East meets East? #Naan with #fishfragrant #eggplant | Fish fragrant eggplant is a classic #Chinese dish. I had all the ingredients for it at the house including ground pork but I wanted to have something to go with naan. Since there are no Indian dishes with ground pork I decided to mix east and east since Chinese food does have a few breads and fish fragrant eggplant is extremely flavourful like a curry, with chili bean paste, garlic, and green onions. Cut 3 Asian eggplants into slightly larger than bite size pieces. The eggplant will shrink when cooked. Heat 2 tbsp canola oil in a wok or large pan. Add eggplant and stir frequently, allowing it to brown but not burn. You want the eggplant to caramelize to bring out the flavour. Cook in batches if you’re using a small pan to prevent over crowding. Too much eggplant at once will prevent the eggplant from browning. When the eggplant is cooked set aside. Heat pan again and add 1/2 lb ground pork, cook pork until all the liquid evaporates and the oil starts coming out of the pork and the pork starts to brown. Add 3 cloves minced garlic and 3 chopped spring onions. Cook until fragrant, about 2-4 minutes. Add 1 tbsp chili bean paste and 1 tsp soy sauce. Cook for another 1-2 minutes, stirring constantly. Add back eggplant and cook for another 1-2 minutes stirring constantly. Finish with 1 tbsp black vinegar and 3 green onions chopped, remove from heat and stir. (Taken with instagram)

I strongly believe that some of the best foods come out of necessity, and with my oven broken its been necessary for me to find other ways to get my bread fix. I found a great way to make #naan without a clay oven or any oven and with the nice brown spots of great naan. | Heat 1 cup of whole milk with 1 tbsp unsalted butter on medium heat. As soon as the butter melts remove from heat and add 1/4 cup water. Let the liquid cool til cool enough to touch and add 1 tsp dry active yeast, 1 tsp salt and enough all-purpose flour so the dough pulls away from the bowl. The dough should be sticky but not too sticky to handle (about 2 cups of flour). Knead dough for 5 minutes and let rest for 2 hours. Punch down the dough, divide into 8 balls and roll out to 2 cm high using a rolling pin. I find the naan cooks best when the dough is even. Heat a cast iron pan on medium heat. When the pan is hot add naan and cover with tight fitting lid. Cook for 2-3 minutes, flip and cook for another 2-3 minutes, still covered. The cast iron pan gets nice and hot like a clay oven and the lid insulates the heat like an oven to help the dough rise and cook faster. Each stove is slightly different so play around with your settings to get the bread nice and brown in about 2-3 minutes. You can brush with butter or sprinkle with onion seeds if you like but this naan is great plain. (Taken with instagram)

#fresh #pasta w #spicy #Italian #sausage, #caramelized #onions, baby #spinach, and #parmesan | Heat pan on medium high heat and brown 2 spicy Italian sausage out of casing. When brown and crumbly and all the water has evaporated, add 1/2 diced red onion and 1 clove minced garlic and continue to cook until the onion caramelizes, this may take 5-10 minutes. Add a handful of baby spinach and cook until wilted. Add pasta with 1/4 cup pasta water or chicken stock and cook for another 2-4 minutes. Add salt & pepper to taste and top with freshly grated parmesan. (Taken with instagram)

#Fresh #Pasta is really easy to make especially for one or two people. If you have a pasta roller than its even easier but if you’re making one or two portions you can roll it out by hand. With more people it may get a bit tedious to roll out by hand but it’s still doable. | 2/3 cup all purpose flour or whole wheat, 1 large egg per serving. Pile flour on a counter and make a well so it looks like a little volcano. Crack eggs in center of the well and beat with a fork incorporating flour a little at a time until you get a sticky dough. You may not incorporate all the flour but that’s ok. Knead dough by hand with as little extra flour as possible so that the dough is not sticky enough to handle. Let dough rest covered for 10 minutes while you boil a pot of water. Roll out pasta with pasta roller or rolling pin and cut to desired width. Place in boiling water for 1-2 minutes. Just until the pasta floats. Drain and serve with desired sauce. (Taken with instagram)

Since my oven’s not working I’ve started going to friend’s houses to bake bread. I make the dough at home then proof and bake in their oven. It’s actually been a good learning experience because every oven is slightly different and everyone’s tools are different. This morning’s kitchen was a little oven and very little kitchen tools so we opted for a simple breakfast. Just #fresh baked #bread, soft boiled #eggs, Yorkshire #smoked #ham, & sliced #avocado. Normally I would have done bacon but it’s a bit messier and this Yorkshire smoked ham was so delicious I didn’t miss the bacon at all. :) (Taken with instagram)

