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.

When life gives you...carrots?

I'm a proud member of the wonderful Crown Heights Farm Share, and I split a winter share with two friends. As such, I'm pretty well covered on root vegetables right now. Just to give you an idea of what farms produce through the cold winter months (or can store through the season), here's an example of what my friends and I received at the last pickup: 5 pounds sweet potatoes, 8 pounds Kueka Gold potatoes, 10 pounds storage carrots, 2 stalks of Brussels sprouts, 2 heads of broccoli, 1 piece of daikon radish, 1 head of Arrow cabbage, 1 bulb kohlrabi, 1 bunch of fresh field carrots, 5 pounds storage beets, 1 head of Napa cabbage, 1 bunch kale, 1 bunch green Romaine lettuce, 1 bunch red Romaine lettuce, 1 bunch green Oak lettuce, and 1 head green Boston lettuce.

As you can see, what we got was a mix of fresh produce (probably grown in a greenhouse or under plastic tarps) as well as storage produce, that's likely being kept in a cool, dark cellar. Getting a winter farm share is interesting, because it gives you some insight into what people were dealing with back in the days of eating truly locally. Although I supplement my share with imported produce like bananas and avocados, I also try to put myself in the mindset of, oh, say, a 19th century self-sufficient farmer, and try to envision what I would do to keep all those dark greens and starchy roots interesting for my family through the cold, dark months.

Altogether, my friends and I got more than ten pounds of carrots, in an array of beautiful colors. Here's my share of the loot:























Figuring out what to do with them wasn't hard. I instantly thought of soup, as most cooks do when faced with a surplus of perishable product. I knew I would cook the carrots down and purée them into something smooth and silky, but I wanted to keep the flavors zingy, as sometimes carrots (especially cooked carrots) can tend towards the blandly sweet. First, I decided that I would roast the carrots in the oven before cooking them in the broth, in order to bring out some of the complexities that high heat imparts to vegetables. Then I decided that I would throw a lot of strong, warming spices in with the usual salt and pepper on my carrots. So after a lot of peeling and chopping, I ended up with this:























That's the carrots, some oil and seasoning, plus generous amounts of whole cumin, coriander and mustard seeds. I tossed them and into the oven they went, emerging burnished and fragrant after about forty minutes. Then I sweated some onions, garlic and grated ginger in some olive oil, added the carrots and enough chicken stock to cover, and simmered for about forty minutes, until the carrots rehydrated and melded with the other flavors in the pot. Then, I busted out my handy immersion blender and puréed it all up, adding dollops of plain yogurt as I went. The end result is a surprisingly complex-tasting soup, warm and spicy from the whole seeds, but also cool and tangy from the addition of the yogurt. I actually think this would be excellent cold, but as it's (sort of) chilly outside, I've been eating it hot:























But wait, I'm not done with my carrot transformations yet! I kept the slender, fresh carrots to the side, cut them into little sticks, and pickled them in a brine made with apple cider vinegar, garlic, mustard seeds and fresh cilantro (I wanted to use dill, but I forgot to buy some). They'll be ready in ten days; I can hardly wait!































Spice-Roasted Carrot Soup with Yogurt
Serves 10 - 12

Ingredients:

3 lbs. carrots, peeled and cut into large, uniform chunks
Grapeseed, canola or other neutral oil
2 tsp. cumin seeds
2 tsp. coriander seeds
1 tbsp. mustard seeds
Salt
Pepper
2 large onions, peeled and cut into a medium dice
2 cloves of garlic, chopped
1 tbsp. grated ginger
About 1 quart chicken or vegetable broth
About 1 1/2 c. plain yogurt
1 lime

Preparation:

1. Preheat the oven to 425°. Toss the carrots with a small amount of oil, the cumin, coriander and mustard seeds, and a generous amount of salt and pepper. Turn out onto a sheet tray and place in the oven, stirring occasionally, for about 40 minutes, or until the carrots are nicely browned. Set aside.

