by Krista | May 24, 2010 | Bootstrap Monday
Good morning, dear ones! How was your weekend? I hope you were able to find time for at least one thing that made you smile really big. 🙂
(Oh! Before I forget, please remember to update your blog readers and email subscriptions to https://www.ramblingtart.com/since the old links no longer work. I’d also love to connect with you on Facebook and Twitter. )
My weekend was quiet and peaceful, recovering after being dreadfully sick all week. I’m getting better each day and hope to be right as rain soon. 🙂
In the meantime, I’m focusing on happy little things, like a cozy dinner and movie night with some of my cooking group buddies, a great old book to read, and these beautiful apricots from my friends, Don and Jen.
I love these perky little chive blossoms from my Mum’s garden, and am so excited to see my own herb garden flourishing. I’ve been able to use thyme, basil and spearmint this week. 🙂
I’m ridiculously pleased with this creamy berry confection I made. My Russian friend Nat is a berry fanatic, and when she was here visiting from Thailand two summers ago, we simply had to go berry picking and came home with baskets piled high with plump raspberries and marionberries. I froze most of them, using them for various sauces and desserts, and was finally down to my last bag. I knew I had to make something special with it, something unique, and this weekend I finally made something up: Marionberry Crème Fraîche Gelatin. Isn’t the color splendid?! The flavor is lovely too, bright with strong berries mellowed by the rich Crème Fraîche. Accompanied by fresh spearmint tea, it was a splendid cool and creamy dessert for a sunny Sunday evening.
Marionberry Crème Fraîche Gelatin
Ingredients:
1 pounds marionberries fresh or frozen (thawed, if frozen)
2-3 Tbsp honey or maple syrup or agave syrup
1 tub Crème Fraîche
2 cups milk
2 packages unflavored gelatin
1 tsp vanilla
Directions:
- Place berries and honey in saucepan and bring to a boil. Turn to low and simmer, stirring often until juices are reduced and mixture resembles applesauce. Cool.
- Place one cup of milk in glass bowl, sprinkle gelatin over top and let sit until permeated with milk. Stir slightly and let sit.
- Heat remaining cup of milk until just boiling, remove from heat and pour over gelatin mixture. Stir constantly until gelatin has dissolved.
- In separate bowl combine cooled berries, Crème Fraîche and vanilla. Stir until well mixed. Add gelatin/milk and stir until well mixed.
- Pour into gelatin mold and chill for 2-3 hours until firm.
- To unmold, dip mold into bath of hot water for 2-5 seconds. Invert onto plate and keep chilled until ready to serve.
by Krista | May 21, 2010 | Fabulous Friday
Good morning, dear ones! 🙂
Over the past several months I’ve had numerous requests to share what camera I use, what photographic equipment I employ, and what editing program I utilize for the photos I post here five days a week. So – drum roll please! – today is Camera Confession Day!
Camera: Nikon Coolpix L20 – though mine is rather the worse for wear since the battery hatch no longer closes and I can’t take a photo without holding down the spring-loaded hatch with one hand while I press the button with the other. Those batteries like to fall out at the most inopportune moments!
Photographic equipment: non-existent. Unless you count my knees, which allow me to kneel in mud, grass and water, and also work beautifully as a tripod when necessary.
Photo editing program: Picasa – used to turn photos right side up and crop. Alas, that’s all I know how to do.
The End. 🙂
Moral of the story: don’t let anyone tell you you have to wait for expensive equipment or have mad skills at editing before you can capture beautiful moments.
A friend of mine tells me regularly: “Start where you are.” I love that!! We may be poor-ish (check), sick (check), and have responsibilities that overwhelm (check), but we can all do something to make our lives a bit more beautiful each day, and, if we’re lucky, share them with others so they can be cheered too.
I just finished reading “The Martha Rules” by Martha Stewart, and while I gleaned much from it, one thing in particular stood out to me. She said that at the top of her to-do list every day she writes three words: Make it beautiful. As she organizes her day she plans ways to make life more beautiful for herself, her family, friends, co-workers and customers. What a gorgeous way to live!
So, my beloved readers, I can’t send you beautiful magazines or fancy chocolates or whisk you away on fancy vacations to exotic climes, but I can share the little things that make my life beautiful each day. I hope that they might brighten your day a little too, wherever you are.
Speaking of beautiful things, here are a few that delighted me this week.
