The healthy fruity vegetarian sandwich.

Last weekend I had two meaty dinners of epic deliciousness. First, my family celebrated mother's day on Saturday night with an amazing pulled pork dinner that my mother put together. And on Sunday, I went to Ottawa with one of my friends to attend the ComicCon that was happening there. For dinner, I decided to take him to Fatboys Southern Smokehouse. I discovered this place last year on Canada day with my family. And we stuffed ourselves with huge smoked ribs, more pulled pork and the most delicious fried chicken I have ever had in my life so far. After that, my digestive system decided to go into emergency digestion mode and I have been digesting all this meat for two days. Needless to say, when it was time to grab lunch on Monday, I opted for a light vegetarian meal.

A colleague of mine suggested that I try this place called Frais Café. It is located near my work on Beaver Hall just south of René Lévesque. It's a little sandwich, salad and soup shop; kind of like a fancy Cultures. They had a couple of vegetarian options and the one that got my attention was a pear and brie sandwich. I ordered that with a minestrone soup and it was delicious! Then I thought "hey! I can do that!" And so I did. That evening, I went grocery shopping and got my stuff together and made myself an amazing lunch. Let me show you what I did.

Ingredients:

• Raisins and nuts muesli bread from Moulin Rouge bakery
• Arugula lettuce
• Hummus (I got the roasted garlic one to add another dimension of flavour)
• Pears
• Brie cheese

Directions:

It's a sandwich. So, it's just a matter of putting all this stuff together between two slices of bread. You can do a PB&J sandwich? Then you can do this too.

First off, slice a pear into thin slices, making sure you remove the core.

Spread hummus on both slices of bread and add the pears.

Slice the Brie cheese lengthwise and add to the sandwich along with the Arugula lettuce and drizzle with a little bit of olive oil and balsamic vinegar.

Add some chips and some salted mixed nuts for a little extra protein and you got yourself a well balanced vegetarian sandwich meal.

This was absolutely delicious. Sweet and salty at the same time. I love it! And the key here is the bread. If you can't find this kind of bread, just get regular multi-grain bread. Don't use raisin bread like the Sun Maid one. This is too sweet and has cinnamon and stuff. If you can't have nuts, try something else for the protein like a bean salad or quinoa salad.

That's gonna be my lunch for the week!

Quick Chicken Tikka Masala

Remember when I made that vegetarian lentil curry? I made too much and ended up with some extra. I decided to freeze it for later. Well, I've been extra lazy these past couple of weeks, eating plain sandwiches for lunch and also a shit-ton of frozen leftover Chinese fried rice. So, I decided I was going to eat the curry now. Except, I realized I barely had enough to last me two days with a fresh batch of rice. So, in order to make at least 4 meals for the week, I decided I'd add some chicken. But, to accompany an Indian dish, I decided to spice it up in the same way. Which is why I made chicken tikka masala.

Tikka means chunks. Masala, I think, means spicy or is a name for a blend of spices. That's basically what this is. Chicken cut into chunks, marinated with a blend of spices. The recipe is basically like the chicken shish taouk that I made a while back. You combine yogurt, spices, garlic, ginger, tomato paste and lemon juice to make the marinade, marinate the chicken for an hour (it's best if you can leave it over night) and then put it on skewers and cook in the over for about 25-30 min. Here is the recipe in more details.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup plain yogurt. (I used 0% greek yogurt, but any kind of plain yogurt will work)
• 1/2 can of tomato paste
• 2 tbs ginger paste (I had ginger puree)
• 2 tbs garlic
• 1 tbs sage (I didn't have any coriander on hand, otherwise use 1 cup finely chopped coriander.)
• 3 tbs garam masala
• 1 tsp chili flakes
• 1/2 tsp paprika
• 1 tbs lemon juice
• 4 chicken breasts

Directions:

First, mix all the ingredients above (except the chicken) into a bowl and mix.

I had slightly too much lemon juice in mine. I corrected it above in the ingredients.

Whisk all that up into a nice uniform mixture.

Cut your chicken breasts into cubes.

Dump the cubes into the marinade, cover with plastic cling wrap and refrigerate for an hour or a day, or whatever time you have available to do other stuff.

