duchess bake shop macarons

 

my absolute favourites from this batch were the banana chocolate, salted caramel, and coconut

I'm so thankful I got enough for both of us. I was able to nibble tiny sections off of mine all night.

if you're ever in Edmonton, get your own right here

and check them out on facebook

menu for two

{the menu}

monday : gyro, pita, tzatziki, and greek salad

tuesday: skillet lasagna

wednesday: sweet spicy BBQ ribs and coleslaw (recipe halved)

thursday: grilled cheese

friday: honey mustard chicken and salad

saturday: fireplace meat with all the greek fixin's

sunday: taco salad

what really happened

{monday} This is probably the closest we've come to having gyro at home. It's a really easy recipe and I especially like that there are enough leftovers to get at least three more gyro meals out of it. Monday was a busy cooking day for me as I had to make pitas, I had to mix all the meats for the gyro and precook it, plus I had to make tzatziki. Usually it's not so haggard because I'll have the pita and tzatziki on hand before I decide to make gyro, then all I really have to do is the meat part which is fine cuz I can make it ahead of time and pop them in the oven for a few minutes before dinner. It was entirely my fault for scheduling it when I didn't have the other important sides, but I did it so it would force me to finally turn the strained yogurt (that had been in my fridge for almost a week) into tzatziki. Next time we have this it'll be simpler.

{tuesday} I started making this as directed, honest, but as soon as the tomatoes went in the skillet, I didn't think there'd be any way the rest of the ingredients would fit. So I changed it to a vegetable lasagna (in a baking pan) by slicing the leftover acorn squash and sweet potato really thinly on a mandolin and adding them as layers to the lasagna noodles. On hindsight, I should have put the sweet potato slices on the bottom of the dish and the squash on the top so their juice would soak down and help cook the potatos. After an hour, the potatoes were still a touch crunchy and they were (oddly) the only thing Idle Husband complained about. I thought he'd notice the squash right away but that didn't phase him at all.

{wednesday} So I was literally doing nothing, hanging this stupid garland, and somehow I pinched a nerve in my back, almost blacked out, and then spent the rest of the day in bed (I think my sink was full of water with the dishes I was washing pre-accident until Thursday evening). So Idle Husband picked up some french fries and he made store-bought chicken fingers (er, store-free. I just happened to spend over the specified amount the last time I went grocery shopping, so they gave me a family-sized box of them for free -- I would never buy these premade, mine are better; and honestly, I was just a little annoyed I even had to stop what I was doing and go back through the store to find them, free or not) and we ate dinner in bed. Good times.

{thursday} Because of Wednesday, I deleted grilled cheese day and the ribs took its place. I'd much rather have ribs. Besides, Idle Husband stayed home from work to take care of me, so I had him make them instead (everybody together now, awwww!). I don't make this recipe as directed anymore. The full cup of brown sugar is highly unnecessary and creates a huge smokey fire hazard (I also don't have a clue as to what ribs I'm buying or how closely matching the amount is to what the recipe calls for. That could be why the sugar was burning all to hell the first time I made it). Instead I use about a 1/4 cup or less and use my own judgement for the spices. I also only cook it at the high temperature for 30 minutes, flipping them over after 15 minutes instead. Then I carry on as instructed, although sometimes they're done before the second hour is completely up. I also think ribs taste better when they're with something cool and creamy so I'll usually do a one potato salad, but I still had almost a full head of cabbage so I decided to do slaw instead. I cut the slaw recipe in half and then I halve the miracle whip and the sugar again. I don't like it that creamy and I almost never have the motivation to measure out chopped cabbage anyway.
{friday} This was an easy recipe to put together but it didn't taste like honey or mustard, it tasted mosty like tomato. I also cooked it in the toaster oven instead of on a grill. It was nice to do something different with chicken breasts, though. We also had plain rice as I anticipated having more sauce from the chicken, but there wasn't much to be used for that. It always annoys me when recipes call for a measly tablespoon of tomato paste for some inane reason. We don't have tomato paste in a tube. I might have seen it once and swooned over it, but I couldn't justify the cost in comparison to the tiny cans. Normally, I'll just avoid recipes like this, but I decided to freeze teaspoon sized dollups of the leftover paste on a cookie sheet so I'd have it all ready to use in other recipes later. Another handy hint, if you are opening a can of tomato paste, open both ends then push the lid into the can from one end, pushing the tomato paste out the other. It's a lot cleaner and I can usually get almost all the paste out at one time.
{saturday} Fireplace meat is so easy and so delicious. I could easily get away with making double this amount and we would be able to eat all of it. But I try to keep portions down as much as possible otherwise we'd definitely end up stuffing ourselves silly, and I'd rather be a little empty than too full.
{sunday} I promised Idle Husband I would never try to trick him into eating beans and if beans were supposed to be in the dish, I'd omit them and put them in a seperate bowl just for me. Since then, he'll actually eat anything I make that sounds even vaguely mexican. He lived in the states for a while so any mexican sounding dishes are immediately associated with beans. When I think of tacos, I think of spicy ground beef, maybe some onion and garlic, and that's it. I'm not a huge fan of beans on their own and I'm especially not a fan of refried beans. So my tacos only consist of ground beef, sauted onion and garlic, and some spice (yes, the packaged type. We also don't eat mexican food all that often, so I don't keep any of the proper spices stocked). I don't usually bother with a shell or wrap and just pile it all on top of a salad, but sometimes I crave a flour tortilla. I've made my own tortillas before, but I just didn't find it worth the effort. IH doesn't like them and when I'm the only one eating them, and very occasionally at that, I don't feel like bothering myself with it. I shouldn't be eating tortillas anyway, so when I do want them, I'll just buy the small ones for myself as a treat (I think I get a craving for these exactly once a year). I'm also making the meat even spicier than I would for myself as Idle Husband has really developed a taste for extreme heat. To make it more enjoyable for me, I cool mine off with some plain yogurt. I know most people would probably think sour cream for this, and that's fine and all, but if I purchased a tub of sour cream, I'd use a few dollups of it and it would just sit in the fridge and rot if I didn't go searching for recipes that specifically called for it. In my opinion, plain yogurt's just more versatile than sour cream. I can get a bigger bang for my buck if I keep yogurt stocked in my fridge instead since it can be used for more dishes either sweet -- if you have a baking recipe that calls for sour cream, you can substitute yogurt -- or savoury. I think they both basically taste the same anyway.

