Edible Tulip

Poppyseed Banana Bread

 

This banana bread recipe is a great base. When I make it, about once a month, I just add or take away ingredients depending on my mood and what I have in the cupboard. It's easy to substitute rye or whole wheat flour for all, or half, of the all purpose flour. You can add an entire 1/2 cup of poppy seeds, like I did for the loaf pictured above, or you can mix poppy seeds and sesame seeds, or you can just avoid both, and add 1/4 chopped walnuts instead. And if you don't like nuts at all, then doggone it, do away with them altogether. It's your bread, therefore it's your recipe, so alter it to your heart's delight. The other addition I made to the loaf featured above is I added a cup of cooked red river cereal to the wet ingredients before blending in the dry ingredients. The taste of porridge isn't at all obvious, more so it's a curious chewiness, an earthy nutty contrast to the sweet biting rush of poppy seeds, and an overall moistness that makes the added cereal such a bonafide welcome addition to this bread. Re: sweetening quick breads. I usually add less than recipes typically call for in the sugar department. And I try, unless it's absolutely necessary, not to rely solely on white granulated sugar. So in something like a bread, brown sugar, a bit of molasses, some maple syrup, and/or a bit of clover honey, are all great substitutions when combined with the flavour you like best weighing in heaviest. This recipe makes ONE nice tall robust LOAF made in a 4 x 8 1/2 inch loaf pan and SIX MUFFINS.

Recipe below.

Crusty Homemade Bread with Red Rice and Flax Seeds

 

There are so many hackneyed phrases about the smell of homemade bread so I'm not going there (even though they're all true!). Suffice to say, on a damp day, in a cold season, when you're cooking lots of stews and soups and sloppy things, well, bread is pretty good to have on hand, and if your like me and enjoy more of a cereal bread - chewy, crunchy, seedy, with a touch of sweetness - then this bread will knock your socks off.

You can substitute any cereal blend from a bulk store for the Sunrise Blend I've included. There are usually five-grain, or eight-grain, or red river kind of mixes. Any will do. Experiment until you find one that brings the right flavour of nuttiness to your liking. (My sunrise blend was made up of bulgur wheat, buckwheat groats, red rice, whole grain, quinoa flakes, and brown flax seeds.)

The recipe can easily be doubled to make 2 loaves.

Seed Bread

Yields 1 round free form loaf

1. Bring 1 1/2 cups of water to a boil. Stir in 1/2 cup of cereal blend, reduce heat to medium-low, cover and let cook for 10 minutes, or until all the moisture has been absorbed.

2. Once the cereal has cooked, remove pot from heat, and stir in 1/3 cup milk, 1 1/2 Tbsp honey, 1 1/2 Tbsp butter, 1 Tbsp molasses, 1 tsp salt. Let cool. 

3. Meanwhile, in a large bowl, combine 2 Tbsp warm water with 1 package of active dry yeast. Let stand until the yeast is dissolved, and beginning to bubble up. 

4. Stir the cooked cereal into the yeast mixture, then gradually beat in 2 cups all purpose flour and 1 cup whole wheat flour (or rye flour or spelt flour).

5. Turn the dough onto a floured board, and knead for about 10 minutes. Place in an oiled deep sided bowl and cover with a tea towel and set aside to rise in a warm place until doubled in volume, about 1 hour.

6. Punch down the dough (my favourite part of the process!), knead a few more times, place on a greased baking sheet in a softly formed round shape and let rise, covered, until doubled in volume, about 45 minutes.

7. Preheat oven to 350 F degrees. Mark an X on top of the loaf with a knife. Bake about 35 minutes, or until the loaf is crusty, and sounds hollow when you tap it.

Thin Crust Homemade Pizza: Meat and Vegetarian Versions

 

Even someone who is irascible as I am has to learn to modify behaviours when sharing space. And by space, I even mean air. If I could have controlled my former office environment entirely, I would have banned bringing leftovers. Especially if they needed re-heating in the microwave. And even more especially if the dish included salted dried cod or nam pla sauce or pulled aged pork. I was a strict vegetarian for pretty much my whole life until a few years ago when my B12 levels plummeted so low walking became a trapeze act. I still pretty much eat that way accept for the random excursion into the meat underworld. My heightened sense of smell keeps me vigilant to my surroundings, but it can also be a bit of a liability. When a co-worker (who I shared a draft-free work space with) and I were going through tumultuous warfare over petty things like who had more work and who slacked off more well you can imagine what she brought for lunch every day. Oh, things like shell fish chowder and burritos. And she'd heat them up at 10:30 in the morning in the microwave that was located about 3 feet from my face from where I sat. (The public washroom was right across from the microwave, just to paint the picture properly). And then she took 3 long, leisurely hours to eat the meal, reheating when necessary, or just leaving the plate idle on her desk emanating smells. Those particular odours pretty much ruined all possibility of my own enjoyment at food or drink. How could I drink a nice creamy cup of sweetened strong arabica coffee when wafting through the air are smells so heinous they can only be described as being hit with teh smell of walking into a barn full of sows with ear infections and athlete foot - a foul mustiness seasoned with bile.  My boyfriend is also guilty, although less vindictively, of using my nose against me. If he's mad at me, he smokes in the car (to be fair, it is lawfully his car). Or if I'm acting especially moody, he'll fry a whole bunch of bacon on the stove top so the bed sheets smell like a diner's tablecloth. I guess my point, after all this, is that I know I can't carve boundaries into thin air and thank god I live in Canada where the personal space index is so enormous.

