The Hungry Squid

Montreal in the fall is a lovely place to be. The weather is perfect - cool enough that the temperature is perfect for sleeping, but not cool enough for down comforters in the middle of September. The morning air is crisp and bracing without being chilly, and for a long time, the rain retains a hint of warmth, a wistful reminder of a fleeting but beautiful summer. This past weekend and week have been idyllic -  a light work load interspersed with conferences, and luxurious staycation have made it almost seem like an Indian summer. But Monday always comes, and this particular Monday was accompanied by a wicked sore throat, cough and general malaise. So, what's the remedy for tiredness, weekend withdrawal and grad school blues? Soup, of course! I have always put soup recipes on the back burner (pun intended). For me, they've been an accompaniment, and being a self-professed carb aficionado, I have to be in a particular mood to appreciate them. Of course, there are exceptions , b...

Hello, my name is Squid and I have the travelling bug. I caught it earlier this year, after I came back from the West Coast, a vacation that was, as all vacations, too short. It worsened steadily, with friends travelling to exotic places, and was particularly acute when I was preparing for my thesis advisory committee meeting. Now, in the swing of things post-meeting, my condition has improved but the symptoms nonetheless linger.  So what is the best way to beat the vacay blues? Distract yourself with cooking! Ever since resurrecting this half-dead monster of a blog, I have thrown myself into cooking again, with great satisfaction. I am, after all, a hungry squid. After a (very, very) late night on Friday and a Saturday that consisted of rushing around like a wild person during my new apartment redecoration quest , I came home with 2 hours to spare before a potluck dinner in honor of a departing lab member. I wanted to make something light for the dinner, something easy to eat but ...

And with that, summer is gone. I can't believe that it's been 3 months since my last post! Unacceptable - blogging CANNOT and will not fall at the wayside, and I will be held to that. But the last 3 months have been lovely....A summer of sunshine, weddings, old friends, new friends...and of course, delicious food. I spent an amazing week on the West Coast in August and there, had the most delicious, fresh, tender seafood and sushi, the like of which I have never experienced. My standards have been irrevocably raised. Sue me.  I have to admit, summer is not the best time to get down and dirty with your stove, so my adventurous culinary spirit was quelled in favour of huevos rancheros  and a stroll to a friend's place on a beautifully cool night. But now that school has started (though I guess it  never really ended ....?), evenings of cooking experiments are back on the table...pardon the pun. I've decided to start off the cooking year with a simple recipe, for a dish t...

Today, I read an article about "McWeddings" - apparently McDonald's  restaurants in Hong Kong have started to offer wedding catering and reception venues for up to 50 people(http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/foodwine/2014359941_mcweddings01.html) . For about $1300, you will get a "cake" made of McDonald's apple pies, a full McMeal, wedding invitations and even gifts for guests - what a deal!! Who can resist the aroma of burgers and fries as you revolve slowly to your first dance as husband and wife? I can't. Future husband, beware. As a child, one of my favourite foods was chicken fingers. I could eat them any time, literally, a dangerous obsession for a baby that looked like a potato. As an adult (if you can call me that), I still love chicken fingers - BUT, in a quest to be more healthy, I've been trying to make them at home, sans deep frying and with real, all-white meat chicken breast (just like McDonald's uses, of course). This past wee...

Sometimes, I wonder what makes take-out food so delicious. It's not nutritious. The ingredients are  sub-par, and often not well matched to the dish. The dishes themselves are not well-made, overly greasy and far too salty. And yet...we keep going back. Regardless of the barrage of ad campaigns extolling the virtues of organic, fair-trade, non-GM, 100, locally grown etc etc, in the dead of night, alone in our apartments, we will inevitably call Super Express pizza. So last week, in my quest to find something, anything, to save me from writing my grant proposal, I stopped myself from ordering take-out and instead, sought to make a take-out style dish at home. It seems that the key to delicious take-out is a) deep-frying and b) drowning the dish in grease; however, I discovered that this was not the case. This dish was delicious served with white rice and a salad with cherry tomatoes, cucumbers, spinach, parmesan and a honey-mustard vinaigrette (courtesy of the culinarily-inclined V...

This past week, we said a fond farewell to a postdoc in our lab, and, in her honor (and also just for fun), a lab member held a very delicious dinner party. Though the gracious host told us just to bring ourselves, everyone felt compelled to contribute to the feast, which consisted of treats that ranged from homemade dumplings, scrumptious salads, babba ghanoush and hummus, as well as authentic Italian lasagne the best tiramisu I have ever tasted. Oh, and there was a lot of wine, which was especially exciting, as it was a Tuesday. My contribution to the table of treats was avocado bruscetta, a lovely recipe that I found in Vegetarian Times magazine (aka Squid Daily) a few years ago. Let me first say this: overall, I don't really care for avocado. The texture and flavour turn me off of it and, in general, I will opt not to top my salad with it. I do, however, love guacamole, but I am not sure if that counts....in any case, making this recipe was a strange departure for me, but I am ...

KD has had it's time. For many years (i.e. during my 4 years in undergrad), it was a mainstay in my cupboard, next to the box of Oreos and the the bag of candied ginger. It was the perfect remedy to late-hunger, afternoon lunch, early dinner, normal dinner...basically appropriate on any culinary occasion. But now, as I begin the venture into adulthood (which, by the way, is a concept that is as vague to me now as it was to me 4 years ago) I have been making a conscious effort to leave the relics of my youth behind. So it is with sadness, that I say goodbye to you, KD, and move towards human food. In honor of its bastard plastic cousin, I decided to make real macaroni and cheese, the right way. This recipe, from Epicurious(a website that, I am ashamed to say, have neglected over the past couple of weeks), was surprisingly easy to make - M and I had it ready in just under 1 and a half hours, most of which was baking time. We modified the recipe by adding pancetta, substituted pimien...