Keftedes

Ooh these are good. I mean, they're fried, but still. There's so much zucchini right now, and I really can't get on board with zucchini bread and shit like that. I've always wanted to try these but they sounded like a lot of work... grate the zucchini, salt and press out the water, make patties and fry 'em up. But it was really easy, not all that greasy. Totally making these again. Topped with a quick version of tzatziki, Greek yogurt and mint.

So, a pound and a half of zucchini, grated and salted with the water pressed out, diced onion, 1 tsp baking powder and enough flour to pull it together. Make little flat patties, fried in not even that much olive oil (like, less than a 1/4 cup). Making these again soon!

Corn Chowder

Wow. This made my weekend. I usually have a pretty strict No Soup in the Summer policy, so I haven't made a lot of soups with summer veggies. But it's all rainy out, and I didn't feel like making another saute or succotash.

This was crazy easy- I cut the corn off 3 years of corn (bi color, so pretty!), I diced up some prosciutto (the little nubs they sell for cheap, perfect for this), and sauteed that with scallions whites in a little olive oil. Added in the corn, one cob, and little thyme and a can of chicken broth. Simmered for a while (I honestly don't know how long, I'm not good at times and measurements and stuff) and pureed it for a bit with an immersion blender. I went to taste it, thinking, hm I wonder if this will be any good, and I was Blown. Away.

I love how so many veggies can make things creamy- corn, eggplant, lima beans. I want to make this for other people so I can say "No really! There's no cream in it!" The tastiness:effort ratio on this stuff is off the charts.

Pineapple-Poblano Salsa

Whenever possible, I will work into conversation how much I love mango salsa. Mangos in general, really. I always do the same mango, jalapeno, bell pepper, red onion, cilantro and lime juice.

So I had this pineapple sitting around, looking awesome, but it really needed to be dealt with. I also had these poblanos... This guy at work brought them in from his garden, and insisted they were Anaheims. They were clearly not.

Those are poblanos. They tasted like poblanos, too. Poblanos are great grilled/ roasted, like you would do with a bell pepper. My mom makes this quesadilla with roasted poblanos and mozzarella and Serano ham. To clarify, she's never made this for me, she just makes it for herself and then calls me and tells me about it, like once a week.

So I've had roasted poblanos on my mind, and I had that very nearly overripe pineapple. I grilled the peppers on this neat little stovetop grill I just got, diced them up with the pineapple, some cilantro, scallion, and lime juice. I might need to make this more often, it's a nice switch from mango. The almost caramel-y sweetness of the pineapple works with the smokey poblano. I made some chili-rubbed chicken to go with it. (Yeah, I made a protein to go with the topping, not the other way around.)

Salmon Burgers

I'm obsessed with these salmon burgers. Salmon's obviously really great for you. I don't think I've ever read a fitness magazine that didn't mention salmon (and I read that crap a lot). I really like salmon, everyone else seems to, too. But I feel like I do the same thing with it- pan sear it or bake it in the oven, with a green vegetable. It kind of bores the hell out of me. I've done a recipe where you wrap the salmon fillet in rice paper and fry it, I did one where it's poached in a tarragon cream sauce... and like most fish it kind of needs to be fresh to be good. I like the idea of salmon burgers a lot and I was thrilled to find that they can be frozen and thawed without really compromising the quality of the fish.

So these are a pretty awesome weeknight dinner- you can pull some frozen burgers out of the freezer, thaw them quickly, and pan-sear them and they're so, so tasty. I got a big side of salmon at BJ's yesterday (just over 2 lbs) and made salmon burgers today. They're all individually wrapped in my freezer waiting to be devoured later in the week.

2 lbs salmon
1 cup fresh breadcrumbs
2 cups mayonnaise
4 cloves garlic
1/2- 2/3 cups chopped chives
1/4 cup mustard
2 Tbs lemon juice
salt and pepper
1/4 tsp cayenne

I chopped the salmon the a food processor, in 3 batches, 5-8 pulses per batch. I wouldn't do it all at once- part of it would get destroyed while the top bits stayed in big chunks. Mixed the mayonnaise with the garlic (grated on the microplane) and the rest of the ingredients. It seems like a ton of mayonnaise- it is. You won't need it all. I combined the chopped up salmon, breadcrumbs, and a scant 1 cup of the mayonnaise mixture and chilled it. I made what turned out to be 20 slider-sized burgers. I lined them up on cutting boards (baking sheets work too) and froze them. I pulled them out and individually wrapped them in plastic and put the in bags. (The burgers are a little sticky. Trying to wrap them in plastic before freezing just gets gross.)

