Slobs, then snobs

Last week we ate a meal that made Brian and I first feel like slobs and then like snobs. I'm not overly concerned with creating unified menus for our mid-week meals and we often have strange juxtapositions--Middle Eastern red lentil soup served with quesadillas and a side of sauteed cabbage with caraway seeds? Why not?--but usually my meals aren't quite as schizophrenic as this one was.

We started with my strategy to use up some of the vast quantity of lovely lettuce from the farm share by treating the lettuce as a containment device, a sort of substitute for tortillas, or egg roll wrappers or pita in the enclosing of fillings. I had planned on a chicken filling with Chinese flavors but then went out on my deck, saw my herbs threatening to overrun their pots and thought a little thinning was in order. With handfuls of mint, basil and cilantro, a goodly splash of fish sauce, some chopped up peanuts and a lime-garlic dipping sauce the flavor profile veered towards something more South East Asian in origin.
I also made some steamed short grain rice to round out the filling. The wraps were very messy and very fun to eat.
Then Brian and I convinced the critters to at least pretend to go to bed (they go in their rooms, we leave the lights on and pretend that we don't hear the bumps and thumps. Denial! It works!)

We cleaned up the kitchen, cleaned up our messy selves (in my case, a change of T-shirt was necessary since I was still wearing my dinner, kind of like a toddler.) Then we settled down on the couch, popped in the latest Netflix offering and treated ourselves to a dessert that was a complete juxtaposition to our dinner: honey drizzled strawberries with honey lavender panna cotta. Other than drizzling honey over the berries about an hour ahead of time to mix with the berry juices and make a syrup, I followed this recipe to a T.
Oh my this was a lovely dessert. It was cool and fragrant and made me feel just a bit elegant eating it. And elegant is usually the last thing I feel after a messy dinner, critter wrangling and the evening house clean up.

Chicken Lettuce Wraps with SE Asian Flavors

1 T canola or peanut oil
1 onion, chopped fine
1 T chopped ginger
1 T chopped garlic
1 lb ground chicken or finely chopped chicken thighs
2 T fish sauce
2 T soy sauce
1 t sugar
4 scallions, whites and greens sliced
1 oz can water chestnuts, chopped
1 carrot, grated coarsely
1/3 C roasted peanuts (unsalted or low salt preferable), chopped
handful of basil (Thai if you have it, regular if you don't), picked off the stems
handful of mint, picked off the stems
handful of cilantro, picked off the stems
two heads of broad leafed lettuce--Boston or butter lettuce is great, but leaf lettuce is good too--washed and dried; try to keep the leaves as intact as possible

cooked short grain sticky rice (about 1/2 C or so per person)

dipping sauce:
1/4 c sugar
juice of one lime
2 T fish sauce
2 T water
1 T soy sauce
1 clove garlic, minced or pressed
2 T rice wine vinegar
a source of heat: either a small chopped chili, a 1/2 t of dried chili flakes, or a good squirt of sriracha hot sauce

Heat oil in a skillet and saute the onion until soft. Add the garlic and ginger and cook briefly, until fragrant. Add the ground chicken to the pan and break up into smallish pieces. Brown the chicken then add the fish sauce, soy sauce, sugar, scallions, water chestnuts and carrot. Stir fry briefly until carrot is softened. Before serving stir in the peanuts and the fresh herbs. Or you can serve the herbs alongside the lettuce on a plate and let people add the herbs to their rice/chicken/lettuce bundles as they like. Serve with the dipping sauce (just mix together all ingredients for the sauce and divide into smaller bowls so everyone has one to dip from) and plenty of napkins.

a forced pause

I had been having so much fun knitting this:
Until I did this:
I know--it looks pretty contained now. I dare not show under the bandage for fear of causing nausea of extreme proportions. There is a chunk of my finger tip missing thanks to poor attention to my chefs knife while chopping scallions last night. I dabbed/poured some liquid bandage over it in an effort to help my overwhelmed platelets and stop the constant drip of blood. (That stuff stings like hell, let me tell you; I was able to track exactly where the nerve that starts in my finger tip is located all the way up my arm and where it connects to my spinal column because as I put the stuff on the entire thing felt like it was on fire.) Blood bubbled up under the liquid bandage and then the stuff hardened and I went around with a big lump of blackening, drying blood hanging off my finger that Brian got squeamish just looking at. But at least it meant no trip to the ER for stitches. Right now I feel my pulse throb-throb-throbbing in the missing wedge and my typing? Ha--I'm back to pecking at the keyboard with my right index and left middle finger. And screwing up royally.

