A bath for your greens: Creamy Italian Dressing

We were stuffed, full to the gills, fiber-ized to the roots of our hair. Still, my husband and fought over the last few leaves of lettuce. We could not let the salad go. The dressing was too good. Based on a recipe from Cooks Country, I urge you to try it today. The technique of warming up the garlic in the acid with an herb is pure genius.

Creamy Italian Dressing
(enough for two large salads)

3 tablespoons red wine vinegar
3 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese (I only had Romano and it worked just fine)
1 shallot, minced (Screw it. I didn't have one.)
1 garlic clove, minced
1 teaspoon dried oregano (original recipe called for two, but that was a little too much "dried" for me)
1/2 cup mayonnaise (I used lowfat Duke's, my favorite)
1/4 cup yogurt (they called for sour cream, but I used Greek yogurt)
1/2 cup olive oil
Salt and pepper

1. Whisk vinegar, cheese, shallot, garlic, oregano, and pepper flakes in a little bowl.
2. Put it in the microwave. Really.
3. Cook it for 30 seconds or so, until cheese melts and vinegar looks cloudy.
4. Add mayonnaise, sour cream (or yogurt) and whisk it together.
5. Add oil in little bursts and whisk together until emulsified. I used an immersion blender.
6. Season with salt and pepper.
7. Whatever you don't use can be kept in fridge for a couple days.

One pot cauliflower

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Spring in central Ohio is gorgeous. After the miserable, soul-sucking gray months of damp, cold winter the explosion of flowering trees really is miraculous. Tulips are a marvel. Hyacinths send me into orbit. Daffodils make me smile every damn time I see hthem.

But then I sneeze and rub my red, watery eyes. I gasp for my albuterol and happily ingest prednisone, my lungs begging for merciful corticosteroids. Ah, Zyrtec, Zyrtec, come hither. Mama needs thee.

My food thoughts, happily, are less itchy, scratchy, and wheezy. I turn away from February and early March carbohydrate-laden chowathons, and turn to salads and fruits, finally starting once again to have some taste. My kids, sick of bananas, sliced apples, and pears, feast on strawberries that actually taste like strawberries. Sure, they're still imported, but not from as far. Asparagus. Ramps. A glorious pile of plump green beans greeted me at the market yesterday for NINETY NINE cents a pound!

What to do with it all? Well, here's an idea.

From my favorite new cookbook, Mad Hungry, I acquired the completely nifty practice of slicing cauliflower like bread to bake, roast, blanche, or steam. So much less waste! Remove the green leaves, cut out the woodiest part of the core, then slice. Today I combined my sliced flowerets with a fast pickle-like preparation on the stove, cribbed from Mollie Katzen in Salads. An all-in-one salad prep, and I must say, it's pretty good. We'll have it all week either as a stand-alone side dish, tossed in greens with a salad, or tossed with cooked beans and raisins as a lunch perhaps stuffed in pita.

Bavarian Spring Cauliflower Salad

1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
1/4 cup white wine or white balsamic vinegar
1/2 cup of waater
2 minced garlic cloves
1 teaspoon Bavarian spice mix (Penzy's, optional product but tasty)
Whole peppercorns
2-3 bay leaves
1 cauliflower, cored, sliced like bread into florets
1 spritz lemon

Combine oil, vinegar, water, spice mix (if using), garlic, salt, a tablespoon or so of peppercorns, bay leaves, and cauliflower in a large saucepan. Bring to a boil, then cover and simmer gently until the cauliflower is done to your liking.

Transfer to a bowl, add a squeeze of lemon, remove bay leaves, and chill.

To serve, consider addition of capers. Sliced hard-boiled eggs would make this tapas-like. For that matter, canned or fresh tuna chunks wouldn't be out of place, with or without capers, or the hard-boiled eggs.

Cooking the blog: Salty Crispy, Warm Spaghetti-Squash

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Made a few things this weekend from la blog. My latest feature, for all you who don't want to read all my blah blah blah is a letter grade.

A=Knock your socks off keeper (to quote PassUBy), A+ if my kids love it, too.
B=Tweak and perhaps it will be a KYSO
C=Not bad. Seen better.

