Happy New Year! These shrimp cakes are chuck-full of shrimp, in fact, they are more shrimp than cake! And they are packed with the fresh flavours of ginger, cilantro and green onions which work incredibly well with the sweet succulent shrimp! I had intended on freezing them, but they disappeared too quickly so unfortunately I have no idea how they would perform after being frozen. They really don’t take long to put together and they pan fry so quickly, you could make them up in the morning and hold them in the refrigerator until needed, then reheat them at 250F for about 30 minutes. These luscious babies are definitely going on my New Years Eve tapas menu.
In another bowl, combine baking powder, coconut flour and sea salt and mix well. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and mix into a paste.
Add the remaining ingredients (cilantro, green onions, celeriac and chopped shrimp and mix well.
Heat grape seed oil in pan (about 1 cm deep). Using a 4 cm cookie scoop, scoop spoonfuls into the hot oil and press down to flatten a bit. Fry each side until golden.
Serve warm with a spicy mayo dipping sauce (125 mL (1/2 cup) mayo with 15 mL (1 tbsp) sriracha sauce).
Notes:
You may use a blended gluten-free flour mix instead of just plain coconut flour, but I found the coconut flour flavour works really well here.
We are knee-deep in entertaining season so I thought I’d share some easy recipes for entertaining. Homemade dips are simple to make and are a million-times better than store-bought dips. I’ve suggested grilling the eggplant for a smoky flavour in my recipe but if your grill is tucked away for the long winter, you can broil them for a similar effect.
Speaking of entertaining, do you own a wood-burning fireplace or know someone who does? Do you struggle to bring wood in from your wood pile when you have friends over? The sawdust and bits of wood alway stick to your clothes and the number of trips in and out is tiring! I have a solution! I’ve created a handy log carrier, hand made by yours truly in Canada! This is the perfect gift for the wood burning fireplace owner! Made of heavy duty denim, with a copper handles, these carriers can hold 12-14 kg (25-30 lbs) of wood, the perfect amount for a roaring fire without breaking your back! They are $60 (Canadian) each or two for $100 (Canadian). Shipping within Canada and to the US is available but you’ll need to contact me before November 23 to make sure you get it by Christmas. Now let’s get busy and make some baba!
Late in the summer, I got together with a dear friend whom I haven’t seen in quite some time. We had a long lunch chatting about what’s going on in each of our lives and ended up reminiscing about wonderful vacations we have each had in Spain. Of course, my head goes directly to food and I had couldn’t stop thinking about a spectacular dish we had during one of our first meals in Almaria: a scallop wrapped in Iberian bacon bathed in a corn emulsion! It was out of this world. The delicate flavours worked so well together. I thought this dish could make a lovely starter or a beautiful amuse bouche, appetizer or light main course for the holidays; of course, I put my own little spin on it and it is equally as compelling. In the Notes area, I have made suggestions on how to make this dish vegetarian or vegan.
This scallop wrapped in Iberian bacon bathed in a corn emulsion is the artistic creation of Joseba Anorga Taberna, a contemporary restaurant rated as one of the top ten in Almeria.
Seared Scallops in Creamy Grilled Corn Velouté
A KitchenInspirations Original Recipe
Serves 4 as an appetizer or 2 as a main
Ingredients:
300 g grilled corn (or frozen corn)
~200 mL chicken stock
20 g roasted almonds (with or without skins)
sea salt to taste
20 g pancetta, cut into small bits
15 mL grapeseed oil
4-6 large scallops
butter
45 mL white wine vinegar
Splash of water
Directions:
Rince frozen corn, if using, to defrost. Purée the corn with almonds and the chicken stock until desired consistency is achieved (I used 200 mL for a thicker velouté). Press through a fine sieve to catch all of the corn skins, discard skins. Reserve the creamed corn at room temperature until required.
