greeks do it fest

every year, smack dab in the middle of august, the greeks in the greek-centric neighbourhood of montreal put on a grand little street festival, complete with rides, dancing, hellenic music, and (most importantly) greek food.

there's no shortage of souvlaki, spit-roasted pork, and other dead meats, grilled octopus, greek salad with fantastic feta, and these: loukoumades (greek honey balls).

[i ate 6 of these loukoumades in one sitting. that's $3 worth of deep fried delectableness. i also now have recurring dreams about riding loukoumades balls down a waterfall made of honey and sandbanks made of cinnamon dust, except i can't swim so it's kind of scary.]

[everyone's favourite yiayia making those delectable loukoumades and fighting off the hornets!]

you know this is a culture where people eat not just for the sake of eating and merry-making, but to make sure everyone else around you gets fatter than you do.

[spit-roasted pork for sale. note the wild-looking butcher in the background. he's famous!]


don't miss next year's festivities so you can hasaposerviko* with the gang!

* i don't think that's a verb but whatever.

arugula and you!

gardeners know that if there ever was an annual garden green that was as prolific as the quiverfull, it would be arugula (also called rocket though i don't know why).

despite its evil superpowers to procreate like rabbits, arugula is deliciously bitter, flavourful and earthy. it's great in mixed green salads to give some bite and palatial, er, titillation. your gluttony is only bound by your imagination!


[gluttony as defined by fresh homemade pasta with arugula pesto and some sort of stunted cherry tomato]

when the arugula overruns my garden as it does every year*, i let my appetite for weeding run rampant and then make this arugula pesto with the reapings (more out of necessity than want). i mean, there's only so much arugla one can eat in a week before one's skin turns a tint of green.


[ready to rumble!]

arugula pesto
2 cups (500ml) arugula leaves
1 cup (250ml) coriander**
2 cloves garlic
1/2 tsp (2.5ml) capers
1 Tbsp ground nuts (pecans, pine nuts, almonds... if you toast them it brings out the nutty flavour)
1/2 tsp (2.5ml) salt
ground pepper to taste
1/2 cup (125ml) olive oil

1. pulverize: stick everything but oil in a food processor or hand blend it with an immersion blender.
2. finish: blend in olive oil.
3. store: store in an airtight container, such as a mason jar, and top it with a bit more olive oil. should last for a month or so (maybe longer).

* if you walk around chinatown here, you'll notice arugula growing everywhere where there's greenery. great for foragers and freegans.

** crazy it up! add a bit of tarragon, mint, basil or other herbage to make up 1 cup (250 ml) avoid using grass (though if you have fond memories of eating grass after getting tripped by soccer bullies into the sidelines, that's your prerogative).

hot naan from the bbq

the nearby grocery chain sells chewy, frozen naan bread for the rip off price of $1.99 for two little breads, each the size of a pancake. double-you-tee-eff is all i have to say.

in the spirit of diy and corporate defiance, i made my own fresh and hot naan on the bbq (that's indian bread and not anything else, pervs).



i followed this overly-joyous chef's norecipe guidelines:


[the colourful chef sanjay from www.vahrehvah.com!]

unlike my east indian neighours, i don't own a tandoor and would probably burn my place down if used one, but the bbq generates enough heat to imitate one. paired with a pizza stone and you've got finger-lickin' naan at your fingertips (as long as you don't put your hands in the bbq while they're cooking)!

tips: make sure the bbq is hot -- at least 500F (~260C). pop them in on a baking sheet or on the hot pizza stone and keep the bbq closed until you're ready to flip it, which should be about after 2 minutes. (oryou can also follow in chef sanjay's advice and use a piping-hot oven).

[more on indian bread coming soon... with special indian friend, rishi-rish!]

mango armadillos and mango salsa

if some of your friends are jerks, they probably keep secrets from you and call you ugly behind your back.

fortunately, i am not a jerk and i think everyone is equally ugly, therefore i'm nice enough to share this nifty little tidbit on dicing up mangoes.

[mango armadillos!]

1. quarter your mangoes all the way to the pit using a paring knife.
2. slide your knife between the flesh and the pit to loosen the flesh from the pit.
3. score each mango quarter all the way to the skin as in the photo.
4. slide your knife between the mango flesh and skin, as if filleting a fish. you should end up with diced pieces of mango, or if you're unlucky, diced mango with nicks in your fingers.

after dicing your mangos, you can make this great fruit salsa!



mango mango salsa
3 mangos (ataulfo, preferably), diced
1 cup fresh coriander leaves, chopped
1 red pepper, diced
3/4 cup red onion, diced
1 fresh chili pepper, diced
1/3 cup olive oil
salt/pepper to taste

• mix all ingredients together and then eat it with pleasure on fish, meats, roasted or unroasted vegetables, or with tortilla chips or with just a spoon and your guilty conscience.  
• even goes with hot dogs!

dahl 1 for butter, 2 for ghee, or dahl zero for the operator

my friend dan claims he's incompetent at cooking because he's scared of poisoning himself. i think if he's gone through 20+ years of feeding himself, and if you've only poisioned yourself once, it's a good start.

dan, however, is a vegetarian, not to mention a busy and talented artist. he is also a self-proclaimed lazy and terrible cook, and might actually be malnourished and anemic as a result.


so i said to dan, "dan, you should eat probably more legumes. it'll probably help with your anemia."

and dan said, "i'm not sure i want stuff up my butt."

