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Kids, Cooking and a Love for Food

November 12, 2008

I took these photos at a mall here in Brazil on a holiday called “The Day of Children”. They had the coolest set up of a little bakery/kitchen and they held sessions throughout the day. Each session offered the chance to create a different food and the kids were given all the gear including the cutest chef hats and aprons.

We watched the children become completely mesmerized as the leader explained what they would be making. It was so quiet you could hear a pin drop. It was such a great reminder of how much children actually like cooking and how learning those skills can affect their health and future.

I don’t have children of my own, but I know the importance of learning how to cook and bake. Why? Well, like most of us, my family taught me the basics. My mom, grandmothers and great aunt all provided me with the skills I needed. My mom had a cake shop in our house and I was able to help at an early age. I think I’ve taken this love of food and cooking to a whole new level, but that is where it started.

I love that new programs are being developed and efforts being made to get kids back into the kitchen. I just completed an article for a client about the importance of family meals and cooking together is a big part of it.

I’ll be honest. I am always completely amazed when people say they can’t cook. I guess this is because I equate cooking with making any meal. If you can throw yourself a salad together you are cooking in your own way. It is about putting together a great meal. It doesn’t mean you have to be any good at it. The failures in my kitchen overwhelm me sometimes. It just saddens me when I hear people have never learned to simply make a grilled cheese.

Cooking and baking for me goes way beyond just having food. It is a huge component of health. I realized long ago that I would never be able to maintain a healthy weight if I ate out all the time. Over the years it has become a source of peace and stress release for me as I moved from the all-in-one boxed meals during the college days to baking my own chicken as a grown up.

So tell me where your love of food and cooking comes from? Is it about health for you too?

Foodbuzz 24, 24, 24: Country-Style U.S. Breakfast in Brazil

October 25, 2008

If there is one thing I’ve missed throughout my ex-pat experience it is waking up on a weekend morning to a table full of hearty breakfast treats. I’ve learned that few countries celebrate this meal the way we do in the US.

Most often breakfast in Brazil is bread with butter, coffee and maybe some fruit. Breakfast is a bigger deal to me. While I’ve been known to have toast now and then, eggs, oatmeal and yogurt usually join the mix. If it is a weekend, well, things get a little more extravagant.

After sharing stories of cozy weekends filling our stomachs with country breakfast favorites, we found that many of our new Brazilian friends wanted to experience it too.

With plans to have a breakfast party at some point the October Foodbuzz 24, 24, 24 event gave me the motivation to put things together and enter the idea.

Well, here we are! On October 25th we took part in this exciting event with a Country-style US Breakfast in Maringá-PR, Brazil.

Making your favorite foods in a new land is an interesting challenge. Not to mention the fact that when you are living in a place for only a short time (and can ship few things along) elegant dinnerware and serving platters are the first to go.

I made the best of it and along with my husband, a ½ size oven and some borrowed forks and knifes, we exposed our friends to some of our favorite foods from home.

Let’s start with the menu. I’ll warn you, it is a bit carb-loaded, but then again what great US breakfast isn’t. I wanted to give our guests a taste of many things without making a ton of separate dishes.

Ham and Cheese Brunch Bake
Ham and cheese sandwiches turn into a breakfast casserole in this recipe my mom received from a friend a few years ago.

Oven Home Fries
Potatoes, onions, and peppers baked topped with grill seasoning.

Pancakes with Maple Syrup
Pancakes made from scratch, topped with syrup brought to us by coworkers visiting from the US.

Homemade Cinnamon Rolls
Cinnamon sweetness adapted from a recipe at The Salty Cod.

Fresh Fruit Salad
In an effort to offer a healthy option, fruit salad in a watermelon boat made from fruits popular both in the US and Brazil – watermelon, pineapple, kiwi and bananas.

Mimosas
Orange juice and champagne to cool us from the summer heat.
(I think these were for me. Entertaining can be stressful!)

One thing we didn’t have is coffee.

I know, I know – breakfast without coffee?! I started thinking about this though and there was no way to make it like what I used to have back home. The coffee here is much stronger and taken in smaller does. Warm milk is added instead of any variety of cream. So I decided to nix it.

As a substitute we made spiced apple cider. No apple cider here either, but the nectar of apple sold as apple juice is much closer to apple cider than the clear juice available in the US. I added some cinnamon and pumpkin pie spice, warmed it up and it turned out to be pretty tasty.

