Food Truck Day
Today is food truck day! Our goal: to have all of our meals at Austin food trucks around the city. Food truck culture is well ensconced here and there are a large number of choices available to hungry meal seekers. Every type of food is represented, across enthnicities, styles, and trends, for breakfast, lunch and dinner and from the basic to the hautest of haute.
These aren’t your father’s chip wagons. In Austin and other cities, food trucks are a lower cost alternative for a chef with vision to open a food business and to get known, gain a following and to be self-sufficient. The overhead and start-up costs are considerably lower. The nature of the competition is different as well as access and ambiance are taken out of the equation. The focus is on the food.
Our first stop of the day was one of Austin’s original and very popular food truck businesses, Torchy’s Tacos. One of the deciding factors for choosing Torchy’s was that only a small fraction of the trucks are open earlier in the day. Most open around 11:30 for the lunch crowd.
Torchy’s had a large assortment of Tacos available. I chose breakfast variants, chorizo and egg and a migas taco (egg, onion, green pepper, cheese and crisp tortilla strips). Both came with mild red sauce and a green sauce with a green chile kick.
Maureen ordered a “Dirty Sanchez” (probably just so she could say she did) and a green chile pork carnitas taco. The Dirty Sanchez had egg, poblano pepper that was battered and deep fried and dressed with guacamole, escabeche carrots and cheese. The other was stuffed with lots of pork carnitas, green chile, cilantro , raw onion and soft queso cheese, with a mild herb creamy sauce.
Often tacos ordered this way can be quite small, and the idea is to order a few. These were not that kind. They were larger and full to the top with their fillings. All were delicious and were a great start to the day.
Our second stop was 400 feet down the road.
Gourdough’s specializes in big-ass doughnuts with exotic flavours. Among the 20 or so varieties that all look spectacular. After some major consternation we finally settle on one each. Ordinarily we might order more and have a taste of each, but these doughnuts were $4.50 each, signaling that they were substantial in size.
I originally asked for the “Flying Pig”, with Bacon and a maple syrup glaze. After all that work of whittling the offerings down to a single choice, I was told that they were out of bacon. So back to the menu board. My plan B choice was “Porkey’s”, a doughnut with cream cheese and jalapeño jelly topped with Canadian bacon.
Maureen choose a “Sarah’s Joy”, a doughnut with coconut cream filling, frosted with chocolate and covered with large, coarse coconut flakes. Doughnuts are fried to order so when they called our names, the just-topped donuts were warm and very fresh. And large. Very large — a little wider than a CD in diameter, with no hole.
First mine: The fresh yeasty dough, the cream cheese and the jalapeño jelly were perfect together, not needing the superfluous bacon as it didn’t add or take away from the experience. Although, “Superfluous Bacon” is a very good name for a rock band. Maureen’s, however, was hands-down too sweet. The coconut cream was quite sweet and chocolate icing killed any chance the doughnut had left to be enjoyed. A word to bakers: Chocolate icing obliterates all other flavours — it’s strong and sweet and is almost always paired with more delicate ingredients that can’t stand up to it. Even chocolate cake suffers for it.
All was not lost, however. These are big doughnuts, so I happily gave up half of mine.
Mid-afternoon we headed to our choice for a late lunch, called Fat Cactus, a truck that specialized in combining a couple of our favourite things: they made tacos and sandwiches using Navaho fry bread, a crispy, fluffy, rich flat bread (similar to a Beaver Tail for our Ottawa-based readers). But alas, they were sold out by the time we got there… That’s an important lesson to learn for food truck aficionados — get it while you can.
The good news was that we were across the street from one of the largest collections of food trucks in Austin along South Congress. We looked at the many offerings, ranging from Cajun/Creole, to cupcakes, sausages, shaved ice treats, assortments of food cooked and put in cones and the one we selected, Thai. Food trucks often have great names built on puns and ours was no exception. “Coat & Thai” served the full range of Thai and near-Thai specialties.
We ordered red curry, pineapple fried rice, spicy Thai chicken wings and crab rangoon. A few minutes later our number is up and we bring it back to one of the communal picnic tables in the area. Everything is hot, home-made and delicious.