2. When the carrots come out of the oven, heat about 3 tbsp. of olive oil in a large, heavy-bottomed soup pot. Add the onions and stir; a minute or two later, add the garlic and ginger. Cook over medium heat, stirring often, until the onions sweat and break down, about ten minutes. Add the roasted carrots and enough broth to cover. Bring to a boil, then drop to a simmer and cook for about 40 minutes, until carrots plump up again.

3. Use an immersion or standard blender to blend the soup until smooth, adding more chicken stock as needed to maintain a fluid consistency. Work in the yogurt as you go. Squeeze in the juice of the lime and check for seasoning, adding more salt or pepper as needed. Serve hot or cold.


Pickled Carrots
Adapted from Epicurious.com
Makes one jar

Ingredients:

1 lb. carrots, peeled and cut into sticks
1 1/4 c. water
1 c. apple cider vinegar
1/4 c. sugar
1 1/2 tbsp. salt
1 garlic clove, peeled and crushed
1 tsp. mustard seeds
Sprig of fresh herbs, such as dill or cilantro

Preparation:

1. Fill a medium pot with water and bring to a boil. Blanch the carrots in the water for one minute, then remove with a slotted spoon and place in an ice bath, or run under cold water, to stop the cooking.

2. Choose an appropriate-sized glass jar for the carrots and place it and its lid in the boiling water. Boil for about 7 minutes to sanitize, then remove with tongs.

3. Combine the water, vinegar, sugar and salt in a small saucepan and bring to a boil. Turn off heat.

4. Place carrot sticks in jar. They should fit closely together. Add mustard seeds, garlic and fresh herbs to the jar. Using a funnel, pour in the pickling liquid to top of jar, then seal tightly with the lid. The carrots should be left to pickle for about 10 days. Unopened, they will last for several months.

As I was saying...

In my last post I talked about some pernil tacos and the condiments I made to eat with them. And just by coincidence, I recently whipped up another taco-worthy topping, so I thought I'd piggyback on my most recent entry and share this complementary recipe with you.

My summer CSA share ended this week, and it was bittersweet: sweet, because that means the winter CSA share starts up soon; and bitter, because I had to finally say goodbye to all that wonderful warm-weather produce. But bitter, also, for another reason: all those dang radishes.

For the last four pickups in a row, I'd gotten bunches of different kinds of radishes, such as slender magenta French breakfast radishes, and brightly-hued, multicolored Easter egg radishes, to name two types. I was running out of ideas for radishes, people. I sliced them thinly and scattered the pale discs over my salad. I smeared them with good butter and sprinkled them with coarse salt for an appropriately French snack. And then I...shoved the rest of the radishes in my crisper drawer, waiting for inspiration to strike. Now don't get me wrong: I'm a fan of this vegetable, with its crisp, watery, sharp bite. (I also have a more sentimental fondness for it: in a memorable scene in my very favorite children's book, A Special Trade, the aging main character pulls a radish out of the ground and gives it to his friend and caretaker, a little girl, to bite into, fresh from the earth.) But it just doesn't seem like the most versatile foodstuff. Luckily, I found the perfect occasion to use up a lot of my radishes when I had friends over for a Mexican-inspired meal of corn tortillas, rice, beans, guacamole, and pickled red onions. What better addition to this spread but a refreshing radish salsa, fiery with jalapeño and bright with fresh cilantro?

