British Columbia

Lend me your ears!…for some Eva-style Elote

August 29, 2013 by Eva Louise 9 Comments

I don’t really like ears of corn. There’s something so cumbersome about the way they look that turns me off…as in, they look like a real commitment to prepare and eat. You know? No? OK, yea, I forgot that everybody else on the planet freakin’ loves corn…Which means I need to have a few corn recipes in my repertoire. FINE.

Luckily, my Mom decided to buy a million ears of it for our recent trip to British Columbia, so this was the perfect time to practice. I decided to do a riff on elote, Mexican street corn and used our BBQ to char the corn before preparing the dish. Not revolutionary, but it took the dish to a totally stellar level.

Eva-style Elote

Ingredients

3 ears of corn, husks off, stub on (makes it easier to BBQ)
1/2 medium red onion, diced
1 bunch cilantro, rinsed and roughly chopped
1 can black beans, rinsed
2 heaping dollops of crema (Mexican sour cream), creme fraiche (French sour cream) or just regular sour cream
1 heaping T mayonnaise
1/4 cup crumbled cotija cheese or grated Parmesan
juice of 1 juicey lime
pinch of cayenne pepper
1 ripe avocado

Char the ears of corn for about 8-10 minutes on a seriously hot grill or griddle pan, probably, 375-400 degrees. Let them cool long enough to take a knife to chop off the kernels. Reserve a small bunch of kernels, cotija, cilantro and avocado for garnish later, then mix corn with all of the other ingredients EXCEPT the avocado. Careful on the mayo and crema to make sure you don’t add too much. Taste and adjust flavors accordingly. Fold in the diced avocado near the end so it doesn’t squish. Cover and refrigerate for about 30 minutes. Garnish the mixture with the remaining corn, cotija, cilantro and avocado, then serve!

Put this in your pipe and smoke it! No, no, please just eat it with some cream cheese

August 23, 2013 by Eva Louise 4 Comments

So you’re probably wondering, Evey, what’d you do with that Coho you slaughtered in your last post? I’ll tell you what we did, we made smoked salmon of course…we’re Jews after all…! Our smoked salmon is insanely delicious, meaty, brine-y and flavorful, not those slimy, thin, hot pink lox you get at the deli.

All the accompaniments are just as essential as the smoked salmon: cream cheese, capers, red onion, tomatoes and lemons.

Obviously I’ll never make this in my New York apartment, but I would like to have this recipe on file. It’s funny because as I’m typing, I’m looking in the guest book of our Tofino house (we keep a guest book/journal every year so we can remember everything, recipes included) and apparently Dad calls this recipe his “Lil’ Chief Smoked Salmon Deluxe,” so we’ll continue to call it that.

Lil’ Chief Smoked Salmon Deluxe

The process is quite long (about 13 hours door to door NOT including actually catching the fish) but nice and easy if you have the time and a smoker. We start with a super intense brine with the ingredients below. Mom and Dad will adjust the recipe depending on what’s in fridge but you get the idea. We leave the fillets to brine for about 4 hours in the fridge, then leave it to air dry on the counter until it forms the pellicle – that glossy, salty seal on the top of the fish which apparently helps the smoke adhere to the fish more effectively. Then we smoke it in our smoker (looks like a mini-bar fridge) for 6-8 hours at different temperatures (below). I might not be able to smoke the fish back in New York but I sure can eat it back in New York! Going to have to have you all over for brunch soon…

For the Brine

1 cup water
2 cups soy sauce
1/4 cup non-iodized salt
1/3 cup brown sugar
1 cup dry white wine
1/4 cup lemon juice
crushed garlic (knowing my family, a whole bulb)
onion powder or chopped onions

Smoke for:

1-2 hours at 100-120F
2-4 hours at 140F
1-2 hours at 175F

Sharpening My Dad Skills

August 22, 2013 by Eva Louise 3 Comments

Let’s get started

Omelettes, baking (of any sort), pivot tables, PowerPoint presentations, refraining from opening other peoples’ mail, picking up my dry cleaning when it’s actually ready, controlling my hanger (that special type of rage you get when you’re starving), cheese-making, sushi rolling, running…

These are all things I’m not particularly good at; the most devastating addition to this list is fish filleting. It’s kind of pathetic given my family’s fishfolk status but my dad spoils me and presents me with perfectly filleted kitchen-ready salmon all the time…So, hey! What’s my motivation to figure out how to cut these damn things myself?! In efforts to be more self-sufficient, I finally tried my hand at filleting a whole Coho, under Dad’s direction of course.

I don’t know about you, but trying to learn stuff from Dad is the most frustrating and painful process. Ever. Yes, I love him and yes, he has tons of knowledge to impart but man, that guy has NO PATIENCE (cut to tear-laden movie montage of me learning to walk, ride a bike, drive a car…). And as articulate and commanding as he must have been on Wall Street back in the day, when he’s trying to teach me something he makes NO SENSE WHATSOEVER.

So there we were with a Coho, 2 sharp knives and my lovely sister to document the whole thing…

I started off strong….

Wouldn't be lesson learned without "too many cooks in the kitchen"!

When I’m struggling, it really helps when two people start giving me competing advice. Please, please provide me with competing advice. It calms me.

I just went haywire here with my hands criss-crossed. Under no circumstance does this look safe!

Filleting towards your own fingers…also not a good idea…

Got my groove…kind of

….I could strangle him right now! Eyyy…but I did it! Daddy’s so proud!

Tofino Time: 2012 Foragers and Fishermens’ Mashup!

August 20, 2013 by Eva Louise Leave a Comment

My gorgeous dad, mom, sister and brother!

It’s that time of year again…Tofino Time! The whole family made the great trek West and North to beautiful British Columbia for our week long family holiday filled with foraging and fishing adventures. My trip in particular took a whopping 16 hours…grrr…so admittedly it’s taken the past few days to get into vacation mode, but I’m in it! I’m in vacation mode….weeee!

For those of you who know my family, food and cooking are the main features of any FFV (Fowler Family Vacation). So to get my inspirational juices flowing for the week ahead, I looked back on last year’s postings. I had just started up the bloggy and I had so much fun documenting all of our delicious meals and the hilarious adventures that got the food to the table. Here are a few of our 2012 highlights; I can’t wait to share this week’s culinary delights!

Mom’s bangin’ Smoked Salmon and Clam Chowder from Clamming Leads to Clam Chowder