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Winter can be long. And for those of us who are blessed with non snowy winters, the damp grey months seem to drag on forever. This fall and winter started out spectacularly. We had more sun and less rain than I have seen in the fourteen odd years that I have called Vancouver home.  But the Farmers Alimac warned that when winter finally hit us it was going to be a cold one. For most of the country that has been true, here in Vancouver it hasn’t been particularly cold, but it sure has felt dark and dreary. To top it all off, I have just been too busy to have much down time and any notion of a extended vacation is months away.

About a year ago Scott and I had made a 45 minute trek just outside of Vancouver to the small community of Point Roberts. While there we learned that the small village was a quant little spot filled with vacation rentals. It seemed like the perfect spot to return for a little winter weekend away. Right smack in the middle of my winter dulldrams we decided it was time to cash in our trip to Point Roberts. We found the perfect little cottage, booked it and a couple of weeks later we were all packed up in the car and heading for America.

Point Roberts is a little tiny piece of America that is surrounded by water on three sides and attached directly to Canada on the fourth. Children living in The Point have to board a bus and take a 40 minute ride through Canada and then cross back into mainland America to attend school. Additionally most of Point Roberts emergency services are provided by local Canadian services. So as you can imagine it is an interesting little spot to visit.

Our plan for the weekend was to eat, sleep, getup, drink coffee, eat a little more, explore the area a little, eat some more, sleep… and so on. We had cooking on our minds and stocked our tiny cabin full of groceries so we could eat in all weekend long. We had planned a hearty warm soup, pancake breakfast and most excitingly a Raclette dinner paired with some bubbly.
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As you may have guessed, eating was one of the main goals for the weekend, but once we had eaten our fill we bundled up in our toques and gloves and headed to the beach. I had really been looking forward to wandering the beach as somehow even though it is so close to home the beach is just a little different than our Vancouver beaches. The mountains are further away, the trees where littered with Bald Eagles and for some strange reason the shore line was sprinkled with rusted out car parts. All of which made for exciting exploring!

After just a few short days away we returned home relaxed, well feed and ready to face another week of grey drizzle.

I don’t often spend much time regaling you with tales of recipe missteps. It seems like there is not much of a story there, only small oven fires. Of course I do have my fair share of disappointments, recipes that leave me with a pot of something that turns into leftovers for days. I’d rather forget some of those forays. But the truth is, part of the adventure of cooking is that it leads us down some unexpected paths.

The interesting thing about working on a food blog is that I get to be pretty adventurous with my cooking. There are not many meals in constant rotation at our house. Sure, we have our favorites, but more often than not, I am trying out some new recipe in hopes that I might happen upon something pretty or tasty enough to share with you here.

My fridge door is in constant flux with my most recent obsessions. I jostle for magnets and space with my son’s artwork – recipes and paintings side by side in the kitchen. There is a little counter, just the right size to catch the clutter, including a stack of cookbooks that I have been referencing and magazines I’m still reading.

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Whether it is my favorite magazine, a menu ingredient I just can’t shake or Instagram, I am always gathering ideas. Recently, a passing conversation on moonpies inspired a taste-off event – I baked up a batch to compare them to the standard convenience store staple. Goodness, they were delicious. And if you are really patient, I might even share them with you here one day.

Not so long ago, there was a foot of snow outside and it was Valentine’s day. I decided that I needed to bake a cake. With the chill of winter all around me, citrus sounded so good. I wanted something easy – the kind of cake you stir together before dinner without pulling out a mixer and dirtying a stack of bowls. It smelled heavenly in the oven, filling the kitchen with citrusy wafts. And since we were celebrating, I topped it off with a swirl of cream cheese frosting. In the end, it just didn’t up being all I had hoped it would be. As pretty as it looked, I feel like I would have to tweak the recipe before I would be happy sharing it here with you.

Until then, I’ll keep cooking.

Have you ever considered what type of food you would eat if you could only eat one for the rest of your life? This is a really tough call for me. There are so many different things that I love to eat, I really can’t imagine going without all the lovely fruit options, dark chocolate and who knows what else, that I don’t think that I could live without. But if for some reason we were in a MMA fight and you had me pinned to the ground with my arm stuck in some sort of an arm bar and you demand that I choose a cuisine, I think that I would say Vietnamese.

“Vietnamese?” you might ask, why would you choose soup when you could eat Italian or French for the rest of your life. The French with their bread and pastries really are up there on my list but, there is just something so flavourful and fresh about Vietnamese food. Maybe it has to do with the touch of French influence in Vietnamese cuisine! One of my favourite things about Vietnamese food is the contrast and balance that is features. Sweet, salty, sour, spicy and then the additional ultra fresh and crisp vegetables, yum. One of my favourite memories of Vietnamese food is one that Ginger wrote about last May. We had had a bit of a mentally tough morning and by early afternoon were starving. We decided to try out the little family run Vietnamese kitchen down the street. We ordered takeout and went home with a couple of the most delicious salads and salad rolls that I have ever had. IN. MY. WHOLE. LIFE.

