Love, Sweet love.

Lots on food, Some on drink, some on life....where's the love?

Well, I suppose the love's always been inside. When I cook all I can claim is that when I'm cooking with my heart...I'm cooking out of love, and good food, no matter who complicated or expertly prepared has an inherent quality of tastiness. Usually because it's made out of love. But right now I'm not talking about the love your family has for you, I'm talking Eros here, I'm talking the love that is associates with Romance...yeah Capital R.

There's a stereotype out there, one that starts with "I love this person, I want to cook to impress, I'll find something complicated/fancy/Impressive to show how I love them." The Sitcom ends it with the poor sucker looking like the most pathetic person on the face of the planet with at least one thing that is pompei-esque for sheer carbonisation and burntness. The Romance novel ends it with dinner being tasted, and then ignored in favor of copious, if not exaggerated lovemaking. I see the middle ground being A LOT of work put into a dish that may be beautiful, and may be tasty, but often has so much more art than artifice...which I'm sorry to say often misses the point. Which is: "I love you"

"There is something to be said for spontinaity." Alternatively there is something to be said for planning. But anyone who knows me i'm usually advocating the middle ground, I like the Taoist philosophy of Wu Wei(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wu_wei). I don't always plan out any act of love I mearly act on it when the timing is right, and believe me the same principle applies to cooking. (And some people wonder why the Romantic Cultures are so brilliant with food, sex, and philosophy...they were meant to be discussed in the same breath, intensity, and intonation.) Love and acts of love(yes, making love included) should be as natural as breathing, as natural as walking, as natural as smiling. I kinda forgot this because well, I gave into my surroundings and I gave into the demands of modern life, I forgot how natural things should be: in cooking, in writing, in being, in love. In forgeting this simple and important princliple, I was doing myself a really stupid harm. So, now I know why I've been so down, why I haven't been "recovering", more improtantly why I haven't been writing. And I admit it, I wrote this so I could remember this very important principle. But if Teachers pounded anything into my head over two decades of learning If you have a question, remember to ask it for the whole class, and if you have a point to make, share it. Well, I know I forgot something important, and sometimes a little reminder is not entirely out of the question.

What the world needs now is love, sweet love
It's the only thing that there's just too little of
What the world needs now is love, sweet love,
No not just for some but for everyone.
-Burt Bacharach

From Darkness Rising comes: Food...and inspiration.

So, from the depths of well, blatant stupidity and selective amnisia I come rising from the crappy sea of utter shittiness with ideas that need/should be mentioned.

Recently I've noticed within myself certain patterns of spicing and seasoning...certain combinations that seem to work in ways that I hadn't thought of. Since it's past 4AM my time and I'm not going to be going absolutly nuts with every combination but I've got a few good ones that are completely tasty.

Cumin + Cayenne + Lime(Favorite combo for marinating chicken either make a paste of it or add chicken stock to make a more loose marinade)
Cumin + Black Pepper + Rosemary(Rub onto some good beef or )
Cumn + Cayenne/Chili Flakes + Lemon Juice + Basil (this tastes bloody awesome when mixed with olive oil to coat pasta If so mix in with lemon zest it works like a Vinigrette, You can mix this well and make a kickass pasta salad)
Cumin + Black Pepper + Allspice + Cayenne + Coriander(Add Chili Powder and Tumeric and you'll have a kickass spice mixture for beans, Carribian soup, If you're thinking Chilli I suggest dropping the allspice unless you really like it...instead add a little Tumeric and some Cocoa powder it's really tasty and the Cocoa does help add some smoothness. )
Chipotle + Green Onions+ Roasted Garlic + Yogurt + Black Pepper (Trust me it's great, I've used this combo as a dip, but for sheer amazingness: Mix it into your mashed potato, it's tasty shit! Alternatively you can marinate chicken in this mixture to fantastic results.)
Chinese Five spice powder+ Black Pepper + Gold/Dark Rum (This combination is Amazing with a chicken and veggie stirfry don't go nuts with the black pepper, but I know it needs a tiny amount of Spice based heat.)
Salt + Cayenne + Black Pepper (This is MY favorite Steak rub, don't use too much of either spice the key thing is to use enough salt to create a nice crust when you first start the searing...you do not want to salt-crust this sucker, when you first cook up the steak, and when you like rare steak or even medium rare...it makes for a damned tasty Jus...I like using it on roasts too.)
Allspice + Cinnimon + Nutmeg (use this combination in a cream sauce to give it a little bit of kick, also: great over cooked apples)
Butter+ Brown sugar + Nutmeg + Peaches (yes it's a classy combination I found it delicious with Pork)
well, that's all the really awesome stuff I came up with the last little while. I hope to have some more succesful recipies, and post them

Shwartz Deli: Smoked Meat...a meditation.

