Apple Brown Sugar Grunt
Chances are you know someone from Atlantic Canada, you’re related to someone from Atlantic Canada, or you are from Atlantic Canada.
Desserts
A Lost Watch And The Last Of The Blueberries
Here are a couple of recipes for the last of the blueberries, with thanks to the blueberry buddies: J, N, M and, especially, G.
Yukon Chef Goes For Top Spot On National TV
Chef Chris Irving describes his life as a chef humbly “as a job.” Irving recently competed on Top Chef Canada (on The Food Network),
Raspberry Fool With Wild Chamomile Shortbreads
Nothing is assured about wild food gathering. If you find butter & whipping cream try this dessert recipe.
Time to Celebrate: Birch Syrup Season is Done
Shift from birch sap for syrup, to sap for beer. “Oh yeah, beer concentrate is fun and easy, relative to syrup, and the vibe is all beer,”
Chocolate ‘Poops’
Is it weird to lick your fingers making Chocolate poops? Use a dark high-percentage chocolate, ideally bean to bar chocolate if available.
Bright Flavours for Spring
Lemon yogurt cake. With the addition of tangy low-bush cranberries, this cake will provide a burst of bright flavours
Feel good foods: Healthy Hot Chocolate?
Normally we think of hot chocolate as “junk food,” but this healthy hot chocolate recipe packs a serious health punch.
Gather: No Trifling Matter
trifle—luscious, layered concoction of cake or cookies, fruit, custard, jam and whipped cream invented by the British and adored by everyone
Parmesan and Spruce Tip Shortbreads
Ever eat from a package and think, “Huh. I could make that.” I sampled pricey Parmesan &rosemary shortbreads, I tried spruce tips instead.
A tall glass of Christmas treat: Gingerbread protein smoothie
Christmas is coming and with it, all the gingerbread-flavoured things! Try this delicious gingerbread protein smoothie recipe.
Buttermilk, black pepper crepes with bacon and birch syrup
Buttermilk gives the crepes a lovely, fresh, slightly sour taste that plays off the salty bacon and the slightly bitter birch syrup.
Cranberry bounty
Old-fashioned jelly roll, made with cranberry jam, not jelly, and finished with whipped cream, Amaretto and toasted sliced almonds.
Pineapple bourbon rice pudding
Pineapple and bourbon make this simple rice pudding a bit more interesting. Try pouring additional bourbon on top of just before serving.
Cassava flour chocolate chip cookies
Soft and chewy, like you’d expect from a classic chocolate chip cookie, but without grains, gluten and dairy. They can’t tell the difference!
Peanut butter banana oat smoothie recipe
This peanut butter banana oat smoothie is a fast and nutritious snack or breakfast. It is high in calories, protein and fat so it won’t leave you feeling hungry soon after. It is also gluten-free, dairy-free/vegan and soy-free.
A Hubbub of Rhubarb
Rhubarb is a good producer to just keep harvesting, resulting in a pile-up of chopped rhubarb in bags in the freezer. A hubbub of rhubarb!
Wild Strawberry jam
The berry season is still months away, but a close friend gave me a small jar of jam for Christmas. And so, I made cheesecake.
Caffeinated!
In these recipes you may use any coffee roast you like—the effect will be different with each one–but be sure to use a fine grind. The coarser stuff can be unpleasantly gritty.
Post-holiday baking projects
I’ve wanted to make savoury thumbprint cookies forever, so once the spruce needles were swept up, the decorations put back in their boxes and the cookie tins fully emptied, I decided to give them a try.
Freezer candy
There is a famous vegetarian restaurant in New York City called Dirt Candy. Someday I will get there, but, in the meantime, I love the name. It perfectly captures the sweetness of the root vegetables that come up from the dirt in their jewel-like colours. At this time of year, I think of another jewel-like …
Christmas treats
I just can’t wait for Christmas to come around again and the kitchen abounds with the cooking smells of Christmas pudding.
Pancakes
I come from a time when tradition dictated that Friday was Pancake Friday. That meant we had pancakes for supper on Fridays. At the time, we didn’t make pancakes from a box of ready-made, store-bought mix. I’ve dug back into the 1930s, 40s and 50s to pass along some of those good old-fashioned recipes. To …
Blueberry Pilgrims
I don’t believe I’ve ever seen so many berry pickers as this year in the White Pass near Fraser, B.C., southern Yukon’s favourite place to find blueberries. The pandemic was driving us out into the stunning moonscape of small lakes, rock, balsam fir, lichen, alder and dwarf birch from Log Cabin to Summit Creek in …
Currant-ly Available
Blackcurrants do grow wild in the Yukon, sparsely. You may find Ribes hudsoniam in damp forests at the base of mountains, like for example on the King’s Throne hike in Kluane National Park.
