Skirts On Fire

Moroccan Spiced Chickpea Soup

From Good Deal with Dave Lieberman

This is delicious, cheap and gluten-free.

1/4 c extra virgin olive oil
1 large onion, diced
6-8 cloves of garlic, pressed
1 t cinnamon
1 t cumin
1/8 t cayenne
1 t sweet paprika
14.5 oz diced tomatoes
3 x 15 oz chickpeas, drained and rinsed
1 L veg or chicken broth
1 t sugar
salt & pepper
5 oz fresh spinach

1. Saute the onion and garlic in the olive oil.
2. Add spices (I usually use more of everything except the cayenne.)
3. Add tomatoes, chickpeas, broth and sugar.
4. Add a couple of pinches of salt and a good amount of pepper.
5. Add water to cover chickpeas.
6. Bring to a simmer and then lower heat, cooking for 45 min.
7. (Optional) Remove from heat and mash slightly. Or use a hand-blender and blend up a third of the soup or to the consistency you like.
8. Add spinach.
9. Add more salt and pepper to taste.
10. Drizzle a bit more olive oil and serve

Chili con Carne – Jamie Oliver Cooks Summer

I mistakenly watched Mr. Oliver make some delicious things tonight.  I am now hungry.  Everything he made looked tasty but his chili con carne stood out.  Here’s the recipe that I knocked out from the show:

Chili con Carne

Ingredients:
1.5kg piece of beef brisket
1T ground cumin
1T smoked paprika
1T dried oregano
olive oil
salt and pepper
2 x 14oz canned tomatoes
14oz beef stock
2 yellow peppers
2 red peppers
1 cinnamon stick
2 bay leaves
2 medium red onions
4 cloves of garlic
2-4 chilis
handful or so of fresh coriander, chopped

Take the brisket and do a 3/4″ score in both directions creating a grid effect.
Cover liberally with salt and pepper, and then sprinkle on the cumin, paprika, and oregano.
Rub in the spices on both sides of the brisket, making sure you get the spices into the scores as well.
Add olive oil to a frying pan and brown the meat.

Put any leftover spice into a pot.
Add the two tins of canned tomatoes and the beef stock.

Roughly dice the 2 yellow and 2 red peppers and add to the pot, along with the cinnamon and 2 bay leaves.
Add brisket to pot but keep the pan around.

Chop 2 med red onions, 4 cloves of garlic and the chilis.
Add all to frying pan you set aside earlier and cook til the onions are softened.

Add the onion mixture to the pot along with half of your fresh coriander and bring to a boil.
When the pot comes to a boil, put on the lid and turn down to low and simmer 4, 4.5 hrs.

After the 4 hours or so, pull apart the meat with a couple of forks.
Add salt and pepper to taste and the other half of the coriander.

Serve with guacamole and tortillas or some great cornbread.

Two Greedy Italians – Ricotta Dumplings

So I have been watching this show on the BBC called Two Greedy Italians.  If you like food, watch it.  It’s about these two older Italian guys who travel back home from the UK to check out how food and cooking might have changed in their native Italy.  They say silly things, make fun of each other, eat delicious things, cook delicious things, you get the idea.  Here’s a recipe from the first episode.  It’s very easy to make and you get to be all proud for making the dumplings from scratch.  Total time to do this is maybe 45 min the first time and then once you get the hang of the dough, it’s faster.  You can start the sauce while you wait for the water to boil for the dumplings.

