Jaws, Hallowe'en

Saturday night they had Jaws on Turner Classic Movies. I turned it on for Matt to watch. He ended up going to play on the PC and I ended up glued to the TV. I had forgotten what a good film it was although having read the book I didn't think enough was made of the town wanting to preserve their holiday business. I am sure if Matt had watched it he would have assured me this was wrong or that was wrong, but I am not so critical and I really enjoyed it once again. Not sure when I last saw it, but it was quite a few years ago. The movie was made in 1975. The year we came to Canada. Amazing. What occurred to me later, people were all smoking in the movie. You rarely see anyone smoke in movies today. One thing I don't think I believed, shark cages are not that vulnerable. I have actually seen real film of Great Whites attacking shark cages and they did NOT break them. Mind you I guess this was the Moby Dick of Great Whites.

I pay for our bowling a couple of weeks or so in advance. That way I can use my Visa card and get

cash back on it. Anyway, when I paid last week, it included October 31. These days, we have the owner, his son who is also an owner and his son who is now called the manager. So the manager made some comment that I had to arrive in costume. I said how about I come as an old woman!! However, it would be fun to turn up in some costume or other but I don't want anything difficult or elaborate. So, anyone got any ideas? I did think I might see if I could buy a witches hat or something. Whatever I do it has to either be wearable when I bowl or easily removed.

I am not a Roman Catholic but recently I have adopted the idea of Fish on Friday. Last Friday we had smoked salmon open sandwiches, but I wanted something else with it and ended up doing a Crisp Snow Pea Salad. Luckily I have a Julienne gadget which made life simpler with the carrots. We both liked it very much although I think I might have added a touch more wasabi powder although Matt figured there was enough..

Crisp Snow Pea Salad

A simple Japanese dressing turns crunchy snow peas into a refreshing salad. Great with grilled

salmon or chicken.

1 lb snow peas
1/4 cup very thinly sliced carrot ( Matchstick size)
2 Tbs soy sauce
2 Tbs lemon juice
1 Tbs dark sesame oil
2 1/2 tsp granulated sugar
1/2 tsp wasabi powder
salt
2 tsp sesame seeds, preferably toasted

1. Snip ends and remove string from snow peas. Fill a large bowl full of ice water.

2. Bring a large saucepan of salted water to a boil, and add snow peas and carrots.

3. Cook just until snow peas turn bright green, about 15 seconds, drain and plunge into cold water. Drain well and pat dry.

4. Cut snow peas diagonally into ½-inch (1-cm) wide pieces. Place in a bowl along with carrots.

5. To prepare dressing, whisk soy with lemon juice, sesame oil, sugar and wasabi powder, making sure sugar and wasabi powder are dissolved.

6. Stir with snow peas and carrots. Taste and add salt if needed. Sprinkle with sesame seeds.

Servings: 4

Author: Heather Trim
Source: Food and Drink.

Have a great day

Spices and Salmonella, Hallowe’en, Bowling.

A report on GMA Thursday morning sent me to Google. It appears there is a risk of getting salmonella from imported spices many of which come from India and Mexico. India says it is working on changing farming practises to eliminate the risks, but the changes described in the report don’t seem enough; bearing in mind the source of many of these spices, grown by poor farmers, the farming changes may not be insufficient. A lot of spices are cooked before being eaten which helps eliminate the risks, but many people, including my husband, use lots of pepper at the table and that can be a source of risk. Also, dried spices can be contaminated for years sitting on our kitchen shelves, the contamination doesn’t go away. I don’t know what kind of testing is done in Canada, but from the article, it doesn’t seem enough is being done in the States.

I hope you all enjoyed your ghoulies and ghosties and things that go bump in the night. Here it was raining pretty hard most of the day so I think that put off a lot of trick or treaters. The women who were manning the table downstairs Had had very few visitors although I saw lots of adults tucking in. Matt went to the liquor store and the grocery store and they had a few people dressed up. At the bowling alley they had some challenged kids bowling for a while and several of them were dressed up.

Talking of bowling, Matt bowled up a storm when it didn’t particularly matter. I didn’t do too badly, but nothing like he did. As an added bit of fun we were all playing Snakes and Ladders and out of the three games (a quarter a time) Matt won once and then I won the second time. So we made a big profit, at least $4 I think. The friend who’s arm I had been twisting to come to the Travel League with us did join us, I was so pleased. I think she enjoyed herself. The alley we went to in New Hamburg is actually quite small, they only have about 8 lanes, but its a nice little house. Of course we got our doughnuts.

