Roasted Cauliflower Polonaise

It’s actually feeling like fall here this week. Cooler weather, drizzly rain, and earlier sunsets are making it clear that summer is gone. Just in time to help warm up the house with the oven, Ruhlman's How to Roast has appeared, and I received a review copy. This new book covers the basics of oven roasting everything from the Thanksgiving turkey to roasted fruit for dessert. He starts by explaining what roasting has come to mean. Originally, roasting involved a spit and fire, but these days, the process of roasting is really the same as that of baking. The different names are used depending on what is being cooked. With either name, it’s a “dry-heat cooking method.” And, it’s a pretty easy way to make things delicious when they take on a golden crispness in the oven. Starting with a classic roasted chicken, Ruhlman walks you through the simple steps of seasoning, bringing up to temperature, prepping, roasting, and carving. Beef, pork, lamb, fish, and shellfish are all covered including an actual spit-roasted leg of lamb, and then there are lovely, golden, roasted vegetables. I’ve roasted all sorts of vegetables over the years. Usually, I just toss the vegetables with some olive oil, maybe add some sliced garlic or smashed whole cloves of garlic, and pop them in the hot oven on a sheet pan. But, now that I’ve tasted the wonder of roasting cauliflower in a cast iron skillet with butter, I may never go back. The Roasted Cauliflower Polonaise recipe caught my eye because it was completely unfamiliar to me. I learned that Polonaise refers to any dish topped with buttered breadcrumbs and hard cooked eggs. Here, there’s also a splash of lemon and chopped fresh parsley. It’s one of two recipes that uses Basic Roasted Cauliflower in the book, and I highly recommend it. 

Now, I have to explain that I took option B in making this dish. Option A would have been to roast the whole head of cauliflower intact. Then, it would have been served in the cast iron skillet and portions would have been cut as wedges. It’s a lovely, old-school kind of preparation and presentation, but since I was just cooking for two, I went the simpler route. I cut the head of cauliflower into florets, and roasted them in the skillet with butter. Every ten minutes or so, I turned the cauliflower pieces and spooned melted, browned butter over the tops. The cauliflower pieces roasted for about 40 minutes total, and came out of the oven nicely golden. Meanwhile, I hard-cooked two eggs, chopped parsley, and toasted breadcrumbs in melted butter on top of the stove. To serve, I transferred cauliflower pieces to a platter, squeezed lemon juice over the top, added the toasted buttery breadcrumbs and chopped eggs, and garnished with parsley. 

For me, this was a vegetarian main course. The buttery goodness was undeniable, but the crispy breadcrumbs, bright lemon, and rich chopped egg combined delightfully. My next stop in the book will either be the Duck Fat-Roasted Potatoes or the Roasted Pineapple with Vanilla Ice Cream and Caramel Sauce. The oven is going to get plenty of use this fall. 

Roasted Cauliflower Polonaise 
Recipes reprinted with publisher’s permission from Ruhlman's How to Roast. Copyright ©2014 by Ruhlman Enterprises, Inc. Courtesy Little, Brown and Company. The book is available at Barnes and Noble and IndieBound.

Boiled cauliflower with hard-cooked eggs, bread crumbs, and parsley? When I first learned this old preparation, in a culinary basics class at the CIA, I thought it was too goofy for words. But when I asked my cooking partner, Adam Shepard, what he thought of it, he said, “I’d serve it at my restaurant. Though I’d figure out a way to make the egg and bread crumbs stick to the cauliflower.” That he took it seriously made me take it seriously. As my appreciation of classic dishes grew, so too did my affection for this dish. Prepare it with roasted cauliflower rather than boiled, and it becomes a great dish for any occasion. 

1 head cauliflower (whole or cut into florets), roasted 
1/4 cup/20 grams panko bread crumbs 
1 or 2 hard-cooked eggs, chopped 
3 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley 

• PLACE the hot roasted cauliflower on a serving platter. If there is no remaining butter in the skillet, add another tablespoon. Add the bread crumbs to the skillet and cook over medium-high heat till they’re toasted. 

• SQUEEZE the lemon over the cauliflower and then spoon the toasted bread crumbs over the cauliflower. Spoon the chopped egg over the cauliflower (don’t worry if it doesn’t stick). Sprinkle it with parsley and serve in wedges or slices, scooping up extra garnish as you do so. 

