Chorizo This Time But Most Any Fresh Sausage Works This recipe has been part of my culinary DNA for decades. It started life as Mum’s interpretation of a ‘back of the 1970s lifestyle magazine’ casserole and honestly hasn’t changed much since. It’s an easy way to fill a big pan to feed a crowd which is its main objective but you get delicious in … Read More →
Rich, Red & Satisfying To match the beans in the previous post, you need to learn the tricks for perfect ‘red rice’, aka arroz rojo. This took me a surprising amount of tinkering to get exactly the way I remembered from countless ‘family style’ Mexican restaurants of my past. These days I’d love to have one near me to … Read More →
A Little Extra Cheese Never Hurts You should all know my obsession with beans by now so I’ll not to bore you yet again. Soak from dry, five times cheaper, etc. etc. Here’s how I make a batch of particularly creamy pinto beans suitable for parking next to Mexican red rice. If you’ve ever been to a family-style Mexican restaurant, you’ll … Read More →
Made At Home Without The Drive Editor’s Note: I wasn’t planning on typing this up but more than three and a half actual (I think) people asked for it after seeing the curry lurking on the side of my recent basmasti rice missive. Butter Chicken I’m told was ‘invented’ in the 1950s by clever chefs with a surplus of meat from … Read More →
I get through great heaping bags of this stuff. Curries are never photogenic. Editor’s Note: Another question from the forums here. Seems like a lot of words to explain a very simple process but that’s what it takes to get it just right on the first go. Took me a while to sort out the details myself. You’ll memorize the technique soon after a few pot’s worth of … Read More →
Deliciously Charred In All The Right Places ‘Chicken & rice’ is a natural pairing. From hauling out old retro recipes that call for cream of mushroom soup to treading the path to Indian biriyani, there is universal appeal. Arroz con pollo is arguably on the top five list of permutations and that’s where I started this iteration. The ongoing origin debate between … Read More →
This One Night In New Orleans... (ed. note: this is complete tinkering of the original posting on 6 December, 2016 to better address vegetarians and the finer points of roux making as well as a new video of my last batch) After reading about my bean obsession and gallo pinto theories, a viewer from the Googlytubes asked for more specifics on … Read More →
Colonial Ingredients Meet Indian Technique If you’ve heard the term succotash but never knew what it was beyond Warner Brother’s favourite expletive, let me enlighten you. Native people of North America have long benefited from corn in their diet and likewise discovered both the gardening and culinary benefits of matching it with beans. Sure you could talk about complete essential … Read More →
Quick, simple, delicious. And oh yeah, it's healthy. The need for my gong bao recipe, one of the pillars of Chinese sauce mastery *, came up in conversation so here are the details recycled from a post long ago. This sauce is what you find wrapped around your beloved Kung Pao Chicken or Broccoli Beef takeaway at the local Chinese. Make a batch … Read More →
Simple. Healthy. Fiesta. I’ve whinged on about the lack of Mexican food this far north plenty before. It simply doesn’t exist in the restaurant ecosystem of eastern Canada. One burrito shack and a tamale stall at the farmer’s market for a whole province, both of which have to dull down the cuisine for the tender Maritime palate, simply … Read More →
Eat Your Beans (and Spicy Rice) Rice and beans together goes by many names. “Hoppin’ John” across many parts of the US or simply “Red Beans & Rice” in New Orleans proper. Orez Shu’it in Jerusalem. And if you’ve ever been to Central America, you know about gallo pinto. There it’s on every menu and eaten all hours of the day … Read More →
