January Giveaway: From The Wood-Fired Oven

Happy New Year dear ones! This month, I've got a special treat for you to start off this year with a bang. Are you ready to cook with fire?

One of my resolutions for 2014 involves several challenges, the ultimate end goal being to produce one truly kick-ass loaf of wood-fired sourdough bread. Well. Hopefully more than one. But I would be quite content with a single life-changing loaf. The kind with a golden crunchy crust, a moist and chewy crumb with those marvellous bubbles of air that butter so delightfully melts and seeps into. So far, I've managed several bricks. Tasty, somewhat handsome, probably very nutritious little bricks, mind you, but bricks nonetheless. I am still in the early stages of experimenting with sourdough in my kitchen oven and I have my work cut out for me.

One of the key components to achieving my resolution will be to build my own wood-fired oven. Something I learned how to do at this year's Kneading Conference, but have yet to execute. Then, it would be rather nice to learn how to use that oven properly. I know that will come with time, patience, and practice. But there's something else that is going to be indispensable in this adventure with fire. It's The Bible. The wood-fired baker's bible that is. Richard Miscovich's From The Wood-Fired Oven.

This book is an epic oeuvre. Or as a friend who was leafing through the book exclaimed, "this book is hard-core!" Indeed. It's the kind of book that I know will inevitably become tattered and worn (the highest praise that can ever be showered on a book) from a lifetime of consulting it. It really is the ultimate reference for anyone interested in learning how to cook with a wood-fired oven. 

Photo of the author by JonathanBeller.Com

And while I know this book will help me achieve the wood-fired sourdough loaf of my dreams, let's be clear, we're not only talking about bread here. You see, Richard Miscovich is a genius, and he shows us how to use a wood-fired oven to its fullest potential. That is to say, aside from outstanding pizzas and breads (which are certainly not overlooked), the book opens up a whole world of mouth-watering concoctions that (who would have ever known) can be prepared in a wood-fired oven. Everything from braised vegetables to baked beans to beef jerky to dried herbs and infused oils. The secret is in learning how to use of the oven's whole range of temperatures from its peak heat to its slow cool-down. If you love cooking with fire, or have ever been curious about it, you must own this book, no way around it.

Photo by Richard Miscovich

So for all you wood-firing lovers, be sure to enter this month's giveaway which is kindly sponsored by the amazing folks at Chelsea Green Publishing. (Only residents of the United States are eligible for this one). Bonne chance!

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My 2013 recipe round-up

It's been one helluva year. 

2013 was the year I officially left the big city lights and the fulfilling job I had there, in a leap of faith to move back to the east coast, closer to the ocean, my family, my sweetheart, and my dream of growing as much of my own food as possible. 

It hasn't been an easy leap that's for sure. I dove into it all a bit starry-eyed and it took a particularly grumpy and uncompromising border guard last February to make me realize cross-border romance is not always a walk in the park. But despite a rather unsettled year with a lot of back-and-forths across the border, I managed to finally find a resting place on a magical farm on the northern shore of Nova Scotia. Through it all, I cooked, ate, discovered new recipes, and shared the worthy ones with all you wonderful friends and fellow food lovers. Where would I have been without you and the enthusiasm and encouragement you shared with me? In some ways, this blog became my home, the place I came back to again and again, wherever I happened to be throughout this nomadic year. 

From finding new ways to sneak furry creature cameos in my videos, to starting to blog for PBS Food to interviewing my favorite GMO activist, to starting a monthly giveaway, it's been an adventurous year and I've learned so much along the way. I can't thank you enough for your kind-hearted words, your stories, your recipe ideas, and your feedback on my videos, posts, and recipes. To all the new readers, a warm welcome to you! Here's to another year exploring food together. May this new year bring you joy, adventure, and everything you most deeply wish for.

Here's a look back and a little round-up of this year's most popular recipes.

The ultimate brunch: ginger broccoli fritters topped with poached egg and green tea-poached wild salmon smothered in miso hollandaise

Sesame Chocolate Buckwheat Shortbread

Lemon Poppyseed "Larabars"

Honey Lemon Polenta Cake

Banana Cajeta Pudding Chomeur

Semolina Gnocchi Stuffed with Asparagus

Nettle Fettuccine Alfredo

Lentils with Roasted Beets and Carrots

Cherry Tomato Galette

Zucchini "No Noodle" Lasagna

Teff Porridge with Dates, Apples, and Pecans

Delicata Squash and Sage Biscuits

Kale Salad with Caramelized Parsnips, Pomegranate, and Hazelnuts

Classic Tourtière

A most joyful food-filled 2014 and my very best wishes to you all!

A Merry Christmas Tourtière!

This year's Christmas video was such pleasure to work on. Partly because I got to film it with my dear friends at Waldegrave Farm. And eat tons of tourtière in the process. And also because the lovely UK-based musical duo, Rue Royale, allowed me to use one of their beautiful songs again. (Some of you may remember their song Snow on Snow which I used in my Baba au Rhum video, two years ago). If you haven't yet heard Rue Royale's music, it's exquisite. Do yourself a favour and take a listen. 

In the meantime, here is my video greeting of the season to you all:




I've always been a shameless, over-the-top lover of Christmas. But the thing is, Christmas has not been the same since my mom and my grammie passed away. They both, in their own ways, "made" Christmas. They just made it happen, the magic, the good feeling in the air, the amazing smells coming out of the kitchen. And maybe that's one of the biggest lessons they both taught me about this time of year. Christmas is whatever you make of it. For each person, it means something different. The important thing is that you make Christmas be what you want it to be.

Some of my closest friends claim they don't like this time of year. And whenever I ask them, eagerly (desperately) "but but but what about the egg nog by the fire, and the roasted chestnuts, and being around the people you love (even if they sometimes drive you to insanity), and the snow, and the lights, and and and..." They usually respond "oh yeah, I like all that stuff, it's just the other stuff I don't like". So then I sit back, satisfied (self-congratulating yes, perhaps a little), and say "AHA! So you don't really hate Christmas, you just hate the Christmas muck." You know the muck. We all know the muck. The shopping, the plastic stuff, the traffic jams, the running around, the endless commercials and overplayed tunes, the pressure we put on ourselves. I guess I never really considered all that stuff part of Christmas, because we somehow just managed to tune it out, and to skip to the essence of this time of year. Which is really just about being together and enjoying special moments, whatever they may be. It's different for everyone. But I think the Danish word "hygge" best describes the feeling of what I want Christmas to be. "Hygge" has no direct English translation, but it apparently involves a combination of the words "coziness," "togetherness" and "well-being", among other things.

For my family, these moments of togetherness usually involve food. And there are two recipes that my mom used to make that have become annual traditions for me. One is her Baba au Rhum, and the other is her tourtière, a Québec meat pie that I've loved ever since I was little. For me, making these recipes is a way to feel my mom's presence and to feel connected to all the things that I want Christmas to be: pleasure, magic, delight, coziness.

So here's wishing you all a most delicious and delightful holiday season. And that you make Christmas, or whichever holiday you celebrate, be exactly what you most want it to be this year.

If you'd like to try my mom's Christmas tourtière, the recipe can be found on my post at PBS Food. Bon appétit and my warmest holiday greetings to you and yours.