Anna N

They are the most evil of all!

Now that might work with store-bought salsa and at least there's none of those evil beans in it! Thanks.

Excuse me. This was my plate!

And after all that I forgot.

So it looks as if I will have to take one for the team. Cauliflower ready to go into the oven to be roasted. I ran across a tip that suggested collecting all the little crumbs that are inevitable when you try to slice cauliflower and put them in a smaller container and roast them separately for a shorter time. I think I will just put them in after the larger pieces are mostly roasted. Why is it that some cauliflowers will yield "steaks" and some won't? I decided I wanted a romesco sauce with it but knew I was not up to the complicated version in the Zuni Café cookbook although I do love that one. So I turned to Serious Eats for their version. Garlic, tomato, bread, almonds are ready to be roasted. I intend to cheat even more and use roasted peppers from a jar! Even as I post I'm thinking I am going to remove some of the almonds and replace them with some hazelnuts because I can!

And another question. What would you do with mini flour tortillas? Mexican is not my forte and remember we are in the land of ingredient paucity. Why sometimes you can't even find chicken thighs.

So. Has anyone tried reheating roasted cauliflower in the Cuisinart steam oven? How did it turn out if you did so?

Thanks. Must try that.

Good morning. It's another bright, sunny day. The temperature currently is 22°C and it is going to get warm enough by day's end that Kerry has turned on the air conditioner. She is on call again today so anything could happen. I debated whether chocolate-dipped crystallized ginger was an appropriate breakfast food then quickly nixed that idea as I remembered the slow roasted tomatoes and the goat cheese in the refrigerator. Warned ahead that the bread we bought in Espanola on our way home from Sudbury would turn to rusks if toasted, I avoided the problem by sprinkling it with some EVOO and pan toasting it. A chiffonade of basil might have taken this to a slightly higher level but it really didn't need much to be a perfect breakfast. I awoke without any serious plans for the day except for some minor housekeeping. I will make another tray of the slow roasted tomatoes and floating around somewhere in my disorganized mind is a recipe for roasted cauliflower that sounded intriguing. I know I saw it either in one of the many books we just purchased, on one of the many websites I've visited, in an email from one of the food sites I subscribe to or…… I know how to roast cauliflower. I've done that many times. This was one with a particularly intriguing sauce. I realize my chances of finding it are slim but I'm going to attempt the task.

That is almost me except that I don't buy the hard copy. Even if I cook nothing from these books I usually learn something, get inspired or am cheaply entertained.

Yep. Some people are even more spoiled than I am as if that were possible.

So while the garlic gadget was a bust I am quite enamored of this small knife. I think it was sharper than any that I've found right out of the package. Of course I needed another knife like I needed a hole in the head. And I will most definitely keep the small container from the useless garlic gadget.

Yep. PC pastry but it used to be 100% butter. Now not so much. Very disappointing. I often use it though to make elephant ears which are just a sweet version of your puffy pinwheels. Easy, fast and usually impressive to one's audience.

Bear with me while I brag. (Or bare with me while I brag. I'm no prude.) I am obviously getting much too cheffy for my own good! I think this is the first time in my life I've actually had the edges of a puff pastry tart rise. This is a bacon, tomato and cheese "pizza tart". I consulted various sources and then did my own thing including brushing the edge of the pastry with bacon fat since that's what I had available. And making tomato petals to make sure that there was not too much liquid to deal with. I mean really! Who makes tomato petals for a pizza? Not sure how it's going to taste. Pride cometh before a fall. But the rug rat is a non-critical consumer of my various attempts. And she can always finish up with one of her mother's fabulous blueberry muffins.

I have quite a number of them and I found them all interesting but none of them grabbed me as some books can. That is hardly a review. Just a brief comment. If any of them really turn your crank you might want to borrow them from the library and make a final decision although at the prices they are it's hard to lose.

She is the epitomy of whimsical! That is neither a compliment nor an insult. It is simply how I think of her books. Have never attempted any of her recipes but they do look interesting

Thanks!

Had a cup of the smoky corn soup today for lunch and now I have a burning tongue and burned lips. Damned microwave.

Damned enabler, eh?

Yes they were sous vide first at 54.5°C for something in excess of four hours but done at different times. They were chilled down, frozen and when retrieved from the freezer given extra time in the sous vide bath in the hopes of improving their tenderness. I don't think it helped.

The rib cap was procured from a very reputable butcher in Toronto (not Cumbrae's). It was intended to be used for an Eggfest. Originally there were two of them but a test of one was very unsatisfactory and was never served at the Eggfest This is the second one which had been in Kerry's freezer. It was tough and this is particularly difficult for me due to limited dentition. I don't know if it was bad product or if it was operator error. I would love to try again particularly with those rolled caps. I have never seen them but then again I don't get much opportunity to look. Perhaps Kerry and I can make it a challenge to find them when we get back down south.

I just cannot resist posting yet another picture of the tomatoes ready to go into the oven. You will notice the sparsity of the basil. Weare rapidly running out. So the garlic genius isn't. Trust me there are so many ways to deal with garlic that are more efficient, less messy and definitely easier than this gadget. But because it practically turned the garlic into a paste I decided to modify the slow roasted cherry tomato recipe somewhat. Given that those tomatoes are going to roast for three hours, and given my propensity for burning garlic, I opted to put the raw garlic over the tomatoes and just briefly sauté the onions. I suspect no one will notice any difference.

Don't you just love the way that Kerry's impulse buys suddenly become my problem?

I love tri tip but confess to never going quite that low temperature wise nor quite that short time wise. But my question is about the chili coffee sauce. Can you elaborate? Please.

OK @Smithy (and others) if you are ever tempted to buy one of these, please don't. First of all the instructions for assembling and using it were on the underside of the cardboard packaging and I might have missed them completely! They were in fact on the packaging which one normally just tosses into the garbage. Even so without an engineering degree I found myself googling YouTube videos of how to assemble and use the damn thing. Still not sure that I have it right. But one would think with that very attractive little container that one could grind directly into it. Put that thought aside. The container will not attach to the main unit as long as it is fully assembled. And attempting to transfer the grated contents from the unit to the container resulted in a huge cleanup job. Since the thing said it would grate cheese and I needed cheese for my breakfast this morning I opted to try that before the garlic. Yes it will grate cheese. A minuscule amount at a time. And unless you have been smart enough to put down some parchment paper or other surface on which your cheese can land you will find yourself with cheese everywhere when you attempt to get it out of the unit. Of course if you watch the YouTube videos things work perfectly and with no mess whatsoever. Harumph. Epic fail on all accounts except the amusement value which is about all I expected anyway. Edited to add that also on my to do list is to make more of that wonderful slow roasted cherry tomato sauce with all the tomatoes that Kerry picked up yesterday. I am off into the kitchen to begin the task.