Day 72: Shepherd’s Pie...

This may sound strange, but until I made this, I’m not sure I’ve ever eaten Shepherd’s Pie.  I grew up believing that Asian food was superior to Western food, so things like Shepherd’s Pie was something I’d avoid.  In the last five or six years, I’ve come to rethink my opinions and delved into Western food.

One day I had some potatoes left over, and so I decided to try making up a batch, and this was the result.

Enjoy...

Day 71: Pork and Shrimp Dumpling...

Let’s say you have an empty Sunday, not much to do, but maybe watch TV or a movie.  It’s raining and cold outside, so nursing a warm apple cider, tea or coffee while the screen flickers before you sounds in order.

If, when your cup empties, and you’re looking for something else to do with your hands, you can lay out the tools and ingredients to make some pork and shrimp dumplings.  After an hour or less, you’ll have a cookie sheet covered with Chinese Dumplings!  Freeze them and bag them, and then you can have them any time you want.

You want to impress guests?  Have some ready made, home made dumplings prepared.

Enjoy...

Day 70: Pita Bread...

By popular demand I was asked to post this recipe.  I hadn’t planned on doing so, because it’s really just my old reliable bread loaf recipe, just shaped differently.  It however made such a positive impression I had no choice but to post it.

Enjoy...

Day 69: Wet Dream version 2

Please disregard my previous recipe for this drink.  When I originally made it the store I went to didn’t have all the liqueurs I wanted, so I made do.  Later I tried again with more ingredients from a larger store, and came up with a newer, better drink.

This could be the very best cocktail drink I have ever devised.  It’s a smooth chocolate drink with a very complex, dynamic flavour.

Enjoy...

Day 68: Dinner in a Pot...

I was caught in the middle of a firefight between militant wings of the Scientologist and Hari Krishna movements.  There were bullets flying everywhere, as the two enemies battled over control of the Ottawa International Airport lobby.  I was pinned down behind a ticket kiosk, hoping that the mound of plastic and metal would be enough to stop the high velocity 5.56mm bullets screaming past.  I knew I didn’t want to wait until I took a bullet to find out if I was safe, I did something I probably shouldn’t - I ran for it.

Spotting a nearby doorway, I picked myself up off the floor and ran.  I knew I could get there quickly, being a pretty fast runner, but once I got going, I suddenly had an idea what it was like to run across the 417 in traffic.  Only these bullets were much smaller, more numerous, and a lot, lot faster than cars.  It took everything I had to keep me from freezing in place as I felt the burning wind of SS109’s graze my flesh.

Reaching the door, my hand thrust out, hoping it wasn’t locked.  It wasn’t.  I bolted in, closed the door behind me, and locked it.  Once my breathing normalized I realized I was in a kitchen.  Since it was 5:45, and I was starting to get hungry.  I took a look around at what was available, and threw this meal together.

Day 67: Wet Dream...

I was going to a friend’s party, and it had become a tradition to mix up a batch of my Maple Cream cocktail to serve as part of the pot-luck.  Alas I was nearly out of the Maple liqueur I needed for the drink, so I thought, “It’s been a while, maybe I can come up with a new drink!”

I took a look at my selection of liqueurs for inspiration, and decided on chocolate.  Everyone likes chocolate, and since I already had the Maple Cream drink in mind, of which the primary ingredient is milk, I decided to marry chocolate with milk.  So this was to be a chocolate milk cocktail, but I didn’t want this to be a one note chocolate drink.  It needed to have depth, so I went for more than one type of liqueur to complement the milk and chocolate syrup I used to make it.

The cocktail went over very well, and after a brief discussion, a good friend of mine suggested a name for it, the Wet Dream, which I think is so much better than what I came up with.

Overall I’m not sure I haven’t created a monster here.  Once you have one, it’s hard not to have more, and given how tasty it is, you tend to drink it quickly, and out go the inhibitions.  Maybe it’s a great drink to serve at an orgy, and not really suitable for a casual gathering for friends?

I’ll let you decide...

Day 66: Thin Crust Pizza...

Between getting ready for the Ottawa Animation Festival, going to the Ottawa Animation Festival, and then getting sick, I haven’t had much time to blog.

With that in mind, I thought I’d return with a biggie!  My pizza crust is famous among those who’ve had the chance to try it, but there’s one problem with it, it takes time.  Often (and I include myself) people want pizza, and they want it now, not tomorrow.  So enter my thin crust pizza recipe.

A thin crust pizza dough doesn’t need the time to develop like a normal crust because the whole point is to keep it thin and not a thick, bready thing.  The only disadvantage to making the crust within an hour instead of 24 hours, is the dough doesn’t get the time to develop flavour, but I think I’ve gotten around this by introducing molasses into the mix.

So knock yourself out, and give this thing a try.  One tip, if you want the crust to be extra crispy, precook it in the oven for 1 to 2 minutes before topping, otherwise the crust will be thin, but not crispy.