It’s a bit late for a Hallowe’en cocktail, but this also has ties to bowling so what could be more suitable for me. I haven’t posted a cocktail in a while either.

The Hirshfield

Contributed by Cocktails 2008

Makes 1 drink

Pin-Up Bowl • St. Louis
This bar and bowling alley partners serious, classically prepared cocktails with fun, light-hearted drinks like this homage to Leo Hirshfield, creator of the Tootsie Roll, one of America's first penny candies.

© Wendell T. Webber

Hallowe’en Cocktails
Vodka

1. 1 orange wedge
2. Unsweetened cocoa powder
3. Ice
4. 2 ounces chocolate vodka
5. 1/2 ounce vanilla vodka
6. 1/2 ounce dark crème de cacao
7. 1/4 ounce Grand Marnier
8. 1 orange twist

1. Moisten half of the outer rim of a martini glass with the orange wedge and coat lightly with cocoa powder. Fill a cocktail shaker with ice. Add all of the remaining ingredients except the twist and shake well. Strain into the prepared martini glass and garnish with the orange twist.

Have a great day

Hallowe’en Comments, Authors and Cons.

People have been commenting on Hallowe’en and what the kids were like the other night, which made me think about when we first came to Canada, 37 years ago last month, just before Hallowe’en. We knew little or nothing about it but did pick up the fact that kids would come to the door for treats. We bought a bunch of candies and having no idea how many kids would turn up, ran out very quickly, we had a few apples on hand and gave those out (were told that was a no no later) and then Matt would go to the door and say sorry to the callers but we had just arrived in Canada and didn’t know much about it. We were both much impressed when a tiny tot turned round and said something like “that’s alright and welcome to Canada, I hope you enjoy it”. Out of the mouths of babes….. As for the apples, apparently some charming people had been known to insert razor blades into apples before giving them out with the result that apples were always suspect. Its unbelievable what some people will do.

Oh woe is me, Brandon Sanderson, one of my very favourite authors, is going to be at book signing in Markham, Ontario this weekend. Sadly there is no way I could drive all the way there just for a book signing. He is also going to be at the World Fantasy Convention too. I had never even heard that that was taking place, I would have given my eye teeth to go to that but it is somewhat expensive and is also sold out. Oh well, unless my fairy godmother pops down the chimney (not that we have one) I guess I am out of luck. Excuse me while I cry in my beer; coffee actually. He looks so young to have written as much as he has. He has completed the Wheel of Time series, the last book comes out in January although I have just discovered a prologue on Amazon.com By Grace and Banners Fallen which I purchased for my Kindle. I have another book of his waiting for me at the library, The Emperor’s Soul. I have suddenly got a lot of stuff to read all at once.

Here is a somewhat unusual recipe from Mushrooms Canada, we occasionally have vegetable stuffed mushrooms, but this is a new one on me.

Cranberry Stuffed Mushrooms

by Louisa Clements of Living Lou

Ingredients

12 white button mushrooms

60 g (1/4 cup) fresh cranberries, chopped

15 g (1 tbsp) butter

olive oil for pan

1 medium sausage link

1 clove garlic, chopped

15 g (1 tbsp) white wine

60 g (1/4 cup) goats cheese

60 g (1/4 tsp) dried sage

11 mL (3/4 tsp) maple syrup

salt and pepper to taste

15 g (1 tbsp) parmesan

Method

1. Preheat oven to 350.
2. Dice 6 of the mushroom stems, discarding the remaining 6.3. In a pan, melt butter over med-low heat. Add cranberries and cook for 3-4 minutes. Add the mushroom stems and cook for another 2-3 minutes. Remove from pan and allow to cool in bowl.
4. In the same pan, turn up the heat to med-high and add a little olive oil to coat the pan. Next, add the garlic and sausage meat. Cook and crumble until sausage is fully cooked.
5. Leaving the sausage meat in the pan, add the white wine, scraping up all the brown bits on the bottom.6. Turn off heat and add the cranberry and mushroom mixture back into the pan. Add in the goats cheese, sage and maple syrup. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Allow goats cheese to melt then stir together to combine all of the ingredients.
7. Spoon the mixture into the mushrooms and bake in the oven for 15 minutes.8. After the 15 minutes, remove from oven and sprinkle with Parmesan. Return to oven and bake for another 5-7 minutes.