Considering the fact that we would have some guests who only spoke Portuguese, I made some little signs for each food with both languages to clear up confusion and keep me from having to explain multiple times.

Prep started the night before with the breakfast casserole and cinnamon rolls, both of which rested in the fridge overnight giving me a lot less to do in the wee hours of Saturday morning.

The Ham and Cheese Brunch combines 4 favorite breakfast items into one dish – ham, cheese, bread and eggs. Unfortunately we had to make due with processed cheese. Good cheddar doesn’t exist around here. It wasn’t my first choice for keeping things focused on real foods, but what can you do?

Ham and Cheese Brunch Bake

16 slices bread (any variety would work, but I used plain ol’ white)
8 slices deli-sliced ham
8 slices sharp cheddar cheese
6 eggs
3 cups milk
1 tsp. brown mustard
½ cup butter, melted
1 cup corn flakes, crushed
1 small can sliced mushrooms, drained

Layer a large casserole dish with 8 bread slices. Top the bread with the ham and then the cheese. Layer the 8 remaining slices of bread on top. Mix eggs, milk and mustard. Pour over casserole, cover tightly with plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight.

The next morning add crushed cereal to the melted butter. Stir in the mushrooms and spread over the casserole. Bake at 350 degrees F for 45 minutes. Makes 8, main course servings.

I adapted the cinnamon rolls from a recipe by The Salty Cod. For the inside of the rolls I used what I had available here – brown sugar, white sugar, cinnamon and some pumpkin pie spice (brought from home). I also took my chances cutting them with a serrated knife instead of floss.

Saturday morning was a frenzy of baking off the rolls and casserole, cutting fruit, chopping potatoes and pancake making. I am the worst pancake-maker you will ever meet, so this is where my husband came in and saved the day.

The original plan was to make pecan pancakes and while I promise I saw them around the holidays last year, they are no where to be found in supermarkets around here at the current moment.

Pancakes
from the Betty Crocker’s Cookbook Bridal Edition

1 large egg
1 cup all-purpose flour
¾ cup milk
1 tbsp granulated sugar
2 tbsp vegetable oil
3 tsp baking powder
¼ tsp salt
Butter for the pan, if needed

Beat egg in medium bowl until fluffy. Beat in remaining ingredients (except butter) until smooth. For thinner pancakes, stir in additional 1 to 2 tablespoons of milk.

Makes nine 4-inch pancakes. We doubled the recipe and made small, silver-dollar pancakes.

Guests arrived at 10:00 am and included friends I have made during my time here (one who found me through my blog) and my husband’s coworkers/friends and their loved ones.

My first surprise was all the pictures. Everyone had their camera out to snap photos of the food. Next came the eatin’ and I have to say I was certainly happy with the response. I think enough was said in the fact that many of them went back for seconds and even thirds.

“Muito bom (very good)” and “delicioso (delicious)” were repeated many times.

We had a wide variety of guests – some had spent time living in the US, others had visited before on business or vacation and others had never been there before.

For some this breakfast brought back memories of their travels and for others it was a completely new experience. We’ve experienced so many new things especially regarding food since moving to Brazil and it was nice to be able to provide this opportunity to our new friends.

Kind of Like a Cherry

October 24, 2008

I got something interesting at our farmer’s market this week so I thought I’d go back to my “foods of Brazil” for this post. This week, many of the booths had bags toppling over, full of these little red fruits – acerola.

I’ve had acerola before in the juice form at the hotel breakfast here in town. Did I mention we lived in a hotel of a few months before getting into our apartment? Man, that breakfast got old!

Anyway, I had never ventured to try the actual fruit. I’ve only seen it at the market a few times and considering how fast they are going in my fridge right now, they aren’t the most stable of fruits.

Acerola appears to be pretty popular in the supplement world and is often sold in a powdered form. Its popularity comes from its utterly amazing amount of vitamin C content.

In a cup of the fruit there is 1644 mg of vitamin C! Compare that to 63 mg in an average-sized Florida orange. Wow!

How lucky am I to get to eat the actual fruit and drink the juice instead of sucking down a supplement!

Acerola is in the cherry family, but different than many fresh cherries I’ve had before. It is available in many other places in addition to Brazil. I saw some info that it is grown in California.

