Curry Bowtie Pasta Salad

This pasta salad is a PARTY PLEASER!!!!!!!!!!  It is also aesthetically pleasing.  Hahaha, sounds like I am tooting my own horn, but it is true.  Facts are facts, what can I say?  This recipe is adapted from allrecipes.com, and when I say "adapted," I really mean it.  It is supposed to be a chicken salad, with the primary ingredient being chicken (obviously), but I changed it into a pasta salad. 

1 package of bowtie pasta, cooked
4 sprigs of green onion, chopped finely
2 apples, diced
1/2 cup raisins
1 to 2 cans of mandarin oranges or pineapple, drained
1/2 cup pecans pieces or sliced almonds, toasted
1/2 cup shredded coconut, toasted
3/4 cup plain yogurt
1/4 cup mayonnaise
3 tbsp curry powder
pepper to taste

Directions:  THROW EVERYTHING IN A BOWL AND STIR!!!!!!!  (Not sure why I felt the need to write that in capslock, but perhaps it was to emphasize the ease and fun of the recipe). 

Amendment:  You will probably actually want to withhold the coconut and sprinkle on top.

NINJA Rice Bowl from Fresh Restaurant

How could you not love the sound of this one!  However, please be warned - this recipe takes an extremely long time to make and may leave you feeling very fatigued.  It also takes a lot of patience and ambition.  It is adapted from the new re-Fresh cookbook by Ruth Tal and Jennifer Houston.

Ninja Rice Bowl

Ingredients

16 Marinated Tofu Cubes (see recipe below)

1 batch Crispy Tofu Coating (see recipe below)

3 tbsp. olive oil

2 cups cooked brown basmati rice

1 1/2 cups Wasabi Dill Dressing (see recipe below)

8 cups mixed lettuce greens

6 marinated sundried tomatoes (see recipe below)

1 cup sprouts

Method

1. Toss Marinated Tofu Cubes in Crispy Tofu Coating. Heat olive oil in pan over medium heat, add tofu cubes and cook until browned on all sides.

2. Put 1 cup cooked brown basmati rice in large rice bowl and drizzle with a portion of Wasabi Dill Dressing.

3. Toss lettuce with Wasabi Dill Dressing and pile on top of rice.

4. Arrange marinated sundried tomatoes on top of lettuce.

5. Make a little nest with the sprouts in the centre and put Crispy Tofu cubes in the nest.

6. Repeat for each serving.

Marinated Tofu Cubes

Ingredients

3 1/2 cups tofu

1/2 cup apple cider vinegar

3/4 cup soy sauce

1/4 cup water

1 1/2 tbsp. oil

Method

1. Cut the tofu into medium-sized cubes.

2. Combine the remaining ingredients in a bowl; then pour over the tofu cubes. Marinate for 1 hour.

Crispy Tofu Coating

Ingredients

1 cup flour

1/2 cup wheat germ

1 tbsp. garlic powder

salt & pepper

Method

Combine all the ingredients in a large bowl and mix well.

Wasabi Dill Dressing

Ingredients

1/4 cup olive oil

1 diced onion

3 cloves garlic, minced

1 tbsp. wasabi powder

6 tbsp. water

2 cups firm tofu, chopped

1 tsp. Dijon mustard

1 tbsp. dried dill weed

1/4 cup rice vinegar

Method

1. Sauté onion and garlic five minutes or until softened. Let cool.

2. Put wasabi and 2 tablespoons water into the blender and blend.

3. Add remaining ingredients and 2 tablespoons of water. Blend until smooth. Add remaining water if needed to get to a pourable consistency.

Marinated Sundried Tomato Paste

Ingredients

1 cup water

1 cup sundried tomatoes

1 cup olive oil

2 tbsp. Mixed Dry Herbs

Method

1. Bring water to a boil in a saucepan. Remove from heat and add the sundried tomatoes. Let sit for 5 minutes or until softened. Strain.

2. In a bowl, mix the olive oil and herbs together. Stir in the sundried tomatoes.

3. Purée in a blender or food processor. 

I made the mistake of using 1/2 cup more olive oil in the wasabi dressing by accident.  Ooops.  A ridiculously big mistake I do realize, but it wasn't a big disaster.  Just consumed a bit more oil than I perhaps would have liked.  And by "a bit," I mean "a lot."  C'est la vie!

Veggie Box

This is my veggie box from Organics Delivered 2 You.  I got 4 Groupons for 4 veggie boxes and so far have only used one.  I am saving the other 3 for the summer when berries and other delicious summer produce are available!  Unfortunately the company messed up my friend's order, so I am not actually sure how good this company is.  I know that their customer service is not good though, so be warned.  Besides that, I am very pleased with the amount of food that came in this box.  This is a bit of a boring post, and coincidentally I am feeling pretty bored...not sure if there is a relationship there.  Anyways, hopefully the colourful picture will make up for that.

Here is a picture of a soup I made by throwing all of the leftover veggies into some broth.  Unfortunately, I actually literally threw things in and did not bother doing things such as taking off the stringy bits of the snowpeas which made for an interesting time when trying to eat the soup.  Oh well, what can you do.  I did throw in some curry powder which was a nice change.

