Did you know that you can peel pumpkin, butternut squash or any other thin-skinned winter squash with a speed peeler? Well, I didn’t until I saw one of the pumpkin pros on Food Network’s Halloween Wars do it, and man, does it make a difference. You see, I used to use a Chinese-style meat cleaver to break into my squash, and rather than dirty up a perfectly good knife to use as a peeler, I would use said cleaver to peel my squash. Now, over the years I’ve gotten pretty dexterous with that cleaver, but using a speed peel wastes way less of the tender flesh, and may even be a bit easier. Maybe. It freaks onlookers out less, too, which may or may not be a good thing, depending upon your proclivities.
You know what’s great about winter soups? They’re healthy as shit. You’re basically eating liquid vegetables here, and the dairy? I can totally handle 2/3 c. + a little fat spread out among 4 servings if it comes with an entire day’s worth of vegetables. 4 4 3 2, bitchez! (yes I’m aware there’s now some plate thingie instead of 4 4 3 2, but lessons with songs die hard)
If you don’t want to spring for a whole container of creme fraiche, Greek yogurt might make a good substitute here. Or cream cheese. Anything creamy in the dairy family would do, even sour cream. You’re going for a little zing, a little cream, a little thick. Go on, play with your food. You know you want to.
Roasty Toasty Winter Bisque
Adapted from Roasted Pumpkin Bisque from Whole Foods
5 lb. winter squash – I used a sugar pie pumpkin and butternut squash
2 yellow onions, chopped
1 Tbsp. thyme, chopped
3 Tbsp. olive oil
6 c. chicken or vegetable broth
1/2 c. white wine (whatever you have on hand that’s drinkable)
1 tsp. ground cardamom
Juice of half a lemon
Roasted squash seeds (see recipe below)
2/3 c. creme fraiche (optional)
Preheat your oven to 425 F. Toss the squash, onions, thyme & oil and spread onto baking sheets in a single layer. Salt & pepper to season, and roast 30 mins. or until tender and just starting to brown around the edges (you may want to stir once or twice to prevent burning and feel useful – if that’s you, knock yourself out. I didn’t and mine was just fine). Once the squash is done to your liking, remove from the oven.
This would be a great time to add those squash seeds to the (now vacant) oven.
Transfer squash + friends to a large pot. Add the broth, wine & cardamom and simmer 10 minutes. Blend with an immersion blender** (or however you blend soup – in batches in a blender, whatever) until smooth. Add the lemon, stir and taste. Does it need salt or pepper? Add it now. Bring your soup back up to a simmer and kill the heat. Remove from the burner and whisk in the creme fraiche. Serve with crusty bread or a nice peppery arugula salad.
Serves 4 for dinner, or 2 for dinner with 2 big lunch portions.
Roasted Squash Seeds
Take the seeds from your peeled squash from the above recipe. Clean and place in a small bowl.
Add 1 tsp. each cumin, chipotle powder, cinnamon and brown sugar. Toss with a splash of olive oil and a big pinch of salt.
Spread out on a baking sheet and bake ~5 mins. or until browned but not burnt. Be careful here. Ideally, the oven would be at 350 to bake squash seeds, but I like to live on the edge. Just babysit your seeds and they will be fine. A little blackened on the edges is tasty, too, just make sure they’re done enough (read: dry and browned) or the texture will be off.
**A note on immersion blenders: If you make soup more than once a year and/or enjoy the occasional smoothie, buy one already. You can get them on sale for under $25 almost any month of the year if you look, and they are worth it. They hardly take up any space, and if you will use it more than once a year, it is a great investment. This is a tool I broke down and finally bought this year. I thought for years that they were a: too expensive, b: too much of a unitasker and c: something I could totally live without – people lived without them for thousands of years, after all. *Horn Sound* Wrong (except for the thousands of years bit).
