A series of sides

Vegetarian cooking rarely involves the kind of feature dish that meat-eaters get. A big steak, a roasted chicken, a lovely filet. We get side dishes elevated to the main course, hearty stews, gorgeous salads, bread and cheese.

Tonight, I decided to embrace that.

A series of sides:

Mushrooms on toast, curried deviled eggs, roasted chickpea and broccoli, caprese salad. These recipes all work well on their own, but tonight was about the strange rhythm of preparing so many dishes all at the same time. 

Ingredients:

For the Mushrooms:

8oz crimini mushrooms
3-5 cloves of garlic
1/4 cup butter
juice of a 1/2 a lemon
splash of white wine (optional)
good balsamic vinegar
salt, pepper and fresh herbs to taste (I used oregano, rosemary and savory but thyme would be amazing.)
1 slice of good wheat bread per person

For the chickpeas:

1 can chickpeas
1 large head broccoli
1 diced spring onion or 1/2 regular onion
1 diced sweet bell pepper
fresh spinach leaves
crushed red chili flakes
liqud aminos or soy sauce
olive oil
smoked paprika
cumin
salt and pepper

For the Caprese:

Fresh Mozzarella
tomatoes
olive oil
balsamic
fresh basil or other herbs
salt and pepper

For the Eggs:

8 hard boiled eggs, chilled
olive oil
vinegar
good brown mustard
curry powder
salt and pepper
a dash of mayo
paprika

Preheat the oven to 400. Put the eggs in a pot and cover with 1 inch of cold water. Cover, and bring to a boil. Start chopping things while you do. When it boils, remove from the stove and allow to sit. Set your timer for 10 minutes so you don't have to drop everything all at once the second it is done. (They can set for up to 15 minutes but I like my yolks softer so I aimed for 12ish.)

Finish chopping things. Combine chickpeas, veggies, spices, oil and aminos in an oven-safe pan (the shallower the better.) Put the mushrooms and garlic in a bowl with fresh herbs and toss with salt, pepper and lemon juice. When the timer goes off, put the eggs in cold water and set aside.

Start the mushrooms in a nonstick pan, adding the knob of butter to melt on low heat. Stir when you remember. Put the chickpeas in the oven. Slice the fresh mozzarella and tomatoes, toss with olive oil and balsamic and spices and set aside to marinate.

Peel the eggs, stopping from time to time to check the stove and the oven, stirring when needed. Cut the eggs in half and remove the yolks carefully. Mash well with oil, vinegar, spices, salt, pepper and mayo if you want it. Spoon carefully back into the whites and garnish with paprika.

Remove the chickpeas when the other veggies are just starting to get dark edges. Splash a little white wine into the mushrooms and cook on high for a minute to reduce. Toast your bread (I used the oven).

Set handfuls of fresh spinach to wilt under the chickpeas. Serve, and try not to stuff yourself sick. 

Saffron

Dr. Rubrub has never had saffron before, and I have a little box of it I've been hoarding and "saving" for some special culinary occasion. So tonight seemed like as good a night as any to break it out.

Saffron Potatoes and cold beet salad. 

Ingredients

1lb potatoes (I used yukon golds)
1 stick butter (unsalted)
1 cup milk (or cream, or half and half)
salt and pepper to taste
a few pinches of saffron threads

First I started the very well-scrubbed potatoes in boiling water with the peels on. If you hate nutrients and dont want to eat the peels you can remove them after cooking, but we liked them mashed in with the middles.

The important part is that you let them boil in the peels in very well-salted water. This helps the flesh to stay creamy and not to absorb water and get all gluey and weird.

So let them boil for about a half hour or until a knife slides right through the middle of the biggest one without any trouble.

While those were cooking I decided to make a salad of last night's roasted beets. I chopped them up, drizzled them in olive oil and apple cider vinegar, tossed in the sections of an orange with some salt and pepper and shook the whole mix up to muddle the juices a little. This went on some good dark lettuce with a little aged white cheddar shredded on top.

