motley food

Lower Taxes For Craft Brewers In BC Hopefully Means More Beer

Wed, 28 Nov 2012 16:51:31 -0500

by Trish

A change in the tax code should give small brewers in British Columbia a break when expanding operations. On Monday, the Liberal government approved a new tax scale for small-scale breweries, allowing for increased sales at a lower tax rate.

Under the old policy, breweries faced a higher tax bill after output passed 160,000 hectoliters of beer (that’s 16 million liters of beer). The new policy introduces a scaled tax scheme, where breweries pay taxes incrementally for every 5,000 hectoliters of beer sold over the 160,000 hectoliter mark. After sales reach 300,000 hectoliters, a higher tax rate applies.

Currently, there are seven BC breweries that should benefit from these changes. Officials hope the changes will create more jobs, but I’ll be happy if our terrific BC beer will be more widely distributed.

As there always in with politics, there’s a bit more to the story with some big ticket donations to the Liberal party from mid-sized brewing company Pacific Western. But since it favors a cause I’m all for, I’m not letting my feathers get too ruffled over it.

Read the whole story over at the National Post. Image courtesy miss604 via Flickr.

Lego Bowl Of Ramen, Finally Something Even I Could Build

Wed, 28 Nov 2012 15:03:05 -0500

by Trish

It may just look like a jumble of blocks, and well, technically that’s all it is. But use your imagination a bit, and it’s a steaming bowl of ramen with noodles, green onions, and pork, courtesy of the University of Tokyo for the Komaba Festival. This particular exhibit honors a local Tokyo-area ramen shop, Ramen Jiro, which is known for its legendary ramen. A cursory google search led me to articles about Ramen Jiro in the Guardian (among the 50 best places to eat), NPR, CNN, to name but a few. And while write-ups in some of the biggest media organizations is great, I can think of no greater honor than to have a scale lego rendition created of your product. Congrats, Ramen Jiro, you’ve made it to the top.

Now where can I get some of those noodle-looking blocks?

Rocketnews24 via FoodBeast.

Crab Cakes: More Affordable Doesn't Have to Mean Less Delicious

Tue, 27 Nov 2012 19:35:00 -0500

by Trish

Great crab cakes aren’t rocket science. This isn’t the territory of complicated ingredients or difficult techniques; the secret to great crab cakes is just to chock them full of crab. The only problem with this method is it’s expensive, especially if you’re planning on making them for more than 2 people.

Luckily, you can bulk up your cakes without having to settle for an inferior finished product, as long as you choose the right ingredients. The recipe I like comes from Mark Bittman, who can always be counted on for balance and reason. He cuts the crab with grated celery root, delivering twice as many cakes without washing out the flavor of the seafood star of the show. The celery root also makes the cakes seem more substantial and texturally interesting, in my opinion.

If you’ve never worked with celery root before, it’s the ugly looking, knobby bulb that sometimes goes by the name celeriac. It has a vague celery flavor, but not so much that I would have picked it up if “celery” wasn’t in its name.

To peel, cut off the rooty bottom so that you have a flat surface to stand it up on. Then, using a chef’s knife, cut the outside off in strips, working from top to bottom. This recipe calls for it to be grated, which is an easy task if your food processor has a grating attachment but can also be done on a box grater. Like most root vegetables, it will turn brown when exposed to the air, so don’t peel it too far in advance of use.

And if you are serving these crab cakes to friends, remember it’s all how you sell it. If anyone raises an eyebrow to celery root in their crab cake, don’t admit you’re a cheapskate. Rather, you are an individual concerned with ocean sustainability and committed to consuming less - purely noble reasons. But I’m pretty sure after they try them, no one will be complaining.

Affordable and Responsible Crab Cakes

This recipe makes four massive cakes suitable for two gluttons (which was the direction I went), but you could easily make them bite sized for hors d’ oeuvres. I served it with an unconventional choice of chipotle mayo, but it would be fancier with a nice remoulade. A squeeze of lemon is all it really needs, though.

8 oz fresh lump crab meat, picked over for cartilage and shell

1 small celery root (1/2 lb - 3/4 lb), peeled and grated

1 egg, lightly beaten

2-3 tbsp bread crumbs, preferably homemade (white or whole grain)

1 cup flour

Salt and pepper

2 tsp curry powder (optional)

1/4 cup vegetable oil

Lemon wedges, for serving

Mix the crab, celery root, egg, and a light sprinkle of salt and pepper in a bowl.

