Lemon Ricotta Crepes with Berry Icewine Sauce

January is icewine month! To celebrate, here is the recipe I created for the iYellow Wine Club featuring our star, icewine!

Just as a fantastic icewine strikes the perfect balance between sweetness and acidity, any dish made with icewine should do the same. For such a special wine you want the other flavours in the dish to complement the icewine rather than overpower it. Lemon Ricotta Crepes with Berry Icewine Sauce is the perfect example of this. Despite ricotta being the main ingredient in this dish, the subtle flavours of the creamy cheese lets the icewine take centre stage. Inspired by traditional Italian cannoli filling, the ricotta mixture mimics those same sweet and acidic flavours you get in icewine, but with a touch less sweetness. Hugging the ricotta are thin, delicate crepes speckled with fragrant lemon zest, which is topped with a generous drizzle of sweet, yet complex berry icewine sauce. The addition of lemon in both the crepe and filling brings f

reshness to the dish allowing your taste buds to experience that same refreshing taste that comes with a sip of icewine. The only thing that can make this dessert more special is serving it alongside your favourite Vidal icewine.

Tip: To ensure that your crepes are not greasy, take a small piece of paper towel and rub it in softened butter. Quickly, carefully, and lightly rub the paper towel with the butter onto the hot pan so that you have the thinnest layer of butter possible on your frying surface.

Ingredients:

Crepes

3/4 cup flour

1 cup milk

3 eggs

1/4 cup vegetable oil

1/4 tsp salt

1 tbsp sugar

1/4 tsp lemon zest

Filling

1 400g container of fresh ricotta cheese

4-5 tbsp confectioners sugar

1 1/2 tsp lemon zest

2 tsp fresh lemon juice

1/4 tsp vanilla extract

Sauce

1 cup raspberries

1 cup blueberries

6-7 tbsp VIDAL sauvignon blanc icewine

Directions:

Lemon Crepes

1. Whisk or process (using a food processor) all ingredients until blended. Transfer batter to a bowl or container, cover and refrigerate for at least 1 hour.

2. On medium-low heat, lightly grease a small crepe pan (see tip above). When pan is hot, add 1/4 cup of the crepe batter and tilt your pan around so that the batter covers evenly. Fry crepes for approximately 60 seconds on one side, or until golden. Using a spatula, carefully flip the crepe and fry on the other side for approximately 30 seconds, or until golden. Repeat with remaining batter. Crepes can be made up to 2 days in advance and may be reheated upon serving.

Lemon Ricotta Filling

1. In a medium bowl, stir together the ricotta with the lemon juice, lemon zest, and vanilla extract. Sift in the confectioners sugar (you may add 4-5 tbsp depending on your taste). Refrigerate until ready to serve. Filling can be made up to 2 days in advance.

Berry Icewine Sauce

1. In a food processor fitted with the steel blade, puree raspberries and blueberries until liquified, but not so much that the seeds begin to crush.

2. Pour berry mixture into a fine sieve resting over a bowl to remove the seeds.

3. Once berry mixture has been strained, stir in the icewine. Refrigerate until ready to serve.

Assembly

1. If crepes have been made in advance and refrigerated, reheat, wrapped in tin foil, in a low temperate oven or toaster oven until warm.

2. Lay a crepe out flat and add desired amount of lemon ricotta filling down the centre of the crepe. Drizzle with berry icewine sauce and roll the crepe up. Drizzle with additional berry icewine sauce and garnish with fresh raspberries and blueberries. Repeat with remaining crepes. Enjoy served alongside Vidal icewine.

Listening To:

Science of Fear - The Temper Trap

Powered by mp3skull.com

Sesame Seed Chicken

You know when you're a kid and you have those same handful of favourite meals that you ask for over and over again, that you never seem to get sick of? For most kids that seems to be pizza, Kraft dinner, and even cereal, but for me it was always Sesame Seed Chicken. I remember whenever I would have friends over for dinner, I would always request Sesame Seed Chicken so that I could impress them with a delicious meal (that, at the time, I had no role in preparing). I even remember my friends parents calling up my mom to ask for the recipe, because they couldn't believe how their children had raved about this chicken (Sam Young I'm talkin' about you!). What really amazed me was that just about any time I would ask to have Sesame Seed Chicken for dinner, my request would be granted! It can baffle a child's mind that something you like so much can actually be something you can get just about whenever you want it! I mean, whenever I wanted cotton candy I would never get that for dinner. So how come Sesame Seed Chicken?

