Most of my cooking starts with a single ingredient. I see something unusual or new, buy it, and then find a way to learn a new recipe.

Although I have been stockpiling ingredients (masa harina, corn husks, dried peppers) from trips to the U.S. to make tamales for some time, it was actually the purchase of pasilla peppers from Sobeys Urban Fresh that prompted the tamales finally get made. I’ll admit it, I was intimidated. I have learned how to roll cabbage rolls and make perogies from my Gran before she died, but she’s Ukranian, not Mexican. So I did not know how to roll tamales, and it seemed complicated.

Oh, I had books. Rick Bayless has a multi-page section dedicated to the filling and making of tamales. There are diagrams, tips and descriptive paragraphs, but it just wasn’t the same. Luckily, Youtube came to the rescue with a visual guide on what to do.

Zarela runs a restaurant, and has a series of videos up on Youtube on Mexican cooking. She also had an easy going attitude, and was knowledgeable. In four minutes with her help, I was rolling tamales.

I made the masa dough for a filling and stuffed the tamales full of roasted pasilla peppers, adobe tomato salsa and Monterey Jack cheese. I made a few vegan tamales by making the masa dough with vegetable shortening instead of pork and omitting the cheese.

And you know what? Just like perogies and cabbage rolls, tamales aren’t that hard to do.

First you must acquire corn husks, and soak them so they are pliable. I used the hole filled ones to tear into strips to tie the tamales with. This isn’t a necessary step, but it’s a pretty one.

Bob’s Red Mill masa harina from a Whole Foods in Minneapolis. I would have bought a bigger package, but my luggage was already grossly obese.

I cannot find masa harina in Edmonton. I’m hoping the latin markets will have it, I just haven’t had time to look yet. It’s easier to do my grocery shopping while on holiday, apparently. Safeway, Save-On and Planet Organic all carry a wide assortment of Bob’s Red Mill products, just not this.

What gives?

Masa harina is a corn flour, mixed with lime. It’s used to make a variety of things, including tamales and tortillas.

The masa dough being stirred. You need strong arms and a wooden spoon if you don’t have a mixer. Luckily I’ve been making cookie dough for years, so I can handle my spoons.

Peeling the roasted pasilla peppers. I broiled them in the oven on all four sides, tossed them in a bag for a bit and then peeled, cored and seeded them.

After making an adobo tomato salsa, and cubing the cheese, I rolled. It’s really easy.

Tied with strips of corn husk. Not as easy. I had to redo a few, and some popped on me.

The tamales were steamed for about an hour. The dough gets fluffy, and the smell of corn is wonderful.

A bit moist, still, but I think I had a good dough to filling ratio.

If it seems like I’m proud, it is because I am. The key thing is to have the ingredients. The rest is easy.

Vegan Masa filling for tamales

• 1/2 cup of vegetable shortening
• 2 cups masa harina
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup vegetable stock, plus 1/4 cup of water
• 1 teaspoon baking powder

Beat the shortening in a bowl with a whisk until fluffy. In another bowl, mix the masa harina and salt. Combine stock and water. Mix the masa and liquid into the shortening, alternating, until the dough stiffens. Mix in the baking powder. This makes enough for about 15 mid sized tamales.

I made mine sort of chile rellenos tamales, with peppers and cheese. You can use any variety of ingredients however, and make them any size.

ham + cheese baguette

It’s no secret that I enjoy the bread Cobs makes. For a chain, they make damned fine bread products. Their pane di casa italian rolls are crispy, light and airy with a hint of chew, and I’m a fan of the new Turkish rolls, with the same consistency of the pane di casa, but a generous smothering of olive oil and seasonings on top.

When I visited the other morning, one of the bakers came barreling out of the back. “Behind!” he shouted to the front clerk, before loading a wire rack laden with French baguettes into the display. He then rang a cowbell hanging above, and yelled “FRENCH BAGGGGUUUETTES!” while the other bakers cheered in the back. Turns out the French baguette is a brand new item at Cobs. It was amazing and it immediately brought me back to the first time my Mom brought my brother and I to continental Europe in the early 1990s.

We were living in England at the time, and caught the ferry over to Bruges, in Belgium for a day trip. The food had a huge influence on me, and I still remember every meal we ate that day. There was a serving of spaghetti bolognese that could have sunk a ship (and indeed sunk me, I was ill after overeating it) and the crispiest most delicious pizza ever eaten at an outdoor cafe on the main square of the town. But the best was a last minute picnic of fresh baguettes and some cheese and meats we found at a small market. God, was it ever delicious.

After I finished day dreaming, I naturally had to get a baguette and desired to fill it with ham and cheese. I swung by the Italian Center and loaded up on meats and cheeses. I wasn’t home two minutes when I was tearing into the meats, cutting cheddar and assembling a delicious rosemary ham and cheese baguette. So simple, so delicious.

note: this originally appeared on my personal blog on may 10 2009.

