chili con carne and cheesy garlic bread

Have I told you that I go to school on the weekends? I'm in an MBA program at the University of Windsor that supplements my time away from work. Yah! Busy. Last Saturday while intently listening to my fascinating accounting prof discuss the new IFRS accounting standards, I glanced out the window and noticed the snowflakes. In my brain (or stomach) the first sign of snow, means the first chili should be made. And, what better to way to complement chili than with gooey-cheesy garlic bread (and I mean stupid-gooey-cheesy garlic bread)?

Pioneer Woman's Firecracker Shrimp Appetizer

Pioneer Woman's Garlic Cheese Bread
~I substituted Mozzarella for Monterrey Jack cheese~

Jamie Oliver's Chili Con Carne

~I used a cinnamon stick instead of ground cinnamon and added a small can of tomato paste~

The evening ended with us playing Taboo by the fire. Almost as cheesy as the garlic bread...I know.

gnocchi gone wild, making it for my first time

Picture this: I'm flipping through Cook With Jamie, trying to find the perfect meal to impress our friends George & Kara. They were driving in from Toronto so I wanted to make something special. I noticed a recipe for Gnocchi with Wild Mushrooms & Sage. Yum, right? Best of all, it appeared I could make the gnocchi a day ahead and then cook them for a fabulous Saturday night dinner.

The first step in the process was finding a potato ricer. That only took three stores...I should have hit Little Italy first! Next, I baked the potatoes...easy peasy.

Once I turned the potatoes into dough, I placed the gnocchi on a semolina flour lined cookie sheet and left them in the fridge overnight. Pretty.

The following day, I made crispy sage and sauteed wild mushrooms for the sauce.

When the sauce was almost ready, I placed the gnocchi in a large pot of boiling salted water. And, here is our "gnocchi" with wild mushrooms and sage.

Wondering what happened to my beautiful homemade (filled with love) gnocchi? Well, something went terribly wrong and I had a total gnocchi fail -- they disintegrated. My hard work disintegrated in front of my very eyes...and my guests' eyes. So I did what any good hostess would do, I pretended that I wasn't absolutely heartbroken and I threw a bag of brown rice pasta in another pot of boiling water. And, then proceeded to talk about how F-A-B-U-L-O-U-S brown rice pasta is for your health...it's lot easier to digest and much better for you than regular pasta or gnocchi, ya know!

simple thai menu

While my American friends were celebrating Thanksgiving, I was having an impromptu dinner with two friends and their new baby boy. Craving some kind of Asian fare, I decided on a simple Thai menu. I don't have recipes for the spring rolls but I've included links to the chicken and pineapple rice (just omit the shrimp in the recipe) both from Nancie McDermott's Quick & Easy Thai.

Grilled (in our case roasted) garlic chicken, issahn style

Pineapple fried rice

I encourage you to give Thai home cooking a try, and let me know how it goes!

the key to the good life...

The key to the good life is having a friend who bakes. A friend who is an extraordinary bake. A friend who happily brings over a fresh challah. A friend who graciously offers to contribute pumpkin chocolate chip loaf to Thanksgiving dinner. A friend who is not offended when you send her a recipe at 2:30 p.m. on a Friday and suggest that she bring it over for dinner that same night.

Last-Minute Menu

Guacamole & Blue Corn Tortilla Chips

Paprika and Worcestershire Marinated & Grilled Top Sirloin
Roasted Fennel
Roasted Potatoes with Grainy Mustard & Shallots
The [gooiest-yummiest] Maple Pear Upside-Down Cake

*Recipes from Bonnie Stern's Friday Night Dinners except dessert which hailed from the Bitten Blog in the New York Times...and Julie's kitchen.

food52 entry: roasted pumpkin, serrano ham, manchego cheese salad

Every week Food52 summons home cooks around the globe to enter their contests. This week the themes revolve around your best Autumn salad recipe and best sweet potato recipe. Want to know how I created my salad? Click here. Better yet, I encourage you to sign up on Food52 so that you can comment, vote and participate. It's fun and it's food -- how could you go wrong?!?!

awesome pita chips, autumn salad, roast chicken

Have you checked out Food52? I'm addicted to the videos, the Piglet and their weekly recipe contests. This week, Amanda and Merrill are asking home cooks to submit recipes for their best autumn salads and best sweet potatoes. I thought about the salad, and what flavours/foods I'd like to include, then I built a Sunday night dinner around it.

