Mmm...Canada: Vietnamese-inspired steak salad

I know I get on a bit of a soap box when I talk about Canadian cooking. The fact is it's a cuisine so heavily influenced by all the cultures who come here, that it's hard not to like it.

Yes, I know...many people would argue that there is no Canadian cuisine, save the usual: maple syrup, beer, poutine, smoked salmon and butter tarts. But I think a lot of Canadian cuisine is about how people come here and adapt their home cooking to what's readily available...making a far-off place not so far away.

The other week I found some gorgeous Grey County, grass fed and barley finished flank steaks at my favourite butcher. I bought a piece, marinated it and grilled it. My word it was buttery-lovely.

This weekend I went back for more and came back with a bavette steak. Bavette, his assistant told me, is just behind the flank, and is much more tender, which means it needs less marinating time. When figuring out what to do with it, I thought of this year's Canadiana series and realised I could probably pull together a great example of what I think of as new Canadian cuisine.

One of my favourite Vietnamese dishes is beef salad. A southeast Asian flavoured grilled steak, thinly sliced and served with crisp, cooling veggies.

My rendition marinated, grilled and thinly sliced that lovely bavette and served over equally lovely locally-in season veggies: crisp and spicy radishes, sweet carrots, sweet-tender lettuce and sliced spring onions and finely minced garlic scapes. The recipe I provide gives you more veggies than this, but add whatever you have on hand.

Is it "authentic" as only those food snobs who've scaled unheard of mountains and waded through far off streams to get real food as only prepared by a singular cook in a singular subset of a singular culture? Far from it. But does it evoke a far off place, made not so far by what my country market has to offer.

Vietmamese-inspired flank steak
serves two

Ingredients
350g (12.5oz) flank steak or bavette steak
2Tbsp (30ml) olive oil
1.5Tbsp (22ml) runny honey
1Tbsp (15ml) nam pla (fish sauce)
1Tbsp (15ml) soy sauce
1tsp (5ml) sriracha, chilli garlic or hot sauce (to taste)
0.5tsp (2ml) garlic powder
0.5tsp (2ml) onion powder
0.25tsp (1ml) black pepper
0.5tsp (2ml) dried basil

Mix all ingredients together and marinate six to 12 hours.

Grill the steak to your pleasing. Let rest 15 minutes or so and then thinly slice


Vietnamese-inspired Dressing

juice of one lime
1.5Tbsp (22ml) runny honey
2Tbsp (30ml) fish sauce)
2Tbsp (30ml) olive oil
1tsp sriracha, chilli garlic or hot sauce, or 1 minced fresh chilli

Salad:

shredded lettuce

thinly sliced spring onions

radishes, cut into thin matchsticks

carrots cut into thin matchsticks

thinly sliced cucumber

thinly sliced mushrooms

finely minced garlic or scapes (or chives)

Thinly sliced red or yellow bell peppers

cheers!

jasmine

I'm a quill for hire!

Mmm...Canada: Saskatoon Berry Salad

Punnets of deep blue awaited me at Trevor's. No, not blueberries, but Saskatoon berries.

Little, midnight blue and bursting with flavour, Saskatoon berries are a fleeting summertime treat. A fleeting summertime treat made even moreso as I'm not in Saskatchewan.

My Most Marvelous Manager told me about them ages ago--they sounded wonderful, but I thought I'd never see them here.

Never say never.

I was so happy to find them at Herrle's last year. A couple of punnets came home with me and I spent a week making muffins, tarts and sauces followed. I could see why MMM remembered them fondly.

This year's punnet would still be used for baking, but I wanted to play with the savoury side of these berries. With summer's heat upon us, a salad seemed to be the way to go.

I don't know if people usually complement these berries with arugula and goat cheese, but they were the first things to come to mind. Add some thinly sliced red onion (or shallots) and toasted almonds, and it all worked so very nicely--bitter pepperyness from the greens against the sweet berries, tangy cheese, sharp onions, crunchy nuts and the sweet and sour vinaigrette easily came together for a lovely summer salad.

Like many salads I make, this is a non-recipe recipe. Add as much or as little of each ingredient as you like. Serve on its own or with grilled chicken or a some poached or seared white fleshed fish.

Saskatoon Berry, Arugula and Goat Cheese Salad

Arugula
Soft goat cheese
Saskatoon berries
Thinly sliced onions
Toasted almond flakes
Balsamic vinaigrette

cheers!

jasmine

I'm a quill for hire!

