First We Eat Archives - Page 10 of 11

Try this caesar salad dressing recipe

First We Eat: Not just for salad it’s also great spooned over a variety of foods like grilled or roasted veggies

By dee Hobsbawn-Smith May 3, 2019

We arrived for a preliminary visit at the farm in June 2010, a month ahead of our move-in date. Over-anxious? Eager? Yes, both, but mostly we came early to help my aging parents move out — into a bungalow in a nearby town — and to paint the old farmhouse we were moving into. I […] Read more

Mustard greens, or flowering gai lan, a Chinese form of broccoli, are assertive and blend well with strong tastes.

Farm Life, FarmLife

What to use for salad greens while waiting for local produce

First We Eat: In winter, turn to sturdier greens for warm salads and veggie dishes

By dee Hobsbawn-Smith April 18, 2019

In winter, when arugula and other salad greens travel thousands of miles, have been contaminated with E. coli or are too costly, I turn to sturdier greens for warm salads and robust vegetable dishes. Mustard greens, or flowering gai lan, a Chinese form of broccoli, are assertive and blend well with strong tastes. When I […] Read more

Farm Life, FarmLife

Modern-day sausage making

First We Eat: This was once a good way for butchers to use up trimmings but now a good way for you to control ingredients

By dee Hobsbawn-Smith March 29, 2019

Sausages used to be the great unmentionable, made from things no one wanted to know about, never mind eat. But although they began as the thrifty butcher’s way of using up trimmings, sausages have gone uptown. Making your own sausages, like anything homemade, means the cook controls everything, from the selection of meats, salt and […] Read more

Farm Life, FarmLife

Cooking on a winter-weather shoestring

First We Eat: Golden Vegetable Latkes

By dee Hobsbawn-Smith March 22, 2019

The view out my window is relentlessly white. Deep snow has collected across the yard, and the temperature is hovering around -30 C, as it has for the past week. The forecast for the coming week is no better. The roads are rotten. Winter weather means that this week’s cooking must be from the pantry, […] Read more

Farm Life, FarmLife

Saying farewell with apple crepes

First We Eat: What better way to pay tribute after hearing  my cooking mentor had passed away

By dee Hobsbawn-Smith March 8, 2019

I learned recently that my culinary mentor, Madeleine Kamman, died in July 2018. At the time, the event went unnoticed. But when I got word, the news flattened me. Madeleine was the tigress who taught me to trust my palate, who set my benchmarks. She valued methods, flavour principles, terroir — that ineffable link between […] Read more

Farm Life, FarmLife

Reclaiming our peasant heritage

First We Eat: Don’t be intimidated by Boeuf Bourguignon —  just a fancy name for beef stew

By dee Hobsbawn-Smith March 1, 2019

Yesterday I walked home from morning coffee at my neighbour Sharon’s house, my passage closely observed by a leggy Black Angus calf. She bounced up to the barbed wire fence, her head high as she gave my dog and me the once-over. Jake stopped in his tracks, uncertain what this until-now-predictable creature was up to. […] Read more

Farm Life, FarmLife

Forget about the ‘Spaghetti Western’ and try this ‘Spaghetti Eastern’ dish

First We Eat: You’ll want to give this ramen noodles in a tasty broth recipe a try

By dee Hobsbawn-Smith February 15, 2019

It’s a wintry morning in Calgary, where I am visiting my son and his partner. We are bundled up, standing in line. Even though the chinook is blowing in, the morning is raw, and I am grateful I didn’t make any assumptions and underdress. It’s still deep-freeze Prairie winter. The restaurant’s door opens at 11 […] Read more

Tilapia grown aquaponically in Saskatchewan.

Farm Life, FarmLife

Fish on the flatland

First We Eat: Aquaponics on the Prairies  make local sourcing of fish easier

By dee Hobsbawn-Smith February 8, 2019

We didn’t eat much fish when I was a kid, just the occasional trout my grandfather reeled in from the North Saskatchewan River, and East Coast cod on Fridays. Not until we arrived on Vancouver Island did I learn to love fish, especially West Coast sockeye salmon, although the act of fishing struck me as […] Read more

Farm Life, FarmLife

Fowl supper? Fall supper?

Whatever you call them, they are a delicious Prairie harvest tradition

By dee Hobsbawn-Smith December 21, 2018

We gathered at my parents’ house on a mild autumn evening, clucking over Mom and Dad’s recent renovations, sipping Dad’s homemade wine, letting our appetites build for the fowl supper. Our neighbour Ken commented on the lineup he’d witnessed en route. “Halfway down the street and around the block,” he claimed. I was disinclined to […] Read more

Farm Life, FarmLife

This pork porchetta is sure to please

First We Eat: Traditionally a whole pig would be roasted on a spit but here’s a smaller oven version

By dee Hobsbawn-Smith December 7, 2018

I visited my sister and brother-in-law in the Toronto area for Thanksgiving this year, the first time, perhaps ever, that I wasn’t home to cook the feast for my favourite holiday. But even though I wasn’t in my home kitchen, food played as large a part as usual. “We have errands,” my sister said soon […] Read more

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Tag Archives First We Eat

Try this caesar salad dressing recipe

What to use for salad greens while waiting for local produce

Modern-day sausage making

Cooking on a winter-weather shoestring

Saying farewell with apple crepes

Reclaiming our peasant heritage

Forget about the ‘Spaghetti Western’ and try this ‘Spaghetti Eastern’ dish

Fish on the flatland

Fowl supper? Fall supper?

This pork porchetta is sure to please

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