The potatoes were nearing done when I started warming up the dairy. Using cream or half and half is great for really creamy mashed potatoes but all we had was milk, which worked just fine. Warm it slowly in a small saucepan, and crumble a few pinches of saffron into it. Saffron needs heat and fat to infuse things with it's lovely flavor, and heating the milk with it seemed to do the trick.

Melt your butter in another pan. This is important. Do not try to save dishes by melting it with the milk. Trust me.

Drain the potatoes and return them to the pot you boiled them in (there, I'm saving you dishes, see?) Mash in your preferred method (I used a wooden spoon.) Add the melted butter and mix, then add the milk (it's some science-y thing about the water in the liquid and the fat in the butter reacting with starch. Ask Smitten Kitchen if you want. Just trust me about the order.) Mix in the saffron-infused milk and stir things together. (I replaced the lid of the pot and let it all steam together for a bit while I assembled the salads.) Season to taste with salt and pepper. Eat and feel very fancy. Try not to spill the rest of your saffron on the floor....

Rhubarb

I haven't been posting for a number of reasons, the superficial of which being that I keep forgetting to take photos when I cook. The more serious reason is a little beast I sometimes call anxiety and other times depression, that, regardless of its name, coils like a sleeping cat on my chest, night and day. It makes me frantic and immobile all at once.

I don't like it very much.

But today I made a crumble I'm very, very proud of.

My lovely coworker has a garden and has generously been providing Spider with sacks of rhubarb lately, so there's been quite a lot of pie. or crumble really. I've been borrowing heavily from Orangette, making some variation of this crumble three times so far. Once with candied ginger and balsamic vinegar, once with strawberries, and tonight with white wine and vanilla bean. I actually set out to combine it with another of Molly's rhubarb recipes, and Spider seemed to like the result well enough.

Ingredients:

1 lb rhubarb, diced small
1 1/4 cup flour
1/2 cup oats
1 1/2 cup sugar, separated. (Half can be brown sugar if you like.)
7 tbsp melted butter or canola oil
1 vanilla bean, split
1/2 tsp salt
1/3 cup white wine
1 tsp ground ginger

(Alternative spices/fruits: Orange zest, cloves, cinnamon, nutmeg, cardamom, candied ginger, balsamic vinegar, strawberries, raspberries)

Combine 1 cup flour, oats, 3/4 cup sugar (brown if you're using it) salt and ground ginger in a bowl and mix. Pour in the butter or canola oil and mush together until crumbly and combined. Set in the fridge for 30 minutes or until everything else is done and you get impatient. Preheat oven to 375.

(SIDE NOTE: I bought this $4 bottle of white wine from Whole Foods because it was cheap. Cheap wine should not have a real cork. THIS IS WHY NO ONE LIKES YOU, WHOLE FOODS.)


Pour the wine into a small sauce pan over low-medium heat. Scrape the insides of the vanilla beans into the wine and toss the pods in for good measure. Simmer for a few minutes, stirring occasionally to infuse. Chop the rhubarb (I like to chop mine super small into 1/2-inch cubes or so.) Remove the pods from the wine carefully and set aside to garnish. Toss the rhubarb into the sauce pan, stirring to coat. Turn the heat up to high and stir a few more times. Remove from heat and add the other 1/4 cup of flour and 3/4 cup of sugar (I used closer to 1/2 cup but it could have stood a bit more sweetness if you're into that kind of thing.)

Pour into a glass baking dish or pie plate, and top with the oat and flour mixture, crumbling it as evenly as possible over the rhubarb. Garnish with the vanilla bean if you want. Bake for 35-45 minutes (I used too much wine in mine so I baked it for 45 minutes and then turned the broiler on for 3 minutes to brown the top.. just keep an eye on it after 30 minutes or so and use good judgement.)

