Food Matters – Holiday Platters

Posted on December 4, 2014 by Don Genova
New shop just down the street from me!

New shop just down the street from me!

The holiday season is officially in full swing, with many calories to be consumed at dinners and parties now until New Year’s. If you want to be on trend with some of the goodies you plan to serve your guests, here’s some advice I shared on this week’s edition of Food Matters on CBC Radio’s All Points West program.

Sometimes I think I could almost live exclusively on cured meats, cheeses, sausages and all the condiments that go with them. These kinds of foods have been making a big splash in Canadian restaurants and specialty shops for the past few years, and more and more at home as part of cocktail and dinner parties. I was at the Out of Hand Craft Fair in Victoria over the weekend and saw one artisan selling refurbished barrel staves to be used as charcuterie platters and saw a few people walking around with these beautiful staves in their shopping bags and they were quite pleased with their purchases, looked like their guests are in for a treat during upcoming parties.

Two of Cure's Terrines

Two of Cure’s Terrines

There are a lot of choices to make, though, when you are considering putting together a platter, and that’s why I sought some help from Chef Brad Boisvert. Many people in the Cowichan Valley know him from his restaurant, Amuse, which has been in a few different locations of the years, he’s now comfortably ensconced at Cherry Point Vineyards, but Brad has also recently opened a little shop in the Valley View Mall called Cure, Artisan Meat and Cheese. Because the restaurant at Cherry Point is more of a seasonal operation, he decided to devote even more time to a craft he has been fond of for years. Brad says it started when he was in training at the Culinary Institute of America. There was one class in charcuterie, it was only 12 hours long, though! He knew he wanted to do more so he took as many extra classes from the instructor as possible. What hooked him was the ability to take a piece of meat and turn it into so many different things, like using pork belly to make pancetta and bacon.

Cure platter with duck liver pate, smoked duck breast, cheeses, mustards and pickled quail's eggs

Cure platter with duck liver pate, smoked duck breast, cheeses, mustards and pickled quail’s eggs

When it comes to making a platter with all the choices that are out there, Brad is always looking for balance. And balance is in the textures of the different items, chicken or duck liver pate, a nice sausage, smoked duck breast, for example.  And you can’t forget the cheese. Brad says we are very fortunate here on the island since we have so many local cheesemakers making some products perfect for a tasting platter, including Salt Spring Island Cheese, The Happy Goat and Hilary Abbott’s Creamery at Cheese Pointe Farm.

Cheese counter at Cure

Cheese counter at Cure

The condiments are a very important part of any platter, Brad makes several of his own, including three different types of mustard, a spicy ketchup, red onion jam, and these beautiful little pickled quail’s eggs. When it comes to your starch, you don’t want to get in the way of the flavours in your meats and cheeses. Simple baguette, or perhaps, some crostini, thin slices of baguette toasted with a little olive oil and some sea salt. To drink, Brad loves some of the Alsatian-style whites produced in the Cowichan Valley, especially a champagne-style bubbly from Cherry Pointe Vineyards, high in acidity and crispness to help you cleanse your palate in between bits of all that rich meat and cheese. Brad and I had a much longer chat about his love of charcuterie and his new shop, so click here for your listening pleasure

Time challenged? Let Brad make up a platter for you. And if you’re in Victoria, I heartily recommend the products and platters done up by Cory Pelan at The Whole Beast Salumeria. Act soon, these shops are probably already busy with orders for the holiday season.

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Food Matters – Mylkmaid Beverage Company

Posted on November 28, 2014 by Don Genova

In today’s world of food allergies, intolerances and ethical eating, having different choices is key, especially when it comes to beverages. This week on Food Matters, I profiled a dairy alternative that’s making a splash on the local market.

Mylk, 3 flavours

Mylk, 3 flavours

Mylk  gets its main flavour from almonds, and is manufactured in Victoria by the Mylkmaid Beverage Company and Kiley McLean. Kiley started making and drinking almond milk about five years ago. “I had just been reading about how some of the cows in the large scale industrial milk production system are mistreated and thought that I should try an alternative, like almond milk. But when I tasted it and started reading the labels on commercially available almond milk products I wasn’t that impressed. When I figured out that it should just basically contain almonds and water, I started experimenting with making it and came up with something that tastes much better, you can actually taste almonds.”

