Foodie Feature!

Hello there!

As a kid, my first introduction to reading was...different to say the least. My mother had a collection of cookbooks that was about the size of me (at the time) that she never used! So my little tiny self went through all those books, looking for the yummiest things. As I got older, I actually started to read the recipes instead of just drooling over the pictures (and wondering why I couldn't have only chocolate cake for every meal...I mean, it sounds perfect to me...right?) 

I started really getting into cooking and baking around the end of grade eleven. I enjoyed the process of gathering ingredients, mixing, and achieving my well deserved result-delicious things! Around this time I also started watching a certain Canadian chef on TV-Bob Blumer

I got to meet my favourite chef earlier this year at a Food and Wine show-he gives the best hugs! 

I guess this cooking thing became a hobby of mine over time, because I'm still crazy about it! I've always wanted to go to culinary school but took music as my 'safe' option.  Instead, I watch the Food Network like it's my job, create disasters (and miracles) in the kitchen and treat my friends as guinea pigs to my latest concoctions. I knew my fiancé was the One when he bought me a cookbook for our first Valentine's day together. So much more useful than flowers! 

Over the past couple of years, I've amassed my own small collection of cookbooks that I've read a million times, and tried recipes out of. The newest addition to the collection is this beauty-generations eats by Amy Rosen.

New books make me happy

It effortlessly combines catchy titles, yummy recipes, and movie recommendations as an accompaniment! I perused this book at a thrift store today and quickly realized that it was a never-used copy . When I took it to the cash register, I had sticker shock-instead of being the dollar it was marked as, it was fifty cents!! There was a flash sale, with all cookbooks being half off. So much excitement! 

I want to introduce a new feature to my blog-Foodie Features! Once a week (well, I'll try) I will feature a recipe from one of my many cookbooks, complete with photos and a recipe. This blog started off as a food blog, and I haven't posted much of that lately.

Sarina 

An apology and a Sneak-Attack Breakfast Smoothie

It's been almost a full year since I've made this blog...and I've done absolutely nothing with it. You know that saying, "When life gives you lemons make lemonade"? Well that is exactly what I've been doing, minus the posting-about-making-my-lemonade bit. I've been studying, working, spending time with friends..and cooking. A lot. And not posting about it.
When I first made this blog, I thought it would give me a good kick in the butt to actually catalogue what I've been making, even on a once-a-week basis or something small. Well, when you let life in the way, even that once a week seems like too long to put energy into. But I've made a goal to actually start taking photos, and writing down recipes and finally putting them put. So, starting next week, I will be trying to upload on a once-a-week basis, if not more.

A short recipe to start us off-my breakfast smoothies.

Let it just be said that I love my veggies. Except my leafy greens. They don't feel substantial enough to constitue a serving, and yet I continually buy them. Why? To put into breakfast of course Blending up a cup or two of leafy greens like kale, spinach and swiss chard ensures that I get at least SOME nutritional value during breakfast that doesn't come in my multivitamin. Throw in some soy milk, half an avocado, some cocoa powder (because everything is better with chocolate, right?) and some honey, agave or palm sugar, and you've got a sneak-attack of healthy fats, fibre, and protein in a delicious avocado smoothie! My friends who I tell this to all turn up their noses is disgust, but avocado smoothies are actually quite popular in many places. I just upped the ante by making it a bit healthier than usual.

Sneak-Attack Breakfast Smoothie (makes 1 big Magic Bullet mug full or two small servings)

(*note that I currently use a Magic Bullet for my smoothies, which doesn't get the job done as well as I'd like. If you have a proper blender or a Vitamix, this would be perfect to use it. This is also an easy recipe to double, and if you don't have all of the ingredients, it's really easy to switch them up! I sometimes throw in berries or a banana as well, whatever happens to be in season)

1-2 cups of leafy greens ( I use the boxed mixes that have at least some spinach, you can sub in whatever you like best)
1 cup of soy milk, divided
1/2 a Hass avocado, pitted and cut into chunks
1-2 Tbs of cocoa powder (optional)
1-2 tsp of honey, agave, palm sugar or sweetener of choice (optional)

-In your blender, blend the greens with 1/2 of the soy milk for about 30 seconds or so, or until you see a nice thin green paste being formed. Sometimes you may have to divide up the leafy greens into batches to get the optimal blend.
-Add the remaining ingredients and blend to your desired consistency.
-Drink!

Alphabet Survey

As a sweet intro post, here is the food alphabet according to myself!
Hope to start posting again this summer.


A is for Avocado: How do you like yours prepared?
Mashed, with a bit of lemon juice, black pepper and tabasco sauce, on crusty bread.

B is for Bread: Regardless of nutrition, what is your favorite type?
Pumpernickel, with butter. Or rye. Or anything super flaky, like croissants and phyllo pastry (can that count as bread?)

C is for Chocolate: What is your favorite kind currently?
Green and Black's Organic Ginger dark chocolate for eating, and Lindt's 80% dark chocolate for baking with.

D is for Doughnuts: You might not currently eat them, but what kind do you fancy?
Tim Horton's gingerbread doughnuts. Holy CRAP, these taste like Christmas!

E is for Egg(plant): How would you like yours prepared?
By my grandmother, Indian-style, and spicy.

F is for Falafel: Yay or nay?
Yay!

G is for Groceries: Where do you purchase yours?
For essentials, the cheaper stores, like No Frills or Food Basics. For my fancier groceries, I go more-upscale, such as Metro, Loblaws. For even fancier things, I'll go to specialty delis and stores.
H is for Hot Beverages: What is your favorite hot drink?
Loose-leaf tea, mostly from David's Tea. Or a tall Starbucks coffee, two sugars, and a bit of milk.

I is for Ice Cream: Pick a favorite flavor and add a fun topping.
Dulce de Leche with hot fudge topping!!