General Tao’s Chicken | This adapted for #homecooking #recipe has all the flavour of #GeneralTaos #chicken, a #Chinese restaurant favourite, without the messy deep frying and extra breading. The breading while tasty is mostly filler to allow restaurants to use less chicken. Removing it makes it much easier to make this dish at home. Marinade 1 pound boneless skinless chicken thighs, cut into cubes, for 1/2 an hour in 1/4 tsp white pepper, 1/4 tsp five spice powder, 2 tsp soy sauce, 1 tsp Chinese rice wine (I like shao xing wine), 1/2 tsp toasted sesame oil, and 1 tbsp water. Meanwhile mix 1/4 cup Chinese black vinegar, 1/4 cup granulated sugar, 1/4 cup water, and 1 tsp soy sauce. Mix until sugar dissolves and set aside for sauce. Chop 2 stalks green onion, 2 cloves garlic, 1/2 tsp fresh ground ginger, 2-4 fresh #chilies (remove seeds for less heat). Heat pan with 1 tbsp canola oil. Pan fry chicken on high heat until the liquid evaporates and chicken starts to brown and is almost cooked through. Add chilies, garlic, ginger, and green onions and cooked for 1-2 minutes until softened and fragrant. Add vinegar sugar mixture and bring to a boil. Mix 1 tsp cornstarch with 1 tsp water. Add cornstarch mix to chicken and allow to thicken for 1 minute then turn off heat, continue to stir for a minute and serve. (Taken with instagram)

#Gomae (aka cold #spinach w #sesame dressing) | this #traditional #Japanese dish is so #simple and #delicious! Wash spinach and trim off ends if you like. You can use baby spinach or regular spinach. Place in a boiling pot of water and cook until just wilted, 2-3 minutes. Immediately strain and put in ice cold water to stop the cooking and keep the colour. Strain again, this time squeezing out any excess water and place spinach in the fridge. Meanwhile toast 2 tbsp black sesame seeds on a fry pan on low heat until slightly fragrant. You can use white sesame seeds too but I like the colour of the black ones with the soy sauce. Place sesame seeds in a mortar and pestle and add 1 tsp granulated sugar. Grind into fine powder, if the sesame seeds are toasted this should be pretty quick and easy. Add 1 tsp of #mirin, 1 tsp toasted sesame oil, 2 tsp soy sauce, and 2 tsp hot water. Mix, pour over cold spinach and enjoy! More mirin recipes to come so buy a bottle and stay turned for a super simple teriyaki sauce! (Taken with instagram)

Baked #Maple #Apple #Pancake Topping | I love real maple syrup but sometimes it’s a bit strong and tends to stick in one place so you need to add a lot to cover a big pancake. I love apples but I’m allergic to raw apples and can only eat them cooked. This topping gives me a quick apple fix and solves my maple syrup issues. Preheat your oven to 375F. Peel, and slice 1 apple, pick an apple that’s good for baking. Melt 1/2 tsp of butter on a small oven safe frying pan heated. Toss in sliced apples and toss to coat in butter. Add 1/4 - 1/2 cup of maple syrup depending on how syrupy you like your pancakes. You can also sprinkle a little cinnamon if you like. Bake apples in oven until soft, about 15 minutes. Stir 1-2 times to coat apples with syrup. The resulting syrup will be much more watery and weak than pure maple syrup, you can reduce it on the stove if you like to make it more syrupy but I like it a bit weaker because I find pancakes absorb syrup like a sponge and if I use pure maple syrup it’s way too sweet. I’ve also made baked peaches as well. Very delicious and it’s always nice to get in a bit more fruit. Even if it is covered in sweet goodness :) (Taken with instagram)

Pancake for One | This is a one person serving of pancake, you can double, triple or whatever the batch but I find pancakes exhausting to make for a lot of people, one person needs to be constantly flipping pancakes. I like this recipe because it makes a much higher quality pancake, since i’m only making one I’m not thinning out ingredients and it’s one flip and you’re done. Melt 1 tbsp butter in an 10 inch fry pan on medium low heat. Mix 1/4 cup yogurt, 1 beaten egg, 1 tbsp sugar, 1/4 tsp pure vanilla extract, and a pinch of salt in a bowl. Add 1/2 cup self-rising flour and 1/4 tsp baking soda and melted butter, slightly cooled. Mix until combined, do not over mix, the batter should have lumps. Melting the butter on the pan then adding it to the batter means you have a greased and heated pan ready to go. Try to get as much butter as possible off the pan and into the batter. Pour the batter onto the pan and wait until bubbles appear on the top and when they pop you can see the cooked pancake below (about 2-3 min). Flip and cook the other side for another 2-3 minutes until golden brown. Enjoy! (Taken with instagram)

#Sourdough Starter | a starter is basically fermented dough and wild yeast. Anyone can start a starter with a bit of patience. It just requires some flour and water left out at room temperature, covered with a dish cloth, with regular feelings for about 3 weeks. I’d say start with 1 tbsp flour, 2 tbsp water. Leave for 2 days then add another 1 tbsp of flour and 2 tbsp water. Keep doing this until the starter starts to bubble at each feeding and the starter floats when you drop a bit gently into water. I used a large yogurt container to start my starter. Once it started bubbling I mixed 50g of flour with 60g of water and 1 tbsp of the starter in a new container and put the rest of the starter in the fridge. When a drop of the new container of starter floated in water I added another 50g of flour and 60g of water and waited til it floated again. I’d use 200g of the new starter for baguettes when it was ready and added flour and water again for the next round of baguettes. Keeping the larger container of starter in the fridge slows the yeast down so I can feed it less. Once a month I may feed that starter, the rest of the time I just take out a tbsp when needed to start a new batch of starter. Feelings usually take about two days. The longer you leave the starter the stronger the sourdough flavour. (Taken with instagram)