Every so often I remember those salads and think that I need to eat them again. When the pomelos starting showing up in droves at my local grocery this month, I decided it was time to try and make a little pomelo salad of my own. It has been basically a year since Ginger and I ate the original salad, so my version really is just an approximation. But I was delighted with the results at any rate. The salad comes together rather quickly, with the trickiest part being  the peeling of the pomelo. You can also turn this salad into a light main by serving the salad a-top a bed of rice or glass noodles.

Pomelo Salad with Shrimp 
adapted from Andrea Nguyen

1/2 pound large shrimp, cooked
1 medium pomelo
1 carrot, peeled and julienned
1/2 a medium English cucumber, julienned
¼ cup mint leaves, chopped
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2 tablespoons chopped cilantro, leafy tops only
1 small shallot, thinly sliced
1/4 cup chopped unsalted, roasted peanuts

Dressing
2 tablespoons fish sauce
1 lime juiced
1 tablespoon water
1 1/2 tablespoons sugar
1 generous teaspoon chile garlic sauce

Start by preparing the herbs and vegetables. Julienne the carrots and cucumber, chop the mint, celery leaves and cilantro and finely slice the shallot. Set aside. Cut the top off of a medium-sized pomelo, remove its peel and as much of the white pith as possible. Rip the fruit in half and remove all the skin from each individual segment of the pomelo. Break the segments into bite sized pieces and set aside in a medium-sized serving bowl.

For the dressing mix together fish sauce, lime juice, water, sugar and chile garlic sauce. Stir well to ensure the sugar is fully resolved.

Right before serving mix together the shrimp, pomelo, vegetables and herbs. Toss well to combine, pour over the dressing and mix again to fully dress the salad. Serve immediately.

I’ve been making hummus most every weekend since Christmas. It started out innocently enough with a little extra time at home around the holiday and this wish to cook more recipes from my growing cookbook collection. I settled on Jerusalem because it was already out for the amazing chocolate krantz cake that I made for our Christmas morning breakfast. (You can see how it turned out here and here.) A few page turns later, I was planning out a feast with more dishes than we could handle.

Wintertime is my favorite time to immerse myself in cooking projects. On a cold grey day, a warm kitchen seems like the perfect antidote to winter. In years past, I have pursued handmade breads, coaxed from bubbling starters. Sprouting greens and fermenting vegetables have also kept me busy through the winter months. But this year, cooking through the delicious recipes from Jerusalem seems to be my project.

As it seems to go around here, Sunday finds me in the kitchen with at least two too many recipes on the go. We’ve had meatballs, spiked with pinenuts and a tahini sauce, every rice dish listed, from the Iranian preparation, flecked with herbs, barberries and pistachios, to the rice and pasta recipe which won Blaise over. My fridge is well stocked with Persian cucumbers, parsley and mint for all manner of chopped salads. And I’ve become comfortable enough with the yogurt and tahini sauces that I strike out on my own, depending on my mood.

But no matter what I am making, I always set out a bowl of chickpeas to soak overnight. The recipe for basic hummus was an instant hit. This is not the hummus that I’ve grown accustom to at the grocery stores. This version is so creamy and smooth with just the right amount of fresh lemon juice to perk up the flavors. And when the hummus is freshly made, there is nothing quite like it.

We’ve been adding hummus and warm pita to our weekend snack bar, pairing it with fresh salad for a light lunch or serving a dollop of it alongside roasted cauliflower. We haven’t gone wrong so far. I hope you’ll give it a try

Hummus

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Adapted from Jerusalem

1 ¼ cups dried chickpeas
1 tsp baking soda
¾ cup tahini paste
6 tbsp fresh squeezed lemon juice
6 ½ tbsp ice-cold water
Salt, to taste

The night before, place the chickpeas in a large bowl and cover them with plenty of water. Be generous with the water.

The next day, drain the chickpeas and place in a medium saucepan, along with the baking soda and plenty of water. Bring to a boil and continue to cook at a medium-high setting. Skim off any foam or skins that float to the surface. Cooking time for the chickpeas will vary depending on the variety, freshness and soaking time. Start checking for doneness around 20 minutes, they should be quite tender and crushed easily between your fingers.

Once done, drain the chickpeas and rinse away any skins that remain. Place in a food processor and mix until a thick paste forms. With the machine still running, add the tahini, lemon juice and about 1 ½ teaspoons of salt. Slowly add in the ice water and continue mixing for about 5 minutes. Taste and adjust any flavors to your preference.

Transfer the hummus to a serving bowl and allow to rest for about 30 minutes before serving, covered with plastic wrap. Refrigerate any unused hummus and bring to room temperature before serving. Keeps well for about three days.