Have a great day

Pern, Sandy, Radio, Spider.

This weekend I got hold of a wallpaper for my PC which is from the Anne McCaffery book The White Dragon. Those of you who follow The Dragonriders of Pern will recognise the picture. I must admit it is one of my favourite covers from the series. In fact it was reading this book which first started me off on the Dragonrider series. I own all of them these days, even the ones written by her son although I am not as impressed with those as I was with the original Pern stories. Anne McCaffery could write no wrong in my opinion. Ruth, the white dragon, was one of my favourites of course. As many of you will know I am a dragon aficianado and if anything has a dragon in the story or the picture, I am right there. I am not so into stories of ‘bad’ dragons though, superior dragons maybe, but not ones that do willful damage, or eat maidens, etc.

Everybody is concerned about the storm roaring up the east coast, calling it Frankenstorm. I understand Hurricane Sandy is scheduled to meet up with a cold front which will make the storm spread even further, it is already 800 miles wide (update 2000). Of course when we see the meteorologists on the coasts, in the background you can see idiots surfing!! A friend posted a picture from NC at the Bogue pier on Saturday and that was well before the storm is due to hit. As you can see the waves are beginning to pound into the shore. I do hope the pier itself will be OK, it has sustained so much hurricane damage over the years. Not sure how much longer they will continue to repair it. All the other piers have gone now. Here in Ontario they are talking about us getting snow as a result of this storm and saying some of the Lakes will feel effects from the wind. I find very often these storms are magnified beyond proportion and I hope this is the case this time. Nevertheless, I hope all my friends in its path will hunker down and keep out of its way. CBC has, what appears to be, a continuous video cam of the waves at http://www.cbc.ca/news/.

You will remember I posted a recipe and picture last Thursday for Broken Fingers, I am going to be giving out this recipe on the local radio on Wednesday the 31st,  bit late in the day as will already be Hallowe’en. However… if you wanted to hear me you can go to CKWR.com at 11:30 a.m. and click on the Listen Live Button. It is real time, if you don’t hear it at that time, you can’t pick it up later although I will end up with an MP3.

Visiting some friends the other day I spotted a lovely/horrid Hallowe’en spider but didn’t have a camera with me so asked them to take the pic for me. Here it is.


Enough to give one the willies isn’t it? Especially if you aren’t too keen on spiders in the first place.

I thought this was an interesting side to serve for dinner although I am not sure I would use the maple syrup, I think that would make it too sweet.

Roasted Mini Pumpkins

Source: Food & Wine

Yield: 12 Servings

RECIPE INGREDIENTS
12 mini pumpkins
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon ground allspice
6 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/4 cup pure maple syrup
Salt and freshly ground pepper

DIRECTIONS
Preheat the oven to 400°F. Using a grapefruit knife or a sharp paring knife, cut a ring around each pumpkin stem to form a lid; remove the lids and set aside. With a small spoon, scrape out the seeds and any membranes.
In a small bowl, combine the cinnamon, nutmeg, and allspice and sprinkle the spices inside the pumpkins. Add 1/2 tablespoon of the butter and 1 teaspoon of the maple syrup to each pumpkin and season with salt and pepper.
Set the pumpkins in a baking dish and add 1/2 inch of water. Replace the lids and roast the pumpkins for about 30 minutes, or until tender. Serve hot.

Have a great day

Plastic Turkey, Hallowe’en, Tourtières and Turrones, Old Recipes.

I have been complaining for years about the product sold as turkey in most delis, I call it plastic turkey. I have just seen someone else label it extruded meat and ask what part of the turkey is shaped like a football. I have tasted the stuff and to me it is totally tasteless. Last time I was in the UK at Christmas I was impressed to see real honest to goodness turkeys being carved up in the deli. Why can’t we do that here. Maybe they only do that at Christmas in the UK, but even so…..

At least I bowled fairly well yesterday. I wasn’t sure if I would be able to do so as I couldn’t complete one game on Friday. At least I didn’t hear any horror stories of the kids out on Hallowe’en either so I gather locally, at least, all went well. We never see anything of it because we live on the 5th floor; the Super and his wife give out all the candies and deal with all the ghosts, witches and goblins – not to mention zombies and other horrid things. Getting less and less pleasant these days. There was one house down the road which had the whole of their front yard covered in gravestones with a skeleton in a tree and who knows what else.

