Bowla

For the past few weeks, I have been struggling. But it's humbling how something as simple as good food can always save me. Like the cake Cathy brought over last week. Long after it was all gone, I still pictured Cathy standing in her kitchen slicing each of the strawberries and whipping cream for the top. Such a simple act, and so comforting.

What I made tonight was Sweet Potato Curry with Red Lentils. It is all my favorite things: savory, spicy, easy, cheap, and healthy. If you want to DIY, the recipe is below.

Sweet Potato Curry with Red Lentils

First thing, finely chop one medium onion and set aside.

Next, peel a large sweet potato and cut into 1-inch chunks.

Next, bring 3 ½ cups of water to a boil in a medium or large pot. Add an organic bullion cube. (You can also just use proper stock instead of water.)

While you're waiting for it to boil, throw in the sweet potato.

Meanwhile, warm some oil in a large saucepan. Add the onion and a pinch of salt and sauté, stirring occasionally. While it's cooking, peel and finely chop a hunk of ginger and a couple cloves of garlic. Put all this into the onions, plus a teaspoon of curry powder and another of freshly-ground cumin. Give it all a stir and keep it cooking for another minute or so.

While you're waiting, add a cup of red lentils to the boiling water and sweet potato. Then add all the onion stuff, stir, and turn the heat way down to simmer.

Cook for 10 minutes or until lentils are softened. The potatoes will already be softened.

You can really put things into the pot in whatever order you want. The key is chopping the onions, garlic, and ginger really finely and getting them softened up before they go into the pot. Also, don't overcook this dish. If you do, it turns to mush, but catch it before that stage, and it will be a lovely golden color with the beautiful orange sweet potato still intact.

Garnish bowls with chopped cilantro and plenty of plain yogurt or kefir. Best eaten with fresh bread for sopping.

Go Big

Karen and Brian went to a lot of trouble, although they claimed it was nothing at all.

They cooked a five-course dinner for eight of us a week or so ago.

First, they passed a platter of the slowest-roasted tomatoes and garlic with baguette and mild goat's cheese. Round it went, a few times at least, and then we were onto the salad course with cold beets, spinach leaves, blue cheese, and sugared walnuts. All this, I thought, was surely enough to fill us before the main course, but no, out came little plates of mashed celery root, topped off with shaved parmigiana, sauteed chestnuts, and delicate, green chives.

Karen and Mike

By this time, everyone was really warming up, swapping tales about Minnesota and New Brunswick, suggesting movie dates, and draining a bottle or two of vino, of course.

Then came pork tenderloin wrapped with mushrooms into the lightest pastry and plated with wild rice and tender pieces of squash. Nothing at all, remember.

We even found room for dessert plus a slice of homemade pumpkin bread...and Karen sent me home with my very own jar of green tomato chow. What an effort!

Classic Karen and Brian.

Mike and Cathy

Ornge Man

Jeremiah's base. He's inside.


I got left in the car, making funny faces to keep myself company.


Jeremiah, being a natural 'Blue Man.'

Nouveau-Brunswick

It was just enough time for me to unwind, maybe not completely, but significantly: four nights and five days in Wicklow, New Brunswick with my mum and Megan.

We spent it watching Wheel of Fortune, drinking cheap beer, getting manicures, eating at diners, grilling pork, reading inexcusably dumb magazines, shopping for Christmas presents, trying on clothes, walking to the garden and back, sharing jewelry, going to bed early, and snacking on potato chips and ice cream.


Garden tomatoes: so sweet, you could eat them like apples.
Noticed in my dad's workshop: unused golf balls and evidence of his dog, Megan.
Fancy Marimekko stockings from Helsinki via Ottawa to New Brunswick. In the background: Mum and Dad's pink-painted plywood deck.
Two cutie pies. You know it.
Thanks to Dad, even the birds eat well. This sits outside the living room window and attracts all manner of teeny birds, plus a couple greedy jays.
Toasted tomato sandwich with sides of bacon and sliced cucumber. The bread, notably, is called 'brown' (a.k.a. molasses bread) and was baked by Grandma's Bake Shop in Centreville. Veggies are from Dad's garden. Bacon is from a pig.
My mum and dad's last New Brunswick grape of the season. But I'll be getting a jelly delivery at Christmas. Seriously, who can grow organic grapes in New Brunswick? They both have green thumbs, although they deny it.
Keith's was the beer of my university days. Over the weekend, I drank it chilled while wearing gloves outside. It was crisp!
Made-to-order Grammatizer. What in it? Grandma's Restaurant and Bake Shop's own hamburger roll, two ground beef burgers, bacon, several slices of processed cheese, lettuce, tomato, and Gramatizer sauce. So decadent (if you look just to the front of the burger on the plate you can see a delicious drip from the bacon).

