These lamb chops remind me of my time on Corfu. After we’d close the restaurant late at night, we’d grill up a batch and set them in the middle of the table for everyone to nibble on in between stories or songs.
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Month: May 2009
Grilled Crostini with Fava Bean Spread
This nibble comes together super-quick once the fava beans are shelled, so you can whip it up and be back outside before the conversation even hits a lull.
Note: Fava beans need to be shelled twice–once from their pods and again from the skins that hold the bean itself.
1 baguette, cut crosswise into 1/2-inch slices
3 cloves garlic, peeled and divided
3 pounds fava beans, shelled from the pod (about 2 cups)
1/4 cup grated Parmigiano-Reggiano
1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
Grill or broil the baguette slices until crisp and use a halved clove of garlic to rub both sides of each. (can be done ahead of time)
Bring a pot of salted water to boil and drop fava beans in for 20 seconds. Drain. Then slip each bean out of its skin and into the bowl of a food processor.
Add remaining 2 cloves of garlic, Parmigiano-Reggiano and lemon juice to the bowl and process until smooth. Drizzle in extra-virgin olive oil and blend until emulsified. Season to taste with sea salt and freshly ground pepper and spoon into a serving bowl.
Serve fava bean spread with the crostini.
Serves 6-8
Strawberry-Rhubarb Crostata
One of my mom’s springtime standards is strawberry-rhubarb pie. Here’s my take in a rustic crostata–a type of free-form tart. In any form, rhubarb’s tart taste is a perfect foil to sweet strawberries.
1-1/2 cups plus 1 tablespoon all-purpose unbleached flour, divided
1/2 cup plus 1 tablespoon sugar, divided
3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract, divided
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup unsalted butter, chilled and cut into 1/2 inch pieces
2 tablespoons nonhydrogenated shortening (like Spectrum Organic)
1/4 cup ice water, as needed
1 pound rhubarb, cut into 1/2-inch chunks with any ‘stringiness’ peeled off and discarded
1 pint strawberries, cut into 1/4-inch slices
1 teaspoon lemon zest
Pulse together 1-1/2 cups flour, 1 tablespoon sugar, salt and 1/2 teaspoon vanilla in a food processor. Pulse in butter and shortening, adding ice water by tablespoons as needed, until mixture comes together and there are still a few lumps of butter. Form dough into a ball, then flatten into a disc, wrap with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 15 minutes.
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Roll out dough into a 12-inch circle (dough should be between 1/4 and 1/2 inch thick) on parchment paper.
Mix together rhubarb, strawberries, lemon zest, 1 tablespoon flour and 1/4 teaspoon vanilla. Mound on dough, leaving a 1-inch border along the edge. Fold up the edge and crimp as you go along so that the edges stay up and are well-secured. Ease crostata, still on the parchment paper, onto a cookie sheet and bake 40 minutes, removing parchment paper after the first 15 minutes. Dough should be golden-brown and the fruit bubbly and syrupy. Let cool before serving.
Serves 8
Crisp Cornish Hens with Spiced Pomegranate-Honey Glaze
Removing the skin from the hens both decreases calories and increases the impact of this vibrant, spicy glaze. If you’ve never cooked with Cornish hens before, you’re in for a treat.
Hens:
2 (1 1/4-pound) Cornish hens, halved and skin removed
1 teaspoon thyme, minced
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
2 garlic cloves, minced
Glaze:
4 teaspoons olive oil, divided
1 garlic clove, minced
1/3 cup pomegranate juice
1/3 cup honey
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper
Preheat oven to 425. Spray a large, heavy duty roasting pan with cooking spray and place it on the middle rack of the oven. Mix together garlic, thyme, salt and pepper and rub onto hens. Let sit on a plate while preparing the glaze.
Heat 1 teaspoon olive oil over medium heat in a small saucepan and sauté garlic for 2 minutes, until just beginning to color. Add remaining ingredients and simmer for 8-10 minutes, until thickened to a syrup consistency. Remove from heat.
Heat remaining 1 tablespoon olive oil in a large non-stick skillet over medium-high heat. Sear hens breast down for 5-8 minutes, in batches if need be, until deeply browned. Brush hens with glaze and transfer to the roasting pan, breast up. Brush again with glaze. Roast for another 20 minutes, brushing often with remaining glaze.
Serves 4
Classic Blackened Catfish
This dish brings back memories of my college days in New Orleans when I used to make it at least once a week. Little did I know then that I was making a sustainable pick! I’ll warn you from experience; your fire alarm will probably go off, so have a towel handy to fan the smoke away.
