Bibimbap

I know that putting a fried egg on top of a bowl of pretty much anything is pretty trendy right now, a trend that I've embraced wholeheartedly in the past few years. I've been cracking eggs on risotto, on fried rice, I've even cracked a few on a pizza (I know you're skeptical, but it was good). I may be jumping on a foodie bandwagon, but full credit to this one goes to the Koreans. They've been cracking eggs on top of rice bowls for years.

It's Lunar New Year today, and to celebrate we had my first attempt at a traditional Korean dish - Bibimbap. Made from scratch it is a bit fussy, though according to Grace, in Korea this meal is made with leftover side-dishes, ones that are present with every Korean meal. This is Grace's dad's go to meal when her mom is away-

Campbell-Choi Bibimbap

Ingredients:

Veggies-
2 carrots, cut into thin strips
1 zuchinni, cut into thin strips
1 handful of sliced mushrooms (more if EVERYONE in your family likes mushrooms)
bean sprouts (handful per person)
spinach - I used aprox 3 cups fresh

ground beef, aprox 1 pound

eggs, 1 per person

Korean chili paste, found in your city's Korean grocery store, unless you live in Chilliwack.

Sesame oil, with a pinch of salt and pepper

Get Cooking:

1) Make some sticky rice - Korean rice has a stickier texture than Chines, from my Korean taste testers I have found that Calrose rice is the one that most approximates Korean rice texture.

2) Fry the ground beef. Grace reports that this should not be seasoned, as the seasoning comes later but I couldn't resist and added a shot of soy sauce and a pinch of sugar.

3) Cook your veggies. Now, in some of the recipes I saw online some of the veggies were sauteed in sesame oil, but we made Choi-style Bibimbap, which means that veggies were blanched in boiling water. I used one pot with salted boiling water and just rotated the different veggies through, pulling them out with a slotted spoon to a platter when the preceeding veg was cooked.

4) Fry the eggs, sunny-side up style

5) Assemble. On a bowl of rice add the veggies, the beef, a shot of sesame oil, a shot of chili paste, and finally an egg.

6) Mix! See the second photo of our lovely Korean model for the proper mixing technique. I offered to go get chop sticks but was informed that this meal is NOT eaten with chop sticks.

Rach - I'm still waiting on that reciprocal challenge. Guess you're just afraid with what I'm going to come back with. And you should be, afraid that is. Very afraid.

Turnip and Parsnip Latkes with Pomegranate Seeds

It's been brought! If you read our last post, you know that Haley threw down the gauntlet and Rachel was to respond by crafting a dish combining the two seemingly contradictory ingredients, of turnips and pomegranate. Read on to discover the surprisingly delicious results.

Dearest Haley,
Yikes:
A massive squirrel is shimying down the tree outside my window. He's huge. Hmmm. Perhaps this nature sighting could prove insightful for the challenge I put forth to you. In France they eat pigeon...

Ever since Dad declared war on the grey squirrel dominating our neighbourhood and theiving from our cherry tree, I've found the rodents rather repulsive. They're so sneaky. And greedy. For instance, this squirrel in the tree outside my window, he's a big boy, like mondo, overweight, bottom heavy. Oh gross. He just pooed. Sorry.

Anyhow, turnips are a bit like gray squirrels with me. A tad repulsive. Sure, I'll toss one back in a stew and later mistake it for a potato, but I've never consciously thought, 'Mmmm. Turnips.' Have you? Well, after you challenged me to pair the frumpy turnip with the delicious pomegranate, I think I developed a new appreciation for that rather plain veggie. I discovered it has a little spice, a little more something-to-it than your potato. Nonetheless, it is happy to take the role of backdrop, providing a canvass, so to speak, for other showier veggies, fruits (in this case), or meats.

With this in mind, I created a dish composed of turnip latkes, topped with coconut curry sauce and a pomegranate salsa. I was so bold as to offer up this startling combination to dinner guests and, my goodness gracious, they loved it!
Turnip and Parsnip Latkes
4 medium potatoes, grated
2 turnips, grated
1 parsnip, peeled and grated
(2 pounds of vegetables in total)
1 small onion, thinly sliced
1 tsp salt
1 tsp curry powder
1/4 cup flour
1 egg, lightly beaten

Combine all the ingredient in a large bowl. Shape into small paddies and place on two greased cookie sheets. Bake at 370 for thirty minutes, flipping the latkes half way through baking time, or until golden brown.

Good toppings include: pomegranate seeds with balsamic vinegar, sour cream, butter, cheese, anything you'd like!

Kitchen Challenge

Rach,

Channel yourself back to your grade 8 self.

You're at a slumber party, probably at the DeBoer's.

Truth or Dare? Do you pour your heart out, or prank call Caleb Speller? You chose the dare of course.

Now back to 2012, it's time for the first round of Reems Eats Truth or Dare. Truth would be fun, but let's save that for my visit at the end of the month. Here is your first dare: I'm going easy on you with my first foodie challenge, we have to gain momentum after all. All this requires is a quick jaunt down to your favourite Red Barn to shop for the following 2 items that you need to include in a single meal this week:

Go!

(I'm not sure why I thought that photographing myself would lend anything to this post - this particular shot was culled from a ridiculous amount of wasted memory card space - I tried to look tough, which resulted in a strange facial grimace; I tried to give a challenging stare, which brought out an astounding amount of wrinkles, including some odd ones in my neck. Trust me, my face behind paper was the best option)

Stollen worthy..