I went to montreal, with only one real demand: Eat Shwartz's Smoked meat.
And I recieved just what I wanted:
A chunk of medium fatty brisket: brined, pickled, smoked, steamed, carved, and piled onto a plate.
a pile of good rye bread.
and a Cherry Soda.

this is my kind of food, the food you can just EAT, it's flavored and spiced meat, it's Smoked meat! I have tried other people's and other place's attempts, but NOTHING and I do repeat NOTHING can replace the genuine shwartz experience. It's the little but busy deli, it's the smell that makes your mouth water, it's the languages, and the tastes. It's even the wait.

This food cannot be described, I won't bother even trying, nothing can do it as much justice as the experience of being there and eating the sandwich. It's a love at first smell, taste, texture, sight...and hell, even sound....I'm going back there, hopefully more than once on my little Quebecois sojourn. Because some experiences that happen so infrequently MUST be repeated.

Quebec City: An Introspective.

First I want to say, Right Here, Right Now, I am by definition NOT Quebecois. French Canadian: yes. Quebecois influenced: yes. But not officially Quebecois...even though there have been some days where I've wanted to be born here. It's not neccesarily that Vancouver, or even my beautiful British Colombia are neccesarily bad...it's very much instead that when I'm here I get my biggest inspirations for the SIMPLEST of good food ideas.

I think it was my first dinner here that forced the need to write this, and I think it demonstrates my point before I go all food geek on you people over what you're missing. My favorite Quebecois dessert, Tarte Au Sucre, best translated as: sugar pie. Yes, you essentially make a caramel out of maple sugar and place it into a pie crust. So sugary, but oh so fucking good! It's a dumbstruckingly simple idea, but it seems that only the Quebecois seem to think of it. Probably for the same reason that I've been eating dessert with my family for every lunch and dinner, people here like to eat sweets, and I'm not talking a candy bar from the corner shop, I'm talking something like a cake with maple icing, or a fancy cake with mousse, basicly any number of higher quality sweets, and fresh fruits. I'm in dessert heaven around here because people acctually WANT to eat dessert around here, and most people are satisfied by a "small" but excellently made and thought out dessert.

Furthermore: Cretons, a breakfast Paté. You heard me, BREAKFAST PATÉ. Yeah, ground pork + cream + onions equals something ungodly good and fatty. It's something that cannot be described accurately, it's a meat spread that fills you up and lets you know that you've had a damned solid breakfast. It's a savory and comfortable thing that when you try it I swear unto you that paté is not the first word you'd think of.

Lastly: Poutine: a Retrospection.
It's Fries, Cheese Curds, and Gravy...what's not to like?
And it's enjoyable, but I always seem to ahve the biggest problem with one thing about it, no-one within a 100Km radius from Quebec seems to be able to make it properly. aqnd it's always the same thing time and again: cheese curds. I've tried many Poutines and I can tell you that none taste the same as the original because cheese curds have such a unique texture, I don't think it's reproduceable.

Tomorow I'm going to a nice restaurant with my family at Ile Dè Orleans, Quebec city's answer to the Oakanagan. I intend to write my opinion on both the food I eat, and the Fruit wines I intend on sampling.

okay, need to get back on the horse: a look into a morning breakfast.

It's 9 after 5am and I'm in need for something to do until I figure I can walk to school and get there just in time for the library to open.

