Wendy’s Blog

Most people think dent-de-lion (aka dandelions) is just some weedy plant that are blithe to their gardens. Our land lord certainly think so for he gave us three bottles of dandelion killers. They used to be under the stairs, but I moved them to the annex (yes we have an annex!).

My sister in law gave me a Irish cook book when we moved here. The book had all sorts of recipes Irish. I was particular drawn to dandelions. I didn’t know they were editable! Apparently the leaves can be used for salad and flowers can be eaten. I was fascinated by the fried flower recipe. Any recipe with the word ‘FRIED’ is by default is delicious in my book!

So today we went out to gather dandelions. I wonder if our neighbors think we are insane!

Surprisingly it was hard to find. I guess people really hate them!

Anyway, feast your eyes on these wonderful dent-de-lions!

Before :

After:

Mr said they taste like bland fried vegetable. I will have to tweak the recipe next time to see if I should change the herbs or more salt. It smelled delicious as I was cooking them!

If you want to try it out, here’s the recipe:

Ingredients:

• 20 to 30 dandelion – or how ever much you can find in the garden
• Vegetable Oil for frying (you can use olive oil I just had vegetable oil handy
• 2 tablespoon of flour (you can use cormeal if you want)
• Pinch of salt
• Pinch of black pepper
• Pinch of dried thyme
• pinch of dried oregano
• 1 egg, lightly beaten

Directions:

• Rinse the flowers and dry them gently. I left them on a plate on top of some paper towels.
• Mix the flour, salt, black pepper, dried thyme, and dried oregano.
• Heat frying pan over medium heat with the vegetable oil. You don’t need that much just enough to cover the flowers.
• Dip the flower in the beaten egg and then in the seasoned flour mixture.
• Fry the little flowers in batches, stalk side up until golden.
• Serve

You really want to cut as much as stalk off as possible without breaking up the flower. It’s pretty tricky, but if you cut too deep you just end up with petals. It’s kind of cool but hard to fry.

Last night as I was browsing through my cookbook (awesome bedtime reading!) I found a recipe for granola. We have been buying muesli for a while and it’s so yummy and look kind of like granola.

Anyway, this morning we walked down to the Londis and got all the ingredients.

Shopping in a foreign grocery store is a treat. Everything is just a little bit different but the same a the same time. They also have exotic items like sultana aka grapes.

Part of the recipe called for rolled oats. I looked at all the oats (and there are so many different brand and kind of oats.) and had no idea which one is roll oats. I mean everything there says it’s oatmeal. So I end up picking some organic none quick oats (but it did say you can make it in oatmeal in the microwave with it) and hope for the best.

When we got home I read the back of the package and it had instruction for making home made museli. So I guess I got the right one! YAY!

Anyway, making granola is surprising easy. This is what you need:

• 4 cups of Rolled Oats
• 1 cup of Flaked Almonds (for you Americans it’s Sliced Almonds)
• 3/4 cup of vegetable oil
• 1/2 cup of good honey

Pre heat oven to 175 C (for you Americans that’s 350 F)

Mix the Rolled Oats with flaked almonds and sit aside. Whisk the vegetable oil and 1/2 cup of honey together. Pour into the oats mixture and make sure to coat all the oats. Put it in a baking dish and bake in the oven for about 40 minutes or until golden brown.

Make sure to stir it every now and then in the oven.

Take it out of the oven and let it cool. Make sure to stir it other wise you will end up with granola bar. (Happened to my first more brown than golden batch!)

You will end up with something like this:

After all that you can mix it with whatever dry fruit and nuts you want. I end up getting some dry figs, dry apricots, and raisins.

And say SUCCESS!

For Easter, I’ve decided to make some Shrimp! So I looked around the internet and found Ina Garten’s Shrimp Cocktail recipe. It’s easy, fast and I have all the things I need (other than Shrimp of course!)

I love Ina Garten’s recipe! I made her lentil soup last week and it was a total hit. The only thing I don’t like is that everything out of the recipe book serves 6 to 10. When there’s only 2, you end up eating the same thing over and over again. But, it’s so good, I can eat it over and over again!

I couldn’t find Horse Radish at the store, so we substituted wasabi. I guess you can say we made this cocktail sauce with an Asian flair. Anyway, Mr said it taste fine and wasabi is in the horse radish family so I am sure it’s awesome.

Here’s the recipe!

Roasted Shrimp Cocktail

From Ina Garten

Ingredients

For the shrimp:

• 2 pounds (12 to 15-count) shrimp
• 1 tablespoon good olive oil
• 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

For the sauce:

• 1/2 cup chili sauce (recommended: Heinz)
• 1/2 cup ketchup
• 3 tablespoons prepared horseradish
• 2 teaspoons freshly squeezed lemon juice
• 1/2 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce (I used 2 squeezes of Wasabi)
• 1/4 teaspoon hot sauce (recommended: Tabasco)

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
2. Peel and devein the shrimp, leaving the tails on. Place them on a sheet pan with the olive oil, salt, and pepper and spread them in 1 layer. Roast for 8 to 10 minutes, just until pink and firm and cooked through. Set aside to cool.
3. For the sauce, combine the chili sauce, ketchup, horseradish, lemon juice, Worcestershire sauce, and hot sauce. Serve as a dip with the shrimp.

It’s awesome and easy!!