Cafe Maplethorpe Blog :: PEI Restaurant

As promised, here are photos and the recipe for grilled PEI eels. They have been on the February supper menu as an appetizer and have been selling well! We’ll see the end of the eel at month’s end as spearing season is over. I prepare them (more or less) as you would enjoy them in Japan, with a rich, sweet kabayaki sauce. (Recipe for sauce below.)

Step 1: This assumes you have some eel. The eel should be skinned and gutted, with the head removed. You will need to remove the spine. To do this, insert the blade of a sharp knife under the spine. Run the blade along the underside of the spine from the head of the eel toward the tail.  (Where the head used to be toward where the tail used to be–they are long gone.) It may help release the spine to make lateral cuts along the sides of the spine down the length of the eel prior to running the blade under.

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Step 2: Once the spine has been removed, cut the flesh into uniform 4 inch pieces.

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Step 3: Skewer the eel fillets. (This keeps them from curling during the cooking process and makes them easy to handle.)

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Step 4: Steam skewered eel in a bamboo steamer for 20 minutes. (Put steamer lid on top first!) Check the water level in the wok occasionally and add more water if necessary to make sure it doesn’t run dry.

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Step 5: Remove eel from steamer. Grill eel skewers under a broiler (toaster oven is good for this) or on a grill, liberally applying kabayaki sauce, until desired carmelized exterior has been achieved.

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Eel is often eaten on a bed of rice, but it is delicious atop a salad or by itself!

Kabayaki Sauce:

Ingredients:

1/2 cup soy sauce

1/2 cup mirin (Japanese sweet rice wine)

1/4 cup white sugar

Method:
Place all ingredients in a small saucepan. On the stovetop, bring the sauce to a boil. Let boil for approximately 5 minutes, or until slightly thickened. Cool and pour into squeeze bottle.

I was a member of Weight Watchers many, many years ago. Back then the program was much less flexible than it is today and there were many foods that we were told just not to eat. Any. Ever.

Forbidden Foods

For each of the banned foods, however, someone had come up with a clever substitute. For example, peanuts were forbidden, but we were given a recipe using canned button mushroom caps. You were to bake them in the oven until they became shriveled and dry, looking amazingly like a peanut! Then you sprinkle salt on the ‘mock peanuts’ and enjoy! I remember this so clearly these many, many years later because the taste was so bad that the adverse sensory experience is seared in my brain for all time, like a tiny internal tattoo.

I am sharing one of my best recipes for ‘gluten-free sandwich bread.’ As anyone who eats gluten-free bread knows well, it just isn’t like “real” bread. Gluten is the star of “real” bread, and this just doesn’t have any. It is really mock sandwich bread, sort-of like the mock peanuts of my early dieting years. BUT! It isn’t too bad. The flax seed is nutritious and gives the bread a nice look, but isn’t essential if you don’t have any. Hardly anyone has buttermilk any more, but adding some lemon juice to white milk works fine.

The usual disclaimers for gluten-free bread are necessary:

• For sandwich-size bread use a small (length) bread pan and mound the dough up fairly high–it is going to rise, but not much.
• If you have an old-style automatic bread maker that makes tall, round loaves, try that.
• Let the loaf cool completely before slicing.
• Slice it thin, and it helps to toast it.
• Freeze what you aren’t going to use in a day or two.
• Keep experimenting until you find the taste and consistency that you can enjoy for life.

And unless you have a life-threatening allergy, eat a peanut when you feel like it.  Canned mushrooms are for pizza.

Ingredients:

1/4 cup sugar

1/2 cup warm water

1 and 1/2 tablespoon active dry yeast

2 cups brown rice flour

1/3 cup potato starch

1/3 cup potato flour

1/3 cup tapioca flour

3 and 1/2 teaspoons xanthan gum

1/4 cup coarse ground flax seed

1 cup buttermilk (or 3/4 cup milk mixed with 1/4 cup lemon juice)

1/4 cup (2 ounces) butter, softened

1 teaspoon vinegar

1 and 1/2 teaspoons salt

3 eggs

Method:

Grease one bread loaf pan and preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

1. Mix warm water, yeast and sugar in a measuring cup. Let proof for 5 minutes.

2. In the bowl of a stand mixer, mix rice flour, potato flour and starch, flax, xanthan gum, tapioca flour and salt.

3. Pour yeast water into flour mix along with eggs, butter, rice vinegar and buttermilk. Using a dough hook, start mixing on lowest speed.