So, since my house lacks eggs I am not in a position to make my preferred early morning breakfast foods. Omelets and Scrambles.
However, as I've made so many of the latter and quite a few of the former I'm willing to discuss the many things that I doubt you'd have thought of putting into either a scramble or an omelet.
(For the purposes of this post, I'd like to differentiate between them. A scramble is when one takes beaten eggs, combines them either in the pan or out of the pan, and scramble everything in the mixture. An Omelet, is when one cooks a layer of beaten eggs into a solid circle then folds in the filling using this circle. )

Examples:
- fried rice
-chopped up takeout(I've yet to find a doggie bag that I couldn't use)
-Chinese: Noodle dishes and stirfried dishes work wonders.
-Italian: Yes pete, whenever I have less pasta then what I'd need to make a full meal, in it goes.
-Greek: The Lemon flavored take-out potatoes...need I say more?
-Kabob....no elaboration neccesary I feel
-Thai: Pad Thai....yeah
-German food: meat, potato, veg
- sauted veggies(anything will do, I've tried it)
- Thai Peanut sauce(chunkier the better)
- Chopped up Steak: it's good
- Cajun Seasonings
- Fresh chopped Herbs: better in a scramble, but if you combine with goat cheese, it makes for a damned fine filling.
- Solid fruits: Mangoes, Apples, Ect. (use caramel sauce to bind the fruit mixture, you know the one in the fridge that you occasionally put )
- leftover cooked veggies: steamed green beans taste great loaded into an omelet with thinly sliced garlic, you can mash up leftover peas into a paste for a tasty fix.
- Hot sauces: aim for hot sauces that aren't just chili flavored, I tried a peach and habanaro sauce that was so spicy it was sexy. If you're not so into the heat but want to try some sauces, get a solid salty cheese like feta, some chopped green onions, then mix with the hot sauce and place in as a filling.
-Paper thin slices of garlic: In an scramble you need to be careful not to burn it, in an omelet, the residual heat can be just enough to do the job....garlic lovers need apply.
- Unusual Cheeses: Try making an omelet with just a solid slice of Cambanzola and some basil.
- Leftover mexican food(homemade or no): Fajita filling, taco filling, salsa cruda, refried beans, damned good.
-Pepperoni: greg taught me this one
...and I'm tapped out, this is the kind of thing that I make up on the fly with what I find in my fridge, yet another moment when only my imagination is my limit.

Thai Style Peanut sauce.

Tonight I felt like Thai food, Though truth be told I've craved Thai for a while. So for dinner for myself, my cousin, and a friend we chose to make A veggie and noodle stirfry with peanut sauce. We made the sauce from scratch, tasting as we went along. It was pretty tasty.

Why are these measurements in Imperial? Because I honestly don't know exactly how much we used. I only have a rough guess, fortunately I am very good at eyeballing things. So my advice to people who want to try this recipie: Taste it Constantly and Adjust! This sauce can be made with any damn ingredients but Short of the Sriacha I make no promises that the ingredients you have at home and the ingredients I had will have the same effect at the same quantity. These are good guesses at best, though they should be give or take what you're looking for as an end product.

1 1/2 Cup Unsweetened Smooth Peanut Butter
1/2 Cup Soya Sauce
1/4 Cup Vinegar
1/2 Cup Sweet Chili Sauce
The Juice of Half a Lime
1 Teaspoon of Yellow Chili Paste
1 Tablespoon of Sriacha Chili Sauce
4 Tablespoons of Chopped Cilantro
Splash of Rice wine (Optional)

First get a bowl and a fairly sturdy whisk. Put your peanut butter in the bowl, add the Soya sauce, and whisk until it is incorperated, after this add the vinegar(I used malt, but the ideal would be rice or rice wine.), and the Sweet Chili Sauce, and whisk to combine. Add the Juice of half a lime and WHISK AGAIN!!!!!

Now we're at the tasting stage, check to see if it's too/or not enough: salty, sour, sweet, peanutty. If it isn't Adjust! If by adjusting you have to make some more sauce: No worries, it'll keep in the fridge for a least a week in a sealed container. Now: Add about 1 teaspoon of Yellow chili paste and about 1 tablespoon of Chili sauce, if you love spice and heat, add more, this is the bare minimum you need. (remember what I said about tasting?) Add your Cilantro to taste, and maybe add a small splash of rice wine if you're feeling frisky.

There you go, a respectable peanut sauce waiting for some stir fry and noodles.

In My Humble Opinion: Drink, also known as "BOOOOOOOOOOZZZZEEEEEE! WHYYYYYYY?"

Okay, I am not of the school of thought that says that you cannot have Food without Drink. Nor am I of the school of thought that thinks that Drink is only for the purposes of getting drunk. I am most notably of the school of thought that says that Drink is like any other food/ingredient that should not be over indulged terribly often.