For the kitchen accident prone like me, this method of soup blending has become invaluable. There is zero chance of spilling mass amounts of hot liquid on yourself or for dinner to come crashing to the ground because you lack the arm strength to pour soup from a huge pot safely. Also, splatters with the immersion blender are waaaaayyy smaller than splatters with a bar blender. Just sayin’. Having one of those puppies blow up in your face because you put the soup in while it was too hot and the steam got over zealous isn’t the most fun you can have on a weeknight. Nor is leaking soup out of the bottom of your food processor.
Isn’t $25 worth peace of mind? For me it has become so. I love my stick blender. And as an added bonus, it feels “chef-y” too. So there’s that.
My DH and I recently had the opportunity to take a long weekend in New York City. We ate, froze, walked our feet to nubbins, and loved every minute of our too short stay. This city is truly awe-inspiring and I forgot just how at home and at ease it makes me feel. This is the first batch of pictures processed from that trip.
Welcome to New York
Welcome to the Big Apple – LaGuardia airport.
Subway Girders
Steel girders in the subway.
Subway
Our home base stop for the trip, the 42nd St. Times Square station.
NYPD
NYPD @ Times Square.
Neon Flag
U.S. flag in neon – Times Square.
Greenwich Village
Architectural details in Greenwich Village.
Greenwich Village
More architectural details in Greenwich Village.
Greenwich Village
Still more architectural details in Greenwich Village.
Trinity Church - Wall St.
Trinity Church near Wall St., burial place of Alexander Hamilton.
Trinity Church - Wall St.
Trinity Church near Wall St., burial place of Alexander Hamilton.
Trinity Church - Wall St.
Trinity Church near Wall St., burial place of Alexander Hamilton.
Trinity Church - Wall St.
Trinity Church near Wall St., burial place of Alexander Hamilton.
Around the City
Light & shadow around the city.
Wall St.
Right out front of the New York Stock Exchange.
Wall St.
If you look close, the falling leaves look like yellow tickertape.
Battery Park
A frigid but beautiful Battery Park. The scouring winds kept most people away from the unprotected tip of NYC the day we went.
As I write this, it is firmly fall, the first week in November, and if that isn’t fall I don’t know what is. Except.. except I live in Miami. And Miami doesn’t do fall. We do rainy season and dry season, warm and tropical hot, but not fall. And certainly not winter. The only respite our trees get from using their energy to produce vibrant green foliage is the month or two in deep winter it gets too chilly to grow. It might even frost, but even that is rare. Right now it’s a bright sunny 83 degrees*, with not a cloud in the sky. And it’s November. This is not to gloat; I know many of you out there are rolling your eyes, because I live in the sub-tropics and have no idea how hard it is struggling through piles and piles of snow every year and bitter cold. I get it, I do (I’m looking at you, there, in the tundra). I remember shoveling snow, which is partially why I live where I live, we all make choices in life. I chose love over fall. While I don’t regret that choice for a moment, I still miss the crisp air and crunchy fire-hued walks down sidewalks covered in leaves.
I stick by my habitation location choice for the time being, but my body still thinks fall exists. When October rolls around, I start craving pumpkin, cabbage, potatoes, polksa keilbasa, and any other carb-loaded and sausage-laden dish my Eastern European ancestry and midwestern heritage cries out for. I have a deep need for potatoes, down to my toes. I need them. Need cabbage. Need pumpkin. Just like in the summer, when I need my pulled pork (Eastern NC-style, of course) fix. I tell the seasons by my body’s internal food calendar, not necessarily by the weather outside. A benefit(?) of having lived in now three separate U.S. regions.
