Versatility of French toast

If I ever owned a restaurant/hangout joint of my own it would be an upscale bowling alley that serves only pizza/pie. Because I firmly believe that anything can go on a pizza.

Finding foods as versatile as pizza is a challenge but yet I have found another! French toast!

When I was a child my mom used to make her version of a pizza pocket for our school lunches: meat sauce and cheese between 2 slices of bread dipped in french toast standard milk and eggs before fried to a crisp! The outside would be rich and, crispy and delicious and the inside would ooze a hot, rich meaty and cheese filling, satisfying indeed! That’s only one of many things that french toast can transform into   

Think about it, you can coat any type of bread, you can flavour the coating with any flavour, you can pour any sauce, syrup, condiment etc. best of all….you can stuff the centre!

Last week I was at a friend’s birthday brunch at the Easy Restaurant on the corner of Queen and Roncesvalles. The place was packed, serves was friendly and the food was great! Amongst the items order to the was French Toast Croissant with a berry couli. Clever, clever I thought.

So try making your signature french toast and let me know so I can try! And remember breakfast can be eaten for any meal of the day! Happy cracking!

There are no peanuts on Mars…

So I finally went to the Harry Potter exhibit at the Ontario Science Centre last week but not before getting a bite to eat at Dangerous Dan’s, the heart attack cave of the Toronto east end by the beaches.

You have to walk into this place with an appetite, and that’s exactly what we did. We grabbed our table and sat in seats that looked like they were jacked straight out of an airplane back in the 1970′s, while the table next to us had seats out of a soccer mom’s van. The place looked old and worn from too many good times, and the walls were covered with photographs of legendary visitors, all alongside quirky quotes by Dan painted along the top. The place definitely had personality and so did the menu.

After taking a look at some crazy dishes, we ordered our last supper on earth. I had “The Big Cheese,” a burger that included every diner cheese possible: mozzarella, cheddar, blue and feta with tomatoes and fried onions. I played it relatively safe, but unfortunately for my heart, I ate and savoured every last bite! My partner in crime, on the other hand, went the more adventurous route by ordering “The Elvis,” a burger that included peanut butter, bacon and fried bananas. It was interesting but was absolutely a one-time thing. I think it would have been better if the bananas were battered and deep-fried instead of being fried like a plantain.

It was after the disappointment with the fried bananas that we passed on the idea of trying “The Tasty Wang” for dessert, which is a fried banana with two scoops of ice cream. Thankfully there were plenty of other tempting dishes, like the “C.C.P. (cookie cow pie),” a pan-fried mound of cookie dough topped with ice cream, whipped cream and chocolate sauce.

Ah, and then there was the deep-fried Mars bar! That’s what I knew I would be ordering the minute I walked into this place. Oh, and it was more than I expected. The crispy batter hid a melting, gooey nougat, caramel and chocolate mess and when spooned up with just the right amount of ice cream it was amazing! The melted chocolate bar blends perfectly with the crispy bits, and as you chew the chill of the ice cream stiffens the mixture back into that first bite of Mars you tasted as a child. Deep-fried mars bar with ice cream, try it!

Oh and as we were leaving to get on our way to the Science Centre, I asked Dan out of curiosity: have you tried frying other chocolate bars? His answer was simple: there isn’t any other chocolate bar out there without peanuts worth frying.

Erupt Your Plate, Not Your Stomach or Earth

Botanical.com

Read with Caution!

Being a pharmacy technician, I come across many quirky questions, many of which involve home remedies that would get people wondering. (Don’t worry, we aren’t going to have a Dr. Oz moment and discuss the ever extending list of what to eat and what not to eat.)

One of my regular patients, a cute little Italian man (let’s call him Mr. Ranjeev), came in to the pharmacy last Saturday looking for active charcoal. You see, Mr. Ranjeev’s wife was having a terrible upset stomach and he wanted to relieve the pain by giving her active charcoal.

