Good Real Food

It is officially grilling season! Our dinners have taken a turn from kitchen cooking to outside-as -much-as-possible meals. D built this amazing little sitting nook in the back of our yard under a tree where the birds like to hustle and flow, and I have been sitting back here in contemplative bliss many evenings this past week. Making a bunch of interesting salads over the weekend to go with our simple grilled meats has been my new strategy for how I can sit under the tree in the evenings as much as possible. The two salads in the photo I made tonight with little hassle. A few potatoes boiled with two eggs and asparagus tossed in the last few moments (all in the same pot), mayo, Dijon mustard, splash of red wine vinegar, spring onions and garlic, parsley, salt and pepper. The other is a ripe mango tossed with fresh mint form the garden.

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I started out with the best intentions to make a traditional tabouli salad…but the great veggies in the fridge kept calling until I had created a new favorite salad.

What I used (veggies can vary)
-1 cup bulgur
-2 cups hot water
-juice of one lemon
-3 cloves garlic smashed with the back of a knife
-1/2 cucumber cubed
-4 radishes cubed
-7 cherry tomatoes, quartered
-1/2 red pepper chopped
-1 handful parsley chopped
-1/2 avocado chopped
-1/2 cup corn (fresh or thawed)
-1/2 tsp salt
-1 tbsp olive oil
Squeeze the lemon into a stainless steel bowl. Add smashed garlic and dry bulgur. Cover with the boiling hot water and let stand for 1/2 hour. In the meantime, chop all the veggies. Add them to the cooked bulgur, toss with salt and olive oil and serve luke warm or put in the fridge for an hour to cool before serving.

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What the heck is this? Well, it is practically the only local vegetable available (Wisconsin) so I should try it. This is what led me to buy one of these strange things today to take home and test it out.                                                                                                                        I found online a CSA farmer in California who fell in love with these Heirloom roots. “The black Spanish radish is an antique radish, a throwback to a time when people counted on storing roots to survive the winter.” He talks about his journey growing them and also has some interesting Recipes. I was inspired by the Asian influenced one on the site and created this salad using: 1 black spanish radish, two carrots, four scallions, 1/4 tsp red pepper flakes, 1 tbsp olive oil, 1 tbsp lemon juice, 1 tbsp rice wine vinigar, 1 tbsp sugar and 1/ 2 tsp salt. It has a very fresh spicy bite with a really clean finish that tasted amazing with a glass of beer. I brought the mixing bowl over to D right after I tasted it. He gave me a sour look for bothering his reading, but I held up a fork to his mouth. His eyes closed as he chewed and he reached for more with  a boyish grin.                                                                                 

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I found this recipe for Shitake Mushroom and Koshihikari Rice Cakes in my new cookbook Homegrown Pure and Simple. I loved the idea — kinda like Italian risotto cakes but with a Japanese flare – but did not like the fact that to follow the orders exactly would require three seperate stops: to the grocery store, a specialty Japanese food store and, being in Minnesota, the booze store. So, I am doing the unthinkable and customizing a recipe before even making it properly. I do hope you understand. Life is too darn short to forsake a beautifull idea just because you work a 9-5 and are not a professional chef.

The real recipe called for sake, mushroom soy sauce, Koshihikari suchi rice, home-made mushroom stock, Panco (Japanese style bread crumbs), spreading out the hot rice on a cookie sheet and letting it be in the fridge for UP TO 6 hours, and the use of some tool called “ring molds”. I used rice wine that I already had in the house, regular soy sauce, the closest thing I could find to sushi rice at the coop, ready-made mushroom stock, my hands, and the little bit of bread crumbs I had left over from making fish cakes a while back. The whole thing set in the fridge for 9 hours and was just dandy.

Here is what I did today. With a bit of planning, I worked a full day and was able to serve these special delicious treats along with salmon and left over mustard greens for dinner.

 What you need:

• 3 cups mushroom stock (you can make your own by pouring hot water over dried mushroms and letting sit for 30 minutes then drain.)
• 1 cup rice wine
• 1 tbsp soy sauce
• 1 cup rice (arborio or sushi)
• 10-12 fresh (shitake) mushrooms, chopped
• 1 large shallot
• 2 tbsp oil (I used grapeseed oil)
• 1/2 cup bread crumbs
• 1/2 cup black sesame seeds

What to do in the morning before leaving for work: saute the shallots and mushrooms in the oil for 3 minutes. Add the rice and stir for another 3 minutes until toasty. Add the rice wine and stir until dry, add the mushroom stock and stir until rice is cooked. Take off the heat, stir for a few minutes to cool. Leave in the pot and cover. Put in the fridge while you are at work.

