Irish in Another Life?

Am rounding out my bread-making streak with Irish Soda Bread, in honour of the day. Up until my recent forays into yeast breads, this was the only bread I ever attempted, using a (lost) recipe from the (sadly) now defunct Gourmet Magazine.  (Update - am happy to report that I found my original recipe from Gourmet and so have shared that also!) Still obsessed with the ATK / Cook’s Illustrated, All Time Best Bread Recipes publication, I decided to try theirs.

In a recent interview on CBC, America’s Test Kitchen’s Christopher Kimball acknowledged that they spend on average $12,000 testing each recipe – that represents hours of (hu)manpower and ingredients. End result, in my experience, has been that their recipes are reliable and almost foolproof. I say ‘almost’ because I can sometimes find some way of goofing things up a wee bit.

I began to make Irish Soda Bread after our first (of several) trips to Ireland. I have always been much more drawn to walking on cool windy beaches than hot southern ones. I can’t be the only person who has felt an inexplicable peaceful bond with a place they visited. Though I have no known Irish genes, I always felt at home there, and used to joke that I must have lived there in another life. (As a footnote, my brother loves green, celebrates St. Patrick's Day, and is always fêted by his family on this day. Maybe there are some Irish genes lurking in there somewhere. My daughter-in-law just reminded me that she is 40% Irish - too bad she's not here to break bread with me.)

Gap of Dunloe, Source Tom Pulman

Once we had children, we took them there. As a child, son #2 had bright red hair and for the first time saw many other youngsters who “looked like him”. Hiking in the Gap of Dunloe we achieved five minutes of fame as we were featured on an Irish travel show. We were meant to be an Irish family and they felt it necessary to drag a few more kiddies into the shot – seemingly, at the time, an Irish family was unlikely to have only two children!

A “fresh bread” craving can be quickly satisfied by this bread. In Ireland, it appears at all meals – next to stew at supper time, and with breakfast. It is a slightly sweet bread, so I like it best with butter and jam – of course that can be eaten at breakfast, lunch and dinner and snacks – yay! Happy St. Patrick's Day! Sláinte!

Here's the recipe. If you enjoyed this read or the recipe, please click on "Like". I invite you to Share and Comment!

Three Cheers for Broccoli - Three Ways!

It was soup day again, and we were still surrounded by white (snow) – wishing for green (Spring). There was broccoli in the fridge and so broccoli soup became the main item on the menu. My Dad used to like broccoli soup. It was years ago that I had tried to make some for him. Each attempt tasted fine, but the gorgeous green more often than not transformed into the less appetizing olive green colour. It was only in recent years (when he was no longer with us) that I settled on the Podleski Sisters’ version of broccoli soup. 

Broccoli is part of the cabbage family – wait until I have time to share cabbage recipes – yum. So far, every time I research something for this blog, I discover it is an ancient food – and broccoli has been around since the 6th century BC! Italians seem to get credit for cultivating and popularizing broccoli, which “was first introduced to the United States by Italian immigrants but did not become widely known there until the 1920s.” (Source)

As grown ups, many of us likely began reaching for broccoli more often when we discovered it was a great source of vitamin C and fibre, and had anti-cancer properties. It appears on (and tends to disappear from) every veggie tray, at every event / meeting. Yet, people of a certain age may have bad memories of poorly prepared and unappetizing cooked broccoli – often not a kiddie’s favourite. If you’ll pardon the old joke: “What’s the difference between boogers and broccoli? Kids don’t like to eat broccoli.” (badda boom!)

I am sharing the recipe for Looneyspoons reasonably low cal, yet flavourful broccoli soup. It uses the florets only. What to do with the stalks? If I was a clever girl, I’d add them to a freezer bag, saving up veggie scraps to make a homemade veggie stock – but I am not that clever. And yet, it seems wrong to toss the broccoli stalk. Here’s what to do – keep the stalks refrigerated until you accumulate 3-4 stalks and then make Jacques Pépin's Risotto with Broccoli Stalks and Mushrooms.

If suddenly it is the broccoli florets that are luxuriating in the refrigerator – they are great eaten raw with Buttermilk Ranch Dressing as a dip, or can in minutes be transformed into a tasty side with this Optimum Health recipe.

Three recipes, and three cheers for Broccoli!

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National Ranch Dressing Day

Yup. According to Foodimentary, March 10 is National Ranch Dressing Day - though "National" may be referring to the nation south of the 49th. Visit that site for trivia about this salad dressing invented in 1954. It is one of my favourite dressings and it seems I am not alone - it has been the most popular dressing since 1992. The big shock is that according to the Foodimentary guy (John-Bryan Hopkins) "While popular in the United States and Canada, Ranch Dressing is virtually unknown in most of the world"!! How can that be!? 

