Adventures in Food

It's time once again to report on how I'm doing on my self-imposed challenge to make at least one recipe from each issue of Food & Wine. I have to admit, I am really glad I challenged myself to do this. It is really helping me increase my pleasure in every issue. I have to say ... April's issue had me salivating and I think it may be hard to select something ... I may have to conquer something new each weekend.

So, from March's issue, I decided to try something from their article that featured Indian cuisine. With this in mind, I knew I was going into a challenge from if my family would like it. K is pretty open minded, but D is not the world's biggest fan of Indian food. (However, he humours me from time to time because he knows I love it.)

I decided to tackle Sanjeev Kapoor's Parsi-Style Vegetable Stew. I selected this recipe for a couple reasons: 1) it was full of vegetables and, frankly, in this six-month winter, we could use more of those in our diet and 2) it did not contain curry. The reason D doesn't favour Indian food is because he despised curry.

I've learned it's really important to do my mise en place for these recipes. If I want to have flawless execution, I need to be planful. Even though, I have to admit, I needed to improvise a little on this recipe as I thought I had onions ... and didn't and I substituted crushed red chile pepper for the dried red chiles.

 

The result was a mild, but appealing stew. It was a little more brothy than what I think of when I say stew, but it did capture to me the essence of a simple, flavorful dish. While I don't know how often I would go out of my way to make it (okay, the ingredient list is super easy, so not too much to go out of your way for) I won't mind eating the leftovers this week for lunch.

In other adventures ... one of my other favorite mags is Food Network Magazine. And the latest issue has a fantastic article about ten-minute desserts. K and I were looking through it and he spotted a chocolate cream pie. It then became the only thing I heard about for the next few hours. So, I decided to give it a whirl.

You cannot get much easier than this: Beat 8 ounces softened cream cheese, 1/2 cup sugar, 1/3 cup cocoa powder, 1/3 cup milk and 1 teaspoon vanilla extract until fluffy. Spread in a chocolate cookie crust. Beat 1 cup heavy cream with 2 tablespoons sugar until soft peaks form, then spread over the cream cheese layer. Top with shaved chocolate.

The result was a simple, but delicious dessert that pleased all the men in my house. Yes, we even gave O a tiny taste. I think we are excited to tackle some of the other ten-minute desserts.

I have one more adventure in food to tackle this month, and that is sweet potato donuts. I bought the ingredients, but ran out of time, so I am hoping I can tackle them one night this week or definitely this weekend.