What to do When you get home: Take out the rice, form into somewhat flattened balls, roll one half in the bread crumbs, the other in the black sesame seeds. Fry 3 minutes on each side and serve with broiled fish and greens sauted in the same oil with the cakes waiting in the warm oven. I swear it took less than 20 minutes!

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I received a cuisinart food processor for xmas this year and it is opening up all kinds of nifty-quick recipe memories. This particular dish was made for me by a Scottish mystic and microbiotic convert on the Isle of Arran in 1997 and I still remember it!

Shred one whole onion, three cloves garlic, three raw whole scrubbed and topped beets and four scrubbed topped carrots into a bowl. Add two to three tbs. oil, two to three tbsp. apple cidar vinegar, two to three tbsp apple cidar, salt and pepper and sunflower seeds.

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I discovered a way to get D to eat green peppers…stuff them with yummy things and bake until sweet. We have had a recent onslaught of green peppers from our CSA and from our garden along with yellow, red, and orange ones of all varieties. I made up this recipe using what I had on hand and it was one to put in the “that’s a keeper” book. Pilaf is a very old way of cooking rice used by many cultures. I like the wikipedia entry on the subject.

What you need for my dish:

• one cup brown rice
• 1 red onion, diced
• 2 tbsp sunflower oil
• 2 cloves garlic, put through a garlic press
• two sweet peppers (red, yellow, orange), diced
• 1/2 cup nuts (I used pine nuts and pecans)
• 2 cups stock (I used chicken)
• two green peppers

What to do:

1. Dry roast the rice in a frying pan over low heat for 10 minutes, stirring so as not to burn. 2. Heat the oil in another pan and saute the onions, peppers and garlic. 3. Add the stock to the rice along with the cooked peppers, onions and garlic. Let simmer until the liquid evaporates. 4. In the mean time, slice two green peppers in half, keeping the stems, and remove the pith and seeds. Brush them with oil. 5. When the rice is done, fill the green peppers with the pilaf, place in a shallow baking dish, and cook for about 15 minutes at 350.

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I had been thinking about trying Arif’s recipe for home made pita for about a week but wanted to make some sides to serve with them to make it a meal. On my way home from work one day I stopped at the new Midtown Global Market in Minneapolis and picked up a few things at the Holy Land Grocery and Deli.

Here I found bulgar wheat to make tabouli, some dry garbanzo beans, a huge block of feta, and an intriguing smelling spice mix they had there ready made. The pitas were as promised…easy and sooo good. They went very well both for dinner and for lunch the next day with the sides I put together inspired by my trip to the market. (P.S. I used the upside down side of a cookie sheet to cook them and it worked just fine.)

Tabouli Salad

What you need:

• 1 cup dry bulgar wheat
• 11/2 cups boiling water
• 11/2 tsp. salt
• 1/4 cup or the juice of one large lemon
• 2 crushed fresh garlic cloves
• 1 bunch fresh chopped parsley
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• fresh black pepper
• 1 yellow tomato
• 1/2 chopped red bell pepper
• 1/2 cubed avacado

1. Combine bulgar, boiling water, salt and garlic in a bowl. Cover and let stand 15-20 minutes.

2. Add all the other ingredients and mix thouroughly. You can eat it at once, but it gets better after a few hours in the fridge.

Garbanzo Stew

What you need:

• 2 tbsp of the Holy Land Spice mix crushed (or a self made combo of bay leaf, garlic, ginger, cardamon, cumin, tumric, salt and pepper)
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 1 large onion
• 2 cups cooked garbanzo beans (or one can)
• 4 whole ripe red tomatoes (or one can)

1. Cook the spices in the olive oil until they smell good(2-3 minutes), add the chopped onion and stir on low heat for 10 minutes.

2. Add the chopped tomatoes and cover, cooking on medium-low heat for ten minutes.

3. Add garbanzo beans, cover again and cook for an additional 15-20 minutes.

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Arif wrote earlier about a great recipe he found using wild and domestic mushrooms roasted with potatoes. I thought, why not use the same concept with butternut squash? So here is the result! It tasted wonderful with our eggs this morning.