I know fall must continue to exist; I see it on the Internet every day. Food bloggers everywhere are posting their best squash and pumpkin recipes, gearing up for winter’s deep freeze. Vibrant oranges and deep greens are everywhere. Everything out there looks so hearty; so satisfying. Starbucks has released the one latte flavor I wait impatiently all year for – the Pumpkin Spice Latte. The rest of the year, I couldn’t care less about Starbucks; hell, I feel guilty for even stepping in the joint on a normal day and generally take pains to avoid it. But come fall? I need my pumpkin spice fix, dammit. Even if it costs $5, is full of sugar and fat, and is served by a mega-huge corporation. At least they have healthy whole foods on offer now, right? Downtempo chill music? That means they’re evil-light, right? (o.m.f.g. hipster).
Meanwhile, here in Miami we are just starting our high growing season and my local CSA is getting into the swing of the season. Fresh green things are pushing their way out of the soil without having to worry about being baked on the spot by that oppressive ball of gas in the sky. Other things are slowly ripening on vines, taking their time about it sans the worry of torrential downpours daily making the ground soggy and prone to mold.
There is something… off about that.
Since my body sees the calendar and feels like it needs a snuggle, I’ve been craving warm gooeyness; cheesiness even. Preferably in casserole form. What can I say, I’m from the Midwest/ South; I know what I want when the mercury drops. Dead summer? Not so much, other than a nice tall glass of iced tea with a side of pulled pork and tons of peppery vinegar. Maybe a nice German potato salad and fresh corn on the cob. Mmmm…. real tomatoes. Not that crap you get in the grocery store nowadays, real tomatoes that have been given time to mature in due time. Tomatoes that taste of sun and time and love.
I’m posting two recipes this week in link form, because I made both with little to no tinkering. I generally tinker away and post the result, but with these two dishes I just wasn’t up for adventure. I wanted comfort. Ease. The carrot recipe I made straight with no deviation, and it was luscious. Sinfully luscious, and came very close to tasting like a big bowl full of gooey cheese. Granted, the recipe does have Parmesan and Mascarpone in it, but I’d like to think that with all the carrots, the dish is at least a little healthier than straight up mac & cheese.
This recipe won the best carrot dish prize on Food 52, and for good reason. It is great. A little on the time consuming side but deeply satisfying, even for my macaroni and cheese-aholic hubby. And that’s saying something. The man needs mac & cheese perhaps more than he needs bacon. Or mashed potatoes.
In the second dish I only swapped out the Gruyere for Fontina, because that is what my market had for under a million dollars. The price of some cheeses has really skyrocketed lately, and I’m not a fan of that.
This recipe is from Heidi Swanson of 101Cookbooks.com. Heidi is a genius. Her cooking style is very close to my own, and her site (and cookbooks) have become my go-to inspiration source for weeknight vegetarian grain-based meals for years. She is always the first place I turn when the real or imagined hint of fall is in the air.
Since my DH is finally home from his trip and has seen, as well as oohed and aahed over, the sofa back I decorated while he was gone I thought it was high time I shared the whole design.
I’m kind of excited about it. I haven’t had a dedicated horizontal space to decorate in over two years that wasn’t destined as a book case, Starwars Lego repository, clothes-making-it-to-the-drawers land, counter top or workstation. Since we just got a huge frickin couch and it now creates a separate sub-room unto itself, I thought it was high time I actually conceptualize a design and see it through as opposed to drawing up plans, feverishly window/catalog/internet shopping and then promptly forgetting about them.
The Original Design
The Original Concept
The design incorporates the longest sofa table I could find that didn’t cost a bigillion dollars, the Stockholm Sofa Table from IKEA (measuring 59″ long). We needed something to take up a lot of real estate, and this sofa table accomplishes that nicely. It also fits well with our overall black/minimalist/clean aesthetic.
We were also in desperate need of lighting. In our loft, we have a whopping 2 overhead lights with an additional light bar in the kitchen area. While watching TV in the dark is nice, it has been almost impossible doing anything other than reading and/or watching TV after the sun sets in my house. The few times I’ve thrown caution to the wind and crafted anyways have resulted in injury. So, after 2 years of suffering through that crap I was more than ready for adequate light.
