Summer of Stir Fry

I think it's been years since my big beautiful carbon steel wok came down off the high shelf. When we moved here we found a sad little electric stove -- hardly high enough heat for a decent stir fry and no grates to hold the fully round bottom pan in place.
But look at me now with 18,000 BTU per burner quickly tossing together a dinner of tofu, carrots, onions, celery, mushrooms and peppers. That wok turned what looked like a pretty dismal selection of vegetables, minced garlic and ginger, and a couple pantry staples (soy sauce -- 2 TB, hoisin -- 2-3 tsp, sesame oil -- 2 tsp, brown sugar -- 1 1/2 tsp mixed together into a sauce)into way more than the sum of it's parts all in about 15 minutes. Super fast, tasty, too quick to heat up the kitchen and not a lot of prep to tackle -- its' the perfect summer dinner. Why didn't I think of this sooner?

Golden Carrots

About two months ago in a rush before leaving town I tossed out some seeds. Carelessly. Recklessly. Added a little top soil, watered and walked away.
Now, several trips later I am seeing the rewards of slap dash gardening. Beautiful long golden carrots much nicer than I ever grew carefully.
Tonight I'll roast them with harissa and olive oil and top them -- just as they are in the garden -- with carrot top pesto.

Garden Fresh

A side dish straight from the side yard. Steamed carrots, yellow and green beans and snap peas with zesty carrot top pesto. Nasturtium flowers and leaves as a flavorful garnish for the peppery taste James loves.

Oven Roasted Dinner

Another day of yardwork. Too tired to cook. We roasted what vegetables we had in the fridge in a hot oven sprinkled with S&P, olive oil, and a pinch of za'atar for an easy to eat vegetarian dinner.

Roasted Winter Vegetables

Today I took a little time to roast a big platter of farmer's market fresh vegetables -- perfect for a light lunch or a dinner side for James along crispy pork chops or mashed potatoes and grilled sausages, as a topping for salads and grains for me. With the oven at 400º I peeled and quartered parsnips, sprayed them with a bit of oil, sprinkled on S&P and popped them in for about 45 minutes -- turning once as they cooked. Whole thin carrots were coated with spray olive oil and dusted with za'atar -- delicious with carrots and cauliflower. Carrots also roast for about 50 minutes turning once as they cook. Brussels sprouts -- one of James' favorites -- were trimmed and halved and again lightly sprayed and seasoned with S&P before 30 minutes in the oven. The beets were wrapped in tin foil packages and put directly on the oven racks for about 50 minutes until the skins slipped off and they were tender throughout.

Fall Vegetable Stew

"A little sausage makes everything taste better," James said biting into our Italian sausage and vegetable stew. And he's right.

Our dinner was a simple -- almost slow cooked, medley of favorite root vegetables -- another recipe courtesy of Martha Stewart Living. I can't help it, it looked good in the magazine.

First I browned chunks of sausage in olive oil, then I set the sausage aside and browned peeled cipollini onions for about 5 minutes. To the browned onions I added chopped tomatoes, chicken stock and a nice sized bunch of fresh oregano and rosemary. That simmered over medium heat for about 25 minutes. Next came celery (the recipe called for fennel but I just don't like it --too licoricey for me), carrots, parsnips, cubes of butternut squash, and because I was short on butternut a peeled and cubed sweet potato. I wouldn't add sweet potato if I made this recipe again -- it's delicious but doesn't hold it's shape when cooked and gave a bit more mush to the texture than I wanted. I let that mixture simmer, covered, for 15 minutes or so and then added trimmed and halved brussels sprouts, then covered and cooked for 5 minutes more. To finish the stew I uncovered the pot and let the sauce cook down, simmering for about 15 more minutes, swirled in a pat of butter, and served with a plate of crispy cheese toasts.

A perfect fall dinner.

One pot dinner?

I love Thomas Keller. He is probably my favorite chef and I aspire to his totally unachievable greatness.

But, one of his greatest talents is his uncanny ability to turn a one pot peasant dish into a kitchen full of dirty pans and trays and seemingly endless hands on work.

Admittedly I was particularly proud of the carrots in our yard and wanted to find a dish to highlight them. Pride, as they say, goes before a fall.

But, the asparagus in the fridge was calling my name. It was just so fresh and springy. This was no time to listen to reason or be seduced by haute French chef Daniel Boulud's one pot soup.

While mindlessly flipping through the Ad Hoc at Home cookbook, looking for what the super chef might do with asparagus, I had already spied a recipe for Spring Vegetable Garbure. The photograph showed spring produce at it's just harvested best, food porn for gardeners. Didn't the carrots, potatoes, fava beans and green beans I had labored over and raised from sprouts deserve this royal treatment? I was hooked.

I didn't know at the time but a Garbure is a thick vegetable stew from Southwest France often flavored with pork, and sausage or duck confit. Keller's recipe starts with cooking down carrots, leeks, and onions (2 cups each) under a cover of pork skin -- yes the skin off a slab of bacon -- for 35 minutes. Once the fat has rendered out and the vegetables are soft he instructs to remove the pork and add in 8 cups of chicken broth and simmer for 20 minutes more. That pot is drained (into a second pot) to leave the flavorful broth that is the soup's base.