So I'm a little pissed at myself since the injury is messing with my writing and cooking and also means having to take a forced pause in the above knitting project which has got to be the best stash buster ever. You can see the pattern and read about the inspiration here and if you are a Ravelry member you can see the gorgeous completed versions in the project gallery. It a great way to use up ends of skeins and those stray balls of yarn that you aren't quite sure where they came from but also that you don't have the heart to get rid of. Stuff that looks dull as dishwater when by itself suddenly becomes interesting when combined with other scraps.

Tantre farm share, week 4

Whooooo boy! I had trouble fitting all this produce into one photo.

Front row: arugula, dill, peppermint, garlic scapes, 1 pt. shelling peas, 1 qt. strawberries

Back row: 5 (!!) heads of lettuce, radishes, broccoli rabe, turnips with abundant greens, scallions, 4 bunches of spinach

(It might be easier to see this load of green goodness in flickr where I've put notes to identify all the items.)

What I'm planning to do with this week's bounty:

• Tonight I'm making braised turnips with poppy seeds and bread crumbs to go with some honey balsamic pork medallions and lettuce, radish and scallion salad.
• I'll use the arugula and some spinach make another batch of Warda's bulgar with spicy greens and I'll resist the urge to scarf it out of the pot--it makes a great lunch.
• Half of the broccoli rabe will be used to make pizza or calzones with one of my favorite combinations: broccoli rabe, turkey Italian sausage, caramelized onions and ricotta (then I'll blanch and freeze the other half to make this again later).
• The turnip greens, radish greens, rest of the radishes, some dill, some peas and scallions will go into an improvised spring vegetable soup.
• The mint will make some Friday mojitos which will precede souvlaki pork, with tzatziki sauce and spinach and feta rice (that also uses scallions and dill).
• Chicken with garlic scapes and capers will be served with (I'm sure) more salad.
• The strawberries will be sliced and drizzled with honey to go with honey lavender panna cotta (more details about this recipe in my next post).

Soup for summer

Ahhh book group. It has been a while since I posted about book group--I think I spaced out on bringing my camera a couple of times, but this past Wednesday I found myself at Meagan's with my camera and a hearty appetite. I wasn't terribly thorough in the photography department so missed out on taking pics of appetizers (fig-goat cheese tapenade) and dessert (fresh strawberries and alfajores) but I got the food that was served in the middle!

Ami adapted a vichyssoise recipe to make this gorgeous cold potato garlic soup. It was velvety and rich, but also refreshing--not an easy juxtaposition to pull off (recipe below).
For dinner, Meagan made grilled trout stuffed with herbs and butter--both delicate and full of flavor. And there was a salad with strawberries and chive blossoms, watermelon feta salad, sauteed garlicky greens and bread. Ooof.
Oh yea, and there was a book! I confess I didn't re-read Monsters of Templeton despite enjoying it a great deal the first time I read it. So my contribution to the conversation was pretty minimal. After some intelligent sounding discussion of the different "historical" artifacts in the book and an agreement that the stories of the past were more compelling than the life of the main character in the present, I commandeered a copy of the book and forced everyone to sit quietly while I read the monster's epilogue out loud (I'd had a few glasses of wine which, as you can see, makes me a bit of a bore.) The sweet people in my book group tollerated my behavior and perhaps looked on a with a little amusement as I got all choked up when I read about the monster giving birth and dying--so beautiful.

Ami's Cold and Creamy Potato Garlic Soup
adapted from Vichyssoise

2 C finely diced raw potatoes
4 tablespoons butter
5 T minced garlic
3 C chicken broth
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
a dash of nutmeg
1 C heavy cream
3/4 C sour cream
1 C of milk
Chopped chives

Cook the potatoes in salted water to cover until just tender. Drain. Melt the butter in a skillet and add the garlic, cooking until fragrant. Add the chicken broth and bring to a boil. Add the potatoes to the broth and season to taste with salt, pepper and nutmeg. Put this mixture in the blender (you will need to blend it in lots) and blend for 1 minute, or until smooth. Chill. When ready to serve, whisk in heavy cream, sour cream and milk. Garnish with chopped chives.