Roast Vegetable and Tuna Salad

The sun, I fear, is nothing more than a myth. A rumour. A figment of some deluded soul's imagination.

I honestly don't know how much rain has fallen here since the beginning of April. I don't know how many days of dreariness we've had. Sun beams that actually reached the ground in two months? I'll guess three. The final numbers aren't out yet, but I won't be surprised if 2011 turns out to be one of the wettest, if not *the* wettest since they started keeping such records in this area.

It's rained so much that I see thin strokes of fuzzy green on the pavement. With indoor humidity at about 83 per cent according to the wall gadget, the air seems thick and chilly. My Monet print umbrella is my most prized possession. More valued than my kitchen scale, more used than my merlot-hued patent leather near-stiletto boots, more needed than my Blackberry.

That said, the grass is lush and green and my dahlias, irises, bleeding hearts and indigo are thriving. But those are the only real positives I can think of. Oh...and I didn't have to wash winter's salt off my car.

I usually don't moan about cloud or rain, but enough is enough. Really, it is.

It would be nice to feel the sun's warm for more than an hour or so every so many days...or weeks.

The problem with weather like this is I'm still mentally stuck in wintery foodish themes. I'm still roasting meats and making stews. This just doesn't seem right for late May in the northern hemisphere.

I just can't get excited about frizzy salad greens or light broths...not when it's as grey as slate and the sound of rain coming down the chimney reminds me of Jacob Marley's clanging chains.

In hopes of kickstarting my summer cooking, I've taken one of my usual winter staples -- roasted Mediterranean vegetables -- and hoped to coax back the sun with the simple addition of another Mediterranean item: tuna.

Generally I roast a good quantity of vegetables (sometimes adding courgettes (zucchini), or fennel) and keep it in the fridge as a side to go with roast birds or beast, as an omelet stuffing or in wraps, but this time I'm using the same mix, cold, for a salad base.

I prefer to roast the vegetables (well, fruit) separately as I don't want the tomatoes' juices to run into the aubergines, but if you'd rather roast them together, that's fine. I don't pay attention to how much of anything I add to the vegetables--it's totally to taste.

The salad itself is quite adaptable--I use tinned tuna out of convenience, but you can use grilled or seared tuna. If you don't want to use fish, you can use poached eggs, grilled pork or chicken, tinned chickpeas or even cheese such as feta or halloumi.

Roasted Vegetable Salad with Tuna

Serves 4-6

Ingredients

For the tomatoes

3-4 ripe tomatoes, cut into slim wedges
olive oil
red wine
balsamic vinegar
salt
pepper
dried basil
chilli flakes, to taste
1 red onion, cut into slim wedges
6 garlic cloves, with papers left on

For the aubergine/eggplant:
1 medium aubergine (eggplant), skin on, diced into 1.25cm (0.5") pieces,
olive oil
salt
pepper
ground coriander
dried basil
garlic powder
onion powder
chilli flakes, to taste

2 Roasted peppers, sliced

red wine vinegar
canned tuna (see notes)
black olives
capers
black pepper

Method
Line two cookie sheets with tin foil and set aside. Preheat oven to 170C/350F.

For the tomatoes
Mix the tomatoes with olive oil, red wine, a splash of balsamic vinegar, salt, pepper, dried basil and chilli flakes. Let sit for at least an hour if you can.

Scatter the tomatoes onto the other tray and nestle in the onions and garlic. Pour the macerating liquid over the lot.

For the aubergine

Mix all the aubergine's ingredients together with the fruit (yes, it's a berry). and tumble onto one of two trays.

Put both trays into the oven and roast for 30-45 minutes, until cooked but not burnt. One tray may take longer to cook than the other, if so take out the trays as they are ready

Allow to cool a bit and combine the tomatoes, aubergines and peppers with a drizzle of red wine vinegar. Give it a stir and let cool to room temperature

To serve, portion onto plates, top with tuna, scatter capers and olives over top and lightly dust with pepper.

Notes:

- I prefer tuna packed in olive oil, but if you can't find it, use the type packed in spring water or broth. You can also use grilled tuna instead.

- If you'd rather not do this with fish, try poached eggs, grilled chicken, grilled pork, or chickpeas instead.

cheers!

jasmine

I'm a quill for hire!

If you give a mouse a cookie Part I: Roasted pepper, chickpea and feta salad

If necessity is the mother of invention, then an inability to sleep is the upstairs neighbour of a busy kitchen.

