Merry Christmas!

I hope everyone is having a good Monday! The turkey is cooking, the ham is in the oven, too, Christmas dinner is coming together. I am taking a moment out of this to forward some pictures from the making of my favorite meal... chicken fried steak!

Here's the chicken fried steak cooking. You will notice that we do not use a deep fryer for this. That doesn't give a flaky crust, which is absolutley essential for chicken fried steak. This is why most restaurant cfs is grim.



Next is the making of the gravy to put on top of the steak AND french fries Oh yes, it's just that good.



If this were my last meal on earth, it would be pretty much like it was the other night. Chicken fried steak, french fries, gravy and canned baby peas cooked until really soft. We've had this meal my entire life, and I just love it. It's the meal I look forward to most when I come home. Here's the finished plate:



I am sure it looks a bit heavy duty, but oh man, it's so good.

Then, we made fudge. Here's a bunch of pictures of that...





Phew. Good times. The fudge was some of the best we made. Recipe? Courtesy of...



Anyway, got to get back to making Christmas dinner. It's been a great Christmas here, I just can't get over how warm it is here. Global warming at it's nastiest because it is really nice to be able to go outside and feel the sun on your face and have a light jacket on, but you know the cost for this 'comfort' is ridiculously high. I worry for the planet.

I hope everyone has a great day, whatever religion you are or are not. Dinner photos to follow.

J.

G's Hannukah Cupcakes.

A thing of beauty is a joy forever.

Home for the Holidays

Well here we are, in sunny homeworld. It's good times, really.

For dinner tonight, my brother made an old family favorite that I haven't had since my grandmother used to make it when we'd visit on the weekends. What's it called? Hamburger Cobbler.

Now G was game, but she didn't swoon.

Here is the play by play...



Oooh. Browning meat.

But then... ASSEMBLY!!!!



Nothing says dinner like kraft singles. Honestly.



And biscuits. Now Mom told us that this recipe came from a 1950's company cookbook from the company where my Grandfather worked. It's a family thing, eating it tonight really reminded me of being a kid and sitting at my grandparents house and having dinner. It's such a rare thing for us to have, and it reminds me just how much food transports us to a memory. G was joking that, as we were out today, I kept telling her memories of things that were all food related. She thought that was odd, but really, food is one of the most present memories for me. Everything else is just... stuff.

BUT without futher ado, a few shots of the finished product...



Okay, having some connectivity issues, so I am going to stop here. Just to say, what is this beauty above? Well, first you brown ground beef. Then put in casserole pan. Top with cheese slices, kraft works best. Then top with sauce known only to a select few... a combo of tomato sauce, etc., and then top with biscuits of the cheap variety, bake. ENJOY!

Chicken Fried Goodness.

So far, in Toronto, I have only found one place that has chicken fried steak. So tonight, we went to dinner at Shanghai Cowgirl which was just delightful.

G had the pierogies



And I had... the lovely chicken fried steak!!!




Now granted, this isn't the best picture. The gravy was almost hollandaise-y which was strange, but the crust was good and light and the meat was thin, though a bit too thin for my liking. G said that it wasn't as good as my Mom's, which is hand to the Bible true, but all the same, it hit the spot for the comfort food without the dishes

Downside? Diet Pepsi in the CAN instead of coke, but good service and good prices made this an all around good meal.

Yesterday was the McD's after a bad day at work... Let's check out the quarter pounder, shall we?



Yeah, it's all good. Anyway, plans to go home for the holiday's so the pics of the food should be all good all the time. Well, there will be plenty of them. I am not the best at taking photos of the food, yet, give me time...give me time.

Otherwise, hope this finds everyone well. I do recommend Shanghai Cowgirl for a fun relatively inexpensive meal. It's lots o' fun. And if you have pics of chicken fried steak (which isn't chicken, nor is it really steak in the sense of a rib eye, don't ask for it rare, you know?), send em on.

Saturday Night Dinner

Last night, G and I took her mom and dad out to his favourite restaurant, Gameroni's, for dinner. This restaurant has no website, and a websearch yielded about twenty sites with the restaurants mussels in tomato sauce recipe. Alas, no pics of that, but, what can you do? It is amazing, we had it the last time we were there and it was great. BUT, last night...

I had the Veal Medaglioni. This was a veal chop covered (smothered?) in a mushroom cream sauce, served with some steamed veg and a little dollop of pasta. Here it is:



G had the Osso Buco (which makes me say, 'you like osso buco, charlie?' which she found only alightly amusing the first time, but very irritating the twentieth). She said it tasted like something your Nonna would make, however, since neither of us have a Nonna, we imagine that this is how it would taste. My southern grandma made the best chicken fried steak, and G's grandma, well, she could make a mean boiled chicken. Anyway, here is the osso buco...



Now, I have started to make some changes to the blog, as promised. I have recently made a change from my Dell Desktop to a Macbook, and am still in the process of learning the Mac and transferring bookmarks, etc, from the Dell. It will take me some time, but it will get there.

I hope that if anyone actually reads this food blog, you make comments and interact. And for those of you who I am linking to, I hope you don't mind. I read all your blogs regularly and love sharing this with you. Anyway, cheers!

Foodies Beware.

I am really keen to start a food blog, and over the next few days, you will see lots of changes to this. I am really excited to share my love of food and all things food related with you, and will have lots of links to my favourite sites and all that sorta thing.