I don’t dislike broccoli. But still, I buy it because I feel like I should, and every time it sits in my fridge until it starts to turn yellow. Then I end up making broccoli soup or classy chicken (an old Best of Bridge casserole Mike and my Dad love composed of broccoli, chicken, mushroom soup, curry powder and grated cheese) in an attempt to not waste it. Tonight was one of those nights, so with this soup we kicked off “Clean-Out-the-Fridge-Before-Leaving-Town-Week”. I’m sure you celebrate this or a similar occasion at least once per summer.
I can’t hardly believe it’s already almost time to head to Tofino. (While our Hells Angels friends house-sit with their Rotweillers, of course.) Tomorrow is the CBC’s annual Stampede pancake breakfast; Friday is parade day. Where did July come from? So it’s time to stop grocery shopping and use up what we have, which always results in interesting/creative dinners.
Broccoli soup is easy: hack up the broccoli and simmer it (with a chopped onion, if you have the gumption) with some chicken or veg stock. The ratios don’t really matter - I used enough broth to come halfway up the pot of broccoli. Simmer/steam until the broccoli is very tender, then puree it with a hand-held immersion blender right in the pot, or transfer to a blender to puree. Add a handful of grated oldcheddar and stir until it melts, and a splash of half and half, if you like - it’s amazing what even a quarter cup to finish (and this was a big head of broccoli and 1L stock) will do to the resulting texture. And that’s it.
This pan bread is like a giant biscuit, except that the dough is easily stirred together using canola oil instead of cutting in any butter. I bake mine in my ever-present cast iron skillet; after caramelizing the onions, you can just scrape the batter over and bake it in the oven. If you don’t have an ovenproof skillet, you could do it almost as easily in a cake pan or pie plate. This caramelized onion version is fantastic with chili. It does the same duty as a focaccia in far less time, and no kneading.
Like any biscuit the dough takes additions well; fresh herbs would be good, or grated cheese, or chilies. To make a sweet (but not too sweet) version, caramelize sliced apples or pears in the pan, with or without a squirt of honey or maple syrup, and add a shake of cinnamon to the batter.
Upside-down Caramelized Onion Pan Bread
a drizzle of oil and perhaps a bit of butter
2 large onions, cut in half and thinly sliced
2 cups all-purpose flour, or half all-purpose, half whole wheat
1 Tbsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1 cup milk
1/4 cup canola oil
1 large egg
Preheat the oven to 350°F.
In a large ovenproof skillet set over medium heat, melt the butter with the oil. Sauté the onions for about 15 minutes, until they are soft and golden. Spread the onions over the bottom of the pan and take it off the heat, or spread them into an 8″ or 9″ round cake pan or pie plate that has been sprayed with nonstick spray.
In a medium bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, and salt. In a small bowl, stir together the milk, oil, and egg. Add the milk mixture to the flour mixture and stir until just blended.
Spread the batter over the onions and bake for 35-40 minutes, until pale golden around the edges, cracked on top, and springy to the touch.
I’ll tell you straight up, the soup is green, and refreshing in a way that only pure green things are, but I likely wouldn’t make it again. It’s like a pea smoothie; I can’t get past the cold grassiness of it. I’m thinking of throwing the rest on the stovetop tomorrow. Others may enjoy it, though. At least it’s healthy - besides being so green, peas are a crazy high source of fiber.
This morning we talked about no heat dinners on CBC, and so I made it for the occasion. I wasn’t surprised to come home with the whole batch. (Why is it said that something not so great is “nothing to sneeze at”? Is there any occasion that calls for sneezing at something that is particulaly good?)
Minted Pea Soup
Adapted from Real Simple magazine.
4 cups fresh or frozen peas, thawed
a big handful fresh mint, torn into pieces
a small handful fresh chives, torn into pieces
3 cups chicken or veg stock
1 tsp. each salt and sugar
Whiz everything in the food processor or blender until smooth. Makes about 1 1/2 L.
The shrimp fajitas, on the other hand, are great. I made them about a year ago when trying to come up with a way to incorporate guacamole into our dinner, on account of an overabundance of perfectly ripe ones in our fruit bowl. This time it was planned for the aforementioned show. You could throw the cooked shrimp right in there - frozen, even, if you want to keep the fajita innards cool en route to a picnic or bring it in your lunch - but I decided to give them a quick minute in a hot pan with a tiny dab of butter and shake of chili powder, just to fajita things up a bit. Either way.
