Hangover Cure

After a delicious dinner with the girls last night (and a few bottles of wine), we made our way over to a friend's going away party. It finally hit me during dinner; all of the amazing friends that I have made this year (let's face it, they are basically family after spending the last 10 months in a classroom together every day for 8 hours) are departing for the summer and I won't see most of them for the next 2 months. It's really going to be different without them, but I'm sure we will all be back in August with many stories to tell! Only 3 more days until I leave, and I'm getting excited and nervous all at the same time!

After waking up this morning, the events from last night came rushing back, along with a headache and hungry tummy. I went to wake up my friend who had slept over, and my first question to her was "what do you want for breakfast?" After giving her a few options she screamed "creeeepes!!" and this brings us to the best recipe for curing a hangover.

Ingredients
1 cup all-purpose flour
2 eggs
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup + 2 tbsp water
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons butter, melted
1 cup frozen raspberries
1 tbsp corn starch dissolved in 1 tbsp cold water
1 Toblerone (100g)
Fresh fruit

In a bowl, combine the flour, eggs, water, milk, salt and butter and whisk until smooth. Heat a non-stick pan on medium and spray the pan with cooking spray. Place a ladle full of batter into the pan and rotate the pan with your wrist to distribute the batter evenly. Cook the crepe for 1-2 minutes and then flip and cook for 1 more minute. Finish cooking the rest of the batter, while keeping the rest of the crepes warm. While cooking the crepes, in a small saucepan heat up the raspberries on medium heat and stir in the cornstarch mixture. Cook for about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally until the sauce becomes thickened. In a small bowl break up the Toblerone and microwave on high for 45 seconds - 1 minute, then stir until smooth. Do not over heat or else the chocolate will burn and become clumpy. Arrange the crepes on a plate and add the chocolate and raspberry sauce. Fill with fresh fruit and fold the crepe in half, then in half once more. Drizzle on more chocolate and raspberry sauce and serve!

Pad Thai inspired by my upcoming adventure

It's been a quite a few days since my last post. I guess that's what happens during exam period! Now that I am finally done school for the summer (with my fingers crossed at not having to rewrite this exam), its back into cooking mode. Inspired by my upcoming trip to Southeast Asia, I made my recipe for Pad Thai. It's probably no where near as delicious as authentic Thai, but who knows...maybe in six weeks from now I'll have a new Pad Thai recipe to add to the collection! Here it is,

Ingredients
1 package rice noodles
1/2 fish sauce
6 tbsp rice wine vinegar
2 tbsp brown sugar
20 shrimps, peeled and deviened
1 lb pork tenderloin
3 tbsp peanut oil
2 eggs
3 cloves garlic
1/4 cup corn starch
2 tbsp cold water
3 tbsp Thai Clubhouse seasoning
2 cups bean sprouts
1 cup sliced green onions
1/4 cup chopped, roasted peanuts
1/4 cup fresh cilantro
1 tbsp lime juice

Slice the pork tenderloin and add it to a bowl. Stir in the corn starch and cold water and let the pork marinate for a few minutes.  Meanwhile, boil a pot of water and cook the rice noodles for 3-4 minutes. Strain the noddles and set aside. In a wok, heat the oil and add the garlic and add the pork. Saute for 5 minutes until the pork is cooked. Remove the pork and place in a covered dish. In the wok, crack in the eggs and stir until scrambled.  And add the fish sauce, sugar, vinegar and Thai seasoning and let simmer for 5 minutes. Add the shrimp and cook until the shrimp are pink, about 3 minutes. Add the pork and the cooked noodles into the wok and stir until the noodles are well covered with sauce. Stir in the bean sprouts and cilantro and cook for 2 more minutes. Serve the Pad Thai with the chopped peanuts and lime juice.

Summer Salad

Trying to stay healthy in the summer can be hard with all the delicious choices of meat just waiting to be grilled! I think my red meat consumption during the summer months increases 10 fold. Some days I wish I had the metabolism of an 18 year old boy so that I could eat a delicious cheeseburger without all that guilt. One recipe that is life saving when trying to resist the temptations of that rare filet mignon or that rack of lamb is an amazing summer salad made with beets, warm goat cheese and pine nuts. This salad will make anyone stick to their diet and will also satisfy their taste buds!