4. When wet and dry ingredients are mostly combined, stop mixer and scrape sides and bottom to make sure all dry ingredients are mixed with wet. Return to mixing on medium speed for 3 minutes.

5. Form dough into loaf with your hands and place in pan. (Wet hands make this easier.)

6. Place the loaf pan with dough into a large plastic bag and secure with a twist-tie or knot. ( This will help keep the dough moist during the fairly long rising time.) Put in a warm place for 2 and 1/2 to 3 hours. The loaf will increase its original volume by about 1/3.

7. Bake for 45 minutes. Cool completely.

One of the most frequent requests we get at the restaurant is for gluten-free bread and rolls that actually taste and feel like “real” bread. There are over 2 million people in North America that suffer from Celiac Disease and the only treatment is a gluten-free diet. (That means no wheat, rye or barley added to any food product.) In addition to those with the disease, many avoid gluten due to various other health considerations. Today I was a guest chef on CBC’s “Maritime Noon” call-in show and one of the first questions we received was on this very topic.

We are constantly experimenting with gluten-free breads, rolls and desserts to serve at the Cafe and our goal is to make these special products look and taste so yummy that everyone will want them!

Because I didn’t bring specific recipes with me to the studio for the call-in, I offered to post a couple of recipes here on the blog–recipes that actually work, that we make and serve.

These are nice for use as a dinner roll, but can also be the base of a sweet muffin with the addition of fruit or nuts. (Think about adding blueberries and almonds, cinnamon and pecan pieces, lemon and poppy seed…)

Preheat over to 350 degrees. Grease 6 spots in a standard muffin tin or use paper muffin cups. (If you add fruit and nuts, the recipe will make more than 6.)

Ingredients:

4 tablespoons butter, softened

1/4 cup sugar

2 eggs

1 cup gluten-free flour mixture*

2 teaspoons baking powder

3/4 cup milk

Method:

1. Put the soft butter and sugar in a stand mixer and beat with paddle until light and fluffy.

2. Add eggs and beat on low speed to mix.

3. In a separate bowl, add all dry ingredients. I used a combination of soy, rice and tapioca flour. Feel free to use what you have on hand or experiment with the taste and color of the muffins using various gluten-free flours.

4. Alternately add dry ingredients and milk to the egg mixture while the mixer is running on the lowest speed. Stop mixing as soon as all ingredients are incorporated.

5. Fill prepared muffin cups to 2/3 full. Bake in preheated oven for 25 minutes.

These muffins will stay fresh for a few days and freeze well if wrapped individually in plastic film.

School is closed today, courtesy of a big dump of snow last night. It was closed last Thursday as well, that day because of an ice storm. Winter on Prince Edward Island.

Shoveling Snow….Again

I don’t mind school closure, especially on days when it seems obvious. We had enough snow last night that there is a 6 ft wall around our property created by the snowplows. But having a teen around the house all day is inconvenient. When I need to check e-mail on the laptop I have to evict her from her Facebook pals. Then I have to repeat—once again—that no, I am not going to buy her a laptop for her exclusive use. And while we are talking, how can you watch television, chat via the computer and text on the cel phone all at once? She’ll wander into the kitchen several times today begging for food. For some reason, a 16 year old is utterly incapable of putting together even a sandwich if the Mom is around the house.

I like a little bit of new snow, partly because of my dog. He has a routine that involves access to food—first thing in the morning he goes outside to “take care of his business.” When that is done, he can go in and eat. And he really likes to eat. At about 5 a.m. if he hasn’t been crated the evening before, he will jump on the bed, lick our faces, gently bite our hands—anything to get us to take him out.

Tonks was groomed a few weeks ago, slick shaved. When his fur is longer he likes a long romp through the pines behind the house but hairless he sticks close to the house. He has a specific spot that he likes to head for to make his deposit every cold morning. And after a few weeks we give a new meaning to the ‘House on Pooh Corner,’ if you get the picture. A little new snow covers up the sad fact that I need to spend more time outside with the pooper scooper.