Nowadays, we have other remedies (nausea, heartburn, indigestion, upset stomach, diarrhea!…) with funky little jingles that we do little dances to on our way to relief. But back in the day you could walk into a pharmacy and pick up a little package of active charcoal next to that gripe water to relieve your stomach. Though these days you wouldn’t think of seeing active charcoal unless you decide to cut open that water filter of yours, right?

Wrong! Black lava salt cannot be forgotten. It’s a type of sea salt mixed with charcoal harvested directly from lava pools in places like Japan, Hawaii and, more recently, Iceland with its frequent volcanic activity. Coincidentally, “Scandinavian” (oops, sorry, I should say “Nordic” as Barry Yourgrau of the New York Times would correct me) sea salt is the latest craze in the culinary Slow Food Revolution movement. As Iceland’s volcano erupted, so did Noma in Copenhagen, topping the list for World’s Best Restaurants last month with dishes such as “Salsify and milk skin truffle from Gotland.” I would not be surprised if I saw black lava salt on these plates.

Who knows where Noma’s chef Rene Reykjavik bore his gastronomical ideas, but Canada isn’t short on gastronomical brilliance. Montreal’s own Stefan Czapalay was playing around with black lava salt along with kitchen gadgets from the hardware store to give his dishes enough gastronomic charm to be noticed by the Madrid Fusion where the gurus of gastronomy gather – including the likes of Ferran Adria. It is quite often that Czapalay garnishes his plates with black lava salt and even though Iceland’s volcano has just recently settled, Nordic cuisine is still flowing strong and it is only a matter of time before black lava salt will as well. (You didn’t hear it from me.)

This article is in no way, shape or form advising you to venture off to a volcano to create your next culinary masterpiece!

Book recommendation:

Can I have a bite of your strudel?

While my sister and I rushed to make Mother’s Day dinner a masterpiece, both of us failed to remember dessert! As we set the table and called everybody to the table, my younger sister came down first and asked excitedly what was for dessert. Yes, geniuses that we both are, we only thought about it after somebody mentioned it. So I open the freezer to see if we have any ice cream – nothing. Frozen berries to make a cobbler? Nope. How about we cut up the pineapple? Not ripe yet! It was too late to make a cake, plus we weren’t just working with limited time, we also ran out of flour!

Thankfully, I open the fridge to find some golden goodies! A thawed-out piece of puff pastry from last weekend’s party that was starting to look a bit sad would have to do. I also pulled out a can of condensed milk that we could scrape a few tablespoons out of, and a quarter block of cream cheese. I fished around in the pantry to find some shredded coconut (mom’s favourite)  and flaked almonds (mom’s other favourite). We couldn’t find vanilla extract, but we did manage to find a foreign-looking tin with Arabic writing and two words that spelled out our last ingredient, vanilla sugar. So this is what we came up with as we could hear everybody coming down the stairs to dinner.

Easy Cheese Strudel

Ingredients:

1. 1 half package of puff pastry
2. 2 ounces of cream cheese
3. 5 rough tbsp of condensed milk
4. 3 tbsp shredded coconut (dry or fresh would work)
5. 3 tbsps flaked almonds
6. 1 egg beaten well for egg wash
7. 1 tbsp sugar (coarse sugar would be best but isn’t necessary)

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees Celsius. Roll the pastry out on a flat surface until it’s as thin and flat as possible. It should resemble tortilla bread, but a little thicker.

In a bowl, use a fork to mix the cream cheese, condensed milk, coconut and almonds (reserve 1 tbsp of the almonds for later). The mixture will not be  smooth.

Spread the mixture on to the  rolled out pastry leaving a 1-inch border. Roll the pastry up like an egg roll, folding the sides in first. Brush a bit of egg on the end before closing the seam.

Place the roll on an ungreased cookie sheet, and make diagonal slits on the top. Brush the top with egg and sprinkle the sugar and remaining almonds on top.

