Side Dishes – Veggies – Page 4

Vegetarian Black Bean Chili and Chili-Lime Corn on the Cob (with Bernard)

I have a confession to make. I’ve been keeping something from you. I haven’t told you about Bernard. Bernard has been living with me for a few months now. He is exceedingly attractive, but is also highly adaptable and a very hard worker. He must be tenderly cared for, but is able to withstand very heavy duty. We’ve enjoyed each others’ company immensely. We’ve been doing lots of cooking together. Hubby has learned to tolerate Bernard, but he’s not as enamored with him as I am. I, for instance, am the only person allowed to “bathe” Bernard. Bernard and I met at a charming little shop called Sur la Table. A customer-service glitch caused me to be offered a one-time 25% off discount, which enabled Bernard to be able to come home with me. We have joyfully welcomed him into our home and are eager to tackle many future projects with him.

So, after I brought Bernard home, the first thing that we tackled together was this Black Bean Chili. This was one of my mother’s recipes and I have NO IDEA where it came from, so please forgive my potential plagiarism.

Vegetarian Black Bean Chili

2 cups black beans, soaked in water overnight and then drained

1 bay leaf

4 teaspoons cumin seeds

4 teaspoons paprika

4 teaspoons dried oregano

1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper

2 or 2 teaspoons chili powder (I add more!)

3 Tbsp canola oil

3 medium-sized white onions, diced

1/2 teaspoon salt

4 garlic cloves, chopped or pressed

1 Tbsp vinegar (balsamic is great, but plain white will do)

1 1/2 pounds ripe or canned tomatoes, drained and chopped (save the juice)

4 Tbsp chopped fresh cilantro

1 or 2 teaspoons chopped chipotle chili

Cover beans with fresh water in a very large pot and bring to a boil with the bay leaf. Lower heat and simmer. Heat a medium-sized heavy skillet. Add cumin seeds and saute until toasted. Add oregano, stirring frequently. Remove from heat, then add paprika and cayenne. Stir, remove from pan and grind to a coarse powder in a (spice-dedicated) spice or coffee mill (or with a mortar and pestle.) Heat oil in a large skillet and saute the onions until softened and translucent Add the garlic, salt, ground herbs and spices and chili powder and cook for 5 minutes. Add the tomatoes, juice and 1 teaspoon of the chipotle. Simmer for 15 minutes. Add the mixture to the beans and add water, if necessary, to cover beans with liquid by one inch. Cook until beans have softened to your desired consistency (about one hour?) Stir in more chipotle (if desired,) vinegar and cilantro. Serve topped with cheese or sour cream and more chopped cilantro.

Chili-Lime Corn on the Cob recipe here.

Bonus chipotle tip:

Every recipe I’ve ever had that has called for chipotles has called for one or maybe two, yet there are probably a dozen of them in the average can (plus all of that wonderful adobo sauce!) How to solve this issue? After you open a can, pull the remaining chipotles out of the can gently with a fork and place them an inch or two apart on a wax paper-lined baking sheet and freeze them. I dollop the remaining sauce from the can onto the top of each chipotle before freezing, too, so each one will have plenty of that saucy goodness on it. When the chipotles have frozen solid (overnight?,) gently peel them off the waxed paper and place them in a ziploc bag and freeze them until needed. You can more easily pull them out, on at a time, in the future that way.

Steak au Poivre with Frites and Sauteed Spinach

Recipe here.

Hubby and I had a very unusual week a few weeks ago when both kids were at different sleep-away camps at the same time, so we had the house to ourselves for a whole week. I decided that we needed to have something that we normally wouldn’t eat when the kids were around. I’d had my eye on this recipe for a while, so it seemed to fit the bill. It was quite tasty, although VERY peppery and spicy.

We made the leftovers (steak, potatoes AND spinach, with the remaining pepper cream sauce) into a frittata the next morning for breakfast. OUTSTANDING.