Ingredients

For the dumplings

• 200g/7oz 00 flour, plus extra for dusting
• 225g/8oz ricotta
• 3 free-range egg yolks
• 30g/1oz parmesan, freshly grated (I used romano, but really, any hard cheese would do)
• pinch freshly grated nutmeg (no idea where to get whole nutmeg so I used the ground stuff)
• salt and freshly ground black pepper

For the sauce:

• 6 tbsp olive oil
• 3 garlic cloves, peeled, cut into thick slices (thick, in this case, means about 2mm)
• 1 chilli, sliced (or you could use the chili flakes that you find in those shaker thingies)
• 2 x 400g/14oz cans tinned plum tomatoes, each tomato chopped in half (this is an excellent opportunity to use Save-On’s Western Family Fire Roasted Tomatoes)
• few basil leaves (always best to shell out for the fresh stuff, but dried will work fine in the sauce too.  Add them in when you add the tomatoes, rather than tossing the fresh leaves on top when you dish up)

Preparation method

1. Mix the flour, ricotta, egg yolks, parmesan, nutmeg and seasoning together in a large bowl to form a soft, moist dough.
2. Tip the mixture out onto a floured work surface and knead for 3-5 minutes.  If you don’t knead for the full time, the dumplings won’t feel as smooth as they can be. Roll the dough into a long, thin sausage shape, then cut into dumplings about 2cm/1in long.
3. Cook the dumplings for 3-4 minutes in a large saucepan of salted boiling water.  I waited for them to float and then added another minute or two.  The first time I made this recipe it seemed like I didn’t cook them enough so I tacked on a couple of minutes the second time.
4. Meanwhile for the sauce, heat the olive oil in a frying pan and fry the garlic and chili for one minute (don’t burn the garlic!), then remove the pan from the heat and add the plum tomatoes.  Give it a stir and taste it as now is the time to add things: fresh ground pepper? salt? splash of red wine? spices other that basil?
5. Return the pan to the heat, bring to the boil and simmer for five minutes.
6. Remove the dumplings from the pan with a slotted spoon and add them to the tomato sauce.
7. To serve, spoon the dumplings onto a serving plate and sprinkle over the basil leaves.  Feel free to add a bit more parm or whatever cheese on top.

Basil & Veggie Mini Quiches

Pretty sure this recipe is from Chatelaine. You could sub in whatever veggies you have kicking around. Further, I wasn’t overly precise with the eggs vs egg whites so don’t worry too much about that. Good with side of toast or a salad. Or both if you are extra hungry. Although you probably won’t have room for ice cream then and that’s a shame.

5 eggs
3 egg whites
1 cup milk
1/4 cup finely chopped red pepper
1/4 cup finely chopped scallion
6 basil leaves, chiffonaded
1/4 cup grated sharp cheddar cheese, although any cheese will do
Salt and pepper
Cooking spray

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F. In a medium bowl, whisk together the eggs. Add the milk and whisk again.
In a medium bowl, combine the red pepper, scallion, cheddar cheese, basil and salt and pepper.

Spray a muffin tin well with cooking spray. Read further down about the quiches sticking. If you absolutely don’t want yours to stick, now is the time to take action. You could probably up the cooking spray to butter or margarine or seek out a parchment paper solution. You could also try those silicone muffin things your mom gave you a couple of Christmases ago, that you forgot about until now and which are brilliant in this type of situation. Note: silicone still requires oven mitts.

Pour an even amount of the egg mixture into each muffin cup. They will be about 2/3-3/4 full. Anymore than that and you’ll overflow the tins while you are baking as the egg mixture will rise up and bubble as it bakes. Divide the veggie mixture evenly amongst the muffin cups. Sprinkle each with a little pepper and salt if you like, although I didn’t.

Put the filled muffin tin into the preheated oven and bake for about 25 minutes, or until the quiches are just starting to brown. This took me more like 30-35 minutes so if it’s taking longer for you, don’t panic. Just keep setting the time for a few extra minutes at a time until they are starting to brown.

Remove the muffin tray from the oven and cool on a rack for about 5 minutes. Place a cutting board over the muffin tin and flip upside down so that the quiches fall out onto the board. If your muffin tin is like mine and quickly on its way to no longer being a non-stick one, then you’re quiches will probably stick. Once they are done, run a knife around the edge and sorta coax them out as best you can.

Serve immediately.
Makes 12 mini quiches.