Spinach Salad with Warm Cheese, Beets and Pine Nuts
Ingredients
4 cups of baby spinach
3 beets, peeled and cooked (boiled or microwaved)
1 tbsp honey
1/4 cup diced red onion
2 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp red wine vinegar
1/4 cup pine nuts
Two slices of goats cheese (about 2 tbsp)

In two salad bowls arrange the baby spinach. Slice the cooked beets and place on top of the spinach. For the dressing combine the diced red onion, honey, olive oil and red wine vinegar in a bowl and whisk together. In a small pan, toast the pine nuts for a few minutes on a low heat until golden brown. On a cookie sheet or in an oven safe dish broil the goat cheese until warm (microwave for 20 seconds if you are in a hurry). Once the goat cheese is heated place it on top of the salad and drizzle on the salad dressing. Serve and enjoy!

Tada!

Please note: this recipe was adapted from the cookbook "What to cook and how to cook it" by Jane Hornby.

Summer grillin'

My roommate and I had a friend joining us for dinner tonight. I called her in a panic at 5pm "what are we going to make?!" Luckily, today was a beautiful day, the weather was perfect and I knew we had to fire up the grill. In order to decide what to make I had to take into consideration that our guest was a male, and that usually means meat. What better way to satisfy a hungry boy than with homemade burgers? So here is the recipe for my homemade jalapeno burgers (which did not contain jalapenos tonight much to my dismay because my roommate can't stand anything spicier than pepper), accompanied by sweet potato fries.

Ingredients
 For the burgers (makes about 6):
1 lb lean groud beef
2 onions, one chopped one sliced
2 cups mushrooms, sliced
3 tbsp BBQ sauce
2 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
2 cloves garlic
1 jar pickled jalapenos, drained and chopped
1 egg
Goat cheese
Butter
2 tbsp sugar
6 hamburger buns (I prefer ciabatta buns...my roommate likes plain hamburger buns. Luckily for me I won the rock paper scissors competition)

In a frying pan, melt a tbsp of butter and add the sliced onions. Add the 2 tbsp of sugar and saute for 7 minutes until caramelized.  Remove the onions from the pan and place in a serving dish. In the same pan add another tbsp of butter and fry the sliced mushrooms for 3-4 minutes. Transfer to a second serving dish.

 

  

In a glass bowl combine the diced onions, ground beef, BBQ and Worcestershire sauces, egg, garlic and jalapenos. Mix with your hands and form 6 balls of equal proportion. On a cutting board squish the ball down with a dinner plate until it is flat. This prevents the burger from falling apart on the grill. After you have made all the burgers fry them on a grill at medium heat for 15 minutes or until cooked through, flipping them over half way. Just before you take off the burgers, place a slice of goat cheese on top, meanwhile toasting the buns.

Today I assembled the burgers with grainy dijon mustard and the caramelized onions and mushrooms. I do have to say it was a good choice.

As a side, I made rosemary sweet potato fries served with spicy mayo. I love sweet potato but apparently not as much as my roommate (she hugged me in the grocery store when I suggested these for dinner).

Ingredients
For the sweet potato fries:
3 sweet potatoes
3 tbsp dried rosemary
4 tbsp olive oil
4 tbsp low fat mayo
2 tsp sriracha hot sauce

First, wash the potatoes, remove the blemishes and slice them into french fry sizes. Place fries into a plastic bag and add the olive oil and rosemary. Twist the bag closed and shake it to make sure that all the fries are covered evenly with oil and rosemary. Bake on a cookie sheet at 350℉ for 10-20 minutes, turning half way. Fries should be soft and slightly crispy. In a small bowl combine the mayo and sriracha to make a spicy mayo to serve with your fries.

 

We convinced our dinner guest that it was worth it for him to trade his bike-fixing skills for our culinary expertise in the world of BBQing. Hope it was worth it for him, because it sure was worth it for me; a delicious dinner and a ready-to-ride bike, what more could a girl ask for?

