Falafel Fun

For me, falafel has always been one of those foods that can go either way. At Middle Eastern restaurants sometimes the little fried balls of ground garbanzo beans and herbs are chalky and bland. But other times they are moist, delightfully crunchy and perfectly seasoned. When looking for meal ideas in the cookbook How to Cook Everything Vegetarian by Mark Bittman, Trevor found a falafel recipe. Since we know that when falafel is good, it’s very, very good, we gave it a shot.

The odd thing about the recipe it that the garbanzo beans are not cooked. You get dried beans and soak them for 24 hours. Then you whirl them in a food processor with parsley, garlic, onion and spices. Once shaped into little balls or patties, you deep-fry them for about 5 minutes. The recipe doesn't call for it, but I put them on a cookie-rack-covered baking sheet as opposed to a paper-towel-lined baking sheet. I think it keeps fried foods from getting soggy.

We usually make a yogurt-tahini sauce to slather over them and stuff them in pitas with shredded lettuce, and slices of cucumber and tomato. (Sometimes I’ll sprinkle a little feta cheese on top, too.)

The best thing about homemade falafel is its consistency. You know it will always be piping hot, crunchy and seasoned to your taste. Sure it’s deep fried, but it’s also vegetarian. The only other fat in the meal comes from the tahini – and it’s good fat. It’s now become a meal we crave. And because it takes minimal work, it’s suitable for making on a weeknight.

Doubling Down on Sauce

Left to right, tomato sauce and Bolognese sauce

This week my grocery list included the ingredients for mirepoix or the “trinity” — onions, celery and carrots. Because it’s winter and Persephone Farm isn’t doing any farmers’ markets right now, I’ve been getting produce from a grocery store. (Although, I still have plenty of onions in my root cellar!) Grocery-store produce just can’t compare to Persephone’s fresh-picked taste and overall goodness. Also, stuff I get from the store doesn’t last as long in my fridge, so to get the most for my money, I use the produce I buy quickly and in more than one meal.

Since I needed carrots and celery for cannelloni, I decided to make Bolognese and tomato sauce, too. I hadn’t planned on making both sauces on the same day, but I started to get out the ingredients for the Bolognese (a savory tomato sauce with ground pork and beef) and realized it’d be silly not to make both sauces at once. They both start with the trinity, so if I was going to chop up celery, onion and carrots for one recipe I figured I might as well do it for both.

Mirepoix - onion, celery and carrot

I usually don’t get out my Cuisinart food processor for chopping small amounts, but since I was doing large quantities I knew it would save time. I was following Lidia Bastianich’s recipes. But I did tweak the Bolognese recipe. I doubled the amount of mirepoix and crushed tomatoes, while keeping the amount of meat the same. I also mixed a little beef broth concentrate into to the water the recipe said to add every so often to keep the sauce around the same level.

Huge can o' tomatoes

With the intent to make sauce, I picked up a huge can of crushed tomatoes from Costco, where I go every few months to stock up on things such as toilet paper and dish detergent. (I normally don’t buy much food from Costco since we don’t eat a lot of processed food.)

The tomato sauce finished cooking first. The Bolognese cooks for two to three hours, so I’d just give it a stir every once in awhile and add broth as needed.

The Bolognese turned out perfectly. It was meaty and rich. We could have skipped the gnocchi and just eaten it with fresh-baked bread and grated cheese. We’ll put both sauces in the freezer and cut off chunks as needed to sauce fresh pasta or spread on pizza crust. So I saved time by making both sauces at once — and money by not letting produce go to waste. This also means that in the future we’ll have delicious, healthful meals with a slow-cooked taste in the amount of time it takes to defrost the sauce and cook pasta. Double the sauce, double the bonus.

The Bolognese simmered for three hours

Links:

Lidia's Bolognese

http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/9735848

Slow-simmered pork

When the weather starts getting cooler, I happily get reacquainted with my old friend the slow cooker. And after Trevor brought home a couple of pounds of tomatillos, cilantro and several onions after working at the Persephone Farm stand at the PSU Farmers’ Market, I couldn’t wait to make chile verde.

Chile verde is home-style Mexican cooking at its best. It’s versatile — eat it as a stew, wrap it up in a flour tortilla, or make enchiladas with the leftovers. It’s filling and comforting — the pork falls apart when touched with a fork. And it’s healthy — a serving is a moderate amount of lean pork swimming in a sea of vegetables. Serve it with corn or flour tortillas, homemade gorditas or even with some Spanish fried rice.