Think of it like Butter or Lard, both worthy ingredients that should be eaten and occasionally indulged in, but not the kind of thing that you want to consume in large quantities all the time unless you're in a situation where you can't get access to it regularly. I am not against the practice of occasional indulgence that leads a person to ordering an occasional buttery croissant to go with their Café-au-lait with extra whipped cream and chocolate sprinkles. However, if that's the kind of thing you consume EVERY morning...doesn't it take the magic out of it? I feel that this same principle can be applied toward drinking. I can understand enjoying a nice beer after a hard days work, but I feel that having a beer every day gets you too used to it, which I think destroys the idea itself. You have that beer because it's a special experience that you have as a kind of mental support/reinforcement reward. I see it as an aesthetic accompaniment to what you eat, rarely something to be enjoyed on it's own. Unless it's something special, unless you keep that fifty year old brandy, unless you have that carefully stored Don Peringion, unless you have that one artisan brewed beer, to me it's best an addition to a meal.

Even so, this leads to one of my few pundit-like stances that I will not stand down from: life is too short to settle for crappy booze. I'm a proud Canadian, but I don't drink Molson's Canadian, Why? Because it is Shit! Merde! Schise! Merda! Mierda! Дерьмо! compared to the nice beer that is made in more local breweries. Hell, even compared to the beer made in some of our national chains (Sleeman's). You will never find me willingly drinking what I know to be an inferior tasting beer. People don't willingly drink sub-standard rotgut wine, why should you hold the same kind of standard to your beer?

Adolecents and Adults have tried to convince me of one particular case: If you're going to get wasted why spend the extra money? I have a question for them: Why would I want to get violently ill by drinking good beer? In all honesty I don't wish to get wasted often, I don't particularly feel the need to get particularly drunk very often, I enjoy the mild buzz I receive after a few drinks but I feel that is the extent of my interest most of the time I'm casually drinking. I just don't see the complete appeal in getting drunk for no better reason than the need for entertainment at the cost of your liver.

Why am I talking about reasons to drink more than the Aesthetics of drinking? Because I don't think this issue has been addressed adequately. As a general rule, drink is talked about with the assumption that the people drinking it only care about the taste and will appreciate the more esoteric aspects of the wine or beer. Sorry Chums! Fat Bloody Chance! These people do exist, but on the whole as a culture these things really aren't being hammered into us. It's assumed that we'll learn, but for many people they don't! That's what bothers me.

Personally there are four occasions where I will allow myself to drink to excess: Celebrating a birth, Honouring the dead, Celebrating a wedding, or saying goodbye for a long time. Even then I may not drink very much. If the Drink is not a part of the meal, I just drink enough to be more sociable, that's it, for two reasons: 1) I like being in control, and 2) I actually like enjoying the taste. Bare this in mind.

so, some food, some life...dare I go into Love? ...Drink can wait.

Anthony Bourdain said food is sex. In the same note the kind of stuff I write about in this blog could be considered pornography. But I'd like to explore yet another angle on this metaphor, the right meal between the right people could be considered a form of making love. If you're mind immediately went to the spaghetti scene in lady and the tramp you're close. Why is the candlelight dinner between two people considered such an effective romantic cliché? It's the fact that two people are allowed the privacy to just be with each other and experience each other's personality through the medium of the meal.

I didn't bring this up to remind you about the sex part, trust me after a romantic dinner that part usually takes care of it self, I'm more talking about the intimacy of sharing a meal. So you can stop thinking of food=sex, I'm talking meals=Intimacy, and I feel that this is something that most people either understand or ignore. There is great intimacy in sharing a meal, and I admit I hate eating on my own unless it's a special occasion. Sharing a meal with someone allows you to sit down and talk openly...most of the time. Though I admit a meal's intimacy outside of the romantic scope is best understood in the scope of a carefully prepared meal shared between a loving family, no matter the kind.

Last year, before the new year, my friends and I held a dinner in my house, it was a get together with food prepared lovingly for a group of friends to meet and share the experience of the meal. Were any of us related? No. Then why do I consider it one of the most special meals I've experienced in my life? Because we wanted to get together, because all that mattered was the food and each other's company.

Food prepared, served, and shared without love is just that, food. Food that is pepared, served, and shared with love, no matter how humble the fare may be, is a meal.