In a small pan, fry the pancetta in the grapeseed oil until crisp; set on paper towel to remove excess oil. Reserve the pancetta fat (there isn’t much).
Add the butter and reserved pancetta fat to a large cast iron frying pan. Dry the scallops well. When the oil is smoking hot, add the scallops and sear each side without turning or moving. The scallops will release from the pan when they are ready. Flip each scallop only once.
Remove the scallops and cover to keep warm.
Deglaze the pan with the white wine vinegar and splash of water, if using and reserve for drizzle (I did not need to add water).
To serve, spoon the corn velouté into shallow bowls (I like a rimmed soup bowl for a main or a small shell dish as an appetizer. Add the hot scallops, sprinkle on the crispy pancetta and drizzle with the deglazing liquid. Serve immediately garnished with shallot curls.
The subtly sweet corn compliments the delicate sweetness of the scallop, and then there is the salty bacon and the acidity of the pan juices. Heaven!
Notes:
This dish can easily be made into a vegetarian or vegan by using King Mushrooms instead of scallops as I have done here (they have a similar texture to scallops and will sear just like scallops). Substitute a robust olive oil for the butter and vegetable stock for chicken stock. Obviously, omit the pancetta but sprinkle the finished dish generously with sea salt for balance.
Searing is possible only when the scallop or King Mushrooms are perfectly dry, so pat them dry before you cook them.
If you are using frozen corn, add a pinch of sweet smoked paprika to emulate the smokey flavour of grilled corn.
This was our actual dinner, it was very tasty indeed.
I’ve been following “Memorie di Angelina“, an Italian blog by Frank. I like this blog because (like my other favourite Italian blog “from the Bartolini kitchens“), Frank documents authentic Italian recipes with easy instructions and mouthwatering photos. I have been drooling over his recipes all year and during this last summer, I was overwhelmingly inspired to recreate his Frittelle di pasta cresciuta con zucchine (Zucchini Fritters)! Those of you who have been following me for years know that I am not a fan of deep fried food, but once in a while a recipe calls out to me and I am compelled to make it: this is one of them.
These fritters are unlike any fritter that I’ve had; they are soft, pillowy, and slightly chewy, yeasted bread dough balls with delicate shavings of zucchini and thinly sliced shallots (I added the shallots, they were not in the original recipe). They are fried at a slightly lower temperature so they don’t brown quickly and get dark and crusty. The trick is to fry them through without getting them golden like most deep-fried fritters would be. The flavour is a little taste of heaven and if you feel decadent, serve them with a romesco sauce or an aioli (as Frank kindly suggested). I made the recipe as Frank outlined on his beautiful blog and yielded about 41 (may have been 42 — quality control, of course 😉) tasty morsels. I served them 4 per person but you may want to serve the entire batch if your crowd is hungry enough. They freeze beautifully and reheat in a 300° F oven in less than 10 minutes.
The dough is rather shaggy when raw, but using two spoons to portion the little balls (one to portion, the other to push off into the oil), it’s easy and not as messy as I had envisioned. I was quite surprised that I yielded back almost the same amount of oil as before frying, which means the little balls did not soak up much at all — it makes total sense as they didn’t taste oily or deep fried. Each ball swells as it fries and turns into about 1-manly bite or two-lady-like bites, perfect for cocktails. It’ll be some time ’till we drag out the outdoor cushions again but I thought I’d share the recipe for the Holiday season.
In a medium bowl, combine the yeast with the water and mix well. Add the yeast mixture to the flour and stir until well combined. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and cover, set aside for 2-4 hours.
Meanwhile, mix the shredded zucchini with a generous amount of salt and set aside for the duration of the proofing of the dough.
Scrape out the zucchini into a fine sieve and rinse with cold water. Place the rinsed zucchini into a clean piece of cheesecloth and squeeze as much of the water from it as possible. Sprinkle into the prooved dough and mix well. Add the salt and the shallots and mix well.
Preheat oil to 350° F.
