The best pesto, and sore arms
I got a ton of fresh basil from my CSA this week, so I decided to make pesto. I followed this “best pesto” recipe from Serious Eats. Wow was it hard work! I like that it gives the amount of basil leaves by weight, but the recipe did not prepare me for how much work it would be. It took a huge amount of effort to grind all those basil leaves down by hand. Maybe it was because I was using a big thai mortar and pestle instead of the little white (marble?) one they show in the video? By the end I could barely grip the mortar any more. And I never did get my basil leaves as fine as they show in their photos. The pesto did taste really good though (even though I didn’t have any Fiore Sardo, and used all parmesan, and left out the final 2 tablespoons of olive oil).
Alma tasted the pesto but wouldn’t eat it. I froze the bulk of it in two small glass jars.
I have more basil. I might try making the same recipe in the food processor, and see how different it tastes to me. Maybe I’ll even freeze my basil overnight first.
I’m out of pine nuts though. Maybe I’ll try making the next batch of pesto with sunflower seeds instead? Or maybe I’ll just freeze my basil (in oil?) and save it in the freezer for some other recipe.
Saffron cauliflower with raisins and olives
This is a standard Sicilian combination that I’ve seen in many cookbooks. Sometimes the recipe also includes pine nuts, anchovies, garlic, basil, tomatoes, pasta, and/or parmesan. I’ve tried many different variants, but I’m never that excited by the dish. It’s flavorful, but somehow just not my preferred flavors. But a student of mine from Iran gave me a ton of saffron as a gift and I was trying to figure out what to do with it. I came across this Ottolenghi recipe in Plenty, and was surprised to see that—unlike other recipes which usually call for only a pinch or 1/8 tsp. of saffron— his version calls for 1.5 teaspoons (!?!) of saffron. I decided to give it a try. Read the rest of this entry »
Pumpkin risotto with sage and arugula
I’m doing an end-of-the-year pantry cleaning, and wanted to use up some risotto rice. Derek and I looked at a couple of different recipes and finally decided on this pumpkin risotto recipe from the Union Square Cookbook. The recipe first has you make a pumpkin broth using standard vegetable broth ingredients (onion, leek, celery, carrots, etc.) as well as 2 cups canned pumpkin puree, maple syrup, and sweet spices like cinnamon, nutmeg, and allspice. Once the broth is made, you make the risotto, adding diced winter squash along with the rice, and then tossing in fresh sage, arugula, and mozzarella right before serving. Read the rest of this entry »
Saucy Italian baked eggs
I came across this recipe for saucy Italian baked eggs on a random blog, and immediately started drooling. I’ve been craving tomato sauce lately and this recipe is basically an egg baked in a big ramekin of marinara sauce with a little mozzarella and basil for garnish. It even looked easy enough that Derek could make it himself. Read the rest of this entry »
Whole wheat penne with masses of broccoli, green olives, and pine nuts
One of my students recently visited Russia and brought me back a beautiful box of pine nuts. We were trying to decide what to make with them when I found this recipe in Deborah Madison’s Vegetarian Suppers. I was excited because it calls for either oregano or marjoram. I really like marjoram, but have almost no recipes that use it.
Babbo chickpea bruschetta
We were trying to think of a quick appetizer that would work well with a summer squash, basil, tomato pasta salad. I suggested a chickpea salad and Derek instead suggested making chickpea bruschetta. He’s had the dish several times at Babbo in NYC and always liked it. He didn’t follow the recipe amounts too carefully and he used minced garlic instead of sliced and chopped kalamata olives instead of tapenade. Nonetheless, he said it tasted quite similar to the “real thing.” The rosemary was essential, as without it the chickpeas seemed just a little one note. I thought that a dash of cumin would be nice as well, but Derek didn’t want to risk messing up a perfectly nice recipe. Next time!
