Gordon Ramsay...the real story! By: Helen

            I am so excited!! We did something this time that we have never done before!!  Our first time! You always remember your first time!!! Ready? Amber and I made our very first Soufflé!!! I know!!  Super exciting right? We were so nervous about whether or not it would work.... wait till you see it!!! Best cooking moment EVER!! But, I guess we should start at the beginning...

So here we are taking on the recipes of renowned Chef Gordon Ramsay, the feisty, no-nonsense Hell's Kitchen chef with the highest standards and the worst potty mouth! So we were excited to produce some top quality foods. We decided to tackle Scallops because anyone who watches that show knows how particular he is about cooking scallops correctly. So off I went on my shopping spree looking for nice big scallops and from store to store to store.....I found none! So disappointing!! This was one of those moments when I wanted to live in a city with all the ingredients I need at my finger tips....but a quick phone call later we changed our menu to crab cakes! (Of course we had to buy canned crab meat because finding fresh crab is also not easy in a small town so already we were compromised by our ingredients!) Now we were already behind schedule because I worked till five and Amber took advantage of her day off to get some relaxation time (much needed when you have a newborn and toddler) so by the time we got started our diners knew they were in for a late supper.  Luckily we are used to this because punctuality has never been our strong suit!! This week we also welcomed back our guest judge Terrel who, as always, was more than excited to help us out!

The Book:

Gordon Ramsay’s World Kitchen

By: Gordon Ramsay

Our Menu:

Maryland Crab Cakes Pg. 229

Fish Pie with Leeks and Shrimp Pg. 112

Lemon Soufflé Pg. 27

The Undertaking:

         So I got to work on the fish pie as it needed oven time and Amber began the crab cakes. All was going well until Amber said “oh no!” Well something we have learned working together is that one of us doesn't always read to the end of the recipes and accidentally poured in ALL the bread crumbs instead of just a couple tablespoons...no biggie we thought except when it came time to taste them we realized it was an unfortunate mistake because the breadcrumbs soaked up the flavor and then there wasn't a crispy coating which would have probably changed the results a little.... but what can you do we are learning as we go! Also I may add, when making crab cakes it is vital to have proper chilling time. This helps in holding the shape when frying them up and as a result of our late start time we did have to cheat on the chilling which is why our appetizer wasn't quite as picturesque as the ones in the book.

Now some of you know that I spent some time overseas in my youth and while I was living in England I worked in an upscale fish restaurant and had my first ever fish pie.....and it was incredible!! I have since then salivated at the mere thought of this dish so I was excited for Gordon Ramsay's authentic English Fish Pie!! Now we also had an ingredient issue with this meal because we could not find smoked haddock anywhere. The closest we found was smoked salmon which had a different texture so we didn't want to change the idea of the pie so we left it out. Darn this small town! I was in charge of this recipe so I got to work making the béchamel sauce, sautéing the leeks and poaching the fish. There are a few steps to this pie but they are not difficult and they don't take too long. The coolest step was making the potato topping. I got to use Amber's new ricer which I have never used before and it was awesome! It made the potatoes smooth and easy to cream together with butter and milk!! Amber and I are always looking for new kitchen gadgets and if you don't have a ricer we highly recommend getting one! Your kids will love it and you can get them to help out in the kitchen even if they will make a mess! Now I will pause right here to let you know that pre-teen Parker was NOT looking forward to this meal at all! It had all the things she dislikes most, fish and shellfish, and she was staring at us the whole time dreading the thought of what she was going to have to eat!  Because of this, her scores were predictably her lowest scores yet.  What may be a surprise is that up until a few years ago she wasn't a picky eater at all... in fact I made some crazy casseroles and she always ate them up enthusiastically!!! Oh.... the angst of growing up!!

Okay!!! It is time!! The exciting finish to our cooking day! Soufflé time!! So surprisingly soufflés are not hard to make. We did have to go buy some ramekins because I only had small ones and Amber didn't have any but I didn't mind because I use mine all the time and it is a great excuse to make soufflé again! So we started by buttering and sugaring our ramekins and setting them in the cooler till we needed them. An interesting instruction is to butter them with upward strokes which I can only assume is to help the soufflé rise because it is such a light dessert the strokes must offer some sort of directional aid (this of course is just my uneducated guess, but it sounds good!). Then it was whip this, fold that, and viola!! Soufflé!!

The Results:

Maryland Crab Cakes

We were slightly disappointed in a couple aspects of this dish. First in that there was no sauce included in the recipe. It only called for mayonnaise on the side which is boring so Amber whipped up her special dill sauce and I made a caper sirrachi mayo so that our guest had some options. Second, none of our diners thought the cakes had much flavor. Now I believe this was for two reasons: the fact that we didn't have fresh crab and the fact that the extra breadcrumbs soaked up some of the flavor. I think this recipe is worth a do-over when we can get fresh crab from the city.

