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Alison Gillmor
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Going gluten-free doesn't mean giving up foods you love
'I think about what I can eat," says Jeanine Friesen. "Not what I can't eat." When she was diagnosed with celiac disease five years ago, the Steinbach-based food blogger and cookbook writer was determined to stay positive.View Full Column | 05/15/2013 10:12 AM | 0
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We can't crack the jack recipe, but try our turnovers instead
Some months back, there was a request for Gunn's Bakery applejacks. That recipe remains uncrackable, but some readers wrote in with other apple pastry possibilities. A reader named Linda suggested a version using phyllo pastry, apples and cinnamon sugar. I also adapted a recipe for apple turnovers that can be baked or fried -- the deep-fried version is often called an applejack. The Gunn's version of the applejack remains a mystery, but for the time being, these recipes are both very tasty.View Full Column | 05/15/2013 1:00 AM | 0
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Round up fluffy pancakes, flour tortillas
Last month, a reader requested a recipe for thin, crispy buttermilk pancakes. This week we have a recipe from Diane Fraser of Brandon for cooks who prefer the light, fluffy kind. These pancakes get extra airiness from beaten egg whites and, for convenience, can be frozen in individual portions and reheated on the morning you need them. Rose Beaulieu wrote in requesting a reliable recipe for flour tortillas -- she has had trouble with the dough shrinking. Rachel Unger offers a recipe she's tried from Manitoba's own Mennonite Girls Can Cook, a group of women who blog on food and hospitality at mennonitegirlscancook.ca and who have recently published a cookbook.View Full Column | 05/8/2013 1:00 AM | 0
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Delicious and terrifying at the same time
‘DOUBLE EFFING NEWSFLASH,” as the newly infamous Rebecca Martinson might say. You’ve probably heard about the leaked email from the young University of Maryland student, in which she abuses and berates her sorority sisters for their “AWKWARD” and “BORING” behaviour during Greek Week. Known as the Deranged Sorority Girl Email since Gawker posted it on April 18, this hilariously obscene, aggressive screed has become an instant classic, spinning out into social media commentary, Internet memes and viral videos.View Full Column | 05/4/2013 3:20 AM | 0
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Signature intensity aside, Tom's on Cruise control now
There's a weirdly mesmerizing scene in Oblivion, Tom Cruise's new dystopian sci-fi flick. 000It involves Tom Cruise battling Tom Cruise. Now, when Tom Cruise fights, he wins -- because he's Tom Cruise. So what happens when they're both Tom Cruise?View Full Column | 04/27/2013 1:00 AM | 0
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With child... and shame
Kim Kardashian and Gloria Steinem -- not two names you usually hear in the same news story. But last week, the prominent American feminist felt compelled to defend the trashy, fame-mongering reality-TV star. Kardashian, who is currently six months' pregnant, is being hounded by the pregnancy police about her size.View Full Column | 04/20/2013 1:00 AM | 0
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Authentic Mexican food relies on healthy ingredients and bold flavours
Pati Jinich, author of Pati's Mexican Table: The Secrets of Real Mexican Home Cooking (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 256 pages, $34.95), wants you to know that Mexican cuisine is not "taco salads, nachos slathered with cheese, or overstuffed burritos." It's not heavy or fried. Often, it's not even that spicy. As she writes in the introduction to her passionate new cookbook: "Show up in my kitchen any day of the year, and you'll find soft corn tortillas, refried beans, at least two different salsas, the fresh Mexican cheese called queso fresco, ripe avocados and fresh fruit."View Full Column | 04/17/2013 6:54 AM | 0
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Irons in the fire
It's always a treat when a famous person goes off-script. But this latest example -- Jeremy Irons talking about gay marriage -- is an absolute standout. Irons' interview with Josh Zepps of Huff Post Live might have been just another piece of predictable, puffed-up celebrity shmoozing -- the 64-year-old English actor was there promoting his Showtime series The Borgias -- but once he started on the gay marriage issue, it took on a weird and wonderful life of its own. While explaining that he doesn't have "a strong feeling either way," Irons suggests that opening marriage to same-sex couples might "debase, or change, what marriage is." If he'd stopped there, his comments would have been merely disappointing and depressingly familiar.View Full Column | 04/13/2013 1:00 AM | 0
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1950s-era hot cross buns maintain their appeal