Using two spoons, scoop out a small amount (about a generous teaspoon) and gently push the dough into hot oil, being careful not to splash. Add only a few at a time so the oil doesn’t lose its temperature. Lay the fried balls onto a clean paper towel to absorb the excess oil. Serve immediately or set aside/freeze and reheat at 300° F for 4-8 minutes.
These are light and flavourful Italian fritters. Do you like my new outdoor cushions and pillows? I made them using my new heavy duty sewing machine!
We remade the coffee table too but I forgot to take a photo!
We are fast approaching the holiday entertaining season and what better way to kick-start the party-fun than with some tasty cornmeal tuiles! I first saw these beauties on lovely Lorraine’s beautiful blog in early spring, and I knew at first sight that they would be making an appearance on my blog. The yield is amazing, I got about 50 tuiles from one batch! Now that is economical. And they are tasty too. I will definitely make these tuiles again, thank you dear Lorraine.
It’s best not to make these in the middle of the summer heat, like I did. What was I thinking?!?!?!?
This recipe makes 50 chips about 9 cm x 7 cm (3 1/2″ x 2 3/8″)
Ingredients:
215 g plain fine cornmeal, not flour
40 g gruyère, finely grated
5 g salt
30 g unsalted butter, cubed and softened
250-500 mL water, boiling
2 g Herbs en Provence
oil or non-stick spray for brushing baking sheets
Directions:
Pre-heat the oven to 375° F (190° C). Put a Silpat mat on the baking sheet. Add the tuile template, if using. Brush or spray the Silpat liberally with a high flash point oil, like grapeseed.
Combine the cornmeal, gruyère, salt and butter, mix well. Pour the boiling water into the cornmeal mixture and mix to a cream of wheat consistency. See notes.
Spoon 8 mL (a heaped teaspoon) into the centre of each tuile template and spread out to the edges using an offset spatula. Bake for 8-10 minutes, then carefully flip over and continue to bake for an additional 8-10 minutes until edges have gently browned and they are crisp.
Notes:
Lorraine specifically indicates not to put them on a parchment-lined sheet because that is what the original author suggested, but I like to live dangerously and tried it anyway—it didn’t worked out; I found that crisping took a lot longer because the parchment held onto the moisture. I found a happy medium by baking them on a Silpat matt brushed or sprayed with oil.
I mixed everything together with my immersion blender because I wanted a slightly finer texture to the cornmeal and I wanted to break up the herbs a bit more.
Confession: My chips were not curling beautifully so when I flipped them, I snuck a cannoli roll underneath each chip to give it curl.
An Australian cup is slightly less than a North American cup, but I found the recipe worked out anyway. for the pictured recipe, I used 400 mL water.
I reduced the salt by half and it was salty enough, but keep in mind that Gruyère is also very salty.
Consider adding some other flavourings, such as granulated garlic or onion powder. I would add 5 g at a time and taste to make sure it’s not overpowering.
I found that my tuiles shrank about 30% while baking so I increased the spoon drop to 8 mL (a heaped teaspoon) from 5 mL (a level teaspoon).
I tried to make lovely, even ovals but was not able to get it right no matter how hard I tried, so I created a tuile template using a silicon matt (that I bought at the Dollar Store for $4) and an Exacto-knife and oval cookie cutter. It literally took me 10 minutes! Or you may buy a tuile template here. Make the template about 20-30% larger than you want your chip to be because they shrink that much!
These make lovely little snacks when serving cocktails. These chips are deceptively sturdy and will hold up to any dip.
This is not your ordinary pancake. The mung beans add a certain richness and denseness to the pancake. It’s almost like an overmixed North American pancake! Having said that, it still has nice fresh flavour and can be quite addictive. Some recipes have you remove the skins and split the mung beans, I had neither the patience nor the time, so this recipe is a little green/greyer than most. I figured the skins had vitamins or at the very least, fibre. Use whatever veggies make you happy. Next time, I’ll add green onions because the chives had very little flavour.
