In the House of Relax, we take naps - frequently; though maybe not as frequently as you think. There are other things we do like read, visit our local Starbucks, go for walks around our neighbourhood... It's a pretty place, our neighbourhood: quiet, quaint, friendly. We're on the doorsteps of a beautiful escarpment - hiking trails, conservation parks, biking paths - and on the other side we have the shores of Lake Ontario (which, by the way, is much cleaner and a little more picturesque than what you see in Toronto). There are also horses and sheep!
There are a few more things we like to do here in the House of Relax: We like to cook, bake, and EAT. These are some of the things we've been cooking, baking, and eating:
Blueberry Crumble: Mmmm. This is my husband's doing to be honest and I wouldn't dare take credit for it because it's something he's very proud of. One morning while I was sleeping in, he saw the recipe on one of those morning television shows and looked up the recipe. He then made one batch for a family barbeque and received good reviews. Being the little gluttons that we are, we decided to make another batch all to ourselves. Well, serves us right for hoarding good things because we missed a couple of crucial steps the second time around and it didn't turn out quite as well as the first time. It was still yummy though; the good thing about crumble is that you can mix it up and it's just as good.
Another treat my husband did for me was make my "Egg McMuffin" egg in a heart-shaped cookie cutter. I know, I know: there's some gagging going around, but for those hopeless romantics out there, it's cute - and you know you'd love it if you saw it in a chick flick. Along with my tomato soup and tea, it was a delightful breakfast (and by breakfast, I do mean brunch. I rarely wake up in time for
actual breakfast).
Meatballs: With the help from one of our friends
(you know who you are) and Jamie Oliver online, we managed to make our third and most successful batch of meatballs! See, the first two times we did it, we didn't add any bread crumbs so they were essentially dense balls of meat; not bad to eat, but not quite the meatball texture we were looking for. So we found and watched this video on spaghetti and meatballs on Mr Oliver's site and followed the guidelines in making our balls. They turned out splendidly. It's a part of his "Ministry of Food" program where he teaches basic recipes and how to cook them properly and asks everyone who experiences his teachings to "pass it on", and so to honour that, the link to the video is as follows:
http://www.jamieoliver.com/about/jamie-oliver-videos/ministry-of-food-spaghetti
If you're waiting for us to make it for you, then you'll have to book an appointment and make the trip out here. If you're willing to do that, then I'm willing to make meatballs for you!
So my husband always insists on buying bananas and while he does make an effort to eat them, he doesn't always make it to them in time and needless to say, they end up over ripe and brown... And when bananas turn that colour, I can't think of anything better to do than to make BANANA BREAD. I decided to bake banana bread muffins and instead of using muffin cups (or whatever it is you call them), I used squares of parchment paper. It's an idea I got from Martha Stewart (and I love Martha Stewart).
Finally, we had ribs for dinner tonight. It was so simple and easy and delicious that we can't wait to do it again. All we did was marinate the whole rack in barbeque sauce (we just used Kraft) overnight and bake it. We admit that we could have been even more generous with the sauce and perhaps even marinated it for a longer period of time. But despite these minor fumbles, the ribs were really, really, really good. There are a couple of other rib recipes we're waiting to try - namely the ribs that our respective Moms make; they're "Asian" recipes and therefore require ingredients and sauces that we don't have here in the outskirts of the Greater Toronto Area, but that's okay... Once we find out what it is that we need, we can work on it. Until then, Kraft barbeque sauce it is!
And for those of you who are wondering what sort of percentage of all this food output is actually my work, well, it's hard to say. I won't say all, but it certainly isn't none either. I'm getting better at cooking, to say the least. Yes: I still get flustered over the stove when something cooks faster than I expect it to or if something doesn't turn out the way I thought it would, but I am learning. And I'm very fortunate that my husband isn't picky about what he eats or how it's cooked (as long as it is cooked). On the Meatball Project, I actually rolled all the meatballs which is a big step since I don't particularly like to touch raw meat. So slowly but surely I'm becoming more and more comfortable wearing the "chef" hat. For now I'm still just "keeping it warm" for my husband (the "prep chef" hat still fits me just fine though).
