Canadian Living

Chicken Squash Curry

~ Hilary ~ 3 Comments

Alright, I’ll be the first to admit that I haven’t been eating 100 per cent well lately.  It is absolutely crazy at school right now (I feel like all the other university students out there can feel my pain) and I just haven’t had time to take care of myself at all.  For example, this past Monday the only thing I ate was a bagel (sesame seed toasted with strawberry cream cheese, the only way to go), a piece of lemon poppy seed loaf from Starbucks, a Vitamin water and a piece of leftover brownie cake.  I managed to get in all four food groups, right?

WELL, by the time Tuesday rolled around, I was craving actual food.  I’m sorry that this is another post featuring squash as the main-ish ingredient but lets face it, I am one person, with one squash.  No matter how many times I feed my roommates (Ariel has been benefitting quite greatly from my cooking lately), it still takes me three times as long to finish one thing.  This being said, you can expect some sort of “stuffed squash” dish over the next few days, unless I follow Brittany’s suggestions and bake something.

Okay, so this Chicken Squash Curry was something I found when browsing the Canadian Living website the other day, in search of a way to use up my inhuman amount of squash.  Since this recipe also allowed me to use the mild Indian curry sauce that has been sitting in our fridge for months, I decided to go for it.  Mmmm, I forgot how good curry sauce smells when you cook it.  I was happy to smell like a little Indian food restaurant for the rest of the day.  To pay tribute to how crazy even this day was, my cooking was interrupted halfway through by a telephone interview I needed to perform for journalism.  Luckily for me, onion and green peppers don’t mind sitting in a pan half cooked…

Anyways, before you motor on over to your kitchen to cook this, I must add that I used (a) green peppers instead of chili green peppers and (b) didn’t add in as much cilantro because I think it is kind of yucky.  So be cautious.  Also, leftover curry makes some delicious rice wraps (especially when mixed with leftover couscous from the roommates).  Now that I have said that, go forth and eat.

Chocolate Brownie Turtle Cake

~ Hilary ~ 4 Comments

Mom: if you’re worried as to why I’m posting this at 11:30 at night, it’s because this is the only free second I have had today.  As much as you say blogging should not be my priority, I can’t help it, and this cake needed to be shared with the world.  I will sleep soon, green tea is making me drowsy.

This past Sunday night I was all prepared to make a nice end-of-the-weekend dinner for myself, and was pleasantly surprised when I found out that Natalie’s dad was in town and was making all the roomies supper!  Seeing that I could no longer make dinner, and obviously wanting to show off my culinary skills to an outside audience, I knew I had no choice but to make dessert.

I had post-it noted this recipe from way back in the summer.  It is from my 1980’s Canadian Living family cookbook and is so old that it can’t even be found on the website’s recipe index.  With no picture to go off of and the request for loads of chocolate, I went into this one blind-sighted, on nothing but a wing and a prayer.  I don’t think I’ve ever bought so many packages of Baker’s chocolate squares (two boxes of semi-sweet and an unsweetened box).  The amount of chocolate I had at my check-out could only be matched by the amount I once bought to make my gluten-free chocolate cake. Mind blowing.  This recipe also incorporated a beloved Duff family chocolate: the turtle.  For as long as I can remember my parents have shipped over boxes of turtles to my relatives in Ireland for Christmas (can you believe they don’t have them?!), and this cake was just like a walk down memory lane.

Now I don’t know why, but I always seem to insist on making some sort of complicated layer cake, which requires baking, chilling, heating and freezing.  This being said, this cake was under progress the entire day.

Anatomy of the Cake:
Layer 1: delicious brownie
Layer 2: crushed pecans (only because I totally forgot to mix them in with the brownies, my bad!)
Layer 3: melted caramels
Layer 4: chocolate glaze garnished with pecan halves

The result of this dessert was chocolate comas all around the table and an overall hyper state of mind.  To put things into perspective, this is how high on sugar some of us were:

Overall rating: delicious, but in SMALL quantities.  I could take the chocolate rush because I am used to frequent sugar fixes, but poor Brittany (amateur!) was suffering from a chocolate hangover for a full day.  Be wary, non-chocoholics.