Meanwhile a host of other vegetables: fava beans, English peas, green beans, cabbage wedges, and asparagus are individually blanched in boiling water (the fava beans are peeled), shocked in an ice bath and laid on paper towels to drain. Small creamer potatoes (both red and yellow) are peeled and cut into eighths and brought to a boil along with a sachet of bay leaves, thyme, peppercorns, and garlic then cooked until tender. The carrots get a similar treatment with a teaspoon of honey and another sachet. Five pots, two trays, three colanders, a drawer full of utensils and counting.

"This looks healthy," James said as he pulled his spoon through the brightly colored bowl. He nodded as I, his dinner time tour guide, pointed out the ingredients that had come from our yard. "It's good," he said reaching for another slice of the cheese toast I offered on the side. "We can eat healthy," he declared.

Now I just have to worry about the dishes. Sigh.

Small Harvest Dinner

Our backyard is the best place to shop.

While sorting through and staking plants and pulling a few weeds I made a small harvest just perfect to turn into James' dinner -- delicious and not much work.
I cut the freshly dug potatoes and peeled carrots into chunks and placed the vegetables in the bottom of a roasting pan. On top went a trussed chicken, the cavity heavily seasoned with salt and pepper and stuffed with lemons (whole pricked all over with a fork and wedges). I stared the chicken breast down (I don't usually do that but I read something on line and figured I'd try it) at 350º. After half an hour I gave the vegetables a stir, turned the chicken, and gave everything a good wash of olive oil, salt and pepper. Another 30 minutes and I stirred some chopped sage (found it in the front garden) into to the vegetables, added a pat of butter to the chicken breast and turned the oven up to 450º to give the skin a little color (so much for Marcella Hazan, I'll stick with high heat chicken roasting).

With a lightly dressed salad (you don't need much when it's this fresh) our home-grown, garden fresh dinner was ready.

"These might be the best potatoes I've ever tasted," said James . . .

Never Say Never

So much for sweeping statements.

Just a little while ago I mentioned how I never make carrot cake, "I don't like it so I don't know if James likes it or not". Written right here on this blog.

Call it my Rumsfeld moment, but we are in the information age and here already a few within a few weeks I have been proven a liar.

Well, we were going to some friends' house for dinner and I thought I'd bring dessert. I was feeling pretty lazy. I've been busy filling the freezer for James while I am out of town so, oddly enough, cooking for "day of" has taken somewhat of a backseat. And, I needed to clear out the space being taken up by that tub of delicious cream cheese frosting. Anyway, I just didn't feel up to my usual 3 layer red velvet cake -- too many pans to wash I figured. And so I pondered other cakes that take well to cream cheese frosting and landed on the dreaded carrot cake. Not the least of reasons was the 10lb bag of Bunny Love James had deposited in the fridge from his last "I'm going to start juicing again" run to Costco.

Simple, quick, and, I have to admit, not too bad. I used a simple serve in the cake pan recipe from the kitchen stalwart The King Arthur Flour Baking Book.

First I beat together 4 eggs and 1 1/2 cups of canola oil until they were light and -- as the recipe called for but I didn't really see, full of bubbles. Then I added 2 cups of sugar, 1/2 cup at time -- beating well after each addition, and 2 tsp of vanilla. In a separate bowl I mixed 2 cups of all purpose flour, 1 TB of cinnamon, 2 tsps of baking soda and 1 tsp of salt. I gently mixed the dry ingredients into the wet, folded in 3 sups of finely grated carrots and 1 1/2 cups chopped pecans, and popped the pan in to a 350º oven for about 50 minutes.

Easy one pan snack cake -- but barely a dent in the carrot supply.

Roast Chicken with Stewed Winter Vegetables and Balsamic Fig Preserves

I'm a sucker for Thomas Keller. I buy his cookbooks (okay . . . James bought them for me), I dream of eating in his restaurants, I cook his recipes at home.

Yesterday while browsing recipes for dinner I came across the great chef's (and his brother's) recipe for stewed winter vegetables. I just happened to have everything I needed right from the farmer's market.

First I peeled shallots (I did about 4), sprinkled them with S&P and wrapped them in tin foil with 1/2 TB of butter. Those I popped into the oven (350º) for 30 minutes.

Carrots and parsnips are peeled and cut into 2 inch lengths (I made sort of batons about 1/2" x 2"). Leeks are split in half, cleaned and cut into 1" lengths. Turnips, quartered. All of these cut vegetables go into a pot with a sprig of thyme, 2 TB of butter, and 2 1/2 cups chicken stock. I brought the vegetables up to a boil, covered and allowed to simmer for 20 minutes. Meanwhile I boiled some small potatoes until tender, and when the vegetable were just soft added in the drained potatoes and the roasted shallots and seasoned to taste.

On the side -- when a Thomas Keller recipe is on the table everything else is a side-dish -- a quick roast chicken. I simply stuffed the cavity with garlic cloves, lemons and herbs from our garden, trussed, basted with olive oil, sprinkled on S&P and popped it in the oven for an hour and 20 minutes (I basted with more olive oil about 20 minutes into roasting) at 350º -- good company for the roasting shallots.

Thomas Keller was not the only chef on our table last night. Yesterday at work I commented on the delicious balsamic fig preserves served on the grilled chicken breast, and the boys in the truck were kind enough to give me not only the recipe but a little to go container. A little extra autumn flavor complements of our friends at "Off The Shelf."