Originally, we were thinking large arching lights over the back of the couch or, in our dreams, statement spotlights on tripods from the magical land of Restoration Hardware but $500 cheaper. After an exhaustive search, I must report that that magical land does not exist and I just can’t do $800 for a lamp, no matter how awesome it is.
So, we headed to our old friend IKEA. We didn’t like the black lamps from the original design in person, and luckily they were out of the floor lamps. I think the lights we ended up getting work just as well as the dual lights from the concept, and ended up saving us money in the process. Always a big fan of that.
I’m happy to say I haven’t gone a night without turning on the light on my side of the couch. Light is kind of luxurious.
Since our old coffee table looks ridiculous with the new couch, we are doing away with the coffee table idea until we can find something that is just the right width and height. This is not going to be easy. Our couch is on the tall side and while there is a fair amount of space in the middle, I don’t want something too huge that is going to fill the space completely.
We need somewhere to eat. I have half a mind to pull the sofa table around for holiday dinners, since we literally have zero other horizontal space on which to eat, but that really isn’t going to help us on weeknights. We need somewhere to eat dinner every night and I would like for my DH to have a surface on which to work so he isn’t hunched over all the time. I found the laptop tray holder things at IKEA as well, and so far they are working out quite well as makeshift dinner tables. We will have to figure something else out come Thanksgiving, but for everyday use, these are not too bad. Originally I had thought of using TV trays or some sort of table that hooks around the edge of the couch, but so far I haven’t been able to find anything that doesn’t cost $130 each or isn’t tacky.
The baskets are from Target and are being used to hold our couch blankets and my DH’s overflow video games, the few he is currently playing plus a few more. I also added an additional basket on the shelf to give him somewhere to house his pocket stuff, sunglasses, etc. This shelf has become his full-time computer docking station.
I ended up picking up glass canisters at Home Goods and have fallen in love with them. I’ve always loved apothecary style canisters, and these give me a good place to work out my decorating jones at least once a season. Right now, they’re all decked out for Halloween with skulls, spiders and black plants.
I haven’t made it to ZGallerie for the silver cameras yet since they aren’t very “Halloweeny”, but the next time I am there, I just may pick them up.
The Completed Design
I’m loving it. Functional, stylish and easily changeable with the seasons.
2c. mixed cooked farro, pearl barley and brown rice
1c. arugula
1c. parsley
1/2 c. fresh tarragon
1/2 lb. pecans, toasted and chopped
1/4 c. walnut oil
1/4 c. tarragon vinegar
1 c. radishes, sliced wafer thin
1/4 c. shallot, minced
1/4 c. olive oil
Set a large pot of salted water on to boil while you prepare the salad.
While the water is coming up to a boil or while the grains are cooking, mince the parsley, tarragon and shallot. Slice your radishes wafer thin.
When the water has come up to a boil, add the farro, pearl barley and brown rice. Cook until tender, 30 – 45 mins. If you’re worried about everything not cooking at the same time, cook big batches of each separately and freeze the leftovers in zipper bags for a quick weeknight meal base.
When the grains are done to your liking, drain into a colander and set aside to cool.
While the grains are cooling a bit, place your pecans into a dry pan over medium-high heat. Toast until fragrant and beginning to color. Remove from the heat and chop.
Add the rest of the ingredients to the bowl of grains, toss, season to taste with salt & pepper and serve.
Serves 2 for dinner with enough leftover for lunch.
This dinner was pretty good. The beef smelled great, but came out somehow lacking in the spice and smoke department. Don’t get me wrong, this beef was good — juicy, perfectly tender and all around a nice main component — it just wasn’t the ballsy spicy richness I half hoped it would be. It tasted more like a pot roast.
Which got me thinking….