BBC’s The Spice Trail

So I’ve finished watching this BBC 3-parter on spices and their history called The Spice Trail. The presenter is incredibly enthusiastic, which at some points is a bit grating but the content makes it worth the occasional grimaces. If you live in a non-iPlayer location, looks like you can stream it online with a little googling.

P.S. Vanilla rhymes with quesadilla. I’m still blown away by this.

P.P.S. The process to make cinnamon is incredible! I had no idea.

Lunch in the City – V Sandwiches

In a word: yum. I found a new-to-me Vietnamese sub place on Rice Howard, next to It’s All Greek To Me about a month ago and I’ve been going about twice a week since then. For six or seven dollars, you get a 9″ sub on a baguette loaded with sweet onions, carrots, cucumber, cilantro, a couple of sauces and meat. It’s delicious, especially the bbq pork one. The satay ones are a bit sweeter if you are looking for something along those lines. The menu is more more varied that the 3 I’ve tried thus far and I’m excited to try some of the other choices. So far I can’t figure out the best time to go. Some days I go and I’ve the 8th person in line. Other times, I’m 3rd. Unless you only have 5 minutes, it’s worth the potential wait.

Lunch in the City – Cafe de Gama

Cafe de Gama is a Portuguese cafe, right next to Soul Soup, on Rice Howard Way.

I was heading to Telus for Mt Fuji because I was feeling lazy and am disliking Subway as of late, which would be my other go-to, close-to-work, lazy place to eat. Then I remembered that there’s a cafe next to Soul Soup that I hadn’t been to yet. I am incredibly glad that I did. Holy hell was it tasty. $8 got me a big panini with pastrami, spinach, cream cheese and pickles. I’m contentedly stuffed and ready for my nap. I’m happy I’ve found a good sandwich-esque place to replace the one that has been turned into Fat Burger (FatBurger? Fat-Burger?) in City Centre East. Canadian Soup and Sandwich, I still miss you, in all your delicious and fairly-priced glory.

As an aside, I’m still amazed that Fat Burger is called Fat Burger.

Lunch in the City – Good Earth Cafe

The new Elm Cafe or on the twitters @elmcafe is too far away for lunch. I meant to get up early and stop there before work but unsurprisingly that didn’t work out so well. Instead I decided to try out Good Earth Cafe in City Centre and had their Grilled cheese sandwich with apple and rhubarb. Do not do. I wish I’d hit up Wrapture in the food court for their $10 wrap and smoothie deal. >:(

Lunch in the City – Sankyu 2 Go

10347 Jasper Ave – in between Kabsa and Axis Cafe

M-F 11am-8pm, Sat 12-5pm

Cost: $10 will get you 2 salmon sushi and an order of salmon maki.  Note that you’ll be wanting a mid to late afternoon snack.

Someone needs to tell me how often a 28-yr old female can safely eat sushi, in particular salmon, on a weekly basis.  I’m pretty sure I’m blowing over the limit on this one as I can’t stop going to Sankyu 2 Go on the southside of Jasper Ave, between 103st and 104st.  Last week was 3 times, 4 times?  I’ve lost count.

Here’s a link to their menu, courtesy of the ever-handy urbanspoon, as their own site is under construction.

Also good to know, they have customer appreciation cards – spend more than $7.50 five times and they’ll give you a $5 gift certificate.  Not much, but since I’m going anyways…

Lunch in the City – Soul Soup

140-10020 101A Avenue NW (Rice Howard Way, across from the former Praha Bistro)
(780) 409-8272

Hours: M-F 11a-5p

Braved the rain today to go to Soul Soup with co-workers.  Soul Soup is run by the guys who do Culina and they strive for fresh, tasty, local ingredients.  They switch up the menu everyday and I was happy to see that their veg option could be celiac-friendly if you were so inclined.

Ate: Split pea and ham soup in the size of medium.

Paid: $7

I am very, very full.  How Nathan conquered a large is beyond me.  We’re attempting to establish #soulsoup but this is still in progress and doesn’t happen everyday.  Also worth while to note that grouping together some friends and getting a bigger size to take back to the office is a much cheaper way to go.