First. Oh. Fabulous. The ah, Salted Brown Butter Crispy Treats? (Scroll down. Link is lower in the post.) These are seriously good. Very seriously, very being included in my very short list of favorite recipes, and yes, perhaps even in the next BEACH COOKBOOK!

(Oh, not familiar with my original beach cookbook? Take a gander and weep baby. Then plan a vacation.)

dinner

fabulously beat up ...

By vicki rentel (aka...

Book Preview

The only changes I'd make, and I wouldn't make them every time, are that
1. I'd melt semi-sweet chocolate on the top and dust it with sea salt, and / or
2. I'd mix in salted peanuts. But then I'd leave the salt out of the brown butter & cereal.

Letter grade: A+

I also made warm spaghetti squash salad from Food & Wine. (It's the last recipe in the link.) I pretty much stuck to the program but not quite. I roasted the squash in the microwave. Why haven't I tried this before? Pricked it all over with a knife, then put it on 6 minutes @ 100%; flipped it over, then cooked another 8 minutes. Let it cool for five, then sliced in right in half and scooped out the seeds, then the fabulous strands of calorie-free strangely pasta-like squash.

So that's difference #1. I didn't roast the squash in the oven, and might not ever again. This was far, far too easy and fast. I used Kalamata, not green olives, and it's not as pretty with the hunks of diced brown olive. It's a pretty olive-y recipe, in fact, but not bad. I'd probably try the Moroccan squash next time, only I like the addition of almonds. I only had smoked around. They worked. I had it cold for lunch today and it was quite okay. I wouldn't KILL myself to make the recipe again, but all-in-all, a good day out for the new microwave skill.

Letter grade: C

I did chickpeas yesterday, too, from a recent recipe in Food & Wine.

Spicy Chickpea Salad

I didn't use tomato. Blech. I could because I have a few I plucked before the frost, but I don't use raw tomatoes as a rule. I cooked my own garbanzo beans in the slow cooker for oh, I don't know, two or three hours. Used a whole jalepeno, but only because I have about 50 outside on the plant, hanging on despite the coldish weather, and they're so sweet and vegetal. Hardly spicy. Except for not having mango powder and skipping the tomato, I otherwise stuck with the rules. Initially I thought, "Eh." But today it's quite nice. Better summer salad. Could add fresh corn. Little garlic. I reseasoned today and I think I'll pulverize the leftovers and use it as a dip. I wouldn't rush out for the ingredients. Let's say C+.

POM Wonderful Chicken Salad

I have it on good authority--two good food authorities, who just happen to be married--that this salad isn't just POM wonderful, it's plain wonderful. The recipe came to me via a request from Dr. Aveda Soccer Mom, who saw one of the two original food authorities eating it. This will be on my short list.

PS If you click on the recipe, it should open up in a larger window.

Foodie Weekend

Having company over for the weekend. Can't decide what to make. Would it be wrong to serve these for dinner?

Smores IceBox Candy Bars link and picture via Joy the Baker

How to get my two of my favorite foods together, shrimp and chips? How about this fabulous sounding (and looking) dip from an American master, Tom Douglas:

Shrimp Dip with Potato Chips via Yum Sugar

I've been eyeing this recipe for a week. Should I give it a spin or not?

Grilled Apple Salad with Cider Vinaigrette via Slashfood

Did you know Necco wafers have gone all natural? I'm not sure if that's better or worse in regard to you know, the fact that it's candy and all, but still. I'll tell myself that it means that I can eat Necco wafers for lunch 'cause they're full of beets:

Necco Wafers via Slashfood

Speaking junk food, just in case you can't get enough of me, I have a post on the OSU Student Health Services Blog today:

Twinkies really are like crack!

I'm not saying Twinkies are crack, I'm just sayin' to keep the Narcan handy when ingesting.

Regards for a most excellent Friday! ---IcedLatte

Zucchini Crudo from Ruhlman

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I love Michael Ruhlman's blog. It's always thoughtful and literate without being too intellectual for the little old simple likes of me. He lives in Ohio. So do I! The pictures on the blog are taken mostly by his wife, often in their kitchen. I like the puttering around the kitchen sensibility, except that he doesn't just putter. He's serious, and not just about food. I've had great recommendations from his blog about great writers: Reynolds Price, Frank Huyler among them.