Escarole and beans in tomato sauce
Derek and I used to love the escarole and beans appetizer at Girasole in Pittsburgh. It consisted of braised escarole and white beans in a rich tomato sauce. It was hearty, warming, and satisfying. I hadn’t thought about it for years, until this week I saw a green that looked a lot like escarole at the farmer’s market. I asked the farmer what it was and he called it Endivien—the German word for endive. I asked him if you could cook with it and he said Germans only ever eat it raw in salads. But it looked similar enough that I decided to try making escarole and beans with it. There are tons of recipes online for escarole and white bean soup, and a few for escarole and bean dishes, but none seem to call for tomato sauce. So I decided not to try to follow a recipe. Nonetheless, my beans and greens came out quite well. This is a relatively simple, one-pot supper. It’s reasonably fast to make, hearty and satisfying. Read the rest of this entry »
Fennel braised in vegetable broth
I was planning on making white bean, fennel, and rosemary soup this weekend, but I overcooked my white beans and so I ended up making a white bean and rosemary puree with the beans. But what to do with the fennel? I remember making (and loving) a braised fennel recipe from Jack Bishop’s Italian Vegetarian cookbook many years ago, but for some reason I never made it again. I considered making the same recipe tonight, but I didn’t have any white wine open. Instead, I roughly followed this epicurious recipe, except rather than braising my fennel in chicken broth I used vegetable broth. Read the rest of this entry »
Ciambotta, Italian Ratatouille
My main failing as a vegetarian is that I’ve never been able to abide eggplant. But recently I’ve eaten it a few times without minding it so much. I ate a very tasty tiny roasted eggplant in Tokyo, and when Derek and I went to Copenhagen recently a friend of his invited us for dinner and served not one but two dishes with eggplant in them. I ate both and didn’t even really mind the eggplant! So I decided to be brave recently and added a small eggplant to a lasagne I was making. I used Cook’s Illustrated suggested cooking method of dicing it, sprinkling it with salt, placing it on a plate with coffee filters (except I didn’t have any so used a paper towel) and microwaving it until it’s slightly shriveled and dried out. I didn’t even notice it in the lasagne, so I decided to push the limits a bit more and try this Cook’s Illustrated recipe for Ciambotta, which they say is an Italian ratatouille-like stew. Read the rest of this entry »
Asparagus with gremolata, lemon, and olive oil
This post is about another recipe I found on the New York Times, in Martha Rose Shulman’s Recipes for Health series. Besides being really tasty, asparagus is a nutritional power house. And its one of the first fresh green vegetables that is available here in the spring. (Okay, actually the asparagus here is usually white, but I don’t like it very much, and always try to find green asparagus.) I usually roast asparagus and then drizzle it with balsamic vinegar and parmesan cheese, but I had a big bunch of parsley in the fridge and decided to try something new—steamed asparagus with gremolata. Read the rest of this entry »
Simple Italian lentil soup
I have a lot of recipes for lentil soup on my blog already. I have three recipes that call for brown lentils (my mom’s recipe, a simple version with only five ingredients, and a version with quinoa), plus three recipes for red lentil soup (Turkish, curried, and one with lemon and spinach). So I have no idea why I decided to try another pretty basic looking lentil soup recipe. This one comes from Julia Della Croce’s cookbook The Vegetarian Table: Italy. Read the rest of this entry »
Socca (chickpea flour flatbread)
I bought a big bag of chickpea flour (called besan in India) over a year ago, used it once in a recipe, and then didn’t touch it again. I decided it’s been sitting long enough, so I went searching for recipes that called for chickpea flour. The obvious first recipe to try was socca, a simple flatbread made from chickpea flour, olive oil, and liberal amounts of salt and pepper. I actually had a version of socca a few years ago at a bakery in Florence, but there they call it Torta di Ceci. (In other parts of Italy they often call it Farinata). Whatever the name, despite the rave reviews online, the version I got at the bakery in Florence had a somewhat odd texture (more creamy than crisp) and not all that much flavor. Maybe a homemade version would be better. I used Mark Bittman’s recipe on the New York Times website. Read the rest of this entry »
Whole grain pasta with salsa cruda
It’s finally gotten hot in Saarbruecken, so I decided to make this uncooked pasta sauce from the Summer section of Peter Berley’s Fresh Food Fast. The sauce is made of raw, chopped tomatoes, olive oil, parsley, basil, chives, balsamic vinegar, and minced garlic. Read the rest of this entry »
Spring vegetable pasta
It’s unusual to find a light, vegetable-inspired recipe on the Cook’s Illustrated website, so I was intrigued when I saw their recent recipe for a spring pasta dish with leeks, asparagus, peas, mint, chive, and lemon. The ingredient list sounded delicious, and the technique was interesting as well. They toast the pasta in the oil and then cook it in a small amount of liquid, like risotto. The sauce is made from just vegetable broth, a moderate amount of olive oil, and white wine, and they claim it is “light but lustrous and creamy”. Supposedly the starch from the pasta helps it thicken up. Read the rest of this entry »
Curried cauliflower with penne, peas, and chickpeas
This AMA recipe is a strange combination of a standard Indian curried cauliflower dish with peas and chickpeas, and a standard Italian cauliflower dish with parmesan, raisins, and pinenuts. It also has tomato sauce. I love curried cauliflower, but I’ve never been that excited about the sweet Italian cauliflower dish. (I’ve tried several versions, including one in Bishop’s Italian Vegetarian Kitchen and this Sicilian recipe from 101 cookbooks). But I was curious to find out how I would like the combination of the two recipes.