I have been planning to make some Tourtières but I do so with a mixture of meats and have been having trouble getting ground veal. Today I ordered some which we will pick up Friday afternoon, the store is near the bowling alley. I can’t believe I had so much trouble with ground veal, never have before. Yesterday we went to Vincenzo’s, the wonderful deli store I have mentioned before, and bought some cheeses as well as putting myself down to be called in roughly three weeks when they receive some Turron which is a wonderful product of Spain and consists of almonds and nougat as a starter. Had to give my name to the cashier and she insisted on calling it Turoni and spelling it Turone.  Checking it can be Turrones for plural or El Turrón. I can buy it on the internet, but its not cheap and as they want $14 to ship it, that makes it cost prohibitive.

How very odd. I have been thinking about a recipe I used to make years ago called Pigs in Blankets. I hunted on line both in the UK and elsewhere for a recipe and cannot find the one I used to use. I still have the recipe but the picture is black and white. All the recipes I can find are either sausages wrapped in pastry of some kind or cocktail sausages wrapped in bacon. Neither of which are like my recipe which came from Cookery in Colour which was the second recipe book I ever owned, it doesn’t say when it was printed, but I have had it since about 1962 and a girlfriend had it before that date as she recommended it to me. I used to have Guy Fawkes parties – we didn’t usually celebrate Halloween – and would often serve these, I used to do the baked potato version.

Streaky bacon, by the way, is the kind of bacon we, in North America, get all the time.

Pigs in Blankets

Allow 2 medium-sized potatoes and 2 sausages per person together with a rasher of bacon. There are two ways of cooking this recipe. One is to peel the potatoes thinly, make a hole in the centre with an apple corer and insert the sausage. Season lightly, then roast in hot fat until both potatoes and sausages are golden-coloured and tender. Wrap 1/2 rasher of streaky bacon round the potato and cook for a further few minutes. The second way is to retain the skin on the potatoes, make a hole in the centre with the apple corer, season the inside of the potato lightly, put in the sausage and bake the potato in its jacket in the usual way. When the potato is just soft, wrap the half rasher of bacon round the outside and complete the cooking. Garnish with tomatoes and parsley.

Have a great day

Whales, Hallowe’en, Pianist

I feel this is important enough to pass on to you and anyone else I can encourage to sign the petition.

Will we stop mass extinction?

I've just signed an urgent global petition supporting a new treaty to prevent mass extinction. The petition will be delivered Friday at UN talks in Japan -- check out the email below and sign on here:   

http://www.avaaz.org/en/the_end_of_whales/98.php?CLICKTF

Dear friends,

There are only 300 northern right whales left, and 99% of blue whales have been wiped out. These majestic giants are endangered species, and their case is being played out across the world, time and again. In fact, one third of all life forms on the planet are on the brink of extinction.

The natural world is being crushed by human activity, waste and exploitation. But there is a plan to save it -- a global agreement to create, fund and enforce protected areas covering 20% of our lands and seas by 2020. And right now, 193 governments are meeting in Japan to address this crisis.

We have just 3 days left in this crucial meeting. Experts say that politicians are hesitant to adopt such an ambitious goal, but that a global public outcry could tip the balance, making leaders feel the eyes of the world upon them. Click to sign the urgent 20/20 petition, and forward this email widely -- the message will be delivered directly to the meeting in Japan.

To read the rest check the link above.

Watching Good Morning America yesterday, I learned that Hallowe’en is the most dangerous time for kids to be killed on the roads. Particularly boys and particularly between the hours of 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. One of the reporters dressed up in a witches outfit, black hat, black cloak and when they turned off the lights and shone headlight type lights at her, you couldn’t see a thing. However, she took off her cloak and she had all kinds of bangles and stickers which reflected light and on the back of her witches hat there was a chem light. Her back itself was covered in reflective stickers and so on. There are two young girls who were both almost killed a year ago and they are circulating bracelets which shine in the dark in the hope of helping other kids on Hallow’en night.

I just discovered a young pianist called Ethan Bortnick who is now 9 years old and apparently first appeared on Good Morning America when he was 6. He has his own special coming up on Public Broadcasting. He has played piano with some quite amazing people including Elton John. This morning he played a jazz piece which he wrote himself having told the story of the piece first – see GMA.com. With Elton he played Chopin. What really irritated me, we didn’t get to hear the whole piece, the programme cut off for the ubiquitous ads. I know ads pay for all this, but for goodness sake, let us see the segments properly. This youngster got me to thinking about genius. I wonder what it is in the brain which produces a genius, Mozart was one and this young man appears to be another.

