breakfast blogger

Wow these guys don’t hold back on the bananas…

It was a virtual mountain!

These were taken at the Tuscanos at 710 St Joseph here in Hull. YUM. $8.25.

I bet you will never look at a short stack the same again.

Thanks to Kawaii Not for the giggle.

I’ve got silicone muffin pans, cookie sheets and spatulas and I love them– I’d love to get these for my eggs:

Get some here. Found via the j-walk blog!

Don’t get me wrong, Seattle is also full of late Sunday mornings perfect for breakfast OUT as well. It just seems as though everyone else has the same idea, “lets go get breakfast somewhere!” around 8am, Sunday morning, and by the time us late wakers finally roll out of bed and wipe the sleep out of our eyes, all the good breakfast spots are full, and You’re hungry and don’t feel like waiting.

So this late Sunday morning, I took it upon myself to make a nice, full, farmstyle breakfast for my husband and I.

Nothing special, just french toast, bacon, sausage, some fried eggs, toast for dipping, and over in the corner off camera, some little mini croissants with strawberry jam. A nice cold glass of fruit juice and some milk rounded off the meal, and we ate with smiles on our faces, glad we didn’t bother getting out of our PJ’s this cold January morning in the land of rain and… more rain.

…Though glancing out the window now as I type this, the weather man would make me a liar for not acknowledging the striking blue sky as it peeks from beneath its cloudy cover. Perhaps it too did not feel like waking early and shedding its PJ’s just to beat the breakfast crowd.

Here’s to delicious breakfasts, wherever you are.

-A.

During the holidays, our friend Kate suggested that we make Pannetone french toast, so we did.

We used fresh farm eggs that we got from our CSA farm, which is why these eggs are all different colours and sizes.

We also made home fries. We baked these, not only to make them less unhealthy, but to not have to stir them and/or tend to them constantly. It also frees up more real estate on the stove. We simply threw cubes of potato into a big bowl and tossed them with some oil (olive and veg), salt, pepper, and whatever herbs or spices were handy - oregano and rosemary this time. After about 20 minutes we mixed them around, trying to flip as many pieces as possible.

Here they are in the oven:

We also made an apple compote to eat on the french toast.

Here is some cheese we had with our meal. There was a Comte from France and a Manchego from Spain. We invited a few people for this brunch, and they didn’t show up empty-handed, so there was an assortment of fruit and cheese and other goodies to enjoy before, during and after the Pannetone french toast.

The Pannetone french toast:

Yummy!

For dinner that evening, the lady and I made Pannetone french toast peanut butter banana sandwiches, with maple syrup.

Decadent.

Happy New Year! It’s been a while since I last posted– I had a pretty busy holiday season this year.

I decided to pick up a bag of Organic Corn Flakes a couple of weeks ago..

It’s a bit pricey at around 7 dollars or so, but pretty tasty and worth it in my opinion, especially if you’re trying to avoid processed ingredients. I was pretty blown away when I saw this:

Organic corn meal, concentrated organic grape juice (?!?), and sea salt. That’s it!!

After a enchilada feed 2 nights previous, I found that I had a bit of a surplus of leftover black beans in my fridge. Now I’m a big fan of the delicious little high fiber bean beasties, so why not add them to breakfast. So I did. May I present: spicy egg and black bean breakfast wrap.

I beat up some eggs and mixed in some chili seasoning, chive, salt and pepper and some other spicy stuff and made a spicy scramble.

I pan fried the beans to warm them through and threw the eggs, beans, some old cheddar cheese ( and by old I mean aged. I have issues with moldy cheese) and a splat of hot sauce in for good measure into a nice whole wheat wrap.

Add that to the book du jour and it was a most satisfying and fiber rich mid week breaky.

*Burp!*

Almost every Christmas Eve I can remember was spent with my family, and we always had dinner at a Chinese restaurant and then saw a movie. I missed a few years, in my late teens and early twenties, when most people rebel against their families and other institutions. During these years I usually ‘rebelled’ by being temporarily adopted by a Christian family and sometimes even attending midnight mass at a church. What a crazy kid I was.

This year was no different. My girlfriend, my brother, my grandmother and her caregiver (who is a Jehovah’s witness and therefore did not celebrate Christmas or take the evening off) went for Chinese food. Afterwards, my girlfriend, my brother and I went to see “The Golden Compass”, a fittingly anti-Christian film.

The next day, Christmas Day, I went to Kam Fung for Dim Sum.
Some of you may recall that I wrote about the Kam Fung Dim Sum experience last year, but if you compare the two, we ordered a variety of different dishes each time.

This time I was accompanied by four lovely women, and we chatted, ate lots of dumplings and drank copious amounts of tea. Below is a list of most of what we ate.

Fried calmari
Always one of my favorites.

Spicy fried tofu
One the tastiest but unhealthiest ways to prepare tofu.

Mushroom/pork/shrimp meatballs
Strange, but satisfying. slimy mushroom acts as a container for seasoned ground pork.

Tripe
yech.

Chinese broccoli with oyster sauce
Healthy and delicious.

Fried taro.
I don’t know how this ended up on the table, but it was fine.

Shrimp spring rolls.
Once again, we must have been having some really good discussions, as we cannot remember who said ‘yes’ to these, but they were good nonetheless. The pile of mayo was overkill.

Sesame balls with lotus paste
Classic. Almost sweet like dessert, but still savory enough to keep ordering more food…if we’re still hungry…

Deep fried shrimp dumplings
We all thought we were getting steamed shrimp dumplings. Oh well.

Steamed shrimp dumplings
YES!

There were some that i missed opportunities to get photos of, but that is all part of the mystery of Dim Sum.

For dessert, some coconut and mango jelly pudding
The coconut was slightly mild, but the mango was spot on.

The battlefield:

Afterwards, we walked towards home and stopped for Christmas coffees at Café Olympico.

The best Christmas ever!

Whoa. Just imagine the applications this could bring. Bacon quilt anyone? Pic via reddit.

Whoa, this is one of the best Benedicts I’ve had around the Ottawa area…

Sam Snead’s is in Chateau Cartier at 1170 Aylmer Road. There was a brunch available, but we decided to order from the menu instead.

That’s one tasty hollandaise they’re using there, lemme tell ya.

And a little view from above…

Shhh, don’t tell anyone that I took some fancy jams home! \(^o^)/

T’was around $11.