Chili pasta with arugula and coriander seeds
This recipe comes from the cookbook Rancho la Puerta, by Bill Wavrin. I was intrigued by the idea of a somewhat Italian-style pasta but with coriander seeds and chilis as the main flavoring. I made a few modifications though.
Artisanal balsamic vinegar… not
We had friends over for dinner the other night, and Derek wanted to make a summery dessert. He decided on panna cotta. He considered making green tea or earl grey panna cotta, but in the end he decided that he shouldn’t mess around on his first attempt, and made plain vanilla panna cotta. He thought it sounded a bit boring though, and so he decided to top the panna cotta with fresh strawberries and a drizzle of balsamic vinegar. I only had cheap supermarket balsamic vinegar though, and so we decided to reduce it to make it sweeter, less harsh, and more syrupy. Read the rest of this entry »
Farro and yellow soybean risotto with spinach
It’s that time of year again. As Passover approaches I try my best to do a Spring pantry cleaning, using up all the grains and beans that I purchased in the previous year but never got around to using. I bought a large bag of dry yellow soybeans at the Asian store when I first moved to Saarbruecken, and I suspect that the two cups still in my cupboard are from that original batch. I could have just cooked them up and eaten them with nutritional yeast and soy sauce, as I normally do, but I was in the mood for something different. I looked around on the web, but found very few recipes, and almost nothing of interest. The Farm Cookbook has a couple recipes for soybeans that I remember from my childhood, but the only one that I considered trying was the recipe for barbecued soybeans (kind of like baked beans). Then I found this recipe in the Modern Vegetarian Kitchen, by Peter Berley, for a risotto with black soybeans and spring white wheat. I subbed in my yellow soybeans for the black ones, and used farro for the wheatberries. The recipe also calls for fresh sage, but I used what I had on hand — fresh oregano.
The recipe says to cook the soybeans and wheat berries separately from the rice. Perhaps because my soybeans were quite old, by the time the soybeans were soft, the farro was extremely well-cooked — with the innards exploding through the husks. I didn’t have any vegetable broth, so I used bouillon cubes. The recipe says to use 1 Tbsp chopped fresh sage, but I put in more oregano, and then after the dish was cooked, I put in about another Tbsp of fresh oregano. (I think almost all fresh herbs taste best added at the very end.) The recipe calls for 4 Tbsp olive oil, but I think I used 1 Tbsp olive oil and 1-2? Tbsp butter. Berley says to stir in 1 Tbsp olive oil at the very end, but I tasted the risotto and it tasted so good I didn’t bother to add the extra olive oil. I think I may have also reduced the salt.
Berley says to cook the risotto in a 2-3 quart saucepan, and I used my 3-quart wide casserole pan. When it came to adding the spinach, however, it was extremely difficult to get it incorporated into the risotto. Even just adding small handfuls at a time, it kept popping out and getting all over the place. If I make this again, I’ll make it in either my big dutch oven or maybe in a 5-quart pan.