It is the middle of winter on Prince Edward Island and what’s a locavore to do? Well, we’re trying to find ways to use locally-grown root vegetables in an interesting, new way. Maplethorpe Apple Slaw is a cool pick-me-up for your plate. The ingredients are cheap and the entire dish is surprisingly easy to make. This recipe will serve 6 or 8.

Ingredients:

1/2 medium green cabbage, washed, cored and outer leaves removed

1 large carrot, peeled

2 apples, peeled, quartered and cored

2 tablespoons whole grain mustard

1/4 cup mayonnaise

handful of dried fruit, cranberries or dried cherries, raisins or dried blueberries

Method:

1. Chop the cabbage to the desired fineness and place in a large mixing bowl.

2.Chop the carrot to same size as cabbage and add to the bowl.

3. Dice the apples. Any kind of apple will do, but some tend to turn brown–a splash of lemon juice will help keep them fresh. Add to the carrot and cabbage and mix.

4. Toss in the dried fruit, if using.

5. Final step! Mix in the whole grain mustard and mayo and stir well. Adjust the quantities to achieve the desired level of creaminess–exact amount needed depends on the size of the cabbage and carrot. If you prefer something sweeter, add a tablespoon or two of sugar.

For the past 6 years we have observed a Saturday morning ritual…driving 45 minutes to Charlottetown to buy locally-grown veggies, Island-made sausages, Fair-Trade coffee and so much more at the Charlottetown Farmer’s Market. We always bump into other Summerside-area residents we know–there are lots of people making the Saturday trek. The Charlottetown Farmer’s Market has always been THE place to mingle, nosh and stock up on the best provisions on Prince Edward Island. Some Saturdays we can barley squeeze through the crowded isles, let alone find a place to park. Sure, we think about the gas we burn on the trip, our sad contribution toward climate change, the added expense…all that guilt just leaks out of our brains and drips down the seats of our car. But bottom line is we love the Charlottetown Farmer’s Market vibe, the people and the food, and despite the nagging little why-don’t-you-do-the-right-thing-and-shop-closer-to-home thoughts, we just go. Marty Taylor’s sausages are calling and I don’t have call waiting.

Well. We Used to Just Go

Summerside steps up!

The one-year old Spring Street Farmer’s Market is keeping us closer to home these days. And by all measures, keeping lots of other western Islanders out of Charlottetown on Saturday mornings.

What a vibrant market!

The Spring Street Market is a beautiful year-round space in the historic downtown Holman Building. Exposed brick and stone walls, upscale vendor display areas and plenty of space for shoppers to linger and mingle have created a Saturday morning destination for hundreds. (Really–hundreds!)

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This morning I picked up certified organic pork, a week’s worth of locally-grown root vegetables, 5 dozen free-range eggs and a big package of fresh hand-made pasta. Then I sat down to visit with people I haven’t seen since last Saturday.

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I saw people snacking on plates of sushi and Belgium waffles, big cups of steaming coffee and giant moon pies from some of the food vendors. One of the girls was showing off a piece of pottery she just bought, a beautiful birthday gift for a friend. The squeals and laughter of children could be heard coming from the play area.

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Guest Chef

The Spring Street Market just launched a new program–weekly cooking demonstrations featuring local chefs. And guess who got to be the first guest chef!

My job was to offer some new cooking twists on seasonal foods…root vegetables, locally-produced meats–anything currently on offer by Market vendors. I met lots of our regular restaurant customers wondering when we are going to re-open (THIS TUESDAY!) and gave out samples and recipe cards.

We made two of our signature dishes, Apple Slaw and Country Mushroom Soup. (Cabbage is one of the “11 Best Foods You Aren’t Eating.” See the whole article here.) In honor of the Chinese New Year, we tried a new recipe as well, Chinese Five-Spice Braised Pork Loin. What a hit with the crowd!

Thank you, Emmerdale Eden Farms, for the donation of organic pork loin for this demonstration.

We signed up a whole sheet of e-mail addresses for our monthly restaurant updates and recipes. It was a really fun morning and a great way to ease back into restaurant cooking after 4 weeks off.

Still Off to Charlottetown…Sometimes

We are still visiting our friends at the Charlottetown Farmer’s Market once in awhile. But most Saturdays we’ll be supporting local growers even closer to home at the Spring Street Farmer’s Market in Summerside. Hope to see you there, too!

