Food and Cooking Workshop at the Brick Works (Toronto) - Feb 9

For anyone living in Toronto, a friend of mine is putting on a cocktail party cooking workshop at the Brick Works on February 9th where she will demonstrating how to prepare small Persian- and Pakistani-spice plates using ingredients from the Brickworks farmers market. The workshop runs on Thursday February 9 in the evening from 7-9pm and costs $55 per person (less if you buy a multi-class pack). For more information and to register for the workshop, visit Evergreen Brick Works "Green Bites Workshops".

From the Spice Spoon:

MY COOKERY WORKSHOP- FOOD IS LOVE: 

For my Canadian readers- I will be teaching a ‘cocktail party workshop’ at Evergreen Brickworks on February 9th, entitled: FOOD IS LOVE- based on my childhood memories. I’ll be teaching you how to create small Persian- and Pakistani-spiced plates, (a mix of vegetarian and non-vegetarian) influenced by the recipes I have inherited from the women in my family, while giving them a modern twist. Preparing Persian or Pakistani dishes can seem time-consuming and challenging, but they are not. Come and join us to prepare small plates using ingredients from our farmer’s market. I will also be preparing a fancy-coloured cocktail to pair with the treats. 

On the cocktail menu, there will be the following, for example: 

Pomegranate & Rosewater Essence Sparkling Wine Cocktail 

Saffron Chicken and Roasted Red Bell Pepper Brochette with a Cucumber Yoghurt Dip 

Farmer’s Cheese, Dried Cranberry, Walnut and Tarragon Tartine 

This is the link to sign up for my workshop.

Variations of the Garden Vegetable Sandwich

This is the second post about our day trip to Buffalo and our visit to a US Tim Horton's. The other item we tried was the US Tim Horton's spin on the Garden Vegetable Sandwich. This is an item available at Tim Horton's in both Canada and the US (unlike the prized Peanut Crunch Donut) however, in my opinion, the Canadian version very clearly wins over the American one.

Total cream cheese overload...

The American version was rather disappointing for me. First of all, it had way too much cream cheese on it. I'm not sure exactly how much, but you'll see in the photo above that I managed to scrape off at least 2 full tablespoons of cream cheese (the bagels were huge) and there was still a more than reasonable amount left on the bagel. Also, the vegetables consisted of just shredded lettuce and a couple tomato slices--not even a cucumber! It was bit like a Burger King Whopper on a bagel without any meat and with cream cheese instead of Whopper Sauce. A Whopper might just have been better.

The Canadian version of the Garden Vegetable Sandwich, on the other hand, has full lettuce leaves and fresh cucumbers in addition to tomatoes. My preference is to have them with a bit of ranch sauce and sliced cheddar cheese instead of cream cheese. But it's actually such a simple sandwich that you can make them yourself at least as well, if not better.

Garden Vegetable Sandwich Variations

Take your favourite bagel and toast it. Throw on a couple slices of good cheddar cheese (I use an old or extra old white cheddar). Pile on a few fresh sliced cucumbers and tomatoes (and lettuce, optionally), season it with sea salt, freshly ground pepper and a light splash of olive oil and you have a perfectly simple and delicious sandwich. For another variation, try it with freshly sliced avocados as well.

These sandwiches also travel very well (we take them to work quite regularly). Be sure to wrap the vegetables separately in plastic wrap and place it at the bottom of the sandwich bag with the bagels and cheese on top (to prevent the vegetables from making a mess of the bagel).

Another simple variation is to make it a bagel and egg sandwich. For an easy "fried" egg, take a small glass dish (the flatter the bottom the better), lightly spray it with an oil spray, beat in one whole egg, add a touch of salt and pepper and top with freshly shredded parmesan. Microwave for 60-80 seconds and top with tomatoes and season with olive oil, salt and pepper.

Recreating the Tim Horton's (USA) Peanut Crunch Donut

On a day trip to Buffalo over the summer, we stopped at a Tim Horton's to grab a snack. What I learned was that while the Canadian and American Tim Horton's had many things in common, not everything was the same. Some things were better (as I'll explain below) and other things were considerably worse. I'll start off with the good and get to the bad later, in a subsequent post.

It was at this Tim Horton's (near the Buffalo airport--don't ask!) where I discovered the Peanut Crunch Donut. This donut is definitely not sold in any Canadian Timmy's I've ever visited--there's just no way I could have missed this donut. The donut is a simple but brilliant concept: an old-fashioned donut covered with a glaze and then doused with chopped peanuts. I like to think of it as a Payday bar crossed with an old-fashioned donut. With that image, I doubt I need to explain how this donut is now one of my favourites (though a baked peanut and chocolate donut just might beat that out).

Tim Horton's USA - Peanut Crunch Donut

This delicious donut posed a problem for me: how was I going to be able have this donut again upon returning home (and not having easy access to Buffalo)? I thought about petitioning Tim Horton's Canada to bring the Peanut Crunch Donut north of the border, but that could take months/years/never, and I want one here right now!

So I decided on a relatively simple solution. I would take a plain Tim Horton's Old Fashioned Donut, dip it in a donut glaze and then roll in it chopped peanuts. For the donut glaze, I adapted a recipe by Alton Brown from the Food Network website. My change to the glaze recipe was very small, but still important if you don't have experience making donut glazes (like me).

For the donut, any unglazed cake donut should work (e.g. old-fashioned or sour cream). With that said, I realize that not all donuts come unglazed, like many chocolate donuts for example. You could try experimenting using a pre-glazed donut, but you may make a bit of a mess of the old glaze and it might be tricky to get the new glaze to adhere. But just try it! Don't let my doubt stifle your innovation.

Matt's Almost-a-Peanut-Crunch-Donut


These donuts were a pretty big hit with my colleagues, who acted as willing taste testers.

My attempt at the Peanut Crunch Donut - not as pretty, but every bit as tasty

Ingredients

• 6-8 Tim Horton's Old Fashioned Donuts (unglazed)
• 1 1/2 cups of peanuts coarsely chopped as evenly as possible (see the exemplar donut above from Tim Horton's above, and not my version)

• 1/4 whole milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 cups confectioners' sugar
• Hot water (from the stove or microwave) for thinning the glaze - this wasn't in the original recipe but I found the recipe wouldn't have worked without it.

Directions

Before making the glaze, spread the chopped peanuts evenly over a piece of waxed paper. 

Combine the milk and vanilla in a saucepan and heat over low heat until warm. Gradually sift the sugar into the milk mixture, whisking gently and continuously, until well-combined. Remove the saucepan  from the stove and place in a bowl of warm-hot water so that just the base of the saucepan is submerged in the water. If the glaze is so thick that it is starting to harden in parts (as it likely will be), continue whisking it while very slowly dropping in hot water using a spoon until the glaze is just smooth without clumping or hardening as you whisk.

Now, take each donut and quickly dip it in the glaze on both sides and immediately roll each side of the donut and the edges in the peanuts. Repeat this process for each of the donuts. Pay close attention to the consistency of the glaze as you may need to whisk in a few drops from one donut to the next. If you find that the glaze goes on too thick and lumpy or the glaze doesn't adhere to the donut, you need to thin the glaze with hot water as described above.

And after you gorge yourself on several of these, you may want to detox yourself with a simple coleslaw from my previous post.