 

Kiley McLean of Mylkmaid Beverage Company

Kiley McLean of Mylkmaid Beverage Company

Once her family and friends tasted her almond milk she started making it for them, and then got the idea of doing it on a small-scale basis and selling it weekly at the Moss Street Market Saturday mornings. With that market over for the season, Kiley decided to reach out to some local grocery stores like Fairfield Market, Niagara Grocery and Peppers, and it’s growing from there. Part of what made her carry on was the positive response she got from tasters at the farmer’s market, some of whom had tried commercially made almond milk in the past and didn’t like it, but they liked hers because of the fresher flavour and creamier texture. Her basic product line consists of three flavours, all starting with Pure, which is just organic almonds, water and a touch of Saltwest sea salt. Vanilla adds a sweetener made from organic Medjool dates and a vanilla bean, while Cacao adds cocoa powder. Over the summer and fall Kiley made seasonal favourites using strawberries, figs and she just finished up with a batch using fresh pumpkin. One of her holiday flavours adds some peppermint into the cacao version.

Price: I think you can put them in what I would call a premium quality price range. $4.99 for 250 millilitres. Keep in mind it’s an organic product, and organic almonds are particularly pricy, but people are still buying, says Kiley: “People are kind of wowed at the difference, but the stuff in the store can barely have any almonds at all, and it just has so many different additives in it to make up the consistency of milk. The thickness of our Mylk comes just from the almonds. I find that with our Mylk you just maybe need a little less, because it’s so creamy, and maybe you are just adding a little to your coffee, or maybe to smoothies, a lot of people are putting almond milk in their smoothies, and you really just need like a splash, you don’t need a whole cup of it in your smoothie to make it creamy.”

This is just a part-time job for her now, she would like to turn it into a full-time career, and to do that she would like to get some cafes and coffee shops carrying her product for use as creamers or in lattes. This weekend Kiley will be spreading the word on Mylk at Silk Road Tea in Chinatown as she shows people how to make tea lattes with her product.

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Food Matters – Ampersand Gin and a New Era of Distilling in BC

Posted on November 13, 2014 by Don Genova

DSC_4459Changes to liquor laws in BC have meant good news for anyone with an interest in creating spirits for the local market. Small to large distilleries are springing up and the entrepreneurial spirit of the industry is alive and well. This week on CBC Radio’s All Points West I profiled of one of the new kids on the block.

We have already been through and continue to benefit from a greater choice in beverages like wine and beer and mead, now it’s time for spirits to step up. Artisan distillers are quick to thank the pioneers of this era like Merridale Ciderworks, Okanagan Spirits, and Island Spirits Distillery on Hornby Island, the makers of Phrog gin. We’ve had Victoria Gin for a while and Shelter Point Distillery near Campbell River has come on stream with vodka and their single malt whisky will soon be available. Arbutus Distillery is also a newcomer to the field in Nanaimo.

Jessie bottling

Jessie bottling

Jeremy Labelling

Jeremy Labelling

But for now, come with me just outside of Duncan to Sol Farm, a family-run organic farm that is now also home to the Ampersand Distilling Company. Down behind the house in a small shed close to the raspberry bushes I was picking from this summer I found Stephen Schacht, his son Jeremy and Jeremy’s girlfriend Jessica McLeod. Stephen showed me around as Jessie was carefully filling bottles of Ampersand Gin, then passing them on to Jeremy for labelling, everything done by hand in this fledgling business. I asked Stephen why he wanted to get into distilling in the first place:  “Our family has always been independent entrepreneurs, and we’re always looking for something to do that will keep us close to home. Jeremy went to school for chemical engineering but when he graduated most of the job opportunities were in industries like the oil sands and chemical plants, places he didn’t really find attractive. So one day he said, ‘Dad, do you think we could build a distillery?’ And the rest of it came out of that little conversation.”

The 'secret weapon'

The ‘secret weapon’

There have been a lot of crazy ideas hatched over a simple conversation, and in this particular instance Stephen and Jeremy started from scratch. They welded the stills together, built everything by hand, and even created a machine that would turn a spool of wire into these tiny spring-like devices that are used to purify the alcohol in the distilling column. I saw the facility as it was coming together and it had the whole air of ‘mad scientist’ to it, and at times Stephen admitted the whole process seemed a little daunting: “We weren’t even sure that it was going to work. In the few weeks before we started distilling I was lying awake night after night thinking ‘oh god, what have we done, if this is going to work so well why isn’t anyone else doing it?’ But what we kind of discovered is that gin has been made in basically the same way since the 1800’s, the distillers using the same kind of stills, and the technology has never changed. But we’ve decided to take a totally different approach and it seems to be working amazingly well.” 