The fried rice has a subtle heat and is full of plump shrimp, pineapple, cilantro and vegetables. The red curry is medium spicy with a cilantro backbeat and goes very well on rice. Our chicken wings have that sweet, spicy Thai chili sauce on them and are addictive. Lastly, the crab rangoon (crab and cream cheese in a dumpling and deep fried — not a Thai dish, but an American invention first served at Trader Vic’s as faux Polynesian food) was creamy, and cooked so it was still tender. Lovely.
We headed out at about 8PM for our dinner spot, G’raj Mahal, and Indian food truck that has stretched the boundary of what could still be called a food truck. It started out as a trailer and some tables, but while the trailer is still the kitchen, they’ve added some semi-permanent structures to provide shelter for the tables and now have a seating capacity of about 60 people across three areas, and recently added full table service with waitstaff. You can also BYOB and many tables were making a night out of good food, company and wine. It’s still outside, the kitchen is in a trailer and it had humble beginnings, so it’s a food truck.
The theme is Indian food and their specialty is Goan cuisine, known for its use of coconut milk, seafood and chilies. We order some naan bread, sag paneer (Indian cheese with pureed spinach in curried cream), dahl, tandoori shrimp, chicken malabar (sweet coconut in caramelized onion cream sauce), and Goan Coconut Curry (Shrimp with freshly grated coconut, simmered with chilies).
The food is made with the freshest ingredients and the chef shies away from the usual artificial colours and shortcuts used by many Indian restaurants. This is without a doubt, the best Indian food I have ever had. The spice level of the food that the chef designates as “spicy” is well within our comfort zone. The coconut dishes are terrific. Sweet, nutty, spicy and creamy all at once. The creamy and rich sag paneer was also a standout. As with all really good Indian food, it’s impossible to stop eating! It takes almost superhuman strength to resist that last piece of naan soaked in the coconut curry.
That’s it for Food Truck Day. The variety and quality are both outstanding. Great food cities like New York, San Francisco, Portland and Austin are seeing more and more food trucks emerge as a key force in the culinary evolution of the city. One will only hope that other cities (Ottawa: hint, hint!) will change their minds about the crippling regulations that they have stacked against these businesses and will ensure they are allowed to flourish. Cities can only be better for it.
Texas Mish-Mash
Today was a patchwork day. Maureen and I went to an old Austin favourite for Breakfast, took a drive to San Antonio for Lunch, and ate sports event concession food for dinner.
The day started with a trip to the Magnolia Cafe. it’s one of the most popular cafes in the hip SoCo (South Congress Avenue) district — a funky (overused term when describing things in Austin) 24-hour joint with an eclectic menu that described the cross-section of cultures here — cowboy favourites sit along side Mexican dishes. Diner food mingles with upscale eats.
Although the entire menu is available 24hrs a day, we were there for breakfast. Migas is a popular Tex-Mex breakfast item, scrambled eggs with onion, cheese, tortilla chips, served with tortillas and salsa and refried beans on the side. At Magnolia, there’s an option to order the “Love Migas” where the entire dish is cooked in garlic butter and serrano chilies. We opt for that, please!
The place is also celebrated for its plate-sized pancakes and we order one each — gingerbread for Maureen and I opt for the cornmeal pancake, continuing my love affair with all things corn.
Our breakfasts arrive and the aroma rises to make us want to roll around in the plate. The garlic, cheese, heat from the serranos are heaven when the eggs and beans and house-made chunky salsa are piled into a fresh, hot flour tortilla and eaten taco style. It makes for a creamy, eggy, spicy experience that’s totally unique to the Magnolia Cafe.
On to the pancakes: Maureen’s gingerbread pancake has the same rich hue of good gingerbread, but it has the soft and fluffy texture of a pancake, a real winning combo. My cornmeal pancake has great corn-cake flavour and a coarse texture from the cornmeal — great with butter and syrup.
We hit the road to check out some of the small towns (Gruene and New Braunfels) on the way to San Antonio to tour it’s famous Riverwalk — a peaceful, meandering canal through the heart of San Antonio. Constructed with a great deal of forethought and vision for the city, it’s overhung with Magnolia trees, filled with singing birds (important to us Canadians who have missed them for the last several months), and lined with plantings, fountains, cafes and shops. Some stretches of the canal reach into historic districts. Tour boats and water taxis move up river, some with bandoliers, and or microphoned tour guides.