Shrimp & Black Bean Fajitas
All these measurements are approximate; just wing it.
1 ripe avocado
1 clove garlic, finely pressed
2 Tbsp. lime juice (or to taste)
pinch salt
about 20 cooked, peeled shrimp, thawed (or not, if you want to keep it cool en route to a picnic)
1/2 cup canned black beans, rinsed and drained
1/2-1 cup crumbled feta
1/4 cup salsa
4 whole wheat flour tortillas
In a small bowl, mash the avocado, garlic, lime juice and salt until smooth. Spread a quarter of it into the middle of each tortilla. Divide the shrimp, beans, feta and salsa among them, and wrap like a burrito.
I take back yesterday’s comment about Lou being deserving of homemade peanut butter and cheese treats - this morning, his first order of business was to completely chew up Mike’s glasses. Silly me, here I was worried about our shoes.
The fantastic thing about soup is that it can start from anything. I never would have thought to combine these ingredients in soup, but I looked in my fridge tonight, still full from a late lunch at Aida’s with A (please feel free to hate me for eating so well this week. I would) and found the better half of a can of black beans (leftover from the quesadillas) and two mild Italian Spolumbos sausages that needed cooking. And the storage compartment in the seat of the bench at the kitchen table is beginning to get difficult to close - every time I go to the market I pick up sweet potatoes and add them to the stash, which hasn’t been depleted lately, so I figured sausage, black beans and sweet potatoes might make a fine soup.
Because my other favorite black bean soup is made so much better with a fresh jalapeno pepper (and I say this as someone who is not a particular fan of jalapenos), I minced one (they cost about 3 cents each and last forever in the fridge, so I happen to have a couple) and cooked it along with the sausage. Unlike onions and garlic, a hot pepper’s heat will not be tamed by cooking; if you’re a wuss like me, get rid of the seeds and membranes, which contain the majority of a pepper’s capsaicin. Then I threw in a diced sweet potato, the black beans, a 1L tetra pack of chicken stock, a shake of cumin and about a third of a can of leftover tomato sauce that was also in the fridge. I thought this soup would benefit from a hit of tomato - a bit of tomato sauce or spoonful of tomato paste gives it a far richer and deeper flavour, and the starch in the potato thickens the broth slightly.
Some of you in warmer climates may think such a soup is the exact opposite of what one might want to eat on a June evening. Honestly, Calgary does have its share of 30 degree days, but today it’s damp and chilly; we all huddled into kangaroo jackets in order to go outside and see how the garden is recovering from the hailstorm A and I watched out the window at Aida’s while we finished our ricotta-rosewater cheesecake and baklava. When the forecast calls for a week of rain, I’ll be glad to have a pot of leftover soup in the fridge. Besides, Mike is suffering from a hangover, and I can’t think of much more reviving than a warm bowl of spicy black beans, sweet potatoes and sausage.
Sausage, Black Bean and Sweet Potato Soup
a drizzle of canola or olive oil
1-2 mild or hot Italian sausages
1 jalapeno pepper, seeded and minced
1 medium sweet potato, peeled and diced
1 19 oz. (540 mL) can black beans, drained
1 tsp. cumin
1 L chicken or vegetable stock
about a cup of tomato sauce or a big spoonful of tomato paste
In your soup pot, heat a drizzle of oil over medium heat. Squeeze the sausage out of its casing into the pot and cook it, breaking it up as you stir it around, until it’s no longer pink. Add the jalapeno pepper, then the sweet potato, beans, cumin, stock and tomato sauce. Bring to a simmer, reduce the heat and simmer for about half an hour, until the potatoes are tender and the broth has thickened a bit.
Serves 4-6. Per serving, based on 4 servings: 416 calories, 7.7 g total fat (1.5 g saturated fat, 3.8 g monounsaturated fat, 1.8 g polyunsaturated fat), 27.8 g protein, 60.5 g carbohydrate, 30 mg cholesterol, 14 g fiber. 16% calories from fat.
The final resting place for any chicken that has been roasted in my house is a pot on the stove. When it would appear that most of the meat has been used up in salads, quesadillas and fried rice, there is always more to be coaxed off by a stint in the hot tub. Yesterday I covered the last of two chickens with water and added a handful of chives from the garden, a few peppercorns, and that was it. (And always add any chicken gel that might be left in the bottom of the roasting pan or container you stored it in in the fridge.) You could add any kind of vegetable trimmings you like - onion skins to make it darker and richer - or roast the carcass in the oven first, which is akin to browning meat; it caramelizes any natural sugars in there, adding flavour to the resulting stock.