Organic BC Wheat

Organic BC Wheat

The other factor that has worked out well for them, according to Jeremy, are the recent changes in BC liquor laws. “Yeah, you could always start a distillery but it didn’t really make a lot of sense to do so, under the old tax structure. But now, because we are making our gin from raw BC agricultural products (we make it from BC-grown organic wheat), we get a different distribution agreement with the government. In essence we can sell directly to restaurants, liquor stores and consumers, like at the farmer’s market, and that has helped us a lot to start a distillery and be able to charge reasonable prices for a quality organic product.”

Jessie, Jeremy and Stephen

Jessie, Jeremy and Stephen

Farmers’ markets have been a big part of their marketing so far. It’s a great chance to talk to customers, let them taste and buy right there, and that just happened a couple of months ago and it’s great to see these other forms of BC agricultural products at the markets.  While All Points West host Jo-Ann Roberts was sampling the Ampersand Gin Stephen told us why they chose Ampersand as their name: “The ‘And’ symbol (&) means ‘in combination with’ and we just like the feel of that, we’re bringing this new technology to an ancient art, the making of gin, along with our organic farming practices, and in our place of healing the earth by growing things without a lot of chemicals and it’s been a pretty joyful experience and I think it was a good choice of a name.”

Expect more from Ampersand in the days ahead, a vodka, flavoured with tayberries grown on the farm, a beautiful festive red colour for the holidays, and perhaps a liqueur based on Cowichan Valley hazelnuts. Ampersand is available at a growing number of outlets, check their website for locations.

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Food Matters – Fermenting Workshop

Posted on November 6, 2014 by Don Genova

IMG_0646There was a bit of a tangy aroma in the CBC Victoria studio this afternoon as I presented a Mason jar of my homemade sauerkraut to All Points West host Jo-Ann Roberts. I made it from scratch with just five ingredients.  Cabbage. Ginger. Garlic. Carrots. And salt. Squish them all together and wait a week or so and you get sauerkraut. If you remember back in April of this year I introduced you to Melanie Furman on Salt Spring Island and her Culturalive sauerkrauts and kimchis. Since I started eating her products I’ve taken a greater interest in these products, so when I got an invitation from Bootleg Betty to go to a sauerkraut making workshop in Duncan a couple of weeks ago of course I said yes.

Holly Howe, aka 'Bootleg Betty'

Holly Howe, aka ‘Bootleg Betty’

Bootleg Betty is really Holly Howe. Her husband came up the Bootleg Betty name since Holly teaches people how to make a fermented product, and the reference to bootlegging goes back to when making your own fermented alcohols like wine and beer was strictly illegal. She started eating sauerkraut for its healthy properties but became inspired to make her own after reading the book another recent Food Matters guest wrote. That would be Sally Fallon and her Nourishing Traditions cookbook. For the past ten years she’s been teaching these workshops to people who want to make their own kraut whether it’s because they want to save money or because they want to use the ingredients they prefer, as you can put many different kinds of vegetables and even some fruits into a sauerkraut.

 

Holly's different krauts

Holly’s different krauts

There were about half a dozen of us at a community kitchen in Duncan. Holly starts off with a bit of a lecture introducing us to the whole concept of fermented foods, which includes more than wine, beer and sauerkraut. Cider, mead, cheese, yogurt, sour cream, and cultured butter are all fermented foods, as are breads, the yeast in bread produces a fermentation, soy sauce and miso paste, vanilla and other bean products like coffee and chocolate are also fermented as part of their processing. We also tasted five different kinds of sauerkraut Holly had already made so we could figure out which one we would like to make when it came time to start chopping and shredding.

Slice, grate and chop!

Slice, grate and chop!

They were all good so I had a hard time choosing. Ultimately I chose cabbage and ginger and carrots, but there was also cabbage and dill. Cabbage and carrots. Cabbage and beets and garlic and caraway seeds. And for kimchi, cabbage, carrots, green onion, ginger, garlic, radish and hot pepper flakes. And salt, it’s the salt that starts everything going. After you measure out the ingredients needed for your recipe into a big bowl, you add a tablespoon of non-iodized salt, and start mixing it together with your hands. Pretty soon the salt starts getting the veggies to release their liquids, and that’s when you’re ready to stuff a pound and a half of cabbage into a one-quart size Mason jar. You would never think it would fit, but it does. Holly showed us how to make sure the cabbage will stay under all the brine that’s produced and then you put on a plastic lid, and that’s it.

