super power granola: apple-currant-ginger whole grain granola

This granola recipe combines lots of seeds, grains, nuts...and lots of crunch. Granola is great because of its endless variations.

winter comfort: pancetta, white bean, swiss chard pot pies

Monday night Katie and I cooked pot pies from the Smitten Kitchen Cookbook. It was a little bit of work, making the pastry dough from scratch as well, but if you have two cooks in the kitchen it all gets done pretty efficiently. :) Deb Perelman suggests making these for company, because you can also do the components in advance and bake them later. To make: first make the pastry dough, make the pot pie filling (swiss chard, pancetta) and a gravy-like sauce (white beans), fill oven-save bowls, top with the pastry, and bake. The pastry is really flaky, buttery and delicious. If you left out the pancetta and used vegetable stock it would be great as a vegetarian recipe as well.

two quick carrot recipes: carrot-egg cake and carrot couscous

These two recipes are both inspired by Mark Bittman's Kitchen Express, "inspired seasonal recipes in 20 minutes or less." This was a tip from Jennie and Hirak, who have the cookbook. I like how he describes the recipes, instead of listing exact ingredients and measurements, he gives you a short paragraph about how to throw it all together.  The first is an Egg and Carrot Cake with Soy. I found it a bit bland, but I luckily had a jar of The Brinery's kimchi at home, and with the kimchi it was a good simple lunch. The second is a Carrot and Couscous Salad, which is great and has endless variations. Perfect for throwing in a tupperware and taking for lunch.

how to use your winter CSA, part II

The selection doesn't look any different yet from last time...The farm is still giving us a mix of some hoophouse greens and fall/winter storage vegetables. I am looking forward to spring! Here's what we made the last two weeks:

butternut squash (from last box): winter couscous and red curry butternut soup
celeriac (from last box): apple-celeriac salad
sweet dumpling squash: quinoa-stuffed squash, and we still have more to use up
carrots: minestrone, plus raw for lunches
kale: crepes and minestrone
red onions: beet risotto, winter couscous, got thrown in everything!
potatoes: minestrone and more of those delicious potato chips
beets: beet stew with lamb, beet risotto, Jessica also made a roasted beet salad, and still more beets....I'm afraid it's turning into a beet blog...

Also, take a look at this recent NYT article, Winter Poses Challenges for Chefs with a Local Ethos
From the article: "Locally grown. Market-sourced. Farm to table: These phrases have become the mantras of the American menu, promising ingredients that are supremely fresh, in season and produced within a tight radius of the restaurant. But what can they possibly mean in the dead of winter, in northerly climes where farms are battened down and the earth is as hard as a raw cabbage?"

see here for our last CSA box and what we made. Preview for next time: beets + greens, carrots, squash, greens, potatoes, kohlrabi

hearty soups IV: porotos granados, Chilean bean and corn stew

 This soup is adapted from Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's cookbook Veg: River Cottage Everyday. Again, another great British chef I had not heard of...I saw this book at Synne's and fell in love with the images and simple recipe ideas. I just had to have it, although it doesn't come out in the US edition until May 2013. So we're using grams and liters, and "tinned" beans instead of canned. :) If you have a kitchen scale, metric is easier anyways than measuring cups, and for things like soups the measurements don't need to be exact anyways.

This is a take on the traditional Chilean stew porotos granados, a combination of old-world ingredients that (according to the internet) pre-dates the Spanish, from the Mapuche Indians. I guess it is traditionally made with cranberry beans. See here for how beautiful they are, by "Hungry Sofia." I am dealing with winter and the lack of fresh most things, so I used canned cannellini beans.  Other recipes call for the addition of bell pepper and basil instead of cilantro. But the common ingredients are sqaush/pumpkin, beans, sweet paprika, corn. I followed the lead of a recommendation on Saveur to add a swirl of a garlicy-herb paste into the soup. I found it a bit bland without the addition of lots of salt, pepper and herbs at the end. Then it was nice and fresh tasting - so season well.

hearty soups III: jamaican jerk chicken chili

 This soup relates to one of my favorite cooking memories with Michael. We were making this chili in Berlin , and in German grocery stores you of course can't buy Jamaican Jerk seasoning. So Michael made the seasoning from scratch, combining various spices and herbs with the mortar and pestle. Very impressive. But then he forgot to check how much of the spice blend the recipe called for - just adding all of it to the soup. It was so spicy we were both crying, trying to eat the (really good!) soup with yogurt on it. haha!  Here is the recipe, with the addition of chicken.  It's a good one...Michael said it's his favorite so far in the hearty soups series. Just watch the spice level. :)