Contrary to popular belief, stock does not have to simmer for hours on end, nor must you boil an entire chicken to rubber in order to make stock. A half-hour simmer is fine, then turn the heat off and let it all cool down - sort of like steeping a big pot of chicken tea. When it’s cool enough, pull out the bones and help the bits of meat fall off into the stock - a perfect base for soup.
I’ve had a jar of alphabet noodles on my shelf for at least a year - something I thought I should have when I became a mum, but not the sort of thing I often think of cooking with. W likes to play with them, but I have yet to actually add them to anything. Today I thought I’d reheat my chickeny stock, along with some chopped carrots and alphabet noodles. It seemed boring.
Then I remembered a soup Mike used to be addicted to when he worked in a deli decades ago - it was called Italian wedding soup; a basic chicken soup made with teeny meatballs, greens and tiny pasta stars. (I’m pretty sure Campbell’s makes a version of it in one of their hoity toity varieties.) I had greens. I had meatballs, even if they weren’t teeny. I cut them in half. I did a quick internet search to see if I was missing anything, and noticed Giada makes a version (with endive or escarole) in which she whisks together egg and Parmesan cheese and dribbles it into the hot broth, creating a cloudy soup with ribbons of egg, reminiscent of egg drop soup.
Alphabet Wedding Soup
I’d love to try this with sausage meatballs; squeeze lean Italian sausage out of their casings at about 1/2″ intervals to make small meatball-sized pieces that will hold together as they simmer in the soup.
3-4 cups chicken stock, preferrably with pieces of chicken in it
1 carrot, peeled and diced
1/3 cup alphabet or other small pasta
about a dozen marble-sized meatballs, or small bits of sausage (uncooked)
1-2 eggs
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
a couple handfuls of fresh baby spinach, chard or escarole
Bring the stock to a simmer in a pot on the stove. Add the carrot, pasta and meatballs and simmer for about 10 minutes, until the meatballs are cooked through and the pasta is tender.
In a small bowl, whisk together the egg and Parmesan cheese; drizzle into the hot soup, stirring gently so that it doesn’t completely blend in, but cooks in strands. Throw in the spinach and cook for another minute or two, until it wilts.
Season with salt and pepper, and serve with extra Parmesan cheese on top.
Normally I would stir up some biscuits to accompany soup, but today it was the other way around. I made a batch of pesto-filled cheese slab scones for CBC this morning, thinking they might be appropriate for our chat about kids and picnicking, but later on, when there was a slab scone to spare, I really couldn’t imagine anything better to accompany a bowl of soup. Since it has been about to rain all day long (like the pause before a sneeze), soup is fitting. Since the scones are filled with pesto, roasted tomato soup made sense. All the stars fell into alignment when I noticed a bunch of tomatoes going wrinkly on top of the breadbox.
But, the scones. Inspired by the mega scones on Heidi’s blog, these are great slabs of cheesy biscuit dough, folded over pesto to enclose it like a letter. Heidi’s version was lemony, slathered with raspberry jam and drizzled with a glaze. I turned mine into cheese biscuits, divided the dough in half and filled one package with sundried tomato pesto (this one was the best - it came to the studio with me this morning) and one with plain basil pesto, as per W’s love for the stuff.
There is so much potential for these scones. I love that you can fill them, easily, with anything; jam, preserves, cinnamon-sugar, ham and cheese, pie filling, even. Most scones take on additions well, but these you can flavor and then fill. The best part is you can slice off pieces as thin or thick as you like; it even made a great base for eggs on toast at lunch.
Pesto & Cheese Slab Scones
If you want a sweet version, omit the cheese and use jam or preserves in place of the pesto. If you like, add grated orange or lemon zest to the dough, brush the tops with milk and sprinkle with coarse sugar before baking.
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 cups whole wheat flour
1/4 cup sugar (or more if you make a sweet version)
1 Tbsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
1/2 cup butter, cut into pieces
1 cup grated old cheddar cheese
1/3 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1 1/2 cups buttermilk, half & half or 2% milk
1/2-2/3 cup sun dried tomato pesto or basil pesto (from a jar)
Preheat oven to 375°F.
