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Baked Pollock with gravy

roast and grind

1 cardamom

1 clove

1"cinnamon

1/2 tsp cumin

1/4 tsp fennel

Roast the spices and grind to a fine powder and leave aside.

1 pkt pollock fillet (about 4 to 6 pieces)

1/4 tsp turmeric

1/2 tbsp chillie powder or fish curry masala powder to preference

roasted spice powder

1/2 tsp salt

3 tbsp tomatoes or more

2 tbsp onion

1 tbsp curry leaves optional

1 tbsp lemon juice

1 tbsp coconut milk powder

In an ovenproof dish mix the fish with all the spices, salt and lemon juice. Put the tomatoes, onion and curry leaves over the fish and bake at 450F for about 20 minutes, turning once when it is baking.

Add the coconut milk powder and bake for another 5 minutes and serve as a side dish with rice, bread or flatbread.

There is no need to add water the tomatoes and fish as water content that will make a gravy.

Asparagus with pine nuts

1 bunch (about 2 cups) asparagus

hot water

1 tbsp sesame oil or olive oil

1/2 tsp grated ginger

1/2 tsp garlic

1/2 tsp coarse salt (or 1/4 tsp regular salt)

1/2 tsp pepper

2 tbsp pine nuts lightly toasted *

* I got the pine nuts from Kokopelli's kitchen. Lightly toast it over a medium low heat dry skillet. It will become brown and fragrant, make sure it doesn't burn by shaking the skillet or moving the pine nuts constantly. Remove from skillet and cool.

Blanch the asparagus by putting it in boiling water and leave for a 2 to 5 minutes till it becomes dark green, the time depends on the thickness of the asparagus.

Heat oil over medium heat. Saute the garlic, ginger then add the drained blanched asparagus and stir fry. Add the toasted pine nuts and mix. Serve warm.

Binder giveaway USA and Canada ends April 5th

Gulab jamun (Indian sweet with milk powder)

1 cup milk powder

1/4 cup flour

1/8 tsp a pinch of baking soda *

3 tbsp unsalted butter or ghee at room temperature

1/4 cup milk at room temperature

oil about 1 1/2" high to fry

* too much baking soda will make the jamuns too soft and may break when frying

Mix the milk powder, flour, baking soda then add the butter or ghee and mix. Add milk to make a soft dough, the dough will be sticky. Leave the dough aside for about 15 minutes. Then knead the dough again, if needed grease the hands with a little oil before working the dough. Make about 20 to 24 balls, it will swell a little after making the balls.

Heat oil on medium heat, test the oil first with a small piece of dough, when it is put into the oil and if it takes a minute to rise, the oil is ready to fry in. If the dough rises faster the oil is too hot and gulab jamuns will be become dark on the outside and the inside will not be cooked. If the dough doesn't rise in a minute the oil is not hot. Because the size of the balls were small, I fried it in low medium heat.

The gulab jamuns will expand a little while frying so leave space and keep rolling to evenly brown all sides. The inside as to be fully cooked and spongy. Leave the gulab jamun in an absorbent paper towel to cool before putting it into the hot syrup. If hot gulab jamuns are added to the syrup it will become chewy and loose its shape. Leave the gulab jamun at least an hour before serving.

syrup

1 3/4 cup sugar

1 1/2 cup water

1/4 tsp cardamom powder

pinch of saffron strands

Add all the ingredients in a large pan and bring to a boil. Let the syrup boil for a minute or two until the sugar dissolves. Can keep it in lowest heat until it is thick, one string consistency.

Add the cooled gulab jamuns to the hot syrup. Keep the gulab jamuns covered in the syrup and the gulab jamuns will expand in the syrup.

To serve sprinkle nuts over the sweets, this is optional.

Ozeri Black Tungsten Ring

This Ozeri black tungsten ring is a comfort fit, flat ring with a black brushed center and silver polished beveled edge.

It is a high quality 8mm masculine ring made with tungsten carbide which is the 2nd hard to find material in the world next to diamonds. The ring is cobalt free.

This ring is modern, fashionable, smooth and comfortable. It is very durable because of its comfortable thickness and weight the ring will not misshape. It is also scratch resistant for everyday wear.

