Post Christmas in the New Year

So my Christmas vacation is coming to a close and pretty soon the days of sleeping in and wandering aimlessly, day in and day out will come to an end as well. I am looking forward to getting back into my routine though, I won't lie. Especially that I now have a juicer making my days fairly exciting and fresh. The trick is to now incorporate my juicer into my work a day life. It will probably take a bit of planning and prep but I am up for the challenge, I think. I want to have a fresh veggie/fruit concoction once a day. That is my goal. So far I have done well with the exception of one day where I was out and about and barely home. But this is one thing that I am going to endeavor to do and I have already played with a number of combinations. I have looked at a few recipes but I much prefer to experiment. This is not so much a resolution for me but rather a resolve to get more fruits/veggies and the nutrients that go along with them and I would much rather do it in a raw format than a cooked one and hopefully decrease the amount of vitamin supplementation that I seem to require. Below is a list of my combinations thus far, they have all been really good and range in taste between tart, earthy and really sweet. My favourites so far have been day 2 and day 5. I never thought that beet juice would be something that I would take to, but I am truly addicted to its earthy taste and deep rich colour.

Day 1 (Dec 29^th)

1 apple, 1 carrot, 1 satsuma mandarin, 1 piece of ginger root

Day 2 (Dec 30^th)

1 cup of cranberries, 1 lemon, 1 kiwi, ginger root, 1 carrot, 1 cup of pineapple and 1 celery stalk

Day 3 (Dec 31^st)

6 strawberries, 2 mini cucumbers, ½ a personal watermelon, 1 cup of spinach, 1 pear, 1 satsuma mandarin and 1 cup of pineapple

Day 4 (Jan 1^st)

1 beet, 1 cup of spinach, 1 kiwi and 1 carrot

Day 5 (Jan 3^rd)

2 beets, 1 cup of spinach. 1 and a ½ carrots, 1 lemon, 1 cup of pineapple and a large piece of ginger

Day 6 (Jan 4^th)

1 cup of spinach, 1 cortland apple, 1 large navel orange, 1 piece of ginger root, 1 cup of cranberries, 1 and a ½ carrots

Day 1

Day 3

Day 5

Day 6

 

The other thing that marked my break was the amount of baking that I managed to complete. I will have to share the recipes in a separate post, but needless to say that I made a lot of treats for Boxing Day dinner at my place. Instead of one big dessert, I made numerous small ones including; Rum Cake, Besan Barfi/Burfi (Indian Chickpea fudge), Chex Muddie Buddies, Fudge Brownies, Marzipan Squares, Shortbread (my great-grandmother’s recipe), Date Balls, and Spiced Pecans and they were all gluten free. I cannot remember the last time that I baked that much or even attempted to and to be able to complete it all gluten free this year was a major accomplishment for me and it was all so yummy and I still have a lot leftover.

Clockwise from left: Shortbreads, Spiced Pecans, Fudge Brownies,

Besan Barfi,  Date Balls and Marzipan Squares

 

Speaking of Christmas and Boxing Day, I really adhered to the “Buy Local” movement this year. Most of the things that I bought were either manufactured/conceived or purchased locally or will help people regionally. Most of my nephew’s gifts I purchased at the Thomas the Tank Engine Experience by Ambassatours in Saint John. I also purchased books for him from Woozles and an Eastcoast Lifestyle hoodie. I bought my parents sweatshirts from the Lost Cod Clothing Co. and treats from Pete’s Frootique.  My sister-in-law received a clutch from Maggie Pearce and a necklace from the Shy Giraffe, while my brother received a tie from Prostate Cancer Canada. So my brother’s gift was not locally bought but I know that the money spent on it will benefit prostate cancer patients regionally. I participated in Movember this year, so the gift was well intentioned.