In a large bowl or the bowl of a food processor, combine the flours, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Blend using a pastry cutter or fork, or pulse the food processor until the mixture is combined but there are still bits of butter no bigger than a pea.
If you’re using a food processor, dump the mixture out into a bowl. Add the cheeses and toss to combine. Add the buttermilk, cream or milk, and stir just until the dough comes together. Divide it in half, and on a floured surface roll each piece into a 10″-12″ square. Spread the pesto in a strip down the middle third, and fold each half over it, overlapping like a letter. If you like, brush the tops with a little extra milk.
Transfer to a baking sheet and bake for about 30 minutes, until golden. Cut into whatever sized pieces you like.
Makes two slab scones.
And the tomato soup. Another easy thing to make, and a great use of tomatoes that have passed their prime. I don’t really bother measuring, although I’ve provided some measurements below for those who crave them; I’ll use about 4 big tomatoes, 6 or so Romas, or a pint of cherry or grape tomatoes. Spread them on a cookie sheet and roast them with as many cloves of garlic as you like, then add stock and a bit of milk or cream, until you have soup with the consistency you like. Puree it until it’s chunky or smooth.
Roasted Tomato Soup
It’s important to use ripe, flavorful tomatoes for this soup, since their flavor is paramount. If you have overripe, wrinkled, or squishy tomatoes around, use them up, so long as they don’t have any bad spots. Roasting them transforms their flavor, making them sweet and smoky. It’s a great way to make tomato sauce for pasta, too - just blend it without adding the stock.
about 3 lb. ripe tomatoes
a good drizzle of canola or olive oil
Salt and pepper
1 head garlic, cloves peeled (or 2 cloves, if you don’t want it too garlicky)
2 cups (500 mL) chicken or vegetable stock
2 tsp. sugar
1/2 cup milk, half and half or whipping cream (optional)
Chopped fresh basil or pesto (optional)
Preheat the oven to 450°F.
Cut the tomatoes in chunks (or in half, widthwise, if you’re using Roma tomatoes) and place them on a large rimmed baking sheet or in a roasting pan with the cloves of garlic. Drizzle them with olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Roast for about an hour, until the tomatoes are juicy with dark edges and the garlic is very soft. Set it aside to cool for a bit.
If you have a hand-held immersion blender (I highly recommend one), transfer the tomatoes, garlic and all the juices that have collected in the pan into a
medium saucepan and set it over medium heat. If not, transfer it to a blender or food processor, puree it (add a little stock if you need to get it moving) and then transfer it to a pot. Add the chicken stock and sugar. Bring to a simmer and cook for about 10 minutes. If you are going to add cream, turn the heat down to low and add it at the last minute, stirring just until the soup is heated through. If you like, stir in a small handful of chopped fresh basil or a spoonful of pesto just before serving.
Confession: I ate breakfast at Diner Deluxe today (as always the best eggs Benny ever), and lunch at Buffalo Cafe - a fantastic made from scratch bison burger that I meant to save half of for Mike, but didn’t. I did opt for the side salad rather than fries though - theirs are made with real greens, sprouts, chick peas, and some of the best grainy mustard and balsamic vinaigrette I’ve ever had. I was a bit let down by the plastic bowl it arrived in though, considering we were eating in. (Look at me playing restaurant reviewer.)
My point is, I wasn’t much up for dinner. But Mike is driving to Tofino tomorrow morning and I felt obliged to nourish him with something that will carry him through a few days of road food. I had a leftover sausage in the freezer from our pocket dogs, and a bunch of celery, a tin of lentils and some garlic, and really that’s all you need to make Sausage & Lentil Soup - our original Day 1 dinner!
But a big bowl of soup needs bread to go with it. I’m always amazed that people don’t bake Irish soda bread more often - it’s the only way I can think of to produce a loaf of bread with less than 5 minutes of actual effort, and you don’t need to wait for it to rise. It’s like a giant biscuit, really, only less finicky. And like biscuits, soda bread (which ironically contains more baking powder than soda, but whatever) takes on other ingredients well; dried fruit, berries, raisins, nuts, herbs, cheese… whatever you can think of to throw in. I really really wanted to make cheddar cheese and raisin bread, but I didn’t think it would go as well with the lentils and sausage. Next time.