A sad fact about Ranch Dressing he does not mention is that store-bought can be super high in calories. I am calorie-aware. I know the calorie count of most everything I eat. That doesn't mean that I avoid things high in calories.  The strategy is to lean towards nutrient-loaded calories, and permit treats.  As much as I like salads, I figure why "waste" all my calories on the salad dressing. Typical store-bought Ranch Dressings are 120-140 calories per 2 TB. I'm sharing an easy dressing that can be made in minutes and it clocks in at only 34 calories for 2 TB!  So, if I am going to consume 140 calories I can make it store bought dressing - period - or my home-made dressing plus 1.5 Chocolate Walnut Cookies! (smiley face)

Central to authentic Ranch Dressing is Buttermilk.  "Originally, buttermilk was the liquid left behind after churning butter out of cream" (Wikipedia) so there's no butter in buttermilk! Producers are concerned that it's popularity might be waning. It seems, then, that I am among the minority that like buttermilk and don't mind drinking it alone. There is often a carton in my fridge and it has a long shelf life. In truth it is in my fridge less for drinking and more for recipes. Buttermilk figures in many of my favourite recipes - Irish Soda Bread, Party Plum Cake and Red Velvet Cake. I don't often make the following, but there's buttermilk pancakes and biscuits; it's a terrific marinade for chicken - especially chicken destined to be fried.

Without buttermilk there'd be no "red velvet cake". (I will soon share my recipe for this.) The reaction between buttermilk and natural cocoa powder results in a reddish cake - and these days the colour is often enhanced with some food coloring. (Read more)

Buttermilk is often used together with baking soda, for example in Irish Soda Bread. It provides the acid that activates baking soda and the resulting carbon dioxide is what makes whatever's being baked, rise. There was a time when the only way to introduce air pockets to dough/batter was using yeast, and yeast action demands time - thus, slow breads. With the introduction of baking soda came the dawn of "quick breads". But what if there was no buttermilk (or another acid) to activate the baking soda? Along came baking powder which combined baking soda with two powdered acidic components. All this was happening in the 1800s and guess who popularized this in Europe? "August Oetker, a German pharmacist, made baking powder very popular when he began selling his mixture to housewives... Oetker started the mass production of baking powder in 1898 and patented his technique in 1903." And that's where the story began for Dr. Oetker - a family-owned company headed today by a fourth generation real Dr Oetker. How they ever got into making frozen pizza is another story...

Whew! Feels like an episode of "Connections". We went from Ranch dressing to buttermilk, to baking soda and baking powder to Dr. Oetker and to pizza - and it is with pizza that I have my salad with Ranch dressing! Time to make this Buttermilk Ranch Dressing - which, thanks to the buttermilk, is high in probiotics and low in calories. Here's the recipe - and if you tire of this as a dressing - it makes a great veggie dip. In honour of National Ranch Dressing Day, I suppose I must share that your local grocer might carry the "almost like homemade" Bolthouse Ranch Yogurt Dressing - also low calorie - 45 calories per 2 TB - that's one salad and one Chocolate Walnut Cookie!

So, happy salad days! If you enjoyed this read and/or this dressing please click on "Like". I invite you to Share and Comment!

Need an App for that?

Stuffed Creminis with watercress and balsamic reduction!

As a techie, I have often been heard to utter the perhaps tiresome phrase - "There's an App for that".  In this case, we're talking about an Appetizer - Stuffed Mushrooms. I'm presenting them here as an appetizer, but they also work well as a side to a range of entrées - an omelette, roast pork, steak, fish - even next to a bean dish. Choose slightly smaller mushrooms and they become hors-d'oeuvres. Serve several and they can even be the main course! They work at all meals - a (posh) breakfast, or at lunch or dinner.

The brown-ish Cremini mushrooms lie on a continuum between white button mushrooms and larger Portobellos. They are older than the former and younger than the latter, and may be priced a bit higher than buttons, but chefs tend to prefer them to white buttons for their taste and texture. 

Mushrooms are loaded with nutrients and a low calorie food (though the stuffing ingredients are going to add a little bit to the calorie count). “Though neither meat nor vegetable, mushrooms are known as the "meat" of the vegetable world” (source) and are often a staple in a vegetarian diet – offering welcome texture and flavour.

There used to be a golden rule that mushrooms should be packaged / stored in a bag, but over the last few years many stores offer them pre-packaged and covered in plastic!? I have no idea why that became ok – but I always prefer to buy them loose and in a bag. (I suppose some people might be concerned about shoppers “touching” mushrooms that they don’t buy.) Mushrooms purchased in plastic should be stored in a paper bag once home. Check out Mushrooms Canada for tips and recipes.

The appetizer pictured here is served with greens. I was going to use arugula, but could not get them from my source, and instead used watercress. Turns out watercress is also loaded with nutrients, and hundreds of years ago was a “go to” remedy for scurvy. It must have been abundant at one time, whereas now it can be harder to source and more costly than other greens.

I’m not a big fan of “naked greens”, but did not want to interfere with the mushroom flavours. To a small bowl of watercress, I added less than a teaspoon of Canadian Maple Syrup. With a clean hand – in fact it helps if it is a touch wet – gently swish the cress and they quickly become covered with the maple syrup – enough for a gorgeous appearance / presentation and a subtle flavour that people will never guess. A balsamic reduction (which can be made, though is easier purchased) gussies it up – and further enhances the eating experience.

Click here for the recipe and enjoy this appetizer, side, main – whatever seem APPropriate :-)

If you enjoyed this read and/or this recipe please click on "Like". I invite you to Share and Comment!