Which is probably why a caffeine-fuelled evening that led to my inability to sleep, combined with my natural (and I would argue genetic) completionist tendencies, transformed a single-dish potluck offering to a multi-part supper in itself.

It all started when the Toronto panel session I attended ended a tad early. Traffic on the 401 was more than a tad easy. The coffee I had early in the evening kept me more than a tad awake in the-close-to-wee hours.

At home, I did what any normal person would do: I flitted around my kitchen like a hummingbird wired on double espressos, looking for something to do. I didn't feel like baking. Cooking another meal would have been silly as most of the week would have me eat anywhere but home. Alas, it was also too early in the week to prepare my potluck offering.

There I stood, illuminated by the fridge's bulb, pondering its contents. The only thing I could see were bell peppers: the mediumscarymegamart had them on sale so my veggie drawer was full to bursting with oblong orbs.

My potluck muse must have arrived directly from the markets of Tangiers or Marrakesh, sending me into a decidedly Moroccan frame of mind. With North Africa in mind, Claudia Roden's Arabesque offered a solution to my excesses of energy and bell peppers. Her recipe for Felfla Wal Hummas Wa Jban (Roast Peppers and Chickpeas with Fresh Goat's Cheese) was reminiscent of Nigella's roasted pepper and feta starter from Nigella Bites.

Yes, my singular, effortless potluck offering became two relatively effortess potluck offerings. As my Dear Little Cardamummy believes: better to have more food than less.

So there I sat on my kitchen kick stool, at midnight, in front of Beelzebub's window, wearing my white and blue floral printed flannelette granny jammies, occasionally practising culinary voyeurism while reading Nigel Slater's latest tome. I peered into my oven's window as the buckled baking tray encouraged the peppers to rock, roll and wobble in their desert-like heat: their wrinkled and blackened skins spat and oozed boiling juices from blistered gashes. Before my energies dissapated, they were stripped of their char and voided of their seeds, sliced into strips and popped into the fridge to be mixed with chickpeas and their flavourings.

Anyone who didn't know me (and I'm sure those who do) would have thought me mad, I'm sure.

This is easily a pantry dish, especially if you are running late and don't want to roast the peppers yourself and have a favourite jarred offering from your grocer, but you may have to adjust the dressing to make up for the extra sharpness that comes from the vinegar store-bought peppers are packed in.

For a more substantial lunch dish, add chunks of boiled potatoes and perhaps chunks of tinned tuna, with a sprinkling of roughly chopped flat-leafed parsley.

How to roast bell peppers:
Set your oven to its hottest temperature and let it come up to temp. Place whole peppers onto a foil-lined tray and pop into the oven. After 15 minutes, turn the fruit so an unblistered side is foil-down, roast for 10 minutes. Roast remaining sides for 8-10 minutes each.

When done, remove the peppers from the tray and place in a pot with a tight-fitting lid and let steam for about 15 minutes. When the fruit are cool enough to handle, slip off the charred skins from the flesh and remove the stem and seeds.


Roasted pepper, chickpea and feta salad
Serves 8-10

6 roasted red bell peppers, slivered
1x540ml (8.5oz) tin chickpeas, drained
60ml (0.25c) extra virgin olive oil
Juice of one lemon
4 garlic cloves, minced
salt
Pepper
1 Tbsp dried oregano
100g (3.5oz) feta cheese

Make the dressing by combining the oil, lemon juice, garlic, salt, pepper and oregano.

Mix the pepper ribbons and chickpeas together. Pour the dressing over top and give the contents a light stir.

About 10 minutes before serving, mix in the feta cheese.


cheers!
jasmine

I'm a quill for hire!

Cold Soba Noodle Salad

Those who know me, know I've an indiscriminate gluttonous streak that needs little coaxing.

Those who don't know me, but hear of my surprise office treats automatically assume everything that passes my lips is artisinal this, heirloom that, slaved over the hob for hours before being perfectly plated. To them "Jasmine" and "potluck" never mix.

Bah.

The fact is I love communal eating. It goes beyond snagging a long table in the caf or going around the corner to the roadhouse for a 15-minute-or-free lunch deal. To me it's all about sharing food made for friends and friends-to-be.

If I'm in an office potluck, without the luxury of proper refridgeration or a stove, I try and pull together nibbles or something that doesn't need heating. I prefer to not bring desserts and my fear of slow cookers pretty much means that I won't be bringing in a hot main.

