One of the best parts of looking for a job at the moment is having a couple spare moments to go grocery shopping and cook meals. I generally cook quite frequently, but the free time is allowing me to be a bit more creative with my meals. Despite being so busy lately that I haven’t even had a chance to sit down for longer than a couple minutes, I find myself always trying to at least make time to cook a nice dinner from scratch. I generally don’t make anything too fancy. My motto is quick to make, simple and tasty! And always using fresh local organic ingredients.

Above is the Panko and Pecan Encrusted Halibut I made last night. The crust has olive oil seasoned with ginger and green onions, a little chopped habanero pepper in the crust, and it is topped with fresh tomatoes over a bed of garlic ginger broccoli and served with yukon gold nugget potatoes. On a side note, the halibut was previously frozen but it is actually the halibut we caught when we went deep sea fishing in Tofino last summer.

Here’s what I call “The Meat Lovers Kitchen Sink“. This is definitely Allan’s favourite. It features 3 kinds of organic meats: bacon, pancetta, and chorizo sausage. The sauce is a homemade spicy tomato sauce and there’s a number of vegetables in there, including zucchini and peppers. The noodle there is a fresh tagliatelle pasta from Granville Island.

Here is my Tandoori Chicken with Green Curry Vegetables. I always try to find a way to make sure there is a large serving of vegetables with every meal, and curry sauce is one of the best ways to include them! The Tandoori Chicken is marinated and basted with coconut milk, lime juice, garlic, cumin, coriander, pepper, saffron and an indian blend of chilis and spices.

This is called “Heart Attack on a Plate“. Yummy big fresh pappardelle noodles served in an alfredo sauce made with heavy cream, parmigiano reggiano, and green onions. Mixed with my favourite of course… LOTS of double smoked bacon, and some spinach, mushrooms, and asparagas.

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On a non-food note, I’ve been enjoying Twitter very much lately. Just to clarify, I’m not planning on using this account for work purposes or anything, it’s just a life feed from yours truly when I’m in between blogging. http://twitter.com/VancityAllie

I’ll be posting photos/videos from the trip this past weekend to Sun Peaks. Also, this coming weekend I’ll be doing a little Valentine’s stint in Victoria and then up to Courtenay for the snowboarding trip to Mount Washington every year with Allan’s friends.

Usually I’m ahead of the curve when it comes to technology and new media… blogging, video games, ICQ, MSN, GMail, torrents, photo blogs, IRC, gadgets etc..

But this time I’m catching up… because I’m waaaaay behind… on Twitter. One of the companies I am interviewing with has using Twitter as part of the job description, so I thought maybe I’d get a head start by spending some time exploring the service.

Yes! I’ve finally created a Twitter account. http://twitter.com/VancityAllie

If you’d like to follow me, just hit up the link above. There’s not much content yet, but it’s a start.

I do have a question for you Twitter veterans… what are the advantages/disadvantages of making your Twitter feed private?

I had resisted Twitter for so long because I was worried it would consume all the time I usually set aside for blogging. So far I’m really enjoying it. It seems to me that Twitter can potentially take away from blogging time, or even the need to blog. What do you think?