Korean-Style Mung Bean Pancakes
This recipe makes about 20 appetizer portion pancakes.
95 g mung beans, soaked in warm water for at least 2 hours
250 mL water
15 mL miso paste
10 g coconut sugar
65 g rice flour
5 g ginger, grated
45 g coconut, soaked in water then drained
60 g each, frozen peas and corn
a handful of pea shoots
Chives
Cilantro
Directions:
Combine everything but the peas, corn, pea shoots and herbs in the jar of a blender and blend until very smooth.
Heat a non-stick pan and spray lightly with oil. Drop 15 to 30 mL batter onto the pan a good distance apart from each other (so you can easily flip them) and top with a sprinkling of the peas and corn, pea shoots and herbs. Cook until golden on one side, then flip and finish cooking for a very short time so that the herbs don’t burn.
Serve warm with dipping sauce (recipe below).
Ingredients for the dipping sauce:
30 mL rice vinegar
5 mL soy sauce
2.5 mL sesame oil
pinch of coconut sugar
pinch of toasted sesame seeds
Directions:
Combine all of the ingredients and mix well. Serve with mung bean pancakes.
One of the main differences between blog food and food styled food is that blog food is edible. You wouldn’t want to eat food styled food because it’s likely sat on set for hours and at the least been handled to death or at the very worst, there have been additions which make the food last longer on set! Meat is regularly oiled up to look juicy, sauces and stews get a dash of white corn syrup to look glossy and delicious, etc. The gummy-bear pancakes on my website were generously coated with silicon spray so they wouldn’t absorb the syrup too readily! Wraps are most often superglued together, and their stuffing is generally only 1/3 deep (the rest is crumpled up paper towel!). Coffee, tea or bevy’s in general are usually not even real, kitchen bouquet parades as a variety of liquids! So there is a HUGE difference between blog food (which we usually eat, moments after it’s shot) and food styled food! But you needn’t worry about these gyozas, not only are they pretty enough to eat, they were eagerly consumed directly after the shoot, and they were so yummy!
Turkey Gyoza
For original gyoza wrapper recipe, please click here.
Makes 24 gyoza
Ingredients:
120 g AP unbleached flour
67 mL water, boiling
pinch of salt
cornstarch for dusting
150 g lean ground turkey
5 mL sesame oil
40 g shallots (1 large)
3 g garlic scapes, finely minced
10 g ginger, finely grated
15 g carrot, finely grated
15 mL soy sauce
3 g coconut sugar
Butter or grapeseed oil to brown gyoza
Directions:
Combine flour and salt in a bowl. Add boiling water to the flour and salt mixture slowly to make a dough, turn out to a surface and knead for about 10 minutes until smooth. Cut dough into two and roll into a sausage-like roll. Wrap in plastic and allow to rest at room temperature for 30 minutes.
Heat the sesame oil in a pan and sweat out the onions, add the scapes and cook for a minute. Add the ground turkey and cook through. Stir in the ginger, carrot, soy sauce and coconut sugar and cook for a minute. Remove from heat and allow to cool thoroughly.
To make the wrappers, roll each sausage out to a manageable thickness and run it through the KitchenAid pasta roller from #1 to #5.
Cut into 7.5 cm (3 inch) rounds. Wet the edges of each round, spoon 5 mL (1 tsp) of meat filling into the centre and fold in half and seal the edges. I used a handy pleater like this one to get perfect pleats.
Steam each one for 3-5 minutes. When cooked, melt butter or grapeseed oil in a cast iron pan. Pan fry each one on one side only so it is golden and crispy. Serve with your choice of dipping sauce.
Freeze uncooked gyoza on a piece of parchment and once frozen add to a ziplock bag for future use. Frozen gyoza will cook in 3-5 minutes!
One side is crunchy while the other side is soft. They are sooo good!
