groundhog day
soup, cake, and a deep need for garlic bread
It’s been one of those weeks where I feel like I’m never properly warm outside of bed (even the hot shower is unpleasantly drafty). When you’re on the garden level and all your floors are tile or wood, for most of the winter even two pairs of socks doesn’t feel like enough. I’ve been spending most of my free time as I often do: under a blanket on my couch, knitting while watching Star Trek, or turning on the oven for things so I can warm the house up a bit while I cook. I haven’t been too creatively inspired, food-wise, but I have been comforted by being in the kitchen near the warm stove, watching the ingredients of a sauce coalesce, making piles of chopped vegetables for soup on the cutting board, even washing the dishes while something roasts or bakes— all elements of something good coming together.
And now it’s February— a short month that’s always a stark contrast to January, which takes an age to get through. But the coming of spring seems a little less distant as the sun starts to set later than 4pm again, as the angle of the daylight begins to shift back toward the north. We’re still a ways from the equinox, but maybe I’ll start to get some feeling back in my toes soon.
Last Friday I had a need for garlic bread that was almost medical in nature, so I did the unthinkable and went to the grocery store on my way home from work just to buy bread. Save-On’s in house bakery makes a Calabrese-style loaf that costs about $3 and is the perfect texture for this, a soft white interior with a light and crisp crust. It’s almost identical to the pre-made garlic bread in the foil bag that costs twice as much. I understand the convenience factor, but I definitely always have a couple tablespoons of butter and a clove or two of garlic at home to make it myself, so I don’t mind. I also like adding garlic salt to the butter for an even more pronounced flavour.
I made the mushroom and pearl couscous soup again to go with it— I love how hearty it is, but it needs a lot more cream (or coconut milk) and herbs than the recipe specifies. You can really go wild with most types of soup; there’s nothing delicate about them and generally recipes make a fair bit, so if a whole pot of soup calls for less than half a teaspoon of something I’m immediately suspicious.
I let the garlic bread build my menu for the weekend, and made cheesy baked beans again, using a mix of navy and black beans because I’m due for a trip to Bulk Barn for more white beans. Pretty much any cheese will do here. Last time I used pepper jack and provolone; now that the provolone is gone I used cheddar, and it was just as good. And add any spices you like, too: I used a little dried thyme & basil, cayenne, and paprika. These are so delicious, and even better with soft, crusty, garlicky bread to scoop them up with.
With the last bit of loaf left, I made another soup, a perennial favourite of curried red lentil & tomato from Yotam Ottolenghi’s book SIMPLE. It’s easy to make with pantry ingredients and is really filling and tasty. I like to use fire-roasted tomatoes here for their rich flavour, but it’s fine with regular canned tomatoes, too. And if you don’t want to use a bunch of cilantro (or you don’t have any), the soup is still very good without it. A big squeeze of lime or a few dashes of sumac will help give it some notes of freshness. Personally I like to blend the soup with a hand blender, but if you don’t mind a rougher texture, I’m sure it’s nice that way too.
I’m still holding firm to making a cake every month, though sometimes I’m doing it at 8pm on the 31st. This was the case for January, but luckily, most of Alicia Kennedy’s cake recipes are low effort and high reward. I made her coconut almond cake, a lovely vegan cake with coconut milk and a touch of almond flour, plus almond and vanilla extracts (I balanced these evenly; her recipe uses more almond). I also added about 50 grams of unsweetened shredded coconut to the cake for texture. It came out of the oven fragrant and moist, with a light crispness at the edges— impossible to overstate how good your kitchen will smell while baking this.
For the glaze, I was out of coconut milk because in the cake I’d used the remains of a can from something else, but I had pineapple juice in the fridge, so I used that and a little oat milk and really enjoyed the result! Toasted coconut, particularly the large flake variety, on top looks great and adds even more coconut flavour. I loved this cake the first night it was made, but it’s even better the next day once the glaze has set fully, giving it that nice crackly texture when you bite into it.
I was happy to have an opportunity to go to the other produce store I like this week, because it meant we could get some Asian eggplants (the place nearest our house only has the Italian ones usually). This gochujang-glazed eggplant is addictively good and is definitely best made with the long, skinny eggplants. I’ve made it before with the Italian type and it works, but it’s just more satisfying with the thin type sliced in halves. The glaze is seriously amazing, and I always make extra for this dish: it’s made with just a few ingredients, but they provide a lot of flavour nuance. It’s also good for tofu or other vegetables.
If you look at the recipe and get discouraged by the number of steps, don’t: a good chunk of them are for frying the green onions, which are of course excellent, but time-consuming, and I’ve made the dish without it and used peanuts or something else for crunchiness instead. This time I shallow-fried a thinly sliced shallot instead, because that’s what I had, and still added some chopped peanuts on top as well as a couple pieces of gim for garnish. White rice is the ideal contrast to the sweet and spicy glaze if you’re making this a meal, but I bet tteok-bokki would be really great as part of an appetizer spread.
Media:
I read this article about chocolate chip cookies for Taste, frothing at the mouth over the snobbish anti- chocolate chip comments by some recipe developers, who prefer to use chopped bars of chocolate for their superior quality and texture. The piece emphasizes that chocolate chips are, in fact, ideal the way they are: inexpensive (and therefore accessible), structurally sound, and uniform in shape and size.
If I’m making chocolate chip cookies, I don’t really need them to break the mold! I need them to be easy, comforting, and delicious. I can throw them together on a work day using milk chocolate chips I got for a few dollars out of a bulk bin, but I’m not going to spend precious minutes chopping up two $6 bars of high-quality chocolate to put in there. I’m not saying it should never be done, just that it should be the exception rather than the expectation. (Yes, I’m craving chocolate chip cookies now.)
Thanks for reading— if you enjoyed this newsletter, please share it with someone new! I like providing this to you for free, but it does still involve time and effort, so donations I can use towards cookbooks or future treats are much appreciated. And if you haven’t yet seen this incredibly unhinged fridge interior, I am sorry to have to be the one to show you.
the bit about the chocolate chips!!! chocolate chips are great and if you want the extra texture of random chocolate puddles, just toss them in a ziploc and lightly hammer them with a rolling pin.