I'd eaten radish salsa a handful of times before, at some of my favorite Mexican joints (one of the best of this lot being Girasol Bakery in south Park Slope), but I'd never made it at home. Turns out, it couldn't be simpler: you dice up the radishes very finely; add some jalapeño, similarly finely chopped; cilantro, salt, and a very generous squeezing of lime juice. As the salsa sits, the flavors meld and the colors bleed, resulting in a bowl of rosy goodness that's equally at home spooned over roast pork as it is over rice and beans:



















Radish Salsa
Makes about 1 1/2 cups

Ingredients:

- 1 bunch radishes of any type, rinsed and very finely diced
- 1/2 jalapeño pepper, seeds and ribs removed, minced
- A good handful fresh cilantro, finely chopped
- The juice of 2 limes
- Salt, to taste

Preparation:

1. Combine the radishes, jalapeño, cilantro and lime juice in a bowl and stir to combine. Salt to taste. (You'll need a fair amount of salt to cut through the acidity of the lime.) For best results, cover and refrigerate for one hour before serving, to allow flavors to meld.

Dark and spicy, rosy and puckery

Well, it's not yet my birthday (although we're not too far off), but already this year I've had the occasion to make one of my favorite festive dishes, the crowd-nourishing slow-cooked pork shoulder. This time, the occasion was a fête to celebrate the arrival of fall (and the last chance to have a big gathering on our huge deck 'afore the weather turns too crisp). Though my roommates and I declared our shindig a potluck, experience has taught us that cooking the bulk of the meal is probably a safe bet if one actually wants to eat something approximating a dinner (fact: most people like to bring beer as their potluck dish). And that was a o.k. by me; I love cooking for a group. While my roommate Dave slaved over a labor-intensive (and delicious) veggie lasagna, I stuck my pork roast in the oven and called it a day.

Well, not quite; it's hard for me to let myself off too easy when I cook (I'm working on it). Having decided to prepare the meat in the Puerto Rican style pernil, as opposed to going for the Southern comfort of the BBQ pulled pork I also sometimes make, I opted to serve the finished product in corn tortillas, as tacos. Clearly, I needed some condiments to go with. And it just so happened that days earlier I had noticed some mighty fine-lookin' tomatillos at the Co-op, and thought about how I had never cooked with them before. Immediately, salsa verde, that vibrant, often incendiary Mexican preparation came to mind. One down, one to go; in addition to heat, my tacos would need some crunch. Given my recent obsession with canning, I decided that a quick pickle of red onions was the way to go.

For the onions, I used a simple recipe from Epicurious; in addition to the onions, it calls for exactly three ingredients: apple cider vinegar, water, and salt. It takes about five minutes to throw together; I bet you could make it right now. Go ahead, then! Need a further push? Just look at how pretty the finished pickle looks, all glowing and rosy pink:






















For the salsa, I adapted a recipe from Bon Appétit; similarly approachable, it called for the tomatillos to be boiled together with a few jalapeños, then whirled in a blender with fresh parsley, cilantro and mint, and not a small amount of garlic. Looking for a clean flavor, I left out the dried cumin the recipe called for; I also found the finished salsa to be lacking in acidity, and corrected that with both apple cider vinegar and a squeeze of fresh lime juice. I see that Bon Appétit didn't post a photo of the salsa, and neither will I; its hue wasn't exactly appetizing. But piled together with the pork and pickled onions, I doesn't look half bad; nay, the colors are almost complementary:



















Pickled Red Onions
Adapted from epicurious.com
Makes about 2 cups

Ingredients:

- 2 red onions, sliced into half-moons
- 1 c. apple cider vinegar
- 1 tsp. salt
- Water

Preparation:

1. Bring a small pot of water to a boil. Blanch the onions for one minute, then drain and shock in an ice bath. Drain again.
2. Return onions to the pot and add the vinegar, salt, and enough cold water to just cover the onions. Bring mixture to a boil and simmer one minute; transfer onions and brine to glass jars and let cool. Note: if planning to can (preserve) the onions, you will need to sterilize the jars. Canned onions keep indefinitely; if not preserving, transfer the jars to the refrigerator, where they will keep for about a month.