While the chicken was marinating, I made some extra basmati rice. Pretty much the same way I made it in my vegetarian lentil curry post. I added a few drops of rose water this time to make it a little perfumy. An hour later, I took out the chicken and skewered it, put it in a deep cooking dish and put it in the oven at 400 Fahrenheit, for about 30 mins, turning it over halfway at 15 minutes.

The chicken came out great! Along with the rice and lentil curry as a side dish, I'm going to be able to feed myself for another week with minimum effort! Yay!

Chinese Fried Rice

This week I felt like having some Asian food. I was kind of craving chicken fried rice. So I made some! Indeed, having some cooking skills has its perks. You feel like having Chinese take-out? You want some sandwich from a fast food chain? You miss your mom's home cooking? Just make your own!

Chinese fried rice is so easy to make too. As long as you have the right ingredients, sauces and and spices you're gonna be fine. In fact, I sorta did mine like whatever. Just threw in what I thought would be right and it   turned out awesome! Even tastier than take-out! A word of warning though, I made a ton of it because I knew that this was all that I was going to eat for my lunches along with a couple of egg rolls. But if you want, you can reduce the recipe by half and serve it as a side dish to any meal you make. Here's how to do it.

Ingredients:

• 1 lb of chicken breasts
• 1 can 19 oz (540ml) of diced carrots and green peas
• 1/2 a pack of sliced mushrooms
• 2 tomatoes
• 1 small onion (I used half a large spanish onion)
• 3 stems of green onions
• 1 small red or green pepper (I had left over green peppers from last week's recipe)
• 2 eggs (heck, 3 would've been even better!)
• Some oil for cooking
• Sesame oil
• 1/2 cup Soy sauce
• 1 cup Hoisin sauce
• 2 cups of bean sprouts
• 1-2 tbs Chinese 5 spices to taste
• 2 cups Uncle Ben's converted rice
• 1 box of frozen egg rolls (you know, to accompany the rice)

Directions:

First off, just pop those egg rolls in the oven. Those things'll cook themselves. Put 'em on a baking sheet and stick 'em in there at 375 F. After the first 10 minutes, flip them over, then waint another 10 minutes. BAM! You got egg rolls.

And they even come with the plum sauce!

Also, you may want to cook the rice first since it needs to be cooked by itself before mixing it with anything else. So, go ahead and cook 2 cups of rice according to the instructions on the box. Usually it's about 2.5 cups of water for 1 cup of rice. First, get the water to a boil with some salt and a tablespoon of butter or margarine. Then add the rice and let it cook until it's just about done. Drain if you have to and set aside. 

I cooked one cup at a time because I don't have very big pots.

While those egg rolls are a cookin' and that rice is boilin', let's get a choppin'! While you're doing all this, keep an eye on your egg rolls and your rice. Stir that rice from time to time to make sure it doesn't stick to the bottom. Let's get the onions out of the way first because onions are sons of bitches that make you cry... Stupid onions...

I'm not crying...

Then we move on to those... fruits... Fruits? Bitch, please. Do you bite in a Tomato like you do in an apple? Does it even taste sweet? I don't care if technically it grew from a pollinated flower and has seeds. I'd barely even call it a freakin' vegetable. I mean that thing is all weird inside and gelatinous. Like some kind of larvae vegetable hybrid that never quite evolved to full maturity. Anyway, dice those things up.

Same with the peppers. Chop them up finely.

And the green onions.

Finally, cut the chicken into small cubes.

Before we mix all those together in a big pot, lets cook those eggs first. In a bowl, crack open the eggs and add about 1 tsp of soy sauce and 1 tsp of sesame oil. Then whisk them up to mix them.

In a pan, put 1 tsp of regular oil (I use grapeseed oil), and heat up to medium-low. Cook the eggs so that they break up into small pieces. Chop them with your spatula. Then set aside.

Now bring on the big pot and put it on medium heat. Add 1 tbs of oil and brown the onions. Then add the green onions and the chicken and cook the chicken thoroughly.

When the chicken is cooked, incorporate the can of peas and carrots as well as the tomatoes. At this point add half of the Chinese 5 spices and Hoisin sauce and mix well.