Serve warm, with good ice cream or whipped cream or the rest of the bottle of wine. 

Lonely Chicago Salad

Have you ever seen the movie "Waitress"? It's one of my favorites. In it, the main character makes various types of pies and gives them strange names. One is called "Lonely Chicago Pie".

Well Spider's in Chicago and I'm lonely, so I decided to make myself something easy, healthy and super tasty: salad with an egg.

I love salad and I love eggs. In this recipe, the runny yolk muddles together with the oil and vinegar to make a rich dressing without too much work.

Start with a simple salad. I went with a 50/50 mx of spinach and spring greens, and then some cut up tomatoes. That's all. If you've got more veggies and greens, by all means, add them.

Cook the egg super slowly. If your yolk starts to harden you've ruined everything. Luckily mine did not.

Toss the salad with a scant 1/2 tbs of olive oil and vinegar (depending on the size of your salad, of course. You want the leaves to be lightly dressed without any puddles in the bottom of the bowl. Salt and Pepper generously. Top with the egg, letting the yolk bleed into the greens.

Toss with a fork. Salt and pepper again. Take downstairs and enjoy while you watch Game of Thrones in a much too big bed.

The problem with mac and cheese

There are many. The biggest of which being that it's delicious to the point where I don't know when or how to stop eating it. And trying to make "healthy" mac and cheese defeats the purpose. It should be indulgent, and comforting, and delicious.

Before I make too many health claims about the recipe that follows, let me just say that I'm a subscriber to the nutritional wisdom that sugar, and not fat, is the problem. Also that home cooked, whole foods are usually better for you than the processed kind, even if it is pumped full of vitamins and Now with 50% less fat! So while this counts as "healthy" to me, you might not feel that it is so.

But I think you'll like it anyway...

Pumpkin mac and cheese:

Ingredients:

1/2 box of pasta (the picture shows the brand I like because it's high-protein and fiber, but I used penne)
15 oz of canned pumpkin
1/2 sweet onion, diced
3 cloves of garlic, minced
8 oz. mushrooms, sliced
1 bunch of kale, chard or other dark green, stems removed and chopped
2 cups shredded cheese (I used Dubliner, more on that later)
1 cup half and half or whole milk
1 tablespoon apples cider vinegar
1 tablespoon lemon juice
4 tablespoons of butter separated

spices:

nutmeg
salt and pepper
thyme
cloves
ginger

I've stopped slicing my mushrooms. I quarter them now, because I like bigger chunks of mushroom in things. Is that weird? Anyway, before you chop all your veggies, set up your pans. You'll need a big pot for the pasta, which you should prepare with water, olive oil and salt. Do you know how much salt you need to add to the water you cook your pasta in? More than that. not a pinch, not a teaspoon, but more. You want your water salted until it tastes salty. It will make your pasta taste better, trust me.

You'll also need a sauce pan and a skillet. In the saucepan, melt a tablespoon of butter and leave it on low. You want that butter to do more than melt, you want it to just start to brown. So leave it be while you chop things. Pre-heat your oven to 350.

Toss another tablespoon of butter into the skillet and start the garlic, onion and mushroom with salt, pepper and thyme. I added some red chili flakes as well, because I think they go well in everything. Once the butter in your saucepan is starting to brown, add the canned pumpkin.

RULE NUMBER ONE ABOUT CANNED PUMPKIN IS YOU MUST COOK IT BEFORE USING IT. This goes for anything you want it in but especially baked goods. This will taste like the can in comes in, unless you give it some gentle heat to bring out the pumpkin flavor, infuse it with spices and begin to caramelize the natural sugars. Stir the pumpkin into the melted butter, adding nutmeg, ginger and just a dash of cloves. Then add more nutmeg. Nutmeg is the star of this dish, which is why you want to go easy on the cloves, as they can be overpowering. Add some salt and pepper and then more nutmeg. I'm serious. Every step of this dish you should taste the pumpkin and if it doesn't scream nutmeg you haven't added enough.

