David Lebovitz's wild rice salad

As a member of a winter CSA share, there are certain vegetables I've had to welcome, en masse, into my home (and refrigerator) this season: namely, potatoes (sweet and white), carrots, and beets. Though root vegetables store well, I find it's best to dispatch them quickly, if I want to have room in my tiny kitchen for anything else. So after last week's CSA pickup, when I was saddled blessed with several pounds of each, I decided to immediately peel and roast them, which would not only concentrate their flavor but also significantly reduce their bulk. But what to do with them afterwards? I've already eaten a bazillion sweet potato fries this season, already prepared roasted beets tossed with yogurt, lime and scallions, already made a huge batch of carrot soup that lingers on in my freezer. As my cubed and seasoned veggies roasted away in the oven, the debate continued: where would they end up? Luckily, divine providence stepped in when I felt compelled to read one of my favorite blogs, that of master pastry chef David Lebovitz, who usually shares sweet recipes, but occasionally throws in a savory one. Blessedly, that day was one of those days.

Early in his career, David worked in the kitchen at Chez Panisse, so he knows his way around vegetables. The recipes he shares on his site hew closely to my own cooking style: heavy on the produce and whole grains, light on the meat. So it came as no surprise when his Wild Rice Salad with Lemon-Tahini Dressing immediately appealed to me. Not only had I recently purchased a big bag of wild rice at the Co-op, but my roasted vegetables would go perfectly in the dish, plus I had just opened a jar of tahini for a hummus-making endeavor.

Actually, speaking of hummus, what attracted me most to this recipe was how it sort of riffs on that classic Middle Eastern spread. The salad's dressing is made of lemon juice, tahini, olive oil, water and raw garlic: if you were to add some chickpeas, you'd have hummus. I love cooking with raw garlic. Growing up, my dad was allergic, so we almost never utilized the stuff, save for rare occasions when my mother--the cook of the household--felt compelled to make a smaller, separate garlic-free dish for my father, and a larger, garlic-heavy one for her, my brother and me. Think about it: a world of tomato sauces, soups, stews, meatballs, all without the beneficent touch of garlic. Sad, right? These days, I think I still cook with less garlic than most people, and to add raw garlic to something feels downright illicit. So this recipe, with its whole one clove of garlic, minced, was damn near a walk on the wild side for me.

I made a few small changes to the dish, the major one being that to further embrace the hummus theme (and because I still had some left over from the Great Garbanzo Soak of 2012), I added a few handfuls of cooked chickpeas. What results is a lovely salad: the wild rice dense and chewy, the roasted vegetables sweet and earthy, with brightness from the lemon and garlic. Not a bad lunch to eat for six days in a row, as I did:
























Wild Rice and Roasted Vegetable Salad with Lemon-Tahini Dressing
Adapted from davidlebovitz.com
Serves 6 - 8 as a side dish

Ingredients:

- 1 c. wild rice, rinsed
- About 6 cups peeled and cubed root vegetables: I used a mix of sweet potatoes, beets, and carrots
- Olive oil
- Salt and pepper to taste

- About a cup cooked chickpeas
- 3 to 4 scallions (white and green parts), finely chopped
- 1/2 c. fresh parsley, chopped
- 1/4 c. tahini
- Juice of 2 lemons
- 3 tbsp. warm water
- 1 clove garlic, minced
- 1 tsp. soy sauce
- 1/4 c. olive oil
- Salt and pepper to taste

Preparation:

1. Preheat the oven to 425°. Toss the vegetables with 2 or 3 tbsp. of oil and plenty of salt and pepper. Spread on a large baking sheet (or 2) and cook until tender, about 40 minutes.
2. In the meantime, add wild rice to a medium pot and cover with lots of water. Add about a teaspoon of salt. Cover and bring to the boil then drop to a simmer and cook until rice is tender, about 40 minutes. Drain.
3. As rice and vegetables cool, make the dressing: in a medium bowl, combine the tahini, lemon juice and water, stirring briskly to smooth out the tahini. Whisk in soy sauce and olive oil, season, and taste.
4. When rice and vegetables are cool, combine in a bowl then stir in the chickpeas, scallions and parsley. Add the dressing and mix well. Note: the tahini dressing dries out in the fridge. If you're not eating all the salad at once, store salad mix and dressing in separate containers in the fridge and combine them before serving.