Ozeri black tungsten ring would be perfect for a wedding band, to celebrate special occasions or to give as a gift to a special someone.

Even men who aren't into jewelry will love it. This stylish ring comes in a black velvet ring box. It is available to purchase on Amazon, with a fabulous price right now for $25.00 :)

Pan fried fish curry

1 steak of king fish

3/4 tsp chillie powder

1/2 tsp coriander powder

1/2 tsp turmeric

1/2 tsp garam masala

1/4 tsp fenugreek seeds

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tbsp tamarind pulped in 1/4 cup water

2 tbsp oil

2 tbsp onion

2 tbsp tomatoes

1 green chillie chopped

1 tsp garlic

1/2 tsp ginger grated

1 tsp curry leaves

1 tbsp coriander leaves to garnish

Marinate the fish with the spices and tamarind for about 1/2 hour.

Heat the oil, fry the fish and turn carefully to fry the other side. Add onions, tomato, curry leaves, ginger, garlic and the remaining marinate.

Cook the fish covered in low medium heat until it is fully cooked, turn it once in between without breaking the fish.

Serve it as a side with rice or bread.

Check out my post go green lunch boxes :) on Createwithmom

This goes to healthy diet food event easy healthy lunch.

Gourmet popcorn

If you want to avoid unnecessary fat and grease, try popping popcorn at home. It is very easy and delicious, and there are so many ways to get creative with it. Kokopelli's has gourmet popcorn available to buy online.

1/4 cup or 2 tbsp gourmet popcorn

1/2 tbsp coconut oil to toss after popping

salt optional

Put 1/4 cup popcorn in a brown bag, fold it on the top (just like a popcorn bag, but without sealing with pins or tape). Microwave for 2 minutes. When popping slows remove bag. The time depends on the microwave.

Toss with healthy coconut oil and salt, if using and serve.

If you like sweet popcorn sprinkle chocolate, coconut and nuts.

Dear friends,

Please check my site Createwithmom for craft, movies, fun ideas, new product reviews/ giveaways. Thank you for the support :)

Zucchini chocolate muffins

1 cup grated zucchini

2 eggs

1/2 cup vegetable oil

2 tbsp heavy cream, whipping cream or milk

3/4 cup vanilla flavoured sugar

1 1/2 tbsp cocoa powder

1 1/2 cups flour

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

1/8 tsp each ground spice cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, cardamom

Beat eggs, sugar, oil then add the cocoa and zucchini.

Stir in the combined flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt and spices. Pour into lightly greased muffin tins filling 2/3rd.

Bake at 350F for 20 to 25 minutes. Remove from pan and cool on wire rack.

This makes 12 muffins.

Nut pilau

Recipe to dress up rice, nut pilau

1 cup basmati rice

1/2 tsp saffron strands crushed

1 tbsp rose water or orange flower water

1 tbsp ghee or butter

1" cinnamon stick

2 cardamom pods

2 cloves

2 bay leaves

1 tbsp each pine nuts, blanched almonds, blanched pistachios, cashews

1/2 tsp salt

water 1" higher than the rice

garnish with fried onions optional

Blanch the almonds and pistachios remove the skin. Cut the almonds, pistachios and cashews two half or smaller.

Wash and soak the rice for 1/2 hour. Soak the crushed saffron strands in the rose water and leave a side.

Heat the ghee and fry the nuts till it is aromatic. Keep sautéing to make sure that the nuts don't burn. Add the whole spices, then sauté the rice until it is opaque.

Add salt, saffron rose water, and water 1" higher than the amount of rice. Cook the rice in low heat covered for 20 minutes. Let it stand for 10 minutes covered after removing from heat before serving.

This goes to Serve it stir fried, colourful palette

Kitchen scales

I use a kitchen scale to measure when I am not certain of conversions in recipes i.e. ml to oz etc...

We see so many new models of kitchen scales in the market, which makes it hard to choose one. Here is a review of a kitchen scale I got to experiment with.

Ozeri touch professional digital scale 17.6 lb edition looks gorgeous on the counter because of it sleek design similar to an iPad. The touch button displays lbs, kg, g, oz and ml on its easy to read LCD screen. It measures up to 17.6 lbs. The reflective black surface is made with tempered glass is four times stronger than regular glass.

