Ace Bakery’s white baguette, double creme brie & ginger marmalade = heaven.
more chicken February 10, 2008
I have to admit a bias toward drumsticks when it comes to cooking with chicken. Many of the treatments I give them are easily adaptable to breasts and whole birds for a more formal dining experience and that’s precisely why I lean toward drumsticks; they’re very informal, finger food, go with just about anything and therefore make children happy. I often make a bigger batch than is necessary as they’re something the sprogs will willingly pack in their lunches for the next day.
This recipe is nice because it goes together very quickly and the heat output from the chili sauce is very controllable – it gets diluted quite a lot by the butter and lime but more can be added as desired or can be served on the side for the more adventurous to dip into.
What you need:
16-20 chicken drumsticks
1 stick of butter
Juice of 2 lemons or 4 limes
1 tbsp dried thyme or you can remove the leaves from two or three fresh sprigs
2 tbsp chili garlic sauce (I use this but one can easily make their own)
2 tsp powdered ginger or 1 inch chunk of fresh ginger grated (I recommend having one of these on hand for that job)
Melt the butter in a medium sized microwavable bowl or on the cooktop in a medium sized saucepan, stirring constantly to ensure it doesn’t burn (if you’re doing it in the microwave be sure to give it a stir at the one minute mark.) Add the lemon/lime, thyme, chili garlic sauce & ginger to that. Stir until combined. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Dip each drumstick into the mixture and move to a roasting pan, preferably one with a rack to keep the chicken off the bottom of the pan – this makes clean-up so much easier. Once all of the drumsticks have been dipped & arranged brush each one with a little more sauce and toss the pan into the oven. Cook for 30 minutes & serve hot – or let them cool and take them on your next picnic or as your incentive to not eat out for workday lunches.
Mama loves her manhattans November 20, 2007
I’ve started this post a few times and each one seemed to become more long-winded than the one prior. Lesson learned is that it’s difficult to write about something so close to one’s heart, something a girl could feel so passionate about. So I’ll keep this v. 18.5 of my manhattan recipe short and sweet.
Without further ado, let me introduce to my three good friends; Martini Rosse, Danfield’s Private Reserve Rye Whiskey and Angostura’s (brilliant) Bitters.
They are the special ingredients in this favourite cocktail o’ mine. Next, meet Mr. Jigger:
I love my jigger almost as much as I love my manhattans. His two parts complete the whole. They’re essential to the overall balance.
Okay…here’s the recipe:
2 ice cubes
1.5 ounces Danfield’s
1 ounce Martini Rosso
6 shakes from the little bottle o’ bitters
Served in my favourite manhattan glass; a repurposed bottle of Maria’s mole sauce. Dunno what it is but there’s something about getting a noseful of manhattany vapours before reaching in to taste it which makes this glass perfect.
best ever chip dip October 22, 2007
I’m a complete sucker for chips and dip. I’ll pass over chocolate any day, but do not deny me my greasy, potatoey goodness.
The following is a recipe for cream cheese chip dip which is as addictive as it is easy.
What you need:
1 block cream cheese
1/4 cup evaporated (makes a creamier dip) or regular milk
2 tbsp dried onion flakes
Loads of cracked pepper (our mill is always loaded with a red/green/black combo which is to die for – we’re pepper snobs)
A pinch of salt
Toss all of the above into a medium sized bowl, cover with plastic and allow to sit for at least 2 hours so that the onions have a chance to reconstitute in the milk, like so:
Resist the urge to stir or poke it or disturb it otherwise. After about 2 hours you can mix it:
Then serve it in your favourite bowl. This one’s mine:
Yup. It’s a depression era gas station special made by Federal Glass Company. I have a bigger one with tigers, too. It saddens me deeply that the practice of giving cheap glass products away with a refill has gone out of style. So much cool kitchen stuff is collected that way. But I digress.
Your dip is done! Eat it!
Betty Crocker rang, she wants her muffins back October 18, 2007
I’m generally not a strong endorser of mixes and packages of pre-mixed stuff or things to which one should just add water to produce a seven course meal – not because I’m a puritan or that I’m particularly well versed in the benefits of whole foods versus processed foods (though there’s certainly a wee bit of that going on.) Mostly it’s just because they don’t often taste as good as the real deal.
That said, there’s definitely room in my cupboards and a time and place for such things. Most specifically for bulk food store honey oat bran muffin mix. I am not a baker and what muffin mix means in my kitchen is nearly 45 minutes in which my two sprogs and my sister’s two sprogs are happily concocting and not fighting, not wanting outside, not whining because they’re bored, not fighting, not needing me to jump rope, not having squeeling contests, not fighting (did I say fighting?) or requiring massive amounts of my attention otherwise. 45 sweet minutes in which they’re happily smashing bananas, cracking eggs, greasing tins and licking spoons and I can easily accomplish half a day worth of work while keeping half an eye on their productivity (just to ensure they’re not over-mixing the muffins.)
This stuff is great. It’s reasonably healthy – actually providing acceptable levels of complex carbohydrates to keep us all regular and containing a very minimal amount of sweetener (as all good muffins will.) On top of all that, it’s not so expensive or time consuming that you’ll be devastated should the results turn out less than savoury.
Today we made honey-oat-bran-banana-coconut-chocolate-chip-walnut muffins.
Other muffins from mixes we have made include, but are not limited to:
Pineapple-mandarin-coconut
Sesame-apple-cranberry
Salsa-cheese-pecan
Pumpkin seed-pecan-peach
Maple-walnut-apple
Potato-cheese-parsley
Carrot-raisin-pumpkin seed
Cranberry-orange-almond
Papaya-coconut-pecan
Ham-walnut-pineapple
Poppy seed-lemon-almond
p.s. I’ve also used this stuff to make pancakes.
all things squishy October 12, 2007
I have a two year old hanging around lately so we’ve been making all manner of yummy things with the bounty of seasonal goods bestowed upon us recently.
Squash and pumpkins and garlic roasting for soup and muffins. While those cook we eat grilled old cheddar and gala apple (soooo good right now – go get some!) sandwiches.
Then we make the autumnal requisite squash soup. Roasting the squash first gives it a sweeter and nuttier flavour. The roasted garlic goes in there too. We puree it with a few potatoes, add some curry spice and serve it with cream.
We found a recipe for pumpkin bacon muffins over at and had to try it.
Tasty, tasty baconny, pumpkinny goodness.
