Tag: Nova Scotia

Into the Inky Blackness We Go

The days are getting longer, and yet it gives us an increasing perspective on the night. When we leave for work in the dark, and arrive home in the dark, it is hard to appreciate that time when the indigo sky highlights the trees and there is a time of beautiful contrast.

On the “official” first day of spring, we had the trifecta of indigo light, wind, and waving trees. In celebration, dinner consisted of an inky squid pasta, combined with the season’s veg…celery, carrot, onion, hothouse pepper, and some Altantic salmon. It was a great combo that fed our tummies and souls.

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Hen-chilada?

After putting in nearly an hour on the rower, we’ve earned our reward. We’re unsure what to call it – not quite an egg burrito, more like an omelette wrap – with slices of hothouse tomato that remind us what’s in store. Although it’s spring today in name only, seeds are being sprouted for the garden and we look forward to more fresh vegetables on the table.

Breakfast can get a day of healthy eating off to a great start, and this one is going to be grand.

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The Feast Continues – Saints be Praised

Our family traditional dinner for St. Patrick’s Day is corned beef and cabbage – or more colloquially, “boiled dinner”. And the feast was had, in all its glory.

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For many years, we wanted to make Mom’s day-after breakfast, but, mysteriously, the corned beef would always disappear overnight while the young ones lived at home, or be eaten up because we had company. Finally, here we are – empty nest, and we’re making a hash of it!

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Here’s to the approaching spring – and all your family traditions, whatever they are. Long may they last.

A Zippy Start for Your Day

After a week of wild weather, it appears the sun is making an effort to shine. We are definitely planning to take advantage of that. To get ready, a big mug of Full Steam coffee, and a delicious goat cheese-cranberry-lime panini. Here’s how we made it, for two:

Mix 2oz/60g goat cheese, zest and juice of 1/2 lime, 1T/15ml chopped cilantro. Spread on 4 slices whole grain homemade raisin bread. Add 2T/30ml cranberry preserves to each, spread, and assemble sandwiches. Our preserves came from a Nova Scotia business, Terra Beata.

Butter both sides and cook on a panini press, grill, or in the frying pan until golden. Enjoy!

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Does This Taste Cheesy to You?

3000 steps and 7 km on the rower before 7am, while watching the medals for our Canadians at Sochi. These cheese-and-egg breakfast sandwiches will get us on our way. Whole wheat burger buns, bought on sale and frozen for later use, get a freshening in the toaster. Slather on a little Dijon and a couple of tomato slices. For each serving, cook two sliced mushrooms and pour a beaten egg on top. Add a light grating of sharp cheddar. It’ll wake up your mouth (and the rest of you) and keep you going til lunchtime.

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Start the Day with an Experiment

One of the most fun things about eating healthily is trying new and unusual fruits and vegetables. Yesterday we were shopping and spotted a granadilla, a semi-tropical, round, orange, shiny fruit. But what to do with it?

We made a use-it-up fruit salad that included a banana, chopped pear, chopped apple, a few walnuts (cleaning up the pantry) and a cup of fat-free plain yogurt. The fruit provided the sweetness. Spooning this mixture into bowls after stirring so the yogurt coated everything, we cut into the mystery fruit and scooped its seedy interior on top. The insides are reminiscent of passion fruit or pomegranate, with crunchy, gel-encased seeds. It makes a berry-ish, crunchy-sweet topping and a delicious way to start the day. Was it worth a buck-ninety-nine? As an everyday addition to the grocery budget, perhaps not, but layering that with the fun factor of discovering a new taste, I’d say it was great value.

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Fuel Up Fast!

Nearly an hour on the rowing machine and a long day’s work ahead calls for some serious energy. My grandmother used to start us off on cold winter days with a bowl of oatmeal, and she was right. But we don’t need instant oats or the long, slow cooking of her day. Large flake, old fashioned (or steel-cut) oats will cook nicely in the microwave in under 10 minutes.

We dressed ours up with some extra protein (walnuts), dried cranberries and cinnamon, and topped it with half a banana. And we’re off to race through another day!

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Everything's Coming Up…Peaches?

Brrrr! We started the day with the last vestiges of a 3-hour power outage, some of which happened while we were blissfully asleep. By 6ish NS Power had things up and running again. It was interesting that we were the only “powerless” area in the province! We always knew we were special.

Heading outside, we finished clearing the driveway by starlight, then headed in just as the sun was coming up from behind the hills on the other side of the Bay. The sky was a brilliant peach, which got us thinking…what better way to warm up than oatmeal with peaches that we froze at the height of freshness, last summer? Something to be grateful for, we say!

No photo? Apparently it was too good to waste time doing that!

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Use it Up!

January has been a month of creativity for us – in food, and how we live. We decided at the beginning of the month to follow the old advice: use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without. I must admit we haven’t felt as though we are doing without, but instead, finding things in our cupboards, closets, drawers and refrigerators and turning them to a more interesting purpose. The delicious horseradish mustard that we use frequently in summer made a tangy start to this egg-wich, which also amps up its veg quotient with minced broccoli ends and a few straggler mushrooms that were left in the bag.

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We are working our way through the summer’s harvest, our forgotten condiments, and frozen remains of big batch cooking from the fall. And it’s been a delicious journey…one we will continue for as long as possible.

What to Eat When your Plow Guy Quits and you Shovel for Three Hours

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After the apple walnut oatmeal, you go to work like nothing happened out of the ordinary. I love Canada.