Rubbishy Cookery

  It’s that time of year again—holiday parties! You have to bring something, you can’t arrive empty handed, but what can you whip up rubbishly without appearing rubbishy? I can help you. These nuts are originally from a published recipe on a long-forgotten bougie recipe blog, but I’ve pimped them up so much I don’t feel any compunction to confess to any plagiarism. These nuts are original Rubbishy Cookery now baby. Ingredients: Directions: This first part is the part I’ve “borrowed” from the other posh blog (whose name I’ve forgotten so I couldn’t credit them even if I wanted to. Sorry not sorry!). Toast a tray of mixed or single type of nuts at 300F for about 10-15 minutes or until the nuts are fragrant and light brown inside, without burning them: This part is critical (and thanks to the other highbrow blog of long forgotten title): get those hot nuts into a bowl and pour in a good glug  of tamari sauce and a smaller glug of toasted sesame oil—they will sizzle hard and evapo...

  I know tapioca pudding is not my original recipe, nor is it a fan favourite, nor do most people even like it. But on an impromptu trip to the grocery store today, with the thought that maybe, just maybe, I would find something special that was not on the grocery list, I happily found a box of classic tapioca pudding: I was doubly excited to see that a childhood favourite dessert now comes with microwave directions that fit in perfectly with my rubbishy cookery philosophy! So today’s blog entry isn’t an original recipe, but rather an experimental walk through of the microwave version of the recipe on the box, made EXACTLY AS DIRECTED!  Ingredients: Directions: Let’s follow the directions EXACTLY as written on the box to ensure a happy ending (not that kind of happy ending, get your head out of the gutter!). Start by lightly beating one egg in our microwaveable dish: Add the sugar, tapioca, and milk in EXACTLY the proportions instructed on the box and stir: Then we’ll pop it i...

  The best matcha latté I’ve ever had (and I’ve had a lot of matcha lattés!) was from Lady Baker’s tea stand at the Charlottetown Farmer’s Market made by the fabulous former tea barista, Willow. Willow kindly shared her secret ingredient with me and now I will share it with you. Sweetened condensed milk. Now hush! 🤫  Ingredients:  In honour of this shared secret ingredient and out of loyalty to Lady Baker’s Tea, I continue to buy their matcha, but you can buy matcha almost anywhere these days. Directions: Heat some fresh filtered water but not to a boil. I have a kettle that can be programmed for specific temperatures and I’m using my “green tea” setting here: Alternatively, you can just boil your water and then let it cool down a bit. You don’t want to shock the delicate matcha with boiling hot water! Next, if you happen to have a device for stovetop steam foaming milk, get ‘er going: If you don’t have this milk steamer device, there are other ways and means to foam mil...

It’s fall! It’s apple season! Finally! This is a basic apple crisp/crumble recipe that apparently was also once referred to as Apple Betty, which doesn’t sound quite right in 2024. I originally found it here: Which was found in this vintage 1980s cookbook that came for free with the very first microwave oven my parents ever owned: That was back in the early days of microwave ovens, when they were promoted as a conventional oven replacement, and this book has recipes for full course microwave cooking, including « roast » chicken.  If you are interested , here is the original microwave version recipe for today’s dish, with my mother’s annotations and approval (hence the check mark): I don’t think I’m breaking any copyright laws printing this recipe, but just in case, please don’t tell Quasar. Or Betty. Anyway, we’re going to go off script, as usual. Ingredients: Directions: We’re going to have to peel some apples. Do you have an apple peeler? This handy device is a zillion years old,...