• If you’re using roasted florets, melt 1 tablespoon butter in a separate small skillet over medium-high heat and toast the bread crumbs. To serve, simply sprinkle the lemon juice, toasted bread crumbs, chopped egg, and parsley uniformly over the top of the florets and serve right from the skillet. 

Basic Roasted Cauliflower 
6 tablespoons/90 grams butter, at room temperature 
1 head cauliflower 
Kosher salt 

• PREHEAT the oven to 425˚F/220˚C (use convection if you have it). 

• Cut the stem and leaves off the cauliflower so that it will sit flat in a skillet; the more of the cauliflower that’s in contact with the skillet the better, as it gets very brown and tasty. 

• Set the cauliflower in an ovenproof skillet and smear the butter all over the surface. Give it a liberal sprinkling of salt. 

• Roast till tender (a long knife should slide easily down into the cauliflower all the way through to its stem), 1 hour to 1 hour 15 minutes. Several times while it’s roasting, baste it with the butter, which will have melted and started to brown. (If you’re roasting a cut-up cauliflower, simply put the florets and butter in the skillet and put it in the oven. After 5 or 10 minutes, stir and toss the cauliflower to coat the florets with the melted butter, and then continue roasting and basting till tender, 30 to 40 

• Serve immediately, in wedges or slices, or keep warm and reheat for a few minutes in a hot oven before serving. 

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Pickled Gulf Shrimp with Celery Root Sauce

We love our food trailers in Austin, and now it’s easier than ever to try some of their best dishes right at home. Tiffany Harelik has written a series of cookbooks with their recipes. I received a review copy of the latest, Trailer Food Diaries Cookbook: Austin Edition, Vol. 3 , and there are also versions from Dallas-Fort Worth and Houston and a new one on the way from Portland. The Austin Edition, Volume 3 is a fun collection including Drinks, Breakfast, Appetizers and Sides, Sandwiches and Handhelds, Sauces and Jams, Main Courses, and Sweets. Most of the trailers represented are from the city of Austin, but there are a few “Road Trip” locations in Pflugerville, San Marcos, Round Rock, and San Antonio. A few things I can’t wait to try are The Carrot Top from the Blenders and Bowls trailer which is a smoothie with carrot juice and ginger; Dock and Roll Diner’s Tsunami Sauce for sandwiches with jalapenos, lime, garlic, and oils; the Cabbage and Mint Salad with Poached Shrimp and Red Chile-Caramel Fish Sauce and Fried Prawn Chips from Fresh Off the Truck; and the Pineapple Cinnamon MMMpanadas from mmmpanadas. One of our food trailers that does a great job of offering each season’s best is The Seedling Truck. They offer a “revolving menu that is dictated by local farms and purveyors.” I was delighted to find their recipes for Braised Short Ribs with Brown Butter Carrot Puree, Grilled Lamb Chops with Red Peperonata Jam, and Pickled Gulf Shrimp with Celery Root Sauce in the book. I’d made pickled shrimp once before, and I really wanted to try it again. 

The recipe in the book makes a lot of pickled shrimp which is perfect if you’re hosting a few friends. Since I hadn’t planned a party, I cut the quantities in half. I used about a pound of shrimp which I cleaned and deveined leaving the tails intact. The shrimp were poached in boiling water to which had been added a bay leaf, half a lemon, and some black peppercorns. The poached shrimp should be removed from the boiling water and placed directly into an ice bath to stop the cooking. In a separate saucepan, a cup and a half of white vinegar, a cup and a half of water, two tablespoons of sugar, two tablespoons of salt, and a couple of teaspoons of coriander seeds was warmed until the sugar and salt dissolved. The vinegar mixture was then left to cool. Once cool, the vinegar mixture was poured into a bowl with the drained, cooled shrimp, and a big handful of roughly chopped parsley was added. The bowl was refrigerated overnight. Next, the sauce was made by sauteing a peeled and chopped celery root with half a chopped onion and a chopped garlic clove. Once the vegetables became a little tender, after five minutes or so, a cup and a half of water was added with salt and pepper to taste. The mixture was simmered for about 45 minutes until the celery root was completely cooked through. The water should mostly evaporate during the cooking time. After 45 minutes, the vegetables and any remaining liquid were transferred to a blender and pureed with a few tablespoons of cream until smooth. 

