Favourite Cookbooks - Part II

Let’s Cook Japanese Food! – Amy Kaneko

I lived in Japan for five years and when I moved there I knew almost nothing about Japanese food beyond sushi and tempura. Getting familiar with the amazing variety of home-style cooking the Japanese eat on a daily basis (believe it or not they don’t often make sushi or tempura at home) was an adventure in itself (something I’ll save for another blog post). But thankfully I did learn to navigate a Japanese grocery store. The problem upon my return to Canada was finding a cookbook that featured everyday Japanese cuisine. There are tons of cookbooks available on the formal (and very time consuming) food of Japan but until I found this cookbook I had never encountered one that showed how to make the kinds of things Japanese mothers serve their families. Amy Kaneko (an American married to a Japanese man) has produced all my favourite recipes from Japan and then some. She also is aware of the fact that Japanese ingredients are sometimes not the easiest to come by at your local supermarket so she shares alternative ingredients that you can use that will still produce authentic-tasting meals.

Japanese Hot Pots – Tadashi Ono and Harris Salat

Continuing the theme of Japanese cookbooks that specialize in true family-style meals is this great find. Hot pots (or nabe) were a revelation to me when I moved to Japan as I was completely unfamiliar with their popularity, easiness to make, and amazing versatility. Like most Japanese food, hot pots are very healthy and this is the only book I have seen that compiles the endless variations that include everything from seafood, poultry, meat, or vegetarian. Besides the great taste of these recipes, the thing I love best about this type of meal is that it can be cooked on the table-top allowing every member of the family to participate.

The Complete Book of Year-Round Small-Batch Preserving – Ellie Topp and Margaret Howard

I planted a very small vegetable garden this past summer in an effort to get Big-D to eat more veggies (it didn’t work). The whole process of growing my own food, however, became a real interest of mine. And while we just don’t have the space for a larger garden, our family started to make a big effort to eat seasonally. So while we’d be having a summer supper on the patio enjoying fresh peaches from the Farmers’ Market or zucchini from my own garden, I wondered how I could enjoy the same great summer produce in, let’s say, January. That’s when I thought about canning and preserving for the first time. I remember my mom making strawberry jam in the heat of summer but that was about it for my exposure to preserving and, on the surface, it seemed really daunting and time consuming. But thanks to this book, I learned how easy it is to preserve your own food. The recipes are specifically designed to make small batches which are perfect for us as we just don’t have the room to store all the jars.

Favourite Cookbooks – Part I

I love to cook yet get bored very easily so I am always on the lookout for new recipes. I could look online for new ideas but there is something about cookbooks that I can’t resist, particularly if they are from one of my favourite chefs/cooks.

The following is part one of a list of my absolute favourite cookbooks filled with recipes and ideas that I never tire of and use again and again.



Barefoot In Paris – Ina Garten

I ADORE this woman, her books, and her TV show. Her recipes never fail and she has perfected the art of taking simple ingredients and turning them into something delicious and elegant. She is my go-to for dinner parties and everyday recipes. She has seven cookbooks and to pick the one I love best is like picking a favourite child – impossible. However, I am featuring Barefoot In Paris over the others because she has successfully taken a traditionally intimidating cuisine and made it very accessible. Prior to this cookbook I wouldn’t have dared to attempt French dishes even though I love French food. Her approach is to feature easier bistro and countryside cooking making the recipes simple to make and pretty foolproof. I never thought I would ever make things like Mussels Mariniere, Coeur a la Crème and Crème Brulee but now I do.

Jamie At Home – Jamie Oliver

I now have a growing collection of Jamie Oliver cookbooks and, to think, not too long ago he used to annoy me. In recent years, however, he has really become enjoyable to watch on TV especially since he started focusing on healthy family dinners. I love his approach to using seasonal ingredients and I have never made a recipe of his that I didn’t like. I discovered this particular cookbook right at the time I was trying to plant my own garden. He not only gives recipes but advice on growing your own vegetable garden. His overall approach (and this can be said of his other cookbooks too) is to keep recipes simple using the freshest of ingredients. The passion he has for what he does is contagious and makes me want to learn more about food and be a better cook.

