Claire Tansey makes Herb and Garlic Meatloaf

Listen to Chef Claire Tansey making one of her classic Sunday night dinners- meatloaf. Her cookbook UNCOMPLICATED: TAKING THE STRESS OUT OF HOME COOKING proves that great food doesn’t have to be difficult to prepare. Listen to why Claire decided to make the book, what Sunday night dinners were like for her as a kid growing up in Montreal, and why creating a family tree through recipes fascinates her.

She’s funny, relaxed and smart, and I had a great time spending an afternoon in her kitchen. I highly recommend her book (and so does my mom- the woman whose least favourite room in the house is the kitchen!).

Mardi Michels makes Mr. Neil’s Roast Chicken

Mardi Michels teaches French at a small school for boys in Toronto, and she also writes the blog eat. live. travel. write.  As part of her teaching job, Mardi runs cooking classes twice per week for boys aged 7 to 14.  Mardi loves France (where she lived for five years before moving to Toronto) and on this episode, she makes a French classic: roast chicken.  I also visited Mardi and her students at cooking club while they made meatballs and tomato sauce in under an hour.  It was totally inspiring.  Mardi and her partner, Neil, own a historic home in southwest France which they operate as a vacation rental property.  Check it out here: neracvacationrental.com

 

** Photo by Kelly Brisson of The Gouda Life

 

 

 

Nana Aba Duncan makes Peanut Butter Soup

Nana Aba Duncan is the host of CBC Radio’s weekend morning program, Fresh Air.  She was born in Ghana, she grew up in Newmarket, Ontario, and she lives in Toronto.  This soup is called Groundnut Soup in Ghana, where it is a well-loved dish.  It can be made with any kind of meat (goat, chicken, beef), any combination of vegetables (okra, carrots, beans), and lots of peanut butter.  Listen to Nana Aba talk about family roles, visiting Ghana, comfort foods, and the movie, Black Panther.  And we also got to talk to her wonderful mom in Ghana.  Thanks WhatsApp!

To listen to Nana Aba’s podcast, Media Girlfriends, go here: https://soundcloud.com/mediagirlfriends

 

Skye McAlpine makes Spaghettini with Shrimp, Zucchini, and Saffron

When Skye McAlpine was six years old, her family decided to move from London to Venice for a year.  More than 25 years later, they’re still there.  They fell in love with the city, and, now, Skye, her husband and young son live in the same house where she grew up, overlooking a sleepy canal in a quiet corner of the city.

Her blog FromMyDiningTable.com is a love letter to her adoptive city and a beautiful meditation on food, family and la dolce vita. Her new cookbook A TABLE IN VENICE, offers a varied collection of dishes that she and her family enjoy, alongside some absolutely gorgeous photos of the floating city.

Skye came to my kitchen to make a simple yet delicious dish called Tagliolini con Scampi, Zucchine, e Zafferano.  We ended up with spaghettini instead of tagliolini, but Skye assured me that any long, thin pasta would do.  She talks about her daily life in Venice, how she learned how to cook Italian food, some of her favourite Venetian dishes, and she offers some great tips on making great pasta.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Coincidentally, Skye and I are both in the latest Cherry Bombe magazine- the Home Cooks Rule issue!  What an honour!  If you don’t know Cherry Bombe, check them out.  They rock.  Here’s their mission statement:

“Our mission is to support women in the world of food by sharing their stories and to build a community of people making the world a better place through food. We also encourage everyone to cook for themselves and their loved ones; to be confident, curious, and creative in the kitchen; and to sit down for meals with others whenever possible.”

 

 

You can find the podcast episode with Feist and Adrienne Amato HERE.

 

Sook-Yin Lee and Adam Litovitz make Beef Stew in their Instant Pot

Listen to Sook-Yin Lee and Adam Litovitz as they make beef stew (with some seriously delicious Georgian spices called Kharcho) in their Instant Pot.  They cook together and make music together and, years ago, Adam was the one who asked Sook-Yin the life-changing question: What makes you happy?  This question comes up in a memorable scene in Sook-Yin’s brand new brilliant movie Octavio Is Dead! and the scene stayed with me because of its simple profundity. We should do what makes us happy.

 

Find out what makes Sook-Yin happy now, listen to her talk about her Sunday night dinners growing up, her work, reciprocity, and what happened the first time she used the Instant Pot.

 

Octavio Is Dead! official trailer

Songs from the Octavio Is Dead! Original Motion Picture Soundtrack

0:06 – 0:33 Kicked Out of a Dream Bar
4:10 – 4:40 Blue Bathroom
9:07 – 9:30 Stelton Mexico City
16:27 – 16:51 Fuck All
21:44 – 22:15 Cemetery Follow

 

 

Chef Charlotte Langley makes Pierogi (explicit!)

