sweetgeorgia

Confessions of an ex-foodie

I have a confession to make. I don’t cook.

It’s not that I don’t know how or don’t like to cook, I just don’t… It’s a time/energy issue. When I leave the office, the last thing I want to do is spend an hour or more making dinner. I love cooking and have more cookbooks and foodie magazines than I do knitting and spinning books. _Impossible, I know!_ But nearly every day, my husband and I have dinner at various cafés or restaurants nearby. It’s $5 bowls of pho (Vietnamese Beef Noodle Soup), $3 bowls of congee (rice porridge with stuff in it), $5 Malaysian curry from [Hawkers' Delight](http://nancyland.blogspot.com/2005/09/hawkers-delight-main-st.html) on Main Street, or a huge piece (we split) of Sicilian lasagna from the Brioche Bakery across from my office. It’s _easy_.

On the rare occasion that we do cook, we (read “he”) make Ma-Po Tofu and corn soup. Ah yes. Super healthy, eh! But this weekend, I decided to crack open my [new cookbook](http://www.laregalade.com/main/cookbooks.htm) from [La Regalade](http://www.laregalade.com/) and make their Beef Bourguinon (Jen G, if you are reading this, you are not allowed to buy this cookbook for yourself). You will recall last year when the DH made us [Anthony Bourdain's version of this dish](http://blog.sweetgeorgiayarns.com/2004/10/boys_in_the_kitchen/). This is mine:

Whereas the Bourdain version was made in the dutch oven on the stove, Alain Rayé’s version is made by braising in the oven for about 2 1/2 hours. The potatoes are baked in heavy cream alongside in the oven for the last one hour of cooking. So simple. So easy. I just might do it again.

For those of you who want to taste the real deal, make yourselves a reservation at [La Regalade](http://www.laregalade.com/) in West Vancouver. Oh, and make a day out of it and visit the [Knit & Stitch Shoppe](http://www.knit-n-stitch.com) too!