All you do is toss together the dry ingredients and cheese, stir in the egg and buttermilk (this is a low fat version; feel free to add 1/4 cup of canola or flax oil or melted butter, if you like), shape it into a ball, slash the top with a knife and bake it. At Christmastime I like to bake loaves with cinnamon and allspice in the dry ingredients, raisins, cranberries and chopped dried apricots tossed in, and grated orange zest stirred into the egg and buttermilk. Who needs to fuss with fancy stolen and holiday braids with a toddler hanging off your leg? Irish soda bread gets the job done quick. And leftovers make excellent Irish French toast.
Irish Soda Bread
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 cups whole wheat flour
2 Tbsp. brown sugar
2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
1 large egg, slightly beaten
2 cups buttermilk or thin yogurt
1 cup grated old cheddar (or any other cheese), raisins, currants or chopped dried fruit, or both
Flour or oatmeal for rolling
Preheat oven to 375 F.
In a large bowl, combine all the dry ingredients – flour through salt. In a medium bowl, whisk together the egg and buttermilk, and add all at once to the dry ingredients. Stir until you have a soft ball of dough. While you’re mixing, feel free to add any additions you think would be nice – a handful of dried fruit, nuts, grated cheese or fresh herbs.
Sprinkle your countertop with a little flour or oats and knead the dough about 10 times, forming it into a ball. Place on a baking sheet that has been sprayed with non-stick spray and cut an ‘X’ lightly on the top.
Bake for 45-55 minutes, until it’s golden and sounds hollow when you tap it on the bottom.
Makes 1 loaf, or 16 wedges.
Per wedge: 132 calories, 1 g total fat (0.3 g saturated fat, 0.2 g monounsaturated fat, 0.2 g polyunsaturated fat), 5.1 g protein, 26.1 g carbohydrate, 14.5 mg cholesterol, 2.4 g fiber. 7% calories from fat.
I am an easy target for fast food. Which isn’t to say I buy it very often, but if I’m out, and hungry, my brain has come extremely adept at talking me into buying something I shouldn’t.
I had another meeting around dinnertime tonight, at a bar that I’m sure serves many varieties of battered and deep-fried things, served with creamy dips in waxed paper-lined wicker baskets. As I was getting ready to go, wondering if anyone else at the meeting would suggest getting something to eat, and pondering its close proximity to Crave Cupcakes, I thought I’d deflect temptation by bringing some soup with me in a travel mug.
I made carrot soup the other day in order to test a recipe for an upcoming issue of City Palate, so reheated a mugful in the microwave and poured it into my insulated Starbucks mug. It worked splendidly. I swirled in a spoonful of plain yogurt before screwing on the top; sort of like a spicy carrot latte. I love yogurt in curried soups; it adds creaminess without coconut milk or cream, and of course protein and calcium. Plus it adds a cool relief to the spicy soup.
I felt like such a grown-up, driving through snowy rush-hour traffic, sipping on my carrot soup and listening to the CBC news on the radio. So you really do turn into your parents.
Curried Ginger Carrot Soup
Canola or olive oil, for cooking
1 Tbsp. butter
1 onion or 2 shallots, chopped
1 tsp. grated fresh ginger
1 tsp. chopped fresh thyme
½ tsp. curry paste or powder (or to taste)
1 lb. carrots, peeled or scrubbed
1 Yukon gold potato, peeled and cubed
2 cups low-sodium chicken or vegetable stock
1 cup apple or orange juice
1 cup water
salt and pepper to taste
plain yogurt, for serving (optional)
chopped cilantro (optional)
In a medium pot, heat a drizzle of oil and the butter over medium heat. Add the onions and sauté them for 3-4 minutes, until they are translucent. Add the ginger, thyme and curry paste and cook for another minute or two.
While the onions cook, chop the carrots in to 1” chunks, and add them to the pot along with the potato, chicken stock, juice and water. Simmer for 30-45 minutes, until the carrots and potato are very tender.
Blend the soup right in the pot with a hand-held submersion blender (or transfer in batches to a blender) until smooth. Reheat if necessary and serve immediately, swirled if you like with a spoonful of yogurt and sprinkled with cilantro. Serves 4-6.
And some variations:
Thyme, Fennel and Orange Carrot Soup: replace the curry paste with ½ tsp. crushed fennel seeds.
Carrot-Caraway Soup: replace the thyme and curry paste with 1 tsp. crushed caraway seeds.
Well. I must say, I just had an extraordinarily long day that culminated with a 5 hour class and drive home from Red Deer, and I was feeling a little like I had to get my homework done before getting to crawl into bed, but seeing all these fantastic posts has revived me. Somewhat.