I really liked the combination of the arborio rice and the exploded farro kernels. Berley calls the combination of arborio rice with whole grains and beans “new wave risotto”. I actually think I might prefer it to the old wave. There weren’t a lot of soybeans, and you couldn’t really taste them per se, but they added a nice textural contrast and a little…heft. I’m usually not a big fan of spinach, but I actually really liked the spinach in this dish. Derek always likes spinach, and as expected he thought it was good. The first time I served it, he said it was tasty but he was a bit concerned about the quantity of risotto remaining. Berley says it makes 4-6 servings, but I would say six very large servings. Derek’s anxiety, however, was unfounded. We easily polished off all six servings. I actually wouldn’t have minded having it one more time!
Rating: B+
Derek: B+
Update:
I liked this recipe a lot, and I still had soybeans and farro left, so I decided to try another recipe from the Modern Vegetarian Kitchen: Spelt, black soybeans, and vegetable casserole. The casserole calls for carrots, mushrooms, celery, canned tomatoes and cabbage. The combination didn’t sound particularly appetizing, but I liked the risotto so I figured it was worth a shot. I cooked my (yellow) soybeans until soft, then added the farro and cooked until it was al dente. Meanwhile I sauteed all the veggies until they started to caramelize. (I used all the olive oil and salt called for.) Next Berley says to add the tomatoes and some of the cooking liquid from the grain/bean pot and bring to a boil, then simmer for 20 to 30 minutes. It seemed like a bad idea. At this point the cabbage was nice and crisp and caramelized, but I didn’t think the cabbage would be so appetizing after simmering it for 30 minutes. I did it anyway. In the end, I didn’t care for the dish that much. There wasn’t anything wrong with it exactly, but neither Derek nor I were particularly interested in eating it. It just was blah. We had one or two servings each, then I gave away the remaining quart of casserole/stew to a hungry grad student.
Rating: C
Update December 2010:
I made this recipe again, doubling it this time. I was out of farro so used kamut instead. Also I forgot to chop up the spinach, and the long, stringy pieces of spinach were pretty unappetizing. The dish was also underseasoned this time. Without enough salt and pepper it’s not nearly as tasty. Derek wouldn’t even eat the leftovers–I had to finish them off myself. I’ll have to try again with farro, chopped spinach, and enough seasoning.
Campanelle with two mushrooms and rosemary
I asked Derek what he wanted for dinner, and he very quickly replied “mushrooms”. Perhaps his decision was influenced by the very tasty mushroom soup I made last week. I got out the cookbooks and started looking for mushroom recipe. I found a bulgur mushroom pilaf that I plan on trying, and a pasta dish in Jack Bishop’s Complete Italian Vegetarian Cookbook, which I’d made once before. Based on the note in the cookbook I hadn’t been that excited about it, but I wasn’t sure how carefully I had followed the recipe, and I decided to try it again. Below is the recipe, with my modifications and my version of the instructions.
Ingredients
- 1 ounce dried porcini mushrooms
- 2 Tablespoons unsalted butter
- 1 Tablespoon olive oil
- 1 medium onion, minced
- 2 large garlic cloves, minced
- 1.5 teaspoons minced fresh rosemary leaves, plus more for garnish
- 1 pound white button mushrooms
- 3/4 pound campanelle, orecchiette, or small shells
- 1/3 cup freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese (about .8 ounces)
- 2 Tablespoons minced fresh parsley leaves, plus more for garnish
Instructions
- Bring 4 quarts water to a boil in a large pot for cooking the pasta.
- Place the porcini mushrooms in a small bowl and cover with 1 cup hot water. Soak until softened, about 20 minutes.
- Chop the onion, garlic, and rosemary. Start cooking the onion. In a large saute pan heat the butter and oil. Add the onion and saute over medium heat until translucent, about 5 minutes. Add the garlic and rosemary and cook until the garlic is golden, about 1 minute more.
- While the onion cooks, thinly slice the mushrooms. When the garlic is done cooking, add the mushrooms to the saute pan. Saute until golden brown and the liquid they give off has evaporated, about 8 minutes. Season with salt and pepper.
