by Caroline on March 10, 2010
Greens. Greens. Greens. My mother would be so proud to see her once-upon-a-time, lettuce-spurning daughter eat so many greens. And to eat all our greens before the next CSA box arrives, we have to turn to drastic measures of consumption. Forget side salads. Bring on the food processor and pesto.
Pesto is my favorite CSA-survival technique (life is hard, I know). Not only does it eat an entire bunch of greens or herbs in one fell swoop, but a pesto pasta meal only takes 20 minutes from start to plate.
This week’s mizuna pesto was a particular success. Less pungent than a basil or parsley pesto, the mizuna puree was sweet and fresh. I used nearly a full bunch, which packed our food processor to the brim and yielded enough pesto to coat a pound of spaghettini—more than enough for dinner and lunch leftovers. Although second-day pesto pasta tends to be dry, moisture from the mizuna stems kept the pasta from drying out. William ate not one but two portions of the pasta the next day.
This recipe is approximate, but, no doubt, yours will be delicious if you can find greens as lovely as mine (thanks Bee Heaven).
Mizuna Pesto
Combine a seven-cup food processorful of mizuna greens (stems and all), 1 cup walnuts, 1/3 cup grated Parmesan, 3 to 4 cloves garlic, 1/2 cup+ extra virgin olive oil, salt and pepper. Chop, chop, chop in the food processor until it’s smooth. Taste and adjust salt and olive oil as needed. Toss with a pound of cooked pasta, and eat.
FYI: Our camera is on the fritz. We may have to replace it, in which case we’ll be photoless for another week.
by Caroline on March 6, 2010
I don’t trust tofu recipes. And I don’t trust people who review tofu recipes. I question their motives—are these people health nuts, fad dieters or normal humans who happen to enjoy flavorless blocks of fermented soy beans? I guess I fall in the last camp, so you probably shouldn’t trust this blog post either.
But I’ve been making a version of tofu-stuffed mushrooms from epicurious.com for several years—it’s one of the few tofu recipes I’ve found that’s worth repeating. What we love about the original recipe is the inclusion of walnuts (I often use pecans … it’s a Southern thing) that give the tofu a sweet, meaty flavor. The tofu also is frozen and defrosted before it’s cooked, which gives the flabby soy product the texture of cooked ground beef (or pretty close).
For this recipe, I kept the nut and tofu attributes intact, but I included a pound of greens since our CSA boxes have been overflowing with leaves for the past few weeks.
I made this meal after a stressful day at work. Honestly, all my brain wanted was a carb- and cheese-laden slice of pizza. As I cooked the tofu and greens and assembled the unfortunately cholesterol-free mushrooms, I was skeptical that this meal would satisfy my brain and body’s complex need for comfort.
With great pleasure, I report that these vegan stuffed mushrooms made deeply satisfying. The nuts helped calm my fat craving, and the tofu and mushrooms tricked my mouth into thinking it was eating meat. Plus, the kale and other sturdy greens I used in the stuffing took on a delicate sweetness and crispy texture after baking. At last, a new tofu victory worth repeating!
But you should be the judge. I’m the one using tofu for psychological intervention. Read on for the recipe.
by Caroline on March 2, 2010
In search of a new way to eat my dandelion greens (I’ve made dandelion pasta this season, along with dandelion pesto), I found a dandelion and goat cheese empanada recipe in the LA Times. Bitter greens with rich chevre is an obvious combination, and this recipe begged to be toyed with.
I added mushrooms, actually finely diced portabello mushroom stems, to the recipe since I planned to toss the stems anyway. I also used green garlic since the stalks (thankfully) keep showing up at market. Although the dandelion greens gave the little pastries a grown-up complexity, you could use almost any green as long as you tinkered with the cooking time.
With two blocks of chevre and a healthy 1/2 cup of Parmesan, the empanadas, not surprisingly, turned out to be super rich. And without a side dish (after the prep work, I was too lazy to make another), William and I ate an unbalanced but delicious dinner of empanadas. We both agreed, though, that these would work better as a side dish or starter. That’s why we saved four for the freezer—to bring some effortless green and serious calories to another meal. Read on for the recipe.
by Caroline on February 24, 2010
Our CSA boxes were replete with greens this week: turnips, radishes, Swiss chard, dandelion greens, bok choy and collard greens. Needless to say, we’re eating greens every night this week, especially since I still had greens hanging out in the fridge from our last box.
First on my hit list was the bunch of collard greens. Earlier this season I braised a batch of collards Southern-style with a little tasso ham, water and a hint of vinegar. This weekend, I found a recipe for Brazilian-style greens that calls for slicing collards into a chiffonade and then flash cooking them a mere two to four minutes. For time sake and curiosity, this seemed like the way to go.
The recipe was simple and stunning. We got to enjoy the flavor and crunch of collards with a minimal time commitment. I used bacon grease instead of olive oil to infuse a Southern touch, and I will most definitely make these again. Thanks to Brazilians, collards are no longer an hour(or more)-long affair.
I played with traditional cooking methods for my okra as well, roasting rather than frying or stewing it. I just toss whole pods with olive oil, salt, pepper and onion, and blasted them at 400° for 25 minutes. The onions and okra had a hint of caramelization, and they still achieved the slippery goodness of stewed okra—just with more flavor. Another victory.
Turnips (my all-time favorite root vegetable) got gussied up with anchovy paste, toasted pecans and fresh parsley. I just sauteed the turnips until tender (you also could roast them, if you like) then tossed them with fishy goodness, nutty crunch and grassy parsley. It was a mouthful of umami and texture.
The veggies paired with wedge of cornbread made a deeply satisfying if not quite deep South dinner. Read on for the recipe.
by Caroline on February 22, 2010
I’ve been meaning to make my Aunt Carrie’s colcannon recipe since she prepared it for us at Christmas. Colcannon is a traditional Irish dish of mashed potatoes and cabbage. It’s simple fare—something homey to throw together when you’re overstocked with potatoes and cabbage as I was last week with an enormous head of savoy cabbage and several pounds of red-skinned potatoes in the CSA box.
I didn’t have Carrie’s precise recipe, but I figured an approximation would work. Colcannon is nearly foolproof. Just saute onion and cabbage and combine with smashed potatoes, butter and milk. The potatoes envelop the cabbage to make silky, creamy pot o’ veggies.
I also served a modified version of this Chow recipe for chicken in a white wine and mustard sauce. I used whole grain mustard rather than dijon and threw in fresh thyme since I had some on hand. All the the ingredients are pantry staples, and the sauce was super tasty slopped over the colcannon.
Read on for the recipe.