After walking some distance, checking out the sights, we were heavily motivated to have a seat at a sidewalk cafe and enjoy the warmth of the sun (it had been overcast and a little chilly (for Texans – still t-shirt weather for Canadians) since we’ve arrived. We chose Ibiza, an eatery that specializes in Latin cuisine, with Mexico, Cuba, Spain and others well-represented on the menu. We order the Cubano sandwich, which has the traditional ham, roast pork, cheese, pickles and mustard in a toasted roll. Ibiza decided to fore-go the pressing of the sandwich and left the roll in it’s full-volume state. Mixed veggie chips accompanied the sandwich and we washed it all down with a couple Blue Moons. The roast pork was excellent and was definitely the star of the show. As well, the Cubano depends on the combination of salty ham and pork, the creaminess of the cheese and the sharpness of plain old yellow mustard and pickle to provide it’s iconic flavour profile. Even though the sandwiches weren’t pressed, these satisfied the yen.
We headed back to Austin via I-35 — as depressing a stretch of road as you’re likely to find. Chain restaurants, one after another on both sides of the roads for miles and miles, broken up by gas stations, low-end hotels, warehouses and the odd outlet mall were the only view. It reminded us yet again, why we have a strict no interstates, no chain restaurants rule on our road trips.
We had to get back to Austin because we had tickets to the season opener of TXRD all-womens’ Roller Derby. Austin is the epicentre of the resurgence of this sport, blending more actual sport and less Wrestlemania-style they do inject some light-hearted fun into their version of the sport. There are local rock bands playing in the breaks and punishment for minor penalties are assessed by spinning a wheel. Punishments involve the potential to give up points if a penalized player loses a contest, such as a pillow fight, arm-wrestling, a tug-of-war or a two lap track race. However game play is serious and highly athletic, and there’s plenty of bone-crushing contact between players to keep the audience on their feet. There’s a punk rock aesthetic to the whole roller derby scene in Austin that keeps it a great venue for watching people letting their freak flag fly. It was a great time.
Another thing we liked about it was the concession food. Sure, you could get pizza and hot dogs, but you could also get some highly inventive fare from Jackalope, a local eatery. In addition to items like a jalapeno Texas hot-link dipped in orange pancake batter and deep-fried as their take on a corn dog, they had one item that was too intriguing to not order: jicima and cabbage slaw with Cap’n Crunch and couscous crusted fried chicken with green chile ranch dressing on top all served in a bacon waffle cone. This was easy to hold, easy to eat and man, was it good. Sweet, savoury with a nice bite from the slaw and heat from the green chile ranch. The chicken was tender and juicy and Cap’n Crunch is an inspired choice as breading material for fried chicken… well, fried ANYTHING for that matter.
In case you were wondering, the Holy Rollers beat the Putas Del Fuego in a close 54-51 match with the Putas putting on a major comeback push that made it a nail biter. It was a great day across a couple cities. We ended the night with a major crash and slept in on Monday.
Austin Day 2: Kreuz Market
It’s raining in Austin again today so we plan to do a little driving and exploring. Sun is promised for tomorrow and so is the Texas Marathon. But today, brunch will be at 24 Diner. This hip eatery is busy on Saturday and parking is hard to obtain. Once inside the wait is 15 minutes. We are seated and order drinks and peruse the menu. The interior is not diner-like at all but more hipster/industrial.
The menu has all the diner classics but refined and many healthy non-dinerish options. I order the Pork Belly sandwich that is reminiscent of a bahn mi with cucumber, mint, serrano and pickled red onion. Sides are ordered separately and I was intrigued by the menu option: vegetable of the day. I expected the usual bland selection of broccoli, carrots, or cauliflower. Today’s veg was brussel sprouts sauteed in a skillet. Sign me up! I love sprouts. The sandwich was good, the baguette perfectly chewy and the pork belly surprisingly meaty. The mint, serrano and cucumber were not evident and that was a little disappointing. The sprouts were awesome! Charred and sweet.
Rob ordered a patty melt with fries. The melt came nontraditionally on sourdough, but it was perfectly toasted on the flat-top with the pre-requisite fried onions and swiss cheese, combining for a creamy, sweet, sharp foil for the burger. Rob’s a sucker for a patty melt.
After lunch we headed over to the nearby Whole Foods store, perchance to dream. This Austin location is the flagship store and well… as a someone who shops for food in Ottawa…completely depressing. The selection is amazing.