This version of pickled shrimp was so much better than my previous attempt. Shocking the shrimp in ice water is a crucial step, I believe. You really want to stop the cooking to keep the texture of the shrimp at its best. Also, a good, sharp, white vinegar is the way to go. It gives the shrimp a zippy, bold flavor which is perfectly balanced by the mild, sweetness of the celery root puree. I was completely delighted by this dish. I look forward to making this for a party since it requires being made in advance, and it’s a little more interesting than shrimp cocktail. And, when celery root isn’t in season, I highly recommend trying the pickled shrimp on top of deviled eggs. 

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Kamut Crispbreads

As much as I love baking with my sourdough starter and love using all sorts of different grains in bread recipes, until recently, I’d never converted my starter to whole wheat. I knew it was an easy thing to do. You just start feeding it with whole wheat flour or a mix of whole wheat and bread flour. You can just as easily convert a starter with rye flour for rye bread, but I haven’t done that yet. The inspiration for going whole wheat with my starter came from the latest book from Chad Robertson, Tartine Book No. 3, and I received a review copy. If you’re familiar with his previous bread book, Tartine Bread, then the basic approach to bread baking will come as no surprise. He makes a leaven with a small amount of sourdough starter to prevent the final flavor from being too sour and then builds the dough from there. He works with very wet doughs and suggests baking loaves in a lidded cast iron pot. The techniques are all the same in this book for the hearth-style loaves, but this book starts fresh with a focus on different grains. Robertson had traveled to different parts of the world and took notice of the grains used by bakers in those locations. In Denmark, specific Nordic grains not found in the US were used in breads; in Sweden, bakers were using freshly-milled, biodynamic grains; and in Germany, a bakery was stone-grinding their flour daily. Back at home, he began experimenting with ways of using higher percentages of a variety of grains in breads without making the final loaves too dense. So, this new book includes loaves with mixes of whole grain flours, some made with sprouted grains both for hearth-style loaves and pan loaves, and breads made with porridge and cracked grains. And, then these different types of flour appear in crispbreads, cookies, eclairs, cakes, tarts, and scones. When I first flipped through this book, I was delighted by the look of the delicate crispbreads. The dough is rolled extremely thin either by hand or with a pasta machine, and the crisps are either topped with seeds or layered-over with herbs or thinly sliced nuts or vegetables. They’re like shards of delicious, edible, stained glass. 

In this book, the dough-making technique is explained in parts. At the beginning, the master method is explained for making a starter with a blend of whole wheat and bread flours with instructions for feeding it and making a leaven from it. Then, in the Crispbreads chapter, there’s a master method for using that leaven to make these doughs. The Crispbread doughs are not as high in hydration as those for hearth-style loaves, so it’s much easier to work with. Each Crispbread recipe includes an ingredient list for the flours used and quantities of water and leaven. The dough for the Kamut Crispbreads included whole-grain kamut flour, bread flour, wheat germ, salt, water, and leaven. It was mixed and left in the refrigerator overnight. The next day, the dough was divided into small pieces, and I used the pasta machine technique to roll each piece into long, thin ribbons. I topped the ribbons of dough with parsley leaves, thinly sliced garlic, lemon zest, and crushed red pepper. Then, the dough was folded over to encase the herbs and spices inside, and it was rolled through the machine again to seal it. The long pieces were cut into portions, brushed with melted butter, sprinkled with salt and pepper, and baked until crisp. They do brown quickly, so you need to watch and pull them from the oven before they get too dark. To further crisp them, they were placed back in the oven at a lower temperature on racks to fully dehydrate. 

I look forward to sprouting grains for the hearth-style loaves and trying some of the darker, seeded pan loaves like the Sprouted Buckwheat-Einkorn bread. I already visited the Pastry chapter and tried the Croquant D’Amandes which are kind of like almond biscotti made with hibiscus flowers, spelt flour, and kamut flour. They were crunchy, nutty, and deliciously tangy from the hibiscus, but mine turned out a bit flatter than what’s shown in the photo. The whole grain Pate a Choux dough has me very curious, and the Salted Chocolate-Rye Cookies look hard to resist. I can already tell I’ll be spending more time tracking down a variety of whole grain flours to use. 

Kamut Crispbreads 
Recipe reprinted with publisher’s permission from Tartine Book No. 3. 