A good soak

I may have become the shopper I've always wanted to be by making my purchases at the Co-op, but that doesn't necessarily make the me the cook I want to be. Let me explain: my increased access to ingredients like whole grains, healthy oils, organic produce and unprocessed foods--and the low prices for all of this bounty--has certainly led to my cupboards being filled to the bursting, but sometimes those things just find their way in there and stay, never getting the chance to show their stuff in my pots, or in my stomach.

Case in point: dried legumes. Having spent a fair amount of time working on organic farms, where the proprietors grow what they eat and store-bought foods don't often come into the picture, I've eaten some lovely dishes made with dried and soaked beans. And I've noticed that their flavor and texture is exponentially better than the canned stuff. And so when I joined the Co-op, I determined to never again pick up a can of Goya. From now on, I brazenly declared to myself, I will cook exclusively with dried beans! And I lined my shelves with chickpeas, kidney beans, and black eyed peas.

I'm sure you know where this is going. Those bags of beans sat in my cupboards, taunting me, ever since June. Turns out, canned beans are pretty darn convenient: no thinking ahead required. Right? A working farm, though an intensely active place, also has, in its own way, a slower pace than city life, and there's time built into the day to do things like soak some dried beans in water.

The thing is, I don't really even believe the above--that my life is just way too busy to think about my dinner more than an hour before I sit down to eat it. In fact, I do little but think about food and cooking all day long, so I believe I should be able to commit to preparing some beans a day ahead of time.

I had already been stewing over those chickpeas sitting in my kitchen cabinet when I spied a tasty-looking recipe for coconut-braised chickpeas over at the site of my new employer, Serious Eats. The dish sounded like it had some nice flavors going on--lemon, ginger and coconut--and I was keen to try it. The recipe actually called for canned chickpeas, but I would use dried--finally. I knew I would have all the time in the world to cook on Sunday, so on Saturday night, I filled a pot with those clattering little peas, and covered them in twice the amount of water. They'd be (nearly) ready for me when I needed them.

The next day, about an hour before I was ready to cook, I put the pot of chickpeas on the stove, added some salt, and simmered them, covered. Then, as I set to work on the recipe, I simply allowed the garbanzos to steam to toothy perfection before they got to cook for a second time in the dish's flavorful broth.























I used the recipe only as a starting point: though it sounded like a good base, I could tell it would need some punching up. The only spice it called for was ginger and an optional shaking of red pepper flakes, and for me, coconut milk cries out for a complex, heady mixture of aromatics. I also wanted to add some chopped carrot for added sweetness, and some cubed potatoes for some starch to help thicken the broth. The end result was sweet and fragrant, with the tender, creamy chickpeas providing a welcome contrast to the softness of the spinach and the potatoes. Eating it reaffirmed my conviction that cooking with dried legumes is just better. I won't be able to do it all the time--some nights, those ready-to-go Goya beans will still be attractive--but I definitely plan to try this more often. I may not normally possess the virtue of patience, but when it comes to good food, I'm happy to make an exception.























Coconut-Braised Chickpeas with Spinach and Lemon
Adapted (heavily) from seriouseats.com
Serves 4 - 6

Ingredients:

- About 8 ounces dried chickpeas, soaked overnight in 16 oz. water, or one 15-oz. can, drained
- 2 tbsp. vegetable oil
- 2 small (or 1 large) onions, peeled and finely chopped
- 1 carrot, peeled and thinly sliced
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 tbsp. grated ginger
- 1 large lemon, zested and juiced
- 1/2 tsp. red pepper flakes
- 1/2 tsp. curry powder
- 1/2 tsp. turmeric
- 1/2 tsp. ground coriander
- 3 medium waxy potatoes, scrubbed and cut into a medium dice
- One 14-oz. can coconut milk (I used light--I don't notice the difference)
- About 1 c. water
- 5 oz. baby spinach, rinsed
- Fish sauce (nam pla), to taste
- Salt
- About 1/2 c. unsweetened coconut flakes, toasted, for serving
- Chopped cilantro, for serving
- Cooked white rice, for serving