Add 2 tbsp bread crumbs and mix just until combined, adding another tbsp of crumbs if the mixture seems very loose.

Place mixture in the fridge, covered, for at least 30 minutes or up to several hours.

Mix curry powder and flour and put on a plate or shallow dish.

Heat oil in large skillet over medium heat. While the oil is heating, form cakes. They should be 1 inch thick and whatever diameter you fancy.

Dredge the cakes lightly in flour and sprinkle with salt and pepper.

When the oil is hot and shimmery, fry the cakes gently, working in batches to avoid crowding the pan. Cook about 5 minutes per side, turning once when a golden crust has formed.

Serve warm with lemon wedges.

Celery root pictures courtesy Gourmet and World Community Cookbook.

Careful What You Wish For, Chicken 'N Waffles Syrup Now Actually Exists

Mon, 26 Nov 2012 15:36:00 -0500

by Trish

It all started with a pretty harmless April Fools’ Day joke, albeit ill-timed. Back in late March, Torani, the maker of the flavored syrups that typically are added to lattes, announced a bold new flavor: Chicken ‘n Waffles! When it turned out to be an early April Fools’ day joke, Torani was criticized not only for jumping the joke gun, but for crushing dreams. The dreams of a small but apparently very vocal minority who hoped everything could be flavored like chicken ‘n waffles with the ease and simplicity of a pump-action bottle. No more deep fryer. No more waffle iron. Endless possibilities.

No seriously, that actually happened.

The company received so much disappointed feedback that they decided to make their gag a reality, and as of this morning you can purchase Chicken ‘N Waffles flavored syrup on the Torani website for a mere $6.95. What’s more, they’ve even included handy recipes on their website for using the syrup, including a cocktail made from the syrup, bourbon, and root beer. (Making another first: the first application of bourbon I do not endorse.)

Since it only debuted today, I haven’t read any reviews of anyone who’s actually tried the stuff. But I do look forward with morbid curiosity to reading the adventures of those braver than I, who will inevitably pump the stuff into their coffee, onto their ice cream, or straight into their mouths. My hat is off to you.

Huffington Post via Brand Eating.

Thirsty Thursdays: Alameda American Rye

Thu, 22 Nov 2012 11:40:05 -0500

by Trish

We’re starting a new column here at Motley, Thirsty Thursdays, where we’ll discuss my favorite beverage: beer (and perhaps other libations, just to keep it spicy).

We’ll start things off with a review of Alameda American Rye. Alameda is great craft brewery out of Portland, Oregon. This particular bottle was picked up at a shop in downtown Vancouver, but Alameda is distributed throughout the PNW and lower BC.

Rye beers are picking up popularity in the US and Canada, with good reason. Swapping out some of the barley for rye lends a unique spicy, crisp character. Typically you’ll find rye added to red ales or pale ales, but on a rare occasion you may find a roggenbier. Roggenbier is a traditional German style finding it’s way into slow revival, typically made from half rye and half barley grains and very lightly hopped. North American incarnations of rye beers tend to be much more aggressively hopped, and the spicy, earthy character of rye works well with floral, piney hops. Because rye is a tricky grain to brew with, it’s unusual to find beers made with 100% rye grain.

Back to the specimen in question, the Alameda American Rye. It pours very foamy - the picture above wasn’t just a bad pour, it really is insanely foamy. It’s also not the prettiest beer I’ve ever seen, a murky brown. If you can keep your nose out of the foam, it has a light, nutty smell. Nice carbonation keeps it tasting light, with flavors of grass and grain. It’s a balanced brew with subdued hops that deliver a bitter finish. I found the rye in this beer to be subtle, pleasantly rounding out the beer rather but not necessarily star of the show.

The Verdict: Thumbs Up
While not the most interesting rye out there, this is a enjoyable easy-drinker that would likely go over well with both the beer enthusiast and the lager crowd.

For more about rye beers, check out this great article over at Imbibe.

I Like My Kimchi Like My Music, Full Of Funk

Thu, 22 Nov 2012 04:27:36 -0500

by Trish

Kimchi: a polarizing pickle. There was a time in my life when if stranded on a desert island with only kimchi, I would have starved to death rather than eat it. Then for many years I was simply indifferent. Everything changed one fateful evening in June.