A little tired walking the aisles? Stop here and have a craft beer. *sigh*
Our daughter Hannah always requests meatloaf when asked for dinner suggestions.
Raising the candy apple to an art form. The choice of prepared foods is staggering.
Kreuz Market (pronounced “KRITES”) in Lockhart has been on Rob’s radar for some time. It is one of the oldest and most traditional examples of Texas BBQ. We spent the afternoon cruising around in the inclement weather stopping here and there for a picture. Lockhart is about 40 minutes south of Austin and is considered a bit of a Mecca for BBQ enthusiasts. On the way to Lockhart, Rob informs me that he is not certain I’m going to like Kreuz. Why? Well…its hunks of meat and no sauce, and no forks. But there are sides right? Hmmm…crackers and pickles…maybe potato salad. Okay, I’m pretty sure I already hate this place. I don’t care about its iconic status. Oh well, I’ll grit my teeth and take one for the team.
Kreuz is huge. The woodlot out back is the size of your average supermarket garden center. When entering you are oddly accosted by several of those rip-off “claw and capture a stuffed animal” vending machines. Advance warning, parents. Further in the line up to order begins. Selection is small – two varieties of sausage, brisket, beef and pork ribs, smoked ham special today. Ordering is done at a central counter where you pay as well.
The ordering room contains several large smokers and open fires with hot burning logs. The clerk takes your meat orders only. She calls it out directly to the aproned, blackened cutter immediately behind her who slices your brisket and ribs. She weighs it and the cashier rings it up. It is bundled haphazardly with several slices of white bread in several layers of butcher paper and handed still open to you.
At this point you continue to the next ordering phase in the main dining hall. Here you have a few limited choices for sides including sauerkraut, German potatoes (roasted and steamed), mac and cheese, coleslaw and several pickle selections.
From here you find space at a table and spread out your meal. Kreuz also does not provide forks. Plastic spoons and knives and fingers. That’s it. We ordered the brisket (fat), pork ribs, a sausage, mac and cheese, sauerkraut and bread and butter pickles.
Normally we don’t order the brisket because it is too dry and strong tasting. This brisket however was amazing, moist, tender, flavourful, pull apart delicious with a delicate smoke. It was truly fantastic and I would never hesitate to order it. Like no brisket I’ve ever had. The pork ribs were good, very peppery, tender. and had a nice rosy deep smoke ring. They however could have benefited from a sweet Memphis BBQ sauce. Blasphemy, I know. Texas is about the meat but I am about the sauce. The sausage was very unseasoned and dull – perhaps because we were expecting a spiced Texas hot link and it turned out to be German-style sausage. Again, sauce would have rescued it. We ate most of the meal wrapping the juicy brisket in white bread with the crunchy sweet pickles. Heaven.
The sides are fine. Coleslaw is crunchy, creamy and tasty. The mac and cheese is overcooked pasta in day-glo orange cheese sauce and is awful in that perfect, excellent way. The thick ridge cut bread and butter pickles are the perfect foil to the fatty meat. On the whole Kreuz was an awesome Texas BBQ experience and well worth going out of your way to try.
Austin!
Touched down just after noon on Friday. Up since 4 am we are tired and hungry. Austin is overcast and a light rain falls but it is also verdant with spring, mild and the birds are singing, with the bonus of being sans slush and the treachery that is our Ottawa driveway currently.
Rob and I have been to Austin on two other occasions for all-too-brief stops on road trips, so we already have a basic lay of the land and some favorite places to grab a bite. We make an easy decision. Gueros!
Despite the drizzle, South Congress is alive and buzzing on this Friday mid-afternoon. We luck into a parking spot across from the restaurant and head in. Guero’s is packed but has a couple of free tables. We get seated and first up: Margaritas! We already know Guero’s does ‘em right. They offer about 15 margs with different tequilas. We order The Don, February’s featured marg made with Don Julio tequila, Triple Sec, fresh lime juice, rocks, salted rim for me, no salt for Rob. Our drinks arrive with a slice of lime and starting to sweat. Guero margs are in short glasses and are about twenty shades paler than the neon chartreuse abomination that the unfortunate think is a real margarita. Ooooh! Goes down easy after our long day.