Preparation:

1. If using dried, soaked chickpeas: about one hour before starting to cook, transfer the chickpeas in soaking liquid to the stove. Add a pinch of salt, cover, and simmer for one hour. As you proceed, leave chickpeas covered.
2. Heat the oil in a large, heavy-bottomed pot (Dutch oven) over medium heat. Add the onions and carrot, stir, and when they begin to soften, add the garlic and ginger. Add the lemon zest and all the spices and cook, stirring, until onions are translucent and spices are toasted and fragrant.
3. Drain the chickpeas and add to the pot along with the potatoes. Add the coconut milk and water, cover, and bring to a simmer. Cook for 15 - 20 minutes, until potatoes are tender.
4. Uncover pot and taste broth. Add a few dashes of fish sauce, to taste, and salt. Add the spinach, cover again, and let wilt. Cook for about 5 more minutes.
5. Turn off heat and stir in lemon juice. Check again for seasoning. Serve over hot white rice, garnished with cilantro and coconut.

The kitchen sink of stuffed veggie recipes

Recently, while shopping at the Co-op, I noticed some beautiful-looking Delicata squashes, and decided to grab a couple. Though I had never cooked with them, I knew they were among my mom's favorite vegetables, and that she'd be able to recommend a good recipe. And I was right: when I queried her via email, she responded that she bakes them, stuffed with a mixture of cottage cheese, apples, and raisins, then tops them with Swiss cheese, which creates a browned, gooey crust. I liked her idea, but it sounded a little too sweet for me, so using that recipe as a base, I riffed my own version of a stuffing.

First, I sautéed chopped onions and apples in some olive oil, adding some minced garlic and dried thyme once the first ingredients began to break down. Once everything was well cooked, I took some nice clean kale, shredded it up and added it to the pan, covering it to allow the kale to steam. Once that mixture had cooled slightly, I added the rest of the stuffing ingredients: cottage cheese, eggs, breadcrumbs, and grated Parmesan cheese. I portioned this generously between my two halved, par-baked squashes, then topped with more Parmesan cheese, as, well, I didn't have any Swiss. If you wanted to get more decadent, you could add more breadcrumbs to the top along with the cheese, and dot everything with butter before sending it off to the oven. Even if you go that route, you'll still have a pretty virtuous, complete, vegetarian meal:




 



















Baked Stuffed Delicata Squash
Serves 4

Ingredients:
 
2 medium to large Delicata squashes, halved and seeds removed
Olive oil
2 medium onions, peeled and finely chopped
2 medium apples, peeled and finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 tsp. dried thyme
1/2 c. raisins
1 bunch of kale, rinsed, thick stems removed, and shredded
About 1 c. cottage cheese, any style
2 eggs
About 1/2 c. breadcrumbs
About 1/4 c. grated Parmesan cheese
Salt
Pepper

Preparation:

1. Preheat the oven to 350°. Lightly season the squash with salt and pepper, then bake for about 25 minutes or until flesh is slightly tender. (Make sure the squash halves sit flat on the baking pan. If they don't, use a vegetable peeler to trim a strip or two away from the bottom.)

2. Prepare the stuffing: in a large, heavy-bottomed pan, heat about 3 tbsp. olive oil over medium heat. Add the apples and onions; a few minutes later, stir in the garlic, raisins and thyme. Cook, stirring occasionally, for about 5 minutes.

3. Add the shredded kale and cook, stirring occasionally, until kale is mostly wilted, about 5 - 7 minutes. Turn off the heat, cover the pan, and allow mixture to cool slightly.

4. Add cottage cheese, eggs, breadcrumbs, Parmesan, and salt and pepper to taste. Mix well. Remove squash from oven and divide filling evenly among 4 halves. (If you have any leftover stuffing, bake it in a greased dish alongside.) Top squash with more Parmesan, or, if you prefer, Parmesan + breadcrumbs and some dots of butter.