We’d had a thoroughly frustrating drive to Montreal and, after finally arriving at 1 am, wanted nothing more than a cold one. We plopped down in a booth at Big In Japan and tried to order a couple pints of Sapporo, but were informed that they wouldn’t sell us beer unless we both ordered some food as well. We weren’t hungry, but were too lazy to relocate. We ordered a couple of dishes and grumbled to ourselves about what a strange place this French-speaking province was. (I later learned this wasn’t the restaurant’s policy, in Quebec there are different categories of liquor licenses and a restaurant, as opposed to a bar, can only sell alcohol if it accompanies a meal.)

But when the food arrived, we stopped grumbling. The pork buns were wonderful, the fried chicken sandwich even better. But the kimchi, the free kimchi that came with them, was the star. It was salty and really spicy, crunchy and almost effervescent in texture. I had never known kimchi like this. With a big mug of Sapporo, it was the world’s most perfect food pairing. And that’s how Montreal’s silly liquor licensing laws introduced me to my new favorite snack.

The kimchi of my past, often found in Korean restaurants, the stuff that’s limp and sour, isn’t how it’s supposed to be. It’s supposed to be balanced - a balance of salty, spicy, sour, and funk. Funk is the fermented kick that lends an almost effervescent quality to the kimchi, and to me, brings it to the next level. Young kimchi is like young wine, edible, but not nearly as fun as the old stuff. A little extra time in the fridge lends more character and will reward your patience. You’ll know you’re in for a treat when the jar gives off a good gaseous fizz when you open it.

Once you have it in your fridge you’re in for a whole new world of kimchi fried rice, kimchi quesadillas, kimchi straight out of the jar for a midnight snack… It’s stupidly cheap and stupidly easy to make. So check out Big in Japan if you’re in Montreal, but rest assured you can have kimchi that’s just as good at home.

Kimchi

I found the courage to make kimchi after reading a recipe from the wonderful David Lebovitz. You’ll need to source Korean chili powder and chili paste from an Asian or Korean market, but it’s not too difficult to find. Korean chili powder is very coarse in texture.

Day 1

1 big head Napa cabbage (about 2 lbs.)

2 tbsp coarse salt (I used Kosher salt)

Remove the layer of thick, outer leaves from the cabbage and cut in half lengthwise.

Cut cabbage into 2 inch pieces. I start at the top and worked my way toward the core, removing the core when you reach it. (I found leaving the core intact rather than cutting it out first helps keep it together while chopping.)

In a big bowl, combine the cabbage pieces and salt. Mix well to make sure the salt is evenly distributed.

Transfer the cabbage to a non-reactive colander, placed inside a bowl. Put a plate on top with something to weigh it down, such as a heavy can. Let sit for 24 hours, occasionally pouring out any water that accumulates in the bowl.

Day 2

1 tbsp very-finely minced or freshly grated garlic

1/2 tbsp very-finely minced or grated fresh ginger

1/3 cup white rice vinegar

3 tbsp Korean chili pepper paste (gochujang)

2 tbsp Korean chili powder (gokchu garu)

1 bunch green onions (scallions), cut into 2 inch pieces

Mix the garlic, ginger, rice vinegar, chili pepper paste, and chili powder in a large bowl.

Squeeze any excess water out of the cabbage and add to the mixture. Add green onions and mix thoroughly so that each piece of cabbage is coated. (I do this with my bare hands, but gloves would be a good idea.)

Transfer to a jar, let sit at room temperature for 1-3 days depending on how funky you like it. Chill in the fridge for an additional 4 days. After 4 days in the fridge it’s ready to eat, but will last almost indefinitely.

Enjoy!

Keep Chives Perky With This Super Obvious Tip

Tue, 20 Nov 2012 16:19:58 -0500

by Trish

I challenge you to tell me a food that is not made more delicious with the addition of fresh chives. Fine, perhaps not chocolate pudding. But when it comes to eggs, potatoes, dips, spreads, fish, salads, a few fresh chives are a really nice addition. The problem was, chives in my fridge started to look pretty pathetic only a day or two after I’d brought them home from the store. Why you gotta be like that, chives?