Salsa Verde
Adapted from bonappetit.com
Makes about 4 cups

Ingredients:

- 3 lbs. tomatillos, husked, rinsed
- 2 large jalapeños, stems (but not seeds) removed
- 5 garlic cloves, peeled
- 1 bunch fresh cilantro, thick bottom stems trimmed
- 1/2 bunch fresh parsley, thick bottoms stems trimmed
- Handful fresh mint leaves
- 1 1/2 tbsp. vegetable oil
- About 1 tbsp. apple cider vinegar
- Juice of 1 lime
- About 1 1/2 tsp. salt

Preparation:

1. Place tomatillos and jalapeños in a large pot, cover with water, and bring to a boil. Drop to a simmer and let cook until tomatillos are soft, about 15 minutes. Drain.
2. Place tomatillos and jalapeños in the bowl of a blender or food processor. Add garlic and herbs, and pulse to combine, then let run until smooth.
3. Return mixture to the pot, add oil and let simmer for 5 - 10 more minutes, until salsa thickens. Remove from heat. Add cider vinegar, lime juice and salt; taste and correct seasoning. Let cool and serve.

Yet another pesto recipe

Browsing my recipe index here on this site, it's easy to see some themes in what I cook: Asian food. Vegetarian food. And not a small amount of pesto.

OK, you got me--I only have two recipes for pesto published here. But even so, I think two types of pesto is more than many people conceive of. For most of us, the word pesto makes us think of that classic combination of fresh basil, pine nuts, and parmesan cheese. But as I've talked about before, the ways in which you could deviate from that norm (different herb or even bitter green; other nuts besides pine nuts) are basically endless.

Besides its versatility, the other thing that I love about pesto is how it basically acts as a means of preservation. Having joined a CSA this summer, I've learned what it feels like to be drowning in untreated, quickly perishable produce, and as a result I've increasingly turned to jarring and canning, making mostly things like jams and fruit butters. But pesto is another great way to keep your produce around a little longer: tightly sealed, it keeps in the freezer for a very long time. Plus, since it's made up mostly of oil, it never freezes totally solid, making it super easy to just scoop out a portion or two when you're boiling up some pasta--no need to freeze it in individual portion sizes.

So now that I've sold you on the idea of all pesto, all the time, let's get to the recipe, shall we? This particular one utilizes the bitter greens of two tasty root vegetables--beets and radishes. After a very quick blanch in some boiling water just to negate any too-bitter compounds in the greens, they get blitzed with some toasted walnuts, mild oil, and parmesan cheese. This pesto is excellent, of course, served with any kind of pasta, but also makes a nice sauce when thinned down a bit and drizzled over a rich fish filet, such as salmon.






Bitter Greens Pesto
Makes about two cups

Ingredients:

- 2 bunches of bitter greens, such as beet or radish tops, dandelion, or watercress, rinsed and spun dry
- 2/3 c. walnut halves or pieces, lightly toasted and cooled
- 3 garlic cloves, peeled and chopped
- Up to 3/4 c. mild oil--I use a combination of grapeseed oil and olive oil
- 1/2 c. grated parmesan cheese
- Salt
- Pepper

Preparation:

1. Fill a medium saucepan with water and bring it to a boil. In the meantime, prepare an ice bath: fill a large mixing bowl with cold water, and add a handful or two of ice. Also have a colander ready.
2. When water is boiling, drop in greens and allow them to cook for about 30 seconds. Immediately drain them in the colander, then transfer them to the ice bath. When cooled, use your hands or a towel to squeeze out as much extra water as possible, then roughly chop.
3. In the bowl of a food processor, pulse the walnuts with the garlic until both are mostly chopped. Add the greens and pulse again. Season with salt and pepper. Then, while machine is running, drizzle in the oil, stopping when pesto reaches desired consistency--it should not be too thin. Finally, add the parmesan cheese and pulse to combine. Check for seasoning.

Note: if freezing the pesto, choose a sturdy container that is just big enough, and press a layer of plastic wrap right onto the surface of the pesto before sealing with the lid.