Slow Food - The Beginning

This may not be slow food in the revolutionary vein, rather it is the first time we're experimenting with a slow cooker. And if you're going to do something new, you might as well pull out some stops. So, a pound of white turnips, new carrots, onion, baby king mushrooms, garlic from yesterday's foray to the Brickworks market, an eye of the round roast, our own basil, salt, pepper, and a can of Guinness later, dinner is cooking at 7:30 am. This may not be the first time we've started cooking this early, but usually that's just to get the stock pot going, or because we're canning.

Now, the waiting game begins... Time to make breakfast...

 

Brickworks Market Breakfast

In keeping with the Earth Day theme, we used yesterday's market basket provided the almost the entirety of this morning's breakfast. Normally we would turn out a frittata from these sort of ingredients. the big duck eggs with their brilliant orange yolks inspired us to try something different.

First, we sautéed finely chopped onion (the last of Ben Sosnicki's brought up from the cold cellar), with baby king mushrooms, cured whey fed pork tenderloin, and fresh baby spinach from yesterday's market.

Once done, we popped them into the oven to keep warm while making two thin crepe style omelettes. Each was made from two duck eggs, with a dash of salt, pepper, and herbs de Provence. Once done, the filling went in, and some Montfort dairy Toscano was grated on top and rolled up. A slice of olive-cilantro bread rounded out the plate, and there was a mug of tea to drink.

The end result was a lovely start to a Sunday morning. I hope your day started as well too!

 

Earth Day at the Brickworks

Looking at the logs it seems like almost six months have passed since my last post. Where has the time gone? Imagine, Nyls is almost one, and Aija's going on four! That said, while there haven't been updates, there have been lots of good times in the kitchen of the Hotel Cavell. This first post back won't be a retrospective though. Rather, I'd like to take this opportunity to post a look at the good things to be had at the Earthy Day celebrations at the Brickworks. Our local farmers had a lot to offer despite the season, as you can see here.

Chicken, duck and quail eggs, chocolate cookies, baguette and olive-cilantro bread from the St John's Bakery, spinach, cheese and cured pork loing from the Montfort Dairy, cider and Red Prince apples, baby king mushrooms. The question is, what will they become?

You'll just have to wait and see...

 

Marathon Meals

 Staying in a villa on the easternmost edge of Greece where it falls into the Aegean left us far from many amenities.  Despite the demand from the re-enactment, a few nice things were had to eat, "over there."

Here's a little round up before we get back to our regularly scheduled programming.

The view from the pool level at the Ashley Villa.

Taverna take out the first night.  Way too much food!

Suzy toasts after a sit down dinner at a local taverna.

The view from my seat at Archeon Geysis, or ancient tastes, a restaurant in
Piraeus that only serves classicaly prepared food.  Honestly, one of the best meals of my life...

A braised goat leg in the process of being demolished.



We also did some cooking too... Chicken breasts marinading in the villa's rosemary.



Julian Faulkner, one of our companions, prepares dinner one night.

Her piece de resistance, greek yogurt with honey, figs, and cake...

Aija attacks a meal in a Monastiraki taverna.

A "quiet" evening out on the balcony.  A bottle of wine and a box of figs...

The view from the balcony...

Catching Up on the Backlog

A last minute trip to Greece to re-enact the 2500th anniversary of the Battle of Marathon put a bit of a dent in my spare time, and one of the first thing that had to give was posting in the blog.  That's not to say that there wasn't a lot of cooking going on.  Here's a little photo round up of a few things that have gone down or come out of the kitchen over the past month:



Aija spooning fig jam into a savoury tart. 
Some hamming it up for the photo couldn't be avoided...



Suzy happily engaged in the same task.

Aija demonstrating some dexterity by making the marinade
for a batch of teriyaki pork chops into an emulsion.

Summer vegetable salad from the market including purple beans.

A colourful farfalle dish whipped up in a hurry.

The tomatillo salsa was a big hit, especially as it was ready
when company dropped by unexpectedly.

Tired of seeing the bounty from the market yet?  Not me...