Nigella Christmas – Nigella Lawson

I have to give credit to the Brits; they really know how to do up Christmas right. Perhaps it was my Canadian upbringing that makes me gravitate towards the British way of celebrating the Christmas season and this book makes me feel like I’ve been transported to the U.K. in December. It is almost encyclopedia-like in the amount of recipes and information contained in it. Don’t like turkey for Christmas dinner? No worries, try the recipe for prime rib, or goose, or ham. I particularly like the section on what to do with turkey leftovers. I also like how she gives menu ideas for the other celebrations you may have during the festive season like a Christmas brunch or Boxing Day dinner.

Best Summer Weekends Cookbook – Jane Rodmell

Just looking at the cover of this cookbook makes me yearn for the hot days of summer (especially since we are in the middle of a blizzard as I write this). This book gets a lot of use during barbeque season but don’t let the title fool you, it contains many recipes that can be made at anytime of year. If you were to take one cookbook to the cottage for the summer, this would be it. The author even makes note that most of the dishes can be prepared with things you already have in your pantry. It is beautifully photographed and contains great recipes to enjoy on your patio with just your family or for entertaining a crowd. I love that this book reminds us that summer is very short in Canada so we should make the most of it.

Catching Colds or This...

I don’t mean to start off my first post in a long time with a rant but good Lord this is getting ridiculous! Sick AGAIN. I have caught every single cold Big-D has brought home since he started kindergarten in September. And you know what kids are like…little germ factories, that’s what. So he’s been bringing home a lot of colds and passing them all onto me. Delightful.

This latest go around has got me thinking about what I could be doing differently so I don’t catch every little thing he brings home. I try to get enough sleep (as much as any mother of two young kids can); I exercise and try to eat right. I take vitamins. What the hell else can I do besides walking around with a surgical mask on?

Then I remembered one of my roommates from university.

For the record, I didn’t get to choose who I would be living with in the condo-style residences (we all had our own room but shared the common areas). It was two guys and two girls. One of the guys, Mike, was doing his PhD in Math and had lived there the previous year and throughout the summer while working on his dissertation. By the time the rest of us moved in he already had his own cupboard for his food and dishes and his own shelf in the refrigerator.

His academic brilliance was tempered by the fact that he was…a little odd. His room looked like something out of Hoarders and while we knew he took showers we couldn’t quite figure out why he always smelled like he didn’t.

There was a night when the other two roommates and I thought we may be dealing with a Jeffrey Dahmer-like serial killer as we were cleaning out the fridge. Mike had stuff on his shelf that was beyond old. We finally made our way to the back of his no-longer edible food when we encountered a plastic bag that contained, well, what we thought was a severed head.

No, seriously.

When we opened that bag it looked like a decomposing head (not that we had ever seen one) and Mike was just weird enough that all of us truly thought, even for just a few moments, that we were living with a psychopath. When we finally calmed down and took another look we identified the mystery object to be a very, very old cauliflower.

Anyhow, I’m getting away from the real point of why I started talking about Mike. We had all been living together for a couple of months. Our schedules were different but we’d often wind up cooking and eating dinner at roughly the same time. There was, again, something odd about Mike but we were all going about our business and couldn’t quite put our finger on it. However, one night after dinner it FINALLY dawned on us.

He NEVER washed his dishes.

That’s right. Instead, any pots, pans, plates, and utensils that were used when he made his food went right back into his cupboard totally unwashed.

Eeeeeuuuuwwwwww.

