Asparagus and Leek Quiche

Ezra helped with this recipe by breaking the asparagus into pieces (while eating most of the tips),  spreading the cheese into the pie pan (while breaking off pieces of the crust to eat) and cutting the butter (and eating it, then cutting again, and eating it, and then finally cutting one last piece for the recipe). 

Maybe I should have fed him before we started.

I experimented with putting the eggs and milk in a jar so he could shake instead of stir.  (I'm not willing to see my precious backyard chicken eggs splattered all over the kitchen.)  His chubby toddler arms didn't really have the strength to blend the eggs, but it was fun.

Asparagus and Leek Quiche

1 tablespoon butter
1 leek, trimmed and chopped
1 cup of chopped asparagus
1 cup shredded cheese (I mixed gouda and parmesan)
4 eggs
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup milk
black pepper
1 pie crust

Preheat the oven to 350F.  Heat the butter in a skillet, then saute the leeks and asparagus until the asparagus is al dente. 

Whisk together the eggs, milk, salt and black pepper.

Spread the cheese in the bottom of the crust, then add the asparagus and leeks.  Pour the egg mixture over the top. 

Bake for 45 minutes, or until the center is set.

Warm Beet Salad with Potatoes and Sauerkraut

We'd hate to call this a potato salad because of the slimy mayonnaise memories "potato salad" evokes. So let's just call this Russian dish, inspired by a version we devoured at Sadko, a beet salad with potatoes. You can still serve it cold in situations that normally call for potato salad, like summertime picnics, but when served warm, it can keep your blood from freezing during those long Siberian winters.

3 large waxy potatoes (with or without skin)
3 large beets
1 1/2 cups sauerkraut, chopped
3 tablespoons dill, minced
3 scallion, chopped
1 tablespoon white vinegar
3 tablespoons olive oil (plus more for roasting)
salt

Peel the beets and chop them into 1/2 inch cubes. Toss with a little olive oil and salt on a baking tray. Roast at 350 until fork-tender (about 40-50 minutes).

Meanwhile, chop the potatoes into 1/2 inch cubes. Boil in water until tender, then drain and rinse in cold water.

Toss together all of the ingredients and taste for salt. Serve slightly warm or cold.

Complete Beet Fritters

These came to be when we wanted to make Swiss chard fritters for a brunch potluck last month, didn't have enough Swiss chard, and substituted a grated beet for half of it. The beets worked beautifully with the warmth of the cinnamon and allspice and the slightly pink fritters were a big hit, even with self-professed beet-haters.

Beet greens get very muddy, so be sure to wash them extremely well before you cook them, since you don't want dirt in your fritters! If your beets come without greens, or if the greens are slimy and past their prime, feel free to substitute chard.

1 large bunch beet greens, rinsed well
1 beet, peeled and grated
4 eggs, beaten
1 onion, finely chopped (about 1/2 cup)
1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 cup peanut oil

In a medium stockpot, bring 1 inch of water to boil. Add the beet greens, cover, and cook for 2 minutes. Drain the beet greens thoroughly and chop roughly.

Combine the beet, eggs, onion, allspice, cinnamon and salt in a medium mixing bowl. Mix well and stir in the beet greens.

Heat the oil in a skillet over medium heat. When oil sizzles upon contact with a droplet of water, drop 1 tablespoon of the batter into the pan. Flatten the mound of batter slightly with the back of a spoon. Continue adding as many mounds of the batter mixture as the skillet will allow. Fry for 3 minutes, or until golden, turning once. Drain the fritters on paper towels. Repeat this process with the remaining batter.

Almond-Battered Veggies

The concept for this batter came from Mollie Katzen's Sunlight Cafe. Katzen only uses mushrooms, but guess what we added? That's right: okra! The batter doesn't stick to the okra as easily, but it's worth the trouble. Phoebe's sister substitutes nutritional yeast for the parmesan -- a tasty option for the lactose-intolerant among you.