Dinner 2: Faker Pot Roast
Mmmm…. pot roast. Pot roast is one of those dishes that picks you up, gives you a nice snuggly blanket, a soft place to sit and a nice book to read. Pot roast tucks you in. I remember as a kid opening the door to the house on cold winter nights and being buffeted by the wall of warm beefy goodness only pot roast that’s cooked all day in the Crock Pot can provide. Good times.
I wasn’t feeling making another haunch o’beast, so I decided to do the next best thing. I winged it with ingredients I had on hand.
Faker Pot Roast
This spin on pot roast transforms humble leftovers into a deeply satisfying super quick to throw together weeknight meal.
Leftover slow cooker chipotle beef, approximately 1 1/2 cup.
1 c beef broth
1/4 c. red wine
1 1/2 c. carrots, sliced into 1/4 inch thick coins
1 leek, halved lengthwise and sliced into 1/4 inch thick moons
1/2 red onion, thinly sliced
1 Tbsp. olive oil
1/2 lb. egg noodles
1/4 c. chopped parsley
1 Tbsp. butter
Warm 1 Tbsp. olive oil in a large high-sided pan over medium heat. Once the oil is up to temperature, add the leeks, onions, carrots, wine and broth. Sautee 5 mins.
Put a large pot of salted water on to boil. Once the water is boiling, add the egg noodles. Cook to al dente according to package directions
Continue cooking veggies 10 minutes, or until the carrots are soft. If at any time things look too dry, add additional wine and/or stock.
About 2 minutes before cooking is finished, add the leftover beef. Stir to combine until the beef is warmed through. Add the noodles and toss to combine. Remove from the heat. Add the butter and parsley and stir to combine until the butter has melted.
Informed by a vague Mexican vibe, this lively (and healthy!) salad packs a nice kick
I didn’t tinker much with this recipe. The fresh healthy combo of Mexican-ish ingredients looked intriguing and I thought this dish would be just the thing to cure our recent string of ‘no taste dinners’ (at least so says my DH. I’ve been tinkering on my own for awhile and have been kind of stuck in an olive oil/garlic/parsley/Parmesan rut).
I did however, significantly up the spice quotient in my version of the recipe. The original called for timid half teaspoons; as we all know, I just can’t live with half a teaspoon. I estimate I actually used a little over a teaspoon of each spice in my final version. I went with the more reasonable doubling of the original spice for clarity purposes here.
A note on chipotle powder: Don’t be scared. This isn’t cayenne. Chipotle powder is mildly spicy and has a nice deep smokiness that works really well here. Sure you’re getting smokiness from the cumin, but the smokiness you get from chipotle powder is a little different and totally worth checking out if you have not already.
1/2 c. quinoa
1 c. water
Juice and zest of 1 lime
1 tsp. ground cumin
1 tsp. chili powder
1 tsp. chipotle powder
1/4 c. extra virgin olive oil
3 scallions, sliced thin
2 roasted red peppers, chopped
1 15oz. can black beans, drained and rinsed
1/4 c. cilantro, chopped
Kosher salt
In a small pot, bring the quinoa and water to a boil. Cover and drop the heat to simmer. Simmer about 15 minutes, or until the quinoa coils release and the water has been absorbed.
While the quinoa is working, make the dressing. Whisk the lime juice, lime zest, big pinch salt, chili powder, chipotle powder and cumin. Stream in the olive oil and beat until a nice dressing forms.
Combine the cooked quinoa, beans, red peppers, scallions and cilantro in a large bowl. Add the dressing and toss well to incorporate.
Serves 2 for dinner with enough left over for lunch.
Mmmm….. Nope, no purple squeeze-bottle ketchup here
This sweet/tart/savory condiment is the LBD of condiments, pairing equally well dressed-down on top of a burger, dressed-up as the star in a quick weeknight sauce or dressed to the nines as the main performer on a toasted baguette. You’ll want to keep plenty on hand. This recipe makes enough to fill 3 pint jars: two for you, and one to give away to your nearest and dearest.
