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No, it’s not the casserole that’s gigantic, it’s the zucchini! I don’t grow zucchini or summer squash because my family just isn’t that wild about it. Plus, one plant would provide more squash than we could eat in a month! But we’re still not safe from the zucchini avalanche that happens this time of year. A retired couple with a garden up the street found a gigantic squash in their garden yesterday and brought it to us. The wife said she loves zucchini but her husband doesn’t, and she couldn’t bear to slice off a piece and throw the rest out. This thing was monstrous: imagine a zucchini the size of a mega roll of paper towels!
I managed to use half of it in a recipe in place of the called-for noodles. It was so simple that Kate made the casserole. Everyone raved about it, even the kids who wouldn’t touch zucchini with a pair of gardening gloves! I made some homemade cottage cheese, homemade yo-cheese and creme fraiche to go in it, so this was a very, very local, seasonal dish! (Please forgive the horrible photography. When I went back for a second shot, the dish was EMPTY!)
Gigantic Zucchini Casserole
Half of one three-pound zucchini (or three to four normal-sized ones), julienne cut
1 tablespoon coconut oil
1 organic yellow onion
1 pound grassfed ground beef
1 teaspoon sea salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
8 ounces tomato sauce
1 cup homemade cottage cheese
1 cup homemade yo-cheese
3 tablespoons creme fraiche*
1/2 cup chopped bell pepper (any color)
2 green onions, green part chopped
Preheat the oven to 350°. Heat coconut oil in skillet and brown chopped onion and ground beef, stirring occasionally until the beef has browned. Add salt, pepper and tomato sauce, allow to simmer while preparing cheese.
Mix together cottage cheese, cream cheese, creme fraiche, bell pepper and green onion in a bowl. Lightly rub a 9×13 pan with coconut oil. Layer half the julienned zucchini in the dish, the cover with all the cheese mixture. Add the rest of the zucchini, then the meat mixture. Bake, uncovered for 30 minutes.
Note on ingredients: Creme fraiche is another easy-to-make ingredient. Add two tablespoons of cultured buttermilk to a pint of fresh (NOT ultrapasteurized) cream and mix it up. Leave it on the counter overnight, refrigerate in the morning. Use it instead of sour cream, especially when your food will not be heated to preserve the good bacteria it contains!
This post is part of Tuesday Twister, hosted by GNOWFLGINS.
When the budget is maxed out, I have three choices when it comes to serving meat: buy grocery store meat, go meatless or stretch my grassfed meat. I believe too strongly in the importance of the good fats, CLA and protein of grassfed meat to do without. We do have many meatless meals, but once a day, I think a small portion of meat is important. I can’t bring myself to buy meat from the grocery store anymore. The Food, Inc. quote has become fact for me: If people knew where their food came from, they wouldn’t eat it.
So, stretching our lovely, delicious, grassfed meat we buy is a high priority for me. Most cooks and cookbooks recommend a quarter pound of uncooked beef per person. In our house, we aim for half that amount several times a week. One of the ways I’ve found to stretch a piece of meat is the stir fry. Here’s a very basic guideline, a recipe and some options:
Stir Fry for Four
1/2 pound meat, cut into bite-sized pieces
1 tablespoon each naturally fermented soy sauce and cooking sherry
1 large onion, cut in half from root to stem and sliced
1 pound raw vegetables, cut into bite-sized pieces
1 tablespoon each minced garlic and ginger
2 teaspoons arrowroot powder
3 tablespoons homemade stock
3 tablespoons coconut oil
Soaked or germinated brown rice, cooked
The basic procedure is very simple. Cut up all your veggies and meats and have them ready before beginning. Heat a large skillet on high heat. Toss the meat in a bowl with soy sauce and sherry. Mix the arrowroot with the stock in a small bowl. By now the pan is really hot, so add 2 tablespoons of coconut oil and half the meat. You want to keep it moving in the pan for about 2 to 3 minutes, until it is just barely cooked through. Remove that batch of meat and add the other half. When that batch is done, remove it and add the last tablespoon of coconut oil to the pan with the onions. Stir around a minute, then toss in the ginger and the vegetable. Stir around for about two minutes and add the garlic. Return the meat to the pan. Stir the arrowroot mixture and add to the pan, stirring around until thickened and glossy. Serve immediately over hot cooked rice.
