Carried Away … By Caraway!

Dear Caitlin,

Sometimes bread can just speak to you. The moment you see it, it seizes your consciousness and you become enraptured, unable to resist its influence, powerless in the face of its freshly baked goodness. I call it loaf at first sight.

That was very much the feeling I had when I saw the above Caraway Deli Rye sitting on the shelf at Stonemill Bakery in St. Lawrence Market this weekend. I really couldn’t resist! Fortunately, I’m very glad I didn’t.

The first time I tried this bread was yesterday (Sunday), when I whipped up another round of polenta and chard. This time, though, I put most of the grits and greens in between two slices of the rye, like a sandwich. It was delicious!

This bread scores BIG points in my book. It really is an ideal sandwich bread: its wonderful flavors of caraway and rye provide the perfect complement to whatever you’ve got going on inside your sandwich, without being too overwhelming. My mouth is literally watering right now just thinking about it (and I just had another sandwich before writing this; see below).

For Sunday’s dinner, I made another batch of pesto for Red Quinoa Pesto. It was just as delicious as the last time and made me very happy. This time, I also added some “El Supremo” sprouts on top for extra fun!

Sorry that you can’t really see the Red Quinoa Pesto under everything that’s going on on top. The close-up doesn’t help much, either, but what the hey…

I also had a side of corn with this meal, which, sad to say, was disappointing. I didn’t feel like oven roasting it since that seemed a little excessive for just one ear of corn, so I just microwaved it, but I don’t think that was the problem. This was just disappointing corn. Here’s a picture:

Anyway, on to Monday’s adventures! Today I was out and about for most of the afternoon. First, I went to this stationery store called Red Pegasus in hopes of finding a blank journal I could use as a recipe book. And while the one I got is a little thematically off, I think it will function very where. Plus, I like the kitschy design.

The nice things about this journal are that it is spiral bound, so it stays easily open on your kitchen table to whatever page you need, and that it is lined and split into two columns, which I think is ideal for recipe-writing. Plus it’s too all that big, so it’s easy to bring around with you. So all in all, I’m happy with what I got!

The next thing I did was visit the National Film Board of Canada’s Mediatheque Digital Viewing Station, this place in Toronto where you can go and watch any movie you like from a selection of 5,000 National Film Board of Canada-financed pictures. The viewing stations they have are really nice and their catalogue is easy to navigate. Most of the collection is animation and documentary films, and I really enjoyed everything I watched. I spent a little over two hours just browsing their selection, and I could’ve easily spent more. I hope to go back before too long; it seems like a really nice way to pass an afternoon.

When I got back from my afternoon outing, I needed to make myself some lunch! Or breakfast, since it was my meal of the day. Or perhaps dinner, since it was nearly 4:30 before I actually ate. Anyway, I made myself a simple meal of a sandwich and a salad. Both were delicious.

The sandwich of course uses my Caraway Deli Rye again; but inside this time is Ying Ying Soy Food Sweet & Spicy Tofu with sprouts and mustard. This picture might help clarify:

The salad is a combination of the two salad bags I bought at the farmers’ market on Saturday, one of which is a mixed greens bag, whereas the other is just kale. On top are deliciously sweet sunburst tomatoes (you must try these!), sprouts, flax seed meal, dried cranberries, and pepitas. Oh, and one more thing—curious to know what that green dressing is on top?

That’s Gena’s recently posted Raw Green Goddess Dressing!

Mine doesn’t really look the same, but I think that’s just because I used a food processor rather than a blender or magic bullet. Oh, and looking at her original recipe post right now, I just saw that I forgot to add the water. Oh well. It was still very good! I thought it tasted very green, if that makes any sense. One thing I’d like to try, though, is putting in less parsley and more dill, which I might do soon!

You know, it’s kind of crazy how quick things can spread in the food blogging community, although I guess this is true for most internet communities. But to think that Gena just came up with this recipe the other day and now I’m making it myself, hundred of miles away… it’s very interesting to think about. Of course, I’m very grateful to all the great food bloggers out there for sharing all their wonderful ideas—I don’t know where my cooking would be without them!

And that’s all for now! I hope you had a good first day of school!

Until we eat again,

Willie