When you really stop and look around at places like the Halifax Seaport Farmer’s, DalPlex Christmas Craft Show, Christmas at the Forum and all the other unique places in the Downtown areas of any Maritime city including Halifax; you will find stuff that is better than anything that you can buy at any big box store. Beauty part is that it is unique stuff. There is no way that I would ever have been able to give my mother a little piece of her history if I had never been able to buy her a sweatshirt from Lost Cod Clothing Co. She can now proudly display her Sea Nymph Fish Foods Hoodie; knowing she once worked for A.M. Smith & Co. at the Smith Wharves.

Okay, so I clearly need to blog more often. I have so much to say some times that I cannot fit it all in. Next time, I promise to talk about my gluten free baking and share my recipes; as I started this blog to talk about being gluten free in Halifax.

Books and Food; two of my three favourite things.

I am remiss in posting for awhile, however work has kept me pretty busy and I hope that I will be able to share my foodie adventures over the Christmas holidays when I have more time to post.

Today, I am doing a fun little post on a book. There are three things in this world that I absolutely adore, if you don't count my nephew and I absolutely adore him no question. I also adore coffee, books and food in no particular order. When I was given a chance to become a book blogger for Penguin Canada I decided to give it  a try. I thought about reviewing a cookbook, but I did not have the time to cook my tried and true, let alone anything new, so it did not seem like a good idea to attempt first. So I went to the next best thing; a children's book. I am a teacher and it seemed like a natural fit. Penguin Canada has the December Delights promotion on right now and it is basically an advent calendar for book lovers, full of suggestions and contests for bibliophiles such as myself. Today is day #10 and it is The Day the Crayons Quit.

Drew Daywalt poses an interesting dilemma when he suggests that the crayons are not happy with Duncan, their owner. I read this book last night and I could not help but giggle for many reasons and I cannot wait to share this book with my nephew. I know he will love the green page. But I digress. Every year I put a big box of crayons on my desk along with markers and pencil crayons for my students to use and inevitably the crayons are passed over, because junior high students are too cool for crayons. I always feel sad because I love crayons! There is something about them and maybe it is nostalgia more than anything and the fact that they take me back to a time of innocence. I find crayons comforting and I was taught a long time ago that sitting and colouring is one of the greatest stress reducers because of the nostalgia involved. Unfortunately, it is the crayons in this book that are stressed out. All they want is to be used equally without having favourites played. When you think about it though; do we use all the crayons in the box? Sadly, no. However, Duncan comes up with an ingenious idea of how to keep everyone happy.

I like how Daywalt addresses all the problems individually and uses each colour to write the letter. The only problem I had was with yellow (but don't tell yellow crayon that). It was hard to read. Oliver Jeffers drawings combined with the letters were a perfect fit. I enjoy Oliver Jeffers illustrations. I first noticed his illustrations in a book that I gave my nephew for his birthday, How to Catch a Star. His illustrations are simple, yet powerful, and they recreate that sense of nostalgia by looking like a child has drawn the illustrations which fit perfectly with Daywalt's crayon dilemma as the crayons are trying to tell Duncan what it is that they need in order to be happy.

I cannot wait to share this book with my nephew and I am not sure if I will give him this copy of the book for Christmas or buy him his own copy and keep this one for myself. Sometimes we need a good children's story in our life to put our own lives into perspective and recapture some of the innocence lost with maturity. I think I need to go and buy myself a new box of crayons soon. ;) Hopefully I will be able to keep them all happy like Duncan finally does in the end. I love this book and hope that there will be a French translation of it soon, so that I can share it with my junior high students even though they are too cool for crayons. ;)

One potato, two potato, Sweet potato and more...

So a couple of weeks ago when I ventured back in to the pintrest realm and found the cauliflower crust to satiate my pizza craving, I stumbled upon a pin for sweet potato hash. I love sweet potatoes! And I don't mean that in the sense that I loved Bon Jovi, Nelson and dare I say it, NKOTB, as a pre-teen and teenager. You know the kind of love I mean, where you profess undying love and then it sours after a week or two. I would honestly take a naked, baked sweet potato over its fully loaded cousin, smothered in butter, sour cream and chives any day of the week.  I will even eat potato chips again, so long as it is the Covered Bridge Sweet Potato chip from New Brunswick. I don't remember not liking sweet potatoes, so when I found this recipe for sweet potato hash I knew that I needed to try it.