Almond Hot Chocolate on a rainy afternoon.
A blue sky reflected in a placid stream.
A very mossy tree.
Sunshine streaming through my windows onto my bedspread after a terrific rainstorm.
And, last but not least, delicious Baked Asparagus with Browned Butter and Parmesan.
What is making your day beautiful today?
I hope you have a wonderful weekend, dear ones, and I’ll see you on Monday. 🙂
Baked Asparagus with Browned Butter and Parmesan
Ingredients:
one bunch asparagus, rinsed and trimmed
1/4 cup butter
1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese
salt and pepper to taste
Directions:
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
- Arrange asparagus in a skillet and cover with water. Bring to boil and simmer until just tender 4-6 minutes. Remove and drain.
- Put butter in saucepan over medium heat and melt. Continue cooking until butter begins to brown, stirring constantly. Cook for 1 more minute, watching carefully so it doesn’t burn. Remove from heat.
- Arrange asparagus in casserole dish, drizzle with browned butter, dust with salt and pepper, and sprinkle with Parmesan.
- Bake at 375 degrees for 15 minutes until asparagus is cooked through and Parmesan begins to toast.
by Krista | May 20, 2010 | Literary Nibbles
Today I am starting a feature that makes me grin when I think of it: Literary Nibbles.
I have been a voracious reader since I was a little girl “reading” books upside down from my perch inside a galvanized bucket. I devoured Little House on the Prairie and Narnia, was enthralled by the tales of Peter Pan, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and Hans Brinker.
Although I loved the characters, their grand adventures, the amazing worlds the authors created, I was also enchanted by the food. Who could imagine Harry Potter without butter beer, Anne of Green Gables without raspberry cordial, or The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe without Turkish Delight?
So, dear readers, in the weeks, months and years to come, I hope to revisit my literary favorites once a week by making the foods that still delight my memory.
I’ll start with the one that charmed me most as a child: Turkish Delight.
Well I remember my Dad reading aloud to us the adventures of Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy. I listened raptly as he read of Edmund stumbling into snowy Narnia, where it is “always winter, but never Christmas.”
I pictured Edmund cold, wet and scared, wandering alone through that winter wonderland until he heard the swish of a sleigh and was suddenly face to face with the beautiful but terrifying White Witch.
I shivered with anticipation and fear as the White Witch assumed a false loving nature and plied him with a magical warming drink and a jeweled box full of Turkish Delight. At the time I had no idea what such a thing was, but I just knew it was amazing, heavenly, delicious beyond reckoning.
It wasn’t until I was in my teens that I tasted Turkish Delight for the first time, discovered in the gleaming glass case of a sweet shop in Calgary, Alberta. With my carefully horded money I bought a few pieces, watched as the shopkeeper wrapped them up in paper, then carefully carried them out to the car as if they were breakable and precious.
I remember my fingers covered in powdered sugar as I picked up the first one, the taste of that sugar melting on my lips and tongue as I bit into the soft gelatin, the first hints of flowery flavor hitting my tongue as the candy dissolved in my mouth. It was strange and wonderful and I felt I had discovered something exotic and magical. Though I must confess that after four pieces I was more than ready for something salty! I could not for the life of me imagine why Edmund would be entranced by “whole rooms of Turkish Delight” that he could eat “all day long.” Too many pieces of this sweet confection and I’d be sick as can be. 🙂
This week was my time to make it for myself. I researched all sorts of recipes, finally nailing it down to one that seemed as close to authentic as I was going to get. I didn’t have the traditional rosewater, so I made lavender water instead, mixed with a bit of mint, smiling to myself at the sound of Lavender Mint Turkish Delight. 🙂
It was rather time-consuming but not difficult, and if I didn’t have to make the lavender water from scratch, it wouldn’t have taken very long at all. I know real Turkish Delight is supposed to be liberally coated with powdered sugar, but I just couldn’t make myself cover over those glistening chunks of what looked like lavender ice. 🙂
It was a noble first effort, but some kinks need to be worked out. I felt the end result was too stiff and here and there were chewy bits of not quite dissolved candy, like those small lumps of Jell-O that result when it doesn’t get stirred enough. 🙂 It tasted lovely though, delicate and flowery and not too overpowering.