So, now you have 20 frozen salmon sliders and lots of chive mayonnaise to use as a condiment. (The mayonnaise is good on a lot of stuff so having more than you need is nice.) Since I couldn't find slider rolls, I got whole wheat dinner rolls and sliced them and froze them. My freezer's pretty full right now, not gonna lie. Especially since the back is full of frozen chicken I'm not eating right now. Also! one dinner roll makes just about 1 cup of breadcrumbs. So that worked out nicely.

To cook- thaw and pan-cook in a little oil, 4-5 minutes per side. One mini burger is about 140 calories. 2 cooked burgers on toasted rolls with 1 Tbs of mayo on each is about 750 calories. They're kind of decadent. And awesome.

Salad with White Anchovies

I’ve been seeing these white anchovies on a lot of restaurant menus recently and I’m kind of obsessed with them. They’re very different from the grey pungent kind that come in a jar (although I am a huge fan of those, too, in Caesar salads or pastas). These are about 5 inches long, and meatier and fresh-tasting. I found some last weekend in an Italian market and I was thrilled. I was thinking these were one of those things only restaurants and people who lived in Manhattan or Italy could get. They were probably overpriced but a lot cheaper than a restaurant. I like to rationalize expensive ingredients or bottles of wine by comparing to the 300% markup that a restaurant would charge, kind of like buying clothes on sale.

So I had them on a salad based on a recipe I found from Bon Appetit with fennel and red onion. The fennel is a great choice with the anchovies. It compliments most seafood, but I’m not sure I would have come up with this pairing on my own. I’ve been eating fennel a lot this winter- as part of the mire poix of a soup , or cut into wedges and roasted, but I haven’t had it raw in a while. The thing about fennel is if you’re going to eat it raw, it needs to be sliced really thin (I think that applies to onion was well).

First I sliced the onion really thin. Like, as thin as I could get it. I tossed that with 1 Tbs each of red wine and sherry vinegar (mainly because I couldn’t decide which to use). I pretty much always do this with onions when they’re going to be eaten raw; I think it takes the edge off and seems to prevent that raw-onion-mouth thing you get after eating them. I left the onions to pickle in the vinegars while I watched the first half of Glee and opened wine.

I mixed the onion-vinegar mixture with 2 Tbs of olive oil and salt and pepper, and added the fennel to that, and then tossed it all with 5 oz (the whole box) of arugula. I laid the anchovies on top and gave it another few grinds of black pepper, most for aesthetic reasons. Black pepper on white fish just looks good.

This would probably be salad for two normal people, but I ate both. One serving (half the recipe) is about 220-250 calories. The picture is from Bon Appetit, mine had a lot more arugula but just as pretty!

½ package of white anchovies, drained on paper towels

½ red onion, sliced paper-thin

1 small fennel bulb, halved, cored, and sliced thin (but not as thin as the onion)

2 Tbs vinegar (red wine, sherry... I wouldn’t do balsamic though)

2 Tbs good olive oil

Salt and pepper

Vegan Lent

Today, I have officially decided to give up meat for Lent. I’m not the slightest bit religious, but I figure Lent is as good a time to try giving something up as January 1^st is to make a resolution. I don’t eat a lot of meat anyway, so this won’t be as hard as it sounds. I’m always smugly telling people that I could totally be a vegetarian because I don’t eat meat very much and I love vegetables so much you guys and did you know eating a steak has the same carbon footprint as driving a Hummer all day? and then I pat myself on the back for thinking about doing something good for the environment. But then I still end up eating some chicken wings because everyone else is and it would be rude not to, or adding sausage to a soup “for flavor”.

I’m also giving up eggs and all dairy (milk, cheese, yogurt, butter). I’m keeping fish, though. This is because I really love fish, fish is really good for you, we should all eat more fish, the environmental impact of eating fish is not nearly as bad as eating meat, etc… I recognize it seems arbitrary, to go vegan except for fish, but I’m doing it anyway. Also, eating fish during Lent is like, a thing.

(I’m not giving up honey, though. Not because I love it too much to bear putting sugar in my tea for a few weeks or anything. I just can’t really accept the notion that it’s non-vegan. I mean, come on. Bees!)

So I intend to blog my meatless-Lent-escapades. (Lentscapades? No. Sorry.) I won’t be eating fish every night, mostly because I am not that organized. There will be a lot of beans and lentils and maybe some tofu. And I have no intention of ever buying some sort of meat imitation food.