RECENTLY, Mary W. wrote in asking for a recipe for the baba ghanoush formerly sold at Norman's Meats. We couldn't get that exact recipe, but she might want to try this version, submitted by Linda Snider of Glenboro. And here's an example of the Recipe Swap community at its finest. Last month, Dorothy Earley from Onanole asked for a recipe for hot cross buns originally published by The Western Producer in the 1950s. She realized this was a long shot, but she had lost her copy. Wilma DeVos wrote in with that exact recipe. She used to make these sweet buns in a wood stove when she was first married.View Full Column | 04/10/2013 8:10 AM | 0
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TV glitz, glamour and memories of Portage Avenue
Watching Mr. Selfridge (PBS, Sunday, 9 p.m.) is an odd, double-edged experience. The well-appointed Masterpiece series offers a vision of the optimistic birth of the modern department store at a time when our own great department stores are dead or dying. A fictionalized account of American entrepreneur Harry Gordon Selfridge (played by Entourage alum Jeremy Piven), the show isn't exactly must-see TV. But it works as lavish Edwardian décor porn. (One British TV writer called it "Downton Abbey with tills.")View Full Column | 04/6/2013 1:00 AM | 0
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Kelekis doors closed... but the crispy memories live on
In January, the legendary Winnipeg restaurant Kelekis closed after 81 years in business. Lorraine Turner wrote in asking if anyone knows the secret to their fabled french fries. It's impossible to truly replicate those famously crispy fries, since eating them was just one small part of the larger Kelekis experience, which included soaking in the unchanging ambience, staring at the signed celebrity photos on the walls and running into people you hadn't seen for a while.View Full Column | 04/3/2013 1:00 AM | 0
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Maddening Men
Mad Men fans are getting antsy. AMC's gorgeously depressive deconstruction of the American Dream starts up again next Sunday, but in keeping with the series' obsessive secrecy, the first trailer for season six is made up of scenes from season five. Thanks, Matthew Weiner. Thanks a lot.View Full Column | 03/30/2013 1:00 AM | 0
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Soup Sisters cook up comfort food for women in shelters, nourish their own souls
"SOUP is good food,” says the old advertising slogan. It’s good to make and good to eat. But it’s even better to give. And that’s where Soup Sisters comes in.It's good to make and good to eat. But it's even better to give. And that's where Soup Sisters comes in. A grassroots non-profit organization, Soup Sisters was launched in Calgary in March 2009 by Sharon Hapton. Since then, more than 7,500 volunteers across Canada have cooked up more than 100,000 containers of nurturing, nourishing soup. The soups, from good old-fashioned chicken noodle to hearty minestrone, go to women and children affected by domestic abuse and family violence.View Full Column | 03/20/2013 1:00 AM | 0
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Breaking bread for Easter can take a devilish twist
A FEW weeks ago, Shirley Friesen wrote in with a request for the braided egg bread that used to be sold at Michel's Bakery cafe in Polo Park. We don't have that specific version, but thanks to Linda Snider of Glenboro and to Beausejour's Edna Mroz, who sent in the recipe below. This rich, slightly sweet bread goes by different names in different eastern European traditions, and it's also a popular Easter bread. Also in time for Easter, June K. sent in a recipe for classic devilled eggs. Currently, Mary W. hopes someone knows the recipe for the baba ghanoush formerly made at Norm's Meats, which is now closed, and for the orange muffins and oatmeal date sandwich cookies made at the ever-popular lunch counter at Harman's drug store in the 1980s. And Lorraine Turner hopes someone knows the secret to Kelekis's famous fries. If you can help with a recipe request, have your own request, or a favourite recipe you'd like to share, send an email to recipeswap@freepress.mb.ca, fax it to 697-7412, or write to Recipe Swap, c/o Alison Gillmor, Winnipeg Free Press, 1355 Mountain Ave., Winnipeg, MB, R2X 3B6. Please include your first and last name, address and telephone number.View Full Column | 03/20/2013 1:00 AM | 0
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Close, but no cigar, Starbucks
I have a mix tape from every guy I ever dated. That should tell you something about my dating era, which was the 1990s, smack in the middle of the mix-tape heyday. It might also explain why last week, while queuing for coffee, I fell hard for a Starbucks CD -- you know, one of those cutesy compilations they place right next to the cash register, waiting for impulse-buying suckers like me. Called My Last Mix Tape, the music is mostly wistful alt-pop from the '90s, with lots of shimmery, happy-sad songs from groups like Belle and Sebastian and Stereolab and Mazzy Star.View Full Column | 03/16/2013 1:00 AM | 0
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A sweet and sour Passover brisket, hot cross buns in an Easter basket...