Tantre farm share, week 3

It has been perfect spinach growing weather here in Michigan as evidenced by this week's farm share:

In the front row: garlic scapes, peppermint, strawberries, and radishes
In the back row: 3 heads of lettuce, green onions, spicy greens mix, turnips with greens and 6 (yes 6!) big bunches of spinach

My book group is meeting tonight, so I quickly snagged the peppermint and used it in this watermelon feta salad:
And I'm also taking along the turnip greens, radish greens and spicy greens mix to saute with garlic and olive oil as a side dish.

So that doesn't actually leave me with an overwhelming amount of stuff to deal with this week. Here are the plans:

• If you think I'm sick of goma ae you'd be wrong. I really think that Brian and I could eat our body weight of goma ae so I expect at least half of the spinach to be devoted to having some perpetually on hand.
• The other half of the spinach will probably go into Indian spinach with yogurt sauce since I haven't made Indian food in a while.
• I'll make some garlic scape and almond pesto.
• I want to use some of the lettuce (and the scallions) in minced chicken lettuce wraps, probably something like this recipe but without the ham.
• I'm using my cheapo Japanese mandoline to cut the radishes paper-thin and then use them in one of three ways: either on baguette with butter and some chopped chives, topping some of that sweet lettuce in salads or tossed with paper-thin cut carrots and a little vinaigrette dressing. I love having marinated vegetable salads available for snacking in the fridge.
• For the turnips I'm thinking braised as an accompaniment to mustard pork tenderloin.
• And the strawberries? I love them simply accompanied by sour cream and brown sugar.

What has been coming out of the kitchen

I've mentioned some of the dishes I've been planning to cook with the Tantre bounty; I figured it was about time to show a few of the results. I've made three "keeper" recipes and only had one that I thought was a dud which is a pretty good ratio of successful cooking around these parts. (Recipes at the bottom of the post).

Keeper #1: Spanakopita made with mostly assertive greens rather than spinach. I used one of my 3 bunches of Tantre spinach--about 5 oz or so. The rest of the greens consisted of the radish greens and the spicy greens mix--a huge bunch of mostly mustard and mizuna. Washed, chopped and cooked up with the rest of the pie filling you couldn't tell the difference. This is an excellent way to use up a bounty of greens, particularly if you have folks who aren't as enamored of the sharp, bitter flavor that appears in simpler preparations. (The salad is simply the frilly Tantre lettuce with peppermint leaves and a simple vinaigrette).

And since I had only used up about a 1/3 of an 8oz roll of filo dough, I made a small pan of baklava too. I just kind of threw together the stuff that should be in there and it turned out surprisingly decent. Then again, how bad can filo, butter, walnuts, cinnamon, honey syrup and orange flower water ever be?
Keeper #2: Spinach, barley, ricotta salad
This was terrific. I used one bunch of Tantre spinach and the bunch of arugula. I adapted the recipe from this post on the blog Stonesoup. It was creamy, chewy, a little bitter and very satisfying.

Keeper #3: The feta dressing, here on a chicken Greek salad (which would have looked a lot prettier if I had tossed the greens with the dressing instead of blobbing it on top). This used 2 heads of Tantre lettuce (red and green) and the radishes to which I added some cucumbers, beets, red onion slices, tomatoes, kalamata olives and pieces of roast chicken.
Not a recipe, but a nice combination: A breakfast of garlic naan bread, toasted, with cream cheese, chive blossoms, microgreens, cayenne and black pepper, with a side of radishes
And the dud recipe, Spinach and Green Garlic Soup with creme fraiche:
Looks pretty, but the flavor was blah. I stuck to the proportions indicated in the recipe but thought it was thin and could have used something to help give it more substance--maybe a boiled potato? I used up one bunch of Tantre spinach and a lot of the green garlic in my garden but wish I'd found something more worthy of them.

Spanakopita with assertive greens
loosely adapted from this recipe

• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 large onion, chopped
• 1 bunch green onions, chopped coarsely
• 3 cloves garlic, pressed
• about 1.5-2 pounds of greens: spinach, mustard, mizuna, kale (I probably wouldn't use the colored chards because they tend to have a "beety" taste that might show through). Wash well, remove tough stems and chop into small pieces (spinach can be left whole unless it is huge)
• 3 t dried dill weed
• 2 T fresh dill, chopped (optional, use it if you have it)
• 2 eggs, lightly beaten
• 1/2 cup ricotta cheese
• 1 and 1/2 cups crumbled feta cheese
• salt and pepper
  