Cullinary Mental Note (new application of potatoes in Soup)

okay, new thought:

I've often pondered Scalloped Potatoes, there really isn't a why behind it, I like the dish, even though it's a bastard child of a classic French peasant dish...but that is yet another blog.

The style of cutting starchy potatoes into medallions isn't that uncommon, it's just emphasized in that particular dish...and of course me being me I had to sit down and think for a bit. I once tried long boiling raw potatoes into a stock in order to thicken it without resorting to any flour based substance. Upon consideration a thought occurs...what if I was going about it all wrong?

If you want to use potatoes as a thickener in a soup the better thing to do then is to first cook them so that they are more capable of breaking apart. Take chunks of a cooked potato and boil it in stock so it falls apart. I suppose if you wanted to go to the effort required to mash them into paste it would work just as well but now I have something to experiment with next time whole chicken is on sale.

I'll let you guys know how this adapted chicken stew turns out.

So I'm sick, Might as well share one of my "Secret" Recipies

Okay, I'm sick, and have had the kind of sore throat that makes me sound like Barry White on a touch of Helium.
Now, I've heard EVERY bloody drink-type-thing out there, and tried more than a few of 'em. I believe warm coke with lime was no doubt one of the laziest cures I've heard of. But I've got my own little Sore-throat cure, and I find that it works every time. Even if it doesn't people seem to love it.

Here's what you do:
Get 1 Lemon
1 Thumb Sized knob of Ginger
3 heaping tablespoons of brown sugar
2 bags of orange Pekoe Tea
1.25 Litres of boiling water
Rum(optional)

-Peel the knob of ginger, slice into medallions, place into your pot of boiling water.
-Take a vegetable Peeler and remove the zest from the lemon in nice long strips. Place the strips into the water.
-Slice the Lemon in half and squeeze the Juice into the pot.
-Turn down the temperature into a low simmer, and place the tea bags into the pot
-let the mixture simmer for two minutes, after this time take the pot off the heat and dissolve the brown sugar into the liquid.
-after the sugar is dissolved Strain the liquid into a teapot or some other serving device that can maintain the heat.
-Pour yourself a glass, and top it off with a splash of Rum.

Trust me even if you DON'T have a sore throat it's a great hot drink for a warm day

Cullinary Mental Note # 1

I recently made a triple Berry Crisp/crumble...and it was good. Though I had one problem with it, I felt that it was berry enough, and certainly it was sweet enough, but it lacked one thing that I keep telling people is so important when cooking.
CONTRAST!

Blending flavours is all well and good but they need to contrast to a degree otherwise all you taste is the harmony of flavour without catching each and every note that makes up the harmony. In music this is acceptable, in cooking not-so-much.

So how do I rectify this problem in my next Crisp/crumble? Next time I'm adding the juice and the Zest of an orange. Trust me, it'll be damned good, I can't wait for berries to go on sale again.

Okay, Recipie time!!!!!

Okay, I love pasta, yes, it is said, and it is more than noted...so it shouldn't come to any surprize to people that I have a love/hate relationship with Kraft Dinner. I love it because it's dead simple for other people and really handy if you go camping, I hate it because to my pallet after years of cooking it tastes like ass, but not normal "tastes like ass" but "tastes like ass despite the fact that it could have been tastier. " So a few days ago I was out of nearly all kinds of tasty food, I had a bit of Cheese, celery, some onions, garlic...and a box of Kraft Dinner Egg Noodles. So I sautéd the chopped veggies, and tossed them into the prepared KD which was made more Palatable through a half cup of grated Cheddar. It wasn't half bad. a little lacking though...It required more substance. The next morning I went to the grocery store and endeavoured to reproduce the recipe using a "from scratch" mentality. It was abso-fucking-lutely beautiful, however it was not without it's problems...though for the purposes of this recipe I've basically dealt with them.

Egg Noodles with Cheese and veggie sauce

Ingredients
1 package of egg noodles
1 cup diced celery
1 cup diced onion
3 cloves diced Garlic
1/2 cup chopped Pepperoni(Optional...trust me it's just as tasty without it)
1 1/2 cups heated milk (we're talking room temperature here)
4 Heaping tablespoons flour
2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 1/2 cups grated cheddar cheese(I like using old cheddar, but that's up to you)
spices and herbs to taste

Okay I did this meal in a little less than 11 minutes from the start of heating up the pasta water to the moment I combined the pasta into the sauce...trust me it's doable, though don't feel you have to keep up with my speed, I was in the mood to prove something, you can take your bloody time.