One undeniable feature of rural life is that everyone makes it their business to know your business. Gossip on PEI is legendary, once described to me by a life-long resident as a ‘blood sport.’ Historian David Weale quotes a UPEI professor as once telling a class “It is the God-given right of every Islander to know the business of every other Islander.”

Knowing that men who fish stop for supplies at the Village Store in Bedeque, I mentioned to store owner Susan that I wanted to find out about eel. Word spread fast and the very next day she handed me a slip of paper with a name and phone number. The Eel Whisperer. He was expecting my call.

The Eel Whisperer

Islanders are unfailingly generous with their time and knowledge. Brian MacLeod has been fishing for eel all his life and was happy to ‘talk eel’ with a newcomer. Eel is a winter recreational fishery, allowed on PEI in December and January. The eel hibernate in river mud in about 5 feet of water. The successful fisherman has to know where on a river eels are likely to be sleeping, where mud of the right texture is located and the water depth is just right. The weather has to cooperate as well—ice thick enough to walk on, not too thick to cut through, wind and snow at bay for a few hours.

Brian advised that due to warm temperatures the ice was dangerously thin, but colder weather was moving in. He agreed to take me along on the next trip. True to his word, I got a call 2 weeks later.

Off To Find Eel

walking on the Grand River

My fishing guides Brian, Randy and Danny are comfortable with each other and seem to have an unspoken routine. Brian knows where to go and leads the way. Randy wields the chainsaw and cuts holes in the ice. Danny tends the equipment. We are on the Grand River and the ice is so thick Randy can barely open up any holes. While Brian and Danny waste no time getting spears into the first hole, Randy is cutting two more. Good thing, too—no eel in the first hole.

Eel fishing is ‘blind’ fishing—methodically pushing and pulling a 12 foot long spear in and out of the mud. It is done on a slant as the fisherman slowly circles the ice hole, trying to probe every inch of the mud. They say that bumping into an eel feels like pushing a stick into a pile of wet clothes. Quickly the spear is hauled out of the water. IF the wet laundry is really an eel and not just a stick, and IF the technique of threading the spear back out of the ice hole is just right, you are rewarded with a wriggling, clearly pissed-off eel. The eel are flicked off the spear onto the ice. Fishing continues–where there is one sleeping eel there are probably more.

After spending more than an hour working the first three holes and only spearing two eel, the men decide to go further up river. The wind has picked up and it is cold on the ice, but the day is bright and we spot eagles soaring overhead. The next few holes are better. We have been fishing for over 2 hours and have 18 eel. Time to head home.

Cleaning the Catch

Cleaning eel is a job that requires both technique and specialized equipment: a sharp knife, a pair of pliers and an 18-pack of beer for every 3 men in the shed. The skin of an eel is unbelievably tough. It’s removed by making cutting through the flesh behind the gills with the sharp knife then pulling the skin down and off in one piece with the pliers. The beer is required to help the stories flow.

The men remember rivers full of eel, not like today. As a boy Danny would take an axe in an empty feed sack and his spear to the Dunk River and within an hour he had more eels than he could drag home. Those his family didn’t keep for supper he sold door-to-door for fifty cents and made enough money to skate at the rink. Someone’s dad would clean and dry the eel skin, cut it into strips and use them for boot laces. (“The eel laces would last forever as long as you didn’t let the cat into the house. The cat would eat the laces at night.”) That story was more about Islander’s esteem for frugality than about poverty, although I suppose there were elements of both. I was surprised to hear each of the men describe their favorite way of cooking eel, and it was clear that when it came to eel, they did the cooking themselves. Parboiled first then dipped in flour and baked on a drip tray, or grilled on the bar-b-que or fried on the stovetop in a dry skillet. One remembered his mother’s eel pie, another liked eel stew.

eel on the ice

A Fine Day Spent in Good Company

Our eel fishing experience was a real treat, and a glimpse into a way of life fast disappearing on Prince Edward Island. We’re putting an eel appetizer on the supper menu for the month of February and I am experimenting with several of the eel recipes mentioned in the shed. I’ll share the best recipes once I finish fiddling with the ingredients and cooking method.

Jim is already talking about getting his own eel spear for next year.

We cooked and served at Maplethorpe right up to December 23, then dropped everything and rushed to the Halifax airport to open our Christmas gift—a week ‘s vacation in sunny Southern California. 2008 was a busy year for both the bed and breakfast and the café, and we had earned a change.