3 1/2 lb. Roma tomatoes (or whatever looks the best that day), chopped roughly
1 onion, diced, about 1/2 c.
1/2 c. dark brown sugar (a slack half cup)
1/2 c. white sugar (a slack half cup)
1 tsp. salt
1 1/2 tsp. coriander, ground
1 1/2 tsp. cumin, ground
1 1/2 tsp. caraway seeds, whole
1 1/2 tsp. hot paprika
1/4 c. apple cider vinegar
Juice of 1 lemon
1/2 c. Granny Smith apple, diced
1 c. water
Add all ingredients to a large pot over high heat. Bring up to a boil, reduce heat to a simmer and cook until thick and jam-like, about 3 hours. Transfer to sterilized jars and stash in the fridge for up to two weeks, or break out your favorite canning rig and can, making sure to boil for 15 minutes.
Serve slathered on a burger; with simple ricotta, burrata or goat cheese on a toasted baguette; as a topper for chicken; mixed into a nice big bowl of grains or pasta; with grits, greens & smoky bacon; or on crackers with cream cheese for a late night snack.
There’s something magical about the combination of lentils, leeks, butter and sweet nutty maillard that’s intoxicating in this dish
This dish makes a wholly satisfying weeknight meal with tons of flavor and texture. Don’t skimp on the yogurt sauce when making this meal. The buttery, nutty lentil salad is intoxicating on its own, but the yogurt adds a nice little spicy counterpoint to the rich butteryness and should not be missed.
Israeli Lentil, Leek and Onion Salad with Spice Spiked Yogurt Adapted from Mujaddara with Spiced Yogurt from Food 52
Salad
3/4 c. green lentils
Salt
1 c. long grain white rice
2 Tbsp. unsalted butter
3 Tbsp. olive oil
1 large onion, halved and thinly sliced
1 leek, washed, halved and thinly sliced
Yogurt Sauce
1/2 c. plain fat free Greek yogurt
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. ground cumin
1/2 tsp. ground coriander
1/2 tsp. spicy Hungarian paprika
3 Tbsp. chopped fresh mint
Juice and zest of half a lemon
Salt
Preheat your oven to 400 degrees F.
While the oven is going, start your lentils. Combine lentils, big pinch salt and 4 cups water in a medium pot. Bring to a boil. Once your pot is up to the boil, kick the heat back and simmer the lentils until they are cooked but not mushy, about 20 minutes. Drain and add to a large bowl.
While your lentils are going, combine the rice, another big pinch of salt and 1 1/2 cups water in an oven-safe pot on medium heat. Bring up to a boil. Once the water reaches a boil, cover and transfer the whole pot to the oven. Cook for 17 minutes until the rice is cooked. Remove from the oven, uncover and fluff with a fork. I didn’t think this cooking method would work either, but the geniuses at Food 52 were right and it went off without a hitch. Add the rice to the lentil bowl.
While all this is cooking, set your largest sautee pan over medium low heat. Add the butter and 2 Tbsp. olive oil. When that has melted down, add the leeks and onions and toss to coat. Cook gently for 5 minutes or until the mixture has softened slightly and begun to release its liquid. Kick the heat up to medium and cook, stirring occasionally and adding dashes of water if things start to stick, until the onions and leeks are well browned. This will take you 12-20 minutes, depending upon your pan and the day. You’re not looking for burnt here, just a nice deep brown nuttiness. Once the mixture is looking good, add the last Tbsp. olive oil and crank the heat to high. Cook 3-4 minutes until the bottom layer gets a little char. Still not burnt, but crispy.
Add to the lentil & rice bowl and let sit 15 minutes to allow the flavors a chance to get to know each other.
While the ingredients are mingling, combine all yogurt ingredients together and stir.
To serve, scoop servings of lentils into a bowl and top with a dollop of yogurt.
This recipe makes enough for 2 for dinner and lunch the next day (and its perhaps even better the next day, too).
Gastography 