The Yum Yum Factor

Soon summer will be fading and so will my desire for burnt marshmallow ice cream on a sugar cone from  Ed's Real Scoop   in The Beach.  For now, there is still nothing nicer than this addictively delicious cone after a long drive around town on a balmy summer night with the top down. Ed's = summer. On the last Sunday of every month until October, Kensington Market closes the streets to cars for Pedestrian Sunday. It's a great time to enjoy the boho wonderland without worry that you are going to be plowed down by a rogue suburban motorist who thinks they will actually find a parking spot on Augusta. This Sunday we finally got to try out a place I have only heard raves about,   Seven Lives . We both got the fish taco and although it was really delicious, I had buyers remorse the minute I spied someone else's octopus ceviche tostada. I was about to go up and ask them if they would hold off biting into it so I could take a few photos of it but Shack knew what I was...

I swear to god, if I had known how easy it is to make my own grainy mustard, I would have been doing this ten years ago. I love condiments of all kinds but I am a mustard addict. I couldn't even tell you how many jars of fancy mustard I have in my fridge at this very moment. I should own shares in Maille by this point if you measured the actual amount of their grainy mustard I go through a month. I just know that there is so much mustard that I can't find room for anything else most of the time so we are forced to eat nothing but canned foods with mustard sauce. Okay, it's not that bad but it's close. For my first batch I knew I should be keep it simple because I also know this is just my first of many, many batches of mustard. Just a pinch of thyme from my garden for this jar but there will be more and they will get fancy. Grainy Thyme Mustard adapted from  Honest Cooking 2 tbls dark mustard seeds 2 tbls yellow mustard seeds 1/4 cup white...

Sunday's Leslieville Market baconfest was the highlight of the week. It makes me so happy to go to that little farmer's market and see it absolutely packed with people. In only a few short years this market has gone from a handful of vendors and a smattering of shoppers to a jam packed market with live music, crafts for the kids and tons of food vendors, produce vendors, cheese and meat people and the suppliers of my Sunday breakfast fish taco every week, Hooked. Bacon Fest was certainly hopping - in fact it was so hopping that we couldn't get anything we wanted because the lineups were insane. Again, I am sad that I didn't get to eat a sandwich from Rashers but I am happy that the actual market was so busy. We did line up for Rashers but we were not told that it would be a 30 minute wait for a sandwich until we had waited for 15 minutes in line and already ordered. Shack was not amused because those sandwiches looked incredible and it might have been nice if we...

I have had amazing luck with my herb garden this year so I kind of almost keep forgetting about it. In the past I grow everything in pots and they do okay but this year it's like a mutant steroid farm out there and I just can't use all the herbs fast enough. I am not worried about the 400 lbs of oregano, thyme and rosemary since they all dry really well but the basil either had to be consumed this weekend or it was going to go to pot so I had no choice but to make some pesto. I like a traditional pesto well enough but I like to change it up all the time. I love to add arugula, change the nuts and throw in something to give it a bit of heat. I almost never use pine nuts since I was attacked by them during the great PINE MOUTH EPISODE . I was part of a year long experiment where two friends and I documented our year of never repeating a recipe. I will tell you right now that even though I think of myself as a very good, adventurous home cook who thrives on variety, h...

Don't you just love mustard? I have at least a dozen types of mustard in my fridge at any given time and I have also recently started dabbling in the making of my own mustard, which is pretty damned exiting for me. I don't get out much. Anyway, the #1 staple in my fridge is always Maille old style whole grain mustard. I usually have their honey mustard as well but the giant jar of grainy mustard is alway in there. I use it in sauces like this one, in vinaigrettes, on meats, with grilled sausages and in sandwiches. The boys prefer plain old yellow mustard on their sandwiches because they are freaks but not me. When Maille asked for Canadian bloggers to be Maille Mustard Mavericks I was all over that like a Toronto racoon on a green bin the day after Christmas. I almost felt guilty grabbing a free jar of grainy mustard because it's not a new product for me at all but who can say no to a free jar of something they already love? The Maille store ...

