I got a mandoline slicer the other day at Winner’s. It was only $20 and comes with several attachments for grating and stuff (and we needed a new grater) so I’ve used it daily since. I made salads on the weekend and made some pickled onions and today I sliced up some raw beets because nothing says health (to me at least) like raw beets. I am already planning an enormous vat of scalloped potatoes (“eww” says Ari when I announced this, but she thought I meant scallops and she’s right, scallops are EWWW).

I almost wonder how I’ve lived so long without one.

There are also cookies on the horizon, proper crinkles with Skor bits.  I’ll share them with my loved ones but only if Lake Saab gets mopped up.

I dressed them with the sauce from the pickled onions (which was really just fresh lime juice, salt and a little olive oil) and a squeeze of orange juice.

I’m not sure if this will ever appear on the website in question, but as far as I am concerned There! I Fixed It! totally applies to the following:

For some reason I decided I’d like to make truffles to hand out at xmas time. I’d looked on foodgawker and Martha Stewart for recipes and then, surprise surprise, a very simple recipe appeared in the most recent issue of Everyday Food. This is a magazine I buy every month and have had subscriptions to in the past. I try, each month, to do at least one recipe, just to keep things fresh, but haven’t been terribly successful in recent months. Anyway, the recipe had 4 basic ingredients: chocolate, heavy cream, vanilla and salt.  Sounds easy, right? Well. Here’s where things go terribly wrong…

I chopped up the chocolate but instead of weighing it (and YES, I do have a kitchen scale!) I was lazy and measured it by volume. I followed all the instructions to a tee, even leaving it in the fridge to cool longer than recommended (while out and about), but it never set up. I guess I didn’t use enough chocolate? Anyway, it refused to roll into balls, being the consistancy of thick pudding. Delicious, creamy, expensive pudding…I didn’t want to throw it out and I didn’t want to just plop it into bowls and serve as is so I decided to make a bunch of crepes and layer them together.

Voila.

It tastes great, lemme tell you. It’s a little rubbery and hard to eat neatly, and in hindsight, I probably could have rolled the chocolate up inside the crepes in a more traditional way and sprayed them with whipped cream…but, you know, hindsight 20-20 and all that.

These are sort of mutant cookies. I had half a box of lemon cake mix that had been sitting around for a while-I don’t even remember what became of the first half-that I decided to make cookies, based on that awesomely easy recipe I made almost a year ago. I used mini chocolate chips and they came out really well, thanks!

I’m calling them lemon crinkles. Next in line for baking are cupcakes, but that might not happen until we return from our trip to CR.

I hadn’t ordered a good food box from the Anne Johnston Health Centre in months but something in my head tweaked a couple weeks ago and I put my name down. Am I ever glad, look what I got:

1 Romaine Lettuce
2lb carrots
3lb potatoes
3lb  pears
3lb apples
2 lb onions
2 red peppers
1 head cauliflower
1.5 litre box coronation blue grapes
1 bunch organic kale
1 organic eggplant
2 field tomatoes

Not a bad haul, and all that for $17. This cheered me greatly after watching a rather depressing documentary about the woman who ‘starred’ in the infamous ‘Animal Farm’ videos everyone’s seen. Now to figure out what to do with a vegetable only I like (eggplant).

Or maybe the other way around? I have been trying recently to expand my horizons by cooking food outside my comfort zone. This means baking-mostly-non out of the box deserts. I’ve already made 2 of these apple cakes (which really are the best apple cake I’ve ever had and it gets totally eaten here-unusual) in the past weeks, but cake is easy, it’s something I am familiar with. So today I decided to do bars. BARS! Oh, not just bars, these are lime coconut bars and trust me, they are delicious. Oh, so incredibly delicious.

I love sweet and tangy at the same time, so good. I’ll make lemon bars next time!

The second Daring Cooks challenge was presented as vegan and the author insisted that it be completely vegan. Well. We aren’t a vegan household and the only 2 things I changed-honestly!-was that I used cow milk (which we have in the fridge at all times) instead of almond or soy milk (which we never have, ever). I couldn’t justify buying a carton of almond milk that I only needed a half cup of, knowing the rest would take up space in the refrigerator until I realized it’s still there a month after it’s due date.  And I used AP flour instead of spelt flour.  Yeah, call me a cheater, that’s fine.