And what a change! Every suburban community has 200,000 people or more—almost half again more than then entire year-round population of PEI. Hundreds of identical Southern California communities along the beach, millions of people connected by a crazy patchwork of freeways. It sure isn’t University Avenue in Charlottetown, people.

California Style

To blend in with the locals we were required to wear tiny shorts paired with furry knee boots and start every morning at a Starbucks. We elbowed our way through all the crowded tourist sites and gorged ourselves on Chinese, Thai, Vietnamese and Mexican food, washed down with good California wine. It was all great, except one thing. We wanted to visit a bookstore called the “Cooks Library,” billed as “the place” where the hottest LA chefs go to research new recipes and purchase exotic cookbooks. I deliberately packed light on the trip out just in case I needed to drag home half a suitcase of new cookbooks from this place. We spent a morning finding it, then took another half hour finding a parking space within a mile of the shop, only to read the handwritten sign on the door that said the store was closed for a week.

The thought crossed my mind that maybe in some ironic twist they had read about Café Maplethorpe and were on Prince Edward Island right now standing on our porch reading the handwritten note on our front door…

Vacation was just about over. We watched the New Year’s Eve ball drop in New York’s Times Square on the television at 8:00 pm local time and went to bed in anticipation of our early flight back to Halifax the next morning. The week had gone by fast.

Back to Reality

The LA to New York portion of the return flight went well. Flying reminds us how anchovies feel, all packed on top of each other in those tiny cans. We got a bad sensation when we got off the plane in New York and surveyed the departure gate monitor for our Halifax flight. It wasn’t listed. As we soon found out, the Halifax airport was closed due to high winds and snow—blizzard conditions.

I asked the nearest gate agent what we were to do and she directed us to go to the gate printed on our boarding passes even if it wasn’t listed on the departure screen. Skipping past the long and ugly confrontation between the pathetic, stranded passengers and the cold-hearted airline representatives, we found ourselves several hours later on a flight to Bangor, Maine—the closest place we could get to Prince Edward Island without sleeping in a New York airport terminal for the next 3 days.

I am by nature a stoic person, but my feet started to get cold in New York when we walked out on the tarmac to board the commuter airplane. They stayed cold during the flight and got even colder in Bangor where the windchill was minus about a hundred degrees. (“That’s Fahrenheit, dear, not that wimpy Celsius you people have in Canada.”) I think my husband slept on the motel room floor that night to guarantee that I didn’t touch him with my feet. Despite extra socks and a hot meal, my feet stayed frozen all the way to Prince Edward Island aboard the Acadian Bus Lines coach that brought us home the next day. Exactly one week later to the day, my feet are still cold.

When my feet are cold, I am miserable, and I can’t think of anything except warming them up. Hot baths, hot soup, hot tea, wool socks—I’ve tried them all. In case you’re wondering, it really isn’t that cold on Prince Edward Island, either. Although there is snow on the ground, the temperatures are just a few degrees below freezing. Before Christmas I could practically go outside barefoot in this weather.

Lessons Learned

I blame it on that week in California. When you live in a cold place, it is just too much of a shock to your body to go to a really warm spot for a week then immediately return to the cold. As wonderful as it seems at the time, it is just too confusing for all of the blood vessels, capillaries and internal organs. Maybe I will write a letter to the Island’s Chief Medical Officer and suggest a Provincial ban on all of those Spring Break trips from Charlottetown to Cuba, the Dominican and Florida. It could save a lot of Islanders the misery and expense that I’ve recently endured.

I know that next time we plan a winter trip south to warm up, we’ll be thinking of sunny southern North Dakota or perhaps Upstate New York. We’ll probably drive.

Welcome to the Cafe Maplethorpe Blog!

“Maplethorpe” is the name of our house, built in the 1860′s by the first Postmaster of Bedeque, Major Wright. Yes, at first we thought it odd that someone would give a house a name, but why not?

This is the story of an American family that chose Prince Edward Island in 2002, and have been working since then toward a sustainable organic lifestyle for our home and business. Our goal is to chronicle our life on “the gentle island” month by month throughout the year with a special focus on the food of Prince Edward Island.

We invite you to share our stories, post some of your own, try our recipes and pass along your thoughts.