Title = fun quote from an episode of Jamie’s School Dinners, where Jamie Oliver was trying to educate a woman on the benefits of feeding her family salad.

Speaking of Salad…

In an effort to do a little pre-emptive healthy eating before the base hedonism of the Christmas Food Fest, I’ve been trying to eat a salad for lunch every day.

Unfortunately I’m getting a bit bored of my standard combinations of greens + veggies + proteins + carbs + dressing.

So, gentle readers, I’m asking you to pony up your salad suggestions. All I ask is that the combinations go thusly:

-Large portion of greens & veggies
-Small portion of protein
-Small portion of carbs
-preference for homemade dressing (though really, if you suggest a style, there’s probably a recipe for making it out there somewhere that I can find).

And because everyone can use a new salad combo, here are the two I’ve been having the most often so far:

Tuna Salad
1/2 can of Tuna (packed in water, drained)
5 tiny dill pickles, diced
mixed with 1 tbsp mayo
served over2c. Baby Greens
Side of what thins crackers

Spinach Salad
1/2 oz Blue Cheese, crumbled
5 or 6 slices red onion
2c baby spinach greens
tossed withdijon vinaigrette
(2 parts olive oil to 1 part red wine vinegar, dollop of dijon mustard & smaller dollop of honey – whisk together & season with salt & pepper)
Side of cornbread

What about you? What greeny delights get your mojo going?

Wow. Who knew an emulsion was so enticing!

Anyhow, it all started after reading a bunch of Michael Pollan books. I started reading food labels, and one of those was eventually mayonnaise. And there are some frightening unpronounceables on those labels.

This was also around the time Neil and I were realizing how easy it is to make most condiments, and how much better and fresher they taste when homemade.

So we dove into the world of Mayo. And it is so, SO easy.

I happen to use an adaptation of the recipe in this book – I use sunflower oil, since I prefer the taste of that over olive oil for most of my mayo uses – though any basic recipe will probably do. I also use rice wine vinegar, instead of white wine. Again, go with what you enjoy.

The one thing before getting started, is just trust yourself. If you think it needs more or less oil, salt, pepper, mustard, vinegar, lemon juice, go ahead and throw it in. The best part of making your own mayo is that you can really tweak it so it’s your own saucy bowl of perfection.

First things first: you’ll need a non-reactive bowl, an egg, oil, mustard, vinegar, salt, pepper and lemon juice. You’ll also need either an electric mixer, or if you prefer to kick-it old-school, a wire whisk and wrist of steel. Get all your ingredients (or at least the egg) to room temperature.

Separate the the egg, and drop the yolk into your bowl with about a tsp of mustard, vinegar, salt and pepper. You can get fancy and use white pepper if you don’t want black flecks sullying the golden yellow of your mayo, but I don’t care that much.

Whisk or beat those together until well blended. Then comes the tricky part. You want to slowly drizzle in about 1/2c. of oil in a very thin stream and watch the sauce emulsify. You’ll note that my pictures of the really tricky part don’t exist. I ran out of hands. Just trust me.

If it starts to split (the egg won’t absorb any more oil, and it looks chunky and curdled), stop pouring the oil and whisk like the wind! I’ve never had a problem rescuing split mayo with just extra whisking, but YMMV. Books suggest starting with another yolk and mustard, and whisking in the split mixture until it’s all smooth again.

Eventually, you’ll end up with something that looks like mayo. Huzzah! You’ve made it most of the way! But it still needs a little something-something. Add your lemon juice, adjust the salt and pepper, and give it one last gentle mix. It’s too late here to adjust the mustard, but make a mental note for next time.

Once you’re satisfied with the flavour, that’s it! You’ve just made your own mayo in about 6 minutes. Give yourself a pat on the back, you deserve it!

Officially homemade mayo lasts about 3-5 days in the fridge, but we’ve kept ours up to two weeks without any ill effects. Of course, we at chez watercooler take no responsibility for any condiment related disaster or illness that may befall you after making your own mayo. And if you visit, rest assured that we only test our own intestinal fortitude with aged mayo. We’ll only serve guests fresh stuff.

Now, go make yourself a sandwich!

In my last post there was a brief discussion in the comments about the evolution of charging (or not) for shopping bags – plastic and reuseable.

bobvis mentioned

It occurs to me now that if you really want people to remember to bring their own bags, you should actually *charge* them $0.03 for forgetting to bring their own bags. I think that would psychologically be a better incentive to remember to bring your bag than either a discount.