3 cups vegetables:
portabello mushrooms, caps sliced into 1/2 inch strips and stems sliced into 1/4 inch strips
okra, sliced in half lengthwise
gypsy peppers, sliced into long strips
zucchini, sliced into 3/8 inch strips
1/2 cup almonds
1/4 cup parmesan cheese, chopped roughly
dash of salt
1 egg
oil (something that can withstand heat, like canola)

Grind the almonds, cheese and salt in a food processor until the consistency is a little thicker than cornmeal, then pour onto a plate. Beat the egg into a pie pan. Dip the vegetable slices into the egg, then press them into the batter -- you'll want a nice, thick crust. Heat a skillet on medium-high with just enough oil to keep the pan greased. Cook until golden brown, about five minutes on each side, and serve immediately, preferably with ketchup.

Squash Blossom Quesadillas

Have you tried squash blossoms? If you're a backyard gardener or have access to a farmer's market, give these edible flowers a shot--they have a nice zucchini flavor without any of the associated wateriness. Squash blossoms are very perishable (which is why you don't see them in supermarkets), and this is a quick and easy way to use them, inspired by the squash blossoms quesadillas we used to love at the Hillcrest Farmer's Market when we lived in San Diego.

This recipe makes two quesadillas--scale up if you feel like sharing.

1 tablespoon canola oil
6 medium-sized squash blossoms
1/2 cup grated sharp cheddar
4 corn tortillas

Heat the canola oil in a small cast-iron skillet or frying pan. Briefly saute the squash blossoms, approximately two minutes, until they're wilted. Remove pan from heat.

Sprinkle cheese evenly over two tortillas and divide the sauteed squash blossoms between them. Top with another tortilla.

Reheat pan (you can add more oil if you need) over medium-high heat. Cook quesadillas one at a time, about two minutes per side.

Denise's Croatian Goat Cheese Spread

Our friend Denise (she of the tomato bounty and zucchini prowess) returned last summer from a Croatian bike riding adventure and brought this dip to a party, where it was promptly devoured by hungry guests unable to believe that it contained nothing but goat cheese and olive oil. Indeed, the Croatians appear to be masters at more-than-sum-of-parts cuisine: this is an unbelievably simple appetizer that involves nothing other than a quick stir. You can fancy it up with chopped fresh herbs or a little citrus zest, but it's totally addictive in its unadorned state, too. If you're the kind of person who has goat cheese lying around, you can whip it up for unexpected guests--thus guaranteeing a flood of future unexpected guests, so you'd better be consistent about stocking goat cheese!

8 ounces chevre
1/2 cup olive oil

Stir chevre and olive oil together with a fork until well combined. Break out the crackers and instantly become the most popular person on your block. (We've got a few gluten-free neighbors, hence the Mary's Gone Crackers in the photo above).

Yogurt Cheese with Za'atar

Lebneh is one of our favorite party treats: rich balls of oil-drizzled whole-milk yogurt, perfect for spreading on bread and crackers. Add some olives and a bowl of dates and you have yourself the beginnings of an awesome spread.

Za'atar is a Middle Eastern spice blend that usually includes sumac, thyme and sesame seeds. Once you have some, you'll start sprinkling it on everything--especially your morning toast and scrambled eggs! If you don't have a Middle Eastern grocery store or a Middle Eastern grandma at your disposal, you can make your own or buy it online. Or just skip it!

If you're short on time, this is just as delicious served in a bowl--no need to roll the strained yogurt into individual-sized portions. The quality of the finished product depends a lot on the kind of yogurt you start with--you want a nice creamy one, not too watery. We always make ours with whole-milk yogurt; you're welcome to try it with low-fat, but nonfat might not be creamy enough.


1 quart plain whole milk yogurt
1 teaspoon salt
Za'atar for sprinkling (optional)
Olive oil for rolling & drizzling

Line a large bowl with a thick layer of cheesecloth. Pour in the yogurt, tie a knot in the cheesecloth and hang it over the bowl, as shown (refrigeration optional). Let it sit for 6-8 hours, until yogurt is very thick. The whey will drip into the bowl--don't throw it out! Add a little salt or sugar to the whey for a refreshing drink.