Whole-grain Kamut flour (60%) 170 g 
Medium-strong bread flour (40%) 113g 
Wheat germ (7%) 20g 
Fine sea salt (2.5%) 7g 
Water (50%) 142g 
Leaven (15%) 45g 

*Herbs, edible flowers, and shaved vegetables for filling (optional) and flaky salt such as Maldon. 

(The dough is started by making a leaven from a mature starter that’s been fed with a mix of 50% whole wheat flour and 50% bread flour. The leaven is made with one tablespoon of starter, 200 grams of the 50/50 whole wheat-bread flour mixture, and 200 grams of warm water. The leaven is mixed and left at room temperature for 4 – 6 hours before proceeding with the recipe below.) 

Mix the dough with the above ingredients. Let ferment overnight, covered, in the refrigerator. The next day, divide the dough into small pieces, each about 50 grams, and shape into rounds. Let rest for 10 to 15 minutes. 

To make with a pasta machine: 
Flour your work surface and the dough. With a rolling pin, roll one piece of dough just thin enough so it will fit through the widest setting on your pasta machine. Flour the dough well, then feed it through the machine. Repeat this step, reducing the opening of the rollers a notch with each pass until you’ve reached the Number 1 setting on the pasta machine, flouring the dough each time as necessary to prevent sticking. 

As the dough gets thinner, use the backs of your hands to guide the dough through the rollers to help prevent tears. If at any time you feel your dough is too long to manage, cut it in half and roll both pieces separately. Transfer the dough to a well-floured work surface. 

To make filled crispbreads, after the final pass, transfer the dough to a well-floured surface. Roughly mark the center of your dough and, with a pastry brush, brush one half lightly with water. Lay the filling of your choice on the moistened half of the dough in a single layer, arranging it artfully, then fold the dough, encasing the filling, and pat well so that the two pieces of dough adhere to one another. 

Flour the dough well, then run it through the pasta machine again, beginning on the Number 4 or 5 setting and continuing until you’ve passed the dough through the Number 1 or 2 setting (depending on the thickness of the filling). 

Transfer the dough to a floured surface and cut each crispbread into the desired shape, transfer to a parchment-lined baking sheet, and brush with melted butter. Sprinkle with flaked salt. Bake at 425 degrees F/220 degrees C for 10 to 15 minutes, until golden brown. Remove from the oven. 

Reduce the oven temperature to 200 degrees F/95 degrees C. When the oven has cooled, remove the crispbreads from the baking sheets and return them to the oven, placing them directly on the oven racks. To allow moisture to escape, leave the oven door slightly cracked (use the handle of a wooden spoon to keep it ajar), and bake 10 to 15 minutes longer, until the crispbreads are thoroughly dehydrated. They should not have darkened in color. 

Carefully remove from the oven and transfer to a cooling rack. Once cool, break into large pieces or transfer whole to an airtight container right away so they stay crisp; they will keep for a week stored properly and can be recrisped by heating again in a moderate oven (300 degrees F/150 degrees C) for 10 to 12 minutes. 

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Salt Cod, Orange, and Olive Salad

I have this one last citrus dish to sneak in here at the tail end of the season. This is from an article I cut from Delicious magazine two years ago, and the recipe is included on Taste.com. It’s one of those salads that look so pretty in the photo you know it’s going to taste great. I can’t help but be drawn to food like that. With several colors on a plate, there’s bound be a good mix of flavors as well. In this case, there are sweet, brightly-colored orange segments, briny and dark, black olives, pale and mild, soaked salt cod, peppery, pretty, green watercress, and some bite from skinny slices of red onion. I know some people fear that salt cod is going to be stinky or difficult to prep, but it really isn’t. I buy salt cod at Whole Foods that comes in a little wood box, and there’s no smell at all when it’s opened. I soak it in a bowl of cold water covered with plastic wrap that I leave in the refrigerator, and I change the water each day while soaking the fish for three days. The kind I buy is boneless and mostly skinless, so there’s very little work involved other than soaking. Once the salt is removed by soaking, the flavor is mild just like cooked fresh cod.