Once the mushrooms are starting to get soft, add the kale (or chard, or spinach. If you want to eat this all right away I guess spinach would be fine but if you want to have leftovers DO NOT use spinach unless you know the magic trick that will make it not taste like death when reheated. And then please email me that secret.) Sprinkle the greens with salt and then drizzle with olive oil, apple cider vinegar and lemon juice. Stir and keep an eye on this as it cooks, you don't want the greens overdone and they will cook more in the oven, so err on the side of undercooking them.

Add the milk or half and half to the pumpkin and (you guessed it) more nutmeg. Boil your pasta water and cook according to instructions (if you don't want to make yourself crazy trying to multi-task without Dr. Rubrub to stir things because she's taken her manfriend to Portland and left you all alone with Spider and Boogie and CATS WHO WANT TO EAT YOU, than you can do this step well ahead and just have your cooked pasta ready. Sadly, I did not. Anyway, be sure and reserve about a quarter-cup of the cooking water if you do.)

Your greens are done! Take them off the heat!! Now, don't be like me and realize at this moment that you haven't shredded your cheese. Do that in advance. Now. Any cheese you like will work in this recipe. If it's a soft, mild cheese like mozzarella, you might not taste it very much. If it's super hard and strong like Parmigiano-Reggiano, you might go a bit easy so it doesn't get crazy. Something in the middle (Cheddar, especially aged white, gouda, havarti, beecher's flagship, etc) will probably suit your purposes the best. Melt about a cup of the cheese into the sauce, adding it in small handfuls and stirring well between each. If your sauce gets too thick, add a bit more milk.

When the pasta is done (and you want it VERY al dente, as it will continue to soften in the oven,) drain, but reserve about 1/4 cup of the cooking water. Why? Because this will make you a cooking ninja. Add that water (with the salt, olive oil and startchy goodness) into your sauce. It will help everything get along a little better.

Stir that in. Return the drained pasta to the empty pot and melt another tablespoon of butter into the noodles. Pour over the pumpkin sauce, and mix well. Find a round casserole dish or a very deep 9-inch pie plate.

Layer the dish. Pasta, mushrooms and greens, 1/2 cup of shredded cheese, the rest of the mushrooms, the rest of the pasta, then the rest of the cheese. If you're a bread crumb lover, top with bread crumbs (or crushed rosemary triscuits if you want to roll like me,) and the final tablespoon of melted butter. Bake for 15-20 minutes or until the cheese is melted and Spider gets home and you can't wait even a second more to eat it.

It may not exactly be health food, but it has a lot more good-for-you bits than the standard version. If you want it richer, up the cheese and omit the greens (fool. Kale is DELICIOUS.) If you want to make it even lighter, use lowfat milk, up the pumpkin and decrease the cheese. You can also play with the ratio of pasta to vegetables. 

What are we, farmers?

Today's dinner is chickpeas and mushrooms and sweet potatoes. But something more exciting than dinner was going on while Dr. Rubrub and I were waiting for the broth to reduce: FARMING.

Meet Dr. Rubrub's manfriend:

 He's making the starters for what promises to be THE MOST EPIC VEGETABLE GARDEN OF ALL TIME.

 Did I mention how much I love tomatoes? PROBABLY NOT. But I once spent a road trip trying to convince the driver that I was lycopene-deficient so that he would stop at a produce stand so I could eat more tomatoes. (Sorry Eric!!) It mostly didn't work. But I love tomatoes more than I love most anything else except maybe Avocados and Spider.

Anyway, we're taking up farming. So while Dr. Rubrub's Manfriend was hard at work planting, the good doctor and I were making dinner. I had planned on doing a Moroccan-inspired chickpea and tomato stew, but the sweet potatoes were both near the end of their life and calling to me. Also there were mushrooms, which, upon considerations, might rank even higher than tomatoes (thought not higher than Spider, of course.)

