The Frenchman and Daughter #2 made up the team that drew the side dishes.  They decided to work independently on two separate little plates.

Both dishes included Le Grand Garden pesto.  D #2 assembled a silky cream of potato and butter nut squash soup.  She creatively initialed each bowl for every member of the family.

The Frenchman opted to use the same gorgeous green Garden pesto and blended it with chopped poached shrimp and feta and stuffed it into a mushroom cap.  Parmesan shards were melted on top.  He also grilled marinated artichokes to accompany the caps.

Both members of this team are very proficient in the kitchen and very confident in their skills.  This can create high drama just like the reality shows that we were recreating.

The third team made up of the Son and his wife (J1 & J2) drew the entree and the Le Grand Sundried Tomato pesto.  They worked somewhat independently as well but more harmoniously (they’ve known each other since they were 12, after all).

J2 fired up the barbie and stood in the snow flipping her grilled zucchini and eggplant disks.  She crumbled feta upon the circles when they had finished grilling.  She then stacked them Inukshuk style to accompany the chicken.

J1took a family favourite and modified it to incorporate the “hero” product.  First he pasted the inside of the breast with the bright, colourful and tasty pesto, then added cheese and fresh spinach that J2 had steamed for him.  After the ingredients were sealed inside he bathed it in a mixture of Dijon mustard and white wine.  This provided adherence for fresh bread crumb coating.  While these were baking, they created a spicy cream sauce from the pesto that was kicked up with some chili powder and tabasco.

Once the chicken was cooked and sliced, smudges of the sauce were placed atop in addition to dollops which graced the plate.  J1 loves hot sauces while he is aware that others in the family prefer more subtle tastes.

Before the end of the evening, we were declaring that we would all be anxious to purchase the Le Grand pestos on a regular basis because of the ease of handling, gorgeous bright colours and startlingly fresh tastes.    We also knew that these family cooking challenges would be a regular occurrence perhaps even involving extended family up at the cottage.

As I provided the live tweets and was the videographer and photographer, I did not do any of the cooking.  The rule in our family therefore, is that I did the dishes.  This was accomplished in two dishwasher loads that evening as well as (I’m guessing) 4 sink fulls of pots.  Hmm, next time, which cooking team, shall I try to get on?

Kath’s quote: “Life is too short to stuff a mushroom.”-Shirley Conran

The stage was set.  Teams were formed, courses were drawn, the three Le Grand Pestos were revealed as the secret ingredients, and oh yea, the wine was poured.

D had made a bread dough in the afternoon to bake a loaf to have with supper.  But when he and Daughter #1 picked the appetizer course, they quickly modified their plans to use the dough for pizza.

We were calling it pizza because they used our round pizza screens to bake it but it really tasted more like a flatbread.  No matter how you describe it-call it absolutely delicious.

The team made a couple of very strategic decisions.  At one time, they were contemplating the inclusion of corn meal crusted back bacon but decided instead to make the flatbread a true vegetarian recipe.

They started with huge smears of the gorgeous green pesto and then began layering on the roasted vegetables: yellow and red peppers, eggplant, mushrooms and butternut squash.

They went very easy on the cheese so that the complex and varied tastes of the roasted vegetables would shine through.  There was mozzarella, Parmesan and a light sprinkling of Bothwell’s red wine and sharp cheddar as well.

In addition, in order to offset the nuttiness of the pesto, they included roasted pine nuts to add some crunch.

The resulting appetizer course could have been our entire meal, but we kept warning each other to stop eating so we would have room for the other dishes that were still ahead.

I was looking for a flat bread quotation, when I came across this one regarding flatulence (with apologies to my vegetarian readers and friends).  Kath’s quote: “Vegetarianism is harmless enough, though it is apt to fill a man with wind and self-righteousness.”-Sir Robert Hutchinson

One might think that when you are requested to “bring something along to share during the game”, you would pick up a bag of chips or whip up some nachos.  But oh no, the guys at our house spent the afternoon making kabobs and beef sliders (more on that dish tomorrow). 

I could hear D rustling around in the freezer downstairs but was still suprized when I saw six gorgeous New York steaks thawing in the sink.  At one time D was the Food Manager at the Garry St. Keg Steakhouse and Bar, so the recipe for teriyaki sauce which was made from scratch, once a week, was firmly ingrained in his brain.  So too was the memory of the aroma of garlic, ginger and soya sauce which greeted me at the door when I returned from brunch out with my Mom and sisters.