“Tasty, mildly pleasant flavors” - Amber's Man

“Light, fluffy, not much crab flavor” - Helen's Bob

“Cakes seemed bland, required sauces” - Guest Judge Terrel

“I don't like the crab!” - Pre-teen Parker

Score: 2.5/5

Fish Pie with Leeks and Shrimp

So this went over well with many of our guests. It was warm and comforting and most everyone agreed they would eat it again. Terrel even took some home for breakfast (strange but true!).  We would like to see what it would have tasted like with the addition of the smoked fish. It also may be worth a redo to see what depth of flavor it adds to the meal. I did find it under-seasoned so perhaps that would have helped.

“Delicious! I loved it!” - Amber's Man

“Great flavor, well balanced, hearty.” - Helen's Bob

“Subtle fish flavor, it would be really good with smoked fish.” - Guest Judge Terrel

“Horrible!!  Worse than crab! Bleh!!” - Pre-teen Parker (who covered it in ketchup in hopes of getting dessert!)

Score: 3/5

  

Lemon Soufflé

This was so exciting to watch cook. We watched Masterchef last season when they were anxiously waiting for their soufflés to cook and this felt just like that!! When we took them out of the oven and they were all so fluffy and gorgeous it was a fabulous "Helen and Amber" moment!!

“Looks good!  It tastes great!” - Amber's Man

“A 5 all around!” - Helen's Bob

“So smooth and not too sweet! It melts in your mouth!” - Guest Judge Terrel

“Okay I guess... maybe in a different flavor!” - Pre-teen Parker

Score: 4/5

The kids reactions: 

Our dinner ended at 11pm and our fantastic kids did great! There was not one meltdown and we are so very happy about that! Here is what they thought of the meal:

Jaxon and Seth: the only component of the appetizer my boys liked was eating the raw lemon wedge but Jaxon absolutely loved the fish pie and ate two helpings!  The Soufflé was a big hit with both of them!! (Not surprising considering they eat raw lemons!)

Emmersyn and Carter: Both kids liked the crab and ate it all (including Carter eating some lemon rind...oops!) and both loved the fish pie, Emmersyn thought the shrimp was worth an enthusiastic 10! The soufflé, I am proud to say, got the score of infinity!!

Our final thoughts:

I thought the crab was bland...but I will try this recipe and other recipes out of this book again. I think it is important to use fresh ingredients to get the right flavors.  I am excited to see what other things the book has to offer! The fish pie was also slightly too mild for me and I have made my own version with no recipe that tasted as good as this one. I do think the smoked fish is the key ingredient. Of course I loved the soufflé and I will make it again and again! It makes me feel like a superstar!

Amber agrees that the crab cakes needed sauce for flavor. The pie she thought was really good but needed the addition of salt and pepper to compensate for the missing Haddock. It was frustrating for her to look store to store to store trying to find some especially since she is used to living in the city where this would have been a lot easier to shop for. Dessert was so good, super light, really refreshing lemon flavor. In her closing thoughts Amber enthusiastically says........WE MADE SOUFFLE!!!!

Last Minute - Eva Longoria - Blog Dinner (By Amber)

I don’t know if any of you know this about me, but I am a big fan of “Desperate Housewives” and an even bigger fan of Eva Longoria.  And I may sometimes be guilty of talking about her as if I knew her personally… “Eva Longoria said that…”, when actually, like everyone else, everything that I know about this fashion icon is because I’ve seen an interview on TV or status update on Facebook (yes, I follow her on Facebook, and on Twitter too). 

Last year, friends of mine went to Cannes France, and just happened to be there during the Cannes Film Festival.  Since they were there, they went to see the red carpet and saw tonnes of celebrities…including Eva Longoria!  I said to them, “You did what?  I have pictures of Eva Longoria on the red carpet at the Film Festival…wanna see?”  In minutes, we were piled around Eva Longoria’s Facebook page, looking at her Cannes pictures, in awe of her fabulous outfit.

Now that you know my dirty little secret…is it a surprise, that as soon as I found out that Eva Longoria had done a cook book, that I wanted it?...That I wanted it really badly?  I just had to buy it.  Plus, I had the best reason in the world to buy her book; I could blog about it!