Sage Advice
I find one of the best ways to calm the spirit and focus the mind is to go out foraging. When foraging for wild plants we enter the landscape on an intimate scale, we’re down on our knees, looking, exploring, paying attention, the microcosm engages us and the macro shrinks away.
Spruce Tip Jelly
Serve spruce tip jelly on toast with butter; in thumb-print cookies; on a charcuterie platter; with smoked salmon and cream cheese; or to accompany any wild meat or fish, whether braised, grilled, roasted or fried.
Quit loafing around
Try your hand at baking bannock. All it takes is two cups of flour, less than a tsp of salt and about a tsp of baking powder.
Weeknight crepes
Crepes make a great light dinner. They are somewhere between a ‘breakfast for dinner’ type meal and making dessert the star of the show.
For the sweet tooth
Cranberry bread I love old-fashioned toasted raisin bread, but digging into some old recipes, I came across one for cranberry bread. Checking our cupboard, the only thing missing was the cranberries, but you could experiment with just about any berries. Ingredients 2 cups flour 1 tsp salt 1 cup white sugar 1 tsp baking soda …
They’re never “just desserts”
Some kids eat their meals just to get to the desserts. I can well remember when dear old Mom would tell me to eat my supper because it was good for me. My eyes were on the grand finale aka the dessert that only came once I had finished the main event. Often, I would …
There’s no cookin’ like home cookin’!
Murray’s old big stone house, back in St. Marys, Ontario, where cookies cooled on the window ledge every Saturday There is no dessert like a home cooked dessert. My mother baked cookies every Saturday and put them on the window ledge in our big stone house (now designated as Canada’s Baseball Hall of Fame), back …
Blueberry and Saskatoon berry grunt
Grunt is a sweet fruit stew topped with fluffy dumplings, and anyone who grew up on the East Coast (or with parents from the East Coast) will immediately recognize this dessert.
Foil-wrapped apple cake
One of the best parts of mass-produced breads, like hotdog and burger buns, is their super-squishy, cake-like quality. That makes them a great ingredient to serve as both dinner and dessert on your camping trips.
Banana, chocolate marshmallow dip
Admittedly, this is more of a really delicious idea than a recipe.
Candied Blood Oranges
Citrus is everywhere this time of year. And while stuffing yourself with fresh fruit while it’s around is a solid choice, those of us who tend towards gastronomic squirreling are on the look-out for interesting ways to preserve seasonal ingredients. Unless you’re a serious marmalade lover (in which case you’ve probably sorted yourself out already) …
Vanilla Bourbon Rice Pudding
This is simple rice pudding – seasoned with vanilla and bourbon, and not on the overly sweet side.
Ris à l’amande (Danish rice pudding)
This dessert is similar to risengrød and is offered to the nisser (gnomes) on Christmas Eve in Denmark
Apple bourbon crumble
Apple crumble is as close to a perfect food as I’ve ever found. It can be breakfast just as easily as it can be dessert or even dinner. It’s fast to prepare, and when it comes right down to it, pretty healthy.
Oven Stewed Rhubarb with Cornmeal Biscuit Crumble
INGREDIENTS 1½ cup sugar, divided 1 Tbsp cornstarch 2 pounds frozen rhubarb ⅔ cup all-purpose flour ⅔ cup cornmeal Pinch of salt ⅓ cup coconut oil ⅓ cup water Honey, to drizzle Toasted shredded coconut, to garnish Vanilla ice cream (or whipped cream) to serve METHOD 1. Set oven to 375ºF degrees. In a large …
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Cookies
My mother was a master cook sent down from heaven, and as she looks down upon me, I think back to the 1930 and 40s. I must come clean and admit it: I was the person always stealing those great sweet treats. Mom would say, “Don’t you dare steal a cookie.” Dare was something I …
Muffinize Your Snack Time
Muffins are not only a treat, but a very healthy treat – especially when you bake them with fresh fruit. Here are some tasty muffin treats to try out. Wild Berry Muffins Ingredients: 1 cup all-purpose flour 1 cup whole wheat flour ½ cup sugar 1 Tbsp baking powder ½ tsp salt ½ tsp cinnamon …
Honey Panna Cotta with Pineapple
Panna Cotta is a great dessert for a dinner party because it’s best when made a day in advance. Think of it as an adult pudding cup.