The texture to me was like a cross between a cherry and a peach. The flavor isn’t very distinctive. It isn’t overly sour or sweet, kind of bland. Each of the cherries has 3 seeds in it which makes it difficult to get to any of the flesh. I solved that problem by throwing it in the juicer.

It made a thick pulp to which I added water. It needed just a tiny bit of sugar to enhance the flavor and ended up being a great snack. I’ve still got a couple more cups in the fridge to finish. I’m stocked with vitamin C and ready to fight any infection that may arise!

Arugula and Sun-dried Tomatoes

October 17, 2008

The combination of arugula and sun-dried tomatoes has become like peanut butter and chocolate to me. Well, okay, not exactly on the same level, but they go really well together.

There is something about the bitterness of the green with the sweet of the tomato that is like a party in your mouth. The combo is huge here in Brazil. You can find it in almost every form – pizza, crepe, sandwiches.

Many sandwich shops make a spread with sun-dried tomatoes and cream cheese. It is one of my favorites so I set out to try and re-create it to could control the amount of cream cheese and enjoy it more often.

I found just a little of the spread with a lot of greens makes it a healthier option. Using whole grain bread would help too, but this time around I stuck with a fresh baguette. I made just a single serving, but you could easily use a whole block of cream cheese and add the desired amount of each ingredient if you are feeding a group or turning it into an appetizer.

Sun-dried Tomato Spread

2-4 tbsp cream cheese, depending on how you want to control kcals and fat
2 tbsp white or yellow onion, chopped
2 large sun-dried tomatoes packed in oil, sliced
Salt and pepper to taste

Toss the ingredients in a mini-food processor or use an immersion blender to combine well. If you like a chunkier texture, feel free to leave everything as is and just stir together.

Arugula and Sun-dried Tomato Sandwich

¼ average size baguette, split
1 cup arugula leaves, washed
Sun-dried Tomato Spread

I think you can figure out the instructions from here. Just put the sandwich together and enjoy a great meal that is easy to make with simple, yet powerful flavors. Not to mention that you’ll have a least one serving of dark, leafy greens for the day.

Açaí: The Real Thing

October 10, 2008

I had something incredibly interesting last night that I just have to share with my fellow health advocates so today I’m going to back to my ‘foods of Brazil’ theme.

You’ve probably heard about açaí a million times by now. I saw infomercials for it in the States last June and I think I get a spam email about Oprah and açaí in my junk mail box at least three times a week.

People go crazy over this little berry from the Amazon with its antioxidants, essential fatty acids (similar to that of olive oil) and its essential amino acid complex. It is a major powerhouse when it comes to healthy food.

Despite the fact that I am pretty far south in Brazil, it is quite the craze here as well. I’ve had the opportunity to try it in 100% juice form and mixed with other fruits. My favorite is açaí and grape juice.

Last night I got to try it in a way I never had before. It is becoming increasingly popular to eat açaí in a tigela. This is simply açaí in a bowl. They just opened a restaurant here that specializes in these treats along with juices and many fruits from the north of Brazil.

I’ve tried to figure out a way to describe eating açaí like this. The consistency is like a thick milk shake. In my selection a huge bowl of fruit – grapes, strawberries, bananas, kiwi, mango, apple, star fruit and chunks of coconut – were covered in the açaí and topped with granola.

It has to be one of the most interesting things I have ever tried. I wish I could find another word for ‘interesting,’ but I’m not sure how else to describe it. It was complex, yet simply amazing. I loved it!

There is so much açaí in it that the pigment turns your mouth practically black. Is it possible to overdose on natural antioxidants? If so, I think I probably came pretty close to the limit.

My Portuguese is awful, but the friend I was with inquired about how the açaí mixture was made. It turns out the pulp of the berries is mixed with organic sugar and guarana syrup.

In case you aren’t familiar guarana is another berry from the Amazon that contains about five times as much caffeine as coffee! There is actually a soft drink named for it that is popular here.

Considering I had my tigela at 5:00pm I didn’t sleep so well last night. I’m thinking it should really be a breakfast food.

Oh, the juice next to my bowl in the picture is cashew juice. I honestly had no idea that the cashew nut actually came from a fruit until I visited Brazil. Maybe I’ll cover that in my next ‘foods from Brazil’ post.