Next time we’ll have a proper tea with Mr. Tumnus. 🙂
Lavender Mint Turkish Delight
(Adapted from Middle Eastern Food)
Ingredients:
4 cups granulated sugar
1 1/4 cups cornstarch
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
4 1/4 cups water
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 1/2 tablespoons rosewater
1 cup confectioners sugar
Vegetable oil or shortening
Directions:
- In a 9 inch baking pan, grease the sides and bottom with vegetable oil or shortening. Line with wax paper and grease the wax paper.
- In a saucepan, combine lemon juice, sugar and 1 1/2 cups water on medium heat. Stir constantly until sugar dissolves. Allow mixture to boil. Reduce heat to low and allow to simmer, until the mixture reaches 240 degrees on a candy thermometer. Remove from heat and set aside.
- Combine cream of tartar, 1 cup corn starch and remaining water in saucepan over medium heat. Stir until all lumps are gone and the mixture begins to boil. Stop stirring when the mixture has a glue like consistency.
- Stir in the lemon juice, water and sugar mixture. Stir constantly for about 5 minutes. Reduce heat to low, Allow to simmer for 1 hour, stirring frequently.
- Once the mixture has become a golden color, stir in rosewater. Pour mixture into wax paper lined pan. Spread evenly and allow to cool overnight.
- Once it has cooled overnight, sift together confectioners sugar and remaining cornstarch.
- Turn over baking pan containing Turkish delight onto clean counter or table and cut with oiled knife into one inch pieces.
- Coat with confectioners sugar mixture. Serve or store in airtight container in layers separated with wax or parchment paper.
by Krista | May 19, 2010 | Compatriot Wednesday
Monday was one of those ghastly days where everything seemed to go wrong. I was exhausted and on the verge of tears as I worked feverishly to fix one mess after another when suddenly, like a burst of sunshine after days of fog, everything righted itself and all was well. Phew.
Just in time too, for it was Deep Fried Game Hen night at CEC, my cooking club, and I so didn’t want to miss that! My brain was mush by this point so I sent a plea over Twitter for recommendations for gluten-free desserts. @saffronberry recommended financiers, @Valerie_78 suggested my favorite Nanaimo Bars, and @DuchessinBK urged me to try mini pavlovas with cream and berries. Although they all sounded divine, a quick scan of the contents of my cupboard and fridge decided it for me: the pavlovas. Duchess was lovely enough to type the recipe out for me (thank you!!) and after reading it through I figured I could tweak it a bit to suit my ingredients: limes and mangoes. Oooee, I could hardly wait to give it a whirl. 🙂
I arrived at CEC with arms full, oh so ready for a glass of Petite Sirah to calm my frazzled nerves. Selwyn started us off with a dazzling array of fabulous cheeses: Stilton with Dried Cranberries, Hot Wasabi Aged Cheddar and Smoked Gouda with bacon. Mmm, mmm!!
This was followed by a lovely mixed green salad topped with Toby’s delicious Reduced Balsamic Dressing.
We could smell the main course before we saw it, heavenly scents of deep fried game hen and grilled veggies wafting in through the screen door.
At last Cameron brought in the first batch of hens, slicing through the salty, crispy skin to reveal a spiced pear stuffing inside. Amazing!!!
Deb and Darren grilled asparagus, squash and sweet peppers, and they were the perfect smoky accompaniment to the sprightly salad and savory chicken.
Alas, I cannot share the chicken recipe with you for it involves a “Secret Family Recipe” of spices, but if you can come up with your own concoction of spices, simply rub it all over the chicken before frying to give the skin an out of this world flavor.
We ended the evening with my Lime Pavlovas topped with vanilla cream, fresh mangoes and blackberries. I gotta say those meringues were fantastic. Duchess knows what she’s talking about!!! I adored the addition of lime zest and the mangoes went beautifully with the citrus.
What is the best food you’ve eaten this week, dear ones? 🙂
Before I forget!! I got my RSS feed and email subscription sorted out. If you’d like to receive blog updates, feel free to sign up. 🙂
Today is my first day of participation in WanderFood Wednesday! 🙂 It’s a place for travel writers to share photos, stories, recipes, book reviews and any other food-related topics with other foodies (and non-foodies!).