Fear of Pie-ing
The circle is often used as a symbol of perfection. The delicious combination of sweet or savoury filling and flaky pastry at its best when round is known as “pie.” The magic number that tells us everything we need to know about a circle is called “pi.” Coincidence? I think not. Perhaps this relationship between …
Bread and Butter
Here are some good bread recipes from the 1950s. Cranberry Bread 2 cups of sifted flour 1 cup sugar 1½ tsp baking powder 1 tsp salt ½ tsp baking soda ¼ cup butter 1 beaten egg 1 tsp grated orange peel ¾ cup orange juice 1½ cups light raisins 1½ cups fresh chopped cranberries Sift …
Beet Brownies
3. Bake brownies until a toothpick inserted in the centre comes out with just a few crumbs clinging to it, about 45 minutes. Allow brownies to cool for 20 minutes before slicing. Makes 16 brownies
All Tarted Up
I extracted a small tub of raspberries from the freezer yesterday, comforted to see it near overflowing with the season’s harvest. Though saskatoons and blueberries came in in droves this year, the raspberries that made it to the freezer were few and far between – their perishability and spotty cropping this summer made them all …
Whisky and Cake
It’s 6 a.m. on a rainy morning just before Canada Day. In six hours I need to be ready to drive to Mayo, with three canoes on the roof and six days of breakfasts, dinners and desserts packed and labelled for the communal kitchen, and 17 days of lunches for me and my companion. Tomorrow …
Desserts
Apple Crisp Cake: 2 ¼ cups all-purpose flour 1 cup sugar 1 ½ tsp baking soda ½ tsp salt 2 eggs 1 ½ cups sour milk* ⅓ cup vegetable oil Icing: 14 oz. pk. cream cheese, soften ¼ cup butter 1 cup icing sugar ½ cup unsweetened cocoa powder ½ tsp …
Lewis’s Scotch Tablet
Lewis’s Scotch Tablet Ingredients • Pour into a greased tin or tray with at least a two-inch lip. • Score the top in a one-inch cube pattern when it has cooled a bit.This will make it easier to cut into cubes when completely cool.
Rhubarb
It’s in almost everybody’s garden, and it grows totally untended in abandoned homesteads and mine sites — It must be a North American plant, right? Well, not so. it was brought to North America in the late 1700s, but didn’t gain wide popularity until the mid-1900s. This red-stalked, green-leafed vegetable is rich in vitamin C, …
Break Your Fast … F-A-S-T!!!
Morning is a great time for these muffins. Low in fat, high in flavour, calcium, complex carbohydrates and fibre, one of these with a glass of milk or piece of cheese will give you a good start to a busy day. Research shows that regular breakfast eaters are better able to maintain a healthy body …
Lovely Lemons and Rhubarb
That bright and beautiful time of year is finally here: the lupines are in the woods and the eagles are proudly flying overhead. So, too, our northern rhubarb is making its presence known. Use it in this lemon tart or as a spread on morning toast or freshly baked scones. Lemon Tart with Rhubarb Coulis …
Starting to Go Plum Crazy
That special Yukon summer time is here. Go out and pick some fresh wild raspberries to combine with ripe, red plums in this delicious summer dessert. Yukon river banks and the sides of old railroad tracks and ditches usually yield a motherlode of wild raspberries. Take a bunch of friends with you so you will …
Tropical Taste in a Northern Kitchen
When a prolonged winter continues cold, colder and coldest, one can counter with thoughts and tastes of the sunny South. Here is a muffin, loaded with tropical flavour to help you get through the grip of winter. The “white stuff”, coconut, adds fibre and an interesting texture, while canned pineapple adds moisture to these marvelous …
Tutti Fruit-ee, Go Fruit
Sometimes fresh is not always available. In early Klondike days, canned or dried fruit was the norm. Many modern-day Northerners dry fruit for lightweight hiking food or for long-term winter storage. This quick and nutritious crisp dessert can be made using frozen, dried or canned fruit. While summer may seem eons away, this is a …
Round and Round and Round We Go
In old Klondike days, ingredients were rather limited. Lard or bacon grease was often the only fat for baking. Holy smokes, can you imagine? In this recipe, we have the luxury of using butter. There is no doubt: real butter makes the best cookies. Teamed up with brown or raw Demerara sugar, oats, flour and …
Bittersweet Endings
While the snow is gone, and with it the skiing and snowshoeing, back come the swans, ducks, crocuses and the long-awaited spring light. One season ends and another begins. End a meal with both bitter and sweet flavours, a decadent creamy texture and get an extra bit of calcium and add Vitamins A and D …
Rhubarb and Strawberry Fare
Rhubarb is the earliest crop to be harvested in the Yukon and is now fresh and plentiful. Grab it from your garden or find a friend who has a bunch. Ruby-red or tart-green rhubarb, along with sweet summer strawberries, make this a quick-to-prepare cake that packs a wallop of flavour. Enjoy a slice with a …
Bottoms-up in the Blueberry Patch