- When the water comes to a boil, add salt to taste and the pasta. Cook until al dente and then drain.
- While the pasta cooks, prepare the porcinis. Carefully lift the mushrooms from the liquid. Wash them if they feel gritty. Chop them. Add the choped porcini mushrooms to the pan and cook for 1 to 2 minutes to release their flavor. Strain the soaking liquid through a sieve into the pan, and bring to a boil. Cover and remove from the heat.
- When the pasta is done, add it to the mushrooms along with the cheese and parsley. Toss over medium-low heat just until the cheese melts and the pasta absorbs the liquid in the pan. Serve immediately.
My notes
Based on the post it note comment I had stuck in the cookbook, I upped the garlic from 2 medium cloves to 2 large cloves, and increased the rosemary from 1 tsp. to 1.5 tsp. The recipe recommends orecchiette, but I didn’t have any so used campanelle instead. Also, the original recipe calls for 1 pound of pasta, but we always find that the pasta to sauce ratio in Bishop’s recipes is too high, so I reduced the pasta to 3/4 pound.
The recipe worked fine. All the instructions seem correct and the recipe came out as (I imagine) it was intended. But I didn’t care for it. Even increasing the rosemary and adding more as a garnish, I couldn’t taste much rosemary flavor. The flavor of the mushrooms didn’t excite me, and I found the dish overall a bit boring. I had to add more cheese to get it to taste like much at all. I also tried adding a little soy sauce, but it was too strong for the delicate flavors. My post it note from my last attempt sums it up: “Okay, not great. Bland at first, improved by adding more rosemary. Recipe calls for too much pasta, use 3/4 pound. Not creamy enough to warrant all that butter.” I’ve tried a number of mushroom pasta dishes in the last few years, and none of them has excited me. Maybe I just don’t like mushrooms and pasta? Or maybe (as Derek claims) I just don’t know how to cook mushrooms!
Derek liked it more than me. He happily went for seconds, and said I should make it again. I froze the last serving and Derek ate it for dinner the night we got back from our overseas flight from Austin. He said it was still good, even after it had been frozen and defrosted in the microwave.
Rating: B-
Derek: B
Cacio e Pepe
Derek had had a really excellent version of cacio e pepe in one of Mario Batali’s restaurants, and was very excited about trying it. Mario Batali’s version has quite a bit of olive oil and some butter, but the Cook’s Illustrated recipe looked unusually light for a cream pasta. They cook the pasta in very little water so that the water ends up very starchy, and can be used to help make the sauce more cohesive. We decided to give it a try. Read the rest of this entry »
Tri-color winter salad with kumquats
Before I met Derek, he used to eat frequently at Cafe Sam, in Pittsburgh. One of his favorite dishes was a radicchio, arugula, and endive salad served with feta cheese and hard boiled eggs. I was planning to try to replicate this salad, and bought all the ingredients to do so, but as I was checking out at the Turkish grocery store near my house, one of the “seasonal fruits” on display at the checkout stand caught my eye.
A few years ago I went to the Vegetarian Summerfest with my friend Annette, and we had a blast. One of my most distinctive memories from the summerfest is of Dr. Michael Greger asking us “What’s by far the healthiest citrus fruit?”. But no one in a room full of nutrition buffs could answer the question. His answer, it turns out, was the kumquat. He argued that it’s the healthiest because you eat the whole thing, rather than discarding the pith and peel like with other citrus fruits. According to Greger, the bitter flavors in the pith and peel come from a multitude of uber-healthy substances. Greger exhorted us to never eat another lemon, lime, or orange without first zesting the fruit, and adding the zest to our food. I can’t recall what he said to do with the zest, but I imagine it could be good in yogurt, smoothies, rice dishes, breakfast cereal–even in tea or ice water! I was pretty good about zesting all my citrus for a while, but eventually I forgot all about his citrus chastisements. Until, that is, this week, when I saw those kumquats at City Basaar. I bought a handful to bring home, and decided to ditch the feta and egg in this salad in favor of thinly sliced kumquats.