Mike’s sister Kim has been away for nearly a year, WWOOFing (Willing Workers on Organic Farms; you work on a farm, in return for room and board) in Hawaii, New Zealand and Australia. Shortly before she left, she made the plunge and took on the vegan lifestyle. To welcome her home, Mike made a huge vegan spread, and I made a vegan cake.

Predictably, there were a lot of lentils. Lots. The dishes were mostly Indian, except for two lentil dishes which were Ethiopian. Dishes included brown mustard seed cauliflower, okra curry, kik alicha and a variation on misir wot. To accompany, fresh roti.

Okra is SO delicious! We used fresh, but if you find it hard to get, frozen is okay.

Mmmm, fresh roti.

I bought some rhubarb stalks last week, maybe thinking I would make rhubarb strawberry muffins. Instead, I used the stalks in a vegan rhubarb coffee cake. It was my first time baking anything vegan, and I can say a few things put me off, as they weren’t my normal mode of baking. Vegan baking obviously doesn’t allow use of animal fats, so butter, milk and eggs are out. Instead, recipes tend to use things like applesauce and oil in place of animal fats. Pouring a whole cup of oil into the cake batter kind of turned my stomach, even though it’s really no different than butter.

The cake took a LONG time to bake. The recipe said an hour, but I think my choice of pan made leaving the cake in for nearly two hours necessary. When I popped it out of the pan, it looked…gelatinous and underdone. The middle started to collapse (again, possibly from pan choice or from all my cake testing during the baking) and it turned out to be more of a rhubarb crumble instead of cake.

I used safflower oil, so the oil choice was a bit healthier than a regular canola oil. The addition of flax seeds helped add texture and nutrition. The cake was pretty delicious, and far exceeded my expectations.

Very rhubarb-y filling!

Upside down view shows kind of a weird bottom, which was very moist and almost gelatinous. Baking it in a different pan would have helped avoid that, I think.

Vegan Rhubarb Crumble / Coffeecake

Adapted from KimmyKokonut.

Crumb topping

• 1/4 cup flour
• 3 tablespoons brown sugar
• 1/4 tsp cardamom
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon
• 1 tablespoon safflower (or canola) oil

Cake ingredients

• 1 tablespoon flax seeds, ground
• 3 tablespoon water

• 3 tablespoons applesauce (I bought a jar of organic baby food applesauce since I needed so little)
• 2 cups granulated sugar
• 2 tablespoons molasses
• 1 cup safflower (or canola) oil
• 4 cups rhubarb stems, medium dice
• 2 1/2 cups flour
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp cardamom

Method

1. Preheat oven to 300 degrees F and get out your 9×13″ pan or 2 loaf pans.
2. Grind flax seeds, and whisk with water and set aside.
3. Make crumb topping: Mix flour, sugar and spices in a small bowl and mix together (whisk, fork, fingers) while drizzling oil in. Once it becomes crumb-y, set it aside. You may need to add more/less oil.
4. In a medium bowl, mix together applesauce, sugar, molasses, oil and flax & water mix.
5. In a separate, larger, bowl, mix together flour, salt, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon and cardamom.
6. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ones and mix until JUST combined.
7. Fold in rhubarb and pour into pan(s). Top with crumbs.
8. Bake for one hour or until a knife inserted comes out clean. (I had to bake mine for nearly 2 hours)
9. Cool on a wire rack. This would be great with soy ice cream.

It must be avocado season, because I noticed that both Safeway and Costco had bumper crops this week, priced quite reasonably.

I grabbed a few that were soft to the touch (patience is a virtue, but not one of mine. I like my avocados ripe) and whipped up some guacamole to snack on.

My recipe is pretty simple, and quite close to Mexican cuisine God Rick Bayless’ “Simple Guacamole” Basically: be a confident cook, have good avocados and good tortilla chips.

The fixin’s for good guac

Crazy White Girl Guacamole

• 2 medium avocados (if they are not soft, stuff them in a paper bag with bananas for a day or two)
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1/2 to a whole jalapeno pepper, minced
• 1/2 red onion, diced finely
• juice of 1/2 a lime
• 1/2 cup grape tomatoes, halved
• handful of cilantro, coarsely chopped
• salt and pepper to taste

Cut avocados in half, circling around the stone. Jab tip of knife into stone and twist to pop out. Cube avocado in it’s skin, then pop out into a bowl. Coarsely mash with a fork, pouring lime juice on top. Add all other ingredients, mixing. Season to taste.

Easy, right? Basically, just know your tastes in guacamole. I sometimes add more lime or jalapeno. Occasionally, in goes green onion or radish, sometimes a bit of cumin. I usually do it chunky-style.