Of course, a company probably would think twice before implementing this policy because it could tick off consumers. However, it might actually serve as a better motivator.

Which reminded me of the Real Canadian Superstore chain.

Ever since I can remember shopping there (which goes back to 1994 or so), they’ve been charging $0.10 per bag if you want a plastic one from their store to haul your groceries home in.

Growing up in a small town where there was only one small supermarket which charged the high prices you’d expect in that situation, we made semi-monthly pilgrimages to the Superstore 35 minutes away to stock up on groceries for the family.

And even then, more than a decade before “green” was trendy, Superstore was encouraging the purchase of “Green Boxes” – crate-like baskets that fit into their specially-fitted shopping carts, so you could fill them while you were shopping, then unpack and repack them to put into your car.

I remember my mom LOVED them, because they were really easy to handle, and it meant there weren’t bags rolling around in the trunk, squashing groceries on our way home.

I don’t think anyone in my family shops at Superstore anymore. There isn’t one close to any of us, and we aren’t buying things in the quantities Superstore usually packages them in. But to this day, I still have a couple of those green boxes in my storage room, holding dog supplies and recyclables.

The more I think about the Superstore days though, the more I remember them having quite a few green products in their President’s Choice line. I didn’t see special advertising for them, they were just on the shelf next to the regular products. And I never really thought about why.

I have noticed a few commercials and videos going around though, about a new campaign/initiative that the Loblaw’s chain (parent company of Superstore & Extra Foods Price Smart Foods oops! my bad.) is running, trying to bring local produce to their stores:

Sure, now it seems like they’re just doing it to be trendy – but Superstore’s been quietly leading a green charge for a helluva long time (fun fact: they launched the “Green Line” of President’s Choice products in 1989 – yes, eighty-nine).

But is it really (as their commercials claim) worth switching supermarkets for? It’s hard for me to say.

It’s entirely inconvenient for me to get to a Superstore (or any other store in the Loblaw’s chain). I am a creature of habit and convenience, and unless there is a really REALLY compelling reason to go elsewhere (usually a huge price advantage, or to get products my closest store doesn’t carry), I shop at the supermarket closest to home – supplemented by trips to the local farmer’s markets.

But their efforts do make me consider what my local stores are doing. I actually even feel a bit guilty for not rewarding Loblaw’s (by shopping at their stores) for being so green so early. And while I’m still not compelled to actually trek over to their stores, I am curious about what they’re doing and do think about them. Which I suppose is a start.

How about those of you who have a few options for nearby supermarkets? What influences your decision to shop where you do? To those close to a Superstore: do you shop there? Why or why not?

Not that my cupboards are bare, but Zoot posted something awfully fun yesterday that made me think a bit more about what’s in them (and read the comments, too!). I was going to comment, but I’d run on far too long.

She writes:

So, I’m curious how your kitchen is different from mine. Do you own a rice steamer? A breadmaker? How much room do your spices take up? Is your fridge constantly full? Do you use a separate freezer? (Now that is something I could totally use, by the way. To store all of my Stoffer’s frozen entreess.) Do your wine glasses get used? What about your coffee maker? We’ve gone through three in the last few years we use ours so much. What is the appliance you use the most (Crockpot), what is the appliance you use the least (Hand-held mixer). Do you have a food processor? What do you use it for because I’ve never owned one.

We’re big kitchen people. Not that we have a big kitchen, but we love cooking and spend a lot of time in ours. You’ve probably only seen my kitchen looking pristine if you’ve come over or seen pictures, but that’s because I’ve been frantically cleaning it before you showed up.

In reality, it’s usually a mess, because we’ve just made something. And probably from scratch.

It’s not a foodie superiority thing – we certainly wouldn’t do it if we didn’t enjoy it – we both just find it fun, breaking foods down into their most basic elements and figuring out how they really work. We don’t churn butter or anything, but we do make our own mayo. I can’t remember the last time we purchased a store-bought salad dressing. We probably haven’t bought a canned, boxed or frozen meal in over 2 years, and only buy containers of soupstock once in a blue-moon, when our stores of homemade have run out and we’ve been too busy to make more.

We do buy a lot of mustard – but I’ve been itching to take on that particular condiment as well and add it to our arsenal of homemade things.

I’m definitely enjoying this while it lasts – because I’m assuming that it will come to a rapid end once we no longer have just the two of our schedules to manage and the two of us to feed.