Then I noticed at the grocery store one day that all the chives were standing up in a shallow pan of water rather than packaged up in the plastic containers like all the other herbs. So when I got home, I followed suit and put them in a glass in the fridge with a little water in the bottom. And they lasted for a week. I actually used the entire bunch before they died. Keeping plants in water helps keep them alive, who knew!

Now I like to keep chives in my fridge all the time. I use a pair of scissors to snip a bit off top for whatever I happen to be making, from scrambled eggs, to cream cheese for the bagel, mashed potatoes, and roast vegetables. I may even try putting more herbs in water too (I’m looking at you, limp parsley!)

Dear New York Times: Picking on Guy Fieri Is Too Easy

Sat, 17 Nov 2012 06:04:00 -0500

by Trish

If you’ve been doing much reading at all online the last few days, you’ve likely seen or heard about the scathing review the New York Times gave Guy Fieri’s newest restaurant, Guy’s American Kitchen & Bar.

It’s a highly amusing and clever piece, the entire article a series of questions ranging from playful to pointed. There was no question, however, of what Pete Wells thought of the place.

For example, “What exactly about a small salad with four or five miniature croutons makes Guy’s Famous Big Bite Caesar (a) big (b) famous or (c) Guy’s, in any meaningful sense?” Or, “Why is one of the few things on your menu that can be eaten without fear or regret — a lunch-only sandwich of chopped soy-glazed pork with coleslaw and cucumbers — called a Roasted Pork Bahn Mi, when it resembles that item about as much as you resemble Emily Dickinson?”

You have to give credit where credit is due. It’s a fun piece to read and I’m pretty sure his analysis isn’t far off the mark (if not dead on, but mind you I’ve never visited the restaurant myself). What does bother me, however, is the intent. Surely, Mr. Wells, you couldn’t have expected Guy’s American Kitchen to provide a meaningful culinary experience? Did you forget Times Square is a gastronomic wasteland? Did the fact that most of the menu is either deep fried or smothered in melted cheese not tip you off? Did you forget the proprietor looked like this?

But before you write me off as a food snob too, hear me out. Bacon mac and cheese has it’s place. Typically, though, this place hasn’t been the New York Times.

So why, Pete, did you write this review? To save the unwashed masses from wasting $50? Because to be perfectly honest, it feels like a cheap shot on an easy target. Too easy, in fact. It’s all seems a bit high school, the meanness that bites a bit too hard and for no good reason. I can’t imagine Guy’s food is appreciably worse than any other restaurant on that god-forsaken strip. You don’t have to like Guy Fieri, his restaurants, or anything he stands for. But Forbes reports the dude is worth about $8 million, so apparently some people do. And they’re probably not the demographic who give a crap about Pete Wells’ dining recommendations.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not defending Guy or his allegedly poorly-executed food. I’m just saying let’s all be civil. The New York Times should have better fish to fry. Stick to what you’re good at, Times, and Guy will stick to Times Square. Leave the reviews of Guy’s American Kitchen to Yelp. You’re better than these cheap publicity stunts… or at least I thought you were.

Better Browning By Doing Absolutely Nothing

Fri, 14 Sep 2012 15:08:57 -0400

by Trish

Behold: browned pork chops! Browned meat is better than un-browned meat. It’s why people love meat off the grill. It’s why things taste better at restaurants. Best of all, it’s very simple to do and your food will taste (and look) fancy-pants.

What, then, is the secret? DON’T TOUCH IT. Simple as that. If you’re anything like I used to be, you put something in a frying pan and immediately start playing with it. You move it around, you flip it a million times. Sure you’ll cook it, but you will not achieve BROWN. Not without overcooking to death, anyways. From now on when you read in a recipe to brown your meat, here’s what you should do.

How To Brown:

Get a good, heavy pan. Cast iron is perfect.
Put it on the burner with a couple tablespoons of canola oil, turn the heat up high. Let the pan get really, really hot. The oil should be shimmery but not smoking.
Gently put your piece of meat in the pan. It should sizzle a lot, which brings us to the most important step…
DON’T TOUCH IT! Don’t poke the meat, don’t try to move it in the pan, don’t do anything. Keep that spatula to yourself, use it to itch your back if you must, just no touching anything in the pan. I don’t care if you didn’t put the meat in the quite right spot in the pan, that you just want to shift it a bit. NO TOUCH.
After 3-5 minutes, you may investigate if your meat is ready to be turned. Using a pair of tongs (since you were scratching your back with spatula…gross), turn the meat. It should release very easily from the pan and look beautiful. Congratulate yourself on your self restraint. If the meat seems to be sticking, wait a couple more minutes, don’t force it off. It will release from the pan when it’s ready.