1) Heat up water for pasta in your big pot, and gently warm up the milk you're intending to mix into the sauce, your are looking for room temperature, not much higher than that, when the water boils put
2) while waiting for the water to boil prepare the vegetables and the optional pepperoni
3) in a pot over medium heat toss in the butter and the oil, let them melt, when the butter is foaming toss in the pepperoni, the Onion, and the Celery.
4) stir the onion and celery until they start to go transparent, when they do add the garlic.
5) stir in the flour into the pot, making sure that it mixes completely with the fat, you will see a roux happen and you may not believe how much the vegetables facilitate the process of creating a roux without lumps.
6) when the roux is mixed stir it around and let it bubble for a minute, then slowly add the milk to the roux while stirring, the idea is to incorporate the milk completely into the roux, when the sauce begins to thicken and bubble, turn down the heat to low-medium.
7) Add the cheese, stir it in, let it melt. Once melted turn the temperature over the sauce to low. (At this point I added some Cajun Seasonings...but in all honesty do what you like with it, basil, oregano, Cayenne, nutmeg, black pepper...yeah.)
8) when the egg noodles are done according to the instructions on the package, drain the noodles, then mix with the sauce.

You're done! Eat it up, and realise how much more awesome this is than Kraft Dinner

In My Humble Opinion Part 3...god should I rename my blog?

Okay, I have a lot of opinions, especially when it comes to food.

Some of these opinions are derived from long experience cooking or reading about food, however, this one was especially developed by my childhood and further expressed by my short period spent at a university residence cafeteria. To sum up my opinion simply: Most people don't know how to properly roast meat.

I grant you, sometimes it's a matter of taste, I can understand how some people would not like their roasts to be bleeding as they carve them up, some people are squeamish about blood, fair enough. What I object to is the hockey puck syndrome I keep seeing, meat should be moist, tender, and flavourful. I object to cooking a steak unto the point where it looks like a hamburger that has been left on the grill all day for a company barbecue. I know people that would consider doing that to a steak to be the highest form of heresy, why then do we so casually accept that people should be allowed to do it to their Sunday roasts? If you're going to say that gravy is supposed to solve the dryness problem then I'd say you should be sent to some kind of culinary re-education centre. Gravy is supposed to be used to increase the flavour found on your plate and hopefully make up for a lack of intense flavour that we find in the most simple of roasts. People should realize that having a tender, moist roast is the ideal that we are all searching for. There are many methods of keeping roasts moist that exist, even when using a dry cooking method such as roasting...but see, method is only half the problem. People need to start picking their meats better, pick more tender cuts and pick meat that has aged a bit if you don't, stop picking the really tough cuts expecting that they'll magically become nice and tender if you cook them in the oven. Marinating doesn't hurt either way, nor does butterflying a roast, there are so many food and cooking websites out there that most people have no real excuse to not find methods of improving their cooking techniques save for a strong degree of laziness.

But really people...Dry roasts? Come on, you really should be able to do better

Glory to the Béchamel....Yes a new way to apply two old tricks

So, this morning a thought occurred to me, a technique that I used before to glorious ends.

...So, who among you out there like Chocolate Pudding? *Waits for imaginary responses* What about a Rich Chocolate Dessert that could only be described as Liquid Sex? *Waits for considerably more enthusiastic responses* I know most people like chocolate cake, what about combining the two?

And How did I come to this conclusion? Well, truth be told this method has been one that has been knocking around my skull for the last couple years. Have I tested this recipe? See the above questions. Very recently I've been craving two things in particular, 1) Mexican food, and 2) pasta with a nice creamy silky sauce. I admit this posting is more based on the latter, because what does a cheese sauce have to do with Chocolate Pudding? One word my friends: Béchamel. It's the Technical name for a milk based sauce that is thickened with a Roux, I like to smile at myself that this Greek-Italian discovery was officially taken as the "plastic" of the french Culinary movement. Why Plastic? Because if you can make Béchamel out of milk and roux there are dozens of sauces that can be made...though not long ago it occurred to me that in my searches of my cooking literature I did not find any use of the Béchamel in a dessert manner, I found this very odd. So, somehow the idea of combining a Béchamel with chocolate came to me. If you know me outside of this blog you know that I had to sate my curiosity by making the dish. and of course what happened was that I discovered a way of making a fantastically rich form of Pudding. The Béchamel takes to chocolate like Mango takes to White chocolate, not something that you'd normally think might work, but if you were paying attention enough you find that they complement each other beautifully. (Trust me the mango-white chocolate thing is another post.) so since I've no doubt whetted your taste buds for the dish I might as well tell you what I did to make it.