Here is a very simple recipe from Cooking.com although the recipe source is Eating Well, but really easy to do for a party at either Thanksgiving or Christmas.

Date Wraps

Source: Eating Well

Sweet dates and salty prosciutto combine in a tasty bite.

RECIPE INGREDIENTS

16 thin slices prosciutto

16 whole pitted dates

Freshly ground pepper to taste

DIRECTIONS

Wrap a slice of prosciutto around each date. Grind pepper on top.

Have a great day

Hallowe'en, Bateaux Mouches, Penan

Happy Hallowe'en to everyone. I hope you have a good day and if you have kids I hope they have a great time tonight. We will be safely ensconced in our apartment away from all the ghosts and goblins. The first time we experienced Hallowe'en in Canada we ran out of candy and Matt was apologising to all the children and explaining how we had only just arrived in Canada. One little tot piped up "Welcome to Canada" how wonderful! Karen Miller (Karen's Musings this page for link) is presently swanning around France with her publisher. She happened to mention having gone on a trip on one of the Bateaux Mouches which ply the Seine. It brought back memories of when I did the same, many, many years ago. It was spoilt for me however, the main thing I remember is going to the loo and waking up on the deck at the top of a long flight of stairs. I had fainted. Thank God I hadn't fallen down the stairs. No idea why I fainted, I used to do things like that once in a while as a young woman. My friend, Hubèrt, who was with me, didn't know anything about it. Luckily I was able to spend time on the Seine several years later when my parents took our home, Sunfish, to Paris and parked it there. That is Sunfish on the left. We were moored right in the centre of Paris by the Pont d'Alexandre III. A wonderful spot which enabled us to visit wherever we wished to go. Only problem was, in those days, the Seine was pretty filthy. I assume they have cleaned it up considerably by now. What you could see floating in it was enough to turn your stomach. Paris is the city of love and you could tell that by what was floating down the Seine. We have a programme called The Nature of Things which is presented by David Suzuki, a Canadian science broadcaster and environmental activist. Last night we watched a very sad little story about the Penan, who used to be the last race of hunter gatherers on earth and lived a nomadic way of life. Unfortunately this lifestyle has been diminished by logging activities. This is all taking place in Sarawak, Malaysia where it would seem they are allowing indiscriminate logging. The Penan are now having to live in permanent structures, their sources of food have been virtually destroyed so they have to plant crops, they are exposed to the burning sun which they are unused to and they are mostly not compensated by the goverment for the ruination of their life. One or two have had to accept jobs with the logging companies in order to survive and they are paid 50¢ an hour for doing so. They are a very primitive peoples and they didn't want much in their lives, but it is being taken away from them. To read more about it click here for the story The Last Nomads. If you are in my viewing area, it is being aired again on November 6 and I hope you will try and catch it. It is pitiful to see what man's greed achieves. This picture is of a Penan chief. The linguist, Ian Mackenzie, who made this film speaks Penan and is compiling a dictionary of their fast disappearing language. They appear to be very fond of him as he has spent a lot of time with their various groups. Some of the time he has travelled with them but that is now a thing of the past. Ian Mackenzie was almost in tears when he realised that. There is more about the Penan on Wikipedia click here. I am presently trying to figure out a dessert for tomorrow, I haven't decided yet, but I was hunting through my Three and Four Ingredient cookbook and this is one I came across. Chocolate Banana Fools This deluxe version of banana custard looks great served in glasses. It can be made a few hours in advance and chilled until ready to serve. Serves four. 4 oz. plain (semisweet) chocolate chopped 1 1/4 cups fresh custard 2 bananas Put the chocolate in a heatproof bowl and melt in the microwave on high power for 1-2 minutes. Stir, then set aside to cool. (Alternatively put the chocolate in a heatproof bowl and place it over a pan of gently simmering water and leave until melted, stirring frequently). Pour the custard into a bowl and gently fold in the melted chocolate to make a rippled effect. Peel and slice the bananas and stir these into the chocolate and custard mixture. Spoon into four glasses and chill for 30 minutes to an hour before serving. I wondered what they meant by custard, they are talking about good fresh custards as available in your supermarket. I assume Bird's custard would also fill the bill. Have a great day.