We all just tiptoed around the issue since, thankfully, it wasn’t inviting unwanted guests like rodents or bugs. Then one night Mike came into the kitchen and emptied his entire cupboard into the sink and washed everything. He did his grand wash-up just a few more times throughout the school year but none of us ever mentioned it. I guess we were all in such a state of shock (and quite frankly happy we weren’t living with a serial killer) that no one knew how to broach the topic.

But the point of this long story is that Mike never once got sick during the school year. Not once. The rest of the student population with late nights either studying or drinking was a cesspool of sickness from September to April but the guy who never washed his dishes, or particularly cared for hygiene, had nary a sniffle. Go figure.

So while I am desperate to stop getting my kids’ colds I’m not quite ready to go Mike’s route.

Save the Date!

Yuck. Wanna know how the last few weeks have been? Well it has involved trips to the doctor, trips to the Children’s Hospital, antibiotics for an ear infection, antibiotics for strep throat, and generally A LOT of feeling tired and sick. We are starting to feel better now (strep throat hurts like an SOB!) but productivity on the blog and otherwise came to a screeching halt.

Under all the sickness, the one part that brought me great excitement and happiness was the engagement of Prince William to Kate Middleton. I was OBSESSED with Princess Diana and it all started with her engagement to Prince Charles. I feel like I’m ten years old all over again, especially when I’ve been seeing the commemorative magazines showing Diana almost thirty years ago. God how I ate up everything she did; how she wore her hair and what clothes she wore. Whatever my ten-year-old self could copy of hers, I did. I also still have (somewhere) commemorative plates, cups, and spoons of their wedding.

Now I feel the same obsession starting over again with Prince William and Kate. So weird that I’m almost 40 years old and just as giddy as I was when I was ten. Thankfully Mike has embraced my reaction to the engagement with support rather than mocking!

This...

…is waiting for me upstairs. Quite frankly, seeing as how much I ADORE The Barefoot Contessa, I’m surprised that I’ve been able to restrain myself from diving right in after I bought it today.

But I want to enjoy it, savour it. Very much like I do with her amazing recipes.

I will take in every recipe, every description, every picture. I want to do this slowly and take my time. After all, it has been two years since her last cookbook was published and to rush through this new one would just be wrong.

Favourite TV shows will be missed, other books will be temporarily tossed aside, housework will be ignored, kids may or may not get bathed while I read this cover to cover. Such is the power of The Barefoot Contessa.

Well So Much For That

Four years ago when I found out I was pregnant with Big D, Mike and I bought our current home. I love our place. I love its proximity to downtown. I love that shopping and some great restaurants are nearby. I love that the neighbourhood is safe and quiet. I love that we get along with the neighbours on either side of us.

What I don’t love is the overall lack of neighbourhood spirit that I see present in other places. In fact, there appears to be a resistance to making this a friendlier neighbourhood.

Take, for example, a friend of mine who lives in Oakville, Ontario. Her, her husband, and their two girls moved there almost three years ago. Immediately someone on their street threw them a welcome party so they could get to know everyone. They are never without a standing invitation to head over to a neighbour’s house for a barbeque. The neighbours hold a block party every year where they close off the street and where adults and kids alike have a great time. It goes on and on.

Last year this friend told me about having “Been Booed.” I had no idea what she was talking about. It is like a Secret Santa for Halloween where neighbours secretly send candy and treats to two people and then those two people do the same, and so on. By Halloween almost her entire neighbourhood had “Been Booed” by someone.

I thought it was a terrific idea and one this neighbourhood could really use. It isn’t expensive or time consuming, it is just meant to be a lot of fun and perhaps, just perhaps, get people to be friendlier and more open to talking to their neighbours. And I shall be the one to make this happen!

Ha! Guess again.

I did up six bags of treats (if I was going to get this going I had better start out with more than the suggested two. As it happened I could only deliver three bags due to an unusually active neighbourhood the night I did my secret deliveries.) You need to attach the message from the website to explain the concept of “Getting Booed” so people don’t freak out when a bag of random candy shows up on their doorstep. Attached to the message was a sign that you are supposed to put on your front door indicating to any other would-be “Booers” that they should move on to someone else since you were already a recipient.

