Veal With Ginger, Garlic, and Shiitake Mushrooms

As you have noticed from my recipes or the recipes that I choose to make, I rarely cook or eat red meat. In general I prefer vegetables, chicken, and fish to red meat, but Japanese-inspired recipes like this one call for lean red meat.

Tonight my appetite was asking for a Japanese-style dish with noodles, so I got some really lean veal meat and I put together this recipe. The shiitake mushrooms are optional  but since I had them in my cupboard, I used them.

Ingredients (for 2):

- 300 g lean veal cut into strips
- 1 garlic clove minced
- 1 Tbsp of fresh ginger minced
- 1/4 cup soy sauce
- 1/8 cup of rice vinegar
- 1 Tbsp sesame oil
- 1 Tbsp of brown sugar
- 1 tsp dried chili flakes
- 1/4 cup dried shiitake mushrooms (optional)

Method:

- Soak the shiitake mushrooms in warm water. Set aside.

- Marinade the meat with all the ingredients for 15 minutes.

- Heat a pan and then cook the meat with the marinade. When the meat is almost done, add the mushrooms and cook until the liquid marinade is almost gone.

- Serve over noodles or with white rice on the side.

Not everything that shines is …

warm!

Don’t be fooled by the blues skies and yellow sun. Today was a freezing day in Montreal, sunny but biting cold!

Here are a few photos from my Sunday walk around the city.

Have a warm week everyone!

Friday Quote

“C’est d’âme qu’il faut changer, non de climat.” - Sénèque

BON WEEK-END A TOUS!

Let’s Sugar Shack It!

What do you do with the following ingredients: two cars, 7 friends, -5 C, a Sunday, Quebec?

You go to a sugar shack!

Sugar shacks, or sugar houses, (cabanes a sucre in French) are very popular in Eastern Canada and between March and April is the season for what they have to offer. They are cabins that were established to make maple syrup. Sugar shacks now offer a meal in the cabin where most of the food is made with maple syrup and some even have a chimney and live music. In Quebec, it is quite popular during the months of March and April to go to a cabane a sucre to have a typical meal from the region and then have tire d’erable on the snow, which is maple syrup on the snow that solidifies into a caramel-like texture and then scooped by you with a wooden Popsicle stick! Simple, silly but fun!

Needless to say, it turned out to be a cool Sunday. Here are a few photos.

Chicken with Preserved Lemon and Green Olives

My dear friend Ferdy recently gave me a jar of preserved lemons and of course, being the food enthusiast that I am, I rushed to Renaud Bray to find me a Moroccan cookbook. Instead, I found an amazing magazine: Les 60 meilleurs du monde…point final.! And from this amazing magazine, I made this excellent recipe (with a few differences), probably the best chicken recipe that could ever exist!

For best results, use a dutch oven. The dutch oven will render the chicken very tender and the sauce as thick as you’d like it to be. I served this with white rice on the side simply because all the flavor is in the chicken and you don’t want to ruin it by introducing another flavor.

Ingredients (serves 2):

- 2 full chicken breasts, thinly sliced into flat fillets
- 3 Tbsp oil (I used a mix of canola and grape seed oil)

- 2 garlic cloves
- 1 onion, sliced into matchsticks
- 1 Tbsp chopped fresh ginger

- 1/2 cup of green unpitted olives
- 1/2 a preserved lemon
- 1 cinnamon stick
- 1 Tbsp harissa sauce
- 1 tsp ras el-hanout spices
- 500 ml chicken broth

Method:

1. Heat the oil in your dutch oven. Fry the chicken until lightly golden.

2. Add the garlic, onion and ginger. Fry for 3 minutes.

3. Add everything else, cover the dutch oven and cook in the oven at 350 F for 1 hour.

Et voila!

On va à la montagne! On y va!

 

 

Spring Hope

It is never too early to hope and to be enthused about spring, right? 

Carpe diem, I’d say.

Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,
Old time is still a-flying;
And this same flower that smiles today,
Tomorrow will be dying.

Eggs on a Bed of Tomato Sauce with Zucchini, Mushrooms and Parmesan Cheese

I promised myself one last post before the end of January. I have been over my head with life’s ups and downs, but here I am fulfilling my promise.

This recipe makes a great brunch or even dinner. The sauce comes out really thick and tangy and the eggs just go perfectly well with the rest of flavors. I used a cast iron skillet and frankly I could sense the difference in the way everything heated up together and stayed warm.

Ingredients (serves one):

- 1 Tbsp olive oil
- 2 garlic cloves, whole
- 1/2 zucchini, sliced
- 4 large white mushrooms, sliced
- 1/2 cup of tomato sauce
- 1/4 tsp of sugar
- A couple of sprigs of fresh thyme
- 2 Tbsp of chopped fresh parmesan cheese
- 2 eggs
- Salt and pepper

Method

1. Heat the oil in a skillet on medium heat. I used a cast iron skillet. Add the garlic cloves, zucchini and mushrooms. Fry until soft. Discard the garlic cloves.

2. Add the tomato sauce and thyme and bring to boil. Add the sugar and salt. Let the sauce thicken.

3. When the sauce thickens and is ready, add the cheese and give it a good mix.

4. Crack the eggs on top and cover. When the eggs harden and are cooked, uncover and season with freshly cracked black pepper.

Happiness Quote

I can’t help appreciating this quote:

Happiness is like a butterfly which, when pursued, is always beyond our grasp, but, if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you.

~Nathaniel Hawthorne

Loud Bicycle Project

It is common knowledge by now that I love bicycles, and luckily I live in a very bike-friendly city where I can cycle- as a means of commuting and just for chilling- for almost 7 months a year.

In the last cycle-able period from May to November, I witnessed several bicycle accidents simply because the car driver didn’t see or hear the cyclist coming from the side. I have a bell on my bicycle, as I’m sure those bicycle victim do, but is that bell enough to get the driver to brake? Not always.

So, when I saw this project, I couldn’t help but smile and back it up with a few dollars!

Here’s the video (click on orange link): LOUD BICYCLE: CAR HORN FOR YOUR BIKE

Photo via Kickstarter.com