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.

Vietnamese Seared beef salad

To go along with the fried noodles with spicy peanut sate that we had on Saturday we wanted a fresh salad to complement the noodles, and we found the recipe in the same book.

I was also delicious and did have a wonderful fresh crunch. Again the recipe called for vegetable oil, but as always I substituted olive oil.

1lb of flank steak (or any steak really)
1 tablespoon of oil
1 cup of bean sprouts
1 small romaine lettuce
1 bunch each of mint basil and cilantro stalks removed
1 lime cut up to serve

Dressing
Grated rind and juice of 2 limes
2 tablespoons of fish sauce
2 tablespoons of raw cane (or brown) sugar
2 garlic cloves grated
2 lemon grass stalks finely sliced
2 red chillies seeded and finely sliced.

Combine all the dressing ingredients together.

Pan fry or barbecue the steak until it is wonderfully golden on the outside, but very rare inside. rest for 10 minutes, and then slice thinly

Fried Noodles with spicy peanut sate and prawns

I dropped my son off at Vancouver Airport to catch a flight to Bangkok this morning.  I was very excited for him and I could tell he was a little apprehensive, as well as excited.  When I was around the same age I took a similar flight on my own from London to Singapore, also to spend some time alone with my Father. I remember what an eye opening experience that was and I am glad that he is getting a similar opportunity.  So later that day when looking for inspiration for dinner Connie suggested that we cook Thai food. After checking through some books we came up with a mostly Vietnamese menu, but they are fairly close aren't they?

This recipe is adapted from a book that I own called  Vietnamese Food Cooking by Ghillie-Basan which has some wonderful authentic recipes with great step by step photographs. I used olive oil, because that is what I use for everything, but the recipe called for vegetable or peanut oil.

Ingredients
2 tablespoons of olive oil
1 1/2 lbs of large raw shrimp/prawns
8oz dried rice stick soaked in warm water for 20 minutes
1 cup of bean sprouts (we forgot to put these in)
2 tsp on nuc mam (fish sauce)
1 small bunch each of fresh basil and mint leaves

For the sate
1 serrano chili chopped
4 tablespoons of olive oil
2 garlic cloves
2 teaspoons of good curry powder
1/2 cup of roasted peanuts.

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.