Transfer yogurt to a bowl and mix in salt. Rub some olive oil on your hands and roll the yogurt into golf-sized balls. Drizzle finished platter of yogurt balls with olive oil and sprinkle generously with za'atar.

Another Kale Recipe Roundup & Dehydrated Kale

We know, we know, there's no such thing as too many kale recipes. We hear you, we respect your insatiable need for kale, and we offer the following solutions.

1. Check out our Kale and Friends Tag for easy access to all our kale recipes.

2. Try a kale recipe from our favorite blogs:

101 Cookbooks:
Too many to list, but Heidi has her own Kale tag!

Eggs on Sunday:
Lacinato Kale and Ricotta Salata Salad
Breakfast Strata with Greens, Gruyere and Sausage
Greens & Beans Over Polenta

Orangette:
Boiled Kale with a Fried Egg and Toast

Wheat Free Meat Free:
Coconut Curry Stuffed Sweet Potatoes

Desert Candy:
Tuscan Kale and Black Lentil Soup with Crispy Pita Chips
Kale and Gruyere Panade

JustBraise:
Tuscan Kale & Bean Soup
Kale Salami Sandwich with Celeriac Chips

Parsnips Aplenty:
Kale-Potato Soup with Balsamic-Roasted Garlic

Raspberry Eggplant:
Israeli Couscous with Kale, Butternut Squash and White Beans
White Bean, Kale and Butternut Squash Pizza

Raw Epicurean:
Winter Nori Roll with Ginger Garlic Dipping Sauce

3. Dehydrate your own kale!
We've gotten several comments from readers who like to make kale chips in the oven. We wholeheartedly endorse their recipes and would like to offer up a dehydrated variation of our own. In this recipe, we've stuck to the 112 degree limit set by raw foodists, so your kale will theoretically retain more of its natural enzymes and vitamins. More nutrition and also, it's tasty.

You can dehydrate kale without dressing of any kind. (We sometimes do this and then run it through the spice grinder to make kale powder.) You could also dehydrate it with your favorite salad dressing, lemon juice or a custom spice mix. Just keep in mind that the kale will reduce in size, but the spices will not. (We ended up with a few batches of burning hot cayenne-flavored chips before we learned our lesson!)

1 bunch kale (for us, that meant 20 leaves of lacinato from Riverdog)
2 teaspoons olive oil
1 teaspoon maple syrup
1 tablespoon nutritional yeast
1 tablespooon water
1/8 teaspoon salt
pinch cayenne

Remove the kale stems and roughly chop the leaves. Whisk together all the ingredients except for the kale and then pour the dressing over the kale, massaging well for full coverage. Lay the kale on trays and dehydrate at 11o degrees until crispy and fully dry, about 7 hours.

If you don't have a dehydrator, you can make still make kale chips! Set the oven to 400 degrees and keep a close eye on the kale -- it will be done in about 10 minutes.

Marinated Cheese Salad

As if cheese wasn't already delicious enough, some genius came up with the concept of marinating it in olive oil with garlic and herbs. Add a toothpick and a loaf of olive bread and you've got an instant party. (Albeit a somewhat quiet party because everyone is so busy stuffing their faces with cheese.)

Munster, cheddar and gruyere are all delicious in this recipe. We usually mix two or three varieties of cheese -- our all time favorite is Trader Joe's English Cheddar with Caramelized Onions.

2 cups of cubed semi-soft cheese
1 tablespoon pink peppercorns (black is also okay)
1 large sprig of fresh rosemary, broken into a few pieces
3 cloves of garlic, peeled but left whole
olive oil
salt

Cut the cheese into bite-sized pieces. Place in a bowl with the peppercorns, rosemary and garlic, then add enough olive oil to almost cover. Sprinkle on salt to taste, then leave to marinate, unrefrigerated, for about four hours.