It is easy to clean and has an auto turn off. The scale is light in weight, which makes it portable. The Ozeri touch professional digital scale 17.6 lb edition comes with a booklet that shows calories of ingredients. The scale is pretty accurate as I measured many things. I found that sometimes we need a little bit of patience to figure it out, as it is sensitive.

The tare feature on it calculates net weight of the ingredients by subtracting the weight of the container. It comes with 2 lithium batteries, so the scale can be used as soon as it is bought.

If you are interested in this scale it is sold on Amazon.

What type of scale do you use, if you don't then how do you measure?

Live life well

I was invited to attend a media event at the Maple Leaf Garden Loblaws, which opened in November 2011. It had lots of choices and unique features worth looking at such as its ACE bakery that makes artisan bread from scratch everyday, the 18 foot wall with 400 varieties of cheese, patisseries, tea emporium, fresh juice that is squeezed on location, tables with pictures of events that happened at the Toronto Maple Leaf Garden and many more...

The tour was very informative. I had fun meeting the organizers, folks that work at Loblaws, the chefs at the PC cooking school and in-store dieticians. I enjoyed a delicious vegetable soup, barley risotto served with scallop and a berry crumble that was made by the chefs.

Here is the adapted recipe for Wild mushroom barley risotto with scallops from PC blue menu recipes.

2 cup shitake mushrooms *

6 cups of water

2 tbsp olive oil

3 cloves garlic finely chopped

1 tsp salt to taste

1 cup pear barley

2 tbsp or more fresh parsley and thyme

parmesan cheese to garnish optional

* Can use only shitake or use 1/2 cup dried chanterelle, 1/2 cup dried portobello mushrooms and 1 cup shitake for the mushroom stock. Boil the mushroom with the water and turn off the heat. Let the stock stand covered for 20 minutes. Take the mushrooms out of the stock by squeezing the water, chop and leave aside. Keep the stock in low heat.

Heat oil over medium high heat, then cook onions for 2 minutes, add garlic then add sliced mushrooms and 1/2 tsp salt. Cook for about 3 to 5 minutes till the mushrooms are tender. Stir in the barley.

Then add mushroom stock 1 cup at a time, stirring constantly allowing the stock to get absorbed before adding the next cup of stock keep doing this till the barley is cooked to desired consistency about 1/2 hour. It is cooked uncovered. Add parsley, thyme, remaining salt and the cheese if you are using. Leave aside.

scallops

2 tbsp oil

1 bag 400g scallops thawed and drained

salt and pepper to taste

2 to 3 tbsp water from the mushroom

Heat oil over medium high heat cook scallops for 2 to 3 minutes until it cooks through turning it once. When touched if it springs back it is ready. Add about 2 to 3 tsp of water from the stock. Serve hot with the risotto.

This is the berry crumble.

Loblaws will be having in-store dieticians that offer many services i.e. teaching and advising the public about healthy eating for healthy living. You can ask any nutritional related questions such as heart health, diabetes, family nutrition, weight loss, etc. Next time you are shopping make sure to get their knowledgeable tour that is free and the information booklets that also have coupons.

There are over 400 Blue menu products to choose from, so we can introduce a variety into our everyday meals. PC has a new attribute on their packages with a + and - sign, which indicates the level of sodium, omega 3 and fibre.

Healthy eating is not expensive it is about moderation and balance.

Some of the tips that the dieticians gave are; to use less saturated foods which is better for us, to entirely avoid trans fat, naturally occurring sugar in fruit and vegetables are good, a range of colourful food has benefits, and sodium helps the body maintain water balance and transmits nerve impulse so it is good in moderation.

You can learn many things from the PC cooking school i.e. making your own baby food, classes for different age groups, baking, gourmet cooking, learning new skills i.e. making sushi, pastries etc.

Glad I got to share what I enjoyed, please do visit and use their services at Loblaws to live life well :)

If you would like a list of the dieticians, email me.

Pages

Baked Pollock with gravy

Asparagus with pine nuts

Gulab jamun (Indian sweet with milk powder)

Ozeri Black Tungsten Ring

Pan fried fish curry

Gourmet popcorn

Zucchini chocolate muffins

Nut pilau

Kitchen scales

Live life well

Giveaway and My other site