This pie features tender and succulent morsels of lamb and a creamy, garlicky parsnip and potato mash. If ever there was luxurious comfort food, this is it. Full disclosure: this is not a tried and true recipe. At this juncture, I have made it once, but felt it worth documenting because a) it was really…
Vodka sauce
Pasta with vodka sauce is a dish I recommend to anyone who is learning to cook. It sounds, tastes and looks impressive, but it’s such a simple dish to prepare using simple ingredients and goes together very quickly. In fact, the trick to a solid vodka sauce is to keep it simple and not overcook…
Bulgur salad with peaches and basil
Funnily enough, bulgur can be used for things that are not tabbouleh and those things can be delicious. The weirdo and oft-misunderstood “berries” of various grains are lifesavers during our Ontario summers in a city that was built on a swamp as they involve no cooking and are a great blank canvas for all kinds…
Grilled orange and seven spice pork loin
Yes, you can absolutely do this with just about any cut of pork or lamb or even chicken…even chicken breasts, if that’s your grill jam (it’s not mine, like, at all, but I shan’t fault you for your jams), but, mes amis, there’s something really sumptuous about cutting into a big hunk…perhaps MONOLITH (cue 2001:…
Making stock in the Instant Pot
Making stock in the Instant Pot isn’t too different from making stock using the stovetop method, except that it doesn’t take FOR-FREAKIN’-EVER. Using the robot, I have a double-strength stock in about 35 minutes and that’s pretty fantastic as I love using up bits and bobs leftover from meal prep as much as possible, homemade…
White chocolate, cardamom-cranberry fudge
I am a sucker for cardamom. I am also a sucker for convenient, easy recipes made easier with the use of kitschy ingredients like sweetened condensed milk to make easy, kitschy desserts that taste and look like effort, but are not. This fudge, one of this year’s holiday making experiments, is all of that…with a…
Instant Pot cheezy mac
Pictured below is the recipe upon which we base the cheezy mac we make in the IP: I do not remember where I found this recipe and would love to so I can give proper credits to its author. I suspect it was from the facebook IP cult community, but I have nothing to back that…
If you can’t beat ’em, eat ’em sausages
This asshole: This asshole is garlic mustard. It’s incredibly invasive. Where we used to have other invasive plants, like catnip and nettles and phlox; civilized plants who had the decency to at least share the space with others, we now have metric pantloads of garlic mustard. You guys, it was GROWING ON THE ROOF OVER…
Adventures in mask-sewing
In the interest of full disclosure, I have not been wearing a mask out for my bi-weekly shopping trips. I think part of not getting into that habit feels a bit like defeat (it ain’t). Like this terrible pandemic is winning (it’s not). Like I’m somehow weaker for needing one (I am, but it’s not…
Passover 2020 recipe round-up
In the days leading up to it, Passover seemed impossible this year. Doing it without family plus limited availability of KFP ingredients, which are already of limited availability in our neck of the woods, made it all feel rather daunting and…heavy. I started freaking out about it weeks before I acted on the anxiety. Under…
Brisket with springtime in the near east vibes
For Passover this year, I had a friend bring in a goodly-sized beef brisket from the big city, which I cut down from a giant 10 pound hunk of fatty flesh to three 3-ish pound roasts and a nice bag of trimmed fat for future sausage-making. Having never butchered down a brisket before, that was…
Fluffy leek and dill quinoa
This nicely seasoned, but very versatile side goes together quickly and painlessly and makes a great base for everything from roasted veg to saucy brisket. Feel free to swap out the leeks for green onions or shallots or red onion and the dill for whatever fresh herb tickles your fancy. This recipe makes 6 servings….
Spicy Udon Stir Fry
This is a fast and dirty stir fry that goes together quickly and can be used for bustin’ leftovers or veg bits kickin’ about the fridge. I used the leftovers from a chicken I’d made following this amazing recipe for a crispy skinned chicken and froze a bit ago, but it’s ideal for using up…
Corny corn pancakes with spiked and spiced maple sauce
In our years of living in sin, the mister’s and mine cooking trade-off has always meant that he cooks on Mardi Gras, or pancake day. By a fluke of bad luck and a series of unfortunate events, I finally got the chance to show my chops in the fat Tuesday arena and here we are….
Salisbury Steaks
I don’t think I need to say much about this classic except that I’m always reminded of Tom Waits’ Nighthawks at the Diner any time I think about Salisbury steak. So, just put this on and make ’em. You should be tossing the patties into the gravy to simmer just in time to have a…
Melanesca sauce
Every time I serve dishes that feature this sauce, they get rave reviews and, I shit you not, tears. Real tears. Once. The dude I had fed it to, over a bit of savoury, cheesy bread pudding, said it was the best tomato sauce he had ever tasted in his life and shed some tears….
Spumoni Cookies {Recipe}
This tweet thread kinda sums up all you need to know about how these cookies came to be: Kearsley knows. They’re in Austria. They were also inspired by coming across this recipe and my love of all things spumoni. The recipe as it stood didn’t sit well with me, though. Firstly, candied cherries are ew….
Scotch Eggs Pie {Recipe}
You guys, there is nothing healthful or frugal about this pie. It is basically a heart attack on a plate that costs a small fortune in dollars, time and attention to make. It is neither quick nor easy. What it does have going for it is deliciousness. It is full of warming spices and rich…
Adventures in Christmas Ramen
The logistics of a family Christmas dinner were a bit tricky this year as we decided that the day to do the deed was on Christmas day itself and that it would also involve a whirlwind trip out to the middle of nowhere to hopefully catch my grandparents between visits and naps. With no set…
Breakfast Burger Pie {Recipe}
In my never-ending quest to find foods that agree with my picky, pre-pot-of-coffee, morning palate, I have come up with what I and a goodly lot of others consider another winner for the breakfast-is-hard category of my foodie repertoire. It’s all of the best bits of a breakfast burger but, hanks to the magic of…
melanisms 