Drinks arrive with complimentary, well made corn tortilla chips and two house salsas. The first, a smooth, roasted tomato chile dip provides a nice spicy burn. The second is a fresh, chunky pico de gallo with a hint of creaminess provided by some chopped avocado. I’m not sure which I prefer. Both are great with a margarita. I do immediately regret wearing a white shirt however.
Starving, we select a few apps off the menu to share. Tacos Al Pastor and Chorizo Quesadillas. The tacos are small, open-faced and piled with spiced pork and pico de gallo laced with coriander and fresh pineapple. They come with lots of fresh lime. The quesadillas keep me coming back to Guero’s. The soft, pillowy flour tortillas (corn are also available) are sumptuous with just enough cheese, chorizo and spiced oil rendered from the meat to glue the tortillas together. A generous helping of guacamole and sour cream for spooning up with each bite makes these the perfect marg-soaking-up food. With our bellies content we head to the hotel to check in and have a much needed nap.
Refreshed and ready to roll, we select the Iron Cactus for dinner because we can walk there. We are only a block from 6th street which is hopping on a Friday night despite the rain. The Iron Cactus, a large two story affair here in Austin, has a few locations in Texas, much like the Lone Star in Ontario minus the fake Texas crap and waiter named Durango. We have a 15 minute wait at the bar where the tender tells us they make a mighty good margarita. We bite. They have a pretty good array of tequila behind the bar. He makes us a decent drink with fresh lime and agave nectar. It’s good but a tad too sweet. Not bad though. The bar is noisy on a Friday. We are by a factor of two, the oldest people in the joint. Oddly the sound track beckons to us: The Zombies, Johnny Cash, Pink Floyd, Tom Petty and Steppenwolf.
After we are seated, I order a local beer, Fireman Four. Complimentary chips with two roasted chile -tomato salsas, one warm, one cold arrive. Chips are good and the salsas tasty. We order a Chile Con Queso app. It arrives in a cast iron pan, thin and white with a few chunks of chilies and tomato. Quite average but really good when sharing a chip with the mildly spicy roasted salsas.
For mains we are sharing an order of shrimp and pork carnitas fajitas. The dish arrives hot but not sizzling. The pork is in good sized chunks, sweet and nicely spicy. The shrimp appear to be wild caught as they have an intense shrimpy taste and are smokey sweet. Accompanying the proteins are nicely sauteed onions, poblanos, and red peppers. The flour tortillas (again corn are offered) are soft and perfect. Our mains come with a choice of beans. We both opt for the bacon onion beans which are very good but not sweet. The Mexican rice is dull and the classic fajita fixins are fine but in our book cheese is a no no and the guacamole had been set out too far in advance and had started to oxidize which is unappetizing.
We head back to our hotel via 6th Street, Austin’s bar and restaurant scene. Lots of colourful characters and live music spill out into the street. Can’t wait to check it out!
Spanish Tapas Night!
Rob and I are unfamiliar with Spanish wines in general. Oh sure we can pick out a decent Rioja but beyond that we are a little lost. We decided to cozy up an Ottawa winter evening by inviting a group of friends that enjoy red wine, food and travel. We sent out an invite to bring a tapas dish or a bottle of a favorite Spanish wine one might like to share. Our group of eight guests was more than up to the task and we had a fun evening trying new wines, comparing wines and enjoying the fruits of our friend’s kitchens. This is a great excuse to get together, weather be damned and learn about wine. Little or no coordination was done and so it was a true potluck with the tapas. Here’s a rundown for most of the food. As recipes show up, we’ll add them to the list.