4 (6-ounce) catfish fillets
2 tablespoons Cajun Spice Mix (see recipe below)
1 tablespoon canola oil
1 tablespoon butter
8 lemon wedges
Rub each side of fillets with Cajun Spice Mix. Heat oil and butter in a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Add fillets and cook for 3-4 minutes on each side or until fish flakes easily with a fork.
Serve with lemon wedges.
Serves 4
Cajun Spice Mix
Leftover spice mix can be stored in a sealed jar for up to three months.
3 tablespoons paprika
2 tablespoons ground red pepper
2 tablespoons dried thyme
2 tablespoons dried oregano
2 tablespoons onion powder
2 tablespoons garlic powder
1 tablespoon kosher salt
1 tablespoon black pepper
1 tablespoon sugar
Combine all ingredients in a small bowl.
Makes 1 cup
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Plant Something
I was interviewed recently for Natural Solutions magazine on whether gardening affects the way I eat. My answer? You betcha. Sure, a garden gets you the freshest of vegetables and taste alone would be reason to start one–there’s nothing like an heirloom tomato still warm from the sun; even lettuce has a ridiculous amount of flavor when it goes from backyard bed into the bowl. But there are bonuses with gardening that go much, much deeper.
When you finally pick that heirloom tomato, you’re not just tasting the tomato. You’re experiencing the excitement you felt when the first flowers gave way to tiny green globes. You’re reliving the anticipation of inspecting it day after day wondering when it was going to be ripe enough to eat. You’re feeling that sense of joyful peace that comes from witnessing a miracle of nature. All this in a tomato.
It doesn’t take acres to reap the rewards of growing your own food; a sprig of thyme snipped from a pot on the windowsill will transform even the most humble of dishes. The simple truth is that when you grow an eggplant or a cucumber or a bunch of mint you are connected–literally and viscerally–to it, so that the phrase “eat more vegetables” is turned from drudgery into luxury.
This week, I challenge you to plant something to nibble on this summer. If you’re already an experienced gardener, expand your territory and try something new (I just planted lemon verbena for the first time). If you’re an apartment dweller, try some potted herbs on the windowsill or a cherry tomato in a rooftop container. As your project takes root, I look forward to hearing how it affects the way you eat.
Grilled Halibut with Green Pea Coulis
Did you know that fish, like other foods has a season? Pacific halibut season is spring and fall, though you can find high-quality frozen fish at other times of year. Here, we pair grilled halibut with green peas in a kelly-green coulis, which definitely falls into the “can’t get better than fresh-from-the-garden” category. This dish is a good excuse to break in the grill for the season.
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More recipes for fish on the grill:
- Halibut “Burgers” with MInted Napa Cabbage Slaw
- Grilled Salmon with Stone Fruit Salsa
- Grilled Fish in Parchment with Cherry Tomatoes & Corn
Seek Sustainability
Last week, we were at a friends’ house for dinner when talk turned to the Cooking for Solutions conference I was headed to at the Monterey Bay Aquarium. “It’s about exploring ways to create a more sustainable food chain,” I said. Brows went up. Heads tilted. And finally the question was asked: “What, exactly, does sustainability mean?”
The answer, it turns out, isn’t so easy to pin down. Over the past few years I’ve come to think of sustainability as a system of practices that is healthy for the environment, economically viable and a positive influence on the community that can be sustained over the long haul. Admittedly, it’s not cut and dry. But maybe, as Wes Jackson, president of The Land Institute, suggested at the conference, it isn’t meant to be.
Wes suggested that “sustainability,” like “justice” and “health,” is a value term. While we may not be able to pin down precise meanings for these words, we nonetheless organize entire societies around the concepts they embody and fight tooth-and-nail to defend them. I’d argue that a core ideal of sustainability is making sure we do things in a way that will preserve something for future generations.
That can all sound vague and stern and solemn, but bring sustainability to the kitchen and you’ll find color and life and flavor. When I make this sandwich with spring radishes and arugula from the garden and everything else sourced locally, for instance, it brings an added depth of pleasure to know that I’m nurturing the earth and supporting my local farmers . . . and you can’t get much more economical than bread and cheese.
My challenge this week isn’t about buying local or buying organic or anything that dogmatic. It’s simply about encouraging you to look at the effect your food purchases have–on the environment, on your community, on your budget. Because ultimately, sustainability has to be about what you value if it’s to have any value at all.
Radish and Goat Cheese Baguettes
Everything about this sandwich makes me happy. The radishes–so vibrant and colorful–come straight from our back yard, the bread from our local bakery, and the goat cheese from grazing goats just a few miles away. Even the olive oil comes from a local producer. The radish offers a peppery hit that’s lovely against the creamy, pungent cheese.
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