You have a couple of options for finishing cooking. If it’s something like steak where you want the center to be medium-rare, you can finish it on the stove. Items that should be cooked all the way through (chicken, pork) can be put in a preheated oven for a few minutes to finish cooking. If you’re browning meat for a sauce or braise, you’ll add liquid to finish cooking. Any direction you go from here, rest assured that the extra step of adding beautiful browned meat flavor is time well-spent.

See all those brown bits in the pan? That’s a wicked pan sauce waiting to happen. But that is another post.

Finally, a word of warning:
It’s a pretty fine line between super hot pan and smoking, burning oil-spewing, pan of danger. I have learned this the hard way. A splatter guard is key if you don’t want to get burnt by little oil splatters and clean all your surfaces in a 2-foot radius. Dial back the heat if it starts to get crazy. My personal moment of glory was when, browning beef for a stew, everything started splattering and smoking like crazy. The smoke alarm started blaring, and I had to put on my sunglasses to protect my eyes and get close enough to turn down the heat. My boyfriend rushed into the kitchen upon hearing the smoke alarm and there I am, desperately trying to turn little cubes of beef without getting close enough to get burnt, wearing sunglasses indoors, splattered grease everywhere, kitchen full of smoke. Not my finest culinary moment, but hey, the stew turned out great!

Weeding Through the Sea of Sushi: Tamago

Thu, 13 Sep 2012 23:58:55 -0400

by Trish

We’ve all been there: the $5.99 lunch deals filled mostly of over-sized rolls, drenched in spicy-mayo, best eaten drowned in a slurry of fake wasabi and soy sauce. This stuff is fine for the days you just need to fill your gut at the cheapest possible price point, the days where greasy tempura-laden rolls are the ticket. But some day you may want better, and better can be difficult to find.

To find the best sushi you need to find a good sushi chef. A good sushi chef is your ticket to the strange and wonderful world of sushi. He knows what time of year each fish is at its best, he’ll be creative in preparing it, and artful in presentation. The problem is, if you’re just ordering salmon rolls, you might not really be able to tell if your chef is a cut above the rest. So how do you know if a sushi chef is worth his socks? Take a look at his tamago.

Tamago is the egg piece of sushi that often arrives on your sushi combination plate. Here’s mine from a lunch this week. It looks a bit like an omelet, egg layers folded over each other and then sliced for sushi. Until recently, I’d written off tamago as a restaurant cheap-out. Just give me more fish-not some crappy omelet! Turns out that these little guys (when done right) are actually very delicious!

A good tamago isn’t eggy as you’d expect. It’s lightly sweet, delicate in texture, less like a scrambled egg and more like flan in consistency.

Tamago is also notoriously tricky to make. It’s made by folding over gently cooked layers of egg, mixed with soy, sugar and either mirin, sake, or dashi. Overcook it and it turns tough and springy. Treat it roughly it will look sloppy and break apart. The chef at my neighborhood sushi joint told me it usually takes about 100 attempts to perfect it. (The kitchen staff ate the many failed attempts.)

The moral of the story is that if your local sushi chef is going to put in time and attention to perfect a dish that usually plays second fiddle, imagine how much care he (or she) is going to take over the star of the show. If he pays attention to the lowly tamago, odds are that he’s fastidious over the fish. Which means you, my friend, are in good hands to explore well off the california-roll beaten path.

Lupe Fiasco Knows His Food & Liquor

Tue, 17 Apr 2012 16:13:34 -0400

by Trish

When I first read the title of the article on Food Republic, I had to check the date to see if it was April Fool’s Day. Lupe Fiasco is branching into food writing. Be still my beating heart.

You tend to get certain “types” in the food blog world. You get a lot of mommies who love to post pictures of their toddlers eating elaborately decorated cupcakes. You get guys who are really, really into hamburgers. You get hipsters who aren’t impressed unless the restaurant serves heirloom quinoa grown on the roof of a converted industrial loft. But you don’t get too many rappers. Then again, I guess a rapper’s gotta eat (even if it’s greasy).

