Recipe, interrupted

Gifts From the Garden

 

Yesterday, on the way to our friends’ post-wedding brunch, I stopped at the local community garden to drop off some overly ripe compost. After gingerly emptying the stinky bags into the compost bins and rinsing off my hands – no one wants to show up at a party smelling of rotting food scraps – I paused for a moment. I picked two lavender blossoms and two sprigs of lovage flowers and divided them between my daughters as a gift for the newlyweds.

The lovage, in particular, made me smile. It seemed like ages ago that we had sat by a campfire and played a game where you guess the definitions of unfamiliar words. One of those had-to-be-there moments, but for my future husband and this future groom who were just beginning to know each other, it sealed the deal on their friendship. Together, they were completely in stitches as one read the other's definition of lovage: a ton of love. Just watching them on the brink of peeing in their pants from laughter was a joy.

My daughters delivered their little bouquets to the couple and we grown-ups indulged in a little reminiscing. The party spread out onto the terrace where a small potted vegetable garden was beginning to grow under the care of the bride and groom. Before I left the party, they gave me one of their homegrown radishes. I brought it home, photographed it, and without it ever having to undergo refrigeration, prepared and ate it. Leaves and all.

So to make a long story short (too late!) here’s what I made with it. They’re not recipes. I used what happened to be in my fridge, which wasn’t much, but luckily for me was just right.

Radish and salt on buttered bread. I had picked up a baguette on the way home. When I opened the fridge, I found a small nugget of Stilton and some fresh chives, along with their blossoms. With a light sprinkling of sea salt and a schmear of sweet butter, they all made for a beautiful and simple open-faced sandwich. If I didn’t have these ingredients, maybe I would have done radish, butter, and rye bread out of the freezer. If I didn’t have that, radish, butter and salt. I could have reduced it down to radish and salt or, ultimately, just radish and it would have been delicious.

Skillet sausage with onion, rhubarb, and radish greens. I chopped up the bright green leaves and tossed them in with browned chicken sausage, onions and rhubarb (which had been softened and mellowed by cooking it with a dash of salt, and a few teaspoons of sugar). The radish leaves needed just a minute or so in the heat before they were wilted, tender, and an even brighter green. Only the freshest radish leaves will perform this well. Store-bought radish leaves are often dried out and blemished and not worth eating.  But if you get radishes at a farm stand or luck out at the store with some nice-looking radish greens, cook them right away. You can simply add them as a supplement to other cooked greens. Even if you just have a small amount, the chopped greens make a fresh addition to soup, cooked grains, or a quick pasta dish.

Small gifts, but given with a ton of love. 

Recipe: Green Garlic and Jalapeno Pizza with Sprouted Wheat Berry Crust

I often use the basic pizza dough recipe in Mark Bittman’s How to Cook Everything. It’s really simple and reliable. But since I’ve been very curious about sprouted grains and beans these days, I thought I’d see how sprouted wheat berries would work here. I recently bought some Shiloh Farms organic sprouted whole wheat berries, which look a lot like coarse bulghur, and tossed them in with the flour. Fortunately, the experiment paid off – the crust had a pleasant, nubby texture and nutty flavor. Good thing. It would have been such a pity to spoil the topping with a bad crust.
 

Cooked green garlic has a sweet, garlicky flavor and are also a little reminiscent of leeks. They make a kind of monochromatic layer with the jalapenos under the smoked mozzarella, but the taste is packed with color.  I know that three jalapeno peppers sound like a lot. Once the seeds and ribs are removed though, and the peppers are further mellowed by cooking and the cream, they have a nice, not painful, amount of heat.

 

Makes one 16-inch pizza

Preparation time: 30 minutes, plus 2-hour rising time

 

For the crust:

2 ¼ cup all-purpose flour, more if needed

1 cup sprouted wheat berries

1 teaspoon Kosher salt

1 teaspoon yeast

3 tablespoons olive oil

For the topping:

2 tablespoons olive oil

3 cups chopped green garlic (clean and trim them as you would scallions or green onions)

3 jalapeno peppers, seeds and ribs removed and chopped

Kosher salt, to taste

¾ cup heavy cream

1 teaspoon lime juice

8 ounces smoked mozzarella, shredded (about 1 ½ cups)

 

1. In a food processor, pulse flour, sprouted wheat berries, salt, and yeast together for about 1 minute, until wheat berries are coarsely ground.
   
