New Kale recipe

I just tried this new recipe in the Nov 2010 issue of cooking light for Roasted Kale. John and I ate the whole bowl while we were waiting some chicken to come off the grill. Definitely a keeper recipe.

Roasted Kale

1 bunch of kales destemmed and chopped
4-5 cloves garlic
1-2 tablespoons olive oil
salt to taste
1 tablespoon white balsamic vinegar (ok the recipe called for Sherry vinegar but I didn't have any. I suppose most flavors would also work well.)

Heat the oven to 425. Put a jelly roll pan in the oven while it heats.
Put the first 4 ingredients in a bowl and coat the kale with oil and salt.
Add the kale to the heated pan and spread evenly. Roast for 5-7 minute, stir it around and continue roasting for another 5 minutes until the ends of the kale are crispy but the rest is cooked through. Toss the kale and garlic in a bowl with the vinegar and serve immediately.

Butternut Squash

This is the first year John has planted butternut squash. He planted it in August and it took off. We have at least 3 squash off the one plant. I picked it Oct 13 and made a soup with it. It was yummy. Here is the recipe

Butternut Squash Soup

1 tbls coconut oil
1 butternut squash (peeled, sliced into thin slices) when you get to the seeded area cut it in half and remove the seeds and slice the rest up.
1 onion chopped
4-5 cups chicken broth
1 tsp garam masala
1/2 tsp ginger
1/2 cup half and half
1/2 cup non fat plain yogurt
toasted pistachios

Heat the oil in a large soup pot, add the onion and cook until sweated. Add the squash and cook for about 5 minutes. Add the broth until the squash is covered. Add the spices and cook about 20-25 minutes until tender. Blend using an immersion blender if you have one otherwise in a regular blender in batches until smooth. Add salt and pepper to taste. Finish with the half and half and yogurt. Serve with a small handful of toasted pistachios on top.

A peck of peppers

We pulled out all the pepper plants today and picked everything on them. We ended up with a huge basket of jalipenos, serranos, anaheims and pablanos. So what to do?

Pickled peppers
I pickled one jar of the jalipenos which just involved boiled a mixture of half vengar andf half water and a teaspoon of pickling slat (actually I used Kosher - not real sure the difference) I put the washed and stemmed peppers in a sterilized jar. To sterilize you can run the jars through the dishwasher or boil in water for 5-10 minutes. I added some pickling spices - allspice and mustard seeds. Cover the peppers with the boiled vinegar mixture. Now if you want to put this on a shelf you can boil the jars to seal. But I just put the jar in the refrigerator as I only made one. It will take a couple of days though before they are ready.



Frozen Pepper Mash
This is an easy way to preserve peppers. I used the pablanos and a few serranos and cut the steps and seeds out. I added these (about 6 cups) to a food processor with just about 1/2 cup of water. Process until they are ground. Add these to ice cube trays and freeze. You can remove the cubes from the tray when they are frozen and store in a zip lock in the freezer. To use take one out, thaw and you can add to any recipe that calls for peppers.


We then roasted, peeled and chopped the annaheims for Green Chili.

Its time for the fall garden

Well John has pretty much changed out the garden to the fall garden. We ripped out the peppers today and planted the radishes, parnsips and all the slaw crops. The cucumbers and zucchini are doing nicely but we don't have any fruit on them yet. We did plant something new this years as a fall crop - butternut squash. We were out of town for a couple of weeks and when we got back we have 3 very nice sized squash. We harvested a basket full of peppers and I had to scramble to figure out what to do with them but I will detail that on a separate post.

August

well it is August and not much is growing. John tried something new this year and planted Arugula just after the summer solstice. He did it as an experiment to see if it would grow. Usually Arugula will start to bolt as the days get longer. But after the solstice the days get shorter. At any rate it has been a success for the most part - we have had arugula since Mid July which is nice because almost everything else he pulled up except the peppers. The best producing peppers now are the Anaheims which as also called hatch in New Mexico - these are the best for roasting and peeling.

I have been putting them in quiches, eggs and I made some green chili mashed potatoes that were yummy.

Peppers

The peppers are also doing quite well right now as they relaly seem to like the warmer weather. One of the peppers we are growing is the pablono. My favorite dish with pablano's is also also a favorite with the family. You can make iton Sunday and the leftovers are even better.