First I made my Béchamel, taking equal parts Butter and Flour...at the time I was making a lot, so if you just want enough for you... Say 45 ml of Butter and flour and 1/2 Liter of Milk.

First, Get your wisk close to the pot that you intend to make this in, you'll need it ASAP when I tell you you'll need it and I never recommend searching around for equipment when time is indeed an issue. Take your milk and either heat it up(in a microwave, or slowly inside a pot) to about room temperature or just over. Now to the Roux! Here's what you do, you melt the butter in a pot say over low-medium, and after the butter has been melted you pour your flour into the butter and stir the flour into the butter until both ingredients are completely incorporated with each other, if you need to use your wisk do so. It should look kinda gross and smell like flour and butter, but trust me it's a roux. Just stir it around until it's bubbled for a couple minutes, at that point the flour should be completely cooked through. Now, get your wisk and your milk.

Slowly pour the milk into your roux and wisk CONSTANTLY to combine. You don't want ANY and I do mean ANY lumps in your sauce, though this should not be an issue if you did your job with the roux in the first place. When you combine the two ingredients, raise the heat to medium, you want to see some small bubbling in the dish when you've combined the two ingredients. You should notice that the milk is now nice and thick. TURN DOWN THE HEAT...trust me, burnt milk is bad, burnt Béchamel is a crime against taste.

Chocolate Pudding
Ingredients:
Béchamel
Chocolate: 250 ml-450ml (broken-up chocolate, Chocolate chips, whatever.)
Liquor: 60ml(Orange, Coffee, Hazelnut)(Optional but worth it.)

Take your warm Béchamel, place it over a low heat, just enough to maintain a warm temperature, and mix in the chocolate into the sauce until it melts, if you aren't opposed to making more dishes use a double boiler and melt the chocolate and mix. Now, I suppose you're wondering why I have a variable amount of chocolate for a fairly static recipie. Simple, not all chocolate is make alike, and not all chocolate cravings are easily sated. I have listed the maximum amount you should need and the minimum amount you should need, do some work of your own and find what works...and if I need to tell you how to add 60mls of Liquor to a dish...no comment.

In My Humble Opinion Part 2

While I'm on pasta, Not that long ago I went to a "very good" Italitan restaurant in victoria (not Pagliacci's ) and sampled thier Pomodoro, Garlicly alfredo, and pesto platter...I have subsequently sworn never to return there again.
As a Note:
Pesto should not taste like it was made from dried cillantro, the leaves should be fresh and balanced with cheese, garlic, and nuts.
Pomodoro should be fresh tasting and have little salt because the pasta is usually well seasoned, it should not taste saltier than chugging down a full bottle of soy sauce.
the pesto I can forgive...however anyone who is cooking at a high-end Italian Restaurant who can so badly fuck up a pomodoro that I refuse to eat it deserves to be taken out back and kneecapped with a 12 gauge slugg.
In both knees.

In My Humble Opinion Part 1

If I were to describe perhaps my favorite food I would have to sit down for a few moments and think through it, and about 70% of the time I would likely respond with: Pasta. (In case you're wondering about the other 30% it'd be divided 25%: Pizza and 5%: Flavor of the Moment.)

I can think of no other food that in my experience has proven itself to be so amazingly versatile and varied, and I am not just talking about the shapes of dried pasta, I am also talking about the sauces. These two factors that share such a Chicken-and-the-Egg relationship with each other up to the point where you can have a solid argument with a fellow pasta lover on what shape of pasta combines best with what kind of sauce. Assuming that you can agree on which variety of dough you pick in the first place. Though truth be told each of these ideas are leading somewhere...perhaps a description of my Favorite meal, the one (shamefully or no) that I feed myself when I want my (and I cannot stress this enough) FAVORITE pasta dinner.