5. Return to oven and bake until squash is tender and stuffing is nicely browned, about 25 more minutes. I served the squash with a brown rice pilaf and a beet salad.

A starring role for a supporting cast member

Bread: it's the staff of life. Delicious and nutritious (despite what those Atkins people say), we all love it, we all crave it. But usually, we relegate it to some minor position in our meal; not even as important as a side dish, it's consumed to stave off hunger pangs at the beginning of a meal, or nibbled as a sort of afterthought alongside. It's time to bring bread into the fold, folks, and I aim to do that today by sharing two recent recipes that starred bread as the main character, or at least the equally-billed costar.

First up is a quick lunch I whipped up after returning home from my CSA pickup one week. I had gotten a bunch of beets, and wanted to figure out a way to use the greens, whose flavor I adore. I didn't have much else in the house besides a loaf of whole wheat sourdough and some eggs. So I thought to sauté up the greens and pile them on top of the toasted bread, crowning everything with a runny-yolked poached egg. Here's what it looked like:

















And yesterday evening, as I was biking home from a day of new apartment-related errands, I was struck suddenly with August Tomato Fever. It's something we all get around this time of year, I think: the unstoppable urge to eat fresh, sweet and acidic summer tomatoes, all the time, for the rest of the season and, if possible, early into the next one. I realized I hadn't had any local tomatoes yet this year, and was able to find some beautiful mini heirloom ones when I stopped into the Co-op. I didn't want to do much to them--just cut them up, maybe add some basil--and that's when it occurred to me to make a panzanella salad for dinner. One of those classic Italian dishes that comes from poverty (like the bread soup ribollita or pasta with breadcrumbs), this recipe doesn't call for much besides bread (stale, if you have it!), tomatoes, basil, olive oil and balsamic vinegar--plus, more luxuriously if you've got it, fresh mozzarella cheese. I added a little bit of red onion and lemon zest to mine, to brighten the flavors, and what I got was a big bowl of summer, bursting with the brightness of tomatoes and the richness of good olive oil--all without lighting a single burner:



















Garlic Toast with Sautéed Beet Greens and a Poached Egg
Serves 1, for lunch or a light meal

Ingredients:

- 1 small bunch of beet greens, rinsed and drained, with any large stems removed, chopped
- 1 thick slice of good bread such as sourdough or whole wheat
- 1 egg
- 1 clove garlic, peeled, plus 1 clove chopped
- Any light vinegar, such as white vinegar, white wine vinegar, or rice wine vinegar, 1/2 tsp.
- Olive oil
- Salt
- Pepper
- Red pepper flakes, optional

Preparation:

1. Prepare the beet greens: heat a small amount of olive oil in pan set over a medium flame. Add chopped garlic plus a sprinkling of red pepper flakes, if desired. After about 20 seconds, add the beet greens and cook, stirring occasionally, until greens are tender, about 6 - 8 minutes. Season greens to taste and set aside.
2. In the meantime, work on the egg and the toast. Set a small pot of water to the boil, then drop to a simmer. While waiting, toast your bread, then rub it on one side with the garlic clove.
3. When water is at a gentle simmer, add the 1/2 teaspoon of vinegar. Crack egg into a small dish and carefully lower the egg into the water. You can use a spoon to gently encourage the white of the egg to encircle the yolk. Cook at a simmer for about 2 to 3 minutes depending on how runny you like your yolk, then remove with a slotted spoon and drain on paper towels.
4. Assemble the dish: heap the beet greens on top of the garlic-rubbed side of the toast, then add the poached egg. Season egg with salt and pepper, and eat immediately.