So, you do have to plan ahead when working with salt cod since it does need to be soaked for two to three days to remove the salt. For this dish, after the salt cod had soaked for a few days, it was then simmered in milk with parsley sprigs, thyme, and bay leaves. After the milk with herbs and salt cod came to a boil, it was left to sit, off the heat, to infuse for about 15 minutes. Then, the fish was removed and chilled in the refrigerator. While the fish chilled, the vinaigrette was made with garlic, sherry vinegar, white wine vinegar, extra virgin olive oil, and orange juice. To build the salad, chunks of the salt cod, thinly sliced red onion, orange segments, black olives, and watercress were tossed with the vinaigrette and then plated with parsley leaves. A mix of black olives is suggested, and I used some oil-cured black olives, black picholines, and some kalamatas.

Oranges and black olives are a classic pairing, and that fruity and briny combination was a lovely thing with the chunks of cod and fresh watercress and parsley. You have a great dish when all the components’ flavors go together so well and everything looks so good together at the same time.

Buttermilk Biscuits with Parsley and Sage

I feel like I’ve been keeping this from you. It wasn’t on purpose of course, but I’ve made these twice before and am only just now getting around to telling you about them. These biscuits are as easy to make as they are delicious, and I highly suggest doubling the recipe which I’ve done each time I’ve made them. There’s chopped, fresh sage in the biscuit dough, and then when they come out of the oven, they’re brushed with melted butter and sprinkled with chopped parsley. They’re as rich and decadent as buttermilk biscuits should be, and they’re pretty with flecks of herbs inside and out. I found these biscuits in the book Flour by Joanne Chang. The first time I made them, I was looking for something savory to take to the Austin Bakes bake sale earlier this year in April. I was delighted with them, and since they’re quick to prepare, I made them again for the bake sale that just happened a few weeks ago. There’s no cutting butter into flour by hand. The entire process takes place in a mixer. And, once the biscuits are formed, they can be placed in the freezer until you’re ready to bake them. I’m already thinking about how convenient that would be for Thanksgiving dinner.

So, you start the dough by placing the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in the bowl of a stand mixer and mix briefly to combine. Then, you add butter that’s been cut into pieces, and mix until the butter breaks down some. In a small bowl, buttermilk, cream, egg, and chopped sage are whisked together and then added to the mixing bowl, and that is mixed into the flour and butter just until the dough comes together. As you transfer the dough to a work surface, you can work in any loose flour in the bottom of the mixing bowl. After patting the dough into a one-inch thick rectangle, I cut square biscuits to make things easy. Of course, you could use a round cutter, but I like the efficiency of only shaping and cutting once. Since I doubled the recipe and cut smallish squares, I ended up with 20 biscuits. They baked for 40 minutes, and then the tops were bushed with melted butter and sprinkled with chopped parsley. I sprinkled some coarse sea salt on them as well.

Like every recipe I’ve tried from this book, it works beautifully. My only disappointment with these biscuits is that each time I've baked them, I only kept a couple of them at home. I was happy to take them to the bake sales, but next time, I’m making a batch just for us.

Savory Granola with Roasted Beets and Carrots

I never make granola the same way twice. I love the recipe with olive oil and maple syrup from the NY Times. It’s great with plain yogurt. Every time I make it, I use different nuts or dried fruit depending on what I have in the kitchen that day. Almonds and dried cranberries is one favorite variation. However, despite the use of olive oil in that recipe, I would never in a million years have thought to take the entire thing in a savory direction. When I saw a savory granola in Saveur’s Chef’s 100, that was something I had to try. Daniel Humm of Eleven Madison Park in New York makes a savory granola that’s served on a tomato salad with mozzarella ice cream and is also used in a beet salad. He started by using puffed rice as a way to add texture to different dishes, and from there he added other flavors to the puffed rice until it seemed to become a savory granola. I loved the idea of it and of adding something grainy and crunchy to dressed, roasted beets. As with any granola, it’s very easy to mix and match ingredients to make use of what’s available and to bring in whatever flavors you wish, and my version ended up a little different from the recipe in the magazine.

First, if we’re calling this granola, I needed some oats to be included. I used half the suggested quantity of puffed rice and then an equal amount of oats. The original recipe suggests basil leaves, but I don’t have basil plants yet this year, so I used parsley leaves instead. Also, I did have some pine nuts in the freezer but not quite enough, so I threw in some pepitas as well. To begin, the parsley leaves were fried in canola oil and then left to drain and cool. The puffed rice, which is not sweetened, oats, pine nuts, pepitas, some finely grated parmesan, minced garlic, salt, and piment d’espelette were combined, and the fried parsley leaves were added. Honey was melted and added as a binder, and I also added a little olive oil to the mixture before it was spread on a baking sheet and popped into a 250 degree F oven for about 40 minutes.