Reality check

Today was one of those days that makes you stop and do a double take of your life. I have realized just how reckless I have been with my money lately. How often do I stop to grab a coffee (2.50$) or a London Fog (skinny, sugar free syrup for the true cal counting girl at heart - 4.50$) on my way to school or as a study break treat? Far too often. It's crazy how fast it can add up but grabbing a coffee everyday can end up costing almost 20$ a week which translates into about 1000$ a year (ohhhh crap, now you see where I'm going with this). I have decided that I am going to start making a conscious decision when it comes to what I spend my money on. No more wasting money on quick Subway lunches (5$) or lazy night order in sushi (20$ - okay maybe I'll just cut back on that one and not cut it out all together).


Step 1 of the plan: stop spending money on things I can make at home!

One of my best friends, the smart girl that she is, concocted a recipe for a homemade London Fog which is just as yummy as Second Cup, so here it is!

Ingredients
1 Earl Grey tea bag (10 cents)
1/2 cup steamed skim milk (25 cents)
1/2 cup boiling water (free!)
1 shot sugar free vanilla syrup (you can buy a full bottle at Second Cup for about 13$ and I'm sure this thing could supply enough syrup for 100 lattes)

 Pour the boiling water over the tea bag in your all time favorite mug. Add the syrup and stir. Add the steamed milk and enjoy! (Note the double enjoyment from only spending 48 cents to make this latte; you saved 4$, and its delicious taste!)

Ok, so that should cut the annual budget down by a few thousand (perhaps a slight over estimate), now what else can I do to help save some cash? A friend of a friend of a friend of mine made a very interesting point the other day: why go out to dinner a few nights a week and spend 20$ on mediocre food when you can go out once every week and spend 40$ on an amazingly delicious meal? I don't know how many times I catch myself at restaurants that I wouldn't have chosen, simply because my friends were meeting up there or it was just a convenient place to eat. This I shall do no more!

Step 2 of the plan: choose restaurants wisely and go less often!

I have to admit that sometimes I suffer from severe FOMO (fear of missing out) and will join my friends at almost any bar/resto/pub/club they are at because I don't want to miss out on all the fun!  This can really add up. And I mean really really add up. Some weekends I spend 100$ just on cabs, drinks, post- St. Lo clubbing food which seems ridiculous when you think about it. There is no way I can cut out this activity all together but I have an alternate suggestion:


Step 3 of the plan: host pot luck drinking parties instead of going out!

Sangria at a pub can cost anywhere between 25-40$ depending on where you are in this city. Luckily, it costs about 15$ to make 2 full pitchers at home! Here's how you do it:

Ingredients
1 L bottle of depanneur wine (10$)
1 L bottle of diet 7-up
1 cup of orange or apple juice (apple is surprisingly delicious)
2 (personally I prefer 10) shots of white rum
1 shot peach schnapps
1 lemon
1 lime
Other assorted fruits (raspberries, strawberries, blueberries, maraschino cherries etc.)
Ice

In a glass jug pour in half the bottle of wine, the orange juice and the shots of alcohol. Add the fruit. Slowly pour in the 7-up (about 1-2 cups). Add the ice and stir. Serve immediately! Repeat with the rest of the bottle of wine. Instead of spending 50$ on sangria you just spent 15$. And if you're not drinking alone (which I hope you are not) then whoever is joining you can bring some of the ingredients and help you cut some costs. And hey, who doesn't like sharing?

Hopefully if I can stick to these tricks I'll decrease my spending for the summer (and maybe you can too!). There is always my excessive shopping issue and nail polish addiction, but that may need some cognitive behavioral therapy...

Gotta start somewhere

I don't know how many times I have heard the words "you have to start a blog!" escape the mouth of my roommate. "Yeah, maybe..." I would more than often answer. But today, for some reason, it just felt like a good time. Maybe it's because I will be leaving in 17 short days for an adventure spanning Southeast Asia, or maybe it's because I made homemade pizza for lunch and thought that if I could pass on the recipe to someone else I'd be doing my job at paying it forward. Anyway, for whatever reason here it is!

