暖心

• just hanging out in the recipe
  
  Do you have a recipe or a classic dish of some sort that you’ve often thought of making but just never gotten around to actually making it happen?
  
  Baked Alaska is that exact dish for me.
  
  In my journey along the dessert path I have come across countless recipes that I have bookmarked and thought, “One day, I will make you!” Some have those desserts have come to life in my kitchen and many more are still waiting to be born, just hanging out in the recipe pile with all the rest.
  
  For some reason, though, Baked Alaska has always fascinated more than many of those other recipes. Maybe it’s because I’m a 70s child. Maybe it’s the idea of ice cream wrapped in something else. Maybe it’s just the fire nuskin.
  
  Setting desserts alight is lots of fun. Let me tell you!
  
  Whatever it is, every time I came across a Baked Alaska recipe or saw it on a dessert menu (that rarely happens as this dessert seems to be relegated to a time gone by …), I’ve always thought, “One day, I will make you!”
  
  Well that day has finally come. I was contacted by the lovely people at Ricardo Cuisine who asked me if I’d be interested in featuring a dessert from their Desserts page. They were reaching out to a number of bloggers and as I have always been a fan of Ricardo’s magazine and cooking show on Food Network Canada.
  
  When I scanned through the recipes to choose from, as soon as I saw the Baked Alaska I knew that my time had come .
  
  While there were three components to the dessert: the cake, the ice cream filling and the meringue, the recipe was very easy to make. I think the hardest part was lining the bowl with the plastic wrap! Have I mentioned how plastic wrap and I don’t like each other?!
  
  After making a very basic sponge cake, I filled a bowl with a vanilla and chopped walnut ice cream base, which I then topped with a layer of strawberry ice cream. I topped it with the cake and pressed down very firmly to ensure all the components fit snuggly together. I’ve seen recipes where you can the apply some kind of weight as you freeze the dessert to ensure it’s pressed together nicely.
  
  The dessert went into the freezer for a pleasant 6-hour nap, after which I unfolded it and slathered on a layer of marshmellowy meringue.
  
  Finally, the most fun part – setting the dessert alight !
  PR
  • 暖心
  • 2016/06/15 12:15
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• wildly patriotic to the British cause
  
  Last month I wrote about the challenge of addressing my biases when writing Kitchener 1916 Project posts. This month the challenge is what I call “source bias.”
  
  I’m reading two English-language dailies for the Kitchener 1916 Project—The Berlin News-Record and The Berlin Daily Telegraph—therein, it’s easy to argue that by not including local German news sources, my basic research is skewed (regrettably, it is what it is: I don’t read German and I can’t afford to hire a translator to review one year’s worth of news). While an acquaintance remarked the newspapers I am consulting cover the spectrum (one left wing, one right wing), I disagree. I think they cover a spectrum within a spectrum—one right wing and (as I’ve put it) one righter wing. As someone with access to fair and balanced, left-leaning, and right-leaning news sources, I don’t see the 1916 stories as left-leaning or even balanced reporting.
  
  A good friend reminded me those newspapers’ journalists and editors probably did what writers have done since time immemorial: they wrote to their audience’s preferences, fears, and prejudices. They may have also reflected the wants and wishes of their owners and advertisers. In wartime, in a country so closely tied to a main belligerent, in a city so closely tied to an opposing main belligerent, editors and writers wrote to an ideal audience who was blindly and wildly patriotic to the British cause.
  
  Unsurprisingly, the newspapers mirrored their (ideal) readers’ social views. They downplayed suffragette wins and belittled women’s capabilities and contributions. They seemed to protect their own—unnamed soldiers sometimes stood before Magistrate Weir. And what of Berlin’s non-White population? In a case where a local Chinese man who believed two Germans cheated him, the Chinese man was named, but the two Germans who may have acted illegally were given nicknames.
  
