Chicken Farmers of Canada
In the new year, we’ve added a few blog features that we intend to become a regular part of the site in the coming year. One of the features we’re most excited about is our food blogger profile series, in which we interview a new Canadian food blogger every month and hear about what keeps them passionate about food and cooking.
This month, our interview is with Alexa Clark of Unsweetened.ca and Cheap Eats Toronto and Ottawa. She’s also one of the minds behind HoHoTO, a fundraiser for the Daily Bread Food Bank in Toronto, and a regular culinary voice on Twitter.
So, without further ado, here is our interview with food blogger and publisher Alexa Clark.
When did you start blogging about food?
I started blogging about food almost as soon as I started blogging in 2004. In fact, one of the first posts on my personal blog was about a lunch at Dunn’s Diner in Ottawa. I started my first food-related blogs in 2004 – the CheapEats Toronto and CheapEats Ottawa blog as a companion to the Restaurant Guides. I started writing for a more conventional food blog – www.Foodists.ca – in 2006 after meeting one of the Foodists founders on a CBC Sounds Like Canada panel on the state of street food in Canada.
Why do you blog about food?
I think food is one of the most foundational connections people share. Everyone eats. Everyone has opinions on food – what is right, what is wrong; what is good, what is bad. Whether they’re shared or not, it is still one of the fundamental ways people define themselves.
I was raised in a community of people who were back-to-the-landers who ran organic farms, built sustainable practices and developed humane practices for raising and slaughtering their animals. So, I grew up believing that food, how it is grown or raised, how it is handled and how it is prepared is important.
Food is also big business, impacts the environment, is an economic indicator, and influences culture in a myriad of ways. I am fascinated by how these things all come together on a plate.
How often do you cook at home?
As a family, we cook at home at least once a day.
What’s the best cooking tip you can give our readers to help them cook at home more often?
It’s less of a cooking tip than a preparation tip, but keep your pantry stocked with all the things you need to make your favourite dishes, and at least a couple of extras. I find it helps to keep a list of our standard ingredients in my smartphone and run through it any time I’m in a grocery store, just to make sure I’m stocked up.
The worst thing that can happen when you are planning to cook is to come home and find you are out of one of the essential ingredients. Show me someone who doesn’t reach for the pizza delivery menu when that happens! Everyone is rushed, and heading back out to pick up rice, or stock, or chili peppers seems like a huge task at the end of a long day.
Another tip? Don’t be intimidated by FoodTV, food bloggers or food porn. We’re a little obsessive, we are trying to make the food pretty and enticing, AND we have interns! If your kids or spouse don’t have mirepoix freshly chopped when you walk through the door, don’t compare yourself to people who have staff to do the prep work for them.
Make what you like, how you like it and don’t let anyone pressure you into thinking it’s not fancy enough, pretty enough, or not complex enough. Sure it’s fun to play with food, combining flavours, trying out new things – but this is not the way to cook at home more. It’s a way to expand your skills and repertoire.
But if your goal is just to cook more at home… make sure you have all your staples on hand and cut yourself some slack.
What’s the one ingredient you couldn’t live without?
Paprika – no question. I have three varieties on hand at all times. I’m not even sure when, or how, my deep and abiding love for paprika started. It certainly isn’t from my parents, one of whom can’t eat hot food and the other who teases me mercilessly about my paprika-addiction.
One of my saddest memories was having to leave Spain without paprika because I upset the spice vendor in La Boqueria by taking a photo of his paprika without permission. He started screaming at me “Con Permiso! Con permiso!” All the other vendors came out of their stalls to stare and point. I didn’t even have enough Spanish or Catalan to explain and apologize. I left Barcelona traumatized by my own rudeness.
Always remember, don’t upset the spice vendors!
http://www.spanishdict.com/answers/104504/what-is-con-permiso-in-english
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