Savory Roasted Grapes

These look like olives, and we served them alongside two dishes of olives, but they are, in fact, grapes! I know it sounds weird--but hear me out. Grapes are in season right now, and while they're plenty delicious just popped in your mouth as snacks or fermented into wine, sometimes autumn abundance just cries out for a little innovation. So last weekend, we decided to give grapes our household produce spa treatment, i.e. dousing them with olive oil and salt and roasting them. This resulted in a surprising and delectable addition to our game night buffet: savory grapes, warm from the oven and addictively salty-sweet. They're fabulous with a cheese plate or on toast, or just plain. The grapes will give off a delicious liquid that practically begs to be sopped up with a good crusty piece of bread.

We meant to do this with concord grapes, and you should definitely try that if you have them. But the Berkeley Bowl was out of concord grapes, so we just substituted seedless black grapes. We can't vouch for red or green grapes, but you're welcome to try--and let us know how it works!

1 lb Concord or black seedless grapes
1/4 cup olive oil
Kosher salt

Roll grapes with olive oil and salt in a 9 x 13 inch pan (cookie sheets won't work here because the grapes will give off liquid). Bake at 375 for 30 minutes, until soft and juicy.

Stone Fruit Chutney

We made this to use the last fruits of our loquat tree, but we based it on a Madhur Jaffrey recipe for peach chutney (which was based on a recipe for green mango chutney!), so this basic concept will work with apricots, nectarines or other stone fruits. Chutney is a great showcase for fruit that may have been bruised on the way back from the farmer's market, and will be delicious on whatever protein you choose to throw on your grill.

This is based on the recipe for Delhi-Style Peach Chutney in Madhur Jaffrey's World Vegetarian; we skipped the overnight soaking of fenugreek seeds and subbed honey for the sugar.

2 lbs peaches, nectarines, apricots or loquats
3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
3 tablespoons peanut oil
1 teaspoon whole cumin seeds
1/2 teaspoon mustard seeds
1/4 teaspoon fennel seeds
2-inch piece of fresh ginger, finely minced (use a microplane if you have one)
2 cups water
1/4 teaspoon turmeric
5 tablespoons honey
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon cayenne

Pit and roughly chop fruit and toss with lemon juice. Heat oil in a medium-sized saucepan and add cumin and mustard seeds. When the mustard seeds pop, add fennel seeds, stir once, and add ginger and fry for a minute. Add water, fruit, honey, salt, turmeric and cayenne. Simmer, uncovered, over medium heat for 10-20 minutes, until fruit breaks down and sauce thickens, stirring frequently. (If your fruit is extra-juicy, you might need longer than 20 minutes). Cool and store in a clean glass jar.

Swiss Chard Fritters with Creamy Mint Dipping Sauce

These fritters, called krefsiyeh, are from Aromas of Aleppo: The Legendary Cuisine of Syrian Jews by Poopa Dweck. This encyclopedic guide is full of childhood favorites (including a mouthwatering full-page photo of mjeddra), but also includes a lot of interesting dishes that are totally new to me, such as this recipe. (Also, the one for calf brains, which is interesting on a completely different, thanks-for-not-making-that-Grandma level). The classic Syrian flavorings of allspice, cinnamon and fried onions are delicious with the sweet chard, and we didn't modify the seasonings for these fritters at all. We did dairy it up with a sour cream-based dipping sauce that's totally optional for the lactose-intolerant reader, but a smashing addition if you want to throw these on your Shavuot menu.

Recipe notes: we used peanut oil (best for high-heat frying), and you'll want to drain the chard really well so your batter doesn't end up watery--try pushing down on the chard in a mesh strainer over the sink.


Original Recipe from Aromas of Aleppo:

2 bunches Swiss chard, stems removed
4 eggs, beaten
1 onion, finely chopped (about 1/2 cup)
1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 cup vegetable oil

In a medium stockpot, bring 1 inch of water to boil. Add the Swiss chard, cover, and cook for 2 minutes. Drain the Swiss chard thoroughly and chop it.

Combine the eggs, onion, allspice, cinnamon and salt in a medium mixing bowl. Mix well and stir in the Swiss chard.