The parmesan and garlic make this granola unmistakably savory, and the honey and piment d’espelette give it a sweet-heat personality. But, the crunch is what this is all about. Adding that contrasting texture to roasted beets and carrots topped with a shallot vinaigrette was a fun twist. As soon as I have basil plants with lots of leaves, I want to try this again. A basil-scented, savory granola sprinkled over balsamic-drizzled, sun-ripened tomatoes is in my future.

Linguine with Frenched Green Beans and Pesto

This fall, my CSA has switched from having a pick-up every other week to a pick-up every week. I collect my share at our Wednesday farmers’ market, and I’m always tempted by the goods I see at all the other tables at the market too. What this means is that each week I bring home a big supply of fresh, beautiful vegetables and get to think up ways to use them all within the next seven days. Last week, my haul included incredibly fresh and crisp green beans and a bunch of basil, and I remembered this pasta dish from On Top of Spaghetti. I’ve mentioned this book a few times before, and it’s one of my favorites. Once again, it delivered a great meal. Now, the interesting thing about this dish is the cut of the green beans. By frenching them, or cutting them into long, slender strips, the pieces become very tender when cooked and can be twirled on your fork with the pasta. This was the second time in my life that I french-cut some green beans by hand, and for this quantity it’s not such a daunting task. However, if I were preparing this for a crowd, or if I should decide that I need to french beans for every meal, I’m going to have to get a tool to speed up the process.

So, begin by carefully slicing green beans lengthwise into thin pieces. Then, cook them in boiling water until tender enough to twirl on a fork, and drain them, rinse with cool water, and leave them in the colander. While you bring a large pot of water to a boil for the linguine, you can make a pesto from parsley leaves, basil leaves, a garlic clove, a pinch of cayenne, and olive oil. Once the pesto is pureed, add some grated pecorino romano. Cook the linguine, and then drain it into the colander with the beans so as to re-warm the beans. Place the pasta and beans in a large serving bowl, toss with the pesto, and serve with extra grated pecorino.

This pasta dish is all about the fresh flavors of the green beans and the herbs in the pesto while the cayenne perks things up without being assertive, and the pecorino adds richness. I loved that the beans curled into the pasta on the plate and their texture was just barely firmer than the linguine. It’s a simple pasta dish and a delicious way to use fresh green beans.

Gremolata Seared Chicken

This is another quick and simple dish from Donna Hay’s Off the Shelf, and I served this chicken with spinach polenta with balsamic tomatoes. The photos and the straightforward nature of the recipes in this book make each and every thing in it difficult to resist. I looked through the Mediterranean chapter for ideas for what to serve with the polenta. Fish roasted in capers and lemon butter was one option. The balsamic and tomato roast chicken looked good but was too similar to the polenta dish. The tuna and grilled vegetable salad wasn’t quite right, but I’ll definitely be making that eventually. Likewise, the green olive baked chicken was almost perfect, but because cherry tomatoes were included in it, I finally settled on the gremolata seared chicken.

Gremolata was made by stirring together chopped flat-leaf parsley, chopped salt-packed capers that had been rinsed and drained, lemon zest, and black pepper. That mixture was sprinkled on chicken breasts, and the chicken was seared in olive oil in a saute pan. In the book, this chicken is shown being served with salt-roasted potatoes and steamed green beans. I’m sure that would have been delicious too, but the chicken also worked very well with polenta and roasted tomatoes.

If I had been planning ahead, I might have applied the gremolata to the chicken and let it sit in the refrigerator for a few hours before cooking. And, certainly, the chicken could have been grilled or baked rather than pan seared. The gremolata provided a very easy way of adding a lot of flavor to the blank canvas that is chicken breast meat. Now, which page of the book should I cook from next?

Gavurdagi Salatasi with Falafel

In the May issue of Saveur, Anya von Bremzen wrote about living and eating in Istanbul. The pastries, like baked rice pudding, looked wonderful, and the mezes including salt pickled vegetables and a baba-gannouj-like dip looked great too. The stuffed eggplant caught my eye, and then I noticed this tomato salad with herbs and pomegranate. I guessed that this would be brightly flavored and fresh and have a nice, tanginess. It was suggested as a garnish for falafel, and that sounded perfect. I don’t know terribly much about Turkish food, but I’ve been learning from Give Recipe and Turkish Food Passion. Every time I visit those sites, I see dishes I want to try.