Slow Cooker Chile Verde
Serves 6 to 8
I adapted this recipe from a Cooking Light recipe. I like to use a mix of Anaheim and poblano chiles. Sometimes the chiles are hotter than other times, but this dish isn’t supposed to very spicy. You can also make this on the stovetop, so I included a link to the original version below.

2 tablespoon canola oil
2 (1-pound) pork tenderloins or pork sirloin roast, trimmed and cut into 1-inch cubes
1 ½ teaspoons salt
¼ teaspoon freshly ground pepper
¼ cup all-purpose flour
¼ cup water
4 cups onion, chopped
2 pounds small tomatillos, husks and stems removed and quartered
1 pound fresh Anaheim or poblano chiles (about 4 medium), cut into 1-inch pieces
6 garlic cloves, chopped
1 ½ cups chicken or vegetable stock
1 cup fresh cilantro, chopped
1 ½ teaspoons ground cumin
1 teaspoon dried oregano
2 tablespoons flour
¼ cup water

Heat oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Sprinkle the pork evenly with salt and pepper. Place flour in a large zip-top plastic bag. Add pork to bag; seal. Shake to coat. Add pork to pan, and sauté 5 minutes, browning on all sides. This may need to be done in batches. Add more oil if necessary. Remove pork from the pan and place in a slow cooker. Add ¼ cup water to the hot skillet to deglaze it. Use a wooden spoon to loosen all the browned bits stuck to the bottom. Add water and browned bits to slow cooker.

Add onions, tomatillos, chiles, garlic, chicken stock, cilantro, cumin and oregano to the slow cooker. Stir to combine ingredients. Cover and cook for desired amount of time. (I usually cook on the high setting for 4 to 5 hours, but you can use the low setting and cook for 8 to 10 hours.) 1 hour before chile is finished cooking, use a fork to mix together 2 tablespoons flour and ¼ cup water. Mix until there are not any lumps. Add mixture to slow cooker and stir. Cover and let cook for remaining hour. Taste chile verde and add salt and ground black pepper as needed. Enjoy!

Links:
Chile Verde
http://find.myrecipes.com/recipes/recipefinder.dyn?action=displayRecipe&recipe_id=1054864

Good Garnish

While I grew up in a Mexican-American family, Tortilla Soup was never on menu at my house. I first had it at the chain restaurant El Torito. And I’ve liked it ever since. I found a great recipe for it in the Los Angeles Times, but lost it years ago. So when I was craving a rich, steaming bowl of tortilla soup I had to develop my own recipe.

I know red bell peppers aren’t in season, but I was able to make good use of the Persephone Farm onions, shallot and garlic I had in the “root cellar.” Plus, I had some delicious corn tortillas freshly made at the Mexican bakery in my neighborhood. Nothing beats a good fresh corn tortilla. When I was little my dad would only eat tortillas from La Central bakery. Sometimes my Aunt Esther would make them at home and that was even better. So I never ate the pale imitations of corn tortillas sold at the grocery store until I was an adult and didn’t make the extra trip to the panadería. I’m so happy I live close to one now!

The ingredients that make this soup subtly smoky are the roasted red peppers, cumin and pimentón — a specialty Spanish paprika. It’s so flavorful you only need a little. Don’t try to swap it for regular paprika; it just won’t taste the same.

The fun of tortilla soup is the garnishes. I love to add Cotija cheese (a crumbly cow’s milk cheese) for the saltiness, avocado for it’s silky texture, tortilla chips for crunch, and cilantro for a hit of freshness. But you can play around and add other toppers such as sour cream or leftover roast chicken.

Tortilla Soup

Serves 6 or more

Soup

2 red bell peppers, roasted with blackened skin, seeds and stem removed (see link below for instructions)

3 tablespoons olive oil

2 cloves garlic, smashed

¼ cup shallot, chopped

1 cup red onion, chopped

1 cup yellow onion, chopped

1 bay leaf

1 teaspoon ground cumin

½ teaspoon dried oregano

¼ teaspoon pimentón, Spanish smoked paprika (I used sweet pimentón)

1 14.5-ounce can chopped tomatoes

6 cups homemade chicken stock

4 corn tortillas, torn into pieces

Optional garnishes

Cotija cheese, crumbled

Tortilla chips, store bought or homemade

Cilantro, chopped

Avocado, sliced

Sour cream

Heat olive oil in large stockpot or Dutch oven over medium heat. Add garlic, shallot, onions and bay leaf. Cook, stirring frequently until tender and lightly browned, about 10 minutes. Add cumin, oregano and pimentón, stirring for about 30 seconds. Add tomatoes, roasted red peppers and chicken stock. Bring to a boil. Stir in tortillas. Reduce heat to simmer. Simmer partially covered for 30 minutes.