Grilled Salmon with Black Beans and Piment d’Espelette Mayonnaise and Spring Vegetable Quinoa Pilaf

Salmon with beans recipe here. Pilaf recipe here.

This was VERY tasty. The hardest and most time-consuming part was all of the chopping (and beet-cooking) that was required for the pilaf, but it was well worth the effort.

Vegetarian Girl just skipped the salmon and made a healthy meal out of the quinoa (prepared with veggie stock instead of chicken broth) and beans.

If you’re not planning to make sandwiches from the leftover salmon, then I would prepare half the amount of salmon and the mayo mixture.

Jerk-Rubbed Catfish with Spicy Cilantro Slaw

Recipe (from March 2010 Cooking Light) here.

This was quick, fast, easy and tasty. I use my own Jerk Seasoning blend (well, Jeff Blank’s, really.) I served this with some black beans on the side. For Vegetarian Girl, we rubbed a thin slice of firm tofu with the same seasoning and grilled it, which she said was quite tasty.

Pear-Gorgonzola-Caramelized Onion-Toasted Pecan-Balsamic Arugula Pizza

This was fantastic and came together much more quickly than I expected after a CRAZY night. It was inspired by this recipe in Cooking Light magazine, but I adapted it quite a bit to suit Vegetarian Girl and a preference for blue cheese over provolone.

1 large pre-baked pizza shell (I used Boboli)

1 small white onion, thinly sliced

1 Tbsp unsalted butter

1 Tbsp olive oil

1 large, ripe pear, thinly sliced

1/3 cup crumbled blue cheese (I used Gorgonzola)

1/4 cup coarsely chopped pecans, toasted

4 cups baby arugula leaves

about 1 Tbsp balsamic vinegar
Preheat oven to 450 degrees.

Melt butter with olive oil in a medium-sized frying pan over medium heat. Add onion and cook, stirring frequently, for 10-15 minutes or until the onion is soft and lightly browned all over. Spread onions evenly over pizza crust.

Sprinkle cheese evenly over onions, then top with pear slices.

Bake pizza for 10 – 15 minutes or until cheese is thoroughly melted and crust is lightly browned.

Remove pizza from oven and top with toasted nuts.

Toss arugula with vinegar (you may not need all the vinegar) and place a nice layer of it over the top of the pizza.

Cut the pizza into wedges and serve with any leftover arugula on the side.

Green Lentil Salad with Baby Spinach and Goat Cheese

Recipe here.

Super fast and easy and very yummy. I served this with some sliced, grilled steak (and a 2006 Ironstone Cabernet Franc) for the die-hard carnivores at my house, but it was definitely hearty enough to be a meal on its own.
Update: I just saw that a new version of this recipe (with the goat cheese formed into a patty, breaded, and fried until crispy) has been posted by Blake Royer (the original author) on Serious Eats. It can be found here. I will definitely be trying that soon. My mother made a fabulous salad with homemade vinaigrette, roasted chicken and breaded, toasted goat cheese medallions that is TO DIE FOR, so I imagine this will be great, too.

Giada’s Roman-style Chicken and Smoked Mozzarella and Sun-Dried Tomato Cigars

Yum yum yum. Chicken recipe here. Salad/Cigar recipe here.

I adapted the chicken recipe quite a bit, because it was a last-minute decision to make it and I didn’t have the exact right ingredients on hand, but the basic gist was still the same…browned, then simmered with tomatoes and peppers. Caramelized/roasted cauliflower on the side.

The salad and cigars were fantastic. The smokey, gooey cheese (a bit hard to find, but worth effort) and the sweet, chewy tomatoes were delicious together. The salad (with cigars) is hearty enough to be a main dish, but since we were using it as a side, I only put half a cigar on each portion. Also, for the dressing, I didn’t want to open a bottle of champagne just to make it, so I made a vinaigrette with champagne vinegar, instead. Delicious.

Quinoa with Spinach and Mushrooms

Adapted from this recipe.