The Menu:
Mediterranean Spiced Olives
Shrimp and Chorizo with Smoked Tomato Dip
Manchego Cheese
Spanish Roasted Potatoes in Tomato Sauce (Patatas Bravas) – Simply Recipes
Tooma Cheese with Guava Paste
Mussels in Spicy Coconut Milk
Grilled Mushrooms
Homemade Gooseberry Compote
Quinoa Salad
Olives with Roasted Peppers
Whipped Potato, Fish and Olive Spread with Garlic Crostini
Tart with Gorgonzola, Fig, Watercress and Serrano Ham
Abby and Nico’s Quinoa Salad (Abigail Lixfeld and Nico Pham-Dinh )
- toast the quinoa lightly, then cook in duck stock until done
- chop snow pea leaves and then blanche in hot water for one minute, then shock in cold water
- coarsely chop and then saute vegetables in duck fat (e.g. carrots, leeks, bell peppers)
- mix quinoa, snow pea leaves and vegetables, dress and season to taste
Dressing:
- grapeseed oil, reduced sodium tamari, garlic, cracked pepper, agave
Abby and Nico’s Grilled Mushrooms (Abigail Lixfeld and Nico Pham-Dinh )
- thinly slice king oyster mushrooms
- toss in a dressing of grapeseed oil, soy, agave, dijon mustard, tarragon, salt and pepper
- bbq, pan fry or grill until cooked through but still firm
Served with Nico’s Mom’s Ground Cherry Compote
Rob’s Shrimp and Chorizo
- Peel, clean and de-vein gulf-caught fresh shrimp
- Toss cleaned shrimp in spice mix (paprika, chili powder, garlic, salt, pepper)
- Slice Spanish-style dry chorizo into 1cm-thick coins
- Saute chorizo to render some of the fat. Remove from head when tender.
- Saute shrimp in same pan with chorizo-oil (augment with olive oil as needed) until just cooked.
- Take toothpicks and secure chorizo coins inside the curve of the shrimp
- Serve with your favourite dip, in this case, a smoky tomato jam. Sauces made with melted citrus marmalades are excellent as well.
Rob and Maureen’s Tart with Gorgonzola, Fig, Watercress and Serrano Ham
preheat oven to 400 degrees F
Brush flatbread with olive oil
Distribute sliced fresh figs, gorgonzola and watercress sprigs on flatbread
Bake in oven until crispy and golden, and topics are cooked and melted.
Top with slices of Serrano ham while hot (it will “melt” into the hot flatbread)
Cut into easy-to-eat squares.
Spicy Mussels (Courtesy of Jan and Patti adapted from 222 Lyon Street Tapas Bar)
Serves 2 (main course)
2 Tbsp vegetable oil
2-3 cloves chopped fresh garlic
¼ cup chopped Spanish onion
2 Tbsp finely chopped parsley
2-2½ cups chicken stock (use less/more depending on how much liquid you want)
¾ cup dry white wine (less if you want it less “winey”)
2 Tbsp Dijon mustard
Sprinkling of crushed red chillies (to taste)
2 lbs (one mesh bag) fresh live mussels, washed and scrubbed if necessary
1-1½ cups heavy (35%) cream (use less/more depending on how much liquid you want)
In a large pot, heat the oil until hot. Add the chopped garlic, chopped onion and parsley. Cook over medium heat for 2 minutes, stirring occasionally.
Add the chicken stock, wine, crushed red chillies and Dijon mustard. When heated, add the mussels. Cover the pot and cook until the mussels have opened, 5-10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add the cream and stir well. Discard any mussels that have not opened. Serve immediately in a large bowl.
Accidental Vegetarian: Panzanella
Meatless Monday and sharing a bottle of wine over dinner, is a tradition we have recently slipped into, as it is the one evening neither of us has to rush off to do something else. We are discovering that vegetarian food does not have to be boring. It’s actually surprisingly easy to find recipes for dishes that you would cook or order in a restaurant, because you want to eat it, not because it is vegetarian. Italian cuisine offers up many such pleasures. Panzanella is light but satisfying, and pairs well with a good Chianti Classico.
Panzanella (Tuscan Bread Salad)
Serves 4
adapted from the several dozen but all very similar recipes on the web. David Rocco inspired me to try it after he prepared a version on Dolce Vita.
Ingredients: Salad
9-10 cups of day old rustic bread such as Italian crusty, cut into large cubes….1-2 inches
1 pint cherry tomatoes, cut in half
1/2 a large sweet onion, cut into thin slices
1 cucumber, peeled, cut in half, then quarters, then chunks
1 cup fresh basil, chiffonaded
Parmesan for serving
Ingredients for Dressing:
1/3 cup good quality olive oil
3/4 tsp. Dijon mustard
3 tbsp. red wine vinegar
good pinch of Kosher salt
1/4 tsp. fresh ground pepper
Method:
1. Combine bread and half of the marinade, toss and let sit to marinate for 10 minutes.
2. Add the remaining marinade and other ingredients. Let sit at room temperature for 15 minutes. Serve with Parmesan cheese if desired. Salad does not keep so eat up!
Click HERE for a print-friendly version of this recipe.