friday fixations: You Tube edition

{Portlandia} This is such a great video about the world of crafting and diy. They should make a "Put Some Words on It" video, too.

I love Fred Armisen! Is this show on yet? I can't find it on my schedule.

 {hello satellites} I love this song. I wish I could find a download of it somewhere!

{Gentleman Reg} I can't stop listening to this one. Thanks to Erika for tuning me into them!

fireplace meat

Fireplace meat is basically souvlaki, meat on a stick.

hummina hummina

I wish I could say that this is the original, straight-from-Greece recipe, but it's not. In fact, I have no idea if they marinated their pork or even had a 'recipe' to speak of. We've asked many times and aside from 'put it on a rotisserie in a fireplace', we really don't know what happened to that meat before it started cooking. I only know that it was the most delicious and by far one of the best meals I've had in Greece. And one thing is for certain, after having fireplace meat, there's no way I was going to wait until we took another trip to Greece to have it again. So I've had to base this recipe on how I best remember it.

This meal always translates into a wrap for Idle Husband. A smear of tzatziki, a spoonful of greek salad, bits of torn fireplace meat, and ample chunks of feta, all wrapped up in a warm pita. If I'm craving a classic souvlaki wrap, I'll only supply feta and tzatziki, slices of tomato and purple onion, and french fries for wrapping up inside the pita (yes, french fries. You can't order anything in Greece without french fries tucked in). But generally, I like to eat everything a bit at a time using the pita as a scoop for tzatziki and greek salad or making stacks of tomato, cucumber, and meat on my fork. There's really no wrong way to eat it.

Fireplace Meat or Pork Souvlaki

serves 2

1 pound (or a tad more) boneless pork, cubed (if there is any fat on it, don't remove it)*

2 teaspoons salt

1 teaspoon dry dill

1 teaspoon oregano

1 teaspoon garlic powder

1 teaspoon lemon juice

1 tablespoon olive oil

Place the cubed pork into a medium sized bowl and add the salt, dill, oregano, garlic powder, lemon juice, and olive oil and stir until the pork is evenly coated. Cover and allow it to marinate for at least two hours in the fridge (longer is better, but not necessary).

Skewer the marinated meat on a rotisserie rod or bamboo skewers.** Make sure to pack them on really tightly with no spaces between the meat. If you're using skewers, place them on a foil lined baking sheet, and pop into a 350 degree oven (or attach the rottisserie rod into the toaster oven making sure there's a foil lined baking sheet under it to catch drips), and cook until the meat is brown and crispy. It's important for the meat to be a little crispy on the edges. Those darkened bits are the delicious bits. Mine usually takes about 30-40 minutes.

De-skewer the meat and serve with tzatziki (you can buy it from Superstore or Hellas Foods but homemade is 100% better than either of those), greek salad (the traditional one is pretty straight forward and classic, but you could also try the green one), feta, and warm flatbread (this bread is usually called pitas, though pitas with pockets are not traditional. This is now my favourite flatbread recipe minus the basil).

*If you don't have boneless pork, this also makes chicken absolutely delicious. You don't have to use chunks of chicken breast (although those would be superb), I've marinated whole chicken parts with this recipe (4 legs/thighs, 4 wings), cooked without rotating/flipping, and that chicken dinner has turned out to be one of our most memorable chicken meals.

