I'm back (with a late spring salad)

After many weeks of silence (and lack of inspiration at home), I have finally broken the silence (and the dry spell)! Last time we spoke, I just started a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture). I never did get back to you about my experience. Stay tuned!

This lovely in-between-spring-and-summer evening, I'd like to share my recent creation! Like I alluded to earlier, I have been a bit bored lately with my cooking. My remedy? Go to my favoriteblog and look up new ingredients! I decided to branch out with grains and vinegar. I will talk about grains more later.

Vinegar? Isn't that a little boring or basic? Perhaps, but it was severely underutilized in my kitchen! One day I realized I had a decent bottle of balsamic vinegar and Chinese cooking wine (which in my mind is pretty much like vinegar) sitting, just sitting there, in the pantry (next to my olive oil, no less). What a shame, I thought. So I just started adding it to things. First, the Chinese cooking wine went into stir-fried bok choy (thank you CSA for introducing me to bok choy!), and the balsamic into a vinaigrette for salad with chickpeas.

So the next time I went to Trader Joe's, I decided to investigate the vinegar section. Holy smokes, there are some delicious looking vinegars! I decided upon the orange muscat champagne vinegar. Once I opened the bottle, catching a sniff of its sweet scent, I knew was going to have fun. With this and my CSA basket in hand, I was inspired to make this beauty of a salad.

Late spring salad with orange-mint vinaigrette

3-4 cups washed and torn lettuce leaves (I mixed romaine, red leaf, and iceberg)

1/2 cup walnut pieces, toasted

For the vinaigrette:

4 strawberries, sliced

1 small blood orange, peeled and pulled into segments

3 mint leaves, crushed and chopped

1 shallot, thinly sliced

a few splashes of orange champagne vinegar (or whatever you have that's similar)

a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil

pinch salt and pepper

1. Prepare vinaigrette and let sit for at least 5-10 minutes.

2. Toss vinaigrette and toasted walnuts with salad and enjoy!

Notes: No blood orange? No problem. Any small, sweet orange or tangerine will do. Also, the shallot could just as well be an equivalent amount of red onion. I'm sure this could be adapted for other kinds of fruit and nuts depending on what you have on hand as well.

CSA Basket #1

I just joined a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) for the first time. Full of excitement, I brought home my first basket today. Can I say wow? I'm a bit overwhelmed with produce now! Here's a list of what items were in it:

Rosemary

Kale (kale)

Butter lettuce

Broccoli (tiny)

Red romaine (huge)

Red lettuce

Parsley - flat leaf and curly

Swiss Chard (huge)

Carrots

Celery

Beets

Green onions

6 small russet potatoes

2 large sweet potatoes

2 meyer lemons

5 apples

1 grapefruit

2 huge avocados

11 oranges/tangerines

2 kiwis

I would like to do some cost comparison to the same quantities and quality of these items from the grocery store. I say quality because cost is not my reason for doing this. It's more about getting food that's fresh and supports local farmers. However, even good things shouldn't be done if you can't afford them (cough health care cough). I have a feeling that so far, though, it's going to come out about the same. In which case, CSA you are amazing!

Confetti Soup or, How to Use up Thanksgiving leftovers

Despite the fact that there were only three of us for Thanksgiving this year, my kitchen pal and I still managed to cook up a storm! And thankfully I love leftovers. But almost a week after Thanksgiving, I was getting a little bored with eating turkey and stuffing, and most of the other dishes were already finished off. Plus, I will be honest and say I was scared to look into my fridge and pantry for fear of all the odds and ends that were left over. Things like that half a head of cauliflower since I halved my cauliflower dish, or the half a leek, or the all the potatoes and sweet potatoes because I bought too many, or the heavy cream carton which was too big but a smaller size would have been to small, you get the idea.

My advice to anyone who has lots of odds and ends: make a list. I have a white board in the kitchen and I wrote down everything perishable and then starred the most important items to use right away. I don't know why--perhaps its because I read so many recipes--but something about seeing the names of all the items in my fridge is just what I need for inspiration. It's like solving a math problem, but without those darned numbers! After staring for a few moments, an idea started emerging. Then it hit me like an epiphany: soup! A ton of these things I have leftover could be used to make soup! And if you know me well, you know I am totally in love with soup.

So without any further ado, here is my Thanksgiving leftover soup. Every ingredient was either a odd, and end, or a little something from the pantry. It's a little random, I confess, but its and honest to goodness reflection of the variety in my kitchen!