Panzanella (Italian Bread Salad with Tomatoes and Mozzarella)
Serves 1 as a main dish, 2 as a side

Ingredients:

- 1/2 loaf of good bread, such as sourdough or Italian-style, stale is fine, cut into large cubes
- 1/2 pint of cherry or grape tomatoes, halved, or any good ripe tomatoes, cut into chunks, about 2 tomatoes
- 1/2 bunch of fresh basil, thinly sliced
- 1/4 red onion, cut into a very small dice
- Zest of half a lemon
- 1 ball of fresh mozzarella, cut into chunks the same size as the tomatoes
- Salt
- Pepper
- Olive oil
- Balsamic vinegar

1. Toast your bread: place bread on a small tray and toast in a toaster oven or the regular oven until just crisp, about 4 minutes. Set aside.
2. Toss tomatoes with a small amount of salt and pepper, and set aside for a few minutes to allow the tomatoes to "marinate" and give off some juice.
3. Combine bread, tomatoes, basil, red onion, and lemon zest in a bowl. Toss with olive oil, balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper to taste: you want the salad to be nice and juicy, and will probably need around 4 tablespoons olive oil and 1 tablespoon vinegar.
4. Just before serving, arrange the mozzarella over the top of the salad.

Whole grain goodness, in shades of pink

In my last post I talked about the wonderful CSA—that's the Crown Heights CSA, to be exact—that I joined at the beginning of the summer. The produce I've been picking up weekly has been unfailingly fresh, great looking and even better tasting, and this Tuesday's haul was no exception. Among other items, I received a thick, verdant bunch of scallions, a large handful of palely golden wax beans, and three fat beets—one of my favorite vegetables of all time. With temperatures holding steady in the 90s the whole week, I knew that these veggies were destined to be eaten cold. The question was how to bring them together into harmony.

I thought about the different kinds of cold salads that we eat during the summer—beets with goat cheese, a pasta salad to chuck the beans into—and immediately dismissed them as been there, done that. I wanted to try something new. That's when I remembered the cold rice salads that my mom often made when I was growing up, usually with brown rice, vegetables, toasted nuts, etc. (my mother was really ahead of the curve when it came to eating and enjoying whole grains). I decided to take a cue from her, but also to go a step further into unknown territory by using a less common grain. My first thought was spelt, but the only version the Co-op carried was imported from Italy and a small bag cost a whopping six dollars. Right nearby, though, was a bag of equal size of wheatberries, priced to move at an incredible 55 cents. That's my kind of deal, people! I grabbed it up.

At home, I simmered the wheatberries in salted water for about 40 minutes (contrary to popular belief, wheat berries do not need to be soaked before cooking) until they were tender, then drained them and allowed them to cool. In the meantime, I boiled up my beets, peeled and diced them, and cut up and blanched my wax beans. I combined everything in a big bowl, adding liberal amounts of sliced scallions and chopped parsley, as well as a lemon-olive oil dressing. And then I took a picture:























But the story didn't end there, folks: oh no, it had just begun. You see, I wanted to take the photo a) while there was still natural light; and b) before the beets totally took over and dyed everything magenta (as opposed to the early, and still quite beautiful, subtle stage of blush that you see here). But there were more things to come for this salad: right before serving it, I dotted the top with fresh Spanish goat cheese—you could also use something like feta or ricotta salata—and sprinkled on some chopped toasted walnuts. With the snap of the beans, the sweetness of the beets, the nuttiness of the wheat berries and the creaminess of the cheese, I'd say this summer salad definitely achieved the harmony—nay, the symphony—that I was looking for.


Wheatberry Salad with Beets, Wax Beans and Fresh Cheese
Serves 6 - 8 as a side dish, 4 as a main

Ingredients:
1 cup wheatberries, picked through to remove any debris or hard grains
1/2 lb. wax beans, trimmed and cut into halves or thirds depending on length (or substitute green beans)
3 large beets, trimmed and cut into quarters, but not peeled
3 scallions, white and green parts, thinly sliced
1/2 bunch parsley, finely chopped
Juice of 2 lemons
Olive oil
Salt
Pepper
4 oz. fresh cheese, such as goat or sheep's milk, or use a mild feta or ricotta salata, cut into cubes or broken up into pieces
1/2 cup walnut pieces, toasted and chopped

Preparation:

1. Fill a medium pot with water and set it to boil. Add a generous amount of salt, then add the wheatberries. Drop to a simmer and cook, stirring occasionally, for about 40 - 50 minutes, or until wheatberries are tender. Drain and allow to cool.

