Christmas Fruit Cake

We had sampled some traditional fruit cake at the christmas market last week, and it was so delicious that we decided to buy some for my parents for Christmas!  These are some pics of the packaged cake...

Balzac's Café - Distillery District

These are a few extra shots I took while having some yummy hot chocolate at Balzac's Café, during our visit to the Christmas Market!

Toronto Christmas Market

Today, we spent the afternoon at Lowe's Christmas Market at the Distillery District in Toronto!  It's basically a street market with stalls selling traditional european products (local and handcrafted) as well as specialty beer, bakery treats, and a variety of food (including traditional oktoberfest sausages, hot chocolate, pretzels, baked goods, french canadian poutine, etc).  There was also a big Christmas tree set up next to a stage with carollers singing every hour.

At first, we strolled through the market and looked around (it wasn't as big as I hoped it would be, so in that respect, I was a little disappointed), then listened to a few songs the carollers were singing.  We were verry hungry as it was lunch time, and couldn't find a proper restaurant (which served something other than paninis, pasta or grills which seemed to be all there was there), so we ended up getting some Poutine from one of the stalls; it was sooo good!  After that, we visited one of the stalls selling european baked goods, where we sampled some fruit cake :)  At the end of our visit, we stopped by the Balzac café and drank some yummy hot chocolate!

As promised, here are the photos of the traditional european style market and decorations around the distillery district.  Also, you can check out a few videos of the christmas market here, which I will be uploading on my youtube page.

The Christmas Market is open from Dec 2nd - Dec 18... for more info about the market and the Toronto Distillery District: http://www.torontochristmasmarket.com/  and http://www.thedistillerydistrict.com/

More pics to come of Balzac's Café and the Christmas Cake we bought :)

Done and Done!

I'm done with my Italian course for this semester!  The exam was last night, and hopefully I did well... I still have my text books and notes all over the bed, and I've been thinking in Italian for the past week! lol  

My favourite poster in my room... A bella Venezia (hope to be there one day!)

I also had my 3rd/4th driving lesson today, which went much better than my first... I think I'm getting more comfortable with this car (at first I wasn't used to how sensitive the gas pedal was :S ).

I guess this was another one of those boring posts, but I will be going to the Christmas Market this week and then I'll have lots of nice pics to share with you :)  Hope you're having a good week! 

La guida!

Oggi, ho avuto la mia prima lezione di guida in Canada!  Sono stata un po' nervosa ma quando ho cominciato, sono stata più tranquilla e veramente era divertente!  Però, guidare nella città non è facile perché ci sono molti pedoni, molti automobile, e molti segni... devo guardare molte cose in una volta!

(from drivingschooldirectory.com)

Comunque, sono contenta che ho finito la prima lezione e adesso devo aspettare per la seconda!  Anche, ho l'esame d'italiano la settimana prossima quindi sono occupato e devo studiare molto... mi dispiace se non scrivo molto per il blog, ma ho molte cose da fare.  Sarò libera dopo l'esame!
(Sedici giorni per il Natale! :D)

from blogschuolaleonardo.com

Salmon Fish Cakes

This was our dinner a couple of weeks ago (I think!), and I had taken pictures of it to put on the blog, then I completely forgot about it! :S oops!  Anyway, here it is now (lol); a simple baby spinach salad on the side of salmon potato cakes and a yoghurt dip to go with it.  It was my first time making a fish cake, and it turned out pretty well, although it might not be the traditional way to make a fish cake.

From what I can remember, I first baked two salmon filets in the oven, and boiled sweet potatoes to be used to make a mash (with spring onions, some half and half cream, an egg, and spices).  I then mixed in the baked salmon (which I flaked into pieces) and formed them into cakes.  I placed these on a baking tray, sprinkled bread crumbs on top and sprayed with some olive oil.   These were baked for around 20 mins.

For the yoghurt dip, I mixed low fat plain yoghurt with dried mint (or finely chopped fresh mint), and finely chopped cucumbers - delicious! The salad was simply baby spinach, olive oil and lemon juice.  (Don't forget to season everything with salt and pepper, to your liking!)