Finally, add the bean sprouts and the mushrooms. Then add all the rice, the rest of the spices and Hoisin sauce, the soy sauce and the scrambled eggs. Mix it all up and let it cook until the mixture is hot. At this point, you can add more soy sauce, Hoisin sauce and a little more spices to taste.

Done! Now serve. I hope you enjoy!

Those chopsticks are just there for show by the way.

Flipping the bird to Subway, again

July of last year I got really angry at a Subway employee for not knowing how to prepare a regular tuna salad. So I ended up making my own. I haven't been to a Subway in a long time. The truth is, I've eaten there so many times, simply because it was the only cheap "healthy" option around between that, Tim Horton's and McDonald's, that I simply got sick of it. The very smell of the place, you know that weird yeast-y baked bread smell and overripe veggies, now triggers a true feeling of disgust in me. But, sometimes I can't help but crave a god damn southwest steak n cheese sub. It's their sauce. It's so god damn delicious. Yet, I still didn't want to go to one of their franchise and smell that horrible smell. So, I decided to make my own god damn southwest steak n cheese sub and flipped the bird to Subway once more. And if you like that sandwich too, I'll show you how to make one at home.

Take THAT, Jared.

I went to the grocery store and got myself most of the same ingredients that they use at Subway. Bread, meat, cheese, veggies, sauce, etc. That's right, you can get the "same" spicy chipotle sauce at the grocery store. Ok, it's not quite the same. I think the subway one has more sugar in it. I'm pretty sure it tastes sweeter, which is probably why it's so god damn addictive.

Ingredients:

• Thin fondue beef slices
• Sliced Swiss cheese
• 1 green pepper
• A couple of ripe vine tomatoes
• Red onions
• Iceberg lettuce
• Can of sliced black olives
• Jar of sliced Jalapeno peppers
• Jar of pickles
• Herb & Parmesan sub bread
• Bottle of spicy chipotle sauce

Directions:

First, take apart the lettuce. To do this, just turn it upside down and press down on the core so the leaves break off and you can pull it out. Then just split it in two, rinse the leaves and get rid of the water in a spinner. This is important because, often, some bugs and dirt can get stuck in the head of lettuce. You don't want to eat that. I found a couple of small little beetles in mine. Not to mention that this will rinse off any pesticides that might remain on the lettuce.

When it's dry enough, store it for later use. I put mine in a large ziplock and left it open to dry up a bit so there won't be too much moisture in there.

Next, just wash the tomatoes and green pepper, peel the onions and just slice everything up, just like at Subway's.

Now for the steak. The great thing about fondue steak is that it's about as thin as the one they put in the sandwiches at Subway. Also, even though it is sold frozen, you can cook it right away in seconds. I just cooked mine in a pan over a little less than medium heat with a little bit of Worcestershire sauce and Montréal steak spice. I cooked two packs of frozen beef in minutes and I had enough to last me the whole week for my lunches.

After I was done, I put this all away in the fridge in nice sealed plastic containers. The next morning, I prepared my lunch for work. I sliced one of the breads in half lengthwise and just stuffed it. And then, I covered that sandwich with some spicy southwest chipotle sauce!

That bread was way too small to contain so much awesomeness. Thankfully, I had extra super mega heavy duty aluminum foil to contain it. Any regular aluminum foil would've exploded like dynamite. I even put it in a Ziplock bag just in case. To that, I added a small bag of Mrs. Vickies kettle chips, some cheese, and a couple of snacks. And there, you had my not Subway sandwich lunch for the day. Just as tasty, probably healthier, a heck of a lot fresher and probably cheaper considering what I would pay to eat at Subway all week versus the amount I paid for the ingredients themselves. And I didn't have to go through smelling that godawful yeast and rotten veggies smell. Hooray for home-made lunches!

This would've been a complete Subway meal had I

baked some more double chocolate and walnut cookies!

Vegetarian Lentil Curry

A couple of weeks ago I went to a vegan restaurant on Saint-Laurent called Aux Vivres. (Among other places.) I had an amazing dinner there and after I stuffed my face I didn't feel bloated and heavy. It was great! And it got me thinking: maybe I should try to make something vegetarian sometimes to get a break from the meat. Maybe that would help me feel better. And if there's any culture in the world who knows how to cook good vegetarian food, it's the Indians and their multitude of spices and curries. So this weekend I decided to prepare a vegetarian lentil curry with basmati rice. I had a few hiccups while doing this recipe, such as the lentils becoming too soft and turning to mush, but I will still tell you how I did it and tell you afterwards how it can be improved after my experience.

