Category: Recipe

Categories
Cooking Cuisine Food Quebec Recipe

Recipe: Gâteau à l’orange

gateau.jpg
This is a recipe for an orange cake that I got from Fred in Québec. He got it from his grandmother who got it from a newspaperway back in the day. The ingredients and the recipe are simple, but the results are delicious. Here is my slighty jazzed-up Anglophone version:

Ingredients

4 large free-range eggs

2 cups of white sugar

2 cups of white flour

2 teaspoons of baking soda

a pinch of salt

3/4 cup of vegetable oil (I used a half cup of neutral safflower oil and 1/4 cup of extra virgin olive oil to give the cake that Mediterranean je ne sais quoi)

2/3 cup of freshly squeezed orange juice (about 1 and a half oranges)

Grated rind of 1 orange

1 teaspoon of vanilla extract

powdered sugar (for topping)

Method

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit (177 Celsius).

2. Beat together the eggs and the white sugar for 2 minutes

3. Sift together the flour, baking soda and salt and beat into the egg and sugar mixture

4. Beat in the rest of the ingredients except for the powdered sugar and transfer batter to a ring-shaped cake pan or a Bundt cake pan

5. Bake in the preheated oven for 50 minutes or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean

6. Allow the cake to cool complete, remove from cake pan, invert onto a serving plate and top with sifted powdered sugar. Et voilà, c’est fini! Très simple et délicieux.

Categories
Cooking Cuisine Food Recipe

Recipe: Balsamic Glazed Lamb Chops

I haven’t posted a recipe in a long time now, but since I have become the de facto, live-in personal chef for my family, I will probably be posting more recipes from now on.

I made this for dinner last night, and like pretty much everything I cook, I improvised with what was in the kitchen without a set recipe or exact measurements.

Balsamic Glazed Lamb Chops
Serves 4 (with side dishes)

Ingredients:
Rack of lamb (8 chops, separated into individual chops)
Fresh rosemary (1 bunch) – there is a large patch of it in my parents’ backyard
Fresh garlic (about 6 or 7 cloves)
Balsamic Vinegar (about 3-4 tablespoons)
Dijon Mustard (about 2 tablespoons)
Olive oil (about 3 tablespoons)
Salt, Pepper

Method:
Prepare the balsamic glaze: Chop up the fresh rosemary and garlic and smash it up into a paste with some sea salt or kosher salt. Transfer into a dish for marinating. Stir in the mustard, balsamic vinegar and olive oil. Season with a bit more salt if needed and some freshly ground black pepper. Using your hands, massage the marinade into the lamb chops and let the chops marinate for half an hour to an hour. Grill the chops over a medium-high flame barbecue until they reach the desired doneness (well-done for my parents and medium-rare for me and my sister)

Serve with the side dishes below.

Boiled New Potatoes
Peel and boil a small bag of new potatoes in salted water until fork tender. Drain and generously top with a large pat of butter, salt and some chopped chives or green onions.

Steamed Broccoli and Cauliflower
Super simple: Steam broccoli and cauliflower florets in a steamer until cooked, but not mushy. Season with some salt.

Ginger Orange Glazed Carrots
Melt a generous pat of butter in a pan. Add in a bunch of carrots (sliced into quarter-inch diagonal pieces), the juice of one orange, grated fresh ginger (about 1 inch piece) and salt and pepper. Let simmer uncovered until carrots are soft but not mushy (about 10 minutes). You can also spoon some of the ginger orange sauce over the other vegetablesl

Categories
Cooking Cuisine Food Recipe

Salmon Filet with Shiso-Lemon Butter and Wasabi Mashed Potatoes

Here’s a recipe I improvised for dinner last night at my house with Tash and Keiko. It is inspired by a nouvelle japonaise recipe that someone posted on BigDaikon.com.

Ingredients: (for 2-3 people):

  • 2 Salmon Filets
  • one bunch of asparagus (quickly blanched or steamed)
  • 3 potatoes
  • one teaspoon of wasabi
  • 1 teaspoon of Japanese mayonnaise
  • salt and pepper
  • butter, some olive oil
  • a handful of chopped up green onions
  • a handful of shiso leaves, cut in chiffonade
  • 1 clove of garlic, chopped
  • Juice of half a lemon

Method:
1. Peel and cut potatoes into quarters. Boil in salted water until tender. Drain. Mash with a good amount of butter. Mix in wasabi and mayonnaise and season with salt and pepper.

2. Heat about a tablespoon of olive oil and a big pat of butter in a frying pan on medium heat. Pan sear the salt and peppered salmon filets so they are nicely browned on both sides but still tender (about 2 minutes each side)

3. Remove salmon filets from the frying pan and keep warm, keeping the butter and oil in the pan to make the sauce. Add the garlic, green onions and shiso leaves to the pan and fry until the garlic starts to brown and the herbs release their aroma.

4. To present: Put a mound of wasabi mashed potatoes on each plate. Put some steamed or blanched asparagus next to the potatoes and put a salmon filet on top. Drizzle some of the sauce on top of the salmon along with some lemon juice.