise's blog, Keeper Worthy Recipes. If you don't already read Denise's blog, I encourage you to go on over and take a peek. She is also Donna-FFW's sister, incidentally, which is how I happened upon KWR to begin with. I love it when blogging becomes a family affair!

Anyway, since I'd already decided to make the Sour Cherry & Buttermilk Loaf from the previous post, I decided to turn the coconut bread into muffins. I used my king-size muffin pan and my mini muffin pan with mini silicone muffin cups. I got 6 king-size muffins and 11 minis.

This is one great recipe! The texture of the muffins was right on - light and fluffy but still with enough density to set it apart from a cake - and the flavour was coconutty without being overpowering. They weren't too sweet, like coconut pudding can be.

The recipe is here.

Thanks Denise; this recipe is definitely keeper-worthy!