You can follow Lupe on Food Republic, where he’ll be blogging his way across Australia. First stop, Brisbane, where the man sizes up Wagyu beef and grilled mackerel at Wagaya.

So there you have it folks. A rapper who knows his way around a wagyu steak and isn’t ashamed to blog about it. Sure beats a lot of other rappers’ beef, I’d say.

via Food Republic.

Chicken Pot Pie: Need I Say More?

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 00:18:30 -0500

by Trish

Ask anyone when the the last time they had a homemade savory pie and I’d venture the answer would be a very, very long time. Sadly, even the stuff you get from the neighborhood pub is usually straight from the freezer. It’s not entirely surprising, chicken pot pie certainly isn’t the worst option in the freezer aisle, and it beats rolling pastry. But if you find yourself on a Saturday afternoon with lots of ambition and even more time, making the stuff from scratch will provide you with perhaps the most satisfying meal of all time, and then days of leftovers that are just as good.

This is my favorite recipe because it has lots of vegetables you might not generally see in a pie, big pieces of roast chicken, and saffron in the sauce. It is a lot of work, but every step is worth it. If you want to cut corners on anything, you can use frozen puff pastry instead of making your own. This is a great dish to treat your friends to, pretty much everyone loves it and you can make the whole thing even a day ahead, baking just before the company arrives.

Chicken Pot Pie

Dice the veggies small (3/4 inch dice) but leave the chicken in larger chunks for the nicest results.

4 chicken breasts, bone-in, skin on

2 tablespoons olive oil

12 tablespoons butter

2 cups diced yellow onions

1 fennel bulb, thinly sliced

1/2 cup flour

2 1/2 cups chicken stock

pinch of saffron threads

3 tablespoons heavy cream

2 medium white potatoes, diced (1 1/2 cup)

4 carrots, diced (1 1/2 cup)

1 1/2 cup butternut squash, diced

2 cups frozen peas

1/2 cup flat-leaf parsley, minced

Pastry

3 cups flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 cup vegetable shortening

1 stick cold butter, diced

1/2 cup ice water

1 egg, beaten

kosher salt and pepper

Preheat the oven to 350. Rub the chicken breasts with olive oil and sprinkle generously with salt and pepper. Roast for 35-40 minutes until cooked through. When they cool enough to handle, remove the meat from the bones and dice the chicken, discarding the skin.

While your chicken is roasting, chop and prep all your vegetables.

Melt the butter in a large pot/dutch oven over medium heat. Add the onions and fennel and cook until translucent but not browned, about 10 minutes. Add flour and reduce heat to low, stir and cook for 3 minutes. Slowly add in the stock, using a whisk if necessary to avoid lumps. Add saffron, heavy cream, 1/2 teaspoon of pepper, and salt as needed (depending on how salty your chicken stock was). It should be highly seasoned - remember you’re adding a lot of veggies to this mix! Set this mixture aside.

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Add the potatoes. After 5 minutes, add the squash and carrots, boil for 5 more minutes. They should be tender. Drain and add to the onion/flour mixture, along with the peas, parsley, and chicken. Mix until well combined.

Now on to the pastry: In a food processor mix the flour, salt, and baking powder. Add the shortening and butter, toss quickly to coat with flour. Pulse until the mixture resembles small peas, about 10 times. With the ice water ready, turn on the machine and add the water with the machine running, processing just until the mixture comes together. Dump the dough out onto a flour board, give it a quick knead into a ball, and wrap it up in plastic wrap to rest in the fridge for 30 minutes. Give yourself a pat on the back. You, my friend, are on home stretch.

Preheat the oven to 375. Divide the filling amongst whatever vessels you fancy to use: two pie plates, 4 individual ovenproof bowls, a 9 x 13 glass pan, or some permutation of the three.

Crack the egg in a bowl and beat up with a bit of water, brush some of this on the rim of your vessel of choice.

Take the pastry out of the fridge and roll it out on a floured surface to a size large enough to fit over the top of your pies. Cut out the approximate shape and put it on the top. Do you best to try and make the edges look pretty: crimping it over the edge to stick. Don’t worry, even if you massively fail at making it look pretty it will have that great “rustic” look. Brush the tops with more egg wash, make a couple slits in the top, and give it a sprinkle of salt and a couple turns from the pepper mill.