Come into Chef Charlotte Langley’s kitchen and listen to her making cheese and potato pierogi.  A classic dish, and one of her favourite Sunday comfort foods.  She also talks about rocking culinary school, her home province of PEI, and why she moved away from cooking in fine-dining restaurants.  She’s feisty, passionate and lives most of her life in the Land of Po.  Press play to find out what that means!

Check out Charlotte’s website for links to many of the fabulous things she does!  chefcharlottelangley.com

And follow her on IG (@chefcharlottelangley) and Twitter (@ChefCharLangley) for the latest info and updates on current projects.

 

Feist and Adrienne Amato make South African Seed Bread and Halloumi Soup

Feist’s latest album PLEASURE was recorded in Stinson Beach, California; Upstate New York; and Paris, and for that California session, Adrienne Amato came to cook for the musicians and crew.  The recording studio and the kitchen were separated by a thin wall, which meant that Adrienne cooked very quietly.  The experience in Stinson Beach led to the creation of a cookbook, PLEASURES: THE MEALS OF AN ALBUM, and all profits from the sale of the book go to Community Foods Centres Canada, an umbrella network that funds food security and food justice programs all over the country.

Come hang out with us in Adrienne’s kitchen as Feist and Ade make South African Seed Bread and Ariel Engle’s Halloumi Soup, both recipes from the book.  We ended up sitting there all afternoon, talking about family meals, Adrienne’s vinyl-listening room in her childhood home in Zimbabwe, algorithms, butter tarts, Feist’s favourite restaurant on earth, if she has a listener in mind when she writes, and music they listen to when they cook.  This is a wonderfully intimate conversation, and it’s full of surprises and insights.

 

Adrienne has worked in mental health for over 25 years and is currently a psychotherapist in private practice. She has also made several arts/culturally based documentary films, and is a regular curator of musical events. Her films have won numerous awards, screening at prestigious festivals such as Rotterdam, Clermont-Ferrand, and Doc Leipzig, as well as being broadcast on TVO and CBC. Her filmography includes Forgotten Mother (1989), A Brief Life (1992), First Break (1997, National Film Board), National Anthem of Nowhere (2007), Side Girl, (2012) and To the End of Poverty, (2013) which was made for TVO as part of the international Why Poverty? Series.  She is currently completing a feature length documentary film, Mbira Talks, in collaboration with Fifth Town Films.

 

Other goodness:

The Heat: A Kitchen (R)evolution, a documentary film by Maya Gallus

Arts and Crafts

Contramar

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chef Caren McSherry makes Spicy Tofu

At the beginning of Chef Caren McSherry’s new cookbook, Starters, Salads and Sexy Sides, Chef Lynn Crawford writes: “Caren McSherry is truly a Canadian culinary icon. I can tell you that she is one of the most passionate, talented, generous, smart, creative, hilarious, life-loving, food-loving people I have ever met.”  Caren lives in Vancouver, Canada and she’s often on TV and radio in British Columbia. She’s the founder and owner of the Gourmet Warehouse, a food and housewares emporium that stocks a wide-range of products from all over the world.  She’s the author of seven cookbooks, and in 1978, she founded Caren’s Cooking School, which is Canada’s longest-running, privately owned school.

Caren worked as a flight attendant for many years and she took advantage of free flights to take cooking classes all over the world.  And she didn’t like tofu until she created this Spicy Asian Glazed Tofu which she made for Sunday night dinner.

 

Chef Miriam Streiman of Mad Maple makes Grilled Cheese

A grilled cheese sandwich is, for some, the perfect Sunday night dinner.  The simplicity of it is appealing, and, for Chef Miriam Streiman, it’s a great way to show off two of her favourite ingredients: cheese and bread.  For this episode of Sunday Night Dinner, she used a variety (ok, 6!) of Monforte Dairy cheeses; her husband, Neil’s, homemade bread; and lots of butter.  The key to the crispiness is to press the sandwich with a heavy lid as it cooks, and the key to making it even more delicious?  Listen to find out!  Comfort food made by one of the most generous chefs around.  Listen to some of her memories of Italy, and what Sunday nights mean to her.  From running Mad Maple Inn on a 100-acre farm in Creemore, Ontario, to her new home in downtown Toronto, Miriam embodies hospitality.

 

 

 

Jesse Brown of CANADALAND makes Spaghetti Carbonara

Listen to Jesse Brown, writer, journalist, founder of CANADALAND — the incredibly popular news site and podcast network that focuses on media criticism and media reporting.  He’s making Spaghetti Carbonara.  Known by some as the guy who broke the Jian Ghomeshi story, and by others (including himself) as “unapologetically sensational”, Jesse makes podcasts that always wrestle with the important stories of the moment. 

At the end of the day, after marching on Loblaws, Jesse goes home and will sometimes make this easy, comforting, classic dish.  Cook along with him as he talks about pissing off CBC executives, arguing at the dinner table, and Dr. Snuggles.