   
2. With the food processor running continuously, pour olive oil and 1 ¼ cups warm water in a steady stream through the feed tube. Process until the mixture comes together into a ball. Turn the dough out onto a floured surface and knead until smooth and round, adding flour if the dough is very sticky.
   
   
3. Cover the dough with a warm, damp towel and allow it to rise for about 2 hours in a warm spot. It won’t quite double in size, but should puff up a bit.
    
4. If you have a pizza stone, place it in the oven on the middle shelf. Preheat oven to 525°F.
    
5. In a sauté pan over medium heat, heat olive oil. Add garlic greens, peppers, and a dash of salt. Stir to combine. Cook until softened, about 5-7 minutes. Add cream and bring to a simmer. Turn off the heat, stir in lime juice and salt to taste.
   
   
6. Roll out the dough until it is about 1/8-inch thick or so. If using pizza stone, remove from oven and transfer rolled out dough onto it. Or transfer dough onto a baking sheet. Spread the vegetable/cream mixture on pizza dough. Sprinkle smoked mozzarella evenly on top.
   
   
7. Bake until cheese is bubbling and crust is nicely browned, 8-10 minutes. Serve hot or at room temperature. 
    
   

Technique: How to Quickly Trim a Head of Romaine for Salad

Here’s how to prepare a head of lettuce quickly for a salad. With this method, there’s no need for less fresh pre-cut bags of salad.

 

1. Cut of the very top of the lettuce head to remove the somewhat wilted and damaged tips.
   
2. Cut through the length of the lettuce, just above the root end to the top. Rotate 90 degrees and make second, similar cut (so that you’ve cut a ‘+’ into the cross-section of the lettuce.) If the head of lettuce is very thick, you may want to cut into it three times, to make more of a ‘*’ symbol.
   
3. Holding the head of lettuce steady and keeping all the leaves tight, slice the head of lettuce across beginning at the top, at about 1-inch intervals. Short, easy-to-eat sized strips of lettuce should fall away. Stop just short of the root end.
   
4. Wash the cut lettuce well with a salad spinner or colander. 
   

 

Recipe: Kale and Sundried Tomato Pesto

It was a proud motherly moment for me when my younger kid (often referred to as the ‘picky eater’) added kale to the list of foods she’s willing to eat. I’m probably over-invested in what my children eat but after almost five years of seeing vegetables vehemently – and sometimes violently – rejected, I’m so relieved that a world beyond bread and rice is becoming less offensive to her. Kale is also one of my favorite veggies, so I was eager to find more ways to incorporate it into our family meals.

A recipe with the words “pesto” and “sundried tomato” may seem like a complete 80s throwback but my daughter wasn’t even a glimmer in my eye then so it’s all new to her. Besides, I could call this a raw foods pesto, and here we are right back in the new millennium. Of course, none of this matters. It’s yummy, easy to make, and packed with nutrients.

I generally like to toast nuts before adding them to a dish, but this time I didn’t. I had some raw almonds that were so deliciously fruity and had that slightly bitter pure almond flavor, I decided they’d be perfect without the heat.

This pesto is terrific spread on crackers, added to sandwiches, or tossed with fresh pasta. I also like to stuff it under the skin of a chicken before roasting it. It keeps well in the fridge, with a little extra olive oil drizzled on top, for about a week.

 

Makes 2 cups

Preparation time: 10 minutes

 

3 cloves garlic, roughly chopped

¼ cup packed sundried tomatoes

½ cup raw almonds

¼ cup grated parmesan

Kosher salt, to taste

6 cups kale, ribs removed, roughly chopped

1 cup extra virgin olive oil

 

 

1. Place garlic, tomatoes, almonds, parmesan, and salt in the bowl of a food processor. Add as much kale as will comfortably fit and pulse several times. Scrape down the sides of the processor, add the remaining kale and continue pulsing until all the ingredients are well combined and chopped fine.  
   Ignore those walnuts in there. It was better when I made this with raw almonds.
   
   
2. With the food processor running continuously, slowly drizzle in the olive oil through the feeder tube until the consistency of the pesto has gotten finer and the oil is well incorporated.
   Time to add the oil.
   