To answer Zoot’s questions:

No, we don’t have a rice steamer – I’ve tried, and can only successfully make it in a pot. No breadmaker either, though we do make a lot of it, either with the help of the KitchenAid or just by hand. We have a vast selection of spices: about half of one cupboard shelf, 18 magnetic pots on the wall, another rack of 12 jars in another cupboard and 6 pots of fresh herbs on the windowsill. Most of them get used at least once every 6 months.

Generally our fridge is about half-full of different condiments. When we’re home, it’s nearly bursting with fresh ingredients and leftovers. We do have a very small fridge though. And we would LOVE a separate freezer. We had a line on a free used one, but that fell through. It’s currently a big item on our wish list for storing stocks, fruit & berries, and meat. We’re itching to buy a side of beef or a whole hog!

Our wine glasses get used a whole lot (we prefer thinking we are living a French lifestyle to thinking we are alcoholics) – we have four we keep in the regular cupboard for everyday use and a box of 12 we have in our storage room for parties. The coffee maker also gets very regular workouts – used at least once every day, sometimes twice on weekends.

The appliance we use the most is probably the toaster, followed by the KitchenAid – though that’s not really saying much. Unless it’s a really big job, we just use hand tools: sharp knife, wooden spoon, wire whisk. And now that I think about it, there was a time we were using the blender 4 or 5 mornings a week to make fruit smoothies. Note to self: do more of that! The one we use least is a tie between the food processor and the waffle-iron. Both great and super-handy when you need them, but we don’t need them all that often. When I do use the food processor it’s usually for pastry dough, or a big batch of slaw, pesto or hummus.

I’ve also included a couple photos of our kitchen – visit the originals on flickr, which I’ve tagged for your kitchen-snooping pleasure.

And leave a comment or a link to your own post and share how you use your kitchen. What are your answers to Zoot’s questions? How many kinds of mustard do you have? How often do you cook? What’s on your list of “must-try” recipes?

From the Very Good Taste blog:

1) Copy this list into your blog or journal, including these instructions.
2) *Asterisk and Italicize any items you’d be interested in trying but have not yet.*
2) Bold all the items you’ve eaten.
3) Cross out any items that you would never consider eating.

The VGT Omnivore’s Hundred:

1. Venison
2. *Nettle tea*
3. Huevos rancheros
4. *Steak tartare*
5. Crocodile
6. Black pudding
7. Cheese fondue
8. Carp
9. Borscht
10. Baba ghanoush
11. Calamari
12. Pho
13. PB&J sandwich
14. Aloo gobi
15. Hot dog from a street cart
16. *Epoisses*
17. Black truffle
18. Fruit wine made from something other than grapes
19. Steamed pork buns
20. Pistachio ice cream
21. Heirloom tomatoes
22. Fresh wild berries
23. Foie gras
24. Rice and beans
25. Brawn, or head cheese
26. *Raw Scotch Bonnet pepper*
27. Dulce de leche
28. Oysters
29. Baklava
30. *Bagna cauda*
31. Wasabi peas
32. Clam chowder in a sourdough bowl
33. Salted lassi
34. Sauerkraut
35. Root beer float
36. Cognac with a fat cigar
37. *Clotted cream tea*
38. Vodka jelly/Jell-O
39. Gumbo
40. Oxtail
41. Curried goat
42. Whole insects
43. *Phaal*
44. Goat’s milk
45. Malt whisky from a bottle worth £60/$120 or more
46. *Fugu*
47. Chicken tikka masala
48. Eel
49. Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnut
50. Sea urchin
51. Prickly pear
52. *Umeboshi*
53. Abalone
54. Paneer
55. McDonald’s Big Mac Meal
56. Spaetzle
57. Dirty gin martini
58. Beer above 8% ABV
59. Poutine
60. Carob chips
61. S’mores
62. Sweetbreads
63. Kaolin
64. *Currywurst*
65. Durian
66. *Frogs’ legs*
67. Beignets, churros, elephant ears or funnel cake
68. Haggis
69. Fried plantain
70. *Chitterlings, or andouillette*
71. Gazpacho
72. Caviar and blini
73. *Louche absinthe*
74. *Gjetost, or brunost*
75. Roadkill
76. *Baijiu*
77. Hostess Fruit Pie
78. Snail
79. *Lapsang souchong*
80. Bellini
81. Tom yum
82. Eggs Benedict
83. Pocky
84. *Tasting menu at a three-Michelin-star restaurant.*
85. Kobe beef
86. Hare
87. Goulash
88. Flowers
89. Horse
90. *Criollo chocolate*
91. Spam
92. *Soft shell crab*
93. Rose harissa
94. Catfish
95. Mole poblano
96. Bagel and lox
97. Lobster Thermidor
98. Polenta
99. *Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee*
100. *Snake*

I’m a bit disappointed in myself admitting that I’d never eat bugs, or durian, or roadkill (I’m that person who thinks everyone should try everything at least once) – but… ew. I hate bugs, I’ve smelled durian, and I’ve changed enough tires to be pretty wary of roadkill.