For our last potluck I wanted something that I could make the night before, be meatless and could be kept in a cooler until serving. I also didn't want to bring in a pasta salad in its usual state--mine simply get glooshy and stodgy and would probably be best as some sort of biodegradable stucco. My decision: soba noodles--they're nuttier in flavour and sturdier, able to soak up dressing without falling apart as easily as regular wheat pasta.

The flavours are "pan-Asian" and can easily be tweaked to make it a little more Thai, Vietnamese, Chinese or Japanese, I suppose. It's up to you. I wanted to ensure there was some protein, so I doubled the dressing quantity, using half to marinate firm tofu before grilling it, which, apparently, was what was needed to convince the non-tofu eaters that bean curds are, in fact, edible.


Cold Soba Noodle Salad

Dressing:
1 tsp sesame oil
4 dspn rice wine vinegar
4 dspn soy sauce
juice from half a lime
1 Tbsp brown sugar
half a thumb ginger, grated
1 garlic clove, minced

Salad
200g uncooked soba noodles
1 julienned carrot
2 spring onions, sliced
half a bell pepper, julienned
half a jalepeno pepper, minced
1Tbsp toasted sesame seeds
1/2 tsp toasted nigella seeds

Optional:
100g grilled tofu or chicken, marinated in the equal amount of dressing as above, cut into bite-sized pieces.

Mix the dressing ingredients together.

Break the noodles in half and cook according to packet instructions. Drain and rinse in cold water.

Combine noodles, carrots, bell pepper and spring onions and optional tofu or chicken with the dressing. Cover and set in the fridge from one hour to overnight.

Before serving, sprinkle with jalepeno and toasted seeds.

(1dspn = 2tsp = 10ml)

cheers!
jasmine

RIP, Martin Streek

I'm a quill for hire!

Chickpea and Couscous salad

All it takes is a week without Internet access to make me realise two things:
1) I look up far too much trivial nonsense
2) I spend far too much time trivial nonsense

The number of times I wanted to grab the laptop to look up everything from the renewal status of Life (No: they didn't but at least the series finale made sense) to my area's hardiness zone (Yes: my front patch of dirt really really needs tending. No: I don't know what I'm doing) to the G&S version of Baby Got Back (Yes: really).

Zippy's back and she's behaving (mostly). They couldn't replicate the problem (sound familiar, anyone) but they made her a mostly cat-hair free machine.

Even though the weather's warmed up a bit, I'm still daydreaming about the Medeterranean. Normally my thoughts turn to France, Italy, Morrocco and their neighbours in winter's depths or when mired in muck...But my mind still wanders to my idealised world of azure skies, hilltop villages, fields of lavender and shorelines dotted with beach umbrella'd owners spying lapping waves (and each other).

Since my bank balance hasn't magically grown to accommodate a jaunt, my kitchen will have to allow a virtual trip.

My recent reacquaintance with couscous was a happy accident. Meandering the bulk food shop aisles saw me returning with a bag of teeny wheaty granules. Usually it's a side dish, sometimes prepared with dried fruits, it's accompanied roast pork and chicken. After a few meals, when the meat and other sides have long disappeared, I'm usually left with anywhere with an orphaned third- to half-cup of couscous.

Waste not, want not.

Like most salads, this one is thrown together with whatever I've found in my fridge or pantry. And like most salads, I don't measure when I combine ingredients, so just use it as a rough guide. The result is delicious paired with merguez sausages or eaten on its own for a deskside lunch.

Chickpea and Couscous salad
1/2 c cooked couscous
1c drained chickpeas
1/2 red bell pepper, diced
2-3 sundried tomatoes, chopped
3 Tbsps chopped olives
1/2 onion, slivered
1 garlic clove, minced
juice of half a lemon
olive oil
salt, pepper


cheers!
jasmine

What I'm reading: The Children's Book by A.S Byatt

Fishy Fridays: Warm tuna and potato salad

Even though my mind still feels winter's chill, my gullet says warm weather is coming.

I'm still grabbing for my wool coat and pashmina every few days but my little plaid trenchcoat is getting more and more wear. I'm still drawn towards roast chicken and beef with loads of gratin potatoes and veggies. The idea of leafy salad meals just hasn't taken hold of my imagination...yet.

But today my tummy decided that perhaps it would only be sated by a salad. Not a leafy salad with frissée this and hand-torn that. It wanted a hearty and warm salad. The kind of salad that doesn't wilt in the heat. The kind of salad that those who pretend to eat won't go near (because those who pretend to eat wouldn't have the combined tensile and compressive strengths necessary to lift a forkful of food). The kind of salad that that make my tummy feel both full and happy.

