O Canada

It's an emerging tradition in our household that we celebrate the start of the Olympics with food from the host country. This officially started in 2008, with sesame noodles to kick off the Beijing Olympics. I don't remember doing anything specific for Torino in 2006, but then again, we eat a lot of pizza and pasta so it's possible.

So here it is, 2010, the Winter Games are in Vancouver, and I have no idea what would be considered Canadian food. The problem, I think, is that like the United States, Canada is a melting pot of cultures and it is as hard to identify a quintessentially Canadian dish as it is to name one that is strictly American. To make it more difficult, I wanted something from the western provinces to keep as close to the Vancouver theme as possible. This ruled out the only dishes I could think of -- tourtiere and maple syrup pie -- because they were from Quebec and too far east.

After trawling the Internet, I came to a few conclusions: our entree might have to rely on indigenous ingredients (something like bison burgers); fiddlehead ferns are probably unattainable in the Mid-Atlantic states; and if I wanted a truly Canadian dish, I needed to focus on desserts. Desserts like Nanaimo bars, a three-layer no-bake treat that not only originated in British Columbia, but made an Ontarian friend's mouth water when I mentioned I was thinking of making them. Maybe this was a quintessentially Canadian dish.



I started out crushing some graham crackers -- I needed 10 to get the required 1 1/4 c. -- and then chopping the almonds in the food processor. Chopping nuts is always tricky, because if I go too fast I end up with nut paste, but careful pulsing yielded excellent results this time.

I also added a cup of shredded coconut and set it aside.






Then I melted a stick of butter, 1/4 c. sugar, and 5 Tbsp. of cocoa powder in my makeshift double boiler. I don't own a real double boiler, so I usually stack a bowl or a small saucepan on top of another small saucepan and it does the trick. Eventually, I'll get a real one, but this works pretty well.

Next, I needed to combine the melted chocolate with a beaten egg. I followed the advice of The Eclectic Cook, who suggested adding the chocolate to the egg instead of the other way around to avoid curdling. I was still a little worried about whether the egg would be heated enough, so I added a little melted chocolate to warm the egg and then returned it to the makeshift double boiler. This was a mistake: It didn't curdle so much as it mysteriously separated, and after some cursing I scrapped it and started again. This time, I added all the mixture to the egg and used a thermometer to check it was at a safe temperature to proceed. It did make a nice custardy chocolate mix (which also tasted excellent).


Said custardy chocolate mix was then combined with the graham crackers crumbs, finely chopped almonds and coconut. This smelled great, kind of like Girl Scout Samoas.

It also turned into a nice, thick dough, which pressed so easily into an 8 x 8 baking dish. So easily, in fact, that there wasn't any left over to sample.

On to the second layer. I was at first baffled: I had it in my head that this was a custard-like layer, probably because one of the ingredients is 2 Tbsp. of vanilla custard powder (or pudding mix, in the States). But I wasn't thinking straight. Because what do you get from a stick of butter, roughly 3 Tbsp. cream, pudding mix and 2 c. icing (confectioner's) sugar? Holy buttercream, Batman!

I'm not crazy about frostings with lots of confectioner's sugar, so I had some doubts as I spread the buttercream across the base. Keith and Alex, however, were busy licking the frosting off the beaters and assuring me that it was very good.

The last step was to melt 4 oz. of semisweet chocolate with 2 Tbsp. of butter and pour that on top of the buttercream layer, then throw the whole thing in the fridge to chill. Some recipes said for an hour, others said for several. I went with several.

THE VERDICT: An excellent, tasty combination of flavors. I couldn't taste the confectioner's sugar at all. The bottom layer may have smelled like Samoas, but it tasted even better. Four thumbs up. And, when the kids weren't looking this morning, I snuck another one for breakfast. A gold medal winner, indeed.