Bake for 30 minutes or until browned. Cool for 5 minutes before cutting into 1-inch pieces.

This makes 6 servings
Preparation time: 10 min.
Bake time: 35 min.

So as I rolled out the dough, my sister mixed the filling and we got it into the oven by the time everybody sat down. After dinner we had warm cheese strudel and I even found some strawberries to garnish the plate, in addition to the remaining condensed milk and a dash of vanilla sugar on top!

Attention animal activsts: foie gras doesn’t have to be cruel

  Foie Gras: When a Duck/Goose is force-fed ) ‘gavage’ a lot of grain typically corn to get the yellow colour to have the liver grow 8 times the size. It is fatty and delicious and considered a delicacy comparable to caviar. 

Photo from BlogTO.com

 

 

I’ve wanted to go to the Hoof Cafe ever since it opened (about 6 months ago). This cafe is a vegetarian’s nightmare, but it’s definitely run by some creative carnivores! They have a French toast dish on their menu that they serve with a seared piece of foie gras - AND I WANT TO TRY IT! Let’s hope I like foie gras because I’ve never had it before (yes, I have lived an unfortunate life). So my plan is to make it to brunch at the Hoof Cafe one day.  

While we’re on the topic, you might find the below video of a TED lecture on the past, present and future of foie gras very intriguing. Enjoy 

In memory of Filbert

Bringing Filbert home in a cake container        

One summer I decided to buy a live lobster at the local grocery store. Upon its arrival to my house I was confused as what to do with the creature. He peered at me (with what I thought were his eyes) and I grew attached. Word to the wise: never get attached to something that is destined to be served on a plate.        

Drawing on religious traditions        

During my childhood, my family would celebrate Eid-ul-Adha, an Islamic event observed to commemorate Abraham’s sacrifice of his son, which reflected his obedience to God. It is traditional to sacrifice an animal, like a goat, lamb, cow etc. You then divide the meat into 3 portions: 1 portion to keep, 1 portion to share with friends and family and the last portion to feed the poor and less fortunate. Before the big animal sacrifice you keep the animal with you, feed it, fatten it up, love it and grow attached. It wouldn’t be a sacrifice if you weren’t attached. Filbert became just that.     

Note: In medical school, students are not allowed to name the cadavers they are working on out of respect. (I should not have named my lobster.)        

Fugu fish (Japanese blowfish) aren’t the only poisonous edible sea creatures    

Japanese poisionous blowfish called FUGU in a past Simpsons episode

 

Now with this poor lobster staring up at me I felt a sense of attachment and my weakness got the best of me. So with the help of my friend (who, might I add, never admitted how insane the idea of keeping a pet lobster was) I decided to do some research.     

We went through many books, websites and journals to discover a very interesting fact. A lobster can only be sold dead and cooked or alive, straight out of the water. The reason is that a lobster releases a toxic chemical that can toughen the meat and cause food poisoning if the lobster isn’t killed by dropping it directly into boiling water. Alternatively, lobsters that don’t make it alive to the grocery stores are quickly beheaded (the head is where the toxic chemical is released) and sold in stores only as lobster tails.       

Lobster heaven is getting mighty crowded        

So back to Filbert. Long story short, lobsters require water with a specific PH and salt concentration, which meant Filbert could not remain under the damp dish cloth in my fridge. So I decided to give poor little Filbert to my neighbour, who did the dirty deed which I never heard about…

Healthy Weekend Supper!

I decided to make dinner this weekend with as little oil as possible. So naturally the flavours had to be really bold to compensate for the fact that the tongue is more sensitive to taste without all that fat coating it.

In the end here’s what I came up with:

Asian Glazed Pot Roast Chicken

This dish will become a favourite for sure and makes for an impressive presentation!

