ASIAN-STYLE CORN CHOWDER

This is a deliciously different spin on the  American classic.  You can find lemongrass and Thai  chili paste in  most large supermarkets.  It’s an easy soup to whip up and most of the ingredients are generally in your freezer or pantry.

ASIAN-STYLE CORN CHOWDER  makes around nine cups.

2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

2 generous tablespoons peeled, minced fresh ginger

2 medium shallots finely chopped

4 medium garlic cloves, minced

1 large onion, finely chopped

A generous sprinkling of red chili flakes

Around 3-4 cups of chicken stock (or vegetable broth if cooking vegetarian)

20 ounce bag of frozen whole-kernel corn

1 1/2 tsp sugar,    1/2 tsp salt,    generous amount of freshly ground black pepper

2 cups water

1 stalk (12 inches long) fresh lemongrass, lightly pounded and then cut into 4-inch-long pieces, or 3 strips lemon peel

For Garnish:  sour cream, cilantro, Thai red chili paste

Method:

Saute  the ginger, shallots, garlic, onion and lemongrass in the olive oil until lightly golden.   Sprinkle generously with salt and red chili flakes while sauteing.  Add the  2 cups of water, bring to the boil, then reduce heat  and simmer for about ten minutes or so.

In your stock pot add the chicken stock, corn, sugar and heat to boiling over high heat.  Reduce heat to low and simmer for about five minutes.

Remove the lemongrass from the onion mixture and discard.   add onion mixture  to the corn mixture.  Remove two cups of this mixture and set aside.

In a blender at low speed, with center part of cover removed to allow steam to escape, blend soup remaining in pot in small batches until very, very smooth.  Pour soup into large bowl after each batch.  This is probably the most difficult part of this easy to make soup.    And it’s really not difficult, just a little messy.

Return blended soup and reserved soup to same sauce pot and heat over medium heat until hot, stirring occasionally.  Serve with sour cream, cilantro and chili paste.    Bon Appetit!

BOLOGNESE SAUCE … and the butcher at the end of the street.

BOLOGNESE SAUCE

The  day was brilliant sunshine,  crisp and February cold.    Son-in-law Michael and I were discussing what to make for supper.     Toronto’s chilly  temperature called for comfort food.  Michael had a craving for  big bowl of pasta with Bolognese Sauce.    Michael, is a oenologist with more than forty years in the business.  We joke  he knows where the bodies are buried in vineyards around the world.  In fact, he probably helped bury them.    We discuss what wine we’ll cook with today, and what wine to drink with pasta dish.   The lovely thing about Michael, and his encyclopedic knowledge of wine,  he is NOT a wine-weenie.    We headed out into the cold to shop for  cooking ingredients and wine.

Our beautiful and talented grand-daughter,  Cait,  is a lawyer, working long hours.  She is also  mother-hen to her siblings, Greg, Andrew and A.J.   She and her  partner, internationally famous photographer Angus Rowe MacPherson,  conjure up family suppers with a blink of an eye.  They have a butcher at the end of their street.   Gasparro Quality Meats.    Oh that every cook should be so lucky.

Walk through the doors of Gasparro Quality Meats, and you walk into the past.  A shop where little has changed for more than fifty years.   The two Gasparro brothers work behind the big meat display cooler,  flirting outrageously with every women no matter what her age.  Papa  Gasparro, wearing very dark glasses, a rakish black cap, and discussing football scores,  scoops up just the right amount of veal and beef to grind and mix for our Bolognese sauce.

Minutes later we are in the kitchen and I ‘m  sautéing  meat,  loosing its  pink and adding it to the stock  pot of simmering San Marco tomatoes.  (the recipe is on the right, as usual).  The aroma of freshly ground meat is completely different from the supermarket variety.   It’s fragrant and sweet.  This will be the finest Bolognese sauce I have ever made.    I make a triple batch, and when I return to Vancouver Michael will have  Bolognese sauce in his freezer.   Bellissimo!

Oh by and by.  If I have given you the impression I am rather proud of my Grandchildren you are  absolutely right.  They and their amazing partners bring much joy into our life.  The  icing on the cake is our Great Grand Son Max.