Toby’s Reduced Balsamic Dressing
3-4 teaspoons reduced balsamic vinegar
1/4 teaspoon Hawaiian sea salt
Freshly ground black pepper
1/2 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1 small clove garlic, peeled, green germ removed, and minced
1/4 cup (60 ml) extra-virgin olive oil
7 ounces (210 g) mixed salad greens (8 cups, loosely packed), such as escarole, oak-leaf, and romaine, rinsed, patted dry, and torn into bite-size pieces
Directions:
- Place the vinegar, salt, pepper, mustard, and garlic in a medium-size bowl and whisk together until blended. Slowly add the olive oil, whisking constantly, until the dressing is emulsified.
- Add the greens and toss well until they are coated with the dressing. Season with pepper to taste and serve the salad immediately.
Lime Pavlovas with Mangoes and Blackberries
(Adapted from @DuchessinBK)
Ingredients:
3 egg whites
1 1/2 cups sugar
1/4 tsp cream of tartar
2 tbs vanilla
fresh berries
2 tbs orange zest (optional)
1 1/2 cups heavy cream
Directions:
- Preheat oven to 230 degrees, and cover a cookie sheet with parchment.
- Start whipping whites, when just broken and slightly frothy, add tartar – whip it in well.
- Slowly, painfully slowly, add sugar while whipping (scrape down sides gently with rubber spatula)
- When soft peaks form, add 1 tbs of vanilla. Keep whipping until firm peaks form but be careful not to over-whip.
- Very carefully fold in orange zest
- Spoon onto cookie sheet. Depending on size, you’ll get 12+ per sheet. You’ll probably need two sheets.
- Bake for 1 hr. If its humid, 1 hr 20-30 minutes. (By the way, if its super humid, don’t even bother, the whites won’t whip up enough.)
- When finished, they should be completely white, give a hollow noise when you tap them, and still just slightly gooey inside.
- Let them cool completely.
- Meanwhile whip cream with 1 tbs of vanilla.
- Add a dollop of whipped cream to each meringue and add fruit on top.
by Krista | May 18, 2010 | Spring
After our wild drive through the back country of Bosnia and discovering this oh-so-gorgeous lake, we continued to meander through thickly-forested mountains, catching our breath at towering cliffs, turquoise lakes, and pristine rivers cascading through deep, rocky gorges. Although five members of our party were very talkative womenfolk, silence reigned as we gazed in absolute awe and delight at the stunning vistas on every side. I felt that we had stumbled into a magical fairyland. THIS was where giants lived and trolls fought and beautiful maidens spun things in tiny cabins deep in the forest.
In homage to this beautiful country, I researched some of the exquisite food we ate while we were there, and stumbled upon recipes for a dish I absolutely loved: cevapi.
Looking very much like American breakfast sausages, these lovely morsels are a combination of ground beef, lamb and pork, mixed with onions and garlic, and are served in flat bread or pita and topped with an assortment of condiments depending on the specific Balkan region you’re in.
I did not have ground lamb or pork, so I substituted half a ham. I grated it finely and added it to the beef, mixed in grated onion, pepper, salt, finely minced garlic, 1 tsp of baking soda and an egg white to bind it together. Taking a small handful of meat mix, I molded it into the shape of a breakfast link, repeating until all the meat was used, then covered the cevapi and chilled it for an hour. (The combination is not very wet and must be chilled for at least an hour to allow the flavors to meld and the mixture to bind.) Finally I fried them until they were nicely browned on all sides.
Traditionally they are served on bread with ajvar (a roasted pepper spread), diced onions, diced bell peppers, tomatoes, and sour cream. I skip the bread entirely and pile on the condiments, or simply dip them in grainy mustard for a quick afternoon snack. They are splendid hot or cold. 🙂
This post has been entered into the Grantourismo HomeAway Holiday-Rentals travel blogging competition.
Rambling Tart version of Cevapi
Ingredients:
1 pound ground beef
2 cups grated ham (traditionally made with 1/2 pound ground pork and 1/2 pound ground lamb)
4 cloves minced garlic
1 red onion, grated
1 tsp baking soda
1 egg white
Salt and pepper to taste (you won’t need much salt at all if you use ham instead of ground pork/lamb)
Flat bread or pita
Toppings: ajar, chopped onion, bell pepper, tomato and sour cream.
Directions:
- Mix everything.
- Mold into breakfast link sized pieces. Chill for 1 hour.
- Fry or grill until browned on all sides.
- Serve with flat bread/pita, chopped onion, bell pepper, tomato and sour cream.
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