"dan, i said 'anemia', not 'enema'."

i told him this lentil and beans dish will help him regain brain red blood cells he's missed out on due to his narcotics vegetarian habits. after eating half the dish, he asked that i make it for him again, to which i said he can make it himself by following these simple steps!

[murgh makhani (butter chicken) and not dahl makhani... guess my chicken fixation got the best of me.]

dahl makhani* (buttery lentils, i guess)
serves a 4 to 6

protein*
4.5oz (~125g) (dry weight) black lentils (~3/4 cup dry, or ~300g cooked)**
1.75oz (~50g) red (dry weight) kidney beans (~125g cooked)**
1.75oz (~50g) chickpeas (dry weight) or channa dahl (smaller chickpeas, aka gram dahl) (~125g cooked)**
2 cloves garlic
1 small bay leaf

gravy
1/2 onion, chopped finely
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 Tbsp (!5ml)  ginger, finely julienned or chopped (reserve half)
1 tsp (5ml) ground cumin
1/2 tsp (2.5ml) ground fenugreek seeds
1/2 tsp (2.5ml) garam masala
3/4 to 1 cup (175ml to 250ml) tomato puree (or 2 medium tomatoes you've cooked down)
1 Tbsp (15ml) finely ground cashews (or almonds)
salt/pepper to taste

finishing
1/4 to 1/2 cup (65ml to 125ml) heavy cream
1/2 tsp (2.5ml) garam masala
2 Tbsp (30ml) butter or ghee
chopped coriander for garnish

1. prepare the legumes/protein: if using dried, sort and rinse the lentils, and then cook them (~20 min); rinse and soak red kidney beans and chickpeas for a 4-6 hours or overnight. cook them in enough boiling salted water with garlic cloves, bay leaf, and some cooking oil (to keep the foaming down) until cooked through (~40 min). drain, remove garlic and bay leaf and set aside. if using canned, skip the cooking step; just rinse. set aside.
2. prepare the gravy: cook  heat butter or vegetable oil in a large saucepan over medium heat and cook onions until translucent. add garlic, half of ginger, cumin, fenugreek, and 1/2 tsp garam masala and cook until fragrant (a couple of minutes).
3. complete the gravy: add tomato puree and ground cashew to onion mix and stir occasionally until thoroughly heated. 
4. add the protein: add the cooked kidney beans, chickpeas and lentils to the gravy. simmer for another 15 min or so.
5. finish the dish.when ready, stir in cream, garam masala, butter and remaining ginger to the dish until heated through. serve by garnishing with chopped coriander. eat liberally with naan, rice, or whatever you want.

*you can make this dish with chicken (especially if you like dead fowl like i do). marinade about 1/2 lb (~250g to 300g) chicken bits with a yogurt-ginger-garlic-tumeric-salt and then pan-fry the chicken before adding the gravy/curry to it, as you would the lentils/beans.

** you can used canned versions which is about 2.5x the dry weight.

fresh harvest: bloomin' tomatoes

first tomatoes of the season!

oh, ly-co-per-si-cum
so rotund and sweet!
unlike my chewing gum,
you are great with lunch meat!

a marmite enthusiast by the name of chan

this adorable little lady is the only person i know who is obsessed, driven and corrupted by marmite, not unlike anakin skywalker being lured by the power of the dark side. most people i know have either never tried it or have never even heard of it, let alone devote an entire essay to it.


[channy chan-chan about to stuff her face with a beautiful flower salad; she probably would have doused it in marmite if she had a smuggled a bottle on her.]

she is, in fact, the transgressor behind my first taste of marmite (her diminutive size is no indicator for her uncanny ability to convince people to eat random, strange things).

however, as a result of her unhealthy obsession, the gods afflicted her with the curse of vertical challengedness. her "love affair" (her words, not mine...) with this by-product of beer-making makes her a marmitophile... nymphomarmitis... lady marmite!

read up on her infatuation with this weirdly wonderful, salty, yeasty goop!


[photo by g travel via flickr]

(considering that the uk ranks in the top 6 of highest amount of beer consumption per capita, that's a buttload of yeast extract!)