Resolutions

The New Year's Resolution diet overhaul is obviously cliche and contrived but every year I find myself writing lists and plans of how good I'm going to be- getting to work on time, vacuuming on a regular basis, and of course drinking less, eating better and exercising more. I'm generally pretty healthy (I eat like, a ridiculous amount of fruits and vegetables) but the holidays messed me up more than usual. I think it has a lot to do with drinking sparkling wine like it was water for 2 weeks, having cheese for dinner far too many times, and going to the gym about half as often as I normally do. I'm not losing sleep over it, I expected to slack a bit and indulge a bit. But I'm kind of surprised by the results. I didn't gain any weight, my jeans fit exactly the same, but my body fat percentage went up by 2%. I bought a bio-electric impedance body fat analyzer a few months ago and I think it's awesome. It was like, $20, too. It's very validating. I don't own a scale because I don't think it's really helpful. And the body fat percentage correlates so much better with changes in how I'm eating and exercising.

I read an article by Mark Bittman recently where he said every January he gives up all alcohol and all meat. That's probably not going to work out for me; I get kind of cranky and rebellious when I make rules like "don't eat that, ever". If I ate entirely based on impulse with no regard for my health, I'd probably eat grilled cheese and prosciutto with half a bottle of wine every night. On the other hand, I could probably go 6 months without eating any red meat and not miss it. One of my New Year's food resolution is to eat more protein, so I won't be making any effort to cut meat out of my diet.

Instead I'm not eating bread for the month of January. It might be kind of a challenge, especially eating out. I really love bread and have no intention of giving it up for the rest of my life. Same with wine, but it's so much more enjoyable when I have it once or twice week, not every day. The last few glasses of champagne on New Year's didn't really taste awesome since I'd been living on the stuff for a month.

I think "Low Carb" recipes are the stupidest thing ever. Figuring out what to eat this month is the easiest part. In my fridge I have- salmon, a whole chicken, shrimp, salad, spinach, cauliflower, green beans, spinach, carrots, celery, parsnips, cucumber, bell pepper, hummus, prosciutto, chorizo, smoked bacon, apples, oranges, grapefruits, bananas. New Year's food resolution- eat more fruits and vegetables. Easy.

I also have every kind of grain imaginable- most of them barely touched since I moved in. White rice, brown rice, red rice, Israeli couscous, barley, bulgar, quinoa, whole wheat pastas. Other New Year's food resolution- eat more whole grains. Quinoa and barley are great and I haven't made enough effort to come up with ways to cook them that I like enough to keep making.

Looking for Bittman's quote about laying off the meat and the booze for a while, I found this instead, from last January. Gorgeous picture. While I'm glad he validates my love of prosciutto, sherry vinegar and frozen shrimp and my disgust with dried herbs and minute-rice, I don't think I'll ever give up canned beans, bottled lemon juice or canned chicken stock.

Escalivada

One of my favorite things to do with a mix of summer vegetables is to slow-roast them, drizzle with olive oil and eat with slices of toasted bread. A Spanish restaurant I used to go to had a similar dish called "Escalavida," which they sadly took off the menu. I used bell peppers, zucchini, tomatoes and onions, but eggplant is also a great addition. I did each vegetable under the broiler separately, but a grill is even better if you have one!

Bell Peppers: Arrange peppers on a foil-lined baking sheet. Adjust oven rack so the peppers can sit as close to the broiler heating element as possible without touching it. Preheat broiler and put in peppers. Watch and turn when the skin facing the broiler turns black (you'll begin to smell at about the same time). Turn until most of the skin is black and peeling (they don't have to be totally black...about 75%). Cool in a Ziploc bag or a bowl, until they're cool enough to handle.

The skin should then fall off pretty easily. Resist the urge to rinse them- it will be faster and you'll get rid of all the black but they won't have that wonderful roasted, caramelized, smokey taste.

Eggplant: Position rack so that eggplant will be a few inches from the broiler. Rotate the eggplant periodically so the skin is charred and pulls away. Let the eggplant rest until cool enough to handle. Cut open and pull out the inside in strips. Taste some- if it's still a bit chewy, throw it back in for a few more minutes.

Tomatoes: Cut tomatoes in half on the equator and seed. If they're large, cut into quarters. Let them drain for a few minutes on paper towels. Arrange on a rimmed baking sheet (not too crowded- an inch or so between pieces) and drizzle with olive oil and sprinkle with salt. Roast a few inches under the broiler for about 5-10 minutes to cook out some of the water and just begin to brown the edges. (These aren't so well-suited to the grill as the other veggies)

Onions: Cut onions in half, and then into wedges about 1 inch thick. Toss with olive oil and salt and arrange on a rimmed baking sheet. Roast a few inches from the broiler, stirring when the edges start to brown. Take them out when the onions are translucent and browned on the edges. (On the grill- Cut the onions in slices like you would for onion rings. Use a toothpick to hold all of the rings together. Grill on medium-high heat. These make burgers amazing.)