We like to use these meats:
- scallops
- shrimp
- pork tenderloin
- beef
- chicken
The vegetable choices are nearly endless, but some good ones are:
- asparagus – pencil thin to cook quickly and not be tough
- cabbage
- carrots – shredded or sliced very thinly
- celery
- green beans – those tiny skinny ones cook just right in a stir fry
- mushrooms – any kind. White ones go well with chicken, portobello with beef, etc. I add these with the arrowroot so they don’t lose too much consistency.
- bell peppers – these add color to the finished dish
- fresh pineapple – adds a lot of sweetness, so I’ll add a pinch of red pepper to the dish for balance
- sugar snap peas
- summer squash
- broccoli
I like to match the stock for the sauce with the meat I’m using. This is one great reason to store at least some of your frozen homemade stock in ice cube form!
I also like to make flavoring sauces to add to the stir fry. I add these with the cornstarch and stock near the end to add a little more flavor to the dish. For example:
Sweet and Sour Sauce
1/4 cup homemade stock
2 tablespoons naturally fermented soy sauce
2 tablespoons vinegar (cider, balsamic or wine vinegar is nice, my new favorite is coconut vinegar)
1 tablespoon honey
1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
Citrus Sauce
1/4 cup freshly squeezed orange juice
1 teaspoon lemon zest (or preserved lemon rind)
1/4 cup homemade stock
1 tablespoon naturally fermented soy sauce
1 tablespoon honey
Putting together different combinations of meat, vegetable and sauce make for an incredible amount of variety.
This post is part of the Real Food Wednesday blog carnival hosted by Kelly the Kitchen Kop.
We picked up some local burdock root last week. I’m familiar with it from my herbal medicine study, which recommends burdock for clearing congestion in the circulatory, lymphatic, respiratory and urinary systems. But I was fascinated to read that it could be eaten raw or cooked as well!
Burdock gets its name from its burrs, which inspired the invention of Velcro, and “dock,” a name common to plants with a certain leaf shape. Because it is a taproot, it digs deeply into soil and brings up nutrients from deeper than shallow-rooted plants. Medicinally, burdock is used as a blood purifying agent, an excellent tonic for spring.
The first adventure came peeling the roots. I heard that scrubbing them was sufficient, but because they were narrow, I only managed to scrub my fingers. I tried a vegetable peeler, but the soft roots had too much “give.” The method I finally used was the “whittle” method. If you’ve ever had to sharpen a pencil without a mechanical sharpener, you are familiar with the whittle method.
I cut them into 2-inch lengths, just long enough to get a taste without committing to a lengthy string, and put them into cold water as they were peeled. I was thinking this might crisp them up, like a carrot, but as the water turned muddy (along with the creamy white roots) I did a little more research. A touch of vinegar or lemon juice keeps the root from browning, just like one would do with apple.
The taste of the root before soaking was very tannic, but once it came out of the water it was much less so. It was also very reminiscent of jicama. If you haven’t tried jicama, and can find it reasonably locally, you should, it’s yummy. We think it tastes like the love child of an apple and a potato! Burdock tasted much the same, but needed just a little more chewing than jicama. We had the first batch raw.
My next experiment was to cook the julienned roots. I cooked them very slowly in butter with some parsnips, here cut into rounds. They were very chewy, and the sweetness was much less pronounced.
My conclusion? If burdock grew wild here, it would be a great addition to a foraging menu. I don’t have garden space to commit to it, though, and we weren’t so taken with it that we will be purchasing it on a regular basis. It is a bit labor-intensive in preparation as well, making burdock root a rare treat instead of daily fare.
This post is part of Real Food Wednesday, hosted this week by Cheeseslave.
I’ve been making the Winter Root Soup recipe from Nourishing Traditions a couple times a month since the winter root vegetables became available at the Farmer’s Market. Hubby wasn’t thrilled, so I’ve been tweaking the recipe. I haven’t been able to get the flavor right, though. So today I tossed out the recipe and started from scratch.
First, I used roasted veggies that I had cooked last time I made a roast chicken. (I try to combine oven uses, and fill the oven to make use of the heat, rather than heating it up twice or three times.) Roasting the veggies instead of boiling them intensified and sweetened them. I used a different set of veggies, different seasonings, different just about everything! Hubby gave it a thumbs up, even though he does not like some of the ingredients on their own. Tip: if someone in your family is anti-beet, try using a golden beet. The tell-tale deep red won’t be there to clue anyone in to the sweet, mellow flavor they can’t quite put their finger on!
