Grass-fed beef

We ate the first of our organic, grass-fed beef tonight. T-bone steak. Grilled. With grilled asparagus. And salad.

Thawed the steaks in the refrigerator for a couple of days. Air-dried overnight. Seasoned with salt and pepper only. Grilled to rare, and served with aforementioned sides.

The beef was tender, juicy, and both more intensely and more delicately flavoured, if that makes sense. (The intensity might be because of the meat being on the bone; we usually eat boneless steaks, and it's been yonks since I ate a T-bone.) The sirloin side of the steak was delicious and tender and flavoursome and wonderful. And the tenderloin side was like a little slice of heaven.

Grass-fed beef. A bargain at $6 per pound, for the variety we got. And oh, so worth it.

Also, grilled asparagus? Best ever way to eat asparagus.

On a related note, but not to do with this evening's meal, grilled pineapple actually is a little slice of heaven. Cut the top and bottom off a whole fresh pineapple. Take the outer layer off so that there are no brown bits in the flesh. Slice into 1-inch thick slabs. Season with a little salt and pepper if desired (no, really). Grill until just juicy and tender. Let cool, and then cut into chunks, being sure to discard the hard core. While still warm, top with a bit of good quality vanilla ice cream (or similar), and enjoy.

Lazy Long Weekend Sunday Food Activities

So, hot on the heels of yesterday's chef-guided tour of Granville Island Public Market, I was super-stoked to go to the inaugural 2010 session of the local farmer's market. I pumped up my bike tires on Saturday afternoon, put the panniers on the bike rack, and readied for adventure!

The market opened at 10 a.m., but when I showed up at about 11:00, having taken a full three or four minutes to ride there, there were a few stragglers still setting up. It started at the corner of Bayview and 7th Avenue, trickled down that block and through the parking area next to the Steveston Hotel, and up and across the footpath to the parking lot for the Gulf of Georgia Cannery National Historic Site. I got through it all pretty quickly, I'm sorry to say, because in amongst the handmade jewellery, jams and jellies, coffee trucks, homemade soaps, masseurs, and artisan breads, there wasn't a lot of what I was looking for: produce. Turns out the big growers won't be there until next time, which is two weeks from now. *le sigh*

Once home again, I attacked the never-ending task that is keeping the kitchen counters clear and clean. I opened up the pantry cupboard to put the new hot sauces away, only to discover that there was no room for them on the shelf entirely dedicated to hot sauces. I brought this to Beloved's attention, and he decided to cull the hot sauces. He emptied that shelf, and I wiped it clean (let's not do things halfway, after all!). And since the shelf below - the one with all the horrible brown mucky spreads on it - was quite dirty itself, I moved those bottles to the clean, empty shelf, and wiped it off, too. And in removing the shelf to wipe it down, I discovered that something on the top shelf had expired, and leaked all down the back wall of the cupboard. (I know! Ew, right?)

On further investigation, the culprit/victim was identified as a can of artichoke hearts whose age could not be determined, due to the lack of date coding on the can. I could only say with certainty that it had been purchased some time within the last fifteen years. (And now I'm not so sure. Ew again.)

So then I had to pull all the pantry contents and remove the shelves and clean them and the back wall, before I could put them back and reload the cupboard. And while I was at it, I might as well weed out anything that we for sure were never going to eat. And I'm almost ashamed to say how many cans of food I threw out. In fact, if my pantry cupboard were not now lovely and organized and easy to find things in, I might not cop to TWENTY FOUR cans of things varying from Weight Watchers Lentil Soup to tomato sauce (which cans were bulging, and thus spat at me when pierced) to canned shrimp (which, omigosh the pong!) to canned pumpkin to vegetable curry (which had solidified because of all the potato in it).

Yes, I actually opened all these cans, dumped the contents down my garburetor (I love my garburetor), rinsed and flattened the cans, and put them in the recycling.

Beloved was aghast at the dates on some of the cans. The date on the lentil soup was 1995, which means I bought it several years before that (probably in 1991, when I was on WW). That was the big winner. Second runner up was something dated 1997, and third runner up was dated 1999. He could hardly contain his horror when, at one point, I mused that I was pretty sure I had bought a certain item after we were married. "Is that the criterion for deciding whether to keep things or not? God save me!"

Like I've ever poisoned him yet, in fifteen years of marriage. Sheesh. Ya big baby.