1. 1 medium-sized whole skinned/defatted chicken (tie the wings and legs down if you can, I only tied the legs together)
2. 5 tbsp soya sauce
3. 1 tbsp minced ginger
4. 1 tbsp chopped garlic
5. 1 tsp course ground black pepper
6. 1 tsp sesame oil
7. 1 bouillon cube (any flavour)
8. 2 medium onions cut into quarters
9. water
10. 1/4 cup Diane’s rib and chicken sauce
11. 2 small Thai chilies, seeded and chopped

In a large Ziploc bag place soya sauce, ginger, garlic, black pepper and chicken. Marinate for as long as you can; I had 20 minutes.

Preheat the oven at 350 degrees. In an ovenproof pot with a lid large enough to hold the chicken, heat the sesame oil at medium heat, add the onions and cover the pot.

When the onions are slightly soft, add the bouillon cube and brown for 1 minute. Place the chicken in the pot and brown on all sides. When this is achieved, add enough water to come up the pot roughly 1 and a half inches and throw in the chilies. Cover the pot and bring the liquid up to a boil.

Pour the rib and chicken sauce all over the chicken to coat, place a piece of foil over the pot and place lid tightly on top.

Place in the oven for 20 minutes, then remove the cover for another 20 minutes. Once the chicken is cooked place the pot (minus the chicken) back on the stove to bring the gravy to a boil and thicken to a thick consistency.

This roast goes very well over rice or pasta but I served it beside the couscous dish below. The soya sauce keeps this chicken extremely moist and the sauce forms a beautiful glaze over the chicken!

Mrs. Weber’s Couscous Salad (with a protein kick)

This salad can stabilize blood glucose and pressure levels, lower LDL cholesterol and increase HDL cholesterol. It’s also packed with vitamins and minerals! Kids will actually eat is because it’s colourful and can be eaten in small bites.

This salad is a high source of fibre, protein, calcium, iron, potassium and vitamin C, A , E and B12.

1. 2 cups whole wheat couscous prepared according to directions with plenty of salt
2. 2 cups red, yellow and green peppers chopped fine (use whatever you can get your hands on, I like these 3 for colour)
3. 1/4 cup finely chopped red onions
4. 1 cup finely chopped green onions (into tiny rings)
5. 1 small carrot grated into long strips
6. 1/2 of one medium english cucumber seeded and chopped
7. 1 cup roughly chopped curly parsley (great to for cutting down on the onion breathe)
8. 1 cup thawed and shelled soya beans (omit if you can’t find them in your grocery store’s freezer or used canned soya beans)
9. 1/4 cup flaked almonds
10. 1/8 cup toasted sunflower seeds
11. 10 dried apricots chopped
12. 1/4 yogurt beaten smooth
13. 2 tbsp olive oil

Fluff the couscous in a large bowl, and add salt and pepper generously. DO NOT SEASON AFTER THIS POINT! Add all the ingredients except the yogurt and oil. Toss until all the ingredients have been distributed evenly. Mix the yogurt and oil together separately, pour the mixture into the couscous and continue to mix until it’s completely dressed.

This salad would be great for entertaining with a Moroccan style lamb and it keeps in the fridge for days so it’s great for potlucks!

Simple Spiced Sweet Wedges

1. 4 medium sweet potatoes cut into 8 wedges with the skins on
2. 1 tbsp olive oil
3. 2 tbsp taco seasoning

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Toss all the ingredients together and spread out on a foiled baking sheet. Bake for 30 minutes and give the potatoes a little toss halfway between (after about 15 minutes).

Serve hot beside burgers or chicken strips instead of fries. This side can also be prepared alongside a roast in the oven for an easy meal with a great source of vitamin A!

For drinks I served PC Naturally Flavoured Lychee Sparkling Soda with a bit of lime and mint, which is great for digestion since this meal is low on the GI index (glycemic index).

Try these recipes out and tell me what you think! Feel free to share any other healthy recipes and suggestions to make these dishes better!

When there isn’t a pie to steal from the window sill

The Great Diner Pie!

Angel’s Diner in Guelph is the place to go for apple pie and ice cream. That is, if you can’t bake one yourself (the bonus to this is to have the fresh apple pie smell fill your home.)

