A Life, Lived

Why Cat Racing is so Dull . . .

Travel Tuesdays - Venice Christmas

Following up on last week's post . . . shots from when we were in Venice just before Christmas.

Raspberry Frangipane Bars

Oh my.

These may just be the best thing I have baked in YEARS.

Those of you familiar with Bakewell Tarts will recognize the tastes immediately. If you're not, let me describe . . . a buttery shortbread crust, thin layer of raspberry jam, a layer of baked almond cream. MMMMM

When I was sprinkling the almonds on top I decided to add some crystalline sugar to further gild the lily.

 

Raspberry Frangipane Slice

3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/3 cup powdered sugar
1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
1 cups almond meal
1/2 cup sugar
7 tablespoons unsalted butter, room temperature
1 large egg
1 tablespoon whole milk
1/2 teaspoon almond extract (optional)
pinch of salt
1/4 cup raspberry jam (or as desired)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease an 8x8 inch baking pan. Combine the flour, powdered sugar, and the first amount of butter. Pat dough into prepared pan. Bake for 15 minutes.

<Meanwhile, make the frangipane topping. Beat the butter on medium speed until creamy. Add the sugar and mix to incorporate. Add the almond flour and beat until thoroughly combined. Add the salt, almond extract (if using), and egg and mix until incorporated. Add the milk and beat until light and fluffy.

Spread raspberry jam (or any flavor that you like) on the warm crust. Pour the frangpiane mixture on top of the jam layer and spread evenly with an angled spatula, making sure to cover the jam completely.

Bake for 25-30 minutes or until golden brown. Halfway through baking sprinkle sliced almonds on top of the frangipane if desired. Cool completely before cutting to serve.

Pork and Sweet Potato Curry

Our CSA shipment has been offering up plenty of sweet potatoes lately. Since we were not really sweet potato eaters growing up neither Paul or I have a repertoire of recipes to use. I spend a lot of time on google trying to find new ones. Turns out this one was on the cookbook shelf all along - in the Donna Hay Simple Dinners book.

Pork and sweet potatoes are classic comfort foods that get a real boost in flavor from spicy red curry paste, fish sauce, some fresh lime and creamy coconut milk in this easy, quick-to-fix Thai curry. Serve with a cucumber salad and steamed jasmine rice for a satisfying dinner.

The only change I made was to up the curry paste. I used the required amount and thought the flavour was 'blah'. In the end I think I use 2/3 a cup. Thai curry paste isn't necessarily spicy but it is flavourful so you want to gt that balance right.

Pork and Sweet Potato Curry

1/4 cup red curry paste
2 pounds pork stew meat ( or 1 KG pork shoulder trimmed and cut into bite sized cubes)
1 TB grated fresh ginger
8 kaffir lime leaves, lightly crushed
2 cups coconut cream
2 cups chicken stock
1 3/4 pounds sweet potato, peeled and cubed
2 TB lime juice
1 TB fish sauce
1 TB brown sugar
1/2 cup cilantro leaves
1/2 Thai basil leaves
1/2 cup mint leaves
2 green onions, trimmed and shredded
steamed jasmine rice, to serve

Heat a large, deep, non-stick frying pan or wok over medium high heat.

Add the curry paste and cook for 1 minute or until fragrant.

Add the pork to the curry paste. Cook, stirring, until the pork is well coated.

Add the ginger, lime leaf, coconut cream and stock. Simmer, covered, for 20 minutes.

Add the sweet potato, cover, and simmer for a further 20 minutes or until the sweet potato and pork is cooked through.

Mix in the lime juice, fish sauce, and brown sugar. Check for a balance of flavours.

Spoon the curry into bowls with rice. Serve with cilantro leaves, Thai Basil leaves, mint leaves and shredded green onion as a garnish.

Photo Hunt - Folks

This week's Photo Hunt theme is 'folks'.

Lots of folks dressed as Santa in Burlington today.

No, I was not one of them. :-)

Fact Checking

There was a lot in the past few months about how fake news sources and people who spread the fake 'stories' played a hand in the rise of Donald Trump. This short YouTube video shows how it happens . . .

be smart - check before you share!

Inner Child

Travel Tuesday - Amsterdam Christmas

Christmas is a month away. It is time to revisit some of the places I've visited around Christmas for Travel Tuesdays.

 

An Anniversary Dinner

Friday was a bit of a celebration for us. Depending upon your calculations it was our 6 month wedding anniversary or the 18.5 year anniversary of the day we met. During the first year we were together we celebrated ever month. During our first year of official marriage we were lucky to remember when the 6 months rolled around. To be completely honest, were it not for Paul I wouldn't have noticed.

Paul was off work on Friday night. I left the city early so we could make a night of it.

We decided to go to the new Jamie's Italian restaurant at Square One. We've wanted to go since it opened and never had but with something to celebrate we were there.

The restaurant does not take reservations from 5 - 9 so we just had to hope we'd be OK. We were. Large tales were waiting a bit but a table of two was not a bit deal.

We started off with cocktails. . . .

We weren't too hungry so we split an appetizer:

spicy meatball bruschetta. The meatballs were amazing and when they say the sauce is spicy they mean it. Happily we LOVE spicy so we were fine. All in all an amazing starter.

For our mains I ordered the mixed mushroom pizza and Paul ordered the mushroom pappardelle.

Both were delicious. The portions were HUGE. I was unable to eat all of my pizza. The finisher (Paolo) took care of that.

For dessert I had the mixed sorbet and Paul had an affogato. He raved and raved about the affogato (espresso poured over gelato) and wondered why he had never had something this good before - he has both at home and in Italy. SIGH

All in all we had a great meal. Delicious food. Good service. Great wines. A reasonable total.

We will be back.

After dinner we wandered the mall until it closed and headed home.

Why I Say Happy Holidays . . .