The sauce was put together early in the afternoon so that the steaks could marinate for a couple of hours.  This ensures not only great flavour but that desired tenderness.  In truth, when you are using a steak cut like a New York, the tenderness is pretty much guaranteed.

In D’s Keg days, the meat morsels would have been skewed with white onion and green pepper but D added red and orange peppers, purple onion and huge cubes of fresh pineapple for good measure.

D fired up the barbie and got out his “good” tongs to turn them over the flame before they left for the game.  I enjoyed mine with a quiet glass of Merlot as I watched the Superbowl solo and got caught up on some writing.  The sweetness of the pineapple and the brown sugar of the marinade was the perfect offset to the saltiness of the soya sauce and the tartness of the veggies.  The beef itself was perfectly cooked-medium rare inside with a crispness on the surface where the natural sugars had met the flame.

I don’t know if it was these skewers that boosted our son’s energy and enthusiasm, when he ran down the middle of his quiet street in celebration when his Giants won!

For less expensive beef cuts that are perfect for marinating, check out www.beefinfo.org.  I am dreaming of a food bloggers scholarship to Eat, Write, Retreat www.eatwriteretreat.com as I write this…

Kath’s quote: “Beef is the soul of cooking.”Marie-Antoine Carême (1784-1833)

I was searching for recipes to fix for Sunday’s Grey Cup Game and my own blog entry came up!  I wrote this when the Olympics were on and we were all eating suppers in front of the TV.  I recommend making some crunchy bread from scratch for the dipping.

Pizza Fondu

This is a very simple and delicious comfort food to enjoy while watching a movie.  Serve with a side salad and a nice bottle of red wine.  Totally to die for.

 1 lb. Lean ground beef and/or Italian sausage

1 small onion

10 oz cheddar cheese (shredded/cubed)

1 ½ tsp garlic powder

1 tsp. oregano

1 ½ tsp fennel seed or Italian seasoning

Fresh cracked pepper

20 oz can of Meat or Spaghetti sauce

10 oz. mozzarella cheese (shredded/grated)

1 French baguette cut into 1” bite-size pieces.

Sauté the beef/sausage and onion until cooked and drain.  Now transfer to an electric fondue pot.  Add all seasonings, cheddar and sauce and stir well.  Turn onto medium to heat everything up and melt the cheddar cheese.  Once it’s all nicely warm and blended, add the mozza cheese and continue stirring occasionally until all bubbly and melty.  Stick your bread cubes onto fondue fork, dip, twirl and enjoy.

Kath’s quote:  “Do not move back and forth on your chair. Doing so gives the impression of constantly breaking, or trying to break, wind.”-Desiderius Erasmus (1466? – 1536)

Thanks again Wal.

I am fascinated by the variety of pizzas in the world.  Indeed, referring to pizza is like referring to a sandwich.  I suppose the variations are endless.  Here’s an excerpt from my favourite food read from over the summer:  “Keeping the Feast” by Paula Butturini.

She writes: “And every Easter Sunday, a totally different sort of pizza, one meant to break the long Lenten fast, appeared on our breakfast table.  It had a double crust like a calzone, but it was flatter and wider, shaped like a foot-long strudel.  My grandmother called it “pizza gain”, and Anglicized version of pizza chine (KEE-nah), which in itself is dialect for pizza ripena, filled pizza.  “Pizza gain” was stuffed with many of the foods that we could not eat during the forty-day Lenten fast: proscuitto crudo, dried sausage slices, fresh runny cheese, and hard grated cheese all mixed together with endless fresh eggs from cousin Josephine’s farm.  We would cut into them on Easter morning and on every subsequent morning until they were gone, a treat so rich that two slim slices would make a meal.  I loved the Russell Stover’s pecan-studded caramel egg that my grandmother arranged to have appear in my Easter basket every year, but I would have traded that egg away in a heartbeat for a whole “pizza gain” of my own.”

We are fond of a pizza variety that doesn’t really taste like pizza at all.  I call it Pizza Bianca because it is made with entirely white ingredients:  Alfredo sauce, chicken, roasted garlic, grated mozzarella and crumbled feta cheese.  I assemble these things on top of a homemade pizza crust, not really caring how thinly I’ve rolled out the dough. 

It makes a great “stand around in the kitchen while eating your supper” dish.  I made it this past weekend when we called upon the Daughter #3 (daughter-in-law)’s folks to help with a painting project at the new house.  In fact, they virtually handled the entire project by themsleves.  As my dear Dad used to say “many hands make light work”.

Kath’s quote: “My idea of feng shui is to have them arrange the pepperoni in a circle on my pizza.”-Unknown