Yum. This was a bit time-consuming because the quinoa, the greens and the mushrooms must all be cooked separately, but it was quite delicious and is healthy, almost in the extreme. Quinoa is a very healthy grain-like vegetable (it is possible to eat the greens, as well, but they are, as of now, uncommon outside of South America) , very high in protein, iron and fiber. It cooks very quickly and easily and has a nutty flavor and fluffy texture when cooked. Its flavor is neutral enough to easily accept the flavor of whatever stocks or seasonings that it is cooked with, so it lends itself to practically unlimited preparations. It is a great, gluten-free substitution for couscous or a healthier alternative to rice. Look for it in the bulk section of your favorite store. It is also getting popular enough that some stores are carrying it boxed, near the couscous and pasta and rice; look for a small, turquoisey-green box and know, in case you have to ask for it, that quinoa is pronounced “keen-wah.”

I intended to prepare this recipe as-is, but a lack of chard at my “everyday” grocery store, coupled with a whooping cough test (that’s a whole OTHER story) getting in the way of a planned, separate trip to the “gourmet” store to pick some up, caused me to go with an easy and already-on-hand Plan B: spinach. I just subbed a 10 ounce box of fresh baby spinach leaves for the chard and proceeded according to the recipe. I must confess that I am positively dogmatic about mushrooms, so this recipe took me MUCH longer than someone who is less obsessive. I LOVE thoroughly golden-brown mushrooms, so tend to only cook a dozen slices or so at a time, to insure that the mushrooms don’t crowd to much and soften instead of brown. The process is intensively time-consuming, but the pay-off is indescribable. If I ever open a pizza joint (who knows? it could happen!), I will offer super-golden browned mushrooms as a topping option. Too many times, when people cook mushrooms, they are more “steamed” than browned or sauteed. There should NEVER be a collection of liquid in the bottom of the pan. If there is, you’ve added to many to the pan at one time. In my opinion.

This, in my opinion, is what properly browned mushrooms should look like (NOTE: these are regular-old white, button mushrooms, so properly browned creminis will be even darker than this):

Note the golden-browned edges. Not a bit of sogginess and NO liquid in the bottom of the bowl. Mmm…somebody get me a fork.

So, back to the dish…

We all liked it. It was quite good and something that I would readily eat again. I love cremini mushrooms (which are the immature form of portabellas) and they give the dish a robust meatiness, even though it is completely vegetarian. I used some vegetable stock, instead of water, to cook the quinoa, just to give a bit more flavor. Quite nice.

Herb Crusted Lamb Chops and Crispy Kale

This was SO yummy. This photo makes the lamb look too “rosy” and a bit greasy and the kale looks weird and too dark, but trust me, this was much tastier than it looks and was surprisingly easy. The kale recipe is here. The potatoes I’ve covered MANY times before. The lamb recipe follows:

Herb-Crusted Lamb Chops

1 rack of lamb (about 2 pounds or 7 chops, with the bones frenched* and excess fat trimmed off)

1/2 cup fresh bread crumbs

1 finely chopped shallot

1/2 Tbsp finely chopped fresh basil

1/2 Tbsp finely chopped fresh thyme

1/2 Tbsp finely chopped fresh Italian parsley

salt and freshly ground black pepper

1 and 1/2 Tbsp olive oil

1 Tbsp chicken stock

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Place the lamb in a roasting pan, bone side down and fat pad up and roast for about 20 minutes or until a meat thermometer inserted into the thickest part of the lamb (away from the bone) reads 135 degrees.

While the meat is roasting, combine the bread crumbs, shallots, herbs, olive oil, chicken stock and a pinch each of salt and pepper in a small bowl.

Preheat the broiler. When the lamb is done roasting, spread the bread crumb/herb mixture evenly over the meat side of the lamb rack. Place the lamb under the broiler (about three inches from the heat) and broil until lightly browned (3 minutes?) Be careful that the crumb coating doesn’t burn.