*-*-*

We are still working our way through the contents of the freezer, in preparation for getting our 30 lbs of organic beef at the end of June, and so yesterday we thawed a package of "Ground Meat for Kebabs", which was left over from a dinner last year sometime. (Shh!) It turned out to be just the meat - a mixture of ground beef, pork, and lamb - without any of the seasonings added, so my Beloved changed the game plan from Indian kebabs to Lela's Famous Burgers, based on a Google search for a recipe and an innate trust of Gordon Ramsay's cooking. (This recipe is surprisingly simple, for a Ramsay recipe, I thought. No obscure ingredients, no twelve-step cooking process to ready one ingredient, no bizarre instructions, no pretentious presentation.)

I don't know what the burgers taste like when they're plain beef, but this blend of beef, pork, and lamb was brilliant. We had grilled veggies (red and yellow peppers, green beans, white onion, celery) with it, and it was all the dinner I needed, especially after the Sausage Sampler starter. Which was really just one lamb sausage and one chorizo sausage, that we bought at Tenderland Meats on Granville Island on Saturday, with a variety of mustards and relishes. Verdict: their chorizo sausage is good, and their lamb sausage is outstanding.

Success: Lentils with Garlic and Tomatoes

Having a husband who travels a lot for business means that I'm on my own for dinner a fair bit. And while cooking for two can sometimes feel like more work than I want to put out, dinner for one often feels even moreso. I have been known - rather, the Old Me has been known - to eat popcorn and pepperoni for dinner when left to my own devices.

But since I resolved to cook more of what I eat, I look upon solo dinners as opportunities to eat the things I love but don't often get for dinner when he's around. Things like broccoli, and cauliflower.

I also see them as an opportunity to experiment with things. I come by this naturally; my mother's dinner parties are all large-scale food experiments. But my Beloved is usually an unwilling participant in such things, because a single ingredient has the power to ruin everything for him, and he's highly suspicious, so is reluctant to try new things lest they contain an undetectable trace of something he definitely or possibly doesn't like. And if he's around when I'm working an unfamiliar (to him, or me, or both of us) ingredient or method, he's torn between fleeing the scene and hovering worriedly in case... well, I don't know what the "in case" is there.

I've already mentioned his aversions to certain fresh fruits and vegetables. Another thing I'm not entirely sure will really fly with him is Meatless Meals. He could have a massive feed, as at pot luck dinners, and still be unsatisfied because "there was no meat", and therefore it didn't count as dinner. I'm not even joking. This has really happened.

So, lentils. He likes pappadums, those savoury Indian lentil crackers. But beyond that, I don't know if he's ever tried them.  And so naturally I waited until he was gone, to try making them myself, from a recipe I got from my friend Kammy, who says it's a big favourite at her house.

Lentils with Garlic & Tomatoes

4 tablespoons olive oil
5 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 pound tomatoes (1 large or 2 smaller ones), chopped
1 cup dried lentils, picked over, washed & drained
3/4 to 1 teaspooon salt (I used sea salt)
1 tablespoon lemon juice

Heat the oil over medium flame. When hot, put in the garlic. Stir & fry until garlic browns lightly. Add tomatoes & cook for about 5 minutes or until tomatoes turn into a paste. Add lentils and 2-1/2 cups water. Bring to a boil. Cover, lower heat, & simmer gently for 1/2 hour. Add salt & lemon juice; stir to mix.

I found that these took nearly an hour to cook, rather than the half-hour suggested, but that may be because I turned the heat down too low to start, and then couldn't find a gentle simmer in my element's dial; the mix was either flat calm or bubbling merrily. However, bubbling merrily seems to be the right thing.


Kammy didn't mention how she serves these, though I would imagine it'd be great over rice. I had mine with toasted Naan bread that needed eating up.  Tomorrow's lunch will be the same.

For dessert, just because I bought groceries today, I had fresh (California) strawberries with a shot of Starbucks' vanilla syrup (yes, the kind for flavouring coffee), and a quenelle of thick, rich, 11% MF Greek yogurt.

And it never occurred to me to take a picture of any of it. Whoops!

Success: Beef and Bean Chili

Had a really great workout tonight, and came home to a dinner I've been looking forward to since I made it on Sunday.