Picking in the blueberry patch; what could be sweeter? Along waterways and creeks, hillsides and rocky patches, these little blue beauties are worth the hike. This upside-down cake is a nice way to celebrate blueberry season in the North. It is also important to reward your pickers with a delectable goody after the pickings. You …
Approaching Life ‘Gingerly’
There is nothing like ginger for spicing things up. Fresh, candied, pickled in syrup or dried; all forms of ginger are pungent, fragrant and especially aromatic when in the oven baking. Fruit desserts like this Pear Apple Crisp are quick and easy to prepare and contribute lots of nutrients and soluble fibre. Leftovers, if you …
Simple and Sweet: An Old Time
Simple ingredients: butter, sugar and flour make up real old-fashioned shortbread. While variations on these basic ingredients are many, the real McCoy is hard to beat. The trick is in the kneading; you really can’t knead shortbread too much. The more you knead, the stronger the dough (your arms, too) which, in turn, will result …
Cranberries Colour Christmas
The bright-red colour and tart flavour of Yukon cranberries complements Christmas feasts beautifully. For a change, try baking cranberry sauce ahead of the big day. Adding thyme and some Northern sage imparts a nice woodsy mellowness. Cranberry-Orange Squares are a welcome treat on your cookie tray and make up quickly with the use of a …
Having a Cup of Spring-Time Tea
Spring is finally in the Yukon air. When it takes hold, one can hardly remember when we were in the midst of those long winter days. Invite a friend or two and brew up a cup of tea to enjoy with a slice of this lovely, fragrant cake. The addition of moist, mild pears to …
A Chocolate Valentine for Your Sweeties
What is Valentine’s Day without chocolate? Cut into heart shapes and sprinkled with a dusting of icing sugar, these are moist and not too sweet. They make a nice presentation on a dessert tray or a happy surprise in a lunch bag. Valentine Brownie Hearts INGREDIENTS: 7 ounces unsweetened chocolate 1 cup butter 4 eggs …
Cooking on the Wild Side of Summer
Wild raspberries are yours for the picking in a ditch or river bank near you. Take advantage of our warm summer weather and gather plump, succulent red raspberries or peach-coloured salmonberries for jam, juice, pie or these delicious squares. Similar to a date square in texture but amped up in flavour, these will be quickly …
Going Plum Crazy for Fabulous Flavour
With fall come many fruits, particularly juicy plums – lovely large dark ones and smaller golden plums. Either variety will work well in this easy-to-make dessert. Perfect for Sunday dinner or to pack along for your next potluck supper, this cake is moist, yet not too sweet. And hey, with all that fruit eating it …
Conserving Cranberries
For the Thanksgiving table, nothing could be finer than Yukon cranberries prepared with the zing of oranges. This is a very simple, very delicious way to celebrate the bounty of our Yukon forest. Conserves are really rather runny jams made with fruit and sugar. Sometimes nuts and dried fruits such as raisins are used. This …
Snap it Up
Those long and much anticipated golden days of the summer solstice are upon us. Go out and enjoy the sunshine and warmth. When you get back, relax with a refreshing glass of Lemon-Limeade and a light Lemon-Lime cookie to dunk into it. Lemon-Lime Snaps INGREDIENTS: ½ cup butter, room temperature 1 cup granulated sugar 1 …
A Stash of Honey
Have a little spot on your property not being used? Why not plant some berry shrubs? After a recent delivery of Emu Creek Farm-raised honey berries or haskap, I thought to myself, everyone should be growing these berries on their property for a winter stash. The thing that makes these berries so interesting is their …
Smiling Bears Keep Me Awake
At this time of year, a flood of heart-shaped boxes, roses and freaky-looking smiley pink bears stare me down in almost every shop I enter. The image of the bears laughing and throwing chocolates and roses at me stays with me when I close my eyes, keeping me awake some nights. Kind of intimidates me …
Brain Active
Did you know you can build new brain cells at any age? It’s true! Whether you are in your 30s and constantly lose your car keys, or coming into your golden years and find it increasingly hard to recall events, there is hope. To improve brain functioning, the most important things to look at are …
Go for Oats
Those who enjoy the Yukon outdoors know that snacks need to be easy to pack and hold up without crumbling too easily. Peanut butter packs protein while oats are an excellent complex carbohydrate. The following recipes use oats and are quick to make and easy to transport. The secret to a firm cookie is to …
Winter Camping and Skiing? Get Out and Get the Sun!
Winter weather … cold, crisp and clear. When the sun shines, get outside. Ski, snowshoe, sled or run your dog to get that sun full on your face. The sun can help immensely in lifting your spirits as well as getting much-needed Vitamin D. When travelling in cold temperatures, make sure you pack lots of …
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