The truth is Sesame Seed Chicken is incredibly easy to make, requires very few ingredients, is inexpensive, a good source of protein, and...well, it tastes pretty damn good so my parents didn't mind having it over and over again either. Just like your average chicken fingers, Sesame Seed Chicken features moist and tender chicken on the inside, with a light and crunchy breading on the outside. My chicken is given a twist with the nutty flavour of sesame seeds shining through every bite, a simple addition that changes the dish entirely!

Tip: To make this dish healthier, bake your chicken strips in the oven as opposed to frying them!

Ingredients:

24 Ritz crackers

1/2 tsp salt

dash of pepper

dash of paprika

1/4 cup sesame seeds

1 egg plus 2 tbsp water

4 boneless skinless chicken breasts

oil for frying

Directions:

1. In a food processor, pulse together the crackers with salt, pepper, and paprika to make fine crumbs. Stir in the sesame seeds. Transfer to a flat plate.

2. Beat the egg with the water and transfer to a flat plate.

3. Cut chicken into strips, about 1 1/2 inches wide. The size and shape doesn't have to be exact, just try to make each piece similar so that they all fry (or bake) at the same time.

4. In a large frying pan or griddle, heat a generous layer of oil at medium heat.

5. Dip and coat the chicken strips in the egg mixture, then dip and coat in the crumb mixture (keep one hand clean so you can ensure there is no cross contamination!). Brown strips in hot oil in batches (making sure not to crowd the pan), for about 5 minutes on each side, or until golden and crispy. Drain on paper towels, and serve with your favourite dipping sauce.

Listening To:

Metronomy - On Dancefloors

Powered by mp3skull.com

Eggplant Ravioli in a Roasted Red Pepper Sauce

My family and I have gotten into a bit of a funny habit. Each and every time we prepare a meal that we have deemed "amazing", we sit with our empty plates and half-drunk wine glasses and discuss how much we think our meal would have cost at a Toronto restaurant. We go through each and every item that we have prepared, considering the cost of ingredients, labour, etc. and usually end up charging ourselves with an imaginary whopping bill that we would never be able to afford considering just how many of these "amazing" meals we prepare within a week (seriously, I feel very lucky to have such fantastic home cooks as my parents). Sure we have our staples like a great steak dinner, ribs, pork tenderloin etc. that always end up on our "this could be served at a top Toronto restaurant" list, but every now and then we experiment with a totally new creation, inspired by our imagination that may very well end up being an utter failure, but could also be perfection!

Perfection, a word I don't often use when describing my own cooking. I am definitely one of my worst critics, and can almost always find something that can be improved in anything that I do. Whether it's in cooking, writing a blog post, or even curling my hair, nothing is ever perfect for me. Well, maybe that's not true. Who knows if it was in the stars, luck, or actual skill that allowed me to create magic when cooking up my favourite don't-wanna-change-a-thing dishes. But my Rustic Mushroom and Cream Cheese Tart, Chicken Marsala, Strawberry Crumble Muffins, and Lemon Ricotta Crepes with Berry Icewine Sauce were nothing short of exceptional...if I do say so myself. Once again magic entered my kitchen this past Thursday in creating this Eggplant Ravioli in a Roasted Red Pepper Sauce.