I was really hoping to be sharing a soup recipe with you today. A few days ago I went to the store and picked up all the ingredients I needed, came home and started cooking. As fate would have it, there was a soup tragedy! So, instead of wonderfully warming and hearty soup, let’s talk crepes.

Crepes are fantastic really. Two of their biggest virtues in my books are, that if you don’t really care about absolute perfection, then you don’t need any special equipment to make them and secondly they are ridiculously flexible as a meal. You could eat them for breakfast, lunch or dinner. You can stuff them full of whatever goodness you are inspired by at the moment. And if you are just not that inspired you can melt a few squares of dark chocolate in your crepe and bam! you have a fantastic little treat!

I usually find myself gravitating towards savoury fillings. I love a breakfast crepe stuffed with scrambled eggs, Swiss cheese and caramelized onion or a little ratatouille. Yum. But this particular morning, savoury wasn’t in order. The crepe recipe works well for two but also doubles easily if you are feeding a larger group.

Crepes
makes 4

1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons sugar
1/8 teaspoon coarse salt
3/4 cups whole milk
2 large eggs
1 1/2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted

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Heat a non-stick pan over medium heat. Coat pan lightly with a little oil or butter. Pour 1/3 of a cup of batter into the hot pan and swirl to evenly cover the bottom of the pan with batter. Allow the crepe to cook unturned for 2-3 minutes until the underside is golden brown. Flip the crepe and allow to cook for another minute or so. Remove from pan and fill as you like.

Blueberry Sauce

2 cups frozen blueberries
1/2 cup water
1/4 cup sugar
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
2 tablespoons cornstarch, mixed with 2 tablespoons water
1 tablespoon lemon zest

Heat a sauce pan over medium heat, add blueberries, water, sugar and lemon juice. Stirring often, bring blueberries to a boil. In a small bowl combine cornstarch and water. Slowly stir the cornstarch mixture into the blueberries. Simmer until sauce has thickened. Remove from heat and stir in zest.

This is where the fun part starts! I like to fill my crepe with a little greek yogurt and blueberry sauce and then top it with a little more yogurt and sauce. But you can do what ever feels good to you. If you have an extra crepe left over, make sure to fill it with a little melted chocolate. Enjoy!

I bet that if I snuck into your kitchen right now and took a peek in your fridge or maybe even your freezer, I would find a bag of cranberries. That blessed extra bag of cranberries that you bought for the holidays just in case and never ended up needing.

I have had those bags of cranberries before. They start out in your crisper drawer and then as time goes by, reality sets in and you realize that you aren’t going to use them in the near future and they silently slip into the depths of the freezer. Then one day, months from now when you open up the freezer, freshly back from a run (or at least this is what happened to me) and in serious need of something to eat, you realize that the blueberries are all gone and no, a cranberry smoothie will not do the trick. So before you let those cranberries sneak up into the freezer, haul them right out and get busy making this delicious Cranberry Orange & Pecan Coffee Cake from Joy the Baker.

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Better yet, do what I did and turn your coffee cake baking into an event with a friend! Brew yourself a pot of coffee, we made Irish Coffee and then get a bak’n. All of these ridiculously lovely photos were taken by the ever so talented Joann Pai. Hand modelling by myself.

There is nothing quite like a little road trip to bring on the holiday feeling. Tucked up snug in the car with Christmas tunes and plenty of snacks for the drive, things start feeling festive. Recently, we did just that and headed for the hills to the west in hopes of holiday lights and snow in Leavenworth. The timing wasn’t meant to be with the snow, but we did see our fair share of holiday lights. Here are a few sights from the weekend.

It was our first time visiting Leavenworth and the weekend of the Christkindlmarkt seemed like as good a time as any to visit. I’m not going to lie, visions of warm mugs of glühwein were dancing in my head. The holiday lights were festively glowing when we arrived and made for a perfect little stroll through downtown.

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What’s more, I also found the Bavarian Bakery, just on the edge of town, with multiple stollen options and thick slices of striezel dipped in chocolate. Just the inspiration I needed to head home and start some baking of my own!

I hope the festive season has found you and yours. It’s hard to not feel festive with one of these gems sitting up amongst the glassware these days! I’m looking forward to being back in this space a little more frequently and sharing the season with you.

The past is behind us right? Well in that case perhaps we shan’t waste time talking about how a short summer hiatus some how turned into a full summer break and basically a fall break too. Let’s just say things have been really busy and good times were had all around. Perhaps at some point in the future I will tell you about my unexpected trip to the Caribbean and move to a new house. But we aren’t talking about that now that is for sure.

