Celery and parmesan salad

This is one of my husbands favourite dishes and since it is so incredibly easy to make that is a very good thing.  A couple of weeks ago, after what seems like a very long winter we had a Sunday evening that was warm and sunny,  warm enough to have Sunday dinner on the deck! this is pretty good for what was mid April, so I barbecued a pork tenderloin, roasted some vegetables, made a quick cheesy potato gratin, and made my husbands favourite salad.

This is a great salad because it easy and quick to make for 20 or 2 or even one, and I often make this mid week when something fresh and crisp is needed to counter a rich main course. Don't be put off by the simplicity of this recipe, it comes from Italy the masters of simple good food. This made enough for 4 for dinner

8 ribs of celery thinly sliced (I used a mandolin)
1 cup of grated fresh parmesan cheese
Juice of 1 lemon
2 tablespoons of olive oil

Lay the sliced celery on a platter that allows the celery to be almost in one layer.

Sprinkle over the cheese

Grilled rack of lamb and duck fried potatoes

I have been absent from the blog for a few of weeks, as summer, catering and weekends out of town got in the way.  But the summer is over :( the catering is all done and time to settle back down in to my routines.  This meal is one that I cooked up at Pender Harbour earlier in the summer and was enjoyed by my good friend and I as we spent a couple of days capturing a little peace and quiet.

If the sun is not shining and you do not want to use the barbecue, these would be just as good cooked under the broiler.

1 rack of lamb
2 tablespoons of grainy mustard
Sprig of fresh rosemary stripped from the stalk
Salt and pepper

Cut the lamb rack into cutlets and then coat in the mustard salt and pepper.  then press the rosemary into the meat.  

I left this to mellow while we went for a walk. then heated up the barbecue. These cook quickly as lamb chops are really best when pink in the middle.

5 spice duck breast

I had promised my Father when were in Naramata earlier this summer that I would cook one of his favourite things, duck breast, when we returned home.  So last week we went down to Granville Island and picked up two magret duck breasts.  We chose these as they were far more substantial than the regular breasts.  As it turned out it was a good job that we did as we had an unexpected guest for dinner and there was plenty of meat for three.  I love asian style duck and so decided to use some chinese 5 spice to flavour the duck.

2 duck breasts
2 tablespoons of 5 spice
1 teaspoon of salt
1/2 cup of white wine

Score the skin in diamond shapes (being careful to cut through the fat but not the meat) this helps the fat to render out. Rub the 5 spice and salt all over the breasts.

Place them skin side down in a heated frying pan and cook on medium high to high until most of the fat has melted and rendered out of the skin.  I poured about a cup of delicious duck fat in to a container to use at a later date to cook some potatoes in.

When the skin is crispy and most of the fat has rendered off pour as much fat off as you can and turn the breasts over.

Moroccan cous cous salad

This is a go to salad for me, when cooking for a crowd. It ticks all the boxes, it is quick and easy to make, keeps well without refrigeration and tastes good. Also it is something that can be made with items that are probably in your pantry right now. Nancy found a recipe for this a few years ago, neither of us can remember where, and it has definitely morphed over the years.

Cous cous is actually a very small pasta, though it looks like a grain. I made this the other evening when we were enjoying yet another beautiful warm evening and wanted to throw dinner together quickly with out shopping.

Feeds 6

1 cup of cous cous
2 cups of boiling water or hot chicken stock
1 teaspoon of ground cardamom
1 small can of garbanzo beans or half a large
1 bunch of green onion chopped
1/3 cup of chopped dates (or raisins)
1/3 cup of roasted almonds slivered or chopped
Juice of one lemon
1/4 cup of olive oil
1/4 cup chopped mint
1/4 cup chopped cilantro

Put the cous cous  and cardamom into a bowl and add the boiling water and 1 teaspoon of salt or stock.

Cover with a plate or saran wrap and leave for at least 5 minutes.  The cous cous will absorb the liquid and should be dry enough to seperate when picked up with a fork.

While the cous cous is absorbing the liquid prepare all the other ingredients. 