He recently had a recipe for a raw zucchini salad recent which looked delightful, tasty, and not too hard. What DO you do with all that zucchini? Here's something besides zucchini bread to try:

Zucchini Crudo

Tassajara Warm Red Cabbage Salad

Recipe and photo from 101 cookbooks. I'm not the world's biggest cabbage fan unless there's a reuben or brat attached, but this really strikes my fancy. Heidi does it again! Check it out at:

Tassajara Warm Red Cabbage Salad Recipe

Almost oil-free miso all-purpose dressing

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My latest. Tossed blanched haricots verts and snap peas in it. Delicious. This would work for a whole variety of salads, noodles, chicken, fish, most especially tuna. It is adapted from a Crescent Dragonwagon recipe from way back.

More Miso!

2 inches fresh gingerroot, peeled, finely chopped
1/4 cup white miso paste
1/4 cup rice wine vinegar (seasoned or not works)
1/4 cup mirin (or sweet sherry)
2 T tamari soy sauce
2 T honey
2 T tahini
pinch cayenne pepper
1 T sesame oil

Tricky instructions: mix everything together and serve. Think you can handle it? This makes a lot: enough for a salad and then some.

Serious Eats: Best Meat Salads

Yes, please. Great ideas for those few extra slices of flank steak, or the chicken thigh and bits of breast leftover.

Best Meat Salads
via Serious Eats

INSANE list of green recipes

From Cheap Healthy Good. How do they do it? This is AMAZING!

246 recipes for cabbage, kale, spinach, swiss chard, and beyond!

Another great treasure-trove post from Cheap Healthy Good, which coincidentally begins with a reference to David Lebovitz (see below)

Seriously, Eating: 40 recipes from the other website I work for

Backyard Watermelon Salad

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My friend Dragon had a party on Saturday night. It was chic and involved roasted pig, so how could it be anything but fab? I did NOT know what to make and thus was forced to procrastinate all day, waiting for inspiration to strike me. I was drawn to the watermelon (seedless) which had been sitting on my counter for a week. I asked the Cookery Encyclopedia of Google for watermelon salad recipes and came across a quite a few. Sadly, I lacked ingredients for the interesting ones. I also lacked time, thanks to stalling most of the day.

I strolled into my backyard potager to see what was available (jalepenos and mint). I trolled the vegetable drawer in my fridge (lime and a half a red onion). What I threw together was actually rather good, although I was winging it and cannot speak to the quantities exactly. Furthermore, watermelon gives up fluid, so as this was sitting I needed to drain it several times and re - season. I would absolutely make this again, but I might cup up the melon and let it drain in a colander for a little while, perhaps salted.

Backyard Watermelon Salad
Makes a lot

One medium sized seedless watermelon, rind cut off, cut into 1 to 1.5 inch chunks (probably a good 10 cups of melon)
One lime
Two jalapeno peppers, diced fine
One handful of mint, chopped fine
500gm feta cheese
One half red onion, sliced in half, then into very thing slices
Balsamic vinegar (I used Balsamic with Lemon from my dear friend Cartier)
Fruity olive oil
Sea salt

Put watermelon in a large bowl. Squeeze an entire lime over the melon, then toss with jalapenos and mint. Break up feta cheese into very small chunks and toss thoroughly into salad with thinly sliced onion. Once everything is well mixed, add oh, a quarter to a half cup of vinegar, then a good slug of olive oil. Throw some salt on. Mix it up. Taste and adjust dressing ingredients.

As I noted above, I let this sit for a while and it gave off a lot of liquid. I drained off the liquid once or twice and added more vinegar, salt, and a little more olive oil. More lime juice and jalepeno would have worked, too.

Leftovers were tasty. The next day I drained the excess liquid, tossed it up again, and added a little slug of vinegar.

What to do with watermelon?

How about chopped vegetable, watermelon, and feta salad?

Oh, Smitten Kitchen, how ye tempt me.

Dilemma

How to make this sans peanuts (for my anaphylatoid boy) and without raw tomatoes which gross me out? Why is it that anything with lime in it makes me swoon?