Roasted Winter Root Soup
5 large roasted organic carrots
2 roasted organic potatoes (I used small russets)
4 roasted golden beets
1 quart homemade chicken stock
1 orange
2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
1 tablespoon black walnut oil (optional)
fish sauce
Parmesan cheese
Puree the roasted vegetables and stock in a blender or with an immersion blender, warm gently in pot and thin with water if desired. Grate a tablespoon of orange peel into soup. Add vinegar and oil and continue heating until hot. Remove from heat and let cool a few minutes, then add the juice of the orange. Add a dash of fish sauce to each serving (it takes the place of salt and doesn’t taste fishy at all) and top with a grating of Parmesan cheese. Makes about two quarts of soup.
This post is part of Real Food Wednesdays, hosted this week by Cheeseslave.
So, between the broken toe and the chicken pox, you can see we are eating a LOT of dark, leafy greens. I thought I’d share with you my very favorite recipe. It works just as well with collards, kale, spinach, mustard greens or anything else in the greens family, and leaves them slurpfully delicious!
Coconut Greens
1 pound organic dark, leafy greens of your choice
sea salt
2 tablespoons coconut oil
1 small organic yellow onion, diced
3/4 cup coconut milk
1 tablespoon lemon juice
pepper to taste
Bring a large pot of salted water to boil while you stem and roughly chop the greens. Toss the greens in and cook about 5 minutes and drain. Set aside. In the same pot, heat coconut oil over medium heat. Add onions and cook until softened and translucent, about 5-7 minutes. Add the reserved greens, coconut milk and lemon juice (I don’t measure this, I just squeeze half a lemon into the pot) stir well and simmer. The greens will be tender in about 5-7 minutes, but I like to let it cook until the coconut milk gets really thick and boiled down. Serve with the knowledge that you are feeding yourself some of the healthiest food on the planet!
I also like to make this by sauteeing the onions first, stemming and chopping the greens while they cook. I wait until they are chopped to wash them and toss them in the skillet with the onions. The water that adheres to them after washing is just enough for cooking, but you could also dry them and toss a tablespoon of homemade stock in the pan. Cooked covered on medium, they are ready for the next step in about 5 minutes. This method leaves the greens slightly firmer than boiling them, and the “green” flavor is slightly stronger. Another super-yummifying option is to substitute saved, strained bacon fat for the coconut oil (reduce the salt at the end). Oh man, is that good!
For another way to use kale that’s even more kid-friendly, check out my Green Smoothie recipe.
This post is part of Real Food Wednesdays, hosted this week by Cheeseslave.
Warm, smoky, cheesy Baked Potato Soup!
Lots of potatoes in storage, a cold, blowing wind and snow on the ground. Time for Baked Potato Soup! Back when we ate from boxes and cans, the chunky version was one of our favorites. But since it’s particularly easy to make if you have leftover baked potatoes, why not drop a few extra in the oven next time it’s on. It’s not hard to personalize, just close your eyes and picture a big, fluffy, steaming baked potato. What do you like on it? Butter? Sour cream? Green onions? Bacon? Cheese? Everything? That’s what you want in your soup!
Baked Potato Soup
8 to 10 slices bacon, diced
4 tablespoons butter
1/2 cup diced celery
1 cup diced onion
8 green onions, thinly sliced
3 tablespoons potato starch (or cornstarch, arrowroot, etc.)
3 cups chicken stock
2 cups raw cream
4 large baking potatoes, baked, peeled, and diced
sea salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
8 ounces creme fraiche
8 ounces shredded sharp Cheddar cheese
Sliced green onion for garnish, optional
In a Dutch oven or large kettle over medium heat, cook the bacon until crisp. Drain bacon on paper towels and pour off all but 2 tablespoons of the fat (save it, it’s great for cooking with!) To the bacon fat in the pan, add the butter, chopped onion, and celery. Cook, stirring, until vegetables are tender. Stir in the sliced green onion. In a small bowl, whisk together the potato starch with a few tablespoons of your cold chicken broth, or shake in a jar until the lumps are dissolved. Stir in remaining chicken broth then add the chicken broth with the potato starch and stir well. Cover and cook until the soup is thickened and vegetables are very tender, stirring frequently. Stir in the diced potatoes, salt, pepper, and cheese. Continue cooking over low heat until the cheese is melted and the soup is hot. Use an immersion blender or regular blende to puree the soup until it is smooth. Remove from heat, add cream and mix in thoroughly. Add creme fraiche just before serving, and garnish with bacon and extra sliced green onion, if desired. Serves 8 shivering loved ones.
I didn’t add the creme fraiche to the pot, but to individual servings after they were ladled into bowls. Not everyone in my family enjoys a good bowl of soup, so I wanted the leftovers to be reheatable without losing the great enzyme content of the creme fraiche.
