Cooking is Awesome

Hey there again fellow bloggers.  I come to you today with a food offering.  That's right, a food blog.  I decided to take inspiration from a movie I recently saw called Julie and Julia, where a lady would make a recipe book over the course of the next few months and would prepare every recipe in that book.  Containing a few fictional and quite unnecessary plot additions that somewhat turned me off the movie, it turned out to be a solid flick.  But, this isn't a movie review blog... it's a food blog. 

Every week (well hopefully every week) I will be making a recipe and sharing it with all of you.  This week I made a recipe I learnt from working the past year as a food prep, and it's an apple and oka cheese strudel. Its the perfect sized appetizer if you want to impress your woman/man that looks fancy enough to generate a few "wow"s yet simple enough and cost effective enough to cost only around $20 for supplies and yeilds 5-6 studels.

Here's what you'll need:
2 cups Button Mushrooms
2 cups Cremini Mushrooms
1 cup Granny Smith Apple
3/4 cup Leek
1 tbsp dried Basil
1 1/2 tbsp dried Oregano
2 tsp Pureed Garlic
1 package of Filo Pastry
Oka Cheese
1 tbsp Canola Oil
1 tsp Butter

Start of by roughly chopping both types of mushrooms into bite sized pieces. The great thing about this recipe is that you don't have to use a certain type of mushroom, whatever you have will work.  The first time I made this at home I didn't have Cremini's and instead used Mini Portabllo, but anything you have will work. Core and peel the apples and roughly chop to slightly smaller than the mushrooms.  Slice the leek fine but be sure to clean them before use.  The first time I worked with leeks I just thought you chopped and used them, and then my mushroom tapanad tasted girty with sand.  So I thew that out before the chef's saw what I did...just clean your leeks.  Heat oil in a large saute pan.  Add butter then leeks.  After 30 seconds or so (just until the leeks begin to lose their bright white colour, add mushrooms and apple mixture.  Cook until the apples are halfway cooked through (still have somewhat of a crunch) then add garlic, basil and oregano.  Remove from heat and store covered in a fridge until mixture is cool, if the mixture is hot then the filo pastry will turn to mush, and no one likes mushy filo. No one.  When cooled, prepare the filo pastry for use: take a sheet (storing the rest of the sheets under a damp towel so they will not become dry), using a pastry brush, bursh butter as to cover the surface. Place mushroom mixture in the bottom half middle (did that make sense? I think it did....) of the filo as well as as much cheese as you want to add.  I usually place a lot and you probably want to do the same. Wrap by folding the right and left sides over the mixture and rolling to the far end of the sheet.  Brush butter on the top and score it to help quicken the cooking process.

WHEWW! This is my first food recipe/blog ever but I hope it was clear enough.  I'll have pictures of my beautiful creation up as soon as I can.  Maybe my next reciepe will be shorter but if anyone has a recipe they would like to share, I love to cook and will give it a try.  Maybe your recipe will be on the blog! Lucky you.