In fact, that's what everyone always tells me when I cook... It's like there's a football team coming over... 

Well, two nights ago, it was more like there were TWO soccer teams coming over... I'm so used to cooking for my dad and husband and brothers (who eat everything in sight) that when I cooked for these beautiful ladies, I made waaaay too much food!

But when I cook, I cook, so I didn't take any pictures of the night, and I was waiting until someone that came over had mercy on me and posted some images right on my blog!  Thank you Inge, for doing that!  Please go over to Inge's blog and read all about that night, then come back here for the recipes!

I "stole" this image from Inge's blog so that at least you can see what you're getting the recipe for!

If you don't feel like reading, you can just download the recipes in a pdf form, right here! 

So, item #1 is

Brazilian Black Beans (Feijoada) 

Igredients:

4 cans of Black Beans

1 Large Onion, diced 

4 cloves of garlic

2 bay leaves

1/2 lb of bacon

Salt and pepper to taste

Thyme and Parsley (to taste, sorry Mimi, I'm not very good with measuring)

 Olive Oil

Open all cans of Black Beans and put them into a crockpot on High.  Fry the bacon until fully cooked, but not crispy, drain the fat and add it to the crockpot.  Add diced onion, garlic, olive oil and spices, and let it simmer on High for a few hours... At least 4 hours... Then set it to Low until your soccer team arrives!

Item #2

Sausage and Veggies (there's no Brazilian name for this dish since I made it up!)

Ingredients:

6 sausage links of your choice (I use Butcher's choice - Superstore - Mild Italian)

3 Kale leaves (I hate measuring!!!)

4 carrots, finely diced

1 Large Onion, diced

4 stalks of Celery, diced

1 large can of diced tomatoes, blended.

4 cloves of garlic, minced

Cut the sausages into slices so they look like small meatballs (or not, do whatever you want!), saute them in a little bit of olive oil, and add other veggies when the sausages are cooked (on the outside, at least...) 

 Saute the veggies for about 5 minutes until the onion is transparent, and add the can  of tomatoes.

Add the garlic last.  (I always say that if a recipe calls for 2 cloves of garlic, they really mean 4, and if it doesn't call for garlic at all, then they just assumed you knew!)

Let this simmer on low, till it's time to eat (dont' you just LOVE how precise I am?  Of course you'll check if the sausage is cooked, right?  So let's say about 30 minutes?)

Item #3

Tomato Salsa 

I would say that you should leave this dish to be made when your guests arrive.  People love hanging out in the kitchen while you cook!  At least in my house they do...

Ingredients:

6 Roma Tomatoes, finely diced (sometimes I use grape tomatoes cut in quarters) 

1 onion, finely diced

Fresh cilantro leaves

Red Wine Vinegar

Olive Oil.

1 clove of garlic 

It's pretty self explanatory, isn't it?  Dice it, mix it and serve it!  I learned from Jamie Oliver that you should always salt the tomatoes and let them sit for about 20 minutes before you add the rest of the dressing.  To make the dressing I mix it all into a pestle and mortar (garlic, red wine vinegar and olive oil - yes, to taste!) and then just pour it in a few minutes before we sit down to eat!

Item #4

Rice 

Go ahead and make your favorite white rice recipe!  I used basmati and added olive oil, garlic and salt, but go ahead and do whatever you want!

Most important is the order in which you serve the food:

1. Rice

2. Black beans over the rice

3. Sausage slightly on the side 

4. Tomato salsa over everything.

Brazilians traditionally mix everything up once on the plate and then pour farofa over the whole thing... I didn't make farofa because I didn't want to freak you out... it's not for everyone.

 Oh and I almost the caipirinhas! (Brazilian drink)

Ingredients:

1 Lime per person

Sugar

Ice

Cachaca (Sagatiba is the best Brazilian Rum you can find in North America)

Crush the limes well with whatever you have... I have a caipirinha stick that my dad made for me, so there.  Add sugar as you crush, then add the ice and Brazilian Rum (I have NO IDEA how much Rum I add, again, sorry Mimi)...  My husband usually leaves it at that. But I'm a really cheap drunk, so I add sprite to water it down a little. 

So there, ladies, hope this helps and thank you for coming over this week and let's definitely do it again! 

Oh, and here's the only shot I took: the place settings that we made... Yeah, Yoko, I crafted!  So go ahead and fall over!

I love cooking.

I love spending time with my girls.

So, I often put the two things together and voila... We have child labour!

My girls know how important it is to eat healthy and they know I go to great lengths to make sure I always cook our dinners from scratch and try to make them as healthy as possible, without being a vegetarian (Brazilian-vegetarian is an oxy-moron, so I won't even go there...).  So they love to help me and see what goes "in" the food that I "make" them eat.  Sometime after Christmas I had a serious craving for won-ton soup.  The "I-know-exactly-what's-in-there" kind. So I pulled out my trusty recipe book (the one with all the fingerprints all over it) and off we went.  This is a good recipe for rainy days like today and the great thing about it is that you make a great big batch and then freeze all the extra won-tons for another rainy day!  Not to mention the fact that it's an activity you can do with your kids...

Enjoy! And please leave me a comment! 

Won-Ton Soup  

Won-tons 

1 lb ground pork (I always ask the butcher at Sobeys to grind some for me)

1/2 cup water chestnuts (they're not a nut, they're a vegetable!)

4 stalks of green onions, chopped

1 Tablespoon freshly ground ginger root

1 tsp olive oil

3 cloves garlic ( I always triple this amount, but that's just me)

Salt and pepper

1 package of won-ton wrappers (found in your grocer's fridge, usually with the veggies)

Mix all ingredients above using your hands (that's right, get dirty!).  Then using a teaspoon, spoon the mix into the won ton wrappers and using little fingers (see image below) wet the edges with water, then close the wrappers in a triangle shape. 

Soup 

For the soup part, I just mix together a couple of liters of Chicken Stock, some green onions, and some dried mushrooms and whatever other veggies you like to have in there, or whatever you have in your fridge.

Once the stock boils, drop in the won-tons and cook for about 20 minutes or so, to make sure that all meat is thoroughly cooked.

You can flash freeze the extra won-tons by placing them on a cookie sheet, then once frozen move them over to a ZipLoc bag so then don't get freezer burn!

Enjoy the assembly images below.

Here, Sabrina shows us how to wet the edges of the won-ton wrappers... 

 Here are my two little helpers making sure supper gets done in a timely fashion!

Ps: I have been cooking with my kids for years, and if I can give you a little advice it would be to let them come and go as they please... If you insist that they finish what they started, they'll get turned off and won't want to do it again. But that doesn't apply to getting them to clean their room... They better finish THAT job!