This post is part of Real Food Wednesdays, hosted today by Kelly the Kitchen Kop.
In a previous post, I mentioned that I had NO idea how to combine flavors. Marcy suggested The Flavor Bible which I was able to find at the library. I was amazed. This is exactly the part of my culinary education that has been missing.
The first part of the book covers the language of food, from aroma, mouth feel, taste and what they call the “X Factor”: what is going on in your other senses including memory, heart and spirit. Of course, we all have those foods that taste like home or vacation, and this is part of that equation.
I learned, for the first time, about balancing flavors. Of course I knew that some dishes are just too salty, but never knew that adding sourness would help bring that saltiness down. I’ve never learned why creamy guacamole is so good with crunchy chips, it just is. Now I know that it is because crunchy and creamy are complementary in the same way that in painting, placing complementary colors next to each other brightens both (think of a red apple on a green tree.)
The chefs interviewed for the book are unanimous in their insistence on seeking local, seasonal food for the best results. This, too, is something I’m growing into for the first time in my life. Of course, in a home kitchen, I don’t have access to a nearly unlimited variety of seasonings and oils to bring out this flavor or that, but having a reference to tell me that a seasoning I do have will accomplish a similar result to the one I don’t have is very valuable.
Reading through the affinities listings woke something up in me. As I read the list of foods that pair well with apples, for instance, I dreamed up combinations that would have never come to me otherwise. So, our breakfast custard this week will have a touch of apple cider, fresh apples and cheddar cheese instead of just apples in cream and egg. I know, it’s a common pairing and not anything earth-shattering, but for someone who has relied on written recipes for each and every meal for decades, imagining a food pairing well enough to taste it in my mind is revelatory.
The affinities listings in The Flavor Bible contain other information as well, like a listing of foods associated with a certain regional and international cuisines, seasons of the year, foods that are warming or cooling, etc. Some ingredients have menu items in which they are used from the interviewed chefs’ restaurants. It is from one of those that I put together tonight’s dinner: Braised Short Ribs on Mashed Potatoes with Green Beans. You will need to adjust to your size family and meat-eating preferences, of course. We don’t eat a lot of meat in one sitting, so one rib per person was enough for us.
Braised Short Ribs
8 short ribs
2 tablespoons tallow
12 ounces double chocolate stout beer
4 ounces chopped onion
2 ounces each chopped carrot and celery
2 tablespoons butter
Start by making the mirepoix: saute the chopped onion, carrots and celery in butter in oven-proof roasting pan. Remove from pan, add tallow and turn up heat. Sear ribs on all sides. Add beer and mirepoix back to pan, cover and cook in a slow oven (300°) for three and a half hours. You really want the meat falling off the bones.
While the meat was in the oven, I also baked some potatoes until they were soft. I added whole cream and butter, salt and white pepper to the potatoes and whipped them to a fare-thee-well. I used the potatoes as a “base” to hold a rib with a little of the braised veggies and juice on top. I tend to use olive oil only in salad dressings, but it was a strongly suggested pairing with green beans. So, when it came time to make the green beans, I steamed them until just tender, then sprinkled them with some roasted onion and drizzled olive oil over the top.
The depth of the flavors was a surprise to me. The potatoes were more potato-y than those I’ve made from boiled potatoes. The green beans were much more savory drizzled with olive oil and onion than tossed with butter, which makes them sweeter. The amazing thing was in the combining. The ribs alone were good, the potatoes were good, the beans were good. But piled on a fork together created something new and amazing, savory, rich and wonderful.
You’ll have to forgive me, not only am I only learning to cook, but learning to write about food as well! The Flavor Bible just moved to the top of my Christmas list. But until December 25, don’t bother looking for a copy in the Nashville Public Library system because I’ve renewed my loan!
Butternut Squash Gratin
In my continuing quest to use all the winter squash provided by my CSA, I stumbled across a recipe that didn’t sound half bad. With a few tweaks, it would do the trick quite nicely.
It’s a well known principle in our family that to get the kids to eat something, just cover it in cheese. This dish turned out so well that I could see it at our Thanksgiving table easily. It was sweet and savory, gooey and melty, and had just the right “punch” from the rosemary. I served it with salmon and kale. It did take a two-step cooking process, something I’m for the most part against for daily cooking, but the end product was very much worth the trouble.
