buckwheat pancakes with spiced apple plum compote

 

There are those who like to buck the status quo and do things like eat breakfast for dinner. There's nothing new or special about that - especially if you're young enough to remember your days as a 20-something in university. Or your 2 AM runs to the grosser-than-gross Fresgo Inn on Davie street in Vancouver for a breakfast so huge you can split it in half and call it a decent meal. Breakfast for dinner is a concept that is solidly entrenched in Gen X culture.

The Fresgo Inn on Davie is long gone (though apparently still operating in Whalley - who knew?) and I don't think I've had breakfast for dinner in years. However, today I double-bucked the status quo: I ate breakfast for lunch. 

Now, don't you go thinking that I slept in. No no. I got up reasonably early, ate a bagel for breakfast, went out in the cold, blustery weather to shoot an assignment, then came home and made pancakes at 2 in the afternoon. Buckwheat pancakes. With a spiced apple and plum compote.

buttermilk banana bread with cinnamon honey glaze

 

I know I've talked before about how I have a thing for buying bananas, and forgetting to eat them before they start turning brown. Well, after months of abstaining from buying bananas for this very reason (especially as I have at least five bananas in the freezer, just waiting to be turned into banana bread) I made the same mistake. Why do I never learn?

Well, it goes back to that whole thing I was talking about before: positive reinforcement. See, when I saw that the bananas had developed brown spots and were therefore as good as dead to me as a snack on their own, I of course used it as an excuse to try out some new banana bread. I was rewarded for not only purchasing unnecessary bananas but allowing them to languish on my counter with what I call luxury banana bread - any banana bread that calls for a full half cup of butter.

roasted winter vegetables with fresh thyme

You know what one of the cons of having a food blog is? Having the excuse to constantly obsess over food. See... I'm already obsessed with food. Cooking it, eating it, writing about it, sharing it with others. I'm a boredom snacker. I eat my feelings. I snack the whole time I'm cooking. It's terrible.

7 lbs of terrible since I started this blogging business. That wouldn't be a problem if I were a 6 foot amazon, but I'm not. I'm a teeny little person at 5 foot 2 inches and I'm nursing a food baby that I didn't have before.

dijon chicken with rosemary

 

This chicken was not much to look at. I struggled with whether or not to blog it based on its looks. I've posted ugly foods on this blog before (pulled pork with bourbon orange coriander barbecue sauce comes to mind, as does pea and mint soup), but as I progress through this blog, my standards are getting a little higher. With experience comes improvement. Improvement was not evident in any of the photographs taken. Only struggle, oversized garnish and ugly chicken.

Then I tasted the ugly chicken.

The Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap 2011

Hurray for cookies! No recipe in this post - just a super duper FUN announcement. I'm taking part in The Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap 2011! I get to bake 3 batches of cookies and send them to a three mystery food bloggers who could be from anywhere in North America. These three mystery bloggers will be sending me a batch of cookies. It's kind of like a secret Santa with cookies. Could it be anymore fun?!

If you're a food blogger and interested in signing up, please do so here. The more the merrier!

Stay tuned next month for the results of the cookie swap...

deep dish green apple pie

 

This pie was the result of multiple failures. I have been planning this pie for at least a week and a half. It was supposed to be much more than just a deep dish green apple pie, but if I tell you what the surprise ingredient was, I'll steal my own thunder next time I make an attempt.

That being said, even though this pie failed to live up to what it was supposed to be, as a straight up apple pie it was wicked. It had a simple, uncomplicated flavour. It was beautifully tart and apple-heavy - for me, there's nothing worse than an apple pie with a high goop to fruit ratio, like the kind you get at the supermarket. Gross. 

bruschetta with ricotta and oven-roasted tomato

 

Let me take a minute to talk about how I struck lucky and ended up with the best boyfriend out there. Boyfriend seems like sort of an odd, backwards term to describe him given that we've been pretty much married for what feels like a decade (in a good way!). He's rational, sane, unselfish and when you get down to it, an honest to goodness good person. He humours me even though he doesn't laugh at all my jokes.

For example, today we were out running boring errands (of the Home Depot and Canadian Tire variety). One of the items we needed to purchase was some storage jars for our kitchen. While walking down St. Laurent on our way to Canadian Tire, I spotted a kitchen store and suggested that we look in there. There was no way that we'd possibly find any reasonably priced storage jars in a place like this, but I really just wanted to poke around anyways and, you guessed it, Adam humoured me.