I knew it couldn't last. This week was not nearly as exiting as last week. It was one of those weeks where we all take too long to get up and moving so we end up eating a really late lunch and then nobody feels like dinner which always means Shack orders pizza at 9:30pm for him and The Kid. This is the only thing I dislike about summer - we are not very good at keeping to a schedule of any kind unless life forces it upon us. The weekend started off well with a Saturday visit to Kensington Market and late lunch (SEE???? This was the beginning of the end)  at Mexican Salsas  . It's not the best mexican food in the world but it's authentic and tasty and they almost always have Mexican coke. It has become our regular taco spot in the market and since I had a team buy coupon which made it feel like it was free, it was even tastier than normal. I always get the chorizo tacos, Shack gets the cochinita pibil tacos and The Kid got a cochinita burrito. Shack left for a hair cut a...

Takikomi gohan is a traditional Japanese dish consisting of a bit meat or seafood cooked together with rice in dashi with some seasonal vegetables. In other words, It should translate to The Kid's Perfect One Dish Meal. I wanted to make some  takikomi gohan in my new Zojirushi rice cooker but I wanted to adapt it to what i keep in my pantry. Although I love Japanese food, I don't really keep gobo and konnyako lying around the house if you know what I mean and I don't think they are EVER considered a seasonal vegetable here in Toronto. Again, lazy me also doesn't really want to travel all over the city looking for it either so I used what I already had. I also added a bit of miso, which is not traditional but we like miso and we aren't actually Japanese so I thought it would be okay. In the future, I can see throwing in some frozen peas, or julienned carrot and maybe switching the chicken for some frozen shrimp. I will report back. As far as what kind of rice t...

 When I spied this blog post on The Cook Who Knew Nothing, I knew I had to make it. It felt like a great excuse to try out some new ingredients like preserved lemons, pomegranate molasses and baharat spice which are all things that I think about buying but don't because I am not sure what to do with them. North African cuisine is still very unfamiliar to me and I am just really starting to learn about Middle Eastern food this year. There are enough familiar flavours in this food that it feels like something I know but, at the same time, with these kicks of either new tastes or new combinations of spices that I wouldn't normally put together. I can't wait to try this chermoula with some fish and perhaps next time, I will up the chili and make it a bit hotter but otherwise, I wouldn't change a thing at this point. The chicken was just as good over the next couple of days either over rice or in a pita as a sort of shwarma like sandwich with some tahini sauce, pickled ...

We have had a great week, despite the cool, late fall weather over the weekend. Normally I am all about crisp, late fall days IN OCTOBER the downside of the backseat in a convertible in rain Aaaanyway, we left for Westport Ontario on Friday to spend the long weekend visiting family. I was pretty sure we were not going to be able to find a nice place to stay so last minute and would have to make the 30 minute commute back to my sister's place every day (said sister was on her boat in Westport, a lovely little town north of Kingston) but on Thursday i started emailing a few B&Bs on a lark and much to my surprise, one of them had a cancellation later in the day and emailed me back with the offer of a room. We stayed at the  Rothwell Stone Cottage  and I am so happy we did. Margot and her husband were so friendly and helpful, the house is beautiful, the grounds are well kept and there is a really nice pool in the beautifully landscaped backyard. Breakfasts are de...

It's time for my monthly post for  The Great Canadian Food Experience Project  where Canadian bloggers from across our nation write about a different subject each month. This month we are talking about great Canadian food heros and since I am from Toronto and I am pretty passionate about bringing diverse, interesting street food options to our city, I chose to write a bit about Suresh Doss, our very own Toronto food truck warrior. Toronto, despite being a world class city that likens itself to places like New York and Paris, has long suffered from draconian city bylaws that hinder any attempt to serve interesting street food. If you were flogging a grilled hot dog topped with condiments that sit out in the sun all day from a cart, or deep frying potatoes and griddle frying greasy burgers in a truck down at the foot of Cherry St,  you were golden but if you wanted to make me a pulled pork sandwich with kimchi, you were out of luck. Don't get me wrong, I like a nice,...