This salad is a combination of several chopped, fresh tomatoes, a lot of flat-leaf parsley, mint, some onion, fresh thyme, paprika, lemon juice, scallions, banana peppers, a little garlic, and pomegranate molasses. It’s garnished with ground sumac. When I read that ingredient list, I imagined all those flavors mingled together and couldn’t wait to try it. I used a falafel recipe from Epicurious, but I’m not sure if proper Turkish falafel is prepared in a different way. At any rate, the salad and falafel made a very nice pair. I whipped up a tahini, yogurt, lemon sauce and served a mound of salad with falafel sitting on top and plopped a little sauce in the center.

Both the falafel and salad recipes make enough to serve six, so after having this for dinner, there was plenty remaining for a few lunches. To describe the salad, I keep coming back to the freshness of it. The herbs and lemon and scallions did that for it, and the pomegranate molasses, although subtle, added a nice tangy sweetness. The flavors were so right with the chickpeas, onion, cumin, and coriander in the falafel. This is a definite keeper, and some day when I’ve practiced more with Turkish cuisine, I hope to be able to prepare an entire feast.

Salsa Verde Salmon

The other night, I really needed to think of something quick and simple to prepare for dinner. Luckily for me, I remembered The Fast 50 from the February/March issue of Donna Hay Magazine. That was 50 grilling recipes in a row that were simple, straightforward, and as usual for Donna Hay, looked amazing. The salsa verde salmon skewers were perfect for a main course, and I decided to add some vegetables to make each one a complete meal on a stick. The only thinking ahead that’s really required here is to get a thick cut of salmon so that it can be chopped into cubes that will work well on a skewer. I added chunks of zucchini and parboiled, small yukon gold potatoes.

The salmon and zucchini required the same amount of grilling time, and since the potatoes got a head start on the stove, everything achieved doneness at the same time. For the salsa verde, the recommended ingredients were a cup of mint, one third cup of flat-leaf parsley and one third cup of chives, a tablespoon of rinsed capers, a minced clove of garlic, and two tablespoons of olive oil. That sounded like a lot of mint to me, and since my basil plants have been growing so well, I decided to use a little mint and mostly basil. The herbs were chopped and combined with the other ingredients, and the finished salsa was drizzled over the grilled salmon, zucchini, and potatoes.

It was a quick, fresh, flavorful meal lifted by the combination of herbs and the briny note of the capers. Such a simple sauce, but it brightened up and accented the grilled-in flavor nicely. This was another meal from Donna Hay that did not disappoint. And, there are 49 other quick, simple, grilled meals in that one article.

Spaghettini Con Sugo di Tonno

Clearly, I’ve been busy lately because it’s been quite a while since I posted anything labor-intensive that requires multiple days of preparation. And, that’s definitely not what you’ll find here today either. When quick and easy cooking is also enormously delicious, I’m on board. This dish is classically Italian in that six simple ingredients come together to make something unbelievably pleasing. It’s from the September, I think, issue of Saveur. There was an article about canning your own tuna, and this was a suggested way to use that canned tuna. See above statement about quick and easy, because I did not can my own tuna. However, I did place an order with Market Hall Foods which included an exceptional can of Ortiz tuna. It was so delicious that now I’m very curious about the Ventresca. If anyone has tried this, I’d love to hear your opinion of it.

This meal was made for multi-tasking. While the pasta water came to a boil, there was ample time to slice garlic, chop parsley, open the can of tuna, heat the olive oil with crushed red pepper and sliced garlic, add the tuna, and dress a couple of small plates of arugula with oil and vinegar. Al dente spaghettini was tossed with the oil, garlic, pepper, tuna, parsley, and some reserved pasta boiling water. Devouring ensued. At the risk of fawning, I have to say again that this was really, really good tuna. It breaks apart and swirls into the olive oil and twists its way among the strands of pasta. With the hit of crushed red pepper and the garlic, the flavors are sculpted into a situation of give me more because my plate is already empty. Use homemade canned tuna, or get something great like the Ortiz, and try this soon.