Rubbishy Cookery

  On a recent road trip to New Brunswick and la belle provence  Québec I had some knockout meals. Surprisingly, the most memorable meals were not in the main destination, Quebec City, but in Fredericton NB, and inspiring today’s recipe, in Rivière du Loup, Québec. A fantastic little restaurant called L’innocent had a terrific vegetarian curried fried rice and I have tried to recapture its essence here, with some intentional (and some not-so-intentional) twists to make it my own, et plus « rubbishy ». (Sample of menu with inspirational fried rice at the end of the list, reproduced sans  permission.) Ingredients: There are some definite differences already between my experimental inspired version and the restaurant’s original: I’m using brown basmati rice, not white; whatever vegetables were in the fridge missing celery and adding red cabbage and cauliflower; I have no seeds (pumpkin and sunflower) but using chopped walnuts and almonds (I can’t recall what noix  they ...

  This is a great way to use a $3 bag of beets from the farm market up the road, but be forewarned: beets are not just a vibrant colour! They turn everything they come in contact with a vibrant colour! That includes your hands, your clothes, your cutting board, your tablecloth, and even your insides. So DON’T PANIC when you go to the bathroom the next day! Ingredients: I forgot to photograph the raw beets pre-Instant Pot cooking, how rubbishy of me! Rubbishy bloggery! I also added on a bonus ingredient halfway through: Directions: First, cook the beets. As mentioned previously, I use an Instant Pot and have a chart for pressure cooking time by average beet circumference: I don’t remember where I found this chart, so I can’t give it credit, but it’s perfect every time. Thanks to whoever published this on the interwebs!  You can also boil or roast the beets, just get them cooked so that you can easily poke a knife into them: Peel and slice the beets, maybe wearing an apron so yo...