Sometimes the simple things are best... Canadian bacon, heirloom tomato, and
lettuce sandwiches on St. John's Bakery bread with the last of the 2010 pickled asparagus.

Pickles Galore

While life continues to be busy, better busy than bored I say!





My father, Nick, was down over the weekend and we had our noses to the grindstone renovating the Hotel's loft to make it both more fun and a bit safer.  It was a hard weekend's work, but between framing, drywalling, crib assembly there was time for a little bit of fun in the kitchen.  Nick brought five generous quarts of organic Nova raspberries from Pat Brooking's Annan Way Nursery outside of Owen Sound.  Some ended up in our bellies, some frozen for winter, and some became one of Aija's favourites, raspberry jam.  A trip to market turned up some lovely things, particularly white cucumbers from Potager du Kanada.  An experimental Greek-themed fritatta turned out to be a huge hit, and the fresh pickles were finished off.  We also had a nice roast chicken dinner with Suzy's folks on Saturday night to add a convivial turn to the weekend.



White cucumbers finely sliced and arranged.
Delicious with salt, and with none of the bitterness
in the skin one expects in a larger cucumber.



Greek fritatta - olives, tomatoes, feta, red onion, and parsley



Suzy was in particular thrilled by big effort of the past few days; decanting the fermented pickles.  No more would the house smell like pickles...  better than sauerkraut admittedly, but it does wear on a soul.     Fermented food can be quite lovely, but I always feel a bit trepiditious as I pull it out, particularly after a batch of whole heads of cabbage went off last year.  The resulting mess was a disgusting experience, and I probably would have required professional counselling to help deal with the shock if I wasn't made of sterner stuff.

They pickles had been in the pot for three weeks, and they smelled like... pickles.  A quick inspection showed that they were still sufficiently firm, and had turned a lovely variegated olive green, so out they came.  The canning gear got set up with a little help from Aija, and then after she was off bed Suzy and I laid up a dozen jars -  thirteen litres in total.  A yeoman's work on a school night, but you have to do it on the pickle's schedule.  This morning all the jars showed a firm seal, so we're holding to a 100% success rate so far this year. 

The bad news is that Ben Sosnicki's cucumbers didn't turn out, and we're going to have to find another source to make sure we can get up to target...

Fennel Failure

It was Taste of the Danforth weekend here in Riverdale, and most residents of the neighbourhood were doing their best to avoid the insanity going on in Greektown.  By insanity I mean a street packed with humanity waiting in line to pay three dollars for a traditional Greek cob of corn dipped in butter... At least I hope it's butter...

But around the edges life goes on, and as usual there were many nice and colourful things to be had at the market for about the same price as the aforementioned cob of corn, including purple potatoes from Dave at Haystrom farm, garlic and black  tomatoes from Ben Sosnicki, Purple Haze carrots from the Singhs, a perfectly white eggplant (in a beautiful display of three year old logic Aija asked if she could have some eggs the eggplant laid despite knowing all about chickens), a summer sausage from the Webers, and last, but not least, some green and yellow zucchini and young fennel from Laurel at Small Potatoes.

My Saturday dinner plan was pork chops marinated in lemon and fennel, and I was going to experiment and make up a fennel, lemon, and caper topping for the chops, with sides of baked zucchini with balsamic vinegar and parmesan cheese, and a fresh cucumber and tomato salad. 

Despite a kitchen witch to help ensure everything turns out, it was a troubled day from the start.  The tupperware with the marinade turned out not to seal terribly well, and I spilled olive oil and lemon juice all over the kitchen table.  After, despite some misgivings my friend Christian and I were going to join two other friends at Taste dressed as hoplites to advertise the upcoming re-enactment of the 2500th anniversary of the battle of Marathon in Marathon, Greece.  We and our daughters kitted up and marched off only to find that due to some mix-up the others had been escorted off by the police, and we made a strategic retreat to settle Aija down for a rest and eat fresh pickles and drink lemonade.

The third and final failure was the fennel, lemon, and caper topping.  I botched the lemon quantity, and it was quite honestly dreadful.  A sad waste of some lovely fennel.  Fortunately, everything else turned out well, and we had a lovely dinner to wrap things up for the day.