Mixing the kraut

Mixing the kraut

You’ve spent a few minutes chopping your garlic and ginger and grating the carrots and shredding the garlic. But then you just wait. You put the jar in a shallow bowl and leave it at room temperature. More and more brine will be produced, and some of it will even seep out of the jar, which is why you put it into a little bowl. It kind of sings to you, strange little gurgling noises. It’s ready to eat in about a week, but to get the full benefits of the good bacteria being produced in the jar you want to let it ferment for up to four weeks before you put it in the fridge. I made my jar on October 26th and by today, November 6th, it tasted great. I’ll soon be ready to make another jar!

 

 

Getting ready to close the jar

Getting ready to close the jar

If you really get hooked on kraut, you can purchase a special fermenting crock that will allow you to do up to five pounds at a time. Holly has two more workshops scheduled before Christmas, and if you’re further up island, the great people at Stir Cooking School in Lantzville near Nanaimo are doing a kimchi workshop in early January. Yes, people are already making plans for the New Year!

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Thermomix Nougat – Piece of Cake (Candy)

Posted on November 3, 2014 by Don Genova
The finished product, almond nougat

The finished product, almond nougat

Bonus post this week! I came back from Ottawa a couple of weeks ago with some delicious Quebec-made nougat, soft and chewy, with nuts and a bit of fruit. As I chewed, i started wondering if I can make nougat using my Thermomix? A little bit of searching on the intertubes and I had my answer: YES!!

It looked deceptively easy. And it was. The list of ingredients is short:

1 egg white

400 grams liquid honey

1/2 to 1 tsp orange blossom water (optional)

200 grams toasted nuts (hazelnuts, almonds or pistachios, unsalted)

That’s it. Put the egg white in the Thermie, whiz at speed 2 for 10 seconds. Put on the butterfly. Add the honey and the orange water if using. One hour, temperature 100, speed 2. Trust me. The mixture will get thicker and thicker, but it shouldn’t seize. Here’s a video of what it looks like when it’s about halfway through.

Out of the Thermie, onto the silicon mat.

Out of the Thermie, onto the silicon mat.

When the hour is up, stir in by hand the nuts. Then scrape all the nougat out of the canister and onto parchment paper, or preferably a silicon baking mat. Smooth it out with a spatula and top with another piece of parchment paper or another mat. You can now actually roll it out a bit with a rolling pin if you like to make sure it is of uniform smoothness. Let it rest overnight.

 

 

 

 

Starting to cut...

Starting to cut…

The next day take it off the paper or silicon mat and place on a cutting board you have generously dusted with icing sugar. Dust the top of the nougat and slice into desired shape and size of pieces. You’re done. Yes, you can taste a couple to make sure they’re okay.

Oh, and a handy tip I picked up from one of the websites I visited: When you’ve scraped out the Thermomix bowl, add a few drops of dish soap, fill it 3/4 full of warm water, and put on 1 minute, Varoma, speed 6. Another amazing demonstration of what the Thermomix is capable of doing. Contact me if you’re interested in getting one!

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Food Matters – The Spice and Herb Bible

Posted on November 1, 2014 by Don Genova

SpicesAllspice, cinnamon, cilantro, and dill. Fairly common herbs and spices in Canadian kitchens these days. But what about asafoetida, fenugreek and galangal? Those are also herbs and spices you may see popping up in your list of ingredients in cookbooks these days. If you’re not familiar with some of these names, I’ve been poring over just the book to help you out.

Me and Ian 'Herbie' Hemphill

Me and Ian ‘Herbie’ Hemphill

The Spice and Herb Bible is quite a weighty tome. The author of this guide to everything you need to know about herbs and spices is Ian Hemphill. He lives in Sydney, Australia, where he runs a shop called Herbie’s Spices. I had heard of this shop before when I was visiting Australia years ago, and when I found out he was going to be in Vancouver at the same time I was, I really wanted to meet him. We met at one of the big spice and grocery shops in Vancouver’s Punjabi Market, which really got him going with all the different goods on display there.

 

The Spice and Herb Bible, 3rd Edition

The Spice and Herb Bible, 3rd Edition

The book is his way of getting his knowledge out around the world. The Spice and Herb Bible had just arrived at my house when my nephew was visiting, who is just getting into cooking, and he picked it up and couldn’t put it down until I had to grab it from him and then I was captivated going from one topic to the other, because it is filled with so much fascinating history and information. Ian’s daughter Kate is a chef, and she provides lots of recipes throughout the book to give you examples of how to use many of the spices found within its pages.

Ian loved the spice shop we were in. We were only there for about half an hour, but I could easily have spent the whole day with him, moving our way down the racks and bins of spices, as he had something fascinating to say about practically everything. Here is our conversation, presented as an mp3 file for your listening pleasure.

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