Hummus

In an effort to add more protein to my diet, we have started making hummus each week.  I eat it for breakfast with my vegetables.  I have not listed quantities for the ingredients as this is very much by taste.  Each week it tastes difference - heavy garlic one week, strong lemon flavour the next.  All of them are good though.

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Ingredients:

• Chickpeas
• Garlic (fresh or powdered)
• Cayenne Pepper
• Tahini
• Lemon Juice
• Olive Oil
• Water (if needed)

Steps:

1. Soak the chickpeas in cool water over night
2. Cook the chickpeas in water until tender, approx 1 hour (if you don't pre-soak them, cook for approx 2.5 hours),drain well and cool to room temperature (can also be cooked the day before and kept in the fridge)
3. Add all ingredients to food processor
4. Blend until well mixed and desired consistency
5. If it's to thick and dry, add water, 1 Tbsp at a time

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Pesto Shrimp Pasta

This is one of our favorite, quick go-to meals.  We generally have all the ingredients on hand an it only takes as long to make as it takes to boil the pasta.

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Ingredients:

• 1 lb (450 g) of dry penné
• 340 g raw, unpeeled shrimp
• 270 ml Basil Pesto
• 2 onions
• 3-4 tomatoes

Steps:

• Cook penné according to directions, drain
• Drain off oil from the pesto into a frying pan

• Sauté onions till tender
• Add tomatoes and cook for 2-3 minutes, stirring constantly

• Add shrimp and continue to stir until cooked through and completely pink, about 3-4 minutes

• Add pesto and shrimp mixture to drained pasta

• Toss well and serve

Cheese Souflé

I decided that I wanted to learn to make a cheese souflé. I read over many different recipes and decided to follow Alton Brown's from the Food Network.

Souflés are very impressive looking, light and airy and tasty.  They also seem very intimidating.  Turns out, they aren't that hard.  Make a basic Béchmel sauce, add cheese, egg yolks and flavouring and fold in whipped egg whites. Pour into buttered ramikins and bake.  The hard part is folding in your egg whites, making sure you get it well incorporated without losing the volume.

For these cheese souflés I used a sharp old cheddar and chives, with some dry mustard and garlic in the Béchmel sauce.  They rose nice and high and browned well.  They did fall almost as soon as they came out of the oven, but they were very light and fluffy on the inside.

I'm glad to have conquered cheese souflés.  Next I would like to try a desert version.

Cleaning a Pomegranate

It used to be that every time I cleaned a pomegranate that it would look like a murder had occurred in our kitchen, complete with arterial spray on the ceiling.  I have embraced the following technique that guarantees no blood splatter on your cupboards and that your hands and clothing won't be stained for days either.

 

• Cut a small slice off the top and bottom of the pomegranate.  Be careful not to cut too deep as you will hit the seeds.

 

• Score the all around the outside of the pomegranate, about the size of orange sections.

• Put the pomegranate in a bowl of water and cut out the center core.

 

• Separate all the scored sections.

• Using your thumbs, delicately separate the seeds from the pulp.  The seeds will sink to the bottom and the pulp will rise to the top making it easy for you to discard.  Swishing the seeds around with hands will help to remove any bits of pulp that remain.  Drain well.

• Enjoy!