slow cooker and a steamer

Is it possible that slow cooked meat and steamed vegetables are the best combo? I slow cooked a bison roast yesterday with a 1/2 jar of pepperocini peppers - mmm, good! Some steamed asaparagus with a little lemon and some onion rolls made a great meal. Today is braised short ribs in a barbeque sauce simmering all day, perhaps with steamed broccoli and some pan-friend potatoes. (but I don't know how to do it on a stick!)

Food on a stick

Does anything beat food on a stick cooked on an open fire? I made bannock this weekend at a family day festival downtown. I have no hair on my knuckles anymore, but that's the price of cooking with fire I guess.

people and food

I think it is possible to reveal one's personality through a comprehensive dinner menu. Generally three to four courses is best. For example, "the advisor" might be:

* lightly broiled cod on salty crackers with capers and lemon
* oyster, shitake, and button mushroom salad with scallions, oregano, and olive oil, topped with freshly grated Parmesan cheese
* peppercorn T-bone steak with a side of potato pancakes and a vegetable medley of green beans, yellow peppers, and glazed carrots
* baked Alaska covered in whipped cream and shaved German chocolate

mmmm

For those who know "the advisor," would you agree?

DT

Franks & Beans.

Some folks always use the same recipe, some like to change it up every time. Some recipes are simple and ready in minutes, some are complex and take days to get just right. I like to change it up everytime...and today I was looking for something quick and simple.
My family has been hit by some nasty cold bug that's going around, so Z and I were looking for some comfort food while his mommy tried to take a nap. We decided on some simple wieners and beans. We weren't looking to invest a lot of time, but we weren't willing to sacrifice flavour either. I pulled out the Heinz Maple Style Beans in Sauce With Pure Quebec Maple Syrup and the Schneiders Grill'ems (fully cooked smoked sausages) with Cheddar. I just heated the sausages in the toaster oven for a bit, cut 'em up and threw them in a big bowl with the can of beans. I nuked the whole thing for a minute and a half and we were ready to eat.
I experimented in college a bit with wieners and beans...I spent a lot of time trying to get it just right. Some of the ingredients included bacon, various mustards, honey, worcestershire sauce, Frank's RedHot Original, every kind of baked bean you can think of, brown sugar, mozzarella, cheddar, parmesan, pepperoni, even corn! I've tasted a lot of other folks recipes too, there are just so many varieties!
Do you have a variety of Franks & Beans that you like to make? Click on 'Comments' below and share your recipe! If you're not already a Food Panel member, you just might earn yourself an invitation... (The best Franks & Beans recipe received over the next year will win the first 'good eats' t-shirt if we ever actually make them...the t-shirts that is)

Red Robin: A review.

Well tonight was like every other night in one respect...after work, I was hungry. So I packed up the family, and we headed to Red Robin. Not exactly high end dining, but I had a coupon.
I ordered the Royal Red Robin Burger. According to the menu: "This is the aristocrat of all burgers because we crown it with a fresh AAA jumbo fried egg. In addition, three strips of hickory-smoked bacon, American cheese, crispy lettuce, tomato & mayo." After reading that description I thought to myself, "Hey...I didn't have a decent breakfast today, here's my chance to make up for it without missing out on supper!"
I also had steak fries and an iced tea...both bottomless.
The burger was mediocre. Not bad. Just mediocre. The toppings were acceptable; the eggs cooked the right amount, the bacon - not too crispy, not too chewy, fresh lettuce, juicy tomato, a healthy amount of cheese. The meat infortunately was nothing special. I was glad for the egg, cheese and bacon, they brought some flavour to the sandwich. Of course, I ate the whole thing.
I don't want to get too sidetracked by the middle of the road burger, what you really want to know is "How were the fries?" They were excellent. Excellent as a vehicle for the secret ingredient, that is. No, not the ketchup. The Honey Mustard sauce. You have to ask for the Honey Mustard sauce. They don't put it on the table, but it's an absolute requirement for the meal. Apparently it comes from a saucy place in Washington and isn't available to the Canadian public. When I finished off the first basket of fries, there was still some honey mustard left, so of course I asked for more fries...I wasn't hungry, but they were free. And was I glad that I asked! By the time you get to the end of the meal, you rarely notice that the fries had been gradually cooling off the whole time, but when you get the fresh steak fry refill, you'll be glad you kept eating!
Of course, you're probably wondering where I got the coupon, 'cause you don't want to pay full price for an average burger just to get to the 2nd plate of fries and the dipping sauce...check out the Red Robin eClub, they'll send you coupons by email. Buy one burger get one free for your B-Day.
The dessert menu looked pretty fine, but I didn't have a coupon for that...

Gooooooo Carbs!

Seeing the lemming-like fervour at which otherwise useful individuals flock to low-carb/no-carb/i-didn't-know-what-a-carb-was-before-i-bought-into-this-cult diets --- i have decided to release my own diet plan.

As many of you know - i have been following the "Watkins" diet for some time now. It goes a little something like this:

1)Find food that tastes good
2)Eat it
3)stop when you're full (NOTE: #3 is more of a suggestion)

I try to consume my body weight in dairy fat on a daily basis - and believe that the proper amount of carbs was taken in the other day when my diet consisted of: 1 large serving of Granola, 2 "CeCe-style" cinnamon buns, Pasta and a muffin or two before 3:00pm.

Watch for my upcoming book tour "I weigh a buck-seventy-eight - and I feel great" and my frozen snack entrees in your grocer's dairy section.

No wonder French food is so good.

Gateau and Cadeau definitely sound alike.

If you look at both words from a vocal production point of view, you will notice something very interesting. The first sound in both words is velar, meaning that it is produced using the soft palate. In gateau it is a voiced velar consonant, in cadeau it is an unvoiced velar consonant. The second sound in both words is the identical vowel. The third sound is alveolar, meaning that it is produced using the blade of the tongue and the ridge of the gum behind the upper teeth. In gateau it is an unvoiced alveolar consonant, in cadeau it is a voiced alveolar consonant. The fourth sound in both words, like the second, is identical. At this point you are probably hearing yourself say, “Who cares?”, to which I respond, “Let me continue…” If we compare the component sounds of each of these words, we find that both include the exact same parts: a velar consonant and an alveolar consonant, one of which is voiced, one of which is not, and identical vowels.

(For those of you who’s French vocabulary is not large enough to have that certain, je ne sais quoi, gateau means cake, and cadeau means gift.)

The obvious conclusion to be made is that the early speakers of the French language were wise enough to see that cake and gifts were either interchangeable and/or always present at the same time. Meaning that when a cake is required a gift will suffice, and vice versa. Or, of course, when a cake is required, it is to be implied that a gift is required also. And, if necessary, cake is to be considered a gift, unless of course, you paid for it.

You may at this time be asking, “When is a cake required?” to which I respond, “When is it not?”

So…if you find yourself in a situation where cake is present, but you haven’t been presented with the gift, remember that the cake can be considered as the gift itself. However, if you paid for the cake (which cannot be considered as the gift in this case), and there is no other gift to be seen, remember this simple phrase: “Je ne parle pas Francais” and that should save you any embarrassment.