Heat the vegetable oil in a skillet over medium heat. When oil sizzles upon contact with a droplet of water, drop 1 tablespoon of the egg batter into the pan. Flatten the mound of batter slightly with the back of a spoon. Continue adding as many mounds of the batter mixture as the skillet will allow. Fry for 3 minutes, or until golden, turning once. Drain the fritters on paper towels. Repeat this process with the remaining batter, and if necessary, add more oil.

Optional Dipping Sauce from Aromas of Kale-eppo

1 cup sour cream
1 clove garlic, crushed
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons finely chopped mint

Stir together and dollop on fritters!

Gorgonzola and Black Bean Polenta Squares

When we were in college, our dining hall used to make a meal that consisted of a vat of soft polenta, a vat of black bean puree and a vat of gorgonzola sauce. The flavors were good, but the mushy texture was unappealing. Since we're not going to five-year reunion at the end of this month (dude, we're old), we decided to bring a little bit of college dining to our California kitchen. In this version, whole black beans are mixed into the polenta, which is chilled to achieve a nice firm texture, topped with gorgonzola and broiled until bubbly.


4 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 an onion, finely chopped
1 can black beans, rinsed and drained
3 and 1/2 cups vegetable stock
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup coarse-ground polenta
1 cup crumbled gorgonzola cheese

Heat 2 tablespoons of the oil in a medium-sized cast-iron skillet on high heat. Add onions and saute for 5 to 7 minutes, until translucent and starting to brown, then add black beans and stir for another five minutes, so the black beans pick up the sweet onion flavor.

In a medium-sized saucepan, bring the vegetable stock and salt to a boil. Slowly pour in the polenta, whisking as you go. Turn the heat down to low, fold in the black bean mixture and remaining two tablespoons of olive oil, and stir frequently for about 15 minutes. Remove from heat, cover and let sit for 10 minutes, then spread into a greased 9 x 13 inch pan. Top with crumbled gorgonzola and refrigerate for an hour to firm up.

When polenta is firm, cut into squares and place on a greased cookie sheet. Broil for 5 to 10 minutes, until cheese is starting to brown.

Spicy Raw Carrot Soup

The latest in our "homemade recipes from Cafe Gratitude" mission: an attempt to emulate the spicy, smooth and refreshing "I Am Divine," without all the abundance-creation schtick and cash-forking-over. Creamy. Invigorating. Yum.

A word on portions...we're not just being cute with the photography, this is actually best consumed in itsy-bitsy servings. It doesn't make a lot (unless you have the patience to juice more carrots, in which case...wow), and the avocado makes a pretty rich base. So think of this as an appetizer or palate-cleanser, perfect for when dinner party guests get there early or when you just need a little something extra to round out a big salad. It's also best made in small batches because like most raw food, it doesn't keep long.

2 and 1/2 cups carrot juice (juice it yourself if you have the gear)
2 small avocadoes, diced
2 tablespoons chopped fresh mint
2 tablespoons chopped cilantro
juice of 1/2 a lemon
1/8 teaspoon cayenne

Combine all ingredients in blender and blend until smooth. As you eat, feel the abundance of not having paid $7 for your portion.

Cebolladillas

Something I noticed the last time I visited my grandma is that instead of frying up an individual batch of onions every time she makes mjeddra, she fries onions in mass quantities, freezes them in mjeddra-sized portions, and then defrosts them in the oven while the mjeddra is cooking. I like my mjeddra onions super-crispy and I doubt they'd work frozen and defrosted, but we decided to borrow Grandma's technique for something we would love to have on hand: caramelized onions, which are a great addition when you want a rich flavor, but can take forever. So on Sunday night, we sliced up and caramelized five onions and have been chipping away at them for quick meals and snacks, which is how we came up with this cebolladilla--like a quesadilla, but with onions instead of cheese! The decadence of the onions and the smokiness of the chipotle really make this a winning appetizer or mid-evening nibble. It would also be delicious as a dip with corn chips or a spread on toast.