I am not a big fan of the time change that happened a few weeks ago. I have hardly stood up from my desk at the end of the day and it is already dark out. I have given up my forest trail running in favour of blocks and blocks of uneven kind of lite sidewalks. I have started falling asleep on the couch at about 7:30 most nights and to top it all off I forgot some of my potted plants out on the patio and the frost has killed them! My plants lives are on your head time change!!! This whole time change thing has really thrown me off my game!

Such males viagra sales in india ejaculate semen within one or two minutes of penetration into her genital passage, create more contact and friction during lovemaking and offer her enhanced sexual pleasure. And you would want to realize the root cause of problems, viagra pfizer 25mg pinpoint appropriate solutions and implement these solutions in the best possible manner. The device can be worn discreetly under clothing (even at work, if a man has a low-exertion job) and needs to be applied consistently for cialis purchase a course of months. Your get viagra cheap signs of despression symptoms are different as well. The one good thing that the cooler darker days afford me is afternoon tea. Nothing is quite as comforting on a chilly afternoon as a pot of milky tea. But, there is something that can make that afternoon pot of tea even better, Scottish oatcakes. A few days ago I was scanning through Flipbook when I noticed a recipe for oatcakes. A little spot in my heart is dedicated to these lovely little treats but for some reason I have never baked them at home. They have always only been an occasional store-bought treat.

The recipe narrative drew me in right away, I too wanted to be walking the Scottish moors with my thermos full of hot tea and a package of oatcakes in my pocket. Honestly now, who could say no to a cookie chock full of oats that can double as breakfast. Certainly not me! Visit Food52 if you find yourself in need of a salty sweet treat to accompany your afternoon tea.

We are getting set for a little summer vacation around here, so we’ll be away from the blog for a few weeks. We’re looking forward to some good old summertime lounging, Website hacking (cracking) is a widespread phenomenon – cialis for sale australia if you haven’t been a victim yet then it is only a matter of time. Herbal midwayfire.com uk cialis a blend of different herbs, amino acids and some vital nutrients that your body needs to bring these enzymes back into balance cooling the inflammation of your body and brain. Suhagra is essentially an effective anti impotence online viagra no prescription drug. It has been also prepared by using same ingredient, but at the lower the buy cialis prices. picnicking, cycling, drawing, camping and just glorious relaxing while we are away. Check out Instagram to see what we’ve been up to in the meantime (we’ve got some links over here to help you out). See you back here soon!

What makes a perfect potato salad? In my mind the perfect potato salad is the one that I grew up with, the one my mom makes. It has fresh peas, dill, pickles, hardboiled eggs, mustard, a little pickle juice, mayo and a bunch of other things that are currently not on my “can eat” list. Under normal circumstances, I’m sure that I could live without potato salad for a couple of weeks, I certainly have gone without a lot of other things over the last 8 days. However, when everyone else is out at bbq’s having yummy potato salads, I ended up feeling like I need to be part of the potato salad eating crew. So I have had to suck it up and try something new.

The search for the right mayo-less potato salad was not without peril. There are millions of recipes out there, but none of them really seemed to speak to me. Either they were too complex, calling for grilling the potatoes and veggies, or they seemed to call for ingredients that I didn’t have kicking around the house. For me that is one of the beauties of my usual recipe, I can virtually always pull it together. I decided it was time to take note of what I really like about the original salad and find one with similar elements. I was looking for was something that was simple in both its production and in its ingredient list. I wanted a salad that highlighted the flavours of fresh herbs and the bright acidity that pickle juice brings to my moms salad. This fresh herb and lemon was just what I wanted. The fresh herbs and lemon provide bold flavours and the thinly sliced potatoes steam up in a snap. Truth be told, may0-less potato salads really aren’t that bad, they might even be all around delicious.

Fresh Herb & Lemon Potato Salad
Adapted from Fine Cooking 

1-3/4 lb. baby red potatoes, sliced 1/4 inch thick
1 large clove garlic, finely chopped
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1 cup lightly packed fresh flat-leaf parsley
1/2 cup lightly packed fresh basil
1/2 cup thinly sliced chives
6 Tbs extra-virgin olive oil
1 tsp sea salt
1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper

Fill a large pot, that can be fitted with a steamer, with a couple of inches of water. Bring the water to a boil and arrange the potatoes in layers in the steamer. Cover the pot and steam, gently stir the potatoes every 5 minutes until the potatoes are cooked, about 10 – 15 minutes. Let cool for 5 minutes and transfer into a large serving bowl.

In the meantime while the potatoes are steaming, zest and then juice the lemon. Add the zest to a food processor and set the lemon juice aside to use later.

Also add the garlic and herbs to the processor and pulse a few times until the herbs are coarsely chopped. Add the olive oil, salt and pepper, pulse until the mixture is nicely combined, avoid over processing the herbs as this will cause them to discolour. Finally add the lemon juice and pulse once to mix.

Pour the herb mixture over the potatoes and lightly toss to combine. Serve while warm.