Ground turkey sliders

I am calling these sliders, because if I had had some small buns, that is how I would have served them, but I didn't so I served them more like a kefta.

This was a quick dinner on a week night, on a beautiful sunny warm day, which we seem to have an abundance of this summer.  I made enough for 4, and as there was 3 for dinner I had enough for lunch one day at work, oh happy day.

1 lb of ground turkey
1 small onion
2 garlic cloves
handful of mint
handful of parsley
1/4 cup of bread crumbs
salt and pepper

Combine the onion, garlic and herbs in a mini chopper, or chop by hand until they are finely chopped.

Mix this with the ground turkey and bread crumbs.

Season well with salt and pepper and form in to small patties, I made 8 and two per person seemed to be a good serving.

Lighter chicken parmasan

I am again trying to eat lighter and exercise more, this is almost an annual thing for me, as I have a tendency to gain weight and after all I love food, and would rather eat and cook than almost anything else. I committed to lose 8 lbs before going on my next big trip in late October, 3 weeks in and I am down 3lbs with 5 more to go in just over 4 weeks. So comes the challenge to create tasty food that is low in calories and fat.

I saw the idea for this on pinterest, but the version there was using prepackaged items and was not particularly healthy so I have changed it up a lot and came up with a dish that fits my brief of using fresh ingredients, and I will definitely make it again.

For 4

• 4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut in to quarters
• 1 bunch of fresh basil
• 1 garlic clove
• 2 tablespoons of olive oil
• 2 cups of tomato puree or tomato sauce
• 1/3 cup of breadcrumbs (I used panko)
• 1/4 cup of grated parmasan cheese

Place the basil, garlic and olive oil in a small food processor.

Wizz up to make a nutless pesto.

Spread all this mixture on the bottom of baking dish.

Grilled herb marinated chicken

Our summer seems to be continuing on and so many excuses for dinner on the deck, last week is was feeding friends and family that just accomplished a good hike in the local mountains. 

I said that I would have dinner waiting for them for when they got back. I decided barbecued chicken legs would make a good main course.  I have a lot of fresh herbs on my deck, so it seemed a good idea to marinate them in a herb and wine marinade, almost like a pesto.

I gathered a bunch of basil, sage and rosemary then wizzed them in the mini food processor.  You could just finely chop them but this is way easier.

Marinade

One bunch of basil
2 sprigs of rosemary
2 sprigs of fresh sage
2 cloves of garlic cut into quarters
4 tablespoons of olive oil
1/4 cup of white wine
salt and pepper

Roast garlic and tomato pasta

Any one who knows me will know that I am not a lover of pasta, I am not sure why, because often when I have it, I think "oh this is not bad, maybe I like it this way" Any way if I am going to make pasta, I do not want my pasta overcooked and I do not want a jar of sauce poured over it.

Right now when all the produce is abundent and at it's best I wanted to make a pasta dish to be served as a side dish to some grilled chicken. Using all the fresh tomatoes and garlic that are available.

I harvested my tomato plants and this is what I got.

Obvoisly not enough to make a sauce for 11 people which is how many were coming for dinner, so I would have to supplement.  I had 1 jar of home canned tomato puree left from last summer, as I am now putting down for this summer this had to be used. So this is what I came up with.

This made enough as a side dish for 11 or main course for 6

• 1 whole head of garlic cut in half 
• About 3 cups of cherry tomatoes halved
• 1 can of tomato puree (home made best, but a jar of Italian tomato puree second best)
• 1/4 cup of olive oil
• 1 bunch of basil
• 1 package of linguini or pasta of choice.

Place the tomatoes and garlic on a parchment lined cookie sheet sprinkle with salt, and drizzle a little olive oil over the garlic.

You will notice I had to add some bought baby plum tomatoes, but they were very tasty too. Bake this at 350 for about 1/2 an hour until the garlic is soft and the tomatoes have concentrated down a little.

Barbecued chili lime chicken

It is no secret I love spit roast meat and chicken, and the spit roast on my barbecue gets a regular work out during the summer.  I was making dinner for a couple of friends and my family on Sunday evening, so I picked up a large roasting chicken from Hopcotts, and was searching for a new flavour rub to use.