The Great Birth of the Dutch Apple Pie!

There are the regular apple pies, with an identical bottom and top crust, and then there’s the DUTCH apple pie. This is the mothership and ultimate pie, where you have a buttery flaky and yet tender crust on the bottom and a crisp sugary topping for a lid. Without the bottom crust all you have is a good old apple crisp.

There is nothing better than a slice of warm dutch apple pie with a scoop of pure vanilla ice cream. There is something pleasantly comforting about the cool ice cream melting into trails running into the crunchy topping, which usually has cinnamon sugar (a lot like a very rich version of a bowl of cinnamon toast crunch and milk.)  

As the creamy ice cream transforms into a warm sauce over the pie it mingles further down the layers and complements the gel-like apple filling and creates a very creamy tart flavour that cuts the sugary topping and ice cream. Once the saucy ice cream hits the crust, it soaks it up and drinks in all the flavours while forming something like a wet scone texture that can sometimes stick to the roof of your mouth.

NOT so Great Pie!

Warm apple pie and ice cream can be a delight and a sinful pleasure but I have had many disappointments. I think the worst I ever had was at Jack Astor’s. I know, I know - who orders apple pie at Jack Astor’s? But the truth of the matter is that the menu made such a big deal that I had to order it. The menu claimed that the pie would be made fresh-to-order and that it would take 20 minutes because of this. So with patience (or rather, with good conversation) I waited. 

When the little pie arrived I was impressed by the presentation. It was piping hot, smelled divine, and the cinnamon was uplifting. The scoop of ice cream started to melt on top, and I helped it along by cracking the outer crust and letting the ice cream melt further.

The dessert was all that the menu promised in terms of presentation but the dessert itself was awful. Alas, inside was canned pie filling made with gritty apples and the crust was just a square piece of puff pastry laid on top. The only good part (besides the ice cream that was trying to cover the shameful attempt at apple pie) was the crust baked onto the edge of the dish. 

Close to Home-made Great Pie!

Sad as it may sound, a frozen pie can be a good choice is you’re really craving it. President’s Choice, Sara Lee and M&M make good ones. Personally, I never buy a pie in a box in the bakery section, although the Apple Factory in Brampton makes a delicious one that breaks that rule.

You should also try to get an ice cream that has real vanilla beans (the one with the tiny black flecks). I avoid any ice cream that has guar gum or xanthan gum in the first 4 ingredients listed because the ice cream tends to melt too fluffy and not creamy if there is too much of this ingredient.

So good luck with your pie and ice cream, and keep an eye out for my own favourite recipe, which I’ll post very soon…

‘No tzatziki for you!’

‘No tzatziki for you!’ That’s what my Albanian waitress said to me when I wanted tzatziki for my salmon today at dinner. At first I thought she was joking and then she flat-out refused to give it to me, the audacity! She said in her country you are not allowed to have fish and yogurt and that was it. Yet I wanted my tzatziki sauce, so my friend decided to tell her that it was for the vegetables and she finally and reluctantly gave me a little condiment bowl with some. I could feel here peering at me as I ate my meal the rest of the night.

So here is my theory on the case:

Yogurt  is low in fat and high in acid + Fish is high in protein and low in fat + stomach heat and acid = bad combination (protein, acid and heat)

Acid denatures proteins and causes it to coagulate (stick together), and the same goes for heat. Similar to the heating of milk which causes a less severe example of denaturing where a skin is formed on the milk of the coagulated denatured protein (it’s called “casein,” which people are often allergic to, if not lactose intolerant). This results in extreme gas buildup and humans feel this as dying pain! (My waitress was genuinely looking out for me; I gave her a good tip )

Solution to my theory:

Yogurt is low in fat and high in acid + Fish is high in protein and low in fat + fat (butter or oil) + stomach heat and acid = better combination resulting in little or no discomforting gas

Fat coats the proteins, which leaves them unharmed by acid and thus eliminates any opportunity for denaturing or coagulation in the stomach. That means no gas and no spending hours in the washroom or keeled over in pain!