Four years ago: the best lemon bars ever
Saffron Risotto
My friend Alex and I took a walk along the river Saar this evening. Despite the cold, the damp, the dark, and the mist, I had a lovely walk. In the course of our conversation, we started talking about saffron, and I realized I’d never posted one of our favorite risotto’s to my blog: saffron risotto. This dish is plain, but very satisfying. The daisy-yellow color and creamy consistency make me feel like I’m eating macaroni and cheese. There’s just something about saffron that tastes like comfort food to me, even though I never had it growing up. I can’t actually remember the first time I ever ate saffron, but it very well might have been the first time we made this saffron risotto!
The recipe we typically use is based on a recipe from Jack Bishop’s Complete Italian Vegetarian Cookbook. The saffron flavor is maximized by dissolving it in a little hot stock then adding it to the rice toward the end of the cooking time. Bishop’s recipe is good, but quite rich. We usually cut down on the butter quite a bit.
Below I’ve compared Jack Bishop’s recipe to the saffron risotto recipe in Cook’s Illustrated’s The Best Light Recipe. I believe Jack Bishop works for Cook’s Illustrated, so it’s a bit odd that the recipe aren’t more similar. Read the rest of this entry »
Spicy cauliflower simmered in red wine
I love cauliflower, but other than cauliflower curry, I actually don’t have any standby recipes for it. I was looking for something new to try, and I found this recipe in which the cauliflower is simmered in red wine instead of water. It sounded interesting, and, as an added bonus, it would give me a chance to use up the red wine that we often have lying around from unfinished bottles. The recipe is from Jack Bishop’s The Complete Italian Vegetarian Cookbook.
Roasted cauliflower with tomato and green olives
This roasted cauliflower dish was the second dish we made last week from the Second Helpings from Union Square Cafe cookbook. It’s similar in spirit to pasta puttanesca, but the base is cauliflower rather than pasta. Read the rest of this entry »
Whole wheat linguine with chard, tomatoes, and chickpeas
This recipe is based on the Cook’s Illustrated beans and greens recipe. I used to make it with collards or kale, but since I can’t get those greens here I made it with swiss chard and added tomatoes, which blend nicely with the acidity of the chard. Normally I add kalamata olives but I didn’t have any so I added a few spoonsfuls of capers instead. I didn’t have any white beans so subbed in chickpeas.
Serves 4 to 6.
Ingredients
| 3 | tablespoons olive oil |
| 8 | cloves garlic, 5 cloves sliced thin lengthwise, 3 cloves minced (1 Tbs.) |
| 3/4 | tsp. kosher salt |
| 1 | medium red onion, diced small (about 1 cup) |
| 1/2-2/3 | teaspoon hot red pepper flakes |
| 20 | ounces chard, stems halved lengthwise and sliced thinly and leaves sliced into ribbons |
| 3/4 | cups vegetable broth |
| 1 | can (14 1/2 ounces) diced tomatoes with juice |
| 1 | can (15 ounces) chickpeas, drained and rinsed |
| 3/4 | cup pitted kalamata olives, roughly chopped (or 3 Tbs. capers) |
| 10-12 | ounces whole wheat spaghetti or linguine |
| 2 | ounces Parmesan cheese, finely grated (about 1 cup) |
| ground black pepper |
Instructions
- Heat oil and sliced garlic in 12-inch skillet over medium-high heat. Cook, stirring and turning frequently, until light golden brown, about 3 minutes. Using slotted spoon, transfer garlic to plate lined with paper towels. Sprinkle lightly with salt.
- Add onion and chard stems to pan; cook until starting to brown, about 5 minutes. Add minced garlic and red pepper flakes; cook, stirring constantly, until garlic is fragrant, about 30 seconds.
- Add half of chard to pan; using tongs, toss occasionally, until starting to wilt, about 2 minutes. Add remaining chard, broth, tomatoes, and salt; cover (pan will be very full); increase heat to high and bring to strong simmer. Reduce heat to medium and cook, covered, tossing once, until chard is completely wilted. Stir in beans and olives or capers.