Homemade pizza can seem like a pretty daunting task. It's not a common misconception that it takes a lot of time, but you'll be glad to find out it just isn't the case! And who knew it could be so easy. I started off by finding what seemed to be a promising recipe from the net (http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/pizza-dough-iii/Detail.aspx) and modified it to my liking. I spent one summer working at a restaurant that made many different kinds of food, thankfully one of them being pizza! This recipe for the dough resembled the one from the place I used to work at, I just substituted the sugar for 2 tsp of honey and added a little bit of flour to keep the dough from sticking to my fingers.

So here is the final recipe:

Ingredients
1 package active dry yeast (I used Fleischmann's)
1 cup warm water
2 cups flour (plus extra for rolling out the dough)
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon sea salt
2 tsp honey


After dissolving the yeast in the warm water and letting it stand for about 10 minutes, I mixed all the ingredients together in a large glass bowl until a ball of dough had formed. In order for the dough to rise it needs to be covered and placed in a relatively warm area. I covered the bowl with a tea towel and placed it in the cupboard on top of my fridge (it actually gets pretty warm up there!).

After 30 minutes of anticipation I checked on my yeast ball and it had risen to about twice its original size. Things were going according to plan.

I divided up the dough into 4 portions (each one big enough for a personal pizza). I dusted the counter top with flour and using a roiling pin I rolled out the dough into the size of a dinner plate. My roommate and I had decided on the pizzas we were going to make:

Pizza 1: caramelized onions, goat cheese and mushroom
Pizza 2: Caprese salad pizza

For the first pizza I sliced one red onion and fried it in about a tbsp of butter and 2 tbsp of brown sugar for about 10 minutes and this was the result:










Moving on to the mushrooms (you will soon find out that my roommate is addicted to them and sometimes I make her mushroom filled food as a bribe, or in some instances just to be nice. More often as a bribe though...)

I sliced about 2 cups of fresh mushrooms (from the Jean Talon market oh my!) and fried them for about 5 minutes in a tbsp of butter. I set the onions and mushrooms aside and proceeded to spoon out a healthy portion of canned pizza sauce on to my rolled out pizza dough.



 

Next I added the mushrooms, onions and a few tbsp of goat cheese and this pizza was ready to go. On to pizza 2.

Goat Cheese, Caramelized Onion and Mushroom Pizza

It's just starting to feel like summer so what better way to celebrate than with caprese salad? I can think of a better way: on a pizza. I used a basting brush to spread about a tsp of olive oil onto my pizza dough then I topped it off with sliced, ripe tomato and buffalo mozzarella. I set aside some fresh basil leaves (straight from the planters on my balcony) to add to the pizza once it came out of the oven.

Caprese Salad Pizza

Now, how to cook these bad boys? I'm a big fan of Italian pizza which traditionally has really thin crust and is cooked at a very high heat. So I turned my oven up as high as it would go and popped the pizzas in for about 5-7 minutes. I recommend cooking them on a cookie sheet or pizza tray but be careful using stoneware at a very high heat (mine may have exploded in the oven today). To finish them off I put the oven on broil until the cheese turned golden brown. Then it was a race between my roommate and I for the best slice.



After devouring our pizzas for lunch we decided to make the two remaining balls of dough for dinner. This time I added sausage to pizza 1 and it was even better than before. For the last, but by no means least pizza, my roommate suggested we try and recreate the famous spinach and cheese from Danny's pizza (usually enjoyed at 3:30 am) minus the spinach (we didn't have any and the downpour going on outside deterred us from leaving the house). I added olive oil to the dough once more and topped it with one clove of crushed garlic, shredded mozzarella, buffalo mozzarella, goat cheese and shredded parmesan. Again, we cooked the pizzas at high heat and then broiled until golden brown.

Garlic and 4 Cheese

It really was a sad moment as we took our last bites. Now, after all this cooking (what a way to procrastinate) it was time for me to hit the books. Schistosoma and Malaria here I come.