Summer Fruit Smoothie (for Wintertime)

I was on an oatmeal kick for a while, and that was great. Now I'm giving smoothies a go. I did a few piña colada smoothies initially since they'd worked out well in the past. Still delicious, but I'm all out of pineapple and wanted to try something new this morning anyway. After rummaging around in the freezer, I came up with a selection of frozen fruits that I figured would make for a good smoothie. I think I still need to make some tweaks to the recipe, but I'm happy enough with it for now.

Summer Fruit Smoothie
Slightly adapted from The 5-a-day Menu Planner
~1/3 c. frozen mixed berries
~1/3 c. frozen pitted cherries
~1/4 c. frozen blueberries
~1/4 c. vanilla yogurt
~1/2 c. skim milk

1. Blend until smooth. Enjoy!

While the flavour on this particular smoothie wasn't bad, I found it a little flat. I think I'd mix it up a bit next time to try to make it a bit more lively. I'm wondering if adding a few frozen cranberries might be the way to go. They're quite tart, but that might actually be what this blend needs to kick it up a notch. If the tartness needs to be offset a bit, I might try adding either a little bit of honey or maybe even some strawberry jam!

Hopefully I can try this one out again tomorrow (with a few modifications) and report back. I think there's definitely potential here, it just needs a little adjustment to get the balance of flavours just right.

Tortellini with a buttery anchovy-garlic sauce

We were planning to make the Pancit Bihon tonight, but ran out of time. So instead we improvised something with a package of store-made tortellini. It's very loosely inspired by Spaghetti alla Puttanesca Bianca from the Classic Pasta Cookbook.

Ingredients

• 1.5 lbs tortellini or similar stuffed pasta (we used tortellini stuffed with italian sausage)
• 3 tbsp unsalted butter
• 9 anchovies
• 2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
• fresh parmesan

Procedure

1. Bring a pot of water to the boil.
2. Meanwhile, melt the butter in a small skillet over medium low heat.
3. Add the anchovies and cook until they start to break down.
4. Add the garlic. This is a good time to put the pasta in the water.
5. When the pasta is cooked, drain it, transfer to a bowl, then pour the sauce over it and toss well.
6. Grate a bunch of parmesan over the pasta and toss again.

Note: an earlier version of this post called for ⅓C butter. That's way too much. The post has been revised.

Fruited Salmon with Mushrooms and Mustard Sauce

Another 150 Tagines recipe. It comes together quite easily, and quickly for a tagine. We served it over noodles, but it would probably go well with couscous as well -- in which case you may want to start cooking the couscous first, as it will take longer than the tagine if done properly.

We did find it rather excessively tart. symbol suggests replacing the lemon next time; either a sweeter lemon hybrid, or a non-lemon citrus such as blood orange.

The recipe calls for a frozen or preserved lemon, and we had neither; instead we peeled a standard lemon and added the wedges to the tagine, then squeezed the flesh out and removed the skin of the wedges as it was cooking.

Ingredients

• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 1 onion
• 4 cloves garlic, sliced
• 1 tbsp butter
• 1 lb cremini mushrooms, quartered
• 1 pear, chopped
• ½ frozen or preserved lemon, finely chopped, with juice
• 1 tbsp grainy dijon mustard
• 1-1½ lb salmon filet, skin on one side

Procedure

1. Heat the oil in the tagine.
2. Add onion and sautee for five minutes.
3. Add garlic, butter, and mushrooms. Cook, stirring frequently, until the mushrooms soften and release their juices, 5-7 minutes.
4. Add pear, lemon, and mustard, and cook, stirring constantly, for 1 minute.
5. Place salmon on top of vegetables, skin side up (you may need to cut it into pieces to fit it all in the tagine). Cover tagine and cook until fish is opaque and flakes easily when attacked with a fork, 15-20 minutes.

Pomegranate Molasses

This simple recipe comes from Pat Crocker's 150 Best Tagine Recipes. It's not of much interest in and of itself, but it's a necessary component in an upcoming recipe.

Supposedly you can find it in middle-eastern grocery stores, but we haven't had much luck, and fortunately the book includes a recipe.

Ingredients (to make 2 cups of molasses):

• 4 cups pomegranate juice
• ½ cup "cane sugar" (this is very ambiguous; we went with turbinado sugar and it worked out fine)
• ¼ cup lemon juice

Procedure:

1. Combine all ingredients in a small pot. Bring to a boil over medium high heat.
2. Reduce heat to medium low and simmer for ~1h, until it has reduced by a bit more than half.
3. Pour into a jam jar and seal while still hot.