a hippie with a minivan

A few of Willa's favourites…

One of the things that occupied Willa at the hospital was the iPad.

She can turn it on, unlock it, swipe the pages until she finds her favourite page, open apps, change them etc., but something that would keep her attention when she was not in the mood to play was music videos…

She loves music, she sings and dances but when she was stuck in bed, not able to move, it was something that was almost always guaranteed to put a smile on her face. And still now as a part of our evening routine she loves to relax while watching a few of these right before bed…

So I thought that I should share some of her favourites… maybe your music loving kids (or yourself) will enjoy these too… (more…)

Falafel with Taratoor sauce

I remember the first time I had Falafel. I was in high school and working at a veterinarian’s office for the summer and on my lunch break I would go to a little family run place called “Café Joe” that was a few blocks away. They made the most amazing Falafel from scratch and I remember just loving the texture and taste. It was crispy and fried but tasted fresh and light. When I stopped working there and went back to school I would go out of my way to visit at times until one day I went by and they had sold the restaurant. When I left my mom’s and headed into my own place, I would buy those dry mixes to make falafel at home but it was never the same. It tasted… well.. processed and from a box mix. However, a few years ago I found this recipe and have never looked back. This is the good stuff… This is it.

This recipe calls for dried chickpeas… you really need to use dried chickpeas. Canned chickpeas just won’t work… the reason? not because it is snobbish, but because the mix is actually made with uncooked soaked chickpeas. Cooking them (or using canned) will not result in the right texture or flavour. The down side to that is that you do have to think ahead.

So… for the Falafel…

2 cups dried Chickpeas/Garbanzo beans (soaked for 12-24 hours)
1 medium onion
2 -3 garlic cloves
2 -3 slices bread
2 tbsp parsley
1/3 red pepper
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp black pepper
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp oregano
1/2 tsp red pepper flakes *optional
1 tbsp flour
1 tsp baking powder
50 ml water
1/2 tsp baking powder
125 ml water
vegetable oil ( for deep-frying)

When your chickpeas have soaked long enough, drain and put in the food processor. Add onion, garlic, bread, parsley, and red sweet pepper. and process until mealy. Move to a bowl (or use the pulse mode on processor) and Add spices, flour, 2 tsp baking powder and water and mix well.

In a small dish mix the remaining baking powder and water. Dip your hands in the water and form balls of the chickpea mixture the size of walnuts.

Deep fry in oil at medium high heat until golden brown.

Crispy on the outside and soft and fresh tasting on the inside

Serve on warm pita bread with Taratoor sauce (recipe below) and any other toppings you might enjoy (parsley, tomato, pickled turnips etc)…

For the Taratoor Sauce

3/4 cup tahini
1 garlic clove, crushed
Juice of 1 – 1 1/2 lemons
1 cup water
1/2 tsp salt
3 tbsp finely chopped parsley

In a deep bowl beat the tahini with the crushed garlic and lemon juice until creamy. Add water bit by bit, beating well after each addition. If using blender / food processor put all the ingredients in and process until creamy. Add salt and parsley and stir. Taste and adjust. The sauce should have some tang to it not too lemony.

Yumm….

Meal plan for the week

I keep on meaning to add this as a weekly post as every Saturday I sit down and plan our weekly meals before going grocery shopping…

For inspiration I ask the family what they feel like eating, I look at Foodgawker, check out the weekly specials, look at my own Recipe page or look over my meal ideas document on my computer. (I should share that one day 🙂 ) After the list is done, I make my grocery list and buy all that I need for the week… (you can read more about my process here)

So, here is my Menu plan for this week (I’ll be adding a few recipes this week also)

Sushi
Falafel with Taratoor sauce
Fried Chicken sandwiches
Chicken and Dumpling soup
Roasted Veggies with Garlic bread
Pad Thai

Some of our breakfasts and lunches:

Oatmeal Smoothie
Family Apple Pancake
eggs
bagels
Pancakes

Do you make weekly meal plan? What meal are you looking forward to eating this week?

Dehydrated Pumpkin

Did you know that I love my dehydrator? I mean really, truly love it?

We had a blast carving pumpkins at Hallow’een, but there was no way that I would let them go to waste. I mean, gnocchi, pumpkin cinnamon buns, pumpkin butter etc… How can I not make all of those?

