This past weekend, I made a wedding cake for 225 people in my 300 square foot apartment! The challenge became sooo real as I realized that I only have one usable counter space and a dining room table for all of the preparations. However, with a little creative thinking and using all possible surfaces in …
Category Archives: lessons
Taking food recycling to a whole new level
Figured this was a pretty neat piece of news to share with our readers. Adam Smith is a trained UK chef who has come up with an interesting restaurant known as “The Real Junk Food Project”. He cooks up nutritious meals using volunteers and all food that is deemed “un-sellable” by supermarkets and restaurants. This …
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This just in: The Great Nutella Hiest of 2013.
In the small German town of Bad Hersfeld, thieves made off with $21 000 (CAD) worth of Nutella. For those keeping score thats about 6 875 large jars or 27 000 000 calories worth. With climbing food costs, large scale food theft has been on the rise. There have been many high profile incidents, including $18 million dollars …
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Paleo diet – Week 2
Two weeks into the Paleo diet and we feel great. Some weight has been lost but most importantly we’ve survived the first (and hardest) half of this diet. Our energy levels have returned to normal and we’re definitely not as “hungry” all the time. We’ve even taken to talking about regular food with only slight …
A few upcoming changes
Just want to give all our readers a little heads up that our site will be undergoing some annual maintenance and a slight make-over. If things are a little strange for a little bit please bear with us and we promise to try to make this process as painless as possible. Keep reading and remember …
New Year’s Resolution
Since it’s January and the holidays were exactly as expected, gluttonous when it came to food, it is time for our weight loss resolution of 2013. I researched all sorts of diets and really struggled with deciding what goodies I actually wanted to give up. Luckily, in the middle of my procrastinated search, our new …
Gordon Ramsay’s Desserts
“Pastry chefs occupy a very special place in the pecking order of a high flying restaurant kitchen, so…I take my dessert skills as seriously as I do all my cooking” – Gordon Ramsay Desserts by Gordon Ramsay is not a new book by any means, but definitely one that needs to be a part of …
A journey around Toronto’s pastry world (1)
So it’s Saturday afternoon, the sky is grey and depressing, our stomachs are growling so what are we to do?!?! Well, most people would make lunch, but here at Notes On a Meal, we don’t find that to be enough so we embark on a French pastry shop journey. Equipped with a sneaky camera (well, …
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Sugar, part 3
From a culinary perspective, sugar is a very important ingredient so understanding how it reacts while being heated, melted, dissolved, etc is very crucial. One of the most integral parts of this is an understanding of what happens in a simple sugar and water solution. In this case, the sugar molecules have a tendency to …
Sugar, part 2
There are several different types of sugars, all with various qualities and sweetness levels. Different sugars give different impressions of sweetness with sucrose being the longest to be detected on the tongue and the most lingering of the bunch. By comparison, fructose registers quickly and strongly but it also fades very quickly. But before we …
Sugar week, Part 1
I thought it would be neat to explore a new topic every week and learn something new, so this week we’re going to talk about sugar. We’ll get into history, uses, the nature of sugars and its varieties. Sugar is the generalised term used for a class of sweet flavoured substances composed of carbon, hydrogen …
History of the macaron
Their name comes from the Italian word “maccherone” which means to beat or crush, used here in reference to the nut (predominantly almond) flour that these desserts are made with. Although the history of the macaron is a little foggy, most sources agree that they date back to the early 1500’s when Caterine de Medici’s …
Do not feed the animals.
The food stamp program, part of the Department of Agriculture, is pleased to be distributing the greatest amount of food stamps ever. Meanwhile, the Park Service, also part of the Department of Agriculture, asks us to “please do not feed the animals” because the animals may grow dependent and not learn to take care of …
Science, making booze boozier.
The good people at Terressentia have come up with a way of using science to make booze taste better by removing impurities left over from the distillation process. In short, with typical distillation, there are lesser alcohols that are formed that leave a harsh taste in the mouth and contribute to hangovers. By using their patentend process, Terressentia can …
Yours Truly, Ossington & Dundas, Toronto
Having just opened its doors late last year, Yours Truly Restaurant at Dundas and Ossington has caused quite the stir in the foodie world. The chef, Jeff Claudio is a veteran of fine dining cuisine with an impressive resume that includes Noma in Coppenhagen, Alinea in Chicago and Per Se in New York. Needless to …