I did not follow the recipe, I'll admit it. If there is one thing that my mother dislikes the most about when I cook, it is that I don't always follow a recipe. Sometimes I see multiple ideas and I combine them in my head and then make them and they turn out beautifully. The trouble is though, that if I did not write it down or make notations somewhere then I cannot repeat it or tell people what I have done. I like experimenting though and not having to follow a recipe all the time.

I had a few sweet potatoes from Elmridge Farm in my fridge and since I do not have a food processor, I decided to use my little Kitchen Aid food chopper to chop up the potato. No way was I about to risk my knuckles and bits of skin grating the dense little suckers. So I chopped up two small potatoes and roughly a quarter of  a white onion and I let it sit in the fridge for a bit. I did not use any salt on this and this was my first mistake. I rarely cook with salt. The only time I use salt on anything is if it is for a recipe and a chemical reaction is required. Beyond that I rarely use salt. When it came time to cook it, I heated my pan for the hash and my grandmother's little cast iron pan; perfect for one egg. I added a little olive oil to my big pan and dumped the contents of my chopped sweet potato and onion into the hot pain and listened to it sizzle while I checked the heat on the other pan. I then added some extra spicy Mrs. Dash to the sweet potato mixture, and that was mistake number two. I then cracked the egg into the other pan and sprinkled a little Mrs. Dash there too. I like spicy and I thought it would pair well with the sweetness of the potato; it usually does when I roast veggies in the oven. I did not use my universal lid on my frying pan to allow the sweet potatoes to steam a bit, that was mistake three. I ended up undercooking the sweet potato and it did not brown up as much as I thought it would. So my first attempt at it was not a flaming success but it was not an unmitigated disaster either. It just required a few minor adjustments to the process.

Tonight I decided to try again. I went to the Halifax Seaport Farmers Market today and invested in some more Sweet Potatoes and this time around I decided to add some bacon from Sweet Williams to the mix. Unusual choice for me since I spent most of my childhood avoiding the bacon and egg brunches we would have at least one Sunday a month growing up. The only egg I liked was scrambled and unrecognizable with ham, peppers, onions and cheese added to it. The smell of bacon used to repulse me. However I have grown a new appreciation for bacon and even eggs. It is ironic that the things that I avoided as a kid are now the "safest" things for me to eat. Mind you, it doesn't mean that I gorge myself on them, it just means that I have grown to appreciate them and don't shy away from them as much anymore. Anyhow, tonight's hash was prepared slightly differently. I chopped it the same and added onion but this time I ground a little pink crystal salt and fresh black pepper into the mix before placing in to the fridge. When it was time to cook the mix, I heated the pan a little more because I had to cook the bacon first. I diced it, cooked it, drained the fat and let it rest on paper towel while I cooked the sweet potatoes. I added regular Mrs. Dash to the preparation this time. Much better option as it was not overpowering. I used my lid to allow the sweet potatoes to soften further. It steamed them nicely and I had more browning to the pan. I added the bacon back in towards the end of the cooking time and blended it well. I cooked my egg the same as before but used the regular Mrs. Dash on it as well. It gave it all a much nicer flavour. To top it off, I had some Schoolhouse Gluten Free Bakery English muffins in the freezer, so I toasted one and topped it with Thompson's Strawberry Jam.

I felt bad about not participating in I Love Local Halifax's City Harvest today, but I was not sure who had gluten free options and did not have the heart to traipse around only to be disappointed. So I did my own City Harvest meal today and it was worth it! Will definitely be making it again!

Attempt #1--Good but needed some adjustments

Attempt #2--Far superior!