I saw a chili lime chick pea recipe that I thought I would like to try out some time, and thought that chili lime is a wonderful combination and would go very well with chicken.  So I made a chili lime rub for my spit roast chicken.  You could of course just roast this in a regular oven if the weather was not conducive to barbecuing or you are not lucky enough to have a spit roast.

Chili lime rub

3 tablespoons of chili powder (I used combination of chipotle and regular chili powder)

1 teaspoon of salt

grated rind of two limes

Crispy chicken and roast tomatoes

On my front deck I have a multitued of herbs growing some lovely geraniums and several tomato plants.  Most are cherry tomatoes and one very productive plum tomato plant.  I am now starting to get a small crop and it gives me such pleasure to go out on to the deck and harvest some tomatoes and herbs and produce a meal using them.

A cherry tomato plant nestling with the geraniums

I needed something simple to make the other evening for my husband and I and though still a pleasant day, it did not feel like barbecue weather, so I turned on the oven and came up with this.

4 chicken thighs
A handful of cherry tomatoes
1 clove of garlic cut up
A sprig of basil roughly chopped
1 tablespoon of olive oil
1 tablespoon of good balsamic vinegar

Preserving summer, roast tomato sauce

I saw this idea on pinterest, which appears to be the newest way to suck time from my productive life. having said that I have seen several ideas that I want to give a try along with far too many that use packages of this and packages of that. Any way I happened upon this idea last week and thought since we are in full tomato season this along with canning would be a good way to preserve the wonderful taste of in season tomatoes to use in the in depths of winter.

I can not really give measurements, but I will give approximately what I used. I would normally not have sliced the onions so thin for this but I had a large ziploc bag of sliced onions that needed using up.

8 large field tomatoes cut in to chunks
1 large onion cut up
4 cloves of garlic peeled
bunch of basil torn in to large pieces
3 tablespoons of olive oil
salt and pepper.

Place all the ingredients in a large roasting tin toss together and drizzle the olive oil over.

Barbecued chicken with a southwest rub

Saturday last week was another hot summer day and I really did not feel like putting the oven on, so the barbecue was fired up yet again, to cook some chicken legs that I had picked up at Hopcotts.  I really like chicken cooked with a spice rub on the barbecue, So I made one up with some southwest flavours.

4 pieces of chicken (2 legs cut in half)
1 tablespoon of chilli powder
1 teaspoon of chipotle chili powder
1 tablespoon of ground cumin
1 tablespoon of ground coriander
1 teaspoon of garlic powder
1/2 teaspoon of salt.

Combine all the ingredients in a small bowl and rub all over the chicken.

Fire up the grill to high with both burners, then when you get it heated up turn off one side and place on the rubbed chicken.

I cooked these for about 1/2 an hour turning occasionaly with the lid down.

I served these with some potatoes dug up from the garden. Unfortunately my vegetable patch is not getting enough sun as some trees have grown over, and so the potatoes are very small, but they were also very tasty.

We also had some local green beans, a very simple fresh delicious meal enjoyed on the deck with a glass of chardonnay, life is good.

Preserving summer pesto

At this time of year when everything is so abundant, it gives me a lot of pleasure to preserve some of those wonderful fresh flavours to enjoy in the dark days of winter.  There is nothing better than pulling something out of your pantry or freezer on dark rainy January night that is redolent in the freshness of a sunny August day.  I managed last year to have a enough home canned tomato puree to not have to buy a singe can of tomatoes the entire winter.  I am starting to can again this year now that the tomatoes are in season, but I grow a lot of herbs and wanted to preserve some of those as well. Pesto seemed the best way to preserve my summer basil.

My basil is at it's height right now and often I find that before I have had a chance to do anything with the remaining leaves at the end of the summer it is gone.  So I realized this weekend that there was enough basil on my deck, that I could cut enough to make some pesto and still have plenty to use fresh.

One of my patches of basil

I froze mine without any Parmesan in it as this could be added later. So I gathered my ingredients together.