Fall Sunday Night Dinner

Rosemary thyme pita chips (awesome recipe from Food52)
Roasted garlic & sage cannellini bean dip
Autumn salad (I'll post on Food 52 later this week)
Roasted chicken with lemon and rosemary potatoes

Let me know what you think about Food52. Could it become one of your go-to recipe sources?

Sunday dinner: braised short ribs

A few years ago Sharon and I went to a cooking class at the local LCBO (government-owned liquor store, for my American friends). The class was taught by Erik Peacock, from Niagara's Wellington Court Cafe. He showed us how to make Asian-inspired beef short ribs. We left the class and Sharon's been making those sweet, gingery short ribs ever since. It's taken me almost five years to attempt short ribs and I decided to try a more traditional recipe.

Braised in red wine and Port, short ribs can be started in the afternoon and left to cook over the next several hours. What wonderful comfort food for a cold Sunday night!

My Sunday Night Menu from Bonnie Stern's Friday Night Dinners

Hummus with cilantro pesto

Braised beef short ribs on red-skinned smashed potatoes
~I added roasted garlic and a couple of spoonfuls of caramelized onions for fun~

When I mentioned on Twitter that I was making comfort food for dinner, Meg from Maker's Table sent links to two of her favourite recipes: Beef Stew with Zinfandel and Mama Lorette's Rice Pudding. I will be sure to try both of these recipes soon!

Do you have a recipe that you'd like to share? What's your favourite, go-to, homemade comfort food?

pizza party menu

Gudrin's smoked salmon, roasted red pepper, roasted artichoke & goat's cheese pizza

One night this week, Erin and Gudrin came over for a pizza party. What was on our menu? Take a wild guess! Pizza and wine. That's it. BTW, kudos to Erin for making the pizza dough between clients. :)

Erin's pizza: Extra virgin olive oil with a hint of garlic salt, sliced Bosc pear, crumbled blue cheese, a smattering of mozzarella and Parmesan

Gudrin's pizza: Smoked salmon, roasted red peppers, roasted artichokes, Mrs. Porter's homemade roasted tomato sauce, mozzarella, and goat's cheese

Jordana's pizza (which got stuck to the pan...so we couldn't really eat it): Sliced tomato, ricotta and Mrs. Porter's homemade roasted tomato sauce with a touch of pesto

I think we'll have another pizza party. My plan is to recreate my favourite pizza from Terra Cotta in Windsor. I like olive tapenade, spinach, eggplant, roasted red peppers, feta cheese and rosemary. Girls, will you come over again soon?

P.S. Lulu B Pinot Noir was also on the menu. It's a perfect pizza wine. Thanks to Gudrin for bring it along!

canadian thanksgiving menu

Thank you Bonnie Stern. You are my favourite Canadian cookbook author and if you ever talked to me, you'd be my friend. (Even if you just talked to me on Twitter, we don't actually have to meet or anything.)

Hubby and I just moved into our new house (house is old, but it's new to us) and invited two couples over for Canadian Thanksgiving. Bonnie, you posted a Thanksgiving menu on the National Post website but I relied on your Essentials of Homecooking and Friday Night Dinner books to make most of our meal.

Marinated Olives with Tangerine and Rosemary

Marinated Goat Cheese

Mixed Greens with Walnut Dressing

Roast Turkey
~served with wild mushroom & leek stuffing and country mash~

Spiced Cranberry Port Sauce
Julie's Homemade Whipped Cream

~served with Julie's (read: Windsor's best bake) Homemade Pecan Pie and Pumpkin Loaf~

Now, if you're wondering what to do with the leftover turkey...I highly recommend making a turkey, brie, cranberry sauce sandwich. Get to it.

pre-thanksgiving indian dinner menu

Terry the Firefighter and the MenuManiac

You may remember Terry the Firefighter from his guest post. Last night, we were lucky enough to have his expertise in our new professional kitchen. Luckily Terry the Firefighter, is a professional in more ways than one. Inspired by a recent trip to Vij's in Vancouver, this firefighter came up with the perfect Indian menu. He gives total and complete credit to Vikram Vij.

Ginger-Lemon Drink

Tomato, Coriander and Ginger Soup

Garam Masala-Sauteed Portobello Mushrooms in a Porcini Cream Curry
Marinated Lamb Popsicles with Fenugreek Cream Curry

Terry's tips when cooking from Elegant & Inspired Vij's Indian Cuisine:

• Even if the recipe instructions go against your instincts, follow Vij's direction. It will not disappoint
• Take advantage of the wine pairings that are included with each recipe

How groovy we got after this fantastic meal:

metabolic cleanse menu #1: roast chicken

On Sunday, I started a metabolic cleanse. It was recommended by my naturopathic doctor who basically said that detoxing my liver and gastrointestinal tract would build a strong foundation for my immune system. Apparently, this will help me not get a million colds this winter (I'm hoping that it will also prevent swine flu). So, for the next seven days I'll be drinking icky rice and pea protein shakes and eliminating alcohol, beef, dairy and wheat from my diet.