Zucchini and Summer Squash: Cut lengthwise into quarters or smaller. Toss with olive oil and salt and roast several inches under the broiler, turning periodically so no sides get too brown.

Arrange on a dish and drizzle with a good olive oil. Slice bread, brush with olive oil and arrange on baking sheet. Put the sheet in the still-warm oven (broiler turned off) to lightly toast.

In which I take some very un-sexy pictures of the food in my fridge

So, I forgot to cook for about two weeks, and I've been prepared shit for lunch at work, which makes me feel like a terrible person. I've brought prepared microwavable stuff from home, or I've gone to Salad Creations, or gotten a greasy as all hell cheeseburger with other people from work... I used to bring lovely healthy lunches. So this afternoon I made some stuff lunch -appropriate things. Also things that are very appealing when it's approaching 90 outside.



The first is cucumber salad. My mom used to make this when we went to the beach. Recently she told me that the only reason she made this is because my dad's mother used to make it when they went to the beach, so he wanted it, and so she made it. I always really loved this dish. And it's not that I associate it with the beach and that's why I love it. As much as I love sun, bikinis, and drinking during the day, I am not a big beach person. I'll go to a pool in someone's backyard or country club, or I'll go swim in the river, but the beach has never had a lot of appeal for me. The sun is unrelenting, the water is always too cold. and that fucking sand! gets all over everything. But anyway, we would stay at the same hotel all the time, and we'd buy fried fish somewhere, and cucumer salad was a perfect counterpoint. It's effectively like cole slaw. To make mine, I used two English cucumers (from Costco, therefore, huge... like 2 feet.) and I scored the skin with a fork (so no one would have strips of though skin... probably not necessary with these thin-skinned cukes, but whatever) and I spooned out the seeds and sliced them on the bias, about 1/8 of an inch, maybe less. I tossed that with a lot of salt (maybe 4 tablespoons? I don't know, I just piled it on) and let sit for 2 hours before I squeezed it out in towel. After this, the cucumber slices have this wholly different texture. They're limp and flexible but still pleasently crunch when you bite into them, almost like the vegetable equivalent of al dente pasta. I stirred them up with a very small amount of mayonnaise a whole lot of black pepper. This will be great with some sort of chicken, with a spicy rich sauce...



I also got these gorgeous beans at the farmer's market yesterday. They had those super-cool dark purple ones, so I bought some green and some purple, thinking they'd look so beautiful together. I blanched them in some boiling water, and those little bastards turned green! I bought them because they looked so sophisticated and urbane, alll dark purple and skinny, showing up their sad little green buddies next to them. And after I cook them, they're all the same color. Serves me right. I tossed them, still hot, with sliced Vidalia onion, diced yellow bell pepper, cannellini beans and a lemon-basil vinaigrette . I think it will make a really nice lunch.



I also made a black bean salad that I think I should have eaten more of in college. It's very nutrient- dense, very health, and cheap-as-free. Black beans + corn (frozen it cool) + cherry tomatoes +jalepeno + lime juice + cilantro + onion. It looks really beautiful, and you can toss it with lettuce, or have it with grilled whatever meat you're into, or have it in a quesadilla.... it occurs to me this is the only thing I made when I was still living in the dorms that I still make now. That and popcorn. This time, I put in baby shrimp. My parents used to get my a cup of these wee little shrimp when I was like, 4, I I loved them I haven't seen them in a while but they had them at my grocery store, frozen, for $1. I know I need to eat more protein, and this recipe was originally supposed to be a side dish for grilled shrimp, so I think it should work. Another good work lunch.

Mad Men theme party

As a housewarming party, I wanted to have a Mad Men theme party, because I like cocktails, and chip and dips, and skinny ties. So, early 60's food kind of sucks by definition. They were all about some TV dinners and frozen food and they weren't super good at it yet. So, what would Betty Draper do?

So, I obviously need both chips, and a dip. Obviously we needed Utz. Instead of the classic sour cream and onion dip from a mix, I made an onion dip with caramelized onions, fresh thyme, sour cream and cream cheese. I had pigs in a blanket made with smoked sausage and puff pastry, and meatballs (on toothpicks of course). Deviled eggs seemed appropriate as well. The best thing I've seen anyone eat on Mad Men is the iceberg wedge with blue cheese. To make that an hors d'oeuvre, I used Belgain endive, spooned on some blue cheese dressing, crumbled blue cheese, diced tomato, and more bacon than is necessary. It was really freaking good.

It seemed that jello shots were necessary for a Mad Men Party. I found mini (2 oz) plastic martini glasses I filled with jello and fruit, and stacked them to maximize the tackiness. Betty Draper is totally jealous.