I've gotta say, the process to get to this final perfect dish was quite arduous. Thankfully I was not on my own in creating this dish, I had my two helpers, my sister Justine and her boyfriend and my friend Duncan, to help me out throughout the long process. Other than the pasta sheets, we had no recipe, just our wild imaginations, and a fridge full of ingredients, which is really the best way to cook anything! No one was assigned to a particular task, we all pitched in when needed, we all had a say in the flavours, and each of us tasted every single step along the way to make sure everything was "perfect". For a brief moment we feared our homemade ravioli mission had failed when we attempted to fill our raviolis in the gorgeous, yet way too small, ravioli mold that my sister had got me for Christmas. As I said, the mold was ridiculously small, I can't even imagine filling it with anything more than a few poppy seeds! We gave it a try anyway and unfortunately we lost a little filling and some pasta dough along the way, but quickly readapted and cut our own, larger, raviolis by hand. After three long hours of kneading, rolling, sauteing, chopping, filling, and so on, we were exhausted, starving, and weren't even thinking about how the final product would taste. After quickly snapping a photo, we lugged our tired plate-holding bodies to the couch, reclined, and dug in. This is when the sparks went off. I took the first bite: "woah...this is like...really good....like really freaking good!". Justine: "Oh my god! This is amazing!". Duncan: "Wow this is quite good...very good....Wow" Pretty sure we continued on with the "wows", "amazings" and "oh my gods" until our plates were empty! It was THAT good! Which, of course, led to "I would soooo order this at a restaurant!", the final stamp of approval allowing the dish to be deemed perfection! The pasta was tender and held its shape, the filling creamy and bursting with fresh flavours, and the sauce bold and spicy but not too overpowering so you can't taste the savory filling. Yes, it is quite time consuming, and it does take a bit of elbow grease, but this is actually a very simple dish to prepare. You don't need any special skills or experience, literally anyone can make this, and I promise you, it is certainly well worth it! Dare I say, this just may be one dish I've gotta call priceless!

Note: After spending literally hours creating this dinner, the best advice I can give you is to cook this dish in stages. Make the filling the night before, the sauce the morning of, and the pasta dough that afternoon or early evening. You can even make up the raviolis and freeze them to boil another time. Simply lay them out on a lightly floured baking sheet, dust lightly with more flour, place in freezer overnight. Remove raviolis from baking sheet and transfer to a ziplock bag. Simply remove from freezer and boil when ready to prepare.

Note: I have not listed a specific cheese to use in the filling as I don't even know what type of cheese we used! It was wrapped in plastic, unmarked in my fridge. I tasted every cheese in the fridge to find one that I thought would go well. The point here is that you can play around with what flavours you like. Don't feel restricted! Taste and play!

Eggplant Filling:

Ingredients:

1 large eggplant, peeled and sliced

1/2 sweet onion (you may substitute with red onion), chopped

1 tbsp olive oil

1 tsp garlic

1 tsp thyme

1/4 of a roasted red pepper, sliced

1/4 cup any semi-hard mild in flavour cheese, grated

salt and pepper

Directions:

1. Line a baking sheet with paper towels and lay out eggplant slices. Sprinkle the slices with salt, flip and sprinkle the other sides as well. Let stand for an hour to let the bitter juices from the eggplant drain. Rinse the drained slices and pat dry. Dice the eggplant slices.

2. In a medium skillet set to medium heat, heat olive oil and garlic. Add the eggplant, onions, roasted red pepper, and thyme and saute until onions are soft and golden, and eggplant is soft and has darkened. Let cool.

3. Add the cooled eggplant mixture to a food processor, add the cheese, and pulse until mixture is pureed, with a bit of texture. You don't want to make eggplant mush! Season with salt and pepper. Keep refrigerated until raviolis are ready to be filled.

Pasta Sheets:

Ingredients:

3 cups flour

5 egg yolks

1/2 tsp salt

cold water

1 whole egg, beaten

Directions:

1. In a medium-large bowl add the flour and make a small well in the centre. Set aside.

2. In a small bowl, beat the egg yolks. Add the beaten yolks and the salt into the middle of the well in the bowl of flour. Keeping one clean hand for mixing, and one for adding water, mix and form the dough, adding a little bit of water at a time until you have formed a nice, firm, but slightly sticky dough.

3. Knead the dough for about 10 minutes. Place dough back in bowl, cover with plastic wrap and allow to rest in the fridge for 20 minutes or more.

4. Tear off a piece of dough bigger than a golf ball, but smaller than a baseball. On a lightly floured surface, roll out your dough using a rolling pin, until dough is paper thin and you can see your hand through the dough when lifted. While rolling, continue to lightly flour the surface, dough, and rolling pin so that dough does not stick, but try to use as little flour as possible! Repeat with remaining dough. Reserve the 1 whole beaten egg for the assembly.