Accidental Vegetarian: Rustic Pasta
Eating vegetarian appeals to me on many levels: It’s healthy and lighter generally, and, as an animal lover I do struggle with eating mammals at times. Rob and I consciously buy from local farmers where possible. I want to know where my meat came from, that it was raised with care and an eye to it’s quality of life, and without antibiotics and hormones But bacon is so damned delicious and my resolve to eat less meat fades in the light of a frigid Ottawa winter. A steak cooked medium-rare and served up in a Thai coconut curry sauce or a pork and green chile stew is just that more comforting and soul sustaining than a tofu stirfy or portabello burger, in the grip of a -32 windchill. So, when I stumble across a recipe that coats the mouth with such satisfying, savoury richness and flavour and delivers that feeling of being sated, sleepy and happy AND it is vegetarian, I am very happy.
This recipe was shown to my daughter Hannah by her friend, Bridget (Hi, Bridget!) when they were in their late teens.
Rustic Pasta with Roasted Cherry Tomatoes, Garlic and Thyme
Ingredients:
1 sweet onion, medium chop
2 pints of cherry tomatoes. A mix of varieties is nice. Buy the sweetest ones you can.
2-3 large cloves of garlic, sliced thin (I use a hand held mandoline)
A glug of good quality olive oil. I use Frantoia (alla Mario 
)
A couple of sprigs of thyme, remove stems. You can use any woody herb on hand such as Rosemary or sage. Lightly chop to bruise herb.
Salt and pepper
Rustic pasta like garganelli
Parmesan or Pecorino for serving
Method:
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Toss onion, tomatoes (halve any large ones), garlic and thyme with a good glug of olive oil (don’t skimp, it’s a large part of the finished sauce), salt and pepper to taste. Roast in oven for about 40 minutes. Tomatoes should have blistered and lightly charred skins. Turn oven off and leave to keep warm. Cook pasta. Stir tomato sauce and serve on top of pasta. Sprinkle with fresh grated cheese. You can easily adjust this recipe to serve as many people as you like.
Click HERE for a printable version of this recipe.
Roast Chicken with Thai Spices
I was menu planning for the week ahead on Friday and was inspired to create this dish by one of the plump, juicy local chickens from Winfield farms that I had in my freezer. Roast chicken of any kind is comfort food on a blustery winter day. I love the warm, spicy flavours prevalent in Thai cuisine and felt they would compliment a chicken nicely. Rob suggested making a yellow curry sauce and so it came together.
Thai Spiced Roast Chicken with Yellow curry Sauce and Coconut-Mango-Coriander Jasmine Rice
Ingredients for Chicken:
1 3 1/2 to 4 pound chicken
1 tsp Thai Kitchen Green Curry Paste
2 limes
2 tsp fish sauce
1 tsp sesame oil
fresh ground pepper
A handful of coriander
Method:
Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Rinse chicken and set on a rack in roasting pan. Whisk together green curry paste, juice of 1/2 a lime, fish sauce and sesame oil in a small bowl. Baste chicken with spice mixture. Stuff some fresh coriander under the skin and place a handful of coriander and three lime halves in the cavity of the bird. Roast for about an hour and a half.
Ingredients for Yellow Curry Sauce:
1 tsp Thai Kitchen Yellow Curry Paste
2 tbsp fish sauce
1 tbsp brown sugar
Juice of 1/2 a lime
Can of coconut milk
Method:
Heat all ingredients together in a sauce pan over medium low heat. Serve with chicken.
Ingredients for Coconut-Mango-Coriander Jasmine Rice:
1 cup Jasmine or other white rice
Can coconut water with pulp
1/2 cup diced mango (frozen is fine)
1/4 cup chopped coriander
Method:
Using favourite method, make rice with coconut water instead of of water. When rice is done toss with mango and coriander.
Click HERE for a printable version of this recipe.
Holiday Treats: 2 Family Faves
Chocolate Truffle Mice
My mom used to make these chocolate truffle mice every Christmas. When other kids brought in cookies or bar desserts their moms made during our elementary school Christmas parties, I brought these mice. Santa may have even been left a few mice on more than one occasion. This recipe and the recipe below, candied orange peels, are in the notebook my mom passed onto me.
Adult me is wondering how kid me did not appreciate “gooey pizza muffins”.