So out of those three homes, only one has put their sign up in the door indicating that they were getting into the spirit of the thing. The other two? Nothing. I mean, it is clear that it isn’t mandatory to participate in this but they could at least, at the very least, put up the sign that came with the treats to ward off anyone else who may have the same idea of trying to spread some seasonal good cheer.

If there is a Halloween equivalent of Bah Humbug, I would like to know because it certainly applies to my neighbourhood.

In Search of the Holy Perogy

It is Canadian Thanksgiving this weekend and my week has been consumed by menu planning and thinking A LOT about food. And while we are having the traditional turkey, all these thoughts about yummy eats gets me thinking about my favourite comfort food of all time – cabbage rolls and perogies.

I grew up in Alberta where there is a large Ukrainian population. Cabbage rolls, perogies, kielbasa, and nalysnyky were common dinner-time items at our house even though my family isn’t Ukrainian.

When I was 18 my dad got transferred to Vancouver and finding proper Ukrainian food became a BIG problem. In fact, the lengths to which we went to find some took us to some, umm, interesting places.

We had been living in the Lower Mainland of British Columbia for a few months and could not get a lead on any restaurants that served the traditional food (such restaurants were easy to find in Calgary). Finally, we heard of a place near one of the Canada-America border crossings where we could get our fix – huzzah!

After my mom, dad, brother, and I got out of the car and into the restaurant it readily became clear why hardly anyone knew (or admitted to knowing) this place existed: it was attached to a peeler bar. And while the ambiance left A LOT to be desired, the food was amazing! While we (thankfully) couldn’t see the ‘entertainment’ from inside the restaurant we were treated to all the music and announcements and, shall we say, sounds of crowd appreciation.

Still, our desperate need for Ukrainian food drew us back again and again until it finally closed its doors.

Yikes – we were back where we started.

Then, by happenstance, I was reading the local community paper and saw an ad in the classifieds for the local Ukrainian church holding its MONTHLY dinner where you could gorge yourself eating-in or taking out. We were saved! How did we not hear of this before??

So the day rolled around where they were having their parish dinner and Dad and I got there to get some take out. We found it a bit odd that the “dinner” was from 4 p.m. – 7 p.m. A bit early, no?

When we got closer to the church we quickly realized why it was so early. It was smack dab in the middle of skid-row. Going there anytime after 7 p.m. would have been very dangerous indeed. Hell, going in the middle of the day was dangerous.

The church was beautiful and, at one time long ago, was in a good area. All the power to the parishioners for not boarding up the beautiful building and abonding it for a better neighborhood when it started to change for the worse (think terrible drug problems and all the other societal-ills that go along with that).

Dad and I had a tough decision to make. Even though it was daytime, the area was such that you just wouldn’t feel safe at any time of day. We always had the clubs on our cars that deterred theft and we wondered if we should put it on the car we were driving (because if there ever was an area where your car would be boosted – that was it) or bring it with us to swing it at anyone approaching us. We laugh about it now, but it was a real consideration.

Anyhow, all the Babas in the kitchen making this delicious food by scratch made it all worth it. Every month we would get down there as early as possible to get our fix (and not the kind of fix others in the neighbourhood were getting if you know what I mean).

Nine years ago I moved to Ottawa and have been searching ever since for decent Ukrainian food, to no avail. Knowing this, whenever I visited my parents, they made sure they had bought extra perogies and cabbage rolls at the monthly church dinner to freeze for my arrival.

Sadly, my dad tells me, that the church ceased doing their dinners a few months ago. I guess as the Babas got older it became more of a chore to prepare all this food and the younger generations weren’t taking up the tradition in the numbers needed to maintain the monthly feasts.

So I am back to searching for my favourite comfort food.

I just need a lead. After all, I am willing to go pretty much ANYWHERE for it.