It is best to eat it all as soon as possible, as the avocado oxidizes quickly, even with the help of the lime acidity. Covering with Saran Wrap, pressing down into the guac and storing in an air tight container will help contain the browning. Also, it’s not bad for you, it just don’t look pretty. Spread it on a sandwich or something if it bothers you.

Mike and I devoured our snack with some Que Pasa brand organic corn chips. They are low in salt, so I find them easier to eat; the corners of my mouth don’t hurt as much after eating. I bought these at Costco, but you can also buy them at Sobeys Urban Fresh. Sooooo goooood.

note: this post originally appeared on my personal blog on may 3 2008.

I have been thinking about and craving udon or soba noodles the past few days. I had never really been that big into noodles until we visited Tokyo and I really got turned onto them there. Unfortunately I’ve been working a lot this week so I didn’t have time to go out and find a good bowl of udon (I pray there is a place in Edmonton that does them) and I didn’t have time to visit any speciality asian grocers, like T&T or this Japanese and Korean food mart on 99th Street.

I decided to make my own noodle soup at home, just visiting Safeway and Save On Foods, which are pretty run of the mill food stores, but I know I saw fresh noodles at both, so I was probably okay.

I got a recipe off of Epicurious [Soba with shiitake, pea shoots and leek dipping sauce], but edited it heavily. I had to pick up a good soy sauce and rice wine vinegar, and was worried…however Save On had a great selection and I ended up getting a good organic naturally fermented, low sodium, high flavour tamari soy. I’d recommend it, but will probably try other brands as well. Tamari is not a brand by the way, it’s a variety of soy. It’s a bit richer than shiro or other soys like the ‘basic’ koikuchi, and is even gluten free, for those of you on restricted diets. Both bottles were about $4 each, which was far less than I was prepared to pay, I have to say.

We had sesame oil. I think my favorite was the back that declared it THE KING OF ALL VEGETABLE OILS. Last I checked sesame wasn’t a veggie, but whatever. It did a great job adding flavour to my sauce and sauteed vegetables.

Anyhow, my recipe ended up being something like this:

Udon Noodles with dipping sauce

• 1/3 cup soy sauce
• 1/3 cup rice wine vinegar (I would probably add less next time)
• 1/3 cup water
• splash of sesame seed oil
• sliced garlic and ginger (to taste)
• sliced leeks, mushrooms (I used oyster, but shiitakes would be great), julienned carrots. These are for sauteeing with sesame oil
• sliced garlic, ginger, green onions, radish (or daikon), watercress (substitution for pea shoots) all for adding uncooked to the broth
• packs of fresh noodles, udon preferred

I brought the soy and rice vinegar to a boil, then simmered it with the garlic, ginger, sesame oil and water for no particular length of time. I kept it hot until serving, but in the summer months it’s perfectly acceptable to eat the broth cold. Soba are served with cold broth in the summer and hot in the winter in Japan.

Meanwhile, I sauteed and softened the vegetables, seasoning well. A large pot of water was boiling for the noodles, which cook for about three minutes, or according to the package.

When everything is ready, put some vegetables in a bowl, add some broth, then add your fresh ingredients to top it off with. Serve the noodles on the side and dip into the sauce/broth; this is a very easy and inexpensive meal!

My ‘hot’ vegetables. LOTS of leek for flavour.

Some of the fresh ingredients. I sauteed some carrots but also served some raw. The uncooked vegetables and condiments add some crunch to the broth.

Oh god, the noodles! I ended up buying three different kinds, mostly because of the lack of selection. There were some fresh Shanghai noodles in the produce section and in the Asian foods, two packs of these brainy looking udon noodles. One pack was $0.88 and the other $1.20, because it came with curry sauce which I did not use.

I decided to cook the noodles separately so Mike and I could see which ones we liked best, so it turned out well, but it was kind of of a harried run around the store looking for noodles, which I assumed would be in stock and easy to find. I can’t wait to visit a store where they will actually sell other kinds including actual soba.

They came out of the pack like a solid brick and kind of creeped me out. Just put them in the boiling water without breaking them up, they will be easier to eat.

This was the last pack of plain udons at the store. I couldn’t help but think about how bad prepacked ramen noodles are here from grocery stores, but these were pretty good. Unless I’m just in denial.

I love that in French they appear to be “U-Dong” noodles.

Here is the finished set up (minus a bowl of noodles which were not ready yet). Dip the noodles into the broth and slurp them up, as is expected at Japanese restaurants. The chopsticks were actually a wedding favour for my friend Dan and Roz’s wedding and Mike was super excited to use them, he’d been waiting a while for the right moment.

Although I’ve thought about making sushi at home for a while, I’m not sure I’m ready. These udon noodles though…they’ll be added to my “oh god, what am I going to eat tonight” roster. So easy, and highly variable depending on what is fresh at the store or market!