Anything you’d just never, ever try?

It only took a few months to happen – I’ve got lunch fatigue. I’m officially bored with the lunch offerings around my office.

And yah, I could make lunch to take to work, but I’m sorely out of practice and creativity in that department.

It gets especially difficult when you consider the fact that I don’t really like sandwiches.

That’s right. Don’t like sandwiches. I don’t mind a basic PB&J, or a toasted clubhouse, or the holy grail: the day-after Christmas turkey/cranberry sauce/stuffing/mashed potatoes/gravy on bread concoction, but untoasted bread stuffed with… stuff… it just turns me off. I dunno why.

I’ve also tried bringing salads to work, but I find they’re not filling enough, and also a very cold lunch in my very cold office. Plus after 3 days of salads, I’m still bored with the local options and now also bored with salad.

But I think I’ve found a solution!

Surfing through the blogopshere, I found the new site Just Bento.

I love bento – tiny meals in a box – and Makiko has put together a collection of tasty recipes and handy tricks. Including a big ol’ DUH that I didn’t think of but really should have: most bentos start with rice, so pre-cook a bunch, freeze it, and then top a frozen rice-hunk with bento fixin’s.

In fact she talks about maintaining a stash of joubisai (prepared ingredients) to make prep and assembly easier. We already maintain a similar pantry stock for dinners, so why it never occurred to me to populate a similar collection for lunches I’m not sure.

The site is pretty new, so it only has two bento recipes up so far. I’m hoping more will come during the next week while I’m away, and I can start the bento process with earnest once I’m back home.

Do you have any favourite lunch fixin’s or bento resources? After 1 week away, 6 frazzled days at home, and another week on the road, I’m going to be in the mood for some serious home cooking.

Not unlike fellow blogger and member of the ranks of the unemployed, Dave Drucker, I’m also spending a lot more of my time cooking at home, rather than going out.

This isn’t a huge change, as Neil and I both really enjoy cooking – we generally argue over who gets to make dinner – but being home all day means I’m a) watching a lot more food network and b) constructing some awfully elaborate dishes because I have the time, so why not?

Favourites over the last little while include Slow Roasted Moroccan Lamb, Lasagna Rio Grande, BBQ’d Ribs – slow roasted in homemade bbq sauce, and a succulent, falling apart Pork Roast in Teriyaki Pinapple marinade.

And I tell you, nothing has upped my food snob factor like having the time to spend closely examining the origins and quality of the things I eat and how they’re prepared.

I found myself watching Quick Fix Meals with Robin Miller (warning: flashy talking video awaits…) and just getting irate at the TV about the choices she’s making.

The premise of the show is fine – make a meal plan, and purchase the ingredients for three quick and easy weeknight meals, using the same staples. Prep as much as you can ahead of time, and assemble the day you want to eat.

But then she starts off the cooking bit by washing her hands… and drying them with paper towels! She creates a lot of waste on the show in general – from paper towels, through convenience packaging, and storing prepped food in disposable (and disposed of) plastic baggies. I don’t honestly know whether she just strikes me as environmentally non-conscious, or because I’ve been paying more and more attention to living green and sustainability lately. But whatever it is, it irks me.

But maybe the food’s ok? Meh.

Keep in mind she’s targeting her show to busy women who need to feed their families quickly. But every single week, she makes a pasta dish with plain, white pasta. Now I’m sure someday I’ll be rewarded with kids who will eat nothing but one plain spaghetti noodle for dinner (except on Tuesdays after 8:00pm in months that begin with “J”, when they’ll demand a plate of deep-fried chicken strips instead) but where’s the variety???

What about polenta, quinoa, couscous, bulgur, whole what pasta, whole grain rice, other ancient grains? In a brief spark of irony, now that I rant I notice she’s using soba noodles in her recipe this week – but it’s the first non-white food I’ve seen in at least half-a-dozen episodes.

The meals are nutritionally sound if you don’t look too closely: a bit of protein, some starch and plenty of veggies – but convenience is the major focus.