A fresh green salad for a crisp counterpoint to the spice of the chili, a bed of wild rice to complement the protein of the beans, and a little sour cream and cheese to cool some of the jalapeño heat. It turned out really well, if I do say so myself (and I do). I needn't have been so afraid of the heat, really; it's nothing like as hot as I feared it would be. Next time I'd put in all the chili powder and both jalapeños.

It was fantastic to be sitting down to a fresh, healthy, homemade dinner (that wasn't pasta with sauce from a jar) within 20 minutes of getting home, and that includes the time it took me to unpack the gym bag and change out of work clothes into hangin' out at home clothes. Most of the prep time was spent tearing lettuce. Sweet.

I'm going to have to start making my own salad dressings, I think, because I just read the label and discovered that sugar is the second ingredient (after water) of my favourite salad dressing, Litehouse Poppyseed dressing. I'm sad, because I really like it. But it also contains ingredients that violate the rule "don't eat food that contains ingredients you can't imagine growing in nature". So when the current supply is gone, it's gone. *sigh*

Success: Tuna-Stuffed Peppers

I got this recipe from my friend Sietske, and given how much canned seafood I have in my pantry (holy cow what am I gonna do with all that salmon and crab and shrimp?), this was a great idea for a solo dinner (and a solo lunch tomorrow!).

Tuna-stuffed Red Peppers
1 red bell pepper per person, cored and deveined.
Filling:
1 pepper, diced finely (I usually use yellow, for contrast with the red container peppers)
1 can of tuna, drained
1 clove garlic, minced
1 small onion, chopped finely
1 tbs of mixed Italian dried herbs
50g of salad cheese, diced (nondescript white cheese, related to feta so I guess that would work too)

Stuff pepper, put in tray, cover with aluminum foil, shove in oven preheated to 200 Celsius, bake for 40 minutes, take foil away after 20. Make risotto while peppers are in oven. I guess you could serve rice or pasta with it too, but risotto goes really well!

I used standard-issue Italian Seasoning and Kraft's four-cheese Italian Blend, but next time I make these, I'll throw some feta in the mix too. Depending on the size of your peppers, this could make anywhere from two to four stuffed peppers. I have a bit of leftover filling, as you see. Maybe I'll throw a little dressing on it and have it on a lettuce salad. Must remember to pack some parsley to counteract the onion breath, though.

Rather than mess about with tin foil, I used my tiny lidded roasting pan. (It doesn't get out enough, really.) And I didn't make risotto. (Because I don't know how. Yet. It's on my to-learn list, because it see it everywhere: cooking shows, menus, and this recipe! Makes me feel like I'm missing out on something.) I made wild rice instead. And it turned out really purple. Apparently I didn't rinse it enough, because I'm sure it's not supposed to end up a uniform colour, right?

Notes to self for future occasions: use feta or similarly strong cheese. A little more cheese wouldn't hurt, either. Buy some new Italian Seasoning, 'cos the stuff you have has lost its potency. Add salt and pepper to the mix, too. And figure out the rinsing of the wild rice thing, because dang, that's a lot of purple on a plate. (Should have toned it down with some green leaves.)

Thanks, Sietske!

Success: Chicken with Rosemary Vegetables

I am not an imaginative cook. I quite often don't even know what I have in the fridge, the freezer, the pantry, and even if I did, I've never been the kind of person who can pull up a mental picture of the contents of those food storage areas, and think "well, if I pick up some couscous and some rosemary, there's an awesome dinner in the offing!" To stretch my cooking chops outside my half-dozen easy peasy quickie meals, I need some guidance, some suggestions, a list, a recipe, and preferably a photograph to show me what's possible.

Shortly after I resolved to cook more of our meals, there was a post on Lifehacker about NoTakeOut.com, whose mandate seemed to suit mine admirably. So I subscribed, and I read and saved all the daily emails, and today I finally used one of the recipes. To wit: Chicken with Rosemary Vegetables.

All I needed to buy was the couscous and the fresh rosemary (note to self: plant some!); I even had a suitable bottle of red plonk at home. Whole Foods didn't have "instant couscous" so I bought their ordinary (bulk) couscous, and it might as well have been instant. (Is there anything in the world easier to make than couscous? It's brilliantly simple.) I also used boneless/skinless thighs, because that's what we had in the freezer.  It was quick, it was tasty (even though I forgot to season the chicken with salt and pepper, because S was bustling about, distracting me), and there's enough left over for lunch.