Metabolic cleanse dinner menu #1

Homemade hummus and Mary's Seed Crackers

Roast chicken

Grilled vegetables with balsamic basil dressing

Tossed salad

No wine

Betcha can't wait to hear about menu #2...

a not so traditional rosh hashanah dinner menu

Years ago, when my then soon-to-be hubby and I were negotiating my move to Windsor, I requested that we spend the first night of the Jewish holidays with my family. So on Friday, hubby and I drove four hours to spend the first night of Rosh Hashanah in St. Catharines. Luckily, his CTS has an input for our iPod so we were able to chill and prepare ourselves for this:

Appetizers included cheese plate, smoked oysters, chopped liver and hummus

World's best chopped chicken liver (made by my mom, of course!)

Aunt Shelley's Greek salad

Challah

Kinnereth Cookbook chicken

Brisket

Scalloped Potatoes

P.S. Like usual, the more wine I consumed the less focused the photos! :) Sorry.

new recipes: wild rice salad, grilled salmon

Our friends Hilly, Sue & Simone joined us for dinner on Sunday night. I took the opportunity to try two new recipes...a rice salad and a grilled salmon with a crunchy shallot mustard vinaigrette. You are going to love this rice salad and so are your friends. Trust me, this is going to become your go-to recipe for potluck dinners! The fish's vinaigrette was flavoured with shallots, grainy mustard and honey. It was a wonderful enhancement to the already delicious grilled wild salmon.

Wild rice salad with roasted red peppers

~Cook brown rice and wild rice blend according to package. After rice has cooled to room temperature, mix in chopped roasted red peppers, chopped fresh herbs like mint, basil and parsley, add lemon/olive oil dressing, lemon zest, kosher salt and freshly ground pepper. You can find a more complete recipe in Jamie Oliver's book Jamie's Food Revolution.~

Grilled salmon with crunchy sweet mustard vinaigrette and sauteed green beans

This summery meal was a hit. I love when Hilly "oohs and ahhs" over the food. Do you have any summer meals that you must make before the fall is fully here?

mishka's visit

On Friday, my dear friend Mishka drove from Toronto to Windsor in the rain. And, when she arrived it was still raining and cold. Talk about dreary. The weather warranted a special meal for a special friend.

Homemade pesto with buffalo mozzarella and roasted red peppers

~Throw a few handfuls of basil leaves, a small handful of toasted pinenuts, some shredded parmesan, juice from 1/2 lemon, pinch of kosher salt and freshly ground pepper in a small food processor. Pulse. Eat.~

To warm us up, I decided to make Jamie Oliver's Chicken and Leek Pot Pie (you can find the recipe in his book Jamie's Dinners). Unfortunately, I forgot to take the puff pastry out of the freezer (and I don't bake!) so we decided to eat the filling as a stew served on top of mashed red potatoes. I wish this would have photographed better because it was damn tasty.

A rainy day is a perfect day for comfort food. I'm sure you can agree.

summer italian

My inlaws are wonderful people. They are funny, generous and just generally great to be around. Many summer Sundays are spent at their home taking a dip in the pool and gathering around the table for grilled lamb chops, tomato salad, and local corn on the cob.

This week, we wanted to say thank you for everything they've done for us lately. We invited them over for an Italian summer meal...truly inspired from a number of Jamie Oliver cookbooks.

Fava been and fresh pea crostini
~Grill a dozen slices of baguette. Brush with a clove of garlic and drizzle with the best extra virgin olive oil on hand. Top with a puree of canned fava beans, freshly shucked green peas, parmesean cheese, salt, pepper, extra virgin olive oil and lemon juice.~

Peach, prosciutto (in this case, Serrano ham), fresh mozzarella, mint salad

Wild mushroom pappardelle

Our pasta needed a little extra "something", so I pulled out an amazing/outstanding/out-of this-freaking world extra virgin olive oil that our interior designer gave us. It's from a small property in France and is made by his friends. What I love about this olive oil is the pungency. It tastes like olives. And, it was the perfect complement to our meal.Buon appetito!

P.S. If you want my interior designer's name, you'll have to wait. Just a few more weeks, I hope.