• 10 sheets phyllo dough
• 2 T butter melted with 2 T olive oil

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly oil a 9x11 inch baking pan.
2. Heat 3 tablespoons olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Saute onion, green onions and garlic, until soft and lightly browned. Stir in greens and dill, and continue to saute until greens have softened. Season with salt and fresh ground pepper. Remove from heat and set aside to cool.
3. In a medium bowl, mix together eggs, ricotta, and feta. Stir in greens mixture. Lay 1 sheet of phyllo dough in prepared baking pan, and brush lightly with olive oil. Lay another sheet of phyllo dough on top, brush with butter-olive oil mixture, and repeat process with three more sheets of phyllo. Spread spinach and cheese mixture into pan and fold any long edges of dough over the filling. Layer remaining 5 sheets of phyllo dough, brushing each with butter-oil mixture. Tuck overhanging dough into pan to seal filling.
4. Bake in preheated oven for 30 to 40 minutes, until golden brown. Cut into squares and serve while hot.

Spinach, pearl barley & ricotta salad
adapted from stonesoup
serves 2 as a lunch-sized salad or 4 as a dinner side

• 2 oz pearl barley
• 1 large bunch spinach, washed well with thick stems removed
• 1 large bunch of arugula, washed well
• 1 C whole milk ricotta
• 1 t orange zest
• 1 t chili flakes
• 3T clementine olive oil (if you have it, or just use regular extra virgin)
• 1 T balsamic vinegar
• fleur de sel and black pepper to taste

1. Place barley in a small saucepan and cover generously with water. Bring to the boil and simmer for 25 - 30 minutes, or until cooked through. Drain and rinse with cold water and transfer to a large bowl.
2. Heat 1 T of clementine or regular olive oil in a pan, add chili flakes and toast in the oil for a minute. Add greens and allow to wilt.
3. Spread spinach/arugula mixture over a serving platter. Scatter the barley around it. Dot with dollops of ricotta. Grate the orange zest over the top and, if you want a little more heat, scatter a few more chili flakes over. Drizzle with the remaining 2 T clementine olive oil and 1 T balsamic vinegar. Sprinkle on fleur de sel and ground black pepper to taste.

Tantre farm share, week 2

Good thing we like greens over here because whoo boy, the table runneth over with greeny goodness:

From left to right: frilly green lettuce, butter lettuce, (tucked in front) tatsoi, Pink Beauty radishes with ample greens, spicy greens mix with lots of mizuna, 3 big bunches of spinach, peppermint, arugula, asparagus, and spring onions

What I plan to do with the bounty:

• spinach and green garlic soup (I have a load of green garlic in my garden)
• spanakopita with some radish greens and mizuna taking the place of some of the spinach
• lettuce, arugula, radish and spring onion and peppermint leaf salad with feta dressing (see below: really simple, really good). Sarah started chucking whole leaves of mint in her green salads and it is an inspired addition.
• tatsoi stirfry with tofu, dried shitakes, ginger and garlic
• Korean scallion and kimchee pancakes with those long spring onion greens
• raw asparagus with lemon and Parmesan (supposed to be pecorino, but parm will work fine)
• spinach, barley and ricotta salad

and if that doesn't use all the greens

• probably some more goma ae with whatever greens are left
• maybe a quiche with some blanched chopped greens

and if that still doesn't do it, then I'll just blanch and freeze some for use later.

Feta Salad Dressing:
Put about 1 C crumbled feta, 3 T red wine vinegar, 1 T water, 1/2 t dried oregano (or about 2 T fresh oregano), 1/3 C good olive oil and lots of fresh ground black pepper in a food processor or blender. Pulse or blend quickly to combine into a chunky dressing. Don't over blend or the olive oil might take on a bitter flavor. If you want a really smooth dressing, then leave the olive oil out until the last minute and add it at the end.

Fish hat

You'd think that wearing a fish on your head would just about guarantee a smile from a kid.
But my girl critter has been working on her face of gloom.
I had to jump around like a monkey to get her to crack, but I finally succeeded.
She almost looks cuter from behind. Which is good, because now that she's 6, apparently the age of turning away from mom has commenced.
Pattern info:
The fish hat is from this awesome knitty pattern: Fish Hat [Dead or Alive?] It was really fast and fun to knit and I got to use up a bunch of stashed scrap yarn. I'll probably be making one for every member of my family.