This salad is based on my love of warm potato salad, akin to the kind put together by Jamie Oliver in his series where he cooked in his garden--hot potatoes slurping up olive oil and lemon juice--along with a not-so-latent and constant desire to be near the Medeterranean Sea. It's relatively quick to put together and quite satsifying on its own or with a piece of bruschetta.


Warm tuna and potato salad

One boiled potato, cubed
olive oil
squeeze of lemon juice
salt
pepper
half a onion, minced
1 garlic clove, minced
two sundried tomatoes, chopped finely
1 tsp capers,
1 roasted pepper, chopped
2-3 Tbsp chopped black olives
.5c canned chickpeas, drained
1 tin chunked tuna, drained

cheers!
jasmine

Milk Calendar Mondays: Roast Beef Dinner Salad

Found tucked amidst sales flyers and the colour comics, November's new Milk Calendar's arrival is a an anticipated bit of Canadiana, linking together potentially millions of families across the country. Think I'm kidding? More than 2 million were distributed in Saturday newspapers.

I remember being little, leafing through its pages from --the full-colour pictures represented "Canadian" food for me--not what I got a lot of as a youngster. My Dear Little Mummy (okay, she was My Dear Big Mummy then) rarely cooked from it. Apart from the occasional muffin or cake, the recipes went largely untried in our household.

So there it dangled on a bare nail, part art, part time keeper and reminder of bills to be paid and those already paid. Each month had a different meal or treat--everything from milkshakes and smoothies to pastas and, of course cakes and other sweets. Each beautifully photographed to entice the home cook to cook with milk and its kindred foods. At the end of the year, the calendar came down and was stored in the basement, with the other calendars.

Ashamedly, I continued Mummy's tradition of not cooking from it. Yes, I looked forward to receiving the calendar, flipping through the pages and salivating at some of the photos and recipes, but it never really crossed my mind to try the recipes. Inexplicable, really, given I'm pretty much willing to try any kitchen treat at least once.

When this year's calendar arrived, I decided to change that. Not because this year's recipes seem better than last (they don't), or because I've recently developed a hankering for dairy (that's been an ongoing craving ever since I was little, much to Mum's chagrin). I don't know what it was, but I decided this year the calendar to use as more than a record keeper of my household goings ons. So once a month...probably on a Monday, I'll post that month's recipe.

January's recipe for Roast Beef Dinner Salad is quick, satisfying, and different from the usual leftover meal. It's ludicrously simple: lettuce leaves strewn with waves of roast beef, crumbles of tangy old cheddar, juicy little tomatoes, crunchy croutons and fingers of cooked green beans, dressed in a creamy horseradish and thyme vinaigrette.

I'll probably come back to this, but change it up a bit--add sauteed mushrooms and onions and switch the horseradish and cheddar for blue cheese.

Simple, delicious and easily adaptable, this is definitely worth a try.

cheers!
jasmine

"2008 Milk Calendar"

Salad Stravaganza: A leafy lunch

Okay I'm early.

Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay early.

Can we chalk it up to enthusiasm? How about utter embarrassment about emailing foodbloggy event coordinators about their fabulous events and then not actually cooking the required dishes because life got away from me? What about the promise of a round-up on Canada Day? How about a little bit of all the above?

Yeah, I'll settle for that.

Okay...the real reason is that this month is super busy and if I don't post this *now* I may not get around to it later (Yup! Another class!)

Tired of the same-old, same-old salad, Lis and Kelly want some leafy lolligagging, some gorgeous greens and some super starters-cum-suppers. My dears, I am more than happy to help out!

Truth be told, my contribution is my take on a favourite salad served in a local restaurant. I love the combination of textures--crunchy veggies, buttery nuts, juicy, sweet grapes that explode when you bite into them and just a bit of chickenny goodness kissed with a splash of raspberry vinaigrette.

It's also a good way of using up a rather meager amount of leftover roast or grilled chicken in a more interesting way than glomming it with salad dressing and other bits and bobs to fill it out...

I'm not giving quantities, because well, it's a salad and that's a rather silly thing to do...Just add as much as you want of each ingredient, just ensure they are fresh and taste good to you.

The Tropical
Salad leaves (as complicated or familiar as you wish)
Seedless grapes
Almond flakes
Bell pepper
Red onion
Cooked chicken (shredded, if possible)
Raspberry vinaigrette

cheers!
jasmine

tags: Salads
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