Remove pot from heat. Fish out the bay leaf and discard. Allow to cool just slightly, and then use an immersion blender to blend soup until it is smooth. Return pot to heat to bring back to desired temperature.

Garnish each serving with your choice of toppings. Enjoy!

Links:

How to Roast Red Peppers

http://allrecipes.com/HowTo/Roasting-Peppers/Detail.aspx

New Favorite

Looking at the wealth of Persephone onions we had in the root cellar, i.e. garage, I knew I had to try out Mary Ann Esposito’s recipe for Roasted Onion Soup. The soup had a couple things going for it. One, when onions are slow-roasted they transform from bitingly sharp to sweet and mellow. And two, lots of red wine.

I followed the directions and oven roasted the assortment of red and yellow onions, leeks, and fresh thyme from my garden. Then added the two cups of red wine to the rimmed cookie sheet. The smell in my kitchen was heavenly. After most of the wine reduced, I added the onions to a soup pot with beef broth and few seasonings.

I did modify the recipe slightly. It called for each serving to be topped with a slice of bread, sprinkled with Parmesan cheese and broiled. I wasn’t sure my bowls could go in the broiler.  So I tossed some bread cubes I had stashed in the freezer with olive oil and a pinch of kosher salt and toasted them in the oven until they were golden and crunchy. Then I topped each bowl with the croutons and cheese. It definitely worked and the croutons added a nice crunch. This soup of very simple ingredients was incredibly savory and rich. I think it’s my new favorite.

Links:

Roasted Onion Soup

http://www.ciaoitalia.com/Recipes.aspx?id=1258

Slow Cooker Goodness

When I was packing up for our move to a new house, I made sure I clearly marked the box that held our Crock Pot. I planned to make some no-fuss food after we moved in. With the kitchen in boxes, we’d been fast-food slumming and were ready for something tasty and healthy.

I can’t expound enough on the merits of the slow cooker. It was so easy to chop up some veggies, pour in stock and voilà a few hours later you have rich soup. No standing over a stove, no stirring. Perfect when you need your hands free to unpack the mountain of boxes still in your kitchen!

The day after we moved I got out my trusty Crock Pot. I chopped up red onion and garlic from Persephone Farm and tossed them in the slow cooker. I added ground beef, 2 cans each of tomatoes and red kidney beans, 2 bay leaves, salt, pepper, chili powder, cumin, paprika and a little cayenne pepper. (I usually add a little red wine to my chili, but we didn’t have any.) I set it for 6 hours and by dinnertime, we had a hearty chili. We toasted a bake-at-home baguette and had a home-cooked meal that only took about 20 minutes of hands-on prep time. There was plenty left over for lunches and topping a baked potato later on in the week.

The next day I made chicken soup in the slow cooker. You can use whatever vegetables you prefer. I threw in Persephone onions, garlic, celery, kale and potato. I also added carrots, frozen peas and corn. I used the frozen vegetable stock I had on hand and added water, too. For seasoning I added 2 bay leaves, thyme and a pinch of sage, and salt and pepper. I browned the chicken before adding it to the cooker, but you don’t have to. Then I deglazed the pan I cooked the chicken in with water and added that to the pot as well.

And as added bonus, the Crock Pot filled the entire house with the smell of home cooking, all with minimal effort on my part.

P.S. Check out this article in the Oregonian about another Persephone stand employee, Paul Hudak. He's doing great things at Terra Nova High School!

Moving On Up

Getting the keys to your first home is something to celebrate. With Champagne. And since most of our kitchen was packed into boxes, pizza was an easy prep meal. Not your run-of-the-mill pepperoni, but a Special Occasion pizza. Caramelized Onion and Fig Pizza with Havarti.

On a trip to San Francisco a couple of years ago I had the gustatory pleasure of being treated to meal at Greens in Fort Mason. I had a fresh, tasty sampler platter, but Trevor ordered the most delicious pizza with caramelized onions and fresh figs. As I tasted it I knew I’d have to try to recreate it at home.

Caramelizing onions is easy, if a little time consuming. But the result is so delicious. The onions cease to be oniony and take on a sweet flavor that's completely alien to raw onion flavor.

