Marie Cookpad

  Do you have family favourites in your recipe repertoire?  I have plenty in mine. These recipes are my tried and trues.  Recipes that have been gleaned and collected through the years, handed down from family and friends. Shared recipes.  Recipes that turn out every time and that never disappoint. Recipes with a history.   Don't get me wrong. I love trying out new recipes.  I have lots saved on Pinterest to try at some point. There are some wonderful gems in the new ones that I try as well, but after a time, I do tend to gravitate back to what I have known, loved, cooked and baked for many a year. Using one of these old recipes is like visiting with a long lost friend.  A companion that has kept you company for many, many years.  Recipes like this are usually attached to fond memories, be they of family members or of friends.   This recipe I am sharing today is so old that I can no longer remember where it came from. It is one that I have been baking since before I finished high s

  What is Pain Perdu.  Translated from French into English, the words mean Lost Bread.  It is a fancy name for French Toast, which was a great way of using up stale bread in the past. French toast is normally seen as a breakfast dish, and this certainly could be served for breakfast, but when you choose to make it with Brioche bread it becomes a bit more special and actually makes for a very fine dessert.   Brioche bread is rich and sweet and lends itself beautifully to dishes like this.  Soaked in the egg and milk it takes on an almost custard-like texture, very similar to bread pudding  . . .   But of course, cooking it this way is a lot faster than making a bread pudding.  So,  if you are looking for a hearty dessert that is quick and easy, as well as being delicious, this is the dessert for you!    Our Brioche bread here in the UK is actually only about 4 inches square in size, so when sliced the slices are not overly large.  I cut my slices about 1 inch thick to use, which was abs

   I am sitting here as I write this and I am trying to think back to when I first tasted Mexican Food. (Not that this recipe is very Mexican by any stretch of the imagination.)  I think it was when I had moved to London, Ontario and we discovered a restaurant called Chi Chi's.  I believe it was a chain restaurant.   We used to go there every now and then and treat ourselves to Chimichangas and fahitas, and yes, (at that time) margaritas.  I liked the strawberry ones. They were so yummy.  The Fajitas were probably not overly loaded with fat and caloried but those Chimichangas could probably  be considered heart attack specials.   But we were young and did not think of such things. They fed you hot tortilla chips and salsa while you waited for your order.  If it was your birthday they would don Somberoes and come and sing Happy Birthday to you at your table.  Horror of all horrors. As a person who did not and does not like to be the centre of attention, this was a fate worse than de

  On thing I have always missed over here is Angel Food Cake. There is something really special about a proper Angel Food Cake.  It is very difficult to get an Angel Food Cake tin here in the UK, and if you do find a proper one, it costs an arm and a leg.  I was always going to bring one back from Canada when I went home to visit, but it just never happened.   The other day I spied a recipe for a mini angel food cake that is baked in a loaf tin on Pinterest.  It is attributed to recipe the site, Dessert for Two .  This is the recipe I used today and I have adapted it to use British measurements as well as North American.   The best thing about the recipe is that you don't need anything other than a metal loaf tin to bake it in.  No Angel Food Cake tin needed! You must not use a non-stick loaf tin, as the cake mixture needs to be able to grip the sides of the pan to bake up properly.  I just used my metal loaf tin as you see above (this is after baking and I am hanging the cake upsi