Barbecued Pizza

This is something that I have been wanting to try for a while, I have read about it and seen it on TV, but I have never actually tried it before. So on the last night of staying up at Pender Harbour I grilled two pizza's using what I found in the fridge and pantry for toppings.

I made one traditional style pizza with a tomato sauce, fresh tomatoes, mozzorela and fresh basil and one using pesto sauce, sliced cooked potatoes, provolone and fresh rosemary.

Now there were a couple of things I was missing for this experiment, proper flour (I was still using the easy blending flour), a pizza peel and a pizza stone.  I have seen this done with putting the dough directly on the grill, but without a pizza peel it is hard to transport a thin crust pizza with out misshaping it.  Also the easy blending flour does not make a very stretchy dough, I really would not reccomend it.  Any way nothing ventured nothing gained so I gave it a try.  I made my basic foccacia bread recipe and then formed the base of each pizza on an upturned cookie sheet.

Barbecue jerk style chicken

On Saturday night all the boaters were coming to dinner at Pender harbour for a dinner ashore, and Nancy and I decided to make jerk chicken in honour of their sailing trip in the British Virgin Islands last spring.

The recipe I was following for the rub was from Foodnetwork and it called for the chicken marinating in the rub overnight.  Well since we made the rub the afternoon that we were cooking the chicken obviously this did not happen.  And even though the chicken only marinated for about 1/2 an hour before cooking it was still very flavourful.  I really have to try doing this again an marinating for the correct amount of time. We cooked one whole chicken on the spit roast as well as some chicken pieces cooked directly on the barbecue and both worked well.

Ingredients for the rub.


1 onion, chopped
1 1/2 teaspoons dried thyme
1 teaspoon ground allspice
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
4 teaspoons white pepper
1/4 cup chopped green onion
2 teaspoons salt
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
5 small jalapenos
2 tablespoons cooking oil (olive or vegetable)
Splash flavorful rum
Juice of one lime

Combine all these ingredients in a small food processor.

Crusty Olive bread cooked on a barbecue

The oven up at my friends place in Pender Harbour was acting strangely on the weekend, so when I wanted to make bread I had to use the barbecue.  Of course as it was really hot this was not a hardship and in some ways is a good way of dealing with making bread without heating up the house.

I used my basic crusty bread recipe, but after the bread was kneaded and just before leaving to rise I added about a cup of chopped pitted green olives.

I kneaded for about one more minute until the olives were evenly distributed through the dough and then left it to rise as normal.

We heated up the barbecue to 600, then turned one side off and put in the trusty cast iron pot.  When this was heated through I plopped the dough in put the lid on the pot and cooked with the top down on the barbecue for about 20 minutes when I took the lid off the cast iron pot.

Pulled pork and asian style slaw to go

On Friday night we had a mission to deliver dinner to 3 boats full of weary sailers who had been battling against the wind all day.  Nearly everyone one of them had been sea sick at some point during this oddesey, and no one felt like preparing dinner.  We got the call early enough to be able to cook a pork roast long and slow, so that it was falling apart in the way that only pork butt roast can. we were delivering this dinner to Gibsons Landing Marina about an hours drive away at the southern tip of the Sunshine Coast.

When we arrived it was calm, hot and hard to believe the stories that we heard of the rolling seas, high winds and all the throwing up over the side.  Any way who are we to judge, and we did feel like  we were on a mission of mercy.

I made a rub to rub all over the pork roast as follows.

1 tablespoon of ground coriander

1 tablespoon of ground cumin

1 teaspoon of smoked paprika

1 teaspoon of sweet paprika

1 tablespoon of chili powder

1 tablespoon of salt.

I rubbed this all over the pork butt roast, then wrapped it in foil and placed on a barbecue with the lid down for about 3 hours.  I turned the heat down to low on one side and placed the roast on the other.  The barbecue was at about 300.  Obviously you could do this in an oven as well, but it was very hot and the oven was playing up.  

After 3 hours I unwrapped the pork and cooked it for a further 1/2 hour uncovered at about 400.

The pork was getting crusty on the outside and meltingly soft and falling apart in the centre. Just before we left to drive down to Gibsons, I wrapped the pork in foil and then in a large beach towel to keep warm.