Canadian Goulash

This recipe was originally published many years ago in a Vancouver newspaper as "Granville Island Stew." Unfortunately, I don't remember which newspaper it came from, but the stew is delicious.

The key is to saute the primary ingredients before cooking to really bring out their flavours.

Ingredients

Oil for frying (vegetable or peanut oil work well)
500g beef, cut into 1" squares
4-5 medium onions, cut into wedges
500g mushrooms
Minced garlic (as much as you can take)
2 T flour
2 T tomato paste
thyme
bay leaf
salt and pepper
1 1/2 c orange juice
1 1/2 c red wine
1 can broth or consome or other strong soup mix
2 T brandy

Instructions

1. Saute garlic and onions with oil in a frying pan until brown.
2. Add meat to the frying pan and saute until the meat is brown.
3. In a bowl or blender, puree flour, tomato paste, salt, pepper, and thyme. Stir in orange juice, wine, and broth.
4. Pour the liquid mixture into a large wok or slow cooker. Add the bay leaf and sautéed ingredients from the frying pan.
5. Cover the wok or slow cooker and simmer for 1.5 to 2 hours until the meat is tender.
6. While the stew simmers, saute mushrooms in the frying pan.
7. 15 minutes before the stew is finished, add the sautéed mushrooms and brandy to the mixture.
8. Remove bay leaf before serving.

Serve over broad noodles or spaetzle.

Pajon Dipping Sauce

This is a dipping sauce for pajon. Pajon is a Korean pancake, somewhat similar to Japanese okonomiyaki but without the sweetness or mayonnaise on top.

Ingredients

2 T soy sauce
1 T water
1/2 T pepper powder
1/2 T sesame oil
1 T sesame seeds

Directions

Mix ingredients in a bowl.

Sesame Paste Salad Dressing

This is a very simple to make Korean-style salad dressing that tastes delicious.

Ingredients

3 T sesame seeds
1 T mayonnaise
1 T soy sauce
1 T honey
1 t sesame oil (optional)

2 T lemon juice
1 T vinegar

Directions

1. Grind the sesame seeds. If you don't have a tool for this, you can use your hands to grind them. The finer, the better.
2. Mix all ingredients except the lemon juice and vinegar.
3. Add the lemon juice and vinegar a little at a time, tasting as you add them. It's very easy to put too much of these ingredients in and make the dressing too sour.

If the dressing becomes too sour, add more ground sesame seeds to balance the flavour.

Apple Sauce Cocoa Cake

Ingredients

1 cup (250 ml) walnuts

3/4 c (175 ml) butter

1 1/2 c (375 ml) packed brown sugar

2 large eggs

1 t (5 ml) vanilla

1 t grated orange rind

3 c flour

1/2 c unsweetened cocoa powder

1/2 t salt

2 t baking power

cinnamon and allspice

1 t baking soda 

1 1/2 c applesauce

1/2 c yogurt

Directions

1. Grind walnuts. 
2. In large bowl, cream together butter and sugar. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Stir in vanilla and orange rind. Set aside.
3. In another bowl, combine flour, cocoa, salt, baking powder and baking soda. Stir in ground walnuts.
4. In another bowl, whisk together applesauce and yogurt until well blended.
5. Add the flour mixture and applesauce mixture alternately to butter mixture, stirring just enough to blend after each addition. Turn batter into greased 12 c (3L) bundt pan. Bake at 350 F (180 C) for 45 to 55 min or until done. Cool in pan for 5 min. Turn out on to rack and cool completely.

Chocolate Chip Banana Muffins

These muffins taste great and freeze really well for when you want a quick snack. They're best when made with really ripe and mushy bananas that have started to go brown.

Ingredients

Dry Mixture

2 c flour
1 t baking soda
pinch of salt
1 c semi-sweet chocolate chips

Moist Mixture

1/2 c butter

less than 1/2 c sugar
2 eggs
1 c mashed bananas (2 large or 3 medium)
1 t vanilla extract

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees C and prepare 12 muffin cups.
2. In a large bowl mix together flour, baking soda, and salt. Stir in the chocolate chips.
3. In a saucepan, melt the butter and mix the sugar in. Whisk the eggs in one at a time.
4. Add bananas and vanilla to the moist mixture in the saucepan.
5. Add the moist mixture to the dry mixture all at once. Stir until batter is moist but still lumpy.
6. Fill 12 muffin cups 3/4 full of batter.
7. Bake for 25 minutes.

Blueberry-Banana-Sun Butter Smoothie

This is an amazing smoothie. The addition of sun butter (sunflower seed butter) adds a nice variety to the flavour. It tastes very similar to peanut butter but is a much healthier choice. The key is to make sure the ingredients are frozen so that it has a nice milkshake consistency but without any added milk or ice. Peel the banana and break it apart into 3-4 chunks, then freeze in a ziploc bag.

Combine the following in a blender and blend.

1 frozen banana
1 cup frozen blueberries
1 scoop Vega Whole Food Optimizer (original flavour)
1 teaspoon Sun Butter
1 1/2 cups almond milk or soy milk

Salmon Marinade

Prep time: 15 min

This is a great marinade for salmon or other seafood like prawns. Salmon just absorbs whatever flavour it's marinated in. When you're done with the marinade, don't throw it out, but cook up some prawns in the marinade.  It gives them a terrific flavour.

The chilli garlic sauce can be found in most small Asian grocery stores.  T&T probably carries it too.

INGREDIENTS

1/3 c soy sauce
1/3 c raw organic sugar (or use brown sugar)
1/3 c water
1/3 c grapeseed or vegetable oil
2 T Lee Kum Kee chilli garlic sauce
salmon, skinned and cut into chunks

DIRECTIONS

1. Mix all the marinade ingredients together and add the salmon. A ziploc bag usually works best for marinating so that the entire salmon is surrounded by the marinade.
2. Marinade for at least a few hours.  The longer the time, the better the flavour.
3. If grilling on the barbeque, use a tinfoil tray and grill the salmon in a bit of the marinade at a low heat.
4. If grilling in the oven, use an oven tray and grill the salmon in a bit of the marinade at a low heat, perhaps 300-325F.
5. Grill until the salmon is tender and flakes apart (it won't take long).