Pacific Palate, Jan. 24/06 Post-Election Brekkie

Posted on January 24, 2006 by Don Genova

If you’re looking for the Italian Express cookbook contest, click here.  For the next few weeks you’ll find everything you need from my various radio shows posted here instead of my website while my webmaster is away.  Oh, and my wife Ramona has a new blog called The Lasagna Project.  Check it out.

Post-Election Breakfast

This morning on Pacific Palate we welcomed newly elected NDP MP Libby Davies and unsuccessful Liberal candidate Keith Henry.  I served them breakfasts made up of ‘Superfoods’. Superfoods are being acclaimed by medical experts for containing disease-fighting, health-boosting nutrients critical for good health.  Capers Community Markets has come up with a Superfoods Healthy Eating Plan to help you ‘refresh your relationship’ with food.  Here are two recipes from the Eating Plan booklet, available at Capers for just one dollar.

Breakfast Burrito (1 serving)

2 large eggs, slightly beaten

1 tbsp. green onions, thinly sliced

dash of cumin and chili powder, salt to taste

1/4 cup salsa

1 whole wheat tortilla

Pour eggs in a pan lightly sprayed with cooking spray.  Add onions, spices and salt.  Stir.  Add salsa.  Cook eggs, stirring, until firm.  Heat tortilla in a microwave or dry skillet.  Roll eggs into heated tortilla.

Prepare the night before and wrap in wax paper or foil for an easy, grab n’ go breakfast.

High Protein Fruit Smoothie (1 serving)

1 scoop whey or soy protein powder

1/2 cup blueberry juice

1/2 peeled and sliced banana

1/2 cup frozen blueberries

1/3 cup organic plain dairy or soy yogurt

1 tbsp. honey

1/2 tsp. cinnamon

Mix ingredients in blender and whir until smooth.

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Finger Food, Anyone?

Posted on January 19, 2006 by Don Genova

If you’re looking for the Italian Express cookbook contest, click here.  For the next few weeks you’ll find everything you need from my various radio shows posted here instead of my website while my webmaster is away.  Oh, and my wife Ramona has a new blog called The Lasagna Project.  Check it out.

Finger Food, Anyone?

I was pleasantly surprised to hear the fate of the California couple who tried to bilk money out of Wendy’s by claiming the wife had found a finger in a bowl of Wendy’s chili.  Turns out she planted the finger herself, the finger her husband had obtained from his unfortunate co-worker who had lost it in an industrial accident.  The couple were ‘fingered’ by authorities who doubted the story since the finger in the chili hadn’t been cooked.  See, you should always consult Hannibal Lecter before you try to pull off a stunt like that. The wife got 9 years in prison, the husband 12. That’ll teach them to fool around with a fast food giant! Read more details here.

Good Finger Food: Saveur Magazine has sensibly made a West Coast seafood product one of its "Top 100" for 2006. The list is made up of­ the editors’ "favorite restaurants, food, drink, people, places and things."  The magazine features SeaChange Seafoods’ signature Smoked Salmon Jerky as number 43.

Jerky1902 Way to go, guys!

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Food For Thought, Jan. 18/06

Posted on January 18, 2006 by Don Genova

If you’re looking for the Italian Express cookbook contest, click here.  For the next few weeks you’ll find everything you need from my various radio shows posted here instead of my website while my webmaster is away.  Oh, and my wife Ramona has a new blog called The Lasagna Project.  Check it out.

Food For Thought, Jan. 18, 2006 – The Hundred Mile Diet

This week I talked with Alisa Smith and James MacKinnon, freelance journalists who live in Vancouver, and who are living the ‘Hundred Mile Diet’.  This means they are not eating any foods that are produced with ingredients that are grown or raised further than 100 miles away from Vancouver.   They began their year-long experiment in March of last year and have been documenting it in columns on The Tyee.ca.

A colleague of mine in Saskatoon, Amy Jo Ehman, is also documenting her experiment with the ‘Saskatchewan Diet’.  Check out her progress on her blog.

Vancouver’s Raincity Grill restaurant will be featuring a ‘Hundred Mile Diet’ tasting menu in February.  I had a preview the other night and chef de cuisine Andrea Carlson did an excellent job with local ingredients and GM Brent Hayman also adhered to the 100-mile limit for wine pairings.

I’ll be doing a podcast about the ‘Hundred Mile Diet’ in the near future, so stay tuned!

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Pacific Palate, Jan. 17/06 Dine Out Vancouver

Posted on January 16, 2006 by Don Genova

If you’re looking for the Italian Express cookbook contest, click here.  For the next few weeks you’ll find everything you need from my various radio shows posted here instead of my website while my webmaster is away.  Oh, and my wife Ramona has a new blog called The Lasagna Project.  Check it out.