Contrast this with the new Jamie Oliver show, Jamie at Home, where Oliver has taken his trillions of Pounds, and upon returning from Italy has purchased acres of land in the English countryside to devote to a massive vegetable garden. Of course, Mr. Celebrity doesn’t actually do the gardening, he has a gardener for that – but he uses his garden’s spoils to create his dishes. Throughout the show he reminds the viewer (who can’t always grow it all) to “pull your finger out” and make some effort to find a good market, fishmonger, butcher and create wonderful dishes with quality ingredients.

There’s no shortage of people encouraging the Food Network audience to do the same thing.

On his show Good Deal with Dave Lieberman, Dave brings fresh ingredients from Whole Foods back to his tiny New York loft kitchen, and encourages cooking with quality ingredients on a budget.

I even caught an episode of 30-minute meals with Rachel Ray that had to be at least 2-3 years old, where her first instruction was to “Buy Organic Spinach. It’s far and away better than the other stuff, just make sure you get all the dirt off.”

Blogger Rebecca Blood just spent the past month proving that it’s possible to feed your family organic food on a food stamp budget.

And of course our own local 100-mile-diet initiators Alisa Smith and James McKinnon have started a movement that reduces impact on the earth, supports local farms, and results in some darned tasty food at the end of the day.

So what’s up Robin?

Other TV hosts and food influencers have shown that convenience, local eating consciousness and affordability can work in tandem with nutrition and organic ingredients. One shouldn’t come at the expense of the other, and I’d like to see more of a focus on both, because I certainly don’t plan on giving up the awesome meals to which I’ve become accustomed once I’m working again.

A while back I happened upon this blog post, which basically instructs the reader on how to manage cooking for yourself, without eating things that only come out of a can or box, while having absolutely no clue to what you’re doing.

I realized that even though, yes, of course, eating at home is cheaper, the primary obstacle for most people is that cooking at home is about as familiar as Abu Dubai. It takes a long time to get up to speed if you weren’t raised to be a cooking adult; I grew up on McDonald’s, convenience-store ice-cream Snickers and bagels (through no fault of my mother’s–she was an awesome cook, but I was stubborn and unteachable).

I agree with most of her points, but having ventured further and further into culinary utopia as of late, I figured I’d let you, gentle reader, in on a few additional things I’ve picked up along the way.

First, run – don’t walk – to your local bookstore and pick up The Joy of Cooking. There is a reason it’s been around as long as it has, and why it’s been one of the most popular bridal shower gifts for women who’re traditionally setting up their own kitchens for the first time. It’s that good. In fact, of the dozens of cookbooks I currently own, it’s the only one that’s NEVER yeilded a recipe that makes more of its way to the dog’s stomach than mine.

Still not sold? It’s so good that someone else decided it was respectable enough to model one of the world’s most well-known sex books after it. It contains every single thing you ever wanted to know about every ingredient you will ever encounter, and then some. Do you have it yet? No? Why are you still reading this – I SAID GO! I’ll be here when you get back.

Now that you’ve torn yourself away from your new book, I’ve got a couple other tips for you:

Even though the author of the aforementioned post advocates for it, DO NOT under any circumstances, EVER purchase a George Foreman Grill. EVER. The worst crime against food this particular appliance commits is its temperature. You can not regulate it. The grill is either on, or off, and leaves the cook little to no recourse for combatting the tough, leathery outer layer to her meats, shielding the raw inside from being adequately heated through.

Anything you may want to do with a GF Grill, you can do better on a stovetop griddle (or even in a frying pan) or on a charcoal or gas grill outside. An attentive hand and a well-chosen non-stick pan or two will serve you far better in the long run.

If you are going to splurge on an appliance, make it a food processor. They can be had for as little as $50 for a brand-new low-end model, and is considered an “essential” by most chefs I know. While you can use a hand-mixer, or even a strong arm and a whisk as a substitute for a stand-mixer, your oven can serve the same functions as most BBQs or toasters, and a four-sided grater can do the work of about 6 other (expensive) tools, the Food Processor has no substitute and is called for (or will save a great amount of time) in a lot of recipes. Bonus: It can also do the same jobs as a blender.

One thing I do agree with Jen on though. is that she’s absolutely bang-on when she goes over steps instructing new cooks to familiarize themselves with their local farmer’s market, butcher and fishmonger. These people are invaluable resources for fresh food, and can help instruct you on what’s in season and how to prepare most any of their products.