Goma ae days

In these days of spinach bounty, here's how I take what seems to be an overwhelming quantity of leafy goodness that is busting out of the crisper drawers and threatening to creep into the container of yogurt on the shelf above and render it docile and tidy (the spinach, not the yogurt which tends to stay where you put it). And tasty. Very tasty.

The magic words are: Goma Ae. Brian and I used to order this when we went out to Japanese restaurants (ah, the days before GM was teetering on the edge of bankruptcy) but that was before we realized that we wanted to eat a much bigger quantity of it than any restaurant ever served and that it was so darn easy to make.

Take about 1.5-2 lbs of clean spinach. Pinch off the stems if they are tough. Dump the spinach (you can also add in other relatively tender greens--I put some mizuna in this batch) in a big pot of boiling water to blanch, then quickly rinse under cold water. Once it is cool you squeeze it like hell to get all the water out until it is about the size of a softball:
(If only all such unruly things were this easily contained. Kids...?)

In your mortar put 2 T roasted sesame seeds (you can see I buy the pre-roasted ones at the Asian grocery).
Pestle-ize them to a fine-ish grind:
Then add 2 T soy (I use Japanese lower sodium), 1 T rice wine vinegar, 1 T mirin, and 1 t sugar and mix it all together.
(I would bet that the above slurry can also be made in a blender if you don't have a mortar and pestle or if your forearms are just too darn tired today for all the grinding. My blender is putting me through hell at the moment by leaking all over the counter no matter how carefully and tightly I attach the base to the jar so I'll stick with the mortar for now.)

Chop the spinach coarsely, put it in a bowl and then dump the dressing over your chopped spinach. Drizzle on 1 t toasted sesame oil.
Use a fork to distribute the dressing and break up the clods of spinach.
Number of servings depends on the level of goma ae enthusiasm in your house. Brian and I can easily polish of a bowl this size but then we are a little piggy when it comes to this stuff.

Tantre farm share, week 1

Last year I became incredibly curious what a week-to-week farm share looked like. I enjoyed reading about the creative uses the Gastronomical 3 ladies were doing with their split Tantre share and I loved Mary's Community Farm Kitchen blog (she not only lists the weekly full share, but if you are a part of her Kitchen CSA, she tells you how she will be preparing it for you).

If any of you are as curious as I was as to what a full-share looks like, I plan to post a photo of my weekly share from Tantre Farm. I also plan to briefly mention what recipes I intend to use to consume all this produce and would love to hear if you have any creative thoughts of what you would do (particularly when I inevitably get stumped by a vegetable!)

If you have a farm share that you'd be willing to photograph weekly, please let me know. I'd love to peek at your haul! I went with Tantre this year because one of the farmer-owners, Deb, came into my picky boy critter's class when he was in 2nd grade and actually got the kid to taste a tiny nibble of raw sorrel. I figure she must be magical because I haven't been able to pry his jaws apart for any leafy green in years and a magical farmer sounded like a good place to start.

So here is the photo of week 1 of my Tantre farm share:

The haul, from left to right: purple lettuce, green lettuce, some over-wintered fingerling potatoes, mizuna, asparagus, huge bag of spinach, french radishes, globe radishes, spring onions, chives

plus some rhubarb that sneaked out of the photo (rhubarb is sneaky like that):

What I plan to do with it:

• Lettuce: salad (duh)
• Fingerlings: roasted with olive oil, fresh rosemary and fleur de sel
• Mizuna and some of the spinach: Warda's Spicy Greens with Bulgur (Tchicha bel Khoubiz) probably served with something lamb based, maybe some kofte
• Asparagus: there are just a few beautiful spears (apparently some slugs have been having a field day with the asparagus crop this year) so I might supplement these with some from the store. I want to make a broiled miso asparagus dish called Dengaku
• rest of the spinach: goma ae (I'll share my basic recipe soon), probably served some variation of miso soup
• French radishes: my favorite cold soup, Chlodnik
• Globe radishes: roasted radishes with radish greens (Yes, you can eat the greens like, well, greens! And this bunch has gorgeous greens.)
• Spring onions: a couple saved for salad, the rest roasted along with the fingerlings
• Chives: I already used up some in a chive-ricotta omelet as soon as I came home. The rest will be used for more omelets and as garnish for the Chlodnik soup
• Rhubarb: pie (which will make my husband very, very happy since he knew he'd be getting lots of healthy food out of this farm share thingy, but didn't anticipate his favorite pie!)

Thoughts? Plans? Ideas?