Author: Melissa

Bruschetta Chicken

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Summer is the time for tomatoes and there are TONS of ways to enjoy them. One of my favourite ways is to make my recipe for Bruschetta Chicken! This dish is fresh, healthy, and full of traditional Italian bruschetta flavours. Red on down below to see how I make this recipe! What is Bruschetta? There are many different variations of bruschetta, but the most famous version is from Italy. Toasted bread is topped with a mixture of fresh diced tomatoes, olive oil, garlic and basil. There are so few ingredients, but as the Italians do, they always use what is in season and tastes the best–so basically all their recipes tastes delicious!  There are other seasonal variations that have been adopted in North America, where toasted bread is topped with ricotta cheese and then the tomato-based bruschetta mixture. I have even fall-inspired bruschettas using seasonal squash. No matter what, the traditional Italian recipe is the best! My Take on Bruschetta Chicken One key difference between this Bruschetta Chicken recipe and others that are out there …

Pork-Stuffed Zucchini

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Zucchini season is here! Whether you are growing zucchini in your home garden, or are buying them from the grocery store or farmers market, you will notice that there are TONS available and are quite inexpensive. If you want to take advantage of the seasonal prices or just need a way to use up what is in your garden, look no further than this recipe for Pork-Stuffed Zucchini. This recipe is fast, delicious and healthy and is great for the summertime! A Plentiful Summer Squash Zucchini are a summer squash that grow from June to September. There are many varieties of zucchini that are grown, from green to yellow to even orange! Zucchini are also known as corgettes or marrow, depending on where you live. Overall, zucchini are relatively neutral in flavour–making them the perfect squash for taking on lots of delicous flavours. They are incredibly refreshing and a fibre and nutrient-rich, making them a healthy vegetable to enjoy during the summer. Dumpling-Like Filling The filling used to stuff these zucchini rounds is very similar …

Gochujang Chicken Wings

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If you can’t decide between spicy or sweet chicken wings, these Gochujang Chicken Wings are the best of both worlds! This recipe uses delicious Korean Gochujang paste, local honey, and a few other simple ingredients. These Gochujang Chicken Wings are incredibly versatile and can be enjoyed at any occasion including a fancy cocktail party, on game day, or even on a weeknight! A Healthier Version of Korean Fried Chicken This recipe for Gochujang Chicken Wings are inspired by the spicy yangnyeom chicken that you get at Korean fried chicken restaurants. If you have not had yangnyeom Korean fried chicken yet, you have to try it! You can get it at Chicken 649, Chimac Korean Fried Chicken, and Thunderbird Korean Fried Chicken in Victoria.  But instead of the chicken being battered and deep-fried as they do at Korean Fried Chicken restaurants, these chicken wings get a healthier twist by being baked until crispy and then brushed in a delicious spicy and sweet sauce. These wings are also incredibly easy to make and you only need six …

Our Engagement Photoshoot

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After more than a year and a half of being engaged, we finally did our engagement photos! We were originally going to take these photos in March earlier this year, however they got postponed due to coronavirus. But better late than never as they say! Let me tell you about our inspiration behind this photo shoot and a bit about the vendors who helped bring our idea to life! All photos in this blog post were taken by Shantal from Shantal Marie Creative. Our Inspiration As you can see, we definitely thought outside of the box for this engagement photo shoot. We wanted our photos to be really unique and colourful and not like the typical west coast photo shoot on beach or in a forest. Those photos are definitely beautiful, but it’s not really our style. David found a series of photos on Pinterest where couples were wearing traditional Chinese outfits and posing for photos in their city’s Chinatown or local Asian neighbourhood. We thought this would be a super cool idea to do …

Cedar Plank Salmon Burgers

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This Canada Day, I am grilling up the perfect west coast Canadian recipe: Cedar Plank Salmon Burgers! On the west coast of Canada, we love to eat fresh, wild salmon. While there are many species of salmon available, my favourite has to be sockeye salmon. It’s deep rich orange flesh is so succulent, full of omegas, and is always juicy– there’s nothing else like it! Buying Salmon Fillets I picked up my salmon fillets from my favourite seafood store in Victoria, Finest at Sea. They always have a great selection of seafood available and it is always fresh! Not only is their seafood fantastic, I love that they tell you exactly where the seafood was harvested along the coast of B.C.– and even what fishing vessel caught it! Bringing this awareness to the customer is amazing and really makes me appreciate my seafood every time I get it! While I used sockeye salmon in this recipe, you can use whatever variety of salmon you prefer– pink, spring, coho, you name it! Just make sure that …