 

Baked French Toast Recipe

Another breakfast recipe!  I typically prefer warm breakfasts during the winter, but don't usually have time to make something in the morning.  Hence, this is a nice recipe to make on a Sunday night and eat it for the first couple of days during the week.  This recipe is extremely delicious, more so than you might imagine!  It is from allrecipes.com

Ingredients

• 5 cups bread cubes (use raisin bread!!!)
• 4 eggs
• 1 1/2 cups milk
• 1/4 cup white sugar, divided
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 tablespoon margarine, softened (I omitted this)
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon (use more!!!  maybe add some nutmeg too if you're feeling crazy!)

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Lightly butter an 8x8 inch baking pan.
2. Line bottom of pan with bread cubes. In a large bowl, beat together eggs, milk, 2 tablespoons sugar, salt and vanilla. pour egg mixture over bread. Dot with margarine; let stand for 10 minutes.
3. Combine remaining 2 tablespoons sugar with 1 teaspoon cinnamon and sprinkle over the top. Bake in preheated oven about 45 to 50 minutes, until top is golden.

Hot Quinoa Porridge

I wasn't expecting much from this recipe because it looked so healthy, but was pleasantly surprised.  You know how sometimes you make a cake and don't want to tell others what went into it because it is so unhealthy?  Well, the opposite happened with this recipe, whereby I did not want to tell Aki what was in it because I thought that would negatively bias his rating of it.  Anyways, this recipe is from the new Fresh restaurant cookbook (Fresh: New Vegetarian and Vegan Recipes from Fresh Restaurants by Jennifer Houston and Ruth Tal), but was printed in the Toronto Star a couple of weekends back. 

Quinoa, Oat & Barley Porridge
1/2 cup each of quinoa, steel-cut oats, pearl barley
4 cups water
6 dried apricots, sliced (I used craisins)
6 dates, pitted, chopped
2 tbsp currants (I omitted these)
1/4 tsp salt
cinnamon & maple syrup to taste

Rinse grains under cold running water.  Transfer to medium saucepan (I used a pressure cooker), add water, apricots, dates, currants, and salt.  Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to low and cover.  Simmer, stirring occasionally until water is absorbed, about 20 to 30 minutes.  Remove from heat and let stand, covered, for 5 minutes.  Top with anything you would like.

How to Make Fried Rice

Hehe I typed "friend" instead of "fried" in the title just now, perhaps because fried food is my friend?  I don't actually agree with that however.  Although we are not enemies, we are not exactly friends either.  Perhaps acquaintances.  Anyways, onto more important matters...

Ingredients
Basically any leftovers you have sitting in the fridge, including cooked rice.  In this case, old and slightly dry rice that has been in the fridge for a day or two is actually preferable.  Examples of some ingredients to include in fried rice are listed below:

-Chinese vegetables
-Red/green/yellow/orange pepper
-Mushrooms
-Carrots
-Onion
-Peas
-Corn
-Snowpeas or snappeas
-Small pieces of any vegetable really (broccoli, rapini, etc.)
-Small pieces of meat (optional)

-Soya sauce
-Fish sauce (optional)
-Ground black pepper

Directions
-Place 2 tbsp of oil in pan and let it heat up.  Fry up small pieces of meat.  After it is half cooked, add in vegetables from longest cook time to shortest cook time.  For example, add in onions and carrots first until half cooked, then add mushrooms and peppers, then snowpeas.  Add some soya sauce and fish sauce, set to side. 
-Place 2 tbsp of oil in pan and let it heat up.  Add in cooked rice and press spoon down to break up lumps of rice.  Let cook for about 10 minutes.  Add back in the cooked veggies, add more soya sauce and fish sauce, and lots of ground pepper.  Serve with hot sauce.

Optional:  Move rice to side and fry up a scrambled egg in the pan.  Stir into rice.

Note:  Making fried rice is a great way to get rid of bits of leftover cooked vegetables and meat from the fridge.  This makes it much easier to make as well, as you do not have to first cook the meat and veggies.  Instead, you would cook the rice first and add in the meat and veggies and sauces towards the end, just to warm them up.

Raw Food - Sardines

I like raw food a lot.  It may gross some people out but it is probably my favourite way to have a lot of things, specifically with regards to seafood and meat.  I like to think that I am not picky and that I am open to a lot of different foods, however when it comes to meat and fish I am quite picky unfortunately.  I will eat everything especially if I am at someone's house or ordered it at a restaurant, but definitely prefer things cooked (or not cooked!) certain ways. 
This past weekend I ate A TON of seafood, most of it being raw.  Please be warned that this is not a smart thing to do.  For example, I ate a huge bowl of raw shrimp (those that I referred to in my previous post about Diana's Seafood store) and it seems as though my stomach can only handle a medium bowl of raw shrimp.  Lesson learned!
Here is a picture of something you may not have thought to try raw.  Fresh sardines!  They have to be very fresh in order to eat it raw and, surprise surprise, Diana's sells it fresh enough to eat raw.  Aki filleted the fish and topped it with grated ginger, green onions, and soy sauce.  YUM!