Monthly Archive for November, 2010

It was a bit of a tough and taxing weekend this week with preriding the World Cup course on Friday, cleaning bikes, racing the World Cup on Saturday, cleaning bikes, and racing in Drongen on Sunday, and (sort of) cleaning bikes.  I haven’t unpacked my bag and my room is a mess.  My bikes need some serious love and I was just tired today.

That, and I have some seriously painful tendinitis in my left arm.  I’m working that out, but it hurts to even put pants on.  Of course, I have to do that because it’s friggin’ cold here now.  The outside temps are hovering around the freezing mark and the inside temps are just pushing 17C.  So I painfully got kitted up to go for an easy spin this morning, but I only made it halfway.  I gave up and decided to take the day off, so Craig and I rolled downtown to open a bank account and get some groceries.  We decided to share an account, rather than both of us spend 30 euros/year.  While we were, we saw Jon, Cori, and Milo and talked with them for a little while.  Kind of funny to run into some of the few Americans living here just out doing errands.

I had used up my abundance of leftovers and I have some delicious-looking recipes open in my browser’s tabs right now, so it was time to cook.  I have been having trouble finding a few little things I love, so I adapted this recipe a little more than I would have liked, but it still turned out delicious!

Cooks Illustrated Favourite Chili
adapted from cooksillustrated.com

• 2 tbsp olive oil
• ~1lb stew meat
• 2 dried chilis, chopped
• 4 pickled chilis, chopped (I think that’s what they were, the jar had no English)
• 2 tsp cumin
• 2 tsp dried oregano
• 1 medium onion, chopped fine
• 4 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 tbsp corn starch
• 2 tsp cocoa powder
• 1 bottle Chimay Blue (that just happened to be what I had)
• 1 14.5oz can chopped tomatoes
• 1 14.5oz can kidney beans
• 6-8 fingerling potatoes
• 2 bell peppers (I used 1 green and 1 red)
• 1 can corn
• salt
• pepper

1. Heat olive oil in Dutch Oven over medium high heat.  Add stew meat, working in batches if necessary, cooking until browned on all sides.  Transfer meat to a bowl.
2. Add chilis, cumin, and oregano to pot.  Toast until fragrant, 1-2 minutes.  Add onion, cook for another minute or two.  Add garlic, cook for another minute or two.  Add corn starch and cocoa powder, stir until coated.
3. Add beer, scraping any browned bits off the bottom of the pan.  Add tomatoes and beans, reduce heat and bring to a simmer.
4. Place in a 300C oven for 1.5-2 hours, adding potatoes, peppers, and corn in the last 45 minutes.  Add salt and pepper to taste.
5. Enjoy!

::SAdamson

Tags: food, cooking, main course, chili, dinner

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Ever since I went out for hamburgers with my parents in Toronto and saw a fried egg as an optional topping, I’ve wanted to make burgers and put a fried egg on one.  So the other day I was at the bakery and saw some delicious-looking poppy seed buns and had some ground beef in the fridge, I knew what was on tap…

I used my stand-by cooksillustrated.com burger recipe, omitting the barbecue sauce (only for lack of it in the house) and adding in a few dried mushrooms, fried bacon bits, and cumin.  I had some nice gouda cheese to put on them and cooked them in a frying pan with a little butter.  Then I toasted the buns in the frying pan and then cooked the egg.  Scrumptious!!

Delicious burger with a fried egg!!

But the real recipe for this post was a later dinner…

Chickpea and Potato Curry
adapted from JamieOliver.com

• 2 small handfuls dried chickpeas, soaked overnight
• cumin seeds
• fennel seeds
• turmeric
• oil
• 1 medium onion, diced
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• ~10 fingerling potatoes, chopped into bite-size pieces
• curry powder
• 1 14.5oz can diced tomatoes
• chicken bouillon cube
• salt
• pepper
• cinnamon
• dried chili
• 1 tbsp honey
• spinach
• yogurt

1. Soak the chickpeas overnight and then cook in boiling water for an hour before beginning, drain.
2. In a pot, lightly toast fennel and cumin seeds.  Add a couple tablespoons of oil, onion, garlic, potatoes, chickpeas, turmeric, curry powder.  Fry gently for a couple minutes until everything is coated and fragrant.
3. Add tomatoes, fill the can halfway with water and add along with chicken bouillon cube.  Add chili, cinnamon, and salt and pepper to taste.  Stir in honey.
4. Cover and simmer 45 minutes to an hour, until potatoes are tender.  Add in a couple handfuls of spinach and stir to wilt.  Serve with plain yogurt.
5. Enjoy!

::SAdamson

Tags: food, cooking, jamie oliver, curry, hamburgers, bbq, egg, vegetables, vegetarian

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I can’t say that tomato soup is something that I’ve always been a fan of.  I remember my sister liked it as I kid, but I don’t even really remember eating it at all.  And I’ve found that I’m not typically a fan of pureed soups, but when I saw this recipe on Cooksillustrated.com there was just something so appealing about it that I just had to try it. 