Tonight my excellent friend Nik and I drove to Red Deer to teach a private Asian cooking / tea class / dinner at The Cooking Room. I made hoisin pork lettuce wraps, Vietnamese rice paper rolls with peanut sauce, Thai coconut soup with lemongrass and chicken/shrimp (two varieties), pork potstickers, chicken fried rice, teriyaki beef satay, curried peanut orange shrimp, and green tea crème brulée.
Yikes, that really was as much as it felt like.
Thai Coconut Noodle Soup with Chicken or Seafood
This ingredient list may seem exotic, but everything can be easily located in most grocery stores. If there’s something you can’t find, a trip to an Asian market is always worthwhile. This recipe easily halves or doubles, or you can make the whole batch of stock, freeze half, and add chicken or seafood to the rest for dinner.
1 stalk fresh lemongrass
4 cups (1 L) chicken or vegetable broth
1 14 oz. (398 mL) can light or regular coconut milk
1/4 cup fish sauce (nam pla)
1 cup thinly sliced mushrooms
2 Tbsp. grated fresh ginger
1 Tbsp. sugar
1 tsp. - 1 Tbsp. curry paste or curry powder
2-3 tsp. red chili paste, chili-garlic sauce or 1 small Serrano or jalapeño chili, minced
thin or wide rice noodles – enough as you’d like for each person
1-2 skinless, boneless chicken breasts, cut into small strips, and/or 1/2-1 lb. (250-500 g) raw shrimp, peeled and deveined, or raw scallops
1/4 cup lime juice
2 green onions, thinly sliced
1/4 cup fresh basil or cilantro, thinly sliced
Remove the tough outer leaves from the lemongrass and cut the stalk into two or three pieces. In a large saucepan set over medium heat, combine the lemongrass, chicken broth, coconut milk, 1/2 cup water, fish sauce, mushrooms, ginger, sugar, curry powder and chili paste. Bring to a simmer, cover, and cook for 10-15 minutes. Meanwhile, soak the rice noodles according to package directions.
Add the chicken or seafood and simmer for 3-5 minutes, until cooked through. Fish out the chunks of lemongrass, which aren’t meant to be eaten. Stir in the lime juice, green onions and basil or cilantro. Put a small pile of noodles into each bowl. Ladle the soup over top. Serve immediately.
Serves 6.
Curried Peanut Shrimp
Throw the shrimp and marinade into a baggie in the morning and you’ll have dinner almost ready when you come home from work. Sometimes I simmer the whole lot, sauce and all, in a large sauté pan and serve it over rice to catch the sauce.
1/4 cup orange marmalade
1/2 cup orange juice
2 Tbsp. peanut butter
1 tsp. curry paste (or to taste)
1 tsp. sesame oil
1 clove garlic, crushed
1/2 tsp. chili sauce or sambal olek
pinch salt
pinch red pepper flakes
1/2 lb. large shrimp, peeled and deveined, with the tails left on
Combine everything but the shrimp in a bowl or jar and whisk or shake until smooth. Pour over the shrimp in a container or zip lock bag and marinate in the fridge for an hour or overnight.
Now you can proceed one of two ways: pull out the shrimp and cook them quickly in a skillet, just until cooked through, and simmer the reserved marinade in a small saucepan for a few minutes to serve alongside the shrimp for dipping. Or pour the whole lot into a larger skillet set over medium-high heat and cook until bubbly around the edges and the shrimp turn pink; serve over rice.
Serves 4.
Per serving: 159 calories, 5 g total fat (0.8 g saturated fat, 1.8 g monounsaturated fat, 1.8 g polyunsaturated fat), 13.2 g protein, 16.5 g carbohydrate, 86.2 mg cholesterol, 0.4 g fiber. 27% calories from fat.
Potstickers
1 cup finely shredded bok choy or napa cabbage (optional)
1/4 tsp. salt
1 lb. lean ground pork
2 green onions, finely chopped
1 Tbsp. soy sauce
1-2 cloves garlic, crushed
1 tsp. grated fresh ginger
1/2 tsp. sugar
1 tsp. sesame oil
1 pkg. wonton wrappers
canola oil
chicken or veggie stock, or water
If you’re using it, toss the cabbage with salt in a medium bowl and let stand for 5 minutes. Pick it up in your hand and squeeze out the excess liquid, draining it as well as you can. Add the pork, green onions, soy sauce, garlic, ginger, sugar and sesame oil and mix it all up with your hands.