J is for Jams or Jellies: Do you eat them? If so, what kind and flavor?

Usually not a fan, but President's Choice just released a bacon marmalade that I'm dying to try.


K is for Kashi: Name your favorite Kashi product?
Their dark chocolate-cherry granola bars. Deeelish!


L is for Lunch: What was yours today?
Roast beef and swiss cheese wrap, a fruitsource bar, Secret Weapon tea and carrots.
M is for microwave: What is your favorite microwave meal/snack?
I use my microwave to make my quinoa.

N is for nutrients: Do you like carbs, fats, or proteins best?
Proteins, in the form of seafood. Preferrably lobster, oysters, or prime rib. Mmmm.

O is for oil: What kind do you like to use?
Sesame oil for flavour, olive oil for frying.

P is for protein: How do you get yours?
Mostly chicken, ham and seafood, with a bit of red meat in when I have burgers, or eat a steak.

Q is for Quaker: How do you like your oats?
Steel-cut, soeaked overnight in milk, with cocoa powder, almond extract and cinnamon. Mmmmmmmm

R is for roasting: What is your favorite thing to roast?
Garlic. MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

S is for sandwich: What’s your favorite kind?
Lobster rolls on crusty buns. Or a soft-shelled crab po'boy. Or an oyster po'boy.

T is for travel: How do you handle eating while traveling?
Anything fresh and local

U is for unique: What are some of the unique foods that you like?
Smoked blue cheese, sushi, gamey and organ meats (venison, buffalo, liver, marrow bones), interesting things like that.

V is for vitamins: What kind do you take?
daily multi vitamin, and extra vitamin C

W is for Wiener schnitzel: Do you ever recreate this traditional Czech food?
No.

Y is for Youth: What foods remind you of your childhood?
Mac n cheese. Sugar cookies. Tandoori chicken.

Z is for Zucchini: How do you prepare it?
Fried in butter. Raw in sandwiches. Baked.

Super-easy Spicy/Sweet Sriracha Sauced Chicken

Before I begin, I apologize that there are no actual pictures of my food yet. I quite literally ate every last bit of chicken that I made (given that I only made enough for one, it happens more often than not).

This week was a busy, and emotional one for me. A combination of school, personal problems, and a crap knee meant that my focus was thrown WAY off. I wanted to end my week with something delicious (Yes, I realized it's Saturday, but I don't work Sundays, and consider that to be my beginning-of-week rest day)
I was browsing online looking for a good buffalo chicken recipe, and was going to use this one, but I realized that a) I had no Frank's Red Hot sauce AND no Tabasco sauce and b) I didn't want to eat deep-fried chicken, not after the junk I've been eating all week. What's a girl to do when she gets that buffalo chicken craving?!

You adapt. Luckily for me, I DID have my handy-dandy, half-full bottle of Sriracha hot sauce. 'What's that?' you say. Let me show you a comic that explains all.

This recipe is so good, and though it's absolutely NOTHING like actual buffalo chicken, it satiated my cravings...for now.

Super-Easy Spicy/Sweet Sriracha Sauced Chicken(adapted from seriouseats.com, serves 4)

Ingredients:
1 lb chicken pieces
1 tbsp butter (I used margarine, I imagine butter would be tastier)
1/4 cup Sriracha hot sauce
1 tsp Worcestershire sauce (not necessary, but I love it)
2 tbsp brown sugar
1 tbsp barbeque sauce

• Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.
• Melt the butter (or margarine) in a microwaveable-safe bowl. Combine everything but the chicken in the bowl. Increase/decrease ingredients to your personal tastes.
• Add the chicken pieces to the bowl. Make sure that very bit of the chicken is covered. Marinate in bowl for 15 min (or longer, no more than upto 2 hours though). 
• Empty contents of bowl into an oven-safe dish. Bake for 40-45 minutes. 

I ate my chicken with a side of grilled corn, and steamed veggies. It was absolutely delicious, the perfect end to a busy day of work!

Food Favourites

Being an avid foodie, there are a lot of things that I love, love, LOVE, and a lot of sites that I love to follow.

Some of my food favourites:
-Oysters (mmmm...with a little bit of hot sauce? YUM!)
-Chocolate (especially the super dark Lindt  stuff you can only eat a little bit of at a time..or the fancy stuff with ginger/cherries/sea salt...mmm sea salt dark chocolate covered caramels maybe?)
-Cheese. Brie, Cheddar, Oka, Cambozola, Gouda, basically anything. Cheese is just awesome.
-Loose-leaf tea. Like the amazing tea from David's Tea. (Right now my weak spot is their Buttercream and their Caramel Spice from the Fall Collection)
-Freshly-baked bread. It smells amazing, it's soft and squishy, and it goes with everything! (It's like the LBD of food, I swear.)
- Seafood. I love fish, shellfish, and crustaceans!
-BACON. mmmmmmm. Makes anything better. 

Some of the sites I visit on a regular basis
-How Sweet It Is.  Jessica makes me laugh with every new post she puts up. She's witty, and hilarious, and has delicious recipes (The scones are next on my list)
-Always Order Dessert. Alejandra provides beautiful pictures, and super clear recipes, and her writing is just fantastic.
-thekitchn.com. So many articles, and awesome recipes. It's a go-to site for...pretty much everything.
-seriouseats.com. Much like thekitchn.com, Serious Eats provides info articles, recipes, and reviews about restaurants, packaged mixes, and everything in-between.
-g0lubka.blogspot.com.  I'm not even CLOSE to being a vegetarian or a vegan, but this blog definitely makes me want to try. So many beautiful pictures, and most of them feature an ingredient I love-coconuts!

There's still so much I want to learn, and try, and see, but for now? I'll live vicariously through other bloggers