Truffle Mutt

Smokin' Salmon

Last week I bought a vivid red salmon fillet from the fish counter(of course it's farmed so it dyed that color, but that's a different story).  When I make salmon I prefer to accompany it with a stronger sauce, because it's a meatier and stronger tasting fish.  I used a glaze that I'd found in John Ash's Cooking One on One. First I marinaded the fillet in white wine and garlic while I set to preparing the glaze. Once seasoned with salt and pepper I fried the fish it in my cast iron frying pan with some olive oil.  I served it with the glaze drizzled over top, some spicy rice and steamed baby bok choy. 

The balsamic vinegar was the perfect compliment to the richness of the salmon, but the glaze was slightly too sour.  When I make this the next time I'll use less lemon juice, or I'll substitute late harvest or ice wine for half of the white wine. 

Pretty in Pink

I bought this colorful jar of banana goodness at the farmers market awhile back.  The funky pink color caught my eye while I was browsing through the shelves at Jams & Such.  I’d never heard of banana jam before and my adventurous side just couldn’t resist.  In truth, my experience with bananas might not be considered vast, but even so I would have to say that this is one of the world’s greatest banana concoctions.  The ingredients list pineapple and cherry, but these flavors are indistinguishable.  They probably just add to the jams sweetness.  It’s sweet, no it's really sweet.  I love it on a toasted and buttered bagel, but make sure to use salted butter to counter the sugar.  The banana flavor is deepened and doesn’t have the same fresh, bitter taste that the raw fruit does.  It’s almost like a caramelized onion to a raw onion, where the cooking draws the natural sweetness out.   

I haven’t tried the spread on anything but bagels because it’s so perfect.  When I’m confident enough to step outside the box I think I’ll add it to yogurt or mix it with cream and pour it over a hot waffle.  But before I do that I think I might need a new jar!

To keep, or not to keep?

I hate to admit it, but I seriously considered throwing out my leftover puff pastry.  Hey look, I had my reasons.  For starters, I got to thinking about how much puff pastry a reasonably health conscience person should consume in one week?  At least the last time I checked butter laden, puff pastry wasn’t strongly recommended in the Canadian Food Guide.  Then there’s my really small freezer to consider, where the box of store-bought puff pastry is currently residing.

In the end my pastry came this close to going in the trash. This close.  But I couldn’t do it.  If it had come from the store it certainly would have been history, but I'd labored in this creation and I felt a strange connection to it.  Besides, if I threw it out now then I’d never know its true puffing potential, since I’d slightly undercooked it for the napoleons.  So, inspired by Jennifer's SHF entry I made palmiers. I rolled the dough out, brushed it with butter and sprinkled it with cinnamon sugar.  Once out of the oven and still hot I tossed the cookies in another bowl of cinnamon sugar and gave them a quick roll around.  Well, why would I possibly hold back at this point?  If a girl's going to eat an entire batch of puff pastry, she might as well go all the way.  I did however, manage to pawn off half a dozen cookies on my lucky, or perhaps unlucky, friend Lisa.  It’s always good to spread calories around in this way, they do considerably less damage.  You may see my motivation for sharing as somewhat tainted, but who has to know.  And all this time my friends thought I was just being nice…  :o)

Happy Valentine's

You're not the first to notice that there are no hearts decorating this Valentine's treat.  No it wasn't on purpose, I wasn't rebelling against a day where you can't find a flower in the city for under $50.  No really, I didn't think about it until I'd snapped the first picture and you know with souffle you don't have a lot of time to waste until the dreaded deflation begins.  So, I snapped away and you'll just have to get by without the hearts.

I saw Rob Feenie making his souffle on Foodtv the other night and I decided to give it a try.  I mean after the puff pastry success why not try something else I find somewhat intimidating.  Next Phyllo.  Yeah right! 

My souffle took a bit of a different direction than Rob's, because I had no passion fruit puree and I had to use my leftover caramel pastry cream.  Instead of passion fruit I used a well aged banana and some maple syrup.  Baked 'em and filled 'em up with caramel pastry cream and a squirt of dark chocolate sauce.  This was a great introduction to souffle.  Next time I'll experiment with apple sauce filled with a cinnamon cream, or orange juice concentrate with an orange liqueur mascarpone.  Even without the hearts it was a great Valentine's dessert. 

Did you miss your flu shot?

Then I would say eat lots of yogurt.  All those good little bacteria are working hard to toughen you up.  It's worth a shot anyway  :o)

Okay that was bad.