The Chilliwack to Victoria Reems phone lines had a flurry of activity this week. Rachel and I logged in a record number of calls over a topic very dear to our hearts and stomachs, stollen. We came away from last year's stollen baking class with a wonderful, but cryptic recipe; so as we baked our stollen batches, in kitchens a ferry ride apart, much consultation was needed.

Important questions such as: Anise or no? How much simple syrup and rum to soak the dried fruit? To peel or not to peel? Is your sponge looking a tad dry? In response were wise insights, gems such as: Don't skimp on the almond paste. Organic citrus for the best zest...

It might take years before we nail down just the right steps to post a recipe for this wonderful bread. So instead I'll tease you with this lovely stollen photo. If you spend time with us these holidays and share a stollen, count yourself stollen-worthy. If not, there's always next year.

Merry Christmas!

Crockpot Cider

Last night was Chilliwack's Santa Parade. Attending with Coby and Finn makes parade viewing secondary to the entertainment right next to me - little frosty fingers waving for the candy hand-outs, little bodies bobbing to jazzed up Christmas carols, saucer-eyes beaming at flat-beds decked out with lights. Finn's favourite- 'Mom that one has a gorilla AND a monkey.' Santa definitely took a back seat.

Coming back home to a crock pot full of apple cider is a lovely treat - something that I like to prepare a few times over the Christmas season. It's easy, feels special (particularly to a 4-year-old), and makes the house smell amazing. If you don't have a crock pot, or are staying home just let the cider simmer in a pot over low heat.

On low for at least two, but as many as four or five hours - Pour in one or two cartons of 100 percent apple juice (definitely use real apple cider if available) and add a teaspoon or so of whole cloves per carton, and few cinnamon sticks (I used two last night for one carton - I would count on one per child, they make a great stir stick). For extra pizazz add sliced apples or cranberries to the mixture.

Oatmeal French Toast

Yesterday my dear friend asked me a personal question. We were at play. The curtain hadn't opened: okay there was no curtain. The lights hadn't yet dimmed and we were small talking, surrounded by people, and she asked me if I'd ever had a notebook moment.

A notebook moment?

Yeah, like in the Notebook, were it's all super romantic and they're intensely in love (she trails off).

I look around. This is a high-school play. The thirteen year-old girl on my right beams at me.

I Hiss: Yesss. Of course.

I look around.

She nods. I knew it, she says.


The night before, Thursday night, my husband gave an artist talk at the community college. In this talk he read poetry. Poetry. Of course I've had Notebook moment.

Although, I do believe things like lingering breakfasts of hot coffee and french toast with home-made jam make all the difference.

We love breakfast. And french toast. Now, I didn't come up with this recipe entirely on my own. Chef at Home definitely had something to do with it.

Oatmeal French Toast for Two

1/2 a cup of milk
2 eggs
a pinch of salt
a dash of vanilla
4 pieces of soft bread (I used a poppy seed lemon bread and it was a winner)
1/4 cup oatmeal, or more as needed

Whisk together the milk, eggs, salt, vanilla in a shallow bowl. Scatter the oatmeal on a large plate. Dip the bread in the egg mixture then dredge it through the oatmeal. Fry in a hot pan until crispy on both sides. Top with your favourite breakfast condiments.

Soup Sundays

If you've been sitting in proximity of the Campbells at Heartland Fellowship on a Sunday this fall, you might have noticed a particular smell. It's not a bad smell, in fact in context it's lovely, but just not something that we're striving for in our daily hygiene. We smell like soup. From Mike and I, to our trendy Korean teenager, right down to baby, you can't miss that soupy scent. Ironically the soup-link is not from our name, Campbell; it is actually a side-effect of my Dutch heritage, and given the amount of Dutch blood in Chilliwack, I can guarantee we're not the only ones with this particular eau de cologne.

The love of soup is, along with the love of a good deal, in the Dutch DNA. A Sunday, just isn't a Sunday without a piping post-church bowl. When we first started scouting out Chilliwack as our future home, we were introduced to the soup of an expert soup chef, none other than my Dutch Soup-Nazi Uncle, Jan Van Wyk. It was at a post-church lunch that Finn first learned, from one of my triplet cousins (Mark), the art of slurping the final soup dredges from the side of the tipped bowl.

At our house Grace has labeled my beef-vegetable soup as Sunday Soup, alas, that recipe is difficult to transcribe as I have a different variation each Sunday depending on my vegetable crisper and particular whims. The soup that I have been feasting on lately is a simple lentil soup. The key to this soup is to combine your veggies, lentils, and broth and to let the whole mixture simmer for a few hours. This results in a thick and lovely soup, reminiscent of a dahl. This is actually a riff on my pea soup recipe, when I was out of split peas I substituted red lentils and added a shot of cumin. Delicious. There is no way to get an attractive picture of this soup, so I've included my little soup-eater in the shot. I made a batch of this soup on the weekend and have heating it up for lunches during the week.

Lentil Soup
(A flexible recipe, you can play with the quantities and types of veggies depending on your preferences and what you have on hand)


1 cup red lentils
3 chopped carrots
3 chopped stalks of celery
3 clove minced garlic
1 chopped onion
1/3 cup tomato paste OR several chopped tomatoes
6 cups chicken stock (I use Epicures chicken base)
1 tsp salt
good pinch pepper
1/2 tsp cumin

Combine ingredients, bring to a simmer and then simmer at low for as much time as you have - 2 - 3 hours is ideal. The soup should be nice and thick. Taste for seasoning, if it is a bit bland add salt, a pinch at a time until you get it right. Note that if you use chicken stock with sodium then I would decrease the amount of salt in the recipe.