Beef and Mushroom Chop Suey

A recent trip to a Chinese restaurant ,where I enjoyed this dish as part of a combination meal for three, led me to make my own version of beef and mushroom chop suey. It was tasty in the restaurant but the pieces of beef were few and far between. The dish was mostly bean sprouts. My version was much more generous on the beef front with about half a pound of steak divided among two portions.

The only change I made to this recipe was to ‘velvet’ the beef by marinating the sliced beef with one teaspoon of baking soda, for half an hour, before the beef was thoroughly rinsed in cold water, patted dry and then marinated.

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Happy Easter ! (2023)

Happy Easter to everyone who celebrates the occasion.

I was on my own and threw together a pork roast with fiddleheads, hash brown patties and  onion rings for supper. Cream puffs filled with whipping cream for dessert and a glass of Pinot Grigio to wash it down. The latter was a Christmas gift from my nephew.

DIY Tandoori Paste and Tandoori Chicken

I know it’s St. Patrick’s Day but I made an Indian meal today. There are a number of  tandoori paste recipes out there but I chose this one because I had all of the ingredients and didn’t have to make any substitutions. Since it’s too cold to barbecue in south-western Ontario, and I don’t have a BBQ anymore, I broiled the boneless, skinless chicken thighs (720 gm) on high for 13-15 min and then transferred the tray to a lower shelf and baked for another 10 min at 325 deg F, until the meat registered 160 deg F in the thickest parts.

You can use the paste to marinate fish, lamb, mushrooms or tofu according to what I read. I may chop up the leftover chicken and make some butter chicken. Or I may just eat it all as is.

Pizzaman (Steamed Buns)

Pizzaman are pizza filling stuffed Chinese style buns found in Japanese conbini (convenience stores). The dough was made based on this recipe from Youtube though I had to increase the amount of water I used to 120 ml rather than 100 ml. The filling was spicy Italian sausage filling removed from the casing and cooked off, cooled and then combined with jarred pasta sauce and grated mozzarella cheese.

I had to do a bit of fiddling with the amount of pasta sauce I added as it was too wet to start with and my pleating needs work but otherwise, this recipe was a winner.

Pasta with a Blue Cheese Sauce

Another quick and easy dish based on this recipe.

You can use your home made pasta for this but I went with bought pasta and spent my free time making the sauce.

Pasta with a Danish Blue cheese sauce garnished with crispy strips of bacon and toasted walnut pieces. If serving to company, you can garnish with some fresh parsley, but I didn’t bother, especially because I didn’t have any.

Chicken Livers

A comfort dish from my childhood was chicken livers and spinach rice. This is my lazy way of enjoying at least the chicken livers especially on a gray and cold winter’s day.



No real recipe is involved. Just clean the chicken livers by removing the membranes etc. and cut into bite sized pieces that are about the same size. Rinse in several washes of water, drain and pat dry. In a frying pan, saute a diced onion in some vegetable oil until softened and just beginning to colour, add the chicken livers and fry until they’re no longer pink. I like them nice and firm. Season with salt and pepper to taste. I like to push the chicken livers aside to leave an empty spot and then add about half a teaspoon of a good quality sweet paprika (Hungarian preferred) and fry it off then stir into the chicken livers.

Double Chocolate Stout Walnut Bread

My nephew gifted me with various interesting beers over the summer. On one delivery, I ended up with a can of double chocolate stout, which seemed a bit challenging to drink on its own. I HAVE had Guinness Stout in the past, and though I can drink the first half pint without too much trouble, by the second half, as it warms up, it’s rough going. So, I decided to search out a bread recipe that might make good use of the beer. For texture, I decided to add some coarsely chopped walnuts to the dough.

The result was an interesting bread with a bitter undertone that became wearing as I made my way through the loaf.

I ate it in as many ways as I could, including toasted and spread with peanut butter or as a base for scrambled eggs.

I turned it into  French toast with a generous pour of maple syrup and served as part of a hearty brunch.

In a final move, I cubed and toasted the bread and turned it into a bread pudding served with Bird’s custard.

With time, I made my way through the loaf. It was not a failure but I wouldn’t make this bread again. PS: I took a sip or three of the extra beer in the can and it wasn’t to my taste either.

Quick Fish Tacos

Just a quick post to ‘keep my hand in the game’, as it were.

At long last, I made fish tacos. Though they’re not close to being ‘authentic’ starting with the fish used (sole), they tasted great. I based them on this recipe I found on the web.

The toppings were just stuff I had on hand and liked. I substituted feta cheese for the cotija cheese called for.

My only regret is not having a cold cerveza to wash them down with.

Tourtiere (Version 1)

About thirty years ago, I made an attempt at a tourtiere, a French-Canadian meat pie, but the pastry was so hard that I ended up tossing the whole thing. I finally decided to try again using a recipe I found on line. The crust was a great success, but the filling was a bit on the bland side. I’ll try again one day. In the mean time, this was the result.

Beef Rissoles with Zucchini

My neighbour gifted me with a giant zucchini (seedless) and after making a chocolate zucchini loaf, I still had about 75 % of the zucchini left so I did some googling and found this recipe for beef rissoles with grated zucchini in the meat mixture. Here are some pretty pictures taken during the process of assembling the rissoles.

Pictorial recipe