My perogi – before and after!
At the Ukrainian Cultural Heritage Village near Edmonton, Alberta, I spent a contented day learning about the history of this community founded when the first immigrants from Ukraine arrived in 1892. They brought red fife wheat to Canada and with it they made one of their gastronomic gifts to the world – pierogies (which they pronounce perohay – and spell a lot of different ways). I learned to make these delicious little dumplings. After all, food is the best way to learn about people. And a lesson in making pierogies (also called pyrohy or varenyky ) is enlightening. Continue reading
With the approach of barbeque season, it’s time to talk about burgers on the grill. A good sirloin or tenderloin of beef can be tender, juicy and succulent. But we’ve all had the experience of facing a solid mass of muscle with no hope of making a dent with either tooth or knife. Enter the meat grinder, a useful tool. American ingenuity added a bun and speeded up the production line until hamburger became synonymous with fast food.
When I was a kid, a grilled cheese sandwich consisted of two slices of white bread with a Kraft cheese slice in between, fried in butter on the stove. Basically, neither grilled nor really cheese.
