After a hectic month and half of moving, travelling and setting up a home, I have finally settled back into this blog. Taylor and I are renting the most lovely little two bedroom apartment near the college campus where we both work. We’ve been here two weeks now, and I can say that this move has been good for my soul. Green spaces. Fresh air. Natural light. Taylor took the photos and created the lovely triptych above. He now enjoys taking photos for my blog thanks to the big windows in our suite. I vow never to take another food photo in florescent lighting again. Never. This move has been a big step towards the lifestyle we want to live. And what we eat is large part of that lifestyle.
We’re planted a herb garden in our south-facing window. Basil, oregano and parsley are shooting up into warm sunlight. I see a lot of fresh pesto in our future…and what a glorious future that will be. We’ve also been buying farm fresh brown eggs from a gentleman I work with. A mere $3 a dozen -unheard of! My newest guilty pleasure? Liberte yogurt. They have quite the selection at the little grocery store down the road. I’m looking forward to trying each flavour with gusto. Why do all the good food stuffs come from Quebec?
We’ve bought our first share in CSA. We can expect ABSURD amounts of fresh, local fruits and vegetables to come our way starting in mid-July. You can check out “our” farm at www.stonelaneorchard.com To tide us over until our CSA starts harvesting, the St. Norbert Farmer’s Market opens next weekend! If you live in or near Winnipeg, there really is no excuse not to attend. I go for the breads and produce, Taylor for the spring rolls at J.J. Spring Roll.
Aaaand I’m back to blogging. I have been savouring every last moment of my Christmas and New Years Holidays. You know how even stuff that you really love doing becomes work when you have to do it? That’s why I took a hiatus from this blog. I promised myself that I was going to do nothing but relax during the break. Why? Because somedays my job sucks the life out of me.
Do you know what doesn’t suck the life of out me? Cooking really awesome food! Even after working eight stressful hours, I’m so stoked to come home and cook dinner. Granted it sometimes means that we don’t eat dinner until 8:00 at night, but I married a very understanding man. We make it work.
Also new in our household, Taylor and I are experimenting with weekday vegetarianism. Yup, it’s exactly what it sounds like. 5 days of the week we eat only vegetarian food and on the weekends, we choose whatever we like. (Don’t worry mother, I’m still taking all my vitamins.) This idea was inspired by this video
I pondered the question that he poses at the beginning of the video. Knowing what I know, why aren’t I vegetarian? I realized that one of my biggest barriers, is that I would need to re-learn how to cook. Meat is base that you can build a meal around. Have chicken? Make pot pie. Have hamburger? Make some juicy burgers. Have beans and some carrots? ….ummm. Exactly.
Long story short, I tried to make a consious effort to seek out some vegetarian recipes. That’s when I found this. Hello Samosas.
Bundles of goodness filled with potatos, peas, tomatoes and spices. The recipe was super easy. And while I realize that these are in no way authentic, they were delicious. I made very few changes to the recipe. I used canned green chiles, skipped a few spices (Superstore’s ethnic food aisle consists of taco shells), and added a lot more potato that was needed. I also didn’t bother with the dipping sauce. We used a mango sauce we had in the fridge already. We had a ton of filling leftover, so tomorrow night these little guys will be making an encore.