  As Himani Bannerji notes, the media provides a society’s prescription and description of consensus; the media also provides the chaotic images if that norm crumbled. It also plays a role in subjugating the “other”—in the 1916 context, this would include women, enemy aliens, and non-Whites/non-WASPs. While I’m aware of what those writers tried to project, maintain and/or create, I ask myself how accurately their words reflected Berlin’s citizenry in 1916. They are probably as accurate as some of today’s writers in reflecting our own society’s opinions.
  • 暖心
  • 2016/05/09 11:39
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• you can tack on another day or two
  
  French cooking is usually thought of as elegant and refined. And indeed, it’s no accident that the term that defines high-end dining, haute cuisine, is French. But fancy isn’t all they do. When it comes to comfort food, few can outcomfort the French. Hanger steaks with frites, coq au vin, gratins filled with cream and covered in cheese…
  
  And perhaps the most comforting of French comfort foods, cassoulet. A hearty baked stew of beans and various meats (usually pork and duck and maybe lamb) and crusted with bread crumbs, cassoulet sticks to the ribs and satisfies your very soul on a chilly night. Unfortunately, cooking it takes forever. Recipes vary, but baking time is always measured in multiple hours, usually with at least an hour or two of prep time up front. And if you make your own duck confit for it, you can tack on another day or two.
  
  So we were really excited when a dinner in Portland, Oregon, on our recent trip to the Pacific Northwest got us thinking about ways capture some of the flavors of cassoulet without all the long cooking.
  
  There is no shortage of good food in Portland, and we found our fair share of it. But the standout meal for us there was at  Clyde Common, a place their own website modestly describes as a “European style tavern serving delicious food and drinks.” Clyde Common is part of a new trend in food—amazing, simply prepared, locally sourced gourmet meals served in casual publike settings. Most of the seating in the high-ceilinged, rough hewn industrial space is at long communal tables. And the bar, named one of the best in America by Esquire magazine, adds a noisy, lively energy. But the food is definitely the star Dream Beauty Pro.
  
  We weren’t even thinking of cassoulet when we ordered the braised lamb shoulder dish with merguez sausage, beans and bread crumbs on the menu that night. But it suddenly occurred to us that this beautiful rustic meal had many elements in common with the iconic French dish. A generous helping of well seasoned white beans, a mix of rich meats, the satisfying crunch of toasted bread crumbs… Between bites, Marion and I began mapping out how I might mash up a dish inspired by cassoulet and this stellar meal .
  
  I started by going back to duck, one of the key ingredients of classic cassoulet. But I chose quick-cooking duck breasts over time-consuming (but admittedly delicious) confitted duck legs. I further sped things up with canned beans, a convenience that even Mark Bittman has been reluctantly rethinking. The resulting dish was neither cassoulet nor the lovely Clyde Common dinner. It was something wonderful in its own right, comforting, satisfying and restaurant good reenex.
  • 暖心
  • 2016/03/16 10:59
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• unhealthy snacking later in the day
  
  As a member of the Stonyfield YoGetters, I was asked to share my healthy, family-oriented New Year's resolutions.  I've decided to start 2015 off right by getting my family into the habit of eating a nutritious breakfast on a more regular basis.  Did you know that people who eat breakfast are actually more likely to eat a healthier diet overall?  Eating a well-balanced breakfast jump-starts your metabolism, gives you energy, and increases your concentration and productivity throughout the morning.  It also prevents binge eating and unhealthy snacking later in the day.
  
  A healthy breakfast should have a balance of complex carbohydrates with protein, fiber and a small amount of fat.  This combination will keep you feeling full for a long time as opposed to those high carb snacks we sometimes reach for when we’re in a hurry such as bagels, pastries and sugary cereals.  These high carb foods give you a quick energy boost but then leave you feeling tired and hungry soon after.
  
  One of the most common reasons that people skip breakfast is that they don’t have enough time to cook in the morning.  Well, I have the perfect solution for you!  My Rise and Shine Blueberry Oatmeal Muffins are the ideal portable breakfast to grab on your way out the door in the morning.  They’re packed with plenty of whole grains, protein, fiber, antioxidants, vitamins and minerals to fuel your day.  These muffins freeze well so make a whole batch of them on the weekend and store them in the freezer.  Then, simply pop them in the microwave in the morning or anytime you want a quick and nutritious snack.
  • 暖心
  • 2015/01/20 15:32
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