 Ingredients:

4 15-oz cans of chickpeas (RINSED! For the love of god people)
2 cups of sliced mushrooms (I used baby bellas but crimini would be lovely)
4 small sweet potatoes, diced (I would actually use more if you can but this was all I had)
1 box chicken stock (Veggie works just fine)
1 red onion, diced
(2-3 cloves garlic if you aren't allergic)
4 tablespoons butter
Juice of 1 large lemon

Spices and such, to taste:

olive oil
balsamic vinegar
smoked paprika
cumin
white wine
thyme
oregano
ginger
cloves
za'atar
crushed red pepper flakes
salt & pepper

(Yes, I know that's a lot. All of them are optional. Look through your spice cabinet for warm/hot spices and slowly build up the flavor.. I'll get to seasoning in more detail later.)

Toss the cubed sweet potatoes in a little olive oil, salt, pepper and red pepper flakes. dot with 1-2 tablespoons of butter, cut into little pieces, like so:

Bake for 15 minutes or so at 425, stirring every few minutes. (You might have to wait for the oven to clear out, but if your housemate makes 'dillas as good as Boogie, it'll be worth it.)

Melt the other two tablespoons of butter in a large pot. Add a few shakes of red pepper flakes, and about a teaspoon of each of the spices, a splash of olive oil and balsamic. Sweat the onions (and garlic, if using) and, once they soften, add the mushrooms. If the mixture looks dry after several good stirs consider adding a bit more butter.

Add the lemon juice, white wine and a pinch of salt and pepper. Up the heat to medium high and stir a few times, until the mushrooms are starting to get blurry at the edges (HINT: drinking gin and ginger beer helps speed this process, stir longer if this is the case.) Add the chickpeas and then the broth, raising the heat to high until you just barely get it boiling. Reduce heat to med/high (You don't want it rolling but you do want a steady bubble.) Stir frequently.

Don't forget those sweet potatoes! The whole point of roasting them separately is to get the nice, crispy texture that high, dry heat will give them, but you don't want them burned.

See what Dr. Rubrub is doing? She's tasting the cooking liquid. Right after I took this picture she said "Hmm.. it needs... something." And damn it, she was right. It turned out to be more cumin, more balsamic, and more salt. Taste as you go and gently up the spice levels, because as things reduce the flavor will get stronger. Be especially easy on the salt, which you'll want to finish the stew with anyway. And keep in mind the sweet potatoes, which will add sweetness and a little spice.

Drink heavily:

 The broth is going to take a while to reduce. If you're like me and get less patient as you drink, turn the heat up a little and things will reduce faster. If you're a grownup, let the damn thing simmer. Once you've got about an inch of liquid in the bottom when you pull away the solids, add the sweet potatoes, turn off the burner (leave the pot on it) and cover with a lid. Walk away. Admire the plants. Maybe watch Alton Brown make Mac and Cheese and then have a crisis about the fact that your dinner is NOT Alton Brown's Mac and Cheese. It'll be fine. In about 10-15 minutes Spider will be home from work and the stew will be perfect. The broth will have reduced to something closer to a sauce, and everything will be tender. Taste before you serve, adding salt and pepper if needed.

See? Perfect. 

You've got a meal that's super high in protein, fiber and vitamins. It's also delicious, hearty and will reheat nicely on day 2. 

Once our garden is growing, I'll try harder to make more seasonal recipes and to use fresh herbs. For now, this is pretty damn tasty. (And pairs nicely with Gin and Gingers, in case you were so inclined.) 

Apple & Cheese mini pies

I got my muffin tin today and my mother took me to costco which could only lead to one thing: Mini pies. I own this book about mini pies and I love it, but it still lives in my old apartment with Chev, while I have since moved to the house with Dr. Rubrub and Spider. This meant I had to improvise a bit, but if you have the inclination to make mini pies a regular part of your baking repertoire, I highly recommend buying it from your local bookstore.