(Source: hubpages.com)

Roasted Red Pepper Sauce:

Ingredients:

olive oil

1 tsp garlic

2 3/4 roasted red peppers, sliced

1/2 sweet onion

1/3 cup tomato sauce

generous sprinkle of red pepper flakes

2 tsp dried basil

parmesan cheese (optional for garnish)

Directions:

1. In a medium skillet, heat olive oil and garlic. Add the roasted red peppers and onions and saute until onions are soft and golden. Let cool.

2. Pour red pepper and onion mixture into a blender. Add the tomato sauce, red pepper flakes, and basil. Blend until you have a smooth sauce. Keep refrigerated until ready to serve. Heat sauce on stove at medium-low heat. To thin sauce add fresh pasta water (reserve about a cup of the water that you cooked your ravioli in).

Assembly:

1. Using a circle cutter or the rim of a glass, cut the pasta sheets into circles about 2-inches in diameter. Lay out the circles in pairs.

2. Scoop about 2-3 tsp of filling (use your discretion, you want enough filling to get a burst of flavour, but you don't want the filling to literally burst out of the pasta) into the centre of half of the cut pasta circles, so that each pair of circles has one with filling in the centre.

3. Bring out the 1 whole beaten egg from the pasta sheet stage. Dip a clean finger into the egg and spread a little bit of the beaten egg around the outside of the pasta circle to act as the glue that will hold together the ravioli. Top the eggplant filled circles with their empty counterpart and lightly press down around the outside of the circle to form a seal. Use the prongs of a fork to press along the outside seal to ensure the ravioli is well sealed and to add a ribbed look.

4. Cook raviolis in salted, boiling water for about 6 minutes. A trick to judge their doneness is to wait until all raviolis are floating, then wait another 1-2 minutes.

5. While raviolis are cooking, heat sauce. Drain cooked ravioli and place on platter. Top with sauce and serve with grated parmesan cheese.

Listening To: Rollin' and Tumblin' - Jeff Beck feat. Imogen Heap

Leftover Lovin': Butternut Squash Cannelloni

Love it or hate, everyone seems to have an opinion on leftovers. I myself have a bit of a love/hate relationship with them. There are some foods that truly taste better a day or so after it's made, while others, after sitting in their tupperware for days on end, will inevitably end up in the compost, making me feel bad for wasting food. In order for me to feel the love for leftovers, I generally have to use my imagination to transform them into something else entirely. Leftover chicken gets tossed into a stir fry; grilled vegetables get stuffed into an omelette or panini; baked potatoes get cut up and seasoned to become home fries; almost any leftover can easily be transformed into a completely different dish so that you feel like you haven't been eating the same thing all week long.

A few weeks ago (er...maybe even a month...damn procrastination) I decided to experiment with some leftover roasted butternut squash. The evening prior, my family roasted butternut squash tossed with some butter and brown sugar and there was a great deal left over. We also had a few sheets of fresh pasta leftover from our homemade lasagna, so I wanted to use those up as well. In hardly any time at all I had a completely reinvented, delicious meal steaming hot, ready for me to devour! The sweet butternut squash had the perfect texture and flavour for my filling. The cannelloni was topped with tomato sauce and the same cheese sauce my mom uses for her lasagna, which added a fantastic creaminess to the dish. Needless to say, I loved eating every last bit of these leftovers!

Note: You don't have to be meticulous with leftovers. I have given a guide as to the amount of each ingredient goes into this dish, but it is all approximate, and you by no means need to follow it exactly.

Ingredients:

1 butternut squash, peeled, seeded and cut into chunks

about 2 tbsp butter, melted

about 1 tbsp brown sugar

salt and pepper to season

about 1 cup tomato sauce

3-5 sage leaves, chopped very fine

1/2 250g container cottage cheese

1/4 - 1/3 cup grated parmesan cheese

1 package fresh lasagna pasta sheets (you may also use fresh cannelloni tubes or fresh large shell pasta)

Directions:

1. If using fresh butternut squash, not leftovers, toss squash with butter and brown sugar. Spread squash in an single layer on a baking sheet, season with salt and pepper, and bake at 400º for 45-55 minutes.

2. Mash cooked squash with a fork, add the sage and stir to combine. Set aside.

3. In a medium bowl, puree the cottage cheese and parmesan cheese using an immersion blender. Set aside.

4. Lay out pasta sheets and cut them in half widthwise. Spoon about a 1/4 cup - 1/3 of the filling down the centre of the pasta sheet, and roll up to enclose the filling. Repeat with remaining squash and pasta.