Apple Pie - Recipe from the 75th Anniversary Edition of The Joy of Cooking

I'm a bit embarrassed to admit that I didn't have a copy of The Joy of Cooking until last week. For someone who has perhaps one of the broadest collections of books covering topics such as swampwalking and the history of hermits to an indepth analysis of the social life of insects as well as an insatiable love of cookbooks and food themed memoirs, it's curious to wonder how this book, the only cookbook named one of the most influential books of the 20th century by The New York Public Library, escaped my grasp. One possible explanation is that it was my mother's bible, and knowing daughters, and especially a daughter such as myself, I probably rejected it as too traditional, too Betty Crockerish, too methodical. And that last reason is a big issue for me because I have a hard time not only following through with things, but even reading through instructions before I'm finished the exeriment. In the above case, the apple pie, I top crusted it before reading in the recipe that I was to put several large dabs of butter on top of the apples underneath the crust. I had to use a knife to open the slits and shove bits of butter in them to cover the apples. I also realized that an amalgamated recipe right under the one I followed suggested cooking the apples before putting them in the crust. Because I live in an old house, with a very old oven who cooks everything between 25 degrees to 100 degrees over what it says the temperature is actually set at, I have to be careful when baking. As you can see, I burnt the crusts and I cooked this pie in much less time than was suggested simply because if it had existed any longer in that oven the crust would have become an inpenetrable jaw breaker.

So, in an effort to sort of refine myself, I'm going to pay heed to this new cookbook of mine. It's the 75th anniversary edition so it has been updated with all sorts of recipes and techniques that illustrate the way we eat and we cook now. I look forward to the many recipes, failures and bonafide successes, that will come out of this book, and I aim to get my cookbook looking just like my mother's: spine broken, front cover falling off, pages fingerprinted with various ingredients, all the memories of those early years of marriage and childraising held together with an elastic band. And I look forward to sharing my experiments here in the days and weeks to come.

Mexican Gazpacho and Jalapeno Cheddar Cornbread

The night after a week of eating cottage food and a day of eating road trip food (in my case, Budweiser beer and salt & vinegar Lay's chips), and the night before to a large Italian sit down family feast, I invited my boyfriend over for a celebratory dinner, despite food being the last thing on my mind.

I wore a cranberry coloured polyester cocktail dress that I found at a vintage store on Roncesvalles Avenue for $15. It is smashing with diamond earring studs and strappy black peekaboo sandals. We had chilled Italian Prosecco. And a bottle of Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon that we got at a liquor store in Ellenburg, New York, that my father has been stopping at on his way to the cottage for more than 20 years. The guy has incredible deals. We got a California Cab Sauv, a French Rose, an Australian Sauvignon Blanc and an Australian Merlot for $26. He had three of the wines on a $4.99 special "last case in New York State" sell off. We ate the only meal I could summon myself to eat while I was trying both to detox and to cook in a sweltering kitchen - cold soup and vegetable laden bread with a bit of piquant. It's not fancy but it is sufficient in colour and aroma to make a romantic meal for two. I dressed the table with a tall yellow candle in a silver candlestick, aquamarine placements, grass green linen napkins, and the bamboo blinds pulled down enough to only let in slivers of urban light. The moon shone its silouhette through the matchsticks.

Menu

Mexican Gazpacho

Jalapeno Cheddar Cornbread

Fresh Peas, Mango Green Salad with Poppy Seed Dressing

Baskin Robbins Espresso Bean Ice Cream after a walk through Christie Pitts Park with the dog

Mexican Gazpacho serves 6

2 garlic cloves

1 tsp kosher salt

1 lg. cucumber, peeled,chopped

1 yellow bell pepper, seeded, chopped

2 celery sticks, chopped

4 ripe tomatoes, chopped

1 red onion, chopped

4 cups tomato juice

2 tsp ground cumin (I toasted cumin seeds instead and left them whole for a smoky flavour)

1 tsp chili powder

1/2 jalappeno pepper, chopped, sprinkle in a few seeds

1 Tbsp red wine vinegar

Black pepper

Cilantro leaves, finely chopped

Salsa Topping

1 ripe avocado, peeled and diced

Juice of 2 limes

Directions: Pound garlic and salt in a mortar and pestle. *my garlic only shredded, rather than being pounded out into a paste, but it worked fine 2. Put cucumber, bell pepper, celery, tomato and onion in a bowl, and add the garlic 3. Pulse 1/2 the mixture in a food processor until just blended but still a bit chunky. Pour back into the bowl. 4. Mix in tomato juice, cumin seeds, chili, and top with red wine vinegar. Stir. Chill several hours. 5. Just before serving the soup, dice the avocado and toss with the lime juice. Top each bowl with a spoonful of salsa. Season with pepper and a sprinkling of cilantro leaves.

Rising to the Occasion

There is a reason that bread is referred to as the ‘staff of life’. The finished product in ancient times relied upon the skills of several members of an agrarian community: the planters, the farmer, the harvester, the buyer, the miller, the baker, the vendor and the consumer. It is a food that unites and binds through the traditional ingredients of flour and water. The breaking of bread is an act of communion not only in religion but also in a deeply personal way - since the beginning of time, people have shared bread at meals in representation of the covenants that bind us all.

Bread making has been considered a lost culinary art in contemporary times. After all, we can find chewy baguettes and specialty-grained loaves in our local grocers. But the simple act of mixing flour with water to form a dough, adding a touch of salt and then shaping, kneading and baking it is still part of many family traditions, especially around the holiday season. Christmas morning in my family has always meant buttered brioche and sticky sweet buns while sitting in front of a fire.

I want to dedicate any spare time I have this holiday season to the revitalization of the age-old rhythm of working with flour covered hands. Nothing like a little kneading to work out the stress knots of the season!