Little Victories

As y'all know, I take nothing for granted. Even surmounting in tiny ways my physical challenges.

The pot above is a bit of an achievement for me. I was talking of my spicy African peanut soup to someone last week and I thought to myself: I must pick up the ingredients. Next thought was: I can't stand that long on my legs, the pain will kill me.

Then I thought, what odds, give it the old bash. You need to surmount some of these physical challenges of cooking great stuff from scratch.

I took all that cooking and baking stuff for granted. As we do. Inject some health issue and we can be brought to reality quite quickly.

I tackled the recipe, chopping, peeling, slicing, but slowly. Using multiple cutting boards and resting in between.

And Lard Thunderin', as we say out here, look at the pot! All done. And note: this is a completely vegan recipe.

Now some of you will want the recipe and nothing is formalized and basically doesn't need to be but here goes, just a list, be sure to simmer the veggies lightly in oil first to give that added oomph:

Large can of pumpkin
1 can of coconut milk
Goodly amount of chopped up spinach, stems removed
1 or 2 yams/sweet potatoes depending on size.
1 large purple onion chopped
1 smallish red pepper chopped
1/2 of jar of pure peanut butter
A couple of cloves of chopped garlic
A smattering of finely chopped ginger and chili peppers
2 heaping teaspoons of good quality curry powder or enough to personal taste.
Use up all your saved veggie broth or buy a large container of same or use veggie cubes.
Add water to taste
Peanuts to decorate serving bowl.
Stir well at 30 minute intervals, I use a timer to remind me.
Use immersible blender when cooked to smooth out onions and yams - but not too fine, palatable chunky is good.

That's it.

I usually simmer it for a few hours.

If you try it let me know or suggest your own modifications, improvements. Or pass on a treasured recipe of your own.

We're all in this together!

Coming Late in Life to Simple Delights

Rhubarb jam made this morning on the woodstove.

I post pictures of foods to FB and to here. Mainly because:

(a) I've lived long enough
(b) I never really had the chance to delight in food preparation for so very many years.

Meals were all need driven. A single mom, two kids, a full-blown career very much in a man's world, long hours. Free time was dedicated to making ends meet: sewing the clothes, making the curtains, knitting the sweaters, freezing the fall vegetables, preserving, rushing through food preparation and lunch making. Catching my breath in between. Juggling mostly. Not really having a good time with it all.

Now?

It's a never ending delight. One of the attractions in my choosing to live here was the distance from restaurants. I ate out a lot in Toronto. It was the lifestyle of many of my friends and I fell into it.

Now I delight in prepping food, creating my own recipe book, feeding friends and feeding myself. Making my own bread, freezing meals for those days. Making jams, preserves from home-grown fruits.

I freeze rhubarb among other fruits in the summer and then take it out in batches and make jam after soaking it overnight with sugar on the woodstove. Like this morning.

And I take an inordinate amount of pleasure in this never having to rush, enjoying the textures, the colours, the scent of something happening in my kitchen.

Bliss. We need more of it in our lives.

Outport Woman was Busy in the Kitchen

Between other bursts of energy and engagements I've been cooking. A lot. I like to make about 4 or 5 dinners and then freeze the extras. With this in mind I can afford to take more time and effort with some dishes.

In the last wee while I've made seafood crepes which I rarely do as it takes a while. But I am in receipt of a long awaited cast iron crepe pan and these were the result. The extra three servings freeze so well:



Then I made an old favourite, steak and kidney pie, making it an unbroken rule to freeze the extras (4) as I could eat it every day and not get fed up with it, it must be the memories of a long, damp, bone-chilling chilblainy childhood in Cork:



And then finally, this recipe which I've fed to so many at my table as it is so nutritious. I call it coconut spinach. I made 6 of these.



Next up is moose lasagna which is incredible. And then someone was telling me about cooking lasagna and then putting this marvellous stuffing along the strip and rolling it all up and baking. It could have been Grannymar, h'm.

Now if you're in this area, drop in. If there's one thing I enjoy more than cooking, it's feeding it to friends.

A Kitchen Dervish

:

~~~~~~~~~~~Irish Soda Bread w/ chopped apricots and prunes~~~~~~~~~~


I can't believe how many meals I've frozen in the last 10 days. Some serious baking and canning were happening also. I have to be in the mood, unfortunately. That old routine and discipline gene completely skipped my sorry self. But I try. And glory in these accomplishments when they happen.

I put down 8 single serve pots of my super woodstove soup today. Pots of beef stew has been put aside along with this fabulous dish I do of spinach and chickpeas and sundried tomatoes. And my leek and mushroom soup. Then I put up a batch of blueberry jam (I make mine with lemon zest) and baked a few varieties of my Irish bread. I love adapting recipes. I do it all the time. One for instance is the traditional white Irish soda bread (I do make the whole wheat also) I add an egg to it and whatever dried fruit I have on hand. Tonight it was chopped prunes and apricots. With Irish cheese (and yes, I can get that in Newfoundland!) it is amazing. I sometimes accompany it with hot pepper jam. Grown men have wept over this. No other food is necessary.

I'm on a roll. I need to scavenge more cupboards and the bottom of the freezer. Ah rhubarb? Where have you been? next up:

A compote of rhubarb, strawberries, pineapple and fresh chopped ginger? Whoo-ee baby!

Heartbreak & Irish Bread.

It's a sick feeling. Like something green and slimy sitting in my stomach slithering long tentacles into my bowels. I can't see stuff right in front of my nose. Where's the big yellow bowl, I yell at the dog, it was right here under my nose, I took it down off the shelf and now it's gone. Look? Where is it? And I knock other stuff off the counter looking for it. And it's right there, after ten minutes I see it, the stupid thing, yawning its creamy shiny insides at me, teetering on the edge of the sink.

My reality is gone sideways on me, I keep trying to put it upright. Every bloody thing is an effort. I have a brunch tomorrow with a lot of people coming and I have to prep for it which is a very good thing as it keeps my mind off IT.

I make couscous and my Irish brown bread and my strata dish with eggs and ham, broccoli and cheese and bread and mustard. I made my hummus - which is very special as it has Irish chili sauce in it, and I make Irish crepes which have potato and onion and mushy peas stuffed inside. And IT pounds into my brain and pierces my heart from time to time.

Was it the bible, was it my father, it doesn't matter, who said there is nothing worse than an ungrateful child? And by that I don't mean an endless litany of thankyous but the disdain and the verbal abuse and the you've never done enough for me kind of thing that keeps getting thrown at me over and over again. Until my heart breaks yet one more time.

All I know is I did the best I could with what I had, I loved them dearly and too much it seems for the pain to be this great today.