Spot Prawn Dumplings

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It’s that time of year again, people! Spot Prawns are back in season and they are more sweet, succulent and juicy than I remembered! This year, I’m making these delicious Spot Prawn Dumplings to celebrate the season–and you should too! What are Spot Prawns? Spot prawn season typically begins in early May and lasts for about six to eight weeks. This year with COVID-19, the season has been slightly delayed, but we still have enough time to enjoy these succulent coastal prawns! Spot prawns are slightly sweet to the taste, are orange in colour, and have little white spots on their bodies, mainly around their heads and tails. They are harvested just off the coast of BC during the fishing season using baited traps. The cold, nutrient rich waters of the BC coast make these prawns incredibly juicy and meaty. They have the texture of both a lobster tail and a shrimp combined. Sounds amazing right?! Who Doesn’t Love Spot Prawns…and Dumplings? While spot prawns taste amazing on their own, they’re even better in my …

Maltese Stuffed Artichokes

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Of all the delicious spring vegetables that are in season right now, the gorgeous globe artichoke is one of my favourites. Not only do they taste amazing when cooked, I love the springy, flower-like look of them in general. When uncooked, the tightly packed, overlapping leaves on the artichoke looks like a budding flower, and then when it’s all cooked, the leaves open up and it looks like it has magically bloomed. So cute! Every Rose Has It’s Thorns If you have ever heard the saying “every rose has it’s thorns”, this definitely applies to the artichoke…almost literally. The most prized part of the artichoke is the heart. When cooked, it is soft, creamy and meaty and is definitely the reward of the vegetable. But to get to the heart, you have to get passed the prickly leaves and spiny thistle inside of it. At the center of the artichoke, there is a thistle called the “choke”. While you probably won’t actually choke if you ate it, it would definitely be very uncomfortable to swallow …

Pea & Pesto Pasta

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One of my favourite vegetables that I love to eat in the spring are fresh peas. They are incredibly sweet, tender and flavourful and are a nice little treat instead of frozen peas that we eat year-round. This recipe for my Pea & Pesto Pasta celebrates this seasonal vegetable and is super quick and easy! Peas & Basil are a Match Made in Heaven Peas go great with just about anything, but nothing compares to the combination of fresh peas and basil. The sweetness of the peas balances the intense basil flavour and is incredibly refreshing together! To bring these two ingredients together by mixing peas into a traditional basil pesto. I simply add cooked fresh peas to a food processor with typical pesto ingredients including basil, Parmesan cheese, nuts, lemon, and garlic. With a touch of a button, all of these delicious ingredients gets chopped up and pureed into a creamy green pesto sauce that is perfect for coating freshly cooked pasta. Of course, while peas are not in season for very long during …

Rhubarb & Cream Cheese Danish

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Treat your mom to a very special breakfast this Mother’s Day with these Rhubarb & Cream Cheese Danishes. While this recipe looks impressive, the use of store-bought puff pastry makes this recipe incredibly fast, and is simple enough for chefs of any age or cooking level to make! A Little Bit About Rhubarb Rhubarb is a peculiar perennial vegetable that grows thick and fibrous pink stalks with large green leaves. While the pink stalks of the rhubarb plant are edible (and can even be eaten raw), the green leaves are poisonous to humans and are often discarded prior to being sold in farmers markets or grocery stores in the spring and early summer months. When rhubarb is raw, the stalks are tart, fibrous, and have a stringy texture similar to celery, which may be off-putting to many people. But when it is cooked, it becomes extremely tender and almost disintegrates in your mouth. This texture makes rhubarb perfect for baking in pies, stewing into a savoury sauce, and of course using in these Rhubarb & …

Pork & Bacon (Porkception) Skewers with Peanut Dipping Sauce and Mango Salad

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These Pork & Bacon Skewers are my latest and greatest creation! Tender pork chop meat is marinated in a delicious ginger-molasses marinade and is skewered between a thick slice of Double Smoked Bacon from Red Barn Market. You can also call these Porkception Skewers. Grilled to perfection on the BBQ and served with a refreshing mango salad and peanut dipping sauce– these skewers are perfect for upcoming summer BBQs! #KitchenImprovYYJ Challenge I came up with this idea for a recipe from participating in the #KitchenImprovYYJ cookoff, where each week we were given a list of ingredients that we had to make a recipe with. During the final week of the competition, our ingredients were: apple, coffee, bacon and peanut butter. While many people would think to make a sweet recipe, I opted for savoury just to be a bit different. Plus, I love savoury foods way more than sweet foods! And so these Pork & Bacon Skewers were born! I marinated the pork chop with ginger, molasses (for that sweet and smoky flavour), maple syrup, …