I do enjoy looking at food recipes on YouTube and Instagram, many people have great ideas and some present old recipes re-interpreted. I learned a long time ago that while cooking you can innovate. Since we have so much seafood here, recipes about seafood are always of interest, trying something new. Yesterday I saw a recipe for Fish pie. The fish used, we have right here at the fishmonger MR Seafood.
So I need Salmon, Haddock, Shrimp, Cod, which is cut into cubes. The whole recipe is about timing, just watching it because it does not take much time. Then the sauce is milk which is boiled with one onion quartered and spiked with cloves, just a few, that process takes only about 10 minutes. It will the base for your bechamel sauce. Once you did this first step put all the fish into the flavoured milk after you have removed the onion which is discarded. Shrimp are added in the last 3 minutes to cook, but it is important to remember that it does not need to be completely cooked since in part 2 you will the whole pie assembled into the oven for 25 minutes at 125 C. There is no pastry to this pie, mash potatoes are used to cover it all. I want to try this one, sounds good.
I also discovered recently that a white wine like Vouvray Chenin Blanc goes very well with fish. It is highly recommended for fish, salads, Lobster, crab, Thai green curry, risotto, cheese and nuts. Much nicer than your old Pinot Grigio.
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This weekend is CANADA DAY celebration, the 157th Edition. On Monday 1 July, we are going to friends for a BBQ. I am bringing Skewers of chicken with prunes or dates. I will marinate the chicken thigh meat first in a Honey garlic sauce for 24 hours. Our hosts will supply the rest, just a small group. Want to escape the noise of the neighbourhood. A poll was published a few days ago and the question was, Are you proud of your country Canada. The results surprised me and in a way show what people value in life. Having lived in many countries all around our little planet, what I value the most about Canada, no matter where you might be is our stability, peace and common understanding amongst all Canadians. Those are important things in life, if compared to other countries where I lived in various continent.
So the people were polled by age group, the 60 + age group 82% said that they were proud of Canada. The 40 to 60 age group where proud by a margin of 67% , finally the age group 18 to 40 age group only 48% said they were proud of Canada. The reason they gave was that it was difficult to buy a house, lack of economic opportunities, inflation. This younger group tended to be less tolerant than older Canadians and have more right wing ideas. This is a puzzle to me, I would be led to believe the opposite. In recent years though the phenomenon of shaming and denouncing people who do not agree with you is very popular amongst young or under 40 age group. Is this leading us away from a more open society?
The older age group was more concerned with politicians and bad political ideas, partisanship and lack of solutions to societal problems. Also the idea that, if one looks back 80 years ago and today, people tend to say, we made sacrifices and get on with it. That is not so much a value nowadays.
Anyway Happy Canada day to you all, this is still a wonderful place to be.
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Now for the song part, we have made some changes to what we listen to at home, we do not have a television and listen to a lot of radio on Sirius XM and on Sonos. I love the variety from around the world. Now that we are in Summer, many stations have gone to Summer programming, Ici Musique Radio Canada has French song programs of the 1960’s and 70’s, music of that era was often taking its cue from French poets of another earlier age. The texts are beautiful and inspiring, sometimes bitter sweet, nostalgic but always optimistic with beautiful musical arrangements. No screeching or maudlin nonsense with computerized arrangements. So happy to hear such music it changes your mood for the day. On weekends I love to listen to piano music, it can be music by Rameau, nouvelles suites or Bach, so relaxing.
In closing, the Spring Lobster Season closes tomorrow, the price at the fish store is $10. per pound now and about $8.50 at the dock. Quite the drop compared to late April when the season opened. Clearly the restaurants are gouging the tourists with their dinners at $70., I find that totally ridiculous and will have a negative impact on tourism.
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