5. Spoon on a thin layer of tomato sauce on the bottom of a medium baking sheet. Place in the cannelloni, seam side down, in a single layer, The cannelloni rolls should be touching.

6. Spoon over the tomato sauce and top with dollops of cheese mixture. Bake in a 350º oven for 45 minutes to an hour.

Listening To:

Adele - Rolling In The Deep

Powered by mp3skull.com

(If you follow me on Twitter you'll know that this has been my favourite home-alone-belt-it-out song for the past week! Ginger love!)

Cranberry Lemon Squares

Another holiday season come and gone. Who can believe that tomorrow is the last day of 2010? I certainly cannot! This year has flown by at a frightening pace, leaving all of my many crazy nights, hazy mornings, thrilling adventures, laughter, tears, mistakes, inside jokes, unexpected turns of events, and so on in a blur in my mind. It amazes me how much my life has changed over the past year and, more significantly, how I have changed as a result of it. Come to think of it, it wasn't so much me changing as a result of life changes, but my life changing as a result of my own personal growth. This year I learned that life can throw you some pretty big curve balls that can throw your mind out of whack for whatever reason. Just when you think you have it all figured out, something new and unknown, or even ghosts from your past that you thought you had shaken, are sure to enter your life again. But hey, you live and you learn, and some of those scary curve balls can turn into a home run. It's all about rolling with the punches, embracing all of those mistakes, and learning from them in the future.

A few months ago a sniffly cold and lack of focus left me making a big mistake when making Cranberry Coconut Lemon Squares. I accidentally made the squares in a pan much smaller than the recipe had called for. At first I was really mad at myself for being so careless, thinking that I had wasted all of those ingredients and my time. I kept telling myself how stupid I was, and I thought it was just so typical for me to do something so silly. Low and behold the squares turned out incredible! Because I baked them in a small pan, they were extra ooey gooey and each bite gave you an almost overwhelming burst of extra tangy lemon flavour. Who would have thought that my mistake would turn into such a hit. Despite how delicious my Ooey Gooey Cranberry Coconut Lemon Squares were, I couldn't help but want to try my hand at them again, but this time with a clear mind, remembering my past mistake. I decided to try out a new recipe this time to switch things up a bit, so I used a recipe for Cranberry Lemon Squares with coconut from Canadian Living, changing a few things here and there to suit my taste. I secretly thought that they really would taste better making the squares in a larger, correct pan (I apologize for my past dishonesty), but in the end they were both just as tasty. I couldn't even pick which ones I preferred. Despite how much control I had over the recipe this time and how careful I was, it turns out that mistakes can end with just as positive of a result. So let go, embrace your mistakes, and look at how much more you have gained in the end...even if that may be weight from eating so many of your delicious mistakes. Cheers to more mind blowing mistakes in 2011!

Tip: To add just a touch of extra sweetness, dust the baked squares with icing sugar.

Ingredients:

Crust:

2 cups flour

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1/4 tsp salt

3/4 cup butter, cubed and softened

Filling:

2 tbsp flour

1 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

3 eggs

1 3/4 cups sugar

1/3 cup lemon juice

zest from half of a lemon

2 cups fresh or frozen cranberries, cut in half

1 cup shredded unsweetened coconut

Directions:

1. In the bowl of an electric mixer, mix together the dry ingredients for the crust: flour, sugar, and salt. Add in the butter and mix until butter is well incorporated, crumbly, and holds together when pinched.

2. Evenly, pat mixture into the bottom of a greased 13 x 9-inch cake pan. Bake in a 350º oven for 20 min, or until golden.

3. In a small bowl, mix together the dry ingredients for the filling: flour, baking powder, and salt, set aside.

4. In the bowl of an electric mixer, whisk together eggs, sugar, lemon juice, and lemon zest. Mix in the flour mixture. Stir in cranberries and coconut.

5. Reduce heat to 325º, and bake until filling is firm in the centre, 45-50 minutes. Let cool, then cut into squares.

Listening To:

La Roux - Quicksand (Alex Metric Remix)

Powered by mp3skull.com