Lots of lava! (Without the guilt!)
I don’t eat dessert too often, but when I do I really love it! After careful consideration I narrowed down my favourite dessert to two. Chocolate Lava Cake and Créme Brûlèe. (I hope I never have to choose between them because I will be torn forever!) 
However, we all know that when you’re trying to either lose weight or keep it off most (if not all) of the trainers, dieticians and fitness pros will tell you to lay off the sweets and to skip dessert altogether, or to have a bite once in a while but never eat the whole thing! Well… that wasn’t good enough for me! I don’t have much of a sweet tooth, but when I do eat dessert I like to make it worthwhile, and then I feel guilty because of all the hard work I put into working out and getting fit… I don’t know about you but I don’t like feeling guilty, do you? So… in my search for delicious dessert that doesn’t affect the waistline, I found this little gem! Read more
Empanada by any other name…
I’ve always loved empanadas as a mid-afternoon snack, as I got older, it was a delicious accompaniment to the afternoon coffee or tea. Of course, I’ve only ever had them in El Salvador and had no idea that many, many other countries had their own “empanadas”. The ones that I have been lucky enough to try have all been delicious but seems like I haven’t even begun to skim the top of the empanda world… In Chile, empanadas are stuffed with a mix of beef and vegetables called pino (similar to the mincemeat filling), chicken or cheese; In Portugal, their empanadas are usually stuffed with tuna, sardines or chorizo; in Costa Rica , they are fried and filled with seasoned meats or cheese, beans or cubed potato stew; in the Philippines, their empanadas are fried as well and are filled with ground beef or chicken, potato, onion and raisins… I can almost guarantee that if you search for an empanada recipe on-line, you will get hundreds of different variations from dozens of different countries! But, for now, let’s talk about the Salvadorean kind… Read more
Dancing for fun and fitness
Summer is in full swing, gotta take advantage of every second of it since we get very short summers here in Winnipeg. That is one of the reasons why I haven’t spent much time cooking lately. I’ve also been spending a lot of time dancing. I was dancing 4 hours in a row twice a week! I was practicing for a dance performance and really wanted it to be perfect. The costumes that the girls chose for this performance where so much more revealing than anything I’ve ever worn in public. Talk about a motivator for exercising and eating well! 
I learned about the performance in early April when I joined the ladies dance group and 2 weeks later I found out about the costumes so, I did what any one would do and kicked my healthy routine up a notch. The first performance was two weeks ago and, even though I haven’t been as diligent in my routine lately I still was able to break through my plateau! I wanted to share some of my tools with everyone, just in case you were looking to kick things up a notch…
The World in your Kitchen 2010 – Gambia and Senegal – Mafé
After taking a hiatus on my international cooking (my time has been consumed by knitting and dancing believe it or not) I finally came back to my good ole trusty 2010 calendar, I did skip the March recipe for now because it was a litte too simple and more of a “snacky” type food but I will definitely come back to it at a later time. And even though it’s already May I wanted to share the recipe for April. It’s called Mafé and it’s a peanut stew from Gambia and Senegal. It’s a vegetarian dish, like all of the recipes from the calendar, and it looked so good on paper that I was very much excited to finally try it out…
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Tea Time in Vancouver… a short review
I just got back from a short vacation in Vancouver. My reason for going this time around was to celebrate my sister’s 30th birthday but of course I took the oportunity to visit some (not all, there are too many!) of my favourite eateries and to try a couple of new ones in between the celebrations. For me there is no such thing as a trip to Vancouver without trying at least one of the tea houses or tea services that the city has to offer. There is one tea house that I love called The Secret Garden Tea Company but this time I tried two other tea services, one of them was quite good and another one not so much but still worth mentioning. Read more
A favourite treat
I am excited to go see my sisters in Vancouver next week. Not only to see them and the beautiful city that I love but also to eat some of my favourite foods. From the Bandara Salad from The Cactus Club Cafe to the best sushi I have ever tasted (keep in mind that I’ve never been to Japan… yet!) but one of the most unusual and really simple things that I love in Vancouver is the Japadog. Think a hotdog+japanese ingredients. This is something so brilliant that I’m amazed that someone didn’t think of fusing the tastes together a long time ago! Impatient as I am I’ve been counting the days until I can go visit a Japadog stand and, as I was telling my brilliant friend, Jess, about it she decided that she could make her own version of it and share her results with me.
The version that we made was with wasabi mayo (word to the wise, use a very little bit of wasabi powder if you’re making your own wasabi mayonaise) and Nori Komi Furikake (which is sesame seeds and seaweed). Just well cooked veggie weiners and fried onions made this a very good idea indeed. A great way to spend a saturday afternoon:
I have the bestest friend in the world don’t I? Thanks Jess for a delicious treat!
The World in Your Kitchen 2010 Calendar – China
Wow, it’s been a busy time. Everytime I wanted to make this dish there was something that came up. Either dinner plans, studying or just plain lazyness. 
So today I decided to not put it off any longer. This is supposed to be the February recipe from my calendar…. oh well, better late than never I guess.
This recipe is for Bei gu su or Tofu with vegetables. It’s a super easy stir fry! Literally, took about 20 minutes to prep and then about 10 minutes to cook, I think if you prep ahead of time you can have dinner ready in 10 minutes. And who doesn’t love that? Read more
Best EVER Chocolate Cake
It seems like with me joining Steeped Tea I have gotten off track with interntional recipes. I definitely will continue cooking around the world but lately I have gotten requests from my customers to provide some recipes for either baking with tea or treats for a tea party. In my search to find a chocolate cake that I would enjoy, that is, not too sweet or with a lot of bells and whistles, I came across a blog called Whipped and an AMAZING chocolate cake recipe. Not too difficult and very good! Read more
Tea and more tea!
Having a love of tea makes it difficult for me to control myself arond anything tea related. I guess it’s not a bad addiction to have, tea is, after all, very healthy! And it’s the best thing to have around when company shows up. Like the great quote from Gladstone goes: ”If you are cold, tea will warm you. If you are too heated, it will cool you. If you are depressed, it will cheer you. If you are excited, it will calm you.” So, when I came across the tea review blog’s tea swap (http://www.teareviewblog.com/?page_id=1706) I jumped at the chance to share my tea love with others around the world. This was a great idea! Read more
The World in Your Kitchen 2010 – Ethiopia
I wanted to share the recipes from my lovely 2010 calendar. All of the recipes are vegetarian and most of the ingredients are very easy to find. If the recipe calls for something unusual it also gives you a simple substitution. I love it! Here’s the recipe for January… Ethiopia.