Saturday the 27th

Missing Link

Hungry Day

Here's some rare roast beast from Il Negozio NiCastro on Wellington. For dinner last night, Adam piled it it between two slices of baguette -- one of which had been buttered and the other slathered in Lady Ash Burnham pickle.

It was a hungry day, as Lucy's dad would say.

Nine Years Later

Saturday the 13th

Already Autumn

Adam's been eating these little open-facers every day for a week. To make, just slather a piece of salty baguette with any mild goat's cheese and top with spoonfuls of fig compote.

To cook your own compote, gently simmer a large handful of halved, black figs with a few splashes of leftover white wine, two pinches each cinnamon, crushed coriander, chili flakes, cloves, and nutmeg, plus a small knob of chopped fresh ginger. Oh yeah, and add a couple spoons of brown sugar to sweeten the pot.

Bondable

Found

Ladies Night

Holding On

It's back-to-school time, but I'm not ready to say good-bye to summer yet. 30 degree weather demands light-tasting food and delicious drinks.

So, refresh with a green smoothie! Just blend together one banana, a peach or nectarine, a couple handfuls of raw spinach, a half cup of plain yogurt or kefir, and a half cup or so of water. Oh, and throw in a little cube of peeled, fresh ginger. Surprisingly healthy and delicious!

Or fill up on arugula salad topped with fresh figs and magic beans. I served this with smoked turkey breast sandwiches and red quinoa dressed with truffle oil and a squeeze of fresh lemon.

Better Butter Tarts

Lucy says her mum's butter tarts are "so good people talk about them for years after they try them." She even dreamed about them the other night, not knowing that her mum had been cooking a huge batch the very same day.

Magic Beans

Remember the fable of Jack and the Beanstalk? Conveniently, my father (née John) goes by 'Jack' and his organic vegetable garden is the stuff of legends.

Last week, Sarah and Jeremiah delivered two bursting boxes from Dad's garden. Since then, we've been stuffing ourselves full of cucumber sandwiches, cucumber crudités dipped in tzatziki, and Japanese salads with cukes, mirin, and black sesame seeds. Plus, Jeremiah brought over a container of his roasted carrot soup -- perfect with crusty bread and garlicky string bean salad, which we've been eating by the bowlful. And yesterday, the last of our red and yellow chard was sauteed and served alongside black olive pasta with three mushroom marinara.

The purple string beans, shown above, are a wax variety well-suited to New Brunswick summers. Want to know what makes them magic? You'll have to watch them while they cook to find out.

Bear's Berries

Tiny Tims

The other day Christina oh-so-generously handed me a bag of tiny red tomatoes from her Gilmour Street Garden.

"Adam's get-well-soon present," she explained.

Well, Christina, he ate them with chopped fresh basil and a splash of balsamic. To Adam, this is the salad of gods.

Fresh Production

On Shawna's advice, Jeremiah and I made a lunch reservation for today at Fraser Cafe. I forgot my camera, so you don't get to see the local cheddar cheeseburger with house-smoked bacon that I ordered. Or the panko-breaded haddock that Jeremiah scarfed down (hey! I thought we were sharing!). Mine came with house chips; Jeremiah's was on a bed of warm fingerling potatoes, roasted baby fennel, and grilled cherry tomatoes. Everything was, as my dad would say, scrum-diddly-umptious.

The Fraser brothers claim they'll be focusing on seasonal ingredients, and by the looks of the peach cobbler on the table beside us, tis the season!

Also, the Fraser brother (which one is which?) who was at the grill is kind of a hottie.