Squash Risotto (and a new vegetable friend)

~ Hilary ~ 5 Comments

This was a day of trying new things!  Being in an abnormally daring mood (this can probably be attributed to the fact that I’m now rollerblading to school and feeling significantly more badass), I decided to try TWO new things: risotto and squash.  Yes, I know what you’re all thinking.  “Has this girl lived in a hole!?  How can she never have possibly eaten these two things?!”  Well it’s the truth.  The only exposure I’ve had to risotto has been when my roommate Alex makes it and I grab the occasional spoonful (secret’s out!) from the pot when she’s not looking.  Ooo, I also know risotto as the food that the contestants on Hells Kitchen always mess up.  See below for dear Gordon Ramsay’s description of this seemingly easy, but apparently very complicated dish…

Now that we’ve been distracted momentarily by Ramsay’s dreamy British accent, let me resume discussing this squash.  When I went to the grocery store in search of a butternut squash, I wandered around the produce section eventually realizing that I have no idea what it actually looks like.  Once again, my wonderful iPhone saved the day, as I was able to quickly google pictures of this strange vegetable (or is it a fruit because it has seeds?  The verdict is still out).  Once I got home, I had this gigantic desire to draw a face on the squash.  I do not know why…these bizarre thoughts just sort of come to me sometimes.  Anyways, the result was the picture below.  I almost drew a face on Brittany’s to make my squash a husband, but I don’t think that would have bode too well for me…

Anyways, the risotto was yummy!  I also discovered the definition of a miracle while making this meal: there was somehow magically chicken stock, white wine and – this is the best part – FRESH SAGE in our kitchen.  This made my day.  I was super sketched out with adding white wine to the mix at first, but after much convincing from Ariel, I finally caved.  Speaking of the recipe, this one was from the October edition of Canadian Living.  It’s a great way to make use of fall’s wonderful harvest, and I definitely recommend it.  The only thing is, it makes LOADS!  I halved the recipe (thank god) and still ended up with enough for four servings.  Make your measurements wisely blogosphere…

Lemon Sour Cream Loaf

~ Hilary ~ 4 Comments

My goodness, I have been such a slacker with blogging this past week!  It has been four days since my last post, a record-breaking amount of time since the summer began.  This is my oath to the blogging world to try and be better.  School is absolutely crazy right now, and I am running around left, right and centre trying to get journalism stories organized before Thanksgiving.  Right now it looks like October may just be the month from hell, but I will try my very hardest to charge on through, treating my hard work with delicious meals every once in a while!

I made this loaf last week.  The reason why the pictures you see below were taken inside was because I made this little baby at 9 p.m. and, by the time the next day rolled around, the majority of it was gone (yes, this was also due to my near midnight snacking, I had a stomach ache).  That being said, no pictures were able to be taken outside, to my great dismay.

This lemon sour cream loaf is actually just Canadian Living’s Lemon Yogurt Loafwith, you guessed it, sour cream.  Why is sour cream in absolutely everything I make nowadays, you ask?  I have no idea, but it is good.  The original recipe called for the use of “balkan-style plain yogurt,” something I have never heard of.  Apparently it’s like a low-fat yogurt or something?  Not too sure.  Whatever, our fridge was crowded beyond belief (I blame all the plastic containers of spinach) and I needed to use up this sour cream.

When Canadian Living says “use parchment paper” in your loaf pan, I definitely recommend you follow their instructions.  Unfortunately for me, our lowly student home had run out of parchment paper  just a few days earlier, and I instead was forced to heavily oil the pan as an alternative.  This worked…sort of.  After the loaf was semi-cool, I could be seen standing over the deep freeze (I use it as a counter), whacking the bottom of that pan like there was no tomorrow.  After a substantial shaking and use of brunt force, the loaf surrendered to my attempts, and plopped nicely down on the cooling rack, with a mere chunk taken out of the bottom.  Needless to say I bought parchment paper the very next day.

Finally, the reason why the surface of this loaf looks like it has reflective properties is because of all the delicious lemon glaze I put on it!  The glaze was just icing sugar and lemon juice, and the loaf soaked it up like a sponge.  Absolute heaven.

Rosemary Garlic Steak with Potato, Carrots and Shredded Zucchini

~ Hilary ~ Leave a comment

The reason for making this dinner was pretty simple: I was craving steak SO badly, haven’t eaten potatoes in half a year and wanted to use up the rest of my farmer’s market carrots.  This meal took about twenty minutes to make, and allowed me to utilize our beautiful non-stick pan as a BBQ alternative.

I know this is a ridiculously short post, but I’m watching this show Hawaii Five-O with my roommate Amanda, and am too distracted by Daniel Dae Kim’s cheekbones to write anymore.  That’s right, Jin from LOST is in a new show.  It gets an A+ already.

Okay, one more Daniel Dae Kim girl crush moment.  Remember when he was in Seinfeld?  So precious!

PS: this dish was adapted from Canadian Living’s Grilled Rosemary Garlic Flank Steak recipe.