Goiaba

September 30, 2008

I thought I’d revisit my promise to introduce more of the Brazilian produce I’ve come to enjoy. Today I thought I’d talk about goiaba (pronounce goy-aba), known in English as guava.

Guava is a popular ingredient in Brazil. Almost every menu will have a dessert option that involves guava. In this case it is usually the goiabada which is like a thick jam. Of course, it is full of sugar, but very tasty.

I have had the opportunity to buy fresh guava and I do so every few weeks. Guava is a fruit that is pink on the inside and is covered by a thin green skin which is edible. The texture is probably closest to a kiwi, or somewhere between a peach and an apple. The little seeds inside, also edible, are like Grapenuts cereal.

While the fruit has a distinct musty smell it is hard to describe the flavor except for unique. It isn’t overly sweet or sour. Many people slice guava into quarters and eat each section as a fresh fruit.

To be honest, I don’t really like guava fresh like this. There is something about the flavor of the skin and those crunchy nuts that I can’t get used to eating.

I have found one way I like it though – juiced so I can drink it. Putting the guava through the juicer produces a really thick pulp. I add a little water to it and maybe a ¼ teaspoon of sugar.

Earlier this year when I was looking around the USDA web-site I found some interesting information. Yes, the nutrition dork that I am and considering the fact that I worked for a USDA grant funded program for a while, I do search around there for the latest research.

What I found out was that when it comes to antioxidants – Blueberries #1 and Guava #2.

US and Thai researches determined that guava packs an amazing amount of antioxidants. What is even more exciting is that farmers in south Florida are experimenting with the crop. We’ll still have the pesky transport issue to deal with, but this might mean more availability of guava in the U.S. You can read more about the research here.

One thing I found to be funny in the article is this line, “…to meet rising consumer demand for unusual fruits.”

I think “unusual fruit” is a bit of a relative term. Not sure why it caught my attention. Probably the whole living abroad thing has made me more sensitive to these little things.

If you asked someone who has it readily available to them, I doubt they would call it unusual. Maybe exotic, delicious or healthy would be a better term. Looks to me like they were being a little non-PC with their produce talk!

P.S. Being south of the Equator it took me a little longer, but I got my foodbuzz packet last night. This stuff is great!!

A Passion for Fruit

September 17, 2008

When I was starting out with my food blog I had a mission to try and keep it separate from my Brazil blog.

As most of you know, I am living abroad and while I spend some time in the US, more of my time at the current moment is spent here in Brazil.

I started thinking about it though and I have exposure to some pretty cool ingredients here, especially fruits. I thought maybe others might like to see a little bit of what I have around.

Plus, I don’t know where all my readers are from so maybe you have access to some of these things too.

So, every now and then I might mention an ingredient or two that I have come to love here in Brazil. I’ll let you know what I do with it too.

What better place to start than with my favorite fruit, Passion Fruit, or Maracujà.
I love anything and everything made with this tart exotic treat that is known for its calming properties. You can find it fresh, juiced and as a dessert such as cake or mousse.

Around here it is guarana for energy and maracujà for sleep.

I haven’t personally noticed it making me sleepy, but I’m a pretty caffeinated person on a regular basis so maybe I am overriding its affects.

I’ve mostly found the yellow variety here. There is a purple variety, but it is more common in Australia. I’ve seen the purple on occasion, but have never tried it.

Its little black seeds are edible, pack some fiber and they add a great crunch to yogurt. I like to mix the fruit pulp and seeds in with vanilla yogurt.

A few months ago I went to a yoga with a friend. The instructor gave us tea made with passion fruit after class.

She explained the recipe to my friend, however, being true to her yoga, she was a bit of free spirit and we couldn’t get exact instructions. One thing we did discover is that there is no actual tea in it. You just drink it warm like a tea.

I’ve managed to recreate it and I have it almost every week. If you have access to passion fruit give it a try with this tea or mixed in your yogurt. It might become your favorite fruit too.

About 5 cups of water
¼ c sugar
1 inch piece of fresh ginger, cut into small pieces
1 passion fruit

Use some of the water and the sugar to make a simple syrup. To a large pot add the remaining water, simple syrup, ginger and pulp from the passion fruit. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer for about 10 to 15 minutes. Your house will smell awesome by the way!

Pour the liquid through a strainer or colander to separate the pulp and seeds from the liquid. Enjoy it warm in your favorite mug.

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