I usually make my own pizza dough in a bread machine, but my 12-year-old bread machine died when I got it out to make the dough. It served me well and couldn’t have gone at a better time. (I didn’t have to lug it to our new place only to have it die on me there.) RIP Oster bread machine. I ended up making pizza dough in my food processor and it worked OK, but I prefer the ease of putting all the ingredients into a bread machine and forgetting about it until I hear a triple beep.

Below are my recipes for pizza dough and our fig pizza. For this meal we used Persephone Farm onions. And we got our wonderful Havarti from another PSU Farmers’ Market vendor, the Willamette Valley Cheese Co.

And coming soon … your absolute best friend in a move: the slow cooker.

Pizza Dough

Makes 2 large thin-crust pizzas or 4 small thin-crust pizzas.

1 cup warm water

2 tablespoons olive oil

2 ½ cups stone-ground all-purpose flour, such as Bob’s Red Mill

½ cup stone-ground whole-wheat flour, such as Bob’s Red Mill

2 teaspoons (or 1 packet) quick-acting yeast

¾ teaspoons salt

Add all ingredients to the bowl of a bread machine following your manufacturer’s instructions. Select and start dough cycle. Rough is ready when cycle is complete.

Caramelized Onion and Fig Pizza with Havarti

Makes 1 14 ½-inch diameter thin-crust pizza. I used Mission figs for this recipe, but any kind will work.

½ pizza dough recipe listed above

1 tablespoon butter

1 ½ to 2 large onions, sliced

1 ¼ cups dried figs

2 cups Havarti or Fontina cheese, grated (or as much as desired)

¾ cup Mozzarella cheese, grated (or as much as desired)

all-purpose flour for rolling

nonstick cooking spray, such as Pam

cornmeal for dusting pizza pan

Place figs in a bowl of warm water and let soften up while you are cooking onions.

Heat butter in a large skillet over medium heat. When butter is melted add onions. Cook for about 10 minutes until onions are soft and wilted. Turn heat to low and slowly cook the onions stirring occasionally for 30 to 40 minutes. Don’t rush the onions. As they cook they will turn a caramel brown and become sweet. Set aside when done and allow to cool.

Heat oven to 475˚ F. Drain figs and pat dry. Slice into ½-inch thick slices. Set aside.

Dust work surface with flour and roll out pizza dough to fit a large, round pizza pan. Alternately, you can use two cookie sheets and make 2 smaller, rectangle-shaped pizzas. Spray pizza pan with coking spray and dust with cornmeal. Place dough on pan. Top with onions and figs then cheeses.

Bake for 10 to 12 minutes until crust is golden brown and cheese is melted. Enjoy!

Links: www.wvcheeseco.com

www.bobsredmill.com

Cleaning Out the Cupboards

When I was making up my shopping list last week, I looked around the kitchen to see what I had on hand. I spotted some dry lentils and remembered a tasty recipe from Cooking Light— Bacon, Onion and Brown Lentil Skillet.

I’d never enjoyed lentils all that much until I made this recipe. And this is one of those recipes that may not sound all that appetizing, but once you smell the onions hitting the bacon grease, you know it’s going to be great.

In addition to the lentils, I also had some carrots, chicken broth, bacon and lots of fresh thyme. So I knew it’d be an economical meal that I could round out with produce from Persephone Farm. So we grabbed Persephone onions, garlic and parsley for this dish — and some Swiss chard and shallot to go on the side. I used some of the extra bacon grease to cook the chard in, too. Below is my variation of a recipe handed out at the Persephone stand.

Tasty Sautéed Greens

Feel free to use kale or collards instead of the Swiss chard. And you can use a combination of onion and garlic instead of shallot. Serves 2.

1 bunch Swiss chard, chopped and thoroughly washed

2 tablespoons bacon grease or olive oil

¼ cup shallot, sliced

salt to taste

½ teaspoon red pepper flakes, or to taste

a splash balsamic vinegar

Bring 1 cup water to boil in a 4-quart stockpot. Stir in chard, reduce heat, cover and cook for 10 minutes.

Add grease or oil to large skillet over medium heat. Add shallot and red pepper flakes, cook, stirring, until shallot is tender, about 4 minutes. Add greens to skillet and reserved cooking water. Add salt to taste, sauté about 10 minutes or until desired degree of softness. Finish with a splash of balsamic vinegar. Serve and enjoy!