The Hunger Struck - Confessions of a Food Fanatic.

I had been thinking about what kind of cake to make for Rain’s first birthday for a few months. I’ll admit I’ve been really excited about all the fun things I can do for kids birthdays now, you know things in small format on sticks etc. Even before I had a kid, despite constantly dissing the cute trend that’s been snowballing in the last few years, I had thought about how I might get away with it at my next dinner party. But then the adult in me couldn’t visualizes brown butter rice krispy pops as the desert following beef bourgangion, go figure. This kid thing may open up a whole new chapter of cute, which used to terrify me but I find myself suddenly drawn to.

I’m sure all of you mothers out there with even the slightest interest in baking understand the dilemma. It was going to be his first taste of sugar so it had to be perfect. I went through the usual list of common first birthday cakes from the allergen free to the fake chocolate black bean cake, none of which seemed particularly appealing to me. I think maybe this is because I’m not exactly a birthday cake person *gasp* shocking I know. I do love many kinds of cake especially those that shine in the morning with a cup of coffee, I’m just not crazy about the typical icing heavy variety traditional to birthdays. I don’t find them very exciting. They have a tendency to be overly sweet with not much flavor, at least the North American variety. I also really wanted to give him something he would love, he’s never had cake before or really any sugar to speak of so I was challenged by trying to find something he already liked and take it to the next level with some serious sugar.

I know you’re thinking that I’m crazy because any kid presented with a high concentration of sugar for the very first time will absolutely go nuts over it no matter what form it come in. While I don’t deny that could be the case, there were also a few other problems that influenced the direction I took. Most important of all, I had yet to give him any form of wheat or eggs. I’m really not one to get all crazy about the allergen thing, but why take the risk on his first birthday even if it is remote?

Actually, once I stopped focusing on birthday cake the answer came quickly to me: yogurt. My son goes absolutely nuts over plain unsweetened yogurt. I mean completely nuts. You would think you were in a monkey cage at the zoo standing in the middle of a giant vat of bananas. It’s to the point where we have to conceal the yogurt all the way in the back of the fridge because if he even gets a glimpse of the shiny white container he becomes completely entranced, every fiber in his little body starts to twitch and noises of all frequencies come flying out of his mouth at such speed there’s no time to even comprehend whats happened before a melt down of epic proportions is well underway. We have to go to great lengths to conceal yogurt in our fridge or anything that resembles a yogurt container.

Yes this was going to be the perfect introduction to sugar and the perfect occasion to just let him have at it. I had the perfect cake… see how many times I’ve said perfect in the last 2 sentences? That’s how PERFECT it was going to be.

Raspberry Dacquoise for the adults and the filling which contained no wheat, nuts or eggs made into a mini individual flower shape for the wee one. I’ve been making this cake for a few years, a recipe I found over at Chocolate and Zucchini that has become one of our favorites. It’s definitely not the most simplistic but really worth it for a special occasion and the filling on the inside: a combination of Greek yogurt, whipping cream and sugar was the answer I was looking for. It is totally yogurt like, same colour, same texture with just a few ingredients to make it even better. I was sure he would love it and that it would result in tiny adorable yelps of joy, with little hands grabbing for it before the candle was even blown out. After which we would have to take him outside and hose him down because much like most meals his entire little body would be covered from head to toe… all of this would naturally be captured on video which we would watch years down the road… blah blah blah…

Oh my GOD was I wrong.

Who took my banshee and replaced him with this sweet little reserved angel? He barely even expressed interest in touching it. I had to feed him some with a spoon. Dude are you serious? My child hates being fed with a spoon, pureed baby food lasted for maybe a week or two with this guy. He has to do everything himself. He comes by that honestly.

After a good 20 minutes of trying to spark his interest we gave up and fed him plain unsweetened organic yogurt for dinner for which he displayed his usual enthusiasm. Sigh. Just when you think you have them figured out they change.

But not all was lost the cake was as amazing as ever and if you’re fairly brave in the kitchen I suggest you give it a whirl – it is truly exceptional. For the recipe you’re better off referring to Chocolate and Zucchini (Raspberry Dacquoise Entrements)as this time around I quadrupled the recipe making the dacquoise in a full sized sheet pan and assembling in a giant pastry ring to accommodate all of Rain’s party guests. I will mention that I used exclusively Greek yogurt which turned out to be my favorite so far. The original recipe calls for Fromage Blanc, which is not only hard to find in North America but adds another lengthy step to the process should you choose to make it like I previously did. Also, I used frozen raspberries this time, I wanted them to taste good and they’re not even close to in season right now – I would suggest using fresh if you can find some decent as mine bled as they thawed taking away from the aesthetics of it.

Aesthetics aside, it did look nice on the cake stand!

I really love making Indian food. Another lifetime ago, long before I was married and even longer before baby Rain was an idea, I spend around 8 months travelling all around India and Nepal with two of my girlfriends. Despite my indifference to almost everything at that time of my life, somehow food and cooking was a priority as it’s always been. I was relatively intent on learning as much as I could about the regional cuisine of the many different places we travelled and I did a pretty good job of retaining and documenting most of that information considering I was completely stoned out of my mind 98% of the time.

