Easy Breakfast

Granola, is surprisingly easy to make and versatile. Excellent with milk or yogurt as breakfast or crumbled over berries and ice cream for dessert - it become a household staple. Granola is also amenable to whatever we have in the cupboard, with maple syrup standing in for honey or a wide range of dried berries and even chocolate chips, the combination are endless.

Granola

3 cups oats
1 cup chopped walnuts
1/2 cup shredded coconut
1/2 cup pumpkin seeds
4 tbs brown sugar
1 tbs ground Cinnamon
1/2 tbs ground ginger
1 tsp salt
1/2 cup honey
2 tbs vegetable oil
1 - 2 cups dried blueberries or other dried fruit

1. Preheat oven to 300 F
2. Heat oil and honey in a small saucepan over low heat
3. Mix all other ingredients except the dried fruit
4. Mix in honey and oil mixture
5. Line cookie sheet with parchment paper and pour mixture in evenly
6. Bake for 35 minutes, stirring the contents every 10 minutes to ensure even cooking
7. Mix in dried fruit

Pork Butchery

There is nothing more primal than butchery. To understand where the animal comes from, every cut, every dish, is cooking at it`s purest. If you truly understand where your food comes from, you should understand that nothing should be wasted. It`s the understanding that an animal gave up its life for a meal and it behooves us to ensure it`s welfare and to not waste a single part of the creature.

I chose the pork course at Northwest Culinary school simply because I felt that it was a good sized animal to work with. Anything larger would be unwieldy while anything smaller would not yield quite as many interesting cuts.

Recipes

Tourtiere

Stuffing

1 tbs oil
1/2 diced medium onion
500 g lean gorund pork
1 tsp allspice
2 tbs flour
1/3 cup milk
salt and pepper to taste
1 large potato, cut into medium dice

Pastry

11/2 cups flour
150 g cubed, chilled butter
1/2 t salt
75 ml, cold water

Method

Pastry

1. Whisk flour and salt
2. cut cold butter into flour until pea sized
3. incorporate enough cold water to bind
4. wrap and rest in fridge

Tourtiere

1. Cook meat and onion, add flour to form a roux. Add milk and simmer for 5 -10 minutes, season
2. Add cubed potato and cook covered until tender
3. Cool mixture, fill pie, close lid
4. Bake at 400 degrees F until golder brown

Wiener Schnitzel

Pork or Veal
breadcrumbs
eggs, whisked
flour
salt and pepper

1. pound slices of pork until thin
2. season with salt and peper
3. dip in flour
4. dip in eggs
5. dip in breadcrumbs
6. Pan fry in a pan with about 1/2 inch of oil until golden brown

Pate or Terrine

2 Tbs Pistachios, chopped
1 egg
2 tsp flour
1 tsp salt
Qautre Epice as needed

Quatre Epice
1 cup ground black pepper
3 tbs ground cloves
5 tbs ground ginger
5 tbs ground nutmeg

Forcemeat
1 kg cubed pork 30% fat
70 ml Brandy
1 tbs quatre epics
1/2 diced onion
3 diced garlic cloves
1 tbs fresh thyme

1. Rub spices into pork, add brandy and marinate overnight
2. sweat onion and garlic in fat with thyme, cool and add to cubed pork
3. grind mixture in food processor
4. emulsify meat and keep cool

Recipe

1. Mix egg and flour into a paste
2. add 1 kg forcemeat, pistachios, egg, flour and salt
3. pack mixture in terrine and bake at 350 F until it reached 140 F
4. Cool and press pate overnight with cans

Sausage Party

I prefer my sausages a little bit rougher. The oscillation between meat, fat and spices can create a much more satisfying and flavourful experience as all parts can come into play with varying strengths. My palette never tires nor does it become inured. The recipes provided will all work with the following methodology.

