Partners for life - ham and cheese

Mmmm....ham and cheese...Turner and Hootch, peanut butter and jam...the perfect partners in crime. Sure, egg, mushroom and mustard join the party occasionally, and it can be nice to have junior sidekicks, but ham and cheese are forever. Especially when cheese has melted and draped all over ham.  

Be it a panini, whole wheat bread, or baked Hong Kong style with cream and rice, ham and cheese are the perfect pair.

Now, I understand that ham and cheese can be too overwhelming (salty) when served on their own. But they are always the main show, the main feature.  They are the reason why rice, bread and rice welcome additions.

A few weeks ago, I had a chance to catch up with ham and cheese over breakfast with my cousins. Ham and cheese were disguised in a gummy (Cora's) crêpe. Egg and ketchup were also there.

The crêpe was okay, the egg was good, but the ham and cheese?  Divine. 

Seafood quinoa salad

I've been trying to wean my parents off white rice for awhile now (it's tough when you're Asian). They don't like brown rice, and my mother isn't a fan of anything whole wheat. Enter quinoa. I love quinoa, but I needed to find a way to make it somewhat rice like. My solution? Warm seafood quinoa salad, cooked in a saffron broth.

The result? Clean plates and request for seconds. What more can a cook want?

Serves 4-5 people

Ingredients for broth
- 4 cups of chicken stock
- 2 cups of water
- 1 cup of diced white onions
- 1/2 bulb of garlic (diced)
- 3 lobster tails
- 1 piece of salmon (approximately 1/2 pound)

Ingredients for the salad
- 1.5 cups of quinoa
- 0.5 cups of diced white onions
- 1 cup of fresh parsley (roughly chopped)
- 10 cherry tomatoes (halved)
- 1 sweet green pepper (chopped)

Directions for broth
- Bring the chicken stock and water to a boil.
- Add onions and garlic - letting it simmer for about 30 minutes.
- Add the lobster tails - they'll cook very quickly, so keep an eye on them.
- Remove the lobster tails from the broth.
- Separate the lobster meat from the shell.
- Add the shells back to the broth and let it simmer for another 30 minutes.
- Chop up the lobster meat and set aside.
- Bring the broth back to a boil - place the salmon on a strainer or a ladle and then submerge it in the bubbling broth.
- Use a fork and flake the salmon to check if it's cooked - if it's pink and flaky, remove it from the broth. Set aside.
- Reduce the heat to low.

Directions for quinoa
- Bring about 3 cups of broth to a boil
- Add the quinoa and the onions
- Wait for the mixture to boil
- Reduce the heat to medium and cook the quinoa until the liquid evaporates (approximately 12 minutes)
- Remove the quinoa from the heat and fluff it.
- Let the quinoa sit (with the lid on) for about 15 minutes.

Directions for the salad
- After the quinoa has sat for 15 minutes, add the fresh ingredients (pepper, tomatoes, and parsley).
- Add the chopped lobster and the salmon.
- Using a wooden spoon, mix everything together (the salmon should flake apart).
- Enjoy.

(I also added cooked corn - sliced off the cob).

Cayenne pepper pork chops with lime, avocado and tomato salsa

The fiery heat of cayenne pepper always brings memories of hot and sticky summer nights, while lime, cilantro, avocado and tomato salsa arethe equivalent of an ice cold drink. Pulled together into one savoury dish? Absolute summer heaven.

Since this recipe comes from my brain (and isn't adapted), I'm going to be pretty loose in terms of ingredients and instructions.

Pork chop spices ingredients
- garlic salt
- cayenne pepper
- black pepper

Salsa topping ingredients
- 1 haas avocado, chopped
- 1/2 purple onion (diced)
- 1/2 cup cilantro
- 1/2 cup of frozen corn (cooked)
- 1/2 cup of tomatoes (diced)

Prime rib roasting on a cold spring day...

After a week of spring-like weather, we're back to winter weather - on the first day of spring! To bring some comfort to my family's bellies, I decided to make a prime rib roast, along with mashed potatoes, gravy and salad.

Making a roast seems like a lot of work, but in fact, it's just time. All you have to do is figure out how long you need to roast the meat for, season it, and then pop it into the oven. An hour or so later (or longer, if you've got a large piece of meat) - voila! Perfectly medium-rare, prime rib roast.

In today's case, the prime rib roast was 4.38 pounds. For medium rare, the calculations are 17-20 minutes per pound at 330. It took me about 1.5 hours.

