Curry, Hummus and Pasta

Boil a package of Pasta. Drain, rinse and allow to cool. In another bowl, combine frozen spinach, a package of Knorr vegetable soup mix, a package of feta, a tub of ricotta, roasted red peppers (from a jar), sun dried tomatoes (from a jar), chopped up marinated artichoke hearts, chopped up garlic and chopped up fresh mushrooms. Mix everything into the pasta. Top with diced tomatoes and shredded mozzarella. Cover and bake in the oven until vegetables are cooked to satisfaction.

I might try this again using some tomato paste, more sun dried tomatoes and more marinated artichoke hearts.

To make hummus, Take a can of chick peas, and blend it in a food processor. At some point, start with a table spoon of lemon juice, a clove of garlic and a tablespoon of tahini. Add more of each to taste. I made roasted red pepper hummus by adding half a jar of roasted red peppers.

For the curry, take some stewing beef and marinate over night with: garlic, ginger, a bit 'o sugar, light soy sauce, some Montreal steak spice, cayenne pepper, parsley, oregano, salt and pepper. The next day, flour and brown. In a large sauce pan, combine curry paste, two cans of coconut milk and one stalk of lemon grass. Add browned beef, chopped up carrots, celery and potatoes. Simmer/stew for two hours. Add mushrooms, more carrots, celery and green onions. Stew/simmer/reduce until desired consistency (thick).

And you're done.

Salmon with Sauce

At some point, my hours spent watching the Iron Chef had to pay off. It was about 10 minutes after I'd shoved the salmon into the oven that I realized I needed to make a tasty sauce for the fish. I wasn't too sure what to do, but I eventually settled on a fruity, honey glaze to offset the lemon and onion I was baking the salmon with.

I started by heating up some butter and a little bit of oil. When the grease was hot enough, I threw in some garlic, ginger and orange rind. Had I shallots, I would have used those too. I let everything fry for a few moments until it started to brown, then I took it off the heat and removed most of the fried up bits leaving only the slightly burnt, flavoured oil.

Once that was done, I put the oil back on the stove and threw in a chopped up apple. I added some brown sugar and a fair bit of honey at this point. I let the apples stew for a few minutes, I wanted to make sure that they were cooked. By this time, much of the water in the apples had thinned out the liquid in the pot. I threw in a bunch of raisins, and an orange. I also had some boiled, left over carrots, so I chopped those up and threw them in too. That was about as fancy as I wanted to make this concoction, so I just let it simmer until the liquid thickened up again.

Voila! A sweet, fruity, slightly burnt and bitter tasting saucy fish glaze.