2. In the meantime, fill a second medium pot with water. Set it to boil and salt generously. Drop in the beans and cook for exactly two minutes. Remove with a slotted spoon—do not drain, you'll need the water for the beets—and immediately rinse beans with very cold water to stop the cooking process.

3. Bring the bean water back to a boil and add the beets. Cook for about 20 minutes or until the beets are tender. Drain beets, then place them in a bowl while they are still hot. Cover bowl with a large plate (or with plastic wrap) and let the beets steam up as they cool down. This will make it a cinch to peel them. When cool enough to handle, peel beets and cut them into small pieces.

4. When wheat berries, beans and beets are cooked and cooled, combine in a large bowl. Add the scallions and parsley.

5. In a small bowl, combine the lemon juice with olive oil to taste, probably about the same quantity, or slightly more, as of the lemon juice. Season generously with salt and pepper. Pour over salad, and stir to combine. Chill in fridge until ready to eat.

6. Before serving, garnish the salad with the cheese and the walnuts.

Back, with a bushel of zucchini

I've been back in the States almost two months now and this is the first free moment I've found to write on the blog. Life has been a flurry, of moving around, job hunting, catching up with friends and visiting all the New York spots that I missed while I was away. But things are finally taking on a sense of normalcy, allowing me some time to tell you about something important: summer zucchini.

When I got back from France, I did two things almost immediately: one, became a member of the Park Slope Food Co-op, that alternately venerated and misunderstood Brooklyn temple of local and organic food; and two, signed up for a CSA share of local fruit and vegetables. Having spent a long time in Europe, where, it seems to me, people are both more passionate and more discriminating than the majority of us Americans when it comes to the quality of their food, I would say that my growing interest in healthy, sustainable produce pretty much reached its peak. I didn't want to go back, upon returning home, to eating ordinary supermarket items flown in from California or Argentina or wherever. And I haven't looked back.

Anyone even marginally familiar with vegetable gardening knows about summer squash and, well, what a beast it is, basically. This vegetable (I suppose it is biologically a fruit) just erupts out of the ground come late June, fruiting and fruiting and producing tons of zucchinis. Gardeners sometimes don't know what to do with all their bounty, giving them away to neighbors, turning them into breads and cakes. There are even numerous gardeners' sayings about zucchini (here's a sample one "Zucchinis, terrific/Like bunnies, prolific!"). I've grown zucchini myself so I know this to be true, and just in case I'd forgotten, my weekly CSA share has certainly reminded me. For weeks now we've been getting bunches of small squash in all varieties: yellow and green; pattypan, crookneck, and everything in between. Fortunately for me, I love zucchini. Not so fortunately, I've been super busy at work lately, leaving little time to cook. So quite inadvertently, a small stockpile of squash began building up in my refrigerator's crisper drawer, until I finally found the time, yesterday, to deploy my arsenal.

Like any true NYC summer, this one, so far, has been humid and blazing hot. So what I wanted from my zucchini was something to cool me down. I improvised a simple chilled soup, first sautéing chopped green onions and garlic (also from my CSA) in olive oil, then adding a whole mess of chunked zucchini. I let that sweat down just a little bit, then added water almost to cover (the zucchini will let out a lot of liquid as it cooks, so you want to be careful not to add too much water). Once the squash was tender, I puréed the soup in batches in the blender, adding a couple of dollops of plain yogurt, plus a few fresh mint leaves and some additional seasoning, as I went. When everything was smooth and light green, I let the soup chill in the fridge before enjoying it with some homemade croutons. Say hello to my new favorite summer lunch:





Chilled Summer Squash Soup with Yogurt and Mint
Serves 8

Ingredients:

- 4 tbsp. olive oil
- 1 bunch scallions, trimmed of any brown or stringy parts, roughly chopped
- 3 cloves garlic, chopped
- 3 lbs. summer squash of any variety, chopped into rough pieces
- Water
- Salt
- Pepper
- About 1 cup plain yogurt
- A handful of fresh mint leaves, washed

Preparation:

1. In a large, deep, heavy-bottomed pot, heat the olive oil over a medium flame. Add the scallions and stir; add the garlic a few minutes later. Season with some salt and sauté for a few minutes, until the scallions start to break down.
2. Add the squash along with a few pinches of salt and a few grinds of pepper and stir to combine. Let the squash sweat for 4 or 5 minutes, then add just enough water to almost cover the squash, about 4 cups. Cover and bring to a boil, then drop to a steady simmer and leave partially covered.
3. Cook soup until squash is just tender, about 15 minutes. Turn off the heat and, working in batches, ladle the soup into a blender (you can also leave the soup in the pot and use an immersion blender). Purée, adding a dollop of yogurt, plus a few mint leaves and additional seasoning, with each batch. If the soup is looking too thin, try to leave behind some of your cooking liquid, and if too thick, add more.
4. Check soup for seasoning and allow to chill in the fridge for several hours. Serve, garnishing with additional chopped mint and, preferably, some homemade croutons (see recipe below).


Homemade Croutons
Makes two cups

Ingredients:

- Day-old bread, preferably crusty (ie, a baguette), cut into small cubes and yielding 2 cups
- 3 tbsp. olive oil
- Salt
- Pepper
- Dried herbs, such as thyme, oregano, sage, etc.

Preparation:

1. In a bowl, toss the bread cubes with the olive oil, a generous amount of salt and pepper, and a sprinkling of the herbs. Make sure each cube is coated in oil.
2. Place bread cubes in a large wide skillet set over medium-low heat and cook, tossing occasionally, for about 6 - 10 minutes, or until bread is fragrant, golden, and crunchy. Let cool completely before serving.
3. Alternatively, you can bake the croutons in a 325° oven. Set bread cubes on a sheet tray and bake, stirring occasionally, for about 6 - 10 minutes, or until bread is fragrant, golden, and crunchy. Let cool completely before serving.

Major co-op action!

Got a huge variety of fruits and vegetables at the co-op yesterday (pretty colors, right?):















Limes, kiwis, red onions, dandelion greens, plum tomatoes, a mango, a Pink Lady apple, and an avocado. Yum. I definitely see Mexican food in my future--definitely a salsa, perhaps guacamole, maybe some margaritas to take advantage of those limes. And I better get to cooking, because I still have a ton of produce left over from last week's pickup.

P.S. I'm embarassed to report another failure in my continuing endeavor to make yogurt. Dear lord! I'm going to try to get my hands on a candy thermometer this weekend and give it another go.

Co-op time

Valencia oranges, collard greens, baby portabello mushrooms, anjou pears, and an ear of corn.

Catching up

Here's what I received from the co-op on Thursday (less one grapefruit, which I ate already):

Strawberries, a grapefruit, two artichokes, two cucumbers, and red leaf lettuce.

Thursday already?

In the course of a week it suddenly became spring, a development that's left me pretty much giddy with happiness. I got some beautiful fruit at the co-op today, along with some staples that aren't very seasonal but which will be nice to have on hand nonetheless:















A pound of onions, a pound of russet potatoes, two bunches of Swiss chard, a mango, and three plums. Here's hoping I can force myself out of the sunshine and into the kitchen soon.

It's Thursday

And here's a look at what I got at the co-op this week:




















Basil, zucchini, plum tomatoes, blueberries, a Valencia orange, and green beans. I'm excited. Visions of delicious pesto-coated Italian foods are dancing through my head.

Fruit and veggie pickup

Every Thursday, I receive a share of organic fruits and vegetables from Wesleyan's student-run co-op. Not only does everything have more flavor, but I'm also inspired to cook more often (so that nothing goes bad before I use it) and to cook more exciting things (since I'm sometimes unfamiliar with an ingredient I receive). It's a pretty sweet deal all around.

When conceiving of this blog, I envisioned that I would use my weekly co-op haul as inspiration, posting, every week, what I received and then documenting how I used each ingredient in my cooking. I later decided to be slightly more ambitious, instead trying to post every single time I cook. But I am still going to post my weekly pickup and how I use it. Here's this week's:

Asparagus, pineapple, strawberries, broccoli, and avocado (not pictured: the honey tangerine I consumed immediately upon receipt). Stay tuned for all the exciting ways in which they get used...