Transfer the lamb to a serving platter and cut between the bones to separate it into chops for serving sizes. Serve immediately.

* Your butcher will trim the fat off and french the bones for you, if you ask. I left the “fat pad” on to baste the meat as it roasted (then just eat around it when you eat the chops), but that’s personal preference. Feel free to cut it off, too, for a prettier presentation.

Update: Here’s an even better set of lamb rack preparation instructions:

http://www.seriouseats.com/2010/04/how-to-clean-and-french-a-lamb-rack.html

Artichokes

Yum. We love artichokes around here and are always so excited when we start to see them in the springtime. It seems a little early this year, since it’s still unseasonably frigid right now, but we love ’em, so we’re going for it.

Stay tuned and I’ll show you how to disembowel these suckers and get ’em fit for human consumption. You do have to wonder what the first guy to try to eat these was thinking. He must have been pretty freakin’ hungry to even attempt it; these things are a lot of work for not a lot of sustenance, but, what tasty sustenance it is!

Lop off the bottom of the artichoke. Leave maybe an inch of the stem. Remove any small, shrimpy leaves from around the stem – there are usually 4 or 5 that are inedible and just in the way…

Off with her head! Chop off the pointy top of your artichoke – maybe an inch or an inch and a half.

This is about what it should look like.

Trim off the pointy edges of each leaf with scissors or kitchen shears.

This is what your fully-prepped artichoke should look like.

Give the entire artichoke a quick rinse in some running water, if you’re finicky. Them rub down all of the cut surfaces (top, bottom and leaf tips) with half of a lemon, squeezing a bit of the juice onto the artichoke as you go.

Repeat with as many artichokes as you are planning to cook. I can only fit 4 in my largest stockpot, so that’s what we usually do. For a family dinner, we usually will each have our own artichoke as a first course, but if I’m serving a crowd, I’ll make some for everyone to share.

Place the artichokes in a very large stock pot and cover them with water. Sprinkle in a generous amount of kosher salt and squeeze the rest of the lemon juice into the water, too. Or just throw the lemon in the pot. Whichever.

Cover the pot and cook over high heat until the artichokes are soft enough that you can pull a leaf off, but not so soft that they’re falling apart. This can take up to an hour, but I’d start to check them after about 40 minutes. This is the only tricky part, but even if they’re a bit overcooked, they’re still pretty fabulous. Undercooked, however, is NOT good, so err on the side of cooking them to long, if you’re in doubt.

While they’re cooking, you can make the dipping sauces. The first sauce is VERY easy: Get a ramekin. Put about 6 Tbsp of butter in it. Melt it in the microwave. Sprinkle a little kosher salt in it if you used unsalted butter (which you should be doing, by the way, but that’s a whole other topic…)

The second sauce isn’t much more difficult. Mix the following ingredients together in another small bowl or ramekin:

1/3 cup mayonnaise

1 garlic clove, minced or pressed

a sprinkle of kosher salt and freshly ground pepper

a little squeeze of fresh lemon juice (about 1 teaspoon)

When the artichokes are done, pull ’em out of the water (be careful – use BBQ tongs) and serve ’em along with the dips.

To eat ’em, pull the leaves off, one at a time, drip them in the sauce of your choice (or naked’s good, too) and use your teeth to scrape the meat off of each leaf.

Once you get to the center of the artichoke, you’ll see a fuzzy thing that looks like the inside of a flower (well…it kind of *IS* the inside of a flower.) This is called the choke.

You don’t want to eat that, so gently pull out that fuzzy choke with your fingers (if it’s cooled down enough) or a gently scrape it out with a spoon and discard it. That bottom (under the choke) part?

Well, that’s your reward for all your hard work, baby…that’s the artichoke heart. Dip it in some butter or aioli (that’s the fancy name for that mayo sauce we made earlier) and DIG IN. If you’re really disciplined (or full,) you can save it, after you eat all the leaves, and toss it into an omelet for your breakfast the next day. Yum.