Method

1. Soak casings in water for about 1 hour. Be sure to change the water as the casings will be salted. If there are any casings leftover, you can always place in a bag with a bit of water and freeze again. Sheep casings are the most common but it`s often best to match the casing to the meat filling
2. You will want a large sturdy working surface. Cover with a plastic sheet to ease cleaning. The meat can be quite greasy.
3. 2.Mix the spices with the thoroughly. Take a small batch, about the size of a fist, and drop it on the work surface from about 6 inches. Gather the ball, rotate a quarter and drop down again. As you continue to do this, the fat in the pork will break down and start to glue the meat together. As the ball of meat gets stickier, drop it from higher and higher heights until the ball will hold its shape. Continue with the rest of the meat.
4. Heat a small pan and cook a small amount of meat. Taste and adjust if required. If the meat is freshly ground, you can certainly try a bit of the filling raw.
5. Remove a casing from the water place over the spout of the stuffer. Try to get as much of the casing on the spout as possible and cut off any extra. Be sure to leave about 2 inches of extra material for tying off the sausages.
6. Slowly feed the meat into the casing and try not to over stuff the sausage. You will need to twist off the sausages and you do not want to burst the casings. here is where a manual stuffer works well as the flow of the stuffing can be better managed, however, it will require an extra set of hands.
7. Once you have filled a casing, lie the entire link on the work table. You can either twist the links at regular intervals to create sausages or you can braid them through each other. The former is much easier but is not as fast as the later.
8. Grill over a BBQ, enjoy and deal with the inevitable sausage jokes.

Recipes

Hot Italian Sausage

10 lbs rough ground pork
1 cup red wine (mix after the meat has been properly mixed with other spices)
1 cup chopped fresh parsley
5 tsp salt
6 garlic cloves, minced
1 tbs ground pepper
3 tsp cayenne pepper
5 tbsp fennel seed
2 tsp crushed chili peppers
5 tbsp paprika

Sweet Italian Sausage

10 lbs rough ground pork
4 tbsp salt
1 tbsp fennel seed
2 tsp ground black pepper
1 tbsp brown sugar
1 tsp caraway seeds
1 tbsp coriander
3 tsp crushed chili peppers

Cotechino Sausage

10 lbs rough ground pork
1 cup grated Romano cheese
4 cloves minced garlic
4 tbsp salt
3 tbsp ground pepper
1 tbsp nutmeg
1 tbsp cinnamon
1 tbsp cayenne
1 tsp ground clove

Moroccan Lamb Sausage

10 lbs ground lamb
4 tbsp salt
3 tbsp ground pepper
1 tbsp cinnamon
1 tsp all spice
6 minced garlic cloves
1 tbsp ginger powder
1 tbsp coriander
1 cup chopped, dried figs

Lamb and Feta Sausage

10 lbs ground lamb
4 tbs salt
3 tbsp ground pepper
1 cup crumbled feta
1 cup chopped fresh parsley

New Grill Favorite

I've never really grilled pork ribs out of sheer laziness. Ribs have become one of these recipes where everyone has some needlessly gimmicky secret with little or no bearing on the final outcome. It was so refreshing when I found this simple yet deep recipe in Bon Apetit. I've adapted Sarun Pich's recipe to give it a more floral note.

Cambodian Ribs

Ingredients

2 2 1/2 lb baby back pork rib racks

Marinade

1/2 cup fresh peeled ginger

12 cloves garlic

1 tbs sugar

1 tbs coarse kosher salt

1 tbs fresh ground black pepper

2 tbs honey

2 tbs soy sauce

2 tbs fish sauce

6 Kaffir lime leaves

3 large limes

Directions

Using a sharp knife, remove the papery, shiny membrane off the underside of each rib rack.

Combine all the marinade ingredients in a food processor and marinade the pork ribs overnight.

Place the ribs on a BBQ grill on medium heat. Grill 8 minutes aside and then cover until the pork is cooked.

Drizzle with fresh lime juice and serve.

Plum Jam

It's been a hot summer. A dry summer. An orchard summer and my plum tree has started to bow under the gorging weight of it's fruit. With the fruit turning rapidly, there was no option but to start making jam. The following Vanilla Plum jam has been adapted from The Chez Pim blog.

Plum Jam

Ingredients

2 lbs plums

3/4 lb sugar

Juice from 1 lemon

2 Vanilla beans

Directions

Place new jars, lids and seals into boiling water and boil for at least 20 minutes.