All of you former young world travellers out there know how it is to be 18 and in search of the next “life changing” experience. Or maybe that was just typical to the angsty teenage backpackers travelling in South Asia in the late 90s? Either way, I was definitely in search of something or at least thought I was because it was all or nothing on every front. I think it’s safe to say that was the case for my friends as well. From the strange yogi who completely hypnotized my friend into covering her whole body with turmeric – incidentally my first experience with the spice – which despite relentless scrubbing made her appear jaundiced for 2 weeks afterwards (this still makes me laugh harder than most things), to the apprentice of a particularly famous guru, who I thought had the answers to all of life’s questions and had me dressing all in white and carrying a poster sized FRAMED picture of her with me for the rest of my travels. It’s safe to say that I am completely terrified of having a teenager, or at least one as willful as I was.

There are many things I love about quinoa but the best thing by far is that it fills you up for a long long time. I’m not sure exactly why that is, someone mentioned to me recently that they thought quinoa contained more protein than other grains, I’m going to run with that theory as it makes perfect sense to me.

So I’ve gradually started to make quinoa in the place of other grains and pastas. I never thought it would stick for more than maybe a few dinners as I was anticipating serious opposition from my husband. If there’s one thing I’ve learned it’s to never take rice away from an Indian! Not that I was actually trying to make him stop eating rice, I was just trying to find something that we could occasionally replace the all the basmati rice with.

Have you ever had basmati rice at an Indian restaurant? Or maybe you have a fabulous Indian cook in the family too? Ever wondered why the rice is so freaking never-want -to-eat-anything-else-EVER-again good? I’m talking about the kind of rice that makes you completely forget about that incredible piece of naan bread laying next to your plate AND the butter chicken you ordered.

Can you guess the answer?

Here’s a recipe that will make you feel a little fancy on a Tuesday night. I almost can’t believe I’m writing a post about artichokes as they were one of my most feared food items as a child. I’m not quite sure why anymore, I think it had something to do with a period in my life where my mother made them a lot, beyond that I can’t remember any details.

A few years ago after seeing baby artichokes make there way into Vancouver markets, I decided it might be worth giving them another shot. They are small and seemed like the perfect entry level artichoke to tackle as a former artichoke hater. Plus I had them once being served as part of an amazing antipasti platter and I completely fell in love with the way they  complimented everything both aesthetically and with their woodsy flavor.

These artichokes apart from the cleaning process are extremely simple to prepare. Really it’s just a few tablespoons of olive oil, lemon and any variety of strong hard cheese you have on hand. They are a perfect snack or accompaniment. I served these roasted as is but I suspect they would be fabulous if you had some kind of simple sauce like an aioli to dip them in. My behind is starting to look like an Easter ham so I decided to skip that part at least this time around.

After 2 weeks of eating white bread for almost every meal, I haven’t been able to eat anything but fresh vegetables since I got home. I know it seams a bit simple to be posting a recipe as basic as an heirloom tomato salad, but this is what I’ve been eating so tough! Ha! No in all seriousness there were some amazing looking heirloom tomatoes at the farmers market this morning and I just wasn’t strong enough to leave without a few of them. For the most part I’m powerless against these, when I see some good ones I just can’t walk away.

This salad is so simple and really needs nothing aside from some ripe heirloom tomatoes and maybe a bit of olive oil and some sea salt. I added in the pea shoots and thought the sweetness really complemented these amazing subtle tomatoes, but of course they aren’t necessary.

Alright I give up. After many many months of resistance to writing about baked kale chips, I finally decided that enough was enough. To tell you the truth, I’m getting increasingly frustrated with my own stubbornness, which extends well past the world of Kale and deep into the depths of macaroons and gluten free puff pastry, all extremely well covered topics among food bloggers, all topics that interest me, all topics which I had until now decided I would not cover.

I have to give credit for the new found inspiration, at least in the Kale chips department, to my farmers market in Vancouver. While I’m easily inspired by such things, there was something different about this weekend. The beautiful spring temperature, with the cherry blossoms in full bloom and a weekend dedicated entirely to my kitchen, a place I wish I could spend every hour of every day, was enough to appease even the most stubborn aspects of my personality. And once I laid my eyes on the beautiful basket of mixed baby kales of one vendor, I knew I was completely defeated.

I’ve been really into raw beets lately and its fitting for this to be the first documentation of that here, as I have served various dips with raw sliced yellow and red beets at least 3 times in the past 2 months. There’s just something so pretty about them as they can easily dress up your average everyday crudites platter and the taste and texture of a raw beet is something that pairs so nicely with my favorite dips.

Maybe it’s just me, but I’ve always loved cooked beets in almost every way, including some of those questionable way-too-many-things-going-on soaked in miso gravy ways I come across so often in vegan restaurants. Not that I’m a huge fan of this sort of establishment, but I do find myself eating at one on occasion. Needless to say, I am a huge beet fan. So much that sometimes it’s hard to completely dislike a dish that clearly doesn’t work solely because there are beets in it. It’s almost like my subconscious wants to give bonus points just for including them, despite how badly the dish failed on a whole.