For today, I used this pie crust recipe I found online. It seemed like it was pretty heavy on the butter, and I am trying to up the healthy in my cooking and baking, so I broke out my secret weapon for better baked goods:

That's right. Ground Flaxseed. I use it in everything from oatmeal to cookies to pie crusts and it works beautifully, adding richness, fiber and good fats without the animal products. I get a giant bag from costco, but 1-pound bags are easy to find at any grocery store. Substitute 3 tablespoons flax for every 1 tablespoon butter. (I would say up to a cup, maximum) I used a cup of flax instead of 1/2 cup of butter in the recipe I linked, which meant it was a bit drier than the dough needed to be so I added a little extra water to compensate (less than 1/2 cup.)

If you're super in to buttery crusts, by all means, use the full butter. It's tasty and lovely and flaky. But if you are looking for a healthy alternative, this lends a nutty taste and tender crumb to crusts that I think is lovely.

First up! Assemble your ingredients:

Ok. I know there are 2 apples in that picture and no lemons. Pretend, for a second, that that second apple is a lemon. More on that later. 

For the Crust:

2 cups flour 

1 tsp salt (I like more salt in my baked goods)

1/2 cup butter very cold and cut into pieces

1 cup ground flax

1 tsp sugar

3/4-1 cup very cold water (don't add this all at once!!!)

For the filling:

1 (1!) large apple diced (and peeled if you're fussy. More on that later.)
zest and juice of one lemon
1/3 cup brown sugar
Cinnamon (to taste)
Cloves (to taste)
Ginger (to taste)
(nutmeg, cardamom, allspice would also be tasty in this)
1/2 cup grated cheese

I used a lovely raw milk cheddar for this, but that's only because it was already open. I would strongly suggest a cheese like Dubliner, which is nuttier and great for pairing with sweet recipes like this one.

Mix the dough first, as it will need resting time. If you mix it by hand, great. I use the food processor because it's easier and I never seem to have the patience to properly crumble butter into flour. Just don't use a mixer that's too small, like I did:

Once you have your mixture in an appropriately-sized mixer, pulse until the butter is about pea-sized, making a very course meal:

Transfer to a bowl, slowly and gently add the ice water until the dough starts to come together. Allow to rest for about 10 minutes before rolling out.

While your dough is resting, prepare your filling. This recipe should probably have 2 apples but I hate having leftover pie filling so I went with one. It worked fine, thought it was a little thin. Also, I understand that some people insist on peeling their apples before baking, but I like the texture and added nutrition of apple peels so I don't. If you do, definitely go for a second apple. I used several teaspoons of each spice but apparently some people feel weird about too much ground cloves in baked goods so if you are one of those people, 1/2 tsp should suffice.

Form the pies by rolling out the dough and cutting it with a juice glass. I left mine a little thick so I could squish them into the cups (don't worry about it sticking, they always pop right out.) patch any holes that form, and leave the excess attached to press down later, like so:

If you spill some dough, I hope you have a good cat friend like Dr. Rubrub's to clean up for you:

(Just don't open bottles of gin around her and everyone is happy.) 

Spoon apple filling into pies and top with cheese:

These could actually have taken a bit more cheese but I was trying not to overwhelm them. Fold the extra dough over the top, leaving a little vent for steam:

Yes, I'm sure there's a much prettier way to do this but I left mine fairly rustic. Brush the tops with butter or eggwash if you want them to brown up. Bake at 375 for 20 minutes or until tops are starting to brown.

Inside you'll get a not-too-sweet mix of warm spices, bright lemon and gooey cheese:

These might be good with walnuts, if you're into that, and I've made some pretty good variations with brie, or tomatoes, pesto and cheese. You can also just up the apples and do a standard mini apple pie, if you like, in which case I suggest sprinkling the top with sugar before baking.