Pacific Palate for January 17/06  Dine Out Vancouver 

This morning’s show featured a preview of the wildly popular Dine Out Vancouver concept.  The official duration of the promotion is January 20th to February 4th, but some restaurants have begun their menus already and others will extend past the 4th.  To find out which restaurants are participating, visit the Tourism Vancouver website. The listings will also tell you which restaurants are still accepting reservations, and have menu information as well.  For help with some restaurants that have live, on-line reservations, visit OpenTable.com and check for Vancouver restaurants.

I was lucky enough to do a couple of previews for Dine Out Vancouver. Img_1305_1  One of my favourite dishes was found at Umberto’s Circolo, a divine duck breast coated in five-spice rub and served with mixed stonefruit chutney and a truffled bread and butter pudding.  Of course I stole tastes of my dining companions’ plates and can highly recommend the sablefish and veal medallions.

Img_1315 Over at Nu, I had two dishes that rank among the best restaurant courses I’ve had in months.  My first course was a salad of goat cheese, frisee and beets topped with walnuts.  The beets were sliced so thinly they just melted into my mouth.

Img_1316 And then there was the braised duck legs with spinach and white beans, a very comforting cassoulet-style dish that really hit the spot on a very damp and dreary Vancouver evening.  This dish is a very generous serving, and along with the salad or mushroom soup starter and your dessert, is an incredible bargain at $25.  Spend $17.50 more and you get a trio of wine pairings as well.

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So Much On My Plate, Jan. 13/06

Posted on January 13, 2006 by Don Genova

If you’re looking for the Emily Richards cookbook contest, click here. 

So Much On My Plate, Friday, January 13th:

Today I talked about the resurgence of Slow Cookers as a method of cooking and featured recipes from a book by Judith Finlayson called The Healthy Slow Cooker.

Cooker I haven’t used a slow cooker in ages, but over the past week I’ve made 3 recipes from the book, all with great results.  Here’s the one for Apple Oatmeal with Wheat Berries, a great way to wake up in the morning, with breakfast already made!

Ingredients: 

1 and a 1/2 cups steel-cut oats

1/2 cup wheat berries

2 apples, peeled, cored and chopped

1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

1/2 tsp vanilla

3 1/2 cups water

1 cup cranberry or apple juice

This works well in a small, slow cooker, but I used my large one and just cut the cooking time by a couple of hours.  First, grease the slow cooker stoneware with butter, margarine or oil.  In the cooker, combine the steel-cut oats, wheat berries, apples, cinnamon and vanilla.  Add water and juice.  Cover and cook on High for 4 hours or on Low for 8 hours or overnight.  When ready to serve, stir well, spoon into bowls and top with fruit, nuts or sugar of your choice.

My new slow cooker is from Breville. The company is from Australia, and features excellent design along with sturdy construction. Breville I already have an excellent electric grill/griddle combination I use for steaks, breakfasts, whatever!  Anyway, the slow cooker is finished in brushed stainless steel and looks so good you won’t be embarassed to have it sit on your countertop, unlike the ‘flowery’ designs of the past.  That is, unless you’re into retro.  This one retails for about 50-60 dollars, with a 5.3 quart capacity.

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Food For Thought, Jan. 11/06

Posted on January 11, 2006 by Don Genova

Hi everyone…for the next few weeks you’ll find everything you need from my various radio shows posted here instead of my website while my webmaster is away.  Oh, and my wife Ramona has a new blog called The Lasagna Project.  Check it out.  If you’re looking for info from yesterday’s Pacific Palate, it’s here.

Food For Thought, Jan. 11/06

Today I got a little closer to my Italian roots with Emily Richards, author of Italian Express, published by Harper Collins.

Emily Emily and I strolled along a busy Commercial Drive, one of Vancouver’s last havens of Italian culture, where men still gather in the cafes to watch soccer, drink espressos and chat about life in general, and women shop some excellent delis, bakeries and green grocers.  Emily’s book has some really great shortcuts to help you put Italian-themed meals on the plate in a hurry.  I have two Italian Express cookbooks to give away.  All you have to do is click on the ‘Comments’ link below and tell me what your very favourite Italian dish is. 

For me, it was my Aunt Polly’s spaghetti and meatballs, because she would put some fennel seed in her tomato sauce, and also make some tiny sausages to mix in with the meatballs, some hot, some not, so every sausage was a gamble.  After Sunday dinner, when everyone was watching the Ed Sullivan show, I would sneak back into the kitchen and steal a few more sausages and meatballs out of the tomato sauce.  Somehow they tasted even better that way!  I look forward to reading YOUR stories.  Deadline for the contest is January 27th.  Good luck!

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