A great tip for the locals: Edible British Columbia offers a series of Marketplace Tours in the key “food” areas of Vancouver: Granville Island, Chinatown, Commercial Drive, and (in season) the Richmond Night Market. For the price of a good meal in a good restaurant, you’ll not only get lunch, but a guided tour of one of these locations, where you’ll be informed of and introduced to the best local vendors, and ideas of how to find ingredients and prepare great, local cuisine.

Eat local, eat in-season, and suddenly your entire world will turn topsy turvy and the words Kraft Dinner and Pizza Pop will all but vanish from your regular vocabulary.

The best tip for a new cook though, is one I’ve never read ANYWHERE and something I’ve had to establish all on my own: If you don’t like it, THROW IT AWAY.

I know you’ve probably been lectured since you were wee that wasting food is a very big no no, and you may even be feeling the pinch in your own pocketbook. I understand. But there is absolutely no sense in forcing down something awful. Tossing it will also help you move forward faster, toward culinary greatness!

If you completely botch a recipe and subsequently force yourself to eat something you completely dislike, you’ll suffer through an unbearable meal, and feel not only ill, but discouraged that your attempts at feeding yourself only lead to discomfort.

If instead you toss the offending dish, you will feel bad about throwing it away and wasting food and money, but you will also be much more likely to pay closer attention to what you did wrong, and think about how to remedy or avoid it next time.

You could even take the 5 minutes you’re waiting for the water for your ramen noodles (which you keep in the back of the cupboard for such an occasion) to boil, to google “how to fix dropping the entire box of salt in the soup” which will yield you the expert advice of thousands of cooks who’ve gone there before, and suggest throwing some potatoes into the mix to absorb the sodium.

Above all, don’t be afraid to try something new, pick up an ingredient that sounds utterly unfamiliar, and expand your cooking and eating horizons. You have nothing to lose but your Big Macs.

I think it’s nearly impossible to live in Vancouver for a certain amount of time, and not eventually develop a liking for at least one soy product.

Don’t get me wrong, I love meat. And not in the PETA way – in the kill and devour it charred and bloody way.

But I also really like edamame, agedashi tofu, and soy beverage (for its own sake, not as a milk substitute). As do most other people I know.

What I don’t like – in fact I consider it a complete abomination of food as we know it – is soy products masquerading as meat.

Tofurkey, Fake-on, Ground Round… If you’re going to be vegetarian or vegan that’s fine, but that means you DON’T GET TO ENJOY THE MEAT. Enough torturing the market with your sad and inadequate meat substitutes. I don’t even want to know how you mimic the flavour of turkey using no animal products.

So it was much to my surprise, that I encountered the following recipe for a cake made with tofu, that’s actually DELICIOUS and a pretty much constant coffee cake standby for when guests drop in (which in reality means the man and I end up eating it all our damn selves because who just “drops by” on anyone anymore?):

1. Take 1 Betty Crocker Cake Mix
2. Empty cake mix into food processor or mixer
3. Add 1 package of Surise or Pete’s Tofu dessert tofu. Blend
4. Add 1/4 cup of water. Blend just until mixed. Note: do not add eggs or oil
5. Bake as directed on box.

TA DA!

It really is just that easy. And it tastes GOOD. It does not taste like a regular cake-in-a-box, rather it’s much more moist and dense. Just like a coffee cake. I make mine in a fluted pan, although you could certainly use regular cake or cupcake tins as well.

The best thing about it is that it doesn’t taste like a “cake substitute.” It just tastes like dessert. Tofu because it’s tasty – not as a piss-poor substitute that will only leave you longing for the way things used to be, before you grew a beer gut and/or an environmental conscience.

Another fun bit, for me anyway, is playing with flavour combinations. The two I’ve had the most success with are a French Vanilla cake with Peach-Mango tofu and a Devil’s Food cake with Caramel tofu (excellent warmed up a bit and served with vanilla ice cream, and liberally doused with Blackberry dessert wine) .

Think it can’t get better? OH YOU’D BE WRONG.

Not only does this not taste like tofu, it’s also one of the lowest fat/calorie desserts you’ll ever enjoy:

Made the regular way (oil & eggs), a serving of Betty Crocker cake (1/12 of the total batch) will ring in at 120 Calories, 11g of Fat, and 45mg of Cholesterol.

Using tofu instead? One serving (same size) is a mere 35 Calories, 0.5g Fat and 0g Cholesterol.

Considering the holidays are coming up, you may want to introduce this to your kitchen, as an alternate temptation to the mincemeat tarts and shortbread that I’m sure will be making their way around soon. Consider the recipe a holiday gift from my stomach to yours!