Place on a baking sheet and bake for 1 hour, or until the tops are golden.

Enjoy! (And believe me, you will!)

Adapted from the Barefoot Contessa. This recipe is essentially her Vegetable Pot Pie (Barefoot Contessa Parties!) and Chicken Pot Pie (available online) recipes combined.

Let’s Not Be Paternalistic About Food

Fri, 21 Oct 2011 10:16:00 -0400

by Trish

Food policy is in the news lately. Denmark has a fat tax, Americans are overweight, why you should be a locavore, these are just a few topics I’ve seen in recent weeks. For a refreshing take on food policy, check out a great article by Adam over at the Amateur Gourmet about keeping food in perspective. Read it!

Bar Nuts So Good, You Could Even Skip The Beer (But Why Would You?)

Mon, 17 Oct 2011 00:44:10 -0400

by Trish

Sure, it looks like a bowl of cashews. A bowl of cashews with a bit of annoying greenery poked in it. But really all I can say about these is that they’re really, really good. Good enough to stand on their own rather than play second fiddle to a foamy beverage. Yet simply enough to require no more skill than the ability to turn on your oven.

Bar Nuts

You can use any variety of nuts besides cashews, in fact a mix of nuts would be even better. Don’t use dried rosemary here (blech!).

About 2 or 2.5 cups unsalted cashews or mixed nuts (no peanuts)

1 tablespoon butter

2 tablespoons chopped rosemary

2 teaspoons brown sugar

1/2 teaspoon cayenne

2 teaspoons sea salt

few grinds of pepper

Preheat the oven to 350. Roast the nuts on a sheet pan until warmed through (5 minutes), or if they’re unroasted, until they begin to slightly brown (10 minutes). Be careful, they burn easily.

While waiting for the nuts to heat up, melt the butter in the microwave. Add the rosemary, brown sugar, cayenne, salt, and pepper.

Put the nuts in a mixing bowl and add the butter mixture. Stir to combine. Serve warm in a pretty bowl with a nice IPA.

Recipe adapted from Nigella via

Food Network.

The Alphabet in Bacon

Fri, 14 Oct 2011 13:37:41 -0400

by Trish

File this one under “way too much time on your hands.”

Henry Hargreaves, a Prada model and photographer, has made a rendering of the alphabet in an Old English font made entirely out of bacon. The project took Hargreaves and his assistant two days to complete and about 15 lbs of bacon, which they made into bacon jam after they finished.

Why this is newsworthy, I cannot tell you. But it does take the cake for the most ridiculous thing I stumbled across on the internet this week. Which is no small feat, considering I also discovered Fo ogos. There you have it.

Via the LA Weekly.

Cellars: Not Just For Wine

Fri, 14 Oct 2011 12:48:24 -0400

by Trish

Bill Sysak from Stone Brewing Co., a phenomenal brewery from California, explains how you can cellar certain beers for several years like you would wine.

Read the entire article at The Kitchn.

Foodies Team Up To Stop Mega-Quarry

Thu, 13 Oct 2011 21:51:01 -0400

by Trish

What does mining and food have to do with each other? Well, not a heck of a lot. Unless you’re a well-renowned Canadian chef donating your time to raise money to stop a huge mining project. Which is exactly what Foodstock is.

It all started with a proposal for a mega-quarry near Orangeville, Ontario to mine limestone. The quarry would be a pit-mine covering over 3 miles and dug to a depth of 200 ft, occupying what is currently prime Ontario farmland. Environmentalists are incensed over the project, citing concerns over the water requirements of the operation (which would reportedly be 600,000,000 liters per day), increased truck traffic, and long term rehabilitation to the land after the mine is empty.

There have been a number of protests againt the quarry, but the tastiest protest will surely be this Sunday’s Foodstock. The website gives the following promo:

“Join Chef Michael Stadtlander and 100 of the best chefs from across Canada for an outdoor, pay-what-you can, public food event in support of the movement to Stop The Mega Quarry”

The event will be held from 11am-5pm this Sunday, October 16th in Honeywood, ON. More information and registration can be found on the NoMegaQuarry website.

via The Toronto Star

Quebec Announces Lowering Drinking Age To 14

Wed, 12 Oct 2011 11:36:00 -0400

by Trish

It must be a big week for booze, because here’s my second alcohol-related post this week!

