We were delighted to host a potluck in conjunction with Sobey’s Potluck Challenge.  When we invite this particular group of friends over, I am not sure who is the most excited: the parents because they get a breather from their kids (we take the kids off their hands for the evening) or the kids who are anxious to see each other and head down to our play area in the family room.

But we always start the evening off with a family dinner.  The contributions to our “Tastes from Home” potluck were homemade chicken noodle soup, green bean casserole (a classic modified to be made without cream of mushroom soup) to accompany the macaroni and cheese that I had prepared,

a make-it-yourself spinach salad and watermelon and brownies for dessert.  The hit in the dining room where D, myself and Sister #3 were supervising the little ones was the chicken noodle soup.  The noodles were lovely and fine and the broth had a hint of what we guessed was fennel in it.  We couldn’t confirm because the home cook that contributed it had to attend another event, but she sent a stock pot full of soup over with her husband and girls. We grown ups in the room loved the green beans and the spinach salad.

My contribution of Mac and Cheese was modified from an old family favourite.  We have been preparing Best of Bridge’s Gourmet Macaroni and Cheese for years.  But recently, we had been saving the dish for special occasions because it was anything but low fat and low calorie.  I performed a test run of the recipe for Daughter #2’s birthday dinner.  When the original recipe and my version were tasted side by side, no one could tell the difference.

The moist, dense brownies for dessert were perfection.  One bite could truly satisfy a chocolate yearning.

Now, who wouldn’t want to cook for these adorable kids? They are well mannered, taste everything and have sophisticated palettes for children their age. This is, I am quite sure, because of the example and encouragement of their parents.  All the parents in our circle, simply place wholesome, home prepared foods in front of their families and let the kids take it from there. Soon there will be another little guy around the table, as they have a brand new baby brother!

In the foreground are three sisters.  They all help their parents in the kitchen and one of their favourite pastimes is flipping through pages of cookbooks.  I kid you not.  When we were invited there for dinner recently, all three of them were on the floor by the cookbook shelf in the kitchen, oohing and awing over various recipe photos, sharing them with each other and then requesting of their Mom that they make the most popular items.

The Wee One (our Granddaughter) is also a part of this group.  This weekend she tried grilled eggplant for the first time!

After our successful potluck, the kids donned t-shirts which served as painting smocks and made painted terra-cotta pots for their Moms for Mother’s Day.  These children are truly blessed with amazing Moms who know that time invested in the nurturing of these little ones is their most important work.

So as far as a Food Revolution is concerned, the need is not great amongst our particular circle.  But please do not misunderstand me; we know that we are a privileged group.  We have the luxury of time and can afford a variety of wholesome ingredients to prepare for our families.  Such is not the case the world over and indeed not even throughout our own neighbourhoods and communities.  We try not to take our blessings for granted and know that our responsibility is to share our knowledge with other families by example, with hospitality and with contributions of money and time to organizations that help feed families nutritious food.

I applaud Jamie Oliver and his efforts through Food Revolution Day-a global day of action celebrating the importance of cooking good food and inspiring in children a love of healthy food that will last a lifetime.  Sobeys wanted all Canadians to get involved and show off their cooking skills and that is why they created the national potluck challenge.  I encourage you to host your own potluck but also to tweet and/or post to Instagram about your potluck event with the #PotluckChallenge hashtag.  Sobeys will be donating $1 to the Cooking Towards Independence Project-a joint initiative between Sobeys and the Children’s Aid Foundation that will set up cooking workshops with children across Canada.

Kath’s quote: “As soon as I was old enough to peer over the worktops, I remember being fascinated by what went on in the kitchen. It just
seemed such a cool place, everyone working together to make this lovely stuff and having a laugh doing it.”-Jamie Oliver

Love-that is all.

Even though I am not partial to sweets, I love anything baked with apples: apple pie, apple crisp, apple jacks (perhaps these are a Winnipeg thing), apple platz (definitely a Winnipeg thing) and apple strudel.  After years of being timid about working with phyllo pastry, I had to step up to the plate when a food styling gig that I was contracted for, demanded that I make my first fruit strudel.  What did I discover?  Working phyllo is a piece of cake.

I had some phyllo dough in the freezer and decided that a vegetable strudel would make not only a perfect dinner that evening but that left overs would be handy for lunch.  I love spanakopita (a Greek pastry filled with spinach and feta), so I worked up a recipe that would spring off of it.

Kath’s quote: “You may feel that you have eaten too much…But this pastry is like feathers – it is like snow. It is in fact good for you, a digestive!”
-M.F.K. Fisher

Love-that is all.

I read this book many years ago, almost all in one sitting.  D and I had driven up to our beach house for one last fall weekend and to celebrate our wedding anniversary.  We have a lovely time on this annual weekend, walking the beach, lying on the deck and watching the stars and cooking up delectable little treats to eat.  But it is also the first Sunday in the NFL Season and D is often anxious to make his way over to the “big cottage” that is equipped with satellite TV.  In the mean while, I will make a cup of tea and cozy up on the deck or if the weather is still really fair, down to the beach for an afternoon read.

Tom Stone lived in Greece for twenty-two years and one summer, was partner and cook of a tavern which catered to the fishermen of the area in the mornings, locals at lunch and tourists in the evening and sometime early into the morning.

Here is an excerpt from the chapter entitled “The Main Course”, with the sub-head of “First Lessons” about the weekend before the Taverna opens for business (page 104-105):

That Saturday morning, I unpacked the rest of my things and began making space for myself in the kitchen.

