Eric Akis

6 days ago | timescolonist.com | Eric Akis

If you like sweet- and sour-tasting dishes and Italian-style foods, consider making chicken scarpariello, scarpariello being the Italian word for “shoemaker.”Some sources, citing lore, rather than fact, say it’s called that because when you eat the chicken its bones might protrude from your mouth, like a shoemaker’s tacks might from theirs while they are working.

1 week ago | timescolonist.com | Eric Akis

If you like burgers and French-style food, today’s recipe should appeal, because it combines the two in one delicious package. To make it, grilled beef patties are topped with wine/peppercorn-flavoured barbecue sauce, French-style cheese and sautéed mushrooms and shallots. The patties were then set on mayonnaise-spread brioche buns topped with butter lettuce and crispy bacon. The last step is to set on the top buns and garnish each burger with a skewer of cornichon, small French-style pickles.

1 week ago | timescolonist.com | Eric Akis

Fresh B.C. spot prawns are in season and when first available my wife and I like to have a generous feast of them. They are pricey, but they are such a sumptuous treat, and only available a few weeks, that we can’t resist that indulgence. That said, when we inevitably get another craving for them, we will adjust how we prepare them to a method that requires fewer prawns to sate us.

2 weeks ago | timescolonist.com | Eric Akis

The cost of food in a range of categories has definitely gone up the past few years and that includes meat. It’s for that reason that when I get a craving for something protein-rich, such as beef, I’ll often opt to use a smaller, more budget-friendly amount of it. For example, rather than buying two steaks and serving one per person, I’ll only buy one of them, weighing about 227 to 250 grams.

2 weeks ago | timescolonist.com | Eric Akis

If you love asparagus, this is a wonderful time of year for you. Fresh B.C.-grown spears are now in season and available at farm markets and grocery stores specializing in selling our province’s produce. Asparagus can be used in many delicious ways. Appetizers, soups, salads, egg dishes and stir-fries are just a few of the possibilities. Another appealing option is to use it in a savoury tart, which is what I did for today’s recipe.