By the way, I could have called this post: no horse meat in this chili. Have you heard about the latest Horse Meat Scandal, aka "Burgergate," in Europe? Horse meat has been "masquerading" as beef across Europe, mislabeled in all kinds of prepared dinners, and now in Nestle products. A poll in Britain found that 1 in 4 people is now eating less meat, and 65% mistrust food labels. See also NPR, Why is some food taboo? and Salon's 5 Lessons from the Horse Meat Scandal. It's strange: in the US I very rarely eat meat that has been processed in any way. In Germany, however, where you can get so much good sausage, I do occasionally do so, in Salami form. Stories like this do make me cringe a bit though. What do you think?

hearty soups II: french lentil stew with roasted carrots and mint

Synne made this recipe a while back and told me it's a good one. It's a basic French Lentil soup with the addition of mint, lemon, harissa, and oven-roasted carrots and onions. It's amazing that something so simple (roasting the onions in the oven and not sauteing them) can make such a difference. They smelled so sweet - the whole apartment smelled amazing as they were roasting.

hearty soups: shredded pork stew with chipotle tomato sauce

 When we're planning what to cook, Michael often tells me he feels like something "hearty." I'm spending a few days in Providence and my goal is to make him some hearty soups, putting all the leftovers in the freezer so he misses me lots when I'm gone. :)  The first one I came across in a book series from Food & Wine: Best of the Best Cookbook Recipes, taking recipes from what they consider the 25 best cookbooks of the year. (This was a find at the Ann Arbor Public Library, which has an amaaazing selection of cookbooks. Except also a long waiting list for new and popular items. I guess it's a community with a lot of good cooking going on!) This particular recipe is from Lourdes Castro, from the cookbook Simply Mexican. It looked so good, I just had to try it. It was a little on the spicy side, so be careful with the adobo sauce and chipotles - but don't leave them out. This gives the soup its spicy, smoky flavor.

roommate dinner: quinoa stuffed squash and apple-celeriac salad

Jessica and I were both finally home on a Friday night, so we cooked and caught up on our Top Chef episodes (We love Sheldon! And we want to cook for the Iditarod mushers! That was the coolest challenge ever!). This was a recipe on our to-cook list for a while, plus a recipe to use up more CSA ingredients. The two recipes actually paired really well together, both using green apples. One hot and one raw dish. Even after a great dinner, watching Top Chef still made me hungry...especially for some seafood! (this episode took place in Alaska, and they had a salmon/sourdough challenge!) I wish I had access to my dad's freezer full of wild salmon...

A Valentine's Dinner: beet stew with lamb meatballs and wild rice

 For our Valentine's Day dinner, and what is turning out to be a weekly Ole Reunion dinner, we went with pink food: a beet stew with spiced lamb meatballs. It was meant to be: Katie had the idea for the stew, I had just happened to buy lamb at the farmer's market last weekend. And we added some wild rice to bring in our Minnesota roots. Nicole made a beautiful winter salad with toasted almonds and cranberries and buttermilk dressing, and Peter mixed us ladies some cocktails while we were cooking. This stew is beautiful and so tasty!

a valentine's day recipe: beet risotto

This recipe is very timely...considering the beets make it bright pink, and it's from Dennis Cotter's For the Love of Food. Mmm... It also made me super happy each time I added a ladle-ful of the pink beet-veggie stock and watched it mix in. Gorgeous color. I used a mix of golden and pink beets, which is just what was in the drawer. The gold color gets lost in the pink. The risotto needs something salty/acidic at the end, so top with lemon zest and cheese.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Ottolenghi's ultimate winter couscous

This recipe is from Yotam Ottolenghi's Plenty, a vegetarian cookbook. Thanks to Synne for introducing me to this Israeli-born British chef, who also regularly writes for The Guardian. The flavors are always amazing in his recipes. This one was great for using our winter produce. I love recipes that are just so vibrant. This one, with the squash, carrots, parsnips, and warm spices, is very orange and very beautiful. 

veggies for breakfast: kale crepes

Here's another way to get an extra serving of veggies in the morning...Kale crêpes! I made Jessica have some and tell me I wasn't crazy...They are very green. :)  

Puree some (de-stemmed) kale leaves with 1 cup milk in blender or with immersion blender. I used about 4 leaves. Pour into a bowl. Add 1/2 tsp vanilla, 2 eggs, 1 cup flour (I used whole wheat pastry flour), 2 tsp sugar, and whisk. Serve with fresh fruit and maple syrup.
Serves 3-4.