Butternut Squash Gratin
2 tablespoons coconut oil, plus extra for casserole prep
1 tablespoon pastured butter
1 small yellow onion, diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 two-pound butternut squash, peeled, seeded and cut into 1/2 inch chunks
1 teaspoon real maple syrup
1 cup chicken broth
8 ounces each shredded Havarti and extra-sharp Cheddar
2 bread heels, whirred in blender to crumb
1 tablespoon stripped and chopped fresh thyme
1 tablespoon stripped and chopped fresh rosemary
Preheat oven to 350° and rub a 9×13″ casserole dish with coconut oil. Melt butter and coconut oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Stir in the onions and cook until they caramelize. Really take your time here and let them develop a light brown (they will continue to caramelize in the next step). This took me about 13 minutes. Add the squash and cook about 8 minutes until it is browned on the outside but still pretty firm in the center. Add minced garlic and maple syrup and cook, stirring, 2 minutes more. Put squash mixture into prepared baking dish. Pour chicken broth over squash and bake, covered for 40-45 minutes.
Stir together the breadcrumbs, chopped herbs and two cheeses. Cover the squash evenly with this mixture and return to the oven, uncovered this time, for about 15 minutes, or until topping is very lightly browned. This made 10 very generous servings.
This post is part of Twister Tuesday, hosted by Gnowfglins, the Make it From Scratch carnival and Real Food Wednesdays, hosted this week by Cheeseslave.
I made a delicious soup for lunch today with some of the bounty I found at the Farmer’s Market. I’ve been thinking about breaking one of my rules and canning some of the butternut squash taking over my kitchen just to get it stored. I hate to think about the nutrient loss it will suffer, though. So, instead, I’m going to work on using some of it up this week. One whole squash the size of my forearm went into this soup. It was delicious and nearly twinkled with that crisp, fall flavor. It was ready in about an hour and fed eight of us with no leftovers.
October Harvest Soup
1/2 stick grassfed, unsalted butter
1 large organic onion, chopped
1 large potato, scrubbed and cubed
3 cups butternut squash, peeled and cubed
2 carrots, scrubbed and diced
1 Granny Smith Apple, cored and sliced 1/4-inch thick
4 cups chicken stock
1/4 cup white wine (I used Riesling because it was what I had on hand)
creme fraiche
Melt butter in soup pot. Stir in onions and cook about 5 minutes until translucent. Add potato, squash, carrots, apple and stock. Bring to a boil, skim, reduce heat and cover, allowing to simmer for about a half hour. Use a stick blender to puree in the pot (or use blender in small batches very carefully) but don’t reheat. Stir in wine, and serve with dollops of creme fraiche.
This post is part of Twister Tuesdays with Gnowfglins, Pennywise Platter Thursdays with Nourished Kitchen, and Make it from Scratch blog carnivals.
baked kale chips by eraine, on Flickr
My kitchen is being overrun by kale. For some reason, my CSA box has had two huge bunches of kale every week. Lacinato kale, Dinosaur kale, Red Russian kale, they are beautiful and apparently plentiful, even in our 90° heat.
I’ve served kale for breakfast in green smoothies and as the nest in eggs in a nest; for lunch sauteed with pasta and in soups; for dinner lightly steamed and tossed in a wilted salad; for snacks as chips. Every time my kids see something green in a dish, they have taken to asking, “Mom, is that kale again?” If I serve kale one more time this month, I just know the kids will pool their life savings and buy a McDonald’s franchise.
And still the kale comes. There were a record three bunches in my CSA box this week. I just knew I had to do something with it, other than feed it to the family. I have been guilty of “gifting” my neighbors with the hot peppers that arrive later in the season since I can’t hide them well enough in food to serve to my tenderfoot family. But I want to avoid that if possible since I don’t think most of my neighbors would have any idea what kale is or what to do with it.
I’ve done a bit of canning in my day, but the meager storage we have here is near full and I don’t imagine kale cans much better than spinach. So, I’ve decided to dehydrate half of it and freeze the other half. Washed, stemmed and dehydrated leaves can be tossed into soups and salads all summer when (and if) kale eventually goes out of season. Blanched and frozen flat in airtight bags (yeah, I’d like to get away from plastic here, but options are limited for space-saving freezer storage) they will take up as much room in my tiny freezer as a paperback book, but be available for side dishes once the kale flood slows to a trickle.
Finding new ways to deal with a bountiful blessing is an unexpected and previously unexplored creative avenue for me. I love learning new things, and this Real Food lifestyle always presents me with educational opportunities!
This post is part of the Pennywise Platter Thursday blog carnival, hosted by The Nourishing Gourmet.