As an aside, this notebook is the first thing I will grab if there’s ever a fire. It’s full of clippings from magazines and newspapers my mom stuck in a huge spiral-bound notebook. There’s notes all throughout, “excellent”, “not great”, “Heather loves these” and lots of these recipes I remember my mom making growing up.
Chocolate Truffle Mice (Canadian Living Magazine)
4 ounces/squares of semi-sweet baking chocolate
1/3 cup sour cream
1 cup chocolate wafer crumbs (or Oreo baking crumbs… But if you grind up the cookies yourself, about 30 cookies.)
1/3 cup more crumbs for later (or you can use icing sugar or sprinkles… But be warned, icing sugar will make your little mice disturbingly realistic)
Dragees
Almond slivers or flakes
Licorice for tails
Melt the chocolate in a double boiler, then remove it from the heat. Mix in sour cream, and then the cookie crumbs. Park it in the fridge to cool for about an hour.
Roll about a tablespoon’s worth of truffle into a ball, and then shape the ball to have a little point at the end for the mouse’s nose. Coat the truffle in more cookie crumbs.
You can then decorate with dragees (silver balls) for eyes, almond slivers for ears and licorice strings for tails. Do not be surprised if once everyone is done eating them, you are left with a plate of disembodied tails.
Candied Orange Peels
I’ve been making the candied orange peels on my own for the past three or four Christmases. Matt’s mom showed me a recipe in a magazine for candied orange slices, not peels. I thought this was really interesting and I am going to do both peels and slices during this run.
One interesting note is that the recipe for peels is done in two stages: first, you boil the peels in water for 15 minutes to remove the bitterness, then simmer them in sugar syrup until they are candied. For the slices, all the recipes I have found skip that first step. In addition, the peels use sugar and corn syrup, while the slices do not use corn syrup, but simply a 2:3 water to sugar ratio.
I’ve experimented with this recipe, and the only other citrus fruit that holds up well to the process is grapefruit, which still retains its distinct grapefruit flavour. Lemon and lime peels seem too thin and turn out crunchy and burnt-tasting.
The chocolate dipping is what I added to this recipe. Dark chocolate tastes really good, but semi-sweet chocolate chips are easier to eat out of the freezer when no one is looking.
This recipe is from Family Circle, December 1989.
Candied Orange Peels 
2 to 3 lbs of navel oranges, or about 8 oranges.
3/4 cup of water
2 cups of sugar, with extra for rolling the peels in
2 tablespoons of corn syrup
Remove the peel from the oranges. I’ve found cutting them into quarters and scooping out the flesh works best, but if you intend on eating the leftovers later you will be left with a pile of mush. I always intend to eat the oranges, but never do. This is why I am excited about trying slices this time around, because there is less waste.
Boil the orange peels in a pot of water for about 15 minutes, drain.
Boil sugar, 3/4 cup of water and corn syrup, add the orange peels and simmer for about 35-55 minutes or until translucent. Do not burn it, or your pot will never be the same again. In addition if you burn the syrup, your peels will taste burnt and be crunchy even if they don’t look burnt.
After the peels are simmered, they are left to cool/dry before rolling them in sugar. They are supposed to be rolled in sugar when they’re just “tacky”, but I have found if you roll them when too dry the sugar won’t stick, but if you roll them just before the tacky stage the sugar is absorbed because of the moisture and the peels stay… Juicy.
I found the slices difficult to candy evenly, as they float. And, the more you push ‘em back into their syrup, the more they fall apart. But if you cover them with enough chocolate it doesn’t really matter
Enjoy!
Inspiration 2: Perogies
For the second time in as many visits, a trip to Piggy Market changed our dinner plans on the spot. We spotted heads of local cabbage in the corner, molasses-cured smoked bacon and perogies behind the glass counters and a lovely home-made apple pie cooling on the counter. My plan hatched immediately. It was cool, grey day, calling out for a dinner of old-world comfort food.
The cabbage was chopped and blanched. Onions and bacon fried together, the pot de-glazed with a generous couple of glugs of Waupoos hard apple cider. The cabbage was added and fried until soft, absorbing the bacon fat and flavours from the thickened cider.
The pot, now emptied of its mixture, gets a fresh dollop of special, high-milk fat butter, and we fry the cheese and potato pillows until they are golden. Everything is tossed together and served with the rest of the Waupoos, paving the way for the punctuation of a perfect sweet bite of pie.