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This is such a fun winter party salad. I found it hard to get all the skins off the beets, but my co-worker Jenny swears that they will slip right off if you plunge them in very cold water after you roast them. I will try this next time, as my hands are still a bit pink from hand peeling them!

Ingredients:

• 3 bunches beets, mixed colors
• 3/4 C extra-virgin olive oil
• Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper
• 1 1/2 tsp. whole cumin seeds
• 1/4 cup red wine vinegar
• 1 tbsp. lemon juice
• 1 cup cooked chickpeas, drained
• 1/4 cup shallots, thinly sliced
• 1/2 cup black olives
• 1/2 cup flat-leaf parsley leaves
• 1/4 lb. ricotta salata cheese (I have used feta as well in a pinch)

To prepare:

Preheat oven to 400F. Toss cleaned beets with 2 tbsp. olive oil and 1 tsp. salt. Place in a roasting pan with 1/4 inch water and cover with foil. Roast for 40-50 minutes until tender. Let cool and remove skins. Slice into slabs and put in a bowl.

As the beets roast, toast cumin seeds in a pan over medium heat for 2-3 minutes. Pound half of the seeds into a powder and mix with remaining cumin, 1/4 tsp. salt, red wine vinegar, and lemon juice. Whisk in 1/2 cup olive oil.

Heat 2 tbsp. of olive oil in a pan and add chickpeas when very hot. Fry for 4-5 minutes shaking pan often, until crispy. Drain on a paper towel.

Add shallots and beets to the dressing and season with salt and pepper. Toss in chickpeas, olives, and parsley. Cut ricotta into slabs and layer into the salad.

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So this weekend I decided to experiment with collard greens and a version of a Jamaican Pattie I that I found at a Saint Paul restaurant West Indies Soul. The Collard greens I adapted from a New York Times magazine recipe and served them at my parents’ house for Thanksgiving. They were such a hit that they instantly became a family tradition. Since then I have made them a few times with some variations. I cut out the timely sauce reduction for this version. You can use diffferent kinds of stock, omit the ham or meat altogether, add cut up sweet potato etc. 

 Collard Greens

• 1 pound collard greens, cleaned and stemmed
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1/4 cup country ham*
• 2 tablespoons minced shallots
• 1/3 cup sherry or red wine vinegar
• 1/3 cup honey
• 1/2 cup pork stock**
• salt and pepper to taste

1. Chop greens (see photo) and blanch in salted boiling water for 30 seconds. Drain, refresh in cold water and squeeze dry.

2. Heat oil in a large pan. Saute ham and shallots. Deglaze pan with vinegar and stir in honey. Add stock and bring to a simmer.

3. Add collard greens and simmer until tender, 10-15 minutes.

*use the meat from the ham hocks if making your own pork stock or use store bought veggie, pork, or beef stock. All are good.

** To make pork stock cover two to three ham hocks with 4-6 cups of water for about two hours, or until it tastes right to you.

Jamaican Patties

You can make these with a variety of fillings. The ones in the picture above are made with ground beef spiced simply with garlic, fresh ginger, salt and pepper. Try a vegetarian option made with onion, garlic, carrots, mushrooms, red bell pepper, red chilies, sweet potatoes and corn.

 I adjusted the pastry to include yeast rather than self rising flour and used less butter than recepies I found. This makes it a bit more like a Jamaican calzone as the dough resembles pizza dough more than a pastry, but it still tastes delicious.

 For the pastry:

1 cup all pupose flour

1 tablespoon yeast

2 cups whole wheat flour

2 1/2 teaspoons tumeric

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 stick-1 stick butter chilled and diced

Chilled water as needed

1. Warm bowl with warm water, put yeast in bowl, add a bit of warm water, a spinkle of sugar and let sit for a few minutes until foamy.

2. Sift together flours, tumeric and salt into the yeast foam and stir.

3. Rub in the butter withtyour fingers until it evenly distributed.

4. Mix in enough cold water to gather the mixture into a soft, pliable dough. Shape quickly into a ball. Do not overhandle. Cover with a damp cloth and let it sit in a cool place for 30 minutes.

5. Preheat oven to 375F. To make the patties, divide the chilled pastry into small portions and roll them out on a lightly floured board. Place cooled filling in the rounds as shown, moisten the edges of the pastry with water and seal them shut with the prines of a fork.

6. Lightly greese and flour a baking sheet and arrange the patties about 1 inch apart on the sheet. Bake in the oven for about 25-30 minutes, or until golden brown.

 These are great hot or cold. I have found the to make excellent snacks!

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