But a stuffed bitch.

We don’t eat a whole lot of carbs in our house – it’s an easy trap for lots of Veggies out there, and it isn’t healthy to overload on them (as with anything). Recently however, a friend and fellow foodie has been exploring bread baking and all it’s twists, including pretzles. His results just looked too good to pass up and after much begging from the boys, we went out and got the necessary ingredients.

Since he explains it much better than I can (and since I’m full of delicious pretzel and consequently laaaazy), go and visit Charley at www.chuckskitchen.blogspot.com. Ahhh. Coattails. So comfortable.

No, but really, check him out. Besides really breaking into the world of bread, he’s an awesome chef and has some really incredible dishes and a way with words that makes his blog a treat to read. Plus, he’s delving into vegetarianism for the next forty days! Can’t wait to see the tasty dishes he wields.

Onward:

We did two batches, one plain whole-wheat and the other whole-wheat with fresh dill. The plain ones were topped with black gomazzio (aka sesame seeds and sea salt). The dill had garlic, red bell pepper, and sea salt; these were by far the favoured ones. While the gomazzio was good, there wasn’t enough on top and the delicate flavour got a bit lost in the rich, chewy wheatiness. Not a bad thing necessarily, particularly with the grainy deli mustard we dipped it in, but when compared to the bold kick that the garlic ones had? Whoo-ee.

This is definitely something we’re gonna be toying with. I’d like to try make a batch with some sort of filling – maybe a cinnamon-infused dough with an amaretto almond meal centre? Who knows. We’re hooked though and this is definitely going under ‘family favourites’.

Anyway, today kicked off a busy week of surf competitions. My two older children (Alex, 11, and Andy, 9) are competing professionally for the first time this year, which means that in addition to the actual meets, they have training schedules. Add to that mix recreational surfing, soccer, swimming and lacrosse, and you can begin to see that by the time they get home, they are wiped and starving.

With my grandparents visiting and James (my husband) away in Turkey, I’ve been so swamped with shuttling the kids around and entertaining that I’ve been very neglectful in the garden – which means that I’ve also been lazy in the kitchen. We own seven acres, one of which is completely dedicated to our fruit trees and vegetables. The deal that my husband and I have with the boys is that we’ll do all the planting and upkeep (they’re more than welcome to help if they’re so inclined, but it’s not expected) and their job is to check it every day and bring in whatever needs eating. I’m usually pretty on top of the inventory but, with all the distractions, I only had a vague idea of what I was working with.

When we got home tonight, Andy and Alex were thoroughly exhausted and ready to just scarf a meal and hit the hay. I had no idea what I was going to feed them but I did know it had to be filling, but not so heavy that they’d end up getting cramps in the middle of the night (during a long surf session you ingest quite a bit of salt water, and that can make it really hard to digest a big meal.) I asked them to pull out whatever we had in the fridge while I put the baby to bed, and then headed upstairs, contemplating how on earth I was going to make a meal out of half a cucumber and some carrots (which I knew we had.)

I was not expecting this:

Apparently while I was loading Rhys (our youngest) and all the sports gear into the car this morning, they were out scouring the garden. I hadn’t been home all day and so missed it entirely. With the exception of the broccoli and the celery, everything pictured is fresh from the ground.

Of course, I didn’t need all of that, but it certainly opened up the options. From the depths of the freezer a couple of ahi steaks were rescued, defrosted, and we were ready to rock and roll.

Minus the excess (and ignoring the pile o’ fruit), this is what we used:

Lime, Italian parsley, chives, carrot, celery, tomato, red pepper, yellow pepper, cabbage, purple kale, red onion, cucumber, manoa lettuce, spinach, corn, garlic and ahi. Oh, and some honey, delivered this morning by our dear frieds Ilse and Yvan. They have the best bees on the island.

Now, the ahi was a bit too thick for pan cooking, so I sliced them in half to create four thin steaks. First things first was to get the salad ready. Everything except the onion, lime, garlic, parsley, chives and honey went into the bowl. Pretty easy stuff – slice and dice as you like. Purdy colourful, eh?

Next I prepped the leftover ingredients – diced the garlic, sliced the onion, parsley and chives, juiced the lime.

Add a little of that gorgeous bee spit – I’d say it was probably two tablepoons to a quarter cup of juice.

Into a pan went some butter and once that was nicely heated, the onions and garlic were added. Mmm now there’s an awesome smell.

These little guys don’t need to be in there alone for long – just enough to soften up, maybe a minute or two. Salt and pepper the ahi and slap it on in.

Sear it on both sides – thirty seconds, max – and then add in the lime juice-and-honey mixture, toss on a lid, and let the ahi relax it in it’s own sauna of deliciousness.

Meanwhile, the water for the corn was boiling away and so in the cobs went. They boiled for a few minutes until they were done – and, conveniently, so was the fish. By this time, it was cooked through but still very, very moist, and broke apart effortlessly with a fork. The lime and honey had made a beautiful sauce, and the entire contents of the pan went into the salad bowl. Add the parsley and chives on top and toss – the heat from the fish is just enough to wilt them slightly by this point, releasing their flavour without making them soggy.

Alex sliced up some bread I’d made yesterday – it was my first attempt and it was just a plain wheat loaf, but it doesn’t look (or taste) too bad!

Voila! A substantial meal that’s chock-full of good stuff and that filled up the boys without knocking them out. Next time I think I’ll add a little less pepper as it was enough to almost distract one from the honey glaze but all in all, it got the thumbs up from both of them and that’s all I’m really after.