saucy spaghetti squash

Tonight, for the first time, I made spaghetti squash. What a cool vegetable! In my effort to eat healthy and not want to bore my taste buds into nonexistence, I have been trying out some new foods. It looks like any other squash as you cook it, but when done, it pulls apart just like spaghetti stands. I made a tomato, white kidney bean and sweet pea sauce to go with it. For the tomato sauce I use Victoria's All Natural Marinara Sauce from Costco. It doesn't have any extra sugar or additives like many others and it tastes amazing! A few chillies and some hot sauce to finish it off and wow! It was great! Even my meat loving, I won't like anything vegetarian finance loved it. Success!

genius!

While running errands with my mum a few weeks back we stopped at A&W for a snack - necessary shopping fuel. While there I discovered something genius! The A&W ketchup packages are double sized! Such a genius idea! One is never enough, people then take far more than they need because of how little actually comes out. But not here, 1 maybe 2 is enough. Simple and brilliant. Way to go A&W! I am a fan.

Korean BBQ

One of the many perks of dating Dennis is his mother. She is a fantastic cook! She has introduced me to so many wonderful Korean foods. One of my absolute favourites is a meat dish called Kalbi. This is basically Korean ribs marinated in a mouth watering sauce served with rice. I can't describe how great the flavour is in Kalbi sauce - sesame, garlicy yummy goodness. A few summers ago President's Choice came out with their rendition of Korean BBQ sauce. I was intrigued, so I tried it. Amazing! Honestly it is so so good. Not Mrs. Kim good, but very very good.

So here's what you need to do now, like right now: buy the Korean cut spare ribs at Superstore/Loblaws and marinate them over night with onions in the sauce. Cook them on the BBQ or in a pan on the stove top and enjoy. You will not regret it!

Mofongo what?

I would like to share the food I learned about on tonight's episode of Diners, Drive Ins and Dives. Yes, seriously. Mofongo! What the heck is Mofongo you ask? Well, according to Wikipidia Mofongo is a plantain-based dish from Puerto Rico. Mofongo is generally made from fried green plantains (although fried yuca or breadfruit are possible) which is mashed together with broth, garlic, olive oil, and pork cracklings or bits of bacon. It is often filled with vegetables, chicken, crab, shrimp, or beef and is often served with fried meat and chicken broth soup. Doesn't this sound delicious?? It is now my mission to find a place that serves this so I can try it. That or an excuse to go to Puerto Rico. I'm so hungry right now!

Looks so good!

Nothing better than diner food

Today I watched another episode of Diners, Drive Ins and Dives. I'm a little addicted to this show! I love diner food! And this show is all about diner food; the greasy, fatty, fully loaded completely terrible for you food. The food you want but shouldn't eat and mostly don't but sometimes cave and do. I honestly do not know how Guy eats all this food all the time and hasn't had a heart attack yet - knock on wood!! I really like the host (Guy Fieri) I think his humour and quick wit adds to the show. Anyway, this is one of my guilty pleasures. It would be much guiltier if I ate all the things that I see on the show that I want - but guilty non the less.

So much better than a bunny!

Possibly the best things ever.

Yum Yum

I went to Cora's this morning for breakfast; what great food they have! I had a skillet with bacon ham, tons of veg, a scrambled egg on top of roast potatoes. So yummy! What a gold mine that franchise must be!

Spicy Dry Rub

Tonight I wanted to cook a whole chicken but didn't feel like my usual seasoning of garlic, rosemary, thyme and lemon. So, I decided to get creative. I created a dry rub of Ginger Powder, Garlic Powder, Mustard Powder, Cayenne Pepper and Paprika. I poured olive oil over the whole chicken then generous coated the chicken with my new rub. AMAZING!

I also cut up a couple Yukon Gold potatoes 30 minutes into cook and tossed them in the casserole dish with the chicken and mixed a bit of the rub in with them. AMAZING! A bit of heat and a great taste! Love it!

If you want to try: (I didn't measure as I did it so you can play around with the quantities)

Mustard Powder 1 part

Garlic Powder 2 parts

Ginger Powder 1 part
Cayenne Pepper 2 - 3 parts

Paprika 1 part

Start with a tablespoon as your unit of measure if you are coating a whole chicken.

Cooking a whole chicken!

So the packages of chicken breasts were so expensive last week so I decided to protest the extreme price mark of chopping the chicken up into pieces and bought a whole chicken. Take that Galen Weston! Only the joke was on me because when I got home I realized I didn't know how to cook a whole chicken.

So, I decided to take the chicken by the legs and just do it. So here's what I did and what it turned out looking like...

I boiled a lemon for 10 minutes to heat it up enough to release the flavours and heat the chicken from the inside of the chicken, I then stuffed it inside the chicken.

I made a rub consisting of garlic, olive oil, thyme, rosemary and lemon zest and rubbed it all over the chicken and stuff a little inside too.

Cooked it for 1 hour and 40 minutes, basting it half way and throwing in potato wedges when I basted it.

Amazingly it turned out great! I even have a testimonial to the success! Given she is my sister and given she suffers from a need to encourage me and be positive but still!

Loved it! The potatoes were great too!

Spicy Garlic Shrimp

While having dinner at a friends house over Christmas I learned a new recipe that is so easy and so tasty it would be a crime not to try it for yourself. However....this recipe is not for the faint hearted. What could I mean? Well for one, you should use the shrimp that are still in their shell, legs, tails and all! And no pre-cooked all cleaned up shrimps - where's the fun in that?? Believe me it will be worth it for taste and culinary fun when you get to eat with your hands!

Here it goes:

Shrimps - depending on how many people and how hungry you are - but make lots
Olive Oil
Garlic - fresh is best and most flavourful (flavorful for my American viewer (Bree that's you)
Red onion chopped roughly
1 tomato/several cherry tomatoes whatever you like
Red chilli paste
Dried chilli peppers
two lemon wedges - skin and all
couple table spoons of water

So combine, oil, garlic, onions, lemon, tomato (chopped), chilli paste, chilli flakes (lots if you like it with a kick) - basically put everything in the pan but the shrimp and let the flavours jive for about 10 minutes while the tomatoes get runny etc. Med-high heat - stir often.

Put shrimp in mixture and move around a bit so that they cook evenly in the pan. About 10 minutes, if that.

Put whole mixture in a bowl, serve with rice. People can spoon what shrimp and mixture they want onto their plate and then you get to pick at them and eat with your hands! SO GREAT!

Let me know how you like it. This meal honestly takes a total of 20 minutes start to finish - or you're slow. :)

Slow cooker time

I recently bought a slow cooker because I decided it was a great idea for no good reason. I just got the idea in my head because my friend Sarah has one and she's a great cook argo if I got a slow cooker I would be a great cook. Perfectly sensible.... ahem

So now that it's getting colder outside I'm about to christen the cooker. Sarah (the great cook) sent me a few recipes that I am going to try out, soon!

Can always count on Martha - Pot Roast Stuffed Peppers Chili Chicken Tacos

Asian Noodle Soup

I'm always looking for new recipes. I get so sick of eating the same thing all the time. I'm going to try this Asian Noodle Soup recipe I found on the Food Network website - LOVE the Food Network.

Yummy Asian Noodle Soup