It’s a chilly, gray Tuesday.  The kind of day you want a big pot of Bolognese sauce simmering away in your kitchen.    This recipe is rich with many flavours, a complex sauce that is a reputation maker.

The secret is the addition of Hoisen sauce.   Any beef dish (stew, casserole) will benefit from just adding a tablespoon or so of Hoisen sauce.  For a Bolognese sauce with a deep tomato flavour always use Italian tomatoes.  Peeled whole tomatoes are best.  If you can find San Marco tomatoes these are really splendid.  The addition of a couple of cubes of Mushroom bouillon cubes is another secret flavour enhancer.  Taste your sauce as it simmers away, add more seasoning if necessary.  Be generous and you won’t be disappointed with the results, I promise.

BOLOGNESE MEAT SAUCE  – enough to find the multitudes!

4 tbs olive oil

1 lb ground beef

1 lb ground lean pork

1 onion chopped

4 nice fat garlic cloves

1 celery stalk

l carrot chopped

salt and freshly ground pepper

2 cans Italian whole peeled tomatoes

2 tbsp tomato paste

2 tbsp Hoisen

1/2 tsp red pepper flakes

1/2 tsp dried thyme

2 tbsp dried oregano

2 mushroom bouillon cubes

1-3 tsp sugar

1/2 cup beef stock

Saute the beef and pork in a little of the olive oil until  the meat changes colour.  Drain off the liquid and fat and discard.  Put the meat mixture into  a large stock pot.  You are making a big batch of sauce.

The best way to chop your vegetables is using a food processor.  You want them finely chopped.  First chop the onion and garlic  and saute in a little olive oil.  Sprinkle with some salt and the onion flakes.  When the onions are translucent add them to your stock pot.

Now process the carrots and celery until finely chopped, and saute  in a little olive oil for a few minutes.  Add to the stock pot.

Add the two cans of tomatoes and smoosh the whole tomatoes to break them up.  Add the tomato paste, the Hoisen sauce, oregano and thyme, and the beef stock.  Sprinkle with a little sugar (tomatoes become quite acidic when they cook for more than 30 minutes).

Simmer for at least an hour or so uncovered.  Your sauce will be come rich and thick.

The quantities makes a lot of sauce so you can freeze portions for later use. This sauce tastes better the next day so do try and make it a head.

HAPPY AMARYLLIS

Exotic

Stunning

Improbable

Sentinels of beauty

I have a armada  of Amaryllis flowers .  A dozen or so grow in a south window.   Most are more than ten years old.   Each winter they brighten my day with glorious, glorious colour.   Happy Amaryllis to you today

A MID SUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM and HOW A GELATIN DUPLICATOR ALMOST GOT ME INTO SERIOUS TROUBLE

A gelatin duplicator is an old method of making duplicate copies using a gelatin substance set in a flat pan .  A master copy is produced using special coloured pencils.  The gelatin substance absorbs the ink from the original copy.  You lay plain paper in the gelatin and the ink would bleed off the gelatin.  Great idea except each succeeding copy gets a little lighter.  And, that’s when I ran into trouble.  The faded  copy, my myopic vision, and my great excitement about acting in a play had me reading F for P.

Ours was a quiet, calm home.  I never heard my parents use an expletive word.  NEVER.    So when I rushed home to tell my Mother we were doing a play at school and I had  the role of F___k my Mother went white.  “Where did you hear that word?  What is the name of this play?” “Midsummer Nights Dream. “I replied.  “Oh, you mean you are playing the role of Puck.  I never want to hear that other  word again!”

It was a few years before I realized in a home where  not even the word damn was uttered I had very loudly used the worst of all possible words.   Mother wasn’t thrilled about my new word, but Mid Summer Night’s Dream is still my favorite play by Shakespeare.   So much so I have written lines from the play around the bulkhead in our kitchen.

“I know a bank where-on the wild thyme blows, where the oxlips and the nodding violet grows quite over-canopied with blossoms woodbine with sweet musk-roses, and with eglantine.”