Blossom Berry Smoothie

March 19, 2015March 27, 2015 / Kake2Kale | Culinary Travel Adventures / 2 Comments

Vancouver is awash in freeze-framed explosions of bubble-gum-pink-awesomeness. Magnolias, cherry and plum blossoms are on practically every block in the city. Their dazzling, blushing petals clear my mind of the gloomy grey days that plague our city over the winter months. Getting eyefuls of blossoms evoke in me a sweetness tinged with sadness, knowing this eye candy is fleeting and will soon flutter away.

Making a Blossom Berry Smoothie is my way of rejoicing and recapturing the joy of springtime!

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Gung Hei Fat Prawns

February 20, 2015March 12, 2015 / Kake2Kale | Culinary Travel Adventures

Gung Hei Fat Choy! I love Chinese New Year! Lots of eating with family, friends, lucky money, special treats, and new clothes (on the first day of the New Year you should wear new clothes to give yourself a fresh start). But I also love that Chinese New Year for me is where I get to have a “do over”. If there were any resolutions made on Jan 1 that haven’t started, then I can try again. And, to all of you who also had good intentions to ie. give up sugar, start a new workout, read more, floss every day, and/or eat more superfoods, well, don’t be discouraged as you can try again in the Lunar New Year….even if you aren’t Chinese!

My Chinese New Year recipe is quite unconventional, in that the ingredients aren’t your standard New Year’s fare. Because, frankly, most of the “special” dishes eaten at this time are not delicious to my North American palate, such as dried oysters, black moss (looks like a clump of black hair), jai (vegetarian gluten dish). Doesn’t sound too appetizing, does it? But I hope this Gung Hei Fat Prawns does! And, it’s loaded with superfoods.

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Good Things Come in Small Packages

February 6, 2015March 12, 2015 / Kake2Kale | Culinary Travel Adventures

People love eating me all around the world. I am like a warm, cozy blanket for your taste buds and tummy. You can fill me with all sorts of goodies, meat, and veggies. What am I? No, I am not a calzone. Go smaller and Asian….you got it – Dumplings! Kale and I can eat them every day if we could. We aren’t sure if it’s in our blood, but there is just something in those small puffy pillows of savoury meat and veggies that calls to us. A few years ago, Kale and I took a dumpling making class and loved it. Ironically, it was taught by a very knowledgeable non-Asian guy. Making dumplings at home is ideally a social activity; therefore, Kale and I took off to the Granville Island Public Market to shop for the ingredients, then headed back to her place to make them.

But before we dove into making the dumplings, we fortified ourselves with a late breakfast of tea and scones. It felt like we had stepped back in time to when we were kids playing with our tea sets. Although now, we drank fragrant lavender rooibos tea and nibbled on blueberry-lemon-oat scones using Kale’s sophisticated fine china.

Superfoods in our dumplings:
Turkey – This meat is lean, high in protein and has a good amount of iron, phosphorous, zinc , potassium and vitamin B’s. We selected the free-run and non-medicated turkey.
Prawns – Good protein with Omega-3’s, B vitamins, and is also high in iron, as well as zinc, selenium, copper, magnesium and phosphorous.
Shitake mushrooms – Has a particularly high amount of copper, which may be beneficial to heart health. These mushrooms are also high in B vitamins and selenium. It contains lentinan which has anti-fungal properties and can also protect against cancer.
Chives – A good source of vitamin K which is important for the production of osteocalcin, a bone protein.
Ginger – An anti-inflammatory and is full of antioxidants to support its antibacterial, antiviral, and anti-parasitic properties.

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Gastown Grazing

January 30, 2015March 12, 2015 / Kake2Kale | Culinary Travel Adventures

One of Kale’s favourite foodie activities in Vancouver is hanging out in Gastown for a progressive dinner with friends. They hop from restaurant to restaurant for different courses throughout the evening. It can be called a dine-around or dinner crawl, depending on their mood; but the places are spontaneously selected and no two evenings are the same. That’s the fun part! For those of you less familiar with Vancouver, Gastown is a stylish, historic neighbourhood in the city centre and considered a hub for unique dining. Since most of Kale’s gastronomic experience of Gastown is nocturnally-driven, she thought a progressive lunch would be a good Kake2Kale challenge. And, to up the ante, Kale wanted to find comfort dishes, with superfoods, that can be eaten in a bowl. At first, I was skeptical and thought we could only eat pasta and soup. But Kale convinced me to be open and surprised by what we might find. I’m glad she did, and without any plans, here is how we grazed our way through Gastown on a rainy January afternoon!

Flying Pig
The Truffled Cauliflower Gratin with 4 cheeses on the menu of the Flying Pig restaurant peeked our interest. Kale and I knew we HAD to have it. As we were giving our order, the server suggested we order the brussel sprouts as well. They were served in boats, which was bowl-like enough for us. Wow, the brussel sprouts were outstanding. They were roasted with capers, which brought a brightness to the earthy flavor of the sprouts. The cauliflower, however, was a little underwhelming as they were under cooked. Please bear in mind I am not a restaurant reviewer, but I do know what I like. The cheeses were yummy though – white cheddar, mozzarella and parmesan. Cauliflower and brussel sprouts are both cruciferous vegetables which have indole-3-carbinol and promotes a healthy balance of good estrogen. They also have anti-tumour properties and are high in fibre. So we were off to a good start!

Jules Bistro
For a romantic meal where you feel like you’ve been whisked away to an intimate, pretty, little jewel (pun intended) of a restaurant in France, Jules Bistro is the place for you. More importantly, the food is delicious as well! We ordered a bowl of mussels with a leek cream sauce, which turned out to be light and flavourful. The sauce was sooo delicious, and I couldn’t stop dipping chunks of baguette into it. We went in search of our next course after being fortified with protein, Omega 3’s as well as minerals – like calcium, zinc and iron – from the mussels. Continue reading →