   
3. Use immediately or store covered in the refrigerator until ready to use.

 

Recipe: Polenta with Sautéed Watercress

It has become clear to me as I write these posts is how much I love my greens and grains. And that I don’t write many meat-heavy recipes. I like to add small amounts of meat to my cooking, but in this dish, like in most of the others, you can skip the meat entirely or use a flavorful vegetarian substitute. Instead of the prosciutto here, lemon-pepper tofu strips or roughly chopped smoked almonds come to mind.

This was a very full and hearty bunch of local watercress that I practically jumped on at the food co-op. Though very tender, it was more stem-y, as you can see, than what you’d typically find in cultivated watercress. I was thrilled when my 5-year-old, who is just in the nascent stages of accepting leafy greens on her plate, declared that she liked the watercress in this dish. She did stay clear of those stems, however. Fine with me – the leaves have more of the vitamins anyway.

You may like this dish too, even if raw watercress tends to be to sharp for you. The pepperiness settles into a mellow brightness as the watercress cooks.

 

Preparation time:

Serves four

 

4 tablespoons olive oil

½ cup minced shallots

Kosher salt, to taste

1 cup coarsely ground cornmeal (possibly labeled as “polenta” or “corn grits”)

2 tablespoon minced garlic

7-8 cups watercress, roughly chopped

1 ounce thinly sliced prosciutto (optional)

1. Heat 2 tablespoons of olive oil in a medium saucepan over medium heat. When the oil is hot, add shallots and a pinch of salt. Cook, stirring occasionally, until softened, about 3-5 minutes.
    
2. Add 3 cups water and bring to a boil. Add a dash of salt and pour polenta in a steady stream while stirring. Reduce heat to low and cook, stirring frequently, until polenta is tender and very thick, about 10-12 minutes. If the polenta begins to get very thick and sticky before it is fully cooked, cover the saucepan to contain the steam.  
3. Preheat oven to 450°F. Spread polenta into a 10-inch tart form or 13- x 9-inch baking sheet. The polenta will slice more neatly later if you allow it to cool completely before moving on to the next step, but if you don’t have time, just move right on ahead. Bake until lightly browned and crisp on the top surface, about 15 minutes.
   
   
4. While polenta is baking, heat a sauté pan over medium-high heat. Add remaining 2 tablespoons of olive oil and, when oil is hot, stir in garlic. Toss in watercress and a dash of salt and cook until leaves are wilted and stems are tender, about 2 minutes.
   
5. Top the polenta with watercress. Garnish, if desired, with prosciutto. Serve immediately. 
   

Recipe: Miniature Spinach Tarts

My sister called me the other day on her way to the grocery store. Her in-laws were arriving in town in about an hour. She wanted to welcome them with a little something to eat and thought of these spinach tarts I had made a while back. I wished I had posted this recipe online already but it was easy enough to talk her through over the phone.

If you keep a box of frozen spinach and a sheet of frozen puff pastry in the freezer you can make this hors d’oeuvres on very little notice.  There are a few other ingredients as well, but in a pinch you can substitute the feta cheese with any cheese you have in the fridge and use sour cream, crème fraiche, or even cream cheese in place of the cream.

 

Makes 24 mini spinach tarts

Preparation time: 25 minutes

 

1 sheet frozen puff pastry (I usually use Pepperidge Farm, but there are excellent all-butter ones out there), roughly 9 ½ by 10 ½ inches and a little more than 1/8 inch thick

1 well-packed cup cooked spinach, with all excess water squeezed out (this equals one package of frozen spinach, defrosted and drained of all excess water)

¼ cup crumbled feta or ricotta salata

2 tablespoons cream

1 egg

Freshly ground black pepper and Kosher salt, to taste (keeping in mind the saltiness of feta if you are using it)

Zest of half lemon

A few gratings of nutmeg

 

1. Preheat oven to 375°F. Allow to defrost slightly at room temperature while you prepare spinach filling.
   
2. In a food processor, pulse together spinach, cheese, cream, egg, salt, lemon zest, and nutmeg until well combined and lightly pureed.
   
3. When the puff pastry has softened slightly but is still quite cold, unfold it and roll it out slightly ib a non-stick or lightly floured surface just to thin it out a bit, until it is roughly 10 x 13 to 14 inches. Cut the puff pastry into 24 squares. If some of them are a little narrow, don’t worry about it; they are easy enough to stretch out by hand as you fill the muffin pan.
   