Dough
Dough is to Pasta as clay is to pottery, I like this metaphor because of how true it works mechanically. You can't make good pottery without good clay and you can't make good pasta without good dough. Anyone who has made pasta from scratch looking for relatively authentic texture knows that the very specific texture of the pasta comes from Semolina/Durum flour, though you can make homemade pasta without it...it really doesn't compare. But wait a minute! what about the flavored dough!!! Which I have to say are generally more fun and more exciting. When it comes to my personal preference I love the Spinach flavored dough, something about that appetising green colour does it for me every time.

Shape
Shape is married to sauce, they are intentionally designed to complement each other. You've got funny shaped pasta, long pasta, pasta that is meant to go into soup, try cooking lasagna with full pasta sheets and you gain a whole new apreciation for how impressive the stuff is. When it comes to my preference...I like the long pasta, the kind that you can twirl around your fork and eat with gusto and some fun. I usually buy linguine because it's a good midground long pasta that can be used for most kinds of sauces, but for my strong preference...nothing beats fettuccine.

Sauce
Okay, sauce, what can I say here that hasn't already been said...well my title is IMHO. I think that there are only four kinds of sauces: Vegetable based, Stock/gravy Based, Dairy based, and Oil/fat based.
My Rationale: Okay, how can I argue this? easy. the nature of a sauce is that it is a medium for other flavors to become active condiments for the pasta. That means that really you've got limited options for getting your flavor-solids onto your pasta solids. the typical methods use vegetable puré(marinara), Milk or cream(Alfredo), Oils (Pesto), or a stock/gravy (demi-glacé). This isn't to say that you won't find oil in a marinara or meat in your cream sauce, it is however saying that one of the four methods I mentioned is going to be likely....I can't think of another kind of sauce method.
Okay....here's my "shameful" bit normally I just make my sauces from scratch...it's really not that hard, and I find it amazingly relaxing, however when I'm in the mood for my favorite dish I almost always go for Hunt's Tomato Sauce. Call it nostalgia if you wish, but nothing tastes the same.

Toppings
"Duh, pasta doesn't have topings..." Yes, yes it does, what do you think all that "Parmasan" you've been shaking on top of it is? what about the black pepper you grate over the dish? what about that little bit of parsley? Shit! WHAT ABOUT THE MEAT BALLS!?!
Yes, pasta does have toppings, little additions to the dish intended to help contrast of complement the flavors found within the sauce. Usually cheese, sometimes meat, sometimes other vegitables, but the toppings do exist and they shouldn't be ashamed of their toppings status,
Yet for my dish...grated old cheddar and simple meatballs do the job. Nothing fancy.

So my FAVORITE pasta meal...Spinach Fettuccine with tomato sauce, meat balls, and grated cheddar. Nothing terribly fancy, nothing complicated, the kind of thing a kid would like, which is kind of the idea, this meal is nostalgic to me, Every time I eat it I go back to being eight years old, if only for the duration of the meal.

First Official Post, you know, the one where I state the Obvious

Hi, I'm Daniel, If you're reading this you're either one of my friends or you're taking a look around the blog-o-sphere and you've found this.

Welcome to my Passions

I love to eat, about as much as I love to cook, and about as much as I like talking about both of these topics. Why did I create this blog? At the suggestion of my Cousin mostly, the idea of being able to finally write down all these food ideas and philosophies that I extol seems way too tempting to me. What will you get out of this if you keep reading it? Hopefully some ideas on food, or a new recipe that I came up with on the spot, or even some commentary on Love and Life, because my passion for food is meaningless without those two four-lettered words. I have an Opinion about food, I also have an open mind to the many delicious things that are created at the hands of every day people. I enjoy food TV, so I understand the idea of the Michelin rating scale and the fancy chefs that can practically spin gold, but more importantly I understand that some of the best meals can be found for as little as five bucks in some hole in the wall that you'd ignore if someone didn't tell you. I am not about "Finding the Perfect meal", Anthony Bourdain wrote about it beautifully, I am not about "quick beautiful eats that are easy and worth the time and effort" I'd happily praise Jamie Oliver for that, I am about the love of food and the love of eating food, on my own, but preferably with friends. Will I talk about food and my joys of cooking on this first post?
No.

I want to hammer a Quote from one of the United State's best chefs that may just get what I'm all about across.

When you acknowledge as you must, that there is no such thing as perfect food, only the idea of it, then the real purpose of striving towards perfection becomes clear; to make people happy. That's what cooking is all about.
- Thomas Keller