If you haven't caramelized five onions recently--and if anyone besides my grandma has, I'd love to hear about it--you can still make this and just caramelize the onions on the spot. But consider mass caramelization (particularly those of you with winter breaks approaching), since it will be a welcome shortcut later on.

To make (four) cebolladillas:

2 yellow onions (or about 1 cup of already-caramelized onions)
1 chipotle chile
1/2 cup pine nuts
1 teaspoon salt (more, to taste)
1/4 teaspoon cayenne
8 corn tortillas
olive oil for caramelizing
canola or peanut oil for frying

First, caramelize the onions if you haven't already. To caramelize, chop the onion into rings and cook in a sauce pan over low heat with a little olive oil. Stir occasionally until they are completely wilted and have turned brown. Depending on how many onions you're using, this could take anywhere from 1/2 an hour to an hour. When we made our master batch of five onions, we had to use our largest sauce pan to contain all the chopped onions. By the time they finished caramelizing, we had about 2 1/2 cups.

Place the chipotle chile in a small bowl and pour boiling water over it. Cover with a plate and let sit for 15-20 minutes to soften.

When chile is soft and onions are caramelized, combine the pine nuts, onions, chile, cayenne and salt in a food processor. Blend until you have a paste. Taste for salt and spice (if you're like us, you'll want more cayenne!).

Spread the paste on your corn tortillas to make sandwiches. Fry each cebolladilla over medium-high heat with a small amount of canola oil, a few minutes on each side or until the bottom is golden brown. That crispy corner of onion that sneaks out around the edge of the tortilla is the best part, so skip the Lactaid for once and chow down!

Scallion Latkes

Happy Chanukah, blogosphere! To celebrate the first night of the festival of lights, here is our latke recipe, with enough oil to light up your whole block. Some latke recipes use flour as a binder; ours uses the natural starch in the potatoes, so it's gluten-free. If you feel you need to add more binder, we suggest potato flour.

Because we'll be eating latkes a lot this week, it's important to mix it up and go beyond the traditional sour cream and applesauce topping options. We dolloped ours with guacamole and some Vicky Day's raspberry-red currant preserves (not in the same bite--our weird food combinations have limits). These preserves are made by our friend and guest blogger Honor's family with fruit grown on their farm in Vermont. So far I've only tried this flavor of preserves--the tart currants and the flavorful raspberries are delicious with latkes, atop a Camembert-slathered slice of bread, with peanut butter and plenty of other combinations I haven't yet tried (I want to make some rugelach before the jar runs out). Their preserves do have refined cane sugar, but they also make a blackcurrant maple syrup, with a sweet-tartness that I'm excited to try in a marinade or salad dressing.

And obviously, we served this with a side of brussels sprouts, stir-fried with Tokyo turnip tops...perhaps it's time to change our name to I Heart Brussels Sprouts.


The Essentials:

2 pounds Yukon Gold Potatoes, scrubbed but not peeled
1 onion
4-6 scallions, minced
2 eggs
salt and pepper to taste
1/4 cup potato flour (optional)
hella peanut oil (we stopped keeping track, but you should have at least 1 cup on hand)

More Stuff to Throw In:

a small bunch chopped cilantro, chives or parsley
3 cloves minced garlic
1 tablespoon smoked spanish paprika
3 dried red chiles, minced well or ground roughly

Grate your potatoes and onion and place them in a cloth towel and wring out as much liquid as you can -- catch the liquid in a bowl. Let the potato juice sit for a few minutes, then pour the liquid from the bowl, saving the potato starch that has collected in the bottom. Write your initials in it with a fork. Well done.

Mix the potato starch, potatoes and onions with the rest of the ingredients, except the oil. Heat a large cast-iron frying pan over medium-high heat with about two tablespoons of the oil. When the oil is hot (but never smoking) add spoonfuls of batter, pressing them flat with your spoon. When the bottom is crispy and brown, flip to the other side and fry until golden. Refresh the peanut oil as needed, usually before each new batch. (Don't even try to use olive oil or another low-heat but healthy-sounding alternative. You'll be sorry when the smoke alarm goes off.) Drain on brown paper bags or paper towels.