   
   
4. Press a cut square/rectangle gently into each of the cups of a miniature muffin pan. Make sure the pastry dough is pressed against the inner surfaces of the muffin cup but without pressing overly hard into the dough. (If you press too hard and start to warm up the dough a lot, the tarts will be more difficult to remove when they are cooked. They don't have to look perfect, though. If the corners stick out at odd angles or the dough doesn't come right up to the top edge, that's fine. Once they puff up, they'll look great.)
    
    
5. With two small spoons, place a teaspoon or so of the filling into each of the puff pastry cups.
   
   
6. Bake until puff pastry is golden brown, about 15-17 minutes. Remove from oven and let tarts cool in the pan for a few minutes before removing them. They should come out very easily, but you can use a small offset spatula to help loosen any stubborn tarts. 
   
   

 

Recipe: Spinach Matzo Latkes

I devoted a good portion of yesterday to preparing a Passover Seder meal – that’s my excuse for not putting up a Monday post. However, the quickest, easiest, and most last-minute addition to the meal gave me the material to write today’s post.

I had matzo meal that I wanted to use but the only thing I really knew to do with it was make matzo balls (that’s tonight’s dinner). Then I came across this recipe for matzo meal latkes on Serious Eats. To make them a little more savory and vitamin-packed, I added onions and spinach. (I also put in a little more matzo meal and took out the sugar.) They were such a cinch to make – I just mixed all the ingredients together in a large measuring cup and fried the batter up like regular pancakes. And the texture was just right, not at all chewy or dense but with enough substance to serve as a starchy side to the braised short ribs I had prepared.

 

Serves 4

Preparation time: 15 minutes

 

3 eggs, lightly beaten

¼ cup pureed cooked spinach, drained well

½ cup minced onion

¾ cup water

¾ cup matzo meal

1 teaspoon Kosher salt

Grapeseed oil for frying, about 3 tablespoons

 

1. Blend together eggs, spinach, onion, water, matzo meal, and salt in a mixing bowl (or large measuring cup).
   
2. Heat a skillet over medium heat and add about 2 tablespoons of oil, enough to provide a thick coating to the bottom of the pan.
   
   
3. When the oil is hot, ladle the batter onto the skillet, forming pancakes about 3 inches in diameter. Flip when they are lightly browned on the bottom, after about 4 minutes. Brown on the second side and transfer to a warmed serving plate.
   
4. Continue with remaining batter, adding oil to skillet as necessary. 

 

Recipe: Avocado, Grapefruit, and Watercress Salad

I like to eat this salad as a bridge between winter and spring produce. The avocado and grapefruit thrive throughout the winter in the warmer parts of the U.S. And the watercress is just beginning to come up in cooler parts (though it is also grown hydroponically throughout the year and throughout the country).

There are a lot of balancing flavors here: smoky paprika, creamy avocado, sweet and acidic red grapefruit, and bitter watercress. As the days and nights begin to equalize, isn’t it refreshing to find some balance in our food, as well?

 

Serves four as a first-course or side dish

Preparation time: 25 minutes

 

1 medium avocado (Hass variety is good for a creamy dressing), sliced thinly

1 medium red grapefruit, segmented, plus 1-2 tablespoons of the juice reserved

1 tablespoon strained or Greek-style plain yogurt

½ teaspoon whole grain mustard

1 teaspoon white wine vinegar

¼ teaspoon, or to taste, Kosher salt

Freshly ground black pepper, to taste

3 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil

About 3 cups tender watercress leaves, washed and dried

Pinch smoked paprika

 

1. Toss the avocado slices and grapefruit segments in a bowl together, setting aside ¼ of the avocado for the dressing. The acid from the grapefruit will help prevent the avocado from browning.
   
   
   
2. In a small bowl or jar (I like using a jar – it works well with my immersion blender and also makes for easy storage of leftover dressing), combine the reserved ¼ avocado, 1 tablespoon reserved grapefruit juice, yogurt, mustard, vinegar, salt, and pepper. If you are using a whisk, mash the avocado well before proceeding. If you are using a blender, this is not necessary. Gradually drizzle in the olive oil, whisking or blending vigorously to emulsify it well. Adjust seasoning to taste.
   