Also, I think in North America with all the pasteurization our yogurt goes through there is less bacteria and therefore fewer enzymes, which are known to quicken the denaturing process and in turn create worse gas. (Yes, WORSE GAS is posssible!)

I live in a densely populated Sikh community, and if you know anything about the region of Punjab, India, you know how much they love their yogurt! For this community, yogurt is cultivated like an art at home, kind of like wine and cheese in the West. Except it is a much simpler process: mix a spoonful of unpasteurized yogurt into milk, leave to cultivate overnight and the next morning you have nutritious yogurt that is filled with all your pre/probiotics. You never have to buy a container of yogurt at the store again. 

Unpasteurized (bacteria, enzymes) yogurt is low in fat and high in acid + Fish high in protein and low in fat + stomach heat and acid = The deathly combination that my waitress was trying to save me from!

The high amount of bacteria increases the coagulation rate and causes a high volume of gas!

I’m guessing in Albania they have unpasteurized yogurt because it has been roughly 7 hours since I had my meal and I’m still living!

P.S. The dill in the tzatzki sauce was divine with my broiled salmon!

*Yogurt/tzatziki is generally lactose free, lactose being the milk’s sugar it ferments in the yogurt making process into lactic acid

Meat is meat, no matter what the exterior used to be…

A friend of mine from university once spoke freely about how he had almost every animal for supper, how it was natural and not strange at all in Kenyan custom. Since then I have been keen on trying every meat that I get an opportunity to try - Kenyans don’t have to be the only ones. You would be surprised that living in Canada does not limit this quest.    

The list thus far:    

Crocodile @ Alley Catz in Toronto, Ontario    

It was a kebab in a red sauce. The texture was rather tough and chewy, like chicken gizzards with a slight fish flavour. I personally would not order that dish again. I think the chef could have done something a bit more exciting than skewering the poor crocodile, overcooking it and hiding it under some tomato sauce (the sauce was preferable though, almost like a gazpacho).    

Ostrich @ White Rock Ostrich Farm in Rockwood, Ontario    

It’s a neat place to visit. You can buy an intricately carved ostrich egg close to the size of your head, ostrich fat which is supposed to work wonders on your skin (far better than cocoa butter). You can take a look at the little hatchlings running around in the nursery or be terrified by the adult ostriches that prance around with their magnificent strong legs.    

Me? I prefer hanging out by the BBQ sinking my teeth into an ostrich burger. I know what you are thinking: so many chefs could make a culinary masterpiece with this meat and I’m raving about an ostrich burger? Well, here’s the thing, the fresh ostrich meat is a red meat, which is something one does not expect to have a game flavour similar to venison and similarly very lean and healthy. Take a fresh cut of ostrich meat, grill it on a BBQ with minimal seasoning, place it on a bun, and, all I can say is that it’s so flavourful you’ll forget the COW!    

Shark @ Drupati’s in Toronto, Ontario    

Shark and bake @ Richard's in Trinidad

 

After trying shark and bake at a place called Richard’s in Trinidad, I found myself on a quest for more last summer.    

Thus far I have found only one place that has come slightly close to that day at Richard’s: Drupati’s Doubles and Roti Shop.    

Shark is a delicate, white fish that doesn’t have a fishy smell at all. In “shark and bake” it is lightly battered and served on a split, fried piece of West Indian bread called “bake.”    

Back in Trinidad, the dish alone is a lovely fish sandwich, but the 16 condiments outside Richard’s hut is what makes it the king of street food. Condiments included hot sauce, pickled carrots, sauerkraut and many others that I had never tasted before. Drupati’s doesn’t have all the dressings, but their shark and bake is the best I’ve found here in Toronto. I still have an eye out for the freshest shark dish in Toronto!    

To be continued…