Weekend = shopping + cooking

Oh don't u just love weekends where it's all about food?

Guess you all know I am passionate about food. Actually about all steps involved in food. Growing, buying, preparing and eating it. I can simply get emotional when something really really tastes good. And I am not talking about four star restaurants. Just basic stuff can be so beautiful as well. So buckle yourselves up for a foodpost!

It all starts on Friday when I go groceryshopping. I make a shoppinglist for the whole week. We decide what we're going to eat and from there we derive what ingredients we need. (Back in Belgium I used to type out my list and even spend a couple of minutes on the layout, freaky right!)

I usally buy stuff at lots of different places, but I try to get most of it in a supermarket. So far we've been going to 3 different supermarkets: L'intermarché 4 frères, PA supermarket and Provigo. First one is rather small, not a lot of choice and is kinda expensive. And the people working there are not really friendly. It's the one closest to our appartment, but we kinda only go there for last minute stuff. PA is about a 10 minute walk, but it's small, too crowded, too noisy. They have too much personnel and they don't work effectively. Usually the guys spend more time checking out the girls than filling the shelves. The owners are hispanic and you mostly hear Spanish and English. And finally there's PROVIGO a large chain (part of Loblaws). 20 minute walk, close to the Parc du Mont Royal on avenue du Mont Royal. They have a large variety of products, fresh fish, meat, cheese, nice large aisles and their generic brand "President's Choice" has the best tasting organic whole milk (tastes fresh from the cow, and I know coz I drank it every sunday when I was a kid at my grandparents' farm). Provigo is the ZEN shopping experience. (But you have to take a bus back and with all the groceries and full shopping bags in an overcrowded bus during rush hour is far from Zen).
By the way, all supermarkets do home delivery for an extra buck.

But this friday I went to PA supermarket coz some of the stuff I needed was on sale.
So I am not gonna go over my whole shopping list (that I forgot at home I noticed in the supermarket) but concentrate on 2 of my new favourite brands: Liberty/Liberté Yogurt and Celestial Seasonings Herb Tea. They have so many varieties. To list just a few: Dulce de Leche (with Argentinian caramel), Orange & Marzipan (my favourite), Coconut, Apple Pie, Plums & Walnuts, French Style Hazelnut, Lemon, Wild Blackberries, Peach & Passion Fruit, Black Cherries, Moka and lots more. Since I couldn't decide (and they were on sale), I bought 7 different flavours. As for the tea (and you can find this brand in Belgium as well) I kinda like Lemon Zinger, Sleepy Time, Mandarine Orange Spice and Bengal Spice. And I discovered new flavours such as Moroccan Pomegranate Red and Peach Apricot Honeybush. Oh and most of their teas are caffeine free.

Oh and the limes were on sale as well (10 limes for 1 dollar), so we had Drunken Mule. It's basically a punch with ginger ale (Canada Dry of course), some sprigs of fresh mint, crushed ice, sliced limes and vodka. Very yummy but also very dangerous. Y'all know what I'm talkin' 'bout :-)

So for the Drunken Mule we needed to buy booze. And here in Québec that means going to the SAQ. SAQ, Société des alcools du Québec, is a state-owned corporation responsible for the trade of alcoholic beverages. It's the same things as Alko in Finland and Systembolaget in Sweden. We bought some designer SKYY VODKA for our mule (hey, it was on sale :-) )

But let's fast forward to dinner tonight. Tonight we're having crostini with fresh figs, mint and prosciutto. Frittata with zuchini, mushrooms and tomatoes. And lemons filled with mozzarella, anchovies, basil and tomatoes. And as a main course a simple but fresh carbonara. Fresh meaning , fresh pasta, so I went down to Little Italy to the Jean Talon Market to buy durum wheat flour (=semolina di grana duro) to make pasta. Although it was a cold chilly and rainy day, walking at Jean Talon seeing and smelling mouthwatering produce is a warming experience.

Anyway, I should head back into the kitchen now, but I'll quickly give you my carbonara recipe. I add a few things to make it extra tasty.

Carbonara
Fresh pasta or very good linguine (I like the brand Di Cecco)
Bacon or pancetta cut in strips
1 clove of garlic
couple of eggs
double cream
freshly grated parmesan or pecorino cheese
small diced tomato
some chopped flatleaf parsely

Boil the pasta al dente. Fry a clove of garlic in some olive oil in a pan. Take the garlic out and fry the bacon. Whisk the eggs, cream and cheese together. When the pasta is ready add the bacon in the pan and add the eggmixture. And mix everything together on a very low heat.
Now it's up to you, I like my carbonara smooth & silky and others like it scrambled egg style. So smooth and silky means you take it of the heat and mix in the diced tomato and parsley. Otherwise you heat it through a little bit more (and stir often) and afterwards you can add the tomatoes and parsely. And serve directly with some extra grated parmesan cheese on top.

Tip: you can add a tiny bit of white wine or lemon juice just so the acidity will cut through the fat of the cream.

Tomorrow I'll be making Belgian waffles.

Have a tasty weekend!