Suanne's Stuffed Pablano

4 cups of pulled pork - see below
2-3 teaspoons of Suanne's Spice rub
1/4 cup apple cider vinegar
1 onion julienned
3 cloves garlic sliced
1/3 cup raisins chopped
salt and pepper
Mexican Asidero cheese (or provolone or mozzarella works well) cut into 1/2 inch chunks
6-8 large pablano peppers with tops and seeds removed

Saute the onions until they soften in a medium high large saute pan. Add the pulled pork, vinegar, garlic, raisins and spices. Cook on med low heat until the flavors combine about 20 minutes. Let cook slightly and add cheeses. Stuff as much as you can into each pepper making sure the stuffing gets all the way to the bottom of the pepper. Arrange peppers in a baking dish and bake at 350 for about 1 hour until the peppers are tender.

Serve with a red chili sauce.

Red Chili Sauce

1/2 cup butter
2-3 tablespoons New Mexican red chili
1/2 knorr tomato bouillon
1/3 cup flours
2 cups chicken broth

Heat butter until it melts, add bouillon and chili and combine. Add flour to make a roux. Cook the roux a couple of minutes to remove floury flavor. Add half the chicken broth slowing stirring constantly until the mixture thickens. As it thickens add more broth until it a a thick sauce consistancy.




Pulled pork
1 pork butt
1 bay leave
2-3 teaspoon of my spice rub spice rub
1 onion chopped in large pieces
3-4 garlic cloves peeled
2 teaspoons salt
I start this in the morning when I get up and put the pork butt (it can be frozen even) in a crock pot with the rest of the ingredients. Cover with water and set it high (if frozen) low if not and let it cook all day about 8 hours until the meat pulls apart very easily. Put the pork on a board and using two forks pull it apart, removing excess fat and any bones. Save the liquid from the park straining the solid out.

Okra

Ok the tomatoes and Cucumbers are gone. The weather is hot so the Okra is ready. I have several ways to cooks okra, but we discovered a new way this summer which is now our favorite - Grilled Okra.

Grilled Okra

Wash and remove the small feathers near the stem. They should come off quite easily. Brush olive oil and salt and pepper plus a little cajun seasoning on the Okra. Heat the grill to med high and grease the grill so the Okra doesn't stick and add the okra to the grill. Grill about 5 minutes per side or until tender. Remove from grill, let it cool just a little and pick it up using the stem and eat.


Sauteed Okra

This is just a simple stirfry.
1/2 onion chopped
3 garlic cloves chopped
10-15 okra sliced into 1/2 inch slices.

Heat a saute pan with a tablespoon of olive or coconut oil. Add the onions and cook until they begin to brown, add the garlic and okra and cook until okra is tender about 5-10 minutes.

The rush is over - summer salads

Well it is the end of June. The tomatoes have slowed down and I have made my last batch of gazpacho for the season. One of my favorites in the summer are salads made with fresh herbs, grains and veggies. Here are a couple. You can mix and match these ingredients to taylor to your tastes and what you might have in the fridge.

Tabbouleh

2 cups Cooked bulgur wheat
1/2 cup chopped mint
1 cup chopped parsley
2 tomatoes chopped
1 cucumber, peeled, seeded and chopped
1 can garbanzo beans
1 chopped avocado
1/2 crumbled feta
1/3 cup lemon juice
1/4 cup olive oil
salt and pepper
Combine all ingredients thru the feta, combine lemon juice, olive oil and salt and pepper. Add to salad and mix. Serve

Greek Barley Salad
1/2 cup barley
1 1/2 cup broth (beef or chicken or vegetable)
20 pitted kalamata olives pitted and chopped
20 cherry tomatoes halves
1 cucumber peeled, seeded and chopped
6 green onion chopped
1/2 cup feta cheese crumbles
lemon peel
1/3 cup lemon juice
1/4 cup olive oil
salt and pepper
In med saucepan combine barley, broth and a 1/2 teaspoon salt. Bring to a boil, cover reduce heat and cook for 40 minutes until all liquid is absorbed. Cool.
Add remaining ingredinets through lemom peel. Combine lemon juice, olive oil and salt and pepper. Add to salad and mix. Serve

More Eggplant

Inspired by a dish we had in Spain I decided to try making Albondigas which are meatballs in a spicy tomato sauce. I chose bison as the meet because of its leanness. But I picked a few of our Japanese eggplant and a banana pepper, along with an onion and diced all of the vegetables up and sauteed them until they were soft. I let this mixture cool and then added this to the bison meat.
The meatballs turned out very tender and juicy but without all the fat.