I didn’t follow the recipe exactly, but made something along its lines while I was in Boston and it was really tasty.  I served it (yes, just to myself) with a delicious peanut butter and cheese sandwich.  Scrumptious…

This time I adapted it slightly differently, but still came out with a great result.

Tomato Soup
adapted from cooksillustrated.com

• olive oil
• 2 small onions, chopped
• 4 cloves of garlic, chopped
• 1 small dried chili
• 2 bay leaves
• 2 sun-dried tomatoes
• a few dried mushrooms
• 3 cans of tomatoes (14.5 oz)
• 1 chicken bouillon cube
• 4 slices of day-old bread
• salt
• pepper

1. Heat olive oil in a Dutch oven over medium heat.  Add chopped onions, garlic, chili, and bay leaves.  Cook for a minute or two, then chop the sun-dried tomatoes and remove the mushrooms from the water and chop them as well.  Add both to the pot.  Continue stirring as everything cooks.
2. Add water from the mushrooms along with the canned tomatoes and the chicken bouillon cube.  Stir everything together and bring to a boil.  Chop bread into small squares and add them in, stirring until they break down, about 5 minutes. 
3. Remove bay leaf and blend with an immersion blender or work in batches to blend the soup in a blender.  Return to pot, add in a splash of olive oil and salt and pepper to taste. 
4. Ladle into bowls and enjoy!

::SAdamson

Tags: soup, tomatoes, vegetarian, cooking, food, dinner, main dish

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After my bottom bracket debacle yesterday afternoon I was looking forward to just heating up some leftovers.  But the stress was still running through my system, the kitchen wasn’t being invaded yet, and I had some good ideas.

Cumin Scented Sweet Potato Hash
adapted from pinchmysalt.com

• butter
• 1 medium onion
• 2 small sweet potatoes, chopped small
• 1 carrot, chopped small
• cumin
• paprika
• salt
• pepper

1. Heat a large large over medium heat.  Add butter to coat pan.  When butter is melted add onion and cook for a minute or two.  Add carrot, cook for another minute or two.  Add sweet potatoes and continue cooking, stirring occasionally. 
2. When everything is getting tender and beginning to brown add cumin, paprika, salt, and pepper to taste.  Remove from heat and serve.  This made about 2 servings. 

This obviously wasn’t all I had to eat, but that is what was interesting enough to put on the blog. Another day there will be another reciple I’m sure. Enjoy!

::SAdamson

Tags: food, cooking, sweet potatoes, cumin, vegetables, side dish

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I don’t know what made me think of this exactly.  Maybe it was the Mac and Cheese recipes I had been looking at or maybe it was the onions that I have that are cooking up really nicely or maybe I’ve just been craving pasta.  Either way, it turned out delicious.  So delicious in fact that I forgot to take a picture…  It was actually really simple too.

Roasted Garlic and Caramelized Onion Bechamel Pasta

• 1 head garlic
• 2.5 small onions
• butter
• salt
• pepper
• olive oil
• flour
• milk
• pasta

1. Roasted Garlic: Turn oven on to 400F.  Cut to the top of the garlic head off and discard.  Put the garlic on a piece of tinfoil, drizzle with olive and sprinkle with salt and pepper.  Wrap tightly in the tinfoil and place in the oven for about 30 minutes.  Unwrap, let cool, and remove the cloves from the skin. 
2. Caramelized Onions: Chop onions, not too finely.  Heat medium saucepan over medium high heat, melt about a tablespoon or two of butter in the pan.  Let the butter melt a bit and place onions in the pan.  After a minute or two reduce heat and let cook, stirring occasionally until soft and brown and caramelized, smelling delicious, about half an hour.  Remove onions from pan and place in a bowl with roasted garlic.
3. Melt about 1/4 cup butter in the onion saucepan over medium heat.  When the butter has melted and is starting to foam, add 3 heaping tablespoons of flour and begin whisking constantly.  Slowly add about 3 cups of milk in batches, continuing to whisk until it is all mixed and smooth.  Bring mixture to boil, then reduce heat. 
4. Continue stirring and add in caramelized onions and roasted garlic and mix in thoroughly.
5. Prepare pasta according to directions and add to sauce (I added my sauce to my pasta as I wanted leftovers, but wanted to make fresh pasta with my leftover sauce). 

Enjoy! 

I’m going to try and get back onto my posting my quality recipes and dinner making adventures here.  I had some saved that I still wanted to post that are slowly fading from memory, so I’ll see if I can get them up here before I completely forgot what I did.

::SAdamson

Tags: cooking, food, pasta, italian, main dish, onions, garlic, bechamel, italian, dinner

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