Monthly Archives: June 2012

Grilled Tofu on the BBQ with Sweet Potato Fries and Fresh Garden Salad

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Regular readers of this blog will know, I’ve recently fallen in love with Moksha Yoga.  I first went to Moksha when I was participating in the Waterloo Cleanse and the Living your Moksha challenge and it has become a large part of my life.  So large in fact that I have started to volunteer there four hours per week.  Officially, I am an Ambassador; which means I help clean the studio, check people in when they arrive and generally help the studio run smoothly.  Moksha is a really great community that I am so happy to be a part of.

All this yoga has effected my riding to work though. The Moksha studio is a fifteen minute drive from home which doesn’t allow me to ride as often.  But I can’t say I miss it that much, since I’ve been able to replace it with something even more fulfilling to me.  Al on the other hand has really taken to riding to work this year and typically rides four to five times per week.  So far he is on pace for our goal of 80 bike rides this year.

Recently, the weather has been really hot and humid – forcing me to not attempt new recipes and just sticking with the old standby’s to get a quick meal prepared.  But tonight I was inspired by cupcakes and kale to try the grilled tofu.

For the salad, I used a mix of romaine, Boston bib, red leaf, kale and radishes all fresh-picked from my garden.  The rest of my veggies – tomatoes, cucumbers and peppers are not ready yet so I had to settle for store bought and I dressed it with the leftover tofu marinade.

I didn’t try her sweet potatoes since I knew the tofu would be a hard sell for Al so I stuck with our usual spicy sweet potato fries on the BBQ – which are always a hit.

The grilled tofu was …awesome!  Both Al and I really liked it.  Al even said he would be “okay”, if I made it again.

I think we have found yet another way to make tofu.

Enjoy !

Grilled Tofu with Spicy Sweet Potato Fries and Garden Fresh Salad

Grilled Tofu with Spicy Sweet Potato Fries and Garden Fresh Salad

 

Oven Apple Pancake

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I have been a little lax on the blog lately since the weather has been so nice and we have been spending a lot of time outside.  So far this spring we have picked lettuce twice.  The radishes and kale are also ready to be harvested.  We had a bit of rain this morning and our first two zucchini flowers popped out.  Everything else is coming along well and it looks like this year will be a great season for produce.

Veggie garden - Five weeks after planting

Veggie garden - Five weeks after planting

Crisp radishes waiting to be picked

Crisp radishes waiting to be picked

Zucchini flower

Zucchini flower

In honour for Father’s Day I decided to make an old favourite for my wonderful hubby that I found in a Christmas cookbook about 15 years ago.

Oven Apple Pancake

1/4 cup butter
1/3 cup brown sugar
pinch of cinnamon
1 – 2 apples (I used McIntosh) peeled, cored and sliced
3 eggs
3/4 cup milk
1/2 tsp. salt
3/4 cup flour

Melt butter in a 9 inch pie plate at 425 F

Remove pan from oven, stir brown sugar and cinnamon into melted butter.

Overlap apples in a single layer on top of the brown sugar mixture.

In a small bowl add eggs, milk, salt and flour. Stir to moisten.  Don’t try to smooth out the small lumps.  Pour over apples.

Return pan to oven and bake for 20 – 25 minutes until top is golden brown.

Cut into wedges.  Serves 4 – 6

Oven apple pancake

Oven apple pancake

A slice of yummy oven apple pancake

A slice of yummy oven apple pancake

Enjoy !

Barrie’s Fresh Asparagus Soup

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Asparagus season is here! What better way to celebrate it then with a pot of homemade asparagus soup – especially since the weather has once again gone below seasonal.

A short drive from our house is Barrie’s Asparagus Farm and Country Market.  When we first moved here, this great little spot only sold asparagus and rhubarb during May and June, but over the past few years they have evolved into a fabulous place to get tons of local products and produce.  You can get local cheeses, jams, pickled products, a variety of flour and seasonal fruits and veg. They even raise their own pigs now and sell the most amazing sausages.  Try the hot one’s, you’ll love them – and they’re not greasy like store bought sausages.

This asparagus soup recipe is theirs and I wanted to make sure to give them credit.  When asparagus season is coming to a close I typically make up a few batches of the asparagus puree and freeze it so that I can make a few batches over the summer.  Asparagus soup is even great served cold on a really hot humid day.

Barrie’s Fresh Asparagus Soup

Cook in covered saucepan:

1 lb fresh or frozen asparagus, chopped
¼ cup chopped onion
1 cup chicken broth

When asparagus is tender, it can be blended until smooth into a puree. (This can be done ahead and frozen)

Heat in saucepan:

2 tbsp. butter or margarine
2 tbsp. flour
½ tsp. salt
Dash pepper

Into this stir: additional cup of chicken broth
Asparagus puree (prepared earlier)
1 cup of milk

Stir until boiling

Stir a little of the hot soup mixture into ½ cup sour cream or plain yogurt.

Stir this back into the soup, then add 1 tsp. fresh lemon juice.

Heat to serving temperature.  Sprinkle with fresh chives.

Enjoy ! 

 

Asparagus Soup

Asparagus Soup

Al Wins His First Bike Race…Sort of…

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This past Sunday, Ashley Judd’s husband Dario Franchitti won the Indy 500. In F1, Mark Webber held the pole and won the Monaco Grand Prix. Ryder Hesjedal became the first Canadian to win cycling’s Giro D’Italia. And I beat a cyclist in man-tights.

It was Monday. The humidex climbed to a sticky 38 degrees celcius. The warm breeze slammed my face like Lard Ass Hogan slammed his face into blueberry pies in the movie Stand By Me. I came to a stop at a traffic light alongside another cyclist in his man-tights. Me and man-tights didn’t say anything, but you could feel the tension. We both knew it was on. An epic face-off, like Luke Skywalker vs. Darth Vader…Ali vs. Foreman…Sampras vs. Agassi…Travolta vs. Cage in the actual movie Face-off…and now…me vs man-tights.

Knowing I needed a quick start once the light turned green (in order to possibly catch the next light), I glanced back at the light behind me so I could jump the gun once the advanced green was finished. The advanced left changed to amber, then just as it turned red I started peddling. I bolted through the intersection past an ill-prepared man-tights.  I was unstoppable. I felt like Kevin Costner in the epic cycling movie, American Flyers. Okay, maybe it’s not an epic, but it’s a cycling movie. And I know what you’re thinking, get to the point Al – and I will, I just didn’t want to be like Jim Levenstein in American Pie and get to the climax too quickly.

Anyway, with my head low, my legs were pumping like pistons.  I approached the next light and could see the hand had started flashing, but then I had a Randolph Dupree moment like in You, Me, and Dupree, and I said to myself “Not this time Lance”. I kicked it into high gear and just as I got into the intersection, the light turned amber. Once I was through the intersection I looked back and man-tights was running the red. Whiskey-Tango-Foxtrot man-tights? Obey the rules of the road…second place LOSER!

Anyway, it was a good week for riding, even if my bike is starting to squeak more than the Station Inspector’s leg in Hugo. Maybe I’ll retire from racing undefeated and get a bike that I can do this on…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJXU7EVXs2A