Serves about 5 moderately hungry people, if you don't eat them all before dinner.

Work Snacks: Muhammara with Pita Triangles

First things first: no, we don't take a chip-and-dip bowl to the office. We made this for work snacks last month, forgot to take a picture, and then whipped up a batch as a games-and-mezze snack last night, hence the non-lunch-box presentation. But picture this in a work snacks container--doesn't that look like the answer to your 3 pm slump?

Muhammara is a red pepper and walnut spread, tart with pomegranate molasses. You can reduce or even omit the garlic and chile depending on whether you have the kind of job that involves breathing on other people--it's delicious no matter what, since the main flavors are the smokiness of the roasted peppers and the je ne sais quoi of the pomegranate molasses. Pomegranate molasses is available in well-stocked grocery stores (it's next to the honey at the Berkeley Bowl for you East Bay folks) or Middle Eastern food stores. Once you have some in your fridge, you'll drizzle it on everything; it's delicious over yogurt and granola.

Also, no need to limit yourself to pita triangles--tortilla chips, zucchini rounds, carrot & celery sticks or crackers will work too. And if you're serving it at home, it's delicious with fried eggplant slices as an appetizer.

The Antidote to a 2-Hour Conference Call

2 red bell peppers (when you have access to gypsy or marconi peppers, by all means substitute those and use a few more)
1 and 1/2 cups walnut pieces
1 minced jalapeno or serrano chile (with seeds if you like heat, without if you don't)
2 cloves garlic, minced (optional)
3 tablespoons pomegranate molasses
juice of 1/2 a lemon
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
1/2 teaspoon salt

Now, About That Toner Cartridge...

Roast peppers in the broiler, turning until blackened on all sides. When peppers are completely blackened, remove from broiler and place in a paper bag to steam for about 15 minutes. When the peppers have cooled down, peel off the charred skins, discard cores and seeds and chop roughly. Throw the peppers and everything else in the food processor and pulverize for a minute or so, until you have a thick paste. If you want it thicker, add more walnuts; if you want it thinner, drizzle in extra olive oil.

Buttery Soft Fried Eggplant with Smoky Tomato Sauce

You may notice that this post is tagged "work snacks" and wonder what kind of barn I was raised in. I'll tell you: one in which my dad and my grandma made meltingly tender fried eggplant spiced with paprika and served it cold or at room temperature. This is actually a common thing for Syrian Jews to serve at room temperature for Saturday lunch, so why not have it for Tuesday snack in a little Tupperware? Of course, it's also delicious over cooked grains for dinner (we chose a red quinoa-brown rice mix), with lemon wedges to cut the grease. We've moved the paprika from the eggplant to a seat-of-the-pants dipping sauce we created with our abundance of roasted tomatoes, but if you're not into big canning projects, we provide alternate instructions for roasting tomatoes while you do other stuff.


Forget Parmesan

1 large eggplant, sliced into 1/4-inch thick rounds
Salt
Peanut or canola oil for frying
7 roasted tomatoes (if you have them) or 7 medium fresh tomatoes
Olive oil for roasting tomatoes
1 chipotle chile
1/2 teaspoon paprika
1/4 teaspoon salt

Ratatouille is So Last Year

If you don't have roasted tomatoes, start here: roll the whole tomatoes in olive oil, sprinkle with salt, and bake on 300 for 1 and 1/2 to 2 hours.

In a small bowl, pour boiling water over the chipotle and cover with a plate while you do everything else.

Place eggplant slices in a large bowl and sprinkle with salt. Let sit for about 30 minutes--the salt will leach out all the bitterness and it will collect in a brown pool at the bottom of the bowl (and to think you usually eat that!). Pat the eggplant slices dry, which will make them fry up nicely.