On a side-note, a lot of people have told me about saffron and how it's so expensive for just a few strands and how hard it is to find. I really don't know what's the big deal. I have a huge container full of the stuff that I bought for $2.59 in a Lebanese grocery store. See? This is great in basmati rice and I always use it when I make some.

Ingredients:

• 4 small ripe tomatoes
• 1 large regular onion, or 1/2 a Spanish onion
• 2 small sweet potatoes or regular potatoes
• 1 bag of frozen cauliflower, thawed.
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 1 tbsp grapeseed/olive/vegetable oil
• 2 tbsp curry paste (I used leftover Thai curry paste in a jar that I had)
• 1 tbsp curry powder
• 1 tbsp turmeric powder
• 1 tbsp cumin powder
• 1 tsp chili powder
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp white sugar
• 1 tsp grated ginger
• a pinch of safran
• 1 tbsp margarine
• 2 cups red lentils
• 4 cups of vegetable broth
• 2 cups basmati rice
• 6  cups of water

Directions:

First off, wash, peel and cut the potatoes into tiny cubes about 2 cm wide (~2/3 of an inch). They have to be small in order to cook faster.

Next, peel and chop the onion. Man up and stop crying, you wuss!

Next, mince the garlic.

Then cut the tomatoes in small quarters. Don't need to chop them up too small, we're going to put them  in a food processor to turn them into a purée. Try to keep the juices in as much as possible.

I got this for cheap at Walmart. It's small, but it does the job.

Before cooking the lentils, it is very important that you wash them in cold water and make sure to check for small stones. Wash the lentils in a large bowl by soaking them and whisking them with a whisk. When the water is all dirty, use a strainer to drain the water and start all over again and repeat until the water is clean. If  you don't do that, your broth is going to turn all scummy and gross and it's going to taste bad.

What you need to wash the lentils.

Keep them close for later when you need to drain the rice.

Now here's where I start cooking the lentils. This was my first mistake. I started cooking the lentils before I started on the vegetables. And when I was supposed to add the lentils to the curry, it was too late. They had been sitting in their hot broth for far too long and turned mushy. So from my experience, do this step later while your vegetables are cooking and add them when the lentils are almost done. To check if lentils are ready, you do like you do with rice: you taste them. If they are tender but still whole, they are ready to eat! So we want to cook them until they start getting soft, which isn't very long, trust me. It's just a few minutes. So if you want to do this right, you may skip ahead to the curry preparation part.

To cook the lentils, bring 4 cups of vegetable broth to a boil. The way I did it is I boiled 4 cups of water with 1 tbsp of margarine and added vegetable broth powder as instructed on the package.

Once the broth is boiling, add the 2 cups of red lentils.

For the rice, bring 6 cups of water to a boil. Add 1 tbsp of margarine and a pinch of saffron and mix until margarine has all melted. Then add the rice and cook until the rice is tender, then drain and set aside.

To prepare the curry, first combine and mix the curry paste, curry powder, turmeric, cumin, chili, salt, sugar and grated ginger into a bowl until uniform an set aside.

In a large pot, heat up the oil on medium heat and brown the onions and the garlic until the onions start getting transparent.

Then add the mix of spices and toast the spices for about a minute. This will help bring out the flavours a lot more. Then add the tomato purée and mix well.

Bring to a simmer and then add to potatoes, mix and cover, stirring occasionally to make sure nothing sticks to the bottom. Let the potatoes cook until they start becoming tender, but are still a bit hard. (That's when you should start cooking the lentils.) Then add the cauliflower, mix, cover and let it cook until they start getting tender too.

When the lentils are just about done, transfer them with the vegetables, mix well and cover a little while longer. When the sweet potatoes, the cauliflower and the lentils are all tender, remove from the heat and let cool.

Dinner is done and is ready to eat. Just scoop some basmati rice in a place and cover with the lentil curry and enjoy!

Hopefully, if you follow my advice, yours should end up better than mine. It's a good think I documented this so that next time I want to do this recipe, I'll remind myself of the right way to do it!