- Meanwhile, bring 4 quarts water to boil in dutch oven or 5-6 quart pan over high heat. Add pasta and 1 tablespoon salt; cook until pasta is just shy of al dente. Drain pasta and return to pot. Add the greens mixture to pasta, set over medium-high heat, and toss to combine. Cook until pasta absorbs most of liquid, about 2 minutes. Season with black pepper to taste. Serve immediately, passing garlic chips and parmesan separately.
Note: By draining the pasta before its al dente, and finishing cooking in the brothy sauce, the pasta absorbs the flavors of the sauce and release its residual starch, which helps to thicken the sauce slightly.
Derek really loved this dish, even without the olives. I thought it was reasonably flavorful, but I’m never as excited about beans and greens as he is.
Summer rice salad
I was looking for something to do with some yellow and red bell peppers, and I found a recipe in Jack Bishop’s Complete Italian Vegetarian Cookbook for a summer salad made with arborio rice. I normally just use arborio rice for risotto, so I was excited about trying something new with it. The rice is boiled in salted water like pasta, until al dente (about 16 minutes), and then mixed with a vinaigrette and allowed to cool before the vegetables and herbs are mixed in.
Bishop says to peel and seeds the tomatoes and cucumber, but I just seeded the tomatoes, and peeled neither. If I made this again, I wouldn’t even bother to seed the tomatoes. I think the pulpy parts would add more tomato flavor. My cucumbers were the little tiny ones that have small seeds–maybe if you have big, waxy American cucumbers it would be worth seeding and peeling them. I didn’t have fresh parsley, but I doubled the basil to two tablespoons. I also forgot to add the one garlic clove that Bishop calls for. The salad tasted okay, but was a bit boring, and the ratio of rice to vegetables seemed too high. I added one red bell pepper, another kirby cucumber, and two more small tomatoes to the salad. The extra veggies helped, but it was still a little boring. Derek thought it needed pesto, and I agree that it definitely needed more than 2 Tbs. of herbs. After my tweaks the salad was pleasant eaten with scrambled eggs and garlicky chard for lunch, but I wouldn’t make it again without making some additional changes.
Here are the ingredients, with my suggested changes:
- 1.5 cups Arborio rice
- salt
- 1 Tbs. white wine vinegar
- 1 medium garlic clove, minced
- fresh ground black pepper
- 3 Tbs. olive oil
- 4 small, ripe tomatoes (about 1 pound)
- 1 medium yellow bell pepper, diced
- 1 medium red bell pepper, diced
- 3 small kirby cucumbers, diced
- 10 kalamata olives, pitted and chopped
- 2 Tbs. minced parsley
- 2 Tbs. minced basil leaves
Rating: B-
Roasted tomato pasta sauce
This recipe from Cook’s Illustrated is a nice recipe to make when you have an abundance of summer tomatoes. It’s nothing unusual, but it’s very tasty. The recipe calls for cherry tomatoes but I’ve also made it successfully with just regular tomatoes chopped up.
Sicilian Broccoli and Cauliflower Pasta
Whenever I ask Derek what veggies he wants me to get at the store he invariably asks for the same thing: broccoli and cauliflower. I have a few recipes that are my regular weeknight standbys for these vegetables (sesame noodles, pan-fried broccoli, stuffed hashbrowns, and cauliflower curry), but I’d like a few more recipes to add to the rotation. I found this recipe for Sicilian broccoli and cauliflower pasta on 101 cookbooks, and it looked like something Derek would love. Heidi warns that it is a large recipe, but I decided to make the whole thing nonetheless. Because it’s such a big recipe, the instructions say to saute the broccoli, cauliflower, and onions in separate batches. Between all the chopping and sauteing, this was a pretty time consuming recipe. It’s definitely not a quick week night meal, which is what I was looking for. The recipe, however, is competently done—the final pasta came out just as I imagine it was supposed to. The vegetables were well cooked, the onions and garlic created a nice flavor base, I could taste the saffron and a touch of sweet from the raisins, the olive oil and pine nuts added a nice mouth-feel without the dish tasting heavy, and the fresh parsley added a final touch of freshness. My only complaint is that I couldn’t taste the rosemary, and I think the saffron should be soaked in warm water before adding it to the dish. But otherwise the recipe is fine as is. Read the rest of this entry »
The captious vegetarian 