The Province of Quebec announced earlier this week that the drinking age will be lowered from age 18 to 14 for general consumption and 12 if you are at home with your parents. This move is the first change in the drinking age in Quebec since 1972 when the drinking age was lowered from 20 to 18.

Quebec is the first province to lower the drinking age, with most other Canadian provinces setting the drinking age at 19.

On a CBC Radio interview Alain Rousseau from the Societe des Alcools du Quebec called cited Quebec’s similarity to European culture among the reasons for adopting the policy.

Update: I got fooled by a fake news show! Apparently not all the links on the CBC radio page link to proper news, this particular article is from their phony news show and poor me was gullible. And I just thought the French were trying to stir the pot!

Via CBC Radio. Photo courtesy Stella Maya via flickr.

Wine Hits The Taps

Tue, 11 Oct 2011 14:52:00 -0400

by Trish

Visiting my family over the holiday weekend, my sister and I wandered down to a local bar after dinner for a drink. It’s a small town, and while this particular place is one of the cleanlier establishments, it has a very casual vibe with TVs showing college football, a popcorn machine, and some comfy leather chairs. I ordered a pint of beer and my sister a glass of red. But when the drinks arrived, the bartender told my sister that they were out of the wine she had ordered and gave her a glass of some other red wine, on the house. While it was a really nice gesture of the bartender, the good intentions were diminished after she tried the wine.

“It tastes funny.”

Sure enough, I had a sip and it smelled and tasted like vinegar. Who knows how long that opened bottled had floated around behind the bar before finding its way to her glass. However long it was, it was clearly way too long.

It’s not terribly uncommon to get bad wine by the glass, and it’s why I generally don’t order it. When you open a bottle of wine, the wine comes in contact with the air, causing it to oxidize. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, older wines do well with a bit of oxidation which is why people decant wine bottles about a half hour before serving them. However, after a couple of days you’ll begin to pick up a distinct vinegar flavor to your wine, and this means your wine has been opened too long. When ordering wine by the glass, you really have no idea when the bottle was opened, and while busy establishments usually have enough turn over to maintain fresh bottles, it’s really luck of the draw. But this could all change.

Winemakers and restaurant owners have been tentatively introducing wine on tap, served alongside beer through the keg system. Because wine from a keg doesn’t come in contact with the air as it’s served, it remains fresh for months. It also saves producers in bottling and shipping costs, without sacrificing flavor. (In fact, some experts argue that the flavor from kegs is actually better since the wine doesn’t undergo “bottle shock”.) And rather than keeping the red wine floating around on top of the bar with the sambuca, the temperature of the keg could be controlled so it could be served at a slightly cooler, proper temperature.

So far there there are only a handful of establishments offering wine on tap, mostly in New York City, Los Angeles, and one in British Columbia, but hopefully the trend will continue. Don’t get me wrong, I love the ceremony and circumstance that calls for opening a bottle of wine. But for the evenings where a bottle is just too much commitment, it would be nice to know you could have a lovely, fresh glass, drawn to order.

Via the Globe and Mail and NYMag.

by Trish I’ve had more than one misadventure with garlic....

Mon, 03 Oct 2011 15:47:00 -0400

by Trish

I’ve had more than one misadventure with garlic. Once, when chopping lots of garlic for a recipe I took of the end of my thumbnail with my super-sharp chef’s knife. Squeamish as I was from my close-call (thankfully it was just the nail), I was thoroughly annoyed at having to throw out all my hard work as I had no clue where said thumbnail ended up. On another occasion, when making a pasta dinner for my boyfriend, I must have brushed my hair out of my face after chopping lots of garlic. After dinner when we were cuddled up on the couch he remarked, “Your hair smells really garlicky.” Great - just what every girl wants to hear.

This video from Saveur piqued my interest, then, as it shows you how to deal with garlic en masse quickly and without having to get your fingers all through it. Don’t worry, it’s not one of those “Martin Yan bones a chicken in 20 seconds” type videos. No, if you have two bowls and a bit of pent-up aggression, you too can peel a whole head of garlic in mere seconds.

I might just be inspired to make some Chicken with 40 Cloves of Garlic this weekend.

Via lifehacker.