Bison Aubergine meatballs with spicy tomato yogurt sauce.

1 lb ground bison
2 Japanese eqqplant
1 pepper such as banana or Serrano or pablano
1 med onion
2 oz of breadcrumbs - progresso italian works well here, but not panko
1 egg
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp ground coriander
1 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp cinnamon
salt and pepper


Cut the onion, peppers and eggplant into a small dice. Saute in a few tblspns of olive oil until soft.
Cool and add to bison along with the rest of the ingredients.
Form into small balls and dredge in flour.
Heat some olive oil in a med high pan and cook meatballs until browned on all sides. Serve with the Tomato yogurt sauce below.

Tomato Yogurt Sauce
1/c cup tomato frito - which is a tomato sauce with tomatoes onion, garlic, a little sugar and vinegar.
2 tbsp mayonnaise
1 tsp vinegar
1/2 tsp paprika
1/2 tsp cumin
some cayenne to taste
1/2 cup yogurt
2 clove crushed garlic
Juice of 1/2 lime

Combine all ingredients

June Crop Management - Plums, eggplant, cucumbers oh and tomatoes

OK I should be better at blogging because there really is quite a bit of activity in June primarily around what I call crop management. I usually make about 2 batches of gazpacho per week, plus homemade salsa weekly. But in additional to the usual overload of tomatoes, cucumbers and beans, this year we had a huge plum crop. We decided to make some plum wine so we picked, washed and pitted 30 lbs of plums and put them in the freezer. You need to ferment the plum below 80 degrees so we will wait until October to start this process. Freezing the fruit won't harm the quality, in fact its helps to release the sugars in the fruit which are a key component of the fermentation process.

We also made a quick batch of plum chutney that turned out yummy. I gave a ton of plums away and am hoping that someone will make some plum jam and give me some.

Another vegetable crop this year is eggplant. We planted two varieties. Purple Japanese Eggplant and a White Japanese Eggplant. Both are flourishing. One of our favorite ways to eat eggplant is to cut them in half and grill them. We then server with a simple yogurt sauce or melt goat cheese (during the grilling) on them and drizzle with a balsamic vinegar reduction.

Grilled Eggplant

4-6 Japanese eggplant
Olive oil
salt and pepper ( Monterey Steak seasoning also works well)

Wash and trim end off eggplant. Cut in half lengthwise.

Using a pastry brush, brush on olive oil and season.

Place on a hot grill, cut side down and grill for about 4-5 minutes, keep and eye out so they don't burn. Turn and grill a couple minutes more until soft.

You can either server like this with a yogurt sauce or add some goad cheese in that last couple of minutes of grilling and then drizzle with a reduction of balsamic vinegar. Any leftover eggplant you can scrape from the skins and use in omelets, quiches, souffles, or crepes. It also freezes well.

Yogurt Sauce
1/2 cup plain yogurt
2 cloves garlic crushes
juice of 1/2 lemon
salt and pepper to season

Combine all ingredients in a small bowl and server with Eggplant.

Balsamic Reduction
1/3 cup balsamic vinegar

Heat vinegar in small sauce pan over low heat until reduced in half - about 20 minutes. The reduction makes a thick sweet sauce that complements the goat cheese and eggplant.

Cucumber Recipes

Well we have tons of cucumbers right now so here is one of my favorite recipes.


Cucumber Cream salad

I used to use sour cream for this but it works equally well to use greek yogurt or a combination of yogurt and sour cream.

2 -3 cucumbers peeled seeds removed and sliced.
1 cup sour cream or yogurt or half of each. You can also use low fat versions of both sour cream and plain yogurt.
2 teaspoons chopped dill
Juice of one lemon
1 onion (red or sweet white onion) about 1/2 cup chopped
salt and pepper to taste.

Mix all ingredients except cucumber together. Then add cucumber and mix.

Tomatoes, zucchini and beans!! Oh my!!

The summer rush has begun. The tomatoes are plentiful, the bean crop is very impressive, Zucchini is nearly done. Onions are all in. Peppers are getting there. Cucumbers and Eggplant are producing nicely. Still have swiss chard and the okra is getting close. OK now how do I keep up.