Confetti Soup

Ingredients:

handful each green split peas and yellow split peas

half head of cauliflower

2 medium potatoes

1 medium sweet potato

1 carrot

half can of water chestnuts (yes, Kira, I even used your water chestnuts)

2 inch piece of Spanish chorizo, finely diced (trust me, a little goes a long way)

diced leftover turkey, your choice on the amount (dark meat)

chicken broth and water to cover everything so far

1 large onion, thinly sliced

1 leak (white part only), thinly sliced

1 clove garlic (in retrospect may have doubled)

fresh parsley, rosemary, sage finely chopped, to taste

thyme (would have used fresh if I had it)

salt and pepper to taste

heavy cream (optional)

1. Start by simmering the peas in chicken broth and water for about 10 minutes. Then add the cauliflower, potatoes, sweet potatoes, carrot, water chestnuts, chorizo, and turkey. Add more liquid if necessary to cover vegetables. Simmer covered for 15 minutes or until the peas are done.

2. Meanwhile, saute the onions and leeks in olive oil over medium low heat until caramelized (about 20 minutes). Then add the herbs and garlic and cook for 30-60 seconds more and turn off heat.

3. When the vegetable/meat mixture is done, stir in the onion/herb mixture. Add a little heavy cream if you like to add a touch of richness and sweetness.

This ended up making a rather large pot of soup. And the good news is it tastes delicious!

The best thing I learned from this is that sweet potatoes and chorizo go beautifully together! There's something about the richness and spicyness of the chorizo that play just right against the earthy yet sweet qualities of the sweet potato. Now I'll have to think about other ways to combine the two. :)

Couscous lunch

Stop reading this and go buy some organic whole wheat couscous right now!

Waiting....

Waiting....

Waiting....

All right, I assume you're back with the couscous in hand now. Now you can experience the amazing speed and deliciousness of this amazingly fast and delicious product! If you're not familiar with couscous, they are tender minuscule balls of wheat joy. All you do is boil some liquid, add the couscous, cover, and turn off the heat. Five minutes later and it's ready! Now that's fast!

And because this post wouldn't be complete without a recipe, here's what I just made for lunch with it:

Part 1: make couscous (subbing stock if you have any; I used free range chicken broth)

Part 2:

Saute in some butter 1 small thinly sliced onion and 1 julienned carrot.

Stir in a couple/few handfuls of spinach and a small handful of sprouts. After spinach welts a bit, turn off heat.

Top with Rogan Josh seasoning (or similar blend), golden raisins, toasted pine nuts (can easily sub another nut), and grated Parmesan cheese.

Part 3: Mix together the couscous and veggie mixture and devour!

YUMMMMMM!!!

Sorry, I just couldn't resist typing up one of my sudden kitchen inspirations, sloppy and all. :)

Ralph's Peanut Butter Oatmeal Cookies

Now that we've featured a recipe that my mom created, it's time to celebrate one from Lynn, my mother-in-law. But first it requires a little background on the father-in-law, Ralph.

Ralph loves a good oatmeal. And what, might you ask, is a good oatmeal? I must say mine goes something like apples, cinnamon, honey, walnuts, and milk. Fairly conventional. But Ralph's oatmeal is the most unique kind I've heard of. Not to sweet, full of healthy nuts and seeds, and entirely his own.

So his wife decided to try creating a cookie that had all the elements of his oatmeal. And the result is not only unique but absolutely delicious! Featuring sunflower seeds, raisins, peanut butter, and flax seed, it's one you don't want to miss.

Ralph's Peanut Butter Oatmeal Cookies

(adapted from here)

Note: I'm not a fan of raisins, so I tried doing half with raisins and half with chocolate chips. To my amazement, not only did I like the version with raisins, but I thought it was significantly better! Go figure.

In a medium bowl, mix together:

2 cups quick cooking oatmeal

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt (reduce if using salted sunflower seeds)

2 Tbl ground flaxseed (optional but highly recommended)

In another bowl, mix at medium speed until smooth:

1 cup creamy peanut butter (both peanut only and the Skippy kind work)

3/4 cup butter

Beat in:

1 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup white sugar

Then beat in:

2 eggs

1 tsp vanilla extract

Stir in the flour mixture, then add:

1-2 cups raisins

1/2 cup unsalted toasted sunflower seeds

Chill dough until it can be shaped into 1" balls (about 1-1/2 hours). When ready, shape into 1" balls and place on an ungreased cookie sheet; flatten slightly with a wet fork. Bake at 325 degrees for 8-12 minutes, until very lightly browned.