Here's my seasoning recipe:
- Dijon mustard (option)
- 5 cloves of garlic
- 1 Tbs sea salt

- Let the prime rib roast warm up to room temperature before you start working with it; otherwise, you'll need to increase your roasting temperature.
- Take the garlic and slice each clove into 2-3 pieces
- Where there are natural folds of the meat (fat, etc), and put the garlic into the meat
- Take the salt and likely coat the entire outside of the roast
- This is optional, but take a pastry brush and coat the outside of the roast with dijon mustard (this helps to keep the roast moist); you can also add rosemary to the mixture
- Pre-heat the oven, and when it hits 330C, put the roast in
- After the roast is done, take it out and cover the roast for 20 minutes (this process is called tenting, and helps keep the roast moist by letting the juices in the meat settle) - DO NOT cut into the roast until it's done.

After waiting 20 minutes, I like to cut into the meat and use some of the juices that have come out to make a gravy.

I'm not a big fan of instant gravy - it just tastes off. If you're boiling vegetables, save the water (as it is now technically a broth) and use it as the base for your gravy.

- Bring the vegetable stock to a boil (you can also take 3 cups of water and add a beef bouillon cube)
- When it boils, pour in the meat juices
- Take 1 tbs of corn starch (or 1.5 tbs if you like a thicker gravy) and add about 2 tbs of cold water
- Mix the corn starch and water together until the cornstarch no longer sticks
- Pour this mixture into the boiling pot - being careful to stir / whisk the bubbling mixture (whisking reduces the chances of the gravy being lumpy)
- The gravy will start to thicken - once it does, take if off the heat

And...that's my prime rib roast recipe...simple, huh?

Mini chicken pie tartlets / chicken pot pie

One of my favourite things to do is to take a recipe or a dish and adapt it to make something smaller. I often find recipes overwhelming because the portions are usually meant to feed 6-8 people, which is a lot of food. (And to be honest, I'm sometimes just too lazy to do the math). But over the last few years, I've gotten pretty comfortable (through lots of trial and error) with tinkering. I once made chicken pot pie from scratch - pie crust, roasted chicken - and it took forever. After thinking through the basics, I decided to do something much simpler - namely buying a roast chicken (or using leftovers) and the pie crust.

Since then, I've adapted the recipe again and turned it into finger foods. The end result? Mini chicken pie tartlets, or "home made" chicken pot pies

Ingredients
- 1 whole chicken (or the leftovers from roasted chicken...at least 1/2 though)
- 2-3 cups of frozen mixed veggies (more chicken = less veggies, and vice versa)
- 1-2 cloves of garlic, minced
- 1/2 teaspoon of olive oil
- pinch of salt
- 1 can of cream of mushroom soup (low sodium)
- 1/2 cup of skim milk (or if you like more flavour, actual cream)
- 2 big pie shells or 12 mini pie shells


Directions
- Defrost pie shells
- Preheat your oven to 375 degrees celcius
- Separate the cooked chicken from the bones and shred / cut into small pieces
- Pour oil into a large pan and wait for the pan to heat
- Once the oil starts popping, toss in the minced garlic with the salt
- Lower the heat to medium as soon as the garlic starts to brown (approximately 15-20 seconds)
- Toss in the frozen vegetables
- Cook the veggies on medium heat for 3-5 minutes
- Toss in the chicken
- Open the cream of mushroom soup and pour into the mixture
- Add the milk
- Stir until the soup and milk are evenly distributed
- Wait until the mixture starts to bubble a bit and remove from the heat
- Take the defrosted pie shells out of the box
- Add the filling to one of the pie shells (or half the small shells) - be careful not to overfill
- Take a little bit of water, and with your finger, wet the edge of the pie shell
- Take the remaining pie shell, turn it upside down and put it on top of the pie shell
- Pinch the edges of both pie shells so that they stick together
- Using a fork, poke a few holes into the top of the pie (this allows steam to escape...otherwise your pie could explode)
- Place the pie in the oven and let it cook for 50 - 60 minutes (or until the crust is golden brown)
- Remove from oven and let cool for 5-10 minutes
- Enjoy

Curry makes feta taste better...

...or maybe it doesn't. I admit that I'm a little tipsy as I post this, but I had such an amazing dinner that I wanted to talk about it. Tonight is the first night of the Olympics, so the booze, sweets and yummy foods are aplenty.



I had the most amazing cucumber salad and deep fried/baked drumsticks. Add a bottle of pinot grigio and wow. Me, being super inquisitive, I wanted to know how everything was made. Here is an approximate recap of the recipes. I haven't tried these yet, but I will soon.

Cucumber salad ingredients
- Dill
- Cucumbers
- Lemon / lime juice (freshly squeezed)
- Feta cheese
- Olive oil
- Red peppers (if desired)
- Salt (to draw out the sweetness)
- White/Red onions


Double beer battered drumsticks
- Chicken drum sticks
- Beer + buttermilk mixture
- Flour
- Oil (for deepfrying)

After deep frying, bake.

I swear, it was really good. I'll most likely try these dishes in my own kitchen.

And, for those who are taking part. Happy Olympics. Go Canada, go!