To fill wontons, place a small spoonful of filling in the middle of each wrapper; moisten the edges with water (just use your finger) and fold over, pressing the edge tightly to seal. Place seam side up on a cookie sheet, pressing lightly to flatten the bottom. Cover with a tea towel to prevent them from drying out. (Dumplings can be prepared up to this point, covered with plastic wrap and refrigerated for up to 24 hours or frozen.)
When you’re ready to cook the potstickers, heat a drizzle of canola oil in a largeish skillet set over medium-high heat. Place half the dumplings at a time in the skillet and cook for a minute or two, until deep golden brown on the bottom, shaking the pan a few times to keep them from sticking. Don’t crowd the pan too much.
Pour about 1/4 cup stock or water into the pan. Cover, reduce heat to medium and cook for about 5 minutes – this will allow them to steam, cooking them through.
Makes 2 - 3 dozen potstickers.
Each: 45 calories, 1 g total fat (0.2 g saturated fat, 0.4 g monounsaturated fat, 0.3 g polyunsaturated fat), 3 g protein, 5.9 g carbohydrate, 5.2 mg cholesterol, 0.4 g fiber. 20% calories from fat.
Green Tea Crème Brulée
6 large egg yolks
6 Tbsp. sugar
1 tsp. matcha powdered green tea
1 1/2 cups heavy (whipping) cream or 18% coffee cream
½ tsp. good-quality vanilla
sugar, for sprinkling on top
In a bowl, whisk together the egg yolks and sugar. Dissolve the tea in a little bit of water or cream to get rid of any lumps; whisk the cream, tea and vanilla into the egg yolks and sugar.
Divide among 6 small ramekins, and put them into a roasting pan or 9?x13? pan; pour water in so that the water comes about halfway up the sides of the ramekins. This will sort of insulate them so that they cook gently and evenly. Bake for about 40 minutes, until the custards are set but still just slightly jiggly in the middle (you’ll get a feel for this!). Take them out, let them cool and then refrigerate for a few hours or overnight, until nice and cold.
Sprinkle an even layer of sugar over each dish and caramelize with a torch or transfer to a cookie sheet and place under the broiler in the oven for about 2 minutes, just until the sugar is caramelized and golden. Turn the sheet around if you need to to help them caremelize evenly. Refrigerate again, or just let them sit on the countertop while you eat dinner, just until the sugar is set like glass.
I have never been so happy to see the arrival of daylight savings time. Sunlight at dinnertime! This is going to make documenting these dinners much easier.
Last week I lugged home the bone from the roast ham we made on It’s Just Food (in case you haven’t figured this out already, I can be cheap) and yesterday threw it in a pot of water to coax the remaining meat off and make a stock.
Having opened up a can of black beans to make quesadillas for lunch (still one of my favorite things ever) I decided that the ham stock was destined to be black bean soup. I’m sorry if I’ve black bean souped you to death already; turns out we eat a lot of it.
This one was a bit of a soup yukaflux: half a leftover can of diced tomatoes, carrots, celery, onion, red pepper, jalapeno (this is something I never would have had in the fridge even a year ago, but I have discovered that even one chopped into my soup makes all the flavor difference), the half can of black beans, a shake from the bag of frozen corn, and the meaty ham stock. Scooped hot over a pile of leftover brown rice that was in the fridge. Done like dinner.
At this point in the program I have to pause and ponder how much detail I should divulge when it comes to relaying the events that occur in my life over dinnertime. Suffice to say that today there was a crisis; everyone is OK, more or less, but at dinnertime we converged at my sister’s house to do some damage control. My other sister brought roast chickens from Safeway, a loaf of sourdough bread, some oranges and a salad. I brought coffee.
To be honest, in the late afternoon I made another batch of chocolate covered hazelnuts, and ate enough to qualify calorically as dinner. When it became apparent I had to leave the house quickly, with Willem, I put on the pot of chickenoodle soup (I have to say it like that now, since reading it in Nigella’s Feast) that I made yesterday from the chunky, chickeny stock Mike made from a roast chicken left over from shooting a few days before. I poured out most of the stock into freezer containers, leaving all the shredded chunks of chicken in the bottom, brought the rest to a simmer, and threw in a handful of frozen peas and wide egg noodles. Salt and pepper to finish once the noodles were tender, and that’s it.