Anyway, it’s a good recipe, I loved the dosas (if I made them again, I’d double the recipe-this didn’t make nearly enough for the 4 people eating) and halve the coconut sauce. I wound up with 2 giant jars of coconut sauce that will probably never get eaten. Not that it’s not delicious, because it is, just that it’s a LOT and we don’t normally eat curry type food here. The filling is very tasty too. I only used one banana pepper because Ari was eating it too and I didn’t want to make it too spicy, but in hindsight, I do believe 2 would have been fine for everyone. The dosas made for a fun meal and I think any kid would love this.

The recipe (all notations are by the author):

Indian Dosas
This recipe comes in 3 parts, the dosas, the filling and the sauce. It does take awhile to make, but the filling and sauce can be made ahead and frozen if need be. You can serve them as a main course with rice and veggies, or as an appetizer. This does take a little planning ahead, so make sure you read the recipe through before starting (I forgot & didn’t start making the rice until everything was ready, oops).

Serves 4

Equipment needed:
large bowl
whisk
griddle or skillet
ladle (or large spoon)
spatula
vegetable peeler &/or knife
large saucepan
food processor or bean masher

Dosa Pancakes
1 cup (120gm/8oz) spelt flour (or all-purpose, gluten free flour)
½ tsp (2½ gm) salt
½ tsp (2½ gm) baking powder
½ tsp (2½ gm) curry powder
½ cup (125ml/4oz) almond milk (or soy, or rice, etc.)
¾ cup (175ml/6oz) water
cooking spray, if needed

Dosa Filling
1 batch Curried Garbanzo Filling (see below), heated

Dosa Toppings
1 batch Coconut Curry Sauce (see below), heated
¼ cup (125gm) grated coconut
¼ cucumber, sliced

Dosa Pancakes
1.Combine the dry ingredients in a bowl, slowly adding the almond milk and water, whisking until smooth.
2.Heat a nonstick skillet over medium heat. Spray your pan with a thin layer of cooking spray, if needed.
3.Ladle 2 tablespoons of batter into the center of your pan in a circular motion until it is a thin, round pancake. When bubbles appear on the surface and it no longer looks wet, flip it over and cook for a few seconds. Remove from heat and repeat with remaining batter. Makes 8 pancakes.

Curried Garbanzo Filling
This filling works great as a rice bowl topping or as a wrap too, so don’t be afraid to make a full batch.

5 cloves garlic
1 onion, peeled and finely diced
1 carrot, peeled and finely diced
1 green pepper, finely diced (red, yellow or orange are fine too)
2 medium hot banana chilies, minced
2 TBSP (16gm) cumin, ground
1 TBSP (8gm) oregano
1 TBSP (8gm) sea salt (coarse)
1 TBSP (8gm) turmeric
4 cups (850gm/30oz) cooked or canned chick peas (about 2 cans)
½ cup (125gm/4oz) tomato paste

1.Heat a large saucepan over medium to low heat. Add the garlic, veggies, and spices, cooking until soft, stirring occasionally.
2.Mash the chickpeas by hand, or in a food processor. Add the chickpeas and tomato paste to the saucepan, stirring until heated through.

Coconut Curry Sauce
This makes a great sauce to just pour over rice as well. This does freeze well, but the texture will be a little different. The flavor is still the same though. My picture of this sauce is one that I had made, had to freeze, then thaw to use. It tastes great, but the texture is a little runnier, not quite as thick as it was before freezing.

1 onion, peeled and chopped
2 cloves garlic
½ (2½ gm) tsp cumin, ground
¾ (3¾ gm) tsp sea salt (coarse)
3 TBSP (30gm) curry powder
3 TBSP (30gm) spelt flour (or all-purpose GF flour)
3 cups (750ml/24oz) vegetable broth
2 cups (500ml/24oz) coconut milk
3 large tomatoes, diced

1.Heat a saucepan over medium heat, add the onion and garlic, cooking for 5 minutes, or until soft.
2.Add the spices, cooking for 1 minutes more. Add the flour and cook for 1 additional minute.
3.Gradually stir in the vegetable broth to prevent lumps. Once the flour has been incorporated, add the coconut milk and tomatoes, stirring occasionally.
4.Let it simmer for half an hour.

My other advice would be to make the meal in steps and clean up between each step. I used a CRAZY amount of pots and pans and bowls and utensils and the kitchen was an enormous mess that took 2 full days to properly clean up. That said, I love doing these challenges, it forces me to think outside my normal cooking box and I’d recommend to anyone to join up and be a part of the team!

Thanks to Dave who continues to be my daring cooks challenges guinea pig!