I live in an interfaith household, which means in spring we celebrate both Passover and Easter. That means lots of cooking. This week Dorothy Earley from Onanole is hoping someone might have a recipe for the best hot cross buns she's ever tasted, first published in the Western Producer in the 1950s. She's lost her copy, and while she realizes this is a longshot, she hopes a Recipe Swap reader might have clipped it.View Full Column | 03/13/2013 10:51 AM | 0
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Reconsidering Friedan
Fifty years ago, Betty Friedan shook up North America's social landscape with her controversial bestseller The Feminine Mystique. The American journalist and feminist wrote about "the problem that has no name" -- the fact that many middle-class housewives who were told they should be happy were, in fact, deeply, desperately, silently unhappy. (Think of Betty Draper sitting at the kitchen table and staring into space.) To mark the 50th anniversary of The Feminine Mystique, commentators have been discussing what's changed and what's remained the same since its publication. Often the talk gets dirty -- literally. Perhaps the book's most intriguing, intractable ongoing issue is housework.View Full Column | 03/9/2013 1:00 AM | 0
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Icing on the art
‘CUPCAKES are confectionary metaphors,” says Shawna Dempsey. “They’re a fabulous canvas on which to inscribe our hopes and dreams.” Dempsey should know. A longtime Winnipeg artist and co-executive director at Mentoring Artists for Women's Art, Dempsey is helping to organize MAWA's ninth-annual Over the Top Art Auction and Cupcake Party. (This year the event will be held on Sunday, March 17, 2 to 5 p.m. Tickets are $10 advance or $12 at the door. MAWA is located at 611 Main St.)View Full Column | 03/6/2013 1:00 AM | 0
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Cook meat low and slow for stick-to-your-ribs short ribs
Last week, Nichole wrote in with a request for short ribs made in the slow cooker. Thanks so much to Renée Lavitt, who sent in a recipe for barbecued ribs, and to Sandra Hickey, who offers a version flavoured with Guinness. With Easter and Passover coming up, please keep those requests or recipes for family favourites coming in. If you can help with a recipe request, have your own request, or a favourite recipe you'd like to share, send an email to recipeswap@freepress.mb.ca, fax it to 697-7412, or write to Recipe Swap, c/o Alison Gillmor, Winnipeg Free Press, 1355 Mountain Ave. Winnipeg, MB, R2X 3B6. Please include your first and last name, address and telephone number.View Full Column | 03/6/2013 1:00 AM | 0
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Are beards back? Testosterone front and centre on Oscar night
This year's Oscars were all about the beard, from the silver screen to the red carpet. When Ben Affleck accepted an Academy Award for Best Picture last Sunday, he had left the young upstart of Good Will Hunting and the looks-good-in-tights guy from Daredevil far behind.View Full Column | 03/2/2013 1:00 AM | 0
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An opening for Argo?