Zucchini and sun dried tomato pasta with feta.

1 large or 3 small zucchini sliced into thin slices
3 cloves garlic sliced
1 onion julienned
olive or coconut oil - 2 tblspoons
3 tbls sliced sun dried tomatoes
1/2 cup feta cheese crumbled
pasta - rotini shapes works well here

cook pasta according to directions
Heat oil over med high heat. Saute - onion until soft, add zucchini and cook for several minutes and add garlic and sun-dried tomatoes. Cook until zucchini is soft but not mushy - just a few minutes more. Add the pasta and the cheese and toss. Serve.

Suanne's Salsa

3-4 Ripe tomatoes cut into chunks

1 med onion cut into chunks

1-2 jalipenos – for milder salsa use one and remove the seeds

1-2 serrano, banana or Anaheim peppers

1-2 cloves garlic crushed and chopped

1 bunch cilantro

Juice of 1 lime

Salt to taste

Combine all ingredients into a food processor and pulse until consistence is uniforms and how you like it. Serve with tortilla chips.

Greek Tomato Salad

2-3 small ripe tomatoes

Greek Olives

1 tblspoon chopped red onion

1 tbls olive oil

1 tblspn red wine vinegar

1/2 tbls chopped oregano

Greek Feta cheese about 2 ounces

Cut tomatoes into bite size pieces and put in dish, add onion and olives.

Sprinkle with fresh chopped oregano, vinegar and oil, Add cheese on top and

Season with pepper.

Suanne’s Black Beans and Rice – 6 servings

2 Cups chicken or Vegetable broth

1 Cup Medium grain rice

1 can black beans

1 med green pepper diced

1 med red pepper diced

1 med onion diced

1 jalipeno without seeds diced

2 tbls canola oil

Salt and pepper to season

1 bunch chopped cilantro

1 tbls cumin

Cook rice by bringing broth to boil and adding rice. Cover and simmer on low

18 minutes until rice is cooked.

Heat oil in large sauté pan until hot, add onions and peppers and cook until softened. Add beans and cumin and heat through 1 to 2 minutes. Add rice and stir to combine. Add cilantro and server.

This recipe is actually from my dad. He used to make these for us as a kid. It is a variation on the standard BLT with fired egg and cheese added. I also add avocado. This is an easy supper or lunch to make

Western Sandwiches – 4 servings

1 large beefsteak tomato cut into 4 thick slices.

8 slices of crispy cooked bacon

Lettuce, spinach, or swiss chard ( whatever you have growing)

4 eggs fried

4 slices of cheese (cheddar or american)

1 avocado sliced

8 slices of toasted wheat bread.

Mayonaise

Add the cheese while you are toaSting the bread to 4 of the slices to melt cheese.

Spread Mayo on 4 slices of the toast(the ones without the cheese). Place avocado on bread and Add 2 bacon strips each slice. Top with the egg, tomato slices and finally the lettuce, chard or spinach. Cover with the Melted Cheese toast and slice on a diagonal. Serve.

Zucchini Pancakes

2 zucchini grated

2 potatoes with skin grated

1 med onion chopped

1 cup flour

½ cup breadcrumbs

¼ tsp grated nutmeg

2 tablespoons chopped parsley ( dried is fine if you do not have fresh)

2 eggs

Salt and pepper to season

Canola oil or butter to grease pan.

I used a food processor to chop and grate the vegetables but chopping or grating by hand is also fine. Combine all ingredients until well mixed. Heat a griddle over med high heat. Grease the pan using canola oil or butter and drop about 1/3 cup of zucchini/potato mixture on pan. You should be able to cook about 4 at a time. Brown on first side about 3-4 minutes or until nicely browned. Flip adding more oil or butter for the other side and cook until second side is browned and vegetable soft.. Cook in batches until batter is finished.

Gaspacho

2 green peppers

3 banana peppers

2 mild jalapenos or 1 hot jalapenos

1 large onion

3 cloves garlic

2 smalls cucumbers or 1 large one

8 medium tomatoes

1 bunch cilantro or parsley

2 cups beef broth

1/3 cup red wine vinegar

3 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce

1 lime

2 tspspoons salt

Fill large saucepan with water and heat to boiling to blanch tomatoes. Fill a large bowl with ice and water to be used as a cold water bath.