I found this interesting plum and walnut flavor combination at Sunterra Market just the other day.  I hadn't yet had the opportunity to try Mediterranean yogurt so wanted to see what all the hype was about.  I admit that I wasn't expecting much from this plum and walnut duo, but don't be afraid this is good stuff.  Plums and walnuts should seriously consider getting together more often.  It's creamy and delicate and it doesn't have the pronounced sourness that I often associate with yogurt.  Of course I don't think I've eaten anything but sugar free fat free yogurt in 5 years, so it's probably not a fair comparison. 

Pork & Clams: My Attempt

This pork and clam casserole preceded the banana foster napoleons that I served for dinner on Friday night.  This was my take on the version that I'd had at Mimo Portuguese Restaurant a few weeks ago.  You can see the recipe for Porco com Amêijoas à Alentejana (Pork with Clams) that I adapted on Leite's Culinaria. 

This casserole is rich, spicy and just darn good.  I served the sauce over oven roasted potatoes and it turned out closer to Mimo's than I expected.  In my version I used a mixture of sweet and Hungarian hot paprika to increase the kick, but I think next time I'll seek out smoked paprika for a deeper flavor.  And for the clams I used canned not fresh ones (sacrilege!).

I followed the recipe to start with, but once everything was simmering away I found the sauce lacked zip.  I fixed this problem with the addition of beef stock, oregano, an extra bay leaf and about 1/8 cup of tomato puree and that did the trick. 

This was a really easy dinner to make, but it certainly didn't taste like it was.  Serve it with fresh crusty bread to mop up the sauce.  Yum.  I will certainly make this again.

Banana Foster Napoleons

Let me introduce you to my very first SHF entry, the Bananas Foster Napoleon.  This little tower of pancreas stressing delight was on tonight's dessert menu, so I'm coming in just under the time limit.  I made the puff pastry from scratch earlier in the week and was very surprised (actually jumping with joy) when it began to puff in the oven.  This was a truly amazing moment for me considering the agony of making it.  I was so sure it would be a dud that I purchased a package from the frozen section as back up.  All went reasonably well however and it ended up looking really good.  I think it should have puffed more than it did, but I'm not going to complain.  Not too loudly anyway.

This dessert layers bananas foster and caramel pastry cream between circles of sugared puff pastry.  The napoleon is then topped with a big scoop of toasted coconut whipped cream.  I really liked the presentation and the taste was a smash too.  The pastry was slightly underdone, so next time I'll bake it 5 minutes, or so longer. 

Since the recipe for it was thrown together as I went along I won't be posting it tonight.  Figuring out what amount of what, went in where is a job better left for tomorrow when I'm a bit more awake. 

Merry Sugar High to all and to all a good night! 

Reruns

Friday night was foggy and cold in Calgary.  I planned to go shopping at the Asian market on International Avenue, to collect some goodies for sweet and sour soup.  So a friend and I set off to seek out tiger lily buds and black fungus.  I found both and some bbq pork and sweet taro buns, which under no circumstances should ever be passed up.  Once we were done wandering the store, it was time to find a place to eat.  I had been on a food tour of International Avenue several months prior and had the opportunity to visit Mimo Portuguese Restaurant.  On the tour we sampled goodies from the Restaurant, but I had never been back for dinner.

To start with we ordered the grilled squid. Squid is commonly sold fried in restaurants here, so it was a different preparation then I’ve had before.  The squid was incredibly tender and was served in a spicy tomato sauce.  I loved the sauce and the bread that mopped it up, but I found the squid slightly fishy tasting. For dinner we ordered the Paella and pork and clam casserole to share. The Paella was enormous and came heaped with clams, mussels, crab, shrimp, squid, lobster and chicken.  Up to this point I'd never been a huge fan of Paella, but this version certainly changed my opinion.  The rice in a spicy, light tomato sauce was jammed with meat and seafood.  The pork and clam casserole was my absolute favorite though.  The pork was cooked in a rich, almost smoky, tomato sauce that had really distinct flavor.  Our waitress let us in on the method.  The clams or mussels are added to the pork and tomato sauce right at the end.  Once cooked the sauce is poured over a bed of fried potatoes. The potatoes swim around in the tomato sauce and soak up all the yumminess.  So good.

The Taste Test

A few weeks ago, while wandering around Lina’s Italian Market, I spotted a rather unappetizing stack of polenta logs.  Regardless of the not-so-appetizing appearance, I still really wanted to try it, so in the cart it went.  When I got it home it took up residence with the salad dressings in the door of the fridge.  And there it sat as I wasn’t sure what to do with it.  I know I’d seen recipes for the darn stuff, but at the moment I was having difficulty finding even one.  At first it didn’t bother me that it was just chillin’ in the fridge, but as the days wore on I became upset by its idleness.  The dilemma of what to make with it remained and was sure to haunt me until the day it reached expiry, which I discovered from the package was still several months away.  Great!  Now what?