I like Argo. It's entertaining and pacey, a kind of geopolitical caper flick, with expertly staged suspense and some disarming comedy. Ben Affleck stars as a CIA "exfiltration" expert, who decides to use a fake Hollywood movie to solve a real international crisis, springing six Americans who are hiding out at the Canadian embassy in Tehran by pretending they're part of a film crew. Affleck, who also directs, has pulled off a good minor movie. But for all its strengths, Argo feels like an unlikely Best Pic. The Academy is not overly fond of good minor movies. In the early weeks after nominations were announced, many analysts saw this year's Oscars as a race between Lincoln (worthy, weighty history) and Life of Pi (spectacular storytelling). So how did Argo end up as the front-running favourite? As with Affleck's exfiltration operation, there are some unpredictable variables on the road to Sunday night's announcement, but here are a few factors in Argo's favour.View Full Column | 02/23/2013 1:00 AM | 0
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Beautiful cookbook proves Polish food is more than perogies and potatoes
Recently there's been talk about the rise of Internet cooking, a trend that sees more and more people getting their recipes from websites, food blogs, YouTube videos and apps. So far, cookbook sales have been holding their own, but the prosaic, purely functional coil-bound variety is probably on the way out. The cookbooks that will survive will be the ones that offer more than just information. The ones that are workhorses in the kitchen but elegant enough for the coffee table. The ones with gorgeous visuals and meaningful text.View Full Column | 02/21/2013 4:09 PM | 0
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Truth and consequences
The Oscars like a little bit of controversy -- not too much, of course, but enough to make people notice. There's a buzz of debate surrounding several Best Picture nominees this year, from Django Unchained, with its unsettling, slap-happy treatment of slavery, to Zero Dark Thirty, with its murky look at America's post-9/11 use of torture. Strangely, though, the most shocking Best Pic nominee might be Amour, which deals with the commonplace experiences of aging, illness and death. It's getting harder and harder to scandalize audiences with extremes of sex and violence, with loaded historical topics and sensationalized socio-political issues. This straight-on depiction of old age, on the other hand, is genuinely revolutionary. By gazing unflinchingly on the end of life, Austrian auteur Michael Haneke is busting one of cinema's last taboos.View Full Column | 02/16/2013 1:00 AM | 0
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Potato water, potahto water ...let's eat the cinnamon buns!
Lorraine Turner wrote in some time ago asking for a recipe for cinnamon buns made with potato water. Several readers wrote in with the recipe from Free Press Solutions columnist Reena Nerbas. Thanks to Mary Schulz and Loretta Hibbert, and to Reena. Thanks also to Kim Ewart, whose tried-and-true recipe for cinnamon buns uses not only potato water but mashed potatoes. This handy recipe can be made the night before, left to rise in the fridge overnight, and baked fresh in the morning. If there's one thing I've learned from Recipe Swap, it's that Winnipeggers have strong feelings about restaurants that are now gone. Joy Wright is hoping someone has a recipe for the garlicky house dressing at the Paladin Restaurant in St. Boniface, which was destroyed by fire in 2011. If you can help with a recipe request, have your own request, or a favourite recipe you'd like to share, send an email to recipeswap@freepress.mb.ca, fax it to 697-7412, or write to Recipe Swap, c/o Alison Gillmor, Winnipeg Free Press, 1355 Mountain Ave. Winnipeg, MB, R2X 3B6. Please include your first and last name, address and telephone number.View Full Column | 02/13/2013 3:17 AM | 0
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Beware of the binge
Netflix is an online provider that lets you stream movies and television on multiple devices. This is an absolutely swell service -- ask anyone who's had a weekend binge of Breaking Bad or Mad Men or The Walking Dead. But because it involves content that's already played somewhere else, it lacks cachet. It doesn't get much attention. Enter House of Cards, a Netflix original series. Since Netflix is in the business of changing people's viewing habits, it offered a new model for watching House of Cards. On Feb. 1, it released the first season of the series all at once, allowing subscribers to watch the 13 episodes any time and any way they wanted.View Full Column | 02/9/2013 1:00 AM | 0
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