Fresh Pasta

With the price of food ever rising I decided I’d start investing in a few things I’ve always wanted that will make the daily cost of living a little more manageable.

Don’t get me wrong… They were pricey (~$250 each) but I’ve been eyeing these pasta presses for a long time and am VERY HAPPY to have them.

I call these investments my “apocalypse prep” so that in the event we just end up fending for ourselves all I need is flour, water and eggs then some solar power to make all the comforts of home.

(Obviously more work to be done- bare pasta is kinda meh.. One step at a time.)

It seems like the pasta recipes are all very similar (and easy) the one that came in the pasta maker instruction manual by far seems to be the best consistency for the machines (who would have thought)

I’m really looking forward to experimenting with different flours once I get the hang of the basic recipe! Lots of opportunities for whole wheat or even vegetable based pastas I think. For now though I am enjoying this very easy 4 ingredient recipe- sometimes simple is best.

The presses allow me to make my own lasagna, fettachuni, spaghetti, macaroni, fuscalini, etc etc for pennies on the dollar- I don’t recommend making the switch to fresh pasta if you don’t want to invest the time to do the prep but I do recommend it for the amazing taste as ease of cooking (4 minutes!)

For the lasagna noodles I opted not to boil then, instead treating them like “ready to bake” noodles and putting them right in the oven. Took about 35 minutes to get them tender to our liking but if you have the time to do it I really recommend! With it cooking in the sauce it just added so much flavor.

I still need more practice with making spaghetti, it just LOVES getting stuck in the machine and the internet has not provided any assistance to why… So I think it will just be a matter of practice and getting the consistency and thickness just right.

I am so excited to continue to learn tips and tricks with these and I will certainly be sharing more as I learn!

Halifax Burger Week 2017

This years burger week is just around the corner. While I'm anxiously awaiting the voting for the burger ambassador (which of course I was born to be) I wanted to look back at last years favorites and misses.

#hfxburgerlove

Below is the old blog post (from my blogspot days) ranking the burgers I got to try!

So Halifax does a wonderful thing every year. Many local restaurants will put on a featured burger where proceeds will go to Feed Nova Scotia! For 2017 there was an incredible amount of amazing burgers.

Halifax Burger week 2017

This year's was March 23rd to the 29th and I managed to grab 5 awesome burgers.

Here are the 5 in order of enjoyment.

 

#5 The Armview: The Hot Mess

 

A good start to burger week, beef patty, mac and cheese and onions with a special ketchup... It was missing something I still don't know what but it was missing something.

#4 Clay West: The Smash Burger

This one would have done better but the service at Clay West was less to be desired... They are definitely not used to that sort of traffic.. Double beef patty smothered in cheese sauce and topped with onion rings and pickles... and extra pickles.

#3 Big Leagues (No name)

 

I good classic burger! Beef patty seasoned with taco spice topped with Monterrey Jack cheese, fried onions and a deep fried pickle along with some traditional burger toppings. Very tasty.

#2 Bubba Rays: The Pepperoni Burger

This one looked like garbage on the website HOWEVER the actual burger itself blew my mind! Beef patty topped with lots of pepperoni and cheese with a chipolte dipping sauce for it. The sauce put this one in the rankings for me!

#1 Tempo: The Pizza Corner Burger

TOP NOTCH and the best burger I had all week. It was the second stop all week so all other burgers had heavy competition. This was a donair burger (spiced perfectly) topped with donair sauce on a pizza pun with fried pepperoni on top. Everything about this burger was amazing. They win burger week!

This year I have been planning for this week every since the last burger week ended. Time off work has been booked to optimize my restaurant visits. Look out Halifax!! I'm coming for you!