However, pumpkin purée takes up so much space and I desperately need to unfrost my deep freezer. So I wondered… can I dehydrate it? Well… Of course I can!!!

cut the pumpkin in half and place it face down (or face up if it carved 😉 ) in a pan and bake at 350 until tender… (you can also do the same with any other squash)

(Xavier’s Pumpkin grew a chin in the oven…)

The peel will be very easy to just peel off… so do that and place the purée on your dehydrator tray and follow your dehydrator’s instructions for veggies.

I found that the easiest way it to first put it on a non stick paper on the tray first and then when it is half way done flip it onto the tray so that it can dry completely. You don’t really have to do it, but If you skip this step it will stick inside the little holes of the tray and it will be time consuming to clean up…

Tear the dehydrated purée into pieces and place in the blender and process…

What you get is a crushed dehydrated pumpkin…

See that jar? That is actually 5 pumpkins worth 🙂

To rehydrate, use 1/4 cup of powder with 1 cup of boiling water. Let sit and cool before using in a recipe 🙂

and don’t forget to do those seeds too!

Électrium

On the south shore of Montreal, on highway 30, just east of the 20, there is a hidden gem called the “Électrium” that not many people seem to know about…

Really, unless you are going there specifically, or out to one of the towns past the 20 (including where I live) you would never see it.

The Électrium is Hydro-Quebec’s “Electricity Interpretation Centre”… It is full of information, experiments and hands on activities about electricity and best of all, it is free! If you have read my blog for while or looked back in the archives you will see that I have already written about it, but another visit, warrants another post.

Last Friday the boys and I headed to Montreal for Wilhelmina’s Dr. Appointment… (btw… everything is looking good!!!) On the way back I went to the Atwater market to get some veggies and food for the week and then on the ride back home I decided to stop at the Électrium on a whim. Each time we had passed by the boys would talk about it but it was never a good time, so this time it was perfect and they got so excited when I took the exit.When we arrived, there was no else there.

We were met at the door by one of the guides and she asked if we wanted to just go around by ourselves or if we wanted the guided tour… The last time we were there we were with a french homeschooling group, so even though the kids understand french, it takes a bit more effort and were not able to really listen and follow. Of course, it was also more than 2 years ago so the age difference adds much more to comprehension also. So I said that it would be fun to have an english guided tour. We were asked to wait for a minutes in the unlikely event that others that wanted to follow an English tour may arrive, but no one did so we started…

(Waiting for the tour to start)

The first part of the tour is watching a series of clips on electricity made by the NFB.

They only showed the ones on electricity but the whole set can be watched here… (they are really fun to watch!!!)

oehttp://www.nfb.ca/film/science_please_1

oehttp://www.nfb.ca/film/science_please_part_2

After the watching the clips we were led into the next room which is about safety. The guide was great and really engaged the kids… even Willa was interested… well… somewhat…

Because it was just us and the guide, the boys were able to ask as many questions as they wanted and the guide was great at answering them. He was also very passionate about his job and about what he was talking about which made it so much more interesting and informative.

After learning about safety, it was the section on electricity in nature. Our own nervous system, our reflexes, the brain, heart etc… and of course, on of the highlights of the show is the electric eel (did you know that it is actually not an eel but a knifefish?). A blue panel next to the tank has lights that light up when the eel becomes electrified. Pretty cool of you ask me…

The next section is about static electricity and starts with a small film on the Aurora Borealis/Australis and lightening… both natural reactions of static electricity…

(making balls move though glass using static electricity)

This is of course a favourite section for all because static electricity means playing with the Plasma ball and the Van de Graaff Generator.

(Wilhelmina loved the Plasma Ball)

(Van de Graaff Generator)

The last section is on magnetism and generating electricity. The boys listed and took in as much as they could but soon started getting restless… they last about 90 min before this so it was actually pretty impressive!

Since we were getting the private tour we were able to cut it short at that point and the guide left us alone so that we could go back to the beginning and the we could play with everything again…

Again, this is a great, free, hands on place to head with the kids… If you are in Montreal it is worth the short ride and will make for a great outing. They do ask for people to call ahead to not be at the same time as a group, it is a small place so if a school group is there, it will be cramped and not much fun but if it a lazy day, like on the day we went, it is a great way to spend a few hours…