Author: Hilary

Chicken and Lentil Curry with Homemade Naan Bread

~ Hilary ~ 2 Comments

For some reason I seem to be going international with my food.  With this Indian feast of a meal and last week’s greek-style macaroni, I guess I’m trying to inadvertently embrace some of the non-Americanized eating traditions.  If that means I get to eat tonnes of delicious ethnic food, I am SO down.

The recipe for this curry also came from the January edition of Canadian Living, which seems to be providing me with lots of great meal choices for the winter months.  Like all Indian food, this recipe was very…fragrant.  By this, I mean that both my kitchen and me smelled like garam masala and cumin for a day.  On a related note, is cumin not the most wonderful spice in the world?  If I wasn’t going to be shunned from society for doing this, I would definitely look into purchasing some sort of eau du cumin perfume (please don’t judge me).  The spices in this recipe were what made the meal.  The curry part of this turned out to be really filling and chalked full of protein.  Also, I got to use up loads of lentils, bags of which have been sitting in my cupboard since the summer months.  All part of my never ending task to empty out the giant void that is my second shelf pantry.

As for the naan bread, this was sort of an impulsive make.  On Saturday morning I knew I was going to be making this curry, and quite simply decided that there was no other way to eat Indian food than by piling it atop some delicious naan.  I got this recipe from the blog Itsy Bitsy Foodies which I found on Tastespotting.  Since I’m lacking the whole authentic clay oven thing that they actually use to bake this bread, I used our pizza stone and my normal oven, which had to be turned up to a whopping 550°C.  Hot, I know.  Let me tell you, our whiny fire alarm did not like that one, and frequently reminded us of its presence throughout the naan’s baking period.  The bread turned out pretty well for a homemade job, I think.  It was way more doughy than the authentic Indian naan and in turn not as light.  Nonetheless, it was incredibly satisfying to shove layers upon layers of naan/rice/curry into my mouth, so I consider this one to be a success.

This meal’s leftovers became a huge and filling lunch on Sunday when I had all day television training at school.  That’s right, on a SUNDAY </complaints>.  The big meal helped cheer and wake me up, so it was much appreciated!

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Greek-Style Macaroni and Cheese

~ Hilary ~ 2 Comments

Macaroni and cheese (better known in student terms as the beloved Kraft Dinner) is something that most people my age can’t live without.  I am no different, and sometimes experience cheesy pasta cravings so violent that I don’t know what to do with myself.  As much as I love good ol’ KD, I thought I’d expand on the classical student meal of choice and try Canadian Living’s most recent twist on the original.  I made an adaptation of the recipe, the original of which can be found in the January edition of the magazine.  The dish is appropriately located under the “hearty foods to go” section – the perfect section for a busy student who is always on the run and in dire need of a quick and delicious foodie fix.

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Good Morning! Breakfast Strudels

~ Hilary ~ Leave a comment

Before I start, let me say HAPPY NEW YEAR everyone!  May your 2011 be filled with delicious recipe discoveries and good health!

Now that I’m back in Ottawa for the winter term, I figured it was time to resume blogging.  For my last days at home I was almost never on my computer, since my parents were worried that I was over-doing my computer usage by watching endless amounts of How I Met Your Mother on my brightly lit macbook (I’ve almost finished four seasons in two weeks, a tv addiction like this hasn’t happened since I fell in love with LOST…).

But back to the food… These are the breakfast strudels that my family and I have every Christmas morning.  They’re rich, tasty and the perfect start to a special day.  My mom has always made these in the past but, just like with my dad’s fruitcake, I decided it was time for me to take up the reins on making this second Duff family tradition. The recipe for these strudels was from an old edition of Canadian Living and has been adapted by my mom to become the recipe that I love today.

The one challenging thing about these strudels is the phyllo pastry.  Phyllo is probably the most delicate item you will ever have to cook or bake with and it becomes a bit of a hassle when you’re a tad impatient like me.  In the process of making my strudels, I wrecked one or two sheets of phyllo simply because I wasn’t careful enough when handling it.  Luckily for me I enjoy eating raw pastry dough (one of those weird Hilary things), and ate the destroyed sheet despite the disapproving look I got from my mom.  Regardless of the initial challenges, these strudels are a foolproof way to make an awesome breakfast!

End note: you know you’re back in a student kitchen when you keep watching the stove while boiling water, waiting for a fire to begin.

End note 2.0: YES, my suitcase just got delivered after it was lost in transit yesterday.  Going to unpack this instant!

See recipe after pictures.  ALSO: Since the directions may be a little confusing, I’ve included a very poorly-photographed/focused (my kitchen is dark, okay?) step-by-step visual guide on how to arrange the phyllo pastry for these.  Hope it helps!

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Nana’s Christmas Fruitcake: the continuation of an old family tradition

~ Hilary ~ 6 Comments

Happy Boxing Day everyone!  Since the stores in Sudbury are closed on boxing day (thanks to a rather archaic bylaw which I quite adore), I took the good graces to extend my annual Christmas “sit around the house and do nothing but read and eat” festival into the depths of December 26.  Still being in a disgustingly full state, I decided to settle in and do the only activity you can do while in a food coma: food blog!

Here is the old Duff family tradition around which this post is based:

Every Christmas for the past 25 years, my dad has been the recipient of one of my Nana’s famous homemade fruitcakes.  The tradition started when my dad, who moved to Canada 31 years ago, stopped returning home to Ireland for Christmas after he met my mom.  Since my Nana passed away almost two years ago, this family tradition has risked extinction.  Last Christmas, my dad was eating fruitcake from the year before that had been hidden away in the depths of our freezer, making this Christmas the very first where he would be without his traditional holiday fare.

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