“Eva’s Kitchen” came in the mail two weeks ago, and I have now (with the help of my lovely friend/sister-in-law Helen) fixed up 10 recipes from her book!  But getting to cook out of my favourite celebrity’s cookbook turned out to be our biggest challenge yet.  Not because the recipes were difficult…but because this week, was the biggest menu that we have attempted (7 recipes along with recipes within recipes) in one night!  Plus we had left the planning to the last minute…we gave ourselves less than 24 hours to plan our menu and get our shopping done!  CRAZY!  Read on for the results of our “Last Minute - Eva Longoria - Blog Dinner”.

This Week’s Book:

Eva’s Kitchen: Cooking with Love for Family & Friends

By Eva Longoria

This Week’s Menu:

Baby Spinach with Beets and Goat Cheese – Pg 55

Flautas – Pg 93

Chicken with Caramelized Shallots and Shiitake-Wine Sauce – Pg 83

Mexican Rice – Pg 124

Garlic Green Beans – Pg 141

Beso’s Churros – Pg 186

Mint Lemonade – Pg 216

The Undertaking:

            Our blog dinner preparation actually started in the morning, when Helen came over for coffee to plan the menu.  After coffee-ing and planning the menu, our boys needed naps… Then the older kids needed to be picked up from school… Then we had to go grocery shopping… Then we had to get dinner started!  What a busy day!

           We started with boiling the beets for the salad and tomatillos for the sauce for the flautas.  Our flauta recipe called for canned tomatillos, but we couldn’t find canned ones at any the three grocery stores in town…so we grabbed fresh ones and boiled them.  When the chicken the flauta filling was in the oven, we realized that we forgot to make sure that we had veggie oil to fry the flautas!  So we sent one of the men to make a quick trip to the store.  What would we do without our men on blog dinner night?  They are constantly on stand-by for the store to retrieve our forgotten grocery items.
            Once the chicken, beets and tomatillos were done cooking, the appetizers fell into place quite quickly, and in no time we were dinning on our Mexican inspired first course.

The second course was started after our judges were done devouring the last of the flautas.  To save time this week, we had made sure to get our prep work done for our main meal menu items at the same time as we were prepping for the starter dishes, so all we had to do was hunker down and cook our entrée recipes. 

My favorite part of the night came when the rice was cooking.  The recipe called for tomato sauce and cumin…the aroma that filled the house was simply spectacular!  I almost dove into the pot every time the lid was lifted to check on the rice’s progress!  Yum!

Surprisingly, we had chosen some pretty simple recipes to prepare …but we hit a couple of snags in our chicken recipe that proved to be time consuming.  First, I must confess…I messed up the Shiitake-Wine Sauce (by not following the directions properly).  I added all of the chicken stock and wine when I was supposed to save half of it to add back into the sauce after the first half reduced. Also, the (bone-in) chicken, which was required for the “Chicken with Caramelized Shallots and Shiitake-Wince Sauce”, was only supposed to take 8-10 minutes stove top and then 15 minutes in a 350 degree oven, but after all that cook time…our chicken was not done cooking.  Needless to say, our main course was ready for consumption quite late.  And we lost one of our younger diners to “bed time”, as it was already after 8:00 pm by the time we started serving!
Sadly, we ended up skipping desert because we ran out of time (much to the dismay of our diners), because it was time to get the rest of the kids off to bed.  We did however get our desert made on the weekend, when our families got together again for a dance recital and it was well worth the wait!

The Judgment:

Baby Spinach with Beets and Goat Cheese:

"The salad was OK…” – Amber’s Man

“The cheese and the dressing were both yummy.” – Helen’s Bob

“It was good.  The goat cheese texture took some getting used to.” – Stuart

“I loved the beets in the salad.  I’ve never had a salad with beats before, but they were delicious (as was the dressing).” – Amber

“The salad dressing was delicious.  I loved the salad.” – Helen

The Salad got an average score of 3 out of 5.

Flautas:
“There was not much flavour to the flautas, but they were cooked perfectly.” – Amber’s Man

“The flautas were crisp taquito like.  The sauce was yummy, but needed some heat.” – Helen’s Bob

“Yummy.  They definitely do not require any spice added to them.” – Stuart

“I didn’t like the green sauce on the flautas, and the cheese was mush.” – Pre-teen Parker

“The flautas were lacking a little spice.  The sauce was magnificent, but the chicken needed cumin or chili powder (…“bite” of some sort).” – Amber

“The chicken in the flautas needed spice, but I loved the tomatillo and avocado sauce.” - Helen

The Flautas got an average score of 3.5 out of 5.