Heat 2 inches of oil in a large frying pan. When a drop of water sizzles on contact with the oil, add the eggplant slices in a single layer (you'll need to do more than one batch). Fry for about 3 minutes, flip, and fry for 3 minutes on the other side. Remove finished slices to a paper-towel-lined plate.

When all eggplant slices are fried, remove the stem and seeds from the chipotle and drop in the food processor with tomatoes (recently roasted or from your fridge), paprika and salt. Process until smooth. Drizzle sauce over eggplant and serve with a lemon wedge.

Rosemary-Threaded Figs with Cashew Cream

We threw a tapas-and-games party on Saturday night and needed a not-too-rich dessert to round out a decadent spread. We made our household gazpacho and three tapas (tortilla espanola, marinated semisoft cheeses with garlic & rosemary and soft cheeses with honey) from Tapas: A Taste of Spain in America, plus a guest brought gorgonzola-stuffed dates wrapped in bacon. So we created this fall incarnation of a dessert we love to make with whatever fruit is in season. (We've also made a summer version with grilled peaches and a blueberry reduction, and a Christmas version with grilled pears and an apple cider reduction).

For the cashew cream:
1 cup raw cashews
4 cups water
2 tablespoons agave nectar (or maple syrup or honey)
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

For the threaded figs:
18-20 fresh black or purple figs
6 branches fresh rosemary
2 tablespoons butter or Earth Balance
1 tablespoon honey
1/4 teaspoon each cinnamon, allspice and cardamom

For the delicious dessert assembly:

Soak the cashews in 4 cups of water for as long as you can--at least 3 hours, but they'll get softer (and achieve a creamier texture) if you soak them for longer. You can also soak the rosemary branches if you want--they only need about 20 minutes. This will keep them from burning in the oven, but I forgot to do this once and it wasn't catastrophic.

When you're ready, remove cashews from water with a slotted spoon and place in the food processor with 1/2 cup of the soaking water, agave/maple syrup/honey, cinnamon and vanilla extract. Blend until smooth--you can add more water as necessary, but you want this to have the consistency of a pudding rather than a sauce.

Preheat the oven** to broil. Thread 3-4 figs onto each rosemary branch. Melt butter and honey in the microwave for about a minute and mix in cinnamon, cardamom and allspice. Brush figs with butter-honey mixture and place in the broiler on a foil-lined cookie sheet:


Broil about 3-4 minutes on each side, brushing with more butter-honey marinade mixture halfway through. Serve figs with a dollop of cashew cream. If you're serving more people than you have rosemary branches, you can snip branches between figs with kitchen scissors to create individual servings.

**We used the broiler because we don't have a grill, but these would be delicious grilled.

Work Snacks: Raw Zucchini Discs with Mint-Tahini Sauce

We both love to nibble at work, and we like to mix it up a little so we're not eating yogurt and Luna Bars all the time. We'll be posting innovative office snack ideas as they come along--to start, here's *another* way to use summer squash. The recipe for the sauce is from a recent acquisition, RAWVolution by Matt Amsden. We spent a few days snickering at the multiple gratuitous photos of Matt Amsden looking smoldering and raw-fed: Matt on the beach canoodling with some girl, Matt doing topless yoga that hints at his Kama Sutra-like abilities, Matt seductively smelling jars in the bulk section of a natural foods store! But once we stopped smirking, we came across this fragrant hummus alternative, and it's fantastic as a mid-day snack with raw veggies.

The Recipe

3/4 cup fresh lemon juice
1/4 cup olive oil
1/4 cup Nama shoyu (we used Braggs Liquid Aminos)
2-3 cloves garlic, peeled
1 cup raw tahini
1 bunch fresh mint leaves, stems removed

In a high-speed blender (we used a food processor), combine all of the ingredients and blend until smooth.

Notes from the test kitchen: This makes 2 cups--we decided to scale it down to 1/4 recipe. Also, we added a squirt of agave nectar, because we're addicted like that.

Serving suggestion: slice a zucchini on the bias into oval-shaped discs. When you want variety, try it with carrots, snap peas or tortilla chips!