Peel and deseed peppers and cut into large pieces. Peel garlic and onion and cut into pieces. In food processor with steel blade, puree seeded peppers, onion and garlic. Pour puree into large pot or soup tureen.

Peel and remove seeds from Cucumber. Cut into pieces and add to food processor. Puree and add to pot with onions and peppers.

Add tomatoes to boiling water and heat for a minute until skins begin to crack remove from boiling water and place in cold water bath. When the tomatoes are cool enough to touch remove the skins and cut into large pieces. Add to food processors. Add cilantro or parsley and process until pureed. You may need to process tomatoes in more than one batch. Add to pot with other vegetables. Add broth, vinegar, Worcestershire, lemon juice and salt. Chill and store in refrigerators. Serve with BLT’s or Western Sandwiches as a light summer meal.

This is one of our favorite ways to serve tomatoes and there are many variations. I have to confess that the amounts are not set in stone so you can adjust as you like. If you do not like onion then leave it off. In our family I make some with onion and some without as my daughter won’t touch it with the onion. If you like more cheese then add more. This is easy for the kids to make too.

Sliced Tomato Salad

Serve 4

4 medium Tomatoes sliced

2 tablespoons Chopped red onion
2 tablespoons Fresh chopped herbs

1 tablespoon Olive oil

2 tablespoons Vinegar

¼ cup Cheese

Slice the tomatoes and arrange on the place. Add onions and oil and of the three combination below: Option 1: red wine vinegar, feta and fresh oregano. Option 2: balsamic vinegar, blue cheese or gorgonzola and basil. Option 3: Fresh mozzarella with balsamic vinegar and basil.

Roasted Peppers

Pick or any quantities of green chilies , Green, Red, Hatch or Anaheim or banana pepper work well. Heat a grill to hot and place peppers on grill. Turn the peppers as they blacken until all sides are blacked. Put the roasted peppers in a paper bag to cool. Once cooled peel off the blackened skins. I usually do this in a large batch and then freeze small container that I can use throughout the year.

One of my favorite green bean recipes – best in the summer with fresh produces but if you have all beans you can substitute a small can of diced tomatoes and used some frozen green chilis if you have some in the freezer.

Green Beans with roasted green chilis, tomato and garlic

Serves 4

1 lb of green beans with ends cut or snapped

4-5 cloves garlic, peeled and sliced

4-5 roasted green chilis

1 tomato chopped or sun dried tomatoes or both.

3 tablespoons olive oil

Heat Olive oil over medium high heat for 5 minutes or until beans become bright green and start to soften. Add garlic and cook 2 minutes. Add tomato chilis and heat for a few minutes more until beans are still a little crispy.

Zucchini Carrot Ribbons - serves 3-4.

1 zucchini
1 carrot
1 small onion
3 tblspoons olive oil
1 tsps fresh or dried dill weed

Juline onion and sautéed until they begin to carmelize. Peel the carrot and cut the end s off the zucchini. With a vegetable peeler - slice the carrot and zucchini into long flat ribbons. Saute the ribbons with the onion over med high heat until the they are soft. About 3-5 minutes.

Picked the first zucchini of the season

The Spring garden is beautiful. We picked our first zucchini and also started picking the spring crop of beets. John is also going to try something new this year. Anasazi beans. He planted a few to test if they would germinate since we just bought them at the grocery store. If they come up we will plant more where the beets are right now. Anasazi are the red and white beans. They are relatively new in grocery stored but there history goes way back to the Anasazi Native americans for which they are named.

I made a cous-cous dish last night for dinner using the zucchini, kale, celery and onions. This is one of those dishes that you can very easily depending on what you have growing. I usually just stir fry onion and a few different veggies and then mix in with cooked cous-cous. You can buy cous-cous in bulk at many grocery stores which saves quite a bit of money over the expensive packaged ones.

Cous-cous with stir-fried veggies.

Cook cous-cous - bring to boil 1 1/2 cups water or broth, add 3/4 cup of dried cous-cous. Stir, cover and remove from heat. Let sit for 10 minutes.

Stir fry onion, chopped carrot, chopped celery in coconut or olive oil for a few minutes. Add chopped Zucchini and chopped kale and cook for about 5 minutes more, if it gets too dry add some chicken broth to steam. You can vary the veggies substituting Swiss Chard, yellow quash, eggplant, okra, beans, spinach. Just use at least three different textures and colors.