a glorious summer

Well, as this summer is evolving as one of the best ever, especially as far as the weather is concerned, my thoughts are turning once more to cooking up a storm. I made a yummy quinoa and kale salad, filled with delicious seeds...next time i think I'll add some feta cheese for more protein and shred the kale to make it easier to eat for some folks (the large pieces are a bit hard to negotiate to get some quinoa on your fork lol, and also I think most folks would like the kale better if it was mixed in a bit more)....one of the recipes to share with Lily's cafe in Picton. Yes, things are moving forward on that front. I have bought a house and could move as early as Oct. After a couple of business related meetings this coming week I should have a better idea. I have put my condo on the market and hope to make enough profit to hold me for a bit....

July healthies and yummies

I am continuing to make my sister's delicious recipe for granola with my favourite combination being pumpkin seeds, dried cranberries and pecans. I've also been spending time and energy researching the relative nutritional values of a few baking items, looking into the whys and whats of gluten free diets (interesting issue and trend).... I made some 'healthier' oatmeal cookies last weekend with decadent chocolate bits and a bit too much wheat germ, which resulted in a pretty crumbly cookie. I laughed with a friend that while they tasted good, they would make a better fruit crumble bottom than a cookie. I may be doing some baking this weekend for someone a met in a medical office....hmmm, I will stick to a more basic recipe for selling, for now at least. Big changes are in the works for me as I build this passion for promoting healthy baking as part of a healthier lifestyle.

On another yummy and not as healthy treat note, the ice cream store Slickers in Bloomfield (Prince Edward County) sells homemade ice cream that is worth every bit of fat and calories. Enjoy the summer everyone!

veg on...

Since I have been back from the Canyon I have mostly been out and about and not spending too much time cooking or baking. However I am working on learning how to cook tofu to make it really tasty (it is definitely a work in progress :)) ...after viewing a video on factory farming and also reading 2 wonderful books by Sy Montgomery, The Good Pig and Birdology I have found it increasingly difficult to buy, cook and eat meat. So I am making more vegetarian dishes,like a delicious Morrocan salad, a variety of tofu dishes such as tofu eggless sandwich filling and the dish of tonight, a red curry cauliflower dish. It has coconut milk which I love and it is very tasty on brown rice. yum! I have also started to eat hemp hearts which are very high in complete protein. I overdid the exercise about 4 weeks ago and have had to forgo cycling (I did do 30 km in the ride for Heart) as well as rowing for a bit....hope the physiotherapist is able to help me get back into these things soon. In the meantime, I am not gaining weight, due mostly to eating veggie most of the time (my thought anyway!)....happy cooking....more soon

Grand Canyon adventure

I find it interesting, that while life and of necessity both making and eating food continue, writing about this may not. At the end of April I was gifted with a 6 day hike in the Grand Canyon. My best friend and I decided last fall to do this trip together and it not surprisingly was our 'best trip ever'. We hiked long and hard and were gifted with being part of this amazing piece of our world. We of course ate many energy bars and trail mix as well as meals prepared by the lodges and hotels. My favourite meals were prepared by our 2 guides, Travis and Marc, Travis being a foodie extraordinaire. A banquet 'fit for royalty' was prepared at the bottom of Havasu Canyon on a small BBQ. (..and yes, our guides carried all ingredients all of the way down in their packs) It started with grilled Brie with blueberries (see photo)on French bread; grilled fresh salmon served with home-made pepper, onion, cilantro, pineapple salsa (see photo) and chicken grilled in balsalmic vinegar and olive oil; grilled portabello mushrooms and couscous with grilled zucchini and asparagus....since I have been back, I have made a conscientious decision to become vegetarian. Knowing more about factory farming as well as reading the amazing book "Birdology" by Sy Montgomery has opened my eyes and heart to the creatures who have graced my table with their flesh. So....I am experimenting with tofu, have started to include 3 Tbsp of hemp hearts in my breakfast porridge and have opened a new chapter in my life and love of food. In actual fact, I think that I am just picking up the pieces of my initial venture into being a veg that started about 25 years ago and just fell by the wayside over the years. Stay tuned for more recipes and learnings.....Love to all

pot luck dishes

I recently went to a pot-luck and decided to bring a salad and dessert...healthy for the former and decadent for the latter :) I found a grain salad recipe in the Stop cookbook (I have not yet found a recipe I don't love from this cookbook!). The options for ingredients are pretty much endless and I used quinoa and bulghur as the grains, sweet red pepper, carrots and cucumber for the veggies, cilantro and parsley the herbs, cumin, curry and paprika the spices, grapeseed oil with lemon (yum!) for the oil with cider vinegar and cranberries, pecans, pumpkin seeds and dried apricots....it made a large bowl and was absolutely delicious as well as colourful and of course very healthy. It is one of those dishes that I can feel my body saying thank you for.

The dessert I decided upon was for a chocolate pie. I got the recipe from the internet which included an oreo cookie crust. I wanted to make the filling from scratch of course and used a high quality chocolate. It was well worth it and while a bit like a pudding filling rather than a solid pie, it got raving reviews. I used an organic cane sugar for the sweetener. I intend to experiment with agave soon, not in this recipe but perhaps for granola...who knows???

Sis' granola

A while ago (months actually) my sister gave me her recipe for home-made granola and I have just made it for the first time.....it is absolutely the best, most nutritious granola I have ever had. Thanks Sis!!! I had a blast buying various types of grains and nuts to try and then mixed and matched when it came to putting it all together. As I love cranberries and dried apricots, these were the fruits I chose to add...As it makes a large batch I am hoping that it won't get stale before I eat it all, if I decide not to give any away, which I may. I am thinking that I will post the recipe at the local bulk store where I have made friends of the owners and they are teaching me some of the business, as well as bring some in for them to try. The world can only get better with happy thoughts and bodies, fueled by good, healthy food...YUM!!!

...best ever zucchini loaf

I actually have been both baking and cooking over the last couple of weeks and just haven't made the time to post. I am the proud owner of an amazing cookbook from The Stop, a community kitchen in north-west Toronto. In fact, I was so blown away by most of the recipes in this book, I took the folks there a Christmas braid as a treat. As my sisters will testify, these braids are a family gift tradition that are usually reserved for good friends. The recipe for zucchini loaf has cranberries and pecans as well as being sweetened with mostly apple sauce. It was a huge hit at my 'condo-warming get together, as was the delicious minestrone soup from the same cookbook. The soup had fennel, beans not too much tomato....YUM!!!