Chicken with Caramelized Shallots and Shiitake-Wine Sauce:
“Full, rich flavour.” – Amber’s Man

“The chicken was tender and juicy.  The sauce was rich and savoury.” – Helen’s Bob

“The chicken was delicious and savoury.” – Stuart

“I didn’t like the mushrooms.” – Pre-teen Parker

“Even though I messed up on the sauce, I think we all go the gist of the dish.  It was really great.” – Amber

“I really enjoyed the chicken.  The sauce was strong, but tasty.” – Helen

The Chicken with Caramelized Shallots and Shiitake-Wine Sauce got an average score of 4 out of 5.

Mexican Rice:

“Tasty.” – Amber’s Man

“Smoky…real Spanish taste.” – Helen’s Bob

“Spicy” – Stuart

“I didn’t like the rice.” – Pre-teen Parker

“The rice was super flavorful and spicy.  I love cumin, but the recipe called for a little too much cumin in my opinion.” – Amber

“The rice needed less cumin, but it was still good.” – Helen

The Mexican Rice got an average score of 3 out of 5.

Garlic Green Beans:
“Very good.” – Amber’s Man

“The beans were good for being beans…” – Helen’s Bob

“I didn’t like the beans either” – Pre-teen Parker

“The beans were just cooked in some garlic…really simple but they were a nice contrast to the spicy rice.” – Amber

“This was the only time I have eaten green beans and mostly enjoyed them.” – Helen

The Garlic Green Beans got an average score of 2.3out of 5.

Mint Lemonade:
“A ton of flavour…excellent!” – Amber’s Man

“The lemonade was fresh and natural tasting.  The mint adds zing!” – Helen’s Bob

“I don’t like the mint.” – Pre-teen Parker

“The mint lemonade was so delicious and refreshing that the ingredients are now a staple in my house and I have had a glass every single day since our blog dinner!” – Amber

“The mint lemonade was good and refreshing.” – Helen

The Mint Lemonade got an average score of 3.8 out of 5.

Beso’s Churros:
“Light, sugary goodness.  I will eat them anywhere.” – Helen’s Bob

“They were Gr8!” – Pre-Teen Parker

“The churros were surprisingly easy to make!  If I had known that I could make these at home without much effort…I would have weighed 800 lbs a long time ago.  Biggest Looser, here I come!” – Amber

“The churros were easy to make and fast…good, like a cinnamon donut…” – Helen

The Churros weren’t rated because we didn’t get everyone to write down their ratings, but everyone loved them!  Good thing we made a double batch!

The Kids Vote:

Appetizers: Three out of the five little ones eating dinner with us during Eva Longoria week were beet eaters, so those three ate up their salads…there were a few comments on the mushy goat cheese even though they ate that up too.  Only one of the five children did not like the flautas…they went over pretty well with the kids!

Main Meal: Serving cumin filled rice to kids was risky business, but we tried it anyways…unfortunately, none of them kids liked it.  All of the kids liked the chicken and ate every last bite of it, but only Emmersyn and Carter enjoyed the beans.

Desert: We kept telling the kids that the desert was like donuts because they had no idea what a Churro was.  Their verdict: “The donuts were yummy!”

 
     In addition to these recipes, I made the “Rotini Pasta Salad”, on Pg 56 (which included the same dressing as the Baby Spinach and Beets and Goat Cheese Salad).  It was really good, especially after sitting overnight in the fridge.

Overall we enjoyed this book.  Some of the ingredients were hard to find in our town of 3 grocery stores… and unfortunately we had to search for substitutions for some of the traditional Mexican ingredients (like queso fresco) online because there weren’t any listed within the book.  But, we enjoyed the stories that she had at the beginning of each of her recipes.  She explains where some of the recipes came from or when she might serve the dish.  For example, she says that her Tortilla Soup (Pg 45) is the most requested dish in her kitchen, and although some people might think that it’s a family recipe, it was in fact a recipe that she found in a magazine when she was young!

Another thing that I really like about Eva’s book; is that she included tips that she learned from her cooking idol (her Aunt Elsa) throughout the book.  I love learning cooking tips in recipe books…and I’m sure that there will be a conversation about guacamole in my future that will sound something like: “Eva Longoria’s Aunt Elsa says to press the pit from an avocado into the center of your guacamole to keep it from turning brown”.
            The thing that I like the most about this book is that when I feel like Mexican food, rather than my fall back (tacos), I can now pull out this book and cook up some Enchilada’s (Pg 94) or Chalupas (Pg 87) when ever I want to.

Stay tuned next week when we tackle recipes from “Chef Gordon Ramsey”!!!  Is there a cookbook that you love and think we should try?  Is there a celebrity chef that you enjoy and would like to see us blog about?  Or are you in our area and would like to be a guest judge at one of our blog dinners?  We would love you to leave us a comment and let us know your thoughts!