It was, of course, infinitely smaller than the one I had remembered when I was indulging in my fantasies back in Rethymnon.  Barely large enough to accommodate tiny Demetra and myself, much less Memis and the boys, every available space in it seemed to be utilized twice over.  The walls were lined with shelves, cupboards, plates, glasses, flour, pastas, herbs, matches, old lottery tickets, nails, string, and, among other useless items, a broken telephone.  In the center stood a large working table, and another, smaller table was in a nook leading to the glass-fronted display units.  Along the back wall crouched a huge, blackened electric stove with four hot plates on top.  Next to it was a gas-operated three-burner range.

To the left of the stove, also along the back wall, were two stained, stainless steel sinks and a draining board, and leading off that to the rear, a long, narrow space that Theologos had recently added on in one of his attempts at improvement.  It was a bedroom, dressing and storage room, with two narrow cots that were used both for quick naps and for the boys to sleep at night.  A narrow passageway running behind the walk in refrigerator linked it to the taverna’s single toilet, also accessible from the dining area, and barely larger than those you find on airplanes.  In an alcove was a wash basin and a door that led to the outside storage area, mainly used for empty creates and bottles and for washing and peeling vegetables.

I staked a claim to the small table between the kitchen area and the refrigerated display units and set up my food processor and work area there.  Since Memis was apparently also going to help (at no extra cost, it seemed) and had clearly fallen for one potato cutter, I left him to find a space for it.

One of the features of this and many of my favourite stories of living in a foreign place, are the appendices of recipes in the back of the book:

I was going to fashion these around a skewer to grill but the weather turned cold, so I didn’t want D to have to fire up the barbeque.  There were moist and delicious and reminded me of my own time in Greece.

Kath’s quote: Diogenes, the ancient Greek philosopher, once advised a young courtier, “If you lived on cabbage, you would not be obliged to flatter the powerful.” To which the courtier replied, “If you flattered the powerful, you would not be obliged to live upon cabbage.” – Diogenes

Love-that is all.

In the olden days when I was a young Mom, I had a couple of go-to recipe books where many of our family’s meals originated.  The Best of Bridge was one resource and the Company’s Coming cookbooks another.  But the most family meals likely came from The Campbell Soup Cookbook.  With a few simple ingredients, a can of cream soup (it didn’t much matter whether it was cream of chicken, cream of mushroom or cream of celery) could be transformed into supper.

Fast forward to present day where I try to cook as “clean” as possible, avoiding processed foods, “white” ingredients, reducing fat and increasing fibre.  BUT, my family still have favourite dishes that they love the taste and memories of.  This week our youngest was writing her last major paper of her winter semester at university.  On the day that she successfully sent it off,  I asked her what she would like me to make for dinner to celebrate her hard work.  The answer: Chicken Enchiladas and I knew that I better not muck around with the recipe too much because this particular offspring is a stickler for tradition and authenticity.  So I had to be sneaky about it.  I prefer to refer to my tactics as “clever”.

The original recipe is pretty basic: cook up fresh or left over chicken with diced onion and chili powder.  In the mean time, mix a can of cream soup with equal parts of sour cream.  Add a couple of dollops of this mixture to the chicken.  Place the chicken mixture in a line across the edge of a flour tortilla.  Roll up, place in a pan and spread with the sour cream mixture.  Cover with foil and bake until the centre of the middle wrap is heated through and add grated cheese over top.

I modified the recipe by mixing up a batch of the soup substitute:

The consistency was different, the substitute version in foreground.

The two versions looked identical when added to the chicken and heated.

The difference in consistency was evident before they were placed into the oven.

Both versions side by side and you couldn’t tell the difference (even to the discerning taste buds of Daughter #2).

Lucky for us, J1, J2 and the Wee One arrived at our door right at supper time so we had another expert judge at the table and at our house at dinner time, it is always to more, the merrier.

Kath’s quote: “Serve this dish with much too much wine for your guests, along with some cooked green vegetables and a huge salad. You will be famous in about half an hour.” -Jeff Smith (The Frugal Gourmet)

Love-that is all.

Sister #3 missed out on our family Thanksgiving dinner.  She helps D and I take care of the kids when we host our Young Families’ group.  I had abundant left overs and instead of getting tired of them during the days following the Thanksgiving, I repanned everything and put it all in the freezer to feed another large group.  There are approximately 20 of us in the Young Families Group including toddlers and babies, so this seemed like a good time.  I decided that a baked ham would do the trick to adequately feed everybody and that the ham would pair well with my leftovers of sweet potatoes, caramelized onions and roasted garlic potatoes and baked squash and quinoa.  The supper was a success, but then I was left with a new challenge-what to do with the leftover ham?

I dug out an old recipe that I know that my family loves but was amazed at how much fat it contained.  By the time I had finished modifying it, I had written an entirely new recipe.

The recipe indicates using three different potatoes but this is only because I had three varieties in my fridge.  We have loved all the assortment of potatoes in our garden share basket this season.  I used the array of pink and blue (looked more like dark purple to me) ones for this dish.  I would recommend though that at least one variety be a sweet potato because they have different nutrient values that regular potatoes.  In addition, the combination of the sweetness of the sweet potato and the saltiness of the ham, is one of my favourite taste combinations.  Add the tartness from the sour cream and the sharpness of the old cheddar cheese and we are really onto something here….

Since I was using more than one kind of potato, I had a hard time judging how many pounds I was using.  D eyeballed it at five pounds but I thought closer to ten, so I doubled the “moisture” , that is sour cream and cream soup.

Under normal circumstances, I would have put the second casserole in the freezer but I love to send our kids home with leftovers after mandatory Sunday suppers, so I did so and now we have enough left for supper tonight!

Kath’s quote: “The most remarkable thing about my mother is that for 30 years she served the family nothing but leftovers. The original meal has never been found.” –Calvin Trillin

Love-that is all.