Pit the plums and cut into chunks. Place in a pot with the sugar and lemon juice. Let stand for an hour covered with parchment paper.

Cut the vanilla beans lengthwise and scrape the seeds into the plum mixture. Add the pods in as well for good measure.

Bring to a boil over medium heat and let simmer until reduced by half, stirring occasionally.

You can also test the jam for readiness by first placing a plate in the fridge. Put a small spoonful on the cooled plate and let cool in the fridge for 2 minutes. If you can run your finger through the jam and create lasting tracks, it's ready. It however, all depends on your own preference.

Ladle jam into jars, seal and finger tighten the lids. Place back into the boiling water for 10 minutes. Remove from water and cool.

Eating for my Blood Type

Why am I eating for my blood type? No apparent reason, other than for the random desire for challenge. More likely, it was just an excuse for trying my hand at rabbit. This recipe, adapted from David Tanis' A Platter of Figs and other Recipes, was pretty straightforward and provided a full, wintry feel. Next time, I'd like to try to get a hold of a rabbit with skin, just to try for that crispy texture.

Rabbit Roasted with Mustard

Ingredients

1 rabbit, 2 1/2 to 3 lbs

salt and pepper

1/4 cup Dijon mustard

2 tsp mustard seeds, crushed

1 1/2 cups heavy cream

10 garlic cloves, sliced

1/2 pound thick sliced bacon

4 bay leaves

1/2 can beer

thyme branches

sage branches

Directions

Cut the rabbit into 6 pieces, the legs and then the saddle in half. Season rabbit with salt and pepper. Marinade at least 1 hour in the mustard, mustard seeds, heavy cream, garlic, bacon, bay leaves, thyme and sage.

Preheat oven to 400 F. Place rabbit in a low sided baking dish with as much marinade as you can get out of the bowl. Bake for 1 hour, turning the pieces as they brown.

Remove rabbit from the pan. Heat the pan over low to medium heat. De glaze the pan with half a can of beer or a cup of wine and heat until thick. Place rabbit back into pan to heat through and serve.

Jealous of Roses

Long Chains of carbon accrue out of nothing more than air and sunshine. This is the simple pleasure of a vegetable garden. We've been fortunate enough to have a decent summer and I've been harvesting goodness to create joy of out thin air.

Grilled Lemon Rosemary Chicken

This has been a fan favourite for years; all based on the belief in doing as little as possible. Investing in a decent BBQ makes all the difference in the world as my Weber keeps flares to a minimum and eliminates hot spots.

Ingredients

1 whole chicken, cut along the back and butterflied
1 bunch Rosemary
2 lemons
Kosher salt and fresh ground black pepper to taste

Directions

Preheat BBQ on medium low heat

Place the chicken backside down and cover BBQ for 30 minutes

Turn chicken over and cover BBQ for 15 minutes or until skin is crisp and juices run clear

Let chicken stand for 10 minutes before cutting up into pieces.

Roughly chop Rosemary leaves and spread over chicken. Pour juice of 1 lemon over top, and salt and pepper to taste. Serve with lemon wedges.




Pesto

The basil was about to turn so I quickly hacked it out and made some pesto to freeze. The smell of fresh green basil lingered in the house for hours. This recipe is adapted from Marcella Hazan and can be served with a pound of pasta. I’ve always found her recipes the most straightforward and rewarding. I served my pesto with some bread as a bit of a pick me up.

Ingredients

2 cup basil leaves, fresh, tightly packed
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
3 tablespoons pine nuts
3 cloves garlic
salt to taste

1/2 Cup freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese
2 tablespoons finely grated Romano cheese
3 tablespoons butter, softened to room temperature

1 1/2 pounds Pasta (optional)

Directions

Wash basil in cold water and pat dry

Add the olive oil, garlic, salt and pine nuts to the blender run.

Add handfuls of basil, waiting until a smooth creamy consistency.

Transfer to a bowl, and mix in the two grated Cheeses by hand. Mix in softened butter.

Taste and adjust Salt.