I thought the house smelled a lot like kale as I was making them, but when they cooled down and I ate some of the leftovers cold, I could hardly taste the kale. They were great leftover and would be good with a savory topping, too.

minestrone with kale, white beans, tomatoes

 This recipe came to my inbox from the New York Times Recipes for Health, just when we had fresh kale to use. Pretty much everything else is in the pantry. We had our beautiful purple potatoes and purple kale from the CSA. As I was cooking, Jessica was heating up some amazing smelling smoked bacon next to me, so I threw in some of that, too, and garnished with crispy pieces. It would be vegetarian and vegan without the bacon and the parmesan rind. Yum yum.

how to use your winter CSA: what we made

 Jessica and I get a bi-weekly CSA share from Sunseed Farm, just outside of Ann Arbor. I thought it would be fun to track what we made with our produce, and do this regularly so you can also see how the produce changes as we move from the dead of winter to warmer temperatures. Today they told us this is a "transitional period" at the farm, as the spring stuff isn't up yet and they get to the end of winter storage items. He said in the hoophouses it is now April weather, so they will soon be growing spring veggies.

This is what we got last time and what we made:

Kale and Bok Choy - Green Soup
Carrots -Winter Slaw
Purple Potatoes - Cabbage-Beet-Borscht  also purple potato chips, also pizza with leeks and potatoes
Celeriac -Winter Slaw
Greens - Roasted Beet Salad
Butternut Squash - still in storage...
Beets -Cabbage-Beet-Borscht

and looking ahead, this is what we got today for the next two weeks. Expect recipes with squash, carrots, onions, beets, potatoes, kale... Any ideas for above items are welcome! :)

 

sesame kale salad with cranberries

 This was a quick packed lunch for the office... Thought: I have kale wilting in the veggie drawer and must eat something green today! I once had a great raw kale salad from the farmer's market with a sesame dressing. So this is a variation of that. Cut the kale into ribbons, "massage" or mix with the dressing, sprinkle with sesame seeds and cranberries for a little sweetness. Throw in a tupperware and go!

dressing:
olive oil / vinegar / soy sauce / sesame oil / agave or maple syrup

Sesame oil can be super overpowering. Just add a dash of the soy and sesame, and just enough of the sweetener. Rice vinegar is nice and light if you have it, or use red wine or apple cider.

Chicken Tagine with Apricots and Almonds served with couscous

My weekly dinner with Katie and Peter ended up being an Ole reunion this week, with another St. Olaf grad, Nicole, joining us. She brought a great spinach salad, Katie and Peter supplied the wine and kitchen, and adorable puppy. We made a chicken tagine with apricots and almonds...mmm...The warm smell of cinnamon is perfect for winter weather!

winter slaw with creamy yoghurt-poppy seed dressing

  It's snowing big, thick snowflakes today in Ann Arbor. Still makes me want to just eat soup and not leave the house, but this morning Katie and I put on our boots and walked to the farmer's market to support the year-round sellers. I have to admit it was pretty slim pickings (at least by the time we got there...after getting side-tracked by TeaHaus...). I just got eggs, radish, and a pie pumpkin. (Still have a drawer full of CSA  veggies, too.) It's pretty amazing that Ann Arbor does have a year-round market. Such a great food city! We ended up going from the market to the co-op to Plum, one of Ann Arbor's many superfancy grocery stores. Splurge trip. (But since most all my grocery shopping is done by foot/bike, it's sometimes necessary to have a little stock-up trip!) Anyways, this recipe has been on my "to-make" list for a while. To get some raw veggies and to use some of the seasonal stuff we have on hand. It does involve a lot of chopping/cutting, but it makes a good, big portion. The poppyseed dressing is really good, too.

Spiced Carrot-Poppyseed Pancakes

 Ann Arbor has this great breakfast place. Really a breakfast experience: Selma Cafe. They have different chefs cooking breakfast in a private home on Friday mornings. A couple of weeks ago I was promised "carrot cake pancakes," which made me so excited. They ended up being quite sweet, but I haven't got the idea out of my head and wanted to make my own.