**I have a rotisserie toaster oven now, so I skewer my pork on the metal rod and let the rotisserie do all the turning. But if you don't have a rotisserie, don't fret. I used to skewer the meat on simple bamboo sticks (you can find them anywhere and they're very cheap for a bag of a billion skewers) and then rotate them about halfway through cooking.

favourites

As mentioned before, I've been going through art and pictures for the last week or more, so I thought I'd share some of my favourites with you. Everything came from Value Village or other thrift stores, and if the picture didn't come from there, the frame most certainly did. Also, last year, mom brought me about eight heavy suitcases and said they were filled with pictures. So for some reason, I just assumed they were family pictures, and I never bothered to open them. When we moved, Idle Husband was really keen on unpacking everything and opened a suitcase. Inside, there were some family pictures but the rest of it was mom's art collection. I told him to just leave them for later and it's been on my mind since then, so I went through all of the suitcases this weekend, and it was really like having my own personal Value Village in our basement. Those old suitcases were a treasure trove filled with a lot of art that I remembered and always loved, so I included a few of my favourites from that source as well.

I love poppies, so when I saw this paint-by-number, I had to have it. Actually, I also had to have it just cuz it's paint-by-number (I used to paint those all the time when I was younger). You never think it's paint-by-number from far away, either. I think it's just because you don't really expect it to be since they usually only come in really childish kittie/doggie/pony designs. If they started making really gorgeous paint-by-number designs like this, I'd probably start painting them in again.

I bought this as an empty frame because it was round and the glass is convex. I didn't have anything to put in it for the longest time and at some point, I cut out this print I liked from a magazine ad, didn't know what to do with that either, so I tried putting it in the frame, kinda liked it, and that's where it's stayed for at least 10 years. I still don't have a picture for the frame, but the print has grown on me so I'll probably never change it.

The parthenon Random Greek temple in a seashell frame! No, I didn't buy this cuz Idle Husband's Greek and I wanted to get all the Greek stuff I could. I bought it years before we met. I just thought it was so beautiful in its tackiness, you know? It was too strange to leave. Now that I've actually been there (gawd who'd've thought?!), I always stare at it cuz it amazes me how much the parthenon has changed since this picture. Just the fact that there's not a swarm of people in the background is odd to me. Also the picture isn't an actual picture. It might've come from a magazine, I'm not sure. I was also just informed that this isn't the parthenon at all and that even though it kinda looks like it, there are a million temples that look like this in Greece.

I love everything about this one. The colours, the raised texture, the frame, the artistic style, it all really works well together. The only thing that sucks is that it's a tiny picture again. A lot of my favourite art is tiny and I can't use it as a feature which really bums me out.

This was in a suitcase. The picture needs a better frame and better matting (duh), but I love that it's the Queen (or queen mom? I'm actually not sure) and she's looking right at the photographer. It's neat and historic and I love those old black and whites where you can kinda make up a story as to what's happening, but you'll never really know. It must've been some visit to Canada since you can see all the Mounties in the background.

This is a ceramic piece and it's part of a series. It says that this one's September: Saison Start. I've always loved the art style. It's really unique. Hmm now that we're in the age of Google, let's search it... Interesting! The series tells the story of a young couple from meeting to their first child. Aww! I had no idea. Gosh I'd love to find the rest of them.

This is another thrift store frame I bought without a picture. At one point, I was cutting that unicorn writing paper to size so I could use the backside as matting since it matches the frame colour (it's hard to tell in the picture). Anyway, I put the paper in to make sure I'd cut it correctly, and then I thought, I actually really like that. It's different and interesting. And there it's stayed. I probably did it in high school and I've never once thought of changing it.

This picture came to us from a dear friend of the family after he passed away. I love that it's double exposed, so the people kind of look like ghosts on top of the background. I think that's the friend, the guy in the middle (I only knew him when he was elderly, so I'm not sure what he looked like when he was younger). I put it in the frame years later. This is another one that makes me wonder what they were doing, what they're laughing about, and then it's even more interesting because there's another completely different picture under them. I think it's a guy fixing a boat, but it's really hard to tell! Oh and I love the dresses and hairstyles on the women.

I love her shirt and hair -- style and colour, the dreamy gauzy feel of it, and I just think it's so unusual to have a bunny in a picture like this. It's probably a reproduction of some artist's work, but I have no idea who.

This came out of the suitcases today. I remember it on the wall and I always loved it. I'm so glad I have it again. It's been almost 10 years since I've seen it. The frame's a little damaged, it looks like mom glued the corner at one point. I think I remember it accidentally falling off the wall. I like how this isn't a typical landscape, either. Most landscapes always have trees or flowers or maybe a river bank, but I've never seen a swampy looking marshland landscape since this one. I've always been drawn to it because of that uniqueness.

I picked this up cuz of the homemade frame first and then I fell in love with the photograph. The frame is old barn siding or perhaps a shingle. It's extra delicate since it's so thin. I love how the photographer paired such a rustic frame with a photograph that I think looks really modern. It's that unexpected pairing which makes it so interesting.

This is a photo of my dad and his buddies. It's not supposed to be whimsical or humorous, this is just how they were. I scanned the photo into the computer today to see what it would look like in black and white. I don't really like the frame and how it screams western so much, but I do love the picture and the concept. It's a nice memory. I thought that if I made it black and white and put it in a larger black frame with white matting, it would make it a little more modern and more of an interesting feature piece rather than just a smallish picture off to the side somewhere.