Lime & Peanut Coleslaw

Playdate nirvana

FIVE playdates and counting this weekend. Kids love it; so do Mommy & Daddy.

Tonight we're having a barbecue. Burger bar (with tiny buns for kids); broccoli slaw; fruit salad (yummy yummy for all you Wiggles fans); leftover marinated chickpea salad; and mac & cheese (the fabulous crock pot version from this very website made with lowfat evap. milk, lowfat milk, and lowfat Velveeta). For dessert, SlimaBear ice cream sandwiches.

Seems like a good excuse to include my broccoli slaw recipe here, modified from a Cooks Country recipe. It's a stand-alone slaw. It's not the creamy kind of slaw you'd put on pulled pork, but more of a salad. I make it all ahead, except I hold the ramen noodles until just before serving. This is a great and sneaky way to get veges in my kids. They love the dressing (thanks to the sugar) and will gulp this salad down generally by the tubful.

Ramen Noodle Broccoli Slaw
Serves 6-8

Dressing
1/3 cup sugar
1/3 cup white vinegar
1/2 cup olive or canola oil

Salad
1 (12-ounce) bag broccoli slaw mix
2 (3 ounce) packages ramen noodles, crushed, flavor packets reserved
4 scallions, chopped thin
1 cup shelled roasted sunflower seeds
1 cup slivered toated almonds (or 2 cups seeds or 2 cups nuts)

Whisk sugar and vinegar in a medium bowl until sugar dissolves.

Combine broccoli slaw mix, ramen noodles (add 30 minutes before serving), and flavor packet (I only use one generally), scallions, seeds/nuts, in a large bowl. Drizzle dressing over the salad and toss until well-coated. Put in fridge for 30 minutes; up to two hours before serving without the noodles.

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Breakfast for Dinner Salad

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We love breakfast here. What's not to love? Bagels, pancakes, fruit, Timbits, coffee, coffee, coffee, fresh orange juice, coffee, sausage, bacon....Almost better is breakfast for dinner. It's fast, and loaded with ah, well, let's call it "protein" and the whole family loves it.

So today is Thursday, and I've been sick all week with a fever, sore throat, and snot:



I don't have any cowbell. I've as stressed as can be for any number of good reasons and a lot of really neurotic ones. I got home and stared with my febrile gaze at the fridge praying that it would suddenly fly up and crush me. Cooking another meal (we're trying to do six at home, plus all breakfasts, and lunches on weekends) was rather intimidating after a SUPER crazy week all with a tedious febrile illness.

But then I got inspired. How about a breakfast for dinner salad? My favorites--bacon, egg, cheese, fruit--all served over lettuce. Here's how it went down in about 20 minutes:

Breakfast Dinner Salad
Serves 4

Salad:
1 large container baby salad greens (mesclun or baby romaine, already washed)
8 slices bacon
2-3 ounces blue cheese
1 mango
2 pears
4 eggs
Olive oil

Dressing:
2 teaspoons sherry vinegar
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1 1/2 teaspoons olive oil
Salt

1. Turn on large frying pan to heat up and throw bacon in (I use a non-stick electric skillet).
2. While the bacon is cooking arrange lettuce on 4 plates.
3. While the bacon is still cooking, peel mango.
4. Check the bacon and flip it over if it's ready. Chop up mango and pear into bite-sized pieces and arrange fruit on lettuce.
5. Crumble cheese on lettuce.
6. Turn over the bacon if you haven't already.
7. When the bacon is done put it on paper towels and press out the fat. Drain the rendered fat in the frying pan and wipe it out. Add about 1 teaspoon of olive oil if the pan looks too dry for eggs.
8. When the pan is ready break the four eggs carefully into the pan individually and start to fry.
9. Mix the ingredients for the dressing and drizzle over the four salad plates.
10. Flip the eggs sunnyside over (unless you want sunnyside up)
11. Flip the eggs on to the salads and serve. The yolk will break and spread deliciousness all over your salad.
12. You could also serve toast triangles on the side if you wanted to, and croutons wouldn't be out of place, but this salad was quite fine on its own.

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