   
3. Arrange the watercress around the perimeter of your serving plate. Fan the avocado and grapefruit in an alternating pattern on the plate. If some of the grapefruit segments are a little thick, slice them in half lengthwise.
   
   
4. Just before serving, drizzle the dressing over the salad. (Note: if the dressing is very thick, you can thin it out with a little additional grapefruit juice.)
   
   
5. Dust the salad with smoked paprika. 

 

Kale, Two Ways: Caesar Salad and Kale Chips

Kale is one of my favorite vegetables. From a practical standpoint, it is sturdy, stores well, and is available throughout the winter months. But mostly, I love the taste of it. It’s got some of the earthy heartiness of cabbage, but with added green brightness. Kind of like spinach or chard, but it doesn’t break down when cooked or leave that spinach-y residue on your tongue.

Here are two of my favorite ways to prepare kale: one’s raw and one’s baked.  You don’t really need a strict recipe for baked kale chips – scroll down for the procedure in the post below. The Caesar salad recipe is right here and is so delicious you may convert non-kale eaters with it.

The nice thing about using kale in a salad is that it doesn’t totally deflate and start losing its structure as soon as it is dressed. In fact, if the salad is dressed slightly in advance, the kale softens up a bit and the flavors meld nicely.

 

Serves 4

Preparation time: 15 minutes

 

For Croutons:

8 ¼-inch thick slices day-old baguette

1 clove garlic

2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

Kosher salt, to taste

For Salad:

1 tablespoon white wine vinegar

2 teaspoons lemon juice

1 teaspoon Dijon mustard

¼ teaspoon Kosher salt

¼ teaspoon finely grated raw garlic

optional: 1/8 to ¼ teaspoon anchovy paste

1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil, more as needed

5 cups washed and dried kale, ribs removed and leaves cut into ½-inch strips

Zest of ½ lemon

¼ cup grated Parmigiano Reggiano

1. Prepare the croutons. Preheat oven to 350°F. Cut the garlic clove in half and rub the cut side on both sides of the bread slices. Brush the bread with olive oil and sprinkle with salt. Place on a baking sheet and bake for about 5-7 minutes on each side, or until crisp and toasted. Set aside.
   
2. Prepare the dressing. You can use an immersion blender or a whisk to prepare the salad dressing. If using an immersion blender, combine vinegar, lemon juice, mustard, salt, garlic, and anchovy paste (if using) in a jar or cup just wide enough to accommodate the blender. If using a whisk, combine these ingredients in a small mixing bowl.
3. Whisk above ingredients together to combine well. Gradually, beginning with a few drops, blend in the olive oil. After the first tablespoon is incorporated, add the remaining olive oil in a slow steady stream with the immersion blender on high speed, or whisking vigorously. Taste and add more oil if needed.
   
4. Place the kale in a large bowl. Drizzle the dressing over it and toss salad with two large spoons to coat the kale evenly.
5. Toss the lemon zest and grated cheese together. Sprinkle over salad and toss gently to combine.
6. Transfer salad to a serving bowl. Garnish with croutons. Serve immediately or prepare up to 2 hours in advance and refrigerate until serving.

 

 

Eat Your Greens: Baked Kale Chips

This is one of the few greens I can get my picky five-year-old to eat. Calling them chips helps. It’s an apt name though; they really are very crispy when they come out of the oven and just as addictive as any chips out of a bag. Unlike the Caesar salad above, though, these need to be eaten right away. Leftover kale chips get soggy.

I find that lacinato kale works best here because of its flatter shape, but you can use any variety of kale.

You don't really need a recipe, these basic instructions should do it. I usually use one store-bought bunch of kale per batch (approximately 5 cups once you've torn the leaves up).

Preheat the oven to 275°F. A convection oven is ideal, but you can use a conventional oven.

Wash and dry the kale, and remove the ribs. Tear the leaves up into chip-sized pieces (they will shrink as they bake). Make sure they are very dry. This will ensure a good crunch.

Spread them out on a baking sheet. The less crowded they are, the crispier they will be.

Drizzle olive oil over the leaves and toss to coat with an even, thin coat of oil. Sprinkle with kosher salt.  If you’d like, you can also toss in some red pepper flakes.

Bake for 20-minutes or until the kale is crispy and very lightly browned in some spots. Sometimes I sprinkle some freshly grated parmesan over the chips as they come out of the oven, but they are delicious without.

Serve immediately.