Yield: 5 dozen

Lynn's notes: A 1" cookie scoop works really well for making the balls of dough. It doesn't even have to be too firm. Ground flaxseed and toasted sunflower seeds can be found for a good price at Trader Joe's stores. They are the only place I have found toasted unsalted sunflower seeds.

Banana Walnut Chocolate Chunk Cookies

This recipe comes courtesy of Martha Stewart herself. I found this on line the other day and decided to make the cookies as a welcome home treat for my co-worker who just returned from Greece. I am happy to report they received multiple stamps of approval!

- 1 cup(s) all-purpose flour
- 1/2 cup(s) whole-wheat flour
- 1 teaspoon(s) coarse salt
- 1/2 teaspoon(s) baking soda
- 3/4 cup(s) (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
- 1/2 cup(s) granulated sugar
- 1/2 cup(s) packed light-brown sugar
- 1 large egg
- 1 1/2 teaspoon(s) pure vanilla extract
- 1/2 cup(s) (about 1 large) mashed ripe banana
- 1 cup(s) old-fashioned rolled oats
- 8 ounce(s) semisweet chocolate, coarsely chopped into 1/4-inch chunks
- 1/2 cup(s) (about 2 ounces) coarsely chopped walnuts, toasted


Directions:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Whisk together flours, salt, and baking soda in a small bowl; set aside. Put butter and sugars into the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment; mix on medium speed until pale and fluffy. Reduce speed to low. Add egg and vanilla; mix until combined. Mix in banana. Add flour mixture; mix until just combined. Stir in oats, chocolate chunks, and walnuts.

Using a 1 1/2-inch ice cream scoop, drop dough onto baking sheets lined with parchment paper, spacing about 2 inches apart. Bake cookies, rotating sheets halfway through, until golden brown and just set, 12 to 13 minutes. Let cool on sheets on wire racks 5 minutes. Transfer cookies to wire racks; let cool completely. Cookies can be stored in airtight containers up to 2 days.

What my mom made for dinner

My mom is my inspiration for cooking and baking! Growing up, as busy as she was as a single mom raising two kids and often working multiple jobs, she still managed to make dinner almost every night. Not to mention her amazing baking around Christmas time! I should write up another post on that sometime. :) Even though my brother and I could be picky, she did her best to introduce us to whole grains (it took until recently to like them), vegetables, fruits (these I had no trouble liking, especially when it was something from the backyard!), and unsweetened cereal (well she tried, but I sneaked sugar onto it anyway). But I thank her for her hard work and giving a solid foundation!

So today I'd like to feature a dish that she just created. I'm not sure what to call it, "Mom's curried chickpea dish"? Or the not very descriptive but accurate "What I made for dinner" which is what she said upon first telling me about it. Well, whatever the title, this is a tasty, healthful dish that is sure to please everyone!

"What I made for dinner" in my mom's words:

Prepare white or brown Jasmine rice or couscous with chicken or vegetable broth (I used low sodium chicken broth and didn't add additional salt)

Saute lightly in olive oil
-1 yellow squash sliced
-1 red bell pepper cut into strips
-1 small red onion chopped
-1 carrot cut into somewhat thin 2-inch strips

Add to veggies and stir:

-chili pepper flakes (I used about 1/2 tsp)
-kosher salt (1 used about 1/4 tsp)
-black pepper (I used about 1/4 tsp)
-curry (I used a mixture of yellow and red curry, started with 1/4 tsp, but added mo9re to taste)
-cinnamon (3 quick dashes)
-lemon juice (I started with 2 tablespoons then added more to taste)

Mix in rice or couscous (I used 2 cups of white jasmine loosely measured-don't pack into cup).
Mix in 1/2 can rinsed garbanzo beans.

Serve with feta cheese sprinkled on top.

Note: I think that fresh chopped cilantro added at the end would be a nice addition (but I didn't have any).

Love, Mom

~

Notes from my mom:

I made this recipe again using brown jasmine rice and black beans instead of garbanzo. It came out good except for the fact that I accidentally cooked the veggies too long which wasn't that great. Make sure that you do a quick stir fry only so that the onions are a bit soft but everything else is still crisp. Also, 1/4 tsp chili pepper flakes puts in on the spicier side. You might want to try less to start.

My notes:

Use the vegetable broth and skip the cheese to make this vegan.

I think I used more garbanzo beans (I started with the dry, so I can't say for sure), which I recommend.

Also good with brown basmati rice.

Enjoy!